While these things were doing on the coast of Hindostan, Simon de Sousa Galvam, on his way to the Moluccas in a galley with seventy men was driven by a storm to take shelter, in the port of Acheen. Several vessels flocked immediately about him, on pretence of giving assistance, but the natives were no sooner on board than they fell upon the seventy Portuguese, with all kinds of weapons. Recovering from their first surprise, the Portuguese bravely drove the enemy from their ship, although not more than twenty were left that could stand to their arms. The king of Acheen gave orders to his admiral to attack the Portuguese galley next morning; when, after a desperate resistance, most of the Portuguese were slain and Galvam among them; only those being spared who were so severely wounded as to be unable to resist. Don George de Menezes, who commanded at the Moluccas, sent a party to Tidore against the Spaniards; but on the rout of that party, Menezes collected a considerable allied force, consisting of the people of Ternate, the Sangages, and the subjects of Cachil Daroez king of Bacham. With these and a small number of Portuguese, Menezes landed in Tidore, where he defeated the Spaniards and troops of Tidore, obliging the former to retire into their fort after losing six men, two of whom were slain and four taken. Menezes then assaulted and took the city of Tidore, which he plundered and burnt; after which he invested the Spanish fort, and summoned Ferdinando de la Torre the Spanish commander to surrender. Being unable to resist, the Spanish captain agreed to evacuate Tidore, retiring to the city of Comafo, and engaging to commit no hostilities upon the Portuguese or their allies, and not to trade to any of the islands producing cloves. After this the king of Tidore was made tributary to the Portuguese, and Menezes returned victorious to Ternate.
During his absence, Bohaat king of Tidore had died, not without suspicion of having been poisoned by Cachil Daroez, and was succeeded by his brother Cachil Daialo. The new king being suspicious of Cachil Vaiaco, fled to the fort; but afraid that Menezes might give him up to his enemy, threw himself from a window. All Ternate now mutinied against Menezes; and as he imagined that Cachil Vaideca, a noble of Tidore, had caused the death of a Chinese sow belonging to him, he imprisoned that nobleman, after which he set him free, having first anointed his face with bacon, which among that people is reckoned a most heinous affront. Not contented with this violence, he sent to rob the houses of the Moors of their provisions, and became suddenly most outrageous and tyrannical. The Moors stood upon their defence, and treated some of the Portuguese as they now deserved. Menezes seized the chief magistrate of the town of Tabona and two other persons of note. These two he set at liberty after cutting off their hands; but he let loose two fierce dogs against the magistrate, which tore him in pieces. Becoming odious to all by these cruelties, Cachil Daroez stirred up the natives to expel the Portuguese; but being made prisoner, Menezes caused him to be beheaded. Terrified by this tyranny, the inhabitants of Ternate fled to other places, the city becoming entirely deserted. Don George de Menezes was afterwards sent a prisoner to India for these enormities, whence he was sent to Portugal, where he was condemned to banishment. Any reward was too small for his former services, and this punishment was too slight for his present offences.
Nuno de Cuna, appointed governor-general of India, arrived in May 1529 at Ormuz. Setting out too late from Lisbon in the year before with eleven ships, he had a tedious voyage. One of his ships was lost near Cape Verd, when 150 men perished. After passing the line, the fleet was dispersed in a violent storm. Nuno put in at the port of St Jago in Madagascar, where he found a naked Portuguese soldier, who had belonged to one of two ships commanded by Lacerda and Abreu, which were cast away in 1527 at this place. The people fortified themselves there, in hopes that some ships passing that way might take them up. After waiting a year, one ship passed but could not come to their assistance; and being no longer able to subsist at that place, they marched up the country in two bodies to seek their fortunes, leaving this man behind sick. In consequence of intelligence of these events sent home to Portugal by Nuno, Duarte and Diego de Fonseca were sent out in search of these men. Duarte perished in Madagascar; and Diego found only four Portuguese and one Frenchman, who had belonged to three French ships that were cast away on that island. These men said that many of their companions were still alive in the interior, but they could not be got at. From these it was thought had sprung a people that wore found in Madagascar about eighty years afterwards. This people alleged that a Portuguese captain, having suffered shipwreck on the coast, had conquered a district of the island over which he became sovereign; and all his men taking wives from among the natives, had left numerous issue, who had erred much in matters of faith. Great indeed must have been their errors, to have been discovered by the atheistical Hollanders! Doubtless these people did not descend from that shipwreck only, but might have sprung likewise from the first discoverers, who were never heard of, and among others from three ships that sailed from Cochin in 1530 along with Francisco de Albuquerque.
While Nuno was at Madagascar, his own ship perished in a storm. The men were saved in the other two ships, but much goods and arms were lost. Sailing thence to Zanzibar, he landed 200 of his men who were sick, under the care of Alexius de Sousa Chichorro, with orders to go to Melinda when the people were recovered. Being unable to continue his voyage to India, on account of the trade wind being adverse, he determined upon taking revenge upon the king of Mombaza, who infested those of Melinda and Zanzibar from hatred to the Portuguese. If successful, he proposed to have raised Munho Mahomet to the throne, who was son to him who had received De Gama on his first voyage with so much kindness. Mahomet however objected to this honour, saying, "That he was not deserving of the crown, being born of a Kafr slave: But if Nuno wished to reward the friendship of his father, he might confer the crown on his brother Cide Bubac, a younger son of his father by a legitimate wife, and who was therefore of the royal blood of the kings of Quiloa." Nuno set off on this expedition with 800 men, accompanied by Mahomet and Bubac, each of whom had sixty followers. On the way he was joined by the sheikh of Otonda, a neighbouring town, who offered to accompany him with a well appointed vessel. This prince had silver chains on his legs, which he wore as a memorial of having been wrongfully imprisoned by the king of Mombaza, and had sworn never to take them off till revenged, having been so used merely because he had shewn friendship to the Portuguese.
Having been apprized of the intended attack, the king of Mombaza had provided for his defence, by planting cannons on a fort or bulwark at the mouth of the river, and brought 600 expert archers into the city. Though opposed by a heavy cannonade from the bulwark, Nuno forced his way up the river and anchored in the evening close to the city, whence the archers shot continual flights of arrows into the ships, and were answered by the Portuguese cannon. Next morning early the troops were landed under Pedro Vaz, brother to Nuno, who carried all before him, and planted the Portuguese colours, after killing many of the Moors and driving the rest from the city, without losing a single Portuguese soldier. To secure and repeople the city, Nuno sent for a nephew of the king of Melinda, who came with 500 men, many of whom were of some rank; and these were followed by the prince of Montangue with 200 more. Many likewise of the former inhabitants came in and submitted, so that the island began to reassume an appearance of prosperity. The expelled king, sensible of the desperate situation of affairs, sent one of his principal men to propose an accommodation, offering to pay a ransom to preserve his city from destruction, and to become tributary. An agreement was accordingly entered into to this effect, and the king began to make the stipulated payments; but finding sickness to prevail among the Portuguese of whom two hundred soon died, and many more were incapacitated from service, he began to fall off from the completion of the agreement, and as the prince of Melinda durst not undertake to defend the place without a considerable force of Portuguese, Nuno destroyed the city by fire and returned to Melinda, carrying with him those he had formerly left sick at Zanzibar. Leaving Melinda, he left 80 of his men there sick, to be carried to India on their recovery by Tristan Homem: who afterwards defended Melinda with these men against the king of Mombaza, who endeavoured to revenge himself there for the injury he had sustained from the Portuguese.
It has been formerly mentioned that Nuno de Cuna arrived at Ormuz in May 1529, into which he made a formal and pompous entry, to the great admiration of the natives. He immediately issued a proclamation at that place and its dependencies, "That all who had cause of complaint against the Portuguese should appear before him for redress." Many complainers accordingly came forwards, and the offenders were obliged to make restitution, to the great astonishment and satisfaction of the Moors, who had not been accustomed to see justice executed on their behalf. He found that Reis Xarafo; great guazil[179] or rather arch tyrant over the king and people of Ormuz, though restored to that situation by Sampayo, was by no means clear of the great crimes he had been formerly accused of, particularly of rapine and murder. On a representation of this to the king of Portugal, Manuel de Macedo had orders to bring him prisoner to Lisbon, and accordingly had him arrested by the assistance of Nuno, who waited upon the king of Ormuz to justify this procedure. The king readily acquiesced, and presented the governor with a rich present of jewels and cloth of gold, together with a fine horse richly caparisoned in the Persian manner. As the reigning king was implicated in the murder of his predecessor Mahomet, Nuno imposed upon him a fine of 40,000 Xerephines, in addition to the tribute of 60,000 which he had to pay yearly; that crime being used as a pretence to overburthen him with a tribute equal to a third part of the yearly revenue of Ormuz[180]. Xarafo, or Ashraf, was sent to Portugal with examinations respecting the crimes laid to his charge; but he carried such riches along with him, that he was not only able to purchase a remission of punishment, but was actually reinstated in his former employment. While Nuno still remained at Ormuz, Tavarez de Sousa came there, who had been with forty men to assist the king of Basrah against the lord of Gizaira[181]; having been the first Portuguese who went up the rivers Tigris and Euphrates. Basrah or Bazora, in about the lat. of 30° N. is about 30 leagues from the mouth of the great river Euphrates, and received its name in commemoration of the more ancient city of Basrah, eight leagues higher up, the ruins of which are said by eye-witnesses to be twice as extensive as the city of Grand Cairo. The island of Gizaira, or Jazirat, is formed by the two rivers Tigris and Euphrates, being about 40 leagues in circumference, and is said to contain 40,000 archers. The river Tigris rises among the Curds in the greater Armenia, and the springs of the Euphrates are in Turkomania. The king of Basrah received Sousa with much state, and appeared greatly satisfied at his assistance. Sousa accompanied him on his expedition against the lord of Jazirat, the infantry of Basrah amounting to 5000 men, 600 of whom carried firelocks, were conveyed up the river in 200 dalacs or large boats, accompanied by seven vessels full of Turks with a considerable number of cannon. The king went along with his infantry by water, while his nephew marched by land at the head of 3000 horse. The king established his camp on the right or Arabian side of the river, opposite to the encampment of the lord of Jazirat, who was, posted on the island with 12,000 men. By order of the king of Basrah, Sousa wrote to the lord of Jazirat, saying that he was sent by the Portuguese commander of Ormuz, either to make peace between the contending parties on reasonable terms, or in case of refusal to take part with the king of Basrah. The king of Jazirat made answer, that as this was the first request of the captain of Ormuz, and as Sousa was the first Portuguese who had come into these parts, he agreed to comply with the terms demanded, which were merely the restoration of certain forts belonging to the king of Basrah which he had taken possession of. Persons were accordingly appointed on both sides to treat for an accommodation, which was satisfactorily concluded. But the king of Basrah now refused to perform what he had promised to Sousa for his aid; which was to deliver up the seven Turkish vessels, and not to admit any more of that nation into his dominions, because enemies of the Portuguese. Enraged at this breach of compact Sousa after embarking with his men, took one of the large barks belonging to Basrah, after which he landed with thirty-six of his men and burnt a town of 300 houses on the Arabian side of the river, and a smaller one on the Persian side.
[Footnote 179: In Astley, I. 80, this person is named Reis or Raez Ashraf, Wazir or Visier of Ormuz. The strange title in the text, great guazil, is probably a translation of Alguazil mayor, giving a Portuguese or rather a Spanish denomination to an Arab officer.--E.]
[Footnote 180: On a former occasion, the Xerephine was stated as equal in value to 3s. 9d. Hence the total revenue of Ormuz was only about L.83,750 yearly: The tribute to Portugal L.11,250; and the fine L.7500. It is true that the value of money was then much greater than now, and these sums for comparison with our present money of account may perhaps be fairly rated at L.837,500, L.112,500 and L.75,000 respectively, or ten times their numerical amount in 1529.--E.]
[Footnote 181: Called Jazirat by the Editor of Astleys Collection.]
In reward to Sousa for his gallantry, Nuno gave him the command in the Persian Gulf, and sent him to Bahrayn at the request of the king of Ormuz, to reduce Reis Barbadim who had revolted. But as Sousa had not a sufficient force for this purpose, Simon de Cuna was sent there with eight vessels and 400 men, besides a native force in the barks of the country. Joining Sousa, the fort of Bahrayn was battered for three days; but powder running short, they had to send to Ormuz for a supply, and in the mean time the Portuguese sickened so fast, owing to the unhealthiness of the climate that above an hundred of them died, and even the Persian soldiers belonging to Ormuz, though accustomed to the climate, were in very little better condition, insomuch that they had to give up the siege and return to Ormuz, where Simon de Sousa died.