ferred to governesses in that age and country, we are not able to decide.

Where the difference of age secured both master and pupil from the secret growth of a dangerous passion, nothing seems more apt to create a pure and lasting attachment than the duties performed by the noble Castilian to the daughter of his sovereign. But that princess had none of the noble qualities which adorned her father; and, if we may be allowed to conjecture from the scanty notice which history gives of her mother, Urraca had derived from that source a selfish, turbulent spirit, which, even without her peculiar and grosser failings, would stand in the way of gratitude to the virtuous instructor of her youth.

Prince Sancho, the only son of Alphonso VI. being slain near Uclés, in a battle against the Moors, Urraca became heiress to the throne of Castile. She was at that time the widow of Raimund, Lord of Galicia, a son of William I. Count of Burgundy, whom the Castilian king had chosen, out of the noble adventurers that joined his standard from France, to share the throne with his daughter in the event of her accession. Alphonso, now far advanced in years, saw with increasing concern, that within a short time the sceptre he had wielded with glory, would glide into the feeble grasp of a young volatile woman, who appeared alike intemperate in the enjoyment of power and of pleasure. Anxious for the glory of a kingdom which, under his sway, had given the first signs of a settled ascendancy over the Moors, he feared that the infant son of Urraca, if allowed to grow under the exclusive influence of his mother, might disgrace the name of Alphonso, which, in the fond hope of imparting his own spirit, the old king had given his grandchild. The fate of his family and kingdom hung upon the choice of a husband for the heiress, whose hand was already a subject of contention among the grandees. To obviate, therefore, the feuds and divisions with which Gomez, Count of Candespina, and Peter, Count of Lara, the two chief suitors, threatened the state, Alphonso announced his fixed determination of giving Urraca to the Prince of Aragon. Not long after the marriage, the two crowns became vacant; and Alphonso of Aragon, who, by his numerous victories against the Moors, obtained the addition of Conqueror, assumed, in right of his wife, the title of Emperor of Spain, which the kings of Leon and Castile claimed, at that time, as due to the extent and importance of their dominions.

The last illness of Alphonso VI. though it had obliged him for a whole year to abandon the cares of government, had not been perceived in the weakness of delegated power, for that power was in the hands of Peranzúles. Upon the death of the king his master, Alphonso of Aragon, well acquainted with the worth of that noble Castilian, confirmed his powers to govern the kingdom; and when the Queen's impatience to appear at her court of Toledo prevailed upon him to send her to Castile some time before he could follow her, it was upon condition that she would strictly adhere to the advice of her former tutor. Urraca's spirit, now emboldened with power, and become ungovernable with the love of pleasure, could ill brook the control of a virtuous man, who fearlessly opposed her misrule and jealously watched her conduct. Lara and Candespina, who formerly sued for her hand, were now

*A. D. 1109.

rivals for an intimacy, to which the Queen's levity seemed to encourage them equally. Peranzúles, finding his efforts unequal to preserve the honour of the Spanish throne, urged the necessity of the King's presence at Toledo. It seems that one of his despatches was intercepted by the Queen, who having already set up pretensions to absolute and independent sway over her portion of the kingdom, enforced a sentence of banishment on Peranzúles, for addressing the King by the title of Emperor of Castile and Leon.

The party which encouraged the Queen in her attempts towards independence, though strong enough to deprive Peranzules of his Castilian states, and oblige him to take refuge in Aragon, had not yet acquired the nerve and consistency which were necessary to make head against the King, who, aware of his wife's misconduct, hastened from Aragon to Toledo, and confined her in the fortress of Castellar, on the banks of the Ebro. Alphonso's military renown, and the decision of his character, struck awe into the restless and aspiring nobles, while the justice of his administration, and the benefits he conferred on the commonalty by rebuilding the towns of Billorado, Berlánga, Sória, and Almazán, which lay dismantled by the Moors, attached the nation to his person, and cemented his power in the kingdom. His right in fact to the throne was, in those times, considered by many as equal to that of his wife; for both were great grandchildren of Sancho III. and the order of succession by representation was still unsettled in Europe.

Prince Alphonso, Urraca's son, was in the mean time in Galicia, under the care of Peter, Count of Trava, his tutor. This nobleman, assisted by the Bishop of Santiago, formed a plan for liberating the Queen, which being carried into execution, put the power of the state into the hands of the Galician party. Alphonso of Aragon, whose absence from Castile had favoured the views of his enemies, penetrated with an armed force into the revolted provinces, and carrying every thing before him, overran in a short time Galicia, Castile, and Estremadura, reducing fortresses, and laying waste the lands of his opponents.

It was not, however, Alphonso's power and military prowess which the united barons had solely to fear. The Queen's natural levity, combined with her unruly ambition, disconcerted at once the well-laid plans which were at work to expel the Aroganese from the Castilian throne.

Consanguinity, even in the third remove, was deemed, in that age, to invalidate marriage; yet this supposed impediment was constantly overlooked in the negotiation of every royal match, as if both parties were glad to leave a flaw in the contract, which might, at their option, free them from its obligations. In the present instance, the Galicians having possessed themselves of the Queen's person, lost no time in pleading the nullity of a marriage, which was the most plausible of Alphonso's claims to the government of Castile and Leon. A petition was accordingly addressed to the Pope, who appointed the Bishop of Santiago, and some other prelates of the Galician party, to examine the merits of the case, and pronounce the sentence of divorce according to Canon Law. While the Bishops were intent on the execution of their commission, the Queen, jealous of the power which her protectors

assumed, and aware that Trava, her son's tutor, had no object but that of governing the kingdom in his pupil's name, fled secretly to her husband, whom she was artful enough to appease by her tears.

The Queen's reconciliation with Alphonso brought fresh troubles on the Galician party. Trava's rivals for power could not endure the thoughts of his reigning in the name of the young prince. A force was raised to take the royal pupil out of his hands, and both were besieged in a castle, which, from its strength, seemed only to be reduced by famine. Unwilling to carry dissension to extremities, and thinking that the presence of the Queen, whom they knew too well to suppose she would long continue quiet with her husband, might reconcile their contending interests, a secret interview was procured, where Urraca concerted a second escape to Galicia. The plot, however, coming to Alphonso's knowledge, he, with a degree of forbearance which could hardly be expected in that rude age, conveyed his wife to Sória, then on the limits of the two kingdoms, and, having obtained a divorce, in an Ecclesiastical Court, allowed her to depart in perfect liberty.

The divisions of Spain, to which we here give the name of kingdoms, were, in those days, far from exhibiting an organized society, existing under a regular government, and forming the compact bodies to which we are accustomed at present. A number of fortified towns and castles stood at considerable distances, without other ties but those of religion, language, and an almost nominal allegiance to the same monarch. Hence the surprising facility with which they changed masters; not only as fortune or intrigue favoured, by turns, some of the more powerful chiefs among the Spaniards, but even as the strength or imbecility of their princes pushed or withdrew the limits between the Moors and the Christians. Under this imperfect system of policy, we must not be surprised to find Alphonso committing the principal fortresses of Castile into the charge of some of his noblemen, and expecting that they would continue in his allegiance, notwithstanding his separation from Urraca.

On none did he repose more confidence than Peranzúles, whom, during the imprisonment of the Queen, he had recalled to be the main support of the Castilian crown, and to help him in the work of improving that kingdom. The most important towns and castles of the country were, accordingly, in that nobleman's keeping; while, during the frequent expeditions of the King, either against the Aragonese Moors, or to quell the rebellions which broke out in Galicia, Peranzúles appeared at the helm of the state by a kind of natural right.

Alphonso's feelings of surprise and indignation on receiving intelligence that Peranzúles had surrendered all the towns and castles into the hands of the Queen, without resistance or delay, and merely upon a simple summons, cannot be easily described. Burning with thoughts of revenge, the Aragonese was collecting an army to repossess himself of what he had meant to preserve, probably as a compensation for the claims to the throne which he had resigned, when, upon a muster-day, as he was surrounded by the flower of his warriors, a knight, in bright armour, and mounted upon a spirited war-horse, was seen to approach the splendid group, which formed the King's court in the open field. Unable to guess who the stranger could be, the eyes of all were rivetted on his person, while he drew up to within a short distance. Here,

alighting from the horse, and letting down his beaver, Peranzúles was recognized with a suppressed emotion-the first note of an indignant shout from the crowd of warriors. This sudden ebullition was changed into suspense, when they saw the ancient knight take off his helmet, and exchange it for something which he took from the hands of his attendant.

The thin white locks which, freed from the casque, fell over a countenance where neither fear nor shame had ever impressed a line, though furrowed, and that deeply, by thought and age, seemed to dazzle at once the multitude of proud eyes which had been raised to look down on the Castilian. Their aim was changed, their eyelids were relaxed, and none looked straight before him but Peranzúles. He advanced with humble dignity to the King's presence, where, bending one knee to the ground, and holding up a halter in his right hand: "My Liege (he said)-I have addressed your Highness by that word which I cannot utter without myself sealing the doom which you have already passed against my life. With that life, indeed, I swore to answer for the places which you intrusted to my loyalty, and here I come to lay it down at your feet. Yet think not that, with life, you will take away my honour, nor sully the name of Peranzúles with the odious reproach of treachery. It has pleased Heaven, indeed, to try me on the brink of the grave by the conflicting claims of the most opposite duties. But I appeal to all who know the laws of Castile and the rules of Spanish knighthood, whether I swerved from the path of honour by delivering up the towns to their and my natural queen, whose crown you gave back when you put her away. Alas! that I should have to blush for my country!-As for myself, though the affront which you have put on the blood of our kings might be supposed to cancel all former obligations, I will have no traitor in future times screen himself behind the name of Peranzúles. Let those whom Fortune may compel to decide between the rights of contending sovereigns-those who, to be just, must be faithless-learn the only price at which they can save both conscience and honour. I have delivered my trust to the right owner, and now give up my life to whom I pledged it."

The King beckoned his knights under a wide-spread oak, whose shade had often been cast over his ancestors while debating the interests of their infant kingdom. Resentment was still stirring in his bosom: but the unanimous voice of his nobles, in favour of Peranzúles, restored the complete ascendancy of his generous mind. They all declared that, by the laws of knightly honour in Spain, the Castilian was guiltless. The King might take his life as a forfeiture; but could not blame, nor reproach him as a criminal.

Alphonso, opening a way through the circle of knights within which he had held his council, came to where the Lord of Valladolid stood alone, holding the rope with as firm a grasp, as if he clung to it over the stormy sea. It was, indeed, the only stay which, in his view, could keep him from sinking into shame. The King did not speak till he had clapsed the venerable warrior in his arms. "Peranzúles, (he said) thou hast been a judge between contending crowns, and judged honourably and truly. Let none, however, assume that proud office, who cannot, like yourself, face him whom he has cast in judgment !"

THE LIVING FRENCH POETS.-NO. I.

De Béranger.

PIERRE Jean de Béranger is one of those geniuses which are rare in the poetical literature of every nation, but most rare in that of France. The rules of French versification have seldom allowed its followers to display originality of thought or manner; and while we see the prose writers of that country developing the most poetical sentiments in their unrhymed sentences, the poets, in the everlasting monotony of their verse, are prosaic to the last degree. Many reasons conspire to produce these paradoxical effects; and the most evident are to be found in the national character. That love of finery, and exaggerated notion of grandeur and grandiloquence, so undeniable in Frenchmen, lead the great majority of their poets, of their best ones too, to follow the beaten track of their predecessors. Then the vanity of upholding the fancied dignity of the Muse; the pride of being enrolled among the train of "faultless monsters" to which French poetry has given birth; and the imperfect conception of the art in a country which boasts of practising it on the narrowest existing scale ;-all this unites to make French poets the willing slaves of an unexampled system of constraint. But a few of them have, from time to time, sent forth sweet notes of wildness though the bars of their cage-and De Béranger dances in his chains.

This writer is only known to the world under the humble designation of "Chansonnier." Song-writing is the line which he has wisely selected, for the display of powers fitted for the very highest walks of poetry. He thus has not only made choice of the style to which his language is best adapted, but has completely limited the attacks of national criticism. Had he chosen the tragic or the epic line, he would have at once thrown himself into the cross-fire and sharp-shooting, in which the little wits of his country are so expert. The grand labour of French criticism has ever been to give words a supremacy over thoughts; to make refinements of idiom superior to bursts of feeling; and to place language on the pedestal where Nature ought to be worshipped. In the spirit of this principle they have put the most ridiculous restrictions on every branch of poetical composition within their reach; they have bowed down to an idol of imaginary perfection; and one of the high priests of this false worship, La Harpe, has acknowledged, with an air of boasting rather than repentance, "Parmi nous le Poëte ne jouit pas du tiers de l'idiome national; le reste lui est interdit comme indigne de lui. Il n'y a guère pour lui qu'un certain nombre de mots convenus." But the volatile spirit of song-writing rises above the atmosphere of these contemptible constraints. It admits of the whole range of the language. Few words are too low, and none too lofty, for its usage. The poet may in that line attain the liberty, which the same La Harpe imagines to have been confined to the Greek and Latin writers, of being by turns "natural without fearing to appear mean, and sublime without dreading to be thought bombastic." The songs of De Béranger are the proofs that the canons of criticism are mere nullities when genius will oppose them; and the success of his efforts has cleared at least one path for the vigorous exerVOL. VI. No. 34.-1823.

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