"Lo tolse e disse: Acciò più non istea
Mai cavalier per te d'essere ardito;
Nè quanto il buono val, mai più si vanti
Il rio per te valer, qui giu rimanti."
Orlando Furioso, canto 9, st. 90.
[147] "Quien podrá, contar," exclaims the old Curate of Los Palacios, "la grandeza, el concierto de su corte, la cavallería de los Nobles de toda España, Duques, Maestres, Marqueses é Ricos homes; los Galanes, las Damas, las Fiestas, los Torneos, la Moltitud de Poetas é trovadores," etc. Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 201.
[148] Oviedo notices the existence of a lady-love, even with cavaliers who had passed their prime, as a thing of quite as imperative necessity in his day, as it was afterwards regarded by the gallant knight of La Mancha. "Costumbre es en España entre log señores de estado que venidos á la corte, aunque nó estén enamorados ó que pasen de la mitad de la edad fingir que aman por servir y favorescer á alguna dama, y gastar como quien son en fiestas y otras cosas que se ofrescen de tales pasatiempos y amores, sin que les dé pena Cupido." Quincuagenas, MS., bat. 1, quinc. 1, dial. 28.
[149] Viaggio, fol. 27.
Andrea Navagiero, whose itinerary has been of such frequent reference in these pages, was a noble Venetian, born in 1483. He became very early distinguished, in his cultivated capital, for his scholarship, poetical talents, and eloquence, of which he has left specimens, especially in Latin verse, in the highest repute to this day with his countrymen. He was not, however, exclusively devoted to letters, but was employed in several foreign missions by the republic. It was on his visit to Spain, as minister to Charles V., soon after that monarch's accession, that he wrote his Travels; and he filled the same office at the court of Francis I., when he died, at the premature age of forty-six, in 1529. (Tiraboschi, Letteratura Italiana, tom. vii. part. 3, p. 228, ed. 1785.) His death was universally lamented by the good and the learned of his time, and is commemorated by his friend, Cardinal Bembo, in two sonnets, breathing all the sensibility of that tender and elegant poet. (Rime, Son. 109, 110.) Navagiero becomes connected with Castilian literature by the circumstance of Boscan's referring to his suggestion the innovation he so successfully made in the forms of the national verse. Obras, fol. 20, ed. 1543.
[150] Fernando de Pulgar, after enumerating various cavaliers of his acquaintance, who had journeyed to distant climes in quest of adventures and honorable feats of arms, continues, "E oí decir de otros Castellanos que con ánimo de Caballeros fueron por los Reynos estrafios á facer armas con qualquier Caballero que quisiere facerlas con ellos, é por ellas ganaron honra para sí, é fama de valientes y esforzados Caballeros para los Fijosdalgos de Castilla." Claros Varones, tit. 17.
[151] "Son todos," says the Admiral, "de ningun ingenio en las armas, y muy cobardes, que mil no aguadarian tres!" (Primer Viage de Colon.) What could the bard of chivalry say more?
"Ma quel ch'al timor non diede albergo,
Estima la vil turba e l'arme tante
Quel che dentro alla mandra all' aer cupo,
Il numer dell' agnelle estimi il lupo."
Orlando Furioso, canto 12.
[152] L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 30.
[153] "I Spagnoli," says the Venetian minister, "non solo in questo paese di Granata, ma in tutto 'l resto della Spagna medesimamente, non sono molto industriosi, ne piantano, ne lavorano volontieri la terra; ma se danno ad altro, e più volontieri vanno alia guerra, o alle Indie ad acquistarsi facultà, che per tal vie." (Viaggio, fol. 25.) Testimonies to the same purport thicken, as the stream of history descends. See several collected by Capmany (Mem. de Barcelona, tom. iii. pp. 358, et seq.), who certainly cannot be charged with ministering to the vanity of his countrymen.