Transcriber’s Note: There is a good deal ofinconsistency with regard to spelling, accents etc in the Spanishpassages of this text. These have been preserved as printed rather thanattempting to correct or standardise.
MODERN POETS
AND
POETRY OF SPAIN.
By JAMES KENNEDY, Esq.,
HER BRITANNIC MAJESTY’S JUDGE IN THE MIXED COURT
OF JUSTICE AT THE HAVANA.
WILLIAMS AND NORGATE,
14, HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, LONDON;
AND
20, SOUTH FREDERICK STREET, EDINBURGH.
1860.
My Lord,
I have sought permission to inscribeyour Lordship’s name on this page, as a favour appropriateto my work, under the considerations in whichit originated.
I began these translations, partly as a means ofacquiring an accurate knowledge of the Spanish language,and partly as a relaxation from other studiesand pursuits, about the time when your Lordship, inthe course of your statesmanlike visit to America,made, in 1842, a lengthened stay in Cuba, studyingthe circumstances of those countries, which are soon,perhaps, to take a yet more prominent place, thanthey do at present, in the history of the world.
The discussions I heard respecting that visit—forit was then considered an extraordinary one—raisedin my mind many suggestions, as to the benefitsthat must accrue to the public from the observationsof individual travellers. Accordingly as each onemight have his special object in view, his sphere of actionor opportunities of learning, so the knowledge he acquiredmight be proportionately imparted. The communityat large had always evinced the greatest interestin the accounts given by travellers of theirvisits to foreign countries, as was shown by thefavourable reception uniformly given to their works.Of these many that were published were well deservingof the popularity they obtained, especially as withregard to Spain there were several that left little forany future writer to supply of ordinary information.In one respect, however, all such works appeared tome to be deficient, though their failure was almostunavoidable, in the case of transient visitors, in theirbeing unable to convey any adequate idea of the stateof mental culture among the people they visited.
Yet this, to a philosophic reader, would be undoubtedlythe truest test of the state of civilization towhich any nation had attained. Such a reader wouldnot be contented with merely a recital of the every-dayoccurrences of travelling, nor yet with general orstatistical information respecting any people, obtainedfrom ordinary sources. He would rather seek tofollow them into the occupations of private life and[v]into their favourite courses of thought and feeling,judging of these by the studies of their better classesof society, in their hours of relaxation or for domesticenjoyment. As the sagest of the Roman emperors,M. Antoninus, observed, To know any people’s mindsand inclinations, we should examine their studiesand pursuits,—τὰ ἡγεμονικὰ αὐτῶν διάβλεπε, καὶ τοὺςΦρόνιμους, διὰ μέν Φεύγουσιν, διὰ δὲ διώκουσιν.
Few persons going abroad for a short period, orfor a specific purpose, could be expected