OF THE DISASTERS WHICH BEFELL THE CAMP.
While the Christian camp, thus gay and gorgeous, spread itself out like
a holiday pageant before the walls of Baza, while a long line of beasts
of burden laden with provisions and luxuries were seen descending the
valley from morning till night, and pouring into the camp a continued
stream of abundance, the unfortunate garrison found their resources
rapidly wasting away, and famine already began to pinch the peaceful
part of the community.
Cid Hiaya had acted with great spirit and valor as long as there was any
prospect of success; but he began to lose his usual fire and animation,
and was observed to pace the walls of Baza with a pensive air, casting
many a wistful look toward the Christian camp, and sinking into profound
reveries and cogitations. The veteran alcayde, Mohammed Ibn Hassan,
noticed these desponding moods, and endeavored to rally the spirits of
the prince. “The rainy season is at hand,” would he cry; “the floods
will soon pour down from the mountains; the rivers will overflow their
banks and inundate the valleys. The Christian king already begins to
waver; he dare not linger and encounter such a season in a plain cut up
by canals and rivulets. A single wintry storm from our mountains would
wash away his canvas city and sweep off those gay pavilions like wreaths
of snow before the blast.”
The prince Cid Hiaya took heart at these words, and counted the days as
they passed until the stormy season should commence. As he watched the
Christian camp he beheld it one morning in universal commotion: there
was an unusual sound of hammers in every part, as if some new engines
of war were constructing. At length, to his astonishment, the walls and
roofs of houses began to appear above the bulwarks. In a little while
there were above a thousand edifices of wood and plaster erected,
covered with tiles taken from the demolished towers of the orchards
and bearing the pennons of various commanders and cavaliers, while the
common soldiery constructed huts of clay and branches of trees thatched
with straw. Thus, to the dismay of the Moors, within four days the light
tents and gay pavilions which had whitened their hills and plains passed
away like summer clouds, and the unsubstantial camp assumed the solid
appearance of a city laid out into streets and squares. In the centre
rose a large edifice which overlooked the whole, and the royal standard
of Aragon and Castile, proudly floating above it, showed it to be the
palace of the king.*
* Cura de los Palacios, Pulgar, etc.
Ferdinand had taken the sudden resolution thus to turn his camp into a
city, partly to provide against the approaching season, and partly to
convince the Moors of his fixed determination to continue the siege. In
their haste to erect their dwellings, however, the Spanish cavaliers had
not properly considered the nature of the climate. For the greater part
of the year there scarcely falls a drop of rain on the thirsty soil of
Andalusia. The ramblas, or dry channels of the torrents, remain deep
and arid gashes and clefts in the sides of the mountains; the perennial
streams shrink up to mere threads of water, which, trickling down the
bottoms of the deep barrancas, or ravines, scarce feed and keep alive
the rivers of the valleys. The rivers, almost lost in their wide and
naked beds, seem like thirsty rills winding in serpentine mazes through
deserts of sand and stones, and so shallow and tranquil in their course
as to be forded in safety in almost every part. One autumnal tempest,
however, changes the whole face of nature: the clouds break in deluges
among the vast congregation of mountains; the ramblas are suddenly
filled with raging floods; the tinkling rivulets swell to thundering
torrents that come roaring down from the mountains, tumbling great
masses of rocks in their career. The late meandering river spreads over
its once-naked bed, lashes its surges against the banks, and rushes like
a wide and foaming inundation through the valley.
Scarcely had the Christians finished their slightly built edifices when
an autumnal tempest of the kind came scouring from the mountains. The
camp was immediately overflowed. Many of the houses, undermined by
the floods or beaten by the rain, crumbled away and fell to the earth,
burying man and beast beneath their ruins. Several valuable lives were
lost, and great numbers of horses and other animals perished. To add to
the distress and confusion of the camp, the daily supply of provisions
suddenly ceased, for the rain had broken up the roads and rendered the
rivers impassable. A panic seized upon the army, for the cessation of
a single day’s supply produced a scarcity of bread and provender.
Fortunately, the rain was but transient: the torrents rushed by and
ceased; the rivers shrank back again to their narrow channels, and the
convoys which had been detained upon their banks arrived safely in the
camp.
No sooner did Queen Isabella hear of this interruption of her supplies
than, with her usual vigilance and activity, she provided against its
recurrence. She despatched six thousand foot-soldiers, under the command
of experienced officers, to repair the roads and to make causeways and
bridges for the distance of seven Spanish leagues. The troops also who
had been stationed in the mountains by the king to guard the defiles
made two paths, one for the convoys going to the camp, and the other
for those returning, that they might not meet and impede each other. The
edifices which had been demolished by the late floods were rebuilt in
a firmer manner, and precautions were taken to protect the camp from
future inundations.