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 deg.  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