The difficulties arising from the anomalous political condition of Seville were well known to the petty princes of the shattered khalifate. The prize which the rich and defenceless city offered to the ambition of an enterprising commander was too tempting to long remain secure. Yahya, the son of Ali, the Edrisite Khalif who had recently refused to trust his person among the perfidious inhabitants of Cordova after they had tendered him the government and who now ruled the principality of Malaga, suddenly appeared with a powerful Berber army before the walls of Seville. Resistance was impossible, and Yahya was informed that the city would acknowledge his pretensions if his soldiers were not permitted to enter the gates. This proposition he was not unwilling to accept, but demanded, as an indispensable preliminary, the delivery of hostages, to be selected from the families of the most prominent citizens and the nobility. When this condition was proposed, negotiations were at once suspended, for no one was prepared to incur the risk. The Berbers had never renounced their savage practices. They were not accustomed to observe the faith of treaties, even where their own interests were concerned. The massacre of captives and hostages was in perfect accordance with their sanguinary instincts, and a sudden caprice, or the fear of escape, might in an instant cause the annihilation of the flower of the Sevillian youth. In this trying emergency neither the patriotism nor the confidence of Abul-Kasim in his good fortune deserted him. He placed his own son in the hands of the Berber prince, and removed the apprehensions of his countrymen by convincing Yahya that this pledge was a sufficient warrant for the fidelity of the people. Relying on the authority vested in a nominal sovereign, the Kadi now seized the opportunity of delivering himself from his councillors, and they were, one after another, under various pretexts, dismissed from office. Animated by the hope of one day being able to assert his independence, he next devoted his energies to the acquisition of new territory and the consolidation of his power. The noble self-sacrifice he had exhibited in exposing his son to danger for the public welfare had raised his character in the estimation of every class of citizens. The nobility regarded him with undisguised gratitude and admiration. His popularity with the masses, now liberated from the insults of the soldiery, was unbounded. The faquis extolled the justice and generosity of a magistrate who had removed the tyrannical exactions imposed on their order. Secure of the devotion of the army, whose interests he was careful never to neglect, the Kadi, having formed an alliance with the governor of Carmona, began to make incursions into the dominions of the princes who surrounded him. He overran the province of Beja. He plundered the settlements on the sea-coast west of Cadiz. The son of the Emir of Badajoz was defeated by his troops and taken prisoner.