Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/355

ADMINISTRATION OF CASTILE. 211 the obscure town of Compostella in Galicia, which chapter contained the sainted relics, ^"^ that it became the , '. — resort of pilgrims from every part of Christendom, during the middle ages ; and the escalop shell, the device of St. James, was adopted as the universal badge of the palmer. Inns for the refreshment and security of the pious itinerants were scattered along the whole line of the route from France ; but, as they were exposed to perpetual annoyance from the predatory incursions of the Arabs, a number of knights and gentlemen associated themselves, for their protection, with the monks of St. Lojo, or Eloy, adopting the rule of St. Augustine, and thus laid the foundation of the chivalric order of St. James, about the middle of the twelfth century. The cavaliers of the fraternity, which received its papal bull of approbation five years later, in 1175, were distinguished by a white mantle embroidered with a red cross, in fashion of a sword, with the escalop shell below the guard, in imitation of the 36 The apparition of certain pre- uineness of the body, as well as ternatural lights in a forest, dis- the visit of the Apostle, but like a covered to a Galician peasant, in good Jesuit concludes, "It is not the beginning of the ninth century, expedient to disturb with such dis- the spot, in which was deposited a putes the devotion of the people, marble sepulchre containing the so firmly settled as it is." (Lib. 7, ashes of St. James. The miracle cap. 10.) The tutelar saint of is reported with sufficient circum- Spain continued to support his stantiality by Florez, (Historia people by taking part with them in Compostellana,lib. 1, cap. 2, apud battle against the infidel down to a Espana Sagrada, tom. xx.) and very late period. Caro de Torres Ambrosio de Morales, (Coronica, mentions two engagements in which General de Espana, (Obras, Ma- he cheered on the squadrons of drid, 1791-3,) lib. 9, cap. 7,) who Cortes and Pizarro, "with his establishes, to his own satisfaction, sword flashing lightning in the the advent of St. James into Spain, eyes of the Indians." Ordenes Mariana, with more skepticism Militares, fol. 5. than his brethren, doubts the gen-