The Constant Prince

Suddenly the door was flung open, and Enrique, dusty and travel-stained, and with a face pale as death, came in. Fernando sprang up with a cry of joy, but his brother’s look silenced him. Enrique took him into his arms and sat down on the bench.

“I have come to fetch you, Fernando,” he said, huskily. “Be a brave boy; do not cry. You and Joao must come to mother, for she is ill at Saccavem, and – and – I must take you to her.”

Fernando was more frightened by his brother’s look of anguish than by his words, which were too new and strange to be more than half comprehended, and there was little time for the indulgence of grief. Enrique hurried their preparations, and soon the two boys were riding beside him, with but a few followers, hardly realising, in the haste of their journey, what awaited them at the end of it.

For the good Queen Philippa was dying, and the children must lose her motherly care – her encouragement of all their efforts after goodness and learning. High aims and kindly ways she had alike set before them; by her own example she had taught them the severest self-denial in the midst of the state necessary for the support of their rank: and the old chronicles tell – us that her five sons owed to her tender training much of the deep religious feeling, the loyalty to their father and to each other, the strong mutual affection and the remarkable virtue, that afterwards distinguished them. “She constantly talked with them of their duties towards their father and to the state,” and, spite of the stiff and ceremonious manners of the times, they loved her tenderly, and showed their love; and for her dear sake, her English habits, opinions, and language became dear to her husband and children, and largely influenced the development of her adopted country.

She lay on her death-bed in the palace of Saccavem. Her ladies stood weeping round, her confessor was by her side, the low chanting of the priests who had been praying for her departing soul had ceased for the time, and before receiving the last Sacraments of the Church she had desired to take leave of all her children.

Joao and Fernando, as they entered awe-struck into the dim chamber, were clasped and held back by their sobbing sister, who knelt at some distance from the high daïs on which the Queen’s bed was placed. She lay raised high on her pillows, and on the silken coverlet beside her were three swords, their jewelled scabbards catching here and there the light of the lamp.

The King sat near her, his head resting on his hand, his elder sons standing behind his chair, and at the further end of the long room several people were kneeling, sadly watching the dying Queen – her English squires, and other members of her household, to whom she had been the most faithful of friends. All was silent, save for the sounds of weeping that could not be repressed.

“My sons, come hither,” suddenly said the Queen; and the five brothers came slowly forward and stood beside her, Fernando following the rest in a sort of trance of awe and bewilderment.

“My sons!” said Philippa, in a clear and audible voice, “you all know well that my blessing goes with you in your undertaking.”

“Alas, dear wife?” said the King, weeping, “it will be long before your sons or I have heart for any such enterprise.”

“Not so,” said the Queen, heartily; “you will sail, I doubt not, on Saint James’s Day, and the fair wind I feel in my face from the casement will fill your sails and blow you to victory.”

The King could not answer; but he felt as if Saint James’s Day might come and go before he could take the field, in his great grief.

“My sons!” again said Philippa, “it has pleased me well that you have so earnestly desired to earn your spurs by real service, and especially against the enemies of Holy Church; for pretences and empty forms are unworthy of princes. Therefore, I have caused to be made these swords, which ye will draw, I trust, in many a good fight in a good cause, and never against your sovereign or each other. Duarte, the time will come when you must use this sword in defence of your subjects; see that you rule them with justice, and make their happiness your highest good. And, my son, be kind to your brothers, to Isabel, and to Fernando; he is weakly and young – ”

“Always, dear mother, so help me God and the Holy Saints,” said Duarte, kneeling and kissing her hand.

“Pedro, you are brave and strong; let it be ever your part to do a knight’s duty, in defending the weak and helpless, – fight for the oppressed. And Enrique, our soldiers love you, as my good father and uncle were loved; look ever to their welfare, nor ever regard them as churls and their deaths of no account.”

“Oh, mother, mother, give us swords too!” cried Joao, pressing forward as his brothers faintly promised all that was asked of them.

“Alas! my little boys,” said the mother, for the first time faltering, “I have no swords for you. I had thought to keep you with me longer. Alas! what will become of you! Love God, and serve Him. What better can I say?”

Then gentle Duarte drew first Joao and then Fernando up to the bed-side for their mother’s kiss. Joao sobbed aloud; but Fernando remembered how his mother had blamed him for his tears, and shed none; while in his childish heart was the thought that he too would one day be worthy of a good knight’s sword.

Then the Queen commended her daughter to the King’s care, and bid him choose a good husband for her, that her lot might be happy, as her mother’s had been before her; and then she grew worse, and her speech failed her; and Joao and Fernando were sent away into another room.

The fair wind of which the Queen had spoken blew into their faces as the two boys, so soon to be motherless, crouched up in the window and looked out at the sunset, feeling less wretched so than in the dark. It was not long before they heard a movement, and sounds of weeping and lamenting; but no one came near them, and they were afraid to stir.

“Let us say our prayers,” suggested Fernando: and they knelt down in the fading light; but it seemed an endless time before Enrique came in to them.

“Have you been here alone?” he said. “Ah, there is no one now to care for us. Our mother is dead.”

Enrique’s voice was stifled with grief; but Joao flung himself up against him, Fernando laid his head on his shoulder; both feeling their worst misery softened by the mere presence of their kind, strong brother.

Chapter Four

Perils and Dangers

“He sails in dreams

Between the setting stars and finds new day.”

The Queen’s dying words were fulfilled. The fair wind she had promised sprang up in time, and on Saint James’s Day, 1414, such a fleet as had never been known in Portugal before set sail from the Bay of Lagos. The Portuguese ministers had wished to delay the expedition till the days of public mourning were over, but Dom Joao and his sons knew better what Philippa would have wished them to do, and did not wait an hour after their preparations were complete. Fifty-nine galleys, thirty-three tall ships of war, and 120 transports carried 50,000 sailors and seamen on board; while several English ships had volunteered to join in an expedition that promised so much glory, and was in so good a cause. For the Pope had granted them a bull of Crusade, making the war a holy one, and the blessing of the Church had been invoked on their arms by a series of solemn services, immediately following on the ceremonies of the Queen’s funeral; and no doubt the grief which they were enduring with all its chastening influences, deprived the young Infantes of none of their crusading spirit; but caused them rather to strive more earnestly to be worthy in their inmost souls of that knighthood which they hoped to win at the sword’s point. All had done their utmost to further the preparation; but Enrique had shown so much skill in the arrangements as to win for himself a foremost place in making them. After all, the younger brothers were not left behind. Dona Isabel had been left in the charge of the abbess of a great Lisbon convent; and it was at first proposed to leave the boys at Lisbon with their tutors. But Enrique and Duarte had pleaded for them, the latter urging that Joao was really old enough for the duties of a page, and strong enough not to suffer from hardship, and Enrique promising to take care of Fernando. He might stay on board ship when they neared the enemy’s quarters, and the change would rouse him from his grief. A little rough living would be much less hurtful to him than the misery of solitude and separation.

The sun was setting clear and bright over a sea of purple blue. A light wind stirred the gay banners and devices which floated from the mastheads, an unceasing source of admiration to the Portuguese sailors, for they had been introduced in imitation of the more northern nations, and were hitherto unknown in the Peninsula. The invention and embroidery of these banners had been for a long time a favourite employment of Queen Philippa’s court. Dom Enrique’s ship was one of the largest, and all on board was well ordered, and ready for action. “Talent de bien faire” was inscribed on his crimson flag, and “The desire to do well,” as the old French is said to signify, inspired him in small things as well as great.

The evening hour was a time of leisure, and on the deck of the vessel a group of young gentlemen were lounging about telling stories, prophesying success, and indulging in speculations as to what Ceuta would be like when they got there, while Enrique, at a little distance in his deep mourning dress, was sitting on a bench, his chin resting on his hand, and his great eyes gazing out towards the horizon, as if longing to see to the very world’s end. Fernando, who was more sociably inclined, was listening with great interest to a description of the interior of a Moorish city, given by a lively young Englishman, named Northberry, who belonged to Dom Enrique’s household, and who insisted forcibly that the Moors were in the habit of feasting on their Christian prisoners, arrayed in silks and cloth of gold, in palaces ornamented with untold splendour. Other poor slaves were forced to serve, sometimes to share the horrible banquet, and were driven to it with blows and curses.

Poor Fernando grew pale with horror, and Dom José de Alemquer, a knight of some renown, and brother to the Portuguese Prime Minister, remarked grimly —

“And with whom, Señor, have you conversed who has partaken of this extraordinary feast?”

“’Tis commonly believed in England, I understand, sir,” said Northberry. “What matter, since we are about to punish the miscreants?”

“When you are served up, may I be there to see!” muttered Dom José. “We shall find our work out out for us; it were better to prepare for it in a pious spirit.”

“Prepare! we shall prepare,” shouted another young man, enthusiastically. “We are ready to wade through rivers of blood, and tear down the accursed Crescent if we leave not one infidel found alive in Ceuta.”

“If we fall ourselves, it is a sure path to heaven,” said another.

“That depends, so said the Bishop, on whether we have a true crusading spirit,” remarked a third.

“By Saint George!” said Northberry, “I’ll strike a good blow, crusade or no crusade; and God defend the right!”

“We are sure of success in such a cause!” cried the first speaker.

“But the crusaders were sometimes defeated,” said Fernando.

“Ah, my lord, doubtless they had not the true spirit,” said Northberry, with something of earnestness, carried off by the apparent sneer.

Fernando moved away towards his brother, and, pulling his sleeve to attract his attention, repeated some of the foregoing conversation.

“Did Enrique think it possible that they might be defeated?”

“Surely,” said Enrique, “it is possible, if it were God’s will, but,” he added, colouring with enthusiasm, “I think, we are so well prepared, it is not likely.”

“But could it be God’s will that the infidels should triumph?”

“Why, yes,” said Enrique; “you do not think what you say. It is His will that we should offer ourselves to his service; but it is not always His will to give us the victory. Else there would have been no martyrdoms. But yet,” he continued, with the grave ardour peculiar to him, “there is a blessing on zeal and self-devotion. I, for one, would risk the result!”

Fernando looked satisfied, and then demanded if Enrique thought that the Moors were really man-eaters.

No; Enrique did not think so. They were very cruel and treacherous; kept no faith with Christians; but they were not, so far as he understood, savages. In fact, he hardly thought that they would treat prisoners of distinction otherwise than well.

“What else?” he added, smiling, as Fernando still looked thoughtful.

“It would be better to convert them than to kill them,” said the boy, earnestly.

“That is what I hope for,” returned Enrique. “Their crimes have deserved a just punishment; but Ceuta once in our hands, we can there show them what Christian life and Christian worship really is; and from thence I hope to send out missionaries to the lands beyond, where all is darkness. The good Franciscans will be willing to go, and who knows into what strange worlds they may penetrate?”

“I don’t think,” said Fernando, “that your gentlemen here think of converting them.”

“Perhaps not. It is the part of princes to show themselves of a more enlightened spirit than other men. We must take heed that no needless cruelty stain our arms, and especially that in our own lives we show what it is to be Christians.”

“Even a prisoner might do that, if he were very patient,” said Fernando.

“Yes, like the holy martyrs. See, Fernando, I think there is no object worth living for, but that of winning men to the service of our Lord by conquest, by preaching, by the discovery of distant lands. I long to make myself worthy of it!”

Fernando’s young heart thrilled within him, and he longed ardently for the day when he too should be old and strong enough to fight for the holy Cross. For he did not quite follow all that Enrique said, and the storming of Ceuta was, as was natural, much the distinctest image in his mind.

The sun sank below the horizon, the purple headland of Turo came into view, one by one the stars came out in the deep clear sky; while at the prow of each vessel was hung a great lantern, so that in the gathering darkness the fleet seemed almost as if composed of ships of fire. Enrique threw himself back on the bench, and lay looking up at the sky. The study of the heavens was familiar to him, and the movements of the stars, both as a means of guiding mariners and as in themselves wonderful, were a favourite source of contemplation both to himself and to his elder brothers. They were indeed among the first to find the true science more interesting than the false one, and in their study of astronomy deliberately to lay astrology on one side. He was pointing out to Fernando the different constellations that were visible, when suddenly, as they gazed upward, the dark still heaven flashed into lurid light, and the peaceful silence was broken by a loud shout of alarm. The great lantern of their own ship had caught fire.

“Back! back! Stand still,” shouted Enrique, springing to his feet, and, in a moment, he rushed forward, climbed on to the high prow of the ship, and clinging on with one hand, with the other he detached the burning lantern, and flung it into the sea. Another moment and the ship must have been on fire: as it was, the wind caught a piece of flaming framework and wafted it on to the deck at Fernando’s feet. He caught it up – it was too large to trample out, or he thought so – he could not push through the crowd that had rushed to the sides of the vessel, and he held out the burning mass at arm’s length, unflinchingly, till Northberry, turning, snatched it out of his hand, and succeeded in throwing it into the water. At the same moment Enrique sprang down upon the deck, giving orders, and, allaying the excitement, desiring torches to be lit, and calling on all to give thanks to God for the saving of their lives.

Morning and evening a solemn service of prayer and praise arose from the whole fleet, and now on board the ship of Good Hope, as Dom Enrique had named his vessel, the sense of recent danger quickened every heart to thanksgiving.

Messages came from the King and from the other Infantes, to know what had caused the sudden extinction of Dom Enrique’s lantern, and in the answering of these no one thought of Fernando till Enrique missed him, and, hastily looking for him, found him on the bench where they had been sitting, half fainting with the pain of his burnt fingers.

“I did not think of it at first,” he said; “and then if I am a soldier I must bear pain.”

Enrique could not understand how he had been hurt; and when he heard the story, declared that Fernando’s courage had saved the ship, and then turned on Northberry with one of his rare outbursts of anger. Could he not see that Dom Fernando was burnt when he took the flaming wood from him!

Enrique was habitually gentle; but there was an intensity in his displeasure when it was once roused, which was not easily forgotten.

“I hid my hand behind me; it did not hurt me much,” said Fernando, who was reviving. “Señor Northberry could not see.”

“Dom Fernando is as true a soldier as yourself, my lord,” said Northberry.

“I know it,” returned Enrique; but he said no more, only anxiously watching while one of his chaplains, Father José, who, like most priests, was something of a surgeon, bound up the injured hand, saying that it was after all but a trifle.

He would hardly, for the rest of the voyage, let Fernando out of his sight; though the boy, exceedingly anxious to prove that he was able to bear such trifling casualties of war, resolutely concealed all the ill-effects which the adventure caused to his delicate constitution.

Chapter Five

The Siege of Ceuta

“Upon them with the lance!”

The Christian host approached the pillars of Hercules amid violent storm and tempest. Separated from each other, and scattered far and wide in the darkness of the night, there were hours when they feared that all their preparations had been in vain, when they dreaded the morning light that would reveal to them the gaps in their numbers. But the winds sank, and the sun rose, and the dispersed vessels drew together again, after but little damage, and the King prepared to superintend the landing of the troops. He did not then know what would have greatly encouraged him, that Zala-ben-Zala, the Governor of Ceuta, trusting too much to the effects of the tempest, had allowed the 5,000 allies whom he had collected to return home, thinking the danger over.

Joao and Fernando were ordered to remain and watch the assault from a vessel, moored at a safe distance from the shore, behind the rest of the fleet; in which were also safely stored all the Church vessels and furniture, which it was hoped might be used in the conquered city, but which must not in the event of a defeat, be allowed to fall into the hands of the Infidels. Here, too, many of the priests and chaplains, after saying mass in the different vessels, retired to watch the event, and here, all day long, the voice of prayer went up for the success of the Christian arms.

The two little boys were taken, before daybreak, on board their father’s ship that he might bid them farewell, and here they saw all their three brothers ready armed for the attack, full of joy at the thought that the long-wished-for moment had at last come when they were to prove themselves worthy of knighthood. All looked grave, collected, and resolute, and the boys caught the tone of their elders, and bore themselves as like soldiers as they could.

“If we were only going too!” whispered Joao, as they went down again into their boat.

“We will one day,” returned Fernando; but as he glanced up at the ship, he saw Enrique looking down at him with the light of the dawn on his shining helmet and clear, solemn eyes. Fernando thought that Enrique would look like that in heaven, and for the first time it occurred to him how likely it was that his brothers would be killed in the attack, and he felt that Ceuta might be dearly won. That was a strange day on board the young princes’ ship. They heard, and could dimly see, the attack on the town of Ceuta, led by the Infantes Duarte and Enrique, and directed by their father from a small boat near the shore. They heard the shouting, the noise of the cannon, the rush, and the hurly-burly, behind the constant chanting kept up all day by the waiting priests, who bade the young princes pray for their father, since they could not otherwise aid him. The sea was now perfectly calm, the ships, lately so busy, almost deserted, save this one, where high on the deck an altar had been raised, and the solemn chant went up through all the conflict of hope and fear.

At last they became aware that the Infantes had entered the town, at least there was no retreat. The long, hot afternoon wore on, when, suddenly from every soldier in reserve, from every sailor in charge of the fleet, there rose a mighty shout; for, on the walls of Ceuta, there appeared the banner of the Cross. The town was taken. Over the fortress above the Crescent still drooped as if in despair.

Joao shouted and danced, and threw himself about in an ecstasy of triumph. Fernando felt half stifled; he could not speak. Presently a boat put off from the shore, and was rowed rapidly towards their vessel.

“What news; what news?” shouted Joao, pressing before captain and chaplains, and nearly throwing himself overboard in his eagerness.

“Good news, my lord,” said the young squire, as he came up the side of the ship. “The town is taken, the fortress is yielding to the attack. The King, your father, bids me summon you and my lord Dom Fernando to his presence, as he is now in a place of safety, and would that you should see how towns are won.”

“And the Infantes?” said Fernando as he prepared eagerly to obey the summons.

“They have shown courage worthy of their name, in particular my lord Dom Enrique, to whom, in great part, this happy result is owing.”

The young princes were taken by a strong guard through the half-conquered city, for on the outskirts the battle still continued, or rather the Portuguese soldiers were still engaged in completing their conquest. The wonderful architecture, with its splendid colouring of red, blue, and gold all blazing in the hot light of an August sun against a sapphire sky, astounded the Portuguese princes, in whose native country the Moors had left no trace. All along the streets as they passed lay the bodies of the slain, Christian and Infidel side by side, while here and there frightful groans were uttered. Most of the inhabitants had fled or hidden themselves; but by chance a face scowled at the new-comers from the windows, and once they passed a group of dark-skinned, strangely-attired children, who were uttering in their unknown language griefs which needed no interpretation.

“We will make them Christians,” thought Fernando, as he shrank a little from the terrible sights around him, through all the thrill of triumph.

They were taken to a mosque in the middle of the town, where their father, in full armour, was seated, receiving reports and giving orders to his different captains. Duarte was standing behind his father’s chair; he looked grave and troubled. The King made a sign to the boys to wait while he listened to Dom Pedro, who was speaking to him.

“And so, sire, we fear my brother must have been surrounded, and his retreat cut off. Duarte and I have endeavoured to show ourselves worthy to be your sons, but Enrique – ”

Pedro paused, and Duarte added with a faltering voice, “It was he who forced a way into the town and beat back the enemy. If we have lost him, would the victory were a defeat?”

The King’s face was pale as when he had stood by the death-bed of his beloved wife, but he answered firmly, “My sons, this is the fortune of war. If my son Dom Enrique has fallen, he has fallen as becomes a Christian prince. Weep not for him, but see that we make sure of that which we have gained, and to-morrow shall the traces of the accursed worship be removed from this mosque. And in a Christian temple will I give you the knighthood you have so nobly won. And for my son Enrique there is a martyr’s crown.”