Due protection.[NOTE 4] The ships
of Manzi and other countries that come hither in summer lay in their
cargoes in 6 or 8 days and depart as fast as possible, because there is no
harbour other than the river-mouth, a mere roadstead and sandbanks, so
that it is perilous to tarry there. The ships of Manzi indeed are not so
much afraid of these roadsteads as others are, because they have such huge
wooden anchors which hold in all weather.[NOTE 5]
There are many lions and other wild beasts here and plenty of game, both
beast and bird.
NOTE 1. - No city or district is now known by the name of ELY, but the name
survives in that of Mount Dely, properly Monte d'ELY, the Yeli-mala of
the Malabar people, and called also in the legends of the coast
Sapta-shaila, or the Seven Hills. This is the only spur of the Ghats that
reaches the sea within the Madras territory. It is an isolated and very
conspicuous hill, or cluster of hills, forming a promontory some 16 miles
north of Cananore, the first Indian land seen by Vasco da Gama, on that
memorable August morning in 1498, and formerly very well known to
navigators, though it has been allowed to drop out of some of our most
ambitious modern maps.
