Volume II Part 24 (1/2)
Ordinances were also pa.s.sed for encouraging the breed of horses, which had suffered greatly from the preference very generally given by the Spaniards to mules. This had been carried to such a length, that, while it was nearly impossible, according to Bernaldez, to mount ten or twelve thousand cavalry on horses, ten times that number could be provided with mules.
(Reyes Catolicos, MS., cap. 184.) ”E porque si a esto se diesse lugar,”
says one of the _pragmaticas_, adverting to this evil, ”muy prestamente se perderia en nuestros reynos la n.o.bleza de la cauelleria que en ellos suele auer, e se oluidaria el exercicio militar de que en los tiempos pa.s.sados nuestra nacion de Espana ha alcancado gran fama e loor;” it was ordered that no person in the kingdom should be allowed to keep a mule, unless he owned a horse also; and that none but ecclesiastics and women should be allowed the use of mules in the saddle. These edicts were enforced with the utmost rigor, the king himself setting the example of conformity to them. By these seasonable precautions, the breed of Spanish horses, so long noted throughout Europe, was restored to its ancient credit, and the mule consigned to the humble and appropriate offices of drudgery, or raised only for exportation. For these and similar provisions, see Pragmaticas del Reyno, fol. 127-132.
Mateo Aleman's whimsical _picaresco_ novel, Guzman d'Alfarache, contains a comic adventure, showing the excessive rigor with which the edict against mules was enforced, as late as the close of Philip II.'s reign. The pa.s.sage is extracted in Roscoe's elegant version of the Spanish Novelists, Vol. I. p. 132.
[13] See a copy of the ordinance taken from the Archives of Simancas; apud Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. apend. 13.
When Francis I, who was destined to feel the effects of this careful military discipline, beheld, during his detention in Spain in the beginning of the following century, striplings with scarce down upon the chin, all armed with swords at their sides, he is said to have cried out, ”O bienaventurada Espana, que pare y eria los hombres armados!” (L.
Marineo, Cosas Memorables, lib. 5.) An exclamation not unworthy of a Napoleon,--or an Attila.
CHAPTER IV.
ALLIANCES OF THE ROYAL FAMILY.--DEATH OF PRINCE JOHN AND PRINCESS ISABELLA.
Royal Family of Castile.--Matrimonial Alliances with Portugal.--With Austria.--Marriage of John and Margaret.--Death of Prince John.--The Queen's Resignation.--Independence of the Cortes of Aragon.--Death of the Princess Isabella.--Recognition of her Infant Son Miguel.
The credit and authority which the Castilian sovereigns established by the success of their arms, were greatly raised by the matrimonial connections which they formed for their children. This was too important a spring of their policy to be pa.s.sed over in silence. Their family consisted of one son and four daughters, whom they carefully educated in a manner befitting their high rank; and who repaid their solicitude by exemplary filial obedience, and the early manifestation of virtues rare even in a private station. [1] They seem to have inherited many of the qualities which distinguished their ill.u.s.trious mother; great decorum and dignity of manners, combined with ardent sensibilities, and unaffected piety, which, at least in the eldest and favorite daughter, Isabella, was, unhappily, strongly tinctured with bigotry. They could not, indeed, pretend to their mother's comprehensive mind, and talent for business, although there seems to have been no deficiency in these respects; or, if any, it was most effectually supplied by their excellent education. [2]
The marriage of the princess Isabella with Alonso, the heir of the Portuguese crown, in 1490, has been already noticed. This had been eagerly desired by her parents, not only for the possible contingency, which it afforded, of bringing the various monarchies of the Peninsula under one head, (a design of which they never wholly lost sight,) but from the wish to conciliate a formidable neighbor, who possessed various means of annoyance, which he had shown no reluctance to exert. The reigning monarch, John the Second, a bold and crafty prince, had never forgotten his ancient quarrel with the Spanish sovereigns in support of their rival Joanna Beltraneja, or Joanna the Nun, as she was generally called in the Castilian court after she had taken the veil. John, in open contempt of the treaty of Alcantara, and indeed of all monastic rule, had not only removed his relative from the convent of Santa Clara, but had permitted her to a.s.sume a royal state, and subscribe herself ”I the Queen.” This empty insult he accompanied with more serious efforts to form such a foreign alliance for the liberated princess as should secure her the support of some arm more powerful than his own, and enable her to renew the struggle for her inheritance with better chance of success. [3] These flagrant proceedings had provoked the admonitions of the Roman see, and had formed the topic, as may be believed, of repeated, though ineffectual remonstrance from the court of Castile. [4]
It seemed probable that the union of the princess of the Asturias with the heir of Portugal, as originally provided by the treaty of Alcantara, would so far identify the interests of the respective parties as to remove all further cause of disquietude. The new bride was received in Portugal in a spirit which gave cordial a.s.surance of these friendly relations for the future; and the court of Lisbon celebrated the auspicious nuptials with the gorgeous magnificence, for which, at this period of its successful enterprise, it was distinguished above every other court in Christendom.
[5]
Alonso's death, a few months after this event, however, blighted the fair hopes which had begun to open of a more friendly feeling between the two countries. His unfortunate widow, unable to endure the scenes of her short-lived happiness, soon withdrew into her own country to seek such consolation as she could find in the bosom of her family. There, abandoning herself to the melancholy regrets to which her serious and pensive temper naturally disposed her, she devoted her hours to works of piety and benevolence, resolved to enter no more into engagements, which had thrown so dark a cloud over the morning of her life. [6]
On King John's death, in 1495, the crown of Portugal devolved on Emanuel, that enlightened monarch, who had the glory in the very commencement of his reign of solving the grand problem, which had so long perplexed the world, of the existence of an undiscovered pa.s.sage to the east. This prince had conceived a pa.s.sion for the young and beautiful Isabella during her brief residence in Lisbon; and, soon after his accession to the throne, he despatched an emba.s.sy to the Spanish court inviting her to share it with him. But the princess, wedded to the memory of her early love, declined the proposals, notwithstanding they were strongly seconded by the wishes of her parents, who, however, were unwilling to constrain their daughter's inclinations on so delicate a point, trusting perhaps to the effects of time, and the perseverance of her royal suitor. [7]
In the mean while, the Catholic sovereigns were occupied with negotiations for the settlement of the other members of their family. The ambitious schemes of Charles the Eighth established a community of interests among the great European states, such as had never before existed, or, at least, been understood; and the intimate relations thus introduced naturally led to intermarriages between the princ.i.p.al powers, who, until this period, seem to have been severed almost as far asunder as if oceans had rolled between them. The Spanish monarchs, in particular, had rarely gone beyond the limits of the Peninsula for their family alliances. The new confederacy into which Spain had entered, now opened the way to more remote connections, which were destined to exercise a permanent influence on the future politics of Europe. It was while Charles the Eighth was wasting his time at Naples, that the marriages were arranged between the royal houses of Spain and Austria, by which the weight of these great powers was thrown into the same scale, and the balance of Europe unsettled for the greater part of the following century. [8]
The treaty provided, that Prince John, the heir of the Spanish monarchies, then in his eighteenth year, should be united with the princess Margaret, daughter of the emperor Maximilian; and that the archduke Philip, his son and heir, and sovereign of the Low Countries in his mother's right, should marry Joanna, second daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. No dowry was to be required with either princess. [9]
In the course of the following year, arrangements were also concluded for the marriage of the youngest daughter of the Castilian sovereigns with a prince of the royal house of England, the first example of the kind for more than a century. [10] Ferdinand had cultivated the good-will of Henry the Seventh, in the hope of drawing him into the confederacy against the French monarch; and in this had not wholly failed, although the wary king seems to have come into it rather as a silent partner, if we may so say, than with the intention of affording any open or very active co-operation.
[11] The relations of amity between the two courts were still further strengthened by the treaty of marriage above alluded to, finally adjusted October 1st, 1496, and ratified the following year, between Arthur, prince of Wales, and the infanta Dona Catalina, conspicuous in English history, equally for her misfortunes and her virtues, as Catharine of Aragon. [12]
The French viewed with no little jealousy the progress of these various negotiations, which they zealously endeavored to thwart by all the artifices of diplomacy. But King Ferdinand had sufficient address to secure in his interests persons of the highest credit at the courts of Henry and Maximilian, who promptly acquainted him with the intrigues of the French government, and effectually aided in counteracting them. [13]
The English connection was necessarily deferred for some years, on account of the youth of the parties, neither of whom exceeded eleven years of age.
No such impediment occurred in regard to the German alliances, and measures were taken at once for providing a suitable conveyance for the infanta Joanna into Flanders, which should bring back the princess Margaret on its return. By the end of summer, in 1496, a fleet consisting of one hundred and thirty vessels, large and small, strongly manned and thoroughly equipped with all the means of defence against the French cruisers, was got ready for sea in the ports of Guipuscoa and Biscay. [14]
The whole was placed under the direction of Don Fadrique Enriquez, admiral of Castile, who carried with him a splendid show of chivalry, chiefly drawn from the northern provinces of the kingdom. A more gallant and beautiful armada never before quitted the sh.o.r.es of Spain. The infanta Joanna, attended by a numerous suite, arrived on board the fleet towards the end of August, at the port of Laredo, on the eastern borders of the Asturias, where she took a last farewell of the queen her mother, who had postponed the hour of separation as long as possible, by accompanying her daughter to the place of embarkation.
The weather soon after her departure became extremely rough and tempestuous; and it was so long before any tidings of the squadron reached the queen, that her affectionate heart was filled with the most distressing apprehensions. She sent for the oldest and most experienced navigators in these boisterous northern seas, consulting them, says Martyr, day and night on the probable causes of delay, the prevalent courses of the winds at that season, and the various difficulties and dangers of the voyage; bitterly regretting that the troubles with France prevented any other means of communication, than the treacherous element to which she had trusted her daughter. [15] Her spirits were still further depressed at this juncture by the death of her own mother, the dowager Isabella, who, under the mental infirmity with which she had been visited for many years, had always experienced the most devoted attention from her daughter, who ministered to her necessities with her own hands, and watched over her declining years with the most tender solicitude.[16]
At length, the long-desired intelligence came of the arrival of the Castilian fleet at its place of destination. It had been so grievously shattered, however, by tempests, as to require being refitted in the ports of England. Several of the vessels were lost, and many of Joanna's attendants perished from the inclemency of the weather, and the numerous hards.h.i.+ps to which they were exposed. The infanta, however, happily reached Flanders in safety, and, not long after, her nuptials with the archduke Philip were celebrated in the city of Lisle with all suitable pomp and solemnity.
The fleet was detained until the ensuing winter, to transport the destined bride of the young prince of the Asturias to Spain. This lady, who had been affianced in her cradle to Charles the Eighth of France, had received her education in the court of Paris. On her intended husband's marriage with the heiress of Brittany, she had been returned to her native land under circ.u.mstances of indignity never to be forgiven by the house of Austria. She was now in the seventeenth year of her age, and had already given ample promise of those uncommon powers of mind which distinguished her in riper years, and of which she has left abundant evidence in various written compositions. [17]
On her pa.s.sage to Spain, in midwinter, the fleet encountered such tremendous gales, that part of it was s.h.i.+p-wrecked, and Margaret's vessel had wellnigh foundered. She retained, however, sufficient composure amidst the perils of her situation, to indite her own epitaph, in the form of a pleasant distich, which Pontenelle has made the subject of one of his amusing dialogues, where he affects to consider the fort.i.tude displayed by her at this awful moment as surpa.s.sing that of the philosophic Adrian in his dying hour, or the vaunted heroism of Cato of Utica. [18]