this Castle, Ferdinand Gonzales ruled Castile, and here
the Cid led Dona Zimena, and Edward I of England Eleanor of Castile, to
the altar. The only colors brightening the melancholy hillside are here
and there the brilliant blood-stain of the poppy, the gold of the
dandelion, and the episcopal purple of the thistle. Below and beyond,
stretches a sea of shaded ochre, broken in the foreground by the
corrugations of the many roofs turned by time to the brownish tint of
the encircling hillocks and made to blend in one harmony with its
monochrome bosom. Fillets of silver pierce the horizon, glittering as
they wind nearer between over-hanging birches and poplars. The deep,
guttural, roar of the great Cathedral's many voices rises in majestic
and undisputed authority from the valley below, now and again joined by
the weaker trebles of San Esteban and San Nicolas. Regiments of soldiers
march with regular clattering step through holy precincts and up and
down the crooked lanes and squares; barracks and parade-grounds occupy
consecrated soil,--still Santa Maria la Mayor raises her voice to
command obedience and proclaim her undivided dominion over the plains of
drowsy, old Castile.

From this height, one does not notice the transformation of the Gothic
into seventeenth-century edifices, nor the changes wrought by later
centuries. In the glare of the dazzling sun, the tremulous atmosphere,
and the lazy, curling smoke of the many chimneys, Burgos still seems
Burgos of the Middle Ages, the royal city, mistress of the castles and
sweeping plains, and the Cathedral is her stronghold.

She is very old,--tradition says, founded by Count Diego Rodriguez of
Alava with the assistance of an Alfonso who ruled in Christian Oviedo
towards the end of the ninth century. For many years his descendants, as
well as the lords of the many castles strewn along the lonely hills
north of the Sierra de Guadarrama, owed allegiance to Leon and the
kingdom of the Asturias. Burgos finally threw off the yoke, and chose
judges for rulers, until one of them, Ferdinand Gonzalez, assumed for
himself and his successors the proud title of "Conde of Castile." Under
his great-grandson, Ferdinand I, Castile and Leon were united in 1037,
thus laying the foundations of the later monarchy. Burgos became a
capital city. Against the dark background of mediaeval history and
interwoven with many romantic legends, there stands out that greatest of
Spanish heroes, the Cid Cam