Page:First Voyage Round the World.djvu/30

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xviii
INTRODUCTION AND

Calecut. He took much care that the chests should not be broken, and that there should be no robbery, because the captains were going to request ships of the governor, with which to return to the ships to save what goods had not been wetted. These captains reached Cananor in eight days, from whence they sent a message to the governor, who at once sent Gonzalo de Crasto in a caravel, with two pilots; and they went to the ships and put the best things on board the caravel, until they could not load it any more, and having recovered all the men, they set fire to the ships, as they were already full of water. So they returned to Cochim. In this Fernan de Magalhāes worked hard, and did much service, and attended well to everything.

"This Fernan de Magalhāes was of the king's household, and came to India with the Viceroy Dom Francisco [d'Almeida], and he was in the action with the Turks; and he was always much wounded in the fleets and in Calecut; and in these ships he lost his small portion of property,[1] and he went away poor to Portugal, and went about with claims for his services, and begged of the king a hundred reis increase of his palace stipend,[2] which the king did not choose to grant, at which he was aggrieved, and went to Castile to live at Seville, where he married. As he had much knowledge of the art of navigation, and enterprise, and devoted himself to that, he came to an understanding with the directors of the House of Trade of Seville, so that the emperor gave him a fleet of five ships, with which he navigated, discovering a new way to Maluco, which was in the year 1519, as I will relate further on in its place; with which he caused great difficulties to Portugal."

Correa again refers to the incident of Magellan remaining with the wreck, in his tome ii, p. 625, where he says:

"Fernan de Magalhāes, an honourable gentleman, who served in these parts in the time of the Viceroy Afonso

  1. "Perdeo sua pobreza"
  2. "Moradia."