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and the howling of the wind , they fancied they heard the sound of the drums and trumpets , the shouts of armies and the rush of * steeds . Thug beaten hy tempest and overwhelmed with horror , the king and his courtiers arrived at Toledo , clattering across the bridge oi' the Tagus , and entering- the gate in headlong confusion , as though they had been pursued by an enemy . " — p . 28 .
The following extract describes the fate of Florinda , the Helen of Spain . After the complete subjugation of the country by the Saracens , she still lived with her father , who had acquired countless riches . But all his success and all his luxuries could not give him ease , nor soften the anguish which he suffered at seeing ( says the legend , ) that " the Christians cursed him as the cause of all their woe ; the Moslems despised and distrusted him as a traitor . "
" Florinda , the daughter of his heart , for whose sake he had undertaken this signal vengeance , was sinking a victim to its effects . Wherever she went , she found herself a by-word of shame and reproach . The outrage she had suffered was imputed to her as wantonness , and her calamity was magnified into a crime . The Christians never mentioned her name without a curse , and the Moslems , the gainers by her misfortune , spake of her only b y the appellation of Cava , the vilest epithet they could apply to woman .
" liut the opprobrium of the world was nothing to the upbraiding of her own heart . She charged herself with all the miseries of these disastrous wars ; the deaths of so m ; my gallant cavaliers ; the conquest and perdition of her country . The anguish of her mind preyed upon the beauty of her person . Her eye , once soft and tender in its expression , became wild and haggard ; her cheek lost its bloom , and became hollow and pallid ; and at times there was desperation in her words . When her father sought to embrace her , she withdrew with shuddering * from his arms ; for she thought of his treason mid the ruin it had
brought upon Spain . Her wretchedness increased after her return to her native country , until it rose to a degree of frenzy . One day , when she was walking with her parents in the gardens of their palace , she entered a tower , and having barred the door , ascended to the battlements . From thence she called to them in piercing accents , expressive of her insupportable anguish and desperate determination . * Let this city , ' said she , « be henceforth called Malacca , in memorial of the most wretched of woman , who therein i > ut an end to her days / So
saying , she threw herself headlong from the tower , and was dashed to pieces . * The cit y / adds the ancient chronicler , * received the name thus given it , though afterwards softened to Malaga , which it still retains , jn memory of the tragical end of Florinda / "~ p . 318 . The story of the end of Muza , the magnificent conqueror of Spain , whose services were rewarded by the confiscation of his property , scourging , and imprisonment , is exactly like one of the tales in the Arabian Nights ; wherein the caprice of Caliphs and Sultans , and the sudden ruin of their favourites , are so often related . One of the moHt beautiful legends is that of the wife of Count Julian and her son . The Arabs had become suspicious
Untitled Article
86 Legends of the Conquest of Spain -
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1836, page 86, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2654/page/22/
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