Page 39 - History of Portuguese in the Gulf_Neat

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lxx INTRODUCTION.
his men under arms and posted in the places most necessary for 1 which they fired at our ship. The people of our ship seeing that
any eventuality.1
As soon as he anchored there came a launch, sent at once from
the ships, and lying at a little distance from ours, a man hailed
those in the ship, and said in Spanish, that the captain-major of
those ships sent word to the captain, asking him to go forthwith
to him in his boat, and deliver up the ship to him, that he would
deal well with him; otherwise, he would send and fetch him.
Diogo de Sousa, as soon as he heard the message, caused a falcon
to be levelled at the launch, and gave orders to hail them to come
nearer, as they did not understand it; but those in the launch
understood the intention of our people, and not wishing to take
advantage of their courtesy turned about in great haste, and gave
their captain an account of what had passed, and of what they
suspected.2
As soon as the Dutch captain saw that our ship would not
yield, he gave orders to play upon her with his guns with great
fury, and they killed two of her men, and cut through the fore­
mast, and well nigh unrigged it, and shot through one side of the
mainmast with a ball of cast-iron, of which all were made with
1 The account that follows of the combat between the Portuguese
and Dutch ships agrees so closely with that given by Dos Santos
(both being often verbally identical), that it is evident that both must
be derived from a common source. (The Ethiopia Oriental of Dos
Santos was issued in 1609; while Couto’s Dccada XII—unfinished—
was first printed only in 1645, though written in 1611, as he states
in Liv. 111, cap. v, of that Decade). Faria y Sousa, in his Asia
Portuguesa, tom. Ill, Pt. II, cap. iii, says: “On his return voyage,
Sousa fought singly with two Dutch ships at the island of Santa Elena,
until he put them to a shameful flight;” while further on, in cap. vi,
he gives a fuller account of the engagement, but erroneously post­
dates it a year.
1 Faria y Sousa {Joe. cil.) characteristically writes:—“There was
at once sent from them to our ships an arrogant message, that they
were to surrender immediately, and that the captain was to go and
yield obedience to them, if he did not wish to go to the other world in
great haste. Sousa saw that the reply that he had to give needed a
loud voice, so, keeping his own mouth shut, he caused that of a cannon
to be directed at them, that it might reply to them, because it was a
mouth with a loud voice. It spoke : and understanding it very well,
and having the advantage in points [there is here a play on the word
puntos, which means both the pips on cards and the sights of guns],
they let fly eight balls, which from sheer terror caused all the sailors
that were furling the sails on the ship to fall from the yards and
rigging. This took place very much as when ripe apples fall from
trees shaken by a strong hand. However, if they resembled caduke
apples in falling, they resembled balls in rising.” (Stevens under­
stands these last words to mean : “ they soon recovered themselves,”
and so renders them.)
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INTRODUCTION. I xxi
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destruction, which had been done in so short a time, were for the
most part so terrified, that they betook themselves to the side on 1
which lay the caravel, in order to jump into it, and seek shelter : if
there, because of its being very light. On this Diogo de Sousa
hurried up,1 and made them return once more to the ship, at ■
times uttering abusive words, at others urging them to defend
themselves like valiant Portuguese, assuring them that to deal H
with those ships theirs was enough; and that he trusted in
God to conquer them and take them along with them.2 And so
he quickly gave orders to work his guns, with which also he ; )
killed many of their men, and caused such havoc, that the • r
Hollanders went hauling on warps until they lay across the bow
of our ship, where there were only two pieces of artillery, in order 1
to play on her from there with less risk.
The master of our ship,3 who was a very sagacious man and of
great experience, put an anchor into the boat,4 and ordered it to E11
be cast into the sea on one side in such manner that it lay near i
the whip-staff;5 and fastening it to the capstan, the ship went
veering round, and lying with all her guns athwart the other ships.
Thus they went on firing for the space of twenty hours,0 with such
great fury and terror, that the rebels, not being able to endure . i
the injuries that they received from our guns, veered away their !•
cables, hoisted their sails, and took to flight well fustigated.7 \i
1
1 Dos Santos states that, at the request of Pero Gomez d’Abreu de
Lima, he informed Diogo de Sousa of the intention of some of the 1
Portuguese to escape to the caravel, the former not being on speaking
terms with the captain. ?;■
2 This differs greatly from the account given by Dos Santos, who vx
says that Diogo de Sousa, after bringing all who were in the caravel
on to his ship, made the former sheer off to some distance with a
»
cable attached. He then gave the men white biscuit and wine to t*
refresh and reanimate them.
3 Antonio Diaz, according to Dos Santos, who describes him in :£
similar laudatory terms. A
?
4 According to Dos Santos, the Dutch had put an anchor in a
launch for the purpose described above ; but the anchor here spoken !
of, he says, was cast into the sea direct from the ship, which seems
much more probable.
6 It was the cable, and not the anchor itself, that lay “on the poop
near the whip-staff,” as Dos Santos correctly says.
0 “ All night, with a beautiful moonlight, until 10 in the morning,”
says Dos Santos.
1 Davis’s account of this engagement is very terse. He says:—
“ The thirteenth we anchored at the He Saint Helena. . . . The
fifteenth, at Sun-set, there came a Caravell into the Road, who
anchored a large musket-shot to wind-ward of us. She was utterly
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