publique thanks to be given and Te Deum to be sung in all Churches Hopes to revenge the late defeat given by the Lord Therimicourt and desire to do some valiant act before he departed from his Government made the Marquess of Leganez governour of the Spanish forces at Estramadura give an Alarum to the Portuguese Frontiers and enter into the Country with two thousand horse and 6000 foot but the valiant Count of St. Laurence assaulting him forced him to retire with shame and excuse himself that he marched out onely to meet the Marquess of Mortare who was appointed to succeed him in the Government Yet this small and worthless Alarum made the King of Portugal who knew that too much care could not be had of the safety of his Kingdom to send Orders to the Governors to look more exactly to the countries committed to their charges then formerly and strictly to give charge to Don Iuan de Menezez Governour of Porto The Viscount Ponte de Lima Governour of the countries between Douro and Mimbo to the Count of Arogna Governor of Trasmontes and Don Roderigo de Castro Governour of Beira to repair with all expedition to their several Commands Nor was his Majesty less careful of his dominions abroad then of those neer home which made him dispatch the Baron of Alviro to be Governour of Tanger and D. Franciso De Norogna to Mazagan both strong Forts in Africa the last of which had been neer surprized by the Moors of Barbary but the Commander of that party which assaulted it being slain by a valorous French-man they were beaten off with loss for which service the King bestowed upon the French-man a pension of six hundred Crowns per annum And whilst His Majesty was distributing his bounties he could not forget the Lady Dona Maria Manuel widdow to the some-time before deceased D. Antonio Coello D. Caravallio who had ever since His Majesties coming to the Crown been one of His Privy-Councellors and was one of the chief persons that went Ambassadors into France to renew the Alliance and conclude a firm League between the King of Portugal and Lewis the thirteenth King of France His Majesty therefore in consideration of his services bestowed a valuable pension on his aforesaid widdow There was almost dayly inroads made upon the Frontiers in some places or other amongst the rest the Baron of Themericourt entred with a strong party into the Spanish Territories surprized the Suburbs of the City of Albuquerque and brought away a very rich booty without the loss of so much as one souldier upon the place and not above twenty wounded The succor of the distressed Subjects of the more distressed King of England about the year 1650. gave occasion to the King of Portugal to manifest his affection to the English Nation which he did by giving assistance to the gallant Prince Rupert who being by His Majesty of England made Admiral of those few ships which in the year 1648. returned to their Allegiance had ever since been pursued by the more poâ—ent Fleets of the English Rebels and was now by them driven to seek the protection of his Portugal Majesty who notwithstanding that the Fleet of the Rebels with threatning Bravado's demanded the said Kings leave either to assault them in his port or to force them to come out bravely protected them under his Castles In revenge of which the Rebels of England who stiled themselves a Parliment proclaimed an open War with the Portugal Nation which His Majesty notwithstanding his great engagement at that present both against the Spaniards at home and the Hollanders on the other side the Line resolved to endure rather then deliver up the faithful Subjects of England into the hands of Murther Tyranny and Treason and therefore in part to cry quittance with the English who had taken Prize several Ships belonging to this Nation he made seizure of all the English Ships and goods within his whole dominions but onely those he had before protected But at length Prince Rupert finding a clear passage from out his ports where he had for many months been blocked up the King by reason of his other large expences in defence of his Kingdom finding himself unable to maintain a War against the English and nature dictating us to the preservation of our selves resolved more moved out of necessity then inclination to send an Agent into England to conclude a peace The person deputed to go on this unpleasant imployment viz to court Rebels was D. Suarez de Gimeraines who had for his assistance and interpreter Mr. Myles and English Merchant these two embarqued upon a Hamburger hired for that purpose by the King of Portugal arrived in England in Ianuary 1650. About the beginning of Feburary D. Suarez had audience before a Committee of the pretended Parliament to whom he made a Speech in Latine to this effect THe Serenissimo King of Portugal my Master sends me hither to the Parliament of the Commonwealth of England that on his behalf and in his name having first most friendly saluted you as I now do with the greatest affection of my heart that I am able I may joyntly tender and make known to you the Royal desire which my Master feels within himself to conserve and more and more to knit the knot of that Amity which uninterrupted hath ever been between the Serenissimo Kings of Portugals their Ancestors and this renowned English Nation It being my part to endeavor what lies in me to remove all obstacles that may hinder the most vigorous effect of this hearty union and conjunction of minds so to preserve inviolably the ancient peace between us This I come to continue hoping and wishing all happy success therein this I come to intimate and offer unto the Parliament of the Commonwealth of England with that sincere and pristine affection which hitherto the experience of many ages hath made manifest Nor shall you need to scruple the sincerity of my intention and purpose by reason of the divers past attempts not to say fights between your power and ours since they have not been such as have broken or dissolved our amity nor have had their rise or approbation from the King my Master nor as we believe from the Parliament of the Commonwealth of England but more probably carried on either by the impulse of their own private affections or by the defect of that circumspection which in such cases is ever necessary But as I hope particularly and fully to prove indeed to demonstrate this truth unto the Parliament of the Republique of England so I am assured they will not onely rest satisfied therein but shall also have accruing to them a newer force and sence of mutual friendship between us since the jarrs that happen amongst friends are oftentimes justly accounted as certain redintigrations of love And I do admire our enemies have not made this reflection whilst fed with vain hope they have thought it in their power to sow and
and that as he had in a moment gained that kingdom so he should as soon loose it if he should but give them the least opportunity For that the people were highly discontented might easily appear by their attentive listning after old prophesies among which was one of an old Hermit who told Alphonso the first King of Portugal of the great victory that he should obtain over the five Kings of the Moors that he and his posterity should reign happily King of Portugal but that in the sixteenth generation his line should fail but that God at length should have mercy again upon them and restore them Others had respect to a Letter written by St. Bernard to the same King Alphonso the original of which is reported to have been given to the Portugal Embassadors by Lewis the Thirteenth King of France Anno 1641. the substance of which was to this effect That he rendred thanks to him for the Lands bestowed upon him that in recompence thereof God had declared unto him that there should not fail a Native of Portugal to sit upon that Throne unless for the greatness of their sins God would chastise them for a time but that this time of Chastisement should not last above sixty years Other Prophesies there were of this nature and to this effect which put the people in hopes of a Deliverance and many of them flattered themselves that Don Sebastian was yet alive and would come and deliver them nay so foolish were some of them that though they believed him slain at the battel of Alcazar in Barbary yet they thought he should live again and miraculously come to redeem them But that which most of all expressed the peoples Discontents was what was publickly spoken by the mouthes of their Orators the Priests in their Pulpits who would ordinarily in their Sermons utter speeches much in prejudice of the Spaniards Title and in favor of the Dutchess of Braganza nor were they sparing to do so in the presence of the King himself who would therefore often say That the Portuguez Clergy had made the sharpest war with him Father Lewis Alvarez a Jesuite preaching one day before the Vice-Roy took his Text Surge tolle Grabatum tuum ambula and turning himself to the Duke said Sir the meaning of that is Arise take up your pack and be gone home But above all this might the Discontents be perceived in the Noblemens Chappels especially in the Duke of Braganza's where they were wont to sing the Lamentations of Ieremy applying all the scorn and reproach of the Israelites to themselves as Aquam nostram pecunia bibimus because of the Excize put by the Spaniards upon Wine and other necessaries And that Servi Dominati sunt in nos and that Cecidit Corona Capitis nostri most commonly ending with this Invocation Recordare Domine Quid acciderit nobis Intuere respice opprobrium nostrum Haereditas nostra versa est ad alienos Yet did king Phillip bear all these Affronts with an incomparable patience dissembling with an admirable prudence his passion if he had any for these Discontents for he knew the onely way to win this Nation to an obedience and complyance must be lenity at first what ever he intended to practice afterwards and that he had by his exact keeping of his Word and Oath won much upon this people appears in that during his whole Reign and the Reign of his Successor Philip the Third who followed his fathers foot-steps though not with that craft and dissimulation they made no attempts nor were inclinable to a Revolt which the ensuing Story will evidence Don Antonio Prior of Crato the base born son of Lewis the Infante who had by the tumultuary Rabble on the Death of King Henry been elected King being expulsed Lisbon by the Forces of the Duke D' Alva fled from thence into France to the protection of that Queen who in regard that her Claim was exploded both by the Spaniard and the Portugal as an outworn Title and injurious to all the kings of Portugal ever since as unjust Possessors had long endeavored to excite Queen Elizabeth of England against the Spaniard and to forewarn her and other Princes to beware of his increasing power who now enriched with the addition of Portugal East-India and many Isles in the Atlantique sea might in time overshadow all his neighboring Princes and therefore advising that it behooved them to think of some way to curb his Ambition betimes and restrain his too far extending Power into some reasonable limits Which advice of hers Queen Elizabeth easily listned too being always providently careful of her own and her Subjects safety fore-seeing how dangerous the over-swelling Power of that Prince would be both to Her and her Dominions and therefore though she then entred not into a present War with him yet when Don Antonio came over to her with Recommendations from the French Queen she bountifully relieved him which she then thought she might do without offence considering that she acknowledged him her Kinsman descended of the Blood Royal of England and of the House of Lancaster nor was there ever any promise made in any League between the English and Spaniard that the Portugals should not be received into England Here then Don Antonio resided till the Wars breaking forth between Spain and England after the Spaniard had received that notable Overthrow of his Invincible Armado to whose power and puissance the whole World thought England would have been but a morsel Queen Elizabeth judging it more honorable to assail her Enemy then again to be assailed by him suffered a Fleet to be set forth against Spain which Sir Iohn Norris and Sir Francis Drake with some other private persons to their eternal honor rigged and set out at their own charge requiring nothing of the Queen but some few Ships of War and she granted to them that the Ships and spoils taken should be divided amongst them The Hollanders likewise to this Fleet joyned some Ships so that the number of the whole Fleet was about eleven thousand Soldiers and fifteen hundred Mariners With this Fleet Don Antonio with some few Portugals set Sayl out of England having before loaden the English with great promises of the recovery of this kingdom assuring them that the Portugueses would be ready upon his appearance to revolt from the Spainiard and that Muley Hamet King of Morocco would assist him with twenty thousand men The first place that the English Fleet put into was the Groyne in Gallicia the base town of which they easily took but attempting the higher town were twice repulsed and forced to raise their siege upon advice that the Condy di Andrada had gathered Forces at Burges Bridge and that the Condy di Altamira was coming with more purposing to besiege them in the base town and so cut off their way to their ships which Norris resolved to prevent and therefore with a sufficient force marched against them overthrew them and had
great importance and they endeavored to explain to his Eminence what was before his sentiment that it very much imported the two Crowns of France and Portugal to be united by an indissoluble League considering that it was the chief and principal end and aim of the House of Austria whose branches were spread over almost all Europe not onely to be the greatest but to be the sole and onely Monarch of Christendom That to effect those ambitious desires he had never made scruple to usurp and seize upon Kingdoms and States upon the least pretences imaginable as had appeared in the kingdoms of Naples Sicily Navarre the Dutchy of Millan and lately several States in Germany seizing upon the Valtoline whereby they had a passage open to lead an Army of Germans into Italy at pleasure That considering the vast power and interest that this Family had not onely in Europe but also in America it could not but be confessed that they had a large foundation of their imaginary universal Monarchy but that nothing gave them so great hopes as the possession of Portugal For by the addition of that Kingdom to the Crown of Castile they became absolute Masters not onely of all Spain but of all the East-Indies of all the Eastern Trade of Ethiopia Persia Arabia China Iapan and all that incredible wealth that was raised out of the Portugal Traffick whereby the Austrian Greatness if not their Monarchy was principally sustained that therefore it concerned all States whatsoever not onely to put a stop to the raving Tyranny of this devouring Monster but to suppress and lessen his Power by all means possible That to do this none was more concerned or more able than the Kingdom of France united with that of Portugal That this having bin called the Right Arm as Catalonia the Left of that great Austrian Colossus now both being separated from it and united to France will be able to do greater service against it than they were ever forced to do for it not onely by assaulting the Spaniard within his own doors but by intercepting the Plate-Fleet which in its return from the West-Indies it being necessarily forced to pass by the Tercera Islands must run in danger of the Portuguez Fleet or be forced to be at the charge of an extraordinary Convoy These were the sum of the Ambassadors discourses to the Cardinal In answer to which his Eminence made offer not onely of all the Assistance of the most Christian King his Master but that he would disburse himself for the service of the King of Portugal promising that he would presently send thither a Fleet of twenty Sayl with his Nephew Admiral and Ambassador Extraordinary This Treatment thus ended the Ambassadors took their leaves his Eminence waiting upon them as far as the Stairs which when they endeavored to hinder he replyed That the Ambassadors of the King of Portugal were to be treated with as much respect as those of the Emperor or Pope Few days after a Iuncto of the King of France his Council were appointed to treat with the Ambassadors in the House of the Lord High Chancellor of the kingdom where a Peace was fully concluded between the two Kingdoms of France and Portugal Other Ambassadors were about the same time that the afore-mentioned were sent into France dispatched into England for it very much concerned the Kingdom of Portugal to maintain a good Correspondence with the Crown of England both in regard of the Navigation and Commerce of both States and also the better to break that Amity and good Understanding which was now held between the Crown of Spain and that State Hither therefore were sent Don Antonio D' Almado and Don Francisco D' Averado Leilon both persons of exquisite parts who notwithstanding that the Dunkirkers chased them arrived safe in England And for all the sturdy endeavors of the Spanish Ambassadors they were received on shore with abundance of respect yet His Majesty of England would not give them Audience or accept of the Ambassage from the King of Portugal so tender was He of His Honor and Conscience till Don Antonio de Sosa their Secretary had drawn up a Paper to satisfie him of the Right and Title of the Duke of Braganza to the Crown of Portugal The sum of which was Vpon the Death of King Henry the Cardinal without Issue many pretended together with the Infanta Donna Catherina Dutchess of Braganza and Grandmother to this present King to the Crown of Portugal but all their pretences wanting foundation soon fell except that of Philip the second King of Spain who propt up his with force King Henry was Vncle equally near to both but with this difference Catherine was the Daughter of a Son named Edward and Philip was the son of a daughter named Isabella brother and sister to King Henry King Philip pleaded That he being in equal degree with Catherine was to be preferred for his Sex Catherine replyed That the constitution of that Kingdom allowing Females to succeed and withal the benefit of Representation in all Inheritances she representing Edward must exclude Philip by the very same right that her father if he were living would exclude Philips mother This Conclusion is infallible in Jure whereto Philip answered That successiou of Kingdoms descending Jure sanguinis there was allowed no Representation Catherine destroyed that foundation alledging That the Succession by the death of the last King was derived Jure haereditatis non sanguinis because the Succession of Kingdoms was to be regulated by that ancient way whereby all things descended by Inheritance the other way of Succession being not known until later Ages nor ever practised either in Spain or Portugal in such cases Briefly in behalf of Catherine it was urged which by the Castilians can never be denied or answered That she was no stranger but a Native of the Kingdom to whom alone according to the Laws of Lamego the Crown of Portugal can appertain The King having perused and deliberated upon this Paper gave immediately order they should be presently conducted to London which was done withal convenient Solemnity and they logded in a Palace ready prepared for them soon after with great ceremony they received audience of His Majesty in a fair and stately Hall prepared for that purpose where his Majesty sat upon a Throne raised two steps and at the entrance of the Ambassador pulled off his Hat nor would be covered till they were so too To the Propositions made in the speech of D. Antonia D' Almoda concerning a Peace between Portugal and England His Majesty replied That he should be very glad if an expedient might be found out to renew the antient Leagues of friendship between the two Crowns without the breaking with Spain Some few days after the Ambassadors were conducted to give a Visit to Mary Queen of England who sat in a Chair of Estate ready to entertain them when they came into the Presence She rose out of the Chair and