Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/153

BIRTH OF ISABELLA. 9 but to accompany his revocation with the most chapter humiliating concessions/ They even ventured so ! — far, during this reign, as to regulate the expenses of the royal household ; and their language to the throne on all these occasions, though temperate and loyal, breathed a generous spirit of patriotism, evincing a perfect consciousness of their own rights, and a steady determination to maintain them.^ Alas ! what could such resolution avail, in this season of misrule, against the intrigues of a cunning and profligate minister, unsupported too, as the commons were, by any sympathy or cooperation on the part of the higher orders of the state ! A scheme was devised for bringing the popular branch of the legislature more effectually within the control of the crown, by diminishing the number of its constituents. It has been already remarked, in the Introduction, that a great irregularity prevailed in Castile as to the number of cities, which, at dif- ferent times, exercised the right of representation. During the fourteenth century, the deputation from this order had been uncommonly full. The king, however, availing himself of this indeterminateness, caused writs to be issued to a very small proportion of the towns which had usually enjoyed the privi- 6 Several of this prince's laws cessario consejo de nuestros sub- for redressing the alleged griev- ditos, y naturales, especialmente de ances are incorporated in the great los procuradores de las nuestras code of Philip II., (Recopilacion de ciudades, villas, y lugares de los las Leyes, (Madrid, 1640,) lib. 6, nuestros reynosy It was much tit. 7, leyes 5, 7, 2,) which de- easier to extort good laws from clares, in the most unequivocal Ian- this monarch, than to enforce guage, the right of the commons them. to be consulted on all important 7 Mariana, Historia de Espana, matters. " Porque en los hechos (Madrid, 1780,) torn. ii. p. 299. arduos de nuestros reynos es ne- 8 Marina, Teori'a, ubi supra. VOL. 1. 2