8. Of a compass.
.
DO N JUAN, CANTO 1 / 69 3 1565 These I could bear, but cannot cast aside The passion which still rends it as before, And so farewell?forgive me, love me?No, That word is idle now?but let it go. 197 15701575'I have no more to say, but linger still, And dare not set my seal upon this sheet, And yet I may as well the task fulfil, My misery can scarce be more complete: I had not lived till now, could sorrow kill; Death flies the wretch who fain the blow would meet, And I must even survive this last adieu, And bear with life, to love and pray for you!' 198 1580This note was written upon gilt-edged paper With a neat crow-quill, rather hard, but new; Her small white fingers scarce could reach the taper,9 But trembled as magnetic needles do, And yet she did not let one tear escape her; The seal a sunflower; 'Elle vous suit partout,'1 The motto, cut upon a white cornelian; The wax was superfine, its hue vermilion. 199 15851590 This was Don Juan's earliest scrape; but whether I shall proceed with his adventures is Dependent on the public altogether; We'll see, however, what they say to this, Their favour in an author's cap's a feather, And no great mischief's done by their caprice; And if their approbation we experience, Perhaps they'll have some more about a year hence. 200 15951600My poem's epic, and is meant to be Divided in twelve books; each book containing, With love, and war, a heavy gale at sea, A list of ships, and captains, and kings reigning, New characters; the episodes are three: A panorama view of hell's in training, After the style of Virgil and of Homer, So that my name of Epic's no misnomer. 201 All these things will be specified in time, With strict regard to Aristotle's rules, The vade mecum2 of the true sublime,
9. The candle (to melt wax to seal the letter). Byron's 1807 poem 'The Cornelian.' 1. She follows you everywhere (French). This 2. Go with me (Latin, literal trans.); handbook. motto was inscribed on one of Byron's seals and Byron is deriding the neoclassical view that Arison a jewel he gave to John Edleston, the boy with totle's Poetics proposes 'rules' for writing epic and whom he had a romantic friendship while at Cam-tragedy. bridge. Their friendship was memorialized in
.
69 4 / GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON
Which makes so many poets, and some fools; Prose poets like blank-verse, I'm fond of rhyme,
Good workmen never quarrel with their tools; I've got new mythological machinery,3 And very handsome supernatural scenery.
There's only one slight difference between Me and my epic brethren gone before, And here the advantage is my own, I ween;
(Not that I have not several merits more, But this will more peculiarly be seen)
They so embellish, that 'tis quite a bore Their labyrinth of fables to thread through, Whereas this story's actually true.
203
If any person doubt it, I appeal To history, tradition, and to facts, To newspapers, whose truth all know and feel, To plays in five, and operas in three acts; All these confirm my statement a good deal,
But that which more completely faith exacts Is, that myself, and several now in Seville, Saw Juan's last elopement with the devil.4
204
If ever I should condescend to prose, I'll write poetical commandments, which Shall supersede beyond all doubt all those That went before; in these I shall enrich My text with many things that no one knows,
And carry precept to the highest pitch: I'll call the work 'Longinus o'er a Bottle, Or, Every Poet his own Aristotle.'
205
Thou shalt believe in Milton, Dryden, Pope;5 Thou shalt not set up Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey; Because the first is crazed beyond all hope, The second drunk, the third so quaint and mouthey: With Crabbe it may be difficult to cope,
And Campbell's Hippocrene6 is somewhat drouthy: Thou shalt not steal from Samuel Rogers, nor? Commit?flirtation with the muse of Moore.
3. The assemblage of supernatural personages and incidents introduced into a literary work. 4. The usual plays on the Juan legend ended with Juan in hell; an early-20th-century version is Bernard Shaw's Man and Superman. 5. This is one of many passages, in prose and verse, in which Byron vigorously defends Dryden and Pope against his Romantic contemporaries. 6. Fountain on Mount Helicon whose waters supposedly gave inspiration. George Crabbe, whom Byron admired, was the author of The Village and other realistic poems of rural life. Thomas Campbell, Samuel Rogers, and Thomas Moore were lesser poets of the Romantic period; the last two were close friends of Byron and members of Lon- don's liberal Whig circles.
.
DO N JUAN, CANTO 1 / 69 5 Thou shalt not covet Mr. Sotheby's Muse, His Pegasus,7 nor any thing that's his; Thou shalt not bear false witness like 'the Blues,'8 (There's one, at least, is very fond of this); 1645 Thou shalt not write, in short, but what I choose: This is true criticism, and you may kiss? Exactly as you please, or not, the rod, But if you don't, I'll lay it on, by G?d!9 207 If any person should presume to assert 1650 This story is not moral, first I pray That they will not cry out before they're hurt, Then that they'll read it o'er again, and say, (But, doubtless, nobody will be so pert) That this is not a moral tale, though gay; 1655 Besides, in canto twelfth, I mean to show The very place where wicked people go. 213 But now at thirty years my hair is gray? (I wonder what it will be like at forty? I thought of a peruke0 the other day) wig 1700 My heart is not much greener; and, in short, I Have squander'd my whole summer while 'twas May, And feel no more the spirit to retort; I Have spent my life, both interest and principal, And deem not, what I deem'd, my soul invincible. 214 1705 No more?no more?Oh! never more on me The freshness of the heart can fall like dew, Which out of all the lovely things we see Extracts emotions beautiful and new, Hived in our bosoms like the bag o' the bee: 1710 Think'st thou the honey with those objects grew? Alas! 'twas not in them, but in thy power To double even the sweetness of a flower. 215 No more?no more?Oh! never more, my heart, Canst thou be my sole world, my universe! 1715 Once all in all, but now a thing apart,
7. The winged horse symbolizing poetic inspiration. The wealthy William Sotheby, minorpoet and translator, is satirized, as Botherby, in Byron's Beppo.
8. I.e., bluestockings, a contemporary term for female intellectuals, among whom Byron numbered his wife
