Don Juan
Page 19
Of his arrival, so that no one stirred.
And long he paused to reassure his eyes,
In fact much more astonished than delighted
To find so much good company invited.
38
He did not know (alas, how men will lie)
That a report (especially the Greeks)
Avouched his death (such people never die)
And put his house in mourning several weeks,
But now their eyes and also lips were dry.
The bloom too had returned to Haidée’s cheeks.
Her tears too being returned into their fount,
She now kept house upon her own account.
39
Hence all this rice, meat, dancing, wine, and fiddling,
Which turned the isle into a place of pleasure.
The servants all were getting drunk or idling,
A life which made them happy beyond measure.
Her father’s hospitality seemed middling,
Compared with what Haidée did with his treasure.
’Twas wonderful how things went on improving,
While she had not one hour to spare from loving.
40
Perhaps you think in stumbling on this feast
He flew into a passion, and in fact
There was no mighty reason to be pleased.
Perhaps you prophesy some sudden act,
The whip, the rack, or dungeon at the least
To teach his people to be more exact,
And that, proceeding at a very high rate,
He showed the royal penchants of a pirate.
41
You’re wrong. He was the mildest mannered man
That ever scuttled ship or cut a throat.
With such true breeding of a gentleman,
You never could divine his real thought.
No courtier could, and scarcely woman can
Gird more deceit within a petticoat.
Pity he loved adventurous life’s variety,
He was so great a loss to good society.
42
Advancing to the nearest dinner tray,
Tapping the shoulder of the nighest guest,
With a peculiar smile, which by the way,
Boded no good, whatever it expressed,
He asked the meaning of this holiday.
The vinous Greek to whom he had addressed
His question, much too merry to divine
The questioner, filled up a glass of wine,
43
And without turning his facetious head
Over his shoulder, with a Bacchant air,
Presented the o’erflowing cup and said,
‘Talking’s dry work, I have no time to spare.’
A second hiccuped, ‘Our old master’s dead,
You’d better ask our mistress who’s his heir.’
‘Our mistress!’ quoth a third, ‘Our mistress – pooh –
You mean our master – not the old but new.’
44
These rascals, being newcomers, knew not whom
They thus addressed, and Lambro’s visage fell
And o’er his eye a momentary gloom
Passed, but he strove quite courteously to quell
The expression, and endeavouring to resume
His smile, requested one of them to tell
The name and quality of his new patron,
Who seemed to have turned Haidée into a matron.
45
‘I know not,’ quoth the fellow, ‘who or what
He is nor whence he came and little care,
But this I know, that this roast capon’s fat,
And that good wine ne’er washed down better fare,
And if you are not satisfied with that,
Direct your questions to my neighbour there.
He’ll answer all for better or for worse,
For none likes more to hear himself converse.’
46
I said that Lambro was a man of patience,
And certainly he showed the best of breeding,
Which scarce even France, the paragon of nations,
E’er saw her most polite of sons exceeding.
He bore these sneers against his near relations,
His own anxiety, his heart too bleeding,
The insults too of every servile glutton,
Who all the time was eating up his mutton.
47
Now in a person used to much command,
To bid men come and go and come again,
To see his orders done too out of hand,
Whether the word was death or but the chain,
It may seem strange to find his manners bland;
Yet such things are, which I cannot explain,
Though doubtless he who can command himself
Is good to govern – almost as a Guelf.
48
Not that he was not sometimes rash or so,
But never in his real and serious mood;
Then calm, concentrated and still and slow,
He lay coiled like the boa in the wood.
With him it never was a word and blow,
His angry word once o’er, he shed no blood,
But in his silence there was much to rue,
And his one blow left little work for two.
49
He asked no further questions and proceeded
On to the house, but by a private way,
So that the few who met him hardly heeded,
So little they expected him that day.
If love paternal in his bosom pleaded
For Haidée’s sake is more than I can say,
But certainly to one deemed dead returning,
This revel seemed a curious mode of mourning.
50
If all the dead could now return to life
(Which God forbid!) or some or a great many;
For instance, if a husband or his wife
(Nuptial examples are as good as any),
No doubt whate’er might be their former strife,
The present weather would be much more rainy.
Tears shed into the grave of the connexion
Would share most probably its resurrection.
51
He entered in the house no more his home,
A thing to human feelings the most trying,
And harder for the heart to overcome,
Perhaps, than even the mental pangs of dying.
To find our hearthstone turned into a tomb,
And round its once warm precincts palely lying
The ashes of our hopes, is a deep grief,
Beyond a single gentleman’s belief.
52
He entered in the house – his home no more,
For without hearts there is no home – and felt
The solitude of passing his own door
Without a welcome. There he long had dwelt,
There his few peaceful days time had swept o’er,
There his worn bosom and keen eye would melt
Over the innocence of that sweet child,
His only shrine of feelings undefiled.
53
He was a man of a strange temperament,
Of mild demeanour though of savage mood,
Moderate in all his habits and content
With temperance in pleasure, as in food,
Quick to perceive and strong to bear and meant
For something better, if not wholly good.
His country’s wrongs and his despair to save her
Had stung him from a slave to an enslaver.
54
The love of power and rapid gain of gold,
The hardness by long habitude produced,
The dangerous life in which he had grown old,
The mercy he had granted oft abused,
The sights he was accustomed to behold,
The wild seas and wild men with whom he cruised
And made him a good friend, but bad acquaintance.
55
But something of the spirit of old Greece
Flashed o’er his soul a few heroic rays,
Such as lit onward to the Golden Fleece
His predecessors in the Colchian days.
’Tis true he had no ardent love for peace;
Alas, his country showed no path to praise.
Hate to the world and war with every nation
He waged in vengeance of her degradation.
56
Still o’er his mind the influence of the clime
Shed its Ionian elegance, which showed
Its power unconsciously full many a time:
A taste seen in the choice of his abode,
A love of music and of scenes sublime,
A pleasure in the gentle stream that flowed
Past him in crystal, and a joy in flowers
Bedewed his spirit in his calmer hours.
57
But whatsoe’er he had of love reposed
On that beloved daughter; she had been
The only thing which kept his heart unclosed
Amidst the savage deeds he had done and seen –
A lonely pure affection unopposed.
There wanted but the loss of this to wean
His feelings from all milk of human kindness
And turn him like the Cyclops mad with blindness.
58
The cubless tigress in her jungle raging
Is dreadful to the shepherd and the flock;
The ocean when its yeasty war is waging
Is awful to the vessel near the rock;
But violent things will sooner bear assuaging,
Their fury being spent by its own shock,
Than the stern, single, deep, and wordless ire
Of a strong human heart, and in a sire.
59
It is a hard although a common case
To find our children running restive – they
In whom our brightest days we would retrace
Our little selves reformed in finer clay.
Just as old age is creeping on apace,
And clouds come o’er the sunset of our day,
They kindly leave us, though not quite alone,
But in good company – the gout or stone.
60
Yet a fine family is a fine thing
(Provided they don’t come in after dinner).
’Tis beautiful to see a matron bring
Her children up (if nursing them don’t thin her).
Like cherubs round an altarpiece they cling
To the fireside (a sight to touch a sinner).
A lady with her daughters or her nieces
Shine like a guinea and seven shilling pieces.
61
Old Lambro passed unseen a private gate
And stood within his hall at eventide.
Meantime the lady and her lover sate
At wassail in their beauty and their pride.
An ivory inlaid table spread with state
Before them, and fair slaves on every side;
Gems, gold, and silver formed the service mostly,
Mother of pearl and coral the less costly.
62
The dinner made about a hundred dishes:
Lamb and pistachio nuts, in short, all meats
And saffron soups and sweetbreads; and the fishes
Were of the finest that e’er flounced in nets,
Drest to a Sybarite’s most pampered wishes.
The beverage was various sherbets
Of raisin, orange, and pomegranate juice,
Squeezed through the rind, which makes it best for use.
63
These were ranged round, each in its crystal ewer,
And fruits and date bread loaves closed the repast,
And Mocha’s berry from Arabia pure,
In small fine China cups came in at last,
Gold cups of filigree made to secure
The hand from burning underneath them placed.
Cloves, cinnamon, and saffron too were boiled
Up with the coffee, which (I think) they spoiled.
64
The hangings of the room were tapestry, made
Of velvet panels, each of different hue
And thick with damask flowers of silk inlaid,
And round them ran a yellow border too.
The upper border, richly wrought, displayed,
Embroidered delicately o’er with blue,
Soft Persian sentences in lilac letters
From poets, or the moralists their betters.
65
These oriental writings on the wall,
Quite common in those countries, are a kind
Of monitors adapted to recall,
Like skulls at Memphian banquets, to the mind
The words which shook Belshazzar in his hall
And took his kingdom from him. You will find,
Though sages may pour out their wisdom’s treasure,
There is no sterner moralist than pleasure.
66
A beauty at the season’s close grown hectic,
A genius who has drunk himself to death,
A rake turned methodistic or eclectic
(For that’s the name they like to pray beneath),
But most, an alderman struck apoplectic
Are things that really take away the breath
And show that late hours, wine, and love are able
To do not much less damage than the table.
67
Haidée and Juan carpeted their feet
On crimson satin, bordered with pale blue.
Their sofa occupied three parts complete
Of the apartment and appeared quite new.
The velvet cushions (for a throne more meet)
Were scarlet, from whose glowing centre grew
A sun embossed in gold, whose rays of tissue,
Meridian-like, were seen all light to issue.
68
Crystal and marble, plate and porcelain
Had done their work of splendour. Indian mats
And Persian carpets, which the heart bled to stain,
Over the floors were spread. Gazelles and cats
And dwarfs and blacks and such like things, that gain
Their bread as ministers and favourites (that’s
To say, by degradation), mingled there
As plentiful as in a court or fair.
69
There was no want of lofty mirrors, and
The tables, most of ebony inlaid
With mother of pearl or ivory, stood at hand,
Or were of tortoise shell or rare woods made,
Fretted with gold or silver. By command
The greater part of these were ready spread
With viands and sherbets in ice, and wine,
Kept for all comers at all hours to dine.
70
Of all the dresses I select Haidée’s.
She wore two jelicks – one was of pale yellow;
Of azure, pink, and white was her chemise,
’Neath which her breast heaved like a little billow.
With buttons formed of pearls as large as peas,
All gold and crimson shone her jelick’s fellow,
And the striped white gauze baracan that bound her,
Like fleecy clouds about the moon, flowed round her.
71
One large gold bracelet clasped each lovely arm,
Lockless, so pliable from the pure gold
That the hand stretched and shut it without harm,
The limb which it adorned its only mould,
So beautiful its very shape would charm.
And clinging as if loath to lose its hold,
The purest ore enclosed the whitest skin
That e’er by precious metal was held
in.
72
Around, as princess of her father’s land,
A like gold bar, above her instep rolled,
Announced her rank. Twelve rings were on her hand;
Her hair was starred with gems; her veil’s fine fold
Below her breast was fastened with a band
Of lavish pearls, whose worth could scarce be told.
Her orange silk full Turkish trousers furled
About the prettiest ankle in the world.
73
Her hair’s long auburn waves down to her heel
Flowed like an Alpine torrent, which the sun
Dyes with his morning light, and would conceal
Her person if allowed at large to run,
And still they seem resentfully to feel
The silken fillet’s curb, and sought to shun
Their bonds whene’er some zephyr caught began
To offer his young pinion as her fan.
74
Round her she made an atmosphere of life;
The very air seemed lighter from her eyes,
They were so soft and beautiful and rife
With all we can imagine of the skies,
And pure as Psyche ere she grew a wife,
Too pure even for the purest human ties.
Her overpowering presence made you feel
It would not be idolatry to kneel.
75
Her eyelashes, though dark as night, were tinged
(It is the country’s custom), but in vain;
For those large black eyes were so blackly fringed
The glossy rebels mocked the jetty stain
And in their native beauty stood avenged.
Her nails were touched with henna, but again
The power of art was turned to nothing, for
They could not look more rosy than before.
76
The henna should be deeply dyed to make
The skin relieved appear more fairly fair.
She had no need of this; day ne’er will break
On mountain tops more heavenly white than her.
The eye might doubt if it were well awake,
She was so like a vision. I might err,
But Shakespeare also says’tis very silly
‘To gild refinèd gold or paint the lily.’
77
Juan had on a shawl of black and gold,
But a white baracan, and so transparent
The sparkling gems beneath you might behold,
Like small stars through the milky way apparent.
His turban furled in many a graceful fold;
An emerald aigrette with Haidée’s hair in’t
Surmounted as its clasp, a glowing crescent,
Whose rays shone ever trembling, but incessant
78
And now they were diverted by their suite,
Dwarfs, dancing girls, black eunuchs, and a poet,
Which made their new establishment complete.
The last was of great fame and liked to show it,