Queen Isabella and her court had remained at Cordova in great anxiety for the result of the royal expedition. Every day brought tidings of the difficulties which attended the transportation of the ordnance and munitions and of the critical state of the army.
While in this state of anxious suspense couriers arrived with all speed from the frontiers, bringing tidings of the sudden sally of El Zagal from Granada to surprise the camp. All Cordova was in consternation. The destruction of the Andalusian chivalry among the mountains of this very neighborhood was called to mind; it was feared that similar ruin was about to burst forth from rocks and precipices upon Ferdinand and his army.
Queen Isabella shared in the public alarm, but it served to rouse all the energies of her heroic mind. Instead of uttering idle apprehensions, she sought only how to avert the danger. She called upon all the men of Andalusia under the age of seventy to arm and hasten to the relief of their sovereign, and she prepared to set out with the first levies. The grand cardinal of Spain, old Pedro Gonzalez de Mendoza, in whom the piety of the saint and the wisdom of the counsellor were mingled with the fire of the cavalier, offered high pay to all horsemen who would follow him to aid their king and the Christian cause, and, buckling on armor, prepared to lead them to the scene of danger.
The summons of the queen roused the quick Andalusian spirit.
Warriors who had long since given up fighting and had sent their sons to battle now seized the sword and lance rusting on the wall, and marshalled forth their gray-headed domestics and their grandchildren for the field. The great dread was, that all aid would arrive too late; El Zagal and his host had passed like a storm through the mountains, and it was feared the tempest had already burst upon the Christian camp.
In the mean time, the night had closed which had been appointed by El Zagal for the execution of his plan. He had watched the last light of day expire, and all the Spanish camp remained tranquil. As the hours wore away the camp-fires were gradually extinguished.
No drum nor trumpet sounded from below. Nothing was heard but now and then the dull heavy tread of troops or the echoing tramp of horses--the usual patrols of the camp--and the changes of the guards. El Zagal restrained his own impatience and that of his troops until the night should be advanced and the camp sunk in that heavy sleep from which men are with difficulty awakened, and when awakened prone to be bewildered and dismayed.
At length the appointed hour arrived. By order of the Moorish king a bright flame sprang up from the height of Bentomiz, but El Zagal looked in vain for the responding light from the city. His impatience would brook no longer delay; he ordered the advance of the army to descend the mountain-defile and attack the camp. The defile was narrow and overhung by rocks; as the troops proceeded they came suddenly, in a shadowy hollow, upon a dark mass of warriors who, with a loud shout, rushed to assail them. Surprised and disconcerted, they retreated in confusion to the height. When El Zagal heard of a Christian force in the defile, he doubted some counter-plan of the enemy, and gave orders to light the mountain-fires. On a signal given bright flames sprang up on every height from pyres of wood prepared for the purpose: cliff blazed out after cliff until the whole atmosphere was in a glow of furnace light.