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VIII. A Memoir on the Geography of the North-Eastern Part of
Asia, and on the Question whether Asia and America
are contiguous, or are separated by the Sea. By
Capt. James Burney, F.R.S.

IX. Characters of Shakespear's Plays. By William Hazlitt.
X. Origin of the Pindaries; preceded by Historical Notices
on the Rise of the different Mahratta States. By an
Officer in the Service of the Honourable East India
Company.

431

458

- 466

XI. Brudstykker af en Dagbok holden i Grönland i Aarene 1770-1778 af Hans Egede Saabye, fordum ordineret Missionær i Claushavns og Christianshaabs distrikter nu Sognepræst til Udbye i Fyens stift.

XII. Investigation of the Cause of Easter, 1818, being appointed
to be celebrated on a Wrong Day, &c. &c. By a
Member of the University of Oxford.

XIII. The Secret and True History of the Church of Scotland,
from the Restoration to the
year 1678. By the Rev.
Mr. James Kirkton, &c. With an Account of the
Murder of Archbishop Sharp. By James Russell, an
actor therein. Edited from the MS. by Charles Kirk-
patrick Sharpe.

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Note, on Colonel Wilks's Explanation.'

Quarterly List of New Publications.

Index

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· 480

496

- 502

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THE

QUARTERLY REVIEW.

OCTOBER, 1817.

ART. I. Some Account of the Lives and Writings of Lope Felix de Vega Carpio, and Guillen de Castro. By Henry Richard Lord Holland. 2 vols. London. 1817.

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O name among the Spanish poets is so generally known out of its own country as that of Lope de Vega, but it is only the name; and perhaps no author whose reputation is so widely extended has been so little read. The good fortune, however, of this phoenix of Spain' has not wholly forsaken him, and he has been as happy now in a biographer, as he was during his life in obtaining the patronage of the great, and the favour of the public.

This celebrated man was born at Madrid on the 25th of November, 1562: both his parents were persons of good family in that city, and the father, according to the son's testimony, was deserving of praise as a poet : it may, indeed, frequently be noticed, that an aptitude for metre is hereditary, like that for drawing, or the more analogous art of music. At five years of age young Lope is said to have composed verses, and exchanged them with his school-fellows for prints and sweetmeats :-school-boys in Spain must be very different from those in other parts of the world, if such wares were saleable among them. It is said also, that at this early age he could read Latin; and that at eleven he was master of the Latin idiom, with rhetoric, eloquence, and poetry :—but however complete his classical education may have been thought, the Latin verses which he ventured to publish in after-life would not have passed muster in the fourth form at Westminster. He was taught also to dance, to sing, and to fence. When he was about fourteen he ran away from school, being actuated, according to his friend and eulogist, Montalvan, by a restless desire of seeing the worldanother biographer, with more propriety, hints at this as one of the vagaries and scrapes of his youth. One of his school-fellows accompanied him in his elopement; they bought a mule at Segovia, and got as far as Astorga before they perceived that the state of their finances made it prudent for them to return home. This measure, which in itself was not very palatable, was accelerated by an unpleasant adventure at Segovia on their way back. Having offered some trinkets for sale, the tradesman to whom they applied took them before a magistrate upon a suspicion that they had stolen them, and the magistrate, with a moderation which, from the

VOL. XVIII. NO. XXXV.

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praise

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