i 7 o TRAVELS TO DISCOVER 



The meafure of David's misfortunes feems to have been 

 now full, and he died accordingly this very year 1540. 



It will be neceffary here to remind the reader, that Al- 

 varez, the chaplain and hiilorian of the firft Portuguefe em- 

 bafTy, was (as he faid) on his return appointed by king Da- 

 vid to make his fubmiflion to the pope. Leaving Zaga 

 Zaab, therefore, in Portugal, he proceeded to Bologna, where 

 the emperor Charles V. was then in perfon, before whom 

 and the pope himfelf he delivered his credentials framed 

 by Peter Covillan, and afterwards, in a long fpeech, the rea- 

 fons of his embaffy. 



The pope received this fubmiflion of David with infinite 

 pleafure, at a time when fo many kingdoms in the well 

 were revolting from his fupremacy. He confidered it as a 

 thing of the greatert moment to be courted before the em- 

 peror by fo powerful a prince in Africa, But as for the 

 emperor himfelf, though he was then preparing for an ex- 

 pedition againfl the Mahometans, and though it was his fa- 

 vourite war, he feems to have been perfectly indifferent 

 either to the embaffy itfelf, or to the perfon that fent it ; 

 a great proof that he believed there was nothing real in 

 it. 



Many other people have doubted whether this embafiy, 

 or that of John Bermudes, actually came from the Abyfli- 

 nian court^as the king would fcarcely have abandoned the 

 form of the Alexandrian church in which he had been 

 brought up by Abuna Mark, then alive. Abuna Mark, , 

 moreover, could fcarcely be believed to have promoted em- 

 bames which were intended to ftrike at the root of his own 



& religion,. 



