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[Pg xxxviii]

At last in 1613, the Novelas exemplares were issued. The author was silent as to the continuation of the Galatea, but he promised that the Second Part of Don Quixote should be forthcoming—con brevedad. We know what followed. The Viaje del Parnaso was published in the winter of 1614; and, though it contains a short Letter Dedicatory and Preface,ssss1 which might easily have been made the vehicle of a public announcement in Cervantes's customary manner, there is no allusion to the new Don Quixote or to the new Galatea. Next year, however, in the dedicationssss1 of his Ocho comedias y ocho entremeses nuevos, Cervantes informed the Conde de Lemos,—with whom the book was a special favouritessss1—that he was pushing on with the Galatea. He makes the same statement in the Prologue to the Second Part of Don Quixote,ssss1 and the assurance is repeated by him on his deathbed in the noble Letter Prefatory to Persiles y Sigismunda.ssss1 This latter is a solemn occasion, and Cervantes writes in a tone of impressive gravity which indicates that he weighed the full meaning of what he knew would be his last message. Ayer me dieron la Extremaunción, y hoy escribo esta: el tiempo es breve, las ansias crecen, las esperanzas menguan. And, in the Prologue, written somewhat earlier, the old man eloquent bids this merry life farewell, declares that his quips and jests are over, and appoints a final rendezvous with his comrades in the next world. At this supreme moment his indomitable spirit returns to his first love, and once more he promises—for the fifth time—the continuation of the Galatea.