At the sanguinary battle of Ocaña, near Toledo, where, in November, 1809, the Spaniards were vanquished by the French, Don Angel de Saavedra, severely wounded, was left among the dying and the dead. He was rescued by a common soldier, and the life thus saved has been devoted by him to the benefit of his country, to the service of the muses, and to the claims of friendship and affection. He has by turns been loaded with honours and oppressed by persecution. Sent to the Cortes as a deputy from Cordova in 1822, he was soon obliged to seek refuge in England. In 1834, the poet and the patriot, who had then become Duke de Rivas, by the death of his elder brother, repassed the Pyrenees, and in 1836 became Minister of the Interior under Isturitz. At the fall of that ministry the duke had again to fly his country, and only escaped the fury of the misled populace by assuming a disguise. In 1845 he was the Spanish ambassador at Naples; in January, 1851, he was offered the foreign department, on the resignation of the ministry of which General Narvaez was the head; but on his declining to accept it, the office was filled by M. Beltran de Lis. Recently, in January, 1852, the Duke de Rivas, along with the Duke de Vista Hermosa, and M. Martinez de la Rosa, have been appointed to the three vacant seats of councillors in the Royal Academy of the Noble Arts of St. Ferdinand.
The most esteemed work of the Duke de Rivas is his "Moro Exposito," which was published at Paris in 1834. It, and his historical romances, have acquired for him the flattering name of “The Walter Scott of Modern Spain.” His lyrical poems form a kind of impassioned history of his life, while a fugitive from his beloved country. "El Desterrado," "The Proscribed,” was written when the poet, obliged to leave Spain in 1823, had reached Gibraltar, from whence he embarked; the ship sailed at sunset, and the melancholy poet exclaims:
When morning dawns, I shall behold no more,
O loved Hesperia, thy beauteous shore!
Borne by the swelling breeze far, far from thee,
In vain those eyes shall seek thee o'er the sea!
Ab, sink not yet, bright sun! In pity stay!
While on yon plains I gaze, with verdure gay,
And on yon noble stream amid them flowing,
That 'neath thy parting ray is warmly glowing.
Hail, Guadalquivir, Andalusia's pride!
So swiftly rolling to the ocean's tide.
Alas! reflected on thy waters clear,
Do not Cordova's ancient walls appear?
Cordova! where these eyes first saw the light,
Where Fortune’s smiles seemed promising and bright,
And in her golden cradle rocked—to me,
None could have deemed how faithless she would be!
A simple child, upon thy banks I strayed,
While gathered shells and flowers my treasure made;
An ardent youth, my charger's fiery tread
Impressed thy shores, as wildly on I sped.
They murmuring wavelets echoed back the sound
Of martial lays, or of love’s sighs profound;
On thy sweet margin, riches, glory, love,
Were mine, till rose an evil star above.
