Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 332 Spring Day Trip
On August 1886, 3, the weather was sunny and cloudless.

A carriage that looked a bit large was moving slowly on the road, and the emblem of the Spanish Savoy royal family was clearly visible on the carriage.

In order to pull this slightly bulky carriage, six handsome white horses were tied to the front of the carriage. Their strong and powerful hooves waved easily, driving the luxurious carriage slowly forward.

There were two horses in front of the carriage. Both horses were white. One was handsome and majestic, with a 30-year-old man in noble clothes riding on it. The other horse was a little younger and looked like a foal. However, due to its excellent genes, the foal was not tired carrying a young man. The two horses jointly guided the carriage forward.

On the left and right of the two horses, there were several knights with weapons and equipment riding scattered around. The knights carefully observed the situation around the road, and in their spare time, they looked respectfully and enthusiastically at the men on the two horses in the middle.

Behind the carriage were specially modified cars, carrying the palace servants as well as various utensils and supplies.

At the end of the convoy were hundreds of cavalrymen who were responsible for escorting the entire team forward and ensuring the safety of the team.

"Xiaobai, run faster, you can't catch up with your father." On the white pony, the excited-looking Antonio Fernando said to the pony under him with some dissatisfaction.

The white pony seemed to have a spirit. After Juan Fernando Jr. finished speaking, it quickened its pace and managed to catch up with the big horse in front.

"Father, wait for us!" The two leading horses suddenly quickened their pace, which made the little ones in the carriage unhappy.

They were originally leisurely enjoying the beautiful scenery along the road, but when they saw their father and brother riding away on horseback, they all started calling out.

“Hahaha!” Carlo, who was running the fastest in front, heard the shouts of the little ones and pulled the reins to slow down the horse. He also said to little Juan Fernando: “Let your pony run slower, don’t tire it out before reaching the destination.”

The little guy nodded obediently, and followed his father's example to tighten the reins and stop the foal.

Although he is less than 11 years old, Crown Prince Juan Fernando has already been exposed to and learned horse riding courses. Although he is not as skilled as Carlo, he can ride a small pony at a relatively slow speed and freely.

The horses of the royal family were specially trained. They were not only selected to be fat and strong, but also to be gentle and free of wildness.

A pony with this kind of personality will not encounter any accidents at all. As long as the speed is controlled, even a person who does not know how to ride can ride it slowly.

"Carlo, does the Aranjuez Palace really have a garden bigger than the one in the Madrid Palace?" Queen Sophie was a little curious. She was quite satisfied with the large garden in the Madrid Palace, but if there was a garden even larger than the Madrid Palace, she naturally wouldn't mind going to admire it.

"Of course, Sophie." Carlo nodded with a smile and said to his queen, "The garden of the Aranjuez Palace has all the tree, flower and grass seeds brought back from all over the world by all the botanists and explorers in Spain over the past hundreds of years. It should be the place with the most plant seeds in Spain.

Knowing that you like to look at flowers, I had a large area of ​​flowers planted last year. Now is the time to enjoy them. "

"Really? I want to see it too, I want to see it too!" Before Queen Sophie nodded in response, Princess Sophia, who was admiring the scenery outside the window in the carriage, stuck her head out and said to her father excitedly.

"Haha, of course, you have a share, Sofia." Carlo nodded. He naturally would not refuse the request of his most beloved princess.

The Aranjuez National Palace was Carlo's destination on this trip and was also one of the summer palaces he selected for the Spanish royal family.

This place was originally the property of the Bourbon royal family. After Carlo became the King of Spain, these palaces that originally belonged to the Bourbon royal family naturally belonged to Carlo.

Aranjuez is not far from Madrid. It is located in the southernmost part of the Special Municipality of Madrid, forming a triangle with Madrid and Toledo.

This triangular area is also the area with the densest concentration of palaces and castles in Spain, and is home to a large number of old-fashioned aristocrats.

There is a reason why Carlo chose Aranjuez as his summer palace. First of all, the Aranjuez Palace was originally the summer palace of the Spanish royal family. It has beautiful scenery and a quiet environment, which is just right for the royal family to live in.

Secondly, the Aranjuez Palace is not far from Madrid. If the government has any urgent affairs that need Carlo to handle, it will only take a few hours to get to Aranjuez from Madrid.

Although this royal palace is not famous among all the palaces in Spain, in terms of historical heritage and scenery, the Aranjuez Palace is among the best in all the palaces in Spain.

The Aranjuez Palace is known as the Versailles of Spain. In addition to its impressive gardens and lake views, it also has a porcelain room, an armory room and a jewelry room, with a large number of gold and silver products and ornaments.

When Queen Isabella fled Spain, she had no time to pack up these gold products because the revolutionary army was about to reach Madrid.

This also gave Carlo, who took over these palaces, a bargain. According to the statistics of Butler Loren, the collections and various jewelry left by the Bourbon dynasty in these palaces were worth at least more than 5000 million pesetas.

The weight of the gold products and accessories alone exceeded 10 tons. If all this gold was converted into wealth, it would be enough to make him the richest man in Spain at that time.

These also show how exaggerated the exploitation of the Bourbon royal family in Spain was. Almost all the money earned during the Spanish colonial era went into the pockets of the royal family, the nobility and the church, making the Bourbon royal family extremely wealthy.

The reason why the Royal Palace of Madrid has become one of the three largest palaces in Europe is because of the money invested by the Spanish royal family in the repair and renovation of the palace. If this money had been invested in national development and industrial popularization, Spain might have been able to achieve some results during the First Industrial Revolution.

When Carlo had little money, he embezzled part of his property to cash in, which allowed the royal business to develop so rapidly.

When Carlo gradually became rich, he rarely touched the treasures stored in these palaces.

The collections of the Aranjuez Palace are still preserved in the various treasure rooms, including many fine porcelains, calligraphy and paintings from all over the world and other antiques.

Because the distance between Madrid and Aranjuez is only about 50 kilometers, even though the convoy was driving very slowly, it still arrived at the Aranjuez Palace a few hours after departure.

Of course, Carlo and Juan Fernando did not choose to ride horses for the entire journey. Although the royal horses were carefully selected, this slow and long ride was also quite tiring.

In fact, Carlo and Juan Fernando Jr. only experienced the ride for less than an hour before returning to the spacious and comfortable carriage.

This carriage is the exclusive carriage of the Spanish royal family. It is usually only used when the king or queen travels. Because it is exclusive to the royal family, this carriage has also been modified very finely and luxuriously. Almost everything in the carriage is a luxury. A blanket covering the entire carriage may be worth decades of income for a Spanish family.

Because the carriage was very spacious, it did not seem crowded even with Carlo, Queen Sophie and five little ones.

There is a large sofa on the north and south sides of the carriage. The space in the middle where the table was originally located has become vacant and a specially made baby crib has been placed there.

Needless to say, the person lying in the crib is Carlo's youngest daughter, Princess Christina, who is not yet a full year old.

Prince Alexander, who is one and a half years older than Princess Christina, is already two years old this year. He does not need to be served in a crib, but is now being held in the arms of his mother, Queen Sophie, and is obediently admiring the scenery outside the carriage.

Carlo sat opposite Queen Sophie, with his eldest son Juan Fernando and his eldest daughter Sofia sitting on his left and right respectively.

Carlo deliberately brought his eldest son on this trip so that he could have some free time during his busy studies so that he wouldn't be depressed all the time.

However, in the middle of the trip, Carlo also briefly asked about Prince Juan Fernando's academic progress.

At present, he is the only one who is busy with his studies. Carlo's second son, Martin, has just turned 6 years old. In addition, because he is not the heir to the throne, his studies are not as complicated as those of his elder brother, Prince Juan Fernando.

Of course, Carlo would treat his children equally in their education. The education that Martin and Alexander received was also specially customized by Carlo for them, with the aim of making them a traditional aristocrat while also taking into account and taking into account the development of the times.

Carlo did not want his sons to be mere aristocrats who were only interested in pleasure. He hoped that the two of them could become Juan Fernando's right-hand men and women, and together contribute to the development of Spain and the Royal House of Savoy.

Besides, it is possible for the two little guys to obtain their own fiefdom in the future.

The situation in Europe will change in the future, and more European countries will become independent from the control of the original powers. Under the condition that the monarchy is the main body, these European countries are likely to become monarchical kingdoms.

It will be easy to fight for two thrones for his two sons at that time. Whether they want to be kings or not will depend on their choice.

Of course, the prerequisite for fighting for the throne for them is that Carlo is sure that they can become a qualified king.

If they are not capable enough to suppress local officials and other forces, they should just be good Spanish nobles.

Although the king symbolizes supreme power, the crown also symbolizes obligations as heavy as a mountain.

If the king can properly perform his duties, he can certainly enjoy his power without any worries. But if a king cannot even perform his duties, how can the people be willing to let the king enjoy his power unscrupulously?

After testing Prince Juan Fernando's academic performance, Carlo picked up a book and read it with relish.

The words "History of Spain" were clearly written on the cover. The whole book was brand new and seemed to have not been published for long.

In fact, the publication of this Spanish history book has a lot to do with Carlo. As mentioned before, Carlo wanted to weaken the contribution of the Bourbon dynasty to Spain and increase their harm to Spain.

The newspaper's propaganda is one means, and subtly modifying the Spaniards' understanding of history through various means is also a means.

In fact, Carlo did not revise history. The book is generally objective and describes the history of Spain from its unification to the present.

However, when introducing several kings of the Bourbon royal family, this book simply glossed over the deeds of the previous kings and focused on the stories of Carlos IV and his son and granddaughter.

The stories of the last three monarchs of the Bourbon dynasty, Carlos IV, Ferdinand VII and Isabella II, are simply outrageous, each one more outrageous than the other.

One third of the entire book of Spanish history is devoted to describing their achievements, detailing how the once great Spanish Empire declined in their hands and caused Spain to become one of the countries with the lowest per capita income at that time.

Anyway, the Bourbon family has completely left Spain, and some of the blame for the monarchy has been completely placed on them.

For Carlo, he had to make clear one fact, that is, there was nothing wrong with the monarchy, but the one who was wrong was the Bourbon royal family, the monarch at that time.

It’s no wonder that with the combined influence of newspaper propaganda and detailed historical descriptions, the Spaniards’ hatred for the Bourbon royal family has indeed deepened.

Indeed, no one would have any good feelings towards a royal family that was full of incompetence. In addition to the king being incompetent, the Bourbon royal family also led to the outbreak of the decades-long Carlos War, which was also one of the reasons why Spain was heading towards a more serious decline.

While Carlo was reading the book, the convoy was slowly approaching the Aranjuez Palace. The cavalry in the front approached the carriage and respectfully reported to Carlo: "Your Majesty, we have arrived at the Aranjuez Palace."

Carlo put down his book and said to his children who were already impatient: "Okay, little ones, the Aranjuez Palace is waiting for you.

Come on, enjoy your holiday, I don't mind letting you have some flowers tonight."

The carriage stopped at the square in front of the Aranjuez Palace, from where you can see the entire palace. Because it is just a temporary palace, the overall building of the palace is not high, with only about 4 floors at the highest.

But it is undeniable that after hundreds of years of renovation and expansion by the Spanish kings, the palace before us has indeed reached a certain scale.

The Aranjuez Palace is located in the town of Aranjuez, which is also the origin of the name of the palace. For the sake of quietness, the previous Spanish kings deliberately chose to build the palace a few kilometers away from the town.

This also makes the entire Aranjuez Palace almost undisturbed, making it a peaceful and tranquil residence. Blue sky, white clouds, and beautiful scenery are almost the most realistic portrayal of the Aranjuez Palace.

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(End of this chapter)