158 Coromandel Heading further along the coast as it turns Northwards, one comes to a country called Coromandel, which stretches for around seventy to eighty leagues along the coast, where there are many cities; towns, and villages, inhabited by many gentiles. This plentiful land belonging to the King of Vijayanagara produces a lot of rice; wheat; meat, and all the other vegetables which grow here; it is arable land. Many ships from Malabar come here each year to load up on rice, which they make a great deal of money from. They bring many goods from Cambay here, such as copper; quicksilver; vermillion; pepper and many other commodities. There are also many spices and remedies in this province of Coromandel, which come from the kingdom of Malacca; China, and Bengal, which the Mouros bring here on their ships, because they are too afraid of our navies to go as far as Malabar. This is the most abundant land in these parts of India, with the exception of Cambay. If, however, there are some years in which it does not rain, there is such hunger that many of them die, and for this reason, they sell their children for four orfive fanões; the Malabars bring them large quantities of rice and coconuts at these times and return with their ships laden with slaves. Most if not all gentile and Chetty merchants that live throughout India originally come from here and they are very sharp men in all sorts of trade. Many local Mouros live in the seaports; they are great merchants and have many ships. Maliapur Further on, beyond Coromandel and its country, one comes to a very old city right on the sea-coast which is almost deserted. It is called Maliapur and used to be a beautiful large city, belonging to the King of Vijayanagara himself, where the body of Blessed Saint Thomas is buried, in a small church close to the sea. The Quilon Christians say that
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