I
Leave A Son Behind Me, Blas De Albuquerque, Whom I Entreat Your
Highness To Promote In Recompence Of My Services.
The affairs of India
will answer for themselves and me."
Having arrived on the bar of Goa, which he called his Land of Promise,
he expired on the 16th of December, 1515, in the sixty-third year of his
age, retaining his senses to the last, and dying as became a good
Christian. Alfonso de Albuquerque was second son to Gonzalo de
Albuquerque lord of Villaverde, by Donna Leonora de Menezes, daughter of
Alvaro Gonzalez de Atayde, first count of Atouguia. He had been master
of the horse to King John the Second. He was of moderate stature, having
a fair and pleasing countenance, with a venerable beard reaching below
his girdle to which he wore it knotted. When angry his looks were
terrible; but when pleased his manners were merry, pleasant, and witty.
He was buried in a chapel which he built near the gate of the city of
Goa, dedicated to Our Lady of the Mountain, but, after a long
resistance from the inhabitants of Goa, his bones were transferred to
the church of Our Lady of Grace at Lisbon.
The dominion of the Portuguese in India was founded by three great men,
Duarte Pacheco, Francisco de Almeyda, and Alfonso de Albuquerque; after
whom scarcely was there a single successor who did not decline from
their great character, having either a mixture of timidity with their
valour, or of covetousness with their moderation, in which the vices
predominated.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 257 of 809
Words from 70038 to 70298
of 221361
