The Manitowoc tribune. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1866-1878, 1878-02-28
THE SPANISH BOURBONS.

THE SPANISH BOURBONS.
Highly Intere sting Chapter of History.
With the royal marriage at Madrid,
says the Chicago Tribune, closes, prob
ally, one of the most sensational and
singular chapters of modern political
history. Inasmuch as it throws some
light on subjects yet of interest, though
less familiar to this generation than they
we're to former one, it may not be space
lost that is devoted to q brief recital
Ferdinand VII, King of Spain, dying in
1855, left td h's infant daughter, Maria
Isabel Luisa, the throne end erown. hav-
ing three years before repealed the Salic
law, thus cutting off Don Carlos, his
brother, the regular heir under the sys-
tenn In force since the time of Philip V.
This brought about at Ferdihantfs death
the bloody, civil war of the Carlists aid
Christinists, partisans respectively of
Don Carlos and of Queen Maria Chris
tina, the baby Queens mother and Re-
gent Finally the Carlists were defeated
and made peace, the Cortes having mean
while SUPPORTED Queen Isabella, and ex
cluded in perpetuity the Carlist line
from the throne In 1S43 Isabella's ma
jority was proclaimed, and she ascended
the throne. Two years later the question
of her mario ge was agitated. -Four can
didates for her hand reared-Don
Carlos sen; the Count de Montemol:n,
backed by Russia; Prince Leopold of
Cobourg, backed by England; the Count
de Trapani, son of the King of the two
Sicilies, and Don Francisco de Assis, her
cotsin. Louis Philippe supported this
last candidate. aid With his adroit Minis
ter, Guizot, brought about the famous
"Spanish marriages" of Oct. 10, 1916,
when the Queen married Don Francisco
and her sister Maria Luisa married Louis
Philippe's fifth son, the Duke de Mont
pensier. England had rievad this Pro-
iect with decided disfavor, for, rs Don
Francisco was physically impotent, no
children could be expected to result from
the union, and the succession would de-
volve. upon the heirs of Isabella's sister,
Louis Philippe's grandchildren. So
close an alliance of France and Spain
was unpopular, and, when the old King
brought it about after having pledged
his word to Lord Acetdeen that he had
abandoned the project, the feeling en-
genoered in England threatened a rup-
ture of the peaceful relations between
the two countries so fondly nursed by
both.
Bit two factors had not been ts.ken
into account Barely year after the
marriages the Orleanist dynasty in
France came to an end forever, and in
1851 the Queen of Spain gave birth to
child, followed later by four others, so
that Louis Philippe's house lost the
throne of France and had five lives be-
tween it and that of Spain. Tt was GER
tainly not a moral course of action, but
if anything could excuse Queen Isabel
las conduct it was the conduct of Louis
Philippe Against mock-marriage
there was no effective weapon but that
which she took.
Meanwhile Montpensier had become
a Spanish subject, and was prosecuting
his campaign for the crown cautiously
and perseveringly. On the eve of the
revolution of 1868, Isabella, doubling
his loyalty, "invited :" him to quit Spain,
and he left the country-not, however,
it is shrewdly suspected, till he had fur
nished Prim and Topete with the means
to overthrow the Queen. He obtained
permission from the Provisional Gov
ernment to return to Seville, and set to
work to obtain his own election to the
vacant throne. Backed by the Liberal
6lGmSuU, WHICH WAS dllutSG SOIlu III IiS
support his success at one time seemed
reasonably certain, but early in 1870 his
hopes were forever dashed. His cousin,
ter published in January, displayed such
hatred in his words that a duel was
thought inevitable in .Letter to the
Montpensieristes,' dated March 7, he re-
doubled the insult. The Duke was not
a ,,oo,, b,,t ba 1uoc fnroa1 into
fighting, and on the 10Th of March Don
Enrique fell by the hand of the relative
he had driven 10 resent repeated insults.
In homely phrase, Don Enrique had
got what he deserved" but the Span
ish people are distinguished by nothing
so much as their dislike for foreigners,
and, as the Frenchman had killed the
Spaniard, Montpensier's perpetual un-
popularity was assured At the election
of King in November he only obtained
% of 311 votes, Amadeus, Duke of
Aosta, being the successful candidate.
The Montpensiers, meanwhile, had re-
turned to Paris, where the Duchess had
striven assiduously to prevent her sister,
Queen Isabella, from resigning her pre-
tensions to the throne in favor of young
Alphonso. Vainly, however, for On the
25th of June the Queen abdicated the
throne she could never hope to regain
in favor of her SOD, to whom, in the in
terval between the abdication and his
proclamation by Martinez Campos,
rallied almost all the friends of Mont
pensier
At this precise moment, with himself
profoundly hated, and Isabella's son
firmly seated on the throne and beloved
by the people, the son of Louis Philippe
was TO experience this last revenge
brought on by the whirhgig of time; his
daughter became Queen of Spain. The
object of Louis Philippe and Guizot was
in measure accomplished, though in a
way how unlike that which they had
planned and under circumstances how
different Not because of Isabella Sc
gunda's cLildishness, but through Der
son, was granlcbild of the old bourgeois
King elevated to the throne, and France
was not an Orleanist kingdom, but a re-
public.
Patents.
The following table shows the number