The monks that were in the country served more as chaplains to the Portuguese armies than as missionaries to the heathen. The Portuguese were endeavouring to introduce some kind of order among the native tribes, and to develop the resources of the country especially in gold and silver mines. Hence the Portuguese soldiers appeared in this quarter following the crucifix and the arms of Portugal. A successful chief on the other side would don the ‘clerical dress’ of some monk that he had slain, and appear at the head of his clan with the chalice in one hand and a spear in the other. But in course of time the country became more settled, and the missionaries had numerous stations. On the west coast the Portuguese missionaries seem to have laboured with great zeal. Father Carli (1666) has recorded his experiences of African life both in health and sickness, and many of his statements give a good idea of inconveniences to be met with in Africa even at the present day. He says, “My bed was against a wall which might well be called a nest of rats—they were so many and so large that they troubled me very much, running over me and biting my toes, which kept me from sleep. I caused my bed to be put in the middle of the room, but to no purpose, for those cursed creatures knew where to find me. I caused mats to be laid all about my bed for my blacks to lie on and defend me, not only against the rats, but any other wild creatures that might come. This precaution stood me in no stead, for there was no night but the rats disturbed me.” In his distress he applied to the Great Duke. “I took the freedom,” he says, “to acquaint the Great Duke with the trouble I had from the rats, and the stink of my blacks who had always some wild and disagreeable smell.” The Duke promised him an infallible cure, and sent him forthwith a tame monkey which lay at the foot of his bed. When the rats appeared the little monkey blew hard at them, two or three times, which made them run away, and its scent of musk corrected ‘the ill smell’ of the blacks. “The little monkey,” he adds, “kept my head and beard clean and combed, better than any of the blacks would have done; and to say the truth, it is easier to teach those monkeys than the blacks.”