made it an independent and
permanent kingdom. This prince slaughtered Saracens and carried off
honors on the field as fast as the Cid, but his deeds were not embalmed
in an epic destined to become a storehouse of poetry for all the world.
His chronicler did not come till about four centuries later, and then
nearer and vaster achievements than those of Affonso Henriquez lay
ready to his pen. At the birth of Camoens, in 1525, Portugal had gained
her greatest conquests, and, if the shadows were already falling across
her power, she had still great men who were making heroic efforts to
retain it. Vasco da Gama had died within the year. Albuquerque, the hero
of the _Lusiado_, the noblest and most far-sighted mind in an age of
great men, had been dead ten years. Camoens, like the Greek dramatists,
was soldier as well as poet: he was not alone the singer of past
adventures--he was the reporter of what took place under his own eyes.
His epic was already finished before the defeat of Don Sebastian in the
battle of Alcazar put an end to the glory it celebrated, and in dying
shortly after the poet is said to have breathed a prayer of thanksgiving
at being spared the pain of surviving his country.

[Illustration: CHAPEL NEAR GUIMARAENS.]

The period of Portuguese supremacy lasted then, altogether, less than a
century. There is an irresistible temptation to ponder over what results
were lost by its sudden downfall, and to seek therein some explanation
of the strange fact that Portugal alone among the southern nations of
Europe has never had a national art. There was a moment when the
foundations for it seemed to be laid: it was the period at which early
Spanish art was putting forth its first efforts, while that of Italy was
in its prime. Under Emanuel the Fortunate and his successor Portugal was
rich and powerful. Its intellect and ambition had been stimulated by the
achievements of its great navigators. There was an awakening of interest
in art and letters. A school of poets had arisen of which Camoens was to
be the crown. The court, mindful of the duties of patronage, was
building new churches and convents and decorating the old ones with
religious pictures, and in Portugal religious feeling has always been
peculiarly strong. Many of these pictures are still preserved. They are
not, however, of a high order of merit, and it is not even certain that
they are the work of native artists, some authorities inclining to the
belief th