commands, equipped a powerful fleet, went on board himself, and
cruised about the coast without being able to discover the Turkish
vessels. Enraged to find that with this great preparation he should
be able to effect nothing, he landed at Mazna four hundred
Portuguese, under the command of Don Christopher de Gama, his
brother. He was soon joined by some Abyssins, who had not yet
forgot their allegiance to their sovereign; and in his march up the
country was met by the Empress Helena, who received him as her
deliverer. At first nothing was able to stand before the valour of
the Portuguese, the Moors were driven from one mountain to another,
and were dislodged even from those places, which it seemed almost
impossible to approach, even unmolested by the opposition of an
enemy.

These successes seemed to promise a more happy event than that which
followed them. It was now winter, a season in which, as the reader
hath been already informed, it is almost impossible to travel in
Aethiopia. The Portuguese unadvisedly engaged themselves in an
enterprise, to march through the whole country, in order to join the
Emperor, who was then in the most remote part of his dominions.
Mahomet, who was in possession of the mountains, being informed by
his spies that the Portuguese were but four hundred, encamped in the
plain of Ballut, and sent a message to the general that he knew the
Abyssins had imposed on the King of Portugal, which, being
acquainted with their treachery, he was not surprised at, and that
in compassion of the commander's youth, he would give him and his
men, if they would return, free passage, and furnish them with
necessaries; that he might consult upon the matter, and depend upon
his word, reminding him, however, that it was not safe to refuse his
offer.