A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 06 eBook

Robert Kerr (writer)
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 750 pages of information about A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 06.

A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 06 eBook

Robert Kerr (writer)
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 750 pages of information about A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 06.

After this great victory, Chrisna-rao resumed the siege of Rachol, but was unable to make any impression on its walls.  At this tine one Christopher de Figueredo came to his camp, attended by twenty other Portuguese, bringing some Arabian horses for sale to the king.  In discourse with Chrisna-rao respecting the siege, Figueredo asked permission to view the place, and to try what he could do with his Portuguese, which was granted.  Figueredo gave two assaults, and being seconded in the latter by the troops of Chrisna-rao, he gained possession of the place.  Soon afterwards, Adel Khan sent an embassy to Chrisna-rao, begging the restoration of the prisoners and plunder which had been taken in the late battle and in the captured city.  Chrisna-rao offered to restore the whole, on condition that Adel Khan would acknowledge his supreme authority, as emperor of Canara, and come to kiss, his foot in token of submission and vassalage.  This degrading condition was accepted, but its performance was prevented by several accidents.  In the mean while, however, Ruy de Melo, who commanded in Goa, taking advantage of the declining situation of the affairs of Adel Khan, possessed himself of those parts of the continent adjoining to the Isle of Goa, with a force only of 250 horse and 800 Canara foot.

In the same year 1520, Lope de Brito went to succeed Juan de Sylveira in the command of the fort of Columbo in Ceylon, and carried with him 400 soldiers and many workmen, by whose means he made the fort so strong that it raised the jealousy of the natives of Columbo, who at the instigation of the Moors gave over trade with the Portuguese, and besieged the fort for five months, during which the garrison suffered great hardships.  At length Antonio de Lemos arrived with a reinforcement of fifty men; with which small additional force Brito ventured to attack the vast multitude of the enemy, whom he completely routed, and matters were immediately restored to their former quiet.

On the change of the monsoon, Sequeira set sail from Ormuz and joined Albuquerque at Muscat, where he found one ship from Lisbon of nine that sailed together, but all the rest came safe afterwards.  One of the ships of this fleet, while sailing before the wind beyond the Cape of Good Hope, was stopped all of a sudden.  On examining into the cause, it appeared that a sea monster bore the ship on its back, the tail appearing about the rudder and the head at the boltsprit, spouting up streams of water.  It was removed by exorcisms, no human means being thought sufficient.  By the sailors it was called the Sambrero, or the hat-fish, as the head has some resemblance to a hat.  A similar fish, though less, had been seen on the coast of Portugal near Atouguia, where it did much harm.

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 06 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.