peculiarities of the Muslims as impious trafficking with evil, while the salvation of thousands was at stake. Ximenes shared the fanaticism of his age and country. Having obtained a commission to aid the Archbishop in his work, he assembled the Muslim doctors, harangued, flattered, and bribed them till many received baptism (1499). Still unsatisfied, he adopted more violent measures. He began to ill-treat the descendants of renegades and to tear their children from them; he imprisoned the more obstinate of his opponents, and confiscated and publicly burned all books treating of their religion. A savage revolt within the city was quelled only by the influence of the Captain-general and the Archbishop. Ximenes, when recalled to Court to be reprimanded for his high-handed action, succeeded in winning over the Queen to his views. A commission was sent to punish a revolt provoked by the infraction of guaranteed rights. It was evident that the capitulation was no longer to be respected, and while thousands, cowed but unconvinced, received baptism, others quitted Spain for Africa. The districts round Granada showed none of the submissive spirit of the city. On hearing of the injustice done to their fellow-countrymen the mountaineers of the Alpuj arras revolted, and the Count of Tendilla, with Gonzalo de Cdrdova, then a young soldier, undertook a difficult and dangerous campaign in an almost inaccessible region. In the spring of 1500 Ferdinand himself assumed the command, and the rebellion was crushed out by irresistibly superior forces. Each little town perched upon its crag had to be stormed. Men taken with arms in their hands were butchered as rebels; the survivors were punished by enormous fines, and cajoled or forced to receive baptism.
No sooner was this rising repressed, than a still more formidable one broke out in the Sierra Bermeja on the western side of the kingdom. Christians were tortured and murdered, and the alarm was increased by the belief that the rebels were in communication with Africa. A splendid force, hastily raised in Andalucia, marched into the fastnesses of the mountains; but, becoming entangled among passes where the heavy-armed horsemen were helpless, it was nearly exterminated at Rio Verde (March, 1501). The rebels, however, were terrified by their success; the revolt spread no further; and when Ferdinand hurried to Honda, prepared for a campaign, they sued for peace. Again the choice between baptism and exile was offered, and thousands quitted the country.
In July, 1501, the whole kingdom of Granada was declared to be Christian; and the only Muslim element left within the realms of Castile consisted of small groups settled in cities even as far north as Burgos and Zamora, under the protection of the Crown. These Mudejares were now forbidden to communicate with their newly converted brethren of the south. Six months later, all who refused to become Christians were banished. In Aragon and Valencia the Mudejares were allowed, for a
