LXXXI
Love had made Catherine make each lover’s fortune,
Unlike our own half-chaste Elizabeth,
Whose avarice all disbursements did importune,
If History, the grand liar, ever saith
The truth; and though grief her old age might shorten,
Because she put a favourite to death,
Her vile, ambiguous method of flirtation,
And stinginess, disgrace her sex and station.
LXXXII
But when the levée rose, and all was bustle
In the dissolving circle, all the nations’
Ambassadors began as ’twere to hustle
Round the young man with their congratulations.
Also the softer silks were heard to rustle
Of gentle dames, among whose recreations
It is to speculate on handsome faces,
Especially when such lead to high places.
LXXXIII
Juan, who found himself, he knew not how,
A general object of attention, made
His answers with a very graceful bow,
As if born for the ministerial trade.
Though modest, on his unembarrassed brow
Nature had written “Gentleman!” He said
Little, but to the purpose; and his manner
Flung hovering graces o’er him like a banner.
LXXXIV
An order from her Majesty consigned
Our young Lieutenant to the genial care
Of those in office: all the world looked kind,
(As it will look sometimes with the first stare,
Which Youth would not act ill to keep in mind,)
As also did Miss Protasoff801 then there,802
Named from her mystic office “l’Éprouveuse,”
A term inexplicable to the Muse.
LXXXV
With her then, as in humble duty bound,
Juan retired—and so will I, until
My Pegasus shall tire of touching ground.
We have just lit on a “heaven-kissing hill,”
So lofty that I feel my brain turn round,
And all my fancies whirling like a mill;
Which is a signal to my nerves and brain,
To take a quiet ride in some green lane.803
Canto X
I
When Newton saw an apple fall, he found
In that slight startle from his contemplation—
’Tis said (for I’ll not answer above ground
For any sage’s creed or calculation)—
A mode of proving that the Earth turned round
In a most natural whirl, called “gravitation;”
And this is the sole mortal who could grapple,804
Since Adam—with a fall—or with an apple.805806
II
Man fell with apples, and with apples rose,
If this be true; for we must deem the mode
In which Sir Isaac Newton could disclose
Through the then unpaved stars the turnpike road,807
A thing to counterbalance human woes:808
For ever since immortal man hath glowed
With all kinds of mechanics, and full soon
Steam-engines will conduct him to the moon.
III
And wherefore this exordium?—Why, just now,
In taking up this paltry sheet of paper,
My bosom underwent a glorious glow,
And my internal spirit cut a caper:
And though so much inferior, as I know,
To those who, by the dint of glass and vapour,
Discover stars, and sail in the wind’s eye,
I wish to do as much by Poesy.
IV
In the wind’s eye I have sailed, and sail; but for
The stars, I own my telescope is dim;
But at the least I have shunned the common shore,
And leaving land far out of sight, would skim
The Ocean of Eternity:809 the roar
Of breakers has not daunted my slight, trim,
But still sea-worthy skiff; and she may float
Where ships have foundered, as doth many a boat.
V
We left our hero, Juan, in the bloom
Of favouritism, but not yet in the blush;—
And far be it from my Muses to presume
(For I have more than one Muse at a push),
To follow him beyond the drawing-room:
It is enough that Fortune found him flush
Of Youth, and Vigour, Beauty, and those things
Which for an instant clip Enjoyment’s wings.
VI
But soon they grow again and leave their nest.
“Oh!” saith the Psalmist, “that I had a dove’s
Pinions to flee away, and be at rest!”
And who that recollects young years and loves—
Though hoary now, and with a withering breast,
And palsied Fancy, which no longer roves
Beyond its dimmed eye’s sphere—but would much rather
Sigh like his son, than cough like his grandfather?
VII
But sighs subside, and tears (even widows’) shrink,
Like Arno810 in the summer, to a shallow,
So narrow as to shame their wintry brink,
Which threatens inundations deep and yellow!
Such difference doth a few months make. You’d think
Grief a rich field which never would lie fallow;
No more it doth—its ploughs but change their boys,
Who furrow some new soil to sow for joys.
VIII
But coughs will come when sighs depart—and now
And then before sighs cease; for oft the one
Will bring the other, ere the lake-like brow
Is ruffled by a wrinkle, or the Sun
Of Life reached ten o’clock: and while a glow,
Hectic and brief as summer’s day nigh done,
O’erspreads the cheek which seems too pure for clay,
Thousands blaze, love, hope, die—how happy they!—
IX
But Juan was not meant to die so soon:—
We left him in the focus of such glory
As may be won by favour of the moon
Or ladies’ fancies—rather transitory
Perhaps; but who would scorn the month of June,
Because December, with his breath so hoary,
Must come? Much rather should he court the ray,
To hoard up warmth against a wintry day.
X
Besides, he had some qualities which fix
Middle-aged ladies even more than young:
The former know what’s what; while new-fledged chicks
Know little more of Love than what is sung
In rhymes, or dreamt (for Fancy will play tricks)
In visions of those skies from whence Love sprung.
Some reckon women by their suns or years,
I rather think the Moon should date the dears.
XI
And why? because she’s changeable and chaste:
I know no other reason, whatsoe’er
Suspicious people, who find fault in haste,811
May choose to tax me with; which is not fair,
Nor flattering to “their temper or their taste,”
As my friend Jeffrey writes with such
