through
the tempest which he surmounted ere he doubled the Cape of Good Hope.
Columbus, with _his_ crew, must have returned. The expedients which he
used to soothe them, would, under _his_ authority, have had no avail in
the tempest which Gama rode through. From every circumstance it is
evident that Gama had determined not to return, unless he found India.
Nothing less than such resolution to perish or attain his point could
have led him on.

[56] It afterwards appeared that the Moorish King of Mombas had been
informed of what happened at Mozambique, and intended to revenge it by
the total destruction of the fleet.

[57] Amerigo Vespucci, describing his voyage to America, says, "Having
passed the line, _e come desideroso d'essere autore che segnassi la
stella_--desirous to be the namer and discoverer of the Pole-star of the
other hemisphere, I lost my sleep many nights in contemplating the stars
of the other pole." He then laments, that as his instruments could not
discover any star of less motion then ten degrees, he had not the
satisfaction of giving a name to any one. But as he observed four stars,
in form of an almond, which had but little motion, he hoped in his next
voyage he should be able to mark them out.--All this is curious, and
affords a good comment on the temper of the man who had the art to
defraud Columbus, by giving his own name to America; of which he
challenged the discovery. Near fifty years before the voyage of Amerigo
Vespucci, the Portuguese had crossed the line; and Diaz fourteen, and
Gama nearly three years before, had doubled the Cape of Good Hope; had
discovered seven stars in the constellation of the south pole, and from
the appearance of the four most luminous, had given it the name of "The
Cross," a figure which it better resembles than that of an almond.

[58] Properly "Samudra-Rajah," King of the Sea, corrupted into
Zamorim.--_Ed._

[59] "Kotwal" signifies Superintendent of the Police.--_Ed._

[60] Faria y Sousa.

[61] It was the custom of the first discoverers to erect crosses at
various places remarkable in their voyage. Gama erected six: one,
dedicated to St. Raphael, at the river of Good Signs; one to St. George,
at Mozambique; one to St. Stephen, at Melinda; one to St. Gabriel, at
Calicut; and one to St. Mary, at the island thence named, near
Anchediva.

[62] _The Lusiad_; in the original, Os Lusiadas, The Lusiads, from the
Latin name (_Lusitania_) of Portugal, derived from