The Moors now became seriously jealous of the activity, power, and success of their rivals. They resorted to every means to excite the hostility of the zamorin and his subjects against them. They attacked and destroyed the Portuguese market, plundering it of goods to the amount of four thousand ducats. The inconstant zamorin offering neither apology nor restitution, Cabral determined on vengeance. He boarded two large Moorish vessels, killed six hundred men, and salted down three elephants for food. He then bombarded the town: palaces, temples, and store-houses crumbled to dust beneath the thunders of the artillery. The zamorin fled, and Cabral withdrew with his victorious fleet to Cochin, a rich capital one hundred and fifty miles to the south of Calicut, where pepper was abundant and the king was poor. Trimumpara, the monarch, was informed of the summary vengeance wreaked by the fleet upon his brother of Calicut, and at once offered the strangers hospitality and protection. The admiral sent him a silver basin full of saffron and a silver vial filled with rose-water. Trade and barter rapidly loaded the ships with the fragrant commodities of the country. A fleet of twenty-five sail now appeared in the offing, and Trimumpara told Cabral that their object was to attack him, and that they were sent by the zamorin of Calicut. Cabral, having been separated from his most efficient ship, determined not to venture a combat, and made for the north, casting anchor before Cananor, a town a little above Calicut. Here he found a commodious roadstead, an independent prince, and a soil abounding in ginger, cardamom-seeds, tamarinds, and cinnamon. Of the latter article he took four hundred quintals. The king, judging, from the insignificance of this purchase, that he was short of money, offered him a further supply upon credit. Cabral expressed his sense of appreciation of this generosity, but declined the proposition. The fleet now sailed homewards: one of the vessels was lost upon the African coast, and, taking fire, was destroyed with its contents. The six ships remaining of the twelve which had left Brazil, arrived at Lisbon on the 31st of July, 1501. Cabral was received with coldness by the king, partly on account of the loss of ships and men he had met with, and partly on account of his failure at Calicut, to which place he,--the king,--relying on Cabral's success, had sent out, three months previous to his return, a fleet of four vessels under Juan de Nueva. This expedition was singularly happy in its results,--Nueva lading his vessels to great advantage at Cananor, and discovering the island of St. Helena upon his homeward voyage. [Illustration: DA GAMA'S FLAG-SHIP.]