How often have these atalayas given notice,
by fire at night or smoke by day, of an approaching foe I It was
down a cragged defile of these mountains, called the Pass of Lope,
that the Christian armies descended into the Vega. Round the base of
yon gray and naked mountain (the mountain of Elvira), stretching its
bold rocky promontory into the bosom of the plain, the invading
squadrons would come bursting into view, with flaunting banners and
clangor of drum and trumpet.
Five hundred years have elapsed since Ismael ben Ferrag, a Moorish
king of Granada, beheld from this very tower an invasion of the
kind, and an insulting ravage of the Vega; on which occasion he
displayed an instance of chivalrous magnanimity, often witnessed in
the Moslem princes, "whose history," says an Arabian writer,
"abounds in generous actions and noble deeds that will last through
all succeeding ages, and live for ever in the memory of man."- But let
us sit down on this parapet and I will relate the anecdote.
It was in the year of grace 1319, that Ismael ben Ferrag beheld from
this tower a Christian camp whitening the skirts of yon mountain of
Elvira. The royal princes, Don Juan and Don Pedro, regents of
Castile during the minority of Alfonso XI, had already laid waste
the country from Alcaudete to Alcala la Real, capturing the castle
of Illora and setting fire to its suburbs, and they now carried
their insulting ravages to the very gates of Granada, defying the king
to sally forth and give them battle.
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