duke joined his affectionate uncle in camp, much to that eminent relative's discomfiture. Philip gave alternately conflicting instructions to Farnese—sometimes that he should encourage the natural jealousy between the pair; sometimes that he should cause them to work harmoniously together for the common good—that common good being the attainment by the King of Spain of the sovereignty of France.

But it was impossible, as already intimated, for Mayenne to work harmoniously with his nephew. The Duke of Guise might marry with the infanta and thus become King of France by the grace of God and Philip. To such a consummation in the case of his uncle there stood, as we know, an insuperable obstacle in the shape of the Duchess of Mayenne. Should it come to this at last, it was certain that the Duke would make any and every combination to frustrate such a scheme. Meantime he kept his own counsel, worked amiably with Philip, Parma, and the young duke, and received money in overflowing measure, and poured into his bosom from that Spanish monarch whose veterans in the Netherlands were maddened by starvation into mutiny.

Philip's plans were a series of alternatives. France he regarded as the property of his family. Of that there could be no doubt at all. He meant to put the crown upon his own head, unless the difficulties in the way should prove absolutely insuperable. In that case he claimed France and all its inhabitants as the property of his daughter. The Salic law was simply a pleasantry, a bit of foolish pedantry, an absurdity. If Clara Isabella, as daughter of Isabella of France, as grandchild of Henry II., were not manifestly the owner of France—queen-proprietary, as the Spanish doctors called it—then there was no such thing, so he thought, as inheritance of castle, farm-house, or hovel—no such thing as property anywhere in the world. If the heiress of the Valois could not take that kingdom as her private estate, what security could there ever be for any possessions public or private?

This was logical reasoning enough for kings and their counsellors. There was much that might be said, however, in regard to special laws. There was no doubt that great countries, with all their livestock—human or otherwise—belonged to an individual, but it was not always so clear who that individual was. This doubt gave much work and comfortable fees to the lawyers. There was much learned lore concerning statutes of descent, cutting off of entails, actions for ejectment, difficulties of enforcing processes, and the like, to occupy the attention of diplomatists, politicians and other sages. It would have caused general hilarity, however, could it have been suggested that the live-stock had art or part in the matter; that sheep, swine, or men could claim a choice of their shepherds and butchers.

Philip—humbly satisfied, as he always expressed himself, so long as the purity of the Roman dogmas and the supremacy of the Romish Church over the whole earth were maintained—affected a comparative indifference as to whether he should put the crown of St. Louis and of Hugh Capet upon his own grey head or whether he should govern France through his daughter and her husband. Happy the man who might exchange the symbols of mutual affection with Philip's daughter.

The king had various plans in regard to the bestowal of the hand thus richly endowed. First and foremost it was suggested—and the idea was not held too monstrous to be even believed in by some conspicuous individuals—that he proposed espousing his daughter himself. The pope was to be relied on, in this case, to give a special dispensation. Such a marriage, between parties too closely related to be usually united in wedlock, might otherwise shock the prejudices of the orthodox. His late niece and wife was dead, so that there was no inconvenience on that score, should the interests of his dynasty, his family, and, above all, of the Church, impel him, on mature reflection, to take for his fourth marriage one step farther within the forbidden degrees than he had done in his third. Here is the statement, which, if it have no other value, serves to show the hideous designs of which the enemies of Philip sincerely believed that monarch capable.

"But God is a just God," wrote Sir Edward Stafford, "and if with all things past, that be true that the king ('videlicet' Henry IV.) yesterday assured me to be true, and that both his ambassador from Venice writ to him and Monsieur de Luxembourg from Rome, that the Count Olivarez had made a great instance to the pope (Sixtus V.) a little afore his death, to permit his master to marry his daughter, no doubt God will not leave it long unpunished."

Such was the horrible tale which was circulated and believed in by Henry the Great of France and by eminent nobles and ambassadors, and at least thought possible by the English envoy. By such a family arrangement it was obvious that the conflicting claims of father and daughter to the proprietorship of France would be ingeniously adjusted, and the children of so well assorted a marriage might reign in undisputed legitimacy over France and Spain, and the rest of the world-monarchy. Should the king decide on the whole against this matrimonial project, should Innocent or Clement prove as intractable as Sixtus, then it would be necessary to decide among various candidates for the Infanta's hand.

In Mayenne's Opinion the Duke of Guise was likely to be the man; but there is little doubt that Philip, in case these more cherished schemes should fail, had made up his mind—so far as he ever did make up his mind upon anything—to select his nephew the Archduke Ernest, brother of the Emperor Rudolph, for his son-in-law. But it was not necessary to make an immediate choice. His quiver was full of archdukes, any one of whom would be an eligible candidate, while not one of them would be likely to reject the Infanta with France on her wedding-finger. Meantime there was a lion in the path in the shape of Henry of Navarre.

Those who disbelieve in the influence of the individual on the fate of mankind may ponder the possible results to history and humanity, had the dagger of Jacques Clement entered the stomach of Henry IV. rather than of Henry III. in the summer of 1589, or the perturbations in the world's movements that might have puzzled philosophers had there been an unsuspected mass of religious conviction revolving unseen in the mental depths of the Bearnese. Conscience, as it has from time to time exhibited itself on this planet of ours, is a powerful agent in controlling political combinations; but the instances are unfortunately not rare, so far as sublunary progress is concerned, in which the absence of this dominant influence permits a prosperous rapidity to individual careers. Eternal honour to the noble beings, true chieftains among men, who have forfeited worldly power or sacrificed life itself at the dictate of religious or moral conviction—even should the basis of such conviction appear to some of us unsafe or unreal. Shame on the tongue which would malign or ridicule the martyr or the honest convert to any form of Christian faith! But who can discover aught that is inspiring to the sons of men in conversions—whether of princes or of peasants— wrought, not at risk of life and pelf, but for the sake of securing and increasing the one and the other?

Certainly the Bearnese was the most candid of men. It was this very candour, this freedom from bigotry, this want of conviction, and this openness to conviction, that made him so dangerous and caused so much anxiety to Philip. The Roman Church might or might not be strengthened by the re-conversion of the legitimate heir of France, but it was certain that the claims of Philip and the Infanta to the proprietorship of that kingdom would be weakened by the process. While the Spanish king knew himself to be inspired in all his actions