Less fortunate in this respect than Acuña was Gutierre de Cetina, another Spaniard of the same period and school, since no attempt has ever been made to collect his poems. The few that remain to us, however,—his madrigals, sonnets, and other short pieces,—have much merit. Sometimes they take an Anacreontic tone; but the better specimens are rather marked by sweetness, like the following madrigal:—
Eyes, that have still serenely shone,
And still for gentleness been praised,
Why thus in anger are ye raised,
When turned on me, and me alone?
The more ye tenderly and gently beam,
The more to all ye winning seem;—
But yet,—O, yet,—dear eyes, serene and sweet,
Turn on me still, whate’er the glance I meet![794]
Like many others of his countrymen, Cetina was a soldier, and fought bravely in Italy. Afterwards he visited Mexico, where he had a brother in an important public office; but he died, at last, in Seville, his native city, about the year 1560. He was an imitator of Garcilasso, even more than of the Italians who were Garcilasso’s models.[795]