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our, Bisnagar, and other districts of India, sent ambassadors to the viceroy; who endeavoured in his answers to impress them powerfully with the value of amity with the Portuguese, and dread of encountering their arms, and sent back envoys of his own to these princes, to acquire intelligence respecting their power and resources. There arrived likewise at Goa an ambassador from the Christian sovereign of Abyssinia, whom the Europeans denominate Prester John[131], who was destined to go over to Portugal, carrying a piece of the _true cross_, and letters for the king of Portugal from the queen-mother _Helena_, who governed Abyssinia during the minority of her son David. The purport of this embassy was to arrange a treaty of amity with the king of Portugal, and to procure military aid against the Moors who were in constant hostility with that kingdom. This ambassador reported that there were then three Portuguese at the Abyssinian court, one of whom, named Juan, called himself ambassador from the king of Portugal; and two others, named Juan Gomez and Juan Sanchez, who had been lately set on shore at Cape Guardafu, by order of Albuquerque, in order to explore the country. [Footnote 130: The editor of Astleys Collection adds, _with liberty to build a fort_; but this condition is not to be found in the text of Faria, which is followed in that work literally on most occasions, though often much abridged.--E.] [Footnote 131: In our early volumes it will be seen that this imaginary _Prete Jani_, Prester John, or the Christian Priest-king, had been sought for in vain among the wandering tribes of eastern Tartary. The Portuguese now absurdly gave that appellation to the Negus of Habesh, or Emperor of the Abyssinians; where a degraded species of Christianity prevails among a barbarous race, continually engaged in sanguinary war and interminable revolution.--E.] Every thing at Goa being placed in order, the viceroy now determined upon carrying the enterprise against Aden into execution, which had been formerly ordered by the king of Portugal. Without communicating his intentions to any one, he caused twenty ships to be fitted out, in which he embarked with 1700 Portuguese troops, and 800 native Canaras and Malabars. When just ready to sail, he acquainted the captains with the object of his expedition, that they might know where to rendezvous in case of separation. Setting sail from Goa on the 18th of February 1513, the armament
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