Read Ebook: Don Sebastian; or The house of the Braganza: An historical romance. vol. 1 by Porter Anna Maria

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This proposal De Castro pressed with such earnestness that Sebastian was induced to consider it--there was such an air of sincerity in the whole of that young nobleman's conduct, and his character had hitherto been so irreproachable, that it was impossible even for the passion-blinded King to refuse believing him innocent of wanton insolence. Whatever romantic notions of right and honour might tempt him into the present opposition, it was evident that he rather sought to give his prince time to recollect himself, than finally to thwart his wishes.

Stimulated to convince Don Emanuel that his choice arose not from a temporary gust of passion, Sebastian half-resolved to accept these offered terms, and consent to six months probation. With this view he hastened from the palace of Ribera to that of Xabregas, to communicate the letter to Donna Gonsalva: he found her in the midst of her little court, like the Queen of beauty surrounded by graces and loves. On his entrance the nobles retired, leaving only the prior of Crato, and Donna Sancha Vimiosa.

While the fair Portuguese read De Castro's letter, the blood suddenly forsook her lips and cheeks; she fixed her amazed eyes on Don Antonio, as if unconscious of what they looked on, repeating aloud "for six months!"--at that moment Sebastian forgot his rational resolution; "but we are not to be debarred the society of each other all that time, my Gonsalva!" said he, tenderly kissing her hand.

Gonsalva gazed at him with a mixture of astonishment and apprehension--"already so indifferent!" she exclaimed--"artful De Castro, thou knowest but too well, I fear, how those six months would end!"

"Donna Gonsalva!" cried the prior, with no very respectful roughness, "are you in your senses?--observe the king."

Instantaneously recalled, the beautiful Gonsalva recovered from her extraordinary agitation, and turning to her lover, beheld on his countenance such an expression of grateful surprize and fond regret, then she half sunk into his arms, repeating with the voice of a syren "you will not banish me from happiness for six long months? you will not kill your Gonsalva with fears which your authority may end for ever!"

Sebastian pressed her to him in a transport of love--"what is it you fear!" he exclaimed, "what is it alarms my Gonsalva!"

His charming mistress cast down her eyes abashed, "I fear, without cause perhaps," she said, "yet, you have yourself often remarked, that true tenderness trembles at every delay of what it sighs for.--These six months passed with a relation of the man who calls himself my husband--these six months in which you may be wrought on to abandon me--are so frightful--so sad--alas! how shall I live through them!"

Antonio, who was reading the important letter, now broke in upon Sebastian's soothings: he spoke with peculiar warmth on the weakness of allowing himself to be thus trifled with by an inferior. He could not understand, he observed, any of those romantic notions which his royal master urged in defence of Don Emanuel; but frankly gave it as his opinion that De Castro, so far from being sincere in his promise of resigning the lady in half a year, was more likely to take a base advantage of a husband's authority, and whenever Donna Gonsalva should be removed from her own family, render it impossible for her to return to her lover.

"I am not a deep reasoner, my honoured cousin," added the prior, with his usual good-humoured levity--"but depend on it I see actions as they are; and never am out in men's motives,--shall I tell you what I would do in your majesty's place?--I would flatly refuse this insidious offer, and send the proposer of it back to the Indies: give him the viceroyalty by way of consolation."

"No, nor that either," answered Sebastian, "I will not purchase the silence of an enemy at the expense of my people. If I am to believe De Castro insincere and unworthy, he is not to be trusted with the destinies of thousands."

"Well, you must pardon my zeal, sire!--I would perform a ten year's penance for your sake, and it chafes me into uncharitableness, perhaps, to find a fellow cheating your generous nature with mere breath."

"I know your affectionate heart!" said the King, with one of his benign smiles: then turning to Gonsalva, who had been all this time resting her fair cheek on his shoulder, and moistening it with tears, he besought her to pronounce her will, and it should be obeyed.

"Renew your solicitations at Rome!" she exclaimed, pleasure sparkling in her eyes--"suffer me still to remain at Xabregas with my kind aunt here--and from this hour till the blessed one which makes me yours, refuse to see or hear from Don Emanuel.--Never, never again let me be tortured with his presence."

The King kissed her hand in token of assent; and De Castro's proposal was rejected.

A second embassy was now dispatched under the Count Vimiosa into Italy; while Don Emanuel, wearied with fruitless efforts to see the King again, and secretly supported by many of the nobility, who envied the elevation of the Vimiosas, went himself to Rome to ask for justice at the feet of the pope. His cause was strengthened by the French court, exasperated at the refusal of their alliance with Portugal; and strenuously promoted by the influence of a high Italian family with whom he was connected by blood.--But Sebastian felt secure of success, and intoxicated by the delight of love, could not conceive the possibility of disappointment.

His beautiful idol was now the idol of the people and the nobles; wherever she moved, crowds hung upon her charms; the graces of her air, and the bewitching playfulness of her manner, attracted hearts as well as eyes, and among the young lords who approached the fascination of her accomplishments, scarcely any one preserved himself from the torment of fruitless desires.--This admiration from others, increased the passion, because it flattered the pride of the King; and assured of being exclusively beloved, he no longer blushed to display the excess and tenderness of his feelings.

At length the pope's decision arrived;--Count Vimiosa returned triumphant; De Castro foiled.

Transported with joy, Sebastian flew to impart the tidings to Donna Gonsalva: how was she struck on finding that her father had obtained her lover's suit, only by promising his holiness the performance of an imprudent vow once made by the King to Don Antonio!--that vow would leave her still without perfect security; it would take him into Africa, amidst danger and death!

Donna Gonsalva, soon after, blazing in jewels, and attended by a splendid retinue of pages and ladies, received the compliments of the nobility in the palace of Xabregas.--Everywhere announced as their future queen, her favour was courted, her influence implored: it was no longer Sebastian, but she who ruled in Portugal.

Don Emanuel de Castro shocked at this ascendancy, which it was in vain for him to attempt opposing, retired to the house of a relation in a remote province, where he passed his hours in study and benevolent acts: his name ceased to be spoken of at court, and even his remembrance shortly wore out of the minds of the courtiers.

The prior of Crato, enflamed with the same ardour, and sanctioned by the title of a religious war, accompanied his royal cousin in these progresses, liberally offering his revenues and retainers to aid and support the cause:--he was to make one in the formidable expedition; a circumstance highly agreeable to the King, who loved his enlivening talents, and was accustomed to talk with him of Gonsalva.

But the glory of their little army consisted in one gallant stranger, Sir Thomas Stukeley of England.--This brave adventurer had left his native country from the restlessness of a disordered but fine mind, and hearing of Sebastian's intended attack upon the Moors, came to offer his services at the head of a band of noble Italians.

The chivalric romance of Stukeley captivated our youthful hero; he found in him that ardour of enterprize, and those unquenchable hopes, which he had hitherto believed his own peculiar property. While they conversed together, both burned with the same fire; prudential calculations were equally despised by each; danger only, possessed charms for them, and success, unless torn from the arms of destruction, was to them destitute of honour.

Stukeley's reason had once been rudely assaulted by a domestic calamity; and though it still remained uninjured in the eyes of most men, deeper observers beheld a lamentable chasm in his once perfect mind:--an exuberance of imagination had usurped the place of the reasoning faculty; while his heart, true to its nature and to its habits, fed this imagination with visions of exalted but often hazardous virtue.

The wild inspiration of his countenance, breathing goodness and greatness, never suggested to Sebastian the idea of an unsettled intellect: what might have appeared feverish ravings in another, were sublimed by the magnificent eloquence of Stukeley into theories of god-like excellence, and heroic exploit.--The young monarch listened to these effusions till their magic transformed impossibilities into certainties: hitherto his character impelled others; now, it was impelled in its turn, and borne with resistless force before the mighty character of Stukeley.

With such a coadjutor, the King of Portugal was enabled to give an additional impulse to the martial spirit of his kingdom, Stukeley was a zealous catholic like himself, and the destruction of the infidels was equally the object of his wishes.

An opportunity of prosperously invading Africa, now presented itself. One of the Moorish princes who had been dethroned by his uncle Muley Moloch, King of Fez, Morocco, and Tarradunt, after vainly soliciting the aid of Mahometan courts, came as a suppliant to Portugal: he pleaded his rights and his distress; offering the monarch in lieu of assistance, several valuable territories along the sea-coast.

Sebastian's zeal for the extension of Christianity would not suffer him to be contented with a mere accession of territory: he dictated new terms; stipulating for the half of whatever was re-conquered, and for the enlargement of every Christian found enslaved amongst the Moors. But the leading article in their treaty was an agreement that no Christian hereafter should be forced into the profession of Mahometanism, and that the Emperor of Morocco should make a law for this purpose, under the penalty of death to any of his subjects who should disobey.

On completing this compact with the Moor, and receiving some mercenaries from Germany and Flanders, the King called a general assembly of his nobles and ministers.--After eloquently detailing his motives for taking arms, and the advantages likely to result from it to all Christendom, he proceeded to say, that he convened his council, not to ask their advice, but to instruct them in his aim, and to receive their concurrence. He called God to witness, that his first and dearest aim was the preservation of unnumbered souls who now groaned under the sinful yoke of a detestable religion, and perhaps wanted only to live under a Christian government, and be taught by Christian teachers, to awake from their delusion: he pathetically painted the miseries of his captive countrymen to whom the Portuguese arms were about to give freedom: he then commented on the political advantage of acquiring a maritime frontier in Africa for the protection of their trade with the gold coast; and lastly, he avowed a strong desire for honorable distinction. His impetuous youth here dwelt delighted, and laid claim to some indulgence for this last infirmity of noble minds: he finished an animated confession of that infirmity, by these words from Cicero.

This speech produced very different effects upon his hearers: the younger were already converts to his opinion; but the old and experienced, who had lived long enough in the world to foresee the probable termination of this military romance, received their King's determination sorrowfully. Each, in private, endeavoured to persuade him of the impracticability of subduing Africa with a handful of men, unsupported by foreign succours, and depending for their safety in a great measure on the good faith of an infidel ally: they expatiated upon the exhaustless numbers of the Moors, and their knowledge of their own country, where he, would fight upon ground he knew little of, where in the event of a defeat he might be so bewildered as not to get back to his transports, and must consequently resign his troops either to starvation or captivity.

Similar arguments were pressed on him by the ambassadors of foreign courts; but they served only to inflame the courage of Sebastian, and to exasperate him against their masters, those cautious monarchs who proved themselves nominal sons of the church, since they would not contribute one detachment towards his enterprize. His uncle too, the Cardinal Henry, opposed the expedition, and aided by the foreboding lamentations of the Queen dowager, frequently agitated their rash kinsman by unavailing remonstrances.

Sebastian listened respectfully to each; but, seduced into the belief of being born for the destruction of Mahometanism, persevered in his resolution.

To the enchantments of Donna Gonsalva he continually turned from these vexations: her wit enlivened him, her syren voice soothed the most turbulent emotions of his soul, and his unsated eyes found ceaseless delight in following the graceful varieties of her face and figure: yet Sebastian had a void in his heart; a something unfilled, unsatisfied, which he placed to the account of the imperfection of human felicity. Donna Gonsalva was exquisite in person and mind; she certainly loved him, but her love did not meet either the delicacy or the intensity of his: her feelings were obtuse in those trifles to which sensibility is tremblingly alive: she would often pursue her own sprightly pleasures with such eager forgetfulness of him, as to mortify and displease him. Two or three times he had entered her apartments at Xabregas in the bitterness of a spirit traversed and exhausted by political disappointments, and she had not observed it: his watchful passion was never one moment insensible to the slightest variation of its object; not even the mist of an unpleasant thought could shade that heaven of beauty, without disturbing his repose--and she--yes she, often saw him agitated or depressed, without observation.

It was at these periods that Sebastian acknowledged the torments and the omnipotence of love: he saw a defect in his idol, yet he worshipped her still.

But what could he desire more than to be loved with all the powers of her soul? if that soul wanted some of the energy of his, was it not her misfortune rather than her fault? his reason assented to this, though his heart frequently burst out into fond complaints which Gonsalva silenced by the warmest assurance of preference. Under the immediate impression of his grief, she would lose no opportunity of evincing her tenderness, and then Sebastian's transports would return: but attentions which do not flow spontaneously from a natural softness, seldom are lasting; Donna Gonsalva would soon forget her lover's character, because her own was of a lighter stamp, and gay thoughtlessness uniformly succeeded a short solicitude.

This perpetual inconsideration deeply wounded the King; for a lover like him, expected to throb in every pulse of her heart. Racked with repeated mortifications, that perhaps owed their existence to an impassioned fastidiousness "which I beseech ye, call a godly sin"--he looked anxiously towards the hour of his departure from Portugal, secretly hoping to endear himself by danger, or at least to rouse some of those sensibilities which were as wholly concealed now by ceaseless gaiety, as when no anxieties existed to call them forth.

Don Antonio was ever Gonsalva's advocate; sometimes rallying, and sometimes more seriously reproving his royal cousin for pampering a sickly sensitiveness, which thus poisoned life's chief blessing.

Sir Thomas Stukely, ignorant of his illustrious friend's discontent, unconsciously increased it; for one night in a walk among the gardens of Ribera, under the boundless and starry heavens, he poured into the attentive ear of Sebastian, the story of his early life: that story, though it might be comprised in a single incident, was deeply interesting to the young King, whose heart, penetrated with one affection, delighted to sympathize with every other; yet he listened sadly, for he thought the more of Gonsalva's temperate feelings.

The untimely death of a brother, long and justly beloved, had driven Stukely a wanderer from his country: that brother's character, made up of every estimable and endearing quality; his fraternal love "exceeding the love of women," were depicted in the heart-wringing language of a regret increasing with time.

"We lived in our native Devonshire," continued Stukely, "far from the excitements and the temptations of a court; ignorant of any mortal happiness beyond each others deserved encomiums. One fatal day, hunting among the woods round Illfracombe--my erring spear--I cannot describe it!--this brother, dearer to me than existence, this soul of my wretched life, fell through a disastrous accident by my hand!--But he died with forgiveness on his lips--he died kissing the hand that smote him!"--

Stukely's voice assumed a fearful hollowness as he spoke the last words, his eyes rolled back upon themselves, and his pale countenance expressed the extremity of despair; but the next moment rapture illumined him, and he wildly resumed--

"Oft in the dead of night his voice I hear, Like harp angelic, bidding me rejoice, Not weep his fate; for now he dwells in bliss, High, full, seraphic, far transcending all That heart of man can image, and with eye Cleared from its mortal dross, beholds the end Of human suff'ring; weeps no more the woes Of fellow dust, but sees unnumbered crowds, Multitudes vast--of ev'ry race and tint-- Dreaming of pain awhile, but to awake In beatific and eternal Heaven!"

Accustomed to hear his friend converse by snatches in a strain resembling poetry, Sebastian made no remark on this momentary rhapsody: Stukeley paused awhile, and then continued:

"After the loss of my brother, I know not what strange calamity fell on me. I sometimes think I could not have been in my right mind. Memory retains a confused notion of my having once formed a visionary project of colonizing Florida, then but newly discovered, erecting over it the sovereignty of an order still purer and more self-denying than the orders of Jerusalem and Malta: I can recollect displeasing the young queen Elizabeth with my romantic ambition. At length, when my intellect recovered its cruel shock, I found myself in a court, filled with the professors of a new religion; it was impossible for me to stay, even to hear their doctrines. I passed from England to Ireland, from Ireland to Italy, sorrowing and self-condemned for my involuntary crime; there, my arms have been constantly employed against the enemies of our holy church. This wandering warfare; this renunciation of home, country, and kindred, is the penance to which I have condemned myself: may it tend to expiate my guilt!--My grief it cannot cure." Again Stukeley mused awhile, and again he abruptly added, "'Tis a distinguished privilege to die in defence of the sacred cross! I swear never to abandon it! We will plant the blessed banner on every mosque in Morocco, or perish in the attempt."

Gladly seizing the last subject suggested by Stukeley, Sebastian forbore to comment on the melancholy commencement of their discourse, leading him to talk of the meditated war, of which religion formed the only basis.

Public affairs now hastened to a crisis: the armament was complete, and the fleet equipped; the Pope had transmitted his blessing, with a present exceeding in value that of the consecrated rose: it was an arrow which had pierced the side of St. Sebastian!

In their armour and field accoutrements, the nobility displayed infinite splendour; and as desolated Portugal could not furnish many private soldiers, the troops composed chiefly of gentlemen volunteers, seemed but a gallant shew of accomplished knights.

The royal-standard was carried in procession through the streets of Lisbon, to receive the benediction of the archbishop; it was then delivered into the hand of the Marquis Villa-real, and the army marshalled around it.

After this august ceremony, the troops prepared to embark, while his officers and men were exchanging adieus with wives, sisters, and parents, Sebastian hurried to take leave of Donna Gonsalva: she had for some days yielded to an excess of grief, and had shut herself up from all society. At sight of her royal lover clad in the shining livery of war, she flung herself into his arms with tears and cries; distracted at the possibility of eventually losing him either by death or changed sentiments, she wildly expressed a wish to become his by a secret, but binding tie.

Sebastian pressed her to his breast in a tumult of tender delight, "dearest treasure of my life!" he exclaimed, covering her fair brow with kisses, "at this moment your Sebastian is blest to the utmost extent of his fantastic desires.--Ah, Gonsalva! why have I ever believed you indifferent, or incapable of exquisite love? be assured I go now, confident of possessing your heart; I go to conquer for your sake, to return worthy of you, covered with the spiritual dew of heaven, its blessing and the blessings of millions:--but ask me not to forfeit my right to this dear hand, by evading the conditions upon which it has been awarded to me; I have promised our holy father to engage in an expedition against the infidels--successful or unsuccessful, I will return to Portugal, and either share my glory with you, or--perish the possibility of mischance!" Donna Gonsalva now redoubled her tears and her endearments; and tying round his neck a picture of herself, conjured him to remember that her existence was interwoven with his own.

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