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Title: El Estudiante de Salamanca and Other Selections

Author: George Tyler Northup

Contributor: Don Jose de Espronceda y Lara

Release Date: May 7, 2005 [EBook #15781]

Language: Spanish / English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

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ESPRONCEDA

EL ESTUDIANTE
DE SALAMANCA
AND OTHER SELECTIONS

EDITED BY

GEORGE TYLER NORTHUP, PH.D.

PROFESSOR OF SPANISH LITERATURE
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

PREFACE

The selections from Espronceda included in this volume have been edited for the benefit of advanced Spanish classes in schools and universities. The study of Espronceda, Spain's greatest Romantic poet, offers the best possible approach to the whole subject of Romanticism. He is Spain's "representative man" in that movement. Furthermore, the wealth of meters he uses is such that no other poet provides so good a text for an introduction to the study of Spanish versification. The editor has therefore treated the biography of Espronceda with some degree of completeness, studying his career as one fully representative of the historical and literary movements of the period. A treatment of the main principles of Spanish versification was also considered indispensable. It is assumed that the text will be used only in classes where the students are thoroughly familiar with the rudiments of Spanish grammar. Therefore only the more difficult points of grammar are dealt with in the notes, and little help, outside of the vocabulary, is given the student in the translating of difficult passages.

The editor makes no pretense to having established critical texts of the poems here printed, although he hopes that some improvement will be noted over previous editions. A critical edition of Espronceda's works has never been printed. Espronceda himself gave little attention to their publication. Hartzenbusch and others intervened as editors in some of the earliest editions. Their arbitrary changes have been repeated in all subsequent editions. The text of "El Estudiante de Salamanca" has been based upon the "Poesías de D. José de Espronceda," Madrid, 1840, the so-called editio princeps. This edition, however, cannot be regarded as wholly authoritative. It was not prepared for the press by the poet himself, but by his friend José García de Villalta. Though far more authentic in its readings than later editions, it abounds in inaccuracies. I have not followed its capricious punctuation, and have studied it constantly in connection with other editions, notably the edition of 1884 ("Obras Poéticas y Escritos en Prosa," Madrid, 1884). To provide a really critical text some future editor must collate the 1840 text with that version of the poem which appeared in La Alhambra, an obscure Granada review, for the year 1839. "El Mendigo" and "El Canto del Cosaco" I also base upon the 1840 edition, although the former first appeared in La Revista Española, Sept. 6, 1834. I base the "Canción del Pirata" upon the original version published in El Artista, Vol. I, 1835, p. 43. I take the "Soneto" from "El Liceo Artístico y Literario Español," 1838. For "A Teresa, Descansa en Paz," I follow the Madrid edition of 1884. The text of this, as for the whole of "El Diablo Mundo," is more reliable than that of the earlier poems.

I desire to thank Professors Rudolph Schevill, Karl Pietsch, and Milton A. Buchanan for helpful suggestions, and the latter more particularly for the loan of rare books. The vocabulary is almost entirely the work of my wife Emily Cox Northup, whose collaboration is by no means restricted to this portion of the book. More than to any other one person I am indebted to Mr. Steven T. Byington of the staff of Ginn and Company, by whose acute and scholarly observations I have often profited.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

THE LIFE OF ESPRONCEDA

Don José de Espronceda y Lara, Spain's foremost lyric poet of the nineteenth century, was born on the 25th of March, 1808, the year of his country's heroic revolt against the tyranny of Napoleon. His parents were Lieutenant-Colonel Don Juan de Espronceda y Pimentel and Doña María del Carmen Delgado y Lara. Both were Andalusians of noble stock, and, as we learn from official documents, were held to be Christians of clean blood "without taint of Jews, heretics, Moors, or persons punished by the Holy Inquisition, and who neither were nor had been engaged in mean or low occupations, but in highly honorable ones." This couple of such highly satisfactory antecedents had been married four years previously. In 1804 Don Juan, a mature widower of fifty-three, was still mourning his first wife when he obtained the hand of Doña María, a young widow whose first husband, a lieutenant in the same regiment, was recently deceased. The marriage was satisfactory in a worldly way, for Doña María brought as a dower four hundred thousand reales to be added to the two hundred thousand which Don Juan already possessed. By his first marriage Don Juan had had a son, Don José de Espronceda y Ramos, who became ensign in his father's regiment, then studied in the Artillery School at Segovia, and later entered the fashionable Guardia de Corps regiment. He died in 1793 at the early age of twenty-one, soon after joining this regiment. By the second marriage there were two other children, both of whom died in infancy: Francisco, born in 1805, and María, born in 1807. During the early months of 1808 the Bourbon cavalry regiment in which Don Juan served was stationed in the little hamlet of Villafranca de los Barros, Estremadura, and there the future poet was born. We do not know where the mother and son found refuge during the stormy years which followed. The father was about to begin the most active period of his career. We learn from his service record that he won the grade of colonel on the field of Bailén; that a year later he recaptured the cannon named Libertad at the battle of Consuegra (a feat which won him the rank of brigadier), and fought gallantly at Talavera as a brother-in-arms of the future Duke of Wellington. The mere enumeration of the skirmishes and battles in which he participated would require much space. In 1811 he distinguished himself at Medina Sidonia and Chiclana, and sought promotion to the rank of field-marshal, which was never granted. After the Peninsular War he seems to have been stationed in Madrid between 1815 and 1818. His family were probably permanently established in that city, for we know that mother and son resided there during the time that the brigadier was doing garrison duty in Guadalajara (1820-1828), and there is no evidence that they followed him to Coruña during his term of service in that city (1818-1820). Possibly the old soldier preferred the freedom of barrack life, where his authority was unquestioned, to the henpecked existence he led at home. "Ella era él y él era ella," says Patricio de Escosura in speaking of this couple; for Doña María was something of a shrew. She was a good business woman who combined energy with executive ability, as she later proved by managing successfully a livery-stable business. But, however formidable she may have been to her hostlers, her son José found her indulgent. He, the only surviving son of a mature couple, rapidly developed into a niño consentido, the Spanish equivalent of a spoiled child. Parallels are constantly being drawn between Byron and Espronceda. It is a curious fact that both poets were reared by mothers who were alternately indulgent and severe.

In 1820 the Espronceda family occupied an apartment in the Calle del Lobo. It was there and then that Patricio de Escosura firmed his intimacy with the future poet. He describes graphically his first meeting with the youth who was to be his lifelong friend. He first saw José sliding down from a third-story balcony on a tin waterspout. In the light of later years Escosura felt that in this boyish prank the child was father of the man. The boy who preferred waterspouts to stairways, later in life always scorned the beaten path, and "the illogical road, no matter how venturesome and hazardous it was, attracted him to it by virtue of that sort of fascinating charm which the abyss exercises over certain eminently nervous temperaments." The belief that Espronceda studied at the Artillery School of Segovia in 1821 appears to rest upon the statement of Solís alone. Escosura, who studied there afterwards, never speaks of his friend as having attended the same institution. Solís may have confused the younger José with his deceased, like-named brother, who, we know, actually was a cadet in Segovia. On the other hand, Solís speaks with confidence, though without citing the source of his information, and nothing would have been more natural than for the boy to follow in his elder brother's footsteps, as he did later when he joined the Guardia de Corps. However, the matter is of slight moment, for if he studied in Segovia at all he cannot have remained there for more than a few weeks.

What little education Espronceda was able to acquire in the course of his stormy life was gained mostly in the Colegio de San Mateo between the years 1820 and 1830. This was a private school patronized by sons of the nobility and wealthy middle class. Two of the masters, José Gómez Hermosilla and Alberto Lista, were poets of repute. Lista was the best teacher of his time in Spain. The wide range of his knowledge astonished his pupils, and he appeared to them equally competent in the classics, modern languages, mathematics, philosophy and poetics, all of which subjects he knew so well that he never had to prepare a lecture beforehand. Plainly Lista was not a specialist of the modern stamp; but he was something better, a born teacher. In spite of an unprepossessing appearance, faulty diction, and a ridiculous Andalusian accent, Lista was able to inspire his students and win their affection. It is no coincidence that four of the fellow students of the Colegio de San Mateo, Espronceda, Felipe Pardo, Ventura de la Vega, and Escosura, afterwards became famous in literature.

Espronceda's school reports have been preserved. We learn that he studied sacred history, Castilian grammar, Latin, Greek, French, English, mythology, history, geography, and fencing, which last he was later to turn to practical account. He showed most proficiency in French and English, and least in Greek and mathematics. His talent was recognized as unusual, his industry slight, his conduct bad. Calleja, the principal, writes in true schoolmaster's fashion: "He is wasting the very delicate talent which nature gave him, and is wasting, too, the opportunity of profiting by the information of his distinguished professors." It cannot be denied that Espronceda's conduct left much to be desired. According to Escosura he was "bright and mischievous, the terror of the whole neighborhood, and the perpetual fever of his mother." He soon gained the nickname buscarruidos, and attracted the notice of police and night watchmen. "In person he was agreeable, likable, agile, of clear understanding, sanguine temperament inclined to violence; of a petulant, merry disposition, of courage rash even bordering upon temerity, and more inclined to bodily exercise than to sedentary study." The two friends were much influenced by Calderón at this time. The height of their ambition was to be like the gallants of a cape-and-sword play, equally ready for a love passage or a fight. Lista's influence upon his pupils was not restricted to class exercises. In order to encourage them to write original verse and cultivate a taste for literature, he founded in April, 1823, the Academy of the Myrtle, modeled after the numerous literary academies which throve in Italy and Spain during the Renaissance period and later. Lista himself presided, assuming the name Anfriso. Was Delio, the name Espronceda assumed in his "Serenata" of 1828, his academic designation? The models proposed for the youthful aspirants were the best poets of antiquity and such modern classicists as Meléndez, Cienfuegos, Jovellanos, and Quintana. Two of Espronceda's academic exercises have been preserved. They are as insipid and jejune as Goethe's productions of the Leipzig period. As an imitator of Horace he was not a success. What he gained from the Academy was the habit of writing.

The Academy lasted until 1826, when many of its members had been driven into exile; but its later meetings must have seemed tame to spirited boys engrossed in the exciting political events of those times. The year 1823 is famous in Spanish history for the crushing out of liberalism. This was effected by means of the Holy Alliance, an infamous association of tyrants whose main object was to restore absolutism. Louis XVIII, the Bourbon king of France, sent a force of one hundred thousand men under the Duke of Angoulême who met with little resistance, and in short order nullified all that had been accomplished by the Spanish liberals. Before the end of the year Ferdinand VII, who had been virtually deposed, was restored to his throne, and the constitution of 1820 had been abolished. Espronceda, the son of a hero of the War of Liberation, felt that the work of the men of 1808 had been undone. They had exchanged a foreign for a domestic tyrant. What his feelings were we may gather from his ode in commemoration of the uprising of the Madrid populace against the troops of Murat, "Al Dos de Mayo":

But, as he says later in the poem,

These verses were written in later life; but already in 1827 he dates a poem "fourth year after the sale of Spanish liberty."

It was an age of political conspiracy and secret societies. Many liberals were members of Masonic lodges, and in addition there were circles like the Friends of Liberty, the Friends of the Constitution, the Cross of Malta, the Spanish Patriot, and others. Nothing more natural than that boys whose age made them ineligible to join these organizations should form one of their own. The result was La Sociedad de los Numantinos. The prime movers were Miguel Ortiz Amor and Patricio de Escosura, who drew up its Draconic constitution. Other founders were Espronceda, Ventura de la Vega, and Núñez de Arenas. All told, the society had about a dozen members. Their first meetings were held in a sand-pit, until the curiosity of the police forced them to seek safer quarters. One of the members was an apothecary's apprentice, who, unknown to his master, installed the club in the shop cellar. There they built an altar bearing all the romantic paraphernalia of skull and cross-bones, swords, and pistols. The members stood wrapped in black garments, their faces muffled with their long Spanish capes, wearing Venetian masks, each one grasping a naked dagger. There they swore binding oaths and delivered fiery orations. Red paper lanterns cast a weird light over the scene. How tame the sessions of the Myrtle must have seemed by comparison! Yet the two organizations throve simultaneously.

With the return of Ferdinand in September the persecution of the liberals began. The boys witnessed the judicial murder of Riego, the hero of the constitutional movement, November 8, 1823. This made the impression upon them that might have been expected. That night an extraordinary session of the Numantinos was held at which Espronceda delivered an impassioned oration. Then all signed a document in which the king's death was decreed. Some of the members' parents seem to have learned what was happening. The father of Ortiz, the club's first president, prudently sent him away to Oñate. Escosura became the second president, and held office until September of 1824, when his father sent him to France. Espronceda then became the club's third president, but his term was brief. The boys had made the mistake of admitting one member of mature years whose name we do not know; for, in spite of his treachery, the Numantinos even in their old age chivalrously refrained from publishing it. This Judas betrayed the secrets of his fellow-members, and placed incriminating documents, among them the king's "death warrant," in the hands of the police. The latter, however, displayed less rigor and more common sense than usual. While all the youths implicated were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment in various monasteries scattered throughout Spain, nothing more was intended than to give the conspirators a salutary scare. They were all released after a few weeks of nominal servitude. Ortiz and Escosura, the ringleaders, were sentenced to six years of seclusion, and Espronceda received a term of five years to be served in the Monastery of San Francisco de Guadalajara in the city of Guadalajara. His term was pronounced completed after a very few weeks of confinement. That he had a father prominent in the government service stood him in good stead, and this probably accounts for the fact that his place of confinement was in the city where Don Juan was garrisoned. The latter, as an old soldier in the wars against Napoleon, sympathized in a general way with liberal ideas; yet, placed as he was in a very difficult position, he must have found his son's escapades compromising. His record shows that he was "purified," that is his loyalty to the crown was certified to, on August 8, 1824. He seems to have maintained a "correct" attitude toward his rulers to the end, with all the unquestioning obedience of a military man.

While undergoing this easy martyrdom Espronceda improved his time by beginning what was to be a great patriotic epic, his Pelayo. Like many another ambitious project, this was never completed. The few fragments of it which have been printed date mostly from this time. The style is still classic, but it is the pseudo-classicism of his model, Tasso. The poet had taken the first step leading to Romanticism. Hence this work was not so sterile as his earlier performances. Lista, on seeing the fragments, did much to encourage the young author. Some of the octaves included in the published version are said on good authority to have come from the schoolmaster's pen. Lista's classicism was of the broadest. He never condemned Romanticism totally, though he deplored its unrestrained extravagances and the antireligious and antidynastic tendencies of some of its exponents. He long outlived his brilliant pupil, and celebrated his fame in critical articles. After his return from exile Espronceda continued to study in a private school which Lista had started in the Calle de Valverde. Calleja's Colegio de San Mateo had been suppressed by a government which was the sworn enemy of every form of enlightenment. The new seminary, however, continued the work of the old with little change: While there José carried his mathematical studies through higher algebra, conic sections, trigonometry, and surveying, and continued Latin, French, English, and Greek. If we may judge from later results, a course in rhetoric and poetics must have been of greatest benefit to him.

Espronceda's schooling ended in 1826, when he began what Escosura terms "his more or less voluntary exile." Escosura thinks he may have been implicated in a revolutionary uprising in Estremadura, and this conjecture is all but confirmed by a recently found report of the Spanish consul in Lisbon, who suspected him of plotting mischief with General Mina. If Espronceda was not a revolutionary at this time, he was capable of enlisting in any enterprise however rash, as his past and subsequent record proves all too clearly, and the authorities were not without justification in watching his movements. In a letter dated Lisbon, August 24, 1827, he writes to his mother: "Calm yourselves and restore papa to health by taking good care of him, and you yourself stop thinking so sadly, for now I am not going to leave Portugal." In these words the boy seems to be informing his parents that he has given up the idea of making a foray from Portugal into Spain as Mina was then plotting to do. He had left home without taking leave of his parents, made his way to Gibraltar, and taken passage thence to Lisbon on a Sardinian sloop. The discomforts of this journey are graphically described in one of his prose works, "De Gibraltar a Lisboa: viaje histórico." The writer describes with cynical humor the overladen little boat with its twenty-nine passengers, their quarrels and seasickness, the abominable food, a burial at sea, a tempest. When the ship reached Lisbon the ill-assorted company were placed in quarantine. The health inspectors demanded a three-peseta fee of each passenger. Espronceda paid out a duro and received two pesetas in change. Whereupon he threw them into the Tagus, "because I did not want to enter so great a capital with so little money." A very similar story has been told of Camoens, so that Espronceda was not only a poseur but a very unoriginal one at that. Some biographers suspect that while parting with his silver he was prudent enough to retain a purse lined with good gold onzas. This is pure speculation, but it is certain that he knew he could soon expect a remittance from home.

Portugal was at the time rent with civil war. The infanta Isabel María was acting as regent, and her weak government hesitated to offend the king of Spain. The liberal emigrants were kept under surveillance; some were imprisoned, others forced to leave the kingdom. Espronceda was forced to Live with the other Spanish emigrants in Santarem. There is no evidence that he was imprisoned in the Castle of St. George, as has so frequently been stated. He appears to have been free to go and come within the limits assigned him by the police; but he was constantly watched and at last forced to leave the country. It was in Portugal that the nineteen-year-old boy made the acquaintance of the Mancha family. Don Epifanio Mancha was a colonel in the Spanish army who, unlike the elder Espronceda, had been unable to reconcile himself to existing conditions. He had two daughters, one of whom, Teresa, was to play a large part in Espronceda's life. He undoubtedly made her acquaintance at this time. We are told that she embroidered for him an artillery cadet's hat; but the acquaintance probably did not proceed far. The statement that vows were exchanged, that the Mancha family preceded Espronceda to London, that on disembarking he found his Teresa already the bride of another, all this is pure legend. As a matter of fact, Espronceda preceded the Manchas to London and his elopement with Teresa did not take place until 1831, not in England but in France. All this Señor Cascales y Muñoz has shown in his recent biography.

Espronceda's expulsion from Portugal was determined upon as early as August 14, 1827; but the execution of it was delayed. He must have reached England sometime within the last four months of 1827. The first of his letters written from London that has been preserved is dated December 27 of that year. What his emotions were on passing "the immense sea ... which chains me amid the gloomy Britons" may be observed by reading his poem entitled "La Entrada del Invierno en Londres." In this poem he gives full vent to his homesickness in his "present abode of sadness," breathes forth his love for Spain, and bewails the tyrannies under which that nation is groaning. It is written in his early classic manner and exists in autograph form, dedicated by the "Citizen" José de Espronceda to the "Citizen" Balbino Cortés, his companion in exile. The date, London, January 1, 1827, is plainly erroneous, though this fact has never before been pointed out. We can only suppose that, like many another, Espronceda found it difficult to write the date correctly on the first day of a new year. We should probably read January 1, 1828. When he assures us in the poem: "Four times have I here seen the fields robbed of their treasure," he is not to be taken literally. Who will begrudge an exiled poet the delight of exaggerating his sufferings?

Five letters written from London to his parents have been preserved, thanks to the diligence of the Madrid police who seized them in his father's house in their eagerness to follow the movements of this dangerous revolutionary. They are the typical letters of a schoolboy. The writer makes excuses for his dilatoriness as a correspondent, expresses solicitude for the health of his parents, and suggests the need of a speedy remittance. In fact la falta de metálico is the burden of his song. Living is excessively dear in London. So much so that a suit of clothes costs seventeen pounds sterling; but there will be a reduction of three pounds if the draft is promptly sent. He asks that the manuscript of his "Pelayo" be sent to him, as he now has abundant leisure to finish the poem. He asks that the remittances be sent to a new agent whom he designates. The first agent was a brute who refused to aid him to get credit. He wonders that his father should suggest a call upon the Spanish ambassador. Not one word as to his political plans, a discretion for which Don Juan must have thanked him when these interesting documents fell into the hands of the police.

We have information that in London Espronceda became a fencing-master, as many a French émigré had done in the century before. This calling brought him in very little. He may have profited by the charity fund which the Duke of Wellington had raised to relieve the Spanish emigrados. His more pressing needs were satisfied by Antonio Hernáiz, a friend with whom he had made the journey from Lisbon; but the remittances from home came promptly and regularly, and Espronceda must have been one of the most favored among the refugees of Somers Town. If we may take as autobiographical a statement in "Un Recuerdo," he was entertained for a time at the country seat of Lord Ruthven, an old companion-in-arms of his father's. Ruthven is not a fictitious name, as a glance into the peerage will show. During all this time he was improving his acquaintance with Shakespeare, Milton, Byron, and other English poets. What is more surprising is that, if we may judge from his subsequent speeches as a deputy, he gained at least a superficial acquaintance with English political thought and became interested in economics. He was a convert to the doctrine of free trade.

Meanwhile the parents, who appear to have formed a bad opinion of a land where a suit of clothes cost seventeen pounds, were urging the son to go to France. He himself thought of Holland as a land combining the advantages of liberty and economy. But before leaving London he required a remittance of four thousand reales. This bad news was broken to the family bread-winner, not by José himself, but by his banker Orense. The debt, it was explained, had been incurred as the result of a slight illness. The four thousand reales were duly sent in December, but Espronceda lingered in London a few months longer; first because he was tempted by the prospect of a good position which he failed to secure, and second on account of the impossibility of obtaining a passport to France direct. He finally made his way to Paris via Brussels, from which city he writes, March 6, 1829. All this effectually dispels the legend that he eloped from England with Teresa by way of Cherbourg. The arrival in Paris of the revolutionary fencing-master put the Madrid police in a flutter. On the seventeenth of that same month the consul in Lisbon had reported that Espronceda was planning to join General Mina in an attack upon Navarra; and by the middle of April the ambassador to France had reported his arrival in Paris. It was then that the brigadier's papers were seized. Measures were taken to prevent Espronceda's receiving passports for the southern provinces of France, and for any other country but England. The friendly offices of Charles X, who had succeeded Louis XVIII on the throne of France, checked for a time the efforts of the patriotic filibusters. The latter, therefore, must have felt that they were aiding their own country as well as France when they participated in the July revolution of 1830. Espronceda fought bravely for several days at one of the Paris barricades, and wreaked what private grudge he may have had against the house of Bourbon. After the fall of Charles X, Louis Philippe, whom Espronceda was in after years to term el rey mercader, became king of France. As Ferdinand refused to recognize the new government, the designs of Spanish patriots were not hindered but even favored. Espronceda was one of a scant hundred visionaries who followed General Joaquín de Pablo over the pass of Roncevaux into Navarra. The one hope of success lay in winning over recruits on Spanish soil. De Pablo, who found himself facing his old regiment of Volunteers of Navarra, started to make a harangue. The reply was a salvo of musketry, as a result of which De Pablo fell dead. After some skirmishing most of his followers found refuge on French soil, among them Espronceda. De Pablo's rout, if less glorious than that of Roland on the same battlefield, nevertheless inspired a song. Espronceda celebrated his fallen leader's death in the verses "A la Muerte de D. Joaquín de Pablo (Chapalangarra) en los Campos de Vera." This poem, which purports to have been written on one of the peaks of the French Pyrenees which commanded a view of Spanish soil, and when the poet was strongly impressed by the events in which he had just participated, is nevertheless a weak performance; for Espronceda in 1830 was still casting his most impassioned utterances in the classic mold. Ferdinand had now been taught a lesson and lost little time in recognizing the new régime in France. This bit of diplomacy was so cheap and successful that Louis Philippe tried it again, this time on Russia. His government favored a plot, hatched in Paris, for the freeing of Poland. Espronceda, who had not yet had his fill of crack-brained adventures, enlisted in this cause also, desiring to do for Poland what Byron had done for Greece; but the czar, wilier than Ferdinand, immediately recognized Louis Philippe. The plot was then quietly rendered innocuous. Espronceda must have felt himself cruelly sold by the "merchant king."

Espronceda's literary activity was slight during these events, but his transformation into a full-fledged Romanticist begins at this time. Hugo's "Orientales," which influenced him profoundly, appeared in 1829, and the first performance of "Hernani" was February 25, 1830. There is no record that he formed important literary friendships in either England or France, but, clannish as the emigrados appear to have been, an impressionable nature like Espronceda's must have been as much stirred by the literary as by the political revolution of 1830; the more so as the great love adventure of his life occurred at this time. The Mancha family followed the other emigrados to London, just when we cannot say. In course of time Teresa contracted a marriage of convenience with a Spanish merchant domiciled in London, a certain Gregorio de Bayo. Churchman has discovered the following advertisement in El Emigrado Observador, London, February,1829: "The daughters of Colonel Mancha embroider bracelets with the greatest skill, gaining by this industry the wherewithal to aid their honorable indigence." From this it is argued that the marriage to Don Gregorio and the consequent end of the family indigence must have come later than February, 1829. Espronceda had met the girl in Lisbon, he may later have resumed the acquaintance in London. She may or may not be the Elisa to whom Delio sings in the "Serenata." According to Balbino Cortés in an interview reported by Solís, Teresa and her husband, while on a visit to Paris in October, 1831, happened to lodge at the hotel frequented by Espronceda. Shortly afterwards Teresa deserted her husband and an infant son and eloped with Espronceda. She followed him to Madrid in 1833, where a daughter, Blanca, was born to them in 1834. Within a year Teresa abandoned Espronceda and her second child. She sank into the gutter and died a pauper in 1839. This sordid romance occupied only about three years of Espronceda's life, a much shorter time than had been supposed. Churchman was the first to break the long conspiracy of silence which withheld from the world Teresa's full name. Cascales y Muñoz has since thrown more light upon this episode. But these gentlemen have done nothing more than to tell an open secret. Escosura, long ago, all but betrayed it in the following pun: "Tendamos el velo de olvido sobre esa lamentable flaqueza de un gran corazón," he says, referring to the affair with Teresa, "y recordemos, de paso, que el sol mismo, ese astro de luz soberano, tan sublimemente cantado por nuestro vate, manchas tiene que si una parte de su esplendor anublan, a eclipsarlo no bastan." Señor Cascales publishes a reproduction of Teresa's portrait. We see a face of a certain hard beauty. We are struck with the elaborate coiffure, the high forehead, the long nose, the weak mouth. The expression is unamiable. It is the face of a termagant ready to abandon husband and child. Espronceda seems to have returned to England for a brief period in 1832, as we may infer from the fact that the poem "A Matilde" is dated London, 1832. Corroboration of this belief was discovered by Churchman, who found that the paper on which "Blanca de Borbón" was written shows the water-mark of an English firm of that date.

In 1833 Ferdinand VII died, and his daughter Isabel II ascended to the throne under the regency of her mother Cristina. As the conservatives espoused the cause of the pretender, Don Carlos, the regency was forced to favor the liberals. The rigid press censorship was abolished, and a general amnesty was granted all the victims of Ferdinand's tyranny. In politics the year 1833 marks the beginning of the Carlist war, and in literature of Spanish Romanticism. Espronceda was one of many emigrados who returned to Spain, bringing with them new ideas for the revitalizing of Spanish literature. He did not arrive soon enough to see his aged father. Brigadier Espronceda's death certificate is dated January 10, 1833.

Shortly after José's arrival he joined the fashionable Guardia de Corps or royal guard regiment. This step, apparently so inconsistent with his revolutionary activities, has puzzled all his biographers. But Espronceda was only following the family tradition. His elder brother had done the same. Doubtless he believed, in his first enthusiasm, that Spain was now completely liberalized. Besides, he was a dandy always eager for social distinction, and he had to live down the fact that his mother was proprietress of an establecimiento de coches. The conduct of his fellow-Numantino, Escosura, who had found it possible to accept a commission under Ferdinand, is far more surprising. Espronceda's snobbishness, if he had any, cannot have been extreme, for he took up residence with his mother over the aforementioned livery stable, in the Calle de San Miguel. Teresa was prudently lodged under another roof. Doña Carmen was as indulgent as ever, and especially desirous that her son dress in the most fashionable clothes procurable. What with her rent from the house, her widow's pension, and the yield of her business venture, she was comfortably circumstanced. When Teresa abandoned the child Blanca, Doña Carmen became a mother to her. When Doña Carmen died in 1840 everything went to her son.

Espronceda's career as a guardsman was brief. As a result of reading a satirical poem at a public banquet, he was cashiered and banished to the town of Cuéllar in Old Castile. There he wrote his "Sancho Saldaña o el Castellano de Cuéllar," a historical novel in the manner of Walter Scott, describing the quarrels of Sancho el Bravo with his father Alfonso X. This six-volume work was contracted for in 1834 and completed and published the same year. For writing it the author received six thousand reales. Many writers in Spain were striving to rival the Wizard of the North at this time. Ramón López Soler had set the fashion in 1830 with "Los Bandos de Castilla." Larra's "Doncel de Don Enrique el Doliente" appeared in the same year with "Sancho Saldaña." But Espronceda was probably most influenced by his friend Escosura, who had printed his "Conde de Candespina" in 1832. The latter's best effort in this genre, "Ni Rey ni Roque," 1835, was written when its author was undergoing banishment for political reasons in a corner of Andalusia. To employ the enforced leisure of political exile in writing a historical novel was quite the proper thing to do. The banishment to Cuéllar must have taken place in late 1833 or early 1834, for Espronceda's novel is unquestionably inspired by his enforced visit to that town, and the contract with his publisher is dated in Madrid, February 5, 1834. On reading the contract it is apparent that the novel had hardly been begun then, as it was to be paid for in installments. Whether it was written mostly in Cuéllar or Madrid we do not know and care little. In January of that year El Siglo was founded, a radical journal with which Espronceda was prominently connected. During the brief existence of this incendiary sheet (January 21 until March 7) Espronceda contributed to it several political articles. The last issue came out almost wholly blank as an object lesson of the censor's activity. There follow a few months of agitation and political intrigue, the upshot of which was Espronceda's imprisonment for three weeks without trial. After protesting in the press and appealing to the queen regent, he was released and banished to Badajoz. How long he was absent from the capital we do not know, except that this banishment, like the others, was of short duration. During all this commotion there was produced at the Teatro de la Cruz, in April, an indifferent play, "Ni el Tío ni el Sobrino," whose authors were Espronceda and his friend Antonio Ros y Olano. It is difficult to paint anything but a confused picture of Espronceda's life during the remaining years of this decade. We catch glimpses of him debating questions of art and politics at cafés and literary tertulias like the Parnasillo, where Mesonero Romanos saw him faultlessly attired and "darting epigrams against everything existing, past, and future." Córdoba in his memoirs bears witness that he was still the buscarruidos of old. Espronceda with Larra, Escosura, Ros De Olano, and Córdoba constituted the "Thunder Band" of the Parnasillo (partida del trueno). After a long literary discussion they would sally forth into the streets, each armed with a peashooter and on mischief bent. A favorite prank was to tie a chestnut vender's table to a waiting cab and then watch the commotion which followed when the cab started to move. On one occasion, finding the Duke of Alba's coachman asleep on the box, they painted the yellow coach red, so altering it that the very owner failed to recognize it when he left the house where he had been calling. In politics Espronceda is always a leader in revolt, fighting with pen and sword for his none-too-clearly-defined principles. Even the Mendizábal ministry, the most advanced that Spain has ever had, does not satisfy him. His ideal is a republic and the downfall of "the spurious race of Bourbon." His love affairs are equally stormy. In literature he is attempting everything, plays, a novel, polemical articles, lyric poems, and one supreme work which is to be the very epic of humanity.

In 1835 Espronceda became an officer in the National Militia. In August of that year the militiamen were defeated in an unsuccessful revolt against the Toreno ministry. In 1836 he was equally unfortunate in a revolt against the Istúriz ministry. It was then, when pursued by the police, that a friend secreted him in the safest possible place, the home of a high police official. Espronceda employed his leisure hours in this refuge by writing "El Mendigo" and "El Verdugo." Two years later he traveled extensively through Andalusia engaged in revolutionary propaganda. He was probably trying to bring about a republican form of government. In September, 1838, his play "Amor venga sus agravios," written in collaboration with Eugenio Moreno López, was produced at the Teatro del Príncipe. Its success was moderate. The next year, while in Granada, he and his friend Santos Álvarez were guests of honor at a literary soirée. Espronceda's contribution was the reading of "El Estudiante de Salamanca." This poem was first printed, at least in part, in La Alhambra for 1839. The great political event of this year was the ending of the first Carlist war. The victories of the national troops were celebrated by a huge public demonstration in Madrid on the national holiday, May 2, 1840. For this occasion Espronceda wrote his patriotic poem "El Dos de Mayo." Only three days later his volume of "Poesías" was placed on sale, and, like Byron, he awoke to find himself famous. His old teacher Lista wrote a favorable review. From then on Espronceda was a man of note. The Madrid revolution of September 1 forced an unwilling regent to make Espartero, hero of the Carlist war, prime minister. A radical sheet, El Huracán, was accused of attacking Cristina and of advocating republicanism. Espronceda, though not a lawyer, was chosen to defend the journal. This he did with complete success. His speech has not come down to us, but we are told that in it he appeared in the rôle of an uncompromising republican.

Nevertheless he was soon to compromise. He was now a man of mark, and the liberal régime in power were not slow to see that it would be advantageous to enlist his services. In November, 1841, he accepted an appointment to serve as secretary to the Spanish legation at the Hague. He served in this capacity exactly five days. Arriving at the Hague on January 29, 1842, he departed for Madrid on February 3. A certain Carrasco had been elected deputy of the province of Almería. He was now urged to resign to make room for Espronceda. This he did, and Espronceda was elected and served in his stead. Of course all this had been prearranged. After his return he continued to hold his diplomatic position and receive pay for it, a not very honorable course on the part of one who pled so eloquently for the abolition of useless offices and the reform of the diplomatic service. In this way the Espartero government conciliated Espronceda with two offices. Henceforth his republicanism was lukewarm. Escosura tells us that concern for his daughter Blanca's financial future had rendered him prudent.

I am inclined to think that Espronceda's biographers underrate his services in the Chamber of Deputies. The trouble is that in his rôle of deputy their hero failed to justify preconceived notions regarding his character. Those who looked for revolution in his speeches found only sound finance. We seek in vain for anything subversive. There is nothing suggestive of the lyric poet or even of the fiery defender of El Huracán. As a poet he had praised the destructive fury of the Cossacks who swept away decadent governments. In defending El Huracán he had used the word Cossack as a term of reproach, applying it to those self-seeking politicians who were devouring the public funds. By this time he had himself become a Cossack on a small scale. Yet we must do him the justice to point out that he had had sufficient firmness of principle to refuse office under Mendizábal, Istúriz, and the Duque de Rivas. Fitzmaurice-Kelly is possibly going too far in intimating that he was degenerating into a hidebound conservative and opportunist. Something of the old reforming zeal survived. Though many disillusionments may have rendered him less eager for a republican form of government, his latest utterances show him zealous as ever for social and economic reform. Espronceda's parliamentary career lasted less than three months (March 1 to May 23, 1842). One can only wonder that in so brief a time a man already stricken with a fatal illness should have taken so able a part in an assembly in which he was a newcomer. Nor should we complain that his speeches lack eloquence. It is fairer to give him credit for not falling into the abuse of palabrería, the besetting sin of most diputados.

His views were sober and sound. Travel had given him a wider outlook than most of his colleagues possessed. He was the enemy of españolismo, wanted his nation to take a prominent part in European affairs, and no longer to lead the life of a hermit nation. But he is no jingo. He speaks against the bill to add fifty thousand to the standing army. Spain had passed through too many upheavals. What she needed to make her a European power was tranquility and opportunity to develop financial strength. Give the producing classes their long-awaited innings. But he is bitter against the magnates of the bourse and those politicians who legislate to produce an artificial rise in values. The true policy is to better the condition of the masses, to encourage agriculture and manufactures: even the construction of railways should wait until there is first something to haul over them. But manufactures should not be protected by a tariff. In his speech against the tariff on cotton he shows himself an out and out free-trader. He praises the English for their policy of free trade, enlightened self-interest he deems it, which tends to make the world one large family. As a writer he had inveighed against commercialism. But he now discerns a future where commerce shall replace war. He was unable to foresee that in the future trade was to be a chief cause of war.

That he was a ready debater is shown by his neat rejoinder to Deputy Fontán. This gentleman had made sneering allusions to men of letters who dabbled in diplomacy. Far from accepting the remark as a thrust at himself, as it was intended, Espronceda resented it as an insult to the then American minister Washington Irving, "novelist of the first rank, known in Europe through his writings even more than through the brilliancy of his diplomatic career."

Espronceda's health had been failing for some months. It is said that chronic throat trouble had so weakened his voice as to make his remarks in the Cortés scarcely audible. On May 18, 1842, he journeyed on horseback to Aranjuez to visit Doña Bernarda Beruete, a young lady to whom he was then engaged. Hastily returning to Madrid on the afternoon of the same day, so as not to miss a night session of the Cortés, he contracted a cold which soon turned into a fatal bronchitis. Others say he was taken ill at a reception given by Espartero. He died May 23, 1842, at the early age of 34. He was honored with a public funeral in keeping with his position as deputy and distinguished man of letters. His first place of burial was the cemetery of San Nicolás; but in 1902 his remains, together with those of Larra, were exhumed and reburied in the Pantheon for Distinguished Men of the Nineteenth Century, situated in the Patio de Santa Gertrudis in the Cementerio de la Sacramental de San Justo.

In forming our estimate of the man, we must carefully distinguish between the Espronceda of legend and the Espronceda of fact; for a legend sprang up during his own lifetime, largely the result of his own self-defamation. Like many other Romanticists, Espronceda affected a reputation for diabolism. He loved to startle the bourgeois, to pose as atheist, rake, deposer of tyrants. Escosura sums up this aspect of his character by branding him "a hypocrite of vice." Many have been led astray by Ferrer del Río's statement that in drawing the character of the seducer, Don Félix de Montemar, Espronceda was painting his own portrait. Such criticism would have delighted Espronceda, but the imputation was indignantly denied by his close friend Escosura. Modern critics are careful to avoid this extreme; but, in the delight of supporting a paradox, some are disposed to go too far in the opposite direction. Señor Cascales, for instance, is unconvincing when he seeks to exonerate Espronceda from all blame in the Teresa episode. Like the devil, Espronceda was not so black as he was painted, not so black as he painted himself; but he was far from being a Joseph. It is easy to minimize the importance of the part he played in the national militia. Doubtless much of his plotting was puerile and melodramatic. His activities as a revolutionist cannot have greatly affected the course of events. But it is unfair to deny him credit for constant willingness to risk his life in any cause which seemed noble. That his conduct was inconsistent merely proves that he followed no calmly reasoned political system. He reflects in his conduct the heated sentiment of the time, varying as it did from day to day. He sometimes compromised with his ideals, his sense of honor was not always of the highest, but he never seems to have grown lukewarm in his desire to serve the people. He is a liberal to the last, a liberal with notions of political economy and English constitutional practice. His quarrel with the church seems to have been political rather than theological. He hated the friars and the church's alliance with Carlism. That the last rites were administered to him shows that he died a professing Catholic. In appearance Espronceda was handsome, if somewhat too effeminate-looking to suggest the fire-eater. He never cultivated slovenliness of attire like most members of the Romantic school; on the contrary, he was the leading representative in Spain of dandyism. To sum up, Espronceda's was a tempestuous and very imperfect character. "Siempre fuí el juego de mis pasiones," is his own self-analysis. The best that can be said of him is that he was a warm, affectionate nature, generous, charitable to the poor, a loyal friend, and one actuated by noble, if sometimes mistaken, ideals. Years afterward, when Escosura passed in review the little circle of the Colegio de San Mateo, Espronceda was the only one of them whom he could truly say he loved.

THE WORKS OF ESPRONCEDA

Of all the Spanish poets of the period of Romanticism, Espronceda is the most commanding figure. Piñeyro, adopting Emerson's phrase, calls him the Representative Man of that age of literary and political revolt. More than that, criticism is unanimous in considering him Spain's greatest lyric poet of the nineteenth century.

First of all he interests as the poet of democracy. The Romantic poets were no more zealous seekers for political liberalism than the classic poets of the previous generation had been; but their greater subjectivity and freedom of expression rendered their appeal more vigorous. Espronceda's hatred for absolutism was so intense that in moments of excitement he became almost anti-social. The pirate, the beggar, the Cossack, were his heroes. The love of this dandy for the lower classes cannot be dismissed as mere pose. He keenly sympathized with the oppressed, and felt that wholesale destruction must precede the work of construction. We look in vain for a reasoned political philosophy in his volcanic verse. His outpourings were inspired by the irresponsible ravings of groups of café radicals, and the point of view constantly changed as public sentiment veered. According to his lights he is always a patriot. Liberty and democracy are his chief desires.

Like most Romanticists, Espronceda was intensely subjective. He interests by his frank display of his inner moods. Bonilla, in his illuminating article "El Pensamiento de Espronceda," states that the four essential points in the philosophy of Romanticism were: doubt, the first principle of thought; sorrow, the positive reality of life; pleasure, the world's illusion; death, the negation of the will to live. Espronceda shared all of these ideas. It is often impossible to say how much of his suffering is a mere Byronic pose, and how much comes from the reaction of an intensely sensitive nature to the hard facts of existence. There is evidence that he never lost the zest of living; but in his writings he appears as one who has been completely disillusionized by literature, love, politics, and every experience of life. Truth is the greatest of evils, because truth is always sad; "mentira," on the other hand, is merciful and kind. He carries doubt so far that he doubts his very doubts. Such a philosophy should logically lead to quietism. That pessimism did not in the case of Espronceda bring inaction makes one suspect that it was largely affected. There is nothing profound in this very commonplace philosophy of despair. It is the conventional attitude of hosts of Romanticists who did little but re-echo the Vanitas vanitatum of the author of Ecclesiastes. Espronceda's thought is too shallow to entitle him to rank high as a philosophic poet. In this respect he is inferior even to Campoamor and Núñez de Arce. Genuine world-weariness is the outgrowth of a more complex civilization than that of Spain. Far from being a Leopardi, Espronceda may nevertheless be considered the leading Spanish exponent of the taedium vitae. He has eloquently expressed this commonplace and conventional attitude of mind.

Like so many other writers of the Latin race, Espronceda is more admirable for the form in which he clothed his thoughts than for those thoughts themselves. He wrote little and carefully. He is remarkable for his virtuosity, his harmonious handling of the most varied meters. He never, like Zorrilla, produces the effect of careless improvisation. In the matter of poetic form Espronceda has been the chief inspiration of Spanish poets down to the advent of Rubén Darío. Fitzmaurice-Kelly, with his happy knack of hitting off an author's characteristics in a phrase, says: "He still stirs us with his elemental force, his resonant musical potency of phrase, his communicative ardor for noble causes."

Much harm has been done Espronceda's reputation for originality by those critics who fastened upon him the name of "the Spanish Byron." Nothing could be more unjust than to consider him the slavish imitator of a single author. In literature, as in love, there is safety in numbers, and the writer who was influenced by Calderón, Tasso, Milton, Goethe, Béranger, Hugo, Shakespeare, and Scott was no mere satellite to Byron. Señor Cascales is so sensitive on the point that he is scarcely willing to admit that Byron exerted any influence whatsoever upon Espronceda. The truth is that Byron did influence Espronceda profoundly, as Churchman has sufficiently proved by citing many instances of borrowings from the English poet, where resemblance in matters of detail is wholly conclusive; but it is another matter to assert that Espronceda was always Byronic or had no originality of his own.

In considering Espronceda's writings in detail, we need concern ourselves little with his dramatic and prose writings. The quickest road to literary celebrity was the writing of a successful play. Espronceda seems never to have completely relinquished the hope of achieving such a success. His first attempt was a three-act verse comedy, "Ni el Tío ni el Sobrino" (1834), written in collaboration with Antonio Ros de Olano. Larra censured it for its insipidity and lack of plan. A more ambitious effort was "Amor venga sus agravios" (1838), written in collaboration with Eugenio Moreno López. This was a five-act costume play, in prose, portraying the life at the court of Philip IV. It was produced without regard to expense, but with indifferent success. Espronceda's most ambitious play was never staged, and has only recently become easily accessible: this was "Blanca de Borbón," a historical drama of the times of Peter the Cruel in five acts, in verse. The first two acts were written in Espronceda's early Classic manner; the last three, written at a later period, are Romantic in tone. The influence of "Macbeth" is apparent. "Blanca de Borbón" could never be a success on the stage. The verse, too, is not worthy of the author. Espronceda was too impetuous a writer to comply with the restrictions of dramatic technique. The dramatic passages in "El Estudiante de Salamanca" and "El Diablo Mundo" are his best compositions in dialogue.

"Sancho Saldaña" is Espronceda's most important prose work. It is a historical novel of the thirteenth century, written frankly in imitation of Walter Scott's Waverley Novels. The romance contains many tiresome descriptions of scenery, and drags along tediously as most old-fashioned novels did. But Espronceda had none of Sir Walter's archaeological erudition, none of his ability to seize the characteristics of an epoch, and above all none of his skill as a creator of interesting characters. The personages in "Sancho Saldaña" fail to interest. The most that can be said of the work is that among the numerous imitations of Scott's novels which appeared at the time it is neither the best nor the worst. Of his shorter prose works only two, "De Gibraltar a Lisboa, viaje histórico" and "Un Recuerdo," are easily accessible. They are vivid portrayals of certain episodes of his exile, and may still be read with interest. His most important polemical work is "El Ministerio Mendizábal" (Madrid, 1836). In this screed we find the fiery radical attacking as unsatisfactory the ultra-liberal Mendizábal. This and shorter political articles interest the historian and the biographer, but hardly count as literature. His rare attempts at literary criticism have even less value.

Espronceda shows true greatness only as a lyric poet. For spirit and perfection of form what could be more perfect than the "Canción del Pirata"? Like Byron in the "Corsair," he extols the lawless liberty of the buccaneer. Byron was here his inspiration rather than Hugo. The "Chanson de Pirates" cannot stand comparison with either work. But Espronceda's indebtedness to Byron was in this case very slight. He has made the theme completely his own. "El Mendigo" and "El Canto del Cosaco," both anarchistic in sentiment, were inspired by Béranger. Once more Espronceda has improved upon his models, "Les Gueux" and "Le Chant du Cosaque." Compare Espronceda's refrain in the "Cossack Song" with Béranger's in the work which suggested it:

The "Canto del Cosaco" was a prime favorite with the revolutionary youth of Spain, who thundered out the "hurras" with telling effect. "El Reo de Muerte" and "El Verdugo" are in a similar vein, though much inferior. "Serenata," "A la Noche," "El Pescador" (reminiscent of Goethe), "A una Estrella," and "A una Rosa, soneto" are lighter works. They make up in grace what they lack in vigor. "El Himno al Sol" is the most perfect example of Espronceda's Classic manner, and is rightly considered one of his masterpieces. It challenges comparison with the Duque de Rivas' very similar poem. Of the numerous patriotic poems "Al Dos de Mayo" and "A la Patria" deserve especial mention. He attempted satire in "El Pastor Clasiquino," recently reprinted by Le Gentil from "El Artista." In this poem he assails academic poetry like that produced by his old fellow-academicians of the Myrtle. It betrays the peevishness of a Romanticist writing when Romanticism was already on the wane.

"El Diablo Mundo," Espronceda's most ambitious work, is commonly considered his masterpiece; an unfinished masterpiece, however. Even if death had spared him, it is doubtful if he could have finished so all-embracing a theme as he proposed:

Adam, hero of the epic, is introduced in Canto I as an aged scholar disillusioned with life, but dreading the proximity of Death, with whom he converses in a vision. The Goddess of Life grants him the youth of Faust and the immortality of the Wandering Jew. Unlike either, he has the physical and mental characteristics of an adult joined to the naïveté of a child. In Canto III Adam appears in a casa de huéspedes, naked and poor, oblivious of the past, without the use of language, with longings for liberty and action. Here his disillusionment begins. His nakedness shocks public morality; and the innocent Adam who is hostile to nobody, and in whom the brilliant spectacle of nature produces nothing but rejoicing, receives blows, stonings, and imprisonment from his neighbors. Childlike he touches the bayonet of one of his captors, and is wounded. This symbolizes the world's hostility to the innocent. In Canto IV we find Adam in prison. His teachers are criminals. He was born for good; society instructs him in evil. In Canto V he experiences love with the manola Salada, but sees in this passion nothing but impurity. He longs for higher things. Circumstances abase him to crime. He joins a band of burglars, and, falling in love with the lady whose house they are pillaging, protects her against the gang. In Canto VI he continues along his path of sorrow. He enters a house where a beautiful girl is dying, while in another room revelers are making merry. This leads him to speculate on life's mysteries and to reason for himself. The poem ends where Adam has become thoroughly sophisticated. He is now like any other man.

Evidently it was the poet's intention to make Adam go through a series of adventures in various walks of life, everywhere experiencing disillusionment. In spite of the elaborate prospectus quoted above, we may agree with Piñeyro that the poet started writing with only the haziest outline planned beforehand. Espronceda frankly reveals to us his methods of poetic composition:

And again:

"El Diablo Mundo" is no mere imitation of Byron's "Don Juan" and Goethe's "Faust," though the influence of each is marked. It has numerous merits and originalities of its own. Inferior as Espronceda is to Byron in wit and to Goethe in depth, he can vie with either as a harmonious versifier.

The philosophy of "El Diablo Mundo" is the commonplace pessimism of Romanticism. The following excerpt shows how the author's skepticism leads him to doubt his very doubts; hence his return to a questioning acceptance of Christianity:

Canto II of "El Diablo Mundo" consists of the poem "A Teresa. Descansa en Paz." This has not the slightest connection with the rest of the poem, and can only be understood as a separate unity. It is included in the present collection because it is the supreme expression of our poet's subjective method. As such it stands in excellent contrast to "El Estudiante de Salamanca," which is purely objective. No reader knows Espronceda who has read merely his objective poems. For self-revelation "A Jarifa en una Orgía" alone may be compared with "A Teresa." We may agree with Escosura that Espronceda is here giving vent to his rancor rather than to his grief, that it is the menos hidalgo of all his writings. But for once we may be sure that the poet is writing under the stress of genuine emotion. For once he is free from posing.

"THE STUDENT OF SALAMANCA"

"El Estudiante de Salamanca" represents the synthesis of two well-known Spanish legends, the Don Juan Tenorio legend and the Miguel Mañara legend. The first of these may be briefly stated as follows: Don Juan Tenorio was a young aristocrat of Seville famous for his dissolute life, a gambler, blasphemer, duelist, and seducer of women. Among numerous other victims, he deceives Doña Ana de Ulloa, daughter of the Comendador de Ulloa. The latter challenges Don Juan to a duel, and falls. Later Don Juan enters the church where the Commander lies buried and insults his stone statue, after which he invites the statue to sup with him that night. At midnight Don Juan and his friends are making merry when a knock is heard at the door and the stone guest enters. Don Juan, who does not lose his bravery even in the presence of the supernatural, plays the host, maintaining his air of insulting banter. At the end of the evening the guest departs, offering to repay the hospitality the following night if Don Juan will visit his tomb at midnight. Though friends try to dissuade him, Don Juan fearlessly accepts the invitation. At the appointed hour he visits the tomb. Flames emerge from it, and Don Juan pays the penalty of his misdeeds, dying without confession.

This is the outline of the story as told by Tirso de Molina in "El Burlador de Sevilla o el Convidado de Piedra." The same theme has been treated by Molière, Goldoni, Mozart, Byron, and Zorrilla, to mention but a few of the hundreds of writers who have utilized it. In the hands of non-Spanish writers the character of Don Juan loses the greater part of its essential nobility. To them Don Juan is the type of libertine and little more. He was a prime favorite with those Romanticists who, like Gautier, felt "Il est indécent et mauvais ton d'être vertueux." But as conceived in Spain Don Juan's libertinage is wholly subsidiary and incidental. He is a superman whose soaring ambition mounts so high that earth cannot satisfy it. The bravest may be permitted to falter in the presence of the supernatural; but Don Juan fears neither heaven nor hell. His bravery transcends all known standards, and this one virtue, though it does not save him from hell, redeems him in popular esteem.

Don Félix de Montemar is the typical Don Juan type, a libertine, gambler, blasphemer, heartless seducer, but superhumanly brave. Yet the plot of Espronceda's poem bears closer resemblance to the story told of Miguel Mañara.

Miguel Mañara (often erroneously spelled Maraña) Vicentelo de Leca (1626-1679) was an alderman (veintecuatro) of Seville and a knight of Calatrava. As a youth his character resembled that of Don Juan. One day some hams sent to him from the country were intercepted by the customs. He started out to punish the offending officers, but on the way repented and thenceforth led a virtuous life. In 1661, after his wife's death, he entered the Hermandad de la Caridad, later becoming superior of that order. In his will he endowed the brotherhood with all his wealth and requested that he be buried under the threshold of the chapel of San Jorge. His sole epitaph was to be "Here repose the bones and ashes of the worst man who ever existed in the world." Don Miguel's biography was written by his friend the Jesuit Juan de Cardeñas and was added to by Diego López de Haro, "Breve relación de la muerte, de la vida y virtudes de Don Miguel de Mañara," Seville, 1680.

There soon sprang up a legend around the name of Mañara. He is said to have fallen in love with the statue on the Giralda tower. On one occasion the devil gave him a light for his cigar, reaching across the Guadalquivir to do so. Again, he pursued a woman into the very cathedral, forcibly pulled aside her mantilla and discovered a skeleton. Yet more surprising, he was present, when still alive, at his own funeral in the Church of Santiago. But these stories associated with the name of Mañara are much older than he. Antonio de Torquemada, "Jardín de Flores Curiosas," Salamanca, 1570, tells of an unnamed knight who fell in love with a nun. He enters her convent with false keys only to find a funeral in progress. On inquiring the name of the deceased, he is told that it is himself. He then runs home pursued by two devils in the form of dogs who tear him to pieces after he has made pious repentance. Cristóbal Bravo turned this story into verse, Toledo, 1572. One or other of these versions appears to have been the source of Zorrilla's "El Capitán Montoya." Gaspar Cristóbal Lozano, "Soledades de la Vida y Desengaños del Mundo" (Madrid, 1663), tells the same story, and is the first to name hero and heroine, Lisardo and Teodora. Lozano, too, is the first to make the male protagonist a Salamanca student. Lozano's version inspired two ballads entitled "Lisardo el Estudiante de Córdova." These were reprinted by Durán, Romancero general, Vol. I, pp. 264-268, where they are readily accessible.

This ballad of Lisardo the Student of Cordova was undoubtedly Espronceda's main source in writing "The Student of Salamanca," and to it he refers in line 2 with the words antiguas historias cuentan. Yet the indebtedness was small. Espronceda took from the ballad merely the idea of making the hero of the adventure a Salamanca student, and the episode of a man witnessing his own funeral. Needless to say Espronceda's finished versification owed nothing to the halting meter of the original. Lisardo, a Salamanca student, though a native of Cordova, falls in love with Teodora, sister of a friend, Claudio. Teodora is soon to become a nun. One night he makes love to her and is only mildly rebuked. But a ghostly swordsman warns him that he will be slain if he does not desist. Nevertheless he continues his wooing in spite of the fact that Teodora has become a nun. She agrees to elope. While on his way to the convent to carry out this design, his attention is attracted by a group of men attacking an individual. This individual proves to be himself, Lisardo. Lisardo, then, witnesses his own murder and subsequent funeral obsequies. This warning is too terrible not to heed. He gives over his attempt at seduction and leads an exemplary life.

There are many other examples in the literature of Spain of the man who sees his own funeral. Essentially the same story is told by Lope de Vega, "El Vaso de Elección. San Pablo." Bévotte thinks that Mérimée in "Les Ames du purgatoire" was the first to combine the Don Juan and the Miguel de Mañara legends, so closely alike in spirit, into a single work. But Said Armesto finds this fusion already accomplished in a seventeenth-century play, "El Niño Diablo." Dumas owed much to Mérimée in writing his allegorical play "Don Juan de Maraña," first acted April 30, 1836. This became immediately popular in Spain. A mutilated Spanish version appeared, Tarragona, 1838, Imprenta de Chuliá. It is doubtful whether Espronceda owes anything to either of these French works, although both works contain gambling scenes very similar to that in which Don Félix de Montemar intervened. In the Dumas play Don Juan stakes his mistress in a game, as Don Félix did his mistress's portrait. It seems likely that Espronceda derived his whole inspiration for this scene from Moreto's "San Franco de Sena," which he quotes.

The legend of the man who sees his own funeral belongs to the realm of folk-lore. Like superstitions are to be found wherever the Celtic race has settled. In Spain they are especially prevalent in Galicia and Asturias. There the estantigua or "ancient enemy" appears to those soon to die. These spirits, or almas en pena, appear wearing winding-sheets, bearing candles, a cross, and a bier on which a corpse is lying. Don Quijote in attacking the funeral procession probably thought he had to do with the estantigua. Furthermore, Said Armesto in his illuminating study "La Leyenda de Don Juan" proves that the custom of saying requiem masses for the living was very ancient in Spain. One recalls, too, how Charles V in his retirement at Yuste rehearsed his own funeral, actually entering the coffin while mass was being said.

Of all Espronceda's poems "El Estudiante de Salamanca" is the most popular. It has a unity and completeness lacking in both the "Pelayo" and "El Diablo Mundo." Every poet of the time was busy composing leyendas. Espronceda attempted this literary form but once, yet of all the numerous "legends" written in Spain this is the most fitted to survive. Nowhere else has the poet shown equal virtuosity in the handling of unusual meters. Nowhere among his works is there greater variety or harmony of verse. Though not the most serious, this is the most pleasing of his poems. Espronceda follows the Horatian precept of starting his story "in the middle of things." In the first part he creates the atmosphere of the uncanny, introduces the more important characters, and presents a striking situation. Part Second, the most admired, is elegiac in nature. It pleases by its simple melancholy. This part and the dramatic tableau of Part Three explain the cause of the duel with which Part One begins. Part Four resumes the thread of the narration where it was broken off in Part One, and ends with the Dance of Death which forms the climax of the whole. The character of Don Félix de Montemar is vigorously drawn. Originality cannot be claimed for it, as it is the conventional Don Juan Tenorio type. The character of Doña Elvira hardly merits the high praise of Spanish critics. She is a composite portrait of Ophelia, Marguerite, and two of Byron's characters, Doña Julia and Haidée, a shadowy, unreal creation, as ghostly in life as in death. "The Student of Salamanca" tells a story vigorously and sweetly. It does not abound in quotable passages like the "Diablo Mundo." It is neither philosophic nor introspective. It teaches no lesson. Its merit is its perfection of form.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

The best biography of Espronceda is that of José Cascales y Muñoz, "D. José de Espronceda, su época, su vida y sus obras," Madrid, 1914. This is an expansion of the same author's "Apuntes y Materiales para la Biografía de Espronceda," Revue hispanique, Vol. XXIII, pp. 5-108. See also a shorter article by the same author in La España Moderna, Vol. CCXXXIV, pp. 27-48. Less critical, but useful, is Antonio Cortón, "Espronceda," Madrid, 1906. The very uncritical book by E. Rodríguez Solís, "Espronceda: su tiempo, su vida y sus obras," Madrid, 1883, is chiefly valuable now as the best source for Espronceda's parliamentary speeches. J. Fitzmaurice-Kelly's "Espronceda," The Modern Language Review, Vol. IV, pp, 20-39, is admirable as a biography and a criticism, though partially superseded by later works containing the results of new discoveries. P.H. Churchman, "Byron and Espronceda," Revue hispanique, Vol. XX, pp. 5-210, gives a short biography, though the study is in the main a penetrating investigation of Espronceda's sources. E. Piñeyro has written two articles on Espronceda: "Poetas Famosos del Siglo XIX," Madrid, 1883, and "El Romanticismo en España," Paris, 1904. This last was first printed in the Bulletin hispanique for 1903. The older biography of D.A. Ferrer del Río, "Galería de la Literatura," Madrid, 1846, still has a certain value; but the most important source for Espronceda's youthful adventures is "El Discurso del Excmo. Señor D. Patricio de la Escosura, individuo de número de la Academia Española, leído ante esta corporación en la sesión pública inaugural de 1870," Madrid, 1870. This matter is expanded in five very important articles which appeared in "La Ilustración Española y Americana" for 1876 (February 8, February 22, June 22, July 8, September 22), partially reproduced in the book of Cascales y Muñoz. See also López Núñez, "José de Espronceda, Biografía Anecdótica," Madrid, 1917 and A. Donoso, "La Juventud de Espronceda," Revista Chilena, July, 1917. The best study of Espronceda's philosophy is Bonilla y San Martín's, "El Pensamiento de Espronceda," La España Moderna, Vol. CCXXXIV. For a recent short article see Cejador y Frauca, "Historia de la Lengua y Literatura Castellana," VII, Madrid, 1917, PP. 177-185.

The best bibliography of Espronceda's writings is that of Churchman, "An Espronceda Bibliography," Revue hispanique, XVII, pp. 741-777. This should be supplemented by reference to Georges Le Gentil, "Les Revues littéraires de l'Espagne pendant la première moitié du XIXe siècle," Paris, 1909. The least bad edition of Espronceda's poems is "Obras Poéticas y Escritos en Prosa," Madrid, 1884. (The second volume, which was to contain the prose writings, never appeared.) See also the "Obras Poéticas de Espronceda," Valladolid, 1900, and "Espronceda," Barcelona, 1906. Also "Páginas Olvidadas de Espronceda," Madrid, 1873. There has been a recent reprint of "Sancho Saldaña," Madrid, 1914, Repullés. Churchman has published "Blanca de Borbón," Revue hispanique, Vol. XVII, and also "More Inedita" in the same volume. There is said to be an English translation of "The Student of Salamanca," London, 1847. An excellent French version is that of R. Foulché-Delbosc, "L'Étudiant de Salamanque," Paris, 1893. Mary J. Serrano has made splendid translations of "The Pirate" and "To Spain: An Elegy," Warner's Library of the World's Best Literature, Vol. XIV.

For a very full treatment and bibliography of the Don Juan Tenorio legend see G.G. de Bévotte, "La Légende de Don Juan," Paris, 1911. Also Farinelli, Giornale Storico, XXVII, and "Homenaje a Menéndez y Pelayo," Vol. I, p. 295; A.L. Stiefel, Jahresberichte für neuere deutsche Litteraturgeschichte, 1898-1899, Vol. I, 7, pp. 74-79.

NOTES ON ESPRONCEDA'S
VERSIFICATION

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS

To enjoy the work of so musical an artist as Espronceda, the student must be able to read his verse in the original. This cannot be done without some knowledge of the rules which govern the writing of Spanish poetry. It therefore becomes necessary to give some account of the elementary principles of Spanish prosody. This is not the place for a complete treatment of the subject: only so much will be attempted as is necessary for the intelligent comprehension of our author's writings. A knowledge of English prosody will hinder rather than help the student; for the Spanish poet obeys very different laws from those which govern the writer of English verse.

The two essentials of Spanish poetry are (1) a fixed number of syllables in each verse (by verse we mean a single line of poetry); (2) a rhythmical arrangement of the syllables within the verse. Rime and assonance are hardly less important, but are not strictly speaking essential.

SYLLABLE-COUNTING

FINAL SYLLABLES

When a verse is stressed on the final syllable, it is called a verso agudo or masculine verse.

When a verse is stressed on the next to the last syllable, it is called a verso llano or feminine verse.

When a verse is stressed on the second from the last syllable, the antepenult, it is called a verso esdrújulo.

For the sake of convenience, the verso llano is considered the normal verse. Thus, in an eight-syllable verse of this type the final stress always falls on the seventh syllable, in a six- syllable verse on the fifth syllable, etc., always one short of the last. In the case of the verso agudo, where the final stress falls on the final syllable, a verse having actually seven syllables would nevertheless be counted as having eight. One syllable is always added in counting the syllables of a verso agudo, and, contrariwise, one is always subtracted from the total number of actual syllables in a verso esdrújulo. These three kinds of verses are frequently used together in the same strophe (copla or stanza) and held to be of equal length. Thus:

Theoretically these are all five-syllable verses. The first is a verso llano, the normal verse. It alone has five syllables. The second is a verso esdrújulo. It actually has six syllables, but theoretically is held to have five. The third is a verso agudo. It actually has but four syllables, but in theory is designated a five-syllable verse. All three verses agree in having the final stress fall upon the fourth syllable.

It would be simpler if, following the French custom, nothing after the final stress were counted; but Spaniards prefer to consider normal the verse of average length. It follows from this definition that a monosyllabic verse is an impossibility in Spanish. Espronceda writes:

He is not here dropping from dissyllabic to monosyllabic verse, but the last verse too must be considered a line of two syllables.

Espronceda never uses a measure of more than twelve syllables in the selections included in this book. Serious poets never attempt anything longer than a verse of sixteen syllables.

DIPHTHONGIZATION

Spanish vowels are divided into two classes: the strong vowels, a, o, e, and the weak vowels, u, i. According to the Academy rules, followed by most grammarians, there can be no diphthongization of two strong vowels in the proper pronunciation of prose; only when a strong unites with a weak or two weaks unite can diphthongization take place. In verse, on the other hand, diphthongization of two strong vowels is not only allowable but common. This would probably not be the case if the same thing did not have considerable justification in colloquial practice. As a matter of fact we frequently hear ahora pronounced áora with diphthongization and shift of stress.

Of the three strong vowels, a is "dominant" over o and e; o is dominant over e; and any one of the three is dominant over u or i. A dominant vowel is one which has the power of attracting to itself the stress which, except for diphthongization, would fall on the other vowel with which it unites. The vowel losing the stress is called the "absorbed" vowel. This principle, which we find exemplified in the earliest poetic monuments of the language, must be thoroughly understood by the student of modern Spanish verse.

SYNERESIS

Syneresis is the uniting of two or three vowels, each of which is ordinarily possessed of full syllabic value, into a diphthong or a triphthong, thereby reducing the number of syllables in the word; h does not interfere with syneresis. Thus, aérea is normally a word of four syllables. In this verse it counts as three.

(The numbers in parentheses indicate the syllables in the verse. Remember that the figure represents the theoretical number of syllables in the line, and indicates the actual number only in the case of the verso llano. Furthermore, the figure has been determined by a comparison with adjacent lines in the same stanzas, verses which offer no metrical difficulties.) So likewise in:

In the following we have double syneresis, and the word has but two syllables:

Examples of syneresis after the tonic stress:

Impio, usually impío, is one of a number of words admitting of two stresses. Such are called words of double accentuation. The principle is different from that governing the stress-shift explained above. The word has its ordinary value in the following:

Examples of syneresis before the tonic stress:

Examples of syneresis under stress:

In the first two examples there is no stress-shift. In the third, the stress travels from the o of Ahora to the initial a. In the following example ahora has three syllables:

The rule regarding syneresis under stress is that it is allowable, with or without resulting stress-shift, except when the combinations éa, éo, óa, are involved. Espronceda violates the rule in this instance:

This is a peculiarly violent and harsh syneresis. The stress shifts from the first e to the a, giving a pronunciation very different from that of the usual véame. Such a syneresis is more pardonable at the beginning of a verse than in any other position; but good modern poets strive to avoid such harshnesses. Espronceda sometimes makes río monosyllabic:

In the poetry of the Middle Ages and Renaissance such pronunciations as teniá for tenía are common.

DIERESIS

Dieresis is the breaking up of vowel-combinations in such a way as to form an additional syllable in the word. It is the opposite of syneresis. Dieresis never occurs in the case of the diphthongs ie and ue derived from Latin (e), and (o), in words like tierra, bueno, etc. Uá and uó are regularly dissyllabic except after c, g, and j. Examples:

The same word without dieresis:

In certain words, such as cruel, metrical custom preserves a pronunciation in which the adjacent vowels have separate syllabic value. Traditional grammar, represented by the Academy, asserts that such is the correct pronunciation of these words to this day; but the actual speech of the best speakers diphthongizes these vowels, and their separation in poetry must rank as a dieresis. In printing poetry it is customary to print the mark of dieresis on many words in which dieresis is regular as well as on those in which it is exceptional.

SYNALEPHA

Synalepha is the combining into one syllable of two or more adjacent vowels or diphthongs of different words. It is the same phenomenon as syneresis extended beyond the single word. H does not prevent synalepha. The number of synalephas possible in a single verse is theoretically limited only by the number of syllables in that verse. A simple instance:

The number of vowels entering into a synalepha is commonly two or three; rarely four, and, by a tour de force, even five:

Synalepha is not prevented by any mark of punctuation separating the two words nor by the caesural pause (see below). In dramatic verse a synalepha may even be divided between two speakers. In the short lines of "El Mendigo," Espronceda mingles four- with five-syllable verses. But as the five-syllable verses begin with vowels and the preceding four-syllable verses end with vowels, the former sound no longer than the rest. In very short lines synalepha may occur between one verse and another following it. See also line 1389 of "El Estudiante de Salamanca."

1. The simplest case is where both vowels entering into synalepha occur in unstressed syllables:

When the two vowels coming together are identical, as here, they fuse into a single sound (s'escuchan), with only a slight gain in the quantity of the vowel. Se here has no individual accent in the stress-group. Where the vowels in synalepha are different, each is sounded, but the stronger or more dominant is the one more distinctly heard:

2. The second case is where the vowel or diphthong ending the first word in the synalepha bears the stress, and the initial vowel or diphthong of the second word is unstressed. Examples which do not involve stress-shift:

(He is without stress in the group.)

In the following examples stress-shift occurs, because the unstressed vowel is dominant while the stressed vowel is absorbed. Such stress-shifts as these are sanctioned only when they do not coincide with a strong rhythmic stress (see below) in the verse. They are less offensive at the beginning than at the end:

The following are disagreeably harsh:

3. The third case is where the second vowel or diphthong bears the stress, while the first is unstressed:

In cases like these we are dealing with a form of synalepha which, if not true elision, approaches it closely. According to Benot, the pronunciation is not quite d'ópalo, but "there is an attempt at elision." In other words, the second vowel or diphthong, if dominant, so predominates over the first that it is scarcely audible. Under this case, too, there may arise stress-shift:

This is a very bad verse. But such instances are rare in Espronceda and good modern poets. They are never sanctioned in connection with a strong rhythmic stress. In such a case hiatus (see below) is favored as the lesser of two evils.

4. The fourth case is where each of the two vowels bears the stress:

What happens here is that one of the two stresses becomes subordinate to the other, the stress being wholly assumed by the more dominant of the two.

Where three or more vowels unite in a synalepha, two things must be borne in mind: (1) Stress-shift is not harsh to the Spanish ear, and is always permissible, if more than two vowels are involved. This is Espronceda's justification in the following:

(2) The vowels of three words may not combine if the middle word is y, e, he, o, or u. Examples:

There is one case in the text where he as middle word does enter into synalepha, but this is merely the fusion of three identical vowels:

HIATUS

Hiatus is the breaking up into two syllables of vowel combinations in adjacent words capable of entering into synalepha. It is an extension to the word-group of dieresis, which applies only to a single word.

Many authorities on Spanish versification recognize as hiatus various cases which should not be so classified. In words like yo, yerro, hierro, huevo, etc., the first phonetic element is in each case a semi-vowel, and these semi-vowels have the value of consonants in the words cited. To classify the following as examples of hiatus is to be phonetically unsound:

In none of these cases could there possibly be synalepha. Consequently by definition there can be no hiatus.

Hiatus most frequently occurs to avoid the greater cacophony which would arise from stress-shift under case 3 of synalepha:

Lack of hiatus would here produce a stress-shift resulting in an unharmonious stressing of two successive syllables.

The same principle applies here as in the above, except that the effect would be even worse, because the stress shift would come under the rhythmic stress. (See below.)

Probably to give the pronominal adjective greater emphasis.

Probably to avoid two successive stresses, though possibly there may be dieresis in mansión.

Again to avoid stress-shift under the rhythmic stress.

In these two examples instead of hiatus there is synalepha with stress-shift, but we have to do with case 2 of synalepha, not case 3.

In some instances hiatus seems to occur for no other reason than to preserve the verse-measure:

In general hiatus is most likely to occur before the principal rhythmic stress in a verse; that is, before the final stress.

RHYTHM, RHYTHMIC STRESS, THE CAESURAL PAUSE

In English poetry the foot, rather than the syllable, is the unit. The number of feet to a verse is fixed, but the number of syllables varies. In Spanish poetry the number of syllables to a verse is fixed, subject only to the laws of syllable-counting given above. But if in this respect the Spanish poet has less freedom than the English versifier, he has infinitely greater liberty in the arrangement of his rhythms. The sing-song monotony of regularly recurring beats is intolerable to Latin ears. The greater flexibility of Spanish rhythm can best be shown by illustrations:

Having chosen to write this poem in the anapestic tetrameter, Byron never varies the rhythm except to substitute an occasional iambic at the beginning of a verse:

Notice how much more freely Espronceda handles this meter in Spanish:

The first of these stanzas has the true Byronic swing. But note how freely the rhythm is handled in the second. Spanish rhythm is so flexible and free that little practical advantage is gained by counting feet. We distinguish only two sorts of verse-measure, the binary, where in general there is stress on one syllable out of two—that is there are trochees (__' __) or iambics (__ __') in the verse, or the two intermingled—and second the ternary measure, where one of a group of three syllables receives the stress. Such a verse is made up of dactyls (__' __ __), anapests (__ __ __'), or amphibrachs (__ __' __), or some combination of these. Of course, a three-syllable foot is often found in binary verse, and, vice versa a two-syllable foot in ternary measure. By binary verse we mean only a form of verse in which the twofold measure predominates, and by ternary one in which the threefold measure predominates. The extract last quoted is an example of ternary verse. The following will serve as a specimen of the binary movement:

Every word in Spanish has its individual word-accent: habí'a, habla'do. Now if we join these two words in a phrase, habí'a habla'do, we note that while each of the words still retains its individual word-accent, hablado is more strongly stressed than había. In addition to its word-accent hablado bears what we term a phrase-accent. In any line of verse some of the word-stresses are stronger than others, and these stronger stresses are termed rhythmic stresses. They correspond to the phrase-stresses of prose. The principal rhythmic stress is the last stress of the line. In general the rhythmic stress must coincide with a word-stress. It always does except where stress-shift comes into play. We have already seen that a stress-shift coinciding with the rhythmic stress is intolerable, and hiatus is preferred. It is very unharmonious for two stresses to fall together at the end of a verse:

This is a very bad verse, because a is dominant over é and brings about stress-shift, and the two consecutive syllables a and ver are both stressed. The result is unharmonious. A syllable bearing stress and standing immediately before the final stress is called an obstructing syllable (una sílaba obstruccionista). Every effort is made by a good poet to avoid such a cacophony. The above is a good example of one. I have emended llegué to llegue in the text.

A short verse can easily be spoken without pause, but above ten syllables it becomes necessary for the reader to rest somewhere within the line. The resting-place is called the caesural pause. The longer the verse, the greater its importance. It does not prevent synalepha. The stress immediately before the caesura must be the second most important rhythmic stress of the verse.

RIME AND ASSONANCE

The regularity of the beats in English verse is of itself sufficient to indicate when a line of poetry is ended, even though there be no rime to mark that end. Hence blank verse has been highly developed by English poets, and many, like Milton, have held it to be the noblest form of verse. Blank verse is impossible in French, because French with its lack of verbal stress has no other device than rime to mark the end of a verse. Without rime French blank verse would be indistinguishable from rhythmic prose. In Spanish the stress is not so heavy as in the Germanic languages, but, on the other hand, is much stronger than in French. Spanish blank verse is not unknown, but has never been cultivated with great success. It is evident that in this language too, lacking as it does regular rhythm in its versification, rime is much more necessary than in English. However, an occasional verso suelto, or blank verse, intermingled with rimed ones, is very common.

Two words rime with one another when there is identity of sound between the last stressed vowels and between any letters which may follow these vowels. Rime is masculine (in Spanish rima aguda) when the last syllables bear the stress: mal—cristal; or feminine when an unstressed vowel follows the stressed one (in Spanish rima llana): hermosura—locura. Inasmuch as b and v represent the same sound, they rime. The weak vowel of a diphthong is ignored for riming purposes; thus vuelo rimes with cielo. Good poets avoid obvious or easy rimes such as those yielded by flexional endings and suffixes. It is permissible to rime two identically-spelled words if they are in fact different words in meaning: ven (they see) rimes with vén (come).

Assonance is the identity of sound of two or more stressed vowels and the final following vowels, if there are any. In case consonants stand after the stressed vowel they are disregarded.

Assonance is of two sorts: single assonance (asonante agudo), están—va—parar—jamás, etc.; and double assonance (asonante llano), cuentan—tierra—dejan or coronada—gasa—baña. In assonanced verse the assonanced words end the even lines. The odd are usually blank, though sometimes rimed. A voz aguda cannot assonate with a voz llana, but there is no objection to the introduction of voces esdrújulas into asonante llano. In this case only the stressed and the final vowels of the esdrújula are counted; for example, América assonances with crea. When diphthongs enter into assonance, the weak vowel is ignored: pleita assonances with pliega.

Assonance is not unknown in English, especially in popular or folk verse; but we generally regard it as a faulty rime. Thus in the British national anthem we read:

"Over us" plainly assonates, rather than rimes, with "glorious," but this is dangerously close to doggerel. Assonance is unsuited to the genius of any language possessed of a rich vowel-system. This is evident to any one who has read Archbishop Trench's attempt to render Calderon's verse into English assonance.

STROPHES

I shall not attempt to list the innumerable verse-forms to be found in Spanish poetry, but shall only indicate the forms used by Espronceda in the selections contained in this volume. Some of these are fixed and conventional, and others are of his own contrivance. Spanish uses the terms estrofa and copla to designate an arrangement of verses in a stanza. Copla must not be confused with English "couplet." These are general terms; most verse-forms are designated by special names. The following verse-forms are found in the selections contained in this book:

"EL ESTUDIANTE DE SALAMANCA"

Lines 1-40. Ballad meter or verso de romance (8 syllables) with assonance in é-a.

Lines 41-48. Verso de romance with assonance in ó.

Lines 49-63. Irregular 3-syllable meter with assonance in ó occurring irregularly; lines 53 and 55 rime, and 59 and 61 assonate in é-a.

Lines 64-75. Verso de romance with assonance in ó.

Lines 76-99. Quatrains or cuartetas of 12-syllable verse; rime-scheme abab (this arrangement of the rime is called rima cruzada); alternation of masculine and feminine rime.

Lines 100-139. Octavillas italianas (8-syllable verse); lines 2 and 3, 6 and 7, 4 and 8 rime; lines 1 and 5 either assonate or are blank (sueltos).

Lines 140-179. Octavas reales (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme abababcc; the rimes must be feminine.

Lines 180-257. Verso de romance, printed in the form of cuartetas; assonance in á-a.

Lines 258-302. Quintillas (8-syllable verse); the rime-scheme varies; the rule is that there shall be two rimes to a quintilla, and the same rime must not occur in three consecutive verses.

Lines 303-330. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme abab; occasionally assonance replaces rime in the even verses.

Lines 331-338. Octava real.

Lines 339-370. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse).

Lines 371-418. Octavas reales.

Lines 419-434. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse).

Lines 435-454. Verso de romance, printed as cuartetas; assonance in á.

Lines 455-558. Redondillas (8-syllable verse); rime-scheme abba; this arrangement of rimes is called versos pareados en el centro.

Lines 559-578. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse); rima cruzada.

Lines 579-590. Redondillas.

Lines 591-600. Décima (8-syllable verse); rime-scheme abbaaccddc.

Lines 601-692. Redondillas.

Lines 693-792. Cuartetas (12-syllable verse); odd verses rime; the even either form a masculine rime or are in assonance.

Lines 793-820. Cuartetas (8-syllable verse); the rime-scheme varies: some coplas are redondillas; others have the crossed rime.

Lines 821-884. Cuartetas of 12-syllable verse resumed; same rime-scheme as above.

Lines 885-894. Quintillas (8-syllable verse); rime-scheme abaab.

Lines 895-910. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme either abba or abab.

Lines 911-938. Cuartetas of 12-syllable verse; rime-scheme abab; even verses form either a masculine rime or assonance.

Lines 939-942. Cuarteta (11-syllable verse); even verses in assonance; the odd verses rime.

Lines 943-961. Irregular meter (6-syllable verse); a mixture of rime, assonance, and blank verse.

Lines 962-1033. Verso de romance; assonance in á.

Lines 1034-1063. Quintillas.

Lines 1064-1115. Cuartetas (12-syllable verse); rime in the odd verses; assonance or masculine rime in the even.

Lines 1116-1145. Quintillas.

Lines 1146-1149. Cuarteta (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme abab.

Lines 1150-1164. Quintillas.

Lines 1165-1196. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme abab; feminine rime.

Lines 1197-1364. Octavas reales.

Lines 1365-1384. Quintillas.

Lines 1385-1390. Irregular blending of 2-and 3-syllable meter; assonance and rime; the crescendo effect begins here.

Lines 1391-1399. Irregular 4-syllable meter; assonance and rime.

Lines 1400-1412. Irregular 5-syllable meter; assonance, rime, and blank verse.

Lines 1413-1439. Irregular 6-syllable meter; assonance, rime, blank verse.

Lines 1440-1447. Irregular 7-syllable meter; assonance, rime, blank verse.

Lines 1448-1469. Verso de romance; assonance in é-o.

Lines 1470-1485. Irregular 9-syllable meter; assonance in ó.

Lines 1486-1501. Cuartetas (10-syllable verse); rime-scheme abab; even verses assonate or form a masculine rime.

Lines 1502-1521. Cuartetas (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme abab; even verses assonate or form a masculine rime.

Lines 1522-1553. Cuartetas (12-syllable verse); rime-scheme abab; even verses assonate or form a masculine rime; the crescendo is now at its height.

Lines 1554-1569. Octavillas italianas (11-syllable verse); see above for description of this verse form.

Lines 1570-1585. Octavillas italianas (10-syllable verse).

Lines 1586-1601. Octavillas italianas (9-syllable verse).

Lines 1602-1617. Octavillas italianas (8-syllable verse).

Lines 1618-1633. Octavillas italianas (7-syllable verse).

Lines 1634-1649. Octavillas italianas (6-syllable verse).

Lines 1650-1661. An irregular 12-verse stanza of 5-syllable verse in which verses 3 and 4, 8 and 9 rime as couplets; 6 and 12 also rime; the other verses are blank.

Lines 1662-1669. Variant of the octavilla italiana; 4-syllable verse; verse 6 is blank instead of 5.

Lines 1670-1677. Octavilla italiana; 3-syllable verse; rime-scheme normal.

Lines 1678-1680. Irregular meter of 2-syllable verse; rime and blank; the diminuendo effect ends here.

Lines 1681-1704. Octavas reales.

"CANCIÓN DEL PIRATA"

Lines 1-16. Octavillas italianas (8-syllable verse).

Lines 17-22. Sextina (8-syllable verse, except that verse 2 is a verso quebrado or "broken verse" of 4 syllables). The sextina admits of the greatest variety of form; those in this poem are all of the same pattern; rime-scheme abaccb.

Lines 23-30. Octavilla italiana (4-syllable verse).

Lines 31-34. Cuarteta (8-syllable verse); verses 1 and 3 are blank; 2 and 4 assonate.

Lines 35-40. Sextina.

Lines 41-48. Octavilla italiana, same as above.

Lines 50-55. Sextina.

Lines 56-63. Octavilla italiana.

Lines 65-70. Sextina.

Lines 71-78. Octavilla italiana.

Lines 80-85. Sextina.

Lines 86-93. Octavilla italiana.

Lines 94-97. Cuarteta.

"EL CANTO DEL COSACO"

This poem is written in cuartetas of 11-syllable verse with rima cruzada. Verses 1 and 3 rime and 2 and 4 assonate, except in the refrain, where 1 and 3 are blank.

"EL MENDIGO"

Lines 1-4. Cuarteta (11-syllable verse); verses 1 and 3 are blank; 2 and 4 assonate.

Lines 5-10. Sextina (8-syllable verse, except 2, the verso quebrado, which has 4 syllables); rime-scheme abcaac; the verso quebrado is blank.

Lines 11-28. Irregular 4-syllable meter; a wholly irregular arrangement of rime, assonance, and blank verse.

Lines 29-32. Irregular cuarteta of two 8-syllable verses followed by two of 11; verses 1 and 3 are blank; 2 and 4 assonate.

Lines 34-39. Sextina, same as above.

Lines 40-57. Irregular 4-syllable meter, same as above.

Lines 58-61. Cuarteta, same as the irregular one above.

Lines 63-68. Sextina, same as above.

Lines 69-88. Irregular 4-syllable meter, same as above.

Lines 89-92. Cuarteta, same as the irregular ones above.

Lines 94-99. Sextina, same as above.

Lines 100-117. Irregular 4-syllable meter, same as above.

Lines 118-121. Cuarteta, same as the irregular ones above.

Lines 122-125. Cuarteta, like the normal one above.

"SONETO"

Lines 1-14. Sonnet. 11-syllable verse. Rime-scheme abba, abba, cde, cde.

"A TERESA. DESCANSA EN PAZ"

Written throughout in octavas reales (11-syllable verse); rime-scheme abababcc.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

For a fuller treatment of Spanish prosody the student may profitably consult the following works:

BENOT. "Prosodía Castellana y Versificación," 3 vols., Madrid, no date.

ROBLES DÉGANO. "Ortología Clásica de la Lengua Castellana," Madrid, 1905.

BELLO. "Ortología y Arte Métrica" (Vol. 4 of "Obras Completas"), Madrid, 1890.

For more or less summary treatments of the subject the American student may profitably consult:

OLMSTED. "Legends, Tales, and Poems by Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer" (Ginn and Company).

FORD. "A Spanish Anthology" (Silver, Burdett and Company).

HILLS and MORLEY. "Modern Spanish Lyrics" (Henry Holt and Company).

"EL ESTUDIANTE DE SALAMANCA"
AND OTHER SELECTIONS
FROM ESPRONCEDA

CUENTO.

EL ESTUDIANTE DE SALAMANCA

PARTE PRIMERA

Sus fueros, sus bríos; sus premáticas, su
voluntad.—"Quijote", Parte Primera

PARTE SEGUNDA

No dirge except the hollow sea's
Mourns o'er the beauty of the Cyclades.
BYRON, "Don Juan," Canto 4

PARTE TERCERA

CUADRO DRAMÁTICO

SARGENTO
¿Tenéis más que parar?
FRANCO
                        Paro los ojos.
Los ojos, sí, los ojos: que descreo
Del que los hizo para tal empleo.
MORETO, "San Franco de Sena"

PERSONAS

D. FÉLIX DE MONTEMAR
D. DIEGO DE PASTRANA
SEIS JUGADORES

ESCENA I

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR TERCERO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

ESCENA II

JUGADOR PRIMERO (al que entra)

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

D. FÉLIX (con desdén)

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX (con altivez)

JUGADOR CUARTO (aparte)

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR TERCERO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

JUGADOR PRIMERO (a Don Félix)

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR PRIMERO (tomando el retrato)

JUGADOR CUARTO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR PRIMERO (mirando el retrato)

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR CUARTO

JUGADOR QUINTO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR QUINTO

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

(Todos se agrupan con ansiedad al rededor de la mesa. El tercer jugador tira los dados.)

JUGADOR CUARTO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

D. FÉLIX (con calma al primero)

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX (con cólera)

JUGADOR TERCERO

TODOS

D. FÉLIX (sosegado)

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

ESCENA III

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX (al tercer jugador sin hacer caso de Don Diego)

JUGADOR TERCERO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO (desembozándose con ira)

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX (con sarcasmo)

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

(Tira de la espada; todos los jugadores se interponen.)

TODOS

D. FÉLIX (con calma levantándose)

D. DIEGO (con furor reconcentrado y con la espada desnuda)

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO

D. FÉLIX

D. DIEGO (con voz solemne)

D. FÉLIX (sale tras de él, embolsándose el dinero con indiferencia)

ESCENA IV

LOS JUGADORES

JUGADOR PRIMERO

JUGADOR SEGUNDO

JUGADOR TERCERO

JUGADOR CUARTO

PARTE CUARTA

Salió, en fin, de aquel estado, para caer en el
dolor más sombrío, en la más desalentada desesperación
y en la mayor amargura y desconsuelo
que pueden apoderarse de este pobre corazón
humano, que tan positivamente choca y se quebranta
con los males, como con vaguedad aspira
en algunos momentos, casi siempre sin conseguirlo,
a tocar los bienes ligeramente y de pasada.—"La
protección de un sastre," novela original
por D. MIGUEL DE LOS SANTOS ÁLVAREZ

SPIRITUS QUIDEM PROMPTUS EST; CARO
VERO INFIRMA.—S. MARCOS, "Evangelio"

D. FÉLIX

D. FÉLIX

CANCIÓN DEL PIRATA

[Nota 1: Nombre que dan los Turcos a Constantinopla]

EL CANTO DEL COSACO

Donde sienta mi caballo los pies no vuelve
a nacer yerba.—Palabras de Átila

CORO

EL MENDIGO

SONETO

A TERESA
DESCANSA EN PAZ

Bueno es el mundo, ¡bueno! ¡bueno! ¡bueno!
Como de Dios al fin obra maestra,
Por todas partes de delicias lleno,
De que Dios ama al hombre hermosa muestra;
Salga la voz alegre de su seno
A celebrar esta vivienda nuestra;
¡Paz a los hombres! ¡gloria en las alturas!
¡Cantad en vuestra jaula, crïaturas!
DON MIGUEL DE LOS SANTOS ÁLVAREZ, "María"

NOTES

EL ESTUDIANTE DE SALAMANCA

PARTE PRIMERA

Instead of Cuento, later editions read Leyendas.

The introductory quotation is taken from the "Don Quijote," Part I, chap. 45. The words were addressed by Don Quijote to members of the rural police who were arresting him for depredations committed on the highway. The full sentence in Ormsby's translation reads: "Who was he that did not know that knights-errant are independent of all jurisdictions, that their law is their sword, their charter their prowess, and their edicts their will?" This Spanish declaration of independence was frequently used as a slogan by the Romanticists. Espronceda is here making the quotation apply more particularly to his lawless hero.

1. Era más de media noche: the poet begins with a characteristic Romantic landscape, gloomy, medieval, fantastic, uncanny. He is trying to create a mood of horror. He follows the Horatian precept of beginning the plot in the middle (in medias res). The situation here introduced is not resumed until Part Four is reached. Parts Two and Three supply the events leading up to the duel. The Duque de Rivas's "Candil" begins in similar fashion:

This was first published in "El Liceo," 1838. The Duque de Rivas may have been influenced by our text, but such introductions were a Romantic commonplace. See M. Fernández y González, "Crónicas romanescas de España. Don Miguel de Mañara, memorias del tiempo de Carlos V," Paris, 1868. The story begins "Era la media noche"; and, later, "Hacía mucho tiempo que Sevilla estaba entregada al sueño y al silencio." Espronceda is here following his sources closely.

2. antiguas historias: not a mere rhetorical statement. These old stories actually existed. See the study of sources in the Introduction.

4. lóbrego: I follow the reading of the 1840 edition. Later editions changed to lóbrega, making the adjective agree with tierra instead of silencio. Either reading makes good sense, but in cases of doubt I follow the Editio Princeps.

11. fantasmas: this noun is usually masculine, but is often feminine in popular speech. The distinction between the masculine and feminine meanings given in most dictionaries does not apply in Espronceda. He uses both genders indifferently.

19. sábados: Saturday was the usual day when, according to popular belief, witches attended their yearly aquelarre or sabbath. The favorite meeting-place for Spanish witches was said to be the plain around Barahona (Soria).

27. gótico: admiration for the Gothic was a characteristic of Romanticism.

37. Salamanca: the famous university city of Spain. Its founding antedates the Carthaginians and the Romans. The university of Palencia was transferred to Salamanca by Fernando III in 1239. Neither the university nor the city retains much of its ancient importance. See Gustave Reynier, "La Vie universitaire dans l'ancienne Espagne," Paris, 1902.

38. armas y letras: these words summarize the Renaissance ideal of culture. The perfect gentleman must combine literature and arms. Letters were not considered to be apart from active life. Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Quevedo, and many others of Spain's great writers of the classic period exemplify this ideal.

53. embozado: to avoid breathing the cool mountain air of his country, a Spaniard frequently draws the corner of his cape over his face, concealing it. He is then embozado, 'muffled.' When a woman is heavily veiled she is tapada. This national custom has been effectively used by Spanish poets, novelists, and dramatists. It offered a plausible excuse for the concealment or confusion of identity.

64. calle: this word is the object of atraviesa, l. 72.

65. la calle del Ataúd: this dismal name does not seem to be of Espronceda's own invention. It is found in José Gutiérrez de la Vega's "Don Miguel de Mañara," 1851. Espronceda probably used some earlier edition of the prose romance of Don Miguel de Mañara.

96. que: a relative adverb used with the force of a genitive Translate 'whose.'

100. Segundo Don Juan Tenorio: see the Introduction.

PARTE SEGUNDA

The quotation is taken from Byron's "Don Juan," Canto IV, stanza 72, the description of Haidée's tomb. I restore the first two words, omitted in all previous editions, without which the passage is devoid of meaning. The way in which this passage has been garbled was pointed out by Piñeyro, "El Romanticismo en España," Paris, 1904.

181. de luceros coronada: this verse occurs also in Meléndez Valdés' "Rosana en los fuegos." See Foulché-Delbosc, "Quelques Réminiscences dans Espronceda," Revue Hispanique, XXI, p. 667.

218. hoja tras hoja, etc.: in the first part of "Faust," Margarete pulls out one by one the petals of a daisy to determine whether or not Faust loves her. Is this a reminiscence of Margarete's Er liebt mich—liebt mich nicht?

242. pasó: translate by the English perfect tense. There are many other cases in these poems where the preterit had best be rendered by the perfect.

245. miraran: here and elsewhere the second (-ra) tense of the imperfect subjunctive is equivalent to a simple past. This use of the tense is frequent. At other times this tense is better rendered by a pluperfect indicative, when the common subjunctive meaning does not serve.

268. These verses are the most frequently quoted of the whole poem.

268. juguete: I retain, though with some doubt, the reading of the original. Later editions have changed to juguetes.

278. The thought of these verses is that mean objects may present a beautiful appearance when viewed through a telescope. "Distance lends enchantment." So woman when viewed through the illusion of fancy is better than the woman of reality. This thought is developed farther in "A Teresa."

298. A frequently recurring thought in Espronceda, typical of Romantic pessimism. Truth is man's greatest enemy, he holds. Illusion is friendly.

318. In this and what follows, Elvira is plainly a copy of Ophelia. The influence of Hamlet cannot be doubted. Churchman has pointed out that Elvira is a composite of Goethe's Margarete, Shakespeare's Ophelia, and the Haidée and Doña Julia of Lord Byron. See "Byron and Espronceda," Revue Hispanique, Vol. XX, p. 164.

324. otra: I retain the original reading. Later editions erroneously read otras.

347. Vaso de bendición: `blessed vessel,' i.e. an individual peculiarly favored with the divine blessing. The phrase vaso de elección is commoner, meaning one chosen for a particular mission or appointed task. The latter term is frequently applied to the Apostle Paul (Acts ix, 15).

359. Mas despertó también de su locura, etc.: Ophelia did not recover her reason before dying. Likewise she was drowned, while Elvira dies of love.

364. El bien pasado y el dolor presente: an obvious reminiscence of Dante's:

There is no greater sorrow than to recall the happy time in the midst of misery.

371. The letter which follows represents Espronceda's most important borrowing from Byron. It is based upon Doña Julia's letter of adieu to Don Juan: see "Don Juan," Canto I, stanzas 192-197. The circumstances attending the writing of the two letters are entirely different. The tone of Doña Julia's letter is cynical; she is a married woman whose sin has been discovered and whose husband is forcing her to enter a convent. Doña Elvira's letter, written with death in view, is tender and pathetic. For details see Churchman, "Byron and Espronceda," Revue Hispanique, Vol. XX, p. 161.

PARTE TERCERA

In giving this quotation from the second act of Moreto's "El Lego del Carmen o San Franco de Sena," Espronceda is either quoting erroneously or following some edition not known to me. In the Rivadeneyra edition the passage is as follows:

As this play influenced Espronceda, it is well to give a synopsis of it. Like the "Rufián dichoso" of Cervantes, the "San Franco de Sena" deals with the sinful life and conversion of one who was destined to be a saint. Franco of Siena, a youth noted for his wild conduct, falls in love with the inappropriately named Lucrecia. He kills her lover Aurelio in a duel, and, passing himself off for Aurelio, elopes with her and gets possession of her jewels. A cross with a lighted lamp before it is placed on a wall to mark the spot where Aurelio fell. One night, as he is passing, Franco sacrilegiously attempts to extinguish the light. A hand issues from the wall and seizes him by the wrist. Words of warning accompany this action. Franco shows neither fear nor compunction. He kills all the officers of justice who try to arrest him. Again passing the wall, he hears a ghostly voice urge him to try his hand at play, for by losing he will win. Franco hopes to win in a material way, and decides to follow this advice. He loses all and then stakes his eyes, making the blasphemous remark quoted above. He loses and is stricken blind. His conversion follows immediately. In the weak third act he becomes a Carmelite monk, and his companions in sin experience a like change of heart.

The legend of the saint of Siena has many points of similarity with the legends of Don Juan Tenorio, Don Miguel de Mañara, and Lisardo the Student; but Espronceda has been only slightly influenced by Moreto's play. If he gained from it, rather than from Dumas or Mérimée, the idea of his gambling scene, he does not follow his model closely. In each case a chain is played for, but in Moreto the game is pintas, not parar or dice, and the other details are different. Moreto (1618-1659) was one of the most graceful but least original of the dramatists of the classic period.

438. The game of parar, carteta, or andaboba, as it was variously called, was played as follows: The dealer, who also serves as banker, places two cards face up at his left. The third card he places in front of himself. The fourth card, called the réjouissance card in the French form of the game, he places in the middle of the table. The players stake on this card whatever bets they desire to make, and these the banker is obliged to cover. He then deals a fifth. If this matches his own card, he wins all the money staked. If, on the contrary, it matches the réjouissance card, those who have staked money upon it win from the bank. If it matches neither, it is laid face up on the table, and money may be staked upon it precisely as upon the réjouissance card. So with all successive cards. The deal ends as soon as the banker's card is matched. He then surrenders the bank to the winner, unless the two cards laid to his left are matched before the third card dealt, his own, is duplicated. In this latter case he is privileged to keep the bank for another deal. This game, by reason of its swift action and the large number of players who could engage in it, was called el juego alegre. As results depended upon the turn of a single card, it lent itself readily to cheating. It is mentioned in a pragmática of Philip II, 1575, among a list of games to be prohibited. The modern games of monte and baccarat have points of similarity. In France and England the game is known as lansquenet, and is supposed to have been invented by the German Landsknechte, mercenary foot-soldiers of the sixteenth century. For further information see Hazañas y la Rúa, "Los Rufianes de Cervantes," Sevilla, 1906, p. 44, and Monreal, "Cuadros Antiguos," Sevilla, 1906, p. 342. For a similar gambling scene see Tirso de Molina, "Tanto es lo de más como lo de menos," Act II, sc. vii.

455. El Caballo: to understand what follows some knowledge of Spanish playing-cards is necessary. In Spain the baraja, or deck, consists, according to the game played, of 48 or 40 cards (cartas, naipes, cartones), and not of 52 as with us. The ten spot is unknown, and when the deck consists of but 40 the eight and nine spots are also wanting. The palos, or suits, are four: oros (gold coins, corresponding to our diamonds), copas (cups, corresponding to our hearts), espadas (swords, corresponding to our spades), and bastones (clubs). These figures are not conventionalized. The face cards are three: el rey (the king), el caballo (representing a mounted cavalryman, and corresponding in value to our queen), and la sota (a standing infantryman, sometimes called also el infante, and corresponding in value to our knave). These figures are unreversible. The First Gambler is dealer and banker, as is shown by the fact that he covers the bets (line 466). He is losing in spite of the fact that the banker had an advantage. The caballo is clearly the card that has turned up in front of the dealer. The turning up of a second caballo would end the deal.

457. Pues por poco, etc.: the Second Gambler is mocking the First. "You want the caballo, and the sota, the card next under it in the suit, has turned up. This is so close that you should be satisfied." All this is implied in his remark.

459. The Second Gambler strikes an irreligious note by pretending to believe that the First Gambler's oath is a pious remark. He suggests that prayer and repentance should be deferred until one is dying. Gentlemen of equal rank formerly addressed each other in the second person plural.

466. The Third Gambler stakes upon the sota. Each new card, not matching previous ones, was the occasion for new bets.

480. An allusion to the world-wide superstition that he who is lucky at love is unlucky at cards and vice versa.

490. Se vende y se rifa: Don Félix, who has no ready cash, raffles off his chain. He places on it a value of 2000 ducats, and announces that each of the five gamblers who are in funds must contribute 400 ducats to the raffle. The First Gambler, a heavy loser, does not engage in the play; and Don Félix, too, enters into this first transaction merely as a seller. The chain is to go to the player to whom he deals the ace of oros, and he himself will get the 2000 ducats. After this he will begin to gamble on his own account. The game of parar ceased upon the entrance of Don Félix.

491. afrenta: the affront lies in Don Félix's insolent manner and the masterful way in which he forces them to accept his terms without question. Indignant as the Fourth Gambler is, he dares not offer open objection.

496. I restore una from the 1840 edition instead of uno, found in the later prints. The agreement is with carta, understood, not with naipe. So likewise when the cards are dealt out in Moreto's "San Franco de Sena," the first numeral is una.

498. Three is the lucky number. The third card falls to the Third Gambler, who wins. The grief of the First Gambler is increased by the fact that the winning card would have fallen to him, if he had been in the game. Line 496 indicates that D. Félix passes him in dealing.

500. Having now come into possession of his 2000 ducats, Don Félix, always a reckless gambler, proposes to stake them all upon a single throw of the dice.

516. Si esta imagen respirara: the First Gambler is so unlucky at cards that he may be supposed to be lucky in love. Hence sentimental remarks are placed in his mouth.

520. The Second Gambler makes a side bet with the Fourth and then a second one with the Fifth. These bets will be decided by the same throw that decides the bet between Don Félix and the Third Gambler.

526. Tirad con sesenta, etc.: "Throw in the name of sixty horsemen." Some word like hombres or demonios needs to be supplied.

529. Don Félix, who has again lost, speaks with ironic blasphemy. He blames the First Gambler for addressing his prayer to God rather than to the devil.

546. vendellas: for venderlas. In Old Spanish the final r of the infinitive frequently assimilates to the initial l of the enclitic pronoun.

550. Don Félix's perverted sense of honor will not brook the most trivial verbal slight to Elvira on the part of another, although he has cruelly wronged her himself by his deeds.

558. The First Gambler is not sufficiently blasphemous to invoke the devil, and Don Félix does so himself. This invocation changes his luck.

567. Encubierta fatídica figura: one of those threadbare phrases abused by Spain's romantic poets. Valera in his "Del Romanticismo en España y de Espronceda" instances some of these, such as negro capuz, lúgubre són, fúnebre ciprés, etc. Mesonero Romanos in his "Románticos y Romanticismo" ridicules the abuse of the word fatídica. Espronceda was less frequently guilty of this sort of unoriginality than other less gifted poets were.

610. Mentís vos: the usual formula for picking a quarrel.

625, 631. Que: equivalent to porque.

653. vos: antiquated for vosotros. Don Diego alone is addressed. After Esperad, que may be understood; such omissions of the conjunction are common in poetry. Punctuating differently, we might place a period after Esperad, in which case Cuente might be taken as a first person imperative.

676. juego: such is the reading of the 1840 edition. Some later editor emended to fuego. Though this emendation is plausible, the change seems to me both unnecessary and unhappy. It is characteristic of Don Félix's cool insolence that he should refer to his affair with Elvira as a "game" rather than as a "passion."

692. The Fourth Gambler's remark is somewhat ambiguous, but the sense demands that we take lo as referring to Don Félix. Remember that it was the Fourth Gambler who had resented Don Félix's overbearing conduct. He acted the coward and now talks like a coward. The Third Gambler is the most skeptical regarding changes of luck, because he himself has experienced the greatest ups and downs of fortune in the game just finished.

PARTE CUARTA

Miguel de los Santos Álvarez (1818-1892) was a friend and imitator of Espronceda and the last surviving member of his school. He was one of several who attempted the vain task of completing the "Diablo Mundo." He was a guest of honor with Espronceda at the first reading of "El Estudiante de Salamanca" at Granada in 1837. His verse is mediocre, and he is best known for the Cuento en prosa here quoted. This Fitzmaurice-Kelly terms "a charming tale," and Piñeyro praises it for the grace and naturalness of its irony. Rubén Darío gives some interesting reminiscences of Santos Álvarez in his old age, "La vida de Rubén Darío escrita por él mismo", Barcelona, n.d., chap. xxvii. Apparently Santos Álvarez never outgrew the bohemianism of his youth.

The second quotation is from Mark xiv, 38: "The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak."

693. The narrative begun in Part First is now resumed at the point where it was interrupted. We now know that it was Don Diego Pastrana who lost his life in the duel described in the opening lines.

717. The omission of the usual accent of impio is intentional and indicates how the word should be stressed in this verse. Impío is a "word of double accentuation". See Introduction.

729. Notice how the absolute phrase Los ojos fijos is broken by the insertion of the proper name. Poets depart from the usual word-order with the utmost freedom.

737. néctar jerezano: sherry wine.

738, 740. bastara, intentara: to be translated as pluperfects.

766. It is necessary to supply a que to serve as the object of achaca. This is readily to be inferred from the que in the verse before, which is, however, used as a subject.

793. In this speech of Don Felix's there is rapid alternation between direct address, in the second person, and side remarks in the third person about the person addressed.

800. tengo de: we would have he de in modern prose.

811. The que in this verse is the que regularly following oaths and asseverations. Cf. Tobler, "Vermischte Beiträge zur französischen Grammatik," Leipzig, 1912, Article 17, pp. 57 f. Tobler gives the following example from Calderón: ¡Vive Dios! que no he salido. ("El Mágico Prodigioso," Act III, v. 387.) In these examples, the ¡vive dios! is hardly more than an emphatic digo, and is followed by que just as digo would be. Verse 810 is parenthetical.

828. del: construe with mar.

833. For the conclusion of the sentence here begun it is necessary to turn to line 883. We have to do with a sentence of 54 lines.

840. The 1840 edition lacks the third su.

853. fueron: 'are past and gone.'

861. del: the later editions read el. Ditto in lines 862, 863, 866. De is also omitted in 865.

868. jamás: I restore the 1840 reading. Later editions read y no.

916. que: a conjunction introducing a clause, the verb of which (pese) has to be supplied.

921. The usual accent is intentionally omitted from veame. To read this verse correctly the second syllable, and not the first, must bear the stress. The bad prosody of this verse is discussed in the Introduction.

943. The Dance of Death begins.

1012. misteriosa: late editors wrongly change to misterioso. Espronceda is using guía as a feminine.

1040. Dale, etc.: 'plague take the tolling of the passing bell and these towers dancing in tangled confusion to the measure of such a concert.'

1046. llegue: I have emended llegué (which I believe Espronceda did not intend on account of the "obstructing syllable" which that accentuation would give to the verse) to llegue. I take llegue to be the subjunctive of emphatic asseveration. See Bello-Cuervo, "Gramática Castellana," paragraph 463. Other editors are perhaps right in interpreting the passage differently. They suppress the period after maravillas, the exclamation point before Que, and write llegué. This makes equally good sense and is just as grammatical, but the verse is less harmonious. This last point, however, is not a vital objection. The two ways of editing this passage seem to me to offer little choice.

1062. Construe en que with ha dado, above.

1112. The quotation from Mark xiv, 38 applies especially to this passage. Also to ll. 1626-1633.

1121. The three forms of address used by Don Félix in addressing el enlutado indicate his change of manner from politeness to insolence. He begins with the polite third person singular form. Then, enraged by the answer, he is intentionally insulting in verse 1126, wishing to provoke a duel. As the other puts up a brave front, he next addresses him as an equal (verse 1127) by using the second person plural. This was the usual form of address between gentlemen of equal standing during the Renaissance period. But, again losing his temper, he relapses into the insulting second person singular (verse 1133 and following).

1133. haga: an instance of the use of the subjunctive after oaths and asseverations. See Bello-Cuervo, "Gramática Castellana," paragraph 463.

1311. una: goes with gradería in the following verse.

1385. Beginning with this verse and ending with l. 1680, the poet attempts to indicate the gathering and abating fury of the ghostly revel by the successive lengthening and shortening of the verses. The final verses also express Don Félix's waning strength. This device is an attempt to imitate the crescendo and diminuendo effect of music. This whole passage is an obvious imitation of Victor Hugo's "Les Djinns," a poem included in "Les Orientales." Nowhere has Espronceda shown greater virtuosity in the handling of meter.

1448. The nouns and infinitives in this and the following lines are objects of siente, l. 1456.

1703. Y si, lector, etc.: 'And if, reader, you say it is a fabrication, I tell it to you as they told it to me.' León Medina, "Frases literarias afortunadas," Revue hispanique, Vol. XVIII, p. 226, states that these two verses are a quotation from Juan de Castellanos, an obscure poet of the sixteenth century, author of Elegías de Varones Ilustres de Indias. (The first three parts of this work may be found in Vol. IV of the Biblioteca de Autores Españoles; Part IV has been edited by Paz y Melia for the Colección de Escritores Castellanos, Vols. XLIV and XLIX. The passage in question may be found in Canto II, octave 8.) Churchman, "Byron and Espronceda," Revue hispanique, Vol. XX, p. 210, adds the information that Espronceda probably took the lines directly from Villalta, who had quoted them in his historical novel El Golpe en Vago, Madrid, 1835. This is made probable by the fact that whereas Castellanos had written correctly os lo cuento, Villalta wrote te lo cuento, Espronceda following him in this grammatical error.

The form dijerdes, an old form for the second plural of the future subjunctive (modern dijereis), represents the syncopation of a still older dijéredes. Grammatically the pronoun os should have been used. Evidently both Villalta and Espronceda considered dijerdes to be a second singular form. A modern editor cannot undertake to correct a mistake made by the author. In Old Spanish infinitives could be very loosely used. It was not necessary that the subject of a dependent infinitive should be the same as that of the verb on which it depended.

The word comento here has the meaning "fiction," "fabrication." I find this meaning given in none of the dictionaries, but it can readily be inferred from the word comentador, which had as one of its meanings "an inventor of false reports." Comento, like Latin commentum, has as one of its meanings "fiction," "fabrication."

The writers of leyendas were fond of stressing the traditional nature of their poems. Thus Zorrilla concludes his "Capitán Montoya":

CANCIÓN DEL PIRATA

7. en todo mar conocido: I follow the reading of the text as it originally appeared in El Artista. The later version of 1840 is peculiar in the reading en todo el mar conocido. We cannot be certain that this is a change made by Espronceda himself.

84. Instead of negro the 1840 edition reads ronco.

EL CANTO DEL COSACO

Attila, king of the Huns, reigned from 433 until his death 453 A.D. He is noted for the barbaric ferocity of his campaigns against the Eastern and Western Roman Empires and the Germanic kingdoms of the West. In 447 he ravaged seventy cities in Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece, and all but captured Constantinople. In 451 he crossed the Rhine and sacked the cities of Belgic Gaul. He was decisively defeated at Troyes by the Gothic leader Theodoric in league with the Roman general Aëtius. He then entered northern Italy, where he continued his depredations and advanced upon Rome. The Emperor Valentinianus II saved the city by paying tribute. Legend has it that while in Gaul a hermit called Attila to his face the "scourge of God." Attila accepted the designation and replied with the remark quoted in the text. This story is not found in Jordanes, Priscus, or any of the contemporary historians. Gibbon says: "It is a saying worthy of the ferocious pride of Attila that the grass never grew on the spot where his horse had trod" ("Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," London, 1897, III, p. 469). This poem is a magnificent expression of barbaric battle-lust. Espronceda felt as a youth that wholesale destruction must precede the new order of things in Spain and Europe.

50. The poet hopelessly confuses the exploits of the Huns, the Goths, and the Cossacks. Neither the Cossacks nor the Huns ever captured Rome. Alaric the Goth took Rome in 410 A.D.

65. The principal Cossack invasion of Poland was in the first half of the seventeenth century, when Chmielnicki, hetman of the Cossacks, with the aid of his Tartar allies ruthlessly devastated the Polish provinces. This war has been vividly described by Sienkiewicz in his novel "With Fire and Sword."

79. The Huns are said to have carried raw meat beneath their saddles as they rode. At the end of the day's ride they would eat it.

EL MENDIGO

108. The poet has paraphrased the proverb Allá van leyes do quieren reyes, the idea of which is that a tyrant can twist the law to serve the purposes of his tyranny.

A TERESA. DESCANSA EN PAZ

For an account of Teresa, see the Introduction. For Miguel de los Santos Álvarez, see the note to "El Estudiante de Salamanca," Part IV.

41. The poet describes his three youthful passions: liberty, romantic literature, and love.

49. Catón: Caius Porcius Cato (95-46 B.C.), commonly called Cato of Utica, was a stalwart defender of Roman republicanism against Caesar and his party. His suicide after the defeat of the republican cause at Thapsus was regarded as an act of stoic heroism.

50. Bruto: it is not clear whether the poet refers to Lucius Junius Brutus, who drove from power Tarquinius Superbus, founded the Roman republic, and displayed his rigid justice by condemning to death his own sons, or Marcus Junius Brutus, who assassinated Cæsar in the name of liberty.

51. Scévola: a hero of early Rome who was captured by the enemy and threatened with death by fire if he refused to give important information. He replied by deliberately holding his hand in a flame.

52. Sócrates (469-400 B.C.): the celebrated Grecian philosopher. He believed in the immortality of the soul.

54. Del orador de Atenas: Demosthenes (385-322 B.C.), especially famous for his Philippics, a series of twelve orations directed against Philip of Macedon, the tirano macedonio here alluded to. All these classical allusions seem to show that Espronceda, like most of the leaders of the French Revolution, was influenced by Plutarch.

57. In this octave the poet voices his enthusiasm for the Middle Ages and romantic literature in general. In his desire to embrace in his own life the careers of knight and troubadour, Espronceda is harking back to the "arms and letters" ideal of many of Spain's greatest writers.

77. Soñaba al héroe: con is the usual complement of soñar in prose.

89. Espronceda's first meeting with Teresa took place in Portugal in the beautiful region around Cintra.

131. La sacra ninfa que bordando, etc.: according to Menéndez y Pelayo, these two verses are taken from the "Fábula de Genil" of Pedro Espinosa, an author whom he says Espronceda knew by heart. (See "Discursos leídos ante la Real Academia Española en la recepción del excmo. señor D. Francisco Rodríguez Marín, el día 27 de octubre de 1907," Madrid, 1907, p. 86). The verses in question are:

And farther down,

This in turn, it seems to me, may be reminiscent of Garcilaso de la Vega's Égloga Tercera. Apparently P. Henríquez Ureña has made this discovery independently. See Revista de Filología Española, IV, 3, p. 292.

170. The usual accent has been intentionally omitted from aerea.

201. "How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning." Isaiah xiv, 12.

232. The story of the man who spits upon himself while trying to spit upon the sky is as old as Berceo in Spanish literature.

238. One has to supply a se with convirtieron. This may readily be inferred from the preceding verse.

352. Foulché-Delbosc thinks that this last verse was suggested by Hugo, "Les Feuilles d'automne, XXXV, Soleils couchants." See Revue hispanique, XXI, p. 667.

VOCABULARY

The sign "-" means the word which stands in black type at the head of the paragraph; thus, -se under abrir means abrirse.