The people which arrogates the right to choose its ruler has ever been considered a sort of pirate among the nations, and fair game for more powerful states. Kadir at the moment of his deposition had been nominally under the protection of the Cid. That redoubtable warrior, under the pretext of avenging his protégé's death, advanced on Valencia. The Almoravides came to his assistance, but precipitately retired. Distrusting these allies almost as much as the Christians, Ibn Jahhaf amused the Cid with negotiations, but meanwhile made preparations for defence. He became the special object of the famous warrior's hatred, and when the city fell, was burnt to death at the stake before the eyes of his horrified countrymen. The Cid now ruled Valencia as absolute lord and despot till his death, five years later, in 1097. The legend need not be related here, how his wife defended the city for two years after his death, and finally, setting his corpse fully armed upon his warhorse, won a victory over the terrified Moors and thus took him to his last resting-place at Cardeña. Valencia was not finally wrested from the yoke of Islam till the memorable 28th of September, 1238, when the standard of the victorious Jaime I. of Aragon was hoisted over the tower of Ali Bufat. In the history of Aragon the conquest ranks with the taking of Seville in the history of Castile. Granada was the joint conquest of both kingdoms. It is curious to compare the ready submission of the Moors, and their surrender of whole kingdoms to the Christians, sometimes as the result of a single battle, with the tenacious resistance offered by their descendants in Algeria in modern times. Enervated by the climate of Spain, the Mussulmans of that country were absolutely incapable of maintaining a prolonged guerrilla warfare. If a fortified capital was taken they at once handed over the whole kingdom to the conqueror. They were not, of course, peculiar in this respect. The sentiment of nationality and physical courage are characteristic far more of the modern than of the ancient world. We have only to compare the resistance of the Anglo-Saxons to the Normans with that of the Boers to the British, of the French in the Hundred Years' War with that of their descendants in 1871, to realize how much more of manliness and endurance we possess than did our ancestors. We must go back to the days of Leonidas and Regulus to find parallels for the exploits of our own Indian army; to Numantia and Saguntum for parallels to Saragossa and Gerona. National and individual self-respect withered under feudalism, and revived only on the introduction of free institutions.