List! hear ye, through the still and lonely night,
The distant hymn of mournful voices roll
Solemn and low? It is the burial rite;
How deep its sadness sinks into the soul,
As slow the passing bell wakes its far ling'ring knoll.
CHARLES SWAIN.
Spain has often been regarded as an absolute monarchy; an opinion,
no doubt, founded on the absolute measures of her later sovereigns.
Ferdinand and Isabella certainly laid the foundation of the royal
prerogative by the firmness and ability with which they decreased the
power of the nobles, who, until their reign, had been like so many
petty sovereigns, each with his independent state, and preserving his
authority by the sword alone. When Ferdinand and Isabella, however,
united their separate kingdoms under one denomination, neither Castile
nor Arragon could be considered as an absolute monarchy. In Castile,
the people, as representatives of the cities, had, from, early ages,
obtained seats in the Cortes, and so in some measure balanced the
power of the aristocracy. The Cortes, similar to our houses of
parliament, could enact laws, impose taxes, and redress grievances,
often making the condition of granting pecuniary aid to the Sovereign,
his consent to the regulations they had laid down, and refusing the
grant if he demurred. In addition to these privileges of the Cortes
of Castile, the Junta of Arragon could coin money, declare war, and
conclude peace; and what was still more remarkable, they could be
neither prorogued nor dissolved by their Sovereign without their own
consent. Alluding to the Castilians, a few years after the period of
our tale, Robertson says--
"The principles of liberty seem to have been better understood,
by the Castilians than by any other people in Europe. They had
acquired more liberal notions with respect to their own rights
and privileges. They had formed more bold and generous sentiments
concerning government, and discovered an extent of political
knowledge to which the English themselves did not attain till
nearly a century afterwards."
When we compare this state of things with the misery and anarchy
pervading Castile before the accession of Isabella, we may have
some idea of the influence of her vigorous measures, and personal
character, on the happiness and freedom of her subjects. The laws
indeed existed before, but they wanted the wisdom and moderation of an
enlightened Sovereign, to give them force and power to act.
In the kingdom of Arragon, besides the Junta, or National Assemblage,
there was always a Justizia, or supreme judge, whose power, in some
respects, was even greater than the King's; his person was sacred; he
could remove any of the royal ministers whom he deemed unworthy of the
trust, and was himself responsible to none but the Cortes or Junta by
whom he had been elected. The personal as well as the national rights
of the Arragonese, were also more accurately defined than was usual
in that age: no native of Arragon could be convicted, imprisoned, or
tortured, without fair and legal evidence.[A]
[Footnote A: See History of Spain, by John Bigland.]
Such being the customs of the kingdom of Arragon, the power of the
crown was more limited than Ferdinand's capacious mind and desire
of dominion chose to endure: the Cortes, or nobles, there were
pre-eminent; the people, as the Sovereign, ciphers, save that the
rights of the former were more cared for than the authority of the
latter. But Ferdinand was not merely ambitious; he had ability and
energy, and so gradually were his plans achieved that he encountered
neither rebellion nor dislike. The Cortes found that he frequently and
boldly transacted business of importance without their interference;
intrusted offices of state to men of inferior rank, but whose
abilities were the proof of his discernment; took upon himself the
office of Justizia, and, in conjunction with Isabella, re-established
an institution which had fallen into disuse through the civil wars,
but which was admirably suited for the internal security of their
kingdom by the protection of the peasantry and lower classes: it was
an association of all the cities of Castile and Arragon, known as the
Sainta Hermandad, or Holy Brotherhood, to maintain a strong body of
troops for the protection of travellers, and the seizure of criminals,
who were brought before judges nominated by the confederated cities,
and condemned according to their crime, without any regard to feudal
laws. Against this institution the nobles of both kingdoms were most
violently opposed, regarding it as the complete destroyer, which in
reality it was, of all their feudal privileges, and taking from
them the long possessed right of trying their own fiefs, and the
mischievous facility of concealing their own criminals.
Thus much of history--a digression absolutely necessary for the clear
elucidation of Ferdinand and Isabella's conduct with regard to the
events just narrated. The trial of Arthur Stanley they had resolved
should be conducted with all the formula of justice, the more
especially that the fact of his being a foreigner had prejudiced many
minds against him. Ferdinand himself intended to preside at the trial,
with a select number of peers, to assist in the examination, and
pronounce sentence, or confirm the royal mandate, as he should think
fit. Nor was this an extraordinary resolution. Neither the victim,
nor the supposed criminal, was of a rank which allowed a jury of
an inferior grade. Morales had been fief to Isabella alone; and on
Ferdinand, as Isabella's representative, fell the duty of his avenger.
Arthur Stanley owned no feudal lord in Spain, save, as a matter of
courtesy, the King, whose arms he bore. He was accountable, then,
according to the feudal system, which was not yet entirely extinct,
to Ferdinand alone for his actions, and before him must plead his
innocence, or receive sentence for his crime. As his feudal lord, or
suzerain, Ferdinand might at once have condemned him to death; but
this summary proceeding was effectually prevented by the laws of
Arragon and the office of the Holy Brotherhood; and therefore, in
compliance with their mandates, royal orders were issued that every
evidence for or against the prisoner should be carefully collected
preparatory to the trial. More effectually to do this, the trial was
postponed from seven to fourteen days after the discovery of the
murder.
The excitement which this foul assassination excited in Segovia was so
extreme, that the nobles were compelled to solicit Isabella's personal
interference, in quieting the populace, and permitting the even course
of justice: they had thronged in tumultuary masses round the prison
where Stanley was confined, with wild shouts and imprecations,
demanding his instant surrender to their rage, mingling groans and
lamentations with yells and curses, in the most fearful medley. Old
Pedro, who had been Arthur's host, unwittingly added fuel to the
flame, by exulting in his prophecy that evil would come of Ferdinand's
partiality for the white-faced foreigner; that he had seen it long,
but guessed not how terribly his mutterings would end. By the Queen's
permission, the chamber of state in which the body lay was thrown open
to the eager citizens, who thronged in such crowds to behold the sole
remains of one they had well nigh idolized, that the guards were
compelled to permit the entrance of only a certain number every
day. Here was neither state nor pomp to arrest the attention of the
sight-loving populace: nought of royalty or gorgeous symbols. No; men
came to pay the last tribute of admiring love and sorrow to one who
had ever, noble as he was by birth, made himself one with them,
cheering their sorrows, sharing their joys; treating age, however poor
or lowly, with the reverence springing from the heart, inspiring
youth to deeds of worth and honor, and by his own example, far more
eloquently than by his words, teaching all and every age the duties
demanded by their country and their homes, to their families and
themselves. And this man was snatched from them, not alone by the
ruthless hand of death, but by midnight murder. Was it marvel, the
very grief his loss occasioned should rouse to wildest fury men's
passions against his murderer?
It was the evening of the fifth day after the murder, that with a
degree of splendor and of universal mourning, unrivalled before in the
interment of any subject, the body of Ferdinand Morales was committed
to the tomb. The King himself, divested of all insignia of royalty,
bareheaded, and in a long mourning cloak, headed the train of chief
mourners, which, though they counted no immediate kindred, numbered
twenty or thirty of the highest nobles, both of Arragon and Castile.
The gentlemen, squires, and pages of Morales' own household followed:
and then came on horse and on foot, with arms reversed, and lowered
heads, the gallant troops who had so often followed Morales to
victory, and under him had so ably aided in placing Isabella on her
throne; an immense body of citizens, all in mourning, closed the
procession. Every shop had been closed, every flag half-masted;
and every balcony, by which the body passed, hung with black. The
cathedral church was thronged, and holy and thrilling the service
which consigned dust to dust, and hid for ever from the eyes of his
fellow men, the last decaying remains of one so universally beloved.
The coffin of ebony and silver, partly open, so as to disclose the
face of the corpse, as was customary with Catholic burials of those of
high or priestly rank, and the lower part covered with a superb velvet
pall, rested before the high altar during the chanted service; at the
conclusion of which the coffin was closed, the lid screwed down, and
lowered with slow solemnity into the vault beneath. A requiem, chanted
by above a hundred of the sweetest and richest voices, sounding in
thrilling unison with the deep bass and swelling notes of the organ,
had concluded the solemn rites, and the procession departed as
it came; but for some days the gloom in the city continued; the
realization of the public loss seemed only beginning to be fully felt,
as excitement subsided.
Masses for the soul of the Catholic warrior, were of course sung for
many succeeding days. It was at midnight, a very short time after
this public interment, that a strange group were assembled within the
cathedral vaults, at the very hour that mass for the departed was
being chanted in the church above their heads; it consisted of monks
and travelling friars, accompanied by five or six of the highest
nobility; their persons concealed in coarse mantles and shrouding
hoods; they had borne with them, through the subterranean passages
of the crypt, leading to the vaults, a coffin so exactly similar in
workmanship and inscription to that which contained the remains of
their late companion, that to distinguish the one from the other was
impossible. The real one, moved with awe and solemnity, was conveyed
to a secret recess close to the entrance of the crypt, and replaced
in the vault by the one they had brought with them. As silently, as
voicelessly as they had entered and done their work, so they departed.
The following night, at the same hour, the coffin of Morales, over
which had been nailed a thick black pall, so that neither name,
inscription, nor ornament could be perceived, was conveyed from
Segovia in a covered cart, belonging, it appeared, to the monastery of
St. Francis, situated some leagues southward, and attended by one or
two monks and friars of the same order. The party proceeded leisurely,
travelling more by night than by day, diminishing gradually in number
till, at the entrance of a broad and desolate plain, only four
remained with the cart. Over this plain they hastened, then wound
through a circuitous path concealed in prickly brushwood, and paused
before a huge, misshapen crag, seemingly half buried in the earth: in
this a door, formed of one solid stone, flew back at their touch;
the coffin, taken with reverence from the cart, was borne on their
shoulders through the dark and narrow passage, and down the winding
stair, till they stood in safety in the vale; in the secret entrance
by which they entered, the lock closed as they passed, and was
apparently lost in the solid wall. Three or four awaited them--nobles,
who had craved leave of absence for a brief interval from the court,
and who had come by different paths to the secret retreat (no doubt
already recognized by our readers as the Vale of Cedars), to lay
Morales with his fathers, with the simple form, yet solemn service
peculiar to the burials of their darkly hidden race. The grave was
already dug beside that of Manuel Henriquez; the coffin, resting
during the continuance of a brief prayer and psalm in the little
temple, was then borne to the ground marked out, which, concealed by
a thick hedge of cypress and cedar, lay some little distance from the
temple; for, in their secret race, it was not permitted for the house
destined to the worship of the Most High, to be surrounded by the
homes of the dead. A slow and solemn hymn accompanied the lowering of
the coffin; a prayer in the same unknown language; a brief address,
and the grave was filled up; the noble dead left with his kindred,
kindred alike in blood as faith; and ere the morning rose, the living
had all departed, save the few retainers of the house of Henriquez and
Morales, to whose faithful charge the retreat had been intrusted. No
proud effigy marked those simple graves; the monuments of the dead
were in the hearts of the living. But in the cathedral of Segovia a
lordly monument arose to the memory of Ferdinand Morales, erected,
not indeed for idle pomp, but as a tribute from the gratitude of a
Sovereign--and a nation's love.