But although his life was spared, he was still detained in custody.  After a time he escaped from prison, and fled to the Priory of Sheen, near Richmond, where he desired the prior, who was a favourite with the king, to petition for his life and a pardon.  If Henry had listened to the advice of his counsellors he would have taken advantage of the opportunity to rid himself of this persistent disturber of his peace; but he was content to give orders that “the knave should be taken out and set in the stocks.”  Accordingly, on the 14th of June 1499, Warbeck was exposed on a scaffold, erected in the Palace Court, Westminster, as he was on the day following at the Cross on Cheapside, and at both these places he read a confession of his imposture.  Notwithstanding this additional disgrace, no sooner was he again under lock and key, than his restless spirit induced him to concoct another plot for liberty and the crown.  Insinuating himself into the intimacy of four servants of Sir John Digby, lieutenant of the Tower, by their means he succeeded in opening a correspondence with the Earl of Warwick, who was confined in the same prison.  The unfortunate prince listened readily to his fatal proposals, and a new plan was laid.  Henry was apprised of it, and was not sorry that the last of the Plantagenets had thus thrust himself into his hands.  Warbeck and Warwick were brought to trial, condemned, and executed.  Perkin Warbeck died very penitently on the gallows at Tyburn.  “Such,” says Bacon, “was the end of this little cockatrice of a king.”  The Earl of Warwick was beheaded on Tower Hill, on the 28th of November 1499.

DON SEBASTIAN—­THE LOST KING OF PORTUGAL.

King Sebastian of Portugal, who inherited the throne in 1557, seems, even from his infancy, to have exhibited a remarkable love of warlike exercises, and at an early age to have given promise of distinguishing himself as a warrior.  At the time of his accession, Portugal had lost much of her old military prestige; the Moors had proved too strong for her diminished armies; the four strongholds of Arzilla, Alcazar-Sequer, Saphin, and Azamor, had been wrested from her; and Mazagan, Ceuta, and Tangier alone remained to her of all her African possessions.  Consequently, the tutors of the boy-king were delighted to see his warlike instinct, and carefully instilled into his mind a hatred of the Paynim conquerors.

The lesson was well learnt, and from the moment King Sebastian reached his 14th year (the period of his majority), it was evident that all his thoughts centred on an expedition to Africa, to revive the former glories of his house, and to extend his empire even beyond its former limits.  In 1574 he set out, not to conquer the land, but simply to view it, and with youthful audacity landed at Tangier, accompanied by only 1500 men.  Finding no opposition to his progress, he organized a hunting expedition among the mountains, and actually put his project into execution.  The Moors, by this time thoroughly incensed by his audacity, mustered a force and attacked his escort, but he succeeded in beating them off, and escaped in safety to his ships, and reached his kingdom unharmed.