CHAPTER XXXII

Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada

by Washington Irving

CHAPTER XXXII, CHRONICLE OF THE CONQUEST OF GRANADA by Washington Irving

HOW THE COUNT DE CABRA ATTEMPTED TO CAPTURE ANOTHER
KING, AND HOW HE FARED IN HIS ATTEMPT.


The elevation of a bold and active veteran to the throne of Granada
in place of its late bedridden king made an important difference in
the aspect of the war, and called for some blow that should dash
the confidence of the Moors in their new monarch and animate the
Christians to fresh exertions.

Don Diego de Cordova, the brave count de Cabra, was at this time in
his castle of Vaena, where he kept a wary eye upon the frontier. It
was now the latter part of August, and he grieved that the summer
should pass away without an inroad into the country of the foe. He
sent out his scouts on the prowl, and they brought him word that
the important post of Moclin was but weakly garrisoned. This was
a castellated town, strongly situated upon a high mountain, partly
surrounded by thick forests and partly girdled by a river. It
defended one of the rugged and solitary passes by which the
Christians were wont to make their inroads, insomuch that the
Moors, in their figurative way, denominated it the shield of Granada.

The count de Cabra sent word to the monarchs of the feeble state
of the garrison, and gave it as his opinion that by a secret and rapid
expedition the place might be surprised. King Ferdinand asked the
advice of his councillors. Some cautioned him against the sanguine
temperament of the count and his heedlessness of danger: Moclin,
they observed, was near to Granada and might be promptly reinforced.
The opinion of the count, however, prevailed, the king considering him
almost infallible in matters of border warfare since his capture of
Boabdil el Chico.

The king departed, therefore, from Cordova, and took post at Alcala
la Real, for the purpose of being near to Moclin. The queen also
proceeded to Vaena, accompanied by her children, Prince Juan and
the princess Isabella, and her great counsellor in all matters, public
and private, spiritual and temporal, the venerable grand cardinal
of Spain.

Nothing could exceed the pride and satisfaction of the loyal count
de Cabra when he saw the stately train winding along the dreary
mountain-roads and entering the gates of Vaena. He received his
royal guests with all due ceremony, and lodged them in the best
apartments that the warrior castle afforded.

King Ferdinand had concerted a wary plan to ensure the success
of the enterprise. The count de Cabra and Don Martin Alonso de
Montemayor were to set forth with their troops so as to reach Moclin
by a certain hour, and to intercept all who should attempt to enter
or should sally from the town. The master of Calatrava, the troops
of the grand cardinal, commanded by the count of Buendia, and
the forces of the bishop of Jaen, led by that belligerent prelate,
amounting in all to four thousand horse and six thousand foot,
were to set off in time to co-operate with the count de Cabra, so
as to surround the town. The king was to follow with his whole
force and encamp before the place.

And here the worthy padre Fray Antonio Agapida breaks forth into a
triumphant eulogy of the pious prelates who thus mingled personally
in these scenes of warfare. As this was a holy crusade (says he),
undertaken for the advancement of the faith and the glory of the
Church, so was it always countenanced and upheld by saintly men;
for the victories of their most Catholic majesties were not followed,
like those of mere worldly sovereigns, by erecting castles and
towers and appointing alcaydes and garrisons, but by the founding
of convents and cathedrals and the establishment of wealthy
bishoprics. Wherefore their majesties were always surrounded in
court or camp, in the cabinet or in the field, by a crowd of ghostly
advisers inspiriting them to the prosecution of this most righteous
war. Nay, the holy men of the Church did not scruple, at times, to
buckle on the cuirass over the cassock, to exchange the crosier for
the lance, and thus with corporal hands and temporal weapons to
fight the good fight of the faith.

But to return from this rhapsody of the worthy friar. The count de
Cabra, being instructed in the complicated arrangements of the king,
marched forth at midnight to execute them punctually. He led his
troops by the little river that winds below Vaena, and so up to the
wild defiles of the mountains, marching all night, and stopping only
in the heat of the following day to repose under the shadowy cliffs
of a deep barranca, calculating to arrive at Moclin exactly in time
to co-operate with the other forces.

The troops had scarcely stretched themselves on the earth to take
repose, when a scout arrived bringing word that El Zagal had
suddenly sallied out of Granada with a strong force, and had
encamped in the vicinity of Moclin. It was plain that the wary Moor
had received information of the intended attack. This, however,
was not the idea that presented itself to the mind of the count de
Cabra. He had captured one king; here was a fair opportunity to
secure another. What a prisoner to deliver into the hands of his
royal mistress! Fired with the thoughts, the good count forgot all
the arrangements of the king; or rather, blinded by former success,
he trusted everything to courage and fortune, and thought that by
one bold swoop he might again bear off the royal prize and wear
his laurels without competition.* His only fear was that the master
of Calatrava and the belligerent bishop might come up in time to
share the glory of the victory; so, ordering every one to horse, this
hot-spirited cavalier pushed on for Moclin without allowing his
troops the necessary time for repose.

*Mariana, lib. 25, c. 17; Abarca, Zurita, etc.


The evening closed as the count arrived in the neighborhood of
Moclin. It was the full of the moon and a bright and cloudless
night. The count was marching through one of those deep valleys or
ravines worn in the Spanish mountains by the brief but tremendous
torrents which prevail during the autumnal rains. It was walled on
each side by lofty and almost perpendicular cliffs, but great masses
of moonlight were thrown into the bottom of the glen, glittering on
the armor of the shining squadrons as they silently passed through
it. Suddenly the war-cry of the Moors rose in various parts of the
valley. "El Zagal! El Zagal!" was shouted from every cliff,
accompanied by showers of missiles that struck down several of the
Christian warriors. The count lifted up his eyes, and beheld, by the
light of the moon, every cliff glistening with Moorish soldiery. The
deadly shower fell thickly round him, and the shining armor of his
followers made them fair objects for the aim of the enemy. The count
saw his brother Gonzalo struck dead by his side; his own horse sank
under him, pierced by four Moorish lances, and he received a wound
in the hand from an arquebuse. He remembered the horrible massacre
of the mountains of Malaga, and feared a similar catastrophe. There
was no time to pause. His brother's horse, freed from his slaughtered
rider, was running at large: seizing the reins, he sprang into the
saddle, called upon his men to follow him, and, wheeling round,
retreated out of the fatal valley.

The Moors, rushing down from the heights, pursued the retreating
Christians. The chase endured for a league, but it was a league of
rough and broken road, where the Christians had to turn and fight at
almost every step. In these short but fierce combats the enemy lost
many cavaliers of note, but the loss of the Christians was infinitely
more grievous, comprising numbers of the noblest warriors of Vaena
and its vicinity. Many of the Christians, disabled by wounds or
exhausted by fatigue, turned aside and endeavored to conceal
themselves among rocks and thickets, but never more rejoined
their companions, being slain or captured by the Moors or perishing
in their wretched retreats.

The arrival of the troops led by the master of Calatrava and the
bishop of Jaen put an end to the rout. El Zagal contented himself
with the laurels he had gained, and, ordering the trumpets to call
off his men from the pursuit, returned in great triumph to Moclin.*

*Zurita, lib. 20, c. 4; Pulgar, Cronica.


Queen Isabella was at Vaena, awaiting with great anxiety the result
of the expedition. She was in a stately apartment of the castle
looking toward the road that winds through the mountains from
Moclin, and regarding the watch-towers on the neighboring heights
in hopes of favorable signals. The prince and princess, her children,
were with her, and her venerable counsellor, the grand cardinal. All
shared in the anxiety of the moment. At length couriers were seen
riding toward the town. They entered its gates, but before they
reached the castle the nature of their tidings was known to the
queen by the shrieks and wailings from the streets below. The
messengers were soon followed by wounded fugitives hastening
home to be relieved or to die among their friends and families. The
whole town resounded with lamentations, for it had lost the flower
of its youth and its bravest warriors. Isabella was a woman of
courageous soul, but her feelings were overpowered by spectacles
of woe on every side: her maternal heart mourned over the death
of so many loyal subjects, who shortly before had rallied round her
with devoted affection, and, losing her usual self-command, she sank
into deep despondency.

In this gloomy state of mind a thousand apprehensions crowded upon
her. She dreaded the confidence which this success would impart
to the Moors; she feared also for the important fortress of Alhama,
the garrison of which had not been reinforced since its foraging
party had been cut off by this same El Zagal. On every side she saw
danger and disaster, and feared that a general reverse was about
to attend the Castilian arms.

The grand cardinal comforted her with both spiritual and worldly
counsel. He told her to recollect that no country was ever conquered
without occasional reverses to the conquerors; that the Moors were
a warlike people, fortified in a rough and mountainous country, where
they never could be conquered by her ancestors; and that, in fact,
her armies had already, in three years, taken more cities than those
of any of her predecessors had been able to do in twelve. He
concluded by offering to take the field himself with three thousand
cavalry, his own retainers, paid and maintained by himself, and
either hasten to the relief of Alhama or undertake any other
expedition Her Majesty might command. The discreet words of the
cardinal soothed the spirit of the queen, who always looked to him
for consolation, and she soon recovered her usual equanimity.

Some of the counsellors of Isabella, of that politic class who seek
to rise by the faults of others, were loud in their censures of the
rashness of the count. The queen defended him with prompt
generosity. "The enterprise," said she, "was rash, but not more
rash than that of Lucena, which was crowned with success, and
which we have all applauded as the height of heroism. Had the
count de Cabra succeeded in capturing the uncle, as he did the
nephew, who is there that would not have praised him to the
skies?"

The magnanimous words of the queen put a stop to all invidious
remarks in her presence, but certain of the courtiers, who had
envied the count the glory gained by his former achievements,
continued to magnify, among themselves his present imprudence;
and we are told by Fray Antonio Agapida that they sneeringly
gave the worthy cavalier the appellation of count de Cabra the
king-catcher.

Ferdinand had reached the place on the frontier called the Fountain
of the King, within three leagues of Moclin, when he heard of the
late disaster. He greatly lamented the precipitation of the count,
but forbore to express himself with severity, for he knew the value
of that loyal and valiant cavalier.* He held a council of war to
determine what course was to be pursued. Some of his cavaliers
advised him to abandon the attempt upon Moclin, the place being
strongly reinforced and the enemy inspirited by his recent victory.
Certain old Spanish hidalgos reminded him that he had but few
Castilian troops in his army, without which stanch soldiery his
predecessors never presumed to enter the Moorish territory, while
others remonstrated that it would be beneath the dignity of the king
to retire from an enterprise on account of the defeat of a single
cavalier and his retainers. In this way the king was distracted by a
multitude of counsellors, when, fortunately, a letter from the queen
put an end to his perplexities. Proceed we in the next chapter to
relate what was the purport of that letter.

*Abarca, Anales de Aragon.