Leaves froin a Madeira Garden 



and he was driven by the necessities of the 

 situation to take arbitrary measures against 

 some supporters of the old regime. The 

 incidents of the time will supply material for 

 many historical romances — the secret meetings, 

 the sensational arrests, the hurried flights in 

 motor-cars to the Spanish frontier. If it was 

 Charles and Strafford over again, the Portuguese 

 Carlos displayed the moral courage and the 

 loyalty to his servant in which the English 

 king was wanting. To the bitter disappoint- 

 ment of those who had based their hopes of a 

 regenerated Portugal on this combination, his 

 very courage and loyalty were the cause of the 

 king's assassination ; and in that first critical 

 hour the minister, his nerve broken, faltered 

 and fell. It is interesting to conjecture what 

 course events might have taken if there had 

 been In him something of the stuff of Crom- 

 well. One can imagine a strong man forcing 

 the boy-king to his will, and using the murders 

 as a means to crush his opponents completely. 

 And we may wonder what was in King Carlos* 

 mind to do In the event of Franco's assassina- 

 tion, the possibility of which must have been 

 ever present to him. But Franco failed at the 



lOO 



