and publish in 1591 his account of the Kongo kingdom, together with a recital of the Portuguese explorations and conquests in East Africa. Although Portuguese priests—Jesuits probably—continued for a little while longer to visit the kingdom of Kongo, from the end of the 16th century both Christian and Portuguese influence slowly faded, and the country relapsed into heathenism, in spite of the strenuous efforts made by the Popes of the 17th and 18th centuries, who sent thither Italian, Flemish, and French missionaries. The Portuguese appear to have excited the animosity of a somewhat proud people by their overbearing demeanour and rapacity. They held intermittently Kabinda, on the coast to the north of the Congo estuary, and occasionally sent missions of investiture to São Salvador to represent the king of Portugal at the crowning of some new king of Kongo; and the king of Kongo was usually given a Portuguese name and occasionally an honorary rank in the Portuguese army. But it was not till after the middle of the 19th century that Portugal began to assert her dominion over the Congo countries. France and Britain during the 18th and nearly all the 19th centuries steadily refused to recognize Portuguese rule anywhere north of the Loge river in Angola (south of the Congo Estuary); but Britain in 1884 proposed to do so under sufficient guarantees for freedom of trade set forth in a treaty which was rendered abortive by the opposition of the House of Commons. If this treaty had been ratified it would have brought under joint English and Portuguese influence the lower Congo, besides settling amicably Portuguese and British claims in Nyasaland. The opposition of a knot of unpractical philanthropists in the House of Commons wrecked the treaty, and gave to the other powers of Europe an opportunity for interfering in the affairs of the Congo. The result to Portugal, nevertheless, was that she secured the territory of Kabinda north of the Congo, and the ancient kingdom of Kongo south of that river.