A prince of the Catholic branch of the Coburgs was then proposed,—­Prince Ferdinand, who made subsequently an excellent king-consort in Portugal; but to him France objected, as too nearly allied to the English Crown.  Finally the suitors were reduced to three,—­the queen’s cousin Enrique (Henry), a rough sailor of rather radical opinions and turbulent ways; the Comte de Trepani, a Neapolitan prince, a man of small understanding; and another cousin, Don Francisco d’Assis, a creature weak alike in mind and body, whom it was an outrage to think of as fit mate for a young queen.  England was willing to consent to the queen’s marrying anyone of these princes, and also that the Duc de Montpensier should marry the Infanta Luisa, provided that the queen was first married and had had a child.  All this was fully agreed upon in the conference at Eu.  But Christina, the queen-mother, who had been plundering the Spanish treasury till she had accumulated an enormous fortune, offered, if Louis Philippe would use his influence to prevent any inquiry into the state of her affairs, to further his views as to the Duc de Montpensier.

It seems more like a scene in the Middle Ages than an actual transaction in our own century, that at midnight, in a Spanish palace, a dissolute Italian dowager and a French ambassador should have been engaged in coercing a sovereign of sixteen into a detested marriage.  As morning dawned, the sobbing girl had given her consent to marry Don Francisco, and the ambassador of Louis Philippe, pale from the excitement of his vigil, left the palace to send word of his disgraceful victory to his master.  The Duc de Montpensier, who was in waiting on the frontier, soon arrived in Madrid, and Isabella and Luisa were married on the same day; while M. Guizot, who was head of the French Government, and Louis Philippe excused their breach of faith to the queen of England by saying that Queen Isabella was married before her sister, though on the same morning.

Isabella at once banished her unwelcome husband to a country seat, and flung herself headlong into disgraceful excesses.

Queen Victoria was greatly hurt by the treachery displayed by Louis Philippe and his minister, and doubtless, as a woman she was deeply sorry for the young queen.  Louis Philippe not only lost credit, popularity, and the support he derived from the personal friendship of the Queen and the Prince Consort of England, but he obtained no chance of the throne of Spain for his son by his wicked devices; for Queen Isabella, far from being childless, had three daughters and a son.  The latter, subsequently Alfonso XII., married, in spite of much opposition, his lovely cousin Mercedes, daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Montpensier.  She died a few months after her marriage, so that no son or grandson of Louis Philippe will be permitted by Providence to mount the Spanish throne.

The affair of the Spanish marriages, the quarrel it involved with Queen Victoria, and the loss to Louis Philippe of personal honor, had a great effect upon him; he became irritable and obstinate, and at the same time weak of will.