About the opening of the fifth century, when Alaric, the terrible king
of the Visigoths, had sacked and burned the City of the Seven Hills,
his brother, Adolph, crossing the Pyrenees, penetrated into Spain, and
founded, in that secluded province of the Roman Empire, a kingdom, of
which the capital was Toledo――situated on a steep rock, which was
washed on three sides by the waters of the Tagus.
The Gothic monarchy, thus established, lasted for three centuries,
when Roderick, who wore the crown of Spain, ravished the daughter of a
Count named Julian, and thus created an implacable foe. Boiling with
resentment, and panting for vengeance, Count Julian crossed to
Barbary, and invoked the aid of the adventurous Moors; and forthwith
the sound of Moorish horns, and the neighing of war-steeds, and the
waving of the Crescent, announced that a Saracenic host had invaded
the sunny fields of Spain.
King Roderick encountered the Moors in several battles; and at length,
in the summer of 711, a decisive conflict took place at Xeres. There
the king and the flower of his chivalry perished; and the cities
quietly yielding to the turbaned victors, a splendid Moorish monarchy
was instituted under princes of the line of Omeyades. They exercised a
temporal as well as spiritual authority, selected Cordova as their
seat of empire, and adorned that city with magnificent palaces,
colleges, libraries, hospitals, mosques, bridges, and fountains.
The vanquished Spaniards, so far from being harshly treated, enjoyed
so much civil and religious liberty, that many remained in their
native regions; and the Spanish women freely availed themselves of the
invitation to intermarry with the conquerors. Such of the proud
barons, indeed, as disdained to submit, escaped to neighboring
countries; while others, departing from Andalusia, with its sunny
skies and fair landscapes, moved northward, and formed themselves into
petty states, at such mortal enmity with each other, and so exposed to
the predatory incursions of the Arab cavalry, that the chieftains were
under the necessity of keeping their followers in harness night and
day.
Notwithstanding their internal feuds, the eyes of the Spaniards were
perpetually turned, with the longing of exiles, toward the land of
corn and wine of which they had been dispossessed; and they
contemplated, with fierce indignation, the Crescent glittering on
mosques under which their sires had worshiped the Christian’s God.
Invoking as their patron St. James, on his white steed, bearing the
banner of the Cross, they deemed themselves the champions at once of
their country and Christendom; and the Spanish nobles, thus trained
from infancy to serve against the Moors, were continually advancing
southward, and in the stern school of adversity regained among the
mountains of Gallicia so much of their ancestral valor as to render
them formidable foes.
In the thirteenth century the Cordovan empire had been reduced to the
little province of Granada, in the midst of which stood the beautiful
city of that name, on one of whose hills rose the far-famed Alhambra;
while the kingdom of Castile was not only receiving the homage of
other states, but even the homage of the Moorish king, who pledged
himself to pay an annual rent, to serve in war with a certain number
of knights, and to attend the Cortes, or legislative assembly, when
summoned.
A hundred years later, Castile was the scene of fierce civil war.
Pedro, surnamed the Cruel, had rendered himself unpopular by the
severity with which he treated his enemies; and his illegitimate
brother, Henry of Trastamare, conceived the idea of seizing the
throne. With this view, he applied to Charles V of France, who sent to
his aid several companies of Free Lances, commanded by Bertrand Du
Guesclin, one of the most valiant warriors of the age. These terrible
adventurers, after passing Avignon, and compelling the Pope to bestow
upon them gold and his blessing, entered Spain. Pedro disbanded his
troops and sought shelter in Gascony, at the court of Edward the Black
Prince, by whom he was honorably received; while his rival was
proclaimed king in his stead.
Henry of Trastamare transmitted the crown of Castile to his
descendants, whose disputed title was decidedly favorable to public
liberty, and rendered them deferential to public opinion, till the
reign of Henry IV, who ascended the Castilian throne with the promise
of a crusade against the Moors of Granada. The preparations made by
him for that purpose were attended by results so inadequate, that he
fell into contempt with friends and foes.
In the year 1465, on a plain outside the walls of Avila, a platform
was erected; and thereon was placed, in royal robes, an effigy of
Henry, with the crown on his head, the sceptre in his hand, and the
sword of justice by his side. A sentence of deposition was pronounced:
the archbishop of Toledo tore off the crown; one Count snatched away
the sword; another removed the sceptre; a third tumbled the figure
headlong to the ground; and proclamation was made that Don Alphonso
was king of Castile and Leon. But Alphonso died in 1468; and Henry,
though reduced to the depths of despair, continued to reign till his
decease in 1474.
His daughter Joanna not being considered worthy of occupying the
throne, his sister Isabella was recognized as heir to the deceased
sovereign. The young queen, one of the most interesting characters in
history, was highly endowed both in mind and person. Intelligence
beamed in her mild blue eye, and was displayed in a manner which,
though modest, was particularly gracious and dignified. In her
nineteenth year she had been united to Ferdinand, the hereditary
sovereign of Arragon, in conjunction with whom she now began to reign
over the united kingdoms. They were not, however, undisturbed; for
Alphonso, king of Portugal, whose victories over the Barbary Moors had
gained for him the cognomen of ‘the African,’ having been affianced to
the princess Joanna, invaded Castile to vindicate her claim to the
crown. Ferdinand, by a herald, challenged the invader to fight with
his whole army or by single combat, and the hostile ranks encountered.
Castilian valor prevailed; the standard of Portugal was torn to
shreds; the king escaped to a fortified castle, and soon after he
withdrew with his youthful bride into Portugal; but the Pope having
forbidden their marriage, the hapless princess sought consolation in a
convent.
Ferdinand and Isabella, being now secure, introduced several important
reforms for the observance of law, the administration of justice, and
the regulation of trade. The Moorish kingdom of Granada was so
tempting a prize, that they determined on annexing it to their
dominions. Hitherto the two nations, in spite of their natural enmity,
had enjoyed much, and not unimportant, friendly intercourse. The
Spaniards had acquired something of Arabian gravity of demeanor,
magnificence of air, and reserve in conversation, from communicating
with their Saracenic neighbors. As late as 1463, Henry had held a
personal interview with the king of Granada, under a splendid pavilion
erected in the _vega_, at the foot of the Alhambra, and after an
exchange of presents, the Spanish sovereign had been escorted to the
frontiers by Moorish cavaliers; but in 1476, when the annual tribute
was demanded, the Moorish king proudly replied, that the mints of
Granada coined gold no longer, but steel; and he soon after attacked
and carried off the population of the town of Zahara. At this crisis
the high-spirited Moor died, and was succeeded by his nephew, the weak
and unfortunate Boabdil. Thereupon Ferdinand, entering Granada with
the whole force of Arragon and Castile, besieged the city for eight
months. The Moorish king then came to the gates, and presenting the
keys on a cushion to Ferdinand and Isabella, implored their
protection. The valley of Piorchena was assigned him as a residence;
but being discontented with his lot, he after a little delay went over
to Barbary. On Friday, the 6th of January, 1492, Ferdinand and his
queen made their entrance into Granada; the Moslem crescents were
plucked from the minarets of the Alhambra, and the arms of Castile and
Arragon were displayed in their stead.
The conquest of Granada made Ferdinand master of the fairest province
in the Peninsula; and, assuming the title of King of Spain, he
recovered from France the districts of which Louis the Crafty had
taken possession. He then established the Court of Inquisition, which
consigned thousands of his subjects to the flames for heresy, and was
put in force against the Jews, who fled by thousands, with their
industry and intelligence, to the other states of Europe. For these
services, Ferdinand and Isabella were rewarded by the Pope with the
title of Catholic Majesties.
About this time Christopher Columbus received from the court of Spain
the encouragement which led to discoveries so important. A native of
Genoa, he had unsuccessfully applied to the Government of that state
for aid in his daring project of sailing to the East Indies by the
west, and then made proposals to the Kings of England and Portugal,
which were rejected. In 1486 he came to urge his schemes upon the
sovereigns of Spain; but after six years of fruitless entreaty, was on
the point of leaving the country, when Isabella, at the instance of
her confessor, summoned the suitor to her presence. At this interview,
the solemn aspect, grave air, and dignified appearance of Columbus,
made so favorable an impression on the Queen that she ordered a fleet
of three vessels to be fitted out at Palos. At that port, with a
hundred and twenty companions, Columbus embarked on the 3d of August,
1492; and on the 12th of October, after thirty days’ sail from Canary,
came in sight of land, which proved to be one of the Bahama Islands.
When the sun rose, the adventurers, manning their boats, rowed ashore,
playing martial music, and displaying the royal standard. Columbus, in
a scarlet dress, and bearing a naked sword, set his foot on the soil
of the new world, and after taking possession of the island on behalf
of the Castilian sovereigns, gave it the name of San Salvador. The
natives gazed on in silent surprise, and in the simplicity of their
hearts believed the Spaniards to be preternatural beings.
Pursuing his career of discovery, Columbus took possession of Cuba and
St. Domingo, and then returned in triumph to Spain. At Barcelona he
was received by Ferdinand and Isabella with the utmost favor, and
desired to sit covered, like a grandee of the realm. A fleet of
seventeen ships was fitted out, and he undertook a second voyage,
which ended in disappointment; but during a third, on the 1st of
August, 1498, he discovered the continent of America, and carried six
of the natives to St. Domingo, as evidence of his success. But the
great navigator was doomed to humiliating reverses: his enemies
prevailed at Madrid; he was displaced from his offices, and sent home
in chains. Being set at liberty on arrival, he undertook a fourth
expedition, from which, after being shipwrecked on the island of
Jamaica, he arrived in Spain in 1505; but Isabella having meantime
died, he was allowed by Ferdinand to drag out his career in obscurity
at Valladolid.
Ferdinand, after taking an important part in the Italian wars, where
his general, Gonsalvo de Cordova, the Great Captain, signalized his
military skill against the French, died in 1516, and an Austrian
prince ascended the Spanish throne.
Mary of Burgundy, daughter and heiress of that fiery Duke who fell
fighting against the Swiss, became wife of Maximilian, afterward
Emperor of Germany. In the month of February, 1482, that noble lady
was holding her court in the city of Bruges, in Flanders, then a great
commercial emporium of Europe; and, mounting her palfrey one day, she
rode forth, with a small retinue, to fly her hawks at the herons,
which abounded in the vicinity. While pursuing the sport and leaping a
fence, the girths of her saddle burst, and she was thrown violently
against a tree. Dying from the effects of the accident, Mary left a
son, named Philip, who espoused Ferdinand’s daughter, Jane the
Foolish, and had a son Charles, born at Ghent in 1500. On the demise
of Isabella, Jane, as her daughter, became Queen of Castile; but
immediately after, the sudden death of Philip bereft his young widow
of her reason. Her case was hopeless; and on Ferdinand’s death, young
Charles of Austria was associated with his insane mother on the
Spanish throne, while the aged Cardinal Ximenes, a consummate
statesman, grasped the reins of government with vigor and dexterity.
Three years later, on the death of his grandfather Maximilian, the
ambitious King of Spain was elected Emperor of Germany; and thus
becoming the most powerful monarch in Europe, he commenced that long
and arduous struggle with Francis I of France, which has been
previously sketched.
At the time when Charles received the imperial crown there was
residing on the island of Cuba a Spaniard, named Hernando Cortez, the
scion of an ancient and honorable family. He had left the mother
country at nineteen, became proprietor of a flourishing plantation,
married a young woman of beauty and excellence, and acquired high
favor with Velasquez, governor of the colony. Yet, though apparently
destined to a prosperous and peaceful career, so adventurous was the
spirit of Cortez, that he sought and obtained the command of a
squadron which the governor was fitting out for a voyage of discovery
to the American continent. Dreading the bold and ambitious nature of
Cortez, the governor recalled this promise, and appointed another as
captain; but Cortez got under way in the night, with the ships
half-stored and equipped, and sailed from Cuba, never more to return.
Arriving in the river Tabasco, he landed in spite of a desperate
resistance, made the natives swear allegiance to the King of Spain,
caused mass to be celebrated in the principal temples, formed an
alliance with the Tlascalans, a warlike Indian tribe, and rolled the
tide of conquest toward the capital of Mexico.
Montezuma, the Mexican Emperor, received the strangers with
veneration, swore fealty to Spain, placed himself in the custody of
Cortez, and assigned a temple as a Christian place of worship. This
last concession was too much for his heathen subjects, who, instigated
by their priests, declared that the Spaniards must perish on the
altars they had violated. Cortez was preparing for a fierce struggle,
when informed that a fleet had anchored off the coast, commanded by
Narvaez, commissioned by the Governor of Cuba to supersede him. Aware
that his only chance lay in a sudden stroke, Cortez, with seventy
picked men, set out for the camp of Narvaez, and after arresting his
rival in a dark night, allured the soldiers to his standard, and
returned to the capital. There the fury of the Mexicans had become so
great, that Montezuma in vain attempted to allay the storm; and
mortified at his loss of authority, the Emperor expired, while the
streets were thronged with countless multitudes, who for successive
days besieged the palace where the Spaniards were lodged.
In this terrible situation, Cortez resolved to cut his way to the
territory of his Tlascalan allies; and on a July night, after hearing
mass, he led his followers from their quarters in the centre of the
city. After a bloody fight on the causeway he effected an escape, and
reached the open country; but there his little army was suddenly
attacked by an overwhelming force. The position of the Spaniards
seemed desperate, when Cortez, ever cool and courageous, suddenly
penetrated to where the enemy’s banner was displayed, killed with his
own hand the Mexican general, and instantly changed the fortune of the
day. Resting from his fatigues till the autumn, he returned to the
capital, where Gautemozin now reigned as Emperor, and commenced
warlike operations. But in May, 1521, Cortez, hopeless of otherwise
accomplishing his object, took the terrible resolution of destroying
every house as he advanced. Burning palaces and temples, he gradually
made his way into the market-place, and then reluctantly gave orders
for a general assault. The battle, which lasted for two days, was
decisive: the youthful Emperor, being taken in a canoe, was executed:
and the independence of Mexico was extinguished.
Soon after the conquest of Mexico, Francis Pizarro, landing in Peru
with a formidable force, subdued that large, powerful, and flourishing
empire, compelled the Peruvians to work the mines for their advantage,
and added the conquered territory to the possessions of the Spanish
crown.
While his gallant subjects, stimulated by the desire of wealth, were
winning for Charles an empire on which the sun never set, war was
carried on in Europe; and his great rival, Francis, taken at Pavia,
was lying at his mercy in Madrid. But though the might of the Emperor
overshadowed the princes of Europe, the Spaniards, regarding him as a
stranger and foreigner, revolted in defense of their political rights;
the civil wars of the _Communeros_ were the consequence; and Charles,
having excluded the grandees from the representation, succeeded in
withering by his despotism the free spirit that had long animated the
ancient institutions of Castile and Arragon.
While the religious reformation was agitating the other states of
Europe, the Spanish nation remained unmoved by the shock, and out of
it came Ignatius Loyola, destined not only to rescue the imperiled
Papacy, but to breathe new life into the expiring system by which Rome
had for centuries held the human intellect in sacerdotal bondage.
Eight years after his rival Francis had gone to the grave, Charles, in
1556, abdicated the Spanish throne in favor of his son Philip, and a
few months later, weary of war and disgusted with grandeur, he
resigned the imperial crown to his brother Ferdinand, and retired to
indulge his melancholy mood in the monastery of St. Just, on the
frontiers of Castile. While there he is reported to have enacted no
less extraordinary a scene than the celebration of his own funeral
obsequies. After causing a tomb to be erected in the chapel, and
making his attendants walk thither in procession, the ex-Emperor
followed in his shroud, and was laid in his coffin. The monks then
chanted the service for the dead, prayed for the repose of his soul,
and shed tears for his departure. This singular ceremony is said to
have thrown Charles into a fever, of which he expired in his
fifty-ninth year.
Philip II, inherited one of the wealthiest and most magnificent
empires on which the sun ever shone, and he sought to increase his
hereditary influence by espousing Mary, queen of England, who loved
him with the utmost tenderness. But, notwithstanding her displays of
affection, Philip, tiring of the society of a spouse so destitute of
attractions, and indignant that her subjects would not allow England
to be made a fief of Spain, escaped to his Continental dominions.
However, when the Pope, jealous of the King’s enormous power, formed
an alliance with Henry II of France, to detach Milan and the Sicilies
from the crown of Spain, Philip considered it expedient to feign some
esteem for his Queen, and paying her a visit at Greenwich, obtained
the aid of England in his struggle. His army was victorious over the
French, led by the Constable Montmorency, at St Quentin; and at
Gravelines the Count Egmont vanquished the old Marshal Thermes; after
which the King of France, by the Treaty of Cambresis, surrendered to
Spain eighty-nine fortified towns in Italy and the Low Countries.
Philip was destined to deal with a sovereign infinitely less
accommodating: for, ere the treaty of peace was signed, Queen Mary had
breathed her last, and been succeeded on the English throne by a
princess whose policy baffled his schemes, and whose courage defied
his vengeance. After in vain soliciting the coveted hand of Elizabeth,
Philip wedded a daughter of Catherine de Medici; and becoming
disquieted on the score of religion, he resolved to gratify his
natural bigotry by extirpating from his dominions every species of
heresy. He began with the Netherlands, where the Reformed doctrines
had made considerable progress, and established the Inquisition with
plenary power; but this alienated the hearts of the inhabitants, who,
choosing as their leader William of Orange, a Count of the Empire,
bravely resisted the power of Spain. Philip proscribed, and set a
price on the head of, the Prince of Orange, who was soon assassinated;
but his son, Maurice, appeared as his successor, and, with the aid of
Queen Elizabeth, ere long secured the independence of the United
Provinces.
Philip, exasperated by the assistance which the English Queen had
afforded to the revolted Netherlands, having meantime seized on
Portugal, commenced fitting out the Invincible Armada for the invasion
of England; and preparations were in full progress when suddenly Sir
Francis Drake made a dash at Cadiz, and after destroying thirty
vessels, scoured the Spanish coast, burning and shattering many
castles and ships. The King’s naval operations were thus delayed till
May, 1588, when the Armada, consisting of a hundred and thirty sail,
left the Tagus under the command of the Duke of Medina, who hoped to
steer through the Channel to Flanders, and form a junction with the
Duke of Parma. But being attacked by the English Admiral, and after
several engagements driven toward Orkney, the fleet was so effectually
scattered by a tempest, that the Duke returned to Spain with not more
than sixty shattered vessels.
In 1596, war being formally declared, the Spaniards seized Calais,
with other walled towns; and in alarm Queen Elizabeth dispatched a
fleet to Cadiz, under the young and accomplished Earl of Essex.
Landing in spite of the fire from the forts and battlements, the
English forced the town to capitulate, made the inhabitants pay for
their lives, razed the fortifications, and burned the houses. In
revenge, Philip sent ships to threaten the English coast, though
without any success; and at length, satiated with the blood which had
been shed in promotion of his various ambitious designs, he signed the
Peace of Vervins. On the eve of the battle of St. Quentin, Philip
vowed, in the event of victory, to build, in honor of St. Lawrence, a
church, a monastery and a palace, and in fulfillment of this vow, he
erected near Madrid the magnificent palace of the Escurial, which
contained the residence and mausoleum of the sovereigns of Spain.
Expiring in 1598, he was laid in the cemetry which he had formed
beneath the pavement of the church; and his son, Philip III, ascended
the throne.
From that period Spain declined in power and importance, though her
empire was long, to outward appearance, great and magnificent. The new
king, who was not less bigoted than his gloomy sire, prosecuted the
war against the United Provinces, but, in 1609, was forced to conclude
a treaty at the Hague, which secured civil and religious freedom to
the new republic, and restored the confiscated estates of the house of
Orange. Yet, untaught by experience, and under the inspiration of his
minister, the Duke of Lerma, he issued an edict, ordering the
Morescoes, or descendants of the Moors, to leave the kingdom within
thirty days, and thus farther enfeebled a state which war and
emigration had previously deprived of so many energetic and
industrious inhabitants. The Morescoes had been conspicuous for their
skill and ingenuity in arts and manufactures, and this depopulation
produced a most baneful effect.
Philip IV succeeded, on his father’s decease, to an empire more
extensive indeed than the realms of the Grand Monarch, but corrupt in
all its parts, and in a state of hopeless prostration. The result soon
appeared. Brazil was taken by the Dutch; Catalonia revolted to France;
and to suppress the rebellion, the Portuguese were intrusted with
arms. The latter turning against their oppressive governors, placed
the Duke of Braganza on the throne; and Philip was one of the last
personages in Europe who heard of the important event. Shut up in the
recesses of the Escurial, he was indulging in licentious dissipation,
when one day his able and artful minister, Olivarez, craved an
audience. ‘I bring,’ said he, ‘good news to your majesty. The Duke of
Braganza’s whole fortune is yours. He has presumptuously got himself
declared King of Portugal, and, consequently, you are entitled to the
forfeiture of all his estates.’ Philip, lost in luxurious enjoyment,
only replied, ‘Let the sequestration be ordered.’ And Portugal was
lost to him beyond the hope of recovery.
A war which broke out with France was terminated, in 1659, by the
Peace of the Pyrenees, which was negotiated by the crafty Mazarin; and
by this treaty it was stipulated that Louis XIV should espouse the
King’s eldest daughter, she renouncing all claim to the succession.
In 1665, Philip expired, and his son Charles succeeded. The kingdom
was in a deplorable state, and its ruler a prey to listless melancholy
and extravagant superstitions; so the Kings of France and England,
seeing that Charles had no heirs, and that his days were numbered,
agreed to a treaty of partition. This roused the languishing monarch
into temporary indignation, which Louis, though the chief offender,
succeeded in turning entirely against the other powers. Thus it
happened, that while the Spanish ambassador was so insolent in his
remonstrances at the court of St. James, that William commanded him to
leave England, Charles, in making a destination of his territories by
will, after numerous consultations with the Pope, the Spanish
Universities, and his own Council, nominated as his heir Philip, duke
of Anjou, second son of the Dauphin of France, and grandson of Louis.
Having thus laid the foundation of a memorable war, Charles died on
the 3d of November, 1700.
When it was publicly announced that the kingdom of Spain had been
bequeathed to the Duke of Anjou, Louis, with an unscrupulous disregard
of the obligations he had incurred by treaties, acknowledged his
grandson as Philip V, and rejoiced in the thought of all the rich
possessions of the crown of Spain being transferred to the house of
Bourbon. Philip hastened to take possession of the magnificent legacy;
his brothers accompanied him to the frontier; and Louis made use of
the vain, but significant words――‘The Pyrenees exist no longer.’
Ferdinand V, a prince of a mild and pacific disposition, succeeded his
father in 1746, and gave much encouragement to arts, commerce and
manufactures; but the death of his Queen overwhelmed him in such grief
that he died in 1759. His brother Don Carlos, ascending the throne
with the title of Charles III, was induced to sign, with France, that
family compact which stipulated for reciprocal aid between the
different branches of the Bourbons, and denounced as the enemy of all,
any power that might hereafter be at war with one.
Ferdinand and his subjects had soon cause to repent of this temerity;
for the Seven Years’ War began, and the arms of England were signally
triumphant. Havana was taken by the English in 1762, and Spain
suffered enormous losses, till the Treaty of Fontainebleau put an end
to the war, and restored her possessions.
Charles was once more drawn into war with England; and in 1779
commenced that siege of Gibraltar, which for two years was persisted
in without effect. At length, in 1782, when the defense had been
intrusted to General Elliot, a grand attack was resolved upon, and
King Charles inquired every morning on waking, ‘Is it taken?’ On the
13th of September a mighty effort was made; a French engineer had
constructed floating batteries which he said could neither be sunk nor
set on fire; and four hundred pieces of the heaviest artillery were
brought to bear on the fortress. But the red-hot balls fired by the
garrison were irresistible in their effect; the hostile batteries were
destroyed, the ships sunk, and most of the besiegers with them.
Elliot, for his gallant and memorable defense, was ennobled, with the
title of Lord Heathfield, and peace was concluded next year.
Soon after this failure, King Charles made an attempt to reform the
dress and manners of his subjects, and carried his measures to so
imprudent a length, that an insurrection occurred at Madrid, and he
was under the necessity of dismissing his favorite minister,
Squillace. The earthly career of Charles closed in 1788, and he was
succeeded by his son, Charles IV.
When, in 1793, a confederacy was formed against the French Republic,
Charles joined in the league; but a French army being sent into Spain,
he changed sides, and was soon inspired with a high admiration of the
Emperor Napoleon. His subjects being still animated by their ancient
hatred toward England, Charles was not averse to minister to
Napoleon’s ambition, and in 1805 they declared war in concert; but
their united fleets were destroyed in the great battle of Trafalgar.
Still it was in Bonaparte’s power to exercise a sovereign influence
over Spain, without infringing on that national spirit which, a
century earlier, had resisted the allies of the House of Austria; till
the dissensions in the royal family stimulated his ambition. Charles,
a feeble prince, entirely under the influence of Godoy, the Queen’s
favorite, had fallen into contempt. His son, Ferdinand, was the idol
of the nation; and Napoleon was entreated to arbitrate in regard to
their differences. He seized the occasion to send an army across the
Pyrenees under Murat, who suddenly took possession of Barcelona and
several strongholds. Soon after, Napoleon demanded a surrender of the
provinces on the left bank of the Ebro. Charles and his spouse were
dumb with surprise; Godoy advised the King and Queen to embark for
their American dominions; and preparations were made with that view.
But their son, Ferdinand, opposing the step, summoned the populace,
raised an insurrection, in which the royal troops took part, caused
Godoy to be arrested, kept the King prisoner, and after procuring an
abdication in his own favor, entered Madrid in haughty triumph as
Sovereign of Spain.
Brief was his ovation; for on the following day Murat marched his army
into the capital, and Charles protested against his compulsory
abdication; but though Murat refused to acknowledge the royalty of
Ferdinand, he administered no comfort to Charles――‘Napoleon alone,’ he
said ‘can decide between the father and the son.’
What that meant was ere long beyond all doubt; for the Emperor going
to Bayonne, summoned thither the King as well as his undutiful heir.
He then decided the matter by making Charles abdicate in his own
favor, by imprisoning Ferdinand in the Château of Valencay, and by
assigning that of Compiègne as a residence for the deposed monarch.
Murat, meanwhile, retained possession of Madrid; and, under French
influence, the Council of Castile demanded as King the Emperor’s
eldest brother, Joseph. The latter, resigning the crown of Naples to
Murat, hastened to Bayonne, where he was acknowledged as sovereign of
Spain by various deputations. But, ere his entry into Madrid, the
Spanish peasantry had indignantly taken up arms; the clergy had
inflamed their enthusiasm by representing Napoleon as Antichrist; the
royal troops joined the insurgents; a cry of vengeance arose
throughout the land; and at Cadiz the French fleet was seized and the
crew slaughtered. The victory of Bessières opened the gates of Madrid
to King Joseph; who, however, was fain, when Dupont capitulated at
Bayleu, to leave the city within a week of his triumphant entry; and
he soon possessed in all Spain no more than Navarre, Biscay, and
Barcelona.
Ambitious of subjugating Spain, the Emperor summoned thither his still
unconquered legions, and placing himself at their head, was victorious
in three engagements. Entering Madrid, he tempted the inhabitants with
promises of franchises and the abolition of feudalism; but their ears
were closed against all offers.
The Spaniards were resolutely rising in organized bands, and the
English army was approaching, when the news arrived that Austria had
formed a new coalition with England. Bonaparte withdrew to the Rhine,
while the Spaniards hailed their ancient enemies as deliverers, and
the English defeated King Joseph in the battle of Talavera. The
victory of Wellington over Marmont at Salamanca, in 1812, and that
over King Joseph at Vittoria, in 1813, brought the English to the
Pyrenees; and Spain was irreclaimably lost to the Empire of the
French.
Emerging from his prison at Valencay, Ferdinand VII returned to take
possession of his ancestral throne; but the princes of restored
dynasties are the most infatuated of beings, and the new King of Spain
did not escape the general doom. Instead of granting liberal
institutions, he, at the instigation of the priests, reëstablished the
hateful Inquisition, and practiced his tyrannies so ruthlessly, that,
in 1820, the endurance of his subjects was at an end. Riego, rising in
arms, proclaimed the Constitution which the Cortes had adopted in
1812; and, though he was unsuccessful, the greater part of the nation
rose. The army joined the insurgents, and, though Ferdinand announced
his intention of convening the Cortes and granting reforms, his offers
were despised. The populace thronged and clamored around his palace;
and the wretched King was fain to proclaim the Constitution.
At that time, the Congress of Verona convoked to consider the affairs
of Greece, found the Spanish revolution a much more exciting topic; a
French army on the frontier was ready to aid Ferdinand, but the Duke
of Wellington, as representative of England, objected to intervention.
Nevertheless, in 1823, the troops, under the Duke of Angoulême,
crossed the Pyrenees, and entered Madrid. Ferdinand, who had
previously been deposed by the Cortes, on being restored by French
arms annulled every act of the Constitutional Government, and Riego
was hanged on a very high gibbet, without being permitted to address
the people.
In 1833, Ferdinand, from indulging to excess in eating, died of
apoplexy, having previously nominated his Queen as Regent during the
minority of her daughter, Isabella II, then three years of age. The
new reign began with civil strife, for Don Carlos, uncle of the
youthful sovereign, aspired to the crown, and on his return from exile
the Carlist war for years desolated the unfortunate country.