The Lusiad and "Isle of the Cross"

RUSSELL PATRICK GOLLARD The Lusiad and “Isle of the Cross” University of Nevada, Las Vegas E vidence of the existence of a literary work by Herman Melville titled The Isle of the Cross, now lost, appears in Melville family correspondence . In his 1990 chronology of events surrounding the book, Hershel Parker presents “the Agatha story,” a project discussed by Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne, as the book’s likely content (Parker, “Isle of the Cross” 2; see also Melville 2.136–61). Here, I propose that Melville’s title may be an elided reference to the “Isle of Holy Cross” in Edward Mickle’s translation of the sixteenth-century Portuguese epic poem, Camoëns’s The Lusiad; or the Discovery of India. Melville had a lifelong fascination with Camoëns and may have found some inspiration in Book 5 of The Lusiad for the title of The Isle of the Cross, parts of which may have been salvaged in The Encantadas. Let us look to Herman Melville’s literary life in mid-1852. The popular international recognition of Typee (1846) and Omoo (1847) had been undercut by the befuddled and increasingly hostile reception of Mardi (1849), Moby-Dick (1851), and Pierre (1852). The frustration for Melville was both artistic and monetary. His discovery of an older but kindred literary spirit in Hawthorne has been preserved in correspondence; what we now know of the title for The Isle of the Cross derives primarily from Melville family letters that came to light in 1983 and from the surviving Hawthorne-Melville correspondence. The case of abandonment and bigamy that is the likely source of The Isle of the Cross was first related to Melville by an acquaintance in a meeting on Nantucket in early July 1852. Melville’s interest in the story of a sailor (Robertson) who leaves a pregnant mate (Agatha Hatch) on a remote island has been extensively documented elsewhere (Parker 2:114–15, Hayford, NN PT 482–83). In an October 25, 1852 letter, Melville urged Hawthorne to write up the story of Agatha and Robertson (Parker 2.141). Hawthorne considered the project while vacationing on the Isles of the Shoals, eight barren and rocky islands ten miles southeast of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and came up with the title The Isle of Shoals in early September 1852. (Parker, Melville 2.136–37). Presumably, the change of the setting from Nantucket to the Isles of Shoals c  2012 The Melville Society and Wiley Periodicals, Inc. L E V I A T H A N A J O U R N A L O F M E L V I L L E S T U D I E S 43 R U S S E L L P A T R I C K G O L L A R D would disguise the story’s original locale (145). Eventually, Hawthorne gave the project back to Melville, who, for a while, adopted Hawthorne’s title. In early 1853, Melville changed the title to The Isle of the Cross. (Parker, Melville 2.146–47). Melville’s reason for making the change may be related to his reading of The Lusiad. To begin with, the word “shoals” denotes a shallow sandbank or sandbar and suggests proximity to a major land mass and a consequent lack of geographical isolation. If Melville had it in mind to relocate the story to the Pacific, or more specifically, the Galapagos Islands, then “shoals” would not apply. At the same time, the word “cross” connotes Christian suffering, sacrifice, and, with respect to Agatha, patience. When we consider the “Isle of Holy Cross” in The Lusiad as a possible source for the title, the setting of Agatha’s abandonment seems all the more remote from nineteenth-century New England than the original title “The Isle of Shoals” might have had it. The only allusion to “Isle of Holy Cross” in The Lusiad occurs in Book 5 with Camoëns’s recounting of Vasco de Gama’s voyage through the southern hemisphere around Africa’s coast. Camoëns—also known as Camões, but I use the more common English spelling—writes: Now, round black Afric’s coast our navy veer...