In May, 1475, having collected an army of 5600 horse and 14,000 foot, he crossed the border and advanced to Plasencia. His plan of campaign was to march from there northwards in the direction of Toro and Zamora, as secret correspondence had aroused his hope of winning both these strongholds. At Plasencia he halted, until the Marquis of Villena and the Duke of Arévalo appeared with his niece, and then he and Joanna were married on a lofty platform in the centre of the city, the marriage awaiting fulfilment pending the necessary dispensation from Rome. A herald, however, using the old formula at once proclaimed the union: “Castile! Castile for the King Don Alfonso of Portugal and the Queen Doña Joanna his wife, the rightful owner of these kingdoms.” From Plasencia the Portuguese at length marched to Arévalo, where another delay, this time of two months, took place, Alfonso determining to await the troops that had been promised him by his Castilian allies. He had with him the chivalry of his own Court, young hot-bloods, who had pledged their estates in the prospect of speedy glory and pillage. In their self-confidence the easy theories of Villena found an echo; and they loudly boasted that Ferdinand and his wife would never dare to meet them, but were in all probability on the road to Aragon. “Before gaining the victory they divided the spoil,” comments Pulgar sarcastically. The Castilian sovereigns were far from meditating flight. The war had not been of their choosing, but, since it had been forced upon them, they were ready to prosecute it to the end. For the moment affairs looked threatening. Not only was their treasury practically empty, and a hostile army on the march across their western border, but news came from France that Louis XI., who had at first expressed his pleasure at their accession, was now in league with their enemies and intended to invade the provinces of Biscay and Guipuzcoa; Villena and his companions were in arms; the Archbishop of Toledo sulking in Alcalá de Henares. To him the Queen determined to go and address a last appeal in person, leaving her husband to watch the movements of the Portuguese from Valladolid. Some of those at Court, who knew the pitch of resentment and fury to which the old Primate had brought his broodings, assured her that her mission would be in vain, saying that it was beneath her dignity to thus humble herself to a subject. Isabel replied that she counted as little on his service as she feared his disloyalty, and that if he had been anyone else, she would most certainly have weighed the matter more carefully, but she added, “I would not accuse myself later with the thought that if I had gone to him in person, he would have withdrawn from the false road he now seeks to follow.”