and
choicest chivalry will soon be at our mercy. Now is the time to show the
courage of men, and by one glorious victory retrieve all that we have
lost. Happy he who falls fighting in the cause of the Prophet! he will
at once be transported to the paradise of the faithful and surrounded by
immortal houris. Happy he who shall survive victorious! he will behold
Granada--an earthly paradise!--once more delivered from its foes and
restored to all its glory." The words of El Zagal were received with
acclamations by his troops, who waited impatiently for the appointed
hour to pour down from their mountain-hold upon the Christians.

CHAPTER XLIX.

RESULT OF THE STRATAGEM OF EL ZAGAL TO SURPRISE KING FERDINAND.

Queen Isabella and her court had remained at Cordova in great anxiety
for the result of the royal expedition. Every day brought tidings of
the difficulties which attended the transportation of the ordnance and
munitions and of the critical state of the army.

While in this state of anxious suspense couriers arrived with all speed
from the frontiers, bringing tidings of the sudden sally of El Zagal
from Granada to surprise the camp. All Cordova was in consternation. The
destruction of the Andalusian chivalry among the mountains of this very
neighborhood was called to mind; it was feared that similar ruin was
about to burst forth from rocks and precipices upon Ferdinand and his
army.

Queen Isabella shared in the public alarm, but it served to rouse all
the energies of her heroic mind. Instead of uttering idle apprehensions,
she sought only how to avert the danger. She called upon all the men of
Andalusia under the age of seventy to arm and hasten to the relief of
their sovereign, and she prepared to set out with the first levies.
The grand cardinal of Spain, old Pedro Gonzalez de Mendoza, in whom the
piety of the saint and the wisdom of the counsellor were mingled with
the fire of the cavalier, offered high pay to all horsemen who would
follow him to aid their king and the Christian cause, and, buckling on
armor, prepared to lead them to the scene of danger.

The summons of the queen roused the quick Andalusian spirit. Warriors
who had long since given up fighting and had sent their sons to battle
now seized the sword and lance rusting on the wall, and marshalled forth
their gray-headed domestics and their grandchildren for the field. The
great dread was, that all aid would arrive too late; El Zagal and his