We have thus accounted for all the members of the expedition whose names are known, with the exception of eight.
Four of these—João de Sá, Alvaro Velho, João Palha and João de Setubal—are stated to have been among the thirteen who attended Vasco da Gama to Calecut (p. 51), and of these, João de Sá was clerk in the S. Raphael, the author’s ship. He certainly might have been the author. Prof. Kopke thinks not, first, because of the author’s supposed humble position; secondly, because. João de Sá, if we may credit an anecdote recorded by Castanheda (I, p. 57),[19] had his doubts about the people of India being Christians, whilst the author unhesitatingly affirms them to be so. The only other person mentioned by Castanheda as having been connected with the expedition is Alvaro Velho, a soldier, who, according to Prof. Kopke, may “fairly be looked upon as the author of this Journal.” He admits, however, that this conclusion is acceptable only on the assumption that Castanheda knew the author: a purely gratuitous assumption, in our opinion.
Castanheda only mentions six out of the thirteen who were present at Vasco da Gama’s audience of the Zamorin. Correa mentions two others—João de Setubal and João Palha. Five remain thus to be accounted for; and, although these may have included servants and trumpeters, not likely to have troubled about keeping a journal, our author may have been among them. It will thus be seen that this process of elimination has led to no result, and that we cannot even tell whether the author’s name occurs in any single account of this expedition. Comparing his “Journal” with the contents of Sernigi’s first letter, it almost seems as if he had been the person from whom the Florentine derived the bulk of his information. In that case his name may perhaps turn up some day in the Italian archives. If our choice were limited to Alvaro Velho and João de Sá, we should feel inclined to decide in favour of the latter.
Correa mentions three other persons as having been with Vasco da Gama: namely, João Figueiro, whose diary he claims to have used, and who cannot therefore have been the author of a “Journal” the contents of which are so widely different; André Gonçalves and João d’Amoxeira. Camões adds a fourth name, that of Leonardo Ribeyra. This exhausts the muster-roll, as far as the names are known to us.
The Portuguese Editions of the “Roteiro”.[20]
The Roteiro was printed for the first time in 1838. The editors, Diogo Kopke and Dr. Antonio da Costa Paiva, both teachers at the Academia Polytechnica of Oporto, furnished it with an introduction, in which they give an account of the manuscript and discuss its authorship, add sixty-nine notes, explanatory of the text, and append King Manuel’s letters patent of January 10th, 1502 (see p. [230]). The illustrations include a map, the facsimile of a page of the MS., a portrait, and an illustrated title-page of poor design. The book was published by subscription. Three hundred and ninety-two copies were subscribed for, including two hundred and thirty-seven by residents in Oporto, among whom British wine-merchants figure prominently. Only five copies went abroad, and three of these were subscribed for by Captain Washington, R.N., the Royal Geographical Society, and the Geographical Society of Paris.
A second edition appeared at Lisbon in 1861. Its editors, A. Herculano, the famous historian, and Baron do Castello de Paiva, claim to have “got rid of those imperfections in the text, as also in the notes of the first edition,[21] which must be attributed to the inexperience of the editors, and to their eagerness to bring before the public so precious an historical document”. Their emendations, however, are not of a kind to justify this somewhat brutal reference to the work done by their predecessors. They consist, in the main, of a modernisation of the spelling, the introduction of a few “philological” notes of no particular interest, and a short preface in which Correa’s Lendas da India are spoken of in terms of eulogy. These Lendas the editors consider to be “far superior in substance (quanto á substancia) to the Decades of João de Barros, and to the exuberant but evidently honest narrative of Castanheda.” After praising Correa “for depicting in firm contours and vivid colours” the human passions brought into play by close companionship within the narrow limits of a ship, they admit that as to “facts” “he is often vague, forgetful, or ambiguous”. They conclude by saying that the author of the Roteiro and the chronicle-writers mutually complement each other, and jointly acquaint us with all the details of one of the great events in the history of modern nations.[22]
The French Translations of the “Roteiro”.
Two have been published. The first of these, by M. Ferdinand Denis, will be found in the third volume of Charton’s Voyageurs Anciens et Modernes, Paris, 1855. It is based upon the first Portuguese edition, and ends with the arrival of the two vessels at the Rio Grande. The notes by Professor Kopke are embodied in those of the translator, who has added an introduction, giving a short but excellent biography of Vasco da Gama, and a bibliography. The map of the original is retained, and there are twenty illustrations, including two portraits of Vasco da Gama, the one stated to be from Count Farrobo’s painting, as published in the Panorama, the other from a Paris MS. of Barretto de Rezende.[23]