The rest of the chapter is more concerned with the evils of the actor's life than with the audience, which is the point most interesting to us; but it is clear from what has been quoted that the comedies, witty and facile as they were, nevertheless did not form the only attraction that drew crowds daily to the theatres of the Court. In the first place, they were a pretext for the prevailing idleness, and the sure sign of decadence which manifests itself in the inactive many gazing upon and criticising the hired exertions of the active few. But the "corrales" of Madrid are also shown in the above extract, and in hundreds of allusions in the comedies themselves, to have been places of assignation and incentives to promiscuous gallantry.[27] The King himself, behind the impenetrable window grating of a first-floor private room (_aposento_) first saw many of his mistresses, they were not mistresses in the sense that prevailed at the Court of the French Bourbon kings. None of them ever aspired to, or attained, political or social power, for the distance between the sacrosanct sovereign and common humanity was too great for that to be possible in Castile. They were just the creatures Of Philip's caprice, and the { 207} momentary playthings of his passions, none of them retaining hold upon him but for a very short time.
Of his thirty and more illegitimate children, of whom eight were recognised, the only one that was given princely rank was that Don Juan of Austria who was beloved by his father above all others of his offspring. From the theatre, at the period which we are now writing, Don Juan of Austria sprang. It was at the Corral de la Cruz in 1627 that Philip first set eyes upon the girl whom one of Olivares' agents had sent from the country to act upon the Madrid stage. Her name was Maria Calderon, and at the time she appeared in the capital she was not more than sixteen years of age. She was no great beauty, but her grace and fascination were supreme, and her voice was so sweet and her speech so captivating that Madrid fell in love with her at once.[28] The King from his aposento was enamoured of her the first time he saw her, and for him to desire was to enjoy. She was immediately summoned to the private apartment, that the King might listen more closely to her lovely voice, and when he heard it the King's love grew fiercer still. From the corral to the palace was but a step when Philip willed it, and thenceforward the _Calderona_ became the King's best beloved mistress. She still acted upon the stage, though gifts and tokens of affection were piled upon her by the love-lorn King. She, proud of the ineffable honour vouchsafed to her, became rigidity itself in her virtue, and turned a hard face to all other lovers.