_ 214 _ You tell me that the friars there another you a great deal. This comes as no surprise because that is their job. If they are very persistent go off to a house in the country with a couple of drunkards and a buffoon to tell you jokes, and please yourself. I am informing you that your friend the bishop has just ordered that rogue of a vicar to attend to his vicarate(A) and he is writing him a letter which Rui Goncalves will share you about the great virtues that are in it. I must send his letter to our Lord the King as an item of great value. (A) This is a reference to the Vicari of Diu, Father Joao Coelho, accused of a number of shortcomings the exercise of his spiritual duties. See the investigation in this regard set up on 23rd December 1546 by order of Dom Joao the Castro, a document kept in the Torre do Tombo, Colleccao de Sao Locrencoi, Vol V ff 53-76v, which is published by Antonio de Silva Regao in the third volume of his Documentatacao para a Historia dassalssoes do padraodo Portugues do Orients. From other letters in the same collection, published in the work mentioned, that of the Chancellor Francisco Toscano of 8th January 1547 (p 97) and those of the bishop himself (10th January and 1st February, pp 93 and 97), it may be inferred that it was due to the favourable opinion given by Father Paulo da Santarm, Dom Joao Mascarenhas and Vasco da Gama, that the prelate had decided to order the Vicar to return to Diu, an error for which he asked forgiveness of the Governor in the most servile manner. At the end of January when Joao Coalho was sent as a prisoner to Goa with the record of his offences, the Bishop suggested to the jailer “if necessary load him with more chains and then let him go at them off!” (Opus cit p 97)
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTg0NzAy