Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/129

105 SURRENDER OF THE CAPITAL. 105 tries, and kept in pay bodies of mercenaries, as the chapter XV. Swiss for example, reputed the best disciplined - — '— — troops of that day. In this admirable school, the Spanish soldier was gradually trained to patient endurance, fortitude, and thorough subordination ; and those celebrated captains were formed, with that invincible infantry, which in the beginning of the sixteenth century spread the military fame of their country over all Christendom. But, with all our sympathy for the conquerors, it Jj^^g^^oorf is impossible, without a deep feeling of regret, to contemplate the decay and final extinction of a race, who had made such high advances in civiliza- tion as the Spanish Arabs ; to see them driven from the stately palaces reared by their own hands, wan- dering as exiles over the lands, which still blos- somed with the fruits of their industry, and wasting away under persecution, until their very name as a nation was blotted out from the map of history. ^^ It must be admitted, however, that they had long- since reached their utmost limit of advancement as a people. The light shed over their history shines from distant ages ; for, during the later period of their existence, they appear to have reposed in a state of torpid, luxurious indulgence, which would seem to argue, that, when causes of external ex- citement were withdrawn, the inherent vices of 24 The African descendants of erations, and perhaps still continue, the Spanish Moors, unable wholly to put up a petition to that ef- to relinquish the hope of restora- feet in their mosques every Friday, tion to the delicious abodes of their Pedraza, Antiguedad de Granada, ancestors, continued for many gen- fol. 7. VOL. II. 14