Note 313 — Extracts from “The Admirable Adventures and Strange Fortunes of Master Antonie Knivet, which went with Master Thomas Candish in his Second Voyage to the South Sea, 1591,” published in Purchas His Pilgrimes, Part IV, lib. vi, c. 7. London, 1625.
Reading edition
King Affonso, whose account of this battle may be read in Paiva Manso, p. 8, does not mention the flaming swords, but there can be no doubt that they were seen, for they were introduced in the coat-of-arms subsequently granted to the King. D. Lopez (p. 82) substitutes the Virgin for the white cross seen during the battle. Cavazzi (p. 273), and others, down to Father Eucher (Le Congo, Huy, 1894, p. 36), unhesitatingly accept this miracle. The Rev. W. H. Bentley most irreverently suggests a solar halo; but such a phenomenon might account for flaming swords, but not for the Virgin and St. James.