at nightfall on tuesday, the 16th of september, 1578, d. john suddenly felt the intense cold of fever and general lassitude. the fever lasted all night, and the next day, although still unwell, and with a bad headache, he got up at his usual time, heard mass, did his business, held a council, and visited several quarters. this was at the camp of tirlemont, where d. john had moved the royal troops after the famous battle of mechlin, the last at which he commanded, and at which he did such valiant deeds. the plague was decimating the camp of the rebels, and although the infection had not penetrated to that of d. john, his soldiers suffered from diarrh?a, especially the germans, who were intemperate in what they ate, and not careful about what they drank. this, with reason, worried d. john, and he took infinite precautions to avoid the contagion, inspecting everything himself, making daily rounds, visiting the sick in their huts, helping and cheering them, and striving, above all, that none died without receiving the viaticum, which he usually accompanied. this matter of the sacraments, as being transcendental and eternal, he had committed to his then confessor, the franciscan fr. francisco de orantes, in order that he might urge and watch over the many ecclesiastics in the camp, because d. john, who always had taken much care of the spiritual welfare of his troops, had in these latter days, according to vander hammen and cabrera de córdoba, made his camp into a real convent of monks.
it was feared, therefore, that this sudden illness of d. john was the forerunner of the plague, and this fear was strengthened when the same symptoms showed themselves in three or four gentlemen of his household, of those who attended him most closely, among them the venerable gabrio cervelloni, who was already seventy, and was then, by d. john's orders, making a fort on the heights of bouges, in front of the camp at tirlemont, and scarcely a league from namur. alarm was ended on the fourth day, seeing that the fever and other ills left d. john. but the next day, which was a saturday, he suddenly grew worse, and while the other invalids went on getting better and became convalescent, he showed other symptoms of a strange illness, palpitations which made him get up in bed, tremblings of the hands, arms, tongue and eyes, and red spots showed themselves, others livid and almost blue, with black, rough heads.
then another suspicion spread through the camp, which historians of old have transmitted to us, and which the fresh facts and discoveries of modern ones make probable. they said that d. john had been poisoned during his recovery, and vander hammen goes so far as to point to the hand which was the instrument of the crime. "this made his household suspect," he says, "that he was poisoned, and that doctor ramirez had given him something in his broth." and in the diary of d. john's illness, kept by his doctor, the original of which porre?o inserts in his life of the hero of lepanto, these words are to be read: "with some suspicion, the antidote for poison was used, sometimes externally, sometimes internally."
public opinion, not only in the camp, but wherever the news reached, at once pointed to the queen of england or the prince of orange as authors of the suspected crime. ratcliffe's recent attempt and the various defeated ones of orange justified this bad opinion, and the application of the judicial principle "cui prodest" fits like a glove either the heretic queen or the apostate prince.
but nobody could then suspect that the sinister "cui prodest" suits the secretary antonio pérez better than anyone else, because nobody yet knew that he, more than anyone, was interested in the disappearance from the world's stage of d. john. it must have been a nightmare for antonio pérez, even to dream that d. john might return to spain, knowing, or at least suspecting, the crimes, infamies and artifices of which he had been the victim. and once put on the scent, investigating, proving, becoming certain, with his right and terrible thirst for justice, in a single interview with the king, his brother, he could bring everything to light, and sink antonio pérez in that abyss of infamy and iniquity in which the hand of god buried him later. it is, therefore, very probable that antonio pérez, believing at last that d. john of austria would return to spain, would try to keep him away for ever with "the broth of doctor ramirez," or by some similar means; and it is the general opinion at present that if d. john's death were caused by crime (although it is not sufficiently proved), it might be as justly attributed to the queen of england, or the prince of orange as to the secretary antonio pérez; all three were capable of it, and for divers reasons all three gained great advantages by the death of the conqueror of lepanto.
but be this as it may, it is certain that from the first moment of his relapse d. john understood that he was dying, and that his hoped-for end was coming to him—
... que non ha dolor
del home que sea grande ni cuytado.[18]
he therefore made ready to receive death with perfect, manly courage, with the dignity of a prince and the humility of a christian, and his first arrangement was that he should be conveyed to the fort which gabrio cervelloni was then making a league away. he ordered himself to be carried on a stretcher by his servants, without order or arrangement, to prevent the soldiers having the grief of saying good-bye to him, and to cause no one alarm or trouble. there remained inside the surrounding wall of the fort the only part yet finished, a hut, or rather a pigeon house, where d. bernardino de zú?iga, d. john's captain of infantry, lodged, and there he ordered himself to be taken to disturb no one. "there was only," says vander hammen, "a pigeon house to make him a chamber." they cleared out the young pigeons, cleaned it, hung a few coverings on the ceilings and wall to exclude the light, and over them some pieces of cloth, which they sprinkled with perfumed waters, and made a wooden staircase for mounting to it. the father confessor fr. francisco de orantes writes to philip ii: "he died in a hut, as poorly as a soldier. i assure y.m. there was nothing but a cock-loft over a farm-yard, in order that in this he should imitate the poverty of christ."
all this took place on saturday, the 20th, and on sunday, the 21st, very early in the morning, d. john ordered his confessor, fray francisco de orantes, to be called, and with great humility and with much sorrow for his sins he made a general confession of his life, with the eagerness and fervour of one who is preparing to die; and although the doctors still held out hopes of saving his life, and tried to dissuade him, he asked for the viaticum, and received it with great devotion and fervour, at a mass celebrated in his room by the jesuit juan fernández. then he sent for all his field-marshals to his miserable retreat, also the councillors of state and other personages attached to the army, and before them solemnly resigned the command and gave the baton to alexander farnese, prince of parma, who was present, kneeling at the foot of the bed, and so overcome and afflicted because of his great love for d. john, that he buried his forehead in the bed-clothes, and the count de mansfeld had to lift him up and comfort him. it was an extraordinary thing, which moved and brought tears to the eyes of all those veterans, to see that thunderbolt of war, alexander farnese, daring and brave and of indomitable courage, afflicted and overcome like a weak woman on receiving the supreme command from the hands of his dying friend and kinsman.
then he directed his confessor fr. francisco de orantes to declare before them all what d. john had already told him privately. that he left no will, because he possessed nothing which was not his lord and master the king's. that he commended his body and soul to the king; his soul in order that the king should order suffrages to be made for the great need there was; his body that it might be buried near that of his lord and father the emperor, by which he should consider his services were repaid. but if this were not so, then that they should give him burial in the monastery of our lady of montserrat. item, he begged the king to look after his mother and brother. item, to look after his servants, pay them and reward them, because he died so poor that he could not do so. "as to my personal debts and bills," he said at the end, "they are very few and are very clear."
he said this with great firmness, taking leave of them all with his hand, and himself taking leave of the things of earth to think and speak of nothing beyond those of heaven.
he, however, retained father juan fernández, and showing him a little manuscript book which he kept under his pillow, said these were the prayers which he recited every day, without ever missing one in his life, and as the dreadful pain in his head troubled his sight, so that he could not read, begged the father, for the love of god and for the love of him, to do him the favour of reciting them in his name. much moved, the father promised, and, according to his own testimony, it took him a good hour to recite those prayers which the devout prince said "every day of his life," in the midst of the fatigues of war, the occupations of governor, and, most difficult of all, in the midst of the dissipations of worldly pleasures. the little book was all in d. john's writing. it began with the baby prayers he had learnt in his childhood from do?a magdalena de ulloa; then followed various pious exercises, and it ended with several prayers composed by d. john himself, according as he had been inspired in the course of his life, by his difficulties, his sorrows, hopes and joys, and his warm effusions of thanksgiving. in short, it was an index, showing his attitude towards god in all the events of his life, which the grateful heart of d. john daily remembered, and which only the holy father juan fernández had the happiness of knowing.
it was this father who, a few months later, under the command of alexander farnese, performed the extraordinary deed of heroism, at the same time an act of incredible charity, in the trench of maestricht, which we have told in another place. d. john had known him in luxemburg, on his first arrival, and astonished at his holiness, prudence and learning, and profoundly struck by his untiring zeal for the welfare of the soldiers, attached him at once to the army, and took him everywhere; and although he was not d. john's official confessor, he confessed to him often, and consulted him privately in all difficult matters. during d. john's short last illness, together with fr. francisco de orantes, he assisted him all the time, and when d. john's dreadful headache and delirium left him, the father sustained him with spiritual talks which maintained the sick man in his peace and resignation, and gave the jesuit the ineffable comfort that the just experience before the marvels of divine grace.
in one of these conversations d. john told p. juan fernández of his firm determination, taken four months beforehand, if god spared his life in flanders, to retire for ever from the world to the hermitage of montserrat, there to serve "that lord who could and would do much more for him than his brother d. philip." a bitter phrase this, which without, as some have thought, censuring philip (because there would be none in supposing greater power and love in the king of heaven than in the most powerful and saintly king on earth), still reveals the profound disillusionment which had taken hold of the victor of lepanto, for the last four months, that is to say since the death of escovedo.
photo anderson
d. john of austria's place of burial
escorial and surrounding country, present day
the illness gained ground rapidly; each day, even each hour, produced some new, strange and painful symptom. at times he was seized with fainting fits, in which he appeared to have drawn his last breath, at others with delirium of wild things and of war, in which he always imagined himself commanding in a battle, and from which he was only drawn by the names of jesus and mary, which fathers orantes and fernández invoked in his hearing. on the 30th d. john felt so weak that he again desired to receive the viaticum, and charged fr. francisco de orantes to give him extreme unction in time, whenever he judged that the moment had come. at nightfall that day the confessor thought that the time had arrived, and administered the last sacrament to him, which d. john received with great devotion and perfect consciousness, in the presence of all the field-marshals and other personages who were crowded into the narrow precincts.
no one slept that night in fort or camp, and continually messengers went to and fro, bearers of sad news. at dawn father juan fernández said mass at the bedside, thinking d. john unconscious, as his eyes were already closed; but being told by the confessor that the host was being raised, he quickly took off his cap and did reverence. at nine o'clock he seemed somewhat to revive, and then he was taken with a fresh delirium, in which, with extraordinary strength, he began to get angry with the soldiers, commanding in a battle, giving orders to the battalions, calling the captains by name, sending horses flying, reproving them at times because they allowed themselves to be cut off by the enemy, calling others to victory with eyes, hands and voice, always clamouring for the marqués de santa cruz, whom he called "d. álvaro, my friend," his guide, master, and his right hand.
"jesus! jesus! mary!" implored the confessor. "jesus! jesus! mary!" at last repeated d. john of austria, and, repeating these holy names, became gradually calmer, until he sank into a profound lethargy, forerunner, doubtless, of death, with his eyes shut, his body inert, with the crucifix of the moors on his breast, where p. juan fernández had placed it, the only sign of life being his difficult, uneven breathing.
they all knelt, believing that the supreme moment had come, and the two priests began to recite by turns the prayers for the dying. suddenly, about eleven o'clock, d. john gave a great sigh, and they heard him distinctly articulate in a weak but clear, sweet, plaintive voice, like a child calling to its mother, "aunt! aunt! my lady aunt!"
and this was all. for two hours the lethargy lasted, and at half-past one, without effort, trouble, or any violence, he gasped twice, and the soul of "that john sent by god" fled to his bosom to render account of the mission which had been confided to him.
had he really fulfilled it? was the mission of d. john of austria to drown in the waters of lepanto the great power of the turk, threat to the faith of christ and to the liberty of europe, or did the mission also extend to conquering the kingdom of england, and bringing back that great people to the fold of the catholic church, as christ's two vicars pius v and gregory xiii wished and thought?
if it were so, d. john of austria can well liquidate his debt before the divine tribunal, giving for only answer those words of christ to st. theresa, which so alarmingly show the fearful reach of human free will: "theresa! i wished it, but men did not wish it."
eusebio nieremberg, in his life of the p. juan fernández, relates this strange circumstance relative to d. john of austria:
"a few days later (after d. john's death) he appeared to the father, who was at one of the colleges, and said, 'father juan fernández, why have you forgotten friends?' 'i have not forgotten, my lord, but what have i got to do?' then he told him that he must help him with his suffrages and do certain things. the servant of god did all he asked with much celerity and earnestness, saying masses and prayers and doing penances for him, and making others do the same. at the end of a few days he appeared again, shining and glorious, saying that he was in heaven and was very grateful for the good works they had done for him."
don john was buried first in the cathedral at namur, but the following spring his body (except his intestines) was conveyed to spain by orders of philip ii and buried with much pomp in the escorial. the story of the body being cut in pieces at the joints and placed in three leather bags on the pack saddle of a horse for the journey, is too well known not to be mentioned here. sir william stirling maxwell says that it was to avoid "expense and the troublesome questions which were in those days likely to arise between the clergy and magistracy of the towns through which a royal corpse was publicly carried." (translator.)