ies.

First of all, the Count of Barcellos, natural son of John I., created
Duke of Braganza by Affonso V., had taken up a definite policy of
supplanting the Regent. The Queen Mother had not forgotten or forgiven
Don Pedro's action at Edward's death, and the young King himself, though
engaged to the Regent's daughter, was already distrustful, was fitting
himself to lead the Barcellos party against the Prince.

On February 18, 1445, died the Queen Leonor, with suspicions of poison,
diligently fostered by the malcontents. Next year (1446) Affonso, now
fourteen, came of age, and his uncle proposed at once to resign all
actual power and retire to his estates as Duke of Coimbra. But the King
was either not yet prepared to part with him, or still felt some
gratitude to his guardian, "the wisest head in Spain."

He begged him to keep the chief direction of affairs, thanked him for
the past, and promised to help him in the future. More than this, he
protested that he wished to be married to his cousin, Pedro's daughter
Isabel. They had been formally betrothed four years; now Affonso called
on his nobles and the deputies of Cortes to witness the marriage.

In May, 1447, this royal wedding was celebrated, but coldly and poorly,
as nephew and uncle had now drifted quite apart. The more the younger
disliked and suspected the elder, the more vehement became his
protestations of regard. But he bitterly resented the Duke's action in
holding him to his promise, and he made up his mind before the marriage
that he would henceforth govern as well as reign.

The Regent just prevented his dismissal by laying down his offices; the
King seemed almost to relent in parting from his guardian, who had kept
the kingdom in such perfect peace and now resigned so well discharged a
duty; but even his wife could not prevent the coming storm. She
struggled hard to reconcile her father and her husband, but the
mischief-makers were too hard for her. Persuaded that the Duke was a
traitor, the King allowed himself to be used to goad him into revolt.
"Your father wishes to be punished," he said fiercely to the Queen, "and
he shall be punished."

[Illustration: HENRY IN MORNING DRESS, WITH GREAT HAT.]

If Henry, who in the last six years had only once left Sagres, to knight
Don Pedro's eldest son at Coimbra in 1445, had now been able, in
presence as well as writing, to stand by his brother in this crisis, the
Regent might have been saved. As it was, Pe