[351] A few words should be added, on each of these last five authors.
1. “Las Odas de Leon de Arroyal,” Madrid, 1784, 12mo. At the end are a few worthless Anacreontics by a lady, whose name is not given; and at the beginning is a truly Spanish definition of lyrical poetry, namely, that “whose verses can be properly played, sung, or _danced_.”
2. Pedro de Montengon, “Eusebio,” Madrid, 1786-87, 4 tom. 8vo. The first two volumes gave great offence by the absence of all injunctions to make religious instruction a part of education; and, though the remaining two made up for this deficiency, there is reason to believe that Montengon intended originally to follow the theory of the “Emile.” “El Antenor” (Madrid, 1788, 2 tom. 8vo) is a prose poem on the tradition of the founding of Padua by the Trojans. “El Rodrigo” (Madrid, 1793, 8vo) is another prose epic, in one volume and twelve books, on the “Last of the Goths.” “Eudoxia,” Madrid, 1793, 8vo; again, a work on education; but on the education of women. “Odas,” Madrid, 1794, 8vo; very poor. Montengon, of whom these are not all the works, was born at Alicante, in 1745, and was alive in 1815. He was very young when he entered the Church, and lived chiefly at Naples, where he threw off his ecclesiastical robes and devoted himself to secular occupations.
3. Francisco Gregorio de Salas, “Coleccion de Epigramas,” etc., 1792, 4th edition, Madrid, 1797, 2 tom. 12mo. His “Observatorio Rústico” (1770, tenth edition 1830) is a long dull eclogue, divided into six parts, which has enjoyed an unreasonable popularity. L. F. Moratin (Obras, 1830, Tom. IV. pp. 287 and 351) gives an epitaph for Salas, with a pleasing prose account of his personal character, which he well says was much more interesting than his poetry; and Sempere (Biblioteca, Tom. V. pp. 69, etc.) gives a list of his works, all of which, I believe, are in the collection printed at Madrid in 1797, _ut sup._ A small volume entitled “Parabolas Morales,” etc., (Madrid, 1803, 12mo,) consisting of prose apologues, somewhat better than any thing of Salas that preceded it, is, I suppose, later, and probably the last of his works.
4. Ignacio de Meras, “Obras Poéticas,” (Madrid, 1797, 2 tom. 12mo,) contain a stiff tragedy, called “Teonea,” in blank verse, and within the rules; a comedy called “The Ward of Madrid,” in the old _figuron_ style, but burlesque and dull; an epic canto on “The Conquest of Minorca,” in 1782, to imitate Moratin’s “Ships of Cortés”; a poem “On the Death of Barbarossa, in 1518”; and a number of sonnets and odes, some of the last of which should rather be called ballads, and some of them satires;--the whole very meagre.