Of these sketches, several are striking. First, we have a scene between Cervantes himself and two of his fellow-captives, in which they are jeered at as slaves and Christians by the Moors, and in which they give an account of the martyrdom in Algiers of a Spanish priest, which was subsequently used by Lope de Vega in one of his dramas. Next, we have the attempt of Pedro Alvarez to escape to Oran, which is, no doubt, taken from the similar attempt of Cervantes, and has all the spirit of a drawing from life. And, in different places, we have two or three painful scenes of the public sale of slaves, and especially of little children, which he must often have witnessed, and which again Lope de Vega thought worth borrowing, when he had risen, as Cervantes calls it, to the monarchy of the scene.[113] The whole play is divided into five _jornadas_ or acts, and written in octaves, _redondillas_, _terza rima_, blank verse, and almost all the other measures known to Spanish poetry; while among the persons of the drama are strangely scattered, as prominent actors, Necessity, Opportunity, a Lion, and a Demon. [113] The “Esclavos en Argel” of Lope is found in his Comedias, Tom. XXV., (Çaragoça, 1647, 4to, pp. 231-260), and shows that he borrowed very freely from the play of Cervantes, which, it should be remembered, had not then been printed, so that he must have used a manuscript. The scenes of the sale of the Christian children, (pp. 249, 250), and the scenes between the same children after one of them had become a Mohammedan, (pp. 259, 260), as they stand in Lope, are taken from the corresponding scenes in Cervantes (pp. 316-323, and 364-366, ed. 1784). Much of the story, and passages in other parts of the play, are also borrowed. The martyrdom of the Valencian priest, which is merely described by Cervantes, (pp. 298-305), is made a principal dramatic point in the third _jornada_ of Lope’s play, where the execution occurs, in the most revolting form, on the stage (p. 263). Yet, notwithstanding the unhappy confusion and carelessness all this implies, there are passages in the Trato de Argel which are poetical. Aurelio, the hero,--who is a Christian captive, affianced to another captive named Sylvia,--is loved by Zara, a Moorish lady, whose confidante, Fatima, makes a wild incantation in order to obtain means to secure the gratification of her mistress’s love; the result of which is that a demon rises and places in her power Necessity and Opportunity. These two immaterial agencies are then sent by her upon the stage, and--invisible to Aurelio himself, but seen by the spectators--tempt him with evil thoughts to yield to the seductions of the fair unbeliever.[114] When they are gone, he thus expresses, in soliloquy, his feelings at the idea of having nearly yielded:--