“So King Sancho drew near and beheld Zamora how strongly it was built, upon a cliff, with many massy towers and the river Duero running at the foot thereof.” It was no light task to reduce it, and he proffered Valladolid in exchange. But my lady was in no mood to barter her beautiful stronghold for commonplace Valladolid, and doubtless regarded the offer from the same standpoint as her practical councillors,—“He who assails you on the rock would soon drive you from the plain.”
The Castilian army lacked the aid of its champion: for Ruy Diaz had been bred up with the princess at Zamora in Don Arias Gonzalo’s household, and would not fight against her in person “for the sake of old times.” Yet King Sancho was very competent to manage his own battles; and though his assaults were abortive, he soon began to feel more sanguine of blockade. Zamora was reduced to the last extremity when Vellido Dolphos, a knight of the princess’s, put into practice against King Sancho the old ruse of Gobryas and Sextus Tarquinius. He feigned desertion, won the confidence of the king, and assassinated him under the walls in the course of{142} a pretended reconnaissance, escaping again to the city when the deed was done. Less fortunate than his prototypes who gained credit for their services, Vellido Dolphos has ever since been held up to execration as the very type and pattern of a traitor; and Don Diego Ordoñez gave voice to the wrath of the Castilians by issuing a formal challenge to the whole city of Zamora,—man, woman, and child, the babe unborn, and the fishes in the river:—which even Don Quixote considered was going a trifle too far. Yet the city was saved; for the heir to the throne was Alfonso, and his return from exile put an end to the civil war.
It is a shame to tell the story in prose. Yet we cannot refrain from recalling how Don Arias Gonzalo, the princess’ foster-father, pointed out to Don Diego Ordoñez what a very serious thing he had done in challenging a whole cathedral city. How (no doubt with a grim chuckle) he produced the Rules for such case made and provided, whereby it appeared that the challenger must meet five champions in succession, and be declared disgraced if he failed against any one;—which was considerably more than Don Diego had bargained for! Nevertheless he put a bold face on the matter and gallantly met and slew his two first antagonists.{143} But the third contest was indecisive; so honour was declared satisfied, and all imputations withdrawn. The old chivalrous legend makes a capital sauce for our musings as we pace the still formidable ramparts from which Doña Urraca once looked down upon her foes; or gaze up from the fortified bridge at the rock-built city above us, towering over the waters of the Duero like the very embodiment of romance.
But meanwhile it is still Corpus Christi day; and the giants are becoming impatient. We found them all four at the bridge-head, attended by a large retinue of loiterers, and waiting outside a church door, like camels at the eye of a needle. The show had not really begun. But as we approached to investigate, there suddenly gushed upon us out of the church itself as strange a medley as that which encountered Don Quixote on a similar anniversary in the chariot of the Cortes of Death. First, four minor giants—great goggling pumpkin-headed Prince Bulbos—and the drum and fife band of Falstaff’s ragged regiment. Then the processional cross and candlesticks, and Our Lady gorgeous in a white silk frock, borne shoulder-high on a litter, with her canopy bucketting along behind her about half a length to the bad. More{144} saints, also on litters—the boys struggling and fighting for the honour of acting as bearers, and getting cuffed into a shortlived sobriety by their indignant elders. And finally the Host itself in its silver ark surrounded by chanting priests with banners and tapers. The giants closed in behind it as it issued from the door and beamed serenely down the long procession from their commanding elevation in the rear.
Whether the spectacle were a sacrament or a circus, seemed at first an open question; but it was soon resolved. At once every head was uncovered and every knee was bowed, and “His Majesty’s”[21] progress through the kneeling throng seemed all the more impressive for its incongruous trappings.
Beyond the bridge the procession received its final embellishment in the accession of a mounted guard of honour; and throughout the rest of the day it continued to parade the streets and call at the various churches, while the populace thronged the balconies, crossing themselves, and cheering, and showering their paper flowers impartially upon saints and giants and the bald heads of the accompanying priests—an attention which did not{145} appear at all gratifying to the cavalry horses of the escort.
