Some of the eclogues of Lope, we know, were performed; as, for instance, “The Wood and no Love in it,”--Selva sin Amor,--which was represented with costly pomp and much ingenious apparatus before the king and the royal family.[416] Others, like seven or eight in his “Pastores de Belen,” and one published under the name of “Tomé de Burguillos,”--all of which claim to have been arranged for Christmas and different religious festivals,--so much resemble such as we know were really performed on these occasions, that we can hardly doubt, that, like those just mentioned, they also were represented.[417] While yet others, like the first he ever published, called the “Amorosa,” and his last, addressed to Philis, together with one on the death of his wife, and one on the death of his son, were probably intended only to be read.[418] But all may have been acted, if we are to judge from the habits of the age, when, as we know, eclogues never destined for the stage were represented, as much as if they had been expressly written for it.[419] At any rate, all Lope’s compositions of this kind show how gladly and freely his genius overflowed into the remotest of the many forms of the drama that were recognized or permitted in his time. [416] Obras, Tom. I. p. 225. [417] Obras, Tom. XVI., _passim_, and XIX. p. 278. [418] For these, see Obras, Tom. III. p. 463; Tom. X. p. 193; Tom. IV. p. 430; and Tom. X. p. 362. The last passage contains nearly all we know about his son, Lope Felix. [419] See the scene in the Second Part of Don Quixote, where some gentlemen and ladies, for their own entertainment in the country, were about to represent the eclogues of Garcilasso and Camoens. In the same way, I think, the well-known eclogue which Lope dedicated to Antonio Duke of Alva, (Obras, IV. p. 295), that to Amaryllis, which was the longest he ever wrote, (Tom. X. p. 147), that for the Prince of Esquilache, (Tom. I. p. 352), and most of those in the “Arcadia,” (Tom. VI.), were acted, and written in order to be acted. Why the poem to his friend Claudio, (Tom. IX. p. 355), which is in fact an account of some passages in his own life, with nothing pastoral in its tone or form, is called “an eclogue,” I do not know; nor will I undertake to assign to any particular class the “Military Dialogue in Honor of the Marquis of Espinola,” (Tom. X. p. 337), though I think it is dramatic in its structure, and was probably represented, on some show occasion, before the Marquis himself. CHAPTER XVIII. LOPE DE VEGA, CONTINUED.--HIS CHARACTERISTICS AS A DRAMATIC WRITER.--HIS STORIES, CHARACTERS, AND DIALOGUE.--HIS DISREGARD OF RULES, OF HISTORICAL TRUTH, AND MORAL PROPRIETY.--HIS COMIC UNDERPLOT AND GRACIOSO.--HIS POETICAL STYLE AND MANNER.--HIS FITNESS TO WIN GENERAL FAVOR.--HIS SUCCESS.--HIS FORTUNE, AND THE VAST AMOUNT OF HIS WORKS.