XLV.

There was just then a kind of a discussion,

A sort of treaty or negotiation

Between the British cabinet and Russian,

Maintain'd with all the due prevarication

With which great states such things are apt to

push on;

Something about the Baltic's navigation, Hides, train-oil, tallow, and the rights of Thetis, Which Britons deem their "uti possidetis."

XLVI.

So Catherine, who had a handsome way
Of fitting out her favourites, conferr'd
This secret charge on Juan, to display

At once her royal splendour, and reward
His services. He kiss'd hands the next day,

Received instructions how to play his card, Was laden with all kinds of gifts and honours, Which show'd what great discernment was the donor's.

XLVII.

But she was lucky, and luck's all. Your queens
Are generally prosperous in reigning;
Which puzzles us to know what Fortune means.
But to continue: though her years were waning,
Her climacteric teased her like her teens ;

And though her dignity brook'd no complaining,
So much did Juan's setting off distress her,
She could not find at first a fit successor.

XLVIII.

But time, the comforter, will come at last;

And four-and-twenty hours, and twice that number Of candidates requesting to be placed,

Made Catherine taste next night a quiet slumber: Not that she meant to fix again in haste, Nor did she find the quantity encumber, But always choosing with deliberation, Kept the place open for their emulation.

XLIX.

While this high post of honour's in abeyance,
For one or two days, reader, we request
You'll mount with our young hero the conveyance
Which wafted him from Petersburgh: the best
Barouche, which had the glory to display once
The fair czarina's autocratic crest,
When, a new Iphigene, she went to Tauris,
Was given to her favourite 1, and now bore his.

L.

A bull-dog, and a bullfinch, and an ermine,
All private favourites of Don Juan;-for
(Let deeper sages the true cause determine)
He had a kind of inclination, or
Weakness, for what most people deem mere vermin,
Live animals: an old maid of threescore
For cats and birds more penchant ne'er display'd,
Although he was not old, nor even a maid; —

1 The empress went to the Crimea, accompanied by the Emperor Joseph, in the year I forget which. The Prince de Ligné, who accompanied Catherine in her progress through her southern provinces, in 1787, gives the following particulars:-"We have been traversing, during several days, an immense tract of deserts formerly inhabited by hostile Tartar hordes, but recovered by the arms of her Majesty, and at present ornamented from stage to stage with magnificent tents, where we are supplied with breakfast, collation, dinner, supper, and lodging; and our encampments, decorated with

LI.

The animals aforesaid occupied

Their station: there were valets, secretaries, In other vehicles; but at his side

Sat little Leila, who survived the parries

He made 'gainst Cossacque sabres, in the wide Slaughter of Ismail. Though my wild Muse varies Her note, she don't forget the infant girl

Whom he preserved, a pure and living pearl.

LII.

Poor little thing! She was as fair as docile,
And with that gentle, serious character,

As rare in living beings as a fossile

Man, 'midst thy mouldy mammoths, "grand Cuvier !"

Ill fitted was her ignorance to jostle

With this o'erwhelming world, where all must err: But she was yet but ten years old, and therefore Was tranquil, though she knew not why or wherefore.

LIII.

Don Juan loved her, and she loved him, as
Nor brother, father, sister, daughter love.
I cannot tell exactly what it was;

He was not yet quite old enough to prove
Parental feelings, and the other class,

Call'd brotherly affection, could not move His bosom, for he never had a sister: Ah! if he had, how much he would have miss'd her!

LIV.

And still less was it sensual; for besides

That he was not an ancient debauchee, (Who like sour fruit, to stir their veins' salt tides, As acids rouse a dormant alkali,) Although ('t will happen as our planet guides)

His youth was not the chastest that might be, There was the purest Platonism at bottom Of all his feelings-only he forgot 'em.

LV.

Just now there was no peril of temptation;
He loved the infant orphan he had saved,
As patriots (now and then) may love a nation;
His pride, too, felt that she was not enslaved
Owing to him;-as also her salvation

Through his means and the church's might be paved. But one thing's odd, which here must be inserted, The little Turk refused to be converted.

LVI.

'T was strange enough she should retain the impression Through such a scene of change, and dread, and slaughter;

But though three bishops told her the transgression, She show'd a great dislike to holy water;

She also had no passion for confession;

Perhaps she had nothing to confess :-no matter Whate'er the cause, the church made little of itShe still held out that Mahomet was a prophet.

all the pomp of Asiatic splendour, present a noble military spectacle. The empress has left, in each town, presents to the amount of 100,000 roubles. Each day of rest is marked by the gift of some diamonds, by balls, by fireworks, and by illuminations extending for leagues in every direction. During the last two months I have been daily employed in throwing money out of our carriage windows, and have thus distributed the value of some millions of livres."— Lettres et Pensées.]

LVII.

In fact, the only Christian she could bear

Was Juan; whom she seem'd to have selected
In place of what her home and friends once were.
He naturally loved what he protected :
And thus they form'd a rather curious pair,

A guardian green in years, a ward connected
In neither clime, time, blood, with her defender;
And yet this want of ties made theirs more tender.
LVIII.

They journey'd on through Poland and through Warsaw,

Famous for mines of salt and yokes of iron: Through Courland also, which that famous farce saw Which gave her dukes the graceless name of "Biron."1 'Tis the same landscape which the modern Mars saw, Who march'd to Moscow, led by Fame, the siren ! To lose by one month's frost some twenty years Of conquest, and his guard of grenadiers.

My guard! my old guard! "2 exclaim'd that god of Think of the Thunderer's falling down below Carotid-artery-cutting Castlereagh !

Alas! that glory should be chill'd by snow!
But should we wish to warm us on our way
Through Poland, there is Kosciusko's name
Might scatter fire through ice, like Hecla's flame. 3
LX.

From Poland they came on through Prussia Proper,
And Königsberg the capital, whose vaunt,
Besides some veins of iron, lead, or copper,

Has lately been the great Professor Kant. 4
Juan, who cared not a tobacco-stopper

About philosophy, pursued his jaunt To Germany, whose somewhat tardy millions Have princes who spur more than their postilions.

LXI.

And thence through Berlin, Dresden, and the like,
Until he reach'd the castellated Rhine: -
Ye glorious Gothic scenes! how much ye strike
All phantasies, not even excepting mine;

A grey wall, a green ruin, rusty pike,

Make my soul pass the equinoctial line Between the present and past worlds, and hover Upon their airy confine, half-seas-over.

LXII.

But Juan posted on through Manheim, Bonn, Which Drachenfels frowns over like a spectre

In the Empress Anne's time, Biren, her favourite, assumed the name and arms of the "Birons" of France; which families are yet extant with that of England. There are still the daughters of Courland of that name; one of them I remember seeing in England in the blessed year of the Allies (1814) - the Duchess of S.-to whom the English Duchess of Somerset presented me as a namesake.-[“ Ernest John Biren, become so famous by his great advancements, and his not less extraordinary reverses of fortune, was born in Courland, of a family of mean extraction. His grandfather had been head groom to James, the third Duke of Courland, and obtained from his master the present of a small estate in land.... In 1714, he made his appearance at St. Petersburg, and solicited the place of page to the Princess Charlotte, wife of the Tzarovitch Alexey; but being contemptuously rejected as a person of mean extraction, retired to Mittau, where he chanced to ingratiate himself with Count Bestucheff. master of the household to Anne, widow of Frederic William duke of Courland, who resided at Mittau. Being of a handsome figure and polite address, he soon gained the good-will of the duchess, and became her secretary and

Of the good feudal times for ever gone,

On which I have not time just now to lecture. From thence he was drawn onwards to Cologne,

A city which presents to the inspector
Eleven thousand maidenheads of bone,
The greatest number flesh hath ever known. 6
LXIII.
From thence to Holland's Hague and Helvoetsluys,
That water-land of Dutchmen and of ditches,
Where juniper expresses its best juice,

The poor man's sparkling substitute for riches.
Senates and sages have condemn'd its use —
But to deny the mob a cordial, which is
Too often all the clothing, meat, or fuel,
Good government has left them, seems but cruel.
LXIV.

Here he embark'd, and with a flowing sail
Went bounding for the island of the free,
Towards which the impatient wind blew half a gale;
High dash'd the spray, the bows dipp'd in the sea,
And sea-sick passengers turn'd somewhat pale;

But Juan, season'd, as he well might be,

By former voyages, stood to watch the skiffs
Which pass'd, or catch the first glimpse of the cliffs.
LXV.

At length they rose, like a white wall along
The blue sea's border; and Don Juan felt
What even young strangers feel a little strong
At the first sight of Albion's chalky belt —
A kind of pride that he should be among
Those haughty shopkeepers, who sternly dealt
Their goods and edicts out from pole to pole,
And made the very billows pay them toll.
LXVI.

I've no great cause to love that spot of earth,
Which holds what might have been the noblest
But though I owe it little but my birth, [nation;
I feel a mix'd regret and veneration
For its decaying fame and former worth.
Seven years (the usual term of transportation)
Of absence lay one's old resentments level,
When a man's country's going to the devil.

chief favourite. On her being declared sovereign of Russia, Anne called Biren to Petersburg, and the secretary soon became Duke of Courland, and first minister or rather despot of Russia. On the death of Anne, which happened in 1740, Biren, being declared regent, continued daily increasing his vexations and cruelties, till he was arrested, on the 18th of December, only twenty days after he had been appointed to the regency; and at the revolution that ensued he was exiled to the frozen shores of the Oby."- TOOKE.]

2 [Napoleon's exclamation at the Elysée Bourbon, June the 23d, 1815.]

3 ["Hope for a moment bade the world farewell, And freedom shriek'd when Kosciusko fell."-CAMPB.] [Immanuel Kant, the celebrated founder of a new philosophical sect, was born at Königsberg. He died in 1804.] "["The castled crag of Drachenfels

Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine," &c.— See ante, p. 31.1 6 St. Ursula and her eleven thousand virgins were still extant in 1816, and may be so yet, as much as ever.

LXVIII.
Would she be proud, or boast herself the free,
Who is but first of slaves? The nations are
In prison, but the gaoler, what is he?
No less a victim to the bolt and bar.
Is the poor privilege to turn the key

Upon the captive, freedom? He's as far
From the enjoyment of the earth and air
Who watches o'er the chain, as they who wear.
LXIX.

Don Juan now saw Albion's earliest beauties,
Thy cliffs, dear Dover! harbour, and hotel;
Thy custom-house, with all its delicate duties;
Thy waiters running mucks at every bell;
Thy packets, all whose passengers are booties
To those who upon land or water dwell;
And last, not least, to strangers uninstructed,
Thy long, long bills, whence nothing is deducted.
LXX.

Juan, though careless, young, and magnifique,

And rich in rubles, diamonds, cash, and credit, Who did not limit much his bills per week,

Yet stared at this a little, though he paid it, (His Maggior Duomo, a smart, subtle Greek, Before him summ'd the awful scroll and read it :) But doubtless as the air, though seldom sunny, Is free, the respiration's worth the money.

[On the tomb of the prince lies a whole-length brass figure of him, his armour with a hood of mail, and a scull cap enriched with a coronet, which had been once studded with jewels, but only the collets now remain.]

2 [Becket was assassinated in the cathedral, in 1171.]

3 [The French inscription on the Black Prince's monument is thus translated in the History of Kent:

"Whoso thou be that passest by
Where these corps interred líe,
Understand what I shall say,
As at this time speak I may.

Such as thou art, sometime was I.
Such as I am, such shalt thou be.

LXXIV.

The effect on Juan was of course sublime:
He breathed a thousand Cressys, as he saw
That casque, which never stoop'd except to Time.
Even the bold Churchman's tomb excited awe.
Who died in the then great attempt to climb

O'er kings, who now at least must talk of law
Before they butcher. Little Leila gazed,
And asked why such a structure had been raised :
LXXV.

And being told it was "God's house," she said
He was well lodged, but only wonder'd how
He suffer'd Infidels in his homestead,

The cruel Nazarenes, who had laid low
His holy temples in the lands which bred

The true Believers;—and her infant brow Was bent with grief that Mahomet should resign A mosque so noble, flung like pearls to swine.

I little thought on the hour of death
So long as I enjoyed breath.
Great riches here I did possess,
Whereof I made great nobleness;
I had gold, silver, wardrobes, and
Great treasures, horses, houses, land.
But now a caitiff poor am I,
Deep in the ground, lo here I lie ;
My beauty great is all quite gone,
My flesh is wasted to the bone;
And if you should see me this day,
I do not think but you would say,
That I had never been a man,
So much alter'd now I am."]

CANTO XI.

LXXX.

So said the Florentine: ye monarchs, hearken Juan now was borne, To your instructor.

Just as the day began to wane and darken,

O'er the high hill, which looks with pride or scorn Toward the great city. - Ye who have a spark in

Your veins of Cockney spirit, smile or mourn
According as you take things well or ill;
Bold Britons, we are now on Shooter's Hill!!
LXXXI.

The sun went down, the smoke rose up, as from
A half-unquench'd volcano, o'er a space
Which well beseem'd the "Devil's drawing-room,"
As some have qualified that wondrous place;
But Juan felt, though not approaching home,

As one who, though he were not of the race,
Revered the soil, of those true sons the mother,
Who butcher'd half the earth, and bullied t'other. 2
LXXXII.

A mighty mass of brick, and smoke, and shipping,
Dirty and dusky, but as wide as eye

Could reach, with here and there a sail just skipping
In sight, then lost amidst the forestry

Of masts; a wilderness of steeples peeping

On tiptoe through their sea-coal canopy;

A huge, dun cupola, like a foolscap crown

On a fool's head-and there is London Town!
LXXXIII.

But Juan saw not this: each wreath of smoke
Appear'd to him but as the magic vapour
Of some alchymic furnace, from whence broke
The wealth of worlds (a wealth of tax and paper):
The gloomy clouds, which o'er it as a yoke

Are bow'd, and put the sun out like a taper,
Were nothing but the natural atmosphere,
Extremely wholesome, though but rarely clear.
LXXXIV.

He paused-and so will I; as doth a crew

Before they give their broadside. By and by, My gentle countrymen, we will renew

Our old acquaintance; and at least I'll try
To tell you truths you will not take as true,
Because they are so ;-a male Mrs. Fry, 3
With a soft besom will I sweep your halls,
And brush a web or two from off the walls.
LXXXV.

Oh Mrs. Fry! Why go to Newgate? Why
Preach to poor rogues? And wherefore not begin
With Carlton, or with other houses? Try
Your hand at harden'd and imperial sin.

["Under his proud survey the city lies,

And like a mist beneath a hill doth rise,

Whose state and wealth, the business and the crowd,
Seem at this distance but a darker cloud,
And is, to him who rightly things esteems,
No other in effect than what it seems;

Where, with like haste, tho' several ways they run,
Some to undo, and some to be undone;
While luxury and wealth, like war and peace,

Are each the other's ruin and increase."- DENHAM.]

711

Cure them of tours, hussar and highland dresses; Tell them that youth once gone returns no more, That hired huzzas redeem no land's distresses; Tell them Sir William Curtis is a bore,

Too dull even for the dullest of excesses,
The witless Falstaff of a hoary Hal,

A fool whose bells have ceased to ring at all.
LXXXVII.

Tell them, though it may be perhaps too late
On life's worn confine, jaded, bloated, sated,
To set up vain pretences of being great,

'Tis not so to be good; and be it stated,
The worthiest kings have ever loved least state:

And tell them— -But you won't, and I have prated Just now enough; but by and by I'll prattle Like Roland's horn in Roncesvalles' battle.

6 [The celebrated and ingenious Bishop of Cloyne, in his "Principles of Human Knowledge," denies, without any ceremony, the existence of every kind of matter whatever; nor does he think this conclusion one that need, in any degree, "Some truths there are," says he, stagger the incredulous. "so near and obvious to the mind, that a man need only open his eyes to see them. Such I take this important one to be, that all the choir of heaven, and furniture of earth, -in a word, all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world, have not any subsistence without a mind." This deduction, however singular, was readily made from the theory of our perceptions laid down by Descartes and Mr. Locke, and at that time generally received in the world. According to that theory, we perceive nothing but ideas which are present in the mind, and which have no dependence whatever upon external things; so that we have no evidence of the existence of any thing external to our minds. Berkeley appears to have been altogether in earnest, in maintaining his scepticism concerning the existence of matter; and the more so, as he conceived this system to be highly favourable to the doctrines of religion, since it removed matter from the world, which had already been the strong hold of the Atheists. — SIR DAVID BREWSTER.]

2 z 4

III.

For ever and anon comes Indigestion,

(Not the most" dainty Ariel”)1 and perplexes Our soarings with another sort of question:

And that which after all my spirit vexes,

Is, that I find no spot where man can rest eye on,
Without confusion of the sorts and sexes,

Of beings, stars, and this unriddled wonder,
The world, which at the worst's a glorious blunder—

IV.

If it be chance; or if it be according

To the old text, still better:-lest it should Turn out so, we'll say nothing 'gainst the wording, As several people think such hazards rude. They're right; our days are too brief for affording Space to dispute what no one ever could Decide, and every body one day will Know very clearly—or at least lie still.

V.

And therefore will I leave off metaphysical
Discussion, which is neither here nor there :
If I agree that what is, is; then this I call

Being quite perspicuous and extremely fair;
The truth is, I've grown lately rather phthisical:
I don't know what the reason is-the air
Perhaps; but as I suffer from the shocks
Of illness, I grow much more orthodox.

VI.

The first attack at once proved the Divinity
(But that I never doubted, nor the Devil);
The next, the Virgin's mystical virginity;
The third, the usual Origin of Evil;

The fourth at once established the whole Trinity
On so uncontrovertible a level,
That I devoutly wish'd the three were four,
On purpose to believe so much the more.

VII.

To our theme. The man who has stood on the

Acropolis,

And look'd down over Attica; or he Who has sail'd where picturesque Constantinople is, Or seen Timbuctoo, or hath taken tea In small-eyed China's crockery-ware metropolis, Or sat amidst the bricks of Nineveh, May not think much of London's first appearance · But ask him what he thinks of it a year hence? VIII.

Don Juan had got out on Shooter's Hill;

Sunset the time, the place the same declivity Which looks along that vale of good and ill

Where London streets ferment in full activity; While every thing around was calm and still, Except the creak of wheels, which on their pivot he Heard, -and that bee-like, bubbling, busy hum Of cities, that boil over with their scum :

IX.

I say, Don Juan, wrapt in contemplation,

Walk'd on behind his carriage, o'er the summit, And lost in wonder of so great a nation,

Gave way to't, since he could not overcome it. ["Prosp. Why, that's my dainty Ariel: I shall miss thee;

But yet thou shalt have freedom."-Tempest.] ["Falstaff. Diana's foresters, gentlemen of the shade,