240 CONVERSION OF KING OF MACASSAR book iii
had no sooner done so, than they were searched, and all the diamonds found on them were confiscated.
I
return to the King of Macassar, whom the reverend Jesuit fathers strove
to convert, and would possibly have accomplished their design, were it
not for a condition which he imposed upon them, which they neglected to
fulfil. For at the same time that the Jesuits laboured to attract him
to Christianity, the Musalmans on their part made equal efforts to
induce him to embrace their Law ; and the Prince, who wished to
relinquish idolatry, not knowing which side he should take, told the
Musalmans to summon two or three of their most learned Mullas from
Mecca, and the Jesuits to send him an equal number of their ablest men,
that he might hear them and instruct himself thoroughly in the two
religions; both promised to do so. But the Musalmans made more haste
than the Christians, and eight months afterwards, when they brought two
learned Mullas from Mecca, the King, as the Jesuits sent no one,
embraced the Law of Muhammad.1 It is true that three years
afterwards two Portuguese Jesuits arrived at Macassar, but it was too
late, as the King was then no longer inclined to become a Christian.
The
King of Macassar having been made a Musalman, the Prince, his brother,
was so annoyed that he was unable to restrain himself from giving signs
of his feeling by a deed which resulted in his disgrace. As he knew
that the Musalmans had a horror of pork, which is one of the common
articles of food of the idolaters of Macassar, as soon as the mosque
which the King built was finished, he entered it one night, caused ten
or twelve pigs to be slaughtered in his presence, and the blood to be
sprinkled in all directions, both the walls and the niche 2 where the Mulla places himself to offer up prayers being soiled with it. The King, by the Law of the
1 This, according to Crawfurd (Dictionary, 91),
took place in the year 1603; but the people generally did not follow
his example till 1616, or a century after the Portuguese had been in
occupation of Malacca and the Moluccas.
2
The Mihrab, which marks the direction of Mecca. See a drawing of the
fine Mihrab in the Jami' or Cathedral Mosque at Fatehpur-Sikri (Smith, Hist, of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, 429).
