But even had the Inquisition desired to relax its grasp, or Uzeda to forego his vengeance, so great was the exultation of the people at the fall of the dreaded and obnoxious secretary, and so numerous the charges which party malignity added to those which truth could lay at his door, that it would have required a far bolder monarch than Philip the Third to have braved the voice of a whole nation for the sake of a disgraced minister.
The prince himself was soon induced, by new favourites, to consider any further interference on his part equally impolitic and vain; and the Duke d'Uzeda and Don Gaspar de Guzman were minions quite as supple, while they were companions infinitely more respectable.
One day, an officer, attending the levee of the prince, with whom he was a special favourite, presented a memorial requesting the interest of his highness for an appointment in the royal armies, that, he had just learned by an express was vacant.
"And whose death comes so opportunely for thy rise, Don Alvar ?" asked the Infant.
"Don Martin Fonseca.

He fell in the late skirmish, pierced by a hundred wounds." The prince started and turned hastily away.

The officer lost all favour from that hour, and never learned his offence.
Meanwhile months passed, and Calderon still languished in his dungeon.
At last the Inquisition opened against him its dark register of accusations.

First of these charges was that of sorcery, practised on the king; the rest were for the most part equally grotesque and extravagant.

These accusations Calderon met with a dignity which confounded his foes, and belied the popular belief in the elements of his character.