Having Now Nothing To Detain Him Here, He Departed From Calicut, Carrying With Him The Malabars Whom He Had Made Prisoners; As He Hoped By Their Means A Good Agreement Might Be Entered Into With The Zamorin On Sending Out The Next Fleet From Portugal.

On the Thursday after his departure, being becalmed about a league from Calicut, about sixty _tonys_, or boats of the country, came off to the fleet filled with soldiers expecting to have taken all our ships.

But the general kept them off by frequent discharges of his artillery, though they followed him an hour and a half. At length there fell a heavy shower of rain attended with some wind, by which the fleet was enabled to make sail, and the enemies returned to the land. He now proposed to direct his course for Melinda; but made little way along the coast, by reason of calms. At this time, having in mind the good of the next ships which might come to Calicut, he thought fit to send a soothing letter to the zamorin, which was written in Arabic by Bontaybo; in which he apologized for having carried off the Malabars, as evidences of his having been at Calicut. He said he was sorry that he had left no factor, lest the Moors might put him to death; and that he had been deterred by the some cause from having frequently landed himself. That, notwithstanding all that had happened, the king his master would be glad to have the friendship of the zamorin, and would assuredly send him abundance of all those commodities he might need; and that the trade of the Portuguese to his city would henceforth redound to his great profit.

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