before. A muster was held and commands assigned. Rather than wait for new transports to bring the troops that were left behind, Henry determined to continue with the ones he had. The original plan was probably to proceed along the coast and seize Ksar es-Seghir, then Tangier and then Asilah in sequence, but this was quickly shelved. A scouting force sent out to examine the road to Ksar es-Seghir found strong resistance in the mountain passes leading to the city. As a result, Henry and his war council decided to side-step Ksar es-Seghir and aim for Tangier first. The army was split – part of it would go by ship with Prince Ferdinand while the bulk would march overland under Henry's personal command. The overland column was to take a long circuitous loop, through the south via the ruins of Tétouan, then across the mountains and back up to Tangier. Henry's overland column left Ceuta on September 9 in nearly processional array. The vanguard was led by Ferdinand of Arraiolos. The right wing was led by D. Fernando de Castro (head of Henry's household), the left wing by his relative and namesake D. Fernando de Castro 'o Cegonho' (head of Ferdinand's household). Henry himself led the center. D. Duarte de Menezes carried the royal standard in his father's place (Ceuta governor D. Pedro de Menezes was the alferes-mor, or official standard bearer of the realm, but had fallen ill at this time and was forced to remain behind.) Henry's personal standard was carried by Rui de Mello da Cunha. To inspire the troops, religious banners were unfurled bearing the images of the Virgin Mary, Christ as Crusader, the late King John I and the late beatified constable Nuno Álvares Pereira. The papal legate D.Álvaro de Abreu, Bishop of Evora, carried a piece of the True Cross, lent by Pope Eugenius IV for the occasion. The overland column did not meet any significant incidents, and arrived in the outskirts of Tangier on September 13. Ferdinand had already disembarked on a nearby beach (around Punta de los Judios). According to eyewitness Frei João Álvares, Henry launched the first assault on Tangier on the very day he arrived, but chronicler Ruy de Pina reports the first assault was not launched until a week later. (For this article, the dating and events largely follows Pina's account. The alternative timeline of Álvares will be summarized