Note 69 — CABINET OF BIOGRAPHY. (continued 4)

The Argensolas were men much esteemed in their day, and are so often mentioned by Cervantes and Lope de Vega, that they must not be passed over in silence. But as there is nothing very original in their writings, we shall take the liberty of dismissing them in a note. The elder, Lupercio, the historiographer for Aragon, secretary to the empress Maria of Austria, and secretary of state to the count of Lemos when viceroy of Naples, died in that city in 1613, at the age of forty-eight. He founded an academy at Naples, and was a studious and laborious man. He burned a considerable portion of his poems just before his death, as not worthy to survive him. Bartolomé was an ecclesiastic. He followed his brother to Naples. On his death he quitted Italy. He continued the "Annals of Aragon," and wrote a history of the conquest of the Molucca islands; a work written with judgment and elegance. His secular poetry is so similar to his brother's that they cannot be distinguished one from the other. Following the same school, adopting the same tastes, and neither of them original, it is not surprising that their productions bore a close resemblance. The best works, however, of Bartolomé are his sacred Canzoni. He died at Saragossa, in the year 1531, at the age of sixty-five.