one of these two brothers, Antonio Nunalvarez Pereira, of a manuscript of Garci Lasso de la Vega’s poems shortly before Miranda’s marriage revived his enthusiasm for the alien metres. He turned again to the hendecasyllable and wrote the eclogues _Andrés_ (1535), _Celia_, and _Nemoroso_ (1537), the latter in memory of the tragic death of Garci Lasso in the preceding year. He returned to the _quintilha_ later, employing it with flowing ease in _A Egipciaca Santa Maria_ (or _Santa Maria Egipciaca_), which was probably written between 1544 and 1554, when he was educating his two sons with _amor encoberto e moderado_ (_A Egipciaca_, p. 3), and nearer the former than the latter date. Its vigour and the promise of more[323] after 721 _quintilhas_ preclude the date (1556-8) assigned to it by its first editor, even without the statement of the 1614 biographer that Miranda wrote scarcely anything after his wife’s death in 1555; but it may have been written even earlier, before 1544. And still through all these various poems, despite their undeniable value and incidental beauties, it is the man, his life and character, that interest us. The wild yet green and peaceful scenery of Minho accorded well with his _alma soberana_, at once active and contemplative, disciplined and independent. At first hunting the wolf and boar occupied his leisure--we see him out with his dogs Hunter, Swallowfoot, &c., in crimson dawn and breathless noonday--and gave him a hundred opportunities for quiet observation of Nature, the streams, especially the birds, and the peasants. The poems written soon after his arrival still retain the freshness of these impressions. His evenings were spent with his friends at Cabeceiras--true _noctes cenaeque deum_--or in the more formal society at Crasto or with music--he played the viola--or his favourite authors, Homer in Greek, or Horace, the Bible, the Italians, or Garci Lasso and Boscán. Later gardening[324] and the education of his sons and entertainment of visitors took the place of his favourite wolf-hunting. As his fame and influence spread, Diogo Bernardez (whose recollections of Miranda were recorded in the 1614 life) was not the only disciple who came to see him in his retreat, and he corresponded in verse with most of the poets of the time, Andrade Caminha, Montemôr, Ferreira, D. Manuel de Portugal, Bernardez. Cardinal Henrique was a steadfast admirer of his work, and the young Prince João asked for a copy: _lhas mandou pedir_. This wide recognition after the first coldness[325] was some measure of comfort for the many sorrows of his last years, the death of his eldest son Gonçalo, killed in his teens in Africa (1553), of his wife (1555), of that promising precocious Prince João (1537-54) to whom he had thrice sent a collection of his poems, the departure of his brother, Mem, to become one of the most notable Governors of Brazil (1557). In the latter year King João died, leaving an infant heir to a