198 Kpilome of th€ Progress of Natural Science. 



phants, those huge pillars of the globe, bend beneath so noble a 

 weight." Bernier, who was present, whispered in the ear of 

 (he prince, " Your majesty must generously abstain from riding 

 on horseback, or your poor subjects will suffer too much from 

 these earthquakes." " It is on that account," replied he, enter- 

 ing into the joke, " that I usually travel in a palanquin." 



It was in the year 1085, A. D., that Alfonso, the 4th king of 

 Castile, with the aid of many French knights, recovered Toledo 

 from the dominion of the Moors. The inhabitants having sub- 

 mitted to the Spaniards, their gay manners, their customs, their 

 music, their poetry, their colleges, all became famiUarly known 

 to the conquerors. From this period may be dated the origin of 

 Spanish letters, and of the Troubadour poetry, which contains 

 no traces of Greek or Latin origin, but in its peculiar style is al- 

 together Arabian. The Proven^aux, inhabiting a climate that 

 favoured these oriental manners, soon gave way to the influence 

 of them ; to such an extent had they adopted the free manners 

 of the Moors, that they almost realized the romantic stories con- 

 tained in the Arabian Tales. To do extravagant things in the 

 name of the tender passion, was a true passport to fame. The 

 Abbe Millot, amongst many other anecdotes, relates the following. 

 " Richard of Barbcsieu, guilty of infidelity to his mistress, and un- 

 able to obtain pardon, retired to the forests, where he built a hut, 

 from which he declared he never would issue, until his mistress 

 had received him into favour. At the end of two years, his com- 

 panions waited upon the offended lady, when she consented to 

 i"e-instate him in her graces, upon condition that a hundred 

 knights with a hundred dames, ' S'aimant d'amour,' should pre- 

 sent themselves before her, with their hands joined, and on their 

 bended knees should entreat her to pardon him. This was lit- 

 ^•rally performed at the lady's castle, and at the conclusion of 

 this solemn extravagance, she pronounced the pardon of Barbe- 

 sieu. Manners like these, held up, as they then were, to the imi- 

 tation of the best classes of society, could never have arisen out 

 of tlie ferocious, anarchical, and polemical spirit, which, in Eu- 

 rope, preceded this period ; and are entirely to be attributed to 

 the mercuiial and lively habits of the Saracens, of which the 

 Arabian Nights furnish a more extended picture. 



In the early poetry of the Troubadours, we perceive strong 

 traces of the imitation of Arabian verse, and the model of the 



