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 106 FIRST STRUGGLE FOR THE INDIAN SEAS by seizing Malacca. " For when Malacca is taken," he exhorted his captains, " the places on the Straits must be shut up, and they [the Moslems] will never more be able to introduce their spiceries into those places." In the year 1508 King Emmanuel had despatched an expedition under Diogo Lopes de Sequeira to explore Madagascar on one side of the Indian Ocean and the CAPE COMORIN, THE SOUTHERNMOST POINT OF INDIA. Malay Peninsula on the other. Sequeira, after a friendly reception by the Sultan of Malacca, set up a factory, but underwent the usual experience of hostility from the Arab traders and treachery from the court officials. He found himself compelled to sail away, leaving the factory and twenty Portuguese at the mercy of the natives. A squadron, despatched from Lisbon in 1510 to rescue these prisoners, was retained by Albuquerque in India to assist in the capture of Goa. In 1511 Albu- querque himself undertook the task, captured Malacca, built a fortress, and established a firm Portuguese gov-