COLUMBUS IN CHAINS AT CADIZ.CHAPTER XVII.THE FAILING HEALTH OF COLUMBUS—HIS FOURTH VOYAGES—MARTINIQUE, PORTO RICCO, NICARAGUA, COSTA RICCA, PANAMA—HIS SEARCH FOR A CHANNEL ACROSS THE ISTHMUS—HE PREDICTS AN ECLIPSE OF THE MOON AT JAMAICA—HIS RETURN—THE DEATH OF ISABELLA—COLUMBUS PENNILESS AT VALLADOLID—HIS DEATH—HIS FOUR BURIALS—THE INJUSTICE OF THE WORLD TOWARDS COLUMBUS—CHRISTOPHER PIGEON—AMERIGO VESPUCCI—THE NEW WORLD NAMED AMERICA—ERRORS OF MODERN HISTORIANS—THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA—JOHN CABOT IN LABRADOR—SEBASTIAN CABOT IN HUDSON'S BAY—VINCENT YANEZ PINZON AT THE MOUTHS OF THE AMAZON.Columbus was now advanced in years, and his sufferings and labors had dimmed his eyesight and bowed his frame; but his mind was yet active, and his enthusiasm in the cause of discoveryirrepressible. He had convinced himself, and now sought to convince the queen, that to the westward of the regions he had visited the land converged, leaving a narrow passage through which he hoped to pass, and proceed to the Indies beyond. This convergence of the land did in reality exist, but the strait of water he expected to find was, and is, a strait of land—the Isthmus of Panama. However, the queen approved of the plan, and gave him four ships, equipped and victualled for two years. Columbus had conceived the immense idea of passing through the strait, and returning by Asia and the Cape of Good Hope, thus circumnavigating the globe and proving its spherical form. He departed from Cadiz on the 8th of May, 1502.He touched at, and named, Martinique early in June, and afterwards at St. Jean, now Porto Ricco. Ovando refused his request to land at Isabella to repair his vessel and exchange one of them for a faster sailer. Escaping a terrible storm, which wrecked and utterly destroyed the splendid fleet in which the rapacious pillagers of the island had embarked their ill-gotten wealth, he was driven by the winds to Jamaica, and thence by the currents to Cuba. Here a strong north wind enabled him to sail south southwest, towards the latitude where he expected to find the strait. He touched the mainland of North America at Truxillo, in Honduras, and coasted thence southward along the Mosquito shore, Nicaragua, Costa Ricca, and Panama. Here he explored every sinuosity and indentation of the shore, seeking at the very spot where civilization and commerce now require a canal, a passage which he considered as demanded by Nature and accorded by Providence. He followed the isthmus as far as the Gulf of Darien, and then, driven by a furious tropical tempest, returned as far as Veragua, in search of rich gold mines of which he had heard. The storm lasted for eight days, concluding with a terrible display of water-spouts, which Columbus is said to have regarded as a work of the devil, and to have dispelled by bringing forth the Bible and exorcising the demon.One of the water-spouts passed between the ships without injuring them, and spun away, muttering and terrible, to spend its fury elsewhere.THE WATERSPOUT.On reaching Veragua, Columbus sent his brother up a river, which he called Bethlehem, or by contraction Belem, to seek for gold. His researches seeming to indicate the presence of the precious metal, Columbus determined to establish a colony upon the river, an attempt which was defeated by the hostility of the natives. Their fierce resistance and the crazy state of his vessels forced Columbus, in April, 1503, to make the best of his way to Hispaniola with two crowded vessels, which, being totally unseaworthy, he was obliged to run ashore at Jamaica. There Columbus awed the natives and subdued them to obedience and submission, by predicting an eclipse of the moon.Thus left without a single vessel, he had no resource but to send to Hispaniola for assistance. After a period of fifteen months lost in quelling mutinies and in opposing the crueltiesand exactions of the new masters of the island, he obtained a caravel, and again sailed for Spain on the 12th of September, 1504. During the passage, he was compelled, by a severe attack of rheumatism, to remain confined to his cabin. His tempest-tossed and shattered bark at last cast anchor in the harbor of San Lucar. He proceeded to Seville, where he heard, with dismay, of the illness, and then of the death, of his patroness Isabella. Sickness now detained him at Seville till the spring of 1505, when he arrived, exhausted and paralytic, before the king. Here he underwent another courtly denial of redress. He was now without shelter and without hope. He was compelled to borrow money with which to pay for a shabby room at a miserable inn. He lingered for a year in poverty and neglect, and died at last in Valladolid, on the 20th of May, 1506. The revolting ingratitude of Ferdinand of Spain thus caused the death, in rags, in destitution, and in infirmity, of the greatest man that has ever served the cause of progress or labored in the paths of science. Had we written the life of Columbus, and not thus briefly sketched the history of his voyages, we should have found it easy to assert and maintain his claim to this commanding position.The agitation of the life of Columbus followed his remains to the grave,—for he was buried four successive times, and his dead body made the passage of the Atlantic. It was first deposited in the vaults of the Franciscan Convent of Valladolid, where it remained seven years. In 1513, Ferdinand, now old and perhaps repentant, caused the coffin to be brought from Valladolid to Seville, where a solemn service was said over it in the grand cathedral. It was then placed in the chapel belonging to the Chartreux. In 1536, the coffin was transported to the city of St. Domingo, in the island of Hispaniola. Here it remained for two hundred and sixty years. In 1795, Spain ceded the island to France, stipulating that the ashes of Columbus should be transferred to Spanish soil. In December of thesame year, the vault was opened, and the fragments which were found—those of a leaden coffin, mingled with bones and dust returned to dust—were carefully collected. They were carried on board the brigantine Discovery, which transported them to the frigate San Lorenzo, by which they were taken to Havana, where, in the presence of the Governor-General of Cuba and in the midst of imposing ceremonies, they were consigned to their fourth and final resting-place.It will not be altogether out of place to group together here the numerous and remarkable instances of the world's injustice and ingratitude towards Columbus. We have said that he died in penury at Valladolid. A publication, issued periodically in that city from 1333 to 1539, chronicling every event of local interest—births, marriages, deaths, fires, executions, appointments, church ceremonies—did not mention, or in any way allude to, the death of Columbus. Pierre Martyr, a poet of Lombardy, once his intimate friend, and who had said, at the time of his first voyage, that by singing of his discoveries he would descend to immortality with him, seemed to think, later in life, that he should peril his chances of immortality were he to sing of his death, for his muse held her peace. In 1507, a collection of voyages was published by Fracanzo de Montalbodo, in which no mention was made of Columbus' fourth voyage, and in which Columbus himself was alluded to as still alive. In 1508, a Latin translation of this work was published, in the preface to which Columbus was mentioned as still living in honor at the court of Spain. Another famous work of the time attributes the discovery of the New World, not to the calculations and science of a man, but to the accidental wanderings of a tempest-driven caravel. Not ten years after the death of Columbus, the chaplain of one of the kings of Italy, in a work upon "Memorable Events in Spain," stated that a New World had been discovered in the West by onePeter Columbus. And, in the same taste and spirit, a German doctor, inthe first German book which spoke of the New World, did not once mention the name of Columbus, but, translating the proper name as if it were a common noun, calls him Christoffel Dawber, which, being translated back again, signifiesChristopher Pigeon.We shall now speak of that signal instance of public ingratitude and national forgetfulness which is universally regretted, yet will never be repaired,—the giving to the New World the name of America and not that of Columbia,—a substitution due to an obscure and ignorant French publisher of St. Dié, in Lorraine.Amerigo Vespucci, born at Florence fifteen years after Columbus, and the third son of a notary, appears to have been led by mercantile tastes to Spain in 1486, where he became a factor in a wealthy house at Seville. He abandoned the counter, however, for navigation and mathematics, and took to the sea for a livelihood. He was at first a practical astronomer, and finally a pilot-major. He went four times on expeditions to the New World, in 1499, 1500, 1501, 1502. During the first, he coasted along the land at the mouths of the Orinoco, which had been discovered by Columbus the preceding year. Even had he been the first to discover the mainland,—which he was not,—there would have been no merit in it, for he was merely a subordinate officer on board a ship following in the track of Columbus, seven years after the latter had traced it upon the ocean and the charts of the marine. He published an account of his voyage. But it does not appear that he ever claimed honor as the first discoverer, and the friendly relations he maintained with the family of Columbus after the death of the latter show that they did not consider him as attempting to obtain a distinction which did not belong to him. The error flowed from another and more distant source.Columbus had died in 1506, and had been forgotten. In 1507, a Frenchman of St. Dié republished Vespucci's narrative,substituting the date of 1497 for that of 1499,—thus making it appear that Vespucci had preceded, instead of followed, Columbus in his discovery of the mainland. He did not once mention Columbus, and attributed the whole merit of the western voyages to Vespucci. He added that he did not see why from the name of Amerigo an appellation could not be derived for the continent he had discovered, and proposed that of America, as having a feminine termination like that of Europa, Asia, and Africa, and as possessing a musical sound likely to catch the public ear. This work was dedicated to the Emperor Maximilian, and passed rapidly through editions in various languages.Thus far no specific name had been given to the continent. Its situation was sometimes indicated upon maps by a cross, and sometimes by the wordsTerra Sanctæ Crucis, sive Mundus Novus, often printed in red capitals. In 1522, for the first time, the name of America, under its French form ofAmérique, was printed upon a map at Lyons. Germany followed, and the presses of Basle and Zurich aided the usurpation. Florence was but too eager to accept a name which flattered her vanity; and, as Genoa did not protest in the name of Columbus, Italy yielded to the current, and did a large share in the labor of injustice. In 1570, the name of America was for the first time engraved upon a metal globe, and from this time forward the spoliation may be regarded as accomplished. Columbus had been twice buried and twice forgotten; and now his very name was lost,—the continent he had found having been baptized in honor of another, and his race in the male line being extinct,—for Diego and Fernando had died without heirs.In modern times, in our own day even, it has been a common practice to depreciate the services of Columbus, and eminent writers have thought it no disgrace to profess and testify ignorance of his history and life. Raynal, a French philosopher of distinction, declared, about the year 1760, that the passageof the Cape of Good Hope by Vasco da Gama was a greater achievement than the crossing of the Atlantic by Columbus. He offered a prize for disquisitions upon the question, "Has the discovery of America been useful or prejudicial to the human race?" Buffon seems, too, to have considered the discoveries of the Portuguese in the East as more important than those of Columbus in the West. Robertson, in his History of America, says that even without Columbus some happy accident would have discovered the New World a few years later. Fontenelle, and many others, attribute the first notice of the variation of the compass to Cabot in 1497, though Columbus distinctly mentions noticing it in his journal on the 13th of September, 1492. A late Spanish historian writes:—"Columbus made nothing but discoveries in these regions; conquest was reserved for Cortez and Pizarro." Lamartine makes an error of fifteen years in stating the period of the return of Columbus to Spain. Dumas asserts that Columbus passed "a portion of his life in prison,"—an expression he would not probably have used, knowingly, to designate a period of three months. Granier de Cassagnac places the last voyage of Columbus in 1493, instead of 1502. St. Hilaire makes the celebrated Las Casas cross the sea with Columbus nine years too soon. These mis-statements, though not resulting in distortion or misrepresentation of character, are the effects of that indifference which for centuries history has manifested towards the life, services, and death of Columbus.Columbia is the poetic and symbolical name of America, occurring in the National Anthem and in numerous effusions of patriotic verse. An effort to avenge the memory of the discoverer was made by giving his name, officially, to a tract borrowed from Virginia and Maryland, and measuring one hundred miles square,—the seat of the American Government. So far from this tardy acknowledgment being a reparation, however, it is probable that the spirit of the departed benefactor, if summonedto speak, would declare it the last, and by no means the least, of the long line of insults that an ungrateful posterity had heaped upon his memory.It will be proper to add to this view of the voyages of Columbus a brief account of those effected immediately afterwards by John and Sebastian Cabot, and by Vincent Yanez Pinzon.In the year 1496, Henry VII. of England, stimulated by the success of Columbus, granted a patent to one Giovanni Gabotto, a Venetian dwelling in Bristol, to go in search of unknown lands. Little is known of this person, whose name has been Anglicized into John Cabot, except that he was a wealthy and intelligent merchant and fond of maritime discovery. He had three sons, one of whom, named Sebastian, was nineteen years old at the time of the voyage, upon which, with his brothers, he accompanied his father. They sailed in a ship named the Matthew, and on the 24th of June, 1497, discovered the mainland of America, eighteen months before Columbus set foot upon it at the mouths of the Orinoco. For a long time it was supposed that Cabot had landed upon Newfoundland, but it is now considered settled that Labrador was the portion of the continent first discovered by a European. No account of the further prosecution of the voyage has reached us, and the only official record of Cabot's return is an entry in the privy-purse expenses of Henry, 10th August, 1497:-"To hym that found the New Isle, 10l." Thus, fifty days had not elapsed between the discovery and its recompense in England,—a fact which shows that Cabot returned home at once. He is supposed to have died about the year 1499.Sebastian Cabot, the second son, who is regarded as by far the most scientific navigator of this family of seamen, appears to have lived in complete obscurity during the following twelve years. Disgusted, however, by the want of consideration of the English authorities towards him, he accepted an invitation from King Ferdinand to visit Spain in 1512. Here, for severalyears, he was employed in revising maps and charts, and, with the title of Captain and a liberal salary, held the honorable position of Member of the Council of the Indies. The death of Ferdinand and the intrigues of the enemies of Columbus induced him to return to England in 1517. He was employed by Henry VIII., in connection with one Sir Thomas Perte, to make an attempt at a Northwest passage. On this voyage he is said to have gained Hudson's Bay, and to have given English names to sundry places there. So few details of the expedition have been preserved, that the latitude reached (67 1/2 degrees) is referred by different authorities both to the north and the south. The malice or cowardice of Sir Thomas Perte compelled Cabot to return without accomplishing any thing worthy of being recorded. It was often said afterwards, that if the New World could not be called Columbia, it would be better to name it Cabotiana than America.Vincent Yanez Pinzon, the youngest of the three brothers who had accompanied Columbus upon his first voyage, determined, upon hearing, in 1499, that the continent was discovered, on trying his fortunes at the head of an expedition, instead of in a subordinate position. He found no difficulty in equipping four caravels, and in inducing several of those who had seen the coast of Paria to embark with him as pilots. He sailed from Palos in December, 1499, and proceeded directly to the southwest. During a storm which obscured the heavens he crossed the equator, and on the disappearance of the clouds no longer recognised the constellations, changed as they were from those of the Northern to those of the Southern hemisphere. Pinzon was thus the first European who crossed the line in the Atlantic. The sailors, unacquainted with the Southern sky, and dismayed at the absence of the polar star, were for a time filled with superstitious terrors. Pinzon, however, persisted, and, on the 20th of January, 1500, discovered land in eight degrees of south latitude. He took possession for the Crown of Spain,and named it Santa Maria de la Consolaçion. We shall soon have occasion to mention why this name was superseded by that of Brazil.Pinzon explored with amazement the huge mouths of the Amazon, whose immense torrents, as they emptied into the sea, freshened its waters for many leagues from the land. Sailing to the north, he followed the coast for four hundred leagues, and then returned to Palos, carrying with him three thousand pounds' weight of dye-woods and the first opossum ever seen in Europe.And now, having closed the fifteenth century with the achievements of the Spanish in the West, we open the sixteenth with those of the Portuguese in the East.THE PHAETON OR TROPIC BIRD.VASCO DA GAMA.CHAPTER XVIII.PORTUGUESE NAVIGATION UNDER EMMANUEL—POPULAR PREJUDICES—THE LUSIAD OF CAMOENS—VASCO DA GAMA—MAPS OF AFRICA OF THE PERIOD—PREPARATIONS FOR AN INDIAN VOYAGE—RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES—THE DEPARTURE—RENDEZVOUS AT THE CAPE VERDS—LANDING UPON THE COAST—THE NATIVES—AN INVITATION TO DINNER, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES—A STORM—MUTINY—THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.In the year 1495, John II. of Portugal was succeeded by his cousin, Emmanuel, into whose mind he had a short time before his death instilled a portion of his own zeal for maritime discovery and commercial supremacy. He had especially dwelt upon the necessity of continuing the progress of African research beyond the point which Bartholomew Diaz had lately reached, into the regions where lay the East Indies with their wealth and marvellous productions, and thus substituting for the tedious land-route a more expeditious track by sea. Upon hisaccession, Emmanuel found that a strong opposition existed to the extension of Portuguese commerce and discovery. Arguments were urged against it in his own councils, and had a marked effect upon the public mind by heightening the danger of the intended voyage.In our narrative of the first East Indian expedition, we shall often have occasion to quote from a poem written in commemoration of it,—the Lusiad of Camoens, a semi-religious epic and the masterpiece of Portuguese literature,—Lusiade being the poetic and symbolical name of Portugal. Camoens describes at the outset the hostility of the nation to further maritime adventure, and places in the mouth of a reverend adviser of the king the following forcible appeal:"Oh, frantic thirst of Honor and of Fame,The crowd's blind tribute, a fallacious name;What stings, what plagues, what secret scourges cursed,Torment those bosoms where thy pride is nursed!What dangers threaten and what deaths destroyThe hapless youth whom thy vain gleams decoy!Thou dazzling meteor, vain as fleeting air,What new dread horror dost thou now prepare?Oh, madness of Ambition! thus to dareDangers so fruitless, so remote a war!That Fame's vain flattery may thy name adorn,And thy proud titles on her flag be borne:Thee, Lord of Persia, thee of India lord,O'er Ethiopia vast, and Araby adored!"Never was any expedition, whether by land or water, so unpopular as this of King Emmanuel. The murmurs of the cabinet were re-echoed by the populace, who were wrought upon to such an extent that they believed the natural consequence of an invasion of the Indian seas would be the arrival in the Tagus of the wroth and avenging Sultan of Egypt. But Emmanuel, who, we are told, "regarded Diffidence as the mark of a low and grovelling mind, and Hope the quality of a noble and aspiring soul," discerned prospects of national advantage in the scheme, and determined to pursue it to a prosperous issue.King John, before his death, and shortly after the return of Diaz, had ordered timber to be purchased for the construction of ships fit to cope with the storms of the redoubtable Cape. Emmanuel now sought a capable commander, and, after much deliberation, fixed upon a gentleman of his own household, Vasco da Gama by name, a native of the seaport of Sines, and already favorably known for enterprise and naval skill. We are told that "he was formed for the service to which he was called,—violent indeed in his temper, terrible in anger, and sudden in the execution of justice, but at the same time intrepid, persevering, patient in difficulties, fertile in expedients, and superior to all discouragement. He devoted himself to death if he should not succeed, and this from a sense of religion and loyalty." When the king acquainted him with the mission intrusted to his charge, Vasco replied that he had long aspired to the honor of conducting such an undertaking. Camoens makes da Gama thus describe his acceptance of the honor:"'Let skies on fire,Let frozen seas, let horrid war, conspire:I dare them all,' I cried, 'and but repineThat one poor life is all I can resign.'"The most distinguished members of the Portuguese nobility were present at this interview. The king gave da Gama, with his own hands, the flag he was to bear,—a white cross enclosed within a red one,—the Cross of the military Order of Christ. Upon this he took the oath of allegiance. Emmanuel then delivered him the journal of Covillam, with such charts as were then in existence, and letters to all the Indian potentates who had become known to the Portuguese. Among these was of course one addressed to the renowned Prester John.MAP OF AFRICA DRAWN IN THE YEAR 1497.A map of Africa had been lately designed, in accordance with the discoveries made by land, as we have mentioned, by Covillam. The accompanying specimen is a fac-simile of one which belonged to Juan de la Cosa—the pilot of Columbus. Upon it the principal cities are indicated by a roughly sketched house or church; the government is denoted by a picture of a king, closely resembling the royal gentry in a pack of cards; while flags, planted at intervals, indicate boundary lines and frontier posts. The winds are represented by fabulous divinities sitting round the world upon leathern bottles, whose sides they are pressing to force out the air. The celebrated statue of the Canaries is often seen flourishing his club at the top of his tower. Abyssinia figures with its Prester John, his head being adorned with a brilliant mitre. Other kingdoms are marked out by portraits of their kings in richly embroidered costumes. The inhabitants of Africa, in maps of the world, are represented as giraffes, black men, and elephants. Portuguese camps are denoted by colored tents, while groups of light cavalry, splendidly caparisoned, dotting the territory at numerous points, indicate that the Portuguese army is making the tour of that mysterious continent. These quaint specimens of chartographical art are,in short, the faithful expression of the geographical science of the age.The fleet equipped for da Gama's voyage consisted of three ships and a caravel,—the San Gabriel, of one hundred and twenty tons, commanded by da Gama, and piloted by Pero Dalemquer, who had been pilot to Bartholomew Diaz; the San Rafael, of one hundred tons, commanded by Paulo da Gama, the admiral's brother; a store-ship of two hundred tons; and the caravel, of fifty tons, commanded by Nicolao Coelho. Besides these, Diaz, who had already been over the route, was ordered to accompany da Gama as far as the Mina. The crews numbered in all one hundred and sixty men, among whom were ten malefactors condemned to death, and who had consequently nothing to hope for in Portugal. Their duty in the fleet was to go ashore upon savage coasts and attempt to open intercourse with the natives. In case of rendering essential service and escaping with their lives, their sentence was to be remitted on their return home.A small chapel stood upon the seaside about four miles from Lisbon. Hither da Gama and his crew repaired upon the day preceding that fixed for their departure. They spent the night in prayer and rites of devotion, invoking the blessing and protection of Heaven. On the morrow, the adventurers marched to their ships in the midst of the whole population of Lisbon, who now thronged the shore of Belem. A long procession of priests sang anthems and offered sacrifice. The vast multitude, catching the fire of devotion and animated with the fervor of religious zeal, joined aloud in the prayers for their safety. The parents and relatives of the travellers shed tears, and da Gama himself wept on bidding farewell to the friends who gathered round him.Camoens thus describes the emotions of the adventurers as they gazed at the receding shore:"As from our dear-loved native shore we fly,Our votive shouts, redoubled, rend the sky:'Success! Success!' far echoes o'er the tide,While our broad hulks the foaming waves divide.When slowly gliding from our wistful eyes,The Lusian mountains mingle with the skies;Tago's loved stream and Cintra's mountains cold,Dim fading now, we now no more behold;And still with yearning hearts our eyes explore,Till one dim speck of land appears no more."The admiral had fixed upon the Cape Verd Islands as the first place of rendezvous in case of separation by storm. They all arrived safely in eight days at the Canaries, but were here driven widely apart by a tempest at night. The three captains subsequently joined each other, but could not find the admiral. They therefore made for the appointed rendezvous, where, to their great satisfaction, they found da Gama already arrived; "and, saluting him with many shots of ordnance, and with sound of trumpets, they spake unto him, each of them heartily rejoicing and thanking God for their safe meeting and good fortune in this their first brunt of danger and of peril." Diaz here took leave of them and returned to Portugal. Then, on the 3d of August, they set sail finally for the Cape of Good Hope.They continued without seeing land during the months of August, September, and October, greatly distressed by foul weather, or, in the quaint language of those days, "by torments of wind and rain." At last, on the 7th of November, they touched the African coast, and anchored in a capacious bay, which they called the Bay of St. Helena, and which is not far to the north of the Cape. Here they perceived the natives "to bee lyttle men, ill favored in the face, and of color blacke; and when they did speake, it was in such manner as though they did alwayes sigh." Camoens rhapsodizes at length over this approach to the land; and it must be remembered that, having followed in da Gama's track as early as the year 1553, his descriptions of scenery are those of an eye-witness:"Loud through the fleet the echoing shouts prevail:We drop the anchor and restrain the sail;And now, descending in a spacious bay,Wide o'er the coast the venturous soldiers stray,To spy the wonders of the savage shoreWhere strangers' foot had never trod before.I and my pilots, on the yellow sand,Explore beneath what sky the shores expand.Here we perceived our venturous keels had pass'd,Unharmed, the Southern tropic's howling blast,And now approached dread Neptune's secret reign:Where the stern power, as o'er the Austral mainHe rides, wide scatters from the Polar StarHail, ice, and snow, and all the wintry war."Trade was now commenced between da Gama and the natives, and, by means of signs and gestures, cloth, beads, bells, and glass were bartered for articles of food and other necessaries. But this friendly intercourse was soon interrupted by an act of imprudent folly on the part of a young man of the squadron. Being invited to dine by a party of the natives, he entered one of their huts to partake of the repast. Being disgusted at the viands, which consisted of a sea-calf dressed after the manner of the Hottentots, he fled in dismay. He was followed by his perplexed entertainers, who were anxious to learn how they had offended him. Taking their officious hospitality for impertinent aggression, he shouted for help; and it was not long before mutual apprehension brought on open hostilities. Da Gama and his officers were attacked, while taking the altitude of the sun with an astrolabe, by a party of concealed negroes armed with spears pointed with horn. The admiral was wounded in the foot, and with some difficulty effected a retreat to the ships. He left the Bay of St. Helena on the 16th of November.He now met with a sudden and violent change of weather, and the Portuguese historians have left animated descriptions of the storm which ensued. During any momentary pause in the elemental warfare, the sailors, worn out with fatigue and yielding to despair, surrounded da Gama, begging that he would not devote himself and them to a fate so dreadful. They declared that the gale could no longer be weathered, andthat every one must be buried in the waves if they continued to proceed. The admiral's firmness remained unshaken, and a conspiracy was soon formed against him. He was informed in time of this desperate plot by his brother Paulo. He put the ringleaders and pilots in irons, and, assisted by his brother and those who remained faithful to their duty, stood night and day to the helm. At length, on Wednesday, the 20th of November, the whole squadron doubled the tremendous promontory. The mutineers were pardoned and released from their manacles.The legend of the Spectre of the Cape is given by Camoens in full; and it is so characteristic of the age, and, as an episode, is itself so interesting, that we cannot refrain from quoting it entire. Da Gama is supposed to be relating his experience in the first person:"I spoke, when, rising through the darken'd air,Appall'd, we saw a hideous phantom glare.High and enormous o'er the flood he tower'd,And thwart our way with sullen aspect lower'd;An earthly paleness o'er his cheeks was spread,Erect uprose his hairs of wither'd red;Writhing to speak, his sable lips disclose,Sharp and disjoin'd, his gnashing teeths' blue rows;His haggard beard flow'd quivering in the wind;Revenge and horror in his mien combined;His clouded front, by withering lightnings sear'd,The inward anguish of his soul declared.Cold, gliding horrors fill'd each hero's breast;Our bristling hair and tottering knees confess'dWild dread. The while, with visage ghastly wan,His black lips trembling, thus the fiend began:'Ye sons of Lusus, who, with eyes profane,Have view'd the secrets of my awful reign,Have pass'd the bounds which jealous nature drewTo veil her secret shrine from mortal view;Hear from my lips what direful woes attend,And, bursting soon, shall o'er your race descend:With every bounding keel that dares my rage,Eternal war my rocks and storms shall wage.The next proud fleet that through my drear domainWith daring hand shall hoist the streaming vane,That gallant navy, by my whirlwinds toss'd,And raging seas, shall perish on my coast.Then he who first my secret reign descried,A naked corpse, wide floating o'er the tide,Shall drive. Unless my heart's full raptures fail,O Lusus, oft shalt thou thy children wail!Each year thy shipwreck'd sons shalt thou deplore,Each year thy sheeted masts shall strew my shore!'"THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.The cut upon previous page—a copy from an antique original—represents da Gama's ship and the Spectre of the Cape. The table-land of the promontory is seen through the drift of the tempest, towards the east. The ship is broached to, her sails close-furled, with the exception of the foresail, which has broken loose and is flapping wildly in the hurricane. Both the engraving and the description we have quoted from Camoens are strikingly illustrative of those visionary horrors which pervaded the minds of the navigators of the period, and are also characteristic of that peculiar cloud whose sudden envelopment of the Cape is the sure forerunner of a storm. The artist seems to have chosen the moment when the spectre, having uttered his dreadful prophecy, is vanishing into air.PHOSPHORESCENCE.THE MAN OVERBOARD, AND THE ALBATROSS.CHAPTER XIX.DA GAMA AND THE NEGROES—THE HOTTENTOTS AND CAFFRES—ADVENTURE WITH AN ALBATROSS—THE RIVER OF GOOD PROMISE—MOZAMBIQUE—TREACHERY OF THE NATIVES—MOMBASSA—MELINDA, AND ITS AMIABLE KING—FESTIVITIES —THE MALABAR COAST—CALICUT—THE ROUTE TO THE INDIES DISCOVERED.Da Gama landed some two hundred miles beyond the Cape, and, discharging the victualling-ship of her stores, ordered her to be burned, as the king had directed. He then entered into commercial relations with the natives, and exchanged red nightcaps for ivory bracelets. "Then came two hundred blacke men, some lyttle, some great, bringing with them twelve oxen and four sheep, and as our men went upon shore they began to play upon four flutes, according with four sundry voices, the music whereof sounded very well. Which the generall hearing, commandedthe trumpets to sound, and so they danced with our men. In this pastime and feasting, and in buying their oxen and sheep, the day passed over." Da Gama had reason before long to suspect treachery, however, and withdrew his men and re-embarked. It was in this place that a man falling overboard, and swimming for a long time before the accident was observed, was followed by an albatross, who hovered in the air just above him, waiting the propitious moment when he could make a quiet meal upon him. The man was subsequently rescued, and the albatross disappointed.Da Gama now passed the rock de la Cruz, where Diaz had erected his last pillar, and by the aid of a brisk wind escaped the dangers of the currents and shoals. Losing sight of land, he recovered it again on Christmas-day, and in consequence named the spot Tierra da Natal,—a name which it still preserves. From this point his course was nearly north, along the eastern coast of the continent. Farther on he landed two of his malefactors, with instructions to inform themselves of the character and customs of the inhabitants, promising to call for them on his return. On the 11th of January, 1498, he anchored off a portion of the coast occupied by people who seemed peaceably and honestly disposed. They were, in fact, Caffres,—the fleet having passed the territory of the Hottentots. One of the sailors, Martin Alonzo, understood their language,—a circumstance very remarkable, yet perfectly authenticated. As he had not been lower than the Mina, on the western coast, and of course never upon the eastern at all, the inference seems inevitable that some of the negro tribes of Africa extend much beyond the limits usually assigned them in modern geography. After two days spent in the exchange of civilities of the most courteous nature, the ships proceeded on their way,—da Gama naming the countryTierra da Boa Gete,—Land of Good People.He next found, at the mouth of a large river, a tribe ofnegroes who seemed to have made greater progress in civilization than their neighbors. They had barks with sails made of palm-leaves,—the only indication of any knowledge of navigation the Portuguese had yet met with upon the African coast. No one—not even Martin Alonzo—understood their language: as far as could be gathered from their pantomime, they had come from a distance where they had seen vessels as large as the San Gabriel, whence da Gama conjectured that the Indies were not far off. He gave to the river the name ofRio dos bos Sinaes, or River of Good Promise. The crew suffered greatly here from the effects of scurvy,—many of them dying of the disease and others succumbing under the consequences of amputation. The ships were careened and repaired: thirty-two days were spent in this labor. These incidents are thus graphically described in the Lusiad:"Far from the land, wide o'er the ocean driven,Our helms resigning to the care of Heaven,By hope and fear's keen passions toss'd, we roam;When our glad eyes behold the surges foamAgainst the beacons of a shelter'd bay,Where sloops and barges cut the watery way.The river's opening breast some upward plied,And some came gliding down the sweepy tide.Quick throbs of transport heaved in every heart,To view this knowledge of the seaman's art;For here we hoped our ardent wish to gain,To hear of India's strand,—nor hoped in vain:Though Ethiopia's sable hue they bore,No look of wild surprise the natives wore;Wide o'er their heads the cotton turban swell'd,And cloth of blue the decent loins conceal'd.Their speech, though rude and dissonant of sound,Their speech a mixture of Arabian own'd.Alonzo, skill'd in all the copious storeOf fair Arabia's speech and flowery lore,In joyful converse heard the pleasing tale,'That o'er these seas full oft the frequent sail,And lordly vessels, tall as ours, appear'd,Which to the regions of the morning steer'd:Whose cheerful crews, resembling ours, displayThe kindred face and color of the day.'Elate with joy, we raise the glad acclaim,AndRiver of Good Signsthe port we name."Our keels, that now had steer'd through many a clime,By shell-fish roughen'd, and incased with slime,Joyful we clean; while bleating from the fieldThe fleecy dams the smiling natives yield.Alas! how vain the bloom of human joy!How soon the blasts of woe that bloom destroy!A dread disease its rankling horrors shed,And death's dire ravage through mine army spread.Never mine eyes such dreary sight beheld!Ghastly the mouth and gums enormous swell'd;And instant, putrid like a dead man's wound,Poison'd with fetid steam the air around.Long, long endear'd by fellowship in woe,O'er the cold dust we give the tears to flow;And in their hapless lot forebode our own,—A foreign burial, and a grave unknown."The fleet joyfully left the River of Good Promise on the 24th of February, and not long after discovered two groups of islands. Near the coast of one of these they were followed by eight canoes, manned by persons of fine stature, less black than the Hottentots, and dressed in cotton cloth of various colors. Upon their heads they wore turbans wrought with silk and gold thread. They were armed with swords and daggers like the Moors, and carried musical instruments which they called sagbuts. They came on board as if they had known the strangers before, and spoke in the Arabic tongue, repelling with disdain the supposition that they were Moors. They said that their island was called Mozambique; that they traded with the Moors of the Indies in spices, pearls, rubies, silver, and linen, and offered to take the ships into their harbor. The bar permitting their passage, they anchored at two crossbow-shots from the town. This was built of wood and thatch,—the mosques alone being constructed of stone. It was occupied principally by Moors, the rest of the island being inhabited by the natives, who were the same as those of the mainland opposite. The Moors traded with the Indies and with the African Sofala in shipswithout decks and built without the use of nails,—the planks being bound together by cocoa fibres, and the sails being made of palm-leaves. They had compasses and charts.The Moorish governor of Mozambique and the other Moors supposed the Portuguese to be Turks, on account of the whiteness of their skin. They sent them provisions, in return for which da Gama sent the shah a quantity of red caps, coral, copper vessels, and bells. The shah set no value upon these articles, and inquired disdainfully why the captain had not sent him scarlet cloth. He afterwards went on board the flag-ship, where he was received with hospitality, though not without secret preparations against treachery. The Portuguese learned from him that he governed the island as the deputy of the King of Quiloa; that Prester John lived and ruled a long distance towards the interior of the mainland; that Calicut, whither da Gama was bound, was two thousand miles to the northeast, but that he could not proceed thither without the guidance of pilots familiar with the navigation. He promised to furnish him with two. Discovering subsequently, however, that the strangers were Christians, the shah contrived a plot for their destruction. The vessels escaped, but with only one pilot, whose treachery throughout the voyage was a source of constant annoyance and peril. On departing, da Gama gave the traitors a broadside, which did considerable damage to their village of thatch.On the 1st of April, da Gama gave to an island which he discovered the name of Açoutado, in commemoration of a sound flagellation which was there administered to the pilot for telling him it formed part of the continent,—upon which he confessed that his purpose in thus misrepresenting the case was to wreck and destroy the ships. On the 7th, they came to the large island of Mombassa, where they found rice, millet, poultry, and fat cattle, and sheep without tails. The orchards were filled with fig, orange, and lemon trees. This island received honey, ivory, and wax from a port upon the mainland. Thehouses were built of stone and mortar, and the city was defended by a small fort almost even with the water. "They have a king," says the chronicle, "and the inhabitants are Moores, whereof some bee white. They goe gallantly arrayed, especially the women, apparelled in gownes of silke and bedecked with jewells of golde and precious stones. The men were greatly comforted, as having confidence that in this place they might cure such as were then sick,—as in truth were almost all; in number but fewe, as the others were dead."The King of Mombassa, however, was as great a rogue as the Shah of Mozambique, from whom he had heard, by overland communication, of what had happened in his island. During the night following a grand interchange of civilities and of protestations, da Gama was informed that a sea-monster was devouring the cable. It turned out that a number of Moors were endeavoring to cut it, that the ship might be driven ashore. Anxious to quit this inhospitable coast, the fleet profited by the first wind to continue their course to the north. They captured a zambuco, or pinnace, from which they took seventeen Moors and a considerable quantity of silver and gold. On the same day they arrived off the town of Melinda, situated three degrees only to the south of the equator. The city resembled the cities of Europe, the streets being wide, and the houses being of stone and several stories high. "The generall," we are told, "being come over against this citie, did rejoyce in his heart very much, that he now sawe a citie lyke unto those of Portingale, and rendered most heartie and humble thanks to God for their good and safe arrival." The chief of the captured zambuco offered to procure da Gama a pilot to take the fleet to Calicut, if he would permit him to go ashore. He was landed upon a beach opposite the city. The chief performed his promise, and induced the King of Melinda to treat the strangers with courtesy and respect. Camoens thus describes the festivities upon the alliance:"With that ennobling worth whose fond employBefriends the brave, the monarch owns his joy;Entreats the leader and his weary bandTo taste the dews of sweet repose on land,And all the riches of his cultured fieldsObedient to the nod of Gama yields.'What from the blustering winds and lengthening tideYour ships have suffer'd, here shall be supplied;Arms and provisions I myself will send,And, great of skill, a pilot shall attend.'So spoke the king; and now, with purpled ray,Beneath the shining wave the god of dayRetiring, left the evening shades to spread,When to the fleet the joyful herald sped.To find such friends each breast with rapture glows:The feast is kindled, and the goblet flows;The trembling comet's irritating raysBound to the skies, and trail a sparkling blaze;The vaulting bombs awake their sleeping fire,And, like the Cyclops' bolt, to heaven aspire;The trump and fife's shrill clarion far aroundThe glorious music of the night resound.Nor less their joy Melinda's sons display:The sulphur bursts in many an ardent ray,And to the heavens ascends in whizzing gyres,Whilst Ocean flames with artificial fires."During the interview which followed, the king remarked that he had never seen any men who pleased him so much as the Portuguese,—a compliment which da Gama acknowledged by setting at liberty the sixteen Moors of the captured pinnace. The king sent the promised pilot on his return; he proved to be as deeply skilled in the art of navigation as any of the pilots of Europe. He was acquainted with the astrolabe, compass, and quadrant. The fleet set sail from Melinda on the 24th of April. As they had now gone far enough towards the north, and as India lay nearly east, they bade farewell to the coast, of which they had hardly lost sight since leaving Lisbon, and struck into the open sea, or rather a wide gulf of the Indian Ocean, seven hundred and fifty leagues across. A few days after, having crossed the line, the crew were delighted to behold again the stars and constellations of the Northern hemisphere. Thevoyage was rapid and fortunate; for in twenty-three days they arrived off the Malabar coast, and, after a day or two of southing, discovered the lofty hills which overhang the city of Calicut. Da Gama amply rewarded the pilot, released the malefactors from their fetters, and summoned the crew to prayer. The anchor was then thrown, and a feast was spread in honor of the day. The route by sea had been discovered from the Tagus to the Ganges: da Gama had laid out the way from Belem to Golconda.CALICUT IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
COLUMBUS IN CHAINS AT CADIZ.CHAPTER XVII.THE FAILING HEALTH OF COLUMBUS—HIS FOURTH VOYAGES—MARTINIQUE, PORTO RICCO, NICARAGUA, COSTA RICCA, PANAMA—HIS SEARCH FOR A CHANNEL ACROSS THE ISTHMUS—HE PREDICTS AN ECLIPSE OF THE MOON AT JAMAICA—HIS RETURN—THE DEATH OF ISABELLA—COLUMBUS PENNILESS AT VALLADOLID—HIS DEATH—HIS FOUR BURIALS—THE INJUSTICE OF THE WORLD TOWARDS COLUMBUS—CHRISTOPHER PIGEON—AMERIGO VESPUCCI—THE NEW WORLD NAMED AMERICA—ERRORS OF MODERN HISTORIANS—THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA—JOHN CABOT IN LABRADOR—SEBASTIAN CABOT IN HUDSON'S BAY—VINCENT YANEZ PINZON AT THE MOUTHS OF THE AMAZON.Columbus was now advanced in years, and his sufferings and labors had dimmed his eyesight and bowed his frame; but his mind was yet active, and his enthusiasm in the cause of discoveryirrepressible. He had convinced himself, and now sought to convince the queen, that to the westward of the regions he had visited the land converged, leaving a narrow passage through which he hoped to pass, and proceed to the Indies beyond. This convergence of the land did in reality exist, but the strait of water he expected to find was, and is, a strait of land—the Isthmus of Panama. However, the queen approved of the plan, and gave him four ships, equipped and victualled for two years. Columbus had conceived the immense idea of passing through the strait, and returning by Asia and the Cape of Good Hope, thus circumnavigating the globe and proving its spherical form. He departed from Cadiz on the 8th of May, 1502.He touched at, and named, Martinique early in June, and afterwards at St. Jean, now Porto Ricco. Ovando refused his request to land at Isabella to repair his vessel and exchange one of them for a faster sailer. Escaping a terrible storm, which wrecked and utterly destroyed the splendid fleet in which the rapacious pillagers of the island had embarked their ill-gotten wealth, he was driven by the winds to Jamaica, and thence by the currents to Cuba. Here a strong north wind enabled him to sail south southwest, towards the latitude where he expected to find the strait. He touched the mainland of North America at Truxillo, in Honduras, and coasted thence southward along the Mosquito shore, Nicaragua, Costa Ricca, and Panama. Here he explored every sinuosity and indentation of the shore, seeking at the very spot where civilization and commerce now require a canal, a passage which he considered as demanded by Nature and accorded by Providence. He followed the isthmus as far as the Gulf of Darien, and then, driven by a furious tropical tempest, returned as far as Veragua, in search of rich gold mines of which he had heard. The storm lasted for eight days, concluding with a terrible display of water-spouts, which Columbus is said to have regarded as a work of the devil, and to have dispelled by bringing forth the Bible and exorcising the demon.One of the water-spouts passed between the ships without injuring them, and spun away, muttering and terrible, to spend its fury elsewhere.THE WATERSPOUT.On reaching Veragua, Columbus sent his brother up a river, which he called Bethlehem, or by contraction Belem, to seek for gold. His researches seeming to indicate the presence of the precious metal, Columbus determined to establish a colony upon the river, an attempt which was defeated by the hostility of the natives. Their fierce resistance and the crazy state of his vessels forced Columbus, in April, 1503, to make the best of his way to Hispaniola with two crowded vessels, which, being totally unseaworthy, he was obliged to run ashore at Jamaica. There Columbus awed the natives and subdued them to obedience and submission, by predicting an eclipse of the moon.Thus left without a single vessel, he had no resource but to send to Hispaniola for assistance. After a period of fifteen months lost in quelling mutinies and in opposing the crueltiesand exactions of the new masters of the island, he obtained a caravel, and again sailed for Spain on the 12th of September, 1504. During the passage, he was compelled, by a severe attack of rheumatism, to remain confined to his cabin. His tempest-tossed and shattered bark at last cast anchor in the harbor of San Lucar. He proceeded to Seville, where he heard, with dismay, of the illness, and then of the death, of his patroness Isabella. Sickness now detained him at Seville till the spring of 1505, when he arrived, exhausted and paralytic, before the king. Here he underwent another courtly denial of redress. He was now without shelter and without hope. He was compelled to borrow money with which to pay for a shabby room at a miserable inn. He lingered for a year in poverty and neglect, and died at last in Valladolid, on the 20th of May, 1506. The revolting ingratitude of Ferdinand of Spain thus caused the death, in rags, in destitution, and in infirmity, of the greatest man that has ever served the cause of progress or labored in the paths of science. Had we written the life of Columbus, and not thus briefly sketched the history of his voyages, we should have found it easy to assert and maintain his claim to this commanding position.The agitation of the life of Columbus followed his remains to the grave,—for he was buried four successive times, and his dead body made the passage of the Atlantic. It was first deposited in the vaults of the Franciscan Convent of Valladolid, where it remained seven years. In 1513, Ferdinand, now old and perhaps repentant, caused the coffin to be brought from Valladolid to Seville, where a solemn service was said over it in the grand cathedral. It was then placed in the chapel belonging to the Chartreux. In 1536, the coffin was transported to the city of St. Domingo, in the island of Hispaniola. Here it remained for two hundred and sixty years. In 1795, Spain ceded the island to France, stipulating that the ashes of Columbus should be transferred to Spanish soil. In December of thesame year, the vault was opened, and the fragments which were found—those of a leaden coffin, mingled with bones and dust returned to dust—were carefully collected. They were carried on board the brigantine Discovery, which transported them to the frigate San Lorenzo, by which they were taken to Havana, where, in the presence of the Governor-General of Cuba and in the midst of imposing ceremonies, they were consigned to their fourth and final resting-place.It will not be altogether out of place to group together here the numerous and remarkable instances of the world's injustice and ingratitude towards Columbus. We have said that he died in penury at Valladolid. A publication, issued periodically in that city from 1333 to 1539, chronicling every event of local interest—births, marriages, deaths, fires, executions, appointments, church ceremonies—did not mention, or in any way allude to, the death of Columbus. Pierre Martyr, a poet of Lombardy, once his intimate friend, and who had said, at the time of his first voyage, that by singing of his discoveries he would descend to immortality with him, seemed to think, later in life, that he should peril his chances of immortality were he to sing of his death, for his muse held her peace. In 1507, a collection of voyages was published by Fracanzo de Montalbodo, in which no mention was made of Columbus' fourth voyage, and in which Columbus himself was alluded to as still alive. In 1508, a Latin translation of this work was published, in the preface to which Columbus was mentioned as still living in honor at the court of Spain. Another famous work of the time attributes the discovery of the New World, not to the calculations and science of a man, but to the accidental wanderings of a tempest-driven caravel. Not ten years after the death of Columbus, the chaplain of one of the kings of Italy, in a work upon "Memorable Events in Spain," stated that a New World had been discovered in the West by onePeter Columbus. And, in the same taste and spirit, a German doctor, inthe first German book which spoke of the New World, did not once mention the name of Columbus, but, translating the proper name as if it were a common noun, calls him Christoffel Dawber, which, being translated back again, signifiesChristopher Pigeon.We shall now speak of that signal instance of public ingratitude and national forgetfulness which is universally regretted, yet will never be repaired,—the giving to the New World the name of America and not that of Columbia,—a substitution due to an obscure and ignorant French publisher of St. Dié, in Lorraine.Amerigo Vespucci, born at Florence fifteen years after Columbus, and the third son of a notary, appears to have been led by mercantile tastes to Spain in 1486, where he became a factor in a wealthy house at Seville. He abandoned the counter, however, for navigation and mathematics, and took to the sea for a livelihood. He was at first a practical astronomer, and finally a pilot-major. He went four times on expeditions to the New World, in 1499, 1500, 1501, 1502. During the first, he coasted along the land at the mouths of the Orinoco, which had been discovered by Columbus the preceding year. Even had he been the first to discover the mainland,—which he was not,—there would have been no merit in it, for he was merely a subordinate officer on board a ship following in the track of Columbus, seven years after the latter had traced it upon the ocean and the charts of the marine. He published an account of his voyage. But it does not appear that he ever claimed honor as the first discoverer, and the friendly relations he maintained with the family of Columbus after the death of the latter show that they did not consider him as attempting to obtain a distinction which did not belong to him. The error flowed from another and more distant source.Columbus had died in 1506, and had been forgotten. In 1507, a Frenchman of St. Dié republished Vespucci's narrative,substituting the date of 1497 for that of 1499,—thus making it appear that Vespucci had preceded, instead of followed, Columbus in his discovery of the mainland. He did not once mention Columbus, and attributed the whole merit of the western voyages to Vespucci. He added that he did not see why from the name of Amerigo an appellation could not be derived for the continent he had discovered, and proposed that of America, as having a feminine termination like that of Europa, Asia, and Africa, and as possessing a musical sound likely to catch the public ear. This work was dedicated to the Emperor Maximilian, and passed rapidly through editions in various languages.Thus far no specific name had been given to the continent. Its situation was sometimes indicated upon maps by a cross, and sometimes by the wordsTerra Sanctæ Crucis, sive Mundus Novus, often printed in red capitals. In 1522, for the first time, the name of America, under its French form ofAmérique, was printed upon a map at Lyons. Germany followed, and the presses of Basle and Zurich aided the usurpation. Florence was but too eager to accept a name which flattered her vanity; and, as Genoa did not protest in the name of Columbus, Italy yielded to the current, and did a large share in the labor of injustice. In 1570, the name of America was for the first time engraved upon a metal globe, and from this time forward the spoliation may be regarded as accomplished. Columbus had been twice buried and twice forgotten; and now his very name was lost,—the continent he had found having been baptized in honor of another, and his race in the male line being extinct,—for Diego and Fernando had died without heirs.In modern times, in our own day even, it has been a common practice to depreciate the services of Columbus, and eminent writers have thought it no disgrace to profess and testify ignorance of his history and life. Raynal, a French philosopher of distinction, declared, about the year 1760, that the passageof the Cape of Good Hope by Vasco da Gama was a greater achievement than the crossing of the Atlantic by Columbus. He offered a prize for disquisitions upon the question, "Has the discovery of America been useful or prejudicial to the human race?" Buffon seems, too, to have considered the discoveries of the Portuguese in the East as more important than those of Columbus in the West. Robertson, in his History of America, says that even without Columbus some happy accident would have discovered the New World a few years later. Fontenelle, and many others, attribute the first notice of the variation of the compass to Cabot in 1497, though Columbus distinctly mentions noticing it in his journal on the 13th of September, 1492. A late Spanish historian writes:—"Columbus made nothing but discoveries in these regions; conquest was reserved for Cortez and Pizarro." Lamartine makes an error of fifteen years in stating the period of the return of Columbus to Spain. Dumas asserts that Columbus passed "a portion of his life in prison,"—an expression he would not probably have used, knowingly, to designate a period of three months. Granier de Cassagnac places the last voyage of Columbus in 1493, instead of 1502. St. Hilaire makes the celebrated Las Casas cross the sea with Columbus nine years too soon. These mis-statements, though not resulting in distortion or misrepresentation of character, are the effects of that indifference which for centuries history has manifested towards the life, services, and death of Columbus.Columbia is the poetic and symbolical name of America, occurring in the National Anthem and in numerous effusions of patriotic verse. An effort to avenge the memory of the discoverer was made by giving his name, officially, to a tract borrowed from Virginia and Maryland, and measuring one hundred miles square,—the seat of the American Government. So far from this tardy acknowledgment being a reparation, however, it is probable that the spirit of the departed benefactor, if summonedto speak, would declare it the last, and by no means the least, of the long line of insults that an ungrateful posterity had heaped upon his memory.It will be proper to add to this view of the voyages of Columbus a brief account of those effected immediately afterwards by John and Sebastian Cabot, and by Vincent Yanez Pinzon.In the year 1496, Henry VII. of England, stimulated by the success of Columbus, granted a patent to one Giovanni Gabotto, a Venetian dwelling in Bristol, to go in search of unknown lands. Little is known of this person, whose name has been Anglicized into John Cabot, except that he was a wealthy and intelligent merchant and fond of maritime discovery. He had three sons, one of whom, named Sebastian, was nineteen years old at the time of the voyage, upon which, with his brothers, he accompanied his father. They sailed in a ship named the Matthew, and on the 24th of June, 1497, discovered the mainland of America, eighteen months before Columbus set foot upon it at the mouths of the Orinoco. For a long time it was supposed that Cabot had landed upon Newfoundland, but it is now considered settled that Labrador was the portion of the continent first discovered by a European. No account of the further prosecution of the voyage has reached us, and the only official record of Cabot's return is an entry in the privy-purse expenses of Henry, 10th August, 1497:-"To hym that found the New Isle, 10l." Thus, fifty days had not elapsed between the discovery and its recompense in England,—a fact which shows that Cabot returned home at once. He is supposed to have died about the year 1499.Sebastian Cabot, the second son, who is regarded as by far the most scientific navigator of this family of seamen, appears to have lived in complete obscurity during the following twelve years. Disgusted, however, by the want of consideration of the English authorities towards him, he accepted an invitation from King Ferdinand to visit Spain in 1512. Here, for severalyears, he was employed in revising maps and charts, and, with the title of Captain and a liberal salary, held the honorable position of Member of the Council of the Indies. The death of Ferdinand and the intrigues of the enemies of Columbus induced him to return to England in 1517. He was employed by Henry VIII., in connection with one Sir Thomas Perte, to make an attempt at a Northwest passage. On this voyage he is said to have gained Hudson's Bay, and to have given English names to sundry places there. So few details of the expedition have been preserved, that the latitude reached (67 1/2 degrees) is referred by different authorities both to the north and the south. The malice or cowardice of Sir Thomas Perte compelled Cabot to return without accomplishing any thing worthy of being recorded. It was often said afterwards, that if the New World could not be called Columbia, it would be better to name it Cabotiana than America.Vincent Yanez Pinzon, the youngest of the three brothers who had accompanied Columbus upon his first voyage, determined, upon hearing, in 1499, that the continent was discovered, on trying his fortunes at the head of an expedition, instead of in a subordinate position. He found no difficulty in equipping four caravels, and in inducing several of those who had seen the coast of Paria to embark with him as pilots. He sailed from Palos in December, 1499, and proceeded directly to the southwest. During a storm which obscured the heavens he crossed the equator, and on the disappearance of the clouds no longer recognised the constellations, changed as they were from those of the Northern to those of the Southern hemisphere. Pinzon was thus the first European who crossed the line in the Atlantic. The sailors, unacquainted with the Southern sky, and dismayed at the absence of the polar star, were for a time filled with superstitious terrors. Pinzon, however, persisted, and, on the 20th of January, 1500, discovered land in eight degrees of south latitude. He took possession for the Crown of Spain,and named it Santa Maria de la Consolaçion. We shall soon have occasion to mention why this name was superseded by that of Brazil.Pinzon explored with amazement the huge mouths of the Amazon, whose immense torrents, as they emptied into the sea, freshened its waters for many leagues from the land. Sailing to the north, he followed the coast for four hundred leagues, and then returned to Palos, carrying with him three thousand pounds' weight of dye-woods and the first opossum ever seen in Europe.And now, having closed the fifteenth century with the achievements of the Spanish in the West, we open the sixteenth with those of the Portuguese in the East.THE PHAETON OR TROPIC BIRD.
COLUMBUS IN CHAINS AT CADIZ.
COLUMBUS IN CHAINS AT CADIZ.
COLUMBUS IN CHAINS AT CADIZ.
THE FAILING HEALTH OF COLUMBUS—HIS FOURTH VOYAGES—MARTINIQUE, PORTO RICCO, NICARAGUA, COSTA RICCA, PANAMA—HIS SEARCH FOR A CHANNEL ACROSS THE ISTHMUS—HE PREDICTS AN ECLIPSE OF THE MOON AT JAMAICA—HIS RETURN—THE DEATH OF ISABELLA—COLUMBUS PENNILESS AT VALLADOLID—HIS DEATH—HIS FOUR BURIALS—THE INJUSTICE OF THE WORLD TOWARDS COLUMBUS—CHRISTOPHER PIGEON—AMERIGO VESPUCCI—THE NEW WORLD NAMED AMERICA—ERRORS OF MODERN HISTORIANS—THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA—JOHN CABOT IN LABRADOR—SEBASTIAN CABOT IN HUDSON'S BAY—VINCENT YANEZ PINZON AT THE MOUTHS OF THE AMAZON.
Columbus was now advanced in years, and his sufferings and labors had dimmed his eyesight and bowed his frame; but his mind was yet active, and his enthusiasm in the cause of discoveryirrepressible. He had convinced himself, and now sought to convince the queen, that to the westward of the regions he had visited the land converged, leaving a narrow passage through which he hoped to pass, and proceed to the Indies beyond. This convergence of the land did in reality exist, but the strait of water he expected to find was, and is, a strait of land—the Isthmus of Panama. However, the queen approved of the plan, and gave him four ships, equipped and victualled for two years. Columbus had conceived the immense idea of passing through the strait, and returning by Asia and the Cape of Good Hope, thus circumnavigating the globe and proving its spherical form. He departed from Cadiz on the 8th of May, 1502.
He touched at, and named, Martinique early in June, and afterwards at St. Jean, now Porto Ricco. Ovando refused his request to land at Isabella to repair his vessel and exchange one of them for a faster sailer. Escaping a terrible storm, which wrecked and utterly destroyed the splendid fleet in which the rapacious pillagers of the island had embarked their ill-gotten wealth, he was driven by the winds to Jamaica, and thence by the currents to Cuba. Here a strong north wind enabled him to sail south southwest, towards the latitude where he expected to find the strait. He touched the mainland of North America at Truxillo, in Honduras, and coasted thence southward along the Mosquito shore, Nicaragua, Costa Ricca, and Panama. Here he explored every sinuosity and indentation of the shore, seeking at the very spot where civilization and commerce now require a canal, a passage which he considered as demanded by Nature and accorded by Providence. He followed the isthmus as far as the Gulf of Darien, and then, driven by a furious tropical tempest, returned as far as Veragua, in search of rich gold mines of which he had heard. The storm lasted for eight days, concluding with a terrible display of water-spouts, which Columbus is said to have regarded as a work of the devil, and to have dispelled by bringing forth the Bible and exorcising the demon.
One of the water-spouts passed between the ships without injuring them, and spun away, muttering and terrible, to spend its fury elsewhere.
THE WATERSPOUT.
THE WATERSPOUT.
THE WATERSPOUT.
On reaching Veragua, Columbus sent his brother up a river, which he called Bethlehem, or by contraction Belem, to seek for gold. His researches seeming to indicate the presence of the precious metal, Columbus determined to establish a colony upon the river, an attempt which was defeated by the hostility of the natives. Their fierce resistance and the crazy state of his vessels forced Columbus, in April, 1503, to make the best of his way to Hispaniola with two crowded vessels, which, being totally unseaworthy, he was obliged to run ashore at Jamaica. There Columbus awed the natives and subdued them to obedience and submission, by predicting an eclipse of the moon.
Thus left without a single vessel, he had no resource but to send to Hispaniola for assistance. After a period of fifteen months lost in quelling mutinies and in opposing the crueltiesand exactions of the new masters of the island, he obtained a caravel, and again sailed for Spain on the 12th of September, 1504. During the passage, he was compelled, by a severe attack of rheumatism, to remain confined to his cabin. His tempest-tossed and shattered bark at last cast anchor in the harbor of San Lucar. He proceeded to Seville, where he heard, with dismay, of the illness, and then of the death, of his patroness Isabella. Sickness now detained him at Seville till the spring of 1505, when he arrived, exhausted and paralytic, before the king. Here he underwent another courtly denial of redress. He was now without shelter and without hope. He was compelled to borrow money with which to pay for a shabby room at a miserable inn. He lingered for a year in poverty and neglect, and died at last in Valladolid, on the 20th of May, 1506. The revolting ingratitude of Ferdinand of Spain thus caused the death, in rags, in destitution, and in infirmity, of the greatest man that has ever served the cause of progress or labored in the paths of science. Had we written the life of Columbus, and not thus briefly sketched the history of his voyages, we should have found it easy to assert and maintain his claim to this commanding position.
The agitation of the life of Columbus followed his remains to the grave,—for he was buried four successive times, and his dead body made the passage of the Atlantic. It was first deposited in the vaults of the Franciscan Convent of Valladolid, where it remained seven years. In 1513, Ferdinand, now old and perhaps repentant, caused the coffin to be brought from Valladolid to Seville, where a solemn service was said over it in the grand cathedral. It was then placed in the chapel belonging to the Chartreux. In 1536, the coffin was transported to the city of St. Domingo, in the island of Hispaniola. Here it remained for two hundred and sixty years. In 1795, Spain ceded the island to France, stipulating that the ashes of Columbus should be transferred to Spanish soil. In December of thesame year, the vault was opened, and the fragments which were found—those of a leaden coffin, mingled with bones and dust returned to dust—were carefully collected. They were carried on board the brigantine Discovery, which transported them to the frigate San Lorenzo, by which they were taken to Havana, where, in the presence of the Governor-General of Cuba and in the midst of imposing ceremonies, they were consigned to their fourth and final resting-place.
It will not be altogether out of place to group together here the numerous and remarkable instances of the world's injustice and ingratitude towards Columbus. We have said that he died in penury at Valladolid. A publication, issued periodically in that city from 1333 to 1539, chronicling every event of local interest—births, marriages, deaths, fires, executions, appointments, church ceremonies—did not mention, or in any way allude to, the death of Columbus. Pierre Martyr, a poet of Lombardy, once his intimate friend, and who had said, at the time of his first voyage, that by singing of his discoveries he would descend to immortality with him, seemed to think, later in life, that he should peril his chances of immortality were he to sing of his death, for his muse held her peace. In 1507, a collection of voyages was published by Fracanzo de Montalbodo, in which no mention was made of Columbus' fourth voyage, and in which Columbus himself was alluded to as still alive. In 1508, a Latin translation of this work was published, in the preface to which Columbus was mentioned as still living in honor at the court of Spain. Another famous work of the time attributes the discovery of the New World, not to the calculations and science of a man, but to the accidental wanderings of a tempest-driven caravel. Not ten years after the death of Columbus, the chaplain of one of the kings of Italy, in a work upon "Memorable Events in Spain," stated that a New World had been discovered in the West by onePeter Columbus. And, in the same taste and spirit, a German doctor, inthe first German book which spoke of the New World, did not once mention the name of Columbus, but, translating the proper name as if it were a common noun, calls him Christoffel Dawber, which, being translated back again, signifiesChristopher Pigeon.
We shall now speak of that signal instance of public ingratitude and national forgetfulness which is universally regretted, yet will never be repaired,—the giving to the New World the name of America and not that of Columbia,—a substitution due to an obscure and ignorant French publisher of St. Dié, in Lorraine.
Amerigo Vespucci, born at Florence fifteen years after Columbus, and the third son of a notary, appears to have been led by mercantile tastes to Spain in 1486, where he became a factor in a wealthy house at Seville. He abandoned the counter, however, for navigation and mathematics, and took to the sea for a livelihood. He was at first a practical astronomer, and finally a pilot-major. He went four times on expeditions to the New World, in 1499, 1500, 1501, 1502. During the first, he coasted along the land at the mouths of the Orinoco, which had been discovered by Columbus the preceding year. Even had he been the first to discover the mainland,—which he was not,—there would have been no merit in it, for he was merely a subordinate officer on board a ship following in the track of Columbus, seven years after the latter had traced it upon the ocean and the charts of the marine. He published an account of his voyage. But it does not appear that he ever claimed honor as the first discoverer, and the friendly relations he maintained with the family of Columbus after the death of the latter show that they did not consider him as attempting to obtain a distinction which did not belong to him. The error flowed from another and more distant source.
Columbus had died in 1506, and had been forgotten. In 1507, a Frenchman of St. Dié republished Vespucci's narrative,substituting the date of 1497 for that of 1499,—thus making it appear that Vespucci had preceded, instead of followed, Columbus in his discovery of the mainland. He did not once mention Columbus, and attributed the whole merit of the western voyages to Vespucci. He added that he did not see why from the name of Amerigo an appellation could not be derived for the continent he had discovered, and proposed that of America, as having a feminine termination like that of Europa, Asia, and Africa, and as possessing a musical sound likely to catch the public ear. This work was dedicated to the Emperor Maximilian, and passed rapidly through editions in various languages.
Thus far no specific name had been given to the continent. Its situation was sometimes indicated upon maps by a cross, and sometimes by the wordsTerra Sanctæ Crucis, sive Mundus Novus, often printed in red capitals. In 1522, for the first time, the name of America, under its French form ofAmérique, was printed upon a map at Lyons. Germany followed, and the presses of Basle and Zurich aided the usurpation. Florence was but too eager to accept a name which flattered her vanity; and, as Genoa did not protest in the name of Columbus, Italy yielded to the current, and did a large share in the labor of injustice. In 1570, the name of America was for the first time engraved upon a metal globe, and from this time forward the spoliation may be regarded as accomplished. Columbus had been twice buried and twice forgotten; and now his very name was lost,—the continent he had found having been baptized in honor of another, and his race in the male line being extinct,—for Diego and Fernando had died without heirs.
In modern times, in our own day even, it has been a common practice to depreciate the services of Columbus, and eminent writers have thought it no disgrace to profess and testify ignorance of his history and life. Raynal, a French philosopher of distinction, declared, about the year 1760, that the passageof the Cape of Good Hope by Vasco da Gama was a greater achievement than the crossing of the Atlantic by Columbus. He offered a prize for disquisitions upon the question, "Has the discovery of America been useful or prejudicial to the human race?" Buffon seems, too, to have considered the discoveries of the Portuguese in the East as more important than those of Columbus in the West. Robertson, in his History of America, says that even without Columbus some happy accident would have discovered the New World a few years later. Fontenelle, and many others, attribute the first notice of the variation of the compass to Cabot in 1497, though Columbus distinctly mentions noticing it in his journal on the 13th of September, 1492. A late Spanish historian writes:—"Columbus made nothing but discoveries in these regions; conquest was reserved for Cortez and Pizarro." Lamartine makes an error of fifteen years in stating the period of the return of Columbus to Spain. Dumas asserts that Columbus passed "a portion of his life in prison,"—an expression he would not probably have used, knowingly, to designate a period of three months. Granier de Cassagnac places the last voyage of Columbus in 1493, instead of 1502. St. Hilaire makes the celebrated Las Casas cross the sea with Columbus nine years too soon. These mis-statements, though not resulting in distortion or misrepresentation of character, are the effects of that indifference which for centuries history has manifested towards the life, services, and death of Columbus.
Columbia is the poetic and symbolical name of America, occurring in the National Anthem and in numerous effusions of patriotic verse. An effort to avenge the memory of the discoverer was made by giving his name, officially, to a tract borrowed from Virginia and Maryland, and measuring one hundred miles square,—the seat of the American Government. So far from this tardy acknowledgment being a reparation, however, it is probable that the spirit of the departed benefactor, if summonedto speak, would declare it the last, and by no means the least, of the long line of insults that an ungrateful posterity had heaped upon his memory.
It will be proper to add to this view of the voyages of Columbus a brief account of those effected immediately afterwards by John and Sebastian Cabot, and by Vincent Yanez Pinzon.
In the year 1496, Henry VII. of England, stimulated by the success of Columbus, granted a patent to one Giovanni Gabotto, a Venetian dwelling in Bristol, to go in search of unknown lands. Little is known of this person, whose name has been Anglicized into John Cabot, except that he was a wealthy and intelligent merchant and fond of maritime discovery. He had three sons, one of whom, named Sebastian, was nineteen years old at the time of the voyage, upon which, with his brothers, he accompanied his father. They sailed in a ship named the Matthew, and on the 24th of June, 1497, discovered the mainland of America, eighteen months before Columbus set foot upon it at the mouths of the Orinoco. For a long time it was supposed that Cabot had landed upon Newfoundland, but it is now considered settled that Labrador was the portion of the continent first discovered by a European. No account of the further prosecution of the voyage has reached us, and the only official record of Cabot's return is an entry in the privy-purse expenses of Henry, 10th August, 1497:-"To hym that found the New Isle, 10l." Thus, fifty days had not elapsed between the discovery and its recompense in England,—a fact which shows that Cabot returned home at once. He is supposed to have died about the year 1499.
Sebastian Cabot, the second son, who is regarded as by far the most scientific navigator of this family of seamen, appears to have lived in complete obscurity during the following twelve years. Disgusted, however, by the want of consideration of the English authorities towards him, he accepted an invitation from King Ferdinand to visit Spain in 1512. Here, for severalyears, he was employed in revising maps and charts, and, with the title of Captain and a liberal salary, held the honorable position of Member of the Council of the Indies. The death of Ferdinand and the intrigues of the enemies of Columbus induced him to return to England in 1517. He was employed by Henry VIII., in connection with one Sir Thomas Perte, to make an attempt at a Northwest passage. On this voyage he is said to have gained Hudson's Bay, and to have given English names to sundry places there. So few details of the expedition have been preserved, that the latitude reached (67 1/2 degrees) is referred by different authorities both to the north and the south. The malice or cowardice of Sir Thomas Perte compelled Cabot to return without accomplishing any thing worthy of being recorded. It was often said afterwards, that if the New World could not be called Columbia, it would be better to name it Cabotiana than America.
Vincent Yanez Pinzon, the youngest of the three brothers who had accompanied Columbus upon his first voyage, determined, upon hearing, in 1499, that the continent was discovered, on trying his fortunes at the head of an expedition, instead of in a subordinate position. He found no difficulty in equipping four caravels, and in inducing several of those who had seen the coast of Paria to embark with him as pilots. He sailed from Palos in December, 1499, and proceeded directly to the southwest. During a storm which obscured the heavens he crossed the equator, and on the disappearance of the clouds no longer recognised the constellations, changed as they were from those of the Northern to those of the Southern hemisphere. Pinzon was thus the first European who crossed the line in the Atlantic. The sailors, unacquainted with the Southern sky, and dismayed at the absence of the polar star, were for a time filled with superstitious terrors. Pinzon, however, persisted, and, on the 20th of January, 1500, discovered land in eight degrees of south latitude. He took possession for the Crown of Spain,and named it Santa Maria de la Consolaçion. We shall soon have occasion to mention why this name was superseded by that of Brazil.
Pinzon explored with amazement the huge mouths of the Amazon, whose immense torrents, as they emptied into the sea, freshened its waters for many leagues from the land. Sailing to the north, he followed the coast for four hundred leagues, and then returned to Palos, carrying with him three thousand pounds' weight of dye-woods and the first opossum ever seen in Europe.
And now, having closed the fifteenth century with the achievements of the Spanish in the West, we open the sixteenth with those of the Portuguese in the East.
THE PHAETON OR TROPIC BIRD.
THE PHAETON OR TROPIC BIRD.
THE PHAETON OR TROPIC BIRD.
VASCO DA GAMA.CHAPTER XVIII.PORTUGUESE NAVIGATION UNDER EMMANUEL—POPULAR PREJUDICES—THE LUSIAD OF CAMOENS—VASCO DA GAMA—MAPS OF AFRICA OF THE PERIOD—PREPARATIONS FOR AN INDIAN VOYAGE—RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES—THE DEPARTURE—RENDEZVOUS AT THE CAPE VERDS—LANDING UPON THE COAST—THE NATIVES—AN INVITATION TO DINNER, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES—A STORM—MUTINY—THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.In the year 1495, John II. of Portugal was succeeded by his cousin, Emmanuel, into whose mind he had a short time before his death instilled a portion of his own zeal for maritime discovery and commercial supremacy. He had especially dwelt upon the necessity of continuing the progress of African research beyond the point which Bartholomew Diaz had lately reached, into the regions where lay the East Indies with their wealth and marvellous productions, and thus substituting for the tedious land-route a more expeditious track by sea. Upon hisaccession, Emmanuel found that a strong opposition existed to the extension of Portuguese commerce and discovery. Arguments were urged against it in his own councils, and had a marked effect upon the public mind by heightening the danger of the intended voyage.In our narrative of the first East Indian expedition, we shall often have occasion to quote from a poem written in commemoration of it,—the Lusiad of Camoens, a semi-religious epic and the masterpiece of Portuguese literature,—Lusiade being the poetic and symbolical name of Portugal. Camoens describes at the outset the hostility of the nation to further maritime adventure, and places in the mouth of a reverend adviser of the king the following forcible appeal:"Oh, frantic thirst of Honor and of Fame,The crowd's blind tribute, a fallacious name;What stings, what plagues, what secret scourges cursed,Torment those bosoms where thy pride is nursed!What dangers threaten and what deaths destroyThe hapless youth whom thy vain gleams decoy!Thou dazzling meteor, vain as fleeting air,What new dread horror dost thou now prepare?Oh, madness of Ambition! thus to dareDangers so fruitless, so remote a war!That Fame's vain flattery may thy name adorn,And thy proud titles on her flag be borne:Thee, Lord of Persia, thee of India lord,O'er Ethiopia vast, and Araby adored!"Never was any expedition, whether by land or water, so unpopular as this of King Emmanuel. The murmurs of the cabinet were re-echoed by the populace, who were wrought upon to such an extent that they believed the natural consequence of an invasion of the Indian seas would be the arrival in the Tagus of the wroth and avenging Sultan of Egypt. But Emmanuel, who, we are told, "regarded Diffidence as the mark of a low and grovelling mind, and Hope the quality of a noble and aspiring soul," discerned prospects of national advantage in the scheme, and determined to pursue it to a prosperous issue.King John, before his death, and shortly after the return of Diaz, had ordered timber to be purchased for the construction of ships fit to cope with the storms of the redoubtable Cape. Emmanuel now sought a capable commander, and, after much deliberation, fixed upon a gentleman of his own household, Vasco da Gama by name, a native of the seaport of Sines, and already favorably known for enterprise and naval skill. We are told that "he was formed for the service to which he was called,—violent indeed in his temper, terrible in anger, and sudden in the execution of justice, but at the same time intrepid, persevering, patient in difficulties, fertile in expedients, and superior to all discouragement. He devoted himself to death if he should not succeed, and this from a sense of religion and loyalty." When the king acquainted him with the mission intrusted to his charge, Vasco replied that he had long aspired to the honor of conducting such an undertaking. Camoens makes da Gama thus describe his acceptance of the honor:"'Let skies on fire,Let frozen seas, let horrid war, conspire:I dare them all,' I cried, 'and but repineThat one poor life is all I can resign.'"The most distinguished members of the Portuguese nobility were present at this interview. The king gave da Gama, with his own hands, the flag he was to bear,—a white cross enclosed within a red one,—the Cross of the military Order of Christ. Upon this he took the oath of allegiance. Emmanuel then delivered him the journal of Covillam, with such charts as were then in existence, and letters to all the Indian potentates who had become known to the Portuguese. Among these was of course one addressed to the renowned Prester John.MAP OF AFRICA DRAWN IN THE YEAR 1497.A map of Africa had been lately designed, in accordance with the discoveries made by land, as we have mentioned, by Covillam. The accompanying specimen is a fac-simile of one which belonged to Juan de la Cosa—the pilot of Columbus. Upon it the principal cities are indicated by a roughly sketched house or church; the government is denoted by a picture of a king, closely resembling the royal gentry in a pack of cards; while flags, planted at intervals, indicate boundary lines and frontier posts. The winds are represented by fabulous divinities sitting round the world upon leathern bottles, whose sides they are pressing to force out the air. The celebrated statue of the Canaries is often seen flourishing his club at the top of his tower. Abyssinia figures with its Prester John, his head being adorned with a brilliant mitre. Other kingdoms are marked out by portraits of their kings in richly embroidered costumes. The inhabitants of Africa, in maps of the world, are represented as giraffes, black men, and elephants. Portuguese camps are denoted by colored tents, while groups of light cavalry, splendidly caparisoned, dotting the territory at numerous points, indicate that the Portuguese army is making the tour of that mysterious continent. These quaint specimens of chartographical art are,in short, the faithful expression of the geographical science of the age.The fleet equipped for da Gama's voyage consisted of three ships and a caravel,—the San Gabriel, of one hundred and twenty tons, commanded by da Gama, and piloted by Pero Dalemquer, who had been pilot to Bartholomew Diaz; the San Rafael, of one hundred tons, commanded by Paulo da Gama, the admiral's brother; a store-ship of two hundred tons; and the caravel, of fifty tons, commanded by Nicolao Coelho. Besides these, Diaz, who had already been over the route, was ordered to accompany da Gama as far as the Mina. The crews numbered in all one hundred and sixty men, among whom were ten malefactors condemned to death, and who had consequently nothing to hope for in Portugal. Their duty in the fleet was to go ashore upon savage coasts and attempt to open intercourse with the natives. In case of rendering essential service and escaping with their lives, their sentence was to be remitted on their return home.A small chapel stood upon the seaside about four miles from Lisbon. Hither da Gama and his crew repaired upon the day preceding that fixed for their departure. They spent the night in prayer and rites of devotion, invoking the blessing and protection of Heaven. On the morrow, the adventurers marched to their ships in the midst of the whole population of Lisbon, who now thronged the shore of Belem. A long procession of priests sang anthems and offered sacrifice. The vast multitude, catching the fire of devotion and animated with the fervor of religious zeal, joined aloud in the prayers for their safety. The parents and relatives of the travellers shed tears, and da Gama himself wept on bidding farewell to the friends who gathered round him.Camoens thus describes the emotions of the adventurers as they gazed at the receding shore:"As from our dear-loved native shore we fly,Our votive shouts, redoubled, rend the sky:'Success! Success!' far echoes o'er the tide,While our broad hulks the foaming waves divide.When slowly gliding from our wistful eyes,The Lusian mountains mingle with the skies;Tago's loved stream and Cintra's mountains cold,Dim fading now, we now no more behold;And still with yearning hearts our eyes explore,Till one dim speck of land appears no more."The admiral had fixed upon the Cape Verd Islands as the first place of rendezvous in case of separation by storm. They all arrived safely in eight days at the Canaries, but were here driven widely apart by a tempest at night. The three captains subsequently joined each other, but could not find the admiral. They therefore made for the appointed rendezvous, where, to their great satisfaction, they found da Gama already arrived; "and, saluting him with many shots of ordnance, and with sound of trumpets, they spake unto him, each of them heartily rejoicing and thanking God for their safe meeting and good fortune in this their first brunt of danger and of peril." Diaz here took leave of them and returned to Portugal. Then, on the 3d of August, they set sail finally for the Cape of Good Hope.They continued without seeing land during the months of August, September, and October, greatly distressed by foul weather, or, in the quaint language of those days, "by torments of wind and rain." At last, on the 7th of November, they touched the African coast, and anchored in a capacious bay, which they called the Bay of St. Helena, and which is not far to the north of the Cape. Here they perceived the natives "to bee lyttle men, ill favored in the face, and of color blacke; and when they did speake, it was in such manner as though they did alwayes sigh." Camoens rhapsodizes at length over this approach to the land; and it must be remembered that, having followed in da Gama's track as early as the year 1553, his descriptions of scenery are those of an eye-witness:"Loud through the fleet the echoing shouts prevail:We drop the anchor and restrain the sail;And now, descending in a spacious bay,Wide o'er the coast the venturous soldiers stray,To spy the wonders of the savage shoreWhere strangers' foot had never trod before.I and my pilots, on the yellow sand,Explore beneath what sky the shores expand.Here we perceived our venturous keels had pass'd,Unharmed, the Southern tropic's howling blast,And now approached dread Neptune's secret reign:Where the stern power, as o'er the Austral mainHe rides, wide scatters from the Polar StarHail, ice, and snow, and all the wintry war."Trade was now commenced between da Gama and the natives, and, by means of signs and gestures, cloth, beads, bells, and glass were bartered for articles of food and other necessaries. But this friendly intercourse was soon interrupted by an act of imprudent folly on the part of a young man of the squadron. Being invited to dine by a party of the natives, he entered one of their huts to partake of the repast. Being disgusted at the viands, which consisted of a sea-calf dressed after the manner of the Hottentots, he fled in dismay. He was followed by his perplexed entertainers, who were anxious to learn how they had offended him. Taking their officious hospitality for impertinent aggression, he shouted for help; and it was not long before mutual apprehension brought on open hostilities. Da Gama and his officers were attacked, while taking the altitude of the sun with an astrolabe, by a party of concealed negroes armed with spears pointed with horn. The admiral was wounded in the foot, and with some difficulty effected a retreat to the ships. He left the Bay of St. Helena on the 16th of November.He now met with a sudden and violent change of weather, and the Portuguese historians have left animated descriptions of the storm which ensued. During any momentary pause in the elemental warfare, the sailors, worn out with fatigue and yielding to despair, surrounded da Gama, begging that he would not devote himself and them to a fate so dreadful. They declared that the gale could no longer be weathered, andthat every one must be buried in the waves if they continued to proceed. The admiral's firmness remained unshaken, and a conspiracy was soon formed against him. He was informed in time of this desperate plot by his brother Paulo. He put the ringleaders and pilots in irons, and, assisted by his brother and those who remained faithful to their duty, stood night and day to the helm. At length, on Wednesday, the 20th of November, the whole squadron doubled the tremendous promontory. The mutineers were pardoned and released from their manacles.The legend of the Spectre of the Cape is given by Camoens in full; and it is so characteristic of the age, and, as an episode, is itself so interesting, that we cannot refrain from quoting it entire. Da Gama is supposed to be relating his experience in the first person:"I spoke, when, rising through the darken'd air,Appall'd, we saw a hideous phantom glare.High and enormous o'er the flood he tower'd,And thwart our way with sullen aspect lower'd;An earthly paleness o'er his cheeks was spread,Erect uprose his hairs of wither'd red;Writhing to speak, his sable lips disclose,Sharp and disjoin'd, his gnashing teeths' blue rows;His haggard beard flow'd quivering in the wind;Revenge and horror in his mien combined;His clouded front, by withering lightnings sear'd,The inward anguish of his soul declared.Cold, gliding horrors fill'd each hero's breast;Our bristling hair and tottering knees confess'dWild dread. The while, with visage ghastly wan,His black lips trembling, thus the fiend began:'Ye sons of Lusus, who, with eyes profane,Have view'd the secrets of my awful reign,Have pass'd the bounds which jealous nature drewTo veil her secret shrine from mortal view;Hear from my lips what direful woes attend,And, bursting soon, shall o'er your race descend:With every bounding keel that dares my rage,Eternal war my rocks and storms shall wage.The next proud fleet that through my drear domainWith daring hand shall hoist the streaming vane,That gallant navy, by my whirlwinds toss'd,And raging seas, shall perish on my coast.Then he who first my secret reign descried,A naked corpse, wide floating o'er the tide,Shall drive. Unless my heart's full raptures fail,O Lusus, oft shalt thou thy children wail!Each year thy shipwreck'd sons shalt thou deplore,Each year thy sheeted masts shall strew my shore!'"THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.The cut upon previous page—a copy from an antique original—represents da Gama's ship and the Spectre of the Cape. The table-land of the promontory is seen through the drift of the tempest, towards the east. The ship is broached to, her sails close-furled, with the exception of the foresail, which has broken loose and is flapping wildly in the hurricane. Both the engraving and the description we have quoted from Camoens are strikingly illustrative of those visionary horrors which pervaded the minds of the navigators of the period, and are also characteristic of that peculiar cloud whose sudden envelopment of the Cape is the sure forerunner of a storm. The artist seems to have chosen the moment when the spectre, having uttered his dreadful prophecy, is vanishing into air.PHOSPHORESCENCE.
VASCO DA GAMA.
VASCO DA GAMA.
VASCO DA GAMA.
PORTUGUESE NAVIGATION UNDER EMMANUEL—POPULAR PREJUDICES—THE LUSIAD OF CAMOENS—VASCO DA GAMA—MAPS OF AFRICA OF THE PERIOD—PREPARATIONS FOR AN INDIAN VOYAGE—RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES—THE DEPARTURE—RENDEZVOUS AT THE CAPE VERDS—LANDING UPON THE COAST—THE NATIVES—AN INVITATION TO DINNER, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES—A STORM—MUTINY—THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.
In the year 1495, John II. of Portugal was succeeded by his cousin, Emmanuel, into whose mind he had a short time before his death instilled a portion of his own zeal for maritime discovery and commercial supremacy. He had especially dwelt upon the necessity of continuing the progress of African research beyond the point which Bartholomew Diaz had lately reached, into the regions where lay the East Indies with their wealth and marvellous productions, and thus substituting for the tedious land-route a more expeditious track by sea. Upon hisaccession, Emmanuel found that a strong opposition existed to the extension of Portuguese commerce and discovery. Arguments were urged against it in his own councils, and had a marked effect upon the public mind by heightening the danger of the intended voyage.
In our narrative of the first East Indian expedition, we shall often have occasion to quote from a poem written in commemoration of it,—the Lusiad of Camoens, a semi-religious epic and the masterpiece of Portuguese literature,—Lusiade being the poetic and symbolical name of Portugal. Camoens describes at the outset the hostility of the nation to further maritime adventure, and places in the mouth of a reverend adviser of the king the following forcible appeal:
"Oh, frantic thirst of Honor and of Fame,The crowd's blind tribute, a fallacious name;What stings, what plagues, what secret scourges cursed,Torment those bosoms where thy pride is nursed!What dangers threaten and what deaths destroyThe hapless youth whom thy vain gleams decoy!Thou dazzling meteor, vain as fleeting air,What new dread horror dost thou now prepare?Oh, madness of Ambition! thus to dareDangers so fruitless, so remote a war!That Fame's vain flattery may thy name adorn,And thy proud titles on her flag be borne:Thee, Lord of Persia, thee of India lord,O'er Ethiopia vast, and Araby adored!"
Never was any expedition, whether by land or water, so unpopular as this of King Emmanuel. The murmurs of the cabinet were re-echoed by the populace, who were wrought upon to such an extent that they believed the natural consequence of an invasion of the Indian seas would be the arrival in the Tagus of the wroth and avenging Sultan of Egypt. But Emmanuel, who, we are told, "regarded Diffidence as the mark of a low and grovelling mind, and Hope the quality of a noble and aspiring soul," discerned prospects of national advantage in the scheme, and determined to pursue it to a prosperous issue.
King John, before his death, and shortly after the return of Diaz, had ordered timber to be purchased for the construction of ships fit to cope with the storms of the redoubtable Cape. Emmanuel now sought a capable commander, and, after much deliberation, fixed upon a gentleman of his own household, Vasco da Gama by name, a native of the seaport of Sines, and already favorably known for enterprise and naval skill. We are told that "he was formed for the service to which he was called,—violent indeed in his temper, terrible in anger, and sudden in the execution of justice, but at the same time intrepid, persevering, patient in difficulties, fertile in expedients, and superior to all discouragement. He devoted himself to death if he should not succeed, and this from a sense of religion and loyalty." When the king acquainted him with the mission intrusted to his charge, Vasco replied that he had long aspired to the honor of conducting such an undertaking. Camoens makes da Gama thus describe his acceptance of the honor:
"'Let skies on fire,
Let frozen seas, let horrid war, conspire:I dare them all,' I cried, 'and but repineThat one poor life is all I can resign.'"
The most distinguished members of the Portuguese nobility were present at this interview. The king gave da Gama, with his own hands, the flag he was to bear,—a white cross enclosed within a red one,—the Cross of the military Order of Christ. Upon this he took the oath of allegiance. Emmanuel then delivered him the journal of Covillam, with such charts as were then in existence, and letters to all the Indian potentates who had become known to the Portuguese. Among these was of course one addressed to the renowned Prester John.
MAP OF AFRICA DRAWN IN THE YEAR 1497.
MAP OF AFRICA DRAWN IN THE YEAR 1497.
MAP OF AFRICA DRAWN IN THE YEAR 1497.
A map of Africa had been lately designed, in accordance with the discoveries made by land, as we have mentioned, by Covillam. The accompanying specimen is a fac-simile of one which belonged to Juan de la Cosa—the pilot of Columbus. Upon it the principal cities are indicated by a roughly sketched house or church; the government is denoted by a picture of a king, closely resembling the royal gentry in a pack of cards; while flags, planted at intervals, indicate boundary lines and frontier posts. The winds are represented by fabulous divinities sitting round the world upon leathern bottles, whose sides they are pressing to force out the air. The celebrated statue of the Canaries is often seen flourishing his club at the top of his tower. Abyssinia figures with its Prester John, his head being adorned with a brilliant mitre. Other kingdoms are marked out by portraits of their kings in richly embroidered costumes. The inhabitants of Africa, in maps of the world, are represented as giraffes, black men, and elephants. Portuguese camps are denoted by colored tents, while groups of light cavalry, splendidly caparisoned, dotting the territory at numerous points, indicate that the Portuguese army is making the tour of that mysterious continent. These quaint specimens of chartographical art are,in short, the faithful expression of the geographical science of the age.
The fleet equipped for da Gama's voyage consisted of three ships and a caravel,—the San Gabriel, of one hundred and twenty tons, commanded by da Gama, and piloted by Pero Dalemquer, who had been pilot to Bartholomew Diaz; the San Rafael, of one hundred tons, commanded by Paulo da Gama, the admiral's brother; a store-ship of two hundred tons; and the caravel, of fifty tons, commanded by Nicolao Coelho. Besides these, Diaz, who had already been over the route, was ordered to accompany da Gama as far as the Mina. The crews numbered in all one hundred and sixty men, among whom were ten malefactors condemned to death, and who had consequently nothing to hope for in Portugal. Their duty in the fleet was to go ashore upon savage coasts and attempt to open intercourse with the natives. In case of rendering essential service and escaping with their lives, their sentence was to be remitted on their return home.
A small chapel stood upon the seaside about four miles from Lisbon. Hither da Gama and his crew repaired upon the day preceding that fixed for their departure. They spent the night in prayer and rites of devotion, invoking the blessing and protection of Heaven. On the morrow, the adventurers marched to their ships in the midst of the whole population of Lisbon, who now thronged the shore of Belem. A long procession of priests sang anthems and offered sacrifice. The vast multitude, catching the fire of devotion and animated with the fervor of religious zeal, joined aloud in the prayers for their safety. The parents and relatives of the travellers shed tears, and da Gama himself wept on bidding farewell to the friends who gathered round him.
Camoens thus describes the emotions of the adventurers as they gazed at the receding shore:
"As from our dear-loved native shore we fly,Our votive shouts, redoubled, rend the sky:
'Success! Success!' far echoes o'er the tide,While our broad hulks the foaming waves divide.When slowly gliding from our wistful eyes,The Lusian mountains mingle with the skies;Tago's loved stream and Cintra's mountains cold,Dim fading now, we now no more behold;And still with yearning hearts our eyes explore,Till one dim speck of land appears no more."
The admiral had fixed upon the Cape Verd Islands as the first place of rendezvous in case of separation by storm. They all arrived safely in eight days at the Canaries, but were here driven widely apart by a tempest at night. The three captains subsequently joined each other, but could not find the admiral. They therefore made for the appointed rendezvous, where, to their great satisfaction, they found da Gama already arrived; "and, saluting him with many shots of ordnance, and with sound of trumpets, they spake unto him, each of them heartily rejoicing and thanking God for their safe meeting and good fortune in this their first brunt of danger and of peril." Diaz here took leave of them and returned to Portugal. Then, on the 3d of August, they set sail finally for the Cape of Good Hope.
They continued without seeing land during the months of August, September, and October, greatly distressed by foul weather, or, in the quaint language of those days, "by torments of wind and rain." At last, on the 7th of November, they touched the African coast, and anchored in a capacious bay, which they called the Bay of St. Helena, and which is not far to the north of the Cape. Here they perceived the natives "to bee lyttle men, ill favored in the face, and of color blacke; and when they did speake, it was in such manner as though they did alwayes sigh." Camoens rhapsodizes at length over this approach to the land; and it must be remembered that, having followed in da Gama's track as early as the year 1553, his descriptions of scenery are those of an eye-witness:
"Loud through the fleet the echoing shouts prevail:We drop the anchor and restrain the sail;And now, descending in a spacious bay,Wide o'er the coast the venturous soldiers stray,To spy the wonders of the savage shoreWhere strangers' foot had never trod before.I and my pilots, on the yellow sand,Explore beneath what sky the shores expand.Here we perceived our venturous keels had pass'd,Unharmed, the Southern tropic's howling blast,And now approached dread Neptune's secret reign:Where the stern power, as o'er the Austral mainHe rides, wide scatters from the Polar StarHail, ice, and snow, and all the wintry war."
Trade was now commenced between da Gama and the natives, and, by means of signs and gestures, cloth, beads, bells, and glass were bartered for articles of food and other necessaries. But this friendly intercourse was soon interrupted by an act of imprudent folly on the part of a young man of the squadron. Being invited to dine by a party of the natives, he entered one of their huts to partake of the repast. Being disgusted at the viands, which consisted of a sea-calf dressed after the manner of the Hottentots, he fled in dismay. He was followed by his perplexed entertainers, who were anxious to learn how they had offended him. Taking their officious hospitality for impertinent aggression, he shouted for help; and it was not long before mutual apprehension brought on open hostilities. Da Gama and his officers were attacked, while taking the altitude of the sun with an astrolabe, by a party of concealed negroes armed with spears pointed with horn. The admiral was wounded in the foot, and with some difficulty effected a retreat to the ships. He left the Bay of St. Helena on the 16th of November.
He now met with a sudden and violent change of weather, and the Portuguese historians have left animated descriptions of the storm which ensued. During any momentary pause in the elemental warfare, the sailors, worn out with fatigue and yielding to despair, surrounded da Gama, begging that he would not devote himself and them to a fate so dreadful. They declared that the gale could no longer be weathered, andthat every one must be buried in the waves if they continued to proceed. The admiral's firmness remained unshaken, and a conspiracy was soon formed against him. He was informed in time of this desperate plot by his brother Paulo. He put the ringleaders and pilots in irons, and, assisted by his brother and those who remained faithful to their duty, stood night and day to the helm. At length, on Wednesday, the 20th of November, the whole squadron doubled the tremendous promontory. The mutineers were pardoned and released from their manacles.
The legend of the Spectre of the Cape is given by Camoens in full; and it is so characteristic of the age, and, as an episode, is itself so interesting, that we cannot refrain from quoting it entire. Da Gama is supposed to be relating his experience in the first person:
"I spoke, when, rising through the darken'd air,Appall'd, we saw a hideous phantom glare.High and enormous o'er the flood he tower'd,And thwart our way with sullen aspect lower'd;An earthly paleness o'er his cheeks was spread,Erect uprose his hairs of wither'd red;Writhing to speak, his sable lips disclose,Sharp and disjoin'd, his gnashing teeths' blue rows;His haggard beard flow'd quivering in the wind;Revenge and horror in his mien combined;His clouded front, by withering lightnings sear'd,The inward anguish of his soul declared.Cold, gliding horrors fill'd each hero's breast;Our bristling hair and tottering knees confess'dWild dread. The while, with visage ghastly wan,His black lips trembling, thus the fiend began:
'Ye sons of Lusus, who, with eyes profane,Have view'd the secrets of my awful reign,Have pass'd the bounds which jealous nature drewTo veil her secret shrine from mortal view;Hear from my lips what direful woes attend,And, bursting soon, shall o'er your race descend:With every bounding keel that dares my rage,Eternal war my rocks and storms shall wage.The next proud fleet that through my drear domainWith daring hand shall hoist the streaming vane,That gallant navy, by my whirlwinds toss'd,And raging seas, shall perish on my coast.Then he who first my secret reign descried,A naked corpse, wide floating o'er the tide,Shall drive. Unless my heart's full raptures fail,O Lusus, oft shalt thou thy children wail!Each year thy shipwreck'd sons shalt thou deplore,Each year thy sheeted masts shall strew my shore!'"
THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.
THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.
THE SPECTRE OF THE CAPE.
The cut upon previous page—a copy from an antique original—represents da Gama's ship and the Spectre of the Cape. The table-land of the promontory is seen through the drift of the tempest, towards the east. The ship is broached to, her sails close-furled, with the exception of the foresail, which has broken loose and is flapping wildly in the hurricane. Both the engraving and the description we have quoted from Camoens are strikingly illustrative of those visionary horrors which pervaded the minds of the navigators of the period, and are also characteristic of that peculiar cloud whose sudden envelopment of the Cape is the sure forerunner of a storm. The artist seems to have chosen the moment when the spectre, having uttered his dreadful prophecy, is vanishing into air.
PHOSPHORESCENCE.
PHOSPHORESCENCE.
PHOSPHORESCENCE.
THE MAN OVERBOARD, AND THE ALBATROSS.CHAPTER XIX.DA GAMA AND THE NEGROES—THE HOTTENTOTS AND CAFFRES—ADVENTURE WITH AN ALBATROSS—THE RIVER OF GOOD PROMISE—MOZAMBIQUE—TREACHERY OF THE NATIVES—MOMBASSA—MELINDA, AND ITS AMIABLE KING—FESTIVITIES —THE MALABAR COAST—CALICUT—THE ROUTE TO THE INDIES DISCOVERED.Da Gama landed some two hundred miles beyond the Cape, and, discharging the victualling-ship of her stores, ordered her to be burned, as the king had directed. He then entered into commercial relations with the natives, and exchanged red nightcaps for ivory bracelets. "Then came two hundred blacke men, some lyttle, some great, bringing with them twelve oxen and four sheep, and as our men went upon shore they began to play upon four flutes, according with four sundry voices, the music whereof sounded very well. Which the generall hearing, commandedthe trumpets to sound, and so they danced with our men. In this pastime and feasting, and in buying their oxen and sheep, the day passed over." Da Gama had reason before long to suspect treachery, however, and withdrew his men and re-embarked. It was in this place that a man falling overboard, and swimming for a long time before the accident was observed, was followed by an albatross, who hovered in the air just above him, waiting the propitious moment when he could make a quiet meal upon him. The man was subsequently rescued, and the albatross disappointed.Da Gama now passed the rock de la Cruz, where Diaz had erected his last pillar, and by the aid of a brisk wind escaped the dangers of the currents and shoals. Losing sight of land, he recovered it again on Christmas-day, and in consequence named the spot Tierra da Natal,—a name which it still preserves. From this point his course was nearly north, along the eastern coast of the continent. Farther on he landed two of his malefactors, with instructions to inform themselves of the character and customs of the inhabitants, promising to call for them on his return. On the 11th of January, 1498, he anchored off a portion of the coast occupied by people who seemed peaceably and honestly disposed. They were, in fact, Caffres,—the fleet having passed the territory of the Hottentots. One of the sailors, Martin Alonzo, understood their language,—a circumstance very remarkable, yet perfectly authenticated. As he had not been lower than the Mina, on the western coast, and of course never upon the eastern at all, the inference seems inevitable that some of the negro tribes of Africa extend much beyond the limits usually assigned them in modern geography. After two days spent in the exchange of civilities of the most courteous nature, the ships proceeded on their way,—da Gama naming the countryTierra da Boa Gete,—Land of Good People.He next found, at the mouth of a large river, a tribe ofnegroes who seemed to have made greater progress in civilization than their neighbors. They had barks with sails made of palm-leaves,—the only indication of any knowledge of navigation the Portuguese had yet met with upon the African coast. No one—not even Martin Alonzo—understood their language: as far as could be gathered from their pantomime, they had come from a distance where they had seen vessels as large as the San Gabriel, whence da Gama conjectured that the Indies were not far off. He gave to the river the name ofRio dos bos Sinaes, or River of Good Promise. The crew suffered greatly here from the effects of scurvy,—many of them dying of the disease and others succumbing under the consequences of amputation. The ships were careened and repaired: thirty-two days were spent in this labor. These incidents are thus graphically described in the Lusiad:"Far from the land, wide o'er the ocean driven,Our helms resigning to the care of Heaven,By hope and fear's keen passions toss'd, we roam;When our glad eyes behold the surges foamAgainst the beacons of a shelter'd bay,Where sloops and barges cut the watery way.The river's opening breast some upward plied,And some came gliding down the sweepy tide.Quick throbs of transport heaved in every heart,To view this knowledge of the seaman's art;For here we hoped our ardent wish to gain,To hear of India's strand,—nor hoped in vain:Though Ethiopia's sable hue they bore,No look of wild surprise the natives wore;Wide o'er their heads the cotton turban swell'd,And cloth of blue the decent loins conceal'd.Their speech, though rude and dissonant of sound,Their speech a mixture of Arabian own'd.Alonzo, skill'd in all the copious storeOf fair Arabia's speech and flowery lore,In joyful converse heard the pleasing tale,'That o'er these seas full oft the frequent sail,And lordly vessels, tall as ours, appear'd,Which to the regions of the morning steer'd:Whose cheerful crews, resembling ours, displayThe kindred face and color of the day.'Elate with joy, we raise the glad acclaim,AndRiver of Good Signsthe port we name."Our keels, that now had steer'd through many a clime,By shell-fish roughen'd, and incased with slime,Joyful we clean; while bleating from the fieldThe fleecy dams the smiling natives yield.Alas! how vain the bloom of human joy!How soon the blasts of woe that bloom destroy!A dread disease its rankling horrors shed,And death's dire ravage through mine army spread.Never mine eyes such dreary sight beheld!Ghastly the mouth and gums enormous swell'd;And instant, putrid like a dead man's wound,Poison'd with fetid steam the air around.Long, long endear'd by fellowship in woe,O'er the cold dust we give the tears to flow;And in their hapless lot forebode our own,—A foreign burial, and a grave unknown."The fleet joyfully left the River of Good Promise on the 24th of February, and not long after discovered two groups of islands. Near the coast of one of these they were followed by eight canoes, manned by persons of fine stature, less black than the Hottentots, and dressed in cotton cloth of various colors. Upon their heads they wore turbans wrought with silk and gold thread. They were armed with swords and daggers like the Moors, and carried musical instruments which they called sagbuts. They came on board as if they had known the strangers before, and spoke in the Arabic tongue, repelling with disdain the supposition that they were Moors. They said that their island was called Mozambique; that they traded with the Moors of the Indies in spices, pearls, rubies, silver, and linen, and offered to take the ships into their harbor. The bar permitting their passage, they anchored at two crossbow-shots from the town. This was built of wood and thatch,—the mosques alone being constructed of stone. It was occupied principally by Moors, the rest of the island being inhabited by the natives, who were the same as those of the mainland opposite. The Moors traded with the Indies and with the African Sofala in shipswithout decks and built without the use of nails,—the planks being bound together by cocoa fibres, and the sails being made of palm-leaves. They had compasses and charts.The Moorish governor of Mozambique and the other Moors supposed the Portuguese to be Turks, on account of the whiteness of their skin. They sent them provisions, in return for which da Gama sent the shah a quantity of red caps, coral, copper vessels, and bells. The shah set no value upon these articles, and inquired disdainfully why the captain had not sent him scarlet cloth. He afterwards went on board the flag-ship, where he was received with hospitality, though not without secret preparations against treachery. The Portuguese learned from him that he governed the island as the deputy of the King of Quiloa; that Prester John lived and ruled a long distance towards the interior of the mainland; that Calicut, whither da Gama was bound, was two thousand miles to the northeast, but that he could not proceed thither without the guidance of pilots familiar with the navigation. He promised to furnish him with two. Discovering subsequently, however, that the strangers were Christians, the shah contrived a plot for their destruction. The vessels escaped, but with only one pilot, whose treachery throughout the voyage was a source of constant annoyance and peril. On departing, da Gama gave the traitors a broadside, which did considerable damage to their village of thatch.On the 1st of April, da Gama gave to an island which he discovered the name of Açoutado, in commemoration of a sound flagellation which was there administered to the pilot for telling him it formed part of the continent,—upon which he confessed that his purpose in thus misrepresenting the case was to wreck and destroy the ships. On the 7th, they came to the large island of Mombassa, where they found rice, millet, poultry, and fat cattle, and sheep without tails. The orchards were filled with fig, orange, and lemon trees. This island received honey, ivory, and wax from a port upon the mainland. Thehouses were built of stone and mortar, and the city was defended by a small fort almost even with the water. "They have a king," says the chronicle, "and the inhabitants are Moores, whereof some bee white. They goe gallantly arrayed, especially the women, apparelled in gownes of silke and bedecked with jewells of golde and precious stones. The men were greatly comforted, as having confidence that in this place they might cure such as were then sick,—as in truth were almost all; in number but fewe, as the others were dead."The King of Mombassa, however, was as great a rogue as the Shah of Mozambique, from whom he had heard, by overland communication, of what had happened in his island. During the night following a grand interchange of civilities and of protestations, da Gama was informed that a sea-monster was devouring the cable. It turned out that a number of Moors were endeavoring to cut it, that the ship might be driven ashore. Anxious to quit this inhospitable coast, the fleet profited by the first wind to continue their course to the north. They captured a zambuco, or pinnace, from which they took seventeen Moors and a considerable quantity of silver and gold. On the same day they arrived off the town of Melinda, situated three degrees only to the south of the equator. The city resembled the cities of Europe, the streets being wide, and the houses being of stone and several stories high. "The generall," we are told, "being come over against this citie, did rejoyce in his heart very much, that he now sawe a citie lyke unto those of Portingale, and rendered most heartie and humble thanks to God for their good and safe arrival." The chief of the captured zambuco offered to procure da Gama a pilot to take the fleet to Calicut, if he would permit him to go ashore. He was landed upon a beach opposite the city. The chief performed his promise, and induced the King of Melinda to treat the strangers with courtesy and respect. Camoens thus describes the festivities upon the alliance:"With that ennobling worth whose fond employBefriends the brave, the monarch owns his joy;Entreats the leader and his weary bandTo taste the dews of sweet repose on land,And all the riches of his cultured fieldsObedient to the nod of Gama yields.'What from the blustering winds and lengthening tideYour ships have suffer'd, here shall be supplied;Arms and provisions I myself will send,And, great of skill, a pilot shall attend.'So spoke the king; and now, with purpled ray,Beneath the shining wave the god of dayRetiring, left the evening shades to spread,When to the fleet the joyful herald sped.To find such friends each breast with rapture glows:The feast is kindled, and the goblet flows;The trembling comet's irritating raysBound to the skies, and trail a sparkling blaze;The vaulting bombs awake their sleeping fire,And, like the Cyclops' bolt, to heaven aspire;The trump and fife's shrill clarion far aroundThe glorious music of the night resound.Nor less their joy Melinda's sons display:The sulphur bursts in many an ardent ray,And to the heavens ascends in whizzing gyres,Whilst Ocean flames with artificial fires."During the interview which followed, the king remarked that he had never seen any men who pleased him so much as the Portuguese,—a compliment which da Gama acknowledged by setting at liberty the sixteen Moors of the captured pinnace. The king sent the promised pilot on his return; he proved to be as deeply skilled in the art of navigation as any of the pilots of Europe. He was acquainted with the astrolabe, compass, and quadrant. The fleet set sail from Melinda on the 24th of April. As they had now gone far enough towards the north, and as India lay nearly east, they bade farewell to the coast, of which they had hardly lost sight since leaving Lisbon, and struck into the open sea, or rather a wide gulf of the Indian Ocean, seven hundred and fifty leagues across. A few days after, having crossed the line, the crew were delighted to behold again the stars and constellations of the Northern hemisphere. Thevoyage was rapid and fortunate; for in twenty-three days they arrived off the Malabar coast, and, after a day or two of southing, discovered the lofty hills which overhang the city of Calicut. Da Gama amply rewarded the pilot, released the malefactors from their fetters, and summoned the crew to prayer. The anchor was then thrown, and a feast was spread in honor of the day. The route by sea had been discovered from the Tagus to the Ganges: da Gama had laid out the way from Belem to Golconda.CALICUT IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
THE MAN OVERBOARD, AND THE ALBATROSS.
THE MAN OVERBOARD, AND THE ALBATROSS.
THE MAN OVERBOARD, AND THE ALBATROSS.
DA GAMA AND THE NEGROES—THE HOTTENTOTS AND CAFFRES—ADVENTURE WITH AN ALBATROSS—THE RIVER OF GOOD PROMISE—MOZAMBIQUE—TREACHERY OF THE NATIVES—MOMBASSA—MELINDA, AND ITS AMIABLE KING—FESTIVITIES —THE MALABAR COAST—CALICUT—THE ROUTE TO THE INDIES DISCOVERED.
Da Gama landed some two hundred miles beyond the Cape, and, discharging the victualling-ship of her stores, ordered her to be burned, as the king had directed. He then entered into commercial relations with the natives, and exchanged red nightcaps for ivory bracelets. "Then came two hundred blacke men, some lyttle, some great, bringing with them twelve oxen and four sheep, and as our men went upon shore they began to play upon four flutes, according with four sundry voices, the music whereof sounded very well. Which the generall hearing, commandedthe trumpets to sound, and so they danced with our men. In this pastime and feasting, and in buying their oxen and sheep, the day passed over." Da Gama had reason before long to suspect treachery, however, and withdrew his men and re-embarked. It was in this place that a man falling overboard, and swimming for a long time before the accident was observed, was followed by an albatross, who hovered in the air just above him, waiting the propitious moment when he could make a quiet meal upon him. The man was subsequently rescued, and the albatross disappointed.
Da Gama now passed the rock de la Cruz, where Diaz had erected his last pillar, and by the aid of a brisk wind escaped the dangers of the currents and shoals. Losing sight of land, he recovered it again on Christmas-day, and in consequence named the spot Tierra da Natal,—a name which it still preserves. From this point his course was nearly north, along the eastern coast of the continent. Farther on he landed two of his malefactors, with instructions to inform themselves of the character and customs of the inhabitants, promising to call for them on his return. On the 11th of January, 1498, he anchored off a portion of the coast occupied by people who seemed peaceably and honestly disposed. They were, in fact, Caffres,—the fleet having passed the territory of the Hottentots. One of the sailors, Martin Alonzo, understood their language,—a circumstance very remarkable, yet perfectly authenticated. As he had not been lower than the Mina, on the western coast, and of course never upon the eastern at all, the inference seems inevitable that some of the negro tribes of Africa extend much beyond the limits usually assigned them in modern geography. After two days spent in the exchange of civilities of the most courteous nature, the ships proceeded on their way,—da Gama naming the countryTierra da Boa Gete,—Land of Good People.
He next found, at the mouth of a large river, a tribe ofnegroes who seemed to have made greater progress in civilization than their neighbors. They had barks with sails made of palm-leaves,—the only indication of any knowledge of navigation the Portuguese had yet met with upon the African coast. No one—not even Martin Alonzo—understood their language: as far as could be gathered from their pantomime, they had come from a distance where they had seen vessels as large as the San Gabriel, whence da Gama conjectured that the Indies were not far off. He gave to the river the name ofRio dos bos Sinaes, or River of Good Promise. The crew suffered greatly here from the effects of scurvy,—many of them dying of the disease and others succumbing under the consequences of amputation. The ships were careened and repaired: thirty-two days were spent in this labor. These incidents are thus graphically described in the Lusiad:
"Far from the land, wide o'er the ocean driven,Our helms resigning to the care of Heaven,By hope and fear's keen passions toss'd, we roam;When our glad eyes behold the surges foamAgainst the beacons of a shelter'd bay,Where sloops and barges cut the watery way.The river's opening breast some upward plied,And some came gliding down the sweepy tide.Quick throbs of transport heaved in every heart,To view this knowledge of the seaman's art;For here we hoped our ardent wish to gain,To hear of India's strand,—nor hoped in vain:Though Ethiopia's sable hue they bore,No look of wild surprise the natives wore;Wide o'er their heads the cotton turban swell'd,And cloth of blue the decent loins conceal'd.Their speech, though rude and dissonant of sound,Their speech a mixture of Arabian own'd.Alonzo, skill'd in all the copious storeOf fair Arabia's speech and flowery lore,In joyful converse heard the pleasing tale,'That o'er these seas full oft the frequent sail,And lordly vessels, tall as ours, appear'd,Which to the regions of the morning steer'd:Whose cheerful crews, resembling ours, displayThe kindred face and color of the day.'Elate with joy, we raise the glad acclaim,AndRiver of Good Signsthe port we name.
"Our keels, that now had steer'd through many a clime,By shell-fish roughen'd, and incased with slime,Joyful we clean; while bleating from the fieldThe fleecy dams the smiling natives yield.Alas! how vain the bloom of human joy!How soon the blasts of woe that bloom destroy!A dread disease its rankling horrors shed,And death's dire ravage through mine army spread.Never mine eyes such dreary sight beheld!Ghastly the mouth and gums enormous swell'd;And instant, putrid like a dead man's wound,Poison'd with fetid steam the air around.Long, long endear'd by fellowship in woe,O'er the cold dust we give the tears to flow;And in their hapless lot forebode our own,—A foreign burial, and a grave unknown."
The fleet joyfully left the River of Good Promise on the 24th of February, and not long after discovered two groups of islands. Near the coast of one of these they were followed by eight canoes, manned by persons of fine stature, less black than the Hottentots, and dressed in cotton cloth of various colors. Upon their heads they wore turbans wrought with silk and gold thread. They were armed with swords and daggers like the Moors, and carried musical instruments which they called sagbuts. They came on board as if they had known the strangers before, and spoke in the Arabic tongue, repelling with disdain the supposition that they were Moors. They said that their island was called Mozambique; that they traded with the Moors of the Indies in spices, pearls, rubies, silver, and linen, and offered to take the ships into their harbor. The bar permitting their passage, they anchored at two crossbow-shots from the town. This was built of wood and thatch,—the mosques alone being constructed of stone. It was occupied principally by Moors, the rest of the island being inhabited by the natives, who were the same as those of the mainland opposite. The Moors traded with the Indies and with the African Sofala in shipswithout decks and built without the use of nails,—the planks being bound together by cocoa fibres, and the sails being made of palm-leaves. They had compasses and charts.
The Moorish governor of Mozambique and the other Moors supposed the Portuguese to be Turks, on account of the whiteness of their skin. They sent them provisions, in return for which da Gama sent the shah a quantity of red caps, coral, copper vessels, and bells. The shah set no value upon these articles, and inquired disdainfully why the captain had not sent him scarlet cloth. He afterwards went on board the flag-ship, where he was received with hospitality, though not without secret preparations against treachery. The Portuguese learned from him that he governed the island as the deputy of the King of Quiloa; that Prester John lived and ruled a long distance towards the interior of the mainland; that Calicut, whither da Gama was bound, was two thousand miles to the northeast, but that he could not proceed thither without the guidance of pilots familiar with the navigation. He promised to furnish him with two. Discovering subsequently, however, that the strangers were Christians, the shah contrived a plot for their destruction. The vessels escaped, but with only one pilot, whose treachery throughout the voyage was a source of constant annoyance and peril. On departing, da Gama gave the traitors a broadside, which did considerable damage to their village of thatch.
On the 1st of April, da Gama gave to an island which he discovered the name of Açoutado, in commemoration of a sound flagellation which was there administered to the pilot for telling him it formed part of the continent,—upon which he confessed that his purpose in thus misrepresenting the case was to wreck and destroy the ships. On the 7th, they came to the large island of Mombassa, where they found rice, millet, poultry, and fat cattle, and sheep without tails. The orchards were filled with fig, orange, and lemon trees. This island received honey, ivory, and wax from a port upon the mainland. Thehouses were built of stone and mortar, and the city was defended by a small fort almost even with the water. "They have a king," says the chronicle, "and the inhabitants are Moores, whereof some bee white. They goe gallantly arrayed, especially the women, apparelled in gownes of silke and bedecked with jewells of golde and precious stones. The men were greatly comforted, as having confidence that in this place they might cure such as were then sick,—as in truth were almost all; in number but fewe, as the others were dead."
The King of Mombassa, however, was as great a rogue as the Shah of Mozambique, from whom he had heard, by overland communication, of what had happened in his island. During the night following a grand interchange of civilities and of protestations, da Gama was informed that a sea-monster was devouring the cable. It turned out that a number of Moors were endeavoring to cut it, that the ship might be driven ashore. Anxious to quit this inhospitable coast, the fleet profited by the first wind to continue their course to the north. They captured a zambuco, or pinnace, from which they took seventeen Moors and a considerable quantity of silver and gold. On the same day they arrived off the town of Melinda, situated three degrees only to the south of the equator. The city resembled the cities of Europe, the streets being wide, and the houses being of stone and several stories high. "The generall," we are told, "being come over against this citie, did rejoyce in his heart very much, that he now sawe a citie lyke unto those of Portingale, and rendered most heartie and humble thanks to God for their good and safe arrival." The chief of the captured zambuco offered to procure da Gama a pilot to take the fleet to Calicut, if he would permit him to go ashore. He was landed upon a beach opposite the city. The chief performed his promise, and induced the King of Melinda to treat the strangers with courtesy and respect. Camoens thus describes the festivities upon the alliance:
"With that ennobling worth whose fond employBefriends the brave, the monarch owns his joy;Entreats the leader and his weary bandTo taste the dews of sweet repose on land,And all the riches of his cultured fieldsObedient to the nod of Gama yields.'What from the blustering winds and lengthening tideYour ships have suffer'd, here shall be supplied;Arms and provisions I myself will send,And, great of skill, a pilot shall attend.'So spoke the king; and now, with purpled ray,Beneath the shining wave the god of dayRetiring, left the evening shades to spread,When to the fleet the joyful herald sped.To find such friends each breast with rapture glows:The feast is kindled, and the goblet flows;The trembling comet's irritating raysBound to the skies, and trail a sparkling blaze;The vaulting bombs awake their sleeping fire,And, like the Cyclops' bolt, to heaven aspire;The trump and fife's shrill clarion far aroundThe glorious music of the night resound.Nor less their joy Melinda's sons display:The sulphur bursts in many an ardent ray,And to the heavens ascends in whizzing gyres,Whilst Ocean flames with artificial fires."
During the interview which followed, the king remarked that he had never seen any men who pleased him so much as the Portuguese,—a compliment which da Gama acknowledged by setting at liberty the sixteen Moors of the captured pinnace. The king sent the promised pilot on his return; he proved to be as deeply skilled in the art of navigation as any of the pilots of Europe. He was acquainted with the astrolabe, compass, and quadrant. The fleet set sail from Melinda on the 24th of April. As they had now gone far enough towards the north, and as India lay nearly east, they bade farewell to the coast, of which they had hardly lost sight since leaving Lisbon, and struck into the open sea, or rather a wide gulf of the Indian Ocean, seven hundred and fifty leagues across. A few days after, having crossed the line, the crew were delighted to behold again the stars and constellations of the Northern hemisphere. Thevoyage was rapid and fortunate; for in twenty-three days they arrived off the Malabar coast, and, after a day or two of southing, discovered the lofty hills which overhang the city of Calicut. Da Gama amply rewarded the pilot, released the malefactors from their fetters, and summoned the crew to prayer. The anchor was then thrown, and a feast was spread in honor of the day. The route by sea had been discovered from the Tagus to the Ganges: da Gama had laid out the way from Belem to Golconda.
CALICUT IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
CALICUT IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
CALICUT IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.