This was a town strongly posted on a steep height, by which the Moorish king would have to return.
Muley Abul Hassan saw by the fires blazing on the mountains that the country was rising.

He struck his tents, and pushed forward as rapidly as possible for the border; but he was encumbered with booty and with the vast cavalgada swept from the pastures of the Campina de Tarifa.

His scouts brought him word that there were troops in the field, but he made light of the intelligence, knowing that they could only be those of the alcayde of Gibraltar, and that he had not more than a hundred horsemen in his garrison.

He threw in advance two hundred and fifty of his bravest troops, and with them the alcaydes of Marabella and Casares.
Behind this van-guard followed a great cavalgada of cattle, and in the rear marched the king with the main force of his little army.
It was near the middle of a sultry summer day when they approached Castellar.

De Vargas was on the watch, and beheld, by an immense cloud of dust, that they were descending one of the heights of that wild and broken country.