Lord Byron - Delphi Poets Series

by Lord Byron

  Although you borrow’d all that e’er the muses

  Have sung, or even a Dandy’s dandiest chatter,

  Or all the figures Castlereagh abuses;

  Just as a languid smile began to flatter

  His peace was making, but before he ventured

  Further, old Baba rather briskly enter’d.

  CXLIV

  “Bride of the Sun! and Sister of the Moon!”

  (‘T was thus he spake) “and Empress of the Earth!

  Whose frown would put the spheres all out of tune,

  Whose smile makes all the planets dance with mirth,

  Your slave brings tidings — he hopes not too soon —

  Which your sublime attention may be worth:

  The Sun himself has sent me like a ray,

  To hint that he is coming up this way.”

  CXLV

  “Is it,” exclaim’d Gulbeyaz, “as you say?

  I wish to heaven he would not shine till morning!

  But bid my women form the milky way.

  Hence, my old comet! give the stars due warning —

  And, Christian! mingle with them as you may,

  And as you’d have me pardon your past scorning —”

  Here they were interrupted by a humming

  Sound, and then by a cry, “The Sultan’s coming!”

  CXLVI

  First came her damsels, a decorous file,

  And then his Highness’ eunuchs, black and white;

  The train might reach a quarter of a mile:

  His majesty was always so polite

  As to announce his visits a long while

  Before he came, especially at night;

  For being the last wife of the Emperour,

  She was of course the favorite of the four.

  CXLVII

  His Highness was a man of solemn port,

  Shawl’d to the nose, and bearded to the eyes,

  Snatch’d from a prison to preside at court,

  His lately bowstrung brother caused his rise;

  He was as good a sovereign of the sort

  As any mention’d in the histories

  Of Cantemir, or Knolles, where few shine

  Save Solyman, the glory of their line.

  CXLVIII

  He went to mosque in state, and said his prayers

  With more than “Oriental scrupulosity;”

  He left to his vizier all state affairs,

  And show’d but little royal curiosity:

  I know not if he had domestic cares —

  No process proved connubial animosity;

  Four wives and twice five hundred maids, unseen,

  Were ruled as calmly as a Christian queen.

  CXLIX

  If now and then there happen’d a slight slip,

  Little was heard of criminal or crime;

  The story scarcely pass’d a single lip —

  The sack and sea had settled all in time,

  From which the secret nobody could rip:

  The Public knew no more than does this rhyme;

  No scandals made the daily press a curse —

  Morals were better, and the fish no worse.

  CL

  He saw with his own eyes the moon was round,

  Was also certain that the earth was square,

  Because he had journey’d fifty miles, and found

  No sign that it was circular anywhere;

  His empire also was without a bound:

  ’T is true, a little troubled here and there,

  By rebel pachas, and encroaching giaours,

  But then they never came to “the Seven Towers;”

  CLI

  Except in shape of envoys, who were sent

  To lodge there when a war broke out, according

  To the true law of nations, which ne’er meant

  Those scoundrels, who have never had a sword in

  Their dirty diplomatic hands, to vent

  Their spleen in making strife, and safely wording

  Their lies, yclep’d despatches, without risk or

  The singeing of a single inky whisker.

  CLII

  He had fifty daughters and four dozen sons,

  Of whom all such as came of age were stow’d,

  The former in a palace, where like nuns

  They lived till some Bashaw was sent abroad,

  When she, whose turn it was, was wed at once,

  Sometimes at six years old — though it seems odd,

  ‘T is true; the reason is, that the Bashaw

  Must make a present to his sire in law.

  CLIII

  His sons were kept in prison, till they grew

  Of years to fill a bowstring or the throne,

  One or the other, but which of the two

  Could yet be known unto the fates alone;

  Meantime the education they went through

  Was princely, as the proofs have always shown:

  So that the heir apparent still was found

  No less deserving to be hang’d than crown’d.

  CLIV

  His majesty saluted his fourth spouse

  With all the ceremonies of his rank,

  Who clear’d her sparkling eyes and smooth’d her brows,

  As suits a matron who has play’d a prank;

  These must seem doubly mindful of their vows,

  To save the credit of their breaking bank:

  To no men are such cordial greetings given

  As those whose wives have made them fit for heaven.

  CLV

  His Highness cast around his great black eyes,

  And looking, as he always look’d, perceived

  Juan amongst the damsels in disguise,

  At which he seem’d no whit surprised nor grieved,

  But just remark’d with air sedate and wise,

  While still a fluttering sigh Gulbeyaz heaved,

  “I see you’ve bought another girl; ‘t is pity

  That a mere Christian should be half so pretty.”

  CLVI

  This compliment, which drew all eyes upon

  The new-bought virgin, made her blush and shake.

  Her comrades, also, thought themselves undone:

  Oh! Mahomet! that his majesty should take

  Such notice of a giaour, while scarce to one

  Of them his lips imperial ever spake!

  There was a general whisper, toss, and wriggle,

  But etiquette forbade them all to giggle.

  CLVII

  The Turks do well to shut — at least, sometimes —

  The women up, because, in sad reality,

  Their chastity in these unhappy climes

  Is not a thing of that astringent quality

  Which in the North prevents precocious crimes,

  And makes our snow less pure than our morality;

  The sun, which yearly melts the polar ice,

  Has quite the contrary effect on vice.

  CLVIII

  Thus in the East they are extremely strict,

  And Wedlock and a Padlock mean the same;

  Excepting only when the former’s pick’d

  It ne’er can be replaced in proper frame;

  Spoilt, as a pipe of claret is when prick’d:

  But then their own Polygamy’s to blame;

  Why don’t they knead two virtuous souls for life

  Into that moral centaur, man and wife?

  CLIX

  Thus far our chronicle; and now we pause,

  Though not for want of matter; but ‘t is time

  According to the ancient epic laws,

  To slacken sail, and anchor with our rhyme.

  Let this fifth canto meet with due applause,

  The sixth shall have a touch of the sublime;

  Meanwhile, as Homer sometimes sleeps, perhaps
r />   You’ll pardon to my muse a few short naps.

  DON JUAN: CANTO THE SIXTH

  I

  “There is a tide in the affairs of men

  Which, — taken at the flood,” — you know the rest,

  And most of us have found it now and then;

  At least we think so, though but few have guess’d

  The moment, till too late to come again.

  But no doubt every thing is for the best —

  Of which the surest sign is in the end:

  When things are at the worst they sometimes mend.

  II

  There is a tide in the affairs of women

  Which, taken at the flood, leads — God knows where:

  Those navigators must be able seamen

  Whose charts lay down its current to a hair;

  Not all the reveries of Jacob Behmen

  With its strange whirls and eddies can compare:

  Men with their heads reflect on this and that —

  But women with their hearts on heaven knows what!

  III

  And yet a headlong, headstrong, downright she,

  Young, beautiful, and daring — who would risk

  A throne, the world, the universe, to be

  Beloved in her own way, and rather whisk

  The stars from out the sky, than not be free

  As are the billows when the breeze is brisk —

  Though such a she’s a devil (if that there be one),

  Yet she would make full many a Manichean.

  IV

  Thrones, worlds, et cetera, are so oft upset

  By commonest ambition, that when passion

  O’erthrows the same, we readily forget,

  Or at the least forgive, the loving rash one.

  If Antony be well remember’d yet,

  ’T is not his conquests keep his name in fashion,

  But Actium, lost for Cleopatra’s eyes,

  Outbalances all Caesar’s victories.

  V

  He died at fifty for a queen of forty;

  I wish their years had been fifteen and twenty,

  For then wealth, kingdoms, worlds are but a sport — I

  Remember when, though I had no great plenty

  Of worlds to lose, yet still, to pay my court, I

  Gave what I had — a heart: as the world went, I

  Gave what was worth a world; for worlds could never

  Restore me those pure feelings, gone forever.

  VI

  ‘T was the boy’s “mite,” and, like the “widow’s,” may

  Perhaps be weigh’d hereafter, if not now;

  But whether such things do or do not weigh,

  All who have loved, or love, will still allow

  Life has nought like it. God is love, they say,

  And Love’s a god, or was before the brow

  Of earth was wrinkled by the sins and tears

  Of — but Chronology best knows the years.

  VII

  We left our hero and third heroine in

  A kind of state more awkward than uncommon,

  For gentlemen must sometimes risk their skin

  For that sad tempter, a forbidden woman:

  Sultans too much abhor this sort of sin,

  And don’t agree at all with the wise Roman,

  Heroic, stoic Cato, the sententious,

  Who lent his lady to his friend Hortensius.

  VIII

  I know Gulbeyaz was extremely wrong;

  I own it, I deplore it, I condemn it;

  But I detest all fiction even in song,

  And so must tell the truth, howe’er you blame it.

  Her reason being weak, her passions strong,

  She thought that her lord’s heart (even could she claim it)

  Was scarce enough; for he had fifty-nine

  Years, and a fifteen-hundredth concubine.

  IX

  I am not, like Cassio, “an arithmetician,”

  But by “the bookish theoric” it appears,

  If ‘t is summ’d up with feminine precision,

  That, adding to the account his Highness’ years,

  The fair Sultana err’d from inanition;

  For, were the Sultan just to all his dears,

  She could but claim the fifteen-hundredth part

  Of what should be monopoly — the heart.

  X

  It is observed that ladies are litigious

  Upon all legal objects of possession,

  And not the least so when they are religious,

  Which doubles what they think of the transgression:

  With suits and prosecutions they besiege us,

  As the tribunals show through many a session,

  When they suspect that any one goes shares

  In that to which the law makes them sole heirs.

  XI

  Now, if this holds good in a Christian land,

  The heathen also, though with lesser latitude,

  Are apt to carry things with a high hand,

  And take what kings call “an imposing attitude,”

  And for their rights connubial make a stand,

  When their liege husbands treat them with ingratitude:

  And as four wives must have quadruple claims,

  The Tigris hath its jealousies like Thames.

  XII

  Gulbeyaz was the fourth, and (as I said)

  The favourite; but what is favour amongst four?

  Polygamy may well be held in dread,

  Not only as a sin, but as a bore:

  Most wise men, with one moderate woman wed,

  Will scarcely find philosophy for more;

  And all (except Mahometans) forbear

  To make the nuptial couch a “Bed of Ware.”

  XIII

  His Highness, the sublimest of mankind, —

  So styled according to the usual forms

  Of every monarch, till they are consign’d

  To those sad hungry jacobins the worms,

  Who on the very loftiest kings have dined, —

  His Highness gazed upon Gulbeyaz’ charms,

  Expecting all the welcome of a lover

  (A “Highland welcome” all the wide world over).

  XIV

  Now here we should distinguish; for howe’er

  Kisses, sweet words, embraces, and all that,

  May look like what is — neither here nor there,

  They are put on as easily as a hat,

  Or rather bonnet, which the fair sex wear,

  Trimm’d either heads or hearts to decorate,

  Which form an ornament, but no more part

  Of heads, than their caresses of the heart.

  XV

  A slight blush, a soft tremor, a calm kind

  Of gentle feminine delight, and shown

  More in the eyelids than the eyes, resign’d

  Rather to hide what pleases most unknown,

  Are the best tokens (to a modest mind)

  Of love, when seated on his loveliest throne,

  A sincere woman’s breast, — for over-warm

  Or over-cold annihilates the charm.

  XVI

  For over-warmth, if false, is worse than truth;

  If true, ‘t is no great lease of its own fire;

  For no one, save in very early youth,

  Would like (I think) to trust all to desire,

  Which is but a precarious bond, in sooth,

  And apt to be transferr’d to the first buyer

  At a sad discount: while your over chilly

  Women, on t’ other hand, seem somewhat silly.

  XVII

  That is, we cannot pardon their bad taste,

  For so it seems to lovers swift or slow,

  Who fain would have a mutual flame confess’d,

  And see a se
ntimental passion glow,

  Even were St. Francis’ paramour their guest,

  In his monastic concubine of snow; —

  In short, the maxim for the amorous tribe is

  Horatian, “Medio tu tutissimus ibis.”

  XVIII

  The “tu”‘s too much, — but let it stand, — the verse

  Requires it, that’s to say, the English rhyme,

  And not the pink of old hexameters;

  But, after all, there’s neither tune nor time

  In the last line, which cannot well be worse,

  And was thrust in to close the octave’s chime:

  I own no prosody can ever rate it

  As a rule, but Truth may, if you translate it.

  XIX

  If fair Gulbeyaz overdid her part,

  I know not — it succeeded, and success

  Is much in most things, not less in the heart

  Than other articles of female dress.

  Self-love in man, too, beats all female art;

  They lie, we lie, all lie, but love no less;

  And no one virtue yet, except starvation,

  Could stop that worst of vices — propagation.

  XX

  We leave this royal couple to repose:

  A bed is not a throne, and they may sleep,

  Whate’er their dreams be, if of joys or woes:

  Yet disappointed joys are woes as deep

  As any man’s day mixture undergoes.

  Our least of sorrows are such as we weep;

  ‘T is the vile daily drop on drop which wears

  The soul out (like the stone) with petty cares.

  XXI

  A scolding wife, a sullen son, a bill

  To pay, unpaid, protested, or discounted

  At a per-centage; a child cross, dog ill,

  A favourite horse fallen lame just as he’s mounted,

  A bad old woman making a worse will,

  Which leaves you minus of the cash you counted

  As certain; — these are paltry things, and yet

  I’ve rarely seen the man they did not fret.

  XXII

  I’m a philosopher; confound them all!

  Bills, beasts, and men, and — no! not womankind!

  With one good hearty curse I vent my gall,

  And then my stoicism leaves nought behind

  Which it can either pain or evil call,

  And I can give my whole soul up to mind;

  Though what is soul or mind, their birth or growth,

  Is more than I know — the deuce take them both!

  XXIII

  So now all things are damned one feels at ease,

  As after reading Athanasius’ curse,

  Which doth your true believer so much please:

  I doubt if any now could make it worse

  O’er his worst enemy when at his knees,

  ’T is so sententious, positive, and terse,

  And decorates the book of Common Prayer,