Influence of the rule and character of Philip II.--Heroism of the
sixteenth century--Contest for the French throne--Character and
policy of the Duke of Mayenne--Escape of the Duke of Guise from
Castle Tours--Propositions for the marriage of the Infanta--Plotting
of the Catholic party--Grounds of Philip's pretensions to the crown
of France--Motives of the Duke of Parma maligned by Commander Moreo
--He justifies himself to the king--View of the private relations
between Philip and the Duke of Mayenne and their sentiments towards
each other--Disposition of the French politicians and soldiers
towards Philip--Peculiar commercial pursuits of Philip--Confused
state of affairs in France--Treachery of Philip towards the Duke of
Parma--Recall of the duke to Spain--His sufferings and death.
The People--which has been generally regarded as something naturally
below its rulers, and as born to be protected and governed, paternally or
otherwise, by an accidental selection from its own species, which by some
mysterious process has shot up much nearer to heaven than itself--is
often described as brutal, depraved, self-seeking, ignorant, passionate,
licentious, and greedy.
It is fitting, therefore, that its protectors should be distinguished, at
great epochs of the world's history, by an absence of such objectionable
qualities.
It must be confessed, however, that if the world had waited for
heroes--during the dreary period which followed the expulsion of
something that was called Henry III. of France from the gates of his
capital, and especially during the time that followed hard upon the
decease of that embodiment of royalty--its axis must have ceased to turn
for a long succession of years. The Bearnese was at least alive, and a
man. He played his part with consummate audacity and skill; but alas for
an epoch or a country in which such a shape--notwithstanding all its
engaging and even commanding qualities--looked upon as an incarnation of
human greatness!
But the chief mover of all things--so far as one man can be prime
mover--was still the diligent scribe who lived in the Escorial. It was he
whose high mission it was to blow the bellows of civil war, and to
scatter curses over what had once been the smiling abodes of human
creatures, throughout the leading countries of Christendom. The throne of
France was vacant, nominally as well as actually, since--the year 1589.
During two-and-twenty years preceding that epoch he had scourged the
provinces, once constituting the richest and most enlightened portions of
his hereditary domains, upon the theory that without the Spanish
Inquisition no material prosperity was possible on earth, nor any
entrance permitted to the realms of bliss beyond the grave. Had every
Netherlander consented to burn his Bible, and to be burned himself should
he be found listening to its holy precepts if read to him in shop,
cottage, farm-house, or castle; and had he furthermore consented to
renounce all the liberal institutions which his ancestors had earned, in
the struggle of centuries, by the sweat of their brows and the blood of,
their hearts; his benignant proprietor and master, who lived at the ends
of the earth, would have consented at almost any moment to peace. His
arms were ever open. Let it not be supposed that this is the language of
sarcasm or epigram. Stripped of the decorous sophistication by which
human beings are so fond of concealing their naked thoughts from each
other, this was the one simple dogma always propounded by Philip. Grimace
had done its worst, however, and it was long since it had exercised any
power in the Netherlands. The king and the Dutchmen understood each
other; and the plain truths with which those republicans answered the
imperial proffers of mediation, so frequently renewed, were something
new, and perhaps not entirely unwholesome in diplomacy.
It is not an inviting task to abandon the comparatively healthy
atmosphere of the battle-field, the blood-stained swamp, the murderous
trench--where human beings, even if communing only by bullets and push of
pike, were at least dealing truthfully with each other--and to descend
into those subterranean regions where the effluvia of falsehood becomes
almost too foul for ordinary human organisation.
Heroes in those days, in any country, there were few. William the Silent
was dead. De la Noue was dead. Duplessis-Mornay was living, but his
influence over his royal master was rapidly diminishing. Cecil, Hatton,
Essex, Howard, Raleigh, James Croft, Valentine Dale, John Norris, Roger
Williams, the "Virgin Queen" herself--does one of these chief agents in
public affairs, or do all of them together, furnish a thousandth part of
that heroic whole which the England of the sixteenth century presents to
every imagination? Maurice of Nassau-excellent soldier and engineer as he
had already proved himself--had certainly not developed much of the
heroic element, although thus far he was walking straightforward like a
man, in the path of duty, with the pithy and substantial Lewis William
ever at his side. Olden-Barneveld--tough burgher-statesman, hard-headed,
indomitable man of granite--was doing more work, and doing it more
thoroughly, than any living politician, but he was certainly not of the
mythological brotherhood who inhabit the serene regions of space beyond
the moon. He was not the son of god or goddess, destined, after removal
from this sphere, to shine with planetary lustre, among other
constellations, upon the scenes of mortal action. Those of us who are
willing to rise-or to descend if the phrase seems wiser--to the idea of a
self-governing people must content ourselves, for this epoch, with the
fancy of a hero-people and a people-king.
A plain little republic, thrusting itself uninvited into the great
political family-party of heaven-anointed sovereigns and long-descended
nobles, seemed a somewhat repulsive phenomenon. It became odious and
dangerous when by the blows it could deal in battle, the logic it could
chop in council, it indicated a remote future for the world, in which
right divine and regal paraphernalia might cease to be as effective
stage-properties as they had always been considered.
Yet it will be difficult for us to find the heroic individualised very
perceptibly at this period, look where we may. Already there seemed
ground for questioning the comfortable fiction that the accidentally
dominant families and castes were by nature wiser, better, braver than
that much-contemned entity, the People. What if the fearful heresy should
gain ground that the People was at least as wise, honest, and brave as
its masters? What if it should become a recognised fact that the great
individuals and castes, whose wealth and station furnished them with
ample time and means for perfecting themselves in the science of
government, were rather devoting their leisure to the systematic filling
of their own pockets than to the hiving up of knowledge for the good of
their fellow creatures? What if the whole theory of hereditary
superiority should suddenly exhale? What if it were found out that we
were all fellow-worms together, and that those which had crawled highest
were not necessarily the least slimy?
Meantime it will be well for us, in order to understand what is called
the Past, to scrutinise somewhat closely that which was never meant to be
revealed. To know the springs which once controlled the world's
movements, one must ponder the secret thoughts, purposes, aspirations,
and baffled attempts of the few dozen individuals who once claimed that
world in fee-simple. Such researches are not in a cheerful field; for the
sources of history are rarely fountains of crystal, bubbling through
meadows of asphodel. Vast and noisome are the many sewers which have ever
run beneath decorous Christendom.
Some of the leading military events in France and Flanders, patent to all
the world, which grouped themselves about the contest for the French
throne, as the central point in the history of Philip's proposed
world-empire, have already been indicated.
It was a species of triangular contest--so far as the chief actors were
concerned--for that vacant throne. Philip, Mayenne, Henry of Navarre,
with all the adroitness which each possessed, were playing for the
splendid prize.
Of Philip it is not necessary to speak. The preceding volumes of this
work have been written in vain, if the reader has not obtained from
irrefragable testimony--the monarch's own especially--a sufficient
knowledge of that human fetish before which so much of contemporary
humanity grovelled.
The figure of Navarre is also one of the most familiar shapes in history.
As for the Duke of Mayenne, he had been, since the death of his brother
the Balafre, ostensible leader of the League, and was playing, not
without skill, a triple game.
Firstly, he hoped for the throne for himself.
Secondly, he was assisting the King of Spain to obtain that dignity.
Thirdly, he was manoeuvring in dull, dumb, but not ineffective manner, in
favour of Navarre.
So comprehensive and self-contradictory a scheme would seem to indicate
an elasticity of principle and a fertility of resource not often
vouchsafed to man.
Certainly one of the most pregnant lessons of history is furnished in the
development of these cabals, nor is it, in this regard, of great
importance whether the issue was to prove them futile or judicious. It is
sufficient for us now, that when those vanished days constituted the
Present--the vital atmosphere of Christendom--the world's affairs were
controlled by those plotters and their subordinates, and it is therefore
desirable for us to know what manner of men they were, and how they
played their parts.
Nor should it ever be forgotten that the leading motive with all was
supposed to be religion. It was to maintain the supremacy of the Roman
Church, or to vindicate, to a certain extent, liberty of conscience,
through the establishment of a heterodox organisation, that all these
human beings of various lineage and language throughout Christendom had
been cutting each other's throats for a quarter of a century.
Mayenne was not without courage in the field when he found himself there,
but it was observed of him that he spent more time at table than the
Bearnese in sleep, and that he was so fat as to require the assistance of
twelve men to put him in the saddle again whenever he fell from his
horse. Yet slow fighter as he was, he was a most nimble intriguer. As for
his private character, it was notoriously stained with every vice, nor
was there enough of natural intelligence or superior acquirement to atone
for his, crapulous; licentious, shameless life. His military efficiency
at important emergencies was impaired and his life endangered by vile
diseases. He was covetous and greedy beyond what was considered decent
even in that cynical age. He received subsidies and alms with both hands
from those who distrusted and despised him, but who could not eject him
from his advantageous position.
He wished to arrive at the throne of France. As son of Francis of Guise,
as brother of the great Balafre, he considered himself entitled to the
homage of the fishwomen and the butchers' halls. The constitution of the
country in that age making a People impossible, the subtle connection
between a high-born intriguer and the dregs of a populace, which can only
exist in societies of deep chasms and precipitous contrasts, was easily
established.
The duke's summary dealing with the sixteen tyrants of Paris in the
matter of the president's murder had, however, loosened his hold on what
was considered the democracy; but this was at the time when his schemes
were silently swinging towards the Protestant aristocracy; at the moment
when Politica was taking the place of Madam League in his secret
affections. Nevertheless, so long as there seemed a chance, he was
disposed to work the mines for his own benefit. His position as
lieutenant-general gave him an immense advantage for intriguing with both
sides, and--in case his aspirations for royalty were baffled--for
obtaining the highest possible price for himself in that auction in which
Philip and the Bearnese were likely to strain all their resources in
outbidding each other.
On one thing his heart was fixed. His brother's son should at least not
secure the golden prize if he could prevent it. The young Duke of Guise,
who had been immured in Castle Tours since the famous murder of his
father and uncle, had made his escape by a rather neat stratagem. Having
been allowed some liberty for amusing himself in the corridors in the
neighbourhood of his apartment, he had invented a game of hop, skip, and
jump up stairs and down, which he was wont to play with the soldiers of
the guard, as a solace to the tediousness of confinement. One day he
hopped and skipped up the staircase with a rapidity which excited the
admiration of the companions of his sport, slipped into his room, slammed
and bolted the doors, and when the guard, after in vain waiting a
considerable tine for him to return and resume the game, at last forced
an entrance, they found the bird flown out of window. Rope-ladders,
confederates, fast-galloping post-horses did the rest, and at last the
young duke joined his affectionate uncle in camp, much to that eminent
relative's discomfiture. Philip gave alternately conflicting instructions
to Farnese--sometimes that he should encourage the natural jealousy
between the pair; sometimes that he should cause them to work
harmoniously together for the common good--that common good being the
attainment by the King of Spain of the sovereignty of France.
But it was impossible, as already intimated, for Mayenne to work
harmoniously with his nephew. The Duke of Guise might marry with the
infanta and thus become King of France by the grace of God and Philip. To
such a consummation in the case of his uncle there stood, as we know, an
insuperable obstacle in the shape of the Duchess of Mayenne. Should it
come to this at last, it was certain that the Duke would make any and
every combination to frustrate such a scheme. Meantime he kept his own
counsel, worked amiably with Philip, Parma, and the young duke, and
received money in overflowing measure, and poured into his bosom from
that Spanish monarch whose veterans in the Netherlands were maddened by
starvation into mutiny.
Philip's plans were a series of alternatives. France he regarded as the
property of his family. Of that there could be no doubt at all. He meant
to put the crown upon his own head, unless the difficulties in the way
should prove absolutely insuperable. In that case he claimed France and
all its inhabitants as the property of his daughter. The Salic law was
simply a pleasantry, a bit of foolish pedantry, an absurdity. If Clara
Isabella, as daughter of Isabella of France, as grandchild of Henry II.,
were not manifestly the owner of France--queen-proprietary, as the
Spanish doctors called it--then there was no such thing, so he thought,
as inheritance of castle, farm-house, or hovel--no such thing as property
anywhere in the world. If the heiress of the Valois could not take that
kingdom as her private estate, what security could there ever be for any
possessions public or private?
This was logical reasoning enough for kings and their counsellors. There
was much that might be said, however, in regard to special laws. There
was no doubt that great countries, with all their livestock--human or
otherwise--belonged to an individual, but it was not always so clear who
that individual was. This doubt gave much work and comfortable fees to
the lawyers. There was much learned lore concerning statutes of descent,
cutting off of entails, actions for ejectment, difficulties of enforcing
processes, and the like, to occupy the attention of diplomatists,
politicians and other sages. It would have caused general hilarity,
however, could it have been suggested that the live-stock had art or part
in the matter; that sheep, swine, or men could claim a choice of their
shepherds and butchers.
Philip--humbly satisfied, as he always expressed himself, so long as the
purity of the Roman dogmas and the supremacy of the Romish Church over
the whole earth were maintained--affected a comparative indifference as
to whether he should put the crown of St. Louis and of Hugh Capet upon
his own grey head or whether he should govern France through his daughter
and her husband. Happy the man who might exchange the symbols of mutual
affection with Philip's daughter.
The king had various plans in regard to the bestowal of the hand thus
richly endowed. First and foremost it was suggested--and the idea was not
held too monstrous to be even believed in by some conspicuous
individuals--that he proposed espousing his daughter himself. The pope
was to be relied on, in this case, to give a special dispensation. Such a
marriage, between parties too closely related to be usually united in
wedlock, might otherwise shock the prejudices of the orthodox. His late
niece and wife was dead, so that there was no inconvenience on that
score, should the interests of his dynasty, his family, and, above all,
of the Church, impel him, on mature reflection, to take for his fourth
marriage one step farther within the forbidden degrees than he had done
in his third. Here is the statement, which, if it have no other value,
serves to show the hideous designs of which the enemies of Philip
sincerely believed that monarch capable.
"But God is a just God," wrote Sir Edward Stafford, "and if with all
things past, that be true that the king ('videlicet' Henry IV.) yesterday
assured me to be true, and that both his ambassador from Venice writ to
him and Monsieur de Luxembourg from Rome, that the Count Olivarez had
made a great instance to the pope (Sixtus V.) a little afore his death,
to permit his master to marry his daughter, no doubt God will not leave
it long unpunished."
Such was the horrible tale which was circulated and believed in by Henry
the Great of France and by eminent nobles and ambassadors, and at least
thought possible by the English envoy. By such a family arrangement it
was obvious that the conflicting claims of father and daughter to the
proprietorship of France would be ingeniously adjusted, and the children
of so well assorted a marriage might reign in undisputed legitimacy over
France and Spain, and the rest of the world-monarchy. Should the king
decide on the whole against this matrimonial project, should Innocent or
Clement prove as intractable as Sixtus, then it would be necessary to
decide among various candidates for the Infanta's hand.
In Mayenne's Opinion the Duke of Guise was likely to be the man; but
there is little doubt that Philip, in case these more cherished schemes
should fail, had made up his mind--so far as he ever did make up his mind
upon anything--to select his nephew the Archduke Ernest, brother of the
Emperor Rudolph, for his son-in-law. But it was not necessary to make an
immediate choice. His quiver was full of archdukes, any one of whom would
be an eligible candidate, while not one of them would be likely to reject
the Infanta with France on her wedding-finger. Meantime there was a lion
in the path in the shape of Henry of Navarre.
Those who disbelieve in the influence of the individual on the fate of
mankind may ponder the possible results to history and humanity, had the
dagger of Jacques Clement entered the stomach of Henry IV. rather than of
Henry III. in the summer of 1589, or the perturbations in the world's
movements that might have puzzled philosophers had there been an
unsuspected mass of religious conviction revolving unseen in the mental
depths of the Bearnese. Conscience, as it has from time to time exhibited
itself on this planet of ours, is a powerful agent in controlling
political combinations; but the instances are unfortunately not rare, so
far as sublunary progress is concerned, in which the absence of this
dominant influence permits a prosperous rapidity to individual careers.
Eternal honour to the noble beings, true chieftains among men, who have
forfeited worldly power or sacrificed life itself at the dictate of
religious or moral conviction--even should the basis of such conviction
appear to some of us unsafe or unreal. Shame on the tongue which would
malign or ridicule the martyr or the honest convert to any form of
Christian faith! But who can discover aught that is inspiring to the sons
of men in conversions--whether of princes or of peasants--wrought, not at
risk of life and pelf, but for the sake of securing and increasing the
one and the other?
Certainly the Bearnese was the most candid of men. It was this very
candour, this freedom from bigotry, this want of conviction, and this
openness to conviction, that made him so dangerous and caused so much
anxiety to Philip. The Roman Church might or might not be strengthened by
the re-conversion of the legitimate heir of France, but it was certain
that the claims of Philip and the Infanta to the proprietorship of that
kingdom would be weakened by the process. While the Spanish king knew
himself to be inspired in all his actions by a single motive, the
maintenance of the supremacy of the Roman Church, he was perfectly aware
that the Prince of Bearne was not so single-hearted nor so conscientious
as himself.
The Prince of Bearne--heretic, son of heretics, great chieftain of
heretics--was supposed capable of becoming orthodox whenever the Pope
would accept his conversion. Against this possibility Philip struggled
with all his strength.
Since Pope Sixtus V., who had a weakness for Henry, there had been
several popes. Urban VII., his immediate successor, had reigned but
thirteen days. Gregory XIV. (Sfondrato) had died 15th October, 1591, ten
months after his election. Fachinetti, with the title of Innocent IX.,
had reigned two months, from 29th October to 29th December, 1591. He died
of "Spanish poison," said Envoy Umton, as coolly as if speaking of gout,
or typhus, or any other recognised disorder. Clement VIII. (Aldobrandini)
was elected 30th January, 1592. He was no lover of Henry, and lived in
mortal fear of Philip, while it must be conceded that the Spanish
ambassador at Rome was much given to brow-beating his Holiness. Should he
dare to grant that absolution which was the secret object of the
Bearnese, there was no vengeance, hinted the envoy, that Philip would not
wreak on the holy father. He would cut off his supplies from Naples and
Sicily, and starve him and all-his subjects; he would frustrate all his
family schemes, he would renounce him, he would unpope him, he would do
anything that man and despot could do, should the great shepherd dare to
re-admit this lost sheep, and this very black sheep, into the fold of the
faithful.
As for Henry himself, his game--for in his eyes it was nothing but a
game--lay every day plainer and plainer before him. He was indispensable
to the heretics. Neither England, nor Holland, nor Protestant Germany,
could renounce him, even should he renounce "the religion." Nor could the
French Huguenots exist without that protection which, even although
Catholic, he could still extend to them when he should be accepted as
king by the Catholics.
Hereditary monarch by French law and history, released from his heresy by
the authority that could bind and loose, purged as with hyssop and washed
whiter than snow, it should go hard with him if Philip, and Farnese, and
Mayenne, and all the pikemen and reiters they might muster, could keep
him very long from the throne of his ancestors.
Nothing could match the ingenuousness with which he demanded the
instruction whenever the fitting time for it should arrive; as if,
instead of having been a professor both of the Calvinist and Catholic
persuasion, and having relapsed from both, he had been some innocent
Peruvian or Hindoo, who was invited to listen to preachings and to
examine dogmas for the very first time in his life.
Yet Philip had good grounds for hoping a favourable result from his
political and military manoeuvre. He entertained little doubt that France
belonged to him or to his daughter; that the most powerful party in the
country was in favour of his claims, provided he would pay the voters
liberally enough for their support, and that if the worst came to the
worst it would always be in his power to dismember the kingdom, and to
reserve the lion's share for himself, while distributing some of the
provinces to the most prominent of his confederates.
The sixteen tyrants of Paris had already, as we have seen, urged the
crown upon him, provided he would establish in France the Inquisition,
the council of Trent, and other acceptable institutions, besides
distributing judiciously a good many lucrative offices among various
classes of his adherents.
The Duke of Mayenne, in his own name and that of all the Catholics of
France, formally demanded of him to maintain two armies, forty thousand
men in all, to be respectively under command of the duke himself and of
Alexander Farnese, and regularly to pay for them. These propositions, as
has been seen, were carried into effect as nearly as possible, at
enormous expense to Philip's exchequer, and he naturally expected as good
faith on the part of Mayenne.
In the same paper in which the demand was made Philip was urged to
declare himself king of France. He was assured that the measure could be
accomplished "by freely bestowing marquisates, baronies, and peerages, in
order to content the avarice and ambition of many persons, without at the
same time dissipating the greatness from which all these members
depended. Pepin and Charlemagne," said the memorialists, "who were
foreigners and Saxons by nation, did as much in order to get possession
of a kingdom to which they had no other right except that which they
acquired there by their prudence and force, and after them Hugh Capet,
much inferior to them in force and authority, following their example,
had the same good fortune for himself and his posterity, and one which
still endures.
"If the authority of the holy see could support the scheme at the same
time," continued Mayenne and friends, "it would be a great help. But it
being perilous to ask for that assistance before striking the blow, it
would be better to obtain it after the execution."
That these wholesome opinions were not entirely original on the part of
Mayenne, nor produced spontaneously, was plain from the secret
instructions given by Philip to his envoys, Don Bernardino de Mendoza,
John Baptist de Tassis, and the commander Moreo, whom he had sent soon
after the death of Henry III. to confer with Cardinal Gaetano in Paris.
They were told, of course, to do everything in their power to prevent the
election of the Prince of Bearne, "being as he was a heretic, obstinate
and confirmed, who had sucked heresy with his mother's milk." The legate
was warned that "if the Bearnese should make a show of converting
himself, it would be frigid and fabricated."
If they were asked whom Philip desired for king--a question which
certainly seemed probable under the circumstances--they were to reply
that his foremost wish was to establish the Catholic religion in the
kingdom, and that whatever was most conducive to that end would be most
agreeable to him. "As it is however desirable, in order to arrange
matters, that you should be informed of everything," said his Majesty,
"it is proper that you should know that I have two kinds of right to all
that there is over there. Firstly, because the crown of France has been
usurped from me, my ancestors having been unjustly excluded by foreign
occupation of it; and secondly, because I claim the same crown as first
male of the house of Valois."
Here certainly were comprehensive pretensions, and it was obvious that
the king's desire for the establishment of the Catholic religion must
have been very lively to enable him to invent or accept such astonishing
fictions.
But his own claims were but a portion of the case. His daughter and
possible spouse had rights of her own, hard, in his opinion, to be
gainsaid. "Over and above all this," said Philip, "my eldest daughter,
the Infanta, has two other rights; one to all the states which as
dower-property are joined by matrimony and through females to this crown,
which now come to her in direct line, and the other to the crown itself,
which belongs directly to the said Infanta, the matter of the Salic law
being a mere invention."
Thus it would appear that Philip was the legitimate representative, not
only of the ancient races of French monarchs--whether Merovingians,
Carlovingians, or otherwise was not stated but also of the usurping
houses themselves, by whose intrusion those earlier dynasties had been
ejected, being the eldest male heir of the extinct line of Valois, while
his daughter was, if possible, even more legitimately the sovereign and
proprietor of France than he was himself.
Nevertheless in his magnanimous desire for the peace of the world and the
advancement of the interests of the Church, he was, if reduced to
extremities, willing to forego his own individual rights--when it should
appear that they could by no possibility be enforced--in favour of his
daughter and of the husband whom he should select for her.
"Thus it may be seen," said the self-denying man, "that I know how, for
the sake of the public repose, to strip myself of my private property."
Afterwards, when secretly instructing the Duke of Feria, about to proceed
to Paris for the sake of settling the sovereignty of the kingdom, he
reviewed the whole subject, setting forth substantially the same
intentions. That the Prince of Bearne could ever possibly succeed to the
throne of his ancestors was an idea to be treated only with sublime scorn
by all right-minded and sensible men. "The members of the House of
Bourbon," said he, "pretend that by right of blood the crown belongs to
them, and hence is derived the pretension made by the Prince of Bearne;
but if there were wanting other very sufficient causes to prevent this
claim--which however are not wanting--it is quite enough that he is a
relapsed heretic, declared to be such by the Apostolic See, and
pronounced incompetent, as well as the other members of his house, all of
them, to say the least, encouragers of heresy; so that not one of them
can ever be king of France, where there have been such religious princes
in time past, who have justly merited the name of Most Christian; and so
there is no possibility of permitting him or any of his house to aspire
to the throne, or to have the subject even treated of in the estates. It
should on the contrary be entirely excluded as prejudicial to the realm
and unworthy to be even mentioned among persons so Catholic as those
about to meet in that assembly."
The claims of the man whom his supporters already called Henry the Fourth
of France being thus disposed of, Philip then again alluded with his
usual minuteness to the various combinations which he had formed for the
tranquillity and good government of that kingdom and of the other
provinces of his world-empire.
It must moreover be never forgotten that what he said passed with his
contemporaries almost for oracular dispensations. What he did or ordered
to be done was like the achievements or behests of a superhuman being.
Time, as it rolls by, leaves the wrecks of many a stranded reputation to
bleach in the sunshine of after-ages. It is sometimes as profitable to
learn what was not done by the great ones of the earth, in spite of all
their efforts, as to ponder those actual deeds which are patent to
mankind. The Past was once the Present, and once the Future, bright with
rainbows or black with impending storm; for history is a continuous whole
of which we see only fragments.
He who at the epoch with which we are now occupied was deemed greatest
and wisest among the sons of earth, at whose threats men quailed, at
whose vast and intricate schemes men gasped in palefaced awe, has left
behind him the record of his interior being. Let us consider whether he
was so potent as his fellow mortals believed, or whether his greatness
was merely their littleness; whether it was carved out, of the
inexhaustible but artificial quarry of human degradation. Let us see
whether the execution was consonant with the inordinate plotting; whether
the price in money and blood--and certainly few human beings have
squandered so much of either as did Philip the Prudent in his long
career--was high or low for the work achieved.
Were after generations to learn, only after curious research, of a
pretender who once called himself, to the amusement of his
contemporaries, Henry the Fourth of France; or was the world-empire for
which so many armies were marshalled, so many ducats expended, so many
falsehoods told, to prove a bubble after all? Time was to show. Meantime
wise men of the day who, like the sages of every generation, read the
future like a printed scroll, were pitying the delusion and rebuking the
wickedness of Henry the Bearnese; persisting as he did in his cruel,
sanguinary, hopeless attempt to establish a vanished and impossible
authority over a land distracted by civil war.
Nothing could be calmer or more reasonable than the language of the great
champion of the Inquisition.
"And as President Jeannin informs me," he said, "that the Catholics have
the intention of electing me king, that appearing to them the gentlest
and safest method to smooth all rivalries likely to arise among the
princes aspiring to the crown, I reply, as you will see by the copy
herewith sent. You will observe that after not refusing myself to that
which may be the will of our Lord, should there be no other mode of
serving Him, above all I desire that which concerns my daughter, since to
her belongs the kingdom. I desire nothing else nor anything for myself,
nor for anybody else, except as a means for her to arrive at her right."
He had taken particular pains to secure his daughter's right in Brittany,
while the Duchess of Mercoeur, by the secret orders of her husband, had
sent a certain ecclesiastic to Spain to make over the sovereignty of this
province to the Infanta. Philip directed that the utmost secrecy should
be observed in regard to this transaction with the duke and duchess, and
promised the duke, as his reward for these proposed services in
dismembering his country, the government of the province for himself and
his heirs.
For the king was quite determined--in case his efforts to obtain the
crown for himself or for his daughter were unsuccessful--to dismember
France, with the assistance of those eminent Frenchmen who were now so
industriously aiding him in his projects.
"And in the third place," said he, in his secret instructions to Feria,
"if for the sins of all, we don't manage to make any election, and if
therefore the kingdom (of France) has to come to separation and to be
divided into many hands; in this case we must propose to the Duke of
Mayenne to assist him in getting possession of Normandy for himself, and
as to the rest of the kingdom, I shall take for myself that which seems
good to me--all of us assisting each other."
But unfortunately it was difficult for any of these fellow-labourers to
assist each other very thoroughly, while they detested each other so
cordially and suspected each other with such good reason.
Moreo, Ybarra, Feria, Parma, all assured their master that Mayenne was
taking Spanish money as fast as he could get it, but with the sole
purpose of making himself king. As to any of the House of Lorraine
obtaining the hand of the Infanta and the throne with it, Feria assured
Philip that Mayenne "would sooner give the crown to the Grand Turk."
Nevertheless Philip thought it necessary to continue making use of the
duke. Both were indefatigable therefore in expressing feelings of
boundless confidence each in the other.
It has been seen too how entirely the king relied on the genius and
devotion of Alexander Farnese to carry out his great schemes; and
certainly never had monarch a more faithful, unscrupulous, and dexterous
servant. Remonstrating, advising, but still obeying--entirely without
conscience, unless it were conscience to carry out his master's commands,
even when most puerile or most diabolical--he was nevertheless the object
of Philip's constant suspicion, and felt himself placed under perpetual
though secret supervision.
Commander Moreo was unwearied in blackening the duke's character, and in
maligning his every motive and action, and greedily did the king incline
his ear to the calumnies steadily instilled by the chivalrous spy.
"He has caused all the evil we are suffering," said Moreo. "When he sent
Egmont to France 'twas without infantry, although Egmont begged hard for
it, as did likewise the Legate, Don Bernardino, and Tassis. Had he done
this there is no doubt at all that the Catholic cause in France would
have been safe, and your Majesty would now have the control over that
kingdom which you desire. This is the opinion of friends and foes. I went
to the Duke of Parma and made free to tell him that the whole world would
blame him for the damage done to Christianity, since your Majesty had
exonerated yourself by ordering him to go to the assistance of the French
Catholics with all the zeal possible. Upon this he was so disgusted that
he has never shown me a civil face since. I doubt whether he will send or
go to France at all, and although the Duke of Mayenne despatches couriers
every day with protestations and words that would soften rocks, I see no
indications of a movement."
Thus, while the duke was making great military preparations far invading
France without means; pawning his own property to get bread for his
starving veterans, and hanging those veterans whom starving had made.
mutinous, he was depicted, to the most suspicious and unforgiving mortal
that ever wore a crown, as a traitor and a rebel, and this while he was
renouncing his own judicious and well-considered policy in obedience to
the wild schemes of his master.
"I must make bold to remind your Majesty," again whispered the spy, "that
there never was an Italian prince who failed to pursue his own ends, and
that there are few in the world that are not wishing to become greater
than they are. This man here could strike a greater blow than all the
rest of them put together. Remember that there is not a villain anywhere
that does not desire the death of your Majesty. Believe me, and send to
cut off my head if it shall be found that I am speaking from passion, or
from other motive than pure zeal for your royal service."
The reader will remember into what a paroxysm of rage Alexander was
thrown on, a former occasion, when secretly invited to listen to
propositions by which the sovereignty over the Netherlands was to be
secured to himself, and how near he was to inflicting mortal punishment
with his own hand on the man who had ventured to broach that treasonable
matter.
Such projects and propositions were ever floating, as it were, in the
atmosphere, and it was impossible for the most just men to escape
suspicion in the mind of a king who fed upon suspicion as his daily
bread. Yet nothing could be fouler or falser than the calumny which
described Alexander as unfaithful to Philip. Had he served his God as he
served his master perhaps his record before the highest tribunal would
have been a clearer one.
And in the same vein in which he wrote to the monarch in person did the
crafty Moreo write to the principal secretary of state, Idiaquez, whose
mind, as well as his master's, it was useful to poison, and who was in
daily communication with Philip.
"Let us make sure of Flanders," said he, "otherwise we shall all of us be
well cheated. I will tell you something of that which I have already told
his Majesty, only not all, referring you to Tassis, who, as a personal
witness to many things, will have it in his power to undeceive his
Majesty, I have seen very clearly that the duke is disgusted with his
Majesty, and one day he told me that he cared not if the whole world went
to destruction, only not Flanders."
"Another day he told me that there was a report abroad that his Majesty
was sending to arrest him, by means of the Duke of Pastrana, and looking
at me he said: 'See here, seignior commander, no threats, as if it were
in the power of mortal man to arrest me, much less of such fellows as
these.'"
"But this is but a small part of what I could say," continued the
detective knight-commander, "for I don't like to trust these ciphers. But
be certain that nobody in Flanders wishes well to these estates or to the
Catholic cause, and the associates of the Duke of Parma go about saying
that it does not suit the Italian potentates to have his Majesty as great
a monarch as he is trying to be."
This is but a sample of the dangerous stuff with which the royal mind was
steadily drugged, day after day, by those to whom Farnese was especially
enjoined to give his confidence.
Later on it will be seen how-much effect was thus produced both upon the
king and upon the duke. Moreo, Mendoza, and Tasais were placed about the
governor-general, nominally as his counsellors, in reality as
police-officers.
"You are to confer regularly with Mendoza, Tassis, and Moreo," said
Philip to Farnese.
"You are to assist, correspond, and harmonize in every way with the Duke
of Parma," wrote Philip to Mendoza, Tassis, and Moreo. And thus cordially
and harmoniously were the trio assisting and corresponding with the duke.
But Moreo was right in not wishing to trust the ciphers, and indeed he
had trusted them too much, for Farnese was very well aware of his
intrigues, and complained bitterly of them to the king and to Idiaquez.
Most eloquently and indignantly did he complain of the calumnies, ever
renewing themselves, of which he was the subject. "'Tis this good Moreo
who is the author of the last falsehoods," said he to the secretary; "and
this is but poor payment for my having neglected my family, my parents
and children for so many years in the king's service, and put my life
ever on the hazard, that these fellows should be allowed to revile me and
make game of me now, instead of assisting me."
He was at that time, after almost superhuman exertions, engaged in the
famous relief of Paris. He had gone there, he said, against his judgment
and remonstrating with his Majesty on the insufficiency of men and money
for such an enterprise. His army was half-mutinous and unprovided with
food, artillery, or munitions; and then he found himself slandered,
ridiculed, his life's life lied away. 'Twas poor payment for his
services, he exclaimed, if his Majesty should give ear to these
calumniators, and should give him no chance of confronting his accusers
and clearing his reputation. Moreo detested him, as he knew, and Prince
Doria said that the commander once spoke so ill of Farnese in Genoa that
he was on the point of beating him; while Moreo afterwards told the story
as if he had been maltreated because of defending Farnese against Doria's
slanders.
And still more vehemently did he inveigh against Moreo in his direct
appeals to Philip. He had intended to pass over his calumnies, of which
he was well aware, because he did not care to trouble the dead--for Moreo
meantime had suddenly died, and the gossips, of course, said it was of
Farnese poison--but he had just discovered by documents that the
commander had been steadily and constantly pouring these his calumnies
into the monarch's ears. He denounced every charge as lies, and demanded
proof. Moreo had further been endeavouring to prejudice the Duke of
Mayenne against the King of Spain and himself, saying that he, Farnese,
had been commissioned to take Mayenne into custody, with plenty of
similar lies.
"But what I most feel," said Alexander, with honest wrath, "is to see
that your Majesty gives ear to them without making the demonstration
which my services merit, and has not sent to inform me of them, seeing
that they may involve my reputation and honour. People have made more
account of these calumnies than of my actions performed upon the theatre
of the world. I complain, after all my toils and dangers in your
Majesty's service, just when I stood with my soul in my mouth and death
in my teeth, forgetting children, house, and friends, to be treated thus,
instead of receiving rewards and honour, and being enabled to leave to my
children, what was better than all the riches the royal hand could
bestow, an unsullied and honourable name."
He protested that his reputation had so much suffered that he would
prefer to retire to some remote corner as a humble servant of the king,
and leave a post which had made him so odious to all. Above all, he
entreated his Majesty to look upon this whole affair "not only like a
king but like a gentleman."
Philip answered these complaints and reproaches benignantly, expressed
unbounded confidence in the duke, assured him that the calumnies of his
supposed enemies could produce no effect upon the royal mind, and coolly
professed to have entirely forgotten having received any such letter as
that of which his nephew complained. "At any rate I have mislaid it," he
said, "so that you see how much account it was with me."
As the king was in the habit of receiving such letters every week, not
only from the commander, since deceased, but from Ybarra and others, his
memory, to say the least, seemed to have grown remarkably feeble. But the
sequel will very soon show that he had kept the letters by him and
pondered them to much purpose. To expect frankness and sincerity from
him, however, even in his most intimate communications to his most
trusted servants, would have been to "swim with fins of lead."
Such being the private relations between the conspirators, it is
instructive to observe how they dealt with each other in the great game
they were playing for the first throne in Christendom. The military
events have been sufficiently sketched in the preceding pages, but the
meaning and motives of public affairs can be best understood by
occasional glances behind the scenes. It is well for those who would
maintain their faith in popular Governments to study the workings of the
secret, irresponsible, arbitrary system; for every Government, as every
individual, must be judged at last by those moral laws which no man born
of woman can evade.
During the first French expedition-in the course of which Farnese had
saved Paris from falling into, the hands of Henry, and had been doing his
best to convert it prospectively into the capital of his master's
empire--it was his duty, of course, to represent as accurately as
possible the true state of France. He submitted his actions to his
master's will, but he never withheld from him the advantage that he might
have derived, had he so chosen, from his nephew's luminous intelligence
and patient observation.
With the chief personage he had to deal with he professed himself, at
first, well satisfied. "The Duke of Mayenne," said he to Philip,
"persists in desiring your Majesty only as King of France, and will hear
of no other candidate, which gives me satisfaction such as can't be
exaggerated." Although there were difficulties in the way, Farnese
thought that the two together with God's help might conquer them.
"Certainly it is not impossible that your Majesty may succeed," he said,
"although very problematical; and in case your Majesty does succeed in
that which we all desire and are struggling for, Mayenne not only demands
the second place in the kingdom for himself, but the fief of some great
province for his family."
Should it not be possible for Philip to obtain the crown, Farnese was, on
the whole, of opinion that Mayenne had better be elected. In that event
he would make over Brittany and Burgundy to Philip, together with the
cities opposite the English coast. If they were obliged to make the duke
king, as was to be feared, they should at any rate exclude the Prince of
Bearne, and secure, what was the chief point, the Catholic religion.
"This," said Alexander, "is about what I can gather of Mayenne's views,
and perhaps he will put them down in a despatch to your Majesty."
After all, the duke was explicit enough. He was for taking all he could
get--the whole kingdom if possible--but if foiled, then as large a slice
of it as Philip would give him as the price of his services. And Philip's
ideas were not materially different from those of the other conspirator.
Both were agreed on one thing. The true heir must be kept out of his
rights, and the Catholic religion be maintained in its purity. As to the
inclination of the majority of the inhabitants, they could hardly be in
the dark. They knew that the Bearnese was instinctively demanded by the
nation; for his accession to the throne would furnish the only possible
solution to the entanglements which had so long existed.
As to the true sentiments of the other politicians and soldiers of the
League with whom Bearnese came in contact in France, he did not disguise
from his master that they were anything but favourable.
"That you may know, the humour of this kingdom," said he, "and the
difficulties in which I am placed, I must tell you that I am by large
experience much confirmed in that which I have always suspected. Men
don't love nor esteem the royal name of your Majesty, and whatever the
benefits and assistance they get from you they have no idea of anything
redounding to your benefit and royal service, except so far as implied in
maintaining the Catholic religion and keeping out the Bearne. These two
things, however, they hold to be so entirely to your Majesty's profit,
that all you are doing appears the fulfilment of a simple obligation.
They are filled with fear, jealousy, and suspicion of your Majesty. They
dread your acquiring power here. Whatever negotiations they pretend in
regard to putting the kingdom or any of their cities under your
protection, they have never had any real intention of doing it, but their
only object is to keep up our vain hopes while they are carrying out
their own ends. If to-day they seem to have agreed upon any measure,
tomorrow they are sure to get out of it again. This has always been the
case, and all your Majesty's ministers that have had dealings here would
say so, if they chose to tell the truth. Men are disgusted with the
entrance of the army, and if they were not expecting a more advantageous
peace in the kingdom with my assistance than without it, I don't know
what they would do; for I have heard what I have heard and seen what I
have seen. They are afraid of our army, but they want its assistance and
our money."
Certainly if Philip desired enlightenment as to the real condition of the
country he had determined to, appropriate; and the true sentiments of its
most influential inhabitants, here, was the man most competent of all the
world to advise him; describing the situation for him, day by day, in the
most faithful manner. And at every step the absolutely puerile
inadequacy of the means, employed by the king to accomplish his gigantic
purposes became apparent. If the crime of subjugating or at least
dismembering the great kingdom of France were to, be attempted with any
hope of success, at least it might have been expected that the man
employed to consummate the deed would be furnished with more troops and
money than would be required to appropriate a savage island off the
Caribbean, or a German principality. But Philip expected miracles to be
accomplished by the mere private assertion of his will. It was so easy to
conquer realms the writing table.
"I don't say," continued Farnese, "if I could have entered France with a
competent army, well paid and disciplined, with plenty of artillery, and
munitions, and with funds enough to enable Mayenne to buy up the nobles
of his party, and to conciliate the leaders generally with presents and
promises, that perhaps they might not have softened. Perhaps interest and
fear would have made that name agreeable which pleases them so little,
now that the very reverse of all this has occurred. My want of means is
causing a thousand disgusts among the natives of the country, and it is
this penury that will be the chief cause of the disasters which may
occur."
Here was sufficiently plain speaking. To conquer a war-like nation
without an army; to purchase a rapacious nobility with an empty purse,
were tasks which might break the stoutest heart. They were breaking
Alexander's.
Yet Philip had funds enough, if he had possessed financial ability
himself, or any talent for selecting good financiers. The richest
countries of the old world and the new were under his sceptre; the mines
of Peru and Mexico; the wealth of farthest Ind, were at his disposition;
and moreover he drove a lucrative traffic in the sale of papal bulls and
massbooks, which were furnished to him at a very low figure, and which he
compelled the wild Indians of America and the savages of the Pacific to
purchase of him at an enormous advance. That very year, a Spanish carrack
had been captured by the English off the Barbary coast, with an assorted
cargo, the miscellaneous nature of which gives an idea of royal
commercial pursuits at that period. Besides wine in large quantities
there were fourteen hundred chests of quicksilver, an article
indispensable to the working of the silver mines, and which no one but
the king could, upon pain of death, send to America. He received,
according to contract; for every pound of quicksilver thus delivered a
pound of pure silver, weight for weight. The ship likewise contained ten
cases of gilded mass-books and papal bulls. The bulls, two million and
seventy thousand in number, for the dead and the living, were intended
for the provinces of New Spain, Yucatan, Guatemala, Honduras, and the
Philippines. The quicksilver and the bulls cost the king three hundred
thousand florins, but he sold them for five million. The price at, which
the bulls were to be sold varied-according to the letters of advice found
in the ships--from two to four reals a piece, and the inhabitants of
those conquered regions were obliged to buy them. "From all this," says a
contemporary chronicler; "is to be seen what a thrifty trader was the
king."
The affairs of France were in such confusion that it was impossible for
them, according to Farnese, to remain in such condition much longer
without bringing about entire decomposition. Every man was doing as he
chose--whether governor of a city, commander of a district, or gentleman
in his castle. Many important nobles and prelates followed the Bearnese
party, and Mayenne was entitled to credit for doing as well as he did.
There was no pretence, however, that his creditable conduct was due to
anything but the hope of being well paid. "If your Majesty should decide
to keep Mayenne," said Alexander, "you can only do it with large: sums of
money. He is a good Catholic and very firm in his purpose, but is so much
opposed by his own party, that if I had not so stimulated him by hopes of
his own grandeur, he would have grown desperate--such small means has he
of maintaining his party--and, it is to be feared, he would have made
arrangements with Bearne, who offers him carte-blanche."
The disinterested man had expressed his assent to the views of Philip in
regard to the assembly of the estates and the election of king, but had
claimed the sum of six hundred thousand dollars as absolutely necessary
to the support of himself and followers until those events should occur.
Alexander not having that sum at his disposal was inclined to defer
matters, but was more and more confirmed in his opinion that the Duke was
a "man of truth, faith, and his word." He had distinctly agreed that no
king should be elected, not satisfactory to Philip, and had "stipulated
in return that he should have in this case, not only the second place in
the kingdom, but some very great and special reward in full property."
Thus the man of truth, faith, and his word had no idea of selling himself
cheap, but manifested as much commercial genius as the Fuggers themselves
could have displayed, had they been employed as brokers in these
mercantile transactions.
Above all things, Alexander implored the king to be expeditious,
resolute, and liberal; for, after all, the Bearnese might prove a more
formidable competitor than he was deemed. "These matters must be arranged
while the iron is hot," he said, "in order that the name and memory of
the Bearne and of all his family may be excluded at once and forever; for
your Majesty must not doubt that the whole kingdom inclines to him, both
because he is natural successor, to the crowns and because in this way
the civil war would cease. The only thing that gives trouble is the
religions defect, so that if this should be remedied in appearance, even
if falsely, men would spare no pains nor expense in his cause."
No human being at that moment, assuredly, could look into the immediate
future accurately enough to see whether the name and memory of the man,
whom his adherents called Henry the Fourth of France, and whom Spaniards,
legitimists and enthusiastic papists, called the Prince of Bearne, were
to be for ever excluded from the archives of France; whether Henry, after
spending the whole of his life as a pretender, was destined to bequeath
the same empty part to his descendants, should they think it worth their
while to play it. Meantime the sages smiled superior at his delusion;
while Alexander Farnese, on the contrary, better understanding the
chances of the great game which they were all playing, made bold to tell
his master that all hearts in France were inclining to their natural
lord. "Differing from your Majesty," said he, "I am of opinion that there
is no better means of excluding him than to make choice of the Duke of
Mayenne, as a person agreeable to the people, and who could only reign by
your permission and support."
Thus, after much hesitation and circumlocution, the nephew made up his
mind to chill his uncle's hopes of the crown, and to speak a decided
opinion in behalf of the man of his word, faith and truth.
And thus through the whole of the two memorable campaigns made by
Alexander in France, he never failed to give his master the most accurate
pictures of the country, and an interior view of its politics; urging
above all the absolute necessity of providing much more liberal supplies
for the colossal adventure in which he was engaged. "Money and again
money is what is required," he said. "The principal matter is to be
accomplished with money, and the particular individuals must be bought
with money. The good will of every French city must be bought with money.
Mayenne must be humoured. He is getting dissatisfied. Very probably he is
intriguing with Bearne. Everybody is pursuing his private ends. Mayenne
has never abandoned his own wish to be king, although he sees the
difficulties in the way; and while he has not the power to do us as much
good as is thought, it is certainly in his hands to do us a great deal of
injury."
When his army was rapidly diminishing by disease, desertion, mutiny, and
death, he vehemently and perpetually denounced the utter inadequacy of
the king's means to his vast projects. He protested that he was not to
blame for the ruin likely to come upon the whole enterprise. He had
besought, remonstrated, reasoned with Philip--in vain. He assured his
master that in the condition of weakness in which they found themselves,
not very triumphant negotiations could be expected, but that he would do
his best. "The Frenchmen," he said, "are getting tired of our disorders,
and scandalized by our weakness, misery, and poverty. They disbelieve the
possibility of being liberated through us."
He was also most diligent in setting before the king's eyes the dangerous
condition of the obedient Netherlands, the poverty of the finances, the
mutinous degeneration of the once magnificent Spanish army, the misery of
the country, the ruin of the people, the discontent of the nobles, the
rapid strides made by the republic, the vast improvement in its military
organization, the rising fame of its young stadholder, the thrift of its
exchequer, the rapid development of its commerce, the menacing aspect
which it assumed towards all that was left of Spanish power in those
regions.
Moreover, in the midst of the toils and anxieties of war-making and
negotiation, he had found time to discover and to send to his master the
left leg of the glorious apostle St. Philip, and the head of the glorious
martyr St. Lawrence, to enrich his collection of relics; and it may be
doubted whether these treasures were not as welcome to the king as would
have been the news of a decisive victory.
During the absence of Farnese in his expeditions against the Bearnese,
the government of his provinces was temporarily in the hands of Peter
Ernest Mansfeld.
This grizzled old fighter--testy, choleric, superannuated--was utterly
incompetent for his post. He was a mere tool in the hands of his son.
Count Charles hated Parma very cordially, and old Count Peter was made to
believe himself in danger of being poisoned or poniarded by the duke. He
was perpetually wrangling with, importuning and insulting him in
consequence, and writing malicious letters to the king in regard to him.
The great nobles, Arschot, Chimay, Berlaymont, Champagny, Arenberg, and
the rest, were all bickering among themselves, and agreeing in nothing
save in hatred to Farnese.
A tight rein, a full exchequer, a well-ordered and well-paid army, and
his own constant patience, were necessary, as Alexander too well knew, to
make head against the republic, and to hold what was left of the
Netherlands. But with a monthly allowance, and a military force not equal
to his own estimates for the Netherland work, he was ordered to go forth
from the Netherlands to conquer France--and with it the dominion of the
world--for the recluse of the Escorial.
Very soon it was his duty to lay bare to his master, still more
unequivocally than ever, the real heart of Mayenne. No one could surpass
Alexander in this skilful vivisection of political characters; and he
soon sent the information that the Duke was in reality very near closing
his bargain with the Bearnese, while amusing Philip and drawing largely
from his funds.
Thus, while faithfully doing his master's work with sword and pen, with
an adroitness such as no other man could have matched, it was a necessary
consequence that Philip should suspect, should detest, should resolve to
sacrifice him. While assuring his nephew, as we have seen, that
elaborate, slanderous reports and protocols concerning him, sent with
such regularity by the chivalrous Moreo and the other spies, had been
totally disregarded, even if they had ever met his eye, he was quietly
preparing--in the midst of all these most strenuous efforts of Alexander,
in the field at peril of his life, in the cabinet at the risk of his
soul--to deprive him of his office, and to bring him, by stratagem if
possible, but otherwise by main force, from the Netherlands to Spain.
This project, once-resolved upon, the king proceeded to execute with that
elaborate attention to detail, with that feline stealth which
distinguished him above all kings or chiefs of police that have ever
existed. Had there been a murder at the end of the plot, as perhaps there
was to be--Philip could not have enjoyed himself more. Nothing surpassed
the industry for mischief of this royal invalid.
The first thing to be done was of course the inditing of a most
affectionate epistle to his nephew.
"Nephew," said he, "you know the confidence which I have always placed in
you and all that I have put in your hands, and I know how much you are to
me, and how earnestly you work in my service, and so, if I could have you
at the same time in several places, it would be a great relief to me.
Since this cannot be however, I wish to make use of your assistance,
according to the times and occasions, in order that I may have some
certainty as to the manner in which all this business is to be managed,
may see why the settlement of affairs in France is thus delayed, and what
the state of things in Christendom generally is, and may consult with,
you about an army which I am getting levied here, and about certain
schemes now on foot in regard to the remedy for all this; all which makes
me desire your presence here for some time, even if a short time, in
order to resolve upon and arrange with the aid of your advice and
opinion, many affairs concerning the public good and facilitate their
execution by means of your encouragement and presence, and to obtain the
repose which I hope for in putting them into your hands. And so I charge
and command you that, if you desire to content me, you use all possible
diligence to let me see you here as soon as possible, and that you start
at once for Genoa."
He was further directed to leave Count Mansfeld at the head of affairs
during this temporary absence, as had been the case so often before,
instructing him to make use of the Marquis of Cerralbo, who was already
there, to lighten labours that might prove too much for a man of
Mansfeld's advanced age.
"I am writing to the marquis," continued the king, "telling him that he
is to obey all your orders. As to the reasons of your going away, you
will give out that it is a decision of your own, founded on good cause,
or that it is a summons of mine, but full of confidence and good will
towards you, as you see that it is."
The date of this letter was 20th February, 1592.
The secret instructions to the man who was thus to obey all the duke's
orders were explicit enough upon that point, although they were wrapped
in the usual closely-twisted phraseology which distinguished Philip's
style when his purpose was most direct.
Cerralbo was entrusted with general directions as to the French matter,
and as to peace negotiations with "the Islands;" but the main purport of
his mission was to remove Alexander Farnese. This was to be done by fair
means, if possible; if not, he was to be deposed and sent home by force.
This was to be the reward of all the toil and danger through which he had
grown grey and broken in the king's service.
"When you get to the Netherlands" (for the instructions were older than
the letter to Alexander just cited), "you are," said the king, "to treat
of the other two matters until the exact time arrives for the third,
taking good care not to, cut the thread of good progress in the affairs
of France if by chance they are going on well there.
"When the time arrives to treat of commission number three," continued
his Majesty, "you will take occasion of the arrival of the courier of
20th February, and will give with much secrecy the letter of that date to
the duke; showing him at the same time the first of the two which you
will have received."
If the duke showed the letter addressed to him by his uncle--which the
reader has already seen--then the marquis was to discuss with him the
details of the journey, and comment upon the benefits and increased
reputation which would be the result of his return to Spain.
"But if the duke should not show you the letter," proceeded Philip, "and
you suspect that he means to conceal and equivocate about the particulars
of it, you can show him your letter number two, in which it is stated
that you have received a copy of the letter to the duke. This will make
the step easier."
Should the duke declare himself ready to proceed to Spain on the ground
indicated--that the king had need of his services--the marquis was then
to hasten his departure as earnestly as possible. Every pains were to be
taken to overcome any objections that might be made by the duke on the
score of ill health, while the great credit which attached to this
summons to consult with the king in such arduous affairs was to be duly
enlarged upon. Should Count Mansfeld meantime die of old age, and should
Farnese insist the more vehemently, on that account, upon leaving his son
the Prince Ranuccio in his post as governor, the marquis was authorised
to accept the proposition for the moment--although secretly instructed
that such an appointment was really quite out of the question--if by so
doing the father could be torn from the place immediately.
But if all would not do, and if it should become certain that the duke
would definitively refuse to take his departure, it would then become
necessary to tell him clearly, but secretly, that no excuse would be
accepted, but that go he must; and that if he did not depart voluntarily
within a fixed time, he would be publicly deprived of office and
conducted to Spain by force.
But all these things were to be managed with the secrecy and mystery so
dear to the heart of Philip. The marquis was instructed to go first to
the castle of Antwerp, as if upon financial business, and there begin his
operations. Should he find at last all his private negotiations and
coaxings of no avail, he was then to make use of his secret letters from
the king to the army commanders, the leading nobles of the country, and
of the neighbouring princes, all of whom were to be undeceived in regard
to the duke, and to be informed of the will of his majesty.
The real successor of Farnese was to be the Archduke Albert, Cardinal of
Austria, son of Archduke Ferdinand, and the letters on this subject were
to be sent by a "decent and confidential person" so soon as it should
become obvious that force would be necessary in order to compel the
departure of Alexander. For if it came to open rupture, it would be
necessary to have the cardinal ready to take the place. If the affair
were arranged amicably, then the new governor might proceed more at
leisure. The marquis was especially enjoined, in case the duke should be
in France, and even if it should be necessary for him to follow him there
on account of commissions number one and two, not to say a word to him
then of his recall, for fear of damaging matters in that kingdom. He was
to do his best to induce him to return to Flanders, and when they were
both there, he was to begin his operations.
Thus, with minute and artistic treachery, did Philip provide for the
disgrace and ruin of the man who was his near blood relation, and who had
served him most faithfully from earliest youth. It was not possible to
carry out the project immediately, for, as it has already been narrated,
Farnese, after achieving, in spite of great obstacles due to the dulness
of the king alone, an extraordinary triumph, had been dangerously
wounded, and was unable for a brief interval to attend to public affairs.
On the conclusion of his Rouen campaign he had returned to the
Netherlands, almost immediately betaking himself to the waters of Spa.
The Marquis de Cerralbo meanwhile had been superseded in his important
secret mission by the Count of Fuentes, who received the same
instructions as had been provided for the marquis.
But ere long it seemed to become unnecessary to push matters to
extremities. Farnese, although nominally the governor, felt himself
unequal to take the field against the vigorous young commander who was
carrying everything before him in the north and east. Upon the Mansfelds
was the responsibility for saving Steenwyk and Coeworden, and to the
Mansfelds did Verdugo send piteously, but in vain, for efficient help.
For the Mansfelds and other leading personages in the obedient
Netherlands were mainly occupied at that time in annoying Farnese,
calumniating his actions, laying obstacles in the way of his
administration, military and civil, and bringing him into contempt with
the populace. When the weary soldier--broken in health, wounded and
harassed with obtaining triumphs for his master such as no other living
man could have gained with the means placed at his disposal--returned to
drink the waters, previously to setting forth anew upon the task of
achieving the impossible, he was made the mark of petty insults on the
part of both the Mansfelds. Neither of them paid their respects to him;
ill as he was, until four days after his arrival. When the duke
subsequently called a council; Count Peter refused to attend it on
account of having slept ill the night before. Champagny; who was one of,
the chief mischief-makers, had been banished by Parma to his house in
Burgundy. He became very much alarmed, and was afraid of losing his head.
He tried to conciliate the duke, but finding it difficult he resolved to
turn monk, and so went to the convent of Capuchins, and begged hard to be
admitted a member. They refused him on account of his age and
infirmities. He tried a Franciscan monastery with not much better
success, and then obeyed orders and went to his Burgundy mansion; having
been assured by Farnese that he was not to lose his head. Alexander was
satisfied with that arrangement, feeling sure, he said, that so soon as
his back was turned Champagny would come out of his convent before the
term of probation had expired, and begin to make mischief again. A once
valiant soldier, like Champagny, whose conduct in the famous "fury of
Antwerp" was so memorable; and whose services both in field and-cabinet
had, been so distinguished, fallen so low as to, be used as a tool by the
Mansfelds against a man like Farnese; and to be rejected as unfit company
by Flemish friars, is not a cheerful spectacle to contemplate.
The walls of the Mansfeld house and gardens, too, were decorated by Count
Charles with caricatures, intending to illustrate the indignities put
upon his father: and himself.
Among others, one picture represented Count Peter lying tied hand and
foot, while people were throwing filth upon him; Count Charles being
pourtrayed as meantime being kicked away from the command of a battery of
cannon by, De la Motte. It seemed strange that the Mansfelds should, make
themselves thus elaborately ridiculous, in order to irritate Farnese; but
thus it was. There was so much stir, about these works of art that
Alexander transmitted copies of them to the king, whereupon Charles
Mansfeld, being somewhat alarmed, endeavoured to prove that they had been
entirely misunderstood. The venerable personage lying on the ground, he
explained, was not his father, but Socrates. He found it difficult
however to account for the appearance of La Motte, with his one arm
wanting and with artillery by his side, because, as Farnese justly
remarked, artillery had not been invented in the time of Socrates, nor
was it recorded that the sage had lost an arm.
Thus passed the autumn of 1592, and Alexander, having as he supposed
somewhat recruited his failing strength, prepared, according to his
master's orders for a new campaign in France. For with almost preterhuman
malice Philip was employing the man whom he had doomed to disgrace,
perhaps to death, and whom he kept under constant secret supervision, in
those laborious efforts to conquer without an army and to purchase a
kingdom with an empty purse, in which, as it was destined, the very last
sands of Parma's life were to run away.
Suffering from a badly healed wound, from water on the chest,
degeneration of the heart, and gout in the limbs, dropsical, enfeebled,
broken down into an old man before his time, Alexander still confronted
disease and death with as heroic a front as he had ever manifested in the
field to embattled Hollanders and Englishmen, or to the still more
formidable array of learned pedants and diplomatists in the hall of
negotiation. This wreck of a man was still fitter to lead armies and
guide councils than any soldier or statesman that Philip could call into
his service, yet the king's cruel hand was ready to stab the dying man in
the dark.
Nothing could surpass the spirit with which the soldier was ready to do
battle with his best friend, coming in the guise of an enemy. To the last
moment, lifted into the saddle, he attended personally as usual to the
details of his new campaign, and was dead before he would confess himself
mortal. On the 3rd of December, 1592, in the city of Arran, he fainted
after retiring at his usual hour to bed, and thus breathed his last.
According to the instructions in his last will, he was laid out barefoot
in the robe and cowl of a Capuchin monk. Subsequently his remains were
taken to Parma, and buried under the pavement of the little Franciscan
church. A pompous funeral, in which the Italians and Spaniards quarrelled
and came to blows for precedence, was celebrated in Brussels, and a
statue of the hero was erected in the capitol at Rome.
The first soldier and most unscrupulous diplomatist of his age, he died
when scarcely past his prime, a wearied; broken-hearted old man. His
triumphs, military and civil, have been recorded in these pages, and his
character has been elaborately pourtrayed. Were it possible to conceive
of an Italian or Spaniard of illustrious birth in the sixteenth century,
educated in the school of Machiavelli, at the feet of Philip, as anything
but the supple slave of a master and the blind instrument of a Church,
one might for a moment regret that so many gifts of genius and valour had
been thrown away or at least lost to mankind. Could the light of truth
ever pierce the atmosphere in which such men have their being; could the
sad music of humanity ever penetrate to their ears; could visions of a
world--on this earth or beyond it--not exclusively the property of kings
and high-priests be revealed to them, one might lament that one so
eminent among the sons of women had not been a great man. But it is a
weakness to hanker for any possible connection between truth and Italian
or Spanish statecraft of that day. The truth was not in it nor in him,
and high above his heroic achievements, his fortitude, his sagacity, his
chivalrous self-sacrifice, shines forth the baleful light of his
perpetual falsehood.
[I pass over, as beneath the level of history, a great variety of
censorious and probably calumnious reports as to the private
character of Farnese, with which the secret archives of the times
are filled. Especially Champagny, the man by whom the duke was most
hated and feared, made himself busy in compiling the slanderous
chronicle in which the enemies of Farnese, both in Spain and the
Netherlands, took so much delight. According to the secret history
thus prepared for the enlightenment of the king and his ministers,
the whole administration of the Netherlands--especially the
financial department, with the distribution of offices--was in the
hands of two favourites, a beardless secretary named Cosmo e Massi,
and a lady of easy virtue called Franceline, who seems to have had a
numerous host of relatives and friends to provide for at the public
expense. Towards the latter end of the duke's life, it was even
said that the seal of the finance department was in the hands of his
valet-de-chambre, who, in his master's frequent absences, was in the
habit of issuing drafts upon the receiver-general. As the valet-
dechambre was described as an idiot who did not know how to read, it
may be believed that the finances fell into confusion. Certainly,
if such statements were to be accepted, it would be natural enough
that for every million dollars expended by the king in the
provinces, not more than one hundred thousand were laid out for the
public service; and this is the estimate made by Champagny, who, as
a distinguished financier and once chief of the treasury in the
provinces, might certainly be thought to know something of the
subject. But Champagny was beside himself with rage, hatred.]