Be it observed, that he set out on his travels in 1542, and died in 1552. If he had time to learn the languages of all the nations he visited, it was no trifling miracle: if he had the gift of tongues, it was a greater miracle still. But unfortunately, in several of his letters, he says that he is obliged to employ an interpreter; and in others he acknowledges that he finds extreme difficulty in learning the Japanese language, which he cannot pronounce. The Jesuit Bouhours, in giving some of his letters, has no doubt that "St. Francis Xavier had the gift of tongues"; but he acknowledges that "he had it not always." "He had it," says he, "on several occasions; for, without having learned the Chinese tongue, he preached to the Chinese every morning at Amanguchi, which is the capital of a province in Japan." He must have been perfectly acquainted with all the languages of the East; for he made songs in them of the Paternoster, Ave-Maria, and Credo, for the instruction of the little boys and girls. But the best of all is, that this man, who had occasion for a dragoman, spoke every tongue at once, like the apostles; and when he spoke Portuguese, in which language Bouhours acknowledges that the saint explained himself very ill, the Indians, the Chinese, the Japanese, the inhabitants of Ceylon and of Sumatra, all understood him perfectly. One day in particular, when he was preaching on the immateriality of the soul, the motion of the planets, the eclipses of the sun and moon, the rainbow, sin and grace, paradise and purgatory, he made himself understood to twenty persons of different nations. Is it asked how such a man could make so many converts in Japan? The simple answer is that he did not make any; but other Jesuits, who staid a long time in the country, by favor of the treaties between the kings of Portugal and the emperors of Japan, converted so many people, that a civil war ensued, which is said to have cost the lives of nearly four hundred thousand men. This is the most noted prodigy that the missionaries have worked in Japan. But those of Francis Xavier are not without their merit. Among his host of miracles, we find no fewer than eight children raised from the dead. "Xavier's greatest miracle," says the Jesuit Bouhours, "was not his raising so many of the dead to life, but his not himself dying of fatigue." But the pleasantest of his miracles is, that having dropped his crucifix into the sea, near the island of Baranura, which I am inclined to think was the island of Barataria, a crab came, four-and-twenty hours after, bringing the cane between its claws. The most brilliant of all, and after which no other deserves to be related, is that in a storm which lasted three days, he was constantly in two ships, a hundred and fifty leagues apart, and served one of them as a pilot. The truth of this miracle was attested by all the passengers, who could neither deceive nor be deceived.