ADVERTISEMENT. 



The subject of the Araucana being so immedi- 

 ately connected with the preceding history, the 

 translators have believed that extracts from some of 

 the most striking passages in that celebrated poem 

 could not fail of proving highly acceptable to a con- 

 siderable portion of readers. This consideration, 

 together with that of the poem being in many re- 

 spects elucidatory of the history, has induced them 

 to add the following sketch, selected from Hay ley's 

 Notes to his Essay on Epic Poetry, excepting the 

 third and fourth cantos, which are principally taken 

 from a Specimen of a Translation of the Araucana, 

 by the Rev. H. Boyd, the well known translator of 

 Dante. 



The Araucana, justly esteemed one of the first 

 epic poems of Spain, claims a distinguished rank 

 in the scale of poetic excellence; it possesses, more- 

 over, the singular advantage of being an historical 

 record of a war in which the poet was himself en- 

 gaged, and an eye-witness of many of the incidents. 

 The author, Don Alonzo de Ercilla di Zuniga, was 

 born of an illustrious family in Madrid, in 1535. 

 He was appointed page to the Prince Don Philip, 

 and, at the age of fourteen, accompanied him in 

 the splendid visit v,'hich, at the desire of the empe- 

 ror his father, he paid to the principal cities of Ger- 



