FOOTNOTES
[97] [“Henceforward for years, during the most troublous crisis of Spain’s fall, she did more for the country and for the young king and queen than all the ministers together. Manners and morals were reformed, light and brightness penetrated where gloom and ignorance alone had existed before. A Frenchwoman sent specially to serve French interests, she stood firm in defence of Philip and his wife, and of Spanish traditions, when everything depended on her prudence.”—Hume.[d]]
[98] [“Here they committed the most enormous sacrileges, adding the rage of enemies to that of heretics,” says San Felipe.[b]]
[99] [“After thirteen years of struggle, the most obstinate and deadly in the modern history of Europe, Catalonia was brought back to the fold, shorn of all her privileges and assimilated to the contemned Castile.”—Hume.[h]]
[100] [“And so at last, after years of constant plotting and secret treaties innumerable, Elizabeth Farnese had triumphed in the great object of her life: all Europe accepted the sovereignty of her son over the Italian dominions of her forefathers. She had kept Europe in effervescence for years, but she had her way; and the persistence of one woman had re-established Spanish influence in Italy and raised Spain once more to a leading place in the councils of the world.”—Hume.[h]]
[101] [The importance of this “right of search” will recur in connection with the War of 1812 between England and the United States. The war hereafter described is sometimes called “The War of Jenkins’ Ear.”]
[102] [“At Piacenza the Franco-Spanish army was literally cut to bits by Lichtenstein (July 16th, 1746), and the ambitious dreams of Elizabeth Farnese seemed to melt into thin air.”—Hume.[h] Fuller details of this war will be found in the French, Austrian, and English histories.]
[103] [En se nada, that is, “in himself nothing,” referring to his humble origin.]
[104] [Was it not time, after the disastrous influences of cardinals, monks, warriors, merchants, and noblemen had been tormenting Spain for centuries, that a musician should be tried? Are not the eminently beneficial results of the singer’s influence over the benevolent king his justification?]
[105] [Martin Hume[d] calls Ferdinand VI “the most truly beneficent sovereign that Spain had known for centuries. The encouragement extended to learning and intellectual progress was even more marked than that given by his father. Academies and learned societies sprang up everywhere;” and again,[h] “Ferdinand had found Spain struggling painfully to the light, still ruined, bankrupt, and miserable. He left it enjoying comparative prosperity, with a fleet of fifty ships of war and £3,000,000 ($15,000,000) in the treasury.”]