A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 02 eBook

Robert Kerr (writer)
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 778 pages of information about A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 02.

A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 02 eBook

Robert Kerr (writer)
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 778 pages of information about A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 02.
Moors, who had traded for 600 years with Malabar, having never done injury to any in all that time, and had greatly enriched the country, and had raised his city of Calicut to be the greatest emporium in all the Indies:  Whereas the Portuguese had taken and destroyed his ships, made his ambassadors prisoners, insisted on having their ships laden before those belonging to the Moors, had taken a ship of the Moors, burnt ten of his ships in his own harbour, had destroyed his city and forced him to escape for safety from his palace; taking law and vengeance for pretended grievances into their own hands, instead of applying regularly to him for redress.  And, since the rajah of Cochin was fully informed of all these things, yet persisted in favouring the Portuguese in despite of all remonstrances, he had resolved to make war upon him, to deprive him of his dominions, and to drive these Christian intruders out of India.

This address gave much satisfaction to all the assembled chiefs, and most especially to the lord of Repelim, who entertained a rooted enmity against the rajah of Cochin, who had dispossessed him of an island called Arrnuul.  The only person who opposed the zamorin on this occasion was Nambeadarin[2], who was brother and next heir to the zamorin.  He strongly urged the impolicy of driving the Christians from Malabar, to which merchants resorted from all places of the world, seeing that the Portuguese had made richer presents to the zamorin, than he had ever received before, and had brought much gold and silver into the country for the purchase of commodities, which was not usually done by such as came to make war.  He represented the attempt of the hostages to escape who had been given for the safety of the Portuguese chief, and whom the zamorin was pleased to call ambassadors, as the first cause of jealousy and distrust; yet they were afterwards reconciled, and took the large Moorish ship at the desire of the zamorin, to whom they presented the great elephant.  He said their conduct in trade and otherwise while in Calicut was quite satisfactory to all except the Moors, who were envious against them for interfering in their trade, and accused them falsely of taking pepper against the will of the owners, which in fact they had done themselves to prevent the Christians from loading their ships; nay that this was so evident that even the zamorin had licensed the Portuguese to take the pepper from the Moorish vessels.  After which the Moors had risen against them, slaying their men and seizing all their goods.  Yet, after all these outrages, they had given the zamorin a whole day in which to offer reparation, and had not sought revenge of their injuries treacherously like the Moors.  That he saw no cause of going to war against the rajah of Cochin for receiving the Portuguese into his city like any other merchants who might frequent his harbour, as had likewise been done by the rajahs of Cananor and Koulan, who would not have done so if they had been robbers and pirates.  And if the zamorin meant to drive the Portuguese from the Indies, besides making war on Cochin, it would be necessary for him to do the same against Canauor and all the other princes on the coast.

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A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 02 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.