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faint-hearted," adds Antonio Agapida, "looked upon this torment of the elements as a prodigious event, out of the course of nature. In the weakness of their fears, they connected it with those troubles which occurred in various places, considering it a portent of some great calamity, about to be wrought by the violence of the bloodyhanded El Zagal and his fierce adherents.” *

* See Cura de los Palacios, cap. 91. Palencia, De Bella Granad. lib. 8.

CHAPTER LXX.

HOW KING FERDINAND PREPARED TO BESIEGE THE CITY OF BAZA, AND HOW THE CITY PREPARED FOR DEFENSE.

HE stormy winter had passed away, and the spring of 1489 was advancing; yet the heavy rains had broken up the roads, the mountain brooks were swollen to raging torrents, and the late shallow and peaceful rivers were deep, turbulent, and dangerous. The Christian troops had been summoned to assemble in early spring on the frontiers of Jaen, but were slow in arriving at the appointed place. They were entangled in the miry defiles of the mountains, or fretted impatiently on the banks of impassable floods. It was late in the month of May, before they assembled in sufficient force to attempt the proposed invasion; when, at length a valiant army, of thirteen thousand horse and forty thousand foot, marched merrily over the border. The queen remained at the city of Jaen, with the princeroyal and the princesses her children, accompanied and supported by the venerable cardinal of Spain, and those reverend prelates who assisted in her councils throughout this holy war.

The plan of king Ferdinand was to lay siege to the city of Baza, the key of the remaining possessions of the Moor. That important fortress taken, Guadix and Almeria must soon follow, and then the power of El Zagal would be at an end. As the Catholic king advanced, he had first to secure various castles and strongholds in the vicinity of Baza, which might otherwise harass his army. Some of these made obstinate resistance, especially the town of Zujar. The Christians assailed the walls with various machines, to sap them and batter them down. The brave alcayde, Hubec Abdilbar, opposed force to force and engine to engine. He manned his towers with his bravest warriors, who rained down an iron shower upon the enemy; and he linked cauldrons together by strong chains, and cast fire from them, consuming the wooden engines of their assailants, and those who managed them.

The siege was protracted for several days: the bravery of the alcayde could not save his fortress from an overwhelming foe, but it gained him honorable terms. Ferdinand permitted the garrison and the inhabitants to repair with their effects to Baza; and the gallant Hubec marched forth with the remnant of his force, and took the way to that devoted city.

The delays caused to the invading army by these circumstances, had been diligently improved by El Zagal, who felt that he was now making his last stand for empire, and that this campaign would decide, whether

he should continue a king, or sink into a vassal. He was but a few leagues from Baza, at the city of Guadix. This last was the most important point of his remaining territories, being a kind of bulwark between them and the hostile city of Granada, the seat of his nephew's power. Though he heard of the tide of war, therefore, collecting and rolling towards the city of Baza, he dared not go in person to its assistance. He dreaded that should he leave Guadix, Boabdil would attack him in rear while the Christian army was battling with him in front. El Zagal trusted in the great strength of Baza, to defy any violent assault, and profited by the delays of the Christian army, to supply it with all possible means of defense. He sent thither all the troops he could spare from his garrison of Guadix, and dispatched missives throughout his territories, calling upon all true Moslems to hasten to Baza, and make a devoted stand in defense of their homes, their liberties, and their religion. The cities of Tavernas and Purchena, and the surrounding heights and valleys, responded to his orders, and sent forth their fighting men to the field. The rocky fastnesses of the Alpuxarras resounded with the din of arms; troops of horse and bodies of foot-soldiers were seen winding down the rugged cliffs and defiles of those marble mountains, and hastening towards Baza. Many brave cavaliers of Granada also, spurning the quiet and security of Christian vassalage, secretly left the city and hastened to join their fighting countrymen. The great

CID HIAYA ALNAYAR.

477

dependence of El Zagal, however, was upon the valor and loyalty of his cousin and brother-in-law, Cid Hiaya Alnayar,* who was alcayde of Almeria,—a cavalier experienced in warfare and redoubtable in the field. He wrote to him to leave Almeria, and repair with all speed, at the head of his troops, to Baza. Cid Hiaya departed immediately, with ten thousand of the bravest Moors in the kingdom. These were for the most part hardy mountaineers, tempered to sun and storm, and tried in many a combat. None equaled them for a sally or a skirmish. They were adroit in executing a thousand stratagems, ambuscadoes, and evolutions. Impetuous in their assaults, yet governed in their utmost fury by a word or sign from their commander, at the sound of a trumpet they would check themselves in the midst of their career, wheel off and disperse; and at another sound of a trumpet, they would as suddenly reassemble and return to the attack. They were upon the enemy when least expected, coming like a rushing blast, spreading havoc and consternation, and then passing away in

*This name has generally been written Cidi Yahye. The present mode is adopted on the authority of Alcantara in his history of Granada; who appears to have derived it from Arabic manuscripts, existing in the archives of the marques de Corvera, descendant of Cid Hiaya. The latter (Cid Hiaya) was son of Aben Zelim, a deceased prince of Almeria, and was a lineal descendant from the celebrated Aben Hud, surnamed the Just. The wife of Cid Hiaya was sister of the two Moorish generals, Abul Cacim and Reduan Vanegas, and like them the fruit of the union of a Christian knight, Don Pedro Vanegas, with Cetimerien, a Moorish princess.