of the Portuguese poetry, induced him to write several dramas, and thus to leave no kind of poetic composition unattempted. It is not known at what period of his life these dramatic works were produced; but it is probable that they were written previously to his departure for India. They belong more completely to the age of Camoens than to the poet himself. They are, however, highly deserving of attention, though they should be merely considered as the last proofs of the poetic versatility and plastic genius of an author who comprised his whole age within himself, as far as a Portuguese national poet could accommodate himself to his age. Camoens was too much a poet to wish to supplant the national drama of his native country, however rude it then might be, by a prosaically modelled imitation of the ancient drama. He adhered to the party formed by the Spanish dramatist Naharro, and his ingenious countryman Gil Vicente. But his determination to dramatic poetry was not sufficiently decided to enable him to fix, by his productions, the taste of the Portuguese nation. Had the genius which animates the Lusiad, taken a dramatic direction, Camoens Sua dor; e em si tornando, Naõ deita dos olhos agoa, Que nao quer que a dor se abrande Amor, porque em mágoa grande Sécca as lagrimas a mágoa would have been the Calderon of Portugal, before a Lope de Vega had arisen in Spain. But Camoens in the composition of his dramas contented himself with slightly overstepping the bounds of Gil Vicente's manner, and with refining, also, only in a slight degree, the construction of the plot and the language. The rudest of the three dramas, which are now attached as a supplement to the other works of the author, is, El Rey Seleuco, (King Seleucus) a singular production, founded on the well known anecdote of the history of that monarch, who resigned his wife Stratonice to his son Antiochus, lest the youth should fall a sacrifice to the passion of love. Camoens seems to have had no idea of treating this delicate subject in a sentimental way. The burlesque prelude or prologue, as it is called, in prose, is calculated to raise the expectation of a farce rather then of a serious drama. The theatrical manager, a lad who acts as his servant, a man of condition, who presents himself as a spectator, and his escudeiro, (attendant) are the characters in this prologue. The manager's servant is the gracioso of the piece, and his jokes are at least so far useful that they afford an idea of the kind of wit which was at that time relished by the fashionable world in Lisbon. The drama itself, to which this prologue is the introduction, is entitled a comedy in the Spanish acceptation of the term, and is likewise denominated an auto, probably because royal personages are brought upon the scene, a circumstance which according to the Portuguese notions of poetry in that age elevated the piece above a mere comedy. The historical material is moulded according to the romantic forms; the composition is not only inartificial but trivial; and in the execution the ludicrous is quite as prevalent as the comic. The king and queen first enter, to converse on the melancholy state of the prince, and the king takes the opportunity of lamenting that he is no longer young enough for so fair a consort. The prince next appears attended by his pages, to whom he complains of his passion, but without naming the beloved object. The king and queen in vain endeavour to ascertain the cause of the prince's grief, and orders are given to prepare a bed for him. A bed is introduced on the stage, and a chamber-maid who is engaged in making it, is surprised by her lover in disguise, who is a porteiro (usher) of the castle. This scene is altogether an interlude in the romantic style. The prince again enters, and after many tender complaints betakes himself to bed. A band of music arrives to sooth him while he reposes. One of the musicians named Alexander de Fonseca, enters into conversation with the usher and a page, concerning the melancholy of the prince. With the consent of the prince the usher sings a romance, and the queen again enters with an attendant. Various scenes thus succeed each other, until the physician by feeling the prince's pulse, discovers the secret. The catastrophe is merely a representation of the close of the anecdote, without any reference to the queen, who is resigned by the father to the son, like an article of household furniture. The physician in this comedy is a Spaniard. He is made a native of Castile in order that one of the characters might speak Spanish, and thus introduce a variety into the dialogue which it appears was agreeable to a Lisbon audience. The dialogue is in other respects natural, and the versification in redondilhas is pleasing and not devoid of elegance. But there is not a single excellent scene to compensate for the grotesque frivolity of the composition. It is impossible to consider this work as any thing else than a mere juvenile essay of such a poet as Camoens. The second comedy of Camoens, Os Amphitryões, (the Amphitryons) was, however, a valuable contribution to the dramatic literature of Portugal. The merit of the invention of this purely comic piece, belongs indeed to Plautus, whose Amphitryon Camoens has freely imitated. But even the imitation must have marked an epoch in the history of the dramatic literature of Portugal, had the public been inclined to favour so happy a combination of the national and ancient forms. Any one unacquainted with the Amphitryon of Plautus would regard the Portuguese comedy as an original. The whole story of the piece is modernized without weakening the comic force of the situations. Jupiter indeed remains unchanged; but Mercury who attends him in his disguise, performs the servant in the true Portuguese style. Amphitryon is a sea captain, according to the Portuguese idea of that character. The servant of Amphitryon is converted into a perfect gracioso, who speaks Spanish, but still retains the name of Sosia. The humour of the burlesque scenes in which Sosia appears, is heightened by making Mercury, who converses with Jupiter in Portuguese, always speak Spanish, when he plays his part as the pseudo Sosia. It would be worth while to ascertain whether this pleasant comedy is ever performed in Lisbon. Filodemo, the third comedy of Camoens, is one of those dramatized novels, of which the Spanish theatre afterwards afforded many examples. It is not a drama of intrigue, but a variegated collection of grave and half comic scenes, which are combined together as a whole by their common reference to the result of a singular event. That event is the saving of two twins, a boy and a girl, whose mother is a princess of Denmark. A shepherd finds the twins and brings them up. Shepherds and shepherdesses, gentlemen and ladies, a waiting woman, a hunter, and other characters of a similar kind, form the romantic groupe. The scene is sometimes in town in the open streets, or within a house; sometimes in the country, and among barren mountains. The denouement is the most trivial part of the whole composition. It is brought about by a shepherd initiated in the art of magic, who, by his necromantic skill, discovers the parentage of the twins, and by this discovery removes the obstacles which impede the happy issue of two parallel love stories. In this drama Camoens has interspersed, and evidently not without design, scenes in prose among scenes in verse. In conformity with his inclination to unite all manners, he was desirous of approximating to the party, which on the pretext of adhering strictly to nature endeavoured to banish verse from Portuguese comedy. He accordingly gives the dialogue in prose where the conversation is entirely of a popular character; and whenever the style becomes somewhat elevated, redondilhas are again |