akes in the bed of the river, and
let in so much water that she was in danger of sinking. The brave
Lorenzo exerted himself to the utmost in this perilous situation, till a
ball broke his thigh; then ordering himself to be set up leaning against
the main-mast, he continued to encourage his men till another ball broke
his back and killed him. His body was thrown below deck, where it was
followed by his page Gato, who lamented the fate of his master with
tears mixed with blood, having been shot through the eye by an arrow.
After a vigorous resistance, the Moors boarded the ship, and found Gato
beside his masters body. He immediately rose and slew as many of the
Moors as covered the body of Lorenzo, and then fell dead among them. At
length the ship sunk, and of above an hundred men who belonged to her
only nineteen escaped. In all the Portuguese ships an hundred and forty
men were slain, while the enemy lost upwards of six hundred. The other
captains got to Cochin, where the viceroy then was, and who received the
intelligence of his sons glorious death with wonderful resolution.

Soon after the defeat of the Portuguese fleet at Chaul, Almeyda received
a letter from Malek Azz. This man was born in slavery, being descended
of heretic Christian parents of Russia, and had risen by degrees to the
rank he now held. The origin of his advancement was owing to the
following trivial incident. One day a kite flying over the king of
Cambaya, muted on his head, on which the king was so enraged that he
declared he would give all he was worth to have the kite killed. Malek
Azz who heard this, was an excellent bowman, and immediately let fly an
arrow which brought down the kite. The king of Cambaya rewarded this
lucky shot so bountifully, that the archer soon rose to be lord of Diu,
a famous sea-port in Guzerat, seated on a triangular peninsula, which is
joined to the continent by so small an isthmus that it is generally
reputed an island. In this letter to the viceroy, Malek Azz craftily
endeavoured to secure himself at the same time both in the favour of the
king of Cambaya, and to conciliate the Portuguese, though he mortally
hated them for the injury they had done to the trade of Diu. While he
pretended to condole with the viceroy on the death of his son, whose
bravery he extolled in exalted terms, he sent him the nineteen men saved
from his sons ship, who had been made prisoners in the late battle;
endeavouring by this conciliatory co