EARLIEST EUROPEAN WRITERS 77 From the above account, it will be seen that although there is evidence enough to show that the Roman Catholic missionaries at one time were very active in this country, especially in Eastern Bengal, yet not much trace is left of their direct or indirect connexion with the language or literature of this country. Indeed, before Carey, mission- aries confining themselves, as they did, exclusively to their proselytising work never seriously took either to educating the people of this country or writing in their language, There was as yet 700 Protestant Protestant Mission- SL dior way naan Mission to Bengal. The oniy well- known missionary, before Carey, who visited this country was Kiernander, of whom we shall have occasion to speak later on; but Kiernander, himself ignorant of the language, is in no way connected with our present enquiry. Of Kiernander's asso- ( শি nee. ciates, however, there was one Bento de and Book of Common Silvestre (a/7as de Souza), who seems Prayer, in Bengali. : ; :
- to have written a Bengali Catechism
and a Book of Common Prayer in Bengali. Bento is said to have been born in Goa about 1728! of European paren- tage and his sojourn in Bengal extended from thirteen? to fifteen* yeirs spent mostly at Calentta and Bandel. He was for many years an Augustinian friar but he abjured the Pope before Kiernander on February 7, 1766,4 whereupon he was appointed Catechist of the Mission at £20 a vear and is reputed to have been a . Carey, Oriental Christian Biography, Cal. 1850, vol. ii, p. 182. 3 Hyde, Parochial Annals of Bengal Cal. 1901, p. 155, ® Carey, op. cit. p. 182.
- Carey, op. cit. gives different dates: at p. 182, vol. ii, the date
given is July, 1769: while in the same volume at p. 290, the date is 1768. The story of his public abjargation of Roman Catholic faith is given in vol ii. at p. 182.
