of Skanderbeg, in which drums, trumpets, clarionets, explosions of squibs and rockets, and all the pomp of spectacle is introduced. But the most extravagant creation of Montalvan’s fancy, is his auto of _Polyphemus_, in which the cyclops of that name appears as the allegorical representative of judaism; and the rest of the cyclops, together with the nymph Galathæa, and other mythological beings, are introduced for the allegorical personation of faith and infidelity, according to christian notions. To these characters are added, Appetite as a peasant, Joy as a lady, and finally the Infant Christ. Drum and trumpet accompaniments are not forgotten in this auto. The cyclops too perform on the guitar; and an island sinks amidst a tremendous explosion of fire works.[464] NOVELS IN THE AGE OF CERVANTES AND LOPE DE VEGA. Notwithstanding that poetry, sometimes under heterogeneous, sometimes under harmonizing forms, was, next to religion, the object which principally interested the Spanish public in the age of Cervantes and Lope de Vega, yet elegant prose was not consigned to such obscurity as to engage only the attention of the learned. The old Spanish soundness of understanding which particularly displayed itself in Cervantes and the two Argensolas, still, in some measure maintained its influence. But upon the whole that rhetorical cultivation which had been so early developed in Spain was obviously on the decline. Novels and romances, either decidedly bad or very indifferent, were as widely circulated as rapidly produced, and so great was their number that they counteracted the good effects which the master-piece of Cervantes must necessarily have produced under more favourable circumstances. If few new romances of chivalry were now written, the old ones were read with the greater avidity. After the Galatea of Cervantes, any very successful production in pastoral romance was scarcely to be expected. Romances, depicting the manners of modern society, were, however, proportionally the more numerous. Among the best of the serious, but yet spirited productions of this class, is the Life of _Marcos de Obregon_;[465] by the poet and musician Vicente Espinel.[466] The object of the author was, in his old age, to transmit useful instruction to the rising generation in the form of a novel. The Spanish title in which the hero of the story is styled an _Escudero_, would seem to indicate a romance of chivalry, but the whole character of the work is modern. The Escudero is a sort of gentleman or squire by courtesy, and by no means a shield-bearer. The book is intended as a moral warning for young men without fortune, who hope to get honourably through the world by attaching themselves to persons of distinction. The story, though entertaining, presents nothing particularly attractive; the narration is rather prolix, but still natural; and the diction plainly denotes the classic pupil of the sixteenth century,