At length the marquis of Villena, the very soul of the league, being disappointed in his expectation of the grand-mastership of Santiago, which was conferred on the count of Ledesma, formed no less a project than that of arresting both king and queen, of proclaiming Alfonso, and, in concert with his confederates, of reigning under the name and authority of that young prince. Being seasonably warned by four faithful servants, the king avoided the snare. Nevertheless in a subsequent interview he agreed that his brother Alfonso should be declared his heir; that Don Beltran should resign the grand-mastership of Santiago in favour of that infante, who should be consigned to the guardianship of the marquis of Villena. Early in the following year (1465), these conditions were punctually performed: Beltran resigned the dignity, with which Alfonso was immediately invested; and that infante, on engaging to marry the Beltraneja, was, at the same time, proclaimed prince of the Asturias, and successor to the throne. But Henry’s unexampled concessions were insufficient. Henry summoned them to lay down their arms, and to surrender his brother, and went to invest Arevalo, one of their fortresses: that siege, however, he soon raised on hearing that Valladolid had declared for Alfonso, whom the rebels were conducting to Avila, to be there proclaimed king of Leon and Castile. The scene which now disgraced Avila was one of unparalleled effrontery. In the midst of the plain, near the walls of the city, a vast theatre was constructed; in the centre rose a throne, on which was placed an effigy of Henry with a crown on the head, a sceptre in the hand, and other ensigns of royal dignity. A herald ascended the platform and read, in a loud voice, the various charges that had long been urged against the administration of the king--his neglect of justice, his incapacity, the outrages which he had committed against his kingdom and nobles; hence, that, in conformity with reason and justice, no less than the fundamental laws of the realm, the said Henry had been pronounced by the most eminent civilians to be unfit any longer to wear the crown, and that his deposition was imperiously demanded by the interests of the nation. This decision was justified by an allusion to other kingdoms, which, in various periods of history, had been compelled to depose their rulers.