Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/350

206 206 ADMINISTRATION OF CASTILE. PART to jour estates, as you think best ; but, so long as ' Heaven permits us to retain the rank with which we have been intrusted, we shall take care not to imitate the example of Henry the Fourth, in be- coming a tool in the hands of our nobility." The discontented lords, who had carried so high a hand under the preceding imbecile reign, feeling the weight of an authority which rested on the affec- tions of the people, were so disconcerted by the rebuke, that they made no attempt to rally, but condescended to make their peace separately as they could, by the most ample acknowledgments.^^ The queen's Au cxamplc of thc impartiality as well as spirit, spirited ^ ^, . ™ , meli^obiiity "^^'^^^ which Isabella asserted the dignity of the crown, is worth recording. During her husband's absence in Aragon in the spring of 1481, a quar- rel occurred, in the ante-chamber of the palace at Valladolid, between two young noblemen, Ramiro Nuilcz de Guzman, lord of Toral, and Frederic Henriquez, son of the admiral of Castile, king Ferdinand's uncle. The queen, on receiving in- telligence of it, granted a safe-conduct to the lord of Toral, as the weaker party, until the affair should be adjusted between them. Don Frederic, howev- er, disregarding this protection, caused his enemy to be waylaid by three of his followers, armed with bludgeons, and sorely beaten one evening in the streets of Valladolid. Isabella was no sooner informed of this outrage • on one whom she had taken under the royal pro- '1 Ferreras, Hist. d'Espagne, torn. vii. pp. 487, 488.