On the 17th of March, 1498, Gama reached Melinda, and was consequently
completely within the boundary of the Greek and Roman discovery and
commerce in this part of the world. This city is represented as well built,
and displaying in almost every respect, proofs of the extensive trade the
inhabitants carried on with India, and of the wealth they derived from it.
Here Gama saw, for the first time, Banians, or Indian merchants: from them
he received much important information respecting the commercial cities of
the west coast of India: and at Melinda he took on board pilots, who
conducted his fleet across the Indian Ocean to Calicut on the coast of
Malabar, where he landed on the 22d of May, 1498, ten months and two days
after his departure from Lisbon. He returned to Lisbon in 1499, and again
received the command of a squadron in 1502; he died at Cochin in 1525,
after having lived to witness his country sovereign of the Indian seas from
Malacca to the Cape of Good Hope. "The consequence of his discovery was the
subversion of the Turkish power, which at that time kept all Europe in
alarm. The East no longer paid tribute for her precious commodities, which
passed through the Turkish provinces; the revenues of that empire were
diminished; the Othmans ceased to be a terror to the western world, and
Europe has risen to a power, which the three other continents may in vain
endeavour to oppose.
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