nd legendary
ballads that have transmitted, from generation to generation, the story of
the woes of Spain. In very truth, however, she appears to have been a
guiltless victim, resisting, as far as helpless female could resist, the
arts and intrigues of a powerful monarch, who had nought to check the
indulgence of his will, and bewailing her disgrace with a poignancy that
shows how dearly she had prized her honor.

In the first paroxysm of her grief she wrote a letter to her father,
blotted with her tears, and almost incoherent from her agitation. 'Would
to God, my father,' said she, 'that the earth had opened and swallowed me
ere I had been reduced to write these lines! I blush to tell thee, what it
is not proper to conceal. Alas! my father; thou hast entrusted thy lamb to
the guardianship of the lion. Thy daughter has been dishonored, the royal
cradle of the Goths polluted, and our lineage insulted and disgraced.
Hasten, my father, to rescue your child from the power of the spoiler, and
to vindicate the honor of your house!'

When Florinda had written these lines, she summoned a youthful esquire,
who had been a page in the service of her father. 'Saddle thy steed,' said
she, 'and if thou dost aspire to knightly honor, or hope for lady's
grace--if thou hast fealty for thy lord, or devotion to his
daughter--speed swiftly upon my errand. Rest not, halt not, spare not the
spur; but hie thee day and night until thou reach the sea; take the first
bark, and haste with sail and oar to Ceuta, nor pause until thou give this
letter to the count my father.'

The youth put the letter in his bosom. 'Trust me, lady,' said he, 'I will
neither halt nor turn aside, nor cast a look behind, until I reach Count
Julian.' He mounted his fleet steed, sped his way across the bridge, and
soon left behind him the verdant valley of the Tagus.

* * * * *

The heart of Don Roderick was not so depraved by sensuality, but that the
wrong he had been guilty of toward the innocent Florinda, and the disgrace
he had inflicted on her house, weighed heavy on his spirits, and a cloud
began to gather on his once clear and unwrinkled brow.

Heaven, at this time, say the old Spanish chronicles, permitted a
marvellous intimation of the wrath with which it intended to visit the
monarch and his people, in punishment of their sins; nor are we, say the
same orthodox writers, to startle, and withhold our faith, when we meet in
the