Don José de Espronceda y Lara, Spain's foremost lyric poet of the
nineteenth century, was born on the 25th of March, 1808, the year of his
country's heroic revolt against the tyranny of Napoleon. His parents
were Lieutenant-Colonel Don Juan de Espronceda y Pimentel and Doña María
del Carmen Delgado y Lara. Both were Andalusians of noble stock, and, as
we learn from official documents, were held to be Christians of clean
blood "without taint of Jews, heretics, Moors, or persons punished by
the Holy Inquisition, and who neither were nor had been engaged in mean
or low occupations, but in highly honorable ones." This couple of such
highly satisfactory antecedents had been married four years previously.
In 1804 Don Juan, a mature widower of fifty-three, was still mourning
his first wife when he obtained the hand of Doña María, a young widow
whose first husband, a lieutenant in the same regiment, was recently
deceased. The marriage was satisfactory in a worldly way, for Doña María
brought as a dower four hundred thousand reales to be added to the two
hundred thousand which Don Juan already possessed. By his first marriage
Don Juan had had a son, Don José de Espronceda y Ramos, who became
ensign in his father's regiment, then studied in the Artillery School at
Segovia, and later entered the fashionable Guardia de Corps regiment.
He died in 1793 at the early age of twenty-one, soon after joining this
regiment. By the second marriage there were two other children, both of
whom died in infancy: Francisco, born in 1805, and María, born in 1807.
During the early months of 1808 the Bourbon cavalry regiment in which
Don Juan served was stationed in the little hamlet of Villafranca de los
Barros, Estremadura, and there the future poet was born. We do not know
where the mother and son found refuge during the stormy years which
followed. The father was about to begin the most active period of his
career. We learn from his service record that he won the grade of
colonel on the field of Bailén; that a year later he recaptured the
cannon named Libertad at the battle of Consuegra (a feat which won
him the rank of brigadier), and fought gallantly at Talavera as a
brother-in-arms of the future Duke of Wellington. The mere enumeration
of the skirmishes and battles in which he participated would require
much space. In 1811 he distinguished himself at Medina Sidonia and
Chiclana, and sought promotion to the rank of field-marshal, which was
never granted. After the Peninsular War he seems to have been stationed
in Madrid between 1815 and 1818. His family were probably permanently
established in that city, for we know that mother and son resided
there during the time that the brigadier was doing garrison duty in
Guadalajara (1820-1828), and there is no evidence that they followed him
to Coruña during his term of service in that city (1818-1820). Possibly
the old soldier preferred the freedom of barrack life, where his
authority was unquestioned, to the henpecked existence he led at home.
"Ella era él y él era ella," says Patricio de Escosura in speaking of
this couple; for Doña María was something of a shrew. She was a good
business woman who combined energy with executive ability, as she later
proved by managing successfully a livery-stable business. But, however
formidable she may have been to her hostlers, her son José found her
indulgent. He, the only surviving son of a mature couple, rapidly
developed into a _niño consentido_, the Spanish equivalent of a
spoiled child. Parallels are constantly being drawn between Byron and
Espronceda. It is a curious fact that both poets were reared by mothers
who were alternately indulgent and severe.
In 1820 the Espronceda family occupied an apartment in the Calle del
Lobo. It was there and then that Patricio de Escosura firmed his
intimacy with the future poet. He describes graphically his first
meeting with the youth who was to be his lifelong friend. He first saw
José sliding down from a third-story balcony on a tin waterspout. In the
light of later years Escosura felt that in this boyish prank the child
was father of the man. The boy who preferred waterspouts to stairways,
later in life always scorned the beaten path, and "the illogical road,
no matter how venturesome and hazardous it was, attracted him to it by
virtue of that sort of fascinating charm which the abyss exercises over
certain eminently nervous temperaments." The belief that Espronceda
studied at the Artillery School of Segovia in 1821 appears to rest upon
the statement of Solís alone. Escosura, who studied there afterwards,
never speaks of his friend as having attended the same institution.
Solís may have confused the younger José with his deceased, like-named
brother, who, we know, actually was a cadet in Segovia. On the other
hand, Solís speaks with confidence, though without citing the source of
his information, and nothing would have been more natural than for the
boy to follow in his elder brother's footsteps, as he did later when he
joined the Guardia de Corps. However, the matter is of slight moment,
for if he studied in Segovia at all he cannot have remained there for
more than a few weeks.
What little education Espronceda was able to acquire in the course of
his stormy life was gained mostly in the Colegio de San Mateo between
the years 1820 and 1830. This was a private school patronized by sons of
the nobility and wealthy middle class. Two of the masters, José Gómez
Hermosilla and Alberto Lista, were poets of repute. Lista was the best
teacher of his time in Spain. The wide range of his knowledge astonished
his pupils, and he appeared to them equally competent in the classics,
modern languages, mathematics, philosophy and poetics, all of which
subjects he knew so well that he never had to prepare a lecture
beforehand. Plainly Lista was not a specialist of the modern stamp; but
he was something better, a born teacher. In spite of an unprepossessing
appearance, faulty diction, and a ridiculous Andalusian accent, Lista
was able to inspire his students and win their affection. It is no
coincidence that four of the fellow students of the Colegio de San
Mateo, Espronceda, Felipe Pardo, Ventura de la Vega, and Escosura,
afterwards became famous in literature.
Espronceda's school reports have been preserved. We learn that he
studied sacred history, Castilian grammar, Latin, Greek, French,
English, mythology, history, geography, and fencing, which last he was
later to turn to practical account. He showed most proficiency in
French and English, and least in Greek and mathematics. His talent was
recognized as unusual, his industry slight, his conduct bad. Calleja,
the principal, writes in true schoolmaster's fashion: "He is wasting the
very delicate talent which nature gave him, and is wasting, too, the
opportunity of profiting by the information of his distinguished
professors." It cannot be denied that Espronceda's conduct left much to
be desired. According to Escosura he was "bright and mischievous,
the terror of the whole neighborhood, and the perpetual fever of his
mother." He soon gained the nickname _buscarruidos_, and attracted
the notice of police and night watchmen. "In person he was agreeable,
likable, agile, of clear understanding, sanguine temperament inclined
to violence; of a petulant, merry disposition, of courage rash even
bordering upon temerity, and more inclined to bodily exercise than to
sedentary study." The two friends were much influenced by Calderón at
this time. The height of their ambition was to be like the gallants of
a cape-and-sword play, equally ready for a love passage or a fight.
Lista's influence upon his pupils was not restricted to class exercises.
In order to encourage them to write original verse and cultivate a taste
for literature, he founded in April, 1823, the Academy of the Myrtle,
modeled after the numerous literary academies which throve in Italy and
Spain during the Renaissance period and later. Lista himself presided,
assuming the name Anfriso. Was Delio, the name Espronceda assumed in his
"Serenata" of 1828, his academic designation? The models proposed for
the youthful aspirants were the best poets of antiquity and such modern
classicists as Meléndez, Cienfuegos, Jovellanos, and Quintana. Two of
Espronceda's academic exercises have been preserved. They are as insipid
and jejune as Goethe's productions of the Leipzig period. As an imitator
of Horace he was not a success. What he gained from the Academy was the
habit of writing.
The Academy lasted until 1826, when many of its members had been driven
into exile; but its later meetings must have seemed tame to spirited
boys engrossed in the exciting political events of those times. The year
1823 is famous in Spanish history for the crushing out of liberalism.
This was effected by means of the Holy Alliance, an infamous association
of tyrants whose main object was to restore absolutism. Louis XVIII, the
Bourbon king of France, sent a force of one hundred thousand men under
the Duke of Angoulême who met with little resistance, and in short order
nullified all that had been accomplished by the Spanish liberals. Before
the end of the year Ferdinand VII, who had been virtually deposed, was
restored to his throne, and the constitution of 1820 had been abolished.
Espronceda, the son of a hero of the War of Liberation, felt that the
work of the men of 1808 had been undone. They had exchanged a foreign
for a domestic tyrant. What his feelings were we may gather from his
ode in commemoration of the uprising of the Madrid populace against the
troops of Murat, "Al Dos de Mayo":
¡Oh de sangre y valor glorioso día!
Mis padres cuando niño me contaron
Sus hechos, ¡ay! y en la memoria mía
Santos recuerdos de virtud quedaron.
But, as he says later in the poem,
El trono que erigió vuestra bravura,
Sobre huesos de héroes cimentado,
Un rey ingrato, de memoria impura,
Con eterno baldón dejó manchado.
¡Ay! para herir la libertad sagrada,
El Príncipe, borrón de nuestra historia,
Llamó en su ayuda la francesa espada,
Que segase el laurel de vuestra gloria.
These verses were written in later life; but already in 1827 he dates a
poem "fourth year after the sale of Spanish liberty."
It was an age of political conspiracy and secret societies. Many
liberals were members of Masonic lodges, and in addition there were
circles like the Friends of Liberty, the Friends of the Constitution,
the Cross of Malta, the Spanish Patriot, and others. Nothing more
natural than that boys whose age made them ineligible to join these
organizations should form one of their own. The result was La Sociedad
de los Numantinos. The prime movers were Miguel Ortiz Amor and Patricio
de Escosura, who drew up its Draconic constitution. Other founders were
Espronceda, Ventura de la Vega, and Núñez de Arenas. All told, the
society had about a dozen members. Their first meetings were held in a
sand-pit, until the curiosity of the police forced them to seek safer
quarters. One of the members was an apothecary's apprentice, who,
unknown to his master, installed the club in the shop cellar. There
they built an altar bearing all the romantic paraphernalia of skull and
cross-bones, swords, and pistols. The members stood wrapped in black
garments, their faces muffled with their long Spanish capes, wearing
Venetian masks, each one grasping a naked dagger. There they swore
binding oaths and delivered fiery orations. Red paper lanterns cast a
weird light over the scene. How tame the sessions of the Myrtle
must have seemed by comparison! Yet the two organizations throve
simultaneously.
With the return of Ferdinand in September the persecution of the
liberals began. The boys witnessed the judicial murder of Riego, the
hero of the constitutional movement, November 8, 1823. This made the
impression upon them that might have been expected. That night an
extraordinary session of the Numantinos was held at which Espronceda
delivered an impassioned oration. Then all signed a document in which
the king's death was decreed. Some of the members' parents seem to
have learned what was happening. The father of Ortiz, the club's first
president, prudently sent him away to Oñate. Escosura became the second
president, and held office until September of 1824, when his father sent
him to France. Espronceda then became the club's third president, but
his term was brief. The boys had made the mistake of admitting one
member of mature years whose name we do not know; for, in spite of his
treachery, the Numantinos even in their old age chivalrously
refrained from publishing it. This Judas betrayed the secrets of his
fellow-members, and placed incriminating documents, among them the
king's "death warrant," in the hands of the police. The latter, however,
displayed less rigor and more common sense than usual. While all the
youths implicated were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment in
various monasteries scattered throughout Spain, nothing more was
intended than to give the conspirators a salutary scare. They were all
released after a few weeks of nominal servitude. Ortiz and Escosura, the
ringleaders, were sentenced to six years of seclusion, and Espronceda
received a term of five years to be served in the Monastery of San
Francisco de Guadalajara in the city of Guadalajara. His term was
pronounced completed after a very few weeks of confinement. That he had
a father prominent in the government service stood him in good stead,
and this probably accounts for the fact that his place of confinement
was in the city where Don Juan was garrisoned. The latter, as an old
soldier in the wars against Napoleon, sympathized in a general way with
liberal ideas; yet, placed as he was in a very difficult position, he
must have found his son's escapades compromising. His record shows that
he was "purified," that is his loyalty to the crown was certified to, on
August 8, 1824. He seems to have maintained a "correct" attitude toward
his rulers to the end, with all the unquestioning obedience of a
military man.
While undergoing this easy martyrdom Espronceda improved his time by
beginning what was to be a great patriotic epic, his _Pelayo_. Like many
another ambitious project, this was never completed. The few fragments
of it which have been printed date mostly from this time. The style is
still classic, but it is the pseudo-classicism of his model, Tasso. The
poet had taken the first step leading to Romanticism. Hence this work
was not so sterile as his earlier performances. Lista, on seeing the
fragments, did much to encourage the young author. Some of the octaves
included in the published version are said on good authority to have
come from the schoolmaster's pen. Lista's classicism was of the
broadest. He never condemned Romanticism totally, though he deplored
its unrestrained extravagances and the antireligious and antidynastic
tendencies of some of its exponents. He long outlived his brilliant
pupil, and celebrated his fame in critical articles. After his return
from exile Espronceda continued to study in a private school which Lista
had started in the Calle de Valverde. Calleja's Colegio de San Mateo had
been suppressed by a government which was the sworn enemy of every form
of enlightenment. The new seminary, however, continued the work of
the old with little change: While there José carried his mathematical
studies through higher algebra, conic sections, trigonometry, and
surveying, and continued Latin, French, English, and Greek. If we may
judge from later results, a course in rhetoric and poetics must have
been of greatest benefit to him.
Espronceda's schooling ended in 1826, when he began what Escosura terms
"his more or less voluntary exile." Escosura thinks he may have been
implicated in a revolutionary uprising in Estremadura, and this
conjecture is all but confirmed by a recently found report of the
Spanish consul in Lisbon, who suspected him of plotting mischief with
General Mina. If Espronceda was not a revolutionary at this time, he was
capable of enlisting in any enterprise however rash, as his past and
subsequent record proves all too clearly, and the authorities were not
without justification in watching his movements. In a letter dated
Lisbon, August 24, 1827, he writes to his mother: "Calm yourselves and
restore papa to health by taking good care of him, and you yourself stop
thinking so sadly, for now I am not going to leave Portugal." In these
words the boy seems to be informing his parents that he has given up
the idea of making a foray from Portugal into Spain as Mina was then
plotting to do. He had left home without taking leave of his parents,
made his way to Gibraltar, and taken passage thence to Lisbon on a
Sardinian sloop. The discomforts of this journey are graphically
described in one of his prose works, "De Gibraltar a Lisboa: viaje
histórico." The writer describes with cynical humor the overladen little
boat with its twenty-nine passengers, their quarrels and seasickness,
the abominable food, a burial at sea, a tempest. When the ship reached
Lisbon the ill-assorted company were placed in quarantine. The health
inspectors demanded a three-peseta fee of each passenger. Espronceda
paid out a duro and received two pesetas in change. Whereupon he threw
them into the Tagus, "because I did not want to enter so great a capital
with so little money." A very similar story has been told of Camoens,
so that Espronceda was not only a _poseur_ but a very unoriginal one at
that. Some biographers suspect that while parting with his silver he was
prudent enough to retain a purse lined with good gold _onzas_. This is
pure speculation, but it is certain that he knew he could soon expect a
remittance from home.
Portugal was at the time rent with civil war. The infanta Isabel María
was acting as regent, and her weak government hesitated to offend the
king of Spain. The liberal emigrants were kept under surveillance; some
were imprisoned, others forced to leave the kingdom. Espronceda was
forced to Live with the other Spanish emigrants in Santarem. There is no
evidence that he was imprisoned in the Castle of St. George, as has so
frequently been stated. He appears to have been free to go and come
within the limits assigned him by the police; but he was constantly
watched and at last forced to leave the country. It was in Portugal that
the nineteen-year-old boy made the acquaintance of the Mancha family.
Don Epifanio Mancha was a colonel in the Spanish army who, unlike the
elder Espronceda, had been unable to reconcile himself to existing
conditions. He had two daughters, one of whom, Teresa, was to play a
large part in Espronceda's life. He undoubtedly made her acquaintance at
this time. We are told that she embroidered for him an artillery cadet's
hat; but the acquaintance probably did not proceed far. The statement
that vows were exchanged, that the Mancha family preceded Espronceda to
London, that on disembarking he found his Teresa already the bride
of another, all this is pure legend. As a matter of fact, Espronceda
preceded the Manchas to London and his elopement with Teresa did not
take place until 1831, not in England but in France. All this Señor
Cascales y Muñoz has shown in his recent biography.
Espronceda's expulsion from Portugal was determined upon as early as
August 14, 1827; but the execution of it was delayed. He must have
reached England sometime within the last four months of 1827. The first
of his letters written from London that has been preserved is dated
December 27 of that year. What his emotions were on passing "the immense
sea ... which chains me amid the gloomy Britons" may be observed by
reading his poem entitled "La Entrada del Invierno en Londres." In this
poem he gives full vent to his homesickness in his "present abode of
sadness," breathes forth his love for Spain, and bewails the tyrannies
under which that nation is groaning. It is written in his early classic
manner and exists in autograph form, dedicated by the "Citizen" José de
Espronceda to the "Citizen" Balbino Cortés, his companion in exile. The
date, London, January 1, 1827, is plainly erroneous, though this fact
has never before been pointed out. We can only suppose that, like many
another, Espronceda found it difficult to write the date correctly on
the first day of a new year. We should probably read January 1, 1828.
When he assures us in the poem: "Four times have I here seen the fields
robbed of their treasure," he is not to be taken literally. Who will
begrudge an exiled poet the delight of exaggerating his sufferings?
Five letters written from London to his parents have been preserved,
thanks to the diligence of the Madrid police who seized them in his
father's house in their eagerness to follow the movements of this
dangerous revolutionary. They are the typical letters of a schoolboy.
The writer makes excuses for his dilatoriness as a correspondent,
expresses solicitude for the health of his parents, and suggests the
need of a speedy remittance. In fact _la falta de metálico_ is the
burden of his song. Living is excessively dear in London. So much so
that a suit of clothes costs seventeen pounds sterling; but there will
be a reduction of three pounds if the draft is promptly sent. He asks
that the manuscript of his "Pelayo" be sent to him, as he now has
abundant leisure to finish the poem. He asks that the remittances be
sent to a new agent whom he designates. The first agent was a brute who
refused to aid him to get credit. He wonders that his father should
suggest a call upon the Spanish ambassador. Not one word as to his
political plans, a discretion for which Don Juan must have thanked him
when these interesting documents fell into the hands of the police.
We have information that in London Espronceda became a fencing-master,
as many a French _émigré_ had done in the century before. This calling
brought him in very little. He may have profited by the charity
fund which the Duke of Wellington had raised to relieve the Spanish
_emigrados_. His more pressing needs were satisfied by Antonio Hernáiz,
a friend with whom he had made the journey from Lisbon; but the
remittances from home came promptly and regularly, and Espronceda must
have been one of the most favored among the refugees of Somers Town. If
we may take as autobiographical a statement in "Un Recuerdo," he was
entertained for a time at the country seat of Lord Ruthven, an old
companion-in-arms of his father's. Ruthven is not a fictitious name,
as a glance into the peerage will show. During all this time he was
improving his acquaintance with Shakespeare, Milton, Byron, and other
English poets. What is more surprising is that, if we may judge from
his subsequent speeches as a deputy, he gained at least a superficial
acquaintance with English political thought and became interested in
economics. He was a convert to the doctrine of free trade.
Meanwhile the parents, who appear to have formed a bad opinion of a land
where a suit of clothes cost seventeen pounds, were urging the son to
go to France. He himself thought of Holland as a land combining the
advantages of liberty and economy. But before leaving London he required
a remittance of four thousand reales. This bad news was broken to the
family bread-winner, not by José himself, but by his banker Orense. The
debt, it was explained, had been incurred as the result of a slight
illness. The four thousand reales were duly sent in December, but
Espronceda lingered in London a few months longer; first because he was
tempted by the prospect of a good position which he failed to secure,
and second on account of the impossibility of obtaining a passport to
France direct. He finally made his way to Paris via Brussels, from which
city he writes, March 6, 1829. All this effectually dispels the legend
that he eloped from England with Teresa by way of Cherbourg. The arrival
in Paris of the revolutionary fencing-master put the Madrid police in a
flutter. On the seventeenth of that same month the consul in Lisbon had
reported that Espronceda was planning to join General Mina in an attack
upon Navarra; and by the middle of April the ambassador to France had
reported his arrival in Paris. It was then that the brigadier's papers
were seized. Measures were taken to prevent Espronceda's receiving
passports for the southern provinces of France, and for any other
country but England. The friendly offices of Charles X, who had
succeeded Louis XVIII on the throne of France, checked for a time the
efforts of the patriotic filibusters. The latter, therefore, must have
felt that they were aiding their own country as well as France when they
participated in the July revolution of 1830. Espronceda fought bravely
for several days at one of the Paris barricades, and wreaked what
private grudge he may have had against the house of Bourbon. After the
fall of Charles X, Louis Philippe, whom Espronceda was in after years to
term _el rey mercader_, became king of France. As Ferdinand refused to
recognize the new government, the designs of Spanish patriots were
not hindered but even favored. Espronceda was one of a scant hundred
visionaries who followed General Joaquín de Pablo over the pass of
Roncevaux into Navarra. The one hope of success lay in winning over
recruits on Spanish soil. De Pablo, who found himself facing his old
regiment of Volunteers of Navarra, started to make a harangue. The reply
was a salvo of musketry, as a result of which De Pablo fell dead. After
some skirmishing most of his followers found refuge on French soil,
among them Espronceda. De Pablo's rout, if less glorious than that of
Roland on the same battlefield, nevertheless inspired a song. Espronceda
celebrated his fallen leader's death in the verses "A la Muerte de D.
Joaquín de Pablo (Chapalangarra) en los Campos de Vera." This poem,
which purports to have been written on one of the peaks of the French
Pyrenees which commanded a view of Spanish soil, and when the poet was
strongly impressed by the events in which he had just participated,
is nevertheless a weak performance; for Espronceda in 1830 was still
casting his most impassioned utterances in the classic mold. Ferdinand
had now been taught a lesson and lost little time in recognizing the new
régime in France. This bit of diplomacy was so cheap and successful
that Louis Philippe tried it again, this time on Russia. His government
favored a plot, hatched in Paris, for the freeing of Poland. Espronceda,
who had not yet had his fill of crack-brained adventures, enlisted in
this cause also, desiring to do for Poland what Byron had done for
Greece; but the czar, wilier than Ferdinand, immediately recognized
Louis Philippe. The plot was then quietly rendered innocuous. Espronceda
must have felt himself cruelly sold by the "merchant king."
Espronceda's literary activity was slight during these events, but his
transformation into a full-fledged Romanticist begins at this time.
Hugo's "Orientales," which influenced him profoundly, appeared in 1829,
and the first performance of "Hernani" was February 25, 1830. There
is no record that he formed important literary friendships in either
England or France, but, clannish as the _emigrados_ appear to have
been, an impressionable nature like Espronceda's must have been as much
stirred by the literary as by the political revolution of 1830; the more
so as the great love adventure of his life occurred at this time. The
Mancha family followed the other _emigrados_ to London, just when
we cannot say. In course of time Teresa contracted a marriage of
convenience with a Spanish merchant domiciled in London, a certain
Gregorio de Bayo. Churchman has discovered the following advertisement
in _El Emigrado Observador_, London, February,1829: "The daughters of
Colonel Mancha embroider bracelets with the greatest skill, gaining by
this industry the wherewithal to aid their honorable indigence." From
this it is argued that the marriage to Don Gregorio and the consequent
end of the family indigence must have come later than February, 1829.
Espronceda had met the girl in Lisbon, he may later have resumed the
acquaintance in London. She may or may not be the Elisa to whom Delio
sings in the "Serenata." According to Balbino Cortés in an interview
reported by Solís, Teresa and her husband, while on a visit to Paris in
October, 1831, happened to lodge at the hotel frequented by Espronceda.
Shortly afterwards Teresa deserted her husband and an infant son and
eloped with Espronceda. She followed him to Madrid in 1833, where
a daughter, Blanca, was born to them in 1834. Within a year Teresa
abandoned Espronceda and her second child. She sank into the gutter and
died a pauper in 1839. This sordid romance occupied only about three
years of Espronceda's life, a much shorter time than had been supposed.
Churchman was the first to break the long conspiracy of silence which
withheld from the world Teresa's full name. Cascales y Muñoz has since
thrown more light upon this episode. But these gentlemen have done
nothing more than to tell an open secret. Escosura, long ago, all but
betrayed it in the following pun: "Tendamos el velo de olvido sobre
esa lamentable flaqueza de un gran corazón," he says, referring to the
affair with Teresa, "y recordemos, de paso, que el sol mismo, ese astro
de luz soberano, tan sublimemente cantado por nuestro vate, _manchas_
tiene que si una parte de su esplendor anublan, a eclipsarlo no bastan."
Señor Cascales publishes a reproduction of Teresa's portrait. We see
a face of a certain hard beauty. We are struck with the elaborate
coiffure, the high forehead, the long nose, the weak mouth. The
expression is unamiable. It is the face of a termagant ready to abandon
husband and child. Espronceda seems to have returned to England for a
brief period in 1832, as we may infer from the fact that the poem
"A Matilde" is dated London, 1832. Corroboration of this belief was
discovered by Churchman, who found that the paper on which "Blanca de
Borbón" was written shows the water-mark of an English firm of that
date.
In 1833 Ferdinand VII died, and his daughter Isabel II ascended to the
throne under the regency of her mother Cristina. As the conservatives
espoused the cause of the pretender, Don Carlos, the regency was forced
to favor the liberals. The rigid press censorship was abolished, and a
general amnesty was granted all the victims of Ferdinand's tyranny. In
politics the year 1833 marks the beginning of the Carlist war, and
in literature of Spanish Romanticism. Espronceda was one of many
_emigrados_ who returned to Spain, bringing with them new ideas for the
revitalizing of Spanish literature. He did not arrive soon enough to
see his aged father. Brigadier Espronceda's death certificate is dated
January 10, 1833.
Shortly after José's arrival he joined the fashionable Guardia de Corps
or royal guard regiment. This step, apparently so inconsistent with
his revolutionary activities, has puzzled all his biographers. But
Espronceda was only following the family tradition. His elder brother
had done the same. Doubtless he believed, in his first enthusiasm, that
Spain was now completely liberalized. Besides, he was a dandy always
eager for social distinction, and he had to live down the fact that his
mother was proprietress of an _establecimiento de coches_. The conduct
of his fellow-Numantino, Escosura, who had found it possible to accept
a commission under Ferdinand, is far more surprising. Espronceda's
snobbishness, if he had any, cannot have been extreme, for he took up
residence with his mother over the aforementioned livery stable, in the
Calle de San Miguel. Teresa was prudently lodged under another roof.
Doña Carmen was as indulgent as ever, and especially desirous that her
son dress in the most fashionable clothes procurable. What with her
rent from the house, her widow's pension, and the yield of her business
venture, she was comfortably circumstanced. When Teresa abandoned the
child Blanca, Doña Carmen became a mother to her. When Doña Carmen died
in 1840 everything went to her son.
Espronceda's career as a guardsman was brief. As a result of reading a
satirical poem at a public banquet, he was cashiered and banished to the
town of Cuéllar in Old Castile. There he wrote his "Sancho Saldaña o
el Castellano de Cuéllar," a historical novel in the manner of Walter
Scott, describing the quarrels of Sancho el Bravo with his father
Alfonso X. This six-volume work was contracted for in 1834 and completed
and published the same year. For writing it the author received six
thousand reales. Many writers in Spain were striving to rival the Wizard
of the North at this time. Ramón López Soler had set the fashion in
1830 with "Los Bandos de Castilla." Larra's "Doncel de Don Enrique
el Doliente" appeared in the same year with "Sancho Saldaña." But
Espronceda was probably most influenced by his friend Escosura, who had
printed his "Conde de Candespina" in 1832. The latter's best effort in
this genre, "Ni Rey ni Roque," 1835, was written when its author was
undergoing banishment for political reasons in a corner of Andalusia. To
employ the enforced leisure of political exile in writing a historical
novel was quite the proper thing to do. The banishment to Cuéllar must
have taken place in late 1833 or early 1834, for Espronceda's novel is
unquestionably inspired by his enforced visit to that town, and the
contract with his publisher is dated in Madrid, February 5, 1834. On
reading the contract it is apparent that the novel had hardly been begun
then, as it was to be paid for in installments. Whether it was written
mostly in Cuéllar or Madrid we do not know and care little. In January
of that year _El Siglo_ was founded, a radical journal with which
Espronceda was prominently connected. During the brief existence of this
incendiary sheet (January 21 until March 7) Espronceda contributed to it
several political articles. The last issue came out almost wholly blank
as an object lesson of the censor's activity. There follow a few
months of agitation and political intrigue, the upshot of which
was Espronceda's imprisonment for three weeks without trial. After
protesting in the press and appealing to the queen regent, he was
released and banished to Badajoz. How long he was absent from the
capital we do not know, except that this banishment, like the others,
was of short duration. During all this commotion there was produced at
the Teatro de la Cruz, in April, an indifferent play, "Ni el Tío ni el
Sobrino," whose authors were Espronceda and his friend Antonio Ros y
Olano. It is difficult to paint anything but a confused picture of
Espronceda's life during the remaining years of this decade. We catch
glimpses of him debating questions of art and politics at cafés and
literary _tertulias_ like the Parnasillo, where Mesonero Romanos saw him
faultlessly attired and "darting epigrams against everything existing,
past, and future." Córdoba in his memoirs bears witness that he was
still the _buscarruidos_ of old. Espronceda with Larra, Escosura, Ros
De Olano, and Córdoba constituted the "Thunder Band" of the Parnasillo
(_partida del trueno_). After a long literary discussion they would
sally forth into the streets, each armed with a peashooter and on
mischief bent. A favorite prank was to tie a chestnut vender's table to
a waiting cab and then watch the commotion which followed when the cab
started to move. On one occasion, finding the Duke of Alba's coachman
asleep on the box, they painted the yellow coach red, so altering it
that the very owner failed to recognize it when he left the house where
he had been calling. In politics Espronceda is always a leader in
revolt, fighting with pen and sword for his none-too-clearly-defined
principles. Even the Mendizábal ministry, the most advanced that Spain
has ever had, does not satisfy him. His ideal is a republic and the
downfall of "the spurious race of Bourbon." His love affairs are equally
stormy. In literature he is attempting everything, plays, a novel,
polemical articles, lyric poems, and one supreme work which is to be the
very epic of humanity.
In 1835 Espronceda became an officer in the National Militia. In August
of that year the militiamen were defeated in an unsuccessful revolt
against the Toreno ministry. In 1836 he was equally unfortunate in a
revolt against the Istúriz ministry. It was then, when pursued by the
police, that a friend secreted him in the safest possible place, the
home of a high police official. Espronceda employed his leisure hours in
this refuge by writing "El Mendigo" and "El Verdugo." Two years later
he traveled extensively through Andalusia engaged in revolutionary
propaganda. He was probably trying to bring about a republican form of
government. In September, 1838, his play "Amor venga sus agravios,"
written in collaboration with Eugenio Moreno López, was produced at the
Teatro del Príncipe. Its success was moderate. The next year, while in
Granada, he and his friend Santos Álvarez were guests of honor at a
literary soirée. Espronceda's contribution was the reading of "El
Estudiante de Salamanca." This poem was first printed, at least in part,
in _La Alhambra_ for 1839. The great political event of this year was
the ending of the first Carlist war. The victories of the national
troops were celebrated by a huge public demonstration in Madrid on the
national holiday, May 2, 1840. For this occasion Espronceda wrote his
patriotic poem "El Dos de Mayo." Only three days later his volume of
"Poesías" was placed on sale, and, like Byron, he awoke to find himself
famous. His old teacher Lista wrote a favorable review. From then on
Espronceda was a man of note. The Madrid revolution of September 1
forced an unwilling regent to make Espartero, hero of the Carlist war,
prime minister. A radical sheet, _El Huracán_, was accused of attacking
Cristina and of advocating republicanism. Espronceda, though not a
lawyer, was chosen to defend the journal. This he did with complete
success. His speech has not come down to us, but we are told that in it
he appeared in the rôle of an uncompromising republican.
Nevertheless he was soon to compromise. He was now a man of mark, and
the liberal régime in power were not slow to see that it would be
advantageous to enlist his services. In November, 1841, he accepted an
appointment to serve as secretary to the Spanish legation at the Hague.
He served in this capacity exactly five days. Arriving at the Hague
on January 29, 1842, he departed for Madrid on February 3. A certain
Carrasco had been elected deputy of the province of Almería. He was now
urged to resign to make room for Espronceda. This he did, and Espronceda
was elected and served in his stead. Of course all this had been
prearranged. After his return he continued to hold his diplomatic
position and receive pay for it, a not very honorable course on the part
of one who pled so eloquently for the abolition of useless offices
and the reform of the diplomatic service. In this way the Espartero
government conciliated Espronceda with two offices. Henceforth his
republicanism was lukewarm. Escosura tells us that concern for his
daughter Blanca's financial future had rendered him prudent.
I am inclined to think that Espronceda's biographers underrate his
services in the Chamber of Deputies. The trouble is that in his rôle of
deputy their hero failed to justify preconceived notions regarding his
character. Those who looked for revolution in his speeches found only
sound finance. We seek in vain for anything subversive. There is nothing
suggestive of the lyric poet or even of the fiery defender of _El
Huracán_. As a poet he had praised the destructive fury of the Cossacks
who swept away decadent governments. In defending _El Huracán_ he had
used the word Cossack as a term of reproach, applying it to those
self-seeking politicians who were devouring the public funds. By this
time he had himself become a Cossack on a small scale. Yet we must do
him the justice to point out that he had had sufficient firmness of
principle to refuse office under Mendizábal, Istúriz, and the Duque de
Rivas. Fitzmaurice-Kelly is possibly going too far in intimating that
he was degenerating into a hidebound conservative and opportunist.
Something of the old reforming zeal survived. Though many
disillusionments may have rendered him less eager for a republican form
of government, his latest utterances show him zealous as ever for social
and economic reform. Espronceda's parliamentary career lasted less than
three months (March 1 to May 23, 1842). One can only wonder that in so
brief a time a man already stricken with a fatal illness should have
taken so able a part in an assembly in which he was a newcomer. Nor
should we complain that his speeches lack eloquence. It is fairer to
give him credit for not falling into the abuse of _palabrería_, the
besetting sin of most _diputados_.
His views were sober and sound. Travel had given him a wider
outlook than most of his colleagues possessed. He was the enemy of
_españolismo_, wanted his nation to take a prominent part in European
affairs, and no longer to lead the life of a hermit nation. But he is no
jingo. He speaks against the bill to add fifty thousand to the standing
army. Spain had passed through too many upheavals. What she needed to
make her a European power was tranquility and opportunity to develop
financial strength. Give the producing classes their long-awaited
innings. But he is bitter against the magnates of the bourse and those
politicians who legislate to produce an artificial rise in values. The
true policy is to better the condition of the masses, to encourage
agriculture and manufactures: even the construction of railways should
wait until there is first something to haul over them. But manufactures
should not be protected by a tariff. In his speech against the tariff
on cotton he shows himself an out and out free-trader. He praises the
English for their policy of free trade, enlightened self-interest he
deems it, which tends to make the world one large family. As a writer he
had inveighed against commercialism. But he now discerns a future where
commerce shall replace war. He was unable to foresee that in the future
trade was to be a chief cause of war.
That he was a ready debater is shown by his neat rejoinder to Deputy
Fontán. This gentleman had made sneering allusions to men of letters
who dabbled in diplomacy. Far from accepting the remark as a thrust at
himself, as it was intended, Espronceda resented it as an insult to the
then American minister Washington Irving, "novelist of the first
rank, known in Europe through his writings even more than through the
brilliancy of his diplomatic career."
Espronceda's health had been failing for some months. It is said that
chronic throat trouble had so weakened his voice as to make his remarks
in the Cortés scarcely audible. On May 18, 1842, he journeyed on
horseback to Aranjuez to visit Doña Bernarda Beruete, a young lady to
whom he was then engaged. Hastily returning to Madrid on the afternoon
of the same day, so as not to miss a night session of the Cortés, he
contracted a cold which soon turned into a fatal bronchitis. Others say
he was taken ill at a reception given by Espartero. He died May 23,
1842, at the early age of 34. He was honored with a public funeral in
keeping with his position as deputy and distinguished man of letters.
His first place of burial was the cemetery of San Nicolás; but in 1902
his remains, together with those of Larra, were exhumed and reburied in
the Pantheon for Distinguished Men of the Nineteenth Century, situated
in the Patio de Santa Gertrudis in the Cementerio de la Sacramental de
San Justo.
In forming our estimate of the man, we must carefully distinguish
between the Espronceda of legend and the Espronceda of fact; for a
legend sprang up during his own lifetime, largely the result of his own
self-defamation. Like many other Romanticists, Espronceda affected a
reputation for diabolism. He loved to startle the bourgeois, to pose as
atheist, rake, deposer of tyrants. Escosura sums up this aspect of his
character by branding him "a hypocrite of vice." Many have been led
astray by Ferrer del Río's statement that in drawing the character of
the seducer, Don Félix de Montemar, Espronceda was painting his own
portrait. Such criticism would have delighted Espronceda, but the
imputation was indignantly denied by his close friend Escosura. Modern
critics are careful to avoid this extreme; but, in the delight of
supporting a paradox, some are disposed to go too far in the opposite
direction. Señor Cascales, for instance, is unconvincing when he seeks
to exonerate Espronceda from all blame in the Teresa episode. Like the
devil, Espronceda was not so black as he was painted, not so black as
he painted himself; but he was far from being a Joseph. It is easy to
minimize the importance of the part he played in the national militia.
Doubtless much of his plotting was puerile and melodramatic. His
activities as a revolutionist cannot have greatly affected the course of
events. But it is unfair to deny him credit for constant willingness
to risk his life in any cause which seemed noble. That his conduct was
inconsistent merely proves that he followed no calmly reasoned political
system. He reflects in his conduct the heated sentiment of the time,
varying as it did from day to day. He sometimes compromised with his
ideals, his sense of honor was not always of the highest, but he never
seems to have grown lukewarm in his desire to serve the people. He is
a liberal to the last, a liberal with notions of political economy and
English constitutional practice. His quarrel with the church seems to
have been political rather than theological. He hated the friars and the
church's alliance with Carlism. That the last rites were administered to
him shows that he died a professing Catholic. In appearance Espronceda
was handsome, if somewhat too effeminate-looking to suggest the
fire-eater. He never cultivated slovenliness of attire like most
members of the Romantic school; on the contrary, he was the leading
representative in Spain of dandyism. To sum up, Espronceda's was a
tempestuous and very imperfect character. "Siempre fuí el juego de mis
pasiones," is his own self-analysis. The best that can be said of him
is that he was a warm, affectionate nature, generous, charitable to the
poor, a loyal friend, and one actuated by noble, if sometimes mistaken,
ideals. Years afterward, when Escosura passed in review the little
circle of the Colegio de San Mateo, Espronceda was the only one of them
whom he could truly say he loved.