Portuguese literature
consoles himself, if not his reader, with the sincere conviction that
his rude verse cannot detract from the greatness of the deeds which he
describes (xx. 1-6).
FOOTNOTES:
[401] _Seu quarto avò foi um Gallego nobre_ (Diogo Camacho, _Jornada ás
Cortes do Parnaso_).
[402] Dr. Wilhelm Storck, the author of the most elaborate life of
Camões in existence, considered that the words _quando vim da materna
sepultura_ in one of Camões’ poems could only mean that his mother
(Anna de Macedo) died at his birth, and that he was survived by Anna de
Sá, his stepmother. It may have been so, but there is not a scrap of
evidence in favour of the theory nor were the words _materna sepultura_
anything more than a conventional phrase. Cf. Antonio Feo, _Trattados
Quadragesimais_ (1609), pt. 1, f. 2: _Como Nazianzeno diz ... e tumulo
prosiliens ad tumulum iterum contendo, em nacendo saimos de hũa
sepultura que foi as entranhas da mãi e morrendo entramos noutra._ So
Pinto, _Imagem_, pt. 2, 1593 ed., f. 342 v.: _tornar nu ao ventre de
sua mãi, o qual é a sepultura da terra_, and Bernardes, _Nov. Flor._ i.
122: _A terra e nossa mãe, de cujo tenebroso ventre que é a sepultura_,
&c.
[403] She may have been a distant relation of the poet’s: the name was
a common one, but Camões was connected with the Gamas, and the wife
and granddaughter of the first Conde de Vidigueira were both named
Catherina de Athaide.
[404] According to Dr. Storck he was banished in 1549, and in the same
year, after the sentence of banishment had been commuted to service
in Africa, left Portugal, returning to Lisbon in the autumn of 1551.
Others believe that he was in Lisbon again in 1550 and that his two
years in Africa must be placed between 1546 and 1549.
[405] The important document containing his pardon is printed in
Juromenha’s edition of his works, i. 166-7.
[406] This quotation is assigned to various other persons, as to Nuno
da Cunha when arranging that he should be buried at sea.
[407] _O poeta Simonides fallando._
[408] Cf. _Lus._ i. 19, 43; ii. 20, 67; v. 19-22; vi. 70-9.
[409] _Desejei tanto._
[410] Couto, in the _Dialogo do Soldado Pratico_, remarks that if a
man is given a post at the age of twenty he only receives it at the
age of sixty (p. 99). The soldier, who wishes _ter logo em tres annos
vinte mil cruzados_, suggests, among other posts for himself, that of
_Provedor dos Defuntos: porque com qualquer destes ficarei mui bem
remediado_. To which the _Desembargador_ objects: _he necessario que
quem houver de servir esses cargos seja letrado e visto em ambos os
Direitos_.
[411] _Vinde cá._ It is advisable to give the first words of his poems
without the number until there is a definitive edition of his works.
[412] It is uncertain whether Camões’ ship was the _Santa Clara_ or the
_Fe_.
[413] Barros, _Decada_, III. ix. 1.
[414] It is about the sum (apart from any grant of _pimenta_) which
a common soldier on active service might earn in India (see Barros,
I. viii. 3: 1,200 × 12 = 14,400); _environ huit cents livres de notre
monnoie d’aujourd’hui_ (Voltaire). It would scarcely correspond to more
than £50 of to-day.
[415] _Lus._ V. 45.
[416] Prophetically he had echoed (_Lus._ X. 23) the complaint of the
historians of India: _Morrer nos hospitaes em pobres leitos Os que ao
Rei e á lei servem de muro_.
[417] _Todos hasta oy, y principalmente en Castilla, tuvieron siempre
a mi Maestre por mayor en estes Poemas que en el Heroyco_ (_Varias
Rimas_, Prólogo, 2 vols., 1685, 1689). Cf. the praise of his _versos
pequenos_ in Severim de Faria, _Vida_, p. 121.
[418] See the important work by Dr. Rodrigues: _As Fontes dos Lusiadas_
(1904-1913). Cf. Camões’ _Vão os annos decendo_ (x. 9) and _Leal
Conselheiro_ (cap. 1, p. 18), where the words are used in the same
connexion. With Virgil he was obviously acquainted at first hand, with
Homer perhaps in the translation of the Florentine scholar Lorenzo
Valla (1405-57). In _As Fontes dos Lusiadas_ is also discussed the
origin of the word Lusiads, as by D. Carolina Michaëlis de Vasconcellos
in _O Instituto_, vol. lii (1905), pp. 241-50: _Lucius Andreas
Resendius Inventor da palavra Lusiadas_. It was one of the Latin words
acclimatized by Camões. It occurs in a Latin poem by André de Resende,
_Vicentius Levita et Martyr_ (1545), and in his _Encomium Erasmi_
written, but not published, in 1531; in a Latin poem by Jorge Coelho,
perhaps written in 1526 but touched up before its publication in 1536;
and is twice used by Manuel da Costa (in and about 1537).
[419] The word is undoubtedly _dotto_ in the facsimile of the text
given in Antonio de Portugal de Faria, _Torquato Tasso a Luiz de
Camões_ (Leorne, 1898) although there, as always, it has been
transcribed as _colto_. Diogo Bernardez calls Tasso _culto_, perhaps
mistaking the reference in Garci Lasso, whose _culto Taso_ is not
Torquato but Bernardo. Lope de Vega called Camões _divino_ and reserved
_docto_ for Corte Real.
[420] His works are _ja muitas vezes impressas_ in 1594. In 1631
Alvaro Ferreira de Vera speaks of twelve Portuguese editions (_Breves
Lovvores_, f. 87).
[421] _Apologia em qve defende_, &c. (1641).
[422] The instance he gives is the long story of _Magriço e os Doze de
Inglaterra_ (vi), which he admits is in itself very fine.
[423] One of the best instances of his pedantry is his comment on
the lines _E tu, nobre Lisboa, que no mundo Facilmente das outras
es princesa_. The ordinary reader is content to understand ‘cities’
after _outras_. But no, says Macedo, you can only understand Lisbons.
Princess of all the other Lisbons!
[424] _Laurel de Apolo: Postrando Eneidas y venciendo Iliadas._
[425] Even here some of the lines are a literal translation of Virgil,
but if we compare
Para o ceo crystallino alevantando
Com lagrimas os olhos piadosos,
Os olhos, porque as mãos, &c.,
with the passage
Ad coelum tendens, &c.,
it is not at all clear that the picture of the older poet is more
beautiful than that of _il lusiade Maro_.
[426] He is thus an exception to Macedo’s axiom in the _Motim
Literario_ that Portuguese poets (most of whom, it must be admitted,
are, like Byron, children in thought) either have _versos sem cousas_
or _cousas sem versos_.
[427] _Discursos politicos varios_ (1624), f. 117: _& com esta
obra ficou enriquecida grandemente a lingua Portuguesa; porque lhe
deu muitos termos nouos & palauras bem achadas que depois ficárão
perfeitamente introducidas. Posto que nesta parte não deixárão algũs
escrupulosos de o condenar, julgandolhe por defeito as palauras
alatinadas que vsou no seu poema._
[428] Cf. Fr. Manuel do Sepulchro, _Reflexão Espiritual_ (1669): _Não
ha duvida que maior mudança fez a lingua Portuguesa nos primeiros vinte
annos do reinado de D. Manuel que em cento e cincoenta annos dahi
para ca_. Barros, however, in his _Dialogo em lovvor_ (1540), says
latinization had not yet begun: _se o nos usáramos_.
[429] The authorship of the fine sonnets _Horas breves do meu
contentamento_ (attributed to Camões, Bernardez, the Infante Luis,
&c.) and _Formoso Tejo meu, quam differente_ (attributed to Camões,
Rodriguez Lobo, &c.) is still under dispute.
[430] _Filodemo_, v. 3.
[431] _Os Ratos da Inquisição_, Preface, p. 97.
[432] e. g. _D. Alvaro de Castro e D. Francisco De Meneses_, or _hum
grave Prudente capitam_.
[433] e. g. _valor, esforço e valentia; mar sereno e calmo; abundosa
e larga vea; a dura defensa rigurosa; açoutando e batendo_. The line
often consists of three adjectives and a noun.
[434] Between Corte Real’s _cruel molesto duro mortal frio_ and Dante’s
_eterna maladetta fredda e greve_ (_Inf._ vi) is all the difference
between a heap of loose stones and a shrine. The conception of the
_Auto_, especially the third _novissimo_, _que he o Inferno_, was no
doubt derived from Dante.
[435] These are the first words of the original title of the poem
(1578).
§ 5
_The Historians_
It was a proud saying of a Portuguese _seiscentista_ that the
Portuguese discoveries silenced all other histories.[436] Certainly
this was so in the case of the history of Portugal, which was neglected
while writer after writer recorded the history of the Portuguese in
India. Nor need we quarrel with a vogue which has preserved for us so
many striking pictures in which East and West clash without meeting,
new countries are continually opening to our view, and heroism and
adventure go hand in hand. Sometimes the pages of these historians
seem all aglow with precious stones, emeralds from Peru, turquoises
from Persia, rubies, cat’s-eyes, chrysolites, amethysts, beryls, and
sapphires from Ceylon, or scented with the opium of Cairo, the saffron
of Cannanore, the camphor of Borneo, sandalwood from Timor, pepper from
Malabar, cloves from the Moluccas. Blood and sea-spray mingle with
the silks from China and ivory from Sofala, and among the crowd of
rapacious governors and unscrupulous adventurers move a few figures of
a simple austerity and devotion to duty, Albuquerque, Galvão, Castro,
St. Francis Xavier.
Little is known of ALVARO VELHO except that he was one of the immortals
(unless he was the _degredado_ (convict) from whose _caderno_ Couto
derived his account of the discovery) who accompanied Vasco da Gama
on his first voyage. To him is attributed the simple, clear narrative
contained in the log or _Roteiro da Viagem de Vasco da Gama em 1497_,
filled with a primitive wonder, which pointed the way to the historians
of India. Indeed, it provided material for the first book of a writer
who may perhaps be called the first[437] historian of the discoveries
‘enterprised by the Portingales’. FERNAM LOPEZ DE CASTANHEDA (_c._
1500-59) was born at Santarem, and in 1528 accompanied his father,
appointed Judge at Goa, to India. For the next ten years he diligently
and not without many risks and discomforts consulted documents and
inscriptions in various parts of the country with a view to writing
a history of the discovery and conquest of India, making himself
personally acquainted with the ground and with many of those who had
played a part in the half-century (1498-1548) under review. After his
return to Portugal he continued his life-work with the same devotion
for twenty years, during which poverty constrained him to accept the
post of bedel at Coimbra University. When he died, worn out by his
_continuas vigilias_, his history was complete, but only seven books
had been published: _Historia do Descobrimento e Conqvista da India_
(1551-4). He had at least the satisfaction to know that a part had
already been translated into French and Italian. The eighth book,
bringing the history down to 1538, was published by his children in
1561, but books nine and ten never appeared. This history of forty
years, which has less regard to style than to sincerity and the truth
of the facts, is written in great detail. It is a scrupulous and
trustworthy record of high interest describing not only the deeds of
the Portuguese, ‘of much greater price than gold or silver’, ‘more
valiant than those of Greek or Roman’, but the many lands in which
they occurred. The narrative can rise to great pathos, as in the
account of Afonso de Albuquerque’s death (iii. 154), and is often
extremely vivid.[438] The interest necessarily diminishes after 1515,
and the seventh book is largely concerned with dismal contentions
between Portuguese officials. But the great events and persons, the
capture of Goa or Diu, the characters of Gama or Albuquerque, Duarte
Pacheco Pereira or Antonio Galvão, stand out the more clearly from the
deliberate absence of rhetoric.