Chapter VIII (2)

This, however, could not continue for ever; and when, in 1644, Olivares had disappeared from the scene, and nothing more was to be feared from him, Villanueva was formally arrested by the Inquisition, and carried off to Toledo, where he was taken before the judges in _penitenciæ_; and, without any particulars being recited, was admonished that he had sinned enormously by sacrilege and irreligion, whereby he had incurred the heaviest penalties; but that the Holy Office in its clemency would absolve him, only imposing upon him the obligation of fasting on Fridays for the rest of his life, of never entering a convent again, or speaking to a nun, and of giving 2000 ducats for charity to the Prior of the Atocha. The King then restored Villanueva to his post, and imposed perpetual silence with regard to the case against him.[30] What penalty Philip himself paid for his terrible offence is not known; though it is said that the clock of the convent, which played the dirge for the dead each hour, and which existed well within the memory of the present writer, and perhaps exists still, was one of the King's peace offerings to the outraged cloister.

{352}

[Sidenote: Don Juan legitimated]

The clouds gathered ever blacker over Olivares. The demands he was forced to make now for resources to face the French in Catalonia, and to present some show of attempting the recovery of Portugal, drove the Castilian nobles and people of means into almost open revolt. The copper currency was again tampered with, being reduced to one-sixth of its previous value;[31] and large demands were assessed in silver upon persons who were assumed to be able to pay. In Madrid alone on this occasion, 150 people were sent to the dungeons for their inability or unwillingness to pay all that was asked of them. In addition to the public causes for the hatred of the people against the minister, there were also personal reasons of rapidly increasing strength for his unpopularity with his own class. His arrogance had always offended the nobles of high lineage, and he now added to it, as if in mere wantonness, an offence for which even his own kin never forgave him. His only daughter had died soon after her early marriage; and whatever may have been Olivares' faults, he was an extremely fond father. He had, as he grew older, practically adopted his nephew Don Luis de Haro, son of the Marquis del Carpio, as his heir; but suddenly there appeared at Court a young man of twenty-eight, up to that time known by another name, and passing as the son {353} of a small government official in Madrid. The name now given to this person was Enrique Felipe de Guzman, and Olivares brought him to the palace and to the King's apartments, introducing him as his son. The young man was a person of no breeding or attraction, and his mode of life was far from exemplary, but Olivares appears to have been perfectly infatuated with him. Following his own bent, the son had married a lady of good house in Seville; but Olivares had higher views for him, and, by dint of great and costly efforts, caused the marriage to be declared invalid. No people in the world were more tenacious of purity of blood than the Spanish nobility, whose open immorality of life, indeed, added to their strictness with regard to their legitimate succession; and, much as Olivares favoured his new son, and lavishly as, at his instance, Philip endowed him with rank, resources, and offices, it was difficult to get him acknowledged as an equal by the proud Guzmans, and much less by the nobles, who were already bitterly opposed to the minister. But Olivares was powerful and determined. At his instance, the handsome, gallant young son of the King, and of the actress the _Calderona_, who was now twelve years old, was brought to Madrid, and by decree was given the same semi-royal honours as had been bestowed on the other Don Juan of Austria, the son of the great Emperor. Queen Isabel had but two living children, young Baltasar Carlos, the heir, and a younger girl, Maria Teresa. Baltasar Carlos, who was the same age as his half-brother, was a promising, sturdy little Prince, immensely popular with the people of Madrid as he pranced {354} about on his pony, or raised in his name fresh regiments for the war. But naturally the Queen his mother was jealous that another son of the King, even better looking than Baltasar Carlos, should be brought into such close competition with her own legitimate offspring.[32]

The significance of the legitimation of Don Juan was seen in a family council summoned by the Count-Duke, in which Olivares' three sisters, all great ladies, and their children, were required to greet Enrique Felipe de Guzman as "Excellency," and a relative.[33] All the Castilian nobility was up in arms at such an insult; but the disgust was infinitely deepened when Olivares demanded of the Constable of Castile, the Duke of Frias, the hand of his daughter for Enrique Felipe de Guzman, and when the Constable, a weak man, consented to the indignity--

Soy de la Casa de Velasco,
Y de nada hago asco.

Here great Velasco's chief you see;
Nothing is too vile for me,

{355} was written by one of the poets of the Calle Mayor, and another scorpion was added to the lash preparing for the back of Olivares.

[Sidenote: The son of Olivares]

The minister was no weakling, and his hand fell heavily upon those who dared to oppose him. Quevedo's trenchant pen had scarified the vices and weaknesses of Madrid in a dozen satires: he had scourged the slothful, vain, pretentious crew that filled the gutters of the slums and the galleries of the Buen Retiro; but so long as he was friendly to Olivares none dared to touch him. The moment he turned his glib verse and bitter prose, addressed to the poet-king himself,[34] to an exposure of the {356} evils arising from the policy of the favourite, then isolation in a dark and filthy dungeon was Quevedo's reward. There, until the favourite's fall, the poet, loaded with chains, was kept, whilst the vices he had scourged grew greater with impunity.

The streets of Madrid became more scandalous even than before. Bravos and assassins almost openly stood for hire; murder and robbery were so common in broad daylight as to attract only passing notice, and in one fortnight at this period (1641) there were 110 murders in Madrid alone, many of them of persons of position.[35] Devout in form as were the people, even sanctuary was now no protection, and the most hideous sacrilege went hand in hand with grovelling sanctimoniousness. Fresh pragmatics, with penalties ferocious in their severity, denounced evil living, but little notice was taken of them after the first few days. Women still clattered up and down the Prado and the Calle Mayor on high jingling pattens, and with great swelling farthingales, their faces covered and their breasts exposed; cape snatchers still plied their trade at the street corners, and ruffling bullies picked quarrels for gain with peaceful citizens.

{357}

[Sidenote: Disintegration]

In Catalonia the Spanish armies and fleet were being beleaguered and beaten hopelessly (1641). The French King had received the oath of allegiance from Barcelona, whilst powerful French armies under Schomberg, De la Motte, and Meilleraie, with Richelieu behind them, held the principality firmly, cordially seconded by the Catalans themselves. All Spain, even Madrid, now almost at the end of its resources, saw that the country was upon the rapid slope that led to utter ruin. Portugal gone, with hardly as yet a pretence of winning it back. Catalonia gone, apparently as hopelessly, Andalucia almost in revolt,[36] and Naples simmering in discontent: a great empire of formerly loyal people falling into impotent disintegration, and all fingers pointed at the heavy, frowning, yellow-visaged man, who worked night and day doing everybody's work, and desperately keeping the King immersed in trifling pleasures, as the author of all this ruin and disgrace.

It was inevitable that it should be so; but it {358} was, of course, unjust. At the beginning of the reign, and for long afterwards, the policy that caused the trouble, that of persisting in the inflated claims of a century before, had been heartily endorsed by the whole people. They wanted glory, pride, supremacy. They wanted still to act the part of God's militia, to dragoon the world into one belief--their own--to boast of the riches of their King and the greatness of their country. But when at last they understood that a policy abroad of bombastic meddling and of domestic waste at home was costly, they turned to rend the man who had carried their vain aspirations into acts. Olivares was no wiser than other Spanish statesmen of his time. He could only see with the eyes of his own generation; and his share of the blame for the ruin that had ensued upon his rule was only greater because more conspicuous than that of the whole people, who were blinded and besotted by the foolish hope of enjoying advantages, national and personal, which were beyond their means.

In April 1642, Madrid was panic-stricken by the news that the last reinforcements sent to the seat of war, and raised with such terrible suffering from the exhausted people, had been overwhelmed by Marshal de la Motte; and Castile was now powerless to send adequate forces to make any head against the absolute domination of Catalonia by the French. The satires and epigrams fell as thick as autumn leaves in Madrid, urging Philip to wake up and act the man. Louis XIII. was to be present with his army on Spanish soil at Perpignan, and was already playing a worthy part in a great national crisis; whilst Philip, his Spanish {359} brother-in-law, still dangled about the Buen Retiro, busy in arranging comedies, even writing them, some said; planning ostentatious shows and affected literary competitions, or, as a change, speared driven boars at the Pardo. The Queen, a Frenchwoman though she was, added her tears and entreaties that her husband himself should go whither his duty called him, no matter at what sacrifice of his ease and pleasures.

[Sidenote: Philip goes to the war]

To do Philip justice, he personally was eager to fulfil his duty; but long custom had made him almost incapable now of shaking off the yoke of Olivares and having his own way. For a time the minister and his obedient Councils opposed every obstacle to the project of the King's joining the army in the field. The personal danger was made most of; the incommodity of the voyage, the inconvenience to the troops to be weighted with the additional responsibility of the safety of the monarch; the risk of assassination by rebel subjects; even the positive lack of money for the journey, was urged, again and again, upon Philip by Olivares. It was useless, moreover, he said, for the King to go without large reinforcements. On the other hand, the Queen and the higher nobles, even many of the Councillors, urged that the case was desperate, and that without the King's personal example Catalonia was lost for ever to Spain. They even began to whisper that cowardice was the reason of Olivares' obstinate resistance to the journey; and at length Philip, aroused for once in his life, put his foot down, peremptorily silenced the remonstrances of the Council, and tore up its Memorial opposing his going.

{360}

Again the drums were beaten. The cities of Andalucia were appealed to in the name of loyalty; the nobles and their sons were once more squeezed. The son of Olivares, with his father's money, raised a chosen corps with which he made a brilliant show before the King, and gave an excuse (says Novoa) to put pressure upon other young nobles to do the like. At last, with infinite effort, a new force was got together to accompany the King to Aragon; the Queen, working strenuously, selling her jewels, putting pressure upon pious ladies and ecclesiastics to subscribe, making much of the popularity of her son Baltasar Carlos; and for the time putting aside the frivolous pleasures that had delighted her, to play a part worthy of the daughter of the gallant Béarnais, Henry of Navarre.

When news came to Madrid that Louis XIII. was on Spanish soil in Roussillon, Philip finally determined to go to the front in spite of Olivares. He would go by Aranjuez, he said, and if the Count-Duke did not like to join him there he should go without him. This was open rebellion, but Olivares was too old a hand to gainsay the King, who, like all weak men, was obstinacy itself when once his mind had been made up. On the 26th April, Philip, on a splendid charger, with pistols at his saddle-bow and sword by his side, rode to the Atocha church to pray to the famous image of the Virgin, and thence by Barajas and Alcalá de Henares, on his way to the war. Like a lighted powder-train the enthusiasm flew through the country as the King passed onward. Not in the memory of living men had a monarch of Spain thus rode forth to war to fight for his inheritance, and the foul {361} miasma of sloth and ignoble enjoyment was swept from the hearts of thousands of young Spaniards, whose spirits were aflame and whose chivalry was touched anew with the spirit that in times past had made their sires invincible.

The Queen was left in Madrid as Regent, with the President of the Council of Castile and the Marquis de Santa Cruz to aid her; and Olivares, who knew well the danger of the course he was obliged to acquiesce in, lagged behind in the capital as long as he dared,--afraid of the war, sneered some; afraid of leaving the Queen alone, whispered others; whilst, as time went on, the opinion became general that the King's going was all a feint to get more money and men. There seemed good reason for the suspicion; for when Olivares at length joined his master, it was with plans formed to beguile Philip in the usual way. Two days were passed in devotion at the shrine of St. James at Alcalá; then a pompous visit with long festivities to Olivares' own house at Loeches; and thence to Aranjuez, where and in the neighbourhood nearly a month was passed in hunting parties, tourneys, and the like, with frequent visits from the Queen. Again the war spirit in the country flagged, and the people despaired at so much trifling, when, as the saying went, there were three Kings on Spanish soil instead of one.[37]

At length Philip shook himself free again, thanks to the exhortation of his wife; and on the 20th May rode forth from Aranjuez, now with a numerous unwieldy train of servants, carriages, and baggage, and followed by Olivares in terror {362} of assassination, surrounded by guards whom he beseeched to allow no one to approach him.[38] Olivares was in mortal fear, too, of an interview between Philip and his cousin the Duchess of Mantua, the expelled Vicereine of Portugal; whom, much to her indignation, the minister had forbidden to come to Madrid, and had secluded under formal restraint at Ocaña, which lay in the road by which the King must pass. The Duchess, if once she got ear of the King alone, would tell him how, and why, Portugal had been lost; and in the long drive during which the Duchess shared the King's coach on his way to Ocaña, she laid such a story before him, of oppression, cruelty, and unwise government, as to leave Philip shocked and angered that so much had been hidden from him.

[Sidenote: Philip in Aragon]

Visiting noble houses and shrines on the road, and seizing every opportunity for delay, Olivares managed to spin out the journey to Saragossa until the 27th July, when Aragon itself was half overrun by French raiders. Philip's entry into the city was more fitting for a monarch's triumphal return from victory than for the opening of a campaign by a soldier. Soon after his arrival he heard with dismay that Monzon, the ancient legislative capital, had been occupied by the French; whilst everywhere his troops were either retiring before the enemy or being beaten hopelessly. The greater nobles, both Castilian and Aragonese, systematically avoided contact with Olivares; but the {363} presence of Philip in the Aragonese capital offered a good opportunity for a visit of the grandees to him, in order to take counsel as to what could be done in so calamitous a state of affairs. Olivares received them almost rudely, and refused them collective access to the King, whereupon the nobles in high dudgeon shook the dust of Saragossa from their feet, and to a man swore to be avenged on the insolent upstart who, they said, was keeping the King prisoner. In fact, Philip was practically isolated in two rooms whilst at Saragossa, on the plea of the risk to his life if he went out. Olivares rode forth every day in a coach closely surrounded by guards, and no one was allowed to approach him.

For all the months that Philip passed in the Aragonese city he never saw his army or approached the enemy, his main amusement being to watch tennis matches from his window.[39] Roussillon was lost in September, never to be recovered, when Perpignan fell; and thenceforward every week brought some story of disgrace and defeat for the Spanish arms; whilst Philip, in inglorious despair, moped in his seclusion, bereft even of his cherished amusements. Olivares was growing desperate. Every courier brought from the stout-hearted Queen Regent in Madrid messages of encouragement and good cheer. She was working bravely, and with wonderful success; collecting funds from hoards hitherto unsuspected, gathering troops and putting heart into them. With her {364} son by her side she reviewed soldiers, and made herself the idol of the populace, who for a time had plucked up some hope and pride in the future of their country. But with the Queen's cheery news to her husband there always went open or covert blame of Olivares. To the minister she sent all the plate, jewels, and treasure she could collect; but he saw from the comparative ease with which she could raise it, whilst he could not, that she held the winning hand and had the people behind her. In despair of beating the French in the field, he stooped to conspire with Cinq Mars against the life of Richelieu himself. The conspiracy was discovered, and made the feeling against him personally more bitter than ever.

Philip could not be kept quite ignorant of the misery and ruin around him, or of his own undignified position, and he grew moody and irritable with the minister who had led him to such a pass. Without even consulting him, he appointed the Marquis of Leganes, a cousin of Olivares and an experienced soldier, to the chief command of what was left of his army; and Olivares, foreseeing his disgrace, craved leave to retire. But this Philip would not allow. He had no other minister to replace him; he was in the midst of a disastrous war, and he had neither the energy nor the knowledge necessary to take matters in his own hand at this juncture.

The Queen in Madrid had no lack of friends and advisers, all of them enemies of the Guzmans, especially the Counts of Castrillo and Paredes; but the ostentatious legitimation of Olivares' son Enrique had also alienated his own most influential {365} kinsman, the Haros, represented by the Marquis of Carpio, whose son he had disinherited so far as he was able; and these with other former adherents now joined the Queen's friends. All Madrid knew that the Queen was against Olivares; and, safe now from his presence, she made no concealment of it. "My efforts and my boy's innocence must serve the King for eyes," she said; "for if he use those of the Count-Duke much longer my son will be reduced to a poor King of Castile instead of King of Spain."

When la Motte defeated Philip's army under Leganes before Lerida late in the autumn (1642), the last hope seemed gone. Torrecusa, the Neapolitan general who had fought so well in the previous campaigns, went to Saragossa, and, forcing his way to the King, told him that all was lost unless a change was made in the direction of affairs. Torrecusa was mollified with a grandeeship on the spot; but Philip, overweighed and almost at his wits' end, was fain to return to his capital, in the desperate hope of raising another army in the spring, though the citizens of Saragossa prayed him to stay and defend them against the all-victorious French and Catalans.[40] Alas! he had neither troops nor money with which to defend them,--no spirit, no counsel, no hope.

[Sidenote: Fall of Olivares]

On the 1st December 1642, Philip turned his face towards Madrid, after signing decrees, drafted by Olivares, imposing upon Castile new and crushing impositions with which to raise a fresh army. Another "voluntary" levy of money was ordered, a new loan authorised, the seizure of all the church {366} and domestic plate decreed, and a tax of 7 per cent. upon all real property demanded. Well might the subjects stand aghast at this. Where, they asked, was the actual money to come from? The copper was so debased as to be worthless; the only standard was silver at a high premium (38 per cent.), and of this there was not enough available for currency, much less to represent the new demand. When, therefore, Philip entered Madrid by the side of his wife, all spirits were prepared and eager for the change they saw must come. As the royal pair passed in their coach from the Retiro to the palace, blessings loud and long greeted the Queen, such as Philip had never heard before.

Olivares understood the signs of the times too. Summoning his brother-in-law Carpio, he tried to reconcile him, but in vain, and complained bitterly that all the gentlemen of the King's chamber had turned his enemies. He talked, indeed, about retiring; but Philip never moved a muscle of his face, and the minister knew that the course which had served him so often was powerless to help him now. The Countess was strong and resourceful, and undertook to bring Philip round. When she met him in the palace that evening, she spoke much of her husband's services and efforts, and of the excellent arrangements he was making for carrying on a successful war in the following spring. Philip bowed gravely, but made no reply. The day afterwards (14th January 1643) a courier came from the Emperor, bringing more bad news to Philip and bitterly attacking Olivares, and this also sank into the King's mind.

Moodily the King walked to his wife's apartment {367} that afternoon. There, to his surprise, he found with her the heir Baltasar Carlos, now aged fourteen. Casting herself at the King's feet with her son by her side, the Queen solemnly exhorted him, for the sake of what remained of their child's inheritance, to cast aside the evil councillor who was dragging them all to ruin. The King was troubled, for everything with him was a case of conscience, and he felt that he could trust no one. On his way from his wife's apartment he traversed a passage where he was intercepted by an old woman, his foster-mother, Ana de Guevara, who had been banished by Olivares and had returned without leave. Kneeling, she in her turn implored Philip to listen to those who loved him best; and then with a torrent of impassioned eloquence she impeached the favourite and all his acts: spoke of the national ruin, of the people's misery, of fields untilled, of looms idle, of the foreigner reigning over Spanish land, and of people who once were the soul of loyalty now in revolt against their King, all, all through Olivares. Philip was overwhelmed, and could only raise her, saying, "You have spoken truly."

But still one more blow was to be struck that night at the falling favourite. The Duchess of Mantua, secretly summoned by the Queen, had fled from Ocaña, and as fast as post-horses could draw her carriage through the winter storm she had come to Madrid. Suddenly appearing in the office of Olivares, she said she had come to see the King, and required lodging and food. The minister treated her with great rudeness, and made her wait for four hours before he provided a bad lodging for her in the house of the Treasury. But she was the {368} King's cousin; and the next day the Queen introduced her into Philip's presence, where, this time with documentary proofs, she brought home to him the responsibility of Olivares and his creatures for the loss of Portugal.

That night Philip wrote to his minister, saying that the leave to retire he had so often craved was now accorded him, and that he might go where and when he pleased. Olivares, we are told by one who saw him, stood as if turned to stone as he read the letter; but at length, recovering his serenity, he turned to his wife and told her that he needed rest and change, and would shortly leave for a stay at Loeches, his seat some twelve miles from Madrid, if she would start at once and prepare the place for his coming. Guessing the truth, she resisted as much as possible, but was at last forced to obey. On the following morning, according to his invariable custom for so many years, the minister entered the King's room early, and knelt before him for a time in silence. Then he launched forth an eloquent denunciation of those who had slandered him in the eyes of his master, and in justification of his efforts. He had failed, he acknowledged; circumstances and the venom of his enemies had wrecked his best laid schemes for the exaltation of Spain and the glory of his Sovereign; but at least he prayed that his loyalty should be recognised, and that, in the retirement to which he willingly went at the King's behest, he might carry with him the regard of the master he had so strenuously tried to serve.

No word of reply came from the King, whose long sallow face remained as expressionless as if {369} moulded in putty, and Olivares left the presence for the moment defeated; but still revolving in his mind other expedients to regain Philip's favour, or at least to delay his own fall. First he wrote to his energetic and spirited wife at Loeches, telling her the whole truth; for where he had failed he thought she might succeed. When her husband's letter reached the Countess, she was just taking her seat at table for dinner, "and on reading it not only did her natural colour fly from her face, but the rouge with which she covered it, as is the fashion in the palace, paled and left her like a corpse."[41] Leaving her dinner untouched, the afflicted woman hurried back to Madrid; and after an interview with her husband tried her blandishments upon the King as he was on his way through the corridors to visit his children as usual. She found him unmoved and silent, and then, rushing to the Queen's apartment, she threw herself at her feet. But Isabel had suffered under her hard rule too long, and answered coldly: "What God, the people, and evil happenings have done, Countess, neither the King nor I can undo."

Then Olivares summoned to the Retiro his nephew, Don Luis de Haro, Carpio's son, who he knew was in high favour with the King. He had, he told him, been a bad uncle to him; but he had brought his father and him from their remote grange at Carpio, and had made them rich and powerful; and he begged him, notwithstanding later jealousy, to be a good nephew to him and plead his cause. Haro saw the King, and gave him account of several secret points of politics {370} on behalf of the fallen minister, and asked in his name many and expensive favours for his servant, all of which Philip granted,[42] but kept silent with regard to Olivares himself.

Soon the news was whispered in Madrid; and Liars' Walk was like a swarming hive. At first men were incredulous. It was all a sham, they declared; just another trick to squeeze more money out of them on the pretext that the hated Olivares had gone. But by and by the happy truth gradually forced itself upon them. The nightmare that had sat for all these years upon the heart of Spain had been shaken off at last! And then there burst out such a frantic flood of rejoicing as Madrid had rarely seen before. We have a King again! cried the crowds that stood in the great square before the palace; and squibs and pasquins were handed from hand to hand by the score.[43] But still day followed day and yet Olivares tarried in the vain hope of averting his fate. A hundred excuses were found by him for delay: the difficulty of transport, the condition of his health, his desire to see all those who had served him well provided for, and much else. Hints reached him in plenty that his {371} absence was desirable, though he admitted no one to see him. His keys were demanded, and he sent them; once he saw the King in public audience, and talked to him of affairs for a quarter of an hour, but those who stood by remarked that Philip's eyes never once rested upon him; and again he retired discomfited, with tears coursing down his cheeks. As the King and Queen, with the Duchess of Mantua in their coach, went on St. Anthony's day (17th January 1643) to the Convent of Discalced Carmelites, the people, who now knew everything, impulsively surged around them with joyous cries: "Our King is King at last!--God save the King!"

At length Philip grew impatient at the delay, for he would appoint no new officers until he was clean quit of Olivares and his crew, and he decided to hunt for two days at the Escorial in order that measures might be taken in his absence. No sooner had he left than the Countess of Olivares made another tearful appeal to the Queen, who dismissed her promptly; and on the second day (20th January 1643), when Philip was approaching Madrid on his way back, a great gathering of nobles came out to meet him. Through Melchior Borja they said that they wished to place themselves and their possessions at the disposal of their King once more. Hitherto they had stood aloof, for reasons now known to him; but so soon as that evil cause was removed they were willing to stand by him to the death. Then they urged him to change all his councils and administrative officers, and begin a new régime.

When Philip entered the palace, he turned to Don Luis de Haro and asked, "Has he gone?" {372} "No, Sire," was the reply. "Is he waiting for us to use force?" grumbled the King; and soon the hint was conveyed to Olivares, and, convinced now of the hopelessness of his case, the man who had ruled Spain over the King for two-and-twenty disastrous years slunk out of the capital by unfrequented ways, accompanied by only four attendants in a coach with closely drawn curtains, in mortal fear of assassination; for, as his spiteful biographer says, the very children in the streets would have stoned him to death if they had known of his flitting.[44]

Not until the fallen favourite had left Madrid well behind him did Philip feel himself safe. Summoning to his workroom in one of the corner towers of the old palace, Cardinals Borja and Spinola, and a number of the nobles who had opposed Olivares, he addressed a long speech to them. He was, he said, ardently determined to take the details of Government into his own hands in future. The Count-Duke had served him long, well, and zealously; but his health had broken down and he needed repose. Thenceforward he (the King) would have no confidential minister, but would work himself as minister, with the aid and counsel of his hearers, from whom he asked now reports and suggestions for future remedial action. Oñate, an old man and vain, hoped for some days that he was to replace Olivares as sole minister, but the King promptly undeceived him, and declared publicly that in future he would have no other minister but his wife, whose energy, {373} wisdom, patriotism he now understood for the first time.

As for the once powerful minister who had gone into obscurity broken-hearted, none was so poor as to do him reverence, few magnanimous enough to give him a good word. Those who had beslavered him with adulation were the first now to load him with ignominy; even the Constable of Castile, who had so willingly married his daughter to Olivares' base son, now stripped of all his honour, claimed that young Guzman's earlier marriage had been valid after all. When it was pointed out to the Constable that this would leave his daughter dishonoured, he replied: "I would rather see my daughter a bawd and free, than an honest woman and Guzman's wife."[45]

The many scathing attacks published upon Olivares and his administration, provoked by his fall, found but one able, though imprudently frank, answer, which was called _Nicandra_,[46] and is ascribed to Ahumada, the Prince's tutor, and to that staunch friend of Velazquez and of the Count-Duke, Francisco de Rioja; but now that the dust of the convulsion has cleared away, we see that it was Olivares' methods rather than his principles that were the cause of the disasters of his rule. The foreign policy which he represented was not his alone, but was the policy of the immense majority of his countrymen at the time; and if it had not brought him into antagonism with the {374} provincial and autonomous traditions of the outer realms of the Peninsula, the principal factor of his fall would not have existed. The vast wealth which it was said he had heaped upon himself, amounting, so his enemies asserted, to the enormous total of 400,000 ducats a year, was not accumulated for personal gratification or greed, as had been the case with Lerma, nor were the sums he obtained larger than were appropriated by his great rival Richelieu. He lived very quietly, almost humbly, giving the whole of his time to work, and spent his revenues largely in the entertainment and convenience of the King.

From Loeches he soon, with the King's permission, retired to Toro, far away from Court. Even there, divested of his dignities and power, the envy and hate of his enemies pursued him. More than once in the two years that followed his retreat the King seemed inclined to recall his old minister. But watchful eyes and jealous heart always frustrated such an idea, if it was entertained. Many a time, in fear of such a calamity to them, the nobles, especially those of Aragon, urged the King to punish with death a man who had thus betrayed his confidence; but Philip was neither cruel nor unjust, and naturally drew back from such a course as this. Once it seemed as if the enemies of Olivares had almost succeeded; for in reply to an address from the ex-minister upon public affairs, in which the latter offered his services again, the King wrote from Saragossa: "In short, Count, I must reign, and my son must be crowned King of Aragon. This is difficult unless I deliver your head to my subjects, who {375} demand it unanimously, and I cannot oppose them any further."

[Sidenote: The end of Olivares]

Alas! the head of Olivares was useless to them or to anyone else thenceforward, for the letter sent him raving mad, and he died on the 22nd July 1645, only two years and a half after his disgrace. Thenceforward Philip, for good or for evil, stands alone. What is done he does, and no powerful minister is interposed as a shield between him and the responsibility for his acts. "Philip the Great" meant well, but he had yet to learn the lesson that broke his heart: that good intentions alone are not sufficient to ensure success; and that the despairing struggles of one conscience-haunted man are powerless to save a nation that has lost its faith in itself, and its dependence upon labour as a means to salvation.

[1] She ended by utterly wearing out her welcome, and disgusting everybody in Madrid by her pride and rapacity and the turbulence of her followers, and before she left she was supplanted by another great French lady, the Duchess of Chevreuse, who came to Madrid from London as an emissary of Marie de Medici, and was received with great distinction, much to the Princess of Carignano's anger. Needless to say that nothing came of either of the intrigues, and that Richelieu kept his hand firmly on the helm until he died in 1642.

[2] These two series of festivities, which together lasted about a month, certainly mark the high-water mark of the splendour of the Buen Retiro. Full descriptions of parts of them have been published by Mesonero Romanes in _El Antiguo Madrid_, by Morel Fatio in _L'Espagne au XVI. et XVII. Siècle_, and by at least three contemporary writers--Mendez Silva, Andrés Sanchez del Espejo, and the Newsletters in Rodriguez Villa's _Corte y Monarquia de España_, etc.

[3] The contents of the King's apartment, given by Strada to Philip, "with a very precious reliquary," was valued at 20,000 ducats. But this splendid gift did not save Strada from a fine of 200 ducats a few weeks afterwards, for having addressed Camporedondo, the senior member of the Council of Finance as "Lordship" whereas by the pragmatic he was only allowed to be addressed as "Worship." The house Strada lived in was one he rented from Spinola his fellow-Genoese. As an instance of the prevailing corruption it may be mentioned that Strada paid 300 ducats to the author of the official account of these festivities for the favourable references to him in it.

[4] The Newsletters say that there were 7000 wax lights, which alone cost over 8000 ducats, the cost of this one day's feast being 300,000 ducats--afterwards increased to 500,000 ducats. This enormous expenditure shocked everybody who thought about the matter. "The gossips," says the Newsletter, "assert that this great event, which had no other end than pastime and pleasure, which indeed was pure ostentation was to show our friend Cardinal Richelieu that there is plenty more money left in the world to punish his King." But many persons who dared in the subsequent carnival to blame this waste found themselves in the dungeons a few days afterwards; and several priests who preached before Olivares at St. Geronimo in the ensuing Lenten retreat, and ventured to denounce such wicked extravagance, were banished from Court. Rodriguez Villa's Newsletters have much to say about this.

[5] Aston to Coke, 20th and 25th February 1637.--Record Office, S.P. Spain MSS. 38. This part of the entertainments had been arranged and paid for by Philip's state secretary and confidential friend, Geronimo de Villanueva, Marquis of Villalba, of whom we shall hear later. On the following Tuesday the regular public carnival took place, and the licence appears to have been shocking in the extreme. In one of the cars a donkey was represented as dying in bed, with pretended priests and friars mocking the most sacred mysteries around him, whilst the supposed doctors were going through indecent antics. One masker was covered with habits of knighthood, crosses, and noble insignia, with the significant motto, "For Sale." Rodriguez Villa.

[6] Amongst other devices at this period, Olivares in the King's name appropriated one-third of all the household plate and manufactured silver in private hands, and ordered each member of the Councils of the Indies and Castile to provide each month 200 ducats in silver to be exchanged (for depreciated copper) at the exchange of 25 per cent., the current rate being 38. A young Irish student at the Escoria came and said that he had discovered how to convert a mark of silver and a mark of copper into two marks of pure silver. Olivares accepted the youth's offer to demonstrate his discovery at the palace before experts, but after two attempts he ignominiously failed and was imprisoned.

[7] As may be imagined, Father Salazar's invention produced a perfect torrent of satires, and the Jesuit himself was sternly reproved by his ecclesiastical superiors for busying himself in financial affairs. So bitter was the feeling against him, that he was forced to leave the Society. Amongst other rumours about him was that he had devised a government monopoly of drinking water. In the ensuing Lent the pulpits of Madrid rang in denunciation of Father Salazar; and at the carnival a masker dressed as a peasant bore a banner inscribed--

Sisas alcabalas y papel sellado,
Me tienen desollado.

With food excise and tax on all I sell.
And now with paper stamps, you've flayed me well.

The unfortunate masker had to fly to hiding to escape the wrath of Olivares.

[8] Thirty-four maravedis at the normal value would be equal to 2½d.

[9] An azumbre is ancient liquid measure of about 2 quarts.

[10] A Castilian fanega of grain is 1½ bushel.

[11] This is the silver real, then worth 6d.

[12] Record Office, S.P. Spain MSS. 39.

[13] Although not immediately touching our subject, a very curious set of letters included in the above in the Record Office may be mentioned. They relate to Secretary Windebank's young son Christopher, or Kit Windebank, as he was called. He had been sent under Aston's care to Spain to see the world; and had been quite carried away by the _genius loci_ of Madrid, and got out of hand altogether. The scapegrace makes the best of his proceedings in his letters to his father and mother, but Aston's reports tell a different tale, and Kit is very angry when his money is stopped. The worst of it was that he fell in love with a Spanish girl, and, running away from embassy, married her. At Aston's instance Olivares threw into prison the priest who married them; but a thousand legal difficulties existed, he said, to obtaining a divorce, especially as Kit swore that he would not give up the girl, who was _enceinte_. At the end, however, he submits sulkily, the girl is sent to a convent, and young Kit returns home; doubtless to commit bigamy in due time in England, and continue the knightly family of Windebank.

[14] It is curious to note that when the census of private coaches was made in Madrid for this purpose, it was found that there were 900 in use.

[15] March 1637, Rodriguez Villa's Newsletters.

[16] _Ibid._

[17] The Portuguese in question was splendidly repaid for his generosity. and when he left Madrid at the end of the year he had received the following grants,--"Marquis of Viseu, Count of Linhares for his eldest son and successors, the post of Marshal of Portugal for his second son, that of Governor of Ceuta for his third son, an extension for three years longer of the revenues of the governorship of Sofala (_i.e._ Mozambique), a grant of 24,000 for his own expenses, 5000 ducats per annum for ever, 2500 ducats perpetual pension for his daughter-in-law, General on land and sea during his stay in Brazil with the title of Viceroy, and the title of Lieutenant-Generalin Portugal so long as the Duchess of Mantua rules there, grants for a second life of all the pensioned knighthoods he holds, and four pensioned knighthoods to be disposed of as he likes, and a renewal for three lives of the pension he holds from the crown." It was said that these grants were worth 700,000 ducats. This is a fair specimen of the lavishness to quite a second-rate personage at a time when the nation was in the deepest distress. Rodriguez Villa's Newsletters, 1637.

[18] Rodriguez Villa's Newsletter, 1637.

[19] The following words occur in the famous Memorial on the subject referred to on page 142, etc.: "Let your Majesty hold as the most important affair of your State to make yourself _King of Spain_. I mean, Sire, that you should not content yourself with being King of Portugal, of Aragon, of Valencia, Count of Barcelona, but that you should strive and consider with mature and secret counsel to reduce these realms of which Spain consists to the laws and form of Castile, without any distinction. If your Majesty succeeds in this, you will be the most powerful Prince in the world. Nevertheless this is not a business which can be carried through in a limited time nor do I suggest that it should be disclosed to anybody, however confidential he may be; because the desirability of the object is indisputable, and what is to be done in preparation and anticipation can be done by your Majesty yourself."

[20] Rodriguez Villa's Newsletters.

[21] Aston's letters, MSS., Record Office S.P., Spain.

[22] How completely the old crusading spirit had decayed is seen in the derision with which the courtiers in Madrid greeted the saying of Antonio Mascarenhas, the dignified old-fashioned hidalgo governor of Tangier. When he visited Madrid he went to present his respects to the little Prince Baltasar Carlos. "Who are you?" asked the boy. "I am the gentleman," replied the Portuguese, "who by and by will help your Highness to conquer the Holy Sepulchre." It was the answer of a knight-errant, sneered the courtiers, and so it was, but it was this fervent knight-errantry which had given to Spain the strength it had possessed, and which under the scoffers and mockers it never could possess again.

[23] The speeches are given _in extenso_ in the documents printed in Danvila's _Poder Civil en España_.

[24] Novoa, _Memorias_.

[25] The best contemporary is that by General de Melo, _Guerra de Cataluña_.

[26] The details will be found in _Historia de la Conjuracion de Portugal, Revolutions de Portugal_, Vertot; _Historia del levantamiento de Portugal_, Seyner; and Canovas de Castello's _Estudios del Reinado de Felipe IV._, vol. i.

[27] The King was actually dressing at the time, and with the royal family escaped to one of the hermitages in the park, though at one time in danger. Many ladies who were yet in bed fled in their night garb, and were rescued with difficulty. Novoa.

[28] _Ibid._

[29] The only part of the story which appears open to question is the continuance of the intrigue after Philip's remorseful flight. There seems to be some doubt about this.

[30] The story is told with many embellishments, but the above version is the most trustworthy. It comes from a contemporary MS., written after the fall of Olivares, transcribed by Mesonero Romanes in _El Antiguo_, Madrid.

[31] August 1642. Novoa, an eye-witness, referring to this time, says; "Trade and commerce were confused, and the prices rose enormously, so that people could not find money for boots and clothes; and even provisions could not be had, as no one would sell. The copper money was valueless, and people threw it about or forced it upon those to whom they owed money, as the law gave it currency. The agony and desperation of the people were intense, and utter despair consumed the hearts and lives of the people." Novoa, _Memorias_.

[32] Don Juan was acknowledged in 1642, and the occasion was taken for a great series of festivities to celebrate the event, though the state of public affairs at the time was more deplorable than ever. The Nuncio Panzuolo took a prominent part in the affair, and gave the Pope's blessing to the young Prince; but it was noted that the Queen, usually so hearty and debonnaire, was cold and haughty when Don Juan was led up to kiss her hand and that of Prince Baltasar Carlos. It was noticed that the latter, prompted apparently by his mother, addressed his half-brother as _Vos_, You, which was the manner usually adopted towards nobles, but not to royal personages. An interesting unpublished paper in Italian in the British Museum gives many curious particulars of Don Juan's youth, and the details of his legitimation. Add MSS. 8703. "Ritratto della nascitá qualitá costumi ed accioni de Don Juan d'Austria."

[33] A most amusing account of this family council is given by Novoa, who hits off the respective characters of the three sisters--the Marchiones of Carpio, Marchioness of Monterey, and Countess of Alcañizes--very neatly.

[34] The terrible Memorial, written by Quevedo, exposing in burning words the state of the country, and calling upon the King to arouse himself, should be read by anyone who desires confirmation of the pictures I have tried to trace in this book. The paper was slipped under the King's napkin at dinner, and was accompanied by a parody paternoster, beginning as follows--

Filipo, que el mundo aclama
Rey del infiel tan temido,
Despierta, que por dormido
Nadie te teme, ni te ama;
Despierta, rey, que la fama
Por todo el orbe pregona
Que es de leon tu corona
Y tu dormir de liròn,
Mira que la adulacion
Te llama con fin siniestro
"Padre Nuestro."

Hail, Philip, King whom all acclaim,
In fear the infidel to keep,
Awake! for in thy slumber deep
No one doth love or fear thy name.
Awake! oh King, the worlds proclaim
Thy crown on lion's brow to sit,
Thy slumber's but for dormouse fit.
Listen! 'tis flattery's artful wile
That sunk in sloth thy days beguile,
And calls thee, its base ends to foster,
"Pater Noster."

[35] At this time three of the principal grandees of Spain were banished from Court by Philip, for scaling the walls of the Retiro at night and clandestinely making love to the maids of honour. Two years previously affairs had reached such a scandalous length with the nobles, that Philip ordered a special commission to inquire into the matter. As a result a large batch of nobles, two marquises and one of Philip's chamberlains amongst them, were expelled as persons of known evil life. But suspicion is aroused by the terms of the decree that their dissoluteness was not the sole cause of this disgrace, as they are said to have "frequented gambling houses and there murmured without any reason at all against the present Government and the higher officers of the State, although some of them are deeply obliged to the same." Rodriguez Villa's Newsletter.

[36] An extremely dangerous conspiracy hatched at this time in Andalucia was discovered, and contributed much to the increased unpopularity of the Guzmans. The principal plotters were two of Olivares' greatest kinsmen, the Duke of Medina Sidonia, brother of the new Queen of Portugal, and the Marquis of Ayamonte, the object of the conspiracy being to make Medina Sidonia King of Andalucia by the aid of the new King of Portugal. Ayamonte had already betrayed to the Portuguese a conspiracy hatched by Olivares in Lisbon; and then suggested to Medina Sidonia that the discontent in Andalucia and the disorganisation in Madrid offered a good opportunity for him to proclaim himself an independent sovereign. The proud magnate consented, but the plot was discovered. Olivares did his best to minimise the matter, and the Duke was let off with a heavy fine, much humiliation, and a challenge to fight John IV. in single combat; but Ayamonte lost his head, although his life had been promised if he divulged the whole plot, which he did. A curious account of how the plot was discovered is in MSS. Egerton, 2081, British Museum.

[37] That is to say, Philip, the King of Portugal, and the King of France.

[38] It must not be forgotten that Novoa, who says this, was an enemy of Olivares; though there is no doubt that the minister did believe at the time that his death was planned.

[39] These particulars are taken from an interesting Italian MS. in the British Museum, Add. 8701, from the pen of the Venetian ambassador in Madrid at the time, and also to some extent from Novoa.

[40] Novoa ascribes their desire for his presence to the money spent by the Court.

[41] So one of her servants who was present told Novoa.

[42] "I got a pension of 400 ducats," says Novoa; and he relates the whole of these grants and favours to those who had served Olivares.

[43] Amongst the skits was a placard that was stuck upon the palace gates, saying--

El dia de San Antonio
Se hicieron milagros dos;
Pues empezó á reinar Dios,
Y del rey se echó el demonio.

Saint Antonio's day did bring
Of miracles this twain,
'Twas then the Lord began to reign,
And devil cast from the King.

[44] Novoa and, also for other details, Newsletters in Valladares' _Semanario Erudito_, vol. xxxiii.

[45] Many of these particulars are taken from the Venetian narrative, British Museum MSS., Add. 8701.

[46] The work was confiscated by the Inquisition, and the supposed authors and the printer prosecuted; as were the attacks that gave rise to it.

{376}