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became regent of the kingdom. In that high place her chief object of anxiety was to keep at a distance from public affairs, Don Juan of Austria, the only Spaniard who was fitted to conduct them. During her regency of twelve years, the machinery of government at home was daily growing more rotten and unmanageable; while abroad, the King of France, was freely possessing himself of the Spanish Netherlands, and the buccaneers were ravaging the fairest cities of Spanish America. No love or patronage of art and literature in any degree atoned for her political incapacity. Yielding perhaps to the exigencies of the climate, she set the example which female rulers in Spain have generally followed, of dividing her confidence between her confessor and her lover. The latter was Fernando Valenzuela, nicked-named by the Queen, "duende" or fairy, and because of his great arrogance and presumption, he was finally degraded from his dignities and banished from Europe. (1677) - The young King reached

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