of the Italians; but the epic idea of the work is entirely his own; and the kind of composition which forms its ground-work, was something entirely new in poetic literature. The object of Camoens was to recount, in epic strains, with pure poetic feeling, the achievements of the heroes and great men of Portugal in general, not of any individual in particular, and consequently not of Vasco da Gama, who is commonly considered the hero of the Lusiad. He was not to be satisfied with drawing up a poetically-adorned official report, like the Spanish Azaucana, written at a latter period by Ercilla.* 'The title which Camoens gave to his heroic poem, sufficiently denotes the nature of its subject. He named it Os Lusiadas, that is to say, the Lusitanians or Portuguese. This choice of a title was doubtless influenced by the prevailing taste of the Portu→ guese poets of that age, to whom the common name of their nation appeared unpoetic, and also by the popular notion that the favourite term, Lusitania, was derived from a certain mythological hero, named Lusus, who visited Portugal in company with Ulysses, and who, conjointly with the Greek warrior, built the city of Lisbon (Ulyssipolis). Camoens is not to blame if the editors of his poem, wishing to reconcile its somewhat unusual title with the names of other epic compositions, have converted the Lusiadas into the Lusiada.+ But the poem may be designated by its common title,

See the History of Spanish Literature, p. 408.

+ The edition with the Commentaries of Faria e Sousa, published in the year 1656, has the old title of Lusiadas; but in the book itself, the poem is frequently styled the Lusiada. The latter title is, therefore, far from being a recent innovation.

without offence to its spirit or its subject. At the same time, it must not be forgotten, that the Lusiad is a totally different kind of heroic poem from all those epopees, whether successful or unsuccessful, in which a single hero is the mainspring of the whole epic action. According to the plan which Camoens sketched for his national poem, he was enabled to dispense with the choice of a hero, whose achievements should throw those of all others into the shade, and form the sole source of epic interest. To this plan, however, an essential beauty of epic poetry was necessarily sacrificed. The composition lost the advantage of those little groups of characters, which would otherwise have been assembled around the principal character. From its plan, therefore, the Lusiad cannot be accounted such a model of epic perfection as the Iliad, or even as the Eneid, in which that perfection, more faintly presented, is still to be found. But as a narrative poem, deriving a total effect from the union of its parts, the Lusiad may be considered an epic whole, and consequently, a poem entirely different in kind from the Metamorphoses of Ovid, or even the Divina Comedia of Dante. A poetic and epic grouping of all the great and most interesting events in the annals of his native country was what Camoens wished to accomplish. He, therefore, very happily selected the event which constitutes the most brilliant epoch in Portuguese history, as a common keeping point for all the different parts of his epic picture. The discovery of the passage to India by Vasco da Gama, was certainly not an heroic achievement, in the usual sense of the term, but in that age, when such adventures bordered on the

incredible, it was a truly heroic enterprize. Camoens made this event the ground-work of the epic unity of his poem. But in that unity, Vasco da Gama is merely the spindle, round which the thread of the narrative is wound. His dignity, as the leader of his intrepid countrymen, renders him, in some degree, conspicuous; but in other respects he is not distinguished, and the interest of the whole poem depends no more on him than on his companions. The heroes who shine with the greatest lustre in the Lusiad, even the constable, Nuna Alvarez Pereira, who is the most remarkable among them, are all introduced, in, what are styled, the episodes. But the Lusiad has in reality no episode, except the short story of the giant Adamastor. Another portion of the work, which is commonly called an episode, is a poetic sketch from the ancient history of Portugal, and belongs as essentially to the whole as any of the other principal parts of the great picture. It even occupies near one half of the poem. It is precisely on these parts, called episodes, that the epic grandeur of the whole composition rests, and in them the finest passages in the poem occur. Unless the idea of the plan of the Lusiad be rightly seized, the composition will appear in a false light on whatever side it may be viewed.

The Lusiad, designated as a whole, may, therefore, be termed an epic national picture of Portuguese glory, something greater than a mere gallery of poetic stories, but less than a perfect epopee. The principles of the composition are exceedingly simple; but, that they may not be misconceived, it is necessary to understand the epic machinery of the poem, as the poet himself

would have it understood, and as it was understood in the spirit of the age by his cotemporaries. Camoens was too truly a poet to exclude from his Lusiad the charm of the marvellous, and the co-operation of supernatural beings. But he was either accidentally less happy than Tasso in the choice of epic machinery, for a modern heroic poem, or he purposely preferred the Greek mythology as the most beautiful. Nothing prevented him from assigning the necessary parts in his machinery to the good, and bad agents of popular Christian belief; and the subject seems particularly calculated for such an application, as the diffusion of Christianity, by the discoveries and conquests of the Portuguese, is, in the poem itself, made the highest merit of the nation. Camoens, however, appears to be of opinion, that an epic poem, such as he had planned, should be adorned with learning, and particularly mythological learning; and besides, by the introduction of the Greek deities, the whole composition seemed to be raised to the true poetic region of the ancient epopoeia Thus there remains the singular incongruity of the Greek mythology, and the achievements of the Portuguese Christians, who, on no occasion, neglect to act and discourse in the true spirit of their faith. But, in the mind of Camoens, this incongruity was removed by the opinion, which he shared in common with his contemporaries, that the machinery in epopoeia was merely a poetic figure, and that all the heathen deities might be introduced as allegorical characters, in mo dern narrative poetry, by the same privilege which enables Cupid to keep his place in the lyric compositions of Christian poets, without any theological or

literary offence. Thus Camoens allegorically introduced Olympus into his poem. The erroneous opinion which misled the poet, does not, it is true, redeem this defect in the poem, though it contributes to cast a veil over it. But if the reader admits the opinion, which he must do in order to understand the poet in his own sense, then will even the offence against taste be found to vanish imperceptibly. This compromise once made, the whole poem becomes not only singular, but even wonderful in its singularity, particularly where Vasco da Gama and his companions sport with Thetis and her nymphs allegorically, and yet, in good carnest; and the historical material begins, as if suddenly enabled by magic, to shine in the full light of poetry.

The Lusiad assumes a mythological character immediately after the introductory stanzas. Vasco da Gama, with his squadron, has already doubled the Cape of Good Hope; and steering along the eastern coast of Africa, he approaches the Indian Seas. The gods are then assembled on Olympus to deliberate on the fate of India. Venus and Bacchus form two par-` ties; the former in favour of the Portuguese, and the latter against them. In this application of the allegory, the poet, doubtless, gratified his patriotic pride; for Portugal was, even by the Spaniards, styled the native land of love; and temperance in the use of wine was a national virtue of the Portuguese. In order to give a still higher import to this allegory, Venus is made to consider the Portuguese as modern Romans, and to entertain for them the same regard which she formerly extended to the people of ancient Rome: but Bac

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