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Updated: July 29, 2025
The Agony in the Garden, which is still to be found in one of the halls of the Escorial, even now in its faded state serves to evidence the intensity of religious fervour which possessed Titian when, so late in life, he successfully strove to renew the sacred subjects.
The letter-writer of the Escorial, who had earnestly warned his faithful Mucio, week after week, that dangers were impending over him, and that "some trick would be played upon him," should he venture into the royal presence, now acquiesced in his assassination, and placidly busied himself with fresh combinations and newer tools.
His subsequent expeditions against the Spanish possessions in the West Indies were eminently successful, and soon the name of Francis Drake rang through the world, and startled Philip in the depths of his Escorial.
The other and more extensive part to the west comprises the king's apartments on the south side, the queen's on the north, and between them the church. It is not without interest to compare the plan of this palace or monastery with the more famous Escorial.
To all remonstrance, however, the young King had one answer: "I have promised," and the nation, recognising that as a perfectly valid argument, acquiesced, though with many forebodings. The marriage took place, and within a few months the girl Queen was carried with her unborn child to the melancholy Pantéon de los Principes at the Escorial.
He was the man to prove, too, for the instruction of the patient letter-writer of the Escorial, that the crown of France was to be won with foot in stirrup and carbine in hand, rather than to be caught by the weaving and casting of the most intricate nets of diplomatic intrigue, though thoroughly weighted with Mexican gold.
How was an English soldier who valued his knightly word how were English diplomatists among whom one of the most famous then a lad of twenty, secretary to Lord Essex in the Netherlands had poetically avowed that "simple truth was highest skill," to deal with the thronging Spanish deceits sent northward by the great father of lies who sat in the Escorial?
It is now time to look in upon the elderly letter-writer in the Escorial, and see how he was playing his part in the drama. His counsellors were very few. His chief advisers were rather like private secretaries than cabinet ministers; for Philip had been withdrawing more and more into seclusion and mystery as the webwork of his schemes multiplied and widened.
The Bearnese was at least alive, and a man. He played his part with consummate audacity and skill; but alas for an epoch or a country in which such a shape notwithstanding all its engaging and even commanding qualities looked upon as an incarnation of human greatness! But the chief mover of all things so far as one man can be prime mover was still the diligent scribe who lived in the Escorial.
'One of these rascals, said Mazenta, 'was the sculptor Pompeo Leoni, who used to make the bronzes for the Escorial, and he pretended that he would obtain an appointment for Melzi at Milan, if he would get back the thirteen volumes for King Philip's new library in Spain. Leoni got possession of most of the books and kept them in his own cabinet.
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