In the very way you have heard about, the people rose up in other towns, and there was a great rift between people of rank and ordinary folk. This conglomeration of ordinary people, who were gathering in this way at the time, was referred to in those days as ‘the common herd’. At the outset the grandees ridiculed ordinary folk and called them ‘the Lisbon Messiah's people’ for believing that the Master was bound to save them from subjection to the King of Castile.

Once they had summoned up enough courage and had become united, the ordinary folk called grandees ‘schismatic traitors’ for siding with the Castilians in order to hand over the kingdom to someone to whom it did not belong. Not one of them, regardless of rank, dared to contradict this or to speak out on his own account, because he knew that, if he did so, a grim death would swiftly follow, without anyone coming to his aid.

It was wonderful to see how much courage God instilled in the common people and how much cowardice in the others: the very castles, which former kings by force of arms and after a long siege were unable to capture, were forcibly seized, before midday, by the common people, poorly armed, leaderless and scantily armoured though they were.

One such was the castle of Portalegre, governed by Dom Pedro Álvares, the Prior of the Order of the Hospitallers. On his authority it had declared allegiance to the queen, just like the other castles. Yet the ordinary folk of the town came together one Thursday morning, began to attack it and, before midday, with God's help, it was captured.

Similarly, the people of the town of Estremoz became mightily aroused and proposed to the governor that he and his men should abandon the castle and make their way into the town, because otherwise they did not feel safe from him. João Mendes [de Vasconcelos] announced that he would not do that at any price, because it would bring him great dishonour and cause him to be blamed. On receiving his answer, the townspeople decided to attack the castle. They brought a cart into the main square and set about placing in it the wives and children of those who were inside the castle with the governor, who were all natives of the town.