Volume III Part 15 (2/2)
[54] If we are to believe Florez, the king wore no s.h.i.+rt but of the queen's making. ”Preciabase de no haverse puesto su marido camisa, que elle no huviesse hilado y cosido.” (Reynas Catholicas, tom. ii. p. 832.) If this be taken literally, his wardrobe, considering the mult.i.tude of her avocations, must have been indifferently furnished.
[55] Among many evidences of this, what other need be given than her conduct at the famous riot at Segovia? Part I. Chapter 6, of this History.
[56] Pulgar, Reyes Catolicos, part. 1, cap. 4.--”No fue la Reyna,” says L.
Marineo, ”de animo menos fuerte para sufrir los dolores corporales. Porque como yo fuy informado de las duenas que le servian en la camara, ni en los dolores que padescia de sus enfermidades, ni en los del parto (que es cosa de grande admiracion) nunca la vieron quexar se; antes con increyble y maravillosa fortaleza los suffria y dissimulava.” (Cosas Memorables, fol.
186.) To the same effect writes the anonymous author of the ”Carro de las Donas,” apud Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. p. 559.
[57] ”Era firme en sus propositos, de los quales se retraia con gran dificultad.” Pulgar, Reyes Catolicos, part. 1, cap. 4.
[58] The reader may refresh his recollection of Ta.s.so's graceful sketch of Erminia in similar warlike panoply.
”Col durissimo acciar preme ed offende Il delicato collo e l'aurea chioma; E la tenera man lo scudo prende Pur troppo grave e insopportabil soma.
Cosi tutta di ferro intorno splende, E in atto militar se stessa doma.”
Gerusalemme Liberata, canto 6, stanza 92.
[59] Viaggio, fol. 27.
[60] We find one of the first articles in the marriage treaty with Ferdinand enjoining him to cherish, and treat her mother with all reverence, and to provide suitably for her royal maintenance. (Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. Apend. no. 1.) The author of the ”Carro de las Donas” thus notices her tender devotedness to her parent, at a later period. ”Y esto me dijo quien lo vido por sus proprios ojos, que la Reyna Dona Isabel, nuestra senora, cuando estaba alli en Arevalo visitando a su madre, ella misma por su persona servia a su misma madre. E aqui tomen ejemplo los hijos como han de servir a sus padres, pues una Reina tan poderosa y en negocios tan arduos puesta, todos los mas de los anos (puesto todo aparte y pospuesto) iba a visitar a su madre y la servia humilmente.” Viaggio, p. 557.
[61] Among other little tokens of mutual affection, it may be mentioned that not only the public coin, but their furniture, books, and other articles of personal property, were stamped with their initials, F & I, or emblazoned with their devices, his being a yoke, and hers a sheaf of arrows. (Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS., bat. 1, quinc. 2, dial. 3.) It was common, says Oviedo, for each party to take a device, whose initial corresponded with that of the name of the other; as was the case here, with _jugo_ and _flechas_.
[62] Marineo thus speaks of the queen's discreet and most amiable conduct in these delicate matters. ”Amava en tanta manera al Rey su marido, que andava sobre aviso con celos a ver si el amava a otras. Y si sentia que mirava a alguna dama o donzella de su casa con senal de amores, con mucha prudencia buscava medios y maneras con que despedir aquella tal persona de su casa, con su mucha honrra y provecho.” (Cosas Memorables, fol. 182.) There was unfortunately too much cause for this uneasiness. See Part II.
Chapter 24, of this History.
[63] The best beloved of her friends, probably, was the marchioness of Moya, who, seldom separated from her royal mistress through life, had the melancholy satisfaction of closing her eyes in death. Oviedo, who saw them frequently together, says, that the queen never addressed this lady, even in later life, with any other than the endearing t.i.tle of _hija marquesa_, ”daughter marchioness.” Quincuagenas, MS., bat. 1, quinc. 1, dial. 23
[64] As was the case with Cardenas, the comendador mayor, and the grand cardinal Mendoza, to whom, as we have already seen, she paid the kindest attentions during their last illness. While in this way she indulged the natural dictates of her heart, she was careful to render every outward mark of respect to the memory of those whose rank or services ent.i.tled them to such consideration. ”Quando,” says the author so often quoted, ”quiera que fallescia alguno de los grandes de su reyno, o algun principe Christiano, luego embiavan varones sabios y religiosos para consolar a sus heredores y deudos. Y demas desto se vestian de ropas de luto en testimonio del dolor y sentimiento que hazian.” L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 185.
[65] Her humanity was shown in her attempts to mitigate the ferocious character of those national amus.e.m.e.nts, the bull-fights, the popularity of which throughout the country was too great, as she intimates in one of her letters, to admit of her abolis.h.i.+ng them altogether. She was so much moved at the sanguinary issue of one of these combats, which she witnessed at Arevalo, says a contemporary, that she devised a plan, by guarding the horns of the bulls, for preventing any serious injury to the men and horses; and she never would attend another of these spectacles until this precaution had been adopted. Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS.
[66] Isabella, the name of the Catholic queen, is correctly rendered into English by that of Elizabeth.
[67] She gave evidence of this, in the commutation of the sentence she obtained for the wretch who stabbed her husband, and whom her ferocious n.o.bles would have put to death, without the opportunity of confession and absolution, that ”his soul might perish with his body!” (See her letter to Talavera.) She showed this merciful temper, so rare in that rough age, by dispensing altogether with the preliminary barbarities, sometimes prescribed by the law in capital executions. Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. Il.u.s.t. 13.
[68] Hume admits, that, ”unhappily for literature, at least for the learned of this age, Queen Elizabeth's vanity lay more in s.h.i.+ning by her own learning, than in encouraging men of genius by her liberality.”
[69] Which of the two, the reader of the records of these times may be somewhat puzzled to determine.--If one need be convinced how many faces history can wear, and how difficult it is to get at the true one, he has only to compare Dr. Lingard's account of this reign with Mr. Turner's.
Much obliquity was to be expected, indeed, from the avowed apologist of a persecuted party, like the former writer. But it attaches, I fear, to the latter in more than one instance,--as in the reign of Richard III., for example. Does it proceed from the desire of saying something new on a beaten topic, where the new cannot always be true? Or, as is most probable, from that confiding benevolence, which throws somewhat of its own light over the darkest shades of human character? The unprejudiced reader may perhaps agree, that the balance of this great queen's good and bad qualities is held with a more steady and impartial hand by Mr. Hallam than any preceding writer.
[70] The unsuspicious testimony of her G.o.dson, Harrington, places these foibles in the most ludicrous light. If the well-known story, repeated by historians, of the three thousand dresses left in her wardrobe at her decease, be true, or near truth, it affords a singular contrast with Isabella's taste in these matters.
[71] The reader will remember how effectually they answered this purpose in the Moorish war. See Part I. Chapter 14, of this History.
[72] It is scarcely necessary to mention the names of Hatton and Leicester, both recommended to the first offices in the state chiefly by their personal attractions, and the latter of whom continued to maintain the highest place in his sovereign's favor for thirty years or more, in despite of his total dest.i.tution of moral worth.
[73] Queen Elizabeth, indeed, in a declaration to her people, proclaims, ”We know not, nor have any meaning to allow, that any of our subjects should be molested, either by examination or inquisition, in any matter of faith, as long as they shall profess the Christian faith.” (Turner's Elizabeth, vol. ii. p. 241, note.) One is reminded of Parson Thwack.u.m's definition in ”Tom Jones,” ”When I mention religion, I mean the Christian religion; and not only the Christian religion, but the Protestant religion; and not only the Protestant religion, but the church of England.” It would be difficult to say which fared worst, Puritans or Catholics, under this system of toleration.
[74] ”Quum generosi,” says Paolo Giovio, speaking of her, ”prudentisque animi magnitudine, tum pudicitiae et pietatis laude antiquis heroidibus comparanda.” (Vitae Ill.u.s.t. Virorum, p. 205.) Guicciardini eulogizes her as ”Donna di onestissimi costumi, e in concetto grandissimo nei Regni suoi di magnanimita e prudenza.” (Istoria, lib. 6.) The _loyal serviteur_ notices her death in the following chivalrous strain. ”L'an 1506, une des plus triumphantes e glorieuses dames qui puis mille ans ait este sur terre alla de vie a trespas; ce fut la royne Ysabel de Castille, qui ayda, le bras arme, a conquester le royaulme de Grenade sur les Mores. Je veux bien a.s.seurer aux lecteurs de ceste presente hystoire, que sa vie a este telle, qu'elle a bien merite couronne de laurier apres sa mort.” Memoires de Bayard, chap. 26.--See also Comines, Memoires, chap. 23.--Navagiero, Viaggio, fol. 27.--et al. auct.
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