Owing to these circumstances, there was probably no one cause, among the many which occurred in Castile during the fifteenth century, more prolific of intestine discord, than the election to these posts, far too important to be intrusted to any subject, and the succession to which was sure to be contested by a host of competitors. Isabella seems to have settled in her mind the course of policy to be adopted in this matter, at a very early period of her reign. On occasion of a vacancy in the grand-mastership of St. James, by the death of the incumbent, in 1476, she made a rapid journey on horseback, her usual mode of travelling, from Valladolid to the town of Ucles, where a chapter of the order was deliberating on the election of a new principal. The queen, presenting herself before this body, represented with so much energy the inconvenience of devolving powers of such magnitude on any private individual, and its utter incompatibility with public order, that she prevailed on them, smarting, as they were, under the evils of a disputed succession, to solicit the administration for the king, her husband. That monarch, indeed, consented to waive this privilege in favor of Alonso de Cardenas, one of the competitors for the office, and a loyal servant of the crown; but, at his decease in 1499, the sovereigns retained the possession of the vacant mastership, conformably to a papal decree, which granted them its administration for life, in the same manner as had been done with that of Calatrava in 1487, and of Alcantara in 1494. [41]
The sovereigns were no sooner vested with the control of the military orders, than they began with their characteristic promptness to reform the various corruptions, which had impaired their ancient discipline. They erected a council for the general superintendence of affairs relating to the orders, and invested it with extensive powers both of civil and criminal jurisdiction. They supplied the vacant benefices with persons of acknowledged worth, exercising an impartiality, which could never be maintained by any private individual, necessarily exposed to the influence of personal interests and affections. By this harmonious distribution, the honors, which had before been held up to the highest bidder, or made the subject of a furious canvass, became the incentive and sure recompense of desert. [42]