CHAPTER VII

FOUNDATION OF THE SPANISH MONARCHY

The Northern Provinces of Spain--Their Desolate and Forbidding Character--Climate--Population--Religion --Peculiarities of the Asturian Peasantry--Pelayus --His Birth and Antecedents--He collects an Army --Obscure Origin of the Spanish Kingdom--Extraordinary Conditions under which it was founded--Battle of Covadonga--Rout of the Arabs--Increase of the Christian Power--Favila--Alfonso I.--His Enterprise and Conquests --His Policy of Colonization--Survival of the Spirit of Liberty--Religious Abuses--State of Society--Beginning of the Struggle for Empire 337