[ [266] It is vexatious that the date should be wanting; it is probable, however, that this was an Italian and an overland traveller, for if not he could not have been buried more than fifteen years, and a fresh tomb would have hardly called for notice from the writer.
[ [267] This passage is not in the Italian or Portuguese edition of Barbosa. It is in the MS. No. 571 of the Munich Library, and the date is also wanting; in the Munich MS. No. 570 this paragraph is entirely wanting, as in Ramusio.
[ [268] This group is called Maldivar in Ortelius, and is there stated to contain seven or eight thousand isles. One of the islands is called Ya de Ilheos, or island of small islands, the second word being Portuguese and apparently not understood by the compiler of the atlas.
[ [269] Muxama or mojama, preserved tunny fish.
"Vês corre a costa celebre Indiana
Para o Sul até o cabo Comori,
Já chamado Cori, que Taprobana
(Que ora he Ceilão) defronte tem de si."
Os Lusiadas, canto x, stanza 107.
[ [271] There is something wrong here; for, from Cape Comorin to Maylepur is more than double fifty leagues; the direction of the compass and length of the channel, make it probable that the island of Manar was intended instead of Maylepur.
[ [272] Jargon or Zircon is a stone having a superficial resemblance to a diamond. Milburn's Oriental Commerce, p. 361. Possibly this stone may be connected with the jarkna stein mentioned in the Edda, and supposed by Grimm to be the opal. In Ramusio the spelling is the same as in this MS. The whole of this passage is much shortened in the Lisbon edition.
"Olha em Ceylão, que o monte se alevanta
Tanto, que as nuvens passa, ou a vista engana
Os naturaes tem por cousa sancta,
Por a pedra em que està á pegada humana."
Lusiadas, canto x, 136.