Page images
PDF
EPUB

PART 11.

General dissatisfaction.

To accomplish this, the king was compelled to draw largely on the royal patrimony in Naples, as well as to make liberal appropriations of land and rents in his native dominions. As all this proved insufficient, he was driven to the expedient of replenishing the exchequer by draughts on his new subjects. 31

The result, although effected without violence or disorder, was unsatisfactory to all parties. The Angevins rarely received the full extent of their demands. The loyal partisans of Aragon saw the fruits of many a hard-fought battle snatched from their grasp, to be given back again to their enemies. 35 Lastly, the wretched Neapolitans, instead of the favors and immunities incident to a new reign, found themselves burdened with additional imposts, which, in the exhausted state of the country, were perfectly intolerable. So soon were the fair expectations formed of Ferdinand's coming, like most other indefinite expectations, clouded over by disappointment; and such were some of the bitter fruits of the disgraceful treaty with Louis the Twelfth. 36

34 Giannone, Istoria di Napoli, lib. 30, cap. 1.-Summonte, Hist. di Napoli, tom. iv. lib. 6, cap. 5. -Buonaccorsi, Diario, p. 129. Guicciardini, Istoria, tom. iv. p. 71. 35 Such, for example, was the fate of the doughty little cavalier, Pedro de la Paz, the gallant Leyva, so celebrated in the subsequent wars of Charles V., the ambassador Rojas, the Quixotic Paredes, and others. The last of these adventurers, according to Mariana, endeavoured to repair his broken fortunes, by driving the trade of a

corsair in the Levant. Hist. de España, tom. ii. lib. 29, cap. 4.

36 If any one would see a perfect specimen of the triumph of style, let him compare the interminable prolixities of Zurita with Mariana, who, in this portion of his narrative, has embodied the facts and opinions of his predecessor, with scarcely any alteration, save that of greater condensation, in his own transparent and harmonious diction. It is quite as great a miracle in its way as the rifacimento of Berni.

CHAPTER XX.

FERDINAND'S RETURN AND REGENCY. — GONSALVO'S HONORS
AND RETIREMENT.

1506-1509.

Joanna's mad Conduct.-She changes her Ministers. - Disorders in
Castile. Ferdinand's politic Behaviour. He leaves Naples.-
His brilliant Reception by Louis XII. - Honors to Gonsalvo. -
Ferdinand's Return to Castile. His excessive Severity. - Neglect
of the Great Captain. His honorable Retirement.

XX.

Meeting of

WHILE Ferdinand was thus occupied in Naples, CHAPTER the representatives of most of the cities, summoned by the provisional government, had assembled in cortes. Burgos. Before entering on business, they were 1506. 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.

1

Nov.

insane con

She still continued plunged in moody melancholy, Joanna's exhibiting, however, occasionally the wildest freaks duct. 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,

1 Mariana, Hist. de España, tom. ii. lib. 29, cap. 2.-Zurita, Anales, tom. vi. lib. 7, cap. 29.

PART

II.

before her departure. The remonstrances of her counsellors, and 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 humors. 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 Joanna still retained the same jealousy of her sex, which

she had unhappily so much cause to feel during CHAPTER Philip's lifetime. 2

In a subsequent journey, when at a short distance from Torquemada, she ordered the corpse to be carried into the court-yard 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. S

[blocks in formation]

66

Childish as was the affection," says Dr. Dunham, "of Joanna for her husband, she did not, as Robertson relates, cause the body to be removed from the sepulchre after it was buried, and brought to her apartment. She once visited the sepulchre, and, after affectionately gazing on the corpse, was persuaded to retire. Robertson seems not to have read, at least not with care, the authorities for the reign of Fernando." (History of Spain and Portugal, vol. ii. p. 287, note.) Whoever will take the trouble to examine these authorities, will probably not find Dr. Dunham much more accurate in the matter than his prede

cessor. Robertson, indeed, draws
largely from the Epistles of Peter
Martyr, the best voucher for this
period, which his critic apparently
has not consulted.
In the very
page preceding that, in which he
thus taxes Robertson with inaccu-
racy, we find him speaking of
Charles VIII. as the reigning mon-
arch of France; an error not mere-
ly clerical, since it is repeated no
less than three times. Such mis-
takes would be too trivial for no-
tice in any but an author, who has
made similar ones the ground for
unsparing condemnation of others.
3 Peter Martyr, Opus Epist.,
epist. 339.

A foolish Carthusian monk, "læ-
vi sicco folio levior," to borrow
Martyr's words, though more knave
than fool probably, filled Joanna
with absurd hopes of her husband's
returning to life, which, he assured
her, had happened, as he had read,
to a certain prince, after he had

XX.

PART
II.

She changes her minis

ters.

These mad pranks, savouring of absolute idiocy, were occasionally chequered 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 favors of the late reign had been so prodigally showered. At the same time she reformed her privy council, by dismissing the present members, and reinstating those appointed by her royal mother, sarcastically telling one of the ejected counsellors, that "he might go and complete his studies at Salamanca." The remark had a biting edge to it, as the worthy jurist was reputed somewhat low in his scholarship.*

These partial gleams of intelligence, directed in this peculiar way too, led many to discern the secret influence of her father. She still, however, perti

been dead fourteen years. As
Philip was disembowelled, he was
hardly in a condition for such an
auspicious event. The queen, how-
ever, seems to have been caught
with the idea. (Opus Epist., epist.
328.) Martyr loses all patience at
the inventions of this "blactero
cucullatus," as he calls him in his
abominable Latin, as well as at the
mad pranks of the queen, and the
ridiculous figure which he and the
other grave personages of the court

were compelled to make on the occasion. It is impossible to read his Jeremiads on the subject without a smile. See, in particular, his whimsical epistle to his old friend, the archbishop of Granada. Opus Epist., epist. 333.

4 Mariana, Hist. de España, tom. ii. lib. 29, cap. 3.- Zurita, Anales, tom. vi. lib. 7. cap. 26, 38, 54. - Gomez, De Rebus Gestis, fol. 72.- Sandoval, Hist. del Emp. Carlos V., tom. i. p. 11.

« PreviousContinue »