over his extensive empire for even a single day; nor had he, since his accession, ever issued from the gates of his capital. Abd-al-Melik, one of his numerous uncles, whose life had been passed as a dervish, and whose previous experience hardly fitted him for the arduous and practical duties of royalty, was raised by the combined voice of the nobles and the populace to the throne of the Almohades. In Spain, the Moorish princes of the same family that had heretofore administered the affairs of the Peninsula, without regard to the claims of the court of Morocco, openly asserted their independence. The Emir of Murcia, Abu-Mohammed, by reason of age and superior talents, obtained an acknowledged ascendency over his brethren. His diligence and liberality secured many active partisans in the capital of the empire; his ambition to supplant a weak and inexperienced monarch unable to sustain the weight of a crown was approved by the populations of both Andalusia and Al-Maghreb, and the pious Abd-al-Melik returned without reluctance to the practice of a life of devotion and solitude, after having relinquished the sceptre to his able and fortunate kinsman. It is beyond the province of this work to minutely describe the interminable intrigues, quarrels, and petty revolutions which preceded the extinction of the Mussulman power in the South of Spain. The governors of the different provinces exhausted, as usual, the resources of their subjects by constant and destructive hostility. Such as were successful were certain to be eventually overwhelmed by their recent adversaries, who invoked the ready aid of infidel allies. No permanent advantage was secured excepting by the Christians, whose cause was materially advanced by the universal prevalence of Moslem discord. Castilian troops continued to visit with devastation the fertile plains of Andalusia. Every alliance with the invaders was concluded at the expense of the Moors, who were compelled to accede without alternative to the exorbitant demands, by whose acceptance alone they could hope to retain their power. Fortresses which commanded vital points on the frontier and the passes and highways into Andalusia were surrendered as the price of military assistance in the settlement of some insignificant dispute. Among those who had thus secured the precarious and expensive friendship of the Christians was Abu-Ali-Edris, surnamed Al-Mamun, Emir of Seville. By the co-operation of Ferdinand III., King of Castile, he had dispersed an army of Africans sent to reduce him to subjection. The Castilians, not accustomed to observe the faith of treaties longer than it coincided with their immediate interest, persisted in gratifying their rapacity by destructive incursions on Moslem soil. Ferdinand, whose reputation as a saint has been somewhat tarnished by his perfidy as a sovereign and his cruelty as a soldier, directed in person these raids against his allies. His adventurous