Don Julian Goes over to the Moors
Julian’s first object is, without exciting suspicion, to remove his
daughter from Toledo. Full of the project of revenge, he crosses the
Straits and repairs to the Court. Wherever he appears is hailed as the
leader to whose prowess the nation owes its safety. Roderich, counting
on the silence of Florinda, receives him with a frank and generous
welcome, and loads him with new honours. Julian, meanwhile, artfully
magnifies the present danger which threatens the frontier, and prepares
all things for his return to Africa. For Florinda he obtains leave of
absence from the queen “to attend upon her mother Frandina, dangerously
ill at Algeciras.” Together they cross the bridge of the Tagus, followed
by the shouting populace, but as his horse’s hoofs strike on the
opposite bank he raises his mailed hand, and shakes it in the air as he
turns his eyes towards the Alcazar.
“My curse rest on thee, Don Roderich!” are his words. “May desolation
fall on thy dwelling and thy realm!”
Journeying on with Florinda, he came to a wild range of mountains near
Consucara--still called the Mountain of Treason--where he meets his
kinsman, Archbishop Opas, and his wife Frandina, a formidable amazon,
who not only followed her lord in battle, but concentrated in herself
all the duplicity of her brother.
She had long hated Roderich for his marriage with Egilona, now she could
revenge herself.
“I would rather die,” she exclaims, as she gazed at Florinda, prostrate
at her feet, “than submit to this outrage!”
“Be satisfied,” replies Don Julian; “she shall be avenged. Opas will
bind our friends by dreadful oaths. I myself will go to Africa to seek
great Mousa, and negotiate his aid.”
* * * * *
From Malaga Julian embarked for Africa with Frandina and Florinda, his
treasure and his household, and ever since the gate in the city wall
through which they passed has been called _Puerta de la Cava_ (Gate of
the Harlot), by which name the unhappy Florinda was known among the
Moors.
The dark tents of the Moslems were spread in a pastoral valley at the
foot of the billowy chain of hills which follow along the north of
Barbary (as it was called of old), outshoots from the great Atlas range
which towers in the far distance. A motley host from Egypt and
Mauretania--Saracens, Tartars, Syrians, Copts, and Berbers,--all,
Christian or Moslem, fair-skinned or negro, united under the banner of
Mousa, Governor of North Africa for the Caliph of Damascus, a man long
past middle life, but who concealed his years cunningly.
As Mousa sits to administer justice among the mixed tribes of his host,
raised on a divan covered with sheep-skins, under a wide-spreading oak,
near which a rapid streamlet runs down into the sea, the flag of Islam
floating beside him, Tháryk, his lieutenant, on his right hand, a bugle
sounds from above among the hills, and the gay apparel of a herald
appears in the distance, attended by a single trumpeter. Cautiously
descending the steep path among a forest-like grove, the herald, bearing
on his tabard the Gothic arms, pauses at the base; the trumpeter sounds
another loud blast, then both ride boldly into the circle gathered round
Mousa. After an obeisance, responded to in silence by the astonished
Moors, he speaks, lowering his cognisance before the chief: “I demand,”
says he, “a safe passage for my master, Don Julian Espatorios of Spain,
under King Roderich the Goth. Can he come without danger to life and
limb and depart when he lists?”
To which Mousa, touching with the tips of his fingers the folds of the
green turban which he wears, then carrying them down and crossing them
on his chest, in an Eastern salute of ceremony replies:
“The demand of Don Julian is granted. Let my noble adversary advance
without fear. So brave a leader shall eat of our salt were he ten times
our foe.”
Clad in a complete suit of armour, and mounted on a powerful charger,
Julian appears. A surcoat of black is over his armour, his legs are
encased in fluted steel, and on his helmet rests a sable plume. Behind
him rides his esquire, bearing his lance and shield. With grave courtesy
he salutes the Moslem chiefs whom he has so lately defeated, then, upon
the motion of Mousa, who rises at his approach, he dismounts, and,
flinging the bridle to his esquire, takes the place assigned to him.
The deep-set eyes of Julian, for he wears his vizor raised, are fixed on
the face of Mousa, who with the refinement of Eastern courtesy, affects
to smile, although much exercised in his mind as to what motive can have
induced his adversary thus voluntarily to place himself in his power.
His lieutenant Tháryk, a rough warrior, gifted with little command over
his countenance, glares at him meanwhile out of his single eye with
unconcealed hatred.
An awkward pause follows, broken only by the low ripple of the brook,
carolling swiftly over the glancing pebbles, which separates Julian from
Mousa, thus as it were symbolising the position of the late combatants
by its slender barrier. At last Julian speaks: “Hitherto, O Emir of the
Faithful, we have met as enemies. Now I am come to offer you my country
and my king. Country,” he repeats bitterly, as a dark frown overshadows
his face, pale under his helmet, “I have none; Roderich the Goth is my
deadliest enemy. He has blasted the honour of my name. Aid me, O Mousa,
to revenge, and all Spain is in your hand.”
Not even the grave immobility of countenance in which the Moslem is
trained to conceal his emotions could altogether prevent the movement of
amazement with which this speech was received by Mousa and Tháryk and
those around. What motive, however, was powerful enough to cause Julian
thus to present himself in the face of the assembled chiefs of Islam
mattered not to Mousa. Julian had spoken, and his heart leaped within
him at the words. How often had he gazed on the low hills along the
Spanish coast washed by the Straits! How often had he longed to possess
himself of the fair plains lying beyond: a land rich with rivers and
pastures, vines, olives, and pomegranates, splendid cities and castles,
flowing with milk and honey--and now it was his own! But, wary by
nature, and cautious by age, the henna-stained warrior (for it was said
of Mousa that, to retain his youthful appearance, he dyed his hair and
beard) pauses ere he replies, and turns towards the sheikhs who sit
around:
“Don Julian,” says he, affecting to knit his bushy eyebrows, “comes here
as a traitor. The same treason may be hidden in his word that he shows
to his own master. But lately he held the garrisons of the Goths against
us in the stronghold of Ceuta, and prevailed. The faithful were driven
out, and the Arab camp broken. How can we credit him? The Koran teaches
that those who deceive an enemy are blessed.”
“Ceuta!” shouts Julian, “yes, O Mousa, you have said well. It is true I
drove your Moslems from the field like sheep before the wolves. Yes!”
(and even as he speaks his voice grows loud and fierce) “on every side I
was hailed as a deliverer, and my heart swelled within me as I thought
upon the victory I had won. Then, in the moment when the shouts of the
Goths were echoing in my ears, and Roderich made of me almost a king, a
letter came to my hand.” Here all expression died out of his face, his
powerful frame seemed to stiffen into stone, but from out of the
upraised bars of his helmet a menacing fire shone in his eyes, which
belied the seeming calm of his demeanour. His gaze was fixed on Mousa,
not as though he perceived him, but rather as if the eyes of his mind
were ranging far away among the scenes which had brought him to this
pass.
“Explain, noble Goth,” replies Mousa, “else is your coming vain.”
Recalled to himself by the Emir’s voice, Julian proceeded; but he
visibly faltered as the words came slowly to his lips. “The dishonour of
my house is my reward. My name is blasted while Roderich lives. For this
purpose am I come.”
“This is a wild tale,” answers Mousa, crossing his arms within the
draperies of his robe. “Your own words proclaim you a traitor. You may
be true. If false, Allah judge you!”
Then it was that Tháryk-el-Tuerto rose and stood forth from among the
sheikhs, his one eye gleaming with a savage joy.
“Doubt not the words of Don Julian, O Emir,” he cries. “The wrong which
Roderich has wrought him would move the lowest Berber of the desert to
revenge. By his offer, O Emir, a new land spreads out before us,
inviting us to conquest. What is to prevent us from becoming the
inheritors of the Goth? Let me go forth with Don Julian and prove the
land.”
The bold words of “the one-eyed Tháryk” find favour with Mousa and the
chiefs. “Allah is great,” is their answer. “Mahomet the Prophet speaks
by the mouth of Tháryk. Let it be as he desires.”
So Julian and Tháryk departed with five galleys and five hundred men;
landed at Algeciras in the Bay of Gibraltar (Gibel Taric to this day, in
memory of him), and returned to Africa with such tidings of the power of
Julian to raise the land, that a formidable invasion was decided on.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: MOHAMMED.]