Shuddering at so horrid an image, Luisa threw herself on the neck of her husband and fondly chid him. His smiles and caresses banished alarm, while Sebastian, eager to learn the particulars of an association so fraught with importance, proceeded to inquire the names, characters, and resources of the confederate nobles. He found that the party which had thus courted the protection of Braganza, consisted of the first families in Portugal; and that the Archbishop of Lisbon, a prelate of great power and probity, had, through the means of the inferior clergy assured himself of the spirit and fidelity of three parts of the people. The Duchess of Mantua, who governed in quality of Vice-Queen, was in reality but the instrument of Vasconcellos, her secretary. This man, though by birth a Portuguese, was in heart a Spaniard: or rather, was a wretch of such wide ambition, such insatiable covetousness, and such base sensuality, that to gratify these favorite passions, he was ready to trample on the mother who bore him. His licentious conduct, dissolute life, cruelties, extortions, and insults, had by degrees, exasperated the Portuguese into the most deadly animosity: to this private hatred was added the stronger sentiment of national honour, and the animating one of attachment to the person of Braganza. Nothing could be more ardent or universal than the latter sentiment. Braganza’s noble spirit pervaded every place: his bounties flowed into the remotest corners of the kingdom; and while the splendor of his household, his retinue, his equipages, his entertainments, and his palaces, kept in perpetual freshness the remembrance of his royal birth, the ceaseless dew of his secret charities fell all around, penetrating the hearts of men with gratitude and with love. In public, his magnificent train, and serious dignity of manner, preserved to him that profound respect, which should ever follow distinguished personages: in private the sweetness of a benign and smiling temper, the graces of a refined taste, the charm of every accomplishment, and the rivetting talisman of goodness, added affection to respect, and turned admiration into enthusiasm. He was beloved, he was venerated throughout Portugal; and so evident was the dominion he had acquired over his countrymen, that not even the Machiavalian Olivares, though trembling at his power, dared openly arraign or stop his course. There was something strikingly different in the present spirit of Portugal, from that irresolute, fearful conduct, which had palsied her exertions for her legitimate sovereign: Sebastian could not refuse a sigh to the remembrance. Then, not even the probable assistance of other powers, stimulated them into open insurrection: now, they were nobly resolved to free themselves, unsupported by other aid than God and their own arms.