I return to the relation of what I heard of the Kingdom of Adel and of a great captain there was in it, and of the death which he died (and this I heard from many and above all from Pero de Covilham). It was most certain that there was in this Kingdom of Adel a great Moorish captain who was named Mahfudi,[224] whom the people of this Court still sing of when they travel. They say that this captain entered the lands of the Prester during every Lent for twenty-five years, because during Lent the great fast breaks the people’s strength and they are not able to fight. He entered so far into them that many times he reached to a distance of twenty leagues. One year he would enter the kingdom of Amara or of Xoa, another the kingdom of Fatiguar, and he entered sometimes at one place sometimes at another. He began to make these incursions in the lifetime of King Alexander, who was uncle of this king, and he continued them during twelve years of his life; and because he died without children, Nahum his brother, the father of this king, succeeded him, and Mahfud did the same during his time. This David who now reigns, commenced to reign at the age of twelve years, and until he was seventeen years old Mahfud did not cease these incursions and warfare during Lent. They say that he made such great incursions and forays that in one he carried off captive nineteen[225] Abyssinians, and that he sent them all as an offering to the house of Mekkah, and as presents to the Moorish kings: and they say that there they become great Moors, because they escape from the great severity of the fast, and enter into the abundance and luxury of the Moors. He also carried off a great multitude of all sorts of flocks. On the twenty-fourth year of his incursions, on his entry into the kingdom of Fatiguar all the people fled and took refuge in the before-mentioned hill, and Mahfud followed them; and they say that he entered the hill and burned all the churches and monasteries there. I have before related that in all the countries of the Prester there are chavas, who are men-at-arms, because in these kingdoms the cultivators do not go to the wars, and that there were in these kingdoms many chavas, and those who took refuge on the hill were cultivators and chavas, that is, men-at-arms who had fled. Mahfud took them all prisoners, and he ordered the cultivators to be separated from the men-at-arms, and he ordered the cultivators to go in peace, and to sow for next year much wheat and barley against he came, so that he and his people might find enough to eat for themselves and their horses. And he said to the men-at-arms: “Knaves who eat the king’s bread, and guard his lands so ill, all of you to the sword;” and he ordered fifteen men-at-arms to be killed; and returned with a great troop, and without any opposition whatever. Prester John being greatly vexed at this, principally at the burning of the monasteries and churches, ordered spies to go into the kingdom of Adel to learn in what part this Mafude would determine to enter. And he learned how the king of Adel would enter in person, and Mahfud with him, and great forces, and that they would enter this same kingdom of Fatiguar and that they were coming out of Lent in the time when the wheat and barley were young to destroy them all, and during Lent would go to another part. On knowing this, Prester John determined to wait for them on the road, and they say that he was much opposed by all his people and by the grandees of the Court, who said that he was a youth of seventeen and that it was not well that he should go to such a war, and that the Betudetes and captains of his kingdoms were sufficient there. They say that he said that he needs must go in person to avenge the injuries which had been done to his uncle Alexander and to his father Nahum, and to himself for six years, and that he trusted in God to avenge it all. So he set out with his people and Court without ordering men to come from distant lands, so as not to be heard of; and they say that he travelled day and night, and one night before dawn he went and pitched his camp over where the first fair of the kingdom of Adel is held, one day’s journey from where we found the Prester when we brought him the pepper. They say there is here a great pass which the King of Adel had passed the day before, and he was encamped about the distance of half a league in the Prester’s country, and off the road: and the Prester was encamped in the country of Adel. When it was clear daylight they saw each other, and they say that as soon as Mahfud saw the camp of the Prester, and saw the red tents which are only pitched for great festivals or receptions, he said to the King of Adel, “Sire, the Negus of Ethiopia is here in person, to-day is the day of our deaths, do what you can to save yourself, for I shall die here.” They say that the king escaped with four horsemen, and of these four one was the son of a Betudete, who was with the King of Adel, and is now with the Prester in his Court, because here they think nothing of joining the Moors and becoming Moors, and if they wish to return, they get baptised again, and remain pardoned and Christians as before. This one gave the account of what took place among them. As soon as the King of Adel had put himself in safety, which was very early in the morning, Prester John, as they relate, who did not know of the king’s flight, ordered that all should receive the communion and commend themselves to God, and get their breakfasts, and make ready: and at the hour of tierce they began to set their battle array, and go out to fight with the Moors, leaving their tents pitched. They say that as soon as the Moors saw them in motion, Mahfud came out to speak to the Christians, asking if there was among them any knight who was willing to fight with him to the death. A friar of the name of Gabri-Andreas came forth for this purpose, and he killed Mahfud, and cut off his head. He is still alive and is a man who is much honoured at the Court. There was then a general onset on the Moors, who had nowhere to escape, because the Prester’s tents were pitched opposite the principal pass, and the other pass which was further off, by which the king had fled, was already taken possession of. When the Moors were routed and killed, Prester John returned to his tents to rest, and the following day he marched into the kingdom of Adel until he arrived at a rich palace of the King of Adel, which he found without any inhabitant. The Prester came up to the doors of this palace and with his lance struck the doors three times, and he did not choose that anyone else should strike them, nor enter nor approach them, that it might not be said that he went to plunder, and that if he had found the king there, or many other people, he would have been the first to enter in person, because he was going in fair and open warfare; and since he found nobody, nobody should enter. So they turned back again. This battle was in the month of July and they asserted that it was on the same day that Lopo Soarez destroyed and burned Zeila,[226] at which destruction I was present: and the Moors who were taken prisoners there said that the chief captain of Zeila was with the King of Adel in wars with the Negus of Ethiopia. Several times the Prester ordered us to be shewn four or five bundles of short swords with silver hilts, not very well made, saying that they had taken all those and others in the war with the Sultan of Adel, and also the tent which he gave us of common brocade and Mekka velvet was taken in that war, and belonged to the king himself, and on that account he had sent to tell us to bless it before saying mass in it, in case the Moor had sinned in it. The head of Mahfud was going about the Court of the Prester more than three years before that passed in our going or arrival in it; and every Saturday and Sunday and days of observance, the common people and boys and girls made great festivity with it, and at this day it is about the Court, and it seems to me that it will be there for ever, so enamoured are they of it. Gabri-Andreas (as I have said) is a friar and a very honourable person, and a gentleman of great revenues, and (according to fame) he is very eloquent, and is a friend of the Portuguese, and he understands Church matters well, and enjoyed talking about them. He has not got more than half his tongue, and the end cut off, because King Nahum ordered it to be cut off because he talked a great deal.

While we were at the town of Dara, Prester John sent us a map of the world, which we had brought to him four years ago, and which Diogo Lopez de Sequeira had sent him, with a message that if the letters on the map said what the countries were that we should put his letters at the foot of them that he might know what these countries were. We at once set to work, the friar who is going to Portugal and I, he wrote and I read, and beneath our writing he placed theirs. And because our Portugal is mixed with Castile in a small space, and Seville is very near Lisbon and near to Corunna, I put Seville for Spain,[227] and Lisbon for Portugal, and Corunna for Galicia. When the whole of the map was finished and nothing remained they took it away. The following day he sent to call the ambassador and all of us that were with him, and immediately in the first conversation he sent to say that the King of Portugal and the King of Castile were sovereigns of few lands, and that the King of Portugal would not be strong enough to defend the Red Sea from the power of the Turks and Rumys; and that it would be well if he was to write to the King of Spain that he should order a fortress to be built in Zeila, and the King of Portugal should order one to be built in Masua, and the King of France order one to be made in Suaquem; and all three, with the forces of the Prester, would be able to guard the Red Sea and take Jiddah and Mekkah and Cairo, and the holy house, and go through all the countries they chose. The ambassador replied to this that His Highness was deceived or ill informed, and if any one had told him so, that he had not told him the truth; and that if he judged of it by looking at the map of the world, that he would not acquire a right knowledge of the countries, because Portugal and Spain are in the map of the world as things that are well known, and not as things requiring to be known: and that he should look in the map how the cities and castles and monasteries were, and also how Venice, Jerusalem, and Rome were, like things well-known and in small spaces, and let him look at his Ethiopia, how it was an unknown thing, very large and much spread out, full of mountains, and lions and elephants and many other animals, and also many mountain ridges, without the map showing any city, town, or castle; His Highness should know that the King of Portugal, by means of his captains, was powerful enough to defend and guard the Red Sea against all the power of the great Sultan and of the great Turk, and to make war upon them even to the holy house; and that he had made greater conquests in the parts of Africa with the King of Fez and Morocco, and many other kings, subjugating all the Indies and making all their kings his tributary subjects, as His Highness well knew from the adversaries of the King of Portugal, who were the Moorish merchants from India trading at his Court. To this there did not come any answer, and there was another question, and he dismissed us, sending to us plenty to eat and drink; and so he did every day whilst we went with the Court.

Four or five days after the map of the world, the Prester sent to call us, and he sent to say that he wished to write to the Pope of Rome, whom they name Rumea Negus lique papaz: which means the King of Rome and Head of the Popes: and he desired that I should write the beginning of the letter, because they were not accustomed to write, and did not know how to write to the Pope. Don Rodrigo the ambassador answered that we had not come to write, nor was there any one among us who could write to the Pope. I said that I would tell him the beginning, and after that they could continue with whatever he had in his heart to write or to request. There came a message that we should go and dine, and afterwards come back, the friar and I, and that I should bring all my books to prepare the letters; and so we did. When we came we found all those whom they hold to be most learned, assembled together with many books; and they at once asked me for my books. I replied that books were not necessary, but only to know the intentions of His Highness, and by that we should be ruled. Then a man who was the principal one there in rank and learning, and whose title is Abuquer, which means chief chaplain, told the Prester’s intention to the friar, and he told it to me. Then I set to writing and shortly made a small beginning, which was at once taken in my handwriting to His Highness, and was brought back at once, and in that hour we put it into their language and sent it back again. There was no delay with it, for the page came back at once, saying that the king was much pleased with the writing, and amazed because it had not been taken out of books: and he ordered that it should at once be written in clean writing and in two letters; and he ordered that his learned priests should study in their books the most they could to search for what more could be put in the letters.[228] When the friar and I were coming to our tents, the ambassador came out and said to me: “Padre, I regret very much what I said to-day to Prester John that there was no one among us who knew how to write to the Pope, because he will hold us for men of little knowledge, I entreat of you to put all your efforts in this, and do for him all you know.” I answered him, “that whether it was strong or weak, it was done to the best of my knowledge, and that he would see here what I had done”. As soon as he saw it he rejoiced much (according to what he showed), and the minute[229] of the letter which I drew up goes in a separate letter and is smaller; it begins “Blessed Holy Father”.[228] They employed three days in preparing the other letter, and they spent fifteen days in making a small gold cross, which weighs a hundred cruzados, and which is also going to the Pope.

In the letters which Don Luis de Meneses sent to Prester John, he made a complaint and required justice for four Portuguese whom the Moors had killed in the town of Arquiquo, a port of the Red Sea and in his country; which justice and vengeance he had not chosen to execute or take by himself, because it was in the Prester’s country, and that he desired to serve His Highness and not annoy him. We had asked this justice many times, and had for answer that he regretted very much that the captain-major Don Luis had not taken vengeance, and killed all the Moors that were in the town of Arquiquo, and that he valued more one Portuguese than all the Moors and negroes that were in his country: and that since he (Don Luis) did not choose to take vengeance himself, that he would order justice to be done: and he ordered the Chief Justice of his Court to come before us in front of his tent, and he sent to tell him by the Cabeata that he was to go with us to the sea, and to take prisoners all the Moors, Turks, Rumys, and Christians, whom he should discover to have been in the town of Arquiquo at the time that they killed these men of Don Luis de Meneses. And those that he found guilty of the said death, or in not having arrested those who had killed, and who had raised the brawl, he was to give them up to any captain-major who came from Portugal, and he might kill them or do justice as he pleased; killing, beheading, or taking them as captives, either Christians or Moors, Turks and Roumys; but that the Portuguese were not to complain any more of this justice, but to take it for themselves. In this town, and in these days, Prester John determined to send an ambassador to Portugal, for up to this time he was not sending any one. He sent to call the ambassador and me, and he said, that he had determined to send a person with us to the King of Portugal, in order that his desires might have effect quicker, his representative being there; and he asked if we thought that Zagazabo would be sufficient for this journey, inasmuch as he could speak our language, and had already been to our countries. We answered that Zagazabo was quite sufficient for this journey, and for being the envoy of His Highness, because he was a man who got on well with us, and we with him, and that he had no need of an interpreter: and that now His Highness was doing what he ought to do, because on his return he would give more belief to what his own countrymen saw and heard of foreigners, than to what foreigners said of themselves. They then decided that we should have him for our companion. The following day he sent us dresses, and thirty ouquias[230] of gold, and a hundred loaves for the road. Still we waited a great deal later, and the cause (according to what the ambassador himself told us later) was because the determination of Prester John was tardy, this detention was necessary as the ambassador was not yet despatched, until he had given him the things which he had to carry for his journey and himself, that is to say, clothes and gold for his expenses. Also we waited for the Chief Justice who had to go with us, as has been said. After all we set out without them, saying that we would go on at a slow pace: this was because we had often seen his despatch. So we went away and they caught us up on the road, each in their turn, and we travelled until we reached Barua, which is near the sea, where our quarters were, which is the chief town of the country of the Barnagais. We did not find any news of the Portuguese coming to the port, and we all waited together until the monsoon had passed. During this time the Chief Justice arrested three or four gentlemen, and one Xumagali who was at Arquiquo at the time they killed the men. This Xumagali was soltam,[231] Xumagali means a small gentleman, like a gentleman without lands. This one was arrested, because at that time he was justice, and he did not do his duty, and one Gabri Jesus was arrested because he came there and did nothing; and Arrais Jacob was arrested, because at that time he ruled the country of the Barnagais; and one Dafela, who is a great lord, was arrested because some Moors and Turks took refuge in his lands, and he did not make them prisoners, though he knew that they were at the death of Don Luis de Meneses’ men who were killed at Arquiquo. These four were great gentlemen, and all five were sent as prisoners to the Court by the Chief Justice, and no one went to accuse them. Although they were ill treated, they became free. As soon as the Chief Justice arrived at Court, and gave news to the Prester that the Portuguese had not arrived, and that we remained without a remedy, the Prester at once sent a Calacem,[232] ordering us to go to the town of Aquaxumo, where, as I before said, we had been, and where had been the dwellings of the Queens of Saba and Candacia. There they ordered us to be given five hundred loads of wheat, and a hundred cows, and a hundred sheep, and a hundred jars of honey, and another hundred of butter; and for his ambassador who came with us, twenty loads of wheat, and twenty cows, and twenty sheep, and twenty jars of honey, and as many of butter.

Whilst we were in this town of Aquaxumo there came a message to the ambassador of the Prester that a small lordship belonging to him had been taken from him; then he begged me to go with him to the Court to ask for justice. I went, and we discovered there that his adversary was the principal page of Prester John, who was Abdenaguo, captain of the pages, because there is no service here, but what it has one person over all the others. As all the messages went to the Prester through the pages we had no remedy in putting in our word, so then we sought succour from an Ajaze, who is a great lord; and although he was a great friend of Abdenaguo our adversary, yet for the sake of justice he made known to the Prester how we had come and for what. Then there came a message asking me what I had come to Court for. I gave an account of all, and said that the injury and unreasonable thing done to Zagazabo, was done rather to the King of Portugal and to us Portuguese than to him, since he was absent from his land and lordship for the service of the King of Portugal and the company of us Portuguese, by the order of His Highness, and that his land should be confirmed to him, and not usurped and forcibly taken from him: and that in our parts those who went in the service of kings, not only themselves, but moreover their servants, factors, majordomos, property, revenues, and lordships were much favoured and guarded. And so it was hoped that His Highness would favour his ambassador and order justice to be done, and that he should be restored to his lordship. At once there came an answer saying, who was the person that had caused us vexation, and had taken the lordship of the said Zagazabo. We replied that it was Abdenaguo the head of the pages who had ordered this act of force to be done by his stewards and factors, and that we asked His Highness to give us judges above suspicion, and that he should order the pages to carry to him any message that might be necessary upon this business. Soon four pages came to us saying that their lord commanded them that whatever thing should be requested of him by us in this business, that they were to do it with free will and without fear of anybody. The judges in this suit were the Ajaze Daragote and the Ajaze Ceyte, to whom we were to address ourselves. We went to them soon, and they appointed a time that such an hour of the sun we should come to such a place. We went, and there were present the representative of Abdenaguo and the ambassador in person: and they argued on both sides, and brought forward reasons until a conclusion was come to verbally, because here there is no writing in the tribunals, and all was verbal, and the sentence is given verbally. The judges concluded with the sentence that the land and fief[233] which Zagazabo claimed was very small, and that it was subject to another land of great extent and of a great lordship of which Abdenaguo was the lord, and that it was of right that the great wind enters in all the land; and thus the entry could not be taken away from Abdenaguo, great lord as he was. Then we went away to complain, having remained struck down by this sentence. We complained to the King. He sent to tell us to go to our quarters, and not to be vexed, that all would turn out well, and that next day we should go and plead to the Chief Justice, and he would do us justice. With that we went away. Next day we went to wait for the Chief Justice in the road to the Prester’s tent: he received us with good will, saying that he had already received the king’s instructions for the despatch of our business, and that we were to wait at the tent of justice, as he was going to speak to the king, and that then he would despatch us. All the same we went further on with him as far as where he separated from the people to go and speak to the king. While we remained thus expecting our despatch from the good will we had seen in him, when he came out from the tent there came out with him two pages, who accompanied him to the place where they flog men, and there they called the executioners, and they had him stripped and thrown down and tied, as I have already described, that is they threw him down on his stomach and made fast his hands to two stakes, and his feet tied together with a leather cord, and two men to pull at it, and he was bare from the waist upwards. There were two executioners on each side of him, and most times they strike the ground with the scourge. And when orders come from the king to strike, the blow reaches the bones, and of these blows they gave him three. Reckoning this time, I have seen the Chief Justice flogged three times, and after that, two days later, return to his office, because they do not hold it to be a dishonour; rather they say the king is fond of him, because he remembers him, and a short time after does him favours and bestows lordships. And when they now thus flogged the Chief Justice, there were there sixty friars, all clothed in new yellow habits according to their usage. When they had done flogging the Chief Justice, they took an old friar, who was very venerable and the head of the others, and they flogged him in the above mentioned manner, and they did not once touch this friar. When they had done with him they brought another friar who might be a little more than forty years old, and he looked respectable, and they flogged him like the others, and this one was touched twice. When it was over I asked the cause of it, and what sin the friars had committed. Then they related to me that the friar who had been last flogged had been married to a daughter of the Prester, that is of Alexander, uncle of this David, and he had separated from her, and he had married a sister of this Prester, who did what she pleased, and the husband did not dare to meddle with this from fear of the Prester, and also because in this country the faults of women are not looked at with much surprise, and he left this second wife and returned to the first. And Prester John ordered that he should return to his sister. When this order came he did not choose to do it, and went and became a friar: and on this account the Prester ordered these friars to come before the Chief Justice for him to see whether this man was rightly a friar. He judged that he had lawfully taken the habit, and because he had judged thus the Prester had ordered him to be flogged. And the Padre or guardian had been flogged because he had given the habit to the other. And the third man was flogged because he had received the habit; and they commanded him at once to leave the habit and to return to the Prester’s sister. With this we remained without being heard this time, nor till fifteen days later, on account of things which happened in the monastery, which I will relate.

It might be eight or nine months after the death of Queen Helena, who reigned over the greater part of the kingdom of Gojame, that still as many as newly came to the Court, went to weep before her tent, which still remains pitched in its place; and we also did this when we came. After her death Prester John sent the great Betudete to the said kingdom of Gojame to collect the Gibre[234] which is paid to the King each year as dues, and in these days the said Betudete arrived with the gibre, which amounted to three thousand mules, three thousand horses, and three thousand basutos—these are some cloths which the great people have upon their beds, they are of cotton and fleecy like carpets and not so close worked, and as to price, those that are least valuable are not less than an ouquia, and they are worth from two, three, four up to five ouquias; besides thirty thousand cotton cloths of small value, which are worth two of them a drachm, and sometimes less. They also said that they brought thirty thousand ouquias of gold; it is already known that an ouquia weighs eleven cruzados. At the presentation of this gibre, I saw with my eyes all the gold which came covered up on trays,[235] and they said that it was a great quantity, and it all came in this manner. The Betudete in front, stripped from the waist upwards, and with a crown wound round his head, like the head gear of a Castilian muleteer,[236] and when within hearing from where he could be heard at the Prester’s tent, he said three times, with a very small interval between each cry, “Aalto,” which in our language is like Sire: and they answered him from within the tent twice in their language, “Who are you?” He, in their language, replied, “I who call, am the smallest of your house, and am he who saddles your mules and puts the head stalls on your baggage mules, I serve in what other business you command, I bring to you, Sire, what you commanded me.” All this was said three times, and when that was done, the voice from inside said “Pass on, pass forward.” And he went on and made his bow before the tent and passed on. Behind him immediately came the horses, one behind the other, each horse had a man or boy at the halter. The foremost thirty were saddled, they were reasonably good, but of the others that followed behind, the best was not worth two drachms, and many of them were not worth a drachm; I saw them later given for less, and these would be quite three thousand. After these sorry nags came the mules after the manner of the nags, that is thirty good ones saddled, and all the others small young mules, but better than the nags. There were male and female mules of a year and over, and two year old and three, and none more than that except the saddled ones; for none of the others were fit for riding. These would be quite three thousand, and they passed by as had done the Betudete and the little horses. After the mules came the basutos, and each man carried a basuto, for he could not carry more from their great volume. After the basutos came the cloths, each man with a bundle of them; they said that each man carried ten cloths, and there would be quite three thousand men with the basutos, and three thousand with the cloths, and all these were from the said kingdom of Gojame, who were obliged to bring the gibre.[237] Behind the cloths came three men, each with a trencher[238] on their heads, of those in which they eat: they were covered with large green and red cloths of tafetan. Behind these trays came all the men of the Betudete, and they passed in turn as did the Betudete. They said that the gold went in those trays; and they ordered him to go to his quarters with all the gibre, and so he did. Ten days from prime till after vespers were spent in this passing by of the dues. It was fifteen days since a Moorish Queen had come to this Court; she was the wife of the King of Adea, and sister of one that came to be the wife of the Prester John, and he rejected her because she had two large front teeth, that is to say, long ones. And he married her to a great lord who was Barnagais, and now is Betudete.[239] This Queen came to the Prester to ask him for assistance, saying that a brother of her husband had risen against her and was taking the kingdom. This queen came quite like a queen, and brought with her fully fifty honourable Moors on mules and a hundred men on foot, and six women on good mules; they are not very dark people. She was received with great honour, and the third day of her arrival was called and came before the tent of the Prester, and she came with a black canopy.[240] She was dressed twice that day, once at the hour of prime, and the other time at hour of vespers: both dresses were of brocade and velvet and Moorish shirts from India. They said that the Prester sent word to her to rest herself and not be vexed, and that he would go as she desired, and that he was waiting for the Barnagais and the Tigrimahom, and as soon as they came he would at once set out. Eighteen days after this Queen’s arrival, she received dresses. On the following day Tigrimahom arrived, and the day after that Barnagais arrived. Both brought the gibri which they are obliged to pay to the king, and with them came the chauas of their lands, that is the men-at-arms; and also many lords came with them. When these lords were assembled, before they presented their gibris, Prester John commanded that the Betudete should come and present the gibri of Gojame which had already passed before him, as has been said. As this was on Friday, and the holydays of Saturday and Sunday were following, the Betudete came on Monday following with the gibri, and with the same formalities as before; and this in the presence of Barnagais and Tigrimahom and many other gentlemen who had come with them. He spent the whole day, from morning till night, in presenting it and its reception. The following day, after the hour of prime, Barnagais began to give his gibri, and he began with very handsome horses; there were a hundred and fifty, and what with running and making them jump, he passed the day without doing anything else. The day after they said that he presented many silks and much thin stuffs from India; I did not see him present these, as I was unwell. When this was presented the following day very early, Tigrimahom began to present his gibri. He also began with horses, which were two hundred, larger and more handsome than those of the Barnagais, because they came from a less distance; and of one set and of the other most came from Egypt, and others from Arabia. This day nothing was done but horses. The next day they presented more silks than ever I had seen together, and the whole day passed in presenting, counting and receiving. On the following Tuesday, at the hour of midday, Balgada Robel, a great gentleman, subject to Tigrimahom, came to present his gibri separately. It was thirty horses, all from Egypt, the size of elephants, and very fat, each horse with a Xumagali, that is a gentleman without title, and eight of these Xumagali were dressed in some very good cuirasses of ours, and some of them placed on velvet, and others on soft leather and gilt studs. These eight wore some of our helmets on their heads. Balgada Robel was counted among these eight, and the twenty-two all wore coats of mail with full sleeves and fitting close to the body. All the thirty carried two azagays and several knives like Turks: and all had small red caps with large ends, which fluttered in the wind. Before them came two little negroes dressed in red and yellow livery, each upon a camel covered with the same livery, and sounding kettledrums. As soon as they reached near the tent of the Prester, they set aside the horses at one end and did not cease from their music and the Xumagalis from skirmishing: they did it in such a way that the Prester ordered other horses to be brought of those given by the Barnagais and Tigrimahom, that they should play also. This lasted till sunset. This Balgada Robel is a gentleman to whom on our coming Don Rodrigo gave a helmet, and sold him a sword for a mule. They said that he was always fighting with the Moors, and so he has at Court the reputation of a great warrior and good knight.

Of the chauas, that is the men-at-arms, who came with the Barnagais and Tigrimahom and the gentlemen of their company, Prester John sent fifteen thousand with a gentleman of the title of Adrugaz, already mentioned several times in this book, to go immediately to the Kingdom of Adea and establish the King in peace in his kingdom, and the Queen of Adea was to go more at leisure. The Queen and the Adrugaz set out immediately, and they said that they had more than a month’s journey through the Prester’s country before reaching the Kingdom of Adea. When this Queen had departed, on the following day the King ordered the arrest of the Betudete who had brought the gibri of Gojame. He also ordered that the other Betudete, who was named Canha, should be arrested, and so he ordered with respect to Tigrimahom. They were all made prisoners in one day, and early in the morning he set out and all the Court with him, and we in our turn: the Prester’s ambassador and I were at a river feeding the mules, and there passed by this Betudete who brought the gibri, and he said to me “Abba baraqua,” which means “Father give me a blessing.” I answered “Izi baraqua,” which means “God bless you.” This Betudete was accompanied by fifteen gentlemen on mules, and we mounted and went on in his company. As soon as I approached him he took my hand and kissed it, and again asked for my blessing, saying, “What do you think of this; do they thus make prisoners of great men in your country?” I replied that in my country, if great lords were arrested for small matters or for the anger of the King, they gave them their own houses for prisons, and if it was for great things they were prisoners in large castles and prisons. He, with tears which ran down the whole of his face, again said to me: “Father, pray to God for me, for I shall die of this.” And I continued encouraging and consoling him to the best of my ability until in the afternoon he separated from us, and all those who came with him, both on mules and on foot, were none of them his men. On the following day we again met, and he began again with me as the day before, and I with him; he always begging me to pray to God for him, as he would die in that prison. And the restraint under which he was consisted of a very slender chain a fathom long, just like a chain for holding dogs, and a small thin ring at the wrist, and he carried the chain itself in his hand, and those who accompanied him were all guards. We arrived one Thursday where the king’s tents were pitched, and they say that that night Prester John ordered that they should bring to him the Betudete, and those who guarded him brought him; and two of the Betudete’s sons were that night in his company. When he was before the door of the tent, the Prester from within sent pages to bring the Betudete behind the tent, as he wished to speak to him in person, and the guards and his sons were to wait, withdrawn a little from the door of the tent. There they waited until morning, when the Prester travelled, and all of us with him, without there being any news of the Betudete, whether he was dead or alive; nor what had become of him. The two sons who went with him to the door of the tent, and three who had remained at home, all grown men and great gentlemen, and good knights (according to report), made great lamentation with all their servants and those of their father, for he had a household like that of a great king. Then the Prester ordered that the Betudete’s sons should travel alone, without their servants or those of their father, and so it was. I saw them all five travelling without a groom or anybody; stripped from the waist upwards, and without their black fleecy sheep skins on their shoulders, and from the waist downwards they had black cloths, and their mules were covered with black. Their people and those of their father travelled separately, and in mourning, and all on foot, with their mules saddled in front of them. On the following Tuesday we came to stop at the entrance of the Kingdom of Oyja, and here were preparations[241] to celebrate the feast of the Kings,[242] which they name tabuquete, and they celebrate baptism, as has been related above. Here these sons of the Betudete, as soon as it is morning, go from house to house, that is, to the houses or tents of the great men, as others are used to do, to search for news of their father, if he is alive or dead, or what had become of him, or what was expected to happen to him. They did not find any news until the end of fifteen days, when those came who had carried him to the Kingdom of Fatiguar, to a mountain which they say is at the edge of the Kingdom of Adel, and which is very high, and deep in the middle, and it has only one entrance; and they say that inside this mountain there are great herds of cows, and that anyone who newly enters there does not last more than four or five days, and soon dies of fevers; and that they had left him there without any person to serve him except the Moors, who would keep him there till he died. With this news the lamentation was greater than at first. Then they began to say through the Court that the Prester had given him this death because he had to do with his mother; and such had been the report when she was alive; and they say that he had a son of her; also that the Prester did not choose to kill him in the lifetime of his mother that she might not be more defamed than was already the case. As this began to be muttered about, proclamations were soon made throughout the Court that no one was to speak of the Betudete under pain of death. This report soon died out, and three months later, when we were near the sea in the country of Tigrimahom, there was news that the Betudete had not died, and that his sons, with the aid of the King of Adel, had rescued him, and that from Adel they were making much war upon the Prester. In these countries proclamations were made that no one was to speak of the Betudete, and they ceased. Then fresh news arose that the Prester had ordered the beheading of twenty Moors who guarded the Betudete, and of two of his own servants, because they had spoken to him, and the Moors because they had given them an opportunity for so doing; and this we learned was the truth. It was also said that the Prester wished to pardon him since God had given him life for so long a time in such a dangerous place, and because he missed him, for he was a man of great mind and a warrior.

As soon as we had arrived at the place where we were to keep the feast of the kings or tabuquete, before it was reported where the Betudete was, on the next night Prester John ordered the Tigrimahom to be taken away, neither was it then known where he had been taken to. The following day they sent to take away all that he had got in his tents, and for three days they did not cease to take away, and count and deliver up common silks, and camlets and good cloths of India. We found ourselves there six white men, that is to say, I, and another Portuguese, and four Genoese, and to each of us the Prester ordered to be given six cloths, that is, three camlets and three pieces of Indian stuffs. Many days did not pass before it was said that Prester John had ordered the Tigrimahom to be taken to the Kingdom of Damute to a very high mountain, which had only one entrance, and that one was artificial, and above it was uninhabited and very cold, and that there they sent men who were to die. And where we heard in the country of Tigrimahom news that the Betudete had escaped, that was untrue; but we found there certain news that the Tigrimahom had died in the said mountain, and had died of hunger and cold. In those days when we were at the Court, the other Betudete, who had been arrested, was deposed from his office, and Arraz Anubiata, who was Barnagais, was made Betudete. And they made Balgada Robel Tigrimahom, he who came with thirty well-equipped horses. There was a great rumour and talk at the Court about the death of Queen Helena. They said that since she had died all of them would die great and small, and that while she lived, all lived and were defended and protected; and she was the father and mother of all, and if the king took this road, his kingdoms would become deserts. When the tabuquete or baptism was ended, without the ambassador or I making further requests as to our claims, because we did not venture on account of the great affairs which we saw going on, the Prester sent to call us, and took away from Abdenago, our adversary, the great lordship which he held, and he bestowed on his ambassador both the land which we were claiming and that lordship which he had taken away, and so he dismissed us well satisfied. Before our departure a message arrived from the Adrugaz that they had gone with the Queen of Adea to the assistance of her husband, and that the people would not obey him, and wherever he went all ran away and took refuge in the mountains, and that His Highness should send more men. His Highness determined to go there in person, and to take the queen his wife to a place where we had already been with him, which is in the Kingdom of Orgabija, on the edge of the said Kingdom of Adea, and there to leave the queen and his children and all the Court. So he did, and there went with him some Portuguese, namely, Jorge d’Abreu, Diogo Fernandez, Afonso Mendes, and Alvarenga, and five or six Genoese. When they returned they said that as soon as the Prester had entered the Kingdom of Adea all the people came in, obeying him as their sovereign, and withal he did not desist from going forward to very near Magadoxo; and they said that it was a very fruitful kingdom, very wooded, so much so that they could not travel without cutting trees and making roads. They also said there were there plenty of provisions, and great breeding of herds, and many and very large animals of different sorts. They say that there is in this kingdom a great lake like a sea, which cannot be seen across from side to side, and they say there is in it an island, in which in a former time a Prester John had ordered a monastery to be built, and had put in it many friars, although it was a country of Moors. Pero de Covilham related this, and now these Portuguese and Genoese who went there say that the friars of that monastery nearly all died of fevers, and some few remained in another small monastery out of the island, and near the lake, and so they found them. And that on this occasion Prester John ordered many monasteries and churches to be built, and left there many priests and friars, and many laymen to inhabit and dwell in that kingdom. When the kingdom was pacified they came back to where they had left the Court. They say that this kingdom pays tribute of cows in great number, and which we saw at the Court. They say that they come from there as large as great horses, and white as snow and without horns, with large hanging ears.