for the Cid had forbidden the wearing of mourning. So Cardeña was reached, and tenderly and lovingly Ruy Diaz lifted the Cid’s body for the last time from Bavieca’s back—never more to bear a man. The glorious war-horse lived for two years, led to water each day by Gil Diaz. On his death, at more than forty years of age and leaving not unworthy descendants behind him, he was buried, according to the Cid’s express desire, in a deep and ample grave, “so that no dog might disturb his bones,” near the gate of the Convent, and two elms were planted to mark the spot. When Gil Diaz died, full of years and richly provided for by the Cid’s daughters, he was laid to rest beside the horse he had loved and tended so faithfully. In this narrative, condensed from the Chronicles, the curious particular will have been noticed of the gift by the “Great Sultan of Persia” to the Christian warrior of those precious spices and aromatic gums which seem to have been the secret treasure of old Persia, forming a priceless offering reserved for the very greatest personages. The strangeness of bringing in the Sultan of Persia almost suggests that there was truth in the assertion that he had sent presents to the Cid. Over the sea and over the fruitful fields the radiance of noble deeds travels, as Pinder said of old. A little after the march of the Thousand, the Arabs of the desert were heard discussing round their camp-fires the exploits of Garibaldi. If the fame of the Cid reached Persia, as it is very likely that it did, he would have found fervent admirers among a people which was still electrified by the epic poem of Firdusi, who died within a year or two of the Cid’s birth. In that epic is told the story of the Persian Campeador—the Champion Rustem, who not only in his title but in all we know of his general bearings has so great a resemblance to the Cid that it is a wonder if no historical “discoverer” has derived one from the other, the more so since there have not been wanting writers who denied the Cid’s existence. And if Ruy Diaz de Bivar has his analogue in Rustem, has not Bavieca a perfect counterpart in Rakush?