Merolla (1682) is one of the earliest to give a detailed account of mission work in Central Africa. He and his companions found themselves greatly opposed by wizards, who were often seized and sent to the Portuguese Governor who condemned them to death. As the native law itself possessed similar provisions, the people supported the missionaries in this measure and assisted in bringing wizards to justice. One of the laws introduced was that after a person was absolved by the missionary, he was freed from the consequences of any civil crime. “If God has pardoned, how can man pretend to find guilty?” They had established the Confessional, and many of them, like Luther, would try to make it a means of correcting the faults and informing the minds of their people. They also had their troubles with slavery. A Cardinal wrote them ‘in the name of the sacred college complaining that the pernicious and abominable abuse of selling slaves was still continued among them, and asked them to use their power to remedy the said abuse’. They had little hope of checking the evil, because there was no trade in the country except ‘in slaves and ivory’; but they met together and petitioned the authorities ‘that heretics at least should be excluded from this merchandise more especially the English who made it their chief business to buy slaves here,’ and whose slaves were in danger of having the good principles instilled into them perverted by contact with Protestants! The authorities granted their petition, but opposed its operation. This brought the missionaries into serious collision with their governors, whom, however, they promptly excommunicated. When the struggle was over, the Governors wished to be restored to the church, and the penance prescribed for them is instructive, as showing how the Missionaries studied, and tried to remodel, the whole social life of their people. ‘The penance I imposed upon the Count was that he by his authority should oblige 300 of those that lived in unlawful wedlock to marry.’ The restored Count did even more, he ‘brought over 400 to the holy state of matrimony’. On the whole the Missionaries seem to have introduced greater purity into those regions. They could also do much to prevent wars and bloodshed. They had great influence with native rulers. Occasionally kings and their subjects came expressing a desire to be received into the Church in a body, but, alas, their motives were not above suspicion—before submitting to baptism, these converts insisted on making stipulations about ‘trade and commerce’; these stipulations the Missionaries assented to and tried to fulfil. On occasions of baptism, it was usual to bring presents to the Mission, and nothing can better show the discouragements that surrounded these men than the fact that on such occasions they were often presented with poisoned food. Merolla mentions seven Missionaries that were thus poisoned, and he himself had a narrow escape.