uncertain, although Ayala agrees with the ballad, and most subsequent historians have followed his version. M. Mérimée is disposed to exculpate Pedro, alleging the complete inutility of the murder, and that ten years of captivity and ill treatment were sufficient to account for the queen's death. Admitting the latter plea, we cannot see in it a diminution of the crime. In either case Pedro was the murderer of his hapless wife, who was innocent of all offence against him; and his extraordinary aversion for whom might well give rise, in that superstitious age, to the tales of sorcery and magic charms already quoted. The details of Don Fadrique's death are more precise and authentic, as it was also more merited. But, although the Master of Santiago had been guilty of many acts of treason, and at the time of his death was conspiring against the king, his execution by a brother's order, and before a brother's eyes, is shocking and repugnant. It was Don Fadrique's policy, at that moment, to parade the utmost devotion to Pedro, the better to mask his secret plans. Arriving one day at Seville, on a visit to the king, he found the latter playing at draughts with a courtier. True to his habits of dissimulation, Pedro, who only a few hours previously had decided on the Master's death, received him with a frank air and pleasant smile, and gave him his hand to kiss; and then, seeing that he was well attended, bade him take up his quarters, and then return. After visiting Maria Padilla, who gazed at him with tears in her eyes,--knowing his doom, but not daring to warn him,--Fadrique went down into the court, found his escort gone, and the gates shut. Surprised and uneasy, he hesitated what to do, when two knights summoned him to the king's apartments, in a detached building within the walls of the Alcazar.