PREFACE.
The events upon which the following tragedy is
founded, are said to have occurred in Castile, at the
commencement of the thirteenth century, in the
reign of Alphonso VIII.: but, for metrical purposes,
I have transferred the scene from Castile to
Arragon; retaining, however, the name of the king,
that of the cotemporary monarch of Arragon (Peter,
I believe) not being sufficiently tragical—at least,
for poetic ears: several matters and allusions will,
thus, be found historically out of place; but I do
not think I have any where exceeded the allowed
license of the drama.
In the construction of the tragedy (with the exception
of the first and second acts, and the last
scene of the fifth) I have availed myself of the
Spanish play on the same subject, the
Raquel of
Vicente Garcia de la Huerta, prefixed to which is
printed the following ‘argumento’:
“Pues el Rey ovó pasados todos estos trabajos en
el comienzo quando reynó, e fue casado, fuese para
Toledo con su mujer Don̄a Leonor, e estando y,
pagóse mucho de una Judia que avie nombre Fermosa,
e olvidó la mujer, e encerróse con ella gran
tiempo, en guisa que non se podie partir de ella por
ninguna manera, nin se pagaba tanto de cosa ninguna,
e estubo encerrado con ella poco menos de
siete an̄os, que non se membraba de si, nin de su
Reyno, nin de otra cosa ninguna. Estonce ovieron
su acuerdo los omes buenos del Reyno, como pusiesen
algun recando en aquel fecho tan malo e tan desaguisado:
e acordaron, que la matasen: e que asi
cobrarien a su Sen̄or, que tienen por perdido: e con
este acuerdo fueronse para allá, e entraron al Rey
diciendo que querian fabrar con el, e mientras los
unos fabraron con el Rey, entraron otros donde
estaba aquella Judia en muy nobles estrados, e
degollaronla.”—Chrón. Gen.
Of the Spanish play, the ‘personas’ are as follow:
“Alfonso Octavo, Rey de Castilla.
Raquel, Judia.
Ruben, Confidente de Raquel.
Hernan Garcia de Castro, Rico Hombre.
Alvar Fan̄ez, Rico Hombre.
Garceran Manrique de Lara, Rico Hombre.
Castellanos. Guardia del Rey. Acompan̄amento de Judios y Judias.”
From this, it will be seen that in the entire portraiture
of Xavier, and, consequently, in the main
design of the present tragedy, I stand not in the
least in the shadow of my foreign predecessor, however
I may be so placed in regard to many of its
details. By the characters of Xavier and Rachel,
the reader may be not unfrequently reminded of the
origin of the “days of Purim,” which inspired for
France one of the most forcible of the elegant dramatic
poems of the classical Racine.
Thus much as to the subject of the tragedy. Its
failure on the stage only renders its publication the
more imperative; as the few whose good opinion
I covet, will, perhaps, be led by its perusal to think
not unfavourably of the drama, in spite of the united
outcry of the “critics;” some of whom, indeed, do
me the justice first to misquote my lines, and then
charitably load me with the burthen of their own
stupidity:
“Faciunt næ, intelligendo ut nihil intelligant.”
Moreover, it has been asserted by certain of these
benevolent men, that every passage at all worthy of
notice in the tragedy, is derived from the pages
of our glorious old dramatists: this is a direct falsehood,
and they know it to be so; but who shall
give the lie to the oracle, though a wooden god
pronounce it?
Amid the general cry of condemnation (the invariable
portion of ill-success, merited or unmerited)
which has of late been rung so cheerily and continually
in my ears, and which might well dismay
any but a mind predetermined to persevere and to
succeed, some few journalists have ventured to speak
of the tragedy with a little liberality and fairness;
but one gentleman alone has stood aloof from the
mob of critics, and gilded the storm about me with
the radiance of encouraging criticism: I am a debtor
to his justice for the remainder of my life.
To confirm the opinion of two or three sensible
people, that there is at least one superfluous office
in the state, those ‘words and sentences’ which
were struck by the Deputy Play-Licenser from the
manuscript copy of the tragedy submitted to him for
his approval, I have caused to be printed in capitals:
the liberal reader will smile in perusing them; and
deign, perhaps, to anticipate with some pleasure the
speedy abolition of a childish tribunal. Of course,
the revered name of the Deity, wherever it occurs,
was erased by the great religious and moral pen
of the licenser, and altogether abjured in stage-utterance:
still, I have not hesitated to retain it in
many places; having yet to learn, that it is not the
part of the dramatist to make his characters speak
as men speak; having yet to feel, that piety, or
impiety, dwells rather in words, than thoughts—on
the lips, than in the mind.
