The history of Sumatra

by William Marsden

The Portuguese, under the conduct of Vasco de Gama, doubled the Cape of Good Hope in the year 1497, and arrived on the coast of Malabar in the following year. These people, whom the spirit of glory, commerce, and plunder led to the most magnanimous undertakings, were not so entirely engaged by their conquests on the continent of India as to prevent them from extending their views to the discovery of regions yet more distant. They learned from the merchants of Guzerat some account of the riches and importance of Malacca, a great trading city in the farther peninsula of India, supposed by them the Golden Chersonnese of Ptolemy. Intelligence of this was transmitted to their enterprising sovereign Emanuel, who became impressed with a strong desire to avail himself of the flattering advantages which this celebrated country held out to his ambition.

1508.

He equipped a fleet of four ships under the command of Diogo Lopez de Sequeira, which sailed from Lisbon on the eighth day of April 1508 with orders to explore and establish connexions in those eastern parts of Asia.

1509.

After touching at Madagascar Sequeira proceeded to Cochin, where a ship was added to his fleet, and, departing from thence on the eighth of September 1509, he made sail towards Malacca; but having doubled the extreme promontory of Sumatra (then supposed to be the Taprobane of the ancients) he anchored at Pidir, a principal port of that island, in which he found vessels from Pegu, Bengal, and other countries. The king of the place, who, like other Mahometan princes, was styled sultan, sent off a deputation to him, accompanied with refreshments, excusing himself, on account of illness, from paying his compliments in person, but assuring him at the same time that he should derive much pleasure from the friendship and alliance of the Portuguese, whose fame had reached his ears. Sequeira answered this message in such terms that, by consent of the sultan, a monument of their amity was erected on the shore; or, more properly, as the token of discovery and possession usually employed by the European nations. He was received in the same manner at a place called Pase, lying about twenty leagues farther to the eastward on the same coast, and there also erected a monument or cross. Having procured at each of these ports as much pepper as could be collected in a short time he hastened to Malacca, where the news of his appearance in these seas had anticipated his arrival. Here he was near falling a sacrifice to the insidious policy of Mahmud, the reigning king, to whom the Portuguese had been represented by the Arabian and Persian merchants (and not very unjustly) as lawless pirates, who, under the pretext of establishing commercial treaties, had, at first by encroachments, and afterwards with insolent rapacity, ruined and enslaved the princes who were weak enough to put a confidence in them, or to allow them a footing in their dominions. He escaped the snares that were laid for him but lost many of his people, and, leaving others in captivity, he returned to Europe, and gave an account of his proceedings to the king.

1510.

A fleet was sent out in the year 1510 under Diogo Mendez to establish the Portuguese interests at Malacca; but Affonso d'Alboquerque, the governor of their affairs in India, thought proper to detain this squadron on the coast of Malabar until he could proceed thither himself with a greater force.

1511.

And accordingly on the second of May 1511 he set sail from Cochin with nineteen ships and fourteen hundred men. He touched at Pidir, where he found some of his countrymen who had made their escape from Malacca in a boat and sought protection on the Sumatran shore. They represented that, arriving off Pase, they had been ill-treated by the natives, who killed one of their party and obliged them to fly to Pidir, where they met with hospitality and kindness from the prince, who seemed desirous to conciliate the regard of their nation. Alboquerque expressed himself sensible of this instance of friendship, and renewed with the sultan the alliance that had been formed by Sequeira. He then proceeded to Pase, whose monarch endeavoured to exculpate himself from the outrage committed against the Portuguese fugitives, and as he could not tarry to take redress he concealed his resentment. In crossing over to Malacca he fell in with a large junk, or country vessel, which he engaged and attempted to board, but the enemy, setting fire to a quantity of inflammable oleaginous matter, he was deterred from his design, with a narrow escape of the destruction of his own ship. The junk was then battered from a distance until forty of her men were killed, when Alboquerque, admiring the bravery of the crew, proposed to them that, if they would strike and acknowledge themselves vassals of Portugal, he would treat them as friends and take them under his protection. This offer was accepted, and the valiant defender of the vessel informed the governor that his name was Jeinal, the lawful heir of the kingdom of Pase; he by whom it was then ruled being a usurper, who, taking advantage of his minority and his own situation as regent, had seized the crown: that he had made attempts to assert his rights, but had been defeated in two battles, and was now proceeding with his adherents to Java, some of the princes of which were his relations, and would, he hoped, enable him to obtain possession of his throne.

1511.