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After some contests, in which there were many arrests and a great display of animosity, the malcontents plotted to surprise Vasco Nuñez and throw him into prison.
Nicuesa was therefore obliged to regain the brigantine, and there remained with him only seventeen of his sixty companions. It was the calends of March in the year 1511 when Nicuesa set sail, intending to return to Hispaniola and there complain of the usurpation of Vasco Nuñez and the violent treatment offered the judge, Enciso.
The discoveries of Columbus and Vasco da Gama opened new fields, whereof the inheritance was destined to the nations who should achieve the dominion of the Ocean. Always important, the capacity for maritime development now became the primary condition of ultimate greatness.
In 1487, Bartholomew Diaz sailed round the southern point of Africa, which received the significant name of the 'Cape of Good Hope, and entered the Indian Ocean. Henceforth a water pathway to the Far East was possible. Following Diaz, Vasco da Gama, leaving Lisbon in 1497, sailed round the south of Africa, and, reaching the ports of Hindustan, made the maritime route to India a definite reality.
The honors of the hospitality were confided to the eldest son of Comogre, a youth of more sagacity and intelligence than his brothers; he one day presented to Vasco Nuñez and to Colmenares, whom, from their manner and appearance, he recognized as chiefs of the party, sixty slaves, and four thousand pieces of gold of different weight.
The deep opening of the Chaleur Bay, which extended on the left hand as the ships proceeded north, looked like such an opening. Hopes ran high, and Cartier named the projecting horn which marks the southern side of the mouth of the bay the Cape of Good Hope. Like Vasco da Gama, when he rounded South Africa, Cartier now thought that he had found the gateway of a new world.
After many delays, occasioned by the great distance between Portugal and Abyssinia, and some unsuccessful attempts, King John the Third, having made Don Stephen de Gama, son of the celebrated Don Vasco de Gama, viceroy of the Indies, gave him orders to enter the Red Sea in pursuit of the Turkish galleys, and to fall upon them wherever he found them, even in the Port of Suez.
The King, summoning Vasco into his presence, offered him the command of the squadron he proposed sending out to discover a way to the East Indies by sea. The cavalier at once gladly accepted the honourable charge, saying at the same time that he had an elder brother, named Paulo da Gama, whom he requested the King to appoint as Captain-Major to carry the royal standard.
Vasco da Gama, following Dias around the Cape of Good Hope, crossed the Indian Ocean and at last cast anchor in the dazzlingly rich city of Calcutta, the real India. This last did not happen, however, till 1498, six years after Columbus discovered America.
At length, the wind moderating and there being a great want of water, in consequence of the casks having broken or become leaky, Vasco da Gama stood close in for the land, to look for some harbour into which he might run to repair the ships, as well as to obtain a supply of that great necessary of life.
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