Which soared through the lofty halls,
While the instruments, in harmony,
Conformed smoothly to the measure.
Sudden silence restrained the winds
And made a sweet murmuring
In the waters, while savage beasts, deep
In their natural lairs, were lulled to sleep.
7 Her ravishing voice was telling the heavens
The names of heroes* yet to be born,
Whose luminous souls Proteus had glimpsed
In that revolving, transparent globe
Sent him by Jupiter in a dream
So that afterwards, in Neptune’s kingdom,
He prophesied, and now from memory
The nymph rehearsed the glorious history.
8 What she learned there in the ocean depths
Was in the tragic not the comic mode,
And not known to Iopas of Carthage
Nor to Demodocus* among the Phaeacians.
Here, my Calliope,* in my final labour,
I implore you, as my just reward,
To reinstate in this extremity
My joy in writing which is failing me.
9 My years decline, and of my summer days
Few remain as Autumn fast closes;
Ill fortune has starved the genius
I no longer vaunt, nor can vouch for;
Sorrows are carrying me off to the river
Of dark oblivion and endless sleep;
Queen of the muses, grant that what I will
For my nation, I have strength to fulfil!
10 The goddess sang that from the Tagus,
Over the seas da Gama had opened,
Would come fleets to conquer all the coast
Where the Indian Ocean sighs;
Those Hindu kings who did not bow
Their necks to the yoke would incite
The wrath of an implacable enemy,
Their choice to yield or, on the instant, die.
11 She sang of one among the Malabaris,
King of Cochin* and a high priest
Who, rather than sever the bonds
He had forged with the mighty heroes,
Would suffer his cities and farms laid
Waste by the Samorin’s iron and fire,
In his cruel rage and abiding hate
Of the Portuguese encroaching on his state.
12 She sang of one who would embark*
In Belém destined to repair this wrong,
The great Pacheco, Portugal’s Achilles,
Not knowing what future he takes to sea.
As he embarks above the seething
Ocean, the great ship’s timbers
Will groan and uncharacteristically
Wallow a little deeper in the sea.
13 Arriving at length in the far east
He will hurry with his tiny crew
To succour the King of Cochin,
And there in the Strait of Cambalon,
In the salt delta of the winding river,
Will rout the infernal Nairs,
Chilling the sultry Orient that such
A small company could achieve so much.
14 The Samorin will summon reinforcements;
The kings of Beypore and Tanur* will come
From the hills of Narsinga, swearing
Firm allegiance to their lord;
From Calicut to Cannanore, every
Nair will be summoned in support,
As both the hostile faiths prepare for war,
Muslims by sea and Hindus on the shore.
15 So a second time, dauntless Pacheco,
Will destroy them by land and by sea,
And all Malabar will be astounded
At the multitudes of those killed.
Again, impetuously, the Samorin
Will rush back into battle,
Insulting his men, howling incantations
To his deaf gods in their wooden stations.
16 Pacheco will not only hold the fords,
But burn towns, houses, and temples;
Inflamed with anger, watching his cities
One by one laid low, that dog
Will force his men, reckless of life,
To attack both passages at once,
But Pacheco will have wings, and his complete
Command of them both will seal their defeat.
17 The Samorin will be spied in person
Observing the battle, inciting his men,
Until one whistling cannon-shot
Bespatters with blood the royal palanquin.
Then, discovering neither strategy
Nor force can impress Pacheco,
He will try poison, treachery, and finesse,
But always (so Heaven wills) without success.
18 ‘A seventh time,’ she sang, ‘he will return
To attack the invincible Portuguese
Whom nothing will daunt or dismay
As they continue wreaking confusion:
The Samorin will take into battle,
New, terrible wooden engines,
To grapple with the caravels, till then
Beyond attack, even by the bravest men.
19 ‘He will launch towering fireships
To burn as much of the fleet as he can;
But the soldier’s skill and ingenuity
Will make all such onslaughts futile.
No one in the annals of warfare,
Who has soared on the wings of fame,
Can match this man whose triumphs never cease
—Allow me this, Rome and illustrious Greece.
20 ‘That he bore the brunt of so many battles
With barely one hundred soldiers,
Routing so many accomplished foes
With such stratagem and resource,
Must seem nothing more than fantasy,
Or that the heavenly choirs came down,
Summoned to assist him and to impart
Zeal, courage, skill, and a steadfast heart.
21 ‘Not even Miltiades* at Marathon
When he destroyed the might of Darius,
Nor Leonidas defending Thermopylae
With four thousand Lacedaemonians,
Nor young Horatius, who held the bridge
Against all the forces of the Etruscans,
Nor Quintus Fabius—none of them showed more
Wisdom and strength than this paragon of war.’
22 But at this, the nymph dropped her pitch
To a throaty dirge, heavy with tears,
As she sang of the deep ingratitude
With which bravery was rewarded:
‘Belisarius,’* she sang, ‘whom the nine
Muses never cease to celebrate,
If your feats went unrecognized, behold
One by whose destiny to be consoled.
23 ‘Here is a comrade, alike in deeds
As in his harsh, thankless end:
In both you and him, we see noble hearts
Brought to wretchedness and obliquity.
To die in the beds of a hospice
Who were bulwarks to their king and faith!
So kings behave, it being their royal way
To subject truth and justice to their sway.
24 ‘So kings behave when, besotted
By what is smooth and plausible,
They award the prize Ajax deserves*
To the fraudulent tongue of Ulysses.
Yet revenge follows, for where gifts
Are showered on the sycophant
Instead of on some worthy knight-companion,
They vanish among greedy hangers-on.
25 ‘As for you, O king, who so badly repaid
Such a servant, this is your one blot:
You denied him a fair estate
When he won for you a rich realm.
So long as Apollo’s rays circle
The earth, I give you my poet’s word*
He will be among the
great and glorious,
And you reprobated for your avarice.
26 ‘But here’, she resumed, ‘comes another,
Francisco de Almeida,* the viceroy,
And his son, destined to win on the seas
Fame as great as any Roman of old.
Together, by the power of arms,
They will castigate fertile Kilwa,*
Driving out its perfidious princeling
To impose a loyal and humane king.
27 ‘Mombasa,* too, furnished with such
Palaces and sumptuous houses,
Will be laid waste with iron and fire
In payment for its former treachery.
Along the Indian coast, swarming
With enemy ships plotting Portugal’s
Downfall, Lourenço with sail and with oar
Will give his uttermost, and then give more.
28 ‘Though the powerful Samorin’s giant ships*
Choke the entire sea, his cannon-shot
Thundering from hot brass
Will pulverize rudder, mast, and sail;
Then, daring to grapple the enemy
Flagship, watch him leap
On deck, armed only with lance and sword,
To drive four hundred Muslims overboard.
29 ‘But God’s inscrutable wisdom (He knows
Best what is best for his servants)
Will place him where neither strength nor wisdom
Can avail in preserving his life.
In Chaul,* the very seas will churn
With blood, fire, and iron resistance,
As the combined fleets of Egypt and Cambay
Confront him with his destiny that day.
30 ‘The united power of many enemies
(Might was defeated only by might),
Faltering winds and a swelling sea
Will all be ranged against him.
Here, let ancient heroes rise
To learn from this scion of courage
This second Scaeva* who, however maimed,
Knows no surrender and will not be tamed.
31 ‘With one thighbone completely shattered
By a wayward cannon-ball, still
He battles on with his forearms alone
And a heart not to be daunted,
Until another ball snaps the ties
Binding flesh and spirit together:
The leaping soul slips its body’s prison
To claim the greater prize of the arisen.
32 ‘Go in peace, O soul! After war’s
Turbulence, you have earned supreme peace!
As for that scattered, broken body,
He who fathered it plans vengeance.
Already, I hear their hot perdition
Looming in a thunderous barrage
On Mameluke and cruel Cambayan*
From catapult, from ordnance and cannon.
33 ‘Here comes the father, magnified
By his anger and grief, his heart
On fire, his eyes swimming, his soul
Transfixed by paternal love.
He has taken an oath his noble rage
Will make blood run knee-high
In the enemy ships; the Nile will mourn,
The Indus witness, the Ganges be forlorn.
34 ‘As an impassioned bull, rehearsing
For terrible combat, tests his horns
On the trunk of an oak or tall beech,
Attacking air in a trial of strength,
So Francisco, before descending
In wrath on the coast of Cambay,
Plunges his sword in opulent Dabhol,
All its pretensions made contemptible.
35 ‘Then sailing into the bay of Diu,*
Scene of famous battles and sieges,
He will scatter the vast but feeble fleet
Of Calicut that is powered by oars;
While the ships of wary Melik-el-Hissa,
Caught in a hail of cannon-fire,
Will be relegated to their cold, dread
Burial places on the ocean bed.
36 ‘But it is Emir Hussein’s grappled fleet
Bears the brunt of the avenger’s anger,
As arms and legs swim in the bay
Without the bodies they belonged to;
Bolts of fire will make manifest
The passionate victors’ blind fury,
And nothing will penetrate ears and eyes
But smoke, iron, flames, and battle-cries.
37 ‘But sadly, after this great triumph
As he sets sail for his native Tagus,
His glory is all but stolen away
In the dark and mournful outcome!*
The Cape of Storms, which keeps his memory
Along with his bones, will be unashamed
In dispatching from the world such a soul
Not Egypt nor all India could control.
38 ‘For there, brute savages will achieve
What eluded more skilled enemies,
And fire-hardened knobkerries do
What bows and cannon-balls could not;
God’s judgements are inscrutable;
Pagans, unable to comprehend,
Attribute to ill fortune or mischance
What providence ordains and heaven grants.
39 ‘But what great light* do I see breaking,’
Sang the nymph and in a higher strain,
‘Where the seas of Malindi flow crimson
With the blood of Lamu, Oja, and Brava?
This is Cunha’s doing, to be remembered
In seas which wash remote islands,
And on those beaches which once bore the name
St Lawrence—the whole south will know his fame!
40 ‘That light, too,* is from Persian Ormuz
From the fires and the gleaming arms
Of Albuquerque as he rebukes them
For scorning his light, honourable yoke.
There they will see their hissing arrows*
Turn miraculously in the air
Against the archers—so God ever fights
For His Church and for those who spread its rites.
41 ‘Not all that land’s mountains of salt
Can preserve from corruption the corpses
Littering the beaches, choking the seas
Of Gerum,* Muscat, and Al Quraiyat,
Till, by the strength of his arm, they learn
To bow the neck as he compels
That grim realm to yield, without dispute,
Pearls from Bahrain as their annual tribute.
42 ‘What glorious palms I see, plaited
By Victory to crown his forehead
When, without fear or indecision,
He seizes the famous island of Goa.
Then, yielding to hard circumstance,
He abandons it, and waits the occasion
To return and hold it, for so strength and skill
Can bend both Mars and fortune to their will.
43 ‘Watch him as he renews the attack, despite
Ramparts, fire, lances, and cannon,
Breaking with his sword the packed, bristling
Squadrons of Hindus and Muslims;
His noble warriors will match in fury
Famished lions or raging bulls
On that morning sacred to St Catherine,*
Born in Egypt and now Goa’s patron.
44 ‘Nor will you evade him, for all your
Vast treasures and your location
There in Dawn’s very emporium,
Renowned, opulent Malacca!
For all your arrows tipped with poison,
The curved daggers you bear as arms,
Amorous Malays and valiant Javanese
All will be subject to the Portuguese.’
45 This siren would have sung more stanzas
In praise of illustrious Albuquerque,
But recalled that act which damned him
Even as
his fame circled the earth.
The great captain, fated to earn
Glory for his deeds, should have been
A comrade to his fellows in distress,
Not a judge, absolute and merciless.
46 Yet at a time of hunger and hardships,
Sickness, arrows, and constant bombardment,
When season and place dealt harshly
With men rigid in their discipline,
It seems the brutal, savage act*
Of an arrogant and inhuman heart
To execute a comrade who had known
What love and human weakness must condone.
47 This was not the crime of incest
Nor the violent abuse of a virgin,
Still less of hidden adultery
For this was a slave, anyone’s woman.
Whether from jealousy, or shame
Or too habituated to cruelty,
He gave unremitting rein to his fury,
And left an ugly stain on his memory.
48 Alexander, seeing Apelles* enamoured
Of Campaspe, released her willingly
Though he was not one of his veterans
Not sharing the rigours of a siege.
Cyrus knew how Araspas smouldered
Like hot charcoal for Panthea
Whom he held captive, though he had promised
His love for her would never be dishonest;
49 The great Persian, seeing him conquered
By love, which no defence keeps out,
Readily pardoned him, and was served
In a weighty matter in recompense.
Through kidnap and rape, Judith
Became wife of the iron Baldwin.
But Charles her father raised him to be great,
And be the founder of the Flemish state.
50 But resuming her song, the nymph
Sang now of Soares de Albergaria,*
Whose standards will strike terror
Along the whole coast of the Red Sea:
‘Medina’s abomination will fear him,
And Mecca and Jiddah, to the farthest shores
Of Abyssinia, while Berbera will await
The market town of Zeila’s dreadful fate;
51 ‘Even the noble isle of Taprobana,
As famous under its ancient name
As today when its fragrant groves
Of hot cinnamon make it supreme,
She, too, will be taxed by the flag
Of Portugal, hoisted mighty and proud
In Colombo, high on the great tower
Where all the people recognize its power.
52 ‘Then Lopes de Sequeira,* parting
The Red Sea, will open a passage
To you, Abyssinia, mighty empire,
Home of Candace and the Queen of Sheba;
He will see Massawa with its cisterns
And the port of Arkiko close by,
Discovering to the world further marvels
As remote islands glimpse his caravels.
53 ‘After will come Duarte de Meneses,*
Showing much of his metal in Africa;
The Lusiads (Oxford World's Classics) Page 24
