e, in the
fruition of all good things, he gradually waxed too corpulent for his
corselet, which was hung up in the hall of his episcopal palace, and we
hear no more of his military deeds throughout the residue of the holy
war of Granada.**

* Pulgar.

* *"Don Luis Osorio fue obispo de Jaen desde el ano de 1483, y
presidio in esta. Iglesia hasta el de 1496 in que murio en Flandes, a
donde fue acompanando a la princesa Dona Juana, esposa del archiduque
Don Felipe."--"Espana Sagrada," por Fr. M. Risco, tom. 41, trat. 77,
cap. 4.

King Ferdinand, having completed his ravage of the Vega and kept El
Zagal shut up in his capital, conducted his army back through the Pass
of Lope to rejoin Queen Isabella at Moclin.

The fortresses lately taken being well garrisoned and supplied, he
gave the command of the frontier to his cousin, Don Fadrique de Toledo,
afterward so famous in the Netherlands as the duke of Alva. The campaign
being thus completely crowned with success, the sovereigns returned in
triumph to the city of Cordova.

CHAPTER XLV.

ATTEMPT OF EL ZAGAL UPON THE LIFE OF BOABDIL, AND HOW THE LATTER WAS
ROUSED TO ACTION.

No sooner did the last squadron of Christian cavalry disappear behind
the mountains of Elvira and the note of its trumpets die away upon the
ear than the long-suppressed wrath of Muley el Zagal burst forth. He
determined no longer to be half a king, reigning over a divided kingdom
in a divided capital, but to exterminate by any means, fair or foul,
his nephew Boabdil and his faction. He turned furiously upon those whose
factious conduct had deterred him from sallying upon the foe: some he
punished by confiscations, others by banishment, others by death. Once
undisputed monarch of the entire kingdom, he trusted to his military
skill to retrieve his fortunes and drive the Christians over the
frontier.

Boabdil, however, had again retired to Velez el Blanco, on the confines
of Murcia, where he could avail himself, in case of emergency, of any
assistance or protection afforded him by the policy of Ferdinand. His
defeat had blighted his reviving fortunes, for the people considered him
as inevitably doomed to misfortune. Still, while he lived El Zagal knew
he would be a rallying-point for faction, and liable at any moment to
be elevated into power by the capricious multitude. He had recourse,
therefore, to the most perfidious means to compass his destruction. He
sent ambassadors