[No. 1, 
36 H. Beveridge —Father Jerome Xavier. 
truth reflecting mirror.’ This again was followed by two rejoinders, one 
by a father Malvalia, and another and fuller one by father Gadagnol, 
a Franciscan monk, and published at Rome in 1631. There is something 
pathetic in the thought of this controversial literature, long so quietly 
at rest. An account of Xavier’s works will be found in the valu¬ 
able catalogue of Persian MSS. in the British Museum, vol. I, pp. 
3, 4, and 28. 
The Asiatic Society has another of Xavier’s works, though it is 
wrongly entered in the catalogue under only the name of De Dieu. 
This is a life of the Apostle Peter. De Dieu published a Latin trans¬ 
lation of it, with notes, in the same year that he published the Historia 
Cliristi, and appended two letters written from Akbar’s Court by Xavier 
and Pignero in 1598. These are the valuable part of the book, for they 
give a very interesting account of Akbar and his son Jahangir. De 
Dieu took them from a Jesuit work published in 1601. As they appear 
to be little known, I proceed to give an abstract of them. Xavier’s 
letter begins with an account of Kashmir, which he and Benedict had 
visited along with Akbar and Salim. He describes a dreadful famine 
which they saw there, and tells how mothers exposed their children in 
the streets from inability to give them any food. He then gives an 
account of Salim’s hunting parties, and after this comes an account 
of the splendour with which Benedict had celebrated the incunabula, 
that is the representations of the birth of Christ. This leads him to 
describe the affection which Salim had for the Christian religion. He 
says that Salim publicly professed his devotion, and had pictures of 
Jesus Christ and the Virgin in his bedroom. The prince declared that 
if the Gospel did not prohibit polygamy, it would be embraced by many, 
for in all other respects it was a holy doctrine and conformable to reason. 
On this Xavier remarks that it is not wonderful that the prince should 
find the doctrine of monogamy a stumbling block as, though he is not yet 
36, he has already twenty wives. Then comes the following very 
interesting account of Akbar: 
“ Rex a natura rara quadam et felicissima memoria donatus est, quo 
fit ut, tametsi legere et scribere nesciat, nihilominus, quod prudentiores 
et doctiores quosdam disserentes vel aliorum libros legentes audiverit, 
nulla sit res cujus aliquam non habeat notitiam. Pauci est et levis 
somni, bonamque noctis partem in audienda historiarum lectione impen- 
dit. Si quis extraneus ad Aularn accedit, subito ad se venire imperat, 
praesentem minutatim interrogat, quae et quanta viderit, qua transierit. 
Circa noctis medium horae dimidiatae spatio alio se ad orandum recipit, 
interim conferunt, et disputant inter se quos apud se habet doctiores, 
in quos quum aliquando incidissem, inveni examinantes quaestionem 
