The Prime Minister

“There was no mistaking his proud glance, boy,” returned the Duke. “You know not the daring impudence of the man; his sole delight is to show his contempt of that rank to which he can never by right belong.”

“Yet the King, whom we are all bound to reverence, places confidence in him; and he has already shown good example of his abilities,” observed the young Viscount.

“The King is easily deceived by those who choose to flatter him,” answered the Duke; “but his flattery shall avail him but little. Ah! we are at the palace, and that daring plebeian has arrived before us. We shall see with what a sneering and bold glance he will front us in the presence chamber, if he escapes his weak master’s anger at his dilatory appearance. Let him gaze as he will, every glance shall be repaid by a drop of his life’s blood.”

While the Duke was thus venting his rage, the Minister, regardless of the anger he excited, drove rapidly on past all the other carriages, and descending at the gate of the palace, hastened to the audience chamber, to kiss the hand of the sovereign, to whose welfare he was devoted.

As he approached, the King’s ear was yet ringing with the tones of the insidious voices of those who had been striving to blast his reputation; but the eyes of his slanderers, as if conscious that he knew their vile intent, sank abashed before his steady and confident gaze.

“Senhor Carvalho is late in paying his respects to us,” began the King, as the Minister bent his knee before him.

“I trust that your Majesty will pardon me, your most faithful servant, when you learn that I was more deeply engaged in your Majesty’s affairs, and the welfare of the state, than those who would poison your gracious ears with lying tales against my credit;” and drawing up his commanding figure, which towered above the crowd of courtiers, his eagle glance ranged over the frowning countenances of those who stood around. “But I know that your Majesty is too wise and generous to believe them, while I can prove my devotion to your service. I have detected, and for the present counteracted, a conspiracy to deprive your Majesty of your sovereign rights, and to bring your mind under subjection of your most subtle foes, the Jesuits. While many, who would endeavour to injure me in your estimation are passing their nights in sleep or dissipation, I have been consuming the midnight oil in your service, snatching, at intervals, a few hours of hurried rest. The details of my researches I will lay before your Majesty at some future period, and, till then, I trust in your goodness not to condemn me.”

“We fully trust to your zeal, my friend, and know you to be a most loving and faithful servant,” answered the King, banishing, in a moment, all the dark suspicions which had arisen in his mind. “Say no more on the subject at present; but, when this ceremony is over, we will consult in private on the affair. See, numbers are pressing forward to pay their duty to us.”

“But not one whose heart beats with fonder devotion for your Majesty,” answered the Minister, again bending his knee, and kissing the hand of the King, held out to him, when he retired to his allotted station. The Queen and Dom Pedro looked angrily at him, but dared not utter their feelings; the courtiers glanced at each other, when they were not observed, and shrugged their shoulders, seeing that for the present it was in vain to attempt to injure him with the King; but vowing not to lose another opportunity of renewing their attacks against one whom they had just reason to fear. Carvalho spoke a few words, in whispers, to his colleagues, whose eyes sunk on the ground as he proceeded; and, indeed, no one of that assembly of the proudest and most noble in the land seemed as much at their ease as before he entered, except the King himself, who, on the contrary, uttered his expressions of courtesy to those who came to pay their respects, with greater ease and fluency. One of the first was the Marquis of Marialva, one of the most justly-esteemed nobles of the Court, who ever retained the affection of the King, though he did not escape the jealousy of the Minister, who was, however, never able to injure him. “Do what you will with the others,” the King used to say; “but let alone my marquis.” He now entered, with a free and graceful manner, for which he was remarkable, and affectionately kissed the hand of his royal friend.

“Ah, my good marquis, we missed you much from our hunting party yesterday,” said the King. “We much required your active arm to slay the beast, who gored one of our best dogs before he was slain.”

“I had sprained my left arm, and could not guide my horse, or I should not have missed the honour of accompanying your Majesty,” returned Marialva.

“We know; we heard of your accident, and are glad to find that you are so far recovered; and, as we have a favour to ask, let us know when you are perfectly strong. We wish to show the English Minister that we have some nobles of our Court – and of no mean rank either – who are fully equal to the feats of agility and strength of which his countrymen boast. Our father – to whose soul God be merciful! – sent to the English Court an ambassador, who was, we heard, the tallest among all the corps diplomatique, and not the least able, we suspect; so that we may vie with those islanders both in strength and size.”

The Marquis smiled, as he answered, “I will gladly obey your Majesty in anything you may command, and hope in a few days sufficiently to recover my strength to do so.”

A few persons of less note followed, when a disturbance, most unusual at Court, occurred, and a voice, as if in angry discussion, was heard, when the Duke of Aveiro was seen advancing in a hurried and disordered manner. A fierce fire burnt in his eye, and a frown deeply furrowed his brow, while his hand wandered unconsciously to the hilt of his sword; but, as he came close to the King, the presence of majesty restored him slightly to order; yet his carriage was far from having that respectful manner which he was bound to preserve: his step was irregular, and he yet snorted with rage, as, in a careless and indifferent way, he stooped to kiss the hand of his sovereign.

“What has caused my lord duke to be so angry this morning?” said the King. “He seems to forget that he is in the royal palace.”

“I forget not where I am, for I have too much to remind me of it,” answered the Duke, haughtily. “I have been insulted grossly – insulted by one of the ministers in whom your Majesty pleases to confide, in a way to which no noble can submit.”

“Who is the culprit, my lord duke? It seems you have taken a lesson from him,” said the King.

“He stands behind your Majesty, even now, I doubt not, plotting mischief in his fertile brain against your throne and the Church – Senhor Carvalho is the man!” answered the Duke.

The Minister cast a withering glance at him.

“The punishment due to my crime is not to be found mentioned in the laws of the realm,” he said. “I therefore submit myself to your Majesty’s clemency. The offence was in passing my lord duke, in my eagerness to show my respect to my sovereign.”

“Is that the whole of the offence, Senhor Duke?” said the King, half smiling. “It is at once pardoned, and we must request your Excellency to move out of the way in future, when any of our officers wish to pass you, in discharge of their duty;” and the King turned aside his head.

“The whole of the offence!” muttered the Duke of Aveiro, as he moved on one side. “For half such an one many a man has, ere now, died.”

The highest fidalgos, their ladies and daughters, now followed in rapid succession; among them came the Marquis and Marchioness of Tavora, who had lately been acting the part of viceroys in India, and were, perhaps, but little pleased at being obliged to take a secondary place on the present occasion. They presented their eldest son, shortly to be united to the lovely daughter of the Marquis d’Alorna. Both the sovereigns looked coldly on them as they passed, uttering merely the most common-place observations.

“We have not seen you at Court for some time, my lord marquis,” said the King; “but we hope, in future, your own private affairs will not keep you from us. We will not now detain you.”

It was observed, that when the young marquis bent to kiss the King’s hand, Joseph turned aside his head, with a frown, nor dared to meet the eye of the young man, who, after paying the same compliment to the Queen, moved on one side. His betrothed bride, to whom he was to be united in a few days, followed directly after, led forward by her father, till she reached the presence chamber, when, with a slight agitation in her manner, visible only to the eye of a keen observer, she advanced towards the King, and, as she knelt to kiss his hand, he whispered in her ear – “Fear not, dearest, this must be so; but our love alters not.” The unhappy girl blushed, and, as she rose, her eye caught that of the King, bent on her in admiration, when hers fell to the ground, nor did she dare to encounter the angry and fierce glances the Queen cast on her. Her father was received with marked attention, which, unsuspicious of harm, he took as due to his extraordinary merits. Next came the Count of Atouquia, a young noble of unprepossessing appearance, and his countess, a lady much admired by the King.

Trembling with alarm at a scene so strange and dazzling, the fair Donna Clara was now led forward by the aged Marchioness de Corcunda, who had repaired to Court expressly to introduce her. As the beautiful and delicate young being knelt before him, the King smiled with surprise and pleasure, and raising her, bade her take courage, inquiring her name of the old marchioness. “She is, indeed, a bright jewel to adorn our Court, where we hope constantly to see her; and we doubt not many of our gallant fidalgos will enter the lists to win her smiles.”

“Her hand is already sought by one of the first fidalgos, your Majesty; but the young lady has a strong desire to become the bride of our holy Church,” answered the Marchioness.

The King looked annoyed, and an expression in no way respectful to the Church was on his lips; but he checked his anger, contenting himself merely with saying —

“The Church shows great discernment in choosing so fair a bride; but it is putting too great a temptation in the way of sinners to commit sacrilege, by making them seek to rob it of its prize.”

Donna Clara heard these words of compliment, to which her ear was so unaccustomed, that it increased her blushes, adding to the lustre of her beauty, nor knew she which way to turn her eyes, till the marchioness having paid her respects to the Queen, took her arm, and led her through the admiring crowd. The Queen frowned on the lovely girl, and coldly returned her salutation; for she feared, in each new beauty, another rival in her lord’s affections. Gonçalo Christovaö followed directly after.

“We have much pleasure in seeing you at Lisbon, senhor,” said the King; “but we shall find fault with you, if you allow your daughter to quit the world. We hope you will cause her to alter her intention.”

“Your Majesty’s pleasure is my law,” said the fidalgo, bowing and moving on, fearful of trusting his tongue with further words.

Scarcely a person of any rank or note passed, to whom the King did not address some words; and nearly all had passed by, when a handsome cavalier approached, and, gracefully kneeling, kissed his hand.

“We do not remember to have seen your countenance before, young sir,” said the King, pleased with his appearance; “though we shall have much pleasure in seeing it in future. We did not catch your name.”

“Luis d’Almeida,” answered the young fidalgo. “I have but a short time ago returned from abroad, or I should earlier have paid my respects to your Majesty.”

“We are happy to see you, Don Luis,” answered the King. “Your father we have not seen for some time; we trust he is in health.”

“It is the want of it alone which prevents his paying his respects to your Majesty. Weighed down by years and heavy misfortunes, he scarcely hopes again to visit Lisbon.”

“He sends a worthy representative in his son,” answered the King, graciously; “and if you feel inclined to remain, we may give you some office in our Court.”

“Your Majesty’s kindness overpowers me; but my father’s state of health claims all my attention, nor could I be long absent from him; therefore, if your Majesty will permit me, I must decline your goodness with the deepest respect,” said Don Luis.

“In that please yourself, and give our regards to your father, when you return,” said the King, as Don Luis moved on to give place to those who were following him.

At length the tedious ceremony, one of the many penalties royalty is obliged to pay in return for the obeisance of the crowd, was over, and the courtiers, except those in immediate attendance on the sovereigns, were at liberty to go whither they willed. Don Luis, although amid a glittering crowd of the young and gay, felt sad and dispirited; and he had already reached one of the outer rooms on his way to quit the palace, when a page overtook him, and informed him, that Senhor Carvalho requested to see him; and begging him to follow, led the way through various rooms, to a small closet, next to the King’s private council chamber. Here he found the Minister, pacing up and down, with a bundle of papers in his hand, prepared to attend when the King should summon him: he stopped in his walk, as he saw Don Luis, and held out his hand kindly to him —

“Ah, my young friend,” he said, “I am glad to find that you followed my advice, and returned to Court as soon as you were able to leave your father; and now I hope it is from no want of affection to our sovereign, that you rejected his proffered kindness, as I spoke to him in your favour some time ago, and he promised to befriend you; for I would always distinguish those who have enlightened their understanding by foreign travel, from the ignorant and profligate young fidalgos, who are alike useless to themselves, and dangerous to a state.”

“Your Excellency is flattering me at the expense of the Fidalguia of Portugal,” answered Luis, his sense of the respect due to his class hurt by the Ministers expressions.

“I speak but the truth of them, young sir,” answered the Minister, “and am right in making you an exception; but in truth, I would, for another reason, be of service to any of your family, and regretted much, when the King made his gracious offer, that you did not accept it.”

“I have again to thank your Excellency for the interest you take in my welfare; but I should not even have returned to Lisbon so soon, were I not obliged to attend the marriage of my cousin, Donna Theresa d’Alorna, with the young Marquis of Tavora.”

“I forgot your connexion with that family; but beware of the Tavoras. They are haughty, ambitious, and proud; and though I fear them not myself, I would not trust those I regard with their friendship.”

A page now came to inform the Minister that the King was in readiness to receive him.

“Farewell, Don Luis, and remember my offers and advice,” he said, as he turned to follow the page to the presence of the King.

As Luis was leaving the palace, he felt his arm seized in no gentle grasp, and turning round, to his great satisfaction he found his friend Captain Pinto by his side.

“Ah, what! Don Luis turned courtier!” exclaimed the latter. “Well, it is one of the characters of life a gentleman ought to play, though I cannot say it is much to my taste. I cannot stand all the buckram and bowing a man has to go through, though I played my part pretty well to-day, and received all sorts of compliments for sinking the Rover; besides which, I expect to get something about as substantial, in the shape of a cross of some order or other, which, the chances are, I see the next day worn by the escudeiro of my Lord Marquis of Marialva or Tavora. But no matter! it will be intended as an honour, and I may boast how I won it, which few others can do: however, here have I been running on about my own affairs, and quite forgetting to ask you about yours. Tell me first, when did you come to Lisbon, for I have been inquiring for you, and heard that you were not even expected.”

“I arrived only yesterday, and remain but till my cousin Theresa’s marriage takes place.”

“Ah! a sore subject that, I fear; but if you are the man I take you for, you will soon recover from that trifling wound; but I will not talk about it. I was wishing to see you, to deliver a message from Senhor Mendez, who desires to have some conversation with you. He has not yet recovered from his injuries, and begs you will visit him.”

“I will gladly do so, if you tell me where I may find him,” said Luis.

“I will take you with me to-night, for I do not venture to visit him by day, for reasons I will explain some time to you,” answered Captain Pinto.

“I cannot go till late; for I have a visit to pay at the palace of the Marchioness of Corcunda, to deliver some jewels I recovered from some robbers in an extraordinary way to a young lady, who will be anxious to hear of their safety,” said Don Luis.

“What! another young lady in the case? I thought you had foresworn womankind for ever,” said Captain Pinto, laughing.

“I have seen Donna Clara but once, and am only performing an act of common courtesy,” said Don Luis.

“Is she very lovely?” asked his friend. “She is perfection,” answered Don Luis. “That fully accounts for it,” said the Captain. “I thought it would be so. Eternal wretchedness – no comfort but in the grave! Ha! ha!”

Volume Two – Chapter Four

When Don Luis reached the palace of the Marchioness of Corcunda, where he had learned that Donna Clara and her father were residing, he saw light streaming from all the windows, and sounds of revelry met his ear. He paused for a moment, doubtful whether he should enter the scene of festivity; but, being still habited in his full dress of the morning, he felt that he was in a proper costume, having also a modest consciousness that he should not be unwelcome to the lady of the mansion, nor, he trusted, to Donna Clara. He therefore boldly approached the door, working his way through a crowd of lackeys, chairmen, and linkboys, and ascended a flight of steps leading to the habitable part of the mansion, following a gay and laughing party of the young and happy. The anterooms were already crowded with company, and in one of them a servant pointed out the marchioness standing ready to receive her guests. As he advanced towards her, people stared at him as one whom their eyes were not accustomed to meet; but none of the fair or young frowned, or seemed displeased at his appearance. Bowing gracefully, he mentioned his name, and expressed his anxiety to pay his respects to Gonçalo Christovaö and his daughter.

“Oh, I have heard of your exploit and gallantry, Senhor Don Luis, – and I know that Gonçalo Christovaö will be equally anxious again to thank you for the service you rendered his daughter. You will find him on the way to the ball-room,” said the old Marchioness, coldly.

“And Donna Clara?” said Luis, hesitating.

“Her father will inform you,” answered the Marchioness, in the same tone as before.

What these words could mean Luis could not tell, though they seemed to forebode that he would not be as welcome as he hoped; but he could not inquire further, as he had received a strong hint to proceed; bowing, therefore, to the old lady, he looked eagerly among the crowd for Gonçalo Christovaö, to have his doubts removed, but he could nowhere perceive him.

While stopped in his progress by the crowd, a voice, which had once sounded like the sweetest melody to his ear, arrested his attention, and sent a strange thrill, more of pain than pleasure, through his frame; when he beheld before him his cousin Theresa, leaning on the arm of a youth, whose eyes were bent on her as if enchanted with her beauty. He at once recognised the young Marquis of Tavora, whom he recollected in his boyhood; and though, at first, a pang of angry jealousy shot across his bosom, he at once banished the feeling as unworthy of himself, knowing that though, during his absence, the marquis had proved his successful rival, it was owing more to Donna Theresa’s ambition and vanity than to any unfair advantage he had taken. Notwithstanding all the affectionate attentions of her betrothed husband, Donna Theresa’s manner seemed cold and indifferent, and she returned but short replies to his observations; and when she smiled, to Don Luis her smile appeared forced and unnatural. He gazed at the young pair with grief at his heart.

“Alas!” he thought, “that I should have wasted my best feelings on one so incapable of those tender affections which form the chief jewels of the sex. Oh! woman, woman! lovely and angelic as thou appearest, if thy heart has become cold and callous by contact with the world, how valueless, how empty thou art! Unhappy youth! – she loves him not; – I see it in that forced smile, that cold eye, – and yet he seems not to have discovered it – I pity him!”

Such thoughts, very natural to a rejected lover, and very soothing to his vanity, passing through his mind, he was unwilling to address her, and would have passed unnoticed, when her eye caught his regarding her. For a single moment a blush passed across her features, but the next, holding out her hand, with a smile, she led the young marquis towards him; and, to avoid being guilty of marked rudeness, he was obliged to kiss the fair hand she offered.

“What! you seemed to have forgotten me, my good cousin,” she said, in a gay tone, “though I hear you intend honouring me by your presence at my marriage. Ah, you do not remember Don Luis of Tavora. Permit me to introduce my most loving cousin, who has travelled all over the world, I believe; or, at least, to England, and other barbarous countries, where the sun shines only once in the year, and then half the day is obscured by a thick fog, while for six months the ground is covered with snow. Oh, dreadful! I would get rid of such a country altogether: it makes me shiver to think of it, even in this warm room. You have no idea, senhor marquis, how my cousin blinked his eyes when he first came back to clear skies and sunshine, so accustomed had he been to live in the dark.”

While Donna Theresa was thus speaking, the gentlemen exchanged the usual compliments.

“Ah, I am glad to see he has not forgotten how to bow properly, or, I rather suspect, he has picked up the art since his return. I protest that, the first day he came back, he had no notion of bending his body, like the English, who, I hear, are either born with one joint only, and that is in their necks, or else they become stiffened from their forgetting to use them. Now, you are going to defend your friends, but don’t attempt it; I hate them, with their stiff pride and supercilious airs, thinking every people their inferiors who do not possess such good roads and fine horses as themselves. There was one man who came here, an English lord, I forget his dreadful name, but it pained my mouth to attempt to pronounce it, who compared everything he saw with his own country; and, because our habits and manners differed from those to which he was accustomed, he must needs consider ours far less civilised, and took no trouble to conceal his opinion.”

“Though at first rather distant in manner, I was received by many with great cordiality and kindness, and saw much to admire in their manners and institutions,” answered Luis, wishing to protect the character of his friends.

“I know nothing about their institutions,” exclaimed Donna Theresa, in a pettish tone, “but I know their impertinent superciliousness will make them enemies wherever they go – so talk no more about them. By-the-bye, I hear you have been vying in your exploits with that renowned hero Don Quixote, and rescuing distressed damsels from the power of brigands by the strength of your single arm, and with the aid of your faithful squire Pedro. Everybody in Lisbon is prepared to look upon you as a complete Knight Errant. I heard all about it from Donna Clara herself, who speaks warmly in praise of your gallantry, I assure you; and if she does not think you are perfection itself, she thinks you very near it. I believe if anything could make her angry, it would have been my abusing you to her, but, instead of that, it almost made her cry.”

“Where is Donna Clara?” exclaimed Luis, interrupting her eagerly: “I have a packet to deliver to her.”