igin. These
Islamites, whose chief glory it was dexterously to deprive their
enemies of their heads, attach them to their saddle-bows, and afterward
display them as trophies on the {168} battlements of their towers or at
the entrance of their palaces; these restless and ungovernable
warriors, who were ever ready to revolt against their rulers, to depose
or to murder them, were the most tender, the most devoted, the most
ardent of lovers. Their wives, though their domestic position was
little superior to that of slaves, became, when they were beloved, the
absolute sovereigns, the supreme divinities of those whose hearts they
possessed. It was to please these idolized beings that the Moorish
cavaliers sought distinction in the field; it was to shine in their
eyes that they lavished their treasures and their lives--that they
mutually endeavoured to eclipse each other in deeds of arms, in the
splendour of their warlike exploits, and the Oriental magnificence of
their fetes.

It cannot now be determined whether the Moors derived this
extraordinary union of softness and cruelty, of delicacy and
barbarity--this generous rivalry in courage and in constancy from the
Spaniards, or whether the Spaniards acquired these characteristics from
the Moors. But when it is remembered that they do not belong to the
Asiatic Arabs, from whom these gallant knights originally sprang; that
they are {169} found, even in a less degree, if possible, among these
followers of Mohammed in that portion of Africa where their conquests
have naturalized them; and, that after their departure from Spain, the
Grenadians lost every trace of the peculiarly interesting and
chivalrous qualities by which they had previously been so remarkably
distinguished, there is some ground for the opinion that it was to the
Spaniards that their Moslem neighbours were indebted for the existence
of these national attributes. In truth, before the invasion of Spain
by the Arabs, the courts of the Gothic kings had already offered
knightly examples of a similar spirit. And after that event we find
the cavaliers of Leon, Navarre, and Castile equally renowned for their
achievements in war and their romantic devotion to the fair sex. The
mere name of _the Cid_ awakens in the mind recollections alike of
tenderness and bravery. It should be remembered, too, that, long after
the expulsion of the Moors from the Peninsula, the Spaniards maintained
a reputation for gallantry far s