He took his revenge for this disaster by an irruption into Andalusia, which he laid waste from the Navas de Tolosa to within a day’s journey of Cordova. Soon after his return to Leon, the king committed a rigorous but treacherous act of justice. Four counts of Castile, whom he suspected of disaffection, were put to death. Ordoño died in 923, immediately after his third marriage with a princess of Navarre. Fruela II, brother of Ordoño, was elected in preference to the children of the deceased king. Alfonso IV, who succeeded in 925, in preference to the sons of Fruela II, is represented as a prince more addicted to piety than to ambition. In the sixth year of his reign, he renounced the vanities of the world, resigned the sceptre into the hands of his brother Ramiro, and retired into the monastery of Sahagun. The following year, however, he forsook his cell, and, with a considerable force, hastened to Leon to reclaim the throne. His brother compelled him to surrender, and again consigned him to his monastery, with three princes (the sons of Fruela II) his counsellors. In accordance with the laws of the Visigoths, the punishment of death was commuted to all four by the loss of their eyes. Alfonso survived his misfortune about two years and a half. Ramiro II, who ascended the throne in 930, is chiefly distinguished for his wars with the misbelievers. He gained a considerable advantage over Abd ar-Rahman III at Simancas. Like most of his predecessors, Ramiro had also to struggle with internal discord. The dependent count of Castile, Fernan Gonsalez, and one Diego Nuñez, a count also in the same province, for reasons with which history (however communicative romance may be) does not acquaint us, revolted against him. The king marched against them, seized their persons, and confined them in two separate fortresses. His displeasure was not of long duration: he suffered the counts to resume their offices on their taking the usual oaths of obedience; and he even married his eldest son, Ordoño, to Urraca, daughter of Fernan Gonsalez. To that son, on the vigil of the Epiphany, in the year 950, he resigned the crown: his growing illness convinced him that he had not long to live; he therefore assumed the penitential garb, and passed his few remaining days in religious retirement. [Sidenote: [950-967 A.D.]]