Chapter IX: Latter Days of Charles the Fifth (2)

In front of it was a scaffolding covered with black, on which a throne was raised for Philip. The nobles and great officers of the crown occupied the seats, or rather steps, below. Drapery of dark velvet and cloth of gold, emblazoned with the imperial arms, was suspended across the arches of the nave; above which ran galleries, appropriated to the duchess of Lorraine and the ladies of the court.[345]

The traveller who at this time visits this venerable pile, where Charles the Fifth was wont to hold the chapters of the Golden Fleece, while he gazes on the characteristic effigy of that monarch, as it is displayed on the superb windows of painted glass, may call to mind the memorable day when the people of Flanders, and the rank and beauty of its capital, were gathered together to celebrate the obsequies of the great emperor; when, amidst clouds of incense and the blaze of myriads of lights, the deep tones of the organ, vibrating through the long aisles, mingled with the voices of the priests, as they chanted their sad requiem to the soul of their departed sovereign.[346]

I have gone somewhat into detail in regard to the latter days of Charles the Fifth, who exercised, in his retirement, too important an influence on public affairs for such an account of him to be deemed an impertinent episode to the history of Philip the Second. Before parting from him for ever, I will take a brief view of some peculiarities in his personal, rather than his political character, which has long since been indelibly traced by a hand abler than mine.

Charles, at the time of his death, was in the fifty-eighth year of his age. He was older in constitution than in years. So much shaken had he been, indeed, in mind as well as body, that he may be said to have died of premature old age. Yet his physical development had been very slow. He was nearly twenty-one years old before any beard was to be seen on his chin.[347] Yet by the time he was thirty-six, gray hairs began to make their appearance on his temples. At forty the gout had made severe inroads on a constitution originally strong; and before he was fifty, the man who could keep the saddle day and night in his campaigns, who seemed to be insensible to fatigue as he followed the chase among the wild passes of the Alpuxarras, was obliged to be carried in a litter, like a poor cripple, at the head of his armies.[348]

His mental development was equally tardy with his bodily. So long as Chievres lived,--the Flemish noble who had the care of his early life,--Charles seemed to have no will of his own. During his first visit to Spain, where he came when seventeen years old, he gave so little promise, that those who approached him nearest could discern no signs of his future greatness. Yet the young prince seems to have been conscious that he had the elements of greatness within him, and he patiently bided his time. "_Nondum_"--"Not yet"--was the motto which he adopted for his maiden shield, when but eighteen years old, at a tournament at Valladolid.

[Sidenote: HIS DEATH AND CHARACTER.]

But when the death of the Flemish minister had released the young monarch from this state of dependence, he took the reins into his own hands, as Louis the Fourteenth did on the death of Mazarin. He now showed himself in an entirely new aspect. He even displayed greater independence than his predecessors had done. He no longer trusted everything, like them, to a council of state. He trusted only to himself; and if he freely communicated with some one favorite minister, like the elder Granvelle, and the cardinal, his son, it was in order to be counselled, not to be controlled by their judgments. He patiently informed himself of public affairs; and when foreign envoys had their audiences of him, they were surprised to find him possessed of everything relating to their own courts and the objects of their mission.

Yet he did not seem to be quick of apprehension, or, to speak more correctly, he was slow in arriving at his results. He would keep the courier waiting for days before he could come to a decision. When he did come to it, no person on earth could shake it. Talking one day with the Venetian Contarini about this habit of his mind, the courtly minister remarked, that "it was not obstinacy to adhere to sound opinions." "True," said Charles, "but I sometimes adhere to those that are unsound."[349]

His indefatigable activity both of mind and body formed a strong contrast to the lethargy of early years. His widely scattered empire, spreading over the Low Countries, Spain, Germany, and the New World, presented embarrassments which most princes would have found it impossible to overcome. At least they would have been compelled to govern, in a great measure, by deputy,--to transact their business by agents. But Charles chose to do everything himself,--to devise his own plans, and to execute them in person. The number of his journeys by land and by water, as noticed in his farewell address, is truly wonderful; for that was not the day of steamboats and railways. He seemed to lead the life of a courier. But it was for no trivial object that he made these expeditions. He knew where his presence was needed; and his promptness and punctuality brought him, at the right time, on the right spot. No spot in his broad empire was far removed from him. He seemed to possess the power of ubiquity.

The consciousness of his own strength roused to a flame the spark of ambition which had hitherto slept in his bosom. His schemes were so vast, that it was a common opinion he aspired to universal monarchy. Like his grandfather, Ferdinand, and his own son, Philip, he threw over his schemes the cloak of religion. Or, to deal with him more fairly, religious principle probably combined with personal policy to determine his career. He seemed always ready to do battle for the Cross. He affected to identify the cause of Spain with the cause of Christendom. He marched against the Turks, and stayed the tide of Ottoman inroad in Hungary. He marched against the Protestants, and discomfited their armies in the heart of Germany. He crossed the Mediterranean, and humbled the Crescent at Algiers. He threw himself on the honor of Francis, and travelled through France to take vengeance on the rebels of Flanders. He twice entered France as an enemy, and marched up to the gates of Paris. Instead of the modest legend on his maiden shield; he now assumed the proud motto, "_Plus ultra_;" and he vindicated his right to it, by sending his fleets across the ocean, and by planting the banner of Castile on the distant shores of the Pacific. In these enterprises he was generally successful. His success led him to rely still more on himself. "Myself and the lucky moment," was his favorite saying. The "star of Austria," was still a proverb. It was not till the evening of life that he complained of the fickleness of fortune; that his star, as it descended to the horizon, was obscured by clouds and darkness.

Thus Charles's nerves were kept in a state of perpetual excitement. No wonder that his health should have sunk under it; like a plant forced by extraordinary stimulants to an unnatural production at the expense of its own vitality.

His habits were not all of them the most conducive to health. He slept usually only four hours; too short a time to repair the waste caused by incessant toil.[350] His phlegmatic temperament did not incline him to excess. Yet there was one excess of which he was guilty,--the indulgence of his appetite to a degree most pernicious to his health. A Venetian contemporary tells us, that, before rising in the morning, potted capon was usually served to him, dressed with sugar, milk, and spices. At noon he dined on a variety of dishes. Soon after vespers he took another meal; and later in the evening supped heartily on anchovies, or some other gross and savory food of which he was particularly fond.[351] On one occasion, complaining to his _maître d'hôtel_ that the cook sent him nothing but dishes too insipid and tasteless to be eaten, the perplexed functionary, knowing Charles's passion for timepieces, replied, that "he did not know what he could do, unless it were to serve his majesty a ragout of watches!" The witticism had one good effect, that of provoking a hearty laugh from the emperor,--a thing rarely witnessed in his latter days.[352]

It was in vain that Cardinal Loaysa, his confessor, remonstrated, with an independence that does him credit, against his master's indulgence of his appetite, assuring him that resistance here would do more for his soul than any penance with the scourge.[353] It seems a pity that Charles, considering his propensities, should have so easily obtained absolution from fasts, and that he should not, on the contrary, have transferred some of the penance which he inflicted on his back to the offending part. Even in the monastery of Yuste he still persevered in the same pernicious taste. Anchovies, frogs' legs, and eel-pasties were the dainty morsels with which he chose to be regaled, even before the eyes of his physician. It would not have been amiss for him to have exchanged his solitary repast more frequently for the simpler fare of the refectory.

With these coarser tastes Charles combined many others of a refined and intellectual character. We have seen his fondness for music, and the delight he took in the sister art of design,--especially in the works of Titian. He was painted several times by this great master, and it was by his hand, as we have seen, that he desired to go down to posterity. The emperor had, moreover, another taste, perhaps talent, which, with a different training and in a different sphere of life, might have led him to the craft of authorship.

A curious conversation is reported as having been held by him with Borja, the future saint, during one of the visits paid by the Jesuit to Yuste. Charles inquired of his friend whether it were wrong for a man to write his autobiography, provided he did so honestly, and with no motive of vanity. He said that he had written his own memoirs, not from the desire of self-glorification, but to correct manifold mistakes which had been circulated of his doings, and to set his conduct in a true light.[354] One might be curious to know the answer, which is not given, of the good father to this question. It is to be hoped that it was not of a kind to induce the emperor to destroy the manuscript, which has never come to light.

However this may be, there is no reason to doubt that at one period of his life he had compiled a portion of his autobiography. In the imperial household, as I have already noticed, was a Flemish scholar, William Van Male, or Malinæus, as he is called in Latin, who, under the title of gentleman of the chamber, wrote many a long letter for Charles, while standing by his bedside, and read many a weary hour to him after the monarch had gone to rest,--not, as it would seem, to sleep.[355] This personage tells us that Charles, when sailing on the Rhine, wrote an account of his expeditions to as late a date as 1550.[356] This is not very definite. Any account written under such circumstances, and in so short a time, could be nothing but a sketch of the most general kind. Yet Van Male assures us that he had read the manuscript, which he commends for its terse and elegant diction; and he proposes to make a Latin version of it, the style of which should combine the separate merits of Tacitus, Livy, Suetonius, and Cæsar![357] The admiring chamberlain laments that, instead of giving it to the world, Charles should keep it jealously secured under lock and key.[358]

The emperor's taste for authorship showed itself also in another form. This was by the translation of the "_Chevalier Délibéré_," a French poem then popular, celebrating the court of his ancestor, Charles the Bold of Burgundy. Van Male, who seems to have done for Charles the Fifth what Voltaire did for Frederick, when he spoke of himself as washing the king's dirty linen, was employed also to overlook this translation, which he pronounces to have possessed great merit in regard to idiom and selection of language. The emperor then gave it to Acuña, a good poet of the court, to be done into Castilian verse. Thus metamorphosed, he proposed to give the copy to Van Male. A mischievous wag, Avila the historian, assured the emperor that it could not be worth less than five hundred gold crowns to that functionary. "And William is well entitled to them," said the monarch, "for he has sweat much over the work."[359] Two thousand copies were forthwith ordered to be printed of the poem, which was to come out anonymously. Poor Van Male, who took a very different view of the profits, and thought that nothing was certain but the cost of the edition, would have excused himself from this proof of his master's liberality. It was all in vain; Charles was not to be balked in his generous purpose; and, without a line to propitiate the public favor, by stating in the preface the share of the royal hand in the composition, it was ushered into the world.[360]

Whatever Charles may have done in the way of an autobiography, he was certainly not indifferent to posthumous fame. He knew that the greatest name must soon pass into oblivion, unless embalmed in the song of the bard or the page of the chronicler. He looked for a chronicler to do for him with his pen what Titian had done for him with his pencil,--exhibit him in his true proportions, and in a permanent form, to the eye of posterity! In this he does not seem to have been so much under the influence of vanity as of a natural desire to have his character and conduct placed in a fair point of view,--what seemed to him to be such,--for the contemplation or criticism of mankind.

[Sidenote: HIS DEATH AND CHARACTER.]

The person whom the emperor selected for this delicate office was the learned Sepulveda. Sleidan he condemned as a slanderer; and Giovio, who had taken the other extreme, and written of him with what he called the "golden pen" of history, he no less condemned as a flatterer.[361] Charles encouraged Sepulveda to apply to him for information on matters relating to his government. But when requested by the historian to listen to what he had written, the emperor refused. "I will neither hear nor read," he replied, "what you have said of me. Others may do this when I am gone. But if you wish for information on any point, I shall be always ready to give it to you."[362] A history thus compiled was of the nature of an autobiography, and must be considered, therefore, as entitled to much the same confidence, and open to the same objections, as that kind of writing. Sepulveda was one of the few who had repeated access to Charles in his retirement at Yuste;[363] and the monarch testified his regard for him, by directing that particular care be taken that no harm should come to the historian's manuscript before it was committed to the press.[364]

Such are some of the most interesting traits and personal anecdotes I have been able to collect of the man who, for nearly forty years, ruled over an empire more vast, with an authority more absolute, than any monarch since the days of Charlemagne. It may be thought strange that I should have omitted to notice one feature in his character, the most prominent in the line from which he was descended, at least on the mother's side,--his bigotry. But in Charles this was less conspicuous than in many others of his house; and while he sat upon the throne, the extent to which his religious principles were held in subordination by his political, suggests a much closer parallel to the policy of his grandfather, Ferdinand the Catholic, than to that of his son, Philip the Second, or of his imbecile grandson, Philip the Third.

But the religious gloom which hung over Charles's mind took the deeper tinge of fanaticism after he had withdrawn to the monastery of Yuste. With his dying words, as we have seen, he bequeathed the Inquisition as a precious legacy to his son. In like manner, he endeavored to cherish in the Regent Joanna's bosom the spirit of persecution.[365] And if it were true, as his biographer assures us, that Charles expressed a regret that he had respected the safe-conduct of Luther,[366] the world had little reason to mourn that he exchanged the sword and the sceptre for the breviary of the friar,--the throne of the Cæsars for his monastic retreat among the wilds of Estremadura.

* * * * *

The preceding chapter was written in the summer of 1851, a year before the appearance of Stirling's "Cloister Life of Charles the Fifth," which led the way in that brilliant series of works from the pens of Amédée Pichot, Mignet, and Gachard, which has made the darkest recesses of Yuste as light as day. The publication of these works has deprived my account of whatever novelty it might have possessed, since it rests on a similar basis with theirs, namely, original documents in the Archives of Simancas. Yet the important influence which Charles exerted over the management of affairs, even in his monastic retreat, has made it impossible to dispense with the chapter. On the contrary, I have profited by these recent publications to make sundry additions, which may readily be discovered by the reader, from the references I have been careful to make to the sources whence they are derived.

The public has been hitherto indebted for its knowledge of the reign of Charles the Fifth to Robertson,--a writer who, combining a truly philosophical spirit with an acute perception of character, is recommended, moreover, by a classic elegance of style which has justly given him a preëminence among the historians of the great emperor. But in his account of the latter days of Charles, Robertson mainly relies on commonplace authorities, whose information, gathered at second hand, is far from being trustworthy,--as is proved by the contradictory tenor of such authentic documents as the letters of Charles himself, with those of his own followers, and the narratives of the brotherhood of Yuste. These documents are, for the most part, to be found in the Archives of Simancas, where, in Robertson's time, they were guarded, with the vigilance of a Turkish harem, against all intrusion of native as well as foreigner. It was not until very recently, in 1844, that the more liberal disposition of the government allowed the gates to be unbarred which had been closed for centuries; and then, for the first time, the student might be seen toiling in the dusty alcoves of Simancas, and busily exploring the long-buried memorials of the past. It was at this period that my friend, Don Pascual de Gayangos, having obtained authority from the government, passed some weeks at Simancas in collecting materials, some of which have formed the groundwork of the preceding chapter.

While the manuscripts of Simancas were thus hidden from the world, a learned keeper of the archives, Don Tomas Gonzalez, discontented with the unworthy view which had been given of the latter days of Charles the Fifth, had profited by the materials which lay around him, to exhibit his life at Yuste in a new and more authentic light. To the volume which he compiled for this purpose he gave the title of "_Retiro, Estancia, y Muerte del Emperador Carlos Quinto en el Monasterio de Yuste_." The work, the principal value of which consists in the copious extracts with which it is furnished from the correspondence of Charles and his household, was suffered by the author to remain in manuscript; and, at his death, it passed into the hands of his brother, who prepared a summary of its contents, and endeavored to dispose of the volume at a price so exorbitant that it remained for many years without a purchaser. It was finally bought by the French government at a greatly reduced price,--for four thousand francs. It may seem strange that it should have even brought this sum, since the time of the sale was that in which the new arrangements were made for giving admission to the archives that contained the original documents on which the Gonzalez MS. was founded. The work thus bought by the French government was transferred to the Archives des Affaires Etrangères, then under the direction of M. Mignet. The manuscript could not be in better hands than those of a scholar who has so successfully carried the torch of criticism into some of the darkest passages of Spanish history. His occupations, however, took him in another direction; and for eight years the Gonzalez MS. remained as completely hidden from the world in the Parisian archives as it had been in those of Simancas. When, at length, it was applied to the historical uses for which it had been intended, it was through the agency, not of a French, but of a British writer. This was Mr. Stirling, the author of the "Annals of the Artists of Spain,"--a work honorable to its author for the familiarity it shows, not only with the state of the arts in that country, but also with its literature.

[Sidenote: MEMOIRS OF CHARLES.]

Mr. Stirling, during a visit to the Peninsula, in 1849, made a pilgrimage to Yuste; and the traditions and hoary reminiscences gathered round the spot left such an impression on the traveller's mind, that, on his return to England, he made them the subject of two elaborate papers in Fraser's Magazine, in the numbers for April and May, 1851. Although these spirited essays rested wholly on printed works, which had long been accessible to the scholar, they were found to contain many new and highly interesting details; showing how superficially Mr.

Stirling's predecessors had examined the records of the emperor's residence at Yuste. Still, in his account the author had omitted the most important feature of Charles's monastic life,--the influence which he exercised on the administration of the kingdom. This was to be gathered from the manuscripts of Simancas.

Mr. Stirling, who through that inexhaustible repository, the Handbook of Spain, had become acquainted with the existence of the Gonzalez MS., was, at the time of writing his essays, ignorant of its fate. On learning, afterwards, where it was to be found, he visited Paris, and, having obtained access to the volume, so far profited by its contents as to make them the basis of a separate work, which he entitled "The Cloister Life of Charles the Fifth." It soon attracted the attention of scholars, both at home and abroad, went through several editions, and was received, in short, with an avidity which showed both the importance attached to the developments the author had made, and the highly attractive form in which he had presented them to the reader.

The Parisian scholars were now stimulated to turn to account the treasure which had remained so long neglected on their shelves. In 1854, less than two years after the appearance of Mr. Stirling's book, M. Amédée Pichot published his "_Chronique de Charles-Quint_," a work which, far from being confined to the latter days of the emperor, covers the whole range of his biography, presenting a large amount of information in regard to his personal habits, as well as to the interior organization of his government, and the policy which directed it. The whole is enriched, moreover, by a multitude of historical incidents, which may be regarded rather as subsidiary than essential to the conduct of the narrative, which is enlivened by much ingenious criticism on the state of manners, arts, and moral culture of the period.

It was not long after the appearance of this work that M. Gachard, whom I have elsewhere noticed as having been commissioned by the Belgian government to make extensive researches in the Archives of Simancas, gave to the public some of the fruits of his labors, in the first volume of his "_Retraite et Mort de Charles-Quint_." It is devoted to the letters of the emperor and his household, which form the staple of the Gonzalez MS.; thus placing at the disposition of the future biographer of Charles the original materials with which to reconstruct the history of his latter days.

Lastly came the work, long expected, of M. Mignet, "_Charles-Quint; son Abdication, son Séjour, et sa Mort au Monastère de Yuste_." It was the reproduction, in a more extended and elaborate form, of a series of papers, the first of which appeared shortly after the publication of Mr. Stirling's book. In this work the French author takes the clear and comprehensive view of his subject so characteristic of his genius. The difficult and debatable points he discusses with acuteness and precision; and the whole story of Charles's monastic life he presents in so luminous an aspect to the reader as leaves nothing further to be desired.

The critic may take some interest in comparing the different manners in which the several writers have dealt with the subject, each according to his own taste, or the bent of his genius. Thus through Stirling's more free and familiar narrative there runs a pleasant vein of humor, with piquancy enough to give it relish, showing the author's sensibility to the ludicrous, for which Charles's stingy habits, and excessive love of good cheer, even in the convent, furnish frequent occasion.

Quite a different conception is formed by Mignet of the emperor's character, which he has cast in the true heroic mould, not deigning to recognize a single defect, however slight, which may at all impair the majesty of the proportions. Finally, Amédée Pichot, instead of the classical, may be said to have conformed to the romantic school in the arrangement of his subject, indulging in various picturesque episodes, which he has, however, combined so successfully with the main body of the narrative as not to impair the unity of interest.

Whatever may be thought of the comparative merits of these eminent writers in the execution of their task, the effect of their labors has undoubtedly been to make that the plainest which was before the most obscure portion of the history of Charles the Fifth.