He next entered upon an extensive enterprise which soon began to give him both reputation and profit. This was the writing of a score of historical romances, after the model of those of Erckmann-Chatrian, called 'Episodios Nacionales' (National Episodes). They are divided into two series, the first beginning with 'Trafalgar' (1873), the second with 'El Equipaje del Rey Jose' (King Joseph's Baggage: 1875). They deal with the two modern periods comprising the deliverance of the country from the usurpation of the French, and the more obscure struggles against Ferdinand VII., who sought to reduce the country under the same absolutist rule that had prevailed before the ideas of the French Revolution liberalized the whole of Europe. The history in these romances is intermingled with personal interests and adventures, to give it an air of informality; and though each is complete in itself, some knowledge of Spanish history is desirable as an aid to understanding them. They are considerably interlinked among themselves, the same characters appearing more or less in successive volumes. The hero of the first series is one Gabriel, who narrates them all in the first person. He is a poor boy who becomes servant to a family near Cadiz. He accompanies his master on board the huge Santissima Trinidad, the largest ship of her age, and is able to describe in detail the action of Trafalgar, the description being the more interesting for us as coming from the Spanish point of view. In 'La Corte de Carlos IV.' (The Court of Charles IV.: 1873), we find him page to a leading actress, and an eye-witness to the degeneracy of that monarch and his favorite Godoy, which resulted in the seizure of the country by Napoleon for his brother Joseph. In 'La Batalla de los Arapiles' (translated by Rollo Ogden as 'The Battle of Salamanca': 1875), the last of the series, the same Gabriel is a major, and performs an important commission for Wellington. He has risen to this level step by step, and on the way has had as many adventures as one of Dumas's guardsmen, and has carried them off as gallantly. In the second series of 'Episodios,' Salvador Monsalud is the principal character. He is a young fellow who is led by dire want--and also by sharing the liberalized French view of the decadence and worthlessness of the Spanish form of rule--to take service in the body-guard of Joseph Bonaparte. A chapter full of strength and pathos, in 'King Joseph's Baggage,' shows him disowned by his mother and cast off by his village sweetheart on account of such service, both of them frantic with a spirit of independence like that which animated the Maid of Saragossa. A feature of this book that gives it originality is that the action turns not upon the usual principal features of battle, but upon the fate of the rich baggage train of booty with which Joseph Bonaparte had hoped to escape to France after his brief, disastrous reign.