38 
H. Beveridge —Father Jerome Xavier. 
[No. 1, 
likeness of the sun which he worships each day at dawn. But thinking 
that I might object that the sun was not God, but only a created 
thing and the work of God, he ordered it to be removed, and straight¬ 
way the idol vanished. There was then brought in the likeness of our 
Saviour bound to a pillar, and this he placed on his head as a sign of 
reverence and worship, (a thing which he did not not do to the image 
of the sun). He took pleasure in hearing the narratives of the conver¬ 
sions of St. Paul and Constantine the Grreat. 
“ He told me that nearly twenty years ago he had thirty children 
shut up before they could speak, and put guards over them so that the 
nurses might not teach them their language. His object was to see 
what language they would talk when they grew older, and he was 
resolved to follow the laws and customs of the country whose language 
was that spoken by the children. But his endeavours were a failure, for 
none of the children came to speak distinctly. Wherefore, at this time 
he allowed no law but his own. 
After much vacillation and many attempts of opponents, he 
authorised us to build a church at Cambay, but we could not get per¬ 
mission to build one in India proper (?) ” 
The Latin is apparently a translation of a Portuguese original, and 
perhaps does not always convey Xavier’s meaning. If the words act 
quartum lunae had been ad quartam ( lioram ) noctis, the account would 
have agreed better with that in the Ain (see Blochmann, p. 156). Still 
the resemblance between Abu-l-Fazl’s and Xavier’s accounts is striking 1 . 
It is interesting to have the tradition confirmed that Akbar could not 
read or write. 
The story about the children is curious, and shows that Akbar re¬ 
peated the experiment of Psammetichus, the king of Egypt, (see Hero-. 
dotus) on a larger scale. There seems no doubt that Akbar really made 
the experiment, for Badaoni tells us that he did so in 988 A. H., i. e., 
1580, which would be nearly twenty years before 1598 when Xavier was 
writing. Badaoni’s account is very circumstantial. He says that at the 
end of three or four years all the children who survived were found to be 
dumb. 
The rest of Xavier’s letter is taken up with the account of an 
Armenian who wanted to marry his late wife’s niece, and of the danger 
that the fathers fell into for refusing to celebrate such a marriage. 
There is also an account of the Hindu Avatars and of their four ages. 
Pignero’s letter is written from Lahor and describes some conver¬ 
sions, but does not contain anything of interest at the present time. 
Xavier’s letter shows that Akbar continued to worship the sun down to 
1598. It thus adds something to our knowledge of Akbar’s religious 
