Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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And now, leaving Sierra Leone, our good ship makes for the Cape of Good Hope, passing, mostly far out at sea, down that coast along which the Portuguese mariners crept so cautiously yet so surely till Diaz and Da Gama reached South Africa, while the latter showed them the way to the fabled Cathaia, the Orient—India, China, and the Spice Islands.

In the year 1486 “The Cape” of capes par excellence, which rarely nowadays bears its full title, was discovered by Bartholomew de Diaz, a commander in the service of John II. of Portugal. He did not proceed to the eastward of it, and it was reserved for the great Vasco da Gama—afterwards the first Viceroy of India—an incident in whose career forms, by-the-by, the plot of L’Africaine, Meyerbeer’s grand opera, to double it. It was called at first Cabo Tormentoso—“the Cape of Storms”—but by royal desire was changed to that of “Buon Esperanza”—“Good Hope”—the title it still bears. Cape Colony was acquired by Great Britain in 1620, although for a long time it was practically in the hands of the Dutch, a colony having been planted by their East India Company. The Dutch held it in this way till 1795, when the territory was once more taken by our country. It was returned to the Dutch at the Peace of Amiens, only to be snatched from them again in 1806, and finally confirmed to Britain at the general peace of 1815.