Don Juan
Page 17
Came always back to coffee and Haidée.
172
Both were so young and one so innocent
That bathing passed for nothing. Juan seemed
To her, as’twere, the kind of being sent,
Of whom these two years she had nightly dreamed,
A something to be loved, a creature meant
To be her happiness, and whom she deemed
To render happy. All who joy would win
Must share it; Happiness was born a twin.
173
It was such pleasure to behold him, such
Enlargement of existence to partake
Nature with him, to thrill beneath his touch,
To watch him slumbering and to see him wake.
To live with him forever were too much,
But then the thought of parting made her quake.
He was her own, her ocean-treasure, cast
Like a rich wreck, her first love and her last.
174
And thus a moon rolled on, and fair Haidée
Paid daily visits to her boy and took
Such plentiful precautions that still he
Remained unknown within his craggy nook.
At last her father’s prows put out to sea,
For certain merchantmen upon the look,
Not as of yore to carry off an Io,
But three Ragusan vessels bound for Scio.
175
Then came her freedom, for she had no mother,
So that, her father being at sea, she was
Free as a married woman, or such other
Female, as where she likes may freely pass,
Without even the encumbrance of a brother,
The freest she that ever gazed on glass.
I speak of Christian lands in this comparison,
Where wives, at least, are seldom kept in garrison.
176
Now she prolonged her visits and her talk
(For they must talk), and he had learnt to say
So much as to propose to take a walk,
For little had he wandered since the day
On which, like a young flower snapped from the stalk,
Drooping and dewy on the beach he lay,
And thus they walked out in the afternoon
And saw the sun set opposite the moon.
177
It was a wild and breaker-beaten coast,
With cliffs above and a broad sandy shore,
Guarded by shoals and rocks as by an host,
With here and there a creek, whose aspect wore
A better welcome to the tempest-tost.
And rarely ceased the haughty billow’s roar,
Save on the dead long summer days, which make
The outstretched ocean glitter like a lake.
178
And the small ripple spilt upon the beach
Scarcely o’erpassed the cream of your champagne,
When o’er the brim the sparkling bumpers reach,
That spring-dew of the spirit, the heart’s rain!
Few things surpass old wine; and they may preach
Who please – the more because they preach in vain.
Let us have wine and woman, mirth and laughter,
Sermons and soda water the day after.
179
Man being reasonable must get drunk;
The best of life is but intoxication.
Glory, the grape, love, gold, in these are sunk
The hopes of all men and of every nation;
Without their sap, how branchless were the trunk
Of life’s strange tree, so fruitful on occasion.
But to return. Get very drunk, and when
You wake with headache, you shall see what then.
180
Ring for your valet, bid him quickly bring
Some hock and soda water. Then you’ll know
A pleasure worthy Xerxes, the great king;
For not the blest sherbet, sublimed with snow,
Nor the first sparkle of the desert spring,
Nor Burgundy in all its sunset glow,
After long travel, ennui, love, or slaughter,
Vie with that draught of hock and soda water.
181
The coast – I think it was the coast that I
Was just describing – yes, it was the coast –
Lay at this period quiet as the sky,
The sands untumbled, the blue waves untost,
And all was stillness, save the sea bird’s cry
And dolphin’s leap and little billow crost
By some low rock or shelve, that made it fret
Against the boundary it scarcely wet.
182
And forth they wandered, her sire being gone,
As I have said, upon an expedition.
And mother, brother, guardian, she had none,
Save Zoe, who although with due precision
She waited on her lady with the sun,
Thought daily service was her only mission,
Bringing warm water, wreathing her long tresses,
And asking now and then for cast-off dresses.
183
It was the cooling hour, just when the rounded
Red sun sinks down behind the azure hill,
Which then seems as if the whole earth it bounded,
Circling all nature, hushed and dim and still,
With the far mountain-crescent half surrounded
On one side, and the deep sea calm and chill
Upon the other, and the rosy sky
With one star sparkling through it like an eye.
184
And thus they wandered forth, and hand in hand,
Over the shining pebbles and the shells,
Glided along the smooth and hardened sand,
And in the worn and wild receptacles
Worked by the storms, yet worked as it were planned,
In hollow halls with sparry roofs and cells,
They turned to rest, and each clasped by an arm,
Yielded to the deep twilight’s purple charm.
185
They looked up to the sky, whose floating glow
Spread like a rosy ocean, vast and bright.
They gazed upon the glittering sea below,
Whence the broad moon rose circling into sight.
They heard the wave’s splash and the wind so low,
And saw each other’s dark eyes darting light
Into each other, and beholding this,
Their lips drew near and clung into a kiss,
186
A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth and love
And beauty, all concentrating like rays
Into one focus, kindled from above;
Such kisses as belong to early days,
Where heart and soul and sense in concert move,
And the blood’s lava, and the pulse a blaze,
Each kiss a heartquake, for a kiss’s strength,
I think, it must be reckoned by its length.
187
By length I mean duration; theirs endured
Heaven knows how long; no doubt they never reckoned,
And if they had, they could not have secured
The sum of their sensations to a second.
They had not spoken, but they felt allured,
As if their souls and lips each other beckoned,
Which, being joined, like swarming bees they clung,
Their hearts the flowers from whence the honey sprung.
188
They were alone, but not alone as they
Who shut in chambers think it loneliness.
The silent ocean and the starlight bay,
The twilight glow, which momently grew less,
The voiceless sands and dropping caves, that lay
Around them, made them to each other press,
As if there were no life beneath the sky
Save theirs, and
that their life could never die.
189
They feared no eyes nor ears on that lone beach,
They felt no terrors from the night, they were
All in all to each other. Though their speech
Was broken words, they thought a language there,
And all the burning tongues the passions teach
Found in one sigh the best interpreter
Of nature’s oracle, first love, that all
Which Eve has left her daughters since her fall.
190
Haidée spoke not of scruples, asked no vows
Nor offered any; she had never heard
Of plight and promises to be a spouse,
Or perils by a loving maid incurred.
She was all which pure ignorance allows
And flew to her young mate like a young bird,
And never having dreamt of falsehood, she
Had not one word to say of constancy.
191
She loved and was beloved, she adored
And she was worshipped after nature’s fashion.
Their intense souls, into each other poured,
If souls could die, had perished in that passion,
But by degrees their senses were restored,
Again to be o’ercome, again to dash on.
And beating’ gainst his bosom, Haidée’s heart
Felt as if never more to beat apart.
192
Alas, they were so young, so beautiful,
So lonely, loving, helpless, and the hour
Was that in which the heart is always full,
And having o’er itself no further power,
Prompts deeds eternity cannot annul,
But pays off moments in an endless shower
Of hell-fire, all prepared for people giving
Pleasure or pain to one another living.
193
Alas for Juan and Haidée! They were
So loving and so lovely; till then never,
Excepting our first parents, such a pair
Had run the risk of being damned forever.
And Haidée, being devout as well as fair,
Had doubtless heard about the Stygian river
And hell and purgatory, but forgot
Just in the very crisis she should not.
194
They look upon each other, and their eyes
Gleam in the moonlight, and her white arm clasps
Round Juan’s head, and his around hers lies
Half buried in the tresses which it grasps.
She sits upon his knee and drinks his sighs,
He hers, until they end in broken gasps;
And thus they form a group that’s quite antique,
Half naked, loving, natural, and Greek.
195
And when those deep and burning moments passed,
And Juan sunk to sleep within her arms,
She slept not, but all tenderly, though fast,
Sustained his head upon her bosom’s charms.
And now and then her eye to heaven is cast,
And then on the pale cheek her breast now warms,
Pillowed on her o’erflowing heart, which pants
With all it granted and with all it grants.
196
An infant when it gazes on a light,
A child the moment when it drains the breast,
A devotee when soars the Host in sight,
An Arab with a stranger for a guest,
A sailor when the prize has struck in fight,
A miser filling his most hoarded chest
Feel rapture, but not such true joy are reaping
As they who watch o’er what they love while sleeping.
197
For there it lies so tranquil, so beloved;
All that it hath of life with us is living,
So gentle, stirless, helpless, and unmoved,
And all unconscious of the joy’tis giving.
All it hath felt, inflicted, passed, and proved,
Hushed into depths beyond the watcher’s diving,
There lies the thing we love with all its errors
And all its charms, like death without its terrors.
198
The lady watched her lover; and that hour
Of love’s and night’s and ocean’s solitude
O’erflowed her soul with their united power.
Amidst the barren sand and rocks so rude
She and her wave-worn love had made their bower,
Where nought upon their passion could intrude,
And all the stars that crowded the blue space
Saw nothing happier than her glowing face.
199
Alas, the love of women! It is known
To be a lovely and a fearful thing,
For all of theirs upon that die is thrown,
And if’tis lost, life hath no more to bring
To them but mockeries of the past alone,
And their revenge is as the tiger’s spring,
Deadly and quick and crushing; yet as real
Torture is theirs, what they inflict they feel.
200
They are right, for man, to man so oft unjust,
Is always so to women. One sole bond
Awaits them, treachery is all their trust.
Taught to conceal, their bursting hearts despond
Over their idol, till some wealthier lust
Buys them in marriage – and what rests beyond?
A thankless husband, next a faithless lover,
Then dressing, nursing, praying, and all’s over.
201
Some take a lover, some take drams or prayers,
Some mind their household, others dissipation,
Some run away and but exchange their cares,
Losing the advantage of a virtuous station.
Few changes e’er can better their affairs,
Theirs being an unnatural situation,
From the dull palace to the dirty hovel.
Some play the devil, and then write a novel.
202
Haidée was Nature’s bride and knew not this;
Haidée was Passion’s child, born where the sun
Showers triple light and scorches even the kiss
Of his gazelle-eyed daughters. She was one
Made but to love, to feel that she was his
Who was her chosen. What was said or done
Elsewhere was nothing. She had nought to fear,
Hope, care, nor love beyond; her heart beat here.
203
And oh, that quickening of the heart, that beat!
How much it costs us! Yet each rising throb
Is in its cause as its effect so sweet
That Wisdom, ever on the watch to rob
Joy of its alchemy and to repeat
Fine truths – even Conscience too – has a tough job
To make us understand each good old maxim,
So good I wonder Castlereagh don’t tax’em.
204
And now’twas done; on the lone shore were plighted
Their hearts. The stars, their nuptial torches, shed
Beauty upon the beautiful they lighted.
Ocean their witness, and the cave their bed,
By their own feelings hallowed and united;
Their priest was Solitude, and they were wed.
And they were happy, for to their young eyes
Each was an angel, and earth Paradise.
205
Oh Love, of whom great Caesar was the suitor,
Titus the master, Antony the slave,
Horace, Catullus, scholars, Ovid tutor,
Sappho the sage bluestocking, in whose grave
All those may leap who rather would be neuter
(Leucadia’s rock still overlooks the wave) –
Oh Love, thou art the very god of evil,
For after all, we cannot call thee d
evil.
206
Thou mak’st the chaste connubial state precarious
And jestest with the brows of mightiest men.
Caesar and Pompey, Mahomet, Belisarius
Have much employed the Muse of history’s pen.
Their lives and fortunes were extremely various;
Such worthies Time will never see again.
Yet to these four in three things the same luck holds;
They all were heroes, conquerors, and cuckolds.
207
Thou mak’st philosophers; there’s Epicurus
And Aristippus, a material crew,
Who to immoral courses would allure us
By theories quite practicable too.
If only from the devil they would insure us,
How pleasant were the maxim (not quite new),
‘Eat, drink, and love, what can the rest avail us?’
So said the royal sage Sardanapalus.
208
But Juan, had he quite forgotten Julia?
And should he have forgotten her so soon?
I can’t but say it seems to me most truly a
Perplexing question, but no doubt the moon
Does these things for us, and whenever newly a
Strong palpitation rises,’tis her boon,
Else how the devil is it that fresh features
Have such a charm for us poor human creatures?
209
I hate inconstancy; I loathe, detest,
Abhor, condemn, abjure the mortal made
Of such quicksilver clay that in his breast
No permanent foundation can be laid.
Love, constant love, has been my constant guest,
And yet last night, being at a masquerade,
I saw the prettiest creature, fresh from Milan,
Which gave me some sensations like a villain.
210
But soon Philosophy came to my aid
And whispered, ‘Think of every sacred tie!’
‘I will, my dear Philosophy,’ I said,
‘But then her teeth, and then oh heaven, her eye!
I’ll just inquire if she be wife or maid
Or neither – out of curiosity.’
‘Stop!’ cried Philosophy with air so Grecian
(Though she was masked then as a fair Venetian).
211
‘Stop!’ So I stopped. But to return. That which
Men call inconstancy is nothing more
Than admiration due where Nature’s rich
Profusion with young beauty covers o’er
Some favoured object; and as in the niche
A lovely statue we almost adore,
This sort of adoration of the real
Is but a heightening of the beau ideal.
212
’Tis the perception of the beautiful,
A fine extension of the faculties,
Platonic, universal, wonderful,
Drawn from the stars and filtered through the skies,
Without which life would be extremely dull.