The man who
struck the fatal blow was of the royal lineage, and as soon as he
had done the deed of blood and seated himself on the throne he was
regarded as the legitimate king, provided that he contrived to
maintain his seat peaceably for a single day. This, however, the
regicide did not always succeed in doing. When Fern?o Peres
d'Andrade, on a voyage to China, put in at Passier for a cargo of
spices, two kings were massacred, and that in the most peaceable and
orderly manner, without the smallest sign of tumult or sedition in
the city, where everything went on in its usual course, as if the
murder or execution of a king were a matter of everyday occurrence.
Indeed, on one occasion three kings were raised to the dangerous
elevation and followed each other in the dusty road of death in a
single day. The people defended the custom, which they esteemed very
laudable and even of divine institution, by saying that God would
never allow so high and mighty a being as a king, who reigned as his
vicegerent on earth, to perish by violence unless for his sins he
thoroughly deserved it.
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