It was a natural result of the system according to which kingdoms and provinces with the populations dwelling therein were transferable like real estate by means of marriage-settlements, entails, and testaments, that the proprietorship of most of the great realms in Christendom was matter of fierce legal dispute.  Lawsuits, which in chancery could last for centuries before a settlement of the various claims was made, might have infinitely enriched the gentlemen of the long robe and reduced all the parties to beggary, had there been any tribunal but the battle-field to decide among the august litigants.  Thus the King of Great Britain claimed the legal proprietorship and sovereignty of Brittany, Normandy, Anjou, Gascony, Calais, and Boulogne in France, besides the whole kingdom by right of conquest.  The French king claimed to be rightful heir of Castile, Biscay, Guipuscoa, Arragon, Navarre, nearly all the Spanish peninsula in short, including the whole of Portugal and the Balearic islands to boot.  The King of Spain claimed, as we have seen often enough, not only Brittany but all France as his lawful inheritance.  Such was the virtue of the prevalent doctrine of proprietorship.  Every potentate was defrauded of his rights, and every potentate was a criminal usurper.  As for the people, it would have excited a smile of superior wisdom on regal, legal, or sacerdotal lips, had it been suggested that by any possibility the governed could have a voice or a thought in regard to the rulers whom God in His grace had raised up to be their proprietors and masters.

The army of Spain was sunk far below the standard at which it had been kept when it seemed fit to conquer and govern the world.  Neither by Spain nor Italy could those audacious, disciplined, and obedient legions be furnished, at which the enemies of the mighty despot trembled from one extremity of earth to the other.  Peculation, bankruptcy, and mutiny had done their work at last.  We have recently had occasion to observe the conduct of the veterans in Flanders at critical epochs.  At this moment, seventy thousand soldiers were on the muster and pay roll of the army serving in those provinces, while not thirty thousand men existed in the flesh.

The navy was sunk to fifteen or twenty old galleys, battered, dismantled, unseaworthy, and a few armed ships for convoying the East and West Indiamen to and from their destinations.

The general poverty was so great that it was often absolutely impossible to purchase food for the royal household.  “If you ask me,” said a cool observer, “how this great show of empire is maintained, when the funds are so small, I answer that it is done by not paying at all.”  The Government was shamelessly, hopelessly bankrupt.  The noble band of courtiers were growing enormously rich.  The state was a carcase which unclean vultures were picking to the bones.

The foremost man in the land—­the autocrat, the absolute master in State and Church—­was the Duke of Lerma.