About thirty-four miles from Tarragona, near the station of La Espluga, stands the ancient fane of Poblet, the Escorial of Aragon. It bears (according to tradition) the name of a hermit who in the first part of the twelfth century was three times captured by the Saracens and as often was miraculously released, whereupon the paynim king, recognising that he had to do with a man protected by heaven, endowed him with all the lands hereabouts, to be enjoyed by him and his brother hermits. In proof of this story, the religious triumphantly pointed to a venerable-looking parchment inscribed with Arabic characters, which they said and believed was the original deed of gift, and as no one could read it no one was able to throw doubt on the story. In 1496 a Moorish prince examined the document and contented himself with observing that it was not dated in the twelfth century but in the year 1217. However, no one paid any attention to this assertion, and the legend was repeated till on the dismantling of the monastery in the last century the document at last came under the critical eye of Don Pascual de Gayangos, who confirmed the Moor’s correction and pronounced the so-called deed simply a general permit to the monks to pass through and travel freely in the Moorish dominions south of the Ebro. The foundation of the abbey may now be ascribed with safety to Count Ramon Berenguer IV., who, having conquered the territory of Lerida, bestowed the lands of Poblet on the Cistercians of Fontfroide near Narbonne, who, to the number of twelve, took possession of the site in the year 1150, Don Esteban being abbot. The monastery soon rose fair and strong, and prospered exceedingly under the favour of the Kings of Aragon, who made of it their official place of sepulture. The wealth of the community was enormous, the power of the abbot extended over fifty-six villages, but from all this prosperity resulted a falling away from monastic simplicity, till the holy men would not sit down to table unless two partridges were placed on their dishes. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, they could find no better employment for their wealth than in loading their beautiful abbey with the atrocious sculpture and ornament of the period; and then in 1835 came the anti-clericals and swept out the monks and their _baroque_ rubbish with them. What the mob spared, the collectors and villagers annexed--precious manuscripts, vestments, statuary, all were carted away; and ruinous and forlorn, as it now stands, Poblet would have rejoiced the heart of the author of the stern Cistercian rule.