.
Soon the whole body was in full flight. Several hundred of the Moors were
killed and their bodies despoiled, many were taken prisoners, and the
Christians returned in triumph to the army, driving their long array of
cattle and sheep and of mules laden with booty, and bearing in their front
the standard under which they had fought.

King Ferdinand was so delighted with this exploit, and in particular with
the gallant action of Perez del Pulgar, that he conferred knighthood upon
the latter with much ceremony, and authorized him to bear upon his
escutcheon a golden lion in an azure field, showing a lance with a
handkerchief at its point. Round its border were to be depicted the eleven
alcaides defeated in the battle. This heroic deed was followed by so many
others during the wars with the Moors that Perez del Pulgar became in time
known by the flattering appellation of "He of the exploits."

The most famous exploit of this daring knight took place during the siege
of Granada,--the final operation of the long war. Here single combats and
minor skirmishes between Christian and Moorish cavaliers were of almost
daily occurrence, until Ferdinand strictly forbade all such tilts, as he
saw that they gave zeal and courage to the Moors, and were attended with
considerable loss of life among his bravest followers.

This edict of the king was very distasteful to the fiery Moorish knights,
who declared that the crafty Christian wished to destroy chivalry and put
an end to heroic valor. They did their best to provoke the Spanish knights
to combat, galloping on their fleet steeds close to the borders of the
camp and hurling their lances over the barriers, each lance bearing the
name of its owner with some defiant message. But despite the irritation
caused by these insults to the Spanish knights, none of them ventured to
disobey the mandate of the king.

Chief among these Moorish cavaliers was one named Tarfe, a man of fierce
and daring spirit and a giant in size, who sought to surpass his fellows
in acts of audacity. In one of his sallies towards the Christian camp this
bold cavalier leaped his steed over the barrier, galloped inward close to
the royal quarters, and launched his spear with such strength that it
quivered in the earth close to the tents of the sovereigns. The royal
guards rushed out, but Tarfe was already far away, scouring the plain on
his swift Barbary steed. On examining the lance it was found to bear a
label indi