The falcon towered high in the air,
made a swoop at his quarry, but missing it, soared away, regardless of
the calls of the page. The latter followed the truant bird with his
eye, in its capricious flight, until he saw it alight upon the
battlements of a remote and lonely tower, in the outer wall of the
Alhambra, built on the edge of a ravine that separated the royal
fortress from the grounds of the Generalife. It was in fact the "Tower
of the Princesses."
The page descended into the ravine and approached the tower, but
it had no entrance from the glen, and its lofty height rendered any
attempt to scale it fruitless. Seeking one of the gates of the
fortress, therefore, he made a wide circuit to that side of the
tower facing within the walls.
A small garden, inclosed by a trellis-work of reeds overhung with
myrtle, lay before the tower. Opening a wicket, the page passed
between beds of flowers and thickets of roses to the door. It was
closed and bolted. A crevice in the door gave him a peep into the
interior. There was a small Moorish hall with fretted walls, light
marble columns, and an alabaster fountain surrounded with flowers.
In the centre hung a gilt cage containing a singing bird, beneath
it, on a chair, lay a tortoise-shell cat among reels of silk and other
articles of female labor, and a guitar decorated with ribbons leaned
against the fountain.
Ruyz de Alarcon was struck with these traces of female taste and
elegance in a lonely, and, as he had supposed, deserted tower.
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