call, and retired into the
city, mortified, it is said, that the Christian cavaliers should witness
these fratricidal discords between true believers.

Don Fadrique, still distrustful, drew off to a distance, and encamped
for the night near the bridge of Cabillas.

Early in the morning a Moorish cavalier with an escort approached the
advance guard, and his trumpets sounded a parley. He craved an audience
as an envoy from El Zagal, and was admitted to the tent of Don Fadrique.
El Zagal had learnt that the Christian troops had come to aid his
nephew, and now offered to enter into an alliance with them on terms
still more advantageous than those of Boabdil. The wary Don Fadrique
listened to the Moor with apparent complacency, but determined to send
one of his most intrepid and discreet cavaliers, under the protection of
a flag, to hold a conference with the old king within the very walls of
the Alhambra. The officer chosen for this important mission was Don Juan
de Vera, the same stanch and devout cavalier who in times preceding the
war had borne the message from the Castilian sovereigns to old Muley
Abul Hassan demanding arrears of tribute. Don Juan was received
with great ceremony by the king. No records remain of his diplomatic
negotiations, but they extended into the night, and, it being too late
to return to camp, he was sumptuously lodged in an apartment of the
Alhambra. In the morning one of the courtiers about the palace, somewhat
given to jest and raillery, invited Don Juan to a ceremony which some
of the alfaquis were about to celebrate in the mosque of the palace.
The religious punctilio of this most discreet cavalier immediately took
umbrage at what he conceived a banter. "The servants of Queen Isabella
of Castile," replied he, stiffly and sternly, "who bear on their armor
the cross of St. Jago, never enter the temples of Mahomet but to level
them to the earth and trample on them."

The Moslem courtier retired somewhat disconcerted by this Catholic but
not very courteous reply, and reported it to a renegado of Antiquera.
The latter, eager, like all renegados, to show devotion to his
newly-adopted creed, volunteered to return with the courtier and have a
tilt of words with the testy diplomatist. They found Don Juan playing
a game of chess with the alcayde of the Alhambra, and took occasion to
indulge in sportive comments on some of the mysteries of the Christian
religion. The ire of this devout knight and disc