Page:The Coming Race, etc - 1888.djvu/237

Rh hastened to bury himself in the Alhambra. As he passed, dejectedly, into the women's apartments, his stern mother met him.

"My son," she said, bitterly, "dost thou return, and not a conqueror?"

Before Boabdil could reply, a light and rapid step sped through the glittering arcades ; and weeping with joy, and breaking all the Oriental restraints, Amine fell upon his bosom. " My beloved! my king! light of mine eyes! thou hast returned. Welcome—for thou art safe."

The different form of these several salutations struck Boabdil forcibly. " Thou seest, my mother," said he, "how great the contrast between those who love us from affection, and those who love us from pride. In adversity, God keep me, O my mother, from thy tongue!"

"But I love thee from pride, too," murmured Amine; "and for that reason is thine adversity dear to me, for it takes thee from the world to make thee more mine own: and I am proud of the afflictions that my hero shares with his slave."

"Lights there, and the banquet!" cried the king, turning from his haughty mother; "we will feast and be merry while we may. My adored Amine, kiss me!"

Proud, melancholy, and sensitive as he was in that hour of reverse, Boabdil felt no grief: such balm has Love for our sorrows, when its wings are borrowed from the dove! And although the laws of the Eastern life confined to the narrow walls of a harem the sphere of Amine's gentle influence; although, even in romance, THE NATURAL compels us to portray her vivid and rich colours only in a faint and hasty sketch, yet still are left to the outline the loveliest and the noblest features of the sex—the spirit to arouse us to exertion, the softness to console us in our fall!

While Boabdil and the body of the army remained in the city, Muza, with a chosen detachment of the horse, scoured the country to visit the newly acquired cities, and sustain their courage.

From this charge he was recalled by the army of Ferdinand, which once more poured down into the Vega, completely devastated its harvests, and then swept back to consummate the conquests of the revolted towns. To this irruption succeeded an interval of peace—the calm before the storm. From every part of Spain, the most chivalric and resolute of the Moors, taking advantage of the pause in the contest, flocked to Granada; and that city became the focus of all that paganism in Europe possessed of brave and determined spirits.

At length, Ferdinand, completing his conquests, and having refilled his treasury, mustered the whole force of his dominions—forty