[65] Cervantes, as appears from a somewhat confused allusion early in the seventh chapter of the First Book of Don Quixote, seems to have been one of the few (besides the author) who enjoyed Carlos famoso. Zapata himself complained with a comic ruefulness that his forty thousand lines were not widely appreciated, and that he was out of pocket in consequence: "Yo pensé también que en haber hecho la historia del Emperador Carlos V., nuestro señor, en verso, y dirigídola á su pio y poderosísimo hijo, con tantas y tan verdaderas loas de ellos y nuestros españoles, que había hecho algo. Costóme cuatrocientos mil maravedís la ímpresión, y de ella no saqué sino saña y alongamiento de mi voluntad." Zapata, however, consoles himself with thinking that he is in good company and closes with a pious, confident moral: "De Homero se dice que en su vida no se hizo de él caso, et sua riderunt tempora Meonidem. Del autor del famoso libro poético de Amadís no se sabe haste hoy el nombre, honra de la nacion y lengua española, que en ninguna lengua hay tal poesía ni tan loable.... De manera que podemos decir todos el sic vos non vobis de Virgilio, por lo cual todos de paso y como accesorio deben no poner su felicidad acá, donde no hay ninguna, sino atender á aquello que Dios les ha prometido; que si plantaren la viña de las buenas obras, gozarán perpétuamente del fruto de ella y otro no se la vendimiará." See Zapata's Miscelánea in the Memorial histórico español (Madrid, 1859), vol. xi., pp. 304-305. It is interesting to note that Zapata hazards no guess as to the authorship of Amadís de Gaula.
[66] Op. cit., pp. 60-61, n. 76.
[67] Sannazaro's latest and best editor, Signor Scherillo, is properly sceptical (op. cit., pp. clxxvi.-ccviii.) as to many current identifications of the personages in the Arcadia. It seems certain that Barcinio is Chariteo of Barcelona, and that Summontio is Pietro Summonto, the Neapolitan publisher of the book. It is probable that Meliseo is Giovanni Pontani, and that Massilia is the author's mother. It is possible that Sincero is Sannazaro. But, as Signor Scherillo drily observes, it is not easy to follow those who think that Sannazaro was Ergasto, Elpino, Clonico, Ophelia, and Eugenio—not "three gentlemen at once," but five. Other writers hold that Ophelia is Chariteo; that Pontano is Ergasto, Opico and Montano; that Eleuco is the Great Captain; and that Arcadia stands for France. These and similar absurdities are treated as they deserve in Signor Scherillo's masterly introduction.
[68] The supposition that Tirsi, in the Pastor de Fílida, was intended to represent Cervantes is noted by Navarrete (op. cit., p. 278), and on the authority of that biographer has been frequently repeated. It is right to say that Navarrete simply mentions the identification in passing, and that he is careful to throw all responsibility for it on Juan Antonio Mayáns who was the first to suggest the idea in the introduction to his reprint of the Pastor de Fílida (Valencia, 1792), pp. xxxvii, lxxvii, and lxxx. The theory has been disproved by Juan Antonio Pellicer (op. cit., p. cxxxiii.)
There can be no reasonable doubt that the Tirsi of the Pastor de Fílida is Francisco de Figueroa. It is absolutely certain that the Tirsi of the Galatea is Figueroa: for, in the Second Book, Cervantes places it beyond question by ascribing to Tirsi two sonnets and a canción by Figueroa. Cp. Poesías de Francisco de Figueroa, llamado el Divino (Madrid, 1804).
(a)
¡Ay de quan ricas esperanzas vengo
Al deseo más pobre y encogido,
Que jamas encerró pecho herido
De llaga tan mortal, como yo tengo!