Page:EB1911 - Volume 24.djvu/596

 the teeth as a weapon of defence and deserves the character of ferocity generally attributed to it would appear to be rather questionable. Sea-wolves are inhabitants of the northern seas of both hemispheres, one (A. lupus) being common on the coasts of Scandinavia and North Britain, and two in the seas round Iceland and Greenland. Two others occur in the corresponding latitudes of the North Pacific. They attain to a length exceeding 6 ft., and in the north are esteemed as food, both fresh and preserved. The oil extracted from the liver is said to be in quality equal to the best cod-liver oil.

To the fishermen of the North Sea this ish is generally known as the cat-fish, and for some years past numbers of this species have been marketed. As it would be impossible to sell the fish in its natural state on account of its forbidding appearance, it is skinned and beheaded, and the flesh retailed under the name of rock-salmon.

SEAWRACK, the detached seaweeds thrown up, often in great quantities, by the sea and used for manure, also formerly for making kelp. It consists largely of species of Fucus—brown seaweeds with flat branched ribbon-like fronds, characterized in F. serratus by a saw-toothed margin and in F. vesiculosus, another common species, by bearing air-bladders. Also of Zostera marina, so-called sea-grass, a marine flowering plant with bright green long narrow grass-like leaves.

SEBASTIAN, ST, a Christian martyr whose festival is celebrated on the 20th of January. According to St Ambrose (in Psalm 118, oct. 20) Sebastian was a native of Milan, went to Rome at the height of Diocletian’s persecution, and there suffered martyrdom. The Acta of St Sebastian, falsely attributed to the same St Ambrose, are far less sparing of details. They make him a citizen of Narbonne and captain of the first cohort under the emperors Diocletian and Maximian. Having secretly become a Christian, Sebastian was wont to encourage those of his brethren who in the hour of trial seemed wavering in their profession. This was conspicuously the case with the brothers Marcus and Marcellinus. He made many converts, several of whom suffered martyrdom. Diocletian, having been informed of this conduct, sent for him and earnestly remonstrated with him, but, finding him inflexible, ordered him to be bound to a stake and shot to death. After the archers had left him for dead, a devout woman, Irene, came by night to take his body away for burial, but, finding him still alive, carried him to her house, where his wounds were dressed. No sooner had he wholly recovered than he hastened to confront the emperor, reproaching him with his impiety; Diocletian ordered him to be instantly carried off and beaten to death with rods. The sentence was forthwith executed, his body being thrown into the cloaca, where, however, it was found by another pious matron, Lucina, whom Sebastian visited in a dream, directing her to bury him ad Catacombas juxta vestigia apostolorum. It was on this spot, on the Appian way, that was built the basilica of St Sebastian, which was a popular place of pilgrimage in the middle ages. The translation of his relics to Soissons in 826 made that town a new centre of his cult. St Sebastian is specially invoked against the plague. As a young and beautiful soldier, he is a favourite subject of sacred art, being rriost generally represented undraped, and severely though not mortally wounded with arrows.

SEBASTIAN, king of Portugal (Port. Sebastião) (1554–1578), the posthumous son of Prince John of Portugal and of his wife Joanna, daughter of the emperor Charles, was born in 1554, and became king in 1557, on the death of his grandfather John III. of Portugal. During his minority (1557–1568), his grandmother Queen Catherine and his great uncle the Cardinal Prince Henry acted jointly as regents. Sebastian’s education was entrusted to a Jesuit, D. Luiz Conçalves da Camara and to D. Aleixo de Menezes, a veteran who had served under Albuquerque. He grew up resolved to emulate the medieval knights who had reconquered Portugal from the Moors. He was a mystic and a fanatic, whose sole ambition was to lead a crusade against the Mahommedans in north-west Africa. He entrusted the government to the Jesuits; refused either to summon the Cortes or to marry, although the Portuguese crown would otherwise pass to a foreigner, and devoted himself wholly to hunting, martial exercises and the severest forms of asceticism. His first expedition to Morocco, in 1574, was little more than a reconnaissance; in a second expedition Sebastian was killed and his army annihilated at Al Kasr al Kebir (4th of August 1578). Although his body was identified before burial at Al Kasr, reinterred at Ceuta, and thence (1582) removed by Philip II. of Spain to the Convento dos Jeronymos in Lisbon, many Portuguese refused to credit his death. “Sebastianism” became a religion. Its votaries believed that the rei encuberto, or “hidden king,” was either absent on a pilgrimage, or, like King Arthur in Avalon, was awaiting the hour of his second advent in some enchanted island. Four pretenders to the throne successively impersonated Sebastian; the first two, known from their places of birth as the “King of Penamacor” and the “King of Ericeira,” were of peasant origin; they were captured in 1584 and 1585 respectively. The third, Gabriel Espinosa, was a man of some education, whose adherents included members of the Austrian and Spanish courts and of the Society of Jesus in Portugal. He was executed in 1594. The fourth was a Calabrian named Marco Tullio, who knew no Portuguese; he impersonated the “hidden king” at Venice in 1603 and gained many supporters, but was ultimately captured and executed. The Sebastianists had an important share in the Portuguese insurrection of 1640, and were again prominent during the Miguelite wars (1828–34). At an even later period Sir R. F. Burton stated that he had met with Sebastianists in remote parts of Brazil (Burton, Camoens, vol. i.p. 363, London, 1881), and the cult appears to have survived until the beginning of the 20th century, although it ceased to be a political force after 1834.

SÉBASTIANI, HORACE FRANÇOIS BASTIEN, (1772–1851) French marshal and diplomatist. Of Corsican birth, he was in his early years banished from his native island during the civil disturbances, and in 1789 he entered the French army. In 1793, as a French lieutenant, he took part in the war in his native island, after which he served in the Army of the Alps. He became chef de brigade in 1799. Attached by birth and service to the future Emperor Napoleon, he took part in the Coup d’État of 18th Brumaire (9th November 1799). He was present at Marengo in 1800. Sébastiani next appears in his first diplomatic post, in Turkey and Egypt (1802). Promoted general of brigade in 1803, he served in 1805 in the first of the great campaigns of the Empire. His conduct at Austerlitz (2nd December), where he was wounded, won him promotion to the rank of general of division. Sébastiani soon returned to Constantinople as French Ambassador. As ambassador he induced the Porte to declare war on Russia, as a soldier he directed with success the defence of Constantinople against the British squadron of Admiral (Sir) J. T. Duckworth. But the deposition of the Sultan Selim III. put an end to French diplomatic success in this quarter, and Sébastiani was recalled in April 1807 (see La Politique orientale de Napoléon: Sébastiani et Gardane, by E. Driault, Paris, 1905). He was at this time made Count of the Empire. As the commander of a corps he served in the Peninsular War, but his cavalry genius did not shine in the