XVI
In short, she was a walking calculation,
Miss Edgeworth’s novels stepping from their covers,38
Or Mrs. Trimmer’s books on education,39
Or “Coelebs’ Wife”40 set out in quest of lovers,
Morality’s prim personification,
In which not Envy’s self a flaw discovers;
To others’ share let “female errors fall,”41
For she had not even one—the worst of all.
XVII
Oh! she was perfect past all parallel—
Of any modern female saint’s comparison;
So far above the cunning powers of Hell,
Her Guardian Angel had given up his garrison;
Even her minutest motions went as well
As those of the best time-piece made by Harrison:42
In virtues nothing earthly could surpass her,
Save thine “incomparable oil,” Macassar!43
XVIII
Perfect she was, but as perfection is
Insipid in this naughty world of ours,
Where our first parents never learned to kiss
Till they were exiled from their earlier bowers,
Where all was peace, and innocence, and bliss,44
(I wonder how they got through the twelve hours),
Don José, like a lineal son of Eve,
Went plucking various fruit without her leave.
XIX
He was a mortal of the careless kind,
With no great love for learning, or the learned,
Who chose to go where’er he had a mind,
And never dreamed his lady was concerned;
The world, as usual, wickedly inclined
To see a kingdom or a house o’erturned,
Whispered he had a mistress, some said two.
But for domestic quarrels one will do.
XX
Now Donna Inez had, with all her merit,
A great opinion of her own good qualities;
Neglect, indeed, requires a saint to bear it,
And such, indeed, she was in her moralities;45
But then she had a devil of a spirit,
And sometimes mixed up fancies with realities,
And let few opportunities escape
Of getting her liege lord into a scrape.
XXI
This was an easy matter with a man
Oft in the wrong, and never on his guard;
And even the wisest, do the best they can,
Have moments, hours, and days, so unprepared,
That you might “brain them with their lady’s fan;”46
And sometimes ladies hit exceeding hard,
And fans turn into falchions in fair hands,
And why and wherefore no one understands.
XXII
’Tis pity learnèd virgins ever wed
With persons of no sort of education,
Or gentlemen, who, though well born and bred,
Grow tired of scientific conversation:
I don’t choose to say much upon this head,
I’m a plain man, and in a single station,
But—Oh! ye lords of ladies intellectual,
Inform us truly, have they not hen-pecked you all?
XXIII
Don José and his lady quarrelled—why,
Not any of the many could divine,
Though several thousand people chose to try,
’Twas surely no concern of theirs nor mine;
I loathe that low vice—curiosity;
But if there’s anything in which I shine,
’Tis in arranging all my friends’ affairs,
Not having, of my own, domestic cares.
XXIV
And so I interfered, and with the best
Intentions, but their treatment was not kind;
I think the foolish people were possessed,
For neither of them could I ever find,
Although their porter afterwards confessed—
But that’s no matter, and the worst’s behind,
For little Juan o’er me threw, down stairs,
A pail of housemaid’s water unawares.
XXV
A little curly-headed, good-for-nothing,
And mischief-making monkey from his birth;
His parents ne’er agreed except in doting
Upon the most unquiet imp on earth;
Instead of quarrelling, had they been but both in
Their senses, they’d have sent young master forth
To school, or had him soundly whipped at home,
To teach him manners for the time to come.
XXVI
Don José and the Donna Inez led
For some time an unhappy sort of life,
Wishing each other, not divorced, but dead;47
They lived respectably as man and wife,
Their conduct was exceedingly well-bred,
And gave no outward signs of inward strife,
Until at length the smothered fire broke out,
And put the business past all kind of doubt.
XXVII
For Inez called some druggists and physicians,
And tried to prove her loving lord was mad,48
But as he had some lucid intermissions,
She next decided he was only bad;
Yet when they asked her for her depositions,
No sort of explanation could be had,
Save that her duty both to man and God49
Required this conduct—which seemed very odd.50
XXVIII
She kept a journal, where his faults were noted,
And opened certain trunks of books and letters,51
All which might, if occasion served, be quoted;
And then she had all Seville for abettors,
Besides her good old grandmother (who doted);
The hearers of her case became repeaters,
Then advocates, inquisitors, and judges,
Some for amusement, others for old grudges.
XXIX
And then this best and meekest woman bore
With such serenity her husband’s woes,
Just as the Spartan ladies did of yore,
Who saw their spouses killed, and nobly chose
Never to say a word about them more—
Calmly she heard each calumny that rose,
And saw his agonies with such sublimity,
That all the world exclaimed, “What magnanimity!”
XXX
No doubt this patience, when the world is damning us,
Is philosophic in our former friends;
’Tis also pleasant to be deemed magnanimous,
The more so in obtaining our own ends;
And what the lawyers call a “malus animus”
Conduct like this by no means comprehends:
Revenge in person’s certainly no virtue,
But then ’tis not my fault, if others hurt you.
XXXI
And if our quarrels should rip up old stories,
And help them with a lie or two additional,
I’m not to blame, as you well know—no more is
Any one else—they were become traditional;
Besides, their resurrection aids our glories
By contrast, which is what we just were wishing all:
And Science profits by this resurrection—
Dead scandals form good subjects for dissection.
XXXII
Their friends had tried at reconciliation,52
Then their relations, who made matters worse.
(’Twere hard to tell upon a like occasion
To whom it may be best to have recourse—
I can’t
