SPAIN: Jimmie Steps Out

Jacobo Maria del Pilar Carlos Manuel Fitz-James Stuart is more familiarly known as the Duke of Alba and Berwick. Six times a duke, twelve times a marquis, 17 times a count and 15 times a grandee of Spain, the brittle old (66) blueblood was once a close friend of the late Alfonso XIII. Last week he resigned as Spain's Ambassador in London. This desertion of the shaky government of fat Francisco Franco came hard on the heels of the monarchist manifesto issued by the Spanish Pretender Don Juan (TIME, April 2). No one doubted that Alba—"Jimmie" to his British friends—would take a leading part in the royalist drive for power in Spain.