The causes of his success are easily discovered. The Spaniards had hitherto wanted a national literature. Their poetry and their pastorals did not express the heroism, the bigotry, the tenacious honour and violent prejudices that formed their character. Their ballads did, and so did the romances of chivalry; but the latter had become mere imitations, and while they echoed some of the sentiments they entertained, did not mirror their manners. It was like a new creation when the poetic genius of Spain embodied itself in the drama, and under the guise of tragedy and comedy, each romantic, made visible to an audience the ideal of their prejudices and passions, their virtues and vices; and these, in connection with a story that engaged their interest and warmed their hearts with sympathy. The plays of Lope were either romantic tragedies, or plays of la Capa y Espada, of the sword and cloak, sometimes tragic and sometimes comic, but which were founded on the manners of the day. Of course there is a great deal of killing and slaying, but none of the horrors that startle the reader of Titus Andronicus, and other English tragedies of that period. The point of honour, loyalty, love, and jealousy, form the standard groundwork of the dramas of Lope. Lord Holland has analysed the "Star of Seville," in which the interest depends on an affianced lover killing the brother of his betrothed at the instance of the king, and then refusing to betray his royal master's secret. Love and jealousy take singular forms. It was the custom of the lover to watch beneath the barred windows of the house of his lady, and she, if she favoured him, descended and conversed with him from her casement. They never hesitate to acknowledge their love, but it must never be suspected by others. Were it known that a cavalier were thus favoured, the relations of the lady would at once assassinate him, and stab her or shut her up in a convent. Yet when the lovers have escaped these dangers, they marry, and at the sound of wedlock the honour of the family is secured; the injury, to be so mortally avenged, is no longer an injury, and all is well and happy. If a husband is jealous, it is not that he doubts the fidelity of his wife, or even her attachment, but that she has been placed in a situation which might have led to dishonour. Others know this, and she must expiate the fault with her life. In the "Certain for the Doubtful," a lady wishing to dissuade the king from marrying her, confesses that his brother, who is his rival, had once kissed her without her permission. The king instantly resolves to have him assassinated, since he cannot marry the lady till his brother's death has freed her from the dishonour that must accrue, while the perpetrator of such an act lives. He says at the same time "I know that there is no reality in what you tell me, but, although this strange incident be a falsehood invented for the purpose of inducing me not to marry you, it suffices that it has