Already, in the very first years of the century, John Ribera, archbishop
of Valencia, had recommended and urged the scheme.

It was too gigantic a project to be carried into execution at once, but
it was slowly matured by the aid of other ecclesiastics. At last there
were indications, both human and divine, that the expulsion of these
miscreants could no longer be deferred. It was rumoured and believed
that a general conspiracy existed among the Moors to rise upon the
Government, to institute a general massacre, and, with the assistance of
their allies and relatives on the Barbary coast, to re-establish the
empire of the infidels.

A convoy of eighty ass-loads of oil on the way to Madrid had halted at a
wayside inn. A few flasks were stolen, and those who consumed it were
made sick. Some of the thieves even died, or were said to have died, in
consequence. Instantly the rumour flew from mouth to mouth, from town
to town, that the royal family, the court, the whole capital, all Spain,
were to be poisoned with that oil. If such were the scheme it was
certainly a less ingenious one than the famous plot by which the Spanish
Government was suspected but a few years before to have so nearly
succeeded in blowing the king, peers, and commons of England into the
air.

The proof of Moorish guilt was deemed all-sufficient, especially as it
was supported by supernatural evidence of the most portentous and
convincing kind. For several days together a dark cloud, tinged with
blood-red, had been seen to hang over Valencia.

In the neighbourhood of Daroca, a din of, drums and trumpets and the