The two Pastoral Colloquies differ from the four Comedias, partly in having even less carefully constructed plots, and partly in affecting, through their more bucolic portions, a stately and pedantic air, which is any thing but agreeable. They belong, however, substantially to the same class of dramas, and received a different name, perhaps, only from the circumstance, that a pastoral tone was always popular in Spanish poetry, and that, from the time of Enzina, it had been considered peculiarly fitted for public exhibition. The comic parts of the colloquies are the only portions of them that have merit; and the following passage from that of “Timbria” is as characteristic of Lope de Rueda’s light and natural manner as any thing, perhaps, that can be selected from what we have of his dramas. It is a discussion between Leno, the shrewd fool of the piece, and Troico,[21] in which Leno ingeniously contrives to get rid of all blame for having eaten up a nice cake which Timbria, the lady in love with Troico, had sent to him by the faithless glutton. [21] Troico, it should be observed, is a woman in disguise. _Leno._ Ah, Troico, are you there? _Troico._ Yes, my good fellow, don’t you see I am? _Leno._ It would be better if I did not see it. _Troico._ Why so, Leno? _Leno._ Why then you would not know a piece of ill-luck that has just happened. _Troico._ What ill-luck? _Leno._ What day is it to-day? _Troico._ Thursday. _Leno._ Thursday? How soon will Tuesday come, then? _Troico._ Tuesday is passed two days ago. _Leno._ Well, that’s something;--but tell me, are there not other days of ill-luck as well as Tuesdays?[22] [22] This superstition about Tuesday as an unlucky day is not unfrequent in the old Spanish drama:-- Está escrito, El Martes es dia aciago. Lope de Vega, El Cuerdo en su Casa, Acto II. Comedias, Madrid, 1615, 4to, Tom. VI. f. 112. a. _Troico._ What do you ask that for? _Leno._ I ask, because there may be unlucky pancakes, if there are unlucky Thursdays. _Troico._ I suppose so. _Leno._ Now stop there;--suppose one of yours had been eaten of a Thursday; on whom would the ill-luck have fallen? on the pancake or on you? _Troico._ No doubt, on me. _Leno._ Then, my good Troico, comfort yourself, and begin to suffer and be patient; for men, as the saying is, are born to misfortunes, and there are matters, in fine, that come from God; and in the order of time you must die yourself, and, as the saying is, your last hour will then be come and arrived. Take it, then, patiently, and remember that we are here to-morrow and gone to-day. _Troico._ For heaven’s sake, Leno, is any body in the family dead? Or else why do you console me so? _Leno._ Would to heaven that were all, Troico! _Troico._ Then what is it? Can’t you tell me, without so many circumlocutions? What is all this preamble about?