The Last Crusade: The Epic Voyages of Vasco Da Gama (31 page)

Less troublesome than fainting in a timely manner was to set sail earlier, even if that meant waiting out the torrential summer rains that shut down the ports of southwest India. By sheer luck—or, the Portuguese would later claim, with divine assistance—Vasco da Gama had left Africa at an opportune moment.

For twenty-three days the crews saw nothing but cerulean blue water passing at a regular clip, and on May 18 the lookouts sighted land.

Vasco da Gama stood on his poop deck and gazed at India.

The pilot had guided the ships straight to Mount Eli, a prominent, massy hill traditionally used as a marker by Indian Ocean navigators. A decade earlier Pêro da Covilhã had arrived in exactly the same spot, and like the resourceful spy, Gama was headed for the spice emporium of Calicut.

At night the fleet put out to sea again, steering south-southwest to skirt the coast. The next day they headed back to land, but a heavy thunderstorm made it impossible to see where they were. The day after, a lofty mountain range emerged from its inky wrapping, and the pilot announced that the Portuguese were just five leagues from the object of their quest.

Gama paid him his reward on the spot and summoned the company to prayers, “saying the
salve
, and giving hearty thanks to God, who had safely conducted them to the long wished-for place.” The prayers soon gave way to celebrations. If there was a time to break out the rum, this was it.

That evening, just before sunset, the little fleet anchored a league and a half offshore, well clear of some treacherous-looking rocks. The crews lined the bulwarks and climbed the rigging to take a good look. In front, glowing in the sun’s last rays, was a half-mile-long crescent of fine golden sand backed by coconut palms and fir trees. The bay was protected at each end by a rocky promontory, and an old temple perched on a crag to the north. It was a paradise beach, and after nearly a year at sea it looked every bit the Promised Land conjured up in so many travelers’ tales.

Soon four boats approached and the sailors, nut brown and naked except for small cloths around their waists, hailed the strangers and asked where they were from. Some were fishermen, and they climbed on board to proffer their catch. Gama told his men to buy everything they were offered at the price they were asked, and the fishermen doubtfully bit the silver coins to see if they were real. The captain-major was rewarded with the information that the fleet was anchored near a town called Kappad, which the pilot had mistaken for Calicut.

The next day the Indians returned, and Gama sent the degredado who spoke Arabic with them to Calicut.

While the convict was being introduced to two astonished merchants from Tunis, no doubt on the grounds that they came from far to the west as well, the fleet moved in front of the city itself. Gama took in the scene. A broad sweep of beach was backed by tall coconut palms bent inland like reeds by the monsoon winds. Behind, backed by a range of tall hills, Calicut sprawled for miles amid lush palm groves.

The emissary soon returned, and with him came one of the merchants. The explorers soon took to calling him Monçaide, a Portuguese corruption of his Arabic name.

Monçaide was still in shock at the appearance of Europeans in India—and far from the most likely Europeans at that.

“Why,” he and his colleague had asked their unexpected caller, “does the King of Castile, the King of France, or the Signoria of Venice not send men here?”

“The king of Portugal,” he had dutifully replied, “would not allow them.”

“He does the right thing,” the two men had replied with wonder.

The merchants had taken the convict to their lodgings for a snack of bread and honey, and Monçaide had set out to see the ships with his own eyes.

“A lucky venture,” he exclaimed in Spanish as soon as he stepped on board, “a lucky venture! Plenty of rubies, plenty of emeralds! You owe great thanks to God, for having brought you to a country holding such riches!”

The entire crew stood gape-mouthed.

“We were greatly astonished to hear this talk,” recorded the Chronicler, “for we never expected to hear our language spoken so far away from Portugal.” Several of the sailors wept for joy. “They all then joined in humble and hearty thanks to the Almighty, by whose favor and assistance alone this great happiness and good fortune had been accorded to them.”

Gama embraced the man from Tunis and made him sit down beside him. Rather hopefully, he asked if he was a Christian.

The answer momentarily took the shine off things. Monçaide frankly explained that he was from the Barbary Coast and had come to Calicut via Cairo and the Red Sea. He had met Portuguese merchants and sailors, he explained, in his former home, and he had always liked them. He would do anything he could to help.

The captain-major, who was too invigorated to be too discouraged, thanked him and promised to reward him handsomely. He was very happy to meet him, he added; God must have sent him to advance the great mission.

The conversation passed on to Calicut and its ruler, the Samutiri, whom the Portuguese soon started calling the Zamorin. He was a good and honorable man, said the Tunisian, and he would gladly receive an ambassador from a foreign king, especially if he had valuable merchandise for sale. The Zamorin was very rich, he added, and all his revenue came from the customs he levied on trade.

M
ONÇAIDE WAS NOT
exaggerating. Calicut was the busiest port in India, and for more than two centuries it had been the keystone of the international spice trade. A great bazaar stretched inland for a mile, its open-fronted shops busy late into the night and heaped, as the Portuguese soon discovered, with “all the spices, drugs, nutmegs, and other things that can be desired, all kinds of precious stones, pearls and seed-pearls, musk, sanders, aguila, fine dishes of earthen ware, lacker, gilded coffers, and all the fine things of China, gold, amber, wax, ivory, fine and coarse cotton goods, both white and dyed of many colors, much raw and twisted silk, stuffs of silk and gold, cloth of gold, cloth of tissue, grain, scarlets, silk carpets, copper, quicksilver, vermilion, alum, coral, rose-water, and all kinds of conserves.” Pepper, ginger, and cinnamon were grown in the hinterland and were sold in vast quantities; the other spices and exotic goods were brought in convoys from points to the southeast. Platoons of porters plodded up and down the streets between
overflowing warehouses, bent double under the weight of the sacks on their backs, stopping every so often to rest their loads on long, hooked staffs.

At this time of year the harbor was virtually empty, but soon it would fill up with the fleets from Aden, Hormuz, and Jeddah that carried the produce of India to Arabia and Iran, Egypt and Europe. The Chinese, too, had been regular visitors until the Central Kingdom had retreated into splendid isolation. The visiting merchants were not attracted by Calicut’s port facilities—the Portuguese had already discovered that the stony seafloor gave little purchase to their anchors, there was no protection against the monsoon winds, and closer to land, the water was too shallow for all but the smallest boats—but by its carefully cultivated reputation for probity. The Iranian ambassador Abd al-Razzaq, when he finally made it to India, reported that merchants from far-flung ports were so confident in the security and justice of Calicut that they sent their valuable cargoes for sale without even bothering to keep an account: “The officers of the custom-house,” he explained, “take upon themselves the charge of looking after the merchandise, over which they keep watch day and night. When a sale is effected, they levy a duty on the goods of one-fortieth part; if they are not sold, they make no charge on them whatsoever.”

Locals told the story of a rich Arab merchant who was passing by when his ship began to sink under the weight of the gold he had brought from Mecca. He moored in the harbor, built a granite cellar in the Zamorin’s basement, and filled it with his treasure. When he returned to the city, he broke open the cellar and found everything intact. He offered half to the ruler, who declined any reward. From then on the merchant refused to trade anywhere else, and the bazaar was born. Another legend held that an Arab merchant arrived one day with a challenge in the form of a pickle box, which he entrusted to the ruler’s safekeeping. Every other king whom he had tested in the same way had opened the box and had stolen the gold he found inside, but the Zamorin came after him. “You
mistook one thing for another,” he pointed out. “This is not pickles but gold.” That merchant, too, reputedly settled in Calicut.

Gama sent Fernão Martins and another messenger to the virtuous Zamorin, with the helpful Monçaide as their guide. Meanwhile, the Portuguese took the opportunity to find out more about his people.

Their first discovery seemed to confirm everything they had dreamed of for decades.

“The city of Calicut is inhabited by Christians,” recorded the Chronicler.

True, they were unorthodox Christians. “They are of a tawny complexion,” he observed. “Some of them have big beards and long hair, whilst others clip their hair short or shave the head, merely allowing a tuft to remain on the crown as a sign that they are Christians. They also wear moustaches. They pierce the ears and wear much gold in them. They go naked down to the waist, covering their lower extremities with very fine cotton stuffs. But it is only the most respectable who do this, for the others manage as best they are able.”

“The women of this country,” he ungallantly added, “as a rule, are ugly and of small stature. They wear many jewels of gold round the neck, numerous bracelets on their arms, and rings set with precious stones on their toes. All these people are well-disposed and apparently of mild temper. At first sight they seem covetous and ignorant.”

To the newcomers’ dismay there were, though, plenty of Muslims in Calicut. They were dressed in fine long coats and silk turbans embroidered with gold, they carried knives with silver hafts and sheaths, and they worshipped in elegant, pagoda-like mosques. One traveler observed that, unlike the majority of the Indians, who were “commonly very hayrie, and rough upon the breast, and on their bodies,” the Muslims of Calicut were “verie smoth both of haire and skin, which commonly they annoint with Oyle to make it shine.” They were also, he added, “verie arrogant and proud.”

Martins and his companions soon discovered that the Zamorin was staying in a palace some way down the coast. The three men set
off through vast deciduous and evergreen forests, marveling at the strange birds and fruits and watching warily for tigers, leopards, and pythons. When they reached the royal residence they announced, as Gama had instructed them, that an ambassador had arrived with letters from the great king of Portugal. If the Zamorin wished it, they added, he would come to him in person.

The Zamorin, who in the way of kings was not much inclined to betray surprise, undoubtedly had no notion of what or where Portugal was. In reply to his questions Martins explained that they were Christians from far away who had endured many dangers to reach his city. The answer seemed satisfactory, and the three men returned to Calicut with a large quantity of fine cotton and silk and a message for the ambassador. He was most welcome, the Zamorin said, and he need not trouble himself to make a long journey, because the royal party was about to set out for Calicut.

Gama was struck by the friendly tone of the message, and he was even more pleased when a pilot arrived with orders from the Zamorin to conduct the fleet to a safer anchorage. The harbor of Pantalayini, the pilot civilly explained, was four leagues north of Calicut, but it was usual for large ships to anchor there; the water was deeper, and a mudbank offered some shelter from the monsoon-whipped sea.

The Portuguese had been watching the worsening weather with alarm. In the evenings the ocean was an angry gray-green under banked storm clouds. Suddenly the wind whipped the shore, the rain splattered the land, and without warning men and women were lashed and blown along the unprotected coast. The ships had barely held their position, and the captain-major immediately gave the order to set sail—though for all the signs of favor, he still exercised caution. “We did not,” noted the Chronicler, “anchor as near the shore as the king’s pilot desired.”

The fleet had no sooner reached its new berth than a messenger arrived and announced that the Zamorin had already returned to the city. Straightaway a party of dignitaries turned up to escort the
visitors to the palace. At its head was the
wali
, or governor, of Calicut, who was also the chief of police and came attended by two hundred guards. The tall, slender soldiers were an arresting sight to the Europeans. They went barefoot and naked from the waist up; below the waist they wore a dhoti, a white cloth passed between the legs and tied at the back. Their long hair was knotted in a bunch on their heads, and they were never seen without their weapon of choice: sword and buckler, bow and arrows, or pike.

Despite the large turnout, Gama decided it was too late in the day to set off. He had another reason to delay. That night, he called a council of his principal officers to discuss whether he should break his own rule and go ashore in person.

His cautious older brother strongly objected. Though the natives were Christians, Paulo argued, there were many Muslims among them who were Vasco’s mortal enemies. They would use every means to destroy him, and however friendly the Zamorin seemed to be, he could not bring him back from the dead. Besides, the Muslims were inhabitants of the place; his brother was a complete stranger. The Zamorin might even be in league with them to kill or capture him; the voyage would then be ruined, their toil would have been in vain, and they would all be destroyed.

All the officers took Paulo’s side, but Gama had already made up his mind. It was his job to seal a treaty with the Zamorin, he insisted, and to procure the spices that would prove their discovery of the true Indies. The Zamorin might take it as an insult if someone went in his stead. He could not possibly explain to anyone else what to say and do in every situation that might arise. He was going to a Christian city, and he did not intend to be gone long. He would rather die, he vowed, than neglect his duty—or see someone else claim the credit.