FATHER A. MONSERRATE’S MONGOLICAE LEGATIONIS COMMENTARIES. 
527 
clenching argument in this direction is Wilford’s note in As. Researches , XIV (1822), 
p. 454, where he quotes Monserrate in connection with Cuccurri Diva , a place in Arakan. 
At foot he adds: “ In an autograph MS. of the author, in my possession. The Padre 
wrote about the year 1590, in the prisons of Senna in Arabia.” Now, no mention of 
this place occurs in the Calcutta MS., either in the text or in the map. Besides, our 
MS. is clearly dated (cf. end of preface), whereas Wilford’s was not, it would seem. 
It is not impossible that Wilford’s MS. should still come to light. Judging from 
the extracts made by Wilford, we may say that the importance of such a discovery 
cannot be overrated. 
How did Wilford obtain his MS. ? He does not tell us. One of the suggestions 
that might be made is that Bk. II, and perhaps also the Calcutta MS., had found its 
way from Goa to the Jesuit College of Agra, and that Wilford obtained his volume from 
Father J. Tieffentaller, S.J. In the eighteenth century, the Jesuits in North India 
played a conspicuous part as scholars and scientists. We have all too soon forgotten 
the honourable position they occupied at the Court of the Moghul Emperors, what 
they did at the Court of Jay Singh II of Jaypur, as astronomers, 1 or again, what 
valuable services were rendered by them to Indian Geography, in particular by Fr. J. 
Tieffentaller. z If Monserrate’ s MSS. on India were not already at Agra, where they 
would have been more useful generally than at Goa, Tieffentaller might have pro- 
cured them from Goa. He would naturally have been looked up to by his confreres 
as the man best fitted to utilize those materials. Then came the suppression of the 
Society in the Portuguese dominions in 1759 Fathers J. Tieffentaller and Francis 
Xavier Wendel were soon the only quondam Jesuits left in North India. Neither of 
them could now obtain from their brethren in Europe the assistance they would 
formerly have received for the publication of their valuable writings. Both addressed 
themselves to strangers and freely bestowed on them the fruits of their labours and 
those of their predecessors. Tieffentaller sent his learned geographical and historical 
disquisitions to Anquetil du Perron and Dr. Krutzenstein of Copenhagen. 3 * S Father 
Wendel presented Colonel Popham with a map and a MS. memoir on the land of the 
Rajputs and other Provinces to the S-W. of Agra, both drawn up “in 1779 by 
P. Wendle.” + If they were so liberal towards strangers with their own MSS., they 
may be supposed to have been not less generous with those of others. Wilford 
received from Fr. Wendel an account of the travels of Czerniclieff, a Russian, from 
Bokhara to Kashmir in 1780. I11 the same way he obtained from Fr. Tieffentaller 
extracts from Otter’s works which the Father had procured from Europe (cf. Journ. 
.Is. Soc. Beng., 1851, p. 240). He saw Fr. Tieffentaller at Eucknow in 1784, one 
I The Rev. Fr. S. Noti, S.J., St. Xavier’s College, Bombay, has published a monograph on this subject: Land and 
volh des kbnigl. Astronomen Dschaising II , M aharadscha von Dschaipur. Berlin, D. Reimer, 1911, 8vo, pp. vii + 104, 
28 illustr. in text, 8 photograv., 2 coloured maps. Mks. 8. 
‘ 2 Cf. REV. S. Nor 1, S.J., Joseph Tieffentaller , a forgotten Geographer of India, Bombay, 1906. 
S What became of the papers sent to Copenhagen ? For the list of them, Cf. C. SOMMERVOGEE, S.J . , Bibl. de la C. 
de J., Bruxelles, 1898, Vol. VIII. 
+ Cf. James Renneee, Description hislor. et g£ogr. de I'lndostan, Paris, Poignee, 1800. Vol. I, pp. XXI-XXII, 
198, 199; Vol. II, p. 242. 
