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RICHARD GRAY 417 In October 1609 the former assistant of Santori, Girolamo Vecchietti, at– tempted to confirm papal interest in this route. His long memorandum sub– mitted to Paul V surveyed the various routes to Ethiopia and urged the pope to whom was entrusted "the universal charge of the Church of God" to send a mission to Ethiopia. It is a fascinating, if somewhat fanciful, document, and since he almost certainly had discussed his ideas with Pedro it enables us to un– derstand why the Carmelite leader in Rome espoused the Kongo mission with such energy and enthusiasm. In his memorandum, Girolamo emphasized, and almost certainly exaggerated, the resentment caused in the Etl;i.iopian Church by what he termed "the diabolical tyranny" exercised by the patriarchs of Alexan– dria. Fearing that the Ethiopians would subtract themselves from their jurisdic– tion, the patriarchs allowed the Ethiopians only one bishop or abuna, whereas "considering the extent of the country and the infinite and diverse multitudes of people who inhabit it", four hundred bishops would be too few. Girolamo excluded both the normal routes to this promising field. In Egypt, he said, the Turks had expressly forbidden that any Latin emissary should be allowed to pass to Ethiopia. The route via Goa reached either from the Levant or from Portugal was very distant and, as Britti's death had illus– trated, was extremely dangerous given the Turkish control of the Red Sea. In– stead the Kongo kingdom, inhabited by a friendly and Catholic people, was, he maintained, separated from Ethiopia "by a small space of two hundred and fifty or three hundred miles at the most. It is true that it is not greatly frequented and there is no regular communication; nevertheless at a certain time of the year it is customary to hold a fair on the eastern borders of Congo, where many people come together to exchange goods, and from the innermost parts of the land come some Christians who carry the cross in their hands and who are subject to the King of Ethiopia". Girolamo suggested therefore that the papal mission should attempt to travel in the company of these traders from Ethio– pia, or that, at the request of the pope, the king of Kongo should open up this route and develop a regular traffic along it.Girolamo envisaged the establish– ment of a college in Rome for more than a hundred Ethiopians from whom in the future could be promoted the bishops needed for so vast a territory. He even suggested that the Ethiopians, enthused anew by the faith, would set out to convert other peoples, so that "extending to all parts of the great continent, they will even reach the ultimate point of the Cape of Good Hope" 34 • 34 Girolamo Vecchietti's memorandum is published in Beccari, Rerum aethiopicarum scriptores occidentales, XI, 176-185.