ABSTRACT
The Spanish muse has produced numerous epic poems, most of which are unknown beyond the limits of Spain, and many even there have been consigned to merited oblivion. Unlike other poets, Ercilla was himself an actor in the scenes which he describes. In the conflicts of that Indian war Ercilla was eminently distinguished, according to the testimony of nearly all the Spanish writers, and to his own rather boastful account. He had an ample opportunity to indulge his daring spirit of enterprise and his habits of observation. The last years of Ercilla’s life were spent in obscurity. The disappointments he had met with engendered a spirit of gloomy devotion, to which his countrymen were, in those days, peculiarly liable. But as the name of Ercilla belongs rather to the literary than to the political history of Spain, the qualities of his poetry demand our attention in preference to the actions of his life.
