A dreadful confusion took place; the horse trampled upon the foot; the enemy pressed on them with fearful slaughter; those who escaped the sword perished by the stream; the river was choked by the dead bodies of men and horses and by the scattered baggage of the army.
In this scene of horrible carnage fell Boabdil, truly called El Zogoybi, or the Unlucky--an instance, says the ancient chronicler, of the scornful caprice of fortune, dying in defence of the kingdom of another after wanting spirit to die in defence of his own.*
*Marmol, Descrip. de Africa, p. 1, 1. 2, c. 40; idem, Hist. Reb. de los Moros, lib. 1, c. 21.
The aspersion of the chronicler is more caustic than correct. Boabdil never showed a want of courage in the defence of Granada, but he wanted firmness and decision: he was beset from the first by perplexities, and ultimately by the artifices of Ferdinand and the treachery of those in whom he most confided.*
*In revising this account of the ultimate fortunes of Boabdil the author has availed himself of facts recently brought out in Alcantara's History of Granada, which throw strong lights on certain parts of the subject hitherto covered with obscurity.
ZORAYA, THE STAR OF THE MORNING.
Notwithstanding the deadly rivalship of this youthful sultana with Ayxa la Horra, the virtuous mother of Boabdil, and the disasters to which her ambitious intrigues gave rise, the placable spirit of Boabdil bore her no lasting enmity. After the death of his father he treated her with respect and kindness, and evinced a brotherly feeling toward her sons Cad and Nazar. In the capitulations for the surrender of Granada he took care of her interests, and the possessions which he obtained for her were in his neighborhood in the valleys of the Alpuxarras. Zoraya, however, under the influence of Queen Isabella, returned to the Christian faith, the religion of her infancy, and resumed her Spanish name of Isabella. Her two sons, Cad and Nazar, were baptized under the names of Don Fernando and Don Juan de Granada, and were permitted to take the titles of infantas or princes. They intermarried with noble Spanish families, and the dukes of Granada, resident in Valladolid, are descendants of Don Juan (once Nazar), and preserve to the present day the blazon of their royal ancestor, Muley Abul Hassan, and his motto, Le Galib ile Ala, God alone is conqueror.
FATE OF ABEN COMIXA.
An ancient chronicle which has long remained in manuscript, but has been published of late years in the collection of Spanish historical documents,* informs us of the subsequent fortunes of the perfidious Aben Comixa. Discarded and despised by Boabdil for his treachery, he repaired to the Spanish court, and obtained favor in the eyes of the devout queen Isabella by embracing the Christian religion, being baptized under her auspices with the name of Don Juan de Granada.
He even carried his zeal for his newly-adopted creed so far as to become a Franciscan friar. By degrees his affected piety grew cool and the friar's garb became irksome. Taking occasion of the sailing of some Venetian galleys from Almeria, he threw off his religious habit, embarked on board of one of them, and crossed to Africa, where he landed in the dress of a Spanish cavalier.
*Padilla, Cronica de Felipe el Hermosa, cap. 18, y 19, as cited by Alcantara.
In a private interview with Abderraman, the Moorish king of Bujia, he related his whole history, and declared that he had always been and still was at heart a true Mahometan. Such skill had he in inspiring confidence that the Moorish king took him into favor and appointed him governor of Algiers. While enjoying his new dignity a Spanish squadron of four galleys, under the celebrated count Pedro de Navarro, anchored in the harbor in 1509. Aben Comixa paid the squadron a visit of ceremony in his capacity of governor, gave the count repeated fetes, and in secret conversations with him laid open all the affairs of the king of Bujia, and offered, if the count should return with sufficient force, to deliver the city into his hands and aid him in conquering the whole territory. The count hastened back to Spain and made known the proposed treachery to the Cardinal Ximenes, then prime minister of Spain. In the following month of January he was sent with thirty vessels and four thousand soldiers to achieve the enterprise. The expedition of Navarro was successful.
He made himself master of Bujia and seized in triumph on the royal palace, but he found there the base Aben Comixa weltering in his blood and expiring under numerous wounds. His treachery had been discovered, and the vengeance of the king of Bujia had closed his perfidious career.
DEATH OF THE MARQUES OF CADIZ.
The renowned Roderigo Ponce de Leon, marques-duke of Cadiz, was unquestionably the most distinguished among the cavaliers of Spain for his zeal, enterprise, and heroism in the great crusade of Granada.
He began the war by the capture of Alhama; he was engaged in almost every inroad and siege of importance during its continuance; and was present at the surrender of the capital, the closing scene of the conquest. The renown thus acquired was sealed by his death, which happened in the forty-eighth year of his age, almost immediately at the close of his triumphs and before a leaf of his laurels had time to wither. He died at his palace in the city of Seville on the 27th day of August, 1492, but a few months after the surrender of Granada, and of an illness caused by exposures and fatigues undergone in this memorable war. That honest chronicler, Andres Bernaldez, the curate of Los Palacios, who was a contemporary of the marques, draws his portrait from actual knowledge and observation. He was universally cited (says he) as the most perfect model of chivalrous virtue of the age. He was temperate, chaste, and rigidly devout, a benignant commander, a valiant defender of his vassals, a great lover of justice, and an enemy to all flatterers, liars, robbers, traitors, and poltroons.