As this first circumnavigation will fall to be related
more at large, in a division of our arrangement devoted expressly to
that subject, it has not been deemed necessary to elucidate this short
incidental account from De Faria, by any geographical commentary.
- E.]
In one of the former years, Fernan Perez de Andrada had established a
trade at Quantung or Canton in China, which was so exceedingly
profitable that every one was eager to engage in it. In the present year
1521, Simon de Andrada was sent by Sequeira to China with five ships,
and cast anchor in the port of the island of Tamou opposite to Canton,
where his brother had been formerly. The Portuguese ambassador to the
emperor of China still remained at that place, but set out soon
afterwards up a large river with three vessels splendidly decorated with
Portuguese colours, it being a received custom that none but those of
China should be seen there, which are gules a lion rampant.[160] In this
manner he arrived at the foot of a mountain from which that great river
derives its source. This mountainous ridge, called Malexam, beginning
at the bay of Cochin-China in the province of Fokien,[161] runs through
the three southern provinces of China, Quangsi, Quantung, and Fokien,
dividing them from the interior provinces, as Spain is divided from
France by the Pyrenees. Thomas Perez, leaving the vessels at this place,
travelled northwards to the city of Nanking, where the king then was,
having spent four months in the journey without stopping at any place.
The emperor however thought proper to appoint his audience at Peking, a
city far distant, to which place Perez accordingly followed. While on
the journey, Simon de Andrada behaved himself so improperly in the
island of Tamou that an account of his proceedings was sent to court,
and Thomas Perez and his companions were condemned to death as spies.
The rigour of this sentence was mitigated, but the embassy was not
received, and Perez was sent back as a prisoner to Canton, with orders
that the Portuguese should restore Malacca to its native king, who was a
vassal to China, in which case the embassy would be received; but
otherwise the ambassador and his suite were to be put to death, and the
Portuguese for ever excluded from China as enemies. Simon de Andrada
conducted himself with a high hand, as if he had been king of Tamou,
where he raised a fort, and set up a gallows to intimidate the people.
He committed violence against the merchants who resorted to the port,
and bought young people of both sexes, giving occasion to thieves to
steal them from their parents. These extravagant proceedings lost
nothing in their transmission to court, and were the cause of the severe
orders respecting Perez and his followers.
[Footnote 160: The text seems irreconcileably contradictory, perhaps
from mistranslation; but the circumstance is not important. - E.]
[Footnote 161: This account of the ridge of Malexam is considerably
erroneous.
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