ignifying
_man of fire_) induced them to extend a hospitable welcome to his
countrymen, and for a time everything went on well. Coutinho had,
however, learned in India to be an oppressor, and the Tupinambas were
the fiercest and most powerful of the native tribes. The Portuguese were
obliged to abandon their settlement; but several of them returned at a
later period, with Caramuru, and thus a European community was
established in the district.

Some time before the period at which these captaincies were established,
a factory had been planted at Pernambuco. A ship from Marseilles took
it, and left seventy men in it as a garrison; but she was captured on
her return, and carried into Lisbon, and immediate measures were taken
for reoccupying the place. The captaincy of Pernambuco was granted to
Don Duarte Coelho Pereira as the reward of his services in India. It
extended along the coast from the Rio Sao Francisco, northward to the
Rio de Juraza. Duarte sailed with his wife and children, and many of his
kinsmen, to take possession, of his new colony, and landed in the port
of Pernambuco. To the town which was there founded he gave the name of
Olinda. The Cabetes, who possessed the soil, were fierce and
pertinacious; and, assisted by the French, who traded to that coast,
Coelho had to gain by inches what was granted him by leagues. The
Portuguese managed, however, to beat off their enemies; and, having
entered into an alliance with the Tobayanes, followed up their success.

Attempts were made about this time to establish two other captaincies,
but without success. Pedro de Goes obtained a grant of the captaincy of
Parahyba between those of Sao Vicente and Espirito Santo; but his means
were too feeble to enable him to make head against the aborigines, and
the colony was broken up after a painful struggle of seven years. Joao
de Barros, the historian, obtained the captaincy of Maranhao. For the
sake of increasing his capital, he divided his grant with Fernao Alvares
de Andrade and Aires da Cunha. They projected a scheme of conquest and
colonization upon a large scale. Nine hundred men, of whom one hundred
and thirteen were horsemen, embarked in ten ships under the command of
Aires da Cunha. But the vessels were wrecked upon some shoals about one
hundred leagues to the south of Maranhao; the few survivors, after
suffering immense hardships, escaped to the nearest settlements, and the
undertaking was abandoned.

By these adve