Burlesques William Makepeace Thackeray

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that after battle he ate the hearts and drank the blood of many young Moors for his supper:
a thousand wild legends were told of Ivanhoe, indeed, so that the Morisco warriors came
half vanquished into the field, and fell an easy prey to the Spaniards, who cut away among
them without mercy. And although none of the Spanish historians whom I have consulted
make mention of Sir Wilfrid as the real author of the numerous triumphs which now graced
the arms of the good cause, this is not in the least to be wondered at, in a nation that has
always been notorious for bragging, and for the non-payment of their debts of gratitude as
of their other obligations, and that writes histories of the Peninsular war with the Emperor
Napoleon, without making the slightest mention of his Grace the Duke of Wellington, or of
the part taken by BRITISH VALOR in that transaction. Well, it must be confessed, on the
other hand, that we brag enough of our fathers' feats in those campaigns: but this is not the
subject at present under consideration.
To be brief, Ivanhoe made such short work with the unbelievers, that the monarch of
Aragon, King Don Jayme, saw himself speedily enabled to besiege the city of Valencia, the
last stronghold which the Moors had in his dominions, and garrisoned by many thousands
of those infidels under the command of their King Aboo Abdallah Mahommed, son of
Yakoobal-Mansoor. The Arabian historian El Makary gives a full account of the military
precautions taken by Aboo Abdallah to defend his city; but as I do not wish to make a
parade of my learning, or to write a costume novel, I shall pretermit any description of the
city under its Moorish governors.
Besides the Turks who inhabited it, there dwelt within its walls great store of those of the
Hebrew nation, who were always protected by the Moors during their unbelieving reign in
Spain; and who were, as we very well know, the chief physicians, the chief bankers, the
chief statesmen, the chief artists and musicians, the chief everything, under the Moorish
kings. Thus it is not surprising that the Hebrews, having their money, their liberty, their
teeth, their lives, secure under the Mahometan domination, should infinitely prefer it to the
Christian sway; beneath which they were liable to be deprived of every one of these
benefits.
Among these Hebrews of Valencia, lived a very ancient Israelite—no other than Isaac of
York before mentioned, who came into Spain with his daughter, soon after Ivanhoe's
marriage, in the third volume of the first part of this history. Isaac was respected by his
people for the money which he possessed, and his daughter for her admirable good
qualities, her beauty, her charities, and her remarkable medical skill.
The young Emir Aboo Abdallah was so struck by her charms, that though she was
considerably older than his Highness, he offered to marry her, and install her as Number 1
of his wives; and Isaac of York would not have objected to the union, (for such mixed
marriages were not uncommon between the Hebrews and Moors in those days,) but