Note 615 — Chapter XXIII

“La Púrpura de la Rosa” and “Las Fortunas de Andrómeda y Perseo” are both of them plays in the national taste, and yet were sung throughout. The last is taken from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Lib. IV. and V., and was produced before the court with a magnificent theatrical apparatus. The first, which was written in honor of the marriage of Louis XIV. with the Infanta Maria Teresa, 1660, was also taken from Ovid (Met., Lib. X.); and in the loa that precedes it we are told expressly, “The play is to be wholly in music, and is intended to introduce this style among us, that other nations may see they have competitors for those distinctions of which they boast.” Operas in Spain, however, never had any permanent success, though they had in Portugal.