After reproaching Cristina for the weakness which had led her to sacrifice her daughter’s throne to the intrigues of the Infantas, the Princess sent for Calomarde, and a terrible scene took place. She upbraided the Minister for the treacherous way he had played into the hands of the Queen’s enemy, and had abandoned her in time of need; and when he sought to justify himself, she gave way to such fury that she struck him on the face.
For a moment the Princess seemed shocked at her own loss of temper, but Calomarde’s courtier-like remark, that “white hands offend not,” showed that no further resentment on his part would be shown. In the meanwhile, as the King was supposed to be dead, the secret societies noised abroad the news of the Revocation of the Pragmatic Sanction, and Don José O’Donnell sent a secret circular to the authorities and persons of the places in favour of Don Carlos.
In fact, albeit after September 28 immediate anxiety about the King’s life was past, Maria Cristina felt that she was on the brink of a revolution.
It was due to the magnanimity and kind-hearted nature of the Queen that the King at this time finally signed the decree which buried the hatchet of the revolution in Seville, and allowed all people to return to their native land; and it was by this deed that the beautiful young Queen gained a surer hold on the hearts of her subjects.
Cristina was, moreover, relieved from the presence of Calomarde on the recovery of the King, for, as he could no longer expect the favour or confidence of his Sovereigns, he left Spain for France, and there remained until the day of his death.
It was on October 19 that Ferdinand and Cristina returned to the capital after all the events which had so surely sifted true friends from false flatterers. The atmosphere seemed clearer; the King saw that it was necessary to make Cristina Regent during his daughter’s minority, and with this triumph of her authority Cristina wore the bright and joyous look of a tender wife, a loving mother, a heroic Queen, and the liberator of Spain.
Ferdinand was certainly a wreck after his severe illness. As Don Carlos said, “he was more a corpse than a man”; but he was alive, and, after that terrible moment when Cristina had thought she was alone and unprotected with the dead body of her husband, the fact of his being by her side gave her a sense of protection.
The entry of the Sovereigns into Madrid was followed by a manifesto from the Queen, in which she set forth her love to Spain, and a declaration was published by the King, in which he annulled the codicil which would have abrogated the Pragmatic Sanction. After stating the facts of the Pragmatic Sanction, the King said:
“Perfidy completed the horrible plot which sedition commenced.... Being conversant now with the falsity with which the loyalty of my beloved Spaniards was calumniated, as they are always faithful to the descendants of their Kings; and being quite persuaded that it is not in my power, nor in my desires, to break with the immemorial custom of the succession established for centuries past, sanctioned by the law, and followed by the illustrious heroines who have preceded me on the throne; and solicited by the unanimous votes of the kingdoms, and free now from the influence and coercion of those fatal circumstances—I declare solemnly of my own free will that the decree signed at the time of my illness was torn from me by surprise, and that it was the effect of the false terrors which upset me, and that it is now null and void, being contrary to the fundamental laws of the monarchy and the obligations which I owe my august descendants, as father and as King.
“In my Palace of Madrid,