“I bet you that money that the Cabinet will not fall to-morrow as you say.”
Whereupon the Queen took another two ounces from her purse, and placing them beside those of the diplomat, she said:
“The bet is made: if the Ministry does not fall to-morrow, the money is yours; if it does, it is mine.” And the Ministry did fall.
This insidious influence of the camarilla was daily becoming more dangerous. Presumptuous and illegal, it held its sway over all that was prudent and constitutional, and thus the intrigues of the palace came between the Cortes and the throne, and the country and the Queen, exercising power to the detriment of the national representation, the throne, the nation, and the Sovereign. “The royal palace,” says Don Antonio Bermejo, “was a gilded cage where men were slaves to envy and idleness.”
CHAPTER IX
ROYAL MATRIMONIAL SCHEMES—HOW ISABELLA’S SISTER FLED FROM PARIS IN 1848
1843–1848
Isabella’s marriage was now a burning subject of discussion and intrigue. The objection offered to her marriage with one of the sons of the Infanta Luisa Carlota was the hatred reigning between the mother of the proposed bridegroom and Queen Maria Cristina.
Louis Philippe of France had also his own designs in these marriage prospects, and would fain have united the Dauphin to the young Queen. But, as we know, England put her veto upon this alliance, as it would have upset the balance of European power; so the French King had to be contented with the marriage of his younger son, the Duke of Montpensier, with Isabel’s sister Luisa Fernanda.
There was a strong party in favour of the Queen’s marriage with the Count of Montemolin, son of Don Carlos, as this union would have put an end to the rivalry reigning between these two branches of the Royal Family.