love was reciprocal, and tears were
infectious among the thousand deputies who listened to their sovereign's
last speech. On the 16th of January 1556, Charles resigned his Spanish
kingdoms and that of Sicily, and shortly afterwards his county of
Burgundy. On the 17th of September he sailed from Flushing on the last
of his many voyages, an English fleet from Portland bearing him company
down the Channel. In February 1557 he was installed in the home which he
had chosen at Yuste in Estremadura.

The excellent books which have been written upon the emperor's
retirement have inspired an interest out of all proportion to its real
significance. His little house was attached to the monastery, but was
not within it. He was neither an ascetic nor a recluse. Gastronomic
indiscretions still entailed their inevitable penalties. Society was not
confined to interchange of civilities with the brethren. His relations,
his chief friends, his official historians, all found their way to
Yuste. Couriers brought news of Philip's war and peace with Pope Paul
IV., of the victories of Saint Quentin and Gravelines, of the French
capture of Calais, of the danger of Oran. As head of the family he
intervened in the delicate relations with the closely allied house of
Portugal: he even negotiated with the house of Navarre for reparation
for the wrong done by his grandfather Ferdinand, which appeared to weigh
upon his conscience. Above all he was shocked by the discovery that
Spain, his own court, and his very chapel were infected with heresy. His
violent letters to his son and daughter recommending immediate
persecution, his profession of regret at having kept his word when
Luther was in his power, have weighed too heavily on his reputation. The
feverish phrases of religious exaltation due to broken health and
unnatural retirement cannot balance the deliberate humanity and honour
of wholesome manhood. Apart from such occasional moments of excitement,
the emperor's last years passed tranquilly enough. At first he would
shoot pigeons in the monastery woods, and till his last illness tended
his garden and his animal pets, or watched the operations of Torriani,
maker of clocks and mechanical toys. After an illness of three weeks the
call came in the early hours of the feast of St Matthew, who, as his
chaplain said, had for Christ's sake forsaken wealth even as Charles had
forsaken empire. The dying man clasped his wife's crucifix to his breast
till his