the entire kingdom. On every hand gorgeous flower gar-
dens exhibited their wondrous multi-colored beauty, and

. everywhere beautiful fountains plashed theirwaters in the

sunlight, in public places, in the courts of public buildings,
and in the courts of private homes. T T T

These Moors wore clean linen. They taught our Christian
European ancestors to wear clean linen. They were dis-
tinguished by their cleanliness. Cordova alone had nine
hundred public baths, and private baths were everywhere.

These people had one of «thefinest educational systems
the world has ever kn‘own,with thousands of excellent sec-

ondary schools and many universities. The women were

free, and highly educated. Manyof them were able writers.
Some of them’ were advisors to the caliphs.

The government guaranteed absolute toleration of re-
ligious opinion. Even-handed justice was administered.
The Jews, «persecuted everywhere else throughout Europe,
were welcomed and kindly treated by theseSpanish Moors.
They occupied high posts in the educational world. They
were outstanding men of science; they were leading and
able philosophers, physicians and surgeons; theyheld im-
portant governmental positions; they flourishedin   every
branch of commerce. , A T .

These Moors translated the classics of the Greeks and
the. Romans into Arabic, and they produced a  magnificent
native literature running all the way from  beautiful and
delightful poetry to encyclopaedias extending, some of them,
into more than a hundred volumes- o

Glorious was the. architecture of these Moors. .The
mosque of Cordova, the mosque of Seville, the Alhambra,
the royal‘ palace of the kings of Granada, these and a num-
ber of other wondrous marble structures were among the
most magnificent buildings earth has ever known. And

then there were literally thousands of .magnificent marble

palaces, the homes of the wealthier people. The homes of
the common people, hundreds of which ; still remain, were
furnished with beautiful carpets many hundreds of years
before even the reception room of Queen Elizabeth was still
littered with straw. Their walls were adorned with silks
and mosaics and arabesques, and in nearly every home
there was in the living room a beautiful marble fountain.

Such, in bare outline, is the story of the astonishing
civilization which the Moors. created in mediaeval Spain;
a civilization that created vast wealth and Wondrous ob-
jects of beauty; a civilization in whichthirty millions of

4 .