[4] Mariana, _Hist. Esp._, lib. 6, c. 21. They surrounded their youthful monarch, it is true, with a blaze of military pomp. Nothing could surpass the splendor of their arms, which were embossed and enameled, and enriched with gold and jewels and curious devices; nothing could be more gallant and glorious than their array; it was all plume and banner and silken pageantry, the gorgeous trappings for tilt and tourney and courtly revel; but the iron soul of war was wanting. How rare it is to learn wisdom from the misfortunes of others. With the fate of Witiza full before his eyes, Don Roderick indulged in the same pernicious errors, and was doomed, in like manner, to prepare the way for his own perdition. [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER III. Of the Loves of Roderick and the Princess Elyata. As yet the heart of Roderick, occupied by the struggles of his early life, by warlike enterprises, and by the inquietudes of newly-gotten power, had been insensible to the charms of women; but in the present voluptuous calm the amorous propensities of his nature assumed their sway. There are divers accounts of the youthful beauty who first found favor in his eyes, and was elevated by him to the throne. We follow in our legend the details of an Arabian chronicler,[5] authenticated by a Spanish poet.[6] Let those who dispute our facts produce better authority for their contradiction. [5] _Perdida de España_, por Abulcasim Tarif Abentarique, lib. 1. [6] Lope de Vega. Among the few fortified places that had not been dismantled by Don Roderick was the ancient city of Denia, situated on the Mediterranean coast, and defended on a rock-built castle that overlooked the sea. The alcaide of the castle, with many of the people of Denia, was one day on his knees in the chapel, imploring the Virgin to allay a tempest which was strewing the coast with wrecks, when a sentinel brought word that a Moorish cruiser was standing for the land. The alcaide gave orders to ring the alarm-bells, light signal-fires on the hill-tops, and rouse the country, for the coast was subject to cruel maraudings from the Barbary cruisers. In a little while the horsemen of the neighborhood were seen pricking along the beach, armed with such weapons as they could find, and the alcaide and his scanty garrison descended from the hill. In the mean time the Moorish bark came rolling and pitching towards the land. As it drew near, the rich carving and gilding with which it was decorated, its silken bandaroles and banks of crimson oars, showed it to be no warlike vessel, but a sumptuous galiot destined for state and ceremony. It bore the marks of the tempest; the masts were broken, the oars shattered, and fragments of snowy sails and silken awnings were fluttering in the blast.