CANTO THE SIXTEENTH.'

I.

THE antique Persians taught three useful things, To draw the bow, to ride, and speak the truth.2 This was the mode of Cyrus, best of kings

A mode adopted since by modern youth. Bows have they, generally with two strings; Horses they ride without remorse or ruth; At speaking truth perhaps they are less clever, But draw the long bow better now than ever.

II.

The cause of this effect, or this defect,—

"For this effect defective comes by cause," Is what I have not leisure to inspect;

But this I must say in my own applause, Of all the Muses that I recollect,

Whate'er may be her follies or her flaws In some things, mine 's beyond all contradiction The most sincere that ever dealt in fiction.

III.

And as she treats all things, and ne'er retreats
From anything, this Epic will contain

A wilderness of the most rare conceits,

3

Which you might elsewhere hope to find in vain. "T is true there be some bitters with the sweets, Yet mixed so slightly, that you can't complain,

1. March 29, 1823.

2. [Herodotus, Hist., i. 136.]

3. Hamlet, act ii. sc. 2, line 103.]

But wonder they so few are, since my tale is
"De rebus cunctis et quibusdam aliis.” 1

IV.

But of all truths which she has told, the most
True is that which she is about to tell.
I said it was a story of a ghost-

What then? I only know it so befell.
Have you explored the limits of the coast,

Where all the dwellers of the earth must dwell? 'T is time to strike such puny doubters dumb as The sceptics who would not believe Columbus.

V.

Some people would impose now with authority,
Turpin's or Monmouth Geoffry's Chronicle;
Men whose historical superiority

Is always greatest at a miracle.

But Saint Augustine has the great priority,
Who bids all men believe the impossible,
Because 't is so. Who nibble, scribble, quibble, he
Quiets at once with "quia impossibile."

VI.

"2

And therefore, mortals, cavil not at all;
Believe:-if 't is improbable, you must,
And if it is impossible, you shall:

"T is always best to take things upon trust.
I do not speak profanely to recall

Those holier Mysteries which the wise and just Receive as Gospel, and which grow more rooted, As all truths must, the more they are disputed:

VII.

I merely mean to say what Johnson said,

That in the course of some six thousand years,

1. [The story is told of St. Thomas Aquinas, that he wrote a work De Omnibus Rebus, which was followed by a second treatise, De Quibusdam Aliis.]

2. [Not St. Augustine, but Tertullian. See his treatise, De Carne Christi, cap. V. c. (Opera, 1744, p. 310): "Crucifixus est Dei filius: non pudet, quia pudendum est: et mortuus est Dei filius: prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum est: et sepultus resurrexit: certum est quia impossibile est."]

All nations have believed that from the dead
A visitant at intervals appears: 1

And what is strangest upon this strange head,
Is, that whatever bar the reason rears

'Gainst such belief, there's something stronger still
In its behalf-let those deny who will.

VIII.

The dinner and the soirée too were done,

The supper too discussed, the dames admired, The banqueteers had dropped off one by oneThe song was silent, and the dance expired: The last thin petticoats were vanished, gone

Like fleecy clouds into the sky retired,

And nothing brighter gleamed through the saloon
Than dying tapers-and the peeping moon.

IX.

The evaporation of a joyous day

Is like the last glass of champagne, without
The foam which made its virgin bumper gay;
Or like a system coupled with a doubt;
Or like a soda bottle when its spray

Has sparkled and let half its spirit out;
Or like a billow left by storms behind,
Without the animation of the wind;

X.

Or like an opiate, which brings troubled rest,
Or none; or like-like nothing that I know
Except itself;-such is the human breast;
A thing, of which similitudes can show
No real likeness,-like the old Tyrian vest

Dyed purple, none at present can tell how,

1. ["That the dead are seen no more," said Imlac, "I will not undertake to maintain, against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages, and of all nations. There is no people, rude or unlearned, among whom apparitions of the dead are not related and believed. This opinion, which perhaps prevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only by its truth; those that never heard of one another would not have agreed in a tale which nothing but experience can make credible. That it is doubted by single cavillers, can very little weaken the general evidence; and some, who deny it with their tongues, confess it with their fears."—Rasselas, chap. xxx., Works, ed. 1806, iii. 372, 373.]

If from a shell-fish or from cochineal.1
So perish every Tyrant's robe piece-meal!

XI.

But next to dressing for a rout or ball,

Undressing is a woe; our robe de chambre May sit like that of Nessus, and recall

Thoughts quite as yellow, but less clear than amber. Titus exclaimed, "I've lost a day!" 3 Of all

The nights and days most people can remember, (I have had of both, some not to be disdained,) I wish they'd state how many they have gained.

XII.

And Juan, on retiring for the night,

Felt restless, and perplexed, and compromised:
He thought Aurora Raby's eyes more bright
Than Adeline (such is advice) advised;
If he had known exactly his own plight,
He probably would have philosophised:
A great resource to all, and ne'er denied
Till wanted; therefore Juan only sighed.

XIII.

He sighed ;-the next resource is the full moon,
Where all sighs are deposited; and now
It happened luckily, the chaste orb shone
As clear as such a climate will allow;
And Juan's mind was in the proper tone

To hail her with the apostrophe-"O thou!"
Of amatory egotism the Tuism,

Which further to explain would be a truism.

1. The composition of the old Tyrian purple, whether from a shellfish, or from cochineal, or from kermes, is still an article of dispute; and even its colour-some say purple, others scarlet: I say nothing. [Kermes is cochineal, the Greek KÓKKIVOV. The shell-fish (murex) is the Purpura patula. Both substances were used as dyes.] 2. [See Ovid, Heroid, Epist. ix. line 161.]

3. [Titus used to promise to "bear in mind," "to keep on his list," the petitions of all his supplicants, and once, at dinner-time, his conscience smote him, that he had let a day go by without a single grant, or pardon, or promotion. Hence his confession. "Amici, diem perdidi!" Vide Suetonius, De XII. Cæs., "Titus," lib. viii. cap. 8.]

4. [Tuism is not in Johnson's Dictionary. Coleridge has a note

XIV.

But Lover, Poet, or Astronomer

Shepherd, or swain-whoever may behold, Feel some abstraction when they gaze on her;

Great thoughts we catch from thence (besides a cold Sometimes, unless my feelings rather err);

Deep secrets to her rolling light are told;

The Ocean's tides and mortals' brains she sways,
And also hearts-if there be truth in lays.

xv.

Juan felt somewhat pensive, and disposed
For contemplation rather than his pillow:
The Gothic chamber, where he was enclosed,
Let in the rippling sound of the lake's billow,
With all the mystery by midnight caused:

Below his window waved (of course) a willow;
And he stood gazing out on the cascade
That flashed and after darkened in the shade.

XVI.

Upon his table or his toilet,-which
Of these is not exactly ascertained,-
(I state this, for I am cautious to a pitch
Of nicety, where a fact is to be gained,)
A lamp burned high, while he leant from a niche,
Where many a Gothic ornament remained,
In chiselled stone and painted glass, and all
That Time has left our fathers of their Hall.

XVII.

Then, as the night was clear though cold, he threw
His chamber door wide open 2—and went forth

dated 1800 (Literary Remains, i. 292), on "egotizing in tuism," but it was not included in Southey's Omniana of 1812, and must have been unknown to Byron.]

1. [Sc. toilette, a Gallicism.]

2. [Byron loved to make fact and fancy walk together, but, here, his memory played him false, or his art kept him true. The Black Friar walked and walks in the Guests' Refectory (or Banqueting Hall, or "Gallery" of this stanza), which adjoins the Prior's Parlour, but the room where Byron slept (in a four-post bed-a coronet, at each corner, atop) is on the floor above the Prior's Parlour, and can only be approached by a spiral staircase. Both rooms look west, and command