Backward and forward to the echoes faint
Of your own footsteps—voices from the Urn
Appear to wake, and shadows wild and quaint
Start from the frames which fence their aspects stern,
As if to ask how you can dare to keep
A vigil there, where all but Death should sleep.
XIX
And the pale smile of Beauties in the grave,
The charms of other days, in starlight gleams,
Glimmer on high; their buried locks still wave
Along the canvas; their eyes glance like dreams
On ours, or spars within some dusky cave,1169
But Death is imaged in their shadowy beams.
A picture is the past; even ere its frame
Be gilt, who sate hath ceased to be the same.
XX
As Juan mused on Mutability,
Or on his Mistress—terms synonymous—
No sound except the echo of his sigh
Or step ran sadly through that antique house;
When suddenly he heard, or thought so, nigh,
A supernatural agent—or a mouse,
Whose little nibbling rustle will embarrass
Most people as it plays along the arras.
XXI
It was no mouse—but lo! a monk, arrayed1170
In cowl and beads, and dusky garb, appeared,
Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,
With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard;
His garments only a slight murmur made;
He moved as shadowy as the Sisters weird,1171
But slowly; and as he passed Juan by,
Glanced, without pausing, on him a bright eye.
XXII
Juan was petrified; he had heard a hint
Of such a Spirit in these halls of old,
But thought, like most men, that there was nothing in’t
Beyond the rumour which such spots unfold,
Coined from surviving Superstition’s mint,
Which passes ghosts in currency like gold,
But rarely seen, like gold compared with paper.
And did he see this? or was it a vapour?
XXIII
Once, twice, thrice passed, repassed—the thing of air,
Or earth beneath, or Heaven, or t’ other place;
And Juan gazed upon it with a stare,
Yet could not speak or move; but, on its base
As stands a statue, stood: he felt his hair
Twine like a knot of snakes around his face;
He taxed his tongue for words, which were not granted,
To ask the reverend person what he wanted.
XXIV
The third time, after a still longer pause,
The shadow passed away—but where? the hall
Was long, and thus far there was no great cause
To think his vanishing unnatural:
Doors there were many, through which, by the laws
Of physics, bodies whether short or tall
Might come or go; but Juan could not state
Through which the Spectre seemed to evaporate.
XXV
He stood—how long he knew not, but it seemed
An age—expectant, powerless, with his eyes
Strained on the spot where first the figure gleamed
Then by degrees recalled his energies,
And would have passed the whole off as a dream,
But could not wake; he was, he did surmise,
Waking already, and returned at length
Back to his chamber, shorn of half his strength.
XXVI
All there was as he left it: still his taper
Burned, and not blue, as modest tapers use,
Receiving sprites with sympathetic vapour;
He rubbed his eyes, and they did not refuse
Their office: he took up an old newspaper;
The paper was right easy to peruse;
He read an article the King attacking,
And a long eulogy of “Patent Blacking.”
XXVII
This savoured of this world; but his hand shook:
He shut his door, and after having read
A paragraph, I think about Horne Tooke,
Undressed, and rather slowly went to bed.
There, couched all snugly on his pillow’s nook,
With what he had seen his fantasy he fed;
And though it was no opiate, slumber crept
Upon him by degrees, and so he slept.
XXVIII
He woke betimes; and, as may be supposed,
Pondered upon his visitant or vision,
And whether it ought not to be disclosed,
At risk of being quizzed for superstition.
The more he thought, the more his mind was posed:
In the mean time, his valet, whose precision
Was great, because his master brooked no less,
Knocked to inform him it was time to dress.
XXIX
He dressed; and like young people he was wont
To take some trouble with his toilet, but
This morning rather spent less time upon’t;
Aside his very mirror soon was put;
His curls fell negligently o’er his front,
His clothes were not curbed to their usual cut,
His very neckcloth’s Gordian knot was tied
Almost an hair’s breadth too much on one side.
XXX
And when he walked down into the Saloon,
He sate him pensive o’er a dish of tea,
Which he perhaps had not discovered soon,
Had it not happened scalding hot to be,
Which made him have recourse unto his spoon;
So much distrait he was, that all could see
That something was the matter—Adeline
The first—but what she could not well divine.
XXXI
She looked, and saw him pale, and turned as pale
Herself; then hastily looked down, and muttered
Something, but what’s not stated in my tale.
Lord Henry said, his muffin was ill buttered;
The Duchess of Fitz-Fulke played with her veil,
And looked at Juan hard, but nothing uttered.
Aurora Raby with her large dark eyes
Surveyed him with a kind of calm surprise.
XXXII
But seeing him all cold and silent still,
And everybody wondering more or less,
Fair Adeline inquired, “If he were ill?”
He started, and said, “Yes—no—rather—yes.”
The family physician had great skill,
And being present, now began to express
His readiness to feel his pulse and tell
The cause, but Juan said, he was “quite well.”
XXXIII
“Quite well; yes—no.”—These answers were mysterious,
And yet his looks appeared to sanction both,
However they might savour of delirious;
Something like illness of a sudden growth
Weighed on his spirit, though by no means serious:
But for the rest, as he himself seemed both
To state the case, it might be ta’en for granted
It was not the physician that he wanted.
XXXIV
Lord Henry, who had now discussed his chocolate,
Also the muffin whereof he complained,
Said, Juan had not got his usual look elate,
At which he marvelled, since
