'They had a custom that if any Hindu died, the wife had to burn herself of her own free will; and when she was proceeding to this self-sacrifice it was with great merrymaking and blowing of music, saying that she desired to accompany her husband to the other world. But the wife who would not so burn herself was thrust out from among the others, and lived by gaining, by means of her body, support for the maintenance of the pagoda of which she was a votary. However, when Affonso de Albuquerque took the city of Goa, he forbad from that time forward, that any more women should be burned; and although to change one's customs is equal to death itself, nevertheless they were happy to save their lives, and spoke very highly of him because he had ordered that there should be no more burning.'5
5 Albuquerque's Commentaries, vol. ii. p. 94.
Albuquerque, like Warren Hastings and other English governors-general, understood the importance of keeping his employer in a good temper by looking after his commercial interests. In all his despatches he always set forth the commercial advantages of his different conquests, and excused his imperial ideas by defending them on commercial grounds. Nothing more need be said here on the general question of the advantages and history of the direct trade route round the Cape of Good Hope, but some special instances of Albuquerque's sagacity in commercial matters deserve record. His establishment of a Portuguese factory at Malacca is a striking example of his sagacity. He perceived that though the pepper and ginger which was taken on board in the Malabar ports was grown in India, the cinnamon purchased there chiefly came from Ceylon, and the spices from the Malay Peninsula and the Spice Islands. He therefore took steps to open up a direct trade in cinnamon with Ceylon, and made his famous expedition to Malacca. By such measures he hoped to avoid having to pay the middleman's profits for conveying these commodities to India.
A smaller point also deserves notice. When the Portuguese factory was established at Cochin certain prices were fixed which had to be paid in gold to the Rájá's officers for the commodities required. This necessitated a considerable export of bullion from Portugal or else the forced sale of European goods. When Albuquerque was able to dictate terms to the new ruler of Calicut, he bargained that the products of India should be exchanged for merchandise brought from Portugal, and not sold for ready money. This reform was very unwelcome to the Portuguese factors and officials, who had hitherto made large profits by selling the European goods and embezzling part of the price paid for them.
One interesting proceeding of Albuquerque was his establishment of a new coinage, both at Goa and at Malacca. After the first capture of the future capital of Portuguese India, Timoja, whom he had made governor of the island, came with the principal inhabitants of the city and begged Albuquerque to strike some new money. The Governor replied, after holding a council of his captains, that he could not venture to assume one of the chief prerogatives of royalty without first obtaining the permission of the King of Portugal. But the need of a new currency was so urgent that Timoja and the inhabitants made a fresh petition that, if the Governor would not issue coins of his own, he would allow those of the King of Bijápur to pass current. This argument was irresistible, and Albuquerque established a mint for the coinage of gold, silver, and copper, under the superintendence of Tristão de Gá. The new money was inaugurated with an imposing ceremony. A proclamation was issued that the King of Bijápur's coins should not be kept or passed under severe penalties, and that whoever had any was to exchange it at the mint for the new coins. Albuquerque did not invent new measures of value; he adopted the Hindu values and simply gave Portuguese names to coins which he minted of the size and weight of those then in circulation in the country.6 In Malacca however he appeared as an originator. The only coins used there were made of pewter or tin; there was no gold or silver coinage, and trade was carried on by barter. Gold and silver was brought into the Peninsula from China and Siam, but it was used as merchandise and not as money. Albuquerque altered this, and established for the first time a gold and silver currency. But he was too wise to neglect the original native money. The tin mines of the peninsula were made crown property, and tin and pewter coins were struck of the old values. The new currency was inaugurated at Malacca as it had been at Goa, with a grand ceremony, which is fully described in the Commentaries, in which it is quaintly remarked that the people especially approved of the distribution among themselves of the new coins, which were scattered by the Portuguese officials from the back of an elephant.
6 A valuable monograph on the Portuguese coinage in India has been published under the title of Contributions to the Study of Indo-Portuguese Numismatics, by J. Gerson da Cunha, Bombay, 1880.
It is important to grasp the fact that Albuquerque did not commence the policy of wholesale conversions to Christianity. Franciscan friars accompanied him to India, as they had accompanied his predecessors, but their principal duty was to look after the spiritual welfare of the Portuguese and not to convert the natives. These friars included men of different types. Some were employed in political capacities, as for instance, Frei Luis, who was sent as ambassador to the Rájá of Vijayanagar. Some showed themselves men of the highest character, like Frei Francisco Loureiro, who was taken prisoner by the King of Gujarát on being wrecked on his coast with Dom Affonso de Noronha. The worthy priest was allowed to go to Cochin in order to procure a ransom for himself and his comrades in captivity. This occurred during Albuquerque's absence in Malacca, and the Portuguese officials at Cochin refused to furnish the money required. The friar at once returned to Gujarát to his imprisonment to the great admiration of the Muhammadan king. Some clerics, however, did not show themselves worthy of their profession. One in particular, a Dominican friar, embezzled the property of deceased Portuguese by declaring that they had signed wills in his favour.7 This man was promptly sent back to Portugal in disgrace.
7 Cartas de Albuquerque, vol. i. p. 30.
But though the making of converts did not at once become the principal occupation of the Catholic clergy in India, some baptisms on a large scale took place after the capture of Goa. These were principally of the Muhammadan women, whose husbands had been slain, and whom Albuquerque gave in marriage to his favourites. His marriage scheme itself was severely condemned by some of the friars, and but for his own strong will might have caused a schism. But though he did not make missionary effort a main aim of his policy, like some of his successors, Albuquerque was unfeignedly pious. He built churches at Goa, at Malacca, and in the island of Socotra, and he granted in these instances the whole of the property which had belonged to the Muhammadan mosques to the new foundations. The first Portuguese adventurers in India were too delighted to find Christians at all in India to have time to examine into the difference of their ritual from their own. They were overjoyed to find a cross in digging foundations for a church in Goa. They believed that Christianity would quickly spread over the East. And the religious persecutions which mar the later history of the Portuguese in India were not thought of in the days of the great governor.
The causes of Albuquerque's triumphant progress in Asia may be found in a consideration of certain special and general reasons as well as in his own character.