Their armies covered all the fertile plain amid which Toledo stands, on a steep hill, round the base of which flows the Tagus. In some places the spears of the infantry--whose massed columns seemed like a sea of glittering steel--stood thick as upright corn; in others were the squadrons of barbed horse, the knights and men-at-arms, all clothed in chain armour, bright as winter frost or polished silver, their many-coloured plumes, their square banners, and swallow-tailed pennons streaming out upon the wind. High overall, with its towers and the minarets of its mosques, rose the then infidel city of Toledo, the upper part of which was then, as now, girt by Roman, and the lower part by Moorish walls. History tells us that when Alphonso VI. had been a fugitive under the persecution of his brother and predecessor, Sancho, he had found an asylum at the Court of the Caliph of Toledo, who treated him with hospitality and princely distinction; and now more than one Moorish warrior rode forth from the city to reproach Alphonso with ingratitude to his benefactor, and many a terrible and remarkable combat was fought under the walls of Toledo, among the defenders of which was Don Bellido Dolfos, who had renounced his faith and adopted the turban. In the combats before the city, the Cid was daily occupied, and many a Moorish warrior, horse and man, rolled in the dust beneath his lance or battle-axe; and his followers were enriched by the spoil, the rare weapons, the costly garments and jewels, that his hand won. At last there came a day--the anniversary of the victory won by Mohammed at Bedr, between Mecca and Medina--when the Moors made a dreadful sortie from Toledo, led by the renegade, Bellido Dolfos; and closing in on every hand, the Christians met them with equal ardour and fury. The hand-to-hand fighting was terrible, and the Christian knights, led by the Cid, the Count of Toulouse, and others, dashed their horses through and through the living tide of Moors that surged around them. Gorgeous as a field of flowers, with their many-coloured turbans and flowing garments, seemed the Moors as they kept shoulder to shoulder, guarding their heads with round shields covered with glittering bosses, their sharp scimitars flashing in the sun, their shouts rolling like thunder between the Tagus and the walls of Toledo, as they fought with demoniac strength and ferocity, but fought in vain. High over all the throng towered the Cid upon Babieca, its mailed flanks stuck full of arrows and even broken lances. 'Santiágo y cerra España!' he shouted ever and anon--the old war-cry of Spain--and he hewed on all sides with Tisona, till his sword-arm grew weary, and the last who bit the dust beneath it was the traitor Don Bellido, after whose fall the Moors were driven headlong into Toledo.