In the following year the missionaries gathered together and commemorated with gratitude the jubilee of the work, for it was on the 9th July, 1706, that Ziegenbalg and Plütschau landed, as the first Protestant missionaries at Tranquebar. They recalled the lowliness of those two faithful pioneers, how they were rebuffed and insulted by the European and civil authorities, chilled by the attitude of the clergy and made to feel unwelcome by their own countrymen in the presence of the heathen. But in those intervening years what had God wrought! They sang their song of praise and gladness, though at that very moment the native Christians were passing through much persecution. For it was the misfortune of the mission that, wherever French interest and power were in the ascendancy, the Romish priests and Jesuits brought trouble upon the converts of the Protestant mission, and this often showed itself by the malignity of the native rulers, who became too easily the allies of the enemies of English rule. In this respect the fortunes of the mission appeared to be the shuttlecock of the contending parties in the game of war. Besides all this the representatives of the great religions of India, especially the jealous Brahmins and the vindictive Mohammedans, were always standing ready to strike a blow at the new religion of Jesus Christ, which they foresaw would threaten the existence of their own. In some cases, especially where no outside influences had perverted their judgment, Schwartz found these Rajahs and native chiefs were quite open to receive the truth. A leading Hindu, the minister of state of the Rajah of Tanjore, was ready and willing to acknowledge that there is but one true God and that the images and idols they ignorantly worship were only worthy of being thrown into the sea. But while this was a step in advance the opinion of this man does not seem to have carried him very much farther, and his master, the Rajah, was also so superstitious that he was prepared to make a sacrifice of five hundred human beings in order to obtain some imaginary hidden treasure which the evil spirits would not relinquish except on that awful condition. As Schwartz had acquired a fluent knowledge of Portuguese he found many opportunities of speaking to that large class of people who spoke the language, and where there were signs of a real concern he could lead them on by careful instruction in spiritual progress. As he looked wistfully into the faces of these young people, the children of the Portuguese who many years before founded the colony and inter-married with native women, his soul yearned to bring them to a fuller knowledge of Jesus Christ, for it must be to them the heathen would look for evidence that Christianity was the gracious power it professed to be. It was a work of patience and he did not undertake it lightly or with any self-confidence. Here is an expression of his mind at this time in a letter written home to Europe: