No More Learning

The cruelties of Hernando Cortez, and that more
horrid barbarian, Pizarro,[49] are no more to be charged upon Don Henry
and Columbus, than the villainies of the Jesuits and the horrors of the
Inquisition are to be ascribed to Him who commands us to do to our
neighbour as we would wish our neighbour to do to us. But, if it be
maintained that he who plans a discovery ought to foresee the miseries
which the vicious will engraft upon his enterprise, let the objector be
told that the miseries are uncertain, while the advantages are real and
sure.

In 1440 Anthony Gonsalez brought some Moors prisoners to Lisbon. These
he took two and forty leagues beyond Cape Bojador, and in 1442 he
returned with his captives. One Moor escaped, but ten blacks of Guinea
and a considerable quantity of gold dust were given in ransom for two
others. A rivulet at the place of landing was named by Gonsalez, Rio del
Oro, or the River of Gold. And the islands of Adeget, Arguim, and De las
Garcas were now discovered.

The negroes of Guinea, the first ever seen in Portugal, and the gold
dust, excited other passions beside admiration. A company was formed at
Lagos, under the auspices of Prince Henry, to carry on a traffic with
the newly discovered countries; and, as the Portuguese considered
themselves in a state of continual hostility with the Moors, about two
hundred of these people, inhabitants of the Islands of Nar and Tider, in
1444, were brought prisoners to Portugal. Next year Gonzalo de Cintra
was attacked by the Moors, fourteen leagues beyond Rio del Oro, where,
with seven of his men, he was killed.

This hostile proceeding displeased Prince Henry, and in 1446 Anthony
Gonsalez and two other captains were sent to enter into a treaty of
peace and traffic with the natives of Rio del Oro, and also to attempt
their conversion. But these proposals were rejected by the barbarians,
one of whom, however, came voluntarily to Portugal, and Juan Fernandez
remained with the natives, to observe their manners and the products of
the country.

In 1447 upwards of thirty ships followed the route of traffic which was
now opened; and John de Castilla obtained the infamy to stand the first
on the list of those names whose villainies have disgraced the spirit of
commerce, and afforded the loudest complaints against the progress of
navigation. Dissatisfied with the value of his cargo, he seized twenty
of the natives of Gomera (one of the Canaries), who had assisted him,
and with whom he was in friendly alliance, and brought them as slaves to
Portugal. But Prince Henry resented this outrage, and having given them
some valuable presents of clothes, restored the captives to freedom and
their native country.
The reduction of the Canaries was also this year attempted; but Spain
having challenged the discovery of these islands, the expedition was
discontinued. In the Canary Islands a singular feudal custom existed;
giving to the chief man, or governor, a temporary right to the person of
every bride in his district.

In 1448 Fernando Alonzo was sent ambassador to the king of Cape Verde
with a treaty of trade and conversion, which was defeated at that time
by the treachery of the natives. In 1449 the Azores were discovered by
Gonsalo Vello; and the coast sixty leagues beyond Cape Verde was visited
by the fleets of Henry. It is also certain that some of his commanders
passed the equinoctial line.

Prince Henry had now, with inflexible perseverance, prosecuted his
discoveries for upwards of forty years. His father, John I. , concurred
with him in his views, and gave him every assistance; his brother, King
Edward, during his short reign, took the same interest in his
expeditions as his father had done; nor was the eleven years' regency
of his brother Don Pedro less auspicious to him. [50] But the
misunderstanding between Pedro and his nephew Alonzo V. , who took upon
him the reins of government in his seventeenth year, retarded the
designs of Henry, and gave him much unhappiness. [51] At his town of
Sagrez, from whence he had not moved for many years, Don Henry, now in
his sixty-seventh year, yielded to the stroke of fate, in the year of
our Lord 1463, gratified with the certain prospect that the route to the
eastern world would one day crown the enterprises to which he had given
birth. He saw with pleasure the naval superiority of his country over
the Moors established on the must solid basis, its trade greatly upon
the increase, and flattered himself that he had given a mortal wound to
Mohammedanism. To him, as to their primary author, are due all the
inestimable advantages which ever have flowed, or ever will flow from
the discovery of the greatest part of Africa, and of the East and West
Indies. Every improvement in the state and manners of these countries,
or whatever country may be yet discovered, is strictly due to him. What
is an Alexander, crowned with trophies at the head of his army, compared
with a Henry contemplating the ocean from his window on the rock of
Sagrez! The one suggests the idea of a destroying demon, the other of a
benevolent Deity.