ant daughter Isabella instead of
his brother Don Carlos, the leader of the Spanish absolutists. When
Ferdinand died on September 29, 1833, Don Carlos was absent from the
kingdom, supporting the cause of his fellow-pretender Dom Miguel.
Isabella received the hearty support of the constitutional party and was
almost universally acknowledged as queen. It was only in Biscay, where
the centralising tendency of the Spanish constitution, published on
April 10, 1834, seemed to entrench upon local liberty, that Don Carlos
met with much active support. His cause, like that of Miguel in
Portugal, was the more popular, but his adherents were as yet almost
entirely devoid of organisation. Peter's partisans had already made
substantial progress towards a complete victory, and Santha Martha, the
Miguelite commander-in-chief, had surrendered in the beginning of April,
when on April 22 a triple alliance, already signed between Great
Britain, Maria Christina, Queen-regent of Spain, and Peter, as regent of
Portugal, was converted into a quadruple alliance by the adhesion of
France. This treaty provided for the co-operation of Spain and Portugal
to expel Dom Miguel and Don Carlos from the Portuguese dominions. Great
Britain was to assist by the employment of a naval force, and France was
to render assistance, if required, in such manner as should be settled
afterwards by common consent of the four contracting powers. The Spanish
general, Rodil, immediately crossed the frontier. He met with no
resistance, and on May 26 Miguel signed a convention at Evora, by which
he accepted a pension, renounced his rights to the Portuguese throne,
and agreed to quit the country.

[Pageheading: _THE CARLIST WAR._]

Don Carlos, however, refused to renounce his rights to the Spanish
throne, and all that the British navy could do was to convey the two
pretenders, Carlos to England and Miguel to Genoa. Although Miguel, on
June 20, repudiated his abdication, the Portuguese question was really
at an end. The Spanish question was, however, merely entering on its
critical stage. Don Carlos secretly left London on July 1, and nine days
later appeared at the Carlist headquarters in Spain. Here he had the
assistance of the ablest general of this war, Zumalacarregui.
Melbourne's succession to the premiership in July left Palmerston at the
foreign office, and was followed by no change in foreign policy. On
August 18 an additional article to the quadruple alliance prov