He Departed
Therefore From The Island, Much Dissatisfied At Having Missed The
Acquisition Of So Much Treasure By His Own Fault.
After sailing a month,
there arose so great a storm on the 5th of August, that his galliot was
swallowed up.
The other galliot perished a few days afterwards, and only
fourteen of the crew escaped. Thus perished the brave Antonio de Faria;
a just judgment, doubtless, for the sacrilegious robbery he intended to
have committed.
No less unfortunate was the end of the city of Liampo, where Antonio
had been so nobly received, falling a sacrifice to the base and
insatiable avarice of its inhabitants. Lancelot Pereyra, judge of that
city, having lost a thousand ducats by some Chinese, went out with a
body of troops to rob and plunder others in satisfaction of the debt.
This unadvised and barbarous procedure brought the governor of the
province against the city with 80,000 men, and in four hours burnt it to
the ground, together with 80 ships that were in the port. Twelve
thousand men were slain, among whom were 1000 Portuguese, and three
millions of gold were lost. Thus scarce any thing was left of Liampo
but the name; and thus what the Portuguese gained by their valour was
lost by their covetousness. Liampo had above three thousand catholic
inhabitants, almost the half of whom were Portuguese. Those who survived
this cruel execution, obtained leave in 1547, by great presents, to
settle in the province of Chincheo, in a village which began to
flourish in consequence of a rich trade, but it came to the same end
with the other.
SECTION III.
Transactions during the Government of Martin Alfonso de Sousa, from
1542 to 1543.
In the year 1542, but whether under the government of De Gama or De
Sousa is uncertain, Antonio de Mota, Francisco Zeymoto, and Antonio
Peixoto, while on a voyage to China, were driven by a storm among the
islands of Nipongi or Nijon, called Gipon by the Chinese, and
known in Europe by the name of Japan. They were well received in one
of these islands, of which they had the honour to be the first
discoverers, though accidentally. These islands of Japan are far to the
eastward of all India, being even beyond China, and lie between the
latitudes of 30 deg. and 40 deg. N[360]. These islands are numerous, the
principal and largest island being that peculiarly called Niphon,
Nifon, Nipongi, or Japan, which gives name to the group, and in
which is the city of Meaco the imperial residence. According to the
natives this principal island is 366 leagues in length, but by our
computation only 266[361]. The chief islands around the large one, are
Cikoko, Toksosi, Sando, Sisime Bacasa, Vuoki, Taquixima, or
Takishima, and Firando[362]. Fernan Mendez Pinto in his travels
assumes the merit of this discovery to himself; pretending that he came
to the island of Tanixima, by which I suppose he meant Taquixima,
not by stress of weather, but by design, in the service of a pirate who
had relieved him and his companions when cast away, naming Christopher
Borallo and Diego Zeymoto as those who accompanied him. In both
relations three names are mentioned as the discoverers of Japan, one
only, Zeymoto, being the same in both, and both agree in the date of
the discovery being in 1542. According to Pinto, the prince of the
island of Tanixima was named Nautaquim who stood amazed on seeing
the three Portuguese strangers, and uttered the following mysterious
words: "These are certainly the Chinchicogies, spoken of in our
records; who, flying over the waters, shall come to be lords of the
lands where God has placed the greatest riches of the world. It will be
fortunate for us if they come as friends!"
[Footnote 360: More rigidly from lat. 31 deg. 28' to 40 deg. 80' N. and between
the longitudes of 127 deg. 47' and 142 deg. 33' E. from Greenwich. - E.]
[Footnote 361: Meaning probably a different denomination of measure. The
island of Niphon measures 824 English miles in extreme length, from S.W.
to N.E. in a somewhat bent line. Its breadth varies from 55 to 240
miles, averaging about 100; but it is extremely irregular, owing to many
deep bays and considerable peninsulae. Jedo is now the capital and
residence of the temporal sovereign, Meaco of the once spiritual
sovereign, now reduced to chief priest of the national religion. - E.]
[Footnote 362: The only islands of magnitude besides Niphon, are
Kiusiu, which does not appear to have any representative in the text,
and Sicocf, probably the Cikoko of De Faria. The other numerous
islands are of little importance, and several of the names in the text
cannot be referred to any of the islands. Firando and Taquixima
remain unchanged, and the others cannot be traced. - E.]
The first action of the new governor De Sousa was to diminish the pay of
the soldiers. The saving of charges is a great means of gaining the
favour of princes; yet ministers never express their zeal by
retrenching their own large allowances, but by cutting off the small
ones from the poor; and, as was natural, this alteration occasioned much
discontent among the troops. At this time the queen of Batecala, a
well-built city on the banks of a river, on the coast of Canara, in a
fertile country, refused to pay her tribute, and entertained pirates in
her port to the great prejudice of trade; on which account De Sousa
went with 2000 men in 60 vessels of different kinds to reduce her to
obedience. On entering the port of Batecala where he demanded payment of
the tribute, and that the pirate ships should be delivered up, the queen
endeavoured to procrastinate till such time as she knew it would be
necessary for the governor to retire with his armament to Cochin. But
being aware of this artifice, the governor landed with 1200 men in two
battalions, and ordered twenty light vessels to go up the river to
attack the city on that side, while he assailed it on the land side.
While marching through a wood, the governor was opposed by a body of
musqueteers; but his troops drove them to the gates of the city, which
they entered along with the fugitives, in spite of every opposition from
the enemy who were encouraged by the queen in person.
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