as sufficiently proved by the extraordinary sorrow
which he felt at her death. Hereupon," continues the cardinal, "he broke
forth into a panegyric on her virtues, and said, were he to choose
again, he could wish nothing better than to find just such
another."[1574]--It was not long before Philip made the attempt. In
eighteen months from the date of his conversation with the cardinal, the
thrice-widowed husband led to the altar his fourth and last wife, Anne
of Austria,--like her predecessor, as we have seen, the destined bride
of his son. The facility with which her imperial parents trusted the
young princess to the protection of Philip maybe thought to intimate
pretty clearly that they, at least, had no misgivings as to the king's
treatment of his former wife.

Isabella, at her decease, was but twenty-three years of age, eight of
which she had been seated on the throne of Spain. She left two children,
both daughters;--Catherine, afterwards married to the duke of Savoy; and
Clara Eugenia, who became with her husband, the Archduke Albert, joint
ruler of the Netherlands, and who seems to have enjoyed a greater share
of both the love and the confidence of Philip, than he ever vouchsafed
to any other being.

Such is the story of Queen Isabella, stripped of the coloring of
romance, for which, in truth, it has been quite as much indebted to the
pen of the historian as to that of the poet. From the whole account, it
appears, that, if Carlos, at any time, indulged a criminal passion for
his step-mother, such a passion was never requited or encouraged by
Isabella, who seems to have felt for him only the sentiments that were
justified by their connection, and by the appeal which his misfortunes
made to her sympathy. Notwithstanding some feelings of resentment, not
unnatural, when, in the words of Brantome, "he had been defrauded of so
fair a prize," there is yet little evidence that the prince's passion
for her rose higher than the sentiments of love and gratitude which her
kindness might well have awakened in an affectionate nature.[1575] And
that such, with all his errors, was the nature Carlos, is shown, among
other examples, by his steady attachment to Don John of Austria, his
uncle, and by his devotion to his early preceptor, the bishop of Osma.

[Sidenote: HER CHARACTER.]

There is no proof that Philip was, at any time, displeased with the
conduct of his queen, or that he regarded his son in the light of a
rival. Least