How Gomez Pirez and the others who were with him took the other Moors.
So Gomez Pirez pursued his voyage, as you have heard he had said to the
others after they reached the village; and when he was now distant a
good space from the place where they had made their booty, he caught
sight of a Moor coming on an ass; and it appeareth that he had left the
spot where the other Moors remained. But as soon as the Moor caught
sight of our men he threw himself from his ass and began to turn back,
running to where he had left his companions. And since the land was
level, and the Moor was fresh, and had sight of our men coming a long
way off; because of all this the Christians could not follow him, being
greatly wearied from the toil and loss of sleep they had now had for two
days. But they kept him in sight as long as they were able, and at the
end they were obliged to lose him, yet they failed not to keep a
straight course until they reached the huts of a village, where it
seemeth the other Moors were, and in it they found no one; and this
would be about the hour of terce. And as they were gazing around the
moorland as far as their eyes could reach, they perceived the Moors who
had set out from thence; and tired as they were, they followed after
them by the space of a league and a half, when they came upon them by
the sea, near which they had retreated to some very great rocks;[N214]
and our men laboured to seek them out, but many as they were, yet on
account of the difficulty of the place, they could not capture more than
seven. And so they persevered in this toil all that day until nearly
nightfall, but over and above their weariness, they sorely felt hunger
and thirst, for which they had no remedy. And when they had searched all
the places they deemed likely for anyone to hide in, they agreed to turn
back. And true it is that some declared it would be well for some of
them to remain there that night, to see if those Moors would come out,
who were lying hid, but there was no one who dared to remain, so weakly
did they feel their bodies to be; but rather they determined one and all
to turn back to their caravels. And it seemeth that it pleased our Lord
God to have a mind to their weakness, for He ordained that they should
meet upon that path, by the which they were going, two camels already
saddled. And this was a great help to their repose, for they took it in
turn to ride them until they came to their ships, where they found they
had a booty of nine-and-seventy souls.
On the next day it was agreed among them that inasmuch as their ships
were not able to lodge so many Moors on account of the salt they were
carrying from this realm--and this was in order to salt the skins of the
sea-calves lest they should have no other booty, or perchance it was to
enter into ransoming with the Moors--therefore they should throw all
that salt overboard, as in fact they did. And they were minded still to
depart and run down that other coast, and on account of a storm that
came upon them, they determined there to caulk their ships that they
might the better encounter the fortunes of the sea as they returned. And
when their ships had finished their repairing, Gomez Pirez took aside
one of those Moors to know where there might be any other Moors that he
could capture; but although the Moor told him where lay certain villages
and they went to them, directing their course toward the south, they
found neither Moor nor Mooress in them nor any other creature. And so
they made their way by certain places where the Moor thought they would
find them, until they were right well assured that the Moors had
knowledge of them, and that it would be lost labour for them to go
further in their search. Wherefore they agreed to turn back to the
Kingdom, seeing that their food was failing them, and especially their
water, of which they could have no fresh supply in that land. And so
they directed their voyage until they returned to Lagos, on the borders
of which the Infant was staying at a place that is called Mexilhueira.