Portugal received their education, deserves some slight notice here. A
university was founded by King Diniz at Lisbon in 1300, but the
turbulence of the students, and their perpetual quarrels with the
citizens, caused him to remove it to Coimbra, about the year 1308.
During the fourteenth century the habitat of the Portuguese university
was moved from Coimbra to Lisbon in 1338, from Lisbon to Coimbra in
1354, and from Coimbra back to Lisbon in 1377. John “the Great” paid
great attention to the university, as he did to every valuable
institution in the kingdom; and in 1400 he entirely remodelled it,
establishing a staff of fourteen regius professors, four of whom were to
teach grammar, three Roman law, three canon law, two logic, one
medicine, and one theology. On this footing the Portuguese university
remained until 1537, when John III., perceiving that the busy pursuits
of a noisy capital were hardly suited to quiet study and the acquisition
of learning, removed it finally to the beautiful city of Coimbra, and
once more changed its constitution. In 1547 the king summoned Andrea
Govea back to his native land, and requested him to bring with him other
men of learning. Andrea Govea and his brothers were famous as scholars
throughout Europe, even in the days which could boast of Scaliger; they
were all natives of Beja, and had been educated at Paris; Martial Govea,
the eldest, wrote one of the earliest Latin grammars, published at Paris
in 1534; Antonio Govea argued the cause of Aristotle against Ramus,
edited Virgil and Terence, and was held to be the most formidable rival
of Cujas as an exponent of Roman law; while Andrea had been principal of
the College of St. Barbe, rector of the University of Paris, and
afterwards principal of the College of Guienne at Bordeaux, and was
termed by Montaigne, “le plus grand principal de France.”[22] Andrea
Govea brought with him to Coimbra, as requested, many of his friends and
colleagues, including George Buchanan, the greatest scholar Scotland has
ever produced, Patrick Buchanan, his elder brother, Arnoldus Fabricius
and Elias Vinetus, learned Frenchmen, and his own countrymen, Diogo de
Tieve, João da Costa, and Antonio Mendes. This brilliant band did not,
however, long remain united, for Andrea Govea died in 1548, and his
death was followed by the persecution of George Buchanan by the
Inquisition. The illustrious scholar was accused of eating flesh in
Lent, and of writing a poem against the Franciscans, and after being
imprisoned in a convent he was only too glad to escape from the
inhospitable country. Though the death of Govea, and the persecution of
Buchanan, deprived the remodelled university of its most famous
teachers, there yet remained a sufficient number with such coadjutors as
Jeronymo Osorio, Bishop of Silves, Andrea de Resende, and Pedro Nunes,
the mathematician, to make this the golden age of the University of
Coimbra; and the instruction they imparted profoundly impressed the
minds of their most promising young Portuguese pupils, such as Ferreira
and Camoens.
The result of the introduction of a knowledge of the masterpieces of
classical literature was bound to have a great effect upon the
development of Portuguese poetry and prose, but before noticing the
result of that influence in the works of the “classicists,” headed by Sá
de Miranda and Ferreira, and in the epic of Camoens, it is necessary to
devote a little space to the life and works of the greatest Portuguese
dramatist, Gil Vicente. The versatility of the Portuguese people during
the heroic period is in no way better illustrated than by the fact that
in their country appeared the first modern dramatist, nearly a century
before Shakespeare or Calderon. The date of Gil Vicente’s birth is
unknown, but it is said that he came of a good family, and he is first
found attached to the Court of Emmanuel as a dramatic author. He began
by writing “autos” or religious pieces, resembling in their nature the
miracle plays common all over Europe at the time, and the first, which
attracted King Emmanuel’s attention, was written to celebrate the birth
of his eldest son, afterwards John III. Most of them are Christmas
pieces, and the dramatist took advantage of the story of the shepherds
watching their flocks by night, to introduce the elements of what may be
called pastoral comedy. Far more important are his comedies and farces,
which latter won for him the title of the Portuguese Plautus. Neither
the plots nor the language of these productions are very refined, but
they are full of dramatic vigour, and represent the life of the lower
classes in Lisbon, with a vividness which strikingly recalls the works
of his Roman prototype. Gil Vicente died at Evora in 1557, the same year
as his patron, John III., who, in his younger days, did not disdain to
act in his favourite’s dramas, and he has had no successor as a comic
writer worthy to be named beside him, which proves once again, how
thoroughly with the extinction of the national greatness, the
originality of the Portuguese people in every direction disappeared.
Side by side with Gil Vicente must be mentioned Bernardim Ribeiro, the
founder of the most national school of Portuguese poetry, that of the
romantic-pastoral type. Though he showed the influence of the revival
of classical learning in his style, he did not show it in his ideas, and
the shepherds who converse in his eclogues, are as thoroughly Portuguese
as those who appear in Gil Vicente’s Christmas “autos.” Ribeiro, like
Gil Vicente, was a favourite at the Court of King Emmanuel, where he
held the office of “Gentleman of the Chamber,” and it is said that the
lady for whom he cherished a hopeless affection was the Donna Beatrice,
daughter of the king. A modern writer on Portuguese literature, speaking
of Ribeiro and his works, says: “The rivers and mountains of his native
land are the natural framework of a poet’s fancy, and the revival of
classical learning showed him in the Eclogues of Virgil a model, which
he was not slow to imitate. His Eclogues, written in ‘redondilhas’
(octosyllabic nine or ten-lined stanzas), are the earliest in modern
Europe, and while replete with the charms and conceits of versification
of the troubadours, show a truly poetic love of nature.”[23] Ribeiro was
the first true Portuguese poet, as Gil Vicente was the first Portuguese
dramatist. While coming under the influence of the classical writers of
Greece and Rome, he was not a slavish imitator of their master-pieces,
and as the founder of the school of pastoral poetry, he holds an
honourable place in the Portuguese literature of the heroic age.
Ribeiro exhibits in his poetry the influence of the revival of classical
learning to a slight degree; after his time that influence increased,
and his successors, who bridged over the chasm between Ribeiro and
Camoens, were thorough classicists, who imitated the Greek and Roman
poets, not only in form, but in spirit. The chief poets of this
classicist group were Sá de Miranda and Ferreira. Francisco Sá de
Miranda was born at Coimbra, the Portuguese Oxford, in 1495, of a noble
family, and he became professor of jurisprudence in his native town. On
the death of his parents, he resigned his professorship, and travelled
in Italy, where he studied the works not only of the great classical
authors, but of the new school of Italian poets. He returned to his
native country with a great reputation, and received an appointment at
the Court of John III. He proved an accomplished courtier, but a quarrel
with a Portuguese nobleman forced him to abandon his office, and he
retired to his country seat at Tapada, near Ponte de Lima, where he died
in 1558, while Camoens was still fighting in India. It was in Italy and
not in Coimbra, that he learnt to study the great classical poets, and
reverencing their works with the almost superstitious admiration of the
Italians of the Renaissance, he dared not treat their ideas with the
freedom of either Ribeiro or Camoens. Sá de Miranda devoted himself to
the task of polishing the Portuguese language, and in doing this, he did
more harm than good, for he introduced many Latin and Spanish forms of
expression, which were not needed, and which helped to hinder the
natural development of the national literature. He openly expressed his
opinion that Spanish was a more dignified language than Portuguese, and
many of his best poems are written in the former tongue, and are
considered by authorities on Spanish literature to be excellent
specimens of sixteenth-century work. Sá de Miranda’s poems comprise
imitations of many poets. He wrote eclogues in the style of Theocritus,
epistles on the lines of those of Horace, plays based on Terence, and
sonnets of which the form was borrowed from the Italian writers of the
Renaissance. All are good and interesting in their way, but all are
imitations, and the very best imitations of foreign styles can hardly
rank a poet among the glories of his country’s literature. Sá de
Miranda’s right to be included in any work on Portuguese literature is
not due to the poems he wrote, or to his questionable improvements in
his native language, but to the fact that he familiarized the people
with the classic forms of poetry, of which a greater than he was to take
advantage. Yet Sá de Miranda held a very high place in the estimation of
his contemporaries, and the writers of the next century did not hesitate
to rank him above Camoens, as being more “correct,” a criticism, which
irresistibly recalls Voltaire’s avowed preference of Pope over
Shakespeare.
Antonio Ferreira, the second leader of the Portuguese classicist school,
was like Sá de Miranda, a slavish adherent to classical forms, but he
was at the same time a genuine patriot and a lover of his country, and a
student of its past history. He, like Sá de Miranda, was of a noble
family, and he was born at Lisbon in 1528. He was sent to the University
of Coimbra, and studied there in the days of its greatness. His
favourite teacher was Diogo de Tieve, the friend of George Buchanan, and
professor of classical literature, from whom he obtained a knowledge of
the classics, not inferior to that possessed by Sá de Miranda. Even in
his youth, Ferreira determined to devote his poetical talent to works in
his own language, and he refused to write Latin or Spanish verses. He
formed round him at Coimbra, a school of young poets, of whom the chief
were Andrade Caminha, Jeronymo Corte-Real, and Diogo Bernardes; and in
1557 he published his first volume of poems. This book established his
fame, and on coming to Lisbon, he was appointed a judge of the Court of
Appeal, and a gentleman of the Royal Household. He continued to write
and publish until his death from the plague in 1569, the year before
Camoens returned from India. Ferreira, like Sá de Miranda, was an
imitator of the great classical poets, but he differed from his
predecessor, in that he combined with this predilection, an appreciation
of the national greatness. He wrote sonnets after the manner of
Petrarch, elegies after Ariosto, eclogues after Virgil, and odes and
epistles after Horace; but his greatest work was a drama founded on the
model of the ancient Greek tragedies. He selected for his subject the
touching story of Ines de Castro, and the characters in his play are
Ines and her nurse, Dom Pedro and his secretary, King Affonso and his
three counsellors, a messenger, and a chorus of women of Coimbra.
Ferreira’s tragedy, though more fit for the study than the stage,
remains to this day the finest drama in the Portuguese language, and
stands almost as far as above other dramatic attempts of subsequent
ages, as Camoens’s great epic towers above all imitations.
The history of the development of the revival of learning, as
illustrated by the classicist school of Sá de Miranda and Ferreira, is
of great importance to the right understanding of the course of
Portuguese literature, but to the world at large its chief interest lies
in its share in forming the taste of the one man, whom Portugal has
contributed to the small roll of supreme poets, Camoens. His name is
more famous than that of any other Portuguese, whether king or captain;
his great epic has been translated into every civilized European
language, and is a greater subject of pride to his countrymen than their
conquests in the East; and no “Story of Portugal” could be complete
which did not give some account of the poet who has given immortal fame
to the heroic deeds of the great age of Portugal.
[Illustration: LUIS DE CAMOENS.
(_From the Portrait in “Portugal Illustrated,” 1829._)]
Luis de Camoes, commonly called in English Camoens, was the son of a
captain in the Portuguese navy, who had more than once experienced the
perils of the voyage to India, and he was born at Lisbon in either 1524
or 1525. His family was noble, but by no means among the first rank of
the Portuguese nobility in wealth or importance. He was educated at the
University of Coimbra, before it had been revivified by the energy and
learning of Govea and his friends, and there acquired a profound
knowledge of the Latin poets, and of the symbolism and the legends of
the Greek and Latin mythology. He seems to have left the university,
which he ever dearly loved, before the arrival of Diogo de Tieve, and
the foundation of what may be called the national-classicist school of
poetry by Ferreira, and went to Lisbon to obtain employment. His
poetical powers soon became manifest, and he had become somewhat of a
favourite, when he fell in love with a great lady of the Court, said to
be the Donna Catherine de Athaide, lady of honour to the queen. The
lady’s friends were indignant at the poet’s suit, and at their request
he was exiled to the little town of Ceuta, on the coast of Morocco,
where he lost his right eye in a skirmish with the Moors. Wearied of
this life he volunteered for India, the goal of every gallant Portuguese
gentleman, and after serving a term in prison for a street brawl in
Lisbon, he set sail for the East in 1553. In Asia, Camoens remained for
more than sixteen years, and it was there that he gathered the local
knowledge which gives truth and charm to many passages of his immortal
poem. In 1554 he served in the Red Sea and at the capture of Muscat
under Dom Fernando de Menezes, and soon after his return to Goa he was
ordered to take up a lucrative appointment at Macao, in 1556. Here he
remained for two years, and the chief glory of the little island off
Canton is the cave where he is supposed to have worked on his epic, and
which is still known as the “Grotto of Camoens.” From Macao he was
recalled in 1558, when in spite of his poverty he was thrown into gaol
at Goa for peculation, and he was not released until the arrival of an
old court acquaintance, Dom Constantino de Braganza, as Viceroy of
India. With this prince, he served at the capture of Daman, and he
distinguished himself in various engagements under the next
governor-general, the Count of Redondo. In 1568 Camoens determined to
return to Portugal with his great poem for his only fortune, but on his
way, disaster again overtook him, and in 1569 he was thrown into an
African prison for debt, by Pedro Barreto, Governor of Mozambique. From
this cruel confinement, he was released by some old friends on their way
from India, who paid the debt, and in 1570 he once more found himself in
Lisbon. His reception in his native land was not encouraging; he was not
received at Court; he had made no money in India, and had only shown a
peculiar faculty for getting into debt and making enemies; and he now
devoted himself to the final recension of his “Lusiads.” The first
edition of the great poem was published in 1572, but the fame it at once
acquired did little good to the author, who was only granted a pension
of £3 8s. 0d. a year, equivalent perhaps to £20 in modern money. The
later years of Camoens were utterly miserable; poor and neglected, the
arch-poet of Portugal had to subsist upon what his Javan slave could beg
for him at night in the streets of Lisbon. He lived long enough to hear
of the disaster of Alcacer Quibir, and of the death of Dom Sebastian,
but he was spared the pain of seeing the Spaniards ruling over the
fatherland whose glories he had sung, for he died in a common hospital
at Lisbon in June, 1579, or June, 1580.
These are the chief incidents in the life of one of the world’s greatest
poets, and they tell their own tragic story without need of a
commentary. It serves no good purpose to speculate why Camoens was ever
in debt and making enemies, or why he was neglected and left to die in
poverty; other poets and men of letters have shared the same lot. It
remains rather to examine the causes which make his epic take rank among
the works which the unanimous opinion of posterity has decreed to be
immortal. Of his sonnets, eclogues, and smaller poems, beautiful as many
of them are, there is no need to speak, for it is on his “Lusiads” that
the fame of Camoens must ever rest. The subject of the epic is Vasco da
Gama’s first voyage to India and his return, an achievement of such
surpassing difficulty, and of such importance alike to Portugal and to
Europe, that Camoens perceived its fitness for poetical treatment. But
the poem is not confined to the narration of the perils of the voyage
only: it abounds in long episodes, in one of which Vasco da Gama relates
the history of the Portuguese people to the king of Melinda, while in
another a nymph gives a prophetic history to the great admiral of the
achievements of his country-men in the land he had just visited. Sir
Robert Walpole is said to have declared that he derived his knowledge of
English history from Shakespeare’s historical plays, and it might be
affirmed in the same sense that many, if not most, educated people have
learned what they know of Portuguese history from the “Lusiads.” Such a
knowledge is not to be despised. For, if the poet makes the mistakes of
his era, and, for instance, identifies the modern Portuguese with the
ancient Lusitanians, he manages in a few stanzas apiece to sum up with
dramatic genius all the famous tales of Portuguese history, such as the
voluntary surrender of Egas Moniz, the pathetic story of Ines de Castro,
and the glories of the victory of Aljubarrota. This power of historical
description is of itself enough to make Camoens the national poet of
Portugal; every old Portuguese family finds its name enshrined in some
of its glowing passages, and the whole Portuguese people feel identified
with the actors in the great deeds it describes. But Camoens is not only
a national poet; he is a hero telling of an heroic deed done by an
heroic people, and this secures for him the interest of readers of all
nations, who can appreciate true heroism. Vasco da Gama was a Portuguese
sailor, but the results of his enterprise and success were to the
advantage of all Europe, and the poet who sings of him deserved to be
heard by Europe. If, then, the subject was fitted for epic poetry, the
style of Camoens was equal to it. He rises far above the purely
classicist school in Portuguese literature; he uses the names of the
Roman gods, and narrates their councils and their intervention in
mundane affairs with the verisimilitude of Virgil, yet he never falls
into a base or servile imitation of the great Latin poet, but preserves
throughout the cast of thought of a Portuguese “conquistador.” To
criticize the “Lusiads” further is without the purpose of this book, but
in conclusion it must be pointed out that the great poem remains the
strongest bond of union between the modern Portuguese people, whether in
Portugal itself, or in Brazil, Goa, Macao, and Mozambique. It is
impossible to meet an educated Portuguese, who does not know his
Camoens; he is more to them than Dante to the Italians, Goethe to the
Germans, or Shakespeare to the English; he sings of their nation’s
glory, and in maintaining his fame, each one of them is interested.
Never was this more manifest than in the Camoens Celebration of 1880,
when Portuguese-speaking people of all climes, and of all varieties of
political and religious opinion, gathered together in Lisbon to do
honour to the memory of their great poet, whose glory they felt to be a
connecting link between them all.
[Illustration: JOÃO DE BARROS.
(_From a Print in the British Museum._)]
It was not only in the domain of poetry that the boundless energies of
the Portuguese of the heroic age distinguished themselves; in prose
composition, also, they stood high above their contemporaries of other
nations. History, as might be expected, was their chief study, and João
de Barros, the Portuguese Livy, was the writer who bridged over the gap
between the old chroniclers, of whom Damião de Goes was the last, and
the regular historians. This young nobleman, who was born in 1496, was
distinguished at the Portuguese Court by his ardent study of the Latin
historical writers, and especially of Livy, and was commissioned by King
Emmanuel to draw up an account of the discoveries and conquests of the
Portuguese in the East. John III. continued the royal patronage to João
de Barros, who received many lucrative appointments, such as
Captain-general of Brazil and treasurer of the Indian department at
Lisbon. The latter post gave him the opportunity to collect valuable
information on his subject, and he made good use of it. His “Asia” is
written in exact imitation of the style of Livy; it is divided into
decads and abounds in speeches which might have been, but certainly
never were, delivered, and in curious theories, entirely without
foundation. Nevertheless, João de Barros possesses the greatest quality
of an historian, for he took pains in trying to ascertain the truth, and
when he believed he had found it, he told his story simply and directly.
He combines the naïve simplicity of the early chroniclers with the art
of making a story interesting, and he deserves a niche in the history of
Portuguese literature as the first writer of modern Portuguese prose. In
fiction the “Amadis de Gaul” type of romance was followed by imitations
of the “Palmeirim de Inghilterra;” both are alike tedious and absurd,
and thoroughly deserve the hearty mockery of Cervantes, who laughed them
and their school out of existence. Far more interesting, if also
somewhat tedious, are the pastoral novels, which were originated by the
poet Bernardim Ribeiro, and written with most success by Rodrigues Lobo,
for they are truly national, and exhibit the love of nature, which is
inherent in the Portuguese character.
Nor was more serious literary work neglected by the universally cultured
Portuguese of the heroic age. Mention has been made of the great
scholars, who made the University of Coimbra renowned, and who
encouraged the study of the classics. Theological inquiry was also much
favoured, and Francisco Ferrario, one of the divines at the Council of
Trent, and Jeronymo de Azambuja, a learned Hebrew scholar, who wrote a
commentary on the Bible, both held a high place in the estimation of
their contemporaries. Among grammarians, the name of Manuel Alvares, a
Jesuit, is honourably remembered, while scientific research was
represented by the mathematician, Pedro Nunes, who was reckoned one of
the wonders of his age. Lastly, Andrea de Resende, the greatest
Portuguese antiquary, must be again noticed, for his “De Antiquitatibus
Lusitaniæ” is a work of exceptional value, and contains a transcription
of many Roman inscriptions, since destroyed.
Enough has been said to indicate how great and varied was the literary
activity of the Portuguese during their golden age, and it is worthy of
notice, that their literature was most abundant in great works at the
very time in which their energies were most strained by their Asiatic
conquests. It is matter for wonder, that one small nation could do so
much, and in the “Lusiads” the key-note of their success is to be found.
The Portuguese race, trained under great kings and great captains,
believed itself to be invincible, and from that very belief it remained
invincible for a time. When the illusion was shattered, the
superabundant energy which it had fostered vanished completely. When
once a nation has been conquered, and its belief in its invincibility is
gone, its power withers away. The greatness of a nation depends upon the
opinion its people have of themselves as individuals and members of the
body politic; as long as they believe in themselves they can do
anything; when their faith in their invincibility disappears, their
position among nations speedily declines.
[Illustration: text decoration]
XIII.
THE SIXTY YEARS’ CAPTIVITY.