In the meantime the Marquis of Villena was plotting secretly with his brother, the Master of Calatrava, the Archbishop of Toledo, the Admiral of Castile, and other nobles how he might regain his old influence. After a series of attempts on his rival’s life, from which Beltran de La Cueva emerged scatheless with the additional honour of the coveted Mastership of Santiago, he and his fellow-conspirators retired to Burgos, where they drew up a schedule of their grievances. Secret measures having failed they were determined to browbeat Henry into submission by playing on his well-known fears of civil war. The King’s hopes of an undisputed succession had been shattered by the premature birth of a still-born son; and thus the question of the Infanta Joanna’s legitimacy remained as a convenient weapon for those discontented with the Crown. Nor had the gifts and honours heaped on Beltran de La Cueva encouraged the loyalty of the principal nobles. The new favourite was rapacious and arrogant, while even more intolerable to courtiers of good family and wealth was the rise of an upstart nobility, that threatened to monopolize the royal favour. Louis XI. was astute enough to develop such a policy to his own advantage; but the feeble Henry IV. was no more able to control his new creations than their rivals. Almost without exception they betrayed and sold him for their own ends, poisoning his mind against the few likely to remain faithful, and making his name odious amongst his poorer subjects by their selfishness and the corruption of their rule. The conspirators of Burgos were thus enabled to pose as the defenders of national liberties; and their insolent letter of censure took the colouring most likely to appeal to popular prejudice. Complaints of the King’s laxity in religious matters, of the unchecked violence of his Moorish guard, of the debasement of the coinage, and of the incompetence and venality of the royal judges—these were placed in the foreground, but the real crux of the document came later. It lay in two petitions that were veiled threats, first that the King would deprive the Count of Ledesma of the Mastership of Santiago, since it belonged of right to the Infante Alfonso, and next that the said Alfonso should be proclaimed as heir to the throne. The illegitimacy of the Princess Joanna was openly affirmed. Henry received this letter at Valladolid, and, calling together his royal council, laid it before them. He expressed neither resentment at its insolence nor a desire for revenge; and when the aged Bishop of Cuenca, who had been one of his father’s advisers, bade him have no dealings with the conspirators save to offer them battle, he replied with a sneer that “those who need not fight nor lay hands on their swords were always free with the lives of others.”