[35.—28.] The stanzas of pages 34 and 35 are probably known to every Spaniard: schoolboys commit them to memory for public recitation.
[36.—15.] dignáredes = dignareis. In modern Spanish the d (from Lat. t) of the 2d pers. plur. verb endings has fallen.
[38.—4.] Y... despedir = y [si no vieran] á Zaida que le despedía.
[13.] cruz: the cross of a sword is the guard which, crossing the hilt at right angles, gives the sword the shape of a cross. The cross swords were held in especial veneration by the medieval Christians.
Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos (or Jove-Llanos) (1744-1811) was one of the loftiest characters and most unselfish statesmen ever produced by Spain. Educated for the law, he filled with distinction important judicial offices in Seville and Madrid. In 1780 he was made a member of the Council of Orders. He attached himself to the fortunes of Count Cabarrús, and when that statesman fell from power in 1790, Jovellanos was exiled to his home in Gijón (Asturias). There he devoted himself to the betterment of his native province. In 1797 the favorite, Godoy, made him ministro de gracia y justicia; but he could not be other than an enemy of the corrupt "Prince of the Peace," and in 1798 he was again sent home. In 1801 he was seized and imprisoned in Majorca and was not released till the invasion of Spain by the French in 1808. He refused flattering offers of office under the French, and was the most active member of the Junta Central which organized the Spanish cortes. Unjustly criticized for his labors he retired home, whence he was driven by a sudden incursion of the French. He died a few days after in an inn at Vega (Asturias).
Jovellanos' best literary work is really his political prose, such as the Informe sobre un proyecto de ley agraria (1787) and Defensa de la junta central (1810). His Delincuente honrado (1773), a comédie larmoyante after the manner of Diderot's Fils naturel, had wide success on the stage. His works are in vols. 46 and 50 of the Bibl. de Aut. Esp. Cf. E. Mérimée, Jovellanos, in the Revue hispanique, I, pp. 34-68.
¿Quis tam patiens ut teneat se? who is so long-suffering as to control himself?
[21.] prisión: see mention above of Jovellanos' imprisonment in Majorca.
[39.—2.] It is scarcely accurate to call Juvenal a bufón, since he was rather a scornful, austere satirist of indignation.
[40.—26.] cuánto de is an unusual expression; but if the line read: ¡Ay, cuánta amargura y cuánto lloro, it would lack one syllable.