The siege was raised and the small army attempted to regain their ships. Henry with the cavalry protected their retreat. But the cowardice of some, the treachery of others, and the overwhelming number of the enemy proved too much for his splendid defence, and on October 15 he was forced to come to an agreement with the enemy. By this capitulation the Portuguese were to be allowed to re-embark without their arms, Ceuta, their twenty-two years’ possession, was to be given up, and Prince Fernando, with certain other hostages, was to remain in the hands of the enemy until the Portuguese should have evacuated the town. Prince Henry, in his despair, fell ill at Ceuta and afterwards retired to Sagres. He would not give up Ceuta, and he could not save Fernando otherwise. King Duarte, confronted by the same cruel alternative, succumbed to grief and illness at Thomar in the following year. To Henry’s sorrow for the death of one brother and the living death of another--the tortures of Fernando’s captivity ended in a miserable dungeon in 1443--was added the crushing of his hopes and projects. For the new King was but a boy, and it needed no peculiar foresight to prophesy impending trouble in Portugal. It required all Prince Henry’s fortitude and faith to persevere, in loneliness and remorse. Prince Pedro had strongly opposed the expedition: it was on Henry that its failure rested. Nor was he one to wish to shirk responsibility, and many an hour he must have spent brooding over the fatal effects of his rashness. Henry is too great a man to need to have his mistakes glossed over. He had underestimated the difficulty of the enterprise, he had been rash in advancing from Ceuta without awaiting reinforcements, he had been rasher in not retiring after the first unsuccessful attempt to scale the walls of Tangier. His object certainly had been a noble one, based on no personal greed or ambition, and the results of his failure were felt by none more than by himself. In the eyes of others his magnificent courage and steadfast retreat placed him even higher than before. Fortunately for him, there was plenty of work ready to his hand, for, although he did not personally accompany the ships of exploration, he scientifically worked out their instructions, equipped them, and followed their progress on his maps. Perhaps a certain estrangement between Pedro and Henry was natural after 1437; Henry, at least, did not very actively support his brother in his quarrel with the Queen-Regent, and failed to stand by him later when he had resigned his Regency and was venomously attacked and slandered by his enemies before his weak son-in-law, King Affonso V. When the matter came to open conflict Pedro, with his small band of followers, could not hope for victory, and again Henry did not resolutely intervene. Pedro’s tragic death at Alfarrobeira in 1449 cannot have diminished Henry’s remorse for the death of Duarte and Fernando eleven and six years earlier.