The historians' history of the world in twenty-five volumes, volume 10

by Unknown

CHAPTER III. THE FALL, THE CAPTIVITY, AND THE REVOLUTION

[1521-1640 A.D.]

Upon the death of Dom Emmanuel in December, 1521, he was succeeded by Dom João, his eldest son, who had not yet completed his twentieth year. The chroniclers who wrote under the influence of the immediate successors of this prince, having the fear of censure before their eyes, represented him as endowed with high intelligence and qualities worthy of a king.

[1521-1540 A.D.]

During his father’s life many considered him an idiot. Dom Emmanuel himself feared the influence which unworthy men exerted over João during his early youth. It is certain that through inattention or incapacity he could never master the rudiments of science, nor even those of the Latin tongue. Throughout his reign monkish questions always appeared among the gravest business of the state, and his first action, when he had scarcely emerged from infancy, was to build a Dominican convent. This may be regarded as the worthy presage of an inquisition king. Whether from want of natural intelligence, ignorance, or errors of education, João III was a fanatic. The intolerance of his reign, though furthered by different incentives, was chiefly due to his character and inclinations.

The secretary of Dom Emmanuel, Antonio Carneiro, who deserved his confidence for many years and continued to serve the new king, when fatigue forced him to withdraw from a charge which he still held nominally for many years, left as his successor his second son Pedro de Alçaçova. This man, whom we find years later managing the most various affairs at the same time, and whose activity appears almost incredible, by the side of a prince whose lack of culture his very panegyrists cannot bide, must have been practically king in resolving the most difficult questions, as was the marquis of Pombal at a later epoch. Pedro de Alçaçova made no parade of his influence, hiding in the shadow of the throne, and leaving the frequently sterile brilliance of importance and favouritism to a vain nobility. But every dark stain that rests upon the reign of João III may be attributed to him, except the establishment of the horrible tribunal of the faith. In this particular, although the actual deed was his, the impulse came from the monarch. The resistance of the New Christians was long and persistent. A steadfast will made up of a million hatreds struggled against this resistance for more than twenty years and overcame it. In the end the rack, whip, and stake reigned supreme in the region of religious belief, prevailing over the evangelical doctrine of tolerance and liberty.

The failure of the attempt to establish the Inquisition in Portugal in 1515, from whatever cause arising, and the predominance obtained by the policy of tolerance, must have increased the spite of the irreconcilable enemies of the Jews. The hatred of João III for the Jews was profound and well known. This sufficed to excite in the minds of the people the ancient spirit of persecution and assassination. Ignorance and monkish tendencies, unassisted by envy or the memory of former wrongs, made the king naturally a fanatic, though fanaticism did not prevent him from abandoning himself to debauchery with women.

His marriage was treated of and Doña Catherine, sister of Charles V who then reigned in Castile, was chosen for his bride. The marriage took place, and an attempt was made to tighten the bond between the two countries by negotiating the marriage of Charles V with the infanta Donna Isabella, sister of the king of Portugal. The final conditions were adjusted and it was agreed that the dowry of the Portuguese infanta should be 90,000 doubloons, or more than 800,000 cruzados. Resources were wanting and it was necessary to obtain them. Perhaps this circumstance and several others caused the convocation of the cortes in 1525. Since the fifteenth century the Portuguese parliaments had lost their true value; they were more a matter of pomp and formality than of substance. The essential point, which was to raise money, was effected, for the cortes voted the impositions of new taxes to the amount of 150,000 cruzados to be raised in two years. This was the most urgent business. The representations of the councils were generally answered in fair words, which were only partially carried out long after the cortes of 1535, when the same representations were for the most part renewed. It was in this assembly that the general ill will towards the New Christians was at last able to manifest itself in a solemnly significant manner, but within strictly legal limits.[b] In 1536 the Inquisition was finally established. Its methods and its effects will be sufficiently shown in the appendix to this volume. It destroyed life, liberty, humanity, commerce, literature, and art in Portugal as elsewhere. When the Jesuits were admitted in 1540 and given charge of education, the church and the state were one, and the result was as usual a shameful combination of atrocity and paralysis.[a]

THE PORTUGUESE IN AFRICA, INDIA, AND BRAZIL

[1523-1535 A.D.]

The long reign of João exhibits interminable contests in India and Africa. Their details would be perused with little interest by an English reader. They can be noticed in so far only as they affect the general state of the monarchy. During these transactions in the East, Morocco continued to be the sanguinary theatre of the worst human passions. On the one hand the Portuguese were eager to extend their possessions; on the other, the sherifs, exulting in their successful ambition, were not less so to free the country from so troublesome an enemy. From the accession of the new dynasty, the affairs of the Portuguese began to decline. Indicative of the ambitious schemes which they had formed, the sherifs assumed the title of emperors of Africa: the elder, Hamed, remaining at Morocco; the younger, Muhammed, occupying the more western provinces.

To the king of Fez this assumption was not less odious than it was to the Portuguese themselves. That on one occasion the sherif, with four thousand horse, was signally defeated by a Portuguese noble with one hundred and forty, is gravely asserted; victories equally improbable, we may add equally impossible, occur at every step in the Portuguese relations concerning the wars of their countrymen with the misbelievers. But what, we are told, could not be effected by valour was done by fortune. Considering the war which he had to support in India, and his want of troops, João took the extraordinary resolution of dismantling four of his African fortresses, Arzilla, Saphin, Asemmur, Alcacer-Seguier, and of abandoning the ruins to the enemy. This resolution was carried into effect; but that this was owing as much to the arms of the sherif as to the motives will be admitted by every reader except a Portuguese.[c]

The oriental empire of Portugal, however, continued to increase by the wars which the able statesmen and warriors, whom João sent out as viceroys and governors, waged, upon the most frivolous pretexts, against the different neighbouring princes. They took advantage of the dissensions of the princes of the Moluccas, to obtain the complete sovereignty of those valuable islands. The disorders provoked by the tyranny and consequent assassination of the sultans of Cambay enabled them to wrest from those monarchs the important fortress and city of Diu; and similar convulsions in the Deccan gave them opportunities of considerably extending the Portuguese dominions in that wealthy country. It is to be observed, however, that the sovereigns, thus lawlessly despoiled, were themselves equally lawless conquerors. They were the chiefs of the Mohammedan hordes, who had overrun India, overthrown the native princes, and oppressed the Hindus. The enslaved natives probably cared little for the expulsion of one foreign master by another, if they had not cause to rejoice at exchanging the wantonly cruel tyranny of oriental despots for the more orderly extortion and oppression of a civilised people.

The increase of the power of the Portuguese now alarmed all the Mohammedan potentates, and they applied to Constantinople for assistance to expel the Christian intruders. Again the request was enforced by a Christian power, Venice, whose jealousy of the Portuguese rivals of her own commercial greatness extinguished all nobler feeling, all religious sympathy. Suleiman, thus doubly urged, equipped a powerful armament in the Red Sea, which, proceeding to the Indian Ocean, joined the Cambayan forces in besieging Diu. The defence, first by Antonio de Silveira, and afterwards by João de Mascarenhas, of this place, or rather of the fortress, for the town and rest of the island were quickly abandoned as untenable, ranks amongst the most celebrated feats of the Portuguese in India. They repulsed incessant assaults, the women labouring day and night at the fortifications, and venturing into the posts of greatest danger, to carry every needful assistance to the combatants, who, from their scanty numbers, could hardly ever quit the walls. During both sieges, the place was reduced to the utmost extremity; and upon both occasions was relieved by the seasonable appearance of the viceroy with a powerful fleet.

Of the viceroys and governors who effected these acquisitions scarcely one was duly recompensed. Many died in poverty, and Nuño da Cunha, who gained Diu for King João, was only saved by death from being dragged in chains to the foot of his ungrateful master’s throne. During João’s reign, the celebrated apostle of India, St. Francis Xavier, visited that country to attempt the conversion of the idolatrous natives: and the Portuguese obtained an establishment in China, and a free trade with Japan.

[1531-1562 A.D.]

Brazil first acquired importance under João III. In 1531 he began the colonisation of that immense empire, then little more than a long line of seacoast. This he divided into several captaincies, which he granted, with large powers of jurisdiction, civil and criminal, to such persons as, upon those conditions, were willing to settle there, and to people and cultivate their respective grants. The French made various attempts to form rival settlements in Brazil, especially about Rio de Janeiro. They never obtained more than temporary possession of any part of the country.[d]

The greatest credit that can be given to João III is that he kept his country out of all European complications, a task made comparatively easy by his close alliance with the greatest monarch in Europe, Charles V. This alliance was sealed by three marriages: for King João was married to the infanta Catherine, the sister of Charles V; his only son, Dom João, was married to the infanta Juana, daughter of Charles V; and his only daughter, Donna Maria, was the first wife of Philip, prince of the Asturias, the eldest son of Charles V, and afterwards King Philip II.[e]

João died in 1557. By his queen, Catherine, he had several male children, of whom none emerged from their infancy except João. Nor did that infante survive the father. In 1553 he received the hand of Juana, daughter of the emperor; but he died in the third month of his marriage, leaving the princess pregnant of a son, afterwards the unfortunate Dom Sebastian. Of João’s brothers one only, the cardinal Henry, whom he had vainly endeavoured to place in the chair of St. Peter, survived him. As his sister Isabella was the mother of the Spanish monarch, the connection between the royal families of the two kingdoms was, as we shall soon see, fatal to the independence of Portugal. As Sebastian, on the death of his grandfather, was only three years of age, the regency, in conformity with the will of the late king, was vested in the widowed queen, Catherine of Austria. In a few years, however, being disgusted with the intrigues of Cardinal Henry, who aspired to the direction of affairs, she resigned it in his favour.[c]

Before going on with the chronicle, it will be well to read a Portuguese historian’s picture of the decline of this period.[a]

ENNES’ ACCOUNT OF THE DECADENCE OF PORTUGAL

[1521-1557 A.D.]

We are about to enter upon the saddest and most unfortunate period in the history of Portugal. The brilliant epic which the bright sword of Alfonso Henriques began with the battle of Ourique, stops at the exact epoch at which an immortal bard appears. The Lusiadas, that Homeric apotheosis of a great, heroic people, arises almost at the hour of their fatal fall. But a few years and the epic is transformed into an elegy, the apotheosis into a funeral panegyric. But a few years and Camoens drags from his Olympic strophes these four lines:

“Fazei, senhor, que nunca os admirados

Allemaes, Gallos, Italos e Inglezes

Possam dirzer, que sao para mandados

Mais que para mandar, aos Portuguezes.”

—in vain, when the descendants of the old heroes were cowardly and infamously about to sell their humiliated country, poor and agonised, to the sinister son of Charles V, the emperor of legends.

These years of servitude and captivity spread like an immense oil stain over the brilliant history of Portugal, and the sun which sank in clouds of blood at Kassr-el-Kebir plunged the country into an obscure and long night until it rose radiantly once more on the field of Montijo. It falls to our lot to relate the history of this painful period of darkness and tears, barely illuminated in the beginning by the last rays of light thrown out by the conquests of the old East. The warlike genius which gave to Portugal the most glorious pages in modern epopee, the spirit of adventure, chivalrous and combatant, which carried its name to every corner of the world, and gave it a place of honour in the vanguard of the nations of Europe, was the same that apparently lowered the national colours before the victorious crescent on the sands of Africa, was the same that strangled national independence with the bonds of captivity, and delivered it inert and defenceless into the hands of the devil of the south, the lugubrious Philip II.

Portugal, having reached the apogee of her glory, became giddy and fell into the abyss of slavery. In the supreme hour of her agony, the red hat of a cardinal appeared at the bedside of the dying kingdom. Portugal’s grave-digger, the cardinal Dom Henry, was a sinister figure. But who killed her, who struck her the fatal blow? It was not the perverse imbecilities of the cowardly Jesuit; it was not the dangerous errors of the youthful knight-king. The assassin of Portugal was that fanatic and imbecile monarch who opened his foolish arms to the Society of Jesus, who planted deep in the kingdom that deadly tree known as absolutism, under whose protecting shadow was planted, thrived, and flowered that colossal infamy—the Inquisition. And who has to answer before the same tribunal of history for the lost liberty, the outraged honour, the valour spurned, the ruined wealth of that nation which gave to the world the most magnificent spectacle of modern times, a diminutive country throwing over the two hemispheres her power, her influence, her name? It is not the ambitious and imbecile old man chronicled under the hated name of cardinal-king; not the heroic child, the beardless youth who, enamoured of glory, died in pursuit of it, like a daring paladin on the sands of Kassr-el-Kebir; not the cold inert corpse to whom, with pungent irony, tradition has given the nickname of Piedoso, and who is known in history as João III. In history’s terrible logic Philip II was fatal heir to João III. It was the unhappy reign of this inept monarch which prepared the way to Portugal’s ruin.

His internal policy completely transformed the government into a fierce unchecked absolutism; his external policy of pure neutrality, at a time of grave disputes between all the European nations, alienated from him the sympathies of all the states of Europe; and later, when Philip II wiped from the map this diminutive nationality which, hidden in a corner of the west, had spread its fame and name throughout the world, Europe paid back to Portugal the debt of haughty indifference she had incurred under the pious king. When the Spaniards made their threatening invasion into Portugal, instead of finding an energetic and valiant nation defending its life and its liberty, they found a weak and inert people, humbled beneath the yoke of fierce absolutism, fanaticism enveloping the souls of all, demoralisation rampant in the army, luxury enervating the higher social classes, hunger and misery devastating the people; a nation of lions transformed into a flock of sheep by immorality, by despotism, by misery—a flock of sheep guided by an imbecile and disastrous shepherd, the unlucky cardinal, Dom Henry.

Dom Henry and Dom Sebastian could barely reap the deadly fruits of the venomous seeds sown by João III. It would seem that in such critical moments providence chooses incapable, weak, and blundering kings, who instead of delaying for a time the inevitable fall, seem rather unhappily to hasten it.

And thus at the close of the sad reign of João III, on seeing the crown placed on the head of an infant of three years, obstinately disputed by two great ambitions, that of the queen Catherine the grandmother, and that of Cardinal Henry the uncle, on seeing the indifference of Europe, on seeing Spain’s vast power in Portuguese policy, one does not need to be a prophet to foretell in the near future the sad development which fanaticism, tyranny, and the stupidity of the unworthy son of the great Dom Emmanuel had prepared for the splendid epic commenced at the battle of Ourique; to foretell the tremendous downfall of the colossus known as Portugal. Before entering the most lamentable reign of Dom Sebastian, let us cast a glance over the state of Portugal during the last years of Dom João’s life, and consider what manner of kingdom and people the desired king received in heritage, upon taking his first childish steps in a world to which he was to leave so sad a tradition.

The reign of Dom João III is an original mixture of splendours and threats, of wealth and misery. It presents brilliant lights and implacable shadows, but unhappily the lights were the last reflections of Portuguese glory soon to be extinguished, the shadows the unfortunate heralds of the immense night into which Portugal was to be plunged. Portugal at this epoch had reached the apogee of her prosperity. The Portuguese flag fluttered over the most remote countries of the wealthy East. Her commerce sucked fabulous wealth from the abundant breasts of old Asia. India resigned herself to the conquest; Brazil was beginning to be peopled; China and Japan discovered, Oceania subjected, Abyssinia explored, were rich harvests of glory and gold, of heroic deeds and vast fortunes for Portugal. But this gold scarcely circulated in the country; instead of benefiting the latter, it went to enrich England, to give power to Italy and Flanders, stupidly to fill the ever insatiable coffers of the Vatican. This glory instead of acting as a stimulus was suffocated by the tyrannies of absolutism, was crushed by the stupid fanaticism of the Jesuits, who paraded, triumphant and strong, under the sinister protection of the Inquisition. The period of Dom João III marks out distinctly and perfectly in history the transition from the pinnacles of triumphant power to the dark abysses of slavery, from a glorious life to a humiliating death.

The conquests and prosperity in the East were the outcome of the former impulses; what the country owed to the pious king was the demoralisation of the army and people, the glorification of tyrants, the relaxation of judicial authority crushed by the Inquisition, the gilded poverty of the people, the enervation of the aristocracy, the loss of commerce by the flight of foreigners residing in Lisbon harassed at every step by the infamous cruelties of the Inquisition, and the stupid despotism of individual power. All the glory of his reign is due to his predecessors; the shame, opprobrium, immorality, and misery are due to him, and unhappily were left as an inheritance to his successors and to the country.[f]

THE REGENCIES AND THE REIGN OF SEBASTIAN (1557-1578 A.D.)

[1557-1574 A.D.]

João III, dying, had committed the government of his kingdom, and the care of his grandson, then only three years old, to his widow, Queen Catherine. She governed ably; and by her active exertions sent such effective succours to Mazagan, which was almost the only remaining Portuguese fortress in northern Africa, and then reduced to extremity by a Moorish army of eighty thousand men, that the Mohammedans were compelled to raise the siege. But the Portuguese detested queen-dowagers, especially when Spanish; and Queen Catherine in 1562 found it expedient to resign the regency to her brother-in-law, Cardinal Henry, for whom João had unsuccessfully endeavoured to obtain the papal tiara. The cardinal was a good man, but unfitted, by the habits of his past life, for government. Under his feeble administration, the authority of Portugal over her distant colonies was weakened, and the inferior governors struggled against the control of the viceroys; whilst, by committing the education of the infant king wholly to Jesuits, he prepared the way for the heavier calamities that followed.

Sebastian is represented as naturally endowed with many great and good qualities, especially an eager desire for knowledge. But the Jesuits seem to have studied only to guard their royal pupil from a tendency to vice. But scarcely any vice, however injurious to his own individual character and happiness, could have brought such wide-spreading misery, such utter destruction upon his kingdom, as did the extravagance into which Sebastian was hurried by mistaken virtues.[164] He grew up with the idea that hatred of the infidels was Christianity, and courage the first virtue of a king. He proved the ruin of Portugal.

He was very desirous of going out to India, to remedy, by his personal intervention, the disorders which had greatly increased during his minority, and to relieve Goa and Chaul, besieged, in consequence of the weakness those disorders had produced, by the whole force of the Mohammedans, in that part of the world. His ministers remonstrated. Sebastian listened to their representations, and resigned his purpose. It might have been happier for Portugal had he been suffered to execute it. Be that as it may, effective measures were taken. The enemy was repulsed from Chaul and Goa, and the Indian empire of Portugal was tranquillised.

In the year 1571, Philip II invited his nephew to take a part in the great armament against the Turks under Don John of Austria, which Sebastian declined doing, upon the plea of his dominions being desolated by the plague. Sebastian’s first visit to Africa more resembles some of the expeditions of the knights errant of romance, than anything in real sober history. He is said to have left Lisbon on a hunting excursion, in the course of which he crossed the sea, to pursue his sport in another quarter of the globe. Upon landing in Africa, he sent home for a small body of troops, and when they joined him, gave over hunting for the still more exciting amusement of making hostile inroads upon the neighbouring Moors. In these, he of course could do no more than take some booty and prisoners; and when he had roused the Mohammedans to assemble their forces, he was compelled, by the consciousness of inferior strength, to re-embark for Portugal. From this moment he thought of nothing but recovering the African possessions which his grandfather had lost or abandoned, and his court became a scene of contest and cabal—his grandmother, and Cardinal Henry, and all his sagest counsellors remonstrating vehemently against what they justly deemed the visionary projects of extravagant ambition; whilst flattering courtiers, heedless young men, and fanatical ecclesiastics eagerly encouraged his views.

[1574-1578 A.D.]

In the midst of these contests, a revolution in Africa seemed to offer an opportunity too favourable to be neglected. In the empire of Morocco, upon the death of the emperor Abdallah, his son Mulei Ahmed usurped the government. He ruled tyrannically, and his uncle Mulei Moloch [or Maula Abd-el-Melik], the legitimate sovereign, easily formed a strong party against him, with which, after a severe struggle, he succeeded in overthrowing the usurper and establishing himself in his place. Mulei Ahmed sought foreign assistance. Philip II declined interfering, when Mulei Ahmed addressed himself to Sebastian, adding to his offer of tribute that of the restitution of Arzilla. Philip is said to have laboured to deter his nephew from embarking in an enterprise altogether beyond his means. Most historians, with the exception of the Spanish, accused Philip of having employed underhand methods of instigating the young king to persevere in the determination he affected to dissuade. Especially he is charged with inducing the pope to applaud and encourage Sebastian in his purpose.[165] Certain it is that the king of Portugal’s resolution to accept Mulei Ahmed’s offers was not to be shaken. The old queen died of the anxiety occasioned by her grandson’s rashness and obstinacy; Cardinal Henry marked his disapprobation by refusing to act as regent during the king’s absence: and Sebastian appointed in his stead the archbishop of Lisbon and two noblemen, one of whom was João de Mascarenhas, an ex-viceroy of India, and as distinguished a warrior as any of those who had conquered and secured the Portuguese empire in the East.

THE DÉBACLE AT KASSR-EL-KEBIR (1578 A.D.)

The army with which, in June, 1578, Sebastian sailed for Africa, to overthrow the powerful sovereign of Morocco, consisted of less than sixteen thousand men. But he was accompanied by almost all the young nobility of Portugal, and he relied upon the assurances of Mulei Ahmed that great numbers of his former subjects would immediately declare in his favour. A few volunteer adventurers, from different countries, joined the standard of the chivalrous young king [including Sir Thomas Stukeley, an English Catholic].

Mulei Moloch assembled an army of one hundred thousand men, and at their head, although so reduced by illness that he was obliged to be carried in a litter, he advanced to meet the invader. Some of these troops having been formerly partisans of his nephew, Mulei Moloch, distrustful of their attachment, issued a proclamation, that whosoever pleased was at liberty to pass over to his competitor. This magnanimity secured his triumph over any who might have previously hesitated between their old and new sovereigns, and very few indeed of the dispossessed usurper’s former adherents took advantage of the liberty offered them.

Sebastian’s camp was now distracted by contending opinions. Mulei Ahmed, who was disappointed in his expectation of deserters from his uncle’s army, and now relied upon the impending fatal issue of that uncle’s malady for making him master, without a blow, of empire and army, and perhaps of his Christian allies, urged Sebastian to fortify himself in a strong position on the seacoast; but Sebastian, rejecting all rational counsel, led his small army forward, into the open country, to encounter the overwhelming superiority of numbers there awaiting him.

On the 4th of August, 1578, the armies met near Kassr-el-Kebir (Alcazar-Quivir). Mulei Moloch was conscious that his death could not be long deferred, and fearful that, upon its occurrence, his nephew might gain some advantage over his brother and lawful successor, Ahmed ben Muhammed, he sought an opportunity of engaging the invaders, and by their defeat insuring the peaceful succession of Ahmed ben Muhammed. He caused himself to be carried through the ranks in his litter, that he might personally exhort his troops.

Portuguese Costume of the Sixteenth Century

Sebastian likewise displayed a degree of military skill not to have been anticipated from the rashness of his previous movements; and, at first, victory seemed to incline towards him. One division of the Moorish army was routed, when Mulei Moloch, forgetting his malady in indignation, insisted upon being placed on horseback; and in person rallying the fugitives, attempted to lead them back to the attack. The effort was too much for his strength; he fainted, and was replaced in his litter, where he only recovered sufficiently to charge his attendants to conceal his death, lest it should discourage his troops, and expired, with his finger on his lips, to enforce these last commands. They were obeyed. His attendants affected to open and reclose the curtains of the litter, as if making reports, and receiving orders; and the troops, encouraged by his last exertion, and believing themselves still under his eye, fought with irresistible valour. The Portuguese, notwithstanding their dauntless intrepidity and discipline, notwithstanding the invincible heroism of their king, who, flying from place to place, was seen wherever the danger was most imminent, were completely defeated. More than nine thousand of the army fell, and the rest were made prisoners, with the exception of about fifty, who escaped by flight. The young nobility, fighting desperately, were almost all slain; many a noble family was there extinct, and all were plunged in mourning. Mulei Ahmed was drowned in endeavouring to fly; and Ahmed ben Muhammed obtained uncontested possession of his inheritance.

Some portion of obscurity hangs over the fate of the adventurous Sebastian himself. But little real doubt can exist of his having fallen upon the fatal field of Kassr-el-Kebir. He had several horses killed under him, and was seen fighting, long after the general rout, with only three companions, against a host of enemies. The sole survivor of this devoted little band, Nuño de Mascarenhas, stated that, after the fate of two of their company, the king was disarmed and taken prisoner; when, his captors quarrelling about their prize, one of the Moors terminated the dispute by cutting Sebastian down, and he was forthwith despatched. Ahmed ben Muhammed, hearing this, sent one of Sebastian’s servants to the spot indicated, who pointed out and brought away a corpse, which was recognised as the king’s by the other attendants upon the royal person. The emperor of Morocco afterwards delivered it up to his ally the king of Spain, together with some noble prisoners, including two sons of the duke of Braganza. Philip generously sent home the released captives, as well as the remains of Sebastian, which were interred in the royal sepulchre of Belem.[d]

The 4th of August will ever be the most memorable of days in the annals of Portugal. Never was victory more signal than that of Kassr-el-Kebir. Of the Portuguese force which had left Lisbon, fifty individuals only returned; the rest were dead or in captivity, and with them the chivalry of the kingdom. Eighty of the nobles, through the good offices of Philip, were subsequently ransomed for 400,000 cruzados. The uncertainty which hung over Sebastian’s disappearance was converted into a doubt of the catastrophe; and this doubt was still further improved into a report that he was still alive. Several nobles, and among them the prior of Crato, always affected to believe that he had survived the dreadful slaughter of that day. As the public mind was taught to expect the possibility at least of his re-appearance, impostors, in such an age and at such a crisis of affairs, would scarcely fail to personate him—with what success will soon be related.[166]

On the character of this prince, after the preceding relation, it is needless to dwell. Without judgment or power of reflection; the tool of interested flatterers; unacquainted alike with war, with human nature, or the world; misled by the lying miracles recorded of Portuguese valour—one Portuguese being affirmed as a sufficient match for one hundred Moors; confiding in his natural courage, which knew not fear, because it had never been conversant with danger; and taught to believe that to the valour of his people all things must yield—he persisted in the wildest schemes of conquest ever devised by disordered brain. The obstinacy with which he adhered to this resolution, in opposition to representations the most forcible and pathetic; the lamentable imbecility which he displayed alike in the preparation and execution of his purpose, prove that his only virtue was courage. Had there been some superior power to confine the moonstruck prince in the same apartments with his cousin, Don Carlos of Spain, well would it have been for unhappy Portugal.

THE CARDINAL-KING AND THE PORTUGUESE SUCCESSION

[1578-1580 A.D.]

For some time the nation, unwilling to believe that Sebastian had perished, regarded Henry merely as regent; but on the arrival of the royal body, and on the confirmation of the catastrophe by every Portuguese who arrived from Africa, the cardinal, the last surviving male of the ancient house, was solemnly crowned. He was an excellent ecclesiastic; but his bounded capacity, his meekness of character, his subjection to the arts of his courtiers rendered his administration of little use to his country. His short reign has nothing to distinguish it beyond the intrigues of candidates for the throne, which, as he was in his sixty-seventh year, broken down by infirmities, and evidently on the verge of the tomb, could not fail to be soon vacant. At first, indeed, he was advised to marry; and application was actually made to the pope for the necessary bull of secularisation; but Philip of Spain, who had so close an interest in the affair, frustrated his views at the pontifical court, and compelled him to abandon them.

The candidates for the throne of Henry, as may be seen from the adjoining chart,[167] were: (1) Antonio, prior of Crato, who affirmed that his father Luiz, brother of João III, was married to his mother, and that he was consequently legitimate; (2) João, duke of Braganza, in right of his wife Catherine, a younger daughter of the youngest son of Emmanuel; (3) Ranuccio, prince of Parma, whose mother, Maria, was the eldest daughter of Dom Duarte; (4) Emmanuel Philibert, duke of Savoy, sprung from Beatrice, a younger daughter of King Emmanuel; (5) Philip, king of Spain, whose claim was twofold—his mother, Isabella, being eldest daughter of Emmanuel, and his first queen, Maria, eldest daughter of João III. From this genealogy nothing can be more clear than that, if the claim were to be decided by consanguinity alone, Philip’s was by far the most powerful; but by the laws of Lamego, the princess who accepted a foreign husband was ipso facto excluded from the throne. Hence, according to the strict letter of the constitution, Isabella and Beatrice, the daughters of Emmanuel, and Maria, the daughter of Duarte, had, by their marriages with the emperor Charles, the duke of Savoy, and the prince of Parma, renounced all claim to the succession: hence, too, by their exclusion, João was the true heir. Besides—and Philip was probably aware of the fact—the law of exclusion, in its very origin, had been expressly aimed at the probability of a union with Castile, seeing that, if the same prince ever became heir to the two crowns, the less must be absorbed in the greater—the independence of Portugal must be at an end. But conventional forms must yield to necessity. We have before seen how, on the marriage of Beatrice, daughter and sole child of Ferdinand, with Juan I of Castile, the states of the kingdom agreed to recognise the issue of that marriage as their future sovereign; and how, on the death of her father, she being yet without issue, she was actually proclaimed in Lisbon and other places. But such was the hatred of the Portuguese to the Castilians—hatred now as then deep, cordial, and everlasting—that they preferred the bastard, grand-master of Aviz, to that princess.[c]

PHILIP II OF SPAIN BECOMES PHILIP I OF PORTUGAL

[1578-1580 A.D.]

Dom Antonio, who, after being taken prisoner at Kassr-el-Kebir, had broken his Moorish fetters by the help of a Jew, was the favourite of the populace. He still asserted his legitimacy, imputed corruption to the judges who had decided against his mother’s marriage, and reminded his friends that João I, the founder of the reigning house, was an illegitimate son, raised to the throne by popular election. The feeble-minded Henry, whose chief ministers, as well as his Jesuit confessor, were gained over by Philip’s money, hesitated to pronounce, lest he should involve the country in civil war. The cortes, whom he convoked, were divided, and timid as himself. The seventeen months of his reign passed in deliberation; and at his death, on the 31st of January, 1580, he left the question to be decided by five regents, whom he named. Had he boldly declared Catherine his heiress, the greater part of Dom Antonio’s adherents would most likely have deserted an illegitimate pretender for their recognised lawful queen. As it was, the kingdom, divided between two strong factions, lay at the mercy of a powerful invader.

Philip had hitherto committed the management of his pretensions to ambassadors and secret agents; and he now supplied these persons more abundantly than ever with pecuniary means to continue their operations. A majority of the regents were bribed by those agents, and consequently sought to dispose the nation in Philip’s favour, by publishing the terms he offered to grant. The chief of these were, in addition to the general maintenance of the constitution, that he would reside as much as possible in Portugal; that the viceroy appointed to govern in his absence should always be either a prince of the blood or a Portuguese; that a Portuguese council should always attend him for the management of Portuguese affairs; that natives of Portugal should be admitted into offices of the household and others of minor importance in Spain, whilst Spaniards, and all strangers, should be excluded from all offices in Portugal, civil and military, as well as from all church preferment; and that crown lands, as the existing grants fell in, should be regranted to the nearest relations of the former grantees. Conditions so favourable seem to have had great influence in lessening the abhorrence with which the nobles had hitherto shrunk from a connection with Spain; and Philip now prepared to enforce and support his claim with the potent argument of thirty thousand men. A fitting commander for this army was, however, not so easily found. The duke of Alva was the only general esteemed by Philip competent to the task.

[1580-1583 A.D.]

The corrupted regents took all measures for betraying the country to the usurping invader. They dissolved the cortes, and placed creatures of their own in the command of the frontier towns. In June, Alva entered Portugal at the head of his army. Every fortified place threw open its gates at his summons, and he marched onwards unopposed. The duke of Braganza had taken no steps for maintaining his wife’s rights, otherwise than by argument. The prior of Crato got possession of Lisbon, where he was proclaimed king by the populace. The nobility, disgusted by his elevation and the inaction of the regents, withdrew sullenly to their houses; and the regents, freed from their control, boldly declared Philip the lawful heir of the crown.

Dom Antonio seized the crown jewels, church plate, and other funds. He released all prisoners, armed them and the rabble, and offered liberty to all negro slaves who would embrace his cause. With an army thus constituted, he attempted to defend the passage of the Tagus against the veteran Alva, who was master of the whole province of Alemtejo, and had reached the south bank of the river, without more fighting than a short siege of one fortress that had declared for Dom Antonio, and the commandant of which, when taken, he had executed. Dom Antonio was, of course, defeated, almost at the first onset. He fled through Lisbon, northwards; collected another army, with which he was again defeated; and thenceforward thought only of escape. Philip set a high price upon his head, but could not tempt any one of his adherents to betray him. For nine months Dom Antonio lurked in the kingdom, concealed now in one place, now in another, sheltered by rich and by poor, in castle, monastery, and cottage, and everywhere diligently sought by his enemies, ere he could find an opportunity of getting on shipboard.

After Dom Antonio’s second defeat no further resistance was attempted. Portugal submitted, and swore fealty. Her American, Indian, African, and insular possessions followed her example, with the single exception of the Azores, which proclaimed Antonio. The duke of Braganza and his sons acknowledged Philip. The duchess would not thus surrender her rights; and even when Philip, upon the death of Queen Anne and the duke of Braganza, offered her his hand, she refused a crown as the price of disinheriting her sons; but she too desisted from further contest. When all was quiet Philip visited his new kingdom, convoked the cortes, and swore to the conditions he had previously offered.

Thus was effected, however illegally, the union of Spain and Portugal—a union apparently as important to the true interests of the peninsula as is that of England and Scotland to the well-being of Great Britain; and not more repugnant to the inclinations of the two nations in the one case, probably, than in the other. Had Philip and his successors strictly observed the terms of the union, and endeavoured otherwise to conciliate the Portuguese, these last might, erelong, have considered the Spanish monarchs as their lawful kings, and have reconciled their pride to their incorporation with a larger state. But although rather a usurper than a conqueror, he chose to treat Portugal as a conquered country. He rejected the proposals for beneficial laws, and, indeed, all the demands of the cortes, except a few of the most insignificant, and speedily dissolved that assembly. He refused the favours solicited by the nobles, withheld the honours and pecuniary compensations promised to the Braganza family; and although he did publish an amnesty, the exceptions were so large (including all who had favoured Dom Antonio) that, it was said, Philip had pardoned only those who were free from offence. He then proceeded to punish the persons thus excepted; and the extent of the executions which followed may be judged by two circumstances: one that, from the number of dead bodies thrown into the sea, the people would not eat fish again, until the archbishop, in a solemn procession, had purified by his blessing the polluted ocean; and the other, that Philip himself thought it requisite to obtain absolution from the pope, for having put such numbers of ecclesiastics to death. He then appointed his nephew and brother-in-law, the cardinal-archduke Albert, viceroy of Portugal; and committing to him the government of the country, where discontent was already very general, he returned to Spain.[d]

THE ENGLISH IN PORTUGAL

[1582-1589 A.D.]

During the next few years Portugal had nothing to do with the foreign or domestic policy of Philip. Governed with great moderation by the archduke, enjoying internal peace, an extended commerce, and a high degree of prosperity, she might have been happy—happier than she had ever been under her native monarchs—could hereditary enmity have been forgotten, and national pride sacrificed to interest. The exiled Antonio was made aware of the existing discontent: he had many well-wishers and not a few spies in the country, who constantly communicated with him. After the second defeat of his armament in the Azores, he abode at the French court, with the hope of obtaining increased supplies for an invasion of Portugal; but as the civil wars which raged in the former country were likely to prove interminable, he passed over into England to renew his intrigues with the earl of Essex. He arrived at a favourable time, just after the destruction of the Spanish armada, when the resentment of the English was at the highest pitch, and they were longing for revenge.

Portuguese Noble of the Sixteenth Century

At first, however, Elizabeth, with her usual prudence, disapproved of the project of a Portuguese invasion; but, with her usual weakness, wherever the tender passion was concerned, she was persuaded by the favourite earl to enter into an alliance with the exile, and to equip an armament for placing him on the throne. Nothing can better exhibit the unprincipled impostor than certain conditions of that alliance. He engaged to subjugate Portugal in one week from the disembarkation of the troops; to pay Elizabeth an immense sum for the expenses of the armament, and a considerable annual tribute in token of her sovereignty; to receive English garrisons, at his own expense, into the principal maritime fortresses; on his arrival at Lisbon, to abandon that city to a twelve days’ pillage. In conformity with another article of the treaty,—a treaty not over honourable to Elizabeth herself, since she grasped at advantages which generosity, or even justice, would have scorned,—twenty thousand men were embarked at Plymouth in 120 vessels, the whole commanded by Drake and Norris (1589).

The success of this expedition corresponded with its flagitious design. After an unsuccessful attempt on Corunna, the armament cast anchor at Peniche, and disembarked the troops who marched to Torres Vedras, where they proclaimed Dom Antonio, and continued their route towards the capital. But the peasantry, instead of joining his standard, fled at his approach. As the English general approached the suburbs, the monks, the women, and most of the inhabitants retired within the city. The ill success of the English, who repeatedly assailed the outworks, stifled the intrigues of the disaffected; and a vigorous sortie decided the fate of the expedition. The English general, who throughout exhibited strange imbecility, retreated; he was pursued; many of his followers were cut off; with the rest he sought refuge in the tower of Cascaes, which the cowardly governor surrendered to him. Here, considering the want of provisions, and the deception which had been practised on him by Dom Antonio, who had persuaded him that the moment a hostile standard were raised it would be joined by all true Portuguese, he wisely resolved to return home. This was fortunately the last time Portugal was cursed with the prior’s presence. Deserted by his nearest friends, neglected by the sovereigns, his former allies, in 1595 he ended his unprincipled life in merited obscurity and indigence.

THE FALSE SEBASTIANS

[1584-1595 A.D.]

But though Philip was thus rid of a formidable enemy, he had others who were actuated by even a superior spirit of imposture, and who might have occasioned him some trouble. We have before alluded to a strange impression among the vulgar that Sebastian yet lived, and that such an impression, in such an age and country, could not fail to produce impostors. The first, who appeared in 1584, was a native of Alcobaça—a man of low extraction and of still lower morals. Though he was condemned to death, the sentence—very wisely—was not put into execution. He was condemned to labour in the galleys, where all who had the curiosity might visit him, and be convinced by their own eyes that he was not Sebastian.

The failure of this impostor did not deter another from the same hazardous experiment. There was a stone-cutter’s son, Alvares by name, a native of the Azores, who, having passed some months in the monastery of the Holy Cross, on the heights of Cintra, left that community, and, like the youth of Alcobaça, retired to a hermitage. At this time he does not appear to have meditated the personation of Sebastian: when, from his frequent self-inflictions, and from his extraordinary habits, he was suspected to be that prince, and even addressed as such, he replied that he was a stone-mason’s son of Terceira. But the more he affirmed this truth, the less was he believed: he was evidently fulfilling a rigorous penitence, to atone for the misfortunes which he had brought on his people; and, like Roderic the Goth, he had doubtless renounced forever all human grandeur. Perceiving that opposition was useless, Alvares consented to be treated as a king: he was soon joined by hundreds of the peasantry, whom he allowed to kiss his hand with much affectation of condescension. At length the hermit was taken, was brought to Lisbon, paraded through the streets on the back of an ass, exposed to the jeers of the populace, and publicly hanged.

It might have been expected that the failure of these two attempts would have had some effect even on imposture and credulity; but a third Sebastian appeared, and, strange to say, in Spain, under the very eyes of Philip. There was an Augustinian monk, by name Miguel dos Santos, who had been a chaplain of Sebastian, confessor to Dom Antonio, and who was now confessor to the nunnery of Madrigal. Here he met with Gabriel de Spinosa, a native of Toledo, whom he had known in Portugal, and of whose intelligence, boldness, and dexterity he had seen frequent proofs. As this man really bore a resemblance to King Sebastian, he persuaded him, though not without difficulty, secretly to personate that monarch. Finally the priest, being put to the torture, confessed all. The same means extorted a similar confession from Spinosa, who was hanged and quartered. The priest was degraded, delivered over to the secular arm, and suspended from the public gallows at Madrid.[c]

A fourth impostor was more famous than all the rest, by birth supposed to be an Italian; who, after a long confinement in Naples, was transferred to Spain, where he ended his days in a prison. His imposture was the more remarkable from the fact that he could not speak Portuguese.[a]

The remaining actions of Philip must be sought in the history of Spain. Four years before his death, on the removal of the cardinal-regent to the archiepiscopal see of Toledo, the government of Portugal was intrusted to a commission of five. In 1598, Philip breathed his last.[c]

CHAGAS’ ACCOUNT OF THE LOSS OF THE COLONIES

[1585-1600 A.D.]

As yet it was only our pilots who were acquainted with the navigation of the Indies; in India we were the only nation who had dominions and solidly established settlements, and consequently we were sole lords of the commerce of the East. The English confined themselves to plundering our ships on their return voyage from India, but they dared not come to fight us in the land conquered by our superhuman feats. A young nation that was about to appear at this period on the historical stage was chosen by fate to be the one to wrest from our grasp the sceptre of the East. The Low Countries had long held important commerce with us, principally the town of Antwerp, where a Portuguese factory had been long established. The ships of this industrious country came to Portugal to fetch the merchandise of the East, and scattered it afterwards over Europe. When the Flemish and Dutch rising broke out against Spain, dominator of the Low Countries, Antwerp, the central point of the war, lost her commercial importance, which Amsterdam inherited.

While Portugal was independent she continued the commerce which enriched Holland, but when Philip II effected the union of the two crowns, he had the unhappy inspiration of attacking his rebellious subjects by issuing in 1594 an order for the sequestration of fifty Dutch ships at anchor in the Tagus, and at the same time promulgated a decree closing all Portuguese ports to the Dutch. The blow was terrible, and might have proved mortal, but for the unshakable energy of those republicans of the north. Being unable to come to Portugal for the merchandise of the East, they determined to go and seek it in India herself. In 1594, some merchants of Zealand, assisted by the subsidies of Amsterdam and Enkhuizen, equipped three ships, intrusted them to the care of their two most able mariners, Barentz and Heemskerk, and despatched them to the north in quest of a new passage to the Asiatic seas. The English had already made a similar attempt in 1556, but without success; this attempt of the Dutch was not more successful, and the shipowners were in truth discouraged when the hope which upheld them proved vain.

A chance circumstance favoured them. A Dutchman, named Cornelis Houtmann, had been long in Portugal, and had either succeeded in obtaining a passage to India, or had obtained ample information in the country respecting the route first taken by Vasco da Gama. In 1595, a fleet of four ships piloted by him set out for the coveted lands of the East. In August, 1597, he returned to Texel with barely two ships, but having displayed the colours of a new European flag to the amazed natives of Madagascar, Bantam, Java, Madura, and Bali. The spell was broken. Overjoyed at the result, the Dutch merchants equipped a fleet of eight ships in 1598, commanded by Jacques le Neker and Heemskerk and despatched them to the East. This fleet touched at the island of Cirne, which they named Mauritius, in honour of their great general Maurice of Nassau, a name by which it is still called, though also known as the Isle of France, which Bernardin de St. Pierre has immortalised in his romance, Paul et Virginie. From thence they proceeded to Bantam, where they freighted four ships with spices and despatched them to Europe. The remaining ships visited the Moluccas and, in 1600, returned to Holland with a most valuable cargo.[i]

The success of this enterprise was of the greatest importance to England, to which country Philip II had also closed Portuguese ports, in 1589. The English had despatched an expedition to India in 1591. The result did not correspond with the hopes of success, and the British merchants were already discouraged when the example of the Dutch excited them to form the famous company of the Indies, one of the most fruitful origins of England’s prosperity.[f]

Under Portuguese administration the constant war always agitating India never ceased, but the Portuguese arms were ever victorious. Yet this state of war made it impossible to frustrate from the outset the attempts of the English and Dutch.

We must always bear in mind that whereas externally Portuguese dominion was firmly maintained, internally the most profound corruption was at work, and paving the way to the dissolution of this vast empire in the near future. The vices of the Portuguese, the corruption of those in office, the excesses of the Inquisition, the cruel treatment of the subjected Indians, the senseless preponderance of the priests, all this is painted by Diogo do Conto[j] in vivid colours.

Mathias de Albuquerque, and especially the count da Vidigueira, attempted to reform these appalling abuses, but all these vices were deep rooted, and no amount of cauterising could check the gangrene. The governors might consider themselves lucky that they yet, at least, possessed valiant soldiers, who did not bring dishonour on the name of Portugal in the wars, and who supported with the edge of their swords the trembling empire. During the government of Dom Francisco da Gama, a most important annexation was made. The last king of Ceylon, dethroned by his kinsman, Raju, and protected by Portuguese soldiers, bequeathed the island in gratitude to the Portuguese. It was the last ray of the dying lamp. As heralds of the approaching disasters the Dutch ships appeared in the East. Of Cornelis Houtmann’s four ships, two only, as we have said, returned home; of the other two, one was lost on the reefs, and the other was destroyed by the Portuguese; but in the following voyage they succeeded in evading vigilance. What other result was to be expected, when the natives welcomed them as liberators, and the Portuguese were always engaged in wars which prevented them from openly repulsing their rivals?[i]

We have referred elsewhere to the conspiracy in favour of Mary Stuart, favoured by Philip II, and of how this incident resulted in the outbreak of hostilities between the courts of Madrid and London. Elizabeth Tudor decided to declare war against the Catholic king, and despatched Admiral Drake with a fleet of twenty-three ships, furnished with twenty-three hundred men, against the Spanish colonies. The first to fall a victim was the Portuguese colony of São Thiago, Cape Verd Islands, where the English admiral put in on his way to America, on the 16th of November, 1585. Thence the squadron continued its course, capturing various galleons on the way, some of which were bound to Lisbon.

Almost at the same time various African chiefs allied themselves against the Portuguese at the instigation of Ali Bey, despatched by the sultan of Turkey to subjugate to the viceroy of Egypt the petty kings who did homage to the crown of Portugal. Ali’s first victory was not, however, of long duration, as in 1587 a squadron was despatched from India under command of de Mello, who compelled the sovereign of Patta to become a Portuguese vassal, and killed the king of Lamu. Proceeding to Mombasa, he laid waste that place, and put an end to the confederation which Ali Bey had organised. Shortly after, in 1589, the Turks again returned, but this time directed their attack against Melinde, which place had remained faithful. Thomé de Sousa Coutinho hastened from Goa with a fleet, and routed the Turks in the first encounter.

While in east Africa the native population, excited by the Turks, were using every endeavour to throw off the Portuguese yoke, in the west Paulo Dias de Novaes, founder of Loanda, was conquering the kingdom of Angola for the crown of Portugal, at the moment when Philip II was conquering the kingdom of Portugal for Castile. From that day to this the two settlements have remained in the possession of the Portuguese.

Affairs in Brazil were less prosperous. In 1591 the port of Santos was attacked by an English pirate, and the town of São Vicente was sacked and burned; four years later the storehouses of Recife were also sacked by another pirate of the same nation. Worse even than the English pirates were the Spanish defenders.

Before this time the French had already made various incursions into the colony, with the design of establishing themselves there. The province was saved by the patriotism of the residents of Pernambuco, who rushing to arms, under command of the governor, put an end to the French invasions. Enemies more terrible still succeeded them; these were the Dutch who were expelled only after a long and obstinate struggle, when Portugal had already recovered her liberty.

DOMESTIC DISASTER

[1596-1598 A.D.]

To return to the kingdom, where, as we have said, public misery was aggravated by the losses caused to commerce by the pirates of hostile nations, who infested the seas, we must now add that frequently even the ports were attacked. The most daring of these attempts was that made at Faro on the 22nd of July, 1596, where an English and a Dutch fleet put in, commanded by Admiral Effingham, who after entering the port of Cadiz and there burning a number of ships, and plundering at the same time thirty-three ships laden with merchandise of the Indies, made for the coasts of Portugal, and after landing three thousand soldiers on the shores of Algarve, plundered and laid waste the capital of that province. The English then made for Lagos, but the governor was able to repulse them.

We will conclude this account of the reign of Philip II by giving a résumé of the instructions he is said to have left to his son, and which, if they show the evil of his policy, are also an eloquent proof of how ambition will lead the clearest judgments astray, making them dream of impossible ventures, and waste their energy in useless projects. His advice was:

“That without examining into the justice of the case he should obtain complete dominion over Portugal, and once conquered, disorder and terror could be spread throughout Germany, France be conquered, the forces of England weakened, and the terror of the Spanish arms carried to the extreme north.

“That profiting by the advantages gained, his Catholic majesty could thereby get possession of the navigation of the Indies, found colonies wherever he thought fit, conquer new lands, establish an immense commerce, and subjugate all the countries he considered it to his advantage to subjugate. But above all he was to secure the respect of the Portuguese, as this was of the very greatest importance. That far from burdening them with taxes and subsidies, he should grant them all the privileges and favours to which they laid claim. When the kingdom was pacified and the people moulded to Spanish dominion, then he should begin to oppose these privileges, appointing from time to time, under various pretexts, Spanish magistrates who should insensibly mould the people to this.

“That he should strictly watch the duke of Braganza, closely examining into his actions, but always showing him every attention, until the opportunity offered of persecuting him and all his family. As for the rest of the nobility, the only course was to remove them from the country, sending them to fill honourable posts in Flanders, Germany, and Italy. Proceeding in this manner the kingdom of Portugal could be monopolised and reduced to a province, and the people rendered powerless to make any movement; but by burdening them with taxes and subsidies, their anger would be roused, and hatred awakened, which would be fatal to the Spanish monarchy.

“That his majesty should give the viceroyalty of the kingdom to some prince or princess of his house, to inspire the Portuguese with greater respect for the government, and spare them the repugnance of giving obedience to any other.

“That he should be no less careful in dividing up the house of Braganza; that they should contract no new alliances in Portugal; deprive them of all state dignities, which should be bestowed on Spanish subjects only, and finally prevent them from holding correspondence with foreign courts.

“That whenever disputes arose between the Spanish and Portuguese grandees it was most necessary to favour the latter, and at the same time to bestow the principal offices of the kingdom upon those who appeared the most attached to the court of Castile, and thus attract others with the hope of favours.

“That when there was no longer cause to fear the grandees, the nobility, and still less the people, then it would finally become necessary to destroy the whole house of Braganza, deprive the Portuguese of all public ecclesiastical and secular offices, and give them to Spaniards, and govern the kingdom of Portugal as any other province forming part of the Spanish monarchy.”

If the treacherous and immoral policy which Philip II counselled his heir to follow caused the ruin of the oppressed, it was no less fatal to the oppressors. After the death of the son of Charles V the decadence of the Spanish monarchy, the most vast and formidable of the sixteenth century, was rapid and profound.[f]

PHILIP II (1598-1621 A.D.)

[1598-1634 A.D.]

Of Philip III of Spain (II of Portugal) we have only to say that in the course of his reign he once visited his Portuguese subjects. On this occasion the hungry and ambitious chivalry expected much from his liberality; but, except a few, all were disappointed. If he did not treat them with studied insult—a charge levelled at him by the Portuguese historians—he exhibited so great a predilection towards his hereditary subjects that he could not fail mortally to offend a people who would not even have been satisfied with an equal share of his attention. Yet many of them are just enough to blame the weakness, rather than the ill will of Philip: they contend that the truth was kept from him; that every art was taken to confirm his dislike to them as a nation; that the Castilian nobles behaved with intolerable haughtiness to their own; that, in everything, a studied contrast was drawn between the two classes of subjects; that taxes were imposed without the consent of the cortes, and strangers nominated to the most important offices—both violations of the compact signed at Thomar by the first Philip; and that revenues, appropriated to objects exclusively Portuguese, were diverted into the treasury of Madrid.

PHILIP III (PHILIP IV OF SPAIN) (1621-1640 A.D.)

If the Portuguese had so much reason to complain of the government of the second Philip, that of his son and successor was, doubtless, still more onerous, more insulting: a good one, like that of Philip I, would have been hated; a bad one would naturally add to the existing mass of discontent. That the weak, the profligate, and the unprincipled count-duke de Olivares could direct the affairs of this kingdom with advantage, either to it or to his royal master, will not be expected by anyone who has perused the account of his administration in Spain. There can be no doubt that, by forced loans, by intolerable taxes, and by using the native soldiers in foreign wars, he wished to break the proud spirit of the people—to make them the mere slaves of his will.

Finding themselves ground to the very earth by exactions, their complaints disregarded, their persons insulted, their prosperity at an end, we need not wonder that they began to meditate an escape from their yoke. They turned their eyes towards the duke of Braganza, the next heir in the order of succession.[168] That ambitious noble adopted a line of conduct which could not fail to forward his views. To the world he appeared absorbed by hunting, feasting, and other diversions; yet his emissaries were at work in every part of the kingdom, fanning the flame of discontent, and teaching the people to regard him as one able, at least, to effect their deliverance.[169] Owing to their representations, but in a still greater degree to the rapacity of the revenue collectors, open insurrections appeared at Lisbon, at Braga, and, above all, at Evora, and were not quelled without much difficulty and some bloodshed. Though pressed, the duke was too wise to declare himself at this moment: he knew that his combinations were not formed;[170] he therefore determined to await the silent but resistless course of events. The sequel soon justified his policy. The chief nobles, prelates, cavalleros, and clergy were suddenly summoned to Madrid. What could be the object in this mysterious, unexpected, and unparalleled mandate? Conjecture was vain: to disobey it would be dangerous; and a magnificent display of retinues immediately filled the road from Lisbon to the Spanish capital. What passed at the conference between the ministers and this deputation will never be known; but that some extraordinary concession was required from them may be easily believed. That their consent was demanded to the incorporation of the Portuguese with the Spanish cortes, or that a certain number of deputies from the three estates should be summoned at the same time with those of Castile—in other words, that the kingdom should be forever degraded to the rank of a province, is loudly affirmed by the Portuguese. The nobles probably returned the answer attributed to them—that, in an affair of such moment, they could do nothing without the sanction of a legitimate meeting of the cortes in their own country.

[1634-1640 A.D.]

But another reason for this extraordinary mandate may be assigned, more plausible than either. The court could not be ignorant of the disposition of the people towards the duke of Braganza, nor, perhaps, with his intrigues. His arrest might be resolved on: and, as it could not be effected in Portugal, where his connections were so numerous and powerful, he must be inveigled to Madrid. This supposition is confirmed by three facts: he had evaded compliance when summoned alone to the capital; he was not present now; and the subsequent endeavours of the minister to draw him to Madrid were as earnest as they were ineffectual. Disappointed in his views, Olivares now proceeded more boldly: he ordered all the disposable troops in Portugal to march into Catalonia, and the duke of Braganza to place himself at their head. But the war of Catalonia concerned the Castilians only. Both nobles and people resolved to disobey the mandate; but, lest an open refusal should subject them to instant invasion, they merely demanded a short delay, until their preparations were matured.

In the meantime the duke of Braganza was pursuing his end with persevering art: knowing how suspicious was the Spanish court, how jealously every action was watched, he plunged more deeply into his favourite amusements, and asserted that, when the troops were ready to march, he should not be wanting at his post. So well did he counterfeit his part, that many of the conspirators, believing that he had neither ambition nor compassion for his countrymen, declared their intention of soliciting his brother, Prince Duarte, to head them. At length, when obedience or open refusal to the orders of the court was imperative, the conspirators hastened to Lisbon, and began their meetings. Their numbers increased; yet so artfully were their proceedings conducted, that they escaped the notice of the duchess of Mantua, the vice-queen.[c]

ENNES’ ACCOUNT OF THE CONSPIRACY

[1640 A.D.]

It is an old and lasting tradition that the conspirators assembled in the garden of the palace of Antonio de Almada, in a pavilion with stone benches, which had the advantage of a staircase communicating with the turret, where there was a secret door leading into the wood of Santa Anna, fronting the garden of the knight-commanders of the Incarnation. This door supplied an easy entrance to the conspirators, who never assembled all at one time, for fear of the enterprise being crushed with one blow, through treachery. A decision adopted by any seven was binding on all the rest. All the letters of the conspirators were written in an enigmatical manner against the possibility of seizure. Dom João was evidently not anxious to risk his fortune and greatness in a dangerous throw. Egoism was more powerful with him than patriotism, and the voice of prudence deadened the suggestions of ambition. The nobles were in despair, and began to discuss whether it would not be advisable to form a republican government if the duke persisted in his obstinacy.[171] But, thanks largely to the skilful efforts of João Pinto Ribeiro, the duke was won over. But when João Pinto attempted to kiss his hand, this the duke would not allow, saying with a smile, “Let us not buy the cabbage before the meat.”

Upon his return to Lisbon, Pinto Ribeiro lost no time in assembling the nobles to communicate the news he brought from Villa Viçosa. He painted in colours more glowing than truthful the prince’s enthusiasm and determination, and urged his good intentions of sharing the government of the kingdom with those who had given him the throne. João Pinto’s communications were received with the greatest enthusiasm; he had received full power from the duke to adopt in his name any measures he thought fit. The plan of the revolution was then discussed, opinions at first being very varied, but eventually the most sensible opinion prevailed, which was that the nobles should make a surprise attack upon the palace, December 1st.

On Friday, the 30th of November, the last assembly of the nobles took place at the house of Dom Antão de Almada. None now recoiled before danger, and knowing that they were risking their lives, they prepared for death; nearly all confessed, and some made their wills, whilst others recommended their friends in religion to pray for their souls. The judge of the people, and other influential persons of the lower classes, had on this afternoon promised that their men would be ready to follow the nobles at the first summons. It was decided that they should assemble on the following day in the courtyard of the palace, and as nine o’clock struck some should attack the Spanish guard, whilst others should mount immediately to disarm the German guard, and seize all the entrances; upon which, some were to gain the verandas to attack the people, and proclaim Dom João and liberty, whilst others should seek the hated secretary Vasconcellos. The ministers had been warned repeatedly of the suspected assemblies at the house of Dom Antão de Almada, and Vasconcellos received warning of the very day fixed upon the revolution. In spite of all, the conspirators did not meet with the slightest resistance! A few hours sufficed to conclude the revolution.[f]

CHAGAS’ ACCOUNT OF THE 1ST OF DECEMBER (1640 A.D.)

The 1st of December dawned serene and clear! No clouds dimmed the aurora of Portuguese liberty. Who can divine the thoughts which assailed the conspirators at waking upon this cold winter morning to undertake this hazardous enterprise? Hiding her scalding tears behind a smile, Donna Filippa de Vilhena herself girded on the swords of her two sons, commanding them not to think upon her fate, but upon the fate of Portugal; declaring that to die for one’s country when she lay groaning under oppression was still more beautiful than to live for one’s mother. With the same manly resolution Donna Marianna de Lencastre blessed her two sons; and these two Spartan mothers, nobler indeed than the Spartans, for such rigid principles had not been instilled into them by a stoical education, left an heroic example to posterity.

From every quarter of the town the nobles and their followers came to the courtyard of the palace, some on foot, some on horseback, some in their carriages, not revealing the anxiety matured to so critical a moment, but with a calmness which gave no sign of what was about to occur. A little before nine all the conspirators were assembled in the courtyard. The soldiers were not alarmed at the carriages which continued to arrive, accustomed as they were to seeing the duchess’ courtiers come to the palace; in those days business was earlier than in ours. The people, too, had not as yet assembled in great numbers. With their hands upon the doors of their carriages, the nobles impatiently waited the striking of the solemn hour.

Nine o’clock! The doors of all the carriages are thrown open simultaneously, the nobles descend, and while Jorge de Mello, Estevão da Cunha, Antonio de Mello e Castro, Father Nicolão da Maia, and others still wait in their carriages for the signal from the palace to attack the Spanish guard, the majority of the conspirators rapidly mount the stairs, enter the hall of the German archers, and giving them no time even to suspect what is about to happen, some throw down the stands of the halberds, others draw their swords, and the archers fly, astounded and disarmed. Some of them, whether because their halberds are not in the stands or because they are more determined, do their duty with a certain show of courage, and only fly after seeing two of their men fall to the ground, one dead, the other wounded. Meanwhile, drunk with joy, Dom Miguel de Almeida runs to a veranda, throws open the window, and brandishing a sword, cries out: “Liberty! Liberty! Long live the king Dom João IV. The duke de Braganza is our legitimate king!”

Tears prevented his further speech, and ran down to his white beard, which floated in the breeze blowing from the Tagus, whose waters were gilded by the sun riding triumphant in the heavens. He was answered by an immense cry of enthusiasm and joy; “Liberty! Liberty!” shouted the people with one voice. And in the heroic Dom Miguel de Almeida, this venerable old man of eighty years, radiant with youthful ardour, all saw the symbol of Portugal, decrepit and broken, but illuminated in this hour of her resurrection by the reflection of the splendour of her eras of glory. Those in the courtyard did not limit themselves merely to this unanimous response. Before the Spanish guard could grasp the meaning of the cry of liberty, which thundered above their heads, Jorge de Mello and his men fell upon them with drawn swords and pistols cocked. They attempted to resist, but the suddenness of the attack and the ardour of our men rendered resistance vain.

Meanwhile Miguel de Vasconcellos had been warned that something was occurring. He was yet in bed and had scarcely time to dress, when, following on the warning, a strange noise was heard in the corridors. Pale with fear he ran to the door and locked it on the inside, and immediately heard the nobles knocking furiously at the door, when the wood was shivered with the hatchets they had brought to break it down. Thereupon, seeing that he was lost, he seized a loaded musket and shut himself into a cupboard full of papers. There holding his breath, his forehead bathed with the sweat of anguish, he heard the door give way; the nobles entered like a torrent, and blaspheming, searched in every corner of the apartment. His safety hung on a thread; as, not finding him, the conspirators were about to make their way to the department of India, to which place they presumed he had fled, when the narrowness of his hiding-place caused Vasconcellos to make a slight movement. It was heard; with a shout of ferocious joy they rushed upon his hiding-place; a few shots were fired, two balls pierced his throat, and he fell dead, the blood spouting from him. After killing him, the avengers of their country abandoned him, and it was the servants who threw the body of the hated minister out of the window. When the tumultuous crowd of people who filled the courtyard saw the body of their oppressor thus contemptuously thrown out, they gave a roar of triumph and in the satisfying of their eagerly desired vengeance there was no insult which they did not heap on the pitiful remains.

While the nobles rushed from the secretary’s apartments to those of the vice-queen, the people with shouts of enthusiasm crossed the courtyard, shouting, “Liberty!” And meanwhile the rabble—who ever desecrate victory and insult the conquered, who to-day drag in the mire their oppressors and to-morrow their liberators—surrounded Vasconcellos’ body, dragging out his beard, putting out his eyes, and foolishly laughing at the infamous jests of a Moorish slave of the victim, who, seated on the corpse, mocked at and execrated him before whom he had trembled when alive. On the following day the body of the unfortunate wretch was yet in the courtyard, and seeing it João Pinto Ribeiro expressed his astonishment that none had shown Christian piety to him who had so cruelly expiated his faults. Some of Ribeiro’s men carried the body away in a skiff.

The duchess of Mantua had already heard the noise, and coming to the window, she cried out in a loud voice: “What is this, Portuguese? Where is your loyalty?” Meanwhile some of the conspirators, having forced open all the doors they had found closed, courteously compelled her to withdraw from the window. She wished to descend to the courtyard, and as the nobles prevented her: “Enough, gentlemen!” she cried, “the guilty minister has already paid for his sins. Go no further, I pledge my word that the king of Castile shall not merely pardon you, but shall thank you for having delivered the kingdom from the excesses of the secretary.” The nobles replied that they no longer recognised any king but Dom João de Braganza. This answer so enraged her that Dom Charles de Noronha begged her to retire before they lost respect for her. “For me!—how?” she inquired haughtily. “By obliging your highness to leave by the window, if you will not go in by this door,” replied the noble in tones equally haughty. Realising that under the circumstances resistance was folly, the princess gave way and withdrew to her oratory.

The nobles dispersed through the town to rouse public enthusiasm with the cry of victory, and in a short time the multitude rushed through the streets drunk with joy. A vast cry arose of “Miracle! miracle!” and from mouth to mouth the report spread, that the arm of the Christ on the crucifix, carried by one of the chaplains, had unnailed itself to bless the people. This incident, which probably had been prepared, produced an enormous effect, exciting the imagination and rousing popular enthusiasm. Many prisoners had been set at liberty, and it was feared that they would commit great acts of vengeance; but on the contrary numerous reconciliations took place of long standing enemies, and not one act of violence occurred throughout the city. At eleven in the morning the town had already peaceably resumed its usual occupations.

Meanwhile the government was careful to take all necessary measures to secure public order, stationing companies of militia at different posts. The fortresses surrendered peaceably and the commander of the galleons at anchor in the Tagus was convinced of the uselessness of bombardment and perhaps feared reprisals.

On the same day, Pedro de Mendonça and Jorge de Mello set out for Villa Viçosa; they found Dom João in the chapel, who having heard the news with calmness, commanded the divine office to be continued. This being concluded, he entered a carriage and set out for Lisbon escorted merely by a few mounted servants, being enthusiastically received in all the towns and lands through which he passed. He reached the capital on the 6th.

The speed with which the revolution spread in the provinces is a proof how eagerly liberty was desired. A few days sufficed for a yoke of sixty years[172] to be thrown off, and the Spanish monarchy, yet powerful, could not resist a disarmed and weak people, to whom invincible energy was lent by the thirst for liberty and the despair born of oppression.[i]

FOOTNOTES

[164] [“The young king was rather German than Portuguese in appearance, with his blue eyes and fair hair and face disfigured by the Habsburg lip, and in his nature there was much of the Teuton dreaminess and love of the marvellous.”—Stephens.[e]]

[165] [La Clède[g] will allow no virtue to Philip, who, he pretends, suddenly approved the enterprise, in the diabolical view of hastening the destruction of his nephew, and profiting by the catastrophe. “Philippe avait fait, de son côté ses réflexions: autant qu’il s’étoit d’abord opposé à l’entreprise que le roi de Portugal méditoit, autant il montra de désir que l’on l’exécutât. Sébastien étoit jeune téméraire, sans enfans: il pourroit périr et alors le Portugal pouvait être réuni à la Castille.”]

[166] By the populace of the kingdom, Sebastian was believed, even in the nineteenth century, to be yet alive, concealed, like Roderic the Goth, or the English Arthur, in some hermit’s cell, or, perhaps, in some enchanted castle until the time of his re-appearance arrives, when he is to restore the glory of his nation. During the aggressions of Bonaparte on the kingdom, his arrival was expected with much anxiety. [The sect of Sebastianistas often rose to cause excitement, and as early as 1763, Lord Tyrawley exclaimed, “What can one possibly do with a nation, one-half of which expects the Messiah and the other half their king, Dom Sebastian, dead two hundred years?”]

[167] [We may omit from the contest the pope, Gregory XIII, who claimed to be heir to a cardinal, and Catherine de’ Medici, who traced back to Alfonso III’s marriage to the countess of Boulogne in the thirteenth century.]

CHIEF CLAIMANTS OF THE PORTUGUESE SUCCESSION

* The first wife of Emmanuel was Isabella, eldest daughter of the Catholic sovereigns, who died in childbed, and was soon followed by her infant son. By Maria, his sister-in-law and his second queen, he had three other children, besides those enumerated in this table, but all died without issue.

† João III had also other children, but as they all died without issue and before him, they need not be enumerated.

[168] [[See the chart of Portuguese successions on page 503.]]

[169] [According to some historians the duke was really as indifferent as he seemed, and it was the ambition of his wife and of his friends that did all the work for him.]

[170] [“This movement reached Villa Viçosa, where the residents changed it to a rebellion, and under cover of the night some of them proclaimed the duke of Braganza, eighth of the title, as João IV king of Portugal. But the time prescribed from centuries had not yet come; the duke sent his son Dom Theodosio, duke de Barcellos, through the streets, and, although he was only four years of age, the light of the great virtues which afterwards distinguished this excellent prince shone in his face, and he became as it were a rainbow of peace, and returned leaving the people pacified, and saved from anxiety the father whom a serious illness prevented from going himself to check the disturbance.”—Menezes.[k]]

[171] [This statement, which was made by Vertot[l] in 1689 and is repeated by many historians, is denounced by Stephens[e] as “absurd,” though the Netherlands offered an easy analogy.]

[172] [This is the period from 1580-1640 which the Portuguese love to call the “Sixty Years’ Captivity.”]