1420. Discovery of Madeira.

1432. Discovery of the Açores.

The Infante D. Henrique lays the foundation of the maritime greatness of
Portugal.

1433. D. Duarte, "the Eloquent."

1436. Battle of Tangere; defeat of the Portuguese: captivity and martyrdom of the Infante D. Fernando.

1438. D. Affonso V., "the African."

D. Pedro, Duke of Coimbra, Regent.

Civil war between the King and the Regent.

1449. Battle of Alfarrobeira: defeat and death of D. Pedro.

Rise of the House of Bragança.

African conquests extended.

Affonso resigns and re-assumes the crown.

1481. D. João II., "the Perfect."

The feudal system gradually weakened.

Conspiracies against D. João.

1483. The Duke of Bragança beheaded; the Duke of Viseu stabbed by the King.

Conquests in Guinea.

1487. The Cape doubled by Bartolomeo Dias.

1490. D. João drinks of a poisoned fountain. 1491. Death of the Infante D. Affonso.

HOUSE OF VISEU.

1495. D. Manoel, "the Fortunate."

1497. Vasco da Gama discovers India.

1501. Pedro Alvares Cabral discovers Brazil.

1509 Affonso Albuquerque Viceroy of India: rapid conquests there by the Portuguese; Goa made its capital.

1513. Conquests in Africa.

1521. D. João III., "the Pious."

Portugal attains the height of its glory.

The Indian empire increases; that in Africa declines.

Towards the end of this reign Portugal passes the highest limits of its power. 1557. D. Sebastian, "the Regretted." The Infante Cardinal Henrique Regent. 1574. First expedition to Africa.

1578. Second expedition. Sebastian and Muley Hamet advance against Muley Moluc, Emperor of Morocco.

August 4th. Battle of Alcacer Quibir: defeat and death of D. Sebastian; utter destruction of the Portuguese army. Portugal never recovers the blow.

The Cardinal King Henrique, "the Chaste."

Negotiations respecting the succession.

1580. The Cardinal King dies.

The succession disputed by Philip II. of Spain; Antonio, Prior of Crato; João,
Duke of Bragança; Emanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy; the Prince of
Parma; Elizabeth of England; and the Pope.

The claimants resolve themselves into Philip of Spain and the Prior of Crato.
The Duke of Alva invades Portugal.

Accession of Philip.

CASTILIAN USURPATION, CALLED BY THE PORTUGUESE "THE SIXTY YEARS' CAPTIVITY."

1580. Philip I. (Second of Spain), "the Prudent."

Various impostors give themselves out as D. Sebastian.
Rapid decline of the Portuguese empire.

1598. Philip II. (Third of Spain)," the Idle."

The Dutch ruin the Portuguese empire in Asia, and conquer nearly the whole

of Brazil.

1621. Philip III. (Fourth of Spain), "the Rei Olivares," or "desditoso."

1640. Conspiracy at Lisbon for the emancipation of Portugal. The Duke of Bra gança heads it.

December 1st. The Spanish government compelled to leave Lisbon. D. João of Bragança arrives there.

HOUSE OF BRAGANÇA,

1640. D. João IV., " the Restorer."

Portuguese India and Brazil expel the Spaniards.
War with Spain.

1644. Battle of Montijo; the Spaniards defeated.

The Portuguese kingdom gradually re-established.

The Pope refuses bulls for the consecration of the Portuguese bishops, through fear of offending Spain. One prelate alone survives.

1656. D. Affonso VI., "the Victorious." The Dutch expelled from Brazil, The Spaniards defeated at

1659. The lines of Elvas;

1663. Ameixial;

1665. Montes Claros.

The King, from indulging his passions, loses his senses, and is deposed. 1667. D. Pedro Regent, and succeeds

1683. as D. Pedro II., "the Pacific."

Spain renounces all claims ou Portugal.

1706. D. João V., surnamed "the Magnanimous." Lisbon made a Patriarchate.

Erection of Mafra.

D. José," the Most Faithful."

1755. November 1st. The great earthquake.

1758. Conspiracy (?) of the Duke of Aveiro.

Reforms of the Marquis de Pombal; the Jesuits expelled.

1777. Dona Maria I.: marries her uncle D. Pedro III.

1799. The Queen loses her senses: the Infante D. João Regent.

1307. Napoleon proclaims that the House of Bragança has ceased to reign: the Court

escapes to Brazil.

The Peninsular war.

1816. D. João VI.

The King resides in Brazil.

1820. The Constitution proclaimed. He arrives in Portugal, and accepts it.

He surrenders Brazil to the Infante D. Pedro.

1826. D. Pedro IV.

He resigns Portugal to his daughter.

Dona Maria II., "Da Gloria."

Civil war.

1827. D. Miguel proclaimed King at Lisbon.

1832. The Duke of Terceira's expedition from the Açores. D. Miguel's troops every

where defeated.

1833. Sir Charles Napier annihilates his fleet; on which

Dona Maria II. is acknowledged Queen by England and France.

1834. Convention of Evora Monte; D. Miguel resigns the kingdom, Continual outbreaks for a modification of the Constitution.

1853. D. Pedro V. under the Regency of his father, the King-Consort, D. Fernando.

§ 11. THE SEBASTIANISTS.

Any Handbook for Portugal would be incomplete without some account of the most extraordinary superstition that ever prevailed in any civilised nation that of the Sebastianists. When the Portuguese army had been destroyed in the fatal battle of Alcacer Quibir, it became a question of the deepest interest to the captives what was the fate of the king. One Sebastian de Resende, a groom of the chambers to D. Sebastian, affirmed that he had seen the body of his royal master on the field of battle; and having obtained permission from the Xarife to search for it, discovered it, as he said. Belchior do Amaral, a page of the late king's, was convinced of its identity it was agreed that it should be ransomed, and in the mean time it was provisionally committed to the ground in the house of one Abraen Sufiane at Alcacer. But it was never ransomed, and therefore the probability is that it could never be authenticated. It is certain that, for some time after the news of the battle had reached Portugal, Cardinal Henrique assumed the reins of government merely as regent. After the accession of Philip of Castile, the belief that D. Sebastian was not really dead seemed to grow every day stronger; some affirmed that he was in his native country, watching its miseries, and waiting till the proper moment should come for its deliverance; some would have it that he was confined in the dungeons of Madrid; some that he was a prisoner in Africa; but all agreed that, sooner or later, he would reascend the throne, and raise Portugal to a height of glory which she had never yet reached. No wonder that several impostors appeared, who claimed to be the veritable Sebastian. The earliest of these were undoubtedly mere adventurers; but, in 1598, twenty years after the battle of Alcacer, a personage appeared at Venice whose fate is shrouded in far deeper mystery. His appearance answered exactly, due allowance being made for lapse of time, to that of the king; he had one or two moles, with which it was remembered that D. Sebastian had been marked; he related all particulars of the battle; he was acquainted with the size and value of the different crown jewels, and is said to have affirmed, what examination proved to be true, that on the reverse of the stone set in a ring given by D. Sebastian to the Marchioness of Medina Coeli such and such marks would be found. The strongest testimony in his favour is the persuasion of D. João de Castro, who had fought in the battle of Alcacer, that this was the true king. account given by the pretender, if pretender he were, was that, on being cured of his wounds, he had returned to Portugal, had determined on leading a life of penitence for the misery to which he had reduced his country, and had afterwards been induced, for the purpose of more completely escaping notice, to visit the East, where he had long been engaged in the service of the Shah of Persia. Not the least remarkable circumstance in the history of this person is, that his eventual fate is unknown. Some say that he was condemned to the galleys for life as an impostor, some that he made his escape from Venice and was never afterwards heard of. But long after the time when it is certain that D. Sebastian must have ceased to live, the belief in his re-appearance still continued. During the Castilian usurpation it was fostered by the partisans of the House of Bragança, well aware that they never could have a rival in the deceased monarch, while a belief in his existence served to strengthen the feeling of

The

Portuguese nationality. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the Sebastianists had their prophets, of whom one Bandarra, a shoemaker, was the greatest. The delusion was not confined to the lower classes; it was held by all ranks, and prevailed widely even amongst the clergy. The government had sense enough not to persecute so harmless a delusion, and even the Inquisition interfered no further than to prohibit the publication of Bandarra's prophecies. At the period of the French invasion it may safely be affirmed that more than half of the nation were Sebastianists. They believed that the Encoberto, the Hidden One, as he was called, was concealed in an island, never yet discovered, to the south-west of Cape S. Vincent, and the year of his return was fixed from a mystical interpretation of the Portuguese arms, assisted by a prophecy of Bandarra's. The latter ran thus:

"Pôe dois ós um sobre outro,

E pôe lhe outro á direita,
Pôe outro como o primeiro,
Ahi tens a conta feita."

And this was explained to mean 1808. Accordingly in that year all kinds of reports were prevalent with respect to the return of the king. Some had seen the secret island with the naked eye; some had actually discovered with a telescope the quay from which Sebastian was to embark; an infant of three months old had spoken at Lisbon, and announced his return; an egg was sent round on which the letters were to be read, V D SRD P, which were interpreted Viva Dom Sebastião Rei de Portugal, and it was unhesitatingly believed to be a miraculous attestation of the monarch's approach. So strong was the belief, that Junot, then in Lisbon, thought it necessary to alter the name of the Portuguese man-of-war, the D. Sebastião. Thirty years ago it was reckoned that one Portuguese out of three was a Sebastianist, but the belief has, since that time, very much died away, and is now chiefly confined to the wildest mountain-districts in Portugal, though in Brazil it still remains in greater force. The writer, no long time ago, had half an hour's conversation with a farmer of the upper class whose faith remained unshaken. He affirmed stoutly that on Wednesday in some Holy Week such a fog would overspread Lisbon and the mouth of the Tagus as had never been before known; that on Good Friday it would suddenly be dispersed by a brilliant and miraculous light; that on its clearing off, the fleet of D. Sebastian would be seen entering the Tagus from the secret island; that the king would instantly resign his crown, and would be rewarded by the first place in the state; that then D. Sebastian would re-ascend the throne, and would not only restore Portugal to all its ancient glory, but would make it the head of an universal empire. "And this," he continued, "though you do not believe it now, you and I shall both live to see."

§ 12.-WORKS ON PORTUGAL.

The history of Portugal has been so little studied in England that it may not be amiss to give a list of some of its most classical works on the subject. For Portugal itself, Bernardo de Brito, in his Monarchia Lusitana, the authenticity of which, however, is a subject of considerable doubt; his various continuers, Antonio Brandão, Francisco Brandão, and

others; the Portuguese translation of M. de la Clede's history, which corrects many mistakes of the original work; Antonio de Lemos, Historia de Portugal, 20 volumes 12mo., Lisbon, 1786 to 1804; Alexandre Herculano, Historia de Portugal, of which four volumes only have appeared, and which, notwithstanding the historical scepticism of the author, will no doubt be the best history. Almost every particular reign has its own annalist; among them, Ruy de Pina, Fernando de Menezes, Damião de Goes, Francisco d'Andrade, and Luiz de Sousa (whose Annaes del Rey João III. have lately been edited by Herculano) are most esteemed. For Portuguese India, Lopez de Castanheda (Discovery and Conquest), João de Barros (Decads), Diogo do Couto (Decads), Jacinto Freire d'Andrade, Life of the Viceroy João de Castro; and, for the later history, Antonio de Murilles and João da Costa. For Brazil, Cristovão de Gouvea and Francisco Solano Constancio, in their respective histories; Duarte de Albuquerque Coelho (History of the Expulsion of the Dutch). For the other conquests, Pedro de Cintra (Navegação a Guinéa); Álvares d'Almada (Trattados dos Reinos de Guinéa e Cabo Verde); Fernando de Menezes (Historia de Tangere). Proceeding to ecclesiastical histories, we may mention-of the Benedictines, Antonio Yepez (Chronicas de San Bento, 7 volumes folio), and Sandoval (Fundações de S. Bento). For the Augustinian Hermits, Hieronimo Romano in his Chronicles, and Luiz dos Anjos, in his Jardim de Portugal. For the Cistercians, Bernardo de Brito, in his Chronica de Cister, which is a Portuguese classic. For the Franciscans, Marcos de Lisboa. On the Portuguese Dominicans the standard work is the Historia de S. Domingos particular do Reino e das Conquistas de Portugal; por Fr. Luiz Cacegas; Reformada por Fr. Luiz de Sousa, in three small folio volumes, Lisbon, 1662 to 1668; and the continuation by Fr. Lucas de Santa Catarina, Lisboa Occidental, 1733. A more common though inferior edition is that of Lisbon, 1767. Luiz de Mertola supplies the history of the Portuguese Carmelites in his Frutos de Esmola. Fr. Lucas de Montoya has written a history of the Minims. Baltazar Tellez has left annals of the Jesuits in Portugal till the death of S. Ignatius Loyola, Lisbon, 1645, 2 volumes folio. The Agiologio Lusitano of George Cardoso is a very valuable work. The first three volumes in folio appeared at Lisbon respectively in 1652, 1657, and 1666; a fourth, edited by Caetano de Sousa, in 1744, since which time the work has remained unfinished, and probably, since the suppression of monasteries, could not be completed. It is a calendar of such Portuguese as have been distinguished for sanctity or eminence. A short Life of each is given in the text; then follows a commentary, enriched with the most copious ecclesiastical information as to the foundation of monasteries, and the succession of prelates, &c.: each volume contains two months. The general reader, however, will probably be satisfied with a work entitled Das Ordens Religiosas em Portugal, por Pedro Diniz, Lisbon, 1853. It is published by Silva, Rua dos Calafates, No. 80, and is well worth reading.

As to the antiquities of Portugal, the standard work is that of Resende, Libri quatuor de Antiquitatibus Lusitania a L. Andrea Resendio olim inchoati, et a Jacobo Menaetio Vasconcello recogniti atque absoluti, Evora, 1593, 1 volume folio. The Mappa de Portugal Antigo e Moderno, by João Bautista de Castro, of which the second and best edition was published at Lisbon in 1763, in 3 volumes small quarto, is a most valuable