and the Moors flying.*

*Ibid.


The camp was formed, but the artillery was yet on the road,
advancing with infinite labor at the rate of merely a league a day,
for heavy rains had converted the streams of the valleys into raging
torrents and completely broken up the roads. In the mean time, King
Ferdinand ordered an assault on the suburbs of the city. They were
carried after a sanguinary conflict of six hours, in which many
Christian cavaliers were killed and wounded, and among the latter
Don Alvaro of Portugal, son of the duke of Braganza. The suburbs
were then fortified toward the city with trenches and palisades, and
garrisoned by a chosen force under Don Fadrique de Toledo. Other
trenches were digged round the city and from the suburbs to the
royal camp, so as to cut off all communication with the surrounding
country.

Bodies of troops were also sent to take possession of the mountain-
passes by which the supplies for the army had to be brought. The
mountains, however, were so steep and rugged, and so full of defiles
and lurking-places, that the Moors could sally forth and retreat in
perfect security, frequently swooping down upon Christian convoys
and bearing off both booty and prisoners to their strongholds.
Sometimes the Moors would light fires at night on the sides of the
mountains, which would be answered by fires from the watch-towers
and fortresses. By these signals they would concert assaults upon
the Christian camp, which in consequence was obliged to be continually
on the alert.