We call Duero. Thus might these enforce
Each his own claim to stand the noblest knight,
If brave Niebla came not with his blaze
Of glory to eclipse their humbler praise.
Too much honor is not to be claimed for such poetry; but there is little in Juan de Mena’s works equal to this specimen, which has at least the merit of being free from the pedantry and conceits that disfigure most of his writings.
Such as it was, however, the Labyrinth received great admiration from the court of John the Second, and, above all, from the king himself, whose physician, we are told, wrote to the poet: “Your polished and erudite work, called ‘The Second Order of Mercury,’ hath much pleased his Majesty, who carries it with him when he journeys about or goes a-hunting.”[655] And again: “The end of the ‘third circle’ pleased the king much. I read it to his Majesty, who keeps it on his table with his prayer-book, and takes it up often.”[656] Indeed, the whole poem was, it seems, submitted to the king, piece by piece, as it was composed; and we are told, that, in one instance, at least, it received a royal correction, which still stands unaltered.[657] His Majesty even advised that it should be extended from three hundred stanzas to three hundred and sixty-five, though for no better reason than to make their number correspond exactly with that of the days in the year; and the twenty-four stanzas commonly printed at the end of it are supposed to have been an attempt to fulfil the monarch’s command. But whether this be so or not, nobody now wishes the poem to be longer than it is.[658]
CHAPTER XX.
Progress of the Castilian Language. — Poets of the Time of John the Second. — Villasandino. — Francisco Imperial. — Baena. — Rodriguez del Padron. — Prose-writers. — Cibdareal and Fernan Perez de Guzman.
In one point of view, all the works of Juan de Mena are of consequence. They mark the progress of the Castilian language, which, in his hands, advanced more than it had for a long period before. From the time of Alfonso the Wise, nearly two centuries had elapsed, in which, though this fortunate dialect had almost completely asserted its supremacy over its rivals, and by the force of political circumstances had been spread through a large part of Spain, still, little had been done to enrich and nothing to raise or purify it. The grave and stately tone of the “Partidas” and the “General Chronicle” had not again been reached; the lighter air of the “Conde Lucanor” had not been attempted. Indeed, such wild and troubled times, as those of Peter the Cruel and the three monarchs who had followed him on the throne, permitted men to think of little except their personal safety and their immediate well-being.