Chapter III: Introduction (1)

MOSEN JORDI.--CANCIONERO.--ALPHONSO X. AND HIS COURT.--ALPHONSO XI. AND HIS COURT.--JUAN DE MENA.

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 immortality on heroes--some real, some 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 literature 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 independence, an enthusiasm, in the Spanish character that distinguishes them from every other people. Despotism and the Inquisition, ignorance and superstition, 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 hears 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, enthusiasm, gaudiness, and an inveterate tendency to diffuseness. The two Senecas were natives, also, of the same town.[1] 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. 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 conjectured that one of the causes why the Moors, after conquering Don Roderick 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 possessed 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."[2]

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.[3]

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 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 developed, 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 romance 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 eminent scholars came from the East to grace their schools, and introduced a spirit of inquiry and a love of knowledge 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. Mahometanism 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[4], this hapless nation doubtless welcomed the Moors gladly; and finding toleration 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 romances. Before we recur to them however, we will mention the connection between the troubadour and Provençal 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 Provençal, 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 Provençal. 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 Provençal 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 became celebrated; Mosen Jordi de Sant Jordi is one of the first and best-known. Petrarch read and, perhaps, imitated him.[5]

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 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._[6] Boutervek imagines that they may be considered as a relic of the songs of the Roman soldiers. There was something singularly popular in their freedom from constraint, and catching in their effect on the ear. The sonorous harmony of the Spanish language gave them 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 compositions. The most singular circumstance is, that they are nearly all anonymous. No doubt, as language improved, they were altered and amended from oral tradition, 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 sentiments were simple, yet heroic; the action was always impassioned, and sometimes tragic.

Doctor Bowring, who has a happy facility in rendering the poetry of foreign nations into our own, has been more felicitous than any other author in translating 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 untranslatable 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 thou wert already married In the province of Leon; Where thou hadst a lovely lady, And, like flowers too, many a son.'

'Lady! he was but a traitor. And his tale was all untrue, In Castille I never entered-- From Leon too, I withdrew When I was in early boyhood, And of love I nothing knew.'"[7]

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. According 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; hew 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 fictitious cavalier.

Already, however, had various kings and nobles of Spain cultivated letters. The first authors whose names 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 knowledge. 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 interest 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 obsolete 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 public 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 production of the same man and age. The most useful work that owed its existence to his superintendence was the Alphonsine Tables, containing calculations truly extraordinary for that period.

Alphonso XI. followed in his footsteps in the cultivation of the Castillian language. He is said to have 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 encobrir de tus amigos, engañarte quiera assaz, y sin testigos."

"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 1454, began a brighter æra. Politically, his reign was disastrous and stormy. The monarchy was threatened with destruction, and the king had not sufficient firmness to make himself respected. His love of poetry and learning, 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 resolution, 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 so celebrated for his acquirements in natural and metaphysical 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 Æneid, 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 throw his lance at him as he stood at a window. Marcias 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 university, 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 flower 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 wisdom 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."[8]

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. Sismondi 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 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 instructing of their fellow-creatures. The great Tuscan poet, in his Divina Commedia, had the design of comprehending 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 penetrating 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 Santillana both honoured and loved him; he was named one of the king's historiographers, an institution originating with Alphonso X., 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 interesting 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: not like Dante, could be 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 Providence 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.[9]

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 allegorical 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 lived 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 not lend itself to any but the Spanish style; and he never dreamt, as Boscan afterwards so admirably succeeded in doing, of 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 Christmas-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 The laughing 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, And tread joy's round and banish sorrow, For we must part to-morrow."[10]

Meanwhile the state of Spain had wholly changed. The struggle with the Moors had ended, and its civil dissentions were no more. The union of the crowns of Aragon and Castile under Ferdinand and Isabella placed the country under one sovereign; and the conquest 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 manifestations 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 circumstance 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 age.

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 achievements 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, if they had not been so employed, had probably exerted themselves to free their country, and to withstand those encroachments of royalty, and the church, which, after the lapse of a few years, acted so detrimentally on the prosperity of Spain.

The crown of Castile also rose in eminence over that of Aragon, and the Castilian became the language of the court. Writers, in whatever province their birthplace might be cast, adopted Castilian as the classic language of the country.

Juan de Enzina, though he had sojourned in Italy, became imbued by none of its spirit. It could not always be thus. The Neapolitan wars in the time of Ferdinand caused numbers of Spaniards to visit Italy. From the very beginning of the reign of Charles V., these wars increased in importance, and the intercourse between the two countries became more frequent and intimate. The time therefore was at hand when Spain would learn from Italy that poetic art in which she was yet a child, though a child of genius. At this epoch we commence the lives of the literary men of Spain. They came out many at once, like a constellation. The first in the list were born either quite at the end of the fifteenth, or at the very commencement of the sixteenth century, and accordingly were contemporaries of Charles V.

[Footnote 1: "Duosque Senecas, unicumque Lucanum, Facunda loquitur Corduba."

_Martial_, ep. LXII. lib. I.

And Statius records the same fact:--

"Lucanum potes imputare terris. Hoc plus quam Senecam dedisse mundo, Aut dulcem geuerasse Gallionem. Ut tollat refluos in astra fontes Grajo nobilior Melete Bætis."

_Genethliacon._

--_Retrospective Review_, vol. III.]

[Footnote 2: Retrospective Review, vol. III.]

[Footnote 3: Boutervek.]

[Footnote 4: "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 cetro al 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.]

[Footnote 5: In the Retrospective Review, vol. III., 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 'l cielo, e giaceio in terra, E nulla stringo e tutto il mondo abraccio, E ho in odio me stesso e amo altrui, Se non e amor, cosé 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 cel, e nom movi de terra."

And both Italian and Provençal 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 sums up all, 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.]

[Footnote 6: "All verses consisting of four trochaic feet appear to have been originally 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 correctness in the distinction of long or short syllables, as in the rhyme. When one of the poetic narratives, distinguished by the name of romances was sung, line followed line without constraint, the expression flowing 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 advantageous to introduce divisions and periods, which gave rise to regular strophes (_estancias_ and _coplas_). Lines, for the sake of variety, were shortened 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 consonant 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 principles 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 improvement 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 consonante or full rhyme, which is nearly the same as the Italian; and the asonante, 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, tòs 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 the 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 sentence that ends with one; necessary to the otherwise obscure construction of the Spanish: as for instance,--

"¿Buelas al fin, y al fin te vas llorando?"]

[Footnote 7: "'Rosa fresca, Rosa fresca, tan garrida y con amor, cuando os tiene en mis brazos no vos sabia servir no, y agora que vos serviria no vos puedo yo haber no.'

Vuestra fué la culpa, amigo vuestra fué, 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 León, que teneis muger hermosa y hijos como una flor.'

'Quien os lo dijo, Señora, no vos dija verdad, no-- que yo nunca entré in Castilla ni en las tierras de León, sino cuando era pequeño que no sabia de amor.'"]

[Footnote 8: "O flor de saber y cabelleria, Cordoba madre, tu hijo perdona, si en los cantares, que agora pregona no divulgré tu sabiduria. De sabios, valientes loarte podria qui fueron espejo muy maravilloso; por ser de ti mismo, seré sopechoso, dirán que los pinto mejor que debia."

_Wiffen's Life of Garcilaso._]

[Footnote 9: "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 complida palabra; a mi guiadora, rogando que me abra aquesta figura que yo no entendia."]

[Footnote 10: "Hoy comamos y bebamos, y cantemos y holguemos que mañana ayunaremos.

Por honra de San Antruejo paremonos hoy bien anchos, embutamos estos panchos, recalquemos el pellejo que costumbre es de concejo que todo hoy nos hartemos, pues manana ayunaremos.

Honremos a tan buen santo que mañana viene la muerte, comamos, bebemos huerte que mañana habra quebranto comamos, bebamos tanto hasta que nos reventemos, pues mañana ayunaremos."]

BOSCAN

1500-1543.

The first Spanish poet who introduced the Italian style was Mosen Juan Boscan Almogaver. He was a man of mild and contemplative disposition, and thus fitted to receive the shackles of rules of taste from others, at the same time that, being a genuine poet, he could animate the harmony and grace of his versification with earnest sentiments and original thought. Restrain himself as he would, the genius of the Spanish language and early association, forced him into greater vividness and simplicity of expression than his Italian prototypes; and at the same time, being a Catalonian, the very language of Castile, which, as having become the classic language of his country, he adopted, was to a certain degree a foreign tongue, and he could more easily abandon the peculiar rhythm of its national poetry for versification, such as was to be found in the productions of the Provençal poets, to which his native country and dialect were akin.

Little is known of the life of Boscan beyond its mere outline. He was born at Barcelona at the close of the fifteenth century, of a noble and ancient family. He followed the career of arms in his youth, and travelled during a few years. He married donna Ana Giron de Rebolledo, a lady of distinguished birth; and he commemorates their domestic happiness in his verses, dwelling on the detail with all the fondness and pride that springs from a thankful enjoyment of a tranquil life. After his marriage he resided almost constantly at his native town of Barcelona, though sometimes he attended the court of the emperor Charles V., where he was held in high consideration. At one time, strange to say, he filled the office of governor to the youthful duke of Alva, whose cruelties have gained for him such ill renown. That he was so, is rather a blot in his character with us; among his countrymen it is otherwise. Spanish writers regard the duke of Alva as a hero. His crimes had place in a distant land--in his own he was distinguished for his magnificence and his talents, while his very bigotry was considered a virtue. When, therefore. Sedano mentions this circumstance, he speaks of it with pride, saying, "Boscan's rank, joined to his blameless manners 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 versification 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.[11] A state of melancholy ensued, only to be alleviated by travel. He was familiar with Greek and Latin literature, and cultivated 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 destruction 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 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: "Conversing one day on literary subjects with Navagero the Venetian ambassador (whom I wish to mention 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 Castilian, 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 gradually 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 undertaking.

Every thing combines to give us the idea of Boscan as a good and a happy man, enjoying so much of prosperity 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 disposition, happily married, living contented, he possessed advantages that must have added greatly to his happiness, through the good fortune which gave him accomplished and noble friends, addicted to the same studies, delighting in the same pursuits, sympathising in his views, and affording him the assistance of their applause and imitation. What we know of Boscan, indeed, is principally through the mention made of him by 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 _Libro del Cortigiano_,--a book then just published, and which enjoyed the highest repute in Italy. The translation was accompanied by 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 eclogue. 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 Severo who is gazing on the urn of old Tormes.

"Next as his looks along the sculptures glanced, A youth with Phœbus 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, 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. When well surveyed his name Severo read, 'Boscan!' 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."[12]

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 tranquil 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 perfection, attended on by his wife, who plucks for him the rarest grapes and ripe fruit,--the fresh and sweet gifts of summer,--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 diffuseness; 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 versification, my translation wants smoothness; but presenting, as it does, a picture of domestic life, such as was passed at a distant age and in a distant land, yet resembling 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 commending 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:--