330 DISCOVERY OF THE SENEGAL. 



little for the gold ; but the discovery of this pre- 

 cious metal, of which Iudia was proverbially the native 

 land, suggested the idea that by following the coast of 

 Africa the Indies might be reached by sea. Letters 

 and maps which he received from his Venetian corre- 

 spondents encouraged him in this belief, and he ob- 

 tained without delay a Bull from the Pope granting to 

 the Crown of Portugal all lands that its subjects might 

 discover as far as India inclusive, with license to trade 

 with infidels, and absolution for the souls of those that 

 perished in these semi-commercial, semi-crusading ex- 

 peditions. 



The practice of piracy was now partly given up : 

 the Portuguese, like the Phoenicians of old, traded in 

 one place and kidnapped in another. The commodities 

 which they brought home were gold dust, seal skins, 

 and negroes. Yet still they did not reach the negro 

 land, till at last a merchant of Lagos, one time an 

 equerry in the Prince's service, knowing his old master 

 had exploration at heart more than trade, determined 

 to push on, without loitering on the desert coast. He 

 was rewarded with the sight of trees growing on the 

 banks of a great river, which Prince Henry and his 

 cosmographers supposed to be the Nile. On one side 

 were the brown men of the desert with long tangled 

 hair, lean, and fierce in expression, living on milk, 

 wandering with their camels from place to place. On 

 the other side were large, stout, comely men with 

 hah like wool, skins black as soot, living in villages 

 and cultivating fields of corn. 



The Portuguese had now discovered the coast of 

 Guinea, and they were obliged to give up their preda- 

 tory practices. Instead of an open plain in which 

 knights habited in armour and men dressed in quilted 



