twenty-nine years of age when he published the first collection of his poetic works. He had previously been engaged in delivering academic lectures, probably on jurisprudence, in the university of Coimbra. In his poetic pursuits, he was joined by several young men of similar talent, particularly Andrade Caminha, Jeronymo Cortereal, and Diogo Bernardes, who, together with other poets of that age, formed a circle of disciples and admirers of Saa de Miranda. But he grew tired of his university studies, and visited the court where he soon acquired distinction. He obtained the high office of _desembargador de camara de supplicaçaõ_ (judge of the council of grace), and he was likewise appointed a _fidalgo da casa real_ (gentleman of the royal household). For the young poets of Portugal he now became an oracle of criticism; and a most brilliant prospect had opened itself to him, when in the year 1569, and at the age of forty-one, he died of the plague which was supposed to be brought to Lisbon from the Levant. A monument was erected to his memory in the church where he was buried; but the stone is now much defaced.[105] Though not a poet of the first rank, Ferreira has, as a classical poet, been surpassed by no other in Portuguese literature, and has in that respect also had but few equals in the literature of Spain. His fancy was circumscribed, and to originality he seems to have put forth no pretension; but the sound taste which he manifested from the commencement of his poetic cultivation, was a thing totally new in Portugal at that period. Ferreira was by no means a blind or pedantic imitator of the ancients and the Italians. He was, however, animated by an enthusiastic feeling for every thing truly exemplary in the writings of the foreign poets whom he chose for prototypes; his vigorous understanding, cherished with particular predilection the idea of reforming the national Portuguese poetry after such models; and patriotic zeal prompted him to complete what poetic feeling and sound judgment had combined to suggest. Correctness of ideas as well as of language was to him the first requisite of all poetic beauty. He wished to banish from the poetry of his native land those traces of orientalism which it still retained. It was not less his study to avoid the eccentric than the common. He attached more importance to noble than to extraordinary ideas. But to poetic energy, precision and plenitude of picturesque expression, or what may be termed the poetry of language, his attention was chiefly directed. This quality he cultivated with a degree of talent and judgment, which would have imparted to his style Horatian perfection, were it not for the philosophic laconism peculiar to the diction of Horace, and which no modern poet, Klopstock alone excepted, has been able to approach. Ferreira was the first Portuguese writer who manifested a particular interest in the poetic dignity of his native tongue. He was the first