260 REIGN AND DEATH OF PHILIP. I'ARi ernment. There was some difference of opinion, ' — even among the king's friends, as to the expediency of summoning that body at this crisis ; but the greatest impediment arose from the queen's refusal to sign tlie writs. ^^ Joanna's This unhapDv lady's condition had become truly •:on(iitioii. i. L J ^ J deplorable. During her husband's illness, she had never left his bedside ; but neither then, nor since his death, had been seen to shed a tear. She re- mained in a state of stupid insensibility, sitting in a darkened apartment, her head resting on her hand, and her lips closed, as mute and immovable as a statue. When applied to, for issuing the necessary summons for the cortes, or to make appointments to office, or for any other pressing business, which required her signature, she replied, " My father will attend to all this when he returns ; he is much more conversant with business than I am ; I have no other duties now, but to pray for the soul of my departed husband." The only orders she was known to sign were for paying the salaries of her 26 The duke of Alva, the staunch was to procure the appointment of supporter of KinfT Ferdinand in all a regency, this had already heeu his difficulties, objected lo calling done by the nomination of Kin^ the cortes together, on the grounds, Ferdinand at Toro, in 1505 ; that, that the summonses, not l)ein<T by to start the question anew, was un- the proper authority, would be in- necessarily to bring that act into formal ; that many cities might doubt. The duke does not seem consequently refuse to obey them, to have considered that P'erdinand and the acts of the remainder be had forfeited his original claim to open to objection, as not those of the regency by his abdication ; the nation; that, after all, should perhaps, on the ground, that it had cortes assemble, it was quite uncer- never been formally accepted by lain under what inlluencos it might the commons. 1 shall have occa- be made to act, and whether it sion to return lo this hereafter, wonld pursne the course most ex- See the discussion in cxtcnso, apud pedient for Ferdinand's interests ; Zurita, Anales, lib. 7, cap. 26. and finally, that if the intention
