1. in_ernet_dli_2015_87809_2015_87809_Hispanic-Anthology-Poems-Translated-From-The-Spanish-By-English-And-North-American-Poets

HISPANIC

861.8 W22 (2)

Kansas City

Public Library

SCHOOL DISTRICT OF KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI

This Volume is for

REFERENCE USE ONLY

T-47-lit.—P

HISPANIC SOCIETY

HISPANIC

NOTES & MONOGRAPHS

ESSAYS, STUDIES, AND BRIEF

BIOGRAPHIES ISSUED BY THE

HISPANIC SOCIETY OF AMERICA

PENINSULAR SERIES

IV

From

the

"Retrato

perdido"

in

The

Royal

Academy

of

Spain

Miguel

de

Cervantes

Saavedra

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY

POEMS TRANSLATED FROM THE SPANISH BY

ENGLISH AND NORTH AMERICAN POETS

COLLECTED AND ARRANGED BY

THOMAS WALSH, Ph.D., Litt.D.

Corresponding Member of the Real Academia

Sevillana de Buenas Letras, of the Academia

Colombiana and the Hispanic Society

of America

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS

NEW YORK AND LONDON

1920

COPYRIGHT, 1920

BY

THE HISPANIC SOCIETY OF AMERICA

To the memory

OF

JOYCE KILMER

POET AND HERO, WHO EARNED A GLORIOUS

GRAVE NEAR THE RIVER OURCQ,

JULY 30, 1918,—

My Friend.

iv

HISPANIC

ANTHÓLOGY

IV

HISPANIC

NOTES

FOREWORD

v

FOREWORD

Spanish poetry, at first glance, would seem to be an unknown world to readers without a knowledge of Castilian; nevertheless, a study of the contents of this volume will show that some of the greatest poets of England and America have presented in our common English tongue the beauties of this exotic literature. While this achievement of the past may be a matter of legitimate pride to the northern Hispanist, the present would seem to be an opportune moment to strengthen whatever claim he may have upon the regard of his brethren of Hispanic speech by presenting a summary, in chronological order, of the translations, by northern Hispanophiles, of Spanish poems into English verse.

The present work is such a summary, and it is offered as a spontaneous tribute of

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

vi

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY

affectionate admiration to the contemporary Spanish poet—both Peninsular and American—from his English-speaking brethren of the north. It should perhaps be stated that, in the desire that this offering should be recognized as essentially a northern tribute, the editor has with reluctance omitted many able translations by Hispanic-Americans whose work, for the present at least, must be left to the more casual page of the periodical.

The Hispanic Anthology is also offered in the belief that it will greatly facilitate the work of the writer or lecturer on Spanish poetry who, hitherto, has been handicapped by the great difficulty in obtaining English versions adequate to illustrate his theme. To him, as to the student and general reader, the chronological arrangement of the material—the amount of which is surprising—and the bibliographical notes, which in many cases are the result of very considerable research, should prove extremely useful. Particularly is this true in the case of the more recent poets concerning whom accurate information is both scarce

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FOREWORD

vii

and remote. In the matter of selection, a comparison of this work with the best of the

Spanish Parnasos and Hispanic-American Antologias will show that the editor has not

differed greatly from the opinions of the original critics.

The writer's thanks are due to all those who have so graciously permitted their

versions to be included in this collection—

notably, Mr. Peter H. Goldsmith, Mr. William G. Williams, Mr. Alfred Coester, Mr.

E. C. Hills, Mr. John Pierrepont Rice, Miss Alice Stone Blackwell, Miss Lilian E.

Elliott, and Miss Muna Lee.

Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

viii

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

THE TRANSLATORS

ix

THE TRANSLATORS

Leonard Bacon

Alice Stone Blackwell

John Bowring

William Cullen Bryant

J. H. Burton

Lord Byron

Joseph I. C. Clarke

Alfred Coester

L. E. Elliott

Edward Fitzgerald

James Elroy Flecker

Richard Garnett

James Young Gibson

Roderick Gill

Jorge Godoy

Peter Goldsmith

Edmond Gosse

John Hay

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

x

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY

Felicia Hemans

Elijah Clarence Hills

James Kennedy

Muna Lee

J. G. Lockhart

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Ernest F. Lucas

John Masefield

P. Motteux

Thomas Percy

John Pierrepont Rice

Thomas Roscoe

R. Selden Rose

Robert Southey

Garret Strange

Arthur Symons

George Ticknor

R. C. Trench

Thomas Walsh

J. H. Wiffen

William G. Williams

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ILLUSTRATIONS

xi

ILLUSTRATIONS

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de

(Photogravure) . . Frontispiece

Vega, Garcilasso de lÁ . . 155

Saint Teresa . . . 167

Camoëns, Luis Vaz de . . 179

Fray Luis de León . . 189

Alcázar, Baltasar del . . 213

Ercilla y Zúñiga, Alonso de . 220

Herrera, Fernando de . . 227

S. John of the Cross . . 245

Argote y Góngora, Luis de . 267

(Photogravure)

Vega Carpio, Lope Felix de . 279

Argensola, Bartolomé Leonardo de 285

Caro, Rodrigo . . . 298

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

2

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

3

ANONYMOUS

THE LAY OF THE CID

The Poema del Cid was composed about the year 1150. It is a contemporary record of the national peculiarities of Spanish chivalry. It was first published by Sánchez (Madrid, 1779).

I

He turned and looked upon them, and he wept very sore

As he saw the yawning gateway and the hasps wrenched off the door,

And the pegs whereon no mantle nor coat of vair there hung.

There perched no moulting goshawk, and there no falcon swung.

My lord the Cid sighed deeply, such grief was in his heart,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

4

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

And he spoke well and wisely: "Oh Thou

in Heaven that art

Our Father and our Master, now I give

thanks to Thee.

Of their wickedness my foemen have done

this thing to me."

2

Then they shook out the bridle rein further

to ride afar.

They had the crow on their right hand as

they issued from Bivar,

And as they entered Burgos upon their

left it sped.

And the Cid shrugged his shoulders, and

the Cid shook his head:

"Good tidings, Alvar Fañez ! We are ban-

ished from our weal,

But on a day with honor shall we come unto

Castile."

3

Roy Diaz entered Burgos with sixty pen-

nons strong,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

And forth to look upon him did the men and women throng.

And with their wives the townsmen at the windows stood hard by,

And they wept in lamentation, their grief was risen so high.

As with one mouth together they spake with one accord:

"God, what a noble vassal, an he had a worthy lord."

4

Fain had they made him welcome, but none dared do the thing

For fear of Don Alfonso, and the fury of the King.

His mandate unto Burgos came ere the evening fell.

With utmost care they brought it and it was sealéd well;

"That no man to Roy Diaz give shelter now, take heed,

And if one give him shelter, let him know, in very deed,

AND MONOGRAPHS

6

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

He shall lose his whole possession, nay! the

eyes within his head.

Nor shall his soul and body be found in

better stead."

Great sorrow had the Christians, and from

his face they hid.

Was none dared aught to utter unto my

lord the Cid.

Then the Campeador departed unto his

lodging straight.

But when he was come hither, they had

locked and barred the gate.

In their fear of Don Alfonso had they done

even so.

An the Cid forced not his entrance, neither

for weal or woe,

Durst they open it unto him. Loudly his

men did call.

Nothing thereto in answer said the folk

within the hall.

My lord the Cid spurred onward, to the

doorway did he go.

He drew his foot from the stirrup, he smote

the door one blow.

Yet the door would not open, for they had

barred it fast.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

7

5

But a maiden of nine summers came unto him at last

"Campeador in happy hour thou girdedst on the sword.

'Tis the King's will. Yestereven came the mandate of our lord.

With utmost care they brought it, and it was sealed with care;

None to ope to you or greet you for any cause shall dare.

And if we do, we forfeit houses and lands instead.

Nay, we shall lose moreover, the eyes within the head.

And, Cid, with our misfortunes, naught whatever dost thou gain.

But may God with all his power support thee in thy pain."

So spake the child and turned away. Unto her home went she.

That he lacked the King's favor now well the Cid might see.

He left the door; forth onward he spurred through Burgos town.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

8

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

When he had reached Saint Mary's, then

he got swiftly down.

He fell upon his knees and prayed with a

true heart indeed:

And when his prayer was over, he mounted

on the steed.

Forth from the gate and over the Arlanzon

he went.

There in the sand by Burgos, the Cid let

pitch his tent.

Roy Diaz, who in happy hour had girded

on the brand,

Since none at home would greet him, en-

camped there on the sand

With a good squadron, camping as if with-

in the wood.

They will not let him in Burgos buy any

kind of food,—

Provender for a single day they dared not

to him sell.

6

Then said the Cid, who in good hour had

girded on the steel:

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

"Oh Martin Antolinez, thou art a good lance and leal.

And if I live, hereafter I shall pay thee double rent,

But gone is all my silver, and all my gold is spent,

And well enough thou seest that I bring naught with me

And many things are needful for my good company.

Since by favor I win nothing, by might then must I gain.

I desire by thy counsel to get ready coffers twain.

With the sand let us fill them, to lift a burden sore,

And cover them with stamped leather with nails well studded o'er.

7

Ruddy shall be the leather, well gilded every nail.

In my behalf do thou hasten to Vidas and Raquél.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

10

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Since in Burgos they forbade me aught to purchase, and the King

Withdraws his favor, unto them my goods I cannot bring.

They are heavy, and I must pawn them for whatso'er is right.

That Christians may not see it, let them come for them by night.

May the Creator judge it and of all the Saints the choir.

I can no more, and I do it against my own desire."

8

Martin stayed not. Through Burgos he hastened forth and came

To the Castle. Vidas and Raquél he demanded them by name.

9

Raquél and Vidas sate to count their goods and profits through

When up came Antolinez the prudent man and true.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

"How now Raquél and Vidas, am I dear unto your heart?

I would speak close." They tarried not.

All three they went apart.

"Give me, Raquél and Vidas, your hands for promise sure,

That you will not betray me to Christian or to Moor.

I shall make you rich forever. You shall ne'er be needy more.

When to gather in the taxes went forth the Campeador,

Many rich goods he garnered, but he only kept the best.

Therefore this accusation against him was addressed.

And now two mighty coffers full of pure gold hath he.

Why he lost the King's favor a man may lightly see.

He has left his halls and houses, his meadow and his field,

And the chests he cannot bring you lest he should stand revealed.

The Campeador those coffers will deliver to your trust

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12

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

And do you lend unto him whatever may be just.

Do you take the chests and keep them but swear a great oath here

That you will not look within them for the space of all this year."

The two took counsel: "Something to our profit must inure

In all barter. He gained something in the country of the Moor

When he marched there, for many goods he brought with him away.

But he sleeps not unsuspected, who brings coined gold to pay.

Let the two of us together take now the coffers twain.

In some place let us put them where unseen they shall remain.

"What the lord Cid demanded, we, prithee, let us hear,

And what will be our usury for the space of all this year?"

Said Martin Antolinez like a prudent man and true:

"Whatever you deem right and just the Cid desires of you.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

He will ask little since his goods are left in

a safe place.

But needy men on all sides beseech the Cid

for grace.

For six hundred marks of money the Cid is

sore bested.

"We shall give them to him gladly," Ra-

quél and Vidas said.

"'Tis night. The Cid is sorely pressed.

So give the marks to us."

Answered Raquél and Vidas: "Men do not

traffic thus;

But first they take their surety and there-

after give the fee."

Said Martin Antolínez: "So be it as for

me.

Come ye to the great Campeador for 'tis

but just and fair

That we should help you with the chests,

and put them in your care,

So that neither Moor nor Christian thereof

shall hear the tale."

"Therewith are we right well content,"

said Vidas and Raquél,

"You shall have the marks six hundred

when we bring the chests again."

AND MONOGRAPHS

14

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

And Martin Antolinez rode swiftly with the

twain.

And they were glad exceeding. O'er the

bridge he did not go,

But through the stream, that never a

Burgalese should know

Through him thereof. And now behold

the Campeador his tent.

When they therein had entered to kiss his

hands they bent.

My lord the Cid smiled on them and unto

them said he;

"Ha, Don Raquél and Vidas, you have for-

gotten me!

And now must I go hence away who am

banished in disgrace,

For the King from me in anger hath turned

away his face.

I deem that from my chattels you shall gain

somewhat of worth,

And you shall lack for nothing while you

dwell upon the earth."

At the loading of the coffers you had seen

great joy of heart.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

For they could not heave the great

chests up though they stark and

hale;

Dear was the melted metal to Vidas and

Raquél.

And they would be rich forever till their

two lives were o'er.

The hand of my good lord the Cid, Raquél

had kissed once more:

"Ha! Campeador, in happy hour thou

girdedst on the brand.

Forth from Castile thou goest to the men

of a strange land.

Such is become thy fortune and great thy

gain shall be—

Ah, Cid, I kiss thine hands again—but

make a gift to me;

Bring me a Moorish mantle splendidly

wrought and red."

"So be it. It is granted," the Cid in an-

swer said,—

AND MONOGRAPHS

16

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

"If from abroad I bring it, well doth the

matter stand;

If not, take it from the coffers I leave here

in your hand."

— R. Seldon Rose and Leonard Bacon.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

17

RAZÓN DE AMOR

Among the Textes castillans inédits du XIII siècle (Romania, 1887, vol. xvi, pp. 368-373),

M. Alfred Morel-Fatio published this poem for the first time. The name of Lope de

Moros is signed to the MS, but he is conjectured to be merely the copyist.

For the heart with care o'erflowing,

Here's a story that is showing

An adventure fine and free

All of love and melody.

'Twas a scholar made its rhymes

(He was squire of dames betimes)

Who in Germany and France

Had his training for romance,

But in Lombardy was long

To learn courtesy in song.

All in the month of April sweet

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

18

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

In an olive grove I made retreat,

My dinner done, where the branches meet;

And a cup of wine mine eyes did greet

In the cooling shade of an apple-tree

Full and ruddy as wine can be.

It had been placed by a lady fair

Who was mistress of the orchards there,

For on him she loved her mind would think,

When he came that way he would stop and drink,

He would quaff it down in a fashion meet

Whenever he loitered there to eat,

And thus refreshed would remain always

Strong and healthy through all his days.

Higher up on the apple bough

Another cup caught my vision now,

Full to the brim of the water clear

That oozed from the dewy branches near.

I would have tasted its liquor pure

But I feared in it enchantment sure,

So I laid my head to the verdant sward

Where a midday rest I might afford,

And the heat of the day was burning so

I stripped my clothing from head to toe,

And slipped in the spring that flowed thereby—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

Never the like hath met your eye!—

So fresh it was, and healthful too,

In the chill of its waters through and

through.

A step in its depths from off the shore

And you felt the heat of the day no more.

Every herb of odorous air

Was breathing fresh on its margin fair;

The salvia likewise and the rose,

With the lily and the violet close,

And numerous herbs in row on row

Whose very names I do not know;

But such a perfume from all was shed

It was sweet enough to rouse the dead.

I took a sup of the water then

And felt my body cool again;

And in my hand I took a flower,

To wit, the worthiest in that bower,

Prepared to sing of love's fond hour,—

When suddenly a damsel came—

Never in life have you seen the same—

So white, so blushing red was she;

Her short hair round her ears blown free,

Her forehead white and passing fair,

And face as sweet as an apple rare.

Her nose so straight and finely turned,—

AND MONOGRAPHS

20

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Ne'er such another have you discerned!

Her eyes of midnight shining clear;

Her lovely lips where white teeth appear

'Twixt the ruby smiles so full and free-

Perfection's self, so it seemed to me!-

Her girdle broad and measured well

To a graceful line about her fell,

Her cloak and gown were of nothing less

Than samite white, her form to dress;

The little hat upon her head

'Gainst the midday heats was garlanded;

And you would have known by the gloves

she wore

No peasant maid was she who bore.

The flowers bent down before her feet

As she walked along, while her lips repeat:

This song of love:

"O friend of mine,

Would that my arms could always twine

About you here in love, and know

The sweets of loving forever so!

For you are a scholar as you show,

And for this I hold you far more dear.

Never a man did I ever hear

IV.

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

21

To boast of such love as my heart makes clear.

I had rather my love with you to share

Than the diadem of Spain to wear.

There's but one care upon my heart

And dredded lest some mischance may start;

For they say that another lady bright

In beauty and goodness claims a right

Upon your love, and with such a call

That despite shall ruin her mind in all;

And for her my fear is very great,

Lest your love for me she may abate.

But now that you behold me well,

Lover and loved, let us faithful dwell!

The while the lady reasoned so,

I saw she did not turn to go;

That, though she knew me not for long,

She did not fear my passion strong.

That day I was no peasant boor;

I rose and took her fingers pure,

And arm in arm we settled down

In the shade of the olive branches brown.

And I said to her: "My lady, say,

Have you known no love until today?"

She answered,—"Truly with love I glow,

And little about my squire I know;

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IV

22

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

But I should bid his messenger hear,

That I know he's a cleric, not cavalier;

That he reads and writes and sings full clear,

That he follows the troubadour's career.

I know, as well, that his birth is fair

And the first of his youthful beard is there.

"For God's sake, lady, say to me

"What gifts hath he sent in courtesy?"

"These perfumed gloves, this hat, he sent,

This ring, this coral ornament;

And for his love they are the sign

Of the love I bear this sweet friend of mine."

There I, in truth, the trinkets knew

That I had sent! and to her view

The little sash I wore, displayed

With the broideries her hands had made.

She doffed her shoulder mantle bright,

She kissed my mouth and eyelids right,

And such delight she took of me

That I cannot give the history.

"Lord God be praised that here below

"My lover dear so well I know!"

Full long, full long, we tarried there,

When came the thought unto my fair,

And she explained,—"My Master sweet,

If you should deem it more discreet,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

'Twill not displease you should I go—

And I to her—“My heart shall show

That it is faithful evermore,

And prouder than an emperor.”—

And so alone my lady went,

Leaving me to my discontent,

For hardly had she passed the gate

When my heart like death grew desolate.

I tried to lay me down to sleep,

But a tiny dove came there to peep;

As white as any snowflake blown

Across the garden it flew alone,

And unto the pool it took its way

Where suddenly it saw me laid,

And it turned away in trouble great

Into the orchard of pomegranate.

Now there was fastened a cup of gold

That its little feet could scarce uphold,

But into the pool it bore its weight

Where I lay in the shade of the pomegranate.

And when the golden cup was filled

And unto its very depths was chilled,

In sign that the feast was at an end

The water and wine it made to blend.

—Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

24

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

GONZALO DE BERCEO

(1180-1246)

THE PRAISE OF SPRING

(From The Miracles of our Lady)

Gonzalo de Berceo was born at Berceo.

Little is known of the events of his life,

except that he was a priest of the Bene-

tine Monastery of San Millán in the diocese of

Calahorra. His poems, for the most part

devotional, were edited by Florencio Janer

(Biblioteca de autores españoles, vol. lvii).

There is an edition of the Vida de Santo

Domingo by J. D. Fitzgerald (Paris, 1904).

I, Gonzalo de Berceo, in the gentile

summertide,

Wending upon a pilgrimage, came to a

meadow's side;

All green was it and beautiful, with flowers

far and wide,—

A pleasant spot, I ween, wherein the travel-

ler might abide.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GONZALO DE BERCEO

25

Flowers with the sweetest odors filled all the sunny air,

And not alone refreshed the sense, but stole the mind from care;

On every side a fountain gushed, whose waters pure and fair,

Ice-cold beneath the summer sun, but warm in winter were.

There on the thick and shadowy trees, amid the foliage green,

Were the fig and the pomegranate, the pear and apple seen;

And other fruits of various kinds, the tufted leaves between,

None were unpleasant to the taste and none decayed, I ween.

The verdure of the meadow green, the odor of the flowers

The grateful shadows of the trees, tempered with fragrant showers,

Refreshed me in the burning heat of the sultry noontide hours;

Oh, one might live upon the balm and fragrance of those bowers!

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IV

26

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Ne'er had I found on earth a spot that had

such power to please,

Such shadows from the summer sun, such

odors on the breeze;

I threw my mantle on the ground, that I

might rest at ease,

And stretched upon the greensward lay

in the shadow of the trees.

There soft reclining in the shade, all cares

beside me flung,

I heard the soft and mellow notes that

through the woodland rung;

Ear never listened to a strain, for instru-

ment or tongue,

So mellow and harmonious as the songs

above me sung.

—H. W. Longfellow.

CÁNTICA OF THE VIRGIN

Keep watch, keep watch, keep watch,

Keep watch on the Council of the Jew,

Keep watch;

That they steal not God's Son from you,

Keep watch!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GONZALO DE BERCEO

27

To steal Him off they are set upon;

Keep watch,

Andrew, Peter, likewise John,

Keep watch!

Lie not in your trust so long,

Keep watch,

Hearken rather to my song,

Keep watch;

All of them light robbers are,

Keep watch,

Spying you through bolt and bar,

Keep watch;

All are tricksters by the way,

Keep watch,

Ribald thief and cutpurse they,

Keep watch!

Your own words they have employed,

Keep watch,

For your overthrow deployed,

Keep watch!

You know not the deep deceit,

Keep watch,

That is waiting for your feet,

Keep watch;

You know not the reasons wise,

Keep watch,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

28

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

That from His taking shall arise,

Keep watch;

Thomas and old Matthew too,

Keep watch,

They desire this theft to do,

Keep watch;

The disciple Him did sell,

Keep watch;

The Master did not deem it well,

Keep watch.

Don Philip, Simon, and Don Jude,

Keep watch,

For the stealing aids they sued,

Keep watch.

If they have succeeded here,

Keep watch,

On to-day it will appear,

Keep watch.

—Roderick Gill.

THE LIFE OF SAN MILLÁN

And when the kings were in the field,—

their squadrons in array,—

With lance in rest they onward pressed to

mingle in the fray;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GONZALO DE BERCEO

29

But soon upon the Christians fell a terror

of their foes,—

These were a numerous army,—a little

handful those.

And while the Christian people stood in

this uncertainty,

Upward to heaven they turned their eyes,

and fixed their thoughts on high;

And there two figures they beheld, all

beautiful and bright,

Even than the pure new-fallen snow their

garments were more white.

They rode upon two horses more white

than crystal sheen,

And arms they bore such as before no

mortal man had seen;

The one, he held a crozier,—a pontiff's

mitre wore;

The other held a crucifix,—such man ne'er

saw before.

Their faces were angelical, celestial forms

had they,—

And downward through the fields of air

they urged their rapid way;

They looked upon the Moorish host with

fierce and angry look,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

30

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

And in their hands with dire portent their

naked sabres shook.

The Christian host beholding this, straight-

way take heart again;

They fall upon their bended knees, all

resting on the plain,

And each one with his clenchédfist to smite

his breast begins,

And promises to God on high he will for-

sake his sins.

And when the heavenly knights drew near

unto the battle-ground,

They dashed among the Moors and dealt

unerring blows around;

Such deadly havoc there they made the

foremost ranks among

A panic terror spread unto the hindmost of

the throng.

Together with these two good knights, the

champions of the sky,

The Christians rallied and began to smite

full sore and high;

The Moors raised up their voices and by

the Koran swore

That in their lives such deadly fray they

ne'er had seen before.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GONZALO DE BERCEO

31

Down went the misbelievers,—fast sped

the bloody fight,—

Some ghastly and dismembered lay, and

some half dead with fright;

Full sorely they repented that to the field

they came,

For they saw that from the battle they

should retreat with shame.

Another thing befell them,—they dreamed

not of such woes,—

The very arrows that the Moors shot from

their twanging bows

Turned back against them in their flight

and wounded them full sore,

And every blow they dealt the foe was paid

in drops of gore.

Now he that bore the crozier, and the

papal crown had on

Was the glorified Apostle, the brother of

Saint John;

And he that held the crucifix, and wore the

monkish hood,

Was the holy San Millán of Cogolla's

neighborhood.

— H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

32

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

SAN MIGUEL DE LA TUMBA

San Miguel de la Tumba is a convent

vast and wide;

The sea encircles it around, and groans on

every side;

It is a wild and dangerous place, and many

woes betide

The monks who in that burial place in

penitence abide.

Within those dark monastic walls, amid

the ocean flood

Of pious fasting monks there dwelt a holy

brotherhood;

To the Madonna's glory there an altar

high was placed

And a rich and costly image the sacred

altar graced.

Exalted high upon a throne, the Virgin

Mother smiled,

And as the custom is, she held within her

arms the Child;

The kings and wisemen of the East were

kneeling by her side;

Attended was she like a queen whom God

had sanctified.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GONZALO DE BERCEO

33

Descending low before her face a screen of

feathers hung,—

A moscader or fan for flies, 'tis called in

vulgar tongue;

From the feathers of the peacock's wing

'twas fashioned bright and fair,

And glistened like the heaven above when

all its stars are there.

It chanced that for the people's sins, fell

lightning's blasting stroke;

Forth from all four sacred walls the flames

consuming broke;

The sacred robes were all consumed, missal

and holy book;

And hardly with their lives the monks

their crumbling walls forsook.

But though the desolating flame raged

fearfully and wild,

It did not reach the Virgin Queen, it did

not reach the Child;

It did not reach the feathery screen before

her face that shone,

Nor injured in a farthing's worth the image

or the throne.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

34

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

The image it did not consume, it did not burn the screen;

Even in the value of a hair they were not hurt, I ween;

Not even the smoke did reach them, nor injure more the shrine

Than the bishop, hight Don Tello, has been hurt by hand of mine.

— H. W. Longfellow.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ALFONSO EL SABIO

35

ALFONSO X

(1221-1284)

CANTIGA

Alfonso X, known as el sabio or "The Wise," is in a sense the father of all Spanish literature. He was not a successful ruler, but he is famous for his codes, chronicles, and didactic collections. The principal work for which he is famous is the Cantigas de Santa María, in the dialect of the Galician troubadours, which has been edited for the Spanish Academy (Madrid, 1889, 2 vols.), by L. A. de Coeto, the Marqués de Valmar.

Lady, for the love of God,

Have some pity upon me!

See my eyes, a river-flood

Day and night, oh, see!

Brothers, cousins, uncles, all,

Have I lost for thee;

If thou dost not me recall,

Woe is me!

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

36

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

THE TREASURY

The strange intelligence then reached my

ears

That in the land of Egypt lived a man,

Who, wise of wit, subjected to his scan

The dark occurrences of uncome years;

He judged the stars, and by the moving

spheres

And aspects of the heavens unveiled the

dim

Face of futurity, which then to him

Appeared, as clear to us the past appears.

A yearning towards this sage inspired my

pen

And tongue, that instant, with humility

Descending from my height of majesty;

Such mastery has a strong desire o'er men;

My earnest prayers I wrote-I sent-

with ten

My noblest envoys, loaded each apart

With gold and silver, which with all my

heart

I offered him, but the request was vain.

With much politeness the wise man replied,

"You, sire, are a great king, and I should be

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ALFONSO EL SABIO

37

Most glad to serve you, but in such a fee

Of gold and silver gems I take no sort of

pride;

Deign, then, yourself to use them; I abide

Content in more abundant wealth; and may

Your treasures profit you in every way

That I can wish, your servant." I com-

plied;

But sent the stateliest of my argosies,

Which reached, and from the Alexandrian

port

Brought safe this cunning master to my

court,

Who greeted me with all kind courtesies;

I knowing well his great abilities,

And learning in the movement of the

spheres,

Have highly honored him these many

years,

For honor is the birthright of the wise.

—J. H. Wiffen.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

38

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

MOSSÉN JORDI DE SAN JORDI

(About 1250)

SONG OF CONTRARIES

Mossén Jordi de San Jordi, an elusive figure in early Spanish literary history, is confused with another figure called Jordi del Rey. Both are said to have been born either in Valencia or Catalonia about the middle of the thirteenth or fifteenth century, although the style of the present selection would seem to point to the later as the more probable date.

From day to day I learn but to unlearn,

I live to die—my pleasure is my woe;

In dreary darkness I can light discern,

Though blind, I see, and all but knowledge know.

I nothing grasp, and yet the world embrace,

Though bound to earth, o'er highest heaven I fly.

With what's behind I run an untried race

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MOSSÉN JORDI

39

And break from that which holds me mightily.

Evil I find when hurrying after bliss,

Loveless I love, and doubt of all I see;

All seems a dream that most substantial is,

I hate myself—others are dear to me;

Voiceless, I speak—I hear, of hearing void;

My aye is no; truth becomes falsehood strange;

I cat, not hungry—shift, though unannoyed;

Touch without hands—and sense to folly change.

I seek to soar, and then the deeper fall,

When most I seem to sink, then mount I still;

Laughing I weep,—and waking, dreams I call;

And when most cold, hotter than fire I feel;

Perplexed, I do what I would leave undone;

Losing I gain—time fleetest, slowest flows;

Though free from pain, 'neath pain's attacks I groan;

To craftiest fox the gentlest lambkin grows.

—Anonymous.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

40

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

JUAN LORENZO SEGURA

(Late thirteenth century)

MAY

Juan Lorenzo Segura, a native of Astorga, in the latter part of the thirteenth century who became an ecclesiastic—“bon clerigo é onrado”—and who left a long poem on Alexander the Great.

It was the month of May, a glorious time,

When merry music make the birds in boughs,

Dressed are the meads with beauty far and wide,

And sighs the ladye that has not a spouse;

Tide sweet for marriages; flowers and fresh winds

Temper the clime; in every village near

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN LORENZO SEGURA

41

Young girls in bevies sing, and with blythe minds

Make each to each good wishes of the year.

Young maids and old maids, are all out of doors,

Melting with love, to gather flowers at rest

Of noon—they whisper each to each, amours

Are good—and the most tender deem the best.

—J. H. Wiffen.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

42

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

JUAN RUÍZ: Archpriest of Hita

(About 1300)

TO VENUS

Juan Ruíz, was the Archpriest of Hita, in the neighborhood of Guadalajara. It is conjectured that he was born in 1283. His ecclesiastical superiors found it necessary to imprison and degrade him. He is a poet of peculiarly personal character, strangely akin in spirit to the French poet François Villon.

His Libro de buen Amor is to be found in the Biblioteca de autores castellanos (vol. lvii); other editions are that of J. Ducamin (Toulouse, 1901), and of Julio Cejador y Frauca (Madrid, 1913). See also El Arcipreste de Hita (Madrid, 1906), by Julio Puyol y Alonso.

Of figure very graceful, with amorous look, correct,

Sweet, lovely, full of frolic, mild, with mirth by prudence checked,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN RUÍZ DE HITA

43

Caressing, courteous, lady-like, in wreathèd smiles bedecked,

Whom every lady looks upon with love and with respect,—

Lady Venus, wife of Love, at thy footstool low I kneel,

Thou art the paramount desire of all, thy force all feel.

O Love, thou are the master of all creatures; all with zeal

Worship thee for their creator, or for sorrow or for weal.

Kings, dukes, and noble princes, every living thing that is

Fear and serve thee for their being; oh, take not my vows amiss!

Fulfill my fair desires, give good fortune, give me bliss,

And be not niggard, shy, nor harsh; sweet Venus, grant me this!

I am so lost, so ruined, and so wounded by thy dart,

Which I carry close concealed and buried deep in my sad heart,

As not to dare reveal the wound; I dare not e'er impart

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

44

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Her name, ere I forget her, may I perish

with the smart!

I have lost my lively color, and my mind

is in decay;

I have neither strength nor spirits, I fall

off both night and day;

My eyes are dim, they serve alone to lead

my steps astray

If thou do not give me comfort, I shall

sworn and pass away.

Replieth Venus::

Tell all thy feelings without fear or being

swayed by shame,

To every amorous-looking miss, to every

gadding dame;

Amongst a thousand, thou wilt scarce find

one that e'er will blame

Thine unembarrassed suit, nor laugh to

scorn thy tender flame.

If the first wave of the rough sea, when it

comes roaring near,

Should frighten the rude mariner, he ne'er

would plough the clear

With his brass-beakéd ship; then ne'er

let the first word sever

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN RUÍZ DE HITA

45

The first frown, or the first repulse, affright thee from thy dear.

By cunning hardest hearts grow soft, walled cities fall; with care

High trees are felled, grave weights are raised; by cunning many swear

By cunning many perjured are, and fishes by the snare

Are taken under the green wave; then why shouldst thou despair?

—J. H. Wiffen.

PRAISE OF LITTLE WOMEN

I wish to make my sermon brief,—to shorten my oration,—

For a never-ending sermon is my utter detestation;

I like short women,—suits at law without procrastination,—

And am always most delighted with things of short duration.

A babbler is a laughing-stock; he's a fool who's always grinning

But little women love so much, one falls in love with sinning.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

46

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

There are women who are very tall, and

yet not worth the winning,

And in the change of short for long repeti-

tance finds beginning.

To praise the little women Love besought

me in my musing;

To tell their noble qualities is quite beyond

refusing;

So I'll praise the little women, and you'll

find the thing amusing

They are, I know, as cold as snow, whilst

flames around diffusing.

They're cold without, whilst warm within

the flame of Love is raging,

They're gay and pleasant in the strect,—

soft, cheerful, and engaging,

They're thrifty and discreet at home,—the

cares of life assuaging;

All this and more;—try and you'll find

how true is my presaging.

In a little precious stone what splendor

meets the eyes!

In a little lump of sugar how much of

sweetness lies!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN RUÍZ DE HITA

47

So in a little woman love grows and multiplies;

You recollect the proverb says,—“A word unto the Wise.”

A pepper-corn is very small, but seasons every dinner

More than all other condiments, although 'tis sprinkled thinner;

Just so a little woman is, if Love will let you win her,—

There's not a joy in all the world you will not find within her.

And as within the little rose you find the richest dyes,

And in a little grain of gold much price and values lies,

As from a little balsam much odor doth arise,

So in a little woman there's a taste of paradise.

Even as a little ruby its secret worth betrays,

Color and price and virtue, in the clearness of its rays,—

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

48

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Just so a little woman much excellence displays,

Beauty and grace and love and fidelity

always.

The skylark and the nightingale, though

small and light of wing

Yet warble sweeter in the grove than all

the birds that sing;

And so a little woman, though a very little

thing,

Is sweeter far than sugar and flowers that

bloom in spring.

The magpie and the golden thrush have

many a thrilling note,

Each as a gay musician doth strain his

little throat

A merry little songster in his green and

yellow coat;

And such a little woman is, when Love

doth make her dote.

There's nought can be compared to her,

throughout the wide creation;

She is a paradise on earth,—our greatest

consolation,—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN RUÍZ DE HITA

49

So cheerful, gay and happy, so free from all vexation;

In fine, she's better in the proot than in anticipation.

If as her size increases are woman's charms decreased,

Then surely it is good to be from all the great released.

Now of two evils choose the less—said a wise man of the East,

By consequence, of woman-kind be sure to choose the least.

—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

50

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

PERO LÓPEZ DE AYALA

(1332-1407)

SONG TO THE VIRGIN MARY

Pero López de Ayala was a Basque courtier in the suite of Pedro the Cruel, Henry of Trastamara, John I, and Henry III. He became Grand Chancellor of Castile in 1398. His principal work is the Rimado de Palacio (Biblioteca de autores españoles, vol. lvii). It is also to be found in a new edition edited by Albert Kuersteiner in the Biblioteca hispánica.

Lady, as I know thy power,

I place my hopes in thee;

Thy shrine in Guadalupe's tower

My pilgrim steps shall see.

Thy welcome ever was most sweet

To those who come in care;

When from this prison I retreat,

I'll seek thine image there.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

PERO LÓPEZ DE AYALA

51

Lady, as I know thy power,

I place my hopes in thee;

Thy shrine in Guadalupe's tower,

My pilgrim steps shall see.

In all my sorrows would I call

On thee, Sweet Advocate;

My heart adores thee more than all,

And so my sins seem great.

Lady, as I know thy power,

I place my hopes in thee;

Thy shrine in Guadalupe's tower

My pilgrim steps shall see.

Thou art the star that shows the way,

The balm that heals my wrong;

In gentleness be mine today

And lead to heaven along.

Lady, as I know thy power,

I place my hopes in thee;

Thy shrine in Guadalupe's tower

My pilgrim steps shall see.

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

52

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

ALVARO DE LUNA

(1388-1453)

CANCIÓN

Alvaro de Luna, from a mere page became Grand Constable of Castile through the favor of Juan II. He obtained unbounded power and wealth, but earned the hatred of the nobles, who procured his abandonment and execution by his King in 1453. His poems are characteristic in their frivolous, daring manner of the age in which he flourished. Some of his poetical work is to be found in the Cancionero de Baena (edition of P. J. Pidal, Madrid, 1851).

Since to cry

And to sigh

I ne'er cease;

And in vain

I would gain

My release;

Yet I still

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ALVARO DE LUNA

53

Have the will,

Though I see

That the way

Every day

Is less free.

She is light

And the blight

Wrecks my joy;

Better death

Than such breath

I employ!

But perchance

For such glance

I was born;

And my griet

Is relief

For your scorn.

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

54

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

ÍÑIGO LÓPEZ DE MENDOZA

(1398–1458)

SERRANILLA

Íñigo López de Mendoza, Marqués de Santillana, the son of the Admiral of Castile and nephew of López de Ayala, was born at Carrión de los Condes. He was a skilful politician and bitterly opposed to Alvaro de Luna. He died at Guadalajara on March 25, 1458. He is remarkable for a fine classical knowledge, and for his acquaintance with all the literary forms of the Provençal and Italian schools. He is thought to have been the first to employ the sonnet form in Spain. His Obras were published in Madrid, 1852, edited by José Amador de los Ríos, and his poems are to be found in the Cancionero castellano del siglo XV, collected by M. R. Foulché-Delbosc in the Nueva biblioteca de autores españoles (vol. xix).

From Calatrava as I took my way

At holy Mary's shrine to kneel and pray,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ÍÑIGO LÓPEZ DE MENDOZA

55

And sleep upon my eyelids heavy lay,

There where the ground was very rough

and wild,

I lost my path and met a peasant child:

From Finojosa, with the herds around her,

There in the fields I found her.

Upon a meadow green with tender grass,

With other rustic cowherds, lad and lass,

So sweet a thing to see I watched her pass:

My eyes could scarce believe her what

they found her,

There with the herds around her.

I do not think that roses in the Spring

Are half so lovely in their fashioning;

My heart must needs avow this secret thing,

That had I known her first as then I

found her,

From Finojosa, with the herds around her,

I had not strayed so far her face to see

That it might rob me of my liberty.

I questioned her, to know what she might

say:

"Has she of Finojosa passed this way?"

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

56

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

She smiled and answered me: "In vain

you sue,

Full well my heart discerns the hope in you:

But she of whom you speak, and have

not found her.

Her heart is free, no thought of love has

bound her,

Here with the herds around her."

—John Pierrepont Rice.

CANCION

Whether you`love me

I cannot tell.

But that I love you,

This I know well.

You and none other

Hold I so dear.

This shall be always,

Year upon year.

When first I saw you,

So it befell.

I gave you all things—

This I know well.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ÍÑIGO LÓPEZ DE MENDOZA

57

Myself I gave you

Ever in fee.

Doubt them of all things

But doubt not me.

Since first I saw you,

Under your spell,

All my wits wander,

This I know well.

Still have I loved you,

Still shall I love,

Love you and serve you

All things above.

Her I have chosen

None doth excel.

Trust me, I feign not,

This I know well.

— John Pierrepont Rice.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

58

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

ANONYMOUS

(Fifteenth century)

VILLANCICO

This Villancico is a remarkable little poem found in the Cancionero musical de los siglos

X V y X VI, published by F. Asenjo Barbieri (Madrid, 1890, no. 17, p. 62).

Three dark maids,—I loved them when

In Jaén,—

Axa, Fátima, Marien.

Three dark maids who went together

Picking olives in clear weather,

My, but they were in fine feather

In Jaén,—

Axa, Fátina, Marien!—

There the harvests they collected,

Turning home with hearts dejected,

Haggard where the sun reflected

In Jaén,—

Axa, Fátina, Marien—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

59

Three dark Moors so lovely they—

Three dark Moors so lovely, they

Plucked the apples on that day

Near Jaën,—

Axa, Fátima, Marien.

—Thomas Walsh.

THE BLACK GLOVE

From the Cancionero general

Glove of black in white hand bare,

And about her forehead pale

Wound a thin transparent veil

That doth not conceal her hair.

Sovereign attitude and air,

Cheek and neck alike displayed,

With coquettish charms arrayed,

Laughing eyes and fugitive;—

This is killing men that live,

'Tis not mourning for the dead.

—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

60

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

MICER FRANCISCO IMPERIAL

(Early fifteenth century)

DEZIR

Micer Francisco Imperial was the son of a Genovese jeweller settled in Seville. He is important as the first poet in Spanish to imitate the poems of Dante in their allegorical style. Thirteen of his poems are to be found in the Cancionero de Baena.

Passing on no vain journey was I upon the day

On Guadalquiver's bridge I went with footsteps free

Unto the fair encounter that thereon came to me,

Where by the River's reaches, as old Triana lay,

The lovely star Diana her beauty did display;

Upon that May day early, hard at the break of morn

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MICER FRANCISCO IMPERIAL

61

The Feast of holy pilgrimages to adorn,—

To Santa Ana, all the praises due, I pay!—

And there my colors for to show, I chose

the flower

Of jasmine delicate and rare; the rose in bloom

Fresh from its garden breathing rarest of perfume;

And then the fleur-de-lis from the meadow bower.

Their gracious hues and honest smiled so upon that hour

They brought to mind the messenger of angel face

Who came old time and murmured 'Hail, Thou full of Grace,'

Descending out of Paradise to speak its power.

Hushed be the poets all, and authors wise as well,

Homer, Horace, Vergil, Dante, and he too,

That Ovid to whose pen The Art of Love is due,

And all who e'er have written the praise of lords to tell;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

62

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

For she is as the moon in the stars' citadel,

When her with other women one started to

compare,—

A shining flame amid the brightest planets

there—

A rose among the flowers for beauty and

for smell.

Though not to be disdained for beauty or

for grace

The fragile enfregyme, the flowery pride of

Greece,

The blossom that the Trojan voices never

cease

To praise on high and give the loftiest of

place;

Yet native to our soil, where never furrows

trace,

There sometimes comes to blossom so

beautiful a rose,

So stately and so lovely, it quite outshineth

those,—

And that alone is worthy to be put beside

her face.

— Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FERRANT SÁNCHEZ TALAVERA

63

FERRANT SÁNCHEZ TALAVERA

(Fifteenth century)

DEZIR

Ferrant Sánchez Talavera was Commander of the Order of Calatrava. Sixteen of his

poems are to be found in the Cancionero de

Baena, which show a real distinction not

eclipsed by the resemblance of his works to

the Coplas of Jorge Manrique and the verses

of Rodrigo Cota de Maguaque.

For love of God, let's put aside the veil,

Good Gentlemen, that blurs and blinds

our sight,

And upon Death the conqueror look aright,

Who levels high and low beneath his flail.

And unto God in heaven let our sighs

Go up in prayer, each heart a penitent,

For the offenses everyone has spent,

The old, the child, the youth, against the

skies.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

64

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Surely no life at all we live, who here

But measure the assured approach of

death—

The cruel, treacherous master of our breath

And when we think to live,—ah, he is near!

We are well certain of our hour of birth,

But when we die, ah, certain we are not;

No certitude of life an hour we've got;

With tears we come, with tears we leave

the earth.

And what became of all the emperors,

The popes and kings, and all the prelate

lords,

The dukes and counts whom history

records,

Their rich and strong and learned servitors?

And all who in the lists of love would wage

In gallant arms throughout the spreading

world,—

And all in art's and science's scroll enfurled,

Where doctors, poets, troubadours, engage?

Father and son and brother, parents fond

And friends and sweethearts of our very

breast,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FERRANT SÁNCHEZ TALAVERA

65

With whom we ate and drank and took

our rest,

The gay and gallant throng in friendships

bond,—

Ladies and damsels and brave striplings

fair

Who lay their' youthfulness beneath the

ground;

And other gentles that short shift have

found,

Who once were present here and now are

where?

The Duke of Cabra and the Admiral,

And many another Grandee of Castile;

Now Ruy Diaz's sleeve to pluck doth steal

Old Death,—who 'mong his compeers out-

shone all,

So that the people of the farthest East

Dreamt of his prowess and the glory's

shine

He lent this court with all his gracious, fine

Performance graciously and bold increased.

And all we mention now are briefly grown

But dust and ashes, fallen to nothingness;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

66

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Others are bones that are of flesh the less,

And,refuse of the trenches, there are thrown.

And others are disjointed limbs, their head

Without a body, without hands or feet;

Others whereon the worms begin to eat;

Others new set for burial with the dead.

Where now the lordships, prelacies, and

powers,

The tributes and the rents signorial?

Where now their pomps and courtliness

withal,

Where their campaignings and their council

hours?

Where all their sciences and learned lore-

Where are their masters of the poet's art,

Where the great rhymers, where the singer's

heart,

Where he that struck the lute-strings o'er

and o'er?

Where are the treasures, vassals, servitors,

Where are their hangings and their precious

stones,

Where are their pearls baroque in costly

thrones,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FERRANT SÁNCHEZ TALAVERA

67

Where are their perfume arks and scented store?

Where are their woofs of gold and shining chains,

Where are their collars and their buckles now,

Where the great gems that glittered row on row,

Where the light bells that tinkled on their reins?

Where are the feasts and suppers gay be- spread,

Where the bright joust and tourney after- noons,

Where are their fashions and new-fangled boons,

Where the new steps with which their dancers tread?

Where the assemblies and the banquet boards,

Where all the shows and splendor of their ways,

Where all the laughter and the pleasant plays,

Where all the minstrel's and the joglar's words;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

68

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

In faith meseems without a shade of doubt,

The days are now accomplished as foretold

Isaias, prophet son of Amos old,

Who said: "All order shall be blotted out;

Corruption shall be over every worth,

And death o'er all of humankind shall creep,

And every gate shall hear the voices weep,

And all the people be destroyed from

earth!"

Such is the end and tribulation seen

By Jeremias prophet of man's woes,

Whose eyes a flood of weepings did disclose

Whose loud lamentings did his grief demean

Mourning his sins and errors of his days;

And this is written, anyone may read,

Within his chapters and clear and full

indeed;

These surely are the times of which he says.

Wherefore good sense advises we should

arm

Our souls with all the virtues that they lack,

And take earth's empty treasures from our

back

Since they are sure to go at first alarm.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FERRANT SÁNCHEZ TALAVERA

69

And he who looks on this with kindly eyes,

Need not a fear unto his dying give;

Through death he passes, ceasing but to

live,

To Life Eternal where he never dies!

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

70

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

JUAN II OF CASTILE

(1405-1454)

CANCIÓN

King Juan II of Castile was a weak character, a futile monarch, but a good critic and

a graceful poet. He was lordly patron of a

court to which flocked over two hundred

troubadours and poets. His story is inti-

mately involved with that of his favorite

Alvaro de Luna.

O Love, I never, never thought

Thy power had been so great,

That thou couldst change my fate,

By changes in another wrought,

Till now, alas! I know it.

I thought I knew thee well,

For I had known thee long;

But though I felt thee strong,

I felt not all thy spell.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN II OF CASTILE

71

Nor ever, ever had I thought

Thy power had been so great,

That thou couldst change my fate,

By changes in another wrought,

Till now, alas! I know it.

—George Ticknor.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

72

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

JUAN DE MENA

(1411–1456)

CANCION

Juan de Mena was born at Cordoba, where his father was regidor. After travelling in Italy he returned to Spain and became Latin Secretary to Juan II. He was a great favorite of this monarch and died at Torrelaguna. He was the leading poet of his time being called "The Spanish Ennius." His principal poem, El Laberinto, imitates the scheme of Dante's Commedia. El Laberinto, also known as Las Treziendas, was published by M. R. Foulché-Delbosc (Mâcon, 1904). See also F. Wolf, Studien, p. 772, and George Ticknor's History of Spanish Literature, i, p. 329.

As I upon my pallet lie,

The greatest grief I know

Is thinking when I said "Good-bye"

To the breast I'm loving so.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN DE MENA

73

In spite of all the woes I feel

Upon that parting thought,

At times my memories reveal

The mighty joys you brought.

So let the world a-whispering go

To tell why here I lie;

Because they know I've said "Good-bye"

To the breast I'm loving so.

I languish but I let none hear

How deep my sorrows are,

Although my griefs are quite as near

As your sweet balm is far.

And if it be the end they show

And death is coming nigh,

While living, let me say "Good-bye"

To the breast I'm loving so.

— Thomas Walsh.

LINES TO MACÍAS EL ENAMORADO

(From the Laberinto)

We in this radiant circle looked so long

That we found out Macías; in a bower

Of cypress was he weeping still the hour

That ended his dark life and love in wrong.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

74

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Nearer I drew for sympathy was strong

In me, when I perceived he was from Spain;

And there I heard him sing the saddest strain

That e'er was tuned in elegiac song.

"Love crowned me with his myrtle crown;

my name

Will be pronounced by many, but, alas,

When his pangs caused me bliss, not slighter woe

The mournful suffering that consumed my frame!

His sweet snares conquer the lorn mind

they tame,

But do not always then continue sweet;

And since they cause me ruin so complete,

Turn, lovers, turn, and disesteem his fame;

Dangers so passionate be glad to miss;

Learn to be gay; flee from sorrows touch;

Learn to disserve him you have served so much,

Your devoirs pay at any shrine but his:

If the short joy that in his service is,

Were but proportioned to the long, long pain,

Neither would he that once has loved com-plain,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN DE MENA

75

Nor he that ne'er has loved despair of bliss.

But even as some assassin or night-rover,

Seeing his fellow wound upon the wheel,

Awed by the agony resolves with zeal

His life to 'mend, and character recover;

But when the fearful spectacle is over,

Reacts his crimes with easy unconcern;

So my amours on my despair return,

That I should die, as I have lived, a lover!"

—J. H. Wiffen.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

76

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY

GÓMEZ MANRIQUE

(1415-1491)

TO A LADY GOING VEILED

Gómez Manrique, Lord of Amusco, was a nephew of the Marqués de Santillana and brother of Rodrigo Manrique, Grand-Master of Santiago, called "the Second Cid." At first a mere courtier, he devoted himself to the poetry fashionable at the court of Juan II. He was called to sterner duties by his warlike brother and supported in battle the claims of the Pretender Alonso and his sister Isabel of Castile. He is distinguished for a pathos similar to that employed by his great nephew, Jorge Manrique, and this, as well as his satirical poetry, may be studied in his Cancionero edited by Antonio Paz y Mélia (Madrid, 1885).

The very heart went out of me

When first I saw your face,

And soon it did appear to me

Your eyes in mine would trace.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GÓMEZ MANRIQUE

77

I could no more than scarcely breathe

When you drew on your veil

And hid yourself so well beneath

Your dark cloak's heavy trail.

But under it your gentle grace

And simple air were seen;

The very masque its charm would trace

And show, instead of screen;

So very great became my care

And trouble that I knew

My heart was swift entangled there

With my enraptured view.

— Thomas Walsh.

COPLAS ON THE BAD GOVERNMENT

OF TOLEDO

When mighty Rome was conqueror,

'Twas Scipio led the van of fighting;

Old Fabius was her counselor;

And Titus Livius did her writing.

And not a maid or wife but came

And stripped the ornaments from off her,

To offer them for warlike fame

And save her country from dishonor.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

78

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Where none there be to rule the town

How soon its triumph will be ended!

How soon the roof-tree tumble down

Where not a dweller is attended!

When pigs without the dogs to herd

Will straggle quick to their perdition,

Can troops without a captain's word

Be long maintained in war-condition?

For sheep without a shepherd's rod

Will lay in waste both field and garden;

And monks that know no prior's nod

Will fall to sins beyond a pardon.

The vineyards left unwatched to grow

Unto each passer-by will yield them;

The courts where gallants never show

Are hands that have no gloves to shield

them.

The shoe that fares without a sole

Can ill preserve the foot that wears it;

The strings escaped the lute's control

Will make a sound—if you can bear

it—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GÓMEZ MANRIQUE

79

The church that boasts no lettered throng,

Like palace without walls, must tremble;

Who looks for fish both big and strong

Save where the firmest nets dissemble?

In faith, that blow me-seemeth light

Of which a swordless hand is giver;—

But a sword without a hand of might,

Full little thrust will it deliver!

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

80

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

JUAN ÁLVAREZ GATO

(1433-1496)

CANTAR TO OUR LADY

Juan Álvarez Gato was one of the poets of

the court of Juan II. He fell into disgrace

under Henry IV. He was highly esteemed

by Gómez Manrique. His work is to be

found in the Cancionero castellano del siglo

X V (Nueva biblioteca de autores españoles,

vol. xix)

Tell me Lady, tell, prithee,

When from earth I pass away,

Will you then remember me?

When there shall to all be known

How my time away was thrown,

How with sins my days were sown,

And my depths of misery—

Will you then remember me?

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN ÁLVAREZ GATO

81

Through the realms of the eternal

Of the Judgment Seat diurnal,

Refuge from the doom infernal,

In your prayers alone I see,—

Will you then remember me?

When upon the dreaded scales

All my poor accounting fails

To report the bonds and bails

That your Son has given in fee—

Will you then remember me?

Finale

When my soul in grief astounded

At the judgment bar surrounded

With the charge of guilt is hounded,

And your prayers alone can free,—

Will you then remember me?

—Garret Strange.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

82

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

JORGE MANRIQUE

(1440-1479)

CÁNTICA

Jorge Manrique was the son of Rodrigo, Grand-Master of Santiago, "the Second Cid," and was born at Paredes de Nava. From his birth he was in the midst of wars, and he joined his father in supporting Alfonso and Isabel of Castile in their claims for the throne. He was killed before the walls of Garci-Muñoz in his thirty-ninth year. His famous Coplas were written after the death of his father in 1476. Innumerable editions of this great poem have made their appearance; among the best being that of M. R. Foulché-Delbosc (Madrid, 1912). The Coplas have had many commentaries in verse and have several times been set to music. H. W. Longfellow began his literary career with the publication of a version of the Coplas in English.

Let him whose time hath come to go

Put never faith where he must part;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES.

JORGE MANRIQUE

83

Forgetfulness and change of heart

Are penalties the absent know.

You would be loved—a lover you.

Then pay your court incessant, thou,

For hardly are you vanished ere

Remembrance goes as lightly too.

Be done with idle hope, and start

Let him whose time hath come to go;

Forgetfulness and change of heart

Are penalties the absent know.

— Thomas Walsh.

THE COPLAS ON THE DEATH OF HIS

FATHER, THE GRAND-MASTER

OF SANTIAGO

The Introit

Let from its dream the soul awaken,

And reason mark with open eyes

The scene unfolding,—

How lightly life away is taken,

How cometh Death in stealthy guise,—

At last beholding;

What swiftness hath the flight of pleasure

That, once attained, seems nothing more

Than respite cold;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

84

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

How fain is memory to measure

Each latter day inferior

To those of old.

Beholding how each instant flies

So swift, that, as we count, 'tis gone

Beyond recover,

Let us resolve to be more wise

Than stake our future lot upon

What soon is over.

Let none be self-deluding, none,—

Imagining some longer stay

For his own treasure

Than what today he sees undone;

For everything must pass away

In equal measure.

Our lives are fated as the rivers

That gather downward to the sea

We know as Death;

And thither every flood delivers

The pride and pomp of seigniory

That forfeiteth;

Thither, the rivers in their splendor;

Thither, the streams of modest worth,—

The rills beside them;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

85

Till there all equal they surrender;

And so with those who toil on earth,

And those who guide them.

The Invocation

I turn me from the praise and singing

Of panegyrist's, and the proud

Old poets' stories;

I would not have them hither bringing

Their artful potions that but cloud

His honest glories;

On Him Alone I lay my burden—

Him only do I now implore

In my distress,—

Who came on earth and had for guerdon

The scorn of man that did ignore

His Godliness.

This world is but a highway going

Unto that other, the abode

Without a sorrow;

The wise are they who gird them, knowing

The guideposts set along that road

Unto tomorrow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

86

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

We start with birth upon that questing;

We journey all the while we live,

Our goal attaining

The day alone that brings us resting,

When Death shall last quietus give

To all complaining.

This were a hallowed world indeed,

Did we but give it the employ

That was intended;

For by the precepts of our Creed

We earn hereby a life of joy

When this is ended.

The Son of God Himself on earth

Came down to raise our lowly race

Unto the sky;

Here took upon Him human birth;

Here lived among us for a space;

And here did die.

Behold what miserable prize—

What futile task we set upon,

Whilst greed awakes us!

And what a traitor world of lies

Is this, whose very gifts are gone

Ere Death o'ertakes us!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

87

Some through increasing age deprived,

Some by unhappy turn of fate

Destroyed and banished,

Some, as with blight inherent rived

At topmost of their branching state,

Have failed and vanished.

Yea, tell me shall the lovely blason,

The gentle freshness and contour

Of smiling faces,—

The blush and pallor's sweet occasion,—

Of all—shall one a truce secure

From Time's grim traces?

The flowing tress, the stature slender,

The corporal litheness, and the strength

Of gallant youth,—

All, all,—to weariness surrender

As o'er them falls the shadow's length

Of age in truth.

The Visigoths whose lineage kingly

Whose feats of war and mighty reign

Were so exalted,—

What divers ways did all and singly

Drop down to the obscure again

And were defaulted!

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

88

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Some through their worthlessness (How lowly

And base among the rabble came

Their estimation!)

Whilst others as a refuge solely

In offices they only shame

Maintain their station.

Estate and luxury's providing

Can leave us pauper—who may doubt?—

Within an hour;

Let us not count on their abiding,

Since there is nothing sure about

Dame Fortune's dower.

Hers are the gifts of one unstable

Upon her globe as swift as light

Revolving ever;

Who to be constant is unable,

Who cannot stay nor rest from flight

On aughtsoever.

And though, say I, her highest favor

Should follow to the tomb and heap

With wreaths her master;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

89

Let not our solid judgment waver

Since life is like a dream and sleep

Flies nothing faster.

The soft occasions of today

Wherein we find our joy or ease

Are but diurnal;

Whilst the dread torments that must pay

The cost of our iniquities

Shall be eternal.

The pleasures light, the fond evasions

That life on troubled earth deploys

For eyes of mortals,

What are they but the fair persuasions

Of labyrinths where Death decoys

To trap-like portals?

Where heedless of the doom ensuing

We hasten laughing to the snare

Without suspicion.

Until aghast at our undoing,

We turn to find the bolt is there,

And our perdition.

Could we but have procured the power

To make our faded youth anew

Both fresh and whole,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

90

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

As now through life's probation hour

'Tis ours to give angelic hue

Unto the soul,—

What ceaseless care we then had taken,

What pains had welcomed, so to bring

A health but human,—

Our summer bloom to re-awaken,

Our stains to clear,—outrivalling

The arts of woman!

The kings whose mighty deeds are spacious

Upon the parchments of the years,

Alas!—the weeping

That overtook their boast audacious.

And swept their thrones to grime and

tears

And sorrow's keeping!

Naught else proves any more enduring;

Nor are the popes, nor emperors,

Nor prelatries

A longer stay or truce securing

Than the poor herdsman of the moors

From Death's decrees.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

91

Recount no more of Troy, or foeman

The echo of whose wars is now

But far tradition;

Recount no more how fared the Roman

(His scroll of glories we allow)

Nor his perdition;

Nor here rehearse the homely fable

Of such as yielded up their sway

These decades gone;

But let us say what lamentable

Fate the lords of yesterday

Have fallen upon.

Of fair Don Juan the king that ruled us,—

Of those hight heirs of Aragon,—

What are the tidings?

Of him whose courtly graces schooled us,

Whom song and wisdom smiled upon,

Where the abidings?

The jousts and tourneys where they vaunted

With trappings, and caparison,

And armor sheathing,—

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

92

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Were they but phantasies that taunted,-

But blades of grass that vanished on

A summer's breathing?

What of the dames of birth and station,

Their head-attire, their sweeping trains,

Their vesture scented?

What of that gallant conflagration

They made of lovers' hearts whose pains

Were uncontented?

And what of him, that troubadour

Whose melting lutany and rime

Was all their pleasure?

Ah, what of her who danced demure,

And trailed her robes of olden time

So fair a measure?

Then Don Enriqué, in succession,

His brother's heir,-think, to what height

Was he annoointed!

What blandishment and sweet possession

The world prepared for his delight,

As seemed appointed!

Yet see what unrelenting foeman,

What cruel adversary, Fate

To him became;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

93

A friend beiriended as was no man—

How brief for him endured the state

His birth might claim.

The golden bounties without stinting,

The strongholds and the lairs of kings

With treasure glutted;

The flagons of their wassail glinting,

The sceptres, orbs, and crowns, and rings

With which they strutted;

The steeds, the spurs, and bits to rein them,

The pillions draped unto the ground

Beneath their paces,—

Ah, whither must we fare to gain them?—

That were but as the dews around

The meadow places.

His brother then, the unoffending,

Who was intruded on his reign

To act as heir,—

What gallant court was round him bending,

How many a haughty lord was fain

To tend him there!

Yet as but mortal was his station,

Death for his goblet soon distilled

A draught for draining;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

94

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

O Thou Divine Predestination!—

When most his blaze the world had filled

Thou sent'st the raining!

And then, Don Alvaro, Grand-Master

And Constable, whom we have known

When loved and dreaded,—

What need to tell of his disaster,

Since we behold him overthrown

And swift beheaded!

His treasures that defied accounting,

His manors and his feudal lands,

His boundless power,—

What more than tears were their amounting?

What more than bonds to tie his hands

At life's last hour?

That other twain, Grand-Masters solely,

Yet with the fortunes as of kings

Fraternal reigning,—

Who brought the high as well as lowly

Submissive to their challengings

And laws' ordaining.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

95

And what of all their power and prize

That touched the very peaks of fame

That none could limit?—

A conflagration 'gainst the skies,

Till at its brightest ruthless came

Death's hand to dim it.

The dukes so many and excelling,

The marquises, and counts, the throng

Of barons splendid,

Speak, Death, where hast thou hid their dwelling?

The sway we saw them wield so strong—

How was it ended?

What fields upon were they engaging,—

What prowess showing us in war

Or its cessation,

When thou, O Death, didst come outraging

Both one and all, and swept them o'er

With desolation.

Their warriors' unnumbered hosting,

The pennon, and the battle-flag,

And bannered splendor;—

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

96

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

The castles with their turrets boasting,

Their walls and barricades to brag

And mock surrender,—

The cavern’s ancient crypt of hiding,

Or secret passage, vault, or stair,—

What use affords it?

Since thou upon thy onslaught striding

Canst send a shaft unerring where

No buckler wards it!

O World that givest and destroyest

Would that the life which thou hast shown

Were worth the living!

But here, as good or ill deployest,

The parting is with gladness known

Or with misgiving.

Thy span is so with griefs encumbered

With sighing every breeze so steeped,

With wrongs so clouded,

A desert where no boon is numbered,

The sweetness and allurement reaped

And black and shrouded.

Thy highway is the road of weeping;

Thy long farewells are bitterness

Without a morrow;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

97

Adown thy ruts and ditches keeping

The traveller who doth most possess

Hath most of sorrow.

Thy chattels are but had with sighing;

With sweat of brow alone obtained

The wage they give;

In myriads thine ills come hieing,

And once existence they have gained,

They longest live.

And he, the shield and knightly pastor

Of honest folk, beloved by all

The unoffending,—

Don Roderic Manrique, Master

Of Santiago,—Fàme shall call

Him brave unending!

Not here behooves to chant his praises

Or laud his valor to the skies,

Since none but knows them;

Nor would I crave a word that raises

His merit higher than the prize

The world bestows them.

O what a comrade comrades found him!

Unto his henchmen what a lord!

And what a brother!

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

98

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

What foeman for the foes around him!

His peer as Master of the Sword

There was no other!

What precious counsel 'mid the knowing!

What grace amid the courtly bower!

What prudence rare!

What bounty to the vanquished showing!

How 'mid the brave in danger's hour

A lion there!

In destiny a new Augustus;

A Cæsar for his victories

And battle forces;

An Africanus in his justice;

A Ḥannibal for energies

And deep resources;

A Trajan in his gracious hour;

A Titus for his open hand

And cheer unfailing;

His arm, a Spartan king's in power;

His voice, a Tully's to command

The truth's prevailing!

In mildness Antoninus Pius;

A Marc Aurelius in the light

Of calm attending;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

99

A Hadrian to pacify us;

A Theodosius in his right

And high intending;

Aurelius Alexander stern

In discipline and laws of war

Among his legions;

A Constantine in faith eterne;

Gamaliel in the love he bore

His native regions.

He left no weighty chests of treasure,

Nor ever unto wealth attained

Nor store excelling;

To fight the Moors was all his pleasure

And thus his fortresses he gained,

Demesne, and dwelling.

Amid the lists where he prevailed

Fell knights and steeds into his hands

Through fierce compression,

Whereby he came to be regaled

With vassals and with feudal lands

In fair possession.

Ask you how in his rank and station

When first he started his career

Himself he righted?

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

100

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Left orphan and in desolation

His brothers and his henchmen dear

He held united.

And ask you how his course was guided

When once his gallant deeds were famed

And war was ended?

His high contracting so provided

That broader, as his honors claimed,

His lands extended.

And these, the proud exploits narrated

In chronicles to show his youth

And martial force,

With triumphs equal he was fated

To re-affirm in very sooth

As years did course.

Then for the prudence of his ways.

For merit and in high award

Of service knightly,

His dignity they came to raisc

Till he was Master of the Sword

Elected rightly.

Finding his father's forts and manors

By false intruders occupied

And sore oppressed,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

101

With siege and onslaught, shouts and banners,

His broad-sword in his hand to guide,

He re-possessed.

And for our rightful king how well

He bore the brunt of warfare keen

In siege and action,

Let Portugal's poor monarch tell,

Or those who in Castile have been

Among his faction.

Then having risked his life, maintaining

The cause of justice in the fight

For law appointed,

With years in harness spent sustaining

The royal crown of him by right

His lord anointed,

With feats so mighty that Hispania

Can never make account of all

In number mortal,—

Unto his township of Ocaña

Came Death at last to strike and call

Against his portal:

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

102

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Speaketh Death

"Good Cavalier,"—he cried,—"divest you

Of all this hollow world of lies

And soft devices;

Let your old courage now attest you,

And show a breast of steel that vies

In this hard crisis!

"And since of life and fortune's prizes

You ever made so small account

For sake of honor,

Array your soul in virtue's guises

To undergo this paramount

Assault upon her!

"For you, are only half its terrors

And half the battles and the pains

Your heart perceiveth;

Since here a life devoid of errors

And glorious devoid of noble pains

To-day it leaveth;

"A life for such as bravely bear it

And make its fleeting breath sublime

In right pursuing,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

103

Untainted, as is their's who share it

And put their pleasure in the grime

Of their undoing;

"The life that is The Everlasting

Was never yet by aught attained

Save meed eternal;

And ne'er through soft indulgence casting

The shadow of its solace stained

With guilt infernal;

"But in the cloister holy brothers

Besiege it with unceasing prayer

And hard denial;

And faithful paladins are others

Who 'gainst the Moors to win it bear

With wound and trial.

"And since, O noble and undaunted,

Your hands the paynim's blood have shed

In war and tourney,—

Make ready now to take the vaunted

High guerdon you have merited

For this great journey!

"Upon this holy trust confiding,

And in the faith entire and pure

You e'er commended,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

104

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Away,—unto your new abiding,

Take up the Life that shall endure

When this is ended!'

Respondeth the Grand-Master

"Waste we not here the final hours

This puny life can now afford

My mortal being;

But let my will in all its powers

Conformable approach the Lord

And His decreeing.

"Unto my death I yield, contenting

My soul to put the body by

In peace and gladness;

The thought of man to live, preventing

God's loving will that he should die,

Is only madness."

The Supplication

O Thou who for our weight of sin

Descended to a place on earth

And human feature;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JORGE MANRIQUE

105

Thou who didst join Thy Godhead in

A being of such lowly worth

As man Thy creature;

Thou who amid Thy dire tormenting

Didst unresistingly endure

Such pangs to ease us;

Not for my mean deserts relenting,

But only on a sinner poor,

Have mercy, Jesus!

The Codicil

And thus, his hopes so nobly founded,

His senses clear and unimpaired

So none could doubt him,—

With spouse and offspring fond surrounded,

His kinsmen and his servants bared

And knelt around him,—

He gave his soul to Him who gave it,

(May God in heaven ordain it place

And share of glory!)

And left our life as balm to save it,

And dry the tears upon our face!

His deathless story.

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

106

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

RODRÍGUEZ DEL PADRÓN

(About 1450)

TO THE VIRGIN

Rodríguez del Padrón, known also as Rodrí­guez de la Cámara, is considered the last

representative of the Galician troubadours in

Spain. He is said to have been in love with

a queen of Spain, and many fictitious accounts

of him are discussed in Pidal's Cancionero de

Baena (Edition, 1860), and in Ticknor's His­tory of Spanish Literature (vol. i, 355).

O fire of light divine,

Sweet Flame unscorching, pure,—

Against dismay our countersign,

Against all grief a cure,—

Shine on thy servant poor!—

The fickle glory of the world,

Its vain prosperity,

He contemplates;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

RODRÍGUEZ DEL PADRÓN

107

His reasonings profound behold

The centre where there lie

The ills he hates.

Let him who thinks him wise

The Siren’s call attend!

She fearing in amend

The torments that chastise,

Weeps that her reign must end.

—Roderick Gill.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

108

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

RODRIGO COTA DE MAGUAQUE

(About 1492)

ESPARSA

Rodrigo Cota de Maguaque was a Christianized Jew, who has received mistaken notice as the author of the Coplas de Mingo Revulgo and the beginning of the Celestina. His most famous work is the Diálogo entre Amor y un Viejo.

Clouded vision, light obscure,

Moody glory, living death,

Fortune that cannot endure,

Fickle weeping, joy a breath,

Bitter-sweet and sweet unsure,

Peace and anger, sudden crossed,

Such is love, its trappings sure

Decked with glory for its cost.

— Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

CRISTÓBAL DE CASTILLEJO

109

CRISTÓBAL DE CASTILLEJO

(1490-1550)

WOMEN

Cristóbal de Castillejo was born at Ciudad Rodrigo. He joined the household of Ferdinand I of Bohemia, the brother of Carlos V, and later became a priest. In 1539 he went to Venice in the suite of Diego Hurtado de Mendoza. He died in Vienna where he' is buried at Wiener Stadt. His works were published at Madrid in 1792. C. L. Nicolay published The Life and Works of Cristóbal de Castillejo (Philadelphia, 1910).

How dreary and how lone

The world would appear

If women were none!

'Twould be like a fair,

With neither fun nor business there.

Without their smile

Life would be tasteless, vain, and vile;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

110

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

A chaos of perplexity,

A body without soul 'twould be;

A roving spirit borne

Upon the winds forlorn;

A tree without or flowers or fruit,

A reason with no resting place,

A castle with no governor to it,

A house without a base.

What are we? What our race?

How good for nothing and base

Without fair woman to aid us

What could we do? Where should we go?

How should we wander in night and woe,

But for woman to lead us?

How could we love if woman were not?

Love—the brightest part of our lot;

Love—the only charm of living;

Love—the only gift worth giving?

Who would take charge of your house, say

who?

Kitchen, and dairy, and money-chest?

Who but the women, who guard them best;

Guard and adorn them too?

Who like them has a constant smile,

Full of peace, as meekness full,

When life's edge is blunt and dull,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

CRISTÓBAL DE CASTILLEJO

III

And sorrow, and sin, in frowning file,

Stand by the path in which we go

Down to the grave through wasting woe?

All that is good is theirs, is theirs

All we give and all we get;

And if a beam of glory yet

Over the gloomy earth appears,

O, 'tis theirs!

O, 'tis theirs,—

They are the guard,—the soul,— the seal

Of human hope and human weal;

They,—they,—none but they!

Woman,—sweet woman,—let none say

nay!

—John Bowring.

SOME DAY, SOME DAY

Some day, some day

O troubled breast,

Shalt thou find rest.

If Love in thee

To grief give birth,

Six feet of earth

Can more than he;

There calm and free

And unoppressed

Shalt thou find rest.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

112

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

The unattained

In life at last,

When life is passed

Shall all be gained;

And no more pained,

No more distresssed,

Shalt thou find rest.

— H. W. Longfellow.

TO LOVE

Love, grant me kisses beyond counting,

As the hairs upon my head;

A thousand and a hundred shed,

A thousand more be their amounting,

And then add thousands more again,

So that none shall know the number,

And no record shall encumber

With the list of where and when.

— Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN BOSCÁN ALMOGAVER

113

JUAN BOSCÁN ALMOGAVER

(1493-1540)

ON THE DEATH OF GARCILASSO

Juan Boscán Almogaver was born at Barcelona, and served in the Spanish Army in

Italy, later becoming tutor to the Duke of

Alva. His early verses were written in the

old Spanish manner, but when the Venetian

ambassador Navagiero was passing through

Granada he met Boscán and urged him to

introduce the Italian styles of poetry into

Spanish. He thereupon followed in the lead

of Imperial and Santillana, and was most

influential in establishing the Italian verse

methods in Castilian. He frequently imi-

tated Dante and Petrarch. His poems were

first published with those of Garcilasso de

la Vega in 1543. He made a masterly trans-

lation of Castiglione's Il Cortegiano, reprinted

in 1873. His poems may be found in W. I.

Knapp's edition (Madrid, 1875).

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

114

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Tell me, dear Garcilasso,—thou

Who ever aimedst at good,

And in the spirit of thy vow

So swift her course pursued

That thy few steps sufficed to place

The angel in thy loved embrace,

Won instant soon as wooed,—

Why took'st thou not, when winged to flee

From this dark world, Boscán, with thee?

Why, when ascending to the star

Where now thou sit'st enshrined,

Left'st thou thy weeping friend afar,

Alas! so far behind?

Oh, I do think, had it remained

With thee to alter aught ordained

By the Eternal Mind,

Thou wouldst not on this desert spot

Have left thy other self forgot!

For if through life thy love was such

As still to take a pride

In having me so oft and much

Close to thy envied side,—

I cannot doubt, I must believe,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN BOSCÁN ALMOGAVER

115

Thou wouldst at least have taken leave

Of me; or, if denied,

Have come back afterwards, unblest

Till I too shared thy heavenly rest.

— J. H. Wiffen.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

116

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

COMENDADOR JUAN ESCRIVÁ

(About 1497)

CANCIÓN

El Comendador Juan Escrivá was of Valencian birth, and in 1497 went to Rome as ambassador for Ferdinand. He wrote verses in Catalán and Castilian. Lope de Vega wrote a glosa on the present Canción, which is also quoted by Calderón and Cervantes.

Come Death, with so much stealth

I shall not feel thee near;

Let not thy joy appear

The very breath of health!

Come like the thrust that cleaves

The wounded ere he knows

The purport of the blows

Which he, surprised, receives!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

COMENDADOR JUAN ESCRIVÁ

117

Thy coming be by stealth

Else unto me, I fear,

Joy shall make thee appear

The very breath of health.

— Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

118

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

MOSSÉN JUAN TALLANTE

(Late fifteenth century)

PRAYER TO THE CRUCIFIX

Mossén Juan Tallante was a devotional poet of Aragon, whose poems are to be found in the Cancionero General. Little is known of his life.

Almighty God, unchangeable,

Who framed the universe entire

Thy truth to see;

Thou who for loving us so well

Didst in Thine agony expire

On Calvary;

Since with such suffering didst deign

To make amend for our transgression,

O Agnus Dei.

Placed with the thief let us obtain

Salvation in his grief's confession:

Memento mei.

— Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN DE LA ELCINA

119

JUAN DE LA ELCINA

(1468–1529)

COME LET US EAT AND DRINK TODAY

Juan de la Elcina, so called from the probable place of his birth, was educated at the

University of Salamanca and entered the household of the second Duke of Alva. He

made several journeys to Rome where one of his dramatic pieces—Plácido y Victoriano—

was produced in 1512. He became a priest and was appointed chapel-master to Pope Leo X.

In 1518 he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. He returned to Spain and died at Salamanca.

Come, let us eat and drink today,

And sing and laugh and banish sorrow,

For we must part tomorrow.

In Anstruejo's honour, fill

The laughing cup with wine and glee,

And feast and dance with eager will,

And crowd the hours with revelry,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

120

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

For that is wisdom's counsel still;

Today be gay, and banish sorrow,

For we must part tomorrow.

Honor the saint—the morning ray

Will introduce the monster Death—

There's breathing space for joy today,

Tomorrow ye shall gasp for breath;

So now be frolicsome and gay,

And tread joy's round, and banish sorrow,

For we must part tomorrow.

—John Bowring.

VILLANCICO

So rare a flock

In such a sward

A pleasure 'tis to guard !

A flock so rare,

Of such a breed,

Will quickly feed

On land most bare;

When grass is fair

In such a sward

A pleasure 'tis to guard !

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN DE LA ELCINA

121

'Tis my delight

To lead the sheep

And fold to sleep

Their ranks by night;

The frosts are slight,

In such a sward

A pleasure 'tis to guard !

The fruitful throng

In silence goes;

No bleating shows

It suffers wrong;

Ere shades grow long

In such a sward

A pleasure 'tis to guard !

'Tis well to mind

The precious thing

And safely bring

Where no thieves find;

A flock so kind

In such a sward

A pleasure 'tis to guard !

O shepherd charmed,

In a happy vale,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

122

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Where the wolves may rail,

But none is harmed;

A flock unarmed

In such a sward

A pleasure 'tis to guard !

A shepherd true

Shall I alway be,

Since a joy to me

Is my flock to view;

And I swear to you

I shall ne'er discard,

But ever faithful guard !

— Roderick Gill.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

DIEGO DE SALDAÑA

123

DIEGO DE SALDAÑA

(Late fifteenth century)

EYES SO TRISTFUL

Eyes so tristful, eyes so tristful,

Heart so full of care and cumber,

I was lapped in rest and slumber,

Ye have made me wakeful, wistful!

In this life of labor endless

Who shall comfort my distresses?

Querulous my soul and friendless

In its sorrow shuns caresses.

Ye have made me, ye have made me

Querulous of you, that care not,

Eyes so tristful, yet I dare not

Say to what ye have betrayed me.

—H. IV. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

124

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

FRANCISCO SAA DE MIRANDA

(1495-1558)

WHERE IS DOMINGA ?

Francisco Saa de Miranda was born at Coimbra and graduated from the university there. He traveled through Rome, Venice, Naples, Milan, Florence and parts of Sicily as well as throughout Spain. He was the typical philosopher and man of letters of Portugal, and wrote in Spanish as well as in his native tongue. See his Obras (Lisbon, 1595).

All gather from the village here,

But where's Dominga?--Tell me where.

The rest have come--they all have come;

I've counted them, yes, one by one,--

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRANCISCO SAA DE MIRANDA

125

But she's not here, and O, I roam

All desolate and all alone.

What shall I do?—without her, none

My path can light, my way can cheer.

Where is Dominga?—tell me where.

—John Bowring.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

126

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

Old Spanish Ballads are for the most part to be dated from the end of the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries, although as Gaston Paris has pointed out, some of them are concerned with snatches from older epic poems. It is an intricate question among the critics and may be found discussed in the Journal des Savants (May and June, 1898); in Menéndez y Pelayo's Tratado de los romances viejos, in the Antología de los poetas líricos castellanos desde la formación del idioma (vols. xi and xii, Madrid, 1890-1908), in Ramón Menéndez Pidal's L'Epopée castallane à travers la littérature espagnole (Paris, 1910), and in M. R. Foulché-Delbosc's Essai sur les origines du Romancero (Paris, 1912).

RÍO VERDE

I

Río Verde, Río Verdel

Many a corpse is bathed in thee,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

127

Both of Moors and eke of Christians,

Slain with swords most cruelly.

And thy pure and crystal waters

Dappled are with crimson gore;

For between the Moors and Christians

Long the fight has been and sore.

Dukes and counts fell bleeding near thee,

Lords of high renown were slain,

Perished many a brave hidalgo

Of the noblemen of Spain.

2

Don Nuño, Count of Lara,

In anger and in pride,

Forgot all reverence for the King

And thus in wrath replied:

"Our noble ancestors," quoth he,

"Ne'er such a tribute paid;

Nor shall the King receive of us

What they have once gainsaid.

"The base-born souls who deem it just

May here with thee remain;

But follow me, ye cavaliers,

Ye gentlemen of Spain."

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

128

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Forth followed they the noble Count,

They marched to Glera's plain;

Out of three thousand gallant knights

Did only three remain.

They tied their tribute to their spears,

They raised it in the air,

And they sent to tell their lord the King

That his tax was ready there.

"He may send and take by force," said

they,

"This paltry sum of gold,

But the godly gift of liberty

Cannot be bought and sold."

3

The peasant leaves his plough afield,

The reaper leaves his hook,

And from his hand the shepherd-boy

Lets fall the pastoral crook.

The young set up a shout of joy,

The old forget their years,

The feeble man grows stout of heart,

No more the craven fears.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

129

All rush to Bernard's standard,

And on liberty they call;

They cannot brook to wear the yoke,

When threatened by the Gaul.

"Free were we born," 'tis thus they cry,

"And willingly pay we

The duty that we owe our king

By the divine decree.

"But God forbid that we obey

The laws of foreign knaves.

Tarnish the glory of our sires,

And make our children slaves.

"Our hearts have not so craven grown,

So bloodless all our veins,

So vigorless our brawny arms,

As to submit to chains.

"Has the audacious Frank, forsooth,

Subdued these seas and lands?

Shall he a bloodless victory have?

No, not while we have hands.

"He shall learn that the gallant Leonese

Can bravely fight and fall,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

130

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

But that they know not how to yield;

They are Castilians all.

"Was it for this the Roman power

Of old was made to yield

Unto Numantia's valiant hosts

On many a bloody field?

"Shall the bold lions that have bathed

Their paws in Libyan gore,

Crouch basely to a feebler foe,

And dare the strife no more?

"Let the false king sell town and tower

But not his vassals free;

For to subdue the free-born soul

No royal power hath he!"

—H. W. Longfellow.

LORD ARNALDOS

The strangest of adventures

That happen by the sea,

Befell to Lord Arnaldos

On the Evening of Saint John;

For he was out a-hunting—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

131

A

huntsman

bold

was

he!—

When

he

beheld

a

little

ship

And

close

to

land

was

she.

Her

cords

were

all

of

silver,

Her

sails

of

cramasy;

And

he

who

sailed

the

little

ship

Was

singing

at

the

helm;

The

waves

stood

still

to

hear

him,

The

wind

was

soft

and

low;

The

fish

who

dwelt

in

darkness

Ascended

through

the

sea,

And

all

the

birds

in

heaven

Flew

down

to

his

mast-tree.

Then

spake

the

Lord

Arnaldos,—

(Well

shall

you

hear

his

words!)—

“Tell

me,

for

God's

sake,

sailor,

What

song

may

that

song

be?”

The

sailor

spake

in

answer,

And

answer

thus

made

he:

“I

only

tell

the

song

to

those

Who

sail

away

with

me.”

—

James

Elroy

Flecker.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

132

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

A VERY MOURNFUL BALLAD ON

THE SIEGE AND CONQUEST

OF ALHAMA

The Moorish King rides up and down,

Through Granada's royal town;

From Elvira's gates to those

Of Bivarambra on he goes.

Woe is me, Alhama!

Letters to the monarch tell

How Alhama's city fell;

In the fire the scroll he threw,

And the messenger he slew.

Woe is me, Alhama!

He quits his mule and mounts his horse,

And through the strcet directs his course;

Through the street of Zacatín

To the Alhambra spurring in.

Woe is me, Alhama!

When the Alhambra's walls he gained

On the moment he ordained

That the trumpet straight should sound

With the silver clarion round.

Woe is me, Alhama!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

133

And when the hollow drums of war

Beat the loud alarm afar,

That the Moors of town and plain

Might answer to the martial strain,

Woe is me, Alhama!

Then the Moors, by this aware,

That bloody Mars recalled them there,

One by one, and two by two,

To a mighty squadron grew.

Woe is me, Alhama!

Out then spoke an aged Moor

In these words the King before,

"Wherefore call on us, O King?

What may mean this gathering,"

Woe is me, Alhama!

"Friends, ye have, alas, to know

Of a most disastrous blow;

That the Christians, stern and bold,

Have obtained Alhama's hold."

Woe is me, Alhama!

Out then spake old Alfaqui,

With his beard so white to see,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

134

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

"Good King! thou art justly served!

Good King! this thou hast deserved.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"By thee were slain, in evil hour,

The Abencerrage, Granada's flower;

And strangers were received by thee

Of Cordova the chivalry.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"And for this, O King, is sent

On thee a double chastisement;

Thee and thine, thy crown and realm,

One last wreak shall overwhelm.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"He who holds no laws in awe,

He must perish by the law;

And Granada must be won,

And thyself with her undone."

Woe is me, Alhama!

Fire flashed from out the old Moor's eyes,

The Monarch's wrath began to rise,

Because he answered, and because

He spoke exceeding well of laws,

Woe is me, Alhama!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

135

"There is no law to say such things

As may disgust the ear of kings";

Thus, snorting with his choler, said

The Moorish King, and doomed him dead.

Woe is me, Alhama!

Moor Alfaquì! Moor Alfaquì!

Though the beard so hoary be,

The King hath sent to have thee seized

For Alhama's loss displeased.

Woe is me, Alhama!

And to fix thy head upon

High Alhambra's loftiest stone;

That this for thee should be the law

And others tremble when they saw.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"Cavalier and man of worth!

Let these words of mine go forth!

Let the Moorish monarch know

That to him I nothing owe.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"But on my soul Alhama weighs

And on my inmost spirit preys;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

136

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

And if the King his land that lost

Yet others may have lost the most.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"Sires have lost their children, wives

Their lords, and valiant men their lives!

One what best his love might claim

Hath lost, another, wealth and fame.

Woe is me, Alhama!

"I lost a damsel in that hour,

Of all the land the loveliest flower;

Doubloons a hundred I would pay

And think her ransom cheap that day."

Woe is me, Alhama!

And as these things the old Moor said,

They severed from the trunk his head;

And to the Alhambra's walls with speed

'Twas carried as the King decreed.

Woe is me, Alhama!

And men and infants therein weep

Their loss so heavy and so deep;

Granada's ladies, all she rears

Within her walls, burst into tears.

Woe is me, Alhama!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

137

And from the windows o'er the walls

The sable web of mourning falls;

The King weeps as a woman o'er

His loss, for it is much and sore.

Woe is me, Alhama!

—Lord Byron.

THE FLIGHT FROM GRANADA

There was crying in Granada when the

sun was going down,—

Some calling on the Trinity—some calling

on Mahoun!

Here passed away the Koran,—there, in the

Cross was borne,—

And here was heard the Christian bell,—

and there the Moorish horn.

Te Deum Laudamus! was up the Alcala

sung;

Down from the Alhambra's minarets were

all the crescents flung;

The arms thereon of Aragon they with

Castile's display;

One king comes in in triumph,—one weep-

ing goes away.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

138

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Thus cried the weeper, while his hands his

old white beard did tear,

"Farewell, farewell, Granada! thou city

without peer!

Woe, woe, thou pride of Heathendom!

seven hundred years and more

Have gone since first the faithful thy royal

sceptre bore!

"Thou wert the happy mother of an high

renownèd race;

Within thee dwelt a haughty line that now

go from their place;

Within thee fearless knights did dwell, who

fought with mickle glee

The enemies of proud Castile—the bane

of Christientie!

"The mother of fair dames wert thou, of

truth and beauty rare,

Into whose arms did courteous knights for

solace sweet repair;

For whose dear sakes the gallants of Afric

made display

Of might in joust and battle on many a

bloody day.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

139

"Here gallants held it little thing for

ladies' sake to die,

Or for the Prophet's honor and pride of

Soldanry;—

For here did valor flourish and deeds of

warlike might

Ennobled lordly palaces, in which was our

delight.

"The gardens of thy Vega, its fields and

blooming bowers,—

Woe, woe! I see their beauty gone, and

scattered all their flowers!

No reverence can he claim, the King that

such a land hath lost,—

On charger never can he ride, nor be heard

among the host;

"But in some dark and dismal place, where

none his face may see,

There weeping and lamenting, alone that

King should be."—

Thus spoke Granada's King as he was

riding to the sea,

About to cross Gibraltar's Strait away to

Barbary;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

140

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Thus he in heaviness of soul unto his Queen did cry

(He had stopped and ta'en her in his arms, for together they did fly).

"Unhappy King! whose craven soul can brook" (she made reply)

"To leave behind Granada—who hast not the heart to die!

Now for the love I bore thy youth, thee gladly could I slay!

For what is life to leave when such a crown is cast away?"

— J. G. Lockhart.

GENTLE RIVER, GENTLE RIVER

Gentle river, gentle river,

Lo, thy streams are stained with gore.

Many a brave and noble captain

Floats along thy willowed shore.

All beside thy limpid waters,

All beside thy sands so bright,

Moorish chiefs and Christian warriors

Joined in fierce and mortal fight.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

141

Lords and dukes and noble princes

On thy fatal banks were slain;

Fatal banks that gave to slaughter

All the pride and flower of Spain.

There the hero, brave Alonso,

Full of wounds and glory died;

There the fearless Urdiales

Fell a victim by his side.

Lo! where yonder, Don Saavedra

Through their squadrons slow retires;

Proud Seville, his native city,

Proud Seville his worth admires.

Close behind a renegado

Loudly shouts with taunting cry;

"Yield thee, yield thee, Don Saavedra.

Dost thou from the battle fly?

"Well I know thee, haughty Christian,

Long I lived beneath thy roof;

Oft I've in the lists of glory

Seen thee win the prize of proof.

"Well I know thy agèd parents,

Well thy blooming bride I know;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

142

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Seven years I was thy captive,

Seven years of pain and woe.

"May our Prophet grant my wishes,

Haughty chief, thou shalt be mine;

Thou shalt drink that cup of sorrow

Which I drank when I was thine."

Like a lion turns the warrior

Back he sends an angry glare;

Whizzing came the Moorish javelin,

Vainly whizzing through the air.

Back the hero full of fury

Sent a deep and mortal wound;

Instant sank the renegado

Mute and lifeless on the ground.

With a thousand Moors surrounded,

Brave Saavedra stands at bay;

Wearied out but never daunted,

Cold at length the warrior lay.

Near him, fighting, great Alonso

Stout resists the Paynim bands;

From his slaughtered steed dismounted

Firm entrenched behind him stands.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

143

Furious press the hostile squadrons

Furious he repels their rage;

Loss of blood at length enfeebles;

Who can war with thousands wage?

Where yon rock the plain o'ershadows

Close behind its foot retired,

Fainting sank the bleeding hero,

And without a groan expired.

—Thomas Percy.

ABENAMAR, ABENAMAR

O thou Moor of Morería,

There were mighty signs and aspects

On the day when thou wert born,

Calm and lovely was the ocean,

Bright and full the moon above.

Moor, the child of such an aspect

Never ought to answer falsely.

Then replied the Moorish captive,

(You shall hear the Moor's reply):

Nor will I untruly answer,

Though I died for saying truth.

I am son of Moorish sire.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

144

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

My mother was a Christian slave.

In my childhood, in my boyhood,

Often would my mother bid me

Never know the liar's shame.

Ask thou, therefore, King, thy question.

Truly will I answer thee.

Thank thee, thank thee, Abenamar,

For thy gentle answer, thanks.

What are yonder lofty castles,

Those that shine so bright on high?

That, O King, is the Alhambrà,

Yonder is the Mosque of God.

There you see the Alixares,

Works of skill and wonder they;

Ten times ten doubloons the builder

Daily for his hire received;

If an idle day he wasted

Ten times ten doubloons he paid.

Farther is the Generalife,

Peerless are its garden groves.

Those are the Vermilion Towers,

Far and wide their fame is known.

Then spake up the King Don Juan

(You shall hear the Monarch's speech):

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

OLD SPANISH BALLADS

145

Wouldst thou marry me, Granada,

Gladly would I for thy dowry

Cordoba and Seville give.

I am married, King Don Juan.

King, I am not yet a widow.

Well I love my noble husband.

Well my wedded Lord loves me.

— Robert Southey.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

146

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

ANONYMOUS

(Sixteenth century)

THE SIESTA

Vientecico murmurador, by an anonymous author.

Airs that wander and murmur around,

Bearing delight where'er ye blow!

Make in the elms a lulling sound,

While my lady sleeps in the shade below.

Lighten and lengthen her noonday rest,

Till the heat of the noonday sun is o'er.

Sweet be her slumbers! though in my breast

The pain she has waked may slumber no more.

Breathing soft from the blue profound,

Bearing delight where'er ye blow,

Make in the elms a lulling sound

While my lady sleeps in the shade below.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

147

Airs!

that

ever

the

bending

boughs,

And

under

the

shade

of

the

pendent

leaves,

Murmur

soft

like

my

timid

vows

Or

the

secret

sighs

my

bosom

heaves—

Gently

sweeping

the

grassy

ground,

Bearing

delight

where'er

ye

blow,

Make

in

the

elms

a

lulling

sound,

While

my

lady

sleeps

in

the

shade

below.

—William Cullen Bryant.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

148

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

PEDRO DE CASTRO Y ANAYA

(Sixteenth century)

TO THE NIGHTINGALE

Pedro de Castro y Anaya was a Castilian poet of the sixteenth century about whom there are no other particulars. His works are to be found in the Biblioteca de autores españoles (vol. xlii). He has been much admired for his poem, the Auroras de Diana.

Bird of the joyous season!

That from thy flower seat,

Dost teach the forest singers

Thy music to repeat.

Thou wooer of the morning,

That, to this wood withdrawn,

Dost serenade the daybreak,

Dost celebrate the dawn.

Soul of this lonely region,

That hearest me lament,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

PEDRO DE CASTRO Y ANAYA

149

My days in sighing wasted,

My nights in weeping spent.

Chief lyrist of the woodland,

And poet of the spring,

That well art skilled in sorrow,

And well of love can sing.

Go where my lady loosens

Her bright hair to the wind,

Held in a single fillet,

Or floating unconfined.

The beautiful, and cruel,

Whose steps where'er they pass

Tread down more hearts of lovers

Than lilies of the grass.

Sweet nightingale, accost her,

And in the tenderest strain

Say Silvio loves thee; Cruel!

Why lov'st thou not again?

Then tell of all I suffer,

How well have loved and long,

And counsel her to pity,

And tax her scorn with wrong.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

150

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

My gentle Secretary!

If harshly then she speak,

Rebuke her anger, striking

Her red lips with thy beak.

Drink from her breath the fragrance

Of all the blooming year,

And bring me back the answer

For which I linger here.

—William Cullen Bryant.

THE RIVULET

Stay, rivulet, nor haste to leave

The lovely vale that lies around thee.

Why wouldst thou be a sea at eve,

When but a fount the morning found

thee?

Born when the skies began to glow,

Humblest of all the rock's cold daughters,

No blossom bowed its stalk to show

Where stole thy still and scanty waters.

Now on the stream the noonebeams look

Usurping, as thou downward driftest,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

PEDRO DE CASTRO Y ANAYA

151

Its crystal from the clearest brook,

Its rushing current from the swiftest.

Ah! what wild haste!-and all to be

A river and expire in ocean.

Each fountain's tribute hurries thee

To that vast grave with quicker motion.

Far better 'twere to linger still

In this green vale, these flowers to cher-

ish,

And die in peace, an aged rill,

Than thus, a youthful Danube, perish.

— William Cullen Bryant.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

152

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA

(1503-1536)

TO THE FLOWER OF GNIDO

Garcilasso de la Vega, the soldier-poet, was

born at Toledo of a distinguished family. He

served at the battle of Pavia and took part in

several campaigns, winning the favor of Carlos

V, and losing it through his supposed part in a

conspiracy to marry his nephew to one of

the Empress's maids-of-honor. After some

months of imprisonment on an island in the

Danube, he retired to Naples. In 1533 he

visited Boscán in Spain. He was mortally

wounded while storming the walls of Muy

near Fréjus. He died at Nice and two years

later was buried at Toledo. He shared in

Boscán's Italian innovations of style and,

in the few works that he left, is seen to surpass

him. Las Obras de Boscán y algunas de Garci-

lasso de la Vega were first published at Bar-

celona in 1543. There is a good edition by

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA

Tomás Navarro Tomás in the series of Clási-

cos castellanos (Madrid, 1911).

Had I the sweet resounding lyre

Whose voice could in a moment chain

The howling wind's ungoverned ire,

And movement of the raging main;

On savage hills the leopard rein,

The lion's fiery soul entrance,

And lead along with golden tones

The fascinated trees and stones

In voluntary dance,

Think not, think not, fair Flower of Gnide,

It e'er should celebrate the scars,

Dust raised, blood shed, or laurels dyed

Beneath the gonfalon of Mars;

Or borne sublime on festal cars,

The chiefs who to submission sank

The rebel German's soul of soul,

And forged the chains that now control

The frenzy of the Frank.

No, no! its harmonies should ring

In vaunt of glories all thine own,

A discord sometimes from the string

AND MONOGRAPHS

153

IV

154

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Struck forth to make thy harshness known;

The fingered chords should speak alone

Of Beauty's triumphs, Love's alarms,

And one who, made by thy disdain

Pale as a lily clipt in twain,

Bewails thy fatal charms.

Of that poor captive, too, contemned,

I speak,—his doom you might deplore—

In Venus' galliot-shell condemned

To strain for life the heavy oar.

Through thee no longer as of yore

He tames the unmanageable steed,

With curb of gold his pride restrains,

Or with pressed spurs and shaken reins

Torments him into speed.

Not now he wields for thy sweet sake

The sword in his accomplished hand,

Nor grapples like a poisonous snake,

The wrestler on the yellow sand;

The old heroic harp his hand

Consults not now, it can but kiss

The amorous lute's dissolving strings,

Which murmur forth a thousand things

Of banishment from bliss.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

a

print

in

the

Hispanic

Society

of

America

Garcilasso

de

la

Vega

GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA

157

Through thee, my dearest friend and best

Grows harsh, importunate, and grave;

Myself have been his port of rest

From shipwreck and the yawning wave;

Yet now so high his passions rave

Above lost reason's conquered laws,

That not the traveller ere he slays

The asp, its sting, as he my face

So dreads, or so abhors.

In snows on rocks, sweet Flower of Gnide,

Thou wert not cradled, wert not born,

She who has no fault beside

Should ne'er be signalized for scorn;

Else, tremble at the fate forlorn

Of Anaxarete, who spurned

The weeping Iphis from her gate,

Who, scoffing long, relenting late,

Was to a statue turned.

Whilst yet soft pity she repelled,

Whilst yet she steeled her heart in pride,

From her friezed window she beheld

Aghast, the lifeless suicide;

Around his lily neck was tied

What freed his spirit from her chains,

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

158

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

And purchased with a few short sighs

For her immortal agonies,

Imperishable pains.

Then first she felt her bosom bleed

With love and pity; vain distress!

Oh what deep rigors must succeed

This first sole touch of tenderness!

Her eyes grow glazed and motionless,

Nailed on his wavering corse, each bone

Hardeninig in growth, invades her flesh,

Which, late so rosy, warm, and fresh,

Now stagnates into stone.

From limb to limb the frost aspire,

Her vitals curdle with the cold;

The blood forgets its crimson fire,

The veins that e'er its motion rolled;

Till now the virgin's glorious mould

Was wholy into marble changed,

On which the Salamians gazed,

Less at the prodigy amazed,

Than of the crime avenged.

Then tempt not thou Fate's angry arms,

By cruel frown or icy taunt;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA

159

But let thy perfect deeds and charms

To poets' harps, Divinest, grant

Themes worthy their immortal vaunt;

Else must our weeping strings presume

To celebrate in strains of woe,

The justice of some signal blow

That strikes thee to the tomb.

— J. H. Wiffen.

CHANGE

Enjoy the sweets of life's luxuriant May,

Ere envious Age is hastening on his way

With snowy wreaths to crown the beaute-

ous brow;

The rose will fade when storms assail the

year,

And Time who changeth not his swift career,

Constant in this, will change all else

below!

— Felicia D. Hemans.

ECLOGUE

SALICIO AND NEMOROSO

The sweet lament of two Castilian swains,

Salicio's love and Nemoroso's tears,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

160

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

In sympathy I sing, to whose loved strains

Their flocks, of food forgetful, crowding

'round,

Were most attentive. Pride of Spanish

peers!

Who by thy splendid deeds, hast gained a

name

And rank on earth unrivalled,—whether

crowned

With cares, Alvano, wielding now the rod

Of empire, now the dreadful bolts that

tame

Strong kings, in motion to the trumpet's

sound,

Express vice-regent of the Thracian God;

Or whether, from the cumbrous burden

freed

Of state affairs, thou seek'st the echoing

plain,

Chasing, upon thy spirited fleet steed

The trembling stag that bounds abroad in

vain

Lengthening out life,—though deeply now

engrossed

By cares, I hope, so soon as I regain

The leisure I have lost,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA

161

To celebrate, with my recording quill

Thy virtues and brave deeds, a starry sum,

Ere grief, or age, or silent death turn chill

My poesy’s warm pulse, and I become

Nothing to thee, whose worth the nations

blaze.

Failing thy sight and songless in thy praise.

But till that day, predestinied by the Muse,

Appears to cancel the memorial dues,

Owed to thy glory and renown,—a claim

Not only upon me, but which belongs

To all fine spirits that transmit to fame

Ennobling deeds in monumental songs,—

Let the green laurel whose victorious boughs

Clasp in endearment thine illustrious brows

To the weak ivy give permissive place,

Which rooted in thy shade, thou first of

trees,

May hope by slow degrees,

To tower aloft, supported by thy praise;

Since Time to thee sublimer strains shall

bring,

Hark to my shepherds, as they sit and sing.

The sun, from rosy billows risen, had rayed

With gold the mountain tops, when at the

foot

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

162

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Of a tall beech romantic, whose green shade

Fell on a brook, that, sweet-voiced as a

lute,

Through lively pastures wound its spark-

ling way,

Sad on the daisied turf Salicio lay;

And in a voice in concord to the sound

Of all the many winds, and waters round,

As o'er the mossy stones they swiftly stole,

Poured forth in melancholy song his soul

Of sorrow with a fall

So sweet, and aye so mildly musical,

None could have thought that she whose

seeming guile

Had caused his anguish, absent was the

while,

But that in very deed the unhappy youth

Did, face to face, upbraid her questioned

truth.

— J. H. Wiffen.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GIL VICENTE

163

GIL VICENTE (? —1557)

CANTIGA

Gil Vicente passed his life in Portugal. He was of good family, although his history is far from certain. During his years at the Portuguese court he wrote many plays, a large number in Spanish and with Spanish motives. See Menéndez y Pelayo's Antología de poetas líricos castellanos (Madrid, 1890-1908, vol. ii).

Full of grace exceedingly,

As she hath charm and loveliness;

Speak, O sailor of the sea,

And from out thy bark, confess

That never ship nor sail can be

Beautiful as she.

Speak, thou knightly man-at-arms,

Boasting of thy panoply,—

Are horse or sword or war-alarms

Beautiful as she?

Speak, thou shepherd of the hills,

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IV

164

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Where thine idle flocks are free,

Are there peaks or vales or rills

Beautiful as she?

—Thomas Walsh.

THE NIGHTINGALE

The rose looks out in the valley

And thither will I go!

To the rosy vale where the nightingale

Sings his song of woe.

The virgin is on the river-side

Culling the lemons pale;

Thither,—yes! thither will I go

To the rosy vale where the nightingale

Sings his song of woe.

The fairest fruit her hand hath culled,

'Tis for her lover all,

Thither,—yes! thither will I go

To the rosy vale where the nightingale

Sings his song of woe.

In her hat of straw, for her gentle swain,

She has placed the lemons pale;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GIL VICENTE

165

Thither,—yes! thither will I go

To the rosy vale where the nightingale

Sings his song of woe.

—John Bowring.

SONG

If thou art sleeping, maiden,

Awake and open thy door.

'Tis the break of day, and we must away

O'er meadow, and mount, and moor.

Wait not to find thy slippers,

But come with thy naked feet;

We shall have to pass through the dewy

grass

And waters wide and fleet.

—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

166

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

SAINT TERESA (1515-1582)

LINES WRITTEN IN HER BREVIARY

Saint Teresa of Ávila, was born Teresa de Cepeda y Ahumada, at Ávila. In 1534 she became a Carmelite nun and began her reforms and foundations. Known as the Madre Teresa de Jesús, she gave evidence of the highest practical talents and of inspiration as a mystical writer. Her style is simple but passionate with sincerity and elevation. She was canonized in 1612 and was declared co-patron of Spain with Santiago. The best edition of her works was edited by Vicente de la Fuente at Madrid in 1881. Mrs. Cunninghame Grahame has published Saint Teresa, her Life and Times (London, 1891).

Let nothing disturb thee.

Nothing affright thee;

All things are passing;

God never changeth;

Patient endurance

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

Saint Teresa

(Teresa de Cepeda y Ahumada)

SAINT TERESA

169

Attaineth to all things;

Who God possesseth

In nothing is wanting;

Alone God sufficeth.

— H. W. Longfellow.

"IF, LORD, THY LOVE FOR ME IS STRONG"

If, Lord, Thy love for me is strong

As this which binds me unto Thee,

What holds me from Thee, Lord, so long,

What holds Thee, Lord, so long from me?

O soul, what then desirest thou?

—Lord, I would see Thee, who thus choose

Thee.

What fears can yet assail thee now?

—All that I fear is but to lose Thee.

Love's whole possession I entreat,

Lord, make my soul Thine own abode,

And I will build a nest so sweet

It may not be too poor for God.

O soul in God hidden from sin,

What more desires for thee remain,

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

170

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Save but to love, and love again,

And, all on flame with love within,

Love on, and turn to love again?

— Arthur Symons.

"LET MINE EYES SEE THEE"

Let mine eyes see Thee,

Sweet Jesus of Nazareth,

Let mine eyes see Thee,

And then see death.

Let them see that care

Roses and jessamine;

Seeing Thy face most fair

All blossoms are therein.

Flower of seraphim,

Sweet Jesus of Nazareth

Let mine eyes see Thee,

And then see death.

Nothing I require

Where my Jesus is;

Anguish all desire,

Saving only this;

All my help is His,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

SAINT TERESA

171

He only succoreth.

Let mine eyes see Thee,

Sweet Jesus of Nazareth,

Let mine eyes see Thee,

And then see death.

—Arthur Symons.

"TO-DAY A SHEPHERD"

To-day a shepherd and our kin,

O Gil, to random us is sent,

And He is God Omnipotent.

For us hath He cast down the pride

And prison wall of Satanas;

But He is of the kin of Bras,

Of Menga, also of Llorent.

O is not God Omnipotent?

If He is God, how then is He

Come hither and here crucified?

—With His dying sin also died,

Enduring death the innocent.

Gil, how is God Omnipotent!

Why, I have seen Him born, pardie:

And of a most sweet shepherdess.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

172

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

—If He is God how can He be

With such poor folk as these content?

—Seest not He is Omnipotent?

Give over idle parleyings

And let us serve Him, you and I,

And since He came on earth to die,

Let us die with Him too, Llorent;

For He is God Omnipotent.

—Arthur Symons.

"SHEPHERD, SHEPHERD, HARK"

Shepherd, shepherd, hark that calling!

Angels they are, and the day is dawning.

What is this ding-dong,

Or loud singing is it?

Come, Bras, now the day is here,

The shepherdess we'll visit.

Shepherd, shepherd, hark that calling!

Angels they are, and the day is dawning.

Oh, is this the Alcalde's daughter,

Or some lady come from far?

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

SAINT TERESA

173

She is the daughter of God the Father,

And she shines like a star.

Shepherd, shepherd, hark that calling!

Angels they are, and the day is dawning.

—Arthur Symons.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

174

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

GREGORIO DE SILVESTRE

(1520-1569)

LOVE'S VISITATION

Gregorio de Silvestre was born at Lisbon,

the son of a royal physician. He adopted

the fashion of Castillejo in abusing the Italianate

writers, but later wrote poems in that man-

ner. He died as organist of the cathedral of

Granada. See Biblioteca de autores españoles

(vol. xxxv).

Certain Verses very weary

On their laggard footsteps coming

In the Tuscan manner dreary,

Chanced upon a lover humming

Of his woes and bitter sorrows

In the heavy-footed measures

And the leaden-weighted treasures

That were used in ancient morrows—

Heaven forgive our Castillejo

For having praised these oldtime lays so!—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

GREGORIO DE SILVESTRE

175

"And whence," said Love in passion,

"This measure so o'erweighted

Our ears have so much hated?"

They answered in this fashion:

"This is a foreign gabble,

The subject without reason,

To common-sense such treason

That the lady doubts the rabble

Is a-cursing her or praising

When she hears its voices raising."

"See, though the device are using

Garcilasso and Boscán,

This for utmost soarings choosing,

Though a Roland is each man,

Even they find insufficient

This false artificial plan.

'Tis for your own damage making

A perverse, mad, undertaking,—

Through my kingdom idly spreading

The false coinage they are shedding."

"To the chatelaine or maiden

(Venus asks) what rash pretender

Speaks the cares with which he's laden

On a speech no mind can render?

You, nor I, nor she, are able

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

176

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

To feel very comfortable,

When we see the very ladies

That we die for, and each maid is

Quite unsure if it's a joke

Or a satire that we poke

In this rigmarole from Hades."

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS VAZ DE CAMOËNS

177

LUIS VAZ DE CAMOËNS (1524-1580)

ADIEU TO COÏMBRA

Luis Vaz de Camoëns, the glory of Portuguese literature, is also famous for his poetry in Spanish. He was born and died at Lisbon and through birth occupied a distinguished place at court until an unhappy love affair banished him from the city in 1547. He joined the army and later lost an eye at the naval battle of Ceuta. Returning from Goa in 1570, after persecution and imprisonment, he fell into poverty and obscurity and so died. His great work the Os Lusiadas was published first in 1572.

Sweet lucent waters of Mondego's stream,

Of my Remembrance restful jouissance,

Where far-fet, lingering, traitorous Esper-ance

Longwhile misled me in a blinding Dream;

From you I part, yea, still I'll ne'er mis-deem

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

178

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

That long-drawn Memories which your charms enhance

Forbid me changing and, in every chance,

E'en as I farther speed I nearer seem.

Well may my Fortunes hale this instrument

Of Soul o'er new strange regions wide and side,

Offered to winds and watery element;

But hence my Spirit, by you 'companied,

Borne on the nimble wings that Reverie lent,

Flies home and bathes her, Waters, in your tide.

---R. F. Burton.

VILLANCICO--"I'LL BE A MARINER"

I'll go to yon boat, my Mother;

'O yes! to yon boat I'll go;

I'll go with the mariner, Mother,

And be a mariner too.

'Mother, there's no withstanding;

For whereso'er I am driven

It is by the will of heaven,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

a

print

in

the

Hispanic

Society

of

America

Luis

Vaz

de

Camoëns

LUIS VAZ DE CAMOËNS

181

Or the infant god's commanding;

He plays with my heart at will,

I feel it with love o'erflow;

I'll go with the mariner, Mother,

And be a mariner too.

Mother, 'tis vain complaining;

Omipotence is his boast;

I feel that my soul is lost,

And nought but my body remaining;

The mariner's dying, Mother—

He must not die—I’ll go—

I'll go with the mariner, Mother,

And be a mariner too.

He's a tyrant without example!

This little usurping lord;

With a single look or word

A king in the dust will trample;

If the mariner goes, my Mother,

If the mariner's bent to go;

I'll go with the mariner, Mother,

And be a mariner too.

Tell me, ye waves, if ever

A nymph so soft and fair

Sped o'er your waters there;

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

182

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Tell me, ye waves! O never!

'Tis nothing to me, my Mother—

What love commands I'll do;

I'll go with my mariner, Mother,

And be a mariner too.

—John Bowring.

ON THE DEATH OF CATARINA DE ATTAYDA

Those charming eyes within whose starry

sphere

Love whilom sat, and smiled the hours

away,—

Those braids of light, that shamed the

beams of day,—

That hand benignant, and that heart

sincere,—

Those virgin cheeks, which did so late

appear

Like snow-banks scattered with the blooms

of May,

Turned to a little cold and worthless clay,

Are gone, forever gone, and perished here,—

But not unbathed by Memory's warmest

tear!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LŪIS VAZ DE CAMOËNS

183

Death thou hast torn, in one unpitying hour,

That fragrant plant, to which, while scarce

a flower,

The mellower fruitage of its prime was

given;

Love saw the deed,—and as he lingered near

Sighed o'er the ruin, and returned to

heaven!

—R. F. Burton.

ON REVISITING CINTRA AFTER THE

DEATH OF CATARINA

Apparel of green woods and meadows gay;

Clear and fresh waters innocent of stain,

Wherein the field and grove are found

again,

As from high rocks ye take your downward

way;

And shaggy peaks, and ordered disarray

Of crags abrupt, know that ye strive in

vain,

Till grief consent, to soothe the eye of

pain,

Shown the same scene that Pleasure did

survey.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

184

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Nor as erst seen am I beheld by you,

Rejoiced no more by fields of pleasant

green,

Or lively runnels laughing as they dart;

Sown be these fields with seeds of ruth and

rue,

And wet with brine of welling tears, till

seen

Sere with the herb that suits the

broken heart.

—Richard Garnett.

BABYLON AND SION (GOA AND LISBON)

Here, where fecundity of Babel frames

Stuff for all ills wherewith the world

doth teem,

Where loyal Love is slurred with dis-

esteem,

For Venus all controls, and all defames;

Where vice's vaunts are counted, virtue's

shames;

Where Tyranny o'er Honor lords su-

preme;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS VAZ DE CAMOËNS

185

Where blind and erring sovereignty doth deem

That God for deeds will be content with names;

Here in this world where whatso is, is wrong,

Where Birth and Worth and Wisdom begging go

To doors of Avarice and Villainy,—

Trammelled in the foul chaos, I prolong

My days, because I must. Woe to me!

Woe!

Sion, had I not memory of thee!

—Richard Garnett.

SONNET

Leave me, all sweet refrains my lip hath made;

Leave me, all instruments attuned for song;

Leave me, all fountains pleasant meads among;

Leave me, all charms of garden and of glade;

Leave me all melodies the pipe hath played;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

186

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Leave me, all rural feast and sportive throng;

Leave me, all flocks the reed beguiles along;

Leave me, all shepherds happy in the shade.

Sun, moon and stars, for me no longer glow;

Night would I have, to wail for vanished peace;

Let me from pole to pole no pleasure know;

Let all that I have loved and cherished cease;

But see that thou forsake me not, my Woe,

Who wit, by killing, finally release.

—Richard Garnett.

SONNET

Time and the mortal will stand never fast;

Estrangèd fates man's confidence estrange;

Aye with new quality imbued, the vast

World seems but victual of voracious change.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS VAZ DE CAMOËNS

187

New endless growth surrounds on every side,

Such as we deemed not earth could ever bear,

Only doth sorrow for past woe abide,

And sorrow for past good, if good it were.

Now Time with green hath made the meadows gay,

Late carpeted with snow by winter frore,

And to lament hath turned my gentle lay;

Yet of all change this chiefly I deplore,

The human lot, transformed to ill alway,

Not chequered with rare blessing as of yore.

—Richard Garnett.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

188

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN (1528-1591)

IMITATIONS OF VARIOUS

AUTHORS

Fray Luis de León was born at Belmonte

of Cuenca, of presumably Jewish origin.

At an early age he entered the Augustinian

Order at Salamanca and rapidly became one

of the most distinguished figures in the life

and history of that university. In 1572, his

enemies had him imprisoned and tried before

the Inquisition on charges of irregular teach-

ings regarding the Vulgate Bible, and it was

almost six years before he regained his liberty,

proving his orthodoxy and innocence. He

was at first esteemed as a great theologian,

but in later years he has been recognized as the

greatest lyric poet, in Castilian, and one of

the great masters of the world in devotional

song. His poems, of which there are innu-

merable editions, were first published by

Quevedo. The best edition is that of A.

Merino (Madrid, 1816).

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

"Pacheco's

Album"

Fray

Luis

de

León

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

191

That haughty tyranny of thine,

That neck unbending, Love shall take,

I vow, and victim of thee make

In harsh subjection to repine.

Live out thy vain and care-free days,

Love's bitter ways

Shall charge the measure of my score,

When of thy sorrow none shall more

Take any notice whoso pays.

When through the golden locks that crown

Thy brows the scattered snows shall run,

And thy twin daystars have begun

To dim their lights of old renown;

When the first wrinkle line shall sear

Thy visage clear,

And beauty's time is done and over,

And he is fugitive-the lover

That found the rose so fresh and dear;

When thou shalt see thy cause is lost,

And findst thy loving is but weeping,

Thou then shalt know the woe unsleeping

In love that with no love is crossed;

Lady, then with grief shalt say,

That hapless day:-

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

192

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

"Would I had now, alas, my fate!

That beauty that was mine of late,

Or that old love I cast away!"

The thousands whom your coldness spurned

And left to sorrows, on that day

Of vengeance shall be glad and gay

When they have thy discomfort learned;

And Love himself shall take the wing

And publishing

The novel tale of thy disgrace,

To all who mock shall show thy face

To warn them 'gainst the loveless thing.

Alas, by heaven, my lady fair,

Behold thyself in flower so pure

And gracious that cannot endure,

But left unplucked is lost fore'er;

And since no less discreet thou art

In equal part

Than fair and scornful to the view,

Look thou how everything is due

And subject to the loving heart!

'Tis Love that governs all the skies

With law eternal and most sweet;

Thinkst thyself strong enough to meet

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

193

Such foe in this poor world of lies?

'Tis Love gives movement and delight

And beauty's might,

It is the very sweet of life;

So that the fate with it at strife

Is saddened with a pauper's blight.

Of what avail the golden cup,

The silken vesture and brocade,

The ceiling with its gems inlaid,

The piles of treasures mounting up?

Of what avail the fertile breast

Of all earth's best,

And its adoring–if in fine,

O lady, slumbering be thinc

Alone where the cold couch is dressed?

—Thomas Walsh.

AT THE ASCENSION

And wouldst Thou, Holy Shepherd, leave

Thy flock within this vale of woe

And solitude to grieve,

Whilst Thou through ambient skies aglow

Ascendst where death and sorrow cannot go!

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

194

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

But they—so blesséd in the past,

Yet now with hearts afflicted sore—

Thy little ones, outcast,

Bereft of Thee their guide of yore—

Whither shall turn they when Thou

leadst no more?

What now remains to glad the eyes

That once Thy comeliness have known?

What longer can they prize?

What voices, but discordant grown

To them who hearkened to Thy loving

tone?

The waves of yon perturbéd deep,

Whose hand shall curb?—Who now

assuage

The blasts and bid them sleep?

In Thine eclipse,—what star presage

For our benighted bark the harborage?

Alas! swift cloud unpitying

That bidst our joys no more endure,—

Whither thy silvery wing?

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

195

How rich the bliss thou dost secure!-

How beggared wilt thou leave us, how

obscure!-

—Thomas Walsh.

TO THE POET JUAN DE GRIAL

Now is earth's loveliness withdrawn

Unto her bosom; now the heavens are

stoled

In vesture of the fading lawn;

And from the branches' lifeless hold

Leaf after leaf unto the ground is doled.

Now Phœbus turns on sunlit tread

Along Ægean shores; the coursing day

Runs swifter; noontide is bespread

With herding of the fleeces gray

Of Éolus upon his blustery way.

By dim horizons go the cranes

Of Íbycus, migrating with their cry

Portentous; and the bullock strains

Against the yoke with shoulders high,

Turning his patient furrows to the sky.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

196

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

To noble studies would the hours,

Griàl, convene us; now the voice of

Fame

Calls upward to her sacred towers,

And to that summit bids us aim

Where never yet the breath of passions

came.

And at her calling, bolder strides

The foot upon the mountain, so it gains

The final peak whence purest glides

The fountain without worldly stains;

Drink there thy fill, and thirst no more

remains.

Then naught to thee is golden lure

That snares mankind upon a fevered

quest

For that which can no more endure

Than gossamer the zephyr's breast

Is wafting light and fickle without rest.

Doth God Apollo smile?—then write;

Be peer with olden poets,—take thy

stand

Above our newer bards in might;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

197

But oh, dear friend, not hand in hand

May'st hope to clasp me on that songful

strand!

For I whom whirlwinds have assailed,

And treachery from high adventuring

Down to the very grime hath haled,

Find broken—I a wounded thing—

My lyre belovèd and my soaring wing.

—Thomas Walsh.

THE NIGHT SERENE

When I contemplate o'er me

The heaven of stars profound,

And mark the earth before me

In darkness swathed around,—

In careless slumber and oblivion bound;

Then love and longing waken

The anguish of my soul;

Mine eyes with tears are taken

Like founts beyond control,

My voice sighs forth at last its voice

of dole:—

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

198

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

O Temple-Seat of Glory,

Of Beautifulness and Light,

To thy calm promontory

My soul was born! What blight

Holds it endungeoned here from such a

height?

What mortal aberration

Hath so estranged mankind

That from God's destination

He turns, abandoned, blind,

To follow mocking shade and empty

rind?

No thought amid his slumber

He grants impending fate,

While nights and dawns keep number

In step apportionate,

And life is filched away—his poor estate.

Alas!—arise, weak mortals,

And measure all your loss!

Begirt for deathless portals,

Can souls their birthright toss

Aside, and live on shadows vain and

dross?

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

199

Oh, let your eyes beholding

Yon pure celestial sphere,

Unmask the wiles enfolding

The life that flatters here—

The little day of mingled hope and fear!

What more can base earth render

Than one poor moment's pause,

Compared with that far splendor

Where in its primal cause

Lives all that is—that shall be—and that was!

Who on yon constellation

Eternal can set gaze,—

Its silvery gradation,

Its majesty of ways,

The concord and proportion it displays,—

In argent wonder turning

The moon doth nightly rove,

Squired by the Star of Learning

And melting Star of Love,

She trails with gentle retinue above—

And lo! through outer spaces

Where Mars is rolled aflame!

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

200

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Where Jupiter retraces

The calmed horizon's frame

And all the heavens his ray beloved

acclaim!

Beyond swi̇ngs Saturn, father

Of the fabled age of gold;

And o'er his shoulders gather

Night's chantries manifold,

In their proportioned grade and lustre

stoled!—

Who can behold such vision

And still earth's baubles prize?

Nor sob the last decision

To rend the bond that ties

His soul a captive from such blissful

skies?

For there Content hath dwelling;

And Peace, her realm; and there

'Mid joys and glories swelling

Lifts up the daïs fair

With Sacred Love enthroned beyond

compare.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

201

Immensurable Beauty

Shows cloudless to that light;

And there a Sun doth duty

That knows no stain of night;

There Spring Eternal blossoms without blight.

O fields of Truth-Abiding!

Green pasturelands and rills!

And mines of treasures hiding!

O joyous-breasted hills!

Re-echoing vales where every balm distils!

—Thomas Walsh.

TO RETIREMENT

At last, O thou serene retreat

From all my wanderings! Thou balm desired

So long, that bringst me healing sweet

From wounds naught else can heal!

Inspired

Seclusion, gracious welcome for the tired!

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

202

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

At last, thou little thatch of straw

Beneath whose eaves no lurking Care

hath stayed,

Where none within a comrade's glances saw

The gleam of Envy e'er displayed--

Nor voice was perjured, not a plot

betrayed!

Fair upland, sloping to the skies

With peace beyond the thought of earth

endowed--

Beyond where in death's grapple vies

The creature of the fevered crowd

With thirst of dissolution and the

shroud!--

Receive me, mountain, oh receive

Within thy fastness! For I come pur-

sued

By slander!--yea, unfinished leave

The tasks that bring ingratitude,

The peace that mocks, and earth's

unhappy brood!--

Where one, who late at haven-bar

Hath lain to anchor calm, is now the prey

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

203

Of winds that buffet him afar

And waves that gulf him in their spray

And rack his hapless timbers with dismay!

Another meets the lurking rock

And instant down the yawning waters

goes

Calamitous unto the shock!

For one, becalmed, no life-breath blows;

On Syrtean shoals the squall another throws;

Whilst others are despairing prey

To sudden midnight and the dread typhoon,

And to the hungry Neptune pay

Their lives in tribute mid the swoon;

Some, bold to swim, are down the ocean strewn!

Strive or surrendèr to the flood,

What end must ultimate be his, who rides,

Death-gripping through the foaming scud,

Some broken spar his wreck provides

Adown such vast abysm of roaring tides?

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

204

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Alas!--how often and how often thou,

Unfailing haven, hast been my desire!

Then of thy refuge fail not now—

Fail not when I would so require

'Mid such a sea of troubles blind and direl

—Thomas Walsh.

WRITTEN ON THE WALLS OF HIS DUNGEON

Lo, where envy and where lies

Held me in the prison cell;

Blesséd was the lot that fell

To the humble and the wise

Far from earth's chagrins to dwell;

Who with thatch and homely fare

Rests him in some sylvan spot,

Lone with God abiding there,

And none else his thought to share,

Envying none, and envied not.

—Thomas Walsh.

THE VALLEY OF THE HEAVENS

Resplendent precinct of the skies,

Fair sward of gladness neither snow

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

205

Nor parching breath of noonday tries,

Domain whose sacred uplands show

Its peace ungarnered deathlessly aglow!

His brows in white and azure crowned

Athwart its pastures softly wends,

O flock endeared with thee around,

The Holy Shepherd; thee He tends

Unarmed with staff or sling where naught

offends.

He leads, and happy sheep o'erflow

Around Him in a loving feud,

Where the immortal roses blow

And verdure ever is renewed

Howe'er the flock may graze; in plenitude.

And now upon the mountain ways

Of Bliss He guides; now by the stream

To bathe them in His grace He strays;

Now grants them banqueting agleam—

Himself the Giver and the Gift Supreme.

And when the eye of noon attains

The zenith of its fiery powers,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

206

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Amid His fondlings He remains

To drowse away the torrid hours

And cheer with voice serene the holy

bowers.

He wakes the viol's melting tone

And sweetness trembles through the soul

Unto such golden joy unknown;

Enraptured then beyond control

It casts itself on Him, its only goal.

O Breath! O Voice!—mightst Thou ordain

Some little echo for my breast

That—self-surrendering in that strain

To Thee—of Thee 'twould be possest,

O Love, and on Thy shoulder find its

rest!

Where Thou dost linger at the noon,

Sweet Spouse, Oh, would my spirit

knew!—

And breaking from this prison swoon,

Of Thy far flocks might come in view

And stray no more, save paths Thou

leadst them through.

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

207

THE PROPHECY OF TAGUS

In dalliance Roderic the King

Delayed with fair La Cava by the side

Of Tagus' gorge, till clamoring

The river-god from out the tide

Emerged, and in a voice prophetic cried:-

"Licentious despot,—would you choose

Such hour for weakness! Now when

thunders sound

And trumpetings of death confuse!—

When clash and shout of Mars astound

Our land, and conflagrations spread

around!

"Alas, for thy mere pleasure, how

Our country groans! That lovely one

(O day

Unhallowed of her birth!) doth now

On Spain bring weeping and dismay,

To sweep the sceptre of the Goths away!

"Flames, supplications, shouts of war,

Laments of death and anguish and dis-

grace,—

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

208

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

That brief embrace is twining for!—

Involving you and all the race

In shame the ages never shall efface!

"A yoke of slavery on the lands,

They till at Constantina, where the stream

Of Ebro, where Sansueña's strands

And Lusitania's reach extreme—

On all the spacious Spains,—a doom supreme!

"Hark, out of Cadiz raging calls

Count Julian's voice to speak a father's wrongs!

No shame of treachery appals—

He conjures up avenging throngs

To waste the kingdom that to you belongs!

"Adown the morn the trumpet's throat

Proclaims the doom! See, on Morocco's shore

What thronging, when his banners float

Upon the winds conspired to pour

So swift on Spain the Moslem conqueror!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

209

"The cruel Arab lifts his lance

And shakes his gleaming challenge to

the wind;

Swiftly his light flotillas dance

Upon their way of warfare blind—

See all their numbers swarming on my

mind!—

"The trembling earth is hidden where they

tread;

Their sails blot out the intervening sea;

Their clamors strike the heaven with

dread;

The sun from out the noon would flee

Before the dust cloud and obscurity!

"Alas, how ardently their prows

Surmount the waves! What sinews

bend the oar

As every galley onward plows

And how the deeps must foam and roar,

When they glide hissing on the Spanish

shore!

"To Æolus their sails are given

And over Hercules's unguarded straits

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

210

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Their sharpened prows of steel are driven

Where Neptune, the great father, waits

To grant them ingress by his open gates.

"Alas!—poor wretch, that bosom dear

Can still bewitch you?—that you draw

no sword,

When such calamities you hear?—

When even upon the sacred ford

Tarifa falls already to the horde!

"Out in the saddle! Spread your wing

Across the mountains! Spare not on the

plain

Your bloody spurs! There brandishing

The goad, come thundering amain

Upon them, Roderic, with blade in-

sane!

"But oh! what travail now prepares,—

What years of sweat and carnage are

ordained

On him who shield and breastplate bears,

On princeling who might else have

reigned,—

On horse and rider to destruction chained!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRAY LUIS DE LEÓN

"Thou Stream of Betis,—shalt be dyed

With mingling blood of kinsmen and of

foes!

Unto the sea how soon thy tide

With broken wrack of helmets flows,

And surge of corpses kingly in their

woes!—

"Five days of blood infuriate

The God of war unloosens on the plains,

Where meet the swarming hordes of hate;

The sixth, alas, thy doom ordains!—

O land belovéd,—in barbaric chains!"

—Thomas Walsh.

AND MONOGRAPHS

2 I I

IV

212

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

BALTASAR DE ALCÁZAR

(1530-1606)

THE JOLLY SUPPER

BALTASAR DE ALCÁZAR was a native of Seville,

who saw service with the Marqués de Santa

Cruz and later became steward of the Conde

de Gelves. See his poems in the edition of

F. Rodríguez Marín (Madrid, 1910).

In Jaén where I'm abiding

Don Lope de Sosa dwells,

And my story, Ines, tells

Wonders past your mind's providing.

On this gentleman attended

A young squire from Portugal—

But to supper let us fall

So my hunger may be ended.

For the table is awaiting

Where together we may sup;

Forth are set the steaming cup

And the glass,—no more debating,—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

"Pacheco's

Album"

Baltasar

del

Alcázar

BALTASAR DE ALCÁZAR

215

Cut the bread, ah, what a savor!

This

hors

d'æuvre

is

Paradise!

From the

salpicón

arise

Odors of a heavenly flavor.

Pour the wine into the glasses

And invoke a blessing now;

Every time I drink I vow

And bless each ruby drop that passes.

That was sure a healthy portion,

Ines, pass the bottle here;

Every mouthful would appear

Worth a florin,—no extortion.

In what tavern do you buy it?

From the place by the ravine;

Ten and six a measure, clean,

Fresh and good and cheap to try it.

By the Lord, it is a treasure

That Alcocer tavern wine;

Certainly, I think it's fine

To have at hand so just a measure.

Whether old or new invention,

On my faith, I do not know,

But this I see that here below

The tavern came with good intention.

For 'tis there I go a-thirsting,

Order up the newest brew,

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

216

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Mixing it they serve to you,

You pay and drink yourself to bursting.

This, my Ines, is its merit,—

There's no need to sing its praise—

The one objection that I raise,

The fleeting joy that we inherit.

Now, the lighter dishes over,

Tell me what is coming now?

The meat-pie!—O blesséd brow,

Worthy of such noble cover!

What a dish it is, how hollow!—

What meat and luscious fat it holds!—

It seems, Ines, that it unfolds

Its depths for you and me to swallow.

But onward, onward, without question,

For straight and narrow is the road;

No more water,—let the load

Of wine, Ines, invite digestion.

Pour out the three-year vintage freely,

'Twill aid your stomach in its work.

How good to see you do not shirk

But take a grown man's portion, really!

Now tell me, is it not delightful

To have a dish so fine and rare,

With all its biting flavors there,

And all its spices fresh and spiteful?

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

BALTASAR DE ALCÁZAR

217

Pine-nuts in its luscious dressing

Make the brave dame's meat-pie sweet;

And roasted by her there's a treat

In suckling pig that is a blessing.

As true as heaven 'tis fit to honor

The very table of the King;

A pork, Ines,—the sweetest thing

With her delicious tripe upon her!

My very heart is filled with rapture;

I don't know how it is with you,

But taking now and then a view,

You seem contentment here to capture.

Great heavens! I am full of liquor;

But I would make a sage remark;

You brought one lamp to light the dark,

Now two before me seem to flicker.

But these are really drunken notions;

I know of course it had to be,

That with this heavy drink I'd see

The lights increasing with the potions.

Now let us try the tankard's juices,

Celestial beverage refined,

Superior to what we bind

In casks, it livelier joy produces.

What smoothness and what glassy clearness!

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

218

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

What taste and odor rarified!

What touch! What color there beside

And all that makes for luscious dearness!

But now there come the cheese and berry

To take their place upon the board;

And both it seems would claim award

Of cup and tankard passing merry.

Try the cheese,—the choice from many,—

Quite as good as Pinto's best;

And the olives—for the rest

They can hold their own with any.

Now then, Ines, if you're able

Take six mouthfuls from the flask—

There is nothing more to ask;

Clear the covers from the table.

And as we have supped and rested

To our very hearts' content

It would seem the moment meant

For the story I suggested.

'Tis a tale, Ines, to win you—

For the Portuguese fell ill—

Eleven striking?—Wait until

To-morrow, I'll the tale continue—

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

a

print

in

the

Hispanic

Society

of

America

Alonso

de

Ercilla

y

Zúñiga

ALONSO DE ERCILLA

221

ALONSO DE ERCILLA Y ZÚÑIGA

(1533-1594)

FROM THE ARAUCANA

Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga was born at Madrid, where he died after a life of soldiering and adventuring in South America. He spent some years in Chile with the Governor, Jerónymo de Alderete. In 1562 he returned to Spain, and in 1569 he published the first part of his Araucana, a fine heroic poem, much of it written amid the scenes and battles it describes.

Caciques! defenders of our country, hear!

It is not envy wounds my tortured sight,

When I observe these struggles, who shall wear

Ambition's badge,—which had been mine of right;

For see my brow in aged wrinkles dight,

And the tomb tells me I must soon be there;

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

222

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

'Tis love inspires me!—patriotism! zeal!—

Listen! my soul its counsels shall unveil!

To what vain honors, chiefs, aspire ye now?

And where the bulwarks of this towering

pride?

Ye have been vanquished,—trod on, by

the foe;

Defeat is echoed round on every side.

What! are your conquerors thus to be

defied,

That stand around with laurels on their

brow!

Check this mad fury! wait the coming fray!

Then shall it crush the foe in glory's day.

What a wild rage is this that bears you

on,

Blindly to sure perdition,—to despair!

These murderous, fratricidal swords throw

down,

Or point them at the tyrant! He is here!

The Christian felons, noble chiefs! are

near.

Spill their base blood! but spare, O spare

your own!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ALONSO DE ERCILLA

223

Die if you will,—like men, like patriots die;

But dread a death of shame, of infamy!

Madden your weapons with the enthusiast soul!

O let them probe the invader's inmost breast;

He who would chain you to his proud control,—

To slavery, insult!—O 'twere wise, 'twere best

To stay his fettering hand, nor tamely rest

While strength and valor on your efforts call!

Your blood, chiefs, is your country's!—guard it then

For her!—It is not yours, heroic men!

It grieves me not to see a warlike rage,—

I hail the rapturous fury of the brave!

But never let its violence engage

In struggles leading on to freedom's grave;

Such madness loses what it seeks to save;

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

224

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Discord's deep wounds, not valor can assuage.

I cannot bear it, chiefs!--if it must be,

Come wreak your waking violence on me.

Let me fall first; for I am sick of life,

And wearied with misfortune;--let me die!

Devote my bosom to the horrid knife,

Since these sad thoughts end not my misery!

Happy the dying babe!--O why was I

Thus made the victim of this rain world's strife?

Yet will I raise my voice, though weak and rude,--

The tears of age may touch the brave and good.

In strength and valor ye all equal are;

To each a noble heritage was given!

And power and wealth and bravery in war

Were equally conferred by bounteous heaven.

In greatness,--strength of soul,--ye all are even,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ALONSO DE ERCILLA

225

And each might rule the world, they blaze so far.

Now prove your worth by valiant hero-deeds;

This is no time for words! your country bleeds!

I trust your arms,—your hearts; nor aught suspect;

The future smiles; there is no thought of fear!

Yet it were wise some chieftain to elect

Who all may govern and whom all revere.

Let it be he who yon vast log can bear

Longest upon his shoulder, firm, erect.

Since wealth and fortune made ye equal all,

Upon the strongest chief the lot shall fall!

—John Bowring.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

226

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

FERNANDO DE HERRERA

(1534-1594)

IDEAL BEAUTY

Fernando de Herrera was a native of Seville, where, on taking orders he was attached to the church of San Andrés. His love poems celebrate a famous Platonic love-affair with the Countess of Gelves the mother of the patron of Baltasar de Alcázar. In 1580 he published an annotation of the poems of Garcilasso de la Vega; in 1582 he published his poems, Algunas Obras; his Life of Sir Thomas More was published in 1592. See Fernando de Herrera el Divino, by M. A. Coster (Paris, 1908).

O light serene! present in him who breathes

That love divine, which kindles yet restrains

The high-born soul—that in its mortal chains

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

"Pacheco's

Album"

Fernando

de

Herrera

FERNANDO DE HERRERA

229

Heavenward aspires for love's immortal wreaths!

Rich golden locks, within whose clustered curls

Celestial and eternal treasures lie!

A voice that breathes angelic harmony

Among bright coral and unspotted pearls!

What marvelous beauty! Of the high estate

Of immortality, within this light

Transparent veil of flesh, a glimpse is given;

And in the glorious form I contemplate

(Although its brightness blinds my feeble sight)

The immortal still I seek and follow on to Heaven!

—H. W. Longfellow.

THE DISEMBODIED SPIRIT

Pure Spirit! that within a form of clay

Once veiled the brightness of thy native sky;

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

230

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

In dreamless slumber sealed thy burning

eye,

Nor heavenward sought to wing thy flight

away!

He that chastised thee did at length un-

close

Thy prison doors, and give thee sweet

release

Unloosed the mortal coil, eternal peace

Received thee to its stillness and repose.

Look down once more from thy celestial

dwelling,

Help me to rise and be immortal there—

An earthly vapor melting into air;—

For my whole soul with secret ardor

swelling,

From earth's dark mansion struggles to

be free,

And longs to soar away and be at rest

with thee.

—H. W. Longfellow.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FERNANDO DE HERRERA

231

THE LOVER'S COMPLAINT

Bright Sun! that flaming through the

midday sky

Fillest with light heaven's blue, deep-

vaulted arch,

Say, hast thou seen in thy celestial march

One hue to rival this blue tranquil eye?

Thou Summer Wind, of soft and delicate

touch

Fanning me gently with thy cool, fresh

pinion,

Say, hast thou found in all thy wide

dominion,

Tresses of gold that can delight so much?

Moon, honor of the night! Thou glorious

choir

Of wandering Planets and eternal Stars!

Say, have ye seen two peerless orbs

like these?

Answer me, Sun, Air, Moon, and Stars of

fire—

Hear ye my woes, that know no bounds

nor bars?

See ye these cruel stars, that brighten

and yet freeze?—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

232

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

BACHILLER FRANCISCO DE LA TORRE

(1534-1594?)

ODE

Bachiller Francisco de la Torre, an elusive personality in Spanish poetry, is said to have been born at Torrelaguna, and to have received his education at Alcalá de Henares. Disappointed in love, he enlisted for service in the army in Italy, and on his return to Spain found his "Filis" the wife of an elderly man of wealth. His poems were first published by Quevedo in 1631, and a facsimile edition was published by the Hispanic Society of America (New York, 1903).

Tirsis, O Tirsis, turn and seek again

The safety of the port; behold what skies

Descend about thy fragile little bark

And warn thee not to go!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRANCISCO DE LA TORRE

233

The frigid Boreas, the South Wind's threats,

Have stirred the seas to an appalling rage;

Upon that troubled marge no sail can run

Upon a happy course.

Cry out, unhappy man!-the heavens receive

And hush your bitter moans and shouts with roll

Of thunders shaking o'er the brows

Of their disturbèd face!

Ah, do not tell me that thy ardent breast

With passionate disorders so commands

Such rash adventure on thee, but to break

The calmness of thy youth!

See, lad unhappy, how the South Wind's rage

Amid its whirling mocks the fickle wings

In dust and blast of satire, and the head

Too premature and bold!

See ye not how its fiercest breath is stirred

From off the burning mountain, where below

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

234

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Lie in their living death the boastful twain,

Encéladus and Typheus?

Be warned upon thy fortunes, and repair

Thy threatened ills; in time be wise

Nor let mishaps encroach too near, for all

Their sudden charge.

Why shouldst thou perish? ah, return,

Tirsis, return! On land, yea, on the land

Let thy ship be the prison and the cave

Of the infuriate winds!

Afar, the vengeance of the sea, afar,

The raging ordnance of fierce Eolus

Upon the heads of hardy mariners

Who dare to brave his powers.

From off the shore let us behold the storm

And watch the angry heavens, where they

least

Are furious against the heads that least

Oppose their vaunted strength.

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRANCISCO DE FIGUEROA

235

FRANCISCO DE FIGUEROA

(1536?-1620?)

SONNET

Francisco de Figueroa was a native of Alcalá de Henares, returning there after years of service in the army in Italy. He wrote both in Italian and Spanish and was the first to establish blank verse in Castilian. His poems (incomplete) were first published at Lisbon in 1625. A facsimile of the edition of 1626 was published by the Hispanic Society of America (New York, 1903).

Land where the sun forever hides his face

And moon ne'er whitens on thy gloomy brows;

Where Nature, avarous step-dame, scarce allows

A scant provision for the human race;

Oh, what a destiny! were I to trace

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

236

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

(Since I have wandered from my natal boughs)

And end in lone and melancholy drowse

My days of life amid thy snowbound place!

Where never would an amorous shepherd turn

With rose and violet garlands for my tomb

And 'mid his sighs memorial declare:-

"Thy hapless ending doth thy Filis learn,

O Tirsis, and two tears she sheds in gloom

More precious than all Niobe's weeping rare."

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

237

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES SAAVEDRA

(1547-1616)

SONNET ON GOLETTA

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, the immortal author of Don Quixote and The Exemplary Novels, was born at Alcalá de Henares, served in the army and lost his left hand at the battle of Lepanto. He was captured by Moorish pirates and spent five years in captivity in Algiers. He was ransomed and returned to face failure and poverty for the rest of his life. He died at Madrid. His verse is pleasing, but not distinguished when compared to his work in prose.

Blest souls discharged of life's oppressive weight,

Whose virtue proved your passport to the skies,

You there procured a more propitious fate

When for your faith you bravely fell to rise.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

238

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

When pious rage diffused through every vein,

On this ungrateful shore you shed your blood;

Each drop you lost was bought with crowds of slain,

Whose vital purple swelled the neighboring flood.

Though crushed by ruins and by odds, you claim

That perfect glory, that immortal fame,

Which like true heroes nobly you pursued;

On these you seized, even when of life deprived,

For still your courage, even your lives survived;

And sure 'tis conquest, thus to be subdued. — P. Motteux.

SONNET

When I was marked for suffering, Love forswore

All knowledge of my doom; or else at ease

Love grows a cruel tyrant, hard to please;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

239

Or else a chastisement exceeding sore

A little sin hath brought me. Hush! No

more!

Love is a god! All things he knows and

sees,

And gods are bland and mild! Who then

decrees

The dreadful woe I bear and yet adore?

If I should say, O Chloe, that 'twas thou,

I should speak falsely since, being wholly

good

Like Heaven itself, from thee no ill can

come.

There is no hope; I must die shortly now,

Not knowing why, since, sure, no witch

hath brewed

The drug that might avert my martyrdom.

—Edmund Gosse.

CANCIÓN

What makes me languish and complain?—

Oh, 'tis disdain!

What yet more fiercely tortures me?—

'Tis jealousy.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

240

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

How have I patience lost?—By absence crossed.

Then hopes farewell, there's no relief;

I sink beneath oppressing grief;

Nor can a wretch, without despair,

Scorn, jealousy, and absence bear.

What in my breast, this anguish drove?—

Intruding love.

What could such mighty ills create?—

Blind fortune's hate.

What cruel powers my fate approve?—

The powers above.

Then let me bear and cease to moan;

'Tis glorious thus to be undone;

When these invade, who dares oppose?

Heaven, love, and fortune are my foes.

Where shall I find a speedy cure?—Death

is sure.

No milder means to set me free?—Incon-

stancy.

Can nothing else my pains assuage?—

Distracting age.

What! die or change?—Lucinda lose?—

Oh, let me rather madness choose!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

241

But judge, ye gods, what we endure

When death or madness is the cure!

—P. Motteux.

SONNET ON FRIENDSHIP

O sacred friendship, Heaven's delight,

Which, tired with man's unequal mind,

Took to thy native skies thy flight,

While scarce thy shadow's left behind!

From thee, diffusive good below,

Peace and her train of joys we trace;

But falsehood, with dissembled show,

Too oft usurps thy sacred face.

Blessed genius, then resume thy seat!

Destroy imposture and deceit,

Which in thy dress confound the ball!

Harmonious peace and truth renew,

Show the false friendship from the true,

Or nature must to Chaos fall.

—P. Motteux.

FROM "THE JOURNEY AROUND

PARNASSUS"

Poets are made of clay of dainty worth,

Sweet, ductile, and of delicacy prime,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

242

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

And fond of lingering at a neighbor's hearth;

For e'en the wisest poet of his time

Is ruled by fond desires and delicate,

Of fancies full and ignorance sublime;

Wrapped in his whimsies, with affection great

For his own offspring, he is not designed

To reach a wealthy, but an honored state.

So let my patient readers henceforth mind—

As saith the vulgar impolite and coarse—

That I'm a poet of the self-same kind;

With snowy hairs of swan, with voice of hoarse

And jet-black crow, the rough bark of my wit

To polish down Time vainly spends its force;

Upon the top of Fortune's wheel to sit,

For one short moment hath not been my fate,

For when I'd mount, it fails to turn a whit;

But yet to learn if one high thought and great

Might not some happier occasion seize,

I travelled on with slow and tardy gait,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

243

A wheaten loaf, with eight small scraps of

cheese,

Was all the stock my wallet did contain,

Good for the road, and carried with great

ease.

"Farewell," quoth I, "my humble home

and plain!

Farewell, Madrid, thy Prado, and thy

springs

Distilling nectar and ambrosial rain!

Farewell, ye gay assemblies, pleasant

things

To cheer one aching bosom, and delight

Two thousand faint, aspiring underlings!

Farewell, thou charming and deceitful site,

Where erst two giants great were set ablaze

By thunderbolt of Jove, in fiery might!

Farewell, ye public theatres, whose praise

Rests on the ignorance I see becrown

The countless follies of unnumbered plays!"

— James Young Gibson.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

244

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

SAINT JOHN OF THE CROSS

(1549-1591)

THE OBSCURE NIGHT OF THE SOUL

Saint John of the Cross was born Juan de

Yepes y Álvarez, at Ontiveros. He joined the

Carmelite Order in 1563, and soon became an

energetic reformer of monastic life, gaining

renown as a mystic and saintly character.

He became known as the "Ecstatic Doctor"

through the inspired nature of his prose

writings. His poems are few, but among

the greatest productions in all literature.

See the Biblioteca de autores españoles (vol.

xxvii). He was canonized in 1726.

Upon an obscure night

Fevered with love in love's anxiety

(O hapless-happy plight!),

I went, none seeing me,

Forth from my house where all things quiet

be.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

St.

John

of

the

Cross

SAINT JOHN OF THE CROSS

247

By night, secure from sight,

And by the secret stair, disguisedly,

(O hapless-happy plight!)

By night, and privily,

Forth from my house where all things

quiet be.

Blest night of wandering,

In secret, where by none might I be spied,

Nor I see anything;

Without a light or guide,

Save that which in my heart burnt in my

side

That light did lead me on,

More surely than the shining of noontide,

Where well I knew that one

Did for my coming bide;

Where He abode, might none but He abide.

O night that didst lead thus,

O night more lovely than the dawn of

light,

O night that broughtest us,

Lover to lover's sight,

Lover with loved in marriage of delight!

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

248

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Upon my flowery breast

Wholly for Him, and save Himself for none,

There did I give sweet rest

To my belovèd one;

The fanning of the cedars breathed thereon.

When the first moving air

Blew from the tower and waved His locks

aside,

His hand, with gentle care,

Did wound me in the side,

And in my body all my senses died.

All things I then forgot,

My cheek on Him who for my coming came;

All ceased, and I was not,

Leaving my cares and shame

Among the lilies, and forgetting them.

—Arthur Symons.

O FLAME OF LIVING LOVE

O flame of living love,

That dost eternally

Pierce through my soul with so consuming heat,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

SAINT JOHN OF THE CROSS

249

Since there's no help above,

Make thou an end of me,

And break the bond of this encounter sweet.

O burn that burns to heal!

O more than pleasant wound!

And O soft hand, O touch most delicate,

That dost new life reveal,

That dost in grace abound,

And, slaying, dost from death to life translate!

O lamps of fire that shined

With so intense a light

That those deep caverns where the senses live,

Which were obscure and blind,

Now with strange glories bright,

Both heat and light to His belovèd give!

With how benign intent

Rememberest thou my breast,

Where thou alone abidest secretly;

And in thy sweet ascent,

With glory and good possessed,

How delicately thou teachest love to me!

—Arthur Symons.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

250

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

FRANCISCO DE ALDANA

(1550-1578)

THE IMAGE OF GOD

Francisco de Aldana, was a soldier-poet

born at Tortosa. He perished in the African

disaster that overtook the Portuguese King,

Dom Sebastian, in 1578. The body of his

writings has been lost, although he was much

esteemed as an author of mystical poetry,

some of which has survived.

O Lord! who seest from yon starry height,

Centered in one the future and the past,

Fashioned in thine own image, see how fast

The world obscures in me what once was

bright!

Eternal Sun! the warmth which thou hast

given

To cheer life's flowery April, fast decays;

Yet, in the hoary winter of my days,

Forever green shall be my trust in heaven.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRANCISCO DE ALDANA

251

Celestial King! oh let thy presence pass

Before my spirit, and an image fair

Shall meet that look of mercy from on

high,

As the reflected image in a glass

Doth meet the look of him who seeks it

there,

And owes its being to the gazer's eye.

—H. W. Longfellow.

MY NATIVE LAND

Clear fount of light! my native land on high

Bright with a glory that shall never fade!

Mansion of truth! without a veil or shade,

Thy holy quiet meets the spirit's eye.

There dwells the soul in its ethereal essence,

Gasping no longer for life's feeble breath,

But sentinelled in heaven, its glorious presence

With pitying eye beholds, yet fears not, death.

Beloved country! banished from thy shore

A stranger in this prison-house of clay,

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

252

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

The exiled spirit weeps and sighs for thee!

Heavenward the bright perfections I adore

Direct, and the sure promise cheers the way,

That, whither love aspires, there shall my dwelling be.

—H. W. Longfellow.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

MATEO VÁZQUEZ DE LECA

253

MATEO VÁZQUEZ DE LECA

(About 1550)

SONNET

Mateo Vázquez de Leca may be assumed

to have been a Sevillian, although no

definite facts of his life or dates are to be

found. He was secretary to Philip II, and

left several works on genealogical and moral

questions.

You were a foolish, though an amorous

fellow,

Leander–had you for a boat but waited

Death and the devil might have both

been cheated

And history have been spared the pains to

tell how

A silly youth was drowned!–You might

have gone

Dry-footed to your mistress, and have

kissed her

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

254

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

In nuptial joy,—but no!—for driven on

By an impatient passion's gust, you missed her

And died.—A pity that!—In this our Seville

You've not a notion how we cheat the devil;

And run no risk of colds nor disappoint-

ments;

True, love may graze us,—but the drowning plan

Is a mistake, which neither oil nor ointments,

Nor wit, nor wisdom, can get over, man.

—John Bowring.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRANCISCO DE MEDRANO

255

FRANCISCO DE MEDRANO

(Sixteenth Century)

ART AND NATURE

Francisco de Medrano was a native of

Seville during the sixteenth century. Prac-

tically nothing is known as to the date of his

birth or death or the events of his life. He

is known to have visited Italy. His works,

first printed in Palermo in 1617, are to be

found in the Biblioteca de autores españoles

(vols. 35 and 42).

The works of human artifice soon tire

The curious eye; the fountain's sparkling

rill

And gardens, when adorned by human

skill,

Reproach the feeble hand, the vain desire.

But oh, the free and wild magnificence

Of Nature in her lavish hours doth steal,

In admiration silent and intense,

The soul of him who hath a soul to feel.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

256

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

The river moving on its ceaseless way,

The verdant reach of meadows fair and

green,

And the blue hills that bound the sylvan

scene,

These speak of grandeur, that defies

decay,—

Proclaims the Eternal Architect on

high,

Who stamps on all his works his own

eternity.

—H. W. Longfellow.

THE TWO HARVESTS

But yesterday these few and hoary sheaves

Waved in the golden harvest; from the

plain

I saw the blade shoot upward, and the

grain

Put forth the unripe ear and tender leaves.

Then the glad upland smiled upon the view,

And to the air the broad green leaves

unrolled,

A peerless emerald in each silken fold,

And on each palm a pearl of morning dew.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

FRANCISCO DE MEDRANO

257

And thus sprang up and ripened in brief space

All that beneath the reaper's sickle died,

All that smiled beauteous in the summer-tide.

And what are we? a copy of that race,

The later harvest of a longer year!

And oh! how many fall before the ripened ear!

—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

258

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

VICENTE ESPINEL

(1551-1624)

LETRILLA

Vicente Espinel was born at Ronda. After being sold into captivity by Moorish pirates he joined the Spanish army in Italy. Later, he returned to Spain, took orders, and obtained a post at the hospital at Ronda, where his irregular conduct led to his disgrace. He was a famous musician of the school of Salamanca and added the fifth string to the guitar, to the disapproval of Lope de Vega. His death occurred at Madrid. He is most famed as the author of the Relaciones de la Vida del Escudero Marcos de Obregón (1618), after which Le Sage copied his more famous Gil Blas. Espinel's Diversas Rimas were published in 1591.

A thousand, thousand times I seek

My lovely maid;

But I am silent, still, afraid

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

VICENTE ESPINEL

259

That if I speak

The maid might frown, and then my heart would break.

I've oft resolved to tell her all,

But dare not—what a woe 'twould be

From doubtful favor's smiles to fall

To the harsh frown of certainty.

Her grace—her music cheers me now;

The dimpled roses on her cheek,

But fear restrains my tongue, for how,

When, if she frowned, my troubled heart would break?

No! rather I'll conceal my story

In my full heart's most secret cell;

For though I feel a doubtful glory

I 'scape the certainty of hell.

I lose, 'tis true, the bliss of heaven—

I own my courage is but weak;

That weakness may be well forgiven,

For should she speak

In words ungentle, O my heart would break.

—John Bowring.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

260

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

FAINT HEART NEVER WON FAIR LADY

He who is both brave and bold

Wins the lady that he would;

But the courageous and cold

Never did and never could.

Modesty in women's game

Is a wide and shielding veil;

They are tutored to conceal

Passion's fiercely burning flame.

He who serves them brave and bold,

He alone is understood;

But the courageous and cold

Ne'er could win and never should.

If you love a lady bright,

Seek, and you shall find a way;

All that love would say—to say,

If you watch the occasion right,

Cupid's ranks are brave and bold,

Every soldier firm and good;

But the courageous and cold

Ne'er have conquered—never could.

—John Bowring.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

ANONYMOUS

261

ANONYMOUS

(Sixteenth or Seventeenth Century)

TO CHRIST CRUCIFIED

This famous sonnet, in spite of the ascrip-

tion of its authorship to Saint Teresa of

Avila in the Biblioteca de autores españoles,

is still declared to be anonymous. (M. R.

Fouché-Delbosc, Revue Hispanique, 1895, vol.

ii.) It has also been attributed, without suf-

ficient reason, to Saint Ignatius de Loyola,

Saint Francis Xavier, and Pedro de los Reyes,

The Latin hymn "Deus ego te amo" is simi-

lar to it in many ways. The latter hymn,

the work of Saint Francis Xavier, has been

beautifully rendered into English by Alexan-

der Pope. The sonnet has also been transla-

ted by Dryden in his "O God, thou art the

object of my love."

I am not moved to love Thee, O my Lord,

By any longing for Thy Promised Land;

Nor by the fear of hell am I unmanned

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

262

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

To cease from my transgressing deed or word.

'Tis Thou Thyself dost move me,—Thy blood poured

Upon the cross from nail'd foot and hand;

And all the wounds that did Thy body brand;

And all Thy shame and bitter death's award.

Yea, to Thy heart am I so deeply stirred

That I would love Thee were no heaven on high,—

That I would fear, were hell a tale absurd!

Such my desire, all questioning grows vain;

Though hope deny me hope I still should sight,

And as my love is now, it should remain.

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

DE ARGENSOLA

263

LUPERCIO LEONARDO DE

ARGENSOLA

(1559-1613)

SONNET

Lupercio Leonardo de Argensola, together

with his brother Bartolomé, is considered

among the greater poets of the seventeenth

century. He made some attempts at the

drama, but it is not until the publication of

Rimas in 1634 that we have a text to warrant

their great reputation. The Argensolas were

of Italian descent and followed the methods of

the Italian poets, with a strong classical ten-

dency which saved them from the abuses of

Gongorism, then at its height. Lupercio be-

came the Chronicler of Aragon and, following

the Count de Lemos to Naples, died there.

October scatters the torn vines around,

And the great floods their 'customed

bounds break o'er;

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264

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Drowning the plains their shoreless

waters pour,

Sweeping both bridge and bank in Spain's

whole bound.

Moncayo, as of old, lifts up his crowned

High forehead of the snows; the sun no

more

Than scarce appears with day's half-

portioned store,

When it is covered o'er with night profound.

The angry breath of tempests is abroad

Upon the seas and forests. Mankind

hastes

Into his ports and cabins wisely awed;

Whilst Fabio by the Tays lingering

wastes

His shamefaced tears, to mourn the sea-

sons' fraud,

The fruits that wither ere the lip half

tastes.

—Thomas Walsh.

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HISPANIC NOTES

JOSÉ DE VALDIVIELSO

265

JOSÉ DE VALDIVIELSO

(1560-1638)

SEGUIDILLA

José de Valdivielso was a native of Toledo,

and the author of the excellent Autos Sacr-

mentales, and Comedias Divinas. His Vida de

San José is also noteworthy; but he is espec-

ially esteemed for his devotional lyrics. There

was an edition of his Romancero espiritual

published at Madrid in 1880.

I who once was free,

Sold unto death you see;

Trust not, Mother dear,

Hearts ungrateful here!

With a honeyed smile,

Mother, a false friend

At the banquet's end

His hand within my dish the while,

Like a lamb betrayed me vile.

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266

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

Trust not, Mother dear,

Hearts ungrateful here!

I placed him at my side

And passed the dish to him;

I shared and did provide

The best unto the brim.

His bargain rare and grim,—

He sold Thy Son away,

Trust not, Mother dear,

Hearts ungrateful here!

The garden flowers were wet

With the tears I shed thereon;

'Twas Holy Thursday, yet

With me had Judas gone;

He gave unto Thy Son

The kiss I'll not forget—

Trust not, Mother dear,

Hearts ungrateful here!

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

a

bust

in

the

Hispanic

Society

of

America

Luis

de

Góngora

LUIS DE GÓNGORA

267

LUIS DE ARGOTE Y GÓNGORA

(1561-1627)

NOT ALL SWEET NIGHTINGALES

Luis de Argote y GÓNGORA was born of good

family at Córdoba; he was educated at the

University of Salamanca and received a bene-

fice in 1577. In 1613 he removed to Madrid

and became chaplain to the King. He re-

turned to Córdoba in ill health and died there.

His reputation as a poet was already estab-

lished in 1600 at the publication of the Roman-

cero General. His earlier poems are free from

affectations, but in his later style he adopted

the affectations known as Marinism in Italy,

Euphuism in England and Preciosité in France,

in this way establishing in Spain the School of

Gongorism which afflicted Spanish literature

for many generations. His poems may be

found in the Bibliotheca de autores españoles,

vols. x, xvi, xxix, xxxi, and xxxv.

They are all sweet nightingales

That fill with songs the flowery vales;

HISPANIC NOTES

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268

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

But they are little silver bells,

Touched by the winds in the smiling dell's;

Magic bells of gold in the grove,

Forming a chorus for her I love.

Think not the voices in the air

Are from the wingéd Sirens fair,

Playing among the dewy trees

Chanting their morning mysteries;

Oh! if you listen, delighted there,

To their music scattered o'er the dales,

They are not all sweet nightingales, etc.

Oh! 'twas a lovely song--of art

To charm--of nature to touch the heart;

Sure 'twas some shepherd's pipe, which

played

By passion fills the forest shade;

No! 'tis music's diviner part

Which o'er the yielding spirit prevails.

They are not all sweet nightingales, etc.

In the eye of love, which all things sees,

The fragrance-breathing jasmine trees—

And the golden flowers—and the sloping

hill—

And the ever melancholy rill—

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS DE GÓNGORA

269

Are full of holiest sympathies,

And tell of love a thousand tales.

They are not all sweet nightingales,

That fill with songs the cheerful vales;

But they are little silver bells,

Touched by the wind in the smiling dell's,

Bells of gold in the secret grove,

Making music for her I love.

—John Bowring.

ROMANCE

The loveliest girl in all our country-side,

To-day forsaken, yesterday a bride,

Seeing her love ride forth to join the wars,

With breaking heart and trembling lips

implores:

“My hope is dead, my tears are blinding me,

Oh let me walk alone where breaks the sea!

“You told me, Mother, what too well I know,

How grief is long, and joy is quick to go,

But you have given him my heart that he

Might hold it captive with love's bitter

key,—

My hope is dead, my tears are blinding me.

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270

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

"My eyes are dim, that once were full of

grace,

And ever bright with gazing on his face,

But now the tears come hot and never cease,

Since he is gone in whom my heart found

peace,

My hope is dead, my tears are blinding me.

"Then do not seek to stay my grief, nor yet

To blame a sin my heart must needs forget;

For though blame were spoken in good

part,

Yet speak it not, lest you should break my

heart.

My hope is dead, my tears are blinding me.

"Sweet Mother mine, who would not weep

to see

The glad years of my youth so quickly flee,

Although his heart were flint, his breast a

stone?

Yet here I stand, forsaken and alone,

My hope is dead, my tears are blinding me.

"And still may night avoid my lonely bed,

Now that my eyes are dull, my soul is dead.

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HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS DE GÓNGORA

271

Since he is gone for whom they vigil keep,

Too long is night, I have no heart for sleep.

My hope is dead, my tears are blinding me,

Oh let me walk alone where breaks the sea!

—John Pierrepont Rice.

LET ME GO WARM

Let me go warm and merry still;

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

Let other muse on earthly things,—

The fall of thrones, the fate of kings,

And those whose fame the world doth fill;

Whilst muffins sit enthroned in trays,

And orange-punch in winter sways

The merry sceptre of my days;—

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

He that the royal purple wears,

From golden plate a thousand cares

Doth swallow as a gilded pill;

On feasts like these I turn my back,

Whilst puddings in my roasting-jack

Beside the chimney hiss and crack;—

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

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272

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

And when the wintry tempest blows,

And January's sleets and snows

Are spread o'er every vale and hill,

With one to tell a merry tale

O'er roasted nuts and humming ale,

I sit, and care not for the gale;—

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

Let merchants traverse seas and lands

For silver mines and golden sands;

Whilst I beside some shadowy rill

Just where its bubbling fountain swells

Do sit and gather stones and shells,

And hear the tale the blackbird tells;—

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

For Hero's sake the Grecian lover

The stormy Hellespont swam over;

I cross without the fear of ill

The wooden bridge that slow bestrides

The Madrigal's enchanting sides,

Or barefoot wade through Yepes's tides;—

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

But since the Fates so cruel prove,

That Pyramus should die of love,

And love should gentle Thisbe kill;

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS DE GÓNGORA

273

My Thisbe be an apple-tart,

The sword I plunge into her heart

The tooth that bites the crust apart,—

And let the world laugh, an' it will.

—H. W. Longfellow.

THE NATIVITY OF CHRIST

Today from the Aurora's bosom

A pink has fallen—a crimson blossom;

And oh, how glorious rests the hay

On which the fallen blossom lay!

When silence gently had unfurled

Her mantle over all below,

And crowned with winter's frost and snow,

Night swayed the sceptre of the world,

Amid the gloom descending slow,

Upon the monarch's frozen bosom

A pink has fallen,—a crimson blossom.

The only flower the Virgin bore

(Aurora fair) within her breast,

She gave to earth, yet still possessed

Her virgin blossom as before;

That hay that colored drop caressed,—

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274

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Received upon its faithful bosom

That single flower,—a crimson blossom.

The manger, unto which 'twas given,

Even amid wintry snows and cold,

Within its fostering arms to fold

The blushing flower that fell from heaven,

Was as a canopy of gold,—

A downy couch,—where on its bosom

That flower had fallen,—that crimson blossom.

—H. W. Longfellow.

LETRILLA

Riches will serve for titles, too,

That's true—that's true!

And they love most who oftenest sigh,

That's a lie—that's a lie !

That crowns give virtue—power gives wit,

That follies well on proud ones sit;

That poor men's slips deserve a halter;

While honors crown the great defaulter;

That 'nointed kings no wrong can do,

No right, such worms as I and you—

That's true—that's true!

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS DE GÓNGORA

275

To say a dull and sleepy warden

Can guard a many-portal'd garden;

That woes which darken many a day

One moment's smile can charm away;

To say you think that Celia's eye

Speaks aught but trick and treachery,

That's a lie—that's a lie!

That wisdom's bought and virtue sold;

And that you can provide with gold

For court a garter or a star,

And valor fit for peace or war;

And purchase knowledge at the U-

Niversity for P. or Q.—

That's true—that's true!

They must be gagged who go to court,

And bless, beside, the gagged for 't;

That rankless must be scourged, and thank

The scourgers when they're men of rank;

The humble, poor man's form and hue

Deserve both shame and suffering too—

That's true—that's true!

But wondrous favors to be done,

And glorious prizes to be won;

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276

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

And downy pillows for our head,

And thornless roses for our bed;

From monarch's words--you'll trust and

try,

And risk your honor on the die—

That's a lie—that's a lie !

That he who in the courts of law

Defends his person or estate,

Should have a privilege to draw

Upon the mighty River Plate;

And spite of all that he can do,

He will be plucked and laughed at too—

That's true, that's truc!

To sow of pure and honest seeds,

And gather nought but waste and weeds;

And to pretend our care and toil

Had well prepared the ungrateful soil;

And then on righteous heaven to cry,

As 'twere unjust—and ask it why?—

That's a lie, that's a lie!

—John Bowring.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

LUIS DE GÓNGORA

277

"CLEAR HONOR OF THE LIQUID ELEMENT"

Clear honor of the liquid element,

Sweet rivulet of shining silver sheen!

Whose waters steal along the meadows green,

With gentle step and murmur of content!

When she for whom I bear each fierce extreme,

Beholds herself in thee,—then Love doth trace

The snow and crimson of that lovely face

In the soft gentle movement of thy stream.

Then, smoothly flow as now, and set not free

The crystal curb and undulating rain

Which now thy current's headlong speed restrain;

Lest broken and confused the image rest

Of such rare charms on the deep-heaving breast

Of him who holds and sways the trident of the seas.

—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

278

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

LOPE FELIX DE VEGA CARPIO

(1562-1635)

THE GOOD SHEPHERD

Lope Felix de Vega Carpio, one of the greatest figures in Spanish literature, the "monstruo" of the critics, was born at Madrid, and after an irregular youth took part in the Invincible Armada, returning to receive priestly orders, but, also, to continue his dis-solute courses . He is said to have written 1800 dramas of various kinds, establishing the style for all future writers for the Spanish theatre. His lyric talents are of the highest order, and his fluency makes him one of the most remarkable figures in the literature of the world. His Obras sueltas in twenty-one volumes appeared at Madrid in 1776. Me-néndez y Pelayo died before completing the collection of his works which he was preparing for the Spanish Academy.

Shepherd! who with thine amorous, sylvan song

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

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America

Lope

Felis

de

Vega

Carpio

LOPE DE VEGA

281

Hast broken the slumber that encompassed me,

Who mad'st Thy crook from the accursed tree

On which Thy powerful arms were stretched so long!

Lead me to mercy's ever-flowing fountains;

For Thou my shepherd, guard, and guide shalt be;

I will obey Thy voice, and wait to see

Thy feet all beautiful upon the mountains.

Hear, Shepherd Thou who for Thy flock art dying,

Oh, wash away these scarlet sins, for Thou

Rejoicest at the contrite sinner's vow.

Oh, wait! to Thee my weary soul is crying,

Wait for me: Yet why ask it, when I see,

With feet nailed to the cross, Thou'rt waiting still for me!

—H. W. Longfellow.

O NAVIS

Poor bark of Life, upon the billows hoarse

Assailed by storms of envy and deceit,

Across what cruel seas in passage fleet

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

282

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

My pen and sword alone direct thy course!

My pen is dull; my sword of little force;

Thy side lies open to the wild waves' beat

As out from Favor's harbors we retreat,

Pursued by hopes deceived and vain remorse.

Let heaven be star to guide thee! here below

How vain the joys that foolish hearts desire!

Here friendship dies and enmity keeps true;

Here happy days have left thee long ago!

But seek not port, brave thou the tempest's ire;

Until the end thy fated course pursue!

—Roderick Gill.

TOMORROW

Lord, what am I, that with unceasing care

Thou did'st seek after me, that Thou did'st wait

Wet with unhealthy dews before my gate,

And pass the gloomy nights of winter there?

IV

HISPANIC NOTES.

LOPE DE VEGA

283

Oh, strange delusion, that I did not greet

Thy blest approach, and oh, to heaven how lost

If my ingratitude's unkindly frost

Has chilled the bleeding wounds upon Thy feet.

How oft my guardian angel gently cried,

"Soul, from thy casement look, and thou shalt see

How He persists to knock and wait for thee!"

And oh, how often to that Voice of sorrow,

"Tomorrow we will open," I replied,

And when the morrow came I answered still "Tomorrow."

—H. W. Longfellow.

AND MONOGRAPHS

IV

284

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

BARTOLOMÉ LEONARDO DE ARGENSOLA

(1564-1631)

TO THE FATHER OF THE UNIVERSE

Bartolomé Leonardo de Argensola was the younger of the Argensola brothers of Aragon,

who resisted the influence of Gongorism and

who established their literary reputation in

1634 with the publication of Rimas.

Tell me, Thou common Father, tell me

why,

(Since Thou art just and good) dost

Thou permit

Successful fraud, securely throned, to

sit

While innocence, oppressed, stands weep-

ing by?

Why hast Thou nerved that strong arm to

oppose

Thy righteous mandates with impunity,

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

From

a

print

in

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Society

of

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Bartolomé

Leonardo

de

Argensola

BARTOLOMÉ DE ARGENSOLA

287

While the meek man who served and reverenced Thee

Lies at the feet of Thine and virtues's toes?

Why (said I, in despair) should vice con-founded

All nature's harmony, and tower above

In all the pomp, and pride, and power of state?

Then I looked upwards— and I heard a sound

As from an angel, smiling through heaven's gate,

"Is earth a spot for heaven-born souls to love?"

—John Bowring.

TO MARY MAGDALEN

Blessed, yet sinful one, and broken-hearted!

The crowd are pointing at the thing forlorn,

In wonder and in scorn!

Thou weepest days of innocence departed;

Thou weepest, and thy tears have power to move

The Lord to pity and love.

HISPANIC NOTES

IV

288

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

The greatest of thy tollies is forgiven,

Even for the least of all the tears that shine

On that pale cheek of thine.

Thou didst kneel down, to Him who came

from heaven,

Evil and ignorant, and thou shalt rise

Holy and pure and wise.

It is not much that to the fragrant blossom

The ragged briar should change, the bitter fir

Distil Arabian myrrh;

Nor that, upon the wintry desert's bosom,

The harvest should rise plenteous, and the

swain

Bear home the abundant grain.

But come and see the bleak and barren

mountains

Thick to their tops with roses; come and see

Leaves on the dry dead tree.

The perished plant, set out by living

fountains,

Grows fruitful, and its beauteous branches

rise,

Forever, to the skies.

—William Cullen Bryant.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

JUAN DE ARGUIJO

289

JUAN DE ARGUIJO

(1567-1623)

THE TEMPEST AND THE CALM

Juan de Arguijo was a native of Seville

where his abilities and character procured

him a high position in the Sevillian school of

letters. His sonnets are to be found in the

edition of J. Colón y Colón (Seville, 1841).

Sudden I saw the ruddy sun to turn

In cloudy trouble and to disappear;

Across his hidden face the lightning

drear

Upon the darkness then began to burn.

Full soon the furious south-wind came to

churn

In fury and tormenting far and near;

And where the shoulders of great Atlas

rear,

Olympus shook beneath the thunder

stern.

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IV

290

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY:

But soon the heavy veil is swept away

By rains, and clear again the morning

shines

With gladness full-renewed across the

skies;

Marking the freshened splendors of the

day,

I murmur—These perchance may be the

signs

Wherein the image of my fortune lies.

—Thomas Walsh.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES

VENEGAS DE SAAVEDRA

291

PEDRO VENEGAS DE SAAVEDRA

(1576-1609)

PASTORAL CHARMS

Pedro Venegas de Saavedra was born at Sanlúcar la Mayor, of a noble family belonging to Seville. He died at Granada in his thirty-third year. His Remedios de Amor was first published, together with the poems of Francisco de Medrano, in Palermo, 1617. It is an original poem written around the general scheme of Ovid's work of the same title.

How happy he, his idle thoughts unreined,

Who here arrayed in calmness forth can go

With song amid his peaceful oxen trained

And join his wearied flocks returning slow,

Dragging the plough as evening's shadow falls

And daylight all its broken host recalls.

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292

HISPANIC ANTHOLOGY :

Who when the earliest light of Phoebus warns

And earth awakes, is glad from out his bed

Beneath the farm-house eaves, nor laboring scorns

To trim his vines and train the nodding head

Of elms upon the hillsides tall and slight

Such as god Hymen takes for his delight.

Or through the heavy furrows wins his way

With ponderous team, and scatters the glad grain

In token of the Golden Age and sway

Of oldtime Bacchus and Silvanus' reign;

Till grateful gifts to Ceres here disclose,

And on her sacred altars sheaves repose.

Upon the earliest day the floods are free

From icy bondage, there he lightly turns

To seek his Filomena lovingly

When the sun's waning light no longer burns,

And heifers bleat, and doves' compelling song

Is music to the ears attentive long.

IV

HISPANIC NOTES