the Church had the best light of the day, while the laity were still dark and rude, those histrionic shows which the former admitted or encouraged should be the most complete and famous; and, consequently, that notices of them should have been preserved, while the obscure pastimes of the vulgar, or the buffooneries of strolling minstrels, were forgotten. But of these enough has been recorded to show that, from the earliest days, a distinct secular type of mimic representation, however base and poor, was always extant beyond the pale of the Church. Towards the close of the Middle Ages, still more during the century which preceded the birth of the national drama, we see it continually gaining ground, and displaying its activity in various shapes. As the development proceeds, rustic dialogue begins to clothe itself, with no small elegance, in forms of verse which the Provençal bards had taught their followers in Spain, and which, a little later, tended to determine the fashion that afterwards prevailed on the stage. A similar improvement, the while, appears in the treatment of religious subjects; but on the whole it is clear that the profane was rapidly overtaking the devotional movement throughout this period.. At its close it certainly had the leading part in the formation of a national theatre. Although the germ of dramatic art lies, as I have said, in human nature itself, and so is common to all races and ages, still, its development in a complete and living form appears to depend on special conditions; wanting which it is dormant or abortive. Of such requisites two would seem to be essential-a stage of culture, namely, in which the mind, become apt for ideal excur sions, is still powerfully acted upon by the senses, and has few intellectual pleasures but such as are addressed to the eye and ear. The other essential may be described as a certain breadth and settlement in the political state of a people, such as on the one hand begets a general feeling of enlarged self-consciousness, and on the other imparts the leisure and security necessary to the growth of an art in which the co-operation of many is required for its exercise as for its enjoyment. That these conditions are indispensable, it might be hazardous to affirm. But it is certain that no national drama has hitherto been produced without the union of both. No sooner is this consummated, than the rude embryo begins to stir: and the organic process reaches its full term when the combined causes have exerted their utmost force, and are on the eve of subsiding. In this form of poetry the season of maturity arrives soon after the period of birth, while the original impulse is still vigorous: from that point there is a gradual decline, as the momentum grows weaker; and when it is thoroughly exhausted, and new influences, in whatever direction, prevail, the drama expires. Such, at all events, was its history in Spain. While the kingdom was divided between the Christian and the Moor, and their only breathing-time was an armed truce, the seeds of the drama lay for ages in a torpid state; not that the soil was inapt for its production, but because the surface of life was too much agitated to receive any but hasty and broken reflections of the national mind. These we find in the Romances, the offspring of a time of excitement and insecurity in a race full of poetic gifts. They ceased, as a voice of popular feeling, when that stormy period passed away; bequeathing all their cordial influence, and much of their familiar tone, to a new form of native poetry, which sprung from the teeming earth as soon as the atmosphere grew calm, and the genius of the people had leisure to expand in a broader mould and with more perfect development. The Romance* belongs to the epoch of internal strife and alarm; it is the strain Although sung, as well as recited, the Romance has more of the epic than of the purely lyric tone. This is only found unmixed in the Cancion and Copla—a legacy from Provençal minstrelsy-from which the dramatic Eclogues, &c., of the sixteenth century borrowed their versification, and transmitted it, in the redondilla, quintilla, decima, &c., to the comedy of the seventeenth, in which all the three poetic modes are represented. of the bivouac and the leaguer, repeated by the shepherd in the lonely plain, and the watchman on the beacon height. The drama is the child of peace, nurtured in cities; a social pleasure, apt for holidays and festivals, requiring preparation and expense. Of all kinds of Spanish poetry, the Romances are the best known; but their part in the national comedy, if noticed at all, has not, so far as I know, been sufficiently regarded. Their influence on its tone and character was transmitted through a popular feeling, which Lope divined and obeyed. How much they contributed to its rhythmical form, was perhaps less apparent at the outset than afterwards, when the romance measure began to prevail over the rhymed redondillas, in which the earliest plays of Lope's age were almost exclusively written. The degree to which the spirit of the drama was modified by them may not be seen at the first glance, but will not escape an attentive eye; and the longer it is studied, the more will the tone of the Romancero be felt pervading its entire structure, by all who have a quick sense of affinities. I do not merely refer to the practice, peculiar to Spanish comedy, of giving long descriptive passages in the romance style,-which modern critics condemn as adverse to dramatic effect, but which especially delighted the audiences of the day. Nor do I simply point to the frequent and direct use of the old popular lays, whether in quotations, in allusions, or in the choice of subjects from them; although all these are lively reminders of an unceasing echo on the boards from the ancient minstrelsy. It will be found, It will be found, further, that its spirit penetrated to the very core of the drama, and imbued it with a narrative propensity; that it mainly owes to the romance the diffuseness of outline, and contempt of material limits, ever leaning towards the epic mode, -which have so grieved Unitarian critics. For this leaning, in a direction the most opposed to dramatic art strictly considered, there could, indeed, be no other motive than the influence of the older national 51 poetry. It was no result of chance; still less did it proceed from any want of power to frame a wellcompacted story, and to set forth all its essentials in action and dialogue. In the art of dramatic exposition, and in thorough mastery of every scenic device, the Spanish theatre has no rival, and needed no help from without. Beyond this, the liberty of changing the scene at will, and the independence on time, relieved the poet from any pressure like that which imposed on the French the necessity of relating so much that the true dramatic principle requires to be shown. It was, therefore, not for want of skill that he had recourse to narrative, where action might have sufficed; but because it added to the delight of his hearers to suspend the business of the scene, while they listened to the old familiar strain. Thus we have three streams flowing from distant springs, the confluence of which spread out into the national drama; which, having absorbed and blended their several currents, was itself divided into the two branches, wherein it ever afterwards continued to flow; known as comedy on the stage, and mystery (autos) for the Church:each of them retaining a taste of all the three sources from whence they were derived; miracle-plays, namely; mimes, jocular farces, and mummeries of the vulgar; and national lays or romances. There was another, of foreign origin, which had tried to overcome all the rest. Classic imitation was attempted by the learned, and offered to the people, while the rude native drama was stirring into life throughout the sixteenth century, but offered in vain: their healthy taste refused all invitations to feed on the dry bones of antiquity. As such academic essays had no effect on the national stage, to which these Notes are restricted, I refrain from dwelling upon them; although it would be no unwelcome task to give some account of a class of poets whose efforts, though unsuccessful, deserve respect. Among them were men of no vulgar genius-Bermudez, Argensola, and the great name of Cervantes. It must suffice to say that the public, with a true poetic instinct that cannot be too highly praised, were deaf to th their eloquence, and regardless of learned authority in a matter which concerned their own gratification. They required a drama, racy of the Spanish soil, clothed in forms of their own poetry, and speaking a language which no study was needed to enjoy; various and free as their own fancies; and flattering a taste for excitement which the national temper and the events of recent times had made too strong to be subdued by critical rules. That in this impulsive way, intent only on the pleasure of the moment, they were unconsciously evoking a form of poetry as perfect and genuine, according to the canons of just criticism, as that which they rejected-they knew not, nor cared to know. But such was, in truth, the nature of their achievement. In the sixteenth century, Spain had begun to enjoy the internal security which has been described as propitious to the birth of scenic art. By the final subjugation of the Moors, which triumphantly closed a feud of eight hundred years' standing, her spirit had already been exalted, when the accession of Charles to the Empire, and the exploits of Cortes and Pizarro in the New World, came to enhance her pride and fire her imagination. In this ferment, the latent and dispersed elements of dramatic poetry begin to move: they attract each other by natural affinity, and the genetic process commences. In every quarter ingenious minds are busy with improvements on the ancient shows, or trying experiments with something new-the development gathers strength as it proceeds, and soon becomes rapid and decisive. There is nothing, indeed, to direct its ad * vance; and false steps are not wanting. But in every new trial, in every failure, even, something is gained for future efforts, or some error that might frustrate them discovered; until by degrees the material for a genuine national theatre has been so gathered, sifted, and prepared, that it only awaits the electric impulse of genius to start into its destined form. Of the many who busied themselves in this field before the true vein was found, it will suffice to name the most important only. The simple Eclogas of Juan del Encina date before the beginning of the sixteenth century. After him Gil Vicente (1502) and Torres Naharro (1517) made considerable advances, by introducing variety of characters, and something like dramatic plot; while both, but especially Vicente, did much towards providing the nascent drama with a poetic dress. The versification of the latter, indeed, is exquisite, and his dialogue runs with nearly as much ease and elegance as Lope's. Towards the middle of the century (1540), Lope de Rueda, a man of the people,-sometime gold-beater in Seville, afterwards manager of a company of strollers,-struck out a new path with a vigour which gave his humble stage a popularity until then unknown. His subjects, treated in unaffected prose.t were taken from common life, in a tone mainly secular; whereas, with those who preceded him, religious pieces have the preference. It was, no doubt. because of his thus popularizing the theatre, that Cervantes accounts him the father of the national drama; which otherwise cannot have owed much to a homely style so different from that which it afterwards adopted. Although his right to this merit is questioned, he certainly has the credit of having been *Such, for instance, as the celebrated Celestina (1499) and its imitations; which, though effectual in advancing the perfection of Castilian prose, were, so far as they concerned the drama at all, experiments in a direction altogether false. These, at least, are all that have come down to us. Cervantes indeed (Prologue to his Ocho Comedias, &c.) praises his skill in 'pastoral poetry;' and even inserts a specimen, in the 3rd act of his Baños de Argel, taken from one of Lope de Rueda's Coloquios Pastoriles, the verses of which have a certain Doric prettiness. Pellicer also informs us that one of these pieces is preserved-I suppose in MS.-in a volume in the Library of the Escorial; but this kind of writing can hardly have been generally considered his forte, as none but his essays in prose were chosen for publication by his editor, Timoneda. 1859.] Its Precursors in the Sixteenth Century. the first, as Cervantes says, 'to take it out of baby clothes,'-by making plays, which before him had been mostly composed for a select few, an established recreation of the people at large. At the time of his death (in 1567) scenic performances, still rude and artless enough, had become pretty general throughout the southern parts of Spain. At first they were carried about by itinerant players; but as the liking for this pastime increased, the court-yards of houses in some of the chief cities -as in Seville, Valencia, and Madrid-were fitted up for the use of resident companies. In Valencia a theatre of this kind was one of the first to become famous : on its boards Andres Rey de Artieda and Christoval de Virues (1580-90) exhibited their pieces; which, though written on the false principle of blending the classic and popular styles, no doubt prepared the public for happier attempts. On 53 the whole, indeed, throughout this century, down to the time of Lope's appearance, all the poets who fol lowed the stage, Cervantes included, are seen incessantly wavering between the ancient and the modern. Juan de la Cueva, who flourished in Seville (circa 1579), with more genius than any of his predecessors, must on this ground be ranked, with the rest, among the pioneers rather than the founders of the drama.* Such, also, was Cervantes, who appears busy in the foreground down to the moment when Lope came and took possession of the field, or carried off the monarchy of the stage,' as Cervantes himself expresses it. Between 1581 and 1588 he produced in the Madrid theatres, as he informs us, some twenty to thirty pieces, with entire success; and in these he claims to have first set the example of what became a standard rule, by reducing the number of the acts from five to three.† At Several of the works of these precursors of the national drama were pub lished during the sixteenth century; but the original editions are of the utmost rarity. They are, however, to be found in modern reprints in sufficient number to afford a general idea of their character. Of such the following may be named: -Moratin, Origenes del Teatro Español, reprinted, with additions, by Ochoa, in vol. i. of the Tesoro del Teatro Español, Baudry, Paris, 1838; Bohl von Faber, Teatro anterior á Lope de Vega, Hamburg, 1832; Barreto y Monteiro, Obras de Gil Vicente, 3 vols. 8vo, Hamburg, 1834. (The Teatro of Bohl von Faber contains all the Spanish pieces of this author.) Of the best specimens of the classical essays within the same period, the following are now accessible :-The tragedies of Bermudez, Perez de Oliva, and Argensola, in vol. vi. of Sedano's Parnaso Español, 9 t. 8vo, Madrid, 1768. Cervantes' Numancia (with the Tratos de Argel) was first published with the Viage del Paraso, by Sancha, Madrid, 1784. This, as well as the pieces in the Parnaso Español (excepting Oliva's, which are translations), will be found in the first volume of Ochoa's Tesoro. A single play by Virues, La Gran Semiramis, has lately been published here (18mo, Williams and Norgate, 1858) by an anonymous editor, who gives nothing but the bare text, and even that full of errors. + Lope (Arte Nuevo de hacer Comedias, Obras Sueltas, iv. 405) gives Virues the credit of this important change. Both may have been right, if, as likely enough, the plan was introduced in both places about the same time-by Cervantes in Madrid, by Virues in Valencia-neither of the two being at the moment aware of any experiment but his own. However this may be, the value of the new method is indisputable. It is, indeed, the only arrangement of a dramatic subject conformable to the primary laws of nature and reason, that admit of no other divisions of a complete fable but the three essential ones of beginning, middle, and end. I need not remind the reader that this is the Aristotelian canon (Hepi Toint. Y.), but may remark the inconsistency of those moderns who tormented the drama in professed obedience to his dictates on other points, yet in this have neglected an obvious deduction from his rule, that would have given them authority for a privilege which the Spanish poets alone, caring nothing for Aristotle, had the good sense to take from their own perception of its advantage. By what perverse accident this was overlooked, and the unmeaning five-act system imposed on every other stage but the Spanish, it is not my business to inquire. This, however, may be affirmed--that its only use has been to multiply without reason the difficulties of composition where the drama is cultivated as an art; and to condemn it to an utter want of symmetry wherever (as in our Elizabethan period) it owes more to genius than to study. this period, to judge from the two of his acted plays which alone have been preserved, Cervantes seems, as I have said, to have been feeling his way in each of the two opposite directions; his own bias probably tending towards the classical school, while necessity forced him to the popular side. His Numancia, a work of far higher merit than is commonly ascribed to it, belongs to the former, although he has imported into it allegorical fancies of his own invention. The other piece, Los Tratos de Argel (Life in Algiers), is of the homeliest kind, approaching, so far as it goes, to the type which Lope adopted; but in a dry, artless manner, in which not a spark of genius is visible. That Cervantes was not wanting in dramatic faculty, whether of the high or humorous kind, is shown in many passages of the Numancia and in the Entremeses (interludes),-if not in the comedies, which he wrote in his old age, in emulation of Lope.* It must, therefore, remain an open question how much he might have done for the national drama, had he not left Madrid at a critical period, in search of a better living than he had earned as a playwright. The famous diatribe which he delivers in the person of the Curate (Don Quixote, Pt. i. chap. 48) against the comedies of Lope's school, may be cited as evidence that his notions of what the stage should be, could never have been reconciled to the irresistible tendency of the day,and, indeed, that his ideas on the subject were on the whole too narrow and prosaic for the romantic theatre of any day. But these, it must be remembered, were the utterances of his old age, as to which some allowance must be made for a spirit of contradiction, not unnaturally provoked by the rebuff he had recently endured from the players, if not by something like jealousy of the success of his junior and rival, Lope. Twenty years earlier he might have thought more justly of the stage, and written for it, on due encouragement, without having the fear of Aristotle before his eyes. On the whole, however, it seems that the bent of his genius was not towards the drama; nor need we lament the fortune that, estranging him from it, led him to another field, in which no one could compete with him. On the stage he left no impression; and hardly had he quitted it when Lope de Vega appeared. The hour was come, and the man; and from that moment a new order of things commenced.† With an inborn dramatic genius of the first order, an inexhaustible * Ocho Comedias y Entremeses, Madrid, 1615; republished, with a preface, by Blas Nasarre in 1749. They were never acted, the players having wisely refused them. Worse attempts, indeed, no man of transcendent genius has ever made; yet Cervantes looked on them with complacency-and they seem to have been written about the same time as the first part of Don Quixote. The Entremeses are more worthy of their author: though trifles, they are among the pleasantest of this class of slight farces. +Of the changes wrought by this sudden revolution, two should be especially noted. Until Lope took possession of the stage, it mainly depended everywhere for the supply of pieces on the manager, who composed the entertainments or farsas which his company acted, and, probably in virtue of this function, was styled Autor de Comedias; a title which, we learn from Luzan (Poética, ii. 13), he retained as late as 1737. This class of playwrights may be said to have been extinguished by Lope's appearance. The only professional author of whom anything is afterwards heard was Andres de Claramonte, who continued to write in the new manner pieces of his own invention during the first eight or ten years of the seventeenth century. He might have been forgiven for composing mediocre plays, had he not ventured on altering the works of poets whose comedies were performed by his company. The only text now remaining of the masterpiece (by Lope or Tirso)El Rey D. Pedro en Madrid-from which Moreto stole his Valiente Justiciero, is supposed to have been mangled by Claramonte; yet in this state, even, it surpasses Moreto's. From the period in question, with the sole exception named, the dramatists were altogether of a superior class—men of good birth and education, and most frequently either churchmen, members of the military orders, or in honourable public employments. It is another remarkable circumstance that, from this date, the drama, which previously had been cultivated, such as it was, in various other provinces of the |