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night, there arose among all the people so great a tumult, that to hear the cries and the noise that resounded on all sides one would have thought the world was being turned upside down." The reason of the commotion was soon imparted to the astonished Portuguese. Certain news had just arrived of an intended attack of the Tartars on the city of Pekin, "with so great an army, that no king from the days of Adam until now had ever levied its like." In describing the numbers of this invading army—which, however, he reproduces from an account given to him-Pinto certainly makes use of very astonishing numbers-600,000 cavalry and 80,000 rhinoceroses (probably camels) figuring conspicuously in his story among other equally startling items.

Quinsay, or Quangsay, the city where the Portuguese then dwelt, was soon attacked by an immense Tartar horde. According to Pinto's account the enemy advanced "with a terrible aspect." "Their army was divided into seven great battalions, marching with banners displayed, the colours being green and white. In this order, marching to the sound of drums, which they beat after their fashion, they came to a pagoda called Petilau Namegoo, which was very lodgeable in respect of the number of chambers it contained, and not far distant from the walls. In their advanced guard they had a number of light horsemen, who, running confusedly with their lances lowered, careered round the battalions.

"In this order having arrived at the pagoda, they stopped there a good half-hour, and all took up their positions to the sound of warlike instruments, which were continually played, in a great squadron in the form of a half-moon, which encompassed all the city. Then, when they saw themselves near the town wall, within the distance that an arquebuse would carry, they suddenly rushed forward with such a frightful outcry that it seemed as though earth and sky were coming together. Moreover, they set up more than two thousand ladders which they had brought for this purpose, and made an assault on every side where they could attack, mounting the ladders like men of resolute courage and insensible to fear. And although at the outset the besieged made a certain resistance, they were not able to prevent their enemies from fulfilling their purpose; for, through the use of certain batteringrams that they had brought with them, they so completely broke in the four gates of the city as to render themselves masters of it, after having put to death the khan, together with a great number of mandarins and gentlemen who had hastened up to defend the entrance; by this means

without any other assistance these barbarians entered this miserable city by eight gates, and put to the edge of the sword as many inhabitants as they found therein, not sparing the life of one of them; and it is calculated that the number of the slain amounts to sixty thousand persons, among whom were many women and girls grandly beautiful, who belonged to the richest lords of the city. After the bloody massacre of so many people, and after the city had been set on fire, the private houses demolished, and the most sumptuous temples razed to the ground, without there being anything that remained standing in this disorder, they remained there for a week, at the end of which time they returned to the city of Pekin, where dwelt their king, and whence they had been sent out on this expedition."

The Portuguese managed to escape the massacre; but they were carried away as captives by the conquering Tartars. In spite of all they had suffered, these indomitable rovers were still full of courage and energy. It was not in the power of stripes, imprisonment, and wounds to cool their fighting blood; and one of them, George Mendez, so effectually recommended himself and his companions to the notice of the Tartar general by his courage and skill at the taking of a castle, that the barbarous leader, who seems to have had a Napoleonic aptitude for discovering merit, rewarded the stranger with the present of a beautiful horse, and began to treat him and his fellow-countrymen with great honour and distinction, as men who were likely to be very valuable to him. They tried to get away to Hainan with the hope of ultimately making their way to Malacca, but their "resignations" were not accepted.

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Portuguese Boasting-Raising of the Siege of Pekin-Magniloquent Descriptions of PintoGeorge Mendez and his Talents-Departure of the Portuguese-Renewed Quarrels among them-Piracy and Shipwreck-Events at Tanixumaa -The King of Bungo -Great Reputation of Fernand Mendez Pinto.

THE

HE Portuguese accompanied their new patrons to Pekin, where the Tartar khan had pitched his camp for the siege of the city. The monarch received them graciously, and seemed much impressed with the account they gave of the country whence they came. On hearing that their native land was distant a three years' journey, his Tartar majesty was pleased to observe that there must be great ambition and little justice in the country of those people, that they should come from so far away to conquer other lands. The Portuguese, on their side,

were not a little surprised at the splendour and magnificence they saw around them. The khan sat, like the Prince of Darkness in Milton's Paradise Lost

"On a throne of royal state, which far

Outshone the wealth of Ormuz and of Ind;

Or where the gorgeous East, with richest hand,
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold."

Pinto gives a very detailed account of the glories of the Tartar
camp and court, and in many particulars he has been corroborated by
later travellers.

After some time spent before Pekin in skirmishing and other warlike operations, the khan resolved to raise the siege for that time, and retired from the beleaguered city, taking his faithful Portuguese with him. The breaking up of the great camp is described in language strongly savouring of the use of the figure hyperbole, which, as the intelligent reader is doubtless aware, consists in the employment of words conveying more than the idea to be described. Here it is that mention is made of the khan's three hundred thousand horsemen and eighty thousand rhinoceroses. The account of killed and wounded, too, swells to proportions that dwarf to comparative insignificance even the celebrated Russian disasters of Napoleon in 1812. "After the account had been made of all the dead," says Pinto, "it appeared by the reckoning of the captains that they amounted to four hundred and fifty thousand, the greater number of whom had perished from disease, together with three hundred thousand horses and eighty thousand rhinoceroses, which were eaten in two months and a half of famine; so that of one million eight hundred thousand men with whom the khan had gone forth from his kingdom to besiege the city of Pekin, before which he remained six months and a half, he lost seven hundred and fifty thousand, whereof four hundred and fifty thousand had died by plague, famine, and battle, and three hundred thousand had gone over to the side of the Chinese, being induced thereunto by the great pay given them by the latter, and by other advantages of honour and of presents continually held out to them, whereat we must not be greatly astonished, inasmuch as experience has shown us that these inducements have more power in moving men than all other things in the world."

Ultimately the Portuguese obtained permission to depart; but George Mendez, whose engineering skill had been the cause of their good fortune, and who was by this time looked up to as a very Vauban

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by the Tartar generals, was induced by the prospect of gain and honour to cast in his lot with the Tartars, and to remain permanently amongst them. He took leave of his friends with many tears, and most handsomely bestowed on them a thousand ducats, "which," says Fernand Mendez Pinto, who does not seem greatly impressed by this act of generosity, "he could easily do, inasmuch as his revenuc amounted to six thousand already;" nevertheless, it would seem that two months' pay was not a bad parting gift, though Pinto thinks so lightly of it.

Once more the Portuguese adventurers were "set up in the world,” furnished with a ship of their own, and ready to seek fresh cruising grounds. As they sailed away down the great river that flowed from the dominions of the generous Tartar khan, they might have sung in the words of the old sixteenth century sailor's song

"All things are ready, and nothing we want,
To furnish our ship that rideth hereby;
Victuals and provender they be nothing scant,

Like worthy mariners ourselves we will try."

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For seven days they sailed down the river amid villages and pagodas, which Mendez Pinto describes in truly enthusiastic style. "We saw," he says, a quantity of great burghs and of very beautiful towns, the which, so far as we could judge by their appearance, could only be inhabited by people grandly rich. The which we might well judge from the sumptuousness displayed in the private houses, but still more from the temples, whose towers were covered with gold, and likewise from the great number of rowing boats which were upon this river, laden in abundance with all sorts of provisions and merchandise."

But however well our worthy mariners might be furnished with all things necessary for their voyage, they "abundantly lacked discretion," and, forgetful of the severe lesson they had received in China, they began to quarrel violently among themselves. "Inasmuch as we Portuguese," observes Master Pinto gravely, "have this of our nation that we abound in firmness, and hold fast to our opinions, there was among us eight so great a contrariety of feeling in a matter in which it was of the first consequence that we should preserve peace and union, that we were almost ready to kill one another." The officer who had been commissioned to accompany them some way on their journey was so disgusted at the quarrelling of these turbulent men, that he quitted them abruptly, refusing to take back any letters or messages from such ill-conditioned strangers, and roundly declaring

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