We may never know the
exact truth, but at least we can study a state of morals and manners
at Madrid, compared with which the blundering tragedies of Holyrood,
in Queen Mary's time, seem mere child's play. The 'lambs' of Bothwell
are lambs playful and gentle when set beside the instruments of Philip
II.
The murdered man, Escovedo, and the 'first murderer,' as Shakespeare
says, Antonio Perez, had both been trained in the service of Ruy
Gomez, Philip's famous minister. Gomez had a wife, Ana de Mendoza,
who, being born in 1546, was aged thirty-two, not thirty-eight (as M.
Mignet says), in 1578, when Escovedo was killed. But 1546 may be a
misprint for 1540. She was blind in one eye in 1578, but probably both
her eyes were brilliant in 1567, when she really seems to have been
Philip's mistress, or was generally believed so to be. Eleven years
later, at the date of the murder, there is no obvious reason to
suppose that Philip was constant to her charms. Her husband, created
Prince d'Eboli, had died in 1573 (or as Mr. Froude says in 1567); the
Princess was now a widow, and really, if she chose to distinguish her
husband's old secretary, at this date the King's secretary, Antonio
Perez, there seems no reason to suppose that Philip would have
troubled himself about the matter.
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