The duke never went to the council. All papers and documents relating to
business were sent to his apartments. Such matters as he chose to pass
upon, such decrees as he thought proper to issue, were then taken by him
to the king, who signed them with perfect docility. As time went on,
this amount of business grew too onerous for the royal hand, or this
amount of participation by the king in affairs of state came to be
esteemed superfluous and inconvenient by the duke, and his own signature
was accordingly declared to be equivalent to that of the sovereign's
sign-manual. It is doubtful whether such a degradation of the royal
prerogative had ever been heard of before in a Christian monarch.

It may be imagined that this system of government was not of a nature to
expedite business, however swiftly it might fill the duke's coffers.
High officers of state, foreign ambassadors, all men in short charged
with important affairs, were obliged to dance attendance for weeks and
months on the one man whose hands grasped all the business of the
kingdom, while many departed in despair without being able to secure a
single audience. It was entirely a matter of trade. It was necessary to
bribe in succession all the creatures of the duke before getting near
enough to headquarters to bribe the duke himself. Never were such
itching palms. To do business at court required the purse of Fortunatus.
There was no deception in the matter. Everything was frank and above
board in that age of chivalry. Ambassadors wrote to their sovereigns
that there was no hope of making treaties or of accomplishing any
negotiation except by purchasing the favour of the autocrat; and Lerma's
price was always high. At one period the republic of Venice wished to
put a stop to the depredations by Spanish pirates upon Venetian commerce,
but the subject could not even be approached by the envoy until he had
expended far more than could be afforded out of his meagre salary in