The death of Isabella gives a new complexion to our history. We have been made conscious of her presence and parental supervision, by the maintenance of order and the general prosperity of the nation. Her death will make us more sensible of this influence, since it was the signal for disorders which even the genius and authority of Ferdinand were unable to suppress.

While the queen’s remains were yet scarcely cold, King Ferdinand took the usual measures for announcing the succession. He resigned the crown of Castile, which he had worn with so much glory for thirty years. From a platform raised in the great square of Toledo, the heralds proclaimed, with sound of trumpet, the accession of Philip and Juana to the Castilian throne, and the royal standard was unfurled by the duke of Alva in honour of the illustrious pair. The king of Aragon then publicly assumed the title of administrator or governor of Castile, as provided by the queen’s testament, and received the obeisance of such of the nobles as were present, in his new capacity. These proceedings took place on the evening of the same day on which the queen expired.

A circular letter was next addressed to the principal cities, requiring them, after the customary celebration of the obsequies of their late sovereign, to raise the royal banners in the name of Juana; and writs were immediately issued in her name, without mention of Philip’s, for the convocation of a cortes to ratify these proceedings. The assembly met at Toro, January 11th, 1505. The queen’s will, or rather that portion of it which related to the succession, was read aloud, and received the entire approbation of the commons, who, together with the grandees and prelates present, took the oaths of allegiance to Juana as queen and lady proprietor, and to Philip as her husband. They then determined that the exigency contemplated in the testament, of Juana’s incapacity, actually existed, and proceeded to tender their homage to King Ferdinand, as the lawful governor of the realm in her name. The latter in turn made the customary oath to respect the laws and liberties of the kingdom, and the whole was terminated by an embassy from the cortes, with a written account of its proceedings, to their new sovereigns in Flanders.

All seemed now done that was demanded for giving a constitutional sanction to Ferdinand’s authority as regent. By the written law of the land, the sovereign was empowered to nominate a regency in case of the minority or incapacity of the heir-apparent. This had been done in the present instance by Isabella, at the earnest solicitation of the cortes, made two years previous to her death. It had received the cordial approbation of that body, which had undeniable authority to control such testamentary provisions. Thus, from the first to the last stage of the proceeding, the whole had gone on with a scrupulous attention to constitutional forms. Yet the authority of the new regent was far from being firmly seated; and it was the conviction of this which had led him to accelerate measures.b

Before Isabella breathed her last, the dissensions commenced. That, by the Castilian laws, Juana was now both queen and proprietor of the kingdom, and that Philip, in right of his marriage, might claim not only the regal title, but a considerable share in the administration, were admitted by many. On the other hand, the last will of Isabella, who had constituted her husband regent until the majority of Charles, the experience of that prince, the success of his past government, the solid benefits which he had conferred on the state, and the unpopular character of Philip, as well as his ignorance of the language, laws, and manners of Castile—induced all the sober-judging and patriotic part of the nation to wish for a continuance of the present rule. Unfortunately, however, the momentous question was agitated with more prejudice than reason. The efforts of Ferdinand to curb the violence of the aristocracy, his prudent economy, his firm sway, and the aversion of many Castilians to the sole domination of an Aragonese, had created many enemies. More hoped that, under a weak and lenient prince like Philip, their love of power and their avarice would be equally gratified. Hence, it is no wonder that an opposition, at once systematic and violent, was formed to the pretensions of Ferdinand—an opposition too loud to permit the soft whisper of policy or gratitude to be heard.

Ferdinand was fond of power, and his first steps showed that he would strive to maintain it. Not a few of the discontented, because disappointed, nobles retired from Toro in disgust, assembled others of the same faction at Valladolid, and wrote letters to Philip, then governor of Flanders, pressing him to come and assume the administration of the kingdom. The archduke, eager to seize his consort’s inheritance, had the insolence to order his father-in-law to retire into Aragon, against whose every act of government, since the death of Isabella, he equally protested.

Ferdinand replied that the affair must be settled by negotiation; that in no case would he resign the regency until his daughter and son-in-law arrived in Castile. At the same time, he solicited from the queen, then with her husband in Flanders, the confirmation of his powers as regent. She caused the instrument to be prepared; but the treachery of a servant exposed the intrigue to Philip, who placed her in close confinement, and lost even the semblance of respect towards her. The latter also entered into an alliance with Louis XII of France, the enemy of Ferdinand, by whose aid he hoped to make head against the regent. In the meantime, the factious nobles, who, though constituting a minority in point of numbers, were all-powerful from their stations and alliances, continually urged Philip to appear among them and throw every obstacle in the path of the regent. Seeing the ungrateful return of a people for whom he had done so much, whose glory and happiness he had so successfully laboured to promote, and still more offended, perhaps, with the insults of his profligate son-in-law, the king of Aragon seriously planned a suitable revenge: it was to remarry, and leave to the issue arising from it the kingdom of Naples, which he had united with Aragon, or, perhaps, even Aragon itself.d

Robertsonc explains his plan as follows: “Exasperated at this universal defection, and mortified, perhaps, at seeing all his schemes defeated by a younger politician, Ferdinand resolved, in defiance of the law of nations and of decency, to deprive his daughter and her posterity of the crown of Castile, rather than renounce the regency of that kingdom. His plan for accomplishing this was no less bold than the intention itself was wicked. He demanded in marriage Juana, the supposed daughter of Henry IV.” But this Dunhamd indignantly denies: “Surely this historian must have known that this pretended negotiation with the Portuguese king was but a calumny, invented by the enemies of Ferdinand, to discredit him with the people. By no contemporary writer is it mentioned otherwise than a rumour, and by all it is treated with the contempt it deserves. The age of the princess, which was full forty-four years, sufficiently exposes the malignity.” Other historians, however, accept the scheme as quite within Ferdinand’s capabilities. Martin Humee shares this opinion with Carbajal,f Zurita,g Mariana,h Sandoval,i and Clemencin,j while Burkek says epigrammatically: “The rights of Juana, surnamed La Beltraneja, born in wedlock and recognised by her father, King Henry IV, as his successor on his throne, had only been subordinated to those of her aunt Isabella by force of arms. And Ferdinand, who had entered Castile in 1469 by marrying her rival and denying her legitimacy, now proposed to remain in Castile in 1505 by asserting her legitimacy and marrying her himself! But the lady refused to entertain his proposals, and the legitimate queen of Spain remained unwedded in her Portuguese convent.”a

He solicited the hand of Germaine de Foix, niece of Louis XII, who eagerly granted it. This intelligence was a thunderbolt to Philip, who now consented to negotiate; and it was accordingly agreed, by the agents of the two princes, at Salamanca, that the kingdom should be governed by Juana, Ferdinand, and Philip, each possessing equal authority; and that all public instruments should bear the three names. The Austrian, however, had no intention of observing the treaty: early in 1506, he embarked for Spain with his consort; but contrary winds forced him to England, where he was detained, during three months, by the ungenerous policy of Henry VII. The king of France had refused him a passage through that kingdom until he had come to a better understanding with the regent—in fact, Charles could not, as a close ally of Ferdinand, permit an expedition through his states, evidently hostile to that ally. When Ferdinand heard of the archduke’s embarkation, he caused prayers to be offered up for a prosperous voyage, and ordered a fleet to be equipped to convoy the new sovereigns into the peninsula. He had just celebrated his marriage with the princess Germaine, when his daughter and the archduke landed at Corunna.d

PHILIP ENTERS SPAIN

Ferdinand, who had expected them at some nearer northern port, prepared without loss of time to go forward and receive them. But Philip had no intention of such an interview at present. He had purposely landed in a remote corner of the country, in order to gain time for his partisans to come forward and declare themselves. Missives had been despatched to the principal nobles and cavaliers, and they were answered by great numbers of all ranks, who pressed forward to welcome and pay court to the young monarch. He soon mustered an additional force of six thousand native Spaniards, which, with the chivalry who thronged to meet him, placed him in a condition to dictate terms to his father-in-law; and he now openly proclaimed that he had no intention of abiding by the concord of Salamanca, and that he would never consent to an arrangement prejudicing in any degree his and his wife’s exclusive possession of the crown of Castile.

Ferdinand, at length, finding that Philip, who had now left Corunna, was advancing by a circuitous route into the interior on purpose to avoid him, and that all access to his daughter was absolutely refused, was doomed to experience still more mortifying indignities. By the orders of the marquis of Astorga and the count of Benavente, he was actually refused admittance into those cities; while proclamation was made by the same arrogant lords prohibiting any of their vassals from aiding or harbouring his Aragonese followers. “A sad spectacle, indeed,” exclaims the loyal Martyr,l “to behold a monarch, yesterday almost omnipotent, thus wandering a vagabond in his own kingdom, refused even the sight of his own child!” Even his son-in-law, the constable of Castile, had deserted him.

An end was at length put to this scandalous exhibition by an interview. The place selected was an open plain near Puebla de Senabria, on the borders of Leon and Galicia (June 23rd). But even then the precautions taken were of a kind truly ludicrous, considering the forlorn condition of King Ferdinand. The whole military apparatus of the archduke was put in motion, as if he expected to win the crown by battle. Ferdinand, on the other hand, came into the field attended by about two hundred nobles and gentlemen, chiefly Aragonese and Italians, riding on mules, and simply attired in the short black cloak and bonnet of the country, with no other weapon than the sword usually worn. The king trusted, says Zurita,g to the majesty of his presence, and the reputation he had acquired by his long and able administration.

The Castilian nobles, brought into contact with Ferdinand, could not well avoid paying their obeisance to him. He received them in his usual gracious and affable manner, making remarks the good-humour of which was occasionally seasoned with something of a more pungent character. Among others was Garcilasso de la Vega, Ferdinand’s minister formerly at Rome. Like many of the Castilian lords, he wore armour under his dress, the better to guard against surprise. The king, embracing him, felt the mail beneath, and, tapping him familiarly on the shoulder, said, “I congratulate you, Garcilasso; you have grown wonderfully lusty since we last met.” The desertion, however, of one who had received so many favours from him touched him more nearly than that of all the rest.

After exchanging salutations, the two monarchs alighted, and entered a small hermitage in the neighbourhood. The conference led to no result. Philip was well schooled in his part, and remained, says Martyr,l immovable as a rock. There was so little mutual confidence between the parties that the name of Juana, whom Ferdinand desired so much to see, was not even mentioned during the interview.[66]

But, however reluctant Ferdinand might be to admit it, he was no longer in a condition to stand upon terms; and, in addition to the entire loss of influence in Castile, he received such alarming accounts from Naples as made him determine on an immediate visit in person to that kingdom. He resolved, therefore, to bow his head to the present storm, in hopes that a brighter day was in reserve for him. On the 27th of June he signed and solemnly swore to an agreement by which he surrendered the entire sovereignty of Castile to Philip and Juana, reserving to himself only the grand-masterships of the military orders, and the revenues secured by Isabella’s testament.

On the following day he executed another instrument of most singular import, in which, after avowing in unequivocal terms his daughter’s incapacity, he engages to assist Philip in preventing any interference in her behalf, and to maintain him, as far as in his power, in the sole, exclusive authority.

Before signing these papers, he privately made a protest, in the presence of several witnesses, that what he was about to do was not of his own free will, but from necessity, to extricate himself from his perilous situation and shield the country from the impending evils of a civil war. He concluded with asserting that, far from relinquishing his claims to the regency, it was his design to enforce them, as well as to rescue his daughter from her captivity, as soon as he was in a condition to do so. Finally, he completed this chain of inconsistencies by addressing a circular letter, dated July 1st, to the different parts of the kingdom, announcing his resignation of the government into the hands of Philip and Juana, and declaring the act one which, notwithstanding his own right and power to the contrary, he had previously determined on executing so soon as his children should set foot in Spain.

It is not easy to reconcile this monstrous tissue of incongruity and dissimulation with any motives of necessity or expediency. Why should he, so soon after preparing to raise the kingdom in his daughter’s cause, thus publicly avow her imbecility, and deposit the whole authority in the hands of Philip? Was it to bring odium on the head of the latter, by encouraging him to a measure which he knew must disgust the Castilians? But Ferdinand by this very act shared the responsibility with him. Was it in the expectation that uncontrolled and undivided power, in the hands of one so rash and improvident, would the more speedily work his ruin? As to his clandestine protest, its design was obviously to afford a plausible pretext at some future time for reasserting his claims to the government, on the ground that his concessions had been the result of force. But, then, why neutralise the operation of this by the declaration, spontaneously made in his manifesto to the people, that his abdication was not only a free but most deliberate and premeditated act? He was led to this last avowal, probably, by the desire of covering over the mortification of his defeat; a thin varnish, which could impose on nobody. The whole of the proceedings are of so ambiguous a character as to suggest the inevitable inference that they flowed from habits of dissimulation too strong to be controlled even when there was no occasion for its exercise. We occasionally meet with examples of a similar fondness for superfluous manœuvring in the humbler concerns of life.

THE REIGN OF PHILIP I (1506 A.D.)

King Ferdinand had no sooner concluded the arrangement with Philip, and withdrawn into his hereditary dominions, than the archduke and his wife proceeded towards Valladolid, to receive the homage of the estates convened in that city. Juana, oppressed with an habitual melancholy, and clad in the sable habiliments better suited to a season of mourning than rejoicing, refused the splendid ceremonial and festivities with which the city was prepared to welcome her. Her dissipated husband, who had long since ceased to treat her not merely with affection, but even decency, would fain have persuaded the cortes to authorise the confinement of his wife, as disordered in intellect, and to devolve on him the whole charge of the government. But the commons could not brook such an indignity to their own “natural sovereign”; and the usual oaths of allegiance were tendered to Juana as queen and lady proprietor of the kingdom, and to Philip as her husband, and finally to their eldest son, Prince Charles, as heir-apparent and lawful successor on the demise of his mother.

By the tenor of these acts the royal authority would seem to have been virtually vested in Juana. From this moment, however, Philip assumed the government into his own hands. The effects were soon visible in the thorough revolution introduced into every department. Old incumbents in office were ejected without ceremony, to make way for new favourites. The Flemings, in particular, were placed in every considerable post, and the principal fortresses of the kingdom intrusted to their keeping.

The style of living at the court was on the most thoughtless scale of wasteful expenditure. The public revenues, notwithstanding liberal appropriations by the late cortes, were wholly unequal to it. To supply the deficit, offices were sold to the highest bidder. The income drawn from the silk manufactures of Granada, which had been appropriated to defray King Ferdinand’s pension, was assigned by Philip to one of the royal treasurers. Fortunately, Ximenes obtained possession of the order and had the boldness to tear it in pieces. He then waited on the young monarch, and remonstrated with him on the recklessness of measures which must infallibly ruin his credit with the people. Philip yielded in this instance.

All this could not fail to excite disgust and disquietude throughout the nation. The most alarming symptoms of insubordination began to appear in different parts of the kingdom. In Andalusia, in particular, a confederation of the nobles was organised, with the avowed purpose of rescuing the queen from the duress in which it was said she was held by her husband. At the same time the most tumultuous scenes were exhibited in Cordova, in consequence of the high hand with which the Inquisition was carrying matters there. Members of many of the principal families, including persons of both sexes, had been arrested on the charge of heresy. This sweeping proscription provoked an insurrection, countenanced by the marquis of Priego, in which the prisons were broken open, and Lucero, an inquisitor who had made himself deservedly odious by his cruelties, narrowly escaped falling into the hands of the infuriated populace. The grand inquisitor, Deza, archbishop of Seville, the steady friend of Columbus, though his name is unhappily registered on some of the darkest pages of the tribunal, was so intimidated as to resign his office. The whole affair was referred to the royal council by Philip, whose Flemish education had not predisposed him to any reverence for the institution; a circumstance which operated quite as much to his prejudice, with the more bigoted part of the nation, as his really exceptional acts.

The minds of the wise and the good were filled with sadness, as they listened to the low murmurs of popular discontent, which seemed to be gradually swelling into strength for some terrible convulsion; and they looked back with fond regret to the halcyon days which they had enjoyed under the temperate rule of Ferdinand and Isabella.

The Catholic king, in the meantime, was pursuing his voyage to Naples. Soon after the conquest he had been earnestly pressed by the Neapolitans to visit his new dominions. He now went, less, however, in compliance with that request than to relieve his own mind by assuring himself of the fidelity of his viceroy, Gonsalvo de Cordova. That illustrious man had not escaped the usual lot of humanity; his brilliant successes had brought on him a full measure of the envy which seems to wait on merit like its shadow. His courteous manners, bountiful largesses, and magnificent style of living, were represented as politic arts to seduce the affections of the soldiery and the people. His services were in the market for the highest bidder. He had received the most splendid offers from the king of France and the pope. He had carried on a correspondence with Maximilian and Philip, who would purchase his adhesion, if possible, to the latter, at any price; and if he had not hitherto committed himself by any overt act, it seemed probable he was only waiting to be determined in his future course by the result of King Ferdinand’s struggle with his son-in-law.

These suggestions, in which some truth, as usual, was mingled with a large infusion of error, gradually excited more and more uneasiness in the breast of the cautious and naturally distrustful Ferdinand. He at first endeavoured to abridge the powers of the great captain by recalling half the troops in his service, notwithstanding the unsettled state of the kingdom. He then took the decisive step of ordering his return to Castile, on pretence of employing him in affairs of great importance at home. Finding that Gonsalvo still procrastinated his return on various pretexts, the king’s uneasiness increased to such a degree that he determined to press his own departure for Naples, and bring back, if not too late, his too powerful vassal.

After a boisterous and tedious passage, he reached Genoa. Here, to his astonishment, he was joined by the great captain, who, advised of the king’s movements, had come from Naples with a small fleet to meet him. This frank conduct of his general, if it did not disarm Ferdinand of his suspicions, showed him the policy of concealing them; and he treated Gonsalvo with all the consideration and show of confidence which might impose, not merely on the public, but on the immediate subject of them.

DEATH OF PHILIP; JUANA’S MADNESS

After quitting Genoa, the royal squadron was driven by contrary winds into the neighbouring harbour of Portofino, where Ferdinand received intelligence which promised to change his destination altogether. This was the death of his son-in-law, the young king of Castile.

This event, so unexpected and awfully sudden, was occasioned by a fever, brought on by too violent exercise at a game of ball, at an entertainment made for Philip by his favourite, Manuel, in Burgos, where the court was then held. Through the unskilfulness of his physicians, as it was said, who neglected to bleed him, the disorder rapidly gained ground, and on the sixth day after his attack, being the 25th of September, 1506, he breathed his last.[67] He was but twenty-eight years old, of which brief period he had enjoyed, or endured, the “golden cares” of sovereignty but little more than two months, dating from his recognition by the cortes. His body, after being embalmed, lay in state for two days, decorated with the insignia—the mockery of royalty, as it had proved to him—and was then deposited in the convent of Miraflores, near Burgos, to await its final removal to Granada, agreeably to his last request.

Philip was so distinguished for comeliness both of person and countenance that he is designated on the roll of Spanish sovereigns as Felipe el Hermoso, or the Handsome. His mental endowments were not so extraordinary. The father of Charles V possessed scarcely a single quality in common with his remarkable son. As he was naturally indolent and fond of pleasure, he willingly reposed the burden of government on others, who, as usual, thought more of their own interests than those of the public. His early education exempted him from the bigotry characteristic of the Spaniards; and had he lived he might have done much to mitigate the grievous abuses of the Inquisition. As it was, his premature death deprived him of the opportunity of compensating, by this single good act, the manifold mischiefs of his administration.

Juana’s condition had become truly deplorable. During her husband’s illness she had never left his bedside, but neither then, nor since his death, had she been seen to shed a tear. She remained in a state of stupid insensibility, sitting in a darkened apartment, her head resting on her hand, and her lips closed, as mute and immovable as a statue. When applied to for issuing the necessary summons for the cortes, or to make appointments to office, or for any other pressing business which required her signature, she replied, “My father will attend to all this when he returns; he is much more conversant with business than I am; I have no other duties now but to pray for the soul of my departed husband.” The only orders she was known to sign were for paying the salaries of her Flemish musicians; for in her abject state she found some consolation in music, of which she had been passionately fond from childhood. The few remarks which she uttered were discreet and sensible, forming a singular contrast with the general extravagance of her actions.

Finding it impossible to obtain the queen’s co-operation, the council at length resolved to issue the writs of summons in their own name, as a measure justified by necessity. The place of meeting was fixed at Burgos in the ensuing month of November; and great pains were taken that the different cities should instruct their representatives in their views respecting the ultimate disposition of the government. Long before this, indeed immediately after Philip’s death, letters had been despatched by Ximenes and his friends to the Catholic king, acquainting him with the state of affairs, and urging his immediate return to Castile. He determined, however, to continue his voyage to Naples. The wary monarch perhaps thought that the Castilians, whose attachment to his own person he might with some reason distrust, would not be the less inclined to his rule after having tasted the bitterness of anarchy.

While Ferdinand was thus occupied in Naples, the representatives of most of the cities, summoned by the provisional government, had assembled in Burgos (November, 1506). Before entering on business they were desirous to obtain the queen’s sanction to their proceedings. A committee waited on her for that purpose, but she obstinately refused to give them audience.

She still continued plunged in moody melancholy, exhibiting, however, occasionally the wildest freaks of insanity. Towards the latter end of December, she determined to leave Burgos and remove her husband’s remains to their final resting-place in Granada. She insisted on seeing them herself before her departure. The remonstrances of her counsellors, and of the holy men of the monastery of Miraflores, proved equally fruitless. Opposition only roused her passions into frenzy, and they were obliged to comply with her mad humours. The corpse was removed from the vault; the two coffins of lead and wood were opened, and such as chose gazed on the mouldering relics, which, notwithstanding their having been embalmed, exhibited scarcely a trace of humanity. The queen was not satisfied till she touched them with her own hand, which she did without shedding a tear or testifying the least emotion. The unfortunate lady, indeed, was said never to have been seen to weep since she detected her husband’s intrigue with the Flemish courtesan.

The body was then placed on a magnificent car, or hearse, drawn by four horses. It was accompanied by a long train of ecclesiastics and nobles, who, together with the queen, left the city on the night of the 20th of December. She made her journeys by night, saying that a widow, who had lost the sun of her own soul, should never expose herself to the light of day. When she halted, the body was deposited in some church or monastery, where the funeral services were performed as if her husband had just died; and a corps of armed men kept constant guard, chiefly, as it would seem, with the view of preventing any female from profaning the place by her presence. For Juana still retained the same jealousy of her sex which she had unhappily had so much cause to feel during Philip’s lifetime.

In a subsequent journey, when at a short distance from Torquemada, she ordered the corpse to be carried into the courtyard of a convent, occupied, as she supposed, by monks. She was filled with horror, however, on finding it a nunnery, and immediately commanded the body to be removed into the open fields. Here she encamped with her whole party at dead of night; not, however, until she had caused the coffins to be unsealed, that she might satisfy herself of the safety of her husband’s relics; although it was very difficult to keep the torches, during the time, from being extinguished by the violence of the wind, and leaving the company in total darkness.[68]

These mad pranks, savouring of absolute idiocy, were occasionally checkered by other acts of more intelligence, but not less startling. She had early shown a disgust to her father’s old counsellors, and especially to Ximenes, who, she thought, interfered too authoritatively in her domestic concerns. Before leaving Burgos, however, she electrified her husband’s adherents by revoking all grants made by the crown since Isabella’s death. This, almost the only act she was ever known to sign, was a severe blow to the courtly tribe of sycophants on whom the golden favours of the late reign had been so prodigally showered. At the same time she reformed her privy council by dismissing the present members.

These partial gleams of intelligence, directed in this peculiar way, led many to discern the secret influence of her father. She still, however, pertinaciously refused to sanction any measures of cortes for his recall; and when pressed by that body on this and other matters, at an audience which she granted before leaving Burgos, she plainly told them “to return to their quarters, and not to meddle further in the public business without her express commands.” Not long after this, the legislature was prorogued by the royal council for four months.

THE RETURN OF FERDINAND

The term assigned for the provisional government expired in December, and was not renewed. No other regency was appointed by the nobles; and the kingdom, without even the shadow of protection afforded by its cortes, and with no other guide but its crazy sovereign, was left to drift at random amidst the winds and waves of faction. This was not slow in brewing in every quarter, with the aid especially of the overgrown nobles, whose license, on such occasions as this, proved too plainly that public tranquillity was not founded so much on the stability of law as on the personal character of the reigning sovereign.

The king’s enemies, in the meantime, were pressing their correspondence with the emperor Maximilian, and urging his immediate presence in Spain. Others devised schemes for marrying the poor queen to the young duke of Calabria, or some other prince, whose years or incapacity might enable them to act over again the farce of King Philip. To add to the troubles occasioned by this mesh of intrigue and faction, the country, which of late years had suffered from scarcity, was visited by a pestilence that fell most heavily on the south.

But although the storm was thus darkening from every quarter, there was no general explosion, to shake the state to its foundations, as in the time of Henry IV. Orderly habits, if not principles, had been gradually formed under the long reign of Isabella. The great mass of the people had learned to respect the operation and appreciate the benefits of law; and notwithstanding the menacing attitude, the bustle, and transitory ebullitions of the rival factions, there seemed a manifest reluctance to break up the established order of things, and by deeds of violence and bloodshed to renew the days of ancient anarchy.

Much of this good result was undoubtedly to be attributed to the vigorous counsels and conduct of Ximenes, who, together with the grand constable and the duke of Alva, had received full powers from Ferdinand to act in his name. Much is also to be ascribed to the politic conduct of the king. Far from an intemperate zeal to resume the sceptre of Castile, he had shown throughout a discreet forbearance. The great mass of the common people, too, notwithstanding the temporary alienation of their feelings from the Catholic king by his recent marriage, were driven by the evils they actually suffered, and the vague apprehension of greater, to participate in the same sentiments; so that, in less than eight months from Philip’s death, the whole nation may be said to have returned to its allegiance to its ancient sovereign. The only considerable exceptions were Don Juan Manuel and the duke of Najara. The former had gone too far to recede, and the latter possessed too chivalrous or too stubborn a temper to do so.

At length, the Catholic monarch, having completed his arrangements at Naples, and waited until the affairs of Castile were fully ripe for his return, set sail from his Italian capital, June 4th, 1507. He proposed to touch at the Genoese port of Savona, where an interview had been arranged between him and Louis XII. On the 28th of June the royal fleet of Aragon entered the little port of Savona, where the king of France had already been waiting for it several days. During their interview the monarchs held repeated conferences. The subject of discussion can only be conjectured by the subsequent proceedings, which make it probable that it related to Italy; and that it was in this season of idle dalliance and festivity that the two princes who held the destinies of that country in their hands matured the famous League of Cambray, so disastrous to Venice, and reflecting little credit on its projectors, either on the score of good faith or sound policy.

At length, after enjoying for four days the splendid hospitality of their royal entertainer, the king and queen of Aragon re-embarked, and reached their own port of Valencia, after various detentions, on the 20th of July, 1507. Ferdinand pressed forward to Castile. How different from the forlorn and outcast condition in which he had quitted the country a short year before! He intimated the change in his own circumstances by the greater state and show of authority which he now assumed.

At Tortoles he was met by the queen, his daughter, accompanied by Archbishop Ximenes. The interview between them had more of pain than pleasure in it. The king was greatly shocked by Juana’s appearance; for her wild and haggard features, emaciated figure, and the mean, squalid attire in which she was dressed, made it difficult to recognise any trace of the daughter from whom he had been so long separated. She discovered more sensibility on seeing him than she had shown since her husband’s death, and henceforth resigned herself to her father’s will with little opposition. She was soon after induced by him to change her unsuitable residence for more commodious quarters at Tordesillas. Her husband’s remains were laid in the monastery of Santa Clara, adjoining the palace, from whose windows she could behold his sepulchre. From this period, although she survived forty-seven years, she never quitted the walls of her habitation; and although her name appeared jointly with that of her son, Charles V, in all public acts, she never afterwards could be induced to sign a paper, or take part in any transactions of a public nature. She lingered out a half century of dreary existence, as completely dead to the world as the remains which slept in the monastery of Santa Clara beside her.b

WAS QUEEN JUANA INSANE?

The pendulum of historical criticism to which we have had such frequent occasion to refer has swung back to the original tradition in another instance. Juana was generally accounted mad by her contemporaries though she had admittedly intervals of lucid thought. In the latter half of the nineteenth century papers were turned up which emphasised her aspects of sanity and the theory was raised that she was the victim of slander and cruelty.

It was claimed that her only abnormality was her freedom from the bigotry that bloodied the reign of her father and mother; and that it was her stay in Flanders that liberalised her creed. This theory fascinated the iconoclasts who always hunt the evil side of a glorious period, and her mother and father were openly accused of a hideous disregard of the first instincts of humanity, of blackening her fame and robbing her of her royal heritage. The motive of this unnatural crime imputed to Ferdinand and Isabella was given as a mixture of religious intolerance and of selfishness, though it might as well have been said that they called her insane to keep her from undergoing the torture and fire of the Inquisition which ransacked the kingdom for the most minute heterodoxy. Burkek especially is unsparing in his denunciations of a cruelty which could not be exceeded if true. He claims that Ferdinand’s letters show that he knew Juana to be sane, but simply “unmanageable as she had ever been.”

But in this instance as in so many others, the histories of a few years ago are put out of date and the histories of long ago brought again into timeliness. The story of Juana’s rise and fall in history is as follows:a

For a long time writers who spoke of Juana the Mad stuck to tradition without going back to the original documents. It was only in 1858 that important documents were discovered in the archives at Simancas. Most of them confirmed tradition, but some of them left doubts in the mind of a German scholar, Bergenroth,u who collected and published them with an interesting dissertation in the “state papers.” Interpreting these documents, which were incomplete and often ambiguous, in a way contrary to general opinion, he tried to prove that Juana was not insane, but that she was rather the victim of the ambition and fanaticism of her father and of her son.

We are to-day better informed, having contemporary texts, some from Simancas, others from the archives of the historical academy at Madrid, others from private collections. An eminent Spanish writer, Rodriguez Villa,v has collected, and commented upon them in a work which one may safely affirm says the last word on this subject and completely contradicts Bergenroth’s opinions. The new historian on the one hand introduces elements hitherto unknown into the question, on the other explains differently those which were known. His circumstantial account, well supported by facts, upholds tradition for the most part and exculpates Ferdinand the Catholic as well as Charles V of the accusation brought against them. In the meantime Gachardw had shown like tendencies in a monograph on the subject, and De la Fuentex in a substantial pamphlet had peremptorily denied the heretical opinions attributed to the queen of Castile.

The facts are doubly interesting, first because of their romance and peculiar nature, secondly because of their intimate relations with political events which, at the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century, changed the internal form and diplomatic policy of the Spanish monarchy.

As to the real causes of her mental state, they cannot of course be determined with actual certainty, being hidden in the depths of the human organism. Villav considers that Juana became “mad through love,” exasperated first by the infidelities of her husband.

Juana’s early life had passed in peaceful obscurity. She received a careful and kind training. Did she at that time show any distressing symptoms? Nothing precisely indicates such a thing. If, to judge from certain anxieties afterwards manifested by Isabella, it would seem possible that such symptoms might have appeared, one may suppose that they were considered at that time as passing incidents and of no importance. It is difficult to portray her physically or mentally at the time of her marriage. There is a portrait of her made a few years later when cares had already begun to mark her face.

It is a picture in the somewhat stiff style of the first Flemish school. The features are fairly regular, a forehead high and a little prominent, long eyes with no brilliancy, nose and mouth without character. There are no striking defects, nor is there beauty of line or of colour. A sad physiognomy, the eyes reveal only a kind of intellectual lassitude, a vague and dolorous obstinacy. Force and vitality seem to have been pressed inward and the soul appears drowned in a morbid dream; the whole face, half archaic, remains a puzzle. The features are without doubt those of Juana, but immobile and cold. The portrait shows only a melancholy woman, without charm, sickly, and lacking in thought.y

Isabella and Ferdinand wanted their son-in-law, Philip, to become acquainted with the country over which he would some time rule. But the measure of family misfortune which balanced the weighty political success of the Catholic kings was not yet full. The first months of the stay of Juana and Philip in Spain brought indeed only rejoicing and splendour. In Toledo the Castilian cortes proclaimed allegiance, in Barcelona the Aragonese. But the archduke Philip soon tired of Spanish life, he longed to get back to Flanders. Juana could not follow him on account of the state of her health. In vain she pleaded, in vain her parents urged the flighty gentleman not to leave her so pitilessly.