Queens of old Spain

\\

REESE

Edinburgh : T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty

INTRODUCTION

IN a previous volume I have remarked upon the
extremely small political significance of most of the
Queen Consorts of England, although socially the
country has become what it is mainly through feminine
influence. In Spain the exact reverse has happened,
and in no Christian country has the power of woman
been less formative of the life and character of the
nation, whilst, largely owing to personal and circum-
stantial accident, the share of ladies in deciding the
political destinies of the country from the throne has
been more conspicuous than in other European
monarchies. The oriental traditions dominant in
Spain for centuries tended to make wives the humble
satellites rather than the equal companions of their
husbands ; and the inflated gallantry, before marriage
at least, that sprang from the chivalrous obsession
grafted upon mixed feudal and Islamic ideals, affected to
exclude woman from the harder facts of existence, and
from the practical problems that occupied the minds
of men. But whilst these traditions limited the power
of Spanish women generally, they were insufficient
to counteract the extraordinary political influence of a
series of remarkable feminine personalities who, mainly
-ing to feebleness and ineptitude of consorts, or to
i i g minorities of sons, have on occasion during the

vii

x INTRODUCTION

blems facing Spanish rulers thenceforward were no
longer centred upon the development of the country
as a prosperous Christian land, or even upon the main-
tenance of the Mediterranean as a Christian sea. The
policy of the ' Catholic Kings ' plunged Spain into the
vortex of mid- European politics at the critical period of
the world's history, when new lines of demarcation
were being scored by religious schism across the
ancient boundaries : when deep, unbridgable crevasses
were being split between peoples hitherto bound
together by common interests and traditional friend-
ship. At this crucial time, when the centre of all
earthly authority was boldly challenged, Spain was
pledged by Isabel and Ferdinand to a course which
thenceforward made her the champion of an impossible
religious unity, and squandered for centuries the blood
and treasure of her people in the fruitless struggle to
fix enduring fetters upon the thoughts and souls of
men. Myriads of martyrs shed their blood to cement
the solid Spain that might serve as an instrument for
such gigantic ends ; and the ecstatic Queen, though
gentle and pitiful at heart, yet had no pity for the
victims, as her clear eyes pierced the reek of sacrifice,
and saw beyond it the shining glory of her goal. To
her and to her descendant kings the end they aimed at
justified all things done in its attainment, and the touch
of mystic madness that in the great Queen was allied
to exalted genius, grew in those of her blood who
followed her to the besotted obsession that blinded them
to the nature and extent of the forces against them, and
led them down at last to babbling idiocy, and their

INTRODUCTION xi

country to impotent decay. The pale figure of Joan
the distraught flits across our page, and forces to our
consideration once more the awful problem of whether
she was the victim of a hellish conspiracy on the part
of those who should have loved her best, or a woman
afflicted by the hand of God ; whether her lifelong
martyrdom was the punishment of heresy or the need
of her infirmity. Pathetic Mary Tudor, Queen Con-
sort of Spain, demands notice because her marriage
with Philip ii. marked the vital need of Spain, at any
cost, to hold by the traditional alliance with England
amidst the shifting sands of religious revolt which were to
overwhelm and transform Europe ; whilst, later, the des-
perate attempt of Philip to form a new group of powers
which should enable Spain to dispense with unorthodox
England, is personified in the sweet and noble figure
of his third wife, Isabel of Valois, upon whose life-story,
poignant enough in its bare reality, romancers have
embroidered so many strange adornments. The Aus-
trian princesses, who in turn became consorts of the
Catholic Kings, all represent the unhappy persistence
of the rulers of Spain in clinging to the splendid but un-
realisable dream bequeathed by their great ancestor
the Emperor to his suffering realm ; that of perpetu-
ating Spanish hegemony over Europe by means of
compulsory uniformity of creed, dictated from Rome
and enforced from Madrid. And in the intervals of
discouragement and disillusionment at the impotence
of Habsburg Emperors to secure such uniformity even
within the bounds of the empire itself, and the patent im-
#? s Ability for Spain alone to cope with the giant task,

xii INTRODUCTION

we see the turning of kings and ministers in temporary
despair towards the secular enemy of the house of
Austria, and Spain in search of French brides who
might bring Catholic support to the Catholic champion.
When, at last, exhausted Spain could deceive herself
no longer, and was fain to acknowledge that she had
been beaten in her attempt to hold the rising tide and
deny to men the God-given right of unfettered thought,
the matrimonial alliances of her Kings, whilst ceasing
to be instruments for the realisation of the vision of
her prime, still obeyed the traditionary policies which
drew Spain alternately to the side of France or Austria.
But the end of such efforts now was not to serve
Spanish objects, wise or otherwise, but to snatch ad-
vantage for the rival birds of prey who were hovering
over the body of a great nation in the throes of dis-
solution, ravening for a share of her substance when
the hour of death should strike. Sordid and pathetic
as the story of these intrigues may be in their political
aspect, the personal share in them of the Queens
Consort themselves, their methods, their triumphs and
their failures, are often fraught with intense interest to
the student of manners. The life of the unscrupulous
Mariana of Austria, who in the interests of her house
held Spain so long in the name of her imbecile son,
and in her turn was outwitted by Don Juan and the
French interest, presents us with a picture of the times
so intimate, thanks to the plentiful material left behind
by a self-conscious age, as to introduce us into the
innermost secrets of the intrigues to an extent that
contemporaries would have thought impossible. And

INTRODUCTION xiii

again the sad, but very human, story of the young
half- English Princess, bright and light-hearted, torn
from brilliant Paris to serve French interests, as the
wife of Mariana's half-witted son Charles 11., only to
beat herself to death against the bars of her gloomy
golden cage and break her heart to old Mariana's undis-
guised joy, throws a flood of lurid light upon Spanish
society in its decadence, and proves the baseness to
which human ambition will stoop. More repugnant
is the career of poor Marie Louise's German successor
as the Consort of the miserable Charles the Bewitched
in his last years, and the tale of the extraordinary series
of plots woven by the rival parties around the lingering
deathbed of the King, whom they worried and fright-
ened into his grave, a senile dotard at forty. Only
briefly dealt with here are the Queens of the Bourbon
renascence, stout little Marie Louise of Savoy, and
the forceful termagant Isabel Farnese, who, chosen to
serve as a humble instrument of others, at once seized
whip and reins herself, and drove Spain as she listed
during a long life of struggle for the aggrandisement of
her sons, in which Europe was kept at strife for years
by the ambition of one woman.

These and other Queens Consort will pass before us
in the following pages, some of them good, a few bad,
and most of them unhappy. There is no desire to
dwell especially upon the sad and gloomy features of
their history, or to represent them all as victims ; but
it must not be forgotten, in condonation of the short-
comings of some of them, that they were sent from
their own homes, kin, and country, often mere children,

xiv INTRODUCTION

to a distant foreign court, where the traditional etiquette
was appallingly austere and repellent ; sacrificed in
loveless marriage to men whom they had never seen ;
treated as emotionless pawns in the game of politics
played by crafty brains. No wonder, then, that girlish
spirits should be crushed, that young hearts should
break in despair, or, as an alternative, should cast to
the winds all considerations of honour, duty, and
dignity, and seek enjoyment before extinction came.
Some of them passed through the fiery ordeal trium-
phant, and stand forth clear and shining. Great Isabel
herself, another more colourless Isabel, the Emperor's
wife, a third, Isabel of the Peace, most beloved of
Spanish Queens, and Anne her successor, as solemn
Philip's wife. Of these no word of reproach may
justly be said, nor of Margaret, the Austrian consort
of Philip IIL, nor of the spirited Isabel of Bourbon,
daughter of the gay and gallant B^arnais, and sister of
Henriette Marie of England. These and others bore
their burden bravely to the last ; and of the few who
cast theirs down, and strayed amongst the poisoned
flowers by the way, it may be truly urged that the
trespasses of others against them were greater than
their own transgressions. Such of their stories as are
here told briefly are set forth with an honest desire to
attain accuracy in historical fact and impartiality in
deduction therefrom. There has been no desire to
make either angels or devils of the personages described.
They were, like the rest of their kind, human beings,
with mixed and varying motives, swayed by personal
and political influences which must be taken into

INTRODUCTION xv

account in any attempt to appraise their characters or
understand their actions. Several of the lives are here
told in English for the first time by the light of modern
research, and in cases where statements are at variance
with usually accepted English teaching, references are
given in footnotes to the contemporary source from
which the statements are derived. The opening of the
archives of several European countries, and the exten-
sive reproduction in print of interesting historical texts
in Spain of late years, provide much of the new material
used in the present work ; and the labours of recent
English, French, and Spanish historians have naturally
been placed under contribution for such fresh facts as
they have adduced. Where this is the case, acknow-
ledgment is made in the form of footnotes.

MARTIN HUME.

LONDON, September 1906.

CONTENTS

BOOK I

PAGE

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC ..... i

BOOK II

JOAN THE MAD . 139

BOOK III

1. MARY OF ENGLAND . .207

2. ISABEL OF VALOIS ..... 259

BOOK IV

1. ISABEL OF BOURBON . . . . .315

2. MARIANA OF AUSTRIA . . . .361

BOOK V

1. MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS . . . .413

2. MARIANA OF NEUBURG ! ." . 487

EPILOGUE . . . . . . 531

INDEX .... . . 543

I LLUSTRATION S

MARY TUDOR, QUEEN OF ENGLAND AND

SPAIN. After a Painting by ANTONIO MOR . Frontispiece

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC AT THE SURRENDER

OF GRANADA. After a Painting by PRADILLA to face page 64

JOAN THE MAD AND THE BODY OF HER

HUSBAND. After a Painting by PRADILLA . „ ,. 176

ISABEL OF VALOIS. After a Painting by PANTOJA

DE LA CRUZ . . . . . . „ „ 288

ISABEL OF BOURBON. After a Painting by

VELAZQUEZ . . . . . . „ „ 336

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA. After a Painting by

VELAZQUEZ . . . . . . „ „ 368

ISABEL FARNESE. After a Painting by VAN Loo . „ „ 536

The above Illustrations are reproduced from Photographs by J. Lacoste, Madrid.

xix

BOOK I

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC

4 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

mantles ; nay, beneath the gorgeous vestments of the
great churchmen who stood grouped before the altar
in the palace chapel, though smiling faces and words of
pleasure were seen and heard on every side. For to
the King, after eight years of fruitless marriage, an
heiress had been born, and the court and people of
Castile and Leon were bidden to make merry and
welcome their future Queen. Bull fights, tournaments,
and cane contests, the songs of minstrels and plenteous
banquets, had for days beguiled a populace palled with
gaudy shows ; and now the sacred ceremonies of the
Church were to sanctify the babe whose advent had
moved so many hearts to shocked surprise. The King,
a shaggy, red-haired giant with slack, lazy limbs and
feeble face, towered in his golden crown and velvet
mantle over his nine-year-old half-brother Alfonso by
his side. The child, under a canopy, was borne in
state up to the font by Count Alba de Liste, and the
stalwart, black-browed primate of Spain, Alfonso
Carrillo, Archbishop of Toledo, who, with three attend-
ant bishops, performed the ceremony, blessed the baby
girl unctuously beneath the King's lymphatic gaze,
though he had already resolved to ruin her. By the
side of the font stood the sponsors : a girl of eleven
and a sturdy noble in splendid attire, with his wife.
All around, the courtiers, their mouths wreathed in
doubtful smiles which their lifted brows belied, glanced
alternately at the little group of sponsors, and at the
noblest figure of all the courtly throng : a young man
glittering with gems who stood behind the King.
Tall, almost, as Henry himself, with flashing dark eyes
and jet black hair, a fair skin and gallant mien, this
youth formed with the King, and the group at the font,
the elements of a great drama, which ended in the

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 5

renascence of Spain. For the young man was Beltran
de la Cueva, the new Count of Ledesma, who, all the
court was whispering, was really the father of the new-
born Princess, and the sponsors, besides the French-
man Armignac, were the gorged and spoiled favourite
of the King, the all-powerful Juan Pacheco, Marquis
of Villena, and his wife, and the King's half-sister,
Princess Isabel of Castile. The girl had seen nothing
of court life, for up to this time, from her orphaned
babyhood, she had lived with her widowed mother and
younger brother in neglected retirement at the lone
castle of Arevalo, immersed in books and the gentle
arts that modest maids were taught ; but she went
through her part of the ceremony composedly, and
with simple dignity. She was already tall for her age,
with a fair, round face, large, light blue eyes, and the
reddish hair of her Plantagenet ancestors ; and if she,
in her innocence, guessed at some of the tumultuous
passions that were silently raging around her, she
made no sign, and bore herself calmly, as befitted the
daughter of a long line of kings.1

Seven weeks afterwards, on the Qth May, in the
great hall of the palace, the nobles, prelates, and
deputies of the chartered towns met to swear allegiance
to the new heiress of Castile. One by one, as they
advanced to kneel and kiss the tiny hand of the un-
conscious infant, they frowned and whispered beneath
their breath words of scorn and indignation which they
dared not utter openly, for all around, and thronging
the corridors and courtyards, there stood with ready
lances the Morisco bodyguard of the King, eager to
punish disobedience. And so, though the insulting

1 The ceremony is described by Enriquez de Castillo in the contem-
porary ' Cronica de Enrique IV.3

6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

nickname of the new Infanta Juana, the Beltraneja,
after the name of her assumed father, passed from
mouth to mouth quietly, public protest there was
none.1

Already before the birth of the hapless Beltraneja,
the scandal of Henry's life, his contemptible weakness
and the acknowledged sexual impotence which had
caused his divorce from his first wife, had made his court
a battle ground for rival ambitions. Like the previous
Kings of his house, which was raised to the throne
by a fratricidal revolution, and himself a rebel during
his father's lifetime, Henry iv. had lavished crown gifts
upon noble partisans to such an extent as to have
reduced his patrimony to nought. Justice was openly
bought and sold, permanent grants upon public revenues
were bartered for small ready payments, law and order
were non-existent outside the strong walls of the fortified
cities, and the whole country was a prey to plundering
nobles, who, either separately or in " leagues," tyrannised
and robbed as they listed.2 Feudalism had never been
strong in the realms of Castile, because the frontier
nobles, who for centuries pushed back gradually the
Moorish power, always had to depend upon conciliating
the towns they occupied, in order that the new regime
might be more welcome than the one displaced. The
germ of institutions in Spain had ever been the muni-
cipality, not the village grouped around the castle or
the abbey as in England, and the soldier noble in Spain,
unlike the English or German baron, had to win the
support of townsmen, not to dispose of agricultural

1 Hernando de Pulgar, ' Cronica de los Reyes Catolicos.5

2 Letter of Diego de Valera to Henry iv. MS. quoted by Amador de
las Rios. Historia de Madrid. See also the famous poems of the time,
Coplas de Mingo Revulgo, and Coplas del Provincial, where vivid pictures
are given of the prevailing anarchy.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 7

serfs. But when the Moors in Spain had been reduced
to impotence, and a series of weak kings had been
raised to the throne as the puppets of nobles ; then
when feudalism was dying elsewhere, it attempted to
raise its head in Spain, capturing the government of
towns on the one hand and beggaring and dominat-
ing the King on the other. By the time of which
we are now speaking, the process was well nigh
complete ; and the only safeguard against the absolute
tyranny of the nobles, was their mutual greed and
jealousy.

For years Juan Pacheco, Marquis of Villena, had
ruled the King with a rod of iron. The grants and
gifts he had extorted for himself and his friends made
him more powerful than any other force in the land.
But there were those who sulked apart from him,
nobles, some of them, of higher lineage and greater
hereditary territories than his ; and when the handsome
foot page, Beltran de la Cueva, captured the good
graces of the King and his gay young Portuguese
wife, Queen Juana, the enemies of Villena saw in the
rising star an instrument by which he -might be
humbled. After the Beltraneja's birth and christening,
honours almost royal were piled upon Beltran de la
Cueva ; and Villena and his uncle, Alfonso Carrillo,
Archbishop of Toledo, grew ever more indignant and
discontented. Only a fortnight after the Cortes had
sworn allegiance to the new Princess, Villena drew up
a secret protest against the act, alleging the illegiti-
macy of the child,1 and soon open opposition to King
and favourite was declared.

There is no space here to relate in detail the

1 The protest is in the archives of Villena's descendant, the present Duke
of Frias, to whom I am indebted for an abstract of it.

8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

complicated series of intrigues and humiliations that
followed. The King on one occasion was forced to
hide in his own palace from the assaulting soldiery of
Villena. To buy the goodwill of the jealous favourite
towards his little daughter he went so far as to agree
to a marriage between the Beltraneja and Villena's
son;1 and more humiliating still, in December 1464,
he consented to the inquiry of a commission of church-
men nominated by Villena and his friends, to inquire
into the legitimacy of his reputed daughter. The
inquiry elicited much piquant but entirely contra-
dictory evidence as to the virility of the King, who,
it was admitted on all hands, delighted in the society
of ladies, and aroused the violent jealousy of the
Queen ; but, although with our present lights there
seems to have been no valid reason for disinheriting
the princess, the commission was sufficiently in doubt
to recommend the King to make the best term? he
could with the rebels. The King's sister, Princess
Isabel, who at the time lived at Court, was also used
as an instrument by Henry to pacify the league against
him. She had been betrothed when quite a child at
Arevalo to Prince Charles of Viana, eldest son of the
King of Aragon, and in right of his mother himself
King of Navarre ; a splendid match which, failing
issue from Henry and from her younger brother
Alfonso, might have led to the union of all Spain
in one realm. But Charles of Viana had already in
1461 fallen a victim to the hate and jealousy of his
stepmother, Juana Enriquez, daughter of a great
Castilian noble, Don Fadrique, the Admiral of the

The origin . treaty, which of course came to nothing, is in the Frias
Archives, and s signed by Louis xi. as one of the contracting parties.
It is dated 9tn May 1463. I have not seen the fact stated elsewhere.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 9

realm, and Isabel became to her brother a valuable
diplomatic asset. Before the storm of war burst
Henry attempted to wed his sister to Alfonso v. of
Portugal, his wife's brother, and so to prevent her
claims to the Castilian crown being urged to the
detriment of the Beltraneja ; but the match had no
attraction for the clever cautious girl of thirteen ; for
the suitor was middle-aged and ugly, and already her
own genius or crafty councillors had suggested to her
the husband who would best serve her own interests.
So she gravely reminded her brother that she, a
Castilian princess, could not legally be bestowed in
marriage without the formal ratification of the
Cortes.

In September 1564 Beltran de la Cueva received
the great rank of Master of Santiago, which endowed
him not only with vast revenues, but the disposal of
an armed force second to none in the kingdom, and
this new folly of the King was the signal for revolt.
A party of nobles immediately seized Valladolid against
the King, and though the townspeople promptly
expelled them and proclaimed the loyalty of the city,
the issue between the factions was now joined. On
the following day, i6th September, an attempt that
nearly succeeded was made to capture and kidnap
the King himself near Segovia. He was a poor,
feeble-minded creature, hating strife and danger, and,
though some of his stronger councillors protested
against such weakness, he consented to meet the
revolted nobles, and redress their grievances. In
October Villena, the Archbishop of Toledo, Count
Benavente, the Admiral Don Fadrique, and the rest
of the rebels, met Henry between Cabezon and Cigales,
and in three interviews, during their stay of five weeks,

10 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

dictated to the wretched King their demands.1 The
King was to dismiss his Moorish guard and become
a better Christian : he was to ask for no more money
without the consent of the nobles, to deprive Cueva
of the Mastership of Santiago, recognise his own
impotence and the bastardy of his daughter, and ac-
knowledge as his heir his half-brother Alfonso,
whom he was to deliver to the guardianship of Villena.
On the 30th November the nobles and the King took
the oath to hold the boy Alfonso as the heir of
Spain ; and then Henry, a mere cypher thenceforward,
sadly wended his way to Segovia, where the com-
mission to inquire into the shameful question of his
virility was still sitting,2 and Villena and his uncle, the
warlike Archbishop, were thus practically the rulers of
Spain. But though Henry consented to everything
he characteristically tried to avoid the spirit of the
agreement. Beltran de la Cueva was deprived of the
Mastership of Santiago, but he was made Duke of
Alburquerque in exchange for the loss, and the poor
little disinherited Beltraneja was treated with greater
consideration than before.

When civil war was seen to be inevitable in the
spring of 1465, Henry carried his wife and child with
his sister Isabel to Salamanca, whilst the Archbishop

1 The text of the demands, under thirty-nine heads, will be found in
the ' Documentos Ineditos,' vol. xiv. p. 369.

2 The exact sequence and dates of these and the following events have
never yet been made clear in any of the numerous histories of the time,
not even in Prescott, owing to the fact that Enriquez de Castillo and
Pulgar very rarely give dates, whilst Galindez only mentions the years
of such happenings as he records. The printing of the contemporary
so-called ' Cronicon de Valladolid' (partly written by Isabel's physician,
Dr. Toledo) in the ' Documentos Ineditos,3 now enables us to set forth
the events chronologically, and thus the better to understand their
significance.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC u

of Toledo, in the name of the revolted nobles, seized
the walled city of Avila, where within a few days he
was joined by Villena and his friends, bringing with
them the Infante Alfonso, who, in pursuance of the
agreement made with the King at Cigales, had received
the oath of allegiance as heir to the crown. From the
King it was clear that the nobles could hope for no
more, for he had summoned the nation to arms to
oppose them ; but from a child King of their own
making, rich grants could still be wrung, and for the
first time since the dying days of the Gothic monarchy,
the sacredness of the anointed Sovereign of Castile
was mocked and derided. In April 1565, at Plascencia,
the nobles swore secretly to hold Alfonso as King ;
and on the 5th June 1564, on a mound within sight
of the walls of Avila, the public scene was enacted
that shocked Spain like a sacrilege. Upon a staging
there was seated a lay figure in mourning robes, with
a royal crown upon its head ; a sword of state before
it, and in the hand a sceptre. A great multitude of
people with bated breath awaited the living actors in
the scene ; and soon there issued from the city gate a
brilliant cavalcade of nobles and bishops, headed by
Villena escorting the little prince Alfonso. Arriving
before the scaffolding, and in mockery saluting the
figure, most of the nobles mounted the platform, whilst
Villena, the Master of Alcantara, and Count Medillin,
with a bodyguard, conveyed the Infante to a coign of
vantage some distance away. Then in a loud voice
was read upon the platform the impeachment of the
King, which was summed up under four heads. For
the first, it ran, Henry of Castile is unworthy to enjoy
the regal dignity ; and as the tremendous words were
read the Archbishop of Toledo stepped forth and tore

12 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the royal crown from the brows of the lifeless doll : for
the second, he is unfit to administer justice in the realm,
and the Count of Plascencia removed the sword of state
from its place : for the third, no rule or government
should be entrusted to him, and Count of Benavente
took from the figure's powerless grasp the sceptre
which it held : for the fourth, he should be deprived of
the throne and the honour due to kings, whereupon
Don Diego Lopez de Zuniga cast the dummy down
and trampled it under foot, amidst the jeers and curses
of the crowd. When this was done, and the platform
cleared, young Alfonso was raised aloft in the arms of
men that all might see, and a great shout went up of
" Castillo,, Castilla, for the King Don Alfonso" and
then, seated on the throne, the boy gave his hand to
kiss to those who came to pay their new sovereign
fealty. Like wildfire across the steppes and mountains
of Castile sped the awful news, and Henry in Sala-
manca was soon surrounded by hosts of subjects whose
reverence for a sacrosanct King had been wounded by
what they regarded as impious blasphemy.

Both factions flew to arms, and for months civil war
raged, the walled cities being alternately besieged and
captured by both parties. Isabel herself remained
with the King, usually at Segovia or Madrid ; though
with our knowledge of her character and tastes, she
can have had little sympathy with the tone of her
brother's court. At one time during the lingering
struggle in 1466, Henry endeavoured to win Villena
and his family from the side of rebellion by betrothing
Isabel to Don Pedro Giron, Master of Calatrava,
Villena's brother. The suitor was an uncouth boor,
and that an Infanta of Castile should be sacrificed in
marriage with an upstart such as he was too much for

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 13

Isabel's pride and great ambition. Nothing in the
world, she said, should bring her to such a humiliation ;
though the King, careless of her protests, petitioned
the Pope to dispense Don Pedro from his pledge of
celibacy as Master of a monkish military order.
Isabel's faithful friend, Dona Beatriz Bobadilla, wife
of Andres Cabrera, High Steward of the King, and
Commander of the fortress of Segovia, was as deter-
mined as her mistress that the marriage should not
take place, and swore herself to murder Don Pedro, if
necessary, to prevent it. A better way was found
than by Dona Beatriz's dagger, for when the papal
dispensation arrived, and the prospective bridegroom
set out in triumph to claim his bride, poison cut short
his career as soon as he left his home. Whether
Isabel herself was an accomplice of the act will never
be known. She probably would not have hesitated to
sanction it in the circumstances, according to the ethics
of the time ; for she never flinched, as her brother did,
at inflicting suffering for what she considered necessary
ends.

On the 2Oth August 1467, the main bodies of both
factions met on the historic battlefield of Olmedo, the
warlike Archbishop of Toledo, clad in armour covered
by a surcoat embroidered with the holy symbols, led
into battle the boy pretender Alfonso ; whilst the
royal favourite, Beltran de la Cueva, now Duke of
Alburquerque, on the King's side, matched the valour
of the Churchman.1 Both sides suffered severely, but
the pusillanimity of the King caused the fight to be
regarded as a defeat for him, and the capture of his
royal fortress of Segovia soon afterwards proved his
impotence in arms so clearly, that a sort of modus

1 Enriquez de Castillo, ' Cronica de Enrique IV.'

14 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

vivendi was arranged, by which for nearly a year each
King issued decrees and ostensibly ruled the territories
held by his partisans.1

At length, in July 1468, the promising young pre-
tender Alfonso died suddenly and mysteriously in his
fifteenth year, at Cardenosa, near Avila ; perhaps of
plague, as was said at the time, but more probably of
poison ; 2 and the whole position was at once revolution-
ised. Isabel had been in the Alcazar of Segovia with
her friends the commander and his wife when the city
was surrendered to the rebels, and from that time, late
in 1567, she had followed the fortunes of Alfonso, with
whom she was at his death. She at once retired
broken-hearted to the convent of Santa Clara in Avila,
but not, we may be certain, unmindful of the great
change wrought in her prospects by her brother's pre-
mature death. She was nearly seventeen years of age,
learned and precocious far beyond her years ; the
events that had passed around her for the last six years
had matured her naturally strong judgment, and there
is no doubt from what followed that she had already
decided upon her course of action. She was without
such affectionate guidance as girls of her age usually
enjoy ; for her unhappy widowed mother, to whom she
was always tender and kind, had already fallen a victim
to the hereditary curse of the house of Portugal, to
which she belonged, and lived thenceforward in leth-

1 A number of decrees issued by Alfonso at the time, conferring upon
Villena and his partisans great grants and privileges, are in the Frias
archives ; and other charters rewarding the city of Avila for its adherence
to his cause have recently been printed by the Chronicler of the city from
its archives, Sr. de Foronda.

2 Of a poisoned trout which he ate, it was asserted by his partisans.
The suspicion of poison is strengthened by the fact that his death was
publicly announced as a fact some days before it happened, when he was
quite well.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 15

argic insanity in her castle of Arevalo. Isabel's
brother the King was her enemy, and she had no other
near relative : the churchmen and nobles who had
risen against Henry, and were now around her, were,
it must have been evident to her, greedy rogues bent
really upon undermining the royal power for their own
benefit ; and deeply devout as Isabel was, she was
quite unblinded by the illusion that the Archbishop
and bishops who led the, revolt jv^ere_mpyed to their
action by any considerations of morality or religion.
On the other hand, the rebellious nobles and ecclesias-
tics could not persist in their revolt without a royal
figure head. Young Alfonso, a mere child, had been
an easy tool, and doubtless the leaders thought that
this silent, self-possessed damsel would be quite as
facile to manage.

They did not have to wait many days for proof to.
the contrary. The Archbishop of Toledo was the
mouthpiece of his associates. Within the venerable
walls of the royal convent at Avila he set before Isabel
a vivid picture of the evils of her elder brother's rule,
his shameful laxity of life, his lavish squandering of
the nation's wealth upon unworthy objects, and the
admitted illegitimacy of the daughter he wished to
make his heiress ; and the Archbishop ended by
offering to Isabel, in the name of the nobles, the
crowns of Castile. The wearer of these crowns,
wrested painfully through centuries of struggle from
intruding infidels, had always been held sacred. The
religious exaltation born of the reconquest had invested
the Christian sovereigns in the eyes of their subjects
with divine sanction and special saintly patronage.
To attack them was not disloyalty alone, but sacrilege ;
and the deposition of Henry at Avila had, as we have

16 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

seen, thrilled Spain with horror. It was no part of
Isabel's plan to do anything that might weaken the
reverence that surrounded the throne to which she
knew now she might succeed. So her answer to the
prelate was firm as well as wise. With many sage
reflections taken from the didactic books that had
always been her study, she declared that she would
never accept a crown that was not hers by right. She
desired to end the miserable war, she said, and to be
reconciled to her brother and sovereign. If the nobles
desired to serve her they would not try to make her
Queen before her time, but persuade the King to
acknowledge her as his heir, since they assured her
that the Princess Juana was the fruit of adultery.

At first the nobles were dismayed at an answer that
some thought would mean ruin to them. But the
Archbishop, Carrillo, knew the weakness of Henry,
and whispered to Villena as they descended the
convent stairs, that the Infanta's resolve to claim
the heirship would mean safety and victory for them.
Little did he or the rest of the nobles know the great
spirit and iron will of the girl with whom they had to
deal. No time was lost in approaching the King.
He was ready to agree to anything for a quiet life,
and Alburquerque, and even the great Cardinal
Mendoza, agreed with him that an accord was
advisable ; though it might be broken afterwards
when the nobles were disarmed. Before the end
of August all was settled, and the cities of Castile had
sent their deputies to take the oath of allegiance to
Isabel as heiress to the crown. A formal meeting was
arranged to take place between Henry and his sister
at a place called the Venta de los Toros de Guisando,
a hostelry famous for some prehistoric stone figures of

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 17

undetermined beasts in the neighbourhood. All was
amiable on the surface. Henry embraced his sister
and promised her his future affection, settling upon her
the principality of Asturias and Oviedo, and the cities
of Avila, Huete, Medina, and many others, with all
revenues and jurisdictions as from the beginning of
the revolt (September I464).1 But by the agreement
Isabel was bound not to marry without the King's
consent, and it is evident that to this condition Henry
and his friends looked for rendering their concessions
voidable.

The intrigues of the two parties of Castile were
therefore now centred upon the marriage of the
Princess. Suitors were not lacking. If we are to
believe Hall, Edward iv. of England, before his
marriage with Elizabeth Grey, was approached by
the Spaniards, and it is certain that his brother
Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was at one time a
wooer. Either of them would have suited Henry of
Castile, because it would have removed Isabel from
Spain. A Portuguese would have also been acceptable
to the same party, because Portugal was naturally on
the side of the Beltraneja and her Portuguese mother.
But Isabel had other views, and the only suitors that
were entertained seriously were the Duke of Guienne,
the brother of Louis XL, and the young Ferdinand of
Aragon, the son and heir of John n. and nephew of

1 In a series of documents recently published from the archives of the
city of Avila by St. Foronda, there is one very curious charter signed by
Isabel on 2nd September, before even she started for the interview with
her brother. In it she already acts as sovereign of Avila, confirming the
many privileges given to the city by her brother Alfonso, whom she calls
King, and cancelling the grants of territories belonging to the city which
King Henry had made to his follower, the Count of Alba. Thus she
annulled the King's grants before he bestowed the city upon her.

B

i8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the doughty old Admiral of Castile, who had stood by
the side of the nobles in their revolt. There was
never any doubt as to which of the suitors Isabel
favoured. The Frenchman was reported to her as a
poor, puny creature with weak legs and watery eyes,
whilst Ferdinand, a youth of her own age, was praised
to the skies for his manliness, his good looks, and his
abilities, by those whose judgment she trusted. It is
impossible to say whether Isabel as yet fully under-
stood what such a marriage might mean to Spain ; but
it is certain that the wicked old John n. of Aragon
was quite aware of its advantages for his own realm.

The house of Aragon, with its domains of Sicily and
Naples, and its secular ambition towards the east, had
found itself everywhere opposed by the growing power
of France. The Mediterranean, the seat of empire for
centuries, had no finer havens than those under the
sceptre of Aragon, but the Catalans were harsh and
independent with their kings, and sparing of their
money for royal purposes. A poor king of Aragon
could not hope, with his own unaided resources, to
beat France on the Gulf of Lyons, and bear the red
and yellow banner of Barcelona to the infidel Levant.
But with the resources in men and money of greater
Castile at his bidding, all was possible; and John n.,
who had not scrupled to murder his first-born son for

j the benefit of his second, and oust his own children
from their mother's realm of Navarre, was ready to go
to any lengths to bring about the union which might
realise the dream of Aragon.

From Isabel's point of view, too, the match was a

w good one, apart from personal inclination. There is
no doubt whatever that she was, even thus early,
determined when her time came to crush the tyrannous

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 19

nobles who had reduced Castile to anarchy and the
sovereign to a contemptible lay figure. With her
great talent she understood that to do this she must
dispose of force apart from that afforded by any league
of nobles in Castile itself; and she looked towards
Aragon to lend her such additional strength. This
fact, however, was not lost upon the greedy nobles,
especially Villena. The turbulent leader of conspiracy
already looked askance at the quiet determined girl
who thus early imposed her will upon her followers,
and throwing his power again on the side of the king
he had once solemnly deposed, he seized the master-
ship of Santiago as his reward. In a panic at the fear
of the Aragonese match, the king and Villena once
more agreed to marry Isabel with the king of Portugal,
Villena and Cardinal Mendoza being heavily bribed
by the Portuguese for their aid.1 Isabel was at her town
of Ocana at the time, and her position was extremely
difficult and perilous when the Portuguese envoys
came to her with Villena to offer her their king's hand.
As Isabel had several weeks before secretly bound
herself to marry Ferdinand of Aragon, her reply was
a diplomatic refusal to the Portuguese advances ; and
Villena, enraged, was disposed to capture her on the
spot and carry her a prisoner to Court. Inconvenient
princes and princesses were easily removed in those
days, and Isabel's danger was great. But she had the
faculty of compelling love and admiration ; she was as
brave as a lion and as cunning as a serpent, and the
people of Ocafia made it quite evident to Villena that
they would allow no violence to be offered to her.
But clearly something must be done to prevent Isabel

1 The original deed signed by the King of Portugal, dated 2nd May
1469, is in the Frias archives.

20 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

from becoming too strong ; and as a last resort after
her refusal to entertain the Portuguese match it was
determined to capture her by force of arms. She was
then at Madrigal, and Villena's nephew, the Bishop of
Burgos, bribed her servants to desert her in her hour
of need : the King sent orders to the townsmen that
no resistance was to be offered to his officers ; and
Cardinal Mendoza with a strong force marched towards
Madrigal to arrest Isabel. But another archbishop,
more warlike than he, Carrillo of Toledo, was before
him. With the Admiral Don Fadrique and a band of
horsemen, he swooped down from Leon and bore
Isabel to safety amongst those who would have died
for her, and entered into the great city of Valladolid
after sunset on the 3ist August 1469. No time was
to be lost. Envoys were sent in disguise hurrying up
to Saragossa, to hasten the coming of the bridegroom.
The service was a dangerous one ; for if Ferdinand
had fallen into the hands of the Court party a short
shrift would have been his. But the stake was great,
and Juan n. of Aragon and his son, young as the latter
was, did not stick at trifles. One difficulty, indeed,
was overcome characteristically. Isabel was known to
be rigidity itself in matters of propriety ; and, as she
and Ferdinand were second cousins, a papal bull was
necessary for the marriage. The Pope, Paul IL, was
on the side of the Castilian Court, and no bull could
be got from him ; but Juan n. of Aragon and the
Archbishop of Toledo carefully had one forged to
satisfy Isabel's scruples.1

Whilst one imposing cavalcade of Aragonese bear-

1 Isabel only learnt of the deception practised upon her some time
afterwards (1471) from the partisans of the Beltraneja's projected marriage
with the Duke of Guienne. A genuine bull of dispensation was after-
wards granted to her by the new Pope, Sixtus IV.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 21

ing rich presents took the high road into Castile and
occupied the attention of the King's officers, a modest
party of five merchants threaded the mountain paths
by Soria, after leaving the Aragonese territory at
Tarrazona on the 7th October. The first day after
entering Castile they rocle well-nigh sixty miles ; and
late at night the little cavalcade approached the walled
town of Osma, where Pedro Manrique and an armed
escort were to meet them. The night was black, and
their summons at the gates of the town was misunder-
stood : a cry went up that this was a body of the
king's men to surprise the place ; and from the ram-
parts a shower of missiles flew upon the strangers
below. One murderous stone whizzed within a few
inches of the head of a fair-haired lad of handsome
visage and manly bearing, who, as a servant, accom-
panied those who wore the garb of merchants. It was
Ferdinand himself who thus narrowly escaped death,
and a hurried explanation, a shouted password, the
flashing of torches followed, and then the creaking
drawbridge fell, the great gates clanged open, and the
danger was over.1 The next day, with larger forces,
Ferdinand reached Dueflas, in Leon, near Valladolid ;
and four days later, now in raiment that befitted a
royal bridegroom, for his father had made him king
of Sicily, he rode when most men slept to Valladolid.
It was nearly midnight when he arrived, and the gates
of the city were closed for the night, but a postern
in the walls gave access to the house in which Isabel
was lodged ; and there the Archbishop of Toledo led
him by hand into the presence of his bride, to whom

1 The story of Ferdinand's coming and his marriage is graphically told
in the Decades of Alfonso de Palencia, who had been sent from Isabel to
fetch him, and accompanied him on his journey.

22 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

he was solemnly betrothed by the Archbishop's chap-
lain. It was all done so secretly that no inkling of it
reached the slumbering town ; and within two hours
the youth was in the saddle again and reached Duenas
long before dawn.1

On the 1 8th October 1 469, four days later, all was ready
for the public marriage, and Ferdinand entered the city
this time in state, with Castilian and Aragonese men-at-
arms and knights around him. Isabel was staying at
the best house in Valladolid, that of her partisan, Juan
Vivero, and the great hall was richly decked for the
occasion of this, one of the fateful marriages of history,
though none could have known that it was such at the
time. The celebrant was the warlike Archbishop who
had been so powerful a factor in bringing it about ; and
the next day, after mass, the married pair dined in
public amidst the rejoicing of the faithful people of
Valladolid. There was little pomp and circumstance
in the wedding, for the times were critical, the realm
disturbed, and money scarce ; but imagination is stirred
by the recollection of the great consequences that
ensued upon it, and those who saw the event, even
with their necessarily limited vision of its effects, must
have realised that any splendour lavished upon it
could not have enhanced its importance.

The news of the dreaded marriage filled the King
and his court with dismay. Villena, in close league
with Alburquerque and the Mendozas, now espoused
the cause of the Beltraneja,2 who was declared the

1 * Cronicon de Valladolid,' a diary kept at Valladolid at the time by Dr.
Toledo, Isabel's physician. Doc. Ined. 14.

2 In the Frias archives there is an undertaking, dated 2nd October
1470, signed by the Duke of Guienne, promising rewards to Cardinal
Mendoza, the Marquis of Villena, the Duke of Arevalo, and others, for
their aid in bringing about the betrothal with the Beltraneja.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 23

legitimate heiress to the Crown, and betrothed to
Isabel's former suitor, the Duke of Guienne, in the
presence of the assembled nobles, at the monastery of
Loyola, near Segovia. It mattered not, apparently,
that the very men who now swore fealty to Juana, the
hapless Beltraneja, had previously denounced her as a
bastard : they wanted a puppet, not a mistress, as
Isabel was likely to be, and they were quite ready to
perjure themselves in their own interests. Isabel was
formally deprived of all her grants and privileges, even
of the lordship of her town of Duefias, near Valladolid j1
where she and Ferdinand had kept their little court,
and where their first child had just been born (October
1470), a daughter, to whom they gave the name of
Isabel.

Ferdinand could not remain long in idleness, and
was soon summoned by his father to aid him in a war
with France, being absent from his wife for over a
year, winning fresh experience and credit both as
soldier and negotiator. In the meanwhile, things were
going badly again for the Beltraneja. Her French
betrothed died in May 1472 ; and some of the nobles,
jealous of the greed of Villena, were once more waver-
ing, and making secret approaches to Isabel. She
had bold and zealous friends in the Chamberlain
Cabrera, who held the strong castle of Segovia, and
his wife, Beatriz de Bobadilla.2 In the last weeks of

1 Duefias was granted on the same day, 2ist October 1470, to the
Princess Dona Juana (the Beltraneja). Cronicon de Valladolid.

2 How much Isabel prized the fidelity of these steadfast adherents is
seen by the last act of her life. On her deathbed she revoked — not very
honestly or graciously most people think — all grants and rewards she had
given out of crown possessions, on the pretext that she had been moved
to make them more by need than by her own wish. The only exception
she made was the manors of the Marquisite of Moya, which, with the title,
had . ? ranted to Cabrera and his wife Dona Beatriz Bobadilla.

. . o.- -r...~'i

24 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

1473, Dona Beatriz and her husband urged Henry to
forgive and receive his sister. She was, they told
him, being persecuted by the Marquis of Villena, and
had meant no harm in her marriage with the man she
loved. Henry was doubtful, but Cardinal Mendoza
and Count Benavente had changed sides again, and
now quietly used their influence in Isabel's favour.
A grudging promise was given by the King, but it was
enough for Dona Beatriz ; and, disguised as a farmer's
wife, she set forth from Segovia on a market pad ; and
alone over the snowy roads, hurried to carry the good
news to the Princess in the town of Aranda, which had
just been surrendered to her by the townsfolk. A few
days afterwards, on further advice from Dona Beatriz,
Isabel, escorted by the Archbishop of Toledo and his
men-at-arms, travelled through the night, and before
the first streak of dawn on the 28th December 1473,
they were admitted into the Alcazar of Segovia, where
no force but treachery could harm her.

Villena's son, who, fearing betrayal, had refused to
enter the city when he had come with the King weeks
before, and had remained in the neighbourhood at the
famous Geronomite monastery of El Parral, founded
by his father, fled at the news. His father, with
Alburquerque and the Constable of Castile, Count of
Haro, at once met at Cuellar, and sent an insolent
order to Henry to expel his sister from Segovia. It
came too late, however. The King, by this time, had
met Isabel, who had received him at the gate of the
Alcazar, and professed her love and duty to him. In
a speech full of womanly wisdom,1 she said she had
come to pray him to put aside anger towards her, for
she meant no evil; and all she asked was that he

1 Recorded in Enriquez de Castillo's ' Cronica de Enrique

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 25

should fulfil his oath taken at Toros de Guisando, and
acknowledge her as heiress of Castile. ' For by the
laws of God and man, the succession belonged to her/
Weak Henry swayed from one side to the other like
a reed in the wind, as either party had his ear ; and at
last Isabel took the bold course of sending secretly for
Ferdinand, who had just returned from Aragon. The
risk was great, but Isabel knew, at least, that she
could depend upon the Commander of the Alcazar of
Segovia, and Ferdinand secretly entered the fortress
on the 4th January 1474. It was a difficult matter for
Dona Beatriz to persuade the King to receive his
young brother-in-law ; but she succeeded at last, and
when Henry had consented, he did the thing hand-
somely, and they all rode together through the city in
state, with great show of affection and rejoicing. On
Twelfth Day, Dona Beatriz and her husband gave a
great banquet to the royal party l at the Bishop's
palace, between the Alcazar and the Cathedral. Whilst
the minstrels were playing in the hall after dinner, the
King suddenly fell ill. Violent vomiting and purging
seemed to point to poison, and the alarm was great.
Prayers and processions continued night and day, and
the unfortunate man seemed to recover ; but, though
he lived for nearly a year longer, he never was well
again, the irritation of the stomach continuing in-
cessantly until he sank from weakness.

In the interim both factions interminably worried
him to settle the succession. Sometimes he would
lean to Isabel's friends, sometimes to Villena and
Alburquerque, but Isabel herself, wise and cautious,

1 It should be mentioned that the faithless Queen of Henry IV., the
mother of the Beltraneja, lived apart from him in Madrid. She had
several children by various men subsequently.

26 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

knew where safety alone for her could be found, and
took care not to stir outside the Alcazar of Segovia,
in the firm keeping of Cabrera, who himself was in
the firm keeping of his wife, Dona Beatriz. Once
in the summer it was found that the King had
treacherously agreed that Villena's forces should sur-
reptitiously enter the town and occupy the towers of
the cathedral, whence they might throw explosives
into the Alcazar and capture Isabel on the ground
that she was poisoning the King ; but the plan was
frustrated, and Henry, either in fear or ashamed of
his part of the transaction, left Segovia to place him-
self in the hands of Villena at Cuellar. Greedy to
the last, Villena carried the sick King to Estremadura
to obtain the surrender of some towns there that he
coveted ; but to Henry's expressed grief, and the
relief of the country, the insatiable favourite died un-
expectedly of a malignant gathering in the throat on
the way, and the King returned to Madrid, himself
a dying man. His worthless life flickered out before
dawn on the I2th December 1474, and his last plans
were for the rehabilitation of the Beltraneja. He is
said to have left a will bequeathing her the suc-
cession ; but Cardinal Mendoza, Count Benavente,
and his other executors, never produced such a docu-
ment, which, moreover, would have been repudiated
now by the nation at large, passionately loyal, as it
already mainly was, to Isabel.1

1 Galindez tells the story that Henry on his deathbed swore that Juana
was really his child, and says that he left a will in her favour of which
Villena was the executor. The latter having predeceased the King, the
will remained in the keeping of Oviedo, the King's secretary, who after-
wards entrusted it to the curate of Santa Cruz at Madrid. He, fearing to
hold it, enclosed it in a chest with other papers and buried it at Almeida,
in Portugal. Years afterwards Isabel learnt of this, and when, in 1504,

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 27

There was hardly a private or public shortcoming
of which Henry in his lifetime had not been accused.
From the Sovereign Pontiff to frank, but humble
subjects, remonstrances against his notoriously bad
conduct had been offered to the wretched King ; and
at his death the accumulated evils, bred by a line of
frivolous monarchs, had reached their climax. There
was no justice, order or security for life or property,
and the strong oppressed the weak without reproach
or hindrance, the only semblance of law being main-
tained by the larger walled cities in their territories
by means of their armed burgess brotherhood. But
in the disturbances that had succeeded the birth of
the Beltraneja the cities themselves were divided, and
in many cases the factions within their own walls made
them scenes of bloodshed and insecurity. Faith and
religion, that had hitherto been the mainstay of the
throne of Castile, had been trampled under foot and
oppressed by a monarch whose constant companions
and closest servitors had been of the hated brood of
Mahomet. Nobles who, for themselves and their
adherents, had wrung from the Kings nearly all they
had to give, and threatened even to overwhelm the
cities, were free from taxation, except the almost
obsolete feudal aid in spears which the Sovereign
had nominally a right to summon at need. Such
~n as Villena, or Alvaro de Luna in the previous
^n, with more armed followers than the King and
ater available wealth, were the real sovereigns of

was mortally ill, she sent the curate and the lawyer who had told her
isinter the will. When they brought it she was too ill to see it, and '
3mained in the lawyer's keeping. He informed Ferdinand after the
een's death, and the King ordered the document to be burnt, whilst
lawyer was richly rewarded. Others say, continues Galindez, that the
per was preserved.

28 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Castile in turbulent alternation, and the final dis-
integration of the realm into petty principalities
appeared to be the natural and imminent outcome of
the state of affairs that existed when Henry iv.
breathed his last.

All Castile and Leon, with their daughter kingdoms,
were looking and praying for a saviour who could
bring peace and security ; and at first sight it would
seem as if a turbulent State that had never been
ruled by a woman could hardly expect that either of
the young princesses who claimed the crown could
bring in its dire need the qualities desired for its sal-
vation. Isabel's popularity, especially in Valladolid,
Avila and Segovia, was great ; and at the moment of
the King's death her friends were the stronger and
more prompt, for Villena had just died, the Beltraneja
was but a child of twelve, and the Queen-mother, dis-
credited and scorned, was lingering out her last days
in a convent in Madrid.1 The towns, for the most
part, awaited events in awe, fearing to take the wrong
side, and a breathless pause followed the death of the
King. Isabel was at Segovia, and under her influence
and that of Cabrera, the city was the first to throw
off the mask and raised the pennons for Isabel and
Ferdinand, to whom, in her presence, it swore
allegiance and proclaimed sovereigns of Castile.
Valladolid followed on the 2Qth December ; whilst
Madrid, whose fortress was in the hands of Villr 's
son, declared for the Beltraneja. The nobles shv.iffied
again ; moved by personal interest or rivalry, the
Archbishop of Toledo, abandoning Isabel out
jealousy of Cardinal Mendoza ; whilst Alburquer^
the supposed father of the Beltraneja, joined 1

1 She died in June 1475.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 29

opponent, and civil war, aided by foreign invasion from
Portugal, was organised to dispute with Isabel and
her husband their right to the crown.

By rare good fortune_jhe^young couple, who were
thus forced to fight for their splendid inheritance,
were the greatest governing geniuses of their age.
It is time to say something of their gifts and char-
acters. They were both, at the time of their accession,
twenty-three years of age, and, as we have seen, their
experience of life had already been great and dis-
illusioning. Isabel's was incomparably the higher
mind of the two. The combined dignity and sweet-
ness of her demeanour captivated all those who
approached her, whilst her almost ostentatious religious
humility and devotion won the powerful commenda-
tion of the churchmen who had suffered so heavily
during the reign of Henry. There is no reason to
doubt her sincerity or her real good intentions any
more than those of her great-grandson, Philip n., a
very similar, though far inferior, character. Like him,
she never flinched from inflicting what we now call
cruelty in the pursuance of her aims, though she had
no love for cruelty for its own sake. She_was deter-
mined that Spain should be united, and that rigid
orthodoxy should be the cementing bond ; that the
sacred sovereign of Castile should be supreme over
the bodies and souls of men, for her crown in her
eyes was the symbol of divine selection and inspira-
tion, and nothing done in the service of God by His
vice-regent could be wrong, great as the suffering
that it might entail. She was certainly what our
lax generation calls a bigot ; but bigotry in her time
and country was a shining virtue, and is still her
greatest claim to the regard of many of her country-

3o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

men. She was unmerciful in her severity in suppress-
ing disorder and revolt ; but we have seen the state
at which affairs had arrived in Castile when she
acceded to the crown, and it is quite evident that
nothing but a rod of iron governed by a heart of
ice was adequate to cope with the situation. Terrible
as was Isabel's justice, it entailed in the end much
less suffering than a continuance of the murderous
anarchy she suppressed.1 Her strength and activity
of body matched her prodigious force of mind, and
she constantly struck awe in her potential opponents
by her marvellous celerity of movement over desolate
tracts of country almost without roads, riding often
throughout the night distances that appear at the
present day to be almost incredible.

Ferdinand was as despotic and as ambitious as she,
but his methods were absolutely different. He wanted
the streogilu^Castile to push Aragonese interests in
Ttaly and the Mediterranean ; and, like Isabel, he saw
tHat religious unity was necessary if he was to be pro-
vided with a solid national weapon for his hand. But for
Isabel's exalted mystic views of religion he cared
nothing. He was, indeed, severely practical in all
things ; never keeping an oath longer than it suited him
to do so, loving the crooked way if his end could be
gamed by it, and he positively gloried in the tergiver-
sation by which throughout his life he got the better
of every one with whom he dealt, until death made sport
of all his plans and got the better of him. His school

1 Although she allowed a poor madman who attempted to kill Ferdinand
to be torn to bits by red hot pincers, and consigned_scores of thousands of
poor wretches to the flames for doubting the correctness of her views on
religion, she refused ever to go to a bullfight after attending one at which
two men had been killed. She strongly condemned such waste of human
life without good object.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 31

of politics was purely Italian ; and he cynically acted
upon the knowledge, as Henry vn. of England also
did, that the suppression of feudalism doomed the
sovereign to impotence unless he could hoard large
sums of ready money wrung from subjects. In future
He" saw that kings would be feared, not for the
doubtful feudatories they might summon, but in pro-
portion to the men and arms they could promptly pay
for in cash ; and he went one better than the two Henry
Tudors in getting the treasure he saw was needed.
They squeezed rills of money from religious orthodoxy,
and divided their subjects for a century ; he drew floods
of gold by exterminating a heterodox minority, and
united Spain for the ends he had in view. Ferdinand
and Isabel might therefore challenge the admiration of
subjects for their greatness and high aims, and command
loyalty by their success as rulers ; but they cannot be
regarded as loveable human beings.

Between two such strong characters as these it was
not to be expected that all would be harmonious at first,
and the married life of Isabel began inauspiciously
enough in one respect. There is no doubt that both
Ferdinand and his father intended that the former
should be King regnant of Castile, and not merely
King consort. Ferdinand indeed, through his grand-
father of the same name, was the male heir to the
Castilian crowns ; and as the Salic law prevailed in
Aragon, they assumed that it might be enforced in
Castile. This, however, was very far from Isabel's
view ; reinforced as she was by the decision of the
Castilian churchmen and jurists, and she stood firm.
For a time Ferdinand sulked and threatened to leave
her to fight out her battle by herself ; but better counsels
prevailed, and an agreement was made by which they

32 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

were to reign jointly, but that Isabel alone should appoint
alTcommanders, 6fficers~and administrators, in Uastile,
ancf retain control of all fiscafmatters in hetvrealms.

On the 2nd January 1475, Ferdinand joined his wife
in Segovia, where a Cortes had been summoned to take
the oath of allegiance to them. Through the thronged
and cheering street he rode to the Alcazar ; Beltran
de la Cueva, Duke of Alburquerque, by his side, and
nobles, bishops and burgesses, flocked to do homage
to the new sovereigns. Two months later the faithful
city of Valladolid greeted the royal couple with effusive
joy ; and a round of festivities drew the lieges and gave
time for adherents to come in. Both parties were
mustering forces for the great struggle ; and it needed
stout hearts on the part of Isabel and her husband to
face the future. The^Aj^Jihishnj^of Tolado^was nnw
on the sjde_oj^the_^ekraneja ; and so was Madrid and
some of the great nobles of Andalucia ; and, worst of
all, Alfonso of Portugal had been betrothed to his niece
the Beltraneja ; and was even now gathering his army
to invade Castile and seize the crown. On the 3rd
April the new sovereigns held high festival at Valladolid.
Isabel, in crimson brocade and with a golden crown
upon her veiled abundant russet hair, mounted a white
hackney with saddle cloth, housings and mane covered
with gold and silver flowers. She was followed by
fourteen noble dames dressed in parti-coloured tabards,
half green brocade and half claret velvet, and head
dresses to imitate crowns ; and, as they rode to take the
place of honour in the tilt yard, men said that no woman
was ever seen so beautiful and majestic as the Queen
of Spain.1 Knights and nobles flocked to the lists, and

1 Oviedo, who knew her well, says that no other woman could compare
with her in beauty.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 33

King Ferdinand rode into the yard mounted upon his
warhorse to break a lance, the acknowledged finest
horseman in Spain. But as he entered the populace
stared to see the strange crest he bore upon his helm,
and the stranger motto emblazoned upon his shield.
What could it mean ? asked, not without fear, some of
those who professed to be his friends. The crest took
the form of a blacksmith's anvil, and the motto ran ;—

Como yunque sufro y callo,
Por el tiempo en que me hallo.

I do bear, like anvil dumb,
Blows, until the time shall come.1

which we are told was meant as a warning to those at
his side that he knew they were beguiling him with such
pageantry whilst they were paltering with his enemies.
It was a gay though ominous feast ; but Isabel could
not afford much time for such trifling, and on the second
day she mounted her palfrey and rode out to Torde-
sillas, forty miles away, to inspect the fortifications, and
then to make an attempt to win back to her cause the
Archbishop of Toledo. With prodigious activity the
young Sovereigns separately travelled from fortress to
fortress, animating followers, and providing for defence ;
and Isabel was in the imperial city of Toledo late in
May 1475, when the news came to her that theJKing
of ^Portugal had entered Spain with a large army, had
formally married the Beltraneja at Palencia, and pro-
claimed himself King of Castile.2 Without wasting a
moment Isabel started on horseback for her faithful fief
of Avila, ninety miles away. She was less than two days

1 ' Cronicon de Valladolid,' Doc, Ined. 14, and also Alfonso de Palencia.

2 As one instance of the mercenary character of the Castilian nobles
of the time, I may mention that there is a bond signed by the King of
Portugal in the Frias archives promising to young Villena the Mastership
of Santiago in payment for his help.

C

34 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

on the road, and, though she had a miscarriage on the
way at Cabezon she dared not tarry until safe within the
walls of the city, which she entered on the 28th May.

For some months thereafter the fate of Spain hung
in the~ Lalance. Ferdinand strained every nerve, but
the forces against him were stronger than his, and the
Archbishop of Toledo with his wealth and following
had reinforced the Portuguese. The invading army
lay across the Douro at Toro, a frontier fortress of
Leon of fabulous strength, and Ferdinand from Valla-
dolid attempted to push them Back and was beaten.
All Leon, and the plain of Castile as far as Avila,
looked at the mercy of the invaders. But the Portu-
guese was slow of action, and at this critical juncture
the splendid courage of Isabel saved the situation.1
Summoning Cortes 'at her city of Medina, the centre
of the cloth industry and the greatest mart for bills of
exchange in Europe, she appealed to their patriotism,
their loyalty, and their love. Her eloquent plea was
irresistible. Money was voted without stint, merchants
and bankers "unlocked tHeir coffers, churches sold
their plate, and monasteries disinterred their hoards.
Aragonese troops marched in, Castilian levies came to
the call of their Queen, and by the end of 1475
Ferdinand was at the head of an army strong enough

1 The King of Portugal, having heard that Castilian raiders had crossed
the Portuguese frontier, is said to have proposed to Ferdinand at this
juncture a compromise, by which the Beltraneja should be dropped, and
Isabel recognised in return for the cession to Portugal of all Galicia and
the two fortresses of Zamora and Toro which he occupied. Ferdinand
was inclined to agree to this, and sent an envoy to propose it to his wife.
Before the envoy had finished his first sentence Isabel stopped him
indignantly, and forbade him to continue. She herself, she said, would
in future direct the war, and no foot of her own realm of Castile should
be surrendered. She then hurried to Medina and summoned the Cortes,
as is told in the text.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 35

_tp face the invaders. Isabel took her full share of the
military operations. On the 8th January 1476, she
rode out of Valladolid through terrible weather, in the
coldest part of Spain, to join Ferdinand's half-brother,
Alfonso, before Burgos. For ten days the Queen
travelled through the deep snowdrifts before she
reached the camp, to find that the city had already
surrendered ; and on the evening of her arrival, in the
gathering dusk, she entered the city of the Cid, to be
received by kneeling, silk-clad aldermen with heads
bowed for past transgressions, to be graciously
pardoned by the Queen. The pardon was hearty
and prompt ; for these, and such as these, Isabel
meant to make her instruments for bringing Spain to
heel.

In the meanwhile Ferdinand had marched to meet
the invading army of 3000 horse and 10,000 foot
which lay across the Douro at Toro. First he set
siege to Zamora, between the invading army and its
base, and the King of Portugal ineffectually attempted
to blockade him. Failing in this, the invaders on the
1 7th February raised their camp and marched towards
Toro again. They stole away silently, but Ferdinand
followed them as rapidly as possible, and caught up
with them twelve miles from Toro, late in the after-
noon, on the banks of the Douro. The charge of the
Aragonese upon the disorganised army on the march
was irresistible, and a complete rout of the invaders
ensuecL.no less than 3od~6T the fugitives being drowned
in the river in sheer panic. King Alfonso of Portugal
fled, leaving his royal standard behind him, and before
nightfall all was over, and the last hope of the
Beltraneja had faded for ever.

A month afterwards Zamora, the almost impreg-

36 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

nable fortress, surrendered to Ferdinand ; and then
the King marched to subdue other towns, whilst
Isabel laid siege to Toro. The_ Queen scorned to
avail herself of the privilege of her sex, and suffered
alTThe hardships and dangers of a soldier's life. Early
and Tate"sKeTwas on Tiorseback superintending the
operations, and ordered and witnessed more than one
unsuccessful assault upon the town. At length, after
a siege of many months, Tomjtself^fen, the last great
fortress to hold out, and Isabel rode into the starving
city in triumph. Then indeed was she Queen of
Castile, with none toj^uestion Ber right.

The waverers hastened to join the victorious side,
the nobles who had helped the Beltraneja, even the
Archbishop of Toledo, came penitently, one by one, to
make such terms as their mistress would accord ;
whilst the Beltraneja-herself, unmarried again by an
obedient Pope, retired to a Portuguese convent, and
the King of Portugal afterwards laid aside his royal
crown and assumed the tonsure and coarse gown of
a Franciscan friar. Never was victory more complete ;
and when three years later, earj^ in 1479, the old
King of Aragon, Ferdinand's father, went to his
account, Isabel and Ferdinand, for ever known as ' the
Catholic kings,' by grace of the Pope, reigned over
Spain jointly from the Pyrenees to the Pillars of
Hercules, one poor tributary Moorish realm, Granada,
alone remaining to sully with infidelity the reunited
domains of the Cross.

But the elements of aristocratic anarchy still existed,
especiallyLJn Galicia and Andalucia, where certain
noble families assumed the position of almost inde-
pendent sovereigns, and at any time might again
imperil the very existence of the State. With the

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 37

great ambitions of Ferdinand and the exalted fervour
of Isabel to spread Christianity, it must have been
clear to both sovereigns that they must make them-
selves absolutely supreme in their own country before
they could attempt to carry out their views abroad.
The realms of Aragon offered no great difficulty, since
good order prevailed, although the strict parliamentary
constitutions sorely limited the regal power, and gave
to the estates the command of the purse. In Castile,
however, the nobles, eternally at feud with each other,
were quite out of hand, and Isabel's first measures
were directed towards shearing them of their power
for mischief. All the previous kings of her line — that
of Trastamara — had been simply puppets in the hands
of the nobility ; she was determined, as a preliminary
of greater things, to be sole mistress in her realm.
Her task was a tremendous one, and needed supreme
diplomacy in dividing opponents, as well as firmness
in suppressing them. Isabel was a host in herself;
and to her, much more than to her husband, must be
given the honour of converting utter anarchy into
order and security in a prodigiously short time.

The only semblance of settled life and respect for
law in Castile was to be found in the walled towns.
The municipal government had always been the unit
of civilisation in Spain, and the nobility being untaxed,
the Castilian Cortes consisted entirely of the repre-
sentatives of the burgesses. With true statesmanship
Isabel therefore turned to this element to reinforce the
crown as against lawless nobles. The proposal to
revive in a new form the old institution of the
Brotherhood ' of towns was made to her at the
Cortes at Madrigal in April 1476, and
was at once accepted. A meeting of deputies was

38 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

called at Duenas in July, and within a few months the
urban alliance was complete. An armed force of 2000
horsemen and many foot-soldiers was formed and paid
by an urban house tax,1 They were more than a mere
constabulary, although they ranged the country far and
wide, and compelled men to keep the peace, for the
organisation provided a judicial criminal system that
effectually completed the task of punishment. Magis-
trates were appointed in every village of thirty families
for summary jurisdiction, and constables of the
Brotherhood were in every hamlet, whilst a supreme
council composed of deputies from every province in
Castile judged without appeal the causes referred to
it by local magistrates. The punishments for the
slightest transgression were terrible in their severity,
and struck the turbulent classes with dismay. In
1480 a league of nobles and prelates met at Cabefia,
under the Duke of Infantado, to protest against the
Queen's new force of burgesses. In answer to their
remonstrance she showed her strength by haughtily
telling them to look to themselves and obey the law,
and at once established the Brotherhood on a firmer
footing than before, to be a veritable terror to evil-
doers, gentle as well as simple.

Isabellas jio mild saint, as she is so often repre-
sented. She wasTarToo great a woman and Queen
to be that ; and though for the first two or three years

1 Each group of 100 heads of families subscribed sufficient to pay,
mount, arm, and maintain a horseman ; and when intelligence of a crime
came, every church bell in the district rang an alarm to summon the
members of the constabulary to pursue the evil-doer, a special prize being
given to the captor. It must be understood that the townships in Spain
extend in every case over a large territory outside the walls, so that
the house tax, although nominally urban because collected by the
municipalities, was really collected also from rural hamlets.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 39

of her reign diplomacy was her principal weapon, no
sooner had she divided her opponents, and firmly
established the Holy Brotherhood, than the iron flail
fell upon those who had offended. In Galicia the
nobles had practically appropriated to themselves the
royal revenues, and the Queen's writ had no power.
That might suit weak Henry, but Isabel was made of
sterner stuff than her brother had been, and in 1481
she sent two doughty officers to summon the repre-
sentatives of the Galician towns to Santiago, and to
demand of them money and men to bring the nobles
to their senses. The burgesses despaired, and said
that nothing less than an act of God would cure the
many evils from which they suffered. The act of God
they yearned for came, but Isabel was the instrument.
Forty-seven fortresses, which were so many brigand
strongholds, were levelled to the ground in the pro-
vince ; and some of the highest heads were struck
from noble shoulders. The stake and the gibbet were
kept busy, the dungeons and torture chambers full ;
and those of evil life in sheer terror mended their ways,
or fled to places were justice was less strict.

But it is in the suppression of the anarchy at Seville
that Isabel's personal action is most clearly seen. For
years the city had been a prey to the sanguinary
rivalry between two great families who lorded it over
the greater part of Andalucia, the^ Guzmans and the
Ponces de Leon ; and at the time of Isabel's accession
the feud had assumed the form of predatory civil war,
from which no citizen was safe. The cities of the
south were less settled in Christian organisation
than those of the north, and their municipal govern-
ments not so easy to combine; and Isabel, in 1477,
determined by her personal presence in Seville to

40 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

enforce the hard lessons she had taught the rest of her
realms. The armed escort that accompanied her was
sufficient, added to the awe already awakened by her
name, to cow the turbulent spirits of Seville. Reviv-
ing the ancient practice of the Castilian kings, Isabel,
alone or with her husband by her side, sat every
Friday in the great hall of the Moorish Alcazar at
Seville, to deal out justice without appeal to all comers.
Woe betided the offender who was haled before her.
The barbaric splendour, which Isabel knew how to use
with effect, surrounding her, gave to this famous royal
tribunal a prestige that captured the imagination of the
semi-oriental population of Seville, whilst the terrible
seyejrity_j)f its judgments and the lightning rapidity
ofLJtsjexecutions reduced the population to trembling
obedience wKilst IsaJSeTstayecTin the city. Xo
than four thousand malefactors fled — mostly across the
frontier — to escape from the Queen's wrath, whilst all
those who in the past had transgressed, either by
plundering or maltreating others, and could be caught,
were made to feel to the full what suffering was. So
great was Isabel's severity that at last the Bishop of
Cadiz, accompanied by the clergy and notables of
Andalucia, and backed by hosts of weeping women,
came and humbly prayed the Queen to have mercy in
her justice. Isabel had no objection. She did not
scourge_and slay because she, loved to do it, but to
pompeLobedience. Once that was obtained she was
content to stay her hand ; and before she left the city,
a general amnesty was given for past offences except
for serious crimes. But she left behind her an organ-
ised police and criminal tribunals, active and vigilant
enough to trample at once upon any attempt at
ing the former state of things.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 41

A more difficult task for Isabel was that of reforming
the moral tone of her court and society at large. The
Alcazar of Henry iv. had been a sink of iniquity, and
the lawlessness throughout the country had made the
practice of virtue almost impossible ; whilst the clergy,
and especially the regular ecclesiastics, were shamefully
corrupt. Isabel herself was not only severely discreet
in her conduct, but determined that no countenance
should be given to those who were lax in any of the
proprieties of life ; and it was soon understood by
ecclesiastics and courtiers that the only certain pass-
port to advancement in Castile was strict decorum.
It is probable that much of the sudden reform thus
effected was merely hypocrisy ; but it lasted long
enough to become a fixed tradition, and permanently
raised the standard of public and private life in Spain.

In all directions Isabel carried forward her work of
reform. The great nobles found to their dismay, when
the Queen was strong enough to do it, that she, forti-
fied by the Cortes of Toledo, had cancelled all the
unmerited grants so lavishly squandered by previous
kings upon them. Some of those who had been most
active in the late troubles, such as the Dukes of
Alburquerque and Alba and the Admiral of Castile,
Ferdinand's maternal uncle, were stripped almost to
the skin. Isabel's revenue on her accession had only
amounted to 40,000 ducats, barely sufficient for neces-
sary sustenance ; but in a very few years (1482) it had
multiplied by more than twelvefold, and thirty millions
of maravedis a year had been added to the royal
income from resumed national grants. To all remon-
strances from those who suffered, Isabel was firm and
iignified, though conciliatory in manner. Her voice
was sweet and her bearing womanly ; she always

42 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

ascribed her measures, however oppressive they might
seem, to her loveloF the country and her determina-
tion to make it great. Upon this ground she was
unassailable ; and enlisted upon her side even those
who felt the pinch by^apgealing to their national pride.

There was no one mea7ure"that added more to
Isabel's material power than her policy towards the
religious orders of knighthood. These three great
orders, Calatrava, Santiago, and Alcantara, had grown
out of the long crusade against the Moors ; devout
celibate soldiers receiving in community vast grants of
territory which they wrested from the infidel. By the
time of Isabel jheyjiad grown to be a scandal, for the
grandmasters disposed of revenues and forces as large
as those of the crown, and were practically independent
of it. Isabel's treatment of them was diplomatic and
wise as usual. As e_ach mastership fell vacant she
granted it to her husband ; and thus the three most
dangerous rivals tcPthe royal authority were made
thenceforward appanages of thejcrown, to which the
terri toriejs jvere_af terwards appropriated . l

ThejQueen's activity and strength of body and mind

1 The importance of obtaining control of the Orders was seen by Isabel
at the very beginning of her reign. When the Master of Santiago died
in 1476 the Queen was at Valladolid. Without a moment's delay she
mounted her horse and rode to the town of Huete, where the Chapter to
elect the new Master was to be held. She entered the Chapter and in an
energetic speech urged the knights for the sake of her, their sovereign, to
elect her husband their Master. The Castilian knights were angry at the
idea of an Aragonese heading them, and opposed the suggestion. Isabel
found a way out by pledging Ferdinand to transfer his powers as Master
to a Castilian as soon as he was elected ; and this he did, appointing his
faithful follower Cardenas ; but when the latter died Ferdinand became
actual Master. Thenceforward the knighthoods {encomiendas) were en-
dowed with pensions derived from rent charges on portions of the estates,
the bulk of the revenue being absorbed by the King's treasury. For
details of the Orders and their appropriation, see Ulick Burke's * History
of Spain' to 1515, edited by Martin Hume.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 43

must have been marvellous. We hear of her travelling
vast distances, almost incessantly in the saddle, visiting
remote parts of her husband's and her own dominions
for State business, to settle disputed points, to inspect
fortifications, to animate ecclesiastical or municipal
bodies, and to suppress threatened disorder. No
difficulty seemed to dismay her, no opposition to
deflect her from the exalted purpose she had in view.
For it must not be supposed that this strenuous
activity was sporadic and without a central object
which inspired it all. In this supreme object the
key^to Isabel's life must be sought. Isabel's mother
was mad : after the death of her husband she had
sunk into the gloomy devotional lunacy which afflicted
in after years so many of her descendants ; and in
the impressionable years of Isabel's youth, passed in
the isolated castle of Arevalo, the whole atmosphere
of her life had been one of mystic religious exaltation.
The Christian Spaniard of Castile had through
seven centuries gradually regained for Christ his lost
kingdom by a constant crusade against the infidel.
The secular struggle had made him a convinced
believer in his divine mission to re-establish the reign
of the cross on earth. To this end saints had led
him into battle in shining armour, blazing crosses in
the sky had heralded victory to God's own militia,
and holy relics, miraculously revealed, had served as
talismans which ensured success. JVlysticism and the
yearning for martyrdom was in the, air in Isabel's
youth, and she, a saintly neurotic, who happened also
to^be a genius and a queen, shared to__the full the
Castilian national obsession. The man who fostered
the growth of this feeling in the young princess at
Arevalo might have been useful in spurring a sluggish

44 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

mind to devotion ; but to further inflame the zeal of
a girl of Isabel's innate tendency was unnecessary,
and of this alone was he capable. He was a fiery,
uncompromising, Dominican monk, called Tomas de
Torquemada. The Dominicans, centuries before, had
been entrusted by the Pope with the special duty to
maintain the purity of the faith, and as its guardians,
spiritual pride and arrogance had always been the
characteristic of the order. Torquemada, as Isabel's
confessor and spiritual tutor, had abundant oppor-
tunities of influencing her, and never ceased to keep
before her the sacred duty imposed upon rulers of
extirpating heresy, root and branch, at any cost. Her
own brother Henry had been surrounded by the hated
infidel, the enemy of Christ and Spain. Failure as a
king, ruin as a man, and a miserable death, had been
his portion. And so the lesson was ceaselessly dinned
into Isabel's ear, that no ruler could be happy or
successful who did not smite heretics, infidels and
doubters, hip and thigh, for the glory of God. The
Moor, she was told, still defiled in Granada the
sacred soil of Spain, suffered by an unworthy
Christian king to linger for the sake of the paltry
tribute paid.

To_establish_the rule of Christ jm-earth, which she
was taught was her sacred duty, Isabel knew that a
strong weapon was needed. Only a united and
centralised Spain could give her that, and Spain must
be unifietttirst ofTall. Her marriage with Ferdinand
*waTT"grea1t step in advance ; her^suppression of the
nobles and the masterships of the orders another, the
submission of the country to her will and law a third,
the increase of her revenues a fourth.; but_a__greater
than all was the reawakening inthe breasts of all

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 45

jj^_jpnystic exaltation and spiritual pride
that jjgypl strengtfe-^c^their arms_againsj the Moor
in_jthe heroic days of olcl. The character of~TheT
Spanish ^people, and~~the state of the public mind at
the time, made it easy to stir up the religious rancour
of the majority against a minority already despised
and distrusted. Throughout Spain there were
numerous families of the conquered race nominally
Christians, but yet living apart in separate quarters,
and unmixed in blood with their neighbours. They
were, as a rule, industrious and well-to-do handicrafts-
men and agriculturists, whose artistic traditions and
skill gave them the monopoly in many profitable and
thriving avocations. The Christian Spaniard had not,
as a rule, developed similar qualities, and were natur-
ally jealous of the so-called new Christians who lived
with them, but were not of them.

There was, however, at first but little open enmity
between these two races of Spaniards, though distrust
and dislike existed. It was otherwise in the case of
the Jews. They, during the centuries of Moorish
rule, had grown rich and numerous, and had in sub-
sequent periods almost monopolised banking and
financial business throughout Spain, marrying in many
cases into the highest Christian families. As farmers
of taxes and royal treasurers they had become extremely
unpopular, especially in Aragon ; and although, for
the most part, professed Christians, they were eyed
with extreme jealousy by the people at large, and on
many occasions had been the victims of attack and
massacre in various places.1 Nevertheless, so far as
can be seen, the first steps towards religious persecu-

1 As at Jaen in 1473, where the Constable of Castile was killed whilst
trying to stop the massacre.

46 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

tion by Isabel and her husband do not appear to
have been prompted, although they may have been
strengthened, by this feeling. There had for centuries
existed in Aragon and Sicily an Inquisition for the
investigation of cases of heresy. It was a purely
papal institution, and its operations were very mild,
though extremely unpopular. In Castile, the papal
Inquisition had never been favoured by rulers, who
were always jealous of the interference of Rome, and
at the time of Isabel's accession it had practically
ceased to exist.

When the sovereigns were holding Court at Seville
in 1477, a Sicilian Dominican came to beg for the
confirmation of an old privilege, giving to the Order
in Sicily one-third of the property of all the heretics
condemned there by the Inquisition. This Ferdinand
and Isabel consented to, and the Dominican, whose
name was Dei Barberi, suggested to Ferdinand that
as religious observance had grown, so lax under the
late King Henry, it might be advisable to introduce
a similar tribunal into Castile. Ferdinand's ambitions
were great. He wanted to win for Barcelona the
mastership of the Mediterranean and the reversion of
the Christian Empire of the East, and, as a pre-
liminary, to clear Spain itself of the taint of dominant
Islam at Granada. He understood that times had
changed, and that the nerve of war was no longer
feudal aids, but the concentration in the hands of the
Kipg of the ready money of his subjects. The people
who had most of the ready money in Spain were the
very people whose orthodoxy was open to attack, and
he welcomed a proposal that might make him rich
beyond dreams.

Isabel was not greedy for money as her husband

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 47

was : she was too much of a religious mystic for that ;
but to spread the kingdom of Christ on earth, to crush
His enemies and raise His cross supreme in the eyes
of men, seemed to promise her the only glory for
which she yearned. By her side was her confessor
Torquemada, the Dominican Ojeda, and the Papal
Nuncio, all pressing upon her that to strike at heresy
in her realms was her duty. So Isabel took the step
they counselled, and begged the Pope for a bull
establishing the Inquisition in Castile. The bull was
granted in September 1478, but no active steps were
taken for nearly two years.

In 1480, Isabel and her husband were again in
Seville, and the Dominicans were ceaseless in their
exhortations to them to suppress the growing scandal
of obstinate Judaism. The complaints of the clergy
against the Jews were such as they knew would be
supported by the populace. Amongst other things,
they said that the Jews bought up and ate all the
meat in the market for their Sabbath, and there was
none left for Christians on Sunday ; l that they were
hoarding coin to such an extent that there was a lack
of currency ; that they donned rich finery and ornaments
only fit for their betters, and so on.2

The various modern apologists of Isabel have striven
to minimise her share in the establishment of the dread
tribunal that sprang out of these and similar complaints.
There seems to me no reason for doing so : she her-
self probably considered it a most praiseworthy act,

1 Galindez and Perez de Pulgar.

2 At the Cortes of Madrigal in 1479, and in those of Toledo in 1480,
Isabel and Ferdinand renewed all the old ferocious edicts against the use
of silk and jewels by Jews in their garments, and ordered them strictly to
confine their residence to the ghettoes, and two years later all toleration
they enjoyed by papal decree was abolished.

48 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

and her only hesitation in the matter was caused by
her dislike of strengthening the papal power over the
church of Castile.1 There could have been no repug-
nance in her mind to punishing, however severely,
those whom she looked upon as God's enemies, and
consequently unworthy of the privileges of humanity.
Ferdinand added his persuasion to the clamours of the
churchmen ; and from Medina del Campo, Isabel, in
§£pXeml)ej^j^

act asjiiguisitors, and to establish their.. tribunaLat
Sevill "

took alarm at once, and large

numrjers of them fled from the city to the shelter of
some of the neighbouring great nobles, who looked
with dislike at this new development of priestly power.
A decree of the sovereign's at once forbade all loyal
subjects to withhold suspected heretics from their
accusers, and those fugitive Jews who could escape
sought the safety of Moorish Granada. In the first
days of 1481, the Inquisition got to work, striking at
the highest first, and before the end of the year 2000
poor wretches were burnt in Andalusia alone.2 All
Spain protested against^ it. Deputations from the chief
to^wris^came and demanded the abolition of a foreign
tribunal over Spaniards. The Aragonese, rough and
independent as usual, resorted to violence, and hunted
the Inquisitors, whilst in Old Castile the tribunal could
only sit, in many places, surrounded by the Queen's
soldiers. But Isabel's heart was aflame with zeal, and
Ferdinand, with gaping coffers, was rejoicing at the

1 Father Florez claims for Isabel and Torquemada alone what he con-
siders the great honour of establishing the Inquisition.

2 In the first eight years of its existence, the Inquisition burnt in Seville
alone 700 people, and sent to perpetual imprisonment in the dungeons
5000 more, confiscating all their goods. — Bernaldez.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 49

showers of Jewish gold that flowed to him ; and all
remonstrance was in vain. The Pope himself soon
took fright at the severity exercised, and threatened to
withdraw the bull, but Ferdinand silenced him with a
hint that he would make the Inquisition an independent
tribunal altqgether, as later it practically became, and
thenceforward the horrible business went on unchecked
until Spairt was seared from end to end, and inde-
pendent judgment was stifled for centuries in blood
and sacrificial smoke.

The heartless bigot Tot^uemada^IsabgTs confessor,
wjis jj^ppoi n ted, In^4J4^oj-Generalin 1483, and he, the

man, in Spain,

became the,, greatest power in the land, master of
I sabers conscience and feedej* of Ferdinand's

Isabel's Spanish biographers continue to assert that she
was tireless in her endeavours to soften the rigour of
her own tribunal, and to intercede for her ' dear Cas-
tilians.' There is not a scrap of real evidence known
to prove that she did so, and certainly her contempor-
aries did not believe it.1 Her administration, how-
ever, had already been extremely successful. Peace
and order reigned, the _pride of Spaniards, which she
so sedulously fostered, had-. been -worked up to a high
pitch, the Queen herself was personally popular, in con:
sequence of her dignity, Jier activity, and her patriotism ;
and the urban populations, who had so greatly aided
her, and were now so powerful, dreaded to cause dis-
turbance that might have thrown the country again
into the clutches of the nobles. Terrible, therefore, as

1 Shortly after her death, the mayor of her own city of Medina del
Campo declared that the soul of Isabel had gone to hell for her cruel
oppression of her subjects, and that all the people around Valladolid and
Medina, where she was best known, were of the same opinion. — Spanish
State Papers, Supplement to vols. i. and ii.

D

50 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was the action of the Holy Office, acquiesced in by the
Queen, there were many reasons why no combined
opposition to it in Castile was offered, although for the
first years of its existence it was bitterly hated.

To the Queen during these first few years of cease-
less activity, no other child had been born but the
IirfantaJLsabel, the first fruit of her marriage in 1470.
The constant long journeys on horseback, the hard-
ships and risk entailed by her work, thus for eight
years prevented the birth of a male heir. But during
Isabel's stay at Seville, on the 3Oth June 1478, the
prayed for Prince of Asturias, Juan, was born. Fer-
dinand was away in the north at the time, but all the
pomp and splendour, which Isabel knew so well how
to use, heralded the birth of the Prince. On the i5th
July the Queen was sufficiently well to ride in state to
the cathedral from the Moorish Alcazar where she
lived, and to present her first-born son to the Church.
Through the narrow, tortuous lanes of the sunny city,
packed with people, Isabel rode on a bay charger ; her
crimson brocade robe, all stiff with gold embroidery,
trailing almost to the ground, over the petticoat covered
with rich pearls. Her saddle, we are told, was of gold,
and the housings black velvet, with bullion lace and
fringe. Ferdinand's base brother Alfonso, and his
kinswoman the Duchess of Vistahermosa, followed
close behind, and the Queen's bridle was held by the
Constable of Castile and Count Benavente. The
merry music of fife, tabor, and clarion preceded the
royal party ; and behind there came on foot the nobles
and grandees, and the authorities of the city. The
baby Prince was borne in the arms of his nurse, seated
upon a mule draped with velvet, and embroidered with
the scutcheons of Castile, Leon, and Aragon, and led

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 51

by the Admiral of Castile. At the high altar of the
famous Mudejar Cathedral, Isabel solemnly devoted
her child to the service of God, and then, with splendid
largess to all and sundry, she returned to the palace.1

Isabel was unremitting always in the performance of
her religious duties, and wherever she stayed, endow-
ments for purposes of the Church commemorated her
visit. Her humility and submission to priests and
nuns is cited with extravagant praise by her many
ecclesiastical eulogists, and they tell the story of how,
when Father Talavera first succeeded Torquemada as
her confessor, he bade her kneel at his feet like an
ordinary penitent. When she reminded him that
monarchs always sat by the side of the confessor, as
she had always done before, he rebuked her by saying
that his seat was the seat of God, before whom all
kneeled without distinction ; and the Queen thence-
forward kept upon her knees before the priest, whom
she honoured thenceforward for what in our days we
should consider unpardonable arrogance.

There was little of repose for Isabel, even after the
birth of her child. To Seville came the news a few
months afterwards that the old soldier Archbishop of
Toledo and the Pachecos had once more persuaded
Alfonso of Portugal to strike a blow for his niece and
wife the Beltraneja. Raising what troops she could,
Isabel rode through Estremadura at the head of her
force, determined to end for good claims that she
thought had already been disposed of. Ferdinand was
in Aragon, where, his father having just died, his
presence could not be dispensed with ; but Isabel was
undismayed. In vain her councillors begged her to
refrain from undertaking tb< campaign in person. The

1 Florez, ( Reinas Catolictk' '^

52 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

country was devastated by famine and war, they said ;
pestilence prevailed in the towns, and the raids of the
Portuguese and rebels would expose her to great
danger. 'I did not come hither,' Isabel replied, 'to
shirk danger and trouble, nor do I intend to give my
enemies the satisfaction, nor my subjects the chagrin,
to see me do so, until we end the war we are engaged
upon or make the peace we seek.'1 Isabel, in command
of the Castilians, finally crushed the Portuguese at the
battle jrf^Albuera ; and then, after reducing to sub-
mission the rebel noble fortresses, she negotiated a
peace ^with Portugal and France at Alcantara, by
wrnch both powers were compelled to recognise her as
Queen of Spain. Suppressing revolt, deciding dis-
putes, and punishing trangressions on her way, Isabel
then rode to Toledo, where Ferdinand joined her, and
there her third child, Joan, was born, in November
1479.

1 Pulgar. ' Cronica de los Reyes Catolicos.'

CHAPTER II

CASTILE and Aragon, now being indissolubly united,
and internal peace secured, it was time for the sove-
reigns to prepare for the execution of the great designs
that had respectively moved them to effect what they
had done. These designs were to some extent diver-
gent from each other. Ferdinand's main object was
to cripple his rival, France, in the direction of Italy,
and assume for Aragon the hegemony of the Mediter-
ranean and of the sister Peninsula, of which Sicily
already belonged to him and Naples to a member of
his house. Castile, on the other hand, had for cen-
turies cultivated usually harmonious relations with
France, the frontiers not being conterminous except
at one point, the mouth of the Bidasoa ; and the
ambitions of Castile were traditionally towards the
absorption of Portugal, the domination of the coast of
North Africa, and the spread of the Christian power
generally to the detriment of Islam, its secular enemy.
Its own Moorish populations were as yet but imper-
fectly assimilated, and the existence of the realm of
Granada in the Peninsula kept hopes alive in the
breasts of the Castilian Moors. The presence of
many thousands of potential enemies in the midst of
Christian Spain, and the wealth and number of the
Jews, who, in a struggle, would probably side with
the Moors, undoubtedly influenced greatly in causing
the severity of the Inquisition against them and their
subsequent expulsion. The first step, therefore, to be

54 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

taken towards the objects either of Aragon and Castile,
was to reduce to impotence any Moorish power in
Spain itself that might cause anxiety to the Christian
rulers whilst they were busy upon plans abroad, though
this step was mainly important to Castile rather than
to Aragon.

This was the state of affairs in the beginning of
1481. The Castilians were subdued and prepared to
do the bidding of their Queen, but the Catalans and
Aragonese, rough and independent, had to be conciliated
before they could be depended upon to give their aid
to an object apparently for the advantage of Castile.
Isabel had summoned a Cortes of her realms to the
imperial city of Toledo late in 1480, to take the oath
of allegiance to her infant son Juan as heir to the
throne : and thence, with a splendid train, she rode to
visit for the first time her husband's kingdoms, to re-
ceive their homage as joint sovereign. Ferdinand
met his wife at Calatayud in April 1481, and there,
before the assembled Cortes of Aragon, the oath of
allegiance to the sovereigns and their heir was taken.
The Aragonese were rough-tongued and jealous, and
even more so the Catalans, dreading the centralising
policy of Isabel and their assimilation by Castile ; and
throughout Ferdinand's dominions Isabel was forced to
hear demands and criticisms to which the more amen-
able Cortes of Castile had not accustomed her. It
was gall and wormwood to her proud spirit that sub-
jects should haggle with monarchs, and in Barcelona
she turned to her husband, when the Cortes had refused
one of his requests, and said : ' This realm is not ours,
we shall have to come and conquer it.' But Ferdi-
nand knew his subjects better than she, and gradually
made them understand that in all he did he had their

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 55

interests in view. He was forced, indeed, by circum-
stances and his wife to allow precedence to Castilian
aims, the better to compass those of Aragon.

The turbulent Valencians were being won to be-
nevolence by the presence of their King and the smiles
of his wife in the last days of 1481, when the news
reached the sovereigns that the pretext they needed
for their next great step had been furnished by the
Moors of Granada. From the fairy palace of the
Alhambra for the previous two hundred and fifty
years, the Kings of Granada had ruled a territory in the
South of Andalucia, running from fifteen miles north of
Gibraltar along the Mediterranean coast two hundred
and twenty miles to the borders of Murcia, and in-
cluding the fine ports of Malaga, Velez, and Almeria.
The industry of the people and the commerce of their
important seaboard, facing the African land of their
kinsmen, made the population prosperous and their
standard of living high ; but a series of petty despots,
successively reaching the throne by usurpation and
murder, had enabled the Kings of Castile, by foment-
ing the consequent discord, to_ reduce Granada to the
position of a tributary. When Isabel succeeded, and
the treaties between Castile and Granada had to be
renewed in 1476, Ferdinand had demanded the prompt
annual payment of the tribute in gold, Muley Abul
Hassan had paid no tribute to Isabel's brother, and
intended to pay none to her. ' Tell the Queen and
King of Castile,' he replied, * that steel and not gold
is what we coin in Granada.' From the day they
received the message Isabel and Ferdinand knew that
they could not wield a solid Spain to their ends until
the Cross was reared over the Mosque of Granada.
When, therefore, all the rest of Spain was pacified, and

56 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the sovereigns were at Valencia at Christmas 1481,
the pretext for action came, not unwelcome, at least
for Isabel. The Moors of Granada had swept down
by night and captured the Christian frontier fortress
of Zahara.1 Isabel and her husband had never ceased
since their accession to prepare for the inevitable war.
The civil conflict they had passed through had proved
the superiority for their purpose of paid troops of their
own over feudal levies, and already the organisation of
a national army existed. The Royal Council appointed
by Isabel had brought from France, Italy, and Germany
the best skilled engineers and constructors of the
recently introduced iron artillery ; great quantities of
gunpowder had been imported~from Sicily, and im-
proved lances, swords, and crossbows had been invented
and manufactured in Italy and Spain.

The troops that had been expelled from Zahara, and
those that at first revenged the insult by the capture
and sack of the important Moorish fortress of Alhama,
between Malaga and Granada, were the vassals of the
princely Andalucian nobles, the Duke of Medina
Sidonia and the Marquis of Cadiz ; but the sove-
reigns, hurrying from Valencia to the Castilian town
of Medina del Campo, set about organising the coming
war with national forces. The efficiency and fore-
sight shown were extraordinary, and, up to that time,
unexampled. Nothing seems to have been forgotten
or left to chance ; flying hospitals, field ambulances,
and army chaplains, testify to Isabel's personal in-
fluence. Whatever may have been the case with
Ferdinand, his wife approached the struggle as to a

1 The Moors justified the attack by the accusation that the famous
Ponce de Leon, Marquis of Cadiz, had raided and plundered the town of
Mercadillo, near Ronda.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 57

sacred crusade. Torquemada, though not yet Inquisitor
General, was busy with the Holy Office, and had just
been replaced as Isabel's confessor by the saintly
Father Talavera, whose influence over the Queen
was greater still ; and whose zeal for the conquest of
Granada for the cross was a consuming passion, only
comparable in its strength with his proud humility.1

The kingdom of Granada was girt around with
mountain fortresses of immense strength upon the
spurs and peaks of the Sierra Nevada ; and in the
midst stood the lovely city, as it stands to-day, with its
twin fortresses upon their sister cliffs, the Alhambra
and the Albaycin, each capable of housing an army.
The task of reducing the mountain realm was a great
one, for the outlying fortresses^ had to be subdued^
separately bejm^_tl^e_almos^ jmpregnable capital could
be_attacked, whilst the long line of coast had^ to be
watchje^and_blockaded to ^prevent, if possible, succour
being sent from Africa by_Jdnsinen_^Lcross tEe~sea.
In"^flieTi^~dFys~"ofTlarch 1482, the news of the
capture of Alhama by the Andalucian nobles, and the
awful slaughterof the women and children, as well as
the men, who so heroically defended it, reached Isabel
at Medina ; and the splendid exploit and vast booty
won uplifted all Castilian hearts. It is said by many
historians, but is not true, that Isabel herself set out
barefooted on a pilgrimage to Compostella, to thank
Santiago for the victory. But though she had no time
for this, she bade the Church throughout Castile sing
praises for the boon vouchsafed to the Christian cause.

1 When somewhat later the Queen urgently begged him to accept the
bishopric of Salamanca, and he persistently refused, she reproached him
for not obeying her once when she had obeyed him so many times. ' I
will not be the bishop,' he replied, 'of any place but Granada.' He was
in effect the first archbishop.

58 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

But then came tidings less bright. The Moorish
King, with all his force of 80,000 men, was besieging
the Marquis of Cadiz in Alhama : the water supply
had been cut off, food was scarce, and the Christians
surrounded. Within a week of the news Ferdinand
was on the march with his army, and the Duke of
Medina Sidonia, with his 40,000 armed retainers, was
rapidly approaching Alhama to succour his ancient foe
the Marquis of Cadiz. The slaughter of Moors in the
constant unsuccessful assaults upon Alhama had been
immense ; the King, Muley Abul Hassan, had bitter
domestic enemies, and daring not to face the approach-
ing Christians, he raised the siege and returned to
Granada. The rich booty taken in the town by the
original captors aroused the cupidity of the relieving
force, and dissensions between the Christians arose
over the division of the spoil. Medina Sidonia and
his army marched away, and again Muley Abul
Hassan beleaguered Alhama, with artillery this time,
and a powerful army. Once more deeds of unheard
of gallantry and hardihood were done by the Moorish
chivalry ; but, as before, unavailingly. By the end of
March Ferdinand's great host, with 40,000 beasts of
burden carrying supplies and munitions, approached,
and again Muley Abul Hassan retreated to his dis-
affected capital. It was a blow from which the
Moorish power in Spain never recovered, and thence-
forwardjGranada fought_hopelessly with her back to
tne walIT~

Into the fertile vega of Granada swept Ferdinand's
host in the midsummer of 1482, carrying devastation
and ruin in its van. From the heights of Granada the
Moors, with impotent hate and rage, saw their blazing
villages, their raided flocks and herds, their murdered

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 59

countrymen, and desolated fields ; and yet within the
fair city treason and civil discord numbed all hearts,
and paralysed the warrior's arms. For Muley Abul
Hassan was fighting foes within hjs_own Harem more
deadly than the Christians who raided beneath his
walls ; and a palace revolution led by his wife and his
un3utiful ""son, 7fbu"Abdaila (Boabdil), was already
pIoUmgTTnr^ in the

vega of Granada, it was necessary for Ferdinand to
capture the frowning fortress that crowned the height
of Loja, and commanded the pass into Castile. It
ha3 long been a thorn in the Christian flesh, and now
Ferdinand, with all the chivalry of Spain, were
pledged to capture it at any cost. Though brave
and cool, Ferdinand was no great tactician, and was
easjly^utwitted ^y the wily Moors, who led his forces
into ambush and utterly routed the Christian host.
Panic ancT flight ensued, with the loss of baggage,
standards, and arms ; and Ferdinand himself escaped
only by the efforts of a small devoted band of Castilian
knights. The ruin was complete, and when Ferdinand
joined his heroic wife at the ancient Moorish Alcazar of
Cordova, even her faith and steadfastness for a time
wavered.

But not for long. Talavera, Torquemada, and
Mendoza, the Cardinal of Spain, with fiery zeal for
the extirpation of heresy, were at her side. Not for
territory alone, but to fix God's realm on earth freely,
must sacrifice be made and final victory won : and,
though Ferdinand with longing eyes towards his own
aims, yearned to use his arms against France for the
recapture of his own provinces of Rosellon and
Cerdagne, and tried to persuade his wife that though
1 her war might be a holy one, his against the French

6o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

would be a just one,' Isabel had her way, and with
unflinching zeal set about organising to snatch con-
quest from defeat.1 Muley Abul Hassan, expelled
from his city of Granada, but holding his own in
Malaga and the south, had been succeeded in his
capital by the weak, rebellious Boabdil. The old
King and his brother, El Zagal, were still fighting
doughtily, and even successfully raiding the Christian
land near Gibraltar ; and Boabdil, jealous of their
activity, determined to sally from Granada and strike
a blow for his cause, at the instigation of his masculine
mother. At the head of 9000 Moors, _all glittering
and confident, iTieTPrince sallied out of Granada in
April 1483, and, collecting the veteran guard of Loja
on the way, marched towards Cordova. The Moors
were undisci^nedTToade^witTfToot, and led by a fool,
when they approached the Christian Cordovese city of
Lucena, and their ostentatious march into Christian
land had been heralded. Their attack upon the city
was repulsed with great valour, and whilst they were
mecfitating a^eliew^eii~~a§saulti a relieving force of
Christians approached. The Moors retired, but were
O3Lej-teken__and utterly routed. Boabdil the King,
garbed in crimson veTveTniantle heavy with gold, and
armed in rich damascened steel, was singled out from
amongst the mob of fugitives, c^pti^e^_byaCastilian
and borne in triumph by the Christian

chief, the Count of Cabra, to the strong castle of
Porcuna, there to await the sovereign's decision as to
his fate. Isabel and her husband were far away at the
time; for, after the birth of her fourth child, Maria, in
the previous summer of 1482, she and Ferdinand had
travelled north to Madrid to meet the Castilian Cortes,

1 Pulgar, ' Cronica de los Reyes Catolicos.'

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 61

and ask for supplies for carrying on the war. Thence,
on a more questionable errand, they had moved further
north. The little mountain realm of Navarre on the
Pyrenees, a buffer state between Castile and France,
belonged to the descendants of Ferdinand's father by
his first wife. The desire^ _of_ the Aragonese King to
unite Navarre to Ferdinand's kingdoms, had removed
by murdeFbne Na;v^rese"s^v^r^igTrafter Another, until
now, in 1482, the beautiful young half French Francis
Phcebus was King. He was one more obstacle to be
removed ; for after him a sister would come to the
throne, and she might be easily dealt with : so poison
ended the budding life of Francis Phcebus — by
FefcTThand's orders, TFwasT credibly said at the time ; I
and Ferdinand and his wife hurried up to Vitoria,
bent, if possible, upon adding one more crown to the
brows of the Queen of Castile.2 It was a cynically
clever move of Ferdinand's, for it would bring Castile
in touch with France, and thus play into the hands of
the Aragonese, but jjie threatening attitude of Louis
xi. convinced Ferdinand that he must wait for a more
fitting opportunity, which he did for thirty years, when
Isabel had long been dead. When the news came to
Tarazona, where the Cortes of Aragon were in session,
that Boabdil was captured, Ferdinand hurried south to
Cordova to reap the fruits of victory, leaving Isabel in
Castile.

In the great hall of the Alcazar of Cordova,
Ferdinand sat in council in August 1483, surrounded
by the soldiers who in his absence had overrun the
vega, and two Moorish embassies claimed audience.
One came from the old King, Muley Abul Hassan, in

1 Lagre"ze. See also Zurita's ' Anales de Aragon.

2 Florez, « Reinas Catolicos.'

62 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Malaga, begging with heavy bribes the surrender of
his rebellious son Boabdil. This embassy Ferdinand
refused to receive ; but the other from the Queen
Zoraya, Boabdil's mother, with offers of ransom, sub-
mission, and obedience, was admitted. Ferdinand was
the craftiest man of his age, and saw that the imprison-
ment of Boa^n_gave_unity to the Granadan Moors,
whilst his presence amongst them would again be the
sigiiaTTorTratricidal conflict. But the King of Aragon
ttFove a^a7iTrJa1rgaTri™as he always did, and the foolish,
vain Boabdil only bought his liberty at a heavy price.
He was to do homage to the Christian kings, to pay a
heavy ransom and yearly tribute, and give passage to
the Christian armies to conquer his father in Malaga.
Boabdil meekly subscribed to any terms, and then
paying homage ~orT~Bended knee to his master, he
wended his way to Moorish land, a mark for the scorn
of all men, ' Boabdil the Little ' for the rest of time.

Anarchy thenceforward reigned^ through the kingdom
of^nmaj^a,~2LS Ferdinand had foreseen. I shall pluck
the pomegranate, seed by seed, chuckled the Christian
king. And so he did ; for, although a two years'
truce had been settled with Boabdil, the civil war
gave to the Christian borderers constant opportunities
of overrunning the land, on the pretext of aiding or
avenging one of the combatants and attacking the
old King. Ferdinand would fain have attacked the
new King of France, Charles VIIL, but Isabel was
firm ; and though Ferdinand was thereafter obliged
to stay a time in his own dominions to placate the
discontented Catalans, Isabel was tireless in her in-
sistence upon the Christian crusade that she had
undertaken, though, for appearance sake, she con-
sented to both wars being carried on at the same

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 63

time, which she knew was impracticable.1 The spirit
qf_the woman was indomitable. Travelling south
towards the seat of war in 1484 with the new Arch-
bisjiop of Toledo, Cardinal Mendoza, she herself took
command of the campaign against the Moor.

It was, verily, her own war. In counsel with -
veteran soldiers she surprised them with her boldness
and knowledge ; and her harangues to the soldiery,
and care for their welfare, caused her to be idolised
by men who had never yet regarded a woman as
being capable of such a stout heart as hers. She
managed even to spur Ferdinand into leaving Aragon,
and once more taking the field against the old King
of Granada, and, one by one, the Moorish fortresses
fell, and the Christian host encamped almost before
the walls of Granada : the Queen herself, though
approaching childbirth (in 1485), travelling from place
to place in the conquered country, encouraging, super-
vising, and directing. The following year, 1486,
Isabel and her husband again trav-eHecL- to Cordova.
fromTJastiIe1~and now with a greater force than ever
before. For news of this saintly warrior Queen, who
WcLS^fighting for the cross, had spread now through";
Christendom, and not Iberian knights alone, but the '
chivalry of France and Italy, Portugal and England,
were flocking to share the glory of the struggle.

At the conquest of Loja in May 1486, Lord Rivers,
Conde de Escalas, as the Spaniards called him, aided
greatly with his men in capturing the place, and earned
the praise of Isabel.2 As each church was dedicated
to the true worship in the conquered towns, Isabel
herself contributed the sacred vessels and vestments

1 See Perez de Pulgar, ' Reyes Catolicos.'

2 Florez, ' Reinas Catolicos.'

64 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

necessary for Christian worship ; relics of the saints,
and blessed banners sent by her, went always with
the Castilian hosts ; and soon the spiritual pride,
which had been the secret of all Spain's strength in
the past, became again the overwhelming obsession,
which, whilst it strengthened the arms, hardened the
hearts of all those who owned the sway of Isabel.

In December 1485, Isabel's last child, Katharine, was
born at Alcala de Henares, and through most of the
stirring campaigns of 1486 the Queen accompanied
the army in their sieges of Moorish towns, and thence
rode with her husband right across Spain to far
Santiago, crushing rebellion (that of Count Lemos),
holding courts of justice, punishing offences and
rewarding services on the way. The next spring
again saw her in the field against the important
maritime city of Velez- Malaga, which was captured
in April ; and in the autumn the great port of Malaga
fell after an heroic defence. But heroism of infidels
aroused no clemency in the breast of the Christian
Queen. By her husband's side, with cross borne
before them, and a crowd of shaven ecclesiastics
around them, they^rode in triumph through the
deserted city_jto_the mosque, now purified into a
Christian cathedral. Christian captives in chains were
dragged from pestilent dungeons that the manacles
might be struck from their palsied limbs in the victors'
presence, and when the Christians had given thanks to
the Lord of Hosts, the whole starving population of
Malaga were assembled in the great courtyard of the
fortress, andeverysoul was condemned to slavery
for_]ife__: some to be sent to Africa in exchange for
Christian captives ; some to be sold to provide funds
for the war, some for presents for the Pope and other

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 65

potentates and great nobles, whilst all the valuables
in the wealthy city were grabbed by greedy Ferdinand,
by cme of his usually clever and heartless devices.1

The want of magnanimity and common humanity
to these poor people, who had only defended their
homes against the invader, is usually ascribed entirely
to Ferdinand ; but there is nothing whatever to show
that Isabel thought otherwise than he, except that she
objected to a suggestion that they should all be put
to the sword. She was a child of her age, an age
that did not recognise" the Tight of ofHers trTant^
orthodox Christians to be regardecTjis human beings ;
aricT in Isabel all instinctive womanly feeling was
dominated by her conviction of the greatness of her
cfuty as she understood it, and the sacred mission of
her sovereignty. The fall of Malaga rendered inevit-
able that of the city of Granada, only held, as it was,
under the nominal rule of the miserable Boabdil, sup-
ported by the Christian troops under Gonzalo de
Cordova. Every week his little realm grew smaller,
and every hour the streets of Granada rang with
Moslem curses of his name. Outside the walls rapine
and war, inside treachery and murder, scourged
Granada ; and whilst the pomegranate was rotting to
its fall, in the intervals of fresh conquests Isabel and
her husband progressed through Aragon and Valencia,
everywhere carrying terror to evildoers and strengthen-
ing the arm of the Inquisition. Thejriex^year, 1488.
the_same process was continued, jmdjn 1489 the large
cities of Baza, Almeria and Guadix were conquered
from Boabdil's rebel uncle. Baza was the strongest
fortress in the kingdom, and offered a resistance so
obstinate that the Christians, despairing of taking it,

1 Bernaldez, ' Reyes Catolicos,' and Bleda's ' Cronica.'
E

66 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

sent to Isabel at Jaen, asking her permission to raise
the siege. She commanded them to redouble their
efforts. Fresh men, money and munitions were sent
to them. The Dukes ~oF~Arba and Najera, and the
Admiral of Castile, were bidden to lead their men to
aid Ferdinand before Baza. New field hospitals were
supplied, and all the MancHa and Andalucia were
swept for food and transport, no less than 14,000
mules, for the relief of the besiegers. Floods broke
down the bridges and made the roads impassable, but
still I sabeTHi^ not loseTTieart. A body of 6000 men
were raised to repair the ways. The cost exhausted
the Queen's treasury, but she laid hands on the church
plate and the treasures of the convents, pledged her
own crown with the Jews to overcome the obstacle,
and raised a hundred million maravedis for her pur-
pose. Her ladies followed her example and poured
^^^^l^a^^^^^intQj^L^o^^, and yet Baza
still held out, and winterwas close atjhand. Ferdinand
ISalid^ the stout-hearted

Queen herself set out from Jaen in November, and
rode undaunted through the bitter weather, night and
day, to join her troops at Baza. Her presence struck
the Moors with dismay, and filled the Christian hearts
with confidence, for both knew that there she would
stay, at any cost, ujitil_lbe..4)la£e^surrendered, as it
did, to her, on jhe_4th December 1489,* whereupon
Airfferia ancTGuadix gave up~Tfre" "struggle, and the

1 The chroniclers of the siege dilate much upon the magnificent appear-
ance of Isabel and her great train of ladies when, on the day of her arrival
before Baza, she reviewed her troops in full view of the dumbfoundered
Moors on the ramparts of the fortress. Her own Castilian troops, frantic
with enthusiasm, no longer cried ' Long live the Queen/ but * Long live
our King Isabel.'— Florez, ' Reinas Catolicos,' and Letters of Peter Martyr,
who was present.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 67

Queen and her husband returned to winter at Seville,
knowing now that Granada itself was theirs for the
plucking when the season should arrive.

All through the year 1490 the preparations for the
crowning feat went on throughout Castile. Patriotism,
ifrthe sense of a commcnr prrcte~~of Territory, did not
exist in Spain ; but already in the nine years that
the Inquisition had been at work, and Isabel's fiery
zeal against the Moors had continued, the spiritual
arrogance, always latent, had knit orthodox Spaniards
together as they had never been bound before. To
the majority, the persecution of a despised and hated
minority was confirmation of their own mystic selection.
Isabel was the personification of the feeling^ and to
her, as to her people now, the oppression of the
unbeliever was an act that singled her out as the
chosen of God to vindicate His faith. So JTprguemada
and_the . Jjiquisition, with the approval of the Queen,
harried the wretched Jews, who professed Christianity,
more cruelly every day.1 If a ' New Christian' broke
bread with a JewTFwas the former who was punished.
If he dared to wear clean linen on Saturday, or used
a Hebrew name, the Dominican spies, who dogged
his footsteps, accused him, and the flames consumed
his carcass whilst Ferdinand emptied his coffers. The
revenue of the Jewish confiscations had provided much
of the treasure needed for the constant war of the last
eight years ; but Ferdinand wanted more, and ever
more, money before Granada could be made into a
Christian city. Isabel would conquer Granada, and
at any cost gain the undying glory of recovering for
Christ the last spot in Spain held by the infidel.

1 The professed Christian Jews were much more severely dealt with
than the unbaptised.

68 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

^Injustice, cruelty, robbery, and the torture of innocent
people were nothing, less than nothing, to the end
she aimed at ; and_when the flames were found all
too slow for feeding Ferdinand's greed, Isabel easily
consented to a blow^being struck at the unbaptised
Jews, in 1T~body7"whenever it was necessary to collect
aT~specially large sum of money for /ierwa.r.

TrTAprir 1 49 f, the siege of the lovelyl:ity, set in its
vast garden plain, was begun. The Moors inside were
gallant and chivalrous, determined to sell their city
dearly, however their spiritless King might deport
himself; but their dashing cavalry sallies where almost
futile against an army so carefully organised and
disciplined as that of Isabel. The head quarters of
the Christian Queen were about two leagues from
Granada, and when Isabel joined her army the siege
opened in grim earnest. The many contemporary
chroniclers of the campaign have left us astonishing
descriptions of the dazzling splendour which surrounded
the Queen. She, who in the privacy of her palace
was sober in her attire, and devoted to housewifely
duties, could, when she thought desirable, as she did
before Granada, present an appearance of sumptuous
spendour almost unexampled. Her encampment, with
its silken tents magnificently furnished, its floating
banners and soaring crosses, were such as had never
been since the time of the Crusades. On a white
Arab charger, with floating mane and velvet trappings
to the ground, the Queen, herself dressed in damascened
armour and regal crimson, was everywhere animating,
consoling, and directing. Cardinals and bishops, princes,
nobles and ladies, thronged around her ; and every
morning as the sun tipped with gold the snow peaks of
the Sierra, all in that mighty host, from the Queen down

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 69

to the poorest follower, bowed before the gorgeous altar
in the midst of the camp, whilst the Cardinal of Spain
(Mendoza) performed the sacred mystery of the mass.
One night in the summer (i4th July) the Queen
had retired to her tent and was sleeping, when, two
hours after midnight, a lamp by her bedside caught
the hangings, stirred by the breeze, and in a minute
the great pavilion was ablaze. Isabel in her night garb
had barely time to escape, and witnessed the con-
flagration spread from tent to tent till much of the

At the cries and

bugle calls of the distressed Christians, the Moors afar
off on the walls beheld with joy the discomfiture of
their enemies ; and if another leader than Boabdil had
been in command, it would have gone ill with Isabel
and her men. But there was no defeat for a woman
with such a spirit as hers. The suggestions that the
siege should be raised until the next year, she rejected
in scorn. Once again her virile spirit had its way.
More money^ was raise_cLjnQstly; squeezed out of the
miserablejews ; the army was quartered in neigh-
bouring villages, and within eighty days a city of
masonry and__brick replaced the canvas encampment,
and here, mjhe city of Santa Fe, I Isabel solemnly swore
to stay, winter and summer, until the city of Granada
should surrender to her.

off from thp_jgnr1H. __Thp

cnas^owns_ were no longer in Moorish hands, and no

1 Perez de Hita (Historia de los Vandos) recounts that the city of Santa
Fe sprang from a marvellous edifice which four grandees caused to be
constructed in a single night. It consisted of four buildings of wood
covered with painted canvas to imitate stone, and surrounded by a battle-
mented wall of a similar construction. Roadways in the form of a cross
divided the four blocks with a gate at each of the four extremities. The
Moors, on seeing what they thought was a strong fortress raised so rapidly,
thought that witchcraft had been at work, and were utterly cast down.

70 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

succour from Africa could come to the unhappy Boabdil.
The desperate warriors of the crescent were for sallying
en masse and dying or conquering, once for all ; but
Boabdil was weak and incapable ; and less than a month
after the completion of Isabel's new city of Santa Fe,
he made secret advances to his enemy at his gates for
a capitulation. The Queen entrusted the greatest of
her captains, Gonzalo de Cordova, who understood
Arabic, with the task of negotiation ; but soon the news
was whispered inside the city, and twenty thousand
furious Moorish warriors rushed up the steep hill to the
Alhambra, to demand a denial from the King. Seated in
the glittering hall of the ambassadors, Boabdil received
the spokesmen of his indignant people, and pointed
out to them with the eloquence of despair the hopeless-
ness of the situation ; and the wisdom of making terms
whilst they might. Stupefied and grief-stricken the
populace acknowledged the truth, bitter as it was, and
with bowed heads and coursing tears left the beautiful
palace that was so soon to pass from them.

The negotiations were protracted, for Granada was
divided and might still have held out, and the Moors
be~gge3Thard for at least some vestige of independence
as a State. But at last, on the 28th November 1491,
thg_conditions were^agreed Ux The Granadan Moors
were to enjoy full liberty for their faith, language, laws
and customs ; their possessions ancT property were to

desire to owe
were to. .be aided to

emigrate to Africa. The tribute to be paid was the
same as that rendered to the Moorish King, and the
city was to be free from other taxation for three years ;
whilst Boabdil was to have a tiny tributary kingdom
(Purchena) of his own in the savage fastnesses of the

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 71

Alpujarra mountains, looking down upon the splendid
heritage that had been his. The terms were generous
to a beaten foe, and their gentleness is usually ascribed
to Isabel. Since, however, they were afterwards all
violated with ' her full consent, it matters little whether
the Queen or her husband drafted them. But mild as
the~conditions of surrender were, many of the heart-
broken Moors of the city were still for fighting to the
death in defence of the land of their fathers and their
faith ; and Boabdil, in deadly fear for his life, begged
the visitors to hasten the taking possession of the city.
On the last day but one of the year 1491, the Christian
men-at-arms entered the Alhambra ; and on the 2nd
January 1492, a splendid cavalcade went forth from the
besieging city of Santa Fe to crown the work of Isabel
the Catholic. Surrounded by all the nobles and chivalry
of Castile and Aragon, the Queen, upon a splendid
white charger, rode by her husband's side, followed by
the flower of the victorious army. Upon a hill hard
by the walls of the city, Isabel paused and gazed upon
the towers and minarets, and upon the two fortresses
that crowned the sister heights, for which her heart
had yearned. This must have seemed to her the most
glorious moment of her life : for the last stronghold
of Islam was within her grasp ; and well she must have
known that, capitulations notwithstanding, but a few
short years would pass before the worship of the false
prophet would disappear from the land where it had
prevailed so long.

At a signal the gates of the city opened, and a mourn-
ful procession came towards the royal group upon the
rise. Mounted upon a black barb came Boabdil the
Little, dusky of skin, with sad, weeping eyes downcast.
His floating haik of snowy white half veiled a tunic of

72 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the sacred green, covered with barbaric golden orna-
ments. As he approached the group upon the mound,
the conquered King made as if to dismount, and kneel
to kiss the feet of the Queen and her husband. But
Ferdinand, with diplomatic chivalry, forbade the last
humiliation, and took the massive keys of the fortress,
whilst Boabdil, bending low in his saddle, kissed the
sleeve of the King as he passed the keys to the Queen,
who handed them to her son, and then to the Count of
Tendilla, the new governor of the city. Four days
later, Granada was swept and garnished, purified with
holy water, ready for the entry of the Christian
Sovereigns.1 The steep, narrow lane leading to the
Alhambra from the Gate of Triumph was lined by
Christian troops, and only a few dark-skinned Moors
scowled from dusky jalousies high in the walls, as the
gallant chivalry of Castile, Leon, and Aragon, flashed
and jingled after the King and Queen. As they
approached the Alhambra, upon the tower of Comares
there broke the banner of the Spanish Kings fluttering
in the breeze, and at the same moment, upon the
summit of the tower above the flag, there rose a great
gilded cross, the symbol of the faith triumphant.

Then, at the gates, the heralds cried aloud, * Granada !
Granada! for the Kings Isabel and Ferdinand;' and
Isabel, dismounting from her charger, as the cross
above glittered in the sun, knelt upon the ground in all
her splendour, and thanked her God for the victory.
The choristers intoned Christian praise in the purified
mosque, whilst the Moors, who hoped to live in favour
of the victors, led by the renegade Muza, added the
strange music of their race to the thousand instruments

1 The title ' Catholic ' was formally conferred upon them by the Pope
after the taking of Granada.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 73

and voices that acclaimed the new Queen of Granada.
Amidst the rejoicing and illuminations that kept the
city awake that night, Boabdil the beaten was forgotten,
When he had delivered the keys of the Alhambra, he
had refused to be treated by his followers any longer
with royal honours, and had retired weeping to the
citadel, soon to steal forth with a few followers and
his masculine mother to the temporary shelter of his
little principality.1 When the sad cavalcade came to
the hill called Padul, ' The last sigh of the Moor,'
thenceforward tears coursed down the bronze cheeks
of the King as he gazed upon the lost kingdom he was
to see no more. * Weep ! weep ! ' cried his mother,
' weep ! like a woman for the city you knew not how to
defend like a man.'

Throughout Christendom rang the fame of the great
Oueen,_whose steadfastness had won so noble a victory ;
and even in far-off England praise of her, and thanks
to the Redeemer whose cause she had championed,
were sung throughout the land. For the conquest of
Granada marked an epoch, and sealed with permanence
and finality the Christianisation of Europe, the struggle
for which had begun eight centuries before, from the
mountains of Asturias. The imagination of the world
was touched by the sight of a warrior-crusading Queen,
more splendid in her surroundings than any woman
since Cleopatra, who yet was so modest, meek, and
saintly in the relations of daily life, so exemplary a
mother, so faithful a wife,2 so wise a ruler ; and the

1 He promptly sold this to Isabel, and retired to Fez, where he was
murdered. The account of the surrender is mainly taken from Perez de
Hita's ' Historia de los Vandos,' 1610, and Perez de Pulgar's ' Cronica.'

'2 She is said never to have allowed Ferdinand to wear a shirt except
those that she herself made for him. — Navarro Rodrigo, l El Cardinal
Cisneros.'

74 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

cautious, unemotional Ferdinand.,_whose ..... ability as a
statesman was even greater than^ that of his wife, was
ov.ersJiadowe<rT5yl^Ta3i^^ she fought

fQr_an exaTtecT abstract idea, whils.t~-hjs e^es_were for
eyj^M:um5^^ himself and

elt ancLdea£ to pleas for

mercy, becajjse^^Here^^

soencfer^ and false,

s baser and his objec^a,alllmundane.
In the ChristIarT~camp Before Granada there had
wandered a man who was not a warrior, but a patient
suitor, waiting upon the leisure of the Sovereigns to
hear his petition. He was a man of lofty stature, with
light blue eyes that gazed afar away, fair, florid face
and ruddy hair, already touched with snow by forty
years of toil and hardship. He had long been a
standing joke with some of the shallow courtiers and
churchmen that surrounded the Queen, for he was a
dreamer of great dreams that few men could under-
stand, and, worst offence of all, he was a foreigner, a
Genoese some said. He had followed the Court for
eight long years in pursuit of his object, the scoff of
many and the friend of few ; but the war, and the
strenuous lives that Isabel and Ferdinand lived, had
again and again caused them to postpone a final
answer to the prayer of the Italian sailor, who had, to
suit Spanish lips, turned his name from Cris_to_fhro

At the_end of 1484^ the man, full of his exalted

1 The sequence of the movements of Columbus, and several facts and
dates here given, vary from the current accounts. The narrative here set
forth has been carefully compiled from the result of much recent Spanish
research, besides the well-known texts of Navarrete and the superb
anthology of contemporary information reproduced by Mr Thatcher in
his exhaustive three volumes lately published. I have also depended

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 75

visions, had sailed from Lisbon, disgusted at the perfidy^
^fjthe ^Portuguese, who had feigned to entertain his
proposals^onlylo" try to cheat him of the realisation of
them. His intention was first to sail to Huelva in
Spain, where he had relatives, and to leave with them
his child Diego, who accompanied him, whilst he him-
self would proceed tojVance, and lay his plans before
the new King, Charles vm. Instead of reaching
Huelva, his pinnace was driven for some reason
to anchoj^jn_-the -..little._port__of Palos, on the other
side of the delta, and thence the mariner and his boy
wended their way to the neighbouring Franciscan
Monastery of St. Maria de la Rabida, to seek shelter
and food, at least for the child. Colon, as we shall call
him here, was an exalted religious mystic, full of a great
devotional scheme, and himself, in after years, wore a
habit of St. Francis. It was natural, therefore, that he
should be well received by the brothers in that lonely
retreat overlooking the delta of the Rio Tinto ; for he
was, in addition to his devotion, a man of wide know-
ledge of the world as well as of science and books, and
in the monastery there was an enlightened ecclesiastic
who had known courts and cities, one Friar J^u an
Perez, who had once been a confessor of Queen Isabel
With him and the physician of the monastery, Garcia
Hernandez, Colon discussed cosmogony, and inter-
ested them in his theories, and the aims that led him
on his voyage. The mariner needed but little material
aid, two or three small ships, which could easily have
been provided for him by private enterprise. But his
plans were far reaching, and well he knew that to be

much upon Rodriguez Pinilla's ' Colon en Espana,' Cappa's * Colon y los
Espanoles,' and Ibarra y Rodriguez's ' Fernando el Catolico y el Descubri-
miento de America/ etc. etc.

76 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

able to carry them out, the lands he dreamed of dis-
covering could only produce for him the means to
attain the result he hungered for, if a powerful sovereign
would hold and use them when he had found them.1

There was a great magnate within a few days'
journey of the monastery, who himself was almost a
sovereign, and not only had ships in plenty of his own,
but could, if he pleased, obtain for any plan he accepted
the patronage of powerful sovereigns. This was the
head of the Guzmans, the Duke of Medina Sidonia,
the Andalucian noble who controlled the port of Seville
and the coasts of the south. It must have seemed
worth while to Colon to address himself to this neigh-
bouring noble before setting out on his long voyage to
France ; for he journeyed from La Rabida towards
Seville, leaving his child, Diego, to be educated and
cared for by the friars of the monastery. He found the
Duke of Medina Sidonia irresponsive to his approaches,
and was again thinking of taking ship to France, when
he was brought into contact, by what means is not
known, with another great noble almost as powerful as
the head of the Guzmans, the Duke of Medina Celi,
who, from his palaces at Rota and Puerto de Santa
Maria, on the Bay of Cadiz, disposed of nearly as
many sail as Medina Sidonia.

The magnate listened, often and attentively, to the
eloquent talk of the sailor seer whom he lodged in his
house : how, far away across the western ocean, beyond
the islands that the Portuguese had found, lay Asia,
the home of gems and spices rare, now only reached
painfully across the forbidden lands of the infidel and
by the Levant Sea, or perchance, though that was not

1 See Columbus's own letter to the nurse of Prince Juan, reproduced by
Mr Thatcher.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 77

sure, around the mighty African continent ; that
wealth untold lay there in pagan hands, awaiting those
who, with cross and sword, should capture it, and win
immortal souls for Christ, and so eternal glory. He,
Colon, was the man destined by God to open up the
new world foretold to Saint John in the tremendous
dream of the Apocalypse, for some vast object of
which he yet refrained to speak. Books, Seneca,
Ptolemy, and the Arab geographers, the Fathers of
the Church, legends half forgotten, the conclusions of
science, the course of the stars, and the concentrated
experience of generations of sailor men, were all used
by the Genoese to convince the Duke. The prospect
was an attracjiv^ nnp; anH 1\/TprHna Celi promised to fit

out the^ejcpedition .

IrTthe building yards of Port Santa Maria the keels
of three caravels were laid down to be built under
Colon's superintendence. They were to cost three or
four thousand ducats, and be fitted, provisioned and
manned, for a year at the Duke's expense ; and Colon
must have thought that now his dream was soon to
come true, and that his doubt and toil would end. But
for the inner purpose he had in view beyond the dis-
covery of the easy way to Asia, he needed a patron
even more powerful than Medina Celi ; and it may
have been the discoverer who took means to let the
Queen of Castile know the preparations that were
being made, or, as Medina Celi himself wrote after-
wards, the information may have been jgnt to Court
by the Duke,Tearing to undertake^ so great an ^xpedi-
tion~~wItEout his sovereign's licence.1 , In either case,

1 As Medina Celi was with Ferdinand during all the campaign of 1485,
it is possible that he may have mentioned it to the King then, and have
been told that when there was time the sovereigns themselves would
examine into the matter.

78 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

when Isabel was informed of it in the winter of 1485,
she and her husband were in the north of Spain, and
instructed the Duke to send Colon to court, that they
might hear from his own mouth what his plans were.

The mariner arrived at Cordova on the 2Oth January
1486, with letters of introduction from the Duke to the
Queen and his friends at court. The sovereigns were
detained by business in Madrid and Toledo for three
months after Colon came to Cordova ; but his letters
procured for him some friends amongst the courtiers
there, with whom he discussed the theories he had
formed, especially with the Aragonese Secretary of
Supplies, the Jewish Luis de Sant'angel, who, through-
out, was his enlightened and helpful friend. Most of
the idle hangers-on of the court at Cordova, clerical
and lay, made merry sport of the rapt dreamer who
lingered in their midst awaiting the coming of the
sovereigns. His foreign garb and accent, his strange
predictions, absurd on the face of them — for how could
one arrive at a given place by sailing directly away
from it ? — jJl_convince<i the shallow pates that this carder
of wool turned sailo^HSs~macir

When Isabel and Femmand at last arrived at Cor-
dova, on the 28th April 1486, the season was already
further advanced than usual to make preparations for
the summer campaign : and there was little leisure for
the sovereigns to listen to the vague theories of the
sailor. But early in May Colon was received kindly
by Isabel and her husband, and told his tale. Their
minds were full of the approaching campaign, and of
the trouble between Aragon and the new King of
France about the two counties on the frontier unjustly
withheld from Ferdinand ; and after seeing Colon for
the first time Isabel instructed the secretary, Alfonso

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 79

de Quintanilla to write to the Duke of Medina Celi
that she did not consider the business very sure ; but
that if anything came of it the Duke should have a
share of the profits.

Irj^the meanwhile Ferdinand and his wife were too
busy to examine closely themselves mto the pros and
cons of Colon's scheme, and followed the traditional
course in such circumstances, that of referring the
matter to a commission of experts and learned men to
sift and report. The president of the commission was
that mild-mannered but arrogant-minded confessor of
the Queen, Father Talavera ; the man of one idea
whom the conquest of Granada for the cross blinded
to all other objects in life, With him for the most
part were men like himself, saturated with the tradition
of the church, that looked upon all innovation as im-
piety, and all they did not understand as an invention
of the evil one. So, when Colon sat with them and
expounded his theories to what he knew were unsym-
pathetic ears, he kept back his most convincing proofs
and arguments ; for his treatment in Portugal had
taught him caution.1 There were two, at least, of the
members of the commission who fought hard for
Colon's view, Dr. Maldonado and the young friar
Antonio de Marchena, but they were outvoted ; and
when the report was presented it said that Colon's
project was impossible, and that after so many thousands
of years he could not discover unknown lands, and so
surpass an almost infinite number of clever men who
were experienced in navigation.2

Hardly had Talavera and his colleagues assured the
sovereigns that the whole plan was impossible and

1 Las Casas and F. Colon.

2 Fernando Colon.

8o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

vain, unfit for royal personages to patronise,1 than
Ferdinand again took the field (2Oth May), and once
more Cristobal Colon was faced by failure. But he
was a man not easily beaten. During his stay at
Cordova he had made many friends, and gained many
protectors at Court. First was his close acquaintance,
Luis de Sant'angel, by whose intervention he was so
promptly received by the sovereigns after their arrival
at Cordova ; but others there were of much higher
rank : the great Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo, Men-
doza, the tutor of the Prince Don Juan, Friar Diego
Deza, Friar Juan Perez, who had first received Colon
at La Rabida, and was now at court, Alonso de Quin-
tanilla, the Queen's secretary, Juan Cabero, the intimate
Aragonese friend and chamberlain of the King ; and
one who probably did more in his favour quietly than
any one else, that inseparable companion of Isabel,
Beatriz de Bobadilla, now Marchioness of Moya.

But it was weary waiting. As we have seen, the
energies of the sovereigns were absorbed in the war.
Ferdinand, molre^v^rTwas desperately anxious to finish
it successfully, and get to Aragonese problems that
interested him more directly ; the intended war with
France and that world-wide combination he was already
planning, by which not the strength of Spain alone
but that of all Christendom should be at his bidding,
to humble his rival and exalt Aragon in Italy, the
Mediterranean and the East. It was too much to
expect that Ferdinand would welcome very warmly
any project for frittering away in another direction the
strength of the nation he was hungering to use for his
own ends. I sabeljuOn ihe other hand, would naturally
be inclined fo jisjenjiigre sympathetically to such a

1 Las Casas.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 81

project as that of Colon. Here was half a world to
be won to Christianity under her flag, here was wealth
illimitable to coerce the other hal£ and, above all, here
was, the fair-faced mystic with his lymphatic blue eyes,
like her own, showing her how the riches that would
fall to his share were all destined for a crusade even
greater than that of Granada, the winning of the Holy
Sepulchre from the infidel, and the fixing for ever of
the sovereign banner of Castile upon the country
hallowed by the footsteps of our Lord. To Isabel,
therefore, more than_tp Ferdinand, must it be attri-
Buted, that when the campaign of 1486 was ended the
Italian manner was not dismissed, notwithstanding
the unfavourable report of Talavera's commission.

The sovereigns were obliged to start out to far
Galicia, as has been related on page 64 ; but before they
went they replied to Colon that, ' though they were
prevented at present from entering into new enter-
prises, owing to their being engaged in so many wars
and conquests, especially that of Granada, they hoped
in time that a ^better__oppo_rtunity would occur__to_
examine his proposals and discuss his offers.'* This
answer, at all events, prevented Colon's supporters in
Spain from despairing ; and whilst the monarchs were
in Galicia in the winter of 1486, the Dominican Deza,
the Prince's tutor, who was also a professor at Sala-
manca, conceived the idea that an independent inquiry
by the pundits of the university might arrive at a
different conclusion from that of Talavera's commission,
and undo the harm the latter had effected. Though
there is no evidence of the fact, it is certain that Deza,
who was a Castilian and a member of the Queen's
household, would not have taken such a step as he did

1 Fernando Colon.
F

82 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

without Isabel's consent. In any case, Colon travelled
to Salamanca ; and there, as the guest of Deza in the
Dominican monastery of Saint Stephen, he held con-
stant conference with the learned men for whom the
famous University was a centre.

Isabel and her husband themselves arrived at Sala-
manca in the last days of the year 1486, and heard
from Deza and other friends that, in the opinion of
most of them, the plans of Colon were perfectly sound.
The effect was seen at once : the mariner accompanied
the Court to Cordova in high hopes, no longer an un-
attached projector of doubtful schemes, but a member
of the royal household. Before once more taking the
field in the spring of 1487, the Queen officially informed
Colon that ' when circumstances permitted she and the
King would carefully consider his proposal ' ; and in
the meantime a sum of 3000 maravedis was given
to him for his sustenance, a grant that was repeated,
and sometimes exceeded, every few months afterwards.
In August 1487, Colon was summoned by the sove-
reigns to the siege of Malaga, probably to give advice
as to some maritime operations ; but thenceforward he
usually resided in Cordova, awaiting with impatience
the convenience of the Queen and King.

During the heartbreaking delay he entered again
into"negotiation with the Kings of Portugal, France,
and England, T)ut~wrtribut result ; and it was only
when ffie city~"oT Granada was near its fall, and the
end of the long war in sight, that Colon, following the
sovereigns in Santa Fe, saw his hopes revive. Now,
for the first time, he was invited to lay before them the
terms he asked for if success crowned his project.
Isabel had been already gained to Colon's view by the
transparent conviction of the man and his saintly zeal.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 83

His friends at Court were now many and powerful, and
Ferdinand himself had not failed to see that the
promised accession of wealth to be derived from the
discovery would strengthen his hands. Perhaps he,
like Isabel, had been dazzled with Colon's life-dream
of the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre ; for that would,
if it were effected, tend to realise the highest ambitions
of Aragon. But Ferdinand, as a prudent man of
business, never allowed sentiment, however exalted, to
override practical considerations. When, therefore, the
t^msjjemanded_by^ Colon were at length submitted to
him and the Queen, he unhesitatingly rejected them
as'libsolutely out of the question. Much obloquy
has Been heaped upon Ferdinand for his lack of
generosity in doing so ; but a perusal of the conditions,
with a consideration of the circumstances and ideas of
the times, will convince any impartial person that
Ferdinand's first rejection of them was more to his
credit than his subsequent acceptance with the obvious
intention of violating them.

They were, indeed, extravagant and impracticable to
the last degree. The title of Admiral had only been
given in Spain to nobles of the highest rank and
greatest possessions. The office, usually hereditary,
carried with it seignorial rights over the coasts and
ports that were practically sovereign, as in the case of
the Enriquezs in Castile and of Medina Sidonia in
Andalucia. And yet Colon, a plebeian Italian sailor,
dropped as if from the clouds, made as his^ first
demand, that he should be recognised as ' Admiral of

that may be discovered or

_

gained by his means, for himself_ during his life, and
for his heirs and successors for ever, with all the
prerogatives and pre-eminences appertaining to such

84 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

office, as they are enjoyed by Don Alonso Enriquez,
your Admiral of Castile.' The Admiral of Castile was
Ferdinand's uncle, and the second person in realm
after the blood royal ; and, although the office was
hereditary in his house, the sovereigns of Castile had
never surrendered the power of withdrawing the title
if they pleased, whereas the Italian mariner demanded
that for ever he and his should be practically inde-
pendent of the sovereigns. The second condition was,
that ^ Colon was t^_bg_fiovggiQr and Viceroy of all
islands and continents_discovered, with the right of
nominating three persons for each sub-j[oy^rnorship or
office from which the sovereigns were bound tc^choose
one. This latter condition was also an infraction of
the right of the kings to choose their own officers
freely. The discoverer claimed for himself and his
heirs for ever one clear tenth ofLall merchandise, gold,
gems, pearls, and commodities^ oj^gyery sorttbought.
bartered, found, gained, or possessed, in the territories
discovered. It was just, of course, that Colon should
be splendidly rewarded if success crowned his efforts,
but the imagination reels at the idea of the stupendous
wealth that would have been his by virtue of such a
claim as this. But this was not all. Colon claimed
the right, if he pleased, of taking one-eighth share in
every expedition and trading venture leaving Spain for
thejhicli.es, and, to crown all, 17 any dispute arose with
regard to the discoverer's rights and profits, under the
capitulation, he and h_is_jnominees were to be the sole
judges of the case.

Most of these demands could not be legally granted
under the laws of Castile, and it is no wonder that
when Colon refused^to modify them, he was curtly
dismissed by Ferdinand, and told to go about his

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 85

business and propose his plans elsewhere. There is
no reason to doubt, in spite of romantic legends
unsupported by evidence, that Isabel acquiesced in
this action of her husband. She was, it is true,
strongly in favour of the proposed undertaking ; but
she was a greater stickler than Ferdinand for her
regal prerogatives, and it is unlikely that she would
have lightly surrendered them thus any more than he.
In any case, Colon, in high dudgeon, left Santa Fe
with the intention of offering his plans to France.
First visiting in Cordova the lady with whom he had
lived, he proceeded on his way to La Rabida, where
his son Diego was still living, thence to embark for
France. In the monastery there he again met the
guardian. Fray Juari^Perez, the Queen's confessort to
whom he told his tale of disappointment ; and the
physician, Hernandez, was summoned to the conference.
Colon, with his earnestness and eloquence, impressed
them more than ever with the glowing prospects of
wealth unlimited for Spain, and glory undying for the
Christian Queen, who should bring pagan Asia into
the fold of the Church ; and, unknown to the explorer,
Juan Perez sent post haste by a trusty messenger a
letter to the Queen urging her not to let Colon go
elsewhere with his plans. It is well-nigh two hundred
miles, and a bad road, from Palos to Granada, and
Isabel was in the midst of taking possession of the
conquered city ; but yet she found time to send back
an answer within a fortnight to Perez, who, by one
pretext or another, had detained Colon in the
monastery, bidding her late confessor himself to
come and see her without delay, that she might
discuss with him the subject of his solicitude. .JPerez
lost no time ; for at midnight the same day, without

86 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

a word to Colon, he rode out of La Rabida towards
Granada.

"What arguments he used to Isabel we do not know,
probably he told her that Colon was inclined now to
modify his pretensions. In any case, the good friar
hurried back to the monastery with the cheering news
that the Queen had promised to provide three caravels
for the expedition, _and summoned Colon to court
again, sending him, in a day or two, two thousand
maravedis to buy himself some new clothes, and make
him fit to appear before her. It is extremely unlikely
—indeed impossible — that Isabel should have taken
this step without Ferdinand's consent. She was the
stronger vessel, and may have won him over to her
way of thinking, aided probably by the representations
of Juan Perez, that Colon's terms would be modified.

The explorer arrived at Granada shortly after the
triumphal entry of the conquerors, and saw Isabel (and
presumably her husband) on several occasions at their
quarters at Sante Fe. To Ferdinand's annoyance he
found that Colon still insisted upon the same im-
practicable conditions as before. Talavera, the new
Archbishop of Granada, full of zeal for the Christian-
isation of his new diocese, frowned at all suggestions
that might divert attention to another direction ; and
finally, the King and Queen decided to dismiss Colon
for good as impossible to deal with. Rather than bate
a jot of his vast claims, for, as he solemnly asserted
afterwards, he needed not the wealth for himself, but
to restore the Holy Land to Christendom, he wended
his way heartbroken towards his home at Cordova ;
his red hair now blanched entire to snow. The glory
for Spain of discovering a new world for civilisation
was trembling in the balance. The great dreamer,

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 87

hopeless, had turned his back upon the court after
seventy ears "of fruitless waiting, and Ferdinand, this
time, had no intention of recalling him.

Then the keen business prescience of the Jew
Secretary of Supplies, JLuis__de Sant' angel, pained
that such bright hopes should be carried to other
lands, took what, for a man of his modest rank, was a
very bold step. He was a countryman of Ferdinand,
and in his confidence, but it was to Isabel he went,
and with many expressions of humility and apology
for his daring,1 urged her not to miss such a chance as
that offered by the Genoese^ Sant'angeT^appears to
have been under the impression that the main reason
for Colon's dismissal was the difficulty of the Castilian
treasury providing the money he asked for, as he
offered to lend the million maravedis necessary. It is
quite likely, indeed, that he did not know the details of
the explorer's demands as to reward. Isabel appears
to have thanked Sant'angel for his offer and opinion,
with which she said she agreed ; but asked him to
defer the matter until she was more at leisure.

This was something gained ; but the principal diffi-
culty was to persuade Ferdinand. Another Aragonese
it was who undertook it ; that inseparable companion of
the King, the Chamberlain, Juan Cabero. What
arguments he employed we know not, but he was
as astute as Ferdinand himself, and probably we shall
not be far from the truth when we presume that he
and his master agreed that, since the Queen was so
bent up6n the affair, it would be folly to haggle further
over terms, which, after all, if they were found incon-
venient, could be repudiated by the sovereigns, and it

1 The speech, which is probably apocryphal, is given at length by Las
Casas.

88 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

is probable that Isabel may have been influenced by
the same view. So, a few hours only after Colon had
shaken the dust of Santa Fe from his feet, a swift
horseman overtook him at the bridge of Los Pinos,
and brought him back to court.

^Againjie stood^finnjn his immj^ejraJ^prej^sJQ n s^
and the chaffering with him was resumed, for it must
have been evident to Ferdinand that the terms could
never be fulfilled. It must not be forgotten that
Colon had come with a mere theory. The plan was
not to discover a new continent : there was no idea
then of a vast virgin America, but only of a shorter
way to Japan and the realms of the great Khan.
Such a project, great as the profit that might result,
would naturally loom less in the sight of contemporary
Spaniards than the Christianisation of Granada, and
it is unjust to blame Ferdinand for holding out against
terms which were even a derogation of his own and
his wife's sovereignty. IsabeJ^Jkr-jnor^^dej^^
her husband.wasready'^Io' accede to Cojon^j^mands,
anoHer advocacy carned~che dayl Possibly, to judge
from what followed, even she assented, with the
mental reservation that she, as sovereign, could, it
she pleased, cancel the concessions she granted to
Colon if she found them oppressive.

The terms demanded, however, were not the only
difficulty in the way. There was the question of
ready money.; and^the waFTTad exhauste"HTEetreasury.
ItTjTlm ungracious thing to demolish a~ pretty tradi-
tional story, but that of Isabel's jewels, sacrificed to
pay for Colon's first voyage, will not bear scrutiny.1

1 The legend of Queen Isabel and her jewels has been now completely
disproved by my friend, Don Cesareo Fernandez Duro, in his article ' Las
Joyas de la Reina Isabel' in the 'Revista Contemporanea/ vol. xxxviii.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 89

As a matter of fact, her jewels were already pawned
for the costs of the war, and although Las Casas,
Bernaldez, and Colon's son Fernando, say that the
Queen offered to Sant'angel to pawn her jewellery
for the purpose, and it is probable enough that in
the heat of her enthusiasm she may have made such
a suggestion figuratively, it is now quite certain
jthat^jhe money for the expedition was advanced
by LuisTlie San^angeT, "although no tPas was, and
s^ usually supposed, from his own resources, but
from money secretly given to him for the purpose
from the Aragonese treasury, of which he was a

The agre.emenl_wjth_ Colon, was signed finally in
Santa Fe on the i ;th April TjgjJ and~aTlHe~~end'~
of~the month~trle~ great dreamer departed, this time
with a light heart and rising hopes, to Palos and
La Rabida to fit out his caravels, and sail _on the,
yd__ August 1402 for his fot-e.fiil voyage. With him
went Isabel's prayers and hopes ; and during his
tiresome and obstructed preparations at Palos, she
aided him to the utmost by grants and precepts,2 as
well as by appointing his legitimate son, Diego, page
to her heir, Prince Juan, in order that the lad might

1 Professor Ibarra y Rodriguez's interesting study ' Fernando el Catolico
y el Descubrimiento ' (Madrid, 1892) makes this matter clear for the first
time. The treasury of Castile was empty, but Ferdinand had plenty of
money in Aragon. He was careful, however, not to allow the Castilians
to know this, or they would have clamoured for some of it for their war
against Granada, whilst he was hoarding it for his war against France.
He therefore went through the comedy of causing Sant'angel to lend the
million maravedis, apparently out of his own pocket, but the money was
secretly advanced for the purpose to Sant'angel from the King's Aragonese
treasury, to which it was subsequently repaid through Sant'angel.

2 Some of these took the form of generosity at other people's expense.
The town of Palos was ordered, as punishment for some offence, to
provide two caravels and stores.

90 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

have a safe home during his father's absence. Although
Isabel's action in the discovery may be less heroic
and independent of her husband, than her enthusiastic
biographers are fond of representing, it is certain that
but for her Ferdinand would not have patronised the
expedition. Looking at the whole circumstances, and
his character, it is difficult to blame him, except at
last for agreeing to terms that he knew were impossible
of fulfilment, and which he probably never meant to
fulfil. But Isabel's idealism in this case was wiser
than Ferdinand's practical prudence, so far as the
immediate result was concerned, and to Isabel the
Catholic must be given the glory of having aided
Columbus, rather than to her husband, who was
persuaded against his will.

Granada was conquered for Isabel, and it was now
Ferdinand's turn to have his way. For years Aragonese
interests had had to wait, though, as Ferdinand well
knew, the unifying process, which he needed for his
ends, was being perfected the while. Under the stern
rule of Torquemada the Inquisition had struck its
tentacles into the nation's heart, and, crazy with the
pride of superiority over infidels, the orthodox Spaniard
was rapidly developing the confidence in his divine
selection to scourge the enemies of God, which made
the nation temporarily great. Isabel was the inspiring
soul of this feeling. A foreigner, visiting her court
soon after Granada fell, wrote, as most contemporaries
did of her, in enthusiastic praise of what we should
now consider cruel bigotry. ' Nothing is spoken of
here,' he says, * but making war on the enemies of
the faith, and sweeping away all obstructions to the
Holy Catholic Church. Not with worldly, but with
heavenly aim, is all they undertake, and all they do

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 91

seems inspired direct from heaven, as these sovereigns
most surely are.'1

This eulogium refers to the plan then under dis-
cussion for ridding Isabel's realms of the taint of
Judaism. We are told that to the Queen's initiative
this terrible and disastrous measure was due. ' The
Jews were so powerful in the management of the
royal revenues that they formed almost another royal
caste. This gave great scandal to the Catholic Queen,
and the_decree was, signed that all those who would
not in three mojiths embrace the faith, were to leave
her kingdoms of .Castile and Leon.'j2 Ferdinand was
quite willing, in this case, to give the saintly Queen
and her clergy a free hand, because, to carry out his
world-wide^ combmatioiU&Jiumble France, he would
need money — very much money — and the wholesale
confiscation of Jewish property that accompanied the
edict of expulsion was his only ready way of getting
it. On the 3Oth March 1492, less than three weeks
before the signature of the agreement with Colon, the
dread edict against the Jews went forth. Religious
rancour had been inflamed to fever heat against
these people, who were amongst the most enlightened
and useful citizens of the State, and whose services
to science, when the rest of Europe was sunk in
darkness, make civilisation eternally their debtor.
They were said to carry on in secret foul rites of
human sacrifice, to defile the Christianity that most
of them professed, and Isabel's zeal, prompted by the
churchmen, was already climbing to the point after-
wards reached by her great-grandson, Philip IL, when

1 Quoted by Florez. ' Reinas Catolicos.'

'2 Ibid. Both Luis de Sant'angel, who served as accountant general,
and Gabriel Sanchez, the Aragonese treasurer, were of Jewish descent.

92 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

he swore that, come what might, he would never be
a king of heretic subjects.

By the 3<Dth July 1492 not a professed Jew was to
be left alive in Isabel's dominions. With crueljxony,
m_\vhjch_J^ the

banished people were permitted-^tQjsell their property,
Vet forBI(3cten~T6 carrythe money abroad^ with them.
AF^easF^quaffer oT a InHlternST Spaniards of all
ranks and ages, men, women, and children, ill or well,
were driven forth, stripped of everything, to seek
shelter in foreign lands. The decree was carried
out with relentless ferocity, and the poor wretches,
straggling through Spain to some place of safety,
were an easy prey to plunder and maltreat. It was
a saturnalia of robbery. The shipmasters extorted
almost the last ducat to carry the fugitives to Africa
or elsewhere, and then, in numberless cases, cast their
passengers overboard as soon as they were at sea. It
was said that, in order to conceal their wealth, the
Jews swallowed their precious gems, and hundreds
were ripped up on the chance of discovering their
riches. There was no attempt or pretence of mercy.
The banishment was intended, not alone to remove
Judaism as a creed from Spain — that might have been
done without the horrible cruelty that ensued — but
as a doom of death for all professing Jews ; for
Torquemada had, five years before, obtained a Bull
from the Pope condemning to major excommunication
the authorities of all Christian lands who failed to
arrest and send back every fugitive Jew from Spain.1

1 From Ulick Burke's 'History of Spain.' Edited by Martin Hume. Only
five years after the expulsion from Spain, as many of the Spanish Jews
had fled to Portugal, Isabel, through her daughter, who had married the
King of Portugal, coerced the latter to expel all Jews from his country.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC ^3

Isabel appears to have had no misgiving. Her
spiritual guides, to whom she was so humble, praised
her to the skies for her saintly zeal : her subjects,
inflated with religious arrogance, joined the chorus
raised by servile scribes and chroniclers, that the dis-
covery of the new lands by Colon was heaven's reward
to Isabel for ejecting the Hebrew spawn from her
sacred realm ; and if her woman's heart felt a pang
at the suffering and misery she decreed, it was
promptly assuaged by the assurance of the austere
churchmen, who ruled the conscience of the Queen.

Leaving Talavera as archbishop, and Count de
Tendilla as governor of conquered Granada, Isabel
and her husband, with their children and a splendid
court, travelled in the early summer of 1492 to their
other dominions where their presence was needed.
Ferdinand, indeed, was yearning to get back to his
own people, who were growing restive at his long
absence, and for the coming war with France, it was
necessary for him to win the love of his Catalan
subjects, who, at first, still remembering his murdered
half-brother, the Prince of Viana, had borne him little
affection. He had treated them, however, with great
diplomacy, respecting their sturdy independence, and
had asked little from them, and by this time, in the
autumn of 1492, when he and Isabel, with their
promising son, Juan, by their side, rode from Aragon
through the city of Barcelona to the palace of the
Bishop of Urgel, where they were to live, the Catalans
were wild with enthusiasm for the sovereigns with
whose names all Christendom was ringing.

Ferdinand nearly fell a victim to the attack of a
lunatic assassin in December, as he was leaving his hall
of justice at Barcelona, and during his imminent danger

94 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Isabel's affection and care for him gained for her also
the love of the jealous Catalans.1 Throughout the
winter in Barcelona Ferdinand^ was busy weaving his
web of ^intrigue a round^F rance^joAS^io^^to which
reference will presently be made, and in March 1493
there came flying to the court the tremendous news
that Colon had run into the Tagus for shelter after
discovering the lands for which he had gone in search.
No particulars of the voyage were given ; but not
many days passed before Luis de Sant'angel, the
Aragonese Treasurer Gabriel Sanchez, and the mon-
archs themselves, received by the hands of a messenger
sent by the explorer from Palos, letters giving full
details of the voyage.2 No doubt as to the importance
of the discovery was any longer entertained, and when
the Admiral of the Indies himself entered Barcelona
in the middle of April, after a triumphal progress across
Spain, honours almost royal were paid to him. He
was received at the city gates by the nobles of the
court and city, and led through the crowded streets to
the palace to confront the sovereigns, at whose feet he
was, though he and they knew it not, laying a new
world. With him he brought mild bronze-skinned
natives decked with barbaric gold ornaments, birds of
rare plumage, and many strange beasts ; gold in dust
and nuggets had he also, to show that the land he had
found was worth the claiming.

Ferdinand and Isabel, with their son, received him in

1 It is said that Ferdinand tried to save the life of his assailant, who
had been condemned to the most cruel and awful tortures as a punish-
ment. The Catalans, furious at being baulked of their vengeance, appealed
to Isabel, who decided that the sentence should be carried out, but that
the victim should be secretly suffocated first.

'2 The Luis de Sant'angel and the Sanchez letter have been published
several times, but the letter to the Sovereigns has been lost, but for some
passages quoted by Las Casas.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 95

state in the great hall of the bishop's palace ; and, rising
as he approached them, bade him to be seated, an un-
precedented honour, due to the fact that they recognised
his high rank as Admiral of the Indies. With fervid
eloquence he told his tale. How rich and beautiful was
the land he had found ; how mild and submissive the
new subjects of the Queen, and how ready to receive
the faith of their mistress. Isabel was deeply moved
at the recital, and when the Admiral ceased speaking
the whole assembly knelt and gave thanks to God for
so signal a favour to the crown of Castile. Thence-
forward during his stay in Barcelona, Colon was treated
like a prince ; and when he left in May to prepare his
second expedition to the new found land, he took with
him powers almost sovereign to turn to account and
bring to Christianity the new vassals of Queen Isabel.
It is time to say something of Isabel's family and her
domestic life. As we have seen, she had been during

the nineteen years_sjnce her accession constant! yah-

- _ . - — — > * — —

sorted in state and warlike affairs ; and the effects of
her efforts to reform her country had already been
prodigious, but her public duties did not blind her to
the interests of her own household and kindred ; and
no personage of her time did more to bring the new-
born culture into her home than she. She had given
birth during the strenuous years we have reviewed to
five children. Isabel, born in October 1470; John,
the only son, in 1478; Joan in 1479, Maria in 1482,
and Katharine at the end of 1485 : and these young
princesses and prince had enjoyed the constant super-
vision of their mother. Her own education had been
narrow under her Dominican tutors, and that of Ferdi-
nand was notoriously defective. But Isabel was deter-
mined that her children should not suffer in a similar

96 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

respect, and the most learned tutors that Italy and
Spain could provide were enlisted to teach, not the
royal children alone, but the coming generation of
nobles, their companions, the_ wider culture of the
classics^and_the_jvor]d_^^ had so much

neglected. And not book learning alone was instilled
into these young people by the Queen. She made her
younger ladies join her in the work of the needle and the
distaff, and set the fashion for great dames to devote
their leisure, as she did, to the embroidering of gorgeous
altar cloths and church vestments, whilst the noble
youths, no longer allowed, as their ancestors had been,
to become politically dangerous, were encouraged to
make themselves accomplished in the arts of disciplined
warfare and literary culture.

Isabel, like all her descendants upon the throne,
set a high standard of regal dignity, and in all her
public appearances assumed a demeanour of impas-
sive serenity and gorgeousness which became tradi-
tional at a later period ; but she could be playful
and jocose in her family circle, as her nicknames
for her children prove. Her eldest girl, Isabel, who
married the King of Portugal, bore a great resem-
blance to the Portuguese mother of Isabel herself, and
the latter always called her child 'mother,' whilst her
son Juan to her was always the 'angel,' from his
beautiful fair face. She could joke, too, on occasion,
though the specimens of her wit cited by Father Florez
are a little outspoken for the present day ; and her
contemporary chroniclers tell many instances of her
keen caustic wit. Her tireless and often indiscreet zeal
for the spread of tneTaith has been mentioned several
times in these pages ; but submissive as she was to the.
^clergy, she was ke^ly^ljyje_^y^a-tQ_.their defects, and

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 97

the laxity of the regular orders, which had grown to be
a scandal, was reformed by her with ruthless_severity.
Her principal instrument, perhaps the initiator, of this
work was the most remarkable ecclesiastical statesman
ofjiis time, anoTone of the greatest Spaniards who ever
livecT, Alfonso Jimenez de Cisnerps.

A humble Franciscan friar of over fifty, living as an
anchorite in a grot belonging to the monastery of
Castanar, near Toledo, after a laborious life as a secular
priest and vicar general of a diocese, would seem the
last man in the world to become the arbiter of a nation's
destinies ; and yet this was the strange fate of Jimenez.
When Talavera was created Bishop of Granada, Isabel
needed a new principal confessor ; and, as usual in such
matters, consulted the Cardinal Primate of Spain,
Mendoza, who years before had been Bishop of
Siguenza, and had made Father Jimenez his chaplain
and vicar-general, because his rival archbishop, that
stout old rebel Carrillo, had persecuted the lowly priest.
Mendoza knew that his former vicar-general had retired
from the world, and was living in self-inflicted suffering
and mortification ; and he was wont to say that such a
man was born to rule, and not to hide himself as an
anchorite in a cloister. When, after the surrender of
Granada, a new royal confessor was required, Jimenez,
greatly to his dismay, real or assumed, was at the in-
stance of the Cardinal summoned to see the Queen.
Austere and poorly clad, he stood before the sovereign
whom he was afterwards to rule, and fervently begged
her to save him from the threatened honour. In vain
he urged his unfitness for the life of a court, his want of
cultivation and the arts of the world ; his humility was
to Isabel a further recommendation, and she would take
no denial.

G

98 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Thenceforward the pale emaciated figure, in a frayed
and soiled Franciscan frock, stalked like a spectre
amidst the splendours that surrounded the Queen ;
feared for his stern rectitude and his iron strength of
will. His mind was full, even then, of great plans to
reform the order of Saint Francis, corrupted as he had
seen it was in the cloisters ; and when the office of
Provincial of the Order became vacant soon afterwards
the new Confessor accepted it eagerly. Through all
Castile, to every monastery of the Order, Jimenez rode
on a poor mule with one attendant and no luggage ;
living mostly upon herbs and roots by the way.
When, at last, Isabel recalled him peremptorily to her
siETe, he painted to her so black a picture of the shameful
licence and luxury of the friars, that the Queen, horri-
TTed at such impiety, vowed to sustain her Confessor in
the work of reform. It was a hard fought battle; for
the Priors were rich and powerful, and in many cases
were strongly supported from Rome. All sorts of in-
fluences were brought to bear. Ferdinand was be-
sought to mitigate the reforming zeal of Isabel and
Jimenez, and did his best to do so. The Prior of the
Holy Ghost in Segovia boldly took Isabel to task per-
sonally, and told her that her Confessor was unfit for
his post. When Isabel asked the insolent friar whether
he knew what he was talking about he replied, * Yes,
and I know that I am speaking to Queen Isabel, who
is dust and ashes as I am.' But all was unavailing,
the broom wielded by Jimenez and the Queen swept
through every monastery and convent in the land ; the
Queen herself taking the nunneries in hand, and with
gentle firmness examining for herself the circumstances
in every case before compelling a rigid adherence to
the conventual vows. When Mendoza di< in January

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 99

1495, tne greatest ecclesiastical benefice in the world
after the papacy, the Archbishopric of Toledo, became
vacant. Ferdinand wanted it for his illegitimate son,
Alfonso of Aragon, aged twenty-four, who had been
Archbishop of Saragossa since he was six. But Toledo
was in the Queen's gift, and to her husband's indignation
she insisted upon appointing Jimenez. The Pope,
Alexander vi., who had just conferred the title of
' Catholic ' upon the Spanish sovereigns, was by birth
a Valencian subject of Ferdinand ; and there was a
race of the rival Spanish claimants to win the support
of Rome. But Castile had right as well as might on
his side this time, and, again to his expressed dis*
pleasure, Jimenez became primate of Spain, and the
greatest man in the land after the King who distrusted
him.1 >£

^C_From their births Ferdinand had destined his
children to be instruments in his great scheme for
humbling France for the benefit of Aragon ; and
Isabel, in this respect, appears usually to have let
him have his way. It was a complicated and tortuous
way, which, in a history of the Queen, cannot be fully
described. Suffice it to say that when Ferdinand
found himself by the fall of Granada free to take his
own affairs seriously in hand, he had for years been
intriguing for political marriage for his children. First

1 It is related that the Queen concealed from Jimenez her intention to
make him Primate, and handed him unexpectedly the papal bull addressed
to him as : The venerable brother Francisco Jimenez de Cisneros, Arch-
bishop-elect of Toledo. When the friar saw the superscription he dropped
the document and fled, crying, This bull is not for me. He was pursued
and caught two leagues from Madrid by envoys from Isabel, and still re-
fused the great preferment on the ground of his unworthiness. He stood
out for six months until Isabel obtained from the Pope a peremptory
command to him to accept the archbishopric, and even then he insisted
that the vast revenues should be used for pious and charitable purposes.

ioo QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

he had endeavoured to capture the young King of
France, Charles vin., on his accession in 1483, by a
marriage with Isabel, the eldest daughter of Spain.
Charles vm. was already betrothed to Margaret of
Burgundy, but Anne of Brittany, with her French
dominion, was preferred to either, and then (1488)
Ferdinand, finding himself forestalled, betrothed his
youngest daughter, Katharine, to Arthur, Prince of
Wales, to win the support of Henry Tudor in a war
against France,1 to prevent the absorption of Brittany.
All parties were dishonest ; but Ferdinand outwitted
allies and rivals alike. Henry vn. of England was
cajoled into invading France ; whilst Ferdinand, in-
stead of making war on his side as arranged, quietly
extorted from the fears of Charles vm. an offensive
and defensive alliance against the world, with the
retrocession to Aragon of the counties of Roussillon
and Cerdagne ; and England was left in the lurch.

There is no doubt that the object of the King of
France in signing such a treaty was to buy the implied
acquiescence of Ferdinand in making good his shadowy
claims to the kingdom of Naples, then ruled by the
unpopular kinsman of Ferdinand himself. As was
proved soon afterwards, nothing was further from
Ferdinand's thoughts than thus to aid the ambition
of the shallow, vain King of France in the precise
direction where he wished to check it. But in appear-
ance the great festivities held in Barcelona on the
signature of the treaty in January 1493, heralded a
cordial settlement of the long-standing enmity between
the two rivals. Isabel took her share in the rejoic-
ings ; and rigid bigots appear to have written to her

1 A full account of these complicated intrigues will be found in the
present writer's * Wives of Henry vm.'

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC roi

late Confessor, Archbishop Talavera, an exaggerated
account of her participation in the gaiety. Isabel, in
answer to the letter of reprimand he sent her, defended
herself with spirit and dignity, after a preface express-
ing humble submission. ' You say that some danced
who ought not to have danced ; but if that is intended
to convey that I danced, I can only say that it is not
true ; I have little custom of dancing, and I had no
thought of such a thing. . . . The new masks you
complain of were worn neither by me nor by my ladies ;
and not one dress was put on that had not been worn
ever since we came to Aragon. The only dress I wore
had, indeed, been seen by the Frenchmen before, 'and
was my silk one with three bands of gold, made as
plainly as possible. This was all my part of the fes-
tivity. Of the grand array and showy garments you
speak of, I saw nothing and knew nothing until I read
your letter. The visitors who came may have worn
such fine things when they appeared ; but I know of
no others. As for the French people supping with
the ladies at table, that is a thing they are accustomed
to do. They do not get the custom from us ; but
when their great guests dine with sovereigns, the
others in their train dine at tables in the hall with
the ladies and gentlemen ; and there are no separate
tables for ladies. The Burgundians, the English and
the Portuguese, also follow this custom ; and we on
similar occasions to this. So there is no more evil in
it, nor bad repute, than in asking guests to your own
table. I say this, that you may see that there was no
innovation in what we did ; nor did we think we were
doing anything wrong in it. ... But if it be found
wrong after the inquiry I will make, it will be better
to discontinue it in future. The dresses of the gentle-

102 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

men were truly very; costly, and I did not commend
tKerff; and, indeed, moderated them as much as I could,
and advised them not to have such garments made.
As for the Bull feasts, I feel, with you, though perhaps
not quite so strongly. But after I had consented to
them, I had the fullest determination never to attend
them again in my life, nor to be where they were held.
I do not say that I can of myself abolish them ; for
that does not appertain to me alone, nor do I defend
them, for I have never found pleasure in them.1 When
you know the truth of what really took place, you may
determine whether it be evil, in which case it had better
be discontinued. For my part all excess is distasteful
to me, and I am wearied with all festivity, as I have
written you in a long letter, which I have not sent, nor
will I do so, until I know whether, by God's grace,
you are coming to meet us in Castile/^J>

This letter gives a good idea of Isabel's submission
to her spiritual advisers, as well as of her own good
sense and moderation, which prevented her from
giving blind obedience to them. Another instance
of this is seen by Isabel's attitude towards the chapter
of Toledo Cathedral after the death of her friend
Cardinal Mendoza (January 1495), tne third King of
Spain, as he had been called. The Queen travelled
from Madrid to Guadalajara to be with him at his
death, and tended him to the last, promising, person-
ally, to act as his executor, and to see that all his
testamentary wishes were fulfilled. Amongst these
was the desire of the prelate to be buried in a

1 Father Florez quotes a remark of Isabel, on another occasion, warmly
approving of the bull-fight, ' which, though foreigners who have not seen
it condemn as barbarous, she considered it very different, and as a diver-
sion where valour and dexterity shine.'

2 Florez, * Reinas Catolicos.3

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 103

certain spot in the chancel of the cathedral. To
this the chapter had readily assented in the life of
the archbishop, but when he had died they refused
to allow the structural alterations necessary, and the
matter was carried to the tribunals, which decided in
favour of the executors. The chapter still stood firm
in their refusal, and then the Queen, as chief executrix,
took the matter in her own hands, and herself super-
intended the necessary demolition of the wall of the
chapel at night, to the surprise and dismay of the
chapter, who no longer dared to interfere.1

On leaving Aragon after the signature of the hollow
Treaty of Barcelona (1493), Isabel and her husband
took up their residence in the Alcazar of Madrid,
where, with short intervals, they remained in residence
for the next six years. During this period, spent,
as will be told by F^rcHnand^^jin almost constant
struggle for his own objects in Italy and elsewhere,
Isabel was tireless in her efforts for domestic reform.
The purification of the monasteries and convents went "
on continually under the zealous incentive~oTThe new
Archbishop of Toledo, Jimenez : the roads and water-
sources throughout Castile were improved ; the^muni-
cipal_authorities, corrupt as they had become by the
introduction of the purchase of offices, and the effects
of noble intrigue, were brought under royal inspection
and control ; and this, though it improved the govern-
ment of the towns, further sapped their independence
and legislative power. The Universities and high
schools, which had shared in the universal decadence,
were overhauled, and a higher standard of graduation
enforced : the_ coinage, which had become hopelessly
debased, in consequence of the vast number of noble

1 Montero de los Rios ' Historia de Madrid.'

104 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

>

and municipal mints in existence, was unified and
rehabilitated : sumptuary pragmatics, mistaken as they
appear to us now, but well-intentione^L-at the time,
endeavoured to restrain extravagance arid idle vanity :
rrt^asnres for promoting agriculture, the great cloth
industry of Segovia and oversea commerce, and a
score of other similar enactments during these years,
from 1494 to the end of the century, show how
catholic and patriotic was Isabel's activity at the
tifne that Ferdinand was busy with his own Aragonese
plans. The annals of Madrid at this period give a
curious account of Isabel's prowess in another direction.
The neighbourhood of the capital was infested with
bears, and one particular animal, of special size and
ferocity, had committed much damage. By order of the
Queen a special battue was organised, and the bear was
killed by a javelin in the hands of Isabel herself, upon
the spot where now stands the hermitage of St.
Isidore, the patron of Madrid.1

^Terdina^^ perspicacity, and

the Hir^reactimg" combinations he had formed, now
began to produce some of the international results
foTwhich he had worked. The Treaty of Barcelona
had bound Ferdinand to friendship with France, and
abstention from marrying his children in England,
Germany or Naples, and implied the leaving to
Charles vm. of a free hand in Italy : but no sooner
had Ferdinand received his L_rewardJ)y the retrocession
of Roussillon and Cerdagne to him, than he broke all
his obligations under the treaty. Charles vm. had
marched through Italy, to the intense anger of the
native princes, and took possession of Naples, and
then Ferdinand, in coalition with the Valencian Pope,

1 Oviedo.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 105

Alexander vi., formed the combination of Venice, and
Spanish troops under the great Castilian, Gonzalo de
Cordova, expelled the French from Naples, and set
up the deposed Aragonese- Neapolitan king, until it
should please, as it soon did, Ferdinand to seize the
realm for himself.

This war was an awakening to all Europe that a
new fighting nation had entered into the arena.
Already the proud spirit of superiority by divine
selection was being felt by Spaniards as a result of
the religious persecution of the minority, and the
devotional exaltation inspired by the example of the
Queen : and under so great a commander as Gonzalo
de Cordova Spanish troops for the first time now
showed the qualities which, for a century at least,
made them invincible.1 Whilst this result attended
the policy of Isabel and her husband in religious
affairs, their action in another direction simultaneously,
whilst for the moment seeming to give to Ferdinand
the hegemony of Europe, really wrought the ruin of
Spain by bringing her into the vortex of central Euro-
peanjDolitics^ and burdening her with the championship
ofjm impossible cause under impossible conditions. '

1 Ferdinand had wished to appoint an Aragonese commander, but as
Castile was defraying most of the expenses of the war, Isabel insisted
upon a Castilian being appointed.

CHAPTER III

AMIDST infinite chicanery and baseness on both sides
the marriage_Jreaty of Isabel's youngest daughter,
Katharine, with Arthur, Prince of Wales, had been
alternately confirmed and relaxed, as suited Ferdi-
nand's interests] But he took care that it could be at
any time revived when need should demand it. This
made Ferdinand always able to deal a diverting blow
upon France in the Channel. But Ferdinand's main
Sitroke_^£__Eolicy was the double marriage of his
children, Juaj34__Prince of Asturias, with the Arch-
duchess Margaret, daughter of Maximilian, sovereign
of the Holy Roman Empire ; and of Joan, Isabel's
second daughter, with Philip, Maximilian's son, and,
by right of his mother, sovereign of the dominions of
the Dukes of Burgundy with Holland and Flanders ;
whilst Isabel's eldest daughter, already the widow of
the Portuguese prince, Alfonso, was betrothed to his
cousin, King Emmanuel. Imagination is dazzled at
the prospect opened out by these marriages. The
children of Philip and Joan would hold the fine
harbours of Flanders, and would hem in France by
the possession of Artois, Burgundy, Luxembourg, and
the Franche Comt6 ; whilst their possession of the
imperial crown and the German dominions of the
house of Hapsburg would identify their interests with
those of Ferdinand in checking the French advance

106

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 107

towards Italy. On the other side of the Channel the
grandchildren of Ferdinand and Isabel would rule
England, and hold the narrow sea ; whilst the friend-
ship between England and Scotland, prompted by
Ferdinand, and the marriage of Margaret Tudor with
James iv., deprived France of her ancient northern
ally. The King of Aragon might then, with the
assurance of success, extend his grasp from Sicily to
the East, and become the master of the world. The
plan was a splendid one ; and for a time it went merry
as the marriage bells that heralded it. With his
family seated on the Portuguese throne, Ferdinand
had, moreover, no attack to fear on that side from
French intrigue, such as had often been attempted ; and
for a brief period it seemed as if all heaven had smiled
upon the astute King of Aragon.

Isabel had always been an exemplary mother to her
children, who, on their side, were deeply devoted to
her. She had rarely allowed them to be separated
from her, even during her campaigns ; and had herself
cared for their education in letters, music, and the arts
under the most accomplished masters in Europe.1
When they had to be sacrificed one by one for the
political ends of their father, Isabel's love as a mother
almost overcame her sense of duty as a queen, ^and in
the autumn of 1496 she travelled through Spain with a
heavy heart to take leave of her seventeen-year old
daughter, Joan, for whom a great fleet of 120 sail was
waiting in the port of Laredo, near Santander. The
King was away in Catalonia preparing his war with
France ; the times were disturbed, and a strong navy
with 15,000 armed men were needed to escort the
young bride to Flanders, the home of her husband,

1 Clemencin. 'Elogio.3

io8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Philip of Burgundy, heir of the empire, and to bring
back to Spain the betrothed of Prince Juan, Philip's
sister, Margaret, who, in her infancy, had been allied
to the faithless Charles vm. of France. For two
nights after the embarkation Isabel slept on the ship
with her daughter, loath to part with her, as it seemed,
for ever ; and when, at last, the fleet sailed, on the
22nd August 1496, the mother, in the deepest grief,
turned her back upon the sea, and rode sadly to
Burgos to await tidings of her daughter.

Storms and disasters innumerable assailed the fleet.
Driven by tempest into Portland, one of the largest of
the ships came into collision and foundered ; and though
the young Archduchess received every courtesy and
attention from the English gentry, she was not even
yet at the end of her troubles ; for on the Flemish
coast another great ship was wrecked, with most of
her household, trousseau, and jewels. Eventually the
whole fleet arrived at Ramua, sorely disabled, and
needing a long delay for refitting before it could return
to Spain with the bride of Isabel's heir.1 Whilst Joan
was being married, with all the pomp traditional in the
house of Burgundy, to her handsome, good-for-nothing
husband, Philip, at Lille, Queen Isabel, at Burgos, in
the deepest distress, was mourning for the loss of her
own distraught mother, as well as for her daughter.2
Every post from Flanders brought the Queen evil
news. The fleet that had carried Joan over, and was
refitting to bring Margaret to Spain, was mostly
unseaworthy : Philip neglected and ill-treated his

1 Zurita, ' Anales,' and Padilla, ' Cronica de Felipe I. '

2 The Spanish chroniclers complain bitterly of Philip's slowness in
coming to meet his bride. He was in Tyrol when she arrived in
Flanders, and spent nearly a month in joining her at Lille. From the
first the love was all on poor Joan's side.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 109

wife's countrymen to the extent of allowing 9000 of
the men on the fleet at Antwerp to die from cold and
privation, without trying to help them ; already his
young wife was complaining of his conduct. Her
Spanish household were unpaid ; and even the income
settled upon her by Philip was withheld, on the pretext
that Ferdinand had not fulfilled his part of the bargain,
which was, of course, true.

At length, after what seemed interminable delay, the
Archduchess Margaret arrived at Santander early in
March 1497. Ferdinand, with a great train of nobles,
received his future daughter-in-law as she stepped
upon Spanish soil, and a few days later Queen Isabel
welcomed her in the palace of Burgos, where, with
greater rejoicing than had ever been seen in Castile,
heir of Ferdinand and— Tsahe.1 was married to

^

gentle Margaret, one of the finest characters of her
time. Seven months afterwards the Prince of Asturias,
at the age of twenty -one,_ was borne to his grave,
arid~~rris wife gave birth to a dead child.1 The blow
was one from which Isabel never recovered. Juan
was her only son, her 'angel,' from the time of his
birth ; and the dearest wish of her heart had been the
unification of Spain under him and his descendants.

^•^ ^ _ _ -^ _ ___ •!• _ | - — • ----- - ----- • '• •• -- - — —

The next heiress was Isabel, her eldest daughter, just
(August 1497) married to King EmmanueFoFPbltugal,
and the jealous Aragonese and Catalans would hardly
brook a woman sovereign ; and, above all, one ruling

1 Ferdinand, it is related, fearing that the sudden news of Juan's death
would kill Isabel with grief, caused her to be told that it was her husband,
Ferdinand himself, that had died, so that when he presented himself
before her, the — as he supposed — lesser grief of her son's death should be
mitigated by learning that her husband was alive. The experiment does
not appear to have been very successful, as Isabel was profoundly affected
when she heard the truth. (Florez^ * Reinas Catolicos').

no QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

from Portugal, when Ferdinand should die.1 Hastily
Cortes of Castile was summoned at Toledo, and swore
allegiance to the new heiress and her Portuguese
husband^ as princes of Asturias in April 1498, but
she, too, died in childbed in August, when the heirship
devolved upon her infant son, MTguel, who, if he had
lived, would have united not only Spain, but all the
Iberian Peninsula under one rule. But it was not to be,
and the babe followed his mother to the grave in a
few months.

Troubles fell thick and fast .upon Isabel and her
husband. Death within three years had made cruel
sport of all their plans ; and the support of England,
long held in the balance by Ferdinand, to be bought
when it was worth the price demanded, had now to be
obtained almost at any cost. The price had increased
considerably ; for Henry Tudor was as keen a hand at
a bargain as Ferdinand of Aragon, and closely watched
events. With the usual grasping dishonesty on both
sides, the treaty for the marriage of Isabel's youngest
daughter, Katharine, to the heir of England was again
signed and sealed, and the young couple were married
by proxy in May 1499. But Katharine was young.
Her mother could hardly bring herself to part with her
last-born, and send her for ever to a far country
amongst strangers ; and she fought hard for two years
longer to delay her daughter's going, with all manner
of conditions and claims as to her future life. At
length Henry of England put his foot down, and said

1 In fact the Cortes of Aragon obstinately refused to swear allegiance
to the Infanta Isabel as heiress when she went to Saragossa for the
purpose in the autumn ; and she was kept there in great distress until
her expected child should be born, which, if it were a male, would receive the
oath of the Cortes. The anxiety and worry consequent upon this killed
the Lifaiv.ii (Queen of Portugal) in the birth of her "Md Miguel in August.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC in

he would wait no longer ; and, worse still, he hinted
that he would marry Arthur elsewhere, and throw his
influence on the side of Philip of Burgundy, Ferdi-
nand's son-in-law, in the struggle that was already
looming on the horizon. Isabel and her daughter
both knew that the latter was being sent to serve her
father's political interests against her own sister and
brother-in-law ; but, from her birth, Katharine had
been brought up in her mother's atmosphere of
uncompromising duty, surrounded by the ecstatic
devotion which demanded serene personal sacrifice
for higher ends; and, on the 2ist May 1501, the
Princess of Aragon bade a last farewell to her mother
in the elfin palace of the Alhambra, to see her no more
in her life of martyrdom.1

Isabel's health was already breaking down with
labour and trouble. Disappointment faced her from
every side, and as tribulations fell, bringing her end
nearer, and ever nearer, the stern religious zeal that
inflamed her grew more eager to do its work in her
day. She had never been a weakling, as we have
seen. From her youth the persecution of infidels had
been as grateful to her sense of duty, as the crushing
of her worldly opponents had been satisfying to her
love of undisputed dominion. In all Castile, no man
but her confessor, and he at his peril, had dared to
say her nay ; but at this juncture, when health was
failing and her strength on the wane, there came to
her tidings from across the sea that turned her heart
to stone. Joan, her daughter, had always been some-
what wayward and rebellious at the gloomy, devout
tone that pervaded her mother's life, and Isabel had
coerced her, on some occasions by forcible means, to

1 Her story is told in * The Wives of Henry vin.,' by the present writer.

ii2 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

take her part in the religious observances that occupied
so large a share of attention at the Spanish court.1

Joan was young and bright : the life in her palace
atTrussels was free from the gloom that hung over
crusading Castile. Philip, her husband, cared for
little but pleasure, and, though he was but a faithless
husband, she was desperately in love with him. The
new culture, moreover, which had even found ifs way,
with Peter Martyr, into Isabel's court, had, in rich,
prosperous Flanders, brought with it the freedom of
thought and judgment that naturally came from the
wider horizon of knowledge that men gained by it,
and doubtless the change from the rigid and un-
comfortable sanctimony of her native land to the
gay and debonair society of Flanders had seemed to
Joan like coming out of the darkness into the daylight.
The Spanish priests who surrounded her sounded a
note of warning to Isabel only a few months after
Joan had arrived in Flanders. She was said to be
lax^rn. Jier religious duties : her~old confessorT^who
continued to write~toTierNfervent exhortations to pre-
serve the faith as it was held in Spain, could get no
reply to any of his letters, and he learnt that the
gay Parisian priests, who flocked in the festive court,
were leading Joan astray.

Isabel sent a confidential priest, Friar Matienzo, to
Flanders to examine and report on all these, and the
like accusations. He saw Joan in August 1498, and
found her, as he says, more handsome and buxom
than ever, though far advanced in pregnancy ; but
when he began to press her about religion, though
she had plenty of reasons ready for what she did, she
was as obstinate as her mother could be in holding

1 ' Spanish State Papers.' Calendar, Supplement to vol. i. p. 405.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 113

her own way. She refused to confess at the bidding
of the friar, to accept any confessor appointed by her
mother, or to dismiss the French priests who were with
her, and the friar sent the dire news to Isabel that her
daughter had a hard heart and no true piety.1

This was bad enough, biifT~on~~tEe~ death of the
Queen of Portugal, Isabel's eldest daughter and
heiress, leaving her infant son as heir to the united
crowns, Philip assumed for himself and his wife, Joan,
the title of Prince and Princess of Castile. This was
a warning for Ferdinand.2 Already Philip and his
father, the Emperor Maximilian, had shown that they
had no idea of being the tools of Ferdinand's foreign
policy, but_ if Philip of Burgundyjsucce^fully asserted
Joan's right to succeed her mother as^ueen of Castile,
then all Ferdinand's edifice of-kope fell-like a house of
cardSj. for most of Spain would be governed by a for-
eigner, with other ends and methods, and poor, isolated
Aragon, by itself, must sink into insignificance.

When the infant Portuguese heir, Miguel, died,
early in 1499, the issue between Ferdinand and his
son-in-law was joined. Isabel was visibly failing, and
it was seen would die before her husband, in which
case Joan would be Queen of Castile, in right of her
mother. Philip, her husband, with the riches of

1 * Calendar of Spanish State Papers,' Supplement to vol. i. ' Reports
of the Sub-Prior of Santa Cruz to Isabel.'

2 Ferdinand sent at once an envoy to remonstrate with Maximilian
about his son's pretensions, but it was soon seen that Maximilian and his
son were entirely in accord. Maximilian had the effrontery to claim the
crown of Portugal in right of his mother, Dona Leonor of Portugal, and
the crown of Castile for Juana, in preference to any daughter that might
be born to her eldest sister, Isabel of Portugal. Ferdinand's enemy, the
King of France, naturally supported these pretensions, which were really
put forward at the time to thwart Ferdinand, whose plans in Italy were
now seen to threaten the suzerainty of the empire over some of the Italian
States.

H

ii4 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Flanders and Burgundy, and the prestige of the
empire behind him, would come, perhaps in alliance
with the French, and reduce greedy, ambitious
Ferdinand to the petty crown of Aragon. Thence-
forward it was war__to_the_Jknife between- father and
_sorbiibJaw, who hated each other bitterly ; and Isabel's
distrust of her daughter Joan grew deeper as religious
zeal and ambition for a united Spain joined in adding
fuel to the fire. With true statesmanship Isabel, under
the great influence of Jimenez, clung more desperately
than ever to the idea of a Spain absolutely united.
Ferdinand's object in working for the consolidation of
the realms had always been to forward the traditional
objects of Aragon in humbling France, but those of
Isabel and Jimenez were different. To them the
spread of Christianity in the dark places of the earth,
for the greater glory of Castile, was the end to be
gained by a united Spain, and for that end it was
necessary that the people should be unified in orthodoxy
as well as in sovereignty. The cruel and disastrous
expulsion of the Jews1 served this object in Isabel's
mind, though to Ferdinand its principal advantage
was the filling of his war chest. The squandering of
Castilian blood and treasure in Naples and Sicily was
to Isabel and Jimenez a means of strengthening the
Spaniards in their future Christianisation of north
Africa, whilst to Ferdinand it meant the future
domination of Italy, the Adriatic, and gaining the
trade of the Levant for Barcelona.

When Isabel and her husband went to Granada,

1 As showing how unrelenting was Isabel's determination to exterminate
infidelity in the whole Peninsula at the time, it may be mentioned that
one of the conditions of the marriage of her eldest widowed daughter
Isabel to the King of Portugal in 1497, was that every Jew should be
expelled from Portugal.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 115

afteiL a long absence, in I4QQ, with the all-powerful
Jimenez in his dirty, coarse, Franciscan gown, the
difference of view of the husband and wife was again
seen. The Moors of Granada had lived, since their
capitulation, contented and prosperous in the enjoy-
ment of toleration for their customs and faith under
the sympathetic rule of the Christian governor, the
Count of Tendilla, and the ardent, but always
diplomatic, religious propaganda of Archbishop Tala-
vera. If these two men had been allowed to continue
their gentle system for a generation, there is no doubt
that in time Granada would have become Christian
without bloodshed, even if it had retained its Arabic
speech. But Jimenez and the Queen could not wait,
and determined upon methods? more rapid than those
o£ Talavera In the seven years that had passed
since Granada surrendered to Isabel, the crown of
Spain had become much more powerful. The prestige
and wealth of the sovereigns had been increased ; the
discovery of America had considerably added to
the importance of Castile, whilst the expulsion of
the French from Naples had magnified Aragon. The
Jews had been expelled from Spain, and, above all,
the Inquisition, under the ruthlgss.JTQrqueinada, had
raised the arrogance both of people and priests on
the strength of the stainless orthodoxy of Spain.

Jimenez doubtless felt that the circumstances
demanded, or at least excused, stronger measures
towards the Moslems in Granada. He soon per-
suaded or stultified Talavera, and set about converting
the Moors wholesale. Bribery, persuasion, flattery,
were the first instruments employed, then threats and
severity. Thousands of Moors were thus brought
to baptism, ^with what sincerity may be supposed.

n6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Jimenez, a book lover himself, and afterwards the
munificent inspirer of the polyglot Bible in his splendid
new University of Alcala, committed the vandalism of
burning the priceless Arabic manuscripts that had
been collected by generations of scholars in Granada.
Five thousand magnificently illuminated copies of the
Koran were cast into the flames, whilst many thou-
sands of ancient Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic texts
were sacrificed to the blind bigotry and haste of
Jimenez and Isabel, who, even in learning, drew the
line at Christian writings. From sacrificing books to
sacrificing men was but a step for Jimenez. Isabel
and her husband had sworn to allow full toleration
to the Moors, but what were oaths of monarchs as
against the presumed interests of the faith ? Soon
the dungeon, the rack, and the thumbscrew came to
fortify Jimenez's propaganda, and, though the Moslems
bowed their heads before irresistible force, they cursed
beneath their breath the day they had trusted to the
oath of Christian sovereigns.

The absence of Ferdinand and Isabel in Seville
early in 1500, gave to Jimenez full freedom ; and soon
the strained cord snapped, and the outraged Moors
rebelled. Like a spark upon tinder an excess of in-
solence on the part of one of Jimenez's myrmidons set
all Granada in a blaze ; and the Primate was besieged
in his palace, in imminent danger of death. He acted
with stern courage even then, and refused to escape
until Count de Tendilla with the soldiery dispersed the
populace, and drove them into their own quarter, the
Albaicin. There they were impregnable, and Tendilla,
who was popular, with Talavera, even more beloved,
took their lives in their hands, and unarmed and bare-
headed entered the Albaicin to reassure the Moors.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 117

'We do not rise,' cried the latter, 'against their high-
nesses, but only to defend their own signatures,'1 and
the beloved Archbishop and Governor, who left his
own wife and children in the Albaicin as hostages of
peace, soothed the Moors into quietude almost as
soon as the storm had burst.

The news flew rapidly to Seville, though Jimenez's
version was not the first to arrive, and when he heard
it, Ferdinand turned in anger to Isabel. 'See here,
madam,' he said, handing her the paper, ' our victories,
earned with so much Spanish blood, are thus ruined in
a moment by the rashness and obstinacy of your
Archbishop.'2 Isabel herself wrote in grave sorrow to
Jimenez, deploring that he had given her no proper
explanation of what had happened ; and after sending
his faithful vicar, Ruiz, to placate the monarchs some-
what, the Archbishop himself appeared before the
Queen and her husband. He was a man of tremendous
power. Over Isabel his religious influence was great,
and he proved now that he knew how to get at the
weak side of Ferdinand. The Moors, he urged, had
been converted by thousands ; and so far, his work had
been successful. But rebellion on the part of subjects
could never be condoned, no matter what the cause,
and he appeajecL.LQ both sovereigns only -to- pardoa
G ranada for its revolt on condition that every Moor
should become a Christian or leave Spain. It was a
sHameFuT violatidrnof a -sacred' pledge given only seven
years before, but the rising of the Albaicin was the
salve which Jimenez applied to the wounded honour
of his Queen and King.

1 Marmol Carbajal, ' Rebelion of Castigo de los Moros de Granada/
2Marmol Carbajal. It will be recollected that Ferdinand had opposed

Jimenez's appointment, as he wanted the archbishopric and primacy for

his son.

n8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

To Granada he returned triumphant, with the fell
decree in the pocket of his shabby grey gown. More
converts flocked in than ever when the alternative was
presented to them. But up in the wild Alpujarras, the
Moslem villagers and farmers looked with hatred and
dismay at the lax townsmen abandoning Allah and his
only prophet at the bidding of a ragged, sour-faced
priest who broke his monarch's word. Like an avalanche
the mountaineers swept down from their fastnesses upon
Malaga, beating back the Christian force from Granada
which came to rescue the city. But Ferdinand from
Seville and the greatest soldier in Europe, Gonzalo de
Cordova, hastened with an army to crush the desperate
handful who had defied an empire ; and every Moor in
arms, with many women and children, were pitilessly
massacred. The repression was carried out with a
savage ferocity and heartlessness only equalled by the
despairing bravery of the insurgents ; but at last, by the
end of 1 500, the few who were, still left unconverted were
brought to their knees : all except the fierce moun-
taineers of Ronda, a separate African tribe, notable
even to-day for their lawlessness and indomitable in-
dependence. From their savage fortress over the gorge
they repelled one Christian force after another, until
Ferdinand himself, with vengeance in his heart against
all rebels, came with an army strong enough to crush
them. A ruinous ransom and instant conversion were
dictated to them, and confiscation and death, or depor-
tation to Africa, for those who hesitated.

Then came the turn of Granada itself. Jimenez and
the new Inquisitor-General, Deza, the friend of Colon,
demanded of Isabel and Ferdinand thejsstablishment
of the Inquisition in the city. This was considered too
flagrant a vT6Talion~oT^dt promises ; but what was re-

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 119

fused in the letter was granted in the spirit ; and the
Inquisition of Cordova was given power to extend its
operations over Granada. What followed will always
remain a blot upon the name of Isabel, who with Jimenez
was principally responsible. In July 1501, she with her
husband issued a decree forbidding the Moslem faith
throughout the kingdom of Granada, on pain of death
and confiscation ; and in February 1 502, the wicked
edict went forth, ""that the entire Moslem popula-
tion, men, women, and all children of over twelve years,
should quit the realm within twojponths, whilst they
were forbidden to go_to a Mahommedan country.
Whither were the poor wretches to go but to Africa,
opposite their own shores ? and some found their way
there. This was a pretext a few months afterwards
for prohibiting any one to emigrate from Spain at all ;
and such Moors as still remained in Spain had only the
alternatives of compulsory conversion or death.1 By
the end of 1502 not a single professed Moslem was left
in Spain ; and Isabel, with saintly joy in her heart,
could thank God that she had done her duty, and that
in her own day the miracle had come to pass : the
Jews expelled, the Moors ' converted,' the Inquisition
scourging religious doubt with thongs of flame ; all
men in very fear bowing their heads to one symbol and
muttering one creed. This was indeed a victory to be
proud of, and it made Spain what it was and what it is.
To Isabel, in broken health and sad bereavement,
it was the one ray of glory that gilded all her sorrow.
Not the least of her troubles were those arising from
her new domain across the sea. The impossible terms
insisted upon by the discoverer had, as we have seen,
been accepted with the greatest unwillingness by Fer-

1 Ulick Burke, ' History of Spain.' Edited by Martin Hume.

120 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

dinand, and probably with no intention of fulfilling
them ; and whenjColon began to prepare his second
expedition on a great scale, and thousands of adven-
turers craved to accompany him, the King realised the
danger that threatened his own plans in Europe if
such an exodus continued ; and, at the same time, the
tremendous power that this foreign sailor, now Admiral
of the Indies and perpetual Spanish Viceroy, with
riches untold, would hold in his hands. So the pro-
cess of undermining him began. The Council of the
Indies_was formed to control anjnatters_cormected _with
the new domain, and the priests that ruled it obstructed
and thwarted the Admiral at every turn. Isabel was
mainly ^concerned in, winning her new subjects to
CHristianity,;_and four friars went this time in the
fleet to baptise. All of them but his friend Marchena
were disloyal to the chief, and so were the crowd ot
Aragonese who accompanied the expedition. Of the
fifteen hundred adventurers who at last were selected,
the great majority were greedy, reckless men whom
the end of the Moorish war had left idle.

At first the news from Colon on his second voyage
were bright and hopeful. New lands, richer than ever,
were discovered, and the prospects of coming wealth
from this source, whilst delighting the King, only made
the downfall of the Admiral more inevitable. But
soon the merciless violence of the colonists provoked
reprisals, andj^vej^LsJup that returned to Spain brought
to__Isabel Jritter^ complaints oT'Colon's^ rapacity and
tyranny ; whilst he, on his side, denounced the want

those who were^ ragid^ turnmg- -a Jaeayj^n^nj&_^ hell •
At TelTgtrf the complaints, both of friars and laymen,
against the high-handed Admiral of the Indies, became

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 121

so violent that the sovereigns summoned him to Spain
to give some explanation of the position. Colon saw
the Queen at Burgos in 1496, and found her, at least,
full of sympathy for him in his difficulties, and still
firmly convinced that his golden hopes would be ful-
filled. But the reaction had set in against the extra-
vagant expectations aroused by his second expedition.
The idlers, many of them, had come back disappointed,
fever-stricken and empty-handed, and had much evil
to say of the despotic Italian who had lorded over land
granted by the Viceregent of Christ at Rome to the
Spanish sovereigns ; and though Isabel herself, full
of zeal for winning all Asia, as she thought, for the
faith, did her best, the treasury was empty after the
wars of Granada and Italy, and the heavy expense of
the royal marriages then in progress.

Amidst infinite obstruction from the Council of the
Indies, and with little but frowning looks from Fer-
dinand, Colon's third expedition was painfully and
slowly fitted out. Few adventurers were anxious to
~gcTnow ; and condemned criminals had to be enlisted
for the service; but, withal, at length in May 1498,
the Admiral sailed on his third voyage to his new
land. When he arrived at his centre, the isle of
Hispanola (Haiti), he found that a successful revolt
of tHe lawless ruffians he had left behind had over-
turned all semblance of order and discipline. The
mines were unworked, the fields untilled, the natives
atrociously tortured, and violence everywhere para-
mount. Isabel's verbal instructions to the Admiral
when she took leave of him had been precise. Her
first object, she said, was to convert the Indians to
Christianity, and to carry to them from Spain, not
slavery and oppression, but the gentle, Christian,

122 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

virtues. This doubtless to some extent was the desire
of Colon himself, with his mystic devotional soul,
though wholesale slavery of natives was part of his
system, and he set about his work of the reconciliation
of the Indians, whose horrible sufferings had driven
them to armed opposition or flight. The undisciplined
Spaniards had the whip hand, and the Admiral could
only with much diplomacy, and perhaps unwise con-
cessions to them, at length bring some semblance of
peace and order to the colony. But mild as his
mejthods were on the occasion, they were bitterly re-
sented by arrogant Spaniards, indignant that a foreigner
should wield sovereign powers over them in their own
Queen's territory.

Complaints and accusations more bitter than ever
came to the King and Queen by every ship. The
men who returned to Spain assured Ferdinand that
Colon was sacrificing every interest to his own in-
satiable greed ; and Isabel, favourably disposed as she
was to the discoverer generally, at length lost patience
when she found that he was shipping cargoes of
Indians to Spain to be sold for slaves. To enslave
infidels was not usually held to be wrong, and Colon
considered it a legitimate source of profit : but Isabel's
new subjects, mild and gentle as they were, had been
looked upon by her as actual or potential Christians,
and her indignation was great when she saw that
Colon was treating them indifferently as chattels of his
own.1 At length it was decided to send an envoy to
Hispanola^ with full powers to inquire into affairs and
to take possession of all property and dispose of all
persons in the new territories. The man chosen thus
to exercise unrestrained power was Francisco de

1 Las Casas.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 123

Bobadilla, probably a relative of the Queen's great
friend, Beatriz de Bobadilla, Marchioness of Moya ;
but in any case an intolerant tyrant, who considered it
his business, as, by Ferdinand, it was probably intended
to be, to degrade the Admiral in any case. With un-
exampled insolence and harshness, he loaded the great
explorer with manacles almost as soon as he arrived in
Hispanola ; and then, whilst Colon Jay in prison, the
whole of the charges against him were raked together,
and, without any attempt to sift them judicially, were
embodied in an act of accusation, and sent to Spain by
the same caravel as that which carried in chains the
exalted visionary, whose dream had enriched Castile
with a new world.

The shameful home-coming of Colon in December
1 500, struck the imagination and shocked the conscience
of the people ; and Isabel herself was one of the first
to express her indignation. She and Ferdinand were
at Granada at the time, and sent to the illustrious
prisoner a dignified letter of regret, ordering him at
once to be released, supplied with funds, and to present
himself before them. The Queen received him in her
palace of the Alhambra, and as he stood before his
sovereign, with his bared white head bowed in grief
and shame for the insult that had eaten into his very
soul,1 Isabel lost her usual calm serenity and wept,
whereupon the Admiral himself broke down, and he
cast himself at the foot of the throne that he had so
nobly endowed. The title of Admiral was restored
to him : though in his stead as Viceroy was sent out
Nicolas de Ovando, with thirty-two vessels and a

1 Colon's son, Ferdinand, says that he ordered his fetters to be buried
with him : but this does not appear to have been done. His bitter indig-
nation is expressed by his son, Fernando, and in Colon's * Letter to the
Nurse.'

124 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

great company of gentlemen. But disaster overtook
the fleet ; and, though Ovando arrived, most of the
ships and men were lost, and thenceforward Isabel's
zeal for maritime adventure grew cooler.

The cost and drain of men for the enterprise had
been very great. The fame of the discovery had rung
through the world, and had exalted Isabel and Castile
as they had never been exalted before, but up to this
period the returns in money had been insignificant,
whilst the unsettling influence of the adventure upon
the nation at large had been very injurious. Ferdi-
nand, for reasons already explained, always regarded
it coldly ; and the loss of Ovando's fleet seemed to
prove him right. When, therefore, Colon begged for
the Queen's aid to sail with afburth expeditioji early
in 1502, she was unwilling to ITelpTtRough she was
sufficiently "his friend stuT to prevent others from
hindering him ; and he sailed for the last time in
March 1502, to see his patroness no more; for when
he came kicl^-two years and nine months later, broken
wttTTlnjusticeT and with death^ in Tiis^Heart, Isabel the
)*athoiic jvasjiead.

Even greater^sorrows than those _of . A nicrica came
to Isabel in her last_years, troubles that stabbed her
to' the very heart, and from which one of the great
tragedies of history grew. From Flanders came tid-
ings of grave import for the future of the edifice so
laboriously reared by Ferdinand and Isabel. The
heiress of Spain, the Archduchess Joan, with her
cynical, evil-minded husband, Philip the Handsome,
were daily drifting further away from the influence of
Joan's parents. Dark whispers of religious back-
sliding on the part of the Court of Brussels were rife
in the grim circle of friars and devotees that accom-

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 125

panied Isabel. It was said that Joan and her husband
openly slighted the rigid observance of religious form
considered essential in Spain, and that the freedom of
thought and speech common in Flanders was more to
the taste of Joan than the terror-stricken devotion of
her Inquisition-ridden native land. Isabel had dedi-_
cated her_strenuous life and vast ahi'Tify In the iinifica-_
tion of the faith in Spain.^ She had connived at cruelty
unfathomable, and had exterminated whole races of
her subjects with that sole object. Throughout her
realms and those of her husband no heresy dared now
raise its head, or even whisper doubt ; and the thought
that free-thinking, mocking Burgundian Philip, with
his submissive wife, so alienated from her own people
that she refused to send a message of loving greeting
to her mother, should come and work their will upon
the sacred soil of Castile, must have been torture to
Isabel. To Ferdinand it must have been as bad ; for
it touched him, too, in his tenderest part. His life
dream had been to realise the ambitions of Aragon.
For that he had plotted, lied, and cheated ; for that
he had plundered his subjects, kept his realms at war,
bartered his children and usurped his cousin's throne.^
But it would be all useless if Castile slipped through
his fingers when his wife died, and his deadly enemy,
his son-in-law, became king of Castile in right of his
wife Joan.

The difficulty became more acute when Joan gave
birth to her son at Ghent in February 1500, because,
according "to the law oTsuccession, the child christened
Charles, a name unheard of in Spain^before, would
inrierit"not Castile and Leon alone, but Aragon as
well, with Flanders, Burgundy, Artois, Luxembourg,
the Aragonese kingdoms in Italy, and, worst of all,

126 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Austria and the empire. Where would the interests
of Aragon, nay, even of Spain, be amongst such
world-wide dominions ; and how could such a potentate
devote himself either to aggrandising Aragon, or to
carrying the Cross into the dark places of Moorish
Africa ? What added to the bitterness in Ferdinand's
case was, that Philip was even now intriguing actively
with the Kings of France, Portugal, and England
against Aragon ; and was, with vain pretexts, evading
the pressing invitations of his wife's parents to bring
her to Spain, to receive with him the oath of allegiance
as heirs of the realms.

It was necessary somehow to conciliate Philip and
Joan before they went too far ; for Philip's plan, to
marry the infant Prince Charles to a French princess,
struck at the very root of Ferdinand's policy. Envoy
after envoy was sent to Flanders to expedite the
coming of Philip and Joan, if possible, with the infant
Charles ; hut thet_Archduke jiad_no intention of
becoming the tool- o£ his astute father-in-law, and was
determined to be quite secure before he placed himself
in his power. He was anxious enough to obtain
^recognition as heir of Castile jointly with his wife, but
desired to leave Spain immediately afterwards, which
did not suit Ferdinand, who wished to have time to
influence him towards his policy, and alienate him
from his Flemish and French favourites.1 Joan
herself flatly refused to come without her husband ; of
whom, with ample reason, she was violently jealous ;
and neither would allow the infant Charles to come
without them. At length, after Joan had been
delivered of her third child, a daughter named Isabel, the

v

* Zurita .v Rodriguez Villa, 'Juana la Loca,' ancK' Calericfer of Spanish
S^ate Papers,3 Supplement to Vol. i.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 127

prayers and promises of Queen Isabel and her husband
prevailed, and the Archduke and Archduchess con-
sented to come to Spain. But it was under conditions
that turned the heart of Ferdinand more than ever
against his son-in-law. They would travel to Spain
through France, and ratify in Paris the betrothal of
their one-year old son Charles, heir of Spain, Flanders,
and the empire, with Claude of France, child of Louis
xn. Philip went out of his way during the sumptuous
reception in Paris to show his submission to the King
of France ; and even did homage to him as Count of
Flanders ; but Joan, mindful for once, at least, that she
belonged to the house of Aragon, and was heiress of
Spain, refused all tokens implying her subservience.

On the ;th May 1502, Joan and her husband entered
the imperial city of Toledo with all the ceremony that
Castile could supply. At the door of the great hall in
the Alcazar, Isabel stood to receive her heirs. Both
knelt before her and tried to kiss her hand, but the
Queen raised them, and embracing her daughter,
carried her off to her private chamber. Soon after-
wards the Archduchess and her husband took the oath
as heirs of Castile in the vast Gothic Cathedral ; and
the splendid festivities to celebrate the event were
hardly begun before another trouble came in the
announcement of the death of Arthur, Prince of Wales,
nusband^of Isabel's youngest daughter, Katharine.
Trie event immediately changed the aspect of the
game. The next heir of England was a boy of
eleven, who might be married to a French princess,
and thus cause one other blow to Ferdinand's carefully
arranged schemes. This made it more necessary than
ever that Joan and Philip should be brought into
entire obedience to Spanish views. War broke out

128 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

between France and Spain at once, and strenuous
efforts were made by Ferdinand to expel from Spain
the councillors of Philip, who were known to be in the
French interest.1 The Archduchess and her husband
were then taken to Aragon, to receive the homage of
the Cortes there as heirs of Ferdinand, and then
Philip, in spite of all remonstrance, hurried back
again to his own country. Isabel gravely took her
son-in-law to task when he announced his intention to
return to Flanders by land through France whilst
Spain was at war. It was, she said, his duty to
recollect, moreover, that he was, in right of his wife,
heir to one of the greatest thrones in the world, and
should stay at least long enough in the country to
know the people and their language and customs. To
her entreaties the Archduchess, now far advanced in
pregnancy, and unable to travel, added her prayers
and tears. But all in vain ; Philip, against the
respectful protest even of the Cortes, would go, and
insisted upon travelling through France, the enemy of
Spain.2 So, almost in flight, Philip of Burgundy
crossed the frontiers of his father-in-law, leaving his
wife Joan and their unborn child in Castile, in
December 1502.

Never in their lives had Ferdinand and Isabel
suffered such a rebuff as this. Thal-the ^man, who on
their death would succeed them, was a free-living
^ cared nothing for Spain, to

promote whose glory they had lived and laboured so

1 Especially the Archbishop of Besangon, whose influence over Philip
was great. Philip would not let him go ; but he died suddenly directly
afterwards, doubtless of poison. Philip's hurry to get away from Spain
was attributed to his own fears of poison.

2 A copy of their urgent remonstrance from Toledo is in MS. in the
Royal Academy of History, Madrid.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 129

hard, was bitter enough for them. But that he should
be so lost to all duty and respect towards them and to
their country as to leave them thus, to rejoice with the
enemy in arms against them, convinced them that
under him and his wife Spain and the faith had
nothing to expect but neglect and sacrifice for other
interests. Isabel's frequent conversations with her
daughter Joan, during the months she had been in
Spain, had more than confirmed the worst fears she
had formed from the reports sent to her from Flanders.
Joan, though of course a Catholic, obstinately refused
to conform to the rigid ritual of Castile ; and, both in
acts and words, showed a strange disregard of, and,
indeed, captious resistance to, her mother's wishes.
She was inconstant and fickle ; sometimes determined,
notwithstanding her condition, to go and rejoin her
husband, sometimes docile and amiable.

It had become evident to Isabel and her husband
not many weeks after Joan and Philip's arrival, that
these were no fit successors to continue the policy that
was to make Spain the mistress of the world and the
arbiter of the faith ; and to the Cortes of Toledo,
which took the oath of allegiance to Philip and his
wife, it was secretly intimated that the Queen wished
that, ' if, when the Queen died, Juana was absent from
the realms, or, after having come to them, should be
obliged to leave them again, or that, although present,
she might not choose, or might not be able to reign and
govern,'1 Ferdinand should rule Castile in her name.
This was a serious departure both from strict legality
and from usage, and has been considered by recent
commentators to indicate that, even thus early, Isabel
wished to exclude her daughter from the throne, either

1 ' Calendar of Spanish State Papers,' Supplement to vols. i and ii.

I

130 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

for heresy or madness, or with that pretext. That
Joan was hysterical, obstinate, and unstable, is evident
from 'all contemporary testimony, and that she defied
her mother in her own realm is clear from what
followed ; but it seems unnecessary to seek to draw
from these facts the deduction that Isabel at this
juncture meant to disinherit her daughter in any case.
Philip's flagrant flouting of what Isabel and her
husband considered the best interests of Spain, and
his laxity in religion, as understood in Castile,
furnished ample reason for the desire on the part
of Isabel, when she felt her health failing, to ensure, so
far as she could do it, that the policy inaugurated by
her and her husband should be continued by him after
her death, instead of allowing Spain to be handed over
by an absentee prince to a Flemish viceroy. The
suggestion that Joan might not be able to govern, even
if she was in Spain, was not unnatural, considering
that her conduct, as reported to Isabel from Flanders,
had certainly been strangely inconsistent, whilst her
behaviour since she had arrived in Spain had not
mended matters.1

J^oan gave biptb-4jr_ March 1503 at Alcala de
He'nares to a son, who, in after years, became the
Emperor Ferdinand \ and immediately after trie
christening in Toledo Cathedral the Archduchess
declared that she would stay in Spain no longer,
but would join her husband in Flanders. Isabel
humoured her as best she could, persuading her to
accompany her from Alcala to Segovia, on the pretext

1 Sandoval, in his ' Historia de Carlos v.,' gives a glowing account of
the festivities that followed, and especially of a ridiculously fulsome
sermon preached by the Bishop of Malaga on the occasion, laying quite
a malicious emphasis upon poor Joan's devotion to what was called in
Spain ' Christianity,3 or rather the strict Catholic ritual.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 131

that it would be more easy to arrange there the sea
voyage from Laredo. The Princess was held in
semi-restraint under various excuses for a time, but
at last she extracted from her mother a promise that
she would let her go by sea (but not through France,
with which they were still at war), when the weather
should be fair, for it was still almost winter.

From Segovia the Queen took her daughter to Medina
del Campo, as she said, to be nearer the sea ; but there
the worry of the situation threw Isabel into some sort
of apoplectic fit, and for a time her life was despaired
of. Ferdinand was with his successful army on the
French frontier ; and the physicians, in their reports to
him of his wife's illness, attribute the attacks she
suffered entirely to the life that Joan was leading her.
' The disposition of the Princess is such, that not only
must it cause distress to those who love and value her
so dearly, but even to a perfect stranger. She sleeps
badly, eats little, and sometimes not at all, and she is
very sad and thin. Sometimes she will not speak, and
in this, and in some of her actions, which are as if she
were distraught, her infirmity is much advanced. She
will only take remedies either by entreaty and per-
suasion, or out of fear, for any attempt at force
produces such a crisis that no one likes or dares to
provoke it.'1 This trouble, the doctor adds, together
with the usual constant worries of government, is
breaking the Queen down entirely, and something
must be done. The Secretary, Conchillos, writing at
the same time, gives the same testimony. ' The
Queen,' he says, 'is better, but in great tribula-

1 These interesting letters are in MS. in the Royal Academy of History,
Madrid, An. Some of them are quoted by Rodriguez Villa in his ' Dona
Juafia la Loca.'

132 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

tion and fatigue with this Princess, God pardon
her.'i

Isabel soon had to travel to Segovia, after praying
her daughter not to leave Medina until her father
returned. But she took care to give secret instruc-
tions to the Bishop of Cordova, who had charge of
Joan, ' to detain her, if she tried to get away, as
gently and kindly as possible.' Nothing, however,
short of force would suffice to prevent Joan from
joining her husband, who, on his side from Flanders,
constantly urged her coming, and protested against
delay.2 At last Joan became so clamorous that a
message was sent to her from her mother, saying
that the King and herself were coming to see her
at Medina, and ordering her not to attempt to leave
until they arrived. Joan seems to have taken fright
at this, and, horses being denied her, she attempted
to escape alone and on foot from the great castle of
La Mota, where she was lodged. Finding when she
arrived at the outer moat that the gates were shut
against her by the Bishop of Cordova, she fell into
a frenzy and refused to move from the barrier where
she was stayed. All that day and night, in the bitter
cold of late autumn, the princess remained immovable
in the open, deaf to all remonstrance and entreaty,
refusing even to allow a screen of cloth to be hung
for her shelter. Isabel was gravely ill at Segovia,
forty miles away, but she instantly sent Joan's uncle,
Enriquez, to pacify the princess and persuade her at
least to go to her rooms again. But neither he nor
the powerful Jimenez, Cardinal Primate of Spain,

1 Royal Academy of History, Madrid, A 9, and Rodriguez Villa.

2 He even had a letter written, as if by his child Charles of three years
old, to King Ferdinand praying that his mamma might be allowed to
come home to them.

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 133

could move her, and at last Isabel, sick as she was,
had to travel to Medina, and prevailed upon her
daughter again to enter the castle, where she remained
on the assurance of the Queen that she should go
and rejoin her husband in Flanders when the King
arrived.

In the meanwhile peace was made with France,
and Isabel and her husband tried their hardest to
persuade Philip to send the infant Charles to Spain
to replace his mother. Promise after promise was
given that Charles should go to his grandparents ;
but Philip had no intention of entrusting his heir to
Ferdinand's tender mercies, and all the promises were
broken. Isabel's death was seen to be approaching,
and already a strong Castilian party, jealous of Aragon
and of the old King, was looking towards Isabel's
heiress in Flanders and drifting away from Ferdinand.
The detention of Joan against her will at Medina was
regarded sourly by Castilians generally, and at length
the scandal had to be ended. In March 1504, the
princess therefore was allowed to leave her place of
detention at Medina, and after two months further
delay in Laredo, took ship for Flanders, to see her
mother no more.

No sooner was she safe in her husband's territory
than the plot that had long been hatching against
her father came to a head. In September 1504
Philip, his father Maximilian, Louis XIL, and a little
later the Pope, joined in a series of leagues, from
which Ferdinand was pointedly excluded. It was
intended as a notice to Ferdinand, that when his
wife died he would no longer be King of Spain,
but only King of Aragon, unable to hold what he
had grasped ; and, though the wily King fell ill and

134 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was like to die at the news, he was not beaten yet,
and in time to come was more than a match for all
his enemies. But Isabel was sick unto death. A
^united orthodox Spain had been her life's ideal.
WitrT^labour untiring " sEe" " and her husband had
attained it, and now she saw the imminent ruin of
her work~^th rough the undutifulness of her daughter's
foreign husband. It was no fault of Isabel's, for she
had been single-minded in her aims ; but Ferdinand
h~ad been brought to this pass by his own over-
reaching cleverness. In yoking stronger powers than
himself to his car he had enlisted forces that he
could not control, and which were now pulling a
different way from that in which he wanted to go.
Those that he depended upon to be his prime instru-
ments had been removed by death, whilst those who
he had hoped to make subsidiary factors in his favour
were now principals and against him.

The accumulating troubles at length, in the autumn
of 1504, threw Isabel into a tertian fever, which was
aggravated by the fact that Ferdinand, being also
ill in bed, could not visit his wife. Isabel's anxiety
for her husband was pitiable to witness ; and though
her physicians assured her that he was in no danger, his
absence from her bedside increased the fever and
threw her into delirium. Symptoms of dropsy, and
probably diabetes, since constant insatiable thirst
and swelling of the limbs are mentioned as symptoms,
ensued, and for three months the Queen lay gradually
growing worse and worse. Rogations for her recovery
were offered up in every church in Castile, but by
her own wish, after a time, this was discontinued, and
the heroic Queen, strong to the last, faced death un-
dismayed, confident that she had done her best, yet

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 135

humble and contrite. When the extreme unction was
to be administered she exhibited a curious instance of
her severe modesty, almost prudery, by refusing to
allow even her foot to be uncovered to receive the
sacred oil, which was applied to the silken stocking
that covered the limb instead of to the flesh.

To the last she was determined that, if she could
prevent it, Joan and her husband should not rule in
Castile as absentee sovereigns whilst Ferdinand lived.
Her will, which was signed in October, is a notable
document, showing some of Isabel's strongest char-
acteristics. She would be buried very simply, and
without the usual royal mourning, in the city of her
greatest glory, the peerless Granada ; ' but if the
King, my lord,' desires to be buried elsewhere, then
her body was to be laid by the side of his. Her
debts were to be paid, and many alms distributed
and religious benefactions founded, and all her jewels
were to be given to Ferdinand, * that they may serve
as witness of the love I have ever borne him, and
remind him that I await him in a better world, and
so that with this memory he may the more holily
and justly live.' What does not seem so saintly a
provision was, that all the royal grants she had given,
except those to her favourite Beatriz de Bobadilla,
were cancelled on her death. With a firm hand she
signed this will later in October 1504, £royiding_m
it also that her daughter loan should succeed her
QJL-thg throne of Castile.,:1 but before she died, almost
indeed in the last act of her life, her fears for Spain

1 When the will was signed Isabel called her husband to her bedside,
and with tears made him swear that, neither by a second marriage nor
otherwise, would he try to deprive Joan of the crown. She fell back then
prostrate and was thought to be dead, but afterwards revived.

136 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

conquered her love for her daughter. In a codicil
signed on the 23rd November, three days before her
death, she left to Ferdinand the governorship of
Castile in the name of her daughter Joan ; and
enjoined him solemnly to cause the Indians of
America to be brought to the faith gently and
kindly, and their oppression to be redressed.

With trembling hands and streaming eyes she
handed the codicil to Jimenez, solemnly entrusting
him with the fulfilment of all her wishes, a trust
which he obeyed far better than did her husband,
and then Isabel the Catholic had done with the
world. Thenceforward she was serene ; eyewitnesses
say as beautiful as in youth. * Do not weep,' she
said to her attendants, ' for the loss of my body ; rather
pray for the gain of my soul.'

And so at the hour of noon, on the 26th November
1504, the greatest of Spanish queens gently
breathed her last, a dignified, devout, great lady to
the end. Days afterwards, when Ferdinand was busy
plotting how he could oust his daughter from her
heritage, the body of Isabel was carried across bleak
Castile, with soaring crucifixes and swinging censers,
by a great company of churchmen to far away
Granada, there to lay for all time to come, under
the shadow of the red palace that she had won for
the cross. As the velvet hearse with the body of
the Queen of Castile, dressed in death as a Franciscan
nun, wound its way over the land she had made great,
the wildest tempest in the memory of man roared her
requiem. Earthquake, flood and hurricane, scoured
the way by which the corpse was borne : skies of ink
by night and day for all that three weeks' pilgrimage
lowered over the affrighted folk that accompanied

ISABEL THE CATHOLIC 137

the bier, convinced that heaven itself was muttering
mourning for the mighty dead. But it is related that
when at last Granada was reached, and the Christian
mosque received the corpse of its conqueror, the
^Torious sun burst out at its brightest for the first
time, and all the vega smiled under a stainless sky.

Isabel the Catholic was a great queen and a good
woman, because her aims were high. She was not
tender, or gentle, or what we should now call
womanly. If she had been, she would not have
made Castile one of the greatest powers in Europe
in her reign of thirty years. She was not scrupulous,
or she would not have been so easily persuaded to
displace her niece the Beltraneja, She was not tender-
hearted, or she would not have looted unmoved upon
tiielnassacre or expulsion, in circumstances of atrocious
inhumanity, of Jews and Moors, to whom she broke
her solemn oath upon a weak pretext. She was
none of these pleasant things; nor was she the
sweet, saintly housewife she is usually represented.
If she had been, she would not have been Isabel the
Catholic — one of the strongest personalities, and
probably the greatest woman ruler the world ever
saw : a woman whose virtue slander itself never
dared to attack ; whose saintly devotion to her faith
blinded her eyes to human things, and whose anxiety
to please the God of mercy made her merciless to
those she thought His enemies.

BOOK I I

JOAN THE MAD

BOOK I I

ON the same day (26th November 1504) that Isabel
died, Ferdinand, with sorrow-stricken face, and tears
coursing down his cheeks, sallied from the palace of
Medina del Campo, and upon a platform hastily raised
in the great square of the town, proclaimed his daughter
Joan Queen of Castile, with the usual ceremony of
hoisting pennons and the crying of heralds : ' Castile,
Castile, for our sovereign lady Queen Joan.' Then
the clause of the dead Queen's will was read, giving to
Ferdinand power to act as King of Castile whenever
Joan was absent from Spain, or was unable or un-
willing to govern, and enjoining upon Joan and her
husband obedience and submission to Ferdinand.
Castile was in a ferment ; for all men knew that the
death of the Queen opened infinite possibilities of
change. The Castilian nobles, so long humbled by
Isabel, dared again to hope that better times for them
might come in the contending interests around the
throne ; and there were not a few, especially Aragonese,
that counselled Ferdinand to claim the throne of
Castile for himself1 by right of descent, instead of
governing in his daughter's name.

But Ferdinand's way was always a tortuous one, and
the letters from him the same night that carried to
Flanders the news of his wife's death were addressed
to ( Joan and Philip, by the grace of God Sovereigns

1 Zurita, ' Anales de Aragon.'

141

i42 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of Castile, Leon, Granada, Princes of Aragon, etc.,
etc'; whilst every city m~ the realms was informed
that henceforward the title of King of Castile would
be borne no more by Ferdinand, but only that of
Administrator for Joan.1 The step was profoundly
diplomatic, for all Europe and half Spain was dis-
trustful of Ferdinand, and the open usurpation of
Castile would have been forcibly resisted. And yet,
as we shall see, he intended to rule Castile ; and in the
end had his way. Philip and Joan, in reply to their
loving father, declined to commit themselves as to
Ferdinand's proceedings, and announced their coming
to take possession of their realm of Castile. They
were equally cool to Ferdinand's envoy, Fonseca,
Bishop of Cordova, whom Joan had no reason to love.
In the meanwhile, Cortes was convoked at Toro
(January 1505) in the name of Joan ; and there Ferdi-
nand played his first card, by claiming, under the
clause in Isabel's will, the right to govern Castile until
Joan should be present and demonstrate her fitness to
rule.2 The nobles of Castile, already jealous of
Aragon, were determined to resist this, though the

1 A full account of the progress of events from day to day at the time is
given in Documents Ineditos, vol 18.

2 Ferdinand, after the Cortes had taken the oath of allegiance, addressed
to them a document (quoted in full by Zurita) saying that when Queen
Isabel provided in her will for the case of Joan's incapacity to rule, she
had not gone further into particulars out of consideration for her daughter ;
although the latter had, whilst she was in Spain, shown signs of mental
disturbance. The time had now come, said Ferdinand, to inform the
Cortes in strict secrecy of the real state of affairs. Since Joan's return to
Flanders reports from Ferdinand's agents, and from Philip himself, which
were exhibited to the Cortes, said that her malady had increased, and that
her state was such that the case foreseen by Queen Isabel in her will had
now arrived. The Cortes, after much deliberation and against the nobles,
led by the Duke of Najera, thereupon decided to acknowledge Ferdinand
as ruler owing to the incapacity of Joan.

JOAN THE MAD 143

Cortes agreed ; and Juan Manuel, the most notable
diplomatist in Castile, descended from the royal house,
and Ferdinand's deadly enemy, was sent to Philip,
over whom his influence was complete, as the envoy of
the Castilian nobles ; thenceforward from Flanders to
animate and direct the diplomatic campaign against
Ferdinand.

The situation thus became daily more strained.
Ferdinand's confidential agents endeavoured to sow
discord between Joan and her husband, not a difficult
matter ; and on one occasion the Queen, in a fit of
jealousy, was persuaded by the Aragonese Secretary
Conchillos to sign a letter approving of her father's
acts. The messenger to whom it was entrusted betrayed
it to Philip, and Conchillos was cast into a dungeon ;
all Spaniards were warned away from Court, and Joan
completely isolated, even from her chaplain. Thinking
that in the palace of Brussels Joan was too easy of
access, Philip arranged that she should be secretly
removed. Whilst the Burgomaster and Councillors
were discussing at dead of night in the palace the de-
tails of the secret flitting, poor Joan herself learnt what
was in the wind ; and being denied an interview with the
Spanish bishop who attended her, she peremptorily
summoned the Prince of Chimay. He dared not enter
her chamber alone ; but accompanied by another courtier
he obeyed the Queen's summons. They found her in
a violent passion, and with difficulty escaped personal
attack ; with a result that, though the Queen was not
immediately removed, she was thenceforward kept
strictly guarded in her chambers, a prisoner. l

When news came of the decision of the Cortes of
Toro that Joan was unfit to rul^ Philip prevailed upon

1 Zurita, ' Anales de Aragon.3

i44 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

his wife to sign a remarkable letter l for publication in
Castile. ' Since they want in Castile to make out that I am
not in my right mind, it is only meet that I should come
to my senses again, somewhat ; though I ought not to
wonder that they raise false testimony against me, since
they did so against our Lord. But, since the thing has
been done so maliciously, and at such a time, I bid you
(M. de Vere) speak to my father the king on my behalf,
for those who say this of me are acting not only against
me but against him ; and people say that he is glad of
it, so as to have the government of Castile, though I
do not believe it, as the King is so great and catholic
a sovereign and I his dutiful daughter. I know well
that the King my Lord (i.e. Philip) wrote thither com-
plaining of me in some respect ; but such a thing should
not go beyond father and children ! especially as, if I
did fly into passions and failed to keep up my proper
dignity, it is well known that the only cause of my
doing so was jealousy. I am not alone in feeling this
passion; for my mother, great and excellent person as she
was, was also jealous ; but she got over it in time, and
so, please God, shall I. Tell everybody there (i.e in
Castile) .... that, even if I was in the state that my
enemies would wish me to be, I would not deprive the
King, my husband, of the government of the realms,
and of all the world if it were mine to give.' . . . .—
Brussels, 3rd May 1505.'

We can see here, and in the several reports sent, that
Joan had little or no control over herself. In the con-
flict, daily growing more bitter, between her husband
and her father, she swayed from one side to another
according to the influences brought to bear upon her.

1 Discovered in the Alburquerque archives by Sr. Rodriguez Villa, and
published by him in his ' Dona Juana La Loca.'

JOAN THE MAD 145

Her gusts of jealous rage and frenzied violence gave to
both sides the excuse of calling her mad when it suited
them to do so, or to declare that such temporary fits
were compatible with general sanity when they wanted
her sane. Joan's affection for her husband was fierce,
and monopolous, and his iufluence over her was great,
especially when he appealed to her pride and her rights
as Queen of Castile, but her sense of filial duty was
also high ; and whenever she understood that a measure
was intended to be against her father, she indignantly
refused to countenance it. Ferdinand knew that the
King of France had been enlisted by Philip and
Maximilian against him ; and that an army was being
mustered in Flanders ; whilst a project was on foot for
^Philip to come to Castile without "Joan. TJiisJie was
determined to prevent ; and warned his son-in-law thiat
"tie would not be allowed to act as King without "his
wife. To this warning" Philip retorted by ordering his
father-in-law to leave Castile, and return to his own
realm of Aragon.

In this contest poor hysterical Joan was but a cypher,
wifH her gusts of jealous passion and her lack of fixed
resolution. When she had arrived in Flanders after
her detention in Spain, she had discovered that her
husband, whose coolness she noted from the first, was
carrying on a liaison with a lady of the court. We are
told that she sought out the lady in a raving fury and
seriously injured her ; as well as causing all her beauti-
ful hair, of which she was proud, to be cut off close to
the scalp. This lecl to a violent scene between Philip
and Joan, in which not only hard words but hard blows
were exchanged ; and Joan took to her bed, seriously
ill both in body and mind. These scenes continued at

intervals, either with or without good reason, but with

K

146 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the natural result that Philip in his relations with his
father-in-law acted almost independently of his wife ;
who, as Ferdinand afterwards said, was really a good
dutiful daughter, proud of Spain and her people.

Ferdinand had at his side at this juncture the great
Cardinal Jimenez. The stern Franciscan had been no
friend of the King, who had opposed his appointment
as primate ; but he was a patriotic Spaniard, and could
not fail to see that if Flemish Philip was paramount in
Spain, the work of Isabel for the faith would be in peril.
Ferdinand, he knew, was an able and experienced ruler,
who would not greatly change the existing system ;
and he threw all his powerful influence on the side of
an arrangement that might leave Ferdinand real power
in Castile, without entirely alienating Philip. Above
all, Jimenez was determined to prevent the ambitious
Castilian nobles from again dominating the government ;
which they hoped to do if an inexperienced foreigner
like Philip took the reins. It was, indeed, quite as
much a struggle between Ferdinand and Jimenez and
the~Castilian nobles, as between Ferdinand and hk son-
in-law. But Jimenez's patriotic efforts met with little
Success, so far as Philip was concerned; and, in the
meantime, Ferdinand, whilst ostensibly solacing himself
in hunting, was quietly planning a characteristic stroke
at his enemy.

He was fifty-five years of age and still robust, and
he bethought himself that he might yet win the game
by a second marriage. It was almost sacrilege to
contemplate such a thing in the circumstances ; but^
to Ferdinand of Aragon any crooked way was straight
that led him to his goal. So he sent his natural son,
Hugo de Cardona, to "propose secretly to the King of
Portugal that the forgotten Beltraneja should leave

JOAN THE MAD 147

her convent and become Queen of Aragon, joining her
claims to Castile to those of Ferdinand and ousting
Joan and Philip.1 It wa's a wicked cynical idea, for
it made Isabel a usurper ; but neither the King of
Portugal nor his cousin, the Beltraneja, would have
anything to say to it ; so Ferdinand turned towards a
solution, which, if not quite so iniquitous morally, was
even more inimical to the interest of Spain as a nation.
T^is^was nothing less than to outbid Philip for the^
friendship of the King of France, upon which he
mainly depended to frustrate his father-in-law's plans.
Ferdinand had broken all his former covenants with
Louis xii. The French had been turned out of
Naples, and the great Gonzalo de Cordova was there
as Ferdinand's viceroy. He was a Castilian ; and
already Ferdinand's spies had reported that the Cas-
tilian nobles, in union with Philip and France, were
tampering with Cordova's loyalty and endeavouring
to establish, the claim of Castile, instead of Aragon, to
Naples. Ferdinand, with what sincerity may be sup-
posed, rapidly patched up an alliance with Louis xii.,
hyiwhich the widowed King of Aragon was to marry
the niece of the King of France^ Germaine de Foix, a
spoiled and petted young beauty of twenty-one. Any
heirs of the marriage were to inherit Aragon, Sicily,
and Naples ; but in the case of no children being left,
Naples was to be divided between France and Aragon ;

1 It has already been mentioned on page 26 that, according to Galindez,
a will of Henry IV. leaving the crown of Castile to the Beltraneja had
come into Ferdinand's possession on Isabel's death. The authority for
the statement that Ferdinand offered marriage to the Beltraneja at this
juncture is principally Zurita, ' Anales de Aragon,' and it was adopted by
Mariana and later historians. Mr. Prescott scornfully rejects the whole
story, without, as it seems to me, any reason whatever for doing so, except
that it tells against Ferdinand's character. It is surely too late in the
day to hope to save that.

148 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

great concessions were made at once to the French in
Naples, and a million gold crowns were to be paid by
Ferdinand to France as indemnity for the late war.

This, it will be seen, quite isolated Philip, threatened
again to separate Aragon and Castile, and at one blow
touncto the work both of Isabel and her husband.
But as Ferdinand never kept more of a treaty than
suited him at the moment, it may be fairly assumed
that he signed this only to bridge his present difficulty
and with such mental reservation as was usual with
him. When the news reached Brussels Maximilian
himself was there with his son, and they at once tried
their best to deal a counterstroke. When certain papers
were presented to Joan for signature denouncing to
the Castilian people Ferdinand's treaty and second
marriage, she stood firm in her refusal to sign. Philip
exerted the utmost pressure upon his wife ; but at last,
worn out by his and Maximilian's importunity, the un-
happy lady burst into ungovernable rage, flinging the
papers from her and crying that she would never do
anything against her father. The isolation and close
guard over the Queen was indeed working its natural
effect upon her highly wrought nervous system ; and
Ferdinand's ambassadors, who had come to announce
his marriage with his French bride, and to offer terms
of friendship to his son-in-law, were scandalised at the
treatment of their Queen. When, after much difficulty,
they were allowed to see her at the palace of Brussels
it was only on condition that they should have no con-
versation with her.

Shortly afterwards, in September 1505, Joan was
delivered of a daughter (Maria, afterwards' Queen of
Htrngary ah^T"Governess of the Netherlands), and
Philip then decided that the time had come to carry

JOAN THE MAD 149

her to Castile and claim the throne. First issuing a
manifesto to the Castilian nobles and towns, ordering
them not to obey Ferdinand in anything, he made
overtures to the King of France to allow him to pass
overland to Spain. This was flatly refused. The
French princess, Germaine, was now Ferdinand's wife,
ancTaTT the help that Louis xn. could give would be
against Philip and Joan. It was therefore decided^ to
make the voyage by sea, and a large fleet of sixty ships,
with a retinue of three thousand persons, was mustered
in one of the ports of Zeeland. In the meanwhile
ceaseless intrigue went on both in Spain arid abroad.
France having abandoned him, Philip turned to Eng-
land. Juan Manuel's sister, Elvira, was the principal
FacTy in waiting upon Katharine, Princess of Wales,
and through her and Katharine secret negotiations
were opened for a marriage between Henry^vn. and
Philip's sister, the Archduchess Margaret, the widow
of Juan, Prince of Asturias and of the Duke of Savoy,
with an alliance between England and Philip — though
Katharine probably did not understand at first how
purely this was a move against her father. So, although
Henry vn. still professed to be on Ferdinand's side in
the quarrel, he was quite ready for a secret alliance with
Philip and Joan against him and the King of France.

The King and Queen of Castile left Brussels early
in November to join the waiting fleet, but from the
slowness of their movements and the ostentatious
publicity given to them, it is clear that their first object
was to prepare Castile in their favour. Philip, for a
time, scouted all idea of arrangement with Ferdinand.
He knew that the Castilian nobles were on his side,
and that his wife's legal right was unimpeachable. The
wily old King of Aragon saw that his best policy was to

150 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

temporise, and to do that he must seem strong. His
first move was to declare to the Castilians that Joan was
sane, but was kept a prisoner by her husband,_and he
proposed to send a fleet to rescue her and bring her and
her son Charles to Castile. Philip's Flemish subjects
were discontented at his proposed long absence, and
also threatened trouble. Then Ferdinand hinted that
he would mobilise all his force to resist Philip's landing.

This series of manoeuvres delayed the departure of
Philip and his wife month after month ; until Ferdi-
nand, by consummate diplomacy, managed to patch
up an agreement with Philip's ambassadors at Sala-
manca at the end of November ; which, though on the
face of it fair enough, was really an iniquitous plot for
the_ exclusion of Joan in any circumstances. Philip
and Joan were to be acknowledged by Castile as sove-
reigns, and their son Charles as heir ; but, at the
same time, Ferdinand was to be accepted as perpetual
governor in his daughter's absence : and in the case
of Queen Joan being unwilling or unable to undertake
the government, the two Kings, Ferdinand and Philip,
were to issue all decrees and grants in their joint names.
The revenues of Castile and of the Grand Master-
ships were to be equally divided between Philip and
Ferdinand.

When once this wicked but insincere agreement was
ratified there was no further need for delay, and Philip's
fleet sailed for Spain on the 8th January 1506 to
engage in the famous battle of wits with his father-
in-law, which only one could win. All went well
until the Cornish coast was passed^ and then a dead
calm fell, followed by a furious south-westerly gale
which scattered the ships and left that in which Philip
and Joan were without any escort. To add to the

JOAN THE MAD 151

trouble a fire broke out upon this vessel, and a fallen
spar gave the ship such a list as to leave her almost
waterlogged. Despair seized the crew, and all gave
themselves up for lost. Philip played anything but
an heroic part. His attendants dressed him in an
inflated leather garment, upon the back of which was
painted in staring great letters, ' The King, Don
Philip,' and thus arrayed, he knelt before a blessed
image in prayer, alternating with groans, expecting
every moment would be his last. Joan does not
appear to have lost her head. She is represented
by one contemporary authority l as being seated on
the ground between her husband's knees, saying that
if they went down she would cling so closely to him
that they should never be separated in death, as they
had not been in life. The Spanish witnesses are loud
in her praise in this danger. 'The Queen,' they say,
'showed no signs of fear, and asked them to bring
her a box with something to eat. As some of the
gentlemen were collecting votive gifts to the Virgin of
Guadalupe, they passed the bag to the Queen, who,
taking out her purse containing about a hundred
doubloons, hunted amongst them until she found the
only half-doubloon there, showing thus how cool she
was in the danger. A king never was drowned yet,
so she was not afraid, she said.' 2

At length, mainly by the courage and address of
one sailor, the ship was righted, the fire extinguished,
and the vessel brought into the port of Weymouth
on the 1 7th January 1506. Henry VIL of England

* Collection de Voyages des Souverains des Pays Bas,' vol. i.
2 From a most entertaining Spanish account in manuscript in the
Royal Academy of History, Madrid, in which the courtiers are mercilessly
chaffed.

152 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

had been courted and conciliated by Philip for some
time past, but it was a dangerous temptation to put
in the wily Tudor's way to enable him to make his
own terms for an alliance. Above all, he wanted to
get into his power the rebel Earl of Suffolk, who was
in refuge in Flanders, and this seemed his oppor-
tunity. Philip had had enough of the sea for a while.
We are assured by one who was there that he was

* fatigate and unquyeted in mynde and bodie,' and he
yearned to tread firm land again. His councillors
urged him to take no risk, but Philip and Joan landed
at Melcombe Regis to await a fair wind for sailing
again. From far and near the west country gentry
flocked down with their armed bands, ready for war
or peace, but when they found that the royal visitors
were friendly their hospitality knew no bounds. Sir
John Trenchard would take no denial. The King
and Queen must rest in his manor-house hard by
until the weather mended ; and, in the meanwhile,
swift horses carried the news to King Henry in
London.

As may be supposed, when he heard the news,

* he was replenyshed with exceeding gladnes ... for
that he trusted it should turn out to his profit and
commodity,' which it certainly did. But Philip grew
more and more uneasy at the pressing nature of the
Dorsetshire welcome. The armed bands grew greater,
and though the weather improved, Trenchard would
not listen to his guests going on board until the King
of England had a chance of sending greeting to his
good brother and ally. At_]ength Philip and Joan
realised that they __wgre_Jn_a_ trap, and had to make
the-best of it, which they did with a good grace, for
they were welcomed by Henry with effusive professions

JOAN THE MAD 153

of pleasure. Philip was conveyed with a vast cavalcade
of gentlemen across England to Windsor, where he
was met by Henry and his son, the betrothed of
Katharine, Joan's sister. Then the King of Castile
was led to London and to Richmond with every
demonstration of honour. But, withal, it was quite
clear that Henry would not let his visitors go until
they had subscribed to his terms, whatever they
might be. And so the pact was solemnly sworn upon
a fragment of the true cross in Saint George's Chapel,
Windsor, by Philip and Henry, by which Suffolk was
to be surrendered to his doom, Philip's sister Margaret,
with her fat dowry, was to be married to the widowed
old Henry, and England was bound to the King of
Castile against Ferdinand of Aragon.

Joan was deliberately kept in the background during
her stay in England. She had followed her husband
slowly from Melcombe, and arrived at Windsor ten
clays later, the day after Philip, with great ceremony,
had been invested with the Order of the Garter and
had signed the treaty. On her arrival at Windsor
on the loth February she saw her sister Katharine,
though not alone, and Katharine left the next day
to go to Richmond. Three days later, on the i4th
February, Joan set out from Windsor again towards
Falmouth, whilst Philip joined Henry at Richmond ;
and soon after the King of Castile was allowed to
travel into the west and once more take ship for his
wife's kingdom. The cynical exclusion of Joan from
all participation in the treaty with England^, and the

1 'Spanish State Papers Calendar,' vol. i. Peter Martyr (Epist. 300)
says that Katharine did her best to solace, comfort and entertain her
sister Joan, but that the latter would take pleasure in nothing, and only
loved solitude and darkness. In order to preserve appearances, the
treaty arranged and signed before Joan's arrival at Windsor was

154 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

fact that she was only allowed to see her sister once,
and in the presence of witnesses in the interests of
Philip, seems to prove that she was purposely kept
in the dark as to the real meaning of the treaty, which
was directed almost as much against herself as against
her father, because, with England on his side, Philip
could always paralyse France from interfering with
him in Spain ; and it is clear that, whether Joan was
really incapacitated at the time or not, both Ferdinand
and Philip had already determined to make out that
she was.

Like a pair of wary wrestlers the two opponents still
played at arms' length. Ferdinand, after celebrating
his second marriage — as he had celebrated his first,
nearly forty years before — at Valladolid, awaited at
Burgos, so as to be near on arrival of his daughter and
her husband at one of the Biscay ports, as was
expected. But nothing was further from Philip's
thoughts than to land at any place near where
Ferdinand was waiting. His idea was to go to
Andalucia, so as to be able to march through Spain
before meeting the old King, and to gather friends
and partisans on the way. Contrary winds, however,
drove the fleet into Corunna, on the extreme north-
west of the Peninsula, on the 26th April ; and
Ferdinand, when he got the news, for a moment
lost his smooth self-control, and was for flying at his
undutiful son-in-law sword in hand. But the outbreak
was not of long duration, for the circumstances were
serious, and needed all the great astuteness of which
Ferdinand was capable. Hj^jwas determined to rule

•^

ostensibly entered into by Philip as ruler of Flanders, not as King of
Castile ; but its whole object obviously was to strengthen Philip in
Spain.

JOAN THE MAD 155

Castile whilst he lived for the benefit of his great
A'ragonese aims.

He had, indeed, some cause for complaint against
fortune ; for, with the exception of the kingdom of
Naples, he had not yet gathered the harvest that he
had reckoned upon as the result of the union of the
realms. His son-in-law, now that, by the death of
other heirs, Joan had become Queen of Castile, was
an enemy instead of an ally, and his defection had
rendered necessary the pact between Ferdinand and
France7^wriicri~Fad stultified much of the advantage
previously gained by the Castilian connection. At
any cost Castile must be held, or all would be lost.
If Joan herself took charge of the government, as was
her right, then goodbye to the hope of Ferdinand
employing for his own purposes the resources of
Castile ; for around her would be jealous nobles hating
Aragon ; whereas, with Philip as King, it was certain
that his imprudence, his ignorance of Spain, and the
Castilian distrust of foreigners, would soon provoke a
crisis that might give Ferdinand his chance. Both
opponents, therefore, were equally determined to keep
Jo"a"fT away from active sovereignty, whatever her
mental state ; and as Philip and his wife rode through
Corunna, smiling and debonair, gaining friends every-
where, but surrounded with armed foreigners, German
guards, archers, and the like, strange to Spaniards, as
if in an enemy's country, the plot thickened between
the two antagonists.

Everywhere Philip took the lead, and Joan was
treated as a consort.1 In the verses of welcome it

1 None of Ferdinand's envoys were allowed to see Joan at Corunna,

but when the great Castilian nobles, Count Benavente and Marquis de

r Villena, came to pay homage, Joan was seated by the side of her

156 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was Don Philip's name that came first ; and Joan
showed her discontent at the position in which she was
placed by refusing to confirm the privileges of the
cities through which they passed until she had seen
her father, though Philip promised readily to do so.
Np^ sooner did Philip find himself supported by the
northern nobles, thaji he announced that he would not
be bound by the treaty of Salamanca, and generally
gave Ferdinand to understand that Re, Philip, alone,
intended to be master. Ferdinand travelled foTward
to meet his son-in-law, rhaking desperate attempts at
conciliation and to win Juan Manuel to his side, but
without success : whilst Philip tarried on the way and
exhausted every means of delay in order to gain
strength before the final struggle. To Philip's insult-
ing messages Ferdinand returned diplomatic answers ;
in thejace of Philip's scornful rejection of advances,
Ferdinand was amiable, conciliatory, almost humble ;
he who, with the great Isabel, had been master of
Spain for well nigh forty years. But he must have
chuckled under his bated breath and whispering
humbleness, forjie knew that he was going to win,
and he knew how he was going to do it.

Slowly Ferdinand travelled towards the north-west,
sendifi|pdaiiy embassies to Philip soliciting a friendly
interview, and at every stage, as he came nearer, his son-
in-law grew in arrogance. When Ferdinand left Astorga
in the middle of May, Juan Manuel sent a message to
him that if he wished to see the King of Castile, he
must understand three things : first, that no business

husband, and the reception hall was thrown open to the public. This
was necessary in consequence of the jealousy of Castilians against
foreigners, and their insistence upon Joan's sovereignty ; but it was
the only occasion on which Philip openly associated her with his
government.

JOAN THE MAD 157

would be discussed ; second, that Philip must have
stronger forces than he ; and third, that he must not
expect that he would be allowed to obtain any
advantage by, or through, his daughter, Queen Joan,
as they knew where that would lead them to. There-
fore, continued Manuel, King Ferdinand had better
not come to Santiago at all. In the meanwhile the
inevitable discord was brewing in the Court of Joan
and_Philip at Corunna. The proud Castilian nobles,"
greedy and touchy, who had flocked to Philip's side,
found that Flemings and Germans always stood
between them and the throne, and intercepted the
favours for which they hungered. The Teutons, who
thought they were coming to Spain to lord over all,
found a jealous nobility and a nation convinced of its
own heaven-sent superiority, ready to resist to the
death any encroachment of foreigners, whom they
regarded with hate and scorn.

The Castilians deplored most the isolation of Joan,
and~endeavoured by a hundred plans to persuade her
to second her husband's action towards her father.
Philip ceased now even to consult her, since she had
refused to oppose Ferdinand ; and in the pageantry of
the entrance into Santiago and the triumphal march
through Galicia, with a conquering army rather than a
royal escort, Joan, in deepest black garments and
sombre face, passed like a shadow of death. As the
Kings gradually approached each other, Ferdinand, in
soft words, begged Philip to let him know what
alterations he r"c!e~sired to make in the agreement of
Salamanca. After much fencing, Philip replied that if
his^Iather-in-law would send Cardinal Jimenez with full
powers, he would try to arrange terms. The great
point, he wrote, was that of Queen Joan ; and the

i58 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

King of Aragon knew full well that upon this point
the issue between him and Philip would be joined.
Ferdinand had little love or trust in the great Castilian
Cardinal, Jimenez, though the latter was faithful to
him, not for his own sake, but for the good of Spain ;
but the Cardinal went to Philip with full powers, and
bearing a private letter, saying that, as Joan was
incapacitated from undertaking the government,
Ferdinand besought Philip to join and make common
cause with him, in order to prevent her, either of her
own accord or by persuasion of the nobles, from
seizing the reins. This was the line upon which
Philip was pleased to negotiate, and Cardinal Jimenez
found a ready listener. Ferdinand, however, was
ready with the other alternative solution if this failed.
If Philip would not join with him to exclude Joan, he
would join Joan to exclude Philip, and all preparations
were quietly made to muster his adherents at Toro,
make a dash for Benavente, the place where Philip was
to stay, rescue Joan, and govern, with her or in
her name, to the exclusion of foreigners.1 But it was
unnecessary. Jimenez's persuasion and Ferdinand's
supple importunity conquered ; and, though with
infinite distrust and jealousy on all sides, the Kings
still slowly approached each other, stage by stage,
whilst the negotiations went on.

The Teutons and Castilians were at open logger-
heads now ; Queen Joan, reported Jimenez, was more
closely guarded and concealed than ever, and Philip
less popular in consequence. But, at length, the two
rival Kings, on the 2Oth June 1506, found themselves
in neighbouring villages ; and on that day at a farm-

1 See the draft summons to nobles and gentry, kept ready for the
eventuality, reproduced by Rodriguez Villa, ' Dona Juana la Loca.'

JOAN THE MAD 159

house half-way between Puebla and Asturianos they
met. Ferdinand, in peaceful guise, was attended only
by the Duke of Alba and the gentlemen of his house-
hold, not more than two hundred in all, mostly mounted
on mules and unarmed ; whilst Philip came in warlike
array with two thousand pikemen and hundreds of
German archers in strange garments and outlandish
headgear, whilst the flanks of his great company of
nobles were protected by a host of Flemish troops.
When Philip approached his father-in-law, with steel
mail beneath his fine silken doublet, and surrounded by
armed protectors, it was seen that his face was sour
and frowning, whilst Ferdinand, almost alone and quite
unarmed, came smiling and bowing low at every step.
When the Castilian nobles came forward one by one
shamefacedly, to kiss the hand of the old monarch
they had betrayed, Ferdinand's satiric humour had
full play, and many a sly thrust pierced their breasts,
for all their hidden armour. After a few empty polite
words between the Kings the conference was at an
end, and each returned the way he came ; Ferdinand
more than ever chagrined that he had not been allowed
even to see his daughter.

For the next few days the Kings travelled along
parallel roads towards Benavente ; Philip continuing
to treat his father-in-law as an intruder in the most
insulting fashion. At length their roads converged at
a small village called Villafafila, at the time when the
long discussed agreement had been settled by their
respective ministers ; and here, in the village church,
the two rivals finally met to sign their treaty of peace
xjrthe 2;th June 1506. It was a hellish compact, and
it sealed the fate of unhappy Joan whatever might
happen. Ferdinand came, as he said, with love in his

160 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

heart and peace in his hands, only anxious for the
happiness of his 'beloved children,' and of the realm
that was theirs : and, after warmly embracing Philip,
he led him towards the little village church to sign and
swear to the treaty. With them, amongst others, were
Don Juan Manuel and Cardinal Jimenez, and when the
treaty was signed and the church cleared, the great
churchman took the arm of Manuel, and whispered,
' Don Juan, it is not fitting that we should listen to
the talk of our masters. Do you go out first, and I
will serve as porter.' And there alone, in the humble
house of prayer, the two Kings made the secret com-
pact which explains the treaty they had just publicly
executed. In appearance Ferdinand gave up every-
thing." He was, it is~true, tcTTiave half the revenues
from the American discoveries, and to retain much
plunder from the royal Orders and other grants of
money, but he surrendered completely all share and
part in tKe~ government of Castile, and allied himself to'
Phlltp for offence and defence against the world.

The secret deed, the outcome of that sinister private
talk between two cruel scoundrels in the village church,
allows us to guess, in conjunction with what followed,
the reason for Ferdinand's meek renunciation of the
government. ' As the Queen Joan on no account
wishes to have anything to do with any affair of
government or other things ; and, even if she did wish
it, it would cause the total loss and destruction of these
realms, having regard to her infirmities and passions,
which are not described here for decency's sake ' ;
and then the document provides that, * if Joan of her
own accord, or at the instance of others, should attempt
to interfere in the government or disturb the arrange-
ment made between the two Kings, they will join

JOAN THE MAD 161

forces to prevent it.' 'And so we swear to God our
Lord, to the Holy Cross, and the four saintly evan-
gelists, with our bodily hands placed upon His altar.'
And the two smiling villains came out hand in hand,
both contented ; each of them sure that the best of the
evil bargain lay with him, and Ferdinand made pre-
parations for departure to his own Aragon, and so to
his realm of Naples and Sicily, delighted that his
' beloved children ' should peacefully reign over the
land of Castile.

It was more than two years and a half since Ferdi-
nand had seen his daughter Joan. During that time
both he and Philip had alternately declared she was
quite sane and otherwise, as suited their plans. Now
both were agreed, not only that she did not wish to
govern her country : but that if ever she did wish, or
"Ccistifians wished for her to do so, then her 'passions
and infirmities,' so vaguely referred to, would malce
her rule disastrous. It ensured Philip being King of
Castile so long as he lived, ancT Ferdinand being master
if he survived, and until the majority of his grandson
Charles. There is no reason to deny that Joan was.
wayward, morbid, and eccentric ; ~subJecF~to fits of
jealous rage at certain periods or crises, and that sub-
sequently she developed intermittent lunacy. But ja.t
this time, according to all accounts, she was not mad
in a sense that justified her permanent exclusion from
the throne that belonged to her. Philip, heartless,
ambitious, and vain, wished to rule Castile alone,
according to Burgundian methods, which were alien
to Spain and to the Queen. Ferdinand knew that, in
any case, such an attempt could not succeed for long ;
and by permanently excluding Joan he secured for
himself the reversion practically for the rest of his life.

L

162 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

And so Joan was pushed aside and wronged by those
whose sacred duty it was to protect and cherish her,
and as Joan the Mad she goes down to all posterity.

But old Ferdinand had not yet shot his last bolt, for
symmetry and completeness in his villainy was always
his strong point. On the very day that the secret
compact was signed, he came again to that humble
altar of Villafafila, accompanied this time only by those
faithful Aragonese friends who would have died for
him, Juan Cabrero, who had befriended Colon, and his
secretary, Almazan. Before these he swore and signed^
a declaration that Philip had come in great force whilst
he had none, and had by intimidation and fear com-
pelled him to sign a deed so greatly to the injury of
h^own daughter. He swore now that he had only
done so to escape his peril, and never meant that Joan
should be deprived of her liberty of action : on the
contrary, he intended when he could to liberate her
and restore to her the administration of the realm that
belonged to her : and he solemnly denounced and re-
pudiated the former oath he had just taken on the
same altar. And then, quite happy in his mind, Fer-
dinand the Catholic went on his way, having left
heavily bribed all the men who surrounded doomed
Philip, including even the all-powerful favourite Juan
Manuel.

Philip lost no time. Before Ferdinand had got
beyond Tordesillas, a courtier reached him from his
son-in-law giving him news of Joan's anger and
passion when she learnt that she was pushed aside
and was not to see her father. What would Ferdinand
recommend ? asked Philip. But the old King was
not to be caught ; he would not be cajoled into giving
his consent to Joan being shut up, but he sent a long

JOAN THE MAD 163

sanctimonious rigmarole enjoining harmony, but mean-
ing nothing. Philip then appealed to the nobles one
by one, asking them to sign a declaration assenting
to Joan's confinement. The Admiral of Castile,
Ferdinand's cousin, led a strong opposition to this,
and demanded a personal interview with the Queen
to which Philip consented, and the Admiral and Count
Benavente went to the fortress of Murcientes, where
Joan and her husband were staying. At the door of
the chamber stood Garcilaso de la Vega, a noble in
Philip's interest, and Cardinal Jimenez was just inside ;
whilst in a window embrasure in the darkened room
sat the Queen alone, garbed in black with a hood
which nearly obscured her face. She rose as Admiral
Enriquez approached, and with a low curtsey, asked
him if he came from her father. 'Yes,' he replied,
' I left him yesterday at Tudela on his way to Aragon.'
' I should so much have liked to see him,' sighed poor
Joan ; ' God guard him always.' For many hours that
day and the next the noble spoke to the Queen, saying
ho\v important it was to the country that she should
agree well with her husband, and take part in the
government that belonged to her. He reported after-
wards that in all these conferences she never gave a
random answer.

The Admiral was too important a person to be
slighted, and Philip was forced to listen to some
plain warnings from him. He must not venture to go
to Valladolid without the Queen, or ill would come
of it : the people were jealous already, and if Joan was
shut up their fears would be confirmed. So Joan
was borne by her husband's side to Valladolid in
state, though her face was set in stony sorrow
beneath the black cowl that shrouded it. Near there

i64 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

one other interview took place between the two kings
with much feigned affection, but no result as regards
Joan. On the loth July 1506, Joan and her husband
rode through the city of Valladolid with all the pomp
of Burgundy and Spain. Two banners were to be
carried before the royal pair, but Joan knew she
alone was Queen of Castile, and insisted that one
should be destroyed before she would start. She
was mounted upon a white jennet, housed in black
velvet to match her own sable robes, and a black
hood almost covered her face.1 Shows, feasts and
addresses were arranged for their reception, but they
rode straight through the crowded, flower - decked
streets without staying to witness them ; and this
joyous entry, we are told by an eyewitness, meant
to be so gay, was blighted by an all-pervading gloom,
as of some great calamity to come.

On the following day; the_Cortes took the oath of
allegiance__tg Joan as Queen, ajijd_Jo_j3iilip only~as
consort, and she personally insisted upon seeing the
powers of the deputies. The ceremonies over, Philip
came to business. Great efforts were, made Jx> persuade
the Cortes to consent to J oan^^on^nejnejit_and^hilip's
personal rule"; and Jimenez did his best to get the
her.2 But the stout Admiral Enriquez

1 Her grand-daughter, another Joan, sister of Philip n. and Princess
of Portugal, had also after her widowhood this curious fancy to keep her
face hidden.

2 The part played by Jimenez at this period has always been a puzzling
problem. He was apparently in the full confidence of Philip, but it is
impossible to believe that he was not really acting in concert with
Ferdinand at the time. He probably knew that one way or the other
Philip was bound to disappear very soon, and his presence at the crisis
would enable him, as it actually did, to keep firm hold upon the govern-
ment until Ferdinand returned. His anxiety to get the custody of Joan
seems to point to this also, as the person who held the Queen was the
master of the situation.

JOAN THE MAD 165

stood in the way, and insisted that this iniquity
should not be, so that Philip was obliged to put up
with the position of administrator for his wife, since
he could not be King in her stead. Flemings, Germans
and Castilians, in the meanwhile, vied with each other
in rapacity. Philip was free enough with the money
of others, but even he had to go out hunting by
stealth to escape importunity when he had given away
all he had to give and more. But of all the greedy
crew there was none so rapacious as Juan Manuel,
little of body but great of mind, who, like the Marquis
of Villena forty years before, grabbed with both hands
insatiate. Fortresses, towns, pensions, assignments of
national revenue, nothing came amiss to Manuel, and
at last his covetous eyes were cast upon the fortress
palace of Segovia, still in the keeping of that stout
Andres Cabrera and his wife, Beatriz de Bobadilla,
Marchioness of Moya, the lifelong friend of the great
Isabel. Philip gave an order that the Alcazar of
Segovia was to be surrendered to Manuel. Surrender
the Alcazar ! after fifty years of keeping ! No, forsooth,
said big-hearted Dona Beatriz ; only to Queen Joan
will we give the fortress that her great mother entrusted
to our keeping.

And so it happened that Philip, with Joan still in
black by his side, rode out-o£_Valladolid in August
towards Segovia, to demand the fortress from its
keeper. When the cavalcade reached Cogeces, half
way to Segovia, Joan^would go no further. They
were taking her to Segovia, she cried, to imprison
her in the Alcazar, and she threw herself from her
horse writhing upon the ground, and refused to stir
another step on the way. The prayers and threats
of Philip and his councillors, whom she hated, were

1 66 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

worse than useless, and all that night she rode hither
and thither across country refusing to enter the town.
When the morning came Philip learnt that Cabrera
had surrendered the Alcazar of Segovia to Manuel ;
and as there was no reason now for going thither,
they rode back to Burgos. As they travelled through
Castile, brows grew darker and hearts more bitter at
this fine foreign gallant with his fair face and his gay
garments, who kept the Queen of Castile in durance
in her own realms, and packed his friends and foreign
pikemen in all the strong castles of the land. When
Burgos '~'was~~~reached on the ;th September, Philip
deepened the discontent by ordering the immediate
departure of the wife of the Constable of Castile, an
Enriquez by birth, and consequently a cousin of
Ferdinand, in order that Joan should have no relative
near her, although they lodged in the Constable's
palace. The Admiral of Castile and the Duke of
Alba were also attacked by Philip, who demanded
their fortresses as pledges of loyalty ; and soon all
Castile was in a ferment, clamouring for the return
of the old King Ferdinand, and the liberation of their
Queen Joan.

The King, not content with conferring upon his
favourite Manuel the Alcazar of Segovia, now entrusted
to his keeping the castle of Burgos, where it was
determingd__to celebrate the surrender by entertaining
Philip at a banquet AfteFThe feast the King was
taken ill of a malignant fever, it was said, caused by
indulgence or over-exercise, and Philip lay ill for days
in raging delirium. Joan, dry-eyed and cool, never
left his side, saying little, but attending assiduously
to the invalid. At one o'clock on the 25th September
1506 Philip i., King of Castile, breathed his last, in

JOAN THE MAD 167

his twenty-eighth year : but yet Joan, without a tear
or a tremor, still stayed by his side, deaf to all
remonstrance and condolence, to all appearance un-
moved. She calmly gave orders that the corpse of
her husband should be carried in state to the great
hall of the Constable's palace upon a splendid cata-
falque of cloth of gold, the body clad in ermine-lined
robes of rich brocade, the head covered by a jewelled
cap, and a magnificent diamond cross upon the breast.
A throne had been erected at the end of the hall, and
upon this the corpse was arranged, seated as if in
life. During the whole of the night the vigils for
the dead were intoned by friars before the throne,
and when the sunlight crept through the windows the
body, stripped of its incongruous finery, was opened
and embalmed and placed in a lead coffin, from
which, for the rest of her life, Joan never willingly
parted. I

Joan, in stony immobility, dazed and silent, gave no
indication that she understood the tremendous im-
portance of her husband's death ; but courtiers and
nobles, Castilians and Teutons alike, did not share her
insensibility. Dismay fell upon the rapacious crew,
fierce denunciations of poison,2 scrambling for such
plunder as could be grasped, 3 and dread apprehensions

1 Estanques' ' Cronica ' in Documentos Ineditos, vol. viii.

2 Although, as was usual, Philip's Italian physician vehemently denied
that there were any indications of poison on the remains, there can be
but little doubt that Philip was murdered by agents of Ferdinand. The
statement to that effect was freely and publicly made at the time, but the
authorities were always afraid to prosecute those who made them. See
' Calendar of Spanish State Papers,' Supplement to Vol. i., p. xxxvii.
There were many persons who attributed Philip's death, not to Ferdinand,
but to the Inquisition, which Philip had offended by softening its rigour,
and suspending the chief Inquisitors, Deza and Lucero ; but this is very
improbable.

3 ' Collection de Voyages des Souverains des Pays Bas,' vol. i. It is

1 68 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

as to what would happen to them all when the King
of Aragon should return. Joan had to be forcibly
removed from the corpse ; and for days remained shut
up in a darkened room without speaking, eating, or
undressing. When, at length, she learnt that the
coffin had been carried to the Cartuja de Miraflores,
near Burgos, she insisted upon going thither, and
ordered an immense number of new mourning gar-
ments fashioned like nun's weeds. Arriving at the
church, she heard mass, and then caused the coffin to
be raised from the vault and broken open, the cere-
cloths removed from the head and feet, which she
kissed and fondled until she was persuaded to return
to Burgos, on the promise that the coffin should be
kept open for her to visit it when she pleased ; which
she did thenceforward every few days whilst it
remained there.

The Flemish chronicler, whom I have quoted
several times, gives a curious description of Joan's
jealous amorous obsession for her husband. Philip is
represented as being libidinous to the last degree, as
well as being the handsomest man of his time ; whilst
Joan herself is praised for her beauty, grace, and
delicacy. t The good Queen fell into such jealousy
that she could never get free from it, until at last it
became a bad habit which reached amorous delirium,
and excessive and irrepressible rage, from which for
three years she got no repose or ease of mind ; as if
she was a woman possessed or distraught . . . She
was so much troubled at the conduct of her husband
that she passed her life shut up alone, avoiding the

here stated that foreign officers of the household broke up all the gold
and silver plate they could lay hands on to turn into money, and pay
their way back to Flanders.

JOAN THE MAD 169

sight of all persons but those who attended upon and
gave her food. Her onl^jwish was to go after her
husband, whom sheToved with such vehemence and
frenzy, that she cared not whether her company was
agreea£Ie~to him or not. When she returned to
Spain, she would not rest until all the ladies that had
come with them were sent home, or she threatened to
make a public scandal. So far did she carry this
mania, that it ended by her having no woman near her
but a washerwoman, whom, at any hour that seized
her caprice, she made to wash the clothes in her
presence. In this state, without any women attendants,
she kept close to her husband, serving herself like a
poor, miserable woman. Even in the country she did
not leave him, and went by his side, followed some-
times by ten thousand men, but not one person of her
own sex.'1

The frantic jealousy of her husband during life,
together with the knowledge that he was determined
to confine her as a lunatic, whilst ruling her kingdom
at his will, turned into gloomy misanthropy and
rebellion at her fate at his death ; and her refusal to
sign the formal documents presented to her as Queen
in the first days of her widowhood, made evident to
the few nobles who kept their heads that some sort of
government would have to be improvised, pending the
return of Ferdinand from Naples. Juan Manuel,
fiercely hated by every one, kept in the background ;
only hoping to save his life and some of his booty ;
but the stern old man in his coarse grey frock, to
whom money and possessions were nothing, though,
next to the Pope, he was the richest churchman in
Christendom, Cardinal Jimenez, who perhaps was not

1 ' Collection de Voyages des Souverains des Pays Bas.'

170 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

taken by surprise by the opportune disappearance of
Philip, had everything ready, even before the King
died, for the establishment of a provisional govern-
ment ; and on the day of the death a meeting of all
the nobles and deputies in Burgos confirmed the
arrangements he had made. All parties of nobles
were represented upon the governing council ; but
Jimenez himself was president, and soon became
autocrat by right of his ability. Order was temporarily
guaranteed, and all the members, in a self-denying
ordinance, undertook not to try to obtain possession of
the Queen or of her younger son, Ferdinand, who was
in Simancas Castle,1 the elder, Charles, being in
Flanders. Joan, sunk in lethargy, refused to sign
the decrees summoning Cortes ; and the latter were
irregularly convoked by the government. But when
they were assembled, carefully cho'sen under Jimenez's
influence in favour of Ferdinand, Joan would not
receive the members, until, under pressure, she did so
only to tell them to go home and not meddle with
government any more without her orders. Thus with
a provisional government, whose mandate expired with
the-yeaT 1506, a Queen who refused to rule, and
already~a^archy and j-eUeilion rite in the South,
CastHians could only pray for the prompt return of
King" Ferdinand, who, but a few short weeks before,
had been expelled with every circumstance of insult
and ignominy the realm he had ruled so long.

1 On the very day that Philip died, an attempt was made by a faction
of nobles to obtain possession of the young Prince. The keeper of the
Castle of Simancas was on his guard, as he knew of the King's illness,
and refused admittance to any but the two gentlemen who bore Philip's
signed order for the child to be delivered to them. When the morrow
brought news of the King's death, the Seneschal refused to obey the
order, and defied the forces sent to capture the fortress.

JOAN THE MAD 171

No entreaty could prevail upon Joan to fulfil any of
the duties of government. Her father would see to
everything, she said, when he returned ; all her future
work in the world was to pray for the soul of her
husband, and guard his dead body. On Sunday, iQth
December 1906, after mass at the Cartuja, Joan
announced her intention of carrying the body for
sepulture in the city of Granada, near the grave of
the great Isabel, in accordance with Philip's last wish.1
The steppes of Castile in the depth of winter are as
bleak and inhospitable as any tract in Europe. For
scores of miles over tableland and mountain the snow
lay deep, and the bitter blast swept murderously. The
Queen cared for nothing but the drear burden that she
carried upon the richly bedizened hearse ; and with a
great train of male servitors, bishops, churchmen, and
choristers, she started on her pilgrimage on the 2Oth
December.2 The nights were to be passed in wayside
inns or monasteries, and at each night's halt the grisly
ceremony was gone through of opening the coffin that
the Queen might fondle and kiss the dead lips and
feet of what had been her husband. At one point on
the way, when after nightfall the cortege entered the

1 The monks at first flatly refused to have the corpse moved, and the
Bishop of Burgos reproved the Queen. Joan, however, fell into such a
fury, that they were forced to obey.

2 An interesting letter from Ferdinand's secretary, Conchillos, who was
at Burgos, to Almazan, who accompanied Ferdinand in Italy (Royal
Academy of History, Salazar A 12, reproduced by Sr. Rodriguez Villa),
dated 23rd December, gives a vivid picture of the confusion and scandal
caused by this sudden caprice of the Queen. He says that though they
had all done their best to prevent any one speaking to her but her father's
partisans, the Marquis of Villena, his opponent, is the person she welcomes
most. 'With this last caprice of the Queen there is no one, big or little,
who any longer denies that she is out of her mind, except Juan Lopez,
who says that she is as sane as her mother was, and lends her money for
all this nonsense.'

172 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

courtyard of the stopping place, Joan learnt that,
instead of being a monastery for men, it was a convent
of nuns, histantly her mad jealousy of women flared
up, and she peremptorily ordered the coffin to be
carried out of the precincts. Through the crude
winter's night Joan and her attendants kept their
vigil in the open field over the precious dust of Philip
the Handsome, until daylight enabled them to go
again upon their dreary way. Such experiences as
this could not be long continued, for Joan was far
advanced in pregnancy ; and when she arrived at
Torquemada, only some thirty miles from her starting-
place, the indications of coming labour warned her
that she could go no further; and here, on the i4th
January 1507, her youngest child, Katharine, was born.

There is no doubt whatever that Joan was through-
out carefully watched by the agents of her father and
Jimenez ; and that, although ostensibly a free agent,
any attempt on her part to act independently or enter
into a political combination would have promptly
checked. Her mental malady was certainly not mini-
mised by her father or his agents ; who were as
anxious to keep her in confinement now as her hus-
band had been. Nevertheless, when every deduction
has been made, it is indisputable that in her morbid^.,
condition it might have been disastrous to the country
to have allowed her to exercise full political power_at
this time, even if she had consented to do soj though
if Ferdinand had not been, as he was, solely moved by
his own interests, the unhappy woman might after his
arrival have been associated with him in the govern-
ment, and have retained, at least, her personal liberty
and ostensible sovereignty.

Jimenez, in the meanwhile, kept his hand firmly on

JOAN THE MAD 173

the helm of State, The great military orders, of which
Ferdinand was perpetual Grand Master, were at his
bidding, and enabled him to hold the nobles in check,1
as well as the Flemish party, which claimed for the
Emperor Maximilian the regency of Castile as repre-
senting the dead King's son Charles. The great
Cardinal, far stronger than any other man in. Spain,
thus Kept Castile from anarchy until the arrival of
Ferdinand in July 1508. His methods were, of course,
arbitrary and unconstitutional ; for the Queen either
would not, or was not allowed to, do anything ; but,
at least, Jimenez governed in this time of supreme
crisis, as he did at a crisis even more acute on the
death of Ferdinand eight years later : and when Fer-
dinand eventually came from Naples everything was
prepared for him to govern Castile as he listed for the
ends of Aragon.

So far Ferdinand had triumphed both at home and
abroad. The death of Philip made it necessary for
Henry of England to change his attitude and court
the friendship of the King of Spain. Katharine of
Aragon, the neglected and shamefully treated widowed
Princess of Wales, once more found her English
father-in-law all smiles and amiability. To please him
further she consented to try to bring about a marriage
between Henry vn., recently a widower by the death
of Queen Elizabeth of York, and poor Joan, languish-
ing by her dead husband's side at Torquemada. The
proposal was a diabolical one ; for Joan's madness and
morbid attachment to her husband's memory had been
everywhere proclaimed from the housetops : but Kath-
arine of Aragon made no scruple at urging such a

1 Jimenez also raised a force of one thousand picked soldiers under
an Italian commander to enable him to keep the upper hand.

174 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

match, in order to improve her own position in Eng-
land. Ferdinand gently dallied with the foul proposal.
It was a good opportunity for gaining some concession
as to the payment of Katharine's long overdue dowry,
without which Henry threatened to break off her
match with his son and heir. So Ferdinand wrote in
March 1507 from Naples, praying that the proposal to
marry Joan should be kept very secret until he arrived
inJSpain, or Joan ' might do something to prevent it ' ;
but if she ever married again-he promised that it should
be to no one but to his^good brother of England.

Whatever may have been Ferdinand's real intention,
and it would appear very unlikely that he would have
permitted so grasping a potentate as Henry Tudor to
gain a footing, as regent or otherwise, in Castile, his
agent in England was quite enamoured of this plan for
getting Joan out of the way in Spain. ' No king in
the world,' he wrote on the i5th April 1507, 'would
make so good a husband (as Henry vn.) for the Queen
of Castile, whether she be sane or insane. She might
recover her reason when wedded to such a husband ;
but even in that case King Ferdinand would, at all
events, be sure to retain the Regency of Castile. On
the other hand, if the insanity of the Queen should
prove incurable, it would perhaps be not inconvenient
that she should live in England. The English do not
seem to mind her insanity much ; especially as it is
asserted that her mental malady will not prevent child-
bearing.1

Whilst Katharine in England was, as she says,
'baiting' Henry vn. for her own benefit with the
tempting morsel of the marriage with Joan, and the
King of France was offering the hand of a French

1 Puebla to Ferdinand, Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 409.

IS

JOAN THE MAD 175

)rince, the Queen of Castile remained in lethargic
olation at Torquemada, though the plague raged"
through the summer in the over-crowded village.
Joan had been told by some roguish friar that Philip
wquIcT come to life again there, and she obstinately
stayed on in the face of danger ; saying when she was
urged to go to the neighbouring city of Palencia, where
there was more accommodation, that it was not meet
that a widow should be seen in public, and the only
move she would consent to make was to a small place
called Hornillos, a few miles from Torquemada, in
April.1 She spoke little, and with the exception of
listening to music, of which she was fond, she had no
amusement ; but it is evident from at least one incident
that, however strange her conduct might be, she was
not deprived entirely of her reason. Jimenez had
obtained from her a decree dismissing all tEe Coun-
cillors appointed by Philip. These favourites of her
husband were naturally furious, and demanded audience
of the Queen at Hornillos. They were received by
her in the church where the corpse of Philip was de-
posited. * Who put you into the Council ? she asked
them. ' We were appointed by a decree issued and
signed by your Highness,' they replied. An angry
exchange of words then took place, and Joan, turning
to the Marquis of Villena,2 who was behind her, told
him that it was his smartness that brought such affront
as this upon her. Then she declared in a resolute
tone that it was her wish that every one should return
to the office or position he held before she and her '
husband landed in Spain ; so that when King Ferdi-

1 Peter Martyr, Epistolse.

2 Villena was against Ferdinand, though Joan liked him. She probably
meant that it was he who had inspired the protest.

i ;6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

nand arrived he should find everything as it used to
be in his time. This, of course, was a victory for
Ferdinand's party, but it is clear that Joan knew what
she was talking about on this occasion.1

At length, in the early autumn of 1507, came the
happy news that King Ferdinand had landed at
Valencia ; and, accompanied by a large force, was
entering Castile ; being generally welcomed by nobles
and people.2 As soon as Joan learnt that her father
had entered her realm, she caused a Te Deum to be
sung in the church of Hornillos, and set forth to receive
him, carrying always the corpse of her husband, and
travelling only by night, as was now her custom. At
a small place called Tortoles, about twenty-five miles
beyond Valladolid, father and daughter met. The
King approached, surrounded and followed by great
crowds of nobles and prelates. He was met at the
door of the house by Joan, attended by her half-sister
and the Marchioness of Denia ; and as he doffed his
cap she threw back the black hood which she wore as
a Flemish widow, and bared the white coif with which

1 The Castilian jealousy of Aragonese government, which was really at
the bottom of the adherence of the nobility to Philip, was not by any
means dead ; and, but for the firmness of Jimenez and the diplomacy of
Ferdinand, it is quite probable that a league of nobles would have seized
Joan at this time and have governed in her name. Most of the greater
Castilian nobles appear to have made mutual protests against the assump-
tion of rule in Castile by Ferdinand ; and in the archives of the Duke of
Frias there is one dated iQth June 1507, just before Ferdinand landed at
Valencia, and signed by the Marquis Pacheco, solemnly repudiating
Ferdinand as King, swearing to be loyal to Joan, and attributing any-
thing that he may subsequently do to the contrary effect, to intimidation
and force. As these protests were kept secret the nobles made themselves
safe either way.

2 The Marquis of Villena had just been brought to his side, and some-
what later Juan Manuel was bribed to give up his fortresses, though he
himself retired to Flanders, for he would never trust Ferdinand. The
only great noble who continued to hold out was the Duke of Najera.

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JOAN THE MAD 177

her hair was covered. Casting herself upon her knees
she sought to kiss her father's hand ; but he also knelt
and embraced her tenderly ; leading her afterwards by
the hand into the house. Every sign of dutiful sub-
mission was given by Joan to her father ; and after
several long private conferences between them, Ferdi-
nand announced that she had delegated to Jiim the
government of Castile.

A few days afterwards the whole court moved to
another small place, called Santa Maria del Campo, a few
miles nearer Burgos, Joan, as usual, travelling by
night, accompanied by the ^coffin ; and here, at Santa
Maria, the grand anniversary funeral service for Philip
was celebrated (25th September 1507), and Jimenez
received the Cardinal's hat, though Joan would not
allow that joyous ceremony, as she said, to be held in
the church that held her husband's remains. With
infinite trouble Ferdinand at length persuaded his
daughter to accompany him to a larger town, where
more comfort could be obtained, and in early October
they set forth, Ferdinand travelling by day and Joan
by night. Suddenly, however, Joan guessed that they
were taking her to Burgos, that dreadful city where
Philip had died. No consideration would induce her to
go another step in that direction ; and she took up her
residence at Arcos, a few miles away, whilst Ferdinand
established himself at Burgos with his young French
wife, whom Joan received politely.

^At Arcos Joan, with her two children, Ferdinand
and Katharine, lived her strange, solitary"" life— fer
eighteen months, broken only when Ferdinand, going
in July 1508 to reduce Andalusia to order, decided to
take his favourite little grandson and namesake with
him. Joan flew into a fury when she learnt that her

M

i;8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

child was to be taken from her ; and there is no doubt
that the disturbance thus caused aggravated her
malady for a time, although it is said that she forgot
the boy in a few days. A curious idea of her life at
Arcos is given in a letter sent on the 9th October
1508 by the Bishop of Malaga, her confessor, to the
King. 'As I wrote before, since your Highness left,
the Queen has been quiet, both in word and action ;
and she has not injured or abused any one. I forgot
to say that since then she has not changed her linen,
nor dressed her hair, nor washed her face. They tell
me also that she always sleeps on the ground, as
before.' There follow some medical details, from
which the Bishop draws the conclusion that the Queen
would not live long. ' It is not meet/ he says, 'that she
should liave the management of her own person, as
she takes so little care of herself. Her lack of cleanli-
ness in her face, and they say elsewhere, is very great,
and she eats with the plates on the floor, and no
napkin. She very often misses hearing mass, because
she is breakfasting at the hour it is celebrated, and
there is no opportunity of her hearing it before noon.'1
Before leaving to suppress the revolt in Andalucia,
Ferdinand took effective measures to prevent Joan
from being made a tool of faction. He had tried
without success to prevail upon her to remove to the
remote town of Tordesillas, on the river Douro, where
there was a commodious castle-palace fit for her
habitation, and the climate was good ; but he posted
around Arcos strong forces, commanded by faithful
partisans, with orders that if the Queen at last gave
way to the persuasion of her attendants, and removed
to Tordesillas, the troops were to guard her just as

1 Copied by Rodriguez Villa.

JOAN THE MAD 179

closely and secretly there. But Joan obstinately
refused to move ; and Ferdinand found her still there
when he returned from the South in February 1509.
Whilst he had been absent, the great magnate in
whose district of Burgos Arcos was situated, the
Constable of Castile (Count de Haro) had been
coquetting with the Emperor Maximilian to displace
Ferdinand by his grandson Charles, now nine years
old ; and the possession of the person of Joan was of
the highest importance. Ferdinand decided, therefore,
that, either willingly or unwillingly, Joan should be
placed where she would be safe from capture by
surprise. When he visited her at Arcos, he found
her thin and weak with the coTd, unhealthy climate.1
' H^r dress was such as on no account couM be
allowed, or is fit even to write about, and everything
else looked similarly, and as if it would be^totally
impossible for her to go through another winter if she
continued to liv£ in the same way.'

The King stayed with her for some days, without
broaching the sore subject of removing her ; but on
the 1 4th February 1509, he had her aroused at three
o'clock in the morning — since he knew she would not
travel in daylight — and told her she must prepare
to be gone. She offered no resistance, but only
pleaded for one day to prepare, which was granted ;
and she consented to cast away the filthy rags which
she had been wearing, and don proper garments before
setting out on the journey to her new home ; cajrrying
her little daughter, Katharine, with her ; the corpse of
Phillip on its great hearse drawn by four horses, as
usual, leading the way. Although it was evening

1 It is in the immediate neighbourhood of Burgos, and one of the
i coldest places in Spain.

I

i8o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

when she started, great crowds of people had flocked
over from Burgos to see their Queen, who had been
invisible for so long, and was by many thought to be
dead.

As the morning sun on the third day was glinting
with horizontal rays the bare brown cornlands that
stretch for many miles around Tordesillas on both
sides of the turbid Douro, the wan and weary cavalcade
rode over the ancient bridge. Between the main
street and the river stood a fortress-palace with
frowning walls and little windows looking across the
road at the convent of Saint Clara, with its florid
Gothic church and cloisters. Into the palace rode,
by her father's side, with her face shrouded, Joan, Queen
of Castile ; and thenceforward, for forty-seven dreary
years, the palace was her prison, until, an old, broken
woman of seventy-six, but wayward and rebellious to
the last, she joined her long-lost husband in the splendid
sepulchre in Granada. From the windows of Joan's
early apartment in the palace, she could see the coffin
of Philip deposited in the convent cloister, and in the
first years of her confinement, she kept her vigil over the
corpse in most of her waking hours, as well as on rare
occasions, and closely guarded, attending commemora-
tory services in the convent in honour of the dead,
until her undutiful son, the Emperor Charles, either
overcoming her resistance, or perhaps finding the
dismal caprice outworn, transferred the mouldering
remains ofPhilip the Ha^dsome~To~Its last abiding
place"; whilsT Joan the Mad waited for her release
'wrth-Aerce defiance in her heart, and revilings on her
tongue for all that her oppressors held sacred.

It would not be profitable, even if it were possible,
to follow closely the monotonous life of Joan during

JOAN THE MAD 181

her long years of confinement ; but, at certain crises in
the^ political history of her country, her personality
assumed temporary importance, and on these occasions
a~Hob3 of light is thrown upon her, which, to some
extent, will enable us to see the reality and extent of
her malady, and to judge how far her laxity in religious,
observance was the cause of her continued incarcera- ;
tiorh Mr. Bergenroth, in his introduction to the early
volumes of the Calendars of Spanish State Papers,
very forcibly urges_the view that Joan was not really
mad aj; jLll^and^that she~^was sacrificed solely to Trie
ambition of her husband, her father and her son, in
succession. After carefully considering all the docu-
ments adduced by my learned predecessor as Editor
of the Calendars, and many in the Spanish Royal
Academy of History which were unknown to him, I
find myself unable to come to the same conclusion.
The separate accounts of her behaviour are so numer-
ous, and many of them so disinterested, as to leave in
my mind no reasonable doubt that after Philip's death,
whatever may have been the case before, Joan was
not responsible for all her actions. She appears to
have been able on many occasions to discuss com-
plicated subjects quite rationally, as is not infrequent
with people undoubtedly insane, but her outbursts of
rage against religious ceremonies, her neglect of her
person, her persistence for days in refusing food, and
other aberrations, are not only clearly indicative oTlunacy,
but were the symptoms repeated exactly in the case_pf
her great grandson, Don Carlos, who was undoubtedly
insar^r At the same time it is clear to see that there
was no reason for keeping her closely confined and
isolated under strong guard, except the dread of_Fer-
dinand, and afterwards of Charles, that leagues of

182 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

nobles might make use of her to weaken the power
of the Castilian crown.1 That this fear was not
groundless has already been shown, and at one point,
as "wTfinbe^related presently, the peril was imminent.
That Joan did not seize the opportunity when it was
offered to her after her bitter complaints of her treat-
ment is, in my view, the best proof that she was not
capable of independent rule.

Ferdinand died in January 1516, leaving the whole
of his realms to his grandson Charles in Flanders, in
view of Joan's 'mental incapacity.' He tried almost
with his last breath to divide Spain for the benefit of
his younger son, Ferdinand ; but was overborne by
the remonstrances of his Council. Jimenez was ap-
pointed to be Regent until the new King arrived ; and
when Cardinal Adrian, Charles's ambassador, claimed
the Regency in virtue of a secret authority he pro-
duced, Jimenez accepted him as colleague, but made
him a cypher. Up to this period Joan had been under
the care of Ferdinand's faithful Aragonese friend,
Mosen Ferrer, the man whom rumour accused of
having poisoned Philip : whilst her principal lady in
waiting was the Dowager Countess of Salinas. The
personal guard of the Queen was entrusted to the in-
corruptible Monteros de Espinosa, and there were some
companies of Castilians on duty in, and around, the
palace. Mosen Ferrer was hated, especially by the
townspeople of Tordesillas and by the Castilian
attendants^ of Joan, because it was asserted that he
had treated the Queen cruelly, and had not attempted
to cure her. He gave strict orders that Joan should

1 And at a later period, when that danger was at an end, the fear of
scandal being caused in a court so slavishly Catholic by Joan's violent
hatred of the religious services.

JOAN THE MAD 183

not be told of her father's death ; but such news could
not be hidden, for all Castile was astir to know what
was coming next.

Many of the nobles were around young Ferdinand,
and were claiming Castile for him, in accordance with
the old King's penultimate wish ; and not a few were
looking towards Queen Joan. When she first heard
the news she was disturbed to know that Jimenez was
notion the spot when the King died, but was tran-
quilised_ to learn that he was on the way, and would
promptly assume the government. No sooner was it
known in Tordesillas that Ferdinand was dead than
the townspeople and the Castiliaq guards endeavoured
to enter the Queen's apartments and expel Mosen
Ferrer : but the latter and the Monteros de Espinosa l
stood firm, and for weeks the feud continued. The
Guards brought an exorcising priest to cast out the
devils that afflicted the Queen ; but Ferrer would not
let them enter the room ; though they got into an ante-
chamber, where, quite unknown to the Queen, the
exerciser performed his futile incantations through a
hole in the door. As soon as Jimenez had established
himself in the regency, he sent the Bishop of Majorca
to set matters right in Tordesillas. Ferrer, intensely
indignant at the accusations against him, wrote a letter
to the Regent, which, being read between the lines,
tells us much. How could he hope to cure the Queen
when her own father could not do so ? and how could
he be so bad a man as they say, if wise King Ferdi-
nand entrusted his daughter to his care ? This does
not seem very convincing : but when he tries to excuse

1 This strangely privileged corps has always had the duty to guard the
sovereigns of Castile personally inside their apartments. The men are
all drawn by right from the inhabitants of the town of Espinosa only.

1 84 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

himself Ferrer makes matters much worse. It was,
he says, only to prevent the Queen from starving her-
self to death that he had put her to the torture (dar
cuerda). He complains bitterly that though he is not
dismissed he is not allowed to go near the Queen, for
fear he should injure her health. Jimenez, probably
recognising that Ferrer had thought more of Aragonese
interests than of the health of Joan, thereupon let him
go, and appointed the Duke__of__Estrada to be her
Keeper.

""The first instructions sent by the new King Charles,
whose age was barely sixteen, to the Regent Jimenez
concerned Joan. Her custody was so important, he
said, that he agreed, in view of the dissensions amongst
Spaniards, that a Fleming should guard her. Until
one was appointed he directed that ' whilst she was to
be very well treated, she was to be so closely guarded
that if any body should attempt to thwart my good
intentions they may not be able to do it. It is more
my duty than that of any one to care for the honour,
contentment, and solace of the Queen ; and if any one
else attempts to interfere it will be with an evil object.1
Nevertheless many did attempt to interfere by whisper-
ing doubts to Joan of her Flemish eldest son, in the
interests of his young brother Ferdinand, whom his
mother and all Spaniards loved best ; and when in
September 1517 one of the monteros approached her
and said : ' Madam, our sovereign lord King Charles,
your highness' son, has arrived in Spain,' Joan burst
forth in a great rage. ' I alone am Queen : my son

1 Calendar, Spanish State Papers, Supplement to vol. i. All the docu-
ments quoted in narrating this period of Joan's life are from the same
source, and from the collection of the Royal Academy of History (Rodri-
guez Villa).

JOAN THE MAD 185

ChadesJs but the prince,' and she always resisted call-
ing him King thenceforward.

Charles and his sister Leonora came to Tordesillas
to see their mother in December. Charles's tutor and
counsellor, Chievres, first saw Joan to break to her the
news of the presence of her children ; and when, im-
mediately afterwards, they entered the room and knelt
before their mother, she was overcome with joy to see
those whom she had left as little children twelve years
before, now in the best period of adolescence. When
Charles and his sister had retired, Chievres lost no time
in saying that in order to relieve the Queen, and
accustom Charles to rule^ it would be well to entrust
the government of Spain to him. Joan made no great
objection to this ; but it is clear that her intention was,
that he should administer the government for her and
not rule on his own account as he subsequently did;
and when, a few months afterwards, Charles met the
Cortes at Valladolid they would only confirm his power
as joint sovereign, jealous as they were of Flemings,
on condition that he swore that if ever Joan recovered
her faculties he would resign the government to her.1
i Thenceforward Joan, though her name appeared for
years on decrees and proclamations, was politically
dead.

1 By a long series of intrigues Chievres had forced the hands of Jimenez
to have Charles and Joan proclaimed joint sovereigns even before the
arrival of the former. The Pope and the Emperor had been persuaded
to address Charles as Catholic King upon Ferdinand's death ; but in the
face of the discontent of the Castilian nobles it v/as necessary for Charles
at last to make all manner of promises as to his future residence in Spain,
respect for Spanish traditions, and avoidance of using Spanish money for
foreign purposes, as well as that to which reference is made in the text
with regard to Joan, before he could be fully acknowledged. He broke
most of his pledges at once, and so precipitated the great rising of the
Comuneros. See ' Vie de Chievres ' by Varilla.

1 86 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

During his stay at Tordesillas, Charles was dis-
tressed to see the sad fate of his young sister,
Katharine, now aged eleven. Joan was fiercely
attached to her, and would hardly let her out of her
sight. The child's rooms were behind those of the
Queen, and could only be reached with Joan's know-
ledge ; little Katharine's sole amusement being to look
through a window which had been specially cut for her,
and watch the people going to the opposite church,
and the children playing in the side lane that led to
the river, who were encouraged by money to play
there for her amusement. She never left the palace,
and was dressed in mean rags, such as the Queen
herself wore, and Charles, knowing that the Queen
would never let the child go willingly, somewhat
cruelly £lanne_d to have her kidnapped. He caused
a way into her apartment to be broken through a
tapestry-covered wall from an adjoining gallery ; and
the girl and her female attendants were carried away
at dead of night to a large force of horsemen and
ladies awaiting her on the opposite side of the bridge
across the Douro ; and thence spirited away to Valla-
dolid, where, dressed in fitting splendour, she was
lodged in her sister Leonora's palace. When, in the
morning, Joan disco yer_ed_her loss, she was incon-
solable. She would neither eat, drink, nor sleep, she
said, until her child was restored to her, and after two
days^Bad passed, and she still stood firm, the King
had~tcf be asked what was to be done. He was loath
to give up the education of his sister ; for princesses
were valuable dynastic and international assets ; but
there was no other way but to send her back. Charles
accompanied her to Tordesillas, and made terms with
Joan ; the girl must have proper companions and

JOAN THE MAD 187

attendants, she must dress suitably to her rank, and
she must be allowed some little relaxation and liberty
outside the palace. To this Joan consented, and
Katharine lived with her until her marriage with the
King of Portugal six years later.

In March 1518, Charles appointed to the custody of
the Queen, the Marquis of Denia, who held her until
his death, and was succeeded by his son. Soon after
his appointment, he wrote a letter to the King which
lifts the veil considerably on Joan's condition. She
tried, he says, persistently and with artful words,
remarkable for one in her condition, to persuade him
to take her out of her prison, and to summon the
nobles of Castile, as she was discontented at the way
she was being kept out of the government, and wished
to complain. He details the excuses with which he
put her requests aside, and evidently looks upon her
blandishments as wiles to escape ; but assures Charles,
as he did for many years afterwards, that * nothing
should be done against his interests,' whatever that
may have meant. But even in this letter we see signs
of Joan's undoubted madness. A day or two before
she had thrown some pitchers at two of her women,
and hurt them ; and when Denia went with a grave
face to her and said, ' How is this, my lady ? This is
a strange way to treat your servants ; your mother
treated hers better ;' Joan rose hurriedly, and the very
act of her rising sent her servants scurrying off in
a fright. ' I am not so violent as to do you any
injury,' she said ; and so began again, and for the next
five hours, to try by wheedling to get him to take her
out, 'for she could not bear these women.'

In reply to this, Charles warned Denia that his
conversations with the Queen must never be over-

i88 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

heard by anybody, and that all his letters about her
must be strictly secret. Thus every few days news of his
mother reached the young King, sometimes reporting
improvement, sometimes the reverse ; but always harping^
upon her desire to get out, her dislike of her woman
attendants, and her extreme irregularity in getting up
ari6r~eating, which she often did only at intervals of
two days. At this time, too, began to develop her
great repugnance to attend mass. The women seem
to have been a great source of trouble to every one.
They were, it appears, always gadding about the town,
telling people of what passed in the palace, and what
the Queen said, especially about religion, and her
desire to go out, and to summon the grandees. What
was worse, they defied Denia to dismiss them, until
the King gave him full authority over them, and
brought them to reason. In the autumn of the same
year, 1518, there was a visitation of plague in the
country, though Tordesillas had not suffered much,
owing to the scrupulous care taken to isolate the place.
The removal of the Queen, however, had to be con-
sidered. ' If it be necessary,' wrote the Marquis, ' we
shall want saddle mules with black velvet housings for
the Queen and the Infanta. ... It will also be
necessary to take the body of the King, your father,
and if this has to be done, we must put into proper
order the car in which it was brought here, as it is now
dismantled. Charles was against any removal if it
could possibly be avoided, but if quite unavoidable,
the Queen might be taken to the monastery of St.
Paul at Moralejo, near Arevalo. If she refused to go,
she must be taken by force ; but with as much respect
as possible, and with every precaution against her
endeavouring to stay in the open on the way. If she

JOAN THE MAD 189

wanted the corpse of Philip to go with her, a dummy
coffin might be made up and carried, whilst the real
one with the body remained behind at Tordesillas.

The plague passed away, and the move was not
made ; and so things passed with Joan as before.
Squalid and unhappy, she resisted as_ obstinately as
ever the pressure put upon her to attend mass, though
more "than once she was violently desirous of going
over in Holy Week, or other anniversaries, to the
convent church of St Clara, and on several occasions
had her clothes washed in preparation for the great
event ; which Denia himself was inclined to allow,
under strict guard, as people in the town were tattling
about her being kept a prisoner. ^Grsal-fiffarts were
rnade_byJjLiari^de Avila, the chaplain, to bring Joan to
a better frame of^mind about religion ; and in June
1519 he writes a curious letter to the King, beseeching
him to do his duty by his mother ; * especially for the
salvation of her soul.' Perhaps in answer to this
Charles ordered Denia to insist that the Queen should
hear mass. She had wished it to be said at the end of a
corridor, instead of in a special room adjoining her
own, as Denia desired, and, at last, rather than she
should not hear it at all, she was allowed to have her
way ; and an altar and chapel were screened off by
black velvet hangings at the end of the corridor. She
went through the service with great devotion until the
evangelium and the pax were brought to her, when
she refused them, but motioned that they should be
administered to her daughter.

This attendance at mass continued for some time, to
the immense jubilation of Denia and the priests ; but
as the day approached when Charles was to leave
Spain for Germany to claim the imperial crown, in

190 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

consequence of Maximilian's death (January 1519), the
effervescence and discontent in Castile at the prospect
of an absentee King drawing money from Spain for
foreign purposes, penetrated in some mysterious way
the prison-palace of Joan the Mad. For hours the
Queen railed at Denia for not having summoned the
Grandees, as she had requested him to do so often.
She was being disgracefully treated, she said ; every-
thing belonged to her, and yet she was being denied
what she required. She excitedly summoned the
treasurer, and demanded money of him, which he was
not allowed to give her. So vehement did she
become, that at last Denia forbade any one to speak to
her at all. She would go to Valladolid, she said ; and
at another time she would dress to go over to the
convent church, though she was not allowed to go. She
ordered Denia to write to her son, asking that she should
be better treated ; and that the grandees should
come to her to consult about the realm. Denia, at his
wit's end to pacify her, on one occasion, for, as he
says, 'she uses words fit to make the very stones rise,'
had the inspiration to mention her father, as if he were
still alive, and at the head of affairs ; and for a time all
the disagreeable answers given to her were said to be
by order of King Ferdinand, for whose wisdom she
had a great respect. But this lie gave her a new idea.
If her father were alive, he could help her; and she
ordered Denia to write and tell him that she could no
longer stand the life she led. She was badly treated,
and as a prisoner, her son, Ferdinand, had been taken
away from her, and she feared they were going to rob
her of her daughter Katharine ; but, if they did, she
would kill herself. Denia fell more and more into her
black books, as the discontent at Charles's departure

JOAN THE MAD 191

grew in the country, and echoes reached the Queen's
prison of the public indignation at her seclusion, and
wild rumours of intentions to rescue her. On one
occasion (July 1520) she ordered Denia to open a
doorway from her apartments into the corridor where
mass was said. He was suspicious and refused,
whereupon she fell into a violent rage with him, and
heaped upon him outrageous words without measure.
No wonder the poor man deplores that everybody
believes he keeps her prisoner (as indeed he did,
though he says not), and he advocates her entire
seclusion, although the best way to undeceive the
people, he says, would be to let them see her, and
recognise her sad condition.

Charles sailed from Corunna on 2Oth May 1520.
During the time he had been in Spain he, or rather
his rude, greedy gang of Flemings, had driven
Castilians to desperation. Jimenez, who had held
the country for him in his absence in the face of
the nobles and young Ferdinand, had been con-
temptuously dismissed — and probably poisoned on
Charles' arrival : young Ferdinand had been packed
off to Flanders : Flemings had crowded all the great
posts, to the exclusion of Spaniards : jo>an was not
presented before the Cortes as Queen jointly with

*"** **•* -• " "~ w* " ""

her son,_as she should have been ; and now^ to crown
all, the Constitution of Castile had been violated by
the insolent young foreigner who was to rule, not
Spain alone, but half the world. He had held a
Castilian Cortes outside the limits of Castile itself,
and had coerced the deputies to vote him large sums
of money to be spent away from Spain. The nobles
were already seething with discontent, and now the
people in the towns, who paid all the taxes, rose and

192 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

hanged some of the deputies who had voted away
their money for an absent king.

Then, like^a, weil-laid- - 4£a»y all- Castile blazed into
revolt. It jtvas^ j^reat social, industrial and political
struggle, which ended in the financial impotence of
trie Cortes of Castile, and the decadence of the
Castilian nobility. The complicated details of the
Tevolt cannot here be told, but only those points in
which Joan was personally concerned. The governing
committee of the revolutionary Comuneros met at
Avila at the end of July 1520, headed by the gentry,
and, to some extent, secretly encouraged by the great
nobles. The Flemish Regent, Cardinal Adrian, was
paralysed with dismay at the extent of the rising, and
did nothing ; whilst to the cry of ' Long live the King
and Queen : down with evil ministers,' every Spanish
heart responded. The manifesto published by the
committee announced that the revolutionaries .had
risen in the interests of the imprisoned Queea,4^oari ;
ancTearly in August a committee of the council of
Castile, the supreme executive body of the Regent's
government, with its president, Bishop Rojas, pre-
sented themselves before Joan in her palace of
Tordesillas, to beg her to sign decrees against those
who were in arms. Joan was to all appearance calm,
and replied to the demand for her signature, ' It is
now fifteen years that I have been kept from the
government and badly treated ; and this marquis here'
(pointing to Denia), 'is he who has lied to me most.'
Denia, confused, replied : 'It is true, my lady, that I
have lied to you, but I have done so to overcome
certain prejudices of yours. I may tell you now, that
your father is dead, and I buried him.' The Queen
shed tears at this, and turning to Rojas, murmured

JOAN THE MAD 193

between her sobs, ' Bishop, believe me, all that I see
and hear is like a dream.' Rojas pressed his point.
' My lady, I can assure you that your signature to
these papers will work a greater miracle than Saint
Francis ; for, after God, in your hands now rests the
salvation of these realms.' 'Rest now,' replied the
Queen, 'and come back another day.'

On the morrow the committee of the council saw
the Queen again, and as there was no seat but hers
in the room, the president mentioned that it was not
meet that they should be kept standing. ' Bring a
seat for the council, ' directed the Queen ; but, as the
attendants were bringing in chairs, she said, * No, no,
not chairs, but a bench ; that was the rule in my
mother's time : but the bishop may have a chair.'
After another long conference the Queen directed the
committee to return to Valladolid and discuss again,
in full council the papers to which they requested
her signature ; and thus, unsatisfied, the members left
her, only to find themselves prisoners at Valladolid,
which was now in the hands of the rebels, who were
rapidly marching upon Tordesillas at the urgent request
of the townspeople of the latter place, to save Queen
Joan from being carried away by the government
party.

The rebels had no time to communicate with Joan
as to their aims before they appeared outside the walls
of the town on the 2Qth August. As soon as Joan
learnt of their coming she ordered the townspeople
to welcome them ; and so, amidst salute of cannon
and enthusiastic cheers, Padilla, the rebel leader, and
his host were escorted into the town, and passed before
the Queen, who stood in a balcony of the palace.
After resting and changing their garments, Padilla

N

194 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

and other chiefs sought audience of the Queen. Joan
received him smilingly. ' Who are you ? ' she asked,
as he knelt before her. ' I am Juan Padilla, my lady,'
he replied, ' son of the captain-general of Castile, a
servant of Queen Isabel, as I am a servant of your
Highness.' And then the insurgent chief told the
astonished Queen all that had happened since old
King Ferdinand died : how the evil foreign advisers
of young Charles had brought all Spain into revolt,
and that Padilla and the commons of Castile were
ready to die in the service of their own Queen Joan.
She expressed her wonderment at all this. jj>he had
been kept a prisoner, she said, for nearly sixteen
years, and Denia, her gaoler, had hidden every thing
from" Her. IF she had been sure of her father's death
srfe would have gone forth and have prevented some of
this trouble in her realm. Then, addressing Padilla,
she said : ' Go now ; I order you to exercise the
authority of captain-general of the realm. Look to
all things carefully, until I order otherwise.'

Joan thus made herself the ostensible head of the
revolution ; and on many subsequent occasions con-
ferred with the leaders in arms at Tordesillas, fully
approving of their proceedings and aims. She tried
to exonerate Charles on account of his youth and
inexperience of Spain, but clearly indicated her
intention to govern for herself in future. Most
important of all, she authorised the leaders to
summon the Cortes to meet at Tordesillas. The
weak, foreign Cardinal Regent could only ascribe
Joan's attitude to her madness ; though, as he
wrote to Charles, the people regard it as a proof
of her sanity. Denia was now almost a prisoner,
but the revolutionary leaders could never persuade

JOAN THE MAD 195

Joan to sign his formal dismissal, though they, on
their own authority, turned both the marquis and his
wife unceremoniously out of the town when Torde-
sillas became the centre of the rebel government in
September, and the Cortes held its sittings there.1

Joan met her Parliament in the hall of the palace,
andTIstened patiently to the lengthy harangues of the
deputies. In her reply, which seems to have been
extempore, she spoke at great length of her father,
whose death had been concealed from her. During
his life she was at ease, because she knew no one
would dare to do harm. But she now saw how the
country and herself had been abused and deceived, to
the injury of the people whom she loved so much.
She wished she were in some place where she could
direct affairs better ; but as her father had placed her
there, either because of the woman who took her
mother's place, or for some other reason, she could do
no more than she had done. She wondered that the
Spaniards had not avenged themselves before upon
the^foreigners who had come with her son. She
thought at first that these foreigners had meant well
to her boys ; whom they had, she was told, taken back
to Flanders ; but she saw differently now, and she
hoped no one here had any evil meaning towards her

1 Denia told the rebels that he had appealed to the Queen for a
certificate of his dismissal, but what he really asked for was her written
order to stay. In reply, she told him to go about his business and talk
to her no more. He was, however, successful in getting a letter from
the young Infanta to the revolutionary Junta praying them not to send
the marchioness away, but it had no effect. The Infanta got into sad
disgrace with her brother for her alleged kindness and sympathy with
the rebels, but she spiritedly defended herself, and appealed to this letter
of hers in favour of the Denias as proof that she did what she could in
very difficult and dangerous circumstances. (Letters from Simancas
copied by Senor Rodriguez Villa.)

196 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

sons. Even if she were not the Queen she ought to
have been better treated, for, at least, she was the
daughter of great sovereigns ; and she was in favour of
the Comuneros, because she saw they were anxious to
remedy the abuses of which she complained. All this
seemed quite sane, but at the end of the speech there
is a pathetic ring of self-distrust that tells the sad tale.
' To the extent of my power I will see to affairs, either
here or elsewhere. But if, whilst I am here, I cannot
do much it will be because I am obliged to spend some
time in calming my heart and strengthening my spirit,
on the death of the King, my husband. But as long
as I am in disposition for it, I will attend to affairs.'1

The democratic excesses of the revolutionary Com-
mittee, together with the diplomacy of Charles, were
gradually enlisting the great nobles on the side of the
government. Although Joan's attendants generally
were in her favour, and continued to assert her sanity
now they had got rid of the Denias, her confessor,
Juan de Avila, was always secretly faithful to the
Regent ; and whispered warnings constantly in the
Queen's ear. It was evident after a short time also
to^the_reyolutionary junta thaT"jrrafrwas not^ane ; as
they wrote from T*orctesillas to ShlT city of Valladolid
saying that they had summoned all the best physicians
in Spain to her ; and, apparently finding human aid
powerless, they had ordered processions and prayers
for her restoration to health. The Regent, indeed,
writing to Charles in October, says that the Queen
cannot last long if she does not escape from the power
of the rebel government ; as she was much worse after

1 It was one of the principal allegations of the government, that, although
Joan never signed anything for the rebels, her verbal orders were at once
taken down in notarial form and acted upon as royal decrees.

JOAN THE MAD 197

Denia went. She no longer sleeps in a bed, he says,
nor eats regularly, but keeps her food all around her
cold until it goes bad. At another time, after she
had eaten nothing for three days, she was given the
accumulated food of the whole period at once. The
government party asserted that all the poor woman's
crazy caprices were acceded to, and even threats
resorted to by the junta, in order to get her to sign the
decrees necessary to legitimise their action ; but she
continued obstinate in her refusal to put her hand to
anything.1

The junta began to grow desperate ; for the forces
against them were growing daily, whilst they.jnade.Jio
progress, depending, as they did, for legality upon
drJfaining the signature of a lunatic. They tried to
bribe the poor woman to sign by promising to take
HeT~a way "from Tordesillas ; but that was fruitless : on
another occasion, in the middle of the night, a hue and
cry was raised that the Constable of Castile with a
great force of government troops was outside, and the
Queen was told that the ' tyrants ' had come to seize
her. ' Tell the Constable,' she replied, ' not to do any-
thing until the daylight comes ; and then I will see
about it.' Things thus _ went frpjn bad .._to worse for
the^ rebellion. This was the one chance of -Joan's, life,
and she missed it. For months she trifled and smiled
upon the rebel junta, but would sign nothing; and^
early in December the government troops were strong
enough to make a dash for Tordesillas, which they
took by assault after four hours of desperate fighting ;
the rebel junta flying in a panic from the place. Joan
welcomed the victors with a smiling faceT She had

1 One of her demands was that all her women should be sent away, as
they were. Her hatred of her own sex was remarkable.

198 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

been expecting and wishing they would come, she
said ; and had ordered that the nobles should be
admitted before the fight began.

During the battle she with the Infanta had left the
palace, carrying her jewels with them, and had ordered
the corpse of Philip to be taken from the church and
carried with them out of the town. Before it could be
done, in the confusion, the royal troops entered, and
they found the Queen and her daughter crouched in
the doorway of the palace trembling with fright. The
great nobles who came to the capture of Tordesillas
were full of lip service to Joan, and she, flattered
apparently by their deference, professed delight at
their coming ; but from the moment the rebel junta
fled before the^Constable's troops at Tordesillas with-
out her signature, Joan was a closely watched prisoner.
Denia and his wife", with their "harsh methods, came
back, to the loudly expressed disgust, not only of Joan,
but of some of the greatest of the Castilian nobles, who
saw how his presence irritated her ; I but Charles would
permit no change in his mother's keeper, for he knew
he could depend upon Denia to keep her close.

In April 1521, the Comuneros were finally crushed
at the battle of Villalaj;, and the yoke of imperialism
forged unwittingly by Ferdinand the Catholic, and
open-eyed by Charles the Emperor, was fixed upon
tr!e~ neck of Spain until it strangled her. Thence-

1 The Admiral of Castile and other nobles at the time endeavoured to
prevail upon Joan to take the direction of affairs under their guidance ;
but she refused just as obstinately to give her signature to them as she
had to the rebels. Denia writes to the Emperor that the Admiral is very
anxious to cure the Queen ; but in no case will it be allowed without the
Emperor's permission. 'Besides, it would be another resurrection of
Lazarus.5 The bitterest complaints of Denia and his methods were sent
by the great nobles to Charles, whilst Denia could say no good word for
them.

JOAN THE MAD 199

forward Joan was but a shadow in the world, to which
she no longer appertained.

The person most to be pitied, until marriage rescued
her in 1524, was the poor young Infanta Katharine.
The Denias came back vowing vengeance against
every one who they thought had been polite to the
rebels, and the Infanta, as well as the Queen, had
to feel their petty tyranny. The girl wrote indignantly
to her brother of the wretched straits to which she
was reduced by them, and also of the persecution of
her mother by them. Amongst other complaints, the
following may be quoted. ' For the love of God, pray
order that if the Queen wishes to walk in the gallery
looking on to the river, or in the matted corridor, or
to leave her chamber for pastime, they shall not
prevent her from doing so. And pray do not allow
the servants and daughters of the marchioness, or
others, to go to my closet through the Queen's rooms,
but only the persons who serve ; because, in order
that the Queen may not see them, the marchioness
orders the women to shut the Queen up in her
chamber, and will not allow her to go into the passages
or hall, but keep her in the chamber where there is
no light but candles ; for there is nowhere else for
her to go, and she will not leave the chamber until
she is dragged out : or, if she would, the women are
there to prevent her.' This is the Infanta's own
version ; but the Denias' story is that the young
princess is not allowed by her mother to see any one
but a common servant, and has not the fit company
of ladies. To make matters worse for the girl the
Denias accused her of favouring the rebels, which she
indignantly denied, and made peace successfully with
her brother. Her departure from Tordesillas for her

200 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

marriage afflicted Joan greatly, and for the rest of the
Queen's life there was no one to stand between the
emperor and her gaolers.

During the long years of Joan's seclusion, the
principal feature of her aberration was its anti-
religious tendency. It is true that she often demanded
the summoning of the nobles, and continued "her
eccentricity in eating and sleeping, but the strange
antipathy she showed, and often violently expressed,
to the services of her church, was a scandal worse
than any in a country where thousands of people
were being burnt for a tenth part of what the Queen
allowed herself to say and do. The whole of the
emperor's system was based upon the enforcement of
universal religious orthodoxy by Spain : and it was
a bitter affliction for him to know that his mother,
and rightful Queen, was madly opposed, at intervals,
to the ceremonies imposed upon the rest of Spaniards.
Denia in his letters to the Emperor, on several occa-
sions, drops dark hints that torture should be applied
— as it evidently had been applied to Joan years
before by Mosen Ferrer. Speaking of her obstinacy
soon after the rebel defeat, and advising that she
should be transferred to the fortress of Arevalo,
which he thought safer and more loyal to Charles,
he says : * Your Majesty may be sure that this will
not be done with the Queen's goodwill, for it is not
to be expected that a person who refuses to do
anything beneficial, either for her body or her soul,
but does quite the contrary, will agree to this. And.
in good truth, if your Majesty would use pressure l

1 Mr Bergenroth translated ' hacerle premia] ( applying torture,' and
it may be so translated. I prefer, however, the wider interpretation ;
though, no doubt, Denia meant to recommend physical coercion.

JOAN THE MAD 201

upon her in many things, you would serve God and
benefit her Highness, for people in her condition
really need it. Your grandmother, Queen Isabel,
served her Highness, her daughter, in this way, but
your Majesty will do as you think best.'

Denia, whilst recommending the employment of force
for the removal of the Queen, did not wish to appear
personally as the instrument, but recommended that the
President of the Council of Castile should be sent with
the Emperor's order for her to submit, and if she
resisted, to have her seized and put into a litter by force
in the night time, and carried off. The removal of the
Queen, often urged by Denia for years, on the ground
of the accessibility of Tordesillas to disaffected people,
does not seem ever to have taken place.1 Denia's
desire to lodge Joan in a strong isolated fortress is also
explained by hirn_ on the ground of the scandal caused
by-the Queen's religious attitude. In the letter just
quoted, where he recommends torture, he relates that
on Christmas night, whilst early matins were being
sung in the presence of the Infanta, the Queen came in
search of her daughter, and screamed out in anger for
them to clear the altar of everything upon it ; and she
had to be forcibly taken back to her rooms. He relates
also that : ' She often goes into the gallery overlooking
the river, and calls to any one she sees to summon the
troops to kill each other. Your majesty may judge
from all this what is best to do, and what we have to
put up with.'

These hints at personal punishment of the Queen
are repeated again ancTagaTn over a series of years by
Denial thotrgh7~5o^faF as can be gathered from the

1 The Emperor ordered her to be taken to Toro in 1527, but Denia was
afraid of forcing her to go.

202 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Emperor's replies, he gave no instructions for it to be
done. In 1525 Denia writes : 'Nothing would do so
much good as some pressure (i.e., punishment or
torture), although it is a very serious thing for a subject
to think of applying such to his Sovereign. Perhaps
it will be best to try what effect a good priest would
have upon Her Highness ... a Dominican would
be best, as she does not like Franciscans.' On
another occasion soon afterwards, when Charles had
decided to have his mother secretly carried by night to
the impregnable castle of Toro, not far from Tordesillas,
Denia remarks that he had taken measures that no
persons should be in the streets to witness her arrival,
* for, in good truth, I myself am ashamed of what I hear
and see.'

And SQ from year to year the Queen's religious
aberrations consigned her to constantly increased
seclusion to avoid scandal. The Emperor and his
only son Philip visited the Queen at least on one occa-
sion at Tordesillas, and during the regency of Philip in
1552, whilst Charles was in Germany, the Prince,
much more rigidly devout even than his father, and
shocked at the continued refusal of his grandmother
to attend the services of the Church and fulfil her
religious duties, sent to Tordesillas the saintly Jesuit
Francis of Borgia, Duke of Gandia, to exert his influ-
ence upon the Queen. His success was very small.
For weeks Joan refused to conform, until, at last
Borgia persuaded her to make what is called a ' general
confession,' and he thereupon gave her absolution ; l

1 Denia's account of the interview with Borgia (confirmed by the latter)
is extremely curious. The priestly Duke said, as she would do nothing
else, she might recite the ' General Confession,' and he would absolve her.
' Can you absolve ? ' she asked. ' Yes ! ' he replied, ' with the exception of
certain cases.' * Then,' said the Queen, * you recite the General Confes-

JOAN THE MAD 203

but directly he left she relapsed into her former in-
difference again.

When Philip was leaving Spain to marry Mary,
Queen of England, in 1554, he sent Father Borgia
again to try to bring Joan to her religious duties. She
heard the good father patiently, and when he had
finished his exhortations, she endeavoured to make
terms. Yes, she would hear mass, and confess, and
receive absolution, and the rest of it, if the women
attendants upon her were sent away, as they always
mocked her whilst she was at her devotions. ' If that
be so,' replied Father Borgia, 'the Inquisition shall
deal with them as heretics ; ' and he at once wrote to
Philip recommending that they should pretend to hand
the women over to the Holy Office, place crosses and
images of saints about the Queen's rooms, say daily
mass on the corridor altar, and if the Queen objected,
tell her that it was done by the order of the Inquisition.
He also proposed to bring some priestly exercisers to
cast out the devils that afflicted the Queen ; but this
Philip would not allow. The effect of Borgia's efforts
on this occasion was, that when Prince Philip on his
way to Corunna to sail for England called at Torde-
sillas, he found Joan to his delight going through the
ordinary religious rites without resistance. But her
devotion was clearly only on the surface, and her new
confessor Friar Luis de la Cruz, soon reported that he
dared not expose himself to the peril of committing a

sion.' This Borgia did, and asked her whether she said the same. ' Yes,'
she replied ; and ' she then permitted him to absolve her.' It will be
seen that there was not much submission in this. Only a day or so after-
wards she appears to have flown into a terrible passion because some new
hangings and gold ornaments had been placed on the corridor altar ; and
she refused to eat until they had been removed, and the altar left plain as
before.

204 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

grave act of sacrilege by administering the sacraments
to the Queen, and resigned his office. It appears,
amongst other things, that she always shut her eyes at
the elevation of the Host at the mass, and on one
occasion she violently told her attendants to throw
away the blessed tapers they carried before her, as she
said they stank.

Since the summer of 1553, Joan, then an old woman,
had suffered from swelling of the lower limbs, which
almost crippled her; and in February 1555, after a
bath of very hot water, the legs broke out into open
wounds. Thenceforward the course of her illness pre-
sented an extraordinary resemblance to that which
proved mortal in the case of her grandson, Philip n.
Dreadful gangrenous sores, which she refused to have
dressed or washed, caused her the most awful torment.
She paid no heed to the directions of doctors or nurses ;
and when her granddaughter, the Infanta Joan, came over
from Valladolid with the best medical men procurable,
the Queen violently refused to see them or allow them
to examine her. Thus, lying in repulsive squalor and
filth, the poor creature was told that Father Borgia
had come to see her. She angrily refused to listen to
him at first, but she was weak, and his persistence
seems finally to have conquered. By and bye she_
admitted that she was sorry for her errors, and de-
plored the divagations of her spirit. At the request of
Borgia she repeated the apostle's creed and confessed ;
but just as he was about to administer the viaticum,
she expressed some scruple at receiving it. Learned
theologians were summoned in haste from Salamanca ;
and a few days afterwards, on the nth April 1555, the
famous Dr Soto was closeted with her for hours. His
report was that, though she had privately told him

JOAN THE MAD 205

things that consoled him, the Queen was not fit to
receive the Eucharist ; though extreme unction might
be administered.

That same night the^last_rites were performed.
Leaning over the dying woman with a crucifix, the
priest told her that the last hour for her was come, and
that it behoved her to ask God for pardon. By signs
and gestures of grief and contrition, she expressed what
her poor palsied tongue refused to utter ; and Father
Borgia, believing her beyond speech, asked her to
signify whether he should recite the creed for her. To
the astonishment of every one she suddenly recovered
her power of utterance, and replied, ' You begin it, and
I will repeat it after you.' When the last amen was
said, the saintly Jesuit placed a crucifix to the lips of
the dying woman. * Christ crucified aid me,' she had
strength yet to say, arid then Joan the Mad passed to
_lhe land where all are sane. For twenty years her
body lay in the Convent of St. Clara, opposite her
prison palace ; upon the same spot where the coffin of
her husband had rested for so many years ; and then,
in 1574, she was carried at last to the sumptuous tomb
at Granada, to join for the rest of time the dust of him
that she had loved not wisely but too well.

The foregoing account of the life of this most un-
fortunate of queens, gathered entirely from the contem-
porary statements of persons who knew her, tends
irresistibly to the conclusion that her early rigid train-
ing, followed by her life in Flanders, had implanted in
her mind a dislike of the stern bigotry which charac-
terised^the_religJQji of Spain under the influence of die
Inquisition; and that jhisjiislikg grpw to WrpH wjhgn
fier_jnind became permanently unsettled. Her strict
seclusion and cruel treatment do not appear to have

2o6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

been so necessary for her own health, or even primarily
for the public welfare, as for the interests of her father
and son, whose autocratic power was threatened by any
combination of nobles acting in her name, and whose
policy largely depended upon the maintenance of strict
religious orthodoxy. XQ leave at liberty and accessible
a feeble-minded Queen who desired to govern through
the nobles, and hated the religion of the Inquisition,
would have been to invite disaster to the very basis
upon which the vast edifice of Spanish autocratic power
at its grandest was erected. 1 1 might have been better for
Spain in the long run, but it would have been ruin for
Ferdinand and Charles ; and to their interests succes-
sively Joan the Mad was sacrificed.

-^—_- __*L- -Jr- •

BOOK III

I

MARY TUDOR
QUEEN OF ENGLAND AND SPAIN

-r THE '

UNIVERSITY

BOOK I I I

IN the noble gallery at the Prado there hangs the full-
length seated portrait of a lady of peculiarly modern
aspect, painted by Titian from sketches and descrip-
tions in his extreme old age.1 Her sad, sweet smile,
vague, lymphatic eyes, and high prominent forehead,
give to the face a character of far-away ideality, such
as marked so many of the members of her house : for
this is Isabel, the consort of the Emperor^ and she,
like the greater Isabel's mother, belonged to the fated
royal family of Portugal, whose tainted blood so often
carried to its possessors the mysticism that degenerates
into madness. Throughout the poor lady's life of barely
thirty-six years, she was overshadowed by the tremen-
dous responsibility of being the mother of the Caesar's-
children. During the long and frequent absences from
"Spain of Charles v. in his life-struggle against France
and heresy on the one side, and the powers of Islam
on the other, the Empress Isabel, as Regent, con-
trolled by a council mainly of churchmen, had to squeeze
funds for the imperial wars from the commons of Castile,
well nigh crushed into financial impotence since trie
defeat of the parliamentary champions at Villalaj.

Like all those who came into immediate contact with
Charles in his imperial capacity, his wife was humbly
subordinate to the overwhelming magnitude of the

1 For particulars of this portrait, hitherto unknown, see ' Calendars of
Spanish State Papers,' vol. viii., edited by Martin Hume.

O

210 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

policy which he directed, and she had no share in
moulding_events^ For her the glory was sufficient
to have borne her husband a son who lived, besides
daughters and two boys who died of epilepsy in infancy.
The mother of Philip of Spain looked with reverential
awe upon her own child, so great and important to man-
kind was held to be the inheritance to which he was
to succeed ; and when she flickered out of life in 1539,
the boy of twelve was her main contribution and justifi-
cation to a world which had only known her as Caesar's
wife~, and^only remembered her as Philip's mother.

In the atmosphere of hushed reverence and rigid
sacrifice to imperial ends that filled the monastic court
of Spain in the absence of the Emperor, Philip was
never allowed to forget for an hour the destiny, with
all its duties, its responsibilities, and its power, for
which he was taught that God had specially selected
him as son of his father. As a boy regent in the
Emperor's first great trial of strength with the German
Lutherans, his heart had ached at the sufferings of
Spain from the cruel drain of blood and treasure for
the war in which she had no direct concern ; but -when
he dared, almost passionately, to remonstrate with his
father at the ruin which he himself was forced to impose
upon the people he loved, he was coldly reminded that
it was the cause of God that he and his were fighting,
and all earthly considerations must be sacrificed for its
triumph. Philip was the son of his forbears, and he
learnt his 16*55011 well." LikeTns grandmother Isabel,
he had no love of cruelty for its own sake, but like her
he held the mystic belief that he and the Most High
were linked in cornrnunity of cause, and that the greater
the suffering the greater the glory. He never spared
himself or others when the cause for which he lived,

MARY TUDOR 211

the unification of the faith, demanded sacrifice ; but fate
was cruel in the era she chose for him. The age when
Charles and his son were pledged to force all men to
take their faith unquestioned from Rome at the tips of
Spanish pikes was that in which the rebellious Monk of
Wittemburg had challenged Rome itself, and the world
was throbbing with the new revelation, that beyond the
trappings that man had hung upon the church, there was
a God to whom all were equal, and to whom all might
appeal direct.

So, throughout the century of strife, both Charles
and his son, rigid as they were, were always obliged to
conciliate England, whatever its faith might be ;_for
France, and heresy in their own dominions^were ever
trieT nearest enemies; and for England permanently
to have thrown in its lot with either of them would
have consigned Spain to impotence. Henry vm. might
defy the Pope, despoil the Church, and insultingly
repudiate his blameless Spanish wife, but the Emperor
dared not quarrel with him for long together, or provoke
him too far. But, withal, it was a hard trial for the
champion of orthodoxy to have to speak fair and softly
to his heterodox, excommunicated uncle, and welcome
alliance with the power that was a standing negation
of the cause for which he lived. Still harder was
it when Henry was dead ; for his personal prestige
was great, and his professions of orthodoxy were
emphatic, apart from his personal quarrel with the
Papacy. But to him there succeeded a child-king ruled
by men of small ability, determined to alter the faith of
England itself, and make a durable friendship with
Spain impossible.

Then almost suddenly the whole aspect of affairs
changed. It had been known for some time that the

212 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

young King of England, Edward VL, was failing, and
would probably die without issue ; but the uncertain
element had been the extent of the Duke of Northumber-
land's power and the strength of English Protestantism.
Edward vi. died on the ;th July 1553, and the undig-
nified collapse of Northumberland at once decided the
Emperor's plans. The treachery ~of. Maurice_ of
Saxony had brought Charles to the humiliating peace
pfJPassau, and had made for ever impossible the realis-
ation of the great dream of making Philip Emperor as
well as King. It was the heaviest blow that Charles
had ever suffered ; and, if he could have appreciated
its significance, he would have seen that it proved the
impossibility of the task he had undertaken. He was
still at war with the enemy, France, who had supported
his Lutheran princes, and he was burning to avenge
the crowning disaster of Metz, when the death of the
boy King of England opened to his mind's eye the
gates of a shining future. The hollow crown of the
Empire might go, with its poor patrimony and its
turbulent Lutheran subjects, the fat Portuguese dowry
he coveted for his son Philip might be cheerfully sacri-
ficed ; but if only rich England could be joined in
lasting bonds to Spain, then France would indeed be in
the toils, Flanders and Italy safe, the road to unlimited
expansion in the East open, and Spain, supreme,
might give laws to Latin Christendom, and to heathen-
dom beyond. The prize wras worth bidding for, and
Charles lost no time.

In the brilliant summer weather of late July in 1553,
a faded little woman with a white pinched face, no eye-
browspand russet hair, rode irPa^blaze of triumph
through the green-bordered roads of Suffolk and Essex

MARY TUDOR 213

towards London. Around her thronged a thousand
gentlemen in velvet doublets and gold chains, whilst
a great force of armed men followed to support if need
be the right of Mary Queen of England. It was not
much more tharTa fortnight since her brother had died,
but into that time the poignant emotions of a century
had been crammed. The traitors who had proclaimed
Queen Jane had tumbled over each other to be the
first to betray some of their companions, and all to dis-
own the despotic craven who had led them, the
wretched Northumberland ; Protestant London, even,
had greeted with frantic joy the name of the Catholic
Queen, whose right it knew, and whose unmerited
sufferings it pitied ; but jit thirty- seven, an old maid, dis-
illusioned and wearied by years of cruel injustice, Mary
TudoFcame to herJieritage resigned ratherj;han elated.
"Amongst the crowds of officials and gentlemen who
rode out of London to pay homage to the new Queen,
were two men, each pledged to outwit the other in his
quest. They were of similar age, about fifty, both
Frenchmen, though one was born in the Burgundian
territory of the Franche Comte, and both were
ambassadors ; one, Simon Renard, representing the
Emperor, and the other, Antoine de Noailles, the
King of France, and they went racing towards Chelms
ford, each to try to win Queen Mary to the side of his
master. Noailles was the more courtly and aristocratic ;
and his insinuating grace made him a dangerous rival,
for it hid a spirit that stopped at no falsity or treachery
if it would serve his turn. But in gaining Mary Tudor
he was fatally handicapped, though when she received
him at New Hall she spoke so fairly that he thought
he had succeeded.1 For Simon Renard represented

1 Ambassades de Noailles, vol. ii. p. 99.

2i4 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the power that throughout all the bitter trials of her
life Mary had looked to as her only friend. Again and
again the imperial ambassadors alone had dared to
claim better treatment for her and her outraged mother ;
and had threatened her father with vengeance if ill be-
fell her ; whilst France had always taken the opposite
side, and egged King Henry on to work his own will
in despite of Spain and the empire. So, though Mary
was diplomatic to Noailles she was friendly to Renard,
for to him and his master she looked to keep secure
her trembling throne.

Already it was seen that the Queen must marry.
She had been betrothed times out of number as an
instrument of policy, but of her own will she desired no
husband ^ and when Renard, in a long private chat
with her at New Hall on the ist August, broached the
subject, she told him that she knew her duty in that
respect and would do it, but prayed for the guidance of
the Emperor in her choice of a husband. She was no
longer young, she said, and hoped that too youthful a
husband would not be recommended to her. Renard
knew that already English people had chosen as the
Queen's prospective bridegroom young Courtenay, still
in the Tower as a prisoner ; and that failing him, some
had thought of Cardinal Pole ; but he knew well, as
did the Emperor, that Mary was too proud to marry a
subject, and looked to her marriage as a means of
strengthening her throne; and soon afterwards even
Noailles saw that Courtenay had spoilt his chance- by
dissoluteness of life, though he continued to make use
of him as a tool for conspiracy against Mary and her
Spanish friends.

On the 3rd August the new Queen, dressed in violet
velvet, and mounted on a milk-white pony, came to her

MARY TUDOR 215

city of London through the gaily decked portal of Aid-
gate, and so to the Tower, where she released those
who had lain there in prison to suit the policy of the men
who had ruled Edward vi. Events moved apace.
Gardiner from a prison was suddenly raised to the post
of chief minister. Bonner, the hated Bishop of London,
came from the Marshalsea to his throne in Saint Paul's ;
and everywhere, though yet illegal, the mass was al-
ready being introduced. The Emperor kept warning
Mary to be moderate, and to walk warily ; whilst the
churchmen, burning with zeal to come upon their own
again, were obstinately shutting their eyes to all that
had happened since bluff Henry's death. Renard it
was who almost daily saw the Queen with these mess-
ages of modern counsel from his master ; and the
subject of marriage was mentioned more than once.
Noailles and Gardiner were pushing as hard as they
might the suit of Courtenay ; but on the 7th August
Mary told Renard that she saw no fit match for her in
her own country, and had decided to marry a foreigner.
Then gently and tentatively the ambassador menr
tioned the Emperor's only son Philip. She affected to
laugh at the idea, forjthe Prince was only twenty-seven
—the same age as Courtenay, by the way — and, as she
said on another occasion, most of the bridegrooms they
offered her might have been her sons. But Renard
saw that his suggestion was not altogether an un-
welcome one, and hastened to ask his master for
further instructions. 'Do not overpress her,' wrote
Granvelle, ' to divert her from any other match ; because
if she have the whim she will carry it forward if she be
like other women.' But Mary Tudor's birth and
trials had made her not like other women ; and she
listened to the tale of marriage, not because she hank-

216 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

ered for a husband, but because she hungered for a son
to present to her people.

Noailles soon got wind of the plan to marry Mary
to the Emperor's son, and wherever French gold or
interest could reach the enemies of the new regime
they were plied with hints of the terrible results that
would come if Spain ruled England by Torquemada's
methods. A gust of panic swept over London at the
idea of an Inquisition ; for the Queen had come at first
with promises of toleration, and already the zeal of the
churchmen had darkened the horizon. On the eve of
the Queen's coronation, on the ist October, a Spanish
resident in London, whilst professing to despair of the
probability of the match, writes words that show how
well aware even private citizens were of the advantage
that it would bring to Spain. ' And if the Lord vouch-
safed us to behold this glorious day, what great advan-
tage would befall our Spain, by holding the Frenchmen
in check, by the union of these kingdoms with his
Majesty. And if it were only to preserve Flanders his
Majesty and his son must greatly desire it, ... for when
the Lord shall call his Majesty away the Low Countries
will be in peril of the Frenchmen attacking them, or of
the Germans (i.e., Lutherans) invading them by their
help, the succour from Spain being so remote, and the
people (i.e., of Flanders) not being well affected to-
wards our nation. It would also be most advantageous
to Spain, because if aught should happen to the Prince's
son (i.e., Don Carlos) the son born here would be King
of both countries, and, in sooth, this would be advan-
tageous to the English also.' l

1 Antonio de Guaras to the Duke of Alburquerque. * Antonio de Guaras,'
by Dr R. Garnett. For particulars of this personage, Antonio de Guaras,
see 'Espanoles 6 Ingleses,' por Martin Hume. Madrid y Londres, 1903.

MARY TUDOR 217

We may be sure that Mary's coyly sympathetic at-
titude was not lost on the Emperor. But Philip was a
man of twenty-seven, a widower since his boyhood,
witrTa mistress (Isabel de Osorio) whom he loved ; and
FoFliTany~years past he had been his own master, and
practically King of Spain, though nominally only Prince
Regent. His marriage, moreover, to a Portuguese
cousin with a rich dowry was in active final negotiation,
and the Emperor could not be sure how the Prince
would receive the suggestion of marriage with an un-
attractive foreign woman more than ten years his senior, .
and living in a far country. He need have had no
distrust. Philip under his system had been brought up
frornjhis birth to regard sacrifice to his mission as a
supreme duty. He was a statesman and a patriot, and
he saw as clearly as his father the increment of strength
that the union with England would bring to the cause
to which their lives were pledged ; and his reply, given,
as Sandoval says, 'like a second Isaac ready to sacri-
fice himself to his father's will and for the good^of the
church,' was, * I have no other will than that of your
Majesty, and whatever you desire, that will I do.'

Promptly on the heels of the courier that bore the
dutiful letter to the Emperor went two nobles of
Philip's household, Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza
and Don Diego de Geneda, to offer congratulations and
greetings to the new Queen of England in his name.
Geneda bore a secret message to her of a warmer
character than mere greeting ; and before the sump-
tuous coronation in Westminster Abbey on the ist
October, Mary had practically made up her mind to
marry her second cousin. She knew that England,
under Noailles' artful incitement, was in a ferment of
alarm at the idea ; but she was a Tudor ; she had some

218 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

long scores to settle, she needed strength to do it,
and opposition only made her firmer. Parliament met
on the 5th October, and, under pressure from Mary,
made a clean sweep of all the anti- Papal laws that had
severed England from Rome ; but when, influenced by
Gardiner and prompted by Noailles, the House of
Commons voted an address to the Queen praying her
not to marry a foreigner, Mary sent for the members
to wait upon her. The Speaker and a deputation of
twenty parliament men stood trembling before her and
presented their humble address, whilst the angry
Queen muttered that she would be a match for Chan-
cellor Gardiner's cunning. Her reply to the Speaker
was haughty and minatory : c Your desire to dictate to
us the Consort whom we shall choose we consider
somewhat superfluous. The English parliament has
not been wont to use such language to its sovereigns,
and when private persons on such matters suit their
own tastes, sovereigns may reasonably be allowed to
choose whom they prefer.' I This was the true Tudor
way of dealing with the Commons, and Mary having
obtained the religious legislation she needed to legalise
her own position on the throne, promptly dissolved the
parliament she had flouted.

It was only after much prayerful heart-searching that
Mary had so far made up her mind to prefer the Prince
of Spain. At first she had tried to make it a condition
that the Emperor should not ask her to marry any
candidate before she had seen him ; but this in Philip's
case was impossible. He was too great a catch to be
trotted out for inspection and approval, and when this
was gently put to her by Renard, she tearfully im-
plored the ambassador, whose hands she seized and

1 Correspondance de Cardinal de Granvelle.

MARY TUDOR 219

held between her own, not to deceive her with regard
to the Prince's character. Was he really well con-
ducted and discreet, as he had been described to her ?
The ambassador emphatically protested on his honour
that he was ; but still the Queen, almost doubting still,
wished that she might see him before she gave her
word. A good portrait by Titian was sent to her,
representing the Prince rather younger than he was, a
good-looking young man with the fair Austrian skin
and yellow hair, the slight curly beard hardly masking
the heavy jaw and underlip he inherited from his
father. Tjie. portrait appears to have banished the
last doubts in Mary's mind. She had never had a
love affair before, often as she had been betrothed :
even now her idea had been to marry because her
position entailed it. But the contemplation of the face
of him who was to be her husband, and Renard's
reiteration of his good qualities, gradually worked in
her mind an intense yearning for the affection for
which she had hungered in vain during her persecuted
youth.

On Sunday evening, the 3ist October, she summoned
Renard to a room containing an altar upon which the
monstrance with the Host was placed. The Queen
was alone, except for her devoted nurse Mrs Clarencius,
when the ambassador entered ; and with much emotion
she told him that since he had presented the Emperor's
letter asking her hand for Philip, she had been sleep-
less, passing her time in weeping and prayers for
guidance as to her choice of a husband. 'JThe Holy
Sacrament is my resource, in., all my difficulties^, she
"Said, ' and as it is standing upon the altar in this room,
I will appeal to it for counsel now ; ' and, kneeling, as
did Renard and Clarencius, she recited Veni Creator

220 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Spiritus almost below her breath. After a short silent
prayer she rose, calm and self-possessed, and told the
ambassador that she had chosen him for her father
confessor with the Emperor. She had considered
carefully all that had been told her about Philip, and
had consulted Arundel, Paget, and Petre l on the sub-
ject ; and, bearing in mind the good qualities and dis-
position of the Prince, she prayed the Emperor to be
indulgent with her, and agree to the conditions neces-
sary for the welfare of her realm ; to continue to be a
good father to her, since henceforward he would be
doubly her father, and to urge Philip to be a good
husband. Then solemnly upon the altar, before the
Sacred Presence, she promised Renard that she would
marry Philip, Prince of Spain, making him a good and
faithful wife, loving him devotedly without change.2
She had wavered long in doubt, she said, but God had
illumined her, and her mind was now made up : she
would marry Philip and no one else.

Renard was overjoyed at the news, which he sent
flying to the Emperor, but kept inviolably secret from
all others. But though no one knew, every one sus-
pected ; and the muttering of coming trouble sounded
on all sides. Lady Jane Grey, Northumberland's three
sons, Cranmer, Ridley, and others, were tried and
condemned to death. Risings here and there in the
country burst out sporadically, for disaffection was
everywhere ; Noailles' confabulations with Elizabeth
and Courtnay were discovered and denounced ; Pole
was stopped by the Emperor on his way to England ;
and Gardiner, kept in the dark as to the Queen's irre-

1 These were all councillors in the interest and pay of the Emperor, and
were pledged in any case to favour the match.

2 Record Office. Record Commission Transcripts, Brussels, vol. i.

MARY TUDOR 221

vocable promise, still battled against the project of a
Spanish match. But the secret had to be let out at
last, and the Spanish adherents in Mary's council were
obliged to consult Gardiner as to the marriage treaty.
They drove a hard bargain, notwithstanding all the
bribes and blandishments, for they were determined
that the marriage should not mean the political subjuga-
tion of England by Spain ; and the King Consort's
power was so fenced around by safeguards and limita-
tions that when Philip finally heard the conditions, he
was well nigh in despair, for he knew that if they were
fulfilled to the letter the marriage would be useless to
Spanish interests, and that his sacrifice would be in
vain. But of this the populace knew nothing. What
they did know was, that a Spaniard was coming to be
their King, and London at least shuddered at the
plenteous hints that Noailles had spread, that the In-
quisition and the auto de fe were coming too.

So when, on the ist January 1554, a troop of
foreign servants and harbingers rode through the
city of London to prepare the lodgings of the brilliant
imperial embassy that was to arrive next day, even
the 'prentices gathered as they passed and greeted
them with curses and volleys of snowballs.1 The
brilliant Count of Egmont and his train landed duly
at the Tower wharf on the morrow, to ask formally
for the hand of the Queen for the Emperor's son.
1 They were met by Sir Anthony Browne, he being
clothed in a very gorgeouse apparell. At the Tower
Hill the earle of Devonshire (i.e., Courtenay), with
the lorde Garrett and dyvers others, receyved him
in most honorable and famylier wyse ; and so the
lorde of Devonshire, gevyng him the right hand,

1 Chronicle of Queen Jane and Queen Mary. Camden Society.

222 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

brought him thoroughte Chepsyde, and so fourthe
to Dyrram Place (i.e., Durham House in the Strand),
the people nothing rejoysing, helde downe their heddes
sorowfully.'1 The formalities were soon got through
with a few solemn banquets and courtly ceremonies,
and on the I3th January Gardiner, with as good a
face as he could put upon the matter, made an oration
in the Chamber of Presence at Westminster to the
lords and officials, declaring the Queen's purpose to
marry Philip of Spain : ' in most godly lawfull
matrimonye : and further, that she should have for
her joynter xxx.mil ducketes by the yere, with all
the Lowe Country of Flanders ; and that the issue
betweene them two lawfully begotten shoulde, yf
there were any, be heir as well to the Kingdome of
Spayne, as also to the sayde Lowe Country. He
declared further that we were much bounden to
thanck God that so noble, worthye, and famouse a
prince, would vouchsaff so to humble himself in this
maryadge to take upon him rather as a subject than
otherwise : and that the Quene should rule all thinges
as nowe : and that there should be of the Counsell
no Spanyard, nether should have the custody of any
fortes or castells, nether have rule or offyce in the
quene's house or elsewhere in all England.'2 Gardiner
made the best of it, but the bare fact was enough to
send the friends of the late regime, and not a few
of those who had profited by the plunder of the

1 Chronicle of Queen Jane and Queen Mary. Camden Society.

2 On the 2ist January 1554 the Emperor wrote to Philip sending him
the treaty for ratification, and asked him to send powers for the formal
betrothal, since the English insist that when, by the blessing of God, the
marriage takes place you shall take an oath to respect the laws and
privileges of England : ' but the Queen confidently assures us that secretly
everything shall be done to our liking^ and we believe this? MSS.
Simancas. Estado, 808.

MARY TUDOR 223

church, into a delirium of fear. Carews, Wyatts,
and Greys protested, rebelled and collapsed, for
England, in the main, was loyal to Mary, and the
vast majority of the people, except in and about
London, bitterly resented the iconoclastic changes of
Edward's reign. The Queen knew her own mind
too, and in the face of danger was as firm as a
rock, for in her sight the Spanish marriage meant
the resurrection of her country and the salvation of
ieT~peopIE Charles and his son doubtless thought
so~Too^hr a general way, but tHat was not their first
Wliat they wanted was to humble France
means of their command of English

resources, and^to make Spain the dictatress of the world.
>n the very day that poor Wyatt's ' draggletayles,'
all mud-stained and weary with their march from
Kingston Bridge, were toiling up Fleet Street to
final failure and the gallows, a dusty courier rode
into Valladolid with the news for Philip, that the
offer of his hand had been accepted by the Queen
of England. The prince was at Aranjuez, a hundred
miles away, planning his favourite gardens, when the
news reached him, with the premature addition that
the Earl of Bedford was already on the way to Spain
with the marriage contract. Philip stopped his pastime
at once and started the same day for Valladolid with
his bodyguard of horsemen in the scarlet and gold
of Aragon. In haste the old city put itself into
holiday garb, and organised tourneys, cane-tiltings
and fireworks, to celebrate the agreement which was
to make the beloved Prince of Spain King of England.
The looms and broidery-frames of all the realms were
soon busy making the gorgeous garb and glittering
trappings to fit out the nobles and hidalgos who were

224 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to follow their prince to England, each, with Spanish
ostentation, bent upon outstripping his fellows in
splendour. Alba, Medina Celi, Aguilar, Pescara,
Feria, Mendoza and Enriquez, and a hundred other
haughty magnates, were bidden to make ready with
their armies of retainers all in fine new clothes, in
spite of Renard's warning that : ' Seulement sera reqms
que lesEspaignolez quisuyuront vostre Alteze comportent
les fafons de faire des Angloys, et soient modestes!

Phi]i^s__steward, Padjll§j was sent hurrying to the
coast to receive the Earl of Bedford, who did not
start from England for another month ; and the
Marquis de las Novas, loaded with splendid presents
from Philip to his bride, set out for England. Mary
was conspicuously fond of fine garments and jewels,
and Philip in his youth, and on state occasions, wore
the richest of apparel ; but even they must have been
sated at the piled-up sumptuousness for which their
wedding was an excuse. Philip's offering to Mary,
sent by Las Novas, consisted of 'a great table
diamond, mounted as a rose in a superb gold setting,
valued at 50,000 ducats ; a collar or necklace of
eighteen large brilliants, exquisitely mounted and set
with dainty grace, valued at 32,000 ducats ; a great
diamond and a large pearl pendant from it (this was
Mary's favourite jewel, and may be seen in the
accompanying portrait), the most beautiful gems, says
a contemporary eyewitness, ever seen in the world,
and worth 25,000 ducats; and then follows a list
of pearls, diamonds, emeralds and rubies, without
number, sent to Mary and her ladies by the gallant
bridegroom.1

1 ' The Coming of Philip the Prudent ' in ' The Year after the Armada,'
by Martin Hume.

MARY TUDOR 225

Whilst all these fine preparations were going on
in Spain, the Emperor more than once questioned
the wisdom or safetjLjrf allowing his son to risk
himself amongst 3^ people so incensed against the
match as the English, and in partial rebellion against
ijj arid Renard held many anxious conferences with
Mary and her council on the subject. The Queen
declared again and again that she would answer for
Philip's safety ; and she put aside, as gently as she
could, Renard's incessant promptings of greater
severity upon Elizabeth, Courtenay and the rest of
the suspects and rebels. Once, at the end of March,
Renard told her that if she was so lenient to rebels,
he doubted whether Prince Philip could be trusted
in her realm, * as he could not come armed ; and if
anything befell him it would be a most disastrous
and lamentable scandal. Not only would the person
of his Highness suffer, but also the lords and
gentlemen who accompanied him : and I could not
help doubting whether she had taken all the necessary
steps to ensure safety/ To this she answered, with
tears in her eyes, ' that she had rather never been
born than that any outrage should happen to the
Prince ; and she fervently hoped to God that no
such thing would occur. All the members of her
Council would do their duty in their reception of the
Prince, and were going to great expense about it.
Her Council shall be reduced to six members, as
Paget and Petre had advised ; and she would do
her best to dispose the goodwill of her subjects who
wish for the Prince's coming.'1

Mary was overwhelmed with anxiety. ' She had

1 Renard to the Emperor, 27th March 1554. Record Commission
Transcripts, also printed by Tytler.

P

226 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

neither rest nor sleep,' she said, ' for thinking of the
means of security for Philip in England.' But she
would not sacrifice Elizabeth for all the clamouring of
Renard, and even of Gardiner. She knew that the
French were almost openly subsidising rebellion
against her ; and that her people grew more appre-
hensive daily that her marriage with Philip would
mean a war with France for Spanish objects, but she
hadlibw set her mind upon the marriage, and nothing
in the world would shake her. Philip, though he was
not personally brave, was equally firm about coming,
even at risk of his life ; jor^Jiis was a spirit of sacrifice
and his marriage was a sacred duty. From duty Philip
never shrank, whatever the suffering it entailed.

On the I4th May 1554 Philip rode out of Valladolid
with nearly a thousand horsemen in gaudy raiment.
First going south west to near the Portuguese frontier
to meet his sister Joan, who had just lost her husband,
the Prince of Portgual, he turned aside to take a last
farewell to his grandmother, Joan the Mad, in her
prison-palace at Tordesillas, and then passed on from
town to town, through Leon and Galicia ; his puny,
hydrocephalic heir, Don Carlos, by his side, towards
Santiago and Corunna. Loving greeting and good
wishes followed him everywhere ; for was he not
going to fix upon yet another land, and that a rich
one, the seal that marked it as within the circle of the
Spanish realms? Proud were these hidalgos who
rode behind him, proud the Spaniards, high and low,
who welcomed him and sped him on his way, proud
the very lackeys in the smallest squireling's train ; for
they were all Spaniards, and they felt that this was a
Spanish victory.

On the vigil of St. John, 23rd June, Philip was

MARY TUDOR 227

received at the gates of Santiago by kneeling citizens
with golden keys as usual ; and as he and his train,
all flashing in the southern sun, pranced through the
streets of the apostolic capital, two English lords, Bed-
ford and Fitzwalter, sat at a window with their mantles
before their faces, watching the progress of their future
King. The next morning the English special envoys
were publicly led into Philip's presence. He met them
at the door of the chamber leading into the great hall,
and as the Englishmen bent the knee and doffed their
bonnets the Prince uncovered and bowed low. Bed-
ford, ' a grandee and a good Christian,' we are told by
an eyewitness, then handed the marriage contract to
him, and kissed hand, as did his colleagues. On
leaving the room one Englishman said to another,
apparently delighted at Philip's demeanour, ' O ! God
be praised for sending us so good a King as this ' ;
and the Spaniard who heard the remark and under-
stood English was only too glad of an opportunity of
repeating it to his gratified compatriots. The envoys
had good reason to be pleased with Philip, for though
he was usually a bad paymaster to those who served
him, he could be very liberal when it suited him ; and
on the day after the state interview a splendid piece of
gold plate, magnificently worked, and standing nearly
five feet high, was presented to Bedford, all the rest of
the Englishmen being dealt with_jn similar generous
fashion.

In the harbour a fine fleet of vessels rode at anchor
with several English royal vessels ; and Bedford prayed
that Philip would make the voyage in one of the
latter. This, however, was not considered prudent or
dignified ; but the English envoys were given the
privilege of choosing amongst the Spanish vessels

228 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

that which should carry the King. It was a fine ship
they selected, belonging to Martin de Bertondona, one
of the first sailors in Spain ; and when Philip went to
inspect it the next day it must have presented a
splendid sight, with its towering gilded poop and
forecastle, its thousand fluttering pennons ; and over
all the proud royal standard of crimson damask thirty
yards long.1 At length, after much ceremonious
junketing, the heralds announced that the King would
embark the next day, I2th July. There were over a
hundred sail, fully armed and carrying a body of over
six thousand men to reinforce the Emperor, besides
six thousand sailors ; and when the King stepped upon
his beautiful twenty-four-oared galley, all decked with
silk and cloth of gold, with minstrels and rowers clad
in damask doublets and plumed bonnets to go on board
the ship that was to bear him to England, the ' Espiritu
Santo,' the great crowd on shore cried aloud to God
and Santiago to send the royal traveller a safe and
happy voyage, and confusion to the French. On the
fifth day out a Flemish fleet of eighteen sail hove in
sight off the Land's End, and convoyed the Prince past
the Needles with some ships of the English navy ;
and on Thursday, iQth July 1554, the combined fleets
anchored in Southampton Water amidst the thunderous
salutes of the English and Flemish ships at anchor
there to greet them.

The English and Flemish sailors had not got on
well together during the stay of the Flemish fleet at
Southampton. The officers suspected the Lord
Admiral of England (Lord William Howard) of in-

1 Full details of Philip's voyage and arrival in England will be found in
' The Coming of Philip the Prudent ' in ' The Year after the Armada,' by
Martin Hume.

MARY TUDOR 229

triguing with the French to capture Philip on his way ;
and reported that he made little account of the Flemish
Admiral, de la Chapelle, and called his ships mussel
shells. When some of the Flemings had landed the
English soldiers had hustled and insulted them in the
streets ; and by the time Philip arrived in Southampton
water the two naval forces were not on speaking terms. l
On shore things were no better. The nobility of
England, usually so lavish, except those around the
Queen, were for the most part sulking as much as they
dared. They were too poor, they declared, to make
great and costly preparations to receive the King, and
even a majority of the Queen's Council were suspected
of plotting in favour of Elizabeth ; whilst Noailles was
tireless in his efforts to spread alarm and disaffection.

Bedford had reported that Philip was a bad sailor,
but fortunately the voyage had been a calm one, and
he remained at anchor for twenty hours before he
landed for the first time in England ; so that he was
quite able to carry out the instructions of his father,
and the recommendations of Renard, to conciliate^ the
English in every possible way. During his visit years
before to Germany and Flanders he had offended the
subjects there by his cold precision of manner and his
Spanish abstemiousness ; but from the first hour of
his stay in England, his whole behaviour underwent
a change, for at the call of duty he was even willing
to sacrifice all his usual tastes and habits. A crowd of
English nobles and courtiers who were to be Philip's
household came off at once to salute him on board the
1 Espiritu Santo ' ; and when the next day he stepped
into the magnificent royal barge that was to bear him

1 Renard to the Emperor, gih June 1554, Brussels Transcripts, Record
Office.

23o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to land, the Earl of Arundel invested him with the
badge of the Garter in the name of the Queen. With
him, besides the English lords, there went in the barge
a stately crowd of Spanish grandees, Alba, Feria, Ruy
Gomez, his only friend, Olivares, with Egmont, Horn,
and Bergues ; but no soldier or man-at-arms was
allowed on shore on pain of death. Philip had learnt
from Renard the agony of distrust felt in England of
Spanish arms, and at the same time came the even less
welcome news that the Emperor had suffered a defeat
in Flanders, and needed urgently every soldier that
could be sent to him. So the Spanish fleet was not
even allowed to enter the port of Southampton, but
after some delay and much grumbling on the part of
the Spaniards at what they considered churlish treat-
ment, was sent to Portsmouth to revictual for their
voyage to Flanders.

As Philip stepped ashore, Sir Anthony Browne in a
Latin speech announced that the Queen had appointed
him her consort's master of the horse, and had sent him
the beautiful white charger, housed in crimson velvet
and gold, that was champing its bit hard by. The
King would have preferred to walk the short distance
to the house prepared for him ; but Browne and the
lords in waiting told him that this was not usual, and
the former ' took him up in his arms and placed him in
the saddle, then kissing the stirrup, marched bare-
headed by the side of his new master to the Church of
Holy Rood.' The King must have looked a gracious
figure as he passed through the curious crowd smiling
and bowing, dapper and erect on his steed, with his
short yellow beard and close-cropped yellow head ;
dressed as he was in black velvet and silver, with
massive gold chains and glittering gems on his breast,

MARY TUDOR 231

around his velvet bonnet, and at his neck and wrists ;
and every one around him, so far as fine clothes went,
was a fit pendant to him. All the English guards,
archers, and porters wore the red and yellow of Aragon ;
and the nobles in attendance, both English and Spanish,
were splendid in the extreme ; but beneath the silk and
jewels beat hearts full of hate. The Spanish servants.
400 of them, who landed, were not allowed by the jealous
English to act for their master in any way ; and at
Philip's public dinner the day before he left Southamp-
ton, Alba forcibly asserted his right to hand the
napkin to his master ; whilst all the lowlier courtiers
stood by, idly scoffing and sneering at the clumsy ser-
vice of their English supplanters.

E)unngjlieJbwf^^ stay at Southamp-

ton^whilst his belongings were being landed, splendid
presents and loving messages passed almost hourly to
and fro between Mary and her betrothed. "Hundreds
of gaily clad servitors, with finely houselled horses,
diamond rings and gold chains galore, came from the
Queen at Winchester, though a continuous pelting rain
was falling; and on Monday, 23rd July, the great
cavalcade set out from Southampton 3000 strong. To
the disgust of the Spaniards the King was surrounded
by Englishmen alone ; and on the way 600 more
English gentlemen in black velvet and gold chains
met him, sent by the Queen as an additional body-
guard ; followed a few miles further on by another
embassy from her of six pages clad in crimson brocade
and gold sashes, with six more beautiful horses.1 The
rain never ceased, and soon Philip's felt cloak failed to

1 ' The Coming of Philip the Prudent,' in ' The Year After the Armada,'
by Martin Hume. Philip himself brought 600 Andalusian jennets to
improve the English breed of horses.

232 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

keep dry his black velvet surcoat and his trunks and
doublet of white satin embroidered with gold. So wet
was he, indeed, that he had to stay at St. Cross to don
another suit just as splendid, consisting of a black
velvet surcoat covered with gold bugles, and white
velvet doublet and trunks. And so clad he and his
train rode to the stately cathedral of Winchester to
hear mass ; and then to the Dean's house close by,
where he was to lodge.

That night at ten o'clock, after he had supped, the
Earl of Arundel came and told him that the Queen
awaited him at the Bishop's palace on the other side of
the Cathedral. Once more he donned a change of
garments : this time of white kid covered with gold
embroidery ; and with a little crowd of English and
Spanish nobles, he crossed the narrow lane between
the two gardens, and entered that of the Bishop by a
door in the wall.1 A private staircase gave access to
the Queen's apartment, and there Philip saw his bride
for the first time. The apartment was a long narrow
gallery, where Gardiner and several other elderly
councillors were assembled ; and as Philip entered the
Queen was pacing up and down impatiently. §he was,
as usual, magnificently dressed, with many jewels^over
her black velvet gown/' cut higVjjvjth a petticoat of
frosted silver. W hen her eyes lighted on him who was
to be her husband, she came rapidly forward, kissing
her hand before taking his, whilst he gallantly kissed
her upon the mouth, in English fashion.

In her case, at all events, it was^love at first sight.
The poor woman, starved and hungry for love all her
life, betrayed and illtreated by those who should have

1 Though the palace is a crumbling ruin, the door in the garden wall
remains.

MARY TUDOR 233

shielded her, with a soul driven back upon itself, at last
had found in this fair, trim built, young man, ten years
her junior, a being whom she could love without
reproach and without distrust. He^ confronted the
match in a pure spirit ^Lsacrifice ; for to him it meant
the~~victory of the cause for which he and his great
father lived. It meant, sooner or later, the crushing of
France, the extirpationTof heresy, and "the rlegerhony of
Spain over Europe ; and though Mary was no beauty,
PnTTFfTwas a chivalrous gentleman, and, having decided
to offer himself as a sacrifice for the cause, he did so
with a good grace. Sitting under the canopy side by
side, the lovers chatted amicably ; he speaking in
Spanish and she in French, though she made some
coquettish attempts to teach him English words.

The next day brought fresh changes of gorgeous
raiment, this time of purple velvet and gold, and the
public reception of Philip by his bride in the great hall.
There, under the canopy of state, the betrothed pledged
each other in a cup of wine, whilst the Spanish courtiers
sneered at everything English, and the Englishmen
frowned at the Spaniards. On the day of St. James,
the patron saint of Spain (25th July), the ancient
cathedral was aglow with brilliant colour. All the
pomp that expenditure could command, or fancy devise,
was there to honour a wedding which apparently was
to decide the fate of the world for centuries. The
Queen, we are told, blazed with jewels to an extent
that dazzled those who gazed upon her, as she swept
up to her seat before the altar, with her long train of
cloth of gold over her black velvet gown sparkling
with precious stones. Philip wore a similar mantle,
covered with gems, over a dress of white satin almost
hidden by chains and jewels. Upon a platform erected

234 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

in the midst of the nave, Philip and Mary were made
man and wife by Bishop Gardiner, who afterwards pro-
claimed to the assembly that the Emperor had trans-
ferred to his son the title of King of Naples.

At the wedding banquet in the bishop's palace that
afternoon Mary took precedence of her husband. She
sat on the higher throne, and ate off gold plate, whilst
Philip was served on silver ; and Spaniards scowled
at the idea that their prince should be second to any.
The solid sumptuousness and abundance of everything
struck the Spaniards with amazement, both at the
banquet and at the ball and supper which followed.
But the richer the country the greater their disappoint-
ment. Already they were grumbling that the sacrifice
the King had made was vain. Philip^jfter^an, was
not to be master in England, and must go to a council
tojtsk permissjonto do anything with English resources.
Nay, said the courtiers, so far from being master, it
is he who has to dance as these Englishmen play : he
must bend to their prejudices and caprices, not they
to his, as was fitting for vassals. The English, on
their side, were just as dour under the terrifying
predictions of French agents ; and as the royal lovers
travelled to Basing, and so to Windsor, Richmond
and London, matters grew worse and worse.

Philip, and Regard did their best to smooth ruffled
susceptibilities. All acts of clemency were ostentatiously
coupled with Philip's name, and the King surpassed
himself in amiability and generosity.1 Mary, in the
meantime, was perfectly infatuated with her young
husband, and he was kind and gentle to her, as he

1 This, I am aware, is contrary to the statements of most English his-
torians, and especially of Mr. Froude. The evidence in favour of my
view of the King's attitude is stated in my essay called * The Coming of
Philip the Prudent,' in ' The Year After the Armada ' and other historical

MARY TUDOR 235

was to each of his wives in turn. 'Their Majesties,'
writes a Spanish courtier, ' are the happiest couple in
the world, and are more in love with each other than
I can say. He never leaves her, and on the road is
always by her side, lifting her into the saddle and
helping her to dismount. He dines with her, publicly
sometimes, and they go to mass together on feast
days.' Then the same writer continues : ' These
English are the most ungrateful people in the world,
and hate Spaniards worse than the devil. They rob
us, even in the middle of the city, and not a soul of
us dares to venture two miles away for fear of
molestation. There is no justice for us at all. We
are ordered by the King to avoid disputes and put
up with everything whilst we are here, and to endure
all their attacks in silence. . . . We are told that we
must bear everything for his Majesty's sake.'1

Spanish nobler were openly insulted in jhe streets
of London, and Spanish priests stoned in the churches:
but this was not the worst. What galled most was
the growing conviction that all -tSs- humiliatioji was
in vain. Instead of a submissive people ready to bow
Ifae neck to the new King and his countrymen, the
Spaniards found a country where the sovereign's
pgwgt^_\^s__sj:iictiy~drcumscribed, and where a
foreigner's only hope of domination was by force of
arms. ' This marriage will, indeed, have been a
failure if the Queen have no children,' wrote one of
Philip's chamberlains. ' They told us in Castile that
if his Highness became King of England we should
be masters of France . . . but instead of that the

essays. Mr. Froude and his predecessors depended too implicitly upon
the entirely untrustworthy and biassed accounts sent by Noailles to
France, and the similarly inimical Venetian agent's version.
1 ' The Coming of Philip the Prudent.'

236 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

French are stronger than ever, and are doing as
they like in Flanders. Kings here have as little
power as if they were subjects ; the people who
really govern are the councillors, who are the King's
masters. . . . They say openly that they will not let
our King go until they and the Queen think fit, as
this country is quite big enough to satisfy any one
King.'

struggled on, gaining ascendancy

over his wife and gradually influencing the councillors
by gifts and graciousness.1 The fifty gallows that
had borne as many dead sympathisers of Wyatt were
cleared from the streets, and the skulls of the higher
offenders were banished from London Bridge, so that
the triumphant entry of Philip and Mary into the
capital should be marred by no evil reminders ; but
though London was loyal to Mary, it hated Spaniards
more jhan any c7t^Tm^rie~reaim ; and the crowd that
hailed the Queen effusively when, on the i8th August,
she and her husband went in state from Southwark
through the city to Whitehall, listened and believed
the wild and foolish rumours that a great army of
Spaniards was coming to fetch away the crown of
England ; that a Spanish friar was to be Archbishop

1 Ruy Gomez wrote from Richmond, 24th August 1554, to Eraso. 'The
King entertains the Queen excellently, and knows very well how to pass
over what is not good in her for the sensibility of the flesh. He keeps
her so contented that truly the other day, when they were alone together,
she almost made love to him, and he answered in the same fashion. As
for these gentlemen (i.e., the English councillors), his behaviour towards
them is such that they themselves confess that they have never yet had
a King in England who so soon won the hearts of all men.' MSS.
Simancas Estado, 808. In November 1554 Gonzalo Perez wrote to
Vasquez : 'The English are now so civil you would hardly believe it.
The kindness and gifts they have received, and are receiving every day,
from the King would soften the very stones. The Queen is a saint, and I
feel sure that God will help us for her sake.' — MSS. Simancas Estado, 808.

MARY TUDOR 237

of Canterbury, that English treasure was being sent
from the Tower to fill the Emperor's coffers, and
much else of the same sort that French agents set
afloat ; so, withal, there were few who smiled upon
the Queen's consort, let him smile as he might upon
them. Fair pageants decked the street corners, and
far-fetched compliments were recited to the King and
Queen by children dressed as angels, for the corpora-
tion of London had been warned that there must
be no lack of official signs of welcome ; but to prove
how sensitive and apprehensive both the court and
the people were, the story is told of how the Conduit
in Gracechurch Street was decked with painted figures
of kings, one of whom, Henry VIIL, was represented
with a bible labelled * Verbum Dei ' in his hand ;
whereupon Gardiner, in a towering rage, thinking
this quite innocent representation was intended as an
insult to the Catholic idea of the Bible, sent for
the painter and threatened him with all sorts of
punishments.

Philip's patience, however, was_gra_duallj^_break i ng
down _the__djstrust_ entertained in him. It was seen
that wherever his influence was exerted it was on the
side of moderation ; though of course it was not under-
stood that this and all his sweetness was only part of
the deep plan of the Emperor to obtain for his son full
control of English policy. Ma£y^s position at the time
was a most difficult one. She was deeply in love with
^ heFTiusband ; and she~ desired fervently^tHe^aggran-
disement of jSpain, which would mean the iriumph^of
Catholicism over heresy and security for her throne ;
buFsHe was an English Queen, determined if she could
to_rule for the good of her people, and to bring about
peace with France before she was drawn into the war.

238 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

When Noailles saw Mary to give his tardy and in-
sincere congratulations on the marriage that he had
tried so hard to thwart, she assured him that her
friendship with France was unchanged, and Philip
immediately afterwards added his assurance that he
would maintain intact all the alliances contracted by
England, whilst they were for England's good.1

After Pole had been made to understand that the
full restitution of church property in England must not
be pressed, or revolution would result, he was allowed
to come to England as legate, and the country formally
returned to the pale of the church in November 1554.
On the very day that Pole arrived it was officially
announced that the Queen was pregnant ; and all
England, and still more all Spaniards, greeted the
great news as a special favour vouchsafed by heaven.
To Philip and his father it meant very much ; for if a
son was__born the hold of Spain over England would
be^cbmplete for generations, at least long enough for

of the faith to be effected.

Its significance, even in anticipation, was made use of
by Philip at once, and during the jubilation to which
it gave rise, he caused his spokesman in parliament to
propose the sending of an armed English contingent
to aid the Emperor in the war against France, and the
appointment of himself as Regent of England in case
the expected child outlived his mother. The zeal of
Bonner and Gardiner, however, spoilt it all. They
hai_already begun their fell work of religious persecu-
tion ; and the reaction" that naturally resulted against
Spain compelled the Queen to dissolve parliament in
a hurry before Philip's turn was served.

Not only was Philip personally opposed to the per-

1 Ambassades de Noailles, vol. iii. Leyden, 1763.

MARY TUDOR 239

secution in England, which he saw would injure his
object, but he caused his chaplains openly to denounce
from the pulpit the policy pursued by the English
bishops. Renard ceaselessly deplored in his letters to
the Emperor this over zeal of the English churchman,
whose one idea of course was to serve, as they thought,
their church, and not Spanish political ends. For six
months Philip stood in the breach and dammed the
tide of persecution : but his father was growing im-
patient for his presence in Flanders. The deadly
torpor was creeping over him, though he was not yet
old, as it had crept over others of his house ; and he
had begged for months that his son should come and
relieve him of his burden. Philip had waited week
after week in the ever deluded hope that Mary's
promise of issue would be fulfilled ; but, at last, even
the unhappy Queen herself had become incredulous,
and her husband could delay his departure no longer.
By August 1555 the rogations and intercessions to the
Almighty for the safe birth of a prince were ordered to
be discontinued, and the splendid plot of the Emperor
and Philip to bring England and its resources per-
manently to their side against France and heresy, was
admitted to be a failure.

The conviction that she was to be childless was
only gradually forced upon Maryj for she had prayed
and yearned so much for motherhood that she could
hardly believe that heaven would abandon her thus.
In her mind a son born of her and Philip would have
made England, as she said, Catholic and strong for
ever ; and as the bitter truth of her barrenness came
home to the Queen she sank deeper into gloomy
despondency, increased by the knowledge that her
beloved husband, polite and considerate though he

240 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was to her, was obliged to leave her, with the tacit
understanding that their marriage had failed in its
chief object. Mary passionately longed to bring about
peace between her husband's country and France.
SHe knew that the revolutionary movement in and
about London was being actively fomented by French
intrigue ; that the crowd of pamphlets and scurrilous
publications attacking her and her faith were being-
paid for with French money ; and that unless peace
was soon made or the agitation stopped England would
be drawn into the war and her throne would be in peril.
But her efforts towards peace met with little real aid
from the French, for any step that consolidated her
position and gave time for Spaniards and Englishmen
to settle down under one system would have meant
ruin to France ; and Mary's Council, and more reluct-
antly Mary herself, was obliged to turn to the other
alternative, and attempt to suppress the organised
manifestations of rebellion against her rule.

The burning of heretical and treasonable books,
and even of the Edward vi. prayer book, was but a
prelude to the burning of bodies, and Renard warned
the Emperor that before Philip had been gone six
months from England the holocaust would begin. It
matters little whether the persecutions were religious
or political — the apologists of Mary and Elizabeth j^-
spectively strive to prove that their victims in each
case were political criminals ; and doubtless, according
to the letter of the law, they were — but it was clear to
Philip and his father, that whatever excuse might^be
advanced for the burning of Englishmen by Mary's
Council, the executions would increase the ill-feeling
agamst Spain, andlnake English resources less avail-
ableloT them against France. But notwithstanding

MARY TUDOR 241

this Charles would wait no longer for his son, and
peremptorily ordered him to return to Flanders.

Philip accompanied his wife in state through London
from Hampton Court to Greenwich I for the farewell ;
and there urged her — as he did her Council — to be
moderate in punishment. Mary herself was kindly
and gentle ; but she was a Tudor Queen, and she
lived in an age when the life of the individual was
considered, as nothing to the safety of the State as
constituted. Moreover, counsels of moderation coming
from Philip of Spain, the patron of the Inquisition,
could hardly have sounded very convincing ; though
they were sincere in the circumstances, for Philip was a
statesman before all things, a^ndj^ersecution in England
at the_time_was contrary to his policy. In any case
PEilip did his best to keep his hand on the break
before saying goodbye to his wife. Mary was in the
deepest affliction when she took leave of him on the
2 Qth August 1555, though she struggled to retain her
composure before the spectators of the scene. With
one close embrace she bade him farewell, and sought
solitude in a room of which the window commanded a
view of the Thames. So long as the barge that bore
him to Gravesend was in sight Mary's tear-dimmed
eyes followed it yearningly ; whilst Philip, courteously
punctilious, continued waving his hand and lifting his
plumed cap to her until a turn in the river shut him
from her sight.

Renard was right. No sooner had Philip gone than
the fires blazed out._ Hooper, Rogers, Saunders and
Tayor, were burnt a fortnight afterwards ; then Ridley

1 It had been announced and was generally believed that Mary was
dead, and the citizens were overjoyed to see her in an open litter with
Philip and Pole riding by her side.

Q

242 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

and Latimer some weeks later, to be followed in a
few months by Cranmer and the host of others less
distinguished. Gardiner, Mary's prime minister and
only able councillor, died in November, just after the
opening of parliament ; and then, with Pole, practically
a foreign ecclesiastic, as her only guide, with a divided
Council, and herself in utter despondency, ftlary_sank
into impotence. Philip had ordered

before he left that minutes ofliirthe Council meetings
should be sent to him, but he soon found it difficult
to_control, for his own ends, the action of ministers
far away ; and when soon afterwards he began to
press for English ships to fight the French at sea,
he found the Queen's Council tardy and unwilling.
The ships, they said, were not ready ; but as soon as
possible some would be sent to guard the Channel.
This did not suit Philip. The ships must be instantly
fitted out and commissioned ; not at Dover, as the
Council had promised, but at Portsmouth, to guard the
Emperor's passage to Spain. This, of course, was the
thin end of the wedge ; what he really needed — and
it was now the only benefit he could hope for from
his marriage — was that an English fleet should be at
his disposal to attack France. The coolness of the
English Council and the continued refusal to accede to
Mary's request and give him the crown matrimonial
of England, soon changed Philip's attitude, and the
suavity that had so remarkably characterised him in
England gave way to his usual dry hauteur towards
Englishmen whom he met in Brussels.

He had found his father in the last stage of mental
and bodily depression. All had gone ill with him ;
and the burden of his task, as far from fulfilment as
ever, was greater than he could any longer bear.

MARY TUDOR 243

' Fortune,' he said, ' is a strumpet, and reserves her
favours for the young ; ' and so to the young Philip he
had determined to transmit his mighty mission of Chris-
tian unification as a means of Spanish predominance.
In October 1555, in perhaps the most dramatic scene
in history, the Emperor solemnly handed to Philip the
sovereignty of Flanders ; and on the i6th January 1556,
the assembly of Spanish grandees, in the greaf hall of
the palace of Brussels, witnessed the surrender of the
historic crowns of Castile and Aragon by Charles v.
tcrhis beloved only son. Heart-broken Mary Tudor
from that day was Queen of Spain, as well as Queen of
England. The title was a hollow one for her, though,
fbrUer^mother's sake and her own, she loved the
country which alone had succoured them in their trouble ;
for Philip's accession made the return of her husband
to her side more than ever remote. Philip had pro-
mised faithfully to corne back, and in his letters to her
he repeated his promise again and again. On one
occasion when he was indisposed, Mary sent a special
envoy with anxious inquiries after his health. There
was nothing more the matter than the result of some
little extra gaiety on Philip's part ; and he reassured
his wife and announced his immediate visit to Eng-
land. The English messenger, overjoyed at the good
news, said to some of Philip's gentlemen, that, though
he was delighted to be able to bear the glad tidings to
the Queen, he would take care not to tell her that his
Majesty had exposed himself twice to the dreadful
weather then prevailing, and of his dancing at weddings,
as the Queen was so easily upset and was so anxious
about him that she might be too much afflicted.1

But still Philip came not ; and soon afterwards Mary

1 Badoero to the Doge. Venetian State Papers. i$th December 1558.

244 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was thrown into despair by the order from Brussels^
tKat the King's household in England was to proceed
to Spain. The English people followed the Spanish
courtiers with reviling when they embarked, for the
fear of being drawn into the war was stronger than ever ;
but to the Queen their departure was a heavy blow,
for it meant that hej|^sband would live in England no
more. For a few jionths in the early part of 1556, the
alliance of the jCpe and the King of France against
the Emperor Jpd Philip was broken up by the settle-
ment of a tmce between the latter and the French
aTtime matters looked more hopeful for

IVIary ; buy in the summer of 1556, the^war with
France broke out again, and Philip found himself face
toTace with apowerful coalition of the Papacy, France
an3jHeZTiirE ft ^peajojLa_war over half of Europe,
andnow if ever England might aid its Spanish King
Consort. Phllip~wro1£~~constantly urging the English
Council to join him in the war against France ; but met
only with evasions. Majyj^as—br^aking her heart in
sorrow and disappointment, but was willing to do any:
thing to please Philip. She had, moreover, her own
gruT^eagam^f France ; for Noailles and his master
had left no stone unturned to ruin her from the first
day of her accession. But her Council, and above all,
her subjects, had always dreaded this as a result of her
Spanish marriage, and were almost unanimously opposed
to the entrance of England into a strife which mainly
concerned the supremacy of Spain over Italy. Mary,
moreover, was in the deepest poverty, owing to her
own firm resolve against alt advice to restore to the
cKurch the forfeited tenths and first fruits ; and the
forced loans collected from the gentry, it was untruly
said at the instance of the Spaniards for the purposes

MARY TUDOR 245

of their war, had caused the deepest discontent in the
country.

It was clear that nothing more could be got from
England for Spanish objects unless some special effort
were made, and Philip was forced to undertake the
journey himself to try the effect^^jpersonal pressure.
Mary's joy at the news of his corm^p was pathetic in
its intensity, though Pole warned n^r that, as had
happened on other occasions, Philip rmwit not be able
to come after all. The hope of seeingUier husband
again seemed to give her new life, and sr^ hurried to
London, visiting Pole at Lambeth on tbm way, and
exerting herself to the utmost to win him ro her side.
Thenceforward for weeks, whilst the King's voyage
was pending, the English Council sat nearly night and
day, and couriers incessantly hurried backwards and
forwards to and from London, Brussels, and Paris.1
The French reinforced their troops around Calais and
Guisnes, and all the signs pointed to the approach^of a
war between England and France at the bidding of
PhilipT

"The King landed at Dover on the i8th March 1557,
and again all his haughty frigidity gave way to genial
smiles for all that was English.2 To the Queen's
delight he spent two quiet days with her alone at
Greenwich, and then rode through London to White-
hall by her side as she sat in her litter. Their recep-
tion by the citizens was polite, but cold ; for though

1 Michaeli, the Venetian Envoy (' Calendar of Venetian State Papers ')>
mentions one extraordinary journey of a courier at this time from Paris to
London in twenty-five hours.

2 It is related by the Flemish envoy Courteville that on his way through
interbury he entered the Cathedral with his spurs on, against the rule ;
id on being charged with this by a student, he paid the fine by emptying

lis purse of gold in the student's cap.

246 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Philip personally was not unpopular, the idea of going
to war with France for another nation's quarrel was
distasteful in the extreme to Englishmen of all classes.
What complicated the situation infinitely was that
Philip was at war with the Pope — that violent, head-
strong enemy of his house and nation, Cardinal Caraffa,
Paul iv. — and Pole, as legate, could not even greet
the King, much less acquiesce as a political minister in
a war against the Papacy on the part of England.
Mary, too, was torn between her devotion to the
Church on the one hand and her love for her husband
on the other. Her idea, and that of her Council, was
to provide a subsidy and an English contingent to
Philip, without entering into a national war ; and this
much, under the existing treaty between Charles v.
and Henry vm. in 1543, Philip had a right to claim if
he was attacked by France.

But the King wanted more from his wife's country
than that which he could have claimed even if he had
not married the Queen, and he ceaselessly urged upon
Maryland upon her Council, heavily bribed to a man,
the granting of much greater aid than that offered.
He was at last successful in this, though it was still
arranged that there was to be no declaration of war by
Mary against France, the English forces being used
only for the defence of Flanders and the territory of
Calais. There were to be 8000 infantry and 1000
horse, and an English fleet with 6000 fighting men
was to be raised and maintained, half at the cost of
England and half by Philip.

When this had been arranged, France struck her
counterblow, for it was clearly better for her to be at
open war, in which she could adopt reprisals on the
Scottish border, than to fight English contingents in

MARY TUDOR 247

Philip's service. The English Protestant exiles in
France were made much of and subsidised ; and hare-
brained Stafford and his crew of foolish young gallants
sailed from Dieppe on Easter Sunday to seize the
crown of England for himself. He captured Scar-
borough, but himself was captured directly afterwards,
and incontinently lost his head. It was a silly, hopeless
business ; but the rebels had started from France, and
had been helped by the French King, and the fact
was argument enough. On the 6th June 1557, war
was declared between England and France, and Philip,,
at last, saw some return for his marriage in England.
He hated war, and his methods were in all things
different from those of a soldier ; but his best chance
of securing a durable^peace was to show his strength
whilst his hold over English -resources lasted, and it
was clear from Mary's declining health that this would
not be long.

At the beginning of July, Philip rode for the last
time from Gravesend through Canterbury to Dover,
his ailing wife being carried in a litter by his side. On
the 3rd July he bade her farewell as he stepped into
the barge that carried him to the galleon awaiting him,
and Mary, with death in her heart, turned her back to
the sea, and went desolate to her home in London.

The combined army in Flanders was commanded by
the brilliant young soldier, Emanuel Philibert of Savoy,
who had 50,000 men, whilst the French army, under
Constable Montmorenci, reached barely Half that
number. Savoy began the campaign by several rapid
feints that deceived the French, and then suddenly in-
vested St. Quintin, into which Coligny with 1,200 men
just managed to enter before Savoy reached it. Find-
ing himself in a trap, Coligny begged Montmorenci to

248 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

come to his relief. The first attempt at this failed ;
and on the the loth August the French main body
made a desperate effort to enter the town by boats
over the Somme. This was found impossible, and
Montmorenci's force was surprised and taken in the
rear by Savoy's superior strategy. The order to retire
was given too late, and the French retreat soon became
a panic-stricken rout. Six thousand Frenchmen were
kitted, and as many more captured, with all the artillery
and Montmorenci himself; and there was no force
existent between Savoy's victorious army and the gates
of Paris. Philip was at Cambrai during the battle ;
and if he had been a soldier, like his cousin Savoy, or
even like his father, he might have captured the capital,
and have brought France to her knees. But he turned
a deaf ear to Savoy's prayers, and lost his chance, as
he did all his life, by over-deliberation. Te Deums
were chanted, votive offerings promised, joy bells rung,
but Philip's host moved no further onward. St. Quintin
itself held out for a fortnight longer ; and murder, sack,
and pillage, by the rascal mercenaries of Philip, held
high saturnalia, in spite of his strict command, and to
his horror when he witnessed the havoc wrought : and
then, with the fatal over-deliberation that ruined him,
he tamely quartered his men in the conquered terri-
tory instead of pressing his victory home.

The Germans, discontented with their loot, quarrelled
and deserted by the thousand ; the English, sulky and
unpaid, grumbled incessantly ; and the Spaniards
asserted that they had shown no stomach for the fight
before St. Quintin. Their hearts, indeed, were not in
the war, for it concerned them not, and they demanded
to be sent home. In London, the most was made of
the victory of St. Quintin by the Queen's Government.

MARY TUDOR 249

Bonfires blazed in the streets, free drink rejoiced the
lieges, and Pole, in the Queen's name, congratulated
Philip upon so signal a mark of divine favour ; but the
people wanted to gain no victories for foreigners, and
obstinately refused to be glad. Philip, as usual, was
pressed for money, and rather than keep the unruly
English contingent through the winter, he acceded to
their request to be allowed to go home.

Whilst Philip's forces were melting away in idleness
the fine French army under Guise, who were fighting
the Spaniards outside Rome, were suddenly recalled
by Henry u. to the Flemish frontier. The Pope was
then obliged to make terms with Alba, and withdrew
from the war, leaving the greater antagonists face to
face. The English fortress of Calais had been
neglected, and at the declaration of war Noailles, on
his way back to France, had reported that it might
be captured without difficulty. Guise and his army
from Italy suddenly appeared before the fortress, and
stormed and captured the Rysbank-fort on the sandy
island forming Calais harbour. The news, when it
came the next day (4th January 1558), to Mary,
found her again in high hopes of a child ; and she
received it bravely, setting about means to reinforce
the town without the loss of a day. Lord Pembroke
was ordered to raise a force of 5000 men and cross
to Philip's town of Dunkirk. But before they were
ready matters were desperate, for treachery was at
work within and without the fortress of Calais. Lord
Grey de Wilton at Guisnes was also in evil case ;
* clean cut off,' as he says, ' from all aid and relief.
I have looked for both out of England and Calais,
and know not how to have help by any means, either
of men or victuals. There resteth now none other

250 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

way for the succour of Calais, and the rest of your
Highness's places on this side, but a power of men
out of England, or from the King's Majesty, or from
both.' A first attempt to storm the citadel of Calais
failed, but a few days later a great force of artillery
was brought to bear. Wentworth, the governor, and
Grey, the governor of Guisnes, sent beseeching
messages to Philip for relief, but the time was short,
and no sufficient force to attack Guise could be raised.
Philip from the first had been impressing upon the
English Council the need for strengthening Calais ;
but, as we have seen, they were overburdened, without
money, and without any able leader. Calais had been
left to its fate, and on the 8th January 1558 the place
cheerfully surrendered to the French. A few days
afterwards Guisnes fell, and the last foothold of the
English in France was gone for ever.

When Guise had first approached Calais, Philip in-
structed his favourite Count de Feria to hasten to
England and insist upon reinforcements being sent.
Before his departure Calais fell, and on arriving at
Dunkirk to embark he learnt of the loss of Guisnes ;
whereupon he delayed his departure for a day, in
order not to be the bearer of the last bad news.
Tl^e_tidmgs__oX_the^&iglish defeats had fallen like a
thunderbolt upon Mary and her advisers ; but there
was no repining yet, so far as the Queen was con-
cerned, for God might yet, she hoped, send her a
son, and then all would be well. She would, she
said, have the head of any councillor of hers who
dared to talk about making peace without the restitu-
tion of the captured fortresses ; and church and laymen
alike opened coffers wide to provide funds for avenging
English honour and protecting English soil.

MARY TUDOR 251

Feria arrived in London on the 26th January,
though the primary reason of his mission had dis-
appeared when Calais fell. He saw Mary immediately,
and found her stout of heart and hopeful, desirous of
all things to please her husband, though doubtful
about the goodwill of her Council. Two days after-
wards Feria met the Council in Pole's room, and
presented his master's demands. Mary had told the_
ambassador that both they, and the people at large,
were murmuring that the war was of Philip's making,
and she thought that it would be well boldly to face
and refute that point before it was advanced by the
councillors. The Council listened politely to the
King's message, and recognising that they had before
them the ideas not only of King Philip, but of their
own Queen as well, took time to reply. A day or
two afterwards the Council visited Feria, and Arch-
bishop Heath, the chancellor, delivered their answer.
It was couched in submissive language towards Philip,
and told a sorry story. Far from being able to send
any troops across the sea, they badly wanted troops
for their own defence. The coast and the Isle ~of
Wight were at the mercy of the French, and an
invasion was threatened over the Scottish Border.
But if King Philip would send them 3000 German
mercenaries, for which they would pay, they would
quarter them in Newcastle to protect the north
country, and they would then arm a hundred ships
in the Channel with a considerable force of men,
some of whom might be used, at need, for Philip's
service. Feria reported that the 5000 Englishmen
he had seen at Dover, intended for embarkation, were
disorderly rascals, useless as soldiers, and he and his
master agreed that nothing could now be expected

252 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

from England in the form of a military contingent

Thecountry, says Feria, is in such a condition that
if a hundred enemies were to land on the coast they
could do as they liked.1 Confusion was spreading
throughout all classes in England, owing to the dislike
of the war for the sake of Spain, and to the dis-
quieting news of the Queen's health. Not a third
of the usual congregation go to church since the fall
of Calais, reported Feria ; and when, in a conversation
with the Queen, the ambassador explained to her how
the Spanish nobility were bound to contribute so many
mounted men each, in case of war, Mary sadly shook
her head at the idea of applying any such rule to
England. * Not all the nobility of England together,'
she said, ' would furnish her with a hundred horse.'
Parliament was sitting, and at the demand of money
tongues began to wag that it was to send across the
sea to the Queen's Spanish husband, whose proud
envoy could only sneer and scoff at the clumsy
English way of raising funds for their sovereign, and
tell everybody that he would be only too glad if he
could prevail upon them to raise the necessary money
for their own defence, for his master wanted none of
it from them.

Philip did not go so far as that, for he was very
hard~~pressed indeed, and urged upon Mary some
otrTer way of collecting funds besides the parliamentary
vole. In vain Gresham tried to borrow ,£10,000 in
T^ntwerp on the Queen's credit ; attempts to cajole
more money from the church and the nobles were
made with but small result. The money from the
parliamentary grant and other sources that could be

1 Feria to the King. MSS., ' Simancas Estado,' 81 1.

MARY TUDOR 253

got together was sent to Flanders to pay for the
raising of German levies for the English service ;
and at once the murmurs in London grew to angry
shouts, that English money was being sent out for
King Philip. The fitting out of the English fleet,
ostensibly for coast defence, was hurried forward, for
the distracted English councillors were deluded into
the idea that a great combined movement would be
made to recover Calais : they were frightened by a
false rumour that there was a strong French fleet at
Dieppe, that the Hanse Towns and Denmark would
descend on the east coast ; anything to get them to
push forward a strong fleet, really, though not
ostensibly, for Philip's purpose. But Philip took
care when the fleet was ready that Clinton should
use it as he desired ; l and the much-talked of 3000
German mercenaries never came to England, but in
due time were incorporated in Philip's army. It is
curious to see how cleverly Feria and his master
worked off the Queen against her councillors, and
vice versa. With regard to these mercenaries, for
instance, though the King was constantly sending
letters and messages to his wife, he purposely
refrained from mentioning his desire to make use of
the Germans, for whom she had paid. ' I am writing
nothing of this to the Queen,' he wrote; 'I would
rather that you (Feria) should prudently work with
the councillors to induce them to ask us to relieve
them of these troops.'2

Mary's hopes of progeny were once more seen to be
delusive ; and she, in deep despondency now, was

1 This English fleet was mainly instrumental in gaining for the
Flemings a great victory over the French under Termes in July 1558.

2 MSS., ' Simancas Estado,' 811.

254 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

seen to be rapidly failing. Pole also was a dying man,
said Feria ; and all the other councillors, though con-
stantly clamouring for Spanish bribes, were drifting
away from the present regime. ' Those whom your
Majesty has rewarded most are the men who serve
the least: Pembroke, Arundel, Paget, Petre, Heath,
the Bishop of Ely and the Controller.' Even Philip
himself was ready now to turn to the rising sun, and
away from his waning wife. ' What you write (he
replied to Feria) about visiting Madam Elizabeth
before you leave England, for the reasons you mention,
seems very wise ; and I am writing to the Queen that
I have ordered you to go and see the Princess, and I
beg the Queen also to order you to do so.' I When
Feria had frightened the Queen and Council out of
all that was possible, he went to Hatfield to see
Elizabeth, with all manner of kind messages and
significant hints from Philip ; and sailed from England
in July, leaving as his successor a Flemish lawyer
named D'assonleville.

Mary had lost all hope. She knew now, at last,
that she would never be a mother : the persecutions
for religion, and above all the war for the sake of
Philip, had made her personally unpopular, as she
never had been before ; she had not a single, honest
capable statesman near her, Pole being now moribund,
buFa set of greedy scamps who looked to their own
interests alone ; and the doomed Queen saw that not
for her was to be the glory of making England per-
'manently Catholic, and ensuring uniformity of faith in
Christendom. As the autumn went on the Queen's
condition became more grave, and constant fever
weakened her sadly. In the last week of October

1 MSS., 'Simancas Estado,' 811.

MARY TUDOR 255

D'assonleville wrote to Philip that the Queen's life
was despaired of, and Feria was instructed to make
rapidly ready to cross, and stay in England during
the period of transition that would supervene on her
death. On the 7th November D'assonleville wrote
again, urging that, as Parliament had been summoned
to consider the question of the succession, it would be
well that Philip himself should if possible be present.
This was true ; but Philip had his hands full, and,
even for so important an errand as this, he could not
absent himself from Flanders ; for the peace commis-
sioners from England, France, and Spain were in full
negotiation, and peace to him now was a matter of
vital importance.

Feria arrived in London on the Qth November, and
found Mary lying in her palace of Saint James's only
intermittently conscious. She smiled sadly as the
ambassador handed her Philip's letter, and greeted her
in his name ; but she was too weak to read the lines
he had written, though she indicated that a favourite
ring of hers should be sent to him as a pledge of
her love. Her faithful Clarentius and beloved Jane
Dormer, already betrothed to Feria, whom she after-
wards married, tended her day and night : but most of
the others who had surrounded her in the day of her
glory were wending their way to Hatfield, to court the
fair-faced young woman with the thin lips and cold eyes
who was waiting composedly for her coming crown.
Feria himself took care to announce loudly his master's
approval of Elizabeth's accession when her sister should
die ; and did his best to second the Queen's efforts
to obtain some assurance from the Princess that the
Catholic faith and worship should be maintained in
England. Elizabeth was cool and diplomatic. She

256 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

knew well that she must succeed in any case, and was
already fully agreed with her friends as to the course
she should take, careful not to pledge herself too far
for the future ; and when Feria, leaving the Queen's
death-bed, travelled to Hatfield to see the Princess,
she was courteous enough, but firmly rejected every
suggestion that she should owe anything to the patron-
age of the King of Spain.

Mary in her intervals of consciousness was devout
and resigned, comforting the few friends who were
left to sorrow around her bed, and exhorting them to
faith and fortitude. It was the I7th November, and
the light was struggling through the murky morning
across the mist upon the marshes between Saint
James's and the Thames, when the daily mass in
Mary's dying chamber was being celebrated. The
Queen was sick to death now, but the sacrament she
ordered for the last time riveted her wandering brain,
and the clouds that had obscured her intelligence
passed away, giving place to almost preternatural
clearness. She repeated the responses distinctly and
firmly ; and when the celebrant chanted ' Agnus Dei
qui tollis peccatur mundi] she exclaimed with almost
startling plainness, * Miserere nobis ! Miserere nobis !
Dona nobis pacem" ; then, as the Host was elevated,
she bowed in worship, with closed eyes that opened
no more upon the world that for her had been so
troubled.

And so, with a prayer for mercy and peace upon
her lips, and her last gaze on earth resting upon the
holy mystery of her faith, Mary Tudor went to her
account.1 Her life was but a passing episode in the

1 This account of Mary's last hours is from the Life of Jane Dormer,
Duchess of Feria, by her confessor and secretary, Father Clifford.

MARY TUDOR 257

English Reformation.; for she was handicapped from
the first by her unpopular marriage, and the,unstatej-
manlike religious policy of her ecclesiastical Advisers.
Like Tier mother, and her grandmother Isabel, she
would deign to no compromise with what she considered
evil. ' Rather would I lose ten crowns if I had them/
she exclaimed once, ' than palter with my conscience ' ;
and, though to a less exalted degree, this was Philip's
attitude of mind also. Fatejcast themAoth^inan^age
when rigidity of belief_wasjbreaking down^belonTthe
revival of ancient learning, jmd the widened outlook
of life growing from the renaissance. They were
pitted against rivals whose convictions were as wax,
but who were determined not only to win but to
appear right in this world, at any sacrifice of principle ;
and the fight was an unequal one. Mary could not
diange— only once under dire' compulsion did she
even pretend to give way in the matter of religion-
Elizabeth changed as often and as completely as
suited her purpose : Philip had only one invariable
set of convictions and methods^ his rivals had none,
but invented them and abandoned them as occasion

serve

And so Mary Tudor failed ; pitiably, because she_^
was naturally a good woman, who did her best accord-
ing to her conscience. But the defects of her descent
were too strong for her : she was a Tudor, and con-_
sequently domineering and obstinate ; she was a grand-
daughter of Isabel the Catholic, and as a natural result

mystically devout and exalted, raring nothing- for VimrLan
suffering in the pursuit of her saintly aims ; she was an
English Queen, proud of her island realm ; a Spanish
princess, almost equally proud of the land of the

Catholic kings ; and, to crown all, she was the consort

R

258 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of Philip IL, pledged to the cause for which he lived^
the unification of the Christian faith and the destruction
of the power of France.^ Within a year of her death
England was a Protestant country, and Philip was
married to a French princess.

BOOK I II

II

ISABEL OF THE PEACE

(ELIZABETH DE VALOIS)

BOOK II I

WHEN Mary Tudor lay dying at Saint James's, and all
England was in the throes of coming change, Feria
archly hinted to Elizabeth that she might secure her
succession and consolidate her throne by marrying her
Spanish brother-in-law when her sister should die.
Elizabeth loved such hints and smiled, though she did
not commit herself; and for the next few weeks the
main endeavour of Philip and his agents was to
perpetuate his hold over England by means of the
marriage of the new Queen. They all failed at first
to gauge her character. Feria was certain that if she
decided to marry a foreigner, ' her eyes would at once
turn to your Majesty ' ; and, at length, after his usual
tedious deliberation and endless prayers, Philip once
more donned the garb of matrimonial martyrdom and
bade Feria offer his hand to the daughter of Anne
Boleyn. The conditions he laid down were ridiculous,
for even he quite misunderstood the strength of Eliza-
beth and the new national spirit of her people. She
must amongst many other things become a Catholic,
and obtain secret absolution from the Pope. * In this
way it will be evident that I am serving the Lord in
marrying her, and that she has been converted by my
act.' Elizabeth keenly enjoyed the compliment con-
veyed by the offer ; but she neither wished nor dared
to accept it, and she played with the subject with de-
lightful skill until the latest possible moment. While

261

262 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the question was pending, Philip kept open the peace
negotiations with France, in order that, if he had his
way in England, pressure might be exerted to obtain
the restitution of Calais ; but as soon as it became clear
that he was being used by this cunning young woman
as a cat's paw, he gave her clearly to understand that
he intended to make peace himself, Calais or no Calais ;
and the treaty of Cateau Cambresis was signed on the
2nd April 1559, leaving the erstwhile English fortress
in the hands of France.

Throughout the negotiations that followed Eliza-
beth's accession, Philip's advisers urged upon him
incessantly the vital need for him to retain his hold over
England by conquest and force if other means failed.
TFe new Queen, they said, was not yet firmly estab-
lished ; the country was unsettled, and now was the
time to act if ever. Philip was well aware that the
friendship of England was of greater importance to
him than ever, but he hated war, and the growth of
protestantism in Europe, especially now that Elizabeth
was Queen of England, had suggested to him a com-
bination that exactly suited his diplomatic methods.
When the peace negotiations had first been broached
in the summer of 1558, Henry n. of France had sug-
gested that a close league of the great Catholic powers
might be formed to withstand the growth of heresy
throughout Europe. Such combinations had been
attempted several times before, but had never been
sincerely carried out ; national traditions had always
been too strong. It had been further proposed at the
ephemeral truce of Vaucelles in 1556, that the friend-
ship of France and Spain might be cemented by the
marriage of Philip's only son Carlos to Henry's eldest
daughter Elizabeth of France.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 263

The idea slumbered and the truce was broken ; but
at the begining of the peace negotiations of Cateau
Cambresis the marriage was again brought forward,
and in principle accepted by Philip. When it became
evident after Mary Tudor's death that England under
the new Queen might stand aside, or even permanently
oppose Spain on religious grounds, Philip decided that
an entire change of policy that should isolate Elizabeth
would suit him better than war. So a close union with
France was adopted ; Philip^s name was substituted for
that of his son in the treaty, and the widower of thirty-
two became the betrothed" husband of the most
beautiful and gifted princess in Europe, the^dainty eldest
daughter of Henry n. and Catharine de Medici.^ It
was a clever stroke oT policy ; for it not only bound
France to Philip against heresy everywhere, as it was
intended to do, but it enabled him to counteract from
the inside any attempt on the part of his allies to de-
pose Elizabeth of England in favour of Mary Queen
of Scots, the next Catholic heir and the betrothed wife
of the Dauphin of France. So far as France was
concerned, the substitution of Philip for his son as a
husband of the princess was an advantage. Don
Carlos, though of the same age as the bride (14), was
a deformed, stunted epileptic, who probably for years
to come, if ever, would not possess any political power ;
whereas Philip, in the prime of manhood, was by far
the most powerful sovereign in the world at the time,
and could, if he chose, at once render any aid that
France might need in suppressing the reformers.

Elizabeth of Valois, or Isabel of the Peace, as the
Spaniards called her, was the flower of an evil flock.
Tall, graceful, and well formed, even in her precocious
youth, she had been destined from her birth for splendid

264 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

marriage. ' My daughter, Elizabeth, is such that she
must not be married to a duchy. She must have a
kingdom, and a great one/ said her proud father once,
when his younger daughter Claude was married to the
Duke of Lorraine ; and the Spanish ambassador,
describing her magnificent christening feast at Fon-
tainebleau, in July 1546, says that : ' Isabel was chosen
for her name, because of the hope they have at a future
time of a marriage between her and the Infant (i.e. Don
Carlos), and Isabel is a name beloved in Spain.'1 We
may doubt the correctness of this ; for the Princess's
sponsor was Henry vm. of England, and probably he
chose the name after his own mother, Elizabeth of York.
Isabel grew up by the side of her sister-in-law, the
young^tjueen of Scots ; and although the latter was
four years the senior of her companion, they were close
rivals in the learning then becoming fashionable for
young ladies of rank. The curious Latin and French
didactic letters written by Mary Stuart, aged ten or
eleven, to her little sister-in-law, although prim and
priggish according to our present ideas, throw a flood of
light upon the^severe and systematic training for their
future position that the young princesses underwent.
After making all allowances for inevitable flattery on the
part of such a courtier as Brantome, it is evident that
Isabel was a beauty of the very first rank. ' Her visage
was lovely and her eyes and hair black, which contrasted
with her complexion, and made her so attractive, that
I have heard say in Spain that the gentlemen did not
dare to look at her, for fear of falling in love with her,
and to their own peril making the King jealous. The

1 A curious account of the splendid festival, which celebrated at the
same time the signature of the peace with England and Isabel's baptism,
is given by the Spanish ambassador. (Spanish Calendar, vol. viii., edited
by Martin Hume.)

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 265

churchmen also avoided looking at her for fear of
temptation ; as they did not possess sufficient strength
to dominate the flesh on regarding her.' In 1552 she
was betrothed to Edward vi. of England, and this
danger to Spain, averted by Edward's death, made
Philip and his father all the more eager to keep a firm
hold upon England as soon as Mary's accession made
an alliance possible.

It was this young beauty of fourteen whose portrait
by Janet was sent to Philip in the early days of 1559.
He was always an admirer of women, and had been
twice an affectionate husband ; but his first wife he
had married when he was but a boy, and she died
within a year ; and his second wife, Mary Tudor,
was, as we have seen, married to him for political
reasons alone. Dona Isabel de Osorio, who had been
his acknowledged mistress for years, and had borne
him children, had retired into a convent, and was, of
course, now out of the question. The sight of this
radiant young French beauty seems to have stirred
Philip's heart to as much eagerness as he was capable
of feeling.1 But though the bride was an attractive
one, and her own family exhausted eulogy in her
praise, as well they might, for no princess of her
time excelled her, the^marriage was regardedjon both
sides as a political event of the first importance,
though, as we shall s^ea_jJL_^came^£eally mure -im-
portant even than was anticipated. It was vital for
Philip that he should have some control over French
policy now that friendship with England was deniecl

1 The Bishop of Limoges, writing to Cardinal Lorraine soon after the
betrothal (8th August 1559), says : ' Never was a prince so delighted with
any creature as he (*'.*., Philip) is with the Catholic Queen, his wife. It
is impossible to put his joy in a letter.' — L. Paris, ' Negociations sous
Francois II.'

266 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

him ; whilst to have his own clever daughter by the
side of Philip was to the King of France a guarantee
that no step inimical to him would be taken in Sgajn
without his knowledge, and that he could depend upon
the help, or at least the neutrality, of Spain if he had
to deal with the French and Scotch reformers, who
seemed to threaten the basis of authority. Thence-
forward the Catholic sheep were to stand apart from
the Protestant goats throughout the world.

So, when the saturnine Duke of Alba, with his
train of gallant gentlemen, rode into Paris on the
igth June 1559 to wed Isabel, as proxy for Philip,
the court and capital, all swept and garnished in its
gayest garb, were impressed with the knowledge that
these brilliant nuptials were intended to mark a new
departure in the politics of Christendom. Led by the
princes of the blood royal of France, the Spaniards
and Flemings who represented Philip rode through
the crowded and jubilant city to the Louvre, heralded
by triumphal music, and were received at the door
by Henry n. and his court. Alba dismounted and
knelt at the King's feet, but was raised and embraced
by Henry, and, arm in arm, Philip's proxy and his
erstwhile enemy entered the great hall where the
Queen Catharine and her daughter sat in gorgeous
state, surrounded by their ladies. As Alba knelt and
kissed the hem of the girl's robe, it was noticed that
the colour fled from her cheek, and she rose from
her chair and remained standing whilst the Duke
read to her Philip's message, and handed to her the
splendid casket of jewels he had sent her. One of
the gifts was a portrait of the bridegroom in a superb
diamond locket, which Isabel pressed to her lips.

On the next day, 2Oth June, the same great hall

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 267

of the Louvre was crowded with the princes and
nobles of France, whilst the solemn betrothal cere-
mony was performed that gave to Isabel the title of
Queen of Spain: and on Thursday, 2ist June, the
capital was alive from early dawn for the marriage
itself. Frenchmen and Spaniards alike could speak
of nothing but the dignity and beauty of the bride.
Even Alba, dour as he was, broke into exclamations
at the perfections of the new Queen, and grew almost
romantic in her praises in his letters to Philip. Isabel,
indeed, had been well schooled by her mother, whom
she feared and admired more than any other person
in the world. Catharine de Medici was still, to some
extent, in the shade, for the Duchess of Valentinois
was the real Queen ; but she was profoundly wise,
and had moulded her favourite daughter well for the
character she was destined to play. Isabel herself
was fully conscious of the great position she was
called to fill, and was proud of the triumph that was
hers.

She bore herself throughout the trying ceremonies
with a composure and grace which she knew were
fitting for the Queen of Spain ; and as she glided,
holding her handsome father's hand, along the
gorgeous aised and covered gangway leading from
the bishop's palace to the great door of Notre Dame,
she presented a vision of beauty adorned with such
stately magnificence as can rarely have been sur-
passed, even at the marriage of her friend and sister-
in-law, Mary Stuart, in the same place shortly before.
The texture of Isabel's robe was literally interwoven
with pearls. Round her neck was suspended Philip's
portrait, and the great pear - shaped pearl which
was the greatest treasure in the crown jewels of

268 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Spain. Her mantle was of blue velvet, enriched
with a border of bullion embroidery a foot wide.
The train of this gorgeous robe was borne by her
sister Claude, Duchess of Lorraine, and Mary Stuart,
Queen of Scots, and, as she foolishly called herself,
Queen of England. Isabel wore an imperial crown
which, we are told, cast a halo of light around her
as she walked, so refulgent were the jewels of which
it was composed.1 Alba, in cloth of gold and with
the royal insignia, personated his absent master, and
in his name was married to the Princess by Cardinal
de Bourbon. Splendour truly seems to have excelled
itself in that sumptuous court on this occasion ; the
long-standing enemies, France and Spain, each trying
to outdazzle the other in its lavish magnificence.

But scowling faces there were not a few, for this
was the triumph of the house of Lorraine, and the
debonair Duke of Guise and his brothers took no
pains to hide their elation, whilst the princes of the
blood of the house of Bourbon, the Montmorencis and
the reformers were full of foreboding, for they knew
now that their enemies could look across the Pyrenees,
almost certain of aid from the most powerful potentate
on earth. Queen Catharine, too, clerical though she
was, smiled with a bitter heart, for she had no love
for the house of Guise. For days the festivities went
on : masque and banquet, ball and tournament follow-
ing each other with wearisome brilliancy, for another
daughter of France, Margaret, was wedded at the
same time to the Duke of Savoy, and the double
nuptials called for double display.

At length the last and greatest of the gallant shows
was held under the shadow of the Bastille, hard by the

1 Miss Freer's * Elizabeth de Valois,' quoted from Godefroi.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 269

gate of St. Antoine, on the 3Oth June. In gorgeous
tribunes under broidered silken canopies sat the Queen
of France and Spain, Catharine and her dearest
daughter ; and the Duchesses of Lorraine and Savoy,
with the fairest court in Christendom, gathered around
the great parallelogram of the lists to witness the tour-
nament. The glittering courtiers, gay as they looked,
who stood behind the ladies in the seats, knew that
the ^wedding feast really celebrated a political event oX.
the_firsr^corisequence. It JorebodecT the suppression
of Protestantism in Scotland by France, a war with
j&hgland, and the crushing of reform in France itself
and in Flanders ; for there was to be no more para-
lysing rivalry between" Philip and his new father-in-law,
a"ncl iT maHe the Catholic Guises the masters of France.
Butlione could tell that the stroke_that_was to seFall
these events into immediate motion was to fall so soork
Henry 11., shallow and vain of his unquestioned pre-
eminence in the gallant sport, rode into the lists upon
a big bay war horse, decked, like its rider, with the
black and white devices and interlaced crescents of
Diane de Poitiers, Duchess of Valentinois. The
King of France was determined in the presence of
the Spanish grandees to show that he, at least, was
no carpet knight, like their King Philip, and he rode
course after course victoriously with princes and nobles,
until the light began to wane. Catharine, desirous of
ending the dangerous sport, sent a message from her
tribune to pray her husband to tilt no more for that
day. Henry laughed to scorn such timid counsel.
He would run once more against the Franco-Scot
Montgomerie, Sieur de L'Orge, who tried his best to
avoid the encounter without success. At the first shock
Montgomerie's lance carried away the King's visor, but

270 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the shaft broke with the force of the impact and a
great jagged splinter pierced the eye and brain of
Henry of Valois, who, within three days, was dead.

The whole political position was changed in a day.
The new King Francis and his wife, Mary Stuart,
were little more than children ; and the young Queen's
uncles the Guises would rule France unless Catharine
the Queen Dowager could beat them on their own
ground. For her, indeed, the hour had now come, or
was coming. For years she had been patient whilst
the King's mistress held sway ; but if she could com-
bine the enemies of the Guises now she might be
mistress of France. The alliance with Spain was no
longer to be used if she could help it as a means for
crushing Protestantism ; for to Protestantism she must
partly look to crush the Guises ; but if by diplomacy
and the efforts of her daughter Isabel she could win
Spanish support to her side on personal grounds, then
she might triumph over her foes. It needed, as we
shall see, consummate skill and chicanery, and, in the
end, it did not succeed ; for Philip would naturally in
the long run tend towards the Guises, the enemies of
reform, and he was easily led by a woman.

And thus the mission of Isabel of Valois in marrying
Philip was changed in a moment^ by Montgomerie's
unlucky lance thrust from a national and religious to.
a nersonal and political object. But Philip was a
difficult man to be used for the ends of others ; what
he had needed was French neutrality whilst he tackled
heresy, and he had no desire to forward the interests
oTan ambitious Italian woman whom he hated ; though
at first there was just one element that made him in-
clined to smile upon Catharine, doubtfully orthodox
though she was. The_Queen of Scots and France

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 271

was Catholic heiress of England ; and the Guises were.
already preparing to employ French national forces to
oTost Elizabeth in favour of their niece. This Philip
could never have permitted : better for him a Protes-
umt E no land than a French England : so again
national interests over-rode religious affinities, and
before the ink of the treaty of Cateau Cambresis was
well dry the spirit that inspired the agreement was as
dead as the king who had conceived it.

Philip was still at Ghent when the news of Henry's
death reached him, yearning to get back again to his
beloved Spain, and full of anxiety that even there the
detested heresy was raising its head in his absence.
His Netherlands dominions would clearly have to be
taught submission ; Elizabeth of England was posi-
tively insolent in her disregard of him, and if Spain
failed in orthodoxy then indeed would he and his cause_
be lost. His most pressing need therefore, for the
moment, was to keep the alliance with France intact
foF~the purpose he had in view, whilst restraining the
activity of the Guises in England on behalf of their
niece, Mary Stuart- All went well in this respect at
first. The Montmorencis and the princes of Bourbon
were divested of political power, the ultra Catholic
party was paramount, and even the Queen mother,
Catharine, was working in apparent harmony with the
Guises. But to keep his hand firmly upon the machine
of government in France, it was desirable for Philip to
have at his side at the earliest possible day his young
French wife. Whilst Isabel was yet in mourning
seclusion with her mother, Philip continued to press
for her early coming, and in July the French ambas-
sador, the Guisan Bishop of Limoges, told the im-
patient bridegroom that the Princess now only awaited

272 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the instructions of her future husband to commence
the journey towards the Spanish frontier.

As usual, the smallest detail was discussed and
settled by Philip with his Council at Ghent ; the
choice of the Queen's confessor, the exact etiquette to
be followed on her reception in Spanish territory and
afterwards, the number of her French household, the
amount of baggage she and her suite might bring, and
even the exact manner in which she was to greet the
Spaniards who went to receive her. On the 3rd
August Philip wrote from Ghent to the Cardinal
Archbishop of Burgos to make ready with his brother,
the Duke of Infantado, to proceed to the frontier for
the new Queen's reception soon after the King himself
should arrive in Spain. But Isabel's departure from
her own land could not be arranged hurriedly. There
was a prodigious trousseau to be prepared, so enormous,
indeed, as to strike with dismay the Spanish officers
who had to arrange for its conveyance over the
Pyrenees and the rough bridle paths of Spain ;
Catharine, too, was loath to let her daughter go
before she had indoctrinated her with her new task
in Spain, and she insisted upon her attending the
coronation of her brother, Francis IL, at Rheims in mid
September.

Philip, always impatient for the coming of his bride,
arrived in Spain by sea on the 8th September 1559;
and signalised his arrival by the great auto de fe at
Valladolid, that was to indicate to Europe that heresy
was to be burnt out of the dominions of the^CathoT^g
king. Full of far-reaching religious plansV Tor^which
it was necessary that he should be sure of France, the
presence of his French wife by his side was more than
ever necessary, and in October he sent a special envoy,

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 273

Count Buendia, to France to demand that the bride
should start at once : ' first, because of the great desire
of his Majesty to see and keep the Catholic Queen in
his realm as soon as possible, he begs most earnestly
his good brother the Christian King and Queen
Catharine, to arrange so that, in any case, the Queen
should start at once, and arrive at Bayonne by the
end of November.' l Another letter from the King to
the same effect was written to Isabel herself, and she
in reply promised through the French ambassador in
Spain to delay her departure no longer.

But week followed week*, and yet the bride came
not.' Splendid presents and loving messages from
"PTTilip went to her frequently, and kind replies were
returned from Isabel and her mother. But intrigue
was already rife in the French court, and Catharjne
was trying to gain promises trom Philip to support
her against those who, she said, were bent upon dis-
turbing her son's realm. So every excuse was seized
upon to keep Isabel in France. jjntil Philip bar!
promised what was required The French found him
anything but compliant, and at length, in the depth
of winter (i;th December), Isabel, with her mother
and brother, and a great train of courtiers, left Blois
on her long journey south. The household of the
new Queen appointed by her mother was extremely
numerous, notwithstanding the remonstrances of
Philip's agents, who broadly hinted that they would
not be allowed to remain in Spain. Three of the
Bourbon princes of the blood, Anthony, Duke of
Vendome, husband of Jeanne d'Albret, titular Queen
of Navarre, his brother, Cardinal de Bourbon, and
the Prince of Roche sur Yon, were to accompany her

1 ' Documentos Ineditos/ vol. iii. Philip to Francis II. from Valladolid.

S

274 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to the frontier, a good excuse for sending them away
from Paris, and two Bourbon princesses, the Countess
d'Harcourt (Madame de Rieux), and her niece, Anne
of Bourbon, were to go with her into Spain.

All these great personages and scores of others
needed long lists of servitors and trains of baggage,
and the journey over the snowy winter paths was long
and tedious. The greatest difficulty was foreseen, how-
ever, in the transport over the Pyrenees of the vast
mass of impedimenta taken by Isabel and her ladies.
Much of it was sent by sea, and was only received
in Spain after long delay and continued annoyance to
the ladies, who had to appear in the ceremonies with-
out their fine clothes. The girl lost heart as the time
grew near to bid farewell to her mother. She loved
France dearly, with an ardour she never lost to the
last day of her life, and the French people returned
her devotion. Along the roads to Chatellerault crowds
stood in tears, invoking blessings upon the angel who
\ v^asJLo be sacrificed on the altar of peace. France
and Spain had been at war for generations': Philip's
cold, haughty demeanour, which had earned him the
dislike of Flemings, was equally distasteful to French-
men, and stories current of the gloomy rigidity of his
monastic court struck the heart of the bright young
beauty with fear and dread.

For some days Catharine and her daughter stayed
at Chatellerault, loath to say good-bye ; but at last, on
the 29th November, the parting could be delayed no
longer, and, heartbroken, mother and daughter took a
tearful farewell. Isabel had been reared in the poetical
court in which Ronsard sang, and every courtier wooed
in verse. Mary Stuart throughout her life showed the
effects of such training, and so did Isabel. She and

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 275

her mother had exchanged poetical letters during the
months of their mourning, and continued to do so
afterwards ; and on her lonely way from Chatellerault
Isabel solaced herself by inditing a letter in verse to
the beloved mother whom she had just left. As poetry
it leaves much to be desired. The poem is too long
to quote, but in it the writer compares her desire to
see her husband with the much stronger natural love
for her mother, who, she says, is to her father, mother,
and husband in one. The epistle ends thus : —

' Tantost je sens mon ceil plorer puis ryre,
Mais la fin est toujours d'estre martyre,
Qui durera sans prendre fin ne cesse,
Jusques d tant que je reprenne adresse
Pour retourner vers vous en diligence :
Lors oblyant la trop facheuse absence
Je recevrai la joye et le plaisir,
Et joyrez de mon parfait desir
D'ensemble veoir pere mere et mari.' '

The next morning brought Isabel a similar poem of
regretful adieu from her mother, and some really
poetical lines from Mary Stuart, in which the following
occur : —

' Les pleurs font mal au coeur joyeux et sain,
Mais au dolent, ils-servent quasi de pain :
Car si le mal par les pleurs n'est alleg£
A tout moins il en est soulageV

Through snow-clad France the long cavalcade slowly
made its way. Endless questions of etiquette, prompted
by pride and jealousy on both sides, occupied French
and Spanish officials the while. Philip, as usual, saw
to the smallest point himself. The proud Mendoza

1 Bibliotheque Nationale, ' Fonds Frangois,' No. 7237, where there is
a considerable collection of the poems of both mother and daughter
unprinted. Miss Frere quotes some of Catharine's lines to Isabel, but
not the above.

276 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Cardinal objected to give precedence to the King of
Navarre, as he was not a real king, and the Doge of
Venice had always given place to Cardinal Mendoza,
' The Prince of Roche sur Yon may be called "lordship,"
because he is of royal blood, but he must have only
the privileges of an ambassador whilst in Spain.' The
Countess of Urena, who was to be Isabel's mistress
of the robes, a proud dame in Philip's entire confidence,
was to keep close to the Queen, and decide all points
of feminine etiquette ; whilst Lopez de Guzman,
Isabel's Spanish chief steward, was to arrange every-
thing according to Spanish etiquette in her table
service. Cardinal Mendoza was instructed to alight
and salute the Queen humbly when he first approached
her, and his brother the Duke was to kiss her hand,
notwithstanding any reluctance she might show. Each
morning the Cardinal was to visit her, whereupon she
was to receive him standing, and order an arm-chair to
be brought for him, and he was to be seated whilst he
stayed with her. The Duke of Infantado, chief of the
Mendozas, was only to be received by the Queen
standing the first time he visited her, and for him was
to be brought a red velvet stool upon which to sit ; but
the Duke was warned that this privilege was only to
last during the journey, and was to cease when Isabel
joined her husband.1 And so on, down to the smaller
courtiers in gradation, the honours to be given and
received are all set down in minute detail, that of itself
was sufficient to strike awe in a young girl of fifteen,
who had passed her life in the gay poetical court of her
father.

It was a cruel irony that sent Anthony de Bourbon,
the shadowy King Consort of Navarre, to deliver the

1 * Documentos Ineditos,' vol. iii.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 277

French Consort of the real King of Navarre to her
husband on the frontier of the little mountain kingdom,
and he probably only accepted the mission in the hope
that the long-pending negotiations with Spain, for
giving him some adequate compensation, such as the
title of King of Sardinia, might be advantageously
pushed on such an occasion. Philip fooled poor vain
Anthony as long as it suited him, but without the
remotest intention of giving any satisfaction to the
house of Navarre. When, therefore, in deep snow-
drifts the Queen's cavalcade reached the little frontier
town of St. Jean Pied de Port on the last day in the
year 1559, and France was all behind them, Anthony
and the other Bourbon princes were on the alert to
resent any slight that might be offered to them by
the Spaniards. The exchange of the Queen to the
custody of her husband's envoys was to be made at
a point between St. Jean and the Spanish hamlet of
Roncesvalles, but the inclement weather and heavy snow
made it impossible to reach the elevated spot agreed
upon ; and for three days Isabel and her French suite
tarried weatherbound at St. Jean. For the first time
she donned there the Spanish dress, and received
some of her Spanish household ; and on the 3rd
January 1560 she started on horseback towards the
frontier, for she refused to enter her new realm in a
litter, and thus, with her veritable army of attendants
and baggage-train, she tramped through the savage
pass and into the valley of Valcarlos into Spain.

The cold was intense, and through the elevated
mountain paths the snowstorm drove furiously, yet
she pushed bravely on until she could gain the shelter
of the monastery church of Our Lady of Roncesvalles
in Spanish territory. It was a great concession for

278 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the French to make, and Anthony de Bourbon would
not have crossed the frontier first but for the insistence
of Isabel, and the impossibility of carrying out the
ceremonious programme of handing over the Queen
in a Pyrenean pass in a mid-winter snowstorm.
Further than Roncesvalles he was determined he
would not go, though only five miles further, at the
village of Espinal, the Cardinal and the Duke with
the Spanish train were lodged. At the gate of the
Augustinian monastery, where the King of Navarre
helped the almost frozen Queen to alight, there stood
beside the prior and dignitaries a group of Spanish
nobles who had ridden over from Espinal unofficially
to greet their new Queen ; and after the religious
ceremony and prayers in the beautifully decorated
church, these nobles and their followers almost came
to open fight with the Frenchmen. As Isabel left
the church to enter the apartments in the monastery
assigned to her, the Spaniards, jealous that in their
own country Frenchmen alone should attend the
Queen, flocked in unbidden after her, and had to be
forcibly ejected by those in attendance upon her.1

Distrust and suspicion prevailed on all hands. It
had~t>een arranged, after much courtly wrangling, that
the transfer of the custody of the Queen should take
place at a point exactly midway between Roncesvalles
and Espinal, but King Anthony made the weather an
excuse — probably a perfectly good one — for urging
the Spaniards to come the whole way to Roncesvalles,
rather than expose the Queen and themselves to a
long ceremony in an open field three feet deep in

1 The account of Isabel's voyage and reception is drawn mainly from
the narratives of eyewitnesses in the correspondence published by M. L.
Paris in ' Negociations sous Frangois II.'

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 279

snow. But Infantado was shocked at the idea that
he and his brother the Cardinal should be asked to
go a step further than the Frenchmen, and refused.
Anthony remonstrated, but in vain ; and in the lone
monastery in the Pyrenean valley Isabel passed two
more days waiting for either the pride or the snow
to melt. At length she lost patience. She was as
tenacious of French honour as any one, Jbut she well
knew that the success of her mission depended upon
hefwinning the affections of the Spaniards, and on
tHe^th January she sent for Navarre and told him
that she intended herself to ride to the spot agreed
upon for the exchange. The French nobles were
indignant, and at first inclined to shirk the journey,
but Isabel, young as she was, could be imperious
and insisted ; and in torrents of sleet the great
cavalcade, with the ceremonial finery already be-
draggled, had prepared to start, when the welcome
message came from Espinal that the Duke and the
Cardinal had relented, and were now on their way to
Roncesvalles to obey, as they said, the summons of
their Queen.

The utmost confusion then ensued, for the whole
of the baggage, with hangings, furniture and dresses
had been packed, and much of it had already started
forward, especially the best frocks and furbelows of
Isabel's crowd of ladies, who saw their beds and
finery no more for many a long day. The light was
failing in the stormy winter day when Cardinal
Mendoza and his brother Infantado, preceded by sixty
Spanish nobles in brave attire, marched side by side
up the great torch-lit hall, at the end of which Cardinal
de Bourbon stood upon a canopied dais, surrounded
by French ecclesiastics and nobles. Under the cloth

28o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of state, blazoned with the lilies of France, the powers
of the envoys were exchanged and read ; and then,
with much stately salutation and stilted verbiage, the
Spanish nobles were led to the chamber where, upon
a raised throne, Isabel awaited them with King
Anthony and the two Bourbon ladies. But the place,
a solitary mountain monastery, was unfit for courtly
ceremonies ; and the Spaniards were so eager to do
homage to their new Queen that soon all seemliness
was lost, and a jostling crowd filled the presence
chamber, each Spaniard trying to get the best place
and hustling rudely aside the French, and even the
French ladies in attendance, until the latter had to
retire.

Isabel remained calm and dignified, determined to
say nothing to offend the Spaniards ; but when the
Mendozas advanced, and the actual exchange was to
be made, she turned pale as she stood to receive
and greet them. Through the interminable pompous
speeches that accompanied her transfer she remained
outwardly unmoved, but when Navarre had actually
handed to the custody of Spaniards ' this princess,
whom I have taken from the house of the greatest
king in the world to be delivered to the most
illustrious sovereign upon earth,' and the Bourbon
princes came forward and knelt to say farewell, the
girl's strength broke down, and she wept bitterly.
Cardinal Mendoza, apparently to improve the occasion,
advanced and chanted the verse, Audi filia et vide
inclina aurem tuam, and the response was intoned
by another Spanish priest, obliviscere populum tuum,
et domum patris tui. She^joved her people and the
home of her fathers dearly ; she was going, almost
a child, to live the rest of her Fife amongst strangers

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 281

who had been the enemies of her house for genera-
tions, ^tcT wed a man she had never seen, but of
wKom she could have heard little but evil ; and, aiT
the" words of the versicle were croaked by the eccle-
siastic, they seemed to the overwrought girl a sentence
of doom, and in an agony of tears she threw herself
into the arms of Anthony of Navarre and his brother
the Cardinal. She was led away gently by Infantado,
with some chiding words that she, the Queen of Spain,
should so condescend to the Duke of Vendome. In
the midst of her grief she answered with spirit that
she did so by order of her brother, and, ' as to princes
of the blood, and after the fashion of the nation to
which, up to that moment, she had belonged.'1 And,
so still in tears, the beautiful black-eyed girl was led
to the Spanish litter awaiting her, and through the
heavily-falling snow was carried, to the sound of many
hautboys and trumpets, to the wretched village of
Burgete, where she was to pass the night ; even there,
comforted by the beds, hangings, lights, food and
delicacies, sent by her French countrymen to furnish
forth her poor quarters.'2

There is no space here to follow the Queen step
by step through her new country to join her husband
It was a progress full of jealousy and bitterness between
the French household of the Queen, that still accom-
panied her, and the Spanish courtiers. At Pamplona,
the capital of Navarre, where the" company passed
three days, Isabel charmed all hearts by her grace
and beauty as she was carried through the thronged
thoroughfares from the cathedral to the royal palace

* Negotiations sous Frangois n.,' p. 173.

2 Even more comforted, we are told, were the poor maids of honour,
whose own beds and baggage had gone astray.

282 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

where she was to lodge. At the foot of the grand
staircase stood a lady of fifty, stern and haughty in
appearance, but now all smiles as she kissed the hand
of the Queen and delivered to her a letter from King
Philip. It was the Countess of Urena, daughter of
the Alburquerques and the Toledos, and one of the
greatest ladies in Spain, who had been chosen by
Philip as the guide, philosoper and friend of his new
consort. She looked sourly upon the two Bourbon
princesses whom she was obliged to salute ; and on
the departure from Pamplona after three days of
rejoicing Isabel, desirous of propitiating the Countess
of Urena, whom Philip had praised inordinately in his
letters, offered her a seat in her own litter. This she
thought fit to refuse, as she was panting for the fray
to establish her precedence next to the Queen ; and
when the cavalcade was starting her lackeys, violently
hustling aside the equipage of the elder Bourbon
princess Madame de Rieux, intruded that of the
countess into the place in front of it. An affray
resulted, and an appeal to the Queen, who decided
politely in favour of the blood royal of France until
King Philip himself should give his orders — which
he subsequently did by placing the countess between
Madame de Rieux and her unmarried niece. But the
proud dame stored up in her mind the memory of
the slight, and many a troubled hour for Isabel grew
out of this incident.

The young Queen's life in Spain may now be said
to have commenced, and already she had shown the
tact and diplomacy so extraordinary in a girl of fifteen.
Her hold upon the affection of the Spaniards was
tenacious from the first, owing partly, of course, to
her great beauty and sweetness, but also to her

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 283

prompt adaptability and acceptance of Spanish customs.
From her childhood she had studied Spanish, and a
very few weeks after her entrance she spoke it fluently.
But she never forgot her own people and her own_
tongufiZT^To Frenchmen she always spoke in French,'
wrote Brantome, 'and would never consent to dis-
continue it, reading always in French the most
beautiful books that could be got in France, which
she was very curious to obtain. To Spaniards and
other foreigners she spoke Spanish very correctly.
In short, this princess was perfect in everything,
besides being so splendid and liberal as never was
seen. She never wore a dress twice, but gave them
all after once wearing to her ladies ; and God knows
what rich and splendid dresses they were ; so rich
and superb, indeed, that the least of them cost three
or four hundred crowns, for the King, her husband,
kept her very lavishly in such things. Every day
she had a new one, as I was told by her own tailor,
who went thither a poor man and became richer than
anybody, as I have seen with my own eyes. She
was always attired with extreme magnificence, and
lier dresses suited her beautifully : amongst others,
those with slashed sleeves with laced points, and her
head-dress always matched, so that nothing was
wanting. Those who saw her thus in a painted
portrait admired her, and I will leave you to guess
the delight it was to see her face to face with her
sweetness and grace. . . . When she went walking
anywhere, either to church or to the monasteries or
gardens, there was such a great press and crowds of
people to gaze upon her that it was impossible to
stir ; and happy indeed was the person who could say
after the struggle, " I have seen the Queen." Never

284 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was a queen so beloved in Spain as she ; not even
the great Queen Isabel herself. The people called
her the Queen of peace and goodness, ancTlouf
Frenchmen called her the " olive branch." ?I

Philip at Guadalajara, the town of the Mendozas,
waited impatiently the coming of his bride. With him
from Toledo had come his sombre widowed sister Joan,
and when they learned, at the end of January 1560,
that the Queen's cavalcade was approaching, it was
made known that the King wished special efforts to be
made by the city to welcome his bride. Through
artificial flowering woods with tethered birds and
animals, through lines of gaily decked booths amply
supplied with good cheer for the free refreshment of
her suite, by kneeling aldermen in crimson velvet and
white satin, and through an admiring populace, Isabel
of the Peace rode into the city between the Cardinal
of Burgos and the Duke of Infantado. At the door
of the famous palace of the Mendozas, where Philip
lodged, stood Princess Joan, who half knelt and kissed
the hem of the girl's garment ; then led her by the hand
into the large hall, at the end of which a sumptuous
altar was erected. Before it, in a gilded chair, sat
Isabel's husband, grave of aspect beyond his thirty-
three years. He saluted his bride ceremoniously ; and
after mass at the altar the marriage was performed by
Cardinal Mendoza.

Philip's impatience for his bride had been more
political than personal, for he needed above all things
to be sure of France, and there was at first little
cordiality between the newly wedded pair. The first
afternoon, as the sovereigns sat in their tribune wit-
nessing the bull fight and cane tourneys held in the

1 Brantome, ' Dames Illustres.'

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 285

great square of Guadalajara to celebrate the wedding,
the frightened girl gazed so fixedly in the face of her
husband that Philip became annoyed, and turned to
her curtly and said : 'What are you looking at? To.
see whether I have grey hair.'1 Through the tedious
feasting that followed, the marriage still looked un-
promising. The girl was unformed and inexperienced,
and was overwhelmed with the importance of the task
Her mother had confided to her. Around her there
raged incessant jealousy, both between the Countess
of Urena and her French ladies, and amongst the
French ladies themselves, and it needed all the author-
ity of Catharine de Medici, and the fear with which
she inspired her daughter, to keep Isabel on the right
path amidst the contending factions.

The letters that passed betwen them show how
absolute was the command that at first Catharine
exercised over her daughter, a command that later was
to~a great extent replaced by that of Philip. Isabel
in the quarrels of her French ladies had sided with
Madame Vimeux against her principal attendant,
Madame de Clermont, and, girl like, had made friends
with some of her younger French maids. Upon this
her mother wrote to her as follows : ' It really looks
very bad for you in the position you occupy to show
that you are such a child still as to make much of your
girls before people. When you are alone in your
chamber in private, you may pass your time and play
with them as much as you like, but before people be
attentive to your cousin,2 and Madame de Clermont.
Talk with them often and believe what they say ; for

1 Brantome says he had this story from one of Isabel's ladies in waiting
who was present.
8 i.e. Anne of Bourbon Montpensier.

286 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

they are both wise, and aim at nothing but your honour
and well being ; whereas those other wenches can only
teach you folly and silliness. Therefore do what I tell
you, if you wish me to be satisfied with you and love
you, and to show me that you love me as you ought.' I
From Guadalajara Philip and his Consort passed on
to Toledo for the completion of the festivities, and to
present his son Don Carlos to the Cortes, to receive
their oath of allegiance as heir to the crowns of Castile.
The capital received the Queen with unusual pomp, and
after the public reception was over Isabel retired to her
chamber with her favourite French maids, who for pas-
time danced before her. Soon the Queen, flushed and
excited, rose and danced several times herself. Her
high colour was noticed by some of the elder ladies,
who had been instructed by Catharine to watch the
precious health of her daughter closely ; and in the
morning Philip found that his girl wife was in a
burning fever, which was soon pronounced to be small-
pox.

x Up to this time Philip had not been particularly
demonstrative towards his French bride ; and she had
not quite got over her fear of him. But her dangerous
illness struck both him and her mother with dismay.
Sach of them was determined to use her as a means to
keep a hold upon the other, and her death threatened
to be disastrous for both ; but, apart from this, her
mother was devotedly attached to her, and Philip was
beginning to love her as he loved no other person in the
world, except, years afterwards, his elder daughter by
her. Couriers galloped backwards and forwards be-
tween Paris and Toledo with daily news of the pro-
gress of the malady. No fear for his health, no

1 'Negotiations sous Francois II.,' p. 706.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 287

remonstrance from his courtiers, could persuade Philip
to keep away from his sick wife ; and for long periods
during the most dangerous stages of her illness he
would not leave her side. Catharine was almost beside
herself with anxiety. For her everything depended
upon her daughter's success in gaining influence over
her husband, and for this Isabel's beauty was as
necessary as her life. The attack proved to be light,
and the patient was soon out of danger ; but Catharine
showered upon the ladies in attendance questions and
counsels innumerable, as to the marks left by the fell
disease. The many remedies she sent appear, accord-
ing to Brantome, to have given way to the one which
he mentions as having saved the Queen from dis-
figurement ; namely, the covering of the exposed skin
with fresh white of egg. Though Isabel was soon out
of danger her convalescence was long and tedious, and
the intimate details of her bodily habit and condition
that passed between Catharine and Madame de Cler-
mont, frank to the extreme of coarseness, show how
increasingly the Queen-Mother was depending «pon
her Spanish son-in-law to sustain her amidst the war-
ring interests that were rapidly dividing France.

The irregularities so frequently reported by Madame
de Clermont in Isabel's health, at one time seem to
have suggested to her distracted mother that her dis-
order was the outcome of the dreadful disease which
it was stated she had inherited from her grandfather
Francis i. ; and Catharine alternated scolding with
prayers to her daughter to be circumspect, until Isabel
trembled with very fear when she opened one of her
mother's letters.1 ' Recollect ' (wrote Catherine), * what
I told you before you left. You know very well how

1 Brantome, ' Dames Illustres.'

288 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

important it is that no one should know what malady
you have got ; for if your husband were to know of it
he would never come near you.'1 France had aban-
doned almost every thing at the Peace of Cateau
Cambresis in order to gain the support of Spain
against religious reform, and Catharine now looked
to her daughter to bring the same influence upon her
side in any case. Everything depended upon this
girl's being able to captivate her experienced husband
and to lead him as she liked. Philip, it is true, was
now in love with her ; but his policy was

a fixed principle: it_jva§ never swayed by personal
affection ; and Isabel was really as powerless to move

him as all others who tried to do so.

r~Catharine had impressed particularly upon her
daughter that she was to use every effort to draw the
ties between France and Spain closer, by bringing about
a marriage of her young sister Margaret2 with DOJI
Carlos : or, in any case, to oppose to the utmost his
marriage with an Austrian cousin ; even if it were
necessary to marry him to his aunt Joan. When
Isabel entered Toledo she saw for the first time Philip's
heir. He was within a few months of her own age, a
lame, epileptic semi-imbecile ; already vicious ancf un-
controllable. When he approached his stepmother for
the first time he was yellow and wasted with inter-
mittent fever, and it was noticed that she caressed and
petted him more than he had been accustomed to ; for
he had never known a mother. The passionate ill-
conditioned boy had been told only a year ago to call
this young beauty his wife, and now to see her the

1 ' Negotiations sous Frangois n.'

2 i.e. Margaret of Valois, La Reine M argot, who afterwards married
Henry IV., the Bearnais on the evil day of St. Bartholomew, and was sub-
sequently put aside by him.

ISABEL OF V ALOIS.
.-//'/</• " PditiliiHi '»/ Panto

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 289

wife of the father, whom he feared and hated, turned
his heart to gall. During her illness and convalescence
he was ceaseless in his inquiries about her ; and when
her health again allowed her to resume her family life,
she went out of her way to entertain and please him.
It was probably the only gentle feminine influence he
had ever experienced, for his widowed aunt Joan,
whom he alternately loathed and adored, was a gloomy
religious mystic, almost old enough to be his mother ;
and Isabel was not only just his own age, beautiful and
French, but for the purposes of her mother exerted all
her charms to gain his goodwill.

The romantic story that makes her fall in love with
this poor unwholesome boy may be put aside as base-
less ; but it is probably true that her own charms,
added to his jealousy and hate of his father, made him
fall in love with her. The letters Isabel wrote to her
mother at the time all speak of Philip as a most affec-
tionate husband, and of Don Carlos simply with pity
for his ill-health ; whilst Catharine's replies constantly
urge her to iacline hen stepson to-a marriage with her
sister Margaret ; ' or you will be the most unfortunate
woman IrT~the world if your husband dies, and the
Prince (Carlos) has for a wife any one but your own
sister.' Unfortunately the youth was unable to hide
his extraVagant affection for his young stepmother ;
and soon all the French ladies were nodding and
shrugging their shoulders at the romance that was
passing before their eyes, which probably Isabel her-
self hardly understood.

The need for Catharine to draw personally nearer
to Spain was greater, and yet more difficult, than ever
after the_death, in November 1560, of her young son
F rancis ii. J7here was no fear now jrfJFrance being

T

29o QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

drawn into war again for the benefit of Mary Stuart,
but, on the other hand, Mary Stuart herself, being- a
widow, might marry Don Carlos, and^ become, by
Spanish aid and the efforts of the English Catholics,
Queen of Great Britain, in which case France would
be isolated indeed.1 Cardinal Lorraine, and afterwards
Mary herself, bade briskly for this match ; but, though
Philip shrank from saying so, Carlos was, he knew,
unfit for marriage altogether. In answer to Catharine's
constant pressure upon her daughter to persuade Carlos
to marry Margaret, Isabel repeatedly assured her that
she would do her best, and she appears to have made
a sort of alliance with his aunt Joan to forward her
cause if the marriage with Margaret was found im-
possible.

Philip's sister, the wife of Maximilian, heir to the
empire, wrote to Isabel early in 1561, asking her to
lend her help to the suit then being pressed by the
imperial ambassador for the marriage of Carlos with
one of his Austrian cousins, the Archduchess Anne,2
and Isabel, in giving an account of this to her mother,
says that she showed the letter to Princess Joan, who
had received a similar letter, and angrily expressed
her opinion to Isabel that the plan was directed against
her (Joan) ; with which opinion Isabel agreed. ' I
spoke to the King about it,' wrote Isabel to her mother,
' telling him that the Queen of Bohemia had made one
exception (before her daughter's claim was put forward),
whereas I made two ; namely, first my sister, and,
secondly, the Princess (Joan). He replied that his
son was yet so young, and in such a condition, that

1 Particulars of these intrigues will be found in * The Love Affairs of
Mary Queen of Scots ' by Martin Hume.

2 She afterwards married Philip himself as his fourth wife.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 291

there was plenty of time for everything yet, though
the Prince has got over his quartan fever.' 1 To the
imperial ambassador Philip gently hinted also that his
son's infirmity of mind and body made it impossible to
arrange seriously for his marriage ; but Catharine was
not to be put off easily, and Isabel did her best to
obey her.

The Queen mother, sending her own portrait and
that of her son, the new boy King of France, Charles
ix., to her daughter, included in the parcel a likeness
of her daughter Margaret ; and one of Isabel's maids
writes of the joy that the pictures of her dear ones
gave to the Queen ; who, she says, after having recited
her prayers at night in church, went to her chamber,
and said them again before her mother's portrait.
When the precious portraits were unwrapped Princess
Joan was there to admire them, and soon Don Carlos
came in. ' Which is the prettiest of them ? ' he was
asked. ' The chiquital he naturally replied ; where-
upon one of the ladies drove home the lesson by saying,
' Yes, you are quite right, for she is the most fit for
you'; whereupon he burst out laughing.2 Isabel her-
self wrote joyfully to her mother that Carlos was
pleased with Margaret's portrait, and had repeated to
her three or four times laughing that the ' little one
was the prettiest ; if she was like that ; ' whereupon
Isabel assured him that she was ' bien faite] and
officious Madame de Clermont interjected that she
would make a good wife for him, to which the lad,
though he giggled, made no reply. Philip also, prob-
ably to please his wife, confessed that the portrait of
her younger sister was very beautiful : but it was

1 Negotiations sous Francois n.

2 Ibid.

292 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

noticed that, simultaneously with these transparent
matrimonial intrigues, he_suddenly began to pay osten-
tatious attention to his sister Joan, whose marriage
with her nephew Carlos was always a possibility to
play off against other matches proposed.

TTie kindliest relations were now established between
Philip and his young wife, and though he was usually
absorbed in governmental detail early and late, Isabel's
life was not a gloomy one. The two boys of Maxi-
milian, King of the Romans, the future emperor, and
of Philip's sister Maria, were being brought up in the
Spanish Court ; and though they were kept very close
to their studies, they were allowed to come and see
Isabel and her ladies every afternoon to dance and
romp as they pleased. Carlos also took every oppor-
tunity of being in the company of his stepmother,
and the brilliant young Don Juan of Austria, Philip's
half-brother, and Alexander Farnese, his nephew, were
frequent visitors, all being lively handsome youths
except, indeed, poor fever-wasted Carlos, fretting his
weak wits to frenzy in unrequited love and impotent
spite.

In the summer of 1561 hopes were entertained that
the Queen might fulfil her husband's dearest wish and
make him the father of another son, and the King's
delight at the prospect was unbounded. He caused to
be made a solid silver sedan chair in which to carry his
wife to Madrid, and overwhelmed her with attentions.
But to Isabel's grief the hope was fallacious, and
Philip was tenderly solicitous to solace his wife's dis-
appointment. ' II avait toute la peine du monde de
la consoler, et lui tenir beaucoup plus privee et plus
ordinaire compagnie que n'avait jamais fait, de maniere
qu'il n'a 6t6 que bon que tous deux ayent eu cette

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 293

opinion. II me fit 1'honneur de me prier que je 1'allasse
consoler, et lui dire qu'elle lui volust donner ce con-
tentement et plaisir de ne s'en fachier, et mesme quand
on seroit a Madrid, que ma femme le lui allast aussi
dire, et user de tous ses bons offices qu'elle scavoit
bien faire en son endroit. Elle est aujourd'hui,
Madame, en tel estat pres du roy son mari que Votre
Majeste, et tous ceux qui aiment son bien et sommes
affectionn6s a son service, en devront remercier
Dieu.'1

In the midst of this happy and harmonious life in
Sriain, the girl Queen tactfully did her best to obey
her mother and serve the France she always held
dear, but it was inevitable that as time went on and"
.fEeT" influence of her_ husband over her grew, she
should take a more purely Spanish view of affairs. _
The death of young Francis IL, and the fall of the^
GmisesTiad made the friendship between Spain and
difficult than~~~ever, lor the profound

religious divisions in the latter country forbade an
possibility of the national power being used, as had
been contemplated in the Peace of Cateau Cambresis
in the suppression of heresy everywhere ; whilst
Catharine's now ostentatious friendship with the
Bourbons and the reforming party, by which she
hoped to counterbalance the Guises, deeply offended
her son-in-law. Philip, however, at this time was in
the_ depth of penury: his own Netherlands were
simmering into revolt^; he had suffered a terrible^
defeat at the hands of the Turk on the coast of Tunis
(February 1560), and the Christian power in the
Mediterranean was in the balance. Elizabeth of

1 Letter from the French ambassador in Spain to Catharine de' Medici,
quoted in 'Vie d'Elisabeth de Valois,5 par le Marquis du Prat.

294 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

England, too, was more obstinate than ever in her
adherence to the anti-Catholic policy, now that the
strength of the Huguenot party in France banished
the fear of a Catholic coalition of France and Spain
against her. Much as Philip frowned at, and Isabel
remonstrated against, Catharine's proceedings, the
King of Spain was not in a position to make war
upon France, and for a time was obliged to dis-
semble with his mother-in-law. So far, therefore, the
Treaty of Cateau Cambresis had been a failure, and
Isabel had been sacrificed in vain. France and Spain
could not make common cause against Protestantism,
and Isabel could not win Don Carlos for her sister
nor make her astute husband the tool of her mothePs
plans, deeply as he loved his charming young wifeT""

*With regard to the marriage of Carlos, Isabel was
indefatigable in her efforts, but the prince grew more
reckless than ever. In the spring of 1562 he was
studying at the University of Alcala, when, in descend-
ing a dark stairway to keep a secret assignation, he
fell and fractured his skull. Philip and his wife were
at Madrid when they received the news, and the King
at once set out, travelling through the night full of
anxiety for his son. He found him unconscious and
partially paralysed : the doctors, ignorant beyond con-
ception, treated him in a way that seems to us now
nothing less than murderous. Purges, bleeding,
unguents, charms, and, finally, the laying upon the
bed of the unconscious lad the mouldering body of a
monkish saint, Diego, were all tried in vain, until at
last an Italian surgeon was bold enough to perform
the operation of lifting the bone of the cranium that
pressed upon the brain, and Don Carlos recovered
his consciousness. But if he had been a semi-

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 295

imbecile before, he became at intervals after this
accident a raving^ homicidal maniac" The prince^
himself, and those who surrounded liim, attributed his
recovery to the mummy of the dead monk, and
promised to give for religious purposes in recognition
of the miracle four times his own weight in gold.
When he was weighed for the purpose it was found
that, although he was seventeen years old, he only
weighed seventy pounds.

But, no matter how weak or vicious Carlos might
be, the struggle to obtain his hand in marriage was
waged as keenly as ever by Isabel and her mother
on the one hand, and by the Austrian interest on _the
other, with the Princess Joan, the lad's aunt, as a
permanent candidate, to be used by Philip when he
needed a diversion. Hardly had the grave anxiety
about Carlos subsided when Isabel herself fell grievously
ill, and was like to die. At the time that the physicians
had abandoned hope of saving her (August 1562),
Philip sent the Duke of Alba with a long message
to the French ambassador, of which the latter wrote
a copy to Catharine. He prefaces his letter by saying
that the Queen was truly a bond of peace since she
'possede le roi son mari, et est aujourd'hui en toute
privaute et autorite avec lui.' The message was to
the effect that it had always been the rule when
Spanish queens were ill, even slightly, to urge them
to make their last dispositions in good time. On
account, however, of the great love and extreme
affection which he (Philip) bore to his wife, he had
not allowed her in her present serious illness to be
spoken to on the subject, so as not to distress or
alarm her. For, as he said, he had in very truth
good reason to love her dearly, and to take great

296 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

care of her; and if this loss should befall him, he
would have reason to say that it was the greatest
and most important he had ever suffered in his life,
and that which most nearly touched his heart, seeing
the shining virtues and noble qualities, with which his
wife was endowed. He makes a great point of honour-
ing and pleasing her, and preventing her from being
troubled in any way ; but since the physicians said
that she had reached such an extremity that her life
could no longer be expected to last, x he would regret
that his love for her, and his sorrow for her loss,
should stand in the way of the duty she owed to
her position and reputation to make a will.' He
assured the French ambassador that his friendship
for his wife's brother and mother would not be
diminished by her death, and he proposed that she
should leave two-thirds of her possessions to her
mother, and the remainder be employed in pious uses

1 Speaking of this illness Brantome says quaintly, ' Elle tomba malade
en telle extre'mitd qu'elle fut abandonee des medecins. Sur quoy il y
cut un certain petit medecin Italien qui pourtant n'avoit grande vogue a
la cour, qui se presentant au roy, dit que, si on le vouloit laisser faire,
il la gueriroit, ce que le roy permit : aussi estoit elle morte. II entreprend
et luy donne une medecine, qu'apres 1'avoir prise on luy vit tout a coup
monter miraculeusement la couleur au visage et reprendre son parler et
puis apres sa convalescence. Et cependant toute la cour et tout le peuple
d'Espagne rompaient les chemins de processions, d'alldes et venues qu'ils
fasoient aux eglises et aux hospitaux pour sa Santd, les uns en chemise
les autres nuds pieds, nues testes, offrans offrandes, prieres, oraisons et
intercessions k Dieu par jeusnes, macerations de corps et autres telles
sainctes et bonnes deVotions pour sa SanteV

Brantome arrived in Spain soon after her recovery, and vividly describes
the joy and gratitude of the people at her convalescence. He saw her,
he says, go out in her carriage for the first time after her recovery to
give thanks to the Virgin of Guadalupe, and asserts that she looked more
lovely than ever as she sat at the door of the carriage for the people to
see her. She was dressed in white satin covered with silver trimming,
her face being uncovered. ' Mais je crois que jamais rien ne fut veu si
beau que cette reine, comme je pris Phardiesse de luy dire.' (Dames
Illustres.)

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 297

and in rewarding her very numerous servants.1 This
letter is of great interest in showing how truly Philip
loved and respected his young wife, and every testi-
mony shows that their affection continued to increase
as the time went on, though all around them, both in
public and private life, was full of bitterness and
anxiety. Don Carlos grew more and more outrageous
in his disregard of all decency and respect ; and more
than one miscarriage of Isabel seemed to threaten the
King with the misfortune of a childless marriage.

But what was a source of greater trouble perhaps
than anything to Isabel at this period, was the terrible
infliction that was scourging her own country. The
first war of religion in France had ended with the
death of Guise and Anthony of Navarre, and the
hollow edict of Amboise had been issued by Catharine,
giving toleration to the Huguenots in certain towns.
This was a heavy blow to Philip and his cause, and he
triecT to parry it in his characteristic fashion by the aid
of the Guisan party. Jeanne d'Albret and her son
(afterwards Henry iv.) had retired to mourn the death
of Anthony in their castle of Pau. Henry was heir to
the crown of France after Catharine's sons, and his
mother was a strict Calvinist, so the Catholic, party
planned, with Philip's aid, to kidnap Jeanne d'Albret,.
Queen of Navarre, and her hopeful son, to prevent the__
daliger of a Huguenot ever being king of France.
AITwas arranged for the coup de main when the
principal conspirator, Captain Dimanche, fell ill in a
poor hostelry in Madrid. Isabel had always been
accustomed to keep herself well-informed of all cases
o£jrpuble amongst her own countrymen in Spain, and

1 L'Aube'pine to Catharine. ' Bibliotheque Nationale,' printed in an
appendix to Du Prat's ' Elizabeth de Valois.'

298 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

hearing from her servants that a Frenchman was alone
and suffering, had him brought from his squalid
lodging to the house of one of her servants, to be well
cared for by one of her own doctors. Dimanche, in
the course of his illness, divulged his conspiracy to his
host, who, though a Catholic, was shocked at the
wickedness of the plan, and told it to a higher officer,
ancT afterwards to Isabel, who, he knew, was deeply
attached to Jeanne d'Albret. The Queen listened to
the story with horror, and cried, with tears in her eyes,
'God forbid that such a crime should be committed.'
As fast as a confidential courier could gallop went the
news from Isabel to her mother; how the Catholic
party and Spain were plotting to ruin the house of
Navarre, and overthrow the equilibrium in France ;
and Jeanne d'Albret and her son, also warned by
Isabel, escaped from Pau into central France.

Philip probably never knew that it was his wife who
had upset so promising a plan ; but that her inter-
vention was not from any love of Protestantism is
clearly seen by her subsequent action. Her Catholi-
cism, indeed, was more Spanish than French in its
character ; and that her politic mother should call to
her councils at all those whose orthodoxy was doubtful,
appeared to her nothing short of abominable, though
for a short time after the first Huguenot war,
Catharine had managed to bring about an appearance
oT harmony between the two great French factions.
But Conde, the chief of the Bourbons, after Anthony's
death, was rough and imperious, and personally dis-
liked by Catharine : Cardinal Lorraine returned to
France from the Council of Trent early in 1564,
thirsting to revenge the murder of his brother Guise,
and soon Catholic intrigue was busy in the French Court.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 299

Isabel wrote to her mother an extraordinary letter
at this time (the summer of 1564), evidently inspired
by Philip, and forming a part of the Lorraine intrigues
to win Catherine to the ultra-catholic party. *JjV_
wrote Isabel, ' you will cause Frenchmen to live _as
good catholics, there is nothing you can ask of my
husband that he will not give you. He begs you will
not^compromise with the evil people, but punish them
very severely. If you are afraid because of their great
number . . . you may call upon us, and we will give
you everything we possess, and troops as well, to
support religion. If you do not punish these men
yourself, you must not be offended if the King, my
husband, listens to the demands of those who crave
his help to defend the faith, and gives them what they
ask. He is, indeed, obliged to do so, for it touches
him more than any one. If France becomes Lutheran,
Flanders and Spain will not be far behind.'1 And so,
for page after page of her long letter, J^sabel urges her
mother to crush the Huguenots for once and for aTT.
Catharine loved intrigue and crooked ways ; and,
although it was no part of her plan to have only one
party in France, she feared the Guises less now that
the Duke was dead, and it doubtless seemed to her a
good opportunity for drawing closer to Spain, in order
to effect the marriage of her daughter Margaret with
Don Carlos, and gain some advantage by marriage or
otherwise for her darling son Henry (Duke of Orleans).

The effect of Cardinal Lorraine's action was soon
seen in the long progress through the east and south
of France undertaken by Charles ix. and his mother.
Catharine had been trying, ever since the death of

1 Isabel to Catharine. Bibliotheque Nationale, No. 39, printed in the
appendix of Du Prat's ' Elizabeth de Valois.'

300 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Francis IL, to arrange an interview with Philip, and
bring her personal influence to bear upon him, though
he had shown no eagerness to discuss the matter ; but
now that the Court of France, with Lorraine pulling
the wires, was to visit the south, there seemed a
chance of effecting at last what the treaty of Cateau
Cambresis had failed to do. The Court left Paris in
the spring of 1564, and at Nancy, the scheme of
Lorraine for a Catholic league to suppress heresy was
first broached to Charles ix. He was a mere lad, and
was apparently alarmed at the idea ; but in the mean-
while, active negotiations were going on to induce
Philip and his wife to meet Catharine when she
approached the frontier with her son. The French
ambassador in Spain was a strong Guisan partisan,
and worked hard to bring about the interview, as did
Isabel herself, who was sincerely attached to her kins-
folk, and yearned to embrace her mother again.
Philip was._.anxjous to forward the formation of a
Catholic League, but he distrusted Catharine, and
after much negotiation, he consented to Isabel's going
asHTar as Bayonne to greet her mother ; the political
negotiation, however, being entirely left to the Duke
of Alba.

Philip was not enthusiastic, for he knew that
Catharine was surrounded by 'politicians,' and he was
determined that if nothing came of the interview, it
should not be said that he had been deceived. He
would not, he said, go to any expense on the occasion,
and no gold or silver was to be worn on the dresses on
either side : and the Queen was to be kept to the most
rigid etiquette in her communications with her mother
and brother. She left Madrid with a great train of
courtiers in April 1565, bearing with her powers from

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 301

her husband to ratify the arrangements that Alba
might make. What these arrangements were may be
seen by the memorandum given by Philip to Alba for
his guidance.1 The object aimed at was a league, in..
which each party"~should be pledged to employ all his_
force and means to sustain Catholic orthodoxy^J:o allow
no toleration whatever to any other religion, in public_
of private, and to expel all persons but catholics from
theTealms, within five months, on pain of death, and"
forfeiture for them and their abettors, to publish and
enforce the decisions of the Council of Trent, to purge
all the offices, commands, and services, of every sus-
picion of heresy, and to deprive of their dignities, titles,
and authority, every person not firmly attached to the
faith.

Wkh this fateful mission Isabel travelled slowly
towards the north^ through Burgos, in the spring of
1565. She had in her train more than sixty Spanish
nobles with their gaudily garbed followers ; and, though
Philip's orders with regard to bullion ornaments had
been obeyed, there was no lack of costly show. On
the 1 4th May, in a heat so suffocating that many of the
soldiers died, Catharine and her son with the French
Court rode at early morning out of Saint Jean de Luz,
to reach the little river Bidasoa which divides France
from Spain. For two hours the royal party rested
under a green arbour on the banks, whilst the Spanish
baggage was being ferried across ; and just as the
burning sun was beginning to decline, a burst of
trumpets heralded the approach of the Queen of Spain.
From the ancient castle of I run the royal procession
could be seen winding down the hill to the shore, Isabel

1 Archives Nationales, Paris C. K., 1393, quoted in the Introduction of
the Spanish Calendar of Elizabeth, edited by Martin Hume.

302 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

being borne in a litter. Catharine at once entered her
waiting boat, and swift oars brought her to the Spanish
side just as her daughter's litter reached the edge.
Both Queens were beside themselves with joy. Isabel
bent low enough to kiss her mother's knee, but was
raised and tenderly embraced, again and again, and then,
overcome by their emotions, both Catharine and Isabel
burst into tears of joyful excitement, which continued
unabated until the boat had landed them on the French
bank, where Charles ix. awaited them amidst saluting
volleys of musketry. l

The pompous rejoicings, the tourneys, comedies,
balls, and banquets, which followed at St. Jean de Luz
and Bayonne ; the splendour with which each Court
tried to dazzle the other, and the grave political con-
ferences between Alba and the French ministers and
Catharine, cannot be dwelt upon here ; but the picture
drawn of Isabel herself in the midst of this memorable
interview by Brantome, who was present, is too in-
teresting to omit. 'When she entered Bayonne she
rode upon a pony very superbly and richly harnessed
with a cloth completely covered with pearls em-
broidered, which had belonged to the Empress, and
was used by her when she entered towns in state ; it
was said to be worth one hundred thousand crowns
and more. She was quite bewitching on horseback,
and was worth gazing upon ; for she was so lovely
and sweet that every one was enchanted. We were
all ordered to go and meet her and accompany her on
her entrance . . . and she was most gracious to us
when we paid our respects to her, and thanked us
charmingly. To me, especially, she was kind and

1 Bibliotheque Nationale, Colbert, vol. 140. ' Bref discours de Parrive'e
de la Reine d'Espagne a St. Jehan de Luz.'

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 303

•

cordial ; for I had only taken leave of her in Spain
four months before, and I was greatly touched that
she should thus favour me over my fellows. . . . She
was also familiar to the ladies and maids at the Court,
exactly the same as before her marriage, and took
notice of those who were absent or had got married ;
and about those who had come to Court since she left
she made many inquiries.'

In the discussions with the political ministers it was
soon evident to Catharine, as she had probably foreseen
from the first, that to throw herself entirely into the
hands of the extreme Catholic party as Philip desired,
would be disastrous to her, and probably also to her
son's throne. But it did not suit her to quarrel with
he_r powerful son-in-law, or to send her daughter back_
empty-handed to Madrid, after the much heralded
Trfterview ; so, although an arrangement was signed
which ostensibly Bound France and Spain together for
a religious end^ Catharine took care to leave a sufficient^
number of knotty points open to give her a loophole to
escape. When she returned to Paris she soon began
to raise difficulties about the ratification, and wrote to
her ambassador in Madrid (Fourquevault), ' Je lui dis
que en faisant ces manages, et donnant quelque etat
a mon fils d'Orleans, qu'il nous falloit tous joindre
ensemble : c'est a savoir le Pape, 1'Empereur, et ces
deux rois, les Allemands et autres que Ton avisera : et
que le roi mon fils n'etait pas sans moyens pour aider
de sa part, a ce qui serait avise quand les dits manages
seroient faits, et la dite ligue concliie.' It will be seen
that she makes here so many conditions as to render
the league quite impossible. Not only is her daughter
Margaret to marry Carlos, and her son Henry a
daughter of the Emperor with an independent State,

,.304 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

but all the other Catholic powers are to join the league
before France is to be bound to anything^

Indeed, it is clear that the power of the Huguenot
and 'politician' nobles in France, and the old jealousy
between France and Spain, together with the persecu-
tion by the Inquisition of French residents and visitors
in Spain, and the massacre in the following year of the
French expedition to Florida by Philip's orders, made
a sincere co-operation between the two countries in such
a league impracticable ; l and though appearances were
saved at Bayonne, Philip, when he joyfully met his wife
after her nineteen days' absence from him, must have
known that again his dream of a Catholic leagiieJia4
failed. 'Je ne fis qu'arriver hier (writes the French
ambassador to Catharine on Isabel's return) de baiser
la main de la reine, la quelle jai trouvee si joieuse et
contente de la bonne venue du roy son mari, et de la de-
monstration de la bonne affection et amitie qu'il lui fait.'
Though the personal affection between jjie husband
and wife was without a cloudrtrwascertain that the
political results of the marriage were insignificant.
Isabel fought hard for some satisfaction to the outrage
to France in Florida, but without result ; Coligny, to
her and Philip's indignation, was growing powerful in
the French government ; and the second war of religion
was seen to be inevitable, whilst the issue was already
jdnTed" between Philip and his Dutch subjects ; pledged,
as they were, to stand together to resist him to the
death.

1 It is usually assumed (and amongst others by Father Florez in * Reinas
Catolicas') that the massacre of St. Bartholomew seven years later (1572)
in Paris was arranged at this meeting. There is, however, no proof that
such was the case. Philip and the Spanish party, it is true, were loud in
their praises of this enormity, but much happened between Bayonne and
Bartholomew.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 305

In the midst of these public causes for anxiety Philip
was overjoyed to learn that his wife, whose age was
nearly twenty-one, was likely to become a mother.1
The King, as usual, arranged every small detail him-
self of, ' le regime dont elle devoit user pour conduire
son fruit & bon port ' ; and his demonstrations of affec-
tion and pride for his wife, and rejoicing at his hopes
for a time, even in public, overcame his natural frigid
dignity. Nor was Catharine less delighted, for to her,
should the child prove a son, the event was of the
highest importance, in view of the growing incapacity
of Don Carlos ; and she also sent by M. de Saint
Etienne a parcel to her daughter : ' Ou il y a tout
plein de recettes, dont elle peut avoir de besoin ' ; and
she wrote personally to the physician in attendance,
urging him to make use of these recipes, which she
assured him would do Isabel good.

Every day the smallest incident of the Queen's
condition were recounted by courier to her mother ; and
Philip could hardly tear himself from her side whilst
he disposed of his usually beloved business. At length,
on the ist August 1566. a daughter was born, at
Balsain, near Segovia, to "Philip and Isabel The
child was christened Isabej^ after the great Queen and
heF mother, Clara because she was born on the day of
the Saint, and Eugenie, out of gratitude to the
efficacious body of St. Eugene — and the sumptuous
ceremony of baptism was not allowed to pass without a
jealous wrangle between the Archbishop of Santiago
and the Bishop of Segovia, as to which should have
the honour of performing the rite, which was eventually

1 Isabel herself ascribed the blessing to her prayers to the body of St.
Eugene, which she had with great difficulty persuaded the French to
surrender»to Spain. It was carried with great pomp from St. Denis to
Toledo, and Isabel was constant in her adoration of it.

U

3o6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

celebrated by the Nuncio Castaneo, afterwards Pope
Urban vn. It would doubtless have been more
satisfactory to Philip had a son been born ; but his joy
and gratitude were nevertheless intense, and the
French ambassador, writing to Catharine a few days
afterwards, says that when he went to congratulate
him, he had him (the ambassador) led to the Queen's
room: 'Voulant que je visse la fille qu'il avoit plu
Dieu lui donner, de laquelle il est tant aise qu'il ne
peut le dissimuler, et 1'aime, a ce qu'il dit, pour le
present mieux qu'un fils/ This deep affection for his
elder daughter lasted to the King's dying day; and
the famous Infanta, designated by him to be in suc-
cession Queen of England and France, became by
his will sovereign of the Netherlands, and inherited
from her father not only the ancient domains of his
paternal house but his views, his methods, and his
obstinacy.

The Queen lay apparently at the point of death for
some days after her delivery, but as soon as her life
was safe, the great project, so long discussed, of a
voyage of the royal family to insurgent Flanders, was
again taken in hand. Philip was for going alone,
leaving, it was hoped by Catharine, his wife Regent,
though Isabel herself begged hard that she might be
allowed to accompany her husband : ' Car vraiment,
je serois trop marrie de demeurer par de^a apres lui ;
je ferai ce qui sera en moi qu'il ne m'y laisse point.'
There was another who desired as ardently as she to
go to Flanders with the King. This was his only son
Don Carlos. The young man's frantic excesses had
grown more scandalous than ever as he became older.
The struggle to obtain his hand in marriage was still
going on between the Austrian and French interests ;

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 307

but Philip continued to put the matter gently aside on
the ground of his son's ill-health.

The afflicted father had done his best to wean the
Prince from his violence and dissoluteness. He him-
self had been a dutiful son, ready to sacrifice every-
thing for the task confided to him, and his grief was
profound that this son of his youth should openly
scandalise his court by his disobedience and insolence
to his father and sovereign. Like his great-grand-
mother, Joan the Mad, the Prince lived in constant
revolt against authority, sacred and mundane. His
conduct in the Council of State, where his father had
placed him to accustom him to business, had shocked
every one. Apparently out of sheer wrong-headedness
he had openly expressed his sympathy with the
Netherlanders, who were defying the will of his father,
and he had extorted a semi-promise that he should
accompany the King to Flanders. Whether the
Prince had entered into any communication with the
agents of the Flemings is doubtful ; but even if such
were the case, and the ambition of Carlos to obtain an
early regency of Flanders was the end he had in view,
it is a mere travesty of history to represent that he
seriously held reformed opinions, any more than did
Joan the Mad, when she reviled the mass and the
sacred symbols.

In any case, Philip abandoned his intention, if he
ever really held it, of going in person to the Low
Countries ; and decicled to send the ruthless Alba with
cTgreat army to scourge the stubborn ' beggars ' into
humble suBmtssion^to Jiis-wilL— When Carlos heard
trill, and that he, too, was to remain in Spain, his fury
passed all bounds. He attempted to stab Alba him-
self when he went to take leave ; and when the Cortes

308 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of Castile petitioned the King that the heir to the
throne should be kept in Spain, Carlos made an open
scandal, andj:hreatened the dg£utie£_with death.
"~ ByTrTisTmieTthe autumn of 1567, Isabel was again
pregnant, and Philip's hopes ran high that another son
would be born to him. It is clear that the great
mission to which he and his father had devoted
strenuous lives could not safely be passed on to Carlos ;
and in September, Ruy Gomez, Philip's only friend,
told the French ambassador that if the Queen gave
birth to a son, the future of Carlos as heir would have
to be reconsidered. The Prince was insatiable for
money, which he scattered broadcast on evil doings,
he was openly insolent to his father, and the latter
suspected a design to escape clandestinely to join the
enemies of his State : and there is no doubt that if
Isabel's second child had been a son, he would have
been placed in the succession before Don Carlos.
Philip exceeded himself in tender solicitude for his
wife, but at last, on the i;th October 1567, the child
that all Europe was breathlessly expecting, was born
— another daughter.

TKereafter the romance of Don Carlos unfolded
rapidly. Philip had been patient and longsuffering
under the affliction of such a son, but he at length
despaired, and his attachment to his heir gave place
to antipathy and disgust : especially when his
physicians had definitely assured him that his line
c5uld neverH5e^ci3nTiiaiied by Carlos.1 The Prince, on
the other hand, hated his father bitterly, and was
morose with his aunt Joan, whom he formerly loved,
and with the young Austrian Princes, though he had

1 French ambassador Fourquevault to Catharine, June 1567. Biblio-
theque Nationale, No. 220 (Du Prat).

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 309

now been formally betrothed to their sister Anna.
The only person who influenced him was Isabel : ' II
fait semblant de trouver bon tout ce que la reyne votre
fille fait et dit, et n'y a personne qui dispose de lui
comme elle, et c'est sans artifice ni feinte, car il ne
s£ait feindre ni dissimuler.'1

Matters came to a head at the end of the year 1567.
Philip and Isabel had gone to pass Christmas at the
newly commenced Palace of the Escorial, when Carlos
decided to make his long contemplated attempt to
escape from Spain. On the 23rd December, he
whispered to his young uncle, Don Juan of Austria,
that he needed his help to get horses ; and Juan,
recognising the seriousness of the situation, at once
rode the thirty odd miles to the Escorial to tell the
King. As in all his great calamities, Philip remained
outwardly unmoved, and though he took such
measures secretly as would frustrate the flight, he did
not return to Madrid until the day previously fixed, the
1 7th January 1 568. The next day he went with Carlos
to mass ; but still made no sign. In the interim, the
Prince had even attempted to kill Don Juan; and it
was time for his father to strike, in order to prevent
some greater tragedy, for Carlos had admitted to his
confessor that he had an ungovernable impulse to kill
a rnan. Whom ^ asked the confessor. The King,
was the reply! For once Fhilip broke down utterly
when, with Ruy Gomez and other intimate councillors,
he deliberated what should be done. Late that night,
when the Prince slept, the afflicted father, with five
armed gentlemen and twelve guards, obtained entrance
into the chamber, in spite of secret bolts and locks ;
and when the Prince, disturbed, sprang up and sought

1 Ibid., No. 8.

3io QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

for his weapons, the weapons were gone. In rage and
despair, he tried to strangle himself, but was restrained ;
and, recognising that he was a helpless prisoner, he
flung himself upon his bed in an agony of grief, and
sobbed out, ' I am not mad, not mad, only desperate.'

From that hour he was dead to the world, which
saw him no more. The position was a humiliating one
for Philip, but he made the best of it, by explaining to
all the courts that the prince's mental deficiency neces-
sitated his seclusion. To his own nearest relatives he
did not hide his bitterness. ' It is not a punishment,'
he wrote, ' would to God it were, for it might come to
an end : but I never can hope to see my son restored
to his right mind again. I have chosen in this matter
to sacrifice to God my own flesh and blood, preferring
His service and the universal good to all human
considerations.' Some sort of trial or examination of
the prince was held, but all professed accounts of the
proceedings must be accepted with caution. Certain it
is that they dragged on wearily, whilst the charges of
treason, of conspiracy, of disloyalty, and perhaps of
heresy, were laboriously examined in strict secresy.
Neither Isabel nor his aunt Joan was allowed to see
Carlos, and Don Juan was forbidden even to wear
mourning for the calamity. By all accounts the prince's
malady grew rapidly worse, as well it might in such
circumstances. Like Joan the Mad before him, he
would starve for days, and then swallow inedible things,
he would alternately roast and freeze himself, and he
attempted suicide more than once. The end came
on the 25th July 1568, and the immense weight of
testimony is in favour of his having died in consequ
of his own mad fancies in diet and hygiene.

When Fourquevault conveyed the news of Carlos's

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 311

death to Catharine, he wrote that the Queen Isabel
was suffering from fainting fits and headache ; but it
was her wish that great signs of mourning should be
made for the Prince in France, to show the King ot
Spain that they (i.e., the French) were sorry for his loss ;
1 as the Spanish people attach so much importance to
appearances.' Isabel in weak health, for she was again
pregnant, was deeply touched by the trouble around
her. The French ambassador was gleefully reminding
her mother that the death of Don Carlos was a very
good thing for her, and praising her beauty, which the
deep Spanish mourning set off to advantage, whilst he
indulged in brilliant hopes for the birth of a son to
Isabel. But the young Queen's heart was heavy, not
for Carlos alone, but for the scenes of horror which
were flooding Flan3ers with bloocTurider the flail of
AlbaT Egmont and Horn had been treacherously
sacrificed in Brussels, Montigny in Spain, and her own
dear France was reft in twain by fratricidal war. She
waslTcatriolic as sincere as Philip himself, but that the
faith should need wholesale murder for its assertion
shocked andfrightenedjiex.; and she languished in the
atmosphere 6T gloomy determination which surrounded
Philip.

Catharine wrote often in reply to the depressing
news from her daughter, arousing her hopes for a son
who should, in his time, put all things right ; but Isabel
at twenty-three had lost her gay elasticity, and the
advance of her pregnancy meant the advance of her
exhausting malady. Philip, as usual, was tenderly
solicitous for her ease and happiness ; full of hope, too,
that a son at last was to be born to him, for upon this
everything depended. The lying stories which long
afterwards the traitor Antonio Perez wove with hellish

3i2 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

skill in the safe refuge of Essex House, accusing Philip
of jealousy of his wife with Don Carlos, and subse-
quently with one Pozzo, are hardly worth more credit
now than the sentimental romance of the Abbe de St.
Real about her love for Carlos. Perez, whose only
wish was to blacken Philip indelibly to please his
enemies, and his own paymasters in England and
France, hints that Philip himself connived at his be-
loved wife's murder by poison : but even if the confi-
dential letters of her French friends now before us did
not disprove this, the fact that nothing could be so
unfortunate for Philip's policy as Isabel's death would
give it the lie.

Isabel had been suffering for months from heart
failure and bodily irregularities ; and on the 3rd
October 1568, the violent remedies administered to
her by her doctors caused a miscarriage. The poo_r
Queen knew that she was doomed, for when before
daybreak Pmlip, heartbroken, came and sat by her bed,
she calmly took a last farewell of him, praying him t_Q_
be good to their two little girls, to be friendly with
Catharine and King Charles ix., and kind to the
attendant ladies who had served her so well : ' with
other words worthy of admiration, and fit to break the
heart of a good husband, such as the King was. He
answered her in the same way ; for he could not be-
lieve that she was so near her end, and promised all
she asked him ; after which he retired to his room in
great anguish, as I am told.'1 The dying woman had
confessed and received extreme unction during the
night ; and early in the morning the French ambassa-
dors were summoned to her chamber. ' She knew us
at once, and said, Ah ! ambassador, you see me well on

1 Fourquevault to Catharine, 3rd October 1568. Du Prat.

ISABEL OF THE PEACE 313

the road out of this unhappy world into a better one
. . . pray my mother and brother to bear my loss
patiently, and to be satisfied with what pleases me
more than any prosperity I have enjoyed in this world,
to go to my Creator, where I may serve him better than
I can here. I shall pray Him that all my brothers and
sisters may live long and happily, as well as my mother
and brother Charles : and I beg you to beseech them
to look to their realm, and prevent heresy taking root.
Let them all take my death patiently, for I am very
happy.' 'O!' replied the principal ambassador, 'your
Majesty will live a long time yet, to see France good
and happy.' 'No, no, ambassador,' she whispered,
shaking her head with a faint smile. ' I do hope it will
be so, but I do not wish to see it. I would much
rather go and see what I hope very soon to see.'

Aftep^much more tender talk of her own land and
people, the jlying Cjueen took farewell of her countFy-
meTTancT^rayed awhile with her ghostly~c^mforters :
tKen fell into slumber for a short ten minutes. At
midday, 'she suddenly opened her eyes, bright and
sparkling, and it seemed to me as if she wished to tell
me something more, for they looked straight at me :l
and then Isabel of the Peace passed quietly into the
world her gentle soul longed for. * We left the palace
all in tears, for throughout the people of this city
there is not one, great or small, that doth not weep ;
for they all mourn in her the best Queen they have
ever had.' Philip in grief hid himself from the worI3
iiTthe monastery of Saint Jerome ; Jput his task in the
world was greater to hircuevpn than his sorrow or his
love. The hopes of the French alliance to extirpate
heresy had failed, failed utterly and completely. Eng-

^orquevault to Catharine, 3rd October 1568. Du Prat.

QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

land, helping the insurgent Flemings with all her might,
had drifted further, and ever further, away from him.
In France the reformation was growing, and only two
lives — and bad ones — stood ^between the throne aricTa
Huguenot King. There was no male heir to inherit
the thorny inheritance of championing orthodox Christ-
ianity throughout the world. Whither could Philip
turn for sympathy and a mother for the heir he yearned"
for ? Not to England ; not to France, for both had
failed him. Where but toHhls own kin in Austria ;
to his niece AnnaTlhe betrothed of his dead son Carlos :
and on the second anniversary of Isabel's death Anna"
of^Austria landed in Spain to marry her uncle Philip.
Isabel of the Peace politically had lived in vain.

BOOK IV

I
ISABEL OF BOURBON

•

BOOK IV

THE niece vnk__of Philip n^JaoreJiim many children.

o£_whom one weakling alone survived to inherit the
oppressive crown of his father. Anna was a homely,
devout soul, submissive and obedient to her husband/
ever busy with her needle and her household cares ;
and, like the other members of her house, overpowered
with the vastness and majesty of the mission confided
by^ heaven to its chief. * On the voyage to Portugal
in 1580 Philip fell ill at Badajoz, and when his life
was despaired of Anna fervently prayed that he might
be saved, even if she had to be sacrificed instead.
Her prayer was heard ; and as the husband of fifty-
three recovered the wife of thirty sickened and died,
leaving Philip broken and lonely to live the rest of
his weary life for his work alone. The struggle to
prevent the victory of reform in France, which occu-
pied Philip's later years, and consummated the ruin
of his country, rendered impossible a renewal of the
idea of a French and Spanish coalition, except, indeed,

1 Father Florez tells of her that on one occasion she was brought to
death's door by her loathing her food ; and as all mundane remedies had
been tried in vain, the King sent for the blessed friar Orozco. The friar
told the Queen he had a remedy recommended by his grandmother
which would cure her if she would take it. The Queen consented, and
the friar cooked a partridge and bacon before her, reciting verses of the
Magnificat at each turn of the spit. When the dish was ready he took
it to the Queen and said, ' Eat, my lady, in the name of God, for the mere
smell of this would make a dead man hungry.' Needless to say, Anna
ate and was cured.

317

3i8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

by the conquest of France by Philip, which many years
of fruitless war proved to be impossible, whilst the
gallant cynic, Henry of Navarre, could hold up the
national banner of France as a rally point against
the foreign invader.

Once Philip, in sheer despair, turned, when it was
too late, to England again in the hope of bringing it
into his system by force, if intrigue and subornation
oPconspiracy and murder failed : but with the defeat
of the Armada that hope fljed too ; and again thej£
was no possible bride but an Austrian cousin for
Philip's heir, Philip in., and no feasible policy from
Plnlip's point of viewHbut a continuance of the close
family alliance with the German Habsburg descen-
dants of Joan the Mad. The Emperor, it is true,
was forced to tolerate his Lutheran princes ; but he
and his house made common cause with the Philips
when the French cast greedy eyes towards Catholic
'landers or Italy. Margaret of Ajjstnajbrought to
sickly, scrofulous Philip in. an anaemic body and a
stunted mind to rear his children. She implored her
mother passionately to save her from the terrifying
honour of sharing the gloomy throne of her cousin,
for in her Styrian home she lived the life of a nun,
devoted only to the humble care of the poor and
sick of her own land : but she was sternly told that
all must be sacrificed to the supreme duty that was
hers ; and thenceforward she, too, lived in the awe-
stricken atmosphere of religious abnegation, which
waT the mark oflier Spanish kindred.1 In besotted,
conventual devotion, and frivolous trifling in turns,
her monkish husband and she passed their lives ;

1 She was much beloved, especially in Madrid, and died in childbed
at the Escorial in 1611.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 319

then: children, of whom they had several, all blood-
less decadents of low vitality, with big mumbling
jaVs and lack-lustre eyes, brought up in the same
pathetic tradition that to them and Spain — ^goor,
ruined, desolated Spain now — was confided the sacred
duty and honour of upholding religious orthodoxy
throughout the world at any cost or sacrifice.

"So long as Henry iv. was King of France, even
though he had 'gone to mass,' the close union with
Spain was impossible : but on the fateful day in May
1610 when, in the narrow Paris lane, the dagger of
Ravaillac pierced the heart of the great ' Bearnais,'
all was changed. The Queen- Regent of France was
one of the Papal Medici, imbued, as they all were,
with the tradition of Spain's orthodoxy and over-
whelming might. Her marriage with Henry had
been a victory for the extreme Catholic party in
Europe ; but so long as Henry lived he had pre-
vented violent reaction. Now that he was gone, with
hT«r Huguenot traditions, France and Spain, it^ was
thought, might again be joined in a Catholic league^
ancT together impose their form of faith upon the
world, either by armed force or political pressure. It
was a foolish, impracticable plan, for Frenchmen were
tocTfar advanced now to be used to play the game
orimpotent bankrupt Spain, powerful only in its pride
and its traditions.

"But James i. of England had been toadying and
humiliating himself to gain Philip's aid in favour of
his son-in-law, the Palatine in Germany, and it doubt-
less seemed a good stroke of policy on the part of
France and Spain to leave him and the Lutherans
isolated. In any case no time was lost, and before
Henry iv. had lain in his tomb at St. Denis a year

320 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

it was agreed that the Spanish Infanta, Anna, should
marry Louis xni. of^France, and that__Igabel, or
Elizabeth;" the eldest daughter of Henry iv.^ and
Marie de Medici, should become the wife of Philip,
Prince of Asturias, the son and heir of the Spaliish
^ All the betrothed were children of tender age^
was agreed that the exchange of brides should
be deferred until the Infanta was twelve years old
(1613). Pompous and lavish embassies went through
the solemn farce of paying honour to the girl-children
respectively as Queen of France and Princess of
Asturias. The Duke of Mayenne, of the house of
Guise, ruffled and swaggered in Madrid with a
marriage embassy so splendid in 1612, that the cost
of entertaining him beggared the capital for years ;
and so keen was the emulation in sumptuousness of
dress and adornments during the interminable festivi-
ties in Madrid to celebrate the double betrothals, that
the Spanish nobles came to dagger-thrusts on the
subject in the palace itself.

In Paris Ruy Gomez's son, the Duke of Pastrana,
paid similar court to the dark-haired girl of nine who
was betrothed to young Philip, heir of Spain, two
years younger. Three years more had to pass, not-
withstanding the impatience of the French, before the
backward little Infanta Anna, in October 1615, was
conveyed with a pomp and extravagance that ill
matched the penury of her father's realm, to the
frontier of France, there to be exchanged for I sabel
of" Sourbon,_Jier_ bro^heys^J^ride^1 On the 9th
November 1615 all the chivalry of France and Spain

1 An interminable account of the splendours of the occasion, for which
the favourite Duke of Lerma was mainly responsible, will be found in
' Documentos Ineditos,' Ixi.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 321

were once more assembled on either bank of the
little stream of Bidasoa that separated the two
countries. Wasteful luxury and vain magnificence
had been squandered wantonly by the Spanish nobles,
determined, as usual, to put the French to shame.
At Behovia, the point where the ceremony was to
take place, sumptuous banqueting - halls had been
erected upon rafts moored on each side of the stream,
whilst in mid-current another raft supported a splendid
pavilion covered with velvet and cloth of gold, and
carpeted with priceless silken carpets from the East.
Here the Duke of Guise delivered Isabel of France
to the Duke of Uceda, in exchange for Anna of
Austria, thenceforward Queen of France. The
romantic and turbulent career of the latter is related
elsewhere : here we have to follow the fortunes of
the beautiful dark-haired girl of twelve who, like
Isabel of the Peace fifty-four years before, turned her
back upon her native land to cement the Catholic
alliance between France and Spain.1

The circumstances were widely different, for the
battle of religious liberty in Europe was practically
won, though the blind faith and vanity of Philip in.
refused, even now, to recognise the factx or hisown
pDVeTty - stricken impotence. The Medjci Queen-
Regent of France, moreover, was a very different
person from her kinswoman Catharine. She was not
playing her own game so much as that of the cunning
Italians who directed her, and it was soon evident,
under Richelieu, that Frenchmen were no longer to
be made the playthings of foreign ambitions. Isabel,

1 To show how uncertain were still the relations between the people
of the two countries, it may be mentioned that an eyewitness of the
ceremonies of the exchange, etc., mentions as a marvellous thing that
there was no fighting between Spaniards and Frenchmen.

X

322 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

child as she was, had a stout heart and a high spirit,
as befitted her father's daughter. She was willing
enough to be a queen upon the most pretentious
throne in Europe ; but she was not made for martyr-
dom, and, as we shall see, her_jnarriage was even
less influential in securing lasting peace and co-opera-
tion between France and Spain than that of the
previous Isabel had been.

Through FuenterraKa, San Sebastian and Vitoria,
Isabel travelled towards Burgos, where she was to
meet her boy bridegroom. Dressed in Spanish garb
from Vitoria onward, she won all hearts by her gaiety
and brightness ; and, as an eyewitness says of her,
1 even if she had French blood in her veins she had
a Spanish spirit.' Philip in. and his son met the
bride a league from Burgos, and we are told that
the prince of eleven years old was so dazzled with
her beauty that he could only gaze speechless upon
her. The next day Burgos was all alive with the
splendour of the welcome of the future Queen, who
entered the city on a white palfrey with a silver
saddle and housings of velvet and pearls ; and so,
from city to city, smiling and happy, the girl, in the
midst of the inflated Court, slowly made her way to
Madrid. On the afternoon of iQth December 1615
Isabel rode from the monastery of St. Jerome1 through
Madrid to the palace upon the cliff overlooking the
valley of the Manzanares. An eyewitness describes
her appearance as she rode through the mile of
crowded narrow streets of old Madrid, under triumphal
arches, past thousands of peopled balconies, hung

1 The only portion of this building now standing is the ancient Gothic
church where King Alfonso and Queen Victoria Euge'nie were recently
married. It stands close to the famous picture gallery in the Prado.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 323

with tapestries, with songs and music of welcome
all the way. * Her Highness was dressed in the
French fashion, with an entire robe of crimson
satin embroidered with bugles, a little cap trimmed
with diamonds, and a ruff beautifully trimmed in
French style, and with a rosette and girdle of
diamonds of great size. She went her way, bright
and buxom, full of rejoicing. Her aquiline face was
wreathed in smiles, and her fine eyes flashed from
side to side, looking at everything, to the great
delight of the populace.'1

It was five years after_this, on the 25th November
1620, at the palace of Pardo, that young Philip and
Isabel began their married life together? Thilip was
yet barely sixteen wJien (in March 1621) the low
vitality of his father flickered_out, and the monarch,
who should have been a monk, passed, in alternate
paroxysms of fear and ecstacies of hope, from the
world in which he had meant so well and done so ill.
Thecorruption and waste under Lerma and his crew
of ^parasites had bled^Sjpain ^o the^ white, and utter
ruin was now the lot of whole populations. The
tradition of the King's wealth which still lingered
could hardly be kept up now, though at the fall of
Lerma some of the worst robbers had been made to
disgorge their booty. The King had been beloved
and revered for his saintliness, but all saw the desola-
tion that his idle dependence upon favourites had
caused. Spain now looked only to the sallow, long-
faced boy, Thilip iv., with the light blue eyes and lank
<ffaxeh hair, to save the people from starvation. Not
t<rh~im, but to the man at his side, it soon learned to
loo~k. He was a big-boned powerful man of thirty -

1 From an unpublished MS. in the British Museum. Add. 10,236.

324 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

three, with a great square head, heavy stooping
shoulders, fierce black eyes, burning like live coals
in an olive face ; and his upturned twisted moustache
added to the haughty imperiousness of his mien.
This was the man, Caspar de Guzman, Count of
Qlivares, Duke of St. Lucar, who made a clean_sweep
of all the corrupt gang that had fattened upon Spain,
the brood of Rojas and Sandoval, a.nd replaced them
with his own creatures^ Philip, like his father, meant
well," and was naturally a much more able manjjbut
heTwas idle, pleasure-loving, and pathetically unabl^-to
resist temptation, each constantly recurring transgres-
sion being followed by an agony of remorse, only to
be again committed when the first poignancy of regret
had passed.

Following the advice of Olivares, he attempted to
mend matters by cutting down expenses alone, instead
of changing the system of taxation and finance ; and
the * spirited foreign policy ' which he adopted soon
involved him in expenditure, which later completed
the downfall of the country. The foolish old dream-
that catholic unity might be won "by Spanish arms still
kept him at war with the Dutch, whilst the Moors
were harrying the Spanish coasts and commerce, and
France and Spain were already at loggerheads again,
now that Marie de Medici and her crew had been
thrust into the background. Instead of recognising
facts and lying low to recuperaterOlTvares and Philip,
witE the blinded nation behind them, were as boastful
and haughty as their predecessors had been in the
days of Spain's strength. The weak poltroon who
reigned unworthily in England, was ever ready to
truckle to apparent strength. He had sacrificed
Raleigh at Spain's bidding, he had been contemptu-

ISABEL OF BOURBON 325

ously used and scorned by Lerma and Philip in. when
he had tried to marry his heir to a Spanish Infanta,
and he had been cleverly kept from an alliance with
France by hopes and half promises. But the Palatinate
was still unrestored, and when Philip in. had died,
James made another attempt with the new King^to
wfn Spain's friendship by a marriage.

TKe hare-brained trip of Prince Charles and Buck-
ingham to Madrid, to win the hand of the Infanta and
the alliance of Spain, has often been described, and
can hardly be touched upon here. The Prince
suddenly appeared disguised at the English embassy
at Madrid on the 7th March 1622, and the next day,
to the dismay of Olivares, the awkward visit was
known to all the capital. He and young Philip made
the best of a bad business. To abandon Austria and
the _Palatinate for the sake of protestant England~3id
not suit them, but they could be polite. All the edicts
ordering economy of dress, eating, and adornments,
were suspended, and whilst Charles stayed in Madrid
a tempest of prodigality prevailed. Isabel and the
Infanta played their parts in the farce with apprehen-
siorf and reluctance, for the former knew that the.
besought alliance was directed against France, and the
Infanta was horrified at the idea of marrying a heretic.
But they did their best to keep up appearances, espe-
cially Isabel, who treated Charles most graciously.
The day after his arrival, Philip and his wife and
sister, the latter with a blue ribbon round her arm to
distinguish her, road in a coach to the church in the
Prado, and Charles, of course quite by accident, met
them both coming and going, to his great satisfaction.
Soon after Isabel sent to the English prince a fine
present of white underwear, a nightgown beautifully

326 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

worked, and several scented coffers, with golden keys,
full of toilet requisites, probably guessing that in his
rapid voyage he had not brought such luxuries with
him ; and at the great bull fight at the Plaza Mayor in
honour of the Prince, she sat in brown satin, bordered
with gold, in the fine balcony of the city breadstore
overlooking the Plaza, as Charles, in black velvet and
white feathers, rode his fine bay horse into the arena by
the side of Philip, to take his place in an adjoining box.
Before the masked ball on Easter Sunday, given by
the Admiral of Castile in Charles's honour, Isabel in
white satin, covered with precious stones, dined in
public ; and then, changing her dress to one of black
and gold, awaited the English Prince to lead her to
the ballroom. There during the entertainment, and
on all other occasions, he sat at her right hand under a
royal canopy, with Philip on her left ; whilst the Earl
of Bristol, on his knees before them, interpreted the
small talk suitable to the occasion. And so, with
comedies and cane tourneys, banquets and balls, Charles
and Buckingham were beguiled by Olivares for well
nigh six months, until the farce grew stale^ anji Charles,
wended his way home again, nominally betrothed to
tHeTnfanta, but really outwitted and his country humi-
liaTed^ The defeat was softened by much loving
profession and splendid presents from Philip and his
courtiers to the English Prince ; and it is somewhat
curious that, on the departure of Charles, the present
given to him by Isabel again took the form of white
linen garments, fifty amber-dressed skins, two hundred
and fifty scented kidskins for gloves, a large sum in
silver crowns, and other things.1

1 From MSS. of Diego de Soto, de Aguilar Royal Academy of History,
Madrid, G. 32, and another in British Museum, Add. 10,236.

ISABEL OF BOURBON. 327

Philip and his wife had now settled down to their
regular life in the most brilliant court in Europe. It
w~as~ the Augustan age of Spanish literature and the
drama, and a perfect craze for comedies and satirical
verse seized upon the Spanish people, under the in-
fluence of the King and Queen, both of them passion-
ately fond of the theatre and diversions of all sorts.
Isabel, ITk~e her husband, was conventionally devout,
and her religious benefactions were constant, as well as
her attendances at the ceremonies of the church ; r but
in her devotion she had none of the gloomy monastic
character which had afflicted her husband's family, and
the social demeanour of the courtiers and of the tqwnis -
people generally underwent a complete change in her
time. Her manners, indeed, were so free and debonair
as to have given rise to some quite unsupported scandal
as to her faithfulness to her husband. Madrid was a
perfect hotbed of tittle-tattle ; everybody considered it
necessary to be able to spin satirical verses, and as
these were generally anonymous and in manuscript,
the reputation of no one, high or low, was safe from
attack.

The reaction from the rigid propriety of previous
reigns~~led the Court of Philip iv. to assume a licence

1 Father Florez and other ecclesiastical writers give many instances of
her liberality in contributing to pious works, and in Reinas Catolicas
there is an account of Isabel's action at the time (in 1624), that a 'heretic
had outraged the Most Holy Sacrament in this my convent of St. Philip.'
In addition to the services of atonement for the outrage in all the churches,
' the royal family made such an atonement as never was seen, as befitted
an insult to the greatest of the mysteries. The corridors of the palace
were adorned with all the valuable and beautiful possessions of the crown,
and a separate altar was erected in the name of each royal personage.
That of the Queen attracted the attenion of all beholders for the taste it
exhibited, and the immense value of the jewels that adorned it belonging
to her Majesty. The value of these jewels was computed at three million
and a half (of reals).

328 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

that quite shocked foreigners. Much of the day was
passed in parading up and down the Calle Mayor
(High Street) in coaches, and much of the night in
summer in promenading in the dry bed of the river.
Gallantry became the fashion, and ladies, very far from
resenting, welcomed broad compliments and doubtful
jests addressed to them by strangers in the streets.1
The palace itself, especially the new pleasure palace of
the Buen Retire, built in the Prado for Philip by
Olivares in 1632, was a notorious focus of intrigue;
encouraged by the example of Philip himself, by far
the most dissolute king of his line. From his early
youth he had delighted in amateur acting, and under a
pseudonym (Un Ingenio de esta Corte), wrote comedies
himself, and delighted in the society of dramatic people.
Isabel was as keen a lpver_pf the stage as iier
husband, and from the first days after the mourning
for Prlilip nf. was over, she began her favourite
diversion of private theatricals in her own apartments.
From October 1622, every Sunday and Thursday
during the winter, as well as on holidays, comedies
were performed by regular actors in her private theatre.
Some of these comedies may be mentioned to show
the taste of the Queen in such matters. ' The Scorned
Sweetheart,' ' The Loss of Spain,' and ' The Jealousy of
a Horse,' were three plays by Pedro Valdes, for which
Isabel paid 300 reals (£6) each, the previous price
having been ^4. ' Gaining Friends,' ' The Power of
Opportunity,' and 'How our Eyes are Cheated,' ' The
Fortunate Farmer,' 'The Woman s Avenger,' and 'The
Husband of His Sister,' were others ; and the total

1 ' Voyage d'Espagne.' Aersens van Sommerdyk, and many othei
visitors to Spain at the time testify to this. See also 'Relatione dell'
Ambasciatore di Venetia.' British Museum MSS., Add. 8,701.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 329

number of such plays represented in the Queen's apart-
ments in the palace during the winter of 1622-23, was
forty-three, the fees for which reached 13,500 reals
Wa7o).«

Whilst the Prince of Wales was in Madrid the
theatres in the palace, and the two public courtyard
theatres in the capital, had a busy season. James
Ho well, writing from Madrid at the time,2 says, * There
are many excellent poems made here since the Prince's
arrival, which are too long to couch in a letter. Yet
I will venture to send you this one stanza of Lope de
Vega:

" Carlos Estuardo soy,
Que, siendo amor mi guia,
Al cielo de Espana voy,
For ver mi estrella Maria."

" Charles Stuart here am I
Guided by love afar,
Into the Spanish sky
To see Maria my star."

' There are comedians once a week come to the palace,
where, under a great canopy, the Queen and the
Infanta sit in the middle, our Princeps and Don
Carlos on the Queen's right hand, the King and the
little Cardinal (i.e. the King's boy-brother, Ferdinand)
on the Infanta's left hand.'

Philip's notorious and scandalous infidelity to his
wife, to whom, nevertheless, he was devotedTy^ttacEecl,
did not prevent him from being violently jealous of
any appearance of special loving homage to her beauty
ancT charm. At one of the great cane tourneys to
celebrate his accession in the summer of 1621, it was

1 Historia del Arte Dramatico en Espana (translated from the German
: of A. F. Schack).

2 Howell's 'Familiar Letters.'

330 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

noticed that when Juan de Tassis, Count of Villa-
mediana, rode with his troop of horsemen into the
arena, he was wearing a sash covered with the silver
coins called reales (royals), and flaunting as his motto,
' My loves are reals ' (or royal). The Count was a
spiteful poetaster, neither good looking nor young, but
boastful and presumptuous ; and the quidnuncs of the
capital who flocked Liar's parade,' * began to whisper
that this was a challenge to the love of the Queen ;
and that the King, when his wife had remarked that
Villamediana aimed well, had replied, 'Yes, but he aims
too high.' It is now fairly certain that Villamediana's
homage was not intended for the Queen, but for
another lady, named Francisca de Tavara, with whom
the King was carrying on an intrigue at the time ; 2
and beyond her usual jovial heartiness there is no
ground for supposing that Isabel gave Villamediana
any encouragement.

But in the following spring of 1622, when the Court
was at Aranjuez, a far more serious matter happened
which produced tragic results for Villamediana. There
was a great festival to celebrate Philip's seventeenth
birthday, and one of the attractions was a temporary
theatre of canvas and wood erected in the ' island
garden,' and beautifully adorned, in which was to be
represented at night a comedy in verse written by the
Count of Villamediana, and dedicated to the Queen.
The comedy was called ' La Gloria de Niquea,' and
Isabel was to represent the part of the goddess of
beauty. All the Court was assembled, the King being
in his seat with his brothers and sister, and the Queen

1 The steps of the Church of St. Philip in the Calle Mayor was s
called El Mentidero.

2 Speech (published) by Don Eugenio Hartzenbusch to the Roy !
Academy of History, Madrid, 1861, where the whole question is discussec.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 331

in the retiring rooms behind the stage. The inside of
the flimsy building was of course lit brilliantly with
wax candles and lamps, whilst in the densely wooded
gardens outside all was dark, when suddenly, at the
moment that the prologue had been finished, a cry
went up from behind the curtain : and then a long
tongue of flame licked up the side, and immediately
the whole of the stage was aflame. Panic seized upon
the gaily bedizened crowd, and there was a rush to
escape. In the confusion the King with difficulty
found his way out, only to rush to the back of the
edifice in search of his wife. Villamediana had been
before him, and Philip found his wife half fainting in
the Count's arms.

Whatever may be the truth of the matter, it was
soon noised about by the scandalmongers of Madrid
that Villamediana had planned the whole affair, and
had purposely set fire to the place that he might have
an excuse for clasping the Queen in his arms. This
was on the 8th April 1622 ; and when, in August of
the same year, Villamediana was assassinated in his
coach at nightfall in the Calle Mayor, within a few
yards of his own house,1 all fingers pointed to Philip
himself as the instigator of the crime ; and the current
jingle ascribed to Lope de Vega, in which it says that
' el impulse fu£ soberano ' echoed public opinion on
the matter. No blame, however, in any case can be
ascribed to Isabel, nor did Philip ever cease to hold
her in affection and esteem.

She was a true daughter of her father, sage in
counsel, bold in action, but with a gaiety of heart that
often made her pleasures look frivolous and unbecoming.

1 The house now belonging to Count Onate, just out of the Puerta del
Sol.

332 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

More Spanish than the Spaniards, she loved the bull-
fight and the theatre with an intensity that delighted
her husband's subjects, who were crazy for both pas-
times, but in her boisterous vitality she would often
countenance amusements contrived for her which we
should now think coarse. Quarrels and fights between
country women would be incited, or nocturnal tumults
by torchlight in the gardens of Aranjuez or the Retire,
arranged for her to witness ; snakes or other noxious
reptiles would be secretly set loose on the floor of a
crowded theatre to the confusion of the spectators,
whilst the Queen almost laughed herself into a fit, at
one of the windows overlooking the scene. The Court
indeed during the first years of her married life was a
merry one, notwithstanding its ostentatious devotionj
arrd, although Olivares more than once urged the
King to take a more active interest in the government
and give less time" to jiis amusements, the minister's
enemies, and he had many, averred that there was
nothing he really liked better than to keep the young
monarch immersed in pleasure, that he himself might
rule supreme.1

Much as Isabel herself loved pleasure, she began to
be anxious, as troubles at home and abroad accumulated,
at the complete abandonment of public affairs to the
v minister, and she urged Philip most earnestly to
give more time to his duties. She had good reason
to be distrustful, for she saw how weak to resist his
impulses Philip was. His love affairs were legion,
and as in the case of most of his courtiers, gallantry
became a habit with him. There was, however, one

1 It is certain that Olivares urged Philip most fervently to attend to
business in the early years of his reign. See my chapter on Philip iv. in
' The Cambridge Modern History,' vol. iv., for a letter on the subject from
Philip.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 333

affair of Philip's that gave his wife more disquietude
than most of the others. Olivares, it was said, in
pursuance of his system, had agents all over Spain to
send to Madrid the most talented actors and attractive
actresses that could be found ; and in 1627 there appeared
as a member of a very clever troupe at the ' Corral de
la Pacheca ' * a girl of sixteen named Maria Calderon.
She was no great beauty, but of extraordinary grace
and fascination, with a voice so sweet, and speech so
captivating, that she subdued all hearts. Philip saw
her on the stage, and fell in love with her at onec. She
was summoned to the room overlooking the courtyard
that served the King for a private box, in order that he
might listen more closely to the cadence of her lovely
voice, and the inflammable heart of Philip grew warmer
still. From the Corral to the palace was but a step
when the king willed it, and the ' Calderona ' became
Philip's acknowledged mistress. Gifts and caresses
were piled upon her by the lovelorn King ; and the
Calderona, proud of her position, turned a severe face
to all other lovers, needing, as she said, no favour but
royal favour.

k On the 1 7th April 1629 she had a son by the King,
to tfiegreat delight of Philip. The child JuanHoL
Austria was the handsomest member of his house, and
FrnTip's affection for him from the first was intense ;
somewhat to Isabel's chagrin when she herself bore
him a son six months afterwards.2 But from the
worthy ' Calderona ' she had no more rivalry to fear.
As soon as the actress could go out she sought the
King, and, throwing herself at his feet, craved per-

1 On the site of the present Teatro espafiol in the Plaza de Sant Ana.

2 Philip had had a son by another lady high at Court three years before
this, in 1626, of whom an account from unpublished sources will be found
in ' The Year after the Armada/ etc., by Martin Hume.

334 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

mission, humbly and tearfully, to devote the rest of her
life to religion in a convent, now that she had been
honoured by bearing a son to the King. Philip loved
her still and hesitated, but she firmly refused to cohabit
with him again ; and with sorrow he gave way, and the
Calderona became a nun.1

Isabel's children were many, five who died at, or
soon after, their births having preceded the looked-for
heir of Spain, Don Baltasar Carlos, that chubby, sturdy
little Prince (born in October 1629) who prances his
faTpony for ever upon the canvas of Velazquez. The
fastuous taste of the King and Court was satisfied to
the full in the baptism of Baltasar Carlos. The
Countess of Olivares, who was as supreme in the palace
as her husband was in the country, held the babe at
the font, seated, as we are told by an eyewitness, upon
' a seat of rock crystal, the most costly piece of furniture
ever seen in Europe ' ; and presents were showered
upon the midwife to the value of thirteen thousand
ducats. As soon as the Queen was able to appear,
her birthday (2ist November) was celebrated on this
occasion as it had never been before. Masquerades
on horseback, torchlight parades, cane contests and
bullfights succeeded each other, in all of which the
King made a sumptuous appearance with his brother,
Don Carlos ; and the Queen, who had given an heir
to the crown, was honoured to the full.

This splendid Court, strutting and posturing in rich
garments upon the brink of the slope which was
leading to Spain's overthrow, had the advantage of
being immortalised upon canvas by the greatest master
of portraiture that ever lived, and laid bare to the very

1 From an unpublished contemporary account in Italian. B. M. Ac5 J
8,703.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 335

soul by some of the keenest satirists who ever wielded
gerh The battue parties, in which Philip and his wife
delighted, for the killing of stags in an enclosure, are
brought before us as if we were present by the great
picture in which Velazquez has portrayed the scene.1
In the park of Aranjuez, with the afternoon sun glinting
through the trees, dark against a cloudless sky, the
white canvas enclosure is erected. Into its gradually
narrowing limits the frightened deer have been driven
by mounted beaters, and at the only exit through the
neck of the funnel are stationed the gentlemen, beneath
a sort of platform of leafy boughs decked with red
cloth, in which the ladies sit. The central figure of
the twelve ladies, seated upon a crimson cushion, the
better to see the sport, is the Queen, Isabel of Bourbon,
dressed in a yellow robe, and wearing a white bow
upon her head. Beneath the platform there await,
mounted, the onrush of the deer, Philip and his two
brothers, Carlos and Ferdinand, and, of course,
Olivares. With their hunting knives, they slash at
the deer as they fly past underneath the ladies' bower,
killing some, ham-stringing others, and leaving the
rest that escape to be dealt with by the hounds
awaiting them beyond. The ground beneath the
bower is drenched with the warm blood of the
butchered beasts, and the ladies smile approval at the
sickly spectacle, whilst groups of courtiers, servants,
and beaters, crowd the foreground and discuss the
King's prowess.

Another hunting scene, a little less repugnant to
modern ideas, is the famous * Boar Hunt* in the
National Gallery in London. Here the canvas en-
closure is in the hunting seat of the Pardo, and Philip,

1 Ashburton Collection.

336 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

on his prancing mount, is just thrusting his forked
javelin into the flank of a passing boar, whilst around
him are his courtiers and companions in the sport,
with Olivares nearest ; and in the arena there are some
clumsy blue carriages, with partially curtained windows
innocent of glass except in front, in one of which sits
Queen Isabel. The mules of her coach have, of
course, been unharnessed and put out of harm's way ;
but as the boars are agile and fierce, and had been
known to leap into the coaches, the ladies themselves
are armed with light javelins to repel them. Every
detail of the life of this pleasure-loving Court has been
fixed for us by the great painter: the ladies and
gentlemen in the garb in which they lived, the dwarfs
and buffoons who amused them, the palaces in which
they intrigued ; and, as a running accompaniment
always, the sated weary face of the King from youth to
age.

Fair and lymphatic, with dull blue eyes, and colour-
less sallow face, Philip had inherited the tradition that
in all public appearances the King of Spain must never
smile : and, mad votary of pleasure as he was, he
never moved a muscle either in delight or annoyance
whilst he was behind the footlights. Isabel was more
spontaneous, and ^Spanish etiquette n^vercrusHeH^her.
But as time went on and the clouds piled up for the
coming tempest, her face grew heavier and her eyes
more sad. Her portrait was painted many times by
Valazquez, though only one specimen remains in the
Museo del Prado, the equestrian figure, painted at
about the time of Baltasar's birth before misfortune
had spoilt her life. Another likeness of her, now at
Hampton Court, was painted ten years later (1638),
shows the change wrought by trouble : but in all

ISABEL OF BOURBON

ISABEL OF BOURBON 337

Velazquez's representations of the Queen, we see the
same characteristics : the large, expressive black eyes,
the^broad spacious forehead, and the strong full jaw ; l-
and, though the general aspect was more like Tier
buxom mother than her clever father, Isabel's
countenance is alive with intelligence. In the later
portFaits the face grows weary, and the lower part is
flaccid and heavy, but in all the painted portraits of
Isabel by Velazquez, we have the woman herself
before us ; not a sensuous idealisation of her, like that
painted by Rubens, and now at the Louvre.

If the painter has handed to us by his genius the
exact reflection of this Court in a way that makes it
live for us more vividly, perhaps, than any other,
Quevedo and his followers, especially Velez de Guevara
in El Diablo Cojuelo, have left in biting prose records
no less faithful of its amusements, its follies, and crimes.
By the light held up by the satirists we see an utterly
decadent society, sunk, from the King downwards, into
a slough of apathetic despondency of ever bettering
things, whilst each individual strives madly to get
as much pleasure as he can wring out of life, by fair
means or foul, before the catastrophe overwhelms them
all. Faith has decayed, and trembling superstition
mixed with scoffing irreverence has taken its place :
idleness is everywhere ; poverty and squalor seek to
masquerade as nobility, in order to claim the privilege
to plunder which Court and Church alone possess, and
labour is scorned as beneath the subjects of a King so
wealthy and powerful as the sovereign of Spain is still
assumed to be, in the face of all evidence to the con-
trary. A pretentious, hollow society it was, where all
sought to share in the Scramble, even~at second ^or
tKfrd hand, for the possessions of the State, oblivions

" Y

338 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to the fact that the State itself could possess nothing^
but what the individual citizens supplied.

Pretence was not limited to rank and material
possessions. The noble poet and satirist kept a
sycophantic man of letters to supply him with the
lucubrations that moved the Court to admiration when
they bore the name of a marquis, the cities swarmed
with sham students, who pattered Latin tags, and
cadged on the strength of a scholarship that was not
theirs : and when showy pageants palled upon the
King, and even his beloved comedies failed to spur his
jaded wit, Philip could always find solace in the
pedantic and affected academies and poetical contests
over which he was so fond of presiding in his palace.
There well-studied impromptus were mouthed, far-
fetched conceits declaimed with a pomposity worthy of
inspired prophecy, and preciosity run mad twisted
and befouled the noble Castilian speech into the
bastard Latiniparla, at which Quevedo gibed whilst
himself revelling in it.

It was a Court of mean shams and squalid splendour,
wherejall was rottenness lout jhe fair dufsicle! How
ostentatious that outside was may be seen m the many
records of court festivities that a bombastic age
has handed to us. They are for the most part in-
sufferably tedious catalogues of the dress and orna-
ments of pompously named nobles, courtiers, an3
favourites ; I but a few details of two great feasts in
which Isabel took a conspicuous part, may be set forth
here as a specimen of the diversions of her time. An
entertainment, given to the sovereigns by the Countess

1 Soto de Aguilar, one of Philip's gentlemen of the wardrobe, wrote an
interminable account of all the festivities of his time (MS. Royal Academy
of History. Copy in the writer's possession), from which have been
derived many details.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 339

of Olivares early in June 1631, in the garden of her
brother, the Count of Monterey, inspired Olivares with
the idea of outdoing all previous efforts in the same
direction. The time was short, for the night of St.
John (24th June) was the day fixed. Two comedies
had to be written specially for the occasion ; and Lope
de Vega, the most marvellously prolific playwright that
ever lived, managed to compose one of them in three
days : whilst Quevedo and Antonio Mendoza, put
on their mettle by Lope's rapidity, wrote another
jointly in a single day, whilst Olivarez himself snatched
rare moments of leisure from State affairs, of which he
was the universal minister, to superintend the re-
hearsals.

As if by enchantment, in a few days there sprang up
in the gardens I a sumptuous pavilion from which the
King and Queen, with their favoured courtiers, might
see the play. In front was erected the open air theatre,
crowded with crystal lights and rare flowers, whilst all
around were platforms for other guests, choristers, etc.
At nine o'clock at night, Philip and Isabel alighted
from their coach, and were received by Olivares to the
sounds of soft music. When they had taken their
seats, Philip on a chair of state, and Isabel on a pile of
cushions, trays of presents were brought them, per-
fumes, embroidered scented handkerchiefs, and essences
in cut glass flasks,2 Isabel being especially asked to

1 The garden was that of Monterey, and with the two adjoining gardens,
which for this occasion were thrown into one, occupied the whole space
from the Calle de Alcala to the Carrera de San Geronimo, called the
Salon del Prado.

2 Amongst other trifles offered to the ladies at this feast were some of
the small jars (bucaros) made of fine scented white clay, which it was at
the time a feminine vice to eat. Madame D'Aulnoy gives a curious
account of the evil effects produced by this strange eatable. She also
mentions the curious craze in Madrid at the time amongst people of

340 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

accept in addition a jewelled Italian fan. Quevedo's
comedy, Quien mas miente medra mas (He who lies
most thrives most) was represented first, after a musical
prologue and a poetic welcome to Isabel recited by the
famous actress Maria de Riquelme. The first
representation occupied two hours and a half, we are
told by an eyewitness : ' during which many excellent
dances were introduced ; and although the players,
having had little time to study, did not succeed in
bringing out all the witty invention of the verses, it is
certain that in many ordinary comedies together could
not be found such an abundance of smart jests as in
this one alone ; for one day's work was sufficient
for Don Francisco de Quevedo's wit to invent
it all.'

When the first comedy was finished Philip and
Isabel were led to the adjoining garden of the Duke
of Maqueda,1 where there had been erected two bowers
or summer-houses of leaves and blossoms, with a great
number of coloured lights. These two arbors, one
for the King and the other for the Queen, communi-
cated by an arched passage of - foliage, and were
surrounded by similar erections for the suite, each
bower being supplied with a table of light refresh-
ments. In the King's bower there was a hamper
containing a long cloak of brown cloth, ornamented
at the edge by scrolls of black and silver, solid silver
hanging buttons, and loops serving for fastening.
This was accompanied by a white wide-brimmed hat

fashion to throw eggshells filled with scent at each other in the theatres,
parties, and even whilst promenading in carriages. Philip himself was
much addicted to this pastime.

1 This was the garden on the corner of the Carrera de San Gero-
nimo and the Prado, now occupied by the Villahermosa palace and
grounds.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 341

trimmed with brown feathers and a white aigrette,
and a Walloon falling collar,1 which was still occasion-
ally worn in place of the almost universal^/z'//^ The
King's brothers were similarly supplied with disguises ;
whilst in the Queen's bower the hamper contained a
mirror, a brown woollen cloak embroidered at the
bottom with sprigs of black silk and silver, the
fastenings in this case also being solid silver hanging
buttons and silver loops. The cloak was lined with
silk of the same colour, hemmed and stitched with
black and silver, and with it was a beautiful lace
mantilla, a pleated lace ruff, and a white hat adorned
with brown and white plumes and spangles. The
whole Court was thus supplied with wraps and head-
gear against the night air. A light supper of sur-
passing daintiness was then served in the arbors,
and the whole party, politely supposed to be disguised,
proceeded to witness the second comedy ; the Queen
in her capricious garb, 'adding to her natural and
marvellous graciousness and beauty the extraordinary
attraction of the strangeness of attire, without losing
an atom of the dignity which distinguishes her
Majesty, no less than the other admirable virtues
and perfections which shine in her.' We are assured
that the unusual hats and garments worn by the King
and his brothers were equally powerless to spoil their
dignified appearance, * as they unite those qualities
which vulgar censure and envy always strive to keep
apart, namely, great beauty and a noble air : ' and the
writer of the account from which I quote, nervous,
apparently, at what the outside public would say to
such a derogation of royalty as to don disguises,

1 Philip is represented as wearing such a collar in his portrait by
Velazquez at Dulvvich College.

342 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

assures us that only a very select company was
allowed to be present.1

The comedy of Lope de Vega, ' La Noche de San
Juan,' was then__represente4_9n the open air stage,
and a short^concert followed, after which the King
and Queen were conducted to a flower-decked gallery
erected in the other adjoining garden.2 Here, after
midnight, another delicate Defection was partaken of,
the Count and Countess of Olivares serving the King
and Queen, the whole banquet being so well organised
that everything went off with the utmost decorum and
quietness, except for the sweet music which enlivened
the feast. When the day was just breaking the King
and Queen entered their coach and, after a few turns
in the Prado, rode home to the palace to bed. Olivares
was praised to the skies for the organisation of this
lavish feast, and the wonder is expressed that the
licentious crowd of people who frequented the Prado
at night should have been so awed by the presence
of the King in the garden adjoining, that no disturbance
or disorder took place.

This feast, fine as it was, was completely thrown
in the shade by another which took place a few yards
away, two years later (1633), when, at tremendous ex-
pense, and much unjust appropriation of other people's
property, Olivares run up and sumptuously furnished,
in an amazing short time, the pleasure- palace of the
Buen Retiro, which afterwards became Philip's favourite
place of residence, where his comedies, academies, con-
certs, recitations and masquerades could be indulged

\ Although he confesses that when most of the great folks had retired,
and daylight lit up the scene of revelry, great numbers of people were
found hidden in the shrubberies.

2 On the spot where the Bank of Spain now stands, until a few years
ago the site of the palace and grounds of the Marquis of Alcanices.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 343

in with more propriety than in the gloomy, old half-
Moorish palace on the cliff at the other end of the
town. The house warming of the Buen Retire lasted
for a week in one continual round of tedious entertain-
ment, in which invention and lavishness exhausted
itself; but this was only the first of a series of such
revels in the same place, for which any pretext was
selzecT"

— hT~January 1637, for instance, when Philip learnt
that his brother-in-law, Ferdinand, had been elected
King of the Romans, and future Emperor, an enter-
tainment was ordered on a prodigious scale at the
Buen Retiro. Three thousand men were set to work
to level a hill that Pinelo (Anales) says ' had stood
since the world was made,' for the purpose of building
a wooden enclosure 608 feet long and 480 wide. Four
hundred and eight large balconies or boxes surrounded
this vast space, which was painted to look like masonry
outside, whilst the inside was hung with silk and tapes-
tries, and a silver railing ran round the front of the
boxes. Nine hundred huge candelabra, 'with four
lights in each,' illuminated the plaza ; and the royal
box, with its gilded roofs and pillars, and its green
and gold appointments, glittered with mirrors which
cast back the twinkling lights that fell upon them.
Blazonry, imperial and royal crowns, scutcheons of
arms and 'conceited devices,' were displayed on every
side; and when, on the I5th February (Sunday),
Philip came to the feast in state from the house, in
the Carrera de San Geronimo, where he had robed,
through a broad lane of people, with torch-bearers
standing shoulder to shoulder throughout his route,
people said that never had such a gorgeous show been
seen in Spain.

344 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

With martial music, before them rode in his train,
sixteen bands of nobles, twelve in each band, all
dressed alike in black velvet and silver, and every
man carrying in his right hand a lighted wax taper,
whilst he restrained his prancing steed with the left.
Last of all the bands came those of Olivares and the
King, dressed like the others, but with some richer
ornaments ; and then great triumphal cars of strange
and showy designs, made by Cosme Lotti, the clever
Florentine. Each of them was 30 feet long and 46
feet high, lit with 100 torches, and contained in-
numerable figures and devices ; and bands of music,
the weight being so great that twenty-four bullocks
were needed to draw each one, the bullocks themselves
being hung with crimson, and accompanied by men
in the garb of Orientals bearing silver torches. After
them followed forty savages, whose clubs were torches ;
and as the great procession entered the enclosed space,
and each party passed before Queen Isabel in the royal
box, a fanfare sounded and the men saluted the sover-
eign ; the whole procession, after having completed
the circle, forming up in front of the royal box, whilst
the mummers on the cars represented before the
Queen ' a colloquy of peace and war.'

Philip's band of nobles in their musical ride and
intricate evolutions, of course excelled all others ; and
the King, acclaimed as the champion cavalier of his
realm, ascended to his wife's box to lay at her feet the
guerdon of his prowess, and witness the rest of the
feast at her side. For ten days thereafter the feasting
and vain show went on, comedies, concerts, banquets,
balls, water fetes on the lake, illumination of the
woods, bulLfighia by torchlight, a poetical contest and
greasy poles ;_a. cotillon in which the party pelted each

ISABEL OF BOURBON 345

otherwith eggshells full of perfume, and a hundred
otheFdevices to waste time and money,1 and to beguile
Philip from the looming affairs of State, now wholly
managed by the strong, dark-faced man with the big_
head and bowed shoulders, whem-most people hated
for his imperiousness and his greed, the King's bogey
as some called him, the second King of Spain, trie
Count Duke of Olivares.

The brilliant hopes of peace and retrenchment which

had""greeted Philip's accession had ail been falsified.
The Catholic union with France represented by the
marriages of Philip with Isabel and of Louis xm. with
the Infanta Anna, had failed before the marriages
:hemsefves were complete ; for the ambitious projects'
•of Philip ii. were agairT being revived by Olivares, who
dreamed once more that Spain, cast down in the dust as

^^_ — ' ^-[

she was, might yet hold the hegemony over the powers,
of Europe^ ancTclictate to Christendom the Articles of
i^s faith. Itjwas a vain, foolish, vision in the circum-
stances, for not of material strengtH^alone had Spain
been stripped, but of the real secret of its short pre-
doTninance, the firm conviction of divine selection and
of the mvfhcibiliiyjDf its sacred cause. The country
was as politically heterogeneous as ever^ whilst it had
losT the homogeneity it had borrowed from religious
exaltation ; and yet, with its rival, France, growing daily
in national solidarity and_cpntributive capability under
Richelieu, Spainwas hurried by Olivares into a perfect
fever for conquest, and to the arrogant re-assertion of
its old exploded claims.

The employment of Spanish troops to overrun the

1 Appendix to Mesonero Romanes' ' El Antiguo Madrid.' An account
of this feast, though much less full, is also given in the newsletters of the
date published by Sr. Rodriguez Villa in ' La Corte de Espafia en 1636 y
1637.'

346 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Palatinate and reduce Bohemia, and the recrudescence
of the interminable war against the Dutch, had knit
the two branches of the house of Austria closer
together than ever, and strengthened the Emperor
immensely. It^ was clear, that unless Richelieu struck
promptly and boldly, France would once again, if
Olivares had his way, be shut in by a circle of enemies.
France and Savoy, alarmed at the revived pretensions
of Spain, made common cause with the protestant
powers, and soon all Europe was at war. Spain was
ruined, but at least the court nobles and the church
were rich, and the national pride was excited to the
utmost. The war was primarily against France, but
Isabel of Bourbon was as fiercely Spanish as if her
father had not been Henry the Great, and she herself
set the example of sacrifice. The jewels she loved so
well were sold to provide men-at-arms ; the ladies, who
took their tone from the Queen, sent their valuables
the same way ; the nobles, aroused by appeals to their
pride, contributed voluntarily a million ducats to the
war fund ; and the church opened its hoards to the ex-
tent of raising and maintaining twenty thousand troops.
All French property in Spain was confiscated, and the
war for a time was carried on with an energy that
reminded men of the great times of the Emperor. At
first the Spaniards and Austrians carried all before
them. Tilly in Germany, Spinola in Flanders, and
Fadrique de Toledo on the sea, revived the glory of
the house of Austria ; and Spanish pride rose once
more to crazy arrogance. Philip the Great, the Planet
King, were the titles already given to the idle young
man, whom Olivares flattered and controlled. But
when the first gust of enthusiasm was past, it was clear
that Spain could not provide funds to carry on war by

ISABEL OF BOURBON 347

land and sea the world over ; and peace was made with
England ; Savoy was won over, and thenceforward it was
a duel to the death between the house of Austria and
the house of France, between Olivares and Richelieu.

For years the struggle went on with varying military
phases, but with the inevitable result ot reducing
poverty - stricken, idle Spain to absolute penury.
"Every device to raise more money was tried, and all
in vain. Crushing taxes upon production, debasement
of~The coinage, confiscation, repudiation and robbery,
were but weak resources to maintain a great foreign
war by a Bankrupt State ; and unless Olivares con-
fessed failure more money must be had. The Cortes
of Castile was powerless to check the national waste,
but the Cortes of Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia,
w'ere still vigorous, and resisted all attempts to extort
money except by their votes, grudgingly given only
after much haggling. Olivares Had unHerstood as
"clearly as Ferdinand and Isabel had done, that for the
King of Spain to be powerful enough to cope with
France he must control the whole resources of Spain.
The bond of religious exaltation had dissolved, and
could not be restored ; but the unification on political
lines might be effected by weakening the separate
auTonomous institutions of the outlying States.

This was the plan of Olivares ; doubtless a wise one
if pursued patiently and cautiously in times of peace
and in an era of interior reforms. I^u^ Olivares, like
Ferdinand the Catholic before him, needed national
unity in a hurry, in order to obtain resources to figHt
France^jiot for the purpose of making Spain a homo-
geneous peaceful nation,1 and his reckless attempts to

1 The po A-A aims of Olivares are fully set forth in ' Spain, Its
Greatness a T--e :ay,' Cambridge Historical Series, by Martin Hume.

348 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

obtain money for his war with France by over-riding
the' autonomous privileges of Catalonia and Portugal,
and extorting taxation without parliamentary sanction,
precipitated the ruin that had long threatened. In
June 1640 Barcelona flamed out in revolt against
Castile, and soon all Catalonia, and part of Aragpn
and Valencia^ had repudiated the dominion of Philip,
affd had made common cause with France^ Six
months later, in December 1640, Portugal for similar^
reasons proclaimed the Duke of Braganza king, and
cast off for ever the yoke of Spain.

Philip, plunged in his pleasures, as we have seen,
was "Kept in the dark. The Catalan insurgents were
for~liim merely a band of rioters, as Olivares assured
him, who would soon be suppressed ; and when Por-
tugal proclaimed its freedom the minister had the
effrontery to rush into Philip's chamber with an
appearance of joy, and congratulated him upon gain-
ing a new dukedom and a vast estate. ' How ? '
asked the King. ' Sire,' replied Olivares, 'the Duke
of Braganza has gone mad and revolted against your
Majesty. All his belongings are now forfeit and are
yours.' But Philip knew better, and for once lost his
marble serenity. Blow after blow fell upon him.
Starving subjects. a~ crippIedjTade, an empty treasury,
and his richest realms in revolt : these were the results
of his twenty years rule, and all he had to show was
the hollow glory of battles gained far away in quarrels
not his^ownT^

He was good-hearted and really loved his subjects,
but he had never learnt to rule, for he had never ruled
his own passions or curbed his inclinations ; and Jie
was in despair when the truth came to him, bit by bit.
Frantic prayers ; tears and vows of amendment were

ISABEL OF BOURBON 349

his way of dealing with all the blows of fortune : but
there were others at his side who were more practical
and determined than he. For years the yoke of
Olivares and his wife had galled the neck of Isabel.
Fond of pleasure as she was, she had a statesman's
mind, and her love for her promising^son Balta_s_ar,
now aged thirteen, and the pride of his parents' heart,
had sharpened her wits as she saw his ^n-at inheritance
slipping away from him under the rule of a minister
whom she personally disliked for his rudeness even to
herT Again and again she had urged Philip to play
the man and head his own armies in the field. Philip
was willing, even eager, to do so ; but Olivares would
not hear of it, and the breach widened between the
Queen and the minister. Olivares was detested by
most of the principal nobles and churchmen. His
policy of war could only be paid for out of the plunder
derived from them, since all other classes were reduced
to poverty, and the elements of discontent gradually
grouped around Isabel.

At last Isabel's prayers, for once, overrode Olivares'
counsel, and Philip stood firm in his determination to
leaH his own armies to rescue Catalonia from^tlie
l^rench. Olivares left no stone unturned to defeat
the Queen. Obedient physicians certified that the
voyage would injure the King's health, submissive
Councils voted against the risk of the sovereign's life
in war, and constitutional lawyers laid down that it was
not proper for the King to go. Philip, tired out at
last, snatched a report of the Council from the hands
of the Protonotary who was about to present it, and,

1 Olivares was notoriously offensive to ladies. On one occasion when
Isabel gave an opinion on State affairs he told Philip that monks must
be kept for praying and women for child-bearing.

350 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

tearing it into pieces, cried, * Bring me no more reports
about my going to Catalonia, but prepare for the
journey, for go I will.' The royal confessor — of
course a creature of Olivares — added his remonstrance
against the King's journey, but was at once stopped
by Philip, and was told that if Olivares did not want
to go he could stay away ; and if he was not at Aran-
juez when the King passed through he would not wait
for him.

It was a victory for Isabel that presaged the great
minister's fall ; for OlivarcsllarectTTnt leave hi

sicteTand the^Queen remained in the capital as Regent.

Every device was adopted to delay the King's pro-

, gress. Money_was wanted, and when that had been

extorted, in many casesJBy

and" pompous preparations for the journey were endless.
Nine state coaches and six litters, a hundred and three
saddle horses, with crowds of courtiers, were considered
necessary for a campaign ; and every grandee and
titled nobleman in Spain was warned that he must join
the royal train. When, at last, after visits to number-
less altars, Philip took leave of his wife at Vacia Madrid
in April 1642, it was only to be delayed on the way
for many weeks in ostentatious feasts, hunting parties
and frivolities, before he at length arrived at Saragossa.
By that time Aragon itself was half overrun by the
French, and Philip, fully awake now to the terrible
condition of affairs, grew ever more gloomy with his
minister, who even now found means to keep the King
isolated at Saragossa, miles away from the hostilities, in
discounted inaction.

In the meanwhile Isabel in Madrid, free from the

1 One hundred and fifty persons in Madrid alone were cast into dungeons
for not being liberal enough with their contributions on this occasion.

ISABEL OF BOURBON 351

terrifying presence of the favourite, organised the party
~rjf"his opponents. She had always been a favourit*
with the crowd for her popular manners, but now she
won their hearts completely ; for they knew she was
against the man upon wEose back they laid all their
woes. She visited the guards and barracks, mustered
the regiments in the capital and addressed to them
harangues, exciting their loyalty to the King and
Spain. Once more she sacrificed her ornaments,
devoted herself to the comfort of the soldiers, raised
a new regiment at her own expense in her son's name,
presided over the Councils, and infused more activity
and enthusiasm in the administration than had been
seen for years.

Isabel of Bourbon had seized her opportunity. Up
to that time she had been simply an appanage of the
splendours of the idle King ; now, with the power of a
Regent and the favour of the people, she became the
strongest personality in Spain. Her letters to the
Ring were vigorous and brave ; and he thenceforward
treated her with greater consideration, as if up to that
time he had never realised that his wife was a woman
of talent and spirit. Philip was kept idle at Saragossa,
away from his army and his nobles for months. Once
he acted on his own initiative and appointed a new
commander-in-chief, the Marquis of Leganes, a kins-
man of Olivares ; but the appointment was unfortunate.
At the first engagement afterwards Philip's army was
utterly routed before Lerida ; and as winter approached,
with a badly fed, unpaid dwindling force, quarrelling
generals, and his best provinces held by France, Philip
returned to Madrid with an aching heart at the ertd-of
the year 1642.

He found the tone in his palace very different from

352 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

when hejhad leftJt, There were four women, all of
whom had Philip's ear, and who hated Olivares. The
Queen, Anna of Austria, Queen of France, Philip's
sister, the Duchess of Mantua (Margaret of Savoy),
his cousin, who had been his viceroy in Portugal, and
who rightly blamed the minister for the loss of the
country ; she, moreover, being kept in semi-imprison-
ment at Ocafia by the minister's orders, and Dona
Anna de Guevara, the King's old nurse, who was also
forbidden at Court by the same influence. These
ladies were all in communication with each other and
with the nobles who were Olivares' enemies, led by
the Counts of Paredes and Castrillo. * My good
intentions and my son's innocence,' Isabel told Paredes,
' must for once serve the King for eyes : for if he sees
through those of the Count Duke much longer, my
son will be reduced to a poor King of Castile.'

A week or two after the King's return, Isabel struck
herTplow at the tottering tavounte. The first sign of
the^vent was the escape of the King's Savoy cousin,
the Duchess of Mantua, from Ocafia, and her arrival
at Madrid late at night, after a ride of forty miles
through a storm of sleet. Olivares was furious, and
kept her waiting for four hours before he assigned her
two wretched rooms in one of the royal convents.
But Isabel received her in the palace with open arms
the next morning. Then the banished nurse, Anna
de Guevara, appeared in the palace in defiance of
Olivares. That afternoon Philip visited his wife's
room, and she, kneeling before him, with little
Baltasar in her arms, implored him for the sake of
their son to dismiss his evil minister before it was too
late to rescue the realms his ineptitude had lost. In a
torrent o£ words Isabel poured forth the pent-up

ISABEL OF BOURBON 353

complaints of years ; the wars that had ruined the
country, the starving people, the lost provinces, the
waste and frivolity that had been the rule of their
lives, the insults and slights which she, personally, had
suffered at the hands of Olivares and his wife,. and_tbe
shame that a king, into whose hands God had confided
so sacred a task, should delegate it to others.

Philip was deeply moved, though he said nothing ;
but as he left his wife's chamber, he was confronted in
the corridor by the kneeling figure of his beloved
foster-mother, Anna de Guevara. She, too, formed
her impeachment of Olivares in impassioned words,
and Philip could only reply, 'You have spoken the
truth.' Then for two hours the Queen and the
Duchess of Mantua were closeted with the King, and
the victory was won.1 That night, i;th January 1543^
Olivares was dismissed. He struggled for daysj;o
regain his influence over the King, but tried in vain ;
for Philip, like most weak men, was obstinate when
once his mind was made up, and so, ruined and
degraded, the Count Duke turned his back upon the
Court he_had ruled, and went to madness and death,
leaving Isabel of Bourbon, the mistress of the situation,
the ' King's only minister,' as he said soon after, when
he asked the nuns of shoeless Carmelites to pray for
his 'minister.'

Madrid went wild with joy at Olivares' fall.

} - '"*" " " • •• ^ - - - w * _• - - - - '

1 Isabels have always saved Spain/ the people cried,
asTh'e King and Queen with the Duchess of Mantua
went to the convent church of the barefoots to give
thanks ; * Philip is King of Spain, at last, and will save

1 Relatione dell' Ambasciatore di Venetia (MS. British Museum, Add.
8,701), and also an account attributed (doubtfully) to Quevedo, printed in
vol. iii. of the Semanario Erudito).

Z

354 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

his country.' But it needed much more than shouting
to save Spain. Philip, spurred by his wife, plucked
up more energy than ever before. He would be his
own minister in future, and would take the field as
soon as spring came, and wrest Catalonia from the
French. Before that could be done, Philip's army
met in Flanders with the greatest defeat it had ever
sustained, a blow from which the reputation of the
fafnotfs^Spanish infantry never recovered. His young
brother, Cardinal Ferdinand, had died two years
before, and his place in Flanders had been taken by
the Portuguese noble Mello. He was a good soldier ;
but Conde, young as he was, out-generalled him : and
the defeat of Rocroy made it certain that France, and
nofSpain, would in future lead Europe! But yet the
soft ol Spain itsell mUSt be redeemed from the French
invaders: and again, through the summer of 1643,
Philip struggled manfully to regain his lost dominion ;

whilst Isabel, as Regent in Madrid, organised,

directed, and encouraged, with a spirit and energy
thatwon_Jbr her the fervent love of her" husband's
loyal subjects. Some success attended him, for he
captured Lerida from the French : but the war was a
terrible drain, and in the campaign of the following
year, 1644, failure followed failure.

The poor, weary, King's heart was almost breaking
under his many troubles, when he was brought into
contact with the saintly woman, who until the end was
his one refuge and solace, the Venerable nun, Maria
de Agreda, whose exhortations and prayers sustained
him in his hardest trials, which were yet to come.
Philip was in Saragossa at the beginning of October
when news came to him that his wife was ill._ Send-
ing his new favourite — for his good^ resolves in that

ISABEL OF BOURBON 355

respect had soon failed — Luis de Haro, to the front, to
acquaint The army of the King's reason for leaving, he
started at once for Madrid.

On the 28th September 1644, Isabel had suffered
from some sort of choleraic attack with much fever.
She was copiously bled in the arms, and seemed to
improve, but was soon seen to be suffering from violent
erysipelas in the face ; the disease soon spreading to
the throat, which was almost closed, as if by diphtheria.
The patient was bled eight times more, but still the
inflammation grew ; and, as usual with Spanish
doctors, when bleeding failed, the charms of the church
were resorted to. On the 4th October the last
sacrament was administered, and the dead body of
Saint Isidore was brought to the sick chamber. This
having failed to effect a cure, the more sacred relic
still, the miraculous image of the Virgin of Atocha
was brought in procession from its shrine into the
convent of St. Thomas, at Madrid, with the intention
of placing it for adoration by the Queen's bed. When
Isabel's permission was asked, she said that she was
unworthy of the honour of such a visit, and Prince
Baltasar visited the image instead, to implore upon his
knees that his mother's life might be spared. ( There
was no church nor convent in Madrid that did not
bring out in procession its crucifixes and most sacred
images in prayer for the Queen's health, and the whole
people wailed fervently their prayers and rogations that
her life might be granted.'1

On the 5th of October, the dying woman tried to
malce her new will ; but she was too weak, and only
left verbal authority before witnesses j<p_the King
to carry out her intentions. At noon on that day she

1 News letter of nth October in Semanario Erudito, vol. xxxiii.

356 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

sent for a fleur de lys, which formed one of the
ornaments in the crown, and in which was encased a
fragment of the true cross. This she worshipped
fervently. Her two children were brought to her,
Baltasar and the girl Maria Theresa, but she would
not let them approach her for fear of contagion,
though she blessed them fervently from afar. ' There
are plenty of Queens for Spain,' she sighed, but
princes and princesses are scarce. The next day, as
the great clock of the palace marked a quarter past
four in the afternoon, Isabel of Bourbon breathed her
last, aged Jbrty-one. Garbed as a Franciscan nun, the
body "was carried that night to the royal convent of bare-
foots ; and thence the day after in a leaden coffin, encased
in another of brocade, it was borne back to the palace
to lie in state amidst blazing tapers, nodding plumes, and
all the pomp and circumstance of royal mourning.

In the meanwhile, Philip was hurrying from Aragon,
a prey to the keenest anxiety. At Maranchon, about
fifty miles from the capital, where the King had
alighted at a wretched inn, the news came that the
Queen was dead. The ministers and courtiers around
the King forbore to tell him for a time, out of mere
pity ; for the journey and anxiety had told upon him
' and he had only just dined.' But a few miles further
on, at Almadrones, the news was broken to him in his
carriage by those who accompanied him. _A terrible
burst of grief, and an order that he might be left alone
in his sorrow, proved that Philip, for all his faithless-
ness, was fond of his wife ; and then, rather than enter
the city where the Queen's body lay, he turned aside
and sought solitude at the Pardo,1 where he was soon
joined by his son Baltasar, whilst, with the usual

1 Matias de Novoa, ' Memorias.3 He was one of Philip's chamberlains.

ISABEL OF BOURBON. 357

heavy pomp at dead of night, the body of Isabel was
carried across the bleak Castilian table-land to the new
jasper vault in the Escorial, which, from very dread,
she had never dared to enter in her lifetime.

Three days after Isabel's death, the sainted mystic
of Agreda saw, as she asserted, the phantom of the
Queen before her, asking for the prayers of the
godly to liberate her from the pains she was suffering
in purgatory, for the vain splendour of her attire
during her life.1 To the nun Philip's cry of pain went
up, whilst to all the rest of the world he turned a
leaden face. On the i5th November he wrote —
4 Since the Lord was pleased to take from me to him-
self the Queen, who is now in heaven, I have wanted
to write to you, but the great distress I am in, and
the business with which I am overwhelmed, have
hitherto prevented me from doing so. I find myself
more oppressed with sorrow than seems bearable, for
I have lost in one person alone all that I can lose in
this world : and if it were not that I know, according
to the faith I hold, that God sends to us that which is
best and wisest, I know not what would become of me.
But this thought, and this alone, makes me suffer my
grief with utter resignation to the will of God ; and I
must confess to you that I have needed much help
from on high to bring me to bear this cross patiently.
I wanted to ask you to pray to God very earnestly for
me in this dire trouble, and to aid me in asking Him
to grant me grace to offer up this sorrow to Him, and
take advantage of it for my own salvation.'2

1 Life of Sor Maria de Agreda, quoted by Father Florez.

2 Cartas de la Venerable Madre Sor Maria de Agreda, edited by F.
Silvela. For two years after Isabel's death all comedies and theatrical
representations were forbidden at the instance of Sor Maria, but in
1648 Philip consented to their resumption.

358 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

A^ yet more terrible trial for him came two years
later; and a yet more heart-broken appeal to the nun
for prayers, and to God to save him from rebellion
against his hard fate, burst from the King's breaking
heart when his only son died in his budding manhood,
anoMeft Phjlip,aged by suffering, to face matrimony
again for the sake oMeaving an heir to the crown of
sorrow that was weighing him dowri.

Isabel of Bourbon died bravely, as she had lived.
She was a Frenchwoman, married to bring ahnnt g
friendship between_Jjj2Ji££^ajn^ Spin, and the- two
countries were at war continually from the time that^
ho* marriage was completed to the day of her dearth
In her time the sun of Spain sank as surely as the day
onPVance brightened, and yet she never gloriedjnTHe
triumph of the land of her birth, and kept faithful to
the end to the Spain which she loved so well. It
would be unfair to credit her with so clear and high a
soul as either of the previous Isabels ; but hers was
a brave, sturdy, heart that accepted things as they
were if she was unable to mend them ; and, like her
father before her, she enjoyed herge1f_g^j[rmc]h as she
could whilst doing- her duty valiantly_^nd_welL_

BOOK IV

II

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA

BOOK IV

So long as Prince Baltasar lived Philip resisted all
pressure that he should take another wife. The
spring and summer were spent in Aragon, in the
now almost despairing attempt to win back his
dominions from the French. Approaches for his
own marriage were made by various interests, but
always gently put aside with a reference to his hopes
being now centred in his son, whom he kept at his
side and instructed him in the business of govern-
ment. With a wretched lack of material resources
his attempts to recover Catalonia were fruitless. One
defeat followed another with wearisome reiteration,
and as disaster deepened Philip became more moody
and devout ; his one adviser and confidant being the
nun of Agreda, and his one resource agonised prayer.
When his boy fell ill in May 1646, at Pamplona in
Navarre, on his way to the seat of war, Philip's
invocations to heaven for his safety were almost
terrible in their intensity. J The lad recovered ; and
when he arrived with his father at Saragossa in July,
the imperial ambassadors were awaiting them to offer
JQ marriage to the heir of Spain his first cousin, the
Archduchess Mariana ot Austria, tEe daughter ot tne
Emperor.

Philip could look nowhere else for an alliance.

1 ' Cartas de la Venerable Madre Sor Maria de Agreda y Felipe iv.J
Edited by Silvela.

361

362 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

France was his deadly enemy, though it was governed
by his sister Anna as regent, and a further marriage
experiment in that direction was out of the question
at present, even if there had been an available French
princess.1 The Emperor and Spain, on the other
hand, had beef^-to Spain's ruin — fighting shoulder
to^sHoiilder throughout the whole of the thirty years'
war; now dragging to its conclusion, and the treaty
Was promptly signed for the marriage of Baltasar,
aged seventeen, with Mariana of Austria, three years
younger. With regard to their betrothal, Philip wrote
to the nun thus : ' My sister, the Empress, having
died, I consider it advisable to draw closer the ties
between the Emperor and ourselves in this way, my
principal aim being the exaltation of the faith ; for it
is certain that the more intimate the two branches
of our house are, so much the firmer will religion
stand throughout Christendom.'

Only two months later, early in October, the blow
fell, and thejmnce diedMofsmallpox' Whilst he lay
iir~Tfr(T distracted father wroteTrahtically to his cor-
respondent, crying for God's mercy to save him from
this last trial. But when the boy had died the King's
letters assumed a tone of dull despair. God had not
heard his prayers, and he supposed it was for the
best. He had done everything to dedicate this grief
to God ; but his heart was pierced, and he knew not
whether he lived or dreamed. He was resigned, he
said, but feared his constancy, and so on ; each phrase

1 Marie Anne de Montpensier, the daughter of Gaston, Duke of Orleans
(La Grande Demoiselle), was suggested, but rejected at once as impossible,
both from the French and Spanish point of view ! It would, indeed,
have further alienated, rather than have drawn together, the French
regency and Spain.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 363

revealing a heart that almost doubted the efficacy of
prayer, and the goodness of the Almighty.1

Thenceforward, for a time, his conduct changed.
He had done his best and had not spared himself.
He had prayed night and day, and had fashioned his
life according to monastic counsels. But defeat,
trouble, poverty^ and- bereavement had fallen upon
Kimjn spite of all, and Philip, in the intervals of his
poignant contrition, plunged into dissolute excesses
that shocked and scandalised the devotees about him.
PhiHp_^was_Jorty_:two, about the age when some of
his forbears had developed that strain of mystic
devotion that so nearly borders madness. He had
no male heir, and only one tiny daughter of eight,
and his troubles and excesses had prematurely aged
him. All Spain demanded of him a man child to
succeed to his greatness; and the remonstrances ~bf
tfiie criurchmen and the nuns at the scandal of his
life were reinforced by the Emperor's ambassadors,
who urged that he should marry , the girl-niece who
had been BetTOthed"to"hTs'dead son.

And so history repeated itself; and, as in the case
of his grandfather, Philip IL, the King accepted for
his^ wife the Austrian princess who had been destined
for_his daughter-in-law. Of his many illegitimate
children he had only legitimised one, Don Juan
Jose of Austria, the son of the actress Maria Calderon.
He was brilliant and handsome, and had won his
father's regard ; but he could never be King of Spain ;
and Philip, with little enthusiasm, wedded an im-
mature girl for the sake of giving an heir to his
country, and for the maintenance of the solidarity^pf
the house of Austria, which typified the old impossible

1 ' Cartas de la Venerable Madre Sor Maria de Agreda y Felipe IV.'

364 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

claim of Spain to dictate the religion of the world.
It^vyas a disastrous resolve, which ensured the con-
summation of ruin to the country and the cause which
it was intended to benefit. -

Philip was , straining every nerve against the French
in Catalonia and Flanders; he was, to the extent of
his ability, attacking the Portuguese on the eastern
frontier; and his kingdom of Naples was in full
revolt. The long^war had exhausted him, as it had
exhausted all Europe : he had, to his own destruction,
fought the battles of religion in central Europe by
the side of the Emperor for many years ; and his
newjnarriage was intended to fasten the Emperor
to him in the cause of Spain. The powerlessness of
marriage bonds to resist political forces was once more
proved before Philip saw his bride. The Treaty of
Westphalia (October 1648) was finally~~signed, and
Spain, which had suffered most in the war, sacrificed
mosTirTlfTe "peace! The religlous^questioh Fn Germany
was settle? for good, ancT the dream of CBarles~vTwas
finall)T~clissipated : the independence of Holland, the
point which had dragged Spain down and keptHier
at warHfbT nearly a hundred years, was recognised at
last, out of sheer impotence for further struggle by
Philip. Alsace went to France, and Pomerania to
Sweden : the centraT European powers were satisfied :
there was nothing more for the Emperor to fight for,
and Spain was left face to face alone with her enemy
France, and without the imperial co-operation for which
Philip had paid so dear.

With ceremonies and pomp which would be tedious
to relate the young princess left Vienna on the 1 3th
November 1648, travelling slowly by coach with her
brother, the King of Hungary, towards Trent, where

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 365

the representatives of Philip were to take charge of
the new Queen. Endless festivities were held at
Trent and the Italian cities,1 and simultaneously in
Madrid. Illuminated streets, bull-fights, and palace-
revels, which Philip attended with dull hopeless face
and heavy heart, celebrated the announcement of the
nuptials, coinciding in time with the rejoicings for
the recovery of Naples by the diplomacy of young
Don Juan of Austria, Philip's son, in the winter of
1648. But it was well into the autumn (4th Sep-
tember) of 1649 before the bride and her Spanish
household of one hundred and sixty nobles at length
landed at Denia in the kingdom of Valencia.

At Navalcarnero, a small village some fifteen miles
from Madrid, the great cavalcade arrived on the 6th
October 1 649 ; and there it was arranged that Philip
should first meet his bride.2 For months he had been
writing by every post to the nun, deploring and repent-
ing his inability to resist the temptations of the flesh,
and ascribing to his sins the wars, pestilence and
misery that were scourging his beloved people. With
such qualms of conscience as this it must have been
welcome to him — weary voluptuary though he was —
to enter into a licit union, which, at least, might rescue
him from temptation. Disguised, he watched his bride
enter Navalcarnero, and then went to lodge in another

1 The progress and events from day to day are related by Mascarenhas,
Bishop of Leyria, who accompanied the Queen, in ' Viage de la Sereni-
sima Reina Dona Margarita de Austria.5 Madrid, 1650.

2 It has puzzled many inquirers why the marriages of the kings of
Spain should usually have taken place in poverty-stricken little villages
like Navalcarnero and Quintanapalla, where no adequate accommodation
existed, or could be created. The real reason appears to be that when
a royal marriage took place in a town the latter was freed for ever after
from paying tribute. The poorer the place, therefore, the smaller the
sacrifice of public revenue.

366 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

village before paying his formal visit to her a day after-
wards. Mariana was just fifteen, a strong, passionate,
full-blooded girl with a hard heart. On her way from
Denia the mistress of the robes, the Countess of
Medellin, had gravely remonstrated with her for laugh-
ing at the buffoons, who sought to amuse her, and
had schooled her in the etiquette that forbade a Queen
of Spain to walk in public. But Mariana made light
of such prudery, and in the insolence of her gaiety
and youth went her own way, laughing her fill at the
comedy played before her at Navalcarnero, to while
away the time until supper.

The King and Queen met for the first time in the
little oratory where their marriage was to be confirmed
by the Archbishop of Toledo, and then, after more
comedies and bullfights, the royal pair proceeded to
the Escorial, lit up for the occasion by 1 1,000 lights, to
pass the first days of their honeymoon. From the
Retiro on the i5th November Mariana made her state
entry into Madrid. The capital surpassed itself in its
signs of rejoicing, for Philip was extremely popular
and his subjects yearnejISuijaJLheir^to the throne. We
are told that the whole distance from the Retiro to the
old palace, from one end of Madrid to the other, the
way was spanned by arches of flowers, whilst monu-
mental erections with devices of welcome were placed
at each principal point.1 The Queen rode a snow-
white palfrey ; and as she smiled her frank gratified
smile to the lieges they welcomed her for her rosy,
painted cheeks and red pouting lips, knowing little the
cold selfish heart that beat beneath the buxom bosom.

Philip was too busy for weeks in the delights of his

1 It is all described in Amador de los Rios Historia de Madrid, and the
prodigious sums spent are given.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 367

honeymoon to write to his confidante the nun, pre-
sumably also because the sins he so deeply deplored,
and so constantly repeated, did not tempt him during
the first weeks of his married life. But when, on the
r 7th November, he found time to write, he expresses
the utmost satisfaction at his bride. ' I confess to you,'
he says, ' that I know not how I can thank our Lord
sufficiently for the mercy he has shown to me in giving
me such a companion ; for all the qualities I have
hitherto recognised in my niece are great, and I find
myself exceedingly content, and full of a desire to prove
myself not ungrateful for so singular a mercy by chang-
ing my mode of life and submitting myself in all things
to His will.'1 The nun in answer to this urged the King
to live well in his new condition, ' trying earnestly that
the Queen shall have all your attention and regard,
instead of your Majesty casting your eyes on other
objects strange and curious.' All Spain, the nun con-
tinues, is yearning for an heir, and her own prayers
are ceaseless to that end.

Philip was full of good resolves. He would never
go astray again ; but, though he was as anxious for a
son as his people were, he was in doubt yet as to his
new wife's having arrived at sufficient maturity to have
children : ' although others of her age, which is fifteen
years, can do so. But it is easy for our Lord to remedy
this, and I hope in His mercy that He will do it.'2 In
the meanwhile, the depositary of all these hopes,
Mariana, was diverting^ herself^as best she could in
girjishromps with her step-daughter of ten, who seems
to have been Tier constant companion. Philip, in writ-
ing of them, generally speaks of them as 'the girls,'
and frequently mentions Mariana's joy at shows and

1 Cartas de Sor Maria. * Ibid.

368 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

gaiety. Once more the Buen Retire rang with light
laughter. Comedies and masquerades were again the
constant diversion of the Court, though pestilence was
scourging the land, Catalonia and Portugal defied
the arms of Spain, and the French in Flanders still
held the armies of Philip at bay. Pleasure, the joy of
living, absorbed the young Queerfs" attention ; and
afteT'Th^irrsrtelv^onths of marriage, Philip usually
refers to her somewhat wearily, and only with reference
to her enjoyments or to his hopes of progeny. After
one disappointment a child was born in July 1651, a
girl, who was christened with the usual unrestrained
spleTTclour by the name of Maria Margaret1 Again
high~~rT6pes were entertained in due time, only to be
disappointed, and Mariana fell into melancholy ; for
Philip had relapsed into his bad habits again, notwith-
stanoTng his vows and resolves, and_±he. -delay in the
coming of a son increased his coldness towards his wife.
A frenzied round of gaiety at the Buen Retiro did some-
thing to arouse the Queen out of her depression,2 but
Philip had now but little pleasure in his old love for
glittering shows ; for the prayed for son came not, and
war and pestilence still scourged Spain, as he firmly
believed for his own personal backsliding.

The life of the palace had settled down to utter
monotony. Philip, immersed in business ; ' with his
pen always in his hand/ as he says, had little time for
frivolity. His demeanour in public was like that of a
statue, and when he received ministers or deputations
it was noticed that no muscle of his face moved but
his lips. Every movement was settled beforehand ;
and it was possible to foretell a year in advance exactly

1 In course of time she married her cousin the Emperor Leopold.

2 * Reinas Catolicas.' Florez.

MARIANA OF AT STRIA.
After a Painting by Velazquez.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 369

where the Court would be on a given day, and what
the King would be doing at a certain hour. Mariana
lived in her own way, with little show of affection for
her elderly husband, or for the people amongst whom
she lived. She had fallen by this time (1657) into the
stiff etiquette of the Spanish Court, and in the intervals
of her hoydenish merriment she displayed a haughtiness
as great as that of Philip himself without his under-
lying tenderness or his pathetic resignation. She was
Germanin all her sympathies, and soon lost the love
of Spaniards that had been gained by the freshness~of
her youth.1 Dressed in the tremendous triple-hooped
farthingale ; with her stiff, squarely arranged wig, and
her full painted cheeks, she presented a sufficiently
dignified appearance in public ; but her flat, unamiable
face, hard, weary eyes, and bulging jaw, gave her a
look which repelled rather than attracted.

The outward prudery of her Court barely veiled a
state ol atrocious immorality amongst all classes. It
walTcorrsidered almost a reproach for any of the ladies,
all widows or unmarried, who were attached to the
palace service by hundreds, to have no extravagant
gallant ready to ruin himself for her caprices ; and, as
a natural consequence, assassination was rife in the
capital ; and the news letters of the time are full of
scandalous stories, in which nobles, ladies and actresses
are concerned disgracefully. Corruption reigned more
impudently than ever, and whilst ships were rotting oil
theTDeach, ancT unpaid soldiers were starving in the
midst of war, vast sums were spent on foolish shows
and revelry. Philip now had little pleasure in it all,

JEven thus early she began to introduce Austrian etiquette in her
receptions ; such, for instance, as causing the ladies presented to her to
pass before her, in by one door and out by an opposite door ("Avisos de
Barrionuevo).

2 A

370 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

going through it like a leaden automaton, only to
torture himself with remorse afterwards, but withal,
habit or mere weakness led him to allow such scandals
as the imposition of a tax upon oil to pay for the new
stage at the Buen Retiro, and the robbing of the shrine
of the venerated Virgin of Atocha of a great silver
chandelier for the illumination of the theatre.1

In September 1654 it was announced that Mariana
was again pregnant. * God grant that it may be so,'
wrote a courtier : ' but if it is going to be a girl it is of
no use to us. We do not want any of them. There
are plenty of women already.'2 The King's hopes
rose that a son would at last be born to him, and
Mariana insisted upon accompanying him everywhere ;
for in the intervals of her merrymaking she was a prey
to deep melancholy, increased when a girl infant was
born only to die a few daysjilterwards. Theprognos-
tications of astrologers and quacks decided in the
summer of 1655 that the prayed-for son was now
really on the way ; and as time went on unheard of
preparations were made for the event. The Marquis
of Heliche had twenty-two new comedies written
ready for representation in the coming festivities, and
large sums of money were spent in decorations before-
hand. Mariana's lightest caprice was law, and Philip
hardly left her side. The old palace depressed her,
and the Buen Retiro became her permanent abode ;
Don Juan of Austria sent from Flanders the most
wonderful tapestries, and bed and bed furniture ever
seen, with a vast bedstead of gilt bronze which cost a
fortune ; the bedroom furniture being a mass of seed
pearl and gold embroidery upon satin. * There is no

1 Avisos de Barrionuevo, vol. ii. p. 303 (February 1656).

2 Ibid. vol. i.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 371

getting the Queen out of the Retiro, for she frets in
the palace. She passes the mornings amongst her
flowers, the days in feastings, and the nights in farces.
All this goes on incessantly, and I do not know how
so much pleasure does not pall upon her.' l But again
the prophets were wrong, for in December another
epileptic girl child was bomjindjclied : ' Saint Gaetano
notwithstanding.' 2

Mariana fell gravely ill after this, and a slight stroke
of paralysis, amongst other ailments, kept her for many
weeks hovering between life and death. Philip did
his best to raise her spirits, and when the Cortes
petitioned him to have his elder daughter Maria
Theresa acknowledged as heiress, he refused, in order
not to distress his wife, who, he said, would be sure to
have an heir directly. His letters to the nun show that
he, at this period, was himself in the depths of black
despair, overborne by his troubles ; for Cromwell had
seized Jamaica, and Spain was at war by sea and land
with England and France together. Whilst Philip
was gratifying his young wife by such entertainments
as looking on from concealed boxes in a theatre crowded
with women, whilst a hundred rats were surreptitiously
let loose upon the floor ; 3 hewas_aprey to a morbid
misery closely akin^to madnesst anticip'afmg an-ear4y
death, weeping for the utter ruin that enveloped him
arfcTSpjim, andjhejabsence of a malejieir.

Une of his strange whims at this time was to pass
hours alone in the new jasper mausoleum at the

M

1 Barrionuevo, vol. ii.

2 The comedy of San Gaetano had been represented at the special
desire of the Queen shortly before, not without some difficulty from the
Inquisition, and the crush to see it was so great that several people were

led.
1 Barrionuevo, vol. ii. 308

372 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Escorial, to which the bodies of his ancestors had just
been transferred. He wrote after one of these visits in
1654 : — ' I saw the corpse of the Emperor whose body,
although he has been dead ninety-six years, is still
perfect, and by this is seen how the Lord has repaid
him for his efforts in favour of the faith whilst he
lived. It helped me much : particularly as I con-
templated the place where I am to lie, when God
shall take me. I prayed Him not to let me forget
what I saw there ; ' I and shortly after this another
contemporary records that the King passed two
solitary hours on his knees on the bare stones of
the mausoleum before his own last resting-place in
prayer ; and that when he came out his eyes were red
and swollen with weeping.2

Again, in August 1656, a girl child was born to
Mariana only to die the same day, and then depression,
utter and profound, fell upon Philip and his wife, for
rny ray of light came from any direction. There was
no money for the most ordinary needs. Trie Indian
treasures were regularly captured by the English, who
closely invested Cadiz itself, whilst the French on the
Flanders frontier and in Catalonia worked their will
almost without impeachment, and the Portuguese
defied their old sovereign. Philip was ready to make
peace almost at any sacrifice, at least with the. French ;
but the demands of Mazarin were as yet too humiliat-
ing for a power which had claimed for so long the
predominance in Europe. At length, in the midst
of the distress, hope dawned once more, and again the
wiseacres predicted that this time the Queen would
give birth to a son. Mariana's every fancy was grati-

1 Cartas de la Venerable Sor Maria de Agreda.

2 Barrionuevo, vol. iii. 63.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 373

fied.1 Water parties on the lake at the Retire, endless
farces, as usual, capricious bull feasts, and diversions
of all sorts, kept up her spirits ; and Don Juan sent
another sumptuous bed and furniture more splendid
than the previous gift. Whilst this waste was going
on in one direction, taxes were bemg piled up In a
way that made them unproductive, and such was~tRe
penury in the King's palace that Philip himself, on the
vigil of the Presentation of the Virgin (2Oth November
1657), had nothing to eat but eggs without fish, as his
stewards had not a real of ready money to pay for
anything (Barrionuevo). Exactly a week after the
King was reduced to such straits, the child of his
prayers arrived. An heir was born at last to the
weary man of fifty-two, whose crown was crushing
him.

Madrid as usual went crazy with turbulent rejoicing,
whilst Mariana in the gravest danger battled for her
life. Every bench and table in the palace, we are
told, was broken, and no eating house or tavern in the
town escaped sacking by the crowd of idle rogues who
marched with music and singing, whilst they stripped
decent people even of their garments to pay for their
orgy.2 Later, there were the usual bull fights, masquer-
ades, and the eternal comedies with new stage effects ;
and not a noble in Castile failed to go and congratulate
the King. Astrologists were to the fore, as usual,
foretelling by the stars that the newly born babe would
grow up to be wise, prudent and brave, and would
outlive all his brothers and sisters in a prosperous

1 One day (8th November 1657) she suddenly asked for some Bunuelos
(hot fritters), and men were sent out hurrying to the Plaza where they were
sold. A great cauldron of 8 Ibs. of them were brought smoking hot covered
with honey, and Mariana ate greedily of them, to her great contentment.

2 Barrionuevo.

374 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

fortunate career. The proud father was full of grati-
tude to the Most High for the signal favour conferred
upon him. ' Help me, Sor Maria,' he wrote to the
nun, 'to give thanks to Him ; for I myself am unable
to do so adequately : and pray Him to make me duly
grateful, and give me strength henceforward to do His
holy will. The new-born child is well, and I implore
you take him under your protection, and pray to our
Lord and His holy mother to keep him for their service,
the exaltation of the faith and the good of these realms.
And if this is not to be, then pray let him be taken
from me before he comes to man's estate.' I

Philip, like his courtiers, went into rhapsodies of
admiration of the beauty and perfection of the infant
that had been born to him. So fair an angel surely
never had been seen than this poor epileptic morsel
of humjmity from whom so patheticaljy_j"nuch was,
expected. On the 6th December Philip rode in State
on a great Neapolitan horse through the streets of
Madrid, to give thanks to the Virgin of Atocha for
the boon vouchsafed to him, and the capital began its
round of official rejoicings. Fountains ran wine, music
and dancing went on night and day, mummers in
strange disguise promenaded the streets in procession,
bullfights and the usual tiresome buffoonery testified
that Madrid shared with the King his delight that an
heir had been born to him.2 Philip himself was in high

1 Cartas de la Venerable Sor Maria de Agreda. The King's prayer
came true, for the child died at the age of four.

2 The extravagance of these rejoicings produced a remonstrance from
the nun to the King. ' It is good and politic for your Majesty to receive
the congratulations of your subjects . . . but I do beseech you earnestly
not to allow excessive sums to be spent on these festivities when there is
a lack of money needful even for the defence of your crown. Let there
be in them no offence to God. . . . It is good to rejoice for the birth of
the prince, but let us do it with a clear conscience.' — Cartas.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 375

good humour, bandying jests with his favourite, Don
Luis de Haro ; and, at the brilliant ceremony of the
christening of Prince Philip Prosper, a week later,
which he witnessed hidden behind the closed jalousies
of his pew, he was proudly pleased at the vigorous
squalls of the infant. * Ah ! ' he whispered to Haro,
4 that's what I like to hear, there is something manly
in that.' J It was fortunate for Philip that he could
not foresee that this babe for whom he had prayed so
fervently would be snatched from him four years later,
stricken by the calamity of its descent ; and that the
later child that would succeed him, the offspring of
incest too, would end the line of the great Emperor in
decrepit imbecility, matching sadly with the decadence
of his country.

Whilst the continued and costly celebrations of the
Queen's tardy recovery after the birth of her sickly
childlvere scandalising the thoughtful, national affairs
were going from bad to worse.2 Don Luis de ITaTo,
Philip's prime minister, had started in January 1658
to relieve Badajoz, closely invested by the masculine
Queen of Portugal, herself a Spaniard, and had been
disgracefully routed by the despised Portuguese. This

1 Barrionuevo. A curious circumstance is related by the same journalist
as having taken place at the christening. The lady-in-waiting, as usual,
handed the child to the little Infanta Margaret, aged six, who was the
godmother ; and the only clothing the babe wore was an extremely short
tunic, the lower limbs being entirely bare. The little Infanta, shocked at
what she considered disrespectful neglect, asked angrily why the prince
was not properly dressed ; and had to be told that it was done purposely
in order that all might see that he was really a male.

2 Barrionuevo relates (vol. iv. p. 166), that a saintly Franciscan friar,
upon being appealed to by Philip to pray for the health of his child,
replied that he would do so, but a better prayer still would be for the
King to give up his constant comedies and rejoicings and pray to God
himself. This was in June 1658 ; and the nun was for ever giving to
Philip the same advice.

376 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was a humiliation that proved to the world the com-
plete impotence of Spain : but in June of the same
year a more damaging blow still was dealt at the
power that had held its head so high in the past.
The battle of the Dunes, or Dunkirk, in which Don
Juan, Conde and the Duke of York on the Spanish
side were pitted against Turenne, aided by the troops
of Cromwell, was a crushing defeat for Philip's forces,
and placed all Flanders at the mercy of the French.
It was clear that Philip could fight no longer, for
Spain had well nigh bled to death ; and so great was
trie depopulation of Castile that a project was adopted
—though not carried out for lack of money --to
re-people the country with Irish and Dalmatian
Catholics.

TherejyejgjQthgr circumstances that tended towards
peace besides the exhaustion of^Spain. " The long
years of war had told heavily upon the resources of
France : the Catalans by this time had grown heartily
tired of their French king Stork, and were yearning
for the~re"turn of their Spanish king-. Log ; and, above
all, Mazarin had long cast covetous eyes on the
Spanish succession, in the very probable case of
Philip's issue by his second wife failing. For years
the Queen-regent, Anna of Austria, had been striving
for peace with her brother, but circumstances and
national pride had always defeated her. The efforts
of the Emperor's agents in Madrid, aided very power-
fully by Mariana, had also been exerted to prevent
a close agreement between France and Spain. In
1656 M. de Lionne had been sent secretly by Mazarin
to Madrid, where he passed many months in close
conference with Luis de Haro, endeavouring, but
without success, to negotiate peace.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 377

In one of their meetings Haro wore in his hat, as
an ornament, a medal impressed with the portrait of
the Infanta Maria Theresa, Philip's daughter by his
first wife. ' If your King would give to my master
for a wife the original of the portrait you wear,' said
Lionne, duly instructed by Mazarin, ' peace would
soon be made.' Nothing more was said at the time,
for, in the absence of a son, Philip dared not marry
the heiress of Spain to his nephew Louis xiv., but
when an heir was born to Mariana, the idea of a
marriag^n5etwe"erT~Maria Theresa and Louis xiv. at
^once became realisable. The Austrian interest still
stood in the way ; and Mariana, who was as purely
an ambassador for Eer brother as his accredited
diplomatic representative waSj^sed all her efforts ta
frustrate the plan ; and a marriage was actively ad-
vocated by her between the Infanta and Leopold^ the
heir of the empire. Philip for a long time allowed
himself to incline to the Austrian connection that had
already cost him so dear.

As soon as the French match looked promising^-as
a result of much secret intrigue between Mazarin and
Haro, the Emperor offered to Philip a great army in
Flanders to aid in expelling the French ; and when
Philip was hesitating between the persuasions of his
wife Mariana, and her kinsmen on the one hand, and
the ^pressure of poverty on the other, which made a
continuance o£_the war difficult for hSn^ Mazarin
played a trump card which won the game. "TGouis
was taken ostentatiously to Lyons to woo the Princess
Of Savoy ; and, in fear of a coalition against S£am,
Philip sent his minister Haro to negotiate peace with
MazarirT personally On '"the banks^pfthe Bidasoa.
During all the autumn of 1659, on the historic Isle

378 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of Pheasants in the river, the keen diplomatists fought
over details ; and often their labours seemed hopeless,
for the Spaniards were as proud as ever and the
French as greedy. But the frail health of the puling
babe, who alone stood between the Infanta and the
Spanish succession, at length made Mazarin more
yielding : the last great obstacle, the restoration of
Conde's forfeited estates, was overcome, and one of the
most fateful treaties in history was settled.

It was still a bitter pill for Spain, for she lost much
of her Flemish territory and the county of Roussillon ;
but, at least, she regained Catalonia, and, above^all,
secured peace with France. The Infanta was to marry
Louis XIV., and 'the Spaniards insisted that she should
renounce for ever her claim to the succession of her
father's crown, though Mazarin made the clause In-
effective by stipulating that the renunciation should
be conditional upon the entire payment of the dowry
of 500,000 crowns, which, it was more than probable,
Philip could never pay.1 In the meanwhile Mariana
had borne another son, who died in his early inlancy ;
and at the pompous embassy of the Duke de Gram-
mont to Madrid, formally to ask for the hand of the
Infanta, she took little pains to appear amiable to an
embassy which she looked upon as bringing a defeat
for her and her family.

A vivid picture of her and her husband at one of
the great representations at the theatre of the old
palace is given by a follower of Grammont, who wrote
an account of the embassy.2 'The great saloon,' he
says, ' was lit only by six great wax candles in gigantic

1 ' Recueil des Instructions donndes aux ambassadeurs de France en
Espagne,' vol. i. (Morel-Fatio.)

2 'Journal du Voyage d'Espagne.' Paris, 1669.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 379

stands of silver. On both sides of the saloon, facing
each other, there are two boxes or tribunes with iron
grilles. One of these was occupied by the Infantas
and some of the courtiers, whilst the other was destined
for the Marshal (Grammont). Two benches covered
with Persian rugs ran along the sides facing each
other, and upon these some twelve of the ladies of
the court sat, whilst we Frenchmen stood behind them.
. . . Then the Queen and the little Infanta entered,
preceded by a lady holding a candle. When the King
appeared he saluted the ladies, and took his seat in
the box on the right hand of the Queen, whilst the
little Infanta sat on her left. The King remained
motionless during the whole of the play, and only
once said a word to the Queen, although he occasion-
ally cast his eyes round on every side. A dwarf was
standing close by him. When the play was finished
all the ladies rose and gathered in the middle, as
canons do after service. They then joined hands, and
made their courtesies, a ceremony that lasted seven
or eight minutes ; for each lady made her courtesy
separately. In the meanwhile the King was standing,
and he then bowed to the Queen, who in her turn
bowed to the Infanta, after which they all joined hands
and retired.'

In April 1660 Philip bade farewell to Mariana and
set forth on this famous journey to the French frontier,
to ratify the peace of the Pyrenees_jvvith his sister
A^n^ of Austria, whom lie had not seen since their
early youth more than forty years before, and to give
hisdaughter in marriage to the young King_o£FVance.
P fiffip, for the sake of economy, had Bordered that as
small a train as possible should accompany him ; but,
withal, so enormous was his following and that of his

380 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

nobles, : with the huge stores of provisions and baggage,
that his cavalcade covered over twenty miles of road.
Slowly winding its way at the rate of only about six
miles a day through the ruined land, greeted by the
poor hollow-eyed peasants that were left with tearful
joy, because it meant peace, the King's procession at
last arrived at the seat of so many royal pageants,
the banks of the Bidasoa, early in June. Upon the
tiny eyot in mid-river, the temporary palace that in
the previous year had been the meeting-place of Haro
and Mazarin, still remained intact; and here the sumptu-
ous ceremony was performed that gave to Louis xiv.
the custody of his future wife, Maria Theresa.2

What all the courtiers wore, and how they looked,
is described ad nauseum by French and Spanish
spectators ; but the greatest man in all the host, upon
the Spanish side at least, was the King's quarter-
master, whose exquisite taste and knowledge directed
the artistic details of the pageant, Diego de Silva
Velazquez, whose garments may be described as a
specimen of the rest. His dress was of dark material,
entirely covered by close Milanese silver embroidery,
and he wore around his neck the golilla that had
replaced the ruff, at the instance of Philip many years
before, to save the waste of starching. 3 Upon his
cloak was embroidered the great red floreated sword-
like cross of Santiago, and at his side he wore a sword
in a finely wrought silver scabbard ; whilst around his

1 Luis de Haro alone took a household of 200 persons, whilst the King's
medical staff alone consisted of ten doctors and four barbers.

2 ' Viage del Key N. S. a la Frontera de Francia.3 Castillo. Madrid,
1667.

3 The golilla, so characteristic of Philip's reign, was a stiff cardboard
projecting collar, the under surface of which was covered with cloth to
match the doublet, and the upper surface lined with light silk.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 381

neck there hung a heavy gold chain from which
depended a small diamond scutcheon with the same
cross enamelled in red upon it.1

The restoration of the Stuarts in England soon
after the ratification of the Treaty of the Pyrenees,
madeji rjeace easy of negotiation between their country
anc^ Spain, anj^bythe_begjnning of 1661, Philip fnrmd
KTmsp]fJnrVhg finaPtinng in fr reign offorty years at
peace withjdl the powers outsidejhg PenrnsjjJaT""

BuTrerJellious Portugal had still to be reconquered.
Again disaster befell the Spaniards. Don Juan, the
King's son, was utterly routed at AmegTal after some
partial successes ; for Mariana' had been busily Tn-
trigumg against him, and had caused the re-
inforcement and resources he asked for to be denied
him.

Whilst Don Juan was struggling against the
Portuguese and their English abettors with inadequate
forces and ineffectual heroism^ Philip wassmking
deeper into the morbid devotional misery that afflictecl
in their decline so many of his race. His only son,
Philip Prosper, after a life of Tour years of almost
constant sickness, was snatched from him early in
November 1661, as a younger boy had been a year
previously. The bereaved father, who had watcEed
over his son's bed until the last, nearly lost heart at
this heavy blow ; and was so much overcome, as he
confesses, as to be unable even to write for a time to
his one refuge, the nun of Agreda. When he did so,
the usual self-accusing cry of agony went up — ' I assure
you,' he wrote, 'what troubles me most, much more
even than my loss, is to see clearly that I have

1 Palamino. Life of Velazquez. All the sumptuary decrees were
suspended. From this date the Spanish fashion in dress changed.

382 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

offended God, and that He sends all these sorrows as
a punishment for my sins. I only wish I knew how
to amend myself and comply entirely with His holy
will. I am doing, and will do, all I can ; for I would
rather lose my life than fail to do it. Help me, as a
good friend, with your prayers, to placate the righteous
anger of God, and to implore our Lord, who has seen
good to take away my son, to bless the delivery of the
Queen, which is expected every day, and to keep her
in perfect health and the child that is to be born, if it
be for his good service, for otherwise I desire it not.
The Queen has borne this last blow with much sorrow
but Christian resignation. I am not surprised at this,
for she is an angel, Oh ! Sor Maria : if I had only
carried out your doctrines, perhaps I should not find
myself in this state/1

A few days after this was written, Mariana once_
more bore a son, a weak, puling infant, that seemed
threatened with an early death ; but whose birth
tfirew Spain into a whirlwind of rejoicing as extra-
vagant as any that had gone before. But Philip was
sunk too deep now into despondency, by witchcraft
the people said, to be aroused much, even by the birth
of a son ; and, as the shadows fell around him, the
power of Mariana grew. With her clever German
Jesuit confessor and confidant, Father Everard Nithard,
she soon managed to drag the unhappy King again
into the vortex of imperial politics, that had already
well-nigh wrecked Spain, by persuading him to
maintain an army to aid Austria and Hungary against
the incursions of the Turk. Mazarin had died soon
after the peace of the Pyrenees, and the new advisers
of Louis xiv. were already inciting him to retaliate for

1 Cartas de Sor Maria.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 383

the Austrian rapprochement with Spain by fresh
aggression upon Spanish Flanders. Don Juan, bitterly
opposed to the new German interest in Spain, retired
to his town of Consuegra in disgust and disgrace ; the
French and English governmenis_a(SSuniejd_a_tone_of
dictatorial haughtiness towards Spain unheard before ;
aricT Philip, in declining health and bitter disappoint-
ment, could look nowhere now for help and solace :
for his minister Haro was dead, and the saintly nun of
Agreda, his refuge for so many years, also went to her
rest in the spring of 1665. There was no one now at
Philip's side but Mariana, already intriguing for un-
coTTtfrolled power when her husband should die, and
heFGerman confessor Nithard, whose one aim was to
use what was left of Spanish resources for the ends of
Austria.

Others also were on the alert as to what would
happen when Philip died, and Sir Richard Fanshawe
was sent to Madrid by Charles n., partly to negotiate
for the recognition of Portuguese independence ; and
also : ' to employ his utmost skill and industry in
penetrating and discovering under what model and
form his Catholic Majesty designs to leave the govern-
ment there, when it shall please God that he die,
which, considering his great infirmity and weakness,
may be presumed is already projected/ l When
Philip first received Fanshawe in June 1664, he was
so weak and weary that he could only ask him to put
his speech on paper,2 and thenceforward all Europe
regarded the King as a dying man, whose work in the
world was done.

1 Original Letters of Sir R. Fanshawe. January 1664.

2 An interesting account of this ceremony is given by Lady Fanshawe
in her Memoirs.

384 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

As Philip sank lower in despondency, the importance
of Mariana rose. Lady Fanshawe gives an accounTof
her interview with the Queen on the 27th June 1664,
at the Buen Retiro, which_shows that Mariana was
already regarded almost as the reigning sovereign : * I
was received at the Buen Retiro by the guard, and
afterwards, when I came up stairs, by the Marquesa de
Hinojosa, the Queen's Camarera Mayor, then in wait-
ing. Through an infinite number of people I passed
to the Queen's presence, where her Majesty was
seated at the upper end under a cloth of state upon
three cushions, and on her left hand the Empress I upon
three more. The ladies were all standing. After
making my last reverence to the Queen, her Majesty
and the Empress, rising up and making me a little
curtsey, sat down again ; then I, by my interpreter,
Sir Benjamin Wright, said those compliments that
were due from me to her Majesty ; to which her
Majesty made me gracious and kind reply. Then I
presented my children, whom her Majesty received
with great grace and favour. Then her Majesty,
speaking to me to sit, I sat down upon a cushion laid
for me, above all the ladies who sat, but below the
Camarera Mayor ; no woman taking place (i.e. pre-
cedence) of her Excellency but princesses. . . . Thus,
having passed half an hour in discourse, I took my
leave of her Majesty and the Empress ; making
reverences to all the ladies in passing.' 2 Some months
afterwards Queen Mariana sent to the English lady
many messages of regard and esteem, with a splendid

1 This was Mariana's daughter, the Infanta Margaret, so well recollected
by Velazquez's portraits of her. She was at this time thirteen years old,
and had just been betrothed to the Emperor Leopold, her cousin. She
was married two years later, and died in 1673, at the age of twenty-two.

2 Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 385

diamond ornament worth ,£2,000, which Lady Fan-
shawe received with somewhat exaggerated professions
of humility, and repeated her thanks to her in an
interview soon after (8th April 1655).

The total and final defeat of the Spaniards on the
Portuguese frontier, in June 1665, made the recovery
oflhe lost kingdom hopeless, and broke Philip's heart.
H¥ had written in the spring to the dying nun, saying
that he desired no more health or life than was meet
for God's service, and was ready to go when he was
called. The call came in September 1665. His
chronic malady had been aggravated tol?uch an extent
by anxiety and worry, that by the middle of the month
his physicians confessed themselves powerless. Then
was enacted one of those ghastly farces common at
the time in Spain. It was whispered in the palace
that the King was bewitched, and the Inquisitor-
General called a conference of ecclesiastics to consider
the means for exorcising the evil spirits that held the
sovereign in bondage. Philip himself gave permission
for the Inquisitor to act as might be judged" best ; and
one day the royal confessor, .briar Martinez, acom-
panied by the Inquisitor-General, approached the sick-
bed and demanded of the King a certain little wallet
of relics and charms which he always wore suspended
upon his breast. After examining these carefully the
wallet was returned to the King, and from some clue
therein contained, search elsewhere led to the dis-
covery of an ancient black-letter book of magic, and
certain prints of the King's portrait transfixed by pins.
All these things were solemnly burnt after a service
of exorcism by the Inquisitor-General at the chapel of
Atocha ; and then, to assist the cure, the group of

churchmen administered to the King, who was suffer-

2 B

386 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

ing from several mortal diseases, of which gall-stones
caused the immediate danger, an elaborate confection
of pounded mallow-leaves with drugs and sugar.

This treatment aggravated the ill, and in two or
three days the King appeared to be in articulo mortis,
after what was described as a fit of apoplexy. The
whole Court fell into momentary confusion, and the
death-chamber was already deserted when the King
revived and altered several of his testamentary dis-
positions, one clause of which now appointed Mariana
regent during the minority of her son. The^dlL by
Philip's orders, was then locked into a leather purse
with other impoTtant state papers, and the key, by the
dying^ man's orders, was delivered to his wife. That
afternoon, after taking th^ sacrament, Philip iVafieJa
tearful farewell to Mariana, and blessed his two
children. He then took an affectionate leave of the
Duke of Medina de las Torres and other nobles,
beseeching them with irrepressible tears to work har-
moniously together, and help the widow and the poor
child to whom his heavy heritage was passing.

Philip struggled through the night in agony, and
the next day the image of the Virgin of Atocha was
carried past the windows of the palace to be deposited
in the royal Convent of Barefoots hard by, whilst the
dead bodies of St. Diego and St. Isidro were brought
to the royal chapel for veneration ; * and every church
and convent in Madrid resounded with rogations and
processions for the health of the King. Around the
bed of the dying monarch evil passions already raged \
folFthe Court was divided thus j^arly into two factions ,

1 It is related that when Philip was asked if the bodies of the saints
should be brought into his room he said, ' No, they can intercede in my
favour just as well in the chapel as here.'

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 387

one in favour of Mariana and the other looking to
Don Juan. The Duke of Medina de las Torres, the
principal minister, retired from the palace as soon as
he had taken leave ; and an unseemly wrangle, almost
a fight, took place over the death-bed between rival
friars, as to whether the viaticum might be adminis-
tered or not, until they had to be bundled out of the
room by the Marquis of Aytona.

No sooner was this scene over than Count Castrillo
entered the chamber and announced that Don Juan
had come and was waiting to see his father. Philip
knew, and bitter the knowledge was, that his wife and
son would be in open strife from the day the breath
left his body ; but that Don Juan should return from
exile unbidHen, and dared to disobey his King, whilst
yet he lived, aroused one more spark of sovereign
indignation in the moribund man. * Tell him,' he
said, ' to return whence he came until he be bidden.
I will see him not ; for this is no time for me to do
other than to die.' At early dawn on Friday, 1 7th
September, poor Philip the Great breathed his last.
* And curious it is,' said a contemporary courtier, ' that
in the chamber of his Majesty when he died, there
was no one but the Marquis of Aytona and two
servants to weep for the death of their King and
master. In all the rest of the court not one soul
shed a tear for him. A terrible lesson is this for all
humankind ; that a monarch who had granted such
great favours and raised so many to honour, had no
sigh breathed for him when he died.'1

1 As soon as Philip breathed his last the Marquis of Malpica, who was
on duty as principal gentleman-in-waiting and captain of the guard, went
to the outer guardroom, and said to the assembled officers : 'Companions,
there is no more for us to do here. Go up and guard our King, Charles
II.' Philip had died in one of the lower ground-floor rooms of the palace.

388 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

The same night the dead body of the King was
dressed in a handsome suit of brown velvet, embroidered
and trimmed with silver, with the great red sword-
cross of Santiago worked upon the breast, preparatory
to the pompous lying-in-state in the same gilded hall
of the old palace at Madrid, where the comedies the
King had loved were so often played before him.
At the same time in an adjoining room the Councils
of Castile and State gathered to hear the will read
by the secretary, Blasco de Loyola, which made
Mariana Queen-Regent of Spain, with the assistance
of a special council of regency, consisting of the great
dignitaries of the State, failing two of whom the Queen
might appoint two substitutes, an eventuality which
partially occurred within a few hours of Philip's death
by the decease of the Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo,
Moscoso. Don Juan, who was commended to the
widow in the will, waited to hear no more than the
elevation of Mariana to the regency, and then took
horse with all speed and hurried back to the safe
seclusion of his fief of Ocana. A few days afterwards,
the sumptuous lying-in-state being concluded, the
body of ' Philip the Great ' was carried in a vast
procession to the Escorial, to rest for ever in the
jasper niche before which he had so often prayed
and wept.1

The above account is condensed from a contemporary unpublished MS.
journal of a courtier in the ' Biblioteca National,' c. xxiv. 4. Lady Fan-
shawe also gives a very precise account of the lying-in-state, varying in
some few details from the MS. narrative above referred to.

1 My diarist gives another instance of the heartless conduct of the
nobles after the King's death. When the body was to be transferred to
the Escorial each of the chamberlains and officials insisted that it was
not his duty to make the formal surrender, or to help to carry the corpse.
The squabble was only ended by the Duke of Medina ordering his cousin
Montealegre, to do it.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 389

Mariana, at the age of thirty-one, was now ml^r nf
Spain for her son Charles ifT) aged fnn^ and <shp 1n«st
no time in showing her tendencies when left to hersel f .
The root of most of the calamities that affected Spain
were the traditions that bound it to the imperial house.
All that the country needed, even now, was rest^peace
and freedom from foreign compl.i rations in whirh
Spaniards had no real concern. But Mariana was
Austrian to her finger tips ; and ever since Philip's
health began to fail she had been ___worldqg_for— the
predominance of her kindred and weakening the bonds '
of friendship with France, knit by the marriage-,of
Maria Theresa with Louis xiv.

There was already a large party of nobles who,
seeing the national need for peace, looked with dis-
trust upon a policy which would still waste Spanish
resources in fighting the battles of the empire in mid-
Europe : and when to the vacancy in the Council of
Regency and the Inquisitor-Generalship, caused by
the death of Cardinal Moscoso a few hours after the
King, Mariana appointed her Austrian confessor,
Father Nithard, Spanish pride flared out and protest
became general. Nithard was doubtless a worthy
priest, though of no great ability, but if he had been
a genius the same detestation of him would have pre-
vailed, for he was a foreigner, and it was guessecLat
oncejha£ between him and the Austnan_Oueen Spain \
wouldjjesacrificed as it had been in the past to objects
that wet? not primarily Spanish. Observers abroad
saw it too, and although the French envoy who went
to condole with Mariana on Philip's death assured her
of the desire of Louis to be friendly with her, the first
acts of her regency gave to the French King a pretext
for asserting his wife's right to the inheritance of

390 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Flanders, as her dowry had not been paid, and her
renunciation was asserted to be invalid.

In May 1667 Louis invaded Flanders with 50,000
men, faced only by a small disaffected and unpaid
force under the Spanish viceroy, the result being that
the French overran the country and captured many
principal cities. Don Juan was summoned in a hurry
from his exile to trie" Council of-St-atc irr"Ma3K5Tlmd
he"^and his^swQfn enemy Mariana divided Between
them the sympathies of the capital and the country
Pasquins and satires passed from hand to"~~hand on
the Liars' Parade and in the Calle Mayor, mostly
attacking Nithard and the Queen, who were blamed
for the war ; and the relations between Don Juan and
Mariana grew more strained every day.

It was also evident now that Spain was powerless_to
coei£er~Portugal any longej*, and in February the
humiliating treaty was signed — mainly by the influence
of Fanshawe * and Sandwich — in February 1668, re-
cognising the independence of the sister Iberian nation.
Louis xiv. carried on his attacks in Flanders with
vigour, and "rejected alTovertures of peace except on
terms' which aroused Spaniards to indignation. The
Spanish Franche Comte was occupied by the French
in February 1668 ; and then, but only by a supreme
effort, a fresh army of nine thousand men was collected
in Spain to defend her territories. The Austrian
friendship was of little use to Spain, as usual, and
-Castile Tiad^once more to fight her own battle. In
these circumstances of national peril the influence of
Mariana and Nithard on the Council of Regency pro-

1 Fanshavve died in Spain soon after his recall, Lord Sandwich re-
placing him to conclude the treaty. See * Letters of Earl of Sandwich '
and ' Fanshawe's Letters.' London.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 391

cured an order for Don Juan to take command of
army and lead it to Flanders against the French, and
with an ill grace the royal bastard left Madrid on Palm
Sunday, 1668, for his rendezvous at Corunna, where
the treasure ships from Cadiz and his troops were to
join him. Doji Juan saw in this move an intention of
getting him away from the centre of government, anc[_
tHeTmpression was strengthened by the almost simul-
taneous exile or arrest, on various trivial pretexts, of
some of those who were known to sympathise with
him, one of whom, Malladas, was strangled in prison
by Mariana's orders.

All through the spring Don Juan lagged at Corunna,
excusing himself from embarking on various grounds,
ill-health being the principal ; until, at length, thanks
to the intervention of England and Holland, Louis
was brought to sign terms of peace with Spain at Aix_
la Chapelle, in May 1668, that left him in possession
of the Flemish territories he had conquered. But sjtill
Mariana and Nithard were determined that Don-Juan
should go and take possession of his government-in
Flanders, and sent him a peremptory order to embark.
This he refused to do, and a decree of the Queen in
August directed him to retire to Consuegra, and not
approach within sixty miles of Madrid. He had many
friends and adherents, especially in Aragon, and his
discontent extended to them. Those in Mtadrid began
to clamour that Mariana and Nithard were keeping
the little King in the background away from his people,
and alienating those who might serve the monarchy
best.

Charles n. was now aged seven, and so degenerate^
and weak a child was he. that he had been up to this
period, and continued for some years afterwards, en-

392 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

tirely in the hands of women, and treated as an infant
in arms. He was dwarfish and puny, with one leg
shorter than the other, his gait during the whole of
his life being uncertain and staggering. His face was
of extraordinary length and ghastly white, the lower
jaw being so prodigiously underhung that it was im-
possible for him to bite or masticate food, or to speak
distinctly. His hair was lank and yellow, and his eyes
a vague watery blue. This poor creature with his
mother at his side, in obedience to the clamour of Don
Juan's friends, was first brought out in public for his
subjects to see at a series of visits to the convents and
churches of Madrid in the summer of 1668^ Just as
the King and Mariana were about to start from the
palace at Madrid on one of these excursions, in October
1668, an officer came in great agitation to the door of
the Queen's apartment and prayed for audience. He
was told that the coach awaited their Majesties, and
the Queen could not see him then, but would receive
him when she returned. He begged in the meanwhile
to be allowed to stay in a place of safety in the palace.
This request made his visit seem important enough for
Mariana to be informed of it : and she ordered him to
be introduced at once. When he entered he threw
himself upon his knees and besought that he might
speak with her alone ; and for a half hour he was
closeted with the Queen.

The story he had to tell was of a widespread con-
spiracy of Don Juan and his friends against the
Regency, and without delay the net was cast that
swept into prison one of Don Juan's principal agents

1 An extremely detailed account of the events that accompanied the
feud between Mariana and Don Juan will be found in a rare book called
< Relation of the Differences that happened in the Court of Spain.'
London, 1678.

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 393

in Madrid, Patino, and all his household. In a day
or two a force of soldiers was despatched to Consuegra
to arrest Don Juan himself, but found the bird flown.
Behind him he had left a document addressed to Trie
Queen, violently denouncing Nithard as a tyrant and
a murderer, whilst protesting his own loyalty to his
father's son. Madrid began again to murmur at the
persecution of a Spanish prince in Spain by a foreign
Jesuit, and though a brisk interchange of mani-
festoes and recriminatory pamphlets was carried on,
the great mass of the people were unquestionably on
th"e__side of Don Juan against the German Queen and
he£jesuit favourite.

The Prince fled to Barcejona, where Nithard was
especially hated and the Madrid government always
unpopular, and there nobles _and people received Don
Juan with enthusiasm. Messages of support came to
him from all parts of Spain, and French money and
sympathy powerfully aided his propaganda, so that by
the end of the year 1668 affairs looked dangerous for
Mariana and her confessor. The Queen and her
Camarilla took fright and tried conciliation, but Don
Juan knew that he had the whip hand, and in a letter
written in November to Mariana peremptorily de-
manded the dismissal of Nithard within fifteen days.
Mariana's friends on the Council of Regency voted for
the impeachment of Don Juan for high treason ; and
for a time vigorous measures against him were like to
be taken. But the Council of Castile, the supreme
judicial authority, through its most influential member,
warned the Queen that in a controversy between the
King's brother and a foreign Jesuit Spaniards must
necessarily be on the side of the former, and the Queen
must be cautious or she would alienate the country

394 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

from her. Mariana thereupon wrote softly to Don-
Juan inviting^Eim to approach Madrid that a con-
ference of conciliation might be held. But the prince
would not trust Nithard, who, he said, had planned his
murder, and he declined to risk coming to the capital
except in his own time and way.

Early in February 1669, Don Juan, with a fine
bodyguard of two hundred horse, rode out of Barcelona,
and through Catalonia and Aragon towards Madrid.
Mariana had sent strict orders throughout the country
that no honours were to be paid to him, but his journey
in spite of her was a triumphal progress, and as he
entered Saragossa in state the whole populace received
him with shouts of : ' Long live Don Juan of Austria,
and Death to the_ Jesuit Nithard/ A regiment of
mfantry was added by Aragon to the Prince's force,
and on the 24th February Mariana and her friend in
the palace of Madrid were horrified to learn that Don
Juan was at the gates of the capital with an armed
body stronger than any at their prompt disposal.
Whilst they made such hasty preparations as they
could to resist, all Madrid was in open jubilation at
the approach of their favourite prince. Don JucuVs
force grew from hour to hour, a,nd with it grew his
haughtiness towards the ruling authority. Mariana, in
alarm, tried every means. The Nuncio endeavoured
to soften Don Juan's heart; the higher nobles in the
Queen's household wrote to him deprecating violence ;
and, finally, the Queen herself wrote a letter of kindly
welcome. But to allblandishments Don Juan stood
firm : Father Nithard must go for good, and at once ;
whilst the Council of Castile also demanded the Jesuit's
expulsion.

morning of 25th February, whilst Mariana

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 395

was still in bed, the courtyards of the palace filled with
gentlemen and officials in groups, who openly declared
for Don Juan and the expulsion of Nithard. The
Dukes of Infantado and Pastrana sought an interview
with the Queen, for the purpose of informing her of
the general resolution, but were refused admittance
into her bedchamber. They then charged her secre-
tary, Loyola, to inform her, that unless she instantly
signed a decree expelling Nithard they themselves
would take measures against him, as Madrid was in
a turmoil and order imperilled. Mariana with tears
ofTageswore that she would not be coerced ; and
Nithard himself refused to stir. A hasty meeting of
the Council of Regency assembled in the forenoon,
which Nithard abstained from attending only upon the
entreaty of the Nuncio, where a decree of expulsion
was drafted in the mildest form possible, and laid
before the Queen for signature as soon as she had
dined.

Mariana was at the end of her tether. The Court,
the populace, and the soldiery were all against her
favourite, and she was forced to sign the decree. But,
though she did it, she never forgave Don Juan for the
humiliation, and thenceforward it was war to the knife
between them. Cardinal JNithard, with rich grants
and gifts from the Queen, was with difficulty saved
from the cursing multitude that surrounded his coach
as he slunk out of the capital ; and Don Juan,
tnumphant, begged for permission to comejmd salute
the Queen in thanks for his expulsion. This, haughty
M ariana^coMiy — refused to allow," and _Pon Juan
retorted by demanding a thorough reform in the
administration of the^government, a re-adjustment_of
taxation and many other innovations which he alleged

396 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

that Nithard alone had prevented. The Spanish
nobtev- Jiowever, were no lovers of reform, and
Don Juan's drastic demands were regarded askance by
many. A long acrimonous correspondence was carried
on by the Queen at Madrid and Don Juan at
Guadalajara, in the course of which some financial
amendments were promised by the former : but in the
meantime Mariana's friends were raising an armed
force as a bodyguard for her and her son, which after-
wards became famous as the Chambergo regiment,
because the uniform was copied from those worn by
the troops of Marshal Schomberg. The formation
of this standing force was bitterly resented by the
citizens of Madrid, and aroused new sympathy for Don
Juan. At length a semi-reconciliation was effected by
the appointment of Don Juan as Viceroy of Aragon
in June 1669; ajid_Jor_jeveral years thereafter the
Prince was piling up funds from his rich offices To_
strike a more effectual blow when the time should
comeT~

TThe extreme debility of the boy King, who in 1670
was thought to be moribund, was already dividing the
courtiers, and indeed all Spain and Europe, into two
camps. If Charles n. died without issue, a$ seemed
probable, his elder sister Maria Theresa, wife of Louis
xiv., would be his natural successor,J)ut for the act of
renunciation signed at the time of her marriage ; an
act which from the first the French had minimised and
disputed, and Philip himself had characterised as an
'old wife's tale.' It was evident that Louis xiv., daily
growing in power and ambition, had no intention of
allowing the renunciation to stand in the way of his
wife's claims if her brother died childless ; and a"
Mariana's enemies in Spain, and they were many, \

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 397

ready to stand by the claims of the elder Infanta Maria
Teresa, daughter of the beloved Isabel of Bourbon, if
the succession fell into dispute.

On the other hand, Mariana, naturally championed
the cause of her own daughterTtRe "trifanta "Margaret,
married to the Emperor Leopold, -and*"uprlel3^the
validity of Maria Theresa's formal renunciation of the
succession on her marriage. The Austrian connection
had brought nothing but trouble to Spain, and the
brilliant progress of France, even though it was to the
detriment of their country, had gained many Spanish
admirers of the modern spirit that pervaded the
methods of Louis xiv. Mariana,^ there fore, to most
Spaniards, represented, with her pronounced Austrian
leanings, an attempt to tie the country to the bad old
times, as well as to pass over the legitimate rights of
the elder Infanta for the benefit of her own less
popular daughter the Empress Margaret.

The Queen-Mother, well aware of the strong party
against her, and that her prime enemy, Don Juan, was
only awaiting his time to strike at her, employed all
the resources she could scrape together in providing
for her own defence against her domestic opponents,
leaving the frontier fortresses divested of troops and
means for repelling attack from France ; whilst, on
the other hand, she provoked Louis by sending a
Spanish contingent to co-operate with the Emperor's
troops in aiding the Dutch in their war with France ;
and, later, in 1673, she formed a regular alliance with
the Emperor and Holland against Louis xiv. Nothing
could have been more imprudent tharT this in the
circumstances, for Spain was in a worse condition of
exhaustion than ever, and the hope of beating France
by force had long ago proved fallacious. The ancient

398 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

appanage of Burgundy, the Franche Comte\ promptly
passed for ever from the dominion of Spain to that of
France ; and whilst the fighting in Flanders and the
Catalan frontier was progressing in 1674, a new trouble
assailed Mariana's government. The island of Sicily
revolted, and invited the French to assume the
sovereignty, an invitation that was promptly accepted.
Thirty-seven years before, when he was a mere
stripling, Don Juan had recovered Naples for Spain in
similar circumstances ; and Mariana, almost in despair,
could only beseech her enemy to leave his government
at Saragossa, and take command of the Spanish- Dutch
forces to attack the French in Sicily. But Don Juan,
knowing her desire to get him out of the way, was
determined not to allow himself to be sent far from the
centre of affairs, and refused to accept the position.

His reasons were well founded, for events were
passing in Mariana's palace that rendered her more
unpopular than j^v:er ; and, by the will of Philip iv., her
regency would come to an end when her son attained
his fifteenth year late in the next year 167$. TThad
beenTioped that with the banishment of Nithard and
the absence from the capital of Don Juan, the factions
that divided the Court would have held their peace
during the few years the regency lasted ; and possibly
this would have been the case if the Queen had been
prudent. Her unwise favour to Nithard had already
made her extremely unpopular, tor foreign Queens in
Spain were always suspect ;"but she had learned
nothing from her favourite's ignominious expulsion ;
and soon a confidant, less worthy far than Nithard,
had completely captured the good graces of the Queen.
This was a young gentleman of no fortune named
Fernando de Valenzuela. He was one of those facile,

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 399

plausible, Andaluces, a native of Ronda, who had
figured so brilliantly in the Court of Philip iv. and
Mariana, where the accomplishment of deftly turning
amorous verse, improvising a dramatic interlude, or
contriving a stinging epigram, opened a way to
fortune. He had been a member of the household of
the Duke of Infantado, and upon the death of the
latter, had attached himself to Father Nithard, who
needed the aid of such men.

Valenzuela was not only keen and clever, but
extremely handsome, in the black-eyed Moorish style
of beauty, for which the people of Ronda are famous,
and hesoon managed to gain^thefull confidence of
both Nithard and the Queen, whoirTTTe serve'cTas
a go-between and messenger, a function which he
continued after the Jesuit had been expelled. He had
married the Queen's favourite half-German maid, and
had been appointed a royal equerry ; both of which
circumstances gave a pretext for his continual presence
in the palace ; and at the time of the agitation against
Nithard, and afterwards, he had been extremely useful
in conveying to the Queen all the comments that
could be picked up by sharp ears in the Calle Mayor
and Liars' Parade (the peristyle of the Church of St.
Philip). It was noticed that those who spoke in-
cautiously of the Queen in public were promptly
denounced and brought to trouble, and the gossips
soon pitched upon Valenzuela as the spy, calling him
in consequence by the nickname, by which he was
generally known, of the ' fairy of the palace/ The
rnan was bold, ambitious, and unscrupulous, and soon
more than occupied the place left vacanF by^Jithafd.
"jealous nobles and courtiers looked witElncTigfiafibn
at the rapid rise of a mere provincial adventurer to

400 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the highest places in the State. Not only was a
marquisite and high commands and offices conferred
upon him, but at a time when Spain was in the
midst of a great international war that ended in the
remodelling of the map of Europe at her expense, this
favourite, without special aptitude or experience, was
appointed by Mariana her universal minister for all
affairs ; and Valenzuela was the most powerful man
in Spain. He manfully did his best though unsuccess-
fully, for he was cordially detested, to win popularity
in an impossible position, by multiplying in Madrid
the feasts and diversions its inhabitants loved, by
writing comedies himself, full of wit and malice, for
gratis representation in the theatres, by re-building
public edifices, and generally beautifying the capital.
He was surrounded, moreover, by a great crowd of
parasites, mostly nobodies, like himself, who sang his
praises for the plunder he could pour upon them.

But his rise was too rapid, and his origin too obscure
to "be easily forgiven, and a perfect deluge of satires,
verses, pamphlets and flying sheets, full of gross libels
upon him and the Queen, came from the secret presses
and circulated throughout Spain. The general opinion
was that he was the Queen's lover as well as her
minister ; but Madrid was always a hotbed of scandal,
and, although this may well have been true, it must
be regarded as non-proven. As a specimen of the
view taken of the connection by contemporaries the
following description of a broad-sheet, found one morn-
ing posted on the walls of the palace, may be given.
A portrait of the Queen is represented with her hand
pointing to her heart, with the printed legend, ' This
is given ; ' whilst Valenzuela is pourtrayed standing
close by her side, pointing to the insignias and emblems

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 401

of his many high offices, and saying, 'These are sold.'
The favourite himself seems to have been anxious to
strengthen the rumour that assigned to him the
amorous affection of the widowed Queen, for at two
of the Court festivals, of which he promoted many, he
bore as his devices, ' I alone have licence,' and 'To me
alone is it allowed.'1

The unrestrained favour extended by the Queen to
such an upstart as this gave hosts of new adherents
to Don Juan ; and such of them as had access to The
young King, now rapidly approaching his legal
majority, took care to paint the wretched condition
of the country in the blackest colours, and to ascribe
the trouble to the Queen's bad minister. ^JThe boy,
though nearly fifteen, was still a child ; backward and,
atbest, almost an idiot. He~could hardly read or
write, for the weakness of his wits and the degeneracy
of his physique had caused his education to be entirely
neglected, and he was, even in his mature age, grossly
ignorant of the simplest facts. But, like his father,
he was gentle, kind and good-hearted, and his com-
passion was easily aroused by the sad stories told him
of the sufferings of his people, especially when they
came from the lips of his father confessor, Montenegro,
and his trusted tutor Ramos del Manzano.

They, and the great nobles who prompted them,
understood that the moment had come for action
when, in the late autumn of 1675, Mariana and
Valenzuela ordered Don Juan to sail in RuyteFs fleet
tcTTJicily and eject the French ; and what to them
was just as important, leave them with no rivals near
tEem_jwhen~ the King^ came of age. Charles was
persuaded by his confessor, and Without the know-

1 Montero de los Rios, * Historia de Madrid.'
2C

402 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

ledge of his mother, to sign a letter recalling his half-
brother to Madrid ; and with this in his hand Don
Juan could refuse, as Tie did, to sail for Sicily. On
tfTeTmorning of oth November 1675, the day that
Charles reached his fifteenth year and the regency
ended, Madrid was astir early to see the shows that
wefe to celebrate the new reign, though the country,
in its utter exhaustion and misery^ was in no spirit to
rejoice now.

To the surprise of most was seen a royal travelling
carnage rapidly approach the Buen Retiro palace, and
the escort that surrounded it proclaimed that the occu-
pant of the coach was no other than Don Juan. All
was prepared for the coup d'etat. The prince hurried,
unknown to Mariana, to the young King's apartment,
and kneeling, kissed the boy's hand ; whilst a decree,
already drafted, was presented to the King, appointing
his half-brother the universal minister of the crown.
Mariana had passed the night at the palace a mile
away, but the coming of her enemy to the Buen
Retiro had been announced to her before he alighted.
Without losing a moment she flew to the Retiro and
reached her son's room just as the decree that would
ha^je.- ruined her was about to be signed. She was
an imperious woman, and had been Queen-Regent
of Spain for over ten years : her control of her feeble
son had been supreme whilst she was with him, and
her angry orders that the room should be cleared
might not be gainsaid. Left alone with her son, she
led him to a private room and, with tears and indignant
reproaches, reduced the poor lad to a condition of
abject submiss^iTtb"HeF"witl7"

"" 1 ife~presidefft 6TTFFeT13oimcil of Castile had already
told her, that as Don Juan had come by the King's

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 403

warrant, the same authority alone could send him back,
and Charles was induced to sign a decree commanding
the prince to returrTTorthwith to his government in
Aragon and remain there till further orders. Now was
tHe time when boldness on the part of Don Juan would
have won the day ; for the nobles, court and people,
were mostly on his side against Valenzuela and the
Queen, whose means did not allow them to bribe
everybody. But Don Juan was as vain and empty
as he was ambitious and failed to rise to the occasion.
The sacrosanct character of the King of Castile, more-
over, was still a strong tradition, and Don Juan, who
knew his fellow-countrymen well, darecT~not aim aT
ru"ttngr"ihstead o£ the King, but through the King.
So that night Don Juan and his supporters met In
conclave, and weakly decided to obey the King's new
command without protest, instead of making another
attempt to over-ride Mariana's influence upon her son;
and the prince returned to Aragon overwhelmed with
confusion and disappointment.1

The triumph of Mariana was complete, and she
tooTnio pains to conceal her joy when~~sKe attended
that night in state the theatre of the Buen Retiro, in
celebration of the King's coming of age. In a few
days all those who had had a hand in the futile con-
spiracy were on their way to exile ; and, to keep up
appearances, Valenzuela himself was given the rich
post of Admiral of the Andalucfan coast, with another"
ricTT marquisate, as an excuse for his absence from
the capital during the first few weeks of the King's
majority. He was soon back again, collecting new
honours from the feeble King at the instance of

1 'Diario de los Sucesos de la Corte.' MS. in the Royal Academy of
History, Madrid.

404 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Mariana, and to the indignation of the other nobles.
The great post of Master of the Horse, usually held
by one of the first magnates of Spain, was given to
Valenzuela ; and when the jealous grandees remon-
strated he was made a grandee of Spain of the first
class to match his new dignity. All this, and the
fact that Don Juan had been deprived of his vice-
royalty, thougtr^banished troln^C^ourt. may testify to
Mariana's determination and boldness, but says little
for* her prudence; for all Spain, high and low, was
against her, and^Valenzuela was a weak reed to depend
upon in the face of so powerful an opposition.

In the meanwhile the conspiracy against Mariana
grew in strength. Don Juan amongst his faithful
Aragonese could plot with impunity, whilst the nobles
in Madrid were working incessantly to the same ends,
namely, the banishment of Mariana and the impeach-
ment and punishment of Valenzuela. In February
1676 all the principal grandees signed a mutual pledge
to stand together until these objects were attained ;
and as, in virtue of their position, they had unrestrained
access to the King, who was now nominally his
own master, the result of their efforts was soon
seen.

The object lesson to which they could point was a
very plain one. Spanish troops were still pouring out
their blood upon the battlefields of Europe without
benefit to Spain : the distress in the capital itself was
appalling ; even the King's household sometimes bting
without food, or means of obtaining it. On every side
ruin had overwhelmed the people. Industry had been
crushed by taxation, whole districts were depopulated
and derelict, and neither life nor property was safe
from the bandits who defied the law in town and

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 405

country.1 Spain had almost, though not quite, reached
its nadir of decadence : and, though the distress was
really the result of longstanding causes described in
the earlier pages of this book, the_boy monarch was
made to believe that it all arose from the misgovern-
ment of his mother and ValeilZUelaT and thatTBpir'
J uan could remedy all the ills and ma1<e Spain strong
anjjiappy again.

The noble conspirators took care, this time, to
neglect no precautions that might ensure success, and
obtained (2 7th December 1676) from the King an
order to which Mariana was obliged to consent, for
Don Juan to return to Madrid ; whilst on various pre-
texts they kept the Queen as much as possible from
influencing her son. Valenzuela was, of course, in-
formed of what was going on, and, recognising that the
coalition was strong enough to crush him, had suddenly
Bed into hiding a few days previously. The night of
the 1 4th January 1677, after the King had retired to
his bedchamber in the palace of Madrid, and Mariana
doubtless thought that all was safe until the next morn-
ing, Charles, accompanied by a single gentleman-in-
waiting, escaped by arrangement with the conspirators,
down backstairs and through servants doorways, from
the old palace to the Buen Retire, where the nobles
and courtiers were assembled. Long before dawn a
decree reached Mariana in her bedroom in the
palace, ordering her not to leave her apartments with-
out the written permission of the King. Her rage
and indignation knew no bounds, and for the rest of
the night letters alternately denouncing the unduti-

1 A full description of the condition of Spain at the period, drawn
from many contemporary sources, is given in ' Spain, Its Greatness and
Decay,' by Martin Hume (Cambridge University Press).

4o6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

fulness, and appealing to the affection of her son,
showered thick and fast from the Queen in the old
Alcazar to the sixteen year old boy with the long white
face, who was trying to play the King in the pleasance
of the Buen Retiro. None of her letters softened him,
if ever they reached him, which is doubtful, and all the
next day the antechambers at the Retiro were crowded
with courtiers, applauding the King's stroke of State,
whilst in the Alcazar on the cliff the Queen mother
found herself neglected by flatterers, a prisoner, in tke
palace where she had reigned so long.

The next day news came that Don Juan, with a
great armed escort and household, had arrived at
Hita, thirty-five miles from the capital ; and. there the
Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo and a crowd of grandees
met him with a message from the King, asking him to
dismiss his armed men and come to Court for the pur-
pose of taking the direction of affairs. But Don Juan
had his conditions to make first, and he refused to
pi^^ it, Valenzuela

mg,de_aL__grisoner,^and the hated Chambergo regiment
disbanded. He had his way in all things, and the
same night, with rage"ln her fieart, Mariana rode out
of the capitaL f°r he** banishment at Toledo ; the
CTTambergos were hurried away for shipment to Sicily ;
and then came the question where was Valenzuela.
Reluctantly, and bit by bit, it was drawn from the King
that he himself had contrived the flight of his mother's
favourite, and knew where he was hidden amongst the
friars of the palace-monastery of the Escorial.

From his windows overlooking the bleak Sierra
of Guadarrama the fugitive favourite gazed in the
gathering dusk of the I7th January 1677 in fancied
security ; when, to his dismay, a large body of cavalry

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 407

trotted into the courtyard and dominated the palace.
Amongst them the alarmed Valenzuela descried his
enemy the Duke of Medina Sidonia, and a group of
other grandees. Flying for refuge within the con-
secrated precincts, he besought .the prior to save him ;
and when the doors of the monastery had been closed
the prior greeted the troops and nobles in the court-
yard and demanded their pleasure. ' We want nothing/
they replied, ' but that you will deliver to us the traitor
Valenzuela.' ' Have you an order from his Majesty ? '
asked the prior. ' Only a verbal one,' replied Don
Antonio de Toledo, son of the Duke of Alba, who
took the lead. ' In that case,' replied the monk, sup-
ported by a murmur of approval from his brethren
behind, * we will not surrender him, except to main
force ; for we shelter him by written warrant of the
King.' Threats and insults failed to move the monks,
and an attempt at arrangement was at last made by
means of an interview in the church between Valenzuela
himself and the Duke of Medina Sidonia and Toledo.
Owing mainly to the violence of the latter the inter-
view had no result ; and, as the prior saw that the
soldiery were preparing to force the sanctuary, Valen-
zuela was hidden in a secret room contrived for such
eventualities where he might defy discovery. The
enraged nobles and soldiery, balked of their prey, ran-
sacked the enormous place, room by room, for three
days, overturning altars, insulting and violating the
privacy of the monks, and committing sacrilege undreamt
of in Spain for centuries, for which they were smartly
punished afterwards by the ecclesiastical authority.1

1 The nobles and leaders were all excommunicated, and not even the
King's intercession could mollify the Pope until full reparation was made
at tremendous cost, and penance done in most humiliating fashion.

4o8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

At length, on the night of 2ist January, Valenzuela
took fright at some voices near, and foolishly^ letTum^
self down by his twisted sheets from the window of his
safe retreat ; and, though one sentry let him go, and
the monks made desperate attempts to keep him
hidden, he was captured on the 22nd January and
carried with every circumstanceTbf ignominy to close
confinement in^Uon J uan^siortress of Consuegra ;
then after terrible sufferings^ and stripped ot all his
honours^andpos'sessioiis, fe-wa^nTpns^oned m M anila .
and'Sfterwarcts takeii to Mexico to die fwhilst his unfor-
tunate wife, treated with atrocious brutality by Toledo,
was reduced to beg from door to door for charity, until
her troubles drove her mad.1 No sooner was Valen-
zuela safe behind the bars at Consuegra than Don
Juan of Austria entered Madrid in state on: the
January, acclaimed by the popuiace as the saviour

1 The contemptible instability of the King is seen in a conversation he
had with the prior of the Escorial the day after Valenzuela's capture.
The prior had been formerly urged most earnestly by Charles to shelter
and defend the favourite, and a written warrant to that effect was given.
As no written order for his capture was exhibited the Prior presented
himself before the King to explain what had been done. Before he could
speak Charles giggled and said, ' So they caught him ! ' ' Yes, sire, they
caught him,' replied the prior. 'And his wife too?' asked the King.
' His wife is now in Madrid, sire, and I come now to crave mercy and
protection for both of them.' * For his wife but not for him,' said Charles.
' But surely your Majesty will not abandon your unhappy minister in this
sad strait.' * You may take it from me,' replied Charles, * that a holy
woman has had a revelation from God that Valenzuela was to be captured
at the Escorial.' * A revelation of the devil more likely,' blurted out the
disgusted prior. ' And pray do not think, sire, that I am interceding for
Valenzuela for interests of my own : I never got anything from him in
the world but this benzoin lozenge.' With this Charles jumped back in
a fright. ' Put it away 1 put it away ! ' he cried. ' Perhaps it is witchcraft
or poison.'

(The narrative is from an MS. relation written by one of the monks at
the time, and now in the Escorial Library. Portions of it have been
quoted by Don Modesto Lafuente, ' Historia de Espana,' vol. xii.)

MARIANA OF AUSTRIA 409

Spain,and welcomed by the King as the heaven-sent
minister who was to make his reign brilliant and suc-
cessful. Don Juan's vengeance knew no limit, as his
soul knew no generosity." Whatever may have~been
Mariana's faults as a Queen of Spain, or her errors as
a diplomatist, the ignominy to which she was now sub-
jected by ordeiT of her son, at the instance 61 Don
Juan, shows Che lack uf ^euciustty of the latter and
the miserable weakness of the former. Mafiana*s turn
was to come again by and bye, but with her banish-
ment to Toledo her life as ruling Queen of Spain came
to an end. Shejived nearly twenty years afterwards,
but her vicissitudes~during that time~ may be fold
more fittingly in connection with the lives of her two
successors, the wives of her afflicted son.

BOOK V

I
MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS

BOOK V.

WITH Mariana, closely watched in her convent at
Toledo, and all her friends exiled from Court, Don
Juan of Austria reigned supreme. For years he had
been clamouring for reform, and holding up as a
terrible example of the results of mis-government the
utter prostration that had seized upon the nation.
This was his chance, and he missed it ; for he, whom
a whole people had acclaimed as the strong man that
was to redeem Spain from the sins and errors of the
past, proved in power to be ajealous vindictive trifler,
incapable of great ideas or statesmanlike action.

Every supporter of the^Queen-Mother. from the

highest Itojhe lowest, was made to feel the persecution
of Don Juan ; letters from Toledo were opened, spies
listened at every corner, and violated the sanctity
of every home, in the anxiety of the Prince to discover
plots against him. His pride exceeded all bounds, and
most of his time was occupied in intrigues to secure
for himself the treatment due to a royal prince of
legitimate birth.

Whilst Don Juan was engaged in these trifles and
equally futile government measures, such as endeavour-
ing^ decree to make the courtiers dress in the French
fashion instead of Spanish, the taxes were as heavy as
before, the prices of food higher than ever, the ad-
ministration remained unreformed, and the law was still
contemned : the Spanish troops "were being beaten by
the French iiTCatalonia for lack of support, and King

413

4i4 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Louis still occupied Sicily. E^onjuan's own supporters,
too, soon got tired of him when they saw that he was
grudging ^Tre wards, even to them ; and pasquins and
pamphlets rained against him and in favour of the
Queen- Mother. The latter and the imperial am-
bassador had, before the coming of Don Juan, be-
trothed the King to his niece the Archduchess Marie
Antoinette, aged nine, the daughter of the Emperor ;
as if the miserable Charles himself had not been a
sufficient warning against further consanguineous
marriages 'in the house of Austria: but Don Juan
promptly put an end to that arrangement, and pro-
posed to marry Charles to a little Portuguese Infanta
of similar age. Peace was now an absolute necessity
to all Europe. The pourparlers between the powers
at Nimeguen had already lasted two years, and ended
in an arrangement between Holland and France, in
which Spain was left out. Louis could then exact his
own terms ; and, as usual, they were crushingly hard
on Spain, which lost some of the richest cities in
Flanders and all the Franche Comte (September 1678).
But it was peace, and the rejoicing of the over-
burdened Spanish people was pathetic to witness.

Charles was seventeen years of age, and already his
country was speculating eagerly upon his marriage ;
whilst his degeneracy and weakness aroused hopes and
fears of what might happen if he died without issue.
According to the will of Philip iv., the succession fell
to the Empress Margaret, daughter of Mariana ; but
the French King, who from the first had made light of
his wife's renunciation of her Spanish birthright, and
Maria Theresa herself, were not inclined to let her
'claims go by default. Soon the gossips in Madrid
began to whisper that a French Queen Consort, a

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 415

descendant of the house which had given them their
beloved Isabel of Bourbon, would suit Spain best, and
Dqn Juan himself was not unwilling to listen to such
<i suggestion ; for, in any case, the King must marry,
and a French match would be a blow against Mariana
and the Austrian connection. The Duke of Medina
Celi, Don Juan's principal henchman, slept, as sumiller
de corps, in the King's room ; and it was he who first
broached to Charles the idea of a French wife. He
was,' the Duke reminded him, a grown man now, and
the Austrian Archduchess of ten was too young for
him. The Princess of Portugal, he said, would never
be consented to by the French, and she was also too
youthful : but there was at St. Cloud the most lovely
Princess ever seen, only a year younger than him-
self, who was a bride for the greatest king in the
world. I

Her name was Marie Louise, and she was the
daughter of the brother of King Louis, the Duke of
Orleans, by Henriette of England, that beautiful
daughter of Charles i. who had been so beloved in the
country of her adoption. Maria Theresa took care
that miniatures of her lovely niece should go to the
Spanish Court, and when one of them was brought
to~tHe notice of the young King, his adolescent passion
was inflamed at once, and the Marquis de los
Balbeses, who had represented Spain at the conference
of Nimeguen, was instructed by Don Juan to proceed
to Paris and ask King Louis for the hand of his niece.

Marie Louise was a spoilt beauty of the most refined
and gayest court in Europe. She had when a child

1 ' Memoires touchans le manage de Charles II. avec Marie Louise,'
from which many of details related in the text concerning the marriage
in France and the journey to the frontier are taken.

4i6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

lost her English mother ; but every body was in love
with her, from King Louis downward ; and it had
long been understood that she might marry the
Dauphin, with whom she was on the tenderest terms
of affection. But the treaties of Nimeguen had trans-
formed the face of Europe, and Louis had other views
for his son, whilst the need for securing a footing in
Spain during the critical period approaching was
evident. So, when Balbeses came to Paris with
unusual state, and Saint Germain and Saint Cloud
were a blaze of magnificence to receive him, the girl's
heart sank ; for with her precocious intelligence she
guessed the meaning of the whispers and curious
glances that greeted her every appearance in the
ceremonies in honour of the King of Spain's am-
bassador.

She and the Dauphin were deeply in love with each
other, and had been so since childhood ; and it was
like a sentence of death for the beautiful girl with the
burnished copper-brown hair and flashing eyes, to
learn that she was to be the bride of the long-faced,
pallid boy, with the monstrous jaw and dull stare, in
his gloomy palace far away from brilliant Versailles,
and from her own home at Saint Cloud. When her
father, the Duke of Orleans, and afterwards King
/ Louis himself, gravely told her the honour that was in
V store for her, she implored them in an agony of
passionate tears to save her from such a fate. To her
stepmother, Charlotte of Bavaria, to the Queen Ma*
Theresa, to the King, she appealed on her knees,
again and again, to let her stay in France, where she
was so happy ; and not to send her far away amongst
people she did not love. She was told that her duty
was to France ; and Colbert, by the order of King

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 417

Louis, drew up a serious State paper for the instruction
of the frightened girl in the manner that French L
interests might be served by her as Queen of
Spain.

The fine pearl necklace, worth a hundred thousand
crowns, given to her by King Louis, the magnificent
diamonds brought by the Duke of Pastrana,1 as a
present to her from her future husband, the title of
Majesty, ostentatiously given to her as soon as
preliminaries were arranged, the fine dresses and
jewels, and the new deference with which she was
surrounded, only deepened the girl's grief. Her heart
grew hard and her spirit reckless when she understood
that, regardless of her own feelings, she was to be
a sacrifice : and, as the pompous ceremony of her
marriage by proxy approached, she became outwardly
calm, and more proudly beautiful than ever. On the
30th August 1679, as the new Queen was led by her
father on one hand and the Dauphin she loved on the
other, into the principal saloon at Fontainebleau for
the formal betrothal to the Prince of Conti, represent-
ing the King of Spain, all the Court was enraptured
at her peerless loveliness. Her train, seven yards
long, of cloth of gold, was borne by princesses
of the blood ; and the magnificence that the Roi

1 On the return of the Duke of Pastrana to Spain after the marriage at
Fontainebleau, Marie Louise sent by him her first letter to her husband.
I have had the good fortune to come across this hitherto unpublished
in the Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid. It is badly written, in a great
scared school hand, evidently copied from a draft. I transcribe it here
in full : ' Monseigneur. Je ne puis laisser partir le due de Pastrana sans
tesmoigner a votre Majest£ 1'impatience que j'ai d'avoir 1'honneur de la
voir. Je suplie en mesme temps votre Majestd d'estre bien persuaded
du respect que j'ai pour elle et de Pattachement inviolable avec lequel je
serai toute ma vie, Monseigneur, de votre Majestd la tres humble et
tres observante, Marie Louise.'

2 D

418 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Soleil loved so well found its centre in the jewels that
blazed over the young Princess who was being
sacrificed for France.

It would be tedious to recount the splendour of the
betrothal, and marriage the next day, 3ist August,1
but when, after the ceremony with Conti that made
Marie Louise the wife of Charles 11., she left the
chapel in her royal crown, her purple velvet robe
lined with ermine and covered with golden fleurs de lis,
and her flashing gems enveloping her in light, King
Louis and his Queen, between whom she walked in
the procession, praised and soothed her as the most
perfect princess and queen in the world. At the State
concert and ball that night, and at the ceremonies of
the morrow, Marie Louise was radiant in her loveli-
ness, and shed no tears, for she was steeled now to
the sacrifice, and determinecT thenceforward to get as
much sensuous joy out of life as she could, in spite of
the fate that had befallen her.

Whilst this was happening in Fontainebleau, the plot
was thickening in Madrid. The star of Don Juan
was yisibl^pn_the wane. The adherents of Mariana
grew bolder "daily' ;~some of them, like the Duke of
Osuna, dared to come to Court in spite of prohibition ;
and Don Juan lived in daily fear that the King would
slip through his hands and join his mother in Toledo.
In order to divert him from visiting Aranjuez, which
is within riding distance of Toledo, all sorts of pretexts
were invented, and the surveillance of the old Queen
by Don Juan's agents became more insulting than
ever. Mme. D'Aulnoy narrates a conversation with

1 They are described with the minuteness of a milliner's bill in
1 Descripcion de las circunstancias esenciales ... en la funcion de los
desposorios del Rey N. S. Don Carlos II.' Madrid, 1679.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 419

Don Juan at the time, which may well be authentic.1
' She asked him if it was true that the Queen-Mother
had written to the King requesting him to see her,
and that he had refused. The prince admitted that
it was, and that this was the sole reason that had
prevented his Majesty from going to Aranjuez, for
fear that she might go there and see him, in spite of
the orders given to her not to leave Toledo. "What,
sir," I cried; "The King refuses to see his mother!"
"Say rather," he replied, "that reasons of State
prevent monarchs from following their own inclina-
tions when they clash with the public interest. We
have a maxim in the Council of State always to be
guided by the spirit of the great Emperor Charles v.
in all difficult questions." ' . . . 'It was quite evident
to me,' concludes Mme. B'Aul*ny, 'that D*n Juan
accommodated the genius of Charles v. to suit his
own.'2

Don Juan had grown colder towards the French
match as time went on. He had, indeed, endeavoured
more than once to obstruct or frustrate it by suggest-
ing impossible conditions ; but even Charles n. had
plucked up some semblance of manhood with his
approaching marriage to the original of the portrait
that had so enraptured him, and gave his half-brother

1 Mme. D'Aulnoy's celebrated ' Voyage D'Espagne' is usually quoted
largely for local colour in the histories and romances of this period. I
am, however, of opinion that very little credit can be given to it, so far
as the authoress's own adventures are concerned. I have grave doubts
indeed, whether Mme. D'Aulnoy went to Spain at all. Much of her
information is easily traceable to other books, and the rest, apart from
the love romances that occupy so many of her pages, may well have been
gathered from her cousin, who was married to a Spanish nobleman. The
cousin is represented as a friend of Don Juan, and the conversation very
likely did take place with her, as Mme. D'Aulnoy represents, though
perhaps the latter was not present.

2 'Voyage d'Espagne.' La Haye, 1692.

420 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to understand that he meant to have his own way, in
this and in other things.1 Don Juan had very soon
understood t^jL^the^appearance of Marie Louise in
, SpaTKpwitrT the influence ofLouis xiv. behind her,
would mean his own downfall ; and the arrival of the
Marquis of VillarsT~the French ambassador, with
instructions from his master not to accede to the
ambitious claims of Don Juan to receive the ambas-
sador seated and to give his hand as a royal prince,
led to infinite negotiation. Louis was determined
that the bastard of Philip iv. should not be treated
by his ambassador as royal, unless his own illegitimate
offspring enjoyed the same privilege ; and Villars was
instructed not to negotiate with Don Juan at all unless
he gave way.2 Louis also instructed Villars to pro-
ceed to Toledo and salute Mariana ; and Don Juan
knew that with the Queen-mother's interest, the French
interest, and most of Spain against him, his govern-
ment was doomed to an early extinction.

The knowledge killed him ; and before Marie Louise
had reached the Spanish frontier the news came to
her that Don Juan was dead, I7th September. He
had suffered for many weeks from double tertian fevers,
and his anxiety had increased the malady. The King,
he knew, was already holding conferences of nobles,
plotting to escape to his mother and decree his half-
brother's dismissal. On all sides those upon whom
he had depended now opposed him, and some of his
old enemies had already claimed the right, in virtue
of their rank and offices, to go and attend the new

1 When he consented to the return of some of Mariana's friends to
Court he was told that Don Juan would object. * What does that matter ? '
he replied. ' I wish it, and that is enough.'

'2 ' Recueil des Instructions aux Ambassadeurs de France (Espagne).'
Paris, 1894.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 421

Queen. In these circumstances it is not necessary
to seek, as many contemporaries did, to explain his
death by accusations against Mariana and her friends
of poisoning him ; but there is no denying that his
death was most opportune for them, and was welcome
to the whole nation, as ensuring some degree of
harmony under the new regime that was to commence
with the King's marriage. Don Juan's dying ears
were dinned by the explosion of fireworks from his
own windows, in celebration of the wedding at Fon-
tainebleau, so little regard was paid to him ; and hardly
had the breath left his body when Charles ran to seek
his mother at Toledo, and, with tears and embraces
on both sides, a reconciliation was effected. It had
all been the wicked bastard's fault, and henceforward
all would go well.

Mariana managed her triumphant return with tact
and slaITr~"$fre had left the Court after Valenzuela's
fall intensely unpopular ; but much had happened since
then. Don Juan had proved a whitened sepulchre ;
the detested Austrian match for the King was at an
end, the cordiality shown by Mariana towards the
new_ marriage^ pleased^jhe^ people, and a warm wel-
come greeted her as she rode in state by her son's
side in the great swaying coach with the curtains
drawn back,1 to the palace of the Buen Retiro which
was to be her residence until her own house was
prepared.

All the_Court was eager to know what part Mariana
would in future tak^-irTtlie government. Would"' she

1 The leather or damask curtains of the coaches were usually kept
closed except by confessedly immodest women ; but on such occasions
as these, they were sometimes opened to satisfy the crowd, who wished
to welcome royal persons.

422 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

be, as of yore, the sole dispenser of bounty and the
only fountain of power? Would she avenge herself
upon Don Juan's friends as he had avenged himself
upon hers, or would she leave the dominating influence
to her son's young wife ? Mariana had learnt wisdom
by experience, and walked warily. She was no lover
of the French match j_but__ she^ knew that open oppo-
sitTJoirTo^Tf^woul? alienate' tHe^King aiicT exasperate
the^country, TanS^sKe^smilingly played the part of the
fon3~~mother who rejoiced at her son's happiness.
Everybody, moreover, and especially the King, was
so busy with the marriage that there was neither time
nor inclination for politics ; and until the King's de-
parture to meet his bride he was closeted every day
in loving converse with his mother, talking only of
his coming happiness. Fortunately the treasure-fleet
from America arrived in the nick of time, and, for a
wonder, there was no lack of money, which not only
added to the good humour of the people, but enabled
the preparations for the reception of Marie Louise on
the Spanish side to be made upon a scale approaching
the costly pageantry of former times.

The splendid entertainments at Fontainebleau ended
at last; and on the 2Oth September 1679, the young
Queen rode out of the beautiful park on the first stage
of the long voyage to her new country. She sat
silently in the coach with King Louis and his wife,
and the one man upon whom her heart was set, the
young Dauphin, whose eyes were red with tears. At
La Chapelle, two leagues from Fontainebleau, the long
cavalcade stopped, for here Marie Louise was to take
an eternal farewell of most of those she loved. As
she stepped from Queen Maria Theresa's carriage and
entered one belonging to the King that was to bear

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 423

her to the frontier, every eye was wet with tears, and
the common folk who witnessed the leave-taking cried
aloud with grief. Only Marie Louise, with fixed face
andjstony eyes, was mute. But when the last farewell
was said, and the Queen's carriage with the Dauphin
turned to leave, one irrepressible wail of sorrow was
wrung from the heart of the poor girl, as she sank
back fainting upon the cushions of the carriage by her
father's side.1

Through France, by short stages, and followed by
a great household under the Duke of Harcourt and
the Marechale Clerambant, as mistress of the robes,
the young Queen made her way, splendidly enter-
tained by the cities through which she passed ; for
to them the marriage meant peace with Spain, and
rich and poor blessed her for her beauty and her
sacrifice. The Marquis of Balbeses, the Spanish am-
bassador and his wife, a Colonna, rode in her train, and
at Poictiers the latter brought her the news of Don
Juan's unregretted death. The Marchioness happened
to be wearing a black silk handkerchief at her neck ;
and, lightly touching it, and smiling, she said : * This
is all the mourning I am going to wear for him.'2
Thenceforward to the sad end Marie Louise had to
deal with those who, with smiling face and soft
speeches, were secretly bent upon her ruin ; and she,
a bright beauty full of strength and the joy of life,
hungry for the love that had been denied her, was no
match, even if she had cared to struggle with them,
for the false hearts and subtle brains that planned the
shipwreck of her life.

The household of the new Queen, which had been

1 ' Description de las circunstancias/ etc. Madrid, 1679.

2 Ibid.

424 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

chosen by Don Juan before his death, started from the
capital towards the frontier on the 26th September,
and already intrigue was rife amongst the courtiers to
gairi^ascendencyover the young consort of the King.
The master of the household, the Marquis of Astorga,
was mainly famous for his gallantry, and had been a
firm friend of Don Juan ; whilst the mistress of the
robes, the Duchess of Terranova in her own right,
was a stern grand dame of sixty, whose experience,
like that of Astorga, had been principally Italian, and
of whom some whispered that ' she knew more about
carbines and daggers than about thimbles and needles.'1
However that may be, she was imperious and puncti-
lious to the last degree, but kept Marie Louise in the
right way as she understood it ; though, as we shall
see, the roughness of her methods disgusted the young
Queen and hastened the inevitable catastrophe.2 Close
upon the heels of the official household went some of

1 ' Semanario Erudito,' vol. ii., where a pamphlet of the period is re-
produced accusing her of complicity in the murder of her cousin, Don
Diego de Aragon.

2 The lively Mme. D'Aulnoy gives a description of a scene previous to
the departure of the young Queen's household from Madrid. The ladies
had been privately mustered in the Retiro Gardens for the King to see
how they would look mounted when they entered the capital in state with
the Queen. ' The young ladies of the palace were quite pretty, but, good
God ! what figures the Duchess of Terranova and Dona Maria de Aragon
cut. They were both mounted on mules, all bristling and clanking with
silver, and with a great saddle cloth of black velvet, like those used by
physicians on their horses in Paris. They were both dressed in widows'
weeds, which I have already described to you, both very ugly and very
old, with an air of severity and imperiousneSs, and they wore great hats
tied on by strings under their chins. There were twenty gentlemen
around them holding them up, for fear they should fall, though they
would never have allowed one to touch them thus unless they had been
in fear of breaking their necks. — * Voyage d'Espagne.' The same authority
says that the Duchess of Terranova alone took with her on the journey,
'six litters of different coloured embroidered velvet, and forty mules
caparisoned as richly as ever I have seen.'

MARIE LOUIS OF ORLEANS 425

Mariana's friends, especially the Duke of Osuna, ap-
pointed Grand Equerry, and an Italian priest, who
aspired to the post of Queen's confessor ; and even
before she entered Spain began to whisper to Marie
Louise political counsels intended to betray her.

Once again on the historic banks of the Bidasoa, and
on the island of Pheasants that had seen so many regal
meetings, sumptuous pavilions of silk brocade and
tapestry were erected. Marie Louise at St. Jean de
Luz, a few miles away, was sick at heart, in spite of
all the splendour that surrounded her ; and she could
not suppress her tears as she stood upon the last foot
of French soil she was ever to touch, ready to enter
the gilded barge that was to cross the few feet of water
that separated her from the little gaily decked neutral
island where the Marquis of Astorga was to receive
her on bended knee as his sovereign mistress.

The_rnle of the, formidable old Duchess_.of. Terra-
nova began the moment Marie Louise stepped into the
barge that was to land her on the Spanish bank. The
Queen was dressed in the graceful garb that prevailed
in the Court of Lous xiv. The soft yielding skirts and
square cut bodice with abundance of fine lace at neck
and wrists were coquettishly feminine. The bright
brown hair of the bride was curled and frizzed at the
sides and on the brow, in artful little ringlets, and all
this grace and prettiness looked to the Spanish ladies
of the old school indecorous, if not positively indecent.
Their vast widehooped farthingales, of heavy brocade,
their long flat bodices, their stiff unbendable sleeves,
and in the case of younger ladies, their hair, lank and
uncurled, falling upon their shoulders, except where it
was parted at the side and gathered with a bow of
ribbon over one temple, formed an entire contrast to

426 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the French feminine fashions of the time ; and until
Marie Louise donned the Spanish garb, and did her
hair in Spanish style, the D u^heasjaLXer rano va looked
with grave disapproval at her mistress.

AfteT the whole party had attended the Te Deum
at I run the journey south began, though not before a
desperate fight for precedence had taken place between
the Duke of Osuna and the Marquis of Astorga, a
struggle that was renewed on every opportunity until
the Duke was recalled to the King's side. Long ere
this the young King's impatience to meet his bride
had over-ridden all the dictates of etiquette, and he
had started on his journey northward on the 23rd
October, before even Marie Louise had entered Spain.
To one of those witty French ladies who, at the time,
wrote such excellent letters, we are indebted for in-
valuable information on the events of the next two
years, and the letters of Mme. de Villars, wife of the
French ambassador, will furnish us with many vivid
pictures. Writing from Madrid the day before Marie
Louise entered Spain (2nd November 1679) Mme. de
Villars says : ' M. Villars had started to join the King,
who is going in search of the Queen with such im-
petuosity that it is impossible to follow him. If she
has not arrived at Burgos when he reaches there, he
is determined to take the Archbishop of Burgos and
go as far as Vitoria, or to the frontier, if needs be, to
marry the Princess. He was deaf to all advice to the
contrary, he is so completely transported with love and
impatience. So with these dispositions, no doubt the
young Queen will be happy. The Queen Dowager is
very good and very reasonable, and passionately desires
that she (Marie Louise) should be contented.' l

1 < Letters de Mme. de Villars.' Paris, 1823.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 427

As the royal couple approached each other, almost
daily messages of affection and rich gifts passed
between them. First went from Marie Louise a
beautiful French gold watch, with a flame-coloured
ribbon, which she assured the love-lorn Charles had
already encircled her neck. On the 9th November
she reached Onate, where she passed the night, and
sent from there a miniature of herself on ivory set
with diamonds, and with this went a curious letter,1
now published for the first time, touching upon a
subject which afterwards became one of the principal
sources of Marie Louise's troubles in Spain. The
letter is in Spanish, and in the Queen's own writing,
a large, bold hand, full of character. The Queen told
Balbeses in Paris that she had learnt Spanish in order
to talk it with Queen Maria Theresa, but did not
speak it much. The present letter was .probably,
therefore, drafted or corrected in draft before she
wrote it (perhaps by Mme. de Clarembant, who spoke
Spanish), as there are no serious errors of syntax
in it.

'If I were ruled by the impulses of my heart
alone, I should be sending off couriers to your
Majesty every instant. I send to you now Sergeant
Cicinetti, whom I knew at the Court of France, and
his great fidelity also to your Majesty's service. I
pray you receive him with the same kindness that I
send him. My heart, sire, is so overflowing with
gratitude that your Majesty will see it in all the acts
of my life. They wished to make me believe that
your Majesty disapproved of my riding on horseback,
but Remille (?), who has just come from your Majesty,

1 Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, MSS. C., 1-5, transcribed by the present
writer.

428 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

assures me that just the contrary is the case, especially
as for these bad roads horses are the best. As my
greatest anxiety is to please your Majesty, I will do as
you wish ; for my whole happiness is that your
Majesty should be assured that I shall only like that
which you like. God grant you many years of life, as
I desire and need. Onate, 9th November. — Your
Niece and Servant, MARIE LOUISE.'

In fact, the Duchess of Terranova, from the first
day, had been remonstrating with the Queen against
her insisting upon riding a great horse over the
wretched rain- soaked tracts that did duty for roads.
Spanish ladies, she was told, travelled in closely-
curtained carriages or litters, or, in case of urgent
need, upon led mules, but never upon horses thus :
and Marie Louise, who was a splendid horsewoman,
had excusably defended the custom of the Court in
which she had been reared. This was the first cause
of disagrejeinenx^between Marie Louise and Tier
mistress of the robe^but_others quickly followed.

WKTTsTDharles w^simpatiently awaiting his bride
at Burgos, Marie Louise travelled slowly with her
great train of French and Spanish courtiers over the
miry roads and through the drenching winter of
northern Spain. Already her daily passages of arms
with the Duchess of Terranova had filled her with
apprehension and anxiety. M. de Villars met her at
Briviesca, and found her ' full of inquietude and
mistrust, and perceived that the change of country,
and people and manners, enough to embarrass a more
experienced person than she, and the cabals and
intrigues that assailed her on every hand, had plunged
her into a condition of agitation which made her fear
everything without knowing upon whom she could

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 429

depend.'1 The ambassador did his best to tranquillise
her. All these people, he said, were intriguing in
their own interests. She need not trouble about them :
only let her love the King and live in harmony with
the Queen- Mother, whom she would find full of
affection for her, and all would be well. It is clear
that Don Juan's faction had not died with him, and
even at this early stage the household, mainly
appointed by him, had done their best to make Marie
Louise fear and dread her mother-in-law.

On the 1 8th November, the day after her interview
with Villars, the bride arrived at Quintanapalla, within
a few miles of Burgos, where she was to pass the
night ; the ostensible intention of the Spaniards being
that the marriage should take place at Burgos the
next day. Everything was done to lead the official
Frenchmen to believe this ; but Villars and Harcourt
were suspicious ; and early on the morning of the iQth,
they arrived from Burgos at the miserable poverty-
stricken village where Marie Louise had passed the
night. Assembled there they found members of the
King's household, and taxed the Duchess of Terranova
with the intention of carrying through the royal
marriage there. She replied haughtily that the King
had so commanded, and had given orders that no one
was to attend the wedding, but the few Spanish officers
and witnesses strictly necessary. The two noble
Frenchmen indignantly announced their intention of
attending the ceremony, in obedience to the orders
of their own King Louis, whether the Spaniards liked
it or not. The imperious old lady thereupon flew into
a towering rage ; ' et dit beaucoup de choses hors de
propos? and the ambassadors, declining to quarrel with

1 * Me'moires de la Cour d'Espagne,' par M. de Villars.

430 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

an angry woman, sent a courier galloping to Burgos to
demand leave for the official representatives of France
to witness the marriage of a French princess.1

At eleven o'clock in the morning, the King himself
arrived at the poor hamlet of ten houses, and at the
door of the apartment where she had lodged his
beautiful bride met him. She looked radiant, ' in a
beautiful French costume covered with a surprising
quantity of gems,'2 though Charles told her the next
day that he infinitely preferred her with the Spanish
garb and coiffure, which she usually assumed thence-
forward. On the threshold of the squalid labourer's
cottage, Marie Louise made as if to kneel and kiss the
King's hand ; but he stepped forward and raised her.
Unfortunately, thanks to his mumbling speech and her
agitation, and small familiarity with spoken Spanish,
they soon found that conversation was impossible
without an interpreter, and Villars stepped into the
breach and said the mutual words of greeting between
the husband and wife. 3

But whilst he was doing this courtly service, his
keen eyes saw that the humble living chamber of the
cottage, where the ceremony of marriage was to take
place, was being filled by Spanish grandees, who had
ranged themselves in the place of honour on the right
hand. Louis had broken down the old Spanish claim

1 ' Me"moires.' Villars.

2 Lettres de Mme. Villars.

3 Mme. D'Aulnoy thus describes the King's appearance at this first
interview with his bride : * I have heard that the Queen was extremely
surprised at his appearance. He had a very short, wide jacket (just
au corps} of grey barracan ; his breeches were of velvet, and his stockings
of very loose spun silk. He wore a very beautiful cravat which the
Queen had sent him, but it was fastened rather too loosely. His hair
was put behind his ears, and he wore a light grey hat.'— ' Voyage
d'Espagne.' La Haye, 1692.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 431

to precedence before other nations, and Villars at once
demanded for Harcourt and himself the pre-eminent
place. Under protest, and with evil grace, the
grandees were obliged to make way for the French-
men ; and there, in the squalid room, at mid-day, with
grey skies looming overhead, and the drizzling rain
dimming the tiny windows, Charles King of Spain was
married to Marie Louise of Orleans.1

An impromptu dinner was served immediately
afterwards to the King and Queen ; and at two o'clock
in the afternoon they entered the big coach that
awaited them, and the whole caravan floundered
through the mud to the city of Burgos. The next
morning early the bride left the city privately to dine
at the neighbouring convent of Las Huelgas, and
thence to make her state entry on horseback, and
dressed in Spanish fashion. Then, for three days,
the usual round of masquerades, bull-fights, and
comedies, kept the Court amused, and the dreaded
hour of parting from her French train came to Marie
Louise. Loaded with fine presents and rewards from
the King, the great ladies and gallant gentlemen who
had kept up the spirits of the Queen, now perforce
turned their faces towards the north again, and, as
Marie Louise saw the French carriages depart, her
composure gave way, and she broke into a paroxysm
of tears.

Spaniards generally, and especially the King, saw
the French courtiers depart with delight. For years
the two countries had been constantly at war. The
splendour of France had grown proportionately:^^
poverty and impotence had fallen upon Spain. Old

1 A note on a previous page explains the reason why these small villages
were chosen for the marriage ceremonies of the Kings of Spain.

432 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

ambitions and vengeful hate were not dead, and many
Spaniards still dreamed of dictating to the world if
only France could be checked. At every step Marie
Louise, who loved France with all her heart, and had
been forced to leave it, as she was told, to serve its
interests, was reminded that she must forget the dear
land of her youth and think only of her husband's
realm. It was too much to expect that she would do
TtTTmcTit is fair to say that she did not try. She was
a blithe, gay-hearted girl, in the full flower of youth
and strength, not yet eighteen : the pleasures of
Versailles and St Cloud had hitherto filled her life,
and here in stern Spain, surrounded by sinister
intrigues she did not understand, and married to this
degenerate anaemic creature by her side, she did her
BesTTcPpTay her part properly ; but she was French
to~her inmost-soul, and she would not forget her own
folk andTTeTolcTTiolne. The harsh Duchess of Terra-
no^a~lnigrirtnsist upon the bright brown curls being
brushed wet till they hung flat and lank, and might
cram the beautiful round bosom into the hideous flat
corset demanded by Spanish fashion ; but even she
could not quite silence the frank, careless laugh, or
suppress the triumphant coquetry of a Parisian
beauty overflowing with the sensuousness of maturing
passion.

During the stay at Burgos, and afterwards, the
Duchess of Terranoya kept urgingjjgonjhe_jiarrow,
suspicious King that his new wife was a young woman
of free and easy manners, entirely opposed to Spanish
ideas of decorum, and that he must keep a tight rein
upon her. She laid it down, moreover, that the girl
mOst receive no visits of any sort until after her State
entry into Madrid, which would mean some six weeks

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 433

of complete isolation.1 At Torrejon de Ardoz, a few
miles from Madrid, Charles and his wife were met by
Mariana. The Queen-Mother was wiser and deeper
than the Mistress of the Robes ; and instead of
frightening her daughter-in law she was outwardly all
kindness and sweetness to her. As we shall see in
the course of this history, the Terranova way, harsh
as it was, was less disastrous to Marie Louise than
the policy of letting her go her own way, and then
holding her up to reprobation.

Mme. Villars records the coming of the newly-
married pair to the Buen Retire palace, where the
Queen was to remain whilst the preparations were
made for her state entry some weeks later. ' Le roi
et la reine viennent seuls dans un grand carosse sans
glace, a la mode dupays. II sera fort heureux pour
eux qu'ils soient comme leur carosse.2 On dit que la
reine fait tres bien : pour le roi, comme il etait fort
amoreux avant que de Favoir vue, sa presence ne peut
qu'avoir augment^ sa passion.'

Marie Louise had now no Frenchwomen with her but
two roIcT nurses and two maids of inferior rank; and
so"me~Hays"after line had arrived at the Buen Retiro
she begged that Madame Villars, the ambassador's
wife, might be allowed to come and raise her spirits
by a chat in French. The Duchess of Terranova was
shocked, and refused. Neither man nor woman, she
said, should see the Queen until the state entry.
Marie Louise then tried her husband. Might not the
ambassadress come in strict incognito ? He seems
to have consented, and the Queen joyously sent word

1 ' Me"moires.' Villars.

2 It will be seen that the sprightly letter- writer indulges here in an
untranslatable pun. The carriage was without glass = glace, and she
hoped the occupants would be without ice = glace.

2 E

434 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to Mme. Villars ; but Villars was aware of the jealousy
in the palace, and before allowing his wife to go, com-
municated with the Duchess of Terranova. She knew
nothing, she said, of such a permission, nor would she
inquire, and the Queen should see no one whilst she
remained at the Retiro.

Secret means were found for letting Marie Louise
know why her countrywoman did not respond to the
invitation ; but a few days afterwards Mme. Villars
went to the Retiro, doubtless by appointment, to pay
her respects to the Queen-Mother Mariana. She found
her everything that was kind and amiable. * Have
you seen my daughter-in-law yet ? ' the Queen-Mother
asked. * She is so anxious to see you, and will receive
you when you like : to-morrow if you wish.' This
was a great victory over the Duchess of Terranova,
for Marie Louise had seen not a soul but the in-
habitants of the Retiro since she entered it. Only
two days before the Marchioness of Balbases, the late
ambassadress in France, who, though an Italian, was
married to a Spanish grandee, had gone to the apart-
ment of the Mistress of the Robes to beg an audience
of the Queen. The latter, hearing her friend's voice,
had run into the room from her own adjoining chamber;
but the moment the scandalised Duchess of Terranova
caught sight of her she seized her roughly by the arm
and pushed her into her own apartment again. ' These
manners,' says Mme. Villars in recounting the incident,
' are not so extraordinary here as they would be any-
where else.'1

1 Writing of this period, Mme. D'Aulnoy, who professes to have been
in Madrid at the time, says that the Marchioness de la Fuente told her
that : ' the Queen had been much upset at the roughness of the Mistress
of the Robes, who, seeing that her Majesty's hair did not lie flat on the
forehead, spat into her hand and approached for the purpose of sticking

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 435

The French ambassadress lost no time in availing
herself of the Queen- Mother's hint ; and on the follow-
ing day went to the Retiro. The account of her visit
to the Queen may best be told in her own racy words :
' I entered by the apartment of the Mistress of the
Robes, who received me with all sorts of civility.
She took me through some little passages to a gallery,
where I expected to see only the Queen, but, to my
great surprise, I found myself before the whole royal
family. The King was seated in a great arm-chair,
and the two Queens on cushions. The Mistress of
the Robes kept hold of my hand, telling me as we
advanced how many courtesies I had to make, and
that I must begin with the King. She brought me
up so close to his Majesty's chair that I did not know
what she wished me to do. For my part, I thought
nothing more was required of me than a low courtesy ;
and, without vanity, I may remark that he did not
return it, though he seemed not sorry to see me.
When I told M. de Villars about it afterwards, he
said no doubt the Mistress of the Robes expected me
to kiss the King's hand. I thought so myself, but I
felt no inclination to do so. ... There I was then, in
the midst of these three Majesties. The Queen-
Mother, as on the previous day, said many agreeable
things, and the young Queen seemed very much
pleased to see me, though I did my best that she
should show it in a discreet way. The King has a
little Flemish dwarf who understands and speaks

the straying lock down with saliva. The Queen resented his warmly,
and rubbed hard with her pocket handkerchief upon the spot where this
old woman had so dirtily wetted her forehead. ... It is really quite'
pitiable the way this old Mistress of the Robes treats the Queen. I know
for a fact that she will not allow her to have a single hair curled, and
forbids her to go near a window or speak to a soul.' — 'Voyage d'Espagne.'

436 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

French very well, and he helped the conversation
considerably. They brought one of the young ladies
in a farthingale, that I might examine the machine.1
The King had me asked what I thought of it, and I
replied, through the dwarf, that I did not believe it
was ever invented for a human form. He seemed
very much of my opinion. They brought me a
cushion, upon which I sat only for a moment in
obedience to the sign made to me, but I took an
opportunity immediately afterwards to rise, as I saw
so many " ladies of honour " standing, and I did not
wish to offend them; though the Queens repeatedly
told me to be seated. The young Queen had a col-
lation served by her ladies on their knees — ladies of
the most splendid names, such as Aragon, Castile and
Portugal. The Queen- Mother took chocolate and the
King nothing. The young Queen, as you may
imagine, was dressed in Spanish fashion, the dress
being made of some of the lovely stuffs she brought
with her from France. She was beautifully coiffde,
her hair being brought diagonally across the brow,
and the rest falling loose over her shoulders. She has
an admirable complexion, very fine eyes, and a be-
witching mouth when she laughs. And what a thing
it is to laugh in Spain ! The gallery is rather long,
the walls being covered with crimson damask or velvet,
studded all over very close with gold trimmings. From
one end to the other the floor is laid with the most
lovely carpet I ever saw in my life, and on it there
are tables, cabinets and brasiers, candlesticks being
upon the tables. Every now and then very grandly

1 It was a hooped skirt of peculiar shape, fashionable in Spain, called
a guardainfante, of which a specimen may be seen in the portrait of
Mariana in the present volume.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 437

dressed maids come in, each with two silver candle-
sticks, to replace others taken out for snuffing. These
maids make very great, long courtesies, with much
grace. A good way from the Queens there were
some maids of honour sitting on the floor, and many
ladies of advanced age, in the usual widow's garb,
were leaning standing against the wall.

'The King and Queen left in three quarters of an
hour, the King walking first. The young Queen took
her mother-in-law by the hand leading her to the door
of the gallery, and then she turned back quickly, and
came to rejoin me. The Mistress of the Robes did
not return, and it was evident that they had given the
Queen full liberty to entertain me. There was only
one old lady in the gallery, a long way off, and the
Queen said that if she was not there she would give me
a good hug. It was four o'clock when I arrived, and
half-past seven before I left, and then it was I who
made the first move. I can assure you I wish the King,
the Queen-Mother and the Mistress of the Robes could
have heard all I said to the Queen. I wish you could
have heard it too, and have seen us walking up and
down that gallery, which the lights made very agree-
able. This young Queen, in the novelty and beauty
of her garments, and with an infinitude of diamonds,
was simply ravishing. Once for all do not forget that
black and white are not more dissimilar than France and
Spain. I think our young Princess is doing very well.
She wished to see me every day, but I implored her
to excuse me, unless I saw clearly that the King and
the Queen-Mother wished it as much as she did. . . .
The Mistress of the Robes came to meet me as I left
the gallery, and I found there the Queen's French
attendants, to whom I said that they must learn

438 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Spanish, and avoid, if possible, saying a word of
French to the Queen. I know that they are scolded
for speaking it too much to her.' 1

In thejdejic^ tf^z^^ described

abov^^a_rig_Xouise^jthough she^did her best jcTjje
patient, begged earnestly that her countrywoman
should be allowed to see her often. But Mme. Villars
pointedfout to her how much depended upon her
prudence, and avoided the palace whenever possible,
in the hope that the young Queen would fall into
Spanish ways. The King also, in his half-witted
way, tried to please his lovely wife : ' more beautiful
and agreeable,' says Mme. Villars, 'than any lady of
her Court,' giving her many exquisite presents of
jewellery, and running in and out of her apartments
to tell her bits of news, and so on. But the life was
deadly dull ; and the gloom within the palace could,
as Mme. Villars says, be seen, tasted and touched.
Charles had no amusements other than the most
childish games and trivial pastimes : his intellect was
not capable of sustaining a reasonable conversation,
and after a day of stiff monotony, he and his wife went
to bed every night at half-past eight, the moment they
had finished supper : ' with the last morsel still in their
mouths,' as Mme, Villars writes.

There was some eager talk of the Queen's pregnancy
before the grand State entry into Madrid ; but when
that hope disappeared, and Marie Louise began to
languish alarmingly in the dull incarceration of the
Retire, she and her husband sufficiently relaxed their
surroundings to go to the hunting palace of the Pardo,
six miles away, where the young Queen could ride her
French horses, and Charles could enjoy himself with a

1 ' Lettre de Mme. Villars k Mme. Coulange,' I5th December 1679.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 439

little pigsticking. At length the great day for the
public entry into the capital came on the I3th January
1680. Madrid, as usual, had squandered money sorely
needed for bread in gaudy shows. At every street
corner arose monuments and arches of imitation marble;
and all the heathen mythology was ransacked for far-
fetched compliments to the people's new idol. The
King and his mother leaving the Retiro in the morn-
ing took up a position in the central balcony of the
Onate palace, still standing, in the Calle Mayor ; and
at noon Marie Louise on a beautiful chestnut palfrey
issued from the gates of the Buen Retiro, where the
aldermen of the town stood awaiting her with the
canopy of state, under which she was to ride to the
palace.

Preceded by trumpeters and the knights of the royal
orders, by her household and by the grandees of Spain,
all in garments of dazzling magnificence, rode the most
beautiful woman in Spain, gorgeously dressed in gar-
ments so richly embroidered with gold that their colour
was hidden, and covered with precious stones, but
withal, as a Spanish eyewitness observes, ' more
beautifully adorned by her loveliness and grace than
by the rich habit that she wore.' Her horse was led
by the Marquis of Villamayna, her chief equerry ; and
after her came a great train of ladies led by the Duchess
of Terranova, all mounted on draped led mules. As
the new Queen passed the Onate palace she smiled
and bowed low to the King and his mother, who could
be dimly seen behind the nearly closed jalousies ; and
went triumphantly forward, conquering all hearts by
the power of her radiant beauty.1 But though she,

1 1 Nouvelle relation de la magnifique et royale entre'e ... a Madrid
par Marie Louise/ etc. Paris, 1680.

440 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

poor soul, knew it not, more was needed than careless
beauty to win the battle in which she was engaged, a
battle not of hearts but of subtle crafty brains.

Bullfights, with grandees as toreros, masquerades,
cane-tourneys, and the inevitable religious pageantry,
at all of which Marie Louise, glittering with gems, took
her place, ran their usual course ; and at the end of
a week after the entry the Queen began her regular
married life in the old Alcazar on the cliff, more gloomy
and monotonous, even, than the Retiro, in its gardens
on the other side of the capital.

The political intrigues, though they had never ceased,
had been naturally somewhat abated during the Queen's
voyage and subsequent seclusion : but as soon as the
maTriage feasts were over the struggle began in
earnest. Charles, absorbed in his courtship and
I7narriage, had appointed no minister to succeed Don
Juan, the necessary administrative duties being per-
formed by a favourite of his, Don Jeronimo de Eguia,
a man of no jposition or ability ; and the first bone of
contention was the appointment of the man who was
really to rule Spain. The old party of the Queen-
Mother inclined to a Board of Government, headed by
the Constable of Castile ; but Mariana, in appearance,
at least, held herself aloof, and the minister ultimately
chosen by the King was the first noble in Spain, the
Duke of Medina Cell, an easy going, idle, amiable
magnate, who had sided with Don Juan ; but whose
gentle manners had convinced the King that he would
not tyrannise over him as Don Juan had done. The
Duchess of Terranova and most of the household
whispered constantly to the young Queen distrust and
suspicion of Mariana ; and after her state entry they
encouraged her as much as possible to see the French

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 441

ambassadress constantly. The Queen- Mother, they
said, had been continually with the German ambassador
and his wife talking German, why should not Marie
Louise do the same with the French ambassador.
But both Villars and his wife were wary, and saw that
they were to be used to form a French party at Court
to oppose the Queen- Mother and the Austrians, and
this they were not at present inclined to do.

Villars himself constantly reiterates that the Queen-
Mother was quite sincere in her professions of affection
for her daughter-in-law, and he and his wife lost no
opportunity of urging Marie Louise to respond cor-
dially to her mother-in-law's loving advances. The
diplomatist attributes to Mariana, indeed, at this time,
sentiments which her whole history seems to falsify,
and it appears far more probable that Marie Louise
was right than the ambassador when she looked askance
at the tenderness of her husband's mother. The old
Queen, says Villars, was discontented with the way
her Austrian kinsmen had treated her, and leaned now
to the side of France, which had been friendly with
her in her exile ; she sincerely loved her daughter-in-
law and hoped that her son would have children to
succeed him by his beautiful wife. Villars, indeed,
casts the whole of the blame upon Marie Louise, who,
he says— probably quite truly — was lacking in judg-
ment, decision^^^gejierosity^and hesitated too late
between theTDuchess of Terranova, who constantly
warned her against the Queen-Mother, and the French
ambassador and others who strove to persuade her to
make common cause with her mother-in-law, and rule
all thin^sjojLQily with her.1

The nearest approach to common action of the two

1 ' Mdmoires de la Cour d'Espagne.' Villars.

442 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Queens was when they both persuaded Charles to
appoint the weak, idle, Medina Celi as minister ; but,
in this, and in all the other manifestations of Mariana's
conciliatory amiability at the time and after, it is
unquestionable that the measures and men she smiled
upon were such as would, and did, inevitably lead to a
state of things in which her firm hand would become
indispensable. The effects of the utter ineptitude of
such a government as that of Charles and Medina
Celi were soon seen. The coin had been tampered
with to such an extent as to have no fixed value,
provisions were at famine price, and the attempt to fix
low values of commodities by decree aroused a
sanguinary revolt in Madrid in the early spring of
i^58o, that nearly overthrew the wretched government
such as it was. Bandits infested the high roads, half
the work of the country was done by foreigners,
whilst Spaniards starved in idleness, or lived by prey-
ing upon the comparatively few who still had
means.

In this abject state of affairs, the King gave but a
uarter of an hour daily to his public duties, which
were limited to stamping his signature on decrees
placed before him, for he had neither the industry to
read them nor the intellect to understand them ; and
the rest of his time was spent on the most puerile
frivolity and in endless visits with Marie Louise to
convents and churches. ' Such visits,' says Mme.
Villars, ' are anything but a feast for her. She insisted
upon my going with her the last two days. As I
knew nobody, I was very much bored, and I believe
she only asked me to go in order to keep her in
countenance. The King and Queen are seated in
two arm chairs, the nuns sitting at their feet, and

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 443

many ladies come to kiss their hands. The collation
is brought, the Queen's repast always being a roast
capon, which she eats whilst the King gazes at her,
and thinks that she eats too much. There are two
dwarfs who do all the talking.'

A very few weeks of this idle life and good living
worked its effect _upon Marie Loujse. In February
1680, Mme. Villars writes: 'She has grown so fat,
that if it goes much further, her face will be round.
Her bosom, strictly speaking, is already too full ;
although it is one of the most beautiful I have ever
seen. She usually sleeps ten or twelve hours, and
eats meat four times a day. It is true that her break-
fast and her luncheon (collation) are her best meals.
She always has served for lunch a capon boiled and
broth, and a roast capon. She laughs very much
when I have the honour to be with her. I am quite
sure that it is not I who am sufficiently agreeable to
put her into such a good humour, and that she must be
pretty comfortable generally. No one could behave
better than she does, or be sweeter and more com-
plaisant with the King. She saw his portrait before
she married him, but they did not paint his strange
humour, nor his love of solitude. The customs of the
country have not all been turned upside down to make
them more agreeable for her, but the Queen-Mother
does everything she can to soften them. All sensible
people think that the young Queen could not do better
than contribute on her side to the tenderness and
affection that the Queen- Mother shows for her. . . .
When I tell you that she is fat, that she sleeps
well and laughs heartily, I tell you no more than
the truth ; but it is no less true that the life she
leads does not please her. . . . But, after all, she

444 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

is doing wonderfully, and I am quite astonished
at it.'1

Already we see by this, that before Marie Louise
had been in Madrid three months, she was going her
own way, and was being humoured to the top of her
bent by Mariana. She had been sold into a slavery
of utter boredom, married to a degenerate imbecile ;
and she had neither brains, heart, nor ambition to take
a leading part in politics, or to play the role that she
was intended to fill in Spain by her uncle Xing Louis.
Afrtrlat was left for her, then, was to eat, drink, sleep,
and be as merry as her grim surroundings would
allow ; and let the world wag as it would. The
society of the capital and Court had reached the
lowest degree of decadence ; and a strong, high-
minded Queen would have found ample work in
reducing at least her own household to decency.
Every lady in the palace and elsewhere had a gallant,
and was proud of it ; and it was a universal practice in
theatres and public places, or even at windows looking
upon the street, for lovers to converse openly in
the language of signs. Irnmorality and vice had
reached such a terrible pitch that mere children who
could afford it lived in concubinage, and few people,
high or low, were free from preventible disease.2

Marie Louise, utterly frivolous, made no attempt to
reform all this, but swam with the stream, taking part
in the King's puerile pleasures of throwing eggshells
full of scent at people, or playing with him for hours
at his favourite game of spilikens for pence. Mariana
looked on at it all quite complacently, Villars and his
wife thought out of mere amiability. That may have

1 Lettres de Mme. Villars a Mme. Coulange.

2 ' Voyage d'Espagne,5 Mme. D'Aulnoy. For the amount of credit to
be given to Mme. D'Aulnoy, see note on a previous page.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 445

been so, but it is clear to see now that all that was
necessary was to let Marie Louise go her own way
unchecked, and Mariana had nothing to fear from her
politically or personally. As an instance of the attitude
of the Queen-Mother towards the young Queen's
thoughtlessness, a little circumstance related by Mme.
Villars may be quoted : ' I was walking in the gallery
of the Buen Retire on Sunday, before seeing the
comedy, thinking nothing of kings or queens, when I
heard our young Princess call out my name very
loudly. I entered the room whence the voice pro-
ceeded quite unceremoniously ; and, to my confusion,
I found the Queen seated between the King and the
Queen-Mother. She had thought of nothing when
she called me but her own wish to see me, quite
regardless of Spanish gravity ; and she burst out
laughing heartily when she saw me. The Queen-
Mother reassured me. She is always pleased when
her daughter-in-law enjoys herself. Indeed, she made
an opportunity for me to come and talk with her in a
window recess, but I retired as soon as I could.' To
encourage Marie Louise to forget for a moment that she
was a Spanish Queen, was to ensure her downfall.

Here is another picture of the young Queen a few
days afterwards. Mme. de Sevigne had written a letter
talking of Marie Louise's beautiful little feet, with
which she danced so nimbly at Versailles. The young
Queen was gratified at the flattery, but ruefully said
that all her pretty feet were used for now was to walk
round her chamber a few times, and carry her off to
bed at half-past eight every night. On this occasion
Mme. Villars thus describes her : * She was as beauti-
ful as an angel, weighed down but uncomplaining, by a
parure of emeralds and diamonds on her head, that is

446 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

to say, a thousand sparks; a furious pair of earrings,
and in front, and around her, in the form of a scarf,
rings, bracelets, etc. You think, no doubt, that
emeralds on her brown hair would not look well, but
you are mistaken. Her complexion is one of the
loveliest brunettes ever seen, her throat white, and
exquisitely beautiful.'

S ooji^the.,4^qun£_Queen>s careless jollity receiveda
blow, which embittered her. Charles hated and dis-
tmsteTa^^

TlouTsein making companions of her French maids
annoyed him exceedingly ; and the lives of the two
maids whom she liked best were made intolerable to
them to such an extent that they had to leave. The
Queen was in despair, but protested and wept in vain :
the two Frenchwomen were made to understand that
they had to go ; and when their mistress summoned
them one morning she was told that they had departed
from the palace for good, leaving her with only two
French servants, a nurse and a maid. As usual in
her trouble, she summoned Mme. Villars, who found
her lying down. ' She rose at once. It is truly sur-
prising how beautiful she has grown. She wore her
hair tied up in great curls on her forehead, with rose-
coloured ribbons on her cap and on the top of her
head ; and she was not plastered over with rouge, as
she is generally obliged to be. Her throat and bosom
admirable. She slipped on a French dressing-gown,
which she wore for the rest of the day. She stood
thus for a short time regarding herself in a great
mirror, and the view seemed to revive her. Her eyes
looked as if she had been weeping much. As soon
as she began to speak to me the King entered the
room, and it is the rule in such cases for the ladies all

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 447

to leave, except the Mistress of the Robes and some
servants. I heard cards asked for, and I concluded
that the Queen was going to be bored to death with
the little game that the King is so fond of, at which,
if you have very bad luck, you may lose a dollar. The
Queen always plays it as if she was enraptured with
the occupation.'

The loss of two of her French attendants drew
Marie~Cguise_eveFcloser to MmerViHars^ who was a
person of matureage, but, to~Tier"Ta't'er""regretl she
gracTuaUy lost some of the reserve that at first she
had considered prudent in her communications with
the Queen. Mariana smiled upon the constant com-
panionship of hef"daiighter-in-law with the French
ambassadress, but she must have known, for she was
experienced and_cjfeYi£^^^*:^:~wQuld end_in_disaster

_ __

to Marie Louise, whose future depended upoiTpIeasmg
her"Tmsband and becoming purely SpanishT~ TtTe
Queen did her best to keep the affection of Charles,
who, in his own way, was desperately in love with
her, and on occasions when he had to leave her for
a day or two she affected desperate sorrow at his
absence so cleverly as to arouse the admiration of
Mme. Villars for her good acting.

But, though she kept the King in alternate fits of
maudlin devotion and despairing rage at her capricious
flouting of all the rules and traditions of his Court,
he himself was politically a cypher, and^ the policy_
always favoured by Mariana slowlyjput surely gained
ground, whilst the French interest grew weaker ; and
Marie Louise, in spite of her uncle's indignant re^,
minders^ raised no finger to help the cause she had
been sent to Spain to champion. If Mariana ever
had quarrelled with the Emperor, as Villars thought,

448 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the breach was patched up now, and the Austrian
ambassador, Count de Grana, an old friend of
Mariana's, came to draw closer than before the family
alliance. And yet Mariana ostentatiously abstained
from any governmental action, whilst all went in the
way she wished.

"The first open sign of a return to the old policy of
religious unity and the Austrian connection was the
holding of the greatest auto de fe that had taken place
in ^Madrid for half a century, in June 1580. The
Plaza Mayor was transformed at a vast expense into
a great theatre ; all its hundreds of windows were
filled with the aristocracy of Spain, and the high roofs
of the houses crowded with people to see the dreadful
show. All the inquisitors in Spain had been sum-
moned, and the pulpit, the great tribune for the judges,
the platform for the bishops, and the fronts of the
barriers and balconies were covered with costly tapes-
tries and rich hangings for the occasion. Eighty-five
grandees and noblemen were proud to act as familiars
of the Holy Office, and a picked corps of 250 gentle-
men served as soldiers of the faith, to guard its
ministers, and each to carry a faggot for the devilish
bonfire at the gate of Fuencarral after the auto was
finished.

All day long, from early morning till four in the
afternoon, the King, with Marie Louise and Mariana,
sat in the principal -balcony of the Panaderia, the
centre house in the great square, whilst 120 poor
wretches in sambenitos, with ropes round their necks,
gags in their mouths, and other insignia of shame,
were condemned after innumerable ceremonies, sermons
and rogations, to the tender mercies of the law
condemning heresy. Charles swore again on the

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 449

gospels to defend and promote the Catholic faith as
helcT in Spain ; and when the dread sentences were
pronounced, the captain of the Inquisition Guard
entered the royal balcony, bearing upon his shield a
faggot, which was presented to Charles and the Queen,
the former of whom returned it to the holder, saying :
' Take it in my name, and let it be the first cast upon
the fire to burn heretics.' The French ambassador
and his wife were obliged to be present, for those
who did not attend were looked upon with suspicion ;
but they, and all the world, knew that this atrocious
scene meant the growing power of the traditional ideas
connected with Austrian friendship and the certainty
at no distant period of a renewal of the war with
France.

Paltry questions of diplomatic precedence and privi-
lege, the haughty encroaching spirit of Louis xiv., and
the utter abandonment of even current affairs by the
Spanish government, under lazy Medina Celi, widened
daily the breach between France and Spain. Villars
and his wife, according tc the evidence now before
us, appear to have misunderstood entirely who were
their real friends and foes in the palace. Mariana
was all amiability to them, constantly urging that the
ambassadress should be much with Marie Louise, and
openly disapproving of the harsh manners of the
Duchess of Terranova, who was always, says Villars,
abusing the French and turning the King's dislike to
his wife's countrymen into unreasoning hatred. The
ambassador therefore believed that the Duchess was

really the enemy of the ynnng Onppn and thp Frpnrh

interest ; but it is unquestionable that in the then
state of feeling in Spain, the only hope for Marie
Louise was to keep as far away from her own country-

2F

450 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

men and women as her Mistress of the Robes desired.
Marie Louise, thoughtless as she was, naturally con-~
sidejred this tyrannical and hard. On one occasion a
French half-witted beggar came to her carriage door,
and the Queen, speaking French to him, threw him
some alms ; whereupon the King was so enraged that
he insisted upon the beggar being arrested, examined
and expelled the country. Another day the King and
Queen in their coach passed in the street some Dutch
gentlemen dressed in French style, whose carriage,
according to etiquette, had drawn up whilst the royal
equipage passed. The strangers were on the left side
of the street, and consequently were nearer the Queen
than the King, and in their salutations addressed their
respects to her. Again the King made a violent
jealous scene, and caused a grave reprimand to be
addressed to the Dutchmen, who were forbidden ever
to salute the Queen again.

In the spring of 1680, on a disputed question of
etiquette, the King tookjiway some of the diplomatic
privileges of the French ambassador, and the Duke of
Orleans wrote to his daughter the Queen, asking her
to speak to her husband about it. When Marie Louise
did so, Charles sulkily told her to mind her own busi-
ness, and not to speak to him on such affairs. She
pressed her point, however, and he replied : ' They
will recall this ambassador, and send me another
gabacho instead.'1 Some months later, whilst Mme.
Villars was on one of her frequent visits to the Queen,
the King, who had taken a special dislike to her, and
often listened behind the arras to the conversation in
the hope of detecting an indiscretion, broke out from
his hiding-place in insulting abuse of the ambassadress.

1 Gabacho is an opprobrious term applied to Frenchmen in Spain.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 451

Villars lays all this trouble at the door of the Duchess .
of Terranova and the Marquis of Astorga, the Queen's
master of the household, both appointed by Don Juan,
and praises Mariana to the skies for her gentleness to
Marie Louise, and her desire that she should have her
own way and see as many French people as she liked.1
After a time the Duchess of Terranova, finding that
the harshness of her methods, contrasting with trie
gentleness of her oppents, was destroying her influence,

mann^rc tfLSOme CXtCHt, and W6Ht SO far

as to rebuke the King — even to scold him — when he
said unkind things to his wife about her countrywomen,
b^otjiejr__clesire- to mould Marie Louise into the tradi-
tional Spanish Queen never ceased, and if her advice
had been followed, unpalatable and cross-grained as it
was, the unhappy girl would havebeen saved much of
her misery. Every small device that the King coulcl
adopt, ^TUlars says on the advice of the Duchess, was
brought into play to separate the Queen from French
influence. She was kept so short of money that most
of he?" beloved horses, which she was not allowed to
ride, and their French grooms, had to be sent back to
France, all her French men servants, even her doctor,
were dismissed, though he, from his name (Dr. Talbot),
would seem to have been an Englishman.

In this wretched existence Marie Louise grew
callous. She_j^k^q_rj^j_^venjto be civil toHErie
Spanish grand dames who visited her, or to pretend
to care a jot for the eternal comedies and visits to
convents that were the only amusements allowed her.
She played for hours every day at spilikins with the
King ; ' the worst company in the world, and he never
had any one with him but his two dwarfs.' She was

1 ' Mdmoires de la Cour d'Espagne.' Villars.

452 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

careless and buxom, and found some little pleasure in
attending to her birds,1 but nothing else ; for she had
neither brains, nor ambition, nor ideas, worthy of her
ranjc._ Secretly all she longed for was to return to
France as a widowed Queen, to enjoy herself as she
liked without fear.2 Her one delight was the visit of
Mme. Villars, who sang French airs with her, or played
whilst the Queen danced a minuet, or chatted about
Fontainebleau and St. Cloud. * I do not know,' says
Mme. Villars, 'what passes in her breast and in her
head to keep her up so, but, as for her heart, I believe
that nothing passes there at all.' In these words the
witty Frenchwoman aptly sums up the character of
the Queen, doomed to this life of gloomy dulness by
the side of a semi-imbecile. She had left her heart
behind her in the land she loved, and her existence
now was carelessly epicurean.

The political intrigues went on around her unheeded,
and* she had not jwjt enough to see ±he traps JaicLior
her. The Duchess of Terranova was always dour and
~3Isagreeable, but her desperate attempts to alienate the
Queen from all memory of France had now made her
specially disliked by her mistress, whilst Mariana and
her friends ostentatiously sided with the young Queen,
alTct^TterjFecatecTthe severity of the iDuchess. Incited

1 Mme. D'Aulnoy in her own Mdmoires tells a curious though doubtful
story of these perroquets of which Marie Louise was so fond. They had
been brought from Paris, and the few sentences they had been taught
were in French, so that the Duchess of Terranova thought herself justified
in having them killed. When the Queen asked for them and learnt their
fate she said nothing : but when next the Mistress of the Robes came to
kiss her hand Marie Louise gave her two good sound slaps on the face
instead. When the indignant Duchess with all her followers went in a
rage to demand redress of the King, Marie Louise excused herself by
saying that she gave the slaps overcome by the irresistible influence of a
pregnant woman. This flattered the King and she was absolved.

'2 ' Me'moires de la Cour d'Espagne.' Villars.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 453

by them Marie Louise determined to get rid if she
could of the rough old lady who was really her only
friend, and spoke first to her confidante Mme. Villars
aEouFit. The ambassador and his wife were as deeply
resentful of the old Duchess, who hated French people,
as was the Queen, and were delighted to hear the pro-
ject for getting rid of her, but Mme. Villars counselled
prudence ; for she knew how flighty and unstable the
Queen was. The Duchess, she said, was very clever,
and such a change as that suggested was without pre-
cedent in Spain : besides, the Duchess had been later
somewhat more civil than before ; nevertheless, if the
Queen really wished for a new mistress of the Robes she
must begin by mentioning the matter to the King^and
the Prime Minister, so that the affair might be settled
before a word of it reached the ears of the Duchess.

Marie Louise used all her witchery that same night
when she broached the subject to her husband. He
answered her, as she said, more sensibly than she had
expected, and told her that, if really the Duchess made
her so unhappy, they would make a change ; but it
was a serious matter, and she must recollect that no
second change would be possible. Marie Louise then
approached Queen Mariana, and found her apparently
cool and indifferent about it, to an extent that some-
what discouraged the young Queen, who little under-
stood that there was nothing that her mother-in-law
desired_rnore than^the removal oTlh£—on1y

checkju^on her conduct. But Medina Celi, the Prime
Minister, whom the imperious ways ot the old Duchess
had offended, lent_eager ear to the suggestion when,
by_the_aid of the Villars, itwasTopened to him "Marie

Louise, by the advice of Madame Villars, asked that the
Duchess of Medina Celi might be her new Mistress of

454 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the Robes, but that lady declined absolutely. Then
the Marchioness of los Velez and other great ladies were
suggested ; and when Marie Louise consulted Mariana
upon each one in turn, the old Queen remained cold
and aloof, and even had excuses, and good words to
say about the Duchess of Terranova.

But when there was a talk of the Duchess of Albu-
qu^rque, then Mariana took an interest in tKelnatter
at once, and agreed with Medina Celi that she would
Be an ideal person for Mistress of the Robes. But, of
all the ladies at Court, the Duchess of Albuquerque
was the one that Marie Louise disliked most. She
might struggle as she liked, however, she soon found
that without Mariana's goodwill no one could gain a
footing in the palace, and she was almost tempted to
beg the Duchess of Terranova to stay by her side,
especially as the King himself was opposed to the
Duchess of Albuquerque. I trended, of course, in
Mariana having her way. She bullied her son into
making the appointment, and into dismissing the
people who, she said, had ruled him for a year,jthe
Duchess of Terranova and his friend Eguia. Un-
bending to the last, the old Duchess, when she took
leave of the Queen, noticed that the latter was crying
now that the parting had come, and she told her that
it was not proper for a Queen of Spain to weep for so
small a matter. Marie Louise, half regretting the
change now that it was too late, asked the Duchess
of Terranova to come and see her sometimes. * I will
never set foot in the palace again, as long as I live,'
replied the proud lady, violently banging the table and
tearing her fan to bits ; and she went forth in high
dudgeon, refusing all the honours and rewards offered
to her.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 455

With her departure the outlook for Marie Louise
changecTlike a charm. The new Mistress of the Robes
had always been considered as austere as her prede-
cessor, for which reason the young Queen had feared
her. But she came to her new office all sweetness.^
The Queen was allowed to sit up until half-past ten at
night, an unheard of thing before ; she might mount
her saddle horses and ride whenever she pleased, as no
previous Queen Consort had ever done, and the King,
on the persuasion of his mother and the new Duchess
of the Robes, positively urged his wife to divert her:
self in pas times "that hadjDreviously been rigorously
forSjddenT* The change in the King was extra-
ordinary, and proves the complete domination of his
mother overTiis weak spirit when she pileased to exert
herjpowen Mme Villars happened tcT visit the Queen
two days after the Duchess of Albuquerque assumed
office ; and as she entered the Queen's apartment
Marie Louise ran smiling up to her in joy, crying :
' You will say yes to what I am going to ask you, will
you not ? ' The demand turned out to be that, by the
King's special wish, Mme. Villars's daughter should
enter the Queen's household as a maid of honour ; and
Marie Louise, at the idea of having a French girl of
her own age always near her, was transported with
delight. The appointment was sanctioned and gazetted,
but never took effect, for Villars could not afford to
endow his daughter sufficiently well, and relations

1 * Mdmoires de la Cour d'Espagne.' Villars. Even so, she was not
allowed to mount her horses from the ground, but had to be driven in her
coach to the place and mount the horse from the step of the carriage.
One of her horses being very high spirited resented on one occasion this
strange performance, and the Queen was thrown to the ground, much to
her husband's alarm. No one, it appears, dared to touch the Queen,
even to raise her from the ground, until Charles had sufficiently recovered
from the shock to do so himself. (Mme. D'Aulnoy.)

456 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

soon grew bitter again ; but that Charles, who hated
the French, and especially Mme. Villars, should ever
have consented to it proves how complete the sudden
change of scene was.

Encouraged by her new liberty, Marie Louise began
to take a keener interest in public affairs, always play-
ing, as can now be clearly seen, the game of those
who were bent upon her ruin. Medina Celi had been
cleverly diverted by Mariana, who had been ostensibly
friendly with him, whilst the councils and secretariats
had been gradually packed with her friends ; and
Marie Louise, prompted by her, took the opportunity
of the opposition offered by the minister to the stay of
the Court at Aranjuez, to set her husband against
Medina Celi, after which, both she and her mother-in-
law, into whose hands she played, both worked
incessantly to undermine the minister who was already
unpopular, owing to the terrible distress in the country
and his own ineptitude. The minister and his hench-
man Eguia, and the King's confessor, retaliated
effectively by sowing jealous^ distrust between Mariana
arid her daughter-in-law, and between the King and
his iwile ancL mother; and thenceforward complete,
disunion existed between them all. Mariana, in dis-
gust at her son's weakness, and knowing that events'
were tending her way, stood aloof for a time ;
Marie Louise went her own gait, making no
friends and possessing no party ; and the inept
Charles, alternately petulant and sulky, distrusted
everybody.

Villars writes of Marie Louise at this juncture :
' She, with her youth and beauty, full of life and
vivacity, was not of an age or character disposed to
enter into the views and application necessary for her

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 457

proper conduct. Her bent for liberty and pleasure,
the memories of France and all she had left behind
her there, had made Spain intolerable to her. The
captivity of the palace, the ennui of idleness without
amusement, the coarse low manners of the King, the
unpleasantness of his person, his sulky humour, which
she increased frequently by her lack of amiability
towards him, all nourished her aversion and un-
happiness. She took interest in nothing, and would
take no measure, either for the present or the future^
ancTso, putting aside all that Spain could give her, she
only consoled herself with the idea of returning _to
France. She entertained this idea, encouraged by
predictions and chimeras which formed her only
amusement, for everything else bored her.'1

In her despairing knowledge that she could never
hope for happiness in Spain, Marie Louise thus grew
reckless. She had no ambition to rule except in the
heart of the man she loved ; she was not clever enough
tqjsucceed in the subtle political intrigues that went_pn
around her; she knew now that motherhood was
hardly to be hoped for with such a husband as hers,
and her one thought was of the joy of living in France.
As^ the political relations between France and Spain
grew constantly more strained and Charles's detestation
of Frenchmen increased, the visits of Mme. Villars^to
Mane Louise perforce grew rarer, for the suspicious
King had got into his head that the French am-
bassadress was serving as an intermediary in the
palace intrigues which were setting everybody by the
ears. Marie Louise made matters worse by turning
to her widowed nurse Mme. Quantin, and her inferior
French maid. Quantin was a greedy, meddlesome

1 ' Memoires.' Villars.

458 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

woman, of low rank, who put up her influence over the
Queen for sale, and soon embroiled matters beyond
repair.

The Queen, under the influence of this woman, lost
whaF little discretion and prudence she possessed.
The many poor French people in the town, to whom
Quantin and the other French maids were known,
would congregate beneath their apartments in the
palace to gossip of France, tell the news, and perhaps
to beg for favours ; and Marie Louise would some-
times be imprudent enough to approach the windows
and exchange words with her countrymen below.
Spaniards who saw it — for jealous eyes watched the
Queen always — cried shame upon such a derogation
from the dignity of Spanish royalty, and the
m^tigers of the capital already began to whisphat
the ' Frenchwoia^Mwho would not play
properly, and g^^^^o signs of motherhood, might be
put aside in favour of another Queen. *Jn the Calle
Mayor, a punning verse passed from hand to hand
reproaching her for her sterility, and demanding in
ribald rhyme that she should either give an heir to
Spain, or return whence she came ; and thus, as war
loomed ever nearer between her two countries, the lot
of the unhappy Queen grew darker.

Villars began to see that he had been misled in
corigemning the hard rule of the JDuchess of
Terranova, and aiding the Queen to gain the freedom
advocated for her by the amiable Mariana. ' It was
a^^reat misfortune for the Queen,' he wrote, 'who
now abandoned herself without restraint to a danger-
ous line of conduct, and it is quite a question, judging
by results, whether the hard severity of the Duchess
of Terranova was not better for her than the weak com-

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 459

plaisance of the Duchess of Albuquerque.' l The poor
misguided girl had not a single friend, Mariana kejDt
away ; for things were going admirably from her point of
view; and a new alliance between Spain and the empire
and otFer powers, against the^threatened encroach-
ments of France, was already being discussed in secret.
Trie Minister, Medfna Cell, "Had succeeded, by
means of Eguia and the King's confessor, in re-
establishing his position by arousing the jealousy of all
the three members of the royal family against each
other ; and he sought further to isolate and discredit
Marie Louise by whispering to the King that her
friend Mme. Villars was engaged in political intrigue
with the Queen to the detriment of Spain. Mme.
Vil^s had been specially authorised to visit the Queen
as ^Bh as possible, and report fully all she heard*|br
th^Bformation of the French A^Lnment ; but it is
certain that she had no politic^^JIsion. Charles,
however, wa« childishly jealous of her because his wife
liked her, and he instructed the Marquis de la Fuente,
his ambassador in France, to demand the recall of
Villars in consequence of his wife's indiscretion.
Louis xiv. knew his kinsman well, and the real reason
for his demand : but it was part of his policy just then
to reassure the Spanish King, and Villars was
sacrificed. In the ambassador's letter of recall, Louis
writes, after saying that Charles had complained of the
intrigues of Mme. Villars : ' It is useless to inform
you of all the details ... it will suffice to say that,
for many reasons affecting my service, I have not
thought fit to refuse the King of Spain this mark of
my complaisance, however satisfied I may be of the
services you have rendered in the post you occupy.'

1 ' M^moires de la Cour d'Espagne.' Villars.

460 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Both Villars and his wife disdained to justify them-
selves by a single word, and the ambassadress left
Madrid in the summer of 1 68 1, to the despair of Marie
Louise ; whilst Villars himself was replaced by another
ambassador early in 1682. By^this time the enrpire
was at war withJF ranee. Louis had captured Stras-
bourg, and Casale in Savoy on the same day (3Oth
September 1681), and Germany seemed almost at the
mercy of the now dominant power in Europe. ^The
imperial ambassador at Madrid, supported strongly
by Mariana, was striving his utmost to draw Spain
into the great war that seemed inevitable, and Holland
and England, jealous of the aggression of France,
were for a time apparently willing to join Spain. But
the clever diplomacy of Louis diverted the powers
from the alliance, except the empire and bankrupt
Spain ; and the sorely reduced Flemish dominion; of
Spain was again invaded by French troops. Luxem-
bourg, which belonged to Spain, was besieged, the
cities of Dixmunde and Courtrai were captured
(November 1683), and with every fresh victory of the
French, Louis became more exacting. Finally, when
the unfortunate country could resist no longer, the
government of Charles was forced to accept the
humiliating terms of the Treaty of Ratisbon in June
1684, by which Luxembourg, the well-nigh impreg-
nable fortress, was lost to Spain for ever, whilst Louis
also kept Strasbourg, Bovines, Chimay, and Beaumont.
Other smaller potentates, like the Elector of Braden-
burg and the Regent of Portugal, following the
example of the great Louis, hectored Spain into
degrading concessions, whilst pestilence swept through
the south, floods ruined Spanish Flanders, hurricanes
Sctnk the silver fleets, upon ^dllch the government

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 461

of Charles largely depended, corruption lorded over
all in stark desolate_J5gain_L and the cretin King,
growing more feeble in mind and body, mumbled his
prayers, or played childish games with his wife or
his dwarfs.

During the war, which further despoiled the land
of her adoption, the lot of Marie

pitia"5Te7 Even before it broke out, and during the
periooT of acrimonious recriminatory claims which
followed the recall of Villars, her isolation and im-
potence and the growing power of Mariana were
plainly evident. In the instructions" given by Louts
xiv. to his new ambassador, Vanguyon,1 in 1682, the
latter is instructed to visit the Queen-Mother first,
with all sorts of amiable messages, and Marie Louise
is only to be addressed 'in general terms,' and asked
to do her best to maintain good relations between jh<
two countries. Mariana, indeed, with the imperial]
ambassador, Mansfeldt, constantly at her side, had b}
the mere force of circumstances and her own charactei
gradually again become the principal controlling power^
of the State, and, as usual, she directed her influence
not to the benefit of Spain but to the aid of the''
empire in its secular struggle against the encroach^]' -
ments of France. When the war, as already mentioned,
broke out (1683) with France, the underhand intrigues
oTMariana and the Austrian faction to discredit Marie
Louise and destroy any political influence she might
have over her husband, were powerfully aided by^e
general feeling against everything French : and the
young Queen, without a single friend near her, was
more sorely beset than ever by her relentless enemies,
whilst she, perplexed with intrigues that she did not

1 'Recueil des Instructions aux ambassadeurs de France.' Paris, 1894.

462 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

understand, surrounded by people who would willingly
have followed her if she had had wit enough to lead
them, threw away her chance by the frivolity and
imprudence of her behaviour.1

She managed, it is true, by her charm and beauty
to keep her husband deeply in love with her in his
maudlin fashion, but, weak as he was, she failed to
influence him politically.2 She had already offended

1 In January 1685 the Duke of Montalto in Madrid wrote to Pedro
Ronquillo, the ambassador in London. ' The King attends to nothing
but his hunting pastimes, and the Queen in tiring horses, as if she were
a skilled horse-breaker. That is a pretty way to become pregnant ! In
short, my dear sir, it is quite clear that God determines to punish us on
every side.' Writing again, a month later (28th February), the same
correspondent, after villifying the Medina Celi government, says :
' Neither the things in the palace or anywhere else here improve. It
looks, on the contrary, as if the devil himself had taken them in hand.
Medina Celi is very placid over it, and cares only for himself; the King
has been wolf-hunting for a week thirty miles off, and there would be no
harm in that if he would only despatch business. As for the Queen,
Medina Celi positively encourages her in her pranks so as to be able to
hold on to office by her. He does not care so long as others have to
pay.' Both the correspondents, it is needless to say, belonged to
Mariana's party. ' Doc. Ined.,' Ixxix.

2 There was a document found in Marie Louise's cabinet after her
death, which purported to be a political guide, written to her at this
period by Louis xiv. In this cynical document the Queen is advised
how to gain advantage from the King's weakness and ineptitude, and how
to obtain control of him. She is to maintain an attitude between com-
plaint and friendship with the Queen-Mother, but to be very wary with
regard to her : she is advised to maintain Oropesa in the ministry, but
not to trust him, or to allow him more power than he had. She is to
continue to introduce French fashions, manners, etc., in the palace ; and
advice is given her as to how she should treat all the principal nobles.
The manuscript concludes : ' Withdraw this paper into your most secret
keeping. Live for yourself and for your beloved France. In Spain they
do not love you, as you know, and they do not fear you either, for faint
hearts easily conceive suspicions, and strength is not needed to commit
a cruelty.' The original document is in the Bibliote'ca Nacional, Madrid
(H. n), and there is a Spanish translation of it in MSS. Add. 15,193,
British Museum. The document has usually been assumed to be
authentic, but I am rather inclined to regard it as one of the many means
employed to blacken the French cause after Marie Louise's death.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 463

Medina Celi and played the game of the Queen-
Mother against him — for he had been a friend of Don
Juan — by interfering with his appointments for the
benefit of her nurse, the widow Quantin ; and now,
at the very period when Mariana had determined
that the prime minister, who had failed to pay her
fuH~ pension, and' who alone stood between her and
supreme power, should be dismissed, Marie Louise
again foolishly threw her influence with her husband
against the oft-threatened minister. Medina Celi,
overwhelmed by his unpopularity and the insuperable
difficulties of his task, was brusquely dismissed by the
King in June 1685 ; and thenceforward Mariana was
supreme. The new minister, the Count of Oropesa,
was clever and active, and at first made sweeping
financial reforms : but he was really the tool of the~
Austrian faction, which, before many months had
passed, negotiated the League of Augsburg, which
bound together Spain, the empire, Sweden, Bavaria
and other powers, against the encroachments of Louis
xiv. ; and again poor, ruined Spain was pledged to
enter, if called upon, into the central European war.

For the moment Louis was not prepared to meet
all Europe in arms, and his views with regard to Spain
had become somewhat changed. It was by this time
evident that Marie Louise would bear no child to her
degenerate husband, and Mariana and Mansfeldt were
already preparing to "put forward the claims to the
succession of the children of the Empress^ (the Infanta
Margaret, daughter of Mariana), whilst Louis xiv.,
making light, as he always did, of the renunciation
signed by Maria Theresa on her marriage (already
referred to), was determined to show that his own son,
the__Daiiphin, had the best right to be King of Spain if

464 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Charles n. died without issue. When, therefore, the
new French ambassador, Feuquiere, went to Spain
early in 1685, he was instructed to talk seriously, and
in secret, to Marie Louise on the subject.1 He was
to tell her that she would be wise to desist from all
political intrigue ~dlrected to the change of personnel
of the government, and so to gain the goodwill of the
ministers and obtain a firmer hold over the King.
This advice came too late, for she had foolishly con-
nived at Medina Celi's fall before Feuquieres could
deliver his message. This, however, was only the
first step ; and in the following year Father Verjus
was sent to Madrid with money and instructions to
aid Feuquiere in gaining friends and forming a party
under the aegis ot 'Marie JLouise~to push the__claims
of trie DaupFin to the Spanish succession.

In the meantimeThe Austrian party^nder Mariana,
werejiavmgjtheir ownjway unchecked. Marie Louise
was their sole stumblingjalock, for the King would
never willingly lose sight of her, notwithstanding her
follies, of which her enemies made the most ; and at
the instance of Mariana and her Austrian backers a
dastardly series of plots was formed for ruining the
young Queen in the eyes of her husband. We get
the first hint of them from a letter dated I2th April
1685 in the curious informal correspondence addressed
by the Duke of Montalto in Madrid to the Spanish
ambassador in London, Pedro Ronquillo, both of them
partisans of Mariana : * A case of no little scandalous-
ness has happened in the palace,' he wrote. 'You

1 To the French ambassador who was in Spain in 1688, the Count
de Rebenac, she gave the most intimate detailed reasons for her lack
of issue connected with the constitution of the King. Rebenac repeated
these confidences in his letters to Louis.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 465

know, of course, that Mme. Quantin is the favourite of
our Queen, and that M. Viremont, a Frenchman who
takes care of the Queen's saddle horses, is also well
liked by her Majesty. By these means this man
introduced himself so much into the palace with the
Quantin woman, that, although she wears the dress of
a duenna, and is neither young nor at all handsome,
there was a talk of their getting married. Everybody
laughed at such a courtship ; but the matter went so
far and the connection was so close, for both of them
are cunning enough to get out when they liked, and
perhaps he may have found means to enter her
chamber in the palace, that the woman was recently
taken out of the palace to the house of Donna Ana de
Aguirre, who is in high favour with the Queen, and it
is said that this Quantin woman gave birth to a boy
there the other day.1 This scandal has caused no end
of murmuring and satires, so shameless some of them
as to be incredible. What is quite as incredible is the
irresolution of the King. Up to the present time
nothing has been done, either to the man or the
woman, and Viremont continues in his employment as
if nothing had happened. They are married now ;
but if I had my way they should be burned. Yester-
day the Quantin woman went to pay her respects to
the Queen with as much effrontery as if she had not
behaved thus. You can see by this the state the
palace is in.'2

We can supplement this narrative from other sources.
The French widow was the only person of her own
tongue and country near TVIane Louise, and, though

1 Mme. Quantin was a widow. It has been explained that all the ladies
in the palace had to be maids or widows.

2 « Doc. Ined.,' Ixxix.

2G

^Zr f rr iTrr-

466 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

she had been a dangerous companion, the poor Queen
clung desperately to her. As soon as the rumour of
her marriage spread the outcry for her punishment
and expulsion was raised by the enemies of Marie
Louise, and the Queen herself was attacked in dozens
of spiteful couplets as having connived at immorality
in her own apartments. The outraged Queen threw
herself at her husband's feet in an agony of tears, and
implored him not to expel the only French woman-
servant upon whom she could depend. Charles,
moved by his wife's tears, allowed Quantin to remain
inMadrT37 thoughTnot to sleep in the palace, and
refused fo believe the stories told him that Marie
Louise had knowingly been a party to the irregularity
of her servant.

This was to some extent a defeat for the Queen-
Mother and her friends ; but the scandal laid a founda-
tion of distrust, upon which further attack might be
based. This is how the Duke of Montalto speaks of
the King's concession to his wife. ' I don't know
whether the Quantin affair is true or not ; but it is
publicly stated, and is the most dreadful scandal that
ever happened in the palace. Medina, Oropesa and
the Confessor, all urged the King to take some step,
but to no purpose, for he preferred to give way to the
tears and prayers of the Queen, rather than uphold the
decency of his own household. So she has triumphed
to such an extent that this woman, having married the
rogue Viremont, has positively been brought by the
Queen into the palace again to serve her, and goes
home to her husband every night ! Cases of this sort
are surely enough to drive one crazy, and to banish all
hope of better times. Since I have told you the story
I must now tell you the sequel. As soon as they were

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 467

married the woman went ostentatiously to the palace
to salute the King, which he placidly allowed. The
fine pair have now gone to Aranjuez with the Court,
like people of quality, in one of the royal coaches.
Medina Celi has thrown up everything and gone away
in disgust. It is all the King's fault, and such goings
on as these will expose to the world our master's
tyranny and incapacity.' I

The further blow at the Queen was silently planned
whilst the Court was at the spring palace of Aranjuez,
where it usually stayed until Corpus Christi day. On
the 1 2th May Charles fell suddenly ill, and much was
made of the matter. Although, after bleeding, he was
quite well on the third day, it was decided that he
must immediately return to the capital. * What must
be well borne in mind in all this ' (wrote an enemy of
Marie Louise) ' is that the Queen wanted to prefer her
own pleasure to the health of her husband ; for it was
almost impossible to persuade her to come to Madrid.
She said that the illness was nothing, and wished to
keep the King there till Corpus Christi, notwithstand-
ing the heat and danger. When she was not allowed
to have her own way, she was cross and ill-humoured ;
as was clear when the King was confined to his bed,
for she did not even go to see him. This is the more
strange, as when the Quantin woman was to be bled
she must needs go and visit her without ceremony.
Neither I nor any one else can understand the strange
things that are going on in that house.' 2

This was written at the end of May ; and some three

A Frenchman

named Vilaine, who is called by some authorities a
discharged groom of Marie Louise, and by the Duke

11 Doc. Ined.,3 Ixxix. 2 Ibid.

468 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of Montalto the waxchandler of the Queen- Mother,
denounced Quantin and her husband for having plotted,
with the knowledge of the Queen, to poison King
Charles. The accused persons were at once arrested,
and a carefully prepared hue and cry was raised against
all Frenchmen. Many foreigners were attacked and
some killed in the streets ; the French embassy had to
be surrounded by troops, and the whole Court was in
a panic. Charles was a coward and miserably^wgak,,
but he stood by his wifeas welLasJhe knew how at
this~period ot trial. ^arieJLouise, indignant and out-
raged at what she feriewwasa vile plotagainst her,
demanded that the accusers should also be arrested ;
but before this could be done, Quantin and her husband,
the French maids and others, were put to the torture ;
and the poor woman, with both arms broken and her
lower limbs crippled for life, still maintained her inno-
cence and would confess nothing.

The Queen's few Spanish friends were put into close
confinement. No evidence whatever could be wrung
from any of the accused to support the charge against
them : but the Council of Castile, packed now with
the Queen-Mother's partisans, still continued to regard
the matter as a serious menace to the King's life, and
frightened poor Charles nearly out of what small wits
nature had given him. In a French news letter of the
time (iQth August 1685) the political aim of the pro-
ceedings is exposed. * The Council of Spain desires
to involve the Queen in the accusations, because they
fear her influence over the King, and he has not
sufficient strength to resist the ministers who propose
to appoint commissaries for the Queen. She has
written to her father, saying that she has no French
person now near her, nor any one else whom she could

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 469

trust. ShjMSjshe^says, in daily fear of being poisoned.

and she refuses to eat what they provide for her, which
has cast her into great weakness. She will only eat
with the King and from his dishes. Vilaine, they say,
is to be rewarded and sent to an employment in the
Canaries. The French ambassador is not allowed to
speak with the Queen ; and the Venetian ambassador
was nearly murdered, because they thought he was
French. When the King is with the Queen the
ministers are all in the wrong, but when they are with
him he changes his mind.' I

Quantin and all the French people about the palace
were expelled the country, when no atom of proof could
be found against them, and Charles, apparently alarmed
at the threats of Louis xiv., that if any harm came to
Marie Louise he would avenge heiHEiy war in Spain
itself, was emphatic in his repudiation of any suspicion
orThis part against his wife Reassured Feuquieres
that he regarded his wife's interests as his own, and
never believed for a moment in her guilt : and he
assured the Duke of Orleans that, not only did he not
know that the accused French people had been tor-
tured, but that when he asked for a copy of the whole
of the proceedings in the case, his Council had assured
him that the records had all been burnt. In vain,
however, did the French government insist upon the
punishment of the accusers. The King might promise
and strive, but there were others stronger than he ;
and Vilaine was spirited away and rewarded.

Another news letter in the same French collection
as that justed quoted does not hesitate, a few months
afterwards, when the whole matter was known, to say :

1 MSS. of Father Leonard in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. Quoted
by Morel Fatio in * Mdmoires de la Cour d'Espagne.'

470 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

4 Although the Quantin affair is now a thing of the
past, it is nevertheless worth recording that the Count
of Mansfeldt, the imperial ambassador and his wife, to
please the Queen-Mother, originated the accusation
against the woman. She was made to suffer the
cruel tortures she did in order to injure the young
Queen, who was so outraged at it, and the King
as well, that the imperial ambassador is forbidden the
palace, except on the business of his embassy.'

Mariana's friends looked upon it in a very different
light. Whilst still the accusation was hanging over
Marie Louise, Montalto wrote to Ronquillo in London :
' Quantin and her husband, and all the Frenchmen in
the Queen's stable, with her bob-tailed horses, have all
been packed off to France. They were a lot of rascals,
and the cost of her stable was a calamity. They were
all guilty, but as none of them would confess under
torture, they could not be further proceeded against.
People are talking very scandalously about such
shameful laxity. Quantin's young niece l was sent out
of the palace late at night, so that not a single French
person should remain. But the Queen's tears and
prayers soon fetched her back. This is perfectly
odious and disgraceful, and one can only have con-
tempt of so easy going a King, who will not let even
justice take its course if his wife says nay.' A few
weeks afterwards, the same courtier says : ' The Queen
is still implacable at the loss of her Quantins, and the
King so excessively loving (not to call it by another
name) of his wife, that all his concessions to her, which
ought to make her more submissive to him, makes her

1 This was Susanne Duperroy, to whom Marie Louise left 3,000
doubloons in her will. Mme. Quantin herself received a legacy of 4,000
from the Queen.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 471

humour worse, and the temper that God gave her
causes no end of trouble as it is ; for it is the most
extravagant ever seen.'1

The French servants of the Queen, her only solace,
all except the girl Duperroy, had been sent away ; but
still Marie Louise personally had held her place in the
King's affection. No sooner, however, had the
Ouantin affair fallen a" little into the background, than_
another stab more wicked still was aimed at the Queen
by the same hands out of the darkness. There was a
foolish, vain, French exon of the guard, the Chevalier
Saint Chamans, who had commanded Marie Louise's
escort when she travelled to the Spanish frontier. As
was not unusual in the French Court at the time, Saint
Chamans was pleased to profess a far-off amorous wor-
ship of the lovely Princess ; and it is quite probable
that during his attendance upon her, she may have
smiled in raillery at his silly languishing airs. In
any case, the talk of his adoration reached Madrid ;
and in the autumn of 1685, some miscreant in the
capital of Spain wrote two letters as from the Queen
in a forged hand imitating hers, to Saint Chamans,
containing expressions to the highest degree com-
promising of her honour. Saint Chamans, like the
love-lorn fool that he was, showed the letters to his
churns^ and -Louis xiv. soon learnt of their existence,
and what is more extraordinary, believed them to be
genuine. In sorrow and severe reprobation, he wrote
to Feuquieres, directing him to show the letters to the
Queen, which he did in September.

Marie Louise, outraged at the mere suspicion, and
indignant at so cruel a hoax, rose for once majestic
and dignified in her wratjL She scribbled a Burning

1 ' Doc. Ined.,' Ixxix

472 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

repudiation of the letters which she handed to
Feuquieres for ciphered transmission to the King of
France.1 ' It will not be difficult for your Majesty to
imagine the affliction in which I am, at knowing that
you suspect a person such as I of so unworthy a thing
as this. I cannot avoid expressing my justified sorrow
at seeing that your Majesty does not esteem at its true
worth, as you should, conduct which is most regular,
and which certainly is not of the easiest. . . . but as I
am so unhappy as to have people near me here
perfidious and abominable enough to use every effort
to ruin me by pernicious inventions, I am not surprised
that they should exert all their ingenuity to deprive
me of the esteem of your Majesty. . . . Believe me,
nothing is more false than that which you have thought
of me, and my despair to see that your Majesty doubts
for a moment my good behaviour, makes me, in this,
stand apart from your counsel, and be myself alone ;
and I cannot think of the injustice your Majesty has
done me without being beside myself with sorrow.
Alas ! I had made light of all my grief, believing
that your Majesty, at least, thought well of me : but
I see now I am marked for unhappiness, since your
Majesty believes a thing of me which makes me
shudder even to think of. ... I am so jealous of my
honour, and I love it so much, that I shall never do
anything to stain it : and life itself is not so insupport-
able to me, either, that I should seek thus to lose it.
. . . If I were in a more tranquil state, I should
supplicate your Majesty to have pity upon this poor
realm for my sake ; but I dare not, though I think
you will be good enough to recollect that I have the

1 The letter is in the Archives of the Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres,
Paris, vol. 71. It has been transcribed by M. Morel Fatio.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 473

honour to be your niece, and that all my happiness
depends upon you. . . . Believe me, too, when I
say that I am prouder of being born a princess of your
blood, than of the rank I hold in the world ' : and
so on, for several pages, the wronged and outraged
Queen eloquently protests her innocence.

Thenceforward Marie Louisjythough entirely with-
out political influence — for theAustrian faction ancLtEe
Queen- Mother were in that respect all-powerful — was
unassailable in the affections of the poor man she had
married. Her disregard of the ordinary Spanish
etiquette, the free and easy bonhomie of her de-
meanour, and the indulgence of her caprices increased
as she felt more secure in the love of her husband ;
BuTsKe made norther use of her influence over him.
No^Better series of pictures of the life in her palace
can be found than in the vitriolic references to Marie
Louise and her husband in letters already quoted of
the Duke of Montalto. On the 3<Dth August 1685,
he writes that for months the Queen had not gone
out in public, in which, he says, she was wise,
particularly when the anti- French riots were taking
place, as the mob might have attacked her. * They
say again that she is pregnant, but there is not much
belief in it, as the same thing has happened several
times before. She had got up a very grand comedy
for St. Louis' day ; but it had to be deferred, because
of this pregnancy rumour, and not even the usual
comedies in the palace were given for the same
reason.

On the 24th October of the same year, he records
the removal of the Court to the Retiro : ' which place
the Queen is very fond of, because there she can
enjoy her country sports, and especially ride about on

474 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

horseback every afternoon. In order to have her
horses nearer to her, she has had a place made for
them near the large pond, where she goes every
morning to visit them.' A little later he remarks
that everything in the palace is going to the dogs.
' There is neither firmness nor stability enough to
correct these follies of the Queen.' In April 1686,
the same writer says : ' Things are in the greatest
embarrassment for the government, owing to the
fancies and caprices of the Queen ; for nothing is
done by any other rule than her whim.' It appears
that the presence of the Queen's Spanish friend
Senora Aguirre, who had been exiled at the time
of the Quantin affair, was much desired by Marie
Louise, and the latter demanded her return of the
prime minister, Oropesa. He temporised for a time,
but when she ordered him peremptorily to advise the
King to recall the lady, he refused. 'Well,' said the
Queen, 'do not oppose it if the King suggests it.'
' Yes I will,' replied the minister : whereupon Marie
Louise went with tears and blandishments to her
husband, and begged for the favour. For a time he
held out ; but at last gave way to the extent of
ordering a decree of recall to be drafted and dis-
cussed. Oropesa protested, and Charles cancelled
the decree. Another passionate outburst from the
Queen followed, and in the end she had her way.
' The coming of this woman (Aguirre) will be worse
than all the devils together; worse than Quantin.
Judge what a state we are in with this irresolution of
our master. The advice of ministers and decisions
of tribunals, all are powerless before the will of this
woman (the Queen).'

The caprices of Marie Louise soon reached the

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 475

ears of her uncle Louis, and he did, in May 1686,
what he ought to have done years before, namely, to
seri3 a French lady of great position and experience,
dependent upon him, to advise the Queen and keep
herein the right way. The lady was a descendant of
tKe royal house, the Countess of Soissons, and her
mission was, if possible, to induce Marie Louise to
turn her influence to politicaL account for the benefit
of France. Her task was almost hopeless from the
first, and she failed, though she tried hard for a time"
and in the last few weeks of the Queen's life, when
too Jate, was of some service to French. interests.

'The Queen' (writes Montalto in May 1586) 'is in
the full force of her madness, dominating the King
completely by cries and threats. He has not an atom
of resolution, and no application at all. The day upon
which the great council was held, when he would not
attend, he went on muleback to the wild beast cages
at the Retiro, and there he had the animals caught
and counted, thinking more of this frivolity than if it
had been some heroic action. This government of
ours is nothing more than a boy's school with the
master away. No one respects anything, and each
person does as he likes, whilst the Queen follows her
whim or the last suggestion.' On another occasion,
when the Marquis of Los Velez was giving a repre-
sentation of a sacred auto on a holy day, Montalto
records that * the Queen witnessed the show from a
balcony in the passage, when she behaved herself so
unrestrainedly as to shock people ; and the actions of
this lady really give rise to the idea that she is not in
her right mind.'

The unfortunate woman kept apparently on friendly,
but not cordial, terms with Mariana, who smilingly

476 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

let her go her own way without remonstrance ; and
there was now no check whatever upon her strange
vagaries, for the King grew more feeble-minded than
ever, and "Was as clay in her hands. _ * The Queen's
levity approaches light-headedness,' wrote Montalto
in the 'summer ot 1687. ' She was" lately ill with fever,
owing to the rubbish she is always eating. Nobody
can control her, and she looks consumptive. Those
of us who are not much attached to her are not sorry
to see her afflicted.' Uttejlyj-e£Me5s.iiiJieji-4node-of
life the unhappy woman, though still but twenty-five
y^aT5^fage,^asalready losing her health and beauty.
In"July Montalto reports that 'the Queen still con-
tinues in her extravagant conduct, and no amendment
can now be expected. She is dreadfully thin and
languid, and will take no remedies but those prescribed
by her own caprice and distrust. As for the King, I
say nothing, for I have already said so much, though
not half enough.'

And so, through the summer, matters went from
bad to worse. There was no guidance from the King,
notability or prudence from the Queen, and Spain
drifted helpless towards the whirlpool of civil war that
was soon to engulf her. The only care of old Mariana
was to watch over the interests of her own kin in their
claims to the succession to the Spanish crown, and
paralyse the promotion of the French pretensions".
Writing from the palace on the 2 9th August 1687,
JVtontalto says : * It is impossible to exaggerate the
terrible state of things here. This palace is boiling
over with disorder and scandalous stones to such an
extent as to be simply a mass of confusion. The
Queen is so extravagant in her conduct, and has so
strange a character, that I dare not write, even in

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 477

cypher, what is going on. The King knows, but
remedies nothing. It seems as if God had endowed
him neither with force nor application for anything ;
and the same wretched laxity is seen in the govern-
ment of the realm. He gives no more than a quarter
of an hour to business in the day, and the whole of
the rest of his time is spent in such trifles as running
backwards and forwards through these saloons, and
from balcony to balcony, like a child of six, and his
conversation would match about the same age. The
Queen is dreadfully ill and thin, and has quarrelled
with the Queen-Mother.'

Months later, in May 1688, when the war between
France and the empire was recommencing, and Spain
was once more arming tor a conflict not primarily Jier
own, Montalto wrote, in more despondent spirit than
ever, of the condition of affairs in Madrid. * Yesterday
it was my turn for duty at the Retiro. I used to like
it, but now I dread the day that takes me there. Of
course I know even when I am not there what is
going on with our master ; but it is very shocking to
see it close, and, so to speak, face to face. The
neglect everywhere is quite terrible. The King's
great business whilst I was there was to see the
matting taken up in the rooms, and to count the pins
and other trifles of that sort. The Queen blurts out
whatever comes uppermost, and indulges to the full
in her craze for riding on horseback, prancing about
indecorously over the neighbourhood. She has again
had her ladies mounted, knowing that the King hates
to see it. She has her way and, dead against his will,
she insists upon acting the principal boy's part in a
comedy they are rehearsing. As usual, she will do
as she likes. There are constant tourneys and balls

478 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

because she insists upon them, and there is no influence
or reason that can keep her within bounds. The
Queen-Mother pays great attention to her, but is
cruelly slighted by her.'

A week later, the same writer continues in a similar
strain, saying that the Queen had insisted upon the
comedy being written specially for her to take the
boy's part : but she had fallen ill and the performance
had been postponed. ' The King is totally opposed
to this prank ; but of course she has her way. She
has had a magnificent theatre constructed at the Retiro,
with lavish ornaments, etc., for the ladies, in which
she has wasted thousands of ducats, and yet there is
not a real for urgent needs. The King is a cypher,
and allows things to be done before him of which he
entirely disapproves. I positively dread my turn of
duty, for I see the King does nothing but run about
like an imp, and if he goes into the garden it is only
to pick strawberries and count them.'

A week or so later Marie Louise had recovered her
health, and the long-prepared comedy was played with
great brilliancy. The King went to the full rehearsal
"two days before the public performance ; and although
shocked and annoyed by his wife's caprice in playing
a male part, had not strength of will enough to forbid
jtTTWhen, however, the piece was represented publicly,
and all the principal ladies in Madrid, with the gentle-
men of the household, were present to praise and
applaud, poor, unstable Charles was so charmed with
his wife, even on the stage, that he testified his delight
at her performance, and the entertainment was repeated
again and again during the summer.

Once more at this time there was a belief that the
Queen was pregnant, and the hopes of the French

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 479

party ran high, though they were soon seen to be
fallacious as before. Montalto, reporting the matter
to Ronquillo, says that the Queen had explained, in
answer to an inquiry of her father, the Duke of
Orleans, that the reason for her lack of issue was not
the impotence of the King but his excessive con-
cupiscence, ' which,' says the writer, ' I do not
understand, though the effect is plain.'

In the autumn of 1688 Marie Louise fell ill of
smallpox in the palace of Madrid ; and in her enfeebled
state of health the disease was held to be dangerous.
SHe was a bad patient, self-willed in her rejection of
the remedies prescribed to her by the only physician
she would receive, a Florentine doctor she had known
in Paris in attendance upon the Balbeses. The King
was to have started for the Escorial at the time his
wife was attacked by the malady, and was obliged to
delay his departure, though fear of contagion kept him
away from the invalid. Montalto reports, with char-
acteristic ill-nature : * The King seems sorry ; but he
is more sorry at having to postpone his journey to the
Escorial. For although his feeling towards his wife
appears to be affection, I maintain that it is more fear
of her than anything else.' Before she was fit to be
moved the Queen insisted upon being carried in a
Sedan chair to the Retire to pass her period of con-
valescence there, first visiting the church of the
Atocha, whilst Charles departed to spend a month at
the Escorial.

Left alone in her solitary convalescence, Marie
Louise appears" tcf Have^ ^developed a more devout
spirit than had previously characterised her, and at^
the same time lost her desire to live. During the
period of low vitality which followed her illness one

480 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of her ladies begged her to summon a famous saintly
man, to pray for her prompt restoration to strength.
' No, no,' she replied, ' I will not do so. It would be
folly indeed to ask for life which matters so little.'
When, at this juncture, the representatives of the town
of Madrid offered to build a new church as a votive
offering for her restoration to health, she was no less
emphatic. If the money of the suffering subjects was
to be spent upon the building she would not allow it
to be done.

She had, indeed, little left to live for. Wedded to
the fribble we have described, and with enemies ~oT
herself and her dear France everywhere around her,
she must have felt powerless to cope with the adverse
influences opposed to her. All the love she had to
give was given long ago, before she was called upon
to make the great renunciation which had been made
in vain. So long as youth and sensuous vitality had
remained to her she had sought in reckless enjoyment_
to stifle the horror of the loveless life to which she was
condemned : but when the capacity for bodily grati-
fication was gone, Marie Louise lost her "desire to
Jive.

Spain was trembling upon the brink of a great war
with Jr1 ranee, anddufing the winter succeeding tEe~
Queen's illness_Count Hebenac was in Madrid with
what amounted to an ultimatum to Spain to abandon
the league of Augsburg, formed to crush the ambition
o'TLouis. Kebenac often saw the Queen, and coached
by him and by the Countess of Soissons, she en:
deavoured, now that matters had gone too far, to
employ her hold upon her husband in a political
direction, and to frustrate the policy of the Queen-
Mother in keeping Spain in offensive and defensive

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 481

alliance with the Emperor. Her influence upon
Cfiarles was^ great, and he began to_incline to the
side of trie French against his mother. Marie Louise
pomtecTout to him the awful condition of destitution
in which his country lay, and painted in moving words
the horrors of a war in which Spain had all to lose
and could not hope to gain. Charles was gentle and
tender-hearted, hating to see or hear of suffering, and
Rebenac reported early in February 1689 that the
efforts of the Queen had been effectual, and that he
had great hopes of the success of his mission.1

Ifwas a great crisis/for a^withdrawal of Spain at
1 this point from the alliance would have meant the
predominance of France in Europe thenceforward, and
the defelTt of the Austrian party^JnJSpain. Mariana
and her friends were strong and determine^ ; the King
was jveak and unstable. Only the life of a languid
woman, tired of the struggle, stood between them and
victory, and Marie Louise herself seems to have had
a prophetic knowledge that such an obstacle would not
be allowed to frustrate plans so deeply laid. As usual
with Spanish sovereigns, the Queen went every week
to worship at the shrine of the Virgin of Atocha, and
on Tuesday the 9th February 1689, when she took
leave of the prior of the convent church, she told him
that she should meet him no more on earth. That
night after her light repast of milk and honey the
Queen was seized with convulsions, violent pains and
vomiting ; a colic it was called, which brought her to
the lowest extremity of weakness. From the first she
knew that she was doomed and made no effort. In

1<Recueil des Instructions aux Ambassadeurs Francois,' Paris, 1894,
and ' Correspondance de Rebenac, Archives du Minist£re des Affaires
Etrangeres.'

2 H

482 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the intervals of the burning agony she suffered, her
confessor asked her if there was anything that troubled
her. 'I am in peace, Father,' she replied, 'and am
very glad to die.' She lingered in pain until the early
hours of the i2th February ; jmdthen the most ^beau-
tiful and ill-fated princess_jof the house of Bourbon
breathed Her last, a martyr^ if ever one lived, upon_the
attaFof herjxmntrY,; but a martyr sacrificed in
for she was immolated, not by Eer own
oTpthers.

All that Marie Louise asked of life was love, and that
was the one thing denied to her. The Spanish people,
who had sometimes been cruel to her because she was
a foreigner, were shocked by her untimely death : but
before the pompous procession which bore the body
of Marie Louise to its last resting-place in the inferior
mausoleum in the Escorial reserved for sterile Queens,
whispers ran through Spain and France that it was no
colic that had cut short the life of Marie Louise, but
poison administered in the interests of Mariana and
the Austrian faction. No proof has ever been adduced
that this was the case, for evidence in such a matter
would naturally not be easily obtainable ; l but the
death of the Queen, at the very crisis when, by her

1 The tragic end of the Queen so distressed the French ambassador
Rebenac that for a time he lost his reason after attending the funeral
ceremony. In his subsequent correspondence with the King of France
he made no secret of his belief that she had been murdered. The
Duchess of Orleans, the Queen's stepmother, thus refers to Rebenac's
statements in her correspondence : ' Rebenac's feelings have done no
wrong to our young Queen of Spain. It is the sharp-nosed Count of
Mansfeldt who poisoned her.' De Torcy, in his ' Memoires/ says : ' The
Count of Mansfeldt and Count Oropesa are both suspected of having been
the authors of Marie Louise's death, and take little care to exonerate
themselves. The Marquis de Louville, in his ' Me"moires,' also distinctly
states that the Queen was poisoned, and several other contemporary
French authorities are no less certain.

MARIE LOUISE OF ORLEANS 483

aid, the King had been turned to the side of France,
seems in alflhe circumstances to have been too provi-
dential to her enemies to have been entirely accidental.
At any rate it waT effectual in changing the whole
aspect" of affairs immediately; and before the mourn-
ing for Marie Louise had lost its freshness, the French
ambassador was on his way home unsuccessful, Spain

_ * ----- — '• • ~^

was agairPat war with France, and negotiations .were.
being7 actively carried on to find a

wretched cretin whojyore the crown of Spain.

BOOK V

II
MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG

BOOK V

ALMOST simultaneously with the death of Marie Louise
an event happened which to a large extent altered the
political balance of Europe, and placed at further
disadvantage the French partisans in Madrid. The
Prince of (3 range had surprised the world by becoming
King of England, practically without opposition. It
waiTnoTonger a shifty Stuart with French sympathies
and an itching palm for the bribes of Louis who
directed the policy of Great Britain, but a prince
whose very existence was bound up in the exclusion
of^FrancV from Flanders ; a prince, moreover, under
wTJonTTSngland and Holland were for the firstjjme
really united. TRe coalition against Louis was in-
finitely strengthened thereby, and Spain, with Mariana
at the helm, was now less likely than ever to shirk
the fulfilment of her obligations under the Treaty of
Augsburg. Madrid thereafter became for a time a
prime centre of international intrigues, aimed at the
exclusion of French interest from the Peninsula.
Charles had no personal desire to marry again. He
was afraid of fresh people about him ; he was over-
borne with the responsibilities of his great position,
and, although he was only twenty-eight, his feeble
powers of mind and body were already on the wane.
Left to himself, he would have desired nothing but
to throw up matrimony as a failure, so far as he was
concerned, and live in peace, after his own fashion,

487

488 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

until on his deathbed he left his realm to an heir of
his own choosing.

But the antagonistic factions that divided his Court
between them decided that such a course was quite
impossible. It could hardly have been with the hope,
as they professed, that issue would be more likely from
a second marriage than it had been from the first, for
Charles had been really enamoured with Marie Louise,
who had been his consort during the best period of
such vigour as he ever possessed. It is more likely
that the haste to get him married was prompted by
the desire of the intriguers to have by his side, when
he was called upon to settle the succession, a. wife
favourableto the views of the donnant

_

BadgerecT and pestered on all sides, the poor creature,
always" anxious to do what he was told was his duty,
consented to take another wife.

The opponents of the German interest at first sug-
gested a princess of Portugal, but Mariana and her
friends took care that the negotiations should fall
through ; and, at the Queen-Mother's instance, Charles
consented to leave the choice of a fit bride for him to
his uncle and brother-in-law, the Emperor Leopold.
The latter, who had only one daughter by his first
wife the Infanta Margarita, Mariana's daughter, had
married as his second wife, by whom fie had sons,
Eleanor of Neuburg-Bavaria, daughter of the Elector
Palatine, Duke of Neuburg. This lady had a sister
of twenty-two, Marie Anne of Neuburg ; and upon
her the choice of the Emperor fell to^be the wifb_jof
Charles ii.,King of Spain

Three months after Marie Louise died the marriage-
treaty was signed; and on the i8th August 1689, late
at night in the quaint Bavarian town of Neuburg on

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 489

the Danube, the tall, angular girl with hard eyes and —
mouth, was led by the Spanish ambassador through
the bedizened throng of princes and princesses of
Austria, Bavaria and Hesse, who crowded the church
of the Jesuits, to be wedded to her nephew, the young
King of Hungary, the Emperor's heir, as proxy for
the King of Spain, the officiating priest being her
brother, Prince Alexander. The marriage was re-
garded by all Europe as a pledge that thenceforward
Spain would be firmly united wiih the Germanic
interests against Louis xlv., and trie challenge was
promptly accepted by the French King. TTience-
forward, for seven years, all Europe was at war ; and
Spain, which only needed rest, was forced hot only to
waste blood and treasure upon foreign fields, but to
fight for the integrity of its own soil in Catalonia,
North Africa and America.

England, under the Dutch King, had taken an
active part in promoting an alliance which drew Spain
closer to the Teutonic league ; and only an English
fleet was available to convey the new Queen of Spain
in safety to her husband's realm. Through Cologne
and Rotterdam, Marie Anne and her train of Germans
slowly travelled to Flushing in the late autumn of
1689, costly jewels meeting her as gifts, now from
her husband, now from her gratified mother-in-law,
who regarded her coming as a triumph for herself.1
At Flushing a powerful English fleet, under Admiral
Russell, awaited the bride ; and after much delay, and
not a few mishaps, the squadron sailed for Spain late
in January 1690. The intention had been to land the
Queen at the port of Santander ; and her Spanish

1 The jewels taken by Count Benavente from Charles was valued at
180,000 crowns, and Mariana's gift to her daughter-in-law 30,000.

490 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

household was on the road thither to receive her,
when news reached them that Corunna had been
chosen as a better harbour, and to the extreme north-
west corner of Spain they wended their way. Bad
weather, as is not unusual in the Bay of Biscay in
mid-winter, made the voyage of the Queen a dangerous
and difficult one ; and on approaching Corunna it was
found that the storm was too violent for the ships to
enter. Colonel Stanhope, the English ambassador,
who accompanied the Queen to Spain, says:1 'We
were forced into a small port called Ferrol, three
leagues short of the Groyne (i.e., Corunna), and by
the ignorance of a Spanish pilot our ships fell foul
one with another, and the admiral's ship was aground
for some hours, but got off clear without any damage.'
To Ferrol came hurrying the Spanish household
from Corunna, with the inevitable Mansfeldt, all not
a little ruffled at this game of hide-and-seek with the
German Queen in the most inclement season of the
year ; and at length, on the 6th April, after nearly a
fortnight's stay on board of Russell's ship in the
harbour of Ferrol, Marie Anne and a great train of
German, English and Spanish attendants landed in
the barges of the English squadron, whose decorations
and the smartness of the oarsmen aroused the surprised
admiration of the Spaniards.2 Though the officials
did their best to give Marie Anne a stately welcome
at Corunna, and the Count de Lemos entertained her
and her Court at a splendid festival at his house at
Puente de Ume, all was not harmonious. The general
feeling in Spain was against the German connection,
and especially against the ruinous war with France

1 Stanhope Correspondence in Lord Mahon's ' Spain under Charles n.'

2 ' Reinas Catolicas/ Father Florez.

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 491

that it entailed, and Count Mansfeldt, the imperial
ambassador, was especially detested. The people at
large firmly believed that he had connived at the
poisoning of Marie Louise, and his overbearing manners
had offended the courtiers.

'I find,' writes Stanhope, 'that the Queen's recep-
tion has been much meaner than it would have been
out of a pique the Spanish grandees have against
Count Mansfeldt, who was preferred before them all
to the honour of bringing her over, by the favour of
the Queen-Mother and contrary to the advice of the
Council of Castile.'1 Nor did the demeanour of Marie
Anne mend matters, for, even thus early, her stiff
imperious manner and her hasty temper struck a chill
in the hearts of the Spaniards, who place so high a
value upon an amiable exterior. Dressed in the
traditional Spanish garb, which suited her unbending
mien, the Queen sat unmoved at the bullfights, tourneys,
masquerades and other festivities offered in her honour
by the storied cities through which she passed on her
way to Valladolid. Nobles who knelt to greet her
received but a cold recognition of their compliments,
and the cheers of the populace awoke no smile of
gratification upon the lips of Marie Anne of Neuburg.

Charles was not an eager wooer this time, and
awaited calmly the coming of his new wife to Valla-
dolid. On Ascension Day, 4th May 1690, he first
met his bride. There was little or no pretence of
affection on either side ; but from the first Marie Anne
took the lead and imposed her will upon her husband.
The marriage feasts at Valladolid and the stereotyped
gaieties that throughout Spain celebrated the marriage,
pleased the thoughtless, but the more reflecting knew

1 Stanhope Correspondence.

492 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

that the war for which Spain was being again squeezed
dry by every empirical resource that ingenuity and
ignorance of finance could devise,, was a direct result
of the series of alliances that the German marriage
cemented, and many were the whispered curses uttered
against the boorish Germans and Englishmen, who
were not only disrespectful, but heretics to boot. With
exactly the same ceremonial as had marked the entry
of the beautiful Marie Louise into the capital ten
years before, Marie Anne rode from the Buen Retire
to the old Alcazar through the crowded streets, on
the 22nd May 1690. Again, behind the half-closed
jalousies, in the house of Count Onate in the Calle
Mayor, over against the church of St. Philip, Charles
n. and his mother, growing visibly old now, witnessed
the passing of the new Queen.

The triumph of Mariana at the coming of a German
bride for her son was short lived. The time that

arie Anne had spent at the Buen Retire previous to
the State entry had been sufficient to show the mother-
in-law that she had met her match, and that here there
was no gentle, submissive! young creature ^ijno
thoughtless beauty who would ruin herself if en-
couraged to go her own wray, like poor Marie Louise —
but a hard, passionate - woman, who was determined,
\ whatever happened to Spain, to make the best of her
opportunities for her own advantage. Mariana, in
accordance with her usual policy, endeavoured at first
to co-operate harmoniously with her daughter-in-law,
in order to gain predominance in the partnership after-
wards. The sole minister, Oropesa, had done his best
tCTjFelieve the suffering country, and his financial re-
fonrishad effected some improvement ; but with the
renewal of the war on land and sea, the economies

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 493

were soon swallowed up, and the penury became as
pTessthg as ever. The minister's subordinates were
rapacious and corrupt to an extent unexampled even in
Spain, and offices, dignities, titles, and pensions were
openly put up to the highest bidder. Oropesa, though
fairly honest himself, had an ambitious, greedy wife,
who increased his unpopularity ; and when Marie
Anne arrived in Madrid, the party inimical to the
minister was alreadgjowerful.

Mariana had been Oropesa's patron, but when the
new Queen, for whose aims it was necessary to form a
party in Spain, sided with the enemies of the minister,
Mariana dared not take the unpopular and weaker side,
and reluctantly agreed with her daughter-in-law that
Oropesa and the corrupt crew that followed him should
be deposed. Their principal abettors were the King's
confessor, Father Matilla, the Archbishops of Toledo
(Cardinal Portocarrero) and Saragossa, the Constable
of Castile, and the Secretary of State, Lira, formerly a
creature of Oropesa. Marie Anne and the confessor
gave the poor King no rest. Charles was deeply
attached to Oropesa; he dreade(T"Hew people abo"Of
him ; and for a time he refused to dismiss his minis-
ter^ Mane Anne surferectT when contradicted, frorn
hysterical nervous crises, that were said to threaten
her lite, and every one, from her husband downward,
went in mortal fear of provoking an attack by saying
anything displeasing to her.1 The confessor Matilla
finally threatened the King that he would not give
him absolution, unless he did his duty to the country
by dismissing Oropesa.

Charles, beset on all sides, at first told everything to
Oropesa himself, but that made matters worse ; and he

1 ' Modesto Lafuente Historia de Espafia.'

494 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

then repeated to each party exactly what the other
said, with the result that the palace itself became a
\ hot-bed"bf scandal, hatred, and all uncharitableTTess.
At length Marie Anne had her way, and Charles sent
for his minister with tears in his eyes and told him that
his enemies had demanded his retirement. ' They~
wish it,' sobbed the unhappy man, 'and I must agree
to it : ' and then, in the deepest sorrow, he dismissed
the best minister he had ever had, in obedience to a
palace intrigue led by his German wife. Before
Oropesa went into banishment at the end of June
1691, he sought an interview with the Queen, but was
refused, and Mariana with difficulty was prevailed
upon to receive her former instrument ; her ungracious
farewell of him being to tell him that he ought to have
gone long before.1

A sort_of commission of government was then
fonpelT'entirely composed of men in~The interests of
Marie Anne ; and thenceforward all method and
regularity__in the administration disappeared. The
King referred questions submitted to him to any
person who happened to be near him, and the letters
of Colonel Stanhope at the time testify to the im-
possibility of getting any official business done at all.
The country was in the midst of jwarj__the French
were masters^ of the best part_pf Ha fa Ionia, anH as the
English ambassador reports, the Spaniards had not
4,000 men there in all, fit for service, and in four
months' vigorous recruiting only 1,000 men could be
got. A handful of men, he says, dashing down from
the French frontier, could easily capture Madrid
itself, as not a soldier is between the Pyrenees and the
capital : and, such was the confusion, that it was

1 Stanhope Correspondence.

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 495

dangerous to drive out a mile from the walls of
Madrid for fear of violence and robbery.

Marie Anne with her camarilla was mistress of the
situaTTDn, and the~n Mariana, when it was difficult to
regairTEier lost power, dis^overe3~wliat fHeTaims of her
German daughter-in-law Jwefei Ft will be recollected
thaT^MarTana's daughter, the Infanta Margaret, Em-
press, had died, leaving one daughter married to the
Elector of Bavaria, and it was naturally her son, the
boy Prince of Bavaria, to whom Mariana had looked
to inherit _the Spanish crown, in default of issue to
CHarles, and in accordance with the will of Philip iv.
Marie Anne's mission from the Emperor and his
second wife was, however, quite a different one, and
aroused in Mariana the hottest indignation when she
fully understood it. The plan was to put aside both
the female lines descended from the daughters^ of
Philip iv., "Maria Theresa, Queen of France, and the
Empress Margaret, and to claim the succession of
the Emperor's second son by his secoricT marriage with
Marie Anne's sister, by virtue of his male descent
from the Emperor^ Ferdinand, brother of Charles v.

Marie Anne had around her a gang of blood-suckers
almost as rapacious as herself, and, so long as they
were Spaniards, the people suffered in silence. I But
the Queen's most intimate councillors were Germans,
who, undeterred by the fate of Nithard, vied with the
Spaniards in grasping greed : and this aroused against
Marie Anne the hatred of all who did not share in the
booty. The strongest spirit in the Queen's entourage

1 Stanhope says : ' Our new junta, which raisd so great expectations, at
first, is now grown almost a jest ; especially since, at the time they took
away all pensions from poor widows and orphans, the Duke of Osuna,
one of the richest men in Spain, procured himself a pension of 6000
crowns a year for life, by intercession of the confessor.'

496 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

was the Baroness Berlips, to whom the crowd had
given the nickname of 'the partridge,' from a slight
resemblance in her name to the name of the bird in
Castilian. Another German member was one Henry
Jovier, a lame man of infamous character, who had
served in the Spanish army, and to these after the
first few months was added the Queen's Capuchin
confessor Father Chiusa, also a German, who was
brought purposely to replace the Jesuit confessor first
appointed, the latter having been found not sufficiently
pliant for the place.

This was the gang that principally advised the Queen
in^ heTlheasjjreSt and^withjijew Spanish grandees,
especially the Duke of Montalto and the Admiral of
Castile, practically formed the government Mariana
was treated with the greatest hauteur by her daughter-
in-law, buT had some of the ablest men in Spain on
hef sicfe, of whom Cardinal Portocarrero was the
most influential. The populace cordially hated Marie
Anne, and dreaded the imperial domination of Spain
which she represented ; whilst she took no pains to
disguise her contempt for^tEem. JLouis xiv., in de-
scribing the state of affairs shortly after this in his
instructions to his ambassador, Harcourt, says : ' The
Queen has acquired such a dominion over the spirit
of^KeTTiusbarid thatf~lt may be said that she alone
reigns as sovereign of Spain. . . . The authority of
the Queen, however, is founded rather upon the fear
of her anger than upon any love for her on the part
of the nation. There is no people in the world so
sensitive of praise as the Spaniards ; and consequently
none who are so much affected by contempt. The
Queen professes contempt for the whole nation, and,
as offensive discourse is the only revenge of those

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 497

who are excluded from power, it is not surprising to
hear all the evil things that the public detestation
causes to be said about her. It is, however, very
true that she gives plenty of reasons for the re-
proaches levelled against her with regard to her
avidity in receiving and extorting presents ; and
there is no one more ingenious than she in finding
excuses for appropriating everything that is most
valuable in Madrid, and for amassing every day fresh
treasure for herself.' l

In the spring of 1683 the King's weakness became
so alarming that the physicians almost abandoned
hope, and the intrigues around him grew in intensity.
The last successful effort of Marie Louise before her
death had been to extract from her husband a solemn
promise that he would never cede to the persuasions
of Mariana to appoint a successor to the crown until
he had received the last sacrament on his deathbed ;
and the King had managed so far to withstand all
pressure put upon him to do so. The pressure was
redoubled now, especially by Marie Anne, who took
the opportunity of his illness to urge him to summon
the Archduke Charles to Madrid, and adopt him as
his successor. When the unfortunate King was waver-
ing some one, probably Cardinal Portocarrero, warned
him of the certain consequences, and whilst the hesita-
tion continued the King partially recovered.

Whilst the Court was thus given over to discord the
condition of the country grew worse and worse. The
Marquis of Mancera told Stanhope that the King was
only nominally sovereign of the realms of Aragon.
Spain, but for the power of her allies, was absolutely
defenceless, and the public distress had reached to

1 ' Recueil des Instructions/ etc.
2 I

498 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

such an extent that famine stalked unchecked through
the land, and to protect the capital from depletion of
food, a strict cordon was placed around it, to search
every one entering or leaving the city. The Duke of
Montalto had managed to ingratiate himself with the
Queen sufficiently to obtain recognition as minister ;
and his impracticable remedy was to divide the country
into four autonomous provinces, ruled by viceroys
practically independent of a central government.
Against this violation of the constitutions all Spain
cried aloud. 'These disasters coming so thick,' writes
Stanhope in July 1694, ' has raised a very high ferment
in the minds of people here, which expresses itself in
great insolencies to the great men as they pass in the
streets, and to one of the greatest even in the King's
palace : and the royal authority itself begins to lose its
veneration, several scandalous pasquins being fixed in
several public places, magnifying the great King of
France and with very little respect to his Catholic
Majesty, inasmuch as if Mr. Russell had not appeared
with his squadron as he did, it is generally believed
some public scandals would have followed.'

A few months later the same correspondent writes
that the hatred of the public had greatly increased the
strength of the faction opposed to Marie Anne, whose
great infTuerice over the King they intended to destroy~f
beginning if possible with the banishment of her bosom
friend, Baroness Berlips. ' This lady's son, Baron
Berlips, lately made his entry here, as envoy from the
King of Poland, and as he went to his audience in the
King's coach, a company of ruffians came to the coach
side giving him and his mother very ill names ; one of
them saying, ' Let us kill the dog.' Another replied,
( Not now, for he is in the King's coach.' Nothing is

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 499

so much talked about at present as ousting the Berlips,
and then they think their monarchy safe.'

Cardinal Portocarrero, who was the Queen's prime
opponent, grew in boldness as he saw that public feel-
ing was on his side, and both he and Mariana, when
she could obtain access to her son, implored him to
withstand the pressure of his termagant wife, and
decline to divert the succession from that laid down
by his father's will, which made the Prince of Bavaria
his heir. At the end of 1694 tne Cardinal presented
a formal State paper to the King, urging the expulsion
of Marie Anne's German camarilla and the royal con-
fessor Matilla, who were ruining the country by placing
and maintaining in power men utterly unworthy to
administer the government. The wretched King,
between the hectoring of his

his_mofher, the warnings of rival churchmen,, and the
clamours of his people, swayed first to one side, and
tben to the other, hating to discuss what was to take
place when he was dead ; yet hearing of very little
elso Hfe health, in the meanwhile, visibly declined ;
and all parties thought that there was no time to waste.
The Queen feeling probably the need for some stronger
personality near her than Berlips, and the few other
inferior Germans- who formed her council, soon caused
herself to be reinforced by an imperial ambassador,
Count Harrach, olie~15f~tlTe~a"blest~ diplomatists in the
Emperor's service, and the party of old Mariana and
her Bavarian grandson fell into the background.

Mariana, indeed, was now almost past struggling ;
afflicted "By a mortal disease and abandoned by" her
physicians. She resorted, as usual, to charms and
quackery of the most revolting description ; l but, in

1 Stanhope Correspondence, 3rd May 1696.

500 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

spite of incantations and empirical devices, JVIariana in
May 1 696 endedjier-tu^bulent life^Jgaving the question^
of the suo:ej3sjon_slil^^ With the death

ot the olcTQueen it was thought that the chance of the
little Bavarian prince had disappeared ; and Marie
Anne pushed more energetically than ever the claims
ottrefnephew, the Archduke Charles Soon the King
fell so seriously ill again that his life was despaired of,
and the attempts of the Queen to obtain a will in the
favour of the Archduke were redoubled. Like all
semi-imbeciles, however, Charles, when once an idea
had been drilled into his head, clung to it tenaciously ;
and though, for the sake of peace, he seemed to agree
with his wife, he did not forget his father's will and his
mother's injunction, that his own sister's descendants
had a better right to succeed him than a distant relative
like the Archduke. Count Benavente, his lord of the
bedchamber, although appointed by Marie Anne, was
secretly against the Austrian ; and, with his knowledge
and that of Cardinal Portocarrero alone, Charles signed
a secret will, appointing his great nephew the child
prince of Bavaria heir to his crown.

Once again he recovered sufficiently to rise from his
bed ; and Stanhope wrote on the iQth September 1696 ;
' The King's danger is over for a time, but his consti-
tution is so very weak and broken, much beyond his
age, that it is feared what may be the success of
another attack. They cut his hair off in this sickness,
which the decay of nature had almost done before, all

1 Stanhope reports, ' There is now great noise of a miracle done by a
piece of a waistcoat she died in, on an old lame nun, who, in great faith,
earnestly desired it, and no sooner applied it to her lips, but she was
perfectly well and threw away her crutches. This, with some other
stories that will not be wanting, may in time grow up to a canonisation.'
Correspondence in * Spain under Charles n.'

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 501

his crown being bald. He has a ravenous stomach,
and swallows all he eats whole ; for his nether jaw
stands out so much that his two rows of teeth cannot
meet ; to compensate which he has a prodigious wide
throat, so that a gizzard or a liver of a hen passes
down whole, and his weak stomach not being able to
digest it he voids it in the same manner.'

No sooner was the immediate danger over than
Mari(f~Anne wormed out of the King that he Kacl
made his will in favouT"Df the Bavarian: Her rage
and indignation knew no bounds, and she upbraided
the King with hysterical violence, to which he retorted
by childish outbursts, leading to the smashing of
crockery, furniture, and the like, and usually ending
in tears. Oropesa, who had just returned to Court
TeconciTed to Marie Anne, added his persuasions to
those of the Queen and the threats of the confessor,
but for a time without success. In November 1696
Stanhope reports that the King was still very ill, and
obliged to keep his bed : ' although they sometimes
make him rise out of his bed, much against his will
and beyond his strength, the better to conceal his
illness abroad. He is not only extremely weak in
body, but has a great weight of melancholy and dis-
content upon his spirits, attributed in a great measure
to the Queen's continual importunities to make him
alter his will.'

At^ length, in September 1697, the sick man could

withstand, rhp prpqsiirp no longer; anH during another

grave attack,1 at the instance of his wife and Harrach,

1 His recovery from this attack was attributed to the body of St. Diego,
which was brought to his bed ; and when the King got better, amidst the
great rejoicings and bullfights to celebrate the miracle, Charles and his
wife spent some days at Alcald worshipping the grim relic. — Stanhope.

502 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

tore up the will appointing the Prince of Bavaria his__
heir. Portocarrero had gone sojfar jistp_ threaten to
call the Cortes together to confirm the will, and had
exhorted the King to stand firm, but he had been
powerless as_ against the strong will of Marie Anne.
For a long time, however, Charles still held out against
making another will in "favour of the Austrtan~an9
only, at last, by threats and cajolery wa<; T^P indnrpH
to write a letter to the Emperor asking him to send
the Archduke to Spain with ten or twelve thousand
men, on the pretext that they were required for the
defence of Catalonia.

~But the gigantic armaments needed by Louis xiv.
to face all Europe victoriously, as he had done, was
exhausting the jgsources of France, and peace was in
tHe air. The need also for French agents to have a
good chance in Madrid to push the succession claim
also made Louis pliant ; and when the Peace of Rys-
wick was signed in October 1697, tne world wa£
surprised at the generous terms accorded by the victor
to Spain. With every chance of success, then, Louis
"having restored the territory he had conquered, _he
could pose as the true friend of Spain, ready to
champion the rights of his descendants by Maria
Theresa, the eldest daughter of Philip, against the
unpopular Germans, to succeed to the Spanish throve.
TKere~was much lost ground for the French to make
up ; for the German factions had been in sole posses-
sion ever since the death of Marie Louise in 1690;
but the death of Mariana had left some~of her friends
in the market, and all classes of Spaniards were sick
to death of Germans ; so, as soon as the peace was
signed, the Marquis d'Harcourt hurried to Madrid as
French ambassador, primed with instructions, and

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 503

supplied with means to re-constitute the French party
in_ Spain, and defeat, if possible, the machinations of
Queen Mane Anne.

The first effect of the peace was to stop the project
of bringing an Austrian army to Spain under the
Archduke, and also the plan of the Elector of Bavaria
to put in an appearance to counteract the Archduke's
presence. The arrival of Harcourt at Madrid soon
afterwards put a new complexion on affairs there.
Stanhope writes, on the i4th March 1698, when the
King had fallen again dangerously ill : ' Our Court is
in great disorder : the grandees all dog and cat, Turk
and Moor. The King is in a languishing condition,
not in so imminent a danger as last week, but so weak
and spent as to his principle of life, that all I can hear
is pretended, amounts only to hopes of preserving him
some weeks, without any probability of his recovery.
The general inclination as to the succession is al-
to^tFer French; their (i.e. the Spaniards') aversion
to the Queen having set them against all her country-
men : and if the French King will content himself
that one of his younger children be King of Spain,
without pretending to incorporate the two monarchies,
he will find no opposition, either from grandees or
common people. . . . The King is so very weak he
can scarcely lift his hand to his head to feed himself,
and so extremely melancholy, that neither his buffoons,
dwarfs, nor puppet-shows, all of which have shown
their abilities before him, can in the least divert him
from fancying everything that is said or done is a
temptation of the devil, and never thinking himself
safe but with his confessor and* two friars by his side,
whom he makes lie in his chamber every night.'1

1 Stanhope Correspondence. — Mahon.

.

504 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

In such circumstances as these it was evident to
the Queen's opponents that a bold move must be
made at once or she would win. Her most powerful
abettor with the King was the confessor, Father
Matilla; the ostensible ministers, the Admiral of
Castile,1 Montalto and Oropesa, after many wrangles
with her, agreeing to let her have a free hand with
her husband, if they were allowed to take a fair share
of the national plunder ; the real government behind
them being the Queen and her camarilla. The only
man near the King who was inclined to favour the
Bavarian heir was the lord chamberlain, Count Bena-
vente, to whom one night, late in March 1698, Charles
mumbled that he was very unhappy and uneasy in
his conscience, and should like to see Cardinal
Portocarrero.

The Cardinal Archbishop, who had been a close
friend of Mariana's, and was a man of ability, had
been carefully excluded from the King's chamber by
Marie Anne. It was eleven o'clock at night, but
swift secret messengers were soon at the Cardinal's
door ; and before midnight, unknown to the Queen,
the primate stood by the King's bed. Charles opened
all the troubles of his terror-stricken soul to the friend
of his dead mother : how the violence of his wife and
the harshness of the confessor, Matilla, frightened him_
into adopting a course which his conscience told hirn___
was wrong, and he prayed the primate to help him with
advice in this dire strait. Portocarrero was nothing^
loath. Hurrying from the palace, he hastily convened
aTmeeting of his friends. Count Monterey, the Marquis

1 The Admiral of Castile, who was the Queen's most ostentatious
champion, though she often quarrelled with him, was really betraying her
all the time (' Recueil des Instructions ').

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 505

of Legan^s, Don Sebastian de Cotes, Don Francisco
Ronquillo, the idol of the populace, and Don Juan
Antonio Urraca.

What was to be done, and who should do it, before
the Queen could banish them all ? Monterey, in his
stumbling speech, pointed out the danger of acting
through the King at all, seeing that the Queen could
twist him round her finger and make him alter any
resolution he adopted, as she had done before. The
best course, he said, would be for the Cardinal to
frequent the King's chamber, ostensibly to give spiritual
consolation, and then very gradually to prepare the
King's mind for a change. Others thought that this
process was too slow, since the King might slip
through their hands after all, and Leganes advised
that the Cardinal should immediately urge the King
to order the arrest and imprisonment of the detested
Admiral of Castile, the Duke of Rio Seco. ' His only
escort,' said Legan6s, ' were four knavish poets and a
couple of buffoons,' whilst he, Legan6s, had plenty of
arms at home and two hundred soldiers in his pay,
and could seize the most objectionable ministers at once.
Then turbulent Ronquillo had his say. They must
strike higher than the Admiral. The Queen as well
must be seized as soon as her henchman was laid by
the heels, and the Huelgas at Burgos should be her
future place of confinement. Let us be practical, said
Monterey, sneering at Ronquillo for a fool : if we
offer violence to the Queen the excitement will kill
the King before we can get a will or decree executed.
We must act more cautiously than that. Then the
two angry nobles clapped their hands to their swords,
and were for fighting it out on the spot, until the
Cardinal separated them, and wise old Cotes, with his

506 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

quiet voice, calmly gave his opinion. It would be
easy for the Cardinal to obtain such a decree as that
required, but the Queen would get it revoked the
next morning more easily still, and then, what would
happen to all of us ? Let us, he said, strike at the
trunk by all means, if possible, and get rid of the
Queen : but how ? Before that can be done we should
putTMatilla, the confessor, out of the way. The King
hated and feared him already, and only yesterday
refused to speak to him : let the Cardinal and Bena-
vente advise the King to change his confessor, and
the next step will be easy. This seemed good advice;
but the jealous hidalgos then fell to quarrelling as to
who the new confessor should be, with the result that
the choice was ultimately left to the Cardinal.

The next morning Cotes suggested to his colleagues
a certain modest professor of theology at Alcala, one
Father Froilan Diaz, for the post. He was near
enough to the capital to be brought thither without
delay, and would be humble enough to do as he was
told : and so it was decided to secure the great
appointment to Father Diaz. There was no lack of
messengers to carry to him from the conspirators the
news of his coming elevation, for each of them, espe-
cially Ronquillo, wished to gain the credit of proposing
it ; and the next day the astounded professor found
himself already by anticipation a person to be courted
by the greatest grandees in the land.

One day, early in the morning, in the first week in
April, the sick King lay in bed listening dreamily
to some music being played in the ante-chamber, the
door between the rooms being open. Father Matilla
and a crony of his, one Dr. Parra, were quietly chatting
in one of the deep window recesses of the ante-

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 507

chamber ; when suddenly Count Benavente entered
unannounced, accompanied by a stout, fresh-coloured
ecclesiastic ; and, without saluting Matilla, they walked
straight through into the King's bedroom, which
Benavente alone was entitled to do, as lord chamber-
lain. Matilla was keen-witted, and saw at a glance
what it meant. Turning to his friend, he said, ' Good-
bye : this business is ending just as it ought to have
begun ; ' and with that he hurried out of the palace
and to the monastery of his order in Madrid.

Spies had already carried to Marie Anne and the
Admiral reports of mysterious confabulations of th<eir
enemies, but they knew not where the blow was to
Tall.~ At eleven o'clock the King usually dined ; and
when Marie Anne, according to custom, entered the
room that morning, to sit by his side whilst he ate,
shejearnt for the first time from the disjointed babble
of the^ickmcm, that he was free^rom_j\|a.tilla^ajid
had a new confessor^1 Marie Anne was aghast at the
news,~fhough she made no sign of disapproval to her
husband ; but the moment she could leave the King's
side, she summoned the Admiral and her other
advisers, and considered the ill tidings. None knew
who would be the next victim, and most of them
thought that Matilla had betrayed them. Panic and
bewilderment reigned amongst the chosen Camarilla.
Some were for striving to reinstate Matilla, some for
punishing him, others were for saving themselves by
resignation and flight, but one great churchman, the
head of the Franciscan order, Folch de Cardona, kept
his head, and advised calmness. Matilla was exoner-

1 The account here given is taken mainly from a contemporary MS.,
written by an officer of the Inquisition and an adherent of Portocarrero,
in the British Museum, Add. 10,241 : and from another account printed
in Madrid, 1787.

508 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

ated and consulted ; but when he learned that the
Queen and the Admiral had known of Portocarrero's
meeting before the blow fell, he broke down. 'Oh,'
he cried, ' if I had only known one short half-hour
before, I could have saved us all : ' and then, though
nominally pensioned and banished to Salamanca, he_
fell ill of grief, fever, or poison, and died within a
week of his dismissal.

T)iaz did not seem very terrible at first ; for his
methods with the King were soothing, and he moved
slowly. He took Matilla's place on the Council of
the Inquisition, and at once became a power in the
land ; but he was all politeness and gentle saintliness
to Marie Anne, and even she, suspicious as she was,
began to think that she might jjominate still if she
could confine Father "Diaz to his spiritual^ Junctions.
In the coTiree~~Trf~ar ftew~~weeks after the change, the
Court was moved to Toledo, but there the mob, who
loved the Ronquillo brothers, and hated the Queen,
knowing that she had suffered a defeat, made her
feel that her power was on the wane. ' The Queen,'
writes Stanhope, ' is very uneasy at the impudent
railleries of the Toledo women, who affront her
every day publicly in the streets, and insult the
Admiral to his face. There is besides a great want
of money ; for the King's new confessor having per-
suaded him before he left Madrid to publish a decree
forbidding the sale of all governments and offices,
either in present or reversion, as a duty of conscience
. . . the superintendent of the revenues declares that
he is not able to find money for his Majesty's sub-
sistence, all branches of the revenue being anticipated
for many years, and he is now debarred from selling
offices, which was the only resource he had left.'

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 509

In the meanwhile, the French ambassador, Harcourt,
was busy buying friends at Court, though most of old
Mariana's late adherents still preferred, as the King
undmibtejl}^idrtEe^aYaTia.ii Prince: Tfi^people at
large were strongly in favour of a Frejich jDrince,
descended from Maria Theresa, 'though they would
raTher have the devil/ as Stanhope says, * than see
France and Spain united,. . . . It is scarce conceivable
tK(* abhorrence they have for Vienna ; most of which
is owing to the Queen's very imprudent conduct ;
insomuch that, in effect, that party is included in her
own person and family. They have much kinder
thoughts of the Bavarian, but still rather desire a
French Prince to secure them against war.'

The intrigues of the French ambassador were met
by increased activity on the part of the Queen, wKo
left Charles no rest in pushing the claims of her
nephew the Archduke. The poor King was sick of
the whole business, and only wished to be left alone,
and for his Bavarian nephew to succeed him. The
King will not bear to hear talk of business of any
kind, and when sometimes the Queen cannot contain
herself, he bids her let him alone, and says she designs
to kill him.' I A few weeks later (25th June) the
English ambassador sent this vivid picture of the
invalid : * Our gazettes here tell us every week that
his Catholic Majesty is in perfect health. ... It is
true that he is every day abroad, but h&ret lateri
lethalis arundo ; his ankles and knees swell again, his
eyes bag, the lids are as red as scarlet, and the rest of
his face a greenish yellow. His tongue is " tied," as it is
called, that is, he has such a fumbling in his speech,
that those near him hardly understand him ; at which

1 'Stanhope Correspondence,' Mahon^ nth June 1698.

5io QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

he sometimes grows angry, and asks if they all be
deaf.'

But, with all his feebleness, Charles still resisted the
pressure upon him either to make a will or to summon
the Archduke. Marie Anne was persistent ; and "air7,
the end of June her importunity producedlTBangerpus
fit that nearly ended the King's life there and then,
after which Stanhope writes : ' There is not the least
hope of this King's recovery ; and we are every night
in apprehensions of hearing he is dead in the morning,
though the Queen lugs him out every day, to make
the people believe he is well till her designs are rife,
which I rather fear will prove abortive ; for, by the
best information I can get of the three pretenders,
her candidate is like to have the fewest votes. Upon
old Count Harrach's pressing the King to have the
Archduke Charles sent for to Spain ... he gave no
answer, but turning to the Queen, who was present,
said laughing, " Oyga mujer, el Conde aprieta mucho"
(Hark, wife, how very pressing the Count is) repeating
" very pressing " several times. The French Ambas-
sador " presses " just as much, and the Nuncio, in the
Pope's name, also for the French.'

These signs were not lost on Marie Anne, and she
began to turn to the strongest side. Harcourt and his
wife were charming and liberal, and had quite
captivated the Madrid crowd, who cheered them
wherever they went, whilst Harrach and his wife were
unattractive and unpopular; but what was more im-
portant than anything else, now that Spanish resources
were failing, French money was forthcoming to buy
Baroness Berlips and the Queen's German hangers
on. The Marquise of Harcourt paid assiduous court
to Marie Anne, who, seeing the impossibility of her own

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 511

candidate, listened, beguiled, to the clever suggestion
of the French that if she would abandon the Emperor's
son, she might continue Queen of Spain by a marriage
with the French prince who might succeed Charles.

For a time, in the late autumn of 1698, the French
cause suffered a setback^ Louis apparently considering
that his chance of placing a French prince upon the
throne of all the Spanish dominions in face of Europe
would be impracticable, revived a scheme that he had
agreed upon with the Emperor years before, when
Charles was a child ; namely, to partition Spain, by
agreement with the maritime powers, between the
three claimants : a French prince to take Naples,
Sicily, and the Basque province, the Prince of Bavaria
to reign in Spain itself, and Austria to be contented
with Milan. This, when it was divulged, aroused the
intensest indignation, not only in Spain, but in Austria
and Bavaria. Harcourt and his wife lost their favour
at once, and Marie Anne again leaned towards Jier
( TpnTTan^jnsrnp.n . What was more important still,
the King at last, under pressure which will be presently
explained, made a testament declaring the Prince of
Bavaria his heir. Marie Anne, the King himself, and
the Council, alT denied it ; but it was soon known to
be true, and the French ambassador immediately
presented a demand that Cortes should be summoned
to settle the succession by vote.

Suddenly, whilst this demand was being laboriously
discussed, the news came tBat the little Bavarian prince,
the only descendant of old Mariana except the King, had
die37agedsix — of poisoivit was said, in February 1699 ;
Imd the problerrTor tHe succession was changecTjn a
moment. Bribed and cajoled by hopes of remaining
of Spain by a second marriage, Marie Anne

5i2 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

again seemed inclined to side with those who had been^
Her enemies. Most of the partisans of the Bavarian
claimant, including the King himself, and especially
Portocarrero, went over to the French view ; and the
principal reason why Marie Anne held herself in doubt
was because she saw those whom she hated all ranged
on the side of France.

Whilst this sordid bickering was going on in the
palace the distress in the country increased daily, until
famine invaded even" the capital The jiew confessor
and Cardinal Portocarrero had, as yet, made no great
ctiange in the government ; and Marie Anne's friends
were still in office, headed by Oropesa and the Admiral.
Ronquillo and his fellow-conspirators were growing
impatient for their reward, and incited secretly by their
agents, the populace of Madrid broke into revolt in
April 1699. A howling mob surrounded the palace,
crying for bread. ' Long live the King, and death to
Oropesa,' was the cry. Inside the palace panic reigned
supreme, and poor Charles was like to die with fright,
when the rabble demanded fiercely that he should
show himself upon the balcony. Marie Anne appeared
at the open window undaunted, and told the crowd
that the King was asleep. ' He has slept too long,'
was the reply, ' wake him ' ; and at last the King had
to appear, looking, as Stanhope says, like a ghost, and
moving as if by clock work. Ronquillo ! Ronquillo !
shouted the mob. We will have Ronquillo for mayor :
and in a hurry Ronquillo was sent for and sworn in as
mayor, which somewhat appeased the insurgents, who
bore him off in triumph. Oropesa's palace was ablaze,
and a rush upon it by the mob had resulted in many of
the latter being killed, and cast into a well within the
precincts by Oropesa's servants. Further enraged at

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 513

this, the populace surged en masse to the King's palace,
clamouring for the heads of Oropesa and the Admiral ;
and they were with difficulty restrained from invading
the royal apartments by the clergy, with raised cruci-
fixes and holy symbols. Again they demanded the
presence of the King, who told them that Ronquillo
had orders to do everything to satisfy them, and
promised, on his oath as a King, that the insurgents
should be held harmless for the tumult.

A clean sweep was made of Marie Anne's Jriends.
The" Admiral fled t^^lctmg^nancT Portocarrero declared
that within a week or two he would have Berlips, the
Capuchin confessor of the Queen, and the whole gang
cleared out of Spain. The day after the tumult Stan-
hope wrote : ' The King is very weak, and declines fast.
The tumult yesterday, I fear, may have some ill-effect
further on his health. It was such as the like never
before happened in Madrid in the memory of the oldest
men here, and proves, contrary to what they brag of,
that there is a mob here as well as in other places.'
The whole aspect of the palace changed as if by magic,
and Cardinal Portocarrero was supreme. Marie Anne,
cowed by the violence and vituperation of the mob^
was glad to lie low, and did not attempt to influence
the King, whose health declined every dayT"

Since the death of the Bavarian claimant in February
the matter of the succession had remained in abeyance ;
and it was evident now that unless the King was in-
deed very soon to declare his heir by testament he
would die with the question still open. But poor
Charles shrunk from the execution of an act, which he
had always said he would only do in articulo mortis,
and the persuasions of those about him were always
met by a fresh plea for delay. In this deadlock of

2 K

5i4 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

affairs a course was adopted by the dominant party
which will always furnish one of the most repulsive
episodes of history. During his first grave attack at
the end of 1697, Charles, who was as superstitious as
he was ignorant, sent for Rocaberti, the Inquistor-
General, a stern Dominican, and confessed that he
believed his illness to be the result of a maleficent
charm cast upon him. The Inquisitor replied that he
would have the case examined ; but he saw no prob-
ability of result unless the King would point out some
person whom he suspected, or gave some evidence to
proceed upon.

There the matter remained until Froilan Diaz was
substituted, as has been related, for Matilla as the
King's confessor. Probably as part of a concerted
plan to obtain complete control over him, Diaz appeared
to agree with Charles in his expressed belief that he
was bewitched ; and, having heard that an old friend
of his in a convent in Galicia, had by many efficacious
exorcisms become quite familiar with the evil spirits
that he cast out, he consulted the Inquisitor-General
Rocaberti, as to whether it would be well to summon
the priestly exerciser to the King. The Inquisitor
did not like the business, but consented to a letter
being written to the Bishop of Oviedo, the exerciser's
spiritual superior, asking him to submit to the latter
the question as to the truth of the statement that the
King was suffering from diabolical arts. The bishop,
determined not to be made the channel of such non-
sense, replied that the only witchcraft the King was
suffering from was weakness of constitution and a too
ready acquiescence in his wife's will ; and he refused
to have anything to do with it. Diaz then sent direct
to Argtielles the exerciser in July 1698, instructing

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 515

him to lay upon his breast a paper with the names of
the King and Queen written upon it, and summon the
devil to ask if the persons whose names were written
were bewitched.

Thenceforward for eight or nine months the ghastly
mockery went on.1 The devil announced that the
King was bewitched : * et hoc ad destruendam materiam
generationis in Rege, et eum incapacem ponendum ad
regnum administrandum ' ; the charm having heen
administered by moonlight when the King was four-
teen years old. Repulsive remedies were prescribed
which, if administered, would certainly have killed the
patient, others were recommended just as hideous but
less harmful ; and the poor creature was submitted to
them. At length, after the will in favour of the
Bavarian had been wrung from the King by many
months of this ghastly nonsense, it was seen that the
exerciser was aiming at gaining influence for himself.
He said that the charms had been administered by the
King's mother, and repeated much dangerous political
advice that the devil had given, such as to recommend
the complete isolation of the King from his wife, and
other things less palatable to Portocarrero and the
French party ; and the exerciser, being able to get no
further, was dropped in June 1699.

This was the time when the King was suffering
from the shock of the recent tumults, and Stanhope
writes : 'His Catholic Majesty grows every day sen-
sibly worse and worse. It is true that last Thursday
they made him walk in the public solemn procession
of Corpus, which was much shortened for his sake.

1 Every detail of the correspondence will be found in the MSS. already
referred to, and, in English, in ' The Exorcism of Charles the Bewitched,'
in ' The Year after the Armada,' etc., by the present writer.

5i6 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

However, he performed it so feebly that all who saw
him said he could not make one straight step, but
staggered all the way ; nor could it be otherwise ex-
pected after he had had two falls a day or two before,
walking in his own lodgings, when his legs doubled
under him by mere weakness. In one of them he
hurt his eye, which appeared much swelled, and black
and blue ; the other being quite sunk into his head,
the nerves being contracted by his paralytic distemper.
Yet it was thought fit to have him make this sad figure
in public, only to have it put into the Gazette how
strong and vigorous he is.'

At this juncture JMarie^Anne's suspicions were first
aroused prThe witchcraft business by a hint dropped
by-jhe King, and she at once set spies upon those/
who had access to him, and especially upon Diaz the
confessor. A very few days convinced her that the
ghastly incantations that were being carried on were
directed against her, politically and personally. ' Roar-
ing with very rage,' she summoned her friends and
demanded instant revenge and punishment of the
King's confessor.1 She was reminded by Folch de
Cardona, that as the Inquisitor-General was concerned
in the matter, it would be prudent to go cautiously
until it was seen how far the Holy Office itself was a
party : and, in any case, he said it would be wisest to
allow the Inquisition to avenge her rather than for her
to do it and thereby make herself more unpopular than
she was. It was soon found that the Sacred Tribunal
was not concerned ; but as Rocaberti, the dreaded
chief Inquisitor, had been active in the matter, no one
dared to move against Diaz or him, for Inquisitors

1 MSS. account already referred to. British Museum MSS., Add.
10,241.

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 517

were dangerous people to touch. Almost immediately
afterwards Rocaberti died suddenly, almost certainly
poisoned ; and then Marie Anne laid her plans to
crush Father Diaz the confessor

Stanhope writes (i5th July) : ' The doctors, not
knowing what more to do with the King, to save
their credit have bethought themselves to say his ill
must certainly be witchcraft, and there is a great
Court party who greedily catch at and improve the
report, which, how ridiculous soever it may sound in
England, is generally believed here, and propagated
by others to serve a turn. They, finding all their
attempts in vain to banish Madame Berlips, think
this cannot fail, and are using to find out any colour-
able pretences to make her the witch.' It was higher
game even than Berlips that they were aiming at.
Berlips stood behind the Queen, and one could not
be injured without the other.

In September a mad woman, in a state of frenzy,
burst into the King's presence, foaming at the mouth,
and cursed him with demoniac shrieks until she was
removed by force, leaving Charles in an agony of
terror which nearly killed him. The mad woman was
followed, and it was found that she lived with two
other demoniacs who were under the impression that
they were keeping the King subject in their room.
This nonsense was conveyed to the King by Diaz,
and confirmed the invalid in his conviction that he
was under the influence of sorcery. In this belief
he ordered that the three women should be exorcised
by a famous German monk, who had been brought
to Spain as an able exerciser for the King's benefit.
Diaz, who superintended the incantations, unfortunately
for himself, dictated questions to the demoniacs which

5i8 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

were evidently designed to involve the Queen. Who
was it that caused the King's malady ? A beautiful
woman, was the answer. Was it the Queen ? and
to this no distinct reply was given. But the question
was enough ; and when Marie Anne received a full
report of the proceedings, as she did from her spies,
she was, of course, furious that an open attempt should
be made to cast upon her the blame of the witchcraft.

The first step towards her revenge was to get a
new Inquisitor-General in her interest, and she pressed
the King to appoint Folch de Cardona, General of
the Franciscans. He refused, prompted no doubt by
his confessor, and, in spite of Marie Anne's passionate
outbursts of protest, he appointed Cardinal Cordova ;
to whom the King and the confessor unburdened
themselves completely, and told the whole story of
the exorcism. From these conferences an extra-
ordinary resolution resulted. The Queen herself was
too high to strike at first ; but her great friend and
late all-powerful minister, the Admiral of Castile, was
detested and despised by every one, and might be
attacked with impunity to begin with. So it was
decided that he, being allied with the devil to cause
all the mischief, should be seized by the Inquisition
of Granada and closely imprisoned, whilst his house-
hold should be incarcerated elsewhere, and his papers
seized by the holy office. This could not be done,
however, until the new Inquisitor-General's appoint-
ment was ratified by the Pope. Once more Marie
Anne and her friends trumped their opponents' strong
suit, for Cardinal Cordova died of poison on the very
day that the bull arrived.

Again Marie Anne pressed her husband to appoint
one of her tools Inquisitor-General; but Father Diaz

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 519

was now fighting for his life, and prevented the ap-
pointment. Marie Anne then sought out a man who
would be acceptable to her opponents, but whom she
might buy, and Mendoza, Bishop of Segovia, became
Inquisitor- General, bribed by the Queen with the
promise of a cardinal's hat to do her bidding in
future. Marie Anne had the whip hand and promptly
used it. Stanhope wTote on the 22~nd August :' As"
to Court factions, her Majesty is now as high as ever,
and the Cardinal of Toledo, who carried everything
before him two months ago, now dares hardly to open
his mouth. But he is sullen, comes seldom to Court,
and talks of retiring to Toledo.' First the German
exerciser was captured, and under torture confessed
the details of the exorcism of the three demoniacs
when Diaz was present ; then the compromising cor-
respondence with the exerciser in Galicia was seized,
with all the hints and suggestions made in it to
incriminate the Queen. This was sufficient evidence
against Diaz, and he was arrested. Everything he
had done, he said, was by the King's orders ; and as
royal confessor he claimed immunity, his mouth being
closed. He was at once dismissed from all his offices,
and the King was appealed to by the Inquisitor-
General to allow the confessor's privileges to be dis-
pensed with. Charles could only mumble that they
might do justice ; but Diaz had a powerful party
behind him who took care to spread abroad the story
of the Queen's vengeance, and Diaz, aided by many
of his late colleagues on the Council of the Inquisition,
fled to the coast, and so to Rome. There he was
seized and brought back to Spain ; and thenceforward,
for many years, there raged around him a great and
unparalleled contest between the Council of the Inqui-

520 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

sition, which favoured Diaz, and the Inquisitor-General
in the interests of the Queen's vengeance.1

Marie Anne had won, so far as the King's confessor
w'as concerned, but her unpopularity was so great that
she gained no ground politically ; nor did her German
candidate for the succession improve in his chance of
success, for Cardinal .Fortocarrero and his friends filled
HP the "administrative orhces, and IViarie Anne was
powerless. Stanhope wrote in September 1699 : 'One
rilghfTast week a troop of about three hundred, with
swords, bucklers and firearms, went into the outward
court of the palace and, under the King's window,
sung most impudent lampoons and pasquins ; and the
Queen does not appear in the streets without hearing
herself cursed to her face. . . . The pasquins plainly
tell her they will pull her out of the palace and put
her in a convent, adding that their party is no less
than 14,000 strong. This new turn has damped the
discourse, which was very hot lately, of the Admiral's
return to Court, and the Cardinal of Toledo is now
like to be the great man again/' 2

Every day some fresh sign was given that Marie
Anne's foes were paramount. 'Our great German
lady, the Countess of Berlips, is going, nor does she
go alone ; but all the rest of the German tribe are to
accompany her, namely, a fine young lady, her niece,
a German woman, a dwarf, an eunuch, the Queen's
German doctor, the Capuchin, her confessor, and
Father Carapacci . . . who, though no German, yet
is one of the Queen's chief agents, and as great an
eyesore to the people as any of them. This seems a

1 This struggle, which cannot be described here, is fully narrated in
'The Exorcism of Charles the Bewitched' ('Year After the Armada'), by
Martin Hume. 2 Stanhope Correspondence. — Mahon.

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 521

great reform, but I believe will prove no amendment,
for I expect to see others as greedy, if not more so,
to take their places.'1

JTh.e_ French party was now absolutely ^paramount ;
for the money and diplomatic skill of Louis xiv^had
been lavishly employed ingaining _ friends from, those
wHo had been in favour of the Bavarian pri"™* ; and
Marie Anne herself, though she had now the Inquisitor-
General on her side, could hardly get a word alone
with her dying husband. Charles lingered on . in^
morbid melancholy tor many months longer. Like
his father, in similar case, he found the royal charnel-
house at the Escorial a resort that suited his humour.
On one occasion it is related that, with Marie Anne
4t his side, he caused the coffins of his relatives to be
opened and the bodies exposed to view. He was
deeply affected by the sight of the corpse that had
once been the beautiful Marie Louise, the wife of his
youth, whose dead face he caressed, with tears and
promises to join her soon, whilst Marie Anne, as a
reply to the King's affection for his dead French wife,
kissed the crumbling hand of old German Mariana,
whose enemy she had been on earth.

Whilst the Spanish Court and so-called government
were thus employed in degrading superstitions and
petty squabbles, the fate of the nation, reduced now
to utter impotence, was being discussed and settled
by foreign powers^ Louis xiv., still desirous, if possible
of securing for France without war the portion of
Spain's inheritance which mainly interested him, made
early in 1700, another treaty with England and Hol-
land for the partition of Spain between the claimants
and others interested, threatening that if the Emperor

1 Stanhope Correspondence. — Mahon.

522 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

refused to accept the terms offered the invasion of
Spain by France would follow, and the whole inherit-
ance claimed for the Dauphin at the sword's point.
The Emperor indignantly rejected the advance, alicl
also claimed to be sole heir : the Spaniards, and even
their moribund King, blazing out in anger with some
of their old pride at this unceremonious dismember-
ment of their ancient realm. Stanhope's expulsion
from Spain followed quickly upon this new attempt
at partition, and for a short time the French cause
looked black. Then the Austrians, to make their
assurance doubly sure, endeavoured to secure Marie
Anne firmly to their side by the same means as those
that Harcourt had employed to win her for the French
faction. They promised that if she aided them the
Archduke.__her^ nephew, when he became King^of
Spain should marry her. The Queen was delighted ;
and in order to deal one more blow at the French
claim, went to her husband and divulged to him, not
the Austrian but the former Rfgjlgb offe r . of : mg^Ha gg*
Charles was tired of life and utterly muddled with the
atmosphere of intrigue in which he lived ; but even
he protested in impotent passion against his wife
being wooed before he was dead, and_this_in greased
his dislike of the French claim amythough Louis xiv.
recalled Harcourt and disclaimed theoffer he had made.
But Cardinal Portocarrero was always by the King's
side, and exercised more influence over him than any
one else. He, in his sacred character, warned Charles
that it was his duty to his conscience to lay aside
personal partialities, and to summon a conference of
the most famous theologians and jurisconsults to
discuss and decide the question of the succession.
Portocarrero took care that such conferences should

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 523

result in a vote in favour of Louis xiv.'s young grand-
son, Philip Duke of Anjou. measures being taken to
prevent any future joining of the two realms under one
crown. Charles was hard to convince, for he clung to
the Empire both by tradition and at the pleading of
his wife ; and Portocarrero then told him that it was
His duty to submit his doubts to the Pope., Charles
was devout, and did so. Innocent XL had all along
been an enemy of Austria and a friend of France ; and, .
as Portocarrero of course anticipated, decided in favour
ofjthe Duke of Anjou as the legitimate heir.1

B ut still Charles hesitated . Marie Anne was in^
defatigable in persuading him to favour the Austrian,
and' always managedf to prevent the fateful will being
made in Anjou's favour ; distracting her dying husband,
even at this pass, with the vain shows, bull fights,
tourneys, and the like, which had been for so long the
traditional pleasures of his Court. She even en-
deavoured to make terms with her enemies again,
in order to be safe in any eventuality ; but Louis xiv.
began to speak more haughtily now ; threatening war
if a single German soldier set foot in Spain or resistance
was offered to the partition. There was nothing that
Charles and his people dreaded more than the dis-
memberment of the country, and this frightened the
King into looking upon the acceptance of the French
claim as the only means of keeping Spain intact.
Thus, from day to day, the irresolute monarch turned
to' one side or another, as his wife oTTortocarrero, big
fears or his affectiong^amed the upper hand.

On the 20th September he took to his "bed to rise

1 There is no doubt whatever that the French claim through Maria
Theresa and Anna of Austria, Queens of France, was the legitimate one,
and that the Emperor had no valid right by Spanish law.

524 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

no more, and a few days afterwards received the last
sacrament, asking for pardon of all whom he had
unconsciously offended. The sick chamber assumed
the appearance of a mingled charnel house and toy-
shop, as the pale figure of the King upon his great bed
grew more ghastly and hopeless. All the sacred relics
in the capital were crowded into the room ; carved
saints, blessed rosaries and mouldering human remains,
until, to make space for fresh comers, the less renowned
objects had to be removed. The Primate of Spain,
Portocarrero, made the most of the priestly privilege ;
and, in the interests of the dying King's religious
consolation, he kept from his side Marie Anne and
her allies, the Inquisitor-General and the King's
regular confessor. Alone with the King, the Cardinal
admonished him that in order to avoid dying in a state of
sin, it was necessary for him to avert war from the country
by making a will, leaving his crown to the Duke of Anjou,
putting aside all personal leanings and family ties.

Charles could resist no longer. He was in terror ;
the spectre of sin and devilish temptations always
before him, and summoning the Secretary of State,
Ubilla, he himself directed him to draft a will in
favour of hjs^young FrencETgreat-nephew, the^ Duke
ot Anjou. On the 3rd October 1700, the document

was placed before him. Around his bed stood
Cardinals Portocarrero and Borgia, and the highest
officers of the household ; but Marie Anne of Neuburg^
was not there to see the final shattering of her hopes.
With trembling hand Charles the Bewitched took the
pen. 'God alone gives kingdoms,' he sighed, 'for to
Him all kingdoms belong.' Then signing in his great
uncultured writing ; ' I, the King,' he dropped the pen,
saying, ' I am nothing now : ' and thus the die was

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 525

cast, the house of Austria gave place to the house o£
Bourbon. Marie Anne did not even yet accept defeat
meekly. In an interval of partial improvement in the
King's health, she returned to the attack, and with
tears and protestations, induced the King to think well
again of his Austrian kinsmen. A courier was sent
hurrying to Vienna to tell the Emperor, that, after all,
the last will would make his son the heir of Spain, and
a codicil was signed conferring upon Marie Anne the
governorship of any city in Spain or Spanish State in
Italy or Flanders in which she might choose to reside
after her husband's death.

Soon_af3texwards (26th October) a ^decree-was. .signed
by Charles, who seemed then to be dying, appointing
a provisional government, headed by Marie Anne,
with Portocarrero and other great officers, to rule ,
pending the arrival of tfrp n^w K"ing ; whilst Porto-
carrero was nominated to act as Regent if the King,
though still alive, might be unable to exercise his
functions. With all the terror-stricken devotion that
had been traditional in his house, the last few days on
earth of Charles the Bewitched were passed, and on
the jst November 1700, the last Descendant in the
male line of the great UmperofCharles v.t died_of
senile old age before he was forty~the victim^of four
generations of incest ; leaving7 as his legacy to the
world a greatjwar which changed the face of Europe,
and decided the future course of civilisation.

The terms of the will had been kept a close secret ;
and as soon as the King's death was known, the
Palace of Madrid was packed with an eager crowd of
nobles and magnates to learn the name of their future
king. The will was read solemnly in the presence of
Marie Anne and the principal great officers ; and soon

526 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

the news was spread that Spain was free from the
house of Austria, which had been the cause of its
greatness and its ruin. Marie Anne, at the head of
the Council of Regency, had but a short term of power,
and, as may be suppose37 considering her imperious
nature, a far from harmonious one. Louis xiv., how-
ever, lost no time ; and the bright handsome lad, full
of hope and spirit, thenceforward Philip v. of Spain,
hurried south to take possession of his inheritance"
alrnost'before the Emperor had time to protest.

•On tEe F8th February 170!, Philip "arrived in
Madrid ; and his first act was to confirm Portocarrero
as his leading minister. Marie Anne had quarrelled
with her colleagues before this, and they had com-
plained of her to the young King before his arrival.
She had been defeated indeed ; for she saw now that
the marriage bait that had been held out to her was
illusory ; and when the order came to her from the new
King to leave Madrid before he entered it, she went,
full of plans for revenge still, to her place of *banish-
ment at Toledo ; yet with kindly professions upon her
lips, for the large pension of 400,000 ducats settled
upon her by Charles, was too valuable to be jeopardised
by open opposition to the ruling powers. She was all
smiles when young Philip visited her at Toledo soon
after his arrival ; and she hung around his neck a
splendidly jewelled badge of the Golden Fleece as a
token of her recognition of his sovereignty. But
when the war broke out, and the Archduke, her
nephew, with his allies came to fight for the prize he
claimed, Marie Anne could hardly be expected to
stand quite aloof. In 1706, the victorious Austrian
and his allies were carried by the fortune of war into
Toledo ; and Marie Anne welcomed her nephew with

MARIE ANNE OF NEUBURG 527

effusive joy as King of Spain ; but when the turn of
the jide carried Philip v. into power^ again, a few
months^ later, two hundred horsemen, under the Duke
of Osuna, clattered into the courtyard of Marie Anne's
convent retreat at Toledo, and arrestecTjhe^ Queen,
carrying her thence as rapidly as horses could travel
over the frontier to France.

At Bayonne, Marie Anne lived in retirement for
n i rie years, when a strange revolution of fortune"' s
wheel brought her back to Spam again triumphant.
I n the stately Morisco Palace at Guadalajara, Marie
Annepassed in affluent dignity the last twenty-six
years of life in widowhood, and died in 1 740. She
lived to see Spain rise from its ashes, a new nation,
purged by the fires of war ; "purified by heroism and
sacrifice. The long duel between the Empire and
France for the possession of the resources of Spain
had ended before the death of Marie Anne in the
successful reassertion of Spain to the possession of her
own resources. Rulers, men and women, had blindly
and ignorantly done their worst ; pride, bigotry, and
sloth had dominated for centuries the spirit of the
nation, as a result of the action which alone had
caused Spain to bulk so big in the eyes of the world,
and then to sink so low. But at last the evil night-
mare of the house of Austria was shaken off, and when
the aged widow of Charles n. passed to her rest at
Guadalajara, Spaniards were awakening to the stirring
message, that Spain might be happier and more truly
great in national concentration than when the men-at-
arms of the Austrian Philips squandered blood and
treasure beyond count, to uphold in foreign lands an
impossible pretension, born of ambitions as dead as
those who first conceived them.

EPILOGUE

2 L

EPILOGUE

FIRE and sword swept Spain clean. The long dravm
war of succession broke down much of the old ex-
clusiveness and conceit which had been for two centuries
the bane of the Spanish people, and a new patriotic
spirit was aroused which proved that the nation was
not effete but only drugged. The accession of Philip v.
had been looked upon by his grandfather as practically
annexing Spain to France. * // riy a plus de Pyrdntes,'
he announced ; and his first act proved his determina-
tion of treating his grandson's realm as a vassal state
of his own. Again it was to a large extent the in-
fluence of women which directed the course of Spanish
politics, even to the confusion of the roi soleil. It has
been shown in this history how often feminine influence
had been invoked by statesmen to bring Spain to a
sympathetic line of policy for their own ends, and
how often circumstances had rendered their efforts
ineffectual.

The confident anticipations of Louis xiv. that, by
rightly choosing his feminine instruments he might
use Spain entirely for the aggrandisement of France,
were even more conspicuously defeated than any
previous attempts had been in a similar direction ; for
the ladies upon whom he depended were one after the
other caught up by the chivalrous patriotism of the
Spanish people, newly aroused from the bad dream of
a hundred years, and boldly braving Louis, they did

531

532 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

their best for Spain and for their own ends, whether
France benefited or not.

The bride that Louis chose for his grandson was
one from whom no resistance could be expected. She
was a mere child, under fifteen, Maria Louisa Gabriela
of Savoy, daughter of Victor Amadeus and Anne Marie
of Orleans, sister of that Marie Louise, Queen of
Spain, whose life has been told in detail in these pages.
In September 1701 young Philip went to meet his
bride at Barcelona ; and even thus early it was seen
that he had to face a coalition of all Europe against
him. Revolt had been stirred up in Naples ; and
Philip had hardly time to snatch a brief honeymoon
before he was obliged to hurry away to Italy to fight
for his crown ; leaving the girl whom he had married
to rule Spain in his absence and to marshal the ele-
ments of defence in a country utterly prostrate and
disorganised. Maria Louisa was, of course, entirely
inexperienced, but she came of a stout race and never
flinched from the responsibilities cast upon her. The
young married couple were already deeply in love with
each other ; and Philip, though only seventeen, had
thus early begun to show the strange uxoriousness that
in later life became an obsession which made him a
mere appanage of the woman by his side ; so that
Maria Louisa began her strenuous life assured that
she would meet with no captious opposition from her
husband.

Louis xiv. and Mme. de Maintenon had placed by
her side a far stronger personality than Philip ; one of
the greatest women of her century, whose mission it
was to keep the young King and Queen of Spain in
the narrow path of French interests. Anne Marie de
la Tremouille, Duchess of Bracciano, whom the

EPILOGUE 533

Spaniards called the Princess of Ursinos, took charge
of the young Queen at once when the Piedmontese
household was dismissed at the frontier ; and through
the most troublous period of the great struggle which
finally gave the throne to Philip, she ruled the rulers
gently, wisely and firmly for their own interests and
those of Spain. No cantankerous straitlaced Mistress
of the Robes was she, such as the Duchess of Terra-
nova who had embittered the life of the other Marie
Louise, but a great lady full of wit and knowledge, and
as brave as a lioness in defence of the best interests
of those in her charge.

The young Queen herself, when she had been in-
stalled in the capital as Regent, showed how changed
were the circumstances of a Queen of Spain, now that
the dull gloom of the house of Austria had been swept
away, and a new Spain was gazing towards the dawn.
Nothing could exceed the diligence and ability of this
girl of fifteen in administering the government of
Madrid in the absence of the new King. Instead of
the dull round of devotion and frivolity which had filled
the lives of other Queen Consorts, she, with the wise
old Princess at her side, worked incessantly. She
would sign nothing she did not understand : she in-
sisted upon all complaints being investigated, and
reports made direct to her. Supplies of men and
money for the war in which Philip was already plunged
in Italy, were collected and remitted with an activity
and regularity which filled old-fashioned Spaniards
with surprise, and encouraged those who possessed
means to contribute from their hoards resources pre-
viously unsuspected. The manners of the Court were
reformed ; immorality and vice, so long rampant in
Madrid, was frowned at and discouraged ; and, instead

534 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

of allowing the news of the wars in which the King
was engaged to filter slowly and incorrectly from the
palace to the gossips of the street, the Queen herself
read aloud from a balcony to the people below the
despatches she daily received from her husband.

All this was enough to make the old Queen Consorts
of Spain turn with horror in their porphyry urns at the
Escorial ; but it came like a breeze of pure mountain
air into the miasmatic apathy which had hitherto
cloaked the capital ; and all Spain plucked up heart
and spirit from the energy of this girl of fifteen, with
the wise old Frenchwoman behind her. But even
they could only administer things as they found them,
and the root of the governmental system itself was
vicious. Time, and above all knowledge, was required
to re-organise the country ; and Spaniards grew restive
at the foreign auspices under which the reforms were
introduced. Maria Louisa and her husband well knew
that without French support liberally given, they could
never hold thejr own : for when the King returned to
Madrid early in 1703, the Spaniards, who had belonged
to the Austrian party in the last reign, had thrown
off the mask and fled to join the enemy : and it was
clear that no Spaniards would fight to make Spain a
dependency of France.

Nothing less than this would satisfy Louis xiv. ; and
the Princess of Ursinos, who had tried to make the
struggle a patriotic one for Spaniards, was warned
from Paris that, unless she immediately retired from
the country, King Louis would abandon Spain
and his grandson to their fate. The Princess went
into exile with a heavy heart, and the new French
ambassador, Grammont, came when she had departed
in 1704, instructed to make a clean sweep of all the

EPILOGUE 535

national party in Madrid, and to obtain control for
the French ministers. But Louis xiv. had underrated
the power and ability of Maria Louisa, who resented
the contemptuous dismissal of her wise mentor, and
took no pains to conceal her opposition to the change.
Louis sent scolding letters to her, rating her for her
presumption in wishing, ' at the age of eighteen to
govern a vast disorganised monarchy,' against the
advice of those so much more experienced than her-
self. But at last he had to recognise that this girl,
with the best part of Spain behind her, held the
stronger position ; and he took the wise course of
conciliating her by re-enlisting and restoring to Spain
the offended Princess of Ursinos. In vain his repre-
sentatives in Madrid assured him that neither the
Princess nor the Queen could be trusted to serve
French interests blindly. The two women were too
clever and too firm to be ignored, and the Princess
returned to Madrid in triumph in August 1705, with
carte blanche from Louis to do as she judged best to
save Spain for the house of Bourbon, at all events.

Thenceforward the Mistress of the Robes governed
the Queen, the Queen governed the King, and the
King was supposed to govern the country ; plunged
in war at home and abroad, with the Spanish nobles
either on the side of the Austrian or sullen at the
foreign influence which pervaded the government
measures, even when moderated and held in check
by the Princess of Ursinos. At length, when the
long war was wearing itself out, and peace was in
the air, the stout-hearted little Savoyarde fell sick.
She had borne many children to her husband, but
only two sons, so far, had lived, Louis, born in 1707,
and Ferdinand, born late in 1713. The birth of the

536 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

latter heralded his mother's death. She had not
spared herself in all the strenuous thirteen years of
war and tumult, during which she had to a great
extent governed Spain ; for Philip, when not absent
in the field, was an obedient husband ; and now, at
the dawn of a period of peace at the beginning of
1714, Maria Louisa died at the age of twenty-six.

Philip was still a young man ; but the dependence
upon his wife, and his long fits of apathy that after-
wards led to lunacy, had made him unfit to fulfil the
duties of his position without a clever helpmeet by
his side. The first result of the death of Maria
Louisa was enormously to increase the influence of
the old Princess of Ursinos. She was the only person
allowed to see the King in his heartbroken grief;
and whilst he was in seclusion in the Medina Celi
palace, the monks were turned out of a neighbouring
monastery that the Princess might stay there and
have free access to the King through a passage made
for the purpose through the walls that separated the
buildings. The gossips very soon began to say that
the King was going to marry the Princess, though
she was old enough to be his grandmother. But, as
usual, the scandalmongers were wrong. The Princess
of Ursinos was far too clever for such a stroke as
that ; but she and others saw that Philip must marry
some one without loss of time, or he would lose what
wits were left to him.

The marriage-mongers of Europe were on the alert,
but the problem to be solved was not an easy one.
A bride must be found whom Louis xiv. would accept,
and yet one not too subservient to orders from France,
nor one who would interfere with the absolute para-
mountcy of the Princess of Ursinos. So all the sug-

ISABEL FARNESK.
Afttr n fainting />// I '«»/

EPILOGUE 537

gestions coming from France were regarded coldly ;
and the Princess set about finding a candidate who
would suit her. There was an Italian priest in Spain
at the time, one Father Alberoni, a cunning rogue,
who could be a buffoon when it suited him, who had
wormed himself into Court circles in the suite of the
Duke of Vendome. This man, a Parmese, came to
the Princess of Ursinos the day after Queen Maria
Louisa Gabriela died and suggested that there was a
modest, submissive little princess at' Parma, the niece
and stepdaughter of the reigning prince, who had no
male heirs, and that this girl was exactly fitted to be
the new consort to Philip v. The Princess of Ursinos
was inclined to regard the idea favourably, for not
only was it evident that so young and humble a
princess would not attempt to interfere with her, but
the match seemed to offer a chance for re-establishing
the lost influence of Spain in Italy. Louis xiv. had
other views for his grandson, and did not take kindly
to the proposal, but he was grudgingly won over by
the Princess of Ursinos, whom he could not afford to
offend. Philip himself was as wax in the hands ot
the old Princess; and on the i6th September 1714
he married by proxy Isabel Farnese, Princess of
Parma.

Isabel Farnese had been represented by Alberoni
as a tractable young maiden, but she was a niece, by
her mother, of the Queen Dowager, Marie Anne of
Neuburg, who was eating her heart out in spite in
her exile at Bayonne ; and Alberoni knew full well
when he suggested the Parmese bride that he was
taking part in a deep-laid conspiracy to overthrow the
Princess of Ursinos. His part was a difficult one to
play at first, for he had to keep up an appearance of

538 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

adhesion to the Princess of Ursinos whilst currying
favour with the coming Queen. Isabel Farnese ap-
proached her new realm with the airs of a conqueror.
She was to have landed at Alicante, and thither went
Alberoni and her Spanish household to receive her :
but she altered her mind suddenly, arid decided to go
overland through the south of France and visit her
aunt Marie Anne at Bayonne. Marie Anne had a
long score of her own to settle with the Princess of
Ursinos, who had kept her in exile, and she instructed
her niece how to proceed to make herself mistress of
her husband's realm.

Isabel Farnese, girl though she was, did not need
much instruction in imperious self-assertion, and began
her operations as soon as she crossed the frontier.
She flatly refused to dismiss her Italian suite, as had
been arranged in accordance with the invariable
Spanish rule, and showed from the first that she
meant to have her own way in all things. She was
in no hurry, moreover, to meet her husband until the
Princess of Ursinos was out of the way ; and when
the latter, in great state, came to meet her at Jadraque,
a short distance from Guadalajara, where the King
was awaiting his bride, Isabel was ready for the
decisive fray which should settle the question as to
who should rule Spain.

The old Princess was quite aware also by this time
that she had to meet a rival, and she began when she
entered the presence by making some remark about
the slowness of the Queen's journey. Hardly were
the words out of her mouth than the young termagant
shouted : * Take this old fool away who dares to come
and insult me : ' and then, in spite of protest and
appeal, the Princess was hustled into a coach to be

EPILOGUE 539

driven into exile through a snowstorm in the winter
night over the bleakest uplands in Europe, Attired
in her Court dress, with no change of garments or
adequate protection against the weather, without
respect, consideration or decency, the aged Princess
was thus expelled from the country she had served
so wisely. She saw now, as she had feared for some
time before, that she had been tricked by the crafty
Italian clown-cleric, and that her day was done.

The dominion of the new Queen Isabel Farnese
over the spirit of Philip v. was soon more complete
even than that of the Princess had been, and a letter
of cold compliment from the King was all the reward
or consolation that the Princess got for her protracted
service to him and his cause in Spain ; services with-
out which, in all human probability, he would never
have retained the crown. So long as Philip had a
masterful woman always by his side to keep him in
leading strings, it mattered little to him who the
woman was ; and Isabel Farnese, bold, ambitious, and
intriguing, ruled Spain in the name of her husband
thenceforward for thirty years. Her system was
neither French nor Spanish, but founded upon the
feline ecclesiastical methods of the smaller Italian
Courts : and the object of Isabel's life was to assert
successfully the rights of her sons to the Italian prin-
cipalities she claimed in virtue of her descent. The
pretext under which she cloaked her aims was the re-
covery of the Spanish influence in the sister Peninsula :
but the wars which resulted were in no sense of Spanish
national concern, but purely Italian and dynastic.

Thus, for many years to come, the progress of Spain
was retarded, and her resources wasted in struggles by
land and sea all over Europe, and with allies and

540 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

opponents constantly changing, with the end of seat-
ing Isabel's Bourbon sons upon Italian thrones. She
succeeded, at the cost of a generation of war, and gave
to Spain once more an appearance of some of her old
potency, thanks to new ideas and more enlightened
administration : but when the successive deaths of her
two stepsons, the heirs of Philip by his first Savoyard
wife, made her own eldest son Charles King of Spain,
Isabel was plainly, but delicately, made to understand
that the destinies of the country must in future be
guided by men, and in enlightened national interests,
and not by women for secondary ends.

Again, on the death of Charles in., the only strong
King since Philip IL, the regal mantle fell upon a weak
uxorious man, whose wife, yet another Maria Louisa,
led Spain by the miry path of disgraceful favouritism to
the great war of Independence — the Peninsular war—
which destroyed what was left of old Spain, and held
up to the derision of the world the reigning family, of
whom Napoleon made such cruel sport.

Forty years more of feminine rule in the next
generation brought the unfortunate country to the
revolution of 1868, and then the dawning came of a
happier day, now brightening to its full. Only half
a century ago the old, old struggle between France
and Germany to provide a Consort for Spain was
engaged anew, and brought England and France upon
the very verge of war. But the fall of the Bourbons
in France and Italy, and the disappearance of the
French monarchy, as a result of the great war between
the Frank and Teuton, still, on the ancient pretext of
their rival interests in Spain, banished, at least for our
time, the dynastic jealousy which had kept Europe at
war for centuries.

EPILOGUE 541

An Austrian Queen Regent has since then ruled
Spain with consummate wisdom and the noblest self-
sacrifice for nearly twenty years ; and France has
watched with sympathy, and no thought of aggression,
the sustained effort of a good woman to hand down
intact to her fatherless son the inheritance to which
he was born. An English Queen Consort sits by the
side of the Spanish King, now, for the first time for
centuries, and yet no breath of discord comes from
other nations to mar the love match that has ended
in a happy marriage.

The world grows wiser at last. The old tradition
that dynastic connection could override irresistible
national tendencies has lingered long, but is really
dying now. Matrimonial alliances between reigning
families are symptoms, not causes, and as the personal
power of the monarch wanes before the growth of
popular government, the influence of the consort
becomes more social, and consequently more personally
interesting.

The stories told in these pages treat of a state of
affairs never likely to recur. They show, amongst
other things, with what little prescience the world
has been governed. The attempt of Ferdinand the
Catholic to make Aragon great by marriage ended
in the swamping of Aragon : the attempt of Charles
v. and his son to dictate the religion of the world,
by means of the strength gained by matrimonial
alliances, ended in the exhaustion and ruin of Spain :
the attempts of France and Germany to obtain control
of Spain by providing consorts for the ruling kings
has ended in neither obtaining what it sought, and
in Spain being as safe from foreign domination of
any sort as any country in Europe. The lesson to

542 QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

be drawn surely is that rulers, grandly as they bulk
for their little day in the eyes of men, are themselves
but puppets, moved by aggregate spontaneous national
forces infinitely more powerful than any individuality
can be, and that a monarch's seeming strength is only
effective so long as it interprets truly the accumulated
impulse, that, in obedience to some harmonious law
as yet uncoded, guides to their destiny the nations of
the earth.

FINIS

INDEX

Adrian, Cardinal, 182, 192

Aguirre, Sefipra, 474

Agreda, Maria de, 354, 357

Aix-la-Chapelle, 391

Alba, 230, 249, 266

Albaicin, 116

Alberoni, Father, 537

Albuera, 52

Albuquerque, Duchess of, 455

Alcantara, Master of, 1 1

Alcazar, 3, 165

Alexander VI., 105

Alexander Farnese, 292

Alfonso v. of Portugal, 9, 1 9

Alphonso (brother of Henry iv),

10, 11, 14
Alhama, 56, 57
Almazan, 162
Almeria, 55, 65
Anne of Austria (wife of Phillip ll), j

314; character, illness and

death, 316
Anna of Austria (Queen of France),

320, 321, 352
Arabic Manuscripts, 116.
Aranda, 24
Aranjuez, 331
Arcos, 177
Arevalo, 200
Armada, 318
Armignac, 5

Arthur, Prince of Wales, 100, 127
Artois, 1 06
Arundel, 220
Astorga, 156
Astorga, Marquis, 424
Augsburg, League of, 463, 480, 487
Aulnoy, Madame d', quoted, 419
Avila, n, 192
Avila, Juan de, 189, 196

Badajoz, 317

Balbeses, Marquis de los, 415, 423

Baltasar Carlos, 334, 358

Barcelona, 46 ; Treaty, 104, 348

Bavaria, Prince of, 495, 500

Baza, 65

Bedford, Earl of, 223

Behovia, 321

' Beltraneja/ the birth, 4 ; be-
trothal, 23 ; betrothal to King
of Portugal, 30 ; marriage, 33,
146

Benavente, Count, 9, 12, 163

Bergues, 230

Berlips, Baroness, 496

Bernaldez, 89

Bertondona, Martin de, 228

Bidasoa, 377, 425

Boabdil, 60, 61, 72

Bobadilla, Beatriz de, 13, 80, 135,
165

Bobadilla, Francisco de, 123

Bonner, 215, 238

Borgia, Francis of, 202

Bourbon, Anthony de, 276

Braganza, Duke of, 348

Brantome, quoted, 283, 303

Bristol, Earl of, 326

Browne, Sir Anthony, 221, 230

Buckingham, Duke of, 325

Buendia, Count, 272

Buen Retire, 328, 342, 429

Burgos, 35, 108, 322

Burgundy, 106

Cabena, 38

Cabero, Juan, 80, 87, 162

Cabra< Count of, 60

Cabrera, Andres, 13, 165

Cabezon, 9

Calais, 249

Calatrova, 42

Calderon, Maria, 333

Cardenoza, 14

Cardona, Folch de, 507, 516, 518

544

QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Cardona, Hugo de, 146

Carew family, 223

Carlos, Don, 288, 296, 309, 310

Carillo, Alfonso, 4, 9, 11, 20, 97

Cartuja de Miraflores, 168

Castanar, 97

Castile, Admiral of, 163

Castile, revolt in, 192

Cateau Cambresis, 262

Catharine of Lancaster, ix.

Cerdagne, 59, 100

' Chambergo ' Regiment, 396, 406

Charles, Archduke, 497

Charles, Prince of Wales, 325

Charles of Viana, 8

Charles II, birth. 382 ; description
as a child, 392, 396 ; recalls
Don Juan, 402 ; banishes Don
Juan to Aragon, 403 ; coming
of age, 403 ; suggestions for
marriage, 414 ; reconciliation
with Mariana, 421 ; journey to
meet Marie Louise, 426 ; mar-
riage, 431 ; neglect of govern
ment, 440 ; jealousy of Mme.
de Villars, 459 ; dismisses
Medina Celi, 463 ; illness at
Aranjuez, 467 ; second mar-
riage, 488 ; meets Marie Anne,
491 ; dismisses Oropesa, 494 ;
increasing weakness, 497 ; ap-
points Prince of Bavaria heir,
500 ; destroys will, 502 ; said
to be bewitched, 514; makes
will in favour of Philip, 524 ;
death, 525

Charles m, 540

Charles v, 105, 179, 184, 189, 243

Charles vm, 62, 75, 100, 104, 108

Chatellerault, 274

Chievres, 185

Chimay, Prince of, 185

Cigales, 9, 1 1

Civil War in Spain, 12, 29

Clarencius, Mrs, 217, 255

Claude of France, 1 27

Cl^rambant, Marechalet 423

Coligny, 247

Columbus, Christopher, 74 ; re-
ceived by Isabel, 78 ; guest of
Deza, 82 ; member of royal
household, 82 ; grant for main-
tenance, 82 ; negotiations with
Portugal, France, and Eng-

land, 82; extravagant demands,
83, 84 ; agreement with Isabel,
89; returns in triumph from first
voyage, 94 ; second voyage, 95,
120; third voyage, 120; im-
prisoned, 123; release, 123;
fourth voyage, 124

Columbus, Diego, 89

Communeros, 192, 198

Compostella, 57

Conchillos, 131, 143

Conde", 354, 376

Consuegra, 383

Conti, Prince of, 417

Cordova, Cardinal, 518

Cordova, Gonzalo de, 65, 105, 118

Corunna, 154, 391

Cotes, Sebastian de, 505

Council of the Indies, 120, 121

Court, Spanish, description, 328,

338, 369, 533
Courtenay, 214
Courtrai, 460
Cranmer, 220
Cromwell, 371
Cuellar, 26
Cueva, Beltran de la, 5, 9, 10

D'assonleville, 254

Denia, Marchioness of, 176

Denia, Marquis of, 187, 194, 198

Deza, Diego, 80

Diaz, Froilan, 506, 519

Dixmunde, 460

Dominicans, 46, 48

Duenas, 21, 38

Dunkirk, 376

Edward iv. of England, 17
Edward vi. of England, 212
Egmont, Count, 221, 230
Egnia, Jeronimo de, 440, 454
Elizabeth of England, 229, 27 1
El Zagal, 60

Emanuel Philibert of Savoy, 247
Emmanuel, King, 106
Enriquez, Juana, 8
Escalas, Conde de, 63
Escorial, 357, 366, 388, 406
Estrada, Duke of, 184
Estremadura, 26

Fadrique, Admiral, 9, 20
Fadrique de Toledo, 346

INDEX

545

Fanshawe, Lady, emoted, 384

Fanshawe, Sir Richard, 383, 390

Feuquieres, 464

Ferdinand of Aragon, 17; marriage,
22 ; in France, 23 ; motto, 33 ;
fight against Moors, 56 ; in
Council at Cordova, 61; rejects
Colon's terms, 83 ; attacked by
lunatic, 93 ; schemes for his
children, 99; treaty with France,
loo ; breaks treaty, 104 ; war
with France, 105 ; quarrel with
son-in-law, 113; represses re-
bellion of Moors, 1 1 8; attempts
to conciliate Philip, 126; ill-
ness, 133 ; claims right to go-
vern Castile, 142 ; ordered to
leave Castile, 145; alliance with
Jimenez, 146 ; contemplates
second marriage, 146 ; alliance
with Louis xil, 147 ; agree-
ment with Philip, 150; treaty,
1 59 ; assumes government of
Castile, 177 ; death, 182

Ferdinand, Emperor, 130

Feria, 230, 251

Fernando, 89

Ferrer, Mosen, 182, 183

Flanders, 354, 390

Flushing, 489

Fonseca, 142

Fontainebleau, 417, 422

France, 100, 105, 128, 248, 316, 319,
346

Franche Comte', 106

Francis II, 293

Francis Phcebus, 61

Galicia, 39

Gardiner, 215, 220

Geneda, Diego de, 217

Germaine de Foix, 147

Giron, Pedro, 12

Gloucester, Duke of, 17

Gomez, Ruy, 230

Grammont, Duke de, 378

Granada, 36, 65 ; siege, 67-72 ;

burning of library, 1 16
Granvelle, quoted, 215
Grey family, 223
Grey, Lady Jane, 213
Grey de Wilton, Lord, 249
Guadalajara, 284
Guadix, 65

Guevara, Anna de, 352
Guevara, Velez de, 337
Guieme, Duke of, 17, 23
Guise, Duke of, 32 1
Guisnes, 249
Guzmans, 39

Harcourt, Duke of, 423, 502, 503
Haro, Count de, 179
Haro, Luis de, 355, 375,383
Harrach, Count, 499
Heliche, Marquis of, 370
Henry n. (of France), 269
Henry IV. (of France), 318, 319
Henry iv. (of Spain), 3 ; impeach-
ment, 1 1 ; death, 26
Henry vii. (of England), 149, 153,

173

Henry viu. (of England), 21 1
Hernandez, Garcia, 75
Hispanola, 121
Horn, Count, 230
Hornillos, 175
House tax, 38
Howell, James, quoted, 329
Huelva, 75

Infantado, Duke of, 38, 272

Inquisition, 46, 48, 448, 514, 516

Isabel, Empress, 209

Isabel Farnese, xiii ; marriage, 537 ;
influence over Philip, 539

Isabel of Bourbon, betrothal, 320 ;
meeting with Philip, 322 ; mar-
riage, 323 ; character aud man-
ners, 327 ; love for stage, 328,
331 ; escape from fire at Aran-
juez, 331 ; birth of son, 333 ;
children, 334 ; rejoicings at
birth of Baltasar Carlos, 334 ;
portraits, 336 ; sells jewels to
provide soldiers, 346 ; struggle
with France, 346 ; breach with
Olivares, 349 ; Regent in ab-
sence of King, 350; demands
dismissal of Olivares, 352 ; ill-
ness, 355 ; death, 356

Isabel of the Peace, xi, xiv ; be-
trothal, 267 ; marriage, 268 ;
journey to Spain, 273 ; meeting
with Philip, 284; smallpox, 286;
illness, 295; letter to Catharine,
299 ; defeats conspiracy in
Navarre, 298; meets her mother

2 M

546

QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

at Bayonne, 302 ; birth of
daughter, 305 ; birth of second
daughter, 308 ; death, 313
Isabel the Catholic, ix ; betrothed
to Charles of Viana, 8 : sug-
gested betrothal to King of
Portugal, 9 ; offered crown, 14;
accepts heirship, 15 ; meeting
with Henry, 16 ; intrigues with
reference to marriage, 1 7 ; mar-
riage, 22 ; deprived of grants
and privileges, 23 ; birth of
first child, 23 ; reconciliation
with Henry, 24 ; revenue, 41 ;
reforms Court, 41 ; treatment
of religious orders, 42 ; influ-
ence of Torquemada, 44; estab-
lishes Inquisition, 47 ; birth of
Prince of the Asturias, 50;
crushes Portuguese, 52 ; ac-
knowledged Queen of Spain,
52 ; birth of third child, 52 ;
war with Moors, 56 ; birth of
fourth child, 60 ; takes com-
mand of campaign against
Moors, 63 ; birth of last
child, 64 ; pledges crown, 66 ;
Queen of Granada, 73 ; terms
with Columbus, 89 ; domestic
life, 95; letter to Talavera, 100 ;
purtication of monasteries, 100;
unification of coinage, 104: mar-
riages of children, 106 ; death
of Juan, 109 ; death of eldest
daughter and her son Miguel,
1 10 ; troubles domestic and
political, no; ill health, in ;
visit of Philip and Joan, 127 ;
wishes in regard to succession,
129; apoplexy, 131 ; will, 135;
codicil, 136; death, 136.
Isle of Pheasants, 378, 425

Jaen, 66

Jamaica, 371

James I. of England, 319, 324

James iv., 107

Jews, 45, 47, 48, 67

Jimenez de Cisneros, Royal Con-
fessor, 97; primate, 99, 136, 158,
164 ; maintains order, 173, 175;
Cardinal, 177; Regent, 182,
191

Joan the Mad, xi ; birth, 52 ; mar-

riage, 106; birth of son, 125;
visit to Spain, takes oath with
her husband as heir of Castile,
127 : receives homage as heir
of Ferdinand, 128; detention
at Medina, 132 ; returns to
Flanders, 133 ; proclaimed
Queen of Castile, 141 ; discord
with husband, 143 ; letter on
being declared unfit to rule, 144 ;
journey to Spain, 150; ship-
wreck and landing in England,

152 ; meeting with Katharine,

153 ; interview with Enriquez,
163; receives oath of allegiance
of Cortes, 164 ; grief for death
of Philip, 1 68 ; refusal to per-
form duties of Government, 171;
pilgrimage to Granada, 171 ;
birth of youngest child, 172 ;
suggested marriage with Henry
VII., 173 ; dismisses Council-
lors of Philip, 175; meeting with
Ferdinand at Tortoles, 176 ;
at Arcos, 177 ; imprisoned at
Tordesillas, 180 ; visited by
Charles and Leonora, 184; pro-
test against treatment, 190 ;
conference with executive body
of Regent's government, 190 ;
receives Padilla, 194; identifies
herself with Revolution, 194 ;
anti-religious tendency, 200 ;
visited by Francis of Borgia,
202 ; illness, 204 ; death, 205

Juan, Prince of Asturias, 50, 54, 106,
109

Juan II., of Aragon, 20

Juan of Austria, 292

Juan Jose, of Austria (Don Juan),
xii, 363, 370, 376, 383^ 387, 3?8,
390, 391 ; controversy with
Mariana, 393 ; Viceroy of Ara-
gon, 396 ; ordered to Sicily,
401 ; recalled by Charles, 402 ;
exiled to Aragon, 403 ; recalled
to Madrid, 405 ; enters Madrid
in State, 408 ; decrease of
power, 418 ; death, 420.

Juan II., of Castile, 3

Katharine of Aragon, 100, 173
Katharine, Infanta, 172, 199

INDEX

547

Laredo, 107

Las Casas, 89

Las Huelgas, 431

Legands, Marquis of, 351, 505

Lerida, 351, 354

Lerma, 323

Lille, 108

Lionne, M. de, 376

Lisle, Count Alva de, 4

Literature, Spanish, 327, 338

London, 153

Lope de Vega, 339, 342

Lotti, Cosme, 344

Louis XL, 61

Louis xii., 133, 147

Louis xin., 320

Louis xiv., 460, 464, 521

Loya, 63

Luis de la Cruz, Friar, 203

Luna, Alvaro de, 27

Luxembourg, 106

Madrigal, 20, 37
Malaga, 55, 64, 118
Maldonado, Dr., 79
Manrique, Pedro, 21
Mansfeldt, Count, 463, 490
Manuel, Juan, 143, 156, 165
Marchena, Antonio de, 79, 120
Margaret, Archduchess, 106, 108-,

H9> *53

Margaret, Empress, 368, 414

Margaret of Austria, 318

Margaret of Savoy, 352

Margaret Tudor, 107

Maria of Hungary, 146

Maria Louisa of Savoy, 532 ; mar-
riage, 532 ; regent in absence
of husband, 533 ; ability and
diligence, 533 ; death, 536

Mariana of Austria, offered in mar-
riage to Baltasar Carlos, 361 ;
marriage to Philip IV. ; meets
Philip at Navalcarnero, 365 ;
birth of a daughter, 368 ;
paralysis, 371 ; birth of son,
373 ; intrigues against Don
Juan, 382 ; birth of a son, 382 ;
growth of power, 382 ; Queen
Regent, 389 ; conspiracy in
favour of Don Juan, 394 ; dis-
misses Nithard, 395; alliance
with England and Holland
against France, 397 ; seeks

help of Don Juan, 398 ; favour
of Valenzucla, 400 ; regency
ends, 402 ; triumph over Don
Juan, 403 ; prisoner in Alcazar,
406 ; banished to Toledo, 406;
reconciled to Charles, 421 ;
return to Court, 421 ; meeting
with Marie Louise, 433 ; treat-
ment of Marie Louise, 444;
plots to ruin Marie Louise,
464 ; plans for succession, 499 ;
death, 500

Maria Theresa, 371, 378, 380, 389,
396, 4H

Marie Anne of Neuburg, married
by proxy, 489 ; journey to
Spain, 489 ; welcome at Cor-
unna, 490 ; sides with enemies
of Oropesa, 493 ; unpopularity,
496 ; summons Count Harrach,
499; efforts to secure succes-
sion of Archduke Charles, 500;
plans to crush Diaz, 517; ac-
cused of witchcraft, 518 ;
secures dismissal of Diaz, 529 ;
head of Council of Regency,

526 ; banished to Toledo, 526 ;
visited by Philip V., 526 ; sides
with Austria, 527 ; banished to
Bayonne, 527 ; returns to Spain,

527 ; death, 527

Marie Louise of Orleans, 415 ; love
for Dauphin, 416; betrothed
to King of Spain, 417 ; mar-
riage by proxy, 418; journey
to Spain, 423 ; household, 424 ;
letter to Charles, 427 ; mar-
riage at Quintanapalla, 431 ;
meeting with Mariana, 433 ;
isolation at Burgos, 433 ; entry
into Madrid, 439 ; frivolity,
444 ; humoured by Mariana,
444; growing interest in public
affairs, 456 ; discord with
Mariana and Charles, 456 ;
unhappiness, 457 ; influence of
Madame Quantin, 458 ; re-
proached for sterility, 458 ; ac-
cused of plotting against King,
468 ; French expelled from
palace, 469 ; letter to Louis
xiv. re Saint Chamans, 472 ;
smallpox, 479 ; illness, 480 ;
death, 48 1

548

QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Martinez, Friar, 385

Mary Of England, 213; plans for
marriage, 214-220; accepts
Philip, 223 ; presents, 224 ;
meeting with Philip, 232 ; mar-
riage, 234 ; parting from Philip,
241 ; Queen of Spain, 243 ;
war with France, 247 ; illness,
254 ; death, 256

Mary Queen of Scots, 263, 290

Matienza, Friar, 112

Matilla, Father, 493, 504, 506, 507

Maurice of Saxony, 212

Maximilian, 113, 133, 148, 179, 190

Mayenne, Duke of, 320, 382

Mazarin, 376, 382

Medici, Catharine de, 267

Medici, Marie de, 320, 321

Medillin, Count, 1 1

Medina, 34

Medina Celi, Duke of, befriends
Colon, 76

Medina Celi, Duke of (under
Charles), 415, 440, 453, 459,

463

Medina del Campo, 48, 56
Medina de las Torres, Duke of,

386, 387

Medina Sidonia, Duke of, 56, 76
Melcombe Regis, 153
Mello, 354

Mendoza, Cardinal, 19, 59, 80, 97
Mendoza, Bishop of Segovia, 519
Mendoza, Diego Hurtado de, 217
Metz, 212
Montalto, Duke of, quoted, 464,

470, 473, 475, 476, 477
Montenegro, 401
Monterey, Count, 505
Montgomerie, Sieur de 1'Orge, 269
Montmorenci, 247
Moors, 55, 116, r.?8
Moscoso, 388

Moslems, iitf, 119
Muley Abul nassan,
Murcientes, 163
Muza, 72

55

New Hall, 213
Nimeguen, 414
Nithai:d, Father Everard, 382, 389,

393, 394 5 dismissed, 395
Noailles, Antoine de, 213, 220, 229,

238

Novas, Marquis de las, 224

Ojeda, 47

Olivarez, Caspar de Guzman, Count
of, 230, 324, 345 ; breach with
Queen, 349 ; fall, 353

Olivarez, Countess of, 339

Olmedo, 13

Onate, 427

Orange, Prince of, 487

Oropesa, Count of, 463, 482 ; dis-
missed, 494, 501-512

Osma, 21

Osorio, Isabel de, 217, 265

Osuna, Duke of, 418, 425

Ovando, Nicolas de, 123

Padilla, 194, 224

Paget, 220

Palencia, 175

Palos, 75

Passau, 212

Pastrana, Duke of, 320

Patino, 393

Perez, Friar Juan, 75, 80, 85

Peter Martyr, 112

Petre, 220

Philip ii., 202 ; Regent, 209 ; be-
trothed to Mary, 223 ; journey
to England, 226 ; marriage,
234 ; leaves England, 241 ;
returns, 245 ; proposal of mar-
riage to Elizabeth, 262 ; union
with France, 263 ; marriage to
Isabel, 267 ; poverty, 293 ;
marriage to Anne, 314

Philip in., 318

Philip iv., betrothed, 320 ; marriage,
323 ; succeeds, 323 ; character,
324, 328; jealousy, 330; in-
trigue with Maria Calderon,
333; birth of son, 334; leads
armies in Catalonia, 350 ; re-
turns to Madrid, 351 ; letter to
Maria de Agredo ; grief at
loss of son, 362 ; marriage to
Mariana, 363 ; poverty, 372 ;
birth of son, 373 ; journey to
French frontier, 379 ; ill-health,
383 ; reported bewitched, 384 ;
will, 386 ; death, 387

Philip v., 523, 526 ; marriage, 532 ;
in Italy, 533 ; second marriage,
537

INDEX

549

Philip of Burgundy, 108 ; assumes
title, Prince of Castile, 113,
127, 128, 133 ; intrigues with
England, 149, 153; treaty with
Ferdinand, 159; death, 166
Philip Prosper, 374, 381
Plascencia, 1 1

Pole, Cardinal, 214, 220, 245
Portocarrero, Cardinal, 493, 522
Portugal, throws off Spanish yoke,
348 ; independence recognised,

390
Pyrenees, Peace of, 379

Quantin, Madame, 458, 465, 468
Quevedo, 337
Quintanapalla, 429
Quintanilla, Alfonso de, 79

Raleigh, 324

Ramur, 108

Ratisbon, Treaty of, 460

Ravaillac, 319

Rebenac, 480

Religious Orders, 42

Renard, Simon, 213

Richelieu, 321

Richmond, 153

Rio Seco, Duke of, 505, 518

Rieux, Madame, 282

Riquelme, Maria de, 340

Rivers, Lord, 63

Rocaberti, 514, 517

Roche sur Yon, 273

Rocroy, 354

Rojas, Bishop, 192

Roncesvalles, 276

Ronquillo, Francisco, 505

Rosellon, 59, 100, 378

Ruiz, 116

Russell, Anmiral, 489

Ryswick, Peace of, 501

' Sacred Brotherhood,' 37

Saint Chamans, 471

St. Jean de Luz, 425

St. Jean Pied de Port, 277

St. Jerome, monastery of, 313, 322

Salamanca, 10, 150

Salic Law, 31

Salmas, Countess of, 182

Sanchez, Gabriel, 94

Sandwich, Lord, 390

Santa Fd, 69

Sant'angel, Luis de, 78, 80, 87
Santa Maria de la Rabida, 75
Santa Maria del Campo, 177
Santiago, 39
Segovia, 9, 10, 165
Seville, 39, 48
Sicily, 398, 414
Soissons, Countess of, 475
Soto, Dr., 204
Spinola, 346

Stanhope, Colonel, quoted, 490, 491,
498, 500, 509, 510, 513, 515,

517
Suffolk, Earl of, 152

Talavera, Father, 51, 57, 59, 79, 93,

116

Tavara, Francisca de, 330
Tendilla, Count, 72, 93, 1 16
Terranova, Duchess of, 414, 429,

454

Tilly, 346

Toledo, 54, 127

Tordesillas, 33, 180; battle, 196

Toro, 34, 36, 142

Torquemada, 44, 46 ; inquisitor-
general, 49, 57, 59

Torquemada (town), 172

Trenchard, Sir John, 152

Uceda, Duke of, 321
Urena, Countess of, 282
Ursinos, Princess of, 532, 534, 535,
536,538

Valde's, Pedro, 328
Valentinois, Duchess, 267 . .
Valenzuela, Fernando de, 398 ;

honours, 403, 405 ; flight, 406 ;

imprisoned at Consuegra, 408
Valladolid, 9, 20, 32, 1.54, 164, 223
Vanguyonr 461
Vancelles, 262
Vega, Garcilaso da 13, 163
Velazquez, 335, 337 "
Velazquez, Diego de Silva, 380
Velez, 55
Velez- Malaga, 64
Vendome, Duke of, 273
Venta de los Toros de Guisando,

16

Verjus, Father, 464
Vilaine, 468
Villafafila, 159

550

QUEENS OF OLD SPAIN

Villalar, 198, 209
Villamediana, Count of, 330, 331
Villars, Mme. de, quoted, 426, 433,

435. 443, 445, 446
Villars, Marquis de, 420, 431, 459
Villena, Marquis of, 5, 9, n, 175
Vistahermosa, Duchess of, 50
Vivero, Juan, 22

Westphalia, Treaty of, 364

Weymouth, 151
Winchester, 232
Windsor, 152
Wyatt family, 223

Zahara, 56

Zamora, 35, 36

Zoraya, 62

Zufiiga, Diego Lopez de, 12

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