Meanwhile the two great Orders of the Middle Ages, the Franciscans and the Dominicans, were, at the bidding of the Popes, carrying far and wide the missions by which the all-embracing power and authority of Rome would assert itself, not only in making converts, but in bringing the political power of courts into its grasp and subjection. In the year 1319 a group of friars sailed for the Far East and found themselves on the shores of India (near the modern Bombay), and the leader of them, Jordan or Jordanus, during a stay of two years, visited the Nestorian churches and travelled amid many perils, for the leaders of Islam were oppressing the Christians. The true mission of Jordan was doubtless to bring the Nestorians to acknowledge the supremacy of the Pope, for up to this time they accepted only the rule of their own Archbishop at Bandas (Baghdad). He bitterly complains in his letters to the Pope of the disorder in doctrine which prevails. Not even the rite of baptism is administered and many are so ignorant that they believe Saint Thomas the Great to be the Christ. This friar had, however, the saving quality of optimism, especially in the work of his own Order, for he says, “Of the conversion of those nations of India I say this, that if there were two or three hundred good friars who would faithfully and fervently preach the Catholic faith, there is not a year that would not see more than ten thousand persons converted to the Christian faith.” With the dawn of the sixteenth century we meet the awakening of that spirit of discovery which was to affect so deeply the missionary enterprise of the world. Vasco da Gama had already visited India in May, 1498, and henceforward from Portugal, the faithful son of the Romish Church, sailed ships of exploration and adventure to establish trading colonies, upon the decks of which were hundreds of friars. Churches, monasteries, and colleges sprang up wherever they landed, and Goa, raised to the dignity of a bishopric, became the flourishing centre of Church and Empire. One of the most significant events of this age, however, was the meeting together on the Feast of the Assumption, in the year 1534, of Ignatius Loyola and six friends to establish the Society of Jesus. One of them was a young man who had been reared amid Protestant influences and was related on his mother’s side to the Kings of Navarre. This was Francis Xavier, whose name and character is a glowing point in the history of that time. Shorn of the legends which his Church has woven about his career, the great missionary cannot fail to command the attention and admiration of the historian, and, as his first sphere was India, he deserves a special reference in the early history of Christian missions there. At first his royal patron, John III of Portugal, hesitated whether he should not keep Xavier at home, but eventually he was sent with the new Viceroy and a suite of notables in a well-equipped fleet of seven vessels to Goa on the 7th April,