THE SYNOD OF DIAMPER. 43 welfare of the Malabar Church; nor can we withhold our admiration of the skill, courage, and perseverance of the man who, against such difficulties, and almost single-handed, bowed a whole people to his will. O that the reformation he effected had been in accordance with the purity of the ancient faith! CHAPTER III. THE METROPOLITAN SEE REMOVED TO CRANGANORE. THE MEET- THE Synod of Diamper was followed by other pro ceedings all of which were calculated to render the subjection of the Malabar Church as complete as possible. The episcopal see was removed from Angamalé, its ancient seat, to Cranganore on the sea-coast, which was more easily accessible by the Portuguese. The dignity of the office itself was lowered, by the loss of the title of Metropolitan, which had been attached to it from time immemorial; and by being made subject to the archbishopric of Goa; and the first four bishops. who were appointed to the newly-erected see were either Spaniards or Portuguese, the first of them being Francis Roz, of the Society of Jesus, who had already taken so prominent a part in the subjugation of the Church. But the attachment of the people to their ancient faith and customs was not subdued; and no sooner had the power of the Portuguese begun to decline, than they entertained the design of throwing off the detested yoke to which they had been compelled to submit. THE MEETING AT ALANGHAT. 45 Accordingly they watched with increasing interest the course which events around them now began to take, being determined to seize the first opportunity for the accomplishment of their design. Such an opportunity at length appeared to present itself; and in the year 1653, fifty-four years after the Synod of Diamper had been held, a number of their leading men assembled in the church of Alanghat, and there solemnly bound themselves by oath, sworn upon a copy of the Holy Gospels, to renounce obedience to the Archbishop of Cranganore. They then elected one Thomas, of the archidiaconal family of Palakomatta, (for the Archdeacons were always taken from this family,) to be their chief, twelve leading catanars taking part in the ceremony of his appointment. The next thing to be done was to obtain a Metropolitan from one of the Eastern Patriarchs, but the watchful jealousy of the Portuguese rendering communication with Babylon impracticable, the Syrians applied to the Coptic Patriarch at Grand Cairo, who sent to them a Syrian Bishop named Ahatallaa to take charge of their Church. Ahatalla (who seems to have been a Nestorian) went first to Mousul for confirmation by the Patriarch, and from thence, in the disguise of a mendicant, made his way to Surat, and thence again, as a pilgrim, to the shrine of St. Thomas at Mailapoor. Here he was seized, and embarked in fetters for Cochin, but not until he had found means to communicate with his flock, approving of the appointment of a Captain Swanston and Mr. Day call him Attila. In the Syrian MSS. he is called Mar Ignatius. Thomas, and directing that four assessors should be nominated to act with him, but enjoining him on no account to consecrate the holy oil, or to presume to confer orders. The tidings of Ahatalla's capture, after he had escaped so many dangers, and had arrived within a comparatively short distance of his adopted country, was a sad blow to the Christians over whom he was appointed to preside. They determined, however, to make an effort for his liberation, and anxiously watched for the arrival of the vessel at Cochin. It was at that time, as indeed it is still for the country vessels, a tedious and somewhat perilous voyage from the Coromandel coast to that of Malabar; for the monsoon which produces fair weather on one coast occasions violent storms on the other, and the distance round by Ceylon cannot be much under a thousand miles; so that weeks, and often months, are required for its accomplishment. At length, however, it became known that the vessel was in the roadstead, and the Christians, having assembled to the number of two thousand five hundred men, marched to Cochin, and demanded their Metropolitan's release. The Cochinese manned their walls, and prepared for an assault; but feeling themselves too weak to resist by open force, they embarked their unhappy victim on board a galliot―for he had been brought on shore-and setting sail in the dead of night, either drowned him at sea, or, according to Raulin, conveyed him to Goa, where he was condemned to the flames, and having been delivered over to the secular arm, suffered the execution of that terrible sen tence, as a warning to any others who might venture to promote the liberation of this unhappy Church. It now became an object of the utmost anxiety to the Roman party to reduce these rebellious Churches to submission; but as it appeared improbable that they would listen to any proposal from the Portuguese, whose conduct had rendered them objects of extreme suspicion and abhorrence, and whose power was already shewing symptoms of decay, it was thought a wiser course to entrust the execution of this important and difficult matter to one who had hitherto been unconnected with the country. A Carmelite Friar, Jose de Sancta Maria by name, was accordingly despatched to India, as the legate of Pope Alexander VII., and it was hoped that by the union of firmness and moderation he would ultimately succeed in accomplishing the object of his mission. He was instructed to avoid, as far as possible, everything that would unnecessarily irritate the native Christians; not to interfere with their customs and ritual, (except where interference might be essential to the preservation of the faith in its integrity); but to make it his especial object to regain the allegiance of the Church in Malayala to the see of Rome. The efforts of Fr. Jose were, however, ineffectual, so long as the Christians of St. Thomas remained at unity among themselves; but after an interval of two years, a grave dissension arose between some of the leading members of the native community, and the dispute at length ran so high as to result in the disaffection of two out of the four assessors who had been appointed to act with Thomas of Palakomatta, and who |