The Works of Garcilasso de la Vega, Surnamed the Prince of Castilian Poets, Translated into English Verse / With a Critical and Historical Essay on Spanish Poetry and a Life of the Author

by Garcilaso de la Vega

LIFE OF GARCILASSO.

Of the many distinguished men, to whom, in the enterprising reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, Spain had the honour of giving birth, there are few perhaps much more admired by herself, or that come recommended to the notice of a stranger with so much interest as Garcilasso de la Vega. Whether considered as the cultivated spirit, who, shaking from the Spanish lute the dust of ages, imparted to it by the force of his genius, a more harmonious string and a more polished tone; or whether as a young warrior, brought up in the court of the most celebrated prince of his age, qualified both by birth and education to take part, and actually taking part in that prince's enterprises, till doomed to fall the victim of his too rash valour, his story is calculated to strike forcibly the attention, and to touch the springs of admiration and of sympathy in no common degree. The character of the times in which he lived, of the monarch whom he served, his own adventures, his deep devotion to the muses during the few hours of leisure which alone he was able to snatch from the hurry and alarm of war, the amiable qualities and classic taste developed in his writings, and the new impulse which these writings gave to Spanish poesy,—all offer to the biographer a theme more fertile than usually falls to his lot in recording the lives of poets, and upon which he would love to bestow the illustration they deserve. But unfortunately for such a desire,—a desire in which every one must participate, who peruses the fine relics which his fancy has left of its sweetness,—the pen of his cotemporaries was unemployed in the record of his actions, and centuries were suffered to elapse before any of his countrymen set themselves to the task. It was then too late; the anecdotes that marked the character of the man, and all those slighter traits which in a more particular manner give life and individuality to biography, had perished with his intimate associates; and those who admired his talents, and desired to illustrate them, were obliged to gather from his works, and from the common voice of fame, their scanty particulars, and to make up the deficiency of incident by excessive compliments and eulogies. The consequence is, that although he lived on terms of close intimacy with many who were admirably qualified to depict the lights and shadows of his amiable mind and eventful life, a writer of the present day can hope alone to offer to the world a bare outline of his actions, unenriched by any of those distinctive touches which give value to a portrait. An industrious research into such of the Spanish annalists and cotemporary historians as are to be met with in our public libraries, and the interest I have naturally taken in his story, have enabled me to glean several particulars and incidents unnoticed by any of his commentators; but these must be still too few to satisfy our common curiosity, and it must always remain a subject of regret that we know so little of him, who has ever been considered by his countrymen as one of their most elegant writers, as the one in short who contributed most to the polish and refinement of their language.

Garcias, or, as he is commonly called, Garcilasso de la Vega, was born of one of the noblest titled families in the ancient city of Toledo. His ancestors from remote antiquity were persons of opulence and high consideration, as is evident from the frequent mention of them in the old chronicles of the kingdom. They originally sprang from the mountains of Asturias, having their seat on the banks of the river Vesaya, a league from Santillana, but making in course of time Toledo their principal residence. The first of our poet's ancestors, whom I find chronicled in Spanish story, is Don Diego Gomez, a very rich and distinguished knight in the reign of Don Alonzo the Seventh, a prince cotemporary with our Henry the First. From him sprang Gonzalo Ruyz, who lived in the time of Don Ferdinand the Third and Alonzo the Wise. His descendant, Don Pedro Lasso, was in the year 1329 Admiral of Castile; his son Garcilasso arrived at yet greater honours, being the principal favourite of Alonzo the Eleventh. He was made High Judge and Superintendent of sheep-walks in Castile, as well as Chancellor of the kingdom, and was entrusted with the education of the lady Blanche, daughter of prince Pedro who had fallen in battle against the Moors, no less than with the care of her estate. So rich was he become, that he purchased, says Mariana, the whole lordship of Biscay, of the lady Mary, mother of Don John, who aspiring to the marriage of the infant Blanche, in order to obtain the great estates whereof she was the heiress, had been treacherously invited to a banquet in the palace, and by the king's orders cruelly put to death. Garcilasso was employed by the king in several important negotiations, and amongst others, in that of thwarting the designs of D. John Manuel, who had renounced his allegiance to the crown, and was in arms to revenge the affront put upon him by the king in divorcing his daughter to make way for a second marriage. But in these turbulent times the highest distinctions of court-favour served only to mark out those who enjoyed them for destruction, either by the common vice of courts, intrigue, or by the more decisive dagger. The nobles of the kingdom, piqued at the elevation of one who was no noble to such high offices of trust, or envying his favour and influence with the king, conspired together, and he was assassinated in the church of Soria during the celebration of mass, A.D. 1328. Alonzo was seized with the greatest concern when the news of the murder was brought him; nor was his grief overcome, though his revenge was gratified, by the swift justice executed on the principal conspirators. The lordship of Biscay did not long remain in the family of the purchaser, being at the king's desire restored to the heiress of the attainted family on her marriage with Don John de Lara. The murdered Chancellor left two sons, Garcilasso and Gonzalo Ruyz, who in the grand battle of Salado, 1340, were the first that in spite of the Moors passed the river. The former was made Lord Chief Justice of Spain, as appears by the deeds of the year 1372; and this knight it was, who for his valour in slaying a gigantic Moor that had defied the Christians by parading in the Vega, or plain of Granada, with the words 'Ave Maria' fixed to his horse's tail, took the surname De la Vega, and for his device the Ave Maria in a field d'or;[U] as is seen in the scutcheon of Garcilasso de la Vega, a son of one of the brothers, who followed the party of King Henry against the king Don Pedro, was slain in the battle of Najara, and lies buried in the royal monastery of that city, in the chapel de la Cruz, near Donna Mencia, queen of Portugal. He had married Donna Mencia de Cisneros, and left a daughter, Leonora de la Vega, who married Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, High Admiral of Castile, a knight much celebrated in the annals of that period for his naval and military actions. From this marriage sprang D. Iñigo Lopez de Mendoza, who in 1445 was created Marques de Santillana, Gonzalo Ruyz de la Vega, and two daughters, the elder of whom, Elvira Lasso de la Vega, marrying Gomez Suarez de Figueroa, continued the line of descent. Their son, Don Pedro Suarez, acquired the estate of Los Arcos and Botova by marriage with the lady Blanche de Sotomayor, and Don Pedro Lasso was the fruit of their union. The father of our poet, who was likewise named Garcilasso, was the fourth lord of Los Arcos, Grand Commendary of Leon, a knight of the Order of St. James, and one of the most distinguished gentlemen in the court of Ferdinand and Isabella, being appointed Counsellor of State to their Catholic Majesties, and sent as their ambassador to Pope Alexander the Sixth;[V] his wife, Donna Sancha, of the illustrious house of Toral, was lady of Batres, a considerable domain in Leon, where a fountain, the same our poet describes in his second eclogue, is still seen to play, and bears the name of Garcilasso's fountain, an illustrious monument of the estimation in which his writings were held.[W] According to the best accounts, Garcilasso, who was destined to rival, if not eclipse in battle the valorous deed of the first De la Vega, was born at Toledo, in the year 1503, a few years only after the birth of the celebrated Charles the Fifth; and when, on that prince's accession to the crown, he was persuaded to visit Spain, in the resort which the nobility made to him at Barcelona, Garcilasso, then in his fifteenth year, was not left behind. The office which his father had held under Ferdinand, rendered his attendance on such an occasion indispensable, and Garcilasso was presented to the prince. With a graceful person, frank address, and the most amiable dispositions, it may easily be conceived that he soon recommended himself to the notice and favour of Charles. What confirmed these first prepossessions, was his skill in those martial and gymnastic exercises, which formed in that age the chief pride of persons of rank, and to which the prince always showed an excessive fondness: to ride at full speed, to leap, to wrestle, to fence, to tilt, to swim the Tagus—in these accomplishments, Garcilasso, who, as a younger son, was probably early devoted to the profession of arms, bore the palm from his competitors, and in these severe amusements their hours were frequently spent together. Garcilasso knew, however, and loved to temper the exercises of the gymnasium with those more elegant pursuits and studies to which his royal companion showed but little inclination. Of music, from his earliest years, he was passionately fond, and on the harp and the guitar, already played with extreme sweetness.[X] Music called into exercise the poetical powers with which he now began to feel that he was gifted, and refined both his ear and taste to perceive the wide distance subsisting between the songs and coplas of his native poets, and the writings of those Latin, Greek, and Tuscan masters, to whose works his studies were directed. His acute judgment at once perceived the error into which the generality of Spanish poets had fallen, in contenting themselves with their merely natural endowments, without giving attention to art, as though impatient of the toil of culture. Dissatisfied with the little they had accomplished, he set himself sedulously to the study of more classical models than his countrymen had yet taken as standards of good writing; and the pure elegance of the Greeks, and harmonious numbers of the Tuscans, alternately engrossed his attention. In these pursuits was associated with him Juan Almogavar Boscán, a young man of honourable family, born at Barcelona, with whom he probably became first acquainted on his visit to that city with his father; for whom he entertained through life the warmest affection, and of whose amiable mind and poetical talent he has left in his writings many interesting testimonies. They applied themselves to their purpose with all the devotedness of youthful enthusiasm, newly conscious of its latent powers. Dante, Ariosto, and Petrarch, were ever in their hands, and the reputation of cotemporary poets amongst the Italians, of Bernardo Tasso, Tansillo, Sannazaro, and Bembo, quickened their literary ambition. But the poet whom above all others Garcilasso evidently studied with the most partiality, was Virgil. The mild and tender spirit which pervades and shines throughout his beautiful writings, was in peculiar concordance with the disposition and character of Garcilasso, naturally inclined to the gentle and the affectionate, to the love of rural images and the tranquillity of a country life, though drawn by circumstance into a ruder sphere, and compelled by passing events so frequently to cast aside the pages of the poet and the tones of the lyre, for the sword of battle and those military exertions which his country shortly claimed of him.

Although the nobility and nation at large had hailed Charles's arrival with delight, it was not long before they began to regard his proceedings with extreme mistrust and jealousy. For this there were many causes; but that which excited the greatest discontent was his almost exclusive partiality for his Flemish favourites, and the ascendancy of a Flemish minister. The great Ximenes, whose commanding genius had secured from a murmuring nobility the peaceful recognition of his title, was gone; weighed down by years, and by mortification at being refused an interview by the king, in which his prophetic spirit hoped to expose the calamities impending over the country from the insolence and rapacity of foreign minions, he expired. His death freed Chievres from those fears with which he could not but regard his superior talents, and for awhile he ran his round of misgovernment without restraint. He engrossed, or exposed to sale all offices and appointments, exported into Flanders all the treasures he could amass in the collection of the taxes, imposed new ones, and sedulously guarded the king's ear from the language of complaint. But this system of arbitrary peculation could not long escape the indignant remonstrances of a high-spirited and free people. Already Toledo, Segovia, Seville, and several other cities of the first rank, had entered into a confederacy for the defence of their rights and privileges, had laid before the king complaints of the mal-administration under which they suffered; and the first rumour of his intended departure for Germany to receive the imperial crown of Maximilian, was a signal for every hitherto suppressed discontent to burst forth in open violence. The nobles of Valencia refused to admit the Cardinal, afterwards Pope Adrian, as the royal representative, and firmly declared, that by the fundamental laws of the country, they could grant no subsidy to an absent sovereign: exasperated by their obstinacy, Charles countenanced the people who had risen against their privileges; he rashly authorized them to continue in arms, and sanctioned the association into which they entered under the fatal name of the Germanada or Brotherhood.

The civil dissensions which followed in the king's absence, the alliance of the commons in the principal cities, under the title of the Junta, the actions and death of their heroic leader John de Padilla, and the final extinction of the Germanada, are historical events generally known. Less generally known, however, is the honourable and distinguished part which Don Pedro, the elder brother of Garcilasso, took in these commotions, and we may with little impropriety devote a few pages to its consideration. Our English historians, seizing upon the leading features of the struggle, have celebrated alone the proceedings of Padilla, whose deeds in arms and tragical end seemed to mark him out as the principal personage of the drama. They have not communicated the fact, that Don Pedro Lasso was thought by the Junta to be more worthy of the distinction of Captain-General, was indeed elected such, and that it was only by low intrigues with the meanest of the people that Padilla had the election reversed in his favour.[Y] Young, generous, brave, of an open and sweet disposition, and intolerant of every species of injustice and oppression, Don Pedro Lasso pursued the views he meditated for the freedom and welfare of his country, with a simple sincerity and straight-forwardness of action, which showed clearly that he was swayed by no personal motives of aggrandizement or popularity; he dared the frowns of his sovereign, without stooping to pay court to the passions of the people. Equally brave and zealous, but with views less purely patriotic, and an ambition more daring, John de Padilla threw himself into their ranks, and sealed his devotion to the cause he embraced, by a death which he met with the utmost fortitude and boldness. But if the springs of his conduct are closely examined, they will furnish us with but too certain grounds for belief, that his own aggrandizement in the minds of men occupied quite as much of his thoughts as the good of his country; and if any mode seemed likely to facilitate his ends, he did not stand upon niceties in the use of them. Don Pedro, when he saw the unconstitutional excesses into which the Germanada were hurrying, laboured to lead them back by ways that would have secured from the monarch a recognition of the rights and claims for which they fought: with a blinder or less disinterested policy, Padilla led them on to fresh enterprises, which extinguished the high hopes in which the people indulged. Had the series of events led Don Pedro to the scaffold, he would have met his doom with calm and unpretending dignity, sufficiently rewarded by the testimony of a good conscience; Padilla bent his thoughts to the last to stand high in the applause of men, and the address to the citizens of Toledo, which he caused to be circulated at his death, noble and fine-spirited as it was, betrayed not merely a satisfaction with being, but a thirst to be considered the martyr in their cause he was.

So soon as it was known that the king intended to leave Spain, and that the calling of the Cortes together would only increase their taxes, the principal cities sent either petitions or protests against what they deemed so mischievous a measure. The citizens of Toledo, who considered themselves, on account of the great privileges they enjoyed, as guardians of the liberties of the Castilian commons, and were especially discontented, took the lead; they wrote to the other cities of Castile, exhorting them to send messengers to the king for the redress of their grievances: all, except Seville, returned for answer, that the representatives whom they sent to the approaching Cortes should act conformably to their desire. The persons who interested themselves most in this affair were Don Pedro, Padilla, and Fernando de Avalos, a gentleman of high extraction, and allied to the first nobles of Spain, all commissioners of the juntas in the city. They perpetually urged the expediency of a general assembly being held of those states that sent votes to the Cortes, to petition for a reformation of the abuses of government; it was at length debated in junta, but met with much opposition from the king's party; the dispute waxed hot, insomuch that Padilla and Antonio Alvarez de Toledo drew their daggers at each other. After some disturbances in the city, it was at last voted that they should send two of their regidores as Procuradores, and two Hurados to the king to demand redress: Don Pedro and Alonzo Suarez were appointed Procuradores, and departed with their equipages for Valladolid. They came into the palace as the king, with his dukes, bishops, and ministers of state, were rising from dinner, and requested audience; he, being already acquainted, through Alvarez de Toledo, with the nature of their embassy, pleaded haste, and was retiring; but Don Pedro pressed so urgently the importance of the business they were charged with, that he was obliged to appoint them to meet him at Benavente, on his way to St. Jago, where he had appointed the Cortes to be held, and meanwhile referred their petition to his Council of Justice. It will readily be imagined that no very favourable reception was given by the Council to a petition complaining, not merely of the monarch's leaving the kingdom, but of his ministers' lavishing all offices on strangers, and their rapacity in engrossing the treasures of Spain to enrich a foreign nation. The Council gave their judgment to the king, that the framers and supporters of a petition so dangerous deserved punishment rather than satisfaction; upon which he sent for the Procuradores to his chamber, and with a severe frown told them he was not pleased with their proceedings, and that if he did not consider from what parents they were descended, he would punish them as they deserved; then, referring them to the President of his Council, without listening to their excuses, he retired. The President desired them to return and prevail with their city to send commissioners to the approaching Cortes, who might present a memorial of what they desired, which should be disposed of as might best suit the general good: they refused compliance, and followed the king to St. Jago.

The Cortes was convoked: Charles opened it in person, and stating the circumstances that rendered it necessary for him to leave the kingdom, requested the usual subsidy, that he might appear in Germany with the splendour suitable to his dignity. The Commissioners of Salamanca refused to take the oath, unless he would first grant them what they desired: for this act of court-disrespect they were forbidden to come any more into the assembly. Then rose Don Pedro: he said he had brought a memorial from the city of Toledo, of what he was to do and grant in Cortes, which his majesty might see; that he could not go beyond his commission, yet would perform it as should be most agreeable to his sovereign; "but, my Lord and Señors," said he with a generous enthusiasm, "I will sooner choose to be cut in pieces, I will sooner submit to lose my head, than give my consent to a measure so mischievous as this which is contemplated, and so prejudicial to my city and my country." This bold speech, coming upon an assembly already sufficiently indignant at the innovation of transferring the Cortes to so remote a province, and at the demand for a new subsidy before the time for paying the former one was expired, operated most powerfully: the commissioners of Seville, Cordoba, Salamanca, Toro, Zamora, and Avila, supported Don Pedro's remonstrance, refused their assent, and the king, perceiving the present temper of the assembly, adjourned it to a more convenient season.

The Council meanwhile were not inactive; they thought it would be well, on their part, to send some of the chief officers in opposition back to their cities, that their places might be supplied by others that would be more pliant to the wishes of the king. This was accordingly done, and other regidores were commanded under heavy penalties to attend the court, that Toledo might revoke the powers given to Don Pedro and his colleague: John de Padilla was one of the persons cited. But, with one exception, these regidores excused themselves; and the delegates from Toledo and Salamanca made a request to the others, that as their Commissioners were not yet come to the Cortes, or not admitted, nothing should be granted,—protesting that if any vote of money were passed, it should not be to the prejudice of their cities. This protest was sent in to the new Assembly; but, though many voted in its favour, they would neither receive it, nor suffer the delegates from Toledo to enter. Whereupon they made their protest at the door, declaring, that as they could not form a Cortes without their commissioners, the acts they might pass should be null and void, both as respected their cities and the kingdom at large; requiring them moreover as citizens, not to assemble as a Cortes till they could do so constitutionally. Charles, hearing that Don Pedro and his companions slighted his commands, issued on Palm Sunday immediate orders for their banishment. Don Pedro was ordered within forty days to go and reside in the government of the fort of Gibraltar, which was his own inheritance; and not to depart from thence without the king's permission, under penalty of losing, not only that command, but all his estates whatsoever: but they, ill brooking such rigorous and arbitrary measures, went within two hours of night to the palace, and strongly remonstrated with the minister; the result was an agreement for them to retire only a few miles from St. Jago, leaving the Hurado Ortiz behind, to remind Chievres to solicit the revocation of their sentence of banishment; but no sooner had they followed this crafty advice, and left the town, than the treacherous Fleming opposed it in Council, and no relaxation could be obtained.

Toledo heard of the banishment of their messengers and failure of their embassy, and were exasperated beyond measure. Of this spirit of discontent, John de Padilla took all possible advantage. "Seeing," says the Spanish historian,[Z] "things go forward as they wished, he and Avalos, the other summoned regidor, made a show of complying with the king's command. Hereupon the armed populace, to the number of six thousand men, withstood their apparent intention, and a great tumult was raised, Padilla all the while desiring them to let him fulfil the king's command, which renewed the people's resolve to detain them; and the crowd led them away as honourable prisoners, set a guard over them, still protesting against, though inly rejoiced at the violence, and obliged the governor, at the sword's point, to forbid them on their oath from leaving the city." Not satisfied with this, they seized the bridges and fortified gates, and attacked the alcazar, or castle, which they soon obliged the governor to surrender. Emboldened by this success, they deprived of all authority every one whom they suspected of being in any wise attached to the court, established a popular form of internal government, and levied troops in their defence. Thus, by the evil counsels of an arrogant ministry, was kindled the first spark of that rebellious flame which afterwards burned in men's bosoms with so much fury, and involved the whole kingdom in civil discord; another instance to the many others which history furnishes,—if warning were of any avail,—of the terrible consequences arising from an administration's slighting the voice of an aggrieved and proud-spirited people.

Meanwhile Don Pedro and his companions were come again to St. Jago; and though some gentlemen, their friends, had counselled them to be gone, lest the king, already sufficiently incensed against the Toledans, should imagine them to have abetted the commotion in their city, and punish them accordingly, they yet continued there, without much fearing what might befal them. But Garcilasso, who in this crisis could not avoid feeling a brother's anxiety and alarm, earnestly desired the king's solicitor to go with all expedition to St. Jago, and persuade him to depart, as now only five days remained of the forty limited for his retirement. The solicitor took post, communicated the entreaties of Garcilasso, and with added arguments at length prevailed. Passing through Zamora, Don Pedro arrived by the expiration of the fifth day at Cueva, a village of his, on his way to Gibraltar. The Toledans, hearing of his arrival there, sent messengers to request him to return to the city; but this he refused, and prepared to prosecute his journey. Upon this, they ordered a party of horse to intercept and bring him thither, which he was forced to attend, and got as privately as he could to his own home: he could not, however, keep himself long retired; the people in immense numbers flocked round his house, obliged him to come forth, set him on horseback, then, forming a triumphal procession, escorted him to the church, and with loud acclamations of joy extolling to the skies his patriotism, his courage, the resolution he had shown in defence of their liberties, saluted him with the title of the Deliverer of his Country.[AA]

If the history of these events were followed up, Don Pedro would be found acting uniformly the same part of a pure and fearless patriot. He it was who when the nobles, jealous of the rising freedom of the commons, opposed in arms its progress, was principally instrumental in prevailing on Queen Joanna to come from her retirement, and to use in this state of civil disorder the constitutional authority with which she had been invested on the accession of Charles. Upon him was conferred, after the rash indiscretion of Don Pedro Giron, the office of Captain-General, which Padilla by his artifices caused to be revoked in his own favour: it was no personal offence however that could cool his ardour in the cause of freedom and his country; he led the vanguard of cuirassiers in the battle with the royalists which terminated in the defeat near Tordesillas. It was not till he saw the Junta bent upon pushing their demands and measures to an excess which threatened the extinction of the rights and privileges of the nobility, that he ceased taking an active part in their proceedings; but even then he exerted his good offices in the negotiations carried on between them, and would have persuaded the people to accept the terms offered by the nobility, who, on condition of the Junta's conceding a few articles subversive of the royal authority and their own unalienable privileges, engaged to procure the Emperor's consent to their other demands, and to join with them in order to extort it, if the influence of evil counsellors should lead to a refusal. Unfortunately for the liberties of Spain, the Junta, elevated by success or blinded by resentment, refused assent to any such reasonable conditions; the army of Padilla was shortly after defeated by the Count de Haro, the royalist general; Padilla himself, disappointed of the death he sought on the lost field, was taken and executed; and this bold attempt of the commons did but contribute, as is the case with all unsuccessful insurrections, to extend the power it was intended to abridge.

The return of the Emperor to Spain filled his subjects who had been in arms against him with deep apprehensions; and if they escaped punishment, it was rather from Charles's own generous nature than from the forbearance of his minister, who endeavoured, but in vain, to stir his mind up to revenge. A general pardon was published, extending to all crimes committed from the first of the insurrections, from which a few only were excepted, and these few rather for the sake of intimidating others, than from the wish to seize them. "Go," said the monarch to an officious courtier who offered to inform him where one of the most considerable lay concealed, "I have now no reason to be afraid of that man, but he has some cause to keep at a distance from me, and you would be better employed in telling him that I am here, than in acquainting me with the place of his retreat." By this prudent line of conduct, by adopting the manners and language of Spain, and by breaking from the pupillage in which Chievres had studied to keep him, he effectually conciliated his subjects. The invasion of Navarre by the French determined him to engage in open war with the French king; and without consulting his minister, whose aversion to a war with Francis might have thwarted his design, he had entered into an alliance with the pope to expel the French out of the Milanese, and to secure Francis Sforza in possession of that duchy. No sooner was the treaty signed and imparted to him, than Chievres was well assured he had lost his ascendancy; his chagrin on this account is said to have shortened his days, and his death left the Emperor to exercise without control the unbiassed wishes of his own great mind.

The declaration of war against France called Garcilasso from his studies, and though little more than eighteen, he commenced his career of arms in this campaign. Lautrec, to whom the French forces in Milan were committed, was forced, notwithstanding his vigilance and address, to retire toward the Venetian territories before Colonna and Pescara, the papal and imperial generals; by the bravery of the Spanish fusiliers, the city of Milan was surprised; Parma and Placentia were reduced by the former, and in a short time the whole Milanese, except the citadel of Cremona, submitted to Sforza's authority. To efface the disasters of this campaign, Francis in 1524 assembled a numerous army, and determined, notwithstanding the approach of winter and the dissuasions of his generals, to march into Italy, and attempt the recovery of the lost territory. Crossing Mount Cenis, he advanced with an activity and strength that disconcerted the Imperialists. They retired precipitately from the city of Milan; but instead of seizing upon that favourable moment to attack and disperse them, the evil genius of Francis led him to turn aside to besiege Pavia. The battle of Pavia set the final seal upon his misfortunes. After romantic deeds of personal bravery, and not till he had seen the flower of his nobility perish around him and the fortune of the field hopeless, he delivered up his sword, and submitted himself a captive. It does not appear whether in this memorable engagement Garcilasso fought under the flag of Pescara or the Marques del Vasto: it is certain, however, that he distinguished himself by his courage and heroism, as the emperor, in acknowledgment of the high regard in which he held his conduct, conferred on him shortly after the Cross of the order of St. James.

Previously to the emperor's descent upon Milan, the state of Venice had been in league with Francis, and it was the last of his allies who abandoned him. So long as Charles had to struggle with his insurgent subjects, and with formidable enemies elsewhere, he had avoided increasing their number, and had consented not to consider the Venetians as at war with him, notwithstanding the succour which they gave to France; but now that he felt his power unfettered, he assumed a loftier tone, and declared that he would no longer suffer a State almost surrounded by his own territories, to enjoy the advantages of peace whilst engaged in constant hostilities against him.[AB] The regret which they felt to renounce the friendship with France, for which they had made the greatest sacrifices, caused the Venetians to hesitate a long time which of the two powers they should join with. The ascendancy which Charles was acquiring in Italy at length cut short their deliberation; a treaty of alliance was entered into with the emperor, and Andreas Navagero and Lorenzo Priuli, afterwards doge, were appointed ambassadors to the Spanish court. At Pisa, however, they received orders to await the issue of the siege of Pavia; and it was not till they had received intelligence of the defeat of Francis, that they proceeded on their embassy. They were met on their entrance into the city of Toledo,[AC] where the court at that time was, by the Admiral of the Indies, who was a young son of Columbus,[AD] by the Bishop of Avenea, and the whole suite of foreign ambassadors. Navagero was a scholar and a poet. Born of one of the noblest families of Venice, and naturally inclined to letters, he had devoted his youth to study with so much severity, as to occasion a melancholy which he was obliged to divert by frequent travel and relinquishment of the pursuits he loved. He was no less distinguished for Greek learning than for the ease and elegance of his Latin compositions, and for his taste in Italian poetry, a taste so fastidious that he was rarely satisfied with any thing he wrote, so that he is said to have destroyed, a few hours before his death, not only the greater part of a History of Venice, which he had been charged to write when appointed librarian of the public library of Saint Mark, but many of his Italian poems, which fell short of his high standard of excellence. Such as are extant are sufficient to justify the great applause which he received from his cotemporaries.[4] Navagero enjoys the additional distinction of having originated the improvement that was derived to Spanish poesy from the naturalization of Italian metres and Italian taste, as hitherto both Garcilasso and Boscán had restricted their genius to compositions in the redondilla measure. The circumstance that first led to their relinquishment of the antique models, is narrated by Boscán himself, in the Dedication of the second volume of his poems to the Duchess of Soma.[AE]

"Conversing one day," says he, "on literary subjects, with Navagero the Venetian ambassador (whom I wish to name to your ladyship as a man of great celebrity in these days), and particularly upon the different genius of many languages, he inquired of me why in Castilian we had never attempted sonnets and other kinds of composition used by the best writers in Italy; he not only said this, he urged me to set the example. A few days after I departed home, and musing on a variety of things during the long and solitary journey, frequently reflected on Navagero's advice, and thus at length began the attempt. I found at first some difficulty, as this kind of versification is extremely complex, and has many peculiarities different from ours; but afterwards, from the partiality we naturally entertain towards our own productions, I thought I had succeeded well, and gradually grew warm and eager in the pursuit. This however would not have been sufficient to stimulate me to proceed, had not Garcilasso encouraged me, whose judgment, not only in my opinion, but in that of the whole world, is esteemed a certain rule. Praising uniformly my essays, and giving me the highest possible mark of approbation in following himself my example, he induced me to devote myself exclusively to the undertaking."

The noiseless tenour of a country life and calm domestic pleasure which Boscán now enjoyed, so different from the agitations of the camp to which his friend was subjected, fortunately concurred to favour the poet's scheme. He had for the last four years travelled much, or devoted his principal attention to the education of Fernando de Toledo, afterwards the celebrated Duke of Alva; but having married the lady Anna Giron de Rebolledo, an amiable woman of noble family, he seems now to have given himself up without distraction to his favourite pursuit, and to have presented himself as a reformer of the lyric poetry of his nation, in pursuance of Navagero's advice. He began to study with greater closeness the Tuscan poets, the sonnets of Petrarch, the terze rime of Dante, and the octaves of Bembo, Politian, and Ariosto. The Castilian songs, so pleasing to his nation, compared with those more perfect models, seemed to him comparatively barbarous; he resolved to effect the overthrow of the existing laws of Castilian versification, and to introduce new ones, on a system directly the reverse. The old Castilian measure in short verses, which constituted the actual national poetry, proceeded always from long to short; it consisted of four trochees in succession; Boscán substituted iambics as in Italian, and made the movement of the verse proceed from short to long. The old poets scarcely ever made use but of redondillas of six and eight syllables, and of verses de arte mayor of twelve. Boscán took a medium between both, in adopting the heroic Italian endecasyllabic verse of five iambics with a conclusive breve; a measure which wonderfully enlarged the powers and sphere of Spanish poetry, as the redondillas were by no means fitted for any of the higher kinds of composition. The outcry, however, that was raised at first against this innovation by the host of poets who could conceive nothing excellent but what accorded with their own habits, caused him to reflect seriously on his enterprise. Some of his opponents alleged that the old measures were sufficiently melodious; some, that the new verses had nothing to distinguish them from prose; and others even that the poesies which Boscán took for his model, had something in them effeminate, and were fit only for Italians and for women. It was then, when encouragement was most needed, that Garcilasso, returned from Italy, gave his voice in favour of the poet, and confirmed him in the undertaking by his own effective example. His Sonnets were the first of his compositions which Garcilasso wrote on the new system. The form of the sonnet had been long known in Spain, but the genius of the language had seemed repugnant to its successful structure. Boscán however fully succeeded in naturalizing it, though he failed to communicate to it the sweet reverie of the Tuscan melodist. Garcilasso approached much nearer the softness and sweetness of his model, and has left a few pre-eminently beautiful, which may be placed, without fear from the comparison, by the side of even Petrarch's: several of them, it is true, exhibit a refinement of thought that often verges upon hyperbole and affectation; but in extenuation of this fault, let it not be forgotten that the language of gallantry of those times was made up wholly of artifices of thought, and that the practice of Petrarch had sanctioned their adoption in song. Garcilasso's admiration of Petrarch, which led him to imitate his tone of lamenting love, would be strengthened in that choice of subject by his passion for an Arragonese lady, a cousin-german to the Count of Miranda, and maid of honour to Leonora, Queen of France, to whom it is probable many of them were addressed, and who it would appear from them as well as from his odes, subjected the sincerity and steadiness of his attachment to an ordeal sufficiently severe. More kind however than the Laura of Petrarch, or unpreoccupied in her affections, Helen de Zuñiga at length acknowledged her sense of his merit, and yielded him her hand. Their marriage was celebrated in the palace of the Queen of France,[AF] in 1528, in our poet's twenty-fifth year. It would seem from some coplas of his, which must have been written early in life, that he had been unsuccessful in his first choice, the verses in question exhibiting all that resentment and reproach softening into tenderness, which is the natural course of feeling under disappointment to a mind warm in the hopes and visions it indulges and proudly conscious of its own deserts, yet unchanging in the current of that one emotion into which all its thoughts have set. But whatever might have been his sufferings under this severe privation, it is natural to suppose that time had softened them into that mild melancholy which we trace in almost all his writings, and that they were recompensed by the happiness he now enjoyed in a home, where, in the words of one who has realized himself the picture—

—Love and lore might claim alternate hours
With Peace embosomed in Idalian bowers.

At this time, the celebrated 'Libro del Cortegiano' of Castiglione first made its appearance. It was every where read in Italy with the greatest avidity. The moral and political instruction which her people met in every page of that charming performance, enriched as it was with the flower of Greek and Roman wit, of the sciences and liberal arts, the easy and natural style of elegance in which its precepts were conveyed, the lively pictures it presented of characters whom all Italy knew, and above all, its pure and beautiful Tuscan, that 'poetry of speech' so dear to them, used too with such grace by a Lombard writer, delighted and surprised them. From Italy it passed immediately into Spain, where it was equally well received. The Spaniards read it with the greater interest, having before their eyes the fine qualities of Castiglione himself. This accomplished nobleman had been sent by Pope Clement in 1520, as ambassador to Spain, where he acquired, in a singular degree, the esteem and affection of the Emperor, and of the gentlemen of his court. Desirous that a work of so much merit should be naturalized in Castile, Garcilasso urged Boscán to translate it. It was done, and immediately printed, with a prefatory letter from Garcilasso to the lady Geronyma Palova de Almogavar, who seems to have originated the task; a composition no less interesting from its ingenuity and grace of thought, than from its being the only one that remains to us of our poet's letters.[5] It must have been highly gratifying to Castiglione to see his "Book of Gold," as the Italians in their admiration call it, circulated through Spain by the medium of her two principal geniuses. But he did not live long to enjoy this literary reputation. Falling sick at Toledo, he died in February 1529, to the extreme grief of the Emperor, who commanded all the prelates and lords of his court to attend the body to the principal church there; and the funeral offices were celebrated by the Archbishop with a pomp never before permitted to any but princes of the blood.

The invasion of Hungary by Solyman, the Turkish Sultan, in 1532, summoned Garcilasso from the blandishments alike of Beauty and the Muse. At the instigation of John, the Waywode of Transylvania, that daring prince had laid siege to Vienna; but finding it bravely defended by Philip the Count Palatine, he was obliged to abandon it with disgrace. To repair the discredit of that retreat, he now prepared to enter Austria with more numerous forces. Charles, resolving to undertake the campaign in person, raised on his part the forces of the empire, and all Europe with eager attention expected the contest. But either monarch dreaded the power and talent of his antagonist, each conducted his operations with great caution, and Solyman, finding it impossible to gain ground upon an enemy so wary, marched back towards the end of autumn. Garcilasso was engaged in several skirmishes with the Turks, and has drawn in his second eclogue some interesting pictures of the events of the campaign. Whilst at Vienna, a romantic adventure at court drew upon him the displeasure of the emperor. One of his cousins, a son of Don Pedro Lasso, fell in love with Donna Isabel, daughter of D. Luis de la Cueva, and maid of honour to the empress; and as his views were honourable, Garcilasso favoured by all means in his power this passion of his relative. The resentment which Charles displayed on a discovery of the amour can scarcely be accounted for, but by supposing the lady to have been a favourite of the monarch himself. As a punishment for their indiscretion or presumption, Charles banished the cousin, and confined Garcilasso in an isle of the Danube, where he composed the ode in which he proudly deplores his misfortune, and celebrates the charms of the country watered by the divine Danube (Danubio, rio divino). The marriage he had laboured to promote did not take effect, and the lady became afterwards Countess of Santistévan. How long Garcilasso remained in confinement is not now to be ascertained, but it is probable the monarch's severity soon softened towards him; the expedition he meditated against Tunis would remind him of the bravery he had displayed in past engagements, and suggest the propriety of forgiveness and reconciliation. He was recalled, and desired to attend the Emperor to Tunis.

The daring courage of the corsair Barbarossa, the son of a potter at Lesbos, had recommended him to the friendship of the king of Algiers: having made himself master of twelve galleys, he was received as an ally, murdered, and seized the sceptre of the monarch to whose assistance he had sailed. Putting his dominions under the protection of the Grand Seignior, he was offered the command of a Turkish fleet, availed himself of the rival claims that distracted Tunis, made a descent upon the city, and obliged Muley Hascen the king to fly before him. Muley Hascen escaped to Spain, and presented himself a suppliant before the Imperial throne. Compassionating his misfortunes, and animated at once by a thirst for fame, and a desire to punish the pirate, whose depredations were the subject of continual complaint, Charles readily yielded to his entreaties; he declared his design to command in person the armament destined for the invasion of Tunis; and the united strength of his vast dominions was called out upon the enterprise. Nor was Barbarossa destitute of either vigour or prudence in preparing for his defence. He strengthened the citadel of Tunis, fortified Goletta, and assembled 20,000 horse, and a considerable body of foot; but his chief confidence was placed in the strength of the Goletta. This was a castle on the narrow straits of a gulf formed by the sea, extending nearly to Tunis, of which it formed the key. This fort he garrisoned with 6,000 Turkish soldiers, under the command of Sinan, a renegado Jew, one of the bravest and most experienced of the corsairs. The Emperor, landing his forces, invested it the 19th of June, 1535. Frequent skirmishes took place with the Turks and Arabs, who sallied from the fortress with loud shouts to the sound of trumpets and of cymbals, and once or twice surprising the Imperial forces before break of day, committed great slaughter. In one of these fierce encounters, Garcilasso was wounded in the face and hand, as he himself declares in a sonnet to his friend Mario Galeota. Notwithstanding the resolution of Sinan, however, and the valour of Barbarossa, the breaches of the Goletta soon became considerable. The Spaniards battered the bastion on the shore; the Italians the new works which the Moors had raised towards the canal. The battery continued for six or seven hours without remission, in which time above four thousand bullets were fired, but to great effect, bringing down a great part of the fort with the cannon on it. The Emperor having sent to view the breach, conferred with his officers, and addressing a few words to the soldiers of each nation, gave orders for the last assault. Led and encouraged by a Franciscan friar, carrying a crucifix, the Spaniards pushed fiercely forward, and in a short time all the four nations made their way through the breaches, driving the Moors before them, who at first gave way gently, but soon fled with precipitation, throwing away their arms. To men who were taught to consider it meritorious to destroy the Infidels, pity was a thing unknown: the slaughter was great, and those of the enemy that guarded the entrenchment towards the canal, unable to get over by reason of the throng, threw themselves into the water to escape. Upwards of 80 galleys were taken, and 400 pieces of cannon, many of them marked with fleurs de lys. The same day the emperor entered Goletta through the breach, and turning to Muley Hascen, who accompanied him—"Here," said he, "is the open gate by which you shall return to take possession of your throne."

Barbarossa, though sufficiently concerned for the fall of Goletta, lost not his accustomed courage. He mustered for the defence of Tunis all his forces, amounting to 150,000 men, Moors, Turks, Arabs, and Janizaries, of which 13,000 had muskets or cross-bows, and 30,000 were mounted on fleet horses. Confident in his numbers, he resolved to hazard a battle, and marched out to meet the enemy, having in vain attempted to persuade his officers to massacre 10,000 Christian captives confined in the citadel, lest in the absence of the army they should overpower their guards. Knowing that the Imperialists were in great want of water, he took possession of a plain divided into orchards and olive-grounds, where there were numerous wells among certain ruins of old arches by which the Carthaginians used to convey water to the city. There he placed about 12,000 Turks and renegadoes, all musqueteers, who formed his chief confidence; 12,000 horse he marshalled along the canal, and disposed several other squadrons of horse among the olive-gardens, to shelter them from the scorching sun; his multitudes of foot he placed in the rear. Then, distributing amongst them abundance of water brought upon mules and camels, and inculcating on his men how easy the victory would be over so few Christians, and those spent with thirst, fatigue, and heat, he awaited the Emperor's approach. Arrived within sight of the Africans, Charles posted his Italian foot on the side of the canal, the pikes close to the water, and next to them the Germans. On the right towards the olive-gardens, together with the light-horse, were the veteran Spaniards that had served in Italy; between these wings was the cannon, guarded by the choicest of the army; and the new-raised Spaniards brought up the rear with some horse, commanded by the Duke of Alva. The Emperor himself rode about with his naked sword, ranging and encouraging his men. With loud shouts of Lillah il Allah, the Moors and Arabs rushed to the attack. The latter, taking a compass by the olive-gardens, fell on the rear, where they were warmly received by the Duke of Alva, and the battle became general. The barbarians tossing their darts, and shooting their arrows from the trees, greatly galled the Imperialists, which the emperor perceiving, sent forward the Italians, several of the German veterans, and his Spanish cohorts, commanded by the Marquis de Mondejar, who had been set to guard the baggage between the artillery and the rear. For awhile it was fought with various success, as although the foot went on prosperously, the Spanish cavalry were wavering before the impetuous charge of the Numidian and Turkish horse. The Marquis de Mondejar was deeply wounded in the throat by a Moorish lance, and was with difficulty saved. It was then that Garcilasso rushed forward amongst the thickest of the enemy, and amply atoned for the absence of the general. With his invincible sword, he clove in two the shields and turbans of the bravest Turks, and by his example quickened the drooping courage of those about him. But the Africans in fresh swarms poured around; and inclosed on all sides, and already wounded, he must have fallen a victim to his valour, if a noble Neapolitan, Federico Carafa by name, had not at the imminent peril of his own life generously resolved upon his rescue; by great efforts he at length succeeded in dispersing the multitude, and bore him back in safety, but half-spent with toil, thirst, and loss of blood.[AG] Meanwhile the Duke of Alva had put to flight the Arabs, and the Imperial musqueteers keeping up a constant fire did great execution, so that the foe shortly quitted their posts in the utmost confusion; and though Barbarossa did all he could to rally them, the rout became so general, that he himself was hurried with them in their flight back to the city, leaving the Christians in possession of his cannon, and of the wells of water, which prevented the pursuit; for the soldiers, almost mad with thirst and heat, ran to drink in such confusion, that the infidels might have redeemed the lost field if their panic had been less. The victory however was complete, and gained, according to Sandoval, with the loss of only twenty men. Barbarossa, on gaining Tunis, found his affairs desperate; some of the inhabitants flying with their families and effects, others ready to set open the gates to the conqueror, and the Christian slaves in possession of the citadel. These unhappy men, on the defeat of the army, had been consigned to destruction. A Turk came with powder and a lighted match to blow them up, when one of the captives near the gate ran forward in desperation, snatched a target and scimeter from the nearest officer, and drove the Turk out; the rest having gained two of the keepers, by their assistance knocked off their fetters, burst open the prisons, overpowered the Turkish garrison, and turned the artillery of the fort against their former masters. Barbarossa, cursing at one time the false compassion of his officers, and at others the treachery of the Prophet, fled precipitately to Bona; upon which a Xeque came from the suburbs, and submitted to the emperor the keys of the city. Muley Hascen, restored to his throne, consented to do homage for the crown of Tunis; and Charles, setting at liberty the Christian slaves of all nations without ransom, re-embarked for Europe, and returning through Italy, was every where honoured with triumphs, and complimented in panegyrics by her orators and poets.

Garcilasso, on his return from this expedition, spent some time in Sicily and Naples, in the society perhaps of the young Neapolitan who had so nobly saved his life; and in communion with the Italian literati, and in the composition of his eclogues, the autumn months doubtless rolled delightfully away. The romantic scenery of Sicily would suggest to his fancy a thousand charming images; and passionately fond as he ever was of the country, its quiet and repose would after the tumult of battle fall upon his spirit with peculiar sweetness. He in fact, notwithstanding some melancholy anticipations arising from the chequered incidents of his past life, which are met with in his poems of this period, seems to have luxuriated in the delicious idlesse of such a cessation, in so beautiful a country, at so enchanting a season, with a delight similar to that which Rousseau describes himself as tasting in his solitary summer rambles in Switzerland; whilst the Genius of Poesy, amid the steeps and shades which he haunted, unlocked in his mind her divinest reveries, and casting round his footsteps 'her bells and flowerets of a thousand hues,' submitted to his lips the pastoral flute of Theocritus and Virgil, from which in the mellow noon, amidst the rich red chesnut woods, he struck out sounds that had not for many ages been listened to by the ear of Dryad, or of Faun. In Sicily, from the foot of Mount Etna, he sent to Boscán and the young Duke of Alva, his pensive elegies; at Naples, penetrated with all the spirit of Maro and Sannazaro, he composed the first and finest of his eclogues, which has served as a model to a crowd of imitators, who have been all unable to approach it. The celebrity he had acquired by his actions and his compositions, caused his society to be courted by all of illustrious birth or intellectual endowments, whilst his engaging manners and amability of disposition increased the admiration excited by his talents, and caused him to be beloved wherever he went. Cardinal Bembo, whose Italian writings he always admired, and sometimes imitated, and whose Spanish poems are highly praised by Muratori for their purity and elegance, thus writes of him in Tuscan to one of his friends, the monk Onorato Fascitelo, in a letter dated from Padua, Aug. 10, 1535:—"I have seen the letter of the Rev. Father Girolamo Seripando; concerning the Odes of Sig. Garcilasso which he sent me, I can very easily and willingly satisfy him, assuring him that that gentleman is indeed a graceful poet, that the Odes are all in the highest degree pleasing to me, and merit peculiar admiration and praise. In fine spirit, he has far excelled all the writers of his nation, and if he be not wanting to himself in diligent study, he will no less excel those of other nations who are considered masters of poetry. I am not surprised that, as the Rev. Father writes me word, the Marquis del Vasto has wished to have him with him, and that he holds him in great affection. I beg you to take care that the Signior may know how highly I esteem him, and how desirous I am to continue to be loved as I perceive myself to be by a gentleman so illustrious."[AH]

Amidst the Cardinal's Latin letters, I find one of great elegance to Garcilasso himself, filled with the same kind expressions of esteem and admiration.[AI]

"Naples.

CARDINAL BEMBO TO GARCILASSO THE CASTILIAN OFFERS HEALTH AND PEACE.

From the verses which you have written for my perusal, I am happy to perceive, first, how much you love me, since you are not one who would else flatter with encomiums, or call one dear to you whom you had never seen; and, secondly, how much you excel in lyric compositions, in splendour of genius, and sweetness of expression. The first gives me the greatest pleasure, for what is comparable to the love and esteem of a fine poet? All other things, how dear and honourable soever they are considered by mankind, perish in a very short time, together with their possessors. Poets only live, are long-lived, and immortal, and impart the same life and immortality on whom they will. As concerns the latter division of your qualities, you have not only surpassed in the poetical art all your fellow Spaniards who have devoted themselves to Parnassus and the Muses, but you supply incentives even to the Italians, and again and again excite them to endeavour to be overcome in this contest and in these studies by no one but yourself. Which judgment of mine, some other of your writings sent to me at Naples have confirmed. For it is impossible to meet in this age with compositions more classically pure, more dignified in sentiment, or more elegant in style. In that you love me, therefore, I most justly and sincerely rejoice; that you are a great and good man, I congratulate, in the first place yourself, but most of all your country, in that she is thus about to receive so great an increase of honour and of glory. There is, however, another circumstance which greatly increases the pleasure I have received; for lately, when the monk Onorato, whom I perceive you know by reputation, entered into conversation with me, and amongst other topics, asked me what I thought of your poems, the opinion I gave happened to coincide exactly with his own, (and he is a man of very acute perception, and extremely well versed in poetical pursuits.) He told me what his friends had written to him of your very many and great virtues, of the urbanity of your manners, the integrity of your life, and accomplishments of your mind; adding, that it was a fact confirmed by the assurances of all Neapolitans that knew you, that no one had come from Spain to their city in these times wherein the greatest resort has been made by your nation to Italy, whom they loved more affectionately than yourself, or one on whom they would confer superior benefits. Thus I consider it an advantage to have received your good wishes, by no trouble of my own, and that you should have so far loved me as even to adorn me by the illustrious herald of your muse. Wherefore, if I do not in the highest degree love and esteem you in return, I shall think I act by no means as a gentleman. But from the first I have resolved to give you a proof of my respect and love, and earnestly recommend to your notice the said Onorato, who has a great affection for you, and who is now setting out to pay you a visit; that hence you may best know what to promise yourself respecting me, when you see that I dare ask of you what I have decided to be most desirable for myself. I believe you know that the patrimony of his brothers, worthy and harmless men, was plundered in the Italian wars, from no provocation on their part; I will therefore say nothing on this head. But now that they have come to a resolution to solicit of the emperor, the best of kings and princes, what they have unjustly lost, they will have hopes, if they obtain your assistance, of recovering easily what they honourably desire; so great is your friendship, influence, and authority with him, and with all who are dearest to him. I therefore earnestly solicit you to take up the matter, that by your kind mediation his brothers and family may be restored to their former state of fortune: you will thus firmly secure to yourself the most honourable of men, but me you will so highly oblige, that I shall consider the gift of their patrimony made as to myself; for I love Onorato as a brother, I esteem him more than the generality of my friends; and so desirous am I that through your obliging offices this affair may have the issue which he hopes, that his own brother could not more ardently wish or labour for it than I really do. But I trust that as you love me of your own good pleasure, you will quickly relieve me of this concern by the address in which you excel, and by that amiable ingenuity which endears you so to all. Which that you may do, relying on the excellence of your disposition, not as a new friend modestly and submissively, but as old and peculiar friends are wont, I again and again entreat you. Farewell."[6]

The quiet enjoyment, however, of alternate study and society which Garcilasso thus possessed, was of no long continuance. It was his fate to be called perpetually from his favourite pursuits to scenes of strife from which his mind revolted, and his writings show how keenly he felt the change. A fresh war summoned him to the field. Francis had taken advantage of the emperor's absence to revive his claims in Italy, and the death of Sforza strengthened the ground of his pretensions. Charles acted the part of a skilful diplomatist; he appeared to admit the equity of the claim, and entered into negotiations respecting the disputed territory, till he should be better able to cope with his antagonist. But no sooner had he recruited his armies and finances, than he threw off the mask of moderation, and driving the forces of his rival from Piedmont and Savoy, invaded, though contrary to the advice of his ministers and generals, the southern provinces of France. Garcilasso, on his way from Naples to join the army, wrote from Vaucluse his Epistle to Boscán, concluding it with a gaiety in which he seldom indulges, and which, coupled in our mind with the reflection that his end was near, has something in it singularly affecting. To the period also of this campaign, I should ascribe the composition of his third eclogue, avowedly written in the tent.

"Midst arms, with scarce one pause from bloody toil,
Where war's hoarse trumpet breaks the poet's dream,
Have I these moments stolen, oft claimed again,
Now taking up the sword, and now the pen."

In this ill-starred expedition, Garcilasso was entrusted with the command of thirty companies of Spanish troops. The Marechal de Montmorency, to whom the French army was committed, resolved to act wholly on the defensive, to weary out the enemy by delay, and by laying waste the country around to deprive him of subsistence. This plan, to which he inflexibly adhered, had all the effect he desired. After unsuccessfully investing Marseilles and Arles, with his troops wasted by famine or disease, the emperor was under the necessity of ordering a retreat. In this retreat, effected with much disorder and with more precipitation, his army suffered a thousand calamities. Crowds of peasants, eager to be revenged on a foe, through whom their cultured fields had been turned into a frightful desert, lying ambushed in the lanes and mountainous defiles which overhung their way, by frequent attacks, now in front, now in the rear, kept them in perpetual alarm; nor was there a day passed without their being obliged, every two or three hundred paces, to stand and defend themselves. The farther they advanced, the more their difficulties increased. At Muy, near Frejus, the army was put to a stand. A body of fifty rustics, armed with muskets, had thrown themselves into a tower, and inconsiderable as they were in number prevented its progress. The emperor ordered Garcilasso to advance with his battalion, and attack the place. Gratified with this mark of his sovereign's confidence, and eager for distinction, he planted his scaling-ladders, and prepared for the ascent. The simple peasants, seeing the decorated garment which he wore over his armour, and the high honour that was every where paid him by the soldiers whose motions he directed, supposed it to be the emperor himself, and marked him out for destruction.[AJ] With showers of missiles and the fire of musquetry, they saluted the assailants, whom however they could neither check nor dismay. Garcilasso himself, cheering on his men, was the first that mounted the ladder, and was perhaps the only individual who in this disastrous campaign acquired any splendid addition to what would be considered his military glory. But his life was destined to be the price of this distinction. A block of stone, rolled over the battlements by the combined strength of numbers, fell upon his shielded helmet, and beat him to the ground. He was borne to Nice, where after lingering four and twenty days he expired, November 1536; showing, says D. T. Tamaio de Vargas, no less the spirit of a Christian in his last moments, than that of a soldier in the perils he had braved. Every one was penetrated with sorrow at the loss of one so deservedly dear; but the Emperor was so deeply afflicted, that having taken the tower, he caused twenty-eight of the peasants, the only survivors of the escalade, to be instantly hung; giving thus a strong, though at the same time a barbarous proof of the esteem and affection he entertained for Garcilasso. Thus perished, at the early age of thirty-three, Garcilasso de la Vega, a youth of whom no record remains but what is honourable to his character and talents, and who conferred more real glory on his country by his pen, than all the conquests of the mighty Charles, achieved by his ambitious sword. With every mark and ceremonial of public respect, his body was conveyed to the church of St. Domingo, at Nice; whence it was afterwards in 1538 removed to Spain, and finally deposited in a chapel of the church of San Pedro Martyr de Toledo, the ancient sepulchre of his ancestors, the Lords of Batres.

Garcilasso left three sons and a daughter. His eldest son, named also Garcilasso, as he grew up was highly distinguished by the emperor, who seemed to find a melancholy pleasure in having him near his person. He too fell in the field at the yet earlier age of twenty-four, fighting valiantly at the battle of Ulpian: he lies beside his father. Francisco de Figueroa has celebrated his fall in a sonnet, too beautiful to be here omitted.

"Oh tender slip of the most beauteous tree
That fruitful earth e'er nourished, full of flowers,
And to that other glory of the bowers,
Thy parent sylvan, equal in degree!
The same tempestuous wind, by the decree
Of Eolus that plucked up by the roots,
Far from its native stream, thy trunk, its shoots
Stript off to flourish in a greener lea.
One was your doom; the same fond Angel too
Transplanted you to heaven, where both your blooms
Produce immortal fruits; your fatal case
I weep not, as the wont is, but to you,
On my raised altar burn all sweet perfumes,
With hymns of gladness and a tearless face."

His second son, Francisco de Guzman, entered a convent of Dominicans, and became a great theologian. Lorenzo de Guzman, his youngest son, was distinguished by much of his father's genius, and highly esteemed as such by Don Ant. Augustin, most illustrious, says Vargas, in dignity and doctrine, who, being banished to Oran for a lampoon, died upon the passage. Donna Sancha de Guzman, the poet's daughter, married D. Antonio Portocarrero de Vega, a son of the Count of Palma, who had married Garcilasso's sister. The grandson of Don Pedro Lasso was created Count of Los Arcos, and Charles the Second created his descendant, D. Joachim Lasso de la Vega, the third Count of Los Arcos, a Grandee of Spain, October, 1697.[AK]

Garcilasso in person was above the middle size; with perfect symmetry of figure, he had such dignity of deportment, that strangers who knew him not were sensible at once that they were in the presence of some superior personage. His features corresponded with his deportment; his countenance, not without a shade of seriousness, was expressive of much mildness and benevolence; he had most lively eyes, his forehead was expansive, and his whole appearance presented the picture of manly beauty. Graceful and genteel in his address, courteous and gallant in his behaviour, he is said to have been a first favourite with the ladies; by the most winning manners he engaged his own sex, and accomplished as he was in all the duties of knighthood, he may with much propriety be called the Sidney or the Surrey of Spain. Notwithstanding the great favour he enjoyed at court, he passed through life without incurring the jealousy of the courtiers; a rare piece of good fortune, which he owed to some happy art or sincerity of conduct that disarmed envy. With a disposition peculiarly affectionate, he was more inclined to praise than to censure; in the whole course of his writings, we meet with but one passage that bears the least approach to satire or severity, and this he immediately checks, as though it were something foreign to his nature. He has preserved in his verses the names of his particular friends. Boscán was evidently the one whom he loved with most devotedness; but his attachment seems also to have been great to the Countess of Ureña, Donna Maria de la Cueva, to the Marchioness of Padula, Lady Maria de Cardona, to the Marquis del Vasto, the Duke of Alva, Don Pedro de Toledo, Marquis of Villafranca, Julio Cæsar Caracciola, a Neapolitan poet, and other distinguished characters, whom he celebrates in his poems. Boscán charged himself with performing the last honour to his memory, and published in 1544 their joint productions, under the title of 'Obras de Boscán y Garcilasso.'[AL]

Had Garcilasso lived longer, his poems would probably have been made yet more deserving of cotemporary praise and the perusal of posterity, for the relics he has left are to be considered rather as the early flowers than as the fruits of his genius; yet from these few blossoms we may imagine how rich would have been the autumn of his muse. His style is unaffected, his thoughts ingenious; the language he uses, though employed upon lowly subjects, never sinks into poverty or meanness; he is full of the lights, the colours, and ornaments which the place and subject require; and not satisfied often with the mere production of his sentiments, he amplifies, he compounds, he illustrates them with admirable elegance, yet not without suffering his wealth of ideas frequently to run into diffuseness. He had at his command a rich variety of significant words, which he sometimes selects and combines with so much skill, that the beauty of the words gives splendour to their disposition, and the lucidness of disposition lustre to the words; yet, in some cases, it must be acknowledged, there is too much involution in the structure of his sentences. His feelings and sentiments are either new, or if common, set forth in a certain manner of his own, which makes them seem so. The passages he translates from other authors seem introduced from no ostentation of classical pride, but simply to effect the intention he has in view, and are inlaid with so much art that it becomes a question whether they give or receive the ornament. The flowers with which he sprinkles his poetry seem to spring up spontaneously, the lights he introduces to fall like unconscious sunshine to adorn the spot where he has placed them. His versification, simple, clear, and flowing, has a purity, music, and dignity of numbers, that ever and anon seems to bring upon the ear the mellifluous majesty of Virgil: he tempers the gravity of his style with such a continuous sweetness as to form in their union a harmony equally proportioned. The pause of his verses is always full of beauty, the closing melody of the sentence gratifying the reader as he rests. With all his delicacy of expression and artful sweetness, he has remarkable pliancy and ease; his only constraint is that which he himself imposes, when, abandoning his natural tone of thought, he becomes a sophist on his feelings, and consents to surprise by ingenuity when he should affect by tenderness. Tender, however, he always is in an eminent degree, whenever he ceases to reason on his sensations, and gives himself up without reserve to the promptings of his native sensibility. His first eclogue breathes throughout a spirit of melancholy tenderness that speaks eloquently to the imagination and the heart. Under the name of Salicio he unquestionably introduces himself, and I cannot help thinking that the shepherd's beautiful lament over the inconstancy of his mistress owes half its sweetness and pathos to his own remembrances of the lady whom he loved in youth. There is a truth and a warmth of expression in the feelings that could originate alone from real emotion: nothing can excel the touching beauty of some of the descriptions.

"In the charmed ear of what beloved youth
Sounds thy sweet voice? on whom revolvest thou
Thy beautiful blue eyes? on whose sworn truth
Anchors thy broken faith? who presses now
Thy laughing lip, and hopes thy heaven of charms,
Locked in the embracings of thy two white arms?
Say thou, for whom hast thou so rudely left
My love, or stolen, who triumphs in the theft?
I have not yet a bosom so untrue
To beauty, nor a heart of stone, to view
My darling ivy, torn from me, take root
Against another wall or prosperous pine,
To see my virgin vine
Around another elm in marriage hang
Its curling tendrils and empurpled fruit,
Without the torture of a jealous pang,
Ev'n to the loss of life."

The song and sorrow of Salicio seem to carry our interest to the highest point; but the lamentations of Nemoroso[AM] surpass them in depth of regret, and in the greater variety of sentiments and images with which the emotions are illustrated. The whole eclogue is in fact full of poetry, and from the elegance of its language, its choice imagery, its soft sweet harmony, and the pastoral air that pervades it, it must be pronounced the first composition of its class, not only in Castilian but Italian poetry. Almost equally admirable, though different in character, is the third eclogue. It does not appeal so to the heart, it is less eloquent, but it is characterised by a finer fancy, a yet more classical taste, and a more continuous harmony; and being written in octaves, though octaves are perhaps somewhat too sounding for a pastoral, succeeds in gratifying the ear by its periodical reposes, as well as by its music. In the whole compass of poetry, I do not remember a more delicate image than the following:—

"All with dishevelled hair were seen to shower
Tears o'er the nymph, whose beauty did bespeak
That Death had cropt her in her sweetest flower,
Whilst youth bloomed rosiest in her charming cheek;
Near the still water, in a cypress bower,
She lay amongst the green herbs, pale and meek,
Like a white swan that, sickening where it feeds,
Sighs its sweet life away amidst the reeds."

The second eclogue is decidedly inferior to the other two; it is justly to be censured for its heterogeneous character, its unsatisfactory conclusion, and its great lengthiness;[AN] but it abounds with beautiful passages, and the poet's description of the sculptures on the Urn of Tormes, an elegant conception, however unsuitably introduced, is given with an almost lyrical spirit that half redeems the fault of the episode. Finally, something very like the light romantic touch of Lorraine in his delicious landscapes, is to be met with in the pastoral poetry of Garcilasso; the same freshness, the same nature, the same selection of luxuriant images, and harmony of hues. His elegies are less perfect of their kind; with somewhat of the softness and philosophy of Tibullus, they are too frigid and verbose. That to the Duke of Alva, principally translated from Fracastor, has however many touches of sensibility; and a few stanzas, charged with poetical fire, might be selected from that to Boscán; though from the excessive and unnatural refinement of thought it presents upon the whole, it is what I might have been excused the trouble of translating, if the omission would not have rendered the volume incomplete. The same fault of frigidity and overmuch refinement of thought, though variously modified, applies to many of his sonnets; others are free from all affectation, and of singular beauty. His odes are more uniformly excellent. In the last of them, Garcilasso shows some approach to a sublimer height than he had yet aspired to; his lyre assumes in its tones somewhat of the fervid grandeur that was soon to be exhibited in the lyric poetry of Torquato Tasso. In this the shades are darker, the colours more burning, the thoughts, if I may so say, more gigantic than in any other of his poems whatever; yet I cannot consider, the prolonged personification of Reason, and of its combat with the passions, which indeed both Boscán and he are apt to dilate upon till they displease by their monotony, as the product of a pure taste. I am aware that Muratori, 'suono magnifico,' praises this ode for the very thing I am condemning;[AO] I shall therefore forbear, in deference to his authority, to say more; I will only remark that this example from Garcilasso comes opportunely for the illustration of his theory on the personification of speculative thoughts, and that on this account he may have looked upon the ode with a somewhat more favourable eye than his judgment would otherwise have allowed him to do. He must have admitted that though personification gives life and action to images that would else strike the fancy but feebly, the same artificially extended through a whole cancion, offends as something too unnatural to be reconciled to the mind, even by the beautiful expressions in which it may be clothed. But whatever difference of opinion may exist on this, there can be but one sentiment on the merit of the Ode to the Flower of Gnido. Elegance, delicacy, harmony, and lyrical spirit, are all combined in its composition, and fully authorize the opinion of Paul Jovius, that it has the sweetness of the odes of Horace; an opinion confirmed by the praises of our own countryman, Sir William Jones. Had Garcilasso written nothing else, this graceful composition would have sufficed to give his name all the immortality that waits upon the lyre: it shows with what success he had studied the classics of antiquity, and how deeply his mind was imbued with their spirit. This pervading spirit it is that has advanced Garcilasso to the distinction of being entitled the most classical of all the Spanish poets; and although from their not having received his last polish, and from the unfavourable circumstances under which they were written, his poems may present some defects unpleasing to the cultured minds of a more refined age, such blemishes can be allowed to subtract neither from this classical reputation, nor from the deserved admiration with which their many beauties must be regarded, and the genius that could give at once, amid the tumult of the camp, to Spanish poetry a consideration, and to Spanish language a charm, which in other countries, are commonly communicated by many, in the slow course and literary ease of years.

The Works of Garcilasso have engaged in their illustration the talents of three distinguished Commentators. The first comment that appeared was Fernando de Herrera's, published at Seville in 1580, in small 4to. Living, as Herrera evidently did, in habits of intimacy with Portocarrero, it is much to be regretted that he did not increase the value that was attached to his work by that full account of the life of Garcilasso which he had so favourable an opportunity of obtaining. He excuses himself from the task by the observation, that it would require a mind more at leisure than his was, and one gifted with a happier style of writing; but the world would probably, with very great willingness, have given up a part of his commentary, turning as it often does upon idle disquisitions, to have had its curiosity gratified on the private habits of his author; whilst the Lyrist of the battle of Lepanto should have known that the disclaiming of a style sufficiently elegant, was a species of mock-modesty that would not pass wholly uncensured by posterity. In the year 1612, Sanchez, better known under the Latin name Brocensis, the most learned grammarian of Spain, published at Madrid in 12mo. his commentary, under the title of 'Obras del excelente Poeta Garcilasso de la Vega; con anotaciones y emiendas del Maestro Francisco Sanchez, Catedratico de retorica de Salamanca.' His illustrations, however, were principally restricted to a restoration of the text, for which he deserves very high praise, and to point out in his author the passages imitated or translated from other writers, an elucidation rather curious than useful, as a poet's works will of themselves, to every scholar

whisper whence they stole
Their balmy spoils,

whilst his blind admirers will be apt to quarrel with an exposition that may seem at first sight to detract something from the merit of their idol. Thus Sanchez, on the publication of his comments, was assailed by the small wits of the day with much severity, and some smartness, as will be seen by the following

SONNET
Against the Annotations of Master Sanchez, found in the house of a Knight of Salamanca.

They have discovered a rare theft; the thief,
One Garcilasso's taken at his tricks,
With three silk canopies and pillows six,
Stolen from Queen Dido's bed; young Cupid's sheaf
Of darts; the shuttle of the Fates; but chief,
Three most somniferous kegs of Lethe wine,
And his own lady's golden clasp, a sign
Of turpitude that staggers all belief.
For full seven years the sly Arcadian
Has been at work; on shops of Tuscan ware, he
Made some attempts too—Bembo's and Politian's:
'Tis pitiful to hear the' unhappy man,
His feet fast in the stocks of Commentary,
Declaim against these tell-tale rhetoricians.

On the back of this paper, Sanchez wrote a reply.

Poets are found whose fame we may immerse
In Lethe's wave, who to make up some sonnet
Stuff it with pillows till we slumber on it;
And have recourse for rhymes for their lame verse,
To the sad shuttle of the Fates, or worse,
Young Cupid's darts; whose lines have no more sense
Than their own lady's golden clasp: yet hence
Will they denounce our comments for a curse
On Garcilasso, without knowing why
Barking like curs; amusing 'tis to see
The sapient animals, with long sharp teeth
And short dull wits, far falser than the sly
Quick fidgetings of horses, to get free
Of half the imposed light load they bend beneath.

The third annotator is D. Thomas Tamaio de Vargas. His edition was published in 24mo. at Madrid, in the year 1622: his comments, filled with Greek and Latin, with the opinions of Rabbi Onkelos and St. Cyprian, and quotations from Geronymo Parabosco, Boethius and Arnobius, seem to have been written rather to show his learned reading than to clear up any obscurity he might find in his author: affixed to his volume is a 'Life of Garcilasso gathered from his writings,' which is necessarily meagre and unsatisfactory. Don Nicolas de Azara, the elegant translator of Middleton's life of Cicero, has also illustrated Garcilasso, whose MSS. are deposited in the library of the Escurial.

The commendations which Garcilasso bestowed on cotemporary talent, were echoed back with equal admiration and sincerity by them and by succeeding geniuses. Of the Italians, Tansillo has written two sonnets in his praise, Minturno two sonnets, Marino a madrigal; Camoens celebrates him in his letters, Guillaume de Salluste in his poems. Of his own nation, besides a host of writers whose names Vargas chronicles with a jealous care, Herrera, Villegas, and Góngora, Cristoval de Figueroa, Medina, and Barahono de Soto, wrote Spanish verses, Pachecho and Giron, Latin verses to his memory. The Abbé Conti has translated with fidelity and grace several of his poems into Tuscan,[AP] and Mr. Walpole published, some few years ago, an English translation of the First Eclogue, under the title of "Isabel, with other poems translated from the Spanish;" which however I have not been able to meet with, as the author is understood to have called it in from circulation. Mr. Nott, the industrious commentator and accomplished scholar, in his Works of Surrey and Wyatt, pays an elegant tribute to the talents of Garcilasso, and draws a happy parallel between him and our Surrey. "They both," he observes, "glowed with a generous love of enterprise, and both were distinguished by their military ardour in the field. They both devoted the short intervals of their leisure to the improvement of their native tongue; they both formed themselves on Virgil and the Italian school; both had minds susceptible of love and friendship; both were constant in their attachments; both died immaturely, and left in the bosoms of the good and learned unavailing regret at their untimely loss."[AQ] Yet with this regret the good and the learned may blend the happier feeling of dignified delight. There is no stain on the treasures they have left. The talents with which they were gifted, were properly cultivated; the instruments of music which they touched with so much tenderness, were wreathed around with none but innocent flowers—were devoted alone to the gratification of the generous sensibilities of our nature. Not a single string of those they struck, had in its sound the dissonance of vice—that one grand discord, which not the harmonies of all the others can in the ear of true Taste ever overpower. Let this be their most successful title to applause; there can be no nobler aim marked out for young genius, in an age when the sister-melodies of Virtue and the Lyre are in danger of becoming, like Helena and Hermia, separate and estranged, than the ambition to have it said of him in after days: 'he had nothing to reproach himself with in his devotion to the Muses; he sang like Surrey and Garcilasso de la Vega.'

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