THE AUTHORITIES FOR THE LEGEND, AS GIVEN BY CALDERON.
ACT III., SCENE X. (the concluding lines.)
The list of authorities at the end of the third act has been, and not without reason, a source of great perplexity. Calderon is blamed even by so thoughtful a critic as Mr. Ticknor for putting into the mouth of Enius himself the names of a number of writers who have in some way alluded to the Purgatory of St. Patrick, all of whom were of periods long subsequent to the time at which he represents himself to have lived, several of them being the very writers who nearly a thousand years later described his own adventures. But this is quite usual on the Spanish stage. There is scarcely a drama of Calderon that does not end in the same way. The last speaker, whoever he may be, and he is frequently the 'gracioso', abandons, for the last few lines of his speech, his assumed character, and addresses the audience as an actor in a brief epilogue. The list of authorities at the end of "El Purgatorio de San Patricio" is nothing more. It is simply an epilogue, perhaps a little longer than usual, which the curious nature of the subject to some extent justifies. The manner in which the names are printed is a different matter. But the reader should recollect that this drama was not printed by Calderon himself, but by his brother Joseph, who certainly in this instance at least considered it no part of his duty as editor to verify the correctness of the poet's references. Some of the confusion certainly is attributable to Calderon himself, as he has separated and transposed names for the purpose of adapting them to his versification. But other mistakes remain behind which we may fairly divide between Don Joseph and the printer.
The original lines, as given in all the editions, that of
Hartzenbusch included, are the following:—
"Para que con esta acabe
La historia, que nos refiere
Dionisio el gran Cartusiano,
Con Enrique Saltarense,
Cesario, Mateo Rodulfo,
Domiciano Esturbaquense,
Membrosio, Marco Marulo,
David Roto, y el prudente
Primado de toda Hibernia,
Belarmino, Beda, Serpi,
Fray Dimas, Jacob Solino,
Mensignano, y finalmente
La piedad y la opinion
Cristiana, que lo defiende."
Some of these names are obvious enough; it is with regard to those that are rendered more obscure by the manner in which they are presented that the difficulty arises. The list is taken for the most part from the fourth chapter of Montalvan's "Vida y Purgatorio de San Patricio", but with the names singularly disconnected and misplaced. They are turned, too, so completely into Spanish as to be scarcely recognised. Even in Messingham's "Florilegium", where they are all to be found, though not in one place, they are not always correctly printed. The following attempt at identification, now made for the first time, will be found, it is believed, to be perfectly accurate.
The first name, "Dionisio el gran Cartusiano," scarcely requires any explanation. The work referred to, in an edition of which I have a copy, is as follows:—
"D. Dionysii Carthusiani liber utilissimus de quatuor hominis novissimis, etc.," Parisiis, 1551.
The account "De Purgatorio Sancti Patritii" extends from fol. 235 to fol. 237.
"Enrique Saltarense" is Henry of Saltrey, a Benedictine monk of the
Abbey of Saltrey in Huntingdonshire, who about the middle of the
twelfth century first reduced to writing the Adventures of Owain, or
Enius, in the Purgatory of St. Patrick.