The Alhambra . and not atenant will remain in it. Enough, said the mason sturdily : let me live in yourhouse rent-free until some better tenant present, and I willengage to put it in repair, and to quiet the troubled spirit thatdisturbs it. I am a good Christian and a poor man, and amnot to be daunted by the Devil himself, even though he shouldcome in the shape of a big bag of money I The offer of the honest mason was gladly accepted ; hemoved with his family into the house, and fulfilled all his en-gagements. By little and little he restored it to its formerstate; the clinking of gold was no
The Alhambra . and not atenant will remain in it. Enough, said the mason sturdily : let me live in yourhouse rent-free until some better tenant present, and I willengage to put it in repair, and to quiet the troubled spirit thatdisturbs it. I am a good Christian and a poor man, and amnot to be daunted by the Devil himself, even though he shouldcome in the shape of a big bag of money I The offer of the honest mason was gladly accepted ; hemoved with his family into the house, and fulfilled all his en-gagements. By little and little he restored it to its formerstate; the clinking of gold was no more heard at night in thechamber of the defunct priest, but began to be heard by dayin the pocket of the living mason. In a word, he increasedrapidly in wealth, to the admiration of all his neighbours, andbecame one of the richest men in Granada: he gave largesums to the Church, by way, no doubt, of satisfying hisconscience, and never revealed the secret of the vault until onhis death-bed to his son and THE COURT OF LIONS The peculiar charm of this old dreamy palace is its powerof calling up vague reveries and picturings of the past, andthus clothing naked realities with the illusions of the memoryand the imagination. As I delight to walk in these vainshadows, I am prone to seek those parts of the Alhambrawhich are most favourable to this phantasmagoria of the mind ;and none are more so than the Court of Lions, and its sur-rounding halls. Here the hand of time has fallen the lightest,and the traces of Moorish elegance and splendour exist inalmost their original brilliancy. Earthquakes have shaken thefoundations of this pile, and rent its rudest towers; yet see !not one of those slender columns has been displaced, not anarch of that light and fragile colonnade given way, and all thefairy fretwork of these domes, apparently as unsubstantial asthe crystal fabrics of a mornings frost, exist after the lapse ofcenturies, almost as fresh as if from the hand of the Moslemartist
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookpublisherlondon, bookyear190
