The San Francisco call., 1898-04-09
THE MANY WARS
 OF THE SPANIARDS.
An Expert Says That No Man Is Braver Than the Don When
 in Rattle.

"No man Is brayer than Span1ard, said Sir Richard Grenville of Devon. The history of Spain is history of in cessant struggle, inceSsant warfare and inceSSant cruelty.
 Spain, as we understand the name, came into being with the marriage or Ferdinand and Isabella. By this union two great provinces were made one, and others came in to make the whole. Under Ferdinand and Isabella began the voyages of discovery which were to give Spain control of nine-tenths of the new world Being the initiative reign of Spain as nation it was, of course, warlike reign. Three men out of four when asked to name the leading events of Ferdinand's occu- pancy of the throne will say that Co., lumbuS made an egg stand up Tor ms delectation, and discovered America, and stop there. Yet in that reign the Moors were driven from Spain the in uuisition was established; TorQuemada was a power second only to the Pope himself; the Jews were eXpatriated; there were many wars in Italy; there was a war with France to recover Ger dagne and Roussillon, which had been mortgaged to France by FerdinandS S father; there was the rise and world filling fame of Gonsalvo de Cordova, the great soldier; there was the utter defeat of the French on Italian soil; there were successful wars in Africa and the wars of the so-called Holy League.
 In the days which followed Fernando Cortez fought and conquered Mexico and Francisco Pizarro under contract fought and conquered Peru. This man gave to Spain a territory which extend ed through thirty-nine degrees of lati- tude and included all of those countries now known as Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Chile. Every day of Pizarro's ad- venturous life in the west was day of warfare, and every main actor in the drama of the Incas died violent death. These possessions poured into the cof- fers of the conquering country steady stream of gold and silver. Within fifty years the Spanish navigators made of Spain the greatest empire the world had ever known. The Atlantic and Pacific oceans became Spanish lakes, and became so through constant wars. Every foot of this vast western hold ing, with the exception only of Cuba and Porto Rico, has been lost by war or through the direct consequences of war Since the dethronement of Fer dinand VII and enthronement of Jo- seph Bonaparte revolutions have cost Spain nearly all of her transatlantic colonies. Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Ecua dor .went in 1924. Venezuela went in 1923. Mexico achieved independence in 1929, and the isthmian republics in 1923.
 In 1519 the Frankfort Diet gave the crown of Germany to Charles V, who was a Hapsburg, and Spain leaped at once into prominence and power in the wide field of European politics: For eighty years it dominated the nations of Europe, always at war and always ruling, when 1t ruled, with an iron hand. At that time facing each other were four of the greatest Kings of his tory They were Charles V of Spain. Francis of France, Henry VIII of England and Solyman the Magnificent. The ablest of them was Charles. Dur ing all of his reign his people had small breathing time between his wars For thirty years he was engaged in what are called the Italian wars. He was really behind the Constable de Bour- bon's sacking of Rome in 1527. because Pope Clement had absolved Francis from a truce, and that merry monarch had immediately begun fighting again. Tn the eight years between 1527 and 1885 he had his usual war with Francis, a war with the Florentines, assailed the Barbary pirates and captured Tunis. In 1636 he invaded Provence,