by Cliff, Nigel
Gama slid from soldier to diplomat. He begged his visitors to excuse his precautions and not take offense; he was a stranger, he added as he offered them food, and he didn’t know how things worked in their city. His guests, all smiles, explained that they had merely come to look at the fleet because it was such a striking sight; carrying arms, they added, was their custom in peace or war. The sultan had been eagerly expecting the foreigners’ arrival; he would have come himself if it weren’t so late.
The delicate parley continued for two hours. When the four men left, the Portuguese were still convinced they had come to see if they could capture one of the ships. They were, after all, Muslims, though they, too, had confirmed that there were indeed many Christians on the island.
Sunday morning arrived, and with it a present from the sultan of Mombasa: a sheep, together with crates of oranges, lemons, and sugarcane. Clearly the Europeans had already become minor celebrities along the coast, because they received a stream of callers all day. Among them were two envoys who presented Gama with the sultan’s ring as a pledge of the visitors’ security and promised that they would be supplied with everything they needed if they entered the port. The envoys were pale-skinned and said they were Christians; they were very plausible, and the Portuguese believed them. Gama sent them back with a string of coral beads for the sultan—an unremarkable gift on a coast brimming with coral reefs—and the message that he intended to head into the harbor the following day. At the same time, he sent two of the degredados to repeat his friendly greetings to the sultan in person and to reconnoiter the scene.
As soon as the two men landed, a crowd gathered around them and followed them through the narrow streets to the palace. A series of four doorways, each manned by a doorkeeper holding a drawn cutlass, led to the audience chamber. The sultan received the foreigners hospitably, and he ordered his men to show them around the city.
The group wound through handsome streets lined with three-story buildings. Fine plaster ceilings could be seen through the windows. The women were draped in silk and glittered with gold and precious stones, while coffles of slaves shuffled by in irons.
The tour halted at the house of two merchants who were introduced as Christians. They showed the visitors an image they worshipped, which seemed to be the Holy Ghost painted as a white dove. There were many other Christians in the city, the guides explained, and when their ships came into the harbor they would meet them all. The itinerary ended back at the palace, where the sultan reappeared and handed the two men samples of cloves, pepper, and sorghum. They were for sale in great quantities, he said, and he would permit the visitors to load their ships with them. He also had warehouses full of silver, gold, amber, wax, ivory, and other riches, and he promised to undercut the competition.
Gama received the messages and the reports of the city with much satisfaction. The three captains consulted. As an insurance policy in case anything went wrong in India, they decided to put into the port and stock up with spices.
The fleet weighed anchor, but the São Gabriel refused to turn and it drifted onto a shoal. The next ship ran straight into it, and all three anchored again to sort themselves out.
The shoal turned out to be another instance of divine providence at work. There were still several Africans and Arabs on the ships, and now they decided the Christians were never going to go nearer the shore. They signaled to each other, ran for the stern, and jumped into a dhow that was tied alongside. Seconds later the two pilots jumped overboard and swam to the boat.
Vasco da Gama began to suspect that a deep plot was in hand. That night, he set about interrogating two men from Mozambique who had not managed to escape. Since it was commonly believed that reliable answers were only given under torture, he had some oil heated to boiling point and dripped on their skin.
Between their shouts of pain they gasped out the gist of the plot. News of the Christians’ arrival and their attacks on Mozambique had preceded them up the coast, and plans had been laid to capture them as soon as they entered the port.
Gama ordered more boiling oil applied to more smoking skin. One of the interrogees squirmed out of his tormentors’ grasp and threw himself into the sea, his hands still tied together. The other suicidally followed suit a few hours later. The Portuguese thanked God for once again saving them from the Infidel’s evil grasp.
Around midnight, two canoes paddled silently toward the fleet and halted just out of sight. Dozens of men dived noiselessly off the edge and swam up to the ships. Several surfaced at the side of the Berrio, took out their knives, and cut through the anchor cables. Their skin and weapons glinted in the moonlight, but the night watch took them for a school of tuna. As the caravel began to drift, the sailors finally caught on and raised the alarm. More swimmers had already climbed on board the São Rafael and were swarming around the rigging of the mizzenmast, about to sever the ropes. When they were spotted they slipped silently into the water and swam away.
“These and other wicked tricks were practiced upon us by these dogs,” recorded the Chronicler, “but our Lord did not allow them to succeed, because they were unbelievers.”
The Portuguese were still convinced that half the population of Mombasa was Christian, but they were troubled that there was no sign of them coming to their aid. They eventually concluded that there was a war going on between the Christians and Muslims; clearly the slaves they had seen were captured Christian soldiers. In any case the Christian merchants, they persuaded themselves, were only temporary residents and so were unable to do anything without the sultan’s permission.
By now the crews had finally recovered their strength. Perhaps the ample supply of citrus fruit had helped; more likely, the Portuguese believed, it was another miracle. The captain-major waited two more days for Christians to arrive who might furnish him with a replacement pilot. Then, on April 13, he ordered the fleet to set sail, still none the wiser about how to cross the Indian Ocean.
AT DAWN THE next day the watchkeepers spotted two boats in the open sea, and the ships immediately set off in hot pursuit. If there were no pilots for hire, Gama had decided, one would have to be captured.
One of the boats escaped to the mainland, but by late afternoon the fleet caught up with the other. Inside were seventeen Muslims, some gold and silver, and a great deal of maize. One elderly man had a distinguished look about him, and clinging to his side was his young wife. As the ships closed in the sailors and passengers threw themselves overboard, but the Portuguese jumped in their boats and fished them out of the sea.
To Gama’s annoyance, none of the new captives was a pilot, and the fleet was forced to continue up the coast.
Thirty leagues north of Mombasa the Portuguese found themselves near another sizable town. At sunset they anchored for the night, keeping a close watch for any signs of nefarious activity along the shore.
The next day was April 15, Easter Sunday, but only the usual morning prayers were said. The explorers looked warily around them, waiting to see who would make the first move.
Ahead the coastline curved majestically between two distant rocky points to form a broad, undulating bay. At low tide the surf crashed onto coral reefs that stretched well out from the sandy beach, exposing glinting pools and low rocks spread with tattered green blankets of algae in the shallows. The town spread along the shore amid extensive palm groves flanked by farms and orchards. Well-kept villas roofed with palm thatch stood tall and white against the limpid blue sky; unlike most blank-walled Arab houses, they had many windows and roof terraces that looked out to sea. The scene reminded the Portuguese of Alcochete, a favorite resort of Portuguese royalty—and the birthplace of Manuel I—on the Tagus estuary above Lisbon.
The men who had been seized from the boat told their captors that they were in front of the city of Malindi. They had just come from there themselves, they added, and they had seen four ships belonging to Christians from India in the port. If the strangers would let them go, they would provide them with Christian p
ilots, together with water, wood, and any other provisions they cared to name.
Gama was badly in need of some help, and he listened to their advice. He moved the fleet toward the city and anchored half a league away. The inhabitants kept their distance: perhaps they had already been warned that the foreigners went around capturing ships and kidnapping their passengers and crews.
The next morning, Gama had his men row the elderly Muslim to a sandbank in front of the city. They left him there, and he stood quietly until a canoe approached from the shore and picked him up. The foreigners were still holding his young wife hostage, and he went straight to the palace and passed on the captain-major’s message. The newcomers, he related, were the subjects of a great and powerful king whom the sultan would rejoice to have as an ally; they were headed for India, and would be glad of pilots. For once the diplomatic patter found a receptive ear; the sultan was at war with neighboring Mombasa and was eager for new allies, especially belligerent ones with fearsome-looking ships.
After dinner the old man reappeared with one of the sultan’s men-at-arms, a sharif, and three sheep. The human callers relayed the ruler’s eagerness to enter into friendly relations with the strangers and his readiness to give them pilots or anything else in his power. Gama sent them back with a surtout, two strings of coral, three hand basins, a hat, some small bells, two striped cotton scarves, and word that he would enter the port the next day.
The fleet edged nearer to the shore, and a boat arrived from the sultan with six more sheep and a gift of cloves, cumin, ginger, nutmeg, and pepper. Once again the expensive waft of spices quickened the sailors’ pulses.
With the gifts came a new message: If the strangers’ leader wished to talk with the sultan, he would come out in his dhow and meet him halfway. Gama agreed, and after dinner the next day the royal dhow pushed off from the shore. At the sultan’s side was a band of trumpeters, two of whom played huge horns made from intricately carved ivory tusks, as tall as a man and blown through a hole in the side. Together the deep blasts and sweet peals made a harmonious, hypnotic sound.
The sultan wore a robe of crimson damask trimmed with green satin and a lavish turban. He was seated on a double chair made of bronze and piled with silk cushions. Over his head was a crimson satin parasol, and by his side stood an old retainer holding a sword in a silver sheath. His men were naked above the waist, but below they were wrapped in silk or fine cotton. On their heads they wore cloths embroidered with silk and gold, and they carried fancy daggers and swords decorated with silk tassels in a rainbow of colors. The Europeans were much taken with the pageantry and the dignified comportment of the royal party.
Gama was dressed in his best knightly gear and was accompanied by twelve of his principal officers. His boat had been decked out with flags and streamers, and as the sultan drew near, his sailors rowed him out. The two boats stopped side by side. In signs and through the translators, the two men exchanged cordial greetings, and Gama was flattered to find himself addressed with the deference due a king.
The sultan invited the captain-major to visit the city and stay in his palace, where he could refresh himself after the fatigues of his long voyage. Afterward, he suggested, he would pay a reciprocal visit to the ships. Despite the soft comforts on offer, Gama demurred. He had come to the fixed conclusion that it was too dangerous to set foot in what were clearly strongly armed Muslim cities, however friendly the people seemed. He was forbidden from complying, he replied, by the orders of his king; if he disobeyed them, a bad report would be made of him.
What would his people say of him, the sultan responded, if he were to visit the ships without a sign of goodwill from the strangers? At the least, he would like to know the name of their king.
The Portuguese translator wrote down the name Manuel.
If the strangers called on him on their way back from India, the sultan declared, he would send letters to this Manuel, or even an ambassador in person.
Gama thanked him for his politeness, promised to return, and answered a string of questions about the mission. The sultan expounded at length on spices, the Red Sea, and other matters of vital interest to the explorers, and he promised to provide them with a pilot.
The meeting went so well that Gama sent for his prisoners and handed them all over. The sultan vowed that he could not have been happier if he had been presented with a city. In great good humor he made a lap of honor around the fleet, admiring each ship in turn and doubtless estimating the damage it could inflict on his neighbors. The captain-major, who had followed in his own boat, ordered the bombards to fire off a salute. The alarmed Muslims lunged for their oars, and Gama quickly signaled for the guns to cease. The sultan, when he had recomposed himself, proclaimed that he had never been so pleased with any men and would be very glad to have some of them to help him in his wars. He had seen nothing yet, Gama intimated; if God permitted them to discover India and return home, his king would surely send a whole fleet of warships to his new ally’s aid.
After a visit of three hours the sultan headed home, leaving his son and a sharif on board the fleet as a surety. He was still keen to show off his palace, and he took two sailors with him. Since the captain-major would not go ashore, he said as he left, he would return the following day to the beach.
The next morning Vasco da Gama and Nicolau Coelho took charge of two armed boats and rowed along the town front. Crowds had gathered on the shore, where two cavalrymen were acting out a duel. Behind were handsome streets and plashing fountains. The explorers learned that only Arabs—perhaps four thousand in number—lived inside the city walls, while the Africans, many of them slaves who worked the plantations, lived outside in mud-and-wattle huts. As all along the coast, after centuries of intermarriage there was little to tell physically between the two groups, but whatever their ethnicity the Muslim elite called themselves Arabs and labeled the non-Islamic population kaffirs, the Arabic word for infidels.
The sultan emerged from his seafront palace. He climbed into his palanquin—a covered litter mounted on poles—and was carried down a flight of stone steps to the water’s edge. Gama’s boat bobbed alongside, but it was hard to have a proper conversation, and again the sultan begged the captain-major to step ashore. He asked it as a personal favor, he added; his elderly, infirm father was keen to meet the man who had come so far and survived such dangers for his king. If need be, both he and his sons would wait as hostages on the ships. Even that was not enough to lower Gama’s guard, and he stayed firmly seated in his boat to watch the entertainments that his hosts had laid on.
Of all the Indian Ocean cities ruled by Arabs, the Portuguese had hit upon the one most likely to give them help. The information about the four ships from India turned out to be accurate, too, and soon a party of Indians rowed up to the São Rafael and asked to come aboard. Vasco was there talking to his brother, and he told the crew to show the Indians an altarpiece that represented “Our Lady at the foot of the cross, with Jesus Christ in her arms and the apostles around her.” Since these were the first Indians they had seen, the sailors examined them with unabashed curiosity and decided they looked nothing like any Christians they knew. They wore white cotton shifts, full beards, and their hair long and plaited up under turbans; on top of that, they explained that they were vegetarians, which sounded deeply suspicious to men who were ravenous for fresh meat. But the moment they saw the altar they prostrated themselves on the deck, and throughout the fleet’s stay in the harbor they came daily to say their prayers before the shrine, bringing little offerings of cloves or pepper.
This was final confirmation, surely, that India was teeming with Christians. The Portuguese were even more stirred when the captain-major rowed past the Indians’ ships and they fired off a salvo in his honor.
“Christ! Christ!” they shouted joyfully, raising their hands above their head; at least, so their chant sounded to European ears.
That night the Indians applied to the sultan for permission to throw a party in the
strangers’ honor. As darkness fell the sky blazed with rockets. The Indians fired round after round from their small bombards, and they sang strange hymns at the top of their voices.
After a week of fetes, sham fights, and musical interludes Gama was growing impatient. On April 22 the royal dhow arrived bringing one of the sultan’s counselors, the first caller in two days. Gama had him seized, and he sent a message to the palace demanding the promised pilot. The sultan had hoped to keep the Portuguese diverted until they could join his war, but he immediately sent a man and Gama released his hostage.
To the Europeans’ great joy, the pilot appeared to be another Christian from India. He unrolled a detailed map of the Indian coast, talked the officers through its features, and explained the winds and currents of the ocean. He was clearly an experienced navigator, and he was equally knowledgeable about the science of sailing. The ships’ instruments failed to impress him in the slightest; the pilots of the Red Sea, he remarked, had long used similar contraptions to take the altitude of the sun and the stars, though he and his fellow Indians preferred another device. He showed it to them, and Gama’s pilots decided to let him take the lead.
On Tuesday, April 24 the trumpets sounded, the sails were set, and the fleet left Malindi with all flags flying. According to one report, the sultan was heartbroken to see his new friends go and assured them that the name of the Portuguese “would never leave his heart where he preserved it, except when he died.”
The weather was fair, and they made good progress. Directly north, their pilot told them, was a huge bay that ended in a strait: the Gulf of Aden and the Bab el Mandeb, the gate to the Red Sea and the Kaaba of Mecca. Nearby, he added, were many large cities, both Christian and Muslim, and six hundred islands, counting only those that were known. The Europeans still had a great deal to learn.
After two days the African coast disappeared from view. Three nights later the North Star reappeared on the horizon. The explorers had once again crossed the equator, but this time they were sailing in an ocean where no European ship had ever been. They held their course to the northeast, and India.
