The successful voyages of the Portuguese were soon celebrated throughout Europe, and excited the deepest interest.* With some, they roused a spirit of emulation ; but the Venitians, with the quick-sighted discernment of merchants, early foresaw, and feared that it would prove the ruin of that lucrative branch of commerce with the East, which had contributed so largely to enrich and ag grandise them. Nor were their fears ill founded. The Portuguese did not fail immediately to avail themselves of the route they had discovered to India. The wisdom and prudence of King Emanuel were not more conspicuous in the vigorous and judicious measures adopted at home for monopolizing the commerce of that opulent region, than in his nomination of officers to take the supreme command in Asia; men who, for military and political sagacity, for integrity and love of country, have certainly not been sur passed by persons in similar situations. And their mea sures were not only planned in wisdom, but carried into effect with the greatest activity. In twenty-four years after the voyage of Gama, the Portuguese had rendered themselves masters of Malacca, which was the centre of the trade of the East. They had also formed settlements at Goa and Diu, by which they engrossed the trade of the Malabar coast. In every part of India they were received with respect ; in some they had absolute command; and they thus rapidly diverted from its ancient channels the commerce of India, and were also enabled to import int:). Europe the various productions peculiar to that country in greater abundance than had hitherto been effected. The Venitians now felt that decrease of their Indian trade which they had dreaded. This state of things they were resolved to counteract. And, sensible that their own naval force was inadequate to the task, they incited the Sultan of the Mamelukes to fit out a fleet to attack those unex pected invaders of a monopoly of which he and they had long enjoyed undisturbed possession. But the Portuguese were not unprepared to defend themselves. The formi dable squadron sent out against them they encountered with matchless courage, entirely defeated it, and became more thoroughly masters of the Indian Ocean than be fore. Year after year, they extended their connexion with the East, till they established there a commercial empire of great opulence and extent. And Emanuel, who laid the foundation of it, had the satisfaction of living to see it almost completed. Every part of Europe was supplied by the Portuguese with the productions of the East ; and this quarter of the globe had now little or no intercourse with India, except by the Cape of Good Hope.
Emanuel, who died in 1522, crowned with years and glory, was succeeded by his son John III. a prince who extended his acquisitions in India, colonized the Brazils, and effected some salutary improvements at home. But the praise, to which in other respects he is entitled, is much qualified, if not entirely annulled, by his introduc tion of the inquisition : an event to which, in no mean degree, the rapid subsequent decline of the Portuguese monarchy is to be attributed. From this date, the Portu guese annals are distinguished by nothing that is great or splendid. Sebastian, who succeeded John (1557) was, partly from natural dispositions, and in part from a defect in his education, remarkable for rashness, obstinacy, and want of discrimination. Wishing to distinguish himself
in a war against the infidels, he undertook two crusades into Barbary. For this purpose, he levied large armies, he induced the principal nobility to rally round his stand ard, neglected all domestic and internal improvements, and thus sacrificed the true interests and hopes of his kingdom to personal vanity, and the meanest ambition. And continuing inflexible in his purpose, in opposition to the importunities of his allies and more judicious subjects, he left Lisbon (1578) with a formidable fleet, and having landed in Barbary, was met by Muley Moloch, the Moorish king, and defeated with incredible slaughter, himself slain, and his army either cut off or taken prisoners. By this signal defeat, the kingdom was at once exhausted of men, money, and reputation, and placed in circumstances to be come an easy prey to the ambition or rapacity of any state that might wish to make the attempt. Cardinal Henry, who succeeded Sebastian, only reigned two years; and the male line of the royal family having become extinct, and the kingdom being completely devoid of resources for self-defence, Philip II. the celebrated king of Spain, soon succeeded in adding it to his paternal dominions, though various attempts were made by the people to retain their independence, and though Elizabeth, queen of England, fitted out a fleet to drive Philip from the territories he had so unjustly seized. The Spanish monarch, however, hav ing, in opposition to every obstacle, firmly seated himself on the throne of Portugal, granted his new subjects a form of government and laws, in their spirit and tendency suf ficiently enlightened, but which were afterwards perverted by him and his successors to the great prejudice of Por tugal, which they evidently wished to mould at length into the character and circumstances of a province of Spain. In this situation Portugal long remained in a state of com plete subjection and humiliation at home, and exposed in her colonies, both in India and Brazil, to the inroads of the Dutch, at that time the most enterprising naval power of Europe. This state of things, however, was at length to have an end. Portugal had all along submitted with reluctance to a foreign yoke; the Spanish monarchs showed themselves unworthy of their new acquisition, by the illiberal and tyrannical policy they adopted; and the Portuguese, roused at length by many injuries, and a na tive love of liberty, made a successful insurrection in 1640, expelled the Spaniards from their territories, and conferred the crown on the Duke of Braganza, a descend ant by the female line of the royal family. This revolu tion, which forms so important an era in Portuguese his tory, being the almost unanimous voice of the nation, was attended with little or no effusion of blood. Nor were all the attempts of the king of Spain able to regain posses sion. A fierce war between the two kingdoms raged for many years. Portugal gained several distinguished vic tories; and at length, in 1668, hostilities were terminated in favour of Portuguese independence, through the inter position of Charles II. king of England, who had married a princess of Portugal. For a full and interesting account of this revolution, and the events connected with it, the reader may consult Hist. desRev. de Portugal, par Vertot.