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Table of Contents

LATTER DAYS OF CHARLES THE FIFTH.

Charles at Yuste.—His Mode of Life.—Interest in Public Affairs.—Celebrates his Obsequies.—Last Illness.—Death and Character.

1556–1558.

While the occurrences related in the preceding chapter were passing, an event took place which, had it happened earlier, would have had an important influence on the politics of Europe, and the news of which, when it did happen, was everywhere received with the greatest interest. This event was the death of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, in his monastic retreat at Yuste. In the earlier pages of our narrative, we have seen how that monarch, after his abdication of the throne, withdrew to the Jeronymite convent among the hills of Estremadura. The reader may now feel some interest in following him thither, and in observing in what manner he accommodated himself to the change, and passed the closing days of his eventful life. The picture I am enabled to give of it will differ in some respects from those of former historians, who wrote when the Archives of Simancas, which afford the most authentic records for the narrative, were inaccessible to the scholar, native as well as foreign.[280]

CHARLES AT YUSTE.

Charles, as we have seen, had early formed the determination to relinquish at some future time the cares of royalty, and devote himself, in some lonely retreat to the good work of his salvation. His consort, the Empress Isabella, as appears from his own statement at Yuste, had avowed the same pious purpose.[281] She died, however, too early to execute her plan; and Charles was too much occupied with his ambitious enterprises to accomplish his object until the autumn of 1555, when, broken in health and spirits, and disgusted with the world, he resigned the sceptre he had held for forty years, and withdrew to a life of obscurity and repose.

The spot he had selected for his residence was situated about seven leagues from the city of Plasencia, on the slopes of the mountain chain that traverses the province of Estremadura. There, nestling among the rugged hills, clothed with thick woods of chestnut and oak, the Jeronymite convent was sheltered from the rude breezes of the north. Towards the south, the land sloped by a gradual declivity, till it terminated in a broad expanse, the Vera of Plasencia, as it was called, which, fertilized by the streams of the sierra, contrasted strongly in its glowing vegetation with the wild character of the mountain scenery. It was a spot well fitted for such as would withdraw themselves from commerce with the world, and consecrate their days to prayer and holy meditation. The Jeronymite fraternity had prospered in this peaceful abode. Many of the monks had acquired reputation for sanctity, and some of them for learning, the fruits of which might be seen in a large collection of manuscripts preserved in the library of the monastery. Benefactions were heaped on the brotherhood. They became proprietors of considerable tracts of land in the neighborhood, and they liberally employed their means in dispensing alms to the poor who sought it at the gate of the convent. Not long before Charles took up his residence among them, they had enlarged their building by an extensive quadrangle, which displayed some architectural elegance in the construction of its cloisters.

Three years before the emperor repaired thither, he sent a skilful architect to provide such accommodations as he had designed for himself. These were very simple. A small building, containing eight rooms, four on each floor, was raised against the southern wall of the monastery. The rooms were low, and of a moderate size. They were protected by porticos, which sheltered them on two sides from the rays of the sun, while an open gallery, which passed through the centre of the house, afforded means for its perfect ventilation. But Charles, with his gouty constitution, was more afraid of the cold damps than of heat; and he took care to have the apartments provided with fire-places, a luxury little known in this temperate region.

A window opened from his chamber directly into the chapel of the monastery; and through this, when confined to his bed, and too ill to attend mass, he could see the elevation of the host. The furniture of the dwelling—according to an authority usually followed—was of the simplest kind; and Charles, we are told, took no better care of his gouty limbs than to provide himself with an arm-chair, or rather half a chair, which would not have brought four reals at auction.[282] The inventory of the furniture of Yuste tells a very different story. Instead of "half an arm-chair," we find, besides other chairs lined with velvet, two arm-chairs especially destined to the emperor's service. One of these was of a peculiar construction, and was accommodated with no less than six cushions and a footstool, for the repose of his gouty limbs. His wardrobe showed a similar attention to his personal comfort. For one item we find no less than sixteen robes of silk and velvet, lined with ermine or eider-down, or the soft hair of the Barbary goat. The decorations of his apartment were on not merely a comfortable, but a luxurious scale;—canopies of velvet; carpets from Turkey and Alcaraz; suits of tapestry, of which twenty-five pieces are specified, richly wrought with figures of flowers and animals. Twelve hangings, of the finest black cloth, were for the emperor's bed-chamber, which, since his mother's death, had been always dressed in mourning. Among the ornaments of his rooms were four large clocks of elaborate workmanship. He had besides a number of pocket-watches, then a greater rarity than at present. He was curious in regard to his timepieces, and took care to provide for their regularity by bringing the manufacturer of them in his train to Yuste. Charles was served on silver. Even the meanest utensils for his kitchen and his sleeping apartment were of the same costly material, amounting to nearly fourteen thousand ounces in weight.[283]

The inventory contains rather a meagre show of books, which were for the most part of a devotional character. But Charles's love of art was visible in a small but choice collection of paintings, which he brought with him to adorn the walls of his retreat. Nine of these were from the pencil of Titian. Charles held the works of the great Venetian in the highest honor, and was desirous that by his hand his likeness should be transmitted to posterity. The emperor had brought with him to Yuste four portraits of himself and the empress by Titian; and among the other pieces by the same master were some of his best pictures. One of these was the famous "Gloria," in which Charles and the empress appear, in the midst of the celestial throng, supported by angels, and in an attitude of humble adoration.[284] He had the painting hung at the foot of his bed, or according to another account, over the great altar in the chapel. It is said, he would gaze long and fondly on this picture, which filled him with the most tender recollections; and as he dwelt on the image of one who had been so dear to him on earth, he may have looked forward to his reunion with her in the heavenly mansions, as the artist had here depicted him.[285]

CHARLES AT YUSTE.

A stairway, or rather an inclined plane, suited to the weakness of Charles's limbs, led from the gallery of his house to the gardens below. These were surrounded by a high wall, which completely secluded him from observation from without. The garden was filled with orange, citron, and fig trees, and various aromatic plants that grew luxuriantly in the genial soil. The emperor had a taste for horticulture, and took much pleasure in tending the young plants and pruning his trees. His garden afforded him also the best means for taking exercise; and in fine weather he would walk along an avenue of lofty chestnut-trees, that led to a pretty chapel in the neighboring woods, the ruins of which may be seen at this day. Among the trees, one is pointed out—an overgrown walnut, still throwing its shade far and wide over the ground—under whose branches the pensive monarch would sit and meditate on the dim future, or perhaps on the faded glories of the past.

Charles had once been the most accomplished horseman of his time. He had brought with him to Yuste a pony and a mule, in the hope of being able to get some exercise in the saddle. But the limbs that had bestrode day after day, without fatigue, the heavy war-horse of Flanders and the wildest genet of Andalusia, were unable now to endure the motion of a poor palfrey; and, after a solitary experiment in the saddle on his arrival at Yuste, when he nearly fainted, he abandoned it for ever.[286]

There are few spots that might now be visited with more interest, than that which the great emperor had selected as his retreat from the thorny cares of government. And until within a few years the traveller would have received from the inmates of the convent the same hospitable welcome which they had always been ready to give to the stranger. But in 1809 the place was sacked by the French; and the fierce soldiery of Soult converted the pile, with its venerable cloisters, into a heap of blackened ruins. Even the collection of manuscripts, piled up with so much industry by the brethren, did not escape the general doom. The palace of the emperor, as the simple monks loved to call his dwelling, had hardly a better fate, though it came from the hands of Charles's own countrymen, the liberals of Cuacos. By these patriots the lower floor of the mansion was turned into stables for their horses. The rooms above were used as magazines for grain. The mulberry-leaves were gathered from the garden to furnish material for the silkworm, who was permitted to wind his cocoon in the deserted chambers of royalty. Still the great features of nature remain the same as in Charles's day. The bald peaks of the sierra still rise above the ruins of the monastery. The shaggy sides of the hills still wear their wild forest drapery. Far below, the eye of the traveller ranges over the beautiful Vera of Plasencia, which glows in the same exuberant vegetation as of yore; and the traveller, as he wanders among the ruined porticos and desolate arcades of the palace, drinks in the odors of a thousand aromatic plants and wild-flowers that have shot up into a tangled wilderness, where once was the garden of the imperial recluse.[287]

Charles, though borne across the mountains in a litter, had suffered greatly in his long and laborious journey from Valladolid. He passed some time in the neighboring village of Xarandilla, and thence, after taking leave of the greater part of his weeping retinue, he proceeded with the remainder to the monastery of Yuste. It was on the third of February, 1557, that he entered the abode which was to prove his final resting-place.[288] The monks of Yuste had been much flattered by the circumstance of Charles having shown such a preference for their convent. As he entered the chapel, Te Deum was chanted by the whole brotherhood; and when the emperor had prostrated himself before the altar, the monks gathered round him, anxious to pay him their respectful obeisance. Charles received them graciously, and, after examining his quarters, professed himself well pleased with the accommodations prepared for him. His was not a fickle temper. Slow in forming his plans, he was slower in changing them. To the last day of his residence at Yuste—whatever may have been said to the contrary—he seems to have been well satisfied with the step he had taken and with the spot he had selected.

HIS MODE OF LIFE.

From the first, he prepared to conform, as far as his health would permit, to the religious observances of the monastery. Not that he proposed to limit himself to the narrow circumstances of an ordinary friar. The number of his retinue that still remained with him was at least fifty, mostly Flemings;[289] a number not greater, certainly, than that maintained by many a private gentleman of the country. But among these we recognize those officers of state who belong more properly to a princely establishment than to the cell of the recluse. There was the major-domo, the almoner, the keeper of the wardrobe, the keeper of the jewels, the chamberlains, two watchmakers, several secretaries, the physician, the confessor, besides cooks, confectioners, bakers, brewers, game-keepers, and numerous valets. Some of these followers seem not to have been quite so content as their master with their secluded way of life, and to have cast many a longing look to the pomps and vanities of the world they had left behind them. At least such were the feelings of Quixada, the emperor's major-domo, in whom he placed the greatest confidence, and who had the charge of his household. "His majesty's bedroom," writes the querulous functionary, "is good enough; but the view from it is poor—barren mountains, covered with rocks and stunted oaks; a garden of moderate size, with a few straggling orange-trees; the roads scarcely passable, so steep and stony; the only water, a torrent rushing from the mountains; a dreary solitude!" The low, cheerless rooms, he predicts, must necessarily be damp, boding no good to the emperor's infirmity.[290] "As to the friars," observes the secretary, Gaztelu, in the same amiable mood, "please God that his majesty may be able to tolerate them—which will be no easy matter; for they are an importunate race."[291] It is evident that Charles's followers would have been very willing to exchange the mortifications of the monastic life for the good cheer and gaiety of Brussels.

The worthy prior of the convent, in addressing Charles, greeted him with the title of paternidad, till one of the fraternity suggested to him the propriety of substituting that of magestad.[292] Indeed, to this title Charles had good right, for he was still emperor. His resignation of the imperial crown, which, as we have seen, so soon followed that of the Spanish, had not taken effect, in consequence of the diet not being in session at the time when his envoy, the prince of Orange, was to have presented himself at Ratisbon, in the spring of 1557. The war with France made Philip desirous that his father should remain lord of Germany for some time longer. It was not, therefore, until more than a year after Charles's arrival at Yuste, that the resignation was accepted by the diet, at Frankfort, on the twenty-eighth of February, 1558. Charles was still emperor, and continued to receive the imperial title in all his correspondence.[293]

We have pretty full accounts of the manner in which the monarch employed his time. He attended mass every morning in the chapel, when his health permitted. Mass was followed by dinner, which he took early and alone, preferring this to occupying a seat in the refectory of the convent. He was fond of carving for himself, though his gouty fingers were not always in the best condition for this exercise.[294] His physician was usually in attendance during the repast, and might, at least, observe how little his patient, who had not the virtue of abstinence, regarded his prescriptions. The Fleming, Van Male, the emperor's favorite gentleman of the chamber, was also not unfrequently present. He was a good scholar; and his discussions with the doctor served to beguile the tediousness of their master's solitary meal. The conversation frequently turned on some subject of natural history, of which the emperor was fond; and when the parties could not agree, the confessor, a man of learning, was called in to settle the dispute.

After dinner—an important meal, which occupied much time with Charles—he listened to some passages from a favorite theologian. In his worldly days, the book he most affected is said to have been Comines's Life of Louis the Eleventh,[295]—a prince whose maxim, "Qui nescit dissimulare, nescit regnare," was too well suited to the genius of the emperor. He now, however, sought a safer guide for his spiritual direction, and would listen to a homily from the pages of St. Bernard, or more frequently St. Augustine, in whom he most delighted.[296] Towards evening, he heard a sermon from one of his preachers. Three or four of the most eloquent of the Jeronymite order had been brought to Yuste for his especial benefit. When he was not in condition to be present at the discourse, he expected to hear a full report of it from the lips of his confessor, Father Juan de Regla. Charles was punctual in his attention to all the great fasts and festivals of the Church. His infirmities, indeed, excused him from fasting, but he made up for it by the severity of his flagellation. In Lent, in particular, he dealt with himself so sternly, that the scourge was found stained with his blood; and this precious memorial of his piety was ever cherished, we are told, by Philip, and by him bequeathed as an heirloom to his son.[297]

Increasing vigilance in his own spiritual concerns made him more vigilant as to those of others—as the weaker brethren sometimes found to their cost. Observing that some of the younger friars spent more time than was seemly in conversing with the women who came on business to the door of the convent, Charles procured an order to be passed, that any woman who ventured to approach within two bowshots of the gate should receive a hundred stripes.[298] On another occasion, his officious endeavor to quicken the diligence of one of the younger members of the fraternity is said to have provoked the latter testily to exclaim, "Cannot you be contented with having so long turned the world upside down, without coming here to disturb the quiet of a poor convent?"