And there is much which could not be appreciated
In any manner by the uninitiated.
XXIII
Alas! worlds fall—and Woman, since she felled
The World (as, since that history, less polite
Than true, hath been a creed so strictly held),
Has not yet given up the practice quite.
Poor Thing of Usages! coerced, compelled,
Victim when wrong, and martyr oft when right,
Condemned to child-bed, as men for their sins
Have shaving too entailed upon their chins—
XXIV
A daily plague, which in the aggregate
May average on the whole with parturition.—
But as to women—who can penetrate
The real sufferings of their she condition?
Man’s very sympathy with their estate
Has much of selfishness, and more suspicion.
Their love, their virtue, beauty, education,
But form good housekeepers—to breed a nation.
XXV
All this were very well, and can’t be better;
But even this is difficult, Heaven knows,
So many troubles from her birth beset her,
Such small distinction between friends and foes;
The gilding wears so soon from off her fetter,
That—but ask any woman if she’d choose
(Take her at thirty, that is) to have been
Female or male? a schoolboy or a Queen?
XXVI
“Petticoat Influence” is a great reproach,
Which even those who obey would fain be thought
To fly from, as from hungry pikes a roach;
But since beneath it upon earth we are brought,
By various joltings of Life’s hackney coach,
I for one venerate a petticoat—
A garment of a mystical sublimity,
No matter whether russet, silk, or dimity.1070
XXVII
Much I respect, and much I have adored,
In my young days, that chaste and goodly veil,
Which holds a treasure, like a miser’s hoard,
And more attracts by all it doth conceal—
A golden scabbard on a Damasque sword,
A loving letter with a mystic seal,
A cure for grief—for what can ever rankle
Before a petticoat and peeping ankle?
XXVIII
And when upon a silent, sullen day,
With a Sirocco, for example, blowing,
When even the sea looks dim with all its spray,
And sulkily the river’s ripple’s flowing,
And the sky shows that very ancient gray,
The sober, sad antithesis to glowing—
’Tis pleasant, if then anything is pleasant,
To catch a glimpse even of a pretty peasant.
XXIX
We left our heroes and our heroines
In that fair clime which don’t depend on climate,
Quite independent of the Zodiac’s signs,
Though certainly more difficult to rhyme at,
Because the Sun, and stars, and aught that shines,
Mountains, and all we can be most sublime at,
Are there oft dull and dreary as a dun—
Whether a sky’s or tradesman’s is all one.
XXX
An in-door life is less poetical;
And out-of-door hath showers, and mists, and sleet
With which I could not brew a pastoral:
But be it as it may, a bard must meet
All difficulties, whether great or small,
To spoil his undertaking, or complete—
And work away—like Spirit upon Matter—
Embarrassed somewhat both with fire and water.
XXXI
Juan—in this respect, at least, like saints—
Was all things unto people of all sorts,
And lived contentedly, without complaints,
In camps, in ships, in cottages, or courts—
Born with that happy soul which seldom faints,
And mingling modestly in toils or sports.
He likewise could be most things to all women,
Without the coxcombry of certain she men.
XXXII
A fox-hunt to a foreigner is strange;
’Tis also subject to the double danger
Of tumbling first, and having in exchange
Some pleasant jesting at the awkward stranger:
But Juan had been early taught to range
The wilds, as doth an Arab turned avenger,
So that his horse, or charger, hunter, hack,
Knew that he had a rider on his back.
XXXIII
And now in this new field, with some applause,
He cleared hedge, ditch, and double post, and rail,
And never craned1071 and made but few “faux pas,”
And only fretted when the scent ’gan fail.
He broke, ’tis true, some statutes of the laws
Of hunting—for the sagest youth is frail;
Rode o’er the hounds, it may be, now and then,
And once o’er several Country Gentlemen.
XXXIV
But on the whole, to general admiration,
He acquitted both himself and horse: the Squires
Marvelled at merit of another nation;
The boors cried “Dang it! who’d have thought it?”—Sires,
The Nestors of the sporting generation,
Swore praises, and recalled their former fires;
The Huntsman’s self relented to a grin,
And rated him almost a whipper-in.1072
XXXV
Such were his trophies—not of spear and shield,
But leaps, and bursts, and sometimes foxes’ brushes;
Yet I must own—although in this I yield
To patriot sympathy a Briton’s blushes—
He thought at heart like courtly Chesterfield,
Who, after a long chase o’er hills, dales, bushes,
And what not, though he rode beyond all price.
Asked next day, “If men ever hunted twice?”10731074
XXXVI
He also had a quality uncommon
To early risers after a long chase,
Who wake in winter ere the cock can summon
December’s drowsy day to his dull race—
A quality agreeable to Woman,
When her soft, liquid words run on apace,
Who likes a listener, whether Saint or Sinner—
He did not fall asleep just after dinner;
XXXVII
But, light and airy, stood on the alert,
And shone in the best part of dialogue,
By humouring always what they might assert,
And listening to the topics most in vogue,
Now grave, now gay, but never dull or pert;
And smiling but in secret—cunning rogue!
He ne’er presumed to make an error clearer;—
In short, there never was a better hearer.
XXXVIII
And then he danced;—all foreigners excel
The serious Angles in the eloquence
Of pantomime!—he danced, I say, right well,
With emphasis, and also with good sense—
A thing in footing indispensable;
He danced without theatrical pretence,
Not like a ballet-master in the van
Of his drilled nymphs, but like a gentleman.
XXXIX
Chaste were his steps, each kept within due bound,
And Elegance was sprinkled o’er his figure;
Like swift Camilla, he scarce skimmed the ground,1075
And rather held in than put forth his vigour;
And then he had an ear for
