in state-counsels during the last two or three years of Philip II.; and was then appointed by Philip III. to the Presidency of the Council of Castille, an office nearly corresponding to that of Lord Chancellor. All the testimonies of the time agree in paying a high tribute to his integrity, truth and justice, prudence and equity;* and praise him for his wise discernment and promotion of well-deserving men to public offices of trust. He retired by his own free choice after eight years of this last service, to attend without further distraction to the care of his soul, finding some warnings of decline and decay. "I have seen," he said, “that greatness, like the sea, shews fairest at a distance; when one is in it, or on it, one feels its heavings and tossings up and down." He went down to his estate, and visited the sanctuary of Aguilera, a convent of Franciscan Observants, where he had built a little chapel, designing it for the place of his own burial; and within this chapel he passed some hours alone, as if taking possession of the ground, which was to guard his mortal part till the world's last day. He was soon afterwards confined to his bed, made his confession with a light conscience; for he had done his part as a true public servant, and found nothing in his heart to reproach him with any abuse of power; and peacefully resigned his spirit to his Maker, Sept. 4, 1608.

* A pleasing picture of his influence in Council may be seen in a State Paper published in Gonzalez's Coleccion, Madr. 1829. Vol. ii. 288, from the Archives of Simancas.

was so far from having made himself rich by any of his employments, that his executors, finding no ready money available, were obliged to pawn a portion of his plate to pay his funeral expenses.

*

Philip III., who seems to have learnt rather too late that this honest statesman had rather exhausted than increased his property in the discharge of his duties, conferred upon him not long before his death the title of Duke of Peñaranda, with a pension of six thousand ducats, which he continued to his widow for her life.

(85.) Contarini, the Venetian ambassador, does justice to the character of Miranda; and he also gives the following very pleasing character of Andres de Prada, one of the Secretaries of State :

"The Secretary Prada is charged with the despatches of France, Flanders, England, and Germany. I have not often conversed with him; but all that I have seen of him agrees with what I have heard. He is a man of a perfectly christian spirit; he has had much practice in business of state from the times of John of Austria and the Duke of Alva; capable of dealing with a variety of matters, and of very pleasing conversation; pure and free from all self-interest. He is not a man of much courage or animation; on the contrary, his manner is timid, but not so as to appear embarrassed with the weightiness of any business. It goes far with him if you plead for anything * Davila, Grandezas, 379-382.

as a matter of conscience, and press it earnestly with him. He has not much hand in what is done, but has much credit, and is extremely beloved by all the people."*

He died in 1611. The king sent a message to him a short time before his death, expressing his heart-felt sorrow that he was to lose so good a minister, and desiring him to consider in what way he could shew him favour. "I humbly thank him," said De Prada, "but I look for no more favour to be shewn me in this world. I hope for it from my heavenly King." Philip, however, finding that he had left two kinsmen of his name, gave some remunerative offices to both.t

(86.) There was a strange mixture of little courtintrigues, and games of cross-purposes, plots and counterplots, amidst the more serious business of the state. The ladies sometimes managed these things better than the gentlemen. Magdalen de la Cerda, Marchioness del Valle, was the widow of a grandson of Hernando Cortes, the famous conqueror of Mexico. She had apartments assigned to her in her widowhood in the royal palace, and the privilege of communicating and conversing with the queen, without asking any minister's leave. After three or four years she appears to have been suspected of some correspondence with some political enemies of the Duke of Lerma, or of the worthless Pedro de Franqueza, who was yet in * Contarini, 571. + Cabrera, 443.

favour. She was told to consider herself a prisoner, and was carried off to a fortress, San Torcaz, near Alcala, where the Princess of Eboli had once been confined. All her papers were seized and sealed up for examination.* She was afterwards removed to Simancas, with her cousin Anna de Mendoza. The ladies were confined in separate apartments, and an alcayde from the court came to take down their confessions. "No," said the Marchioness, "I will say nothing, unless it be in the presence of the king himself, or the Count of Miranda. Otherwise, how do I know that the king will hear the truth of what I say?" The king's confessor maintained that there was reason in this; that their Majesties ought to hear her.+ The duke was puzzled. The process was delayed. After a while the ladies were removed to Logroño, and allowed to live as prisoners at large in a convent there, but a lady was in attendance to prevent their writing or receiving any letters. The relaxation went a little further. The Marchioness was told she might choose her own place of residence, only the restraint was to continue. She answered with some spirit, "If she was at liberty she would go where she pleased, but if she was still a prisoner, she had no wish about it but to go wherever the king might determine." At length the odious Franqueza was disgraced, and she returned, after three or four years of exile, fully restored to favour with the king and the duke, and * Cabrera, 45, 201, 202. + Id. 213, 218.

occupied her old apartments in the palace. While she was under this long restraint she worked a great number of altar-clothes for poor churches in the mountain district near Burgos.* All's well that ends well; but it is a curious picture of a despotic government in its milder features, and also a proof how little can be effected by it without doing violence to the common impressions of justice under even such a government.

(87.) At another time Francisco de Mendoza, Marquis of Guadaleste, and a near kinsman of the Duke of Infantado, was under prosecution from some displeasure he had given. The Duke came to the council-board. It was not very usual, though it appears to have been a matter of right, for the grandees to attend these judicial committees. "Sir Duke," said the President, Juan de Acuña, "if you come again, do not come girded with your sword, but leave it at the door." The next day the Duke came, using his sheathed sword as a walking-stick. "You see," he said, "that I am a gouty subject, so I must have my old support." So he continued till the suit was ended. The Marquis, and Antonio de Herrera, the famous historian, and another gentleman, were sentenced not to come within fifteen leagues of the court, unless they had the king's special leave, and they were to swear never to reveal the cause for which they had been confined. Poor little arts of shamefaced tyranny! *Cabrera, 242, 338.