Old Court Life in Spain; vol. 1

“See, Cid Campeador,” she says, proudly launching on him a look out of her glowing eyes, “many kings would have envied you, who were bred up with me, yet you hold me of little count. Go to my brother, and entreat him to leave me alone. I would rather die with these men in Zamora than live elsewhere. Tell him what you have seen and heard, and may God speed you on the way.” With which answer the Cid departs.

CHAPTER XXXI

Don Alfonso Banishes the Cid

DON SANCHO was young. He was arrogant. He had already crowned himself king of the three kingdoms, and believed he was invincible. As the Cid entered his tent and delivered Doña Urraca’s message, he turned upon him savagely.

“This is your counsel,” he cried. “Oh, Cid, such courage does not belong to a woman! My sister defies me because you were bred up with her, and because – ”

What more Don Sancho might have said, remained unspoken, for the Cid broke in with a terrible oath:

“It is false. I have served you faithfully, according to my word. But I declare I will not take arms against the Infanta, nor against the city of Zamora, because of the days that are past.”

“Traitor!” shouted Don Sancho, incensed beyond all bounds. “If it were not for my father, I would order you this instant to be hanged!”

“It is not your father’s desires, but your own use for me which restrains you, Don Sancho. Have you not two brothers alive? And who shall gainsay me if I place one of them on the throne?”

Without another word the Cid turned and left the tent, and calling to him his kinsmen and friends, rode out of the camp towards Toledo.

King Don Sancho, greatly alarmed, sent after him and brought him back.

So hard-pressed was Zamora, that although Doña Urraca was of a stout heart, she determined, by the advice of her foster-father and her council, as she would not willingly see all her people die, to retreat with them to Toledo, to join her brother, Don Alfonso, who was with the Moors.

Now this was exactly what the traitor Dolfos was waiting for.

“Lady Doña Infanta,” he said, kissing her hand as she sat on an ancient seat in her retiring room debating what she was to do, signs of hunger and grief on her royal face, “I have served you long, and never had any reward, though I have seen you gracious to other men. But if you will look with favour on me, I will make Don Sancho raise the siege.”

Now this speech, which the chroniclers give us word for word, would seem to infer either that he was a villain, who took advantage of her strait, or that Doña Urraca was not that faultless dame we would fain believe her to be.

Her answer, too, was calm, as of one to whom the aspirations of love were no strange matter.

“Don Dolfos, I will answer you as the wise men did the fool. Bargains are made with the slothful, and with those in need. I am in sore need. I do not bid you to commit an evil deed, but I say there is nothing I would not grant to the man who saves Zamora from the king.”

Again Dolfos kissed her hand.

Now it is well known that the king was treacherously slain by Dolfos, with his own gilded hunting-spear, outside the walls, believing that he had come to him secretly pretending to give Zamora up. The Cid, who was riding near, met him flying back towards the postern, and charged him with the deed, but he put spurs to his horse and got back within the walls. The Cid, eager to pursue him, took his lance from his esquire, but did not wait to buckle on his spurs, which was the only fault ever found with him in all his life.

Without spurs he could not urge his horse as swiftly as the other, and so he escaped.

Once inside the postern, Dolfos, in mortal fear of those within, rushed to the palace and flung himself at Doña Urraca’s feet, drawing her royal mantle over him for protection.

But when her foster-father, Don Arias, knew it, he went to her and spoke:

“My Infanta, you cannot harbour this traitor, otherwise all the Castilians outside will accuse you of murder.”

“What can I do?” she answers. “See how he clings to my robe.”

She knew she had encouraged him in what he had done, and in the letters she had written, and fain would she have saved him. But Don Arias would listen to nothing.

“Give Dolfos up to me;” and he drew him away by force, the poor wretch trembling all over, with no strength to stand. “Come, Dolfos,” says Don Arias, “be of good cheer; to please the Infanta, I will hide you three days in my house. If the Castilians impeach us, I must give you up. If they do not, you shall escape from the town. Here you cannot bide, for we are honourable men, and keep no company with traitors.”

After King Sancho’s death came Don Alfonso, to be known as El Sabio, to join his sister at Zamora, who had always loved him well.

A council was called in the palace. The Castilians, Navarrese, Leonese, and the Gallegos, being already his subjects, are ready to acknowledge him as king if he can clear himself of all knowledge of the murder of his brother.

The ricoshombres, counts and knights, the prelates and chief persons have already kissed his hand; but the Cid sits apart. The image of his dead master rises up between him and Alfonso. It was he who had found Don Sancho by the side of the Douro wounded to death by his own hunting-spear, which he dared not draw forth for fear of killing him outright.

“Now, how is this, Cid Campeador?” asks the new king, who, in majesty of person and speech and wisdom, was much more like his sister Doña Urraca than Don Sancho. “See you not that all have received me for their lord except you? Why have you not kissed my hand?”

“Sir,” answers the Cid, rising from where he sat, “the reason is this: all these present, as well as I, suspect you of having compassed your brother’s death. Unless you can clear yourself, I will never kiss your hand or acknowledge you as king.”

“Your words please me well,” is the king’s reply, spoken softly, but rage was in his heart. “I swear to God and St. Mary I never slew him or took counsel of his death, and I will clear myself of the charge by oath within the church of Sant’ Agueda at Burgos.”

The ancient church of St. Gaden or Sant’ Agueda, not far from the Suelos of the Cid, and where he was married, is filled with the noblest company in Castile; the Cid, towering over all, at the high altar, in chain armour from top to heel, his good sword Tizona at his side, and in his hand a cross-bow of wood and steel.

Face to face is King Alfonso in royal robes, his hand upon a painted missal beside the Host.

“King Don Alfonso,” says the Cid, in his terrible voice, so well known in the battle-field, “will you swear that you have not compassed the death of my king and master, your brother Don Sancho? If you swear falsely, may you die the death of a traitor and a slave.”

To which King Alfonso, joining his hands on the Cid’s answers, “Amen.”

But he changed colour.

Then the Cid repeats a second time, “King Don Alfonso, will you further swear you neither counselled nor favoured the murder of the king, your brother, and my master? If you swear falsely, may you die the death of a traitor and a slave.”

Again the king presses his hand and answers, “Amen.”

But he changed colour.

Then came forth twelve vassals who confirmed the king’s word, and the Cid was at last satisfied, and the knights also said, “Amen.” The Cid would have embraced the king, but he turned away, and though he had shown himself invincible, the king banished him (1081).

Then the Cid sent for all his kinsmen and vassals and asked who would follow him, and who remain at home?

“We will all go with you,” answers his cousin, Alvar Fañez, “and be your loyal friends.”

“I thank you,” replies the Cid. “The time will come when I shall reward you tenfold.”

CHAPTER XXXII

The Cid Bids Doña Ximena Farewell

WHEN the Cid returned to Burgos, men and women went forth to look at him, others were on the roofs and at the windows weeping, so great was the sorrow at the manner of his return. Every one desired to welcome him, but no one dared, for King Don Alfonso had sent letters to say, “None should give the Cid lodging or food, and that whoever disobeyed should lose all he had, and the eyes out of his head.”

The Cid went up Calle Alta to his Suelos, but he found the door fastened for fear of the king. He called out with a loud voice, but no one answered. Then he took his foot out of the stirrup and gave it a kick, but the lock stood firm, being well secured. The only one who appeared was a little girl nine years old, who ran out of one of the houses near.

“O Cid, we dare not open our doors to you, for we should lose all we have, and the eyes in our heads. This would not help you, dear Cid. But we pray that God and His angels may keep you. Adios.”

When the Cid understood what the king had done, he turned his horse aside to St. Mary’s chapel (at the gateway), and knelt and prayed with all his heart at the altar, then rode out of the town and pitched his tent on the banks of the Arlanzon.

At this time occurred his dealing with the Jews.

The Cid’s purse was empty, and he must fill it. “Take two chests,” he said to his nephew, “and fill them with sand, and go to Rachel and Vidal and bid them come hither privately, because I cannot take my treasure with me on horseback, and money I must have before I start. Let them come for the chests at night when no one will see. God knows I do not this willingly, but of necessity, and I will redeem all.”

Martin Antolinez did as he was told. To the Jews he said, “If you give me your hands that you do not betray me to Christian or Moor, you shall be rich men for ever. The Campeador has great wealth in tribute. He has two chests full of gold. He will leave them in your hands, and you shall lend him money upon them, if you swear solemnly not to open the chests nor look at the gold.”

The confiding Jews swore by Father Abraham, gave the money, and received the chests. They were covered with leather, red and gold, the nails gilt, and the sides ribbed with bars of iron; each chest was fastened by a lock, and they were very heavy, being filled with sand. The Jews came to the Cid’s tent and kissed his hand, then, spreading a sheet on the carpet, they counted out the gold, and also gave a handsome present to his nephew.

“Let us be gone,” whispered Martin into the Cid’s ear, not at all ashamed. So at cock-crow they started to meet Doña Ximena at San Pedro de Cardeña. (In the chapel of Santa Isabel, outside the Puerta del Sarmental of the cathedral, is still to be seen one of these chests, called the Cofre del Cid, clamped with iron and nailed up to the wall.)

At San Pedro the Cid found Ximena and his two little daughters. “Abbot,” he said, addressing himself to the priest. “I commend my two little niñas to your care. Take care of them while I fight, and my wife and her ladies, and when the money I now give you is gone, supply them all the same, for every mark I will hereafter give you four.” And the abbot promised.

Doña Ximena and her daughters kissed the Cid, and she knelt down at his feet weeping bitterly.

The Cid, whose heart was tender for his own however hard with his enemies, wept too, and took the children in his arms, for he dearly loved them.

“My dear and honoured wife,” he said, “cheer up, I shall yet live to give these children in marriage to great lords. Have faith in me, Ximena, whom I love as my own soul.”

Again and again the Cid commended Ximena to the abbot, then he and all the knights loosened the reins of their horses and pricking forward to the Sierra entered into the country of the Moors.

CHAPTER XXXIII

Adventures of the Cid – Death and Burial

FROM this time began that life of knight-errantry which has made the Cid famous in all ages.

First he betook himself to the court of the Count of Barcelona, but not agreeing with him, passed into the service of the Sheikh Móstadri, the most powerful of the Moslem princes of Saragossa. At his death, which occurred soon after, the Cid continued with his eldest son, Montamin, and assisted him against his two brothers with prodigies of valour.

In five days he overran Aragon and harried a large tract of country for spoil, returning in triumph to Saragossa, bringing with him prisoner the Count of Barcelona.

“Blessed be God and all His saints,” said the Cid to his followers. “By this victory we have bettered our quarters for horses and for men. Hear me, all you knights,” and he raised his mighty voice, “we shall get nothing by killing these Moors. Let us make them show us the treasures they have hidden in their houses. That will serve us better than their death.”

All this and much more was done, as the Cid said, por murzar. Enemies or friends, money must be had.

But the great feat of the Cid’s life is his conquest of Valencia, where he was called to protect the Sheikh Yahia along with the Moorish king of Saragossa. Upon whatever cause he went (and the chronicles are extremely confused after he took service with the Moslem), ambition was his motive and pillage his object.

From Jativa, on the hills over the sea, he came down with his army into the Huerta, an unexampled garden, beautiful in all time: woods of palm and orange-trees, fences of aloes and prickly pear, the glory of the Roman, the pleasaunce of the Goth, the delight of the Arab, who declared “that heaven had fallen here.”

Valencia itself lies sweetly on either side of a river, the banks breaking into bosques and gardens, with tall towers shooting into the blue sky. El Miguelete, square and Gothic, its rival Aliberfar, all points, minarets, and domes, – the Zeca (bazaar) and Alcazar, – bridge, twelve gates, and tapia battlements, turreted and machicolated, hemmed in by fruitful plains, the rich country studded with posadas and quintas to the sea-shore, about a mile distant.

The Moorish Sheikh Yahia received the Cid honourably, and gave him a great revenue in return for his protection. But this did not last long.

Seeing how powerful he was, King Alfonso suddenly claimed all his conquests as his suzerain, which led to further strife between them, Alfonso attacking Valencia in his absence with the Moors to gain it for himself; in revenge for which act of treason the Campeador carried his arms into his own land, Castile, destroying castles and sacking towns. “Make war and deceive,” was his motto now. He had learned it from the Moors, and acted up to it till he died. Still in his heart he loved the country where he was born and where he had left his wife and children, only that he hated King Alfonso more.

On his return the gates of Valencia were shut against him, and the terrible siege began, the Cid attacking the city as cruelly as he could, and food becoming dearer every day till at last it was not to be had; the people were carried off in waves of death, dropping and dying in the streets, the Alcazar full of corpses, and no grave with less than ten bodies in it.

At last the gates were opened to him by his friend, Abeniaf, the Adelantado, in return for which he had him first stoned, then burned alive in the plaza.

In these days one seeks in vain for the noble qualities of Ruy Diaz de Bivar. The only excuse to be found is the harshness and injustice with which Don Alfonso treated him.

Valencia surrendered in June, 1694, and the Cid at once bethought him of his wife and children, now grown up to womanhood, left in the Abbey of St. Peter, and sent his nephew Alvar Fañez and Martin Antolinez, with two hundred knights, on a mission to the king. He also sent money to redeem the debt of the chests filled with sand, and to excuse himself to the Jews, Rachel and Vidal, for having cheated them in his great need.

“What tidings bring you me of the Cid?” asks the king (of Alvar and Martin), whom they find in the city of Burgos.

Then Alvar stood out and spake boldly: “The tidings are good, Sir King, but we come to ask a boon, for the love of your Maker. You banished the Cid from the land, and behold, he has won six pitched battles against the Moors, also the city of Valencia; and he places all he has at your feet, if of your bounty he may have his wife and his daughters with him there.”

“It pleases me well,” is the king’s answer. “I will give them a guard through Castile. When they have passed it, the Cid Campeador will look after them himself. Moreover, I grant him Valencia and all that he has won as his own, to be held under me, who am his liege lord and suzerain.”

Great joy was there at San Pedro de Cardeña when the knights appeared, Doña Ximena and her daughters running out on foot to meet them, and weeping plenteously for joy.

“And how does my dear lord fare?” asks the gentle Doña Ximena, wiping her eyes. “In all all these years I have had no news of him.”

“Well, and safe and sound,” answers Alvar Fañez, saluting her. “Be of good cheer, my cousin, for the great city of Valencia is his, and his heart’s desire is to see you and have you with him there.”

“Alas! what am I,” cries poor Ximena, ever humble in her mind, “that he could show me this favour after so many years! God and the Virgin be thanked for his constancy.”

When they were within three miles of Valencia, under the thick shade of the orange woods of the Huerta, word of their coming was brought to the Cid, who ordered that Babieca should be saddled, and girt on his sword.

He was much changed. He had the same commanding aspect and far-seeing eyes, but his white beard was so long and flowing, it was a wonder to behold. No man ever put his hand on it in life but himself, or touched it with a razor, and when he fought it was screwed up like a curl under his chin. Every gesture was imperious, as of a king. At that time, indeed, no king in Spain could compare with the Cid in power.

“Dear and honoured wife,” he exclaimed, as he embraces Doña Ximena, who received him on her knees, “and you, my daughters, come with me into Valencia, the inheritance I have won for you.”

He leads them through the gate called “of the Snake,” then mounts into the famous tower of the Miguelete, now the Campanile of the Cathedral, – and in the clear transparent air shows them the city which lies at their feet, the green Huerta, thick with shade, and the blue ocean beyond, on which ride the ships of the King of Morocco, come to besiege the city, a sight which made poor Ximena tremble.

But the Cid comforted her.

“You shall see with your own eyes how I fight and how I gain our bread. Fear not, honoured wife,” seeing that Ximena’s courage fails her, “my heart kindles to the fight because you are here. More Moors, more gain – ”

The tambours of the enemy now sound a great alarm, but the Cid smiles and strokes his beard, gazing fondly on Ximena, now a wrinkled woman in middle age.

“Dear wife, look boldly out over Valencia. All this I give you for a marriage gift. I have won it, and I will send the King of Morocco packing whence he came. In fifteen days, please God, his rattling tambours shall be hung up in the church of St. Mary. Pray God I may live for your sakes, and still overcome the Moor!”

Thus speaking, they descend the tower and enter the Alcazar, all gold and painted walls on stone and wood, in the Arab manner, with hangings above and below, purple and crimson, and rich cloths thick with gold and silver, and take their seats on benches set with precious stones, the Cid placing himself on an ivory divan like a throne.

About this time King Alfonso and the Cid met at last as friends on the banks of the Tagus, a river of very rapid flood, where tents were pitched and many knights assembled.

The Cid knelt on the ground before him, and would have kissed his foot in the jewelled stirrup, but King Alfonso cried out: “My hand, Cid Campeador, my hand!” and embracing him said he forgave him with all his heart (the Cid still on his knees), then raised him up and gave him the kiss of peace.

Afterwards they ate together, and Alfonso proposed his kinsmen, the two Infantes of Currion, as husbands to the Cid’s two daughters, Elvira and Sol. Very scornful and haughty young princes they were, who did not please the Cid nor Doña Ximena at all, but the Cid dared not say “No,” on account of the king.

The marriages indeed turned out ill; and the dames were afterwards affianced to Don Sancho of Aragon, and the Infante Ramiro of Navarre. The Infantes of Currion were dismissed and dishonoured for their crimes, at the Cortes held in the palace of Burgos, before Alfonso, the Cid sitting beside him, within the golden estrado, on the ivory divan he had taken from the Moors – a throne, in fact, which had served a sheikh – a great triumph for him, at Burgos especially, his native city, where he had begged in vain for bread and was forced to cheat the Jews to fill his purse!

The Cid was in the prime of life, untouched by the hand of time, lord of a great capital and of a powerful state – far-seeing and wise, heroically audacious in all he did, capable of love, yet tremendous in hate. “Our Cid,” as the people called him, “born in a happy hour,” none dreaming of a united kingdom of which he was to be the head when he was struck in the midst of his career by the hand of death.

“Be you sure,” he said to his household and his companions in arm, whom he had called together, “that I am at the end of my life. In thirty days I shall die. More than once lately I have seen my father, Don Diego Laynez, and the son whom I lost. They say to me each time, ‘You have tarried on earth too long, come now with us, among the people who live for ever.’ ”

After this, having sickened of the malady of which he died, he called for the casket of gold in which was the balsam and the myrrh the Soldan of Persia had given him, and he drank it, and, for the seven days which he lived, he neither ate nor drank aught else, and his body and his countenance appeared fairer and fresher and his voice clearer, though he waxed weaker and weaker.

On the day before he departed, he called for Doña Ximena and his nephew Alvar Fañez, and directed them what to do after his death.

“You know,” he said, “that the King Bucar, of Morocco, will presently return to besiege the city; therefore, when I am dead, make no cries or lamentations, but wash my body and dry it well, and anoint it with the myrrh and balsam out of the gold casket, from head to foot; then saddle you my horse Babieca, and arm her as for battle, apparel my body as I went in life against the Moors, and set me on her back, and tie me fast, so as not to fall, and fix my good sword Tizona in my hand, and when thus accoutred lead me out against the king, whom God has delivered into my hands.”

Three days after the Cid died (1099). On the morning of the twelfth day, when all was ready, as the Cid had commanded, they went against the army of the Moor and prevailed, and the dead body of the Cid left Valencia, on his horse Babieca, armed at all points and passed through the camp of the Moors, followed by Doña Ximena and his trusty friends – taking the road for the monastery of San Pedro de Cardeña, near Burgos, where he was to be interred; and the king came from Toledo to meet them.

When they took the Cid from off his horse and set him on a frame before the altar, so fair and comely did he appear, Doña Ximena entreated the king not to have the body laid in a coffin underground. So king Alfonso sent to Burgos for the ivory divan on which the Cid had sat as king at the Cortes, and gave orders that he should be placed in it, to the right of the altar, and a graven tabernacle placed over him, bearing the blazon of Castile and Leon, Navarre, and Aragon, and his own arms as the Cid Ruy Diaz the Campeador. There it was left for ten years, and when the garments waxed old others were put on.

In a side capella of the church of San Pedro, five miles from Burgos, the square monument of the Cid is still to be seen. It is much mutilated, but his lofty figure can still be traced on the lid, wearing a coat of mail and grasping his double-hilted sword Tizona, the effigy of the faithful Ximena at his side.

Legend says that while the body was left alone in the church before being interred, it was visited by a Jew, who, wagging his head, contemptuously contemplated the face of the dead hero and his sacred beard, of which the Cid had said, “Thanks be to God, it is long because I keep it for my pleasure, and never a son of Moor or Jew has dared to touch it.”