Whilst the captain-major was thus employed in taking in the ship's cargoes, the King of Cochym sent to call him, and he went immediately. The King, in private with the captain-major, told him that he had information from some of his men, whom he kept as spies in Calecut, who told him that the fleet of Calecut was now entirely ready, that it consisted of several large ships, and sambuks, and rowing barges, with much artillery and fighting-men, and two captain-majors-to wit, Coja Kasim, and the other, Cojambar, a Moorish eunuch, who had now arrived from Mekkah, and had come from the Maldive Islands in a small boat, and had left there two large ships which he had brought, laden with great wealth, and which he did not choose to risk, and he had come to learn if there were Portuguese in India-he, with great pride, had offered himself to the King to take our fleet. All this was very true, and therefore the King of Cochym begged the captain-major, and enjoined him by the life of the King of Portugal his brother, not to stay and fight with the fleet of Calecut, but to depart at once with the cargo which he had got, for very little was wanting, and it was not well to fight with ships so crammed, and he ought to fly from a possible disaster, and not take any other decision than to go out at once into the open sea, without returning to Cananor, and that he would give him in Cochym all that he required for the voyage for all the ships.