thereof, ordering all men at arms, as well horsemen as footmen, to join
them, and the third night they halted at Calatayud, and great numbers
joined them; and they came up against Alcocer, and pitched their tents
round about the Castle. Every day their host increased, for their
people were many in number, and their watchmen kept watch day and
night; and my Cid had no succour to look for except the mercy of God,
in which he put his trust. And the Moors beset them so close that they
cut off their water, and albeit the Castillians would have sallied
against them, my Cid forbade this. In this guise were my Cid and his
people besieged for three weeks, and when the fourth week began, he
called for Alvar Fanez, and for his company, and said unto them. Ye see
that the Moors have cut off our water, and we have but little bread;
they gather numbers day by day, and we become weak, and they are in
their own country. If we would depart they would not let us, and we
cannot go out by night because they have beset us round about on all
sides, and we cannot pass on high through the air, neither through the
earth which is underneath. Now then if it please you let us go out and
fight with them, though they are many in number, and either defeat them
or die an honourable death.

VII. Then Minaya answered and said. We have left the gentle land of
Castille, and are come hither as banished men, and if we do not beat
the Moors they will not give us food. Now though we are but few, yet
are we of a good stock, and of one heart and one will; by God's help
let us go out and smite them to-morrow, early in the morning, and you
who are not in a state of penitence, go and shrieve yourselves and
repent ye of your sins. And they all held that what Alvar Fanez had
said was good. And my Cid answered, Minaya, you have spoken as you
should do. Then ordered he all the Moors, both men and women, to be
thrust out of the town, that it might not be known what they were