But the King had long cherished the scheme of marrying Don John to Queen Mary of Scotland,--whose marriage with Bothwell could easily be annulled--in order that his presumptuous ambition might be satisfied, and at the same time that he might make of his new kingdom a powerful ally of Spain against Elizabeth of England.

It was for this reason that he had long determined to prevent his brother's marriage with Maria Dolores de Mendoza.

Perez and Dona Ana de la Cerda, on the other hand, feared that if Don John were allowed to marry the girl he so devotedly loved, he would forget everything for her, give up campaigning, and settle to the insignificance of a thoroughly happy man.

For they knew the world well from their own point of view.

Happiness is often like sadness, for it paralyzes those to whose lot it falls; but pain and danger rouse man's strength of mind and body.
Yet though the King and his treacherous favourite had diametrically opposite intentions, a similar thought had crossed the minds of both, even before Don John had ridden up to the palace gate late on that afternoon, from his last camping ground outside the city walls.