The Poetical Works of Aubrey De Vere

Don José de Maria, thus began:
Sirs, some have boasted deeds if quaint yet brave,
And some have lectured long of lesser triumphs
The Cid's half jesting feats. Such chroniclers
Because they shared those battles give them praise,
Praising therein themselves. Valencia! there
Flamed forth the man's true greatness like the sun!—
The Moors' chief city, where their noblest dwelt
In garden-girdled palaces 'mid palms.
Seaward it looks t'ward every coast where waves
Their prophet's flag accurst. Thus spake the Cid:
‘Valencia's King sent kinglings on a day
When I, new wedded, hunted on his grounds,
To visit me. We grappled; and they fled:
Decorum needs that we return that visit.’
Pass we the lesser triumphs on his march.
He took Valencia's suburb chief. Huge walls
Manned by an army barred our farther progress;
Our scaling ladders near them seemed like toys.
The Cid encamped before them: missives sent:
‘Sirs, have your choice! or fight or die of hunger!’
But they had seen him in the field too oft
To fight as once they fought. The Cid flung back
With scorn their petulant sallies. Day by day
Their stores were minished. Sorer week by week
The anguish of their hunger. Many a Moor
Rushed to our serried ranks loud clamouring, ‘Bread!
‘Make us your slaves, but feed our babes!’
At last
An unexpected promise dawned upon them;
The mightiest of the Moorish hosts drew near,
The Almoravides; and Valencia's sons,
Fools of a credulous hope, exultant cried:
‘To Allah praise! Yon Christian foe is doomed;

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Ere long their bones shall whiten vale and plain!’
So sang they, clustered on the city walls
As twilight deeper grew, and plainlier shone
The Moorish camp-fires far. Meantime my Cid
Had given command to rive the dams and bridges
And open fling the sluices to the sea,
For prescient was the man and knew his foe
Must cross a lowland wide. The sea rushed in;
Twilight to blackness changed. The moon was drowned
In plunging storm of hail and rain and snow:
Emerging thence it stared on wandering floods
From sea and river, and the mountain walls
Whose torrents, glimpsed but when the lightning flared,
Thundered far off. Vain were the Moslem vows,
For countless prayers of Christians in all lands
From Breton coasts to the utmost German forest
And all that empire old of Charlemagne
Meeting them, drave them past the heavenly gates
Abortive shapes and frustrate. All night long
The Moors down crouched upon their city bastions
Clinging to tower and coign. At dawn came news!
That Moorish force had fled; Valencia's sons
When spread those tidings deemed themselves dead men;
Yea, as the blind they groped about their streets,
Or staggered on like drunkards; neither knew
Each man the face of neighbour or of friend,
But gazed at him and passed: at other times
Old enemies clasped hands but spake no word;
And some flung forth their arms like swimmer spent
That sinks in black seas lost. Ten days went by;
The famine spread till chiefs remote drew near

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Crying: ‘Thy vassals we!’
Four weeks had passed;
Then rose a white-haired elder, prophet deemed,
And famed for justice long, a silent man;
For three whole years he had not spoken word
Save thrice. He scaled Valencia's topmost tower,
And while around its base the people thronged
Made thus the lamentation of the City:
Nine times he made it ere the sun went down.
‘Valencia, my Valencia! Trouble and grief
Have come upon thee, and the hour decreed:
If ever God on any place shewed mercy
Now let Him shew it. For thy name was joy:
All Moors that live their boasting made of thee.
If God this day should utterly consume thee
Thy doom is doom of pride. If those four stones
The corner-stones that bind thy walls in one
Could leave their dread foundations, and draw nigh
And speak with stony mouth to stony ear,
The burden of their dirge would be thy sin.
Thy towers far-gazing see but woe. Thy river,
Old Guadalever, from its course is bent,
And all those watery ministers of thine
Far-sluiced behold their channels choked with mud;
Dried are the gardens green that sucked their freshness:
The wolf and the wild boar root thy plantains down;
Thy fields are baked like clay.
Thy harbour vast,
The mirror of thy greatness, and the marvel
Of merchant princes, guests from every land,

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Rots thick with corpses; and above it far
Drifts the red smoke from burning tower and town
From coast to coast.
Valencia, my Valencia!
This is the death-cry from a breaking heart,
Repent thee of thy sins!’
When sank the sun
That burthen ceased. Then round that pillar's base
Rang forth a mighty and a piercing cry;
And headlong from it through the city rushed
Women and men. Then first that saying rose,
‘Upon my right hand breaks the sea to drown me,
The lion on my left to crush my bones:
Behind me is the fire: before my face
And all around, the hunger.’
From that hour
Whoso had bread or grain in earth interred it
Like wild beast that inearths its remnant spoil,
And gnawed it stealthily—an ounce a day—
With keen eyes glancing round. At last a beggar
Groped his blind way into the market place
And cried, ‘Give up the city!’ Straight that cry
Ran through Valencia; and its elders rose
And paced barefoot, and found the Cid, and knelt,
And laid the City's keys before his feet:
Right courteously and sadly he received them;
Helmless he rode through silent streets, his horse
With muffled feet in reverence for their woe;
The Cross first raised he on the Alcazar's tower,
Then freed the Christian slaves. Proclaim he made
‘Let all who will depart the city free:’
Two days sufficed not for thosè throngs forth-streaming:
Thousands remained so well they loved that place;

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O'er these he set, alcalde of their race,
That elder—Alfaraxi was his name—
Who mounting to Valencia's topmost tower
Had sung that city's dirge.
Through that just man
The Moors their tribute paid. Thenceforth his fame
Drew thousands to the Cid. From that far East
Whence came the Magi following still the star
To Bethlehem's crib, drew near a wondrous man
Close shorn and shaven, Don Hieronymo,
On foot a monk, a warrior when on horse;
Hating the Moors, he came to waste and slay them.
My Cid received that priest full honourably,
And gave him armour and a horse. Withal
Bishop he made him of Valencia's city,
With instant charge that every mosque should change
Thenceforth to Christian church.
The Cid next day
Sent to San Pedro's Convent golden store
And mystic gems; for well he loved that haunt
Within whose balmy bosom dwelt once more
His wife and infants twain—not infants now
But virgins in the lap of womanhood.
He sent command to speed them to Valencia:
That missive read, they knelt and raised their hands
Much weeping for great joy. The abbot old
Wept also not for gladness but for grief
Since much he loved them. Brief was his reply:
‘I send them, Cid: our convent year by year
Will pray for thine and thee.’
A week went by;
And now Ximena with her daughters twain
Nighed to Valencia, and my Cid rode forth
To meet her, helmed and mailed. Hieronymo,

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Who, clad in mystic raiment white and black,
Followed Perfection, sent his clergy forth:
That great procession met them, golden-robed,
Three crosses at their head. Behind them trooped
The knights, a glittering company. The Cid
Rode at its head. Their Mother and those maids
Leaped down and rushed to him with arms extended.
Silent he clasped them each. At last he spake,
Laughing like one who jests that he may weep not:
‘Enter Valencia! 'Tis your heritage!
I hold it but in fief.’ Entrance they made
Through streets with countless windows tapestry-hung
And arches vine-entwined. Wondering, they marked
Its gilded minarets, and high palace fronts
Mosaic-wrought. At last they reached that tower,
The same which heard so late the prophet's dirge.
They clomb its marble steps. To the West they saw
The city's myriad gardens fountain-lit;
Eastward the sea. They knelt and sang ‘Te Deum’;
And from the vast and marvelling mass beneath
The great ‘Amen’ ascended.
Sirs, a tale
For children made might here find happy end;
But life, a teacher rough, when all looks well
Genders its tempest worst. Winter went by
With feast and tourney rich. Spring-tide returned:
A sudden flame of flowers o'er-ran the earth;
To see that sight, they clomb again that tower:
What met their eyes? A spectacle unlooked for!
The horizon line was white with countless sails.
The Cid but smiled: ‘I told you not of this,
A sorry seasoning for your winter banquets,
But knew it well. In far Morocco sits
The Emperor of the Afric Moors. Yon fleet

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Wafts here his son, with thirty kings all vowed
Their steeds to water in our Holy Wells
Then stable them in every Christian church:
What sayst thou, lady mine?’ Ximena spake:
‘How many come they?’ And the Cid replied
‘Full fifty thousand; and five thousand ours!’
Death-pale his daughters grew and silent stood:
Ximena made reply, her large black eyes
Dilating at each word, ‘What God inflicts
Man can endure.’ That moment strange eclipse
Darkened the sun; and from that fleet storm-hid
The Arab tambours rolled their thunders forth:
The Cid but stroked his beard, and smiling said:
‘Daughters, take heart! The larger yonder host
The shamefuller their defeat; our spoil the greater!
I promised you long since good mates in time:
This day I promise you fair marriage portions!’
He turned; not once again he sought that tower:
Not once he sallied from Valencia's wall
Till the last Moor had landed.

Sirs, to the end!
There where we fought we triumphed; but at last
Our springs of water failed us: then it was
Our Cid put forth his greatness. Earliest dawn
Was glimmering sadly under clouds low-hung
When, in San José's, Don Hieronymo
Sang Mass. He gave the absolution thus:
‘This day whoever, Christ's true penitent,
His heart with God, his face to God's chief foe,
Dies for his country, that man's sins shall fly
Backward in cloud; his Soul ascend to heaven!’
The rite complete, that Perfect One exclaimed:
‘A boon, my Cid! Your vanguard's foremost place!
God's priest should strike the earliest blow for God.’

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The Cid made answer: ‘Be it in His name!’
Then Alvar Fanez thus: ‘Concede me, Cid,
Three hundred knights that we may bide our time
Within that bosky dell of Albuhera:
The battle at its fiercest, we will on them!’
The Cid replied: ‘In God's name be it so!’

Ere day with knights five thousand forth he rode,
And, curving round through by-ways in the woods
Dashed on the Moorish rear. New risen and 'mazed,
They deemed some second host was in among them.
That second host was Don Hieronymo
With all his vanguard. ‘Smite them,’ still he cried,
‘For love of Charity!’ The battle flame
Upsoared and onward ran like fire o'er woods:
Great deeds were done that day and many a horse
Lacking a rider spurned the blood-red plain
That flashed with broken breast-plates and with helms;
And now the Moor the Christian now prevailed,
And all the battle reeled as when two storms
Through side-way valleys met in one black gorge
Wrestle and writhe commixed. That day the Cid
Seemed omnipresent, so the Moors averred;
They sware that on his crest a fire there sat
And shone in all the circlings of his sword,
His stature more than man's. Not less in mass
Their dusk battalions hour by hour advanced:
Numbers at last prevailed; and here and there
The Christian host fell back. At once my Cid
Cried to his standard-bearer, ‘Scale yon rock,
And wave around thy head my standard thrice!’
Forward the standard-bearer rushed. That hour
The monks in far San Pedro's Church entoned
Their customed matin song and promised prayer
For him, the man they loved. The standard-bearer

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Waved thrice his standard from that craggy height,
And, as he waved it, shouted thrice ‘My Cid’
With sound as when the Fontarabian cliffs
Re-echoed Roland's horn. Swifter than moon
Fleeting 'mid stormy hill-peaks forest-girt,
That host by Alvar Fanez hid forth dashed
And flung themselves upon the Moorish flank,
Three hundred spears. The Moors were panic-stricken;
Ere long, half blinded by the westering sun,
They broke, and headlong toward the harbour fled:
Then jesting cried my Cid, ‘The day declines;
The sun must not go down upon our wrath.
For that cause, Christians, smite, and smite your best!
Your battle-axe be on them till yon orb
Shows but one star-like point!’ That point evanished
The fugitives reached the sea. Three times that hour
My Cid closed up upon the flying king,
Yucef, and three times smote his shoulders lithe;
Half dead he reached his ship; but as he leaped
My Cid flung after him the sword Colada;—
It left its mark upon him till his death,
Then sank in sea; next day a diver raised it.
Twelve thousand perished there in ship or wave.
That evening through Valencia's stateliest street,
That Perfect One, Hieronymo, beside him,
Bare-headed rode the Cid. Like creatures winged
Ximena and his daughters rushed to meet him
And kissed his hands and kissed Bavieca's neck;
Great feast was in the palace held that night,
And in the churches great were the thanksgivings
And great the alms bestowed upon the poor,
Christian and Moor alike.
Ere long within Valencia was fulfilled
That vow the Cid had vowed: ‘Though exiled now,

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This hand will give these babes to worthy mates,’
For thither, drawn by rumours of their charms,
Great princes flocked. In after times these maids
Were queens: The elder throned in Aragon,
The second in Navarre.

Don José ceased:
Then shouted loud Don Ivor of Morena
With hands high holden and with eyes upraised,
‘O Cid, my Cid, how glorious were thy days!
How many a minstrel sang thee in far lands!
What greetings came from kings! The French king thus,
“Hail, Cid, no king, yet prop of all our kings!
In vain Charles Martel with his Paladins
Had trod the Crescent down on Poitiers' plain
Thy later aid withheld!”’
Then rose once more
That youngest knight and slender as a maid
Who on the earliest of those knightly vigils
Spake thus, ‘Our earthly life is but betrothal.’
Again he spake: The Cid's most happy day
Was one that neither brought him gift nor triumph:
The day when came to him that silent man
Whom from the first his heart had loved and honoured,
The Alcalde Alfaraxi—he of whom
Hieronymo had said, ‘Watch well yon man,
For when he speaks he'll teach us lore worth knowing.’
That day he sought the Cid and thus addressed:
‘Sir, I give thanks to God Who sent you here!
Here dwelt my forefathers: I loved this spot;
The Christians took me captive yet a child,
And taught me their religion: but my kin
Ransomed me later; with their seers I bode
And won from them all learning of the Moors;

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Yea, zealous for their Prophet's law was I.
Now, sir, a man of silence, musing long,
And measuring Christian Faith with Moslem Law,
Albeit on many loosely hangs that Faith
Else I had been a Christian many a year,
My sentence is with Christ and not Mahomet;—
I will to be baptized.’ Then laughed for joy
My Cid: he kissed that Moor, and caught his hand
And led him straight to where Ximena sat
Crying, ‘Rejoice! The Alcalde is our brother!’
Ximena heard, and rose, and, like her husband,
That Christian kissed, and largess sent to shrines,
And decked the palace gates because God's Church
Is Gate, as all men know, 'twixt earth and heaven;
And on the morn of Holy Saturday
The font new-blessed, when leaped therein once more
‘God's creature, water, holy and innocent,’
His god-mother was she. From that day forth
Gill Diaz was his name. That eve my Cid
Whispered a priest, ‘I often mused why God
Had sent me hither, not some worthier knight:
Perchance 'twas but to serve one silent soul!’
In three months more Gill Diaz was a Saint.
He taught the Cid to rule the Moors with kindness
Judged by their proper law. They loved that Cid
For gracious ways in peace, though fierce in war,
And ofttimes when he passed the gates cried loud,
‘Great Cid, our prayers attend thee!’
The young knight ceased. Then glittering from afar,
Again before the Altar shone the lights:
Again Ximena 'mid their radiance knelt;

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Again arose that saintly ‘Miserere’;
Again those warriors joined the rite august.

University of Virginia Library

III. The Cid at Valencia.