During that dark and ill-recorded period in which Spain was little more than a field of battle between the Moors and the Christians, the Sanchos of Navarre held the most conspicuous rank among the peninsular potentates, and Sanchez “el Mayor” was the most conspicuous of the Sanchos. Besides the throne of Navarre, he had succeeded to the royalty of Arragon, and the sovereignty of Castile was the dower of his queen. He had married the beauteous Elvira Muna early in life; and before he had reached the full prime of manhood, two of his sons, Garcia and Gonsalo, were able to bear the panoply of a knight; and a third, Fernando, a boy of thirteen, was sighing for the day to come when he too should have the spur upon his heel and the sword upon his thigh. Another son, also, King Sancho boasted of, but not by Donna Elvira. In his very first battle he had been taken prisoner by a Moorish captain of high rank, and confined in a dreary dungeon many days and nights, until at length his escape was effected by means of the daughter of his conqueror, a maiden of exquisite beauty named Caya, who had seen him, and fallen in love with him. This Moorish girl the generous young prince would gladly have married, if the political or religious laws of Navarre would have permitted him; but he tried to persuade himself and her, that, under such circumstances, the tie which bound them together after their flight from her father’s fortress would be nearly as sacred as if it were a conjugal one. The offspring of their love was a boy, whom Sancho named Ramiro, and who grew up with the king’s legitimate children. Caya too--it was the custom of those days--lived at court, and was paid respect and honour besides, as the deliverer of the country’s hope. She had abjured, at least outwardly, her Moslem creed, and, for the sake of her son, whom she tenderly loved, conformed in all respects to the customs of her adopted one. In truth, however, she was a quiet, unpretending creature, who never said or did anything to the injury of anyone with malice prepense, and not being feared, was not hated. Even Elvira herself, hateful to Caya for giving her no reasonable cause for jealousy since her marriage with Sancho (which was a mere matter of state policy), made the Moorish woman the confidante of most of her joys and sorrows. And many were the sorrows of that gentle queen. Sancho had ever been indifferent towards her, though she repaid his coldness with devoted attachment. He was, besides, continually away at the wars, in imminent danger from the chances of battle, while she, at home, was ever mourning over the neglect of her lord and the disobedience of her children. Garcia had made, before his twentieth year, no fewer than three different attempts to excite a revolt in Ribagorza during the absence of the king, impatient as he was to seize the reins of command. Gonsalo, cunning as a fox, and darkly-working as a mole, was continually endeavouring, by secret machinations, to render