"You argue, friend Guillen, as well as if you had attended lectures in the School of Palencia; but I am quite certain that neither your lady nor the count would see it in the same light as you."
"If my mistress were like the ordinary run of women, or even like the generality of men, who think only as others think, and not as they themselves should think, my love would be certainly great folly; but I know well that Doña Teresa is guided more by reason than by custom. Besides, who has told you, ignoble as you are, that I may not be rich and noble some day, if Doña Teresa desires that he who is to obtain her hand and heart should be so? I am young, and, 'fore God, I am not wanting in courage. Only let the Moors get up a war on the frontiers, and you will see how I can wield a lance, and perchance return to Carrion as much a cavalier as the count my master. You will see how, once dubbed a knight, I shall collect together a hundred or so brave fellows, enter the country of the Moors, and conquer it. Then I shall become a lord over vassals, for, on my faith, it will not be the first time that such things have happened. You can't imagine, my friend, how my love for Doña Teresa increases when I think over those chances."
"I hope in goodness that your love won't bring you to perdition!" said Garcia in a prophetic tone of voice.
"It is to glory that it shall lead me," replied Guillen enthusiastically. "This love which I feel, impossible as it may seem to you, will exalt the humble page whom you see here. The greater the prize is, for which the wrestler struggles, so much the more bravely does he brace himself up for the contest. Do you imagine that Rodrigo Diaz could have fought so well if, in addition to conquering Martin Gonzalez, he had not hoped for the embraces of Ximena?"
Illan and Garcia could not but feel that amid the wild fancies of Guillen there might be well founded hopes. For that reason they thought it best to leave him in the paradise of his illusions. Just as in our times he who believes in nothing, he who considers but vain words the faith of his ancestors, the love of country, the love for a woman, is the man who most probably will raise himself over others, so, in the times when Guillen lived, that man had the best chance of elevating himself who believed in all those things, and, exalted by such sentiments, acted in accordance with his beliefs. Oh for that age, when, in order to be honoured, the cavalier had to consecrate his heart to God, to a king, and to a woman,—three sovereigns, who had their thrones respectively in heaven, on earth, and at the domestic hearth, and all of them in the soul of a man. If amongst those who at the present day bear the name of cavalier, there are any who do not wish to bear it in vain, they must be cautious with regard to acknowledging that they adore God, that they would die for the anointed of the Lord, or that they love or are faithful to a woman; for they would be laughed at and looked on as madmen, and in vain would they argue that the idols are false and loathsome which have usurped the altars on which these three divinities were formerly enthroned.
Our three youths had arrived at that point in their conversation at which we left them, in order to heave a sigh over lost beliefs, which it would be very difficult to replace. The bells of Santa Gadea announced, with a loud peal, that religion had sanctified the union of the noble scions of the trees of Vivar and of Gormaz. The crowds began to move, to crush, to squeeze, if we may so express ourselves, and with the sounds of the bells were mingled cries of pain, angry exclamations, threats, supplications, weeping, curses,—all that Babel of sounds which is usually heard amongst a great multitude, when it is compressed into a space which cannot well contain much more than half its numbers.
"The women ought to be at home spinning!"
"The men should be killing the Moors!"