BOOKS OF THE DAY.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 149, 30 July 1914, Page 5

BOOKS OF THE DAY.

PRINCE HENRY THE NAVIGATOR THE PORTUGUESE SCIPIO. Much has been written upon the growth f)£ the Portuguese oversea empire, tut, curiously enough, up to the present no English translation had appeared of "w hat is regarded in Portugal, and also in Prance and Spain as practically a classic work on the enterprise, gallantry, and success of the earlier Portuguese voyagers, discoverers, and founders of colonies. This is '' The Golden Age of Prince Henry the Navigator," by Senhor J. P. Olliviera Martins. The English translation (G. Bell and Sons) is by Messrs J. Johnston Abraham, and Wm. Edward Reynolds. The life of him who has been called *' The Portuguese Scipio'' was well worth writing, constituting as it does a fascinating record 'of splendid courage and a foresight as to the value of oversea enterprises which has rarely been found in Toyal princes. Prince Henry was the fourth son of King Jao, or John the First of Portugal, who, in 1387, married an English princess, Philippa of Gaunt, daughter of John of Gaunt.; The Navigator's English Mother. The gallant young Portuguese prince ©wed much of his mental and physical virility to his English mother,- Philippa, daughter of John of Gaunt. Her marriage had been almost purely political, but as time went on and she presented the King with a son, the first of seven children, five of whom were males, her royal husband held her in the deepest affection. Philippa's advent to the Court of Portugal was speedily followed by drastic reforms. For the English prin-

ces.s;_was nothing if not a stickler for And at Oporto and Cintra the morals of the Court were deplorably, , most notoriously, lax. The Portuguese historian clearly holds Philippa to have been ultra-Puritanical, but he has to acknowledge that she cleansed the Court Augean stable with thoroughness. She found, he says, the Court 41 a sink of immorality." She left it "chaste as a" nunnery.'' Over a "hundred courtiers who had contracted illicit unions had forthwith to legalise them by marriage. She constituted herself censor of morals at the Court. She watched the dalliance of lovers, kept a sharp look-out for any surreptitious love-makings amongst those whom marriage debarred from such tilings, and looked unfavourably on any match-making in which she thought the people concerned unsuitable to one another. With the almost unlimited power of the King behind her, she herself chose the brides and bridegrooms, totally disregarding as something quite negligible any secret inclinations on the part ©f the unfortunate -victims.of her marrying instincts. Thus any day some one or other might receive the following command, impossible to disregard: < < The King and I expect you to hurry your wedding. It will be held tomorrow. " < 'But to whom, youT Majesty'?'' would be the startled answer. * ( Never mind. You will know at the altar,'' would be the invariable response. One courtier, an unfortunate gentleman named Fernando Alfonso, who had been detected in a liaison with one of the Queen's maids of honour, having disobeyed her Majesty's commands to marry the girl, as a latter-day phrase runs, and persisted in his defiance, was, without trial, and almost at a day's notice, burnt at the stake by the 4 King's command. The Man and Ilis Becord. Prince Henry was the fourth son of Philippa. Her first boy died in 1390; her second, Prince Duarte (Edward), so called in honour of Edward of England, eventually succeeded his father. Prince Duarte was a great student and an author of no small ability; indeed, it is from his book, "The Loyal Coun- j selior," that Senhor Martins has drawn some of his most interesting material. The third son, Prince Peter, died the death of a hero in the great civil war which ravaged Portugal in 1449. He: had been proclaimed a disloyal traitor by the King. Prince Henry, the hero i of Senhor Martins's book, was born in 1394. It faas to Prince Henry the Navi- j gator that was primarily due that as- ■ tounding outburst of colonising energy which raised Portugal, for the time "being, into the position of the foremost nation in Europe, and likewise, it must be remembered, caused her eventual decay through inability, owing to her meagre population, to defend and maintain the enormous possession she had' acquired. He was not by any means a faultless hero. The warts were many, " and Senhor Martins has not left them out of the portrait. He could, on occasion, be guilty of ferocious cruelty, but he had many splendid qualities, and his careful education and natural taste! for study, especially of geography and history, "had given him an, intellectual; equipment much superior to that of; most of the Portuguese and Spanish—and let it be said also —English navigators and oversea adventurers who came, later. That he was a man of dominant mental power and of special capacity fot urging men on to daring deeds was proved by the way he triumphed over what was the deep-rooted objection o'f his countrymen in general to anything pertaining to adventures oversea. He led the way in Portuguese oversea discovery, the way which was followed by Bartholemew Diaz, Ascodi Gama, Magellan, and so many other great discoverers and colony founders. In 1415 Prince Henry led the Portuguese to victory at Ceuta, the African Gibraltar, and a little later, he commenced, through his sea captain, something like a systematic exploration of the west coast of Africa and the way to the Indies. The Azores were explored, and later on Portuguese com r manders, under princely direction, pushed along the Guinea coast, and discovered the Cape de Verde Islands, establishing Portuguese settlement wherever they went. As Governor of Algaroe, the southern province of Portugal, the prince established a geographical school at Sagres, near Cape il Vincent, where captains, pilots, and others were trained in arts and science specially useful the navigator. As Protector of Portuguese Studies," he founded chairs of mathematics and ->■ wedicine at Lisbon. He imported Arab and even Jewish mathematicians. Pedro Nunes, the great Portuguese .mathematician, is quoted by Senhor

Martins as having testified to the excellent work done at the school. Shipbuilders were encouraged to improve their vessels. The Portuguese caravels were said to be the best sailing ships afloat. He commanded Portuguese expeditions to Morocco, and was keen upon establishing trade routes which should lap the great negro States southwest of the Sahara. He was the accredited successor of the Templars and Grand Master of the Order of Christ. Foreign potentates, such as the King of Castile, the Pope, even the King of England, offered him the command of their armies. But to Portugal and Portuguese interests he remained devoted to the day of his death, which toolc place in 1460, the prince being then in his 76th year. The Good and Evil of His Accomplishment. The world's appreciation of Prince Kenry is* confined chiefly to his character as a man of action. Says Senhor Martins:— "His creative instincts initiated a* new form of Imperial expansion, based on the old classical ideas of conquest. A modern Alexander, he originated and inspired the historical epoch of navigation, dowering Portugal, the forerunner, with the benefit of his discoveries. In addition, he gave'a practical turn to the transcendental idea that the Church ol' Rome possessed a mystic sovereignty over the whole world, by petitioning it for the rights of ownership over the newly discovered territories he had found, and by utilising in his ventures the Bull of Crusaders which had been promulgated really to enact the religious and chivalrous ventures of more ancient times. He thus turned crusading into a profession and the Order of Christ into a company of navigators. . . . The monk found himself doing duty as a pilot; the knight became a merchant; and Portugal rapidly took the appearance of a modern Carthage. Later, in the hands of the Inquisitor, the chosen deity became a Moloch, the fire-breathing dragon that consumed his victims; and a rural, warlike, and pious nation, turned into a company of wealthy merchants, became stimulated ; to fiendish acts by the eruelty of a fanaticism which was obsessed by the delusion that it was thus carrying out the will of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate. '' j Senhor Martins does not confine hig attention to the deeds of Prince Henry, but gives a general and in places, detached survey and narrative of 'Portu-1 guese history between the years 1387 j and 1450. Prince Peter's career, a career little less eventful and extraordinary than that of his younger brother, is dealt with at length, and the internal as well as the external affairs of Portugal are described in a record which from the first to the last of the three hundred odd pages is liberaJiy studded with fascinating passages. Illustrations, from portraits and old prints, add to the interest of the volume. (Pi-ice 10/6.)