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

IN SPAIN

101

I

AND MONOGRAPHS

The Moors worried Salamanca towards
the close of the twelfth century, and two
knightly brothers collected some other
knights and vowed perpetual war against
the Moors. They were D. Suero Fernandez
and D. Gomez his brother, grandsons of
D. Rodrigo Gomez, Count of Salamanca,
and related to the royal house of Aragon.
One fancies them young, gallant creatures
like the Twins at Chartres or at Leon, with

The Order
of
Alcantara

steeply to arable land almost as far; a
green-mantled tank still holds faithfully
its treasure of hoarded water. If once
there were wells they are dry now, and
blocked up and long forgotten; but a
cistern on arches (aljibe is the Spanish
name), needs only filling, perhaps, to serve
again. The sky leans close above dark
stone and thunder-smitten rock; a wind
blows through the pass by night and day,
and always there is the scent of crushed
thyme and mint.