The Moors found the same obsequiousness in Spain. P. 26. (9.) Some of the Spanish Goths are said at this time to have fled to England; others to have ventured upon a farther flight. Among the many wild conjectures which have been sported upon the peopling of America, one is, that the fugitives reached Yucatan : . . the little crosses which the Indians laid upon their sick and dead are adduced as presumptive proofs. Beuther, L. 1. C. 28. Sacaru the governor of Merida, is said to have emigrated by sea, and gone in search of the Canaries; but certain it is he did not find them, for the Spanish discoverers found there a better race than themselves, a different language, and a different religion. Tradition says that an island in the Ocean Sea,' far to the West, is still possessed by his descendants, called the Island of the Seven Cities, having six Bishops and one Archbishop. A Portugueze ship, or a Genoese Carrack, once touched there. Brito had seen it laid down in an old chart: and in an edition of Ptolemy, it is called Antilia. Some have identified it with St. Brandon's famous Island; but they who landed upon that found it desolate. He however who believes the existence of the one will not discredit the other; .. and if there be no better authority for Sacaru's emigration than Miguel de Luna, his existence is as doubtful as that of his island. It was not for his birth that his fellow soldiers lifted Pelayo upon a shield and acclaimed him King. P. 26. (10.) When Philip II. put the Justiza to death, and destroyed the liberties of Aragon, this plea was invented to justify his tyranny;.. that Pelayo, by having been the first King that was set up by the Spaniards after the Moorish conquest, was not only King of so much of that country as they who had chosen him were at that time in possession of, or did afterwards conquer; but of all Spain, and conse quently of Aragon and Catalonia, though those countries had been taken from the Moors by other princes and people, and had quietly been enjoyed by them above five hundred years, without any depend ence on Don Pelayo and his heirs, none of which before had ever pretended to or dreamt of any such right. Now Philip, said the coiners of this new right, being heir and successor to Pelayo, as he is King of Castille and Leon, he and all his predecessors in those two kingdoms must by right have always been Kings of Aragon, though in fact they had been so but for a few years: all the compacts therefore, whereon the Aragonese rights and privileges were grounded, though of five hundred years' standing, are, and were from their beginning, void and of no effect: having been made betwixt the subjects of the King of Leon, and Princes who had no title to be their Kings. Geddes's Tracts, V. 2. 400. Tyrants are scarcely so detestable as the sycophants and sophists who flatter and justify them. Gregorio Lopez Madera, who invented this argument, is infamous as the defender of the Granadan Relics, the most gross imposition that ever was attempted by ignorant impudence. A good account of it is to be found in the first volume of Geddes's Tracts; . . a collection which for the knowledge and fidelity that it displays, should not be mentioned without praise. Dissentions broke out between the original conquerors and the Moors from Africa. P. 28. (11.) A distinction was always made between the Arabian conquerors, and the Africans who came over to share in what the others had won. This distinction, says Moret, siempre fue de grandissima conveniencia a los Reyes Christianos. T. 1. P. 299. Zehra. P. 31. (12.) Five and twenty years were employed in building Zehra ; the annual expenses were 300,000 dinars of gold, in the whole 3,125,0001. But where is the boasted superiority of Moorish art? The architect of Zehra was from Constantinople, and so were its finest pieces of sculpture. This is an Arabian account. The same author states that Cordova contained 200,000 houses, 600 mosques, and 900 public baths: he says that there were in Spain in his time, 80 large towns, and 300 of the second and third order: the villages and hamlets were innumerable; . . there were 12,000 upon the banks of the Guadalquivir. A traveller would find three or four towns in one day's journey and could not proceed a quarter of an hour without coming to a village. ... Where are the monuments of this prodigious population? Nations do not perish without leaving a wreck behind them. The track of the Tartar conquerors may still be traced by the ruins of cities. The detail of the sources of the Moors' prosperity may be more safely trusted. Their chief exports were oil, sugar, cochineal, quicksilver, bar and wrought iron, raw and wrought silk, wrought wool: they also exported ambergris, amber, loadstones, antimony, the marcassite of gold, talc, crystal, tuit, sulphur, saffron, ginger, gentian, myrrh. The Spanish armorers were already famous, and their work was preferred in Africa. There was a coral fishery off Andalusia, a pearl one on the Catalonian coast. Rubies were found in several mines; the best by Malaga and Beja. The revenues of Abdoulrahman were 12,045,000 dinars in specie, 501,8751. Many taxes were paid in kind: they would be productive in proportion to population and industry. The mines of gold and silver were then rich. There exists the inventory of a present made to Abdoulrahman by The Moors found the same obsequiousness in Spain. P. 26. (9.) Some of the Spanish Goths are said at this time to have fled to England; others to have ventured upon a farther flight. Among the many wild conjectures which have been sported upon the peopling of America, one is, that the fugitives reached Yucatan: . . the little crosses which the Indians laid upon their sick and dead are adduced as presumptive proofs. Beuther, L. 1. C. 28. Sacaru the governor of Merida, is said to have emigrated by sea, and gone in search of the Canaries; but certain it is he did not find them, for the Spanish discoverers found there a better race than themselves, a different language, and a different religion. Tradition says that an island in the Ocean Sea,' far to the West, is still possessed by his descendants, called the Island of the Seven Cities, having six Bishops and one Archbishop. A Portugueze ship, or a Genoese Carrack, once touched there. Brito had seen it laid down in an old chart: and in an edition of Ptolemy, it is called Antilia. Some have identified it with St. Brandon's famous Island; but they who landed upon that found it desolate. He however who believes the existence of the one will not discredit the other; and if there be no better authority for Sacaru's emigration than Miguel de Luna, his existence is as doubtful as that of his island. It was not for his birth that his fellow soldiers lifted Pelayo upon a shield and acclaimed him King. P. 26. (10.) When Philip II. put the Justiza to death, and destroyed the liberties of Aragon, this plea was invented to justify his tyranny; that Pelayo, by having been the first King that was set up by the Spaniards after the Moorish conquest, was not only King of so much of that country as they who had chosen him were at that time in possession of, or did afterwards conquer; but of all Spain, and consequently of Aragon and Catalonia, though those countries had been taken from the Moors by other princes and people, and had quietly been enjoyed by them above five hundred years, without any dependence on Don Pelayo and his heirs, none of which before had ever pretended to or dreamt of any such right. Now Philip, said the coiners of this new right, being heir and successor to Pelayo, as he is King of Castille and Leon, he and all his predecessors in those two kingdoms must by right have always been Kings of Aragon, though in fact they had been so but for a few years: all the compacts therefore, whereon the Aragonese rights and privileges were grounded, though of five hundred years' standing, are, and were from their beginning, void and of no effect: having been made betwixt the subjects of the King of Leon, and Princes who had no title to be their Kings. Geddes's Tracts, V. 2. 400. Tyrants are scarcely so detestable as the sycophants and sophists who flatter and justify them. Gregorio Lopez Madera, who invented this argument, is infamous as the defender of the Granadan Relics, the most gross imposition that ever was attempted by ignorant impudence. A good account of it is to be found in the first volume of Geddes's Tracts; . . a collection which for the knowledge and fidelity that it displays, should not be mentioned without praise. Dissentions broke out between the original conquerors and the Moors from Africa. P. 28. (11.) A distinction was always made between the Arabian conquerors, and the Africans who came over to share in what the others had won. This distinction, says Moret, siempre fue de grandissima conveniencia a los Reyes Christianos. T. 1. P. 299. Zehra. P. 31. (12.) Five and twenty years were employed in building Zehra; the annual expenses were 300,000 dinars of gold, in the whole 3,125,0001. But where is the boasted superiority of Moorish art? The architect of Zehra was from Constantinople, and so were its finest pieces of sculpture. This is an Arabian account. The same author states that Cordova contained 200,000 houses, 600 mosques, and 900 public baths: he says that there were in Spain in his time, 80 large towns, and 300 of the second and third order: the villages and hamlets were innumerable; . . there were 12,000 upon the banks of the Guadalquivir. A traveller would find three or four towns in one day's journey and could not proceed a quarter of an hour without coming to a village. ... Where are the monuments of this prodigious population? Nations do not perish without leaving a wreck behind them. The track of the Tartar conquerors may still be traced by the ruins of cities. The detail of the sources of the Moors' prosperity may be more safely trusted. Their chief exports were oil, sugar, cochineal, quicksilver, bar and wrought iron, raw and wrought silk, wrought wool: they also exported ambergris, amber, loadstones, antimony, the marcassite of gold, talc, crystal, tuit, sulphur, saffron, ginger, gentian, myrrh. The Spanish armorers were already famous, and their work was preferred in Africa. There was a coral fishery off Andalusia, a pearl one on the Catalonian coast. Rubies were found in several mines; the best by Malaga and Beja. The revenues of Abdoulrahman were 12,045,000 dinars in specie, 501,8751. Many taxes were paid in kind: they would be productive in proportion to population and industry. The mines of gold and silver were then rich. There exists the inventory of a present made to Abdoulrahman by his Vizir 400 pounds of virgin gold; ingots of silver to the value of 420,000 sequins, 18,750.; 400 pounds of aloes wood, whereof 180 were in one piece; 400 ounces of ambergris, and a single lump of 100 ounces; 300 ounces of camphire; 30 pieces of silk and gold, of that rich texture which none but the Caliphs might wear; 10 marten skins from Korassan; 100 others of inferior kind: trappings of silk and gold for 48 horses from Bagdad; 4000 pounds of silk; 30 Persian carpets; armor for 800 horses; 1000 shields; 100,000 arrows: 15 Arabian horses, caparisoned for the Caliph himself; 100 others for his suit; 20 mules with their trappings; 40 boys and 50 girls of great beauty; and a copy of verses. In return, he had a revenue granted him of 100,000 pieces of gold. The principal trade lay with Constantinople. It was the policy of the Greek Emperors to unite with the Ommiades against their common enemy at Bagdad. Barbary was also a considerable mart, and there was a communication through Egypt with the East. Cardonne 320. 337. T. 1. Galicia was ambitious of becoming independent, like Castille. P. 32. (13.) When Castille and Leon were again divided after the death of Alonso VII. A. D. 1157, the reason assigned was the old jealousy between the Galician and Castilian Lords. Mondejar, Hist. del Rey D. Alonso. 8. P. 11. Santiago could not defend his own Church. P. 33. (14.) The Spaniards however insist upon it that he took vengeance for the insult: for " Antes que Almanzor se partiesse de tierra de Santiago, fue ferido el e toda su compaña de mandamiento de Dios, por el pecado del atrevimiento de las suziedades quel fazie en la ygresia de Santiago; ca cayo en el una de las mas suzias enfermedades que podie ser, a la qual dizen los fisicos Diarria." Cor. Gen. ff. 81. Santiago. P. 36. (15.) This miracle of Santiago's first appearance is related at length by King Ramiro, in the deed which grants this perpetual tribute to the Church of Compostella. The authenticity of this Privile gio de los Votos, as it is called, and of others which confirm it, was questioned in Philip the Second's reign; it was argued that the dates were false; . . but Morales proved that objection to be groundless. To have denied the truth of the miracle would have been heresy. If the deed be authentic, the tribute of the hundred virgins must be believed also; it is neither inconsistent with Mahommedan manners, nor in inself improbable. In Leon the damsels go annually in pro |