The Portuguese were among the first to signalize themselves in the
career of geographical discovery. At the beginning of the fifteenth
century, Prince Henry, son of John I, was at the head of the marine of
Portugal. Under his immediate direction, several voyages were
undertaken to the coast of Africa; in one of which the voyagers were
driven by a storm out of their usual course along shore, and for the
first time the terrified mariners found themselves in the boundless
ocean. When the storm abated, they were in sight of an island, to
which, in their thankfulness to Heaven for the succor it afforded,
they gave the name of Puerto Sancto, or the Holy Haven――the least of
the Madeiras. The voyages of the Portuguese now succeeded each other
rapidly; and other navigators of this nation, either grown bolder, or
again driven off the coast, discovered the Azores. In 1433, the
Portuguese passed Cape Nun, hitherto the limit of their courses, and
arrived at a cape, which presenting a frightful barrier to the still
timid seamen, in the terrible surf that broke on the shoals near it,
they named Bojador, signifying its projection into the sea and the
consequent circuit it required to double it.
In succeeding expeditions, Cape Verd was reached, and the Senegal
arrived at, and Lisbon saw with astonishment a different race from the
Moors. Cape Mesurado was the limit of the Portuguese discoveries at
the death of Prince Henry in 1463, which damping the ardor of
discovery, it was not until 1471 that the Equator was crossed, and the
islands in the gulf of Guinea were discovered.
The terrors of the burning zone, and the belief of the union of Africa
and Asia being dissipated by these successive voyages, the passage to
India round Africa was no longer deemed impossible, and a fleet was
fitted out under Bartholomew Diaz for the express purpose of
attempting it. The captain coasted Africa to within sight of its
southern point, to which he gave the name of Cape of all Torments,
from the violent storms he experienced off it, and which, as well as
the want of provisions, obliged him to return to Lisbon, after an
absence of sixteen months. The name of the Cape of all Torments was
changed by the king to that of Good Hope, from the prospect it
afforded of accomplishing the passage to India.
Ten years however elapsed after the discovery of the Cape before this
passage was attempted; and Vasco de Gama had the honor of doubling the
promontory the 20th of November, 1497. Sailing along the coast of
Africa, he passed through the Mozambique Channel to Mombaz and thence
to Melinda, where he procured pilots, and crossing the Arabian sea,
arrived at Callicut the 22d of May, 1498. It is thought that the
ridiculous ceremony of ducking, etc., on crossing the line, was first
practiced in this voyage.