Rnl 1 LARDNER'S CABINET CYCLOPEDIA. A SERIES Of ORIGINAL WORKS. Price THREE SHILLINGS AND SIXPENCE Jack VOLUME. 3 FR0M-THE-LIB NITYCOLLEGETO :• a 1'icture by Calte and Fall of Freedom in Italy, from .v.u. 47(i to ondi. 1vol. 3s. Cd. The aeoMjMM volumes form Mr. Forster's portion of LIVES of the most Eminent HKITISH STS'IT.SMKN. liy Sir James Mackintosh, Right Hon. T. P. Courtenay, and J. Forstcr, Esq. 7 vols LIVES of the most Eminent ENGLISH POETS. By R. Bell, Esq. 2 vols. . 7s. The HISTORY of the FALL of the KOMAN KMl'IKE; comprising a View of the Invasion and Settlement of the Barbarians. By J. C. L. L)e Sismondi. 2 Th- HISTORY of GREECE. By the U.v. the Lord Bishop of St. David's (Connon Thirbvall. D.D.) 8 vol-. . LONDON: LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. i PRIVT£D TOR LONGMAtf. OKM£, BBOWN. GEKEH * LONGMANS. PATERNOSTER K09T AND jomr TAxum. ITPER GOWT.R STREET. 183V. CONTENTS. INTRODUCTION: Page MOSEN JORDI - .6 THE CANCIONEROS - 9 ALPHONSO X. AND HIS COURT - - - 11 ALPHONSO XI. AND HIS COURT - - 11 JUAN DE MENA - 14 JUAN DE ENZINA - - 17 BOSCAN ... - 21 GARCILASO DE LA VEGA - - 36 DIEGO HURTADO DE MENDOZA - - 58 LUIS DE LEON - 7O HERRERA - - 83 JORGE DE MONTEMAYOR - 89 CASTILLEJO - 92 THE EARLY DRAMATISTS - - 95 ERCILLA - - 103 CERVANTES - 12O LOPE DE VEGA - - 189 VICENTE ESPINEL — ESTEBAN DE VIL- LEGAS 238 VI CONTENTS. Page GONGORA - . 243 QUEVEDO - '•', . 255 CALDERON - - - 278 EARLY POETS OF PORTUGAL - - 288 RlBEYRA - . 290 SAA DE MIRANDA - - _ - 291 GIL VICENTE - - - . 292 FERREIBA - - _ 292 CAMOENS - ... .295 LIVES OF EMINENT LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. INTRODUCTION. MOSEN JORDI. CANCIONERO. ALPHONSO X. AND HIS COURT. ALPHONSO XI. AND HIS COURT. JUAN DE MEN A. IN every other country, to treat of its literary men is at the same time to give a history of its literature. In Spain it is otherwise. We have no trace of who the poets were who produced that vast collection of ballads and romances, which, full of chivalry and adventure, love and war, fascinate the imagination, and bestow im- mortality on heroes — some real, *ome fictitious — who otherwise had never been known. To understand the merits of the later writers, to know on what their style and spirit was formed, it is necessary to give some account of the early, and also of the anonymous, poetry of Spain. Nor will it be foreign to the subject, nor uninteresting, slightly to trace the progress of litera- ture in the Peninsula from its earliest date. From a thousand causes Spain is the land of romance. There never was any one who has travelled in that country, whatever might be his political opinions, or his view of human nature and society, but admired and loved the Spaniards. There is an originality, an indepen- VOL. III. B 2 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. dence, an enthusiasm, in the Spanish character that distinguishes them from every other people. Des- potism and the Inquisition, ignorance and supersti- tion, have been unable to level the noble altitude of their souls; and even while the manifestations of genius have been crushed, genius has survived. From early 'times Spain was the birthplace of men of eminence in literature. We know little of the aborigines, and nothing of their language, except that from the earliest times they appear to have been gifted with that love of song that survives to this day. Silius Italicus bears testimony to this taste, when with all the arrogance of assumed superiority he speaks of the verses sung by the Gallicians in their native dialect, "barbara nunc patriis ululantem carmina linguis," and Strabo alludes to immemorial ballads sung by the inhabitants of Betica. When the Spaniards shared the refinements and learning of the capital, several names became distinguished. Lucan was a native of Cordova. We can fancy that we trace the genuine Spanish spirit in this poet — earnestness, en- thusiasm, gaudiness, and an inveterate tendency to diffuseness. The two Senecas were natives, also, of the same town.* The Spaniards with fond pride collect other names which the tide of time sweeping by, has cast on the shore, too obscure for fame, but sufficiently known to prove that the Spanish nation was always prolific in men who sought to distinguish themselves in literature. These recollections, however, belong to another race. * " Duosque Senecas, unicumque Lucanum, Facunda loquitur Corduba." Martial, ep. Ixii. lib. i. And Statius records the same fact : — " Lucanum potes imputare terris, Hoc plus quara Senecam dedisse mundo, Aut dulcem generasse Gallionem. Ut tpllat refluos in astra fontes Grajo nobilior Melete BaHis." Genethliacon. — Retrospective Review, voL iii. INTRODUCTION. 3 The Visigoths swept over the land, annihilated the Roman power, and, as far as any traces that have come down to us avouch, absorbed the aboriginal Iberian in their invasion. Yet, though they conquered and reigned over the land, it is to be doubted how far they actually amalgamated with the natives. And it is con- jectured that one of t'he causes why the Moors, after conquering Don Roderic in battle, so soon possessed themselves of city and district, and founded what at first was a sway as peaceful as universal, was occasioned by the distinction still subsisting between Iberian and Goth, which led the former the more readily to submit to new masters. The Goths were an illiterate people. There is an anecdote recorded in proof of their barbarism on this point. Queen Amalasunta, who appears to have pos- sessed a more refined and exalted mind than the men of her time, was eager to confer on her son Alaric the graces and accomplishments of literature. The warriors of the land opposed her purpose, — " No," they cried, " the idleness of study is unworthy of the Goth : high thoughts of glory are not fed by books, but by deeds of valour. He is to be a king whom all should dread. He shall not be compelled to fear his instructors." * Another proof of the ignorance and small influence of the Goths is their having adopted the language of the conquered country. All that has come down to us from them, with the exception of a few inscriptions, is in the Latin language, and several poems were written in that tongue. Still the. Goths loved warlike songs and music. To their days some would trace the redondilla, while it has also been conjectured that the peculiar rhythm of these national ballads had its origin in the camp songs of the Roman soldiers, t At length the Gothic power fell — the Moors entered, overran, and conquered Spain. At first the resistance they met was not at all proportionate to what we * Retrospective Review, vol. iii. t Boutervek. B 2 4 LITERARY .AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. should consider to have been the resources of the Spanish nation. But a noble spirit of resistance was awakened. Difference of religion kept alive what difference of language and habits originated. The enthusiastic patriotism which had gathered as waters in a mountain tarn, overflowed from the heights to which it had retreated, and finally poured over the whole land. From the struggle that ensued a thousand deeds of heroism had birth, and those circumstances were de- veloped, which became the subjects to be consecrated by those beautiful ballads and songs, " in which," to use the appropriate language of a modern critic, " truth wears the graceful garb of romance, and ro- mance appears the honest handmaid of truth." Spain owed much to the Moor, however, from other causes. The Arabs were a learned and refined race. They built cities, palaces, and mosques ; they founded universities, they encouraged learning. The most emi- nent scholars came from the East to grace their schools, and introduced a spirit of inquiry and a love of know- ledge which survived their power. Abdorrhaman III. founded the university at Cordova. He established schools and collected a library, it is said, to the extent of six hundred thousand volumes. The blessings of civilisation was fostered by the Omajad dynasty. Ma- hometanism never flourished with such true glory as under the Spanish caliphs. One of the most remarkable circumstances of this era is, the prosperity and learning of the Jews settled in Spain. Persecuted by the Goths *, this hapless nation * " Through the decree of the fifth council of Toledo, each Gothic king swore, before he was crowned, to extirpate the Jews. Ferdinand and Isabella renewed the nefarious oath, and thus generated the spirit which caused Lope de Vega to recur with satisfaction to the old Gothic law: — " The sceptre was denied of yore, " Vedando el consilio Toledano, To the elected king, until he swore tomar el cetroal rey sinque primero With his own royal hand limpiase el verdadero To purge the fertile land trigo con propria mano, Of the vile tares that choke the de la cizana vil que le suprime genuine grain, la Santa Ley en la corona inprime." And write the holy law upon the crown of Spain. " Retrospective Review, voL iii. INTRODUCTION. 5 doubtless welcomed the Moors gladly ; and finding toler- ation under their rule, and their schools open to them, they flocked to the universities of Cordova and Toledo in such numbers, that one Jewish writer tells us that there were twelve thousand Israelitish students at Toledo ; and they gave evidence of the perseverance, sagacity, and talent which belong to that people, and which, fostered by the blessed spirit of toleration, bore worthy fruit. A succession of Hebrew scholars may be traced from the tenth to the fifteenth centuries. De Castro gives an account of seven hundred different works. Every Jew could read. The higher classes flourished in glory and prosperity, so that many of the noblest Spanish families include Jewish sprouts in the tree of their genealogy. Even to this day the Jews' sons of those driven from Spain to this country remember their Spanish renown, and have preserved a recollection of its language. Of the Arabic authors of Spain the greater portion were natives of Andalusia. The number of their poets was very considerable. Of the Romances Moriscos doubtless many originated in Arabic poetry. The old Roman rhythm, the Gothic love of music, the Arab chivalry, and the noble spirit generated by a generous love of freedom, were the sources of these ro- mances. Before we recur to them however, we will men- tion the connection between the troubadour and Proven9al poetry with the Valentian. It is a singular anomaly, we may almost call it, in literature, that a dialect become a written one, adorned by poets and spoken through extensive provinces, should have become the dead tongue of modern times. The French, Italian, and Castillian absorbed the genius that once took form in a tongue which, whether it be called Provencal, Limousin, or Valentian, is still the same, and in it were written the earliest modern verses. Petrarch and Dante raised their native tongue in opposition ; but the poetry they studied as anterior to their own was the B 3 6 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. Provencal. The peculiar tone of troubadour poetry; the refined and somewhat abstract mode in which love is treated, was adopted by Petrarch,, and by Dante also, in his sonnets and canzoni. The rhythm and the subjects were more artful and scientific than the songs of Castille, and thus at one time it was held in higher regard by the Spanish sovereigns who wished to introduce learning and poetry among their subjects. John I. of Arragon invited many Proven9al and Narbonne poets to settle at Barcelona and Tortosa. He established an academy in the former city for the cultivation of poetry. The Spanish troubadours be- came celebrated; Mosen Jordi de Sant Jordi is one of the first and best-known. Petrarch read and, per- haps, imitated him.* Though protected and encouraged by the sovereigns of Arragon, and read and lauded, and even imitated, by the nobles of their courts, the Valentian never became * In the Retrospective Review, vol. Hi., in the article on the poetical literature of Spain, the whole of Sant Jordi's Song of Contraries (Cancion de Opositos), is given, from which Petrarch adopted, it is alleged, whole lines. Nothing is less derogatory to a poet of the highest genius than the fact that he picked up here and there lines and ideas, amalgamating them with his own, and adorning them with alien splendour. It is honourable, however, to Sant Jordi, to be stolen from ; the spirit of the two poems is different and the lines scattered and disconnected. Those of Petrarch are — and they are some of his finest — " Pace non trovo e non ho da far guerra, E volo sopra '1 cielo, e giaccio in terra, E nulla stringo e tutto il mondo abraccio, E ho in odio me stesso e amo altrui., Se non e amor, cose dunque ch'io sento ? " Sant Jordi, describing the struggles of his mind, has these similar lines : — " E no strench res, e tot lo mon abras, vol sovel eel, e nom movi de terra." And both Italian and Provencal bear the same translation. I nothing grasp — and yet the world embrace: I fly o'er highest heaven, though bound to earth. As also — " Hoy he de mi, e vull altra gran he." I hate myself — others are dear to me. And " E no he pace — e no tench gium ganeig." I'm not at peace, but cannot war declare. Petrarch's poem describes a lover's struggles ; Sant Jordi's, the combats of an inquisitive, troubled mind — something of a Faustus spirit, though he turns up ail, not by selling himself to the devil, but concluding piously, — But right oft flows from darkness-covered wrong, And good may spring from seeming evil here. INTRODUCTION. 7 the national poetry of Spain, and we turn from poets who will find better place among the early French writers to the genuine productions of Castille. "We have seen that it was during the Moorish wars, under the successors of Don Pelayo, that these romances had birth. The kings of the various provinces of Spain, ever at war with the Moors, were, of course, in a state of great dependence on their warrior nobles. They needed their subjects to form expeditions against the enemy or to resist their encroachments. Often, also, the Spanish princes were at enmity with each other; and civil discord, or the war of one Christian kingdom against the other, caused temporary alliance with the Mahometans. This brought the chivalry of the two nations into contact. The Spaniards learned the arts of civilisation from their conquerors — they learned also the language of love. In the midst of these romantic wars, there sprung up a species of poetry which in its simplicity and truth resembles the old English ballads, but which, from the nature of the events it commemorates, is conceived in a loftier and more chivalrous tone. The most ancient of these is a poem on the Cid, written an hundred and fifty years before the time of Dante: its versification is barbarous. It was written in the infancy of language ; but it displays touches of nature, and a vivacity of action, that show it to have been the work of men of an heroic and virile age. By degrees the romances or ballads of Spain assumed a lighter and more tripping rhythm, fitter to be easily remembered and to be accompanied by music. These metrical compositions were called redondillas.* Bou- * "All verses consisting of four trochaic feet appear to have been origin, ally comprehended under the name of redondilla, which, however, came at length to be in preference usually applied to one particular species of this description of verse. It is difficult to suppose that the redondillas have been formed in imitation of bisected hexameters, as some Spanish authors have imagined ; they may with more probability be considered a relic of the songs of the Roman soldiers. In such verses every individual could, without restraint, pour forth the feelings which love or gallantry dictated, accompanied by his guitar, as little attention was paid to cor- rectness in the distinction of long or short syllables, as in the rhyme. When one of the poetic narratives, distinguished by the name of romances B 4 8 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. tervek imagines that they may be considered as a relic of the songs of the Roman soldiers. There was something was sung, line followed line without constraint, the expression .lowing with careless freedom, as feeling gave it birth. When, however, romantic sentiments were to be clothed in a popular lyric dress, to exhibit the playful turns of ideas under still more pleasing forms, it was found ad- vantageous to introduce divisions and periods, which gave rise to regular strophes (estancias and coplas). Lines, for the sake of variety, were short- ened by halving them ; and thus the tender and impressive melody of the rhythm was sometimes considerably heightened. Seduced by the example of the Arabs, something excellent was supposed to be accomplished when a single sonorous and unvarying rhyme was rendered prominent throughout all the verses of a long romance. Through other romances, however, pairs of rhymeless verses were allowed to glide amidst a variety of rhymed ones. At length, at a later period, it was observed that, in point of elegance, the redondilla was improved by the change, when, instead of perfect rhymes, imperfect ones, or sounds echoing vowels but not consonants, were heard in the terminating syllables. Hence arose the distinction between con- sonant and assonant verses, which has been converted into a rhythmical beauty unknown to other nations. The period of the invention of the redondillas was also nearly that of the dactylic stanzas called versos de arte mayor, because their composition was considered an art of a superior order. As the inventors of these stanzas were ignorant of the true prin- ciples of prosody, the attention paid to purity in the rhythm of the dactyles was even less than in the rhymes of the redondillas. This may account for these verses falling into disuse, as the progressive improve- ment of taste, which allowed the redondillas to maintain their original consideration, was not reconcileable with the half-dancing half-hobbling rhymed lines of the versos de arte mayor. "— Boutervek, Introduction. (Translation.) Lord Holland observes, in the Appendix No. 3. to his " Life of Lope de Vega:" — "Of rhymes the Spaniards have two sorts; the conso- nante or full rhyme, which is nearly the same as the Italian ; and the asonarite, which the ear of a foreigner would not immediately distinguish from a blank termination. An asonante is a word that resembles another in the vowel on which the last accent falls, as well as the vowel or vowels that follow ; but every consonant after the accented vowel must be different from that in the corresponding syllable. Thus, tbs and amor, pecho,* fuego, alamo, paxaro, are all asonantes. In modern compositions, where the asonante is used, every alternate verse is blank, but the poet is not allowed to change the asonante till the poem is concluded. The old writers, I believe, were no such restriction." M. Gunins, a German annotator, followed by Mr. Lockhart, expresses his opinion that " the stanza was composed in reality of two long lines, and that these have been subsequently cut in four, exactly as we know to have been the case in regard to another old English ballad stanza." See Mr. Lockhart's Introduction to his Ancient Spanish Ballads. Thus, instead of printing it, as is usual,— " Fizo hazer al Rey Alfonso el cid un solene juro, delante de muchos grandes, que se hallaron en Brugos "_ this ought to run — " Fizo hazer al Rey Alfonso, el cid un solene juro, delante de muchos grandes, que se hallaron en Brugos." The u, in the penultimate syllable of juro, and in Brugos, makes the assonance of the redondilla. We need not mention to the Spanish reader he peculiar mode of printing Spanish poetry without the distinction of capitals at the beginning of lines ; nor the peculiar punctuation _ a note of interrogation reversed invariably being placed at the beginning of the sen- tence that ends with one; necessary to the otherwise obscure construc- tion of the Spanish : as for instance, — "<• Buelas al fin, y al fin te vas llorando? " INTRODUCTION. 9 singularly popular in their freedom from constraint, and catching in their effect on the ear. The sonorous harmony of the Spanish language gave themx dignity ; they were easy to compose, easy to remember; they required only a subject, and the words flowed, as it were, with the facility of a running stream. There are several volumes, called the Cancionero general and Romancero general, filled with these com- positions. The most singular circumstance is, that they are nearly all anonymous. No doubt, as language im- proved, they were altered and amended from oral tra- dition, and no one had a right to claim undivided authorship. Their subjects were love and war, and came home to the heart of every Spaniard: the senti- ments were simple, yet heroic ; the action was always impassioned, and sometimes tragic. Doctor Bowring, who has a happy facility in ren- dering the poetry of foreign nations into our own, has been more felicitous than any other author in trans- lating these compositions. His volume is well known, and we will' not quote largely from it, as we are tempted. One poem, which Boutervek pronounces to be untrans- lateable through its airiness and lightness, we present as a specimen of that talent, so peculiar to the redondilla, of catching and portraying a sentiment, as it were, by sketches and hints, where the reader fills up the picture from his own imagination, and is pleased by the very vagueness which incites him to exert that faculty. " ' Lovely flow'ret, lovely flow'ret — Oh ! what thoughts your beauties move ! When I pressed thee to my bosom, Little did I know of love ; Now that I have learnt to love thee, Seeking thee in vain I rove.' ' But the fault was thine, young warrior, Thine it was — it was not mine; He who brought thy earliest letter, Was a messenger of thine ; And he told me — graceless traitor — Yes ! he told me — lying one — That them wert already married In the province of Leon ; Where thou hadst a lovely lady, And, like flowers too, many a son.' 10 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. 'Lady ! he was but a traitor, And his tale was all untrue, In Castille 1 never entered — From Leon too, I withdrew When I was in early boyhood, And of love I nothing knew.' "* In addition to these ballads we must mention the romances of chivalry. There is an undying discussion as to the nation in which these works originated. Ac- cording to Spanish writers, the real author of the first or genuine Amadis was Vasco Lobeira, a native of Portugal, who flourished at the end of the thirteenth century, and lived till the year 1325. Perverted as history and geography are in this and other similar works, they are full of invention, and alive with human feeling. Heroic deeds are blended with fairy machinery, borrowed from Arabian tales; every thing is brought in to adorn and to exalt the character of the knight, in war and in love. Even now Amadis preserves its charm ; how great must have been its influence among nobles whose lives were dedicated to the hardships of war, and whose own hearts were the birthplace of passion, as sincere and vehement as any that warmed the heart of fic- titious cavalier. Already, however, had various kings and nobles of Spain cultivated letters. The first authors whose names * " ' Rosa fresca, Rosa fresca, tan garrida y con amor, cuando os tiene en mis brazos no vos sabia servir no, y agora quo vos serviria no vos puedo yo haber no.* Vuestra fue la culpa, amigo vuestra fue, que mia no, enviastes me una carta con un vuestro servidor, y en lugar de recaudar el digera otra razon, que erades casado, amigo, alia en tierras de Leon, que teneis muger hermosa y hijos corno una flor.' ' Quien os lo dijo, Sefiora, no vos dija verdad, no — que yo nunca entr£ in Castilla ni en las tierras de Leon, sino cuando era pequeiio que no sabia de amor.' " INTRODUCTION. 1 1 appear were less of poets than many whose works appear in the various Cancioneros. Elevated in rank, they addicted themselves to study from a love of know- ledge. Eagerly curious about the secrets of nature, or observant of the philosophy of life, they were desirous of instructing their countrymen. They deserve infinite praise for their exertions, and the motives that animated them ; but their productions cannot have the same in- terest for us as the genuine emanations of the feelings. The heart of man, its passions and its emotions, endures for ever the same, and the poet who touches with truth the simplest of its chords remains immortal; but our heads change their fashion and furniture. We disregard ob- solete knowledge as a ruin, out of proportion and fallen to pieces; while the language of the passions, like vegetation for ever growing, is always fresh. Alphonso X., surnamed the Wise, loved learning. He rendered a great service to his country by the cultivation he bestowed on the Castillian language. His verses bear the marks of the attention he paid to correctness, and by his command the Spanish language was substituted for Latin in pub- lic instruments. Through him the Bible was translated into Castillian, and a Chronicle of Spain was commenced under his directions. He favoured the troubadours, and himself aspired to write verses. There is an entire book of Cantigas or Letras, composed in the Gallician dialect, by him. El Teroso is his principal work ; it detailed his alchymical secrets, and is written in Castillian, in versos de arte mayor : much of this work remains still undeciphered. To him also is attributed a poem called Las Querellas, of which two stanzas only are preserved, and those so superior in versification to the Tesoro, that it is doubted whether they can be the pro- duction of the same man and age. The most useful work that owed its existence to his superintendence was the Alphonsine llables, containing calculations truly extra- ordinary for that period. Alphonso XI. followed in his footsteps in the culti- vation of the Castillian language. He is said to have 12 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. composed a General Chronicle of Redondillas, which is lost. It was in the time of Alphonso XI. that Don Juan Manuel wrote his Count Lucanor, a series of tales put together somewhat in the style of the " Seven Wise Masters." An inexperienced prince, when in any difficulty, applies to his minister for advice, who replies by relating some tale or fable, concluded by a maxim in verse, as the moral of the story. These show his knowledge of the world; and one, in opposition to that of the Grecian sage, who said, men were to treat their friends as if they were one day to become their enemies, deserves to be recorded in honour of the more noble-minded Castilian ; " Quien te conseja fencobrir de tus amigos, engauarte quiera assaz, y sin testigos." ee Whoever counsels you to be reserved with your friends, wishes to betray you without witnesses." Count Lucanor is praised for the artless simplicity of its style, joined to acuteness of observation. In addition, Manuel composed a Chronicle of Spain, and other prose works, as well as several poems. The civil wars and rebellions that desolated Spain at this time checked the literary spirit, and prevented the cultivation of learning. Juan Ruiz, arch-priest of Hita, and Ayala, the historiographer, are almost the only names we find in addition to those already mentioned. Juan Ruiz wrote an allegorical satire in Castillian Alexandrines. With John II., who reigned from 1407 to 14-54, began a brighter sera. Politically, his reign was disastrous and stormy. The monarchy was threatened with de- struction, and the king had not sufficient firmness to make himself respected. His love of poetry and learn- ing, sympathised in by many of his nobles, secured him, however, the affections of his adherents ; and in the midst of civil commotion, despite his deficiency of reso- lution, there gathered round him a court faithful to his cause, and civilised by its love of letters. The marquess of Villena had already distinguished himself ; he was INTRODUCTION. 13 so celebrated for his acquirements in natural and me- taphysical knowledge that he came to be looked on as a magician. He was admired also as a poet. He wrote an allegorical drama, which was represented at court. He translated the ^Eneid, and extended his patronage and protection to other poets by instituting floral games. To instruct them, he wrote a sort of Art of Poetry, termed La Gaya Ciencia. In it he praises, as Petrarch had done at the Neapolitan court, the uses of poetry. " So great," he says, " are the benefits derived from this science on civil life, banishing indolence and employing noble minds in useful inquiries, that other nations have sought and established among themselves schools for this art, so that it became spread through various parts of the world." The zeal of this noble elevated the art he protected ; he inspired others, as well born as himself, with equal enthusiasm, and was the patron of those less fortunate in worldly advantages. He died at Madrid in 1434. His friend -and pupil, the marquess of Santillana, was a better poet. Quintana remarks of him that " he was one of the most generous and valiant knights that adorned his age. A learned man, an easy and sweet love poet, just and serious in sentiment." His elegy on the death of the marquess of Villena is the most celebrated of his poems. Other names occur of less note. Jorge Manrique, who has left a fragment of poetry more purely written than belongs to his age. Garci Sanchez of Badajos, and Marcias. This last is less known for his poetry, of which we possess only four songs, than for his melancholy death. He loved one who refused to, or, disdaining, him, married another. But still he was unable to conquer his fatal attachment. The husband obtained that he should be thrown into prison ; but this did not suffice for his vengeance, nor are we surprised when we know the delicate sense of connubial honour entertained by the Spaniards. He, the husband, concerted with the alcaide of the tower in which Marcias was imprisoned, and found means to 14< LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. throw his lance at him as he stood at a window. Mar- cias was at this moment singing one of the songs he had composed upon the lady of his love ; the lance pierced him to the heart, and he died with the tale of passion still hovering on his lips. These circumstances, and probably the enthusiastic and amiable qualities of the poet, rendered him an object of reverence and regret to his countrymen. He was surnamed the Enemorado, and his name, grown into a proverb, is still the synonyme in Spain for a martyr to devoted love. His contemporary, Juan de Mena, has commemorated his death in some of the sweetest and most poetic verses of his Labyrinto. Juan de Mena is often called the Ennius of Spain. He is the most renowned of the writers of that early age. He was born at Cordova in about the year 1412. Cordova, the seat of the most famous Moorish uni- versity, had just been recovered by the Christians. Juan de Mena was sprung from a respectable though not noble family; at the age of twenty- three he fulfilled some civil office in his native city, of which in after times he spoke with affection, as we find these lines in one of his poems : — " Thou flo-ver of wisdom and of chivalry, Cordova, mother mine ! forgive thy son, If in the music of my lyre, no tone Be sweet and loud enough to honour thee. Models of wJsriom and of bravery I see reflected through thy annals bright. I will not praise thee, praise thee though I might, Lest I of flattery should suspected be."* Juan de Mena studied, however, at the university of Salamanca, and, induced by a love of inquiry and desire to gain knowledge, made a journey to Rome. Sis- mondi says, ' ' On becoming acquainted with the poetry of Dante, his imagination received no inspiration, and his taste was spoilt. His greatest work is called El " O flor de saber y cabelleria, Cordoba madre, tu /hijo perdona, si en los cantares, que agora pregona no divulgr£ tu sabiduria. De sabios, valientes loarte podria qui fueron espejo muy maravilloso; por ser de ti mismo, seri sopechoso, diran que los pinto mejor que debia." Wffin's Life ofGarcilaso. INTRODUCTION. 15 Labyrinto, or Las Trescients Coplas ; it is an allegory, in tetradactyls, of human life." A man is more likely to be incited by the spirit of his age than a single poem. Dante and his contemporaries had most at heart the in- structing of their fellow-creatures. The great Tuscan poet, in his Divina Commedia, had the design of compre- hending all human knowledge ; and the literary men of those days considered visions the proper poetical mode of conveying the secrets of nature and of morals. It is no wonder that Juan de Mena, whose poetic genius was certainly not of the highest description (it might be compared to that of Bruno Latini, the master of Dante), was more led away by the theories and tenets he must have heard continually discussed in conversation in Italy, and endeavoured, as his highest aim, rather to instruct his countrymen in the mysteries of life and death, nature and philosophy, than to express actions and feelings in such harmonious numbers as he heard frequently carolled among the hills, or sung at night beneath some beauty's window. The romances we now prize, as the genuine and poetic expression of the passions of man, could not in his eyes aspire to the height of the muse, whom he sought to gift with the power of pene- trating and explaining the mysteries of life and death — the globe and all that it contains. In this manner, however, he excited the respect of the patrons of learning. King John and the marquess of San- tillana both honoured and loved him ; he was named one of the king's historiographers, an institution originating with AlphonsoX., and those appointed to it were expected to continue the national chronicles down to their own time. Juan de Mena lived in high favour at the court of John II., and constantly adhered to him. He died in 1456', at Guadalaxara in New Castille, and the marquess of Santillana erected a monument to him. Quintana speaks of the Labyrinto as "the most inter- esting monument of Spanish poetry in that age, which left all contemporary writers far behind him." But after all, it is a mere specimen of the poetic art of those days : 16 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. not like Dante, could he put a human soul into his allegory, which wins and enchants with ever renewing interest, nor adorn visible objects with that truth and delicacy, and vividness of description, in which art Dante has been unsurpassed by any poet of any age or country. Juan de Mena's allegory is heavy, his details tiresome, the interest absolutely null, and his poetical invention, such as it was, subordinate to false learning. He intends to sing of the vicissitudes of fortune, ruled, as they are, by the seven planets, to whom Pro- vidence gives such power. He invokes Apollo and Calliope, and then apostrophises Fortune, asking leave to% blame her when she may deserve censure. He then, in imitation of all vision-writers, loses himself, when a lady of wonderful beauty appears, and presents herself to him as his guide. The lady is Providence : she bids him look, and he goes on to describe what he saw : — Turning my eyes to where she bade me gaze* Behold, three ponderous wheels I saw within ; And two were still — nor even moved their place ; The other swiftly, round and round, did spin. Below them on the ground I saw the space O'erspread by nations vast, who once had been, And each upon the brow engraven wore The name and fate the which on earth they bore. And in one wheel that stood immoveable I saw the gatherings of a future race ; And that, which to the ground was doomed to fall, A dark veil cast upon the hideous place, Covered with all her dead. — I was not able The meaning of the sight I saw to trace ; So I implored my guide that she would show The meaning of the vision there below. * ' Bolviendo los ojos a do me mandava, vi mas adentro muy grandes tres ruedas, las dos gran firmes, immotas y quedas mas la del medio boltar no cessava. Vi que debaxo de todos estava caida por tierra grand gente infinita, que avia en la fronte cada qual escrita, el mombre y la suerte por donde passava. Y vi que en la una que no se movia,, la gente que en ella avia de ser, y la que debaxo esperava caer con turbido velo sumorte cubria. Y yo que de aquello muy poco sentia, fiz de mi dubda compliila palabra ; a mi guiadora, rogando que me anra squesta figura que yo no entendia." INTRODUCTION. 17 The wheels of course represent the past, present, and future, each governed by the seven planets. Providence points out the various personages distinguished in the wheel of the past and the present; and the poet has thus occasion to make great display of knowledge on every subject, and deduces from time to time maxims upon the conduct of life and the government of nations ; and thus, as Dante intended in his Commedia, does Juan de Mena introduce instruction on all the sciences then known. In common with every writer of his class, he thinks more of what he has to say, than of the melody of his versification ; ^sometimes his subject suggests lines at once animated and sonorous ; at other times they are tame or turgid. He is not backward in giving moral lessons, either to prince or people ; yet Quintana regards this work probably with too much partiality when he says that we shall always dip into it with pleasure. We regard it with some curiosity, and more respect, and with but little liking. One other name we will mention, since it is connected with the Spanish theatre ; and dramatic writing became in progress of time the most truly national as well as original and perfect form in which the genius of Spanish poetry embodied itself. Juan de Enzina wrote the first Spanish plays. It is true that Villena wrote an alle- gorical drama, which is lost, and other compositions took the form of dialogue ; but Enzina, who was a musical composer, converted mere pastoral eclogues into real dramas. He was born at Salamanca, in the reign of Isabella. He travelled to Jerusalem, in company with the marquis de Tarifa, and he li ved some time at Rome, as maestro da capella, or director of music, to pope Leo X. These travels and residences at a distance from his native country, must have stored his mind with ideas; but though Italy had reached the zenith of her poetic glory at that time, he became no pupil of hers. Perhaps he found Spanish metres, and the Spanish poetic diction did notlend itself to any but the Spanish style; and he never dreamt, as Boscan afterwards so admirably succeeded in doing, of VOL. in. c 18 LITERARY AND SO* m EN T'TTT^™: ".<••• enlarging the sphere of Spanish poetry by introducing Italian modes of rhythm : his songs and lyrics are in the style of the cancioneros ; and the very quips and cranks in which he indulged have the rough humour and extravagant imagination of Castile, not the pointed wit or airy lightness of Italy. Among other things, he published a song of contraries, or absurdities, (disparates,) which has made his name proverbial in Spain. He converted Virgil's eclogues into ballads, and applied to the sovereigns and nobles of Spain the compliments Virgil addressed to the emperor Augustus. His sacred and profane eclogues were acted at court at Christm'as-eve and carnival : these are lost. Some of his songs, calculated to become popular from their spirit, and the tone they seized, which was suited to the hour, remain. There is one translated by Dr. Bowring, which is a Farewell to the Carnival (Antruejo), which, in the Spanish at least, has all the zest and animation of a drinking song : — " Come let us eat and drink to-day, And sing, and laugh, and banish sorrow, For we must part to-morrow. In Antruejo's honour — fill TheJaughing cup with wine and glee, And feast and dance with eager will, And crowd the hours with revelry, For that is wisdom's counsel still — To day be gay, and banish sorrow, For we must part to-morrow. Honour the saint — the morning ray Will introduce the monster death ; There 's breathing space for joy to-day, To-morrow ye shall gasp for breath ; So now be frolicsome and gay, i And tread joy's round and banish sorrow, For we must part to-morrow." * que todo hoy nos hartemos, * " Hoy comamos y bebamos, pues manana ayunaremos. y cantemos y holguemos que maiiana ayunaremos. Honremos a tan buen santo que manana viene la muerte, Por honra de San Antruejo comamos, bebemos huerte paremonos hoy bien anchos, que manana habra quebranto embutamos estos panchos, comamos, bebamos tanto recalquemo* el pellejo hasta que nos reventemos, que costumbre es de concejo pues maSana ayunaremos." INTBODUCTION. 19 Meanwhile the state of Spain had wholly changed. The struggle with the Moors had ended, and its civil dissen- tions were no more. The union of the crowns of Aragon and Castile under Ferdinand and Isabella placed the country under one sovereign ; and the con- quest of Granada put an end to the last Moorish kingdom. The Spaniards, with their constitutional Cortes, made a noble struggle for civil liberty at the beginning of the reign of Charles V. ; but they failed, and an absolute monarchy, guarded by the most nefarious of all institutions, the inquisition, was established; the vaunted privileges of the grandees of Spain became matters of court etiquette, instead of lofty mani- festations of their equality with their sovereign ; the conquest of America brought money to the country, which was quickly drained from it by the wars in Italy ; while the Lutheran heresy again set alight those cruel fires which were at first destined for aliens, — such Jews and Moors might be termed. Liberty of thought, as well as of action, was destroyed; and though the terrors of the inquisition were displayed more in Flanders than in the Peninsula itself, that arose from the circum- stance that in the one country it was resisted, while in the other it was submitted to with a prostration of soul unknown to any other country or ago. For a time, however, the energies of the nation were rather turned aside than checked by these events. The noble spirit of Padilla existed in the Spanish bosom, though turned from its elevated patriotism.. The achieve- ments of Charles V. awoke enthusiastic loyalty ; while his enterprises gave birth to a series of warriors and heroes. Their vast acquisitions in what they named the Indies, added to the splendour of the Spanish name. Glory, if not liberty ; pride, though not independence^ awoke in them a courageous and daring, though stern and cruel spirit, which led to those successes which spread a lustre over their name and age. But at the same time it must be observed, that these very wars and conquests drained Spain of those ardent and enterprising spirits, who, c 2 20 LITERARY AND feu. .pNT,^T/,^ Mr>v if they had not been so employed, nr his magnificence and his talents, while his very bigotry was considered a virtue. When, therefore, Sedano men- tions this circumstance, he speaks of it with pride, saying, " Boscan's rank, joined to his blameless man- ners and his talents, caused him to be chosen governor to the great duke of Alva, don Fernando, which office he filled with success, as is proved by the heroic virtues that adorned the soul of his pupil, which were the result of Boscan's education." From early youth Boscan was a poet; at first he wrote in the old Spanish style ; but he was still young when his attention was called to the classic productions of Italy, and he was incited to adopt the Italian versifi- cation and elegiac style, so to enlarge the sphere of Spanish poetry. It was in the pear 1525 that Andrea NaVagero came as ambassador from Venice to the court of the emperor Charles V. at Toledo. The Venetian was of noble birth, and so addicted to study as to injure his health by the severity of his application.* A state of melancholy ensued, only to be alleviated by travel. He was familiar with Greek and Latin literature, and cul- tivated a refined taste that could scarcely be satisfied by the most finished productions of his native land, while he exercised the severest judgment, even to the destruc- tion of his own. At Toledo he fell in with Boscan and Garcilaso. Their tastes, their love of poetry and of the classics, were the same ; and the superior learning of the Italian led him to act the preceptor to his younger friends. Through his arguments they were led to quit the composition of their national redondillas, and to aspire to introduce more elegance and a wider scope of ideas into their native poetry. Boscan, in his dedication of a volume * Wiflfen's Life of Garcilaso de la Vega : who gives us translations of some very pleasing Latin verses by Navagero. BOSCAN. 23 of his poems, which included several of Garcilaso's, to the duchess of Soma, thus mentions the circumstances that led them to contemplate this change: "Con- versing one day on literary subjects with Navagero the Venetian ambassador (whom I wish to men- tion to your ladyship as a man of great celebrity in these days), and particularly upon the different genius of various languages, he inquired of me why, in Cas- tilian, we never attempted sonnets and other kinds of composition used by the best writers in Italy ; he not only said this, but urged me to set the example. A few days after I departed home, and musing on a variety of things during a long and solitary journey, frequently reflected on Navagero's advice, and thus at length began the attempt I found at first some difficulty, as this kind of versification is extremely complex, and has many peculiarities different from ours ; but afterwards, from the partiality we naturally entertain towards our own productions, I thought I had succeeded well, and gra- dually grew warm and eager in the pursuit. This, however, would not have been sufficient to stimulate me to proceed, had not Garcilaso encouraged me, whose judgment, not only in my opinion, but in that of the whole world, is esteemed a certain rule. Praising uniformly my essays, and giving me the highest possible mark of approbation in following, himself my example, he induced me to devote myself exclusively to the under- taking.'' Every thing combines to give us the idea of Boscan as a good and a happy man, enjoying so much of pro- sperity and rank as would make him feel satisfied and complacent, and endowed with such talents as rendered poetry a pleasing occupation, and the fame he acquired delightful. Blessed with a mild and affectionate disposi- tion, happily married, living contented, he possessed ad- vantages that must have added greatly to his happiness, through the good fortune which gave him accomplished and noble friends, addicted to the same studies, delight- ing in the same pursuits, sympathising in his views, and 24 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEW. affording him the assistance of their applause and imi- tation. What we know of Boscan, indeed,, is princi- pally through the mention made of him hy his friends. Garcilaso de la Vega, superior to his friend as a poet, was one of those gallant spirits whose existence is a poem, and was closely allied to him in friendship. It was through Garcilaso's advice and encouragement that Boscan translated Castiglione's Libra del Cortigiano, — a hook then just published, and which enjoyed the highest re- pute in Italy. The translation was accompanied hy a dedication written by Garcilaso, which Sedano praises as " an exquisite piece of eloquence," in which he speaks of his friend with the fond praise which genuine affection inspires. Several of Garcilaso's sonnets, an epistle, and an elegy, are addressed to Boscan, and all breathe a mixture of friendship and esteem delightful to contemplate. He mentions him also in his second ec- logue. When describing the sculpture on a vase of the God of the river Tormes, he describes don Fernando, duke of Alva, as being depicted among other heroes of the age, and Boscan, in attendance, as his preceptor. It must be remembered, that when this elegy was written, the duke was in the bloom of youth, and regarded as the man of promise of his age ; while his life was yet unstained by the crimes that render him hateful in our eyes. It is a sage named Severe who is gazing on the urn of old Tormes. " Next as his looks along the sculptures glanced, A youth with Phoebus hand in hand advanced ; Courteous his air, from his ingenuous face, Inform'd with wisdom, modesty, and grace, And every mild affection, at a scan The passer-by would mark him for a man,1 Perfect in all gentilities of mind That sweeten life and harmonise mankind. The form which lively thus the sculptor drew, Assured Severo in an instant knew, For him who had by careful culture shown Fernando's spirit, lovely as his own ; Had given him grace, sincerity, and ease, The pure politeness that aspires to please, The candid virtues that disdain pretence, And martial manliness, and sprightly sense, With all the generous courtesies enshrined In the fair temple of Fernando's mind. BOSCAN, 25 When well surveyed his name Severo read, ' BOSGAM !' whose genius o'er the world is spread, In whose illumined aspect shines the fire That, stream'd from Delphos, lights him to the lyre, And warms those songs which with mankind shall stay Whilst endless ages roll unfelt away." * Besides Garcilaso, Boscan enjoyed the friendship of a man, far different in the qualities of his mind, but of high powers of intellect, and of a noble though arrogant and proud disposition. The epistles in verse that passed between Boscan and don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza prove the friendship that subsisted between them, and the esteem in which Boscan was held ; at the same time they present a delightful picture of the tranquil happiness which the poet enjoyed. Mendoza's epistle is imitated from Horace ; it is written in praise of a tran* quil life. At the conclusion it describes the delights of a rural seclusion, ornamented by all the charms of nature ; and he introduces his friend as enjoying these in perfec- tion, attended on by his wife, who plucks for him the rarest grapes and ripe fruit, — the fresh and sweet gifts of sum- mer,— waiting on him with diligence and joy, proud and happy in her task. Boscan, in his reply, dilates on the subject, and fills up the picture with a thousand graces and refinements of feeling drawn from nature, and which coming warm from the heart, reach our own. I am tempted to introduce a portion of this epistle. The fault of the Spaniards in their literature is diffuse- ness ; I have therefore endeavoured in some degree to compress the rambling of the poet, while I suppress no sentiment, nor introduce a new idea. Little used to versi- fication, my translation wants smoothness; but present- ing, as it does, a picture of domestic life, such as was passed at a distant age and in a distant land, yet resem- bling so nearly our own notions of the pleasures of home, I think it cannot fail to interest the reader. Boscan commences, in imitation of Horace, by com- mending the tranquillity enjoyed in a middle station of life. He then goes on to adorn his canvass with a picture of conjugal attachment and happiness : — » Wiffen's translation of Garcilaso's poems. 26 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. 'Tis peace that makes a happy life; * And that is mine through my sweet wife ; Beginning of my soul and end, I 've gain'd new being from this friend,— She fills each thought, and each desire, Up to the height I would aspire. This bliss is never found by ranging ; Regret still springs from saddest changing ; Such loves and their beguiling pleasures, Are falser still than magic treasures, Which gleam at eve with golden colour, And change to ashes ere the morrow. But now each good that I possess, Rooted in truth and faithfulness, Imparts delight to every sense ; For erst they were a mere pretence, And long before enjoy'd they were, They changed their smiles to grizly care. Now pleasures please — love being single — Evils with its delights ne'er mingle. My bed's become a place of rest, Two souls repose on one soft breast ; And still in peace my simple board Is spread, and tranquil feasts afford. Before, to eat I scarce was able, Some harpy hover'd o'er my table, Spoiling each dish when I would dine, And mingling gall with gladsome wine - *" Y asi yo por seguir aquesta via, heme casado con una muger que es principle y fin del alma mia. Esta me ha dado luego un nuevo ser, con tal felicidad que me sostiene llena la voluntad y el entender. Esta me hace ver que ella conviene a mi, y las otras no me convenian ; 6 esta tengo yo, y ella me tiene. En mi las otras iban y venian, y a poder de mudanzas a montones de mi puro dolor se mantenian. Eran ya para mi sus galardones como tesoros por encantamientos, que luego se volvian en carbones. Ahora son bienes que en mi siento firmes, macizos, con verdad fundados, y sabrosos en todo el sentimiento. Solian mis placeres dar cuidados y al tiempo que llegaban a gustarsc ya llegaban a mi casi dafiados. Ahora el bien es bien para gozarse, y el placer es lo que es, que siempre place, rel mal ya con el bien no ha de juntarse. satisfecho todo satisface y asi tambien a mi por lo que he hecho quanto quiero y deseo se me hace. el campo que era de batalla el lecho ya es lecho para mf de paz durable dos almas hay conformes en un pecho. La mesa en otro tiempo abominable y el triste pan que en ella yo comia, y el vino que bebia lamentable ; infestandonie siempre alguna harpia que en mitad del deleyte mi vianda con amargos potages envolvia. BOSCAN. 27 Now the content that foolish I Still miss'd in my philosophy, My wife with tender smiles bestows, And makes me triumph o'er my woes ; While with her finger she effaces Of my past folly all the traces, And graving pleasant thoughts instead, Bids me rejoice that I am wed. » * * And thus, by moderation bounded, I live by my own goods surrounded. Among my friends, my table spread With viands we may eat nor dread; And at my side my sweetest wife, Whose gentleness admits no strife, — Except of jealousy the fear, Whose soft reproaches more endear. Our darling children round us gather, Children who will make me grandfather. And thus we pass in town our days, Till the confinement something weighs; Then to our village haunt we fly, Taking some pleasant company — While those we love not never come Anear our rustic leafy home; For better 't is t* philosophise, And learn a lesson truly wise, From lowing herd and bleating flock, Than from some men of vulgar stock ; Ahora el casto amor acude y manda que todo se me haga muy sabroso, andando siempre todo como anda. De manera, Sefior, que aquel reposo que nunca alcance yo por mi ventura con mi filosofar triste y penoso, Una sola muger me le asegura, y en perfeta sazon me da en las manos vitoria general de mi tristura. y aquellos pensamientos mios tan vanos ell a los va borrando con el dedo, y escribe en lugar de ellos otros sanos. * * * Dejenme estar contento entre mis cosas comiendo en compania mansamente comidas que no scan sospechosas. Conmigp y mi muger sabrosamente este, y alguna vez me pida celos con tal que me los pida blandamente. Comamos y bebamos sin recelos la mesa de muchachos rodeada ; muchachos che nos hagan ser abuelos. Pasaremos asi nuestra Jornada ahora en la ciudad, ahora en la Aldea, porque la vida este mas descansada. Quando pesada la Ciudad nos sea irthnos al Lugar con la compafia A donde el importune no nos vea. AUi se vivira con menos mafia, y no habra el hombre tanto guardaree del malo o del grosero que os engafia. Alii podra mejor filosafarse, con los bueyes y cabras y ovejas que con los que del vulgo ban de tratarse. 28 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. And rustics, as they hold the plough, Mav often good advice bestow. Of love, too, we may have the joy— For Phrebus as a shepherd boy Wander'd once among the clover, Of some fair shepherdess the lover: And Venus wept in rustic bower, Adonis turn'd to purple flower ; And Bacchus midst the mountains derar, Forgot the pangs of jealous fear ; And nymphs that in the waters play, ('Tis thus that ancient fables say), And dryads fair among the trees, Fain the sprightly fawns would please. So in their footsteps follow we, My wife and I, — as fond and free, — Love in our thoughts and in our talk, Direct we slow our saunt'ring walk, To some near murm'ring rivulet ; Where 'neath a shady beech we sit, Hand clasp'd in hand, and side by side, With some sweet kisses too beside, Contending there, in combat kind, Which best can love with constant mind. As the stream flows among the grass, Thus life's clear stream with us does pass : We take no count of day nor night, While, minist'ring to our delight, Nightingales all sweetly sing, And loving doves, with folded wing, Above our heads are heard to coo j And far's the ill-betiding crow. We do not think of cities then, Nor envy the resorts of men, — Alii no scran malas las consejas que cpntaran los simples labradores viniendo de arrastrar las duras rejas. ;y Venus no se vi6 en grande estrecheza por Adonis vagando entre los prados ? segun la antiguedad asi lo reza ? £ y Baco no sintio fuertes cuidados por la cuitada que quedo durmiendo en mitad de los monies despoblados ? Las ninas por las aguas pareciendo, y entre las arboledas las Driadas se ven con los Faunos rebullendo. Nosotros seguiremos sus pisadas ; digo yo y mi muger, nos andaremos tratando alii las cosas namoradas. A do corra algun rio nos iremos, y a la sombra de alguna verde haya a do estemos mejor nos sentaremos. Tenderme ha alii la alda de su saya y en regalos de amor habra porfia qual de entrambos hara mas ajta raya. El rio correra por do es su via nosptros correremos por la nuestra sin pensar en el noche ni en la dia. El ruisefior nos cantara a la diestra y vendra sin el cuerbo la paloma haciendo a su venida alegre muestra. BOSCAN. Of Italy, the softer pleasures, Of Asia too, the golden treasures, All these are nothing in our eyes ; The -while a book beside us lies, Which tells the tales of olden time, Of gods and men the hests sublime,— Eneas' voyage by Virgil told, Or song divine of Homer old, Achilles' wrath and all his glory, Or wandering Ulysses* story, Propertius too, who well indites, And the soft plaints Catullus writes ; These will remind me of past grief, Till, thinking of the sweet relief My wedded state confers on me, My bygone 'scapes I careless eye. 0 what are all those struggles past, The fiery pangs which did not last, Now that I live secure for aye, In my dear wife's sweet company ? 1 have no reason to repine — My joys are her's, and her's are mine; Our tranquil hearts their feelings share, And all our pleasures mutual are. Our eyes drink in the shady light Of wood, and vale, and grassy height ; No tendremos envidia al que esta en Roma ni a los tesoros de los Asianos, ni a quanto por aca de la India asoma. Tendremos nuestros libros en las manos y no se cansaran de andar contando los hechos celestiales y mundanos Virgilio a Eneas estara cantando, y Homero el corazon de Aquiles fiero, y el navigar de Ulises rodeando. Propercio vendra alii por compafiero el qual dira con dulces armonias del arte que a su Cintia amo primero. Catulo acudira por otras vias, y llorando de Lesbia los amores sus tram pas llorara y chocarrerias. Esto me advertira de mis dolores — pero volviendo a mi placer presente tendrfe mis escarmientos por mejores. Ganancia sacar£ del accidente que otro tiempo mi sentir turbava trayendoine perdido entre la gente. ,; Que har6 de acordarme qual estaba viendome qual estoy, que estoy seguro de nunca mas pasar lo que pasaba ? En mi fuerte estare dentro en mi muro ain locum de amor ni fantasia que mi pueda veneer con su conjuro. Como digo estarfe en mi cpmpaflia en todo me hara el camino llano su alegria mczclando con la mia. Su mano me dara dentro en mi mano, y acudiraii deleytes y blanduras de un sano corazon en otro sano. Los ojos holgaran con las verduras de los montes y prados que veremos y con las scmbras de las espesuras. £1 correr de las aguas oiremos 50 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEW We hear the waters as they stray, And from the mountains wend their way, Leaping all lightly down the steep, Till at our feet they murm'ring creep ; And fanning us, the evening breeze, Plays gamesomely among the trees; While bleating flocks, as day grows cold, Gladly seek their shelt'ring fold. And when the sun is on the hill, And shadows vast the valleys fill, And waning day, grown near its close, ' Sends tired men to their repose ; We to our villa saunt'ring walk, And of the things we see we talk. Our friends come out in gayest cheer, To welcome us — and fain would hear, If my sweet wife be tired — and smile — Inviting us to rest the while. Then to sup we take our seat, Our table plentiful and neat, Our viands without sauces drest, Good appetite the healthy zest To fruits we've pluck'd in our own bowers, And gaily deck'd with od'rous flowers, And rustic dainties, — many a one. When this is o'er and supper done, y su blando venir por las montafias que a su paso vendran dpnde estaremos El ayre movera las verdes caiias y volveran entomes los ganados balando por llegar fi. sus cabanas. ' En esto ya que el sol por los collados BUS largas sombras andara encumbrando, enviando reposo a los cansados, nosotros nos ir£mos paseando acia al lugar do esta nuestra morada, en cosas que veremos platicando. La compafia saldra regocijada a tomarnos entonces con gran fiesta diciendo a mi muger si esta cansada. Veremos al entrar le mesa puesta, y todo en buen concepto aparejado como es uso de casa bien compuesta. Despues que un poco habremos reposado Bin ver bullir, andar yendo y viniendo, y a cenar non habremos asentado. Nuestros mozos vendran alii trayendo viandas naturales y gustosas que nuestro gusto esten todo moviendo. Frutas pondran maduras y sabrosas por nosotros las mas de ellas cogidas, embueltas en mil flores olorosas. Las natas por los platas estendidas acudiran y el bianco requeson, y otras que dan cabras paridas. Despues de esto vendra el tierno lechon con el conejo gordo, y gazapito, y aquellos polios que de pasto son. vendra tambien alii el nuevo cabrito que a su madre jamas habra seguido por el tiempo de tierno y de chiquito. Despues que todo esto haza venido, BOSCAN. The evening passes swift along, In converse gay and sweetest song ; Till slumber, stealing to the eye, Bids us to our couches hie. I will not tell what there we do, Even, dearest friend, to you ; Enough that lovers ever share Delights when they together are. Thus our village life we live, And day by day such joys receive ; Till, to change the homely scene; Lest it pall while too serene, To the gay city we remove, Where other things there are to love ; And graced by novelty we find The city's concourse to our mind. While our new coming gives a joy, Which ever staying might destroy, We spare all tedious compliment — Yet courtesy with kind intent, Which savage tongues alone abuse, Will often the same language use. Thus in content we thankful live, And for one ill for which we grieve, How much of good our dear home blesses ; Mortals must ever find distresses, But sorrow loses half its weight — And every moment has its freight 31 y que nosotros descansadamente en nuestra cena hayamos bien comido, pasaremos la noche dulcemente hasta venir el tiempo que la gana del dormir toma al hombre comunmente. Lo que desde este tiempo alia mafiana pasare, pase ahora sin contarse, pues no cura mi pluma de ser vana: basta saver que dos que tanto amarse pudieron, no podran hallar momenta en que puedan dejar siempre de holgarse. Pero tornando a proseguir el cuento, nuestro vivir sera de vida entera- viviendo en el aldea como cuento. Tras esto ya que el corazon se quiera desenfadar con variar la vida tornando nuevo gusto en su manera, a la ciudad sera nuestra partida a donde todo nos sera placiente con el nuevo placer de la venida. Holgaremos entones con la gente, y con la novedad de haber llegado trataremos con todos blandamcntc. Y el cumplimiento que es siempre pesadp a lo menos aquel que de ser vano, no es menos enojoso que escusado ; Alaballe estera muy en la mano, y decir que por solo el cumplimiento se conserva en el mundo el trato humano. Nuestro vivir asi estarA contento, y alcanzaremos mil ratos gozosos en recompensa de un desabrimiento. Y aunque a veces no faltan enojos, todavia entre nuestros conooidos dukes «era"n mas j log sabrosot. LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. Of joy— which our dear friends impart, And with their kindness cheer my heart, While, never weary us to visit, They seek our house when we are in it : If we are out it gives them pain, And on the morrow come again. Noble Dura! can cure our sadness, With the infection of his gladness: Augustin too — well read in pages, Productions of the ancient sages, And the romances of our Spain — Will give us back our smiles again ; While he with a noble gravity, Adorned by the gentlest suavity, Recounts us many a tale or fable, Which well to tell he is most able ; Serious, mingled with jokes and glee, The which as light and shade agree. And Mpnleon, our dearest guest, Will raise our mirth by many a jest; For while his laughter rings again, Can we to echo it refrain ? And other merriment is ours, To gild with joy the lightsome hours. But all too trivial would it look, Written down gravely in a book : And it is time to say adieu. Though more I have to write to you. Another letter this shall tell, So now, my dearest friend, farewell ! Pues ya con los amigos mas queridos que sera el alboro/o y el placer y el bullicio de ser recien venidos. Que sera el nunca hartarnos de nos ver, y el buscarnos cada hpra y cada punto y el pesar de tmscarse sin se ver. Mosen Dural alii estera muy junto, haciendo con su trato y su nobleza sobre nuestro placer el contrapunto. Y con su buen burlar y su llaneza no sufrira un momento tan ruin que en nuestro gran placer muestre tristeza. No faltera Geronimo Augustin con su saber sabroso y agradable, no menos que en romance en el latin : el qual con gravidad mansa y tratable Contando cosa bien por el notadas, nuestro buen conversar hara durable. Las burlas andaran por el mezeladas con las veras asi con tal razpn que unas de otras seran bien ayudadas. En esto acudira el buen Monleon con el qual todos mucho holgaremos, y nosotros y guantos con el son. El nos dira, y nosotros gustaremos, el reira, y hara que nos riamos, Y en esto enfadarse ha de quanto haremoe. Otras cosa habra que las callamos, porque tan buenas son para hacerse que pierden el valor si las hablamos. Pero tiempo es en fin de recogerse, , porque haya mas para otro mensagero, que si mi cuenta no ha de deshacerse no sera, y os prometo, este el postrero." BOSCAN. 38 Thus lived Boscan, enjoying all that human nature can conceive of happiness. One of his tasks, after the lamented death of Garcilaso, was to collect his poems, and to publish several in a volume with his own. The date of his death is uncertain : it took place, however, before the year 1 543 ; so that he died comparatively young. In person he was handsome ; his physiognomy attractive from the mildness and benevolence it expressed; and his manners distinguished by courtly urbanity and elegance. As a poet, he does not rank so high as his friend Garcilaso ; he is less of a poet, less ideal, less harmonious. His chief praise results from his coming forward as the reformer of Spanish poetry: yet he cannot be con- sidered an imitator of the Italian style which he intro- duced. It is true he adopted from the Italians their versi- fication and subjects; but nothing can be more essentially different in character and genius. The tender flow of Petrarch, the inimitable mode in which he concentrates his ideas, and presents them to us with a precision yet with grace and ideality, find no competition in Boscan's poems. But there is more simplicity, more of the nerve of a man ; less enthusiasm but a plainer and com- pleter meaning in the Spaniard. He is less dreamy — to a certain degree, more common place ; but then all is true, heartfelt, and living. We have not Petrarch's diction. Garcilaso de la Vega approached that more nearly; but we have a full and earnest truth that carries us along with it. Take for instance the most perfect of Petrarch's canzone, " Chiare, fresche e dolci acque," and compare it with Boscan's " Claros y frescos rios," written in imitation. The Italian poet invests his love with ideal imagery that elevates its object into some- thing ethereal and goddess-like. How graceful, how full of true poetic fire and love's enthusiasm is that inimi- table stanza ! — VOL. III. - D 34> LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN". Still dear to Memory! when, in odorous showers, Scattering their balmy flowers To summer airs, th' o'ershadowing branches bow'd, The while, with humble state, In all the pomp of tribute sweets she sate, Wrapt in the roseate cloud ! Now clustering blossoms deck her vesture's hem, Now her bright tresses gem (In all that blissful day, Like burnish'd gold, with orient pearls inwrought) : Some strew the turf, some on the waters float I Some, fluttering, seem to say, In wanton circlets tost, " Here Love holds sovereign sway." Boscan's poem has nothing of the ideal creativeness which sheds a halo round its object, making one feel as if Laura fed upon different food, and had limbs of more celestial texture than other women : but Boscan's sen- timents are true to nature. His tenderness is that of a real and fervent lover ; without raising her whom he loves into an angel, he gives us a lively and most sweet picture of how his heart was spent upon thoughts of her ; and when he tells us that during absence he meditates on what she is doing, and whether she thinks of him, pic- turing her gesture as she laughs, thinking her thought, while his heart tells him how she may change from gay to sad, now sleeping and now awake, there is, in the place of the ideal, sincerity, — in place of the wanderings of fancy, the fixed earnestness of a fond and manly heart. Boscan imitated Horace as well as Petrarch. In the epistle from which a passage has been quoted, he abides by the unornamented style of the Latin poet; but he wants his terseness, his epigrammatic turns, his keen observation. His poem is descriptive, and sweetly so, of the best state of man, — that of a happy marriage ; but while he pre- sents a faithful picture of its tranquil virtuous pleasures, and imparts the deep serene joy of his own heart, his hues are not stolen from the rainbow, nor his music from the spheres : it is all calm, earthly, unidealised, though not unimpassioned. One fault Boscan possesses in common with almost all other Spanish poets — he cannot compress : he runs on, one idea suggesting another, one line the one to follow BOSCAN. So in artless unconstrained flow; but his poetry wants concentration and energy. You read with pleasure, and follow the meanders of his thoughts ; they are not wild, but they are desultory ; and we are never startled as when reading Petrarch, by the rising, as it were, amidst melodious soWnds, of some structure of ideal and sur- passing beauty, which makes you pause, imbibe the whole conception of the poet, and exclaim, This is perfection ! 36 GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 1503—1536. A POET of higher merit, a more interesting man, a hero, both in love and war, whose name seems to embody the perfect idea of Spanish chivalry, was Boscan's friend, Garcilaso de la Vega. We possess a translation of his poetry by Mr. Wiffen, who has appended an elaborate life, as elaborate at least as the scanty materials that remain could afford ; for these are slight, and rather to be guessed at from slight allusions made by historians, and expressions in his poems, than from certain know- ledge ; as all that we really learn concerning him is, that he was a gallant soldier and a poet, devoting the leisure he could snatch from the hurry and alarm of war, to the study and composition of poetry, in which art he attained the name of prince, and is, indeed, superior to all the writers of his age in elegance, sweetness, and pathos. Garcilaso de la Vega was sprung from one of the noblest families of Toledo. His ancestry is illustrious in Spanish chronicles. They were originally natives of the Asturias, and, possessing great wealth, arrived at high honours under various sovereigns. One of them, by name also Garcilaso, received the name of De la Vega, in commemoration of his having slain a gigantic Moor on the Vega or plain of Granada.* The miscreant having attached the Ave Maria to his horse's tail, all the knights of Spain were eager to avenge the injury done * This anecdote is usually told as appertaining to the father of the poet; but the name was assumed by the family at an earlier date There is a romance introduced in the Guerras Civiles de Granada, commemorating this action. Sedano and Wiffen are the authorities on which this biography is grounded. Bouterwek tells only what Sedano had done before him; in the earlier portion of his work, Simondi is scarcely more than a rifacciamento of Bouterwek. GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 3? to our lady. Although a mere youth, Garcilaso tri- umphed, and was surnamed in consequence De la Vega, and adopted for his device the Ave Maria in a field d'or. The father of the poet, named also Garcilaso, was fourth lord of Los Anos, grand commendary of Leon, a knight of the order of St. James, one of the most distinguished gentlemen of the court of Ferdinand and Isabella. His mother was donna Sancha de Toral, an heiress of a large estate in Leon, — a demesne, it would seem, where the poet passed his earlier days; for the fountain which ornaments it still goes hy his name, and is supposed to he described in his second eclogue.* These eclogues were written at Naples ; it may, therefore, be a piece of fond patriotism in the Spaniard, that attributes this description to a fountain in his native woods ; hut there is a pleasure in figuring the boy-poet loitering beside its pure waters, and so filling his imagination with images presented by its limpid waves and the sur- rounding scenery, that, in after years and in a foreign country, he could fondly dwell upon and reproduce them in his verse. Garcilaso was born at Toledo in 1503, being a few years younger than the emperor Charles V. When, on his accession to the throne, that prince visited the Spain he was called by right of birth to reign over, Garcilaso was only fifteen. We are told, however, that his skill in martial and gymnastic exercises made him early a favourite with his sovereign, and he soon entered on that warlike career destined to prove fatal to him. Hii * " Temperate, when winter waves its snowy wing, Is the sweet water of this sylvan spring ; And when the heats of summer scorch the grass, More cold than snow : in your clear looking-glass, Fair waves! the memory of that day returns, "With which my soul still shivers, melts, and burns ; Gazing on your clear depth and lustre pure, My peace grows troubled and my joys obscure. * * * * This lucid fount, whose murmurs fill the mind, The verdant forests waving with the wind, The odours wafted from the mead, the flowers In which the wild bee sits and sings for hours, These might the moodiest misanthrope employ, Make sound the sick, and turn distress to joy." •D 3 38 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. poetic tastes, also, were developed while still a youth. He was passionately fond of music, and played with extreme sweetness on the harp and guitar. The accession of Charles V. was signalised in Spain hy disaster. The death of cardinal Ximenes deprived the youthful sovereign of his most illustrious counsellor, though perhaps of one he would have neglected. His Fle- mish courtiers attained undue influence, and a nefarious system of peculation was carried on, — the treasures of Spain being exported to Flanders, which the Spaniards regarded with alarm and indignation. The election of Charles to the imperial crown and his intended departure for Germany was the signal of resistance. This is the more deserving of commemoration in these pages, as the elder brother of Garcilaso took a distinguished part on the popular side.* He was candidate for the distinc- tion of captain-general of the Germanada or Brother- hood (an association, at first sanctioned by Charles, for the purpose of maintaining the privileges of the people), and even elected such, till a popular revolt reversed his nomination in favour of the heroic Padilla. Not less heroic, however, was don Pedro, and in the cortes he boldly confronted the king, and declared that he would sooner be cut in pieces, sooner lose his head, than yield the good of his country to the sovereign's arbitrary will. Of such gallant stun0 was the Spanish courtier made, till Charles's wars drained the country of her most valiant spirits, and the cruel share of the Inquisition ploughed up, and as it were sowed with salt, the soil, originally so fertile in genius and heroism. Don Pedro remained true to his cause to the last, though he did not carry his views so far as Padilla ; and thus escaped the martyrdom of this generous patriot. The conduct of Charles in publishing a general pardon, on his return to Spain, is among the few instances he has given of magnanimity. His reply to a courtier who offered to inform him where one of the rebels lay concealed, deserves repetition from the grandeur of soul it expressed. * Wiflfen. GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 39 " I have now no reason/' he said, " to be afraid of that man, but he has cause to shun me ; you would do better, therefore, in telling him that I am here, than in informing me of the place of his retreat." War being soon after declared against France, Italy became the seat of the struggle. Garcilaso, though little more than eighteen, commenced his career of arms in this campaign. He was present at the battle of Pavia, and so distinguished himself, that he shortly after received the cross of St. Jago from the emperor in reward of his valour. It would appear, that after this battle Garcilaso re- turned for a time to his native country. Since it was soon after, that Boscan, falling in with Andrea Navagero, ambassador from Venice to the Spanish court, in 1525, resolved on imitating the Italian poetry — as is recorded in his life, — and Garcilaso was his adviser and sup- porter. At the age of four-and-twenty, in the year 1528, he married Dona Elena de Zuniga, a lady of Arragon, maid of honour to Leonora, queen of France, — a happy marriage — from which sprung three sons. On the invasion of Hungary by Solyman, in 1532, the emperor repaired to Vienna to undertake the war in person. The campaign was carried on without any action of moment ; but Garcilaso was engaged in va- rious skirmishes, and saw enough of war to fill him with horror at its results. At this time, however, he fell into disgrace at court. One of his cousins, a son of don Pedro Lasso, aspired clandestinely to the hand of donna Isabel, daughter of don Luis de la Cueva, maid of honour to the empress. We are ignorant of the reason wherefore Charles was opposed to this marriage, and the consequent necessity of carrying on the amour secretly. Garcilaso be- friended the lovers. The intrigue being discovered, the emperor was highly incensed ; he banished the cousin, and exiled Garcilaso to an island of the Danube, an im- prisonment which he commemorates in an ode, of which we may quote some stanzas from Mr. Wiffen's transla- D 4 40 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. lion, which characterise the disposition of the man ; no courtier or man of the world he, repining at disgrace and disappointment; but a poet, ready to find joy in solitude, and to adorn adversity with the rainbow hues of the imagination. " TO THE DANUBE. With the mild sound of clear swift waves, the Danube's arms of foam Circle a verdant isle which peace has made her chosen home; Where the fond poet might repair from weariness and strife, And in the sunshine of sweet song consume his happy life. Here evermore the smiling spring goes scattering odorous flowers, And nightingales and turtle doves, in depth of myrtle bowers, Turn disappointment into hope, turn sadness to delight, "With magic of their fond laments, which cease not day nor night. Here am I placed, or sooth to say, alone, 'neath foreign skies, Forced in arrest, and easy 'tis in such a paradise To force a meditative man, whose own desires would doom Himself with pleasure to a world all redolence and bloom. One thought alone distresses me, if I whilst banished sink 'Midst such misfortunes to the grave, lest haply they should think It was my complicated ills that caused my death, while I Know well that if I die 'twill be because I wish to die. * * * * * River divine, rich Danube! thou the bountiful and strong, That through fierce nations roll'st thy waves rejoicingly along, Since only but by rushing through thy drowning billows deep, These scrolls can hence escape to tell the noble words I weep. If wrecked in undeciphered loss on some far foreign land, They should by any chance be found upon the desert sand, Since they upon thy willowed shore must drift, where'er they are, Their relics let the kind blue waves with murmured hymns inter. Ode of my melancholy hours ! last infant of my lyre ! Although in booming waves it be thy fortune to expire, Grieve ncjt, since I, howe'er from holy rites debarred, Have seen to all that touches thee with catholic regard. Less, less had been thy life, if thou hadst been but ranked among Those without record, that have risen and died upon my tongue ; Whose utter want of sympathy, and haughtiness austere, Has been the cause of this — from me thou very soon shalt hear." It is not known how long his exile endured, but certainly not long ; he was recalled, and attended the emperor in his expedition against Tunis. The son of a potter of Lesbos, turning corsair, raised himself to notice and power under the name of Barba- rossa. He possessed himself of Algiers by treachery, and then, protected by the grand signor, he attacked Tunis, and drove out the king Muley Hassan. Muley solicited the aid of the emperor, and Charles, animated by a desire to punish a pirate whose cruelties had deso- lated many a Christian family, put himself at the head of an armament to invade Tunis. Barbarossa exerted GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 41 himself to defend the city, and, in particular,, fortified the citadel, named Goletta, and garrisoned it with 6000 Turks. Immediately on landing, the emperor invested the city ; sallies and skirmishes became frequent, in one of which Garcilaso was wounded in the face and hand. Goletta fell, despite the vigorous defence ; but Barba- rossa did not despair : he assembled an army of 150,000 men, and, confiding in numbers, resolved to offer battle to the Christians. Garcilaso served on this occasion in a division of the imperial army, commanded by the mar- quis de Mondejar, a division at first left as a rear guard, but ordered afterwards to advance to support some newly raised Spanish regiments commanded by the duke of Alva. The marquis de Mondejar was badly wounded and carried from the field ; Garcilaso, seeing the danger to which the troops were exposed in the absence of the general, rushed forward to support them by the example of his valour. His gallantry had nearly proved fatal : he was wounded and surrounded, and must have been slain, but for a Neapolitan noble, Federigo Carafa, who rescued him at the peril of his life. By great efforts he succeeded in dispersing the multitude, and bore him back in safety, half spent with toil, thirst, and loss of blood.* The day ended in the defeat of Barbarossa ; Muley Hassan was restored to his throne ; ' and Charles returned to Italy in triumph. After this expedition, Garcilaso spent some time at Naples and Sicily. During his residence there, he is said to have written his eclogues and elegies, which are the most beautiful of his poems. There is something so truly poetic in the site, the clime, the atmosphere of Naples, that the most prosaic spirit must feel its in- Huence. There Petrarch was examined by king Robert, and declared worthy of the laurel crown ; there he de- livered that oration 'on poetry that won the king to admire the heretofore neglected art, and inspired the young Boccaccio with that enthusiastic love for the Muses, which lasted to his dying day. There (and Garcilaso * Wiffen, 42 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. seems to have felt deeply the influence of these poets) Virgil and Sannazar wrote. The Spanish poet particu- larly loved and admired Virgil. Imbued by his spirit, he emulated his elegance and harmony, while he sur- passed him in tender pathos. One of his elegies to Boscan is dated from the foot of Etna. It does not rank among the best of his poems ; but it is agreeable to preserve proofs of friendship be- tween these gifted men. It a little jars, however, with our feelings, that he in it alludes to some lady of his love, though he was now married ; however, there is a sort of poetic imaginative hue thrown over this elegy, which permits us to attribute his love complaints rather to the memory of past times and the poetic temperament, than to* inconstancy of disposition. Garcilaso's poetry is refined and pure in all its sentiments, though full, at the same time, of tenderness. I subjoin a few stanzas from the elegy in question, such as give individuality and interest to the character of the poet : — " Boscan ! here where the Mantuan has inurned Anchises' ashes to eternal fame, We, Ca^ar's hosts, from conquests are returned ; Some of their toils the promised fruit to claim — Some to make virtue both the end and aim Of action, — or would have the world suppose And say so, loud in public to declaim Against such selfishness ; whilst yet heaven knows They act in secret all the meanness they oppose. For me, a happy medium I observe, For never has it entered in my scheme, To strive for much more silver than may serve To lift me gracefully from each extreme Of thrifty meanness, thriftless pride ; I deem The men contemptible that stoop to use The one or other, that delight to seem Too close, or inconsiderate in their views : In error's moonlight maze their way both worthies find. * * * * Yet leave I not the Muses, but the more For this perplexity with them commune, And with the charm of their delicious love Vary my life, and waste the summer noon ; Thus pass my hours beguiled ; but out of tune The lyre will sometimes be, when trials prove The anxious lyrist : to the country soon Of the sweet Siren shall I hence remove, Yet, as of yore, the land of idlesse, ease, and love. * * * * But how, O how shall I be sure, that here My evil genius, in the change I seek, GARCILASO I)E LA VEGA. 43 Is not still sworn against me ? this strong fear It is that chills my heart, and renders weak The wish I feel to visit that antique Italian city, whence my eyes derive Such exquisite delight, with tears they speak Of the contrasting griefs my heart that rive ; And with them up in arms against me here I strive. O fierce — O rigorous — O remorseless Mars ! In diamond tunic garmented, and so Steeled always in the harshness that debars The soul from feeling ! wherefore as a foe Force the fond lover evermore to go Onward from strife to strife, o'er land and sea ? Exerting all thy power to work me woe, I am so far reduced, that death would be At length a blessed boon, my refuge, fiend, from thee ! But my hard fate this blessing does deny ; I meet it not in battle; the strong spear, Sharp sword, and piercing arrow pass me by, Yet strike down others in their young career, That I might pine away to see my dear Sweet fruit engrossed by aliens, who deride My vain distress ; but whither does my fear And grief transport me, without shame or pride? Whither I dread to think, and grieve to have descried. * * * * But thou who in thy villa, blest with all That heart can wish, look'st on the sweet sea-shore ; And, undistracted, listening to the fall And swell of the loud waves that round thee roar, Gatherest to thy already rich scrutoire Fresh living verses for perpetual fame, Rejoice ! for fires more beauteous than of yore Were kindled by the Dardan prince, inflame Thy philosophic heart, and light thy laurelled name." It may be supposed, that the learned Italians of those days welcomed a spirit congenial to their own, and were proud of a poet who transferred to another language that elegance of style and elevated purity of thought, the original growth of their native land. Cardinal Bembo thus writes of him to a friend, in a letter dated 15th of August, 1535 : — ee Signer Garcilaso is indeed a graceful poet, and his odes are all in the highest degree pleasing to me, and merit peculiar admiration and praise. In fine spirit he has far excelled all the writers of his nation ; and if he be not wanting to himself in diligent study, he will no less'excel other nations who are con- sidered masters of poetry. I am not surprised that the marquis del Vasto has wished to have him with him, and that he holds him in great affection." Among cardinal Bembo's Latin letters, there is one to Garcilaso, full of compliments, which show the high 44? LITEBABY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. esteem in which he was held. " From the verses which you have sent me, I am happy to perceive, first, how much you love me, since you are not one who would else flatter witji encomiums, nor call one dear to you whom you have never seen ; and, secondly, how much you excel in lyric compositions, in splendour of genius, and sweetness of expression. — You have not only surpassed all your fellow Spaniards, who have de- voted themselves to Parnassus and the Muses, but you supply incentives even to the Italians, and again and again invite them to endeavour to be overcome in this contest and in these studies by no one but yourself; which judgment of mine some other of your writings sent to me from Naples have confirmed. For it is im- possible to meet in this age with compositions more classically pure, more dignified in sentiment, or more elegant in style. In that you love me, therefore, I most justly and sincerely rejoice; and that you are a great and good man, I congratulate in the first place yourself, but most of all, your country, in that she is thus about to receive so great an increase of honour and glory. " There is, however, another circumstance which greatly increases the honour I have received ; for lately, when the monk Onorato, whom I perceive you know by reputation, entered into conversation with me, and, amongst other topics, asked me what I thought of your poems, the opinion I gave happened to coincide exactly with his own ; and he is a man of very acute percep- tion, and extremely well versed in poetical pursuits. He told me that his friends had written to him of your very many and great virtues, of the urbanity of your manners, the integrity of your life, and accomplishments of your mind; adding that it was a fact confirmed by all Neapolitans that knew you, that no one had come from Spain to their city in these times, wherein the greatest resort has been made by your nation to Italy, whom they loved more affectionately than your- self, or one on whom they would confer superior be- nefits."' GARCILASO D£ LA VEGA. 45 Garcilaso did not, however, long enjoy the leisure that he so well employed. Charles V., whose great ambition was to crush the power of France, and to possess him- self of a portion of that kingdom, was resolved to take advantage of the disastrous issue of Francis I.'s attempt upon the duchy of Milan, and rashly determined to in- vade a country whose armies, however he might meet victoriously in other fields, he could not hope to van- quish in their own. He entered France from the south ; and recalling Garcilaso, conferred on him an honourable command over eleven companies of infantry. Leaving Naples to join this expedition, he traversed Italy, and from \Vaucluse wrote an epistle to Boscan in a lighter and gayer style than is usual with him ; while he dwells with affectionate pleasure on the tie of friendship that united them, saying, among other things, — " Whilst much reflecting on the sacred tie Of our affection, which I "hold so high, The exchange of talent, taste, intelligence, Shared gifts and multiplied delights which thence Refresh our souls in their perpetual flow- There nothing is that makes me value so The sweetness of this compact of the heart, Than the affection on my own warm part * * * » Such were my thoughts. But oh ! how shall I set Fully to view my shame and my regret, For having praised so at a single glance, The roads, the dealings, and hotels of France. Shame, that with reason thou may'st now pronounce Myself a fabler, and my praise a bounce ; Regret, my time so much to have misused, In rashly lauding what were best abused ; For here, all fibs apart, you find but jades Of hacks, sour wines, and pilfering chambermaids, Long ways, long bills, no silver, fleecing hosts, And all the luxury of lumbering posts. Arriving too from Naples by the way — Naples — the choice, the brilliant, and the gay I Embrace Dural for me — nor rate my muse ; October twelfth, given forth from sweet Vaucluse, Whej-e the fine flame of Petrarch had its birth, And where its ashes yet irradiate earth.'* To the period of this campaign Wiffen is inclined to attribute the composition of his third eclogue which, in point of merit, is the second, and which was avowedly written during a war — for, as he says, — " 'Midst arms — with scarce one pause from bloody toil, When war's hoarse trumpet breaks the poet's dream, Have I there moments stolen, oft claimed. " 46 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. This expedition was disastrous in itself and fatal to the poet. An invading army is necessarily abhorred by all ; and while it inflicts, also suffers the utmost horrors of war. The French general wisely acted on the defensive, and, having laid the country waste, left famine and disease to win the game. The emperor, unsuccessful in his attempts upon Marseilles and Aries, was obliged to retreat through a country roused to ex- asperation by the ills it had endured. His army, in consequence, was exposed to a thousand disasters, while the very peasants, hanging on its rear, or lying in ambush, cut off the stragglers, and disputed the pas- sage of every defile. On one occasion, at Muy near Frejus, the imperialists were held in check by a party of fifty rustics, who, armed with muskets, had thrown themselves into a tower, and harassed them on their passage. The emperor ordered Garcilaso to attack and carry it with his battalion. Eager in his obedience, Garcilaso led the way to scale the tower. The peasants observing that he wore a gaily embroidered dress over his armour, fancied that it was the emperor himself, and marked him out for destruction. He was the first to mount the ladder ; a block of stone rolled from the battlements, struck him on the head and beat him to the ground. He was carried to Nice ; but no care could avail to save him : he lingered for twenty days, and then died, November, 1536, at the age only of thirty-three. He showed, we are told, no less the spirit of a Chris- tian in his death, than of a soldier in the hour of periL His death was universally lamented ; and the emperor displayed his sense of the loss he had sustained, by causing all the peasants who survived the taking of the tower, twenty-eight in number, to be hanged. Such a token of respect would scarcely soothe the ghost of the gentle poet ; but it was in accordance with the spirit of the times. The body was interred at first in the church of Saint Dominique at Nice ; but two years afterwards was removed to the tomb of his ancestors in a chapel of the church of San Pedro Martyr de Toledo. GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 47 Garcilaso is always represented as the model of a young and gallant soldier, adorning his knightly accom- plishments with the softer graces of a poet ; as an ima- ginative enthusiast, joining sentiment to passion, and softening both by the elegancies of refinement. His tall figure was symmetrical in its proportions, and his mien was dignified. There was a mingled seriousness and mildness in the expression of his face, enlivened by sparkling eyes, and dignified by an expansive forehead. He was a favourite with the ladies, while he enjoyed the friendship and esteem of many excellent men. Wif- fen takes pleasure in adopting die idea of doctor Nott, and likening him to our noble poet, lord Surrey. He left, orphaned by his death, three sons and a daughter. His eldest son incurred a similar fate with himself. He enjoyed the favour of the emperor, but fell at the battle of Ulpiano, at the early age of twenty-four. His se- cond son, Francisco de Guzman, became a monk, and enjoyed a reputation as a great theologian. The youngest Lorenzo de Guzman, inherited a portion of his father's genius, and was esteemed for his talent. He scarcely made a good, use of it, since he was banished to Oran for a lampoon, and died on the passage. The only daughter of the poet, donna Sancha de Guzman, mar- ried D. Antonio Portocarrero de Vega. We turn, however, to Garcilaso'a poetry as his best memorial and highest merit, at least that merit which gives him a place in these pages. When we remember that he died at thirty-three, we must regard his produc- tions rather in the light of promise, than of performance. His muse might have soared higher, and taken some new path : as it is, he ranks high as an elegiac poet, and the first that Spain has produced* The most perfect of his poems is his second eclogue. Mr. Wiffeu has succeeded admirably in transfusing, in some of the stanzas, a portion of the pathos and softness of the original. Emu- lating Virgil in his refinement and dignity, Garcilaso surpassed him in tenderness ; and certainly the ex- pression of regret and grief was never more affectingly 48 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC BIEN. and sweetly expressed than in the laments that com- pose this eclogue. The poem commences with the poet speaking in his own person. He introduces the personages of the eclogue : Salicio, who laments the infidelity of his lady ; and Ne- meroso, who mourns the death of his. It is supposed that, under the name of Salicio, Garcilaso personifies himself, and commemorates the feelings which he ex- perienced, when suffering from the inconstancy of a lady whom he loved in his youth. Nothing can exceed the living tenderness of the de- serted shepherd's complaints ; and we feel as if the tone of fond grief could go no further, till the interest becomes heightened by the more touching nature of Nemoroso's laments : under this name it is said that Garcilaso introduced Boscan. Boscan was a happy husband and father. In his epistle to Mendoza, he mentions his former passions as a troubled dream, where all seemed love, but was really hate ; and he does not allude to the death of any object of his affections. Mr. Wiffen, with the natural fondness of a translator and an antiquarian, delights in putting together the scattered and half lost fragments of his poet's life, and to eke out the history of his mind by probable conjecture, and is inclined to believe that Boscan was intended, and that being dear friends, Garcilaso pleased his imagination and heart, in making them brother shepherds in his verses. It is an agreeable idea, and not improbable : the reader may believe according as his inclinations leads him. But not to linger longer on preliminary matter, we select the most beautiful stanzas of the eclogue, which will confirm to the Spanish reader the opinion that Garcilaso is the most harmonious, easy, elegant, and tender poet Spain ever produced : soft and melancholy, he never errs, except in sometimes following the fashion of his country in reasoning on his feelings, instead of simply declaring them. Such fault, however, is not to be found in the following verses, wherein Salicio com- GARCILASO DE LA VEQA. 49 plains of his Galatea's inconstancy,, recalling the f while the dear images of her former tenderness. " Through thec the silence of the shaded glen, * Through thee the horror of the lonely mountain, Pleased me no less than the resort of men : The breeze, the summer wood, the lucid fountain, The purple rose, white lily of the lake, Were sweet for thy sweet sake ; . For thee, the fragrant primrose, dropt with dew, Was wished when first it blew. 0 how completely was I in all this Myself deceiving ! O the different part That thou wert acting, covering with a kiss Of seeming love, the traitor in thy heart! This my severe misfortune, long ago, Did the soothsaying raven, sailing by On the black storm, with hoarse sinister cry, Clearly presage : in gentleness of woe Flow forth, my tears [ 'tis meet that ye should flow. How oft when slumbering in the forest brown, g)eeming it fancy's mystical deceit) ave I beheld my fate in dreams foreshown ! One day, methought that from the noontide heat 1 drove my flocks to drink of Tagus* flood, And, under the curtain of its bordering wood Take my cool siesta ; but, arrived, the stream, I know not by what magic, changed its track, And in new channels, by an unused way, Rolled its warped waters back ; Whilst I, scorched, melting with the heat extreme, Went ever following in their flight astray, The wizard waves : in gentleness of woe, Flow forth, my tears ! 't is meet that ye should flow. * " For ti el silencio de la selva umbrosa, por ti la esquividad y apartamiento del solitario monte me agradava : por ti la verde hierba, el fresco viento, el bianco Urio y colorada rosa y dulce primavera deseaba. i Ay quanto me engafiaba! J Ay quan diferente era, y quan de otra manera lo que en tu falso pecho escondia ! bien claro con su voz»me lo decia la siniestra corneja, repitiendo la desventura mia. Salid sin duelo l&grimas corriendo. ; Quantas veces durmiendo en la floresta (reputandolo yo por desvario) vi mi mal entre suefios desdichado! Soil aba, que en el tiempo del estio llevaba, por pasar alii la siesta. H bever en el Tajo mi ganado ; y despues de 11 egad o, sin saber de qual arte, por desusada parte y por nuevo camino el agua se iba. Ardiendo yo con la calor estiva, el curso enagenado iba siguiendo del agua fugitiva. Salid sin duelo lagrimas corriendo. VOL. III. E 50 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. In the charmed ear of what beloved youth, Sounds thy sweet voice ? On whom revolvest thou Thy beautiful blue eyes ? On whose proved truth Anchors thy broken faith ? Who presses now Thy laughing lip, and takes thy heaven of charms Locked in the embraces of thy two white arms? Say thou, for whom hast thou so rudely left My love, or stolen, who triumphs in the theft ? I have not got a bosom so untrue To feeling, nor a heart of stone, to view' My darling ivy, torn from me, take root Against another wall, or prosperous pine, — To see my virgin vine Around another elm in marriage hang Its curling tendrils and empurpled fruit, Without the torture of a jealous pang, Ev'n to the loss of life : in gentle woe, Flow forth, my tears ; 't is meet that ye should flow. * * * * Over my griefs the mossy stones relent Their natural durity, and break ; the trees Bend down their weeping boughs without a breeze; And full of tenderness the listening birds, Warbling in different notes, with me lament, And warbling prophesy my death ; the herds That in the green meads hang their heads at eve, Wearied, and worn, and faint, The necessary sweets of slumber leave, And low, and listen to my wild complaint. Thou only steel'st thy bosom to my cries, Not even once turning thy angelic eyes On him thy harshness kills : in gentle woe Flow forth, my tears ! 't is meet that ye should flow. i Tu dulce habla en cuya oreja suena ? <; Tus claros ojos a quien los volviste ? f, For quien tan sin respeto me trocaste ? I Tu quebrantada fe do la pusiste ? i Qual es el cuello, que como en cadena de tus hermosos brazos afludastc ? No hay corazon que baste, aunque fuese de piedr'a, viendo mi amada yedra, de mi arrancada, en otro muro asida, y mi parra en otro olmo entretegida, que no se este con llanto deshaciendo hasta acabar la vida. Salid sin duelo lagrimas corriendo. * * * Con mi llorar las piedras enternecen su natural dureza, y la quebrantan : los arboles parece que se inclinan : las aves, que me escuchan, quando cantan, con diferente voz se condolecen, y mi morir cantando me adivinan : las fieras, que reclinan in cuerpo fatigado, dejan el sosegado sueflo por escuchar mi llanto triste. Tu sola contra mi te endurciste, los ojos aun siquiera no volviendo a lo que tii hiciste. Salid sin duelos lagrimas corriendo. GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 51 But though thou wilt not come for my sad sake, Leave not the landscape thou hast held so dear, Thou may'st come freely now, without the fear Of meeting me, for though my heart should break, Where late forsaken, I will now forsake. Come then, if this alone detain thee, here Are meadows full of verdure, myrtles, bays, Woodlands and lawns, and running waters clear, Beloved in other days, To which, bedewed with many a bitter tear, I sing my last of lays. These scenes, perhaps, when I am far removed, At ease thou wilt frequent With him who rifled me of all I loved : Enough, my strength is spent; And leaving thee in his desired embrace, It is not much to leave him this sweet place." The impatience natural to the resentment of in- constancy ruffles though it does not distort these sweet stanzas. But there is more of soft melancholy in Ne- moroso, more of the entire melting of the heart in sad unavailing regret. " Smooth, sliding waters, pure and crystalline, * Trees that reflect your image in their breast Green pastures, full of fountains and fresh shades, Birds, that here scatter your sweet serenades ; Mosses and reverend ivies serpentine, That wreath your verdurous arms round beech and pine, And, climbing, crown their crest ! Can I forget, ere grief my spirit changed, * •"' Mas ya que a soceorrerme aqui no vienesi no dejes el lugar que Canto amaste ; que bien podras venir de mi segura yo dexare el lugar do me dejaste : ven, si por solo este le detienes. Ves aqui un prado llenode verdura, ves aqui unaespesura, ves aqui una agua clara, en otro tiempo cara, a quien de ti con lagrimas me quejo, quiza aqui hallaras, pues yo me al ejo, al que todo mi bien quitarme puede: que pues el bien le dejo, no es mucho que el lugar tambien le quede. Corrientes aguas, puras, cristalinas ; arboles, que os estais mirando en ellas : verde prado, de fresca sombra lleno : aves, que aqui sembrais viK-stras querellas: yedra, que por los arboles caminas, torciendo el paso por su verde seno ; yo me vi tan ageno del grave mal que siento, que de puro contento B 2 52 LITEBABY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. With what delicious ease and pure content, Your peace I wooed, your solitudes I ranged, Enchanted and refreshed where'er I went! How many blissful noons here I have spent In luxury of slumber, couched on flowers, And with my own fond fancies, from a boy, Discoursed away the hours, Discovering nought in your delightful bowers, But golden dreams, and memories fraught with joy. * * * Where are those eloquent mild eyes, which drew My heart where'er it wandered ? where the hand, White, delicate, and pure as melting dew, Filled with the spoils, that proud of thy command,, My feelings paid in tribute ? the bright hair That paled the shining gold, that did contemn The glorious opal as a meaner gem, The bosom's ivory apples, where, ah ! where ? Where now the neck to whiteness overwrought, That like a column with genteelest scorn Sustained the golden dome of virtuous thought ? Gone! ah, for ever gone, To the chill desolate and dreary pall, And mine the grief — the wormwood and the gall ! * * * Poor, lost Eliza ! of thy locks of gold, One treasured ringlet in white silk I keep For ever at my heart, which, when unrolled, Fresh grief and pity o'er my spirit creep ; And my insatiate eyes, for hours untold, O'er the dear pledge, will like an infant's, weep. con vuestra soledad me recreaba, donde con dulce suefio reposaba : 6 con el pensamiento discurria, por donde no hallaba sino memorias llenas de alegria. * * * f, Do estan agora aquellos claros ojos, que lleveban^tras sf como colgada mi anima, do quier que se volvian ? 6 Do esta la blanca inano delicada, llena de vencimientos y despojos que de mi mis sentidos la ofrecian ? Los cabellos, que vian con gran desprecio al oro, como a menor tesoro. c Adonde estan ? <; Adonde el bianco pecho ? d6 la coluna, que el dorado techo con presuncion graciosa sostenia ? aquesto todo agora ya se encierra por desventura mia, en la friadesierta ydura tierra. * * * Una parte guarde" de tus cabellos, Elisa, envueltos en un bianco pafio, que nunca de mi seno se me apartan : descojolos, y de un dolor tamano enternecerme siento, que sobre ellos nunca mis ojos de llorar se hartan. Sin que alii se partan GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 53 With sighs more warm than fire anon I dry The tears from off it, number one by one The radiant hairs, and with a love-knot tie ; Mine eyes, this duty done, Give over weeping, and with slight relief I taste a short forgetfulness of grief." Although this quotation has run to a great length, I cannot refrain from adding the ode to the Flower of Gnido. It is more fanciful and airy, more original, yet more classic. Mr. Wiffen's translation also is very correct and beautiful, failing only in not preserving all the ex- quisite simplicity of the original ; but that is a charm difficult indeed to transfer from one language to another. Of the subject of the ode we receive the following ac- count from the commentators. " The title of this ode is derived from a quarter of a city of Naples called II Seggio di Gnido, or thev seat of Gnido, the favourite abode then of the people of fashion, in which also the lady lived, to whom the ode was addressed. This lady, Violante San Severino, a daughter of the duke of Soma,. was courted by Fabio Galeota, a friend of Garcilaso in whose behalf the poem was written." " TO THE FLOWER OF GNIDO.* it Had I the sweet resounding lyre, Whose voice could in a moment chain The howling wind's ungoverned ire, And movement of the raging main, On savage hills the leopard rein, con suspiros calientes, mas que la llama ardentes, los enjugo del llanto, ye de consuno casi los paso, y cuento uno a uno : juntandolos con un cordon los ato : tras esto el importuno dolor me deja descansar un rato." *'«A LA FLOR DI GNIDO. Si de mi baja Lira tanto pudiese el s6n, que en un momento aplacase la ira del animoso viento, y el furia del mar, y el movimiento: E 3 54 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. The lion's fiery soul entrance, And lead along with golden tones The fascinated trees and stones In voluntary dance ; n. Think not, think not, fair Flower of Gnide, It e'er should celebrate the scars, Dust raised, blood shed, and laurels dyed Beneath the gonfalon of Mars ; Or, borne sublime on festal cars, The chiefs who to submission sank The rebel German's soul of soul, And forged the chains that now control The frenzy of the Frank. in. No, no! its harmonies should ring, In vaunt of glories all thine own, A discord sometimes from the string1 Struck forth to make thy harshness known. The fingered chords should speak alone Of Beauty's triumphs, Love's alarms, And one who, made by thy disdain Pale as a lily dipt in twain, Bewails thy fatal charms. IV. Of that poor captive, too contemned, I speak, — his doom you might deplore — In Venus' galliot shell condemned To strain for life the heavy oar. Through thee, no longer as of yore, y en asp eras mon tafias, con el suave canto enterneciese las fieras alimafias, los arboles moviese, y al son confusamente los truxese : No pienses que cantando seria de mi, hermosa Flor de Gnido. el fiero Marte ayrado, H muerte convertido, de polvo, y sangre, y de sudor tefiido : ni aquellos capitanes, en la sublime rueda colocados, por quen los Alamanes el fiero cuello atados, y los Franceses van domesticados. Mas solamente aquella fuerza de tu beldad seria cantada, y alguna vez con ella tambien seria notada el aspereza de que estas armada. Y como pro ti sola y por tu gran valor, y hermosura, convertida in viola, llora su desventura. el miserable amante en tu figura. Hablo de aquel cautivo de quien tener se deve mas cuidado, que est& muriendo vivo al remo condenado, en la concha de Venus amarrado. GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. 55 He tames the unmanageable steed, With curb of gold his pride restrains, Or with pressed spurs and shaken reins Torments him into speed. v. Not now he wields, for thy sweet sake, The sword in his accomplished hand ; Nor grapples like a poisonous snake, The wrestler on the yellow sand : The old heroic harp his hand Consults not now ; it can but kiss The amorous lute's dissolving strings, Which murmur forth a thousand things Of banishment from bliss. VI. Through thee, my dearest friend and best Grows harsh, importunate, and grave ; Myself have been his port of rest, From shipwreck on the yawning wave ; Yet now so high hi« passions rave Above lost reason's conquered laws, That not the traveller ere he slays The asp, its sting, as he my face So dreads, and so abhors. vn. In snows on rocks, sweet Flower of Gnide, Thou wert not cradled, wert not born ; She who has not a fault beside, Should ne'er be signalised for scorn ; Else tremble at the fate forlorn For ti como, solia, del aspero caballo no corrige la furia y gallardia ni con freno le rige, ni con vivas espuelas ya le aflige. For ti, con diestra mano, no revuelve la espada presurosa, y en el dudoso llano nuye la polvorosa palestra, come sierpe ponzonosa. For tf su blanda Musa, en lugar de la citara sonante, tristes querellas usa, que con llanto abundante hacen bafiar el rostro del amante. For ti el mayor amigo to es importune, grave, y enojoso ; y puedo ser testigo que ya del peligroso naufragio fui su puerto, y su reposo. Y agora en tal manera vence el dolor a la razon perdida que pon/ofiosa fiera nuca fue aborrecida tanto comb yo del, ni tan temida. No fuiste tu engendrada, ni producida de la dura tierra :• no debe ser notada, que ingratamente yerra quien todo el otro error de si destierra. E 4 55. LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. Of Anaxarete, who spurned The weeping Ipliis from her gate ; Who, scoffing long, relenting late, Was to a statue turned. VIII. Whilst yet soft pity she repelled, Whilst yet she steeled her heart in pride, From her friezed window she beheld, Aghast, the lifeless suicide. Around his lily neck was tied, What freed his spirit from lief chains, And purchased with a few short sighs, For her immortal agonies, Imperishable pains. IX Then first she felt her bosom bleed With love and pity — vain distress ! O, what deep rigours must succeed This first sole touch of tenderness ! Her eyes grow glazed and motionless, Nailed on his wavering corse ; each bone Hardening in growth, invades her-flesh, Which late so rosy, warm, and fresh, Now stagnates into stone. x. From limb to limb the frosts aspire, Her vitals curdle with the cold ; The blood forgets its crimson fire, The veins that e'er its motion rolled ; Till now the virgin's glorious mould Hagate temerosa El caso de Anaxarete, y cobarde, que de ser desdefiosa se arrepintio muy tarde, y asi su alma con su mannol arde. Estabase alegrando del mal ageno el pecho empedernido, quando abajo mirando, el cuerpo muerto vido del miserable amante alii tendido, y al cuello el lazo atado, con que desenlazo de la cadena el corazon cuitado, que con su breve pena compio la eterna punicion agena. Sinti6 alii convertirse en piedad amorosa el aspereza. ; O tarde arrepentirse ! i O, ultima terneza ! i como te sucedio mayor dureza ? Los ojos se enclavaron en el tendido cuerpo, que alii vieron, los huesos se tornaron mas duros, y crecieron, y en si toda la carne convirtieron. Las entranas eladas tornaron poco a poco en piedra'dura : ' por las venas cuitadas la sangre, su rignra iba desconociendo, y su natura. GARCILASO DE LA VEGA. O / Was wholly into marble changed ; On which the Salaminians gazed, Less at the prodigy amazed, Than of the crime avenged. Then tempt not thou Fate's angry arms, By cruel frown, or icy taunt ; But let thy perfect deeds and charms To poets' harps, Divinest, grant Themes worthy their immortal vaunt ; Else must our weeping strings presume To celebrate in strains of woe, The justice of some signal blow, That strikes thee to the tomb," We have no room to multiply passages, and with this ode must conclude our specimens. Garcilaso is a happy type of a Spanish poet ; and when we think that such men were the children of the old liberty of Spain, how deeply we must regret the worse than iron rule that Wasted the race ; while we view in any attempt to regain her ancient freedom, a promise of a new people, to adorn the annals of mankind with all the virtues of heroism and all the elevation of genius. Hasta que, finalmente en duro marmol vuelta, y transformada, hizo de si la gente no tan maravillada, quanto de aquella ingratitud vengada. No quieras tu, Sefiora, de Nemesis ayrada las saetas probar por Dios agora ; baste que tus perfetas obras, y hermosura a los Poetas den inmortal materia, sin que tambien en verso lamentable celebren la miseria de algun caso notable, que por ti pase triste y miserable." 58 MENDOZA. 1500—1575. THE third in this trio of friendly poets was of a very different character. Mendoza was gifted neither with Boscan's mild benevolence nor Garcilaso's tenderness. That he was the friend of these men, and addicted to literature, is his chief praise. Endowed with talents, of a high and haughty disposition, his firmness degene- rated into severity, and his valour into vehemence of temper. He was shrewd, worldly and arrogant, but im- passioned and resolute. He possessed many of those high qualities, redeeming, while they were stained by pride, which in that age distinguished the Spanish cavalier; for in those days, the freedom enjoyed by the Castilian nobility was but lately crushed, and its generous influence still survived in their manners and domestic habits. It was characteristic of that class of men, that, when Charles V. asked a distinguished one among them to receive the Constable Bourbon in his house, the noble acquiesced in the commands of his sovereign, but announced at the same time, his intention of razing his house to the ground, as soon as the traitor had quitted it. Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza (and to give him all the titles enumerated by his Spanish biographer), Knight Commander of the Houses of Calatrava and Badajoz, in the order of Alcantara, of the council of Charles V., and his ambassador to Venice, Rome, England, and the council of Trent, captain-general of Siena, and gon- falonier of the holy Roman church, was born in the city of Granada, about the year 1500. He was of noble extraction on both sides, — his father being second count of Tendilla, and first marquis of Mundejar ; his mother, donna Francisca Pacheco, daughter of don Juan Pacheco, marquis of Villena. Being the fifth son, Diego MENDOZA. 59 was destined for the church, and from his most ten- der years received a literary education. He was sent to the university of Salamanca, where he studied theo- logy, and became a proficient in the Latin, Greek, He- brew, and Arabic languages, to which he applied him- self with diligence. Yet, though a laborious student, gayer literature engaged his attention ; and while still at Salamanca, he wrote Lazarillo de Tormes, a tale at once declaratory of the originality of his genius. The graphic descriptions, the penetration into character, the worldly knowledge, the vivacity and humour, bespeak an author of more advanced years. Who that has read it, can forget the proud and poor hidalgo, who shared with Lazarillo his dry crusts ; or the seven ladies who had one esquire between them ; or the silent and som- bre master whose actions were all mysteries, and whose locked-up wealth, used with so much secrecy and dis- cretion, yet brings on him the notice of the inquisition ? It is strange that, in after life, Mendoza did not, full of experience and observation, revert to this species of writing. As it is, it stands a curious specimen of the manners of his times, and as the origin of Gil Bias ; almost we had said of Don Quixote, and is the more admirable, as being the production of a mere youth. Mendoza probably found the clerical profession ill- suited to his tastes ; he became a soldier and a states- man ; and particularly in the latter capacity his talents were appreciated by the emperor Charles V. He was appointed ambassador* to Venice ; and, in the year * The penetration with which Mendoza saw through the lofty pre- tensions of diplomacy, and the keenness of his observation, which strip- ped this science of all its finery, is forcibly expressed in one of his epistles. He exclaims — " O embaxadores, purps majaderos, que si los reges quieren enganar, comiencan por nosotros los primeros. Nuestro major negocio es, no dafiar, y jamas hacer cosa, ni dezilla, que no corramos riesgo de ensefiar." O ye ambassadors ! ye simpletons ! When kings wish to deceive they begin first with us. — Our chief business is to do no harm, and uever to do or say anything, that we may not run the ruk of making others as wise as ourselves. 60 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. 1545, was deputed by his sovereign to attend the coun- cil of Trent, where he made a learned and elegant oration, which was universally admired, and confirmed the opinion already entertained of his talents, so that he was first promoted ambassador to Rome, and in 1 547, he was named governor and captain-general of Siena. This was a difficult post; and Mendoza unfortunately acquitted himself neither with credit nor success. Before the imperial and French arms had found in Italy a lists in which to contend, this country had been torn by the Ghibeline and Guelphic factions ; and these names remained as watch wards after the spirit of them had passed away. When the French and Spaniards struggled for pre-eminence, the Spaniards, as imperialists, naturally espoused the interests of the Ghibeline cause, to which Siena was invariably a partisan. The Spaniards prevailed. At the treaty of Cambria, the emperor be- came possessed of acknowledged sway over a large por- tion of that fair land : over the remainder he exercised an influence scarcely less despotic. Florence,, adhering with tenacious fondness to her ancient republican insti- tutions, was besieged : it capitulated, and, after some faint show of temporising on the part of Charles, the chief of the Medici family was made sovereign with the title grand duke. Siena, Ghibeline from ancient association, and always adhering to the imperial party, was not the less enslaved. Without openly interfering in its institutions, the em- peror used his influence for the election of the duke of Amalfi as chief of the republic. The duke, a man of small capacity, was entirely led by Giulio Salvi and his six brothers. This family, thus exalted, displayed intolerable arrogance : it placed itself above the law ; and the fortunes, the wives and children, of their fellow- citizens, became the victims. The Sienese made their complaints to the emperor, on his return from his expedition against Algiers ; while, at the same time, Cosmo I., whose favourite object was to possess himself of Siena, declared that the MENDOZA. 61 Salvi were conspiring to deliver that town into the hands of the French, and so once more to give that power a footing in Italy. The emperor, roused hy an intim- ation of this design, deputed an officer to reform the government of Siena. A new oligarchy was erected, and the republic was brought into absolute dependence on the commands of the emperor. Siena was quieted, but not satisfied, while a new treaty between Charles V. and France took from them their hope of recurring to the assistance of the latter. After the peace, don Juan de Luna commanded at Siena, with a small Spanish garrison. But still the seeds of discontent and of revolt, fostered by an ardent attachment to their ancient institutions, lay germinating in the hearts of the citizens. Charles never sent pay to his soldiers : during time of war they lived by booty, in time of peace, by extortion ; love of liberty, and hatred of their oppressors, joined to cause them to en- deavour to throw off the foreign yoke. On the 6th of February 1545, the people rose in tumult; about thirty nobles were killed, the rest took refuge in the palace with don Juan de Luna. The troops of Cosmo I. hovered on the frontier. He, perhaps, fostered the revolt for his own ends ; at least, he was eager to take advantage of it, and wished the Spanish governor to call in his aid to quell it. But don Juan wanted either resolution or foresight ; he allowed the Spanish garrison to be dismissed, and, finally, a month after- wards, was forced to quit the town, accompanied by the obnoxious members of the aristpcracy. For sometime Siena enjoyed the popular liberty which they had attained, till circumstances led the emperor to fear that the French would gam power there ; and he re- solved to reduce the city to unqualified submission. Men- doza was then ambassador at Rome. Charles named him captain-general of Siena, and gave him orders to intro- duce a Spanish garrison, and even to build a citadel for its protection. Mendoza obeyed : as the subject of a des- potic sovereign, he felt no remorse in crushing the 62 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. liberties of a republic. He did not endeavour to con- ciliate, nor to enforce respect by the justice of his mea- sures. He held the discontented and outraged citizens in check by force of arms only ; disarming them, and delivering them up to the insolence and extortion of the Spanish soldiery. They could obtain no protection against all the thousand injuries, thefts, and murders to which they were subjected. Mendoza, haughty and unfeeling, became the object of universal hatred. Com- plaints against him were carried to the emperor, and, when these remained without effect, his life was at- tempted by assassination : on one occasion his horse was killed under him by a musket shot, aimed at him- self. But Mendoza was as personally fearless as he was proud; and the sternness that humanity could not mitigate, was not softened by the suggestions of caution. Affairs of import called him away from his government. On the death of Paul III. his presence was required at Rome to influence the election of a new pope. He left Siena, together with the unfinished citadel and its garrison, under the command of don Juan Franzesi,and repaired to watch the progress of the conclave. Through his in- trigues the cardinal del Monte was elected, who took the name of Julian III. The new pope, elected through Spanish influence, adhered to the emperor's interests. He instantly yielded the great point of contention be- tween Paul III. and Charles V., and consented to the restitution of the general council to Trent. Mendoza twice attended this council for the purpose of bringing the cardinals and prelates to a better understanding. On his return the pope named him gonfaloniere of the church; and in this character he subdued Orazio Farnese, who had rebelled. Besides these necessary causes of absence from his government, he was accused of pro- tracting his stay in Rome on account of an amorous intrigue in which he was engaged, and which occasioned a great deal of scandal. The Sienese were on the alert to take advantage of MENDOZA. 63 his absence. The rapacity and ill faith displayed by Mendoza effectually weaned them from all attachment to the imperial cause ; and when fresh war broke out between Charles and the French king, the Sienese so- licited the aid of the latter to deliver them from a tyranny they were unable any longer to endure. The grand duke of Florence had reason to complain of the Spaniards, and especially of Mendoza, who treated him as the vassal of the emperor ; yet he was unwilling that the French should gain footing in Tuscany, and be- sides hoped to advance his own interests, and to add Siena to his dukedom. He discovered a correspondence between that town and the French, and revealed it to Mendoza, offering the aid of an armed force in the em- peror's favour. Mendoza, distrusting the motive of his offers, rejected them. He applied to the pope for as- sistance ; but Julian, offended by his conduct on various occasions, evaded the request and remained neutral. Meanwhile, Mendoza, either ignorant of the imminence of the danger, or despising the power of the enemy, took no active measures to prevent the mischief which menaced his government. The Sienese exiles assembled together, and put them- selves under the command of a leader in the French pay. They marched towards Siena ,and arriving before the gates on the evening of the 26th of July 1552, pro- claimed Liberty ! The people, though unarmed, rose at the cry. They admitted the exiles, and drove the garrison, which merely consisted of 400 soldiers, from the convent of San Domenico, in which they had fortified themselves, and pursued them to the citadel, which was badly fortified and badly victualled. After a few days Franzesi capitulated, and Siena was lost to the emperor. Mendoza was accused of various faults on this occasion ; of weakening the garrison, and of not putting, through avarice, the citadel in a state of defence; and, above all, of delay, when he had been warned by Cosmo, and not being on the spot himself to secure the power of his master in the town. These faults, joined to the hatred 64 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. in which he was held, caused the emperor not long after (1554) to recall him to Spain. While thus employed in Italy as a statesman and a soldier, his active mind led him also to other pursuits. Many inedited philosophical works of his are to be found in Spanish libraries. He wrote a paraphrase of Aristotle, and a translation into Spanish of the Mechanics of that philosopher ; he composed Political Commentaries, and a history of the taking of Tunis. In the library of ma- nuscripts at Florence, Sedano tells us there exists a volume in quarto entitled, fe Various Works of D. Diego de Mendoza, ambassador of his majesty to Venice, Turkey, and England." On all occasions he showed himself an enthusiastic lover of learning, and a liberal patron of learned men ; as a proof of which the bookseller Paulus Manutius dedicated his edition of Cicero to him. Since the days of Petrarch, no man had been so eager to collect Greek manuscripts. He sent to Greece and Mount Athos to procure them, and even made their ac- quisition a clause in a political treaty with the Sultan. He thus collected a valuable library, which at his death he bequeathed to Philip II., and it forms a precious portion of the library of the Escurial. It is, however, as a poet that his name is most dis- tinguished in literature. He was a friend of Boscan, and entered into his views for enlarging the sphere of Spanish poetry by the introduction of the Italian style. Though a bitter enemy to the spirit of liberty in Italy, he could yet appreciate and profit by the highly advanced state of poetry and literature in that country, of which this very spirit was the parent. It is mentioned in the record of his employments, that he went ambassador to England and Turkey ; but it is uncertain at what time these journies were performed; probably before his return to Spain in 1554. Considerable obscurity is thrown over the latter years of his life. That is, no sufficient pains has been taken to throw light upon them. His manuscript works would, doubtless, if consulted, tell us more about him MENDOZA. 65 than is at present known. He devoted a portion of the decline of his life to study and literature ; but it would seem that on his return from Italy, he did not immediately retire from active life, as it is mentioned by some of his biographers that he continued member of the council of state under Philip II. and was present at the battle of St. Quentin, fought in 1557. One of the last adventures recorded of him is characteristic of the vehemence of his temper. While at court, he had a quarrel with a noble who was his rival in the affections of a lady. His antagonist, in a fit of exasperation, unsheathed a dagger ; but before he could use it, Men- doza seized him and threw him from the balcony where they were standing, into the street below. In all countries in those days, a personal assault within the precincts of a royal court was looked upon as a very seri- ous offence, and Spanish etiquette caused it to be re- garded in a still more heinous light. Still Mendoza was not the aggressor : and his punishment was limited td a short imprisonment, where he amused himself by ad- dressing the lady of his love in various redondillas. Much of the latter part of his life was spent in re- tirement in his native city of Granada, given up to study and literature. He here composed the most esteemed of his prose works — the " History of the War of the Moriscos in Granada." The style of this work is ex- ceedingly pure. He took the Latin authors Sallust and Caesar for his models ; and being an eye-witness of the events he records, his narrative is highly interesting. While in Italy, he had written a state paper, addressed to the emperor, dissuading him from selling the duchy of Milan to the pope, which was conceived in so free a style, that Sandoval, in quoting it in his history, believed it necessary to soften its expressions. In the same way this acute observer perceived the faults of the Spanish government against the Moriscos, and alluded to, al- though he did not dare blame them. Philip II., a bigoted tyrant, drove this portion of his subjects to despair. Mendoza tells us that just before VOL. III. P 00 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. their revolt, " the inquisition began to persecute them more than ever. The king ordered them to quit the Morisco language, and all commerce and communication one with the other: he took from them their negro slaves, whom they had brought up with the same kindness as if they had been their children : he forced them to cast off their Arab dress, in which they held invested a large capital, and obliged them, at a great expense, to adopt the Castilian costume. He forced the women to appear with uncovered faces, opening all that portion of their houses which they were accustomed to keep closed ; and both of these orders appeared intolerable to this jealous people. It was spread abroad also that he intended to possess himself of their children, and to educate them in Castile : he forbade the use of baths, which contributed at once to their cleanliness and pleasure. Their music, songs, feasts, and weddings, held according to their manners and customs, and all assemblies of a joyful nature, were already interdicted ; and these new regu- lations were published without augmenting the guards, without sending troops, without reinforcing the 'garrisons or establishing new ones." * The effect of such a system on a proud and valorous people, passionately attached to their religion and customs, might be anticipated. The Moors collected arms secretly, and laid up stores in the rugged moun- * Mendoza felt himself obliged in his own person to refrain from all cen- sure on the edicts of his sovereign. But in a speech he introduced after the manner of Sallust, as spoken by one of the chiefs, he conveyed, in forcible terms, his sense of the persecution which the unhappy Moors endured. The conspirator exclaims : " What hinders a man, speaking Castilian, from following the law of the prophet, or one who speaks Morisco from fol- lowing that of Jesus ? They take our children to their congregations and schools, teaching them arts which our ancestors forbade, that purity of the law might not be disturbed nor its truth disputed. We are threatened at every hour that they shall be taken from the arms of their mothers and the bringing up of their fathers, and carried into distant lands, where they will forget our customs, and learn to become the enemies of the fathers who begot them, and the mothers who bore them. We are ordered to cast off our national dress, and to adopt the Castilian. Germans dress after one manner, the French after another, the Greeks after another. The clergy have a peculiar garb — youths one sort of dress —old men another — each nation, and each profession, and each rank, adopts its own style of dress. Yet all are Christians. And we Moors — why do we dress in the Morisco, as if our faith hung in our garb — not in our hearts ? " MENDOZA. 67 tains of the Alpujarra : they chose forking the young Fernando de Valor, descended from their ancient sove- reigns, who assumed the name of A ben Humeya. The progress of the revolt, however, met with various checks, and they did not receive the aid they expected from the sultan Selim. Instead, therefore, of taking Granada, their war became guerilla ; and the spirit of vengeance incited them to the exercise of frightful cruelties, by way of reprisal, on the Christian prisoners who fell into their hands. An army was sent against them, commanded by don John of Austria, natural son of Charles V. ; Men- doza's nephew, the marquis of Mondejar, was one of the principal generals under him : Mendoza, therefore, had full opportunity to learn the details of the war, which terminated in the success of the Spaniards, whose cruelties rivalled those of the unfortunate rebels. The Moriscos were put down by the massacre of several villages, and the selling of the inhabitants of a whole ter- ritory into slavery. This total destruction of the Mo- risco people is described by Mendoza, with a truth that prevented his history from being published until 1610, and even then with great omissions : a complete edition did not appear till 1776. After a retreat of some years, Mendoza appeared at court again in his old age^ at Valladolid : his repu- tation caused him to be admired as an oracle ; his eru- dition and genius commanded universal respect. He enjoyed these honours but a few months, and died in the year 1575. There are few men of whom the Spaniards are more proud than Mendoza, whom, to distinguish from other poets of the same name, they usually call the Ambas- sador. " Most certain it is," says Sedano, " that from the importance and diversity of his employments, he was considered one of the most famous among the many great men which that age produced. His ardent mind was perpetually employed in the support of the glory of his sovereign flnd the honour of his country ; and in all the transactions in which he was employed, F 2 68 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. his zeal, his integrity, his deep policy, his penetra- tion, and his understanding shone out ; and the very faults of which he is accused, must he attributed to the envy and hatred of his enemies." We may not, perhaps, he ready to echo much of this praise. The oppressor of a, free people must always hold an obnoxious position ; and when to the severe and unpitying system he adopted towards others, we find that he indulged his own passions even to the detriment of his sovereign's interests, we feel somewhat of contempt mingled with resentment. We are told that in person he was tall and robust, dignified in his deportment, but ugly in the face. His complexion was singularly dark, and the expression of his countenance haughty ; his eyes were vivacious and sparkling ; and we may believe that his irregular and harsh features were redeemed in some degree by the intellect that informed them. In judging of him as a poet, he falls far short of Garcilaso ; but in some respects he may be considered as superior to Boscan. His short and simple poems, named in Spanish vilancicos, are full of life and spirit, and are fitted to become popular from the simplicity and yet vivacity of their sentiments and versification : they are the sparkling emanations of the passions, ex- pressed at the moment, with all the ardour of living . emotion. Indeed, he so far indulged in this sort of composition, tempting to one who feels that he can thus impart, and so perhaps obtain sympathy for, the emotions that boil within him, that most of his smaller poems remain inedited as being too free ; the Spanish press never being permitted to put forth works of a li- centious nature. His epistles imitated from Horace, want elegance and harmony ; but they are forcible, and full of excellent sense and good feeling. He could not rise to the sublime. There is a complimentary ode of his addressed to cardinal Espinosa, on his assuming the hat, for the writing of which, we are told by his secretary, that he prepared by three days' study of Pindar ; but it breathes no Pindaric fire ; there is bathos rather than MENDOZA. 69 height in the similes he makes, drawn from the purple of the cardinal's new dress, and the crimson colours with which the sun invests the empyreum. Mendoza was not an imaginative poet ; and it is observable, that when a person, not such by nature, deals in the ideal, the result is rather the ridiculous than the sublime. Acute, earnest, playful, passionate, but neither tender nor sublime, if we except a few of his minor love poems, we read Mendoza's verses rather to become acquainted with the man than seek the soul of poetry in his compositions. 70 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. LUIS DE LEON. 1527—1591. THERE is a variety in the physiognomy and character of the poets whose biography is here traced, that renders each in himself highly interesting ; our misfortune is that we know so little of them. Sedano bitterly laments the obscurity which wraps the history of the great li- terary men of Spain, through the neglect of their con- temporaries to transmit the circumstances of their lives. We have but slight sketches ; yet their works, joined to these, individualise the man, and give animation and interest to very slender details. We image Bos- can in his rural retirement, philosophising, book in hand; — revolving in his thoughts the harmonies of verse, conversing with his friends, enjoying with placid smile jhe calm content, or rather, may we not say, the perfect home-felt, heart-reaching happiness of his married life, which he felt so truly, and describes in such lively colours. Young still, his affections ardent, but con- centrated, he acknowledges that serenity, confidence, and sweet future hopes ; unreserved sympathy, and entire community of the interests of life, is the real Paradise on earth. Garcilaso, the gallant soldier, the tender poet, the admired and loved of all, is of another cha- racter, more heroic, more soft, more romantic. Men- doza, with his fiery eye, his vehement temper, his untamed passions — and these mingled with respect for learning, friendship for the worthy, and talents that exalted his nature to something noble and immortal, despite his defects, contrasts with his friends : and the fourth now coming, Luis de Leon — more earnest and enthusiastic than Boscan — tender as Garcilaso, but with a soul whose tenderness was engrossed by heavenly LUIS DE LEON. 71 not earthly love — pure and high -hearted, with the nobility of genius stamped on his brow, but with religious re- signation calming his heart, — he is different, but more complete — a man Spain only could produce ; for in Spain only had religion such sovereign sway as wholly to reduce the rebel inclinations of man, and, by substituting supernal for terrestrial love, not diminish the fulness and tenderness of passion, but only give it another object. High poetic powers being joined not only to the loftiest religious en- thusiasm, to learning, but also the works of this amiable and highly-gifted man are different from all others, but exquisite in their class. We wish to learn more of his mind : as it is, we know little, except that as his com- positions were characteristic of his virtues, so were the events of his life of his country. The family of Luis Ponce de Leon was the noblest in Andalusia. He was born at Granada in the year 152?. It would appear that his childhood was not happy, for in an ode to the Virgin, written when in the dungeons of the inquisition, he touchingly speaks of his abandon- ment in infancy, saying : — My mother died as soon as I was born,* And I was dedicate to thee, a child, Bequeathed by my poor mother's dying prayer. A second parent thou, O Virgin mild. Father and mother to the babe forlorn ; For my own father made me not his care. It was this neglect, probably, that led him to place his affections on religious objects ; and the enthusiasm he felt, he believed to be a vocation for a monastic life. At the age of sixteen, he endued the habit of the order of St. Augustin in the convent of Salamanca, and took the vows during the following year. Enthusiastically pious, but without fanaticism, his heart was warmed only by the softer emotions of religion ; love, and resig- nation, a taste for retirement, and pleasure in fulfilling * " Luego como naci, murio mi madre : a ti quede yo niflo encomendado : dejoteme mi madre por tutora : del vientre de mi madre en ti fue echado ; murio mi madre, desech6me mi padre, tu sola eres padre y madre ahora." P 4 72 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. the duties of his order. His soul was purified, but not narrowed by his piety. He loved learning, and was an elegant classical scholar. Most of his poems were written when young. He translated a great deal from Virgil and Horace, and became imbued by their elegance and correctness. He was celebrated also as a theologian, and he pursued his scholastic studies with an ardour that led him to adorn his religious faith with the imaginative hues of poetry and the earnest sentiments of his heart. He was admired for his learning by his contemporaries, and rose high in the estimation of the scholars of Salamanca, where he resided. At the age of thirty-three, he was made doctor of theology by the university of that town. In the year 15(?1, he was elected to the chair of St. Thomas, over the heads of seven candidates, by a large majority. Although his learning, his piety, and the austerity of his life, caused him to be regarded with universal re- spect, yet he had enemies, the result, probably, of his very excellencies. These took advantage of a slight imprudence he had committed, to plunge him into the most frightful misfortune. He greatly loved and ad- mired Hebrew poetry ; and, to please a friend, who did not understand the learned languages, he translated into Spanish, and commented upon, the Song of Solomon. His friend was heedless enough to permit copies to rje taken, and it thus became spread abroad. Who was the machinator of the disaster that ensued we are not told ; but he was accused before the tribunal of the inquisition of heresy, for disobeying the commands of the church, in translating Scripture into the vulgar tongue. He was seized,, and thrown into the prison of the inquisition, at Valladolid, in the year 1572. Here he remained five years, suffering all the hardships of a rigorous and cruel confinement. Confined in a dun- geon, without light or space — cut off from com- munication with his friends — allowed no measures of defence — hope seemed shut out from him, while all means of occupation were denied him. His pious mind found consolation in religion. He could turn to the objects of his worship, implore their aid, LUIS DE LEON. 73 and trust to the efficacy of their intercession before God. Sometimes, however, his heart failed him, and it was complaints rather than prayers that he preferred. His odes to the Virgin were written during this disastrous period ; and among them that from which we have already quoted, in which he pathetically describes and laments the extremity of adversity to which he was re- duced. The whole ode in Spanish is full of pathos, and gentle, yet deep-felt lamentation : a few stanzas may give some idea of the acuteness of his sufferings. Thus he speaks of the hopeless, Lingering evils of his imprison- ment : — If I look back, I feel a wild despair —* I shrink with terror from the coining days, For they will mirror but the hideous past; While heavy and intolerable weighs The evil load of all that now 1 bear ; Nor have I hope but it will ever last — The arrows come so fast ; I feel a deadly wound, And, shudd'ring, look around ; And as the blood, rushing all warm, doth flow, Behold ! another, and another blow ! While they who deal to me such fierce annoy, Rejoice to see my woe — Lamenting still they do not quite destroy ! To what poor wretch did heaven e'er deny Leave to declare the misery he feels ? Laments can ease the weight of heaviest chain ; But cruel fate with me so harshly deals, Stifling within my lips the gushing cry, So that aloud I never may complain : For, could I tell my pain, » " Se miro lo pasado pierdo el seso, y si lo por venir pierdo el sentido, porque veo sera qual lo pasado : si lo presente, hallome oprimido de tan pesada carga y grave peso, que resollar apenas no me es dado : apenas ha tirado un enemigo un tiro, la fresca llaga miro la sangre por las sienes ir corriendo : otro por otra parte me esta hiriendo, mientras aquel en ver que me maltratan con tent os esta haciendo, pero tristes en ver que no me matan. c A' qual hombre jamas le rue negada licencia de decir el mal que siente ? Que parece qne alivia su torm en to- ft im, porque mi mal mas me atormiente, la boca fuertemente me es cerrada, para que no publique el mal que siento j que es tal que si lo cuento, LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. What heart were hard enough, Though made of sternest stuff, Tiger or basilisk, or serpent dread, That would not gentle tears of pity shed, Symbols of tender sorrow for my woes ? The while by hatred fed, Fate's hostile fury ever fiercer grows. From living man no comfort reaches me : From me the dearest and most faithful friend Would fly beyond the earth's remotest end, So not to share my hopeless misery ! And my sad eyes, where'er I turn my sight, Are strangers to the light. No man that comes anear, My name did ever hear — 50 I myself almost myself forget ! Nor know if what I was, so am I yet — Nor why to me this misery befell : Nor can I knowledge get ; For none to me the horrid tale will tell. * * * » * * Wreck'd is my vessel on a shoreless sea, Where there is none to help me in my fear, Where none can stretch a friendly saving hand ! I call on men — but there are none to hear ; In the wide world there 's no man thinks of me ; My failing voice can never reach the land ! But, while I fearful stand, A blessed, heaven-sent thought, By bitter suffering brought, d un corazon mas duro que una roca, 6 un muro, 6 sierpe, 6 basilisco, 6 tigre hircana, sin duda har4 llorar, y muy de gana en serial que mi mal les enternece ; pero la furia insana de los que me persiguen siempre crece. En ningun hombre hallo ya consuelo : la lumbrc de mi ojos no es conmigo — el mas estrecho, fiel, y caro amigo huira la tierra, el mar, el alto cielo, a trueco de se ver de mi apartado. 51 mirb al diestro lado, no hallo solo un hombre que sepa ya mi nombre ; y asi yo mismo d£l tambien me olvido, y nose mas de mi de que hube sido ; si mi troque, si soy quien antes era, aun nunca lo he sabido, que no me da lugar mi suerte fiera. » * » * * Metido estoyen este mar profundo, d6 no hay quien me socorra, quien me ayude ; d6 no hay quien para mi tienda su mano. Llamo a los hombres, mas ninguno acude : no tengo hombre algunoen todo elmundo •. estoy ronco de dar voces en vano : tom£ un consejo sano despues de tanto acuerdo, que el mal me hizo cuerdo : r LUIS DE LEON. 75 Bids me, O Virgin ! trust to thee alone. Thou never turn'st away from those who cry, Nor wilt thou let thy son, O piteous Mother I miserably die. My mother died as soon as I was born ; And I was dedicate to thee, a little child, Bequeath'd by my poor mother's dying prayer ; A second parent thou, O Virgin mild ! — Father and mother to the babe forlorn! For my own father made me not his care : — And, Lady, canst thou bear A child of thine thus lost, And in such danger tost ? To other sorrows art thou not so blind : They waken pity in thy gentle mind, Thou givest aid to every other, To me be also kind ; Listen, and save thy son, O piteous Mother ! It could not be, however., but that a heart so truly pious would find relief in prayer, and feel at intervals strong animating confidence in heaven. Thus, in con- trast with these laments, we have a description of an- other mood of mind, which he gives in an epistle to a friend on his liberation. ' ' Cut off," he writes, " not only from the conversation and society of men, but even from seeing them, I remained for five years shut up in darkness and a dungeon. I then enjoyed a peace and joy of mind that I often miss, now that I am restored to light, and the society of my friends." He was at length liberated. Sedano tells us, that "at last his trial being over, in virtue of the proofs and fe ti sola pedir socorro quiero, que delos quo to Hainan no te escondes : pues me ves que me muero, J como, piadosa Madre, no respondes ? * + * Luego como nacf muri6 mi Madre ; 6 ti quedt; yo nifio encomcndado : dejoteme mi madre por ttitora ; del vientre de mi madre en ti fue echado : muriu mi madre, desech6me el padre, tfi sola eres padre y madre ahora ; i y puede ser, Sefiora, que un hijo tuyo muera muerte tan lastimera, siendo por ti mil otros socorridos ? £ Porque me cierras, Virgen, los oidos? i Porque no escucharme? Ocupado no ves ya al puerto a Hercules sagrado ? VOL. III. G 82 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. ' Agony of toil and sweat The sole recompence must be Of each horse, and horseman yet, Plumeless serf, and plumed grandee. Sullied in thy silver flow, Stream of proud Sevilla, weep ! Many a broken helm shall thou Hurry to the bordering deep. ' Many a turban and tiar, Moor, and noble's slaughtered corse, Whilst the furies of the war Gore your ranks with equal loss ! Five days you dispute the field ; When 'tis sunrise on the plains, — O loved land ! thy doom is seal'd — Madden — madden in thy chains ! ' " ' Acude, acorre, buela, trapasa el alta sierra, occupa el llano, no perdones la espuela, no dez paz a la mano, menea fulminando el hierro insano. ' I Ay quanto de fatiga ! ; Ay quanto de dolor esta presente al que biste loriga, al Infante valiente, a hombres, y & caballos juntamente ! ' Y, tu, Betis divino, de sangre agena y tuya amancillado, daras al mar vecino ; quanto yelmo quebrado ! i quanto cuerpo de nobles destrozado ' El furibondo Marte cinco luces las haoes desordena, igual a cada parte : la sexta ; ay! te condena, 6 cara patria, 6 barbara cadena I » " 83 HERRERA, SAA DE MIRANDA, JORGE DE MONTEMAYOR, CASTILLEJO, THE DRA- MATISTS. 1500—1567. THERE are several other poets whose names belong to this age, of whom very little is known except by their works. Yet to complete the history of Spanish literary men, it will be necessary to mention what has come down to us. The first on the list is Herrera. Fernando Herrera was a native of Seville. We learn nothing of his family, and even the date of his birth is unknown. It is conjectured that he was born at the beginning of the sixteenth century. He was an ecclesiastic; but it is believed that he adopted this profession late in life, and we are ignorant of the position he held in the hierarchy, and of all the events of his life. It is believed that he died at a very advanced age ; but when and where we are not told. In the midst of all these negatives as to events, we get at a few affirmatives with regard to his qualities. There is an inedited work, en- titled " The illustrious Men, Natives of Seville," written by Rodrigo Caro, who thus mentions him : — " Herrera was so well known in his native town of Seville, and his memory is so regarded there, that I may be considered in fault if my account of his works is brief: however, I will repeat all I have heard without futile additions, for I knew, though I never spoke to him, — I being a boy when he was an old man ; but I remember the reputation he enjoyed. He understood Latin perfectly, and wrote several epigrams in that language, which might rival the most famous ancient authors in thought and expression. 84 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. He possessed only a moderate knowledge of Greek. He read the best authors in the modern languages, having studied them with care ; and to this he added a profound knowledge of Castilian, carefully noting its powers of expressing with nobleness and grandeur. He evidently wrote prose with great care, since his prose is the best in our language. As to his Spanish poetry, to which his genius chiefly impelled him, the best critics pronounce his poems correct in their versification, full of poetic colour- ing, powerful and forcible as well as elegant and beauti- ful ; although, indeed, as he did not write for every vulgar reader, so that the uneducated are unable to judge of the extent of his erudition. He excelled in the art of selecting epithets and expressions, without affectation. He was naturally grave and severe, and his disposition betrays itself in his verses. He associated with few, leading a retired life, either alone in his study, or in company, with some friend, who sympathised with him, and to whom he confided his cares. Whether from this cause, or from the merit of his poetry, he was called the ' divine Herrera : ' as a satirist of those days mentions : — ' Thus a thousand rhymes and sonnets Divine Herrera wrote in vain.' ' c His poems were not printed during his life ; Fran- cisco Pacheco, a celebrated painter of this city, whose studio was the resort of all clever men of Seville and the environs, performed this office. He was a great ad- mirer of his works, and collected them with great care, and printed them under the patronage of the count de Olivarez. Herrera's prose works are the best in our language. They consist of the Life and Martyrdom of Thomas More, president of the English parliament in the time of the unhappy Henry VIII., leader and abettor of the schism of that kingdom (translated from the Latin of Thomas Stapleton) ; the Naval Battle against the Turks at Lepanto ; a Commentary on Garcilaso ; all of which display deep reading in Greek, Latin, and modern languages, and which he published while living. He em- ployed himself on a general History of Spain, to the time HERRERA. 85 of the emperor Charles V., which he brought up to the year 1590. He was well versed in philosophy : he studied mathematics, ancient and modern geography, and possessed a chosen library. The reward of all this was only a benefice in the parish church of St. Andres in this city. But he has many associates in the mo- deration of his fortune ; for though every one praises merit, few seek and fewer reward it."* The praise of Caro is echoed by others of more note. Cervantes, when he resided at Seville, frequented the society of Herrera; in his "Voyage to Parnassus" he calls him the ' ' Divine," and says that the " ivy of his fame clung to the walls of immortality." Lope deVega in his " Laurel de Apollo," calls him the " learned," and speaks of him with respect and admiration. Sedano tells us that he was a handsome man ; tall, of a manly and dignified aspect, lively eyes, and thick curled hair and beard. In addition, we learn that the lady of his love, whom he celebrates under the names of Light, Love, Sun, Star — Eliodora, was the Countess of Gelves. He loved her, it is said, all his life, to the very height of platonic passion, which burnt fiery and bright in his own heart, but revealed itself only by manifestations of reverence and self-struggle. This sort of attachment, when true, is certainly of an heroic and sublime nature, and demands our admiration and sympathy ; but we must be convinced of the reality of the sufferings to which it gives rise, and of the unlimited nature of its devotion, or it becomes a mere picture wanting warmth and life. Petrarch's letters give a soul to his poetry : the various accounts they contain of his solitary struggles at Vaucluse, make us turn with deeper interest to his verses, which, otherwise, might almost be reasoned away into a mere ideal feeling. Knowing nothing of Herrera but that he loved et a bright particular star," shining far above, we are willing to find an accord between this love of the elevated and unattainable, and the grandeur of •Sedano. G 3 86 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. the subjects he celebrates in his poetry, and the dignity of his verse. Herrera is a great favourite with those Spanish cri- tics who prefer loftiness to simplicity of style, and the ideas of the head rather than the emotions of the heart: the sublime style at which he aimed gained for him the surname of Divine. Boscan, Garcilaso, and Luis de Leon, adopted the Italian metres, and with greater diffuseness, and therefore less classical elegance, but with equal truth and poetic verve, and informed the Spanish language with powers unknown to former poets. But this did not suffice for Herrera. He delighted in the grandiose and sonorous. He altered the language, introducing some obsolete and some new words, and, attending with a sensitive ear to the modulations of sound, endeavoured to make harmony between the thought and its oral ex- pression. Lope de Vega held Herrera's versification in high esteem : quoting a passage from his odes, he ex- claims, " Here, no language exceeds our own — no, not even the Greek nor the Latin. Fernando de Herrera is never out of my sight." Quintana, whose criticism is rather founded on artificial, rather than genuine and simple taste, as is apt to be the case with critics, is also his great admirer. He considers that he contributed more than any other to elevate, not only the poetic style of the Spanish language, but the essence of its poetry, in gifting it with more boldness of imagination and fire of expression than any preceding poet. Sedano is less partial : while he praises and admits his right to his name of " divine," he observes, that in endeavouring to purify and elevate his diction, he erred in rendering it harsh and barren, wanting in suavity and flow, and in- j ured it by the affectation of antiquated phrases. His odes are certainly grand : we feel that the poet is full of his subject, and rises with it. It is rash of a foreigner, indeed, to give an opinion ; still, we cannot help saying that while we admire the fervour of expression, the grandeur of the ideas, and the harmony of the versification, we miss the while a living grace more charming than all. It is the poetry of the head rather than the heart. And thus, HERRERA. 87 among Herrera's poems, the one we admire most is his Ode to Sleep; for, joined to elegant chasteness and great purity of language, we find a pure genuine feel- ing, feelingly expressed. ' Suave sucno, tu que en tarde buelo las alas perezosas blandamente bates, de adormideras coronado, por el puro, adormido, vago cielo, ven & la ultima parte de Ocidente, y de licor sagrado baua mi ojos tristes que cansado y rendido al furor de mi tormento, no admito algun sosiego, y el dolor dcsconorta al infrimiento. Ven a mi humilde ruego : ven a mi ruego humilde, amor de aquella que Juno te ofrecio, tu Ninfa bella. Divino Suefio, gloria de mortales, regalo dulce al misero afligido : Suefio amoroso, ven a quien espera cesar del egercicio de sus males, y al descanso bolver todo el sentido. I Como sufres que muera lejqs de tu poder quien tuyo era ? i No es vileza olvidar un solo pecho en veladora pena, que sin gozar del bien ohe al mundo has hecho, de tu vigor se agena ? Ven, Suefio alegre : Suefio, veri, dichoso : vuelve a mi alma ya, vuelve el reposo. Sienta yo en tal estrecho tu grandeza : baja, y esparce liquido el rocio : huya la alba, que en torno resplandece, mira mi ardiente llanto y mi tristeza, y quanta fue'rza tiene el pesar mio : y mi frente humidece, que ya de fuegos juntos el Sol crece. Torna, sabroso Suefio, y tus hermosas alas suenen aora, y huya con sus alas presurosas la desabrida Aurora ; y lo che en mi falto la noche fria, termine la cercana luz del dia. Una corona, o Suefio, de tus flores ofrezco : til produce el blando efecto en los desiertos cercos de mis ojos, que el ayre entrevgido con olores alhaga, y ledo mueve en dulce afecto : y de estos mis enojos destierra, manso Suefi o, los despojos. Ven pues, amado Suefio, ven liviano,' que del ruo Oriente Despunta el tierno Febo el rayo cano. Ven ya, Suefio clemente, y acabara el dolor , asi te vea en brazos de tu cara Pasitea." G 4 88 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. SAA DE MIRANDA. AT this same period, so fertileMn Spain with poetic ge- nius, there flourished two Portuguese poets, whose names are introduced here from their connection with Spanish poetry. Saa de Miranda was born In 1494, and died in 1558. His Spanish poems are bucolic, and more truly imbued with rural imagery than that of those warrior poets, whose love of the country was that of gentlemen who enjoy the beauties of scenery and the blandishments of the odorous breezes, rather than of persons accustomed to the detail of pastoral life. Saa de Miranda some- times mingled a higher tone of description with his rural pictures; thus imitating nature, who associates the terri- ble with the lovely, the storm and the soft breath of evening. At the same time, none excels Saa de Mi- randa in the union of simplicity and grace : some of his verses remind the Italian reader of the odes of Chiabrera, such as these, describing the wanderings of a nymph, with which his fancy adorned a woodland scene: — Gently straying, Gently staying, She breathed the fragrance of the breezy field ; And, singing, fill'd her lap with flowers, The which the meadows yield, Painting their verdure with a thousand colours.* Nor does his poetry want the charm of melancholy sen- timent, nor the vehemence of passion ; while all that he writes has the peculiar merit of a harmony and grace all his own. * " Graciosamente estando, graciosamente andando, blando ayre respirava al prado ameno ella cantava, y juntamente el seno inchiendose yva de diversas flores en que el prado era lleno sobre verde variado en mil colores." JORGE DE MONTEMAYOR. 89 JORGE DE MONTEMAYOR. JORGE DE MONTEMAYOR is another Portuguese poet, whose name belongs rather to Spain than Portugal. His real appellation is unknown. He adopted that of the place of his birth, Montemor, a town in the jurisdiction of Coimbra in Portugal, which he in a manner translated into Spanish, and called himself Jorge or George de Montemayor. He was born about the year 1520, of humble origin, and slight education. In his youth he entered the military profession. His talent for music first brought him into notice : he emigrated into Castile, and endeavoured to gain his livelihood by music : he succeeded in being incorporated in the band of the Royal Chapel; and when the Infante don Philip, afterwards Philip II., made his celebrated progress through Ger- many, Italy, and the Low Countries, having in his suite a band of choice musicians and singers, Montemayor made one among them. These travels tended to enlarge his mind; and, although unacquainted with the learned languages, he became a proficient in various foreign ones, and joined to these accomplishments a taste for literature. His love for music was allied closely to a talent for poetry ; and when on his return to Spain, he resided at the city of Leon, he established his fame as an author, by writing his " Diana." The fame of this book spread far and wide : it was imitated by almost every poet that wrote in those days, and the style in which it was composed became the fashion throughout Spain. The "Diana" is a pastoral of such an ideal species, that it sets chronology and history at defiance. Of these, our Shakspeare made light, when he wrote " Cymbeline" and the " Winter s Tale ;" but the "Diana" is even more confused in its costume. The scene of it is placed at the foot of the mountains of Leon ; and the heroine is said to be the object of a real attachment of the author. 90 UTERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. This lady in other poems is called Marfida : he is said to have loved her before he left Spain with the court : on his return he found her married ; and his grief and her infidelity he personified in the Sireno and Diana of his pastoral. Thus many modern events are spoken of; and the adventures of Abindarres and Xarifa, contem- poraries of king Ferdinand, are mentioned as of old date, at the same time that Apollo and Diana, nymphs and fauns, are the objects of adoration among the shepherds ; for, indeed, in those days the gods of the Greeks made as it were an integral portion of poetry, and it would have been considered a solecism to have omitted the names and worship of these deities. The story is conceived in the same heterogeneous manner. There is infinite simplicity in all the part that strictly appertains to Diana and her lover ; and much of what is romantic and even supernatural in the other por- tions. The first book commences with the return of Sireno to the valleys of the mountains of Leon. He has already heard of the falsehood of his mistress, who is married to another. The romance opens with the songs of his complaints. In one of these he addresses a lock of hair belonging to Diana ; and nothing can be more simple, yet touching and true, and elegant, than the opening of this poem. He is joined by Silvano, another lover of Diana, who has always been disdained ; and his resig- nation is truly exemplary : these two hapless lovers are joined by a shepherdess, who is also suffering the woes of unfortunate passion ; and her history concludes the book. In the second, events of more action are intro- duced : the scene even changes to a sort of fairy tale ; but though the machinery of the story alters, the sen- timents remain the same, conceived in the language of passion and reality. It is not until the sixth book that Diana herself is introduced, and the canzoni placed in her mouth are among the best in the book : she lays the blame of her infidelity on her parents, who forced her to marry a rich shepherd. The romance concludes JORGE DE MONTEMAYOR. 91 without any change in the situation of the hero and heroine. It is singular, that a work founded on such strange and unnatural machinery should have seized on the imagination, we may almost say, of the world, since this sort of pastoral hecame universally imitated ; hut there is something in the rural pictures and out-of- door life which composes the scenery of such works, grateful, we know not why, to our hearts. The style of the "Diana" is, indeed, peculiarly heautiful. Nothing can be more correct, yet less laboured ; nothing more elegant, yet less exaggerated. To express vividly and truly, yet gracefully and in harmonious measure, the emotions of the various personages, appears to be the author's chief aim. Thus we read on, attracted by the melody of the style, the heartfelt truth of the senti- ments, and the beauty of the descriptions, even while we are quite careless of the developement of the plot, and tolerably uninterested in any of the personages. To translate the poetry of this book would be difficult, as the style forms its charm ; but it is impossible to read it in the original without being carried away by the flow of the versification, and the unaffected ex- pression of real feeling. The " Diana " superseded for a time the books of chi- valry, of which the Spaniards were so fond. Since Amadis first appeared, no work had been so popular. Cervantes, who imitated it in his "Galatea," thus mentions it in the scrutiny the curate and barber make of Don Quixote's library. Speaking of pastorals in general, the curate says : " These books do. not deserve to be burned with the rest, because they have never done nor will do the harm of which tales of chivalry are guilty ; they are mere books of amusement, and hurt no one." Of the pastoral in question itself, he says : " Let us begin by the " Diana " of Montemayor : I am of opinion that we tear out all that relates to the wise Felicia and the enchanted water, and almost all the poems in long measure, and let the prose remain, and the merit of its being the first of this species of books." 92 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. Such was the reputation that Montemayor acquired by this romance, that the queen of Portugal was de- sirous that he should return to his native country. He was, accordingly, recalled, and nothing more is known of him than that it is supposed that he died a violent death *, — where, even, is not known ; for some say in Portugal, some in Italy : the dates tolerably agree, those named being 156l and 1562, so that he was scarcely more than forty at the time of his death. CASTILLEJO. To give a catalogue raisonnte of all the poets that flourished in Spain in this age would be of little avail, as little is known of them and their poetry : though much of it is beautiful, and much more of it agreeable, it does not bear the stamp of the originality and genius necessary to form an era in literature. Sedano gives brief notices of some of them. From him we learn that Fernando de Acuna, a nobleman of Portuguese extraction, a distinguished courtier in the court, a gallant soldier in the camp of Charles V., was also an intimate friend of Garcilaso de la Vega, and imitated him and Boscan in the style of his poetry. He died in Granada about the year 1580. There is elegance, and a certain degree of originality in his poems. Sedano almost places him above his friend Garcilaso. He mingled the Italian and old Spanish styles together, introducing metres more adapted to the Castilian lan- guage than the terzets of his predecessors, being shorter, more airy, and more graceful. Gil Polo, a native of Valentia, flourished about the year 1550. He continued the Diana of Montemayor, and called his work " La Diana Enamorada. He is chiefly famous for the praise that Cervantes bestows on * Sedano tells us that the queen Catalina of Portugal, on recalling him, conferred on him an honourable situation in the royal household. The date of his death is ascertained through an elegy which is printed in all the editions of the "Diana ;" and which mentions that he died in 1562. CAST1LLEJO. 93 him, when in " Don Quixote " the curate says to the barber " Take as much care of Gil Polo's work, as if it were written by Apollo himself." Posterity has not confirmed this preference, and it is chiefly praised for elegance and purity of style. Cetina, an anacreontic poet of merit, also finds a place in the " Parnaso Espanol." The same honour is not bestowed on Castillejo, who, however, deserves peculiar mention as the great partisan of the old Castilian style, and the antagonist of Boscan. Cristoval Castillejo flourished also in the time of Charles V., in whose service he went to Vienna, remaining there as secretary to Ferdinand I.; as, notwithstanding, the imperial crown of Germany was separated from the regal one of Spain, on the death of Charles V., there continued to subsist for some years intimate relations between the courts of Vienna and Madrid. The greater part of Castillejo's poems were written at Vienna, and are full of allusions to the gaieties of the court. He admired and celebrates a young German lady, named Schomburg, whose barbaric appellation he translates into Xomburg. Late in life he returned to Spain, became a Cistercian monk, and died in a convent in 1596. Some Spanish critics raise Castillejo to a high rank among the poets of that nation, while others give him a juster place, and perceive that it was the want of strength to soar beyond, that led him, in his own com- positions, to confine himself to the old coplas, and want of penetration that made him so violent an enemy of those whom he named the Petrarquistas. His satires against them are witty, and not without some justice ; and certainly prolixity is a fault to be attributed to these poets he attacks. He begins with the true Spanish taste for persecution, exclaiming, — As the holy Inquisition Is apt, with saintly diligence, To make eager perquisition, And punish too with violence, Each novel heresy and sect, I would that it were found correct 94 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. To castigate in native Spain A heresy as bad as any That Luther, to our grief and pain, Has introduced in Germany. The Anabaptists' crime they share, And well deserve their punishment : Petrarchists — the new name they bear, Which they assume with bad intent j And they are renegades most fierce To the old Castilian measure ; Believing in Italian verse, Finding there more grace and pleasure.* Upon this, he institutes a ghostly tribunal, presided over by Juan de Mena, Jorge Manrique, and other ancient poets, before whom Bosean and Garcilaso are forced to ap- pear— of course, to their utter discomfiture and disgrace. While it is impossible to accede to this sentence, and while we must look on Castillejo as an inferior poet, he merits great praise within the boundaries which he prescribes himself. His lyrics are light, airy, graceful ; and though they possess a fault little known in Spain — that of levity, — this defect is with him akin to that ani- mation and wit which is the proper charm of poetry of this class. 1 Pues la santa Inquisicion suele ser tan diligente, en casti gar con razon qualquier secta y opinion levantada nuevamente : resucitese luzero a castigar en Espana una muy nueva y estrafia, como a quello de Lutero en las partes de Alemaila. Bien se pueden castigar a cuenta de Anabaptistas pues por ley particular se tornan a baptizar y se Hainan Petrarquistas Han renegade la fe de la trobas Castellanas y tras las Italianas se pierden, diziendo, que son mas ricas y galanas." FERNANDO DE ROXAS. 95 THE DRAMATISTS. As in no long process of time, dramatic poetry became the distinctive and national turn of Spanish poetic genius, it would be ungrateful towards the originators of a species of composition imitated all over the world, and extolled by every man of taste, not to make mention of them. The first dawn of the drama has been men- tioned : the representation of mysteries and autos being permitted by the clergy, leave was taken to exchange the purely religious for the pastoral or the moral. Be- sides the pastoral dialogues of Juan de Enema, before mentioned, there existed a moral Spanish play, whose origin is lost in obscurity. It is named, ' ' Celestina, Tragicomedia de Calisto y Melibea." The first act is supposed by some to have been the work of an un- known priest or poet of the reign of John II. It was finished in the fifteenth century, by Fernando de Roxas. The drama consists of twenty-one acts, and is rather a long-drawn tale in dialogue than a play. It is more didactic than dramatic; descriptive and moral. Its purpose was to warn youth by displaying the dangers of licentiousness ; and many an odious personage and scene is introduced to conduce to this good end; with considerable disdain, meanwhile, of good taste. The first act, of ancient date, brings forward the story — the loves of Calisto and Melibea, two young persons nobly born, divided from each other by their respective families. Melibea is perfectly virtuous and prudent, and submits to the commands that prevent all commu- nication between her and her lover. Calisto is less patient: he applies to Celestina, an old sort of go- between, such as is frequent in a land of intrigue like Spain. Her artifices, her flatteries, her philtres, are all described and put in action ; and the act breaks off* under the expectation of what may be the result of such an engine. Roxas added twenty acts to this one. He in- yO LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. creases the romantic and tragic interest of the tale. Celes- tina introduces herself into Melibea's house. She cor- rupts the servants by presents ; deludes the unfortunate" girl by incantations, and induces her, at last, to yield to, her lover. Her' parents discover the intrigue ; Celestina is poisoned ; Calisto stabbed ; and Melibea throws herself from the top of a tower. According to some writers, where crime is punished in the end, the tale is moral : thus, this drama was regarded as a moral com- position ; at all events, it was popular : doubtless, it pictured the manners of the times, and interested the readers as the novels of the present day do, by shadow- ing forth the passions and events they themselves ex- perienced. This was the first genuine Spanish play. In the beginning of the reign of Charles V., the theatre began to interest classic scholars ; and the first step made to- wards improving the drama, was an attempt to in- troduce antique models. Villalobos, a physician of Charles V., translated the Amphitryon of Plautus, which was printed in 1515. Perez de Oliva made a' literal translation of the Electra of Sophocles. Oliva was a man of infinite learning and zealous inquiry : passing through the universities of Salamanca and Alcala, he visited first Paris, and afterwards Rome, where he gave himself up to the study of letters. The road of advancement was open to him in the papal palace at Rome, but he renounced it to return to Spain. He became professor of philosophy and theology in the university of Salamanca. One of his chief studies was his own language, and he is much praised for the classical purity of his style. Sedano goes so far as to say that the diction of his translation, which he entitles e ' La Veganza de Agamemnon/' or, Agamemnon Avenged, " is so perfect in all its parts — so full of harmony, elevation, purity, sweetness, and majesty, that it not only excuses the author for not having written in verse, but may rival the most renowned poetry." It seems strange to read this sentence, and to turn to the bald THE DRAMATISTS. 97 phraseology of the work itself : we cannot believe that this translation was ever acted. The first original tragedy published in Spain was the work of Geronimo Bermudez, a monk of the order of St. Dominic, a man of austere and pious life ; but who joined a love of letters and poetry to his theological studies. He wrote " Nise Lastimosa," and " Nise Laureada." Ines de Castro, of whose name in the title he makes the anagram of Nise, but who is properly named in the play, is the heroine of these dramas. The first is by no means destitute of merit. The tale itself is of such tragic in- terest, that it naturally supports the dialogue, which is too long drawn, and interrupted by choruses. The fourth act, however, rises superior to the rest, and is extremely beautiful. Ines pleads before the king for her life. She uses every argument suggested by jus- tice, mercy, and parental affection to move him. The language is free from extraneous ornament; tender elevated, and impassioned. It is impossible to read it without being moved by the depth and energy of its pathos. The second play, the subject of which is the vengeance the infante don Pedro took on her mur- derers when he ascended the throne, is a great falling off from the other. The plot is deficient — the dialogue tiresomely long — and the catastrophe, though histori- cally true, at once horrible and unpoetic. Besides these more classical productions, there were written various imitations of Celestina. They were all moral, for they all displayed in an elaborate manner the course of vice, and its punishment. Long drawn out — too real in their representation of vulgar crime, they neither interested on the stage, nor pleased in the closet. The greatest obscurity has enveloped the earliest regular dramas written in Spanish. They were the work of Bartolome Torres Naharro, a native of Es- tremadura, and a priest. Torres Naharro was born in the little town of Tore, near Badajos, on the frontiers i»f Portugal. Little is known of him, except his reput- VOL. III. H 98 LITERAKY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. ation as a man of learning. After a shipwreck, which involved him in various adventures, he arrived at Rome, during the pontificate of Leo X., and was patronised by that accomplished pope. Naples was then in the hands of the Spaniards, and Naharro's comedies were doubt- less represented in that city, whither Naharro himself removed, driven from Rome by the difficulties in which his satirical works involved him.* Cervantes does not mention Naharro in his preface to his comedies, which contains the best account we have of the origin of the Spanish drama. But other writers, and among them the editor of Cervantes's comedies, mention him as the real inventor of the Spanish drama. His plays were written in verse ; there is propriety in his characters and some elegance in his style. He brought in the intrigue of an involved story to 'support the interest of his plays. They did not, however, obtain possession of the stage in Spain. Lope de Rueda followed him. The " great Lope de Rueda " Cervantes calls him, adding that he was an ex- cellent actor and a clever man. " He was born," he continues, " at Seville, and was a goldbeater by trade. He was admirable in pastoral poetry, and no one either before or after excelled him in this species of composition. Although when I saw him I was a child, and could not judge of the excellence of his verses, several have re- mained in my memory, and, recalling them now at a ripe age, I find them worthy their reputation. In the time of this celebrated Spaniard, all the paraphernalia of a dramatic author and manager was contained in a bag : it consisted of four white dresses for shepherds, trimmed with copper gilt, four sets of false beards and wigs, and four crooks, more or less. The comedies were mere con- versations, like eclogues, betAveen two or three shepherds and a shepherdess, adorned and prolonged by two or three interludes of negresses, clowns or Biscayans. Lope performed the various parts with all the truth and excellence in the world. At that time there were no , * Bouterwck. Pe'licer. THE DRAMATISTS. 99 side scenes, no combats between Moors and Christians on horseback or on foot. There was no figure which arose, or appeared to rise, from the centre of the earth, through a trapdoor in the theatre. His stage was formed of a few planks laid across benches, and so raised about four palms above the ground. Neither angels nor souls descended from the sky : the only theatrical decoration was an old curtain, held up by ropes on each side; it formed the back of the stage, and separated the behind scenes from the front. Behind were placed the mu- sicians, who sang some old romance to the music of a guitar." As an actor himself Rueda doubtless could judge best of the public taste. His own parts were those of fools, roguish servants, and Biscayan boors. His plays were collected by Timoneda, a bookseller of Valencia, but, like the witticisms of the masks of the old Italian stage, they lose much in print. His plots consist of chapters of mistakes : there are a multitude of characters in his dramas, and jests and witticisms abound. These gen- erally consist of ridiculous quarrels, in which a clown plays the principal part.* Spanish critics call him the restorer, it would be better to say — the founder of the Spanish theatre. After Rueda, Cervantes tells us, came another Naharro, a native of Toledo ; he was also an actor and manager. " He augmented the decorations of the comedies ; he substituted trunks and boxes for the old bag. He drew the musicians out from behind the curtain, where they were previously placed. He deprived the actors of their beards; for before him no actor had ever appeared without a false beard. He desired that all should show an un- masked battery, except those who represented old men, or were disguised. He invented side scenes, clouds, thunder, lightning, challenges, and battles. Such were the commencements of the Spanish theatre, destined to take so high a place hereafter in the history of the drama. * Bouterwek. H 2 100 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. We now come to a new era., and names more known. We have arrived at the age of Cervantes : these were the men who preceded him. There is something very peculiar in the state of liter- ature at this time. The infancy of Spanish poetry was such as might have been expected from a chivalrous na- tion; its themes were love and war, its heroes national, and its style such as to render it popular. The continued strug- gle with a foreign conqueror gave an ardent and gallant turn to the national character : and while the superior excellence of the enemy in arts and literature imparted some portion of refinement, national enthusiasm inspired independence. But now the enemy was quelled, the country overflowed with money, the harvest of the most nefarious cruelties, and the inquisition was established. Even these circumstances were not enough to subdue the heroism of the Spanish character : they made a stand for freedom against the encroachments of the monarchs; their disjointed councils caused them to fail, and from that moment they sank. The wars of Charles V. drained the country of men and money ; the Lutheran heresy put fresh powers into the hands of the inquisition; a career of arms in a foreign country was all that was left ; the gates of inquiry and free thought were closed and barred. Intercourse with Italy opened fresh fields of poetry, which all other countries have found unlimited in the variety of subjects, and manner of treating them. Not so the Spaniards ; they stopt short at once with elegies, and pastorals, and songs. Boscan, a man of gentle dis- position and retired habits, .naturally dwelt with compla- cency on descriptions of rural pleasures, or the sentiments of his own heart. Garcilaso de la Vega, a gallant soldier, found in poetry a recreation, a mode to gratify his taste ; and retired from the world of arms to brood over the graceful and passionate reveries of a young lover. Men- doza, a man of harder temperament, was the servant of a king : a sort of worldly philosophy, Horatian in its expression, or the passion of love, inspired his writings LITERATURE UNDER CHARLES V. 101 at first ; and when, later in life, he might be supposed to entertain the design of making his talents subservient to the good of mankind, he found, when he wrote the wars of Granada, the political and inquisitorial yoke so heavy that he could only hint at injuries, and allude to wrongs. The poets who came after were men of an inferior grade ; they wrote in a great measure to please their contemporaries ; they adopted, therefore, pastoral themes, they wrote elegies, sonnets; and love and scenic descriptions were the subjects of their compo- sitions. In all this, it is not to be supposed that they were servile imitators of the Italians ; they were at first their pupils, but nothing more. Originality is the great dis- tinctive of the Spanish character. Every line each author wrote was in its turn of thought and expression national. The conceits resulting from a meeting of ardent imagin- ations with ardent passions, which brought the whole phenomena of nature in the poet's service, — the burning emotions, the very constant brooding on one engrossing subject, — all belonged to a people whose souls were fiery, proud, and concentrated. Still the Spaniards had found no peculiar form in which to embody the characteristics of the nation. Perhaps the gay sally of a youthful student, LazariHo de Tormes, of Mendoza, was the most national work yet produced. In Italy the sort of free epic, introduced by Bojardo, became the expression of national tastes and character. This sort of composition never took deep root in Spain. The authors were too circumvented by the inquisition to dare say much ; thus we shall find in the end, that the theatre became the body informed by Spanish poets with a soul all their own, where passions and ima- ginations, the most ardent and the most wild, the most true and the most beautiful, found expression. All the authors hitherto mentioned were born at the very commencement of the sixteenth century. By the time they had arrived at the age of manhood, the policy and success of Charles V. had established him firmly on H 3 102 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. the Spanish throne, and was extending far and wide the glory of his name. To fight for and to serve him was the Spaniards' duty : they had not yet suffered by the yoke, but they had yielded *to it. At first the nobles of the land were the sole authors, while writing was merely a taste, a study, or an amusement ; soon it was followed, for purposes of gain and reputation by men of inferior rank, who were endowed with genius; author- ship became general ; and poetry grew into one of the chief pleasures of the court. 103 ERCILLA. 1533-1600. THE Spanish muse has produced numerous epic poems, most of which are unknown beyond the limits of Spain, and many even there have been consigned to merited oblivion. The Araucana alone has been ad- mitted to a station in general literature. This is owing partly to its own intrinsic merits, but in a greater .degree to the novelty of its argument, and to the circumstances under which it was written. Unlike other poets, Ercilla was himself an actor in the scenes which he describes. The chronicler of his own story, he avowedly rejects the aid of fiction. Veracity and accuracy are the qua- lities in which, as a poetical writer, he is peculiar. His descriptions and characters are portraits taken from nature ; invention is therefore a talent which he never exerts. If his imagination has any play, it is only in the grouping and distribution of his pictures. His scenery, his manners, his personages, are all copied from originals which he had actually before his eyes. The objects of his observation, the subject-matter of his poetry, were, moreover, of a class strikingly novel, — a new world, savage nations, for the first time brought into contact and collision with civilised man : on one side the love of independence; on the other, the thirst of plunder, the fury of religious zeal, and a misguided spirit of chivalrous enterprise. No ordinary talents were required to do justice to so rich a theme, whilst even ordinary abilities were sufficient to give interest to a poem founded on such a basis. To great genius the Spanish poet cannot lay a claim j he is indeed inferior to his labour : yet he had that cleverness requisite to produce a work not totally devoid of interest, occasion- H4 104< LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. ally abounding in beauties ; such, in short, as entitles him to a respectable though not a very high station in the literary world. Don Alonso de Ercilla was born in Madrid on the 7th of March, 1533. [Note 1.] His family was noble; by which word a meaning is conveyed different from that attached in this country to the notion of nobility, it being tantamount to saying that his ancestors were and had been for a long time gentlemen. Fortun Garcia de Ercilla, the father of Ercilla, a native of Biscay, was an industrious writer, whose labours as a jurist were highly prized, and obtained for him the cognomen of the " subtle Spaniard." He wrote gene- rally in Latin, though a Spanish manuscript work of his upon the challenge sent by the emperor Charles V. to Francis I. king of France is recorded by the author of the Bibliotheca Hispana. [Note 2.] Fortun's wife, Dona Leonor de Zuhiga (ladies in Spain do not take their husband's names), was a woman of illustrious descent, the feudal lady of the town of Bobadilla, the domain of which, after her husband's death, was trans- ferred to the crown, she having been admitted into the household of the empress. Three sons were the offspring of their union, of whom Alonso the poet was the youngest. He received his education at the royal palace, and since his tender years became a menino [Note 3.], or page of the heir to the crown, prince Philip, afterwards so famous as Philip II. of Spain. What sort of education he received under such circumstances we are not en- abled to say. It is not probable that it was one suited to a man intended for literary pursuits. His works, however, prove him not to have been unacquainted with the Latin and Italian poets ; and though his knowledge of the latter was probably acquired in the course of his travels, he must have been indebted to his early studies for his introduction to the former. The words C( gentle- man" and " soldier" were atthattime nearly synonymous; and Don Alonso, though bred a courtier, and following his royal master in that capacity, was probably con- ERCILLA. 105 sidered to be intended for the military profession. In his earlier years Philip was directed by his father to travel over his future extensive dominions, which formed a very considerable, and, with the exception of France, at that time the best, part of Europe. In this tour Ercilla was a constant attendant of the young prince, profiting, as he himself boasts*, by his travels, indulging his own inquisitive propensities, and, in imitation of Ulysses, acquiring an ample store of information and wisdom, derived from his observations of nations and manners. [Note 4.] The ambition of Charles V. was not satisfied with the possession of Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, great part of Italy, and the countries recently discovered in America. The rich inheritance which he intended to transmit to his son was to be increased, and as a compensation for the loss of the empire of Germany, to which his brother Ferdinand had been elected suc- cessor, he aspired to the crown of England for the future king of Spain. A marriage between Philip and the Eng- lish queen Mary was brought about ; the young prince repaired to London, attended by Ercilla. During their residence in this metropolis, news reached them that the Araucanos, an Indian tribe in South America, had risen against the power of Spain. The insurrection ap- peared of a more serious nature than those which had hitherto occurred in the annals of Indian warfare. The charge of subduing the refractory patriots, or, as they were called by their invaders, the rebels, was committed to Geronimo de Alderete, who had come over from Peru to England, and soon set out again on his return, having been appointed, by the king, adelantado of Chili, — a title since become obsolete, which was equivalent to that of military commander of a district. To a man of Ercilla's adventurous disposition, this opportunity of military honour was too tempting to be resisted. He left the personal service of the prince, to follow the ade- * Araucana, canto xxxvi. 106 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. lantado in his distant expedition, and girded on his sword*, as he himself says, for the first time, being then in the twenty-first year of his age. Geronimo de Al- derete, however, did not reach the scene of warfare, having died while on his way, in Taboga near Panama. His young companion proceeded alone to Lima, the metropolis of Peru, to join the expedition. Those distant possessions, which, for the most part, had been annexed to the Spanish crown by the prowess of obscure and enterprising adventurers, had already begun to rank high in the public estimation, and indi- viduals of noble birth and courtly favour sought to reap the fruits of the labours of the neglected discoverers and conquerors. Don Andres Hurtado de Mendoza, marquis of Canete, was at that time viceroy of Peru; a man belong- ing to one of the oldest and most illustrious families in Spain. This nobleman entrusted his son, Don Garcia, with the command of the forces destined to subdue the Arau- canos. The expedition consisted of a corps of two hundred and fifty men, who went by sea — a brilliant and well armed and equipped band, as we are told by the Spanish historians £Note 5/] ; and a nearly equal number which had been sent by land across those extensive re- gions. With such inconsiderable forces did the Spaniards attempt to conquer and hold in subjection those immense regions of South America! The expedition having reached the point of its destination, the war proved of a far more important nature than those hitherto waged with the natives of the American continent. Unlike the Indians of the torrid zone, the Araucanos were a hardy and valiant race, whose courage was not less impetuous than perse- vering. They are described by a Spanish historian as " a people exceedingly brave, robust, and swift, who outstrip the deer in the race; and of so strong a breath, that they persist in the course for a whole day; superior * Araucana, canto xiii. ERCILLA. 107 to. other Indian tribes, as well in the strength of their frames as in the vigour of their intellects ; strong, fero- cious, arrogant ; filled with a generous spirit, and thus averse to subjection, to avoid which they readily peril their lives.* " Though masters," says Ercillat, " only of a district of twenty leagues' extent, without a single town, or a wall, or a stronghold in it, destitute even of arms, inhabiting an almost flat country, surrounded by three Spanish towns and two fortresses, they, by dint merely of their valour and tenacity of purpose, not only recovered, but supported and maintained, their free- dom." Their gallant stand against the invaders of Ame- rica was at last crowned with success. Instead of the subjects, they became the honourable foes, and in pro- cess of time the allies and friends, of the Spanish mo- narchy. The poverty of their native land proved their best auxiliary ; it deterred the Spaniards from persisting in a contest in which nothing was to be gained which could repay their exertions; and so completely was the animosity of those nations changed into feelings of mutual esteem, that in the late events, which have se- vered the colonies from their mother-country, the Arau- canos have constantly shown, and still preserve, the most decided partiality to the cause and fortunes of the old Spaniards. In the conflicts of that Indian war Ercilla was emi- nently distinguished, according to the testimony of nearly all the Spanish writers [Note 6.], and to his own rather boastful account. He had an ample opportunity to in- dulge his daring spirit of enterprise and his habits of observation. After the tumult of a battle, or the toils of a march, he devoted the hours of night to write his half poetical, half historical, narration ; wielding, as he says, by turns the sword and the pen, and writing often upon skins, and sometimes upon scraps of paper so small as to contain scarcely six lines. The ordinary duties, which he shared in common with his fellow-soldiers, were * Cristobal Suarez de Figueroa, Hechos de Don Garcia Hurtado de Mendoza, edit Madrid, 1613, p. 18. f Araucana, Preface, p. iv. Madrid, 1776. 108 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. insufficient for his aspiring ambition, and as little did the matter for observation on men and coun- tries, although the supply was unusually copious, sa- tisfy the cravings of his inquisitive mind. Determined to accomplish more, he penetrated into the further- most parts of the South American continent ; left the army, in company with ten of his fellow-soldiers; crossed twice, in a small boat, the dangerous pass of the archi- pelago of Ancudbox ; and in the same manner, though with less of gasconade [[Note 7-Hj than was long after shown by an enterprising French traveller, in an oppo- site region of the earth, carved upon a tree a record of his having, first of all human beings, reached that distant spot. Upon his return from this expedition, Don Alonso narrowly escaped an early and disastrous end. News having been received at the city of La Imperial, where the head-quarters of the Spanish army were fixed, that Philip II. had succeeded to the Spanish crown in con- sequence of the abdication of his father, it was thought proper to solemnise the event by holding a tournament, after the fashion of those days of martial spirit, chival- rous feeling, and imperfect civilisation. Among the various shows and feats of skill there was an estafermo, a figure of wood or pasteboard, in striking which knights made a trial of their strength and dexterity. Don Alonso de Ercilla and a cavalier called Don Juan de Pineda had a dispute, each pretending to have struck the best blow. They soon passed from mock to real battle, drew their swords, and were followed by their respective partisans; so that the games, as not unfrequently happened in those martial amusements, were converted into strife and con- fusion. The general having, it is said, previously suspected the existence of a plot against his authority, concluded that this encounter at the games was meant to be the precursor of its execution. The civil wars, which had arisen in rapid succession among the invaders and conquerors of that part of South America, gave countenance to this impression. The pretended ringleaders were therefore committed to ERCILLA. 1 09 prison; and the irritated general, being desirous of mak- ing a salutary example, to preserve discipline among his troops, ordered that the heads of the criminals should be cut off. The riot being quelled, and more correct inform- ation having convinced Don Garcia that the quarrel had been accidental, the severe sentence was revoked.* Of the treatment which he then suffered, Ercilla complains bitterly in his poem. He states that he was actually taken to a public place, there to be beheaded by sentence of a young and hasty general t ; nay, that he had been already upon the scaffold, and had stretched out his neck for the axe, whilst he was only guilty of having un- sheathed his sword, which he never drew without being most clearly in the right. J The historian of Don Garcia Hurtado de Mendoza, on the other side, pretends that he had been justly condemned by the general, a person, in the opinion of his panegyrist, to whom, by confession of all, no blame could attach, of an exceedingly mild and humane disposition § , endowed with great equanimity, an acute intellect, and a fine memory, a perfect Christian, of marvellous prudence and activity, no gambler, a zealous restorer of discipline, highly abstemious, never tasting wine, and, to crown all, constantly keeping in hand his rosary to tell his beads. || He, moreover, affirms that our poet was indebted to Don Garcia for many favours ; but that he hated Ortigosa, the general's secretary, whom he taxed with cowardice and incompetency for his office.*!! It is impossible, and would be foreign to our present purpose, to settle this question. If Ercilla's testimony in his own case ought to be little attended to, the adula- tory style of Don Garcia's eulogiser renders his assertions and opinions no less liable to suspicion and unworthy of credit. Though the sentence of death passed upon Don Alonso was revoked, he had to undergo a long imprisonment, which terminated, as we are informed, in his being banished. We are at a loss how to reconcile this state- * Suarez de Figueroa, Hist of Don Garcia, Madrid, 1613, pp. 103, 104. t Arauc. canto xxxvii. J Arauc. canto xxxvi. i Suarez de Figueroa, pp. 104. 121. || Ibid. p. 104. 1f Ibid. 110 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. ment with his own assertion, that he was,, nevertheless, present at the several sieges and engagements which took place in those countries after the accident of which mention has been made. Not long after, he left Chili in disgust, without having been duly rewarded for his services. This fact appears to contradict Suarez de Figueroa. who says that he was under many obligations to Don Garcia * ; but what these obligations were the historian has not stated ; and, as has been observed by the writer of Ercilla's life prefixed to the edition of the Araucana of 1776 (p. 22.), it is evident from the nar- ration of that prejudiced author, that in a distribution of rewards, which took place under the general, our poet received none. , A new field of exertion seemed now opened to the martial bard. A spirit of dissension and civil strife had prevailed among the conquerors of Peru ever since their establishment in those regions, where, to borrow the expression of the chief historian of Spanish America, ' ( there had occurred frequent instances of disloyalty and disobedience, cruel murders, and various other crimes, two of the king's lieutenants having been deprived of their authority and imprisoned ; the tribunals having been reduced to utter insignificance ; the power of the crown and justice usurped and trampled upon ; and five civil wars had taken place, in which men became furi- ously enraged against each other, and fought with in- human ferocity, till ultimately the prince prevailed." t One of the most famous " tyrants " of those times (for such was the appellation bestowed by the Spaniards upon those who usurped the royal authority) was Lope de Aguirre, a native of Guipuzcoa, who, having been sent upon an expedition to quell some Indians, raised the standard of revolt against the Spanish commanders, and ruled for a time over the provinces of Venezuela. Of his extraordinary cruelties much has been said, and they are still preserved by tradition, though, perhaps, with that exaggeration of blame which constantly attaches to the * Suarez de Figueroa, p. 104. f Herrera, decada vii. lib. i. cap. i. p. £. ERCILL A. Ill memory of an unsuccessful rebel. In the style of the age, Ercilla compares him to Herod and Nero*; he having caused his own daughter to be put to death. But before our poet had been able to reach the scene of this civil war, the usurper had been defeated, taken, and executed. Nothing now remained for him to do, as the country was peaceable. He therefore determined to re- turn to Europe, which at that time, however, a long and painful illness prevented. Having at length recovered, he left the American continent, proceeded to the Ter- ceiras, and thence to Spain. At this period (1562), his age being only twenty-nine years, he was in the full and active vigour of life, and had lost none of that spirit which impelled him to enterprise and discovery. He ac- cordingly had scarcely returned to his native country, when the restless energy of his mind sent him forth upon new travels. He visited France, Italy, Germany, Silesia, Moravia, and Pannonia.f Having gone back to Spain, he married, at Madrid, Dona Maria de Bazan, a damsel of rank, whose mother held a place at court as lady of the bedchamber to the Spanish queen. The manner in which he speaks of his marriage is quaint and singular : he represents himself to have been carried away by Bellona, in a dreani, over a widely extended and flowery meadow, where, while he was intent upon devoting him- self to amorous songs, he felt an invincible curiosity to be informed of the names of the beautiful damsels who inhabited that region, especially of one of them, who was such that he suddenly lay prostrate at her feet. She was of tender age, yet she showed a maturity of judg- ment and talent much above her time of life. While the poet felt compelled to gaze upon her, and while entranced and captivated by the contemplation of her beauty, he anxiously wished to know her name, he saw at her feet the motto, or inscription, " This is Dona Maria, a branch of the stem of Bazan." Though the emperor and queen of Spain had stood * Arauc. canto xxxvi. f Arauc. canto xviii. 112 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. sponsors to the happy pair [Note 8.], Ercilla does not appear to have obtained any rewards or promotion. The emperor of Germany, Maximilian II., however, appointed him his chambellan, a distinction which did little to better his fortune. In 1580, he lived in Madrid, poor and neglected, and accordingly complaining of the dis- regard with which his services both at court and in the camp had been treated. The stream of fortune (he says) ran constantly against him : he was now in a state of perfect destitution and abandonment, yet he had the consciousness of having merited, by a long course of honourable service, the just recompence which was with- held from him ; a consciousness which is itself a. reward, of which the man of rectitude and honour can never be deprived by external circumstances. * The following anecdote is recorded respecting Er- cilla at this time : — Having waited to pay his court to the king, and wishing to speak to his majesty, he felt so disconcerted that he could not find words to declare the nature of his requests ; and the king being well aware of the temper of the man who was before him, and sure that his timidity arose from the respect he bore to royalty, told him — ' ( Don Alonso, address me by writing." So Ercilla did (says the author from whom this story has been taken t), and the king granted his request. What the nature of this request was it is impossible to ascertain, because Ercilla constantly complains of his having been totally neglected and forgotten. The anec- dote, moreover, seems doubtful. Though a soldier, Don Alonso was not a blunt one : he had been brought up at court, nay, within the precincts of the palace, and as a youthful attendant on the person of that prince, whom now he is represented to have looked upon with such feelings of reverential terror. On the other hand, the account is not entirely devoid of probability, and if not true, is, at least, well imagined. The gloomy and stern disposition of Philip appears to have struck even * Araucana, canto xxxvii. f Avisos para Palacio, p. 104. ERCILLA. 113 his confidential servants with a sort of respect bordering upon fear ; and the notions of the divine attributes of royalty were then carried to the most extravagant lengths by the Spaniards ; a feeling which can be traced in the Spanish writers down to a very recent period, and which has only disappeared in consequence of the late revolutions in the Peninsula. The last years of Ercilla's life were spent in obscurity. The disappointments he had met with engendered a. spirit of gloomy devotion, to which his countrymen were, in those days, peculiarly liable.* His morals in his juvenile years had been loose, as is proved by the circumstance of his having had a numerous illegitimate offspring. He now bitterly repented of his frailties ; and lamented that he had devoted the best years of his life to worldly pursuits and vanities, t The year of his death is not known. In 1596 he was still alive, and is said to have been engaged in writing a poem to com- memorate the exploits of Don Alvaro Bazan, marquis of Santa Cruz, the bravest and most fortunate of the Spanish naval commanders. This work, if it ever ex- isted, has been lost ; and Ercilla is only known in the literary world by his poem La Araucana, and by a few lines printed in the Parnaso Espanol*, which, though they were highly extolled by Lope de Vega, certainly do no credit to his poetical powers. Respecting Ercilla's personal character we possess little information. He appears to have been brave, active, and clever, of an adventurous disposition, impa- tient of control, restless and querulous. That he, like most of the literary men of Spain, was shamefully neglected by his own countrymen, is an incontrovertible fact. In his account of the Indian war, and of his own share in the events of it, he shows himself to have been actuated by a more liberal spirit, towards the abo- riginal natives, than was evinced by the generality of * Most of the celebrated Spanish dramatists (Lope de Vega, Calderon, Moreto, and others,) became clergymen in their eld age, and deplored that they had written for the stage. f Araucana, canto xxxvii. J VoL ii. p. 199. VOL. III. I 114 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. his fellow-soldiers and fellow-writers. That this arose from his discontent has been malignantly asserted by his enemies, but without sufficient evidence. The exe- cution of Caupolican, the Indian general, which he so indignantly condemns, was a fact of glaring and atro- cious injustice, though, unfortunately, of a class by no means uncommon, not only in the annals of Spanish warfare in those regions, but in the history of all con- quests ; where the assertion of independence has been held and treated as rebellion, and punishment the more severely inflicted in proportion as the right to inflict it was more doubtful or untenable. But as the name of Ercilla belongs rather to the literary than to the political history of Spain, the qualities of his poetry demand our attention in preference to the actions of his life. The Araucana, though often quoted, is little known out of Spain. No English version of it has been pub- lished, but it is stated in an article in the Quarterly Review *, that there exists one in manuscript from the pen of Mr. Boyd, known as one of the English trans- lators of Dante. The writer of Ercilla's life, in the French Biographie Universelle, speaks of a French translation by M. Langles, also unpublished. We are not aware that either the Italians or the Germans, the latter of whom have latterly directed their attention to Castilian poetry, possess any complete translation of that Spanish poem. Voltaire was the first, amongst the French, who called the attention of his countrymen to the Araucana. In his very indifferent Essay upon Epic Poetry, he praises the speech of Colocolo in the 2d canto, which he places above that of Nestor in the first book of the Iliad, and says that the remainder of the work is as barbarous as the nations of which it treats.t Of the excellence of the speech so praised (without meaning to enter into a com- parison with Homer) no doubt can exist, and the judg- ment passed upon it by Voltaire deserves the more to be * Quarterly Review, n. f Voltaire, Essai sur la Poesie Epique, liv. 8. Raynouard, p. 406. EBCILLA. 115 relied upon, as, according to Bouterwek's acute remark *, he was a better judge of rhetorical than of poetical ex- cellence. The unqualified condemnation of the rest of the poem cannot, indeed, be assented to ; for, though the Araucana is far from being a work of first-rate merit, yet it contains some manly beauties, which Voltaire's notions of poetry rendered him unable to perceive. [Note 9-] In an article of Moreri's Dictionnaire we find a more just though still a severe criticism of Er- cilla's poem. Latterly the writer in the Biographic Universelle already quoted has expressed a more favour- able opinion of the Araucana, and has perhaps erred on the other side. [Note 10.] It is to Hayley that the English are indebted for a knowledge of the work in question : his analysis and par- tial translations of it, and his eulogium upon the author, are contained in the notes and body of his Essay upon Epic Poetry. [Note 11.] Hayley thought of Ercilla, per- haps, more highly than he deserves ; though, upon the whole, his notice of the Araucana is judicious. In his translations he was not quite so felicitous : his prosaic style was not ill calculated to give a just notion of the tenour of the Spanish poet's composition ; but he wanted that force of expression which constitutes the highest recommendation of Ercilla's poetry. The translator, be- sides, adopted the couplet, a very improper medium to convey to an English reader a just notion of a work originally written in the stanza. It would be needless to point out to those who are acquainted with the Spen- serian stanza, or with the Italian and Spanish octava, so happily adopted by Fairfax in his Tasso, how far the mechanism of this measure affects thf orginal conception and distribution of the poet's thoughts, and how much the structure of the couplet differs from it ; whence it follows, as a necessary consequence, that conceptions ori- ginally adapted to the former must appear distorted when brought by a forced adaptation to the latter. * Bouterwek, Hist, of Spanish Literature, trans. Lond.1823, p. 412. i 2 116 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. From the discordant opinions of critics of all nations respecting the Araucana, we may safely infer that, al- though its defects may be great and numerous, and although even in the Castilian language it cannot be esteemed a first-rate poem, still it possesses just preten- sions to a rank in literature above that which some would assign to it. That Ercilla only meant to write a rhymed history cannot be justly asserted. His fictions, though most of them infelicitous, and unconnected with the main sub- jects of his story; his machinery; his imitations of Ariosto in the first stanzas of all his cantos, and especially at the opening of the work; his frequent similes ; — all clearly prove that he intended to write a poem. But the novel nature of his arguments naturally suggested the idea of rendering his poem a composition far differing from those hitherto existing. He aimed at producing a work, striking from its subject-matter, recommended by the veracity and accuracy of the information £Note 12.] which it was destined to convey, yet clothed in a poetical style, and embellished by episodes where historical fidelity might be easily departed from, and would not, indeed, be expected on the part of the reader. Don Alonso, however, was deficient in many of the qualities which constitute the poet : he wanted invention and command of language and versification; on the other hand, that which he conceived he could ex- press with force, if not with correctness or delicacy. His adventurous disposition seems to prove that the elements of poetry were in his mind. He had no eyes for the beauties of nature ; but he understood the work- ings of the human heart. His warlike habits directed his attention to those fierce passions which rage in the warrior's breast. He could interpret the feelings of the natives of those remote regions fighting for their homes, their altars, and their personal independence, against the invaders of their country ; in his description of their characters and exploits, his style rises and his fanby kindles. By the force of mental association, he is thence ERCILLA. 117 led to the contemplation of animated nature; hence the frequency and beauty of his similes, drawn mostly from the animal creation. In his delineation of character there is abundant matter for praise : his Indians are well pourtrayed, though his Spaniards are all failures. From this latter circumstance he has been accused of bearing ill-will to his fellow-soldiers ; but upon a consideration of his pecu- liar powers, the reason of that difference will be easily explained without admitting the invidious imputations thus cast upon him. Neither could his mind seize, nor his pen delineate, the complex character of civilised man ; whilst the bolder and simpler lineaments of the physi- ognomy of the savage were perfectly adapted to the nature of his genius and the extent of his abilities. The want of unity is one of the greatest faults in the Araucana, as the poem is rendered thereby uninteresting. This defect does not arise solely from the want of a hero ; but likewise from the poet's inability to invent a story. Yet there are frequent instances of works, the plot of which is loose and unconnected, without losing much of their attractions. But in Ercilla, we miss the power of imparting interest, even to the separate stories which form his poem. Ercilla's poem, on the whole, is rather deserving of censure than of praise ; and, if read through, will cer- tainly be found tedious ; but parts of it may be pe- rused with pleasure and admiration. The epithet of Homeric has been both applied and misapplied when bestowed upon his genius. Those qualities which have been praised in him must be admitted by an impartial judge to savour a little of the style of the father of epic poetry. That Ercilla was at an immense distance from his* model must, however, be confessed, even by his warmest admirers. i 3 118 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC MEN. NOTES. NOTE 1.— This date is taken from the life of Ercilla prefixed to tb« edition of the Araucana, of Madrid, 1776. The author of Ercilla's life in the French Biographic Universelle fixes his birth at Bermeo, in Biscay, in 1525. He was led into error as to the place by the collector of the Parnaso Espanol : in assigning the year he confesses that he had no foundation but his own conjecture. This spirit led him to fix a date for our poet's death, •which is uncertain. NOTE 2. — Nicolaus Antonius. Bibl. Hisp. Nov. p. 395. Madrid, 1783. It is a remarkable fact, that while Ercilla the poet is slightly mentioned in this work, his father, whose labours are now forgotten, has nearly two co- lumns devoted to a notice of his life and writings. NOTE 3. — The Meninos were young gentlemen attached to the court The word is no longer used, though the office is preserved in that of the king's pages. NOTE 4. — The pedantic allusion, it is needless to say, is ma