Page:The Coming Race, etc - 1888.djvu/197

Rh "Isabel, the queen of Castille, must be satisfied of the justice of all our actions."

"And, should it be proved that thy throne or life were endangered, and that magic was exercised to entrap her royal son into a passion for a Jewish maiden, which the Church holds a crime worthy of excommunication itself, surely, instead of counteracting, she would assist our schemes."

"Holy friend," said Ferdinand, with energy, "ever a comforter, both for this world and the next, to thee, and to the new powers intrusted to thee, we commit this charge; see to it at once; time presses Granada is obstinate the treasury waxes low."

"Son, thou hast said enough," replied the Dominican, closing his eyes, and muttering a short thanksgiving. "Now then to my task."

"Yet stay," said the king, with an altered visage; " follow me to my oratory within : my heart is heavy, and I would fain seek the solace of the confessional."

The monk obeyed: and while Fsrdinand, whose wonderful abilities were mingled with the weakest superstition, who persecuted from policy, yet believed, in his own heart, that he punished but from piety, confessed with penitent tears, the grave offences of aves forgotten, and beads untold; and while the Dominican admonished, rebuked, or soothed, neither prince nor monk ever dreamt that there was an error to confess, in, or a penance to be adjudged to, the cruelty that tortured a fellow-being, or the avarice that sought pretences for the extortion of a whole people.

T was the dead of night the army was hushed in sleep when four soldiers, belonging to the Holy Brotherhood, bearing with them one whose manacles proclaimed him a prisoner, passed in steady silence to a huge tent in the neighbourhood of the royal pavilion. A deep dyke, formidable barricadoes, and sentries stationed at frequent intervals, testified the estimation in which the safety of this segment of the camp was held. The tent to which the soldiers approached was, in extent, larger than even the king's pavilion itself—a mansion of canvas, surrounded