of having entered into treasonable negotiations with Louis XI.

of France; and also that of his uncle the archbishop of Toledo. He accordingly withdrew his confidence from them, and chose for his minister Bertrand de la Cueva, who became at once the favourite of the king and lover of the queen. But Henry was one of the weakest mortals that ever swayed a sceptre, and well Villena knew it. The disgraced minister went over to the nobles, and after having stirred the flames of civil war, forced the king to sign a most dishonourable peace, treating with his sovereign as a master rather than a subject. His intolerable arrogance went even the length of asking the hand of the Infanta Isabella for his brother; and this union would actually have taken place but for the sudden death of the intended bridegroom. Shortly after the smouldering hostilities again burst into a flame, the nobles, headed by Alphonso the king's brother, encountering the royal forces at Medina del Campo in 1467. Villena meanwhile had gone to Ocagna for the purpose of being elected grandmaster of St. Jago, and strange to say, his election was after his return confirmed by the king. About this time the king of Arragon, in order to gain over the fickle and adroit marquis, proposed to him an alliance between his own son Ferdinand and Beatrix Pacheco, daughter of Villena; but though he was highly flattered by the proposal, his prudence made him decline the honour. The death of Alphonso, brother of the king, greatly disconcerted the nobles, but after some deliberation they agreed to centre their hopes in his sister Isabella. This princess, before she joined their faction, required that she should be declared princess of the Asturias. The poor king, who agreed to every thing and displeased all parties in the kingdom, was accordingly brought to repudiate his wife and disinherit his daughter, who by virtue of her birth was princess of the Asturias. Isabella, who was now sought for in marriage by the kings of Portugal and Arragon, ultimately accepted the hand of the latter, a union big beyond all others which had ever taken place with important consequences to Spain. But Villena again changed sides. He now espoused the cause of the king's daughter, who had been so grievously wronged; and having assembled the nobles in the valley of Lozoya, induced them by his politic and irresistible arts to sign an instrument which entirely annulled the arrangement made in favour of Isabella. Villena, who was now at the height of his power, was about to marry a daughter of the illustrious house of Mendoza, when he was suddenly carried off by the bursting of an abscess in the throat, 11th October, 1474. Villena was a man of great parts, of consummate tact in the management of parties, and of a most subtle and penetrating vigour of mind; but he was fickle, ambitious, and selfish, and died little regretted by any party in the state.—R. M., A. VILLENA, Marques de, a Spanish nobleman, and promoter of the national literature, was born in the latter half of the seventeenth century. His time was passed amid the cares and labours of political life, but he found leisure for the cultivation not merely of general literature, but also of some branches of the exact sciences. It was Villena who in 1713 proposed to the king, Philip V., the founding of a national academy. His first purpose seems to have respected the entire range of human knowledge, and to have been moulded by the arrangement and subdivisions laid down by Bacon. It was found, however, that such an undertaking was much too extensive, and the province of the new association was confined principally to the "cultivation and establishment of the purity of the Castilian language." The Real Academia Espanola, from which have issued valuable dictionaries and other books, was established by a royal decree, dated the 3rd of November, 1714.—R. M., A. VILLENEUVE, Pierre Charles Jean-Baptiste Silvestre, a celebrated French admiral, was born in 1763. At the age of fifteen he entered the naval service, and was rapidly promoted, having in 1796 obtained the rank of rear-admiral. He commanded the rear of the French fleet at the battle of the Nile, and made his escape from that fatal conflict to Malta with two ships of the line and two frigates. In 1804 he was created a vice-admiral, and took the command of the squadron at Toulon. In the following year, having been joined by the Spanish admiral Gravina, with several ships of the line. Admiral Villeneuve sailed for the West Indies, where he caused great alarm, and captured a number of British merchantmen. The combined fleet—consisting of twenty sail of the line, seven frigates, and two brigs—on its homeward voyage, when about forty leagues N.W. of Cape Finnisterre, fell in with fifteen sail of the line, which, under Sir Robert Calder, had been detached in search of the enemy. An action took place, and two of the Spanish ships were captured; night terminated the conflict, and owing to the indecision of the English admiral, it was not renewed next day, and the combined fleet escaped to Ferrol, whence it sailed with augmented force, and reached Cadiz. The important task of watching the enemy was committed to Nelson, who cruised off the port for some weeks, and sent six of his ships to a distance, in order that the blockaded fleet might be induced to come out. This manœuvre produced the desired effect. On the 19th of October, Villeneuve put to sea with thirty-three sail of the line, eighteen French and fifteen Spanish, and early on the 21st came in sight of the British fleet, consisting of twenty-seven sail of the line, off Cape Trafalgar. The fight began at noon, and terminated in the complete victory of the British, dearly purchased, however, by the death of Nelson. Admiral Villeneuve, who had hoisted his flag in the Bucentaur, was taken, together with twenty of his ships, and carried prisoner to England. In April of the following year he was liberated on parole, and returned to France, but was stopped at Rennes, and forbidden to appear at Paris, by order of Bonaparte. A few days after, the brave but unfortunate officer was found dead in his room. It is probable that he had destroyed himself, though there were suspicions of foul play. The emperor threw the whole blame of the disaster at Trafalgar on Admiral Villeneuve, who, he alleged, had disobeyed the instructions sent him. But these orders were in themselves embarrassing and contradictory; and it is certain that the last order which Villeneuve received at Cadiz, instead of enjoining him not to sail, as Napoleon affirmed, imperatively commanded him to put to sea immediately.—J. T. VILLEROY, Nicolas de Neufville, Seigneur de, a distinguished French statesman, was born in 1542. He sprung from a family recently ennobled, but which afterwards produced not a few eminent men. At the age of eighteen he displayed such marks of legislative ability as to gain the confidence of the queen, Catherine de Medicis, by whom he was employed in several negotiations both in Spain and Italy. In 1567 he was appointed secretary of state, and contrived, while retaining his credit with the queen mother, to gain the confidence of Charles IX., who on his deathbed warmly recommended him to his brother and successor, as an able and zealous minister. Henry III. confirmed him in his office, and conferred some honours on him; but Villeroy having failed in obtaining satisfaction for a gross affront offered him by the Duke d'Epernon, resigned his office in 1588. He was in consequence regarded as a partisan of the Guises, and a pensioner of Spain; and so loud was the clamour against him on that account, that he found it necessary to publish an "Apology" vindicating himself from these charges. During the civil war which soon after broke out, Villeroy stood aloof both from the Leaguers and the Huguenots, and became one of the leaders of a third party, composed mainly of the courtiers who were "too good Frenchmen to suffer the domination of Spain, and too zealous catholics to submit to a protestant sovereign." He was employed by the duke of Mayence, the leader of the catholic party, to negotiate with Henry IV., and after the abjuration of protestantism by that monarch, acknowledged him as his lawful sovereign. In 1594 Villeroy was reinstated in his former office of secretary of state, and laboured zealously to restore the peace of the country; but becoming jealous of the supremacy of Sully, he connected himself with the malcontent courtiers, and was even accused once more of being a pensioner of the Spanish court. After the death of Henry IV., Villeroy obtained considerable influence with the queen-mother, Maria de Medicis; but his rivalry with the Marquis d'Ancre led him to engage in certain discreditable intrigues, on account of which he was banished from court. On the death of his rival, however, he was once more reinstated in office by Louis XIII. He died at Rouen in 1617. He was the author of "Memoirs of State, extending from 1567 to 1604"—His son, Charles de Neufville, Marquis de, known during his father's lifetime by the title of the Marquis d'Aliencourt, became a soldier, and joined the party of the League, by whom he was made governor of Pontoise. After the close of the war, he and his father received the enormous sum of five hundred thousand francs for the surrender of this and some other places. He was appointed governor of Lyons by Henry IV., and in 1600 negotiated the marriage of that king and Maria de Medicis. The marquis died in 1642.—J. T. VILLEROY, Nicolas de Neufville, Marquis de, son of the preceding, was born in 1597. He served in Piedmont, and