Julian’s first object is, without exciting suspicion, to remove his daughter from Toledo. Full of the project of revenge, he crosses the Straits and repairs to the Court. Wherever he appears is hailed as the leader to whose prowess the nation owes its safety. Roderich, counting on the silence of Florinda, receives him with a frank and generous welcome, and loads him with new honours. Julian, meanwhile, artfully magnifies the present danger which threatens the frontier, and prepares all things for his return to Africa. For Florinda he obtains leave of absence from the queen “to attend upon her mother Frandina, dangerously ill at Algeciras.” Together they cross the bridge of the Tagus, followed by the shouting populace, but as his horse’s hoofs strike on the opposite bank he raises his mailed hand, and shakes it in the air as he turns his eyes towards the Alcazar. “My curse rest on thee, Don Roderich!” are his words. “May desolation fall on thy dwelling and thy realm!” Journeying on with Florinda, he came to a wild range of mountains near Consucara--still called the Mountain of Treason--where he meets his kinsman, Archbishop Opas, and his wife Frandina, a formidable amazon, who not only followed her lord in battle, but concentrated in herself all the duplicity of her brother. She had long hated Roderich for his marriage with Egilona, now she could revenge herself. “I would rather die,” she exclaims, as she gazed at Florinda, prostrate at her feet, “than submit to this outrage!” “Be satisfied,” replies Don Julian; “she shall be avenged. Opas will bind our friends by dreadful oaths. I myself will go to Africa to seek great Mousa, and negotiate his aid.” * * * * * From Malaga Julian embarked for Africa with Frandina and Florinda, his treasure and his household, and ever since the gate in the city wall through which they passed has been called _Puerta de la Cava_ (Gate of the Harlot), by which name the unhappy Florinda was known among the Moors. The dark tents of the Moslems were spread in a pastoral valley at the foot of the billowy chain of hills which follow along the north of Barbary (as it was called of old), outshoots from the great Atlas range which towers in the far distance. A motley host from Egypt and Mauretania--Saracens, Tartars, Syrians, Copts, and Berbers,--all, Christian or Moslem, fair-skinned or negro, united under the banner of Mousa, Governor of North Africa for the Caliph of Damascus, a man long past middle life, but who concealed his years cunningly.