Camoens

kam'o-ens, Luis de (Portuguese spelling, cameos), (1524-1579), the most celebrated poet of Portugal. In a list of the world's great men the name of Luis de Camoens would stand a long way from the top. For two reasons, however, his name is remembered, and his life's story is interesting. First, he is the "chief and only boast of his country." No other Portuguese poet has been celebrated outside of his own land. Moreover, the epic poem of Camoens is the only great epic since ancient times which has a truly national subject. Camoens was born, it is supposed, at Lisbon. His parents were of gentle birth and high social standing, but of little wealth. The family seems to have removed to Coimbra when Luis was about two years of age to escape a pestilence raging in Lisbon. Of Camoens' early life little is known, except what may be inferred from his writings, where we learn that he wandered on the banks of the Mondego "careless and unfettered in the free license of boyhood." His education was received at the University of Coimbra, where he showed signs of poetic talent and where, it is believed, he first conceived the idea of writing a national epic.

On returning to Lisbon he was received at the court of John III, then king of Portugal. Here began the misfortunes of Camoens' sorrowful career, due doubtless in the first instance to jealousy. The young man was honest and fearless in expressing his opinions. He was witty, cultured, possessed of poetic genius, and of some personal comeliness. He was, moreover, a favorite with the ladies of the court. He fell in love with Dona Caterina de Alaide, a lady in waiting of the queen. Another suitor of the lady, fired with jealousy, persuaded her father to join with him, and together they procured Camoens' banishment from court in 1547. Three years later he joined the army of Africa. He proved himself a brave soldier, but in a naval engagement before Ceuta, he lost the sight of his right eye. Then he fell into careless and dissolute ways. In 1553 he was imprisoned for wounding an equerry of the king in a street fracas. Finally he was pardoned on condition that he would at once embark for India. Fortune served him no better in the East. He wrote a bitter satire on the government and on the life of the Portuguese in India, which increased the malice felt against him. He was banished from Goa, India, to the island of Macao. Here, in a sort of rocky gallery overlooking the sea, Camoens wrote his great epic poem. The place is called the Grotto of Camoens. After five years he was allowed to return to Goa. On the voyage thither the vessel was wrecked. The poet saved his life by swimming, and his poem by holding the manuscript out of the water with one hand while he swam with the other. In Goa he was thrown into prison again, on unjust charges. At length, after an absence of seventeen years filled with adventure and suffering, Camoens returned to his native country and to Lisbon. He found sad changes. His father was dead; his mother "very old and very poor"; the city's population terribly reduced by pestilence, and a young king on the throne.

At last his epic, the Lusiad, "dreamed of at Coimbra, commenced in banishment, continued at Ceuta, resumed at Goa and Macao, and perfected in a humble little room at Lisbon, was issued from the press in 1572." Its success was immense, but in equal proportion was the jealousy and malice it aroused in other poets. The young king granted the author a pension of about twenty-five dollars, but he took with him on his expedition to Africa another poet than Camoens to sing his triumphs. The expedition was utterly disastrous, the king was slain, and Portugal's independence was lost. Camoens, who had borne his own troubles with fortitude, was over-whelmed by the troubles of his country. Henceforth he "went as one dreaming," and in 1579 was taken ill of fever and died in a hospital. He was buried in the Church of Santa Ana, which was later destroyed by an earthquake. Of the inscription on a marble slab erected to his memory in the church wall, the only words remembered are, "He lived poor and neglected, and so died."

Beside his epic, Camoens was the author of many sonnets, ballads, elegiacs, and comedies. In most of them there is a strain of grief-a tragic note-born of the sufferings of a gifted man whose gifts were his own destruction. The great epic, Os Lusiadas, or The Lusiad (meaning The Portuguese), is in ten cantos. It has been translated into nearly every European language. A little over a century after its first appearance thirty-eight editions had been issued. The Lusiad is strictly a national epic. The idea that Vasco da Gama is its hero is unquestionably a mistake. The nation is its hero; love of country its inspiration. The framework is slight. The poet selects the most brilliant episode in Portuguese history-the discovery of the passage to India. With wonderful skill he weaves into his narrative of the discovery every memorable expedition, every splendid achievement, every heroic deed, which the history or tradition of Portugal can furnish. According to the custom of the day, he supplies a fabulous element by introducing the Olympian gods. Venus favors the Portuguese; Bacchus (Portugal was notable for its moderate use of wine) opposes them. Vasco da Gama, of course, leads the expedition, but his exploits, like all else, are praiseworthy only in that they add to his country's glory.

The Lusiad is one of the noblest monuments ever raised to the national glory of any people.-Botta.