After the complete consolidation of the monarchies of Castile and Arragon by the accession of Charles of Austria, the grandson of Isabella and Ferdinand, there appears to have been, for a short time, a suspension of all literary activity in Spain. The political convulsions which then agitated the interior of the two united kingdoms, occupied the public mind too powerfully to allow any interest to be felt in calmer and more agreeable objects. But as soon as the civil contests were terminated by the success of the Austrian party, and the enterprising Charles, incited by Francis I. employed the force of his Spanish states to win new dominions in Italy, the poetic genius of Spain revived in all its pristine vigour. In the meantime, the ancient dialect of the Arragonian provinces began to be supplanted by the Castilian, which became the language of the state and of public business throughout Spain. Castile was then considered the heart of the whole monarchy. Madrid rose to the rank of the capital of Spain, and Saragossa sunk into the condition of a provincial town. It was therefore no very extraordinary event, that a Catalonian, whose maternal language still possessed a certain degree of poetic consideration, should, in connection with a Castilian, produce a revolution in Castilian poetry. BOSCAN. Juan Boscan Almogavèr, who, in concert with his friend Garcilaso de la Vega, introduced the Italian style into Castilian poetry, was born in Barcelona, towards the close of the fifteenth century. He belonged to one of the Patrician families of that city, of equal rank with the nobility of the country. Though possessing a liberal education, and sufficient fortune to enable him to gratify his inclination for literary studies, without regard to any secondary views, he embarked, notwithstanding, on his first outset in life for a short period in the profession of arms. He afterwards travelled, but the countries he visited are not mentioned in the brief notices which remain of him. If, however, it be supposed that he went at this time to Italy, and rendered himself intimately acquainted with the literature of that country, it appears that he was still far from entertaining the idea of transplanting the forms and manner of Italian poetry into Spain; for the Castilian verses, which he wrote in his youth, were all in the ancient lyric style, which, since the time of Juan de Mena no one had thought it necessary to try to improve. It was not until 1526, when, after having flourished at the court of Charles V. he had made a happy marriage, and was settled in his native city, that a Venetian induced him to imitate the Italian poetry in the Castilian language. The emperor resided for some time in Granada; and, among the foreign ministers who repaired to his court, was Andrea Navagero, the envoy from Venice, a man of great literary and historical knowledge, and, like every well-educated Italian of that age, a writer of canzoni and sonnets.