When the first went forth, it was midnight deep,
In heaven was the moon, in the camp was sleep:
When the last through the city's gates had gone,
O'er tent and rampart the bright day shone,
With a sun-burst from the sea!
There were Knights five hundred went arm'd before,
And Bermudez the Cid's green standard bore;
To its last fair field, with the break of morn,
Was the glorious banner in silence borne,
On the glad wind streaming free.
And the Campeador came stately then,
Like a leader circled with steel-clad men!
The helmet was down o'er the face of the Dead,
But his steed went proud, by a warrior led,
For he knew that the Cid was there.
He was there, the Cid, with his own good sword,
And Ximena following her noble lord;
Her eye was solemn, her step was slow,
But there rose not a sound of war or woe,
Not a whisper on the air.
The halls in Valencia were still and lone,
The churches were empty, the masses done;
There was not a voice through the wide streets far,
Nor a foot-fall heard in the Alcazar;
—So the burial-train moved out.
With a measured pace, as the pace of one,
Was the slow death-march of the host begun;
With a silent step went the cuirass'd bands,
Like a lion's tread on the burning sands,
And they gave no battle-shout.
But the deep hills peal'd with a cry ere long,
When the Christians burst on the Paynim throng!
With a sudden flash of the lance and spear,
And a charge of the war-steed in full career,
It was Alvar Fanez*[1] came!
He that was wrapt with no funeral shroud,
Had pass'd before, like a threatening cloud!
And the storm rush'd down on the tented plain,
And the archer-queen, with her bands, lay slain;
—For the Cid upheld his fame.
Then a terror fell on the King Bucar,
And the Libyan Kings who had join'd his war!
And their hearts grew heavy, and died away,
And their hands could not wield an Assagay,
For the dreadful things they saw!
For it seem'd, where Minaya his onset made,
There were seventy thousand Knights array'd!
All white as the snow on Nevada's steep,
And they came like the foam of a roaring deep;
—Twas a sight of fear and awe!
And the crested form of a warrior tall,
With a sword of fire, went before them all;
With a sword of fire, and a banner pale,
And a blood-red cross on his shadowy mail,
He rode in the battle's van.
- ↑ * Alvar Fanez Minaya, one of the Cid's bravest warriors.
