ors under a chief named _Tarif_, to the opposite coast; and the
Moors found, as was promised, that they might range at their own will
and pleasure in that earthly paradise of Andalusia. The name of this
Mussulman chief, Tarif, was given to the spot first touched by the
feet of the Mahommedan, which was called _Tarifa_; and as Tarifa was
afterward the place where customs were collected, the word _tariff_ is
an imperishable memorial of that event. In like manner Gibraltar was
named _Gebel-al-Tarik_, (Mountain of Tarik) after the leader bearing
that name, who was sent later by Musa with a larger force; which name
has been gradually changed to its present form--Gibraltar.

Poor King Roderick, while still fighting to maintain his own right to
the crown he wore, learned with dismay that his country was invaded by
a horde of people from the African coast. Theodemir wrote to him: "So
strange is their appearance that we might take them for inhabitants of
the sky. Send me all the troops you can collect, without delay." The
hawks promised by Count Julian had arrived!

The hour of doom had sounded for the last King of the Visigoths, and
for his kingdom. There is a legend that a mysterious tower existed
near Toledo, which was built by Hercules, soon after Adam, with the
command that no king or lord of Spain should ever seek to know what it
contained; instead of that it was the duty of each King to put a new
lock upon its mysterious portal.

It is said that Roderick, perhaps in his extremity, resolved to
disobey the command, and to discover the secret hidden in the
Enchanted Tower. In a jeweled shrine in the very heart of the
structure he came at last to a coffer of silver, "right subtly
wrought," and far inside of that he reached the final mystery,--only
this,--a white cloth folded between two pieces of copper. With
trembling eagerness Roderick opened and found painted thereon men with
turbans, carrying banners, with swords strung around their necks,
and bows behind them, slung at the saddle-bow. Over these figures was
written: "When this cloth shall be opened, men appareled like these
shall conquer Spain, and be the lords thereof."

Such is the picturesque legend. Men with "turbans and banners and
swords slung about their necks," were assuredly now in Andalusia, led
by Tarik, who had literally burned his ships behind him, and then told
his followers to choose between victory or death.

The two armies faced each other at a spot