Note 380 — Chapter VI

Teatro de Don Ramon de la Cruz. In the Preface, he replies to Signorelli, who, in the seventh chapter of the ninth book of his “Storia dei Teatri,” makes a rude attack upon him, chiefly for sundry translations, which La Cruz does not seem to have printed. The “Coleccion de Sainetes tanto impresos como inéditos de Don Ramon de la Cruz, con un Discurso Preliminar de Don Agustin Duran,” etc., was printed at Madrid in 1843, 2 tom. 8vo. A notice of the life of the author is in Baena, Hijos, etc., Tom. IV., p. 280.

At about the same time that Ramon de la Cruz was amusing the society of Madrid with his popular dramas and farces, Juan Ignacio Gonzalez del Castillo was equally successful in the same way at Cadiz. He was, however, little known beyond the limits of Andalusia till 1845, when Don Adolfo de Castro published, in his native city, a collection of his “Saynetes,” filling two volumes, 12mo. In the variety of their tone, in their faithfulness to the national manners, and in the gayety of their satire, they resemble those of La Cruz; but they are a little more carefully finished than his, and somewhat less rich and genial.