Note 6 — Chapter III
Reading edition
Charles really seems to have fallen in love with her. Howel writes in July. "There are comedians once a week come to the palace, where, under a great canopy the Queen and the Infanta sit in the middle and our Prince and Don Carlos on the Queen's right hand, and the little Cardinal on the Infanta's left hand. I have seen the Prince have his eyes immovably fixed upon the Infanta half an hour together in a thoughtful speculative posture, which sure would needs be tedious unless affection did sweeten it. It was no handsome comparison of Olivares that he watched her as a cat doth a mouse." Endymion Porter, writing to his wife soon after the Prince's arrival in Spain, says: "The Prince hath taken such a liking to his mistress that now he loves her as much for her beauty as he can for being sister to so great a King. She deserves it, for never was there a fairer creature." State Papers, Domestic, March 1623.