Oh heavens! thought I, when I heard the old gentleman call out, "Lota!

Lota _beebee-lee_! _Kabultah, meetoowah?_"[14] and away she vanished

behind the door, with a smile to myself. The tone of the Judge's

voice, and his speaking Hindoo, showed he was fond of his daughter at

any rate. Off I went, too, as much confused as before, only for the

new thought in my head. "The sea, the sea!" I shouted, as soon as out

of hearing, and felt the wind, as 'twere, coming from aft at last,

like the first ripple. "Yes, by George!" said I, "outward bound for a

thousand. I'll go, if it was before the mast." All at once I

remembered I didn't know the ship's name, or when. Next day, and the

next again, I was skulking about my old place, but nobody

appeared--not so much as a shadow inside the keyhole. At last one

evening, just as I was going away, the door opened; I sauntered slowly

along, when, instead of the charming Lota, out came the flat brown

turban of an ugly _kitmagar_, with a mustache, looking round to see

who was there. "_Salaam_, sah 'b," said the brown fellow, holding the

door behind him with one paw. "_Burra judge sahib bhote bhote salaam_

send uppiser[15] sah 'b--'ope not _dekhe_[16] after sahib cook-maid."

"_Joot baht, hurkut-jee_,"[17] said I, laughing. "Sah 'b been _my_

coontree?" inquired the Bengalee more politely. "_Jee_, yes," I said,

wishing to draw him out. "I Inglitch can is-peek," continued the dark

footman, conceitedly; "ver well sah 'b, but one _damned_ misfortune us

for come i-here. Baud _carry_ make--plenty too much _poork_--too much

graug drink. Turmeric--chili--banana not got--not coco-tree got--pah!

Baud coontree, too much i-cold, sah 'b?" "Curse the rascal's

impudence," I thought, but I asked him if he wasn't going back. "Yis,

sah 'b, _such baht_[18] A-il-alàh! Mohummud _burra Meer-kea_. Bote too

much i-smell _my_ coontree." "When are you going?" I asked carelessly.

"Two day this time, sah 'b." "Can you tell me the name of the ship?" I

went on. The Kitmagar looked at me slyly, stroked his mustache, and

meditated; after which he squinted at me again, and his lips opened so

as to form the magic word, "_Buckshish?_" "_Jee_," said I, holding out

a crown-piece, "the ship's name and the harbour?" "Se," began he; the

coin touched his palm,--"ring;" his fingers closed on it, and

"Patahm," dropped from his leathery lips. "The Seringapatam?" I said.

"_Ahn_, sah 'b." "London, eh?" I added; to which he returned another

reluctant assent, as if it wasn't paid for, and I walked off. However,

I had not got round the corner before I noticed the figure of the old

gentleman himself looking after me from the doorway; his worthy

Kitmagar salaaming to the ground, and no doubt giving information how

the "cheep uppiser" had tried to pump him to no purpose. The Nabob

looked plainly as suspicious as if I had wanted to break into his

house, since he held his hand over his eyes to watch me out of sight.

At night, I told my mother and sister I should be off to London next

day, for sea. What betwixt their vexation at losing me, and their

satisfaction to see me more cheerful, with talking over matters, we

sat up half the night. I was so ashamed, though, to tell them what I

intended, considering what a fool's chase it would seem to any one but

myself, that I kept all close; and, I am sorry to say, I was so full

of my love-affair, with the wild adventure of it, the sea, and

everything besides, as not to feel their anxiety enough. How it was to

turn out I didn't know; but somehow or other I was resolved I'd

contrive to make a rope if I couldn't find one: at the worst, I might

carry the ship, gain over the men, or turn pirate and discover an

island. Early in the morning I packed my traps, drew a cheque for my

prize-money, got the coach, and bowled off for London, to knock up Bob

Jacobs, my sea godfather; this being the very first step, as it seemed

to me, in making the plan feasible. Rough sort of confidant as he may

look, there was no man living I would have trusted before him for

keeping a secret. Bob was true as the topsail sheets; and if you only

gave him the course to steer, without any of the "puzzlements," as he

called the calculating part, he would stick to it, blow high, blow

low. He was just the fellow I wanted, for the lee brace as it were, to

give my weather one a purchase, even if I had altogether liked the

notion of setting off all alone on what I couldn't help suspecting

was a sufficiently hare-brained scheme as it stood; and, to tell the

truth, it was only to a straightforward, simple-hearted tar like

Jacobs that I could have plucked up courage to make it known. I knew

he would enter into it like a reefer volunteering for a cutting out,

and make nothing of the difficulties--especially when a love matter

was at the bottom of it: the chief question was how to discover his

whereabouts, as Wapping is rather a wide word. I adopted the expedient

of going into all the tobacco-shops to inquire after Jacobs, knowing

him to be a more than commonly hard smoker, and no great drinker

ashore. I was beginning to be tired out, however, and give up the

quest, when, at the corner of a lane near the docks, I caught sight of

a little door adorned with what had apparently been part of a ship's

figure-head--the face of a nymph or nereid, four times as large as

life, with tarnished gilding, and a long wooden pipe in her mouth that

had all the effect of a bowsprit, being stayed up by a piece of

marline to a hook in the wall, probably in order to keep clear of

people's heads. The words painted on its two head-boards, as under a

ship's bow, were "Betsy Jacobs," and "licensed" on the top of the

door; the window was stowed full of cakes of cavendish, twists of

negrohead, and coils of pigtail; so that, having heard my old shipmate

speak of a certain Betsey, both as sweetheart and partner, I made at

once pretty sure of having lighted, by chance, on his very dry-dock,

and went in without more ado. I found nobody in the little shop, but a

rough voice, as like as possible to Jacobs' own, was chanting the

sea-song of "Come, cheer up, my lads, 'tis to glory we steer," in the

back-room, in a curious sleepy kind of drone, interrupted every now

and then by the suck of his pipe, and a mysterious thumping sound,

which I could only account for by the supposition that the poor fellow

was mangling clothes, or gone mad. I was obliged to kick on the

counter with all my might, in competition, before an eye was applied

from inside to the little window; after which, as I expected, the head

of Jacobs was thrust out of the door, his hair rough, three days'

beard on his chin, and he in his shirt and trousers. "_Hisht!_" said

he, in a low voice, not seeing me distinctly for the light, "you're

not callin' the watch, my lad! Hold on a bit, and I'll sarve your

orders directly." After another stave of "Hearts of oak are our

ships," &c. in the same drawl, and a still more vigorous thumping than

before, next minute out came Bob again; with a wonderful air of

importance, though, and drawing in one hand, to my great surprise, the

slack of a line of "half-inch," on which he gave now and then a tug

and an ease off, as he came forward, like a fellow humouring a

newly-hooked fish. "Now, then, my hearty!" said he, shading his eyes

with the other hand, "bear a--" "Why, Jacobs, old ship," I said,

"what's this you're after? Don't you know your old apprentice, eh?"

Jacobs looked at my cap and epaulette, and gave out his breath in a

whistle, the only other sign of astonishment being, that he let go his

unaccountable-looking piece of cord. "Lord bless me, Master Ned!" said

he--"I axes pardon, Lieutenant Collins, your honour!" "Glad you know

me this time, Bob, my lad," said I, looking round,--"and a comfortable

berth you've got of it, I daresay. But what the deuce _are_ you about

in there? _You_ haven't a savage _too_, like some friends of yours I

fell in with a short time ago! Or perhaps a lion or a tiger, eh,

Jacobs?" "No, no, your honour--lions be blowed!" replied he, laughing,

but fiddling with his hands all the while, and standing between me and

the room, as if half ashamed. "'Tis ownly the tiller-ropes of a small

craft I am left in charge of, sir. But won't ye sit down, your honour,

till such time as my old 'ooman comes aboard to relieve me, sir?

Here's a _cheer_, and maybe you'd make so free for to take a pipe of

prime cavendish, your honour?" "Let's have a look into your cabin,

though, Bob my man," said I, curious to know what was the secret; when

all at once a tremendous squall from within let me sufficiently into

it. The sailor had been rocking the cradle, with a fine little fellow

of a baby in it, and a line made fast to keep it in play when he

served the shop. "All the pitch 's in the fire now, your honour,"

said he, looking terribly non-plussed; "I've broached him to, and he's

all aback till his mammy gets a hold of him." "A good pipe the little

rogue's got though," said I, "and a fine child he is, Jacobs--do for a

bo'sun yet." "Why, yes, sir," said he, rubbing his chin with a

gratified smile, as the urchin kicked, threw out his arms, and roared

like to break his heart; "I'm thinking he's a sailor all over, by

natur', as one may say. He don't like a calm no more nor myself; but

that's the odds of bein' ashore, where you needs to keep swinging the

hammocks by hand, instead of havin' it done for you, sir." In the

midst of the noise, however, we were caught by the sudden appearance

of Mistress Jacobs herself--a good-looking young woman, with a

market-basket full of bacon and greens, and a chubby little boy

holding by her apron, who came through the shop. The first thing she

did was to catch up the baby out of the cradle, and begin hushing it,

after one or two side-glances of reproach at her husband, who

attempted to cover his disgrace by saying, "Betsy, my girl, where's

your manners? why don't you off hats to the leftenant?--it's my wife,

your honour." Mrs Jacobs curtseyed twice very respectfully, though not

particularly fond of the profession, as I found afterwards; and I soon

quite gained her smiles and good graces by praising her child, with

the remark that he was too pretty ever to turn out a sailor; for,

sharp as mothers are to detect this sort of flattery to anybody else's

bantling, you always find it take wonderfully with respect to their

own. Whenever Jacobs and I were left to ourselves, I struck at once

into my scheme--the more readily for feeling I had the weather-hand of

him in regard of his late appearance. It was too ridiculous, the

notion of one of the best foretopmen that ever passed a weather-earing

staying at home to rock his wife's cradle and attend the shop; and he

was evidently aware of it as I went on. It was a little selfish, I

daresay, and Mrs Jacobs would perhaps have liked me none the better

for it; but I proposed to him to get a berth in the Indiaman, sail

with me for Bombay, and stand by for a foul hitch in something or

other. "Why, sir," said he, "it shan't be said of Bob Jacobs he were

ever the man to hang back where a matter was to be done that must be

done. I doesn't see the whole bearings of it as yet, but ounly you

give the orders, sir, and I'll stick to 'em." "'Tis a long stretch

between this and Bombay, Jacobs," said I, "and plenty of room for

chances." "Ay, ay, sir, no doubt," said he, "ye can _talk_ the length

of the best bower cable." "More than that, Bob my lad," said I, "I

know these Company men; if they once get out of their regular jog,

they're as helpless as a pig adrift on a grating; and before they grow

used to sailing out of convoy, with no frigates to whip them in,

depend upon it Mother Carey[19] will have to teach them a new trick or

two." "Mayhap, sir," put in Jacobs, doubtfully, "the best thing 'ud be

if they cast the ship away altogether, as I've seen done myself for

the matter of an insurance. Ye know, sir, they lets it pass at Lloyd's

now the war's over, seein' it brings custom to the underwriters, if so

be ounly it don't come over often for the profits. Hows'ever it needs

a good seaman to choose his lee-shore well, no doubt." "Oh!" answered

I, laughing, "but the chances are, all hands would want to be Robinson

Crusoe at once! No, no,--only let's get aboard, and take things as

they come." "What's the ship's name, sir?" inquired Jacobs, sinking

his voice, and looking cautiously over his shoulder toward the door.

"The Seringapatam,--do you know her?" I said. "Ay, ay, sir, well

enough," said he, readily,--"a lump of a ship she is, down off

Blackwall in the stream with two more--country-built, and tumbles home

rather much from below the plank-sheer for a sightly craft, besides

being flat in the eyes of her, and round in the counter, just where

she shouldn't, sir. Them Par_chee_ Bombay ship-wrights _does_ clap on

a lot of onchristien flummeries and gilt mouldings, let alone

quarter-galleries fit for the king's castle!" "In short, she's

tea-waggon all over," said I, "and just as slow and as leewardly, to

boot, as teak can make her?" "Her lines is not that bad, though, your

honour," continued Jacobs, "if you just knocked off her poop,--and

she'd bear a deal o' beating for a sea-boat. They've got a smart young

mate, too; for I seed him t'other day a-sending up the yards, and now

she's as square as a frigate, all ready to drop down river." The short

and long of it was, that I arranged with my old shipmate, who was

fully bent on the cruise, whether Mrs Jacobs should approve or not,

that, somehow or other, we should both ship our hammocks on board of

the Seringapatam--he before the mast, and I wherever I could get. On

going to the agent's, however--which I did as soon as I could change

my uniform for plain clothes--I found, to my great disappointment,

from a plan of the accommodations, that not only were the whole of the

poop-cabins taken, but those on the lower-deck also. Most of the

passengers, I ascertained, were ladies, with their children and

nurses, going back to India, and raw young cadets, with a few

commercial and civilian nondescripts; there were no troops or

officers, and room enough, except for one gentleman having engaged the

entire poop, at an immense expense, for his own use. This I, of

course, supposed was the Nabob, but the clerk was too close to inform

me. "You must try another ship, sir," said he, coolly, as he shut the

book. "Sorry for it, but we have another to sail in a fortnight. A.1,

sir; far finer vessel--couple of hundred tons larger--and sails

faster." "You be hanged!" muttered I, walking out; and a short time

after I was on board. The stewards told me as much again; but on my

slipping a guinea into the fingers of one, he suddenly recollected

there was a gentleman in state-room No. 14, starboard side of the main

skylight, who, being alone, might perhaps be inclined to take a chum,

if I dealt with him privately. "Yankee, sir, he is," said the steward,

by way of a useful hint. However, I didn't need the warning: at sight

of the individual's long nose, thin lips, and sallow jaw-bones,

without a whisker on his face, and his shirt-collar turned down, as he

sat overhauling his traps beside the carronade, which was tethered in

the state-room, with its muzzle through the port. He looked a good

deal like a jockey beside his horse; or, as a wit of a schoolboy cadet

said afterwards, the Boston gentleman calling himself Daniel Snout,

Esquire--like Daniel praying in the lion's den, and afraid it might

turn round or roar. I must say the idea didn't quite delight me, nor

the sight of a fearful quantity of luggage which was stowed up against

the bulkhead; but after introducing myself, and objecting to the first

few offers, I at last concluded a bargain with the American for a

hundred and twenty guineas, which, he remarked, was "considerable low,

I prognosticate, mister!" "However," said he, "I expect you're a

conversationable individual a little: I allowed for that, you know,

mister. One can't do much of a trade at sea--that's a fact; and I

calculate we'll swap information by the way. I'm water-pruff, I tell

you, as all our nation is. You'll not _settle_ at Bumbay, I reckon,

mister?" But though I meant to pay my new messmate in my own coin at

leisure afterwards, and be as frank and open as day with him--the only

way to meet a Yankee--I made off at present as fast as possible to

bring my things aboard, resolving to sleep at Blackwall, and then to

stow myself out of sight for sick, until there was somebody to take

off the edge of his confounded talk.

Next afternoon, accordingly, I found myself once more afloat, the

Indiaman dropping down with the first breeze. The day after, she was

running through the Downs with it pretty strong from north-east, a

fair wind--the pilot-boat snoring off close-hauled to windward, with

a white spray over her nose; and the three _dungaree_ topsails of the

Seringapatam lifting and swelling, as yellow as gold, over her white

courses in the blue Channel haze. The breeze freshened, till she

rolled before it, and everything being topsy-turvy on deck, the lumber

in the way, the men as busy as bees setting her ship-shape--it would

have been as much as a passenger's toes were worth to show them from

below; so that I was able to keep by myself, just troubling my

seamanship so much as to stand clear of the work. Enjoy it I did, too;

by Jove, the first sniff of the weather was enough to make me forget

what I was there for. I was every now and then on the point of fisting

a rope, and singing out with the men; till at length I thought it more

comfortable, even for me, to run up the mizen shrouds when everybody

was forward, where I stowed myself out of sight in the cross-trees.

About dusk, while I was waiting to slip down, a stronger puff than

ordinary made them clue up the mizen-royal from deck, which I took

upon myself to furl off-hand--quick enough to puzzle a couple of boys

that came aloft for the purpose, especially as, in the mean time, I

had got down upon the topsail-yardarm out of their notice. When they

got on deck again, I heard the little fellows telling some of the men,

in a terrified sort of way, how the mizen-royal had either stowed

itself, or else it was Dick Wilson's ghost, that fell off the same

yard last voyage,--more by token, he used always to make fast the

gaskets just that fashion. At night, however, the wind having got

lighter, with half moonlight, there was a muster of some passengers on

deck, all sick and miserable, as they tried to keep their feet, and

have the benefit of air,--the Yankee being as bad as the worst. I

thought it wouldn't do for me to be altogether free, and accordingly

stuck fast by Mr Snout, with my head over the quarter-deck bulwarks,

looking into his face, and talking away to him, asking all sorts of

questions about what was good for sea-sickness, then giving a groan to

prevent myself laughing, when the spray splashed up upon his

"water-pruff" face, he responding to it as Sancho Panza did to Don

Quixote, when the one examined the other's mouth after a potion. All

he could falter out was, how he wondered I could speak at all when

sick. "Oh! oh dear!" said I, with another howl. "Yes,--'tis merely

because I can't _think_! And I daresay you are thinking so much you

can't _talk_--the sea is so full of meditation, as Lord

Byron--Oh--oh--this water will be the death of me!" "I feel as if--the

whole--tarnation Atlantic was--inside of my bowls!" gasped he through

his nostrils. "Oh!" I could not help putting in, as the ship and Mr

Snout both gave a heave up, "and coming out of you!"

During all this time I had felt so sure of my ground as scarcely to

trouble myself about the Bengal judge and his fairy treasure of a

daughter; only in the midst of the high spirits brought up by the

breeze, I hugged myself now and then at the thought of their turning

out by degrees as things got settled, and my having such openings the

whole voyage through as one couldn't miss in four or five months.

Nobody would suspect the raw chap I looked, with smooth hair and a

high collar, of any particular cue: I must say there was a little

vanity at the bottom of it, but I kept thinking more and more how snug

and quietly I'd enjoy all that went on, sailing on one tack with the

passengers and the old Nabob himself, and slipping off upon the other

when I could come near the charming young Lota. The notion looks more

like what some scamp of a reefer, cruising ashore, would have hit

upon, than suits my taste now-a-days; but the cockpit had put a spice

of the imp in me, which I never got clear of till this very voyage, as

you shall see, if we get through with the log of it. 'Twas no use, as

I found, saying what one should have to do, except put _heart_ into

it,--with wind, sea, and a love affair to manage all at once, after

making a tangled coil instead of one all clear and above-board.

The first time I went down into the cuddy was that evening to tea,

where all was at sixes and sevens like the decks; the lamps ill

trimmed, stewards out of the way, and a few lads trying to bear up

against their stomachs by the help of brandy and biscuits. The main

figure was a jolly-looking East Indian, an indigo-planter as he turned

out, with a bald forehead, a hook nose, and his gills covered with

white whiskers that gave him all the cut of a cockatoo. He had his

brown servant running about on every hand, and, being an old stager,

did his best to cheer up the rest; but nothing I saw showed the least

sign of the party I looked after. I was sure I ought to have made out

something of them by this time, considering the stir such a grandee as

Sir Charles Hyde would cause aboard: in fact, there didn't seem to be

many passengers in her, and I began to curse the lying scoundrel of a

_Kitmagar_ for working "Tom Cox's traverse" on me, and myself for

being a greater ass than I'd fancied. Indeed I heard the planter

mention by chance that Sir Charles Hyde, the district judge, had come

home last voyage from India in this very Seringapatam, which no doubt,

I thought, put the Mahommedan rascal up to his trick.

I was making up my mind to an Indian trip, and the pure pleasure of

Daniel Catoson Snout, Esquire's company for two blessed months, when

all of a sudden I felt the ship bring her wind a-quarter, with a

furious plunge of the Channel water along her bends, that made every

landsman's bowels yearn as if he felt it gurgle through him. One young

fellow, more drunk than sick, gave a wild bolt right over the cuddy

table, striking out with both arms and legs as if afloat, so as to

sweep half of the glasses down on the floor. The planter, who was

three cloths in the wind himself, looked down upon him with a comical

air of pity as soon as he had got cushioned upon the wreck. "My dear

fellow," said he, "what do you feel--eh?" "Feel, you--old blackguard!"

stammered the griffin, "de--dam--dammit, I feel _everything_! Goes

through--through my vitals as if--I was a con--founded _whale_!

C--can't stand it!" "You've drunk yourself aground, my boy!" sung out

the indigo man; "stuck fast on the coral--eh? Never mind, we'll float

you off, only don't flounder that way with your tail!--by Jove, you

scamp, you've ruined my toe--oh dear!" I left the planter hopping

round on one pin, and holding the gouty one in his hand, betwixt

laughing and crying: on deck I found the floating Nab Light bearing

broad on our lee-bow, with Cumberland Fort glimmering to windward, and

the half moon setting over the Isle of Wight, while we stood up for

Portsmouth harbour. The old captain, and most of the officers, were on

the poop for the first time, though as stiff and uncomfortable from

the sort of land-sickness and lumber-qualms that sailors feel till

things are _in_ their places, as the landsmen did until things were

_out_ of them. The skipper walked the weather side by himself and said

nothing: the smart chief officer sent two men, one after another, from

the wheel for "cows" that didn't know where their tails were; and as

for the middies, they seemed to know when to keep out of the way. In a

little, the spars of the men-of-war at Spithead were to be seen as we

rose; before the end of the first watch, we were running outside the

Spit Buoy, which was nodding and plashing with the tide in the last

slant of moonshine, till at last we rounded to, and down went the

anchor in five fathoms, off the Motherbank. What the Indiaman wanted

at Portsmouth I didn't know; but, meantime, I had given up all hopes

of the Nabob being in her, and the only question with me was, whether

I should take the opportunity of giving all hands the slip here, even

though I left my Yankee friend disconsolate, and a clear gainer by

dollars beyond count.

Early next morning there were plenty of wherries looking out for

fares; so, as the Indiaman was not to sail before the night-ebb, when

the breeze would probably spring up fair again, I hailed one of them

to go ashore at the Point, for a quiet stroll over Southsea Common,

where I meant to overhaul the whole bearings of the case, and think if

it weren't better to go home, and wait the Admiralty's pleasure for a

ship. I hadn't even seen anything of Jacobs, and the whole

hotel-keeping ways of the Indiaman began to disgust me, or else I

should have at once decided to take the chance of seeing Lota Hyde

somehow or other in India; but, again, one could scarcely endure the

notion of droning on in a frigate without so much as a Brest lugger

to let drive at. It was about six o'clock; the morning gun from the

guard-ship off the Dockyard came booming down through the harbour, the

blue offing shone like silver, and the green tideway sparkled on every

surge, up to where they were flashing and poppling on the copper of

the frigates at Spithead. I noticed them crossing yards and squaring;

the farthest out hove up anchor, loosed fore-topsail, cast her head to

starboard, and fired a gun as she stood slowly out to sea under all

sail, with a light air freshening abeam. The noble look of her almost

reconciled me of itself to the service, were it for the mere sake of

having a share in driving such a craft between wind and water. Just

then, however, an incident turned up in spite of me, which I certainly

didn't expect, and which had more, even than I reckoned at the time,

to do with my other adventure; seeing that it made me, both then and

afterwards, do the direct opposite of what I meant to do, and both

times put a new spoke in my wheel, as we say at sea here.

I had observed a seventy-four, the Stratton, lying opposite the Spit

Buoy; on board of which, as the waterman told me, a court-martial had

been held the day before, where they broke a first lieutenant for

insulting his captain. Both belonged to one of the frigates: the

captain I had seen, and heard of as the worst tyrant in the navy; his

ship was called "a perfect hell afloat;" that same week one of the

boys had tried to drown himself alongside, and a corporal of marines,

after coming ashore and drinking a glass with his sweetheart, had

coolly walked down to the Point, jumped in between two boats at the

jetty, and kept himself under water till he was dead. The lieutenant

had been dismissed the service, and as I recognised the name, I

wondered whether it could actually be my schoolfellow, Tom Westwood,

as gallant a fellow and as merry as ever broke biscuit. Two

sail-boats, one from around the Stratton's quarter, and the other from

over by Gosport, steering on the same tack for Southsea, diverted my

attention as I sauntered down to the beach. The bow of the nearest

wherry grounded on the stones as I began to walk quicker towards the

town-gates, chiefly because I was pretty ready for an early breakfast

at the old Blue Posts, and also because I had a slight notion of what

these gentlemen wanted on Southsea Beach at odd hours. Out they

jumped, however--one man in naval undress, another, a captain, in full

fig, the third, a surgeon--coming right athwart my course to bring me

to. The first I almost at once remembered for the notorious captain of

the Orestes, or N'Oreste, as the midshipmen called her, from her

French build and her character together. "Hallo, you sir!" said the

other captain decidedly, "you must stand still." "Indeed!" said I;

"and why so, if you please?" "Since you _are_ here, we don't intend

allowing you to pass for some few minutes." "And what if I should do

as I choose, sir?" I asked. "If you stir two steps, sir, I shall shoot

you!" replied the captain, who was one of the bullying school. "Oh,

very well," I said, rather confounded by his impertinence, "then I

shall stay;" and I accordingly stood stock-still, with my arms folded,

until the other boat landed its party of two. They were in plain

clothes; nor did I give them any particular attention till the seconds

had stationed their men, when the captain of the Orestes had his back

to me, and his antagonist stood directly facing. As his pale resolved

features came out before me with the morning sun on them, his lips

together, and his nostrils large, I recognised my old friend Westwood.

The captain had broke him the day before, and now he had accepted his

challenge, being a known dead shot, while the lieutenant had never

fired a bullet in cold blood: there was, no doubt, a settled purpose

in the tyrant to crush the first man that had dared to thwart his

will. Westwood's second came forward and mentioned to the other that

his friend was still willing to withdraw the words spoken in first

heat, and would accordingly fire in the air. "Coward!" shouted the

captain of the Orestes immediately; "I shall shoot you through the

heart!" "Sir!" said I to his second, "I _will not_ look on; and if

that gentleman is shot, I will be witness against you both as

murderers!" I dropped down behind a stone out of the line of fire,

and to keep my eyes off the devilish piece of work, though my blood

boiled to knock the fellow down that I was speaking to. Another

minute, and the suspense was too great for me to help looking up: just

at that moment I saw how _set_ Westwood's face was: he was watching

his enemy with an eye that showed to me what the other's must

be--seeking for his life. The seconds gave the word to each other in

the middle, and dropped two white handkerchiefs at once with their

hands together; I caught the flash of Westwood's pistol, when, to my

astonishment, I saw the captain of the Orestes next moment jerk up his

arm betwixt me and the sky, fire in the air, and slowly fall back--he

was dead!--shot through the heart. One glance at his face gave you a

notion of the devilish meaning he had had; but what was my surprise

when his second walked up to Westwood, and said to him, "Sir, you are

the murderer of Captain Duncombe;--my friend fired in the air as you

proposed." "You are mistaken, sir," answered Westwood, coldly;

"Captain Duncombe sought my life, and I have used the privilege of

self-defence." "The surgeon is of my opinion," said the other; "and I

am sorry to say that we cannot allow you to depart." "I shall give

myself up to the authorities at once," said Westwood. "We have only

your word for that, which I must be permitted, in such a case, to

doubt," replied the captain, whose evident wish was to detain Westwood

by force or threats while he sent off his surgeon. The worst of it

was, as I now found, that since the court-martial and the challenge,

an admiralty order had arrived, in consideration of several gallant

acts during the war, as well as private representation, restoring him

to the service: so that he had in fact called out and shot his

superior officer. As for the charge now brought forward, it was too

absurd for any to believe it, unless from rage or prejudice; the case

was bad enough, at any rate, without it.

In the mean time I had exchanged a word or two with Westwood's friend;

after which, lifting up a second pistol which lay on the sand, I went

up to the captain. "Sir," said I, "you used the freedom, a little ago,

of forcing me into your concerns, and I have seen the end of it. I

have now got to tell you, having watched your conduct, that either you

must submit to be made fast here for a bit, else, by the God that made

me, I'll shoot you through the head!" The captain looked at me, his

surgeon sidled up to him, and, being a man near my own size, he

suddenly tried to wrench the pistol out of my hands: however, I had

him the next moment under my knee, while Westwood's second secured the

little surgeon, and took a few round sea-turns about his wrists and

ancles with a neckerchief. My companion then gave me a hand to do the

same with his superior officer--the medico all the time singing out

like a bull, and the captain threatening--while the dead body lay

stark and stiff behind us, the eyes wide, the head down, and the

breast up, the hand clenching a pistol, just as he had fallen.

Westwood stood quite unconscious of everything we did, only he seemed

to be watching the knees drawn up as they stiffened, and the

sand-flies hovering about the mouth. "Shall we clap a stopper between

their teeth?" said the second to me--he had been at sea, but who he

was I never knew--"the surgeon will be heard on the walls, he bellows

so!" "Never mind," said I, "we'll just drop them beyond tide-mark--the

lee of the stones yonder." In fact, from the noise the tide was

making, I question if the shots could have been heard even by the

watermen, who had prudently sheered out of sight round a point. I

couldn't help looking, when we had done this, from the captain's body

to his own frigate, as she was sluing round head on to us, at single

anchor, to the turn of tide, with her buoy dancing on the brisk blue

sweep of water, and her figure-head shining in the sunlight. As soon

as we covered over the corpse with dulse-weed, Westwood started as if

we had taken something away from him, or freed him of a spell.

"Westwood!" said I, laying my hand on his shoulder, "you _must_ come

along with me." He said nothing, but followed us quietly round to the

wherries, where I told the watermen that the other party had gone a

different way to keep clear, and we wanted them to pull for Gosport.

At Gosport we had Westwood rigged out in black clothes, his hair

cropped, and whiskers shaved off--as I thought it the fittest thing

for his case, and what he could best carry out, to go aboard of the

Indiaman with me as if he were a missionary. Poor fellow! he didn't

know _what_ he was. So, having waited till dusk, to let the watermen

lose our track, and his friend having posted off for Dover, he and I

both got safe over to the Seringapatam, where I had him stowed in the

first empty state-room I found. I had actually forgot, through the

excitement, all about my missing my first chase: from one hour to

another I kept watching the tide-marks ashore, and the dog-vane on the

ship's quarter, all impatience to hear the word given for "all hands

up anchor," and hoping our worthy friends on Southsea Beach were still

within hearing of the Channel flood. At last the order did come; round

went the capstan merrily enough, till she had hove short and up; the

anchor was catted, and off went the lumbering old craft through the

Solent about midnight, before a fine rattling breeze, in company with

six or seven others, all running for the Needles. They were loosing

the Indiaman's royals when I heard a gun from the guard-ship in

harbour; and a little after up went a rocket, signalling to some

frigate or other at Spithead; and away they kept at it, with lights

from the telegraph to her masthead, for several minutes. "All's up!"

thought I, "and both Westwood and myself are in for it!"

Next morning at daybreak, accordingly, no sooner did the dawn serve to

show us the Portland Light going out on the weather quarter, with a

whole fleet of Channel craft and Mediterranean brigs about us, we

surging through it as fast as the Indiaman could go,--than _there_ was

a fine forty-four standing off and on right in our course, in fact the

very identical Orestes herself! She picked us out in a moment--bore

up, stood across our weather-bow, and hailed. "What ship's that?" said

the first Luff in her mizen rigging.

"The Seringapatam, Honourable Company's ship, Captain Williamson!"

sung out our first officer, with his cap off. "Heave to, till I send a

boat aboard of you!" hailed the naval man, and there we bobbed to each

other with mainyards backed. In a few minutes a master's mate with

gig's crew was under our lee-quarter, and the mate came on deck.

"Sir," said he, "the Port Admiral will thank you to deliver these

despatches for Sir Charles Hyde, who I believe is aboard." "Certainly,

sir," said the first officer, "they shall be given to him in an hour's

time."

"Good morning, and a fine voyage," said the master's mate politely;

and I took the occasion of asking if Captain Duncombe were on board

the Orestes. "No, sir," answered the midshipman, "he happens to be

ashore at present." I have seldom felt so relieved as when I saw the

frigate haul round her mainyard, and go sweeping off to leeward, while

we resumed our course. By noon we had sunk the land about Start Point,

with a breeze which it was no use wasting at that season to take

"departures;" and as the afternoon set in hazy, we were soon out of

sight of Old England for good. For my part, I was bound Eastward at

last with a witness, and, like a young bear, again "all my troubles

before me."--"There is two bells though," interrupted the narrator,

starting. "Let us see what sort of night it is before the ladies

retire."

FOOTNOTES:

[7] Cellar for goods.

[8] Asylum of the world.

[9] District judicial courts.

[10] _Flush_--_i.e._, level.

[11] Steward and Butler.

[12] Sport.

[13] Turban-wearing.

[14] Little Girl! Do you hear, sweet one?

[15] Officer.

[16] Look.

[17] 'Tis a lie, you scoundrel.

[18] That is true.

[19] "_Mother Carey_,"--an obscure sea-divinity chiefly celebrated for

her "_chickens_," as Juno ashore for her peacocks. _Quere_,--a

personification of the providential _Care_ of Nature for her weaker

children, amongst whom the little stormy _petrels_ are conspicuous;

while, at the same time, touchingly associating the Pagan to the

Christian sea mythology by their double name--the latter, a diminutive

of Peter walking by faith upon the waters. In the nautical creed,

"Davy Jones" represents the abstract power, and "Mother Carey" the

practically developed experience, which together make up the life

Oceanic.

MÉRIMÉE'S HISTORY OF PETER THE CRUEL.[20]

The memoirs of a sovereign who had Alburquerque for a minister, Maria

Padilla for a mistress, Henry of Trastamare for a rival, and Edward

the Black Prince for an ally and companion in arms, must be worthy the

researches even of so elegant a scholar and learned an antiquarian as

Prosper Mérimée. When the nations are engrossed by their difficulties

and disasters, and the jarring discord of revolution and thundering

crash of monarchies on every side resound, the history of a

semi-barbarous period, and of a king now five hundred years in his

grave, should be set forth with surpassing talent to attract and

sustain attention. But M. Mérimée is the literary Midas of his day and

country: the subject he handles becomes bright and precious by the

magic of his touch. Though its interest be remote, he can invest it

with all the charm of freshness. Upon a former occasion[21] we noticed

his imaginative productions with well-merited praise; to-day, in the

historian's graver garb, he equally commands admiration and applause.

He has been happy in his selection of a period rich in dramatic

incident and fascinating details; and of these he has made the utmost

profit. In a previous paper, we quoted M. Mérimée's profession of

faith in matters of ancient and mediæval history. In his preface to

the _Chronique de Charles IX._, he avowed his predilection for

anecdotes and personal traits, and the weight he is disposed to attach

to them as painting the manners and character of an epoch, and as

throwing upon the motives and qualities of its prominent personages a

light more vivid and true, than that obtained from the tedious and

often partial narratives of grave contemporary chroniclers. In the

present instance, he has liberally supplied his readers with the fare

he himself prefers. His _History of Pedro the First of Castile_

abounds in illustrations, in anecdotes and legends of remarkable

novelty and interest; historical flowerets, most agreeably lightening

and relieving the solid structure of a work for which the archives and

libraries of Madrid and Barcelona, the manuscripts of the old Spanish

and Portuguese chroniclers, and the writings of more modern historians

of various nations, have been with conscientious diligence ransacked

and compared. The result has been a book equal in all respects to Mr

Prescott's delightful _History of Ferdinand and Isabella_, to which it

forms a suitable companion. As a master of classic and antiquarian

lore, the Frenchman is superior to the American, to whom he yields

nothing in the vigour of his diction and the grace of his style.

When Alphonso the Eleventh, king of Castile, died of the plague, in

his camp before Gibraltar, upon Good Friday of the year 1350, the

Iberian peninsula consisted of five distinct and independent

monarchies--Castile, Arragon, Navarre, Portugal, and Granada. The

first of the five, which extended from Biscay and Galicia to Tarifa,

the southernmost town in Europe, was by far the most extensive and

powerful; the second comprised Arragon, Catalonia, and Valencia;

Navarre, poor and scantily peopled, was important as commanding the

principal passes of the Pyrenees, which its monarch could throw open

to a French or English army; Portugal had nearly the same limits as at

the present day; the Moors, the boundary of whose European empire had

long been narrowing, still maintained a precarious footing in the

kingdom of Granada. Alphonso, upon his accession in 1308, had found

Castile a prey to anarchy, and groaning under feudal oppression. The

audacity of the _ricos hombres_, or nobles,[22] had greatly increased

during long minorities, and under the reign of feeble princes. Whilst

they fought amongst themselves for privilege of pillage, the peasantry

and inhabitants of towns, exasperated by the evils inflicted on them,

frequently rose in arms, and exercised bloody reprisals. A

contemporary author, quoted at length by M. Mérimée, represents the

nobility as living by plunder, and abetted by the king's guardians.

Certain towns refused to acknowledge these guardians, detained the

king's revenue, and kept men-at-arms to oppress and rob the poor.

Justice was nowhere in the kingdom; and the roads were impassable by

travellers, except in strong bodies, and well-armed. None dwelt in

unwalled places; and so great was the evil throughout the land, that

no one was surprised at meeting with murdered men upon the highways.

The king's guardians daily imposed new and excessive taxes; towns were

deserted, and the peasantry suffered exceedingly. Alphonso, a

courageous and intelligent prince, saw the evil, and resolved to

remedy it. Without a party of his own, he was compelled to throw

himself into the arms of one of the great factions desolating the

country. By its aid he destroyed the others, and then found himself

strong enough to rule in his own realm. Having proved his power, he

made an example of the most unruly, and pardoned the others. Then, to

give occupation to his warlike and turbulent nobility, he led them

against the Moors of Granada; thus turning to his glory, and to the

aggrandisement of his dominions, the arms which previously had been

brandished but in civil contest. The commons of Castile, grateful for

their deliverance from internal war, and from the exactions of the

rich men, sent him soldiers, and generously supplied him with money.

He compelled the clergy to make sacrifices which, at another period,

would have compromised the tranquillity of the kingdom.[23] But he was

valiant and generous, and had the love of the people; not a voice was

raised to oppose him. On the 29th October 1340, the army of Castile

encountered, near Tarifa, that of Granada, whose ranks were swelled by

prodigious reinforcements from the opposite shores of Barbary. The

battle of Rio Salado was fought; victory loudly declared herself for

the Christians: two hundred thousand Moors (it is said) remained upon

the field, and the power of the Mussulman in Spain was broken for

ever. Following up his success, Alphonso took Algesiras after a long

siege, and was besieging Gibraltar when he was carried off by the

famous black plague, which for several years had ravaged Europe. His

death was mourned by all Spain; and the mere terror of his name would

seem to have dictated the advantageous treaty of peace concluded soon

afterwards with the Saracen.

Alphonso, a better king than husband, left behind him one legitimate

son, Don Pedro--who at his father's death was fifteen years old, and

whose mother, Doña Maria, was a Portuguese princess--and ten bastards,

a daughter and nine sons, children of his mistress Leonora de Guzman.

In 1350, the first-born of this illegitimate progeny, Don Henry, was

eighteen years of age; he had the establishment of a prince of the

blood, the magnificent domain of Trastamare, and the title of count.

His twin-brother, Don Fadrique, was grand-master of the Knights of

Santiago. The two young men had won their spurs at Gibraltar, whilst

the Infante Pedro, rightful heir to the crown, had been kept in

retirement at Seville, a witness of his mother's daily humiliations,

and himself neglected by the courtiers, always prompt to follow a

king's example. Idle in a deserted court, he passed his time in

weeping over his mother's injuries and his own. Youthful impressions

are ineffaceable. Jealousy and hatred were the first sentiments

experienced by Don Pedro. Brought up by a feeble and offended woman,

the first lessons he imbibed were those of dissimulation and revenge.

The premature and unexpected death of Don Alphonso was the alarum of a

host of ambitions. Amongst the great patricians of Spain, two in

particular were designated, by public opinion, to take the chief

direction of affairs: these were--Juan Alonzo de Alburquerque, and

Juan Nuñez de Lara. The former, a Portuguese by birth, but holding

vast estates in Spain, had stood beside Don Alphonso during his

struggle with his nobles; had rendered him great, and, to all

appearance, disinterested services; and had been rewarded by the

king's entire confidence. Grand chancellor and prime minister, he had

also had charge of Don Pedro's education. He had great influence with

the queen-mother, and had always skilfully avoided collision with

Leonora de Guzman, who nevertheless feared and disliked him as a

secret and dangerous foe. All circumstances considered, Juan de Lara,

although connected by blood with the royal family, and possessing, as

Lord of Biscay, great power in the north of Spain, thought it

unadvisable to enter the lists with Alburquerque, who, on the other

hand, openly sought his alliance, and even offered to divide with him

the authority devolved upon him by the king's death. With all this

apparent frankness there was little real friendship; and it was well

understood that henceforward the leading characters on the political

stage divided themselves into two opponent parties. On the one hand

were the dowager-queen Maria, Pedro the First, and the astute and

prudent Alburquerque. Opposed to these, but with little union, and

with various views and pretensions, were Juan de Lara, his nephew,

(the lord of Villena)--whose sister was soon afterwards secretly

married to Henry of Trastamare--Leonora de Guzman, and her three

eldest sons. The third of these, Don Tello, was younger than Don

Pedro, but he was crafty and selfish beyond his years.

Alphonso had hardly given up the ghost, when the reaction commenced.

Leonora fled before the angry countenance of the injured queen-mother.

Refused protection by Lara, from whom she first sought it, she

repaired to her strong fortress of Medina-Sidonia, a gift from her

royal lover. Its governor, her relative, Don Alonzo Coronel, although

reputed a valiant and loyal knight, and, moreover, personally attached

to the faction of the Laras, resigned his command, and would not be

prevailed with to resume it. And amongst all the nobles and

chevaliers, who during Alphonso's life professed themselves devoted to

her, she now could not find one to defend her castle. She saw that her

cause was desperate. Vague accusations were brought against her, of

conspiracy against the new king; and from all sides alarming rumours

reached her of her sons' arrest and probable execution. She lost

courage, and gave up her castle to Alburquerque, in exchange for a

safe-conduct to Seville, which was not respected; for, on her arrival

there, she was shut up in the Alcazar, and treated as a prisoner of

state. Meanwhile her two eldest sons endeavoured to stir up civil war.

They were totally unsuccessful, and finally esteemed themselves

fortunate in being allowed to make their submission, and do homage to

the king. Alburquerque affected to treat them as refractory boys, and

reserved his wrath for their mother, who, even in captivity, proved

herself formidable. By her contrivance, the marriage of Don Henry and

of the niece of Juan de Lara was secretly celebrated and consummated,

in the palace that served her as a prison. When informed, a few hours

subsequently, of the trick that had been played them, the queen-mother

and Alburquerque were furious. Doña Leonora was sent into strict

confinement, in the castle of Carmona. "As to the Count Don Henry, he

was on his guard, and did not wait his enemies' vengeance: he left

Seville by stealth, taking with him a quantity of jewels received from

his mother, and accompanied by two faithful knights--all three having

their faces covered with leathern masks, according to a custom of the

times. By forced marches, and with great fatigue, they traversed the

whole of Spain unrecognised, and reached the Asturias, where they

trusted to find safety amongst devoted vassals."

The sudden and severe illness of Don Pedro gave rise to fresh

intrigues, and Juan de Lara and Don Fernando of Arragon stood forth as

pretenders to the crown in the event of the king's death. His recovery

crushed their ambitious hopes, but might not have prevented a civil

war between the factions of the two aspirants, had not Don Juan de

Lara and his nephew been suddenly carried off by the prevailing

epidemic. "At any other moment," M. Mérimée remarks, "the premature

death of these two men would doubtless have thrown odious suspicions

on their adversaries. But in no contemporary author do I find the

least insinuation against Alburquerque, thus rid in one day of the

chief obstacles to his ambition. This general respect for a man who

was the object of so many jealousies and hatreds, is an honourable

testimony, worthy of note, as a rare exception to the usage of the

times, and which it would be supremely unjust now to attempt to

invalidate." Alburquerque was now the virtual ruler of Castile: the

young king passed his time in hunting, and left all cares of state to

his sagacious minister, who worked hard to consolidate his master's

power. The Cortes were convoked at Valladolid, whither Pedro proceeded

to open them in person. He was accompanied by the queen-mother,

dragging in her train the unfortunate Leonora de Guzman. At Llerena,

in Estremadura, one of the principal commanderys of the Knights of

Santiago, Don Fadrique, grand-master of that powerful order, received

his half-brother Pedro with great respect, and offered him the

magnificent hospitality of his house. He then asked and obtained

permission to see his mother.

"In presence of the jailers, mother and son, both so fallen

from their high fortune, threw themselves into each other's

arms, and during the hour to which their interview was

limited, they wept, without exchanging a word. Then a page

informed Don Fadrique that the king required his presence.

After a last embrace he left his mother, never again to

behold her. The unfortunate woman's doom was sealed. From

Llerena, by Alburquerque's order, she was conducted to the

castle of Talavera, belonging to the queen-mother, and

governed by Gutier Fernandez of Toledo, one of her liege men.

There Leonora did not long languish. A few days after her

arrival, a secretary of the queen brought the governor an

order for her death. The execution was secret and mysterious,

and it is certain Don Pedro had no cognisance of it.

Doubtless the queen had exacted from Alburquerque the

sacrifice of her rival, who was no longer protected by the

pity of Juan Nuñez de Lara. 'Many persons,' says Pero Lopez

de Ayala, a Spanish chronicler whom M. Mérimée has taken as

one of his principal authorities, and whose trustworthiness,

impugned by modern authors, he ably vindicates in his

preface, 'were grieved at this deed, foreseeing that from it

wars and scandal would spring, inasmuch as Leonora had sons

already grown up and well-connected.'

"But the hour of vengeance was not yet come, and the sons of

Leonora bowed their heads before her assassins."

One of them, whose youth might have been deemed incapable of such

dissimulation, went beyond mere submission. A few days after Leonora's

death, Don Pedro, during a progress through various provinces of his

kingdom, reached the town of Palencia, in whose neighbourhood Tello,

then hardly fifteen years old, and who, following the example of his

elder brothers, kept aloof from the court, had shut himself up in the

castle of Palenzuela.

"As there was some fear he might prove refractory, Juan

Manrique, a Castilian noble, was sent to assure him of the

king's good will towards him, and at the same time to gain

over the knights, his counsellors. Manrique succeeded in his

mission, and brought Don Tello to Palencia. Instructed by his

guide, the youth hastened to kiss his brother's hand. 'Don

Tello,' said the king, 'do you know that your mother, Doña

Leonora, is dead?' 'Sire,' replied the boy-courtier, 'I have

no other mother or father than your good favour.'"

The royal bastards humbled and subdued for a time, Alburquerque turned

his attention to more powerful adversaries. The death of its two

chiefs had not entirely dissipated the Lara faction, now headed by Don

Garci Laso de la Vega--a puissant Castilian noble, and an inveterate

enemy of the minister. Garci Laso was in the rich and disaffected city

of Burgos; and on the king's approach he issued some leagues forth to

meet him, escorted by a little army of vassals and retainers. His

enemies took care to call Pedro's attention to this martial retinue,

as indicative of defiance rather than respect. And the Manrique above

mentioned, a creature of Alburquerque's, and a private enemy of Garci

Laso's, took opportunity to quarrel with the latter, and would have

charged him with his troop but for the king's interference. The

commons of Burgos, hearing of these quarrels, and standing in mortal

fear of Alburquerque, sent a deputation to represent to Don Pedro the

danger the city would be in from the presence of rival factions within

its walls, and begged of him to enter with only a small escort. They

added an expression of regret at the arrival of Alburquerque, whom

they knew to be ill-disposed towards them. Although the formula was

respectful and humble, the freedom of these remonstrances incensed the

king, who at once entered the city with his whole force, spears raised

and banners displayed. The citizens made no resistance; a few of those

most compromised fled. Manrique, who commanded the advanced guard,

established himself in the Jews' quarter, which, separated by a strong

wall, according to the custom of the time, from the rest of the town,

formed a sort of internal citadel. Garci Laso, confiding in his great

popularity, and in the fidelity of his vassals, remained in Burgos,

taking up his lodging in one of the archbishop's palaces, of which

another was occupied by the king and his mother. Alburquerque had

quarters in another part of the town. Thus Burgos contained four

camps; and it seemed, says M. Mérimée, as if all the factions in the

kingdom had taken rendezvous there, to settle their differences.

That night an esquire of the queen-mother secretly sought Garci Laso,

bearing him a strange warning from that princess. "Whatever invitation

he received, he was to beware of appearing before the king." The proud

noble despised caution, repaired next morning to the palace, was

arrested by the king's command, and in his presence, and suffered

death the same day.[24] This execution (murder were perhaps a fitter

word) was followed by others, and terror reigned in Burgos. "Whosoever

had lifted up his voice to defend the privileges of the commons, or

the rights of Don Juan de Lara, knew no retreat safe enough to hide

his head. Don Henry himself feared to remain in the Asturias, and took

refuge on Portuguese territory." The implacable Alburquerque was

determined utterly to crush and exterminate the faction of the Laras.

The possessions of that princely house were confiscated to the crown,

the orphan son of Don Juan de Lara died in Biscay, and his two

daughters fell into the hands of the minister, who detained them as

hostages. But the party, although vanquished, was not yet annihilated.

Alonso Coronel, the same who had abandoned Leonora de Guzman in her

misfortunes, and who had been rewarded with the banner and cauldron of

a _rico hombre_, with the vast lordship and strong castle of Aguilar,

aspired to become its leader. He opened a correspondence with Count

Trastamare and Don Fadrique, who, as enemies of Alburquerque, seemed

to him his natural allies. He attempted to treat with the King of

Granada, and even with the Moors of Africa. Alburquerque decreed his

ruin, assembled a small army round the royal standard, and marched

with Don Pedro to besiege Aguilar. Summoned to surrender, Coronel

replied by a volley of arrows, and was forthwith declared a rebel and

traitor. Leaving a body of troops in observation before Aguilar, which

was capable of a long defence, Alburquerque and his royal pupil set

out for the Asturias, seizing, as they passed, various castles and

fortified places belonging to Coronel, which surrendered without

serious resistance--excepting that of Burguillos, whose commander,

Juan de Cañedo, a liege man of Coronel, made an obstinate defence.

Taken alive, his hands were cut off by the cruel victors. Some months

afterwards, when the king and his vindictive minister, with a powerful

army and battering train, had effected, after a long siege, a breach

in the ramparts of Aguilar, "the mutilated knight, his wounds hardly

healed, suddenly appeared in the camp, and with incredible hardihood

demanded of Pedro permission to enter the fortress and die by the side

of his lord. His heroic fidelity excited the admiration of his

enemies, and the favour was accorded him. Many envied Coronel the

glory of inspiring such devoted attachment, and every one awaited with

thrilling interest the last moments of a man whom all Castile was

accustomed to consider as the model of an accomplished and valiant

knight." The assault was given, the castle taken, and Coronel was led

before Alburquerque. "What!" exclaimed the minister, on beholding his

foe, "Coronel traitor in a kingdom where so much honour has been done

him!" "Don Juan," replied Coronel, "we are sons of this Castile, which

elevates men and casts them down. It is in vain to strive against

destiny. The mercy I ask of you is to put me to a speedy death, even

as I, fourteen years ago to-day, put to death the Master of

Alcantara."[25] "The king, present at the interview, his visor

lowered, listened incognito to this dialogue, doubtless admiring

Coronel's coolness, but giving no orders, for he was unaccustomed to

interfere with his minister." Coronel and several distinguished

knights and gentlemen were led a few paces off, and there beheaded.

The Lara faction scattered and weakened, circumstances seemed to

promise Alburquerque a long lease of power, when a fatal mistake

prepared his downfall. Pedro grew restless--his high spirit gave forth

flashes; his minister saw that, to check the desire of governing for

himself, it was necessary to provide him with pursuits of more

engrossing interest than the chase.

"The reign of Don Alphonso had shown what power a mistress

might acquire, and the prudent minister would not leave to

chance the choice of the woman destined to play so important

a part. Fearing a rival, he wished an ally, or rather a

slave. He chose for the king, and blundered egregiously. He

thought to have found the person best suited to his designs,

in Doña Maria de Padilla, a young girl of noble birth,

brought up in the house of his wife, Doña Isabel de Meneses.

She was an orphan, issue of a noble family, formerly attached

to the Lara faction, and ruined by the last civil wars. Her

brother and uncle, poor and ambitious, lent themselves, it

was said, to the degrading bargain. Persuaded that Doña

Maria, brought up in his family, would always consider him as

a master, Alburquerque directed Don Pedro's attention to her,

and himself facilitated their first interview, which took

place during the expedition to the Asturias. Dona Maria de

Padilla, was small in stature, like the majority of Spanish

women, pretty, lively, full of that voluptuous grace peculiar

to the women of Southern Spain, and which our language has no

word exactly to express.[26] As yet the only indication of

talent she had given was her great sprightliness, which

amused the noble lady with whom she lived in an almost

servile capacity. Older than the king, she had over him the

advantage of having already mingled with the crowd, studied

men and observed the court. She soon proved herself worthy to

reign."

Maria Padilla made little opposition to Alburquerque's project. Her

uncle, Juan de Hinestrosa, himself conducted her to Don Pedro, and

placed her, it may almost be said, in his arms. The complaisance was

royally rewarded. Hinestrosa and the other relations of the favourite

emerged from their obscurity, appeared at court, and soon stood high

in their sovereign's favour, although the pliant uncle was the only

one who retained it till the end of his career. Subsequently, before

the Cortes of 1362, Don Pedro declared that he had been, from the

first, privately married to Maria Padilla--thus invalidating his

public union with Blanche of Bourbon, with whom he had never lived,

and after whose death the declaration was made. He produced three

witnesses of the marriage--the fourth, Juan de Hinestrosa, was then

dead--who positively swore it had taken place in their presence. M.

Mérimée, examines the question minutely, quoting various writers on

the subject, and discussing it _pro_ and _con_; one of his strongest

arguments in favour of the marriage, being the improbability that so

faithful, loyal, and valiant a knight as Hinestrosa proved himself,

would have consented, under any temptation, to play the base part of a

pander. It would not be difficult, however, to trace contradictions

nearly as great in the code of honour and morality of the chevaliers

of the fourteenth century; and, very much nearer to our own times, it

has frequently been seen how large an amount of infamy of that kind

the royal purple has been held to cloak.

In a very few months after the equivocal union he had brought about,

Alburquerque began to experience its bad effects. Maria Padilla

secretly incited the young king to shake off his leading-strings, and

grasp the reins of government. Afraid to do this boldly and abruptly,

Pedro conspired with the Padillas, and planned a reconciliation with

his brothers Henry and Tello, believing, in his inexperience, that he

could nowhere find better friends, or more disinterested advisers. The

secret of the plot was well kept: Alburquerque unsuspiciously accepted

a frivolous mission to the King of Portugal; during his absence, a

treaty of amity was concluded between the king and the two bastards.

Whilst these intrigues went on, Blanche of Bourbon, niece of the King

of France, waited at Valladolid, in company with the dowager queens of

Castile and Arragon, until it should please Pedro to go thither and

marry her. Pedro had established himself at Torrijos near Toledo,

holding tournaments and festivals in honour of his mistress, with whom

he was more in love than ever; and the French princess waited several

months, to the great indignation of her suite of knights and nobles.

Suddenly a severe countenance troubled the joy of Maria Padilla's

lover. It was that of Alburquerque, who, in grave and regretful words,

represented to the king the affront he put upon the house of France,

and the anxiety of his subjects, who awaited, in his marriage, a

guarantee of future tranquillity. It was of the utmost importance to

give a legitimate heir to the crown of Castile. Subjugated by the

voice of reason, and by the old ascendency of his austere counsellor,

Pedro set out for Valladolid, and was joined on his way by Count Henry

and Don Tello, who came to meet him on foot and unarmed; kissed his

foot and his right hand, as he sat on horseback; and were received by

him with all honour and favour, to the mortification of Alburquerque,

who saw in this reconciliation a proof of the credit of the Padillas,

and a humiliating blow to his authority. The mortification was all the

greater that he, a veteran politician, had been outwitted by mere

children. On the third day of June the king's marriage took place, the

royal pair being conducted in great pomp to the church, mounted upon

white palfreys, and attired in robes of gold brocade trimmed with

ermine--a costume then reserved for sovereigns. In their retinue,

Henry of Trastamare had the precedence of the princes of Arragon--an

honour held excessive by some, and attributed by others to the

sincerity of the reconciliation between the sons of Don Alphonso. A

tournament and bull-fight succeeded the ceremony, and were renewed the

next day. "But in the midst of these festivities, all eyes were fixed

upon the newly-married pair. Coldness, and even aversion for his young

bride, were visible upon the king's countenance; and as it was

difficult to understand how a man of his age, ardent and voluptuous,

could be insensible to the attractions of the French princess, many

whispered that he was fascinated by Maria Padilla, and that his eyes,

charmed by magic art, beheld a repulsive object in place of the young

beauty he led to the altar. Aversion, like sympathy, has its

inexplicable mysteries."[27]

Upon the second day after his marriage, Don Pedro being alone at

dinner in his palace, (the dinner hour in those days was at nine or

ten in the morning,) his mother and aunt appeared before him, all in

tears, and, having obtained a private audience, taxed him with being

about to desert his wife, and return to Maria Padilla. The king

expressed his astonishment that they should credit idle rumours, and

dismissed them, repeating that he thought not of quitting Valladolid.

An hour afterwards he called for mules, saying he would go visit his

mother; but, instead of doing so, he left the city, accompanied only

by the brother of his mistress, Don Diego Padilla, and by two of his

most confidential gentlemen. Regular relays were in waiting, and he

slept that night at sixteen long leagues from Valladolid. The next day

Doña Maria met him at Puebla de Montalvan. This strange and indecent

escapade was simultaneous with a complete transfer of the king's

confidence from Alburquerque to his brothers and the Padillas. The

minister preserved his dignity to the last, and sent a haughty but

respectful message to his sovereign, by the mouth of his majordomo.

"You know, sire," concluded this knight, Rui Diaz Cabeza de Vaca, "all

that Don Juan Alonzo has done for your service, and for that of the

queen your mother. He has been your chancellor from your birth. He has

always loyally served you, as he served the late king your father. For

you he exposed himself to great perils, when Doña Leonora de Guzman,

and her faction, had all power in the kingdom. My master is still

ignorant of the crimes imputed to him: make them known to him, and he

will refute them. Nevertheless, if any knight do doubt his honour and

his loyalty, I, his vassal, am here ready to defend him with my body,

and with arms in hand." Thus did the arrogant _ricos hombres_ of the

fourteenth century dare address their sovereign, by the mouth of

their knightly retainers. What a contrast between these bold-spoken,

strong-armed magnates, and the puny degenerate grandees of the present

day, sunk in vice, effeminacy, and sloth, and to whom valour,

chivalry, and patriotism are but empty sounds! Alburquerque is a fine

type of the feudal lord--noble as a crowned king, and almost as

powerful. Receiving a cold and discouraging reply to Cabeza de Vaca's

lofty harangue, he retired, followed by an army of adherents and

vassals, to his vast domains and strong castle in Portugal. On their

passage, his men-at-arms pillaged and devastated the country, that

being then the most approved manner for a feudal lord to testify his

discontent. Don Pedro ill concealed his joy at being thus easily rid

of an importunate mentor, whose faithful services to himself and his

father rendered a positive dismissal a most ungraceful act, the shame

of which was saved the king by Alburquerque's voluntary retreat. The

reaction was complete: all the ex-minister's friends were dismissed,

and their places filled by partisans of the Padillas. Many of his acts

were annulled, and several sentences he had given were reversed. Pedro

had no rest till he had effaced every vestige of his wise and prudent

administration. Ingratitude has too often been the vice of kings; in

this instance it brought its own punishment. A few months later we

find Henry of Trastamare, and his brother Tello, leagued with

Alburquerque against the sovereign who had disgraced him in great

measure on their account. This perfidy of the bastards was perfectly

in keeping with the character of the age. "To characterise the

fourteenth century in Spain by its most prevalent vice," says M.

Mérimée, "one should cite, in my opinion, neither brutality of

manners, nor rapacity, nor violence. The most prominent feature of

that sad period is its falseness and deceit: never did history

register so many acts of treason and perfidy. The century, rude in all

other things, shows itself ingenious in the art of deception. It

revels in subtleties. In all agreements, and even in the code of

chivalrous honour, it conceals ambiguities, by which interest knows

well how to profit. The oaths lavished in all transactions,

accompanied by the most solemn ceremonies, are but vain formalities

and matters of habit. He who plights his word, his hand upon the holy

Scriptures, is believed by none unless he deliver up his wife and

children, or, better still, his fortresses, as hostages for his truth.

The latter pledge is held to be the only safe guarantee. Distrust is

general, and every man sees an enemy in his neighbour." The fidelity

of this gloomy picture is fully confirmed by the events of Don Pedro's

reign. Alburquerque set the example to his royal pupil, who was not

slow to follow it, and who soon, in his turn, suffered from the

dominant vice of the time.

The necessity of pressing forward through a book whose every page

offers temptations to linger, prevents our tracing, in detail, the

subsequent events of Alburquerque's life. He died in the autumn of

1354, almost suddenly, at Medina del Campo, which he and his

confederates had taken by assault, and given up to pillage. His

physician, Master Paul, an Italian attached to the house of Prince

Ferdinand of Arragon, was suspected of having mixed a subtle poison in

the draught he administered to him for an apparently trifling

indisposition. Don Pedro, the person most interested in the death of

his quondam counsellor, and now bitter enemy, was accused of

instigating the deed, and magnificent presents subsequently made by

him to the leech, gave an air of probability to the suspicion. "In his

last moments, Alburquerque belied not the firmness of his character.

Near to death, he assembled his vassals, and made them swear to accept

neither peace nor truce with the king, till they had obtained

satisfaction for his wrongs. He ordered his body to be carried at the

head of their battalion so long as the war lasted, as if resolved to

abdicate his hatred and authority only after triumph. Enclosed in his

coffin, he still seemed to preside over the councils of the league;

and, when deliberations were held, his corpse was interrogated, and

his majordomo, Cabeza de Vaca, replied in the name of his departed

master." There is something solemn and affecting in this post-humous

deference, this homage paid by the living to the dead. Alburquerque

was unquestionably _the_ man of his day in the Peninsula: his grand

and haughty figure stands out upon the historical canvass, in imposing

contrast with the boy-brawlers and intriguing women by whom he was

surrounded.

Deserted by all--betrayed even by his own mother, who gave up his last

stronghold whilst he was absent on a visit to his mistress--the king

had no resource but to throw himself into the hands of the rebels,

trusting to their magnanimity and loyalty to preserve him his crown.

With Hinestrosa, Simuel Levi his Jew treasurer, and Fernand Sanchez

his private chancellor, for sole companions--and followed by a few

lackeys and inferior officers, mounted on mules and unarmed--he set

out for Toro, then the headquarters of the insurgent league. "Informed

of the approach of this melancholy procession, the chiefs of the

confederates rode out to meet him, well mounted and in magnificent

dresses, beneath which their armour was visible, as if to contrast

their warlike equipage with the humble retinue of the vanquished king.

After kissing his hand, they escorted him to the town with great cries

of joy, caracoling about him, performing _fantasias_, pursuing each

other, and throwing reeds in the Arab manner. It is said that when Don

Henry approached his brother to salute him, the unfortunate monarch

could not restrain his tears. 'May God be merciful to you!' he said;

'for my part, I pardon you.'" There was no sincerity in this

forgiveness; already, in the hour of his humiliation, Pedro had vowed

hatred and vengeance against its authors. At present, however,

artifice and intrigue were the only weapons at his disposal. By the

assistance of Simuel the Jew, who was sincerely attached to him, and

who rendered him many and great services, he gained over a portion of

the revolted nobility, concluded an alliance with the royal family of

Arragon, and finally effected his escape from the sort of

semi-captivity in which he was held. "Profiting by dense fog, Don

Pedro rode out of Toro very early in the morning, a falcon on his

wrist, as though he went a-hawking, accompanied by Levi, and by his

usual escort of some two hundred cavaliers. Either these were bribed,

or the king devised means of detaching them from him, for he soon

found himself alone with the Jew. Then, following the rout to Segovia

at full speed, in a few hours they were beyond pursuit." During the

short period of Pedro's captivity, a great change had taken place in

public feeling. The king's misfortunes, his youth and firmness,

interested many in his behalf. The Cortes, which he summoned at

Burgos, a few days after his escape, granted all his demands of men

and money. M. Mérimée thinks it probable the commons obtained from

him, in return, an extension of their privileges and franchises; but

this is mere conjecture, no records existing of the proceedings of

this Cortes, which was, in fact, rendered irregular by the absence of

the clerical deputies, the Pope having just excommunicated Don Pedro

for his adulteries. "The excommunication, fulminated by a papal legate

at Toledo, the 19th January 1355, does not appear to have altered, in

any degree, the disposition of the people towards the king. On the

contrary, it excited indignation, now that he was reconciled with his

subjects; for Spaniards have always disliked foreign interference in

their affairs." The thunders of Avignon lost not Pedro a single

partisan. He replied to them by seizing the possessions of Cardinal

Gilles Albornoz, and of some other prelates; and, returning threat for

threat, he announced his intention of confiscating the domains of all

the bishops who should waver between him and the Pope. The rebellion

of his nobles, the treason of his mother and friends, the humiliation

he had suffered, had wrought a marked change in the still plastic

character of the young sovereign. Hitherto we have seen him violent

and impetuous; henceforward we shall find dissimulation and cruelty

his most prominent qualities. He had prided himself on chivalrous

loyalty and honour; now all means were good that led to a triumph over

his enemies. Full of hatred and contempt for the great vassals who,

after having insolently vanquished him, basely sold the fruits of

their victory for fair promises and for Simuel Levi's gold, he vowed

to destroy their power, and to build up his authority upon the ruins

of feudal tyranny.

The angry king lost no time in commencing the work of vengeance. After

a fierce contest in and around Toledo, he routed the army of Count

Henry and Don Fadrique, slew all the wounded, put to death one of the

twenty leaguers, whom he caught in the town, (two had already been

massacred by his order at Medina del Campo,) imprisoned many nobles,

as well as the Bishop of Siguenza, whose palace was given up to

pillage. "Twenty burgesses of Toledo were publicly decapitated as

abettors of the rebellion. Amongst the unfortunate persons condemned

to death was a jeweller, upwards of eighty years old. His son threw

himself at the feet of Don Pedro, petitioning to die in place of his

father. If we may credit Ayala, this horrible exchange was accepted

both by the king and by the father himself." From Toledo, Pedro

marched on Toro, where the bastards, the queen-mother, and most of the

_ricos hombres_ and knights who adhered to the league, had

concentrated their forces, and prepared an obstinate resistance. He

established himself in a village near the town, but lacked the

engines, instruments, and stores necessary to invest the place

regularly. Money was scarce. Fortunately, Simuel Levi was at hand, the

pearl of finance ministers, compared to whom the Mons and Mendizabals

of the nineteenth century are bunglers of the most feeble description.

"Don Pedro, in his quarters at Morales, was amusing himself one day by

playing at dice. Before him stood open his military chest, which was

also his play-purse. It contained 20,000 doubloons. 'Gold and silver,'

said the king, in a melancholy tone,--'here is all I possess.' The

game over, Simuel took his master aside: 'Sire,' he said, 'you have

affronted me before all the court. Since I am your treasurer, is it

not disgraceful for me that my master be not richer? Hitherto, your

collectors have relied too much upon your easiness and indulgence. Now

that you are of an age to reign for yourself, that all Castile loves

and fears you, it is time to put an end to disorder. Only be pleased

to authorise me to treat with your officers of the finances, and

confide to me two of your castles, and I pledge myself that, in a very

short time, you shall have in each of them a treasure of greater value

than the contents of this casket.'" The king gladly gave what was

required of him, and the Jew kept his word. His manner of doing so

paints the strange immorality of the times. It was customary to pay

all court-salaries and pensions by orders on the royal receivers of

imposts. These usually paid only a part of the amount of such orders,

and unless the demand for the balance were backed by force, it was

never honoured. Simuel Levi, having men-at-arms, jailers, and

executioners at his orders, compelled these reluctant paymasters to

disgorge all arrears; then sending for the king's creditors, he

offered them fifty per cent of their due against receipts for the

whole. Most of them, never expecting to recover a real of the sums

kept back by the dishonest stewards, caught eagerly at the offer. This

clumsy fraud, against which none found anything to say, brought

considerable wealth into the king's coffers, and gave him the highest

opinion of his treasurer, by whose careful administration he soon

found himself the richest monarch in Spain.

Money removed the obstacles to the siege of Toro. Before the place was

invested, however, Henry of Trastamare, with his usual precocious

selfishness and prudence, found a pretext to leave it. A breach made,

and part of the exterior fortifications in the possession of the royal

troops, the Master of Santiago passed over to the king, who, from the

opposite bank of the Douro, had given him verbal promise of pardon.

The same night an officer of the civic guard opened the gates of the

town to Pedro and his army. At daybreak the garrison of the castle saw

themselves surrounded by overpowering forces, about to mount to the

assault. "None spoke of resistance, or even of capitulation; safety of

life was almost more than they dared hope. Fearing the king's fury,

all refused to go out and implore his clemency. At last a Navarrese

knight, named Martin Abarca, who in the last troubles had taken part

with the bastards, risked himself at a postern, holding in his arms a

child of twelve or thirteen years, natural son of King Alphonso and of

Doña Leonora. Recognising the king by his armour, he called to him and

said--'Sire! grant me pardon, and I hasten to throw myself at your

feet, and to restore to you your brother Don Juan!'--'Martin Abarca,'

said the king, 'I pardon my brother Don Juan; but for you, no

mercy!'--'Well!' said the Navarrese, crossing the ditch, 'do with me

as you list.' And, still carrying the child, he prostrated himself

before the king. Don Pedro, touched by this hardihood of despair, gave

him his life in presence of all his knights." This clemency was soon

obscured by the terrible scenes that followed the surrender of the

castle, when the robe of Pedro's own mother was stained with the blood

of the nobles struck down by her side. She fainted with

horror--perhaps with grief; for Martin Telho, a Portuguese, and her

reputed lover, was amongst the murdered; and, on recovering her

senses, "she saw herself sustained in the arms of rude soldiers, her

feet in a pool of blood, whilst four mangled bodies lay before her,

already stripped of their armour and clothes. Then, despair and fury

restoring her strength, she cursed her son, in a voice broken by sobs,

and accused him of having for ever dishonoured her. She was led away

to her palace, and there treated with the mockery of respect which the

leaguers had shown, the year before, to their royal captive."

It were quite incompatible with the necessary limits of this paper, to

give even the most meagre outline of the numerous vicissitudes of Don

Pedro's reign, and to glance at a tithe of the remarkable events and

striking incidents his biographer has so industriously and tastefully

assembled. M. Mérimée's work does not bear condensing in a review;

indeed, it is itself a condensation: an ordinary writer would have

spread the same matter over twice the space, and still have deemed

himself concise. The impression left on the reader's mind by this

spirited and admirably written volume is, that not one page could be

omitted without being missed. Sparing as we have been of detail, and

although confining ourselves to a glance at prominent circumstances,

we are still at the very commencement of Don Pedro's reign--the

busiest and most stirring, perhaps, that ever was comprised within the

space of twenty years. Not a few of this warlike, cruel, and amorous

monarch's adventures have been handed down in the form of ballads and

heroic legends, still current in southern Spain, where many of them

have the weight of history--although the license of poetry, and the

transmission through many generations, have frequently greatly

distorted facts. Amongst the numerous objects of his fickle passion

was Doña Aldonza Coronel, who, after some show of resistance, and

taking refuge for a while in a convent where her sister was nun,

showed herself sensible to the solicitations of royalty. Popular

tradition has substituted for Aldonza her sister Maria, widow of Juan

de la Cerda, whom Pedro had put to death. The people of Seville the

Beautiful still believe and tell how "Doña Maria, chaste as lovely,

indignantly repulsed the king's addresses. But in vain did she oppose

the gratings of the convent of St Clara as a bulwark against the

impetuous passion of the tyrant. Warned that his satellites were about

to drag her from the sanctuary, she ordered a large hole to be dug in

the convent garden, in which she lay down, and had herself covered

with branches and earth. The fresh-turned soil would infallibly have

betrayed her, had not a miracle supervened. Scarcely had she entered

this manner of tomb, when flowers and herbage sprang up over it, so

that nothing distinguished it from the surrounding grass. The king,

discrediting the report of his emissaries, went in person to the

convent to carry off the beautiful widow; this time it was not a

miracle, but an heroic stratagem, that saved the noble matron.

Abhorring the fatal beauty that thus exposed her to outrage, she

seized, with a steady hand, a vase of boiling oil, and poured it over

her face and bosom; then, covered with horrible burns, she presented

herself to the king, and made him fly in terror, by declaring herself

afflicted with leprosy. 'On her body, which has been miraculously

preserved,' says Zuñiga, 'are still visible the traces of the burning

liquid, and assuredly it may with good reason be deemed the body of a

saint.'[28] I have dwelt upon this legend, unknown to the contemporary

authors," adds M. Mérimée, "to give an idea of the transformation Don

Pedro's history has undergone at the hands of tradition, and of the

poetical colours imparted to it by the lively imagination of the

people of Spain. After the marvellous narrative, comes the simple

truth of history." Ballads and traditions are echoes of the popular

voice; and, in many of those relating to Don Pedro, we may trace a

disposition to extenuate his faults, extol his justice, and bring into

relief his occasional acts of generosity. The truth is, that, although

harsh and relentless with his arrogant nobles, he was affable with the

people, who beheld in him their deliverer from oppression, and the

unflinching opponent of the iniquities of the feudal system. Facility

of access is a great source of popularity in Spain, where the

independent tone and bearing of the lower orders often surprise

foreigners. In no country in the world is the character of the people

more free from servility. In the poorest peasant there is an air of

native dignity and self-respect, which he loves to see responded to by

consideration and affability on the part of his superiors. Don Pedro

was very accessible to his subjects. When he met his first Cortes at

Valladolid, in 1351, he promised the deputies of the commons that

every Castilian should have liberty to appeal from the decisions of

the magistrates to the king in person. This promise he kept better

than was his wont. In the court of the Alcazar at Seville, near the

gate known as that of the Banners, are shown the remains of a

tribunal, in the open air, where he sat to give his judgments. He had

another habit likely to conciliate and please the people. In imitation

of the Eastern caliphs, whose adventures had doubtless amused his

childhood, he loved to disguise himself, and to ramble at night in the

streets of Seville--to listen to the conversation of the populace, to

seek adventures, and overlook the police. Here was a suggestive text

for balladists and romance writers, who have largely availed

themselves of it. The story of Don Pedro's duel with a stranger, with

whom he quarrelled on one of these expeditions, is well known. An old

woman, sole witness of the encounter, deposed that the combatants had

their faces muffled in their cloaks, but that the knees of one of them

made a cracking noise in walking. This was known to be a peculiarity

of Don Pedro's. Justice was puzzled. The king had killed his

adversary, and had thereby incurred the punishment of decapitation.

Pedro had his head carved in stone, and placed in a niche in the

street where the duel had taken place. The bust, which was

unfortunately renewed in the seventeenth century, is still to be seen

at Seville, in the street of the Candilejo, which takes its name,

according to Zuñiga, from the lamp by whose light the duel was fought.

Condemned at his own tribunal, we need not wonder at the lenity of his

sentence, more creditable to the royal culprit's invention than to his

justice. He appears to have been frequently ingenious in his

judgments. A rich priest had seriously injured a poor shoemaker, and,

for sole punishment, was condemned by the ecclesiastical tribunal to a

few months' suspension from his sacerdotal functions. The shoemaker,

deeming the chastisement inadequate, waylaid his enemy, and soundly

drubbed him. Arrested immediately, he was condemned to death. He

appealed to the king. The partiality of the ecclesiastical judges had

excited some scandal; Don Pedro parodied their sentence by condemning

the shoemaker to make no shoes for one year. Whether this anecdote be

true, or a mere invention, it is certain that a remarkable law was

added, about that time, to the code of the city of Seville, to the

effect that a layman, injuring an ecclesiastic, should thenceforward

be liable only to the same punishment that the priest would have

incurred by a like offence against the layman.

The murder of the Grand-master of Santiago, slain by his brother's

order, and the death of the unfortunate French princess, who found a

tyrant where she expected a husband, are recorded in the Romances of

the Master Don Fadrique, and of Blanche de Bourbon. The fate of

Blanche, attributed by contemporary chroniclers and modern historians

to Don Pedro's orders, is one of the blackest of the stains upon his

character. The poor queen died in the castle of Jerez--some say by

poison, others by the mace of an arbalister of the guard. She had

lived but twenty-five years, ten of which she had passed in prison.

There is no appearance or probability that Maria Padilla instigated

her assassination. That favourite was kind-hearted and merciful, and

on more than one occasion we find her interceding with the king for

the lives of his enemies and prisoners, and weeping when her

supplications proved fruitless. The ballad makes free with fact, and

sacrifices truth to poetry. It was dramatically correct that the

mistress should instigate the wife's death. "Be not so sad, Doña Maria

de Padilla," says the king; "if I married twice, it was for your

advantage, and to show my contempt for this Blanche of Bourbon. I send

her to Medina Sidonia, to work me a banner--the ground, colour of her

blood, the embroidery, of her tears. This banner, Doña Maria, I will

have it made for you:" and forthwith the ruthless arbalister departs,

after a knight had refused to do the felon deed. "Oh France, my noble

country! oh my Bourbon blood!" cries poor Blanche; "to-day I complete

my seventeen years, and enter my eighteenth. What have I done to you,

Castile? The crowns you gave me were crowns of blood and sighs!" And

thus she laments till the mace falls, "and the brains of her head are

strewed about the hall." The song-writer, amongst other liberties, has

struck eight years off the victim's age, perhaps with the idea of

rendering her more interesting. The exact manner of her death seems

uncertain, although Ayala agrees with the ballad, and most subsequent

historians have followed his version. M. Mérimée is disposed to

exculpate Pedro, alleging the complete inutility of the murder, and

that ten years of captivity and ill treatment were sufficient to

account for the queen's death. Admitting the latter plea, we cannot

see in it a diminution of the crime. In either case Pedro was the

murderer of his hapless wife, who was innocent of all offence against

him; and his extraordinary aversion for whom might well give rise, in

that superstitious age, to the tales of sorcery and magic charms

already quoted. The details of Don Fadrique's death are more precise

and authentic, as it was also more merited. But, although the Master

of Santiago had been guilty of many acts of treason, and at the time

of his death was conspiring against the king, his execution by a

brother's order, and before a brother's eyes, is shocking and

repugnant. It was Don Fadrique's policy, at that moment, to parade the

utmost devotion to Pedro, the better to mask his secret plans.

Arriving one day at Seville, on a visit to the king, he found the

latter playing at draughts with a courtier. True to his habits of

dissimulation, Pedro, who only a few hours previously had decided on

the Master's death, received him with a frank air and pleasant smile,

and gave him his hand to kiss; and then, seeing that he was well

attended, bade him take up his quarters, and then return. After

visiting Maria Padilla, who gazed at him with tears in her

eyes,--knowing his doom, but not daring to warn him,--Fadrique went

down into the court, found his escort gone, and the gates shut.

Surprised and uneasy, he hesitated what to do, when two knights

summoned him to the king's apartments, in a detached building within

the walls of the Alcazar.

"At the door stood Pero Lopez Padilla, chief of the

mace-bearers of the guard, with four of his people. Don

Fadrique, still accompanied by the Master of Calatrava (Diego

Padilla) knocked at the door. Only one of its folds opened,

and within appeared the king, who forthwith exclaimed, 'Pero

Lopez, arrest the Master!'--'Which of the two, sire?'

inquired the officer, hesitating between Don Fadrique and Don

Diego de Padilla. 'The Master of Santiago!' replied the king

in a voice of thunder. Immediately Pero Lopez, seizing Don

Fadrique's arm, said, 'You are my prisoner.' Don Fadrique,

astounded, made no resistance; when the king cried out,

'Arbalisters, kill the Master of Santiago!' Surprise, and

respect for the red cross of St James, for an instant

fettered the men to the spot. Then one of the knights of the

palace, advancing to the door, said: 'Traitors! what do you?

Heard you not the king's command to kill the Master?' The

arbalisters lifted the mace, when Don Fadrique, vigorously

shaking off the grasp of Pero Lopez, sprang back into the

court with the intention of defending himself. But the hilt

of his sword, which he wore under the large mantle of his

order, was entangled with the belt, and he could not draw.

Pursued by the arbalisters, he ran to and fro in the court,

avoiding their blows, but unable to get his sword out. At

last one of the king's guards, named Nuño Fernandez, struck

him on the head with his mace, and knocked him down; and the

three others immediately showered their blows upon the fallen

man, who lay bathed in his blood when Don Pedro came down

into the court, seeking the knights of Santiago, to slay them

with their chief."

In the very chamber of Maria Padilla, the assassin-king gave with his

own hand the first stab to his brother's esquire, who had taken refuge

there. Leaving the ensanguined boudoir, (Maria Padilla's apartments in

the Alcazar were a sort of harem, where much oriental pomp was

observed,) he returned to the Master, and finding he still breathed,

he gave his dagger to an African slave to despatch him. Then he sat

down to dinner in an apartment two paces distant from his brother's

corpse.

It is a relief to turn from acts of such unnatural barbarity to the

traits of chivalrous generosity that sparkle, at long intervals, it is

true, upon the dark background of Pedro's character. One of these,

connected with a singularly romantic incident, is attested by Alonzo

Martinez de Talavera, chaplain of John II. of Castile, a chronicler M.

Mérimée is disposed to hold in high esteem. In one of his campaigns

against his rebellious brethren and their Arragonese allies, the king

laid siege to the castle of Cabezon, belonging to Count Trastamare;

and whose governor, summoned to yield, refused even to parley.

"Yet the whole garrison of the castle consisted but of ten

esquires, Castilian exiles; but behind thick and lofty walls,

in a tower built on perpendicular rocks, and against which

battering engines could not be brought, ten resolute men

might defend themselves against an army, and need only yield

to famine. The place being well provisioned, the siege was

likely to be long. But the ten esquires, all young men, were

better able bravely to repulse an assault than patiently to

endure the tedium of a blockade. Time hung heavy upon their

hands, they wanted amusement, and at last they insolently

insisted that the governor should give them women to keep

them company in their eyrie. Now, the only women in Cabezon

were the governor's wife and daughter. 'If you do not deliver

them to us, to be dealt with as we list,' said the garrison

to the governor, 'we abandon your castle, or, better still,

we open its gate to the King of Castile!' In such an

emergency, the code of chivalrous honour was stringent. At

the siege of Tarifa, Alonzo Perez de Guzman, summoned to

surrender the town, under penalty of seeing his son massacred

before his eyes, answered the Moors by throwing them his

sword, wherewith to slay the child. This action, which

procured the governor of Tarifa the surname of Guzman the

Good, was a _fazaña_ (an exploit)--one of those heroic

precedents which everyman of honour was bound to imitate.

_Permittitur homicidium filii potius quam deditio castelli_,

is the axiom of a doctor in chivalry of that epoch. The

governor of Cabezon, as magnanimous in his way as Guzman the

Good, so arranged matters that his garrison no longer thought

of abandoning him. But two of the esquires, less corrupt than

their comrades, conceived a horror of their treason, and

escaped from the castle. Led before the king, they informed

him of the mutiny they had witnessed, and of its

consequences. Don Pedro, indignant, forthwith entreated the

governor to let him do justice on the offenders. In exchange

for those felons, he offered ten gentlemen of his army, who,

before entering Cabezon, should take a solemn oath to defend

the castle against all assailants, even against the king

himself, and to die at their posts with the governor. This

proposal having been accepted, the king had the traitors

quartered, and their remains were afterwards burned. Through

the colours with which a romantic imagination has adorned

this incident, it is difficult to separate truth from

fiction; but we at least distinguish the popular opinion of

the character of Don Pedro--a strange amalgamation of

chivalrous sentiments, and of love of justice, carried to

ferocity."

There was very little justice, or gratitude either, in the king's

treatment of his Jew treasurer. Don Simuel el Levi,[29] Israelite

though he was, had proved himself a stancher friend and more loyal

subject than any Christian of Pedro's court. He had borne him company

in his captivity--had aided his escape--had renovated his

finances--had been his minister, treasurer, and confidant. Suddenly

Simuel was thrown into prison. On the same day, and throughout the

kingdom, his kinsmen and agents were all arrested. His crime was his

prodigious wealth. Pedro, ignorant of the resources of trade, could

not believe that his treasurer had grown rich otherwise than at his

expense. Simuel's property was seized; then, as he was suspected of

having concealed the greater part of his treasures, he was taken to

Seville and put to the torture, under which he expired. The king is

said to have found in his coffers large sums of gold and silver,

besides a quantity of jewels and rich stuffs, all of which he

confiscated. A sum of 300,000 doubloons was also found in the hands of

Simuel's relatives, receivers under his orders: this proceeded from

the taxes, whose collection was intrusted to him, and was about to be

paid into the king's exchequer. There is reason to believe, adds M.

Mérimée, that Levi, like Jacques Coeur a century later, was the victim

of the ignorance and cupidity of a master he had faithfully

served.[30]

We have dwelt so long upon the early pages of this history, and have

so often been led astray by the interest of the notes and anecdotes

with which they are thickly strewn, that we have left ourselves

without space for a notice of those portions of the bulky volume most

likely to rivet the attention of the English reader. When the _Grandes

Compagnies_--those formidable condottieri, who, for a time, may be

said to have ruled in France--crossed the Pyrenees to fight for Henry

of Trastamare, whilst the troops of England and Guyenne came to the

help of Pedro; when the great champions of their respective countries,

Edward the Black Prince and Bertrand du Guesclin, bared steel in the

civil strife of Spain,--then came the tug of war and fierce

encounter--then did the tide of battle roll its broad impetuous

stream. For even at that remote period, although Spain boasted a

valiant chivalry and stubborn men-at-arms, her wars were often a

series of skirmishes, surprises, treacheries, and camp-intrigues,

rather than of pitched battles in the field. The same sluggishness and

indolence on the part of Spanish generals, so conspicuous at the

present day, was then frequently observable. We read of

divisions--whose timely arrival would have changed the fate of a

battle--coming up so slowly that their friends were beaten before they

appeared; of generals marching out, and marching back again, without

striking a single blow; or remaining, for days together, gazing at

their opponents without risking an attack. Even then, the Spaniards

were a nation of guerillas.

"Accustomed to a war of rapid skirmishes against the Moors,

they had adopted their mode of fighting. Covered with light

coats of mail, or with doublets of quilted cloth, mounted on

light and active horses, their _genetaires_ (light horsemen)

hurled their javelins at a gallop, then turned bridle,

without caring to keep their ranks. With the exception of the

military orders, better armed and disciplined than the

_genetaires_, the Spanish cavalry were unable to offer

resistance in line to the English or French men-at-arms."

The infantry of Spain, afterwards esteemed the best in Europe, was at

that time so lightly considered as to be rarely enumerated in the

strength of an army. The English footsoldiers, on the other hand, had

already achieved a brilliant reputation. "Armed with tall bows of

yew," says M. Mérimée, "they sheltered themselves behind pointed

stakes planted in the ground, and, thus protected against cavalry, let

fly arrows an ell long, which few cuirasses could resist." The

equipment of the English cavalry was far superior to that of the

Spanish horsemen. Ayala recapitulates, with astonishment, the various

pieces of armour in use amongst those northern warriors. Plates of

steel and forged iron were worn over jerkins of thick leather, and

even over shirts of mail. The bull-dog courage of the men was not less

remarkable than the strength of their defensive arms. It is

interesting to read of the exploits of a handful of English soldiers

on the very ground where, four hundred and forty-six years later, an

army of that nation crushed the hosts of France. Sir Thomas Felton,

seneschal of Guyenne, was attacked, when at a considerable distance

from the English army, near Ariñiz, two leagues from Vitoria, by more

than three thousand French gendarmes and Spanish light horse.

"Felton had but two hundred men-at arms, and as many archers.

He lost not courage, but dismounted his cavalry, and drew

them up on a steep hillock. His brother, William Felton,

alone refused to quit his horse. With lance in rest, he

charged into the midst of the Castilians, and at the first

blow drove his weapon completely through the body and iron

armour of a foe; he was immediately cut to pieces. His

comrades, closing round their banner, defended themselves,

for several hours, with the courage of despair. At last the

adventurers, headed by the Marshal d'Audeneham and the Bègue

de Vilaines, dismounted, and, forming column, broke the

English phalanx, whilst the Spanish cavalry charged it in

rear. All were slain in the first fury of victory, but the

heroic resistance of this scanty band of Englishmen struck

even their enemies with admiration. The memory of Felton's

glorious defeat is preserved in the province, where is still

shown, near Ariñiz, the hillock upon which, after fighting an

entire day, he fell, covered with wounds. It is called, in

the language of the country, _Ingles-mendi_, the English

Hill."

This gallant but unimportant skirmish comprised (with the exception of

a dash made by Don Tello at the English foragers, of whom he killed a

good number) all the fighting that took place at that time upon the

plain of Vitoria; although some historians have made that plain the

scene of the decisive battle fought soon afterwards, between Edward of

England and Don Pedro on the one hand, and du Guesclin and Henry of

Trastamare on the other. Toreno correctly indicates the ground of this

action, which occurred on the right bank of the Ebro, between Najera

and Navarrete. It is true that the Prince of Wales offered battle near

Vitoria, drawing up his army on the heights of Santo Romano, close to

the village of Alegria, just in the line of the flight of the French

when beaten in 1813. The Prince did this boldly and confidently,

although anxious for the coming up of his rear-guard, which was still

seven leagues off. "That day," says Froissart, "the prince had many a

pang in his heart, because his rear-guard delayed so long to come."

But the enemy were in no haste to attack. Only a day or two

previously, Don Henry had assembled his captains in council of war,

"to communicate to them," says M. Mérimée, "a letter the King of

France had written him, urging him not to tempt fortune by risking a

battle against so able a general as the Prince of Wales, and such

formidable soldiers as the veteran bands he commanded. Bertrand du

Guesclin, Marshal d'Audeneham, and most of the French adventurers,

were of the same opinion--frankly declaring that, in regular battle,

the English were invincible. Du Guesclin's advice was to harass them

by continual skirmishes," &c., &c.; and the result of the council was,

that Don Henry resolved to keep as much as possible on the defensive,

and in the mountains, where his light troops had a great advantage

over their enemies, who were heavily armed, and unaccustomed to a

guerilla warfare. It had been well for him had he adhered to this

resolution, instead of allowing himself to be carried away by his

ardour, and by the confidence with which a successful skirmish had

inspired him. In vain du Guesclin, and the other captains, tried to

detain him in rear of the little river Najerilla: declaring his

intention of finishing the war by one decisive combat, he led his army

into the plain. When the Black Prince, who little expected such

temerity, was informed of the movement--"By St George!" he exclaimed,

"in yonder bastard there lives a valiant knight!" Then he proceeded to

take up his position for the fight that now was certain to take place.

"At sunrise, Count Henry beheld the English army drawn up in line, in

admirable order; their gay banners and pennons floating above a forest

of lances. Already all the men-at-arms had dismounted.[31]... The

Prince of Wales devoutly offered up a prayer, and, having called

heaven to witness the justice of his cause, held out his hand to Don

Pedro: 'Sir King,' he said, 'in an hour you will know if you are King

of Castile.' Then he cried out, 'Banners forward, in the name of God

and St George!"

We will not diminish, by extract or abridgment, the pleasure of those

of our readers who may peruse M. Mérimée's masterly and picturesque

account of the battle, whose triumphant termination was tarnished by

an act of ferocious cruelty on the part of the Castilian king. Don

Pedro had proved himself, as usual, a gallant soldier in the fight;

and long after the English trumpets had sounded the recall, he spurred

his black charger on the track of the fugitive foe. At last, exhausted

by fatigue, he was returning to the camp, when he met a Gascon knight

bringing back as prisoner Iñigo Lopez Orozco, once an intimate of the

king's, but who had abandoned him after his flight from Burgos. In

spite of the efforts of the Gascon to protect him, Pedro slew his

renegade adherent in cold blood, and with his own hand. The English

were indignant at this barbarous revenge, and sharp words were

exchanged between Pedro and the Black Prince. Indeed, it was hardly

possible that sympathy should exist between the generous and

chivalrous Edward and his blood-thirsty and crafty ally, and this

dispute was the first symptom of the mutual aversion they afterwards

exhibited. From the very commencement, the Prince of Wales appears to

have espoused the cause of legitimacy in opposition to his personal

predilections. His admiration of Count Henry, and good opinion of his

abilities, frequently breaks out. After the signal victory of Najera,

which seemed to have fixed the crown of Castile more firmly than ever

upon Pedro's brow, Edward was the only man who judged differently of

the future. "The day after the battle, when the knights charged by him

to examine the dead and the prisoners came to make their report, he

asked in the Gascon dialect, which he habitually spoke: '_E lo bort,

es mort ó pres?_ And the Bastard, is he killed or taken?' The answer

was, that he had disappeared from the field of battle, and that all

trace of him was lost. '_Non ay res faït!_' exclaimed the prince;

'Nothing is done.'"

The Black Prince spoke in a prophetic spirit: the sequel proved the

wisdom of his words. The battle of Najera was fought on the 3d April

1367. Two years later, less eleven days, on the 23d March 1369--Edward

and his gallant followers having in the interim returned to Guyenne,

disgusted with the ingratitude and bad faith of the king they had

replaced upon his throne--the Bastard was master of Spain, where Don

Pedro's sole remaining possession was the castle of Montiel, within

whose walls the fallen monarch was closely blockaded. Negotiations

ensued, in which Bertrand du Guesclin shared, and in which there can

be little doubt he played a treacherous part. It is to the credit of

M. Mérimée's impartiality, that he does not seek to shield the French

hero, but merely urges, in extenuation of his conduct, the perverted

morality and strange code of knightly honour accepted in those days.

By whomsoever lured, in the night-time Pedro left his stronghold,

expecting to meet, outside its walls, abettors and companions of a

meditated flight. Instead of such aid, he found himself a captive, and

presently he stood face to face with Henry of Trastamare. The brothers

bandied insults, a blow was dealt, and they closed in mortal strife.

Around them a circle of chevaliers gazed with deep interest at this

combat of kings. Pedro, the taller and stronger man, at first had the

advantage. Then a bystander--some say du Guesclin, others, an

Arragonese, Rocaberti--pulled the king by the leg as he held his

brother under him, and changed the fortune of the duel. What ensued is

best told in the words of Lockhart's close and admirable version of a

popular Spanish ballad:--

"Now Don Henry has the upmost,

Now King Pedro lies beneath;

In his heart his brother's poniard

Instant finds its bloody sheath.

Thus with mortal gasp and quiver,

While the blood in bubbles well'd,

Fled the fiercest soul that ever

In a Christian bosom dwell'd."

FOOTNOTES:

[20] _Histoire de Don Pédre I^{er}, Roi de Castille._ Par PROSPER

MÉRIMÉE, de l'Académie Française. Pp. 586. Paris, 1848.

[21] _Blackwood's Magazine_, No. CCCLXXX.

[22] The _ricos hombres_, literally rich men, did not yet bear titles,

which were reserved for members of the royal family. Thus, Henry de

Trastamare was commonly designated as "the Count," he being the only

one in Castile. When crowned at Burgos, in 1366, he lavished the titles

of count and marquis, previously so charily bestowed, not only upon the

magnates of the land, but upon Bertrand Duguesclin, Sir Hugh Calverley,

Denia the Arragonese, and other foreign adventurers and allies. "Such

was the generosity, or rather the profusion of the new king, that it

gave rise to a proverbial expression long current in Spain: _Henry's

favours_ (_Mercedes Enriquenas_) was thenceforward the term applied to

recompenses obtained before they were deserved."--MÉRIMÉE, p. 451-2. A

_rico hombre_ was created by receiving at the king's hand a banner and

a cauldron (_Pendon y Caldera_)--the one to guide his soldiers, the

other to feed them. The fidalgos or hidalgos (from _hijodalgo_, the son

of somebody) were dependants of the _ricos hombres_, as these were of

the king. "Every nobleman had a certain number of gentlemen who did him

homage, and held their lands in fee of him. In their turn, these

gentlemen had vassals, so that the labourer had many masters, whose

orders were often contradictory. These mediæval institutions gave rise

to strange complications, only to be unravelled by violence.

Nevertheless, the laws and national usages directed the vassal,

whatever his condition, to obey his immediate superior. Thus, a mere

knight did not incur penalty of treason by taking arms against the king

by order of the rich-man to whom he paid homage."--MÉRIMÉE, p. 29. Some

curious illustrations are subjoined. In 1334, Alphonso took the field

against an insubordinate vassal, and besieged him in his town of Lerma.

Garcia de Padilla, a knight attached to the rebel, seeing an amicable

arrangement impossible, boldly demanded of Don Alphonso a horse and

armour, to go and fight under the banner of his liege lord. The king

instantly complied with his request, warning him, however, that if

taken, he should pay with his head for his fidelity to the lord of

Lerma. "I distinguish," says M. MÉRIMÉE, "in the action and words of

Don Alphonso, the contrast of the knight and the king united in the

same man. The one yields to his prejudices of chivalrous honour, the

other will have the rights of his crown respected. The customs of the

age and the dictates of policy contend in the generous monarch's

breast."--P. 30.

[23] "It were a great error to attribute to Spain, in the 14th

century, the religious passions and intolerant spirit that animated it

in the 16th. In the wars between Moors and Christians, politics had

long had a far larger share than fanaticism.... Although the

Inquisition had been established more than a century, its power was

far from being what it afterwards became. As to Jews and Moors, they

were subject to the jurisdiction of the Holy Office only when they

sought, by word or writing, to turn Christians from the faith of their

fathers; and even then, royal authorisation was necessary before they

could be prosecuted. And the kings showed themselves, in general,

little disposed to let the clergy increase their influence. In 1350,

Peter IV. of Arragon rigorously forbade ecclesiastics to infringe on

secular jurisdiction.... There was much lukewarmness in matters of

religion; and to this, perhaps, is to be attributed the very secondary

part played by the clergy in all the political debates of the 14th

century. The inferior clergy, living and recruiting its ranks amongst

the people, shared the ignorance and rudeness of the latter. Such was

the prevalent immorality, that a great number of priests maintained

concubines, who were vain of the holy profession of their lovers, and

claimed particular distinctions. The conduct of these ecclesiastics

occasioned no scandal, but the luxury affected by their mistresses

often excited the envy of rich citizens, and even of noble ladies.

Repeatedly, and always in vain, the Cortes launched decrees intended

to repress the insolence of the _damoiselles de prétres_, (_barraganas

de clérigos_,) who formed a distinct class or caste, enjoying special

privileges, and sufficiently numerous to require the invention of laws

for them alone."--MÉRIMÉE, p. 34 to 38. These passages tend to explain

what might otherwise seem incomprehensible--the passive submission of

the Spanish priesthood to encroachments upon their temporal goods.

Since then they have rarely shown themselves so enduring; and the mere

hint of an attack upon their power or opulence has usually been the

signal for mischievous intrigue, and often for bloody strife. It is a

question, (setting aside the _barraganas_, although these, up to no

remote date, may be said to have been rather _veiled_ than

suppressed,) whether the Spanish priests of the 14th century were not

nearly as enlightened as their successors of the 19th. They certainly

were far more tolerant. "Arab language and literature," M. Mérimée

tells us, "were cultivated in schools founded under ecclesiastical

patronage."

In the Cortes held at Valladolid, in 1351, we find Don Pedro rejecting

the petitions of the clergy, who craved restitution of the revenues

appropriated by the crown, to their prejudice, under his father's

reign.

[24] In various details of Don Pedro's life and character we trace

resemblance to the eastern despot, although there seems no foundation

for the charges of infidelity brought against him towards the close of

his reign, and which may partly have originated, perhaps, in his close

alliance with the Granadine Moors, a body of whose light cavalry for

some time formed his escort. Contiguity of territory, commercial

intercourse, and political necessities, had assimilated to a certain

extent the manners and usages of Spaniards and Saracens, and given the

former an oriental tinge, of which, even at the present day, faint

vestiges are here and there perceptible. Don Pedro's orientalism was

particularly perceptible in the mode of many of the executions that

ensanguined his reign. He had constantly about him a band of

cross-bowmen who waited on his nod, and recoiled from no cruelty.

Occasionally we find him sending one of them to some distant place to

communicate and execute the doom of an offending subject. This recalls

the Turkish mute and bowstring. These death-dealing archers seem to

have employed mace and dagger more frequently than axe or cord. They

were assassins rather than executioners. They officiated in the case

of Garci Laso. "Alburquerque, impatient of delay, warned the king that

it was time to give final orders. Don Pedro, accustomed to repeat

those of his minister, bade two of Alburquerque's gentlemen go tell

the prisoner's guards to despatch him. The arbalisters, blind

instruments of the king's will, mistrusted an order transmitted to

them by Alburquerque's people, and desired to receive it from their

master's mouth. One of them went to ask him what was to be done with

Garci Laso. 'Let him be killed!' replied the king. This time duly

authorised, the arbalister ran to the prisoner, and struck him down

with a blow of a mace upon his head. His comrades finished him with

their daggers. The body of Garci Laso was thrown upon the public

square, where the king's entrance was celebrated, according to

Castilian custom, by a bull-fight. The bulls trampled the corpse, and

tossed it upon their horns. It was taken from them for exhibition upon

a scaffold, where it remained a whole day. At last it was placed upon

a bier, which was fixed upon the rampart of Camparanda. It was the

treatment reserved for the bodies of great malefactors."--MÉRIMÉE, p.

73.

[25] "In 1339, Don Gonzalo Martinez, Master of Alcantara, having

rebelled against the king Don Alphonso, was besieged and taken in his

castle of Valencia, and Coronel presided at his execution."--_Chronica

de Don Alphonso XI._, p. 385.