Page:The Coming Race, etc - 1888.djvu/185

Rh blood. But this morning I found him without the walls, not far from the Spaniard's camp."

"Ha!" cried the king, quickly, "and what said he?"

"Little, but in hints; sheltering himself, by loose hints, under thy name."

"He! what dared he own?—Muza, what were those hints?"

The Moor here recounted the interview with Almamen, his detention, his inactivity in the battle, and his subsequent capture by the Spaniards. The king listened attentively, and regained his composure.

"It is a strange and awful man," said he, after a pause. "Guards and chains will not detain him. Ere long he will return. But thou, at least, Muza, are henceforth free, alike from the suspicion of the living, and the warnings of the dead. No, my friend," continued Boabdil, with generous warmth; "it is better to lose a crown, to lose life itself, than confidence in a heart like thine. Come, let us inspect this magic tablet; perchance—and how my heart bounds as I utter the hope!—the hour may have arrived."

UZA returned from his visit to Boabdil with a thoughtful and depressed spirit. His arguments had failed to induce the king to disdain the command of the magic dial, which still forbade him to arm against the invaders ; and although the royal favour was no longer withdrawn from himself, the Moor felt that such favour hung upon a capricious and uncertain tenure so long as his sovereign was the slave of superstition or imposture. But that noble warrior, whose character the adversity of his country had singularly exalted and refined, even while increasing its natural fierceness, thought little of himself in comparison with the evils and misfortunes which the king's continued irresolution must bring upon Granada.

"So brave, and yet so weak (thought he); so weak, and yet so obstinate; so wise a reasoner, yet so credulous a dupe! Unhappy Boabdil! the stars, indeed, seem to fight against thee, and their