THE LAST RAVAGE BEFORE GRANADA.
The ravages of war had as yet spared a little portion of the Vega of
Granada. A green belt of gardens and orchards still flourished round
the city, extending along the banks of the Xenil and the Darro. They had
been the solace and delight of the inhabitants in their happier days,
and contributed to their sustenance in this time of scarcity. Ferdinand
determined to make a final and exterminating ravage to the very walls of
the city, so that there should not remain a single green thing for the
sustenance of man or beast. The eighth of July was the day appointed
for this act of desolation. Boabdil was informed by his spies of the
intention of the Christian king, and prepared to make a desperate
defence. Hernando de Baeza, a Christian who resided with the royal
family in the Alhambra as interpreter, gives in a manuscript memoir an
account of the parting of Boabdil from his family as he went forth to
battle. At an early hour on the appointed day, the eighth of July, he
bathed and perfumed himself, as the Moors of high rank were accustomed
to do when they went forth to peril their lives. Arrayed in complete
armor, he took leave of his mother, his wife, and his sister in the
antechamber of the Tower of Comares. Ayxa la Horra, with her usual
dignity, bestowed on him her benediction and gave him her hand to kiss.
It was a harder parting with his son and his daughter, who hung round
him with sobs and tears: the duenas and doncellas too of the
royal household made the halls of the Alhambra resound with their
lamentations. He then mounted his horse and put himself in front of his
squadrons.*
* Hernando de Baeza, as cited by Alcantara, Hist. Gran., t. 4, c. 18.
The Christian army approached close to the city, and were laying waste
the gardens and orchards when Boabdil sallied forth, surrounded by all
that was left of the flower and chivalry of Granada. There is one place
where even the coward becomes brave--that sacred spot called home.
What, then, must have been the valor of the Moors, a people always of
chivalrous spirit, when the war was thus brought to their thresholds!
They fought among the scenes of their loves and pleasures, the scenes of
their infancy, and the haunts of their domestic life. They fought
under the eyes of their wives and children, their old men and their
maidens--of all that was helpless and all that was dear to them; for all
Granada, crowded on tower and battlement, watched with trembling heart
the fate of this eventful day.
There was not so much one battle as a variety of battles: every garden
and orchard became a scene of deadly contest; every inch of ground was
disputed with an agony of grief and valor by the Moors; every inch of
ground that the Christians advanced they valiantly maintained, but never
did they advance with severer fighting or greater loss of blood.
The cavalry of Muza was in every part of the field; wherever it came it
gave fresh ardor to the fight. The Moorish soldier, fainting with heat,
fatigue, and wounds, was roused to new life at the approach of Muza; and
even he who lay gasping in the agonies of death turned his face toward
him and faintly uttered cheers and blessings as he passed.
The Christians had by this time gained possession of various towers near
the city, whence they had been annoyed by crossbows and arquebuses. The
Moors, scattered in various actions, were severely pressed. Boabdil, at
the head of the cavaliers of his guard, mingling in the fight in various
parts of the field, endeavored to inspirit the foot-soldiers to the
combat. But the Moorish infantry was never to be depended upon. In the
heat of the action a panic seized upon them; they fled, leaving their
sovereign exposed with his handful of cavaliers to an overwhelming
force. Boabdil was on the point of falling into the hands of the
Christians, when, wheeling round, he and his followers threw the reins
on the necks of their steeds and took refuge by dint of hoof within the
walls of the city.*
* Zurita, lib. 20, c. 88.
Muza endeavored to retrieve the fortune of the field. He threw himself
before the retreating infantry, calling upon them to turn and fight for
their homes, their families, for everything sacred and dear to them.
All in vain: totally broken and dismayed, they fled tumultuously for the
gates. Muza would fain have kept the field with his cavalry; but this
devoted band, having stood the brunt of war throughout this desperate
campaign, was fearfully reduced in numbers, and many of the survivors
were crippled and enfeebled by their wounds. Slowly and reluctantly,
therefore, he retreated to the city, his bosom swelling with indignation
and despair. Entering the gates, he ordered them to be closed and
secured with bolts and bars; for he refused to place any further
confidence in the archers and arquebusiers stationed to defend them, and
vowed never more to sally with foot-soldiers to the field.
In the mean time, the artillery thundered from the walls and checked all
further advance of the Christians. King Ferdinand therefore called off
his troops, and returned in triumph to his camp, leaving the beautiful
city of Granada wrapped in the smoke of her fields and gardens and
surrounded by the bodies of her slaughtered children.
Such was the last sally of the Moors in defence of their favorite city.
The French ambassador, who witnessed it, was filled with wonder at the
prowess, the dexterity, and the daring of the Moslems.
In truth, this whole war was an instance, memorable in history, of
the most persevering resolution. For nearly ten years had the war
endured--an almost uninterrupted series of disasters to the Moorish
arms. Their towns had been taken, one after another, and their brethren
slain or led into captivity. Yet they disputed every city and town
and fortress and castle, nay, every rock itself, as if they had been
inspirited by victories. Wherever they could plant foot to fight,
or find wall or cliff whence to launch an arrow, they disputed their
beloved country; and now, when their capital was cut off from all
relief and a whole nation thundered at its gates, they still maintained
defence, as if they hoped some miracle to interpose in their behalf.
Their obstinate resistance (says an ancient chronicler) shows the grief
with which they yielded up the Vega, which was to them a paradise and
heaven. Exerting all the strength of their arms, they embraced, as it
were, that most beloved soil, from which neither wounds nor defeats, nor
death itself, could part them. They stood firm, battling for it with the
united force of love and grief, never drawing back the foot while they
had hands to fight or fortune to befriend them.*
* Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, R. 30, c. 3.