Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. III.djvu/338

312 AFRICAN EXPEDITION OF XIMENES. PART to the condition of his college, its discipline, and '- — literary progress, which, with the great project for the publication of his famous Polyglot Bible, seemed now almost wholly to absorb his attention. ^^ His first care, however, was to visit the families in his diocese, and minister consolation and relief, which he did in the most benevolent manner, to those who were suffering from the loss of friends, whether by death or absence, in the late campaign. Nor did he in his academical retreat lose sight of the great object which had so deeply interested him, of extending the empire of the Cross over Africa. From time to time he remitted supplies for the maintenance of Oran ; and he lost no oppor- tunity of stimulating Ferdinand to prosecute his conquests. ,>ivarro's Xhc CathoHc king, however, felt too sensibly the African con- "' ' - j ""'^' importance of his new possessions to require such admonition ; and Count Pedro Navarro was furnished with ample resources of eery kind, and, above all, with the veterans formed under the eye of Gonsalvo de Cordova. Thus placed on an independent field of conquest, the Spanish general was not slow in ])ushing his advantages. His first enterprise was 15 10. against Bugia, whose king, at the head of a power- ful army, he routed in two pitched battles, and got jnn. 31. possession of his flourishing capital. Algiers, Ten- nis, Tremecen, and other cities on the Barbary coast, submitted one after another to the Spanish '3 Qiiintanilla, Arclietypo, lib. 3, torn. vi. lib. 8, cap. 30. — Robles, cap. 20. — Gcimez, De Rebus Ges- Vida de Ximenez, cap. 22. lis, fol. 119, 120.— Zurita, Anales,