soldiers were beheaded; and the court dignitaries, who were classed as non-combatants, were released, with a single exception. Ibn-Abbas, after enduring the taunts of an ungenerous and triumphant foe, was loaded with heavy fetters and thrown into a dungeon. His pathetic appeals for mercy were unheeded by the ferocious Badis. He vainly tried to tempt the cupidity of his jailers with the offer of a bribe of sixty thousand ducats. In accordance with the ruthless customs of mediæval barbarity, the captive minister was dragged in chains before the throne and pierced with the sword-thrusts of the monarch and his courtiers until life was extinct. Thus perished the accomplished Ibn-Abbas through the consequences of his own temerity, and with him was removed one of the greatest obstacles of both national unity and Berber ambition. Before the inhabitants of Almeria had recovered from the consternation caused by the death of their sovereign, his domains were appropriated by the Emir of Valencia. This step, perhaps advised by the astute Kadi of Seville, at all events greatly strengthened the power of that dignitary by extending the domain of a vassal of the pretended Hischem and removing all prospect of the accession of another dangerous enemy. This fortunate circumstance having relieved his apprehensions of disturbance from the successors of Zohair, the wily Abul-Kasim began to carry his insidious operations into the court of Granada. The employment of spies, some of whom occupied high official positions, made this enterprising statesman intimately acquainted with the secret transactions of every Divan in the Peninsula. His emissaries at Granada, while informing him of the discontent prevailing in that city on account of the tyranny and habitual intoxication of the King, which kept the people in constant alarm, also communicated the opinion that it would not be difficult, by means of an insurrection, to bring the entire principality under the jurisdiction of Seville. To insure success for this notable enterprise a competent leader was required, a task of little difficulty in a country long accustomed to revolution and swarming with able and unscrupulous men. There lived at this time at Granada a prominent personage named Abu-al-Fotuh, who combined the rather inconsistent professions of a soldier of fortune and a peripatetic philosopher. A native of Djordjan, on the shores of the Caspian,--the Hyrcania of the ancients,--the affluent circumstances of his family had provided for him an excellent education, and he was well versed in all the learning of the East. Not only was he remarkably proficient in grammar and astronomy, but the occult sciences were the objects of his especial predilection. A recognized authority on geomancy and astrology, he was regarded with awe by the vulgar, who thought that they detected in his habits and occupations evidence of communication with the mysterious powers of the unseen world.