ver whom he was one day to preside. Yet his visit to the Netherlands
had not been attended with the happiest results. He evidently did not
make a favorable impression on the people. The more they saw of him, the
less they appeared to like him. Such impressions are usually reciprocal;
and Philip seems to have parted from the country with little regret.
Thus, in the first interview between the future sovereign and his
subjects, the symptoms might already be discerned of that alienation
which was afterwards to widen into a permanent and irreparable breach.

Philip, anxious to reach Castile, pushed forward his journey, without
halting to receive the civilities that were everywhere tendered to him
on his route. He made one exception at Trent, where the ecclesiastical
council was holding the memorable session that occupies so large a share
in Church annals. On his approach to the city, the cardinal legate,
attended by the mitred prelates and other dignitaries of the council,
came out in a body to receive him. During his stay there, he was
entertained with masks, dancing, theatrical exhibitions, and jousts,
contrived to represent scenes in Ariosto.[46] These diversions of the
reverend fathers formed a whimsical contrast, perhaps a welcome relief,
to their solemn occupation of digesting a creed for the Christian world.

[Sidenote: CONDITION OF SPAIN.]

From Trent Philip pursued his way, with all expedition, to Genoa, where
he embarked, under the flag of the veteran Doria, who had brought him
from Spain. He landed at Barcelona, on the twelfth day of July, 1551,
and proceeded at once to Valladolid, where he resumed the government of
the kingdom. He was fortified by a letter from his father, dated at
Augsburg, which contained ample instructions as to the policy he was to
pursue, and freely discussed both the foreign and domestic relations of
the country. The letter, which is very long, shows that the capacious
mind of Charles, however little time he could personally give to the
affairs of the monarchy, fully comprehended its internal condition and
the extent of its resources.[47]

The following years were years of humiliation to Charles; years marked
by the flight from Innsbruck, and the disastrous siege of Metz,--when,
beaten by the Protestants, foiled by the French, the reverses of the
emperor pressed heavily on his proud heart, and did more, probably, than
all the homilies of his ghostly teachers, to disgust him with the worl