Note 177 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
The peculiarities of a metrical form so entirely national can, I suppose, be well understood only by an example; and I will, therefore, give here, in the original Spanish, a few lines from a spirited and well-known ballad of Góngora, which I select, because they have been translated into English asonantes, by a writer in the Retrospective Review, whose excellent version follows, and may serve still further to explain and illustrate the measure:—
Aquel rayo de la guerra, Alferez mayor del réyno, Tan galan como valiente, Y tan noble como fiéro, De los mozos embidiado, Y admirado de los viéjos, Y de los niños y el vulgo Señalado con el dédo, El querido de las damas, Por cortesano y discréto, Hijo hasta alli regalado De la fortuna y el tiempo, etc.
Obras, Madrid, 1654, 4to, f. 83.
This rhyme is perfectly perceptible to any ear well accustomed to Spanish poetry, and it must be admitted, I think, that, when, as in the ballad cited, it embraces two of the concluding vowels of the line, and is continued through the whole poem, the effect, even upon a foreigner, is that of a graceful ornament, which satisfies without fatiguing. In English, however, where our vowels have such various powers, and where the consonants preponderate, the case is quite different. This is plain in the following translation of the preceding lines, made with spirit and truth, but failing to produce the effect of the Spanish. Indeed, the rhyme can hardly be said to be perceptible except to the eye, though the measure and its cadences are nicely managed.
“He the thunderbolt of battle, He the first Alferez titled, Who as courteous is as valiant, And the noblest as the fiercest; He who by our youth is envied, Honored by our gravest ancients, By our youth in crowds distinguished By a thousand pointed fingers; He beloved by fairest damsels, For discretion and politeness, Cherished son of time and fortune, Bearing all their gifts divinest,” etc.
Retrospective Review, Vol. IV. p. 35.
Another specimen of English asonantes is to be found in Bowring’s “Ancient Poetry of Spain” (London, 1824, 12mo, p. 107); but the result is substantially the same, and always must be, from the difference between the two languages.