Whether Francisco de Tarrega, who can be traced from 1591 to 1608, was one of those who early came from Valencia to Madrid as writers for the theatre is uncertain. But we have proof that he was a canon of the cathedral in the first-named city, and yet was well known in the new capital, where his plays were acted and printed.[497] One of them is important, because it shows the modes of representation in his time, as well as the peculiarities of his own drama. It begins with a _loa_, which in this case is truly a compliment, as its name implies; but it is, at the same time, a witty and quaint ballad in praise of ugly women. Then comes what is called a “Dance at Leganitos,”--a popular resort in the suburbs of Madrid, which here gives its name to a rude farce founded on a contest in the open street between two lackeys.[498] [497] It is ascertained that the Canon Tarrega lived at Valencia in 1591, and wrote eleven plays, two of which are known only by their titles. The rest were printed at Madrid in 1614, and again in 1616. Cervantes praises him in the Preface to his Comedias, 1615, among the early followers of Lope, for his _discrecion é inumerables conceptos_. It is evident from the notice of the “Enemiga Favorable,” by the wise canon in Don Quixote, that it was then regarded as the best of its author’s plays, as it has been ever since. Rodriguez, Biblioteca Valentina, Valencia, 1747, folio, p. 146. Ximeno, Escritores de Valencia, Valencia, 1747, Tom. I. p. 240. Fuster, Biblioteca Valentina, Valencia, 1827, folio, Tom. I. p. 310. Don Quixote, Parte I., c. 48. [498] This farce, much like an _entremes_ or _saynete_ of modern times, is a quarrel between two lackeys for a damsel of their own condition, which ends with one of them being half drowned by the other in a public fountain. It winds up with a ballad older than itself; for it alludes to a street as being about to be constructed through Leganitos, while one of the personages in the farce speaks of the street as already there. The fountain is appropriately introduced, for Leganitos was famous for it. (See Cervantes, Ilustre Fregona, and D. Quixote, Parte II., c. 22, with the note of Pellicer.) Such little circumstances abound in the popular portions of the old Spanish drama, and added much to its effect at the time it appeared.