122 H. HOSTEN ON 



We learn from Father Corsi that Sikandar, Mlrza Zu 1-Qarnain's father, died 

 in 1613, and we may suppose from the same source that the eldest son, Zu 1-Qarnain , 

 then 20 years old, was appointed to the office of collector of the salt revenues at 

 Sambhar. Anyhow, Zu-1-Qarnain appears to have been in charge there in 1616, 

 when Tom Coryate went from Ajmer to visit the place. ff After I had been with the 

 King," he says, " I went to a certain noble and generous Christian of the Armenian 

 race, two days' journey from the Moghul's court, to the end to observe certain 

 remarkable matters in the same place. To him by means of my Persian tongue 

 I was so welcome that he entertained me with very civil and courteous compliments 

 and at my departure gave me very bountifully 20 pieces of such kind of money as the 

 King had done before." 1 A two days' journey would have brought the English 

 traveller to the Sambhar I,ake, and the salt-pans would have proved a sufficiently 

 attractive sight. 



Coryate goes on to relate the following story about one Sikandar, an Armenian 

 who must have been Zu-1-Qarnain's father 2 : — 



[P. 492.] ' ' The King likes not those that change their Religion, hee himselfe being 

 of none but of his owne making, and therefore suffers all Religions in his Kingdome. 

 Which by this notable example I can make manifest : The King had a Servant that 

 was an Armenian, by name Scander ; to whom upon occasion of speech of Religion, 

 the King asked if hee thought either hee or the Padres had converted one Moore 

 to be a true Christian, and that was so for conscience sake, and not for money: 

 who answered with great confidence, That hee had one which was a perfect Christian, 

 and for no worldly respect would bee other, whom the King caused presently 

 to be sent for: and bidding his Master depart, demanded why hee was become 

 a Christian, who rendered certaine feeble, implioite, Jesuiticall Reasons, and avowed 



1607, arrived at Cambay in April 1638, and after a nine months' stay there, came to Surat, where he found William 

 Hawkins. During his stay in Cambay, at Goga, as appears from the faulty spelling of Gaore (Cf. Annual Letters from 

 Goa and Cochin, 1621, in The Examiner, Bombay, 1912, March 23, p. 117), Mukarrab Khan's son fell ill. Pinheiro 

 was called. He read over the child the Gospel of St. Matthew, touched him with relics and obtained his cure, with the 

 result that Mukarrab Khan made the vow of having him baptized. From Surat Pinheiro went to Goa and returned to 

 Cambay in June 1609 on a mission to Mukarrab Khan. He was back in Surat in the beginning of October, and arrived 

 at Goa on November 25. Mukarrab Khan, who had remained in Gujarat, was called to Agra at the end of 

 September 1609. Thrown into prison, liberated, reinstated, he was soon after on his way to Goa with Father Pinheiro, 

 who had rejoined him at Agra. It is therefore in 1610 that he was baptized at Goa by Father Nicholas Pimenta, S.J., 

 under the name of Don Joao, for Don Aleixo de Menezes, the Archbishop, to whom he came as ambassador, left Goa for 

 Portugal either in December 1610 or on January 31, 1611. Mukarrab Khan was back at Surat by the time Middleton's 

 ships arrived. Cf. W. Hawkins, Voyages, Hakluyt, edn. 1878, pp. 406, 409,414; Fi<i<iot'S Hist, of India, VI, 520-321; 

 Guerreiro's Relacam for 1607-08, foil. 19-22V. In 1620, Mukarrab Khan, Governor of Patna, invited the Jesuits of Hugli 

 to come and open a mission at Patna. His son, baptized at Gaore (Goga), had become a Muhammadan, while Mukarrab 

 Khan, though he prided himself on being called a Christian, was no honour to his religion, but a mere hypocrite. 

 On the Jesuit Mission at Patna in 1620-22, cf. The Catholic Herald of India, Calcutta, 1906, pp. 804-805, and The 

 Examiner, Bombay, 1912, pp. 117-119; also L. S. S. O'Malley, Patna (Bengal District Gazetteers), Calcutta, 1907, 

 pp. 75-76. 



1 Cf. Purchas, I. 549. Communicated by Mr. H. Beveridge through the late W. Irvine, March 22nd, 1907. The 

 reference for the new edn. of Purchas, His Pilgrimes, Glasgow, MacLehose, 1905, is vol. IV, 487. 



2 Hakluyt us Posthumus , or Purchas, His Pilgrimes, Vol. IV, Glasgow, James MacLehose and Sons, MCMV, pp. 

 492-494, 



