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“By the divinity of the Ka’abah, by the shrine of Mecca, are not we like this lion? We pass our lives in sloth and luxury, while the ruler of the Franks is hard at work extending his dominions. The day before yesterday he was in Aquitaine—yesterday he was in Lombardy—to-day he is in Saxony—to-morrow he may be in our kingdom. But do you, the sons of those whom Mussa led along the banks of the Rhone and the Saone—do you feel inclined to sit still and wait his coming? If, gorged with prosperity, you have forgotten the past, the people of Nimes and Arles, of Narbonne and Bordeaux, of Toulouse and Chalons, do not forget it when they gaze on their ruined cities, their desolated cathedrals, their overthrown fortresses. Children of Alsamah, of Abdel-Rahman, Ambissa, and Marsufle, have at the descendants of Charles Martel, Eudes, and Pepin! If these victorious names do not make your hearts leap, will they quail at the recollection of our disasters at Poitiers? The bones of our sires enrich French soil—the harvests the Franks reap have been fattened by the blood of our bravest, which fed the fields. They are ours, but we have been robbed of them. Let us go and win them back again!”
The assembly received this harangue with terrific cheering. Shouts, observations, threats, and warnings were mixed in such inextricable confusion that Marsillus did not know what to listen to. He remarked, however, that two of his emirs held themselves apart and maintained silence. When the tumult had subsided, he beckoned to them to draw near.
“Why do you keep aloof instead of sharing in the general enthusiasm? Answer, Abiathar—answer, Ibn al Arrabi. You are generally more lively when there is a prospect of war.”
“Sire,” said Abiathar, the Alcalde of Huesca, “I grieve to behold you undertaking an enterprise which will bring you no credit.”
A threatening murmur ran through the assembly.
“This is a fearful responsibility you take on yourself,” said, in his turn, Soleyman Jaktan Ibn al Arrabi, Alcalde of Saragossa. “Is it not possible you may have reason to repent having called down upon yourself the wrath of the King of the Franks?”
This speech caused such an outburst of anger, that some of Marsillus’s knights drew their swords and threatened the lives of the two emirs.
“Verily, I feel no gratitude to you,” said the King of Saragossa. “I hope I may attribute the cowardly expressions you have just uttered to your increasing years!”