Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/196

52 to that of the prince." Extraordinary doctrines these for the age in which they were promulged, affording a still more extraordinary contrast with those which have been since familiar in that unhappy country!

The government then enforced levies of all such as were above the age of fourteen, and, distrusting the sufficiency of its own resources, offered the sovereignty of the principality to Henry the Fourth, of Castile. The court of Aragon, however, had so successfully insinuated its influence into the council of this imbecile monarch, that he was not permitted to afford the Catalans any effectual support; and, as he abandoned their cause altogether before the expiration of the year, the crown was offered to Don Pedro, constable of Portugal, a descendant Successes of of the ancient house of Barcelona.

In the mean while, the old king of Aragon, attended by his youthful son, had made himself master, with his characteristic activity, of considerable acquisitions in the revolted territory, successively reducing Le- rida, Cervera, Amposta, Tortosa, and the most