STANDARD LITERATURE SERIES
TALES OF
THE ALHAMBRA
BY
WASHINGTON IRVING
SELECTED FOR USE IN SCHOOLS. WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
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NEW YORK AND NEW ORLEANS
UNIVERSITY PUBLISHING COMPANY 1901
COPYRIGHT, 1896, BY UNIVERSITY PUBLISHING COMPANY
*** 2414
Press of J. J. T.ittle & Co. Astor Place, New York
HISTORY OF SPAIN TO THE FALL OF GRANADA.
10 Longitude
SeAnT^e&S? * ' 6
8CALC OF MILES
a
ALMOST nothing is known of the early history of the great peninsula which forms the southwestern extremity of Europe. The Greeks called it Iberia, but they had little real knowledge of the country. To them it was the end of the world, the land of the setting sun, and many wonder ful stories and myths were connected with it. One of these myths was that Hercules had hollowed out the strait that connects the Mediterranean with the Atlantic, and hence the bold, rocky cliffs that rise on either side of the narrow strait were called the Pillars of Hercules.
Phoenician merchants and traders certainly visited the peninsula in early times, and made settlements along the coasts. As the years passed, it gradually came more and more under Carthaginian influence, and
228071
HISPANIA,
about two hundred and thirty-seven years before Christ, a Carthaginian army under Hamilcar Barca occupied the southern part of the country, some of the tribes submitting quietly, others being conquered. His son Hannibal, who had married a Spanish woman, extended the Carthaginian power to the Pyrenees Mountains in the north, and, in 218 B.C., led his army from this peninsula over the mountains to Italy.
Their wars with Carthage had first brought the attention of the Ro mans to the peninsula, which they called Hispania, a name since contracted by the Spaniards into Espana, and by the English into Spain. While Hannibal was still in Italy, the Romans invaded Hispania, defeated the Carthaginians, and conquered the southern portion of the peninsula, thus cutting off Hannibal's supplies and reinforcements. After the power of Carthage was crushed, the Romans retained their conquests in Hispania, and our first accurate knowledge of the country comes from them. They found it occupied by many different tribes more civilized than the Gauls, and so brave that more than two hundred years passed before the entire peninsula was finally subjugated by the Emperor Augustus Caesar. The country then became entirely Roman. The natives acquired the Latin language and the Latin civilization. For more than four hundred years the country remained a part of the Roman Empire, and became famous in literature, arts, and science. Trajan the emperor, and Quintilian, Sen eca, and Martial, the most distinguished Latin authors of the silver age, were Spaniards. The Castilian Spanish of to-day very closely resembles the old Latin language. As a part of the Roman Empire, Spain embraced Christianity, and the Spanish bishops were leaders in the Roman Church.
With the decline of the Western Roman Empire (A.D. 409), Spain was overrun by the Vandals and other German tribes, the Spaniards offering very little resistance to the invaders. Four or five years later the Visigoths (Western Goths) occupied the country, and in time expelled the Vandals, and in A.D. 573 established a Visigothic Empire. The Visigoths ruled Spain until the death of Roderick, the last Visigothic king, A.D. 711.
^ Across the Mediterranean, in Northern Africa, lay the Roman province of Mauritania, inhabited by a dark-skinned people whom the Romans called Mauri, from which our word Moor is derived. The Mauri were converted to Christianity with the rest of the Roman Empire. They called themselves Berbers. After the rise of Mohammedanism, Mauri tania was overrun and conquered by the Arabs, or Saracens, and the Moors all embraced the Mohammedan faith. In A.D. 7.11, a mixed army, made up of Arabs, Moors, Egyptians, and Syrians, under the com mand of Tarik, an Arab, crossed the narrow strait to the Spanish side.
THE ARABS CONQUER SPAIN. 5
They called the rock on which they landed Gebel el Tarik (meaning Rock of Tarik), which has been shortened into Gribralter, the name it bears to-day. The strait has taken its name from the rock.
The country fell an easy prey. By the year 714 the Arabs had con quered the whole of Spain, which now became a part of the Moslem Empire, governed by the Caliphs of Damascus. The ruling Caliph of Damascus was overthrown, and all the members of his family poisoned except Abdurrahman, who in 767 escaped to Spain on the invitation of the Arab governors, and established the Caliphate of Cordova. This embraced all of Spain, except Asturias, and was independent of the Caliphs of Bagdad. It was governed by Abdurrahman's successor for two hundred and fifty years. The Moors during all this time were sub ordinate. The reigning family and all the officers were Arabs. =?«.. The conquest of Spain by the Arabs was at first simply a change of rulers, not of population. The masses of the people were not disturbed in their property or in their business. They paid taxes which supported the Arab rulers and the army of Arabs and Moors. All religions were tolerated. The Arabs were an intellectual race, and by association acquired the culture and civilization of the people whom they had con quered and with whom they lived. For two hundred and fifty years Spain under Arab rulers surpassed every other European nation in architecture, literature, science, manufactures, and agriculture.
The Christian princes had been driven into the mountains of Northern Spain. One of these princes established the petty kingdom of Asturias in the mountains of the north, seven years after the landing of the Arabs. His successors drove the Arabs from Galicia and from Leon, and in the tenth century became kings of Leon. Later on, Navarre, Aragon, Castile, and Portugal, successively threw off the Arab control. Each became an independent kingdom, at first very small, but gradually pushing its boundaries southward. In 997, Almansor, the chief minister of the Arab ruler, regained most of the lost ground, but it was lost again in a great battle in 1002, after which Arab rule never extended north of the river Tagtis. A few years later the Arab empire in Spain was broken up into a number of independent principalities, under Emirs (commanders).
In 1085 Alfonso VI. of Leon and Castile captured the city of Toledo, and was pushing still farther south. The Emir of Seville sought the help of the Moors of Northern Africa. Vnsuf of Morocco, although then eighty years of age, promptly responded, and in 1086 came with his Moors to the assistance of the Emir. In October of the same year he defeated the combined forces of Castile, Aragon, and Barcelona, but was recalled to Africa. He returned four years later. Instead of fighting
6 THE MOORS IN SPAIN.
the Christians, however, he turned against the Arab Emirs, and united all their possessions in an empire which covered practically the southern half of the peninsula. For the first time, the Moorish element in the population became dominant. In 1118, Alfonso VII. of Castile captured Saragossa, and Alfonso VIII. extended the borders of Castile to the Sierra Morena Mountains. In 1146, Abd al mii'min, leader of a new religious sect, united the Slavs (or slaves) and the Moors in an insurrection against the grandson of Yusuf, and established himself as sovereign. His suc cessor defeated the Christian kings, who were quarrelling among them selves, and recovered some of the lost territory. Under the rule of this family, the Arab element disappeared, and from this time the Mohamme dans of Spain were distinctly Moors.
In 1336 Cordova, the capital, was captured by Castile, and the next year the Moorish Empire was again broken up into independent districts under Emirs. The most powerful of these, ^Alhamar, the builder of the Alhambra, Emir of Granada, in 1246 put himself under the protection of Castile, and paid tribute to that kingdom. All the other Moorish districts were, within the next twenty years, conquered by the Christian kings of the peninsula. Granada became a place of refuge for those Moors who were driven out of the other parts of Spain by the persecution of the Christians ; and the Moors in Granada, following the example of the Christians, expelled all, except Mohammedans, from their territory. As a consequence, the population of Granada became almost entirely Moorish. This added greatly to their strength. The mountainous character of Granada made it easy to defend, and in this country, with a united population, the Moors were enabled to hold their ground for two hundred years longer.
The marriage of Ferdinand, King of Aragon ;md Navarre, with Isabella, Queen of Leon and Castile, united the Christian armies of Spain, and in 1481 these monarchs began the conquest of Granada, which ended successfully in 1492.
The Moors rebelled in 1500, and after that time only those who em braced Christianity were permitted to remain in Spain. Though out wardly Christians, the "Moriscos" were secretly Mohammedans. Fi nally, in 1609, they were all expelled from Spain, and that country has never recovered from the loss of this large industrial element.
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES.
IN the annals of American literature no name is brighter or more warmly cherished than that of Washington Irving. He was one of the earliest and most distinguished of American writers. lie was born in New York City in 1783, just at the close of the Revolutionary War, and was given the name at that time dearest to American hearts. He was educated for the legal profession ; but his tastes were in the direction of literature, and as early as 180:3 his "Letters of Jonathan Oldstyle " appeared in the Morning Chronicle.
Irving's first publications of note were his contributions to Salma gundi, a semi-monthly publication in imitation of the Spectator, con ducted by himself, his brother William, and James K. Paulding. His sketches of Dutch character in his "Knickerbocker's History of New York," which made its appearance in 1809, proved him possessed of quaint and genial humor to a high degree. It was everywhere read and admired. Walter Scott, "his sides sore from laughing," praised it warmly. The "Sketch-Book" was completed in 1820. It was received in the United States with universal delight, and with most cordial favor in England. It has a peculiar charm for its delicate touch and purity of style. It was the first production in the United States of a work of the highest literary excellence, and won for Irving a name as one of the chief founders of American literature. The "short story," now so popular, recognizes him as its first great master. The Royal Society of Literature bestowed on him one of the two fifty-guinea gold medals awarded an nually, and the University of Oxford conferred on him the degree of LL.D.
"Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.," " Bracebridge Hall " (1822), and " Tales of a Traveller" (1824) followed. I In 1826 he went to Spain and began the long and arduous studies which were the foundation of his more impor tant serious works: "The Life and Voyages of Columbus" (18~8), " Conquest of Granada " (1829), " Voyages of the Companions of Colum bus" (1831), "The Alhambra" (1832), "Legends of. the Conquest of Spain" (1835), " Mahomet and His Successors " (1850). f For nearly three months he lived at Granada, in the old Moorish palace, the Alhambra, while gathering material for the work which bears that name.
In 1842 he was appointed United States Minister to Spain. He re turned to New York in 1846, and spent the remainder of his life at his residence, Sunnyside, near Tarry town, on the Hudson, where he died
8 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES.
November 28, 1859. His last work was the " Life of George Washing ton "(5 vols., 1855-1859).
America has produced no writer of higher literary fame than Irving. " Diedrich Knickerbocker," " Sleepy Hollow," " Rip Van Winkle," "Ich- abod Crane," have become most familiar names. Sentiment and abun dant humor characterize his writings, and he had the power to seize the attention of cultivated readers by his keen observation, his graphic touches of description, and his clear and musical style.
As a man, Irving was — to quote from Thackeray's graceful tribute to his character — " in his family gentle, generous, good-humored, affection ate, self-denying ; in society a delightful example of complete gentle- manhood ; quite unspoiled by prosperity ; never obsequious to the great, or, worse still, to the base and mean, as some public men are forced to be ; eager to acknowledge every contemporary's merit ; always kind and affable with the young members of his calling ; in his professional bar gains and mercantile dealings delicately honest and grateful. He was, at the same time, doubly dear to men of letters, not for his wit and genius merely, but as an exemplar of goodness, probity, and a pure life."
PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA.1
To the traveller imbued 2 with a feeling for the historical and poetical, so inseparably intertwined jn_ jthe^annals 3 of romantic Spain, the Alhambra is as much an object of devo tion as is the Caaba4 to all true Moslems.6 How many legends and traditions, true and fabulous; how many songs and bal lads, Arabian and Spanish, of love and war and chivalry,6 are associated with this Oriental pile! It was the royal abode of the Moorish kings, where, surrounded with the splendors and refinements of Asiatic luxury, they held dominion over what they vaunted 7 as a terrestrial 8 paradise, and made their last stand for empire in Spain. The rpyal palace forms but a part of a fortress, the walls of which, studded with towers, stretch irregularly round the whole crest of a hill, a spur of the Sierra Nevada, or Snowy Mountains, and overlook the city; exter nally it is a rude congregation of towers and battlements, with no regularity of plan nor grace of architecture,9 and giving little promise of the grace and beauty which prevail within.
In the time of the Moors the fortress was capable of con taining within its outward precincts an army of forty thousand men, and served occasionally as a stronghold of the sover eigns against their rebellious subjects. After the kingdom had passed into the hands of the Christians, the Alhambra con-
1 (ahl-hahm'brah.) Note these leading as nifio (nee' -nyo) ; e final forms a separate
peculiarities of pronunciation of Spanish syllable, as Calle (kahl-lay). names : a, long like a in far, short like a 5 filled. * histories,
in fast ; e, long like a in ale, short like ein * (kah-ah'bahj, the temple at Mecca. met ; i long like e in me, short like i in pin ; 6 followers of Mohammed. o as in English; ^ like oo ,'(7 before e and ?, 'deeds of knights who fought for the
and .7 and x before every vowel, like a gut- weak and the oppressed. 7 boasted, tural h ; n combines the sounds of n and y, 8 earthly. • art or science of building.
10 PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
tinned to be a royal demesne,1 and was occasionally inhabited by the Castilian monarchs. The emperor Charles V. com menced a sumptuous palace within its walls, but was deterred 2 from completing it by repeated shocks of earthquakes. The last royal residents were Philip V. and his beautiful queen, E]izabetta of Parma, early in the eighteenth century. Great preparations were made for their reception. The palace and gardens were placed in a state of repair, and a new suite 3 of apartments erected, and decorated by artists brought from Italy. The sojourn of the sovereigns was transient,4 and after their departure the palace once more became desolate. Still the place was maintained with some military state. The gov ernor held it immediately from the crown; its jurisdiction extended down into the suburbs of the city, and was inde pendent of the captain-general of Granada.
The desertion of the court, however, was a fatal blow to the Alhambra. Its beautiful halls became desolate, and some of them fell to ruin; the gardens were destroyed, and the foun tains ceased to play. By degrees the dwellings became filled with a loose and lawless population — contrabandistas,5 who availed themselves of its independent jurisdiction 6 to carry on a wide and daring course of smuggling ; and thieves and rogues of all sorts, who made this their place of refuge whence they might depredate 7 upon Granada and its vicinity. \ The strong arm of government at length interfered; the whole community was thoroughly sifted; none were suffered to remain but such as were of honest character, and had legiti mate right to a residence; the greater part of the houses were demolished,8 and a mere hamlet left, with the parochial9 church and the Franciscan convent. During the recent troubles in Spain, when Granada was in the hands of the French, the Alhambra was garrisoned by their troops, and the
1 possession. * brief ; lasting only a short time. 7 prey,
'hindered. 'smugglers. 8 destroyed,
•connected set or series. 6 legal authority. 9 parish.
PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 11
palace was occasionally inhabited by the French commander. With that enlightened taste which has ever distinguished the French nation in their conquests, this monument of Moorish elegance and grandeur was rescued from the absolute ruin and desolation that were overwhelming it. The roofs were repaired, the saloons and galleries protected from the weather, the gar dens cultivated, the watercourses restored, the fountains once more made to throw up their sparkling showers; and Spain may thank her invaders for having preserved to her the most beautiful and interesting of her historical monuments.
On the departure of the French they blew up several towers of the outer wall, and left the fortifications scarcely tenable.1 Since that time the military importance of the post is at an end. The garrison is a handful of invalid soldiers, whose principal duty is to guard some of the outer towers, which serve occasionally as a prison of state; and the governor, abandoning the lofty hill of the Alhambra, resides in the centre of Granada, for the more convenient despatch of his official duties.
Our first object, of course, on the morning after our arrival, was a visit to this time-honored edifice.
Leaving our posada,2 and traversing the renowned square of 4he Vivarrambla, once the scene of Moorish jousts 3 and tour naments/ now a crowded market-place, we proceeded along the Zacatin, the main street of what, in the time of the Moors, was the Great Bazaar, and where small shops and narrow alleys still retain the Oriental character. Crossing an open place in front of the palace of the captain-general, we ascended a con fined and winding street, the name of which reminded us of the chivalric days of Granada. It is called the Calle, or street, of the Gomeres, from a Moorish family famous in chronicle" and song. This street led up to the Puerta de las Granadas,
1 capable of being held. a inn. 4 uiock tight or military sport.
3 mock encounters on horseback as a * record, history, trial of skill.
12 PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
a massive gateway of Grecian architecture, built by Charles V., forming the entrance to the domains of the Alhambra.
'At the gate were two or three ragged, superannuated sol diers, dozing on a stone bench, while a tall, meagre l varlet,2 whose rusty-brown cloak was evidently intended to conceal the ragged state of his nether garments, was lounging in the sun shine and gossiping with an ancient sentinel on duty. He joined us as we entered the gate, and oifered his services to show us the fortress.
I have a traveller's dislike to officious ciceroni,3 and did not altogether like the garb of the applicant.
" You are well acquainted with the place, I presume ? "
" Nobody better; in fact, sir, I am a son of the Alhambra! "
The common Spaniards have certainly a most poetical way of expressing themselves. ' ' A son of the Alhambra ! ' ' The appel lation 4 caught me at once ; the very tattered garb of my new acquaintance assumed a dignity in my eyes. It was emblem atic 5 of the fortunes of the place, and befitted the progeny ° of a ruin.
I put some further questions to him, and found that his title was legitimate.7 His family had lived in the fortress from generation to generation ever since the time of the con quest. His name was Mateo Ximenes. "Then, perhaps," said I, "you may be a descendant from the great Cardinal Ximenes?" "God knows, seflor! It may be so. We are the oldest family in the Alhambra." There is not any Span iard, however poor, but has some claim to high pedigree/ The first title of this ragged worthy, however, had completely captivated9 me, so I gladly accepted the services of the "son of the Alhambra."
We now found ourselves in a deep, narrow ravine, filled with beautiful groves, with a steep avenue and various footpaths
1 thin, lean. 2 low fellow. 6 offspring ; descendants.
1 (chee-cha-ro'nee) guides (Italian). 7 in accordance with law.
4 name. 8 line of ancestors ; descent.
6 suggestive by similarity. » pleased ; charmed.
PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 13
winding through it, bordered with stone seats, and ornamented with fountains. To our left, we beheld the towers of the Alhambra beetling1 above us; to our right, on the opposite side of the ravine, we were equally dominated 2 by rival towers on a rocky eminence. These, we were told, were the Torres Vermejos, or vermilion towers, so called from their ruddy hue. No one knows their origin. Ascending the steep and shady avenue, we arrived at the foot of a huge square Moorish tower, forming a kind of barbican,3 through which passed the main entrance to the fortress. Within the barbican was another group of veteran invalids, one mounting guard at the portal, while the rest, wrapped in their tattered cloaks, slept on the stone benches. This portal is called the Gate of Justice, from the tribunal held within its porch during the Moslem domina tion, for the immediate trial of petty causes — a custom com mon to the Oriental nations, and occasionally alluded to in the sacred Scriptures. " Judges and officers shalt thou make thee in all tliy gates, and they shall judge the people with just judgment."
The great vestibule, or porch, of the gate is formed by an immense Arabian arch, of the horseshoe form, which springs to half the height of the tower. On the keystone of this arch is engraven a gigantic hand. Within the .vestibule, on the key stone of the portal, is sculptured in like manner a gigantic key. Those who pretend to some knowledge of Mohammedan symbols, affirm that the hand is the emblem of doctrine; the five fingers designating the five principal commandments of the creed of Islam — fasting', pilgrimage, alms-giving, ablution,4 and war against infidels. The key, say they, is the emblem of the faith or of power; the key of Daoud or David, transmitted 5 to the prophet. " And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open and none shall shut, and he shall shut and none shall open" (Isaiah xxii. 22). The
1 jutting out. 9 seemingly controlled or threatened. « washing.
8 gateway. 5 handed down.
14 PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
key, we are told, was emblazoned ' on the standard of the Moslems in opposition to the Christian emblem of the cross, when they subdued Spain, or Andalusia. It betokened the conquering power invested3 in the prophet. " He that hath the key of David, he that openeth and no man shutteth ; and shutteth and no man openeth" (Rev. iii. 7).
A different explanation of these emblems, however, was given by the legitimate son of the Alhambra, and one more in unison 3 with the notions of the common people, who attach something of mystery and magic to every thing Moorish, and have all kind of superstitions connected with this old Moslem fortress. According to Mateo, it was a tradition handed down from the oldest inhabitants, and which he had from his father and grandfather, that the hand and key were magical de vices on which the fate of the Alhambra depended. The Moorish king who built it was a great magician, or, as some believed, had sold himself to the devil, and had laid the whole fortress under a magic spell. By this means it had remained standing for several hundred years, in defiance of storms and earthquakes, while almost all other buildings of the Moors had fallen to ruin, and disappeared. This spell, the tradition went on to say, would last until the hand on the outer arch should reach down and grasp the key, when the whole pile would tumble to pieces, and all the treasures buried beneath it by the Moors would be revealed.
Notwithstanding this ominous4 prediction, we ventured to pass through the spell-bound gateway.
After passing through the barbican, we ascended a narrow lane, winding between walls, and came on an open esplanade ;> within the fortress, called the Plaza de los Algibes, or Place of the Cisterns, from great reservoirs which undermine it, cut in the living rocks by the Moors to receive the water brought by conduits from the Darro/ for the supply of the fortress. Here,
1 depicted ; represented. * harmony ; agreement. * level place.
3 given to ; put upon. * threatening. • a small tributary of the Xenil.
PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 15
also, is a well of immense depth, furnishing the purest and coldest of water; another monument of the delicate taste of the Moors, who were indefatigable ' in the exertions to obtain that element in its purity.
In front of this esplanade is the splendid j)ile commenced by Charles V., and intended, it is said, to eclipse the residence of the Moorish kings. Much of the Oriental edifice intended for the winter season was demolished2 to make way for this massive pile. The grand entrance was blocked up, so that the present entrance to the Moorish palace is through a simple and almost humble portal in a corner. With all the massive grandeur and architectural merit of the palace of Charles V., we regarded it as an arrogant 3 intruder, and, passing by it with a fe'eling almost of scorn, rang at the Moslem portal.
While waiting for admittance, our self-imposed cicerone, Mateo Ximenes, informed us that the royal palace was intrusted to the care of a worthy old maiden dame called Dona Antonia Molina, but who, according to Spanish custom, went by the more neighborly appellation of Tia Antonia (Aunt Antonia), who maintained the Moorish halls and gardens in order and showed them to strangers. While we were talking, the door was opened by a plump little black-eyed Andalusian damsel, whom Mateo addressed as Dolores,4 but who, from her bright looks and cheerful disposition, evidently merited a merrier ' name. Mateo informed me in a whisper that she was the niece of Tia Antonia, and I found she was the good fairy who was to conduct us through the enchanted palace. Under her guidance we crossed the threshold, and were at once trans ported,5 as if by magic wand, into other times and an Oriental realm, and were treading the scenes of Arabian story. Noth ing could be in greater contrast than the unpromising ex terior of the pile with the scene now before us. We found ourselves in a vast patio, or court, one hundred and fifty feet in
1 tireless. * destroyed. * meaning sorrowful.
* assuming ; haughty. 6 carried.
16 PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
length, and upwards of eighty feet in breadth, paved with white marble, and decorated at each end with light Moorish peristyles,1 one of which supported an elegant gallery of fretted architecture. Along the mouldings of the cornices2 and on various parts of the walls were escutcheons 3 and ciphers, and cufic4 and Arabic characters in high relief, repeating the pious mottoes of the Moslem monarchs, the builders of the Alhambra, or extolling their grandeur and munificence.5 Along the centre of the court extended an immense basin, or tank, a hundred and twenty-four feet in length, twenty- seven in breadth, and five in depth, receiving its water from two marble vases. Hence it is called the Court of the Alberca, the Arabic for a pond or tank. Great numbers of gold-fish were to be seen gleaming through the waters of the basin, and it was bordered by hedges of roses.
Passing from the court of the Alberca, under a Moorish arch way, we entered the renowned Court of Lions. No part of the edifice gives a more complete idea of its original beauty than this, for none has suffered so little from the ravages H of time. In the centre stands the fountain famous in song and story. The alabaster 7 basins still shed their diamond drops; the twelve lions which support them, and give the court its name, still cast forth crystal streams as in the days of Boabdil.8 The lions, however, are unworthy of their fame, being of miserable sculpture ; the work, probably, of some Christian captive. The court is laid out in flower-beds, instead of its ancient and appropriate pavement of tiles and marble; the alteration, an instance .of bad taste, was made by the French when in posses sion of Granada. Round the four sides of the court are light Arabian arcades of open filigree 9 work supported by slender pillars of white marble, which it is supposed were originally
1 ranges of columns. 4 pertaining to the older characters of the
9 moulded projections finishing the part Arabic language.
to which they are attached. * bounty ; liberality. * wastes ; inroada
3 shields on which are coats of arms. T a tine white variety of gypsum.
8 last Moorish king of Granada. • ornamental network.
PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 17
gilded. The architecture, like that in most parts of the interior of the palace, is characterized by elegance, rather than grandeur; bespeaking a delicate and graceful taste, and a dis position to indolent ' enjoyment. When one looks upon the fairy traces of the peristyles, and the apparently fragile fret work of the walls, it is difficult to believe that so much has survived the wear and tear of centuries, the shocks of earth quakes, the violence of war, and the quiet, though no less baneful,2 pilferings of the tasteful traveller; it is almost suffi cient to excuse the popular tradition that the whole is tected by a magic charm.
On one side of the court a rich portal opens into the Hall of the Abencerrages, so called from the gallant cavaliers of that illustrious line who were here perfidiously 3 massacred. There are some who doubt the whole story; but our humble cicerone Mateo pointed out the very wicket of the portal through which they were introduced one by one into the Court of Lions, and the white marble fountain in the centre of the hall, beside which they were beheaded. He showed us also certain broad ,ruddy stains on the pavement, traces of their blood, which, according to popular belief, can never be effaced.
Immediately opposite the Hall of the Abencerrages a portal, richly adorned, leads into a hall of less tragical associations. It is light and lofty, exquisitely graceful in its architecture, paved with white marble, and bears the suggestive name of the Hall of the Two Sisters. Some destroy the romance of the name by attributing it to two enormous slabs of alabaster which lie side by side, and form a great part of the pavement; an opinion strongly supported by Mateo Ximenes. Others are disposed to give the name a more poetical significance, as the vague memorial of Moorish beauties who once graced this hall, which was evidently a part of the royal harem.4 This opinion I was happy to find entertained by our little bright-eyed guide
1 lazy ; idle. * injurious ; destructive. 4 portion of the house allotted to females 8 treacherously. in large dwellings of the East.
2
18 PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
Dolores,, who pointed to a balcony over an inner porch, which gallery, she had been told, belonged to the women's apartment. " You see, seflor," said she, " it is all grated and latticed, like the gallery in a convent chapel where the nuns hear mass; for the Moorish kings," said she, indignantly, "shut up their wives just like nuns."
The latticed "jalousies," l in fact, still remain, whence the dark-eyed beauties of the harem might gaze unseen upon the zambras and other dances and entertainments of the hall below.
On each side of this hall are recesses or alcoves for ottomans and couches, on which the voluptuous 2 lords of the Alhambra indulged in that dreamy repose so dear to the Orientalists. A cupola or lantern admits a tempered light from above, and a free circulation of air; while on one side is heard the refresh ing sound of waters from the Fountain of the Lions, and on the other side the soft plash from the basin in the Garden of Lindaraxa.
It is impossible to comtemplate this scene so perfectly Oriental without feeling the early associations of Arabian romance, and almost expecting to see the white arm of some mysterious princess beckoning from the gallery, or some dark eye sparkling through the lattice. The abode of beauty is here, as if it had been inhabited but yesterday ; but where are the two sisters ? Where the Zoraydas and Lindaraxas ?
An abundant supply of water, brought from the mountains by old Moorish aqueducts, circulates throughout the palace, supplying its baths and fish -pools, sparkling in jets within its halls, or murmuring in channels along the marble pavements. When it has paid its tribute to the royal pile, and visited its gardens and parterres,3 it flows down the long avenue leading to the city, tinkling in rills, gushing in fountains, and main taining a perpetual verdure in those groves that embower and beautify the whole hill of the Alhambra.
1 slatted window blinds. 8 ornamental arrangement of flower-beds,
2 given to sensual pleasure. with walks between.
PALACE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 19
Those only who have sojourned in the ardent climates of the South can appreciate the delights of an abode combining the breezy coolness of the mountain with the freshness and verdure of the valley. While the city below pants with the noontide heat, and the parched Vega * trembles to the eye, the delicate airs from the Sierra Nevada play through these lofty halls, bringing with them the sweetness of the surrounding gardens. Every thing invites to that indolent repose, the bliss of south ern climes; and while the half-shut eye looks out from shaded balconies upon the glittering landscape, the ear is lulled by the rustling of groves and the murmur of running streams.
I forbear, for the present, however, to describe the other delightful apartments of the palace. My object is merely to give the reader a general introduction into an abode where, if so disposed, he may linger and loiter with me day by day until we gradually become familiar with all its localities.
i (vay'gah), valley.
ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBRA.
THE Moors of Granada regarded the Alhambra as a miracle of art, and had a tradition that the king who founded it dealt in magic, or at least in alchemy/ by means whereof he pro cured the immense sums of gold expended in its erection. A brief view of his reign will show the secret of his wealth. He is known in Arabian history as Muhamed Ibii-1-Ahmar; but his name in general is written simply Alhamar, and was given to him, we are told, on account of his ruddy complexion.
He was of the noble and opulent 2 line of the Beni Nasar, or tribe of Nasar, and was born in Arjona, in the year of the Hegira8 592 (A.D. 1195). At his birth the astrologers, we are told, cast his horoscope,4 according to Oriental custom, and pronounced it highly auspicious ; and a santon 5 predicted f or him a glorious career. No expense was spared in fitting him for the high destinies prognosticated.6 Before he attained the full years of manhood, the famous battle of the Navas (or plains) of Tolosa shattered the Moorish empire, and eventually severed the Moslems of Spain from the Moslems of Africa. Factions soon arose among the former, headed by warlike chiefs, ambitious of grasping the sovereignty 7 of the Penin sula. Alhamar became engaged in these wars ; he was the gen eral and leader of the Beni Nasar, and, as such, he opposed and thwarted the ambition of Aben Hud, who had raised his standard among the warlike mountains of the Alpuxaras,8 and
1 an ancient science which aimed to change at the time of one's birth to foretell the
base metals into gold. events of his life.
3 wealthy. 6 a Turkish saint. « foretold.
8 the flight of Mohammed from Mecca, 7 right to exercise supreme power. July 16, 622, from which date time is 8 (ahl-poo-hah'rahs), mountain range par- reckoned by his followers. allel to the Sierra Nevada from Motril to the
* observation of the aspect of the heavens river Almeria.
ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBRA. 21
been proclaimed king of Murcia ' and Granada. Many con flicts took place between these warring chieftains; Alhamar dispossessed his rival of several important places, and was pro claimed king of Jaen3 by his soldiery; but he aspired to the sovereignty of the whole of Andalusia, for he was of a san guine 3 spirit and lofty ambition. His valor and generosity went hand in hand; what he gained by the one he secured by the other; and at the death of Aben Hud (A.D. 1238), he became sovereign of all the territories which owned allegiance to that powerful chief. He made his formal entry into Gra nada in the same year, amid the enthusiastic shouts of the mul titude, who hailed him as the only one capable of uniting the various factions which prevailed, and which threatened to lay the empire at the mercy of the Christian princes.
Alhamar established his court in Granada; he was the first of the illustrious4 line of Nasar that sat upon a throne. He took immediate measures to put his little kingdom in a post ure of defence against the assaults to be expected from his Christian neighbors, repairing and strengthening the frontier posts and fortifying the capital. Not content with the pro visions of the Moslem law, by which every man is made a soldier, he raised a regular army to garrison his strongholds, allowing every soldier stationed on the frontier a portion of land for the support of himself, his horse, and his family; thus interesting him in the defence of the soil in which he had a property. These wise precautions were justified by events. The Christians, profiting by the dismemberment of the Mos lem power, were rapidly regaining their ancient territories. James the Conqueror had subjected all Valencia, and Ferdi nand5 the Saint sat down in person before Jaen, the bul wark of Granada. Alhamar ventured to oppose him in open field, but met with a signal defeat, and retired discomfited to
1 province in southeast of Spain, sur- 3 bloody, with desire for war and blood- rounded by Granada, Andalusia, La Mane ha, shed, and Valencia. * noted.
9 province fifty miles north of Granada. * He founded the University of Salamanca.
22 ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBRA.
his capital. Jaen still held out, and kept the enemy at bay during an entire winter; but Ferdinand swore not to raise his camp until he had gained possession of the place. Alhamar found it impossible to throw reinforcements into the besieged city; he saw that its fall must be followed by the investment ' of his capital, and was conscious of the insufficiency of his means to cope with the potent sovereign of Castile. Taking a sudden resolution, therefore, he repaired privately to the Christian camp, made his unexpected appearance in the pres ence of King Ferdinand, and frankly announced himself as the king of Granada. " I come," said he, " confiding in your good faith, to put myself under your protection. Take all T possess and receive me as your vassal; " 2 so saying, he knelt and kissed the king's hand in token of allegiance.
Ferdinand was won by this instance of confiding faith, and determined not to be outdone in generosity. He raised his late enemy from the earth, embraced him as a friend, and, refus ing the wealth he offered, left him sovereign of his dominions, under the feudal tenure of a yearly tribute, attendance at the Cortes as one of the nobles of the empire, and service in war with a certain number of horsemen. He, moreover, conferred on him the honor of knighthood, and armed him with his own hands.
It was not long after this that Alhamar was called upon for his military services, to aid King Ferdinand in his famous siege of Seville.3 The Moorish king sallied forth with five hundred chosen horsemen of Granada, than whom none in the world knew better how to manage the steed or wield the lance. It was a humiliating 4 service, however, for they had to draw the sword against their brethren of the faith.
Alhamar gained a melancholy distinction by his prowess in this renowned conquest, but more true honor by the humanity
1 surrounding. 3 city on left bank of Guadalquiver, eighty
2 subject ; slave. miles from its mouth,
* humbling.
ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBRA. 23
which he prevailed upon Ferdinand to introduce into the usages of war. When in 1248 the famous city of Seville sur rendered to the Castilian monarch, Alhamar returned sad and full of care to his dominions. He saw the gathering ills that menaced the Moslem cause, and uttered an ejaculation often used by him in moments of anxiety and trouble: "How straightened and wretched would be our life, if our hope were not so spacious and extensive."
As he approached Granada, on his return, he beheld arches of triumph which had been erected in honor of his martial exploits. The people thronged forth to see him with impatient joy, for his benignant ' rule had won all hearts. Wherever he passed he was hailed with acclamations as " The Conqueror." Alhamar gave a melancholy shake of the head on hearing the appellation. "There is no conqueror but God!" exclaimed he. FromMhat time forward this exclamation became his motto, and the motto of his descendants, and appears to this day emblazoned on his escutcheons in the halls of the Alhambra.
Alhamar had purchased peace by submission to the Christian yoke; but he was conscious that, with elements so discordant,2 and motives for hostility so deep and ancient, it could not be permanent. Acting, therefore, upon the old maxim,, " Arm thyself in peace, and clothe thyself in summer," he improved the present interval of tranquillity 3 by fortifying his dominions, replenishing his arsenals,4 and promoting those useful arts which give wealth and real power. He confided the command of his various cities to such as had distinguished themselves by valor and prudence, and who seemed most acceptable to the people. He organized a vigilant police, and established rigid rules for the administration of justice. The poor and the dis tressed always found ready admission to his presence, and he attended personally to their assistance and redress. He erected
1 kind ; mild. 3 freedom from disturbing influences.
8 inharmonious ; contradictory. * storehouses for weapons of war.
24 ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBEA.
hospitals for the blind, the aged, and infirm, and all those in capable Of labor, and visited them frequently ; not on set days, with pomp and form, so as to give time for every thing to be put in order, and every abuse concealed ; but suddenly and un expectedly, informing himself, by actual observation and close inquiry, of the treatment of the sick and the conduct of those appointed to administer to their relief. He founded schools and colleges, which he visited in the same manner, inspecting personally the instruction of the youth. He established butcheries and public ovens, that the people might be furnished with wholesome provisions at just and regular prices. He introduced abundant streams of water into the city, erecting baths and fountains, and constructing aqueducts and canals to irrigate l and fertilize the Vega. By these means prosperity and abundance prevailed in this beautiful city, its gates were thronged with commerce, and its warehouses filled with luxu ries and merchandise of every clime and country.
He, moreover, gave premiums and privileges to the best arti sans;2 improved the breed of horses and other domestic ani mals ; encouraged husbandry ; 3 and increased the natural fertility of the soil twofold by his protection, making the lovely valleys of his kingdom to bloom like gardens. He fostered also the growth and fabrication 4 of silk, until the looms of Granada surpassed even those of Syria5 in the fineness and beauty of their productions. He, moreover, caused the mines of gold and silver and other metals, found in the mountainous regions of his dominions, to be diligently worked, and was the first king of Granada who struck money of gold and silver with his name, taking great care that the coins should be skilfully executed.
It was towards the middle of the thirteenth century, and just after his return from the siege of Seville, that he com-
1 distribute water over. « making.
3 skilled workmen. 6 territory of Asiatic Turkey, bordering on
» farming. Mediterranean Sea.
ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBRA. 25
menced the splendid palace of the Alhambra, superintending the building of it in person, mingling frequently among the artists and workmen, and directing their labors.
Though thus magnificent in his works and great in his enter prises, he was simple in his person and moderate in his enjoy ments. His dress was not merely void of splendor, but so plain as not to distinguish him from his subjects. His harem boasted but few beauties, and these he visited but seldom, though they were entertained with great magnificence. His wives were daughters of the principal nobles, and were treated by him as friends and rational companions. What is more, he managed to make them live in friendship with one another. He passed much of his time in his gardens, especially in those of the Alhambra, which he had stored with the rarest plants and the most beautiful and aromatic ' flowers. Here he delighted himself in reading histories, or in causing them to be read and related to him, and sometimes, in intervals of leis ure, employed himself in the instruction of his three sons, for whom he had provided the most learned and virtuous masters.
As he had frankly and voluntarily offered himself a tribu tary vassal to Ferdinand, so he always remained loyal to his word, giving him repeated proofs of fidelity and attachment. When that renowned monarch died in Seville in 1254, Alha- mar sent ambassadors to condole with his successor, Alonzo X., and with them a gallant train of a hundred Moorish cavaliers of distinguished rank, who were to attend round the royal bier during the funeral ceremonies, each bearing a lighted taper. This grand testimonial of respect was repeated by the Moslem monarch during the remainder of his life, on each anniversary of the death of King Ferdinand el Santo, when the hundred Moorish knights repaired from Granada to Seville, and took their stations, with lighted tapers, in the centre of the sumptu ous cathedral, round the cenotaph a of the illustrious deceased.
Alhamar retained his faculties and vigor to an advanced age.
> fragrant. 8 empty tomb erected in honor of some one buried elsewhere.
26 ALHAMAR, THE FOUNDER OF THE ALHAMBRA.
In his seventy-ninth year (A.D. 1272) he took the field on horseback, accompanied by the flower of his chivalry, to resist an invasion of his territories. As the army sallied forth from Granada, one of the principal adalides, or guides, who rode in advance, accidentally broke his lance against the arch of the gate. The councillors of the king, alarmed by this circum stance, which was considered an evil omen, entreated him to return. Their supplications were in vain. The king persisted, and at noontide the omen, say the Moorish chroniclers, was fatally fulfilled. Alhamar was suddenly struck with illness, and had nearly fallen from his horse. He was placed on a litter, and borne back towards Granada, but his illness increased to such a degree that they were obliged to pitch his tent in the Vega. His physicians were filled with consternation,1 not knowing what remedy to prescribe. In a few hours he died, vomiting blood, and in violent convulsions. The Castilian prince Don Philip, brother of Alonzo X., was by his side when he expired. His body was embalmed, enclosed in a silver coffin, and buried in the Alhambra, in a sepulchre of precious marble, amidst the unfeigned lamentations of his sub jects, who bewailed him as a parent.
I have said that he was the first of the illustrious line of Nasar that sat upon a throne. I may add that he was the founder of a brilliant kingdom, which will ever be famous in history and romance as the last rallying place of Moslem power and splendor in the Peninsula. Though his undertak ings were vast, and his expenditures immense, yet his treasury was always full; and this seeming contradiction gave rise to the story that he was versed in magic art, and possessed of the secret for transmuting baser metals into gold. Those who have attended to his domestic policy, as here set forth, will easily understand the natural magic and simple alchemy which made his ample treasury to overflow.
1 sudden alarm confusing the mind.
YUSEF ABUL HAGIG,
THE FINISHER OF THE ALHAMBRA.
To the foregoing particulars, concerning the Moslem princes who once reigned in these halls, I shall add a brief notice of the monarch who completed and embellished 1 the Alhambra. Yusef Abul Hagig (or, as it is sometimes written, Haxis) was another prince of the noble line of Nasar. He ascended the throne of Granada in the year of grace 1333, and is described by Moslem writers as having a noble presence, great bodily strength, and a fair complexion, and the majesty of his coun tenance increased, say they, by suffering his beard to grow to a dignified length and dyeing it black. His manners were gentle, affable, and urbane;2 he carried the benignity3 of his nature into warfare, prohibiting all wanton4 cruelty, and enjoining mercy and protection towards women and children, the aged and infirm, and all friars and other persons of holy and recluse life. But though he possessed the courage com mon to generous spirits, the bent of his genius was more for peace than war; and though repeatedly obliged by circum stances to take up arms, he was generally unfortunate.
Among other ill-starred enterprises, he undertook a great campaign, in conjunction with the King of Morocco, against the Kings of Castile and Portugal, but was defeated in the memorable battle of Salado,5 which had nearly proved a death blow to the Moslem power in Spain.
Yiisef obtained a long truce after this defeat, and now his character shone forth in its true lustre. He had an excellent
1 ornamented 4 unrestrained ; reckless.
» polite. * small river in province of Cadiz.
* kindness.
28 YUSEF ABUL HAGIG.
memory, and had stored his mind with science and erudition; l his taste was altogether elegant and refined, and he was accounted the best poet of his time. Devoting himself to the instruction of his people and the improvement of their morals and manners, he established schools in all the villages, with simple and uniform systems of education; he obliged every hamlet of more than twelve houses to have a mosque,2 and purified the ceremonies of religion, and the festivals and pop ular amusements, from various abuses and indecorums 3 which had crept into them. He attended vigilantly to the police of the city, establishing nocturnal 4 guards and patrols, and superintending all municipal concerns. His attention was also directed towards finishing the great architectural works commenced by his predecessors, and erecting others on his own plans. The Alhambra, which had been founded by the good Alhamar, was now completed. Yusef constructed the beautiful Gate of Justice, forming the grand entrance to the for tress, which he finished in 1348. He likewise adorned many of the courts and halls of the palace, as may be seen by the inscriptions on the walls, in which his name repeatedly occurs. He built also the noble Alcazar or citadel of Malaga, now unfortunately a mere mass of crumbling ruins, but which most probably exhibited in its interior similar elegance and magnificence with the Alhambra.
The genius of a sovereign stamps a character upon his time. The nobles of Granada, imitating the elegant and graceful taste of Yusef, soon filled the city of Granada with magnifi cent palaces, the halls of which were paved with mosaic; the walls and ceilings wrought in fretwork, and delicately gilded and painted with azure, vermilion, and other brilliant colors, or minutely inlaid with cedar and other precious woods; specimens of which have survived, in all their lustre, the lapse of several centuries. Many of the houses had fountains,
1 very great learning. 3 improprieties of behavior.
2 Mohammedan place of worship. * nightly.
YUSEF ABUL HAGIG. 29
which threw up jets of water to refresh and cool the air. They had lofty towers, also, of wood or stone, curiously carved and ornamented, and covered with plates of metal that glittered in the sun. Such was the refined and delicate taste in archi tecture that prevailed among this elegant people; insomuch that, to use the beautiful simile of an Arabian writer, " Gra nada, in the days of Yusef, was as a silver vase filled with em eralds and jacinths."
One anecdote will be sufficient to show the magnanimity l of this generous prince. The long truce which had succeeded the battle of Salado was at an end, and every effort of Yusef to renew it was in vain. His deadly foe, Alfonzo XI. of Cas tile, took the field with great force, and laid siege to Gibraltar. Yusef reluctantly took up arms, and sent troops to the relief of the place. In the midst of his anxiety, he received tidings that his dreaded foe had suddenly fallen a victim to the plague. Instead of manifesting exultation on the occasion, Yusef called to mind the great qualities of the deceased, and was touched with a noble sorrow. " Alas ! " cried he, " the world has lost one of its most excellent princes; a sovereign who knew how to honor merit, whether in friend or foe! "
The Spanish chroniclers themselves bear witness to this magnanimity. According to their accounts, the Moorish cava liers partook of the sentiment of their king, and put on mourning for the death of Alfonzo. Even those of Gibraltar, who had been so closely invested, when they knew that the hostile monarch lay dead in his camp, determined among themselves that no hostile movement should be made against the Christians. The day on which the camp was broken up, and the army departed, bearing the corpse of Alfonzo, the Moors issued in multitudes from Gibraltar, and stood mute and melancholy, watching the mournful pageant.2 The same reverence for the deceased was observed by all the Moorish commanders on the frontiers, who suffered the funeral train to
1 greatness of mind. 3 showy spectacle or procession.
SO YUSEF ABIJL HAGIG.
pass in safety, bearing the corpse of the Christian sovereign from Gibraltar to Seville.
Yusef did not long survive the enemy he had so generously deplored. In the year 1354, as he was one day praying in the royal mosque of the Alhambra, a maniac rushed suddenly from behind, and plunged a dagger in his side. The cries of the king brought his guards and courtiers to his assistance. They found him weltering in his blood. He made some signs as if to speak, but his words were unintelligible. They bore him senseless to the royal apartments, where he expired almost immediately. The murderer was cut to pieces, and his limbs burnt in public, to gratify the fury of the populace.
The body of the king was interred in a superb sepulchre of white marble; a long epitaph, in letters of gold upon an azure ground, recorded his virtues. " Here lies a king and martyr, of an illustrious line, gentle, learned, and virtuous; renowned for the graces of his person and his manners ; whose clemency, l piety, and benevolence were extolled throughout the kingdom of Granada. He was a great prince, an illustrious captain, a sharp sword of the Moslems, a valiant standard-bearer among the most potent monarchs," etc.
The mosque still exists which once resounded with the dying cries of Yusef, but the monument which recorded his virtues has long since disappeared. His name, however, remains inscribed among the delicate and graceful ornaments of the Alhambra, and will be perpetuated 2 in connection with this renowned pile, which it was his pride and delight to beautify.
1 mildness. s made lasting.
PANORAMA1 FROM THE TOWER OF COMARES.
IT is a serene and beautiful morning; the sun has not gained sufficient power to destroy the freshness of the night. What a morning to mount to the summit of the Tower of Comares, and take a bird's-eye view of Granada and its environs!
Come, then, worthy reader and comrade, follow my steps into this vestibule, ornamented with rich tracery, which opens into the Hall of Ambassadors. We will not enter the hall, how ever, but turn to this small door opening into the wall. Have a care! Here are steep, winding steps and but scanty light; yet up this narrow, obscure> and spiral staircase the proud monarchs of Granada and their queens have often ascended to the battlements to watch the approach of invading armies, or gaze, with anxious hearts, on the battles in the Vega.
At length we have reached the terraced roof, and may take breath for a moment, while we cast a general eye over the splendid panorama of city and country; of rocky mountain, verdant valley, and fertile plain; of castle, cathedral, Moorish towers and Gothic domes, crumbling ruins and blooming groves. Let us approach the battlements, and cast our eyes immediately below. See, on this side we have the whole plain of the Alhambra laid open to us, and can look down into its courts and gardens. At the foot of the tower is the Court of the Alberca, with its great tank or fish-pool bordered with flowers; and yonder is the Court of Lions, with its famous fountain and its light Moorish arcades;2 and in the centre of the pile is the little garden of Lindaraxa, buried in the heart of the building, with its roses and citrons, and shrubbery of em erald green.
That belt of battlements, studded with square towers, strag-
complete view. 2a series of arches supported by columns.
32 PAKORAMA FROM THE T )WER OF COMARES.
gling round the whole brow of the hill, is the outer boundary of the fortress. Some of the towers, you may perceive, are in ruins, and their massive fragments buried among vines, fig- trees, and aloes.
Let us look on this northern side of the tower. It is a giddy height; the very foundations of the tower rise above the groves of the steep hillside. And see ! a long fissure 1 in the massive walls shows that the tower has been rent by some of the earthquakes which from time to time have thrown Gra nada into consternation, and which, sooner or later, must reduce this crumbling pile to a mere mass of ruin. The deep, narrow glen below us, which gradually widens as it opens from the mountains, is the valley of the Darro; you see the little river winding its way under embowered terraces, and' among orchards and flower gardens. It is a stream famous in old times for yielding gold, and its sands are still sifted occasion ally, in search of the precious ore. Some of those white pavil ions,2 which here and there gleam from among groves and vineyards, were rustic retreats of the Moors, to enjoy the refreshment of their gardens. Well have they been compared by one of their poets- to so many pearls set in a bed of emer alds.
The airy palace, with its tall white towers and long arcades, which breasts yon mountain, among pompous groves and hang ing gardens, is the Generalife,3 a summer palace of the Moorish kings, to which they resorted during the sultry months to enjoy a still more breezy region than that of the Alhambra. The naked summit of the height above it, where you behold some shapeless ruins, is the Silla del Moro, or Seat of the Moor, so called from having been a retreat of the unfortunate Boabdil during the time of an insurrection, where he seated himself, and looked down mournfully upon his rebellious city.
A murmuring sound of water now and then rises from the
1 opening ; cleft. 3 on the side of the mountain, high above
2 summer-housee. the Alhambra.
PANORAMA FROM THE TOWER OP COMARES. 33
valley. It is from the aqueduct of you Moorish mill, nearly at the foot of the hill. The avenue of trees beyond is the Ala- meda, along the bank of the Darro, a favorite resort in even* ings, and a rendezvous of lovers in the summer nights, when the guitar may be heard at a late hour from the benches along its walks. At present you see none but a few loitering monks there, and a group of water-carriers. The latter are burdened with water-jars of ancient Oriental construction, such as were used by the Moors. They have been filled at the cold and limpid spring called the Fountain of Avellanos. Yon moun tain path leads to the fountain, a favorite resort of Moslems, as well as Christians; for this is said to be the Adinamar (Aynu- 1-adamar), the "Fountain of Tears," mentioned by Ibn Bat- uta the traveller, and celebrated in the histories and romances of the Moors.
You start! 'Tis nothing but a hawk that we have frightened from his nest. This old tower is a complete breeding-place for vagrant birds; the swallow and martlet l abound in every chink and cranny, and circle about it the whole day long; while at night, when all other birds have gone to rest, the moping owl comes out of its lurking-place, and utters its boding 2 cry from the battlements. See how the hawk we have dislodged sweeps away below us, skimming over the tops of the trees, and sail ing up to the ruins above the Generalife.
I see you raise your eyes to the snowy summit of yon pile of mountains, shining like a white summer cloud in the blue sky. It is the Sierra Nevada, the pride and delight of Granada; the source of her cooling breezes and perpetual verdure; of her gushing fountains and perennial 3 streams. It is this glorious pile of mountains which gives to Granada that combination of delights so rare in a southern city — the fresh vegetation and temperate airs of a northern climate, with the vivifying 4 ardor of a tropical sun, and the cloudless azure of a southern sky.
1 a kind of swallow. 3 through the year ; unfailing.
8 foreshowing or threatening ill. * animating ; enduing with life.
3
84 PANORAMA FROM THE TOWER OF COMARES.
It is this aerial treasury of snow, which, melting in proportion to the increase of the summer heat, sends down rivulets and streams through every glen and gorge of the Alpuxaras, dif fusing emerald verdure and fertility throughout a chain of happy and sequestered ' valleys.
Those mountains may be well called the glory of Granada. They dominate the whole extent of Andalusia, and may be seen from its most distant parts. The muleteer hails them, as he views their frosty peaks from the sultry level of the plain; and the Spanish mariner, on the deck of his bark, far, far off on the bosom of the blue Mediterranean, watches them with a pensive eye, thinks of delightful Granada, and chants, in low voice, some old romance about the Moors.
See to the south, at the foot of those mountains, a line of arid 3 hills, down which a long train of mules is slowly moving. Here was the closing scene of Moslem domination. From the summit of one of those hills the unfortunate Boabdil cast back his last look upon Granada, and gave vent to the agony of his soul. It is the spot famous in song and story, "The last sigh of the Moor."
Farther this way these arid hills slope down into the luxu rious Vega, from which he had just emerged — a blooming wil derness of grove and garden and teeming orchard, with the Xenil winding through it in silver links, and feeding innu merable rills; which, conducted through ancient Moorish channels, maintain the landscape in perpetual verdure. Here were the beloved bowers and gardens and rural pavilions, for which the unfortunate Moors fought with such desperate valor. The very hovels and rude granges,3 now inhabited by boors,4 show, by the remains of arabesques & and other tasteful deco ration, that they were elegant residences in the days of the Moslems. Behold, in the very centre of this eventful plain,
1 secluded ; hidden. 4 peasants ; rustics.
3 parched with heat 6 decorations after the manner of the
3 farm-houses. Arabians.
PANORAMA FROM THE TOWER OF COMARES. i?7
a place which in a manner links the history of the Old World with that of the New. Yon line of walls and towers gleaming in the morning sun is the city of Santa Fe, built by the Catho lic sovereigns during the siege of Granada, after a conflagra tion had destroyed their camp. It was to these walls Columbus was called back by the heroic queen,1 and within them the treaty was concluded which led to the discovery of the West ern world. Behind yon promontory, to the west, is the Bridge of Pinos, renowned for many a bloody fight between Moors and Christians. At this bridge the messenger overtook Co lumbus when, despairing of success with the Spanish sover eigns, he was departing to carry his project of discovery to the court of France.
Above the bridge a range of mountains bounds the Vega to the west — the ancient barrier between Granada and the Chris tian territories. Among their heights you may still discern warrior towns, their gray walls and battlements seeming of a piece with the rocks on which they are built. Here and there a solitary atalaya, or watch-tower, perched on a mountain peak, looks down, as it were from the sky, into the valley on either side. How often have these atalayas given notice, by fire at night or smoke by day, of an approaching foe! It was down a cragged defile of these mountains, called the Pass of Lope, that the Christian armies descended into the Vega. Round the base of yon gray and naked mountain (the Moun tain of Elvira), stretching its bold, rocky promontory into the bosom of the plain, the invading squadron would come burst ing into view, with flaunting banners and clangor of drum and trumpet.
Five hundred years have elapsed since Ismael ben Ferrag, a Moorish king in Granada, beheld from this very tower an invasion of the kind, and an insulting ravage of the Vega; on which occasion he displayed an instance of chivalrous mag nanimity, often witnessed in the Moslem princes, "whose
> Isabella.
PANORAMA FROM THE TOWER OF COMARES.
history," says an Arabian writer, "abounds in generous actions and noble deeds that will last through all succeeding ages, and live forever in the memory of man." — But let us sit down on this parapet, and I will relate the anecdote.
It was in the year of Grace 1319 that Ismael ben Ferrag beheld from this tower a Christian camp whitening the skirts of yon Mountain of Elvira. The royal princes Don Juan and Don Pedro, regents of Castile during the minority of Alfonzo XL, had already laid waste the country from Alcaudete1 to Alcala la Real,2 capturing the castle of Illora, and setting fire to its suburbs, and they now carried their insulting ravages to the very gates of Granada, defying the king to sally forth and give them battle.
Ismael, though a young and intrepid prince, hesitated to accept the challenge. He had not sufficient force at hand, and awaited the arrival of troops summoned from the neigh boring towns. The Christian princes, mistaking his motives, gave up all hope of drawing him forth, and, having glutted themselves with ravage, struck their tents and began their homeward march. Don Pedro led the van, and Don Juan brought up the rear; but their march was confused and irreg ular, the army being greatly encumbered by the spoils and captives they had taken.
By this time King Ismael had received his expected re sources, and putting them under the command of Osmyn, one of the bravest of his generals, sent them forth in hot pur suit of the enemy. The Christians were overtaken in the defiles of the mountains. A panic seized them; they were completely routed, and driven with great slaughter across the borders. Both of the princes lost their lives. The body of Don Pedro was carried off by his soldiers, but that of Don Juan was lost in the darkness of the night* His son wrote to the Moorish king, entreating that the body of his father might
1 town in Andalusia, twenty-four miles 2 town in Andalusia, thirty miles eouth- southwest of Jaen. west of Jaen.
PANORAMA FROM THE TOWER OF COMARES. 37
be sought and honorably treated. Ismael forgot in a moment that Don Juan was an enemy, who had carried ravage and insult to the very gate of his capital; he only thought of him as a gallant cavalier and a royal prince. By his command diligent search was made for the body. It was found in a barranco ' and brought to Granada. There Ismael caused it to be laid out in state on a lofty bier, surrounded by torches and tapers, in one of these halls of the Alhambra. Osmyn and other of the noblest cavaliers were appointed as a guard of honor, and Christian captives were assembled to pray around it.
In the mean time Ismael wrote to the son of Prince Juan to send a convoy for the body, assuring him it should be safely delivered up. In due time a band of Christian cava liers arrived for the purpose. They were honorably received and entertained by Ismael, and, on their departure with the body, the guard of honor of Moslem cavaliers escorted the funeral train to the frontier.
But enough; the sun is high above the mountains, and pours his full fervor on our heads. Already the terraced roof is hot beneath our feet; let us abandon it, and refresh our selves under the arcades by the Fountain of the Lions.
1 slope of steep bank.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY.
JUST within the fortress of the Alhambra, in front of the royal palace, is a broad open esplanade, called the Place or Square of the Cisterns, so called from being undermined by reservoirs of water, hidden from sight, and which have existed from the time of the Moors. At one corner of this esplanade is a Moorish well, cut through the living rock to a great depth, the water of which is cold as ice and clear as crystal. The wells made by the Moors are always in repute, for it is well known what pains they took to penetrate to the purest and sweetest springs and fountains. The one of which we now speak is famous throughout Granada, insomuch that water- carriers, some bearing great water- jars on their shoulders, others driving asses before them laden with earthen vessels, are ascending and descending the steep woody avenues of the Alhambra, from early dawn until a late hour of the night.
Fountains and wells, ever since the scriptural days, have been noted gossiping places in hot climates; and at the well in question there is a kind of perpetual club kept up during the livelong day, by the invalids, old women, and other curi ous do-nothing folk of the fortress, who sit here on the stone benches, under an awning spread over the well to shelter the toll-gatherer from the sun, and dawdle over the gossip of the fortress, and question every water-carrier that arrives about the news of the city, and make long comments on every thing they hear and see. Not an hour of the day but loitering housewives and idle maid-servants may he seen, lingering with pitcher on head or in hand, to hear the last, of the endless tattle of these worthies.
Among the water-carriers Avho once resorted to this well,
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 39
there was a sturdy, strong-backed,, bandy-legged little fellow, named Pedro Gil, but called Peregil for shortness. Being a water-carrier, he was a Gallego, or native of Galicia,1 of course. Nature seems to have formed races of men, as she has of ani mals, for different kinds of drudgery. In France the shoe blacks are all Savoyards,2 the porters of hotels all Swiss, and in the days of hoops and hair-powder in England, no man could give the regular swing to a sedan-chair but a bog-trot ting Irishman. So in Spain, the carriers of water and bearers of burdens are all sturdy little natives of Galicia. No man says, " Get me a porter," but, " Call a Gallego."
To return from this digression,3 Peregil the Gallego had begun business with merely a great earthen jar which he car ried upon his shoulder; by degrees he rose in the world, and was enabled to purchase an assistant of a correspondent class of animals, being a stout shaggy-haired donkey. On each side of this his long-eared aid-de-camp,4 in a kind of pannier,5 were slung his water-jars, covered with fig-leaves to protect them from the sun. There was not a more industrious water- carrier in all Granada, nor one more merry withal. The streets rang with his cheerful voice as he trudged after his donkey, singing forth the usual summer note that resounds through the Spanish towns: " Who wants water — water colder than snow ? Who wants water from the well of the Alhambra, cold as ice and clear as crystal?" When he served a cus tomer with a sparkling glass, it was always with a pleasant word that caused a smile; and if, perchance, it was a comely dame or dimpling damsel, it was always with a sly leer and a compliment to her beauty that was irresistible. Thus Peregil the Gallego was noted throughout all Granada for being one of the civilest, pleasantest, and happiest of mortals. Yet it is not he who sings loudest and jokes most that has the lightest
1 province in northwest of Spain. « (aid-de-kong), assistant. (In the army, a
a natives of Savoy, a department of France general's confidential subordinate officer.)
adjoining Switzerland. 6 wicker basket nsed for carrying bread,
' wandering from the subject. fruit, etc., upon a horse.
tfcO LEGEND OF THE MOORS LEGACY.
heart. Under all this air of merriment, honest Peregil had his cares and troubles. He had a large family of ragged chil dren to support, who were hungry and clamorous x as a nest of young swallows, and beset him with their outcries for food whenever he came home of an evening. He had a helpmate, too, who was anything but a help to him. She had been a village beauty before marriage, noted for her skill at dancing the bolero2 and rattling the castanets; 3 and she still retained her early propensities,4 spending the hard earnings of honest Peregil in frippery, and laying the very donkey under requisi tion for junketing5 parties into the country on Sundays, and saints' days, and those innumerable holidays which are rather more numerous in Spain than the days of the week. With all this she was a little of a slattern,6 something more of a lie-abed, and, above all, a gossip of the first water; neglecting house, household, and every thing else, to loiter slipshod in the houses of her gossip neighbors.
He, however, who tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, accommodates the yoke of matrimony to the submissive neck. Peregil bore all the heavy dispensations of wife and children with as meek a spirit as his donkey bore the water-jars; and, however he might shake his ears in private, never ventured to question the household virtues of his slattern spouse.
He loved his children, too, even as an owl loves its owlets, seeing in them his own image multiplied and perpetuated ; for they were a sturdy, long-backed, bandy-legged little brood. The great pleasure of honest Peregil was, whenever he could afford himself a scanty holiday, and had a handful of mara- vedis 7 to spare, to take the whole litter forth with him, some in his arms, some tugging at his skirts, and some trudging at
1 noisy. beaten together with the middle finger, as
2 (from bola, ball), a favorite dance in an accompaniment to dancing. Spain. 4 inclinations.
3 two small, concave shells of ivory or 6 merry excursion.
hard wood, fastened to the thumb, and 6 woman negligent of dress or house. 7 small copper coins, each worth three mills American money.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 41
his heels, and to treat them to a gambol ' among the orchards of the Vega, while his wife was dancing with her holiday friends in the Angosturas2 of the Darro.
It was a late hour one summer night, and most of the water- carriers had desisted from their toils. The day had been uncommonly sultry ; the night was one of those delicious moon lights, which tempt the inhabitants of southern climes to indemnify3 themselves for the heat and inaction of the day, by lingering in the open air, and enjoying its tempered sweet ness until after midnight. Customers for water were there fore still abroad. Peregil, like a considerate, painstaking father, thought of his hungry children.
"One more journey to the well," said he to himself, "to earn a Sunday's puchero4 for the little ones." So saying, he trudged manfully up the steep avenue of the Alhambra, sing ing as he went, and now and then bestowing a hearty thwack with a cudgel on the flanks of his donkey, either by way of cadence5 to the song, or refreshment to the animal; for dry blows serve in lieu of provender in Spain for all beasts of burden.
When arrived at the well, he found it deserted by every one, except a solitary stranger in Moorish garb seated on a stone bench in the moonlight. Peregil paused at first and regarded him with surprise, not unmixed with awe, but the Moor feebly beckoned him to approach. ''I am faint and ill," said he; "aid me to return to the city, and I will pay thee double what tliou couldst gain by thy jars of water."
The honest heart of the little water-carrier was touched with compassion6 at the appeal of the stranger. "God forbid," said he, "that I should ask fee or reward fordoing a com mon act of humanity." He accordingly helped the Moor on his donkey, and set off slowly for Granada, the poor Moslem
1 frolic. * regular daily dinner.
2 narrow valleys. 6 regular modulation of sound.
3 compensate for harm or loss. * pity.
42 LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY.
being so weak that it was necessary to hold him on the ani mal to keep him from falling to the earth.
When they entered the city, the water-carrier demanded whither he should conduct him. " Alas ! " said the Moor, faintly, " I have neither home nor habitation; I am a stranger in the land. Suffer me to lay my head this night beneath thy roof, and thou shalt be amply repaid."
Honest Peregil thus saw himself unexpectedly saddled with an infidel guest, but he was too humane to refuse a night's shelter to a fellow being in so forlorn a plight, so he conducted the Moor to his dwelling. The children, who had sallied forth open-mouthed, as usual, on hearing the tramp of the donkey, ran back with affright, when they beheld the turbaned stranger, and hid themselves behind their mother. The latter stepped forth intrepidly, like a ruffling hen before her brood when a vagrant dog approaches.
"What infidel companion," cried she, "is this you have brought home at this late hour, to draw upon us the eyes of the inquisition ? "
" Be quiet, wife," replied the Gallego; " here is a poor sick stranger, without friend or home; wouldst thou turn him forth to perish in the streets ? "
The wife would still have remonstrated, for although she lived in a hovel, she was a furious stickler for the credit of her house; the little water-carrier, however, for once was stiff- necked, and refused to bend beneath the yoke. He assisted the poor Moslem to alight, and spread a mat and a sheep-skin for him on the ground in the coolest part of the house, being the only kind of bed that his poverty afforded.
In a little while the Moor was seized with violent convul sions, which defied all the ministering skill of the simple water- carrier. The eye of the poor patient acknowledged his kind ness. During an interval of his fits he called him to his side, and addressing him in alow voice, "My end," said he, "1
i court established for punishment of heretics,
LEGEND OF THE MOORS LEGACY. 3
fear, is at hand. If I die, I bequeath you this box as a reward for your charity: " so saying, he opened his albornoz, or cloak; and showed a small box of sandal-wood strapped round his body. "God grant, my friend," replied the worthy little Gallego, " that you may live many years to en joy your treasure, whatever it may be." The Moor shook his head; he laid his hand upon the box, and would have said something more con cerning it, but his convulsions returned with increasing vio lence, and in a little while he expired.
The water-carrier's wife was now as one distracted.1 " This comes," said she, "of your foolish good nature, always run ning into scrapes to oblige others. What will become of us when this corpse is found in our house ? We shall be sent to prison as murderers; and if we escape with our lives, shall be ruined by notaries and alguazils."2
Poor Peregil was in equal tribulation, and almost repented himself of having done a good deed. At length a thought struck him. "It is not yet day," said he; "I can convey the dead body out of the city, and bury it in the sands on the banks of the Xenil. 3 No one saw the Moor enter our dwel ling, and no one will know anything of his death."
So said, so done. The wife aided him; they rolled the body of the unfortunate Moslem in the mat on which he had expired, laid it across the ass, and Peregil set out with it for the banks of the river.
As ill luck would have it, there lived opposite to the water- carrier a barber named Pedrillo Pedrugo, one of the most pry ing, tattling, and mischief-making of his gossip tribe. He was a weasel-faced, spider-legged varlet, supple and insinuat ing; the famous barber of Seville could not surpass him for his universal knowledge of the affairs of others, and he had no more power of retention 4 thun a sieve. It was said that he slept but with one eye at a time, and kept one ear uncovered,
1 crazed. J a southern branch of the Guadalquivir,
* those authorized to make arrests. 4 keeping or holding.
44 LEGEND OF THE MOOlVs LEGACY.
so that, even in his sleep, he might see and hear all that was going on. Certain it is, he was a sort of scandalous chronicle for the quid-nuncs ' of Granada, and had more customers than all the rest of his fraternity. a
This meddlesome barber heard Peregil arrive at an unusual hour at night, and the exclamations. of his wife and children. His head was instantly popped out of a little window which served him as a look-out, and he saw his neighbor assist a man in Moorish garb into his dwelling. This was so strange an occurrence, that Pedrillo Pedrugo slept not a wink that night. Every five minutes he was at his loophole, watching the lights that gleamed through the chinks of his neighbor's door, and before daylight he beheld Peregil sally forth with his donkey unusually laden.
The inquisitive3 barber was in a fidget; he slipped on his clothes, and, stealing forth silently, followed the water-carrier at a distance, until he saw him dig a hole in the sandy bank of the Xenil, and bury something that had the appearance of a dead body.
The barber hied him home, and fidgeted about his shop, setting every thing upside down, until sunrise. He then took a basin under his arm, and sallied forth to the house of his daily customer the alcalde.4
The alcalde was just risen. Pedrillo Pedrugo seated him in a chair, threw a napkin round his neck, put a basin of hot water under his chin, and began to mollify 5 his beard with his fingers.
"Strange doings!" said Pedrugo, who played barber and newsmonger at the same time — " Strange doings ! Robbery, and murder, and burial all in one night ! "
" Hey! — how! — what is that you say? " cried the alcalde.
"I say," replied the barber, rubbing a piece of soap over the nose and mouth of the dignitary, for a Spanish barber dis-
1 busybodys ; gossips. 3 inquiring ; curious.
2 brotherhood. 4 judge. 5 rub so as to soften.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 4f>
dains to employ a brush — " I say that Peregil the Gallego has robbed and murdered a Moorish Mussulman, and buried him. this blessed night. Accursed be the night for the same! "
" But how do you know all this? " demanded the alcalde.
" Be patient, seflor, and you shall hear all about it," replied Pedrillo, taking him by the nose and sliding a razor over his cheek. He then recounted all that he had seen, going through both operations at the same time, shaving his beard, washing his chin, and wiping him dry with a dirty napkin, while he was robbing, murdering, and burying the Moslem.
Now it so happened that this alcalde was one of the most overbearing, and at the same time most griping and corrupt curmudgeons ' in all Granada. It could not be denied, how ever, that he set a high value upon justice, for he sold it at its weight in gold. He presumed the case in point to be one of murder and robbery; doubtless there must be a rich spoil; how was it to be secured into the legitimate11 hands of the law ? For as to merely entrapping the delinquent 3 — that would be feeding the gallows; but entrapping the booty — that would be enriching the judge, and such, according to his creed, was the great end of justice. So thinking, he summoned to his presence his trustiest alguazil, a gaunt, hungry-looking varlet, clad, according to the custom of his order, in the ancient Spanish garb — a broad black beaver turned up at its sides; a quaint ruff; a small black cloak dangling from his shoulders; rusty black under-clothes that set off his spare, wiry frame, while in his hand he bore a slender white wand, the dreaded insignia of his office. Such was the legal bloodhound of the ancient Spanish breed, that he put upon the traces of the unlucky water-carrier, and such was his speed and cer tainty that he was upon the haunches of poor Peregil before he had returned to his dwelling, and brought both him and his donkey before the dispenser of justice.
The alcalde bent upon him one of the most terrific frowns.
1 (corruption of corn merchant), misers. * lawful. 3 offender ; transgressor.
4:6 LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACV.
"Hark ye, culprit I1' roared he, in a voice that made the knees of the little Gallego smite together — " hark ye, culprit! there is no need of denying thy guilt; every thing is known to me. A gallows is the proper reward for the crime thou hast committed, but I am merciful, and readily listen to reason. The man that has been murdered in thy house was a Moor, an infidel, the enemy of our faith. It was doubtless in a fit of religious zeal that thou hast slain him. I will be indulgent, therefore; render up the property of which thou hast robbed him, and we will hush the matter up."
The poor water-carrier called upon all the saints to witness his innocence. Alas ! not one of them appeared ; and if they had, the alcalde would have disbelieved the whole calendar. The water-carrier related the whole story of the dying Moor with the straightforward simplicity of truth, but it was all in vain. "Wilt thou persist in saying," demanded the judge, "that this Moslem had neither gold nor jewels which were the object of thy cupidity ? " !
" As I hope to be saved, your worship, ' ' replied the water- carrier, " he had nothing but a small box of sandal-wood which he bequeathed to me in reward for my services."
"A box of sandal- wood! a box of sandal- wood! " exclaimed the alcalde, his eyes sparkling at the idea of precious jewels. " And where is this box ? Where have you concealed it ? "
"An' it please your grace," replied the water-carrier, "it is in one of the panniers of my mule, and heartily at the ser vice of your worship."
He had hardly spoken the words when the keen alguazil darted oil, and reappeared in an instant with the mysterious box of sandal-wood. The alcalde opened it with an eager and trembling hand; all pressed forward to gaze upon the treasure it was expected to contain; when, to their disappointment, nothing appeared within, but a parchment scroll, covered with Arabic characters, and an end of a waxen taper.
J eager desire.
LEGEND OP THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 47
When there is nothing to be gained by the conviction of a prisoner, justice, even in Spain, is apt to be impartial. The alcalde, having recovered from his disappointment, and found that there was really no booty in the case, now listened dispas sionately to the explanation of the water-carrier, which was corroborated by the testimony of his wife. Being convinced, therefore, of his innocence, he discharged him from arrest; nay, more, he permitted him to carry off the Moor's legacy, the box of sandal-wood and its contents, as the well-merited reward of his humanity; but he retained his donkey in payment of costs and charges.
Behold the unfortunate little Gallego reduced once more to the necessity of being his own water-carrier, and trudging up to the well of the Alhambra with a great earthen jar upon his shoulder.
As he toiled up the hill in the heat of the summer noon, his usual good humor forsook him. "Dog of an alcalde!" wrould he cry, "to rob a poor man of the means of his sub sistence, of the best friend he had in the world! " And then at the remembrance of the beloved companion of his labors, all the kindness of his nature would break forth. " Ah, don key of my heart! " would he exclaim, resting his burden on a stone, and wiping the sweat from his brow — " Ah, donkey of my heart ! I warrant me thou thinkest of thy old master ! I warrant me thou missest the water- jars — poor beast! "
To add to his afflictions, his wife received him, on his return home, with whimperings and repinings; she had clearly the vantage-ground of him, having warned him not to commit the egregious1 act of hospitality which had brought on him all these misfortunes; and, like a knowing woman, she took every occasion to throw her superior sagacity 2 in his teeth. If her children lacked food, or needed a new garment, she could answer with a sneer: " Go to your father; he is heir to king
1 remarkable ; extraordinary. The word 2 wisdom ; shrewdness, is, generally used in an ironical sense.
48 LEGEND OF THE MODE'S LEGACY.
Chico of the Alhambra; ask him to help you out of tlio Moor\s strong box."
Was ever poor mortal so soundly punished for having done a good action ? The unlucky Peregil was grieved in flesh and spirit, but still he bore meekly with the railings of his spouse. At length, one evening, when, after a hot day's toil, she taunted him in the usual manner, he lost all patience. He did not venture to retort upon her, but his eye rested upon the box of sandal-wood, which lay on a shelf, with lid half open, as if laughing in mockery at his vexation. Seizing it up, he dashed it with indignation to the floor. "Unlucky was the day that I ever set eyes on thee," he cried, " or sheltered thy master beneath my roof ! "
As the box struck the floor, the lid flew wide open, and the parchment scroll rolled forth.
Peregil sat regarding the scroll for some time in moody silence. At length rallying his ideas, " Who knows," thought he, "but this writing may be of some importance, as the Moor seems to have guarded it with such care?" Picking it up, therefore, he put it in his bosom, and the next morning, as ne was crying water through the streets, he stopped at the shop of a Moor, a native of Tangier,1 who sold trinkets and perfumery in the Zacatin, and asked him to explain the contents.
The Moor read the scroll attentively, then stroked his beard and smiled. "This manuscript," said he, " is a form of incantation for the recovery of hidden treasure that is under the power of enchantment. It is said to have such virtue that the strongest bolts and bars, nay the adamantine 2 rock itself, will yield before it ! "
" Bah ! " cried the little Gallego, " what is all that to me ? I am no enchanter, and know nothing of buried treasure." So saying, he shouldered his water-jar, left the scroll in
1 seaport town of Morocco, in Northern 2 hard as adamant, an extremely hard Africa, near the west entrance of Strait of mineral. Gibraltar.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 49
the hands of the Moor,, and trudged forward on his daily rounds.
That evening, however, as he rested himself about twilight at the well of the Alhambra, he found a number of gossips assembled at the place, and their conversation, as is not unusual at that shadowy hour, turned upon old tales and traditions of a supernatural nature. Being all poor as rats, they dwelt with peculiar fondness upon the popular theme of enchanted riches left by the Moors in various parts of the Alhambra. Above all, they concurred in the belief that there were great treas ures buried deep in the earth under the tower of the seven floors.
These stories made an unusual impression on the mind of the honest Peregil, and they sank deeper and deeper into his thoughts as he returned alone down the darkling avenues. " If, after all, there should be treasure hid beneath that tower, and if the scroll I left with the Moor should enable me to get at it ! " In the sudden ecstasy of the thought he had well-nigh let fall his water-jar.
That night he tumbled and tossed, and could scarcely get a wink of sleep for the thoughts that were bewildering his brain. Bright and early he repaired to the shop of the Moor, and told him all that was passing in his mind. " You can read Arabic," said he; " suppose we go together to the tower, and try the effect of the charm ; if it fails we are no worse off than before; but if it succeeds, we will share equally all the treasure we may discover."
" Hold," replied the Moslem; " this writing is not sufficient of itself; it must be read at midnight, by the light of a taper singularly compounded and prepared, the ingredients ' of which are not within my reach. Without such a taper the scroll is of no avail."
" Say no more! " cried the little Gallego; " I have such a taper at hand, and will bring it here in a moment." So saying
1 elements entering into a compound.
50 LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY.
he hastened home, and soon returned with the end of a yellow wax taper that he had found in the box of sandal-wood.
The Moor felt it and smelt of it. " Here are rare and costly perfumes," said he, " combined with this yellow wax. This is the kind of taper specified in the scroll. While this burns, the strongest walls and most secret caverns will remain open. Woe to him, however, who lingers within until it be extin guished. He will remain enchanted with the treasure."
It was now agreed between them to try the charm that very night. At a late hour, therefore, when nothing was stirring but bats and owls, they ascended the woody hill of the Alham- bra, and approached that awful tower, shrouded by trees and rendered formidable by so many traditionary tales. By the light of a lantern, they groped their way through bushes, and over fallen stones, to the door of a vault beneath the tower. With fear and trembling they descended a flight of steps cut into the rock. It led to an empty chamber, damp and drear, from which another flight of steps led to a deeper vault. In this way they descended four several flights, leading into as many vaults, one below the other, but the floor of the fourth was solid ; and though, according to tradition, there remained three vaults still below, it was said to be impossible to pene trate further, the residue being shut up by strong enchantment. The air of this vault was damp and chilly, and had an earthy smell, and the light scarce cast forth any rays. They paused here for a time in breathless suspense, until they faintly heard the clock of the watch-tpwer strike midnight; upon this they lit the waxen taper, which diffused an odor of myrrh 1 and frankincense2 and storax.3 •
The Moor began to read in a hurried voice. He had scarce finished when there was a noise as of subterraneous thunder. The earth shook, and the floor, yawning open, disclosed a
1 transparent gum resin, from Arabia, 2 a fragrant, aromatic resin, often burned valued for its odor and medicinal proper- as an incense in religious services, ties. 3 fragrant resin of reddish-brown color.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 51
flight of steps. Trembling with awe they descended, and by the light of the lantern found themselves in another vault, covered with Arabic inscriptions. In the centre stood a great chest, secured with seven bands of steel, at each end of which sat an enchanted Moor in armor, but motionless as a statue, being controlled by the power of the incantation. Before the chest were several jars filled with gold and silver and precious stones. In the largest of these they thrust their arms up to the elbow, and at every dip hauled forth handf uls of broad yellow pieces of Moorish gold, or bracelets and ornaments of the same precious metal, while occasionally a necklace of Oriental pearl would stick to their fingers. Still they trembled and breathed short while cramming their pockets with the spoils, and cast many a fearful glance at the two enchanted Moors, who sat grim and motionless, glaring upon them with unwink ing eyes. At length, struck with a sudden panic at some fancied noise, they both rushed up the staircase, tumbled over one another into the upper apartment, overturned and extin guished the waxen taper, and the pavement again closed with a thundering sound.
Filled with dismay, they did not pause until they had groped their way out of the tower, and beheld the stars shining through the trees. Then seating themselves upon the grass, they divided the spoil, determining to content themselves for the present with this mere skimming of the jars, but to return on some future night and drain them to the bottom. To make sure of each other's good faith, also, they divided the talismans between them, one retaining the scroll and the other the taper; this done, they set off with light hearts and well- lined pockets for Granada.
As they wended their way down the hill, the shrewd Moor whispered a word of counsel in the ear of the simple little water-carrier.
"Friend Peregil," said he, "all this affair must be kept a profound secret until we have secured the treasure, and con-
52 LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY.
veyed it out of harm's way. If a whisper of it gets to the ear of the alcalde,, we are undone ! "
"Certainly," replied the Gallego; "nothing can be more true."
" Friend Peregil," said the Moor, " you area discreet man, and I make no doubt can keep a secret; but you have a wife."
" She shall not know a word of it," replied the little water- carrier, sturdily.
" Enough," said the Moor, " I depend upon thy discretion and thy promise."
Never was promise more positive and sincere ; but, alas ! what man can keep a secret from his wife ? Certainly not such a one as Peregil the water-carrier, who was one of the most lov ing and tractable of husbands. On his return home, he found his wife moping in a corner. " Mighty well," cried she as he entered, ''you've come at last, after rambling about until this hour of the night. I wonder you have not brought home another Moor as a house-mate." Then bursting into tears, she began to wring her hands and smite her breast : ' ' Unhappy woman that I am! " exclaimed she, " what will become of me ? My house stripped and plundered by lawyers and algnazils; my husband a do-no-good, that no longer brings home bread to his family, but goes rambling about day and night, with infidel Moors! 0 my children ! my children! What will become of us.? We shall all have to beg in the streets ! "
Honest Peregil was so moved by the distress of his spouse, that he could not help whimpering also. His heart was as full as his pocket, and not to be restrained. Thrusting his hand into the latter he hauled forth three or four broad gold pieces, and slipped them into her bosom. The poor woman stared with astonishment, and could not understand the meaning of this golden shower. Before she could recover her surprise, the little Gallego drew forth a chain of gold and dangled it before her, capering with exultation, his mouth distended from ear to ear.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 53
" Holy Virgin, protect us ! " exclaimed the wife. " What hast thou been doing, Peregil ? Surely thou hast not been committing murder and robbery ! "
The idea scarce entered the brain of the poor woman, than it became a certainty with her. She saw a prison and a gallows in the distance, and a little bandy-legged Gallego hanging pendent1 from it; and, overcome by the horrors conjured up by her imagination, fell into violent hysterics.
What could the poor man do ? He had no other means of pacifying his wife, and dispelling the phantoms of her fancy, than by relating the whole story of his good fortune. This, however, he did not do until he had exacted from her the most solemn promise to keep it a profound secret from every living being.
To describe her joy would be impossible. She flung her arms round the neck of her husband, and almost strangled him with her caresses. "Now, wife," exclaimed the little man with honest exultation, " what say you now to the Moor's legacy? Henceforth never abuse me for helping a fellow- creature in distress."
The honest Gallego retired to his sheep-skin mat, and slept as soundly as if on a bed of down. Not so his wife; she emptied the whole contents of his pockets upon the mat, and sat counting gold pieces of Arabic coin, trying on necklaces and earrings, arid fancying the figure she should one day make when permitted to enjoy her riches.
On the following morning the honest Gallego took a broad golden coin, and repaired with it to a jeweller's shop in the Zacatin to offer it for sale, pretending to have found it aniong the ruins of the Alhambra. The jeweller saw that it had an Arabic inscription, and was of the purest gold; he offered, however, but a third of its value, with which the water-carrier was perfectly content. Peregil now bought new clothes for his little flock, and all kinds of toys, together with ample provi-
1 suspended.
5-i LEGEND OF THE MOORS LEGACY.
sions for a hearty meal, and returning to his dwelling, set all his children dancing around him, while he capered in the midst, the happiest of fathers.
The wife of the water-carrier kept her promise of secrecy with surprising strictness. For a whole day and a half she went about with a look of mystery and a heart, swelling almost to bursting, yet she held her peace, though surrounded by her gossips. It is true, she could not help giving herself a few airs, apologized, for her ragged dress, and talked of ordering a new basquifia ' all trimmed with gold lace and bugles,2 and a new lace mantilla.3 She threw out hints of her husband's intention of leaving off his trade of water-carrying, as it did not altogether agree with his health. In fact she thought they should all retire to the country for the summer, that the chil dren might have the benefit of the mountain air, for there was no living in the city in this sultry season.
The neighbors stared at each other, and thought the poor woman had lost her wits; and her airs and graces and elegant pretensions were the theme of universal scoffing and merriment among her friends, the moment her back was turned.
If she restrained herself abroad, however, she indemnified herself at home, and putting a string of rich oriental pearls round her neck, Moorish bracelets on her arms, and an aigrette4 of diamonds on her head, sailed backwards and for wards in her slattern rags about the room, now and then stop ping to admire herself in a broken mirror. Nay, in the impulse of her simple vanity, she could not resist, on one occasion, showing herself at the window, to enjoy the effect of her finery on the passers-by.
As the fates would have it, Pedrillo Pedrugo, the meddle some barber, was at this moment sitting idly in his shop on the opposite side of the street, when his ever-watchful eye
1 part of lady's drees, resembling a jacket 3 lady's cloak or cape of silk, velvet, etc. with a short skirt. 4 plume for the head, of feathers or pre-
« long glass beads. cious stones, in the form of a heron's crest,
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 55
caught the sparkle of a diamond. In an instant he was at his loophole reconnoitering the slattern spouse of the water- carrier, decorated with the splendor of an eastern bride. No sooner had he taken an accurate inventory l of her ornaments, than he posted off with all speed to the alcalde. In a little while the hungry alguazil was again on the scent, and before the day was over the unfortunate Peregil was once more dragged into the presence of the judge.
" How is this, villain ! " cried the alcalde, in a furious voice. " You told me that the infidel who died in your house left nothing behind but an empty coffer, and now I hear of your wife flaunting in her rags decked out with pearls and diamonds. Wretch that thou art! prepare to render up the spoils of thy miserable victim, and to swing on the gallows that is already tired of waiting for thee."
The terrified water-carrier fell on his knees, and made a full relation of the marvellous manner in which he had gained his wealth. The alcalde, the alguazil, and the inquisitive barber listened with greedy ears to this Arabian tale of enchanted treasure. The alguazil was despatched to bring the Moor who had assisted in the incantation. The Moslem entered half frightened out of his wits at finding himself in the hands of the harpies2 of the law. When he beheld the water-carrier standing with sheepish looks and downcast countenance, he comprehended the whole matter. "Miserable animal," said he, as he passed near him, " did I not warn thee against bab bling to thy wife?"
The story of the Moor coincided exactly with that of his colleague; but the alcalde affected to be slow of belief, and threw out menaces of imprisonment and rigorous 3 investiga tion.
"Softly, good Sefior Alcalde," said the Mussulman, who by this time had recovered his usual shrewdness and self-pos session. '; Let us not mar fortune's favors in the scramble
1 list of articles. 3 plunderers ; robbers. 3 strict ; severe.
56 LEGEND OF THE HOOK'S LEGACY.
for them. Nobody knows anything of this matter but our selves; let us keep the secret. There is wealth enough in the cave to enrich us all. Promise a fair division, and all shall be produced; refuse, and the cave shall remain forever closed."
The alcalde consulted apart with the alguazil. The latter was an old fox in his profession. " Promise any thing," said he, " until you get possession of the treasure. You may then seize upon the whole, and if he and his accomplice dare to murmur, threaten them with the fagot and the stake as infidels and sorcerers."
The alcalde relished the advice. Smoothing his brow and turning to the Moor, " This is a strange story," said he, " and may be true, but I must have ocular 1 proof of it. This very night you must repeat the incantation in my presence. If there be really such treasure, we will share it amicably between us, and say nothing further of the matter; if ye have deceived me, expect no mercy at my hands. In the mean time you must remain in custody."
The Moor and the water-carrier cheerfully agreed to these conditions, satisfied that the event would prove the truth of their words.
Towards midnight the alcalde sallied forth secretly, attended by the alguazil and the meddlesome barber, all strongly armed. They conducted the Moor and the water-carrier as prisoners, and were provided with the stout donkey of the latter to bear off the expected treasure. They arrived at the tower without being observed, and tying the donkey to a fig-tree, descended into the fourth vault of the tower.
The scroll was produced, the yellow waxen taper lighted, and the Moor read the form of incantation. The earth trembled as before, and the pavement opened with a thunder ing sound, disclosing the narrow flight of steps* The alcalde, the alguazil, and the barber were struck aghast, and could not
1 received by actual sight.
LEGEND OF THE MOOR'S LEGACY. 57
summon courage to descend. The Moor and the water-carrier entered the lower vault, and found the two Moors seated as before, silent and motionless. They removed two of the great jars, filled with golden coin and precious stones. The water- carrier bore them up one by one upon his shoulders, but though a strong-backed little man, and accustomed to carry burdens, he staggered beneath their weight, and found, when slung on each side of his donkey, they were as much as the animal could bear.
" Let us be content for the present," said the Moor; "here is as much treasure as we can carry off without being perceived, and enough to make us all wealthy to our heart's desire."
" Is there more treasure remaining behind ? " demanded the alcalde.
" The greatest prize of all," said the Moor, "a huge coffer bound with bands of steel, and filled with pearls and precious stones."
%i Let us have up the coffer by all means," cried the grasp ing alcalde.
*'I will descend for no more," said the Moor, doggedly; "enough is enough for a reasonable man — more is super fluous."
*" And I," said the water-carrier, " will bring up no further burden to break the back of my poor donkey."
Finding commands, threats, and entreaties equally vain, the alcalde turned to his two adherents. " Aid me," said he, " to bring up the coffer, and its contents shall be divided between us." So saying, he descended the steps, followed with trem bling reluctance by the alguazil and the barber.
No sooner did the Moor behold them fairly earthed than he extinguished the yellow taper; the pavement closed with its usual crash, and the three worthies remained buried in the tomb.
He then hastened up the different flights of steps, nor
1 more than enough.
58 LEGEND OF THE MOOR^S LEGACY.
stopped until in the open air. The little water-carrier fol lowed him as fast as his short legs would permit.
" What hast thou done ? " cried Peregil, as soon as he could recover breath. " The alcalde and the other two are shut up in the vault."
" It is the will of Allah! " said the Moor, devoutly.
" And will you not release them ? " demanded the Gallego.
"Allah forbid !" replied the Moor, smoothing his beard. "It is written in the book of fate that they shall remain enchanted until some future adventurer arrive to break the charm. The will of God be done ! " So saying, he hurled the end of the waxen taper far among the gloomy thickets of the glen.
There was now no remedy, so the Moor and the water-carrier proceeded with the richly-laden donkey toward the city, nor could honest Peregil refrain from hugging and kissing his long-eared fellow-laborer, thus restored to him from the clutches of the law; and in fact it is doubtful which gave the simple-hearted little man most joy at the moment, the gaining of the treasure or the recovery of the donkey.
The two partners in good luck divided their spoil amicably and fairly, except that the Moor, who had a little taste for trinketry, made out to get into his heap the most of the pearls and precious stones and other baubles, but then he always gave the water-carrier in lieu magnificent jewels of massy gold, of five times the size, with which the latter was heartily content. They took care not to linger within reach of acci dents, but made off to enjoy their wealth undisturbed in other countries. The Moor returned to Africa, to his native city of Tangier, and the Gallego, with his wife, his children, and his donkey, made the best of his way to Portugal. Here, under the admonition ! and tuition of his wife, he became a person age of some consequence; for she made the worthy little man array his long body and short legs in doublet and hose, with a
1 warning ; advice.
LEGEND OF THE MOOtt'S LEGACY. 59
feather in his hat and a sword by his side, and laying aside his familiar appellation of Peregil, assume the more sonorous title of Don Pedro Gil. His progeny grew up a thriving and merry-hearted, though short and bandy-legged generation, while Sefiora Gil, befringed, belaced, and betasselled from her head to her heels, with glittering rings on every finger, became a model of slattern fashion and finery.
As to the alcalde and his adjuncts, they remained shut up under the great tower of the seven floors, and there they remain spellbound at the present day. Whenever there shall be a lack in Spain of pimping barbers, sharking alguazils, and corrupt alcaldes, they may be sought after; but if they have to wait until such time for their deliverance, there is danger of their enchantment enduring until doomsday.
LEGEND OF THE KOSE OF THE ALIIAMBRA.
FOR some time after the surrender of Granada by the Moors, that delightful city was a frequent and favorite resi dence of the Spanish sovereigns, until they were frightened away by successive shocks of earthquakes, which toppled down various houses, and made the old Moslem towers rock to their foundation.
Many, many years then rolled away, during which Granada was rarely honored by a royal guest. The palaces of the nobil ity remained silent and shut up; and the Alhambra, like a slighted beauty, sat in mournful desolation among her neg lected gardens. The Tower of the Infantas, once the residence of the three beautiful Moorish princesses, partook of the gen eral desolation ; the spider spun her web athwart 1 the gilded vault, and bats and owls nestled in those chambers that had been graced by the presence of Zayda, Zorayda, and Zorahayda. The neglect of this tower may partly have been owing to some superstitious notions of the neighbors. It was rumored that the spirit of the youthful Zorahayda, who had perished in tlmt tower, was often seen by moonlight, seated beside the fountain in the hall, or moaning about the battlements, and that the notes of her silver lute would be heard at midnight by way farers passing along the glen.
At length the city of Granada was once more welcomed by the royal presence. All the world knows that Philip V.2 was the first Bourbon that swayed the Spanish sceptre. All the world knows that he married, in second nuptials,3 Elizabeth) or Isabella (for they are the same), the beautiful princess of Parma; 4 and all the world knows that by this chain of contin-
1 sidewise ; obliquely ; across. 4 province in Italy between the Apennines
8 1683-1746, 3 marriage ceremonies, and the Po river.
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 61
gencies ' a French prince and an Italian princess were seated together on the Spanish throne. For a visit of this illustrious pair, the Alhambra was repaired and fitted up with all possible expedition. The arrival of the court changed the whole aspect of the lately deserted palace. The clangor of drum and trum pet, the tramp of steed about the avenues and outer court, the glitter of arms and display of banners about barbican and battlement, recalled the ancient and warlike glories of the for tress. A softer spirit, however, reigned within the royal palace. There was the rustling of robes and the cautious tread and murmuring voice of reverential courtiers about the ante chambers; a loitering of pages and maids of honor about the gardens, and the sound of music stealing from open casements.
Among those who attended in the train of the monarchs was a favorite page of the queen, named Ruyz de Alarcon. To say that he was a favorite page of the queen was at once to speak his eulogium,2 for every one in the suite of the stately Elizabetta was chosen for grace and beauty and accomplish ments. He was just turned of eighteen, light and lithe of form, and graceful as a young Antinous.3 To the queen he was all deference and respect, yet he was at heart a roguish stripling, petted and spoiled by the ladies about the court.
This loitering page was one morning rambling about the groves of the Generalife, which overlook the grounds of the Alhambra. He had taken with him for his amusement a favorite gerfalcon of the queen. In the course of his rambles, seeing a bird rising from a thicket, he unhooded the hawk and let him fly. The falcon towered high in the air, made a swoop at his quarry, but missing it, soared away, regardless of the calls of the page. The latter followed the truant bird with his eye, in its capricious 4 flight, until he saw it alight upon the battlements of a remote and lonely tower, in the outer wall
1 unforeseen events. emperor Hadrian ; drowned in the Nile :
a praise. deified.
1 (au-tin'o-us), page and favorite of the 4 uncertain ; changeable.
f>2 LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
of the Alhambra, built on the edge of a ravine that separated the royal fortress from the grounds of the Generalife. It was in fact the " Tower of the Princesses."
The page descended into the ravine and approached the tower, but it had no entrance from the glen, and its lofty height rendered any attempt to scale it fruitless. Seeking "one of the gates of the fortress, therefore, he made a wide cir cuit to that side of the tower facing within the walls.
A small garden, inclosed by a trellis-work of reeds over hung with myrtle, lay before the tower. Opening a wicket, the page passed between beds of flowers and thickets of roses to the door. It was closed and bolted. A crevice in the door gave him a peep into the interior. There was a small Moor ish hall with fretted walls, light marble columns, and an alabaster fountain surrounded with flowers. In the centre hung a gilt cage containing a singing-bird ; beneath it, on a chair, lay a tortoise-shell cat among reels of silk and other articles of female labor; and a guitar decorated with ribbons leaned against the fountain.
Ruyz de Alarcon was struck with these traces of female taste and elegance in a lonely, and, as he had supposed, deserted tower. They reminded him of the tales of enchanted halls current in the Alhambra; and the tortoise-shell cat might be some spellbound princess.
He knocked gently at the door. A beautiful face peeped out from a little window above, but was instantly withdrawn. He waited, expecting that the door would be opened, but he waited in vain; no footstep was to be heard within; all was silent. Had his senses deceived him, or was this beautiful apparition the fairy of the tower? He knocked again, and more loudly. After a little while the beaming face once more peeped forth ; it was that of a blooming damsel of fifteen.
The page immediately doffed his plumed bonnet, and entreated in the most courteous accents to be permitted to ascend the tower in pursuit of his falcon.
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 63
" I dare not open the door, seiior," replied the little damsel, blushing; " my aunt has forbidden it."
' ' I do beseech you, fair maid ; it is the favorite falcon of the queen; I dare not return to the palace without it."
" Are you, then, one of the cavaliers of the court ? "
" I am, fair maid; but I shall lose the queen's favor and my place, if I lose this hawk."
" Santa Maria! It is against you cavaliers of the court my aunt has charged me especially to bar the door."
"Against wicked cavaliers, doubtless, but I am none of these, but a simple, harmless page, who will be ruined and undone, if you deny me this small request."
The heart of the little damsel was touched by the distress of the page. It was a thousand pities he should be ruined for the want of so trifling a boon. Surely, too, he could not be one of those dangerous beings whom her aunt had described as a species of cannibal, ever on the prowl to make prey of thought less damsels; he was gentle and modest, and stood so entreat- ingly with cap in hand, and looked so charming.
The sly page saw that the garrison began to waver, and redoubled his entreaties in such moving terms that it was not in the nature of mortal maiden to deny him; so the blushing little warden of the tower descended, and opened the door with a trembling hand; and if the page had been charmed by a mere glimpse of her countenance from the window, he was ravished ' by the full-length portrait now revealed to him.
Her Andalusian bodice and trim basquifla set off the round but delicate symmetry a of her form, which was as yet scarce verging into womanhood. Her glossy hair was parted on her forehead with scrupulous 3 exactness, and decorated with a fresh plucked rose, according to the universal custom of the country. It is true her complexion was tinged by the ardor of a southern sun, but it served to give richness to the mantling
1 carried away with delight. 3 very careful.
2 due proportion of the several parts of a body to each other.
64 LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
bloom of her cheek, and to heighten the lustre of her melting
Ruyz de Alarcon beheld all this with a single glance, for it became him not to tarry ; he merely murmured his acknowledg ments, and then bounded lightly up the spiral staircase in quest of his falcon.
He soon returned with the truant bird upon his fist. The damsel, in the mean time, had seated herself by the fountain in the hall, and was winding silk ; but in her agitation ' she let fall the reel upon the pavement. The page sprang and picked it up, then, dropping gracefully on one knee, pre sented it to her; but seizing the hand extended to receive it, imprinted on it a kiss more fervent and devout than he had ever imprinted on the fair hand of his sovereign.
" Ave Maria,2 seflor! " exclaimed the damsel, blushing still deeper with confusion and surprise, for never before had she received such a salutation.
The modest page made a thousand apologies, assuring her it was the way, at court, of expressing the most profound hom age and respect.
Her anger, if anger she felt, was easily pacified, but her agitation and embarrassment continued; and she sat blushing deeper and deeper, with her eyes cast down upon her work, entangling the silk which she attempted to wind.
The cunning page saw the confusion in the opposite camp, and would fain have profited by it, but the fine speeches he would have uttered died upon his lips; his attempts at gal lantry were awkward and ineffectual ; and to his surprise, the adroit 3 page, who had figured with such grace and effrontery 4 among the most knowing and experienced ladies of the court, found himself awed and abashed in the presence of a simple damsel of fifteen.
In fact, the artless maiden, in her own modesty and inno
1 excitement ; emotion. 3 skilful ; expert.
2 (ah'va mah'ree-ah sa'nyor) Hail Mary, sir. 4 boldness ; impudence.
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBHA. 65
ceiice, had guardians more effectual than the bolts and bars prescribed by her vigilant aunt.
The diffidence l of the page, though genuine, was short lived, and he was recovering his usual ease and confidence, when a shrill voice was heard at a distance.
"My aunt is returning from mass! " gried the damsel in affright. "I pray you, sefior, depart."
" Not until you grant me that rose from your hair as a remembrance."
She hastily untwisted the rose from her raven locks. " Take it," cried she, agitated and blushing, "but pray begone."
The page took the rose, and at the same time covered with kisses the fair hand that gave it. Then, placing the flower in his bonnet, and taking the falcon upon his fist, he bounded off through the garden, bearing away with him the heart of the gentle Jacinta.
When the vigilant aunt arrived at the tower, she remarked the agitation of her neice, and an air of confusion in the hall ; but a word of explanation sufficed. " A gerfalcon had pursued his prey into the hall."
" Mercy on us ! to think of a falcon flying into the tower. Did ever one hear of so saucy a hawk ? Why, the very bird in the cage is not safe ! "
The vigilant Fredegonda was one of the most wary of ancient spinsters.
The niece was the orphan of an officer who had fallen in the wars. She had been educated in a convent, and had recently been transferred from her sacred asylum to the immediate guardianship of her aunt, under whose overshadowing care she vegetated in obscurity,* like an opening rose blooming beneath a brier. Nor indeed is this comparison entirely acci dental; for, to tell the truth, her fresh and dawning beauty had caught the public eye, even in her seclusion, and, with that poetical turn common to the people of Andalusia, the
1 timidity ; want of confidence. 2 seclusion from society.
66 LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
peasantry of the neighborhood had given her the appellation of " the Hose of the Alhambra."
The wary aunt continued to keep a faithful watch over her tempting little niece as long as the court continued at Granada, and flattered herself that her vigilance had been successful.
At length King Philip cut short his sojourn at Granada, and suddenly departed with all his train. The vigilant Frede- gonda watched the royal pageant as it issued forth from the Gate of Justice, and descended the great avenue leading to the city. When the last banner disappeared from her sight, she returned exulting to her tower, for all her cares were over. To her surprise, a light Arabian steed pawed the ground at the wicket-gate of the garden; to her horror, she saw through the thickets of roses a youth, in gayly-embroidered dress, at the feet of her niece. At the sound of her footsteps he gave a tender adieu, bounded lightly over the barrier of reeds and myrtles, sprang upon his horse, and was out of sight in an instant.
The tender Jacinta, in the agony of her grief, lost all thought of her aunt's displeasure. Throwing herself into her arms, she broke forth into sobs and tears.
" Ay de mi!"1 cried she; "he's gone! — he's gone! — he's gone! and I shall never see him more ! "
" Gone! — who is gone? — what youth is that I saw at your feet?"
" A queen's page, aunt, who came to bid me farewell."
" A queen's page, child! " echoed the vigilant Fredegonda, faintly; "and when did you become acquainted with the queen's page? "
4 ' The morning that the gerfalcon came into the tower. It was the queen's gerfalcon, and he came in pursuit of it."
" Ah, silly, silly girl ! know that there are no gerfalcons half so dangerous as these young prankling pages, and it is precisely such simple birds as thee that they pounce upon."
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 67
Days, weeks, months elapsed, and nothing more was heard of the page. The pomegranate ' ripened, the vine yielded up its fruit, the autumnal rains descended in torrents from the mountains; the Sierra Nevada became covered with a snowy mantle, and wintry blasts howled through the halls of the Alhambra; still he came not. The winter passed away. Again the genial spring burst forth with song and blossom and balmy zephyr; the snows melted from the mountains, until none remained but on the lofty summit of Nevada, glistening through the sultry summer air. Still nothing was heard of the forgetful page.
In the mean time, the poor little Jacinta grew pale and thoughtful. Her former occupations and amusements were abandoned, her silk lay entangled, her guitar unstrung, her flowers were neglected, the notes of her bird unheeded, and her eyes, once so bright, were dimmed with secret weeping. If any solitude could be devised to foster the passion of a love-lorn damsel, it would be such a place as the Alhambra, where every thing seems disposed to produce tender and ro mantic reveries. It is a very paradise for lovers. How hard then to be alone in such a paradise — and not merely alone, but forsaken !
" Alas, silly child! " would the staid and immaculate Frede- gonda say, when she found her niece in one of her desponding moods, " did I not warn thee against the wiles and deceptions2 of these men ? What couldst thou expect, too, from one of a haughty and aspiring family — thou an orphan, the descendant of a fallen and impoverished line ? Be assured, if the youth were true, his father, who is one of the proudest nobles about the court, would prohibit his union with one so humble and portionless as thou. Pluck up thy resolution, therefore, and drive these idle notions from thy mind."
The words of the immaculate Fredegonda only served to
1 fruit as large ae an orange, with hard J acts which deceive, rind, soft pulp, and numerous seeds.
68 LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
increase the melancholy of her niece, but she sought to indulge it in private. At a late hour one midsummer night, after her aunt had retired to rest, she remained alone in the hall of the tower, seated beside the alabaster fountain. It was here that the faithless page had first knelt and kissed her hand ; it was here that he had often vowed eternal fidelity. The poor little damsel's heart was overladen with sad and tender recollections, her tears began to flow, and slowly fell drop by drop into the fountain. By degrees the crystal water became agitated, and —bubble — bubble — bubble — boiled up and was tossed about, until a female figure, richly clad in Moorish robes, slowly rose to view.
Jacinta was so frightened that she fled from the hall, and did not venture to return. The next morning she related what she had seen to her aunt, but the good lady treated it as a phantasy ' of her troubled mind, or supposed she had fallen asleep and dreamt beside the fountain. " Thou hast been thinking of the story of the three Moorish princesses that once inhabited this tower," continued she, "and it has entered into thy dreams."
" What story, aunt ? I know nothing of it."
" Thou hast certainly heard of the three princesses, Zayda, Zorayda, and Zorahayda, who were confined in this tower by the king their father, and agreed to fly with three Christian cavaliers. The first two accomplished their escape, but the third failed in her resolution, and, it is said, died in this tower."
"I now recollect to have heard of it," said Jacinta, "and to have wept over the fate of the gentle Zorahayda."
' ' Thou mayest well weep over her fate, ' ' continued the aunt, "for the lover of Zorahayda was thy ancestor. He long bemoaned his Moorish love; but time cured him of his grief, and he married a Spanish lady, from whom thou art descended."
1 fancy ; illusion.
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 69
Jacinta ruminated upon these words. " That what I have seen is no phantasy of the brain," said she to herself, "I am confident. If indeed it be the spirit of the gentle Zorahayda, which I have heard lingers about this tower, of what should I be afraid ? I'll watch by the fountain to-night; perhaps the visit will be repeated."
Towards midnight, when every thing was quiet, she again took her seat in the hall. As the bell in the distant watch- tower of the Alhambra struck the midnight hour, the fountain was again agitated; and bubble — bubble — bubble — it tossed about the waters until the Moorish female again rose to view. She was young and beautiful; her dress was rich with jewels, and in her hand she held a silver lute. Jacinta trembled and was faint, but was reassured by the soft and plaintive voice of the apparition, and the sweet expression of her pale, melan choly countenance.
" Daughter of mortality," said she, "what aileth thee? Why do thy tears trouble my fountain, and thy sighs and plaints disturb the quiet watches of the night ? ' '
" I weep because of the faithlessness of man, and I bemoan my solitary and forsaken state."
' Take comfort; thy sorrows may yet have an end. Thou beholdest a Moorish princess, "who, like thee, was unhappy in her love. A Christian knight, thy ancestor, won my heart, and would have borne me to his native land and to the bosom of his church. I was a convert in my heart, but I lacked courage equal to my faith, and lingered till too late. For this the evil genii are permitted to have power over me, and I will remain enchanted in this tower until some pure Christian deign to break the magic spell. Wilt them undertake the task ? "
" I will," replied the damsel, trembling.
"Come hither, then, and fear not; dip thy hand in the fountain, sprinkle the water over me, and baptize me after the manner of thy faith; so shall the enchantment be dispelled, and my troubled spirit have repose.7'
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
The damsel advanced with faltering steps, dipped her hand in the fountain, collected water in the palm, and sprinkled it over the pale face of the phantom.
The latter smiled with ineffable ' benignity.2 She dropped her silver lute at the feet of Jacinta, crossed her white arms upon her bosom, and melted from sight, so that it seemed merely as if a shower of dew-drops had fallen into the fountain.
Jacinta retired from the hall, filled with awe and wonder. She scarcely closed her eyes that night; but when she awoke at daybreak out of a troubled slumber, the whole appeared to her like a distempered dream. On descending into the hall, however, the truth of the vision was established, for beside the fountain she beheld the silver lute glittering in the morn ing sunshine.
She hastened to her aunt, to relate all that had befallen her, and called her to behold the lute as a testimonial of the reality of her story. If the good lady had any lingering doubts, they were removed when Jacinta touched, the instrument, for she drew forth such ravishing tones as to thaw even the frigid bosom of the immaculate Fredegonda, that region of eternal winter, into a genial flow. Nothing but supernatural melody could have produced such an effect.
The extraordinary power of the lute became every day more and more apparent. The wayfarer passing by the tower was detained, and, as it were, spellbound, in breathless ecstasy. The very birds gathered in the neighboring trees, and, hushing their own strains, listened in charmed silence.
Rumor soon spread the news abroad. The inhabitants of Granada thronged to the Alhambra to catch a few notes of the transcendant music that flowed about the tower of Las Infantas.
The lovely little minstrel was at length drawn forth from her retreat. The rich and powerful of the land contended who should entertain and do honor to her; or, rather, who
1 very great ; unspeakably great. 3 kinduees.
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA. 71
should secure the charms of her lute to draw fashionable throngs to their saloons. Wherever she went, her vigilant aunt kept a dragon watch at her elbow, awing the throngs of impas sioned admirers, who hung in raptures on her strains. The report of her wonderful powers spread from city to city. Malaga, Seville, Cordova, all became successively mad on the theme; nothing was talked of throughout Andalusia but the beautiful minstrel of the Alhambra. How could it be other wise among a people so musical and gallant as the Anda- lusians, when the lute was magical in its powers, and the minstrel inspired by love !
While all Andalusia was thus music mad, a different mood prevailed at the court of Spain. Philip V., as is well known, was a miserable hypochondriac,1 and subject to all kinds of fancies. Sometimes he would keep to his bed for weeks together, groaning under imaginary complaints. At other times he would insist upon abdicating his throne, to the great annoyance of his royal spouse, who had a strong relish for the splendors of a court and the glories of a crown, and guided the sceptre of her imbecile2 lord with an expert and steady hand.
Nothing was found to be so efficacious 3 in dispelling the royal megrims4 as the power of music; the queen took care, therefore, to have the best performers, both vocal and instru mental, at hand, and retained the famous Italian singer Fari- nelli about the court as a kind of royal physician.
At the moment we treat of, however, a freak had come over the mind of this sapient and illustrious Bourbon that surpassed all former vagaries.5 After a long spell of imaginary illness, which set all the strains of Farinelli and the consolations of a whole orchestra of court fiddlers at defiance, the monarch fairly, in idea, gave up the ghost, and considered himself absolutely dead.
1 one affected with low spirits. 3 effectual ; powerful. * fancies ; freaks.
*weak; feebleminded. 5 (vny-gay'riz), wild freaks; whims.
72 LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
This would have been harmless enough, and even convenient both to his queen and courtiers, had he been content to remain in the quietude befitting a dead man; but to their annoyance he insisted upon having the funeral ceremonies performed over him, and, to their inexpressible perplexity, began to grow impatient, and to revile bitterly at them for negligence and disrespect in leaving him unburied. What was to be done ? To disobey the king's positive commands was monstrous in the eyes of the obsequious courtiers of a punctilious court — but to obey him, and bury him alive, would be downright regicide. *
In the midst of this fearful dilemma2 a rumor reached the court, of the female minstrel who was turning the brains of all Andalusia. The queen despatched missions in all haste to summon her to St. Ildefonso, where the court at that time resided.
Within a few days, as the queen with her maids of honor was walking in those stately gardens, intended, with their avenues and terraces and fountains, to eclipse the glories of Versailles,3 the far-famed minstrel was conducted into her presence. The imperial Elizabetta gazed with surprise at the youthful and unpretending appearance of the little being that had set the world madding. She was in her picturesque An- dalusian dress, her silver lute in hand, and stood with modest and downcast eyes, but with a simplicity and freshness of beauty that still bespoke her " the Eose of the Alhambra."
As usual, she was accompanied by her ever- vigilant Frede- gonda, who gave the whole history of her parentage and descent to the inquiring queen. If the stately Elizabetta had been interested by the appearance of Jacinta, she was still more pleased when she learnt that she was of a meritorious though impoverished 4 line, and that her father had bravely fallen in the service of the crown. " If thy powers equal their renown,"
1 murder of a king. containing the famous royal palace built by
2 perplexity how to decide. Louis XIII. and Louis XIV. 8 eleven miles west southwest of Paris, «poor.
LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBKA. 73
said she, "and thou canst cast forth this evil spirit that pos sesses thy sovereign, thy fortunes shall henceforth be my care, and honors and wealth attend thee. "
Impatient to make trial of her skill, she led the way at once to the apartment of the moody monarch.
Jacinta followed, with downcast eyes, through files of guards and crowds of courtiers. They arrived at length at a great chamber hung with black. The windows were closed to exclude the light of day; a number of yellow wax tapers in silver sconces ' diffused a lugubrious 2 light, and dimly revealed the figures of mutes in mourning dresses, and courtiers who glided about with noiseless step and woebegone visage. In the midst of a funeral bed or bier, his hands folded on his breast, and the tip of his nose just visible, lay extended this would-be buried monarch.
The queen entered the chamber in silence, and pointing to a footstool in an obscure corner, beckoned to Jacinta to sit down and commence.
At first she touched her lute with a faltering hand, but gathering confidence and animation as she proceeded, drew forth such soft aerial 3 harmony that all present could scarce believe it mortal. As to the monarch, who had already con sidered himself in the world of spirits, he set it down for some angelic melody or the music of the spheres.4 By degrees the theme was varied, and the voice of the minstrel accom panied the instrument. She poured forth one of the legendary ballads treating of the ancient glories of the Alhambra and the achievements of the Moors. Her whole soul entered into the theme, for with the recollections of the Alhambra was associated the story of her love. The funeral chamber resounded with the animating strain. It entered into the gloomy heart of the monarch. He raised his head and gazed
1 lanterns. 4 the harmony supposed by the ancients
ij mournful. to be produced by the accordant movements
* high ; lofty. of the celestial bodies.
74 LEGEND OF THE ROSE OF THE ALHAMBRA.
around ; he sat up on his couch ; his eye began to kindle ; at length, leaping upon the floor, he called for sword and buckler.
The triumph of music, or, rather, of the enchanted lute, was complete; all eyes" sought the lovely enchantress, but the lute had fallen from her hand; she had sunk upon the earth, and the next moment was clasped to the bosom of Kuyz de Alarcon.
The nuptials of the happy couple were celebrated soon afterward with great splendor. "But hold — not so fast," I hear the reader exclaim; "this is jumping to the end of a story at a furious rate! First let us know how the Ruyz de Alarcon managed to account to Jacinta for his long neglect." Nothing more easy; the venerable, time-honored excuse, the opposition to his wishes by a proud, pragmatical 1 old father; besides, young people who really like one another soon come to the amicable understanding, and bury all past grievances when once they meet.
But how was the proud, pragmatical old father reconciled to the match ? Oh! as to that, his scruples were easily overcome by a word or two from the queen. Besides, the lute of Jacinta, you know, possessed a magic power, and could con trol the most stubborn head and hardest breast.
And what came of the enchanted lute ?
Oh, that is the most curious matter of all, and plainly proves the truth of the whole story. That lute remained for some time in the family, but was purloined 2 and carried off, as was supposed, by the great singer Farinelli, in pure jealousy. At his death it passed into other hands in Italy, who were ignorant of its mystic powers, and, melting down the silver, transferred the strings to an old Cremona 3 fiddle. The strings still retain something of their magic virtues. A word in the reader's ear, but let it go no further — that fiddle is now bewitching the whole world; it is the fiddle of Paganini! 4
1 meddlesome (so regarded). 4 (pah-gah-nee'nee), celebrated Italian vi-
2 stolen. olinist, 1784-1840. * fortified city of Italy, forty-eight miles southeast of Milan.
THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY.
IN former times there ruled, as governor of the Alhambra, a doughty ' old cavalier, who, from having lost one arm in the wars, was commonly known by the name of el Gobernador Manco, or "the one-armed governor." He, in fact, prided himself upon being an old soldier, wore his mustaches curled up to his eyes, a pair of campaigning boots, and a Toledo 2 as long as a spit,3 with his pocket-handkerchief in the basket hilt.4
He was, moreover, exceedingly proud and punctilious, and tenacious 5 of all his privileges and dignities. Under his sway the immunities6 of the Alhambra as a royal residence and domain were rigidly exacted. No one was permitted to enter the fortress with firearms, or even with a sword or staff, unless he were of a certain rank ; and every horseman was obliged to dismount at the gate, and lead his horse by the bridle. Now as the hill of the Alhambra rises from the very midst of the city of Granada, being, as it were, an excrescence 7 of the capital, it must at all times be somewhat irksome 8 to the captain-gen eral, who commands the province, to have thus an imperium in imperio* a petty, independent post, in the very centre of his domains. It was rendered the more galling, in the present instance, from the irritable jealousy of the old governor, that took fire on the least question of authority and jurisdiction; and from the loose, vagrant character of the people who had gradually nestled themselves within the fortress, as in a sanc tuary, and thence carried on a system of roguery and depreda tion at the expense of the honest inhabitants of the city.
1 strong ; valiant. 6 keeping firm hold.
2 sword made at Toledo. • special privileges or exemptions.
3 long, pointed iron rod for roasting meat. » an irregular growth. « cover for hand around the handle or hilt 8 tiresome ; annoying.
of a sword. * empire within an empire.
76 THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY.
Thus there was a perpetual feud and heart-burning between the captain-general and the governor, the more virulent on the part of the latter, inasmuch as the smaller of two neigh boring potentates is always the most captious about his dignity. The stately palace of the captain-general stood in the Plaza Nueva, immediately at the foot of the hill of the Alhambra, and here was always a bustle and parade of guards and do mestics and city functionaries.1 A beetling bastion2 of the fortress overlooked the palace and public square in front of it; and on this bastion the old governor would occasionally strut backwards and forwards, with his Toledo girded by his side, keeping a wary eye down upon his rival, like a hawk recon- noitering his quarry 3 from his nest in a dry tree.
Whenever he descended into the city it was in grand parade, on horseback, surrounded by his guards, or in his state coach, an ancient and unwieldy Spanish edifice of carved timber and gilt leather, drawn by eight mules, with running footmen, outriders, and lackey; on which occasions he flattered himself he impressed every beholder with awe and admiration as vice gerent of the king; though the wits of Granada, particularly those who loitered about the palace of the captain-general, were apt to sneer at his petty parade, and, in allusion to the vagrant character of his subjects, to greet him with the appel lation "the king of the beggars. " One of the most fruitful sources of dispute between these two doughty rivals was the right claimed by the governor to have all things passed free of duty through the city, that were intended for the use of him self or his garrison. By degrees the privilege had given rise to extensive smuggling. A nest of contraband istas took up their abode in the hovels of the fortress and the numerous caves in its vicinity, and drove a thriving business under the conni vance of the soldiers of the garrison.
The vigilance of the captain -general was aroused. He con-
1 persons holding office ; officers, 3 animal hunted for.
2 projecting portion of fort.
THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY. 77
suited his legal adviser and factotum,, a shrewd, meddlesome escribano, or notary, who rejoiced in an opportunity of per plexing the old potentate of the Alhambra, and involving him in a maze of legal subtil ties.1 He advised the captain-general to insist upon the right of examining every convoy 2 passing through the gates of his city, and penned a long letter for him in vindication of the right. Governor Manco was a straight forward, cut-and-thrust old soldier, who hated an escribano worse than the devil, and this one in particular worse than all other escribanos.
" What! " said he, curling up his mustaches fiercely, " does the captain-general set his man of the pen to practise confu sions upon me? I'll let him see an old soldier is not to be baffled by schoolcraf t. "
He seized his pen and scrawled a short letter in a crabbed hand, in which, without deigning3 to enter into argument, he insisted on the right of transit free of search, and denounced vengeance on any custom-house officer who should lay his unhallowed hand on any convoy protected by the flag of the Alhambra. While this question was agitated between the two pragmatical potentates, it so happened that a mule laden with supplies for the fortress arrived one day at the gate of Xenil, by which it was to traverse a suburb of the city, on its way to the Alhambra. The convoy was headed by a testy old corporal, who had long served under the governor, and was a man after his own heart; as rusty and stanch as an old Toledo blade.
As they approached the gate of the city, the corporal placed the banner of the Alhambra on the pack-saddle of the mule, and, drawing himself up to a perfect perpendicular, advanced with his head dressed to the front, but with the wary side- glance of a cur passing through hostile ground, and ready for a snap and a snarl.
1 tricks ; artifices. • stooping ; condescending.
* train of wagons engaged in transportation, having an armed escort.
78 THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY.
" Who goes there ? " said the sentinel at the gate.
"Soldier of the Alhambra ! " said the corporal, without turning his head.
" What have you in charge ? "
" Provisions for the garrison."
"Proceed."
The corporal marched straight forward, followed by the con voy, but had not advanced many paces before a posse1 of custom-house officers rushed out of a small toll-house.
" Hallo there ! " cried the leader. " Muleteer, halt, and open those packages."
The corporal wheeled round, and drew himself up in battle array. " Eespect the flag of the Alhambra," said he; " these things are for the governor."
" A fig for the governor, and a fig for his flag. Muleteer, halt, I say."
" Stop the convoy at your peril! " cried the corporal, cocking his musket. " Muleteer, proceed."
The muleteer gave his beast a hearty thwack ; the custom house officer sprang forward and seized the halter; whereupon the corporal levelled his piece, and shot him dead.
The street was immediately in an uproar.
The old corporal was seized, and after undergoing sundry kicks and cuffs and cudgellings, which are generally given impromptu 2 by the mob in Spain, as a foretaste of the after penalties of the law, he was loaded with irons, and conducted to the city prison; while his comrades were permitted to pro ceed with the convoy, after it had been well rummaged, to the Alhambra.
The old governor was in a towering passion when he heard of this insult to his flag and capture of his corporal. For a time he stormed about the Moorish halls, and vapored about the bastions, and looked down fire and sword upon the palace of the captain-general. Having vented the first ebulli-
1 number ; group ; squad. 2 off-hand ; without previous arrangement.
THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY. 70
tion ' of his wrath, lie despatched a message demanding the sur render of the corporal, as to him alone belonged the right of sitting in judgment on the offences of those under his com mand. The captain-general, aided by the pen of the delighted escribano, replied at great length, arguing that as the offence had been committed within the walls of his city, and against one of his civil officers, it was clearly within his proper jurisdic tion. The governor rejoined by a repetition of his demand; the captain-general gave a sur-re joinder 2 of still greater length and legal acumen;3 the governor became hotter and more peremptory in his demands, and the captain-general cooler and more copious in his replies; until the old lion-hearted soldier absolutely roared with fury at being thus entangled in the meshes of legal controversy.
While the subtle escribano was thus amusing himself at the expense of the governor, he was conducting the trial of the corporal, who, mewed up in a narrow dungeon of the prison, had merely a small grated window at which to show his iron- bound visage, and receive the consolations of his friends.
A mountain of written testimony was diligently heaped up, according to Spanish form, by the indefatigable4 escribano; the corporal was completely overwhelmed by it. He was con victed of murder, and sentenced to be hanged.
It was in vain the governor sent down remonstrance and menace from the Alhambra. The fatal day was at hand, and the corporal was put in capilla, that is to say, in the chapel of the prison, as is always done with culprits the day before execution, that they may meditate on their approaching end and repent them of their sins.
Seeing things drawing to extremity, the old governor deter mined to attend to the affair in person. For this purpose he ordered out his carriage of state, and, surrounded by his guards, rumbled down the avenue of the Alhambra into the
1 violent display ; sudden outburst. s shrewdness ; keenness.
2 answer to a rejoinder. 4 tireless.
BO THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY.
city. Driving to the house of the escribano, he summoned him to the portal.
The eye of the old governor gleamed like a coal at beholding the smirking man of the law advancing with an air of exulta tion.1
" What is this I bear," cried he, " that you are about to put to death one of my soldiers ? ' '
"All according to law; all in strict form of justice," said the self-sufficient escribano, chuckling and rubbing his hands. ' * I can show your excellency the written testimony in the case. ' '
' ' Fetch it hither, ' ' said the governor. The escribano bustled into his office, delighted with having another opportunity of displaying his ingenuity a at the expense of the hard-headed veteran.
He returned with a satchel full of papers, and began to read a long deposition with professional volubility. By this time a crowd had collected, listening with outstretched necks and gaping mouths.
' ' Prithee, man, get into the carriage, out of this pestilent throng, that I may the better hear thee," said the governor.
The escribano entered the carriage, when, in a twinkling, the door was closed; the coachman smacked his whip; mules, carriage, guards and all dashed off at a thundering rate, leav ing the crowd in gaping wonderment; nor did the governor pause until he had lodged his prey in one of the strongest dungeons of the Alhambra.
He then sent down a flag of truce in military style, proposing a cartel or exchange of prisoners — the corporal for the notary. The pride of the captain-general was piqued; he returned a contemptuous 3 refusal, and forthwith caused a gallows, tall and strong, to be erected in the centre of the Plaza Nueva, for the execution of the corporal.
" Oho ! Is that the game ? " said Governor Manco. He gave
» triumph. » power of ready invention. » scornful.
THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY. . 81
orders, and immediately a gibbet was reared cm the verge of the great beetling bastion that overlooked the Plaza. " Now," said he in a message to the captain-general, "hang my soldier when you please; but at the same time that he is swung off in the square, look up to see your escribano dangling against the sky."
The captain-general was inflexible ; 1 troops were paraded in the square; the drums beat; the bell tolled. An immense mul titude of amateurs gathered together to behold the execution. On the other hand, the governor paraded his garrison on the bastion, and tolled the funeral dirge of the notary from the Torre de la Campana, or Tower of the Bell.
The notary's wife pressed through the crowd with a whole progeny of little embryo escribanos at her heels, and throwing herself at the feet of the captain-general, implored him not to sacrifice the life of her husband, and the welfare of herself and her numerous little ones, to a point of pride. " For you know the old governor too well," said she, "to doubt that he will put his threat in execution, if you hang the soldier."
The captain-general was overpowered by her tears and lamentations, and the clamors of her callow brood. The cor poral was sent up to the Alhambra, under a guard, in his gallows garb, like hooded friar, but with head erect and a face of iron. The escribano was demanded in exchange, according to the cartel. The once bustling and self-sufficient man of the law was drawn forth from his dungeon more dead than alive. All his flippancy and conceit had evaporated;2 his hair, it is said, had nearly turned gray with affright, and he had a down cast, dogged look, as if he still felt the halter round his neck.
The old governor stuck his one arm akimbo, and for a moment surveyed him with an iron smile. " Henceforth, my friend," said he, " moderate your zeal in hurrying others to the gallows; be not too certain of your safety, even though you should have the law on your side; and above all, take care how you play off your schoolcraft another time upon an old soldier. "
1 unbending ; determined. • disappeared (literally in vapor).
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER.
WHILE Governor Manco, or "the one-armed," kept up a show of military state in the Alhambra, he became nettled at the reproaches continually cast upon his fortress, of being a nestling place of rogues and contrabandistas. On a sudden, the old potentate determined on reform, and, setting vigor ously to work, ejected whole nests of vagabonds out of the fortress and the gypsy caves with which the surrounding hills are honeycombed. He sent out soldiers, also, to patrol the avenues and footpaths, with orders to take up all suspicious persons.
One bright summer morning, a patrol, consisting of the testy old corporal who had distinguished himself in the affair of the notary, a trumpeter and two privates, was seated under the garden wall of the Generalife, beside the road which leads down, from the mountain of the sun, when they heard the tramp of a horse, and a male voice singing in rough, though not unmusical tones, an old Castilian campaigning song.
Presently they beheld a sturdy, sunburnt fellow, clad in the ragged garb of a foot-soldier, leading a powerful Arabian horse, caparisoned in the ancient Moresco fashion.
Astonished at the sight of a strange soldier descending, steed in hand, from that solitary mountain, the corporal stepped forth and challenged him.
" Who goes there?"
"A friend."
" Who and what are you ? "
"A poor soldier just from the wars, with a cracked crown and empty purse for a reward."
By this time they were enabled to view him more narrowly. He had a black patch across his forehead, which, with a grizzled
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 83
beard, added to a certain dare-devil cast of countenance,, while a slight squint threw into the whole an occasional gleam of roguish good humor.
Having answered the questions of the patrol,, the soldier seemed to consider himself entitled to make others in return. * ' May I ask, ' ' said he, ' i what city is that which I see at the foot of the hill?"
''What city?" cried the trumpeter. "Come, that's too bad. Here's a fellow lurking about the mountain of the sun, and demands the name of the great city of Granada! "
' i Granada ! can it be possible ? ' '
''Perhaps not!" rejoined the trumpeter; "and perhaps you have no idea that yonder are the towers of the Alham- bra."
"Son of a trumpet," replied the stranger, "do not trifle with me ; if this be indeed the Alhambra, I have some strange matters to reveal to the governor."
" You will have an opportunity," said the corporal, " for we mean to take you before him." By this time the trumpeter had seized the bridle of the steed, the two privates had each secured an arm of the soldier, the corporal put himself in front, gave the word, "Forward — march!" and away they marched for the Alhambra.
The sight of a ragged foot-soldier and a fine Arabian horse, brought in captive by the patrol, attracted the attention of all the idlers of the fortress, and of those gossip groups that generally assemble about wells and fountains at early dawn. The wheel of the cistern paused in its rotations, and the slip shod servant-maid stood gaping, with pitcher in hand, as the corporal passed by with his prize. A motley train gradually gathered in the rear of the escort.
Knowing nods and winks and conjectures passed from one to another. "It is a deserter," said one; "a contraband- ista," said another; "a bandalero,"1 said the third; until
1 highway robber.
84 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER,
it was affirmed that the captain of a desperate band of robbers had been captured by the prowess ' of the corporal and his patrol. ' * Well, well, ' ' said the old crones, one to another, " captain or not, let him get out of the grasp of old Governor Manco if he can, though he is but one-handed."
Governor Manco was seated in one of the inner halls of the Alhambra, taking his morning's cup of chocolate in company with his confessor, a fat Franciscan 2 friar from the neighboring convent. A derau re, dark- eyed damsel of Malaga,3 the daughter of his housekeeper, was attending upon him. The world hinted that the damsel had found out a soft spot in the iron heart of the old governor, and held complete control over him.
When word was brought that a suspicious stranger had been taken lurking about the fortress, and was actually in the outer court, in durance 4 of the corporal, waiting the pleasure of his excellency, the pride and stateliness of office swelled the bosom of the governor. Giving back his chocolate cup into the hands of the demure damsel, he called for his basket-hilted sword, girded it to his side, twirled up his mustaches, took his seat in a large high-backed chair, assumed a bitter and forbidding aspect, and ordered the prisoner into his presence. The soldier was brought in, still closely pinioned 5 by his captors, and guarded by the corporal. He maintained, however, a resolute self-confident air, and returned the sharp, scrutinizing 6 look of the governor with an easy squint, which by no means pleased the punctilious 7 old potentate.
" Well, culprit," said the governor, after he had regarded him for a moment in silence, " what have you to say for your self — who are you ? "
1 gallantry ; fearlessness of danger. 3 seaport city on a bay of the Mediter-
9 the religious order of the Franciscans ranean, sixty-five miles east northeast of
was founded in 1210 by Francis of Assissi, Gibraltar.
a celebrated Italian monk and preacher. 4 custody ; guarding.
After a serious illness in his youth, he 8 with arms bound to the body.
turned to a life of ascetic devotion. He 6 examining very carefully.
died October 4, 1226. He was canonized 7 yiven to nicety or exactness in forms of
by Gregory IX. in 1228. conduct.
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 85
" A soldier, just from the wars, who has brought away nothing but scars and bruises."
"A soldier? Humph! A foot-soldier by your garb. I under stand you have a fine Arabian horse. I presume you brought him too from the wars, besides your scars and bruises."
" May it please your excellency, I have something strange to tell about that horse. Indeed I have one of the most won derful things to relate. Something, too, that concerns the security of this fortress, indeed of all Granada. But it is a matter to be imparted only to your private ear, or in the pres ence of such only as are in your confidence."
The governor considered for a moment, and then directed the corporal and his men to withdraw, but to post themselves outside of the door, and be ready at a call. " This holy friar," said he, "is my confessor; you may say anything in his presence; and this damsel," nodding towards the hand maid, who had loitered with an air of great curiosity — "this damsel is of great secrecy and discretion, and to be trusted with anything."
The soldier gave a glance between a squint and a leer at the demure handmaid. "I am perfectly willing," said he, " that the damsel should remain."
AVhen all the rest had withdrawn, the soldier commenced his story. He was a fluent, smooth-tongued varlet, and had a command of language above his apparent rank.
"May it please your excellency," said he, "I am, as I before observed, a soldier, and have seen some hard service; but my term of enlistment being expired, I was discharged, not long since, from the army at Valladolid,1 and set out on foot for my native village in Andalusia. Yesterday evening the sun went down as I was traversing a great dry plain of Old Castile."
" Hold ! " cried the governor. " What is this you say ? Old Castile is some two or three hundred miles from this."
> city of Spam, one hundred miles northwest of Madrid. Columbus died here in 1506.
86 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER.
" Even so," replied the soldier, coolly; " I told your excel lency I had strange things to relate; but not more strange than true; as your excellency will find, if you will deign me a patient hearing."
" Proceed, culprit," said the governor, twirling up his mus taches.
"As the sun went down," continued the soldier, "least my eyes about in search of quarters for the night, but as far as my sight could reach, there were no signs of habitation. I saw that I should have to make my bed on the naked plain, with my knapsack for a pillow; but your excellency is an old soldier, and knows that, to one who has been in the wars, such a night's lodging is 110 great hardship."
The governor nodded assent, as he drew his pocket-handker chief out of the basket hilt, to drive away a fly that buzzed about his nose.
" Well, to make a long story short," continued the soldier, " I trudged forward for several miles until I came to a bridge over a deep ravine, through which ran a little thread of water, almost dried up by the summer heat. At one end of the bridge was a Moorish tower, the upper end all in ruins, but a vault in the foundation quite entire. Here, thinks I, is a good place to make a halt; so I went down to the stream, took a hearty drink, for the water was pure and sweet, and I was parched with thirst; then, opening my wallet, I took out an onion and a few crusts, which were all my provisions, and seating myself on a stone on the margin of the stream, began to make my supper, intending afterwards to quarter myself for the night in the vault of the tower; and capital quarters they would have been for a campaigner just from the wars, as your excellency, who is an old soldier, may suppose."
"I have put up gladly with worse in my time," said the governor, returning his pocket-handkerchief into the hilt of his sword.
"While I was quietly crunching my crust," pursued the
GOVERNOR MANCO AND THE SOLDIER. 87
soldier, " I heard something stir within the vault. I listened; it was the tramp of a horse. By and by a man came forth from a door in the foundation of the tower, close by the water's edge, leading a powerful horse by the bridle. I could not well make out what he was by the starlight. It had a suspicious look to be lurking among the ruins of a tower, in that wild, solitary place. He might be a mere wayfarer, like myself; he might be a contrabandista ; he might be a banda- lero! What of that? Thank heaven and my poverty, I had nothing to lose; so I sat still and crunched my crust.
" He led his horse to the water, close by where I was sitting, so that I had a fair opportunity of reconnoitering him. To my surprise he was dressed in a Moorish garb, with a cuirass of steel, and a polished skull-cap that I distinguished by the reflection of the stars upon it. His horse, too, was harnessed in the Moresco fashion, with great shovel stirrups. He led him, as I said, to the side of the stream, into which the ani mal plunged his head almost to the eyes, and drank until I thought he would have burst.
'•'Comrade,' said I, 'your steed drinks well; it's a good sign when a horse plunges his muzzle bravely into the water. '
" 'He may well drink,' said the stranger, speaking with a Moorish accent; ' it is a good year since he had his last draught.'
" ' By Santiago,' ' said I, ( that beats even the camels I have seen in Africa. But come, you seem to be something of a soldier; will you sit down and take part of a soldier's fare?' In fact, I felt the want of a companion in this lonely place, and was willing to put up with an infidel. Besides, as your excellency well knows, a soldier is never very particular about the faith of his company, and soldiers of all countries are comrades on peaceable ground."
The governor again nodded assent.
" Well, as I was saying, I invited him to share my supper,
1 Saint Jago (Saint James).
88 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER.
such as it was, for I could not do less in common hospitality. ' I have no time to pause for meat or drink,' said he; ' I have a long journey to make before morning. '
" ' In which direction ? ' said I.
" ' Andalusia/ said he.
" ' Exactly my route,,' said I; 'so, as you won't stop and eat with me, perhaps you will let me mount and ride with you. I see your horse is of a powerful frame, I'll warrant he'll carry double. '
"'Agreed,' said the trooper; and it would not have been civil and soldierlike to refuse, especially as I had offered to share my supper with him. So up he mounted, and up I mounted behind him.
" ' Hold fast,' said he; ' my steed goes like the wind.'
" ' Never fear me,' said I, and so off we set.
" From a walk the horse soon passed to a trot, from a trot to a gallop, and from a gallop to a harum-scarum scamper. It seemed as if rocks, trees, houses, every thing, flew hurry- scurry behind us.
" ' What town is this ? ' said I.
" 'Segovia,' 1 said he; and before the word was out of his mouth, the towers of Segovia were out of sight. We swept up the Guadarama 2 Mountains, and down by the Escurial; 3 and we skirted the walls of Madrid,4 and we scoured away across the plains of La Mancha. In this way we went up hill and down dale, by towers and cities, all buried in deep sleep, and across mountains and plains and rivers just glimmering in the starlight.
" To make a long story short, and not to fatigue your excel lency, the trooper suddenly pulled up on the side of a moun-
J in Old Castile, forty-five miles northwest a magnificent mausoleum for the members
of Madrid. of the royal family, and an extensive collec-
2 name of mountains northwest of Madrid, tionof rare paintings, books, etc. It was
3 name of town and province northwest set on fire by lightning and partially de- of Madrid. Remarkable for the celebrated stroyed in 1872.
monastery and palace of the Escurial in its 4 capital of Spain, in central part, on Man- vicinity, built by Philip II., which contains zanares River,
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 89
tain. ' Here we are, ' said he, ' at the end of our journey. ' I looked about, but could see no signs of habitation; nothing but the mouth of a cavern. "While I looked, I saw multitudes of people in Moorish dresses, some on horseback, some on foot, arriving*, as if borne by the wind, from all points of the compass, and hurrying into the mouth of the cavern like bees into a hive. Before I could ask a question, the trooper struck his long Moorish spurs into the horse's flanks, and dashed in with the throng. We passed along a steep winding way that descended into the very bowels of the mountain. As we pushed on, a light began to glimmer up, by little and little, like the first glimmerings of day; but what caused it I could not discern. It grew stronger and stronger, and enabled me to see every thing around. I now noticed, as we passed along, great caverns, opening to the right and left, like halls in an arsenal. In some there were shields and helmets and cui rasses and lances and cimeters, hanging against the walls; in others were great heaps of warlike munitions and camp equipage lying upon the ground.
" It would have done your excellency's heart good, being an old soldier, to have seen such grand provision for war. Then, in other caverns, there were long rows of horsemen armed to the teeth, with lances raised and banners unfurled, all ready for the field; but they all sat motionless in their saddles, like so many statues. In other halls were warriors sleeping on the ground beside their horses, and foot-soldiers in groups ready to fall into the ranks. All were in old-fashioned Moorish dresses and armor.
" Well, your excellency, to cut a long story short, we at length entered an immense cavern, or I may say palace, of grotto work, the walls of which seemed to be veined with gold and silver, and to sparkle with diamonds and sapphires and all kinds of precious stones. At the upper end sat a Moorish king on a golden throne, with his nobles on each side, and a guard of African blacks with drawn cimeters. All the
90 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER.
crowd that continued to flock in, and amounted to thousands and thousands,, passed one by one before his throne, each pay ing homage as he passed. Some of the multitude were dressed in magnificent robes, without stain or blemish, and sparkling with jewels; others in burnished and enamelled armor; while others were in mouldered and mildewed garments, and in armor all battered and dented, and covered with rust.
"I had hitherto held my tongue, for your excellency well knows it is not for a soldier to ask many questions when on duty, but I could keep silent no longer.
" ' Prithee, comrade,' said I, 'what is the meaning of all this?'
" ' This,' said the trooper, ' is a great and fearful mystery. Know, 0 Christian, that you see before you the court and army of Boabdil, the last king of Granada. '
" ' What is this you tell me ? ' cried I. ' Boabdil and his court were exiled from the land hundreds of years agone, and all died in Africa. '
"'So it is recorded in your lying chronicles,' replied the Moor; 'but know that Boabdil and the warriors who made the last struggle for Granada were all shut up in the mountain by powerful enchantment. As for the king and army that marched forth from Granada at the time of the surrender, they were a mere phantom train of spirits and demons, per mitted to assume those shapes to deceive the Christian sover eigns. And, furthermore, let me tell you, friend, that all Spain is a country under the power of enchantment. There is not a mountain cave, not a lonely watch-tower in the plains, nor ruined castle on the hills, but has some spellbound warriors sleeping from age to age within its vaults, until the sins are expiated for which Allah permitted the dominion to pass for a time out of the hands of the faithful. Once every year, on the eve of St. John, they are released from enchantment, from sun set to sunrise, and permitted to repair here to pay homage to their sovereign ; and the crowds which you beheld swarming
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 91
into the cavern are Moslem warriors from their haunts in all parts of Spain. For my part, you saw the ruined tower of the bridge in Old Castile, where I have now wintered and sum mered for many hundred years, and where I must be back again by daybreak. As to the battalions of horse and foot which you beheld drawn up in array in the neighboring cav erns, they are the spellbound warriors of Granada. It is written in the book of fate, that, when the enchantment is broken, Boabdil will descend from the mountain, at the head of this army, resume his throne in the Alhambra, and his sway of Granada, and, gathering together the enchanted warriors, from all parts of Spain, will reconquer the Peninsula ' and restore it to Moslem rule. '
" ' And when shall this happen ? ' said I.
'' " Allah alone knows. We had hoped that the day of deliv erance was at hand; but there reigns at present a vigilant governor in the Alhambra, a stanch old soldier, well known as Governor Manco. While such a warrior holds command of the very outpost, and stands ready to check the first irruption from the mountain, I fear Boabdil and his soldiery must be content to rest upon their arms.' "
Here the governor raised himself somewhat perpendicularly, adjusted his sword, and twirled up his mustaches.
" To make a long story short, and not to fatigue your excel lency, the trooper, having given me this account, dismounted from his steed.
" ' Tarry here, ' said he, 'and guard my steed while I go and bow the knee to Boabdil.' So saying, he strode away among the throng that pressed forward to the throne.
"'What's to be done?' thought I, when thus left to myself; 'shall I wait here until this infidel returns to whisk me of! on his goblin steed, the Lord knows where; or shall I make the most of my time and beat a retreat from this hob goblin community ? ' A soldier's mind is soon made up, as
1 Spain and Portugal.
92 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER
your excellency well knows. As to the horse, he belonged to an avowed enemy of the faith and the realm, and was a fair prize according to the rules of war. So hoisting myself from the crupper ' into the saddle, I turned the reins, struck the Moorish stirrups into the sides of the steed, and put him to make the best of his way out of the passage by which he had entered. As we scoured by the halls where the Moslem horse men sat in motionless battalions, I thought I heard the clang of armor and a hollow murmur of voices. I gave the steed another taste of the stirrups and doubled my speed. There was now a sound behind me like a rushing blast; I heard the clatter of a thousand hoofs; a countless throng overtook me. I was borne along in the press, and hurled forth from the mouth of the cavern, while thousands of shadowy forms were swept off in every direction by the four winds of heaven.
" In the whirl and confusion of the scene I was thrown senseless to the earth. When I came to myself I was lying on the brow of a hill, with the Arabian steed standing beside me; for in falling, my arm had slipped within the bridle, which, I presume, prevented his whisking off to Old Castile.
" Your excellency may easily judge of my surprise, on look ing round, to behold hedges of aloes and Indian figs and other proofs of a southern climate, and to see a great city below me, with towers and palaces and a grand cathedral.
"I descended the hill cautiously, leading my steed, for I was afraid to mount him again, lest he should play me some slippery trick. As I descended, I met with your patrol, who let me into the secret that it was Granada that lay before me, and that I was actually under the walls of the Alhambra, the fortress of the redoubted Governor Manco, the terror of all enchanted Moslems. When I heard this, I determined at once to seek your excellency, to inform you of all that I had seen, and to warn you of the perils that surround and under mine you, that you may take measures in time to guard your
1 strap of leather passing under a horse's tail, to prevent the saddle from slipping.
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 93
fortress, aiid the kingdom itself, from this intestine army that lurks in the very bowels of the land."
" And prithee, friend, you who are a veteran campaigner, and have seen so much service," said the governor, "how would you advise me to proceed, in order to prevent this evil?"
"It is not for a humble private of the ranks," said the soldier, modestly, "to pretend to instruct a commander of your excellency's sagacity, but it appears to me that your excellency might cause all the caves and entrances into the mountains to be walled up with solid mason work, so that Boabdil and his army might be completely corked up in their subterranean habitation. If the good father, too," added the soldier, reverently bowing to the friar, and devoutly crossing himself, " would consecrate the barricadoes with his blessing, and put up a few crosses, and relics and images of saints, I think they might withstand all the power of infidel enchant ments. ' '
" They doubtless would be of great avail," said the friar.
The governor now placed his arm akimbo, with his hand resting on the hilt of his Toledo, fixed his eye upon the sol dier, and gently wagging his head from one side to the other, "So, friend," said he, "then you really suppose I am to be gulled with this cock-and-bull story about enchanted moun tains and enchanted Moors? Hark ye, culprit! Not another word. An old soldier you may be, but you'll find you have an older soldier to deal with, and one not easily outgeneralled. Ho! guards there! Put this fellow in irons. "
The demure handmaid would have put in a word in favor of the prisoner, but the governor silenced her with a look.
As they were pinioning the soldier, one of the guards felt something of bulk in his pocket, and drawing it forth, found a long leathern purse that appeared to be well filled. Holding it by one corner, he turned out the contents upon the table before the governor, and never did freebooter's bag make more
94 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER.
gorgeous delivery. Out tumbled rings and jewels, and rosaries of pearls, and sparkling diamond crosses, and a profusion of ancient golden coin, some of which fell jingling to the floor, and rolled away to the uttermost parts of the chamber.
For a time the functions of justice were suspended ; there was a universal scramble after the glittering fugitives. The governor alone, who was imbued with true Spanish pride, maintained his stately decorum,1 though his eye betrayed a little anxiety until the last coin and jewel was restored to the sack.
The friar was not so calm; his whole face glowed like a fur nace, and his eyes twinkled and flashed at sight of the rosaries and crosses.
" Sacrilegious a wretch that thou art! " exclaimed he; " what church or sanctuary hast thou been plundering of these sacred relics?"
" Neither one nor the other, holy father. If they be sacri legious spoils, they must have been taken, in times long past, by the infidel trooper I have mentioned. I was just going to tell his excellency, when he interrupted me, that on taking pos session of the trooper's horse, I unhooked a leathern sack which hung at the saddle-bow, and which I presume contained the plunder of his campaignings in days of old, when the Moors overran the country."
" Mighty well! At present you will make up your mind to take up your quarters in a chamber of the Vermilion Towers, which, though not under a magic spell, will hold you as safe as any cave of your enchanted Moors."
" Your excellency will do as you think proper," said the pris oner, coolly. " I shall be thankful to your excellency for any accommodation in the fortress. A soldier who has been in the wars, as your excellency well knows, is not particular about his lodgings. Provided I have a snug dungeon, and regular rations, I shall manage to make myself comfortable. I
1 propriety of manner or conduct. 2 profane ; impious.
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 95
would only entreat that while your excellency is so careful about me, you would have an eye to your fortress, and think on the hint I dropped about stopping up the entrances to the mountain."
Here ended the scene. The prisoner was conducted to a strong dungeon in the Vermilion Towers, the Arabian steed was led to his excellency's stable, and the trooper's sack was deposited in his excellency's strong box. To the latter, it is true, the friar made some demur, questioning whether the sacred relics, which were evidently sacrilegious spoils, should not be placed in custody of the Church; but as the governor was peremptory on the subject, and was absolute lord in the Alhambra, the friar discreetly dropped the discussion, but determined to convey intelligence of the fact to the church dignitaries in Granada.
To explain these prompt and rigid measures on the part of old Governor Manco, it is proper to observe, that about this time the Alpuxaras Mountains in the neighborhood of Gra nada were terribly infested by a gang of robbers under the command of a daring chief named Manuel Borasco, who were accustomed to prowl about the country, and even to enter the city in various disguises, to gain intelligence of the depart ure of convoys of merchandise, or travellers with well-lined purses, whom they took care to waylay in distant and solitary passes of the road. These repeated and daring outrages had awakened the attention of government, and the commanders of the various posts had received instructions to be on the alert, and to take up all suspicious stragglers. Governor Manco was particularly zealous in consequence of the various stigmas that had been cast upon his fortress, and he now doubted not lie had entrapped some formidable desperado of this gang.
In the mean time the story took wind, and became the talk, not merely of the fortress, but of the whole city of Granada. It was said that the noted robber Manuel Borasco, the terror of the Alpuxaras, had fallen into the clutches of old Gov-
96 GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER.
ernor Mauco, and been cooped up by him in a dungeon of the Vermilion Towers; and every one who had been robbed by him flocked to recognize the marauder. The Vermilion Towers, as is well known, stand apart from the Alhambra, on a sister hill, separated from the main fortress by the ravine down which passes the main avenue. There were no outer walls, but a sentinel patrolled before the tower. The window of the chamber in which the soldier was confined was strongly grated, and looked upon a small esplanade. Here the good folks of Granada repaired to gaze at him, as they would at a laughing hyena, grinning through the cage of a menagerie. Xobody, however, recognized him for Manuel Borasco, for that terrible robber was noted for a ferocious physiognomy,1 and had by no means the good-humored squint of the prisoner. Visitors came not merely from the city, but from all parts of the country; but nobody knew him, and there began to be doubts in the minds of the common people whether there might not be some truth in his story. That Boabdil and his army were shut up in the mountain, was an old tradition which many of the ancient inhabitants had heard from their fathers. Numbers went up to the mountain of the sun in search of the cave mentioned by the soldier; and saw and peeped into the deep dark pit, descending, no one knows how far, into the mountain, and which remains there to this day, the fabled entrance to the subterranean abode of Boabdil.
By degrees the soldier became popular with the common people. A freebooter of the mountains is by no means the opprobrious character in Spain that a robber is in any other country; on the contrary, he is a kind of chivalrous personage in the eyes of the lower classes. There is always a disposi tion, also, to cavil 2 at the conduct of those in command, and many began to murmur at the high-handed measures of old Governor Manco, and to look upon the prisoner in the light of a martyr.
1 face, or countenance. 2 offer frivolous objections.
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 97
The soldier, moreover, was a merry, waggish fellow, that had a joke for every one who came near his window, and a soft speech for every female. Hu had procured an old guitar also, and would sit by his window and sing ballads and love-ditties, to the delight of the women of the neighborhood, who would assemble on the esplanade in the evening, and dance boleros to his music. Having trimmed off his rough beard, his sun burnt face found favor in the eyes of the fair, and the demure handmaid of the governor declared that his squint was per fectly irresistible. This kind-hearted damsel had from the first evinced a deep sympathy in his fortunes, and having in vain tried to mollify the governor, had set to work privately to mitigate the rigor of his dispensations. Every day she brought the prisoner some crumbs of comfort which had fallen from the governor's table, or been abstracted from his larder, together with, now and then, a consoling bottle of choice, rich Malaga.
While this petty treason was going on in the very centre of the old governor's citadel, a storm of open war was brewing up among his external foes. The circumstance of a bag of gold and jewels having been found upon the person of the supposed robber, had been reported, with many exaggera tions, in Granada. A question of territorial jurisdiction was immediately started by the governor's inveterate rival, the captain-general. He insisted that the prisoner had been cap tured without the precincts of the Alhambra, and within the rules of his authority. He demanded his body, therefore, and the spolia opima l taken with him. Due information having been carried, likewise, by the friar to the grand inquisitor, of the crosses and rosaries and other relics contained in the bag, he claimed the culprit as having been guilty of sacrilege, and insisted that his plunder was due to the Church, and his body to the next auto da fe.2 The feuds ran high; the governor
1 rich spoils. who had been tried before the courts of the
a(aw'to dah-fS'), the public declaration Spanish Inquisition, of the judgment passed on accused persons
98 GOVERNOR MANCO AND THE SOLDIER.
was furious,, and swore, rather than surrender his captive, he would hang him up within the Alhambra, as a spy caught within the purlieus 1 of the fortress.
The captain-general threatened to send a body of soldiers to transfer the prisoner from the Vermilion Towers to the city. The grand inquisitor was equally bent upon despatching a number of the familiars of the Holy Office. Word was brought, late at night, to the governor, of these machinations. " Let them come," said he; " they'll find me beforehand with them. He must rise bright and early who would take in an old soldier." He accordingly issued orders to have the prisoner removed, at daybreak, to the donjon keep within the walls of the Alhambra. "And d'ye hear, child?" said he to his demure handmaid, "tap at my door, and wake me before cock-crowing, that I may see to the matter myself."
The day dawned, the cock crowed, but nobody tapped at the door of the governor. The sun rose high above the mountain tops, and glittered in at his casement, ere the gov ernor was awakened from his morning dreams by his veteran corporal, who stood before him with terror stamped upon his iron visage.
" He's off! he's gone ! " cried the corporal, gasping for breath.
" Who's off— who's gone ? "
"The soldier — the robber — the devil, for aught I know. His dungeon is empty, but the door locked. No one knows how he has escaped out of it."
"Who saw him last?"
" Your handmaid; she brought him his supper."
" Let her be called instantly."
Here was new matter of confusion. The chamber of the demure damsel was likewise empty, her bed had not been slept in: she had doubtless gone off with the culprit, as she had appeared, for some days past, to have frequent conversations with him.
1 the outer portion ; environs.
GOVERNOR MANGO AND THE SOLDIER. 99
This was wounding the old governor in a tender part, but lie had scarce time to wince at it, when new misfortunes broke upon his view. On going into his cabinet he found his strong box open, the leather purse of the trooper abstracted, and with it, a couple of corpulent1 bags of doubloons.2
But how, and which way had the fugitives escaped ? An old peasant who lived in a cottage by the roadside, leading up into the Sierra, declared that he had heard the tramp of a power ful steed just before daybreak, passing up into the mountains. He had looked out at his casement, and could just distinguish a horseman, with a female seated before him.
" Search the stables! " cried Governor Manco. The stables were searched ; all the horses were in their stalls, excepting the Arabian steed. 'In his place was a stout cudgel tied to the manger, and on it a label bearing these words, "A gift to Governor Manco, from an Old Soldier."
1 large ; full. a Former Spanish gold coin.
LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES.
THERE lived once, in a waste apartment of the Alhambra, a merry little fellow named Lope Sanchez, who worked in the gardens, and was as brisk and blithe as a grasshopper, singing all day long. He was the life and soul of the fortress; when his work was over, he would sit on one of the stone benches of the esplanade, strum his guitar and sing long ditties for the amusement of the old soldiers of the fortress, or would strike up a merrier tune, and set the girls dancing. * Like most little men, Lope Sanchez had a strapping buxom dame for a wife, who could almost have put him in her pocket ; but he lacked the usual poor man's lot — instead of ten chil dren, he had but one. This was a little black-eyed girl about twelve years of age, named Sanchica, who was as merry as himself, and the delight of his heart. She played about him as he worked in the gardens, danced to his guitar as he sat in the shade, and ran as wild as a young fawn about the groves and alleys and ruined halls of the Alhambra.
It was now the eve of the blessed St. John, and the holiday- loving gossips of the Alhambra, men, women, and children, went up at night to the mountain of the sun, which rises above the Generalife, to keep their midsummer vigil on its level summit. It was a bright moonlight night, and all the mountains were gray and silvery, and the city, with its domes and spires, lay in shadows below, and the Vega was like a fairy land, with haunted streams gleaming among its dusky groves. On the highest part of the mountain they lit up a bonfire, according to an old custom of the country, handed down from the Moors. The inhabitants of the surrounding country were keeping a similar vigil, and bonfires, here and there in the Vega, and along the folds of the mountains, blazed up palely in the moonlight.
LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES. 101
The evening was gayly passed in dancing to the guitar of Lope Sanchez, who was never so joyous as when on a holiday revel of the kind. While the dance was going on, the little Sanchica, with some of her playmates, sported among the ruins of an old Moorish fort that crowns the mountain, when, in gathering pebbles in the fosse, she found a small hand curi ously carved of jet, the fingers closed, and the thumb firmly clasped upon them. Overjoyed with her good fortune, she ran to her mother with her prize. It immediately became a subject of sage speculation,1 and was eyed by some with super stitious distrust. " Throw it away," said one; " it's Moorish; depend upon it, there's mischief and witchcraft in it." " By no means, ' ' said another ; * ' you may sell it for something t J the jewellers of the Zacatin." In the midst of this discussion an old tawny soldier drew near, who had served in Africa, and was as swarthy as a Moor. He examined the hand with a knowing look. "I have seen things of this kind," said he, " among the Moors of Barbary. It is a great virtue to guard against the evil eye, and all kinds of spells and enchantments. I give you joy, friend Lope; this bodes good luck to your child. "
Upon hearing this, the wife of Lope Sanchez tied the little hand of jet to a ribbon, and hung it round the neck of her daughter.
The sight of this talisman called up all the favorite super stitions about the Moors. The dance was neglected, and they sat in groups on the ground, telling old legendary tales handed down from their ancestors. Some of their stories turned upon the wonders of the very mountain upon which •they were seated, which is a famous hobgoblin region. One ancient crone gave a long account of the subterranean palace in the bowels of that mountain where Boabdil and all his Moslem court are said to remain enchanted. " Among yonder ruins," said she, pointing to some crumbling walls and mounds of earth on a distant part of the mountain, " there is a deep black pit
1 conjecture ; mere theory.
102 LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES.
that goes down, down, into the very heart of the mountain. For all the money in Granada I would not look down into it. Once upon a time a poor man of the Alhambra, who tended goats upon this mountain, scrambled down into that pit after a kid that had fallen in. He came out again all wild and staring, and told such things of what he had seen that every one thought his brain was turned. He raved for a day or two about the hobgoblin Moors that had pursued him in the cav ern, and could hardly be persuaded to drive his goats up again to the mountain. He did so at last, but, poor man, he never came down again. The neighbors found his goats browsing about the Moorish ruins, and his hat and mantle lying near the mouth of the pit, but he was never more heard of."
The little Sanchica listened with breathless attention to this story. She was of a curious nature, and felt immediately a great hankering to peep into this dangerous pit. Stealing away from her companions, she sought the distant ruins, and after groping for some time among them, came to a small hollow, or basin, near the brow of the mountain, where it swept steeply down into the valley of the Darro. In the centre of this basin yawned the mouth of the pit. Sanchica ventured to the verge, and peeped in. All was as black as pitch, and gave an idea of immeasurable depth. Her blood ran cold; she drew back, then peeped in again, then would have run away, then took another peep — the very horror of the thing was delightful to her. At length she rolled a large stone, and pushed it over the brink. For some time it fell in silence; then struck some rocky projection with a violent crash; then rebounded from side to side, rumbling and turn-* bling, with a noise like thunder; then made a final splash into water, far, far below; and all was again silent.
The silence, however, did not long continue. It seemed as if something had been awakened within this dreary abyss.' A murmuring sound gradually rose out of the pit, like the
1 a very deep place (literally, bottomless).
LEGEND OF TWO DISCKEET STATUES. 103
hum and buzz of a beehive. It grew louder and louder; there was the confusion of voices as of a distant multitude, together with the faint din of arms, clash of cymbals, and clangor of trumpets, as if some army were marshalling for battle in the very bowels of the mountain.
The child drew off with silent awe, and hastened back to the place where she had left her parents and their compan ions. All were gone. The bonfire was expiring, and its last wreath of smoke curling up in the moonshine. The distant fires that had blazed along the mountains and in the Vega were all extinguished, and every thing seemed to have sunk to repose. Sanchica called her parents and some of her com panions by name, but received no reply. She ran down the side of the mountain, and by the gardens of the Generalife, until she arrived in the alley of trees leading to the Alham- bra, when she seated herself on a bench of a woody recess to recover breath. The bell from the watch-tower of the Alham- bra tolled midnight. There was a deep tranquillity, as if all nature slept, excepting the low tinkling sound of an unseen stream that ran under the covert of the bushes. The breath ing sweetness of the atmosphere was lulling her to sleep, when her eye was caught by something glittering at a distance, and to her surprise she beheld a long cavalcade of Moorish warriors pouring down the mountain side and along the leafy avenues. Some were armed with lances and shields; others with cimeters and battle-axes, and with polished cuirasses that flashed in the moonbeams. Their horses pranced proudly and champed upon their bits, but their tramp caused no more sound than if they had been shod with felt, and the riders were all as pale as death. Among them rode a beautiful lady, with a crowned head and long golden locks entwined with pearls. The housings of her palfrey were of crimson velvet embroid ered with gold, and swept the earth; but she rode all discon solate,1 with eyes ever fixed upon the ground.
104 LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES.
Then succeeded a train of courtiers magnificently arrayed in robes and turbans of divers colors, and amidst them, on a cream-colored charger, rode King Boabdil el Chico, in a royal mantle covered with jewels, and a crown sparkling with dia monds. The little Sanchica knew him by his yellow beard, and his resemblance to his portrait, which she had often seen in the picture gallery of the Generalife. She gazed in wonder and admiration at this royal pageant, as it passed glistening among the trees; but though she knew these monarchs and courtiers and warriors, so pale and silent, were out of the common course of nature, and things of magic and enchant ment, yet she looked on with a bold heart, such courage did she derive from the mystic talisman of the hand which was suspended about her neck.
The cavalcade having passed by, she rose and followed. It continued on to the great Gate of Justice, which stood wide open ; the old invalid sentinels on duty lay on the stone benches of the barbican, buried in profound and apparently charmed sleep, and the phantom pageant swept noiselessly by them, with flaunting banner and triumphant state. Sanchica would have followed, but to her surprise she beheld an opening in the earth, within the barbican, leading down beneath the foundations of the tower. She entered for a little distance, and was encouraged to proceed, by finding steps rudely hewn in the rock, and a vaulted passage here and there lit up by a silver lamp, which, while it gave light, diffused likewise a grateful fragrance. Venturing on, she came at last to a great hall, wrought out of the heart of the mountain, magnificently furnished in the Moorish style, and lighted up by silver and crystal lamps. Here, on an ottoman, sat an old man in Moor ish dress, with a long white beard, nodding and dozing, with a staff in his hand, which seemed ever to be slipping from his grasp; while at a little distance sat a beautiful lady, in ancient Spanish dress, with a coronet all sparkling with diamonds, and her hair entwined with pearls, who was softly playing on
LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES. 105
a silver lyre. The little Sanchica now recollected a story she had heard among the old people of the Alhambra, concerning a Gothic princess confined in the centre of the mountain by an old Arabian magician, whom she kept bound up in magic sleep by the power of music.
The lady paused with surprise at seeing a mortal in that enchanted hall. " Is it the eve of the blessed St. John?" said she.
"It is," replied Sanchica.
" Then for one night the magic charm is suspended. Come hither, child, and fear not. I am a Christian like thyself, though bound here by enchantment. Touch my fetters with the talisman that hangs about thy neck, and for this night I shall be free."
So saying, she opened her robes, and displayed a broad golden band round her waist, and a golden chain that fas tened her to the ground. The child hesitated not to apply the little hand of jet to the golden band, and immediately the chain fell to the earth. At the sound the old man woke, and began to rub his eyes; but the lady ran her fingers over the chords of the lyre, and again he fell into a slumber, and began to nod, and his staff to falter in his hand. "Now," said the lady, "touch his staff with the talismanic hand of jet." The child did so, and it fell from his grasp, and he sank in a deep sleep on the ottoman. The lady gently laid the silver lyre on the ottoman, leaning it against the head of the sleeping magician; then touching the chords until they vibrated in his ear — " 0 potent spirit of harmony," said she, "continue thus to hold his senses in thraldom till the return of day. Now follow me, my child," continued she, "and thou shalt behold the Alhambra as it was in the days of its glory, for thou hast a magic talisman that reveals all enchant ments." Sanchica followed the lady in silence. They passed up through the entrance of the cavern into the barbican of the Gate of Justice, and thence to the esplanade within the fortress.
106 LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES.
This was all filled with Moorish soldiery, horse and foot, marshalled in squadrons, with banners displayed. There were royal guards also at the portal, and rows of African blacks with drawn cimeters. No one spoke a word, and Sanchica passed on fearlessly after her conductor. Her astonishment increased on entering the royal palace, in which she had been reared. The broad moonshine lit up all the halls and courts and gardens almost as brightly as if it were day, but revealed a far different scene from that to which she was accustomed. The walls of the apartments were no longer stained and rent by time. Instead of cobwebs, they were now hung with rich silks of Damascus,1 and the gildings and arabesque paintings were restored to their original brilliancy and freshness. The halls, no longer naked and unfurnished, were set out with divans and ottomans of the rarest stuffs, embroidered with pearls and studded with precious gems, and all the fountains in the courts and gardens were playing.
The kitchens were again in full operation ; cooks were busy preparing shadowy dishes, and roasting and boiling the phan toms of pullets and partridges; servants were hurrying to and fro with silver dishes heaped up with dainties, and arranging a delicious banquet. The Court of Lions was thronged with guards and courtiers and alfaquis, as in the old times of the Moors; and at the upper end, in the Saloon* of Judgment, sat Boabdil on his throne, surrounded by his court, and swaying a shadowy sceptre for the night. Not withstanding all this throng and seeming bustle, not a voice nor a footstep was to be heard; nothing interrupted the midnight silence but the splashing of the fountains. The little San chica followed her conductress in mute amazement about the palace, until they came to a portal opening to the vaulted passages beneath the great Tower of Comares. On each side of the portal sat the figure of a nymph, wrought out of ala baster. Their heads were turned aside, and their regards fixed
* celebrated city of Asiatic Turkey.
LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES. 107
upon the same spot within the vault. The enchanted lady paused, and beckoned the child to her. " Here," said she, " is a great secret, which I will reveal to thee in reward for thy faith and courage. These discreet statues watch over a treas ure hidden in old times by a Moorish king. Tell thy father to search the spot on which their eyes are fixed, and he will find what will make him richer than any man in Granada. Thy innocent hands, alone, however, gifted as thou art also with the talisman, can remote the treasure. Bid thy father use it discreetly, and devote a part of it to the performance of daily masses for my deliverance from this unholy enchant ment." k
When the lady had spoken these words, she led the child onward to the little Garden of Lindaraxa, which is hard by the vault of the statues. The moon trembled upon the waters of the solitary fountain in the centre of the garden, and shed a tender light upon the orange and citron trees. The beautiful lady plucked a branch of myrtle and wreathed it round the head of the child. " Let this be a memento," ] said she, "of what I have revealed to thee, and a testimonial of its truth. My hour is come; I must return to the enchanted hall; follow me not, lest evil befall thee. Farewell. Remember what I have said, and have masses performed for my deliverance." So saying, the lady entered a dark passage leading beneath the Tower of Comares, and was no longer seen.
The faint crowing of a cock was now heard from the cot tages below the Alhambra, in the valley of the Darro, and a pale streak of light began to appear above the eastern moun tains. A slight wind arose; there was the sound like the rus tling of dry leaves through the courts and corridors, and door after door shut to with a jarring sound.
Sanchica returned to the scenes she had so lately beheld thronged with the shadowy multitude, but Boabdil and his phantom court were gone. The moon shone into empty halls
1 reminder.
108 LEGEND OF TWO DISCEEET STATUES.
and galleries, stripped of their transient splendor,, stained and dilapidated by time, and hung with cobwebs. The bat flitted about in the uncertain light, and the frog croaked from the fish-pond.
Sanchica now made the best of her way to a remote stair case that led up to the humble apartment occupied by her family. The door, as usual, was open, for Lope Sanchez was too poor to need bolt or bar; she crept quietly to her pallet, and, putting the myrtle wreath beneath her pillow, soon fell asleep.
In the morning she related all that had befallen her to her father. Lope Sanchez, however, treated the whole as a mere dream, and laughed at the child for her credulity. He went forth to his customary labors in the garden, but had not been there long when his little daughter came running to him almost breathless. "Father! father!" cried she, "behold the myrtle wreath which the Moorish lady bound round my head."
Lope Sanchez gazed with astonishment, for the stalk of the myrtle was of pure gold, and every leaf was a sparkling emer ald! Being not much accustomed to precious stones, he was ignorant of the real value of the wreath, but he saw enough to convince him that it was something more substantial than the stuff of which dreams are generally made, and that at any rate the child had dreamt to some purpose. His first care was to enjoin the most absolute secrecy upon his daughter; in this respect, however, he was secure, for she had discretion far beyond her years or sex. He then repaired to the vault, where stood the statues of the two alabaster nymphs. He remarked that their heads were turned from the portal, and that the regards of each were fixed upon the same point in the interior of the building. Lope Sanchez could not but admire this most discreet contrivance for guarding a secret. He drew a line from the eyes of the statues to the point of regard, made a private mark on the wall, aud then retired.
LEGEND OF TWO DISCREET STATUES. 109
All day, however,, the mind of Lope Sanchez was distracted with a thousand cares. He could not help hovering within distant view of the two statues, and became nervous from the dread that the golden secret might be discovered. Every footstep that approached the place made him tremble. He would have given any thing could he but have turned the heads of the statues, forgetting that they looked precisely in the same direction for some hundreds of years, without any person being the wiser.
" A plague upon them !" he would say to himself. " They'll betray all ; did ever mortal hear of such a mode of guarding a secret ? " Then, on hearing any one advance, he would steal off, as though his very lurking near the place would awaken suspicion. Then he would return cautiously, and peep from a distance to see if every thing was secure; but the sight of the statues would again call forth his indignation. " Ay, there they stand," would he say, "always looking, and looking, and looking, just where they should not. Confound them! They are just like all their sex. If they have not tongues to tattle with, they'll be sure to do it with their eyes."
At length, to his relief, the long anxious day drew to a close. The sound of footsteps was no longer heard in the echoing halls of the Alhambra. The last stranger passed the threshold, the great portal was barred and bolted, and the bat and the frog and the hooting owl gradually resumed their nightly vocations in the deserted palace.
Lope Sanchez waited, however, until the night was far advanced before he ventured with his little daughter to the hall of the two nymphs. He found them looking as know ingly and mysteriously as ever at the secret place of deposit. " By your leaves, gentle ladies," thought Lope Sanchez, as he passed between them, " I will relieve you from this charge that must have set so heavy in your minds for the last two or three centuries." He accordingly went to work at the part of the wall which he had marked, and in a little while laid open a con-
110 LEGEND OF TWO DISCEEET STATUES.
cealed recess, in which stood two great jars of porcelain. He attempted to draw them forth, but they were immovable, until touched by the innocent hand of his little daughter. With her aid he dislodged them from their niche, and found, to his great joy, that they were filled with pieces of Moorish gold, mingled with jewels and precious stones. Before daylight he managed to convey them to his chamber, and left the two guardian statues with their eyes still fixed on the vacant wall.
Lope Sanchez had thus on a sudden become a rich man ; but riches, as usual, brought a world of cares to which he had hitherto been a stranger. How was he to convey away his wealth with safety ? How was he even to enter upon the en joyment of it without awakening suspicion ? Now, too, for the first time in his life the dread of robbers entered into his mind. He looked with terror at the insecurity of his habitation, and went to work to barricade the doors and windows; yet after all Ms precautions he could not sleep soundly. His usual gayety was at an end; he had no longer a joke or a song for his neighbors; and, in short, became the most miserable animal in the Alhambra. He determined, therefore, to beat a secret retreat in the night, and make off to another part of the kingdom.
Nothing was heard of Lope Sanchez for a long time after his disappearance from the Alhambra. Some years after wards, one of his old companions, an invalid soldier, being at Malaga, was knocked down and nearly run over by a coach and six. The carriage stopped ; an old gentleman, magnifi cently dressed, with a bag-wig and sword, stepped out to assist the poor invalid. What was the astonishment of the latter to behold in this grand cavalier his old friend Lope Sanchez, who was actually celebrating the marriage of his daughter Sanchica with one of the first grandees of the land.
LEGEND OF DON MUNIO SANCHO DE HINOJOSA.
IN the cloisters of the ancient Benedictine convent of San Domingo, at Silos, in Castile, are the mouldering yet mag nificent monuments of the once powerful and chivalrous fam ily of Hinojosa. Among these reclines the marble figure of a knight, in complete armor, with the hands pressed together, as if in prayer. On one side of his tomb is sculptured in relief a band of Christian cavaliers, capturing a cavalcade of male and female Moors; on the other side, the same cavaliers are represented kneeling before an altar. The tomb, like most of the neighboring monuments, is almost in ruins, and the sculpture is nearly unintelligible, excepting to the keen eye of the antiquary.1 The story connected with the sepulchre, how ever, is still preserved in the old Spanish chronicles, and is to the following purport :
In old times, several hundred years ago, there was a noble Castilian cavalier, named Don Munio Sancho de Hinojosa, lord of a border castle, which had stood the brunt of many a Moorish foray. He had seventy horsemen as his household troops, all of the ancient Castilian proof — stark 2 warriors, hard riders, and men of iron ; with these he scoured the Moor ish lands, and made his name terrible throughout the borders. His castle hall was covered with banners, cimeters, and Mos lem helms, the trophies of his prowess. Don Munio was, moreover, a keen huntsman, and rejoiced in hounds of all kinds, steeds for the chase, and hawks for the towering sport of falconry. When not engaged in warfare, his delight was to beat up the neighboring forests; and scarcely ever did he ride
1 lover and student of ancient things. 1 strong ; rugged.
112 LEGEND OF DON MUNIO SANCHO DE HiNOJOSA.
forth without hound and horn, a boar-spear in his hand, or a hawk upon his fist, and an attendant train of huntsmen.
His wife, Dona Maria Palacin, was of a gentle and timid nature, little fitted to be the spouse of so hardy and adventur ous a knight; and many a tear did the poor lady shed when he sallied forth upon his daring enterprises, and many a prayer did she offer up for his safety.
As this doughty cavalier was one day hunting, he stationed himself in a thicket, on the borders of a green glade of the forest, and dispersed his followers to rouse the game and drive it toward his stand. He had not been here long, when a cavalcade of Moors, of both sexes, carne prankling ] over the forest lawn. They were unarmed, and magnificently dressed in robes of tissue and embroidery, rich shawls of India, bracelets and anklets of gold, and jewels that sparkled in the sun.
At the head of this gay cavalcade rode a youthful cavalier, superior to the rest in dignity and loftiness of demeanor, and in splendor of attire; beside him was a damsel whose veil, blown aside by the breeze, displayed a face of surpassing beauty, and eyes cast down in maiden modesty, yet beaming with tenderness and joy.
Don Munio thanked his stars for sending him such a prize, and exulted at the thought of bearing home to his wife the glittering spoils of these infidels. Putting his hunting horn to his lips, he gave a blast that rung through the forest. His huntsmen came running from all quarters, and the astonished Moors were surrounded and made captives.
The beautiful Moor wrung her hands in despair, and her female attendants uttered the most piercing cries. The young Moorish cavalier alone retained self-possession. He inquired the name of the Christian knight who commanded this troop of horsemen. When told that it was Don Munio Sancho de Hinojosa, his countenance lighted up. Approaching that
1 prancing.
LEGEND OF DON MUNIO SANCHO DE HINOJOSA. 113
cavalier, and kissing his hand, " Don Munio Sancho," said he, " I have heard of your fame as a true and valiant knight, terrible in arms, but schooled in the noble virtues of chivalry. Such do I trust to find you. In me you behold Abadil, son of a Moorish alcayde. I am on the way to celebrate my nuptials with this lady. Chance has thrown us in your power, but I confide in your magnanimity. Take all our treasure and jewels; demand what ransom you think proper for our persons, but suffer us not to be insulted nor dishonored."
When the good knight heard this appeal, and beheld the beauty of the youthful pair, his heart was touched with ten derness and courtesy. " God forbid," said he, " that I should disturb such happy nuptials. My prisoners, in troth, shall ye be for fifteen days, and immured within my castle, where I claim, as conqueror, the right of celebrating your espousals."
So saying, he despatched one of his fleetest horsemen in advance, to notify Dofia Maria Palacin of the coming of this bridal party; while he and his huntsmen escorted the caval cade, not as captors, but as a guard of honor. As they drew near to the castle, the banners were hung out, and the trum pets sounded from the battlements; and on their nearer approach, the drawbridge was lowered, and Dofia Maria came forth to meet them, attended by her ladies and knights, her pages and her minstrels. She took the young bride, Allifra, in her arms, kissed her with the tenderness of a sister, and conducted her into the castle. In the mean time, Don Munio sent forth missives in every direction, and had viands and dainties of all kinds collected from the country round; and the wedding of the Moorish lovers was celebrated with all possible state and festivity. For fifteen days the castle was given up to joy and revelry. There were tiltings and jousts at the ring, and bull-fights and banquets and dances to the sound of minstrelsy. When the fifteen days were at an end, he made the bride and bridegroom magnificent presents, and conducted them and their attendants safely beyond the bor-
114 LEGEND OF DON MUNIO SANCHO DE HINOJOSA.
ders. Such, in old times,, were the courtesy and generosity of a Spanish cavalier.
Several years after this event, the king of Castile summoned his nobles to assist him in a campaign against the Moors. Don Munio Sancho was among the first to answer to the call, with seventy horsemen, all stanch and well-tried warriors. His wife, Dona Maria, hung about his neck. " Alas! my lord! " exclaimed she, "how often wilt thou tempt thy fate, and when will thy thirst for glorj be appeased ? "
"One battle more," replied Don Munio, "one battle more for the honor of Castile; and I here make a vow, that when this is over, I will lay by my sword, and repair with my cavaliers in pilgrimage to the sepulchre of our Lord at Jerusalem." The cavaliers all joined with him in the vow, and' Dona Maria felt in some degree soothed in spirit; still, she saw with a heavy heart the departure of her husband, and watched his banner with wistful eyes, until it disappeared among the trees in the forest.
The king of Castile led his army to the Plain of Alma- nara, where they encountered the Moorish host, near to Ucles. ' The battle was long and bloody; the Christians repeatedly wavered, and were as often rallied by the energy of their com manders. Don Munio was covered with wounds, but refused to leave the field. The Christians at length gave way, and the king was hardly pressed, and in danger of being captured.
Don Munio called upon his cavaliers to follow him to the rescue. " Now is the time," cried he, " to prove your loyalty. Fall to, like brave men ! We fight for the true faith, and if we lose our lives here, we gain a better life hereafter."
Rushing with his men between the king and his pursuers, they checked the latter in their career, and gave time for their monarch to escape; but they fell victims to their loyalty. They all fought to the last gasp. Don Munio was singled out by a powerful Moorish knight, but having been wounded in
1 town about fifty miles southeast of Madrid.
LEGEND OF DON MUNIO SANCHO DE HINOJOSA. 115
the right arm, he fought to disadvantage, and was slain. The battle being over, the Moor paused to possess himself of the spoils of this redoubtable Christian warrior. When he unlaced the helmet, however, and beheld the countenance of Don Munio, he gave a great cry, and smote his breast. " Woe is me! " cried he, "I have slain my benefactor! The flower of knightly virtue! The most magnanimous 1 of cavaliers! "
While the battle had been raging on the Plain of Almanara, Dofta Maria Palacin remained in her castle, a prey to the keenest anxiety. Her eyes were ever fixed on the road that led from the country of the Moors, and often she asked the watchman of the tower, " What seest thou? "
One evening, at the shadowy hour of twilight, the warden sounded his horn. "I see," cried he, "a numerous train winding up the valley. There are mingled Moors and Chris tians. The banner of my lord is in the advance. Joyful tid ings!" exclaimed the old seneschal.2 "My lord returns in triumph, and brings captives! " Then the castle courts rang with shouts of joy, and the standard was displayed, and the trumpets were sounded, and the drawbridge was lowered, and Dona Maria went forth with her ladies and her knights and her pages and her minstrels, to welcome her lord from the wars. But as the train drew nigh, she beheld a sumptuous bier, covered with black velvet, and on it lay a warrior, as if taking his repose. He lay in his armor, with his helmet on his head, and his sword in his hand, as one who had never been conquered ; and around the bier were the escutcheons of the house of Hinojosa.
A number of Moorish cavaliers attended the bier, with emblems of mourning, and with dejected countenances; and their leader cast himself at the feet of Dona Maria, and hid his face in his hands. She beheld in him the gallant Abadil, whom she had once welcomed with his bride to her castle; but
1 great or high minded. 2 steward who had charge of the house.
116 LEGEND OF DON MUNIO SANCHO DE HINOJOSA.
who now came with the body of her lord, whom he had unknowingly slain in battle.
On one of the stones of a small arch, beside his sepulchre, is the following simple inscription: " Here lies Maria Palacin, wife of Munio Sancho de Hinojosa. "
The legend of Don Munio Sancho does not conclude with his death. On the same day on which the battle took place on the Plain of Almanara, a chaplain of the Holy Temple at Jerusa lem, while standing at the outer gate, beheld a train of Chris tian cavaliers advancing, as if in pilgrimage. The chaplain was a native of Spain, and, as the pilgrims approached, he knew the foremost to be Don Munio Sancho de Hinojosa, with whom he had been well acquainted in former times. Hasten ing to the patriarch/ he told him of the honorable rank of the pilgrims at the gate. The patriarch, therefore, went forth with a grand procession of priests and monks, and received the pilgrims with all due honor. There were seventy cava liers, beside their leader, all stark and lofty warriors. They carried their helmets in their hands, and their faces were deadly pale. They greeted no one, nor looked either to the right or to the left, but entered the chapel, and, kneeling before the sepulchre of our Saviour, performed their orisons in silence. When they had concluded, they rose as if to depart, and the patriarch and his attendants advanced to speak to them, but they were no more to be seen. Every one marvelled what could be the meaning of this prodigy.2 The patriarch carefully noted down the day, and sent to Castile to learn tid ings of Don Munio Sancho de Hinojosa. He received for reply, that on the very day specified, that worthy knight, with seventy of his followers, had been slain in battle. These, therefore, must have been the blessed spirits of those Chris tian warriors, come to fulfil their vow of pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre * at Jerusalem. Such was Castilian faith in the olden time, which kept its word, even beyond the grave.
1 high ecclesiastical dignitary. a marvel; extraordinary occurrence.
3 the burial place of the Saviour.
THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER.
EVERYBODY has heard of the Cave of St. Cyprian at Sala manca/ where in old times judicial astronomy, necromancy,2 chiromancy/ and other dark and damnable arts were secretly taught by an ancient sacristan; 4 or, as some will have it, by the devil himself, in that disguise. The cave has long been shut up and the very site of it forgotten ; though, according to tradition, the entrance was somewhere about where the stone cross stands in the small square of the seminary of Car- vajal; and this tradition appears in some degree corroborated 5 by the circumstances of the following story.
There was at one time a student of Salamanca, Don Vicente by name, of that merry but mendicant 6 class who set out on the road to learning without a penny in pouch for the journey, and who, during college vacations, beg from town to town, and village to village, to raise funds to enable them to pursue their studies through the ensuing term. He was now about to set forth on his wanderings, and, being somewhat musical, slung on his back a guitar with which to amuse the villagers, and pay for a meal or a night's lodgings.
As he passed by the stone cross in the seminary square, he pulled off his hat, and made a short invocation7 to St. Cyprian, for good luck; when, casting his eyes upon the earth, he perceived something glitter at the foot of the cross. On picking it up, it proved to be a seal ring of mixed metal, in which gold and silver appeared to be blended. The seal bore
1 a seat of learning, the Oxford of Spain ; * sexton,
northwest from Madrid, in province of Leon. B confirmed ; strengthened.
'•* art of magic. 8 begging.
3 palmistry ; art of telling fortunes by in- 7 prayer, specting the lines of the hand.
118 THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER.
as a device two triangles crossing each other, so as to form a star. This device is said to be a cabalistic sign, invented by King Solomon the wise, and of mighty power in all cases of enchantment; but the honest student, being neither sage nor conjurer, knew nothing of the matter. He took the ring as a present from St. Cyprian in reward of his prayer, slipped it on his finger, made a bow to the cross, and strumming his guitar, set off merrily on his wandering.
The life of a mendicant student in Spain is not the most miserable in the world, especially if he has any talent at mak ing himself agreeable. He rambles at large from village to village, and city to city, wherever curiosity or caprice may con duct him. The country curates, who, for the most part, have been mendicant students in their time, give him shelter for the night, and a comfortable meal, and often enrich him with several quartos or half-pence in the morning. As he presents himself from door to door in the streets of the cities, he meets with no harsh rebuff, no chilling contempt, for there is no disgrace attending his mendicity. 1 Many of the most learned men in Spain having commenced their career in this manner; but if, like the student in question, he is a good-looking varlet and a merry companion, and, above all, if he can play the guitar, he is sure of a hearty welcome among the peasants, and smiles and favors from their wives and daughters.
In this way, then, did our ragged and musical son of learn ing make his way over half the kingdom, with the fixed deter mination to visit the famous city of Granada before his return. Sometimes he was gathered for the night into the fold of some village pastor; sometimes he was sheltered under the humble but hospitable roof of the peasant. Seated at the cottage door with his guitar, he delighted the simple folk with his ditties; or striking up a fandango 2 or bolero, set the brown country lads and lasses dancing in the mellow twilight. In the morn ing he departed with kind words from host and hostess, and
i life as a beggar. > kind of dance.
THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER. 119
kind looks and, peradventure, a squeeze of the hand from the daughter.
At length he arrived at the great object of his musical vaga bondizing, the far-famed city of Granada, and hailed with wonder and delight its Moorish towers, its lovely Vega, and its snowy mountains glistering through a summer atmosphere. It is needless to say with what eager curiosity he entered its gates and wandered through its streets, and gazed upon its Oriental monuments. Every female face peering through a window or beaming from a balcony was to him a Zorayda or a Zelinda, nor could he meet a stately dame on the Alameda,1 but he was ready to fancy her a Moorish princess, and to spread his student's robe beneath her feet.
His musical talent, his happy humor, his. youth, and his good looks, won him a universal welcome in spite of his ragged robes, and for several days he led a gay life in the old Moorish capital and its environs. One of his occasional haunts was the fountain of Avellanos, in the valley of the Darro. It is one of the popular resorts of Granada, and has been so since the days of the Moors; and here the student had an opportunity of pursuing his studies of female beauty, a branch of study to which he was a little prone.
Here he would take his seat with his guitar, improvise love- ditties to admiring groups, or prompt with his music the ever ready dance. He was thus engaged one evening, when he beheld a padre a of the Church advancing, at whose approach every one touched the hat. He was evidently a man of con sequence; he certainly was a mirror of good, if not of holy, living; robust and rosy-faced, and breathing at every pore, with the warmth of the weather and the exercise of the walk. As he passed along he would every now and then draw a mar- avedi out of his pocket, and bestow it on a beggar, with an air of signal beneficence. "Ah, the blessed father!" would be the cry. " Long life to him, and may he soon be a bishop! "
1 a shaded public walk. 3 father ; priest.
120 THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER.
To aid his steps in ascending the hill, he leaned gently now and then on the arm of a handmaid, evidently the pet lamb of this kindest of pastors. Ah, such a damsel ! Andalus from head to foot — from the rose in her hair, to the fairy shoe and lace-work stocking; Andalus in every movement; in every undulation ' of the body — ripe, melting Andalus! But then so modest! — so shy! — ever, with downcast eyes, listening to the words of the padre ; or if by chance she let flash a side- glance, it was suddenly checked and her eyes once more cast to the ground.
The good padre looked benignantly on the company about the fountain, and took his seat with some emphasis on a stone bench, while the handmaid hastened to bring him a glass of sparkling water. He sipped it deliberately, and with relish, tempering it with one of those spongy pieces of frosted eggs and sugar so dear to Spanish epicures,8 and on returning the glass to the hand of the damsel pinched her cheek with infi nite loving-kindness.
"Ah, the good pastor! " whispered the student to himself. " What a happiness would it be to be gathered into his fold with such a pet lamb for a companion! "
But no such good fare was likely to befall him. In vain he essayed those powers of pleasing which he had found so irre sistible with country curates and country lasses. Xever had he touched his guitar with such skill; never had he poured forth more soul-moving ditties; but he had no longer a coun try curate or country lass to deal with. The worthy priest evidently did not relish music, and the modest damsel never raised her eyes from the ground. They remained but a short time at the fountain. The good padre hastened their return to Granada. The damsel gave the student one shy glance in retiring, but it plucked the heart out of his bosom!
He inquired about them after they had gone. Padre Tomas was one of the saints of Granada, a model of regularity—
1 wave-like motion. * dainty eaters.
THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER. 121
punctual in his hour of rising; his hour of taking a paseo ' for an appetite; his hours of eating; his hour of taking his siesta; a his hour of playing his game of tresillo,8 of an even ing, with some of the dames of the cathedral circle; his hour of supping; and his hour of retiring to rest, to gather fresh strength for another day's round of similar duties. He had an easy, sleek mule for his riding; a matronly housekeeper, skilled in preparing tit-bits for his table; and the pet lamb, to bring him his chocolate.
Adieu now to the gay, thoughtless life of the student; the side-glance of a bright eye had been the undoing of him. Day and night he could not get the image of this most mod est damsel out of his mind. He sought the mansion of the padre. Alas! it was above the class of houses accessible to a strolling student like himself. The worthy padre had no sympathy with him; he had never been Estudiante sopista,* obliged to sing for his supper. He blockaded the house by day, catching a glance of the damsel now and then as she appeared at a casement; but these glances only fed his flame without encouraging his hope. He serenaded her balcony at night, and at one time was flattered by the appearance of something white at a window. Alas, it was only the nightcap of the padre. n
Never was lover more devoted ; never damsel more shy ; the poor student was reduced to despair. At length arrived the eve of St. John, when the lower classes of Granada swarm into the country, dance away the afternoon, and pass midsummer's night on the banks of the Darro and the Xenil. Happy are they who, on this eventful night, can wash their faces in those waters just as the cathedral bell tells midnight; for at that precise moment they have a beautifying power.6 The student, having nothing to do, suffered himself to be carried away by the holiday-seeking throng, until he found himself in the
1 walk. 8 game of cards. 6 according to the current popular belief
* nap. * a singing student. in miraculous powers.
122 THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIEK.
narrow valley of the Darro, below the lofty hill and ruddy towers «v£ the Alhambra. The dry bed of the river, the rocks which 1 order it, the terraced gardens which overhang it, were alive w th variegated l groups, dancing under the vines and fig-trees to the sound of the guitar and castanets.
The student remained for some time in doleful dumps, lean ing against one of the huge misshapen stone pomegranates which adorn the ends of the little bridge over the Darro. He cast a wistful glance upon the merry scene, where every cava lier had his dame; or, to speak more appropriately, every Jack his Jill; sighed at his own solitary state, a victim to the black eye of the most unapproachable of damsels, and repined at his ragged garb, which seemed to shut the gate of hope against him. ^ 'By degrees his attention was attracted to a neighbor equally solitary with himself. This was a tall soldier, of a stern aspect and grizzled beard, who seemed posted as a sentry at the opposite pomegranate. His face was bronzed by time; he was arrayed in ancient Spanish armor, with buckler and lance, and stood immovable as a statue. What surprised the student was, that though thus strangely equipped, he was totally unnoticed by the passing throng, albeit that many almost brushed against him.
"This is a city of old-time peculiarities," thought the student, "and doubtless this is one of them with which the inhabitants are too familiar to be surprised." His own curi osity, however, was awakened; and, being of a social disposi tion, he accosted the soldier.
"A rare old suit of armor that which you wear, comrade. May I ask what corps you belong to ? "
The soldier gasped out a reply from a pair of jaws which seemed to have rusted on their hinges.
"The royal guard of Ferdinand a and Isabella."
" Santa Maria! Why, it is three centuries since that corps
i of different colors. 3 Ferdinand V. of Aragon, 1452-1516 ; married Isabella, 1469.
THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER. 123
" And for three centuries have I been mounting guard. Now I trust my tour of duty draws to a close. Dost thou desire fortune? "
The student held up his tattered cloak in reply.
" I understand thee. If thou hast faith and courage, fol low me, and thy fortune is made."
" Softly, comrade. To follow thee would require small cour age in one who has nothing to lose but life and an old guitar, neither of much value; but my faith is of a different matter, and not to be put in temptation. If it be any criminal act by which I am to mend my fortune, think not my ragged cloak will make me undertake it."
The soldier turned on him a look of high displeasure. " My sword," said he, "has never been drawn but in the cause of the faith and the throne. I am a Cristiano viejo; 1 trust in me and fear no evil."
The student followed him, wondering. He observed that no one heeded their conversation, and that the soldier made his way through the various groups of idlers unnoticed, as if invisible.
Crossing the bridge, the soldier led the way by a narrow and steep path past a Moorish mill and aqueduct, and up the ravine which separates the domains of the Generalife from those of the Alhambra. The last ray of the sun shone upon the red battlements of the latter, which beetled far above; and the convent bells were proclaiming the festival of the ensuing day. The ravine was overshadowed by fig-trees, vines, and myrtles, and the outer towers and walls of the fortress. It was dark and lonely, and the twilight-loving bats began to flit about. At length the soldier halted at a remote and ruined tower, apparently intended to guard a Moorish aqueduct. He struck the foundation with the butt-end of his spear. A rumbling sound was heard, and the solid stones yawned apart, leaving an opening as wide as a door.
» old Christian.
124 THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER.
"Enter in the name of the Holy Trinity," said the soldier, "and fear nothing." The student's heart quaked, but he made the sign of the cross, muttered his Ave Maria, and fol lowed his mysterious guide into a deep vault cut out of the solid rock under the tower, and covered with Arabic inscrip tions. The soldier pointed to a stone seat hewn along one side of the vault. "Behold," said he, "my couch for three hundred years." The bewildered student tried to force a joke. " By the blessed St. Anthony," said he, "but you must have slept soundly, 'considering the hardness of your couch."
" On the contrary, sleep has been a stranger to these eyes; incessant watchfulness has been my doom. Listen to my lot. I was one of the royal guards of Ferdinand and Isabella, but was taken prisoner by the Moors in one of their sorties, and confined a captive in this tower. When preparations were made to surrender the fortress to the Christian sovereigns, I was prevailed upon by an alfaqui, a Moorish priest, to aid him in secreting some of the treasures of Boabdil in this vault. I was justly punished for my fault. The alfaqui was an Afri can necromancer,1 and by his infernal arts cast a spell upon me, to guard his treasures. Something must have happened to him, for he never returned, and here I have remained ever since, buried alive. Years and years have rolled away; earth quakes have shaken this hill; I have heard stone by stone of the tower above tumbling to the ground, in the natural opera tion of time; but the spellbound walls of this vault set both time and earthquakes at defiance.
y >*~0nce every hundred years, on the festival of St. John, the enchantment ceases to have thorough sway. I am permitted to go forth and post myself upon the bridge of the Darro, where you met me, waiting until some one shall arrive who may have power to break this magic spell. I have hitherto mounted guard there in vain. I walk as in a cloud, concealed
1 sorcerer ; wizard.
THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER. 125
from mortal sight. You are the first to accost me for now three hundred years. I behold the reason. I see on your linger the seal ring of Solomon the wise, which is proof against all enchantment. With you it remains to deliver me from this awful dungeon, or to leave me to keep guard here for another hundred years."
The student listened to this tale in mute wonderment. He had heard many tales of treasure shut up under strong enchant ment in the vaults of the Alhambra, but had treated them as fables. He now felt the value of the seal ring, which had, in a manner, been given to him by St. Cyprian. Still, though armed by so potent a talisman, it was an awful thing to find himself tete-a-tete ' in such a place with an enchanted soldier, who, according to the laws of nature, ought to have been quietly in his grave for nearly three centuries.
A personage of this kind, however, was quite out of the ordinary run, and not to be trifled with, and he assured him he might rely upon his friendship and good will to do every thing in his power for his deliverance.
" I trust to a motive more powerful than friendship," said the soldier.
He pointed to a ponderous* iron coffer, secured by locks inscribed with Arabic characters. "That coffer," said he, '''contains countless treasure in gold and jewels and precious stones. Break the magic spell by which I am enthralled, and one half of this treasure shall be thine."
"But how am I to do it?"
"The aid of a Christian priest and a Christian maid is necessary; the priest to exorcise 3 the powers of darkness, the damsel to touch this chest with the seal of Solomon. This must be done at night. But have a care. This is solemn work, and not to be effected by the carnal-minded. The priest must be a Crist iano viejo, a model of sanctity; and must mortify the flesh, before he comes here, by a rigorous
I.(tayt-ah-tayt), face to face. a heavy. s to drive out.
126 THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER.
fast of four-and-twenty hours; and as to the maiden, she must be above reproach, and proof against temptation. Linger not in finding such aid. In three days my furlough is at an end; if not delivered before midnight of the third, I shall have to mount guard for another century. ' '
x" Fear not," said the student; " I have in my eye the very priest and damsel you describe ; but how am I to regain admis sion to this tower ? ' '
" The seal of Solomon will open the way for thee."
The student issued forth from the tower much more gayly than he had entered. The wall closed behind him, and remained solid as before.
The next morning he repaired boldly to the mansion of the priest, no longer a poor, strolling student, thrumminj^his w^y with a guitar; but an ambassador from the shactowy world, with enchanted treasures to bestow. No particulars are told of his negotiation/ excepting that the zeal of the worthy priest was easily kindled at the idea of rescuing an old soldier of the faith, and a strong-box of King Chico, from the very clutches of Satan; and then what alms might be dispensed, what churches built, and how many poor relatives enriched with the Moorish treasure!
As to the immaculate handmaid, she was ready to lend her hand, which was all that was required, to the pious work; and if a shy glance now and then might be believed, the ambassa dor began to find favor in her modest eyes.
The greatest difficulty, however, was the fast to which the good padre had to subject himself. Twice he attempted it, and twice the flesh was too strong for the spirit. It was only on the third day that he was enabled to withstand the temptations of the cupboard ; but it was still a question whether he would hold out until the spell was broken.
At a late hour of the night the party groped their way up the ravine, by the light of a lantern, and bearing a basket with
1 bargaining what conditions should be agreed on.
THE LEGEND OF THE ENCHANTED SOLDIER. 127
provisions for exorcising the demon of hunger so soon as the other demons should be laid in the Red Sea.1
The seal of Solomon opened their way into the tower. They found the soldier seated on the enchanted strong-box, awaiting their arrival. The exorcism was performed in due style. The damsel advanced, and touched the locks of the coffer with the seal of Solomon. The lid flew open, and such treasures of gold and jewels and precious stones as flashed upon the eye!
''Here's cut, and come again!" cried the student, exult- ingly, as he proceeded to cram his pockets.
"Fairly and softly," exclaimed the soldier. " Let us get the coffer out entire, and then divide."
They accordingly went to work with might and main, but it was a difficult task; the chest was enormously heavy, and had been embedded there for centuries. While they were thus employed, the good dominie drew on one side, and made a vig orous onslaught on the basket, by way of exorcising the demon of hunger which was raging in his entrails. In a little while a fat capon 2 was devoured, and washed down by a deep potation; 3 and, by way of grace after meat, he gave a kind- hearted kiss to the pet lamb who waited on him. It was quietly done in a corner, but the tell-tale walls babbled it forth as if in triumph. Never was chaste salute more awful in its effects. At the sound the soldier gave a great cry of despair; the coffer, which was half raised, fell back in its place and was locked once more. Priest, student, and damsel found themselves outside of the tower, the wall of which closed with a thundering jar. Alas! the good padre had broken his fast too soon.
When recovered from his surprise, the student would have reentered the tower, but learnt to his dismay that the damsel, in her fright, had let fall the seal of Solomon; it remained within the vault.
In a word, the cathedral bell tolled midnight; the spell
1 between Egypt and Arabia. ' chicken. » drink.
128 THE LEGEND OF THE ElsCiiSfcTED SOLDIER,
was renewed; the soldier was doomed to mount guard for another hundred years; and there he and the treasure remain to this day, and all because the kind-hearted padre kissed his handmaid.
Thus ends the legend as far as it has been authenticated.1 There is a tradition, however, that the student had brought off treasure enough in his pocket to set him up in the world ; that he prospered in his affairs, that the worthy padre gave him the pet lamb in marriage, by way of amends for the blun der in the vault; that the immaculate damsel proved a pattern for wives as she had been for handmaids.
The story of the enchanted soldier remains one of the pop ular traditions of Granada, though told in a variety of ways; the common people affirm that he still mounts guard on mid summer-eve, beside the gigantic stone pomegranate on the bridge of the Darro, but remains invisible excepting to such lucky mortal as may possess the seal of Solomon.
/
1 established by proof.
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FORM NO. DD6
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY BERKELEY, CA 94720
LD21A-40m-3,'72 (Qll738lO)476-A-32
general Liorary
University of California
Berkeley
GENERAL LIBRARY -U.C. BERKELEY
BD00737051
*
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY
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