His life was gentle, and the elements So mix’d in him that Nature might stand up And say to all the world, ‘This was a man.’
But it is not for us to write his epitaph. He needs no marble sepulchre, and he has none, for the precise spot where he rests is unknown. He has built himself a lordlier and more imperishable monument than we could fashion for him—a monument which will endure so long as humour, wisdom, and romance enchant mankind.
The best and wisest of men have their delusions—especially with respect to themselves and their capabilities—and Cervantes was not free from such natural infirmities. He made his first appearance in literature with a sonnet addressed to Philip II.’s third wife, Isabel de Valois, and as this poem is not included in any Spanish edition of his works, I make no apology for quoting it (in an English version by Norman MacColl which has not yet been published).
Most Gracious Queen, within whose breast prevail What thoughts to mortals by God’s grace do come, Oh general refuge of Christendom, Whose fame for piety can never fail. Oh happy armour! with that well-meshed mail Great Philip clothed himself, our sovereign, Illustrious King of the broad lands of Spain, Who fortune and the world holds in his baile. What genius would adventure to proclaim The good that thine example teaches us; If thou wert summoned to the realms of day, Who in thy mortal state put’st us to shame? Better it is to feel and mutter ‘hush,’ Than what is difficult to say, aloud to say.
This is not a masterpiece in little, nor even a marvel of adroitness; but it is highly interesting as the earliest extant effort of one who was destined to become a master, and, moreover, it supplies us with his favourite poetical formulæ. In his description of the Queen as the
general refuge of Christendom, Whose fame for piety can never fail;
Illustrious King of the broad lands of Spain, Who fortune and the world holds in his baile;
Cervantes strikes the characteristic notes of devotion, patriotism, and loyalty to his sovereign. Though he vastly enlarged the circle of his themes later on, he was sufficiently representative of his own time and country to introduce these three motives into his subsequent writings whenever a plausible occasion offered. This is particularly notable in his fugitive verses. Sainte-Beuve says that nearly all men are born poets, but that, as a rule, the poet in us dies young. It was not so with Cervantes—so far as impulse was concerned. From youth to old age he was a persistent versifier. As we have seen, he first appeared in print with elegiacs on the death of Isabel de Valois; as a slave in Algiers he dedicated sonnets to Bartolomeo Ruffino, and from Algiers also he appealed for help to Mateo Vázquez in perhaps the most spirited and sincere of his poetical compositions; he was not long free from slavery when he supplied Juan Rufo Gutiérrez with a resounding patriotic sonnet, and Pedro de Padilla with devotional poems. As he began, so he continued. He has made merry at the practice of issuing books with eulogistic prefatory poems; but he observed the custom in his own _Galatea_, and he was indefatigable in furnishing such verses to his friends. All subjects came alike to him. He would as soon praise the quips and quillets of López Maldonado as lament the death of the famous admiral Santa Cruz, and he celebrated with equal promptitude a tragic epic on the lovers of Teruel and a technical treatise on kidney diseases. It must, I think, be allowed that Cervantes was readily stirred into song.