FATE OF HAMET EL ZEGRI.

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mitted, that though a Moor in blood, he possessed the Christian beart of a Castilian hidalgo.*

As to Hamet el Zegri, on being asked what moved him to such hardened obstinacy, he replied, "When I undertook my command, I pledged myself to fight in defence of my faith, my city, and my sovereign, until slain or made prisoner; and depend upon it, had I had men to stand by me, I should have died fighting, instead of thus tamely surrendering myself without a weapon in my hand."

"Such," says the pious Fray Antonio Agapida, "was the diabolical hatred and stiff-necked opposition of this infidel to our holy cause. But he was justly served by our most Catholic and high-minded sovereign, for his pertinacious defence of the city; for Ferdinand ordered that he should be loaded with chains and thrown into a dungeon." He was subsequently retained in rigorous confinement at Carmona.f

* Cura de los Palacios, cap. 84.

+ Pulgar, part 3, cap. 93. Pietro Martyr, lib. 1, cap. 69. Alantara, Hist Granada, vol. 4, c. 18.

16

CHAPTER LXVI.

How the Castilian sovereigns took possession of the city of Malaga, and how King Ferdinand signalized himself by his skill in bargaining with the inhabitants for their ransom.

ONE of the first cares of the conquerors, on entering Malaga, was to search for Christian captives. Nearly sixteen hundred men and women were found, and among them were persons of distinction. Some of them had been ten, fifteen, and twenty years in captivity. Many had been servants to the Moors, or laborers on public works, and some had passed their time in chains and dungeons. Preparations were made to celebrate their deliverance as a Christian triumph. A tent was erected not far from the city, and furnished with an altar and all the solemn decorations of a chapel. Here the king and queen waited to receive the Christian captives. They were assembled in the city, and marshalled forth in piteous procession. Many of them had still the chains and shackles on their legs; they were wasted with famine, their hair and beards overgrown and matted, and their faces pale and haggard from long confinement. When they found themselves restored to liberty, and surrounded by their countrymen, some stared wildly about as if in a dream, others gave way to frantic transports, but most of them wept for joy. All present were

RELEASE OF CHRISTIAN CAPTIVES.

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moved to tears, by so touching a spectacle. When the procession arrived at what is called the Gate of Granada, it was met by a great concourse from the camp, with crosses and pennons, who turned and followed the captives, singing hymns of praise and thanksgiving. When they came in presence of the king and queen, they threw themselves on their knees and would have kissed their feet, as their saviours and deliverers; but the sovereigns prevented such humiliation, and graciously extended to them their hands. They then prostrated themselves before the altar, and all present joined them in giving thanks to God for their liberation from this cruel bondage. By orders of the king and queen, their chains were then taken off, and they were clad in decent raiment, and food was set before them. After they had ate and drunk, and were refreshed and invigorated, they were provided with money and all things necessary for their journey, and sent joyfully to their homes.

nature.

While the old chroniclers dwell with becoming enthusiasm on this pure and affecting triumph of humanity, they go on, in a strain of equal eulogy, to describe a spectacle of a far different It so happened, that there were found in the city twelve of those renegado Christians who had deserted to the Moors, and conveyed false intelligence, during the siege: a barbarous species of punishment was inflicted upon them, borrowed, it is said, from the Moors, and peculiar to these wars. They were tied to stakes in a public place, and horsemen exercised their skill in transpiercing them with pointed reeds, hurled at them while carcering at full speed, until the miserable victims expired beneath their wounds. Several apostate Moors, also, who, having embraced Christianity, had afterwards relapsed into their early faith, and had taken refuge in Malaga from the vengeance of the Inquisi tion, were publicly burnt. These," says an old Jesuit bistorian, exultingly, "these were the tilts of reeds and the illuminations

most pleasing for this victorious festival, and for the Cathclic piety of our sovereigns !"*

When the city was cleansed from the impurities and offensive odors which had collected during the siege, the bishops and other clergy who accompanied the court, and the choir of the royal chapel, walked in procession to the principal mosque, which was consecrated, and entitled Santa Maria de la Incarnacion. This done, the king and queen entered the city, accompanied by the grand cardinal of Spain, and the principal nobles and cavaliers of the army, and heard a solemn mass. The church was then elevated into a cathedral, and Malaga was made a bishopric, and many of the neighboring towns were comprehended in its diocese The queen took up her residence in the Alcazaba, in the apart ments of her valiant treasurer, Ruy Lopez, whence she had a view of the whole city; but the king established his quarters in the warrior castle of Gibralfaro.

And now came to be considered the disposition of the Moorish prisoners. All those who were strangers in the city, and had either taken refuge there, or had entered to defend it, were at once considered slaves. They were divided into three lots: one was set apart for the service of God, in redeeming Christian captives from bondage, either in the kingdom of Granada or in Africa; the second lot was divided among those who had aided either in field or cabinet, in the present siege, according to their rank; the third was appropriated to defray, by their sale, the great expenses incurred in the reduction of the place. A hundred of the Gomeres were sent as presents to Pope Innocent VIIL,

"Los renegados fuernon acañavarcados: y los conversos quemados. y estos fueron las cañas, y luminarias mas alegres, por la fiesta de la vitoria, para la piedad Catholica de nuestros Reyes."-Abarca. Anales de Aragon, tom. 2, Rey xxx.. c. 3.

REWARD OF THE MERCHANT.

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and were fed in triumph through the streets of Rome, and after wards converted to Christianity. Fifty Moorish maidens were sent to the queen Joanna of Naples, sister to king Ferdinand, and thirty to the queen of Portugal. Isabella made presents of others to the ladies of her household, and of the noble families of Spain.

Among the inhabitants of Malaga were four hundred and fifty Moorish Jews, for the most part women, speaking the Arabic language, and dressed in the Moresco fashion. These were ransomed by a wealthy Jew of Castile, farmer-general of the royal revenues derived from the Jews of Spain. He agreed to make up, within a certain time, the sum of twenty thousand doblas, or pistoles of gold; all the money and jewels of the captives being taken in part payment. They were sent to Castile, in two armed galleys. As to Ali Dordux, such favors and honors were heaped upon him by the Spanish sovereigns for his considerate mediation in the surrender, that the disinterestedness of his conduct has often been called in question. He was appointed chief justice and alcayde of the Mudaxares or Moorish subjects, and was presented with twenty houses, one public bakery, and several or chards, vineyards, and tracts of open country. He retired to Antiquera, where he died several years afterwards, leaving his estate and name to his son Mohamed Dordux. The latter embraced the Christian faith, as did his wife, the daughter of a Moorish noble. On being baptized he received the name of Don Fernando de Malaga, his wife that of Isabella, after the queen. They were incorporated with the nobility of Castile, and their descendants still bear the name of Malaga.*

As to the great mass of Moorish inhabitants, they implored that they might not be scattered and sold into captivity, but

* Conversaciones Malagueñas, 26, as cited by Alcantara in his History of Granada, vol. 4 c. 18.