From these restless longings after the neighbouring thrones, and the ignoble schemes of the Portuguese monarch, it is a relief to turn to the actions of the Portuguese heroes. Their deeds will be related separately, but after the barren intrigues of Emmanuel, it will be as well to mention chronologically the chief discoveries of his captains. In 1497, Vasco da Gama doubled the Cape of Good Hope and reached India by sea; in 1500 Pedro Alvares Cabral discovered Brazil, and Gaspar Corte-Real, Labrador; in 1501 João da Nova Castella discovered the islands of St. Helena and Ascension; and in that year and in 1503 Amerigo Vespucci first visited the Rio Plata and Paraguay; in 1506 Tristão da Cunha discovered the island which bears his name; and Ruy Pereira Coutinho explored Madagascar and the Mauritius; in 1507 Lourenço de Almeida touched at the Maldive Islands; in 1509 Diogo Lopes de Sequeira occupied Malacca and explored the island of Sumatra; in 1512 Francisco Serrão discovered the Moluccas; in 1513 Pedro de Mascarenhas first touched at the Île de Bourbon or Réunion; in 1516 Duarte Coelho worked his way up the coast of Cochin China and explored Siam; in 1517 Fernão Peres de Andrade established himself at Canton, and the same explorer made his way to Pekin in 1521; and in 1520 Magalhães (Magellan), a Portuguese sailor, though in the Spanish service, passed through the Straits which bear his name and led the way into the Pacific Ocean. These exploits make up a list of achievements of which any country might be proud; the bare catalogue of them, without any epithets, justifies the description given of the reign of Emmanuel “the Fortunate” as the heroic age of Portuguese history. It has been shown that the king contributed little to this greatness, and the mistaken direction of his foreign policy has been noticed. It now remains to be seen how the seeds of rapid decline were sown. Emmanuel was far from being a bad man, though he does not show to advantage, when compared with such monarchs as John “the Great” and John “the Perfect;” he was a moral and pious man,--too pious as his expulsion of the Jews clearly demonstrates; he can hardly be blamed for his extravagance and taste for luxury, when the enormous wealth of the Portuguese Crown is considered; and he spent much of this wealth on art and architecture, as the construction of the magnificent palace of Belem, near Lisbon, testifies to this day. This superb building may have many faults to the eye of the architectural expert, but to the ordinary mind it seems almost the most superb structure in the world. With regard to internal administration, Emmanuel did not do much harm; the wheels of government had been put into such perfect order by John II. that the machine of administration worked well without interference. But John II. had made one great mistake, the fruits of which appeared in the reign of Emmanuel and his successor; he