he
queen's views in the matter, they met with little encouragement from
Philip, who, at that time, seemed more inclined to a connection with the
house of Austria.

[Sidenote: HER ILLNESS.]

In the preceding chapter, we have seen the pain occasioned to Isabella
by the arrest of Carlos. Although so far a gainer by it as it opened to
her own posterity the way to the succession, she wept, as the ambassador
Fourquevaulx tells us, for two days, over the misfortune of her
step-son, until forbidden by Philip to weep any longer.[1554] During his
confinement, as we have seen, she was not permitted to visit him,--not
even to soften the bitterness of his dying hour. And how much her
presence would have soothed him, at such a time, may be inferred from
the simple memorandum found among his papers, in which he assigns her
the first place among his friends, as having been ever the most loving
to him.[1555] The same affection, however we may define it, which he had
borne her from the first, he retained to the last hour of his life. All
that was now granted to Isabella was the sad consolation of joining with
the Princess Joanna, and the few friends who still cherished the memory
of Carlos, in celebrating his funeral obsequies.

Not long after that event, it was announced that the queen was pregnant;
and the nation fondly hoped that it would find a compensation for the
loss of its rightful prince, in the birth of a new heir to the throne.
But this hope was destined soon to be destroyed. Owing to some
mismanagement on the part of the physicians, who, at an early period,
misunderstood the queen's situation, the medicines they gave her had an
injurious effect on her constitution.[1556] It is certain that Isabella
placed little confidence in the Spanish doctors, or in their
prescriptions.[1557] There may have been good ground for her distrust;
for their vigorous applications savor not a little of the Sangrado
school of practice, directed quite as much against the constitution of
the patient as against his disease. About the middle of September a
fever set in, which, though not violent, was so obstinate as to defy all
the efforts of the physicians to reduce it. More alarming symptoms soon
followed. The queen frequently swooned. Her extremities became torpid.
Medicines were of no avail, for her stomach refused to retain
them.[1558] Processions were everywhere made to the churches, and young
and old joined in prayers for her recovery. But th