114 THE PORTUGUESE POLICY IN THE EAST this stupendous task was, from the arrival of her first viceroy, Almeida, the supreme problem of Portugal in India. Almeida (1505 - 1509) believed, as we have seen, that the solution lay in an exclusively sea policy, sup- ported by as few forts as possible at dominant positions on the Indian coast. Albuquerque took a wider view. He realized that the command of the sea, separated by a fourth of the globe from his European base, must depend upon a line of shore supports whence he could draw both revenues and supplies. " My will and deter- mination is, as long as I am governor," runs his famous speech to his captains at Malacca in 1511, " neither to fight nor to hazard men on land, except in those parts wherein I must build a fortress to maintain them." "If it be the wish of our Lord/' he wrote to the king in 1512, " to dispose the commerce of India in such a manner that the goods and wealth contained in her should be forwarded to you year by year in your squadrons, I do not believe that in all Christendom there will be so rich a king as your Highness. And there- fore do I urge you, Senhor, to work up warmly this affair of India with men and arms and strengthen your hold in her and securely establish your dealings and your factories. And that you wrest the wealth of India and business from the hands of the Moors, and this by good fortresses gaining the principal places of business of the Moors." The Moslem opposition " will subsist in India so long as they do not see in your power the principal forces of the country, and good strongholds
