e and stole the custome in the night.
The king of Cochin hauing vnderstanding of this, would not suffer any more
Pepper to bee weighed. Then presently after this, the marchants were
licensed to doe as they did before, and there was no more speach of this
matter, nor any wrong done. This king of Cochin is of a small power in
respect of the other kings of the Indies, for hee can make but seuentie
thousand men of armes in his campe: hee hath a great number of Gentlemen
which hee calleth Amochi, and some are called Nairi: these two sorts of men
esteeme not their liues any thing, so that it may be for the honour of
their king, they will thrust themselues forward in euery danger, although
they know they shall die. These men goe naked from the girdle vpwardes,
with a clothe rolled about their thighs, going barefooted, and hauing their
haire very long and rolled vp together on the toppe of their heads, and
alwayes they carrie their Bucklers or Targets with them and their swordes
naked, these Nairi haue their wiues common amongst themselues, and when any
of them goe into the house of any of these women, hee leaueth his sworde
and target at the doore, and the time that hee is there, there dare not any
bee so hardie as to come into that house. The kings children shall not
inherite the kingdome after their father, because they hold this opinion,
that perchance they were not begotten of the king their father, but of some
other man, therfore they accept for their king, one of the sonnes of the
kings sisters, or of some other woman of the blood roial, for that they be
sure, they are of the blood roiall.

[Sidenote: A very strange thing hardly to be beleeued.] The Nairi and their
wiues vse for a brauerie to make great holes in their eares, and so bigge
and wide, that it is incredible, holding this opinion, that the greater the
holes bee, the more noble they esteeme themselues. I had leaue of one of
them to measure the circumference of one of them with a threed, and within
that circumference I put my arme vp to the shoulder, clothed as it was, so
that in effect they are monstrous great. Thus they doe make them when they
be litle, for then they open the eare, and hang a piece of gold or lead
thereat, and within the opening, in the whole they put a certaine leafe
that they haue for that purpose, which maketh the hole so great. They lade
ships in Cochin for Portugale and for Ormus, but they that goe for Ormus
carrie no Pepper but by Contraba