Page:The Greek and Eastern churches.djvu/647

Rh The destruction of the Christian kingdom of Nubia was the chief cause of the isolation of Abyssinia for many centuries. That country only comes to light again in the sixteenth century, owing to the enterprising spirit of the Portuguese. It would have been infinitely better for the unhappy land if it had been left to its isolation and obscurity. The Portuguese brought in their train bigoted emissaries of the Church of Rome, who, in accordance with the custom of the times, resorted to violence and cruelty in attempting to force a nation that they regarded as heretical into the papal mould. But the first interchange of communications was civil and friendly. Prince Henry of Portugal, having heard semi-fabulous tales of Prester John in a mysterious "India," sent two ambassadors, Pedro de Corvilhãa and Alphonso de Payva, to the Christian sovereign of Abyssinia. Alphonso died; but Pedro was adopted by the Abyssinian nation, highly honoured by the king, and married into a high Abyssinian family. Still he kept up communications with Portugal. Early in the sixteenth century the Queen Helena, who was then regent for her son, a child of eleven years, sent Matthew, an Armenian merchant of ability and trustworthiness, on an embassy to the King of Portugal, asking him to enter into an alliance with her in order to resist the Turks, and proposing an intermarriage between the two royal families. Matthew went first to Goa in India and thence round by the Cape to Portugal, encountering many difficulties and discouragements on his journey. There he gained his end so far as to secure a Portuguese embassy to return with him to Abyssinia, The chaplain of this embassy was Alvarez, who has left us a graphic account of his own experiences and observations concerning the country and people to which he was sent. His narrative is held by some critics not to be entirely reliable; but, after making allowance for inaccuracies, we still have here a mass of information about Abyssinia, including what is especially valuable for our present purposes, light on the practices of the Church. Thus at length the curtain is raised, and again