About The Same Time Menezes Secured The Safety Of Malacca, As Mentioned
Before, By Supplying It With Men And Ammunition,
And appointed Alfonso
Lopez de Costa to the government, in place of Brito who was dying.
Duarte de Melo was
Left there with a naval force; and Duarte Coello was
sent with an embassy and present to the King of Siam, to confirm a
treaty of peace and amity, and to request of him to send a colony of his
subjects to inhabit the city of Malacca, so that the Moors whom he hated
as much as the Portuguese, might be for ever excluded from that place.
All this was agreed to, and as a testimonial of his friendship to the
Christians, he caused a great cross, ornamented with the arms of
Portugal, to be erected in a conspicuous part of the city of Hudia,
where he then resided. Having thus succeeded in his mission, Coello was
forced by stress of weather upon the coast of Pahang, where he was
received in a friendly manner by the king, who voluntarily submitted to
become a vassal to the crown of Portugal, and to pay a cup of gold as an
annual tribute. This was done more from hatred to the king of Bintang,
than from love to the Portuguese.
The kingdom of Siam was at this time one of the greatest in the east,
the two others of greatest consequence being China and Bisnagar. The
great river Menam runs through the middle of the kingdom of Siam from
north to south, having its source in the great lake of Chiamay in lat.
30 deg.
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