Not long afterwards, while Alfonso was deliberating whether he should not again betray his vassal Mohammed by countenancing his rebellious subjects, he was recalled to Castile by a conspiracy of the nobles, headed by the Count de Lara and Don Philip, the brother of the King. The fatal indecision of his character was never more strikingly displayed than in his treatment of the conspirators, who defied the royal authority with impunity in the Cortes and the palace alike, and who finally, to the number of several thousand, including their retainers, renouncing their suzerainty, as permitted by feudal law, took refuge at the court of Granada, plundering and ravaging their own country on the way and sparing neither the rich possessions of the crown nor the sacred edifices of the Church. Mohammed welcomed this seasonable reinforcement to his prestige and power with more than regal hospitality; his distinguished guests were quartered in magnificent palaces, the most attractive national spectacles were arranged for their amusement; they received assurances of the substantial support of the Emir in the disputes with their sovereign; while, in the mean time, the shrewd and enterprising Moslem secured without difficulty the promise of their aid in the impending and doubtful contest with his defiant vassals. An expedition was organized for that purpose; the Christian knights mingled with the train of the Moslem sovereign, and a gallant array issued from the gates of Granada. But before the allied army had advanced far from the capital a sudden illness seized the Emir, and he expired in his tent within sight of the city which he had done so much to adorn.
The founder of a famous dynasty, Mohammed was one of the most talented of those princes who enjoyed the distinction of maintaining through many troubled generations the defence of the Moslem worship and the glory of the Moslem arms. At once bold and crafty, his duplicity arose rather from the character of the adversaries with whom he was forced to contend than from a cunning and ignoble nature. The doctrine that it is pardonable and, under certain circumstances, even meritorious, to disregard the most solemn engagements contracted with an infidel, subsequently carried to such atrocious consequences among the Indian population of the New World, had begun to be, as already stated, a generally admitted maxim of Catholic casuistry. Throughout the Middle Ages the law of nations, the construction of treaties, the courtesies of martial gallantry, the conditions of honorable peace, were imperfectly understood, negligently practised, and often deliberately violated. Many of the defects of this great prince were therefrom traceable to the lax morality of the age. His acts of homage to his mortal foes were mere incidents of a deep-laid policy, entered into to secure the establishment and consolidation of his power. His monarchy, oppressed by the progress of incessant conquest, became insensibly stronger and more easy to defend as its frontiers were contracted. With the Castilian occupation of every city, a crowd of industrious exiles, bearing their household goods, was added to the already numerous population of Granada; accessions which brought with them no inconsiderable wealth and many qualities more valuable than wealth to a declining empire,—habits of industry and thrift, a capacity to adapt themselves to new conditions, the memory of former injuries, the melancholy experiences of persecution, the hope of retribution, and an unconquerable hatred of the Christian name. It was the political incorporation of this banished and oppressed people, aided by the mountain barriers of its last refuge, that contributed to preserve for future glory and unparalleled disaster the flourishing kingdom of Granada.
The founding of the Alhambra has perhaps done more to perpetuate the glory of Mohammed I. than any of the political or military achievements of his career. During its construction he mingled with the workmen, encouraging their efforts, directing their labors, rewarding their diligence. But a small portion of the palace was completed in his lifetime; and it was reserved for his distant successors, under more fortunate circumstances and in a more polished age, to bring to perfection the fairy edifice which his taste and genius had projected. During the reign of this great prince every art and every industry received substantial encouragement; agriculture, which, under the khalifs, had reached such an extraordinary development, again became the favorite pursuit of a laborious peasantry; the shipping of every maritime nation brought the products of the East and West to the Moorish ports of the Mediterranean; the warehouses were filled with those articles of use and luxury which minister to the necessities and the tastes of the noble and the opulent; the mining resources of the sierras, long neglected through internal commotions and foreign war, were again developed; the quarries of jasper and marble once more contributed their treasures for the adornment of palace and mosque; public baths and hospitals furnished with every convenience and appliance known to medicine and surgery in a country which, in its acquaintance with and adaptation of those sciences, surpassed every other in Europe, rose in the principal cities of the kingdom; and the universal thrift and contentment exhibited in the appearance of the people afforded conclusive testimony of the wisdom, the justice, and the vigilance with which they were governed. Nor was the solicitude of the monarch confined to the material wants of his subjects. Schools, colleges, and other institutions of learning were multiplied beyond the example of any preceding age in that quarter of the Peninsula. The libraries, upon whose shelves were still to be found some of those volumes which had survived the wreck and the dispersion of the magnificent collection of Al-Hakem II., were the delight and the recreation of every intelligent scholar. In the embellishment of the mosques were exhibited the first examples of that art whose unrivalled beauty, in after times, found its climax upon the walls of the Alhambra in a splendor of ornamentation which modern skill has in vain attempted to approach.
In the dispensation of justice Mohammed followed the patriarchal example of his Arab ancestors. He gave audience twice a week at the gate of his palace; the humblest suitor was certain of an attentive hearing, and no person was too insignificant to be restored to his rights or too powerful to escape the consequences of insolent oppression or violated law. The public works and institutions were the especial objects of the care of this wise and politic ruler; he personally inspected the baths, the hospitals, the schools, the mosques, the highways, the aqueducts; the fidelity of the teacher and the diligence of the pupil were stimulated by judicious rewards; and his administration, surrounded by every evidence of prosperity and refinement, indicated that the genius of Moslem progress and civilization had entered upon a new and glorious existence on the banks of the Darro and the Genil. What a contrast was all this to the moral, intellectual, and social condition of Europe, and especially of Spain, in the middle of the thirteenth century! What had the boorish Castilian crusader to offer in exchange for it; what benefit could accrue to mankind from its suppression?
Mohammed-al-Ahmar was succeeded by his son Mohammed II., whose genius, taste, and learning proved him to be eminently worthy of his inheritance. An accomplished linguist, his leisure moments were employed in familiar conversation with the scholars and philosophers of distant countries, attracted to his court by his reputation for wisdom, his encouragement of letters, his protection of the arts, and his profuse but discerning liberality. His first act was an edict continuing in their official positions the ministers of his father, whose capacity had been proved by many years of faithful service; his second, the overthrow of the rebel walis, who sustained an overwhelming defeat near Antequera, by which the authority of the new emir was re-established over the territory recently in revolt, and his talents as a general became known to the Castilians, destined erelong to receive fresh evidences of his activity and courage. The recalcitrant Christian nobles, whose valor had contributed to the victory of Antequera, received magnificent rewards of horses, arms, money, and slaves. Sumptuous palaces, furnished with all the refinements of Moorish luxury, were allotted to their use or even constructed in their honor in the suburbs of the most beautiful and romantic capital in Europe.
Sentiments of mutual respect, accompanied perhaps with some apprehension of the results of a conflict where the forces of both parties were so evenly balanced, induced the rival monarchs to consent to a conference with a view to the establishment of peace. In the city of Seville, at that time the seat of the Castilian court, the notable assembly was held. In the old Moorish Alcazar, as yet intact, King Alfonso received the Emir of Granada with the barbaric magnificence which characterized the Spanish chivalry of that age. The handsome features, grave demeanor, and elegant manners of the Moslem sovereign surprised and charmed the ignorant Castilians, accustomed to consider their infidel foes as savages in appearance and demons in character. The splendid arms and costumes of the Moorish nobles dazzled the eyes of the people, while their martial bearing evoked the admiration of the Christian champions, who had experienced the prowess of their guests in many a bloody and stoutly contested encounter. The polished helmets and damascened armor of the recreant knights appeared side by side with the white turbans and silken robes which distinguished the followers of the Prophet. Every courtesy was shown to the Emir and his retinue; the day was passed in tournaments and spectacles, the night in concerts, theatrical displays, and banquets. Political negotiations, for a time subordinated to royal hospitality and chivalric amusements, were finally entered upon, and in the end completed with little honor or credit to the Castilian king. The demands of the Infante Don Philip and his adherents were granted; they were restored to their estates and resumed their precarious allegiance; a truce was arranged between the rival sovereigns, and a numerous escort of nobles, who represented the pride and luxury of the Spanish court, accompanied the Moslems to the frontier of the kingdom.
Mohammed II., humiliated by the dependent position he was compelled to assume at his accession and seeing no advantages to be derived from the perfidious friendship of the Castilians, adopted at once the astute and crooked policy of his father. Influenced by his representations, Ibn-Yusuf, Emir of Morocco, invaded the Peninsula at the head of an army of fifty thousand men. He was at once joined by the King of Granada, and the Moslems of every community of Andalusia hastened to his standard, eager to try once more the alluring but uncertain fortunes of war. The two Moslem princes marched in parallel lines, within supporting distance of each other. The country, which had for a quarter of a century experienced a respite from the ravages of a hostile army, was visited with a severity which equalled that of the most destructive of former campaigns. Not a house, not a tree, not a field of grass or grain remained standing in the blackened track of the invader. Great numbers of Christians perished; a long train of captives followed the Moslem armies; and the days of African dominion seemed about to be renewed. At the Castilian frontier the Sultan of Morocco encountered Nuño de Lara, commandant of that military district, and after a furious battle the bodies of the Spanish general and eight thousand of his followers which strewed the plain bore witness to the prowess of the Berber soldiery.
The division of Mohammed II. moved through the territory of Jaen, where Sancho, Primate of Spain,—who, the son of Jaime, King of Aragon, had inherited the martial instincts of his father, in a warlike age rather an incentive than an impediment to the duties of the clerical profession,—had assumed command. The distinguished prelate, relying more upon the miraculous intervention of Heaven than upon the numerical strength of his squadrons, did not hesitate to attack with a few thousand knights the entire Moorish army. His followers were slaughtered, and he himself, surrounded and disarmed, became the prisoner of a score of Moslems, who, judging from his dress and appearance that he must be a personage of unusual consequence, contended angrily for the honor of the capture and the hope of a heavy ransom. Both African and Andalusian were interested in the result; the old factional prejudices were revived, and an appeal to arms seemed imminent, when a venerable Andalusian sheik, riding up, transfixed the unhappy cause of the dispute between the shoulders with his lance, exclaiming, “God forbid that so many good Mussulmans should shed their blood for the sake of a Christian dog!” The head and the right hand of the Archbishop, embalmed with camphor, were preserved as revolting but significant trophies of victory; the episcopal crosier and the ring of investiture, sanctified by the blessing of the Holy Father himself, became the treasured spoil of the infidel, and the Christians, depressed by the triumphs of the enemy and by the loss of their general, were unable to retrieve the disaster, whose report carried sorrow into every Catholic community in Europe.
Every circumstance seemed at this time favorable to the success of the Moslem arms. The infante, Don Ferdinand, heir apparent to the Castilian crown, died suddenly while marching southward to engage the enemy. His death encouraged the agitation of quarrels and intrigues between the princes of the blood and the nobility. The Christians, warned by past reverses, hesitated to meet their formidable adversaries in the field. The harsh policy originally adopted by the Castilian conquerors now demonstrated its wisdom. The Moors had been driven from the great cities. In every place of importance the Christian population predominated. The invaders could make no impression upon fortified towns, and their sympathizing countrymen, who remained within their walls, dared not afford them the least information or assistance. The campaign ended in ignominious failure. The Africans, having retired to Algeziras, soon experienced the tortures of famine. A Castilian squadron, cruising along the coast, prevented an inglorious retreat, and an enterprise which seemed at first to offer a not improbable prospect of the restoration of Moslem supremacy was frustrated by the indecision and discord of rival commanders. The weakness of one party and the necessities of the other promoted a mutual desire for peace, and a treaty, from whose benefits the Moslem princes of Andalusia, to whose representations was to be attributed the renewal of hostilities which had so seriously affected the Christian power, were tacitly excluded, was negotiated between Alfonso and the Sultan. The Africans were then permitted to retire, and the Andalusians hastened to renew an allegiance solely based upon considerations of present expediency, assumed and renounced with equal facility and unconcern. From time to time, during the reign of Alfonso X., the peace of the kingdom of Castile was disturbed by the determined enmity of the Emir of Granada. The efforts of that prince were, however, mainly confined to the temporary and local injuries incident to the operations of guerilla warfare.
The siege of Algeziras, which, with Tarifa, had been ceded by Mohammed II. to the Sultan of Morocco, was undertaken by the Castilians, who, through the negligence of the authorities and the demoralization consequent on a lamentable want of discipline, were compelled to abandon their position with the loss of their ships and the capture of their admiral. The arms of the Christians were then turned against the Moslems of Granada. The general result of the campaign was favorable to the latter, but the devastation of the rich plantations of the Vega more than counterbalanced the brilliant but costly honors of military success, and hostilities were suspended by common consent, only to be renewed at a more advantageous opportunity. The declining years of Alfonso were harassed by the ambition and disobedience of his son. The aid of the Sultan, moved by the wretchedness of his former adversary, was solicited and granted; but a few indecisive encounters, followed by the sudden withdrawal of the Africans, were the only fruits of this precarious and impolitic alliance, regarded with horror by the clergy and with suspicion and disfavor by even the most ardent partisans of the Castilian king.