]68 ACCESSION OF FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. PART in it, seems to have completely lost his wits at this '. last reverse of fortune. Overwhelmed with shame at his own credulity, he felt himself unable to en- counter the ridicule which awaited his return to Portugal, and secretly withdrew, with two or three domestics only, to an obscure village in Normandy, whence he transmitted an epistle to Prince John, his son, declaring, " that, as all earthly vanities were dead within his bosom, he resolved to lay up an imperishable crown by performing a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and devoting himself to the ser- vice of God, in some retired monastery ; " and he concluded with requesting his son " to assume the sovereignty, at once, in the same manner as if he had heard of his father's death." ^® I'onugai'" Fortunately Alfonso's retreat was detected be- fore he had time to put his extravagant project in execution, and his trusty followers succeeded, though with considerable difficulty, in diverting him from it ; while the king of France, willing to be rid of his importunate guest, and unwilling per- haps to incur the odium of having driven him to so desperate an extremity as that of his projected pilgrimage, provided a fleet of ships to transport him back to his own dominions, where, to complete 1478. the farce, he arrived just five days after the cere- Nov. 15. ' .f J mony of his son's coronation as king of Portugal. Nor was it destined that the luckless monarch i® Bernaldez, Reyes Cat61icos, 20, cap. 10. — Ruy de Pina, Chron. MS., cap. 27. — Pulgar, Reyes Ca- d'el Rev Alfonso V., cap. 104- tilicos, cap. .'SO, 57. — Gaillard, Ri- 202. — Faria y Sousa,EuropaPor- valit6, torn. iii. pp. 290-292. — tufruosa, torn. ii. pp. 412-415.— Zurita, Anales, lib. 19, cap. 56, lib. Comines, M^moires, liv. 5, chap. 7.
