The swallows had all gone to their nests; the soft, fumbling flight of a pair of small bats wove a pattern against the fading sky.
“That portly gentleman on the white mule might well be Hosius, one time Bishop of Cordova. You never heard of him, perhaps, but you must have heard of the Nicene Creed,” Patsy went on. It was evident that we had to listen to all he knew about Cordova.
“The next time you hear that creed repeated, remember Hosius, Bishop here in Cordova for sixty-three years; he presided at the Council of Nicea when the creed was made. That was after he had failed in the task Constantine set him of persuading Arius to give up the Unitarian heresy. Think how often he must have ambled over this old bridge.”
It always has been hard to persuade people to give up the Unitarian heresy! Whenever I hear the Nicene creed, I shall think of Bishop Hosius whom, that night of nights, we saw ride across the old Roman bridge at Cordova on a white mule.
“The one I should like best to have known of all the great men who ever lived at Cordova was the Caliph Abd-er-Rahman. What a man he was! Servant of the compassionate, they called him. That is his Mosque, those are his palms; he planted the great-grandfathers of those trees with his own hand. If you could make Seneca’s toga out of that old beggar’s capa, can’t you see Abd-er-Rahman’s bournous in that young fellow’s cloak? He is as dark as an Arab; the red handkerchief knotted round his head under the sombrero makes a decent turban. He has the swagger of a torrero. Conqueror of bulls, conqueror of men, where is the difference? Toga, bournous, capa,—all three garments are practically the same.”
“What do you suppose Gonsalvo de Cordova, El Gran Capitan wore?”
“A cloak like the rest of them, I fancy. There are a great many things named for him in the city over there: a theatre, a paseo, I don’t know what else. In poetry they call him the Scourge of Islam. When I showed Don Jaime a rather steep bill, he whistled, and said ‘They have made you out the account of el Gran Capitan.’ The size of the bills he presented to Ferdinand and Isabel for scourging the infidel is the thing he is best remembered for in Cordova.”
“That’s gossip; history says he really was a great captain,” I protested.
“According to the proverb, it is the blood of the soldier makes the great captain,” said Patsy. “As to history, Martial says;—’Give up frivolous fable and read history!’ He also says, ‘Fool that I was! Why did I not follow the advice I gave Mamura?’ But, truly, isn’t to-day’s gossip, to-morrow’s history?”
“To-morrow’s history will be rheumatism if we stay mooning here any longer,” J. said firmly. “Right about face, homeward, march!”