It was a bitter answer; and only sheer necessity drove Malaga to a submission from which she could hope so little. Amid fear and wailing, the capitulation was signed, and on August 20th, the sovereigns made their triumphal entry into the city. Hamet “El Zegri” still withstood their power in the Gibralfaro, but treachery amongst his garrison at length led to his betrayal, and the whole of Malaga lay at the Christian mercy. Its renegades, where they were discovered, were put to death, and on the rest of the inhabitants the sovereigns passed the sentence of perpetual slavery;—so many to be distributed amongst the Castilian nobles, so many to be sold for the benefit of the treasury, so many apportioned for the ransom of Christian slaves in Africa. A picked group of one hundred and eighty warriors were dispatched to the Pope as fruits of the crusade, while the Queen of Portugal and the Queen of Naples each received fifty of the fairest maidens. [Illustration: MALAGA TO-DAY FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY LACOSTE, MADRID ] “The fate of Malaga,” says Prescott, “may be said to have decided that of Granada.” Cut off entirely from the western part of the kingdom, that had proved so valuable a storehouse of men and the necessaries of life, she lay ringed round by enemies, who only awaited the moment to strike her death-blow. Yet for this low estate to which she had fallen she could not hold herself blameless. In her passionate distrust of failure she had made and unmade her rulers, regardless of the handicap thus placed upon their actions. “El Zagal” had been right in his fears for his throne, when he sallied forth to the relief of Velez-Malaga. The dread of the fickle populace he had left behind him had hung over his wild encounters with the chivalry of Spain; and when he returned, beaten but patriotic and valorous as of old, it was to find the gates of the capital closed against him, and his rival Sultan, not only of the Albaycin, but the Alhambra. In bitterness of spirit he marched eastwards to protect the cities of Guadix, Baeza, and Almeria, that still remained loyal to his cause; and it was against these that the Catholic sovereigns planned their next campaign.