The King, deeply interested in depressing the house of Austria, and convinced of Sebastian’s identity, from the representations of others, had empowered Don Christopher to offer the persecuted monarch an honourable asylum. It was to his court that Sebastian resolved to direct his steps: while he hastened thither to join the army which Henry offered to raise, [if swelled by succours from any other Prince;] Sampayo and his companions were to return into Portugal, and proclaim their sovereign; Braganza was to seize on the national fleet and the treasury: two acts less difficult than they appeared, owing to the devotion of the sailors to Don Sebastian’s memory, and the extreme weakness of the Spanish garrisons. Sebastian reckoned not on Castillian assistance; he did not even permit himself to name his friends of Medina Sidonia; for he justly concluded, that although he might trust implicitly where his own safety alone was implicated, he should rigidly abstain from all imprudence when it might endanger another. He found that the Duke of Medina Sidonia had been suspected of having favoured his cause, and had been strictly sifted by the minister of Philip; but as no proof appeared of his knowing the stranger in any other character than that of a Portuguese from Brazil, to whom his wife had shewn attention out of regard to her brother’s memory, he was dismissed with nothing more than a severe warning. Upon this information Sebastian remarked in such terms that no one present guessed him at all in correspondence with Medina; and restraining his anxiety to learn, if possible, whether his daughter had been alarmingly noticed, he returned to the subject of his departure from Venice. No doubts could be entertained of the republic’s willingness to further in secret, Philip’s aim of getting his rival into his power, and this conviction rendered extreme precaution indispensible. By the influence of Philip’s ambassadors, all the passages into France and Germany were closed against them; wherever Sebastian went openly, he must expect to be seized as a subject of Spain, being pronounced a Calabrian. (Calabria now forming part of its Italian possessions.) Father Chrysostom therefore proposed that their numerous party should separate, and by different parcels, and different ways, seek their different places of destination. He offered to risk himself through Italy, with Don Sebastian alone, provided he would assume the disguise of a monk, and travel under that character to a free port, where they might embark for France.