to settle a correspondence with them, and which he now believed to be fulfilled on seeing the Christian colours.  Sequeira sent a courteous answer, and drew nearer the shore, on which several Christians came on board.  They told him that their prince had sent several years before an ambassador named Mathew, to a king at the other end of the world whose fleet had conquered India, on purpose to become acquainted with these remote Christians and to demand succour against the Moors; but that the ambassador had never returned.  On hearing this, Sequeira was satisfied that they dealt ingeniously with him, as he had actually brought that ambassador along with him, and had orders from the king of Portugal to land him safe in the dominions of Prester John.  On this, the ambassador of whom they spoke of was brought before them, to their great mutual joy, as he had been ten years absent from his country.  Next day ten monks came from a neighbouring convent of the Vision to visit Mathew, and were received in great ceremony by the priests of the fleet dressed in their surplices.  Great rejoicings were made on occasion of this meeting between two such distant nations agreeing in the same faith; and the consequence of this meeting was, that those who from the beginning had not acknowledged the supremacy of the Roman pontiff, now submitted to his authoritye[150].

[Footnote 150:  The submission of the Abyssinian church to the Roman pontiff was a mere pretence, which afterwards produced long and bloody civil wars, and ended in the expulsion of the Portuguese from the country.—­E.]

The kingdom of Prester John, now first visited by Sylveira, is mostly known by this appellation but improperly, as its right name is the empire of Abyssinia, Abassia, Habesh, or the higher Ethiopia.  It received the former appellation from the great king Jovarus, who came to it from the Christians of Tartary, having a cross carried before him like our bishops, and carrying a cross in his hand, with the title of Defender of the Faith, as being a Jacobite Christian[151].  The dominions of this prince are situated between the rivers Nile, Astabora, and Astapus.  To the east they border on the Red Sea for 120 leagues, this being the smallest side, as their whole extent is 670 leagues.  On the west it borders on those Negroes who possess the great mines of gold, and who pay tribute to the sovereign of Abyssinia.  On the north it is divided from the Moors by a line drawn from the city of Suakem to the isle of Meroe in Nubia.  On the south it borders on the kingdom of Adel, from the mountains of which country the river Obi descends, and falls into the sea at the town of Quilimane in the kingdom of Melinda.

[Footnote 151:  It is not worth while to inquire whence this ridiculous legend of king or Saint Jovarus has been derived.  The origin of Christianity in Abyssinia will be considered on an after occasion, when we come to the particular travels in that country.—­E.]