capture, in 997, Santiago, the shrine and sepulchre of the patron
saint of Spain. "No Moslem general had ever penetrated as far as that
city, which is in an inaccessible position in the most remote part of
Galicia, and is a sanctuary regarded by the Christians with veneration
equal to that which the Moslems entertain for the Kaaba,"--but
Al-mansur, supplied with provisions from a fleet which accompanied his
march along the coast of Portugal, forced his way through the Galician
defiles, and occupied the holy city without opposition--all the
inhabitants having fled, according to Ibn Hayyan, with the exception
of an old monk who tended the tomb. The city and cathedral were
leveled with the ground; the shrine alone was left untouched in the
midst of the ruins, from the belief of the Moslems that St James was
the brother of the Messiah--and the church-bells were conveyed on the
shoulders of the captives to Cordova, where they were suspended as
lamps in the great mosque, to commemorate the triumph of Islam in the
principal seat of Christian worship and pilgrimage.

Such was the depression produced among the Christians by these
repeated disasters, that, if we may believe Al-Makkari, "one of
Al-mansur's soldiers having left his banner fixed in the earth on a
mountain before a Christian town, the garrison dared not come out for
several days after the retreat of the Moslem army, not knowing what
troops might be behind it." The pressing sense of common danger, at
length extinguished ("for the first time perhaps," as Conde remarks)
the feuds of the Christian princes; and in the spring of 1002 the
united forces of the Count of Castile, Sancho the Great of Navarre,
and the King of Leon, confronted the Moslem host at Kalat-an-nosor,[23]
(the Castle of the Eagles,) on the frontiers of Old Castile. The
mighty conflict which ensued is very briefly dismissed by
Al-Makkari--"Al-mansur attacked and defeated them with great
loss"--but a far different account is given by the Christian
chroniclers, who represent the Moslems as only saved from a total
overthrow by the approach of night. It seems, in truth, to have been
nearly a drawn battle, with immense carnage on both sides; but the
advantage was decidedly with the Christians, who retained possession
of the field; while Al-mansur, weakened by the loss of great numbers
of his best men and officers, abandoned his camp, and retreated the
next day across the Douro. In all his fifty-two campaign