As he spoke Spanish
fluently, I was enabled to hold conversation with him, and found him
shrewd and intelligent. He told me that he came up the hill
occasionally in the summer, to pass a part of the day in the Alhambra,
which reminded him of the old palaces in Barbary, being built and
adorned in similar style, though with more magnificence.
As we walked about the palace, he pointed out several of the
Arabic inscriptions, as possessing much poetic beauty.
"Ah, senor," said he, "when the Moors held Granada, they were a
gayer people than they are nowadays. They thought only of love, music,
and poetry. They made stanzas upon every occasion, and set them all to
music. He who could make the best verses, and she who had the most
tuneful voice, might be sure of favor and preferment. In those days,
if anyone asked for bread, the reply was, make me a couplet; and the
poorest beggar, if he begged in rhyme, would often be rewarded with
a piece of gold."
"And is the popular feeling for poetry," said I, "entirely lost
among you?"
"By no means, senor; the people of Barbary, even those of lower
classes, still make couplets, and good ones too, as in old times,
but talent is not rewarded as it was then; the rich prefer the
jingle of their gold to the sound of poetry or music."
As he was talking, his eye caught one of the inscriptions which
foretold perpetuity to the power and glory of the Moslem monarchs, the
masters of this pile.
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