dro had hardly settled down
in his exile at Coimbra, when he found himself charged with the secret
murders of King Edward, Queen Leonor, and Prince John. The more
monstrous the slander, the more absurd and self-contradictory it might
be, the more eagerly it was made.

Persecution as petty and grinding as that which hunted Wolsey to death,
at last drove Pedro to take arms. His son, knighted by Henry himself for
the high place of Constable of the Realm, had been forced into flight,
the arms of Coimbra Arsenal seized for the King's use, his letters to
his nephew opened and answered, it was said by his enemies, who wrote
back in the sovereign's name, as he would write to an open rebel. All
this the Prince bore, but when he heard that his bastard brother of
Braganza, who had betrayed and maligned and ruined him, was on the march
to plunder his estates, like an outlaw's, he collected a few troops and
barred his way. At this Affonso was persuaded to declare war.

Only one great noble stood by the fallen Regent, but this was his friend
Almada, the Spanish Hercules, his sworn brother in arms and in travels,
one of the Heroes of Christendom, who had been made a Count in France
and a Knight of the Garter in England. It was he who now escaped from
honourable imprisonment at Cintra, joined Pedro in Coimbra, and proposed
to him that they should go together to Court and demand justice and a
fair trial, but sword in hand and with their men at their back. Was it
not better to die as soldiers than as traitors without a hearing?

So on May 5, 1449, the Duke left Coimbra with his little army of
vassals, 1000 horse and 5000 foot and passed by Batalha, where he
stopped to revisit the great church and the tombs of his father and his
brothers. Thence he marched straight on Lisbon, which the King covered
from Santarem with 30,000 men. At the rivulet of Alfarrobeira the armies
met; a lance thrust or a cross-bow shot killed the Infant; a common
soldier cut off his head and carried it to Affonso in the hope of
knighthood. Almada, who fought till he could not stand from loss of
blood, died with his friend. Hurling his sword from him, he threw
himself on the ground, with a scornful, "Take your fill of me, Varlets,"
and was cut to pieces.

Though at first leave could hardly be got to bury Don Pedro's body, as
time went on his name was cleared. His daughter bore a son to the King,
and the proofs of his loyalty, the indignant warnings of foreign Cou