ubdued; and
they had more to fear from their treacherous ambuscade, than from their
courage in open fight.

In the mean time, El Feri succeeded in rallying his scattered forces,
and in conjunction with those of Caneri, prepared for a second
encounter: he had, however, taken care to distribute the most expert of
his adherents in concealed situations, whence they could more
effectually annoy the Christians with their missiles. These hidden foes
proved extremely fatal to the Spaniards; blows dealt with security, and
from invisible hands, laying prostrate many of their gallant soldiers.
Don Antonio de Leyva had penetrated into the town, with the unrestrained
impetuosity of youth, reckless of all danger; but El Feri and Caneri
disputed their ground inch by inch, whilst the renegade, in another
quarter, was making dreadful havoc amongst his former fellow-countrymen.

Night had now began to lour, but the fury of the combatants, instead of
abating, seemed to acquire additional power, in proportion as death
reduced their numbers. The Moor and the Christian fell, but immediately
their places were supplied by others, equally ready to lay down their
lives at the shrine of victory or revenge. The town of Alhacen was now
become the scene of indiscriminate carnage, and on every side death
appeared busy in counting its victims. The Christians, however, advanced
slowly, in consequence of the destruction dealt amongst them by the
shafts of their concealed adversaries, who had converted every house
into a fortress, whence they could with difficulty be dislodged. In
order, therefore, to foil this deadly warfare, they had recourse to a
still more terrible expedient: they applied the blazing torch to the
inflammable habitations of their enemies; a rising gale seconded their
intentions, and the greedy flames spreading widely round, the town was
soon enveloped in one promiscuous conflagration. Large volumes of red
foggy flame pierced at intervals through the dense columns of smoke that
rose in undulating sweep, flinging around a pestilential suffocation;
whilst the shrill screams of the women, the cries of the wounded, the
despairing shouts of the defenders, the howling of the blast, and the
crackling of the raging blaze, united in one wild reverberation, that
seemed to strike dismay into the heart of the bravest.

But the frenzied courage of the Moors, instead of yielding, acquired new
impetus when they beheld their dwellings a prey to the