the
inhabitants of the Albaycin, commissioned one of his officers to arrest
those whom he suspected of promoting the opposition. This last
ill-advised and imprudent step so greatly exasperated the malcontents,
that no sooner did the alguazil proceed to the discharge of his duty,
than he became a victim to their fury. Imprecations were first heaped
upon him; menaces succeeded; and finally a large stone, hurled from a
window, stretched the unfortunate officer lifeless an the ground.

This murder was the signal for open rebellion. The Moors were aware that
so flagrant an act could not escape an adequate punishment, and they
accordingly prepared themselves for a vigorous resistance. Some of the
most daring hurried from street to street, summoning their
fellow-countrymen to arms, and exclaiming that the articles of the
treaty, in virtue of which they had surrendered, were violated, since
they could not continue unmolested in the exercise of their religious
duties.

This untoward event was the occasion of great anxiety to the Count de
Tendilla, who had been entrusted with the government of the city by the
queen. He took active measures to subdue the increasing fury of the
malcontents. But desirous of trying the effect of negociation before he
had recourse to extremes, he set forth to the rebels, in the strongest
light, the criminality and madness of the enterprise in which they had
embarked, and the little probability of their ever again struggling with
success against the Christian power. All his efforts to restore order
proved for some time ineffectual. But the promise of amnesty and redress
of their grievances, the well known integrity of the count, and his
generosity in sending his lady and son as hostages for the fulfilment of
the treaty, induced at length the majority of the rebels to lay down
their arms and accept the proffered pardon.

The forty chiefs, however, who had been chosen by the insurgents,
considered this conduct as pusillanimous, and despised it accordingly.
Dazzled by dreams of ambition, fired with hopes of asserting their
independence, and aware that the wild recesses of the mountains afforded
facilities for conducting the war with greater security and success;
they fled from Granada in the night, and succeeded in instilling their
sentiments into the minds of the Moors who inhabited the adjacent
country. The towns of Guejar, Lanjaron and Andarax soon rose up in arms;
all the mountaineers of the Alpuja