That he did not play a more fruitfully effective part in politics was less his fault than that of the politics of the day; but the twofold incentive of serving his country by useful legislation and of a personal triumph in the Chamber prevented this ingenuous victim of political intrigue from ever devoting himself exclusively to literature. In politics he was an opportunist in the best sense of the word and a Liberal who detested the art of the demagogue. His few months as Minister in 1852 gave no scope for his real power of organization and of stimulating others. In the life and literature of his country he was a great civilizing and renovating force. He taught his countrymen to read and what to read, and, having freed them from the trammels of pseudo-classicism, did his utmost to prevent them from merely exchanging pedantry for insipidity. _Adozinda_, based on the _romance_ _Sylvaninha_ and originally published in London in 1828 and reviewed in the _Foreign Quarterly Review_, October 1832) or by others, e. g. Balthasar Diaz’ _O Marques de Mantua_, or popular _romances_ revised and polished by their collector. His own compositions (vol. i) often have great charm, as _Miragaia_, _Rosalinda_, _Bernal Francez_.] His early verses, many of the poems published or reprinted in _Lyrica de João Minimo_ (1829), _Flores sem Fructo_ (1845), and _Fabulas e Contos_ (1853), were written under the influence of Filinto Elysio and the eighteenth century, but, fired by romanticism during his first exile in France, he introduced it into Portugal in his epic poems _Camões_ (1825) and _Dona Branca_ (1826),[658] in which prosaic passages alternate with others of fervent poetic beauty and glimpses of popular customs which in themselves spell poetry in Portugal. But Garrett was no super-romantic, in fact he deprecated ‘the extravagances and exaggerations of the ephemeral romanticism which is now coming to an end in Europe’.[659] At Brussels he learnt German, and the poetry, and especially the plays, of Goethe cast a steadying influence over his work. Garrett had early been attracted towards the theatre. His _Merope_, in its subject derived from Alfieri, and _Catão_ (1821) were both written in his student days. Neither of them can be called dramatic. In vain a glow of liberty[660] and rhetoric strives to melt the ice of _Catão_: its parliamentary debates still leave the reader cold. When fifteen years later, in the tercentenary year of Vicente’s last comedy, he was able definitely to undertake his favourite scheme of providing Portugal with a national drama, he found difficulties. He had to provide not only theatre, actors, and audience, but also the plays. He succeeded in instilling his keenness into some of his more lethargic countrymen, but, not content with translating from the French, Italian, or Spanish, himself wrote a series of plays to pave the way. His themes, unlike those of his earlier efforts, were now