The petition for this step was drawn up in the names of the widows and orphans of those who had fallen in the Cuban War. It was sent in proof to the secretaries of the King and the Queen-Regent. But the patriot had not counted on the antagonism of those in power; and albeit Loygorry, the follower of Lopez Dominguez, spoke eloquently in favour of the idea in the Senate, Moret, the Minister of the Interior, stopped its course by forbidding the Prefecture of the Police to affix the necessary seal to the document; and it was doubtless through such political influence in the palace that the Chamberlain found that further influence with the King was prevented by his removal from Court. The cordial reception of the Colonel by Alfonso XIII., when he saw him in London in 1905, was cheering to the patriot, and it seems more than probable that the King is unaware of the Court intrigue by which his valued adviser was removed from his side. It was in 1905--only a fortnight before his death--that I had the privilege of seeing Don Francisco Silvela, who had spent so much time and effort in the service of his country. “I am utterly weary of politics,” said the statesman, lifting his tired eyes to my face. “It is a fruitless task, and no one is safe from the intrigues at Court. No, no; I am going to give up my spare time to literature now, which will be far more profitable. And, indeed, it seems like pouring water into a tank with a hole in it to expend efforts on the country which is unsupported by a true suffrage.” It is thus that Alfonso, in 1906, had to appoint seven different Governments in the space of fourteen months, and it would sometimes require more than supernatural power to detect the real cause of the fall of a Cabinet in Spain. CHAPTER XVII ALFONSO XIII May 17, 1886, the day on which Spain hailed the birth of their baby Sovereign, Alfonso XIII., is always kept as a fête-day in Spain. Shortly after Señor Sagasta had proclaimed the news to the assembly of Ministers and grandees of the realm, the Duchess of Medina de las Torres appeared in the antechamber, bearing in her arms a basket that contained the royal infant. Wrapped in cotton-wool, the infant King received the homage of his Ministers. Five days later Madrid was _en fête_ for the baptism of the royal child. Wearing a robe of the richest English lace, and the broad velvet sash, embroidered with fleurs-de-lis, that his father had worn at his baptism, the royal infant was borne on a silver salver, draped with costly coverings, through the lines of officers, statesmen, and Court ladies, into the chapel of the palace, where at a solemn service he received the names of Alfonso León Fernando Maria Santiago Isidro Pascual Antony.