Dò hallar en climas helados
Sus negros ojos graciosos,
Que son fuego?
Ora me miren airados
Ora roben cariñosos
Mi sosiego.
Dò la negra caballera
Que al èbano se aventaja?
Y el pie leve
Que al triscar por la pradera
Ni las tiernas flores aja,
Ni aun las mueve?
Doncellas las del Genil
Vuestra tez escurecida
No trocara
Por los rostros de marfil
Que Albion envanecida
Me mostrara.
Padre Dauro! manso rio,
De las arenas doradas,
Dìgnate oir
Los votos del pecho mio,
Y en tus màrgenes sagradas
Logre morir!
Works of Martinez de la Rosa, edition of Barcelona, 1838, vol. iv. p. 1. The other translations are taken from the same, pages 113, 104, 48 and 34 respectively.
In the prologue, he enters on the discussion, so common a few years since, as to the relative merits of what were called the Classical and Romantic schools of poetry, which discussion, it is to be hoped, may now be considered at an end. The pretensions of different writers, who affected to range themselves under one or other of these denominations, were in fact generally only the devices of mediocrity to shelter their deficiencies. Those who write spontaneously from the true inspiration of genius, will never submit to the shackles of any system, and for all writers the wisest
