Surely no truer man or more chivalrous knight ever donned helmet or drew sword. Tradition says that the Lisbon people long assembled to sing songs and witness many miracles at his grave. But his fittest and most enduring monuments are the noble buildings of Carmo and Batalha, and, above all, a free and united Portugal.
PRINCE HENRY THE NAVIGATOR.
III
PRINCE HENRY THE NAVIGATOR
(1394-1460)
Ca trabalho seria de se achar antre os vivos seu semelhante.—Gomez Eannez de Azurara, Cronica de Guiné.
Mestre insigne de toda a arte militar.—D. Francisco Manoel de Mello.
O homem a quem a Europa deve mais.—José Agostinho de Macedo, Motim Literario.
For some years before his death, Nun’ Alvarez might well rest satisfied with the prosperity which largely by his own exertions had fallen upon his country. Nor was it a careless or degenerate prosperity. The five noble sons of King João I and his English wife, Queen Philippa, daughter of “time-honoured Lancaster,” had grown to manhood, and the time was pregnant with great deeds. If Duarte was perhaps Nun’ Alvarez’ favourite among the princes, he certainly must have discerned in his younger brother his own successor in guiding the destinies of Portugal. Although possibly less chivalrous than Nun’ Alvarez, Prince Henry possessed his strong will and intensity of purpose, with a wider range of vision. A Portuguese writer represents him living in retirement at Sagres, his eyes fixed exclusively on Heaven; but Prince Henry believed that he could best serve Heaven by bringing to success the earthly affairs on which he had set his heart.
It was certainly with the keenness which marked the young Nun’ Alvarez that Henrique, then twenty-one, embarked with his father, King João I, and his brothers, Duarte and Pedro, in the expedition against Ceuta in 1415. He had his father’s promise that he should be the first to land, and in the storming of the town he was ever in the thickest of the fighting. The Moors defended the town obstinately, and a fresh danger arose when the victorious Portuguese dispersed to plunder. Henry, with a little band of seventeen followers, saved the situation against such odds that news was at first brought to the King that his son was dead. For his gallant behaviour on that day he was made Duke of Vizeu and Lord of Covilhã, while his brother Pedro became Duke of Coimbra.