But when the levee 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.
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 unembarrass'd brow Nature had written "Gentleman." He said Little, but to the purpose; and his manner Flung hovering graces o'er him like a banner.
An order from her majesty consign'd
Our young lieutenant to the genial care Of those in office: all the world look'd kind,
(As it will look sometimes with the first stare, Which youth would not act ill to keep in mind ;) As also did Miss Protasoff then there, Named, from her mystic office, "l'Eprouveuse," A term inexplicable to the Muse.
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.
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 turn round In a most natural whirl, call'd "gravitation; " And this is the sole mortal who could grapple, Since Adam, with a fall or with an apple.
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, A thing to counterbalance human woes;
For, ever since, immortal man hath glow'd With all kinds of mechanics, and full soon Steam engines will conduct him to the moon.
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 vapor, Discover stars, and sail in the wind's eye, I wish to do as much by poesy.
In the wind's eye I have sail'd, and sail; but for The stars, I own my telescope is dim; But at the least I've shunn'd the common shore, And, leaving land far out of sight, would skim The ocean of eternity: the roar
Of breakers has not daunted my slight, trim, But still sea-worthy skiff; and she may float Where ships have founder'd, as doth many a boat. V.
We left our hero, Juan, in the bloom
Of favoritism, 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 vigor, beauty, and those things Which for an instant clip enjoyment's wings.
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 [rather Beyond its dimm'd eye's sphere, but would much Sigh like his son, than cough like his grandfather?
But sighs subside, and tears (even widow's) shrink Like Arno, 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.
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 reach 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!-
But Juan was not meant to die so soon. We left him in the focus of such glory As may be won by favor 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
Besides, he had some qualities which fix Middle-aged ladies even more than young: [chicks The former know what's what; while new fledg'd Know little more of love than what is sung In rhymes, or dream'd, (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.
And why? because she's changeable and chaste. I know no other reason, whatsoe'er Suspicious people, who find fault in haste,
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 an air: However, I forgive him, and I trust He will forgive himself;-if not, I must.
Old enemies who have become new friends Should so continue-'tis a point of honor; And I know nothing which could make amends For a return to hatred: I would shun her Like garlic, howsoever she extends
Her hundred arms and legs, and fain outrun her. Old flames, new wives, become our bitterest foesConverted foes should scorn to join with those.
This were the worst desertion: renegadoes,
Even shuffling Southey-that incarnate lieWould scarcely join again the "reformadoes," Whom he forsook to fill the laureate's sty: And honest men, from Iceland to Barbadoes, Whether in Caledon or Italy,
Should not veer round with every breath, nor seize, To pain, the moment when you cease to please.
The lawyer and the critic but behold The baser sides of literature and life, And nought remains unseen, but much untold, By those who scour those double vales of strife. While common men grow ignorantly old,
The lawyer's brief is like the surgeon's knife, Dissecting the whole inside of a question, And with it all the process of digestion.
A legal broom's a moral chimney-sweeper, And that's the reason he himself's so airty; The endless soot bestows a tint far deeper
Than can be hid by altering his shirt; he Retains the sable stains of the dark creeperAt least some twenty-nine do out of thirty, In all their habits: not so you, I own; As Cæsar wore his robe you wear your gown.
And all our little feuds, at least all mine, Dear Jeffrey, once my most redoubted foe, (As far as rhyme and criticism combine
To make such puppets of us things below,) Are over: Here's a health to "Auld Lang Syne!" I do not know you, and may never know Your face but you have acted on the whole Most nobly, and I own it from my soul.
And when I use the phrase of "Auld Lang Syne!" 'Tis not address'd to you-the more's the pity For me, for I would rather take my wine [city; With you, than aught (save Scott) in your proud But somehow,-it may seem a schoolboy's whine, And yet I seek not to be grand nor witty, But I am half a Scot by birth, and bred A whole one, and my heart flies to my head XVIII.
As "Auld Lang Syne " brings Scotland one and all, Scotch plaid, Scotch snoods, the blue hills, and clear streams,
The Dee, the Don, Balgounie's Brig's black wall, All my boy feelings, all my gentler dreams Of what I then dreamt, clothed in their own pall, Like Banquo's offspring-floating past me seems My childhood in this childishness of mine:
I care not-'tis a glimpse of "Auld Lang Syne.” XIX.
And though, as you remember, in a fit
Of wrath and rhyme, when juvenile and curly. I rail'd at Scots to show my wrath and wit, Which must be own'd was sensitive and surly, Yet 'tis in vain such sallies to permit
They cannot quench young feelings fresh and early: I "scotch'd, not kill'd," the Scotchman in my blood, And love the land of "mountain and of flood."
Don Juan, who was real or ideal
For both are much the same, since what men think Exists when the once thinkers are less real,
Than what they thought, for mind can never sink And 'gainst the body makes a strong appeal; And yet 'tis very puzzling on the brink Of what is call a eternity, to stare, And know no more of what is here than there :
Don Juan grew a very polish'd Russian
How we won't mention, why we need not say Few youthful minds can stand the strong concussion Of any slight temptation in their way; But his just now were spread as is a cushion
Smooth'd for a monarch's seat of honor: gay Damsels, and dances, revels, ready money, Made ice seem paradise, and winter sunny. XXII.
The favor of the empress was agreeable; And though the duty wax'd a little hard, Young people at his time of life should be able To come off handsomely in that regard. He was now growing up like a green tree, able For love, war, or ambition, which reward Their luckier votaries, till old age's tedium Make some prefer the circulating medium.
About this time, as might have been anticipated, · Seduced by youth and dangerous examples, Don Juan grew, I fear, a little dissipated; Which is a sad thing, and not only tramples On our fresh feelings, but-as being participated With all kinds of incorrigible samples Of frail humanity-must make us selfish, And shut our souls up in us like a shell-fish.
This we pass over. We will also pass The usual progress of intrigues between Unequal matches, such as are, alas!
A young lieutenant's with a not old queen, But one who is not so youthful as she was In all the royalty of sweet seventeen. Sovereigns may sway materials, but not matter, And wrinkles (the d-d democrats) won't flatter. XXV.
And Death, the sovereigns' sovereign, though the Gracchus of all mortality, who levels [great With his Agrarian laws, the high estate
Of him who feasts, and fights, and roars, and revels, To one small grass-grown patch (which must await Corruption for its crop) with the poor devils Who never had a foot of land till now,- Death's a reformer, all men must allow.
He lived (not Death, but Juan) in a hurry [glitter, Of waste, and haste, and glare, and gloss, and In this gay clime of bear-skins black and furry- Which (though I hate to say a thing that's bitter) Peep out sometimes, when things are in a flurry, Through all the "purple and fine linen," fitter For Babylon's than Russia's royal harlot― And neutralize her outward show of scarlet.
He had brought his spending to a handsome an Replied, "that she was glad to see him through Those pleasure after which wild youth will hanker; As the sole sign of man's being in his senses Is, learning to reduce his past expenses. XXXII.
"She also recommended him to God,
And no less to God's Son, as well as Mother, Warn'd him against Greek worship, which looks odd In Catholic eyes; but told him too to smother Outward dislike, which don't look well abroad: Inform'd him that he had a little brother Born in a second wedlock; and above All, praised the empress's maternal love.
"She could not too much give her approbation Unto an empress, who preferr'd young men Whose age, and, what was better still, whose nation And climate, stopp'd all scandal, (now and then :) At home it might have given her some vexation; But where thermometers sunk down to ten, Or five, or one, or zero, she could never Believe that virtue thaw'd before the river."
Oh, for a forty-parson power to chant
And this same state we won't describe: we could Perhaps from hearsay, or from recollection; Thy praise, hypocrisy! Oh for a hymn But getting nigh grim Dante's "obscure wood," Loud as the virtues thou dost loudly vaunt, That horrid equinox, that hateful section Not practise! Oh for trumps of cherubim Of human years, that half-way house, that rude Or the ear-trumpet of my good old aunt, Hut, whence wise travellers drive with circumspec- Who, though her spectacles at last grew dim, Life's sad post-horses o'er the dreary frontier [tion Drew quiet consolation through its hint, Of age, and, looking back to youth, give one tear;- When she no more could read the pious print.
Perhaps, but, sans perhaps, we need not seek For causes young or old: the canker-worm Will feed upon the fairest, freshest cheek, As well as further drain the wither'd form: Care, like a housekeeper, brings every week His bills in, and, however we may storm,
There was just then a kind of a discussion A sort of treaty or negotiation
Between the British cabinet and Russian,
Maintain'd with all the due prevarication
With which great states such things are apt to push Something about the Baltic's navigation,
They must be paid: though six days smoothly run, Hides, train-oil, tallow, and the rights of Thetis,
The seventh will bring blue devils or a dun.
I don't know how it was, but he grew sick: The empress was alarm'd, and her physician (The same who physick'd Peter) found the tick Of his fierce pulse betoken a condition Which augur'd of the dead, however quick
Itself, and show'd a feverish disposition; At which the whole court was extremely troubled, The sovereign shock'd, and all his medicines doubled. 1
Low were the whispers, manifold the rumors: Some said he had been poison'd by Potemkin; Others talk'd learnedly of certain tumors,
Exhaustion, or disorders of the same kin; Some said 'twas a concoction of the humors, Which with the blood too readily will claim kin Others again were ready to maintain, ""Twas only the fatigue of last campaign."
But here is one prescription out of many: “Sodæ sulphat. 3vj. 5fs. Mann optim. Aq. fervent. f. 3 ifs. 3 ij. tinct. Sennæ
Which Britons deem their "uti possidetis."
So Catherine, who had a handsome way Of fitting out her favorites, conferr'd This secret charge on Juan, to display
At once her royal splendor, and reward His services. He kiss'd hands the next day, Received instructions how to play his card, Was laden with all kinds of gifts and honors, Which show'd what great discernment was the donor's.
But she was lucky, and luck's all. Your queens Are generally prosperous in reigning; Which puzzles us to know what fortune means. But to continue: though her years were waning, Her climacteric teased her like her teens ;
And though her dignity brook'd no complaining, So much did Juan's setting off distress her, She could not find at first a fit successor.
But time, the comforter, will come at last; And four and twenty hours, and twice that number [him) Of candidates requesting to be placed,
Haustus" (And here the surgeon came and cupp'd "R. Pulv. Com. gr. iij. Ipecacuanha"
(With more beside if Juan had not stopp'd 'em.) "Bolus Potassæ Sulphuret. sumendus, Et haustus ter in die capiendus."
This is the way physicians mend or end us, Secundum artem: but although we sneer In health-when ill, we call them to attend us, Without the least propensity to jeer: While that "hiatus maxime deflendus,"
To be fill'd up by spade or mattock, 's near, Instead of gliding graciously down Lethe, We tease mild Baillie, or soft Abernethy.
Juan demurr'd at this first notice to
Quit; and, though death had threaten'd an ejec- His youth and constitution bore him through, And sent the doctors in a new direction. But still his state was delicate: the hue
Of health but flicker'd with a faint reflection Along his wasted cheek, and seem'd to gravel The faculty-who said that he must travel.
Made Catherine taste next night a quiet slumber. Not that she meant to fix again in haste,
Nor did she find the quantity encumber, But, always choosing with deliberation, Kept the place open for their emulation.
While this high post of honor's in abeyance, For one or two days, reader, we request You'll mount with our young hero the conveyance Which wafted him from Petersburgh; the best Barouche, which had the glory to display once The fair Czarina's autocratic crest, (When, a new Iphigene, she went to Tauris,) Was given to her favorite, and now bore his.
[tion, A bull-dog, and a bull-finch, and an ermine, All private favorites of Don Juan; for (Let deeper sages the true cause determine) He had a kind of inclination, or Weakness, for what most people deem mere vermin Live animals:-an old maid of threescore For cats and birds more penchant ne'er display'd, Although he was not old, nor even a maid.
The climate was too cold, they said, for him, Meridian born, to bloom in. This opinion Made the chaste Catherine look a little grim, Who did not like at first to lose her minion: But when she saw his dazzling eye wax dim, And drooping like an eagle's with clipp'd pinion, She then resolved to send him on a mission, But in a style becoming his condition.
The animals aforesaid occupied
Their station: there were valets, secretaries, In other vehicles; but at his side
Sat little Leila, who survived the parries He made 'gainst Cossack sabres, in the wide Slaughter of Ismail. Though my wild Muse varies Her note, she don't forget the infant girl Whom he preserved, a pure and living pearl.
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