The Lusiads (tr. Mickle)/Book V

by Luís de Camões

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THE

L U S I A D.

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BOOK V.

WHILE on the beach the hoary father stood
And spoke the murmurs of the multitude,
We spread the canvas to the rising gales;
The gentle winds distend the snowy sails.
As from our dear-loved native shore we fly
Our votive shouts, redoubled, rend the sky;
"Success, success," far echoes o'er the tide,
While our broad hulks the foamy waves divide.
From Leo now, the lordly star of day,
Intensely blazing, shot his fiercest ray;
When slowly gliding from our wishful eyes,
The Lusian mountains mingled with the skies;

Tago's loved stream, and Cyntra's mountains cold
Dim fading now, we now no more behold;
And still with yearning hearts our eyes explore,
Till one dim speck of land appears no more.
Our native soil now far behind, we ply
The lonely dreary waste of seas and boundless sky.
Through the wild deep our venturous navy bore,
Where but our Henry plough'd the wave before;
The verdant islands, first by him decry'd,
We past; and now in prospect opening wide,
Far to the left, increasing on the view,
Rose Mauritania's hills of paly blue:
Far to the right the restless ocean roared,
Whose bounding surges never keel explored;
If bounding shore, as reason deems, divide
The vast Atlantic from the Indian tide.

Named from her woods, with fragrant bowers adorn'd,
From fair Madeira's purple coast we turn'd:
Cyprus and Paphos' vales the smiling loves
Might leave with joy for fair Madeira's groves;

A shore so flowery, and so sweet an air,
Venus might build her dearest temple there.
Onward we pass Massilia's barren strand,
A waste of wither'd grass and burning sand;
Where his thin herds the meagre native leads,
Where not a rivulet laves the doleful meads;
Nor herds nor fruitage deck the woodland maze;
O'er the wild waste the stupid ostrich strays,
In devious search to pick her scanty meal,
Whose fierce digestion gnaws the temper'd steel.
From the green verge, where Tigitania ends,
To Ethiopia's line the dreary wild extends.
Now past the limit, which his course divides,
When to the north the sun's bright chariot rides,
We leave the winding bays and swarthy shores,
Where Senegal's black wave impetuous roars;
A flood, whose course a thousand tribes surveys,
The tribes who blacken'd in the fiery blaze,
When Phaeton, devious from the solar height,
Gave Afric's sons the sable hue of night.
And now from far the Libyan cape is seen,
Now by my mandate named the Cape of Green.^[1]
Where midst the billows of the ocean smiles
A flowery sister-train, the happy isles,^[2]
Our onward prows the murmuring surges lave;
And now our vessels plough the gentle wave,

Where the blue islands, named of Hesper old,
Their fruitful bosoms to the deep unfold.
Here changeful nature shows her various face,
And frolics o'er the slopes with wildest grace:
Here our bold fleet their ponderous anchors threw,
The sickly cherish, and our stores renew.
From him the warlike guardian power of Spain,
Whose spear's dread lightning o'er th' embattled plain
Has oft o'erwhelm'd the Moors in dire dismay,
And fixt the fortune of the doubtful day;
From him we name our station of repair,
And Jago's name that isle shall ever bear.
The northern winds now curl'd the blackening main,
Our sails unfurl'd we plough the tide again:
Round Afric's coast our winding course we steer,
Where bending to the east the shores appear.
Here Jalofo its wide extent displays,
And vast Mandinga shews its numerous bays;

Whose mountains' sides, though parch'd and barren, hold,
In copious store, the seeds of beamy gold.
The Gambia here his serpent journey takes,
And through the lawns a thousand windings makes;
A thousand swarthy tribes his current laves,
Ere mix his waters with th' Atlantic waves.
The Gorgades we past, that hated shore,
Famed for its terrors by the bards of yore;
Where but one eye by Phorcus' daughters shared,
The born beholders into marble stared;
Three dreadful sisters! down whose temples roll'd
Their hair of snakes in many a hissing fold,
And scattering horror o'er the dreary strand,
With swarms of vipers sow'd the burning sand.

Still to the south our pointed keels we guide,
And through the austral gulf still onward ride.
Her palmy forests mingling with the skies,
Leona's rugged steep behind us flies;
The Cape of Palms that jutting land we name,
Already conscious of our nation's fame.
Where the vext waves against our bulwarks roar,
And Lusian towers o'erlook the bending shore:
Our sails wide swelling to the constant blast,
Now by the isle from Thomas named we past;
And Congo's spacious realm before us rose,
Where copious Zayra's limpid billow flows;
A flood by ancient hero never seen,
Where many a temple o'er the banks of green,
Rear'd by the Lusian heroes, through the night
Of Pagan darkness, pours the mental light.

O'er the wild waves as southward thus we stray,
Our port unknown, unknown the watery way;

Each night we see, imprest with solemn awe,
Our guiding stars and native skies withdraw:
In the wide void we lose their cheering beams:
Lower and lower still the pole-star gleams,
Till past the limit, where the car of day
Roll'd o'er our heads, and pour'd the downward ray,
We now disprove the faith of ancient lore;
Bootes shining car appears no more:
For here we saw Calisto's star retire
Beneath the waves, unawed by Juno's ire.
Here, while the sun his polar journeys takes,
His visit doubled, double season makes;

Stern winter twice deforms the changeful year,
And twice the spring's gay flowers their honours rear.
Now pressing onward, past the burning zone,
Beneath another heaven, and stars unknown,
Unknown to heroes, and to sages old,
With southward prows our pathless course we hold:
Here gloomy night assumes a darker reign,
And fewer stars emblaze the heavenly plain;
Fewer than those that gild the northern pole,
And o'er our seas their glittering chariots roll——
While nightly thus the lonely seas we brave
Another pole-star rises o'er the wave;
Full to the south a shining cross appears;
Our heaving breasts the blissful omen cheers:
Seven radiant stars compose the hallowed sign
That rose still higher o'er the wavy brine.
Beneath this southern axle of the world,
Never, with daring search, was flag unfurl'd;

Nor pilot knows if bounding shores are placed,
Or if one dreary sea o'erflow the lonely waste.

While thus our keels still onward boldly stray'd,
Now tost by tempests, now by calms delay'd,
To tell the terrors of the deep untry'd,
What toils we suffer'd, and what storms defy'd;
What rattling deluges the black clouds pour'd,
What dreary weeks of solid darkness lour'd;
What mountain surges mountain surges lash'd,
What sudden hurricanes the canvas dash'd;
What bursting lightnings, with incessant flare,
Kindled in one wide flame the burning air;
What roaring thunders bellow'd o'er our head,
And seem'd to shake the reeling ocean's bed:
To tell each horror on the deep reveal'd,
Would ask an iron throat with tenfold vigour steel'd:
Those dreadful wonders of the deep I saw,
Which fill the sailor's breast with sacred awe;
And which the sages, of their learning vain,
Esteem the phantoms of the dreamful brain.
That living fire, by sea-men held divine,
Of heaven's own care in storms the holy sign,

Which midst the horrors of the tempest plays,
And on the blast's dark wings will gaily blaze;
These eyes distinct have seen that living fire
Glide through the storm, and round my sails aspire.
And oft, while wonder thrill'd my breast, mine eyes
To heaven have seen the watery columns rise.
Slender at first the subtle fume appears,
And writhing round and round its volume rears:
Thick as a mast the vapour swells its size;
A curling whirlwind lifts it to the skies:
The tube now straightens, now in width extends,
And in a hovering cloud its summit ends:
Still gulp on gulp in sucks the rising tide,
And now the cloud, with cumbrous weight supply'd,

Full-gorged, and blackening, spreads, and moves, more slow,
And waving trembles to the waves below.
Thus when to shun the summer's sultry beam
The thirsty heifer seeks the cooling stream,
The eager horse-leech fixing on her lips,
Her blood with ardent throat insatiate sips,
Till the gorged glutton, swell'd beyond her size,
Drops from her wounded hold, and bursting dies.
So bursts the cloud, o'erloaded with its freight,
And the dash'd ocean staggers with the weight.
But say, ye sages, who can weigh the cause,
And trace the secret springs of nature's laws,

Say, why the wave, of bitter brine erewhile,
Should to the bosom of the deep recoil
Robb'd of its salt, and, from the cloud distil
Sweet as the waters of the limpid rill?
Ye sons of boastful wisdom, famed of yore,
Whose feet unwearied wander'd many a shore,
From nature's wonders to withdraw the veil,
Had you with me unfurl'd the daring sail,
Had view'd the wondrous scenes mine eyes survey'd,
What seeming miracles the deep display'd,
What secret virtues various nature shew'd,
Oh! heaven! with what a fire your page had glow'd!

And now since wandering o'er the foamy spray,
Our brave Armada held her venturous way,
Five times the changeful empress of the night
Had fill'd her shining horns with silver light,
When sudden from the main-top's airy round,
Land, land, is echoed—At the joyful sound,
Swift to the crowded decks the bounding crew
On wings of hope and fluttering transport flew,
And each strain'd eye with aching sight explores
The wide horizon of the eastern shores:
As thin blue clouds the mountain summits rise,
And now the lawns salute our joyful eyes;
Loud through the fleet the echoing shouts prevail,
We drop the anchor, and restrain the sail;
And now descending in a spacious bay,
Wide o'er the coast the venturous soldiers stray,

To spy the wonders of the savage shore,
Where stranger's foot had never trod before.
I, and my pilots, on the yellow sand
Explore beneath what sky the shores expand.
That sage device, whose wondrous use proclaims
Th' immortal honour of its authors'^[3] names,
The sun's height measured, and my compass scann'd,
The painted globe of ocean and of land.
Here we perceived our venturous keels had past,
Unharm'd, the southern tropic's howling blast;
And now approach'd dread neptune's secret reign,
Where the stern power, as o'er the austral main
He rides, wide scatters from the polar star
Hail, ice, and snow, and all the wintry war.
While thus attentive on the beach we stood,
My soldiers, hastening from the upland wood,
Right to the shore a trembling negro brought,
Whom on the forest-height by force they caught,
As distant wander'd from the cell of home,
He suck'd the honey from the porous comb.
Horror glared in his look, and fear extreme,
In mien more wild than brutal Polypheme:
No word of rich Arabia's tongue he knew,
No sign could answer, nor our gems would view:

From garments striped with shining gold he turn'd;
The starry diamond and the silver spurn'd.
Straight at my nod are worthless trinkets brought;
Round beads of crystal as a bracelet wrought,
A cap of red, and dangling on a string
Some little bells of brass before him ring:
A wide-mouth'd laugh confest his barbarous joy,
And both his hands he raised to grasp the toy.
Pleased with these gifts we set the savage free,
Homeward he springs away, and bounds with glee.

Soon as the gleamy streaks of purple morn
The lofty forest's topmost boughs adorn,
Down the steep mountain's side, yet hoar with dew,
A naked crowd, and black as night their hue,
Come tripping to the shore: their wishful eyes
Declare what tawdry trifles most they prize:
These to their hopes were given, and, void of fear,
Mild seem'd their manners, and their looks sincere.
A bold rash youth, ambitious of the fame
Of brave adventurer, Velose his name,
Through pathless brakes their homeward steps attends,
And on his single arm for help depends.
Long was his stay: my earnest eyes explore,
When rushing down the mountain to the shore
I mark'd him; terror urged his rapid strides;
And soon Coëllo's skiff the wave divides.
Yet ere his friends advanced, the treacherous foe
Trod on his latest steps, and aim'd the blow.

Moved by the danger of a youth so brave,
Myself now snatch'd an oar, and sprung to save:
When sudden, blackening down the mountain's height,
Another crowd pursued his panting flight;
And soon an arrowy and a flinty shower
Thick o'er our heads the fierce barbarians pour,
Nor pour'd in vain; a feather'd arrow stood
Fix'd in my leg, and drank the gushing blood.

Vengeance as sudden every wound repays,
Full on their fronts our flashing lightnings blaze;
Their shrieks of horror instant pierce the sky,
And wing'd with fear at fullest speed they fly.
Long tracks of gore their scatter'd flight betray'd,
And now, Veloso to the fleet convey'd,
His sportful mates his brave exploits demand,
And what the curious wonders of the land:
"Hard was the hill to climb, my valiant friend,
"But oh! how smooth and easy to descend!
"Well hast thou proved thy swiftness for the chase,
"And shewn thy matchless merit in the race!"
With look unmoved the gallant youth reply'd,
"For you, my friends, my fleetest speed was try'd;
"'Twas you the fierce barbarians meant to slay;
"For you I fear'd the fortune of the day;
"Your danger great without mine aid I knew,
"And swift as lightning to your rescue flew."

He now the treason of the foe relates,
How soon, as past the mountain's upland straits,
They changed the colour of their friendly shew,
And force forbade his steps to tread below:

How down the coverts of the steepy brake
Their lurking stand a treacherous ambush take;
On us, when speeding to defend his flight,
To rush, and plunge us in the shades of night:
Nor while in friendship would their lips unfold
Where India's ocean laved the orient shores of gold.

Now prosp'rous gales the bending canvas swell'd;
From these rude shores our fearless course we held:
Beneath the glistening wave the God of day
Had now five times withdrawn the parting ray,
When o'er the prow a sudden darkness spread,
And slowly floating o'er the mast's tall head
A black cloud hover'd: nor appear'd from far
The moon's pale glimpse, nor faintly twinkling star;
So deep a gloom the louring vapour cast,
Transfixt with awe the bravest stood aghast.
Meanwhile a hollow bursting roar resounds,
As when hoarse surges lash their rocky mounds;
Nor had the blackening wave, nor frowning heaven
The wonted signs of gathering tempest given.
Amazed we stood—O thou, our fortune's guide,
Avert this omen, mighty God,—I cried;
Or through forbidden climes adventurous stray'd,
Have we the secrets of the deep survey'd,
Which these wide solitudes of seas and sky
Were doom'd to hide from man's unhallowed eye?

Whate'er this prodigy, it threatens more
Than midnight tempests and the mingled roar,
When sea and sky combine to rock the marble shore.

I spoke, when rising through the darken'd air,
Appall'd we saw a hideous Phantom glare;
High and enormous o'er the flood he tower'd,
And thwart our way with sullen aspect lour'd:
An earthy paleness o’er his cheeks was spread,
Erect uprose his hairs of wither'd red;
Writhing to speak, his sable lips disclose,
Sharp and disjoin'd, his gnashing teeth's blue rows;
His haggard beard flow'd quivering on the wind,
Revenge and horror in his mien combined;
His clouded front, by withering lightnings scared,
The inward anguish of his soul declared.
His red eyes glowing from their dusky caves,
Shot livid fires: far echoing o'er the waves
His voice resounded, as the cavern'd shore
With hollow groan repeats the tempest's roar.
Cold gliding horrors thrill'd each hero's breast,
Our bristling hair and tottering knees confest
Wild dread; the while with visage ghastly wan,
His black lips trembling, thus the fiend began;

O you, the boldest of the nations, fired
By daring pride, by lust of fame inspired,

Who scornful of the bowers of sweet repose,
Through these my waves advance your fearless prows,

Regardless of the lengthening watery way,
And all the storms that own my sovereign sway,
Who mid surrounding rocks and shelves explore
Where never hero braved my rage before;
Ye sons of Lusus, who with eyes profane
Have view'd the secrets of my awful reign,
Have pass'd the bounds which jealous nature drew
To veil her secret shrine from mortal view;
Hear from my lips what direful woes attend,
And bursting soon shall o'er your race descend:

With every bounding keel that dares my rage,
Eternal war my rocks and storms shall wage,
The next proud fleet that through my drear domain,
With daring search shall hoist the streaming vane,

That gallant navy by my whirlwinds tost,
And raging seas, shall perish on my coast:
Then He who first my secret reign descried,
A naked corse wide floating o'er the tide
Shall drive—Unless my heart's full raptures fail,
O Lusus! oft shalt thou thy children wail;
Each year thy shipwreck'd sons shalt thou deplore,
Each year thy sheeted masts shall strew my shore.

With trophies plumed behold^[4] an hero come,
Ye dreary wilds, prepare his yawning tomb.
Though smiling fortune blest his youthful morn,
Though glory's rays his laurel'd brows adorn,
Full oft though he beheld with sparkling eye
The Turkish moons in wild confusion fly,
While he, proud victor, thunder'd in the rear,
All, all his mighty fame shall vanish here.
Quiloa's sons, and thine, Mombaze, shall see
Their conqueror bend his laurel'd head to me;

While proudly mingling with the tempest's sound,
Their shouts of joy from every cliff rebound.

The howling blast, ye slumbering storms prepare,
A youthful lover and his beauteous fair,
Triumphant sail from India's ravaged land;
His evil angel leads him to my strand.
Through the torn hulk the dashing waves shall roar,
The shatter'd wrecks shall blacken all my shore.
Themselves escaped, despoil'd by savage hands,
Shall naked wander o'er the burning sands,
Spared by the waves far deeper woes to bear,
Woes even by me acknowledged with a tear.
Their infant race, the promised heirs of joy,
Shall now no more a hundred hands employ;
By cruel want, beneath the parents' eye,
In these wide wastes their infant race shall die.
Through dreary wilds where never pilgrim trod,
Where caverns yawn and rocky fragments nod,
The hapless lover and his bride shall stray,
By night unshelter'd, and forlorn by day.
In vain the lover o'er the trackless plain
Shall dart his eyes, and cheer his spouse in vain.
Her tender limbs, and breast of mountain snow,
Where ne'er before intruding blast might blow,
Parch'd by the sun, and shrivell'd by the cold
Of dewy night, shall he, fond man, behold.
Thus wandering wide, a thousand ills o'erpast,
In fond embraces they shall sink at last;

While pitying tears their dying eyes o'erflow,
And the last sigh shall wail each other's^[5] woe.

Footnotes

1. ——Cape of Green—Called by Ptolemy, Caput Asinarium.
2. ——the happy isles—Called by the ancients, Insulæ Fortunatæ, now the Canaries.
3. That sage device———The Astrolabium, an instrument of infinite service in navigation, by which the altitude of the sun, and distance of the stars is taken. It was invented in Portugal, during the reign of John II. by two Jewish physicians, named Roderic and Joseph. It is asserted by some that they were assisted by Martin of Bohemia, a celebrated mathematician. Partly from Castera.  Vid. Barros, Dec. 1. l. 4. c. 2.
4. —Behold an hero come—Don Francisco de Almeyda. He was the first Portuguese viceroy of India, in which country he obtained several great victories over the Mohammedans and Pagans. He conquered Quiloa, and Mombassa or Mombaze. On his return to Portugal he put into the bay of Saldanna, near the Cape of Good Hope, to take in water and provisions. The rudeness of one of his servants produced a quarrel with the Caffres, or Hottentots. His attendants, much against his will, forced him to march against the blacks. "Ah, whither (he exclaimed) will you carry the infirm man of sixty years." After plundering a miserable village, on the return to their ships they were attacked by a superior number of Caffres, who fought with such fury in rescue of their children, whom the Portuguese had seized, that the viceroy and fifty of his attendants were slain.
5. And the last sigh shall wail each other's woe.—This poetical description of the miserable catastrophe of Don Emmanuel de Souza, and his beautiful spouse Leonora de Sà, is by no means exaggerated. He was several years governor of Diu in India, where he amassed immense wealth. On his return to his native country, the ship in which was his lady, all his riches, and five hundred men, his sailors and domestics, was dashed to pieces on the rocks at the Cape of Good Hope. Don Emmanuel, his lady, and three children, with four hundred of the crew, escaped, having only saved a few arms and provisions. As they marched through the wild uncultivated deserts, some died of famine, of thirst, and fatigue; others, who wandered from the main body in search of water, were murdered by the savages, or destroyed by the wild beasts. They arrived at last at a village inhabited by Ethiopian banditti. At first they were courteously received, and Souza, partly stupified with grief, at the desire of the barbarians, yielded up to them the arms of his company. No sooner was this done, than the savages stripped the whole company naked, and left them destitute to the mercy of the desert. The wretchedness of the delicate and exposed Leonora was encreased by the brutal insults of the negroes. Her husband, unable to relieve, beheld her miseries. After having travelled about 300 leagues, her legs swelled, her feet bleeding at every step, and her strength exhausted, she sunk down, and with the sand covered herself to the neck, to conceal her nakedness. In this dreadful situation, she beheld two of her children expire. Her own death soon followed. Her husband, who had been long enamoured of her beauty, received her last breath in a distracted embrace. Immediately he snatched his third child in his arms, and uttering the most lamentable cries, he ran into the thickest of the wood, where the wild beasts were soon heard to growl over their prey. Of the whole four hundred who escaped the waves, only six and twenty arrived at another Ethiopian village, whose inhabitants were more civilized, and traded with the merchants of the Red Sea: from hence they found a passage to Europe, and brought the tidings of the unhappy fate of their companions. Jerome de Cortereal, a Portuguese poet, has written an affecting poem on the shipwreck, and deplorable catastrophe of Don Emmanuel and his beloved spouse. Vid. Faria, Barros, &c.