the Duke That he could never hope to find a fairer occasion of recovering the possession of his Estates from which his Father had been driven by Francis the First and the Duke on his side prevailed so far with Philip the Second that the Treaty was concluded a little while after at Chateau-Cambresis It is easie to judge of the grief of Don Carlos at the breaking of the Truce and how great his joy was when the Negotiation of a Peace was reassumed and yet this Peace which seemingly gave such seasonable grounds for his hopes was that which at last proved their utter destruction During the time of the Negotiation Philip the Second was made a Widower by the death of Mary Queen of England his Second Wife and being obliged by several weighty considerations to a Third Marriage he demanded for himself the Princess that had before been promised to his Son The French would doubtless much rather have given her to the Heir of the Crown who was much of the same age with her then to a Prince old enough to have been her Father and by whom she could have none but younger Children and by consequence incapable of inheriting the Crown but all things considered he could not handsomely be refused Though this news was like the stroak of a Thunder-bolt to poor Don Carlos who was told it at first before a great deal of company yet he was enough Master of himself to hinder any body from taking notice of the grief it caused in him but the violence he did himself cost him dear when he was alone All his thoughts were nothing but the continual inspirations of Love and Rage But the trouble he was in not permitting him to resolve upon nor the present state of his fortune to undertake any thing that might ease his mind his Despair was insensibly turned into Melancholly and from thence proceeded that reserved way of living which rendred him so odious to the King his Father who never once dreaming of the true cause of his discontent and judging of his Son by himself did attribute it to the impatience he thought this young Prince might have of Reigning As for Madam though what she felt in her self for Don Carlos was rather a disposition to love him then a true and well established passion yet the fear she had that there was something more in it then as yet she apprehended made her have an unspeakable distrust of her self Till then she had an extreme curiosity to know the effect her Picture had produced upon the Prince nay and she had desired sometimes that his heart if it were possible might in that respect enjoy less quiet then her own But as soon as she knew the change that was happened in their fortune she feared nothing in the world so much as to be lov'd by him What pleasure soever there be to be thought handsome she wish'd that what all people said of her charms had been false In this difference of thoughts her mind not having all the tranquillity necessary to bring her handsomely off in an Action so hard for a person in her circumstances as her first arrival at the Court of Spain was she stopp'd her journey as long as she could have the least appearance of an excuse and though the Duke D' Alva had marri'd her in his Masters name in the moneth of June she did not leave Paris till the end of November She staid to see all the fine Houses that were in her way and did not come into the Province of Aquitane till the year was ready to expire as if those delays could have done that in her heart that her own reason was not capable of doing When she was at the Pyrenaean Mountains Fortune that sometimes pleases her self in bestowing her favours upon those that least expect them helped her to one stop more then ever she had hoped for Anthony of Bourbon King of Navar was charged with the conduct of the Princess into Spain and he was to remit her upon the Frontier into the hands of the Cardinal of Burgos and the Duke De l' Infantado This King possessed onely the lower Navar because the Upper had been usurped from his Wives Great Grandfather by the Spaniards but yet not to prejudice the right he pretended to upon them both he would not acknowledge the place that at that time separated his Dominions from those of the King of Spain for the true Spanish Frontier but he required a declaration from the Deputies that the Delivery he should make of the Princess in that place should in no way hurt his pretensions The Declaration was of too great consequence to be accorded without express order and therefore they were forced to write to Madrid and expect His Majesty's answer in the place where they were Philip would have been glad to have been spared this trouble by the Court of France and that this Commission had been given to some body else rather than to the King of Navar But the Princes of the House of Guise at that time the new and absolute Masters of all Affairs had their particular reasons for keeping the Princes of the Bloud as much as they could from approaching the Court or the King's Person and their design being onely to seek out fair pretensions so to do they were ravish'd to find so plausible an one of delivering themselves from him that troubled them the most In short the King of Spain saw himself oblig'd either quickly to satisfie the King of Navar '◠demand or else to bring the business to a Negotiation to obtain of the Court of France that he might be called back and another sent in his place This last way seem'd to be of an insupportable length for a Prince that was in expectation of the most lovely person in the world for his Wife Wherefore this great Polititian satisfied for that time his amorous impatience to the prejudice of his Interests and wrote to his Deputies to grant the King of Navar his demand Presently after the Queen began her Journey to Madrid and was met upon the way by Don Carlos who was accompanyed besides many other considerable persons by his Cousin Alexander Farnese the young Prince of Parma and by Rui Gomez de Silva Prince of Eboli his Governour and the King 's great Favourite At the first news the Queen had of the Prince's coming such opposite sentiments did raise themselves in her mind and did agitate her with so much violence that she fell into a 〈◊〉 in her Womens arms and could not be brought to her self till Don Carlos was ready to ask leave to salute her After the first civilities these two illustrious Persons taken up with the mutual consideration of each other left off speaking and the rest of the company holding their peace out of respect there was for some time a silence extraordinary enough in such an occasion Don Carlos was not shap'd according to the exactest rules of Symmetry but
DON CARLOS OR AN HISTORICAL RELATION OF The Unfortunate Life and Tragical Death of that Prince of SPAIN Son to PHILIP the II d. Written in French Anno 1672. and newly Englished by H. I. LONDON Printed by T. N. for Hen. Herringman at the Blew Anchor in the Lower Walk of the New Exchange and John Crump at the Three Bibles in St. Pauls Church-yard 1674. TO THE LADY ELLIS Wife to the RIGHT WORSHIPFUL Sir WILLIAM ELLIS Baronet Madam BEing lately necessitated to pass some dayes in a place where I had but little Company and less Diversion I resolved to spend my idle houres in Translating this Relation of the Misfortunes of poore Don Carlos It was Written by a Person of Honour and one that pretends to have a particular insight into the Spanish History Yet least his Authority should not seem sufficient in some dubious passages he backs it with that of the most Famous Writers of the last Age. His Design as you may see by his own Advertisement was chiefly to Vindicate the Queen of Spaine's Vertue from the Aspersions that had been cast upon it by some Malicious Pens and mine is no other then to divert you and by this small testimony of my Affection to Assure You that I am MADAM Your most Humble and most Obedient Servant H. J. Advertisement of the AUTHOR ALl Historians of the last Age that make mention of the unfortunate Prince of Spain who is the subject of this Treatise do also speak of his Love for his Mother-in-Law and as people are always apt to put an evil interpretation upon things of that nature his Passion hath done some wrong to the reputation of that vertuous Queen The Authour of this Book having found in divers places the particularities of their History thought himself obliged to communicate them to the Publick because they justifie the memory of that Princess and make it appear that there was nothing but what was very innocent on her side Though she had done nothing else but discover the Conspiracy whereof you shall see the recital she had well deserved to have some care taken of her glory because it is certainly true that without her the Prince of Navarre had never come to be the greatest King in the world and to say something more to his honour Grandfather to Lewis the Fourteenth This History is taken out of all the Authors Spanish French Italian and Dutch which have written of those times in which it hapned The principal are Thuanus Monsieur Aubigné Brantome Cabrera Campana Adriani Natalis Comes Dupleix Mathieu Mayerne Mezerai le Laboureur Sur Castelnau Strada Meteren The History of Don John of Austria the Elogies of F. Hilarion de Coste The Spanish Book of the Deeds and Sayings of Philip the Second A Relation of the Death and Obsequies of his Son c. It is likewise collected out of several Pieces pertaining to History as well Manuscripts as Printed and amongst the rest out of a little Book intituled Diogenes which treats largely of this matter and a Manuscript written by Monsieur de Peresese expresly upon that subject However for the Reader 's farther satisfaction I have set down in the Margent of the most particular and extraordinary places the principal Authors out of which they were taken DON CARLOS Or An Historical Relation of the Vnfortunate Life and Tragical Death of that Prince of Spain Son to Philip the Second WHen the Emperour Charls the Fifth resolved to quit the Government of the Empire and to retire himself into a solitary way of living fearing to leave his Son exposed to the good fortune of Henry the Second of which himself had already felt the effects he concluded with that Prince a Truce for the five first years of his Son's Reign Amongst other Propositions for a Peace between the two Crowns which were made during this Truce was proposed the Marriage of Don Carlos Prince of Spain and onely Son of Philip the Second and Mary of Portugal his first Wife with Madam Elizabeth the Eldest Daughter of France This Princess was very young but wonderfully accomplish'd for a person of her age And as this Marriage was resolv'd upon with great joy on both sides as soon as it was proposed she could not chuse but conceive a very great esteem for him that was destin'd to be her Husband her young heart finding in that occasion a suitable object to fix it self upon did much please it self in the thoughts of it and she did by degrees insensibly ingage her self in an inclination which though altogether innocent did afterwards prove more troublesome blesome to her vertue then ever she thought it would The Prince of Spain was no less contented then she with his hoped for happiness and as all that people said to him concerning Madam gave him a very lovely Idea of her person he abandon'd himself with pleasure to all those thoughts of love and desire which that Idea inspir'd him withall The Princess's Picture which according to the custome was sent him by the King of France finished that conquest in him which the reputation of her beauty had already begun Those that brought it said it was extremely like her and Don Carlos easily believ'd them in a thing he so much desired might be true When he considered this Picture there was no way that he would not willingly have tried to let Madam know the thoughts he had of her He could by no means endure that she should be ignorant of the joy which the hopes of possessing her fill'd him with Sometimes he was even asham'd of the excess of his good fortune and could almost have been contented to allow himself the time of winning the Princess's heart by his merits and services rather then to obtain her by the common ways but knowing that to be an impossible thing he thought he should be well enough satisfi'd if he could but at least acquaint her with the diversity of his thoughts In the mean time the face of affairs was wholly changed by a sudden and unexpected breach of the Five years Truce the Princes of the House of Lorrain or those that at the sollicitation of Paul the Fourth brought about this rupture The Pope's aim was by raising troubles in Flanders to free himself from the Duke D' Alva who had the command of a Spanish Army and had for some time kept him as it were block'd up within the Walls of Rome One part of his design which was the diversion of the Spanish Arms succeeded according to his desire but in Flanders he found more opposition where the French lost two Battels in which the greatest part of their most valiant men were either kill'd or taken prisoners and which reduc'd their affairs to so ill a a condition that they resolv'd speedily to buy a Peace at what price soever This Peace was the work of the Duke of Savoy General of the Spanish Army and of the Constable of Montmorency his Prisoner The Constable represented to
him an account on the King's part of the news they had received from Granada This Minister entertain'd him so late that the Prince seeing he had not night enough left to go so far as he desired before his flight could be discover'd thought it his best way to put it off till the morrow Rui Gomez retir'd himself after he had seen him in bed but being ignorant of the change of his resolution he set some of his most faithful and resolute men at all the avenues of the Prince's apartment It had been to be wish'd for the King's justification that Don Carlos had been taken in attempting to escape But when they had waited two or three hours without seeing any appearance of his coming out the King resolved to pass on not thinking that he ought to hazard all things for a formality Don John had observed the manner in which his chamber door was shut and whilst Don Carlos was yet at the Queen's chamber the King had commanded the maker of that extraordinary Lock to spoil the spring of it some how or other that so it might no more shut so close but that it might be open'd on the outside Whatsoever this Workman could do the spring made a great noise in opening but the Count of Lerma whom the King made enter first into the room found the unfortunate Prince sleeping so soundly that he had the leisure to take away the Swords and Pistols that were under his bolster without waking of him After this the Count sate down upon a Coffer that stood by his bed-side and in which Don John thought the Fire-arms were kept Then the King judging by the Count of Lerma's silence that he had done what he ought to do entred himself into the Chamber preceded by Rui Gomez the Duke of Feria the Great Commander and Don Diego de Corduba all armed with Swords and Pistols The Prince being awakened with much ado by Rui Gomez as soon as he had opened his eyes cried out that he was dead The King told him That all they did was for his good But Don Carlos seeing that he seized on a Box full of Papers that was under his bed entred into so furious a despair that he was going to throw himself all naked as he was into a great Fire pan full of Coals which the extremity of the cold had obliged his servants to leave lighted in his chimney They were fain to draw him from it by force and he appeared inconsolable that he had not had the time to smother himself in it They presently unfurnish'd his Chamber and in stead of so many magnificent things which they took out of it they put into it for its onely furniture a scurvy Groundpallet None of his Officers after that time ever appeared in his presence His Guards never let him go out of their sight They caused a mourning Suit to be made for him and he was no more waited upon but by men clothed in the same dress and who were unknown to him This unfortunate Heir of so many Crowns saw no more any thing about him which did not represent to his eyes the frightful image of death In the mean time the King saw the designs and intelligence of his Son by the Papers which he had seized He was astonished at the greatness of the danger he had run but he was yet more touched when amongst several Letters of the Queens Hand-writing he found one which appeared to him the most Passionate and most Amorous in the world It was that which the Marquess of Posa had carried to Alcala and which Don Carlos would never be perswaded to restore As the Queen had written it in the first transport of her grief for the Mortal Accident that had befallen that Prince she did not think any consequence could be drawn from what she could say to a Man whose life was despaired of or that it could produce any other consequence then to make him die more contentedly So that she had abandon'd her self to all her tenderness in writing it and had in it expressed the dearest and most secret Sentiments of her heart with all the violence that so lamentable an occasion could inspire Yet it was without any Passionate expressions that could interest her honour or so much as offend her Duty But the King drew very different consequences from it The fury he conceived for it was at first accompanyed with so lively a grief that it would perhaps have bereaved him of his Life if the desire of revenge so natural in those occasions had not preserved it But reflecting presently in himself That he was Master of those that had so cruelly offended him this agreeable thought made a barbarous joy succeed to the rage he had in his Soul which changed his tormenting despair into a tranquility full of horrour The same day Monteigni was clapt in prison to leave some time after his head upon a scaffold and the Marquis of Bergh in favour of Rui Gomez his ancient friend had leave to poison himself The intimacy of these Two Noble-men with Don Carlos was known to all the world They were both as well as he declared enemies of the Cardinal Spinosa Inquisitor General and this Enmity was enough in Spain to make a man suspected for his Religion They accused this Prelate to be the Authour of all those violent Counsels that the King had taken against their country but the Cardinal accused them themselves of having made several Packets of Calvin's Catechismes he brought out of France by the help of a Passport from Don Carlos All the passionate proceedings of this Prince against the Inquâ—sitors about the will of Charles the fifth were not as yet forgotten All these things joyned together did strangely dispose the people to believe the Innocent Prince engaged in the new opinions of which he had never so much as heard any body speak The King saw well that there was nothing but Religion that could make so strange an action as that he had done be endured He doubted not but that with these favorable dispositions and the proofs he had of his Son's intelligences he could if he would Sacrifice him with impunity to his revenge In this belief he put into the hands of the Cardinal Spinosa all the Originals he had found in Don Carlos his Cabinet excepting onely the Queen's Letters He established the Inquisitors Sovereign Judges between his Son and him and he protested he would wholly refer himself to their Judgment He knew that the choler of that sort of people never dies and that he should find their resentment against the Prince as violent after several years of interval since their quarrel as if it had been but a week before Although the King had made rigorous prohibitions to write of the imprisonment of Don Carlos into Forreign Countries the news of it was soon spread abroad The most part of the Princes of Christendom begg'd his pardon the Empress especially
the Queen and considering what was the pleasure of seeing her he well perceived he should never resolve to see her no more In this thought he went and gave her an account of what had passed between the Deputies and him and of the project he had formed He askt her pardon a thousand times over for being able to think for some moments that he could live absent from her but the Queen who aimed at nothing but to cure him of his passion obliged him notwithstanding his resistance to pursue his design of the expedition into Flanders and to make him resolve upon it the more easily she represented to him That this Voyage would dissipate the ill-humour the King was in through his suspicion of their affection and that so being less observed at his return and more considerable and absolute by reason of the glory he would doubtlessly acquire they might live together with less inquietude Don Carlos partly perswaded by these reasons but much more by the blind obedience he had sworn to the Queen in all things declared himself openly in favour of the Nobility of the Low-Countries to the great scandal of the Inqu sitors who held them to be almost all infected with Heresie and who had not yet forgotten the business of Charles the Fifth's Will. He made the King be told That if he would give him the Government of these Provinces he would be an werable to him upon his Life for their O edience It would be difficult to express to what a degree Rui Gomez and the Duke d'Alva were allarm'd at this design The Authority that an employment of that consequence was like to give to the Heire of the Crown appeared to them to be their evident ruine They judg'd That at his return from this expedition in which he would infallibly have good success this Prince would be his Fathers first Minister and that by consequence they must depend upon him The Duke d'Alva above all who had the same pretensions with Don Carlos engaged Rui Gomez who was more familiar with the King than he to make him consider How much this enterprise would raise his Son above him in the hearts of the Flemmings Perez without seeming to act by consent with them put him also in fear of the strait League which Don Carlos would doubtless make with France by the meanes of the Queen if he were once Master of the Low-Countries These Advertisements made all the impression they were capable of making upon the mind of a Prince naturally jealous of his Authority and fearful of his Sons Ambition The King thought no more of any thing but how to refuse Don Carlos with a good grace and so that he might not take his refusal for an affront He made him be told That he granted his Request and that he was ravisht that they had both hapned upon the same intention but that he was resolved to go himself establish him in Flanders and that they would shortly go away together for that design that it would not be handsome for him to live securely in Spain and in the mean time to expose his onely Son to the accidents of so fu ious a Rebellion and that he would share the danger with him and afterwards let him reap all the Glory The noise of this Voyage was immediately spread abroad into all parts by reason of the preparations the King made for it to deceive Don Carles yet no body could believe it In the mean time how groundless soever this noise appeared it filled the minds of the Rebels yet wavering with terror and the King to confirm it more and more made so considerable an Expence in Equipages that even Bergh and Monteigni who had laught at it till then cu st no longer doubt of its t uth The Queen and Don Carlos were at first cheated by appearances as well as the others but they undeceived themselves sooner then any When the Equipages were finisht the King who saw that people would soon be disabus'd if he began not his Journey could find no other expedient to excuse his stay but the feigning to be sick This pretence wrought its effect pretty well in the Countries afar off but what care soever he took to make his sickness be believed in his Court and what constraint soever this poor Prince brought himself under to live after a manner that might confirm the opinion he had a mind to give of himself he could never deceive his Wife and his Son In this conjuncture one day that a great deal of company that had been with the Queen and had discoursed a long time about the Kings Voyage into Flanders were gone out Don Carlos Don John and the Princess of Eboli being left alone with her at first they made an observation altogether How Courtiers do often torment themselves to divine the Causes and effects of that which shall never be After having some time laughed at those that had spoken of the Voyage Don Carlos came insensibly to laugh at the Voyage it self and at the violence the King did himself to counterfeit the sick Man He said That Charles the Fifth had made Voyages enough for himself and his Son too and that the King would repose both for himself and his Father The Queen did not hear these words because she was obliged to talk privately with some persons that had business with her In the mean time while Don John and the Princess of Eboli talked softly together Don Carlos in a pensive posture set himself to make a little Book in which he wrote these words in Capital Letters upon the first page The great and admirable Voyages of King Philip and in every one of the other pages of the Book he wrote one of the following Titles The Voyage from Madrid to the Escurial The Voyage from the Escurial to Toledo from Toledo to Madrid from Madrid to the Aranjuez from the Aranjuez to the Pardo from the Pardo to the Escurial And after this manner he filled the whole Book with the Kings Voyages to his Houses of Pleasure and to some of the greatest Townes in Spain The Queen could not keep her self from laughing at this imagination of the Prince how dangerous soever she thought it but as she read this paper one came to tell her that the King was newly fallen into a swoon and that he was very ill At this news she had onely the leisure to recommend the Book to Don Carlos The Prince who would needs follow her as soon as might be contented himself to throw it into a little Closet of which he shut the door after him He knew not that the Princess of Eboli had false Keys to all the Queen's Locks He was hardly out of the room but she seized upon his writing and when she had seen what it was she was extremely glad to have in her hands so considerable a means of prejudicing him in the King's mind The first thing she thought of was how she
rose up briskly at these words and askt his Guards Whether the Bath in which he was to die were ready The King whether it were the longer to feed his eyes with this barbarous Spectacle or that perhaps he was a little shaken and sought how he might handsomly render himself asked him If he had nothing else to say to him The Prince who would willingly have redeemed what he had done at the price of a thousand other lives well perceiving that it was now too late to husband any thing either for him or the Queen could not forbear answering once for all with all his natural fierceness If some persons said he for whom my Complaisance ought not to end but with my life had not obliged me to see you I should not have been guilty of the Cowardise of asking you pardon and I should have dyed more gloriously then you live The King retir'd himself after this Answer without shewing any disturbance Don Carlos put himself in the Bath and having caused the Veines of his Armes and Legs to be opened he commanded all that were present to withdraw Afterwards taking into his hand a Picture of the Queen in Miniature which he alwayes wore about his neck and which had been the first occasion of his Love he remained with his eyes fixed upon that fatal Image till the cold convulsions of death surprized him in that contemplation and his Soul being already half gone out of his body with his Blood and Spirits he lost insensibly his sight and then his life The time of his death is not precisely known It is only known that it arrived a great while before it was published There was a long Relation of his Sickness printed which they said was a Malignant Dysentery caused by his disorders The Grief of the People and the despair of the Princes Domesticks brake out so loudly that the most passionate Historians have not dared to dissemble it The Count of Lerma whom the King had intrusted with the oversight of Don Carlos whilst he was in prison had conceived so extraordinary a Friendship for him that he appeared inconsolable to the eyes of all the Court The King to whom these regrets were but so many reproaches took that way he thought most certain to make them cease He recompenced magnificently all Don Carlos his Servants He gave the Government of Calatrava to the Count of Lerma and made him Gentleman of his Bed-chamber It was well seen that these Liberalities were not grounded upon any gratitude for the affection they testified for Don Carlos nevertheless the People diminished nothing of their eagerness to honour this Princes Memory And it being known that the King designed to make his Obsequies with an extraordinary Magnificence the Town of Madrid demanded that they might be permitted to be at the Expence of them and that all the care of performing them might be left to them Though the King foresaw that this Funeral would be accompanyed with Elegies which would not be very honourable for the Enemies of the dead Man he durst not refuse their Petition The Historians of his time do particularly extol the tranquility of mind that he made appear upon the day of that Pompe when looking from a Window of his Pallace upon the disposition and march of the Ceremony he decided upon the place a difficulty that was raised concerning the Precedency of the different Councils of State that were there present The two Sons of the Emperor that were then at the Court of Spain were the close Mourners When they were come near the Church the Cardinal Spinosa who went before them immediately after the Body took leave of them and retired himself under pretence of a pain that took him in his head But as he was known for the most dangerous and most irreconcileable Enemy Don Carlos had ever had there were several Voices heard crying round about him That he could not suffer the presence of the Prince neither dead nor living The first thing exposed to sight was that famous Encomium of the Scripture for a dead Man which was written in great Letters of Gold over the Church-porch He hath been ravisht from us for fear least the Malice of the Age should have chang'd his heart and least his mind should have been seduced by flattery All that an ingenious grief can invent to ease it self was employed in the proud Mausoleum where this Prince was Interred But as all those Ornaments had a reference to the Latin Inscription that served him for an Epitaph it sufficeth to give the sence of that Inscription to make the Invention and design of the whole Pomp be comprehended To the eternal Memory of Charles Prince of the Spaines of both the Sicilies of the Gaules Belgick and Cisalpine heir of the New World incomparable in greatness of Soul in Liberality and in love for the Truth Thus it was that the elevated Genius and heroical inclinations of the unfortunate Don Carlos were at last represented under their proper names of Virtues after having been so long disguised by his enemies under those of Vices During the time that the King kept Don Carlos his death secret he resolved to make the news of it be told to the Queen at the time she should be in Travel He hoped that so sensible a trouble of mind joyned to that of her body in the condition she was in would finish his revenge but he quickly knew that she was better informed then he desired And as she could not be ignorant that Don Carlos had been sacrificed to his Father's jealousie she did not at all constrain her self to hide the resentment she had of it Her just anger cast her Husband into new inquietudes He thought he had much to fear from her wit and courage but yet more from the extraordinary consideration the Court of France had for her and the streight correspondence she held with the Queen her Mother A few months after the Prince's death the Dutchess d' Alva who had one of the chiefest Offices in the Queen's House came one morning into her chamber with a Potion in her hand The Queen told her That she was well and would not take it But the Dutchess going about to force her to it the King who was not far off came in at the noise of their contest At first he blamed the Dutchess for her peremptoriness but this woman having represented so him that the Physicians judged this remedy necessary for the Queen 's happy lying in he rendred himself to their authority He told the Queen with great sweetness that because this Medicine was of so great importance she must needs take it Because you will have it so answered she to him I am contented He went immediately out of the Chamber and some time after came back clothed in deep Mourning to know how she did But whether it were that there was some mistake in the Composition of the Drink