A criticism of the style of _La Araucana_ is hardly involved in the purpose of the present writing. Concerning this subject reliance must be placed on the judgment of Spanish critics, by whom one will find the excellences and defects of Ercilla’s verses sufficiently emphasized. There are stretches of dull and loose narration, but here and there are spirited verses, and octaves as fine as any found elsewhere in the Spanish language; but in this age of rapid movement, in these days of social impatience, three hundred and forty years after its publication, the reading of the poem is likely to be confined to persons who on account of their nationality or for other reasons have a special interest in the romantic history of the Spanish conquest in Chile. It is on its quality as history that stress must be laid. “Ercilla,” to quote a French critic, “n’était qu’un historien fourvoyé dans la poésie.... Il manquait surtout de sensibilité, de tendresse, pour mieux dire, et c’est selon nous, la grande cause de son infériorité. Il ne parait avoir ressenti vivement que l’ivresse brutale des combats. Il quitte la patrie sans un soupir, il la retrouve sans un transport. Il n’a fait parler ni l’amour paternel, ni l’amour filial. Les amants et les époux qu’il met en scène sont des raisonneurs froids, sententieux et subtils, et s’il leur échappe par hasard un cri passionné nous y percevons l’écho d’une plainte antique.”[67] In his _Retórica poética_, Barros Arana affirms that Ercilla “describes with ardour” the combats and naturally and correctly the localities, sketches regularly the characters, and puts beautiful speeches into the mouth of his heroes, but his work lacks the plan and the necessary unity of an epic to such a degree that instead of a poem it appears as a poetical history of the war it celebrates.[68] [Sidenote: Popularity of the poem] But in spite of its shortcomings there are few books that have been oftener printed, and, like the other great modern historical poems, it has enjoyed a very noteworthy popularity. Even in recent times new and popular editions have appeared, and in the last half of the nineteenth century Alexandre Nicolas translated it into French prose, published at Paris in two volumes in 1869. It had already been translated into German by C. M. Winterling thirty-eight years earlier. An abridged translation into French, by Gilibert de Merlhiac, appeared in 1824. The metrical translation of parts of the poem into English, published in the translation of Molina’s _Historia de Chile_ (Middletown, Conn., 1808) hardly merits comment. The most striking success of the poem was achieved in Chile, where the people, ignorant of all the favourable and unfavourable contentions of the critics, have regarded it as their Iliad, celebrating the beginning of their national life. [Sidenote: _Hechos de Don García_] [Sidenote: Character of Figueroa’s book] [Sidenote: Life of Figueroa]