By this time it had become clear, from Columbus’s second voyage, that there were more difficulties in the way of reaching the Indies by his method than had been thought; and the year after his return from his second voyage in 1496, King Emmanuel determined on once more taking up the older method.  He commissioned Vasco da Gama, a gentleman of his court, to attempt the eastward route to India with three vessels, carrying in all about sixty men.  Already by this time Columbus’s bold venture into the unknown seas had encouraged similar boldness in others, and instead of coasting down the whole extent of the western coast of Africa, Da Gama steered direct for Cape Verde Islands, and thence out into the ocean, till he reached the Bay of St. Helena, a little to the north of the Cape of Good Hope.

For a time he was baffled in his attempt to round the Cape by the strong south-easterly winds, which blow there continually during the summer season; but at last he commenced coasting along the eastern shores of Africa, and at every suitable spot he landed some of his sailors to make inquiries about Covilham and the court of Prester John.  But in every case he found the ports inhabited by fanatical Moors, who, as soon as they discovered that their visitors were Christians, attempted to destroy them, and refused to supply them with pilots for the further voyage to India.  This happened at Mozambique, at Quiloa, and at Mombasa, and it was not till he arrived at Melinda that he was enabled to obtain provisions and a pilot, Malemo Cana, an Indian of Guzerat, who was quite familiar with the voyage to Calicut.  Under his guidance Gama’s fleet went from Melinda to Calicut in twenty-three days.  Here the Zamorin, or sea-king, displayed the same antipathy to his Christian visitors.  The Mohammedan traders of the place recognised at once the dangerous rivalry which the visit of the Portuguese implied, with their monopoly of the Eastern trade, and represented Gama and his followers as merely pirates.  Vasco, however, by his firm behaviour, managed to evade the machinations of his trade rivals, and induced the Zamorin to regard favourably an alliance with the Portuguese king.  Contenting himself with this result, he embarked again, and after visiting Melinda, the only friendly spot he had found on the east coast of Africa, he returned to Lisbon in September 1499, having spent no less than two years on the voyage.  King Emmanuel received him with great favour, and appointed him Admiral of the Indies.

The significance of Vasco da Gama’s voyage was at once seen by the persons whose trade monopoly it threatened—­the Venetians, and the Sultan of Egypt.  Priuli, the Venetian chronicler, reports:  “When this news reached Venice the whole city felt it greatly, and remained stupefied, and the wisest held it as the worst news that had ever arrived”—­as indeed they might, for it prophesied the downfall of the Venetian Empire.  The Sultan of Egypt was equally moved, for the greatest source of his riches