I see—I see—Ah, no!—’tis not—yet ’tis—
Ye powers! it is the—the—the—Pooh! the cat!
The Devil may take that stealthy pace of his!
So like a spiritual pit-a-pat,
Or tiptoe of an amatory Miss,
Gliding the first time to a rendezvous,
And dreading the chaste echoes of her shoe.
CXIII
Again—what is ’t? The wind? No, no—this time
It is the sable Friar as before,
With awful footsteps regular as rhyme,
Or (as rhymes may be in these days) much more.
Again through shadows of the night sublime,
When deep sleep fell on men,1205 and the World wore
The starry darkness round her like a girdle
Spangled with gems—the Monk made his blood curdle.
CXIV
A noise like to wet fingers drawn on glass,1206
Which sets the teeth on edge; and a slight clatter,
Like showers which on the midnight gusts will pass,
Sounding like very supernatural water,
Came over Juan’s ear, which throbbed, alas!
For Immaterialism’s a serious matter;
So that even those whose faith is the most great
In Souls immortal, shun them tête-à-tête.
CXV
Were his eyes open?—Yes! and his mouth too.
Surprise has this effect—to make one dumb,
Yet leave the gate which Eloquence slips through
As wide as if a long speech were to come.
Nigh and more nigh the awful echoes drew,
Tremendous to a mortal tympanum:
His eyes were open, and (as was before
Stated) his mouth. What opened next?—the door.
CXVI
It opened with a most infernal creak,
Like that of Hell. “Lasciate ogni speranza,
Voi, ch’ entrate!”1207 The hinge seemed to speak,
Dreadful as Dante’s rima, or this stanza;
Or—but all words upon such themes are weak:
A single shade’s sufficient to entrance a
Hero—for what is Substance to a Spirit?
Or how is ’t Matter trembles to come near it?1208
CXVII
The door flew wide, not swiftly—but, as fly
The sea-gulls, with a steady, sober flight—
And then swung back; nor close—but stood awry,
Half letting in long shadows on the light,
Which still in Juan’s candlesticks burned high,
For he had two, both tolerably bright,
And in the doorway, darkening darkness, stood
The sable Friar in his solemn hood.
CXVIII
Don Juan shook, as erst he had been shaken
The night before; but being sick of shaking,
He first inclined to think he had been mistaken;
And then to be ashamed of such mistaking;
His own internal ghost began to awaken
Within him, and to quell his corporal quaking—
Hinting that Soul and Body on the whole
Were odds against a disembodied Soul.
CXIX
And then his dread grew wrath, and his wrath fierce,
And he arose, advanced—the Shade retreated;
But Juan, eager now the truth to pierce,
Followed, his veins no longer cold, but heated,
Resolved to thrust the mystery carte and tierce,
At whatsoever risk of being defeated:
The Ghost stopped, menaced, then retired, until
He reached the ancient wall, then stood stone still.
CXX
Juan put forth one arm—Eternal powers!
It touched no soul, nor body, but the wall,
On which the moonbeams fell in silvery showers,
Chequered with all the tracery of the Hall;
He shuddered, as no doubt the bravest cowers
When he can’t tell what ’tis that doth appal.
How odd, a single hobgoblin’s nonentity
Should cause more fear than a whole host’s identity!
CXXI
But still the Shade remained: the blue eyes glared,
And rather variably for stony death;
Yet one thing rather good the grave had spared,
The Ghost had a remarkably sweet breath:
A straggling curl showed he had been fair-haired;
A red lip, with two rows of pearls beneath,
Gleamed forth, as through the casement’s ivy shroud
The Moon peeped, just escaped from a grey cloud.
CXXII
And Juan, puzzled, but still curious, thrust
His other arm forth—Wonder upon wonder!
It pressed upon a hard but glowing bust,
Which beat as if there was a warm heart under.
He found, as people on most trials must,
That he had made at first a silly blunder,
And that in his confusion he had caught
Only the wall, instead of what he sought.
CXXIII
The Ghost, if Ghost it were, seemed a sweet soul
As ever lurked beneath a holy hood:
A dimpled chin,1209 a neck of ivory, stole
Forth into something much like flesh and blood;
Back fell the sable frock and dreary cowl,
And they revealed—alas! that e’er they should!
In full, voluptuous, but not o’ergrown bulk,
The phantom of her frolic Grace—Fitz-Fulke!1210
Canto XVII1211
I
The world is full of orphans: firstly, those
Who are so in the strict sense of the phrase;
But many a lonely tree the loftier grows
Than others crowded in the Forest’s maze—
The next are such as are not doomed to lose
Their tender parents, in their budding days,
But, merely, their parental tenderness,
Which leaves them orphans of the heart no less.
II
The next are “only Children,” as they are styled,
Who grow up Children only, since th’ old saw
Pronounces that an “only’s” a spoilt child—
But not to go too far, I hold it law,
That where their education, harsh or mild,
Transgresses the great bounds of love or awe,
The sufferers—be ’t in heart or intellect—
Whate’er the cause, are orphans in effect.
III
But to return unto the stricter rule—
As far as words make rules—our common notion
Of orphan paints at once a parish school,
A half-starved babe, a wreck upon Life’s ocean,
A human (what the Italians nickname) “Mule!”1212
A theme for Pity or some worse emotion;
Yet, if examined, it might be admitted
The wealthiest orphans are to be more pitied.
IV
Too soon they are Parents to themselves: for what
Are Tutors, Guardians, and so forth, compared
With Nature’s genial Genitors? so that
A child of Chancery, that Star-Chamber ward,
(I’ll take the likeness I can first come at,)
Is like—a duckling by Dame Partlett reared,
And frights—especially if ’tis a daughter,
Th’ old Hen—by running headlong to the water.
V
There is a common-place book argument,
Which glibly glides from
