Note 763 — Chapter XXVI

Joco-Seria, 1653, ff. 77, 82. In another he parodies some of the familiar old ballads (ff. 43, etc.) in a way that must have been very amusing to the mosqueteros: a practice not uncommon in the lighter dramas of the Spanish stage, most of which are lost. Instances of it are found in the entremes of “Melisandra,” by Lope (Comedias, Tom. I., Valladolid, 1609, p. 333); and two burlesque dramas in Comedias Escogidas, Tom. XLV., 1679,—the first entitled “Traycion en Propria Sangre,” being a parody on the ballads of the “Infantes de Lara,” and the other entitled “El Amor mas Verdadero,” a parody on the ballads of “Durandarte” and “Belerma”;—both very extravagant and dull, but showing the tendencies of the popular taste not a whit the less.