it should be presented to your highness, I have thought proper to fulfil
his intentions in that respect. It was fitting that this treatise should
be written by a native of Portugal, as it treats of the various ways in
which the spiceries and other commodities of India were formerly brought
to our part of the world, and gives an account of all the navigations and
discoveries of the ancients and moderns, in both of which things the
Portuguese have laboured above all other nations. In this treatise, and
in nine or ten other books, concerning India and the Moluccas, this true
Portuguese described the unfortunate and sorrowful times, before our day,
in which he had been engaged. When he was appointed to the command of the
islands and fortresses of the Moluccas, all the kings and chiefs of these
islands had agreed to make war against our nation, and to drive them out
of the country. Yet he fought against them all in Tidore, though he had
only 130 Portuguese soldiers, against their whole united power, and gave
them a signal overthrow, in which their king, and one Ternate, the
principal author of the war, were both slain; besides which, he conquered
their fortresses, and compelled them all to submit to the obedience and
service of our sovereign. In this war, two great and wonderful events
took place: the _first_, that all the chiefs and kings of these islands
united against us, who used ever to be at variance among themselves; and
_secondly_, that Galvano, with only the ordinary garrison, should obtain
the victory against so great a combination. It has happened to other
governors of the Moluccas, with an extraordinary number of European
troops, and assisted by all the other native lords, to go to war with one
king only, and to come back with loss; whereas he, with a small and
inadequate force, successfully waged war against a confederacy of all the
lords of these islands.

"Three brilliant exploits have been performed in India, beyond all others.
The capture of Muar by Emanuel Falcon; the winning of Bitam by Peter