On Offering A Silver Chain At This Place For
Some Provisions, The Natives Gave It To An Old Woman To
Examine if it
was genuine, and she informed the Portuguese that at the distance of
three days journey there was
An island inhabited a long while before by
a white people dressed like the Portuguese and wearing crosses hanging
from their necks, who lived by rapine and easily took whatever they
wanted, as they were armed with spears and guns, with which information
the Portuguese were much gratified. Continuing their voyage past the bay
of _St Bonaventura_ and the mouth of the river _Massimanga_, they
entered the bay of _Santa Clara_, where _Diamassuto_ came to them and
entered into a treaty of friendship, worshipping the cross on his knees.
They were here told that white people frequented a neighbouring port,
and concluded that they were Hollanders. Going onwards they found banks
of sand not laid down in any chart, and entered a port in lat. 24 deg. S.
The king of this place was named _Diacomena_, and they here learnt that
there were Portuguese on the opposite coast who had been cast away, and
now herded cattle for their subsistence. They said likewise that the
Hollanders had been three times at their port, and had left them four
musketeers with whose assistance they had made war upon their enemies.
On some trees there were several inscriptions, among which were the
following. _Christophorus Neoportus Anglus Cap_. and on another _Dominus
Robertus Scherleius Comes, Legatus Regis Persarum_.
[Footnote 10:
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