How the caravels quitted Lagos, and what captains were in them.
On this occasion it happened that the Infant Dom Henry was summoned on
the part of his brother Dom Pedro, who was Regent of the kingdom in the
name of the King, as we have said already, to go to Coimbra and knight
Dom Pedro of Portugal, eldest son of the said Regent, who was then
Constable of these realms; and who was ordered to go to Castille, as in
fact he did. Forasmuch as the King Don John the Second, who was then
King of that realm, was in trouble with his cousins, the King of Navarre
and the Infant Don Henry, who was master of the Order of Santiago, and
other grandees of that kingdom who were with them, because of the great
enmities which had sprung up between the said King and those lords,
owing to the Constable Don Alvaro de Luna. For he, being a man of common
origin and manners, by superabundance of fortune or some other hidden
secret, came to such a pitch of power that he did whatever he pleased in
the kingdom, so that for his sake were slain and destroyed the principal
men of Castille, as you will learn more at length in the General
Chronicle of the kingdom, since of necessity the said actions must be
touched on there. Right well did the Infant Dom Pedro give the world to
understand the great dignity that he recognised in his brother, for he
held it as a greater honour that his son should receive knighthood at
the hand of his uncle than at that of any other Prince of Spain.
And among the things which I have heard say the Infant spake to that son
of his, when he left him, was this: that he charged him to remember the
order of chivalry which he had received, and especially from whose hand
he had received it, the which matter was no small charge for him. But
before the Infant Dom Henry had thus set out from Lagos, he left in the
chief command of all those ships, Lançarote, the same knight of whom we
have already spoken; and this was done with the consent of all the other
captains: for though there were then a sufficiency of notable persons
worthy of great honour, yet, knowing the judgment and discretion of that
man, it was their pleasure that he should have this charge. For there
was there Sueiro da Costa, Alcayde of that city of Lagos, who was a
nobleman and a fidalgo, brought up from boyhood in the court of the
King, Dom Edward; and who happened to have been in many notable actions.
For he was in the battle of Monvedro[N122] with the King, Don Fernando
of Aragon, against the men of Valencia,[K] and he was at the leaguer
of[N123] Balaguer,[L] in which were performed very great matters; and he
was with the King Ladislaus[M] when he assailed the city of Rome; and he
was with the King Louis of Provence in all his war; and he was at the
battle of Agincourt, which was a very great and mighty battle, between
the Kings of France and England; and he was in the battle of
Vallamont[N] with the Constable of France against the Duke of Ossestre;
and in the battle of Montsécur, in which were the Count of Foix[O] and
the Count of Armagnac; and he was at the taking of Soissons[P] and at
the raising of the sieges of Arrasa[Q] and Ceuta,[R] in which matters he
always approved himself a very valiant man of arms. And this Sueiro da
Costa was father-in-law of Lançarote.[N124] And there were also in that
captaincy Alvaro de Freitas, Commander of Aljazur, which belongeth to
the order of Santiago, a nobleman, and one who had made very great
prizes among the Moors of Granada, and of Bellamarim; and Gomez Pirez,
commander of the King's galley, of whom we have already spoken in
another chapter; and Rodriguez Eannes of Travaços, a servant of the
Regent, who was a very zealous squire, and toiled to the utmost of his
power to increase his honour. And there was also Pallenço, a man who had
often fought against the Moors, and who spent his whole life in the
service of God and of the kingdom, undertaking and accomplishing by
himself very great actions (as we have said in the General Chronicle of
the Kingdom) after Ceuta was taken. Other good and honourable persons
chanced to be in the said company, whom we omit to mention, so as not to
be too lengthy: such as Gil Eannes, a knight and dweller in that town,
and Stevam Affonso, and others. And to speak briefly there were armed in
that place and year[N125] fourteen caravels, besides some others that
were armed in Lisbon and in the Madeira Islands, to wit, those of Dinis
Diaz,[N126] who was the first to reach the land of the Negroes, and of
Tristam,[S][N127] one of the captains of the island,[T] who went there
in person with his caravel; besides the vessel of Alvaro Gonçalvez
d'Atayde, who was then preceptor to the King, and afterwards Count of
Atouguya; moreover, John Gonçalvez Zarco, who had the other captaincy in
Madeira,[U] sent there two caravels; and other ships were there, of
whose masters we do not care to make express mention in this place. Only
it were well you should know that in this year there were armed to go to
that land of the Negroes twenty-six caravels, not counting the Fusta of
Pallenço; and among these the thirteen ships of Lagos started first, and
after them the others, each one as it best could; but they did not all
together take part in the affair of Tider.
[Footnote K: Vallença.]
[Footnote L: Vallaquer.]
[Footnote M: Lançaraao.]
[Footnote N: Cabo de Caaes.]
[Footnote O: Fooes.]
[Footnote P: Sansoōes.]
[Footnote Q: Ras.]
[Footnote R: Cepta.]
[Footnote S: Vaz.]
[Footnote T: Madeira.]
[Footnote U: Besides Tristam Vaz.]
And as the history cannot be recounted as well as might be, for that the
voyage was not made by all the caravels in company, we will only say
what we can, in the best manner that we can speak.