"Doubt not our promises," said Ferdinand, kindly, "nor that thou shalt
regain from our friendship the prosperity of which the fortune of war has
deprived thee."
Then drawing from his finger a gold ring set with a precious stone,
Boabdil presented it to the Count of Tendilla, who, he was informed, was
to be governor of the city, saying,--
"With this ring Granada has been governed. Take it and govern with it, and
God make you more fortunate than I."
He then proceeded to the village of Armilla, where Queen Isabella
remained. She received him with the utmost courtesy and graciousness, and
delivered to him his son, who had been held as a hostage for the
fulfilment of the capitulation. Boabdil pressed the child tenderly to his
bosom, and moved on until he had joined his family, from whom and their
attendants the shouts and strains of music of the victorious army drew
tears and moans.
At length the weeping train reached the summit of an eminence about two
leagues distant which commanded the last view of Granada. Here they paused
for a look of farewell at the beautiful and beloved city, whose towers and
minarets gleamed brightly before them in the sunshine. While they still
gazed a peal of artillery, faint with distance, told them that the city
was taken possession of and was lost to the Moorish kings forever. Boabdil
could no longer contain himself.
"Allah achbar! God is great!" he murmured, tears accompanying his words of
resignation.
His mother, a woman of intrepid soul, was indignant at this display of
weakness.
"You do well," she cried, "to weep like a woman for what you failed to
defend like a man."
Others strove to console the king, but his tears were not to be
restrained.
"Allah achbar!" he exclaimed again; "when did misfortunes ever equal
mine?"
The hill where this took place afterwards became known as Feg Allah
Achbar; but the point of view where Boabdil obtained the last prospect of
Granada is called by the Spaniards "_El ultimo suspiro del Moro_" or "The
last sigh of the Moor."
As Boabdil thus took his last look at beautiful Granada, it behooves us to
take a final backward glance at Arabian Spain, from whose history we have
drawn so much of interest and romance. In this hospitable realm
civilization dwelt when few traces of it existed elsewhere. Here luxury
reigned while barbarism prevailed widely in Europe. We are told that in
Cordova a man might walk ten miles by the light of the public lamps, while
centuries afterwards there was not a single public lamp in London streets.
Its avenues were solidly paved, while centuries afterwards the people of
Paris, on rainy days, stepped from their door-sills into mud ankle-deep.
The dwellings were marked by beauty and luxury, while the people of
Europe, as a rule in that semi-barbaric period, dwelt in miserable huts,
dressed in leather, and lived on the rudest and least nutritive food.
The rulers of France, England, and Germany lived in rude buildings without
chimneys or windows, with a hole in the roof for the smoke to escape, at a
time when the royal halls of Arabian Spain were visions of grace and
beauty. The residences of the Arabs had marble balconies overhanging
orange-gardens; their floors and walls were frequently of rich and
graceful mosaic; fountains gushed in their courts, quicksilver often
taking the place of water, and falling in a glistening spray. In summer
cool air was drawn into the apartments through ventilating towers; in
winter warm and perfumed air was discharged through hidden passages. From
the ceilings, corniced with fretted gold, great chandeliers hung. Here
were clusters of frail marble columns, which, in the boudoirs of the
sultanas, gave way to verd-antique incrusted with lapis lazuli. The
furniture was of sandal- or citron-wood, richly inlaid with gold, silver,
or precious minerals. Tapestry hid the walls, Persian carpets covered the
floors, pillows and couches of elegant forms were spread about the rooms.
Great care was given to bathing and personal cleanliness at a time when
such a thought had not dawned upon Christian Europe. Their
pleasure-gardens were of unequalled beauty, and were rich with flowers and
fruits. In short, in this brief space it is impossible to give more than a
bare outline of the marvellous luxury which surrounded this people,
recently come from the deserts of Arabia, at a time when most of the
remainder of Europe was plunged into the rudest barbarism.
Much might be said of their libraries, their universities, their scholars
and scientists, and the magnificence of their architecture, of which
abundant examples still remain in the cities of Spain, the Alhambra of
Granada, the palace which Boabdil so reluctantly left, being almost
without an equal for lightness, grace, and architectural beauty in the
cities of the world. Well might the dethroned monarch look back with
bitter regret upon this rarest monument of the Arabian civilization and
give vent, in farewell to its far-seen towers, to "The last sigh of the
Moor."