Page:Christianity in China, Tartary, and Thibet Volume I.djvu/374

362 362 CHKISTIANITY IN CHINA, ETC. seclusion, he was inspired with the desire of devoting himself to the conversion of the infidels in the further parts of Asia. He left his monastery at about the year 1314, and repaired to Constantinople, and having there crossed the Black Sea, he travelled by land to Trebizond, and passing through Great Armenia to Ormuz, he em- barked at this port for Malabar. At Tana he was in- formed of the glorious death of the four Franciscan monks in Hindostan, of which Andre de Perouse makes mention in his letter. These four missionaries, Thomas de Tolentino, James of Padua, Peter of Sienna, and the lay brother Demetrius of Tiflis, had also started for China for the purpose of preaching the Gospel there. Intending, on their passage through the Indies, to visit the church of St. Thomas at Meliapour, they were thrown by a tempest on to the island of Salcetti. The governor of this district, a fanatic Mussulman, seized upon the Franciscans, and asked them what they thought about Mahomet. Thomas replied, with a saintly dignity, that the impostor would drag to perdi- tion all those who believed in his false doctrine. On hearing these words the Mussulmans became furious, and employed both threats and promises to induce him to recall what he had said. Seeing that the Fran- ciscans were immovable in their faith, and refused to apostatise, they tore off their cowls and exposed them, tied to posts, to the full heat of the sun, which at that place and time can never be borne for long. The monks, however, never left off singing the praises of the Lord, even while the fierce rays of the sun were destroying them ; and this wonderful conduct served only to increase the rage of the persecutors, who, after having made them endure the most horrible torments,