Vasco da Gama

“ If God sees us worthy He will guide us to our destination, but be sure that I will never return alive to Portugal with my purpose unfulfilled.'
That day's work made Vasco da Gama master once for all of the men who sailed with him. He spared the lives of the conspirators after a captivity long enough to teach them an enduring lesson, so winning their allegiance by mercy as well as severity. ”

“ This king is very powerful, and the owner of the gold mines of Sofala, the richest in that part of the world. In all other respects Vasco da Gama has faithfully guarded the royal interests, both in making war upon the Moors of Mecca, and in peaceable negotiations with the kings of those countries. ”

“ Vasco endeavours to enter into amicable relations with the King of Mombaza; but Bacchus transforms himself into a Mahometan priest, and by treacherous tokens of friendship plans the destruction of the Portuguese in Mombaza. Venus, however, discovers the treachery in time to prevent it. She appeals to Jupiter. Her prayers for the Portuguese fleet are heard. Mercury warns Vasco da Gama in a dream, and Vasco escapes the danger that is prepared for him. He sails onward to the African kingdom of Melinda. ”

“ Finally, the King desires that the heirs of Vasco da Gama shall always bear the name of Gama, in memory of the said Vasco da Gama.
5.—Lisbon, February 4, 1504.485
The King, having pointed out that as Divine justice recompenses, in the other world, those who have firmly adhered to the Catholic faith and practised good works, so should the Kings and Princes of this world recompense those who have rendered them faithful service, directs attention to the signal services rendered by Vasco da Gama during his first voyage, when he discovered India. ”

“ Being animated by an ardent desire to continue the work initiated by the Infante and our predecessors, and being assured that Vasco da Gama, a gentleman of our household, was well qualified for rendering us this service, and would disregard the perils to his person and the risk of life which he ran in accomplishing the task set him, we sent him to India as captain-major of our fleet, and with him Paulo da Gama, his brother, and Nicolau Coelho, likewise a gentleman of our household. ”

“ With the dawn of the sixteenth century we meet the awakening of that spirit of discovery which was to affect so deeply the missionary enterprise of the world. Vasco da Gama had already visited India in May, 1498, and henceforward from Portugal, the faithful son of the Romish Church, sailed ships of exploration and adventure to establish trading colonies, upon the decks of which were hundreds of friars. Churches, monasteries, and colleges sprang up wherever they landed, and Goa, raised to the dignity of a bishopric, became the flourishing centre of Church and Empire. ”

“ By an agreement signed on November 4, 1519, he surrendered the towns of Vidigueira and Villa de Frades, in consideration of Vasco da Gama ceding to him an hereditary Royal pension of 400,000 reis (1,000 cruzados) , and in addition, paying the sum of 4,000 cruzados in gold. This transaction having been completed at Evora, on November 7, the King, in Document 16, granted to Vasco da Gama, his heirs and successors, the towns of Vidigueira and Villa de Frades, together with all revenues and privileges hitherto enjoyed by the Duke of Bragança ”

“ Soon afterwards Vasco da Gama took up a position right in front of that city;450 but on May 27th a pilot of the Zamorin guided him to an anchorage off Pandarani, thirteen miles to the north, on the ground of its greater safety, and at that anchorage the Portuguese remained no less than 88 days, until August 23rd, when Vasco da Gama once more took up a position four leagues to the leeward of Calecut. ”

“ The King assured Vasco da Gama that the broker Davané would act honestly, and that as he was now fairly acquainted with the Portuguese language, he would be of the greatest benefit. He warned his friends, however, to be on their guard against the people of Calecut, who were noted for their want of faith, advising them not to trust themselves on shore without safe hostages. Like a true friend, he gave them much more faithful counsel. He had also prepared a banquet, at which they were sumptuously entertained, and he sent boats laden with food to the ships sufficient for both crews. ”

“ The news of Cabral's adventures at Calicut inspired a yet larger expedition to the East, and Vasco da Gama, now Admiral of the Eastern seas, was given command of some fifteen ships which sailed from the Tagus in February 1502. The expedition, though avowedly Christian, was characterised by injustice and cruelty. Near the coast of Malabar the Portuguese fleet met with a large ship full of Mohammedan pilgrims from Mecca. The wealth on board was known to be enormous, and Don Vasco commanded the owners to yield up their riches to the King of Portugal. ”

“ Then, under a new king, Emmanuel the Fortunate, Vasco da Gama went out to complete the unfinished work of Diaz, lest Columbus, fulfilling the prophecy of Toscanelli, should reach Cathay by a shorter route, and rob them of their reward. The right man had been found. It was all plain sailing; and he plucked the ripe fruit. Vasco da Gama's voyage to the Cape was the longest ever made till then. At Malindi, on the equatorial east coast of Africa, he found a pilot, and, striking across the Indian Ocean by the feeble monsoon of 1497, sighted the Ghats in May. ”

“ Vasco da Gama showed how to rule by fire and sword; Sodre showed how to reap a harvest at sea by boarding the ships of Mecca. Piracy and pillage were the two foundations of the Portuguese dominion, its nerves were cannon, and its soul was pepper. When Gama returned from his second voyage a third fleet left Lisbon (April, 1503) with Alfonso de Albuquerque and Duarte Pacheco on board. They went to Cochin to assist the rajah in his war against the rajah of Calicut, and built the first fortress in India. Albuquerque returned to the kingdom ”

“ Texeira de Aragão assumes (on the ground of a vague expression in De Barros) that he reached Terceira on August 29th, arrived at Lisbon on September 9th, and made his triumphal entry into the town on September 18th. This assumption is partly supported by the statement of Barros that Vasco da Gama, after his arrival at Belem, on account of the loss he had suffered 95in the death of a beloved brother, spent nine days in retirement.237
I am myself inclined to believe that Vasco da Gama reached Lisbon on August 29th, and made his triumphal entry on September 8th. ”

“ Vasco da Gama on a horse, with all the men of the fleet on foot, richly dressed in liveries, and accompanied by all the gentlemen of the court, went down to the wharf on the bank, and embarked in their boats, and the standard went in that of Paulo da Gama. Then, taking leave of the gentlemen, they went to the ships, and on their arrival they fired all their artillery, and the ships were dressed out gayly with standards and flags and many ornaments, and the royal standard was at once placed at the top of the mast of Paulo da Gama ”

“ After remaining some months in the island of Anjediva, upon the coast, Vasco da Gama resolved to return and set sail for Portugal on the 10th of July, 1498. A year later on the same date he reached Lisbon. Great was the enthusiasm. Dom Emmanuel also had his Indies, and Portugal her Columbus. But what tidings of Prester John? And what of Covilhão? None. The navigator had succeeded in overcoming the cape and discovering India, but he had not succeeded in solving the enigma which at that time had baffled their search for three centuries. ”

“ Vasco da Gama requested also, should the boy wish to go to any other place, that he might be permitted to do so, as no one without a willing heart could serve well. The same day the pilots went on board the ships, one accompanying Paulo da Gama, and the other, as also the Mozambique pilot, Vasco da Gama.
The men had cabins given them in which to live and stow their property. Lastly the King sent off boats laden with biscuits, rice, butter, cocoa-nuts, powdered sugar in sacks, sheep salted whole and others alive, and fowls and vegetables in great abundance. ”

“ Columbus, trusting as implicitly to the chart and sailing directions xviiiof Toscanelli as did Vasco da Gama to those of Dias, and, perhaps, of Pero de Covilhão, shaped a course westward of Gomera; and, having sailed in that direction for thirty-six days, and for a distance of 2,600 miles, made his first landfall at Guanahani, being favoured all the while by the prevailing easterly winds. The task which Vasco da Gama undertook was far more difficult of accomplishment. ”

“ Two days we spent on a visit to the town of Bremen, which is but a short distance from Lisbon. There is constructed one of the finest of the world's cathedrals, in which rests the remains of Vasco Da Gama. We saw also the point from which he set out upon his voyage to discover a shorter route to India.
In Portugal one feels the spirit of the South. The men are exceedingly small in stature, their hair black and their eyes quick in movement. ”

“ Vasco da Gama brought one of these instruments with him to Portugal, but the astronomer of Cabral’s expedition, who had been instructed to test its qualities, reported unfavourably (Alguns documentos, 1892, p. 122) . Yet the results obtained by means of this instrument by the pilots of the Indian Ocean were very satisfactory, and the charts prepared by these very practical men were far more correct than the abortions produced by “scientific” Arab geographers. ”

“ Ultimately he reached Calicut, and established factories both there and at Cochin, in the face of active hostility from the natives. In 1502 the king of Portugal obtained from Pope Alexander VI. a bull constituting him “lord of the navigation, conquest, and trade of Ethiopia, Arabia, Persia, and India.” In that year Vasco da Gama sailed again to the East, with a fleet numbering twenty vessels. He formed an alliance with the rajas of Cochin and Cannanore against the zamorin of Calicut, and bombarded the latter in his palace. ”

“ The letter was certainly written after the arrival of João de Sá in the S. Gabriel, but Vasco da Gama himself, coming direct from Terçeira, may have reached Lisbon a day or two later: these two distinct events becoming thus blended, as it were, in the mind of a man not thoroughly informed of the matter. ”

“ Having failed in an attack upon Calicut, he seized Goa, which from 1530 became the capital of Portuguese India. Then, sailing round Ceylon, he captured Malacca, the key of the navigation of the Indian archipelago, and opened a trade with Siam and the Spice Islands (Moluccas) . Lastly, he sailed back westwards, and, after penetrating into the Red Sea, and building a fortress at Ormuz in the Persian Gulf, returned to Goa only to die in 1515. In 1524 Vasco da Gama came out to the East for the third time, and he too died at Cochin. ”

“ Malemo stands for “muallim” or “mallim”, “master” or “teacher”, the usual native designation of the skipper of a vessel, whilst “Kanaka” designates the pilot’s caste.
Davane, of Cambay, said to have been taken out of a dhau to the south of Moçambique, to have agreed to accompany Vasco da Gama to Calecut as broker, and to have been ultimately discharged with good testimonials in November 1498 at Cananor, is only mentioned by Correa (Stanley’s Vasco da Gama, pp. 79, 84, 113, 128, 235) . No other historian knows anything about this mythical personage. ”

“ The Lusiad assumes a mythological character immediately after the introductory stanzas. Vasco da Gama with his squadron has already doubled the Cape 156 of Good Hope; and steering along the eastern coast of Africa, he approaches the Indian seas. The gods are then assembled on Olympus, to deliberate on the fate of India. Venus and Bacchus form two parties, the former in favour of the Portuguese, and the latter against them. In this application of the allegory, the poet, doubtless, gratified his patriotic pride; for Portugal was, even by the Spaniards, styled the native land of love ”

“ The astrolabe, for all the improvements of Behaim, was still an awkward instrument for ascertaining latitude, especially on a rolling or pitching ship, and we know that Vasco da Gama went on shore at the Cape de Verde Islands to take observations when the motion of the sea balked him on shipboard. ”

“ In order to give a still higher import to this allegory, Venus is made to consider the Portuguese as modern Romans, and to entertain for them the same regard which she formerly extended to the people of ancient Rome: but Bacchus recollects his expedition in India, and is indignant at the Portuguese, whose enterprize threatens to eclipse his glory. Among the gods who declare themselves friendly to the Portuguese, Mars is particularly conspicuous. Meanwhile Vasco da Gama’s fleet touches at several places on the coast of eastern Africa. ”

“ Having left Melinde on January 11th, Vasco da Gama, passing between the mainland and Zanzibar, 201stopped for a fortnight at the “baixos” upon which the S. Raphael had run in the outward voyage, and there that doomed ship was set on fire, as there were no men left to sail her. Late on February 1st the remaining two vessels hove to in front of S. Jorge Island, where a padrão was erected on the following morning in drenching rain. The voyage was continued without communicating with the town of Moçambique, and on March 3rd Vasco once more found himself in the Bay of S. Braz. ”

“ Vasco da Gama's discovery of the way to the East Indies forms, to be sure, the central part of its action; but around it are grouped, with consummate art, the heroic deeds and destinies of the other Lusitanians. In this, Camoens' work stands alone among all poems of its kind. Originating under conditions similar to those which are indispensable to the [Pg 3135] production of a true epic, in the heroic period of the Portuguese people, when national sentiment had risen to its highest point, it is the only one among the modern epopees which comes near to the primitive character of epic poetry. ”