of Toledo, the Jew Ben-Kalib was sent with a small retinue by Alfonso to collect the tribute of Seville. When the money was tested, it was found to have been alloyed with baser metal. The vizier of Motamid, who had delivered it, was summoned to the camp of the embassy. As soon as he arrived, the fury of Ben-Kalib prevailed over his discretion, and he exclaimed, “How dare you try to impose upon me with these counterfeits? I will not depart until after you have furnished me with coin of the stipulated weight and value, and next year I shall exact the tribute of my master in cities, not in gold!” This insolence was immediately reported to Motamid; the Christian envoys paid for the imprudent conduct of their comrade with imprisonment; and Ben-Kalib, realizing when too late the fatal error he had committed, after having offered in vain his weight in gold as a ransom, was crucified like the most degraded malefactor. The rage of the King of Castile when he heard of the treatment of his ambassadors knew no bounds. The survivors were ransomed by the delivery of the castle of Almodovar; and then Alfonso, leaving behind him a sufficient force to blockade Toledo, carried fire and sword through the dominions of Motamid to the very shores of the Mediterranean. There is nothing so indicative of the helpless condition of the Moslems in these wars as their evident inability to obstruct the progress or harass the movements of an invading army. They seem to have trusted solely to the defences of their strongholds. The plantations, the peasantry, the flocks, and the harvests were precipitately abandoned to the enemy. Not a vestige remained of that ancient spirit which had repelled the martial chivalry of Europe in many sanguinary encounters, which had planted the Moslem standards in the plains of Central France, on the mountains of Sardinia, on the banks of the Po and the Tiber, on the towers of Palermo and Syracuse, on the ruined walls of Narbonne and Santiago.