FIRST EAST INDIAN EXPEDITION. 



191 



accession, Emmanuel found that a strong opposition existed to the 

 extension of Portuguese commerce and discovery. Arguments 

 were urged against it in his own councils, and had a marked 

 effect upon the public mind by heightening the danger of the 

 intended voyage. 



In our narrative of the first East Indian expedition, we shall 

 often have occasion to quote from a poem written in commemo- 

 ration of it, — the Lusiad of Camoens, a semi-religious epic and the 

 masterpiece of Portuguese literature, — Lusiade being the poetic 

 and symbolical name of Portugal. Camoens describes at the 

 outset the hostility of the nation to further maritime adventure, 

 and places in the mouth of a reverend adviser of the king the 

 following forcible appeal : 



"Oh, frantic thirst of Honor and of Fame, 

 The crowd's blind tribute, a fallacious name ; 

 What stings, what plagues, what secret scourges cursed, 

 Torment those bosoms where thy pride is nursed! 

 "What dangers threaten and what deaths destroy 

 The hapless youth whom thy vain gleams decoy ! 

 Thou dazzling meteor, vain as fleeting air, 

 What new dread horror dost thou now prepare ? 

 Oh, madness of Ambition ! thus to dare 

 Dangers so fruitless, so remote a war ! 

 That Fame's vain flattery may thy name adorn, 

 And thy proud titles on her flag be borne : 

 Thee, Lord of Persia, thee of India lord, 

 O'er Ethiopia vast, and Araby adored !" 



Never was any expedition, whether by land or water, so un- 

 popular as this of King Emmanuel. The murmurs of the 

 cabinet were re-echoed by the populace, who were wrought upon 

 to such an extent that they believed the natural consequence of 

 an invasion of the Indian seas would be the arrival in the Tagus 

 of the wroth and avenging Sultan of Egypt. But Emmanuel, 

 who, Ave are told, "regarded Diffidence as the mark of a low 

 and grovelling mind, and Hope the quality of a noble and 

 aspiring soul," discerned prospects of national advantage in the 

 scheme, and determined to pursue it to a prosperous issue. 



