Don Juan
Page 71
93, 6–7 ]… waves which
Their
94, 2 Timon Living in Athens about the time of the Peloponnesian War, he was disillusioned by the many faults of his companions, became a cynical misanthrope, withdrew from society, and admitted only Alcibiades to his house. He is referred to in Plutarch’s Antony, is the subject of one of Lucian’s Dialogues of the Gods, and of Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens.
94, 5 ] But ]
94, 8 What pedigree the best would have to show Byron was probably aware of the bar sinister in his own family. Sir John Byron ‘with the great beard’, grandfather of the first Lord Byron, had no legitimate heir, and his natural son, John Byron, succeeded to his property by deed of gift.
96, 4 Queen of queans queen of sluts. Byron repeatedly calls Catherine II of Russia a lecherous woman.
101, 6 ] And as
102, 7–8 swore on / The holy camel’s hump ‘And the camels! We have appointed them among the ceremonies of Allah. Therein ye have much good [the benefit man gained from use of these desert animals]. So mention the name of Allah over them, when they are drawn up in lines’ (Koran, xxii 36, trans. Marmaduke Pickthall, 1957). The faithful are also reminded that Allah’s camel is allowed to feed on the earth and to drink from wells. Painful retribution will befall the impious who hurt (hamstring) a camel (vii 73; xxvi 155–8; liv 27–31).
105, 7 ] And
106, 5 ‘all amort’ Since 1800 this French derivative, meaning ‘lifeless, dejected’, has been less common than it was in preceding centuries. Shakespeare used it in The Taming of the Shrew IV iii 26.
107, 1–2 as a pythoness / Stands on her tripod The priestess of Apollo at Delphi was named Pythia, or the pythoness. After Apollo slew the serpent Python, the god was commonly called Pythius. Hence this name was given to his priestess and to the Pythian games that were held at Delphi, which Homer always called Pytho.
108, 7 ] Which
110, 2 its tongue On B M, Byron wrote ‘its tongue’; on M, Mary Shelley changed this to ‘his tongue’. Though Byron on M restored ‘its’, 1833 and later editions ignored the joke and printed ‘his tongue’.
111, 6–8 Sallust in his Catiline… /… he trode ‘… his guilt-stained soul, at odds with gods and man, could find rest neither waking nor sleeping, so cruelly did conscience ravage his overwrought mind. Hence his pallid complexion, his bloodshot eyes, his gait now fast, now slow; in short, his face and his every glance showed the madman’ (Sallust, The War with Catiline, section 15, lines 4–8, trans. J. C. Rolfe (1965), 26–7).
116, 5 Jack Ketch The notorious executioner of Lord Russell in 1683 and of Monmouth in 1685.
CANTO VII
For details of the composition, publication and variants see the headnote to Canto VI.
1, 3 meteor in the polar sky See note to Canto VI 72, 5–6.
1, 8 ] Assume,
2, 8 What after all are all things – but a show?
DUKE SENIOR: This wide and universal theatre
Presents more woeful pageants than the scene
Wherein we play in.
JAQUES: All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:…
And one man in his time plays many parts.
(As You Like It II vii 137–40, 142)
4, 6–7 Cato /… Diogenes Both Marcus Porcius Cato the Younger, a Stoic statesman (95–46 BC), and Diogenes the Cynic (?412–323 BC) were austere, rigorous moralists. For Diogenes see XI28, XV 73, XVI43 and notes.
4, 7–5, 2 We live and die, But which is best, you know no more than I. Socrates said…/… nothing could be known See the conclusion of Plato’s Apology, where Socrates says: ‘The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways – I to die, and you to live. Which is better God only knows’ (trans. Benjamin Jowett). Plato usually had Socrates assert his ignorance about any topic of discussion.
5, 5–8 Newton… /… great ocean – Truth Newton’s vast knowledge made him humble, because it enabled him to see how insignificant that knowledge was, in contrast to the magnitude of the unknown. Shortly before his death he said: ‘I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me’ (Sir David Brewster, Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton (2nd edn, 1860) II 331).
5, 8 ] Picking
6, 1 Ecclesiastes said that all is vanity Ecclesiastes i 2. See Byron’s lyric All is Vanity Saith the Preacher in Hebrew Melodies.
6, 8]
8, 1 ‘Fierce loves and faithless wars’ ‘Fierce warres and faithfull loves shall moralize my song’ (Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, Introduction 1, 7).
8, 7 Suvaroff or anglice Suwarrow Aleksandr Vasilievich Suvorov (1729–1800) attacked Ismail on 30 November 1790 with a force of twenty thousand men. See Gabriel de Castelnau, Essai sur l’Histoire ancienne et moderne de la Nouvelle Russie (2nd edn, 1827), II 201.
anglice in English.
8, 8 as an alderman loves marrow The feasts of the mayors and aldermen were traditionally elaborate; hence the aldermanic appetite was a current joke.
9, 1 The fortress is called Ismail I smail, Romania, located on the Kila mouth of the Danube, was a Turkish military centre on the Russo-Turkish frontier. The city has had an eventful though tragic history, being successively the prey of Turk, Cossack, Slav and Russian armies. It was occupied by Russia in 1770, 1790 and 1812.
9, 7 versts A verst is a Russian measure of approximately two-thirds of a mile.
9, 8 toises A toise is a French measure of slightly over six feet (almost two metres). O E D states that its use is chiefly military and cites Byron’s verse here.
10, 2 borough Though Byron may use this word in its obsolete sense of citadel or fortress, it may simply mean a fortified town, separate from the main city of Ismail below it.
11, 2 this new Vauban Marquis de Vauban (1633–1707) was the military engineer of Louis XIV.
12, 1 a stone bastion with a narrow gorge A bastion projected outward from the main fortified enclosure and had two flanks. The gorge was the rear entrance from the main enclosure into the bastion.
12, 3–4 Two batteries, cap-à-pie as our St George, / Casemated one, and t’ other a barbette The thick-walled stone bastion (lines 1–2) had two batteries that armed it from top to bottom, at all points, as St George was armoured from head to foot One of these batteries was casemated, that is, it was a bombproof room within the rampart that had openings through which guns might be fired. The other battery (a barbette) was a mound of earth or platform, on which the guns were mounted.
12, 8 cavalier An armed mound or platform high enough to dominate all adjacent territory.
13, 8 Allah ] Alla B M, M, 1823
‘Bis Millah’ These words, which signify ‘in the name of the most merciful God ’, are prefixed to every chapter of the Koran except one.
14, 3 Cossack ] Cossacque B M, M, 1823 and later editions. This consistent manuscript spelling will not be noted hereafter.
15, 2 there were ] there was B M, M, 1823 and later editions
15, 2–4 Strongenoff… /… Chokenoff Most of the names refer to actual Russian military men mentioned by Castelnau: ‘Strongenoff’ is Stroganov, but see also the note on Canto I 149, 6. ‘Meknop’ is Thèodore Meknop (a corruption of McNab); ‘Lwow’ is Serge Lvov; for Arseniev see note to Canto VIII 9, 4; ‘Tschitsshakoff’ is Tchitchagov; ‘Chokenoff’ is probably Tchoglokov.
15, 7 gazettes Official
journals now published twice a week in London, Edinburgh and Dublin, containing lists of appointments, promotions, honours, bankrupts and other public notices. Byron liked to refer to their lists of military casualties.
16, 6 Londonderry, drawling against time See note to Dedication 13, 1.
17, 1–2 Scherematoff… /… Mouskin Pouskin Byron mingles real and made-up names for sonal effect. ‘Scherematoff’ (Count Boris Cherematov, a Russian general) is paired for euphony with ‘Chrematoff’. Prince Alexis Kourakin and Count Alexis Ivanovitch Moussine-Pouschkine were Russian statesmen. ‘Koklophti’ and ‘Koclobski’ are apparently Byron’s own inventions.
17, 5 mufti Mohammedan priest or expounder of the law. In Turkey, the title was restricted to the official head of the state religion and to the deputies he appointed.
19, 2 called Jemmy, after the great bard James Thomson (1700–1748), author of The Seasons.
19, 4 such a godfather’s as good a card ‘Card’ is slang for any device or attribute that will ensure success. Hence to be named after the Scottish poet James Thomson was as socially effective as having a coat of arms signifying an aristocratic genealogy.
19, 7–8 renowned ‘in country quarters / At Halifax’ Byron remembered some words of Risk’s song from Act II of George Colman’s Love Laughs at Locksmiths:
A captain bold in Halifax,
Who dwelt in country quarters,
Seduc’d a maid who hang’d herself
One Monday in her garters.
21, 6–8 I think one Shakespeare puts the same thought in / The mouth of someone in his plays so doting, /… quoting
while, to my shame I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men,
That, for a fantasy and trick of fame
Go to their graves like beds. (Hamlet IV iv 56–62)
See also Falstaff’s jest about fame in Henry IV Part I V i 126–41. See Appendix.
23, 6 ]
24, 8 Unless they are game The verse reads better with a contraction: Unless they’re game. Colloquial contraction is also natural in Johnson’s terse conversation with Suvorov: I’ve heard (60, 4 and 7); he’d better lead (62, 8); I’ve vowed (63, 5). Since Byron marked contractions in 61, 3; 62, 4; 65, 6; 66, 7, the unmarked ones are oversights.
26, 4 Longman and John Murray Two London publishers. The latter issued most of Byron’s poems and plays from 1812 until 1823. He refused to publish Cantos VI–XVI of DJ, Heaven and Earth, The Vision of Judgment, and several other works.
28, 5 ]
29, 7 grape O E D cites Byron’s use of this shortened form of grape-shot: ‘small cast-iron balls, strongly connected together, so as to form a charge for cannon’.
31, 3 delhis The Turkish adjective ‘deli’ or ‘delli’, meaning ‘mad ’ or ‘wild’, was also a name applied to Bosnian or Albanian cavalry in the Turkish army, originally commanded by one Deli Bashi. Since they often served as the Vizier’s bodyguard, we may surmise that they were fierce and expert fighters. See The Encylopaedia of Islam (1913) and A Military Dictionary and Gazetteer, ed. T. W. Wilhelm (1881). See also ‘Tambourgi’ 10, 3, in C H II: ‘When his Delhis come dashing in blood o’er the banks ’. Byron in a CH note inaccurately said that the ‘delhis’ were ‘horsemen answering [corresponding] to our forlorn hopes’. For ‘forlorn hopes’ see note to Canto VIII 73, 3.
32, 1 says the historian Castelnau. See note to Preface to Cantos VI–VIII 3.
32, 7 The Prince de Ligne and Longeron and Damas Professional army officers. Charles Joseph, Prince de Ligne (1735–1814), a Belgian and a field marshal in the Russian army, published his Mèlanges Militaires in 1795 (see 33, 7). In 1809 Madame de Staël also edited his Letters and Reflections.
33, 2 preux chevaliers In Le Chanson de Roland, the three preux chevaliers (valiant knights) were Roland, and his loyal allies Olivier and the Archbishop Turpin. Byron applied the phrase ‘preux chevaliers ’ ironically to the Prince de Ligne, Langeron and Damas. He also used it ironically in Cantos XIII 86, 3 and XV 77, 2.
35, 3 Admiral Ribas Joseph de Ribas (1737–c. 1797), Neapolitan by birth and Spanish by family origin, was a protégé of Orlov and then of Potemkin. He commanded the Russian flotilla that successfully attacked Ismail.
36, 1–37, 8 There was a man… /… a steeple Moore quotes the following sketch of Potemkin (1736–91), by Louis Philippe, Comte de Ségur, ‘who lived a long time in habits of intimacy with him’: ‘In his person were collected the most opposite defects and advantages of every kind. He was avaricious and ostentatious… haughty and obliging, politic and confiding, licentious and superstitious, bold and timid, ambitious and indiscreet; lavish of his bounties to his relations, his mistresses, and his favourites, yet frequently paying neither his household nor his creditors.… Everything with him was desultory; business, pleasure, temper, carriage’ (Moore, XVI 191).
37, 2 ] When
37, 7 ]
39, 4 ] Into all
42, 5 Or beaten if you insist on grammar Byron’s grammatical licence irritated Landor and many critics. Some of his apparent solecisms were colloquial and acceptable among his London associates.
44–45 ‘Great joy to London now!’… /… Ceres hath begotten famine After gas lamps were introduced in 1812, it was customary on anniversaries and other festive occasions to please the populace with ‘a grand illumination’, when London streets and buildings were lighted, probably at considerable cost.
Byron’s sarcasm is graver in stanza 45, where he derides the wilful, perverse obtuseness, confusion and self-delusion of the English public and their statesmen. England suffered an economic depression after the end of the Napoleonic wars. Returned soldiers and sailors were unemployed. The public debt was enormous and taxes were high. Tariffs restricted imports and raised the price of food, and poor harvests in successive years sent it higher, though farm income declined, as did the export of many goods. Small independent farmers were forced to sell their property to large landowners (see DC 32). Byron considered as absurd the attempts of economic theorists and politicians to rationalize these troubles. Since the Tory government refused to make changes, discontent was prevalent, and riots occurred in cities, climaxing in the Manchester Massacre of 1819.
44, 3 bottle-conjurer A juggler or one who practises legerdemain. O E D cited this use in the Gentleman’s Magazine (1755).
45, 8 Ceres hath begotten famine Demeter, the Greek counterpart of Ceres, the Roman goddess of agriculture, angry because of the rape of her daughter Persephone, prevented the earth from producing any crops. This myth is appropriate to Byron’s allusion to the lean harvests in England.
46, 3 Suwarrow shone like a gas lamp See notes to Canto XI 22, 8, and 28, 1–2.
46, 5–8 Or like a wisp… … … wrong or right See note on Canto VIII 32, 5.
47, 7 fascines Long cylindrical bundles of woodsticks tied together and used to construct batteries, fill ditches or strengthen ramparts.
48, 6 bellwether A castrated ram with a bell on its neck, a leader of the flock.
51, 4]
51, 6 ]
51, 8 bayonet ] bay’net Here and in VII 78, 7, Byron regarded this word as disyllabic. He usually did not indicate elision on his manuscript.
52, 5 Just as you’d break a sucking salamander Just as you’d discipline an immature soldier. See O E D for all three words. Since the salamander was fabled to be as cold as ice and hence able to quench fire and endure it, the word eventually was used to designate a soldier who exposed himself to battle-fire. For legends about the salamander, see Pliny’s Natural History Book X, section 86, trans. H. Rackham (1940), III
412–13; and Book XXIX, section 23, trans. W. H. S. Jones (1963), VIII 230–33.
52, 6 ] To swallow flame, and
53, 2] Like
53, 7–8 ]
Lost, for his Repartee was taking Cities>
55, 5–8 Hero, buffoon… / Praying… /… Harlequin in uniform E. H. Coleridge (VI 321–2 n.) thought that a source of these and other passages about the general’s character and conduct was Tranchant de Laverne’s The Life of Field-Marshal Souvaroff (1814).
55, 7 Momus A Greek god of mockery and censure.
56, 3 hovering like hawks ]
58, 2 Calmucks Also spelled Kalmucks, Kalmuks or Kalmyks; they were Buddhist Mongol tribes, who in the seventeenth century fled the wars of central Asia and settled in southeast Russia, north and west of the Caspian Sea. In this arid region they were tent-dwelling nomads, whose main occupation was grazing sheep and drought cattle. In the 1760s, because of bad economic conditions in Russia, three hundred thousand Kalmucks undertook a disastrous journey back to China, in which two-thirds of them died. The only Kalmuck tribes who remained in Russia were those living west of the Volga River.
59, 3 stern brow B M, M] slow brow 1823 and later editions
63, 7 its tusk ploughshare.
64, 8 the Christian Empress Catherine Byron’s sympathies consistently lean much more to the Turks than to their Russian aggressors. In an ‘Additional Note on the Turks’ appended to C H II, he wrote: ‘Were they driven from St Sophia tomorrow, and the French or Russians enthroned in their stead, it would become a question whether Europe would gain by the exchange. England would certainly be the loser’ (Poetry II 206).
69, 7–8 a single sorrow / Will touch even heroes See Suvorov’s astonishing remark to the artist Műller: ‘Your pencil will delineate the features of my face. These are visible: but my inner man is hidden. I must tell you that I have shed rivers of blood. I tremble, but I love my neighbour. In my whole life I have