mber,
which opened, by a small door, upon one of the back courts. He had
scarcely reached the room, when he heard a low tap at the outer door;
and, when it was thrice repeated, he knew that it was one of his
Jewish-brethren. For Ximen--as years, isolation, and avarice gnawed
away whatever of virtue once put forth some meagre fruit from a heart
naturally bare and rocky--still reserved one human feeling towards his
countrymen. It was the bond which unites all the persecuted: and Ximen
loved them, because he could not envy their happiness. The power--the
knowledge--the lofty, though wild designs of his master, stung and
humbled him--he secretly hated, because he could not compassionate or
contemn him. But the bowed frame, and slavish voice, and timid nerves of
his crushed brotherhood presented to the old man the likeness of things
that could not exult over him. Debased and aged, and solitary as he
was, he felt a kind of wintry warmth in the thought that even he had the
power to protect!

He thus maintained an intercourse with his fellow Israelites; and often,
in their dangers, had afforded them a refuge in the numerous vaults
and passages, the ruins of which may still be descried beneath the
mouldering foundations of that mysterious mansion. And, as the house
was generally supposed the property of an absent emir, and had been
especially recommended to the care of the cadis by Boabdil, who alone
of the Moors knew it as one of the dwelling-places of the santon,
whose ostensible residence was in apartments allotted to him within the
palace,--it was, perhaps, the sole place within Granada which afforded
an unsuspected and secure refuge to the hunted Israelites.

When Ximen recognised the wonted signal of his brethren, he crawled to
the door; and, after the precaution of a Hebrew watchword, replied to
in the same tongue, he gave admittance to the tall and stooping frame of
the rich Elias.

"Worthy and excellent master!" said Ximen, after again securing the
entrance; "what can bring the honoured and wealthy Elias to the chamber
of the poor hireling?"

"My friend," answered the Jew; "call me not wealthy, nor honoured. For
years I have dwelt within the city; safe and respected, even by the
Moslemin; verily and because I have purchased with jewel and treasure
the protection of the king and the great men. But now, alas! in the
sudden wrath of the heathen--ever imagining vain things--I have been
summoned into the presence of the