“Thank you very much,” replied the Queen, “but we must be going.” “You will have noticed,” rejoined the peasant, “that the roads are very bad, and you will get very tired. These mountains are only fit for strong feet, and not little delicate ones like yours.” “Never mind,” returned Isabel; “we like to accustom ourselves to everything. You don’t know, then, who we are?” “It is not easy to guess,” was the answer; “but you are certainly daughters of people of position and money.” Then Isabel said: “I am the Queen.” “The Queen! the Queen!” cried the people with delight; and cider, fruits, and cakes, were pressed upon the royal party. The Queen and her sister received constant signs of affection in the neighbourhood of Guipuzcoa. They went to Pampeluna to receive the Duke and Duchess of Nemours and the Duke of Aumale, the arrival of the distinguished French guests was celebrated in the city by a magnificent banquet and bull-fight, and the distinguished Frenchmen stayed with the Count of Ezpeleta. The fall of Miraflores, the able Prime Minister, was heralded by the evident desire of both the Queens for a change of Ministry, and those who wished to compass the fall of the Prime Minister were listened to by the royal ladies. Miraflores found Queen Isabella alone one day in the palace, and Her Majesty said to the Minister: “I have heard that the scandal this afternoon in the Congress has been so great that the President of the Congress put on his hat in his want of consideration for the Court.” Miraflores explained that this act proceeded from no want of respect for the Cortes. “Nevertheless it must be dissolved to-morrow,” was the reply. Narvaez became Minister of War as well as President of the Congress. The part played at the palace in the change of Ministries is seen in the scene between Pacheco and the Queen-mother. Maria Cristina remarked to the Minister that the Government would not last long. Upon this Pacheco placed two ounces of gold upon the mantelpiece, saying: “I bet you that money that the Cabinet will not fall to-morrow as you say.” Whereupon the Queen took another two ounces from her purse, and placing them beside those of the diplomat, she said: “The bet is made: if the Ministry does not fall to-morrow, the money is yours; if it does, it is mine.” And the Ministry did fall. This insidious influence of the _camarilla_ was daily becoming more dangerous. Presumptuous and illegal, it held its sway over all that was prudent and constitutional, and thus the intrigues of the palace came between the Cortes and the throne, and the country and the Queen, exercising power to the detriment of the national representation, the throne, the nation, and the Sovereign. “The royal palace,” says Don Antonio Bermejo, “was a gilded cage where men were slaves to envy and idleness.” CHAPTER IX ROYAL MATRIMONIAL SCHEMES--HOW ISABELLA’S SISTER FLED FROM PARIS IN 1848 1843-1848