The cool and crafty Ferdinand prepared his own answer to this challenge. The infatuated King Abdul-Hassan followed up his insult by capturing the Christian fortress of Zahara. His temper was not at the best at this time on account of a war raging in his own household. His wife Ayesha was fiercely jealous of a Christian captive whom he had also made his wife. She had become his favorite Sultana, and was conspiring to have her own son supplant Boabdil, the son of Ayesha, the heir to the throne. In his championship of Zoraya and her son, Abdul-Hassan imprisoned Ayesha and Boabdil, whom he threatened to disinherit. We are shown to-day the window in the Alhambra from which Ayesha lowered Boabdil in a basket, telling him to come back with an army and assert his rights. Suddenly, while absorbed by this smaller war, news came that Alhama, their most impregnable fortress, only six leagues from the city of Granada, had been captured by Ferdinand's army. It was the key to Granada. Despair was in every soul. The air was filled with wailing and lamentation. "Woe, woe is me, Alhama!" "Ay de mi, Alhama!" Indignant with their old king, who had brought destruction upon them, when Boabdil came with his army of followers, they flocked about him--"El Rey Chico!" (the boy king) as they called him. Abdul Hassan was forced to fly, and Boabdil reigned over the expiring kingdom. It was a brief and troubled reign. In the famous "Court of the Lions" in the Alhambra, visitors are shown to-day the blood-stains left by the celebrated massacre of the "Abencerrages." The Abencerrages had supported the claim of Ayesha's rival, Zoraya; and it is said that Boabdil invited the Princes of this clan, some thirty in number, to a friendly conference in the Alhambra, and there had them treacherously beheaded at the fountain. But whether this blood-stain upon his memory is as doubtful as those upon the stones at the fountain, seems an open question. [Illustration: From the painting by V. Brozik. Columbus at the Court of Ferdinand and Isabella.] So stubborn was the defense, it appeared sometimes as if the reduction of Granada would have to be abandoned. Isabella's courage and faith were sorely tried. But the brave Queen infused her own courage into the flagging spirits of her husband, and kept alive the enthusiasm of the people; and at last,--on the 2d of January, 1402,--the proud city capitulated. Boabdil surrendered the keys of the Alhambra to Ferdinand--the silver cross which had preceded the King throughout the war gleamed from a high tower; and from the loftiest pinnacle of the Alhambra waved the banners of Castile and Aragon. The conflict which had lasted for 781 years was over. The death of Roderick and the fall of the Goths was avenged, and Christendom, still weeping for the loss of Constantinople, was consoled and took heart again. CHAPTER XVII.