Page:Mexico, Aztec, Spanish and Republican, Vol 1.djvu/215

Rh not only of the whole church, in the estimation of these friars, but of the special sect or brotherhood which happened to obtain the first hold on a tribe or nation by its missionary residence among its people. Palafox requested the Duke of Escalona to deprive the monkish orders of this monopoly; a desire to which the viceroy at once acceded, inasmuch as he was anxious to serve the bishop in all matters pertaining to his religious functions.

The kindly feeling of the viceroy does not appear to have been appreciated, or sincerely responded to by Palafox. This personage was removed in 1642, to the archiepiscopal see of Mexico, and under the pretext of installation in his new office and opening his tribunals, he visited the capital with the actual design of occupying the viceroyal throne to which he had been appointed! This was a sudden and altogether unexpected blow to the worthy duke, who was so unceremoniously supplanted. No one seems to have whispered to him even a suspicion of the approaching calamity, until the crafty Palafox assembled the oidores at midnight on the eve of Pentecost, and read to them the royal despatches containing his commission. His conduct to the jovial hearted duke, who was no match, in all probability, for the wily churchman, was not only insincere but unmannerly, for, immediately after the assumption of his power at dead of night, he commanded a strong guard to surround the palace at dawn, and required the Oidor Lugo, to read the royal cedula to the duke even before he left his bed. The deposed viceroy immediately departed for the convent at Churubusco, outside the city walls on the road to San Agustin de las Cuevas. All his property was sequestrated, and his money and jewels were secured within the treasury.

The reader will naturally seek for an explanation of this political enigma, or base intrigue, and its solution is again eminently characteristic of the reign in which it occurred. It will be remembered that the Duke of Braganza had been declared King of Portugal, which kingdom had separated itself from the Spanish domination, causing no small degree of animosity among the Castilians against the Portuguese and all who favored them. The Duke of Escalona, unfortunately, was related to the house of Braganza, and the credulous Philip having heard that his viceroy exhibited some evidences of attachment to the Portuguese, resolved to supercede him by Palafox. Besides this, the Duke committed the impolitic act of appointing a Portuguese, to the post of Castellan of St. Juan de Ulua; and, upon a certain occasion, when two horses had been presented to him by Don Pedro de Castilla, and Don Cristobal de Portugal,