of the people. Sir Henry Cotton writes about this in “New India.”³ “The success of the missionaries was due to their wonderful power of sympathy and their facility of adaptation to unaccustomed modes of though and action. They possessed in an eminent degree the apostolic faculty of being all things to all men, without compromising the fundamental principles of religion.”

The Madura Mission had under its control about 12 stations. They consisted of merely mud houses usually thatched. There were very few churches built with bricks, and there were neither schools nor charitable institutions worthy of name. The land was then ruled by the Rajas of Madura, Ramnad, Tanjore, Gingi and Vellore along with zamindars and poligars who were subject to them and who paid an annual tribute.

The political state of Tamilnad was one of chaos and unrest when Fr. Beschi landed in India. The numerous rulers and chieftains were perpetually plotting against each other. During the first six years of his missionary life in Tamilnad, Fr. Beschi is seen shifting frequently from place to place. His first stay was at Gurekkalpatti in Tirunelvelly. He later moved to Avur near Trichinopoly and then to the lowlands on the Coromandel coast north of Tanjore. The Maratta chieftain Shahji, had oppressed the Christians during his campaigns and rule between 1682 and 1711. Fr. Michael Bertoldi had been imprisoned and Fr. Joseph Carvalho had died in jail in 1707. Saraboji the next chieftain was no better. The Christian fathers had to find shelter outside Tanjore and retired to Yelakurichi and Kumampathi which sheltered them. They had to do all their work at night to evade being discovered and caught. This troubled state of affairs hampered missionary work a great deal and often the missionaries had to flee for their lives.

It was in May, 1711 that Fr. Beschi entered inland. He stripped off his European attire and donned the Kāvi (red ochre) the colour usually worn by Indian (Hindu) sanyasis. He also adopted a peculiar head-dress. At an earlier date Robert-de-Nobili

3. Sir Henry Cotton, “New India” P. 242.