Chapter VII: Preface (7)

Well might Philip underline this and scatter notes of exclamation around it, for it marked the parting of the ways, and showed that Guise was more anxious for his family aggrandisement and personal ambition in placing his kin upon the English throne than to serve the interests of Spain by securing a close union between the two countries to the exclusion of France, which was Philip's main object.

Guise was therefore told that he must not be precipitate, and the matter was kept in suspense; but from that moment Philip decided to undertake the matter alone. Allen and the English Catholics had never ceased to urge upon him that his troops should be landed first in England, and not in Scotland; and this now obviously suited Philip best, as he was growing more and more doubtful about James' religious sincerity. Another fact must have also influenced him greatly in the same direction. His great admiral, Santa Cruz, had just brilliantly {194} routed the French mercenary fleet in the service of the Portuguese pretender at the Azores, and in the flush of victory had written to Philip begging to be allowed to direct his conquering fleet against England. "Do not miss the opportunity, sire," he wrote, "and believe me I have the will to make you king of that country and others besides." The grand old sailor made light of the difficulties, and besought the King to let him go and conquer England in the name of God and Spain. But Philip was not ready for that yet, and the idea was only now being forced by events into his slow mind that perhaps he might be obliged, after all, to claim England for his own, since the English Catholics were for ever saying they wanted no French or Scotsmen; and not a single English pretender was otherwise than Protestant. So Santa Cruz was told that the King would consider the matter, and in the meanwhile provide for eventualities by ordering large supplies of biscuits, and by gradually sending men to Flanders. At the same time he wrote to his ambassador in Paris, telling him in confidence that he intended in due time to invade England from Flanders, but no one was to learn this until the preparations had advanced too far to be concealed; "and even then they (the French) must be told in such terms as may not make them suspect an intention of excluding the French from the enterprise."

But what is of more importance still, Philip gave directions in the same letter to Tassis in November, 1583, that his own claim to the English crown as a descendant of Edward III. should be cautiously broached. If England was to remain in close {195} alliance with Spain, it is difficult to see what other course Philip could have taken. James as a successor to his mother was now out of the question, so far as Spanish interests were concerned, for he was playing false all round. No sooner did the Scots Catholics gain the upper hand than he intrigued with Elizabeth and the Protestants for their overthrow, and immediately the English and Protestant faction became paramount he wrote beseeching letters for aid to Guise and the Pope. All this, of course, Philip knew, for he knew everything, and although he intended to put Mary Stuart on the throne, from this time he was determined that her son should not succeed her.

The discovery of the Throgmorton plot and Guise's wild plans in connection therewith threw the whole project into the background for a time, and confirmed stealthy Philip in the idea that in future he must manage matters himself. When Tassis, his ambassador in Paris, was withdrawn from his post, in the spring of 1584, he wrote an important memorandum to his master setting forth at length the arguments on both sides for and against a landing in England or Scotland, by which it is clear that the English and Scottish Catholic factions in France were now bitterly at issue on the subject. As the English plan had gained ground, James had once more considered it advisable to feign a desire to become a Catholic; and Guise had again urged the adoption of the plan of a landing in Scotland, with the invasion of England over the Scots border, James himself being the figurehead. Tassis says that such is the jealousy of the Scots in England that if an army crossed the Border the {196} English Catholics themselves might resist it. "The English," he says, "would not like to be dominated by Scotsmen, and if the crown of Scotland is to be joined to theirs, they still wish to be cocks-of-the-walk, as their kingdom is the larger and more important one. On the other hand the Scots may be unduly inflated with the opposite idea, so that imperfections may exist on both sides." As Mary Stuart had drawn closer to Spain she had grown distrustful of Beaton and Tassis, whom she considered too much wedded to French ideas; but withal Tassis in this document very emphatically leans to the English view, which he knew was that now held by his master. The full plan for a great armada was evidently slowly germinating in Philip's mind, but the vast expense had first to be provided for. When Guise's envoy, Melino, had gone on his meddling mission to the Pope his Holiness had offered to subsidise the expedition to a moderate amount, and in answer to the second appeal from James VI. himself he had said that he would stand by his previous promise. But this did not suit Philip, and he let the Pope know promptly that he was willing to undertake the great task for the glory of God and the advance of the Church, but that the Pope must subscribe very largely indeed, "and must find ways and means through his holy zeal to do much more than has yet been imagined." He was also warned that Guise ought not to be allowed to leave France, where he might serve the Catholic cause so much more effectively than elsewhere. And so Guise and the Scotsmen are pushed further and further into the background, Philip's aim being evidently to raise civil {197} commotion in France, which was always easy enough to do, and so to paralyse Henry III. and the Huguenots from helping Elizabeth, whilst Guise would be powerless to promote the interest in England of his kinsman James.

When it became apparent that the Pope was to have a large share in the business the intrigue was transferred from Paris to Rome. Sixtus himself was wise, frugal, and moderate, and had no great desire to serve Philip's political aims, but only to signalise his own pontificate by the restoration of England to the Church; but he was surrounded by cardinals who represented the different interests. Medici, D'Este, Gonzaga, Rusticucci, Santorio, and others represented the French view, which was in favour of an arrangement with Elizabeth and James, and desired to exclude Spanish influence from England. Sanzio watched Guise's interests, whilst the Secretary of State Caraffa, Sirleto, Como, Allen, and the Spanish ambassador, Olivares, craftily forwarded Philip's wishes, the Pope himself being carefully kept in the dark as to the ultimate object in view. The cause of religion was invoked all through as being Philip's only motive; inconvenient points were left indefinite, with the certainty that Caraffa would interpret them favourably to Spanish designs; and by the most extraordinary cajolery the Pope was induced to promise a million gold crowns to the enterprise. He was not brought to this without much haggling and misgiving on his part, and was very cautiously treated with regard to Philip's intention to claim the English crown. "His Holiness," writes Olivares, "is quite convinced that your Majesty is not thinking of the crown of England {198} for yourself, and told Cardinal D'Este so. I did not say anything to the contrary. He is very far from thinking your Majesty has any such views, and when the matter is broached to him he will be much surprised. However deeply he is pledged to abide by your Majesty's opinion, I quite expect he will raise some difficulty." Philip's constant orders were that the Pope should be plied with arguments as to the inadvisibility of the heretic James being allowed to succeed, and the need for choosing some good Catholic to succeed Mary. The person that Philip had decided to make sovereign of England was his favourite daughter, Isabel Clara Eugenia, but this was not to be mentioned to the Pope. "But if at any time the Pope moved by his zeal should talk about any other successor, you will remind him, before he gets wedded to his new idea, that he is pledged to agree to my choice in the matter."

In the meanwhile Allen, Persons, and the other English Catholics, were ceaseless in their steady propagation of the idea of Philip's own right to the crown, in consequence of the heresy of James, and the same view was forced upon Mary Stuart by Mendoza and her English confidants in Paris, all of whom were pensioners of Spain. At length Mary was convinced, and wrote to Mendoza at the end of June, 1586, saying she had disinherited her son in favour of Philip.

The full plan of the Armada had now assumed definite form. The King was in possession of Santa Cruz's marvellously complete estimate of cost and requirements of all sorts--a perfect monument of technical knowledge and forethought; the {199} Pope was pledged to find about a third of the necessary funds, and to leave Philip a free hand with regard to the English succession and the time for the carrying out of the enterprise; whilst Philip's position with regard to his claim to the English crown was regularised by Mary's will in his favour.

Guise, Beaton, and the Scots had thus been routed all along the line, but it was not to be supposed that they would accept their defeat without a struggle. Their next move was within an ace of being successful, and nearly changed the whole plan of the Armada. In July, 1586, Guise wrote to Mendoza that a plan he had long been concocting had at last been brought to a head, and Beaton was commissioned to tell Mendoza what the scheme was. A Scottish gentleman named Robert Bruce had been sent to France with three blank sheets, signed respectively by Lords Huntly, Morton, and Claude Hamilton, which Guise was to fill up over the signatures with letters to Philip, appealing to him to aid the Scots Catholics. They asked for 6,000 foreign troops for one year and 150,000 crowns to equip their own men, and in return promised to restore Catholicism, release James and his mother, compel the former to become a Catholic, and, most tempting of all, to deliver to Philip one or two good ports near the English Border to be used against the Queen of England. Bruce went to Madrid to lay the Scots' appeal before the King, but when he arrived the failure of the Babington plot and the collapse of the Catholic party in England was known to Philip, and he had lost hope of effecting the "enterprise" except with {200} overwhelming forces of his own. He did not wish, moreover, for Guise's interference, and was coolly sympathetic and no more. And yet, in the face of Santa Cruz's advice that he should secure some ports of refuge for the Armada in the North Sea, the offer of the Scots lords to give him two good Scotch harbours was one not to be lightly refused, so whilst he sent Bruce back with vague promises, he instructed Parma and Mendoza to report fully on the scheme. Parma was cold and irresponsive. He would give no decided opinion until he knew what Philip's intentions were. He was apparently jealous that he was not taken fully into his uncle's confidence, and perhaps angry that his son's claims to the English crown, which were better than those of Philip and his daughter, were being ignored. But Mendoza, an old soldier, the last pupil of Alba, as he called himself, was indignant at Parma's doubts, and wrote to Philip an extremely able paper strongly advising the invasion of England through Scotland, instead of risking everything in a vast fleet, to which one disaster would cripple Spain for ever. In prophetic words he foretold the possibility of the very catastrophe which subsequently happened, and prayed Philip, ere it was too late, to close with the Scots lords' offer. But Philip and Parma were slow and wanted all sorts of assurances; so Bruce was kept in France and Flanders for many months, whilst his principals lost hope and heart. At last, when they were on the point of going over to the Protestant side, on a promise of toleration for their religion, Bruce was tardily sent back with 10,000 crowns to freight a number of small boats at Leith to send over to Dunkirk for {201} Parma's troops, and the 150,000 crowns demanded by the lords were promised when they rose.

During all this time the juggle in Rome was going on. Gradually Sixtus was familiarised with the idea that Philip could not go to war for the sake of putting heretic James on the throne; then Allen took care that he saw the genealogical tree showing Philip's claim, and at last, in the summer of 1587, it was cautiously hinted to him that, though Philip would not add England to his dominions, he might perhaps appoint his daughter to the throne. Sanzio, Mendovi and the French cardinals were straining every nerve to persuade the Pope that the King of Scots might be converted, and the Capuchin monk Bishop of Dunblane, amongst others, went to Scotland for the purpose of forwarding this view.

The result of Bruce's appeal at Madrid was concealed from Guise, but of course he learnt it indirectly, and was greatly indignant at his exclusion from a project of which he was the originator. It was really no secret, however, for in July, 1587, Father Creighton, sent by Guise, arrived in Rome full of it; he, like other Scotsmen, being in favour of James' conversion and his acceptance by Spain as King of England. But Allen, Persons, and the rest of them, soon silenced Creighton, with threats, cajolery, and money.

When Catharine de Medici got wind of the business she seems to have thought it a good opportunity for getting rid of Guise and checkmating Philip at the same time, and urged him (Guise) to go himself to aid his kinsman James to the crown, in which case she would largely subsidise him; and Guise himself was so incensed at the way {202} Philip had treated him that he threatened to divulge the whole of Bruce's plot to James, and very probably did so. Elizabeth, too, sent young Gary to warn James of what was going on, so that when Bruce arrived in Scotland the King was fully prepared for him; and although he appeared to acquiesce in the hint from Bruce that the Spaniards would aid him to avenge his mother, he was now surrounded by ministers favourable to the Protestant interest, who saw that James had more to hope for from Elizabeth than from Philip, and the matter was deferred indefinitely. It was late in autumn when Bruce arrived in Scotland, too late in the season to freight ships, and he suggested that in the following summer ships for the transport of Parma's 6,000 men to Leith should be freighted in Flanders. This was impossible--in fact, the long delay whilst Philip and Parma were hesitating had ruined the project, which was now public and consequently impracticable, though Bruce and the Scottish lords continued to clamour for Spanish men and money until the Armada appeared. And so again Philip's want of promptness lost this chance, which might have saved the Armada.

By this time, late in the year 1587, the final plan of the Armada had been settled. Parma had received his full instructions from Philip some months before; all Spain and Catholic Christendom were ringing with preparations for the fray, and the great fleet--or what Drake had left intact of it on his summer trip to Cadiz--was mustering at Lisbon under gallant old Santa Cruz, who was already dying broken-hearted at the neglect of his wise precautions, at the confusion, waste, and ineptitude which foreboded the crowning disaster.

{203}

With the subsequent mishaps and catastrophe this study is not concerned. My object has been to show how circumstances drove Philip to adopt the course he did, both with regard to the invasion itself and his claim to the English crown; and to demonstrate that the ostensible prime object of the Armada, the conversion of England to Catholicism, although undoubtedly desired by Philip, was mainly used as a means to his real end--namely, a close political alliance with England, without which Spain was inevitably doomed to the impotence which eventually fell upon her.

{205}

_A FIGHT AGAINST FINERY._

{207}

_A FIGHT AGAINST FINERY._

(A HISTORY OF THE SUMPTUARY LAWS IN SPAIN.)

It is a curious reflection that whilst all the serious acts and surroundings of civilised life have been rendered amenable to the law, whilst the very instincts inherent in the nature of mankind have been dominated and regulated by authority, utter failure has attended the persistent efforts of rulers to cope with the trivial follies of fashion, or to limit the vanity and extravagance of personal adornment. For long ages men, and particularly women, have insisted upon making themselves absurd and uncomfortable, at great cost and in an infinite variety of ways, in obedience to dictates or impulses springing from nobody knows where, and have only consented to forego each succeeding caprice when the taste for it has worn itself out and has given place to another, perhaps still more preposterous than its predecessor.

It has been from no fault of the rulers that they have {208} been beaten in their fight with fashion, for they have tried their hardest for centuries. Our Plantagenet and Tudor sovereigns made many attempts to regulate the dress and adornment of their subjects, but the motive which mainly prompted them was the desire to differentiate the classes and prevent the humbler citizens from emulating, in appearance at least, their social superiors. In a state of society which depended upon the subjection of the majority by the privileged classes, this motive was perfectly reasonable; as was also the alternative one of protecting a particular national industry, which, in Tudor times especially, often furnished a reason for the imposition of sumptuary enactments; but both of these motives, from their very nature, were necessarily more or less ephemeral and artificial, because, on the one hand, the continual social development, the growing wealth of the traders and the emancipation of the labourers made the classes interdependent; and, on the other, the extended seaboard of England and the maritime enterprise of the inhabitants made the protection of a particular industry by prohibiting foreign competition impossible for any great length of time. The attempted interference, therefore, of English sovereigns with the dress of their lieges was intermittent and spasmodic, and was, at a comparatively early period, admitted to be useless.

Such, however, from various reasons was not the case in Spain. There the fight against finery was kept up persistently for nearly six centuries, and hardly a decade passed during that time without one or more petty and ridiculous attempts being made to interfere with the dress, food, {209} personal habits, and surroundings of the people. The ostensible motives were usually different from those which operated in England. The separation of the classes has never been so complete in Spain as elsewhere in Europe, owing to the fact that from a very early period in the history of the country all Christians were banded together and dependent upon one another for protection against the common enemy, the infidel. Manual industry, moreover, was never a strong point with Spanish Christians, and the main reason for the various attempts to exclude foreign goods was the dread that Spanish gold would be sent out to pay for them. Nothing is more striking, indeed, than the absolutely murderous effect upon Spanish industry exerted by most of the paternal attempts at interference with trade, but political economy was even more of a dead letter amongst that nation of warriors than with our own ancestors. The earliest object of the great mass of sumptuary laws in Spain was to restrict the dreaded taste for luxury and splendour which was felt to be a characteristic of the hated Moor, who had been conquered bit by bit by people who were content to live roughly, feed frugally, and dress plainly. But with victory came wealth, with peace came intermixture, and the subtle, refined, Oriental blood, with its love of pomp and brilliancy, gradually permeated the rough Gothic-Iberians, until its manifestations alarmed rulers whose power still largely depended upon the self-sacrificing frugality and hardy endurance of their subjects. Thus it was that the attempt was made to keep people frugal and homely whilst they were growing rich, and the tendency continued during all the centuries that the struggle against Spanish luxury {210} went on, although during the last three centuries of the period the original motive had disappeared, and the usual excuse for the interference of the King with the dress of his subjects was the desire to prevent them from spending so much money upon themselves, in order that they might spend more upon him.

But, whatever the motives may have been, the fight against extravagance was carried on as persistently as fruitlessly until quite recent times, and there exists a mass of information with regard to the dress and manners of the people in the Spanish sumptuary enactments unequalled elsewhere. The decrees usually took the form of a representation from the Cortes to the sovereign, setting forth in a preamble the particular abuses to be remedied, and then proposing a remedy which the sovereign usually confirmed by what was called his "pragmatic sanction," and the decree was then proclaimed and had the force of law. A large number of these decrees or "pragmatics" of the highest interest will be found in the British Museum manuscripts (MSS. Add. 9933 and 9934), and many more are set forth in Sempere's "Historia de las leyes suntuarias" (Madrid, 1788), whilst the familiar and festive traditions of old Madrid teem with quaint stories of ingenious evasions and jovial defiance of the laws under the very noses of the sable-clad Acaldes and Alguaciles, whose grave and solemn duty it was to clip lovelocks and measure frills and furbelows.

The first vicious extravagance which seizes upon a hardy, simple people who find themselves safe after a period of struggle is naturally that of {211} gluttony; and the earliest sumptuary decrees of the Castilian kings were directed against this particular excess.

In point of date the first decree extant in Spain of a sumptuary character was that issued by Don Jaime (El Conquistador) of Aragon in 1234. He was extremely devout and ascetic himself, and was shocked at the growing extravagance of his subjects, who having in his remote mountain kingdom finally expelled the Moors, turned their attention to tourneys, shows, and mimic warfare, at which great sums were spent both in feasting and adornment. The Jews too, who at the time nearly monopolised Spanish trade, encouraged the growing taste for the fine stuffs and precious ornaments, from the sale of which they derived so large a profit. So in 1234 Don Jaime decreed from his capital of Zaragoza that no subject of his should sit down to a meal of more than one dish of stewed, and one of roast meat, unless it were dried and salted. As much game as they pleased might be eaten, on condition that it had been hunted by the eater, but otherwise only one dish of game might be served. No jongleur or minstrel might eat with ladies and gentlemen, and no striped or bordered stuffs were to be worn. Gold and silver, as well as tinsel, were prohibited, and ermine and other furs were only to be used as a trimming to hoods and hanging sleeves. Jaime since his childhood had been trying to crush the rising power of his feudal nobles, and had already embarked on that long career of conquest by which he subdued the Moorish kingdoms of Majorca and Valencia, so that, although he himself was now safe in his mountain realm from invasion, his decree was as much prompted by his {212} dread of the softening effect of luxury upon his subjects as by his own rough, simple tastes.

His kinsman of Castile was in worse case, for his dominions were more open to the Moor. Saint Ferdinand conquered the splendid Moorish city of Seville in 1248, where he died four years later, leaving his son, Alonso the Wise, to succeed him as King of Castile. Oriental luxury surrounded the frugal Castilians on all hands. The wealth of plundered cities, the spoils of Moslem palaces were to be had for the grasping, so that it was natural that extravagance in attire and eating should soon threaten to soften the Christian conquerors dwelling in the midst of the gentler, vanquished Moor. Alonso the Wise, in 1256, therefore issued in Seville his first great sumptuary enactment. By it no saddles were allowed to be covered or trimmed with plush. No gold or silver tinsel was to adorn them, excepting as a border of three inches wide, the saddle itself being of uncovered leather. Gold and silver might be used on caps, girdles, quilted doublets, saddle-cloths or table-covers, but not for draping shields or cuirasses. No jingling bells were to be used as trimmings, except on the saddle-cloths at the cane-throwing tourneys, but even then no device was to be embroidered on the cloths. Bosses upon the shields were not to be allowed, but the latter might be adorned with a painted or gilded-copper device. No milled cloth was to be worn, nor were the garments to be cut and pinked in fanciful shapes, or trimmed with ribbons or silk cords; the penalty for infringing any of these regulations being the loss of one or both thumbs by the offender, which of {213} course meant his disgrace and ruin in the career of arms. Women were allowed a little more latitude, but not much. They might wear ermine and otter fur to any extent, but they were forbidden to adorn their girdles with beads or seed-pearls, or to border their kirtles or wimples with gold or silver thread, or to wear them of any other colour than white.

With regard to eating, Alonso the Wise held similar notions to those of his neighbour Don Jaime, and ordered that his lieges should not have upon their tables more than two dishes of meat and one of bought game, and on fast days not more than two kinds of fish. As if recognising the difficulty of enforcing this, the King solemnly undertook to comply with his own regulations. Great extravagance had arisen in wedding feasts, which were said (as in Oriental countries they do to-day) to often ruin the contracting families, and Alonso made strict rules to limit the excess in this direction. No presents of breeches were to be given, and the entire cost of a wedding outfit was not to exceed 60 maravedis, whilst not more than five men and as many women might be invited to the wedding banquet by each of the contracting parties. The money spent upon marriage rejoicings, indeed, had become so great that Alonso made this reform a great point in his decree, and provided against evasion by strictly limiting the time during which the feast might continue and wedding presents be given. Moors were said to be dressing like Christians, and this was rigidly forbidden. They were to wear no red or green clothes, and no white or gold shoes, and their hair was to be parted plainly in the middle of the head, {214} with no topknot, whilst they were enjoined to wear their full beard, which made the distinction between them and the shaven-chinned Christians the more marked. The penalties imposed for disobeying this decree of 1256 were savage in the extreme, varying from loss of a thumb and a fine for the first offence, to death for the third; but savage as they were, they can hardly have been effectual, except perhaps in Seville, for only two years later, in 1258, Alonso came out with a perfect code of conduct for his subjects, far too minute to even summarise here, but of which some specimens may be given, as they served as a model for subsequent decrees for many years afterwards. Alonso had apparently got tired of his self-denying ordinance and says the King may eat and dress as he pleases, but agrees to limit his daily table expenditure to 150 maravedis a day, which in spending power would represent about £40 at the present time at least. But he orders his "ricoshomes," ruling men, to eat more sparingly and to spend less money. None of the members of the royal household, squires, scribes, falconers, or porters, except the head of each department, were allowed to wear white fur or trimmings, or to use gilt or plated saddles or spurs. They were forbidden to indulge in breeches of scarlet cloth, gilt shoes, and hats of gold or silver tissue. Priests, it appears, had been reducing the size of their tonsures and ruffling in fine colours, so as to be undistinguishable from laymen, and they are sternly ordered to have their tonsures the full size of their heads, gird themselves with a rope, and eschew red, green, and pink garments. The old regulations about eating were {215} repeated with the addition of one plate of meat for supper, and the prohibition of fish on meat days. No man, however rich, was to buy more than four suits of clothes in a year, and no ermine, silk, gold or silver tissue, no slashes, trimmings, or pinked cloth might be worn by men. Two fur mantles in a year, and one rain-cape in two years was the limit of extravagance allowed to a man in this direction; and the King alone was to wear a red rain-cape. Lawn and silk for outer garments were confined to royalty, but the "ricoshomes" might employ them as linings. No crystal or silver buttons were to be allowed, nor was shaving or other signs of mourning permitted, except to vassals who had lost their overlord and to widows. Jews and Moors are cruelly treated in this decree, and their offences and those of the poorer classes are to be punished by torture or death, whilst those of the "ricoshomes" are left to the King's discretion. Ermine, vair, and otter furs would appear to have been amongst the principal articles of luxury, as the wearing of them is very strictly regulated, and white furs seem to come next in estimation after them.

For ninety years these laws of Alonso the Wise were repeated and reimposed with slight variations, but apparently ineffectually; since in 1348 the Cortes of Alcalá made a presentment to Alonso XI. of Castile bewailing the luxury and extravagance of the age, and proposing a new code of sumptuary rules, which in due course the King confirmed. These rules are very interesting because they demonstrate the great strides which had been made in luxury, refinement, and civilisation since the issue of the decrees {216} of Alonso the Wise nearly a century before. No gold ornaments, no ermine or grebe-neck trimmings, no seed-pearl embroidery, gold or silver buttons or wire, and no enamels were to be worn except by nobles. No gold tissue or silk was allowed except for linings, and no man below the rank of a knight might wear vair fur or gilt shoes. Even the princes of the blood were strictly limited in their dress, and were ordered to use tapestry cloth or silk, but without gold or trimming of any sort. The Spartan wedding regulations of Alonso the Wise had now become obsolete with the advance of wealth, but the new rules, although wider, were to be enforced with equal or greater severity. No gentleman was to give his bride within four months after marriage more than three suits of clothes, one of which might be of gold tissue, and one embroidered with seed-pearls to the value of 4,000 maravedis, an enormous sum when we consider that ninety years before 150 maravedis were the limit of the monarch's daily expenditure, and that at this date, 1348, the value of a sheep was only eight maravedis. The bride's trousseau is regulated down to the smallest details, and the penalty for exceeding them is the loss of one-quarter of his land by the too-generous gentleman who does so. The decree sets forth that some women are wearing trains, "which are both costly and useless," but in future they are to be confined to those ladies who are travelling in a litter--a privilege limited to nobles. All other women are to wear pelisses without trains, just reaching the ground, "or at least not to drag more than two inches upon it." Ladies who broke this rule were to be fined 500 maravedis. Great stress is again laid upon the limitation {217} of extravagance in wedding feasts, and burials, but the cost still allowed shows to what an excess luxury had been carried. The bride's wedding clothes might cost 4,000 maravedis and the groom's outfit 2,000; and thirty-two people were now allowed at the wedding feast. Much more latitude was permitted in the use of seed-pearls, gold, and silver, to people above the rank of knights, but the principal point to be noted in these decrees of Alonso XI. is the incidence of the penalty. In the decrees of Alonso the Wise, as has been shown, the most savage penalties were imposed upon the poorer classes, whilst the punishment of the nobles was left to the King's discretion. But much more even justice is dealt out by Alonso XI. The nobles who break the law are to lose one-quarter of their land, the knights one-third, the citizens 500 maravedis, whilst the poorer classes for slight offences against the sumptuary rules are condemned to lose the offending garment and its cost in money.

But whatever the penalty might be, extravagance, checked in one direction, broke out in another, and Peter the Cruel, the son of Alfonso XI., only a few years after the date of the decree just mentioned, issued a complete sumptuary code in which the punishments were positively ferocious. Fines, scourging, mutilation, and banishment for first and second offences, and death for the third, were imposed for the smallest infraction. Peter was particularly hard on priests, who were said to be swaggering about with women, tricked out in gay finery, and they were ordered in future to be sober and frugal, wearing no ornaments of any kind, and only sad-coloured garb. Workmen, too, were to {218} labour from sunrise to sunset for a fixed wage on pain of punishment as severe as those imposed by our own labour laws. The King, moreover, fixed stringently the cost which was to be incurred by cities and towns in entertaining him when he visited them. The dietary scale appears a pretty generous one from the point of view of to-day, consisting as it does of 45 sheep at 8 maravedis each, 22 dozen of dry fish at 12 maravedis a dozen, 90 maravedis worth of fresh fish, with pork, grain, wine, &c.; the total value of the feast being limited to 1,850 maravedis. Villages and nobles were not to spend more than 800 maravedis on a similar occasion.

In 1384 Peter the Cruel's nephew, John I. of Castile, was well beaten by the Portuguese at the battle of Aljubarrota, and marked his sorrow by issuing a decree prohibiting the use in any form of dress of silk, gold, silver, seed-pearls, precious stones, or ornaments of any kind, and everybody was ordered to don a simple mourning garb. When, four years after this, John of Gaunt's daughter Catharine came to marry the heir to the crown of Castile, she brought something else with her besides the wide, pointed coif which Spanish widows wore for the next three hundred years. Part of her dower consisted of great herds of merino sheep, which crossed and thrived so well in Spain that the coarse duffel, which had been the only native cloth, gave place in a few years to beautiful fine woollen textures which could vie with those of England and Flanders.

Intercourse between nations, the growth of wealth, the spread of learning, and the advance of civilisation were moving with giant strides. The soft arts of peace were practised with greater success than ever, now {219} that the Moslem and the Christian were fast merging into one people in Seville and Toledo, and the refinement of the one was strengthened by the energy of the other. Beautiful stuffs, stiff with gold and gems, gauzy silk, soft cloths, and fine linens, had no longer to be brought from the Moors or the kingdoms across the sea. Seville, Toledo, and Cordova could produce everything that the most luxurious extravagance could desire, and the sumptuary laws for a time were forgotten.

In 1452 the Cortes of Palenzuela presented a petition to John II. asking that the stringent sumptuary code of Alonso XI. should be re-enforced. The King, in reply, admitted that the law was a dead letter, and that the extravagance in dress was greater than ever. He says that gold tissue and silks are now ordinary wear, and that gold trimmings and marten-fur linings are used even by people of low estate. "Actually working women," he says, "now wear clothes that are only fit for fine ladies; and people of all ranks sell everything they possess in order to adorn their persons." Still the remedy proposed to him of a revival of the stern code of a hundred years before he saw was an impossible one, and the matter was held in suspense. He died soon afterwards, and his feeble successor, Henry IV., was equally powerless to stem the rising tide of industry and wealth with their natural consequences.

In 1469, during the interregnum which followed the deposition of Henry, the Master of Santiago issued a proclamation deploring the growing extravagance of the age, and enjoining more moderation. Amongst other similar things it says, {220} "Such is the pomp and vanity now general, even amongst labourers and poor people in their dress and that of their wives, that in appearance they seek to vie with persons of rank, whereby they not only squander their own estates but bring great poverty and want to all classes." But it was useless: and luxury went unchecked until Ferdinand and Isabel the Catholic were firmly seated on the twin throne of a united Spain and the last Moslem stronghold had fallen. Then, in 1495, a "pragmatic" was issued which superseded all previous obsolete sumptuary codes and established a new one, which formed the model for similar decrees for the next two centuries. Probably a more economically unwise decree under the circumstances was never penned. All other previous pragmatics had forbidden the wearing of extravagant apparel, and this did the same, especially severely as regarded the precious metals; but it did more than this. It absolutely forbade the introduction and sale of every sort of gold and silver tissue, and rendered criminal the exercise in Spain of the industry of embroidering or weaving gold, silver, and every other metal. The Christianised populations of the south of Spain were greatly excelling already in this industry. Their gold embroideries on velvet were in great demand for church vestments and royal trappings all over Europe. The taste for chivalrous splendour was not confined to Spain, and the beautiful half-Oriental tissues of Andalusia were eagerly sought for in every Court; gold was just beginning to find its way direct to Spain from the new-found Indies, and if the industry had remained untrammelled there was no reason why the country should not have provided the world {221} with textile splendours to its own great advantage. The ingenious, industrious people--for they were industrious until the strangling of their handicrafts made them idle--did their best to avert ruin. In 1498, only three years afterwards, the Cortes made a presentment to the Queen saying that things were worse than ever. It was true that gold brocade was no longer made and the wicked waste of the precious metal was thus avoided, but all sorts of strange devices and novelties were being introduced in the manufacture of silks, whereby the people were tempted to squander their money on useless finery. The Spanish silk factories were then the finest in Europe, and great quantities of raw silk were raised in the south-east of the Peninsula: and yet a "pragmatic" was issued the next year, 1499, stringently forbidding the manufacture, sale, or use of silk, except for lining. It was a staggering blow to a flourishing industry, and in order to prevent total ruin a decree was given that no raw silk from abroad was to be introduced into the country, and only Spanish-grown silk used. But this was not enough, and some of the silk-making provinces, reduced to desperation, petitioned for the relaxation of the law. Their prayer was granted, as if in irony, to the extent of allowing them to wear silk against the law. But they did not want to wear silk, but to make it for other people to wear, and their industry languished, never entirely to recover.

By the time Isabel the Catholic had died the Spanish silk industry was nearly at an end, and the skittish young Bearnaise princess, Germaine de Foix, who succeeded her as old Fernando's wife, came too late to do it much good. It is true she snapped {222} her slender fingers and threw up her pretty chin at the straitlaced sumptuary laws, and surrounded herself with silks and velvets, gold brocade and gems, wherever she went; but unfortunately they mostly came from the looms and workshops of Southern France, and gave no work to Spanish hands. Money, of course, had to be sent out of Spain to pay for the finery, and in 1515 the Cortes of Burgos complained of this to Jane the Mad, Isabel's nominal successor, who thereupon issued a decree entirely forbidding brocades and gold or silver embroidery and trimmings to be worn at all, and strictly limiting the wearing of silk in any form to people of rank.

But Jane's power was the merest shadow; Spain was in the throes of a great struggle for its democratic institutions, which it lost, and no notice was taken of poor Crazy Jane's decree. If she understood it she probably had as little sympathy with it as her young stepmother, for she had lived for years with her handsome husband Philip as head of the most pompous and splendid Court in Europe, in busy Flanders, surrounded by all the traditional magnificence of the house of Burgundy, and her young son, the coming Emperor Chares V., Fleming as he was by birth and instinct, was even less likely than she to revert willingly to the simple, democratic, and patriarchal traditions of the Spanish Court.

He came to his new country with a whole host of Burgundian, Flemish, and German nobles, whose taste for finery had never been checked; and whatever decrees Charles might issue for the dress of his people, he and his Court were the first to {223} disregard the letter and spirit of his precepts. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that they were not obeyed for long together by any one else. The initiative, moreover, did not come from the King or his courtiers, but from the Cortes of Castile, who were naturally swayed entirely by Spanish ideas, of which Charles had at this time, boy as he was, but little knowledge or sympathy. This was so clearly recognised that when he was about to leave Corunna in 1520 to assume the imperial crown, the Cortes held there petitioned him at least to order that the sumptuary laws with regard to silks, brocades, gold embroideries, and gold and silver lace, should be strictly enforced during his absence from Spain, since they saw that, with such a Court as his, they would not be enforced in his presence. But the example of the Court had struck too deeply, and the fury for splendour had now really taken hold of the Spaniards, who in their ages of struggle had been so simple and homely.

In the pragmatic of 1537 it is said that during the Emperor's absence the use of brocades, silks, and precious embroideries had increased more than ever, and they are absolutely prohibited, and the rigid law of 1498 again repeated. The preamble of the decree of 1537 says that this law against gold embroidery was generally evaded by making the gold lace and devices separately and then stitching them on to the cloth, which cost much more even than embroidery would have done; and the making of such adornments was consequently prohibited altogether. Only nine years afterwards, in 1548, the Cortes of Valladolid made a presentment to the Emperor saying that things {224} were worse than ever, and the cost of clothes had been increased instead of decreased by the ingenuity of tailors, who had taken to the plan of cutting out the most elaborate patterns of coloured cloth with fine scissors and sewing them on to the cloth garments, almost covering the latter with delicate lace-like snippet work of applied cloth. In face of this abuse the Cortes prayed the Emperor to forbid the use of any and every sort of trimming, lace, or adornment on the garments, both of men and women, which might give an excuse for the wicked tailors to charge extravagant prices. Charles V. thought this too sweeping, but in 1552 he issued a "pragmatic" prohibiting the applied snippet work, and also the use or manufacture of gold and silver lace and ornaments, the wearing and making of velvets, silks, and satins being also rigidly limited. Spain, flooded with the precious metals from the Indies, richer perhaps in actual bullion than ever a country was before or since, with home-grown silk in abundance, and the most deft and tasteful weavers in the civilised world, was therefore obliged to import its manufactured gold and fine stuffs from abroad, whilst its own humbler citizens languished amidst the wealth they were not allowed to earn. No decrees could prevent rich people from squandering their money on dress, least of all when the Emperor and his Court were in a constant blaze of magnificence.

Philip II., who in his later years usually wore black velvet trimmed with jet or bugles, with the simple chain of the Golden Fleece about his neck, was in his youth as splendid as his father; and the preparations for his voyage to England to marry Mary {225} Tudor in 1554 included the making of more solid magnificence in the way of dress than probably was ever made for one event in modern history. His son's valet[1] was of a literary turn of mind, and has left us a precise description of the dresses and trappings made for Philip and his army of courtiers--the flower of Spain--in which the language of extravagance is exhausted. Horse furniture, bed-hangings, canopies, quilts, and upholstery, as well as dress, were all of satin or velvet covered with gold embroidery and seed-pearls. There were twenty great nobles, Spaniards, Flemings, and Italians, each with scores of followers, all dressed in silks and satins with gold chains. Philip's German bodyguard, even, of 100 troopers, wore facings of silk on the gaudy red and yellow uniform of Aragon, and the common sailors of the fleet had crimson silk caps with white plumes. Some few amongst Philip's numerous suits may be mentioned as an example of the dresses then in vogue, although many of his nobles appear to have fully rivalled him in splendour. For some years, as has been shown, gold-embroidered dresses had been strictly prohibited; and Muñoz, in his description of the sartorial wonders prepared for the wedding, mentions the revival of gold embroidery as a novelty. Prince Philip had one suit consisting of surcoat, doublet, trunk-hose, and jacket of crimson velvet covered with little lozenges formed of twisted gold chains, the interstices being filled with a running sprig of silver braid, the leaves formed of silver filigree. The surcoat was lined with silver cloth of satin, embroidered in the same way. Another surcoat was of grey satin covered with alternate stripes {226} of applied gold chains and silver bugles. It was lined with stamped cloth of silver, and the doublet, trunks, and jacket were of white satin ornamented in the same way. Another "pretty suit," we are told, consisted of a French surcoat of black velvet embroidered all over with gold and silver bugles, the trunks and jacket being of crimson velvet, and the doublet of crimson satin with the same embroidery. One of his dresses consisted entirely of white silk velvet covered with a costly embroidery of gold filigree; and another had a surcoat of black velvet with a border of gold bugles and heavy twisted silver cords, the garment itself being almost hidden under a closely embroidered running sprig in gold, the leaves being filled in with silver filigree, and in the spaces between the sprigs were slashes of white satin. With this gorgeous coat went a suit of white velvet and gold. Precious stones were worn at the neck and wrists, and gold chains and gems were looped around the hat. Heavy gold chains rested on the shoulders, and arms and housings flashed with riches inestimable, the spoils of the two Indies.

This will give some faint idea of the fashions of a time when the rulers were fruitlessly trying to repress extravagance in dress amongst their subjects. Most of this finery was prepared in the city of Valladolid, whence Philip left on his journey, and it is not entirely surprising that in the following year 1555, the Cortes of Castile, sitting in that place, boldly presented a petition asking that the sumptuary laws should be done away with altogether. They say that they are entirely a dead letter, and are consequently a scandal, as well as {227} being useless and vexatious. Their petition was not granted, for Philip and his father still thought that all the growing wealth of the country should come to them, instead of being used for decking the undistinguished persons of private citizens.

There had been no finer flax than that of Galicia, and no better linens than those made from it, but the trade had been crippled by the sumptuary restrictions, and the business had already fallen into the hands of Flemings and Frenchmen, who got paid for their stuffs with Spanish gold. The wool industry was still more cruelly treated. Thanks to the merino stock, the manufactory of fine cloths, serges, and friezes had been very prosperous, and Spain could, and did, export these textiles largely; but in 1552 the export of such goods was strictly prohibited, and even wool in the fleece might not be sent out of the country except on condition that for every twelve sacks exported two pieces of foreign cloth and one bale of foreign linen should be introduced to prevent the export of gold.

The silk growers of Valencia and elsewhere had been ruined, but the looms remained, and the weavers attempted to obtain raw silk from Italy and France. The introduction of raw silk was thereupon forbidden, and most of the weavers went the way of the growers, to idleness and ruin, or across the seas to the Indies. The Cortes of 1555 saw the evil that was being done and, as usual, made a presentment on the subject. They pointed out the paralysis of Spanish industry and the large sums of coin sent out of the country to pay for French and Flemish linens, and ascribed the evil to its secondary and not its primary reason. They {228} say flax-growing is neglected and decayed, and suggest that public lands, where suitable, should be cultivated, and every landowner forced to plant a certain proportion of flax on his estate. It was useless and absurd, of course, as the sumptuary laws limiting the making or wearing of lawns and fine linens had killed the industry, and the coarse linens were still spun and woven at home; so nothing came of it.

But the acme of absurdity and political perverseness was reached in the Cortes of 1552, which presented a petition begging that the export of manufactured goods of all sorts to the new Spanish empire in America should be strictly prohibited. They say that the people there are getting their money so easily and becoming so rapidly rich, that they buy such great quantities of Spanish goods as to raise the prices in the Peninsula, "_whereby we who work here cannot live._"