Lord Byron - Delphi Poets Series
Page 200
Of Pegasus, or at the least post-chaises
Had feathers, when a traveller on deep ways is.
XXXI
At every jolt — and they were many — still
He turn’d his eyes upon his little charge,
As if he wish’d that she should fare less ill
Than he, in these sad highways left at large
To ruts, and flints, and lovely Nature’s skill,
Who is no paviour, nor admits a barge
On her canals, where God takes sea and land,
Fishery and farm, both into his own hand.
XXXII
At least he pays no rent, and has best right
To be the first of what we used to call
“Gentlemen farmer” — a race worn out quite,
Since lately there have been no rents at all,
And “gentlemen” are in a piteous plight,
And “farmers” can’t raise Ceres from her fall:
She fell with Buonaparte — What strange thoughts
Arise, when we see emperors fall with oats!
XXXIII
But Juan turn’d his eyes on the sweet child
Whom he had saved from slaughter — what a trophy!
Oh! ye who build up monuments, defiled
With gore, like Nadir Shah, that costive sophy,
Who, after leaving Hindostan a wild,
And scarce to the Mogul a cup of coffee
To soothe his woes withal, was slain, the sinner!
Because he could no more digest his dinner; —
XXXIV
Oh ye! or we! or he! or she! reflect,
That one life saved, especially if young
Or pretty, is a thing to recollect
Far sweeter than the greenest laurels sprung
From the manure of human clay, though deck’d
With all the praises ever said or sung:
Though hymn’d by every harp, unless within
Your heart joins chorus, Fame is but a din.
XXXV
Oh! ye great authors luminous, voluminous!
Ye twice ten hundred thousand daily scribes!
Whose pamphlets, volumes, newspapers, illumine us!
Whether you’re paid by government in bribes,
To prove the public debt is not consuming us —
Or, roughly treading on the “courtier’s kibes”
With clownish heel, your popular circulation
Feeds you by printing half the realm’s starvation; —
XXXVI
Oh, ye great authors! — “Apropos des bottes,” —
I have forgotten what I meant to say,
As sometimes have been greater sages’ lots; —
’T was something calculated to allay
All wrath in barracks, palaces, or cots:
Certes it would have been but thrown away,
And that’s one comfort for my lost advice,
Although no doubt it was beyond all price.
XXXVII
But let it go: — it will one day be found
With other relics of “a former world,”
When this world shall be former, underground,
Thrown topsy-turvy, twisted, crisp’d, and curl’d,
Baked, fried, or burnt, turn’d inside-out, or drown’d,
Like all the worlds before, which have been hurl’d
First out of, and then back again to chaos,
The superstratum which will overlay us.
XXXVIII
So Cuvier says; — and then shall come again
Unto the new creation, rising out
From our old crash, some mystic, ancient strain
Of things destroy’d and left in airy doubt:
Like to the notions we now entertain
Of Titans, giants, fellows of about
Some hundred feet in height, not to say miles,
And mammoths, and your wingéd crocodiles.
XXXIX
Think if then George the Fourth should be dug up!
How the new worldlings of the then new East
Will wonder where such animals could sup!
(For they themselves will be but of the least:
Even worlds miscarry, when too oft they pup,
And every new creation hath decreased
In size, from overworking the material —
Men are but maggots of some huge Earth’s burial.)
XL
How will — to these young people, just thrust out
From some fresh Paradise, and set to plough,
And dig, and sweat, and turn themselves about,
And plant, and reap, and spin, and grind, and sow,
Till all the arts at length are brought about,
Especially of war and taxing, — how,
I say, will these great relics, when they see ‘em,
Look like the monsters of a new museum?
XLI
But I am apt to grow too metaphysical:
”The time is out of joint,” — and so am I;
I quite forget this poem’s merely quizzical,
And deviate into matters rather dry.
I ne’er decide what I shall say, and this I call
Much too poetical: men should know why
They write, and for what end; but, note or text,
I never know the word which will come next.
XLII
So on I ramble, now and then narrating,
Now pondering: — it is time we should narrate.
I left Don Juan with his horses baiting —
Now we’ll get o’er the ground at a great rate.
I shall not be particular in stating
His journey, we’ve so many tours of late:
Suppose him then at Petersburgh; suppose
That pleasant capital of painted snows;
XLIII
Suppose him in a handsome uniform, —
A scarlet coat, black facings, a long plume,
Waving, like sails new shiver’d in a storm,
Over a cock’d hat in a crowded room,
And brilliant breeches, bright as a Cairn Gorme,
Of yellow casimere we may presume,
White stocking drawn uncurdled as new milk
O’er limbs whose symmetry set off the silk;
XLIV
Suppose him sword by side, and hat in hand,
Made up by youth, fame, and an army tailor —
That great enchanter, at whose rod’s command
Beauty springs forth, and Nature’s self turns paler,
Seeing how Art can make her work more grand
(When she don’t pin men’s limbs in like a gaoler), —
Behold him placed as if upon a pillar! He
Seems Love turn’d a lieutenant of artillery: —
XLV
His bandage slipp’d down into a cravat;
His wings subdued to epaulettes; his quiver
Shrunk to a scabbard, with his arrows at
His side as a small sword, but sharp as ever;
His bow converted into a cock’d hat;
But still so like, that Psyche were more clever
Than some wives (who make blunders no less stupid),
If she had not mistaken him for Cupid.
XLVI
The courtiers stared, the ladies whisper’d, and
The empress smiled: the reigning favourite frown’d —
I quite forget which of them was in hand
Just then; as they are rather numerous found,
Who took by turns that difficult command
Since first her majesty was singly crown’d:
But they were mostly nervous six-foot fellows,
All fit to make a Patagonian jealous.
XLVII
Juan was none of these, but slight and slim,
Blushing and
beardless; and yet ne’ertheless
There was a something in his turn of limb,
And still more in his eye, which seem’d to express,
That though he look’d one of the seraphim,
There lurk’d a man beneath the spirit’s dress.
Besides, the empress sometimes liked a boy,
And had just buried the fair-faced Lanskoi.
XLVIII
No wonder then that Yermoloff, or Momonoff,
Or Scherbatoff, or any other off
Or on, might dread her majesty had not room enough
Within her bosom (which was not too tough)
For a new flame; a thought to cast of gloom enough
Along the aspect, whether smooth or rough,
Of him who, in the language of his station,
Then held that “high official situation.”
XLIX
O, gentle ladies! should you seek to know
The import of this diplomatic phrase,
Bid Ireland’s Londonderry’s Marquess show
His parts of speech; and in the strange displays
Of that odd string of words, all in a row,
Which none divine, and every one obeys,
Perhaps you may pick out some queer no meaning,
Of that weak wordy harvest the sole gleaning.
L
I think I can explain myself without
That sad inexplicable beast of prey —
That Sphinx, whose words would ever be a doubt,
Did not his deeds unriddle them each day —
That monstrous hieroglyphic — that long spout
Of blood and water, leaden Castlereagh!
And here I must an anecdote relate,
But luckily of no great length or weight.
LI
An English lady ask’d of an Italian,
What were the actual and official duties
Of the strange thing some women set a value on,
Which hovers oft about some married beauties,
Called “Cavalier servente?” — a Pygmalion
Whose statues warm (I fear, alas! too true ‘t is)
Beneath his art. The dame, press’d to disclose them,
Said — “Lady, I beseech you to suppose them.”
LII
And thus I supplicate your supposition,
And mildest, matron-like interpretation,
Of the imperial favourite’s condition.
’T was a high place, the highest in the nation
In fact, if not in rank; and the suspicion
Of any one’s attaining to his station,
No doubt gave pain, where each new pair of shoulders,
If rather broad, made stocks rise and their holders.
LIII
Juan, I said, was a most beauteous boy,
And had retain’d his boyish look beyond
The usual hirsute seasons which destroy,
With beards and whiskers, and the like, the fond
Parisian aspect which upset old Troy
And founded Doctors’ Commons: — I have conn’d
The history of divorces, which, though chequer’d,
Calls Ilion’s the first damages on record.
LIV
And Catherine, who loved all things (save her lord,
Who was gone to his place), and pass’d for much
Admiring those (by dainty dames abhorr’d)
Gigantic gentlemen, yet had a touch
Of sentiment; and he she most adored
Was the lamented Lanskoi, who was such
A lover as had cost her many a tear,
And yet but made a middling grenadier.
LV
Oh thou “teterrima causa” of all “belli” —
Thou gate of life and death — thou nondescript!
Whence is our exit and our entrance, — well I
May pause in pondering how all souls are dipt
In thy perennial fountain: — how man fell I
Know not, since knowledge saw her branches stript
Of her first fruit; but how he falls and rises
Since, thou hast settled beyond all surmises.
LVI
Some call thee “the worst cause of war,” but I
Maintain thou art the best: for after all
From thee we come, to thee we go, and why
To get at thee not batter down a wall,
Or waste a world? since no one can deny
Thou dost replenish worlds both great and small:
With, or without thee, all things at a stand
Are, or would be, thou sea of life’s dry land!
LVII
Catherine, who was the grand Epitome
Of that great cause of war, or peace, or what
You please (it causes all the things which be,
So you may take your choice of this or that) —
Catherine, I say. was very glad to see
The handsome herald, on whose plumage sat
Victory; and pausing as she saw him kneel
With his despatch, forgot to break the seal.
LVIII
Then recollecting the whole empress, nor
Forgetting quite the woman (which composed
At least three parts of this great whole), she tore
The letter open with an air which posed
The court, that watch’d each look her visage wore,
Until a royal smile at length disclosed
Fair weather for the day. Though rather spacious,
Her face was noble, her eyes fine, mouth gracious.
LIX
Great joy was hers, or rather joys: the first
Was a ta’en city, thirty thousand slain.
Glory and triumph o’er her aspect burst,
As an East Indian sunrise on the main.
These quench’d a moment her ambition’s thirst —
So Arab deserts drink in summer’s rain:
In vain! — As fall the dews on quenchless sands,
Blood only serves to wash Ambition’s hands!
LX
Her next amusement was more fanciful;
She smiled at mad Suwarrow’s rhymes, who threw
Into a Russian couplet rather dull
The whole gazette of thousands whom he slew.
Her third was feminine enough to annul
The shudder which runs naturally through
Our veins, when things call’d sovereigns think it best
To kill, and generals turn it into jest.
LXI
The two first feelings ran their course complete,
And lighted first her eye, and then her mouth:
The whole court look’d immediately most sweet,
Like flowers well water’d after a long drouth.
But when on the lieutenant at her feet
Her majesty, who liked to gaze on youth
Almost as much as on a new despatch,
Glanced mildly, all the world was on the watch.
LXII
Though somewhat large, exuberant, and truculent,
When wroth — while pleased, she was as fine a figure
As those who like things rosy, ripe, and succulent,
Would wish to look on, while they are in vigour.
She could repay each amatory look you lent
With interest, and in turn was wont with rigour
To exact of Cupid’s bills the full amount
At sight, nor would permit you to discount.
LXIII
With her the latter, though at times convenient,
Was not so necessary; for they tell
That she was handsome, and though fierce look’d lenient,
And always used her favourites too well.
If once beyond her boudoir’s precincts in ye went,
Your “fortune” was in a
fair way “to swell
A man” (as Giles says); for though she would widow all
Nations, she liked man as an individual.
LXIV
What a strange thing is man? and what a stranger
Is woman! What a whirlwind is her head,
And what a whirlpool full of depth and danger
Is all the rest about her! Whether wed
Or widow, maid or mother, she can change her
Mind like the wind: whatever she has said
Or done, is light to what she’ll say or do; —
The oldest thing on record, and yet new!
LXV
Oh Catherine! (for of all interjections,
To thee both oh! and ah! belong of right
In love and war) how odd are the connections
Of human thoughts, which jostle in their flight!
Just now yours were cut out in different sections:
First Ismail’s capture caught your fancy quite;
Next of new knights, the fresh and glorious batch;
And thirdly he who brought you the despatch!
LXVI
Shakspeare talks of “the herald Mercury
New lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;”
And some such visions cross’d her majesty,
While her young herald knelt before her still.
‘T is very true the hill seem’d rather high,
For a lieutenant to climb up; but skill
Smooth’d even the Simplon’s steep, and by God’s blessing
With youth and health all kisses are “heaven-kissing.”
LXVII
Her majesty look’d down, the youth look’d up —
And so they fell in love; — she with his face,
His grace, his God-knows-what: for Cupid’s cup
With the first draught intoxicates apace,
A quintessential laudanum or “black drop,”
Which makes one drunk at once, without the base
Expedient of full bumpers; for the eye
In love drinks all life’s fountains (save tears) dry.
LXVIII
He, on the other hand, if not in love,
Fell into that no less imperious passion,
Self-love — which, when some sort of thing above
Ourselves, a singer, dancer, much in fashion,
Or duchess, princess, empress, “deigns to prove”
(‘T is Pope’s phrase) a great longing, though a rash one,
For one especial person out of many,
Makes us believe ourselves as good as any.
LXIX
Besides, he was of that delighted age
Which makes all female ages equal — when
We don’t much care with whom we may engage,
As bold as Daniel in the lion’s den,
So that we can our native sun assuage
In the next ocean, which may flow just then,