Mezzofanti himself freely confessed the exceeding difficulty which he had found in mastering this language. It cost him, as he assured Father Arsenius Angiarakian, four months of uninterrupted study. Speaking once with Cardinal Wiseman of his method of linguistic study, he said that the “ear and not the eye was for him the ordinary medium through which language was conveyed;” and he added, that the true origin of the difficulty which he had felt in learning Chinese, was not so much the novelty of its words and forms, as the fact that, departing from the analogy of other languages, it disconcerted the pre-arranged system on which he had theretofore proceeded; it _has an eye-language distinct from the ear-language_, which he was obliged to make an especial study. It is worth while to mention that the Cardinal successfully accomplished in a short time what cost the missionaries in China, with all their advantages of position, many years of labour, having actually preached to the Chinese students in the Propaganda, on occasion of one of the spiritual retreats which are periodically observed in ecclesiastical seminaries. It must not be supposed, however, that the Propaganda was his only school of languages. Not unfrequently, also, missionaries from various parts of the world, who repaired to the Propaganda on the affairs of their several missions, supplied a sort of supplement to the ordinary resources of the institution. In this way a German missionary, Father Brunner, (now, I believe, superior of a religious congregation in the United States,) initiated him in the languages of Western Africa. Father Brunner had been for a time a missionary in Congo. On his arrival in Rome, Mezzofanti placed himself in communication with him; and Cardinal Reisach, (who was at that time Rector of the Propaganda,) states that he soon progressed so far as to be able to keep up a conversation in the language. The general language of Congo comprises many distinct branches, the Loango, the Kakongo, the Mandongo, the Angolese, and the Camba.[498] Of these Mezzofanti applied himself especially to the Angolese, in which he more than once composed pieces for recitation at the academical exhibition of the Epiphany. Two of these, which will be found in the appendix, have been submitted to the criticism of Mr. Consul Brande, long a resident at Loango, who pronounces them “to exhibit a correct knowledge of the Angolese or Bunda language.”[499]