Las hùmedas reliquias de su nave.
This sonnet, and the two following translations, are taken respectively from pages 8, 18 and 46 of the first volume of the Toluca edition. The imitation of Lord Byron is at page 83 of the same. The Odes to ‘Poesy’ and to ‘Night’ are at pages 13 and 72 of the second volume.
49. [Page 282.] “Milton elevated all beyond.”
Y Milton mas que todos elevado
A su angel fiero de diamante armado.
50. [Page 305.] “Josè de Espronceda.”
This name is to be pronounced Esprontheda. The translations, taken from the original poems, may be found in the Paris edition of 1848, at pages 49, 58, 73 and 79 respectively. The one translated, ‘The Condemned to Die,’ El Reo de Muerte, literally, ‘The Guilty of Death,’ has the signification given to this phrase by our translators of the New Testament, and it may be necessary to explain that the refrain “Your alms for prayers,” &c., is in the original merely “To do good for the soul of him who is about to be executed.”
Para hacer bien al alma
Del que van à ajusticiar!
In Spain, when a criminal is about to be executed, it is the custom for the Brothers of the religious order De la Humanidad, to go about the public ways, in their peculiar garb, with salvers for receiving alms for masses to be said for him, repeating words to the effect above given.