Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. III.djvu/466

438 438 FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. PART in any other period of the Spanish history. New '■ — avenues to wealth and honors were opened to them ; and persons and property were alike pro- tected under the fearless and impartial administra- tion of the law. " Such was the justice dispensed to every one under this auspicious reign," exclaims Marineo, " that nobles and cavaliers, citizens and laborers, rich and poor, masters and servants, all equally partook of it."^^ We find no complaints of arbitrary imprisonment, and no attempts, so fre- quent both in earlier and later times, at illegal taxation. In this particular, indeed, Isabella mani- fested the greatest tenderness for her people. By her commutation of the capricious tax of the alcavala for a determinate one, and still more by transferring its collection from the revenue officers to the citi- zens themselves, she greatly relieved her subjects. ^^ Finally, notwithstanding the perpetual call for troops for the military operations, in which the government was constantly engaged, and notwith- standing the example of neighbouring countries, 21 " Porque la io-ualidad de la revenue. As it was originally de- i"usticia que los bienauenturados signed, more than a century before, 'rincipes hazian era tal, que todos to furnish funds for the Moorish los hombres de qualquier condicion war, Isabella, as we have seen in que fuessen : aora nobles, y caua- her testament, entertained great lleros : aora plebeyos, y labradores, scruples as to the right to continue y ricos, o pobres, llacos, o fuertes, it, without the confirmation of the seilores, o sieruos en lo que a la people, after that was terminated, justicia tocaua todos fuessen igua- Ximenes reconunended its aboli- les." Cosas Memorables, fol. 180. lion, without any quahfication, to 22 These beneficial changes were Charles V., but in vain. (lidera made with the advice, and through auct., ubi supra.) Whatever be the agency of Ximenes. (Gomez, thought of its legality, there can be De Rebus Gestis, fol. 2t. — Quin- no doubt it was one of the most tanilla, Archclypo, p. 181.) The successful means ever devised by a alcarala, a tax of one tcntii on government for shackling the in- all transfers of property, produced duslry and enterprise of its sub- more tliau any oilier branch of the jects.