he has expressed himself in several places as being much pleased. His first published book, the "Galatea," is professedly an imitation of the Portuguese romances of this class that preceded it. It is said that the "Galatea" was written to win the affections of a Spanish lady with whom he was in love; and having succeeded in this object before the completion of the work, his interest in it ceased, and it thus remains unfinished. Be this as it may, he married Doña Catalina de Palacios de Salazar, who is supposed to be the heroine of the story, on the 14th December, 1584, with whom he lived in happiness, if not in wealth, for more than thirty years, and who surviving him, desired at her own death to be buried at his side.
After his marriage he appears to have settled at Madrid, and commenced writing for the stage as the readiest mode of contributing to the support of a family. The Spanish drama was then almost in its infancy, and had not developed into the marvellous completion it was destined to attain at the hands of Lope de Vega, Calderon, and their great contemporaries. Cervantes, however, did more than any one who preceded him, and attained a success which even towards the end of his life he regarded with complacency and pride. Of the twenty or thirty plays which he tells us that he produced at this period, he has himself recorded but the names of nine, and of these only two have been discovered. These were the "Numancia" and "Trato de Argel," which were first published with an edition of the "Journey to Parnassus" in 1784. The "Trato de Argel," or Life in Algiers, though defective in many respects, contains some striking episodes, in which Cervantes' own adventures during his captivity in Africa are described with spirit and fidelity. The "Numancia," which has earned for him the epithet of the Spanish Æschylus, has been pronounced by August Schlegel not only as one of the most memorable efforts of the early Spanish theatre, but one of the most striking exhibitions of modern poetry—a dictum which less enthusiastic critics have disputed. These dramas are not to be confounded with the eight comedias and entremeses, or farces, which he produced and printed at a much later period of his life; and which are so much below what might have been expected from Cervantes in the maturity of his intellect, that some Spanish critics, in order to uphold the intellectual character of their idol, have put forward the untenable theory that they were written as a caricature of the successful dramas of Lope de Vega, which were then carrying everything before them. They were first published in 1615, the year of Cervantes' death, and have been republished in 1749, in two volumes, quarto.
However those early dramas, of which "Numantia" and "Life in Algiers" are the only specimens that have reached us, may, in the decline of his life, have satisfied the perhaps over-partial remembrance of their author, it is certain that they did not add considerably to his material prosperity. The golden days of the Spanish theatre had not yet arrived, nor had Cervantes at any period of his life that happy facility of adapting himself to the tastes of his immediate audience, that could bring him in those substantial results that followed the exercise of Lope de Vega's splendid and genial power of improvisation. Whether the fault was the public's or his own, it is certain that the dramatic muse whom he courted at this time with so much assiduity, like the gentle muse of Goldsmith at another time and in another place, "found him poor, and left him so." Finding his efforts to support himself, his wife, daughter, and an unmarried sister who was dependent on him were unavailing, he determined to leave Madrid, and seek his fortunes elsewhere. In 1588 he went to Seville, and there acted in several humble employments; among others as a collector of debts, not only on behalf of the government, but even for private individuals. In this capacity his duties led him to various parts of Andalusia and Granada, and thus gave him an opportunity of visiting the most beautiful portions of his native country, and of making those observations on life and manners that afterwards enriched his later works. "During his residence at Seville," says Mr. Ticknor, "which, with some interruptions, extended from 1588 to 1598, or perhaps somewhat longer, Cervantes made an ineffectual application to the king for an appointment in America, setting forth by exact documents—which now constitute the most valuable materials for his biography—a general account of his adventures, services, and sufferings while a soldier in the Levant, and of the miseries of his life while he was a slave in Algiers. This was in 1590. But no other than a formal answer seems ever to have been returned to the application, and the whole affair only leaves us to infer the severity of that distress which should induce him to seek relief in exile, to a colony of which he has elsewhere spoken as the great resort for rogues." Little as there is known of Cervantes during his ten years' residence at Seville, we know still less of his proceedings during the few subsequent years between 1598 and 1603, when we again hear of him at Valladolid. It is probable that he still continued to discharge the duties of debt-collector and clerk for any who would avail themselves of his services. There is a tradition, probably referring to this pursuit, which, as it has some connection with the great work that has immortalized his name, may be mentioned. It is said that being employed by the grand prior of the order of St. John in La Mancha to collect rents due to his monastery, he proceeded to the village of Argamasilla for that purpose. Whether the defaulters disbelieved his agency, or that there was some informality on his part, we know not; but his claims were rejected, and he himself thrown into prison. It was in this prison, it is said, that he commenced writing the first part of "Don Quixote," making the village in which he had been so badly treated the scene of the knight's insanity and misfortunes. We have his own authority, indeed, for the fact that "Don Quixote" was begun in a prison; but he was an inmate of so many, of which we have unquestionable evidence, that it is unnecessary to adduce this, perhaps imaginary one of Argamasilla as the one alluded to. Notwithstanding all his privations he found opportunities of completing the first part of "Don Quixote," which was licensed in 1604 at Valladolid, and printed in 1605 at Madrid. The success which attended its publication, though giving but a very faint idea of its future celebrity, was however satisfactory. A new edition was called for at Madrid before the end of the year. Two more were published elsewhere—"circumstances which, after so many discouragements in other attempts to procure a subsistence," says Mr. Ticknor, "naturally turned his thoughts more towards letters than they had been at any previous period of his life." In 1606 the court having returned from Valladolid to Madrid, Cervantes followed. In 1609 he joined the fraternity of the holy sacrament, a religious society of which Lope de Vega, Quevedo, and other eminent writers, were members. In 1613 he published his "Novelas E xemplares," or Moral Tales, next to "Don Quixote" the most delightful of his works. In 1614 appeared his "Journey to Parnassus," a satirical poem, written in terza rima, the most interesting portion of which treats in a light and cheerful spirit of his own earlier writings. The "Comedies," already referred to, appear to have been his next work. Stimulated by an audacious continuation of "Don Quixote" which a writer, who assumed the name of Avellanada, but whose real name has not transpired, brought out as the second part of "Don Quixote" in 1614, Cervantes hurried on the completion of his great work, which he published in October, 1615. In the dedication of this part to the count de Lemos, he speaks of his failing health, and intimates that he did not expect to survive many months. His spirits, however, and his industry never forsook him. He worked vigorously at his "Persiles and Sigismunda," the last of his works, which, though not entitled to be considered what he himself thought it would prove, "either the best or worst book of amusement in the language," is remarkable for the fertility of imagination it displays, and for that innate love of the wild and marvellous which he has so amusingly depicted in his immortal satire. In the spring of 1616 he made an excursion to Esquivias, with which place his wife was connected, and where she had a little estate. On his return he wrote the remarkable preface to his unpublished romance, in which he states that his pulse had warned him that he would not live beyond the next Sunday; concluding it in this cheerful but solemn manner—"And so farewell to jesting, farewell my merry humours, farewell my gay friends, for I feel that I am dying, and have no desire but soon to see you happy in the other life." His preparations for death were made with the calmness and solemnity which might have been expected from his philosophical mind and strong religious belief. On the 2nd of April he entered the order of Franciscan friars, whose habit, in accordance with the custom of many of his great contemporaries, he had assumed some years before. On the 18th of the same month he received the last rites of the church, and in four days after, on Saturday, the 23rd of April, 1616, in the full possession of his faculties, and in perfect peace, this great writer surrendered his spirit into the hands of his Creator.
