VII.

DON JUAN.

CANTO I. I.

I WANT a hero :-an uncommon want.

When every year and month sends forth a new one, Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant,

The age discovers he is not the true one; Of such as these I should not care to vaunt, I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan: We all have seen him in the pantomine Sent to the devil somewhat ere his time.

II.

Vernon, the butcher Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke, Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Keppel, Evil and good, have had their tithe of talk, [Howe, And fill'd their sign-posts then, like Wellesley now; Each in their turn like Banquo's monarchs stalk, Followers of fame, "nine farrow" of that sow: France, too, had Buonaparté and Dumourier Recorded in the Moniteur and Courier.

III.

Barnave, Brissot, Condorcet, Mirabeau,

Petion, Clootz, Danton, Marat, La Fayette, Were French, and famous people, as we know, And there were others, scarce forgotten yet, Joubert, Hoche, Marceau, Lannes, Dessaix, Moreau, With many of the military set, Exceedingly remarkable at times,

But not at all adapted to my rhymes.

IV.

Nelson was once Britannia's god of war,

And still should be so, but the tide is turn'd; There's no more to be said of Trafalgar, 'Tis with our hero quietly inurn'd; Because the army's grown more popular, At which the naval people are concern'd: Besides, the prince is all for the land-service, Forgetting Duncan, Nelson, Howe, and Jervis.

V.

Brave men were living before Agamemnon,'
And since, exceeding valorous and sage,

A good deal like him too, though quite the same none,
But then they shone not on the poet's page,
And so have been forgotten ;-I condemn none,
But can't find any in the present age
Fit for my poem, (that is, for my new one ;)
So, as I have said, I'll take my friend Don Juan.
VI.

Most epic poets plunge in "medias res,"

(Horace makes this the heroic turnpike road,) And then your hero tells, whene'er you please, What went before-by way of episode,

While seated after dinner at his ease,

Beside his mistress in some soft abode,

Palace or garden, paradise or cavern,
Which serves the happy couple for a tavern.

That is the usual method, but not mine-
My way is to begin with the beginning:
The regularity of my design

Forbids all wanderings as the worst of sinning, And therefore I shall open with a line,

(Although it cost me half an hour in spinning,) Narrating somewhat of Don Juan's father, And also of his mother, if you'd rather.

VIII.

In Seville was he born, a pleasant city,
Famous for oranges and women-he
Who has not seen it will be much to pity,
So says the proverb-and I quite agree;
Of all the Spanish towns is none more pretty,
Cadiz perhaps, but that you soon may see:-
Don Juan's parents lived beside the river,
A noble stream, and call'd the Guadalquivir.

IX.

His father's name was Jose-Don, of course
A true Hidalgo, free from every stain
Of Moor or Hebrew blood, he traced his source
Through the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain,
A better cavalier ne'er mounted horse,

Or, being mounted, e'er got down again,
Than Jose who begot our hero, who
Begot-but that's to come-Well, to renew

X.

His mother was a learned lady, famed

For every branch of every science knownIn every Christian language ever named,

With virtues equall'd by her wit alone, She made the cleverest people quite ashamed, And even the good with inward envy groan, Finding themselves so very much exceeded In their own way by all the things that she did.

XI.

Her memory was a mine: she knew by heart
All Calderon and greater part of Lopé,

So that if any actor miss'd his part,

She could have served him for the prompter's copy For her Feinagle's were an useless art,

And he himself obliged to shut up shop-he
Could never make a memory so fine as
That which adorned the brain of Donna Inez.

XII.

Her favorite science was the mathematical,

Her noblest virtue was her magnanimity, Her wit (she sometimes tried at wit) was Attic all, Her serious sayings darken'd to sublimity; In short, in all things she was fairly what I call A prodigy-her morning dress was dimity, Her evening silk, or, in the summer, muslin, And other stuffs, with which I won't stay puzzling.

XIII.

She knew the Latin-that is, "the Lords prayer,"
And Greek, the alphabet, I'm nearly sure;
She read some French romances here and there,
Although her mode of speaking was not pure:
For native Spanish she had no great care,
At least her conversation was obscure;
Her thoughts were theorems, her words a problem,
As if she deem'd that mystery would ennoble 'em.

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,”
And sometimes ladies hit exceeding hard,
And fans turn into falchions in fair hands,
And why and wherefore no one understands.
XXII.

'Tis a pity learned 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 henpeck'd you all?

XLII.

Ovid's a rake, as half his verses show him;
Anacreon's morals are a still worse sample;
Catullus scarcely had a decent poem;

I don't think Sappho's Ode a good example, Although3 Longinus tells us there is no hymn [ple; Where the sublime soars forth on wings more amBut Virgil's songs are pure, except that horrid one Beginning with "Formosum pastor Corydon." XLIII.

Lucretius' irreligion is too strong

For early stomachs, to prove wholesome food, I can't help thinking Juvenal was wrong, Although no doubt his real intent was good, For speaking out so plainly in his song,

So much indeed as to be downright rude: And then what proper person can be partial To all those nauseous epigrams of Martial?

XLIV.

Juan was taught from out the best edition,
Expurgated by learned men, who place.
Judiciously, from out the schoolboy's vision,
The grosser parts; but, fearful to deface
Too much their modest bard by this omission,
And pitying sore his mutilated case,
They only add them all in an appendix,
Which saves, in fact, the trouble of an index;

XLV.

For there we have them all "at one fell swoop,"
Instead of being scatter'd through the pages;
They stand forth marshall'd in a handsome troop,
To meet the ingenuous youth of future ages,
fill some less rigid editor shall stoop

To call them back into their separate cages,
Instead of standing staring altogether,
Like garden gods-and not so decent, either.

XLVI.

The Missal too (it was the family Missal)

Was ornamented in a sort of way

Which ancient mass-books often are, and this all
Kinds of grotesques illumined; and how they
Who saw those figures on the margin kiss all,
Could turn their optics to the text and pray,
Is more than I know-but Don Juan's mother
Kept this herself, and gave her son another.

XLVII.

Sermons he read, and lectures he endured,
And homilies, and lives of all the saints;
To Jerome and to Chrysostom inured,

He did not take such studies for restraints;
But how faith is acquired, and then insured,
So well not one of the aforesaid paints
As Saint Augustine, in his fine Confessions,
Which made the reader envy his transgressions.

XLVIII.

This, too, was a seal'd book to little Juan-
I can't but say that his mamma was right,
If such an education was the true one.

She scarcely trusted him from out her sight;
Her maids were old, and if she took a new one,
You might be sure she was a perfect fright;
She did this during even her husband's life-
I recommend as much to every wife.

XLIX.

Young Juan wax'd in goodliness and grace:
At six a charming child, and at eleven
With all the promise of as fine a face

As e'er to man's maturer growth was given:
He studied steadily, and grew apace,

And seem'd, at least, in the right road to heaven For half his days were pass'd at church, the other Between his tutors, confessor, and mother,

L.

At six, I said he was a charming child,
At twelve, he was a fine, but quiet boy:
Although in infancy a little wild,

They tamed him down among them: to destroy His natural spirit not in vain they toil'd,

At least it seem'd so; and his mother's joy Was to declare how sage, and still, and steady, Her young philosopher was grown already.

LI.

I had my doubts, perhaps I have them still. But what I say is neither here nor there;

I knew his father well, and have some skill In character-but it would not be fair From sire to son to augur good or ill;

He and his wife were an ill-sorted pairBut scandal's my aversion-I protest Against all evil speaking, even in jest.

LII.

For my part I say nothing-nothing-but
This I will say-my reasons are my own-
That if I had an only son to put

To school (as God be praised that I have none)
'Tis not with Donna Inez I would shut
Him up to learn his catechism alone;
No-no-I'd send him out betimes to college,
For there it was I pick'd up my own knowledge.
LIII.

For there one learns-'tis not for me to boast,
Though I acquired-but I pass over that,
As well as all the Greek I since have lost:
I say that there's the place-but “Verbum sat.”
I think I pick'd up, too, as well as most,
Knowledge of matters-but, no matter what-
I never married-but, I think, I know
That sons should not be educated so.

LIV.

Young Juan now was sixteen years of age,
Tall, handsome, slender, but well knit; he seem'd
Active, though not so sprightly, as a page;

And every body but his mother deem'd
Him almost man; but she flew in a rage,

And bit her lips (for else she might have scream'd) If any said so, for to be precocious Was in her eyes a thing the most atrocious.

LV.

Among her numerous acquaintance, all
Selected for discretion and devotion,
There was the Donna Julia, whom to call
Pretty were but to give a feeble notion

Of many charms, in her as natural

As sweetness to the flower, or salt to ocean, Her zone to Venus, or his bow to Cupid, (But this last simile is trite and stupid.)