For a Queen's Love: The Stories of the Royal Wives of Philip II

As soon as he was alone with his father, Philip said: “Father, I must have a new teacher.”

“A new teacher! Why, Zuniga is the best horseman in Spain. He’s a master fencer too. There could not be a better teacher for you.”

“But I cannot endure his insolence. He spoke to me as though I were … any boy learning to ride. He said I sat my horse like a sack of grain.”

Charles drew his son to him so that Philip could smell the garlic on his breath. “You were a boy learning to ride this morning, my son; and a prince learning to ride must learn all the tricks that any boy must learn. I saw you ride into the stables, and, Philip, you did look like a sack of grain.”

The boy did not speak, but his usually pale cheeks were fiery red. He felt that he would die of shame.

The restraint of the boy never failed to astonish Charles. He softened as he said: “Listen to me, my son. If Zuniga were to flatter you and be only solicitous of ministering to your wishes, he would be like the rest of the court, and you would have one the less near you to tell you the truth—and a worse thing cannot happen to any man, old or young; but most of all to the young, for their want of experience does not enable them to discern truth from error. You are a wise boy and I rejoice in your wisdom. Do not be downcast. You have had a riding lesson this morning, but you have had too an even more valuable lesson. You have learned it well, I know.”

Charles was right. Philip had learned yet another lesson, and he knew that it was more important than the management of horses.

In a room of his own house in Salamanca, the Prince sat at a table listening to the voice of his tutor, the learned Dr. Juan Martinez Pedernales. Pedernales—which meant “flint”—was not a name likely to endear its owner to his pupils, so the professor had somewhat ingeniously latinized it, as so many learned men like to latinize their names, and so was always known as “Dr. Siliceo.”

He was fat, fond of good living, preferring to teach in comfort. It was, therefore, great good fortune to have been selected by the Emperor and his wife to tutor their son. What a change from teaching the poor boys of the University, who loved learning so much that they starved for it, begged for it, and came shivering with cold into the University of Salamanca, digesting knowledge in place of the food they could not afford to buy!

To this great seat of learning had come the Prince, riding in state to the town in the valley not far from the Portuguese border. Salamanca was one of the most notable centers of learning in the world, so that it was inevitable that Philip should be sent there. He could not, of course, be allowed to mix with the poor students or even the rich students. He had his own house in the town, with a full complement of attendants and guards.

With him had come his young cousin, Maximilian, who would one day marry Maria, Philip’s sister, and return with her to Vienna. There was also the Prince’s beloved friend, whom he was delighted to have with him—Ruy Gomez da Silva. These two boys took their lessons with Philip, and these lessons were made easy by Dr. Siliceo. In competition with these two boys—although Ruy was so much older and in any case by far the cleverest—Philip was always the one to be especially commended. The doctor made it his pleasure to see that Philip always knew the answers he was called upon to give; he never failed to compliment his royal pupil on his astuteness, his grasp of a problem or a translation.

The weak blue eyes would regard the doctor solemnly, and there would be no sign of pleasure in the pale face. Philip hid his thoughts, which were: But for Zuniga’s treatment of me and my father’s comments on it, I verily believe I should imagine I am cleverer than Ruy and Max in spite of some evidence to the contrary. How right my father was! A prince, and especially one who is to be king, should be more ready to believe those who say harsh things of him than those who applaud.

Yet in his grave manner he accepted the compliments of Dr Siliceo, for he understood that in the scholar’s mind there was the ever-present reminder that one day this pupil of his would rule Spain; and, even while knowing this, Philip could not help preferring Siliceo to Zuniga, who was still instructing him in physical exercise. This might have been because physical exercise did not greatly appeal to him and he found it easier to apply himself with keenness to learning than to fencing or the hunt.

History—and in particular the history of Spain—enchanted him. When he rode out incognito with Ruy and Max, as he liked to do, he would gaze with awe at the landscape, at the distant sierras—and they seemed ever-present, near or far, in whatever part of Spain he happened to be—and think of the times when the Romans had dominated the country, of the coming of the Visgoths; and chiefly he pondered on the great Mohammedan conquest. Then he would feel a fierceness rising within him, for everywhere in the country the influence of the Infidel was apparent. The name of his great-grandmother, Isabella the Catholic, was frequently mentioned; and as he sat there at the table, pale and impassive, inwardly he was swearing an oath, pledging himself to drive the heretics from the world as Isabella had driven the infidels from Granada.

The voice of Dr. Siliceo rose and fell in that quiet room as he spoke of the past.

“Spain was broken. Her children were exiled or dead. Her noble language was lost, and in the mountains and the plains was heard an alien tongue. Blackamoors were in command, and the slaughter was great. None was left to mourn save those women who had been taken as slaves to the foul Infidel.”

Philip clenched his hands, but he did not speak. He knew that the expulsion of the Moors had not been effected until nearly eight hundred years had elapsed. Everywhere in Spain was the mark of the Moor to bring humiliating reminders. Only the mountainous regions of the north and the northwest had escaped, but everywhere else it seemed the Moors lived on—in the buildings, in the customs and habits of the people, in the shape of a face and the slant of a pair of eyes. Arabs and Berbers had left their mark forever on the land of Spain.

The Cid had been a great hero, but it was not until the coming of Ferdinand and Isabella nearly four hundred years later that Spain had been freed, for that pair had conquered the Moorish stronghold of Granada itself. Isabella and Ferdinand had grown rich, and Spain had grown rich, and under them the dwarf Inquisition had grown to a monster.

Philip was stung into speech suddenly. He said: “And now we have the heretic. We will attack them as we have attacked the Moor and the Jew.”

Ruy looked at him with a faint smile curving his lips. He knew his friend well; he knew that beneath the grave calm a fierce spirit burned. It would be amusing to watch the great Siliceo pander to the Prince’s ideas.

Maximilian, thinking of the chase which he longed to join, smiled too. Now, he thought, the old man can marvel at the cleverness of our Prince. Let him. It means no questions for me to answer, and who cares about the Moors and Moriscos, the Jews and the Berbers nowadays? What does the past matter when there is the future before us? Let them talk, Maximilian would sit dreaming, not of the past, but of the forest … the boar hunt and himself leading the chase.

“Your royal Highness has found the root of the matter as usual. Now we have the heretic! And we must drive him from the Earth with all the strength we once used against the Infidel.”