As a sort of prologue, a few satirical petitions were produced, which were intended to excite merriment, and, no doubt, were successful; after which Lope opened the literary proceedings of the festival, by pronouncing a poetical oration of above seven hundred lines in honor of San Isidro. This was followed by reading the subjects for the nine prizes offered by the nine Muses, together with the rules according to which the honors of the occasion were to be adjudged; and then came the poems themselves. Among the competitors were many of the principal men of letters of the time: Zarate, Guillen de Castro, Jauregui, Espinel, Montalvan, Pantaleon, Silveira, the young Calderon, and Lope himself, with the son who bore his name, still a boy. All this, or nearly all of it, was grave, and beseeming the grave occasion. But at the end of the list of those who entered their claims for each prize, there always appeared a sort of masque, who, under the assumed name of Master Burguillos, “seasoned the feast in the most savory manner,” it is said, with his amusing verses, caricaturing the whole, like the _gracioso_ of the popular theatre, and serving as a kind of interlude after each division of the more regular drama. Lope took hardly any pains to conceal that this savory part of the festival was entirely his own; so surely had his theatrical instincts indicated to him the merry relief its introduction would give to the stateliness and solemnity of the occasion.[259] All the various performances were read by him with much effect, and at the end he gave a light and pleasant account, in the old popular ballad measure, of what had been done; after which the judges pronounced the names of the successful competitors. Who they were, we are not told; but the offerings of all--those of the unsuccessful as well as of the successful--were published by him without delay. [259] “But let the reader note well,” says Lope, “that the verses of Master Burguillos must be supposititious; for he did not appear at the contest; and all he wrote is in jest, and made the festival very savory. And as he did not appear for any prize, it was generally believed that he was a character introduced by Lope himself.” Obras, Tom. XI. p. 401. See also p. 598.