Part 12

When amatory poets sing their loves In liquid lines mellifluously bland, And pair their rhymes as Venus yokes her doves, They little think what mischief is in hand; The greater their success the worse it proves, As Ovid’s verse may give to understand; Even Petrarch’s self, if judged with due severity, Is the Platonic pimp of all posterity.

I therefore do denounce all amorous writing, Except in such a way as not to attract; Plain—simple—short, and by no means inviting, But with a moral to each error tack’d, Form’d rather for instructing than delighting, And with all passions in their turn attack’d; Now, if my Pegasus should not be shod ill, This poem will become a moral model.

The European with the Asian shore Sprinkled with palaces; the ocean stream Here and there studded with a seventy-four; Sophia’s cupola with golden gleam; The cypress groves; Olympus high and hoar; The twelve isles, and the more than I could dream, Far less describe, present the very view Which charm’d the charming Mary Montagu.

I have a passion for the name of ‘Mary,’ For once it was a magic sound to me; And still it half calls up the realms of fairy, Where I beheld what never was to be; All feelings changed, but this was last to vary, A spell from which even yet I am not quite free: But I grow sad—and let a tale grow cold, Which must not be pathetically told.

The wind swept down the Euxine, and the wave Broke foaming o’er the blue Symplegades; ’Tis a grand sight from off ‘the Giant’s Grave To watch the progress of those rolling seas Between the Bosphorus, as they lash and lave Europe and Asia, you being quite at ease; There’s not a sea the passenger e’er pukes in, Turns up more dangerous breakers than the Euxine.

’Twas a raw day of Autumn’s bleak beginning, When nights are equal, but not so the days; The Parcae then cut short the further spinning Of seamen’s fates, and the loud tempests raise The waters, and repentance for past sinning In all, who o’er the great deep take their ways: They vow to amend their lives, and yet they don’t; Because if drown’d, they can’t—if spared, they won’t.

A crowd of shivering slaves of every nation, And age, and sex, were in the market ranged; Each bevy with the merchant in his station: Poor creatures! their good looks were sadly changed. All save the blacks seem’d jaded with vexation, From friends, and home, and freedom far estranged; The negroes more philosophy display’d,— Used to it, no doubt, as eels are to be flay’d.

Juan was juvenile, and thus was full, As most at his age are, of hope and health; Yet I must own he looked a little dull, And now and then a tear stole down by stealth; Perhaps his recent loss of blood might pull His spirit down; and then the loss of wealth, A mistress, and such comfortable quarters, To be put up for auction amongst Tartars,

Were things to shake a stoic; ne’ertheless, Upon the whole his carriage was serene: His figure, and the splendour of his dress, Of which some gilded remnants still were seen, Drew all eyes on him, giving them to guess He was above the vulgar by his mien; And then, though pale, he was so very handsome; And then—they calculated on his ransom.

Like a backgammon board the place was dotted With whites and blacks, in groups on show for sale, Though rather more irregularly spotted: Some bought the jet, while others chose the pale. It chanced amongst the other people lotted, A man of thirty rather stout and hale, With resolution in his dark grey eye, Next Juan stood, till some might choose to buy.

He had an English look; that is, was square In make, of a complexion white and ruddy, Good teeth, with curling rather dark brown hair, And, it might be from thought or toil or study, An open brow a little mark’d with care: One arm had on a bandage rather bloody; And there he stood with such sang-froid, that greater Could scarce be shown even by a mere spectator.

But seeing at his elbow a mere lad, Of a high spirit evidently, though At present weigh’d down by a doom which had O’erthrown even men, he soon began to show A kind of blunt compassion for the sad Lot of so young a partner in the woe, Which for himself he seem’d to deem no worse Than any other scrape, a thing of course.

‘My boy!’ said he, ‘amidst this motley crew Of Georgians, Russians, Nubians, and what not, All ragamuffins differing but in hue, With whom it is our luck to cast our lot, The only gentlemen seem I and you; So let us be acquainted, as we ought: If I could yield you any consolation, ’Twould give me pleasure.—Pray, what is your nation?’

When Juan answer’d—‘Spanish!’ he replied, ‘I thought, in fact, you could not be a Greek; Those servile dogs are not so proudly eyed: Fortune has play’d you here a pretty freak, But that ’s her way with all men, till they’re tried; But never mind,—she’ll turn, perhaps, next week; She has served me also much the same as you, Except that I have found it nothing new.’

‘Pray, sir,’ said Juan, ‘if I may presume, What brought you here?’—‘Oh! nothing very rare— Six Tartars and a drag-chain.’—‘To this doom But what conducted, if the question’s fair, Is that which I would learn.’—‘I served for some Months with the Russian army here and there, And taking lately, by Suwarrow’s bidding, A town, was ta’en myself instead of Widdin.’

‘Have you no friends?’—‘I had—but, by God’s blessing, Have not been troubled with them lately. Now I have answer’d all your questions without pressing, And you an equal courtesy should show.’ ‘Alas!’ said Juan, ‘’twere a tale distressing, And long besides.’—‘Oh! if ’tis really so, You’re right on both accounts to hold your tongue; A sad tale saddens doubly, when ’tis long.

‘But droop not: Fortune at your time of life, Although a female moderately fickle, Will hardly leave you (as she ’s not your wife) For any length of days in such a pickle. To strive, too, with our fate were such a strife As if the corn-sheaf should oppose the sickle: Men are the sport of circumstances, when The circumstances seem the sport of men.’

‘’Tis not,’ said Juan, ‘for my present doom I mourn, but for the past;—I loved a maid:’— He paused, and his dark eye grew full of gloom; A single tear upon his eyelash staid A moment, and then dropp’d; ‘but to resume, ’Tis not my present lot, as I have said, Which I deplore so much; for I have borne Hardships which have the hardiest overworn,

‘On the rough deep. But this last blow—’ and here He stopp’d again, and turn’d away his face. ‘Ay,’ quoth his friend, ‘I thought it would appear That there had been a lady in the case; And these are things which ask a tender tear, Such as I, too, would shed if in your place: I cried upon my first wife’s dying day, And also when my second ran away:

‘My third—’—‘Your third!’ quoth Juan, turning round; ‘You scarcely can be thirty: have you three?’ ‘No—only two at present above ground: Surely ’tis nothing wonderful to see One person thrice in holy wedlock bound!’ ‘Well, then, your third,’ said Juan; ‘what did she? She did not run away, too,—did she, sir?’ ‘No, faith.’—‘What then?’—‘I ran away from her.’

‘You take things coolly, sir,’ said Juan. ‘Why,’ Replied the other, ‘what can a man do? There still are many rainbows in your sky, But mine have vanish’d. All, when life is new, Commence with feelings warm, and prospects high; But time strips our illusions of their hue, And one by one in turn, some grand mistake Casts off its bright skin yearly like the snake.

‘’Tis true, it gets another bright and fresh, Or fresher, brighter; but the year gone through, This skin must go the way, too, of all flesh, Or sometimes only wear a week or two;— Love ’s the first net which spreads its deadly mesh; Ambition, Avarice, Vengeance, Glory, glue The glittering lime-twigs of our latter days, Where still we flutter on for pence or praise.’

‘All this is very fine, and may be true,’ Said Juan; ‘but I really don’t see how It betters present times with me or you.’ ‘No?’ quoth the other; ‘yet you will allow By setting things in their right point of view, Knowledge, at least, is gain’d; for instance, now, We know what slavery is, and our disasters May teach us better to behave when masters.’

‘Would we were masters now, if but to try Their present lessons on our Pagan friends here,’ Said Juan,—swallowing a heart-burning sigh: ‘Heaven help the scholar whom his fortune sends here!’ ‘Perhaps we shall be one day, by and by,’ Rejoin’d the other, when our bad luck mends here; Meantime (yon old black eunuch seems to eye us) I wish to God that somebody would buy us!

‘But after all, what is our present state? ’Tis bad, and may be better—all men’s lot: Most men are slaves, none more so than the great, To their own whims and passions, and what not; Society itself, which should create Kindness, destroys what little we had got: To feel for none is the true social art Of the world’s stoics—men without a heart.’

Just now a black old neutral personage Of the third sex stept up, and peering over The captives, seem’d to mark their looks and age, And capabilities, as to discover If they were fitted for the purposed cage: No lady e’er is ogled by a lover, Horse by a blackleg, broadcloth by a tailor, Fee by a counsel, felon by a jailor,

As is a slave by his intended bidder. ’Tis pleasant purchasing our fellow-creatures; And all are to be sold, if you consider Their passions, and are dext’rous; some by features Are bought up, others by a warlike leader, Some by a place—as tend their years or natures; The most by ready cash—but all have prices, From crowns to kicks, according to their vices.

The eunuch, having eyed them o’er with care, Turn’d to the merchant, and begun to bid First but for one, and after for the pair; They haggled, wrangled, swore, too—so they did! As though they were in a mere Christian fair Cheapening an ox, an ass, a lamb, or kid; So that their bargain sounded like a battle For this superior yoke of human cattle.

At last they settled into simple grumbling, And pulling out reluctant purses, and Turning each piece of silver o’er, and tumbling Some down, and weighing others in their hand, And by mistake sequins with paras jumbling, Until the sum was accurately scann’d, And then the merchant giving change, and signing Receipts in full, began to think of dining.

I wonder if his appetite was good? Or, if it were, if also his digestion? Methinks at meals some odd thoughts might intrude, And conscience ask a curious sort of question, About the right divine how far we should Sell flesh and blood. When dinner has opprest one, I think it is perhaps the gloomiest hour Which turns up out of the sad twenty-four.

Voltaire says ‘No:’ he tells you that Candide Found life most tolerable after meals; He ’s wrong—unless man were a pig, indeed, Repletion rather adds to what he feels, Unless he ’s drunk, and then no doubt he ’s freed From his own brain’s oppression while it reels. Of food I think with Philip’s son, or rather Ammon’s (ill pleased with one world and one father);

I think with Alexander, that the act Of eating, with another act or two, Makes us feel our mortality in fact Redoubled; when a roast and a ragout, And fish, and soup, by some side dishes back’d, Can give us either pain or pleasure, who Would pique himself on intellects, whose use Depends so much upon the gastric juice?

The other evening (’twas on Friday last)— This is a fact and no poetic fable— Just as my great coat was about me cast, My hat and gloves still lying on the table, I heard a shot—’twas eight o’clock scarce past— And, running out as fast as I was able, I found the military commandant Stretch’d in the street, and able scarce to pant.

Poor fellow! for some reason, surely bad, They had slain him with five slugs; and left him there To perish on the pavement: so I had Him borne into the house and up the stair, And stripp’d and look’d to—But why should I ad More circumstances? vain was every care; The man was gone: in some Italian quarrel Kill’d by five bullets from an old gun-barrel.

I gazed upon him, for I knew him well; And though I have seen many corpses, never Saw one, whom such an accident befell, So calm; though pierced through stomach, heart, and liver, He seem’d to sleep,—for you could scarcely tell (As he bled inwardly, no hideous river Of gore divulged the cause) that he was dead: So as I gazed on him, I thought or said—

‘Can this be death? then what is life or death? Speak!’ but he spoke not: ‘Wake!’ but still he slept:— ‘But yesterday and who had mightier breath? A thousand warriors by his word were kept In awe: he said, as the centurion saith, “Go,” and he goeth; “come,” and forth he stepp’d. The trump and bugle till he spake were dumb— And now nought left him but the muffled drum.’

And they who waited once and worshipp’d—they With their rough faces throng’d about the bed To gaze once more on the commanding clay Which for the last, though not the first, time bled: And such an end! that he who many a day Had faced Napoleon’s foes until they fled,— The foremost in the charge or in the sally, Should now be butcher’d in a civic alley.

The scars of his old wounds were near his new, Those honourable scars which brought him fame; And horrid was the contrast to the view— But let me quit the theme; as such things claim Perhaps even more attention than is due From me: I gazed (as oft I have gazed the same) To try if I could wrench aught out of death Which should confirm, or shake, or make a faith;

But it was all a mystery. Here we are, And there we go:—but where? five bits of lead, Or three, or two, or one, send very far! And is this blood, then, form’d but to be shed? Can every element our elements mar? And air—earth—water—fire live—and we dead? We whose minds comprehend all things? No more; But let us to the story as before.

The purchaser of Juan and acquaintance Bore off his bargains to a gilded boat, Embark’d himself and them, and off they went thence As fast as oars could pull and water float; They look’d like persons being led to sentence, Wondering what next, till the caique was brought Up in a little creek below a wall O’ertopp’d with cypresses, dark-green and tall.

Here their conductor tapping at the wicket Of a small iron door, ’twas open’d, and He led them onward, first through a low thicket Flank’d by large groves, which tower’d on either hand: They almost lost their way, and had to pick it— For night was closing ere they came to land. The eunuch made a sign to those on board, Who row’d off, leaving them without a word.

As they were plodding on their winding way Through orange bowers, and jasmine, and so forth (Of which I might have a good deal to say, There being no such profusion in the North Of oriental plants, ‘et cetera,’ But that of late your scribblers think it worth Their while to rear whole hotbeds in their works Because one poet travell’d ’mongst the Turks)—

As they were threading on their way, there came Into Don Juan’s head a thought, which he Whisper’d to his companion:—’twas the same Which might have then occurr’d to you or me. ‘Methinks,’ said he, ‘it would be no great shame If we should strike a stroke to set us free; Let ’s knock that old black fellow on the head, And march away—’twere easier done than said.’

‘Yes,’ said the other, ‘and when done, what then? How get out? how the devil got we in? And when we once were fairly out, and when From Saint Bartholomew we have saved our skin, To-morrow ’d see us in some other den, And worse off than we hitherto have been; Besides, I’m hungry, and just now would take, Like Esau, for my birthright a beef-steak.

‘We must be near some place of man’s abode;— For the old negro’s confidence in creeping, With his two captives, by so queer a road, Shows that he thinks his friends have not been sleeping; A single cry would bring them all abroad: ’Tis therefore better looking before leaping— And there, you see, this turn has brought us through, By Jove, a noble palace!—lighted too.’

It was indeed a wide extensive building Which open’d on their view, and o’er the front There seem’d to be besprent a deal of gilding And various hues, as is the Turkish wont,— A gaudy taste; for they are little skill’d in The arts of which these lands were once the font: Each villa on the Bosphorus looks a screen New painted, or a pretty opera-scene.

And nearer as they came, a genial savour Of certain stews, and roast-meats, and pilaus, Things which in hungry mortals’ eyes find favour, Made Juan in his harsh intentions pause, And put himself upon his good behaviour: His friend, too, adding a new saving clause, Said, ‘In Heaven’s name let’s get some supper now, And then I’m with you, if you’re for a row.’

Some talk of an appeal unto some passion, Some to men’s feelings, others to their reason; The last of these was never much the fashion, For reason thinks all reasoning out of season. Some speakers whine, and others lay the lash on, But more or less continue still to tease on, With arguments according to their ‘forte;’ But no one ever dreams of being short.—

But I digress: of all appeals,—although I grant the power of pathos, and of gold, Of beauty, flattery, threats, a shilling,—no Method ’s more sure at moments to take hold Of the best feelings of mankind, which grow More tender, as we every day behold, Than that all-softening, overpowering knell, The tocsin of the soul—the dinner-bell.

Turkey contains no bells, and yet men dine; And Juan and his friend, albeit they heard No Christian knoll to table, saw no line Of lackeys usher to the feast prepared, Yet smelt roast-meat, beheld a huge fire shine, And cooks in motion with their clean arms bared, And gazed around them to the left and right With the prophetic eye of appetite.

And giving up all notions of resistance, They follow’d close behind their sable guide, Who little thought that his own crack’d existence Was on the point of being set aside: He motion’d them to stop at some small distance, And knocking at the gate, ’twas open’d wide, And a magnificent large hall display’d The Asian pomp of Ottoman parade.

I won’t describe; description is my forte, But every fool describes in these bright days His wondrous journey to some foreign court, And spawns his quarto, and demands your praise— Death to his publisher, to him ’tis sport; While Nature, tortured twenty thousand ways, Resigns herself with exemplary patience To guide-books, rhymes, tours, sketches, illustrations.

Along this hall, and up and down, some, squatted Upon their hams, were occupied at chess; Others in monosyllable talk chatted, And some seem’d much in love with their own dress. And divers smoked superb pipes decorated With amber mouths of greater price or less; And several strutted, others slept, and some Prepared for supper with a glass of rum.

As the black eunuch enter’d with his brace Of purchased Infidels, some raised their eyes A moment without slackening from their pace; But those who sate ne’er stirr’d in anywise: One or two stared the captives in the face, Just as one views a horse to guess his price; Some nodded to the negro from their station, But no one troubled him with conversation.

He leads them through the hall, and, without stopping, On through a farther range of goodly rooms, Splendid but silent, save in one, where, dropping, A marble fountain echoes through the glooms Of night which robe the chamber, or where popping Some female head most curiously presumes To thrust its black eyes through the door or lattice, As wondering what the devil a noise that is.

Some faint lamps gleaming from the lofty walls Gave light enough to hint their farther way, But not enough to show the imperial halls, In all the flashing of their full array; Perhaps there’s nothing—I’ll not say appals, But saddens more by night as well as day, Than an enormous room without a soul To break the lifeless splendour of the whole.

Two or three seem so little, one seems nothing: In deserts, forests, crowds, or by the shore, There solitude, we know, has her full growth in The spots which were her realms for evermore; But in a mighty hall or gallery, both in More modern buildings and those built of yore, A kind of death comes o’er us all alone, Seeing what ’s meant for many with but one.

A neat, snug study on a winter’s night, A book, friend, single lady, or a glass Of claret, sandwich, and an appetite, Are things which make an English evening pass; Though certes by no means so grand a sight As is a theatre lit up by gas. I pass my evenings in long galleries solely, And that ’s the reason I’m so melancholy.

Alas! man makes that great which makes him little: I grant you in a church ’tis very well: What speaks of Heaven should by no means be brittle, But strong and lasting, till no tongue can tell Their names who rear’d it; but huge houses fit ill— And huge tombs worse—mankind, since Adam fell: Methinks the story of the tower of Babel Might teach them this much better than I’m able.

Babel was Nimrod’s hunting-box, and then A town of gardens, walls, and wealth amazing, Where Nabuchadonosor, king of men, Reign’d, till one summer’s day he took to grazing, And Daniel tamed the lions in their den, The people’s awe and admiration raising; ’Twas famous, too, for Thisbe and for Pyramus, And the calumniated queen Semiramis.

That injured Queen by chroniclers so coarse Has been accused (I doubt not by conspiracy) Of an improper friendship for her horse (Love, like religion, sometimes runs to heresy): This monstrous tale had probably its source (For such exaggerations here and there I see) In writing ‘Courser’ by mistake for ‘Courier:’ I wish the case could come before a jury here.

But to resume,—should there be (what may not Be in these days?) some infidels, who don’t, Because they can’t find out the very spot Of that same Babel, or because they won’t (Though Claudius Rich, Esquire, some bricks has got, And written lately two memoirs upon’t), Believe the Jews, those unbelievers, who Must be believed, though they believe not you,