His most tender moments are for the innocence of his characters when they are innocent; but that is an innocence that he has passed beyond. That realism is gallant, though, and not despairing or at least not just despairing. This is not a serious moral because the moral is that seriousness leads finally to despair. While this is the final truth of human life—that reason does not lead to some transcendent truth, and that this is liable to make reason despair—it is not the only truth in the poem, nor is the poem contemptuous of idealism.
The same radical idealism that would lead Byron to join the rebellion for Greek independence from Turkey in addition to contributing large sums of money, he was made a commander and died in the field of a fever led him to similar commitments in his poetry and in particular in Don Juan. Byron would never convert politically as the Lake Poets did, although in accusing them of being motivated only with an eye to patronage, he perhaps neglected their genuine commitment to the views they espoused.
This does not mean that Don Juan is only parody. Parody provides its basic tonality, but it does so only because for Byron parody was the form that was adequate to the strange and irreconcilable varieties of life. Juan has left the scandal of his affair with Julia to travel to Italy, but the waves that cause the hilarious seasickness at the start of his journey turn into a dreadful and endless storm.
The comic expectations that the poem has established and met so far contrast with an extraordinary sense of the duration and grimness of the storm, the wreckage, and the privation in the marooned lifeboat it causes; we keep expecting relief, both narrative and comic, and instead things go from bad to worse.
In addition to grimness, which has the energy but not the delight of the hilarious sections of Don Juan , Byron manages tenderness, love, regret, asperity, satire, and interpolated lyric. In a perhaps unparalleled fashion the poem contains and combines every kind of literary emotion or feeling. It is indecorous, in the technical as well as informal sense of the word: It does not keep to literary decorum not confining itself to one genre but tracks all the different moods or modes of life itself.
For this reason, it might be more easily compared to the variety of tone typical of the novel and not poetry. But it is a poem, all its great effects are poetic effects, and while it may not be the most intense work of poetry written in the 19th century, it certainly combines more varieties of intensity than any other 19th-century work, and does it splendidly. It is a fit tribute to Byron and the capacious and various vitalities of his own personality. Bloom, Harold. Garden City, N.
Soon she lapses into apathy again, and after twelve days she dies. Juan has been carried on board one of Lambro's ships, where he finds himself in the company of several other captives. Not long after, he is brought to a slave market in Constantinople.
In the slave market Juan and a fellow captive, an Englishman named Johnson, are bought by the eunuch Baba for Gulbeyaz, the fourth wife of the sultan, who has seen Juan being led to the market and who wants him for herself.
They are brought to the royal palace, where Juan is dressed in woman's clothes. She commands him to make love to her. The sultana throws her arms around him, but Juan disengages himself. At first, the sultana is enraged, but her mood soon changes to tears. Her tears move Juan and he "began to stammer some excuses," but at this point the interview is ended by the announcement that the sultan is coming. The sultan notices Juan among the sultana's women and remarks that it is a pity that a Christian should be so pretty.
This remark draws the glances of all to the person of Juan. Juan is placed in an apartment of the palace where many of the sultan's concubines are quartered, for it is assumed that he is a new member of the sultan's large harem. He is assigned to a pretty girl named Dudji as a companion.
During the night the whole harem is awakened by a loud scream from Dudji. She is pressed for an explanation. She has dreamed, she says, that she was walking in a wood in which there was a tree with a golden apple.
The golden apple fell at her feet, but when she picked it up to bite into it, a bee flew out and stung her. The eunuch Baba reports the next morning to the sultana that Juan and Dudji shared quarters during the night but says nothing of the dream.
When Gulbeyaz hears this, her cheeks become ashen. She commands Baba to bring Juan and Dudji to her. Here arrive, by steps which Byron omits, a party from Constantinople made up of Juan, Johnson, two unidentified Turkish women, and a eunuch. They are brought to General Suwarrow, the ruthless and efficient commander of the Russians. Johnson had served in the Russian army before, and Suwarrow assigns him to his old regiment.
Juan he assigns to himself. Johnson requests the general that the Turkish ladies and their attendant be given kind treatment because they have helped himself and Juan escape from Constantinople. The final assault on Ismail begins. The Turks resist with valor and before the fortress is captured rivers of blood have been shed.
Juan, swept away by a thirst for glory, proves himself to be a soldier of prowess and courage, but at the same time shows his humanitarianism by rescuing a little Turkish orphan girl from a pair of Cossacks who are about to slay her. Juan, now a lieutenant in the Russian army, is selected because of his valor and humanity to carry the news of the victory to the Empress Catherine in Petersburgh. He takes Leila, the young Turkish girl, with him.
The Empress Catherine is so much taken with the appearance of the handsome youthful lieutenant that when he presents her with his dispatch, she does not at once break the seal.
When she finally does so, she is filled with joy. She falls in love at first sight with the bearer of the good news. Juan is swept off his feet by the attention he receives from Catherine. She promptly makes him a favorite and showers him with wealth. Because of the position he so quickly gains and because of his gracious demeanor, he becomes the center of attention in the Russian court.
Juan soon finds himself quite at home in Petersburgh and "Seduced by Youth and dangerous examples" grows a little dissipated. For a while all goes well; then he falls sick. The doctors conclude that the climate is too cold for him, and Catherine, much against her wishes, decides to send him on an official mission to England.
He leaves Russia for England laden with gifts and honors, taking with him his little orphan Leila. In England Juan quickly becomes the object of as much attention as he had been in Russia. He passes his mornings in business, his afternoons in visits, and his evenings in dancing and other forms of entertainment. One of Juan's first problems to be solved in England is what to do with little Leila. O Gold! Why call we misers miserable? Theirs is the pleasure that can never pall; Theirs is the best bower anchor, the chain cable Which holds fast other pleasures great and small.
Ye who but see the saving man at table, And scorn his temperate board, as none at all, And wonder how the wealthy can be sparing, Know not what visions spring from each cheese-paring. I still prefer thee unto paper, Which makes bank credit like a bank of vapour. Who hold the balance of the world? Who rouse the shirtless patriots of Spain?
Who keep the world, both old and new, in pain Or pleasure? Who make politics run glibber all? Those, and the truly liberal Lafitte, Are the true lords of Europe. Every loan Is not a merely speculative hit, But seats a nation or upsets a throne. Why call the miser miserable? Perhaps he hath great projects in his mind, To build a college, or to found a race, A hospital, a church,—and leave behind Some dome surmounted by his meagre face: Perhaps he fain would liberate mankind Even with the very ore which makes them base; Perhaps he would be wealthiest of his nation, Or revel in the joys of calculation.
Or do they benefit mankind? Lean miser! How beauteous are rouleaus! Is not all love prohibited whatever, Excepting marriage? That suit in Chancery,—which some persons plead In an appeal to the unborn, whom they, In the faith of their procreative creed, Baptize posterity, or future clay,— To me seems but a dubious kind of reed To lean on for support in any way; Since odds are that posterity will know No more of them, than they of her, I trow.
Not a hundred. Mankind just now seem wrapt in mediation On constitutions and steam-boats of vapour; While sages write against all procreation, Unless a man can calculate his means Of feeding brats the moment his wife weans. And now to business. But I am sick of politics. The women much divided—as is usual Amongst the sex in little things or great. Why waltz with him? Why, I pray, Look yes last night, and yet say no to-day?
For sometimes they accept some long pursuer, Worn out with importunity; or fall But here perhaps the instances are fewer To the lot of him who scarce pursued at all. O, pardon my digression—or at least Peruse! Like many people everybody knows, Don Juan was delighted to secure A goodly guardian for his infant charge, Who might not profit much by being at large. And these vicissitudes tell best in youth; For when they happen at a riper age, People are apt to blame the Fates, forsooth, And wonder Providence is not more sage.
How far it profits is another matter. I call such things transmission; for there is A floating balance of accomplishment Which forms a pedigree from Miss to Miss, According as their minds or backs are bent. But now I will begin my poem. These first twelve books are merely flourishes, Preludios, trying just a string or two Upon my lyre, or making the pegs sure; And when so, you shall have the overture.
Don Juan saw that microcosm on stilts, Yclept the Great World; for it is the least, Although the highest: but as swords have hilts By which their power of mischief is increased, When man in battle or in quarrel tilts, Thus the low world, north, south, or west, or east, Must still obey the high—which is their handle, Their moon, their sun, their gas, their farthing candle. This works a world of sentimental woe, And sends new Werters yearly to their coffin; But yet is merely innocent flirtation, Not quite adultery, but adulteration.
A verdict—grievous foe to those who cause it! But they who blunder thus are raw beginners; A little genial sprinkling of hypocrisy Has saved the fame of thousand splendid sinners, The loveliest oligarchs of our gynocracy; You may see such at all the balls and dinners, Among the proudest of our aristocracy, So gentle, charming, charitable, chaste— And all by having tact as well as taste. At first he did not think the women pretty. I say at first—for he found out at last, But by degrees, that they were fairer far Than the more glowing dames whose lot is cast Beneath the influence of the eastern star.
A further proof we should not judge in haste; Yet inexperience could not be his bar To taste:—the truth is, if men would confess, That novelties please less than they impress. It is. I will not swear that black is white; But I suspect in fact that white is black, And the whole matter rests upon eyesight.
Ask a blind man, the best judge. A dubious spark. Like Russians rushing from hot baths to snows Are they, at bottom virtuous even when vicious: They warm into a scrape, but keep of course, As a reserve, a plunge into remorse. But this has nought to do with their outsides. I said that Juan did not think them pretty At the first blush; for a fair Briton hides Half her attractions—probably from pity— And rather calmly into the heart glides, Than storms it as a foe would take a city; But once there if you doubt this, prithee try She keeps it for you like a true ally.
Abroad, though doubtless they do much amiss, An erring woman finds an opener door For her return to Virtue—as they cal That lady, who should be at home to all. For me, I leave the matter where I find it, Knowing that such uneasy virtue leads People some ten times less in fact to mind it, And care but for discoveries and not deeds. He saw, however, at the closing session, That noble sight, when really free the nation, A king in constitutional possession Of such a throne as is the proudest station, Though despots know it not—till the progression Of freedom shall complete their education.
Here the twelfth Canto of our introduction Ends. And if my thunderbolt not always rattles, Remember, reader! My plan but I, if but for singularity, Reserve it will be very sure to take. Meantime, read all the national debt-sinkers, And tell me what you think of your great thinkers.
The struggle to be pilots in a storm? The landed and the monied speculation? The joys of mutual hate to keep them warm, Instead of love, that mere hallucination? Now hatred is by far the longest pleasure; Men love in haste, but they detest at leisure.
If I sneer sometimes, It is because I cannot well do less, And now and then it also suits my rhymes. But his adventures form a sorry sight; A sorrier still is the great moral taught By that real epic unto all who have thought. Redressing injury, revenging wrong, To aid the damsel and destroy the caitiff; Opposing singly the united strong, From foreign yoke to free the helpless native:— Alas! It chanced some diplomatical relations, Arising out of business, often brought Himself and Juan in their mutual stations Into close contact.
And thus Lord Henry, who was cautious as Reserve and pride could make him, and full slow In judging men—when once his judgment was Determined, right or wrong, on friend or foe, Had all the pertinacity pride has, Which knows no ebb to its imperious flow, And loves or hates, disdaining to be guided, Because its own good pleasure hath decided.
These were advantages: and then he thought— It was his foible, but by no means sinister— That few or none more than himself had caught Court mysteries, having been himself a minister: He liked to teach that which he had been taught, And greatly shone whenever there had been a stir; And reconciled all qualities which grace man, Always a patriot, and sometimes a placeman.
Of coursers also spake they: Henry rid Well, like most Englishmen, and loved the races; And Juan, like a true-born Andalusian, Could back a horse, as despots ride a Russian. And thus acquaintance grew, at noble routs, And diplomatic dinners, or at other— For Juan stood well both with Ins and Outs, As in freemasonry a higher brother. Also there bin another pious reason For making squares and streets anonymous; Which is, that there is scarce a single season Which doth not shake some very splendid house With some slight heart-quake of domestic treason— A topic scandal doth delight to rouse: Such I might stumble over unawares, Unless I knew the very chastest squares.
Therefore I name not square, street, place, until I Find one where nothing naughty can be shown, A vestal shrine of innocence of heart: Such are—but I have lost the London Chart.
But Adeline had not the least occasion For such a shield, which leaves but little merit To virtue proper, or good education. But Adeline was not indifferent: for Now for a common-place! Shall I go on? I hate to hunt down a tired metaphor, So let the often-used volcano go. Poor thing! And such are many—though I only meant her From whom I now deduce these moral lessons, On which the Muse has always sought to enter.
And your cold people are beyond all price, When once you have broken their confounded ice. But heaven must be diverted; its diversion Is sometimes truculent—but never mind: The world upon the whole is worth the assertion If but for comfort that all things are kind: And that same devilish doctrine of the Persian, Of the two principles, but leaves behind As many doubts as any other doctrine Has ever puzzled Faith withal, or yoked her in.
The English winter—ending in July, To recommence in August—now was done. But for post-horses who finds sympathy? Wheels whirl from Carlton palace to Soho, And happiest they who horses can engage; The turnpikes glow with dust; and Rotten Row Sleeps from the chivalry of this bright age; And tradesmen, with long bills and longer faces, Sigh—as the postboys fasten on the traces. But these are trifles. Downward flies my lord, Nodding beside my lady in his carriage.
The London winter and the country summer Were well nigh over. None than themselves could boast a longer line, Where time through heroes and through beauties steers; And oaks as olden as their pedigree Told of their sires, a tomb in every tree. Amundeville and Lady A. Within a niche, nigh to its pinnacle, Twelve saints had once stood sanctified in stone; But these had fallen, not when the friars fell, But in the war which struck Charles from his throne, When each house was a fortalice, as tell The annals of full many a line undone,— The gallant cavaliers, who fought in vain For those who knew not to resign or reign.
This may be superstition, weak or wild, But even the faintest relics of a shrine Of any worship wake some thoughts divine. But in the noontide of the moon, and when The wind is winged from one point of heaven, There moans a strange unearthly sound, which then Is musical—a dying accent driven Through the huge arch, which soars and sinks again. O reader!
But, reader, thou hast patient been of late, While I, without remorse of rhyme, or fear, Have built and laid out ground at such a rate, Dan Phoebus takes me for an auctioneer. The mellow autumn came, and with it came The promised party, to enjoy its sweets. The corn is cut, the manor full of game; The pointer ranges, and the sportsman beats In russet jacket:—lynx-like is his aim; Full grows his bag, and wonderful his feats.
Ah, nut-brown partridges! Ah, brilliant pheasants! And ah, ye poachers! If Britain mourn her bleakness, we can tell her, The very best of vineyards is the cellar.
The party might consist of thirty-three Of highest caste—the Brahmins of the ton. There was Parolles, too, the legal bully, Who limits all his battles to the bar And senate: when invited elsewhere, truly, He shows more appetite for words than war. There were the six Miss Rawbolds—pretty dears! All song and sentiment; whose hearts were set Less on a convent than a coronet.
There was Dick Dubious, the metaphysician, Who loved philosophy and a good dinner; Angle, the soi-disant mathematician; Sir Henry Silvercup, the great race-winner. My Muse, the butterfly hath but her wings, Not stings, and flits through ether without aim, Alighting rarely:—were she but a hornet, Perhaps there might be vices which would mourn it. Strongbow was like a new-tuned harpsichord; But Longbow wild as an AEolian harp, With which the winds of heaven can claim accord, And make a music, whether flat or sharp.
If all these seem a heterogeneous mas To be assembled at a country seat, Yet think, a specimen of every class Is better than a humdrum tete-a-tete. The days of Comedy are gone, alas! Its great impression in my youth Was made by Mrs. I must not quite omit the talking sage, Kit-Cat, the famous Conversationist, Who, in his common-place book, had a page Prepared each morn for evenings. I will not dwell upon ragouts or roasts, Albeit all human history attests That happiness for man—the hungry sinner!
Youth fades, and leaves our days no longer sunny; We tire of mistresses and parasites; But oh, ambrosial cash! When we no more can use, or even abuse thee!
The gentlemen got up betimes to shoot, Or hunt: the young, because they liked the sport— The first thing boys like after play and fruit; The middle-aged to make the day more short; For ennui is a growth of English root, Though nameless in our language:—we retort The fact for words, and let the French translate That awful yawn which sleep can not abate.
Each rose up at his own, and had to spare What time he chose for dress, and broke his fast When, where, and how he chose for that repast. The ladies—some rouged, some a little pale— Met the morn as they might. For some had absent lovers, all had friends. The earth has nothing like a she epistle, And hardly heaven—because it never ends.
With evening came the banquet and the wine; The conversazione; the duet, Attuned by voices more or less divine My heart or head aches with the memory yet. There now are no Squire Westerns as of old; And our Sophias are not so emphatic, But fair as then, or fairer to behold.
Peace to the slumbers of each folded flower— May the rose call back its true colour soon! Good hours of fair cheeks are the fairest tinters, And lower the price of rouge—at least some winters. One system eats another up, and this Much as old Saturn ate his progeny; For when his pious consort gave him stones In lieu of sons, of these he made no bones.
Pray tell me, can you make fast, After due search, your faith to any question? Nothing more true than not to trust your senses; And yet what are your other evidences?
For me, I know nought; nothing I deny, Admit, reject, contemn; and what know you, Except perhaps that you were born to die? And both may after all turn out untrue. An age may come, Font of Eternity, When nothing shall be either old or new.
A sleep without dreams, after a rough day Of toil, is what we covet most; and yet How clay shrinks back from more quiescent clay! The very Suicide that pays his debt At once without instalments an old way Of paying debts, which creditors regret Lets out impatiently his rushing breath, Less from disgust of life than dread of death. And you will find, though shuddering at the mirror Of your own thoughts, in all their self-confession, The lurking bias, be it truth or error, To the unknown; a secret prepossession, To plunge with all your fears—but where?
In youth I wrote because my mind was full, And now because I feel it growing dull. I ask in turn,—Why do you play at cards? Why drink? Why read? In play, there are two pleasures for your choosing— The one is winning, and the other losing. The reason why is easy to determine: Although it seems both prominent and pleasant, There is a sameness in its gems and ermine, A dull and family likeness through all ages, Of no great promise for poetic pages.
Sometimes, indeed, like soldiers off parade, They break their ranks and gladly leave the drill; But then the roll-call draws them back afraid, And they must be or seem what they were: still Doubtless it is a brilliant masquerade; But when of the first sight you have had your fill, It palls—at least it did so upon me, This paradise of pleasure and ennui.
Why do their sketches fail them as inditers Of what they deem themselves most consequential, The real portrait of the highest tribe? Poor thing of usages! But as to women, who can penetrate The real sufferings of their she condition? Their love, their virtue, beauty, education, But form good housekeepers, to breed a nation. An in-door life is less poetical; And out of door hath showers, and mists, and sleet, With which I could not brew a pastoral.
Juan—in this respect, at least, like saints— Was all things unto people of all sorts, And lived contentedly, without complaints, In camps, in ships, in cottages, or courts— Born with that happy soul which seldom faints, And mingling modestly in toils or sports. He likewise could be most things to all women, Without the coxcombry of certain she men. No marvel then he was a favourite; A full-grown Cupid, very much admired; A little spoilt, but by no means so quite; At least he kept his vanity retired.
Such was his tact, he could alike delight The chaste, and those who are not so much inspired. This noble personage began to look A little black upon this new flirtation; But such small licences must lovers brook, Mere freedoms of the female corporation. Woe to the man who ventures a rebuke! But, oh! Without a friend, what were humanity, To hunt our errors up with a good grace? But this is not my maxim: had it been, Some heart-aches had been spared me: yet I care not— I would not be a tortoise in his screen Of stubborn shell, which waves and weather wear not.
O Time! Thy scythe, so dirty With rust, should surely cease to hack and hew. Reset it; shave more smoothly, also slower, If but to keep thy credit as a mower.
To trace all actions to their secret springs Would make indeed some melancholy mirth; But this is not at present my concern, And I refer you to wise Oxenstiern. She thought with some simplicity indeed; But innocence is bold even at the stake, And simple in the world, and doth not need Nor use those palisades by dames erected, Whose virtue lies in never being detected. No wonder then a purer soul should dread This sort of chaste liaison for a friend; It were much better to be wed or dead, Than wear a heart a woman loves to rend.
There is an awkward thing which much perplexes, Unless like wise Tiresias we had proved By turns the difference of the several sexes; Neither can show quite how they would be loved.
A something all-sufficient for the heart Is that for which the sex are always seeking: But how to fill up that same vacant part? There lies the rub—and this they are but weak in. I have found it! What I mean To say is, not that love is idleness, But that in love such idleness has been An accessory, as I have cause to guess. Because he mopeth idly in his shell, And heaves a lonely subterraqueous sigh, Much as a monk may do within his cell: And a-propos of monks, their piety With sloth hath found it difficult to dwell; Those vegetables of the Catholic creed Are apt exceedingly to run to seed.
O Wilberforce! Shut up the bald-coot bully Alexander! Shut up the world at large, let Bedlam out; And you will be perhaps surprised to find All things pursue exactly the same route, As now with those of soi-disant sound mind.
Our gentle Adeline had one defect— Her heart was vacant, though a splendid mansion; Her conduct had been perfectly correct, As she had seen nought claiming its expansion.
She had nothing to complain of, or reprove, No bickerings, no connubial turmoil: Their union was a model to behold, Serene and noble,—conjugal, but cold. She knew not her own heart; then how should I?
No doubt the secret influence of the sex Will there, as also in the ties of blood, An innocent predominance annex, And tune the concord to a finer mood. If free from passion, which all friendship checks, And your true feelings fully understood, No friend like to a woman earth discovers, So that you have not been nor will be lovers. Love bears within its breast the very germ Of change; and how should this be otherwise?
Would you have endless lightning in the skies? And I shall take a much more serious air Than I have yet done, in this epic satire. How differently the world would men behold!
How oft would vice and virtue places change! What icebergs in the hearts of mighty men, With self-love in the centre as their pole! But all are better than the sigh supprest, Corroding in the cavern of the heart, Making the countenance a masque of rest, And turning human nature to an art.
Few men dare show their thoughts of worst or best; Dissimulation always sets apart A corner for herself; and therefore fiction Is that which passes with least contradiction. And as for love—O love! The Lady Adeline Amundeville, A pretty name as one would wish to read, Must perch harmonious on my tuneful quill. They differ as wine differs from its label, When once decanted;—I presume to guess so, But will not swear: yet both upon occasion, Till old, may undergo adulteration. O Death! She is so rare, and thou hast so much prey.
Gaunt Gourmand! Experience is the chief philosopher, But saddest when his science is well known: And persecuted sages teach the schools Their folly in forgetting there are fools.
Was it not so, great Locke? Great Socrates? And thou, Diviner still, Whose lot it is by man to be mistaken, And thy pure creed made sanction of all ill? Redeeming worlds to be by bigots shaken, How was thy toil rewarded? We might fill Volumes with similar sad illustrations, But leave them to the conscience of the nations. The whole together is what I could wish To serve in this conundrum of a dish. Now this at all events must render cold Your writers, who must either draw again Days better drawn before, or else assume The present, with their common-place costume.
March, my Muse! If you cannot fly, yet flutter; And when you may not be sublime, be arch, Or starch, as are the edicts statesmen utter. We surely may find something worth research: Columbus found a new world in a cutter, Or brigantine, or pink, of no great tonnage, While yet America was in her non-age.
She had a good opinion of advice, Like all who give and eke receive it gratis, For which small thanks are still the market price, Even where the article at highest rate is: She thought upon the subject twice or thrice, And morally decided, the best state is For morals, marriage; and this question carried, She seriously advised him to get married. But never yet except of course a miss Unwed, or mistress never to be wed, Or wed already, who object to this Was there chaste dame who had not in her head Some drama of the marriage unities, Observed as strictly both at board and bed As those of Aristotle, though sometimes They turn out melodrames or pantomimes.
They generally have some only son, Some heir to a large property, some friend Of an old family, some gay Sir john, Or grave Lord George, with whom perhaps might end A line, and leave posterity undone, Unless a marriage was applied to mend The prospect and their morals: and besides, They have at hand a blooming glut of brides. Because he either meant to sneer at harmony Or marriage, by divorcing them thus oddly. But Rapp is the reverse of zealous matrons, Who favour, malgre Malthus, generation— Professors of that genial art, and patrons Of all the modest part of propagation; Which after all at such a desperate rate runs, That half its produce tends to emigration, That sad result of passions and potatoes— Two weeds which pose our economic Catos.
Had Adeline read Malthus? And the two fair co-heiresses Giltbedding. And then there was—but why should I go on, Unless the ladies should go off? Blood is not water; and where shall we find Feelings of youth like those which overthrown lie By death, when we are left, alas! And grieved for those who could return no more. She gazed upon a world she scarcely knew, As seeking not to know it; silent, lone, As grows a flower, thus quietly she grew, And kept her heart serene within its zone.
And this omission, like that of the bust Of Brutus at the pageant of Tiberius, Made Juan wonder, as no doubt he must. And wherefore not? It was not envy—Adeline had none; Her place was far beyond it, and her mind. It was not scorn—which could not light on one Whose greatest fault was leaving few to find. To say what it was not than what it was.
Had she known this, she would have calmly smiled— She had so much, or little, of the child. I say, in my slight way I may proceed To play upon the surface of humanity. I write the world, nor care if the world read, At least for this I cannot spare its vanity.
My Muse hath bred, and still perhaps may breed More foes by this same scroll: when I began it, I Thought that it might turn out so—now I know it, But still I am, or was, a pretty poet. How shall I get this gourmand stanza through? But I must crowd all into one grand mess Or mass; for should I stretch into detail, My Muse would run much more into excess, Than when some squeamish people deem her frail.
They are rags or dust. Gone to where victories must like dinners go. Farther I shall not follow the research: But oh! Ere you dine, the French will do; But after, there are sometimes certain signs Which prove plain English truer of the two. Hast ever had the gout? I have not had it— But I may have, and you too, reader, dread it. The simple olives, best allies of wine, Must I pass over in my bill of fare? By some odd chance too, he was placed between Aurora and the Lady Adeline— A situation difficult, I ween, For man therein, with eyes and heart, to dine.
Now Juan, though no coxcomb in pretence, Was not exactly pleased to be so caught; Like a good ship entangled among ice, And after so much excellent advice. To his gay nothings, nothing was replied, Or something which was nothing, as urbanity Required. The devil was in the girl! Could it be pride? Or modesty, or absence, or inanity? Heaven knows? Juan was drawn thus into some attentions, Slight but select, and just enough to express, To females of perspicuous comprehensions, That he would rather make them more than less.
And then he had good looks;—that point was carried Nem. Now though we know of old that looks deceive, And always have done, somehow these good looks Make more impression than the best of books. Perhaps I have a third, too, in a nook, Or none at all—which seems a sorry jest: But if a writer should be quite consistent, How could he possibly show things existent?
If people contradict themselves, can I Help contradicting them, and every body, Even my veracious self? Who has its clue? No: she too much rejects. Yes; but which of all her sects? God help us! Opinions wear out in some thousand years, Without a small refreshment from the spheres. But here again, why will I thus entangle Myself with metaphysics?
None can hate So much as I do any kind of wrangle; And yet, such is my folly, or my fate, I always knock my head against some angle About the present, past, or future state. It makes my blood boil like the springs of Hecla, To see men let these scoundrel sovereigns break law. But politics, and policy, and piety, Are topics which I sometimes introduce, Not only for the sake of their variety, But as subservient to a moral use; Because my business is to dress society, And stuff with sage that very verdant goose.
And now, that we may furnish with some matter all Tastes, we are going to try the supernatural. Grim reader! No; but you have heard—I understand—be dumb! You laugh;—you may: that will I not; My smiles must be sincere or not at all. I say I do believe a haunted spot Exists—and where? The antique Persians taught three useful things, To draw the bow, to ride, and speak the truth. This was the mode of Cyrus, best of kings— A mode adopted since by modern youth.
Bows have they, generally with two strings; Horses they ride without remorse or ruth; At speaking truth perhaps they are less clever, But draw the long bow better now than ever.
I said it was a story of a ghost— What then? I only know it so befell. Have you explored the limits of the coast, Where all the dwellers of the earth must dwell? The evaporation of a joyous day Is like the last glass of champagne, without The foam which made its virgin bumper gay; Or like a system coupled with a doubt; Or like a soda bottle when its spray Has sparkled and let half its spirit out; Or like a billow left by storms behind, Without the animation of the wind; Or like an opiate, which brings troubled rest, Or none; or like—like nothing that I know Except itself;—such is the human breast; A thing, of which similitudes can show No real likeness,—like the old Tyrian vest Dyed purple, none at present can tell how, If from a shell-fish or from cochineal.
But next to dressing for a rout or ball, Undressing is a woe; our robe de chambre May sit like that of Nessus, and recall Thoughts quite as yellow, but less clear than amber. But by dim lights the portraits of the dead Have something ghastly, desolate, and dread.
The forms of the grim knight and pictured saint Look living in the moon; and as you turn Backward and forward to the echoes faint Of your own footsteps—voices from the urn Appear to wake, and shadows wild and quaint Start from the frames which fence their aspects stern, As if to ask how you can dare to keep A vigil there, where all but death should sleep.
And the pale smile of beauties in the grave, The charms of other days, in starlight gleams, Glimmer on high; their buried locks still wave Along the canvas; their eyes glance like dreams On ours, or spars within some dusky cave, But death is imaged in their shadowy beams. A picture is the past; even ere its frame Be gilt, who sate hath ceased to be the same.
As Juan mused on mutability, Or on his mistress—terms synonymous— No sound except the echo of his sigh Or step ran sadly through that antique house; When suddenly he heard, or thought so, nigh, A supernatural agent—or a mouse, Whose little nibbling rustle will embarrass Most people as it plays along the arras.
It was no mouse, but lo! And did he see this? The spirit of these walls? And whether for good, or whether for ill, It is not mine to say; But still with the house of Amundeville He abideth night and day. But beware! Then grammercy! But still from that sublimer azure hue, So much the present dye, she was remote; Was weak enough to deem Pope a great poet, And what was worse, was not ashamed to show it.
Not so her gracious, graceful, graceless Grace, The full-grown Hebe of Fitz-Fulke, whose mind, If she had any, was upon her face, And that was of a fascinating kind. Perhaps she merely had the simple project To laugh him out of his supposed dismay; Perhaps she might wish to confirm him in it, Though why I cannot say—at least this minute. But so far the immediate effect Was to restore him to his self-propriety, A thing quite necessary to the elect, Who wish to take the tone of their society: In which you cannot be too circumspect, Whether the mode be persiflage or piety, But wear the newest mantle of hypocrisy, On pain of much displeasing the gynocracy.
And therefore Juan now began to rally His spirits, and without more explanation To jest upon such themes in many a sally. There was a picture-dealer who had brought A special Titian, warranted original, So precious that it was not to be bought, Though princes the possessor were besieging all. There were two poachers caught in a steel trap, Ready for gaol, their place of convalescence; There was a country girl in a close cap And scarlet cloak I hate the sight to see, since— Since—since—in youth, I had the sad mishap— But luckily I have paid few parish fees since : That scarlet cloak, alas!
Now justices of peace must judge all pieces Of mischief of all kinds, and keep the game And morals of the country from caprices Of those who have not a license for the same; And of all things, excepting tithes and leases, Perhaps these are most difficult to tame: Preserving partridges and pretty wenches Are puzzles to the most precautious benches. Perhaps she was ashamed of seeming frail, Poor soul! The lawyers in the study; and in air The prize pig, ploughman, poachers; the men sent From town, viz.
He would not tread a factious path to praise, Though for the public weal disposed to venture high; As for his place, he could but say this of it, That the fatigue was greater than the profit. The Gordian or the Geordi-an knot, whose strings Have tied together commons, lords, and kings.
Explain who can! He gloried in the name of Englishman. Thus on the mob all statesmen are as eager To prove their pride, as footmen to a beggar. All this save the last stanza Henry said, And thought. For any deviation from the graces Might cost both man and master too—their places. There were some massy members of the church, Takers of tithes, and makers of good matches, And several who sung fewer psalms than catches.
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