, and whose
sufferings were shortly to be terminated in the general conflagration
now fast approaching to its crisis.

CHAPTER V.

La cosa mas alegre que en la vida,
Permite al ser mortal humana gloria,
Es la patria del hombre tan querida
Despues de alguna prospera victoria.

_Lope de Vega._

Ah! che per tutto io veggo
Qualche oggetto funesto!

_Metastasio._

Granada now presented a scene of animated confusion. The repeated
successes of the Christians against the rebels, and the intelligence
lately received of the defeat of El Feri de Benastepar, with the total
destruction of his forces, filled the inhabitants of that city with joy.
Various bands of musicians paraded the gay and busy streets, uniting
their harmonious strains with the more solemn sounds of the bells,
whilst the joyous laugh, and other clamorous evidences of pleasure,
filled the air with a confused yet pleasing din.

It was amidst this tumult of rejoicing, that Theodora entered the city
of Granada. Her party had travelled slowly, so that the intelligence of
the recent victory had reached the place before them, and they were not
surprised at the extraordinary excitement of popular feeling. The
animated scene served, in some degree, to draw her mind from its gloomy
recollections, for during her journey she had again relapsed into her
former state of despondency. She was now traversing the principal
streets of that far-famed and renowned city, so long the grand arena of
the Moslem's greatness, now the undisputed dominion of the victorious
Christian. Every step she advanced exhibited some new object to awaken
her curiosity or excite her feelings, such as a stranger must feel upon
arriving at a city so lately rescued from the possession of an
hereditary enemy.

Relics of Moorish grandeur were every where discernible; every street,
every building, nay the very pavement on which they trod, teemed with
associations of by-gone glory and departed power. The city was now
chiefly inhabited by Spaniards; yet a considerable portion of its
population consisted of Moors, who scrupulously adhered to their
national costume, strikingly contrasted by its gaiety with the less
fanciful but more manly attire of the Christians. The two people widely
differed in all points, though now enclosed within the same precincts.
Two mortal and implacable enemies, united in apparent