The History of the Siege of Lisbon

Rairriundo Silva laid down his biro, rubbed his tired eyes, then re-read the closing lines, his own. He was rather pleased with them. He got up, placed his hands on his hips and leaned backwards, sighing with relief. He had been working for hours on end, had even forgotten dinner, he was so absorbed by the subject matter and the words that sometimes escaped him, had not even thought of Maria Sara, an omission that would be quite unforgivable if her presence inside him, save for the exaggeration of the metaphor, were not like the blood in his veins, something we had not really thought about, but which, being there and circulating, is an absolute condition of life. We repeat, save for the exaggeration of the metaphor. The two roses in the vase are standing in water from which they draw nourishment, it is true that they do not last long, but relatively speaking, neither do we. He opened the window and gazed down at the city. The Moors are celebrating the tower's destruction. The Amoreiras, smiled Raimundo Silva. On that side yonder stands the tent of knight Heinrich who will be buried tomorrow in the cemetery of'São Vicente. Ouroana, not a tear in her eyes, keeps vigil over the corpse which is starting to smell. One of the five armed guards who has been wounded is missing. The one who tried to grab Ouroana stares at her from time to time, and remains pensive. Here outside, keeping out of sight, Mogueime prowls round the tent like a moth attracted by the light of the torches coming from the opening in the canvas flaps. Raimundo Silva consults his watch, if Maria Sara does not ring within the half hour, he will telephone her, How are you, my love, and she will reply, Alive, and he will say, It's a miracle.

...

FRAY ROGEIRO STATES that it was about this time that signs of famine in the Moorish stronghold were becoming apparent. And no wonder, if we consider that imprisoned behind those walls as if held in a garrote, were over sixty thousand families, a number that at first sight seems alarming and when looked at a second time seems even more alarming, inasmuch as, in those backward times, families consisting of a father, mother and one child were dubious exceptions, and even if we were to estimate such a low number of people in each family we would arrive at a population of two hundred thousand inhabitants, a calculation in its turn called into question by another source of information, according to which the men alone in Lisbon numbered a hundred and fifty-four thousand. Now then, if we consider that the Koran allows each man to have as many as four wives, all of whom naturally bear him children, and taking into account the slaves who although scarcely treated like humans still have to eat, and therefore must have been the first to feel the want of food, then we end up with numbers that prudence tells us we should treat with extreme caution, some four or five hundred thousand persons, just imagine. In any case, if there were not quite as many, we at least know that the number was high, and from the point of view of those living there, too high by far.