Only 117 years were consumed in the erection of this wondrous structure, which is a short time as old cathedrals go. After St. Peter’s at Rome and the Mezquita at Cordova, it is the largest church in the world. It is 414 feet long, 271 feet wide, and 100 feet high to the top of the nave. The immense pillars, as you look down the church between them, seem to diminish in the distance to the thickness of reeds. Many another cathedral could stand inside the nave of this one. There are numerous churches in the city; most of the older ones are built on the foundations of mosques. The church of La Caridad has a strange legend connected with it. Don Miguel de Manara, the founder, had been a profligate in his youth, a sort of Don Juan, and was known far and wide for his excesses. One night when he was returning home alone he lost his way, and wandered about in a daze, unable to find his home. In imagination he met a funeral procession, and stopping one of the bearers inquired who it was that they were taking to eternal rest at such an hour. “Don Miguel de Manara,” he replied. Greatly surprised at hearing his own name, Don Miguel uncovered the face and saw there his own features. The procession immediately vanished; but left him so deeply impressed that he was converted and built a church and a hospital. PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR, VOL. 1, No. 31 COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC. [Illustration: VIEW OF ALHAMBRA. GRANADA, SPAIN] _SPAIN AND GIBRALTAR_ _Siege of Granada_ FIVE The city of Granada was the last Moorish stronghold in Spain. The usurpers had been driven from province after province, while the power of Castile increased in all the country round. Only the province of Granada held firm. Even there, losses in war had so weakened the Moors that their kings paid tribute to the Christian rulers, down to the time of Muley Hassan. He was a proud and cruel monarch, so fond of the dignity his fathers had held that he not only withheld the tribute, but even made inroads into Spanish territory. A ten years’ war followed. Spain determined to drive her enemy out of Europe once and for all. In battle after battle the Christians narrowed Hassan’s kingdom, till the people of Granada rose in revolt against the ruler whose bad luck and tyranny made him so unpopular. He was dethroned, and the kingdom given to Boabdil, his son. Boabdil was if anything more unfortunate than his father; for Ferdinand and Isabella pushed their conquest little by little up to the very walls of Granada.