10 



JOURNAL, R.A.S. (CEYLON). [VOL. XX. 



dated 3rd February 1614 1 , we learn that Couto had written 

 to the king (at the end of 1612 evidently), but this was on a 

 matter connected with his duties, and had nothing to do with 

 his Historyof India. During that year (1612) Couto's Decade 

 V. had been published in Lisbon 2 , and in 1614 Decade VI. was 

 all printed 3 , awaiting only the preliminary leaves and the 

 title-page, when a disastrous fire took place in the printer's 

 premises, whereby many of the copies were destroyed 4 . The 

 sight of these two Decades in print, and the receipt of Decades 

 XI. and XII. in manuscript from Couto, were probably the 

 causes that moved Philip III. to write to his viceroy (D. 

 Jeronimo de Azevedo) on 21 February 1615 as follows 5 : — 

 " Having respect to the services of Diogo do Couto, guar da 

 mor of the Torre do Tombo of that state, and to the continu- 

 ation and work with which he proceeds in the said office and 

 in the writing of the histories of those parts that he has taken 

 upon himself, I think well to bestow upon him the favor of 

 five hundred xerafins each year during his life 6 , and that for 

 the exercise of the said occupations be given him two clerks 

 who may assist him therein, who shall be paid quarterly, in 

 the form in which those of the secretary of that state are 

 paid ; with the declaration that he actually has them, and 

 that this shall be made manifest by certificate, before payment 



1 See Doc. Rem. iii. 38. 



2 I do not know why there should have been such a delay in the 

 printing of this and the subsequent Decades, unless it were the death, 

 in 1605, of Couto's brother-in-law, Fr. Adeodato da Trinidade, to 

 whom the king had committed the task of seeing the volumes through 

 the press. 



3 According to Barbosa Machado (Bibl. Lusit. i. 10), this Decade 

 was altered by Couto's brother-in-law, Fr. Adeodato da Trinidade (who 

 died in 1605). A comparison of this Decade with Francisco d'An- 

 drada's Cronica do .... rey .... D. Jodo III., published 1613, shows 

 that much of the matter in both works is identical. 



4 Man. Sev. de Faria says that the only copies that escaped were six 

 that happened to be in the convent of St. Augustine in Lisbon. This 

 is a manifest error, as many more than six copies of this edition (for 

 which no title-page and prefatory matter were ever printed) are in 

 existence. 



5 See Doc. Rem. iii. 254-5. 



6 Of. Bocarro xviii. 



