155 - How Count Álvaro Pérez de Castro and Gonçalo Vasques conveyed the documents of the peace treaty, and concerning the discussions that took place before it was signed

Summary

With this agreed, and the articles of the treaty written down, the count and Gonçalo Vasques departed very early at dawn, on Sunday, 10 August. When they reached the King of Castile's camp, they showed him the treaty they brought, signed in the terms you have heard, and they were well received by him. The king, without reading the treaty before he was to sign it, commanded a trumpet to sound, to gather his forces together to hear the proclamation, according to custom when peace is proclaimed. When it began to be proclaimed, the troops in the camp were so joyful that many knelt and kissed the ground, and there were even those who ate bits of earth.

That day, invitations to dine went out to Count Álvaro Pérez and Gonçalo Vasques from Don Fernando Osórez, the Master of the [Castilian] Order of Santiago, who entertained them with much honour and great pleasure, to the point that he did not wish to be seated, all the better to see them well served. He asked those squires who accompanied the count and Gonçalo Vasques what they thought about the work that had been done in relation to the peace between the two kings, whose dissension had been so great. They said that they thought it was the work of God.

‘Not just God,’ he said, ‘but of all the angels in Heaven.’

So they finished their dinner with much rejoicing. The meal ended, they rested there a while, and then left with other knights to go to where the king was, while the master remained in his tent. When the king saw them, he received them very well, and they took him to one side, asking him to be gracious enough to sign the treaty, whereupon the king said that he was pleased to do so. He called his private secretary and commanded him to read it. When he got to that place where it stated that he should deliver all his galleys with their equipage, he said that he had not granted such a thing, nor would he do it for anything in the world. He was pleased to hand back the admiral with all his people, whatever the conditions, but he would by no means give away the galleys.