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afterwards of England! and influence his brother Philip 
to put him in pofleflion of them. Thefe defigns were 
encouraged by his fecretary Juan de Efcovedo, though 
Efcovedo had been appointed to that office by Philip ex- 
prefsly for the purpofe of counteracting them. They had 
even aflumed a treafonable .form. The king, who be¬ 
haved with more tendernefs, or at lead more decency, 
to Don John than he had to his own fon, believed or 
fancied it neceflary to put Efcovedo out of the way. 
For his matter's fake, he would not do this by common 
forms of law; and he therefore kindly ordered Antonio 
Perez to have him aflaflinated. It was fuppofed .that 
this would be confidered as a common accident; and 
accordingly Don Efcovedo was killed in the ttreets of 
Madrid. 
This aCtion undoubtedly was murder. Antonio Perez 
was a politician ; and, though he did not carry the doCtrine 
of expediency quite fo far as the king, feems never to 
have fufpeCted that he had committed a crime in this in- 
ftance. Efcovedo’s death he reprefents as neceflary, and 
the forms of juftice, he thought, might be difpenfed with 
in extraordinary cafes: he had too foon fufficient proof 
that under fuch a king as Philip th.ey were nothing more 
than forms. Sufpicion fell upon both him and the prin- 
cefs of Eboli. It has been furmifed that Philip was an 
unfuccefsful fuitor to this lady, and jealous of Perez’s in¬ 
timacy with her. Be this, however, as it may, he took 
the opportunity, occafloned by the fufpicion, to throw 
them both into prifon, and fuffered the accufation to 
hang over the fecretary’s head for many years, ftill conti¬ 
nuing to employ him, and promifing him his protection 
and favour. At length he got pofieftion of the pnly pa¬ 
pers which he thought could have eftabliflied his own 
fhare in the murder, and then fuffered Antonio to be put 
to the rack. It was the intention of this unfortunate 
man to bear the tortures inflicted on him without con- 
feffing; but the violence of the pain overcame hisrefolu- 
tion, and he declared that he had procured Efcovedo’s 
aflaffination, butthatit was by Philip’s own orders. Hap. 
pily for his own character, he had concealed papers fuf¬ 
ficient to prove this ; and with thefe he efcaped to Ar- 
ragon. “ That kingdom,” faid Mr. Southey, in writing 
the life of Perez only a year or two fince, “ was ftill by 
itsconftitution a free country; but conftitutiops are no¬ 
thing in the way of power, and no country has any other 
fecurity for its freedom than the fpirit and ftrength of 
the people.” He appealed to the tribunal del juftiza of 
Arragon, a free tribunal, to whofe decifion Philip did not 
choofe to attend, and therefore removed the caufe to 
the enquefta, a fort of ftar-chamber of his own, in which 
any wickednefs that it pleafed him to direCt would receive 
the form of legality. “ But,” fays the writer already al¬ 
luded to, “ the Arragonefe had now efpoufed the caufe 
of their injured countryman; and it was thought that 
the moft effectual method of deftroying him would be to 
deliver him over to the inquifition. That accurfed tri¬ 
bunal, which had lately been eftablilhed in Saragofla, 
laid hands on him, on a charge of witchcraft. Blinded 
and befotted with fuperftition as the Arragonefe were, in 
common with all the Spaniards, their love of liberty was 
not at this time to be thus betrayed. They refcued him 
from the holy office. In confequence of this and other 
tumults, an army was marched into Arragon. Thejuf- 
tiza, as he was bound to do, called upon his countrymen 
to relift this invafion of their rights ;‘but he, and the no¬ 
bles with him, aware of their inability to oppofe veteran 
troops, fet the example of flight. He and the other chiefs 
were fecured and beheaded. Perez made his efcape into 
France; and the forms of liberty in Arragon were extin- 
guilhed. Antonio found the protection that he implored : 
he publilhed a narrative of his fufterings ; and it is cer¬ 
tain, by the great names which appear in his correfpon- 
dence, that he was highly efteemed and refpeCted both 
in France and England. Several unfuccefsful attempts 
were made to murder him. He died miferably poor in 
Vox,. XIX. No. 1329. 
R E Z. 607 
the year 1611, and endured to the laft the heavy affliction 
of being fepavated from his wife and children. No in- 
tereft could avail to procure their liberation ; and he im¬ 
putes the death of his eldelt daughter to grief on his ac¬ 
count. R. S. in Gen. Jiiog-. 
PE'REZ (David), the fon of Juan Perez, a Spaniard, 
fettled at Naples, was born in 1711, and brought up in 
the confervatorio of Santa Maria di Loretto, in that city, 
under Antonio Gallo and Francefco Mancini. His pro- 
grefs in compofition was rapid, and difcovered an un¬ 
common genius. When he quitted the confervatorio, 
his firft preferment was at Palermo in Sicily, where he 
was appointed maeftro di capella of the cathedral in that 
city, at a confiderable falary, the half of which he was 
permitted to enjoy, not only after he quitted Sicily, but 
even Italy, to the time of his death. He compofed his firft 
operas for the theatre at Palermo, from 1741 to 1748, and 
then returned to Naples, where his Cleinenza di Tito was 
performed with fuch great applaufe at the theatre of Sari 
Carlo, as to extend his fame to Rome, whither he was in¬ 
vited the next year to compole for the Theatre delle 
Dame. Here he produced Semiramide and Farnace ; and, 
for other cities in Italy, La Didone Abbandonata, Zeno- 
bia, and Allelfandro nell’ Indie. 
In 1752, he went to Portugal, where he was engaged 
in the lervice of king Jofeph. His firft opera at Lifbon, 
Demofoonte, was received with very great applaufe. 
Gizziello was tire principal foprano, and the celebrated 
Raaf the tenor. It was belides rendered magnificent in 
the performance by a powerful orcheftra, and decorations 
that were extremely fplendid. But the new theatre of 
his Portuguefe majefty, which was opened on the queen’s 
birth-day, March 31, 1755, furpafled, in magnitude and 
decorations, all that modern times can boalt. On this 
occalion Perez new-fet the opera of Aleflandro nell’ In¬ 
die, in which opera a troop of horfe appeared on the ftage, 
with a Macedonian phalanx. One of the king’s riding- 
matters rode Bucephalus, to a march which Perez com¬ 
pofed in the manege, to the grand pas of a beautiful horfe; 
the whole far exceeding all that Farinelli had attempted 
to introduce in a grand theatre under his direction at 
Madrid, for the fitting-out of which he had unlimited 
powers. Befides thefe fplendid decorations, his Portu¬ 
guefe majefty had aflembled together the greateft fingers 
then exilting; fo that the lyric productions of Perez had 
every advantage which a moft captivating and perfeCt ex¬ 
ecution could give them. But the operas by which he 
acquired the greateft fame in Portugal were Demetrio and 
Solimano, which, as they were to be alternately performed 
with the operas ofVologefo and Enea in Latio that Jomelii 
had been requefted by his moft faithful majefty to com- 
pofe for his theatre, were produced with a degree of ex¬ 
ertion and emulation which rendered him fuperior to 
himfelf. Jomelii on this occafion was chiefly admired for 
the ingenious and learned texture of the inftrumental 
parts 5 and Perez for the elegance and grace of his melo¬ 
dies, and exprefflon of the words. 
His raufic for the church, of which a fpecimen has been 
printed in England, Matutino dei Morti, publilhed by 
Bremner, in fcore, is grave, ingenious, and expreflive. 
But, though Perez has compofed a Te Deum which is 
greatly efteemed at Lifbon, and his Lezione prima per il 
Giovedi Santo, has confiderable merit, yet it appears, on 
examining his fcores, that this matter had not, like 
Jomelii, much exercifed his pen in the compofition of 
fugues or learned counterpoint for the church, to the per¬ 
fection of which, genius alone can contribute but little, 
without the affiftance of great itudy and experience. 
There is, however, an original fpirit and elegance in all 
his productions; in which, if any defeCt appears, it is the 
want of fymmetry in the phrafeology of his melodies, in 
which there may fometimes be found what the French 
call phrafes manqutcs, and contre-tems, to which critical 
ears, in modern times, are much lefs accuftomed than 
formerly. “ An ear for meafure, (fays Dr. Burney,) and 
7 Q an 
