Page:History of India Vol 7.djvu/65

 THE PORTUGUESE TURN PIRATES 39 decayed. " Thus," he concludes, " having nothing left in this world, neither gold, silver, nor any other prop- erty except the beard on my face, I send it to you to remain with you as a gage." As the " confusion of evils " reached its height in their coast-settlements, the Indo-Portuguese, now de- generated into colonies of half-breeds, tried to wring a living from sea-plunder. Their naval system had from the first lent itself to piracy and corsair descents. It developed into unrestrained buccaneering. The Portu- guese caravels and galleys became the scourge of the Eastern routes. From their pirate nests on the Bay of Bengal they swooped down on the approaches to the Ganges and terrorized the rich coast traffic of Arra- kan and Burma. Sometimes a successful adventurer like Nicote founded for himself a brief dominion. But hasty pillage, careless of the slaughter of infidels, was their main object. Gradually the Eastern sea-races from the Spice Islands to the Persian Gulf roused them- selves against the Christian robbers. Ternate in the far Moluccas shook off the Portuguese yoke (1575- 1576) ; Malacca, their great half-way place of strength, was again and again attacked by the King of Achin. Ceylon rose against them. Their Indian piracies brought on them the vengeance of the coast princes, and at length the crushing wrath of the Moghul Empire. Wherever we turn we see thfe same spectacle of oppression and ruin. The Sular islanders of the most eastern archipelago would not on our first arrival come near our §hips, as the Portuguese " had used to take