With dogmas to his mother's faith unknown

Nature at strife a mother's portion claims,
A fire in embers dim, yet not in vain,

Kindling mild thoughts of peace with faithful Spain.

"This embryo spark of life, that scarcely knew

As yet with certain light to rise and shine,
The princely care of Albert fann'd and blew
With breath of gentle counsels, still benign,
Still to his churchman's patient virtues true.
Then well did Spain the ministry assign
To one, who well could either ensign wield,
The herald's wand, or warrior's sword in field,

"To Tassis of Acuña, heir of fame,

Of Villamediana first to bear

The Count's new honour;-to the charge he came,
Attemper'd well with gentleness austere :

The peaceful wand that charms wild serpents tame
He bore, and sheath'd his flashing sword of fear,
And went a noble envoy, not in vain,
With peace desir'd by Britain, sought by Spain:

"Mild peace, which soon Velasco ratified,

Castille's high Marshal, thunderbolt of war:
Whereby old Janus' gates, long open'd wide,
Were clos'd, and seas and fruitful lands afar
Joy'd in returning commerce. Iris, dyed

In rainbow hues, calm as soft evening star,
O'er England and o'er Spain her symbol spread,
Rejoicing that long-cherish'd hate was fled.

"This quiet of the world's old rebel mood

With our indulgent Duke all favour found;

E'en bloody Mars makes truce in deadly feud,

And wears awhile his burnish'd helm unbound;

*The archduke had been in holy orders, and had held the see of Toledo; then by Papal dispensation he resigned his see and cardinal's hat, and married Isabel, sister of Philip III.

The Darting God, and Huntress of the Wood,
Give pause to flying lance and arrowy wound;
The spear beneath the tree, the bow on spray,
Reserv'd for active use some later day."

It seems right to suppose that these complimentary and elaborate stanzas express the poet's more permanent feelings towards the great minister: for this is only one of many passages in his poems which speak gratefully of the Duke, and his kinsman the Archbishop, and his nephew the Count of Lemos, the generous patron of literary men.

(27.) Gongora speaks gratefully also of Rodrigo Calderon, now approaching the zenith of his fortunes; but not without a sense of his danger, of which he tried to warn him. But we find not a word in the way of compliment spoken of the other creature of the Duke, Pedro Franqueza, whom Philip III, made Count of Villalonga, a man whose contemptible character is. attested by those who had occasion to know him.*

To the Duke, and to the Marquis of Siete Iglesias, a title to which Calderon was advanced not long before his fall, Gongora owed the dignity of honorary chaplain to the King. It seems to have been an office without duties, and without pay, unless it may have recommended him to some occasional private grants from the royal bounty. One of his sonnets,

* Contarini, the Venetian Ambassador's Memoir, edited with Cabrera, p. 571. He was the person to whom Creswell the Jesuit introduced the emissaries of Catesby in 1601-2.

D

written in a tone between jest and earnest, makes it probable that he may sometimes have received a present from the Duke and the Count of Lemos, and possibly from other noble patrons; but of this there is but slight evidence.

By this time many of his songs and ballads were set to music, and became popular. Calderon, on a mission to the French Court in 1612, was accompanied by minstrels, who sang them to the guitar. Mary de Medicis gave the Envoy a private audience to hear his musicians; and expressed herself charmed with the song, "Let the light guitar go play,"* of which an English version may be found in another portion of this volume. It is a song on a sufficiently common topic, the praise of a careless country life, far from the toils and cares of state; a kind of life, however, for which poor Mary de Medicis shewed little inclination, when the overbearing Richelieu drove her from the Court of France.

(28.) Several of these minor poems serve to illustrate the character of the Duke of Lerma's government. It was a time of privileged orders and monopolies, as indeed it was in some countries nearer home. The taxes were farmed; the fiscal offices were purchased; and the productive classes were made a prey to needy scriveners and undertakers.+ Only the Biscayans, with their stubborn independence and practical good

* Cabrera, Ralaciones, 478. "Andese la gaita por el lugar." † Davila, 226.

sense, resisted the encroachments on their ancient fueros, as they have done at other times, and preserved their municipal magistrates, secretaries, and treasurers. The royal Commissioner, who came to Bilbao and St. Sebastian to effect the sale of the Receivership of the port-duties, was warned, by having his windows broken, that he was engaged in a dangerous attempt, and regarded as a disturber of the public peace.* The poor King was made to confess in his Royal Schedule to this officer, that it was in relief to his present needs that he proposed such a questionable mode of contribution to the public service.t But advice to the Council-Board at Madrid would have been as ineffectual as Bacon's to Sir George Villiers: "Beware of monopolies, the cankers of all trading." The grants and sales went on.

However, we are not to confound the personal character of the minister with the system of the time. It is an ordinary practice to accuse the presiding statesmen in most countries of extortion and misappropriation of the public money: but the outcry often comes from those who are disappointed at not having had the same opportunities of shewing kindness to themselves. The Sandovals went out of power at last not much richer than they came in; not that the

* Gonzalez, Coleccion de Cédulas, etc.; Madr. 1829. Vol. ii. 298.

+ Ibid, 291. se me ofrecen.”

"Para ayuda á las necesidades que de presente

grants and honours with which Philip the Pious loaded them were at all to be despised, but there was no parsimony in the recipients.

(29.) The Duke of Lerma was a minister, whose place in history is much on the same level as Sir Robert Walpole's, or that of Thomas Holles, Duke of Newcastle. He was in some respects a compound of both he took the public money as largely as the first, and spent it with as little wisdom as the second.* But his master's entire favour was such as to save him the need of the shifts and tricks of Newcastle; and in moral dignity of character he must rank somewhat higher than Walpole. He governed Spain, as other countries may be governed in a time of peace, by petty attachments and family influences. By such government the progress of decay may be disguised, and the sickness of the body politic alleviated for a time but nothing is done towards a cure.

However, the state was so shaken when he came to the helm, that it would have required a statesman with something of the spirit of a martyr to attempt the remedy. Francisco Sandoval was no such person. He found an empty treasury, and the nation weary of the long wars of the second Philip; and he rightly judged that the land had need of peace. But there was little public benefit from peace, when the wealth, which had been used to feed the wars, was diverted

*

"Lo que recibia con una mano, lo daba con otra."— Davila, 41.