the old “Poem of the Cid” was, no doubt, used, and used freely, by the chronicler, whoever he was, though he never alludes to it. This has been noticed by Sanchez, (Tom. I. pp. 226-228,) and must be noticed again, in note 28, where I shall give an extract from the Chronicle. I add here only, that it is clearly the Poem that was used by the Chronicle, and not the Chronicle that was used by the Poem. [*] Since writing this note, I learn that my friend Don Pascual de Gayangos possesses an Arabic chronicle that throws much light on this Spanish chronicle and on the life of the Cid. [252] Prohemio. The good abbot considers the Chronicle to have been written in the lifetime of the Cid, i. e. before A. D. 1100, and yet it refers to the Archbishop of Toledo and the Bishop of Tuy, who were of the thirteenth century. Moreover, he speaks of the intelligent interest the Prince Ferdinand took in it; but Oviedo, in his Dialogue on Cardinal Ximenes, says the young prince was only eight years and some months old when he gave the order. Quinquagena, MS. As a part of the General Chronicle of Spain,[253] we must, with a little hesitation, pronounce the Chronicle of the Cid less interesting than several of the portions that immediately precede it. But still, it is the great national version of the achievements of the great national hero who freed the fourth part of his native land from the loathed intrusion of the Moors, and who stands to this day connected with the proudest recollections of Spanish glory. It begins with the Cid’s first victories under Ferdinand the Great, and therefore only alludes to his early youth, and to the extraordinary circumstances on which Corneille, following the old Spanish play and ballads, has founded his tragedy; but it gives afterwards, with great minuteness, nearly every one of the adventures that in the older traditions are ascribed to him, down to his death, which happened in 1099, or rather down to the death of Alfonso the Sixth, ten years later.