Free The Last Crusade: The Epic Voyages of Vasco Da Gama by Nigel Cliff Page A

often blew up and changed direction without warning, and the Portuguese would need to be ready to switch berths and tactics at a moment’s notice. It was a daunting prospect for a small country that had never waged war by sea.
    There was one more obstacle to overcome—the queen. Philippa was so well loved by her people, John solemnly explained to his sons, that nothing could be done without her consent. The princes were well aware of their mother’s resolute nature, and they tried a little subterfuge of their own. They unfolded their plan to her and innocently asked her to approach the king on their behalf.
    “Sire,” Philippa addressed her husband: “I am going to make a request which is not such as a mother commonly makes in respect of her children, for in general the mother asks the father that he will keep their sons from following any dangerous courses, fearing always the harm that will come to them.
    “As for me,” she continued, “I ask you to keep them from sports and pastimes and to expose them to perils and fatigues.” The princes, she explained, had come to see her that day. They had told her that the king was reluctant to take up their plan, and they had asked her to intercede.
    “For myself, Sire,” Philippa pressed, “considering the line from which they are descended, a line of very great and excellent emperors and kings and other princes, whose name and renown are broadcast all over the world, I would not by any means that they should lack opportunities of accomplishing, by their fatigues, theirvalor and their skill, the like high feats as were accomplished by their ancestors. I have therefore accepted the mission with which they have charged me, and their request gives me great joy.”
    John made a show of giving in, and the preparations went ahead. Only his immediate circle was in on the plan, and all manner of rumors started to fly: an assault on Aragonese Ibiza or Sicily, Muslim Granada, or even Castilian Seville. Eventually the full council was assembled, presented with a fait accompli, and sworn to secrecy. John’s old comrades in arms had grown long in the tooth, but men as old as ninety reportedly leapt at the chance of one last fling on the battlefield. “On with you, greybeards!” one elderly councilor cried, and everyone burst out laughing. Gratifying though the prospect of the old soldiers squeezing themselves into their suits of armor undoubtedly was, as a precaution John quietly spread the word around Europe’s knightly circles that a noble chivalric adventure was in the offing.
    On the king’s instructions a survey was made of the number and condition of the nation’s ships. The reports were not encouraging, and orders went out to fell a sizable portion of the royal forests and hire every available carpenter, caulker, and cooper. Portugal’s shipwrights were a privileged class; the nation’s ports had become a vital way station between the Mediterranean and northern Europe, and many Italian merchants and sailors had settled there, bringing with them their expertise in nautical design and navigation. Yet it had nothing remotely like Venice’s Arsenale, a state production line that cranked out huge galleys at a rate that astonished visitors. It quickly became clear that the only way to assemble a great fleet on short notice was to hire one, and John sent envoys to Spain, England, and Germany to charter as many tall ships as they could muster. To pay for them he commanded Portugal’s salt producers to sell him their stocks at below-market rates, then sold them on at a large profit, and to defray more of the expenses he ordered anyone who held stockpiles of copper and silver to hand them over. The mint glowed and rang day and night, while the currency was stealthily devalued. Tomany of the nation’s merchants, the enterprise seemed like a ruinous piece of chivalric nonsense.
    Since a large war fleet could hardly be made ready out of sight, the king’s men came up with another