“Here,” thought Abdul-asis, as he wandered among the myrtle-bordered paths, fragrant with jasmine and violet, “is the paradise promised to the faithful, but where are the houris, whose white embraces are to make it sweet?” Neither did the voluptuous movements of the dancing girls (for Seville in all ages has been famed for the _baile_), moving with uplifted arms and quivering limbs in the _vito_ or the _zapateado_, intoxicate his senses; nor did the voices of the young _niñas_, chanting the _malagueñas_ to cither and lute, draw him from the poetic melancholy which possessed his soul, as he turned his steps from alley to alley, not having yet found the ideal of which he was in search. But the son of Mousa was a warrior, though the gods had made him poetical. He could not long be idle, and hastened to fulfil the second mission confided to him by Mousa--to overcome the far-off province of Murcia. Another faithful knight who had survived the battle of the Guadalete was Teodomir, who, by skilful management had entrenched himself in Murcia. Not only brave, but singularly prudent, Teodomir had observed that to oppose the Moors openly in the field was to ensure defeat, therefore he had fortified as best he could, every wild recess of the rocky hills lying toward the coast, and every rise and knoll whence he could shoot down arrows and missiles. So that when Abdul-asis appeared in the land, cleft asunder by wide rivers and divided by swamps and flats, he encountered no enemy. “This is a blind warfare,” he cried, “a war without a foe. What manner of man is this Goth who wages war in the clouds, and with a few raw troops holds my army in check?” With a grim smile Teodomir marked the success of his tactics. Spies told him that, in the council of Abdul-asis, retreat had already been mooted, and more and more he insisted upon giving his enemy no chance in the open. Not so his sons. “What glory is there here?” say these youths. “Let us go forth and face him. We are as good as he. If our men are less disciplined, courage makes up the balance.” “Fools,” answered old Teodomir, laying his wrinkled hands upon them, and drawing them to him, that he might make them if possible understand his counsels. “Glory dazzles from afar, but safety is the best when a foe knocks at the door.” Continued dropping wears a stone. To his great joy, as the sun rose and the weary eyes of handsome Abdul-asis turned towards the marshy plains, he beheld Teodomir riding onwards towards the camp at the head of his troops, a son on either hand, the old Goth in the centre in shining armour, with nodding plumes, preceded by flags and horsemen. “Now Allah be praised!” he exclaims. “At last! Saddle my war-horse Suleiman, and let all the sheikhs follow me, for it is written in the book of fate that these dogs of Christians are given into our hands.”