No More Learning

Lo, distant far, another mountain chain
Rears its rude cliffs, the Guio's dread domain;
Here brutaliz'd the human form is seen,
The manners fiend-like as the brutal mien:
With frothing jaws they suck the human blood,
And gnaw the reeking limbs,[658] their sweetest food;
Horrid, with figur'd seams of burning steel,
Their wolf-like frowns their ruthless lust reveal.
Cambaya there the blue-tinged Mecon laves,
Mecon the eastern Nile, whose swelling waves,
'Captain of rivers' nam'd, o'er many a clime,
In annual period, pour their fatt'ning slime.
The simple natives of these lawns believe
That other worlds the souls of beasts receive;[659]
Where the fierce murd'rer-wolf, to pains decreed,
Sees the mild lamb enjoy the heav'nly mead.
Oh gentle Mecon,[660] on thy friendly shore
Long shall the muse her sweetest off'rings pour!
When tyrant ire, chaf'd by the blended lust
Of pride outrageous, and revenge unjust,
Shall on the guiltless exile burst their rage,
And madd'ning tempests on their side engage,
Preserv'd by Heav'n the song of Lusian fame,
The song, O VASCO, sacred to thy name,
Wet from the whelming surge, shall triumph o'er
The fate of shipwreck on the Mecon's shore,
Here rest secure as on the muse's breast!
Happy the deathless song, the bard, alas, unblest!

"Chiampa there her fragrant coast extends,
There Cochin-China's cultur'd land ascends:
From Anam Bay begins the ancient reign
Of China's beauteous art-adorn'd domain;
Wide from the burning to the frozen skies,
O'erflow'd with wealth, the potent empire lies.
Here, ere the cannon's rage in Europe roar'd,[661]
The cannon's thunder on the foe was pour'd:
And here the trembling needle sought the north,
Ere Time in Europe brought the wonder forth.
No more let Egypt boast her mountain pyres;
To prouder fame yon bounding wall aspires,
A prouder boast of regal power displays
Than all the world beheld in ancient days.
Not built, created seems the frowning mound; }
O'er loftiest mountain tops, and vales profound }
Extends the wondrous length, with warlike castles crown'd. }
Immense the northern wastes their horrors spread;[662]
In frost and snow the seas and shores are clad.
These shores forsake, to future ages due:
A world of islands claims thy happier view,
Where lavish Nature all her bounty pours,
And flowers and fruits of ev'ry fragrance showers.
Japan behold; beneath the globe's broad face
Northward she sinks, the nether seas embrace
Her eastern bounds; what glorious fruitage there,
Illustrious GAMA, shall thy labours bear!
How bright a silver mine! [663] when Heav'n's own lore
From pagan dross shall purify her ore.

"Beneath the spreading wings of purple morn,
Behold what isles these glist'ning seas adorn!
'Mid hundreds yet unnam'd, Ternate behold!
By day, her hills in pitchy clouds inroll'd,
By night, like rolling waves, the sheets of fire
Blaze o'er the seas, and high to heav'n aspire.
For Lusian hands here blooms the fragrant clove,
But Lusian blood shall sprinkle ev'ry grove.
The golden birds that ever sail the skies
Here to the sun display their shining dyes,
Each want supplied, on air they ever soar;
The ground they touch not[664] till they breathe no more.
Here Banda's isles their fair embroid'ry spread
Of various fruitage, azure, white, and red;
And birds of ev'ry beauteous plume display
Their glitt'ring radiance, as, from spray to spray,
From bower to bower, on busy wings they rove,
To seize the tribute of the spicy grove.
Borneo here expands her ample breast,
By Nature's hand in woods of camphor dress'd;
The precious liquid, weeping from the trees,
Glows warm with health, the balsam of disease.
Fair are Timora's dales with groves array'd,
Each riv'let murmurs in the fragrant shade,
And, in its crystal breast, displays the bowers
Of Sanders, blest with health-restoring powers.
Where to the south the world's broad surface bends,
Lo, Sunda's realm her spreading arms extends.
From hence the pilgrim brings the wondrous tale,[665]
A river groaning through a dreary dale
(For all is stone around) converts to stone
Whate'er of verdure in its breast is thrown.
Lo, gleaming blue, o'er fair Sumatra's skies,
Another mountain's trembling flames arise;
Here from the trees the gum[666] all fragrance swells,
And softest oil a wondrous fountain wells.
Nor these alone the happy isle bestows,
Fine is her gold, her silk resplendent glows.
Wide forests there beneath Maldivia's tide[667]
From with'ring air their wondrous fruitage hide.
The green-hair'd Nereids, tend the bow'ry dells,
Whose wondrous fruitage poison's rage expels.
In Ceylon, lo, how high yon mountain's brows!
The sailing clouds its middle height enclose.
Holy the hill is deem'd, the hallow'd tread
Of sainted footstep[668] marks its rocky head.
Lav'd by the Red Sea gulf, Socotra's bowers
There boast the tardy aloe's beauteous flowers.
On Afric's strand, foredoom'd to Lusian sway,
Behold these isles, and rocks of dusky gray;
From cells unknown here bounteous ocean pours
The fragrant amber on the sandy shores.
And lo, the Island of the Moon[669] displays
Her vernal lawns, and num'rous peaceful bays:
The halcyons[670] hov'ring o'er the bays are seen,
And lowing herds adorn the vales of green.

"Thus, from the cape where sail was ne'er unfurl'd,
Till thine, auspicious, sought the eastern world,
To utmost wave, where first the morning star
Sheds the pale lustre of her silver car,
Thine eyes have view'd the empires and the isles,
The world immense, that crowns thy glorious toils--
That world where ev'ry boon is shower'd from Heav'n,
Now to the West, by thee, great chief, is giv'n. [671]

"And still, O blest, thy peerless honours grow,
New op'ning views the smiling fates bestow.
With alter'd face the moving globe behold;
There ruddy ev'ning sheds her beams of gold.
While now, on Afric's bosom faintly die
The last pale glimpses of the twilight sky,
Bright o'er the wide Atlantic rides the morn,
And dawning rays another world adorn:
To farthest north that world enormous bends,
And cold, beneath the southern pole-star ends.
Near either pole[672] the barb'rous hunter, dress'd
In skins of bears, explores the frozen waste:
Where smiles the genial sun with kinder rays,
Proud cities tower, and gold-roof'd temples blaze.
This golden empire, by the heav'n's decree,
Is due, Castile, O favour'd power, to thee!
Even now, Columbus o'er the hoary tide
Pursues the ev'ning sun, his navy's guide.
Yet, shall the kindred Lusian share the reign,
What time this world shall own the yoke of Spain.
The first bold hero[673] who to India's shores
Through vanquish'd waves thy open'd path explores,
Driv'n by the winds of heav'n from Afric's strand,
Shall fix the holy cross on yon fair land.
That mighty realm, for purple wood renown'd,
Shall stretch the Lusian empire's western bound.
Fir'd by thy fame, and with his king in ire,
To match thy deeds shall Magalhaens aspire. [674]
In all but loyalty, of Lusian soul,
No fear, no danger shall his toils control.
Along these regions, from the burning zone
To deepest south, he dares the course unknown.
While, to the kingdoms of the rising day,
To rival thee he holds the western way,
A land of giants[675] shall his eyes behold,
Of camel strength, surpassing human mould:
And, onward still, thy fame his proud heart's guide
Haunting him unappeas'd, the dreary tide
Beneath the southern star's cold gleam he braves,
And stems the whirls of land-surrounded waves.
For ever sacred to the hero's fame,
These foaming straits shall bear his deathless name.
Through these dread jaws of rock he presses on,
Another ocean's breast, immense, unknown,
Beneath the south's cold wings, unmeasur'd, wide,
Receives his vessels; through the dreary tide
In darkling shades, where never man before
Heard the waves howl, he dares the nameless shore.

"Thus far, O favour'd Lusians, bounteous Heav'n
Your nation's glories to your view has giv'n.
What ensigns, blazing to the morn, pursue
The path of heroes, open'd first by you!
Still be it yours the first in fame to shine:
Thus shall your brides new chaplets still entwine,
With laurels ever new your brows enfold,
And braid your wavy locks with radiant gold.

"How calm the waves, how mild the balmy gale!
The halcyons call; ye Lusians, spread the sail;
Old ocean, now appeas'd, shall rage no more.
Haste, point the bowsprit to your native shore:
Soon shall the transports of the natal soil
O'erwhelm, in bounding joy, the thoughts of ev'ry toil. "

The goddess spake[676]; and VASCO wav'd his hand,
And soon the joyful heroes crowd the strand.
The lofty ships with deepen'd burthens prove
The various bounties of the Isle of Love.
Nor leave the youths their lovely brides behind,
In wedded bands, while time glides on, conjoin'd;
Fair as immortal fame in smiles array'd,
In bridal smiles, attends each lovely maid.
O'er India's sea, wing'd on by balmy gales
That whisper'd peace, soft swell'd the steady sails:
Smooth as on wing unmov'd the eagle flies,
When to his eyrie cliff he sails the skies,
Swift o'er the gentle billows of the tide,
So smooth, so soft, the prows of GAMA glide;
And now their native fields, for ever dear,
In all their wild transporting charms appear;
And Tago's bosom, while his banks repeat
The sounding peals of joy, receives the fleet.
With orient titles and immortal fame
The hero band adorn their monarch's name;
Sceptres and crowns beneath his feet they lay,
And the wide East is doom'd to Lusian sway. [677]

Enough, my muse, thy wearied wing no more
Must to the seat of Jove triumphant soar.
Chill'd by my nation's cold neglect, thy fires
Glow bold no more, and all thy rage expires.
Yet thou, Sebastian, thou, my king, attend;
Behold what glories on thy throne descend!
Shall haughty Gaul or sterner Albion boast
That all the Lusian fame in thee is lost!
Oh, be it thine these glories to renew,
And John's bold path and Pedro's course pursue:[678]
Snatch from the tyrant-noble's hand the sword,
And be the rights of humankind restor'd.
The statesman prelate to his vows confine,
Alone auspicious at the holy shrine;
The priest, in whose meek heart Heav'n pours its fires,
Alone to Heav'n, not earth's vain pomp, aspires.
Nor let the muse, great king, on Tago's shore,
In dying notes the barb'rous age deplore.
The king or hero to the muse unjust
Sinks as the nameless slave, extinct in dust.
But such the deeds thy radiant morn portends,
Aw'd by thy frown ev'n now old Atlas bends
His hoary head, and Ampeluza's fields
Expect thy sounding steeds and rattling shields.
And shall these deeds unsung, unknown, expire!
Oh, would thy smiles relume my fainting ire!
I, then inspir'd, the wond'ring world should see
Great Ammon's warlike son reviv'd in thee;
Reviv'd, unenvied[679] of the muse's flame
That o'er the world resounds Pelides'[680] name.
"O let th' Iambic Muse revenge that wrong
Which cannot slumber in thy sheets of lead;
Let thy abused honour crie as long
As there be quills to write, or eyes to reade:
On his rank name let thine own votes be turn'd,
_Oh may that man that hath the Muses scorn'd
Alive, nor dead, be ever of a Muse adorn'd_. "


THE END.


LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING
CROSS.


FOOTNOTES:

[1] _Poems of Luis de Camoens, with Remarks on his Life and Writings. _
By Lord Viscount Strangford. Fifth edition. London, 1808.

[2] The Cama{o}. Formerly every well-regulated family in Spain
retained one of these terrible attendants. The infidelity of its
mistress was the only circumstance which could deprive it of life. This
odious distrust of female honour is ever characteristic of a barbarous
age.

[3] The laws of Portugal were peculiarly severe against those who
carried on a love-intrigue within the palace: they punished the offence
with death. Joam I. suffered one of his favourites to be burnt alive for
it. --_Ed. _

[4] The Maekhaun, or Camboja. --_Ed. _

[5] Thomas Moore Musgrave's translation of The Lusiad is in blank verse,
and is dedicated to the Earl of Chichester. I vol. 8vo. Murray; 1826.

[6] A document in the archives of the Portuguese India House, on which
Lord Strangford relies, places it in 1524, or the following year. --_Ed. _

[7] The French translator gives us so fine a description of the person
of Camoens, that it seems borrowed from the Fairy Tales. It is
universally agreed, however, that he was handsome, and had a most
engaging mien and address. He is thus described by Nicolas Antonio
"_Mediocri statura fuit, et carne plena, capillis usque ad croci colorem
flavescentibus, maxime in juventute. Eminebat ei frons, et medius nasus,
caetera longus, et in fine crassiusculus. _"

[8] Castera tells us, "that posterity by no means enters into the
resentment of our poet, and that the Portuguese historians make glorious
mention of Barreto, who was a man of true merit. " The Portuguese
historians, however, knew not what true merit was. The brutal,
uncommercial wars of Sampayo are by them mentioned as much more glorious
than the less bloody campaigns of a Nunio, which established commerce
and empire.

[9] Having named the Mecon, or Meekhaun, a river of Cochin China, he
says--

_Este recebera placido, e brando,
No seu regaco o Canto, que molhado_, etc.

Literally thus: "On his gentle hospitable bosom (_sic_ brando _poetice_)
shall he receive the song, wet from woful unhappy shipwreck, escaped
from destroying tempests, from ravenous dangers, the effect of the
unjust sentence upon him, whose lyre shall be more renowned than
enriched. " When Camoens was commissary, he visited the islands of
Ternate, Timor, etc. , described in the Lusiad.

[10] According to the Portuguese Life of Camoens, prefixed to Gedron's
the best edition of his works, Diogo de Couto, the historian, one of the
company in this homeward voyage, wrote annotations upon the Lusiad,
under the eye of its author. But these, unhappily, have never appeared
in public.

[11] Cardinal Henry's patronage of learning and learned men is mentioned
with cordial esteem by the Portuguese writers. Happily they also tell us
what that learning was. It was to him the Romish Friars of the East
transmitted their childish forgeries of inscriptions and miracles. He
corresponded with them, directed their labours, and received the first
accounts of their success. Under his patronage it was discovered, that
St. Thomas ordered the Indians to worship the cross; and that the
Moorish tradition of Perimal (who, having embraced Mohammedanism,
divided his kingdom among his officers, whom he rendered tributary to
the Zamorim) was a malicious misrepresentation, for that Perimal, having
turned Christian, resigned his kingdom and became a monk. Such was the
learning patronized by Henry, under whose auspices that horrid tribunal,
the Inquisition, was erected at Lisbon, where he himself long presided
as Inquisitor-General. Nor was he content with this: he established an
Inquisition, also, at Goa, and sent a whole apparatus of holy fathers to
form a court of inquisitors, to suppress the Jews and reduce the native
Christians to the see of Rome. Nor must the treatment experienced by
Buchanan at Lisbon be here omitted. John III. , earnest to promote the
cultivation of polite literature among his subjects, engaged Buchanan,
the most elegant Latinist, perhaps, of modern times, to teach philosophy
and the _belles lettres_ at Lisbon. But the design of the monarch was
soon frustrated by the clergy, at the head of whom was Henry, afterwards
king. Buchanan was committed to prison, because it was alleged that he
had eaten flesh in Lent, and because in his early youth, at St. Andrew's
in Scotland, he had written a satire against the Franciscans; for which,
however, ere he would venture to Lisbon, John had promised absolute
indemnity. John, with much difficulty, procured his release from a
loathsome jail, but could not effect his restoration as a teacher. No,
he only changed his prison, for Buchanan was sent to a monastery "to be
instructed by the monks," of the men of letters patronized by Henry.
These are thus characterized by their pupil Buchanan,--_nec inhumanis,
nec malis, sed omnis religionis ignaris_: "Not uncivilized, not
flagitious, but ignorant of every religion. "

[12] According to Gedron, a second edition of the Lusiad appeared in the
same year with the first. There are two Italian and four Spanish
translations of it. A hundred years before Castera's version it appeared
in French. Thomas de Faria, Bp. of Targa in Africa, translated it into
Latin. Le P. Niceron says there were two other Latin translations. It is
translated, also, into Hebrew, with great elegance and spirit, by one
Luzzatto, a learned and ingenious Jew, author of several poems in that
language, who died in the Holy Land.

[13] This passage in inverted commas is cited, with the alteration of
the name only, from Langhorne's account of the life of William Collins.

[14] The drama and the epopoeia are in nothing so different as in
this--the subjects of the drama are inexhaustible, those of the epopoeia
are perhaps exhausted. He who chooses war, and warlike characters,
cannot appear as an original. It was well for the memory of Pope that he
did not write the epic poem he intended. It would have been only a copy
of Virgil. Camoens and Milton have been happy in the novelty of their
subjects, and these they have exhausted. There cannot possibly be so
important a voyage as that which gave the eastern world to the western.
And, did even the story of Columbus afford materials equal to that of
Gama, the adventures of the hero, and the view of the extent of his
discoveries must now appear as servile copies of the Lusiad.

[15] See his Satyricon. --_Ed. _

[16] See letters on Chivalry and Romance.

[17] The Lusiad is also rendered poetical by other fictions. The elegant
satire on King Sebastian, under the name of Acteon; and the prosopopoeia
of the populace of Portugal venting their murmurs upon the beach when
Gama sets sail, display the richness of our author's poetical genius,
and are not inferior to anything of the kind in the classics.

[18] Hence the great interest which we as Britons either do, or ought
to, feel in this noble epic. We are the successors of the Portuguese in
the possession and government of India; and therefore what interested
them must have for us, as the actual possessors, a double
interest. --_Ed. _

[19] Castera was every way unequal to his task. He did not perceive his
author's beauties. He either suppresses or lowers the most poetical
passages, and substitutes French tinsel and impertinence in their place.

[20] Pope, Odyss. XX.

[21] Richard Fanshaw, Esq. , afterwards Sir Richard, was English
Ambassador both at Madrid and Lisbon. He had a taste for literature, and
translated from the Italian several pieces which were of service in the
refinement of our poetry. Though his Lusiad, by the dedication of it to
William, Earl of Strafford, dated May 1, 1655, seems as if published by
himself, we are told by the editor of his Letters, that "during the
unsettled times of our anarchy, some of his MSS. , falling by misfortune
into unskilful hands, were printed and published without his knowledge
or consent, and before he could give them his last finishing strokes:
such was his translation of the Lusiad. " He can never have enough of
conceits, low allusions, and expressions. When gathering of flowers is
simply mentioned (C. 9, st. 24) he gives it, "gather'd flowers by
pecks;" and the Indian Regent is avaricious (C. 8, st. 95)--

_Meaning a better penny thence to get. _

But enough of these have already appeared in the notes. It may be
necessary to add, that the version of Fanshaw, though the Lusiad very
particularly requires them, was given to the public without one note.

[22] Some liberties of a less poetical kind, however, require to be
mentioned. In Homer and Virgil's lists of slain warriors, Dryden and
Pope have omitted several names which would have rendered English
versification dull and tiresome. Several allusions to ancient history
and fable have for this reason been abridged; e. g. in the prayer of GAMA
(Book 6) the mention of Paul, "thou who deliveredst Paul and defendest
him from quicksands and wild waves--

_Das scyrtes arenosas e ondas feas_--"

is omitted. However excellent in the original, the prayer in English
would lose both its dignity and ardour. Nor let the critic, if he find
the meaning of Camoens in some instances altered, imagine that he has
found a blunder in the translator. He who chooses to see a slight
alteration of this kind will find an instance, which will give him an
idea of others, in Canto 8, st. 48, and another in Canto 7, st. 41. It
was not to gratify the dull few, whose greatest pleasure in reading a
translation is to see what the author exactly says; it was to give a
poem that might live in the English language, which was the ambition of
the translator. And, for the same reason, he has not confined himself to
the Portuguese or Spanish pronunciation of proper names. Regardless,
therefore, of Spanish pronunciation, the translator has accented
Granada, Evora, etc. in the manner which seemed to him to give most
dignity to English versification. In the word Sofala he has even
rejected the authority of Milton, and followed the more sonorous usage
of Fanshaw. Thus Sir Richard: "Against Sofala's batter'd fort. " Which is
the more sonorous there can be no dispute.

[23] Judges xviii. 7, 9, 27, 28.

[24] This ferocity of savage manners affords a philosophical account how
the most distant and inhospitable climes were first peopled. When a
Romulus erects a monarchy and makes war on his neighbours, some
naturally fly to the wilds. As their families increase, the stronger
commit depredations on the weaker; and thus from generation to
generation, they who either dread just punishment or unjust oppression,
fly farther and farther in search of that protection which is only to be
found in civilized society.

[25] The author of that voluminous work, _Histoire Philosophique et
Politique des Etablissements et du Commerce des Europeens dans les deux
Indes_, is one of the many who assert that savage life is happier than
civil. His reasons are thus abridged: The savage has no care or fear for
the future; his hunting and fishing give him a certain subsistence. He
sleeps sound, and knows not the diseases of cities. He cannot want what
he does not desire, nor desire that which he does not know, and vexation
or grief do not enter his soul. He is not under the control of a
superior in his actions; in a word, says our author, the savage only
suffers the evils of nature.

If the civilized, he adds, enjoy the elegancies of life, have better
food, and are more comfortably defended against the change of seasons,
it is use which makes these things necessary, and they are purchased by
the painful labours of the multitude who are the basis of society. To
what outrages is not the man of civil life exposed? if he has property,
it is in danger; and government or authority is, according to our
author, the greatest of all evils. If there is a famine in North
America, the savage, led by the wind and the sun, can go to a better
clime; but in the horrors of famine, war, or pestilence, the ports and
barriers of civilized states place the subjects in a prison, where they
must perish.
There still remains an infinite difference between the lot
of the civilized and the savage; a difference, all entirely to the
disadvantage of society, that injustice which reigns in the inequality
of fortunes and conditions.

[26] The innocent simplicity of the Americans in their conferences with
the Spaniards, and the horrid cruelties they suffered from them, divert
our view from their complete character. Almost everything was horrid in
their civil customs and religious rites. In some tribes, to cohabit with
their mothers, sisters, and daughters was esteemed the means of domestic
peace. In others, catamites were maintained in every village; they went
from house to house as they pleased, and it was unlawful to refuse them
what victuals they chose. In every tribe, the captives taken in war were
murdered with the most wanton cruelty, and afterwards devoured by the
victors. Their religious rites were, if possible, still more horrid. The
abominations of ancient Moloch were here outnumbered; children, virgins,
slaves, and captives bled on different altars, to appease their various
gods. If there was a scarcity of human victims, the priests announced
that the gods were dying of thirst for human blood. And, to prevent a
threatened famine, the kings of Mexico were obliged to make war on the
neighbouring states. The prisoners of either side died by the hand of
the priest. But the number of the Mexican sacrifices so greatly exceeded
those of other nations, that the Tlascalans, who were hunted down for
this purpose, readily joined Cortez with about 200,000 men, and enabled
him to make one great sacrifice of the Mexican nation. Who that views
Mexico, steeped in her own blood, can restrain the emotion which
whispers to him, This is the hand of Heaven! --By the number of these
sacred butcheries, one would think that cruelty was the greatest
amusement of Mexico. At the dedication of the temple of Vitzliputzli,
A. D. 1486, no less than 64,080 human victims were sacrificed in four
days. And, according to the best accounts, the annual sacrifices of
Mexico required several thousands. The skulls of the victims sometimes
were hung on strings which reached from tree to tree around their
temples, and sometimes were built up in towers and cemented with lime.
In some of these towers Andrew de Tapia one day counted 136,000 skulls.
During the war with Cortez they increased their usual sacrifices, till
priest and people were tired of their bloody religion. --See, for ample
justification of these statements, the _Histories of the Conquest of
Mexico and Peru_, by Prescott. --_Ed. _

[27] Mahommed Ali Khan, Nawab of the Carnatic, declared, "I met the
British with that freedom of openness which they love, and I esteem it
my honour as well as security to be the ally of such a nation of
princes. "

[28] Every man must follow his father's trade, and must marry a daughter
of the same occupation. Innumerable are their other barbarous
restrictions of genius and inclination.

[29] Extremity; for it were both highly unjust and impolitic in
government to allow importation in such a degree as might be destructive
of domestic agriculture.

[30] Even that warm admirer of savage happiness, the author of _Histoire
Philosophique et Politique des Etablissements_, confesses that the wild
Americans seem destitute of the feeling of love. When the heat of
passion, says he, is gratified, they lose all affection and attachment
for their women, whom they degrade to the most servile offices. --A
tender remembrance of the first endearments, a generous participation of
care and hope, the compassionate sentiments of honour; all these
delicate feelings, which arise into affection, and bind attachment, are
indeed, incompatible with the ferocious and gross sensations of
barbarians.

[31] It is a question still debated among medical writers, and by no
means yet decided, whether the disease referred to is of American
origin. We do not read, it is true, of any such disease in the pages of
the ancient classic writers; it has hence been inferred that it was
unknown to them. --_Ed. _

[32] The degeneracy of the Roman literature preceded the fate of the
state, and the reason is obvious. The men of fortune grew frivolous, and
superficial in every branch of knowledge, and were therefore unable to
hold the reigns of empire. The degeneracy of literary taste is,
therefore, the surest proof of the general ignorance.

[33] The soldiers and navigators were the only considerable gainers by
their acquirements in the Indies. Agriculture and manufactures are the
natural strength of a nation; these received little or no increase in
Spain and Portugal by the great acquisitions of these crowns.

[34] Ariosto, who adopted the legends of the old romance, chose this
period for the subject of his Orlando Furioso. Paris besieged by the
Saracens, Orlando and the other Christian knights assemble in aid of
Charlemagne, who are opposed in their amours and in battle by Rodomont,
Ferraw, and other Saracen knights. That there was a noted Moorish
Spaniard, named Ferraw, a redoubted champion of that age, we have the
testimony of Marcus Antonius Sabellicus, a writer of note of the
fifteenth century.

[35] Small indeed in extent, but so rich in fertility, that it was
called _Medulla Hispanica_, "The marrow of Spain. "--Vid. Resandii Antiq.
Lusit. l. iii.

[36] In propriety most certainly a crusade, though that term has never
before been applied to this war.

[37] The power of deposing, and of electing their kings, under certain
circumstances, is vested in the people by the statutes of Lamego.

[38] For the character of this prince, see the note, Bk. iii. p. 96.

[39] For anecdotes of this monarch, see the notes, Bk. iii. p. 99.

[40] This great prince was the natural son of Pedro the Just. Some years
after the murder of his beloved spouse, Inez de Castro (see Lusiad, Bk.
iii. p. 96), lest his father, whose severe temper he too well knew,
should force him into a disagreeable marriage, Don Pedro commenced an
amour with a Galician lady, who became the mother of John I. , the
preserver of the Portuguese monarchy.

[41] The sons of John, who figure in history, were Edward, Juan,
Fernando, Pedro and Henry. Edward succeeded his father. Juan,
distinguished both in the camp and cabinet, in the reign of his brother
Edward had the honour to oppose the expedition against Tangier, which
was proposed by his brother Fernando, in whose perpetual captivity it
ended.

[42] The dominion of the Portuguese in the Indian seas cut the sinews of
the Egyptian and other Mohammedan powers.

[43] Flanders has been the school-mistress of husbandry to Europe. Sir
Charles Lisle, a royalist, resided in this country several years during
the Commonwealth; and after the Restoration, rendered England the
greatest service, by introducing the present system of agriculture.
Where trade increases, men's thoughts are set in action; hence the
increase of food which is wanted is supplied by a redoubled attention to
husbandry; and hence it was that agriculture was of old improved and
diffused by the Phoenician colonies.

[44] At the reduction of Ceuta in Africa, and in other engagements,
Prince Henry displayed military genius and valour of the first
magnitude. The important fortress of Ceuta was in a manner won by his
own sword.

[45] Nam, in Portuguese, a negative. It is now called by corruption Cape
Nun.

[46] Cape Bojador, from the Spanish, _bojar_, to compass or go about.

[47] Unluckily, he also left on this island two rabbits, whose young so
increased that in a few years it was found not habitable, every
vegetable being destroyed by the great increase of these animals.

[48] Madeira in Portuguese signifies timber. --_Ed. _

[49] If one would trace the true character of Cortez and the Americans,
he must have recourse to the numerous Spanish writers, who were either
witnesses of the first wars, or soon after travelled in these countries.
[The reader cannot do better than refer to Prescott's _History of the
Conquest of Mexico and Peru_ for information on these points. --_Ed. _] In
these he will find many anecdotes which afford a light not to be found
in our modern histories. Cortez set out to take gold by force, and not
by establishing any system of commerce with the natives, the only just
reason for effecting a settlement in a foreign country. He was asked by
various states, what commodities or drugs he wanted, and was promised
abundant supply. He and his Spaniards, he answered, had a disease at
their hearts, which nothing but gold could cure; and he received
intelligence that Mexico abounded with it. Under pretence of a friendly
conference, he made the Mexican emperor, Montezuma, his prisoner, and
ordered him to pay tribute to Charles V. Immense sums were paid, but the
demand was boundless. Tumults ensued. Cortez displayed amazing
generalship, and some millions of those who boasted of the greatness of
Montezuma were sacrificed to the disease of Cortez's heart. Pizarro,
however, in the barbarity of his character, far exceeded him. There is a
bright side to the character of Cortez, if we can forget that his
avarice was the cause of a most unjust and most bloody war; but Pizarro
is a character completely detestable, destitute of every spark of
generosity. He massacred the Peruvians because they were barbarians, and
he himself could not read. Atabalipa, the Peruvian Inca, amazed at the
art of reading, got a Spaniard to write the word Dios (God) on his
finger. On trying if the Spaniards agreed in what it signified, he
discovered that Pizarro could not read. And Pizarro, in revenge of the
contempt he perceived in the face of Atabalipa, ordered that prince to
be tried for his life, for having concubines, and being an idolater.
Atabalipa was condemned to be burned; but on submitting to baptism, he
was only hanged. See Prescott's _Conquest of Peru_.

[50] The difficulties he surmounted, and the assistance he received, are
sufficient proofs that an adventurer of inferior birth could never have
carried his designs into execution.

[51] Don Pedro was villainously accused of treacherous designs by his
illegitimate brother, the first Duke of Braganza. Henry left his town of
Sagrez to defend his brother at court, but in vain. Pedro, finding the
young king in the power of Braganza, fled, and soon after was killed in
defending himself against a party who were sent to seize him. His
innocence, after his death, was fully proved, and his nephew, Alonzo V. ,
gave him an honourable burial.

[52] Henry, who undertook to extend the boundaries which ignorance had
given to the world, had extended them much beyond the sensible horizon
long ere Columbus appeared. Columbus indeed taught the Spaniards the use
of longitude and latitude in navigation, but that great mathematician,
Henry, was the author of that grand discovery, and of the _use_ of the
compass. Every alteration ascribed to Columbus, had almost fifty years
before been effected by Henry. Even Henry's idea of sailing to India was
adopted by Columbus. It was everywhere his proposal. When he arrived in
the West Indies he thought he had found the Ophir of Solomon, and thence
these islands received their general name, and on his return he told
John II. that he had been at the islands of India. To find the Spice
Islands of the East was his proposal at the court of Spain; and even on
his fourth and last voyage in 1502, three years after Gama's return, he
promised the King of Spain to find India by a westward passage. But
though great discoveries rewarded his toils, his first and last purpose
he never completed. It was reserved for Magalhaens to discover the
westward route to the Eastern world.

Gomara and other Spanish writers relate, that while Columbus lived in
Madeira, a pilot, the only survivor of a ship's crew, died at his house.
This pilot, they say, had been driven to the West Indies, or America, by
tempest, and on his death-bed communicated the journal of his voyage to
Columbus.

[53] Or Bethlehem, so named from the chapel.

[54] Now called St. Helen's.

[55] The voyage of Gama has been called merely a coasting one, and
therefore regarded as much less dangerous and heroical than that of
Columbus, or of Magalhaens. But this is one of the opinions hastily
taken up, and founded on ignorance. Columbus and Magalhaens undertook to
navigate unknown oceans, and so did Gama; with this difference, that the
ocean around the Cape of Good Hope, which Gama was to encounter, was
believed to be, and had been avoided by Diaz, as impassable. Prince
Henry suggested that the current of Cape Bojador might be avoided by
standing out to sea, and thus that Cape was first passed. Gama for this
reason did not coast, but stood out to sea for upwards of three months
of tempestuous weather. The tempests which afflicted Columbus and
Magalhaens are by their different historians described with
circumstances of less horror and danger than those which attacked Gama.
All the three commanders were endangered by mutiny; but none of their
crews, save Gama's, could urge the opinion of ages, and the example of a
living captain, that the dreadful ocean which they attempted was
impassable. Columbus and Magalhaens always found means, after detecting
a conspiracy, to keep the rest in hope; but Gama's men, when he put the
pilots in irons, continued in the utmost despair. Columbus was indeed
ill obeyed; Magalhaens sometimes little better; but nothing, save the
wonderful authority of Gama's command, could have led his crew through
the tempest which he surmounted ere he doubled the Cape of Good Hope.
Columbus, with _his_ crew, must have returned. The expedients which he
used to soothe them, would, under _his_ authority, have had no avail in
the tempest which Gama rode through. From every circumstance it is
evident that Gama had determined not to return, unless he found India.
Nothing less than such resolution to perish or attain his point could
have led him on.

[56] It afterwards appeared that the Moorish King of Mombas had been
informed of what happened at Mozambique, and intended to revenge it by
the total destruction of the fleet.

[57] Amerigo Vespucci, describing his voyage to America, says, "Having
passed the line, _e come desideroso d'essere autore che segnassi la
stella_--desirous to be the namer and discoverer of the Pole-star of the
other hemisphere, I lost my sleep many nights in contemplating the stars
of the other pole. " He then laments, that as his instruments could not
discover any star of less motion then ten degrees, he had not the
satisfaction of giving a name to any one. But as he observed four stars,
in form of an almond, which had but little motion, he hoped in his next
voyage he should be able to mark them out. --All this is curious, and
affords a good comment on the temper of the man who had the art to
defraud Columbus, by giving his own name to America; of which he
challenged the discovery. Near fifty years before the voyage of Amerigo
Vespucci, the Portuguese had crossed the line; and Diaz fourteen, and
Gama nearly three years before, had doubled the Cape of Good Hope; had
discovered seven stars in the constellation of the south pole, and from
the appearance of the four most luminous, had given it the name of "The
Cross," a figure which it better resembles than that of an almond.

[58] Properly "Samudra-Rajah," King of the Sea, corrupted into
Zamorim. --_Ed. _

[59] "Kotwal" signifies Superintendent of the Police. --_Ed. _

[60] Faria y Sousa.

[61] It was the custom of the first discoverers to erect crosses at
various places remarkable in their voyage. Gama erected six: one,
dedicated to St. Raphael, at the river of Good Signs; one to St. George,
at Mozambique; one to St. Stephen, at Melinda; one to St. Gabriel, at
Calicut; and one to St. Mary, at the island thence named, near
Anchediva.

[62] _The Lusiad_; in the original, Os Lusiadas, The Lusiads, from the
Latin name (_Lusitania_) of Portugal, derived from Lusus or Lysas, the
companion of Bacchus in his travels, who settled a colony in Lusitania,
See Plin. 1, iii. c. i.

[63] _Thro' seas where sail was never spread before. _--M. Duperron de
Castera, who has given a French prose translation, or rather paraphrase,
of the Lusiad, has a long note on this passage, which, he tells us, must
not be understood literally. Our author, he says, could not be ignorant
that the African and Indian Oceans had been navigated before the times
of the Portuguese. The Phoenicians, whose fleets passed the straits of
Gibraltar, made frequent voyages in these seas, though they carefully
concealed the course of their navigation that other nations might not
become partakers of their lucrative traffic. --See the Periplus of Hanno,
in Cory's Ancient Fragments. --_Ed. _

[64] _And all my country's wars. _--He interweaves artfully the history
of Portugal. --VOLTAIRE.

[65] _To Holy Faith unnumber'd altars rear'd. _--In no period of history
does human nature appear with more shocking, more diabolical features
than in the wars of Cortez, and the Spanish conquerors of South America.
Zeal for the Christian religion was esteemed, at the time of the
Portuguese grandeur, as the most cardinal virtue, and to propagate
Christianity and extirpate Mohammedanism were the most certain proofs of
that zeal. In all their expeditions this was professedly a principal
motive of the Lusitanian monarchs, and Camoens understood the nature of
epic poetry too well to omit it.

[66] Ulysses, who is the subject of the Odyssey.

[67] The voyage of AEneas, described in the AEneid of Virgil.

[68] Alexander the Great, who claimed to be the son of Jupiter Ammon.

[69] Vasco de Gama is, in a great measure, though not exclusively, the
hero of the Lusiad.

[70] King Sebastian, who came to the throne in his minority. Though the
warm imagination of Camoens anticipated the praises of the future hero,
the young monarch, like Virgil's Pollio, had not the happiness to fulfil
the prophecy. His endowments and enterprising genius promised, indeed, a
glorious reign. Ambitious of military laurels, he led a powerful army
into Africa, on purpose to replace Muley Hamet on the throne of Morocco,
from which he had been deposed by Muley Molucco. On the 4th of August,
1578, in the twenty-fifth year of his age, he gave battle to the usurper
on the plains of Alcazar. This was that memorable engagement, to which
the Moorish Emperor, extremely weakened by sickness, was carried in his
litter. By the impetuosity of the attack, the first line of the Moorish
infantry was broken, and the second disordered. Muley Molucco on this
mounted his horse, drew his sabre, and would have put himself at the
head of his troops, but was prevented by his attendants. His emotion of
mind was so great that he fell from his horse, and one of his guards
having caught him in his arms, conveyed him to his litter, where,
putting his finger on his lips to enjoin them silence, he immediately
expired. Hamet Taba stood by the curtains of the carriage, opened them
from time to time, and gave out orders as if he had received them from
the Emperor. Victory declared for the Moors, and the defeat of the
Portuguese was so total, that not above fifty of their whole army
escaped. Hieron de Mendoca and Sebastian de Mesa relate, that Don
Sebastian, after having two horses killed under him, was surrounded and
taken; but the party who had secured him, quarrelling among themselves
whose prisoner he was, a Moorish officer rode up and struck the king a
blow over the right eye, which brought him to the ground; when,
despairing of ransom, the others killed him. About twenty years after
this fatal defeat there appeared a stranger at Venice, who called
himself Sebastian, King of Portugal, whom he so perfectly resembled,
that the Portuguese of that city acknowledged him for their sovereign.
He underwent twenty-eight examinations before a committee of the nobles,
in which he gave a distinct account of the manner in which he had passed
his time from the fatal defeat at Alcazar. It was objected, that the
successor of Muley Molucco sent a corpse to Portugal which had been
owned as that of the king by the Portuguese nobility who survived the
battle. To this he replied, that his _valet de chambre_ had produced
that body to facilitate his escape, and that the nobility acted upon the
same motive, and Mesa and Baena confess, that some of this nobility,
after their return to Portugal acknowledged that the corpse was so
disfigured with wounds that it was impossible to know it. He showed
natural marks on his body, which many remembered on the person of the
king whose name he assumed. He entered into a minute detail of the
transactions that had passed between himself and the republic, and
mentioned the secrets of several conversations with the Venetian
ambassadors in the palace of Lisbon. He fell into the hands of the
Spaniards, who conducted him to Naples, where they treated him with the
most barbarous indignities. After they had often exposed him, mounted on
an ass, to the cruel insults of the brutal mob, he was shipped on board
a galley, as a slave. He was then carried to St. Lucar, from thence to a
castle in the heart of Castile, and never was heard of more. The
firmness of his behaviour, his singular modesty and heroical patience,
are mentioned with admiration by Le Clede. To the last he maintained the
truth of his assertions: a word never slipped from his lips which might
countenance the charge of imposture, or justify the cruelty of his
persecutors.

[71] Portugal, when Camoens wrote his Lusiad, was at the zenith of its
power and splendour. The glorious successes which had attended the arms
of the Portuguese in Africa, had gained them the highest military
reputation. Their fleets covered the ocean. Their dominions and
settlements extended along the western and eastern sides of the vast
African continent. From the Red Sea to China and Japan, they were sole
masters of the riches of the East; and in America, the fertile and
extensive regions of Brazil completed their empire.

[72] Lusitania is the Latin name of a Roman province which comprised the
greater part of the modern kingdom of Portugal, besides a considerable
portion of Leon and Spanish Estremadura.