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He was a prince of five-and-twenty years of age, very judicious, generous, and civil; but too much engaged in carnal pleasures, after the manner of the Japonian princes. What he had heard from the relation of the messenger, increased his longing to behold Xavier; and the same day he writ to him, in these very terms:
This Japonian also told me, that Father Xavier was esteemed in Japan for the most knowing man of Europe; and that the other Fathers of the Society were nothing to him, because they could answer but one idolater at a time, but that Father Xavier, by one only word, decided ten or twelve questions.
The saint applies himself to the study of the Japonian tongue. He baptizes the whole family of Paul de Sainte Foy. He goes to the court of Saxuma, and is well received. He begins to preach at Cangorima, and converts many. He visits the Bonzas, and endeavours to gain them. He proves the soul's immortality to the chief of the Bonzas. The Bonzas rise against him.
Whereupon, he went again to sea, and having made some little stay in a port of China, he pursued his voyage. Already some Japonian islands were in sight, when there arose a furious tempest, which endangered the sinking of the ship, and which in four days brought him back into the same port of China, from whence he had set out.
He therefore applied himself, with all diligence, to the study of the tongue, which he relates in these following words: "We are returned to our infancy," says he, "and all our business at present is to learn the first elements of the Japonian grammar. God give us the grace to imitate the simplicity and innocence of children, as well as to practise the exercises of children."
They threatened the people with the wrath of their gods, and denounced the total destruction of the town and kingdom; they said, "The God whom the Europeans believed, was not Deos, or Deus, as the Portuguese called him, but Dajus, that is to say, in the Japonian tongue, a lie, or forgery." They added, "That this God imposed on men a heavy yoke.
The Father had yet a further purpose in it, that these first fruits of Japonian Christianity should be consecrated to God by the Bishop Don John d'Albuquerque, in the capital city of the Indies. Since in his voyage to Goa he was to visit the fishing coast, he would not take the three Japonians with him, and gave the care of conducting them to George Alvarez.
Then Gama replying, told the Japonian all that was necessary to give him a good impression of the saint, and to hinder him from contempt of his mean appearance.
The Father, who foresaw, not only that this Japonian should be the first Christian of that kingdom, but also, by his means, the gospel should be preached in it, was transported with joy at the first sight of him, and embraced him with exceeding tenderness.
But as the Japonian women are yet more inquisitive than the men, she asked a thousand questions concerning the Blessed Virgin and our Saviour, which gave Paul the desired opportunity of relating all the life of Jesus Christ; and this relation so much pleased the queen, that some few days after, when he was upon his return to Cangoxima, she sent one of her officers to have a copy of the tablet which she had seen; but a painter was not to be found to satisfy her curiosity.
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