CHAPTER XV

"He took their heads up one by one, he kissed them o'er and o'er;And aye ye saw the tears run down, I wot that grief was sore.He closed the lids on their dead eyes, all with his fingers frail,And handled all their bloody curls, and kissed their lips so pale."'Oh had ye died all by my side upon some famous day,My fair young men, no weak tears then had washed your blood away;The trumpet of Castile had drowned the misbelievers' horn,And the last of all the Lara's line a Gothic spear had borne.'"With that it chanced a man drew near to lead him from the place,Old Lara stooped him down once more, and kissed Gonzalo's face;But ere the man observed him, or could his gesture bar,Sudden he from his side had grasped that Moslem's scymetar."

"He took their heads up one by one, he kissed them o'er and o'er;

And aye ye saw the tears run down, I wot that grief was sore.

He closed the lids on their dead eyes, all with his fingers frail,

And handled all their bloody curls, and kissed their lips so pale.

"'Oh had ye died all by my side upon some famous day,

My fair young men, no weak tears then had washed your blood away;

The trumpet of Castile had drowned the misbelievers' horn,

And the last of all the Lara's line a Gothic spear had borne.'

"With that it chanced a man drew near to lead him from the place,

Old Lara stooped him down once more, and kissed Gonzalo's face;

But ere the man observed him, or could his gesture bar,

Sudden he from his side had grasped that Moslem's scymetar."

Before the count was overpowered he had killed thirteen of the Moors, and then he begged that he might be put to death; but the kalif, on learning all of the details of the treachery of Velasquez, restored the count to liberty and sent him back to his wife in the castle at Salas. The fate of the revengeful Doña Lambra is not recorded, but it is to be hoped that she was made to atone in some way for all her savage rage.

About Ximena and her far-famed husband Don Rodrigo, widely known as the Cid, many marvellous tales have been told, and it is a matter for regret that so many of them are purely legendary. According to one of the traditions, which was followed by the French dramatic poet Pierre Corneille when he wrote his famous play,Le Cid, in 1636, Ximena is given a much more prominent place in the story than that accorded to her in history. According to this version, Don Diego, father of Don Rodrigo, is given a mortal insult by the braggart Don Gomez, who is the father of Ximena. Young Don Rodrigo, eager to avenge the slight put upon his aged father, provokes Don Gomez to a duel and kills him. Ximena, who has loved Don Rodrigo, overcome by these tragic events, is at a loss to know what to do, and in her heart there is a fierce struggle between her love for her lover and her respect for her father. This distressing situation is relieved somewhat by the thought that Don Rodrigo, in killing her father, has but avenged his own; but still her Spanish nature cries for redress, and she appeals to King Fernan of Castile, at whose court all these things have taken place. Believing her love for Don Rodrigo to be stronger than her hatred, the king suddenly announces the death of Rodrigo, which so surprises Ximena that she discloses her deep affection, which she had made an attempt to conceal; whereat he announces his intention to unite the two lovers as soon as Rodrigo should have given further proof of his valor.

As a matter of fact, the Cid was a free-lance of undoubted bravery and courage, who fought now with and now against the Moors; but in spite of the fact that he was not always true to the same allegiance, he is essentially a popular hero, as he represents a spirit of boldness and independence which in itself is enough to endear him to the minds of the people. His killing of Don Gomez in the manner described is extremely doubtful, and history affords no details as to the manner of his wooing or his wedding. But Ximena was his wife, shared in many of his hardships, and at his death, in 1099, ruled in his stead for three years at Valencia. Finally, much harried by the Moslems, who were ever growing bolder, Ximena withdrew to Burgos, taking with her the body of the Cid, embalmed in precious spices, and borne, as in the days of his vigor, on the back of his great warhorse Babieca. The Cid was buried in the monastery of Cardena, near Burgos; and there the brave Doña Ximena was laid by his side at the time of her death, in 1104. Although a number of fanciful stories have been told about the daughters of Ximena and the doughty Cid, the fact remains that they had two daughters, who married into some of the noblest houses of all Spain. The elder, Christina, became the wife of Ramiro, Infante of Navarre; while the younger, Maria, married Count Ramon Berenguer III. of Barcelona. After a long series of intermarriages, to quote from Burke, in a double stream, through the royal houses of Spain and of France, the blood of the Cid is found to flow in the veins of his majesty Alfonso XIII., the reigning King of Spain.

The religious side of Spanish life in the eleventh century, so far as Christianity is concerned, centres about a woman, Constance of Burgundy, the wife of King Alfonso VI. of Castile. This was the period when the monk Hildebrand, become Pope Gregory VII., was endeavoring to unify the power of the Roman Church and strengthen the authority of the papacy; and as he had a devout woman, the Countess Matilda of Tuscany, to aid him in Italy, so he had as his firm ally in Spain the pious Queen Constance, daughter of King Robert of France. Constance was not a Spanish woman, but the influence she exerted in Spain had such a far-reaching effect that she cannot be overlooked in any category such as the present. With Constance to Spain came the monk Bernard of Cluny, a pale ascetic, who had just been leading a crusade against the corruption existing in the Church itself, and whose whole life had been devoted to serious things. The French court had been given over to works of piety, the Church had great authority, and the clergy were held in high esteem. When the French princess left this devout atmosphere to go to sunny Spain, she had grave misgivings as to the frivolous and irreverent character of her new subjects, and deemed it wise to take with her as a friend and adviser the stern Bernard. The worst fears of these two zealous Christians were more than realized. The king had friendly intercourse with Moorish vassals, and Moslem and Christian lived side by side in perfect harmony! That all this should be and at a time when the same Moslem brood was defiling the place of the Holy Sepulchre in far-off Palestine, and when the crusading spirit filled the air, was almost beyond belief, and Constance and the monk were greatly scandalized thereat. Totally without that toleration which comes with experience, they could conceive of no religion as a good religion which did not meet the rigid requirements of their own belief; and they planned at once a Spanish crusade which was intended to improve the general deplorable condition of public morals and at the same time to modify, in a most radical way, the liturgy of the Spanish Church, which was far too lax in points of discipline. Their conduct at the time of the surrender of Toledo, in 1074, is a most excellent example of the eager, yet thoughtless, way in which they went about their new work. When King Alfonso, after an interval of more than three hundred years, regained possession of the ancient capital of the Goths, the city from which the luckless Rodrigo, the last of the Goths, was driven, Toledo was surrendered on the express condition that the Moors should not be disturbed in their religious beliefs and that they were to retain the use of their mosques. Such terms with such an enemy appeared monstrous to the queen. Especially did it seem a sin before God that the principal mosque, the Alfaqui, the noblest building in all that fair city which lay stretched out with many a gilded dome and minaret upon its seven hills above the Tagus, should still be used for the worship of a pagan people; and Constance and Bernard plotted together, piously, for the triumph of the true religion. The first time that the king left the city, Bernard, now Archbishop of Toledo, acting under the authority of Queen Constance, went to the Alfaqui at the head of a company of monks summoned from his monastery at Sahagun, opened the doors, set up crosses, erected altars, hung bells, and then publicly summoned the people to mass on the following morning. The king, upon his return, was furious at this intolerant act, and was moved to threaten punishment; but the Moors, satisfied by his indignation, displayed a real spirit of toleration in asking for the pardon of the monks.

The queen and Bernard, successful in this first struggle, continued to labor incessantly for the glory of the Church. The masterful Pope Gregory VII., in his letter addressed to the princes of Spain, said: "You are aware, I believe, that from the earliest times the kingdom of Spain was the special patrimony of Saint Peter, and although pagans have occupied it, it still belongs to the same master." The King of Castile was not bold enough to deny this papal claim of overlordship, and Gregory demanded as first proof of his submission that he should substitute throughout his realm the Roman liturgy for the national or Mozarabic ritual then in general use. Queen Constance and Bernard were in favor of this reform, and they prevailed upon the king to accept it; but it was a far different matter to secure its actual use at the hands of the national clergy, who were strongly opposed to the change. In spite of all her efforts the queen could do nothing, and finally, as a compromise, it was decided to submit the question to the ordeal of trial by battle. Two champions were duly appointed who fought before a most august assembly over which the queen presided. The Knight of the Gothic Missal, Don Juan Ruiz de Matanzas, killed the Champion of Rome, and was not only victorious, but unscathed, much to the disgust of Constance and her followers. The manifest disinclination to accept this result as final made another ordeal necessary, and this time, in truly Spanish style, a bull fight was resolved upon. The great arena at Toledo was selected as the place where this ecclesiastical combat was to take place, and on the appointed day the great amphitheatre was crowded with an expectant multitude. The queen, the king, and the archbishop, backed by black-robed monks, looked on with evident interest, hoping that this time the scales would turn in their favor; but the people, expert in contests of this kind, had already picked the Castilian bull as the winner and had begun to wager their small coin as to the probable duration of the fight. The people were right, the Romantorowas promptly slain, and once more the cause of Spain was triumphant. But the queen was persistent, and in spite of the fact that the result of each of these ordeals was popularly considered as a direct sign from heaven, she refused to accept them as final, because her pet project had been rejected. If the results had been different, there is little doubt but that the ordeals would have been received as infallible. However, it was not possible to cast a slight upon this time-honored procedure by any act which might tend to throw it into disrepute, so the whole question was dropped for the space of seven years. Queen Constance, in this interval, carried on a quiet campaign which she hoped would lead eventually to the adoption of the much discussed and twice rejected liturgy, and at no time did she give up her hope. Rome, to her narrow mind, must reign supreme in matters spiritual if the kingdom of Spain was to have relations with the kingdom of heaven, and she did not hesitate to ride rough-shod over the national clergy, to whom alone, without any aid whatever from the pope, the recent Christian successes in Spain had been due. When she considered the time ripe for some radical action, Gregory sent his legate, the Cardinal Ricardo, to hold a Church council at Burgos, and there it was formally decreed that the Mozarabic ritual must be put aside in Castile. Before the formal adoption of the Roman form, however, it was decided wise to resort once more to a trial by ordeal, as the favorable issue of such a public test would make it much easier to conquer the prejudices of the people. This time, Constance advising it, the ordeal by fire was tried, and, as Miss Yonge phrases it, "a great pile was erected in the market place of Toledo for the most harmlessauto de féthat ever took place there." Seats were built up on all sides in amphitheatre fashion, the queen, the king, the court, and the dignitaries of the two clerical parties were there in special boxes, and again were the people much in evidence, but this time much in doubt as to the final outcome. When all was ready, the torch was applied to the pile and the two volumes were committed to the flames. The book which was not consumed by the fire was to be considered acceptable to God. To the chagrin of the papal party, the Roman book was utterly consumed, but the Gothic missal came forth unscathed. Although there was great rejoicing at this final triumph for the national clergy, the foreigners were in control, and the king, urged on by his wife, decided to act upon his own responsibility, without regard for the manifest judgment of heaven, and lost no time in giving his signature to the decree of the Council of Burgos, which then went into immediate effect. This time the people made no resistance, and, as has been said, Spain became once more, after the lapse of nearly seven centuries, the obedient province of Rome. In the succeeding centuries the influence of Rome has been ever present and powerful in the affairs of the Spanish peninsula, and whether for its weal or woe, which is not a matter for consideration here, the fact remains that Queen Constance was the one person in Spain who was most responsible for this state of affairs. Her unflagging interest in the success of the papal party and her perseverance in the face of the opposition of a majority of the Spanish clergy made her the life of the whole movement, and to this day she is held in grateful memory at the Holy See.

After the time of the good Queen Constance and with the growth of the Spanish monarchies, which in spite of all their internal turmoil and confusion were fast becoming more powerful and more of a menace to the Moslem rule, the wheels of fate seem to bring women into greater political prominence than ever before. Constance, it is true, had been no mean figure in that epoch, and had exerted a most powerful influence in shaping the destinies of Spain for her own time and for the future, but this was done by an exercise of indirect rather than direct authority. Constance had been queen, but there had been a king to rule as well, and with him remained the real power. As Constance influenced him, she may have been said to use this royal power, it is true, but the fact remains that it was the woman Constance who was using her powers of feminine persuasion to bring about the results which were so dear to her heart. No political responsibilities rested upon her shoulders, there were no cares of state to weary and make uneasy her crowned head, and she was free to follow her own penchants unimpeded by this larger task. But now a wider field for the activities of women seems to come; in Spain, chance gives them full control in their own name in certain instances, and they bear the full responsibility. The measure of their success may not be greater than the measure of their failure in these new lines of endeavor, but, good or bad as their methods of administration may have been, it does not appear that they fall below the level of masculine achievement at the same time. And this is a curious thing. Since the birth of time men have been regarding women as weaklings, both mentally and physically. Tennyson has it that "woman is the lesser man," and such has been the commonly expressed opinion. Everything in the social life of the world has conspired to give truth to this statement; women are still the real slaves of their husbands in many countries, and the virtual slaves in almost all the world; education has been granted to them grudgingly, the scope of their intellect has been limited in the narrowest way; and in spite of all these facts, in spite of this suppression and repression from time immemorial, women have been able by some power or some cunning to exert a most powerful influence in the world, and when called upon to take up a man's work they have left a record for judgment and skill and wisdom which needs no apologies and which is generally above the average. To those who are content with generalities it may be sufficient to say that women are not the equals of men, but to anyone who attempts to study, step by step, the history of human development it becomes apparent that the French admonitionCherchez la femmecontains the truth, unalloyed. In America it has become the custom to say that in every great national emergency there is always a man ready to meet the situation and meet it nobly and with understanding; and what can be said here can be said with equal truth perhaps in other countries of the world, but to this statement it may be well to add that women also may be found to do nobly the tasks which may fall to their lot.

In every day and generation, however, it will rarely be found that the women are better than the men. The interests of men and women are so identical from so many points of view, society is in so many ways but a composite of their common interests, that their moral level must of necessity be the same. By intuition, then, by inherent capacity, by woman's wit, by that something feminine which is at once the power and the charm of a woman, the members of this so-called weaker sex have been able to take their place worthily beside their brothers in the open field of the world's activities whenever circumstance has called them forth, without the inheritance, the education, or the experience which the men possess, but morally they can but be as society makes them. There are exceptions to all rules, however; some women as well as some men may be better or worse than the majority of their fellows, and these are the ones who are signalled out by the historian for special attention. The people who are always good and always happy have no history, as there is nothing noteworthy to tell of them, life has no tragedies, all is plain sailing, and the whole story can be told in a few words. In a measure the same thing is true of the ordinary man, be he good or bad, for what can be said of him can be said of a whole class, and so the history of the class may be told, but the individual will always remain in the background.

In the special epoch of Spanish history with which the present chapter is concerned, the twelfth century and the first part of the thirteenth, there is little to say of women in general which cannot be said of the mediæval women of other parts of Europe. Oriental ideas had been introduced to some extent, it is true, by the Moors, but otherwise the general ignorance and dependence of the women of the time call for no special comment. Above this commonplace level there are to be seen, nevertheless, two women who occupied a commanding position in the world, which was quite unusual. They were both queens of Castile, and as one was bad, vain, reckless, and frivolous, so was the other good, unselfish, wise, and dignified. Within the extremes of character which their lives present is traced the measure of a woman's possibilities at that time.

Urraca of Castile, daughter of Constance and King Alfonso VII., inherited little of her mother's devout nature; the world rather than the Church had attracted her, and she began to show at an early age a taste for gallantry and intrigue which became but more pronounced with her maturer years. She was dark rather than fair, with an imperious bearing, she had compelling eyes, and there was a grace in her movements which it was difficult to see without admiring, but she was vain, intent upon conquest, and without an atom of moral firmness, if all accounts be true. Her mother was sorely tried by her waywardness, but did not live long enough to appreciate her real lack of moral instinct; and her father, in spite of his several marriages, which were almost as numerous as those of Henry VIII. of England, was chagrined to find Urraca as his sole heir, no other children having survived. In the hope that France might again furnish material for a dignified alliance as it had done before in sending Constance herself, Alfonso arranged for the marriage of Urraca with Raymond of Burgundy. Urraca was soon left a widow, with one son, Alfonso; and while she apparently felt some affection for this child, she was in no way weaned from her love of excitement, and was soon again the soul and centre of the court's gay revels. One among the throng of courtiers attracted her, the tall Count Gomez of Candespina, and she made no secret of her love for him. As often seen together, they formed a striking pair, and it was not strange that the Castilian nobles should have wished to see them married, in spite of the fact that the prospective bridegroom was not her equal by birth. No one dared to give Alfonso this advice, however, as his refusal was a foregone conclusion, all things being taken into consideration. Finally, the Jewish physician of the court, Don Cidelio, allowing his interest in the affair to get the better of his discretion, ventured to speak to the king about Urraca and her lover. Alfonso, indignant, was so displeased, that Don Cidelio was banished from the court at once, while he arranged forthwith a political marriage which was full of possibilities for Spain's future welfare. Alfonso, in his long reign, which had lasted for forty-three years, had given such a great impetus to the movement of reconquest directed against the Moors, that a strong and capable successor could have completed his work and hastened the final Christian victory by some four hundred years. Alfonso was far-seeing enough to know the possibilities ahead, and it is easy to understand and sympathize with his rage at the mere thought of the dapper, silken Candespina. So the rebellious Urraca, with her heart full of love for Count Gomez, was married, and just before her father's death in 1109, to King Alfonso I., calledel batallador[the battler], and known as the Emperor of Aragon. This union of Castile, Leon, and Aragon would have promised much for the future, if the rulers of this united kingdom could have lived in peace and harmony together. They were so unlike in every way, however, that it was easy to predict trouble. The Battler was a youth of great military skill and great ambition, but he was not a courtier in any sense of the word and could not be compared in Urraca's eyes with her carpet knight, Don Gomez. So she was loath to change her mode of life, and he was in a state of constant irritation at her worldliness; and as a natural consequence of it all, after a year of turmoil and confusion, the two separated.

Content to lose his wife, Alfonso was quite unwilling to lose her broad domain, and consequently Aragonese garrisons were installed in some of the principal Castilian fortresses, while Urraca, a prisoner, was confined in the fortress of Castelar. This was too much for the Castilians to endure; so they at once took up arms in their queen's defence and, furthermore, demanded a divorce on the ground that Urraca and Alfonso were within the proscribed limits of consanguinity, as they were both descended from Sancho the Great, of Navarre. While there was much in the queen's character which the Castilian people could not admire, they had never approved of her marriage with thebatallador, and were only too happy to have this excuse for severing the ties which bound the two countries together. Urraca was rescued from her captivity, and proceeded without delay to annoy her husband in every manner possible. Her honored father's prime minister was deposed and his estates confiscated, Don Gomez was given this high post and treated as an acknowledged favorite, and most shamelessly, and the whole country was shocked. But matters of self-defence were now of first importance to the Castilians, and so they were compelled to overlook her misconduct for the moment and prepare to withstand the irate Alfonso's threatened invasion. He invited Henry, Count of Portugal, the brother of Urraca's first husband,--and her son's guardian,--to aid him in this attack, and together they invaded Castile and inflicted a complete defeat upon Urraca's army at the battle of Sepulveda in the year 1111. The pope, Pascal II., sent a legate, who granted the divorce for which the Castilians had clamored; and Urraca, again a free woman, was now the centre of her own little court, where she soon gathered about her a small company of nobles who were vying with each other to obtain her royal favor. Two among them, Count Gomez of Candespina, and Pedro, a member of the great and powerful Lara family, hoped to marry her, but she coquetted with them all to such good purpose that she succeeded in keeping their good will by leaving them all in uncertainty as to her serious intentions.

At this moment a new element appeared in the settlement of public affairs. For the first time in the history of Spain, the privileged towns and cities, which had been granted special charters by the late Alfonso, Urraca's father, rose in their might and declared that Urraca should be deposed and that her youthful son, Alfonso Ramon, should be crowned in her stead. Seeing this turn of affairs, Henry of Portugal, the young Alfonso's guardian, decided that he might best serve his own interests by siding with the Castilians against the Battler, and he lost no time in making this transfer of his allegiance. Castile and Leon were still harried by the divorced husband, who now had no legal claim upon them, and there was a general consolidation of national interests for the national defence, while the conflicting interests with regard to the succession within the country were at the same time pressing for settlement and producing a state of strife and contention which was little short of civil war. In the midst of it all, Urraca continued to play the wanton, and soon so disgusted the Count of Portugal that he deserted her standard. This he did on the eve of the great battle of Espina, in the year 1112. Urraca still counted upon the devotion of her nobles, but Lara fled from the field, the prime favorite Candespina was killed, and the revengeful husband gained another victory. It was soon evident, however, that Alfonso of Aragon could never meet with complete success in his attempt to subdue Castile, and he wisely gave up the struggle after a few more years of desultory fighting. Urraca was now in a tight place, and in spite of all her arts and wiles she was unable to gather about her again a party strong enough to command respect. Candespina and Lara were no longer by her side, the other nobles had lost patience with her constant intriguing, and the popular party, backed by the towns, soon gained the ascendency, and Urraca was compelled to resign in favor of her son. From this moment she sinks into obscurity, and little more is known of her unhappy and profligate career besides the fact that she came to her end, unregretted, in 1126. According to the ancientLaws of Manu, "it is in the nature of the feminine sex to seek here below, to corrupt men," and Menander has said, sententiously, "where women are, are all kinds of mischief." While no one at the present time, unless he be some confirmed woman-hater, will be so ungallant as to attempt to maintain the truth of these sweeping statements, there must have been, at various times and places in the world, women of the kind indicated, as Queen Urraca of Castile, for example, or these things would never have been said.

The great-grandson of Urraca, Alfonso III. of Castile, received as his heritage the usual complement of strife and warfare which belonged to almost all of the little Spanish monarchies throughout the greater part of the twelfth century; but in the year 1170, arriving at his majority, he entered into a friendly treaty of peace with Aragon, and in that same fortunate year he married the Princess Eleanor, daughter of the English king, Henry II. Apropos of this marriage and its general effect upon the fortunes of Castile, Burke has written the following interesting sentences: "Up to the time of this happy union, the reign of Alfonso III. in Spain had been nothing but a succession of intrigues and civil wars of the accustomed character; but from the day of his marriage in 1170 to the day of his death in 1214, after a reign of no less than fifty-six years, he exercised the sovereign power without hindrance, if not entirely without opposition, within his dominions. If the domestic tranquillity of Castile during four-and-forty years may not be attributed exclusively to the influence of the English queen, yet the marriage bore fruits in a second generation, of which it would be difficult to exaggerate the importance; for it was the blood of the Plantagenets, that flowed in the veins of Berenguela, their daughter, one of the true heroines of Spain."

In this instance, as in the case of the good Constance of Burgundy, we see that Spain has been sobered and steadied by an infusion of foreign blood. Constance, it is true, was a fanatic who cared little for the national desires, and thought little of adapting herself to the national conditions of life, so long as she could further her own ends, which were those of the pope at Rome; and so stern and strict was her view of life, and so rigid was her discipline, that it was impossible for her to reconcile the lighter-minded Spaniards to her mode of thinking. For a short time, by drastic methods, she subdued to some extent the frivolous temper of her people; but she was so unlovable in her ways, and so unloved by the people at large, that the sum total of her influence upon Spanish life, apart from the somewhat questionable advantage which she gave to Rome as the result of her activity, amounted to very little. Even her own daughter, Urraca, in spite of the fact that she undoubtedly inherited more from her father than she did from her mother, was, beyond peradventure, rendered more wayward and more reckless by the mother's narrow view of life. The gracious Eleanor, on the other hand, was more liberal-minded, did everything in her power to get into touch with her subjects, and by her kindliness and strength of character was able to aid her husband in no mean degree in quieting civil discord and in consolidating the interests of the country.

Her daughter Berenguela, brought up in the midst of these influences, developed a strong and self-reliant character which early in her career gave proof of its existence. In accord with that policy which has so often obtained in the monarchies of Europe, it was decided that a foreign alliance with some strong ruling house would redound to advantage; and so great was the prestige of Castile at this time, that Alfonso found no difficulty in arranging a marriage with Conrad, Count of Suabia, the son of the great Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. As might have been expected, this marriage was nothing but a political arrangement which was to benefit Castile, and in which the will of Berenguela, the person most interested, had not been consulted in any manner whatever. It is not on record that Eleanor was opposed to this arrangement for her daughter, not from any lack of independent spirit,--for she came of a self-willed race, as the erratic life of her brother, Richard Coeur de Lion, will show,--but because such marriages were the common lot of the royal maidens of her time and were accepted as matters of necessity. It must be remembered that the ideals of marriage were yet much undeveloped and that "husband" and "lover" were rarely, if ever, synonymous terms. It appears that the emperor not only consented to this marriage between his son and Eleanor's daughter, but was much in favor of the project and more than anxious to see the consummation of it all, as Eleanor had brought Gascony to her husband as a marriage portion, and the prospective inheritance of Berenguela was a goodly one.

Fortunately for Berenguela, the marriage was postponed until she had attained her majority; and when that day of partial freedom came, she boldly declared that she would not marry the German prince, that she did not know him and did not love him, and that nothing could force her to such a bargain of herself. Great was the consternation in her father's court, and great was the dismay in the North when Frederick Barbarossa was told of this haughty Spanish maiden who refused the honor of an alliance with his imperial house. The case was well-nigh unique; the mediæval world was startled in its traditional routine, and Berenguela's audacity became the talk of every court in Europe. Prayers and entreaties were in vain, so firmly did she stand her ground in spite of the countless specious arguments which were used to bend her will, and, finally, the matter was dropped and considered a closed incident. "Woman sees deep; man sees far. To the man the world is his heart; to the woman the heart is her world;" so says Christian Grabbe, and this epigram may well be applied to Berenguela's case. Her heart was her world, and she fought for it, and in her victory she won, not only for herself, but for Spain as well. And it came about in this way. Berenguela was married, and with her own consent, to Alfonso IX., King of Leon, who had of late made war upon her father, and with this marriage and the peace which followed between the two countries, Spain prospered for a time.

This Alfonso of Leon had already made one marriage venture which had come to grief, for he had previously wedded the Princess Teresa of Portugal, and his marriage had been forcibly dissolved by Pope Innocent III., who was then, as Hume puts it, "riding rough-shod over the nations of Christendom." This divorce had been pronounced on the ground that the young couple were too closely related to each other; and as they ventured to resist, they were for a time excommunicated. So Alfonso and Teresa were finally separated, though not until several children had been born to them, and then the young king led Berenguela to the altar. This marriage, in its immediate result, was but a repetition of what had gone before. The pope annulled it promptly on the same grounds of consanguinity, and turned a deaf ear to every plea for reconsideration. The case was not an unusual one; many marriages which were far less regular in form had been sanctioned by this new Roman Cæsar; and the result of the marriage could be but for the benefit of Rome, as domestic peace in Spain gave assurance of more successful opposition to the Moslem rule. But the pope was firm, his holy permission had not been obtained before the marriage had been celebrated, and, piqued at this unintended slight which had been put upon his august authority, he revealed his littleness by this show of spite.

Rebellious under this harsh decree because of its manifest injustice, Alfonso and Berenguela endeavored to hold out against the pontiff, and for seven years they lived together as man and wife, making their home in Leon. Their life was to some degree a happy one together, children were born to them, but ever about their path was the shadow of doubt that was cast by the pope's decree. As a sad and pitiful end to it all, Berenguela, a mother though not a wife, was forced to return to her father's court in Castile, leaving the eldest son, Fernando, with the father. In but one thing had the pope shown any mercy for this wedded pair, and that was when he had consented to recognize the legitimacy of their children; so Fernando could now be considered, without any doubt, as the rightful heir to Leon. Meanwhile, Alfonso III. of Castile, Berenguela's father, had won new laurels at the great battle known as the Navas de Tolosa, where the Moors had suffered a crushing defeat, and Castile was more than ever the leading Spanish power. But soon after Berenguela's arrival, her father went to his long rest, and the crown descended to his oldest son, Enrico, who was but a boy of ten. Queen Eleanor was first intrusted with the administration of affairs, but she soon followed her husband, dying within a month after this power had been conferred upon her, and the regency passed by common consent to the prudent care of Berenguela, who was, according to Hume, "the fittest ruler in all Spain, the most prudent princess in all Christendom." This regency, however, was not a time of peace and quiet, for the death of the old king had given opportunity for the turbulent Lords of Lara to break forth again in open revolt, and after a year of ineffectual resistance Berenguela was compelled, in the interests of domestic harmony, to surrender the person of her young brother into the control of Alvaro Nuñez, the leader of the opposition, who at once began to rule the kingdom with a heavy hand. What Berenguela's fate would have been and what Castile's if this usurper had been allowed to remain for a long time in power is a matter for conjecture, but Alvaro's dreams of success were soon shattered. Through some whim of fate it happened that the young king was accidentally killed one morning as he was at play in the courtyard of the palace, and Berenguela, as the only lawful heir, became the Queen of Castile in her own right. In this trying moment, clear-headed as usual, she gave further proof of her astuteness. She realized that her husband might in some way try to make political capital out of the situation and might try to work in his own interests rather than in those of their son. For the young Fernando, recognized as heir to Leon, would now, as the prospective ruler of Castile, be heir to a larger estate than that of his father, and Alfonso was not a man big enough to rejoice in this fact, as Berenguela well knew. Accordingly, she sent speedy messengers to Alfonso before the news of the death of the young King Enrico had reached him, and asked that her son might come to her for a visit. The invitation was innocent enough, to all appearances, and the request was granted, but no sooner was the young prince safe within the boundaries of Castile than Berenguela called a meeting of the States-General of her kingdom, and there, after having received the homage of her nobles, in the midst of a most brilliant gathering, she announced her intention of abdicating in favor of her son, the heir to Leon. There was some objection to this move, as Berenguela was so universally beloved that all were loath to lose her from the sovereign's chair. She took great pains to point out to them the advantage which would undoubtedly accrue to the country as the result of this prospective union with Leon, assured them that her interests would ever be theirs, and that she would at all times counsel her son and help him in every way within her power; and finally, her will prevailed and the abdication was approved.

Alfonso of Leon was more than irate when he learned of young Enrico's death and realized the meaning of his son's visit to Castile, and he immediately collected a large army and declared war upon his son. Berenguela had foreseen this as the probable result of her course of action and was not entirely unprepared in the emergency. The ultimate peace and prosperity which might come to Spain with the definite union of Castile and Leon were matters of such importance in her eyes that she did not now hesitate to give of her personal wealth, even her jewels, as Isabella did in a later day, to further the interests of the cause for which she was contending. The goodness and sweetness of character possessed by this great queen made such an impression upon all those who came within the circle of her influence, and her cause was so manifestly just, that her troops were filled with the zeal which knows no defeat, and the conflict was a short one. Through Berenguela's diplomatic action the war was brought to an end, harmony was restored between Castile and Leon, and the united armies of the two countries were sent into southern Spain to make further attack upon the Moorish strongholds.

Now comes an interesting moment in the queen's career, the moment when she was planning with all her wisdom for her son's marriage and his future success. The interminable commotion and discord, the vexatious factional quarrels, and the undying hatreds which had been engendered by a long series of Spanish intermarriages, had so filled her with disgust that she determined, now that the union of Castile and Leon was practically complete, to go outside of this narrow circle in her search for a suitable mate for the young King Fernando. Her choice fell upon the Princess Beatrice of Suabia, cousin of the emperor and member of the same house which she had scorned in her younger days. But the Princess Beatrice was fair and good, the young people were eager for the marriage, and there was no good reason why the thing should not be done. Before this wedding, Berenguela decided that her son must be received into the order of knighthood. There was the customary period of courtly ceremony, with games and gay festivals and much feasting, which lasted for several days, and then came the sacred, final rites, which ended with the accolade. The youthful king and would-be knight was taken, all clothed in white, by two "grave and ancient" chevaliers to the chapel of the monastery of Las Huelgas, near the old city of Burgos, and there, having placed his arms piously upon the altar, he passed the night alone, "bestowing himself in orisons and prayers." When the daybreak came, he confessed to a priest, heard matins, and then went to rest and prepare himself for the final scene. When he was at length brought back to the chapel, there was a most imposing company awaiting him, composed of all the knights of Castile and many others from far distant countries who had come to wage war against the Moors; and in the presence of them all, from the sanctified hands of his noble mother, came the magic touch which made a man of him. The next day, in the great cathedral at Burgos, the wedding was celebrated, for the German princess had come to Spain for the function, and there was much pomp and much show of silks and brocades and the glitter of gold and silver was backed by the glitter of steel.

Soon King Fernando was in the saddle again, riding away toward the south, leading a great host of knights, and one Moorish town after another fell into their hands. While besieging Jaen, Fernando learned of his father's death, which had occurred suddenly. Berenguela summoned her son to return with all possible speed, but without waiting for his arrival she set out at once for Leon, thinking that there might be work to do. Nor was she wrong. Alfonso of Leon, jealous of his wife's great renown and his son's growing success, and knowing that the union of Castile and Leon was her most cherished project, deliberately left Leon to his two daughters, Sancha and Dulce, children of his first marriage, with Teresa of Portugal, perfectly sure that their claims could not find adequate legal support, as these children had never been legitimized after the pope's annulment of this marriage, but contented at the thought that he had probably left an inheritance of dispute and possible warfare which might be sufficient to make Bereuguela's plans miscarry. But in this he reckoned without his host. Berenguela conducted her affairs with the utmost discretion, conciliated the Leonese nobility, caused her son to be proclaimed king, and brought about a permanent union of the two countries without the loss of a single drop of blood. Having accomplished this task, her next care was to provide in some suitable way for Alfonso's two daughters. This she was under no obligation to do, but her sense of justice left no other course of conduct open to her. She arranged a meeting with their mother Teresa, who had long since retired to a convent, and, journeying to the Portuguese frontier, at Valencia de Alcantara in Galicia, these two women, each the unwedded wife of the same man, came together to settle the claims of their children to their dead husband's throne. The whole matter was discussed in the most friendly way, and Berenguela was able to carry her point that there should be no attempt to unseat Fernando from the throne of Leon, and at the same time she made a proposition, by way of indemnity, which Teresa, speaking for her daughters, was quite ready to accept. The infantas were given by Fernando a pension of fifteen thousand gold doubloons, in return for which they formally agreed to abandon all claim to Leon, and this pension, under Berenguela's direction, was paid in all faith and honor. In November of the year 1246 this great queen died, and, according to her own direction, she was buried at Burgos "in plain and humble fashion."

No better eulogy of her life and labors can ever be written than that which is found in Burke's history of Spain, and no excuse is needed for giving it in its entirety: Berenguela was one of those rare beings who seems to have been born to do right and to have done it. From her earliest youth she was a leading figure, a happy and noble influence in one of the most contemptible and detestable societies of mediæval Christendom. Married of her own free will to a stranger and an enemy, that she might bring peace to two kingdoms, she was ever a true and loyal wife; unwedded by ecclesiastical tyranny in the very flower of her young womanhood, she was ever a faithful daughter of the Church; inheriting a crown when she had proved her own capacity for royal dominion, she bestowed it on a strange and absent son, with no thought but for the good of her country and of Christendom; and finally, as queen-mother and ever faithful counsellor, she accepted all the difficulties of government, while the glory of royalty was reserved for the king whom she had created. Berenguela was ever present in the right place, and at the proper time, and her name is associated only with what is good and worthy and noble in an age of violence and wrong and robbery; when good faith was well-nigh unknown, when bad men were all-powerful, when murder was but an incident in family life, and treason the chief feature in politics.

In the early days of the thirteenth century, Pedro II. of Aragon had married the somewhat frivolous, yet devout, Maria of Montpellier, whose mother had been a Greek princess of Constantinople; and when a son was born of this marriage, Maria, who foresaw a great future for her child, was most desirous that he should have an Apostolic patron. There was the embarrassment of the choice, however, as Maria did not wish to neglect or cast a slight upon eleven saints while giving preference to one, and, finally, the queen's father confessor, Bishop Boyl, devised the following plan. Twelve tapers, each consecrated to an Apostle, were to be lighted, and the child was to be named in honor of the candle which burned the longest. Southey, in somewhat prolix and doggerel verse, has given the following account of the ceremony:

"The tapers were short and slender too,Yet to the expectant throng,Before they to the socket burnt,The time, I trow, seemed long."The first that went out was St. Peter,The second was St. John,And now St. Mattias is going,And now St. Mathew is gone."Next there went St. Andrew,Then goes St. Philip too;And see, there is an endOf St. Bartholomew."St. Simon is in the snuff,But it is a matter of doubt,Whether he or St. Thomas could be said,Soonest to have gone out."There are only three remaining,St. Jude and the two Saints James,And great was then Queen Mary's hope,For the best of all good names."Great was then Queen Mary's hope,But greater her fear, I guess,When one of the three went out,And that one was St. James the less."They are now within less than quarter inch,The only remaining two.When there came a thief in St James,And it made a gutter too."Up started Queen Mary,Up she sate in her bed,'I can never call him Judas,'She clasped her hands and said.'I never can call him Judas!'Again did she exclaim.'Holy Mother, preserve us!It is not a Christian name.'"She opened her hands and clasped them again,And the infant in the cradleSet up a cry, a lusty cry,As loud as he was able."'Holy Mother, preserve us!'The Queen her prayer renewed,When in came a moth at the window,And fluttered about St. Jude."St. James had fallen in the socket,But as yet the flame is not out,And St. Jude hath singed the silly moth,That flutters so idly about."And before the flame and the molten wax,That silly moth could kill,It hath beat out St. Jude with its wings,But St. James is burning still."Oh, that was a joy for Queen Mary's heart,The babe is christened James,The Prince of Aragon hath got,The best of all good names."Glory to Santiago,The mighty one in war,James he is called, and he shall beKing James the Conqueror."Now shall the Crescent wane,The Cross be set on high,In triumph upon many a mosque,Woe, woe to Mawmetry!"

"The tapers were short and slender too,

Yet to the expectant throng,

Before they to the socket burnt,

The time, I trow, seemed long.

"The first that went out was St. Peter,

The second was St. John,

And now St. Mattias is going,

And now St. Mathew is gone.

"Next there went St. Andrew,

Then goes St. Philip too;

And see, there is an end

Of St. Bartholomew.

"St. Simon is in the snuff,

But it is a matter of doubt,

Whether he or St. Thomas could be said,

Soonest to have gone out.

"There are only three remaining,

St. Jude and the two Saints James,

And great was then Queen Mary's hope,

For the best of all good names.

"Great was then Queen Mary's hope,

But greater her fear, I guess,

When one of the three went out,

And that one was St. James the less.

"They are now within less than quarter inch,

The only remaining two.

When there came a thief in St James,

And it made a gutter too.

"Up started Queen Mary,

Up she sate in her bed,

'I can never call him Judas,'

She clasped her hands and said.

'I never can call him Judas!'

Again did she exclaim.

'Holy Mother, preserve us!

It is not a Christian name.'

"She opened her hands and clasped them again,

And the infant in the cradle

Set up a cry, a lusty cry,

As loud as he was able.

"'Holy Mother, preserve us!'

The Queen her prayer renewed,

When in came a moth at the window,

And fluttered about St. Jude.

"St. James had fallen in the socket,

But as yet the flame is not out,

And St. Jude hath singed the silly moth,

That flutters so idly about.

"And before the flame and the molten wax,

That silly moth could kill,

It hath beat out St. Jude with its wings,

But St. James is burning still.

"Oh, that was a joy for Queen Mary's heart,

The babe is christened James,

The Prince of Aragon hath got,

The best of all good names.

"Glory to Santiago,

The mighty one in war,

James he is called, and he shall be

King James the Conqueror.

"Now shall the Crescent wane,

The Cross be set on high,

In triumph upon many a mosque,

Woe, woe to Mawmetry!"

So Jayme the youth was named, Jayme being the popularly accepted Aragonese form for James, and early in life he entered upon an active career which soon showed him to possess a strong and crafty nature, though he was at the same time brutal, rough, and dissolute. In his various schemes for conquest and national expansion, he stopped at nothing which might ensure the success of his undertakings, and in particular did he attempt by matrimonial ventures of various kinds to increase his already large domain. This rather unusual disregard of the sacredness of the marriage relation, even for that time, may have been induced to some extent by the atmosphere in which he passed his youthful days; for his mother, the devout Queen Maria, in spite of all her pious zeal for the Church, was pleasure-loving, and in the excitement of court life it was whispered that she had looked with favor more than once upon some gallant troubadour from Provence who had written verses in her honor. Jayme's first marriage was with Eleanor of Castile, Berenguela's sister, but when he discovered that the young Castilian king, Fernando, was strong and capable and that there was no possibility whatever of an ultimate union of Aragon and Castile, at least within his own time, he promptly divorced Eleanor, and then wedded Yolande, the daughter of King Andrew of Hungary. Yolande's eldest son, Pedro, was married to Constance, daughter of King Manfred of Sicily, for purely political reasons; and when the King of France opposed this alliance as one detrimental to the best interests of the pope, who was being much aided at this time by Gallican support, Jayme cleverly silenced this complaint by marrying his daughter Isabel to Philip, the French dauphin. This daring King of Aragon had dreams of a great Romance Empire which might extend all over the southern part of Europe, with Aragon as its centre, and it was to this end that he bent all his energies. While he was not able to realize this fond hope, he was remarkably successful; and not a little of his success must be attributed to his lack of sentiment and his practical view of the matrimonial question.

With his conquests and the corresponding prosperity which is to be seen in Castile at the same general period, Christian Spain slowly became the most civilized and enlightened country in all Europe. Spain was rich, there was much culture and refinement, and her artistic manufactures excited the wonder of the world. With the knights who were coming in ever increasing numbers to do battle against the Moors, now that the time of the Crusades had passed, there came a goodly number of the troubadours and minstrels who had recently been driven from Provence by the cruel Simon de Montfort at the time of the Albigensian massacres, and the whole condition of Spanish society was such that the stern simplicity of the early Spaniards quickly disappeared. So great was the craze for poetry and for glittering entertainments and a lavish display of wealth, that Don Jayme felt called upon to take some restraining measures. Aragon, as well as Castile, was filled with the wealth of captured Moorish cities, there was a new sense of national security with each successive Christian victory, luxuries of all kinds were being brought within the reach of the people as the result of a newly aroused spirit of commercialism, and, all in all, to a warlike king, the situation was fraught with danger. Accordingly, Jayme determined to take matters into his own hands, and he proceeded to issue a number of sumptuary laws which were far from mild. Food was regulated, minstrels were not allowed to sit at the same table with ladies and gentlemen, most rigid rules were formulated against the abuse of gold, silver, and tinsel trimmings on the dresses of the women, and of the men as well, and the use of ermine and of all fine and Costly furs was carefully restricted. In Castile the same movement was taking place, and Alfonso X., who followed Fernando, issued similar laws, wherein women were forbidden to wear any bright colors, to adorn their girdles with pearls, or to border their skirts with either gold or silver thread. As in Italy at about the same time, and notably in Florence, extravagant wedding feasts were condemned, no presents of garments were permitted, and the whole cost of a bride's trousseau could not exceed sixty maravedis, a maravedi being a gold coin containing about sixty grains of the yellow metal.

It was in the midst of this brilliant period of national well-being that Spain was called upon to celebrate a wedding festival which far surpassed in magnificence anything that had ever before been seen among the Christians of the peninsula. The sister of King Alfonso X. of Castile, Eleanor, was given in marriage to Edward Plantagenet, the attractive young heir to the English throne, and it was in honor of this event that all Burgos was in gala dress in the month of October, 1254. All were on tiptoe with excitement, crowds thronged into the old cathedral city, and the windows and housetops were black with people, on that eventful day when the stalwart prince rode in through the great gate, with a glittering train of nobles at his back, to claim his bride. Prince Edward was a magnificent specimen of physical manhood, towering almost head and shoulders above his fellows, and the gorgeous entertainments which were prepared for him and his followers gave good opportunity for all to witness his courtly grace and his distinguished bearing. The chronicles of the time are full of the most superlative descriptions of this whole affair, and often they seem lost in wonderment, lacking words with which to describe the scene properly. Before the wedding, in accord with mediæval custom, Edward received knighthood at the hands of King Alfonso. In that same old monastery at Las Huelgas where the youth Fernando had kept his lonely vigil before he had been knighted by his noble mother, Queen Berenguela, the English prince now kept his watch; and when the morning came and he stood, tall and fair, clothed in a robe of white, ready to receive the accolade, before a company of chosen knights and ladies, the scene must have been wonderfully impressive. The bride, Eleanor, had been a great favorite with all her people, of both high and low degree, and all were glad to see that the future seemed to smile upon her.

A worthy companion to the wise Berenguela is found in the person of Maria de Molina, the wife of Sancho IV., called the Ferocious, King of Castile. His reign, which had extended over a period of eleven years, came to a close with his death in the year 1295, and in all that time there had been nothing but discord and confusion, warfare and assassination, as Sancho's claim to the throne had been disputed by several pretenders, and they lost no occasion to harass him by plot and revolution. It may well be imagined, then, that when he died, leaving his throne to his son Fernando, a child of nine, the situation was most perplexing for the queen-mother, who had been made regent, by the terms of her husband's will, until Fernando should become of age. A further matter which tended to complicate the situation was the fact that the marriage between Sancho and Maria had never been sanctioned by the pope, as the two were within the forbidden limits of consanguinity, and he had refused to grant his special dispensation. With this doubt as to her son's legitimacy, Maria was placed in a position which was doubly hard, and if she had not been a woman of keen diplomacy and great wisdom, she would never have been able to steer her ship of state in safety amid so many threatening dangers. Her first care was to induce the pope to grant, after much persuasion, the long-deferred dispensation which legalized her marriage; and this matter settled, she was ready to enter the conflict and endeavor to maintain her rights. The first to attempt her overthrow was the Infante Juan, the young king's uncle, who made an alliance with the Moorish king of Granada and assumed a threatening attitude. Maria sent against him her greatest nobles, Haro, and the Lords of Lara; but she had been deceived in the loyalty of these followers, as they promptly deserted the regent's cause and, with all their men, went over to the insurgents and helped to make more powerful the coalition which was forming against the infant king. For a brief moment Maria was in despair and felt almost ready to yield in the face of the opposition, as the hostile combination now included Portugal, Aragon, Navarre, France, and Granada, and it was their intent to separate the kingdoms of Leon and Castile if possible and undo all that Berenguela had labored so hard and with such success to accomplish. Inasmuch as this was, above all else, a quarrel which concerned the nobility, a contention which had its rise in the jealousy and mutual distrust of several powerful houses, Maria, with a keen knowledge of the situation, and with a sagacity which was rather surprising in a woman untrained in politics or government, decided to win to her side the great mass of the common people, with whom she had always lived in peace and harmony. Her first act was to call a meeting of the Cortes in Valladolid, which was the only city upon which she could depend in this crisis. The Cortes speedily acknowledged Fernando IV. as king, and with this encouragement Maria de Molina set bravely about her arduous task of organization and defence. Few of the nobles rallied to her support, but she soon won over the chartered towns by the liberal treatment she accorded them in matters of taxation and by her protection of the various civic brotherhoods which had been organized by the people that they might defend themselves from the injustice of the nobility, which was now showing itself in countless tyrannical and petty acts. She labored early and late, conducted her government in a most businesslike manner, convoked the Cortes in regular session every year, and by the sheer force of her integrity and her moral strength she finally quelled all internal disturbances and brought back the government to its former strength and solidity. In the year 1300 Fernando was declared king in his own right, at the age of fourteen, and then, for a short time, it looked as if all that the regent had sought to accomplish might suddenly be nullified. The king, inclined to be arrogant, and with his head somewhat turned as the result of his sudden accession to power, was prevailed upon to listen to evil counsellors, who tried in every way to make him believe that Maria had administered her regency with an eye to her own interests, and that much of the revenue which legally belonged to him had been diverted to her own private uses. Fernando, in spite of all his mother's goodness, was simple enough to believe these idle tales, and, in most unfilial and suspecting fashion, he sternly ordered Maria to render up a detailed account of her stewardship during his minority. Maria was much affected by this thoughtless and inconsiderate act, but before she had had time to reply or attempt her own defence in any way, a storm of indignation broke forth from the free towns, and Fernando was informed that he would not be allowed to enter the town of Medina del Campo, where the Leonese Cortes was to be held, unless he restored his mother to favor and brought her with him to the assembly. Fernando knew enough to fear the veiled threat which this communication contained, and the queen-regent appeared with him at the opening of the session. The scene which followed is pathetic in the extreme, and shows the magnanimity and unselfishness of Maria in a most striking manner. She spoke to the members of the Cortes, recalled their former struggles against the encroachments of the nobles, and urged them to prudent action, that there might be no further occasion for domestic strife. Loyalty to country and to king were the keynotes of her speech, and before she had finished, those who had assembled in anger, ready to renounce their allegiance on account of Fernando's shameful treatment of his mother, were now willing to forgive and pardon for that same mother's sake. This point once established and a loyal following secured, Maria proceeded to give in detail that account of her stewardship which had been called for, and she had no trouble in showing that her administration had been above reproach. Then it was that Fernando made public acknowledgment of the fact that he had been led astray by evil-minded advisers; and the Cortes adjourned, faithful to the king and more than ever devoted to his mother. At Fernando's death in 1312, Maria de Molina was again called to the regency, so great was her reputation for wisdom and fair play; and when she ended her public career, in 1324, all hastened to do honor to her memory, and she was called Maria the Great, a title which has never been bestowed upon any other queen-regent in Spain. Her reputation for goodness was unchanged by the lapse of time, her goodness stands approved to-day, and two dramatists, Tirso de Molina and Roca de Togores, have depicted her as a heroine in their plays.

Under the reign of Alfonso XI., Castile was rent by two factions, one in support of the king's wife, Maria of Portugal, and the other friendly to his beautiful mistress, Leonora de Guzman. When a youth of seventeen, Alfonso had fallen captive to the charms of the fair Leonora; but his grandmother, Maria de Molina, actuated by political motives, had forced him to marry the Infanta Maria of Portugal. What might have been expected came to pass: Maria was the queen in name, but Leonora was the queen in fact. After three years had passed and no heir to the throne had been born, Alfonso threatened to plead his kinship as a reason and get a divorce; but Leonora, anticipating the trouble into which this might plunge the country, as Alfonso was eager to marry her as soon as the divorce should have been granted, urged him not to bring about this separation and did all in her power to make him abide by the arrangement which had been made for him. Nevertheless, in spite of the fact that two sons were finally born to Maria and the succession was assured, Leonora was by far the most influential woman in the kingdom, and was in every way better fitted to rule as queen than the neglected Maria. Leonora had her court and her courtiers, and had not only the love but the respect and confidence of the king, and exercised a considerable interest in affairs of state for a space of twenty years. So established was her position at the court, that she was allowed unhindered to found an order of merit, whose members wore a red ribbon and were called Caballeros de la Banda. This order was for the promotion of courtesy and knightly behavior, as it seems that there was still much crudity of manner in Castile; and according to Miss Yonge, the ceremonious Arabs complained that the Castilians were brave men, but that they had no manners, and entered each other's houses freely without asking permission. Finally, after the battle of Salado in 1340, which was a great triumph for Alfonso and the Christians, the king was induced to part definitely with his mistress. Maria, the true wife, had long been jealous of her power and had lost no opportunity to bring about her downfall. In the course of their long relationship Leonora had borne ten children to the king, and her beauty, if accounts be true, was in no way impaired; but, as he grew older, Alfonso could see more clearly the complications which might ensue if he persisted in this double course; and so, with a heavy heart, he consented to the separation, but not without having given to Leonora the well-fortified city of Medina-Sidonia, while her children were so well provided for that the royal revenues were sadly depleted. With the death of Alfonso in 1350 came the opportunity which Queen Maria had long since sought in vain, an opportunity for revenge. Leonora was summoned to Seville, that Maria might consult with her with regard to the interests of her children; and when the one-time mistress showed some disinclination to accept this invitation and gave evident signs of distrust, two noblemen of Maria's following pledged their honor for her safety. Assured by this show of good faith, Leonora went to Seville as she had been summoned, but no sooner had she entered the walls of the city than she was made a prisoner at Maria's order, dragged about in chains after the court, which was travelling to Burgos, and finally she was sent to Talavera, where she met an ignominious death at the hands of a servant, who cruelly strangled her. Strange to say, this act caused no special comment at the time, for, in spite of Leonora's general popularity, her influence had been of such incalculable harm to Maria and her followers in more ways than one, that their revenge was taken somewhat as a matter of course. Maria, however, in this display of savagery, had done more than she had anticipated; for, although she had continually tried to excite her son to this revenge upon her rival, her desire for bloody satisfaction had been satisfied at Leonora's death, and she now tried to have Pedro treat Leonora's sons as his own brothers, but all to no purpose. Young Pedro was cruel by nature; the early training which he had received from her hands had in no way softened him, and as a natural result, when he came to the throne and became his own master, he soon made himself known and feared by his many terrible and wicked deeds; and so marked did this fierce trait of character appear, that he was ever known as Pedro the Cruel, much to his mother's shame.

"If you ever feel disposed, Samivel, to go a-marryin' anybody,--no matter who,--just you shut yourself up in your own room, if you've got one, and pison yourself off-hand,"--such was the sententious advice of the elder Weller, as recorded by Charles Dickens in the immortal pages of thePickwick Papers; and investigation will show that in all literatures, from the earliest times, similar warnings have been uttered to men who contemplated matrimony. A Tuscan proverb says: "in buying horses and in taking a wife, shut your eyes tight and commend yourself to God;" and a sage of Araby has remarked: "Before going to war, say a prayer; before going to sea, say two prayers; before marrying, say three prayers;" but the majority of men since the world began have been content to close their eyes tightly or utter their three prayers and take the goods the gods provide. Pedro the Cruel was no exception to this rule, and his capricious ventures in search of married bliss would fill many pages. According to Burke, "he was lawfully married in 1352 to the lady who passed during her entire life as his mistress, Maria de Padilla; he was certainly married to Blanche of Bourbon in 1353; and his seduction, or rather his violation, of Juana de Castro was accomplished by a third profanation of the sacrament, when the Bishops of Salamanca and Avila, both accessories to the king's scandalous bigamy, pronounced the blessing of the Church upon his brutal dishonor of a noble lady." Whether Pedro was ever married to Maria de Padilla is still an open question, but, if not his wife, she was his mistress for many years and had great power over him. The details of all this life of intrigue are somewhat confused, but enough is known to make it clear that Pedro was as cruel in love as in war and politics.

The queen-mother, ignorant of her son's marriage to Maria de Padilla, or deciding to ignore it, prevailed upon Pedro to ask for the hand of Blanche, the daughter of the Duke of Bourbon, and sister to Jeanne, wife to Charles, the heir of France. His request was granted, and the king sent his half-brother, the Master of Santiago, one of Leonora's sons, to fetch the bride to Spain. While this journey was being made, Pedro fell in love with one of the noble ladies in waiting of Doña Isabel of Albuquerque, and so great was his passion for this dark-eyed damsel that it was with difficulty that he could be prevailed upon to leave her and go to greet the French princess when she finally arrived in Valladolid. But he tore himself away, went to Blanche, and was married with great pomp and ceremony. Some had said before the marriage that Maria de Padilla must have bewitched Pedro, so great was his infatuation; and three days after the wedding a strange thing happened, which caused people to shake their heads again and suggest the interference of the powers of sorcery. For, after this short time, Pedro rode away from Valladolid and his new queen and went to Montalvao, where Maria de Padilla was waiting to receive him. Just what had happened, it is somewhat difficult to discover, and the story is told that the king, listening to scandalous talk, was made to believe that his royal messenger and half-brother, Fadrique, had played the rôle of Sir Tristram as he brought the lady back, and that she had been a somewhat willing Isolde. There were others who said that Blanche, knowing the king's volatile disposition and of his relations with the notorious Maria, had endeavored upon the eve of her marriage to seek aid from the arts of magic in her effort to win the love of her husband, and had obtained from a Jewish sorcerer a belt which she was told would make Pedro faithful, kind, and true. But the story goes on to say that this wizard had been bribed by Maria de Padilla; and when the king tried on the girdle which his wife presented, it forthwith was changed into a hideous serpent, which filled him with such disgust that he could no longer bear the sight of her. Don Alfonso of Albuquerque, who had first introduced Pedro to Maria de Padilla, now tried to take her away from him, in the hope that he might be prevailed upon to return to his wife, the unfortunate Blanche. This so angered the king that he resolved upon Don Alfonso's death, and if it had not been for the timely warning given by Maria, this gentleman would certainly have been assassinated. This action on Maria's part, however, was the occasion for a fresh outburst of anger; and Pedro left, wooed Doña Juana de Castro in stormy fashion, and induced her to marry him, on the statement that he had made a secret protest against Blanche and that the pope would soon annul this marriage. Thomas Hardy has said that the most delicate women get used to strange moral situations, and there must have been something of this in Juana's makeup, or she would never have been forced into so shameful a position; but, however that may be, she was made to rue the day, as the king left her the next morning for Maria, his Venus Victrix, and never went to see her again, although he gave her the town of Duefias and allowed her to be addressed as "queen." The chronicles of the time tell of the remarkable beauty of Maria and of the adulation she enjoyed in the heyday of her prosperity. As an instance of the extreme gallantry of the courtiers, we are informed that, with King Pedro, it was their custom to attend the lovely favorite at her bath and, upon her leaving it, to drink of its water.

The fate of Blanche was still hanging in the balance. Pedro, on leaving her so abruptly, had left orders that she be taken to his palace at Toledo, but Blanche, fearing to trust herself to his power, tried to slip from his grasp and finally succeeded in doing so. Arrived in Toledo, she asked permission, before entering the palace, to go to the cathedral, for mass; and once within the walls of the sanctuary, she refused to go back to her guards, demanded the right of protection which the churches had always possessed in the Middle Ages, and, finally, told her story with such dramatic effect, that the clergy crowded about her, the nobles unsheathed their swords and swore to uphold her cause, and a revolution was begun which soon assumed great proportions and so frightened Pedro that he consented to take back his wife and send away the baleful Maria. For four years his nobles kept stern watch over him, and he was never allowed to ride out of his palace without a guard of a thousand men at his heels, so fearful were they that he might break away from them, surround himself again with evil counsellors, and recommence his career of wantonness and crime. Their efforts were at last of no avail, as he eluded his followers one day upon a hunting expedition, through the kindly intervention of a heavy fog, rode off to Segovia, ordered his mother, who had been exercising a practical regency during this period, to send him the great seal of state, and then he proceeded to wreak vengeance upon all those who had been instrumental in his humiliation. Blanche was sent to prison at Medina-Sidonia on a trumped-up charge, was shamefully treated during the time of her captivity, and died in 1359, in the same year that Maria de Padilla, discredited and cast aside, also found rest in death. Pitiful as these stories are, they serve to show that women, even at this time, when Spain was the seat of learning and refinement for all Europe, were but the servants of their lords and masters, and that passion still ran riot, while justice sat upon a tottering seat.

In Aragon, near the close of this fourteenth century, similar scenes of cruelty were enacted, although the king, Juan I., cannot be compared for cruelty with the infamous Pedro. Burke has said that if Pedro was not absolutely the most cruel of men, he was undoubtedly the greatest blackguard who ever sat upon a throne, and King Juan was far from meriting similar condemnation. Sibyl de Foix, his stepmother, had exercised so strange and wonderful a power over his father, that when Juan came to the throne he was more than eager to turn upon this enchantress and make her render up the wide estates which the late king had been prevailed upon to leave to her. It is actually asserted that Juan charged Sibyl with witchcraft and insisted that she had bewitched his father and that she had all sorts of mysterious dealings with Satan and his evil spirits. Whatever the truth may have been, the unhappy queen only escaped torture and death by surrendering all of the property which had been given her. Juan was by no means a misogynist, however, for he was noted for his gallantry, and his beautiful queen, Violante, was surrounded by a bevy of court beauties who were famed throughout all Christendom at this time. Juan's capital at Saragossa was the talk of all Europe. It became famed for its elegance, was a veritable school of good manners and courtly grace, and to it flocked poets and countless gentlemen who were knightly soldiers of fortune, only too willing to serve a noble patron who knew how to appreciate the value of their chivalry. Violante was the acknowledged leader of this gay and brilliant world; at her instigation courts of love are said to have been established, and in every way did she try to reproduce the brilliant social life which had been the wonder and admiration of the world before Simon de Montfort had blighted the fair life of Provence. More than ever before in Spain, women were put into positions of prominence in this court; and so great was the poetic and literary atmosphere which surrounded them, that they were known more than once to try their hands at verse making. Their attempts were modest, however, and no one has ever been tempted to quote against them Alphonse Karr's well-known epigram: "A woman who writes, commits two sins: she increases the number of books, and she decreases the number of women;" for they were content, for the most part, to be the source of inspiration for their minstrel knights. Violante's gay court was looked upon with questioning eye, however, by the majority of her rude subjects, and, finally, when the sum demanded from the Cortes each year for the maintenance of this brilliant establishment continued to increase in a most unreasonable manner, the Cortes called a halt, Violante was obliged to change her mode of life, and the number of her ladies in waiting was reduced by half, while other unnecessary expenses were cut in proportion.

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