The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Volume III Part 31

The testament, as finally arranged, settled the succession of Aragon and Naples on his daughter Joanna and her heirs. The administration of Castile during Charles's absence was intrusted to Ximenes, and that of Aragon to the king's natural son, the archbishop of Saragossa, whose good sense and popular manners made him acceptable to the people. He granted several places in the kingdom of Naples to the infante Ferdinand, with an annual stipend of fifty thousand ducats, chargeable on the public revenues. To his queen Germaine he left the yearly income of thirty thousand gold florins, stipulated by the marriage settlement, with five thousand a year more during widowhood. [33] The will contained, besides, several appropriations for pious and charitable purposes, but nothing worthy of particular note. [34] Notwithstanding the simplicity of the various provisions of the testament, it was so long, from the formalities and periphrases with which it was enc.u.mbered, that there was scarce time to transcribe it in season for the royal signature. On the evening of the 22d of January, 1516, he executed the instrument; and a few hours later, between one and two of the morning of the 23d, Ferdinand breathed his last. [35] The scene of this event was a small house belonging to the friars of Guadalupe. "In so wretched a tenement," exclaims Martyr, in his usual moralizing vein, "did this lord of so many lands close his eyes upon the world." [36]

Ferdinand was nearly sixty-four years old, of which forty-one had elapsed since he first swayed the sceptre of Castile, and thirty-seven since he held that of Aragon. A long reign; long enough, indeed, to see most of those whom he had honored and trusted of his subjects gathered to the dust, and a succession of contemporary monarchs come and disappear like shadows. [37] He died deeply lamented by his native subjects, who entertained a partiality natural towards their own hereditary sovereign.

The event was regarded with very different feelings by the Castilian n.o.bles, who calculated their gains on the transfer of the reins from such old and steady hands into those of a young and inexperienced master. The commons, however, who had felt the good effect of this curb on the n.o.bility, in their own personal security, held his memory in reverence as that of a national benefactor. [38]

Ferdinand's remains were interred, agreeably to his orders, in Granada. A few of his most faithful adherents accompanied them; the greater part being deterred by a prudent caution of giving umbrage to Charles. [39] The funeral train, however, was swelled by contributions from the various towns through which it pa.s.sed. At Cordova, especially, it is worthy of note, that the marquis of Priego, who had slender obligations to Ferdinand, came out with all his household to pay the last melancholy honors to his remains. They were received with similar respect in Granada, where the people, while they gazed on the sad spectacle, says Zurita, were naturally affected as they called to mind the pomp and splendor of his triumphal entry on the first occupation of the Moorish capital. [40]

By his dying injunctions, all unnecessary ostentation was interdicted at his funeral. His body was laid by the side of Isabella's in the monastery of the Alhambra; and the year following, [41] when the royal chapel of the metropolitan church was completed, they were both transported thither. A magnificent mausoleum of white marble was erected over them, by their grandson, Charles the Fifth. It was executed in a style worthy of the age.

The sides were adorned with figures of angels and saints, richly sculptured in bas-relief. On the top reposed the effigies of the ill.u.s.trious pair, whose t.i.tles and merits were commemorated in the following brief, and not very felicitous inscription.

"MAHOMETICAE SECTAE PROSTRATORES, ET HAERETICAE PERVICACIAE EXTINCTORES, FERNANDUS ARAGONUM, ET HELISABETA CASTELLAE, VIR ET UXOR UNANIMES, CATHOLICI APPELLATI, MARMOREO CLAUDUNTUR HOC TUMULO." [42]

King Ferdinand's personal appearance has been elsewhere noticed. "He was of the middle size," says a contemporary, who knew him well. "His complexion was fresh; his eyes bright and animated; his nose and mouth small and finely formed, and his teeth white; his forehead lofty and serene; with flowing hair of a bright chestnut color. His manners were courteous, and his countenance seldom clouded by anything like spleen or melancholy. He was grave in speech and action, and had a marvellous dignity of presence. His whole demeanor, in fine, was truly that of a great king." For this flattering portrait Ferdinand must have sat at an earlier and happier period of his life. [43]

His education, owing to the troubled state of the times, had been neglected in his boyhood, though he was early instructed in all the generous pastimes and exercises of chivalry. [44] He was esteemed one of the most perfect hors.e.m.e.n of his court. He led an active life, and the only kind of reading he appeared to relish was history. It was natural that so busy an actor on the great political theatre should have found peculiar interest and instruction in this study. [45]

He was naturally of an equable temper, and inclined to moderation in all things. The only amus.e.m.e.nt for which he cared much was hunting, especially falconry, and that he never carried to excess till his last years. [46] He was indefatigable in application to business. He had no relish for the pleasures of the table, and, like Isabella, was temperate even to abstemiousness in his diet. [47] He was frugal in his domestic and personal expenditure; partly, no doubt, from a willingness to rebuke the opposite spirit of wastefulness and ostentation in his n.o.bles. He lost no good opportunity of doing this. On one occasion, it is said, he turned to a gallant of the court noted for his extravagance in dress, and laying his hand on his own doublet, exclaimed, "Excellent stuff this; it has lasted me three pair of sleeves!" [48] This spirit of economy was carried so far as to bring on him the reproach of parsimony. [49] And parsimony, though not so pernicious on the whole as the opposite vice of prodigality, has always found far less favor with the mult.i.tude, from the appearance of disinterestedness, which the latter carries with it. Prodigality in a king, however, who draws not on his own resources, but on the public, forfeits even this equivocal claim to applause. But, in truth, Ferdinand was rather frugal, than parsimonious. His income was moderate; his enterprises numerous and vast. It was impossible that he could meet them without husbanding his resources with the most careful economy. [50] No one has accused him of attempting to enrich his exchequer by the venal sale of office, like Louis the Twelfth, or by griping extortion, like another royal contemporary, Henry the Seventh. He ama.s.sed no treasure, [51] and indeed died so poor, that he left scarcely enough in his coffers to defray the charges of his funeral. [52]

Ferdinand was devout; at least he was scrupulous in regard to the exterior of religion. He was punctual in attendance on ma.s.s; careful to observe all the ordinances and ceremonies of his church; and left many tokens of his piety, after the fas.h.i.+on of the time, in sumptuous edifices and endowments for religious purposes. Although not a superst.i.tious man for the age, he is certainly obnoxious to the reproach of bigotry; for he co-operated with Isabella in all her exceptionable measures in Castile, and spared no effort to fasten the odious yoke of the Inquisition on Aragon, and subsequently, though happily with less success, on Naples. [53]

Ferdinand has incurred the more serious charge of hypocrisy. His Catholic zeal was observed to be marvellously efficacious in furthering his temporal interests. [54] His most objectionable enterprises, even, were covered with a veil of religion. In this, however, he did not materially differ from the practice of the age. Some of the most scandalous wars of that period were ostensibly at the bidding of the church, or in defence of Christendom against the infidel. This ostentation of a religious motive was indeed very usual with the Spanish and Portuguese. The crusading spirit, nourished by their struggle with the Moors, and subsequently by their African and American expeditions, gave such a religious tone habitually to their feelings, as shed an illusion over their actions and enterprises, frequently disguising their true character, even from themselves.

It will not be so easy to acquit Ferdinand of the reproach of perfidy which foreign writers have so deeply branded on his name, [55] and which those of his own nation have sought rather to palliate than to deny. [56]

It is but fair to him, however, even here, to take a glance at the age. He came forward when government was in a state of transition from the feudal forms to those which it has a.s.sumed in modern times; when the superior strength of the great va.s.sals was circ.u.mvented by the superior policy of the reigning princes. It was the dawn of the triumph of intellect over the brute force, which had hitherto controlled the movements of nations, as of individuals. The same policy which these monarchs had pursued in their own domestic relations, they introduced into those with foreign states, when, at the close of the fifteenth century, the barriers that had so long kept them asunder were broken down. Italy was the first field, on which the great powers were brought into anything like a general collision. It was the country, too, in which this crafty policy had been first studied, and reduced to a regular system. A single extract from the political manual of that age [57] may serve as a key to the whole science, as then understood.

"A prudent prince," says Machiavelli, "will not, and ought not to observe his engagements, when it would operate to his disadvantage, and the causes no longer exist which induced him to make them." [58] Sufficient evidence of the practical application of the maxim may be found in the manifold treaties of the period, so contradictory, or, what is to the same purpose for our present argument, so confirmatory of one another in their tenor, as clearly to show the impotence of all engagements. There were no less than four several treaties in the course of three years, solemnly stipulating the marriage of the archduke Charles and Claude of France.

Louis the Twelfth violated his engagements, and the marriage after all never took place. [59]

Such was the school in which Ferdinand was to make trial of his skill with his brother monarchs. He had an able instructor in his father, John the Second, of Aragon, and the result showed that the lessons were not lost on him. "He was vigilant, wary, and subtile," writes a French contemporary, "and few histories make mention of his being outwitted in the whole course of his life." [60] He played the game with more adroitness than his opponents, and he won it. Success, as usual, brought on him the reproaches of the losers. This is particularly true of the French, whose master, Louis the Twelfth, was more directly pitted against him. [61] Yet Ferdinand does not appear to be a whit more obnoxious to the charge of unfairness than his opponent. [62] If he deserted his allies when it suited his convenience, he, at least, did not deliberately plot their destruction, and betray them into the hands of their deadly enemy, as his rival did with Venice, in the league of Cambray. [63] The part.i.tion of Naples, the most scandalous transaction of the period, he shared equally with Louis; and if the latter has escaped the reproach of the usurpation of Navarre, it was because the premature death of his general deprived him of the pretext and means for achieving it. Yet Louis the Twelfth, the "father of his people," has gone down to posterity with a high and honorable reputation. [64]

Ferdinand, unfortunately for his popularity, had nothing of the frank and cordial temper, the genial expansion of the soul, which begets love. He carried the same cautious and impenetrable frigidity into private life, that he showed in public. "No one," says a writer of the time, "could read his thoughts by any change of his countenance." [65] Calm and calculating, even in trifles, it was too obvious that everything had exclusive reference to self. He seemed to estimate his friends only by the amount of services they could render him. He was not always mindful of these services. Witness his ungenerous treatment of Columbus, the Great Captain, Navarro, Ximenes,--the men who shed the brightest l.u.s.tre, and the most substantial benefits, on his reign. Witness also his insensibility to the virtues and long attachment of Isabella, whose memory he could so soon dishonor by a union with one every way unworthy to be her successor.

Ferdinand's connection with Isabella, while it reflected infinite glory on his reign, suggests a contrast most unfavorable to his character. Hers was all magnanimity, disinterestedness, and deep devotion to the interests of her people. His was the spirit of egotism. The circle of his views might be more or less expanded, but self was the steady, unchangeable centre.

Her heart beat with the generous sympathies of friends.h.i.+p, and the purest constancy to the first, the only object of her love. We have seen the measure of his sensibilities in other relations. They were not more refined in this; and he proved himself unworthy of the admirable woman with whom his destinies were united, by indulging in those vicious gallantries, too generally sanctioned by the age. [66] Ferdinand, in fine, a shrewd and politic prince, "surpa.s.sing," as a French writer, not his friend, has remarked, "all the statesmen of his time in the science of the cabinet," [67] may be taken as the representative of the peculiar genius of the age. While Isabella, discarding all the petty artifices of state policy, and pursuing the n.o.blest ends by the n.o.blest means, stands far above her age.

In his ill.u.s.trious consort Ferdinand may be said to have lost his good genius. [68] From that time his fortunes were under a cloud. Not that victory sat less constantly on his banner; but at home he had lost

"All that should accompany old age, As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends."

His ill-advised marriage disgusted his Castilian subjects. He ruled over them, indeed, but more in severity than in love. The beauty of his young queen opened new sources of jealousy; [69] while the disparity of their ages, and her fondness for frivolous pleasure, as little qualified her to be his partner in prosperity, as his solace in declining years. [70] His tenacity of power drew him into vulgar squabbles with those most nearly allied to him by blood, which settled into a mortal aversion. Finally, bodily infirmity broke the energies of his mind, sour suspicions corroded his heart, and he had the misfortune to live, long after he had lost all that could make life desirable.

Let us turn from this gloomy picture to the brighter season of the morning and meridian of his life; when he sat with Isabella on the united thrones of Castile and Aragon, strong in the love of his own subjects, and in the fear and respect of his enemies. We shall then find much in his character to admire; his impartial justice in the administration of the laws; his watchful solicitude to s.h.i.+eld the weak from the oppression of the strong; his wise economy, which achieved great results without burdening his people with oppressive taxes; his sobriety and moderation; the decorum, and respect for religion, which he maintained among his subjects; the industry he promoted by wholesome laws and his own example; his consummate sagacity, which crowned all his enterprises with brilliant success, and made him the oracle of the princes of the age.

Machiavelli, indeed, the most deeply read of his time in human character, imputes Ferdinand's successes, in one of his letters, to "cunning and good luck, rather than superior wisdom." [71] He was indeed fortunate; and the "star of Austria," which rose as his declined, shone not with a brighter or steadier l.u.s.tre. But success through a long series of years sufficiently, of itself, attests good conduct. "The winds and waves," says Gibbon, truly enough, "are always on the side of the most skilful mariner." The Florentine statesman has recorded a riper and more deliberate judgment in the treatise, which he intended as a mirror for the rulers of the time. "Nothing," says he, "gains estimation for a prince like great enterprises. Our own age has furnished a splendid example of this in Ferdinand of Aragon. We may call him a new king, since from a feeble one he has made himself the most renowned and glorious monarch of Christendom; and, if we ponder well his manifold achievements, we must acknowledge all of them very great, and some truly extraordinary." [72]

Other eminent foreigners of the time join in this lofty strain of panegyric. [73] The Castilians, mindful of the general security and prosperity they had enjoyed under his reign, seem willing to bury his frailties in his grave. [74] While his own hereditary subjects, exulting with patriotic pride in the glory to which he had raised their petty state, and touched with grateful recollections of his mild, paternal government, deplore his loss in strains of national sorrow, as the last of the revered line, who was to preside over the destinies of Aragon, as a separate and independent kingdom. [75]

FOOTNOTES

[1] Mariana, Hist. de Espana, tom. ii. lib. 29, cap. 21.--Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 8, cap. 45, 47. 834.

[2] Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 10, cap. 55, 69.--Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist. 531.

[3] Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist. 486.--Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 3, cap. 7.--Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 10, cap. 2.--Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, lib. 3, p. 288.

[4] Opus Epist., epist. 487.--Pulgar, Sumario, p. 201.

[5] Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, lib. 3, p. 289.--Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 3, cap. 7, 8.--Ulloa, Vita di Carlo V., fol. 38.--Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist. 498.--Pulgar, Sumario, p. 201.

[6] Mariana, Hist. de Espana, tom. ii. lib. 30, cap. 14.--Giovio, Vitae Ill.u.s.t. Virorum, pp. 290, 291.--Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 3, cap. 7, 8, 9.--Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 10, cap. 28.--Quintana, Espanoles Celebres, tom. i. pp. 328-332.--Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. rey 30, cap. 20.--Pulgar, Sumario, pp. 201-208.

[7] Carbajal, a.n.a.les, MS., ano 1509.--Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 10, cap. 55.

[8] They are detailed with such curious precision by Martyr,--who is much too precise, indeed, for our pages,--as to leave little doubt of the fact.

Opus Epist., epist. 531.

[9] Carbajal, a.n.a.les, MS., ano 1513, et seq.--L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 188.--Gomez, De Rebus Gestis, fol. 146.--Sandoval, Hist.

del Emp. Carlos V., tom. i. p. 27.

"Non idem est vultus," says Peter Martyr of the king in a letter dated in October, 1513, "non eadem facultas in audiendo, non eadem lenitas. Tria sunt illi, ne priores resumat vires, opposita: senilis aetas; secundum namque agit et s.e.xagesimum annum: uxor, quam a latere nunquam abigit: et venatus coeloque vivendi cupiditas, quae illum in sylvis detinet, ultra quam in juvenili aetate, citra salutem, fas esset." Opus Epist., epist.

529.

[10] Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 10, cap. 93, 94.--Carbajal, a.n.a.les MS., ano 1515.--Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist. 550.

[11] Zurita, a.n.a.les, tom. vi. lib. 10, cap. 96.--Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. rey 30, cap. 23.--Giovio, Vitae Ill.u.s.t. Virorum, p. 292.

[12] Giovio Vitae Ill.u.s.t. Virorum, pp. 271, 292.--Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 3, cap. 9.--Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist. 560.-- Carbajal, a.n.a.les, MS., ano 1515.--Garibay, Compendio, tom. ii. lib. 20, cap. 23.--Pulgar, Sumario, p. 209.

[13] See a copy of the original letter in the Chronica del Gran Capitan, (fol. 164.) It is dated Jan. 3d, 1516, only three weeks before Ferdinand's death.

[14] Peter Martyr notices the death of this estimable n.o.bleman, full of years and of honors, in a letter dated July 18th, 1515. It is addressed to Tendilla's son, and breathes the consolation flowing from the mild and philosophical spirit of its amiable author. The count was made marquis of Mondejar by Ferdinand, a short time before his death. His various t.i.tles and dignities, including the government of Granada, descended to his eldest son, Don Luis, Martyr's early pupil; his genius was inherited in full measure by a younger, the famous Diego Hurtado de Mendoza.

[15] The following inscription is placed over them.

"_GONZALI FERNANDEZ DE CORDOVA_,

Qui propria virtute Magni Ducis nomen Proprium sibi fecit, Ossa, Perpetuae tandem Luci rest.i.tuenda, Huic interea tumulo Credita sunt; Gloria minime consepulta."

[16] Navagiero, Viaggio, fol. 24.

On the top of the monument was seen the marble effigy of the Great Captain, armed and kneeling. The banners and other military trophies, which continued to garnish the walls of the chapel, according to Pedraza, as late as 1600, had disappeared before the eighteenth century; at least we may infer so from Colmenar's silence respecting them in his account of the sepulchre. Pedraza, Antiguedad de Granada, fol. 114.--Colmenar, Delices de l'Espagne, tom. iii p. 505.

[7] Chronica del Gran Capitan, lib. 3, cap. 9.--Giovio, Vitae Ill.u.s.t.

Virorum, fol. 292.

Gonsalvo was created duke of Terra Nuova and Sessa, and marquis of Bitonto, all in Italy, with estates of the value of 40,000 ducats rent. He was also grand constable of Naples, and a n.o.bleman of Venice. His princely honors were transmitted by Dona Elvira to her son, Gonzalo Hernandez de Cordova, who filled the posts, under Charles V., of governor of Milan, and captain general of Italy. Under Philip II., his descendants were raised to a Spanish dukedom, with the t.i.tle of Dukes of Baena. L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 24.--Ulloa, Vita di Carlo V., fol. 41.--Salazar de Mendoza, Dignidades, p. 307.

[18] Opus Epist., epist. 498.--Giovio, Vita Magni Gonsalvi, p. 292.-- Pulgar, Sumario, p. 212.