The next literary monument attributed to this reign would be important, if we had the whole of it. It is a chronicle, in the ballad style, of events which happened in the time of Alfonso the Eleventh, and commonly passes under his name. It was found, hidden in a mass of Arabic manuscripts, by Diego de Mendoza, who attributed it, with little ceremony, to “a secretary of the king”; and it was first publicly made known by Argote de Molina, who thought it written by some poet contemporary with the history he relates. But only thirty-four stanzas of it are now known to exist; and these, though admitted by Sanchez to be probably anterior to the fifteenth century, are shown by him not to be the work of the king, and seem, in fact, to be less ancient in style and language than that critic supposes them to be.[121] They are in very flowing Castilian, and their tone is as spirited as that of most of the old ballads. [121] This old rhymed chronicle was found by the historian Diego de Mendoza among his Arabic manuscripts in Granada, and was sent by him, with a letter dated December 1, 1573, to Zurita, the annalist of Aragon, intimating that Argote de Molina would be interested in it. He says truly, that “it is well worth reading, to see with what simplicity and propriety men wrote poetical histories in the olden times”; adding, that “it is one of those books called in Spain _Gestas_,” and that it seems to him curious and valuable, because he thinks it was written by a secretary of Alfonso XI., and because it differs in several points from the received accounts of that monarch’s reign. (Dormer, Progresos de la Historia de Aragon, Zaragoza, 1680, fol., p. 502.) The thirty-four stanzas of this chronicle that we now possess were first published by Argote de Molina, in his very curious “Nobleza del Andaluzia,” (Sevilla, 1588, f. 198,) and were taken from him by Sanchez (Poesías Anteriores, Tom. I. pp. 171-177). Argote de Molina says, “I copy them on account of their curiosity as specimens of the language and poetry of that age, and because they are the best and most fluent of any thing for a long time written in Spain.” The truth is, they are so facile, and have so few archaisms in them, that I cannot believe they were written earlier than the ballads of the fifteenth century, which they so much resemble. The following account of a victory, which I once thought was that of Salado, gained in 1340, and described in the “Crónica de Alfonso XI.,” (1551, fol., Cap. 254,) but which I now think must have been some victory gained before 1330, is the best part of what has been published:-- Los Moros fueron fuyendo Maldiziendo su ventura; El Maestre los siguiendo Por los puertos de Segura. E feriendo e derribando E prendiendo a las manos, E Sanctiago llamando, Escudo de los Christianos.