[411] Primera Parte de Entremeses, “Entremes Primero de Melisendra,” Comedias, Tom. I., Valladolid, 1604, 4to, ff. 333, etc. It is founded on the fine old ballads of the Romancero of 1550-1555, “Asentado está Gayferos,” etc.; the same out of which the puppet-show man made his exhibition at the inn before Don Quixote, Parte II. c. 26.
[412] Comedias, Valladolid, 1604, Tom. I. p. 337.
[413] All three of these pieces are in the same volume.
[414] “Lope de Rueda,” says Lope de Vega, “was an example of these precepts in Spain; for from him has come down the custom of calling the old plays Entremeses.” (Obras Sueltas, Tom. IV. p. 407.) A single scene taken out and used in this way as an entremes was called a Paso or “passage.” We have noted such by Lope de Rueda, etc. See ante, pp. 16, 22.
[415] Among the imitators of Juan de la Enzina should be noted Lucas Fernandez, a native of Salamanca, who published in that city a thin folio volume, in 1514, entitled “Farsas y Eglogas al Modo y Estilo Pastoril y Castellano.” Judged by their titles, they are quite in the manner and style of the eclogues and farces of his predecessor; but one of them is called a Comedia, two others are called Farsa ó quasi Comedia, and another Auto ó Farsa. There are but six in all. I have never seen the book; but the notices I have found of its contents show that it is undoubtedly an imitation of the dramatic attempts of its author’s countryman, and that it is probably one of little poetical merit.
[416] Obras, Tom. I. p. 225.
[417] Obras, Tom. XVI., passim, and XIX. p. 278.
[418] For these, see Obras, Tom. III. p. 463; Tom. X. p. 193; Tom. IV. p. 430; and Tom. X. p. 362. The last passage contains nearly all we know about his son, Lope Felix.
[419] See the scene in the Second Part of Don Quixote, where some gentlemen and ladies, for their own entertainment in the country, were about to represent the eclogues of Garcilasso and Camoens. In the same way, I think, the well-known eclogue which Lope dedicated to Antonio Duke of Alva, (Obras, IV. p. 295), that to Amaryllis, which was the longest he ever wrote, (Tom. X. p. 147), that for the Prince of Esquilache, (Tom. I. p. 352), and most of those in the “Arcadia,” (Tom. VI.), were acted, and written in order to be acted. Why the poem to his friend Claudio, (Tom. IX. p. 355), which is in fact an account of some passages in his own life, with nothing pastoral in its tone or form, is called “an eclogue,” I do not know; nor will I undertake to assign to any particular class the “Military Dialogue in Honor of the Marquis of Espinola,” (Tom. X. p. 337), though I think it is dramatic in its structure, and was probably represented, on some show occasion, before the Marquis himself.
[420] This division can be traced back to a play of Francisco de Avendaño, 1553. L. F. Moratin, Obras, 1830, Tom. I. Parte I. p. 182.