secular plays. His "Devotion to the Cross" is regarded as one of the finest dramas in Spanish literature. "No Monster like Jealousy" has been translated into German by Schlegel, and much admired in Berlin, Vienna, and Weimar. The chief characteristic of his dramas is their fatalistic character: masculine honor, female love, knightly gallantry, and jealousy are subjected to such invariable necessities that, the circumstances of an individual's situation being given, his course can be determined almost with mathematical accuracy. Invention of the Spanish Novel by Cervantes.-Probably no work has ever acquired a more universal popularity than Cervantes' burlesque romance "Don Quixote," the two parts of which appeared in 1605 and 1615. It was written to destroy the taste for fictions of chivalry, which had become almost a mania in Europe and the American Colonies; and so complete was its success that no work of that nature was produced after its publication. Cervantes was also the author of numerous plays and of several minor novels: his "Persilis and Sigismunda" has been pronounced the forerunner of the English tale, "Robinson Crusoe." The Spanish novel invented by him was soon cultivated by other writers, notably Quevedo (1580-1645), whose "History and Life of the Great Sharper, Paul of Segovia," is a prose satire of considerable ingenuity. BOOKS OF REFERENCE. Aiken's "Court of Elizabeth," "Court S. M. Davis's "Life and Times of Sir Sir Walter Scott's "Kenilworth," Autos, or religious dramas, were the favorite amusements of the mass of the people till the seven teenth century, streets of the villages of Development of art: beginning of the career of Murillo, one of the most celebrated of painters. Spanish Extension of ence over Goethe's "Torquato Tasso." W. L. Collins's "Montaigne." Schlegel's "History of Dramatic Lit- Sismondi's "History of the Literature erature." J. P. Mahaffy's "Descartes." G. P. R. James's "The Huguenot." Motley's "Rise of the Dutch Republic." of the South of Europe." Watson's "History of Philip II." Archbishop Trench's "Calderon." M. Oliphant's "Cervantes." James Gyll's "Poems of Cervantes." Schiller's "History of The Thirty Magnificent English edition of "Don Years' War." Goethe's "Wallenstein," translated by Coleridge. Bayard Taylor's "Studies in German Literature." M. F. Sweetser's "Van Dyck." J. A. Symonds's "Renaissance in Italy." E. J. Hasell's "Tasso." Tasso's "Jerusalem Delivered," translated by Robertson, Fairfax, Hunt, or Smith. Quixote," published by Cassell, Petter & Galpin (London and New York, 1868-69), illustrated by Gustave Doré. Mickle's translation of "Lusiad" [there are eight other English versions of the epic, the latest being by Captain Burton, an African traveller and explorer, and published in 1881]. Frederick Halm's " Camoens," a dramatic sketch. Tassoni's "Secchia Rapita," transla- Bouterwek's ted by Ozell. 'Spanish and Portu guese Literature." |