Motamid, who now ascended the throne of Seville, was not the ruler to restore the fortunes or even to sustain the burdens of a tottering monarchy. Endowed with excellent abilities, his inclinations led rather to the refined enjoyments of a sedentary life than to the responsibilities of government or to the hardships and perils of a military career. From early youth he had evinced a passion for literature. His faculties had been developed under the instruction of the best scholars of the time, and, possessing unusual powers of improvisation, he had made considerable progress in that art, prized among his countrymen as an indication of the highest poetical genius. Already intrusted with the conduct of important military enterprises, none of which, however, were successful, his disastrous campaign at Malaga sufficiently demonstrated his utter incapacity for command. The society of women divided with the love of letters the domain of his affections; a slave to female charms, he was helplessly subjected to the imperious caprices of his favorites, who exercised over his plastic mind a tyranny which admitted of no compromise and brooked no contradiction. His chief sultana was Romaiquia, a slave purchased from a master who exercised the respectable but plebeian calling of a muleteer. In an accidental encounter she had enchanted him with her quickness of repartee and her readiness in improvisation and poetical dialogue, and, in accordance with a custom not infrequent among a race with whom social rank is often subordinated to intellectual accomplishments, he had made her the companion of his leisure and the sharer of his throne. The minister of Motamid was Ibn-Ammar, whose principal qualification for office in the eyes of his sovereign was his devotion to the Muses. Under such conditions it is not surprising that the affairs of the kingdom assumed a very different aspect from that which they bore during the reign of the stern and merciless Motadhid. The revenues decreased through the intentional neglect of vassals to forward their tribute, and the dishonesty of collectors of taxes who appropriated the bulk of the funds which had been amassed by oppression. Robbers once more ruled the highways. Scarcely a night passed without the pillage of a house or the murder of a citizen within the walls of the capital, often under the very shadow of the palace. Vast sums, whose judicious expenditure would have greatly contributed to the comfort of the people and the security of the kingdom, were bestowed upon foreign poets, whose ingratitude and impudence were far more conspicuous than their talents, or squandered to indulge the whims of rapacious and frivolous women. The army, upon whose discipline everything depended, partook of the prevalent demoralization. The officers neglected their duties. The soldiers supplied the frequent deficiencies of their pay by the plunder of individuals known to be obnoxious to the government or by the precarious gains of