nso Perez de Guzman, the
Cavalier in question, offered to keep possession of the town for a year.
The story is thus condensed by Ford, from the "Romancero." The Moors
beleaguered it, aided by the Infante Juan, a traitor brother of Sancho's
to whom Alonso's eldest son, aged nine, had been entrusted previously as
a page. "Juan now brought the boy under the walls, and threatened to
kill him if his father would not surrender the place. Alonso drew his
dagger and threw it down exclaiming, 'I prefer honour without a son, to
a son with dishonour.' He retired, and the Prince caused the child to be
put to death. A cry of horror ran through the Spanish battlements.
Alonso rushed forth, beheld his son's body, and returning to his
childless mother, calmly observed, 'I feared that the infidel had gained
the city.' Sancho, the King, likened him to Abraham, from this parental
sacrifice and honoured him with the 'canting' name 'El Bueno.' The good
(Guzman, Gutman, Goodman.) He became the founder of the princely Dukes
of Medina Sidonia, now merged by marriage in the Villafrancas." From
this great head descended ultimately Her Majesty the Empress Eugenie of
France. Gaining strength, riches and power, the original residence of El
Bueno became too small for his aspiring family, and in 1560, Don Juan
Quinones y Guzman, Bishop of Calahorra, determined upon the erection, on
the same site, of the present fine structure. The name of the architect
does not seem to be known, but it is obviously the work of one who,
rejecting the elaboration of the Plateresque style, followed the simpler
and more chastened proportions recommended by the early Italian writers
on architecture, such as Alberti and Serlio, and by the first Spanish
student of Vitruvius, Diego Sagredo in his "Medidas del Romano,"
(Toledo, 1526.)

It is probable that the use of a large quantity of iron externally, as
in the balconies and other parts of this Palace was somewhat of a
novelty at the date of construction, since the story runs "that when
Philip II. visited Leon, as his courtiers, some friends of the Bishops,
were praising the building, and were mentioning in a friendly way the
thousands of cwts. of iron employed in it, the King severely observed,
punningly by the way, 'En verdad que ha sido mucho _yerro_ para un
obispo.'"[10] The pun turns upon the word _yerro_ which means both iron,
and a mistake. The joke would have been unworthy of Philip II. if it had
not been grim.

[I