PRESCOTT'S HISTORY OF FERDINAND AND ISABELLA.

SPAIN has been fortunate in her English historians. The prime of her glory was pictured by ROBERTSON, in his Charles the Fifth. The commencement of her decline was described by WAT- SON and THOMSON in their Philip the Second. Her decay and dotage were undertaken by DUNLOP and Coxa ; who, however

inferior to their predecessors, and differing in merit from each other, were fully equal to their subject. The youth and manhood of that once powerful and chivalrous people have fallen into the hands of an American, who, if inferior to ltositaTsoN in brilliant composition, is not unworthy of coping with him in the more solid qualities of an historian. The reign of FERDINAND of Aragon and ISABELLA of Castile, which forms the subject of Mr. Perscoris history, is not only singular and interesting in itself, but important as a crisis in the affairs of Europe. The direct effects of the ancient world in the formal parts of • institutions had ceased; and a foundation was laid for modifying even its mental influences. The feudal prejudices and practices, not yet extinct, arising out of the Northern invasions, began then to be shaken by various causes. The first and most important of these was the discovery of printing ; which, per- fected about 1460, was pretty extensively disseminated by 1474, the date of FERDINAND and IsaincLa's accession to the throne of Castile. Contemporary with this mechanical means of popu- larizing literature, and thus facilitating the revival of learning, was the taking of Constantinople ; which, by scattering many of the unfortunate Greeks. spread over civilized Europe a knowledge of Greek letters. The Tramontane invasions of Italy, however fatal to the country itself, scattered over other nations the arts and refine- ment by which the Italians had hitherto been distinguished ; and the discovery of' America and the passage to the Indies by the Cape of Good Hope, not only furnished a vast accession of mate- rial products for art to employ and commerce to interchange, but

gave expansion to the mind and stimulus to the enterprise of men. About the same period, the policy of Louis the Eleventh of France

and HENRY the Seventh of England finally destroyed the indepen- dent power of the feudal nobility ; a happy result, which the conso- lidation of Spain by FERDINAND and ISABELLA enabled their suc- cessor CHARLES the Fifth to accomplish in the Peninsula. Con- sequent upon these things was the rise of the burgesses, or middle class,—a power unknown to antiquity, and which having now, at least in England, fulfilled its functions and lived its time, must shortly yield to the authority of the people in the fullest sense of the word. So that, to those who can penetrate beyond the external form and " see Othello's visage in his mind," the close of the

fifteenth century affords to philosophical meditation a state analogous to that which is taking place around us,—a transition

stage, when power is passing from its old possessors into new bands; whether with or without much present change of social forms, is yet to be ascertained.

In Spanish history the period of ISABELLA the Pious and FER- DINAND the Perfidious is equally important. Under these reigns, Spain for the first time was combined into one monarchy through the nuptial union of the crowns of Aragon and Castile ; the con- quest, so renowned in song,of the Moorish kingdom of Granada ; and the reduction by war and policy of the kingdom of Navarre. But Mr. PRESCOTT, in his opening chapter, has socomprehensively embraced and so nicely limited the scope and subject of his work, that it shall be stated in his own words-

" For several hundred years after the great Saracen invasion, in the begin- ning of the eighth century, Spain was broken up into a number of small but independent states, divided in interests, and often in deadly hostility with one

another. It was inhabited by races the most dissimilar in their origin, religion, and government; the least important of which has exerted a sensible influence on the character and institutions of its present inhabitants. At the dose of the

fifteenth century, these various races were blended into one great nation, under one common rule. Its territorial limits were widely extended by discovery and conquest. Its domestic institutions, and even its literature, were moulded into the form which, to a considerable extent, they have maintained to the present day. It is the object of the present narrative to exhibit the period in which these momentous results were completed—the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella.

" By the middle of the fifteenth century, the number of states into which the country had been divided, was reduced to four—Castile, Aragon, Navarre, and the Moorish kingdom of Granada. The last, comprised within nearly the same limits with the modern province of that name, was all that remained to

the Moslem of their once vast possessions in the Peninsula. Its concentrated population gave it a degree of strength altogether disproportioned to the extent of its territory ; and thee profuse magnificence of its court, which rivalled that of the ancient Caliphs, was supported by the !Aware of a sober, industrious people, under whom agriculture and several of the mechanic arts had reached a degree of perfection probably unequalled in any other part of Europe during the middle ages.

" The little kingdom of Navarre, embosomed within the Pyrenees, had often attracted the avairee of neighbouring and more powerful states. But as their

selfish schemes operated as a mutual check upon each other, Navarre still con- tinued to maintain her independence when all the smaller states in the Peninsula had been absorbed by the gradually increasing dominion of Castile and Aragon.

" This latter kingdom comprehended the province of that name, together with Catalonia and Valencia. Under its auspicious climate and free political insti- tutions, its inhabitants had reached a high degree of intellectual and moral energy. Its long line of coast opened the way to an extensive and flourishing commerce ; and its enterprising marine indemnified the nation for the scanti- ness of its territory at borne, by the important foreign conquests of Sardinia, Sicily, Naples, and the Balearic Isles. " The remaining provinces of Leon, Biscay, the Asturias, Galicia, Old and New Castile, Estramadura, Murcia, and Andalusia, fell to the crown of Castile, which, thus extending its sway over an unbroken line of country from the Bay of Biscay to the Mediterranean, seemed by the magnitude of its territory, as well as its antiquity, (for it was there that the old Gothic monarchy may be said to have first revived after the great Saracen invasion.) to be entitled to a preemi- nence over the other states of the Peninsula. This claim. indeed, appears to have been recognized at an early period of its history. Aragon did homage to her for her territory on the western bank of the Ebro, until the twelfth cen- tury; as did Navarre, Portugal, and at a latter period the Moorish kingdom of Granada. And when at length the various states of Spain were consolidated into one monarchy, the capital of Castile became the capital of the new empire,, and her language the language of the court and of literature."

Important events have always an interest in their own grandeur;. and the dramatic change of fortune they imply. But, in addition to their greatness, the events and characters of the reign of FERDINAND and ISABELLA have attractions of a very varied nature. The constitutions of Aragon and Castile, as well as their social systems, or more properly, perhaps, the estates of the realm, were of a singular kind, well worth the examination of the poll- tican in their maturity, and in the national circumstances which led to them. The history of the respective kingdoms immediately before the accession of lsABEL,LA, and FERDINAND, is full of treasons, plots, and stratagems ; in Castile, a weak and dissolute King constantly at variance with a turbulent nobility; in Ara- gon, a valiant and politic Monarch, aiming at great achieve- ments with small means. And both these introductory sub- jects are treated by Mr. PRESCOTT clearly, amply, and without

fatiguing minuteness. The love affair, from which such im- portant historical circumstances were to spring, had its diffi- culties: the marriage itself was clandestine, ISABELLA being car- ried off from honourable custody by an armed body of her friends, and FERDINAND, a lover of eighteen, penetrating through a district patrolled by hostile parties, in the guise of a groom, to solemnize his wedding. The accession to Castile was not achieved without a civil contest : its internal administration involved amongst other matters the establishment of the Inquisition. A few years after the death of JOHN of Aragon, the father of FER- DINAND, the romantic and chivalrous crusade against Granada began; terminating, after a long and doubtful struggle, in the exaltation of the cross upon the towers of the Alhambra. The year 1492, which saw the downfal of the Spanish Moors, was dis- tinguished by the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, and the de- parture of COLUMBUS to discover America. Scarcely were these events completed, when the French invasion of Italy produced those long and desolating wars, which, independent of military ex- ploits and territorial gains and losses, established the superiority of infantry over mailed horsemen, and laid the foundation of the modern military art. Varying these events, or contemporary with them, are the far more important discoveries of COLUMBUS; whilst the Colonial policy of Spain, the insurrection of the Moors, and incidents of a more strictly Peninsular kind, aptly fill up the interstices of the narration. The actors are worthy of the action. ISABELLA, the pure, the elevated, the gracious, the generous, and the devout, though her devotion was somewhat inclined to the formal, and dashed with the bigotry of the age. Her husband, cool, crafty, and inscru- table, admitted on all sides to be the most accomplished politician of an age when policy meant deceit if not perfidy. Passing over many great contemporaries and subjects, two Spaniards may be noted in a sentence,—Cardinal XIMENES, the RICHELIEU of Spain, without the Frenchman's vanity, his weakness, or his lower vices; and the scientific and chivalrous soldier GONSALVO of Cordova, emphatically called " the Great Captain." Towering over all in the eyes of posterity, is CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS, the Genoese, with his curious learning, his deep sagacity, his philosophical genius, a resolution that persevered against all obstacles, a mu- rage that even mysterious dangers could not daunt, and a zeal which seems to have been strangely compounded of enthusiasm, self-pride, and scientific fanaticism.

Nor is the close of the historical drama without its me- lancholy moral. The philosophical satirists have illustrated the vanity of human wishes by pointing to the natural evils of old age, the dangers of wealth, and the uncertain duration of power : but IsaBELLs. and FERDINAND were spared a reverse of fortune to feel the insufficiency of its gifts. Beloved by her subjects, gratified iu her ambition beyond what her wildest dreams could once have deemed possible, the Queen, broken down by the cares of power and the death or absence of her children, departed to seek that happiness in another world which she had missed in this. After the accomplishment of all his schemes of worldly grandeur, FERDINAND found that he had been labouring for a grandson, by a female stock, whose father he hated. To dis- inherit him, be married a second wife ; without any other result than to be tormented by jealousy. lie had outlived the friends and counsellors of his )(mill ; he became suspi- cious of his ministers, and even of his " Great Captain." The caprice of illness seems to have affected the Monarch's mind; and as he drew nearer death, he strove to shut out all indications of

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its approach,—refusing to admit his confessor into his room, and sending away without an audience an envoy of CHARLES the Fifth,

whom the old politician, truly enough, divined " had come.to see him die." At last, when his danger became imminent, the me-

dical attendants ventured to intimate that any affairs of moment bad better be settled. The certainty restored him to himself. He received the announcement with composure; and retained his wonted spirit and fortitude long enough to make his will and die with decorum.

This very important and interesting subject has been under- taken by a man well qualified to do it justice. Mr. Paascorr possesses considerable powers, improved by study, and a mind well stored by reading, research, and meditation upon the particular period to which he has devoted himself. This work is not like the book of a ready writer, who puts down the notes of his

reading, or abstracts his authorities as he runs over them. The History of' Ferdinand and Isabella has been carefully studied ;

its materials thoroughly digested; and the book, we should con- ceive, neither written nor planned until the whole subject had been thoroughly grasped. This laborious industry, conjoined with native ability, and previous preparation in a good school, places

the author next to HALLAM amongst our living historians, for the largeness and philosophical justness of his estimate, the dis-

tinctness and comprehension of his general surveys, and the interesting fulness of his narrative. Drawing his information from original authorities, lie possesses that characteristic know-

ledge of the times which can only be obtained from such sources; and either a residence in Spain, or a conversation with Spanish travellers, has given him an acquaintance with the features of the country, that enables him to illustrate the past by its sur- viving remains, and to vivify as it were the dead letter of general description. What is perhaps more important than all these ex- cellences, is the wholeness which has been produced by the

mastery the writer has acquired over his subject. His materials have been fused in his own mind; and hence an equability of narration, quite independent of the literarysharacter of his au- thorities.

The greatest defect of the work, or at least the quality which will most affect its perusal nowadays, is its length. In reading single divisions of the subject, little or nothing of minuteness is felt, for there is nothing unnecessary. But in a continuous perusal, it is probable that something like the tiresomeness of a long , journey may come over the reader. Speaking of history as a dramatic narrative, it is probable, too, that greater effect might have been given by the occasional suppression of collateral circumstances, which, however requisite to complete our knowledge of a transaction, tend somewhat to flatter its interest, especially when the incident is of a tragic kind. In an historical work, the word of the critic must be taken for every thing except composition ; and of the character of Mr.

Pmescorr's a few quotations will convey an idea. It will be seen that GIBBON is the model of our author—with more flexibility, and less inflation, if he falls below his stateliness and comprehension.

HENRY OF CASTILE.

The Queen's levity might have sought some justification in the unveiled licentiousness of her husband. One of the maids of honour whom she brought in her train, acquired an ascendancy over Henry which he did not attempt to disguise ; and the palace, after the exhibition of the must disgraceful scenes, became divided by the factions of the hostile fair ones. The Archbishop of Seville did not blush to espouse the cause of the paramour, who maintained a magnificence of state which rivalled that of royalty itself. The public were still more scandalized by Henry's sacrilegious intrusion of another of his mis- tresses into the post of abbess of a convent in Toledo, after the expulsion of her predecessor, a lady of noble rank and irreproachable character.

The stream of corruption soon finds its way from the higher to the more humble walks of life. The middling classes, imitating their superiors, iudulged in an excess of luxury equally demoralizing and ruinous to their fortunes. The contagion of example infected even the higher ecclesiastics ; and we find the Archbishop of St. James hunted from his see by the indignant populace, in con. sequence of an outrage attempted on a youthful bride, as she was returning from church, after the performance of the nuptial ceremony. The rights of the peo- ple could be but little consulted, or cared fur, in a court thus abandoned to unbounded licence. Accordingly, we find a repetition of most of the uncon- stitutional and oppressive acts Which occurred under Julio the Second of Castile ; attempts at arbitrary taxation, interference in the freedom of elections, and in the right exercised by the cities of nominating the commanders of such contin- gents of troops as they might contribute to the public defence. Their territories were repeatedly alienated, and, as well us the immense sums raised by the sale of Papal indulgences for the prosecution of the Moorish war, were lavished on the Royal satellites. but perhaps the most crying evil of this period was the shameless adultera- tion of the coin. Instead of five royal mints, which formerly existed, there were now one hunched and fifty in the hands of authorized individuals, who debased the coin to such a deplorable extent, that the most common articles of life were enhanced in value three, four, and even sixfold. Those who owed debts eagerly anticipated the season of payment ; and as the creditors refused to accept it in the depreciated currency, it became a fruitful source of litigation and tumult, until the whole nation seemed on the verge of bankruptcy. In this general licence, the right of the strongest was the only one which could make itself heard. The nobles, converting their castles into (lens of rubbers, plun- dered the property, of the traveller, which was afterwards sold publicly in the cities. One of these robber chieftains, who held an important command on the frontiers of Murcia, was in the habit of carrying on an infamous traffic with the Moors, by selling to them as slaves the Christian prisoners of either sex whom he had captured in his marauding expeditions. When subdued by Henry, after a sturdy resistance, he was again received into favour, and reinstated iu Lis possessions. The pusillanimous Monarch knew neither when to pardon nor to punish.

The results of this was to lead to the

DEPOSING A 'MONARCH IN EFFIGY.

In an open plain not far from the city of Avila, they caused a scaffold to he erected of sufficient elevation to be easily seen from the surrounding country. A chair of state was placed on it; and •in this was stated an effigy of Kiug We have not mentioned Mr. PaBscoris arrangement of his sub• ject, because an historian's judgment in this point is not so much an excellence as its absence is a defect. But there is one subordi- nate feature deserving of remark, and of imitation : to many of the chapters is added an appendix, containing short biographical and critical notices of the authors from whom the materials are drawn, which is not only curious, but often interesting. Neither is the literature of Spain, during the period treated of, forgotten by the historian.

Henry. clad in sable robes and adorned wish all the insignia of royalty, a sword at iteside, a sceptre in the hand, and a crown upon its head. A manifesto was then read, exhibiting in glowing colours the tyrannical conduct of the King, and the consequent determination to depose him; and vindicating the proceed- ing by several precedents drawn from the history of the monarchy. The Arch• bishop of Toledo, then ascending the platform, tore the diadem from the head of the statue; the Marquis of Villena removed the sceptre; the Count of Phi- cencia the sword ; the Grand Master of Alcantara, and the Counts of Bent- vente and Paredes, the rest of the regal insignia; when the image, thus despoiled of its honours, was rolled into the dust, amid the mingled groans and clamours of the spectators. The young Prince Alphonse, at that time only eleven years of age, was then seated on the vacant throne, and the assemIded grandees severally kissed his hand in token of their homage; the trumpets announced the com- pletion of the ceremony, and the populace greeted with joyful acclamations the accession of their new sovereign.

CHARACTER OF CONSALVO.

Considers or, as he is called in Castilian, Gonzalo de Hernandez de Cordova, was sixty-two years old at the time of his death. His countenance and person are represented to have been extremely handsome ; his manners, elegant and attractive, were stamped with that lofty dignity which so often distinguishes

his countrymen. " He still bears," says Martyr, speaking of him in the last years of his life, " the same majestic port as when in the height of his former authority ; so that every one who visits him acknowledges the influence of his noble presence, as fully as when, at the head of armies, he gave laws to Italy."

His splendid military successes, so gratifying to Castilian pride, have made the name of Gonsalvo as familiar to his countrymen as that of the Cid, which, floating down the stream of popular melody, has been treasured up as a part of the national history. His shining qualities, even more than his exploits, have been often made the theme of fiction ; and fiction, as usual, has dealt with them in a fashion to leave only confused and erroneous conceptions of both. More is known of the Spanish hero, for instance, to foreign readers from Florian's agreeable novel, than from any authentic record of his actions ; yet Florian, by dwelling only on the dazzling and popular traits of his hero, has depicted him as the very personification of romantic chivalry. This certainly was not his character, which might be said to have been formed after a riper civilization than the age of chivalry; at least it had none of the nonsense of that age, its fanciful vagaries, reckless adventure, and wild romantic gallantry. His cha- racteristics were prudence, coolness, steadiness of purpose, and intimate know- ledge of man. He understood, above all, the temper of his own countrymen. He may be said in some degree to have formed their military character, their patience of severe training and hardship, their unflinching obedience, their in- flexible spirit under reverses, and their decisive energy in the hour of action. It is certain, that the Spanish soldier under his hands assumed an entirely new aspect from that which he had displayed in the romantic wars of the Peninsula.

Gonsalvo was untainted with the coarser vices characteristic of the tints. Ile discovered none of that griping avarice too often the reproach of his country- men in these wars. His hand and heart were liberal as the day. He betrayed none of the cruelty and licentiousness which disgrace the age of chivalry. On all occasions he was prompt to protect women from injury or insult. Although his distinguished manners and rank gave hint obvious advantages with the sex, he never abused them ; and he has left a character, unimpeached by any histo- rian, of unblemished morality in his domestic relations. This was a rare YID. tue in the sixteenth century. Gonsalvo's fame rests on his military prowess; yet his character would seem in many respects better suited to the calm and cultivated walks of civil life. His government of Naples exhibited much discretion and sound policy; and there, as afterwards in his retirement, his polite and liberal manners secured not merely the good-will but the strong attachment of those around him. His early education, like that of most of the noble cavaliers who came forward before the improvements introduced under Isabella, was taken up with knightly exercises, more than intellectual accomplishments. He was ',ever taught Latin, and had no pretensions toscholarship; but he honoured and nobly recompensed it in others. His solid sense and liberal taste supplied all deficiencies in himself, and led him to select friends and companions from among the most enlightened and virtuous of the community. On this fair character there remains one foul reproach. This is his breach of faith in two memorable instances; first, to the young Duke of Calabria, and afterwards to Cesar Borgia, both of whom he betrayed into the hands of King Ferdinand, their personal enemy, and in violation of his most solemn pledges. True, it was in obedience to his master's commands, and not to serve his own purposes; and true also, this want of faith was the besetting sin of the age : but history has no warrant to tamper with right and wrong, or to brighten the character of its favourites by diminishing one shade of the abhorrence which attaches to their vices ; they should rather be held up in their true deformity, as the more conspicuous from the very greatness with which they are associated. It may be remaiked, however, that the reiterated and un- sparing opprobrium with which foreign writers who have been little sensible to Gonsolvo's merits, have visited theme offences, affords tolerable evidence that they are the only ones of any magnitude that can be charged on him.