Pretenders to royalty have not been of uncommon occurrence in other countries. In Portugal, the doubts respecting Sebastian having been really slain at the battle of Alcaçar, gave rise to several attempts to personate that chivalrous but rash monarch. Five or six impostors succeeded each other; of one claimant to the name and title of the Portuguese sovereign, however, the pretensions were so plausibly or so truly supported, that serious doubts have been entertained whether he was not “the true prince,” and no “false thief.”
Of the most conspicuous of these pretenders, the first is said to have been a pastry-cook of Madrigal, Gabriel de Spinosa by name. He was tutored to act his part by Father Michael de los Santos, an Augustin friar, who had been chaplain to Don Sebastian. The friar had spoken so freely in Portugal against the Spanish usurpation, that Philip of Spain removed him out of the country, and made him confessor to a convent of nuns, at Madrigal. Donna Anna of Austria, Philip’s niece, was one of the inmates of this convent. To this princess the friar introduced the pretended Sebastian, who played his assumed character so well that she gave him some rich jewels to raise money. While he was endeavouring to dispose of these valuables privately at Madrid, he was apprehended as a thief. He declared his real profession, and that the jewels belonged to Donna Anna, and he would perhaps have been released, had not his plot been betrayed by the intercepting of a letter, in which he was addressed with the title of majesty. The result was that he and the friar were hanged, and the princess was removed to another convent and rigorously confined for the rest of her life.
The pertinacious belief of the Portuguese, that Sebastian would yet return, and their hatred of the Spanish domination, soon encouraged others to follow the example of Spinosa. The son of a tiler at Alcobaça, who, after leading a loose life, had turned hermit, next came forward to personate the much-desired monarch. He was accompanied by two companions, one of whom assumed the name of Don Christopher de Tavora, and the other took the title of the Bishop of Guarda. They began to raise money, and to collect partisans round them. Their career was, however, cut short by the archduke, who caused them to be apprehended. The pseudo Sebastian was ignominiously paraded through the streets of Lisbon, and then sent to the galleys for life; the self-appointed bishop was sentenced to be hanged.