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The scandalous relations of the Queen with Godoy had deeply incensed the heir to the throne, Ferdinand, Prince of Asturias. His attitude of covert opposition to his parents and their minion was strengthened by the influence of his bride, a daughter of the ex-Queen of Naples, and their palace was the headquarters of all who hoped to end the degradation of the kingdom.
The Prince of the Asturias, and the Marquis de Villena then rose also, end approached my son, both covered, all the other chevaliers remaining seated and covered.
This news could not give the Prince of the Asturias a high opinion of the welcome his father had in store for him; and indeed he was very coolly received, as I shall now relate.
In half an hour the messenger returned with a letter addressed to the favourite, containing only these lines: "A King of Spain is well aware that a Prince and Princess of Asturias can have no answer to give to such proposals or to such questions."
About both there was that air of wild picturesqueness, which we observe in art paintings of the gipsy, and sometimes in the gipsy herself for those sirens of the green lanes have not all disappeared; and, but that saw the snowy cone of Pike's Peak rising over the crest of the cliff, I might have fancied myself in the Sierra Asturias, with a beautiful gitana standing before me.
If he had not taken such decided steps, say the oldest inhabitants, there is no knowing what might have happened. From the thirteenth to the end of the nineteenth century, there are facts enough to prove the universal abhorrence in which this unfortunate race was held; whether called Cagots, or Gahets in Pyrenean districts, Caqueaux in Brittany, or Yaqueros Asturias.
If a French army penetrates by way of Bayonne, the Spaniards may base themselves upon Pampeluna and Saragossa, or upon Leon and the Asturias; and in either case the French cannot move directly to Madrid, because their line of operations would be at the mercy of their adversary. The frontier of the Turkish empire on the Danube presents the same advantages, if the Turks knew how to profit by them.
This plan had been communicated to our Ambassador, and approved of by our Government; but when Herman in such an honest manner had inspected the confidential correspondence of the Princess of Asturias, Beurnonville was instructed by Talleyrand to, warn the favourite of the impending danger, and to advise him to be beforehand with his enemies.
"It is all that we can offer you, sire," said imprudently the Duke de l'Infantado, formerly the most eager accomplice of the Prince of Asturias in his intrigues against his father; "we are waiting till the nation speaks, and authorizes us to give freer course to our sentiments." They stopped the duke from saying any more; the Spanish nation had not been consulted.
Lucien had besides another special reason for giving his daughter to the Prince of the Asturias. He particularly wished to prevent that Prince marrying Mademoiselle de Tascher, the niece of Josephine, a marriage for which M. de Beauharnais, then Ambassador of France at Madrid, was working with all his might.
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