Which stanza is thus translated by Maury:—
Of thirty-three stanzas in the original, Maury has only taken fifteen for his translation, and of ‘The Parting’ he has only taken eighteen out of twenty-five. The four concluding stanzas are in the original—
Political Essay on New Spain, Book II. chapter 5.
Mariano Josè de Larra was born at Madrid, 24th March, 1809. His father had joined the French army as a medical officer, and after the peace went to France, taking his son with him, where he forgot his native language, so that he had to learn it as a novice on his return to Spain. It is not improbable that his education in that country, where also he passed some time subsequently, gave Larra’s mind that tendency for scepticism and perverted feeling which led to his miserable end. From his earliest years he showed great aptitude for learning, and had studied the Greek, English and Italian languages, before he went to Valladolid to prepare for the profession of the law. After a short residence there, he went to Valencia on some disappointment he suffered, which, to one of his temperament, seemed a greater misfortune than what perhaps any other person would have considered it. At Valencia he obtained employment in a public office, which, however, did not suit his taste, and having then married, he returned to Madrid and determined to write for the public. His first efforts were not successful, and have not been subsequently reprinted with his works, but after a short time he began writing a series of essays on passing events, under the signature of Figaro, which at once attained great popularity. He also wrote several plays and a few poems, which, as written by Figaro, were favourably received. But the essays, under that title, were the foundation of his popularity. They were in the style of our essayists of the reign of Queen Anne, containing criticisms, and sketches of manners and characters, written in a style of great ease and elegance, marked with much wit and humour, as well as vigour. These works have been very many times reprinted in Spain, and also in France and South America. The student who wishes to form a correct style in learning Spanish, cannot do better than take Larra for a model. By his writings he had attained a respectable place in literary society, and it was understood that his fortunes were thereby also in a state of competence. He was, however, possessed of an ill-regulated mind and headstrong passions, so that, as it seems intimated, baffled in some object of unlawful desire, he put an end to his existence by a pistol shot the 13th February, 1837.
In his review of Quintana’s Life of Las Casas, he unreservedly subscribes to all the sentiments therein expressed.
Of those who fell at Trafalgar, the names of Alcalà and Churruca seem to be remembered with peculiar affection. The latter is referred to by Arriaza also, and seems to have been an officer of great skill and bravery in his profession, as well as of most amiable qualities in private life. Alcalà was an officer of very superior attainments. He was author of a learned Treatise on taking Observations of Longitude and Latitude at Sea, published at Madrid, 1796. With the copy of this work in my possession, there is bound up an unedited treatise of his original manuscript, ‘On the Trigonometrical Calculation of the Height of Mountains.’ He has already been referred to in Note 2.
The Spanish navy is at the present day much distinguished for the superior attainments and character of the officers, as well as in former years. In addition to the poet Arriaza, they have to boast of the late learned Navarrete, one of the most eminent and industrious writers of our times, principally on scientific subjects connected with his profession, geography, hydrography, and voyages, though in various biographical works he has extended his labours to the memory of poets and others, as well as the naval heroes of his country: see his memoir in Ochoa, vol. ii. p. 586, copied from one by the Bishop of Astorga.
The two poems from Quintana are at pages 16 and 93 respectively of the fourth edition of his works, published in 1825.
This able and enlightened statesman was born at Oviedo in 1786, and died at Paris in 1845. His work, on the ‘Rising, War, and Revolution of Spain,’ is one well deserving of the fame it has attained, having been translated into all the principal languages of Europe.
Born at Ecija, near Seville, in 1808, he came to Madrid in 1833, and was admitted an Advocate in the courts of law, but has been since engaged actively in conducting various publications, principally of a political character. He has been several times chosen member of the legislature, and had to undertake his share of public duties, but he has declined office, and in his whole public life shown a freedom from ambition, remarkable, as Del Rio intimates, from the contrast it presents with the conduct of other men of far inferior abilities. He has announced ‘A History of the Regency of Queen Christina,’ of which he has published a preliminary volume, comprising a detail of antecedent events. He has also written various plays and poems, but not of such a character as to be worthy of his fame as a public speaker and journalist. His life of Martinez de la Rosa, given in a publication entitled ‘Galeria de Españoles celebres contemporaneos, 1842,’ (which work has now extended to many volumes, including persons of distinction in all ranks of life,) is very pleasingly written, and has been taken as the principal authority in this compilation.
For a just statement of these rights, see the late Earl of Carnarvon’s ‘Portugal and Galicia,’ vol. ii.
Our best poets, and Milton especially, afford many exemplifications of this practice.
Many of our syllables also are in effect double syllables, as in the words brave, grave, clave, &c., as singers often have to regret, causing them, on that account, to slur over them. But these rules are only a continuation of Quinctilian’s maxim, “Optime de illa judicant aures. Quædam arte tradi non possunt.”
See note 23 to the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold.
Works of Martinez de la Rosa, edition of Barcelona, 1838, vol. iv. p. 1. The other translations are taken from the same, pages 113, 104, 48 and 34 respectively.
In the prologue, he enters on the discussion, so common a few years since, as to the relative merits of what were called the Classical and Romantic schools of poetry, which discussion, it is to be hoped, may now be considered at an end. The pretensions of different writers, who affected to range themselves under one or other of these denominations, were in fact generally only the devices of mediocrity to shelter their deficiencies. Those who write spontaneously from the true inspiration of genius, will never submit to the shackles of any system, and for all writers the wisest aim is to seek the clearest style of expressing those thoughts which they have to convey. As Martinez de la Rosa has well observed in this prologue, “I do not remember any one sublime passage, in whatever language it may be, that is not expressed with the utmost simplicity; and without this most essential quality, they cannot excite in the mind that lively and instantaneous impression which distinguishes them.”
An Andalusian poet may be excused entering into hyperbolical praise of his countrywomen, but we find an English traveller almost as hyperbolical in praise of them also. “It is beyond the power of language to describe those slow and surpassingly graceful movements which accompany every step of the Andalusa; her every attitude is so flowing, at the same time so unforced, that she seems upborne by some invisible power that renders her independent of the classically moulded foot she presses so lightly on the ground.”—Murray’s Cities and Wilds of Andalusia.
In the work already mentioned, ‘Galeria de Españoles contemporaneos,’ under his own superintendence, and from which the notices in this compilation are principally taken. Pastor Diaz was born at Vivero in Galicia, in the year 1811, and was educated at Alcalà de Henares. Having been admitted an Advocate in the courts of law, he engaged, in 1833, in the public service, and has held various offices under the government in the provinces. In 1847 he published a volume of poems, of which two,—one, ‘The Black Butterfly,’ and the other, an ‘Ode to the Moon,’—Ochoa declares, in his opinion, “two of the most beautiful pieces that have been written for many years in Spain.” Disagreeing very much with this opinion, it is only quoted in token of the estimation in which Pastor Diaz is held among his countrymen. (Ochoa, vol. ii. p. 628.)
In his poem of the ‘Moro Esposito,’ the Duke has inserted an interesting episode referring to his residence in Malta, “whose good and honest inhabitants he found under the dominion of the most wealthy, free, enlightened, noble and powerful nation that the sun admires from the zodiac.” (Book VI.) In the notes he details the particulars under which he arrived there, acknowledging gratefully the hospitality he had received.
This name is pronounced Ped-ro. The true character of the monarch is yet a disputed question, and has only within the last year been offered as a subject for inquiry by the Spanish Academy. The learned Llorente, in his ‘Historical Notices,’ vol. v., has, I think, clearly shown that Pedro was no more deserving of the epithet peculiarly than others of his age, including his half-brother and successor, by whose hand he fell, in retributive justice for the death of their other brother Fadrique. The legend of this prince’s death has been variously given, and thus Salvador Bermudez de Castro, who has also a poem on the subject, takes some different details to those repeated by the Duke de Rivas. The traditions of the people have handed down Don Pedro’s memory more favourably, and, perhaps, more justly, than the historians of the time, whose accounts no doubt were tinctured as darkly as they could be, partly to please the reigning monarch, and partly because Don Pedro had not been so submissive to priestly rule as they had desired.
This romance was originally printed with the ‘Moro Esposito,’ Paris 1834, vol. ii. p. 451. It was subsequently included among the ‘Romances Historicos,’ Madrid 1841, p. 19. The Alcazar of Seville has been described by so many travellers that it is unnecessary to add to their accounts of it, or to the graphic details of the romance. The stain on the floor may remind the reader of the legends of Holyrood and the Alhambra, as well as of other places.
This description of anger, as again at p. 241, seems a favourite one with the Duke, as well as other poets; thus Virgil—
From the peculiarity of this formation, the king was recognized by an old woman who had witnessed his killing a man he had met in a night rencontre in the street opposite her house, and she having given evidence to that effect, he ordered his statue to be beheaded, and so placed in the street in memorial of the sentence against himself.
The two brothers of Fadrique, of whom Henry was his successor on the throne, after he had killed Don Pedro in fight by his own hand. In another romance, the Duke de Rivas describes this “fratricide,” and represents that Don Pedro had the advantage at first, but that the page of the other came to his master’s assistance, and attacking Don Pedro from behind, diverted his attention so as to enable him to give the King the death-wound. From the accounts handed down to us, it is clear that Don Pedro had sufficient grounds for suspecting treason from the brothers, which occasioned his animosity against them and their adherents, for which they afterwards blackened his memory.
In the original, Gazpacho, “the name of a dish universal in and peculiar to Spain. It is a sort of cold soup, made of bread, pot-herbs, oil and water. Its materials are easily come by, and its concoction requires no skill.” Mr. W. G. Clark has taken this name for the title of his lively ‘Sketches of Spain,’ London 1850.
The selections from Breton de los Herreros are taken from the edition of 1831, at pages 61, 63 and 71 respectively.
This celebrated writer was born at Seville in 1775, and in early life adopted the ecclesiastical profession, having therein principally dedicated himself to the education of youth, in which he has been eminently successful. He has written a continuation of Mariana’s ‘History of Spain,’ and translated from the French Segur’s ‘Universal History,’ besides several mathematical and other elementary works. In 1822 he published a volume of poems, of which a second edition has been since published, highly praised by the different writers who have treated of modern Spanish literature. They are however avowedly of the classical school, and their greatest merit must be supposed to consist in their elegance of expression. His critical writings are numerous and valuable.
The stanzas 6, 9, 10, 11, 16 and 17 seem to be of his addition, and it must be acknowledged that they are in no respect inferior to the others. One stanza in Pindemonte he has not taken into his version.
Before observing that this part had been so expressed at the beginning, I made a translation of one small piece, which may give an idea of the others.
It was only on translating the last line that I recognized them as Lord Byron’s.
This sonnet, and the two following translations, are taken respectively from pages 8, 18 and 46 of the first volume of the Toluca edition. The imitation of Lord Byron is at page 83 of the same. The Odes to ‘Poesy’ and to ‘Night’ are at pages 13 and 72 of the second volume.
This name is to be pronounced Esprontheda. The translations, taken from the original poems, may be found in the Paris edition of 1848, at pages 49, 58, 73 and 79 respectively. The one translated, ‘The Condemned to Die,’ El Reo de Muerte, literally, ‘The Guilty of Death,’ has the signification given to this phrase by our translators of the New Testament, and it may be necessary to explain that the refrain “Your alms for prayers,” &c., is in the original merely “To do good for the soul of him who is about to be executed.”
In Spain, when a criminal is about to be executed, it is the custom for the Brothers of the religious order De la Humanidad, to go about the public ways, in their peculiar garb, with salvers for receiving alms for masses to be said for him, repeating words to the effect above given.
The name of this eminently great poet is to be pronounced as Thorrillia; the translations made from his works are of the poems at pages 62, 99, 34, 97, 102, 28 and 65, respectively, of the first volume, as stated in the memoir, published at Madrid in 1837. The headings, for the sake of distinction, have been given somewhat differently from the originals, where they are generally only entitled ‘Oriental,’ or ‘A Romance;’ and the piece named ‘The Warning’ is but part of a longer poem, the conclusion of which is not in the same good taste as the beginning. All the other selections translated in this work, of the different authors, have been given fully.
This tower is a shapeless ruin, the remains of an ancient castle in the plain of Arlanza near Burgos. The history of the castle is unknown, further than that Don Fernan Gonzalez assembled there, on one occasion, the Grandees of Castille, during his wars with the Moors.
THE END.
PRINTED BY RICHARD TAYLOR,
RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET.