He might be taught, by Love and her together—
I really don’t know what, nor Julia either.
LXXXII
Fraught with this fine intention, and well fenced
In mail of proof—her purity of soul73—
She, for the future, of her strength convinced,
And that her honour was a rock, or mole,74
Exceeding sagely from that hour dispensed
With any kind of troublesome control;
But whether Julia to the task was equal
Is that which must be mentioned in the sequel.
LXXXIII
Her plan she deemed both innocent and feasible,
And, surely, with a stripling of sixteen
Not Scandal’s fangs could fix on much that’s seizable,
Or if they did so, satisfied to mean
Nothing but what was good, her breast was peaceable—
A quiet conscience makes one so serene!
Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded
That all the Apostles would have done as they did.
LXXXIV
And if in the mean time her husband died,
But Heaven forbid that such a thought should cross
Her brain, though in a dream! (and then she sighed)
Never could she survive that common loss;
But just suppose that moment should betide,
I only say suppose it—inter nos:
(This should be entre nous, for Julia thought
In French, but then the rhyme would go for nought.)
LXXXV
I only say, suppose this supposition:
Juan being then grown up to man’s estate
Would fully suit a widow of condition,
Even seven years hence it would not be too late;
And in the interim (to pursue this vision)
The mischief, after all, could not be great,
For he would learn the rudiments of Love,
I mean the seraph way of those above.
LXXXVI
So much for Julia! Now we’ll turn to Juan.
Poor little fellow! he had no idea
Of his own case, and never hit the true one;
In feelings quick as Ovid’s Miss Medea,75
He puzzled over what he found a new one,
But not as yet imagined it could be a
Thing quite in course, and not at all alarming,
Which, with a little patience, might grow charming.
LXXXVII
Silent and pensive, idle, restless, slow,
His home deserted for the lonely wood,
Tormented with a wound he could not know,
His, like all deep grief, plunged in solitude:
I’m fond myself of solitude or so,
But then, I beg it may be understood,
By solitude I mean a Sultan’s (not
A Hermit’s), with a haram for a grot.
LXXXVIII
“Oh Love! in such a wilderness as this,
Where Transport and Security entwine,
Here is the Empire of thy perfect bliss,
And here thou art a God indeed divine.”76
The bard I quote from does not sing amiss,
With the exception of the second line,
For that same twining “Transport and Security”
Are twisted to a phrase of some obscurity.
LXXXIX
The Poet meant, no doubt, and thus appeals
To the good sense and senses of mankind,
The very thing which everybody feels,
As all have found on trial, or may find,
That no one likes to be disturbed at meals
Or love.—I won’t say more about “entwined”
Or “Transport,” as we knew all that before,
But beg “Security” will bolt the door.
XC
Young Juan wandered by the glassy brooks,
Thinking unutterable things; he threw
Himself at length within the leafy nooks
Where the wild branch of the cork forest grew;
There poets find materials for their books,
And every now and then we read them through,
So that their plan and prosody are eligible,
Unless, like Wordsworth, they prove unintelligible.
XCI
He, Juan (and not Wordsworth), so pursued
His self-communion with his own high soul,
Until his mighty heart, in its great mood,
Had mitigated part, though not the whole
Of its disease; he did the best he could
With things not very subject to control,
And turned, without perceiving his condition,
Like Coleridge, into a metaphysician.77
XCII
He thought about himself, and the whole earth,
Of man the wonderful, and of the stars,
And how the deuce they ever could have birth;
And then he thought of earthquakes, and of wars,
How many miles the moon might have in girth,
Of air-balloons, and of the many bars
To perfect knowledge of the boundless skies;—
And then he thought of Donna Julia’s eyes.
XCIII
In thoughts like these true Wisdom may discern
Longings sublime, and aspirations high,
Which some are born with, but the most part learn
To plague themselves withal, they know not why:
’Twas strange that one so young should thus concern
His brain about the action of the sky;78
If you think ’twas Philosophy that this did,
I can’t help thinking puberty assisted.
XCIV
He pored upon the leaves, and on the flowers,
And heard a voice in all the winds; and then
He thought of wood-nymphs and immortal bowers,
And how the goddesses came down to men:
He missed the pathway, he forgot the hours,
And when he looked upon his watch again,
He found how much old Time had been a winner—
He also found that he had lost his dinner.
XCV
Sometimes he turned to gaze upon his book,
Boscan,79 or Garcilasso;80—by the wind
Even as the page is rustled while we look,
So by the poesy of his own mind
Over the mystic leaf his soul was shook,
As if ’twere one whereon magicians bind
Their spells, and give them to the passing gale,
According to some good old woman’s tale.
XCVI
Thus would he while his lonely hours away
Dissatisfied, not knowing what he wanted;
Nor glowing reverie, nor poet’s lay,
Could yield his spirit that for which it panted,
A bosom whereon he his head might lay,
And hear the heart beat with the love it granted,
With—several other things, which I forget,
Or which, at least, I need not mention yet.
XCVII
Those lonely walks, and lengthening reveries,
Could not escape the gentle Julia’s eyes;
She saw that Juan was not at his ease;
But that which chiefly may, and must surprise,
Is, that the Donna Inez did not tease
Her only son with question or surmise;
Whether it was she