King, Georgiana Goddard: A brief account of the military orders in Spain (New York: The Hispanic Society of America, 1921)

28
MILITARY ORDERS
Reconstruc-
tion
And only the noble wisdom of his own
folk in that hour
Saved him from death or capture in
midst of the battle’s stour.
And after the day was ended, and the
battle lost and done
The Moors took certain castles, and they
held them, all that they won.
Now this was Alarcos battle; in July
they came to strive,
In the year of Our Lord Incarnate eleven
and ninety-five.
So the Moors came up and besieged
Toledo and withdrew; and in the south,
where all the work of half a century was to
be done again, the Master fell to it. There
was a little house at Ciruelos, where Abbot
Raymond had ended his days and found
burial: what was left of the Order he
settled there, “and he gave the habit to
many knights that, by God’s providence,
asked for it,” as great hearts are always
prompt for the hopeless enterprise.
Politicians are prompt, too, and those of
Aragon snatched this moment to elect a
Master at Alcaniz, D. Garci Lopez de
HISPANIC NOTES