Aubrey F. G. Bell

“ The Spanish fleet remained in the Tagus, and a squire besought Nun’ Alvarez not to cross, saying that he had dreamt that the enemy had captured him as he passed through their fleet. Nun’ Alvarez went on his way, leaving the squire with his dream on the further shore. When he was in mid-stream, still perhaps thinking of the timid escudeiro, he bade his trumpets blow the enemy a challenge. But the Castilians little imagined what a prey was within their grasp, and his small boat passed through safely to Lisbon. ”

“ To any other man, lord of half Portugal, it might perhaps have seemed a little thing to have had a citizen beaten and rolled in a ditch, but presently Nun’ Alvarez stopped eating, his eyes filled with tears, and he began to wish he was dead. ”

“ They did not wait and watch for some wonderful Ism, like a brazen serpent, to change the face of the world: they as individuals simply, persistently set to work and—changed it. In less than fifty years after the Portuguese first reached India they were in Japan, converting and civilising the Japanese, and had made possible that tremendous saying of Camões:
E se mais mundo houvera lá chegára. ”

“ That is a [Pg xi] fact that must uplift and inspire those who study Portugal’s history or consider her future. For the Portuguese of the sixteenth century fought not against or not only against hordes of undisciplined savages, but against Moors and Turks highly civilised and well equipped with artillery.
Perhaps the secret of their success is that their motto was “God, King, and Country,” and that each man among them relied, under Heaven, on himself, not on this or that sect or party or philosophy, election promises or political programmes. ”

“ He adopted oriental methods in dealing with the kings of the East. He murdered in cold blood the powerful minister of the young King of Cochin, and in one of his letters to King Manoel he remarks calmly, “In all my letters I bade him kill the Samuri of Calicut with poison.” But he understood the East and was the only man who could have established the Portuguese Empire firmly. That he was not given a free hand and every assistance from the first was the doom of that empire, and Portugal never saw his like again. ”

“ Thus Albuquerque, whose ties with Portugal had been gradually replaced by those that bound him to Goa, which he had [Pg 142] made, as Castro his quinta, died with the bitter knowledge that, if he lived, he must spend his years in Portugal, a whale among minnows, and watch his work being undone by others; Castro, with his thoughts ever turning to the rocks and woods of Cintra and the study of philosophy in his beloved quinta, died in a foreign grandeur at Goa. ”

“ At nine o’clock on the morning of August 15, 1385, the battle began with a great hurling of stones, followed by fighting with the lance, and then at still closer quarters with axe and sword. Nun’ Alvarez was constantly where the fight raged most fiercely, and his words “Fight, Portuguese, fight for king and country” kept ringing out above the din. The flower of Castilian chivalry fell that day and many Portuguese nobles fighting for Castille. Nun’ Alvarez saw his brother the Master of Calatrava fall pierced by a lance, but was never able to find his body. The King of Castille fled to Santarem. ”

“ A few, no doubt, of the heroic ninety on whose behalf Pacheco wrote to the King, recalling their services, survived, and they might discuss the apparent miracle of their famous victory, and, in Pacheco’s words, “the multitude of things in the very wealthy kingdoms of India,” glad at heart the while to be at home under the more temperate sun of Portugal and to rind their “eight feet of earth” in their own soil. ”

“ On a single day he wrote the King eight letters, one of which contains a splendid general account of the state of India, another is a little masterpiece describing the misdeeds of one of his captains.
No doubt his critics believed him to be [Pg 124] harsh and insensible. That this was far from being the case is shown by the fact that on receiving, amid a shower of blame and criticisms, a sympathetic letter from his old friend, the historian Duarte Galvão, he shed tears, and also by the deep feeling he displayed when a whole batch of letters came from the King full of dispraise. ”

“ There is a whole literature, often not less attractive in style than in subject, of histories, memoirs, travels, accounts of wrecks and sieges, recording the deeds of the Portuguese on and beyond the seas. ”

“ One of the captains who sailed from Lisbon with the cousins Albuquerque in 1503 was Duarte Pacheco Pereira. Like the great Affonso de Albuquerque with whom he sailed, he was still unknown to fame. He may have been between thirty-five and forty years of age, but his subsequent glory has thrown no light for us on his earlier years; and beyond the fact that he was born at Lisbon, that he was a knight of the King’s household, and that under João II he was employed in the discovery [Pg 82] of the west coast of Africa, we have to be content with silence. ”

“ The King of Cambaya still boasted of victory, and Dom João de Castro himself sailed north with a powerful fleet from Goa. After striking terror into the enemy by ravaging the coast of Cambaya, setting it all aflame and, in his own words, “sparing no living thing,” he left these shores covered with dead and crossed to Diu. ”

“ Before Affonso and Francisco de Albuquerque left for home it was known that the King (the Samuri) of Calicut was about to attack Cochin with his entire forces by land and sea. None of the Portuguese captains evinced any alacrity to be left behind in its defence, and when Pacheco accepted with a good will, but “rather to serve God and the King than for any hope of profit,” those who knew how great was the might of Calicut said: “God have mercy on Duarte Pacheco and those who remain [Pg 84] with him,” scarcely expecting to set eyes on him again. ”

“ The Convent of Alcobaça still preserves a huge cauldron taken from the enemy at Aljubarrota, but the noblest memorial of Nun’ Alvarez’ victory is the Church and Monastery of Batalha.
[Pg 32]
Nun’ Alvarez, not yet as old as Napoleon when he conquered Italy, crossed the Guadiana with a few hundred horse and a few thousand foot and advanced into Castille. All the nobles from the south of Spain who had not been present at Aljubarrota collected to give him battle. The enemy, he was told, were as the grass of the field in number. “All the greater will be our honour,” said Nun’ Alvarez. ”

“ Among the men there is Affonso Henriquez, first King of Portugal, half French by birth, and grandson of the Spanish King of Leon, but in heart and action wholly Portuguese; loyal Egas Moniz; Gualdim Paes and other legendary heroes in the conflict with the Moors which transformed Portugal from a dependent province into a free kingdom; and later, if not less legendary, Fernão Rodriguez Pacheco, the astute defender of Celorico, who in starvation by a miracle obtained a fish and sent it to the besieger to show that plenty reigned in the town ”

“ But if Portuguese statesmanship was at fault in India, there never failed a sprinkling of individuals who spent their lives in ungrudging service and heroic effort to counterbalance errors committed, and often died heartbroken for their pains. ”

“ Each fresh success of Nun’ Alvarez had raised him envious backbiters in Portugal, and here was a new opportunity to accuse him of arrogance. King João silenced his accusers by following him to Thomar.
They then went west to Ourem and took up a position towards Leiria. The advance of the King of Castille caused them to turn the front of their battle towards the little village of Aljubarrota. The Portuguese, barely 5,000 strong, were outnumbered seven to one, but they were drawn up on foot in a small compact force and desperate, flight being practically cut off. ”

“ If Duarte was perhaps Nun’ Alvarez’ favourite among the princes, he certainly must have discerned [Pg 50] in his younger brother his own successor in guiding the destinies of Portugal. Although possibly less chivalrous than Nun’ Alvarez, Prince Henry possessed his strong will and intensity of purpose, with a wider range of vision. A Portuguese writer represents him living in retirement at Sagres, his eyes fixed exclusively on Heaven; but Prince Henry believed that he could best serve Heaven by bringing to success the earthly affairs on which he had set his heart. ”

“ The natives perhaps mourned him sincerely, since he had worked for their prosperity and his attitude towards them, as distinguished from the Moors, had always been kindly. The gods, they said, had summoned him to war in heaven. His enemies continued to fear him even dead, so that King João III declared that India would be safe so long as Albuquerque’s body remained there, and it was only in 1566 that his bones were brought to Portugal. ”

“ But especially among the discoverers and early adventurers in India the men of fame are but types of hundreds of less fortunate heroes who perished. Men left Portugal with their lives in their hands, and for every one who (like Fernam Mendez Pinto) survived to tell the tale scores sailed away who were never seen or heard of afterwards. ”

“ But the whole man is in his letters, aptly described as being “written with a sword.” Perhaps it is only in the letters of Napoleon that one finds the same mingling of great plans and conceptions with a mastery of the smallest details and concern for things which a lesser man would scorn to notice. ”

“ The quality that explains how so many of King Dinis’ institutions endured and prospered marvellously in succeeding centuries was thoroughness, the conviction that any work, however humble, if thoroughly done must bear excellent fruit, and a certain solidity which finds little satisfaction in feeding beggars precariously, but great satisfaction in setting them to work on the land. ”

“ James went before the Portuguese on a white horse guiding them to victory, and when in the Red Sea that a fiery cross in the sky was specially sent to beckon him on to further conquests.
There is a massive strength in all that [Pg 120] he said and did. [16] After he had subdued Ormuz its king hesitated whether he should pay his customary tribute to Persia and sent to consult Albuquerque. Albuquerque made a little collection of firearms and cannon-balls and answered, “In this coin is the King of Portugal wont to pay tribute.” ”

“ A contemporary Portuguese historian, Barros, thus describes Albuquerque: “He was a man of medium height, of a cheerful, pleasant countenance, but when angry he had a melancholy look; he wore his beard very long during the time of his command in India, and as it was white it [Pg 118] made him very venerable. He was a man of many witty sayings and in some slight annoyances [menencorias leves! Had not Barros read Albuquerque’s letters?] ”

“ In March of the following year he returned to Goa, and two years later accompanied the new Governor, Dom Estevão da Gama, to the Red Sea.
On all these occasions Castro kept a log or roteiro, from Lisbon to Goa, from Goa to Diu, and from Goa to the Red Sea. They display a strong scientific interest, a spirit thoroughly modern—nothing, however small it might be, was to him necessarily unimportant or negligible—or perhaps ancient, since he complains that in his day the scientific investigations of the [Pg 133] ancients were no longer in vogue. ”

“ There may be something a little theatrical and fantastic (contemporary historians call him bizarro and fanfarrão) in some of Castro’s actions in India, in his Albuquerquian prowess on the coast of Cambaya, the pawning of his beard (again in imitation of Albuquerque) , his triumphal entry into Goa, his preparation of stakes on which to spit the Sultan as Pacheco had [Pg 139] prepared one for the Samuri of Calicut; but there can be no doubt of the sincerity of his desire to obtain this Cintra castanhal. ”

“ The Nairs from Cochin who were to have defended the stockade deserted their post, many of the enemy actually succeeded in crossing, and it was only by unparalleled exertions that Pacheco, after being retained with his ship by the low water, was able to hurl them back with great loss. A cannon-shot aimed at the King of Calicut, which succeeded in killing several persons near him, profoundly discouraged him in what began to seem a [Pg 91] hopeless enterprise, instead of child’s play as at first. ”

“ The Samuri himself was far more favourably inclined to the new-comers than were the Moors, who naturally resented the appearance of other traders. The Portuguese were greatly helped throughout by a Mohammedan who had learnt Spanish at Tunis, but, although Gama brought home specimens of pepper, ginger, cloves, musk, benjamin, and other spices as well as pearls and rubies, his visit to Calicut, which ended with the high-handed measure of seizing and carrying off several natives, was unsuccessful, since it resulted in no treaty of friendship or commerce. ”

“ He had his father’s promise that he should be the first to land, and in the storming of the town he was ever in the thickest of the fighting. The Moors defended the town obstinately, and a fresh danger arose when the victorious Portuguese dispersed to plunder. Henry, with a little band of seventeen followers, [Pg 51] saved the situation against such odds that news was at first brought to the King that his son was dead. For his gallant behaviour on that day he was made Duke of Vizeu and Lord of Covilhã, while his brother Pedro became Duke of Coimbra. ”