LXXI.

Alas! I must leave undescribed the gibier,

The salmi, the consommé, the purée, All which I use to make my rhymes run glibber Than could roast beef in our rough John Bull way: I must not introduce even a spare rib here,

"Bubble and squeak" would spoil my liquid lay, But I have dined, and must forego, alas! The chaste description even of a "bécasse;"

LXXII.

And fruits, and ice, and all that art refines
From nature for the service of the goût-
Taste or the gout,—pronounce it as inclines

Your stomach! 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 itBut I may have, and you too, reader, dread it. LXXIII.

The simple olives, best allies of wine,

Must I pass over in my bill of fare?

I must, although a favourite "plat" of mine
In Spain, and Lucca, Athens, every where:
On them and bread 't was oft my luck to dine,
The grass my table-cloth, in open air,
On Sunium or Hymettus, like Diogenes,
Of whom half my philosophy the progeny is. 1
LXXIV.

Amidst this tumult of fish, flesh, and fowl,
And vegetables, all in masquerade,
The guests were placed according to their roll,
But various as the various meats display'd:
Don Juan sat next an "á l'Espagnole "—

No damsel, but a dish, as hath been said;
But so far like a lady, that 't was drest
Superbly, and contain'd a world of zest.

I sometimes almost think that eyes have ears:
This much is sure, that, out of earshot, things

Are somehow echoed to the pretty dears,

Of which I can't tell whence their knowledge springs. Like that same mystic music of the spheres,

Which no one hears, so loudly though it rings,
'Tis wonderful how oft the sex have heard
Long dialogues—which pass'd without a word!
LXXVII.

Aurora sat with that indifference

Which piques a preux chevalier-as it ought: Of all offences that's the worst offence,

Which seems to hint you are not worth a thought. 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-day in a palace, to-morrow in a cow-house this day with the pachia, the next with a shepherd."- Byron Letters, 1810.]

LXXVIII.

To his gay nothings, nothing was replied,
Or something which was nothing, as urbanity
Required. Aurora scarcely look'd aside,
Nor even smiled enough for any vanity.
The devil was in the girl! Could it be pride?
Or modesty, or absence, or inanity?
Heaven knows! But Adeline's malicious eyes
Sparkled with her successful prophecies,

LXXIX.

And look'd as much as if to say, "I said it;"
A kind of triumph I'll not recommend,
Because it sometimes, as I have seen or read it,
Both in the case of lover and of friend,
Will pique a gentleman, for his own credit,

To bring what was a jest to a serious end :
For all men prophesy what is or was,
And hate those who won't let them come to pass.

LXXX.

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.
Aurora at the last (so history mentions,

Though probably much less a fact than guess) So far relax'd her thoughts from their sweet prison, As once or twice to smile, if not to listen.

LXXXI.

From answering she began to question: this
With her was rare; and Adeline, who as yet
Thought her predictions went not much amiss,
Began to dread she'd thaw to a coquette-
So very difficult, they say, it is

To keep extremes from meeting, when once set In motion; but she here too much refined— Aurora's spirit was not of that kind.

LXXXII.

But Juan had a sort of winning way,

A proud humility, if such there be,
Which show'd such deference to what females say,
As if each charming word were a decree.

His tact, too, temper'd him from grave to gay,
And taught him when to be reserved or free:
He had the art of drawing people out,
Without their seeing what he was about.

LXXXIII.

LXXXV.

Aurora, who look'd more on books than faces,
Was very young, although so very sage,
Admiring more Minerva than the Graces,
Especially upon a printed page.

But Virtue's self, with all her tightest laces,
Has not the natural stays of strict old age;
And Socrates, that model of all duty,

Own'd to a penchant, though discreet, for beauty.
LXXXVI.

And girls of sixteen are thus far Socratic,

But innocently so, as Socrates;
And really, if the sage sublime and Attic

At seventy years had phantasies like these,
Which Plato in his dialogues dramatic

Has shown, I know not why they should displease In virgins-always in a modest way, Observe; for that with me's a “sine quâ."1

LXXXVII.

Also observe, that, like the great Lord Coke
(See Littleton), whene'er I have express'd
Opinious two, which at first sight may look
Twin opposites, the second is the best.
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 ?
LXXXVIII.

If people contradict themselves, can I

Help contradicting them, and every body,
Even my veracious self? -But that's a lie:
I never did so, never will-how should I?
He who doubts all things nothing can deny :
Truth's fountains may be clear- her streams are
muddy,

And cut through such canals of contradiction,
That she must often navigate o'er fiction.

LXXXIX.

Apologue, fable, poesy, and parable,

Are false, but may be render'd also true, By those who sow them in a land that's arable. 'Tis wonderful what fable will not do! 'Tis said it makes reality more bearable :

But what's reality? Who has its clue? Philosophy? No: she too much rejects. Religion? Yes; but which of all her sects?

XC.

Some millions must he wrong, that's pretty clear;
Perhaps it may turn out that all were right.
God help us! Since we have need on our career
To keep our holy beacons always bright,
"Tis time that some new prophet should appear,
Or old indulge man with a second sight.
Opinions wear out in some thousand years,
Without a small refreshment from the spheres.
XCI.

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,

1 Subauditur "non;" omitted for the sake of euphony.

2 [John Scott, Earl of Eldon, Chancellor of England (with the interruption of fourteen months) from 1801 to 1830.] 3 Hecla is a fanous hot-spring in Iceland.

Hamlet Act III. sc. ii.

I always knock my head against some angle About the present, past, or future state: Yet I wish well to Trojan and to Tyrian, For I was bred a moderate Presbyterian.

XCII.

But though I am a temperate theologian,
And also meek as a metaphysician,
Impartial between Tyrian and Trojan

As Eldon on a lunatic commission, —

In politics my duty is to show John

Bull something of the lower world's condition. It makes my blood boil like the springs of Hecla, s To see men let these scoundrel sovereigns break law. XCIII.

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.

XCIV.

And now I will give up all argument;

And positively henceforth no temptation Shall "fool me to the top up of my bent:'

Yes, I'll begin a thorough reformation. Indeed, I never knew what people meant

By deeming that my Muse's conversation Was dangerous; -I think she is as harmless As some who labour more and yet may charin less. XCV.

Grim reader! did you ever see a ghost?

No; but you have heard-I understand-be dumb! And don't regret the time you may have lost,

For you have got that pleasure still to come :

And do not think I mean to sneer at most
Of these things, or by ridicule benumb
That source of the sublime and the mysterious :-
For certain reasons my belief is serious.

XCVI.

Serious? 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? That shall I not recall, Because I'd rather it should be forgot,

"Shadows the soul of Richard" 5 may appal. In short, upon that subject I've some qualms very Like those of the philosopher of Malmsbury. 6

XCVII.

The night (I sing by night—sometimes an owl,
And now and then a nightingale)—is dim,
And the loud shriek of sage Minerva's fowl
Rattles around me her discordant hymn :
Old portraits from old walls upon me scowl—
I wish to heaven they would not look so grim;
The dying embers dwindle in the grate-

I think too that I have sate up too late:

["By the apostle Paul, shadows to-night

Have struck more terror to the soul of Richard
Than can the substance of ten thousand soldiers," &c.
Richard III.]

6 Hobbes who, doubting of his own soul, paid that compliment to the souls of other people as to decline their visits, of which he had some apprehension.

XCVIII.

And therefore, though 't is by no means my way To rhyme at noon- when I have other things To think of, if I ever think-I say

I feel some chilly midnight shudderings,
And prudently postpone, until mid-day,

Treating a topic which, alas! but brings
Shadows;-but you must be in my condition,
Before you learn to call this superstition.
XCIX.

Between two worlds life hovers like a star,
"Twixt night and morn, upon the horizon's verge
How little do we know that which we are!

How less what we may be! The eternal surge Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar

Our bubbles; as the old burst, new emerge, Lash'd from the foam of ages; while the graves Of empires heave but like some passing waves. 1

Don Juan.

CANTO THE SIXTEENTH.

L.

THE antique Persians taught three useful things,
To draw the bow, to ride, and speak the truth. 2
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.
II.

The cause of this effect, or this defect,

"For this effect defective comes by cause,"-3 Is what I have not leisure to inspect;

But this I must say in my own applause, Of all the Muses that I recollect,

Whate'er may be her follies or her flaws

In some things, mine 's beyond all contradiction
The most sincere that ever dealt in fiction.

III.

And as she treats all things, and ne'er retreats
From any thing, this epic will contain

A wilderness of the most rare conceits,

Which you might elsewhere hope to find in vain. 'Tis true there be some bitters with the sweets, Yet mix'd so slighty, that you can't complain, But wonder they so few are, since my tale is "De rebus cunctis et quibusdam aliis."

1["Man's life is like a sparrow-mighty king!

That, stealing in while by the fire you sit,
Housed with rejoicing friends, is seen to flit
Safe from the storm, in comfort tarrying.
Here did it enter-there on hasty wing
Flies out, and passes on from cold to cold;
But whence it came we know not, nor behold
Whither it goes. Even such that transient thing
The human soul: not utterly unknown
While in the body lodged, her warm abode;
But from what world she came, what woe or weal
On her departure waits, no tongue hath shown."

WORDSWORTH.]

IV.

But of all truths which she has told, the most True is that which she is about to tell.

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? 'Tis time to strike such puny doubters dumb as The sceptics who would not believe Columbus.

V.

Some people would impose now with authority, Turpin's or Monmouth Geoffry's Chronicle; Men whose historical superiority

Is always greatest at a miracle.

But Saint Augustine has the great priority,
Who bids all men believe the impossible,
Because 't is so. Who nibble, scribble, quibble, he
Quiets at once with "quia impossibile."

VI.

And therefore, mortals, cavil not at all;
Believe: if 't is improbable, you must,
And if it is impossible, you shall:

'Tis always best to take things upon trust. I do not speak profanely, to recall

Those holier mysteries which the wise and just Receive as gospel, and which grow more rooted, As all truths must, the more they are disputed: VII.

I merely mean to say what Johnson said,

That in the course of some six thousand years,
All nations have believed that from the dead
A visitant at intervals appears; +

And what is strangest upon this strange head,
Is, that whatever bar the reason rears
'Gainst such belief, there's something stronger still
In its behalf, let those deny who will.

4 ["That the dead are seen no more," said Imlac, "I will not undertake to maintain, against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages, and of all nations. There is no people, rude or unlearned, among whom apparitions of the dead are not related and believed. This opinion, which prevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only by its truth; those that never heard of one another would not have agreed in a tale which nothing but experience can make credible. That it is doubted by single cavillers, can very little weaken the general evidence; and some, who deny it with their tongues, confess it with their fears."- Rasselas.]

1

X.

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. I
So perish every tyrant's robe piece-meal!
XI.

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. Titus exclaim'd, "I've lost a day!" Of all

The nights and days most people can remember, (I have had of both, some not to be disdain'd,) I wish they'd state how many they have gain'd. Xu.

And Juan, on retiring for the night,

Felt restless, and perplex'd, and compromised:
He thought Aurora Raby's eyes more bright
Than Adeline (such is advice) advised;
If he had known exactly his own plight,
He probably would have philosophised:
A great resource to all, and ne'er denied
Till wanted; therefore Juan only sigh'd.

XIII.

He sigh'd; the next resource is the full moon,
Where all sighs are deposited; and now

It happen'd luckily, the chaste orb shone
As clear as such a climate will allow;
And Juan's mind was in the proper tone

To hail her with the apostrophe —“O thou!”

Of amatory egotism the Tuism,

Which further to explain would be a truism.

XIV.

But lover, poet, or astronomer,

Shepherd, or swain, whoever may behold, Feel some abstraction when they gaze on her: Great thoughts we catch from thence (besides a cold Sometimes, unless my feelings rather err);

Deep secrets to her rolling light are told;

The ocean's tides and mortals' brains she sways,
And also hearts, if there be truth in lays.

XV.

Juan felt somewhat pensive, and disposed
For contemplation rather than his pillow:
The Gothic chamber, where he was enclosed,
Let in the rippling sound of the lake's billow,
With all the mystery by midnight caused:

Below his window waved (of course) a willow;
And he stood gazing out on the cascade
That flash'd and after darken'd in the shade.

XVI.

Upon his table or his toilet,—which
Of these is not exactly ascertained, -
(I state this, for I am cautious to a pitch
Of nicety, where a fact is to be gain'd,)

The composition of the old Tyrian purple, whether from a shell-fish, or from cochineal, or froin kermes, is still an article of dispute; and even its colour-some say purple, others scarlet: I say nothing.

A lamp burn'd high, while he leant from a niche,
Where many a Gothic ornament remain'd,
In chisell'd stone and painted glass, and all
That time has left our fathers of their hall.

XVII.

Then, as the night was clear though cold, he threw His chamber door wide open—and went forth Into a gallery, of a sombre hue,

Long, furnish'd with old pictures of great worth, Of knights and dames heroic and chaste too, As doubtless should be people of high birth. But by dim lights the portraits of the dead Have something ghastly, desolate, and dread.

XVIII.

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.

XIX.

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 canvass; 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.
XX.

As Juan mused on mutability,

Or on his mistress-terms synonymousNo 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.

XXIII.

Once, twice, thrice pass'd, repass'd-the thing of air, Or earth beneath, or heaven, or t'other place: And Juan gazed upon it with a stare,

Yet could not speak or move; but, on its base As stands a statue, stood: he felt his hair

Twine like a knot of snakes around his face; He tax'd his tongue for words, which were not granted, To ask the reverend person what he wanted.

XXIV.

The third time, after a still longer pause,

The shadow pass'd away but where? the hall Was long, and thus far there was no great cause To think his vanishing unnatural : Doors there were many, through which, by the laws Of physics, bodies whether short or tall Might come or go; but Juan could not state Through which the spectre seem'd to evaporate.

XXV.

He stood how long he knew not, but it seem'd
An age expectant, powerless, with his eyes
Strain'd on the spot where first the figure gleam'd;
Then by degrees recall'd his energies,

And would have pass'd the whole off as a dream,
But could not wake; he was, he did surmise,
Waking already, and return'd at length
Back to his chamber, shorn of half his strength.

XXVI.

All there was as he left it: still his taper

Burnt, and not blue, as modest tapers use, Receiving sprites with sympathetic vapour;

He rubb'd his eyes, and they did not refuse Their office: he took up an old newspaper; The paper was right easy to peruse; He read an article the king attacking, And a long eulogy of "patent blacking."

XXVII.

This savour'd of this world; but his hand shook :
He shut his door, and after having read
A paragraph, I think about Horne Tooke,

Undrest, and rather slowly went to bed. There, couch'd all snugly on his pillow's nook, With what he had seen his phantasy he fed ; And though it was no opiate, slumber crept Upon him by degrees, and so he slept.

XXVIII.

He woke betimes; and, as may be supposed,
Ponder'd upon his visitant or vision,

And whether it ought not to be disclosed,

At risk of being quizz'd for superstition.

The more he thought, the more his mind was posed:
In the mean time, his valet, whose precision
Was great, because his master brook'd no less,
Knock'd to inform him it was time to dress.

XXIX.

He dress'd; and like young people he was wont
To take some trouble with his toilet, but
This morning rather spent less time upon 't;

Aside his very mirror soon was put ;
His curls fell negligently o'er his front,

His clothes were not curb'd to their usual cut, His very neckcloth's Gordian knot was tied Almost an hair's breadth too much on one side.

1 [During a visit to Newstead, in 1814. Lord Byron actually fancied he saw the ghost of the Black Friar, which was sup

XXX.

And when he walk'd down into the saloon,
He sate him pensive o'er a dish of tea,
Which he perhaps had not discover'd soon,
Had it not happen'd scalding hot to be,
Which made him have recourse unto his spoon;
So much distrait he was, that all could see
That something was the matter- Adeline
The first-but what she could not well divine.
XXXI.

She look'd, and saw him pale, and turn'd as pale
Herself; then hastily look'd down, and mutter'd
Something, but what 's not stated in my tale.

Lord Henry said, his muffin was ill butter'd;
The Duchess of Fitz-Fulke play'd with her veil,
And look'd at Juan hard, but nothing utter'd.
Aurora Raby with her large dark eyes
Survey'd him with a kind of calm surprise.
XXXII.

But seeing him all cold and silent still,
And every body wondering more or less,
Fair Adeline inquired, "If he were ill?"

He started, and said, "Yes-no- rather — yes.” The family physician had great skill,

And being present, now began to express

His readiness to feel his pulse and tell

The cause, but Juan said, "He was quite well."

"Oh! have you never heard of the Black Friar?
The spirit of these walls?"" In truth not I."
Why Fame-but Fame you know's sometimes a
Tells an odd story, of which by and by: [liar-
Whether with time the spectre has grown shyer,

Or that our sires had a more gifted eye
For such sights, though the tale is half believed,
The friar of late has not been oft perceived.

posed to have haunted the Abbey from the time of the dissolution of the monasteries. MOOKE.]