Page:History of India Vol 6.djvu/91

 PORTUGUESE EXPEDITIONS TO AFRICA 61 and to have perished there. The Portuguese expedition to the Canaries in 1341 has been told by Boccaccio from the letters of Florentine merchants at Seville. But these voyages yielded little or no result. It was re- served for Prince Henry deliberately to rediscover what had formerly been found, and to make discovery go hand in hand with commerce and colonization. The same remark applies to the African coast. Beginning with the discovery, or rediscovery, of Porto Santo and Madeira in 1418 - 1420, the prince steadily pushed his expeditions southward until in 1434 - 1435 his captains rounded Cape Bojador in latitude 26, and opened up the Sea of Darkness beyond it to Christian ken. After that achievement further progress was only a question of time. Certain dates may however be noted. Between 1441 and 1444 his squadrons explored the African coast to Cape Blanco and Arguin Bay; in 1447 they reached the Rio Grande within twelve de- grees of the equator where " the north star appeared to them very low." By 1455-1456 they had fairly established intercourse with the natives along the shores of Senegambia. Before 1460 his captains had laid open the Cape Verde Islands to the Portuguese, and in that year Prince Henry died. To understand the part played by India in the later history of Portugal, and the patriotic sentiment with which the Portuguese still cling to their Indian posses- sions, we must realize the efforts which the discovery cost the nation and the slow steps by which it was achieved. The forty-two years of Prince Henry's ex-