Then she recounted to him her royal birth, and how from childhood she had been affianced to the son of the King of Tunis; the history of the storm which threw her on the coast of Spain; the Alcaide of Denia (now Malaga), upon whom she had made so favourable an impression. (Here the enamoured Emir drew a deep sigh, and pressed his lips upon her hand as she lay half-reclining upon a pile of gold-worked cushions.) “Again I wore the bridal robes,” she continued, “which I had on when I was shipwrecked, as I awaited Don Roderich.” Here was a pause. Egilona drops her eyes and is silent. The veins on the forehead of Abdul-asis suddenly swell with agony. Every word she utters plunges a dagger in his breast. “This was the man she loved,” he tells himself. “By the Prophet, she will never be to me as she was to him--dog of a Christian!” Meanwhile, guessing his thoughts, a thousand blushes suffuse the cheeks of poor Egilona and dye her olive skin with a ruddy brilliance. “What could I do?” she asks in a plaintive voice. “I had broken through the bonds of Eastern custom; I had despised the laws of the harem; I had stood face to face with man. The beauty and variety of the outer world was known to me. The visits of Don Roderich----” “Say no more, my queen!” exclaims the generous-hearted Abdul-asis, ashamed of his jealous weakness. “Could any one approach you without love? I guess the conclusion.” * * * * * When the discreet Ayub was informed of the purpose of his cousin to wed the Gothic Queen, he covered his head and sat in sackcloth and ashes. In this unbecoming guise he forced himself into the presence of the Emir. “Are you mad?” he cries, “O son of Mousa! Remember the words of your great father, bravest among the chiefs of Damascus: ‘Beware of love, my son. It is a passion----’” “Enough, enough,” answers Abdul-asis, rising from the divan on which he had thrown himself, as the spectacle his cousin presented had moved him to laughter, “I have heard these words before.” “And you will hear them again, O son of my kinsman! I will not forsake you, by Allah! for his sake, nor give you over to the evil genius that possesses you.” But the wrongs of Ayub, however terrible, melted as wax before the fierce fire of the Emir’s love. His nuptials with Egilona were celebrated with great pomp. Nor did possession cool his ardour. He lived but for her. He consulted with her in all the affairs of his government, and rejected the counsels of the discreet though most troublesome cousin. For a time no evil consequences ensued, and the fears of Ayub were almost lulled. Yet who can resist his fate? Reposing one day in a gorgeous chamber of the Alcazar (it is now called the room of Maria de Padilla, but it was then known as the Hall of the Sultana), Egilona drew from under the folds of her mantle a circlet of gold. “See, love,” said she, “the crown of Roderich the Goth. Let me place it on your brow. It will become you well.”