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I soon found the place I was in was not for my settlement, particularly because it was upon a low moorish ground near the sea, and I believed would not be wholesome; and more particularly because there was no fresh water near it. So I resolved to find a more healthy and more convenient spot of ground. I consulted several things in my situation, which I found would be proper for me.

Through the later mediaeval centuries, in the process of reconquest, Moorish populations which made formal surrender were preserved as subjects of the Christian kings; while those that were taken prisoners in battle were retained as slaves.

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.

She reads and writes a little, and this, with a mind prone to religious ideas, constitutes her a saint. Few are the Moorish or Arab female saints, for woman is hardly dealt with by the Mahometan faith. There is a celebrated tutelary goddess, or Maraboutah, near the city of Tunis, who is invoked by all the women of the country, and a pilgrimage is made to her shrine every morning.

The name Alhama, met with in several parts of Spain, merely denotes "the hot," alluding to springs of that character which are in most instances still active. This is the case at the Alhama between Malaga and Granáda, where the baths are worth a visit. The Moorish bath is called the strong one, being nearer the spring.

The alley up which we were moving was planted on each side with that remarkable tree or plant, for I know not which to call it, the giant aloe, which is called in Spanish, pita, and in Moorish, gursean. It rises here to a height almost as magnificent as on the African shore.

For a while the Spaniard remained alone. The room was not so brightly illuminated as many through which he had come on his way across the Palace. Light filtered through swinging lamps of wrought metal encrusted with prisms of green and amber and garnet. The Moorish scheme depends in part upon its shadows. Finally a gentleman entered from a balcony. He was neither in uniform nor in evening dress.

The Christian army beneath the town, being also refreshed by a morning's repast, advanced vigorously to the attack of the walls. They planted their scaling-ladders, and, swarming up, sword in hand, fought fiercely with the Moorish soldiery upon the ramparts.

There were one or two Moorish stools heaped with a motley collection of ivories and gold and silver cigarette cases and knick-knacks, and against the partition that separated the two rooms stood a quaintly carved old wooden chest. Though the furniture was scanty and made the tent seem even more spacious than it really was, the whole room had an air of barbaric splendour.

But Don Carlos still lay senseless; and yielding to popular clamour, the doctors called in the aid of a certain Moorish doctor, from Valencia, named Priotarete, whose unguents, it was reported, had achieved many miraculous cures.