FAILURE OF OSMIA ON THE STAGE—PREVALENCE OF DRAMATIC IMITATIONS AND TRANSLATIONS.
The great difference between such a tragedy as Osmia and the dramatic entertainments to which the Portuguese public were accustomed, must have impeded the good effect which under other circumstances might have been produced by the prizes which the academy of Lisbon continued to offer. Osmia was performed; but it did not obtain a favourable reception from the public, and some similar tragedies by which it was succeeded experienced nearly the same fate. The Italian opera maintained its consideration in Lisbon; and the dramas which have since been produced on the Portuguese stage, are for the most part, either imitations of foreign pieces or translations. No modern Portuguese poet seems to have attempted to pursue the path of dramatic composition in the style of the Spanish comedy, and to carry it forward from the point at which Gil Vicente had stopped. Of the modern Portuguese comedies in the French style those from the pen of Guita have the highest reputation. But the Portuguese appear still to cherish as a favourite dramatic entertainment, the burlesque and truly national entremeses (interludes) which have either risen out of the Spanish compositions of the same class, or have with them one common origin.[394]