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, 

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