ribed[94] the course of foreign policy during the first five
years of his son-in-law's reign. He worked through his daughter; the
only thing she valued in life, wrote Catherine a month after her
marriage, was her father's confidence. When Membrilla was recalled
because he failed to satisfy Catherine's somewhat exacting temper, she
was herself formally commissioned to act in his place as (p. 051)
Ferdinand's ambassador at Henry's Court; Henry was begged to give her
implicit credence and communicate with Spain through her mediation!
"These kingdoms of _your_ highness," she wrote to her father, "are in
great tranquillity."[95] Well might Ferdinand congratulate himself on
the result of her marriage, and the addition of fresh, to his already
extensive, domains. He needed them all to ensure the success of his
far-reaching schemes. His eldest grandson, Charles, was heir not only
to Castile and Aragon, Naples and the Indies, which were to come to
him from his mother, Ferdinand's imbecile daughter, Juana, but to
Burgundy and Austria, the lands of his father, Philip, and of Philip's
father, the Emperor Maximilian. This did not satisfy Ferdinand's
grasping ambition; he sought to carve out for his second grandson,
named after himself, a kingdom in Northern Italy.[96] On the Duchy of
Milan, the republics of Venice, Genoa and Florence, his greedy eyes
were fixed. Once conquered, they would bar the path of France to
Naples; compensated by these possessions, the younger Ferdinand might
resign his share in the Austrian inheritance to Charles; while Charles
himself was to marry the only daughter of the King of Hungary, add
that to his other dominions, and revive the empire of Charlemagne. (p. 052)
Partly with these objects in view, partly to draw off the scent from
his own track, Ferdinand had, in 1508, raised the hue and cry after
Venice. Pope and Emperor, France and Spain, joined in the chase, but
of all the parties to the league of Cambrai, Louis XII. was in a position
to profit the most. His victory over Venice at Agnadello (14th May,
1509), secured him Milan and Venetian territory as far as the Mincio;
it also dimmed the prospects of Ferdinand's Italian scheme and threatened
his hold on Naples; but the Spanish King was restrained from open
opposition to France by the fact that Louis was still mediating
between him and Maximilian on their claims to the administration of
Castile, the realm of their daughter and daughter-in-law