But the examples already quoted will suffice for our assertion. Sometimes the poet, weary perhaps of monotony and heaviness, varies from the measure which he generally uses, and introduces another combination of rhymes in songs which he mingles with his narrative; as, for instance, the following:-- Near the vale's fresh fountain, Having past the mountain, I found relief, at play Of the first beams of day. I thought to die upon The mountain summits lone, With cold and hunger, lost Mid glaciers, snows, and frost. Beside the sparkling rill, At foot of a small hill, A shepherdess I met,-- I see her smiling yet: Her cheeks made e'en the red Ripe roses pale; I said To her, 'Good morrow, sweet, I worship at thy feet!' &c. Don Tomas Antonio Sanchez has published the works of almost all the authors mentioned, with illustrations, excellent, as well for the notices given of them, as for the elucidation of the text, which the antiquity and rudeness of the language, and the errors of manuscripts, by their complication, obscured. There, as in an armoury, rest these venerable antiques, precious objects of curiosity for the learned, of investigation for the grammarian, of observation for the philosopher and historian, whilst the poet, without losing time in studying them, salutes them with respect, as the cradle of his language and his art. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote A: _Tablas_, in allusion to those celebrated calculations drawn up under the superintendence of this monarch, and called, after him, the _Alphonsine Tables_, a work truly extraordinary for the age.] [Footnote B: Some learned men question whether these two works do actually belong to the time and author to whom they are ascribed; and the improvement which the versification and language present, forms a very strong presumption in favour of this doubt.] CHAPTER II. OF SPANISH POETRY TO THE TIME OF GARCILASSO.