full sore and high;
The Moors raised up their voices and by the Koran swore
That in their lives such deadly fray they ne'er had seen before.

Down went the misbelievers,--fast sped the bloody fight,--
Some ghastly and dismembered lay, and some half dead with fright:
Full sorely they repented that to the field they came,
For they saw that from the battle they should retreat with shame.

Another thing befell them,--they dreamed not of such woes,--
The very arrows that the Moors shot front their twanging bows
Turned back against them in their flight and wounded them full sore,
And every blow they dealt the foe was paid in drops of gore.

. . . . . . . . .

Now he that bore the crosier, and the papal crown had on,
Was the glorified Apostle, the brother of Saint John;
And he that held the crucifix, and wore the monkish hood,
Was the holy San Millan of Cogolla's neighborhood.

SAN MIGUEL, THE CONVENT

(SAN MIGUEL DE LA TUMBA)

BY GONZALO DE BERCEO

San Miguel de la Tumba is a convent vast and wide;
The sea encircles it around, and groans on every side:
It is a wild and dangerous place, and many woes betide
The monks who in that burial-place in penitence abide.

Within those dark monastic walls, amid the ocean flood,
Of pious, fasting monks there dwelt a holy brotherhood;
To the Madonna's glory there an altar high was placed,
And a rich and costly image the sacred altar graced.

Exalted high upon a throne, the Virgin Mother smiled,
And, as the custom is, she held within her arms the Child;
The kings and wise men of the East were kneeling by her side;
Attended was she like a queen whom God had sanctified.

. . . . . . . . .

Descending low before her face a screen of feathers hung,--
A moscader, or fan for flies, 'tis called in vulgar tongue;
From the feathers of the peacock's wing 't was fashioned bright and fair,
And glistened like the heaven above when all its stars are there.

It chanced that, for the people's sins, fell the lightning's blasting stroke:
Forth from all four the sacred walls the flames consuming broke;
The sacred robes were all consumed, missal and holy book;
And hardly with their lives the monks their crumbling walls forsook.

. . . . . . . . .

But though the desolating flame raged fearfully and wild,
It did not reach the Virgin Queen, it did not reach the Child;
It did not reach the feathery screen before h