At this period Sebastian king of Portugal made a great alteration in the government of the Portuguese possessions in the east, which he deemed too extensive to be under the management of one person.  He divided them therefore into three separate governments, which were designated respectively, India, Monotmotapa, and Malacca.  The first, or India, extended from Gape Guardafu, or the north-east extremity of Africa on the Indian ocean, to the island of Ceylon inclusive.  The second, or Monomotapa, from Cape Corrientes to Cape Guardafu; and the third, or Malacca, from Pegu to China both inclusive.  To the command of the first, or India, Don Antonio de Noronha was sent with the title of viceroy.  Francisco de Barreto was appointed to Monomotapa, and Antonio Moniz Barreto to Malacca, both stiled governors.  It will be necessary therefore to treat of these governments separately, though by this we must necessarily in some measure neglect the consideration of regular chronology in the distribution of events.  We begin therefore with the viceroyalty of Noronha.

Don Antonio de Noronha arrived at Goa in the beginning of September 1571, having lost 2000 men by sickness out of 4000 with whom he sailed from Lisbon.  Don Luis de Ataine, who surrendered to him the sword of command, was a nobleman of great valour and military experience, and so free from avarice that instead of the vast riches which others brought from India to Portugal, he carried over four jars of water from the four famous rivers, the Indus, Ganges, Tigris, and Euphrates, which were long preserved in his castle of Peniche.  After serving both in Europe and Africa, he went out to India, where at twenty-two years of age he was knighted on Mount Sinai by Don Stefano de Gama.  Returning to Portugal, he went ambassador to the Emperor Charles V. and was present in the battle in which that emperor defeated the Lutherans under the Landgrave and the Duke of Saxony.  He behaved so bravely in that battle, that the emperor offered to knight him; but having already received that honour on Mount Sinai, he could not again accept the offer, on which the emperor declared in public that he envied that honour beyond the victory he had just gained.  On his return to Lisbon from administering the government of India with such high reputation, he was received with much honour by King Sebastian, yet was afterwards much slighted, as Pacheco had been formerly by King Emanuel, as will be seen afterwards, when appointed a second time to the viceroyalty.

The first attention of the new viceroy was bestowed for the relief of Chale, to which Diego de Menezes was sent with 1500 men; but he came too late, as the fort had been already surrendered to the zamorin upon conditions.  This surrender had been made by the commander Don George de Castro, contrary to the opinion of the majority of his officers, overcome by the tears and entreaties of his wife and other ladies, forgetting that he who was now eighty years of age ought to have