Chapter XIV: Part II: VII (4)

On his release from the convent he returned to Madrid, but feeling himself under restraint as subject to the observation of the police, and desirous also of visiting other countries, he shortly afterwards went to Gibraltar and thence to Lisbon. There he seems to have been subjected to great privations, which, however, did not prevent his being involved in romantic adventures, characteristic of one of his temperament, such as he subsequently described with all the warmth of poetic feeling. But the ministers of the king, now restored to absolute power by French intervention, could not allow Spanish emigrants to be congregated so near to Spain, and at their instance Espronceda and others were obliged to go from Lisbon to London. How he maintained himself, during these wanderings, we are not informed, but his relatives probably had the means to afford him sufficient for his pressing necessities, and the love of adventure would lead him, oftentimes willingly, into situations from which most others would have recoiled.

In London, we are informed, that he enjoyed the happiest period of his life, though not abounding in resources; passing his time between his studies and gaieties, which resulted in confirmed dissipation. He learned to read Shakespeare and Milton, as well as Byron, and considering his inclinations, his habits and his writings, we need not be surprised to find him supposed to have taken the last for his model. There he began the series of compositions which place him in the first rank of lyric poets, though we have to lament that they are tinctured with a spirit of such evil character. His ‘Elegy to Spain,’ dated London, 1829, is in the original written with peculiar sweetness of expression, which Del Rio finds in the style of the Prophet of the Lamentations, and which, though not so well suited for translation as most of his other poems, has been chosen as the effusion of the patriotic muse of Spain, no less worthy of note than others of more general application.

From London he passed over to Paris, and happening to be there during the three memorable days of July 1830, he took part in the fearful scenes which then took place with all the ardour of his character as well as of youth. He joined afterwards the small band of emigrants who crossed the Pyrenees in the hopeless attempt of subverting the despotic sway that then prevailed, resulting in the death of Don Joaquin de Pablo, whom his friends regarded as falling heroically, and to whose memory Espronceda has left a poem of great beauty. Returning to Paris, he entered himself in the rank of the bold spirits who volunteered to lend their aid in the regeneration of Poland, from which, and other similar schemes, he was rescued by the promulgation of the first amnesty, of which he took advantage immediately to return to Spain.

On his arrival in Madrid, he entered himself in the Royal Guard, where he soon won the goodwill and affections of his officers and comrades, and might have risen to distinction, but for an unfortunate though characteristic occurrence. He had written some verses on passing events connected with the service, which were recited at a banquet, and having been much applauded and passed from hand to hand, came to the knowledge of the ministry, who thereupon, notwithstanding the efforts of his colonel to the contrary, dismissed Espronceda from the corps, and banished him to the town of Cuellar. There he composed a work, which he called a novel, under the title of the ‘Sancho of Saldania,’ but which, though containing some good sketches and descriptions, is only worthy of notice as having been one of his compositions.

“On the dawning of liberty in Spain with the promulgation of the Estatuto,” by Martinez de la Rosa, he came forward as a journalist, connected with the paper published as ‘The Age.’ His proud spirit could not submit to the censorship previously existing, but even now he had to feel its influence. The fourteenth number of his paper, the most violent of the time, was found to contain some articles which were forbidden by the censor, and as the time pressed, the editors did not know how to supply the deficiency. The ready genius of Espronceda suggested a scheme, which, after a little hesitation, was adopted: this was to publish the sheet in blank, with merely the headings, which had not been struck out of the manuscript by the censor. Accordingly, the usual sheet appeared with the titles only of the subjects it had originally to bear, namely--“The Amnesty;” “Domestic Policy;” “Letter from Don Miguel and Don Manuel Bravedeed in defence of their honour and patriotism;” “On the Cortes;” “Song on the Death of Don Joaquin de Pablo.” The effect was startling, and perhaps more powerful than the forbidden articles would have proved. The people supplied the deficiencies according to their individual feelings, and the ingenuity of the device had its fullest success. As the result, the publication of the paper was forbidden, and the managers had to hide themselves for a time to escape further prosecution.

In the years 1835 and 1836, there were several serious commotions in Madrid in which he joined, erecting barricades in the principal square, and making violent harangues to the people. On both occasions the disturbances were soon put down by the military, and he had to hide himself in the provinces, until, in the year 1840, Espartero having put himself at the head of the liberal party, the public principles prevailed for which Espronceda had so exerted himself. He then came forth again from his retirement, and made himself conspicuous by appearing as an advocate in a case in which a paper named the ‘Hurricane’ had been denounced at law for a seditious article it contained. Espronceda’s speech in defence, from some passages of it given by Del Rio, appears to have been very energetic, and as inflammatory as the article accused, but he was successful, and the proprietor of the paper was acquitted.

In the same year, 1840, he published the volume of poems on which his fame rests, as perhaps the first lyric poet that Spain has produced. Most of the contents had been previously given in the periodical publications of Madrid, but it was a great service to literature to have them collected. They contained the fragment of the epic poem, ‘Pelayo,’ and a short dramatic piece, entitled, ‘The Student of Salamanca,’ in which his own character is supposed to have been depicted; as well as the lyric odes and other poems. They are comparatively few in number, not exceeding fifteen altogether, but of such rare excellence as to make us regret that so gifted a writer was to be so soon cut off, depriving the literary world of the hopes of still further excellence they gave reason to expect. In the following year, 1841, he published his poem, ‘The Devil World, El Diablo Mundo,’ in four cantos, to which three others were afterwards added, found among his papers after his death. His friends had long feared that he was not destined to attain a prolonged period of life, but their fears were unhappily realized much sooner than they had imagined.

In December 1841, Espronceda was sent to the Hague as Secretary of Legation, but the coldness of the climate affecting too severely his enfeebled constitution, he was obliged, almost immediately, to return to Spain. He had meanwhile been elected Deputy to the Cortes for Almeria, and he attempted to take accordingly his share of public duties. But his health and strength had been undermined by the life of hazard, of privations and excesses he had undergone, and the journey to the Hague in the depth of winter seemed to give the final shock to his frame, from which it could not recover. On the 23rd of May, 1842, his friends and admirers were thrown into unexpected grief by hearing that he had died that morning, after what was termed a four days’ illness. The immediate cause was said to have been some disorder affecting the throat, and his sufferings have been described by an intimate friend and schoolfellow, who was with him at the time, as very painful. The loss to Spain and the whole literary world was as great as it was irreparable; and so the people seemed to feel it, by the general expression of regret over his fate, such as it seldom falls to the lot of any one to excite.

The moralist might dilate on the evil courses which probably hastened his death, and all must lament that a man of such extraordinary genius should have sunk under them; but before we judge any one severely, we should be certain of being able to form a right judgement. The utmost remark, therefore, we permit ourselves to make, may be to consider his history as a lesson to all under similar circumstances of life, that if they will not take heed to a moral in others, they may become a warning themselves. Every man’s character may be taken as a whole, in which his good and evil qualities are often so blended together as to make them inseparable. The excesses of youth are often “the flash and outbreak of a fiery mind,” which shows itself in its true characters in other respects, though often with the alloy of lower passions to lead them to a fatal end. Thus Byron and Espronceda, two kindred geniuses in our days, have sunk prematurely into the grave, most unhappily, when new fields of glory seemed to be opened before them to retrieve the past errors of life, and make it in future as honourable as they had already rendered it renowned.

The genius of Espronceda was kindred to Byron’s, of whom he has been accused of having been an imitator. But this seems to me unquestionably a mistake. During his residence in England he had certainly acquired a good knowledge of the English language and literature, much to his advantage; but he could scarcely have acquired such a knowledge of either as to put him in the position of an imitator. The utmost that can be alleged of him in this respect is, that the style of Byron’s writing was so congenial to his own taste and talent, as to make him imbibe it intuitively, and so obtain a more decided character for his own than perhaps it would have otherwise attained.

It is certain that Spanish poetry never before presented such depth of thought and feeling, and such fulness and vigour of expression, as he gave to it; and it is apparent, in every page of his works, that he had studied in a higher school and become imbued with a brighter inspiration than he could have done on the Continent. But what ordinary imitators would have considered the characteristics of Byron as models to follow, he had the good sense entirely to discard. He has none of the egotism and affectation which distinguish that school; and if he indulged in some of its propensities, it is clear that they were the natural results of the circumstances in which he was placed, and not the wilful perversions of misdirected abilities. His poem to Harifa is written with an earnestness of feeling that must be felt, even through the haze of translation, giving tokens of its origin too distinct to admit any supposition of its being a suggestion from any other source than his own experience of life. Neither in this poem nor in any other of his works is there any of those mysterious suggestions of dark histories, or of those morbid denunciations of imaginary wrongs which abound in the productions of the Byronian school. His complaints are the evident effusions of a mind maddened at finding itself in a state unworthy of its powers, and thus, instead of venting his rage on others, he turned it against his own misdeeds, in giving way to excesses that he scorned, and which he felt degraded him. But even in his aspirations for higher thoughts, he had the same leaven of earth to keep him from attaining them. He had not learned the lessons which Jovellanos inculcated in the Epistle to Bermudez, to seek wisdom where only it ought to be sought; as he might have done even from the heathen poet, that the hidden things of God could not be found out, though he were to traverse over all space in search of them.

Ἀλλ’ οὐ γὰρ ἆν τὰ θεία, κρύπτοντος Θεοῦ,
Μάθεις ἆν, οὐδ’ εἰ πάντ’ ἐπεξελθοις σκότων.

In somewhat of the same strain with these lines is the second canto of his poem, the ‘Diablo Mundo,’ addressed to Theresa, which, however, has no connexion with the rest of the poem to which it is attached. The verses ‘To a Star,’ contain also poetical thoughts no less exquisite, though perhaps not of so decided a character; and they are all valuable at least in this, that instead of gilding over vices and follies, they show the confession of one so highly gifted by nature, that the indulgences of sensual gratifications are in reality only sources of unhappiness.

Two other of his poems, ‘The Mendicant’ and ‘The Executioner,’ are no less distinguishable for the power of thought and expression they display; but they also unfortunately indicate such objectionable tendencies, as to make us regret that his extraordinary talents had not been directed to nobler subjects. Not so the two poems selected for translation, ‘The Song of the Pirate,’ and that of the ‘Criminal Condemned to Die,’ in addition to those previously mentioned. Of these, the latter is one of such peculiarly energetic character, as to need no comment. The other is one of the most favourite poems known in Spain, and having been set to music, is therefore heard repeated more frequently. It has been said to have been taken from the French, but I believe erroneously. It bears strongly the impress of Espronceda’s genius; and if the poem intended be either of those by Floran or Victor Hugo, any one who will take the trouble of comparing them will observe that they are essentially different, as each also is from the song of Lord Byron’s ‘Corsair.’

At the first view of it, the ‘Diablo Mundo’ appears to be an imitation of ‘Don Juan;’ but it would be as unjust to declare it so, as to say the latter had been copied from the various Italian poems written in the same style. Espronceda might have had the idea suggested by reading Lord Byron’s poem, or Goëthe’s ‘Faust,’ or both, but he has carried it much higher, and given the outlines of a nobler conception than either. He begins by supposing that, absorbed in meditation, during the silence of the night, he hears an extraordinary noise, which calls back his feelings and arouses them. That confused noise, with sublime music and solemn sound, are all the passions of the world, all the interests found in life,--the affections and hatreds, love, glory, wealth, the vices and the virtues; they are, in fine, the complaint of the whole universe that comes like a revolving whirlwind, and displays before the fancy a thousand allegorical monsters, traced with inimitable facility and astonishing vigour.

The visions pass away, the noise goes gradually off, losing itself in the distance, until it ceases, where begins the introduction of the poem. The first canto is the exposition of the great drama proposed to be developed.

A man bowed down with age and embittered by sorrowful and useless experience, shuts in despair a book he was reading, and mournfully convinced of the barrenness of learning, falls asleep. Death then presents itself, and intones a hymn inviting him to the peace of the grave. With pleasure he feels his benumbed limbs growing stiff with cold, and is enjoying himself in the enervation of his spirit, when Immortality suddenly rises up before him and sings another hymn in opposition to that of Death, and like that also offering herself to the man about to die.

The election is immediate; he chooses Immortality, and is re-endowed with youth. The song of this deity, however, does not lead to the immortality of the spirit, but of the material part of man, and it is that he receives. The image of death is invested with melancholy beauty; it is soft and gentle; that which is desired when, free from prejudices, we feel the heart worn and the soul discontented. The immortality that rises over the pale front of death, effaces it with a magnificent lustre. “It is impossible,” says Ros de Olano, who has written the prologue to this beautiful poem, “to approach, by any words of ours whatever, to the luxuriousness of thought, of expression, and of knowledge displayed in this sublime description, the most happy perhaps yet presented in the Spanish language.” Grand, extended and immense is the field which the poet has displayed to trace out a course for his hero, and the variety of tones he employs are like the face of the world, over which he has to range. As the character is developed, the hero, with the body of a man and the soul of a child, is placed in situations equally original and interesting, and the whole scheme is one which gave full scope to the writer for an unlimited work, even if he had been permitted to live to the utmost period of human existence.

Del Rio states, that Espronceda was in his public discourses an ineffective speaker, and ascribes it to the physical weakness of his frame; he describes him as having been distinguished for sarcasms, and only at intervals powerful in declamation. “In conversation he made an affectation of laughing at the restraints and virtues which are necessary for the order of society, and yet in private life no one was more remarkable for kindness and generosity. When the cholera was raging in Madrid, he was one of the most active in disregarding its attacks, and in attending to the wants of those near him who were suffering from it.” “All who knew him loved him, and even to his faults he knew how to give a certain impression of greatness.” Del Rio proceeds to describe him as having been graceful in his bearing, endowed with manly beauty, and his countenance marked with a melancholy cast that rendered it more interesting. He concludes by observing, that notwithstanding the years that have passed since his friends had to lament his loss, a garland of everlastings never fails to be found renewed over his grave.

In 1848 Baudry published another edition of Espronceda’s works, at Paris, but, with the exception of the fifth and sixth cantos of the ‘Diablo Mundo,’ there is no additional poem given, though Del Rio points out six other pieces published in different periodicals. This omission is much to be regretted, as undoubtedly every line that proceeded from his pen was worthy of being gathered together as a rare treasure. It is to be hoped that some admirer of his genius may soon collect those scattered relics, and give them in an edition worthy of their character in Spanish literature. Another Life of him also would be most desirable, as in the Paris edition there is only repeated the account given by Ferrer del Rio, which, though ably written as a sketch, is still on the same scale with a number of other writers in the same work of far inferior merits, and utterly unworthy of so great a genius as Espronceda. Spanish versification under his influence has become “revolutionized.” He has extended the powers apparently even of the language itself, and by the force of his style as well as by the varied character of his poems, has certainly shown its capabilities more decidedly than any poet who preceded him.

JOSÈ DE ESPRONCEDA.

TO SPAIN, AN ELEGY. LONDON, 1829.

How solitary is the nation now
That peopled countries vast a former day!
That all beneath her sovereignty to bow,
From East to West extended once her sway!

Tears now profuse to shed, unhappy one,
Queen of the world! ’tis thine; and from thy face,
Enchanting yet in sorrow, there is none
Its overwhelming traces to erase.

How fatally o’er thee has death pour’d forth
Darkness and mourning, horrible and great!
And the stern despot in his madden’d wrath
Exulted wildly o’er thy low estate.

Nothing or great or beautiful he spared,
My country! the young warrior by him fell,
The veteran fell, and vile his war-axe glared,
Pleased all its fury o’er thee to impel.

Ev’n the pure maiden fell beneath the rage
Of the unpitying despot, as the rose
Condemn’d the summer’s burning sun to engage
Her bloom and beauty withering soon must close.

Come, O! ye inhabiters of the earth,
And contemplate my misery! can there,
Tell me, be any found of mortal birth
Bearing the sorrows I am doom’d to bear?

I wretched, banish’d from my native land,
Behold, far from the country I adore,
Her former glories lost and high command,
And only left her sufferings to deplore.

Her children have been fatally betray’d
By treacherous brethren, and a tyrant’s power;
And these her lovely fertile plains have made
Fields o’er which lamentations only lower.

Her arms extended wide unhappy Spain,
Her sons imploring in her deep distress:
Her sons they were, but her command was vain,
Unheard the traitor madness to repress.

Whate’er could then avail thee, tower or wall,
My country! still amid thy woes adored?
Where were the heroes that could once appal
The fiercest foe? where thy unconquer’d sword?

Alas! now on thy children’s humbled brow
Deeply is shame engraved, and on their eyes,
Cast down and sorrowfully beating now,
The tears alone of grief and mourning rise.

Once was a time for Spain, when she possess’d
A hundred heroes in her hour of pride;
And trembling nations saw her manifest
Her power and beauty, dazzling by their side.

As lofty shows itself in Lebanon
The cedar, so her brow she raised on high;
And fell her voice the nations round upon,
As terrifies a girl the thunders nigh.

But as a stone now in the desert’s wild
Thou liest abandon’d, and an unknown way
Through strangers’ lands, uncertain where, exiled
The patriot’s doom’d unfortunate to stray.

Her ancient pomp and power are cover’d o’er
With sand and weeds contemptuous; and the foe,
That trembled at her puissance before,
Now mocks exulting and enjoys her woe.

Maidens! your flowing locks dishevell’d tear,
To give them to the wandering winds; and bring
Your harps in mournful company to share
With me the sorrowful laments I sing.

Thus banish’d from our homes afar away
Still let us weep our miseries. O! Spain,
Who shall have power thy torments to allay?
Who shall have power to dry thy tears again!

THE CONDEMNED TO DIE.

I.

His form upon the ground reclined,
With bitter anguish inward drawn,
Full of the coming day his mind,
That soon will sadly dawn,
The culprit waits, in silence laid,
The fatal moments hastening now,
In which his last sun’s light display’d
Will shine upon his brow.

O’er crucifix and altar there,
The chapel cell in mourning hung,
From the dim candle’s yellow glare
A funeral light is flung;
And by the wretched culprit’s side,
His face with hood half cover’d o’er,
The friar, with trembling voice to guide,
Is heard his prayers implore.

His brow then raises he again,
And slowly lifts to heaven his eyes;
Perhaps a prayer for mercy fain
May in his grief arise.
A tear flows: whence had that release?
Was it from bitterness or fear?
Perhaps his sorrows to increase
Some thought to memory dear?

So young! and life, that he had dream’d
Was full of golden days to glide,
Is pass’d, when childhood’s tears it seem’d
As scarcely yet were dried.
Then on him of his childhood burst
The thought, and of his mother’s woe,
That he whom she so fondly nursed
Was doom’d that death to know.

And while that hopelessly he sees
His course already death arrest,
He feels his life’s best energies
Beat strongly in his breast;
And sees that friar, who calmly now
Is laid, with sleep no more to strive,
With age so feebly doom’d to bow,
Tomorrow will survive.

But hark! what noise the silence breaks
This hour unseasonably by?
Some one a gay guitar awakes
And mirthful songs reply;
And shouts are raised, and sounds are heard
Of bottles rattling, and perchance
Others, remember’d well, concurr’d
Of lovers in the dance.
And then he hears funereal roll,
Between each pause in accents high,
“Your alms, for prayers to rest the soul
Of him condemn’d to die.”

And so combined the drunkard’s shout,
The toast, the strifes, and fancies wild
Of all that Bacchanalian rout,
With wanton’s songs defiled,
And bursts of idle laughter, reach
Distinct into the gloomy cell,
And seem far off ejected each
The very sounds of hell.
And then he hears, funereal roll
Between each pause, those accents high,
“Your alms, for prayers to rest the soul
Of him condemn’d to die.”

He cursed them all, as one by one
The impious echos each express’d;
He cursed the mother as a son
Who nursed him at her breast:
The whole world round alike he cursed,
His evil destiny forlorn,
And the dark day and hour when first
That wretched he was born.

II.

The moon serene illumes the skies,
And earth in deepest stillness lies;
No sound is heard, the watchdog’s mute,
And ev’n the lover’s plaintive lute.

Madrid enveloped lies in sleep;
Repose o’er all its shade has cast,
And men of him no memory keep
Who soon will breathe his last.

Or if perchance one thinks to wake
At early dawn, no thoughts whate’er
Rise for the wretched being’s sake,
Who death is waiting there.
Unmoved by pity’s kind control,
Men hear around the funeral cry,
“Your alms, for prayers to rest the soul
Of him condemn’d to die.”

Sleeps in his bed the judge in peace;
And sleeps and dreams of how his store,
The executioner, to increase;
And pleased he counts it o’er.
Only the city’s silence breaks,
And destined place of death portrays,
The harden’d workman who awakes
The scaffolding to raise.

III.

Confused and mad his heated mind,
With raving feverish dreams combined,
The culprit’s soul exhaustion press’d,
His head sunk heavy on his breast.
And in his dreams he life and death
Confounds, remembers, and forgets;
And fearful struggling every breath,
And sigh he gives besets.

And in a world of darkness seems
As now to stray; feels fear and cold,
And in his horrid madness deems
The cord his neck infold:
And so much more, in desperate fight,
In anguish to escape his lot,
He strives, with so much more the might
He binds the fatal knot:
And voices hears, confused the whole,
Of people round, and then that cry,
“Your alms, for prayers to rest the soul
Of him condemn’d to die!”

Or fancies now that he is free;
And breathes the fresh pure air, and hears
Her sigh of love, the maid whom he
Had loved in happier years:
Beauteous and kind as e’er of old,
Sweet flower of spring-time’s gay resort,
As could for love the meads behold,
Or gallant April court.

And joyful he to see her flies,
And seeks to reach her, but in vain;
For as with anxious hands he tries
His hoped-for bliss to gain,
The illusion suddenly to break,
He finds the dream deceitful fled!
A cold stiff corpse the shape to take,
And scaffold in its stead.
And hears the mournful funeral knoll,
And hollow voice resounding nigh,
“Your alms, for prayers to rest the soul
Of him condemn’d to die!”

THE SONG OF THE PIRATE.

The breeze fair aft, all sails on high,
Ten guns on each side mounted seen,
She does not cut the sea, but fly,
A swiftly sailing brigantine;
A pirate bark, the ‘Dreaded’ named,
For her surpassing boldness famed,
On every sea well known and shore,
From side to side their boundaries o’er.

The moon in streaks the waves illumes;
Hoarse groans the wind the rigging through;
In gentle motion raised assumes
The sea a silvery shade with blue;
While singing gaily on the poop,
The pirate Captain, in a group,
Sees Europe here, there Asia lies,
And Stamboul in the front arise.

Sail on, my swift one! nothing fear;
Nor calm, nor storm, nor foeman’s force
Shall make thee yield in thy career,
Or turn thee from thy course.
Despite the English cruisers fleet
We have full twenty prizes made;
And see their flags beneath my feet
A hundred nations laid.
My treasure is my gallant bark,
My only god is liberty;
My law is might, the wind my mark,
My country is the sea.

There blindly kings fierce wars maintain,
For palms of land, when here I hold
As mine, whose power no laws restrain,
Whate’er the seas infold.
Nor is there shore around whate’er,
Or banner proud, but of my might
Is taught the valorous proofs to bear,
And made to feel my right.
My treasure is my gallant bark,
My only god is liberty;
My law is might, the wind my mark,
My country is the sea.

Look when a ship our signals ring,
Full sail to fly how quick she’s veer’d!
For of the sea I am the king,
My fury’s to be fear’d;
But equally with all I share
Whate’er the wealth we take supplies;
I only seek the matchless fair
My portion of the prize.
My treasure is my gallant bark,
My only god is liberty;
My law is might, the wind my mark,
My country is the sea.

I am condemn’d to die! I laugh;
For, if my fates are kindly sped,
My doomer from his own ship’s staff
Perhaps I’ll hang instead.
And if I fall, why what is life?
For lost I gave it then as due,
When from slavery’s yoke in strife
A rover I withdrew.
My treasure is my gallant bark,
My only god is liberty;
My law is might, the wind my mark,
My country is the sea.

My music is the north wind’s roar,
The noise when round the cable runs,
The bellowings of the Black Sea’s shore,
And rolling of my guns.
And as the thunders loudly sound,
And furious as the tempests rave,
I calmly rest in sleep profound,
So rock’d upon the wave.
My treasure is my gallant bark,
My only god is liberty;
My law is might, the wind my mark,
My country is the sea.

TO HARIFA, IN AN ORGY.

Thy hand, Harifa! bring it me;
Come near, and place it on my brow;
As on some lava’s boiling sea
I feel my head is burning now.
Come, bring with mine thy lips to meet,
Though they but madden me astray,
Where yet I find the kisses beat,
There left thy loves of yesterday.

What is virtue, what is joy,
Or love, or purity, or truth?
The false illusions of a boy,
The cherish’d flatteries of my youth.
Then bring me wine; there let me try
Remembrance drown’d to hold repress’d,
Without a pang from life to fly;
In frenzy death may give me rest.

O’erspreads my face a burning flood,
And red and glaring wildly start
My eyes forth out in heated blood,
And forth leaps restlessly my heart.
Woman! I hate thee; fly thee--go:
I feel thy hands my hands infold,
And feel them freezing, cold as snow,
As snow thy kisses are as cold.

Ever the same, try, tempters weak!
Other endearments to enthral;
Another world, new pleasures seek,
For such your joys I curse them all.
Your kisses are a lie; a cheat
Is all the tenderness you feign;
Your beauty ugly in deceit,
The enjoyment suffering and pain.

I wish for love, ethereal, high,
For some diviner joy my lot;
For such my heart will imaged sigh,
For such as in the world is not.
And ’tis that meteor light afar,
The phantom that deceived my mind,
The treacherous guide, the vapour star,
That leads me wandering and blind.

* * * * *

Why is my soul for pleasure dead,
And yet alive to grief and care?
Why doom’d in listless stupor laid
This arid loathing still to bear?
Why this consuming wild desire,
This restless passion vague and strange?
That well I know I rave, ’tis fire,
Yet plunge in its deceitful range.

Why do I dream of love and joy,
That I am sure a lie will prove?
Why where fantastic charms decoy,
Will thus my heart delirious move,
If soon it finds for meads and flowers,
But arid wastes and tangled thorns,
And soon a loathing rage o’erpowers
The mad or mournful love it scorns?

Flung as a rapid comet wide,
On ardent fancy’s wings I flew,
Where’er my wayward mind espied
Or joys or triumphs to pursue.
I launch’d myself, in daring flight,
Beyond the world through heavenward space,
And found but doubt, and all so bright
That seem’d, illusive proved the chase.

Then on the earth I anxious sought
For virtue, glory, love sublime;
And my worn spirit found there nought
But fetid dust and loathsome slime.
Mid clouds with heavenly hues o’ercast
Women of virgin lustre shone;
I saw, I touched them, and they pass’d,
And smoke and ashes left alone.

I found the illusion fled; but rife,
Unquench’d desires their longings crave;
I felt the real, I hated life,
And peace believed but in the grave.
And yet I seek, and anxious seek,
For pleasures still I ask and sigh,
And hear dread accents answering speak,
“Unhappy one! despair, and die.

“Die: Life is torment, joy a cheat,
Hope not for good on earth for thee,
But fruitless struggles look to meet
In thy vain longings endlessly!
For so God punishes the soul
That in its madness dares espy
The unfathom’d secrets of the scroll
Of truth, denied to mortal eye!”

* * * * *

O! cease: no more I ask to know,
No more to see: my soul oppress’d
Is humbly bow’d, and prostrate low,
Now only asks, and longs for rest.
In me let feeling then lie dead,
Since died my hopes of happiness,
Nor joys nor griefs be o’er me spread
My soul returning to depress.

Pass, as in magic optic glass,
And other youthful hearts deceive,
Bright images of glory! pass,
That crowns of gold and laurel weave.
Pass, ye voluptuous fair ones, on!
With dance and mirthful songs attuned,
Like vaporous visions, pass, begone!
No more my heart to move or wound.
And let the dance, and festal din,
O’er my revolted fancy reign,
And fled the night, see morn begin,
Surprised in senseless stupor’s chain.

Harifa, come! Like me this woe
Thou too hast borne! Thou ne’er dost weep!
But, ah! how wretched ’tis to know
Feelings so bitter and so deep!
The same our sufferings and care;
In vain thou hold’st thy tears apart;
Like me thou also hast to bear
A wounded and an aching heart!

XII.

JOSÈ ZORRILLA.

It has been said that “the life of a poet is ever a romance.” Perhaps this observation may apply equally well to the history of every man of ardent genius who enters with characteristic enthusiasm into the affairs of life, so as to invest even ordinary circumstances with the glow and hue of his own excited imagination. But this is more especially the case with poets who make us participate in their feelings, their joys or their sorrows, so as to give a character of romance to incidents that with other persons would have passed away as unnoticed. In the course of the preceding narratives, no doubt, many instances may be remembered to verify this remark, and the life of the eminent and deservedly popular poet with which we have to close the series, even in his yet youthful career, may be found to afford a further exemplification of it.

On the 14th February, 1837, a funeral car, over which was placed a crown of laurel, had to traverse the streets of Madrid, bearing to their resting-place in the cemetery, the remains of the talented but wrong-minded Larra. The car was followed by an immense concourse of mourners, principally young men of the first classes of Madrid, who were so testifying their regret for the loss they had sustained. The whole scene presented a spectacle of homage paid to genius, such as had seldom been witnessed. It was such as power might have envied, and as worth scarcely ever attained. Melancholy as had been the end of the unhappy being they mourned, envy and hatred had become silenced, morality and charity joined in regret, and no one disputed the propriety of the funeral honours paid to the dead.

It was already late when the ceremonies were concluded, and the darkening shadows of the night, in such a place and on such an occasion, gave the countenances of all assembled an extraordinary character. The shock they had felt, to lose so suddenly from among them one so well-known to them all, in the fulness of youth and intellect, in the height of fame and popularity, without any apparent motive and enveloped in mystery, was of itself sufficient to penetrate their minds with sorrow. They felt that a bright light had been extinguished, and they feared there was no hope of another arising to shine in its place. A strange spell seemed to have come over the bystanders, and they lingered round the vault with an unaccountable disinclination to separate.

The eloquent Señor Roca de Togares, distinguished both as an orator and a poet, pronounced a discourse he had hastily prepared, in which he portrayed the general sensation of sorrow, as he eulogized the talents and the principal literary successes of the deceased. But his eloquence had only the effect of exciting still further the prevalent feeling, which was that of something still more appropriate being required to give expression to their grief, and they instinctively looked round for some one to give utterance to it in the language of mournful inspiration with which to take their final farewell.

At that moment, in the midst of, it may be supposed, almost painful silence, a young man, unknown to them, of a slight figure and boyish appearance, stood forward, and with a tremulous voice began reading some verses in unison with their feelings, which at the first accents seemed to seize irresistibly on the minds of the listeners. He was himself so much affected by the scene, and perhaps under the sense of his own temerity, that he could not finish his task, and Roca de Togares took the paper out of his hands and read the verses again audibly. Had they been possessed of only ordinary merit, they would no doubt, on such an occasion, have been favourably received; but expressed as they were in highly poetical language, with appropriate sentiments, the effect was to excite the utmost astonishment and admiration. The author’s name, Josè Zorrilla, was eagerly called for and repeated on all sides with loud applauses, and they who had followed sorrowfully shortly before the remains of the man of genius they had lost, now returned to the city attending in triumph another poet they had found, with all the tokens of enthusiastic rejoicing. The young poet, on his part, had found an audience ready to welcome him, and he was at once launched forth into that “tide in the affairs of men which taken at the flood leads on to fortune.”

The history of the new aspirant for fame was now an object of interest, and the public learned that he was the son of Don Josè Zorrilla, a person well known as an eminent lawyer who had held several judicial offices with credit in Spain. It was while holding one of those offices, in Valladolid, that his son, the subject of this narrative, was born there, the 21st of February, 1817. From Valladolid, the father having been promoted to other duties in Burgos, Seville, and finally at Madrid, the son followed him, and received his primary education in the various cities they inhabited, under circumstances which must have operated powerfully on his mind. On arriving at Madrid he was placed at the Seminary of Nobles, where he remained six years, thus giving that celebrated institution the just merit of claiming him, as well as so many others of the ablest writers and public men of Spain, among those they had educated. There he seems to have gone through his course of studies without apparently other distinction than an early inclination to write verses and attend the theatres, which predilection his tutors disapproved, but in consideration of his father’s position passed over more leniently than they otherwise would have done. This indulgence, however, there is no doubt gave that decided turn to his mind which led to his subsequent career.

On leaving the Seminary, Zorrilla had to go to his father at his estate in the province of Castille, where he now lived in retirement, having lost the favour of the government. There soon a discordance rose between them as to his future course in life. The father wished him to graduate in the profession of the law, in which he had acquired wealth and fame, and sent him, notwithstanding his repugnance, to Toledo, to study in the university of that city. He passed accordingly a year there, but with only sufficient application to go through the ordinary routine respectably. Other studies, more congenial to his taste, engaged all his thoughts. Toledo is a city rich in historical and poetical remembrances and legends. Its monuments and ruins are among the most interesting that exist in Spain, and in the contemplation of these Zorrilla was constantly absorbed. To Toledo he owed his poetical education, as to it he has dedicated some of his sweetest poetry. He shunned the society of his fellow-students, and seemed to pass an eccentric and even mysterious life. Out no one knew where, at strange hours, disregarding the university rules and dress and etiquette, allowing his hair to grow long over his shoulders, and composing songs, not to the taste of his tutors, he was considered half-mad, and his father was informed of his strange conduct as not amenable to study and discipline. On going home for the vacation, his father therefore received him with coldness and displeasure, and made him read law with him, notwithstanding his continued disinclination to it, though in secret he made amends for the restraint by indulging in reading more agreeable to himself. It is recorded more especially that he then studied the Sacred Scriptures, in whose pages he found the truest inspiration of poetry, as he certainly seems in his writings generally to have imbibed the purest principles of morality and religion.

In the hope of his entering on a more diligent course of study at another place than Toledo, Zorrilla was then sent to Valladolid, as if by changing universities he could be expected to change the tendency of mind which urged him to his destiny. There he was watched on all sides by his father’s directions, and it was reported to him that his son still continued his former course of conduct; that instead of passing his hours in study, he was ever out on lonely walks, lying under the shade of trees by the side of the river or the broken rock, absorbed in his own meditations. There is a hint also given, of even the discovery that he had found some dream of youthful love to indulge in, as if it were something extraordinary for one of his age and enthusiastic character. The father must have been one of the class that Chateaubriand suffered under, or Mirabeau; and happy it was for Zorrilla that he did not sink into the recklessness of the one or the inanities of the other, while he had also to submit to similar discouragements. As it was, the father came to the conclusion that no hope was to be entertained of his son’s application to study, to take that position in the world which he had planned out for him, and in which were centred all his own ideas of honourable activity. He therefore resolved to take him from Valladolid, and sent a trusty messenger to bring him home.

On the way the messenger gave Zorrilla to understand that his father had resolved to employ him on his estate, to dress the vines and perform other labours of country occupation. It seems the father had even talked about fitting him out in a labourer’s working garb, as not being calculated for nobler employment, while he himself was unconscious or careless of the wonderful power of mind which lay hid from his observation in the son’s apparent inability to fulfil his expectations. On this intimation, however, Zorrilla at once formed his determination. Shortly before reaching home, he stayed at the house of a relative, where he collected together the few valuable things he could carry away, and appropriating to his necessity a horse belonging to his cousin, he hastened back to Valladolid. There he was fortunate enough to arrive and sell the horse before the messenger sent after him again could arrest him on his flight. He then transferred himself without loss of time to Madrid, where for a length of time he succeeded in escaping the vigilant search made for him by his friends, who not having seen him since he was a boy, were not able now to penetrate his disguise.

At Madrid under these circumstances, a fugitive from his father’s house, he had now passed almost a year, when he came forth before the public, as we have narrated, on the occasion of Larra’s funeral. How he had passed those months we are not informed further, than that he had to submit to every kind of annoyances and privations, which he surmounted by the firmness of his determination and the elevated character of his hopes. He had in the interval sent several pieces of poetry to the different periodicals, by which his name had already become sufficiently known to a number of those who hailed him on the 14th February as supplying the place of the popular writer they had lost.

On the following day, Zorrilla could say, like Lord Byron, that he awoke and found himself famous. The verses on Larra were in every one’s mouth, and all others that could be obtained of his writing were eagerly collected. Editors and proprietors of periodicals were anxious to obtain his cooperation for their works, and his period of difficulties had passed away. Before the year closed, the first volume of his poems appeared with an introduction by Pastor Diaz, and that was so eagerly bought that he was induced to bring out others in succession, with a prolificness unknown almost even in Spain. Seven other closely printed volumes of his poems were published, including several plays, within about three years afterwards, and eight or nine other volumes have appeared since. His works have been reprinted in Paris and in various parts of Spanish America, and received everywhere with unbounded admiration, so as at once to prove him one of the most favourite poets that Spain has produced.

While he was thus rising to fame and competence, his father, on the other hand, had fallen into misfortune. A high prerogative lawyer, he had maintained the doctrines of absolutism, and at length openly espoused the cause of Don Carlos. On the failure of this prince’s attempts to gain the throne, the elder Zorrilla, with other adherents, was proscribed and had his property confiscated. His son had not heard from him after this event for some years, when he received a letter from his father from Bayonne, stating that he was in difficulties, and requesting him to apply to a former friend, whom he named, for a loan for his assistance. Zorrilla wrote back to say that there was no occasion to incur an obligation from one not related to him, and that he himself was happy to have it in his power to send him the sum required, which he would repeat at stated intervals. This he accordingly did, until he received his father’s directions to discontinue it, as not requiring it any more.

Another instance of Zorrilla’s high-mindedness and true Castilian pride has been recorded. On his father’s property having been sequestrated by the government, it was intimated to him that if he applied he might have the administration of it, which was tantamount to giving him possession of it. But he replied that he would neither apply for it nor accept it, for while his father lived, he could acknowledge no one else as entitled to it. His father having since died, Zorrilla has come by law into possession of his estates, and has thus had the rare fortune, for a poet, to be possessed of considerable wealth. He has had several offers of appointments from the government, but he has declined them, contented to live according to his own fancies and occupied with his own peculiar pursuits. His extraordinary facility for composing verses is such as scarcely to allow his compositions to be termed studies; but with them and his attendances at the theatre, and other recreations, or at literary reunions, he is said to pass away his hours in ease and contentment. The first volume of his poems, it has been already intimated, was published before he was twenty-one years of age. Within three years afterwards seven others were published; and in the eighth, to the poem of ‘The Duke and the Sculptor,’ was appended the following note to his wife:--“Dedicated to the Señora Matilda O’Reilly de Zorrilla. I began the publication of my poems with our acquaintance, and I conclude them with thy name. Madrid, 10 October, 1840.”

What were the circumstances attending this acquaintance or union, we are not informed; but it is fortunate for the world that the intimation it might convey of its being the conclusion of his literary works has not been fulfilled. Since then he has published ‘Songs of the Troubadour,’ in three volumes, and other minor poems and plays separately. A larger work he meditated on the conquest of Granada, to be entitled ‘The Cross and the Crescent,’ has not been completed; and another he projected with the title ‘Maria,’ intending to celebrate the different characters under which the Holy Virgin is venerated in Roman Catholic countries, he has published, with the greater part supplied by a friend, all very inferior to what might have been expected from him.

It is much to be regretted that Zorrilla has in all his works allowed carelessnesses to prevail, which too often mar the effect of his verses, and still more that he has often inserted some that were of very inferior merit compared with the rest. It is not to be supposed that an author can be equally sustained in all his productions, but it is somewhat extraordinary in his volumes to find some poems of such transcendent merit, and others so inferior. These, however, are very few, and probably were hastily composed and hastily published, to supply the demand arising for the day. He is probably the only author in Spain who has profited by the sale of his writings to any extent, and to do this he must have been often under the necessity of tasking his mind severely, without regard to its spontaneous suggestions. Thus then, when he found his inspiration failing, he has often had recourse to memory, and repeated from himself, and even from others, verses previously published. It is to be hoped that he may be induced soon to give the world a revised edition of his works, in which the oversights may be corrected, and the poems unworthy of his fame may be omitted.

On reading over dispassionately the ‘Lines to Larra,’ by which he was first brought so prominently into notice, it may occasion some surprise to learn they had produced so remarkable an effect. If they had previously been read over alone to any one of the auditors, he probably might not have considered them so ideal, so beautiful, or so original as they seemed at the public recital. Some phrase might have appeared incomprehensible, some sentiment exaggerated or not true; some expression or line, hard or weak or forced. He might have observed a want of order or connection in the ideas, or the whole to be vague and leaving no fixed thought in the mind; or he might have pronounced them, as they have been since pronounced, an imitation of Victor Hugo or Lamartine. But to the auditors assembled, in the excited state of their feelings, there was no time for reflection or criticism. It was a composition of the hour for that particular scene,--for themselves, in language and feelings with which they could sympathize. Thus the verses seized on their minds and electrified them, so that they had no time to dwell on any discussion or dispute of their merits, but yielded at once to the fascination of the melodious verse they heard, and the appropriate application of the homage they testified.