to the door at the left-hand side of the table. Olozaga intercepted my passage and locked the door. Upon this I turned to the other door, but he then stepped to that one, which he also locked. Then, catching me by the dress, he made me sit down, and seized me by the hand and forced me to sign the document. Before leaving me he told me to say nothing of the occurrence to anybody, but this I declined to promise.” [15] The Ministerial seats are now upholstered in blue. “Then,” continued Brabo, “at Her Majesty’s request, we all signed the royal declaration, for its transmittance to the archives.” It was with great dignity and cleverness that Olozaga followed the statement of Brabo by refuting the points, holding his own as to his innocence, and yet not incriminating the Queen of untruth. When the unfortunate man had entered the Cortes with his brothers, cries of “Death to him!” came from a box filled with officers of the regiment of San Fernando, whilst shouts of “Viva!” came from other directions. “Happen what may,” said Olozaga, “I deserve the confidence of the Queen, which I won as a Minister;” and it was in a voice trembling with emotion that he continued: “The life I have led justifies me--the person of my heart, my daughter, my friends. My colleagues have all found me always an upright man, incapable of failing in my duties, and this opinion I cannot sacrifice to the Queen, nor to God, nor to the Universe. Being a man of integrity, I must show myself as such before the world, even if it were on the steps of the scaffold itself.” It is difficult to get an impartial opinion upon this episode, so fraught with importance and so conclusive of the short-sighted policy of putting the kingdom into the hands of a young girl of thirteen, who was utterly inexperienced in the art of government, as the Regent had lived away from the palace, and fate had sundered her from mother, aunts, uncles, and relatives, who, in any other station of life, might have aided her with their counsels. In the excitement of the moment the Minister had doubtless treated the Queen as he would his own daughter, and, keenly anxious to gain the decree which would empower him to rid himself of the majority of Moderates in the House, Olozaga had not stopped to consider how an exaggerated report might colour his action to the tone of that of a man guilty of gross _lèse-majesté_. The Queen was but a child in his eyes, and when she demurred at the seeming cruelty and ingratitude of dissolving a Cabinet which had been so favourable to the anticipation of her majority, it is probably true that the Minister patted her familiarly on the wrist, and said, with a smile of satisfaction and superiority: “I will accustom My Lady to such cruelties!”