What may mean this
gathering?
Byron
erased.
]
[544] {516}[John Horne Tooke (1736-1812), as an opponent of the American
War, and as a promoter of the Corresponding Society, etc. ; and Benjamin
Franklin (1706-1790), as the champion of American Independence, would
have been cited as witnesses against George III. ]
[545] [In the _Diable Boiteux_ (1707) of Le Sage, Don Cleofas, clinging
to the cloak of Asmodeus, is carried through the air to the summit of
San Salvador. Compare--
"Oh! could Le Sage's demon's gift
Be realiz'd at my desire,
This night my trembling form he'd lift,
To place it on St. Mary's spire. "
_Granta, a Medley_, stanza 1. , _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 56, note 2. ]
[546] ["But what he most detested, what most filled him with disgust,
was the settled, determined malignity of a renegado. "--_Speech of
William Smith, M. P. , in the House of Commons_, March 14, 1817. (See,
too, for the use of the word "renegado," _Poetical Works_, 1900, iii.
488, note i. )]
[547] [For the "weight" of Southey's quartos, compare Byron's note (1)
to _Hints from Horace_, line 657, and a variant of lines 753-756. "Thus
let thy ponderous quarto steep and stink" (_Poetical Works_, 1898, i.
435, 443). ]
[ho] {517}_And drawing nigh I caught him at a libel_. --[MS. erased. ]
[548] [Compare--
"But for the children of the 'Mighty Mother's,'
The would-be wits, and can't-be gentlemen,
I leave them to their daily 'tea is ready,'
Smug coterie, and literary lady. "
_Beppo_, stanza lxxvi. lines 5-8, _vide ante_, p. 183. ]
[hp]
_And scrawls as though he were head clerk to the "Fates,"_
_And this I think is quite enough for one_. --[Erased. ]
[549] {518}[Compare--
"One leaf from Southey's laurels may explode
All his combustibles,
'An ass, by God! '"
_A Satire on Satirists, etc. _, by W. S. Landor, 1836, p. 22. ]
[550] ["There is a chaunt in the recitation both of Coleridge and
Wordsworth, which acts as a spell upon the hearers. "--Hazlitt's _My
First Acquaintance with Poets_; _The Liberal_, 1823, ii. 23, 46. ]
[551] [Compare the attitude of Minos to the "poet" in Fielding's
_Journey from This World to the Next_: "The poet answered, he believed
if Minos had read his works he would set a higher value on them. [The
poet had begged for admittance to Elysium on the score of his 'dramatic
works. ' Minos dismissed the plea, but relented on being informed that he
had once lent the whole profits of a benefit-night to a friend. ] He was
then beginning to repeat, but Minos pushed him forward, and turning his
back to him, applied himself to the next passengers. "--_Novelist's
Magazine_, 1783, vol. xii. cap. vii. p. 17. ]
[552]
[" . . . Mediocribus esse poetis
Non homines, non di, non concessere columnae. "
Horace, _Ars Poetica_, lines 372, 373. ]
[553] {519}[For the King's habit of duplicating his phrases, compare--
"Whitbread, is't true? I hear, I hear
You're of an ancient family renowned.
What? what? I'm told that you're a limb
Of Pym, the famous fellow Pym:
What, Whitbread, is it true what people say?
Son of a Roundhead are you? hae? hae? hae?
* * * * *
Thirtieth of January don't you _feed_?
Yes, yes, you eat Calf's head, you eat Calf's head. "
_Instructions to a Celebrated Laureat_, Peter Pindar's
_Works_, 1812, i. 493. ]
[554] [For Henry James Pye (1745-1813), see _English Bards, etc. _, line
102, _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 305, note 1. ]
[hq] {520} ----_an ill-looking knave_. --[MS. erased. ]
[555] ["Yesterday, at Holland House, I was introduced to Southey--the
best-looking bard I have seen for some time. To have that poet's head
and shoulders, I would almost have written his Sapphics. He is certainly
a prepossessing person to look on, and a man of talent, and all that,
and--_there_ is his eulogy. "--Letter to Moore, September 27, 1813,
_Letters_, 1898, ii. 266.
"I have not seen the _Liberal_," wrote Southey to Wynn, October 26,
1822, "but a Leeds paper has been sent me . . . including among its
extracts the description and behaviour of a certain 'varlet. ' He has not
offended me in the way that the pious painter exasperated the Devil"
(i. e. by painting him "more ugly than ever:" see Southey's Ballad of the
_Pious Painter_, _Works_, 1838, vi. 64). ]
[hr] {521}_He therefore was content to cite a few_. --[MS. erased. ]
[556] [Southey's "Battle of Blenheim" was published in the _Annual
Anthology_ of 1800, pp. 34-37. It is quoted at length, as a republican
and seditious poem, in the _Preface_ to an edition of _Wat Tyler_,
published by W. Hone in 1817; and it is also included in an "Appendix"
entitled _The Stripling Bard, or the Apostate Laureate_, affixed to
another edition issued in the same year by John Fairburn. The purport
and _motif_ of these excellent rhymes is non-patriotic if not
Jacobinical, but, for some reason, the poem has been considered
improving for the young, and is included in many "Poetry Books" for
schools. _The Poet's Pilgrimage to Waterloo_ was published in 1816, not
long before the resuscitation of _Wat Tyler_. ]
[557] [_Vide ante_, p. 482. ]
[558] ["He has written _Wat Tyler_, and taken the office of poet
laureate--he has, in the _Life of Henry Kirke White_ (see Byron's note
_infra_), denominated reviewing 'the ungentle craft,' and has become a
reviewer--he was one of the projectors of a scheme called
'pantisocracy,' for having all things, including women, in common
(_query_ common women? ). "--_Some Observations upon an Article in
Blackwood's Magazine_ (No. xxix. , August, 1819), _Letters_, 1900
[Appendix IX. ], iv. 483. The invention or, possibly, disinterment of
this calumny was no doubt a counterblast on Byron's part to the supposed
charge of a "league of incest" (at Diodati, in 1816), which he
maintained had been disseminated by Coleridge on the authority of
Southey (_vide ante_, p. 475). It is, perhaps, unnecessary to state that
before Pantisocracy was imagined or devised, one of the future
pantisocrats, Robert Lovell, was married to Mary Fricker; that Robert
Southey was engaged to be married to her sister Edith; and that, as a
result of the birth and evolution of the scheme, Coleridge became
engaged to be married to a third sister, Sarah, hitherto loverless, in
order that "every Jack should have his Jill," and the world begin anew
in a second Eden across the seas. All things were to be held in common,
in order that each man might hold his wife in particular. ]
[559] {522}_Remains of Henry Kirke White_ [1808, i. 23]
[560] [Southey's _Life of Wesley, and Rise and Progress of Methodism_,
in two volumes octavo, was published in 1820. In a "Memento" written in
a blank leaf of the first volume, Coleridge expressed his desire that
his copy should be given to Southey as a bequest. "One or other volume,"
he writes, "was more often in my hands than any other in my ragged
book-regiment . . . How many an hour of self-oblivion do I owe to this
Life of Wesley! "--Third ed. 1846, i. xv. ]
[561] [In his reply to the Preface to Southey's _Vision of Judgement_,
Byron attacked the Laureate as "this arrogant scribbler of all works. "]
[hs] _Is not unlike it, and is_----. --[MS. ]
[562] {523}King Alfonso, speaking of the Ptolomean system, said, that
"had he been consulted at the creation of the world, he would have
spared the Maker some absurdities. [Alphonso X. , King of Castile
(1221-1284), surnamed the Wise and the Astronomer, "gave no small
encouragement to the Jewish rabbis. " Under his patronage Judah de Toledo
translated the works of Avicenna, and improved them by a new division of
the stars. Moreover, "he sent for about 50 learned men from Gascony,
Paris, and other places, to translate the tables of Ptolemy, and to
compile a more correct set of them (i. e. the famous _Tabulae Alphonsinae_)
. . . The king himself presided over the assembly. "--_Mod. Univ. Hist. _,
xiii. 304, 305, note(U).
Alfonso has left behind him the reputation of a Castilian
Hamlet--"infinite in faculty," but "unpregnant of his cause. " "He was
more fit," says Mariana (_Hist. _, lib. xiii. c. 20), "for letters than
for the government of his subjects; he studied the heavens and watched
the stars, but forgot the earth and lost his kingdom. " Nevertheless his
works do follow him. "He is to be remembered for his poetry
(_'Cantigas'_, chants in honour of the Virgin, and _'Tesoro'_ a treatise
on the philosopher's stone), for his astronomical tables, which all the
progress of science have not deprived of their value, and for his great
work on legislation, which is at this moment an authority in both
hemispheres. "--_Hist. of Spanish Literature_, by G. Ticknor, 1888, i. 7.
Byron got the quip about Alfonso and "the absurdities of creation" from
Bayle (_Dict_. , 1735, art. "Castile"), who devotes a long note (H) to a
somewhat mischievous apology for the king's apparent profanity. Bayle's
immediate authority is Le Bovier de Fontenelle, in his _Entretiens sur
la Pluralite des Mondes_, 1686, p. 38, "L'embaras de tous ces cercles
estoit si grand, que dans un temps ou l'on ne connoissoit encore rien de
meilleur, un roy d'Aragon (_sic_) grand mathematicien mais apparemment
peu devot, disoit que si Dieu l'eust appelle a son conseil quand il fit
le Monde, il luy eust donne de bons avis. "]
[563] {524}[See Aubrey's account (_Miscellanies upon Various Subjects_,
by John Aubrey, F. R. S. , 1857, p. 81) of the apparition which disappeared
"with a curious perfume, and _most melodious twang_;" or see Scott's
_Antiquary, The Novels, etc_. , 1851, i. 375. ]
[564]
["When I beheld them meet, the desire of my soul o'ercame me,
----I, too, pressed forward to enter--
But the weight of the body withheld me. --I stooped to the fountain.
* * * * *
And my feet methought sunk, and I fell precipitate. Starting,
Then I awoke, and beheld the mountains in twilight before me,
Dark and distinct; and instead of the rapturous sound of hosannahs,
Heard the bell from the tower, Toll! Toll! through the
silence of evening. "
_Vision of Judgement_, xii. ]
[565] {525}A drowned body lies at the bottom till rotten; it then
floats, as most people know. [Byron may, possibly, have heard of the
"Floating Island" on Derwentwater. ]
[ht] _In his own little nook_----. --[MS. ]
[566]
["Verily, you brache!
The devil turned precisian. "
Massinger's _A New Way to Pay Old Debts_, act i. sc. 1]
[hu] ----_the light is now withdrawn_. --[MS. ]
[567] ["Mem. This poem was begun on May 7, 1821, but left off the same
day--resumed about the 20th of September of the same year, and concluded
as dated. "]
POEMS 1816-1823.
POEMS 1816-1823
A VERY MOURNFUL BALLAD[568] ON THE SIEGE AND CONQUEST OF ALHAMA. [569]
_Which, in the Arabic language, is to the following purport_[570]
1.
The Moorish King rides up and down.
Through Granada's royal town:
From Elvira's gates to those
Of Bivarambla on he goes.
Woe is me, Alhama! [hv][571]
2.
Letters to the Monarch tell
How Alhama's city fell:
In the fire the scroll he threw,
And the messenger he slew.
Woe is me, Alhama!
3.
He quits his mule, and mounts his horse,
And through the street directs his course;
Through the street of Zacatin
To the Alhambra spurring in.
Woe is me, Alhama!
4.
When the Alhambra walls he gained,
On the moment he ordained
That the trumpet straight should sound
With the silver clarion round.
Woe is me, Alhama!
5.
And when the hollow drums of war
Beat the loud alarm afar,
That the Moors of town and plain
Might answer to the martial strain.
Woe is me, Alhama!
6.
Then the Moors, by this aware,
That bloody Mars recalled them there,
One by one, and two by two,
To a mighty squadron grew.
Woe is me, Alhama!
7.
Out then spake an aged Moor
In these words the king before,
"Wherefore call on us, oh King?
What may mean this gathering? "
Woe is me, Alhama!
8.
"Friends! ye have, alas! to know
Of a most disastrous blow--
That the Christians, stern and bold,
Have obtained Alhama's hold. "
Woe is me, Alhama!
9.
Out then spake old Alfaqui,[572]
With his beard so white to see,
"Good King! thou art justly served,
Good King! this thou hast deserved.
Woe is me, Alhama!
10.
"By thee were slain, in evil hour,
The Abencerrage, Granada's flower;
And strangers were received by thee,
Of Cordova the Chivalry.
Woe is me, Alhama!
11.
"And for this, oh King! is sent
On thee a double chastisement;
Thee and thine, thy crown and realm,
One last wreck shall overwhelm.
Woe is me, Alhama!
12.
"He who holds no laws in awe,
He must perish by the law;
And Granada must be won,
And thyself with her undone. "
Woe is me, Alhama!
13.
Fire flashed from out the old Moor's eyes,
The Monarch's wrath began to rise,
Because he answered, and because
He spake exceeding well of laws. [573]
Woe is me, Alhama!
14.
"There is no law to say such things
As may disgust the ear of kings:"--
Thus, snorting with his choler, said
The Moorish King, and doomed him dead.
Woe is me, Alhama!
15.
Moor Alfaqui! Moor Alfaqui! [574]
Though thy beard so hoary be,[hw]
The King hath sent to have thee seized,
For Alhama's loss displeased.
Woe is me, Alhama!
16.
And to fix thy head upon
High Alhambra's loftiest stone;
That this for thee should be the law,
And others tremble when they saw.
Woe is me, Alhama!
17.
"Cavalier, and man of worth!
Let these words of mine go forth;
Let the Moorish Monarch know,
That to him I nothing owe.
Woe is me, Alhama!
18.
"But on my soul Alhama weighs,
And on my inmost spirit preys;
And if the King his land hath lost,
Yet others may have lost the most.
Woe is me, Alhama!
19.
"Sires have lost their children, wives
Their lords, and valiant men their lives!
One what best his love might claim
Hath lost, another wealth, or fame.
Woe is me, Alhama!
20.
"I lost a damsel in that hour,
Of all the land the loveliest flower;
Doubloons a hundred I would pay,
And think her ransom cheap that day. "
Woe is me, Alhama!
21.
And as these things the old Moor said,
They severed from the trunk his head;
And to the Alhambra's wall with speed
'Twas carried, as the King decreed.
Woe is me, Alhama!
22.
And men and infants therein weep
Their loss, so heavy and so deep;
Granada's ladies, all she rears
Within her walls, burst into tears.
Woe is me, Alhama!
23.
And from the windows o'er the walls
The sable web of mourning falls;
The King weeps as a woman o'er
His loss, for it is much and sore.
Woe is me, Alhama!
[First published, _Childe Harold_, Canto IV. , 1818. ]
SONETTO DI VITTORELLI. [575]
PER MONACA.
Sonetto composto in nome di un genitore, a cui era motta poco
innanzi una figlia appena maritata: e diretto al genitore della
sacra sposa.
Di due vaghe donzelle, oneste, accorte
Lieti e miseri padri il ciel ne feo,
Il ciel, die degne di piu nobil sorte
L' una e l' altra veggendo, ambe chiedeo.
La mia fu tolta da veloce morte
A le fumanti tede d' Imeneo:
La tua, Francesco, in suggellate porte
Eterna prigioniera or si rendeo.
Ma tu almeno potrai dalla gelosa
Irremeabil soglia, ove s' asconde,
La sua tenera udir voce pietosa.
Io verso un flume d' amarissim' onde,
Corro a quel marmo, in cui la figlia or posa:
Batto, e ribatto, ma nessun risponde.
[_Opere Edite e Postume_ di J. Vittorelli, Bassano, 1841, p. 294. ]
TRANSLATION FROM VITTORELLI.
ON A NUN.
Sonnet composed in the name of a father, whose daughter had
recently died shortly after her marriage; and addressed to the
father of her who had lately taken the veil.
Of two fair virgins, modest, though admired,
Heaven made us happy; and now, wretched sires,
Heaven for a nobler doom their worth desires,
And gazing upon _either, both_ required.
Mine, while the torch of Hymen newly fired
Becomes extinguished,--soon--too soon expires;
But thine, within the closing grate retired,
Eternal captive, to her God aspires.
But _thou_ at least from out the jealous door,
Which shuts between your never-meeting eyes,
May'st hear her sweet and pious voice once more:
I to the marble, where _my_ daughter lies,
Rush,--the swoln flood of bitterness I pour,
And knock, and knock, and knock--but none replies.
[First published, _Childe Harold_, Canto IV. , 1818. ]
ON THE BUST OF HELEN BY CANOVA. [576]
In this beloved marble view
Above the works and thoughts of Man,
What Nature _could_ but _would not_ do,
And Beauty and Canova _can! _
Beyond Imagination's power,
Beyond the Bard's defeated art,
With Immortality her dower,
Behold the _Helen_ of the heart.
_November_ 23, 1816.
[First published, _Letters and Journals_, 1830, ii. 61. ]
VENICE. A FRAGMENT. [577]
'Tis midnight--but it is not dark
Within thy spacious place, St. Mark!
The Lights within, the Lamps without,
Shine above the revel rout.
The brazen Steeds are glittering o'er
The holy building's massy door,
Glittering with their collars of gold,
The goodly work of the days of old--
And the winged Lion stern and solemn
Frowns from the height of his hoary column,
Facing the palace in which doth lodge
The ocean-city's dreaded Doge.
The palace is proud--but near it lies,
Divided by the "Bridge of Sighs,"
The dreary dwelling where the State
Enchains the captives of their hate:
These--they perish or they pine;
But which their doom may none divine:
Many have passed that Arch of pain,
But none retraced their steps again.
It is a princely colonnade!
And wrought around a princely place,
When that vast edifice displayed
Looks with its venerable face
Over the far and subject sea,
Which makes the fearless isles so free!
And 'tis a strange and noble pile,
Pillared into many an aisle:
Every pillar fair to see,
Marble--jasper--and porphyry--
The Church of St. Mark--which stands hard by
With fretted pinnacles on high,
And Cupola and minaret;
More like the mosque of orient lands,
Than the fanes wherein we pray,
And Mary's blessed likeness stands. --
Venice, _December_ 6, 1816.
SO WE'LL GO NO MORE A-ROVING. [578]
1.
So we'll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.
2.
For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And Love itself have rest.
3.
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we'll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.
_Feb_. 28, 1817.
[First published, _Letters and Journals_, 1830, ii. 79. ]
[LORD BYRON'S VERSES ON SAM ROGERS. ][579]
QUESTION.
Nose and Chin that make a knocker,[hx]
Wrinkles that would puzzle Cocker;
Mouth that marks the envious Scorner,
With a Scorpion in each corner
Curling up his tail to sting you,[hy]
In the place that most may wring you;
Eyes of lead-like hue and gummy,
Carcase stolen from some mummy,
Bowels--(but they were forgotten,
Save the Liver, and that's rotten), 10
Skin all sallow, flesh all sodden,
Form the Devil would frighten G--d in.
Is't a Corpse stuck up for show,[580]
Galvanized at times to go?
With the Scripture has't connection,[hz]
New proof of the Resurrection?
Vampire, Ghost, or Goul (_sic_), what is it?
I would walk ten miles to miss it.
ANSWER.
Many passengers arrest one,
To demand the same free question. 20
Shorter's my reply and franker,--
That's the Bard, and Beau, and Banker:
Yet, if you could bring about
Just to turn him inside out,
Satan's self would seem less sooty,
And his present aspect--Beauty.
Mark that (as he masks the bilious)
Air so softly supercilious,
Chastened bow, and mock humility,
Almost sickened to Servility: 30
Hear his tone (which is to talking
That which creeping is to walking--
Now on all fours, now on tiptoe):
Hear the tales he lends his lip to--
Little hints of heavy scandals--
Every friend by turns he handles:
All that women or that men do
Glides forth in an inuendo (_sic_)--
Clothed in odds and ends of humour,
Herald of each paltry rumour-- 40
From divorces down to dresses,
Woman's frailties, Man's excesses:
All that life presents of evil
Make for him a constant revel.
You're his foe--for that he fears you,
And in absence blasts and sears you:
You're his friend--for that he hates you,
First obliges, and then baits you,
Darting on the opportunity
When to do it with impunity: 50
You are neither--then he'll flatter,
Till he finds some trait for satire;
Hunts your weak point out, then shows it,
Where it injures, to expose it
In the mode that's most insidious,
Adding every trait that's hideous--
From the bile, whose blackening river
Rushes through his Stygian liver.
Then he thinks himself a lover--[581]
Why? I really can't discover, 60
In his mind, age, face, or figure;
Viper broth might give him vigour:
Let him keep the cauldron steady,
He the venom has already.
For his faults--he has but _one_;
'Tis but Envy, when all's done:
He but pays the pain he suffers,
Clipping, like a pair of Snuffers,
Light that ought to burn the brighter
For this temporary blighter. 70
He's the Cancer of his Species,
And will eat himself to pieces,--
Plague personified and Famine,--
Devil, whose delight is damning. [582]
For his merits--don't you know 'em? [ia]
Once he wrote a pretty Poem.
1818.
[First published, _Fraser's Magazine_, January, 1833,
vol. vii. pp. 88-84. ]
THE DUEL. [583]
1.
'Tis fifty years, and yet their fray
To us might seem but yesterday.
Tis fifty years, and three to boot,
Since, hand to hand, and foot to foot,
And heart to heart, and sword to sword,
One of our Ancestors was gored.
I've seen the sword that slew him;[584] he,
The slain, stood in a like degree
To thee, as he, the Slayer, stood
(Oh had it been but other blood! )
In kin and Chieftainship to me.
Thus came the Heritage to thee.
2.
To me the Lands of him who slew
Came through a line of yore renowned;
For I can boast a race as true
To Monarchs crowned, and some discrowned,
As ever Britain's Annals knew:
For the first Conqueror gave us Ground,[585]
And the last Conquered owned the line
Which was my mother's, and is mine.
3.
I loved thee--I will not say _how_,
Since things like these are best forgot:
Perhaps thou may'st imagine now
Who loved thee, and who loved thee not.
And thou wert wedded to another,[586]
And I at last another wedded:
I am a father, thou a mother,
To Strangers vowed, with strangers bedded.
For land to land, even blood to blood--
Since leagued of yore our fathers were--
Our manors and our birthright stood;
And not unequal had I wooed,
If to have wooed thee I could dare.
But this I never dared--even yet
When naught is left but to forget.
I feel that I could only love:
To sue was never meant for me,
And least of all to sue to thee;
For many a bar, and many a feud,
Though never told, well understood
Rolled like a river wide between--
And then there was the Curse of blood,
Which even my Heart's can not remove.
Alas! how many things have been!
Since we were friends; for I alone
Feel more for thee than can be shown.
4.
How many things! I loved thee--thou
Loved'st me not: another was
The Idol of thy virgin vow,
And I was, what I am, Alas!
And what he is, and what thou art,
And what we were, is like the rest:
We must endure it as a test,
And old Ordeal of the Heart. [587]
Venice, _Dec_. 29, 1818.
STANZAS TO THE PO. [588]
1.
River, that rollest by the ancient walls,
Where dwells the Lady of my love, when she
Walks by thy brink, and there perchance recalls
A faint and fleeting memory of me:
2.
What if thy deep and ample stream should be
A mirror of my heart, where she may read
The thousand thoughts I now betray to thee,
Wild as thy wave, and headlong as thy speed!
3.
What do I say--a mirror of my heart?
Are not thy waters sweeping, dark, and strong?
Such as my feelings were and are, thou art;
And such as thou art were my passions long.
4.
Time may have somewhat tamed them,--not for ever;
Thou overflow'st thy banks, and not for aye
Thy bosom overboils, congenial river!
Thy floods subside, and mine have sunk away:
5.
But left long wrecks behind, and now again,[ib]
Borne in our old unchanged career, we move:
Thou tendest wildly onwards to the main,
And I--to loving _one_ I should not love.
6.
The current I behold will sweep beneath
Her native walls, and murmur at her feet;
Her eyes will look on thee, when she shall breathe
The twilight air, unharmed by summer's heat.
7.
She will look on thee,--I have looked on thee,
Full of that thought: and, from that moment, ne'er
Thy waters could I dream of, name, or see,
Without the inseparable sigh for her!
8.
Her bright eyes will be imaged in thy stream,--
Yes! they will meet the wave I gaze on now:
Mine cannot witness, even in a dream,
That happy wave repass me in its flow!
9.
The wave that bears my tears returns no more:
Will she return by whom that wave shall sweep? --
Both tread thy banks, both wander on thy shore,
I by thy source, she by the dark-blue deep. [ic]
10.
But that which keepeth us apart is not
Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth,
But the distraction of a various lot,
As various as the climates of our birth.
11.
A stranger loves the Lady of the land,[id]
Born far beyond the mountains, but his blood
Is all meridian, as if never fanned
By the black wind that chills the polar flood. [ie]
12.
My blood is all meridian; were it not,
I had not left my clime, nor should I be,[if]
In spite of tortures, ne'er to be forgot,
A slave again of love,--at least of thee.
13.
'Tis vain to struggle--let me perish young--
Live as I lived, and love as I have loved;
To dust if I return, from dust I sprung,
And then, at least, my heart can ne'er be moved.
June, 1819.
[First published, _Conversations of Lord Byron_, 1824, 4? , pp. 24-26. ]
SONNET ON THE NUPTIALS OF THE MARQUIS ANTONIO CAVALLI
WITH THE COUNTESS CLELIA RASPONI OF RAVENNA. [589]
A noble Lady of the Italian shore
Lovely and young, herself a happy bride,
Commands a verse, and will not be denied,
From me a wandering Englishman; I tore
One sonnet, but invoke the muse once more
To hail these gentle hearts which Love has tied,
In Youth, Birth, Beauty, genially allied
And blest with Virtue's soul, and Fortune's store.
A sweeter language, and a luckier bard
Were worthier of your hopes, Auspicious Pair!
And of the sanctity of Hymen's shrine,
But,--since I cannot but obey the Fair,
To render your new state your true reward,
May your Fate be like _Hers_, and unlike _mine. _
Ravenna, July 31, 1819.
[From an autograph MS. in the possession of the Lady Dorchester, now
for the first time printed. ]
SONNET TO THE PRINCE REGENT. [ig]
ON THE REPEAL OF LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD'S FORFEITURE.
To be the father of the fatherless,
To stretch the hand from the throne's height, and raise
_His_ offspring, who expired in other days
To make thy Sire's sway by a kingdom less,--[ih]
_This_ is to be a monarch, and repress
Envy into unutterable praise.
Dismiss thy guard, and trust thee to such traits,
For who would lift a hand, except to bless? [ii]
Were it not easy, Sir, and is't not sweet
To make thyself beloved?
[544] {516}[John Horne Tooke (1736-1812), as an opponent of the American
War, and as a promoter of the Corresponding Society, etc. ; and Benjamin
Franklin (1706-1790), as the champion of American Independence, would
have been cited as witnesses against George III. ]
[545] [In the _Diable Boiteux_ (1707) of Le Sage, Don Cleofas, clinging
to the cloak of Asmodeus, is carried through the air to the summit of
San Salvador. Compare--
"Oh! could Le Sage's demon's gift
Be realiz'd at my desire,
This night my trembling form he'd lift,
To place it on St. Mary's spire. "
_Granta, a Medley_, stanza 1. , _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 56, note 2. ]
[546] ["But what he most detested, what most filled him with disgust,
was the settled, determined malignity of a renegado. "--_Speech of
William Smith, M. P. , in the House of Commons_, March 14, 1817. (See,
too, for the use of the word "renegado," _Poetical Works_, 1900, iii.
488, note i. )]
[547] [For the "weight" of Southey's quartos, compare Byron's note (1)
to _Hints from Horace_, line 657, and a variant of lines 753-756. "Thus
let thy ponderous quarto steep and stink" (_Poetical Works_, 1898, i.
435, 443). ]
[ho] {517}_And drawing nigh I caught him at a libel_. --[MS. erased. ]
[548] [Compare--
"But for the children of the 'Mighty Mother's,'
The would-be wits, and can't-be gentlemen,
I leave them to their daily 'tea is ready,'
Smug coterie, and literary lady. "
_Beppo_, stanza lxxvi. lines 5-8, _vide ante_, p. 183. ]
[hp]
_And scrawls as though he were head clerk to the "Fates,"_
_And this I think is quite enough for one_. --[Erased. ]
[549] {518}[Compare--
"One leaf from Southey's laurels may explode
All his combustibles,
'An ass, by God! '"
_A Satire on Satirists, etc. _, by W. S. Landor, 1836, p. 22. ]
[550] ["There is a chaunt in the recitation both of Coleridge and
Wordsworth, which acts as a spell upon the hearers. "--Hazlitt's _My
First Acquaintance with Poets_; _The Liberal_, 1823, ii. 23, 46. ]
[551] [Compare the attitude of Minos to the "poet" in Fielding's
_Journey from This World to the Next_: "The poet answered, he believed
if Minos had read his works he would set a higher value on them. [The
poet had begged for admittance to Elysium on the score of his 'dramatic
works. ' Minos dismissed the plea, but relented on being informed that he
had once lent the whole profits of a benefit-night to a friend. ] He was
then beginning to repeat, but Minos pushed him forward, and turning his
back to him, applied himself to the next passengers. "--_Novelist's
Magazine_, 1783, vol. xii. cap. vii. p. 17. ]
[552]
[" . . . Mediocribus esse poetis
Non homines, non di, non concessere columnae. "
Horace, _Ars Poetica_, lines 372, 373. ]
[553] {519}[For the King's habit of duplicating his phrases, compare--
"Whitbread, is't true? I hear, I hear
You're of an ancient family renowned.
What? what? I'm told that you're a limb
Of Pym, the famous fellow Pym:
What, Whitbread, is it true what people say?
Son of a Roundhead are you? hae? hae? hae?
* * * * *
Thirtieth of January don't you _feed_?
Yes, yes, you eat Calf's head, you eat Calf's head. "
_Instructions to a Celebrated Laureat_, Peter Pindar's
_Works_, 1812, i. 493. ]
[554] [For Henry James Pye (1745-1813), see _English Bards, etc. _, line
102, _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 305, note 1. ]
[hq] {520} ----_an ill-looking knave_. --[MS. erased. ]
[555] ["Yesterday, at Holland House, I was introduced to Southey--the
best-looking bard I have seen for some time. To have that poet's head
and shoulders, I would almost have written his Sapphics. He is certainly
a prepossessing person to look on, and a man of talent, and all that,
and--_there_ is his eulogy. "--Letter to Moore, September 27, 1813,
_Letters_, 1898, ii. 266.
"I have not seen the _Liberal_," wrote Southey to Wynn, October 26,
1822, "but a Leeds paper has been sent me . . . including among its
extracts the description and behaviour of a certain 'varlet. ' He has not
offended me in the way that the pious painter exasperated the Devil"
(i. e. by painting him "more ugly than ever:" see Southey's Ballad of the
_Pious Painter_, _Works_, 1838, vi. 64). ]
[hr] {521}_He therefore was content to cite a few_. --[MS. erased. ]
[556] [Southey's "Battle of Blenheim" was published in the _Annual
Anthology_ of 1800, pp. 34-37. It is quoted at length, as a republican
and seditious poem, in the _Preface_ to an edition of _Wat Tyler_,
published by W. Hone in 1817; and it is also included in an "Appendix"
entitled _The Stripling Bard, or the Apostate Laureate_, affixed to
another edition issued in the same year by John Fairburn. The purport
and _motif_ of these excellent rhymes is non-patriotic if not
Jacobinical, but, for some reason, the poem has been considered
improving for the young, and is included in many "Poetry Books" for
schools. _The Poet's Pilgrimage to Waterloo_ was published in 1816, not
long before the resuscitation of _Wat Tyler_. ]
[557] [_Vide ante_, p. 482. ]
[558] ["He has written _Wat Tyler_, and taken the office of poet
laureate--he has, in the _Life of Henry Kirke White_ (see Byron's note
_infra_), denominated reviewing 'the ungentle craft,' and has become a
reviewer--he was one of the projectors of a scheme called
'pantisocracy,' for having all things, including women, in common
(_query_ common women? ). "--_Some Observations upon an Article in
Blackwood's Magazine_ (No. xxix. , August, 1819), _Letters_, 1900
[Appendix IX. ], iv. 483. The invention or, possibly, disinterment of
this calumny was no doubt a counterblast on Byron's part to the supposed
charge of a "league of incest" (at Diodati, in 1816), which he
maintained had been disseminated by Coleridge on the authority of
Southey (_vide ante_, p. 475). It is, perhaps, unnecessary to state that
before Pantisocracy was imagined or devised, one of the future
pantisocrats, Robert Lovell, was married to Mary Fricker; that Robert
Southey was engaged to be married to her sister Edith; and that, as a
result of the birth and evolution of the scheme, Coleridge became
engaged to be married to a third sister, Sarah, hitherto loverless, in
order that "every Jack should have his Jill," and the world begin anew
in a second Eden across the seas. All things were to be held in common,
in order that each man might hold his wife in particular. ]
[559] {522}_Remains of Henry Kirke White_ [1808, i. 23]
[560] [Southey's _Life of Wesley, and Rise and Progress of Methodism_,
in two volumes octavo, was published in 1820. In a "Memento" written in
a blank leaf of the first volume, Coleridge expressed his desire that
his copy should be given to Southey as a bequest. "One or other volume,"
he writes, "was more often in my hands than any other in my ragged
book-regiment . . . How many an hour of self-oblivion do I owe to this
Life of Wesley! "--Third ed. 1846, i. xv. ]
[561] [In his reply to the Preface to Southey's _Vision of Judgement_,
Byron attacked the Laureate as "this arrogant scribbler of all works. "]
[hs] _Is not unlike it, and is_----. --[MS. ]
[562] {523}King Alfonso, speaking of the Ptolomean system, said, that
"had he been consulted at the creation of the world, he would have
spared the Maker some absurdities. [Alphonso X. , King of Castile
(1221-1284), surnamed the Wise and the Astronomer, "gave no small
encouragement to the Jewish rabbis. " Under his patronage Judah de Toledo
translated the works of Avicenna, and improved them by a new division of
the stars. Moreover, "he sent for about 50 learned men from Gascony,
Paris, and other places, to translate the tables of Ptolemy, and to
compile a more correct set of them (i. e. the famous _Tabulae Alphonsinae_)
. . . The king himself presided over the assembly. "--_Mod. Univ. Hist. _,
xiii. 304, 305, note(U).
Alfonso has left behind him the reputation of a Castilian
Hamlet--"infinite in faculty," but "unpregnant of his cause. " "He was
more fit," says Mariana (_Hist. _, lib. xiii. c. 20), "for letters than
for the government of his subjects; he studied the heavens and watched
the stars, but forgot the earth and lost his kingdom. " Nevertheless his
works do follow him. "He is to be remembered for his poetry
(_'Cantigas'_, chants in honour of the Virgin, and _'Tesoro'_ a treatise
on the philosopher's stone), for his astronomical tables, which all the
progress of science have not deprived of their value, and for his great
work on legislation, which is at this moment an authority in both
hemispheres. "--_Hist. of Spanish Literature_, by G. Ticknor, 1888, i. 7.
Byron got the quip about Alfonso and "the absurdities of creation" from
Bayle (_Dict_. , 1735, art. "Castile"), who devotes a long note (H) to a
somewhat mischievous apology for the king's apparent profanity. Bayle's
immediate authority is Le Bovier de Fontenelle, in his _Entretiens sur
la Pluralite des Mondes_, 1686, p. 38, "L'embaras de tous ces cercles
estoit si grand, que dans un temps ou l'on ne connoissoit encore rien de
meilleur, un roy d'Aragon (_sic_) grand mathematicien mais apparemment
peu devot, disoit que si Dieu l'eust appelle a son conseil quand il fit
le Monde, il luy eust donne de bons avis. "]
[563] {524}[See Aubrey's account (_Miscellanies upon Various Subjects_,
by John Aubrey, F. R. S. , 1857, p. 81) of the apparition which disappeared
"with a curious perfume, and _most melodious twang_;" or see Scott's
_Antiquary, The Novels, etc_. , 1851, i. 375. ]
[564]
["When I beheld them meet, the desire of my soul o'ercame me,
----I, too, pressed forward to enter--
But the weight of the body withheld me. --I stooped to the fountain.
* * * * *
And my feet methought sunk, and I fell precipitate. Starting,
Then I awoke, and beheld the mountains in twilight before me,
Dark and distinct; and instead of the rapturous sound of hosannahs,
Heard the bell from the tower, Toll! Toll! through the
silence of evening. "
_Vision of Judgement_, xii. ]
[565] {525}A drowned body lies at the bottom till rotten; it then
floats, as most people know. [Byron may, possibly, have heard of the
"Floating Island" on Derwentwater. ]
[ht] _In his own little nook_----. --[MS. ]
[566]
["Verily, you brache!
The devil turned precisian. "
Massinger's _A New Way to Pay Old Debts_, act i. sc. 1]
[hu] ----_the light is now withdrawn_. --[MS. ]
[567] ["Mem. This poem was begun on May 7, 1821, but left off the same
day--resumed about the 20th of September of the same year, and concluded
as dated. "]
POEMS 1816-1823.
POEMS 1816-1823
A VERY MOURNFUL BALLAD[568] ON THE SIEGE AND CONQUEST OF ALHAMA. [569]
_Which, in the Arabic language, is to the following purport_[570]
1.
The Moorish King rides up and down.
Through Granada's royal town:
From Elvira's gates to those
Of Bivarambla on he goes.
Woe is me, Alhama! [hv][571]
2.
Letters to the Monarch tell
How Alhama's city fell:
In the fire the scroll he threw,
And the messenger he slew.
Woe is me, Alhama!
3.
He quits his mule, and mounts his horse,
And through the street directs his course;
Through the street of Zacatin
To the Alhambra spurring in.
Woe is me, Alhama!
4.
When the Alhambra walls he gained,
On the moment he ordained
That the trumpet straight should sound
With the silver clarion round.
Woe is me, Alhama!
5.
And when the hollow drums of war
Beat the loud alarm afar,
That the Moors of town and plain
Might answer to the martial strain.
Woe is me, Alhama!
6.
Then the Moors, by this aware,
That bloody Mars recalled them there,
One by one, and two by two,
To a mighty squadron grew.
Woe is me, Alhama!
7.
Out then spake an aged Moor
In these words the king before,
"Wherefore call on us, oh King?
What may mean this gathering? "
Woe is me, Alhama!
8.
"Friends! ye have, alas! to know
Of a most disastrous blow--
That the Christians, stern and bold,
Have obtained Alhama's hold. "
Woe is me, Alhama!
9.
Out then spake old Alfaqui,[572]
With his beard so white to see,
"Good King! thou art justly served,
Good King! this thou hast deserved.
Woe is me, Alhama!
10.
"By thee were slain, in evil hour,
The Abencerrage, Granada's flower;
And strangers were received by thee,
Of Cordova the Chivalry.
Woe is me, Alhama!
11.
"And for this, oh King! is sent
On thee a double chastisement;
Thee and thine, thy crown and realm,
One last wreck shall overwhelm.
Woe is me, Alhama!
12.
"He who holds no laws in awe,
He must perish by the law;
And Granada must be won,
And thyself with her undone. "
Woe is me, Alhama!
13.
Fire flashed from out the old Moor's eyes,
The Monarch's wrath began to rise,
Because he answered, and because
He spake exceeding well of laws. [573]
Woe is me, Alhama!
14.
"There is no law to say such things
As may disgust the ear of kings:"--
Thus, snorting with his choler, said
The Moorish King, and doomed him dead.
Woe is me, Alhama!
15.
Moor Alfaqui! Moor Alfaqui! [574]
Though thy beard so hoary be,[hw]
The King hath sent to have thee seized,
For Alhama's loss displeased.
Woe is me, Alhama!
16.
And to fix thy head upon
High Alhambra's loftiest stone;
That this for thee should be the law,
And others tremble when they saw.
Woe is me, Alhama!
17.
"Cavalier, and man of worth!
Let these words of mine go forth;
Let the Moorish Monarch know,
That to him I nothing owe.
Woe is me, Alhama!
18.
"But on my soul Alhama weighs,
And on my inmost spirit preys;
And if the King his land hath lost,
Yet others may have lost the most.
Woe is me, Alhama!
19.
"Sires have lost their children, wives
Their lords, and valiant men their lives!
One what best his love might claim
Hath lost, another wealth, or fame.
Woe is me, Alhama!
20.
"I lost a damsel in that hour,
Of all the land the loveliest flower;
Doubloons a hundred I would pay,
And think her ransom cheap that day. "
Woe is me, Alhama!
21.
And as these things the old Moor said,
They severed from the trunk his head;
And to the Alhambra's wall with speed
'Twas carried, as the King decreed.
Woe is me, Alhama!
22.
And men and infants therein weep
Their loss, so heavy and so deep;
Granada's ladies, all she rears
Within her walls, burst into tears.
Woe is me, Alhama!
23.
And from the windows o'er the walls
The sable web of mourning falls;
The King weeps as a woman o'er
His loss, for it is much and sore.
Woe is me, Alhama!
[First published, _Childe Harold_, Canto IV. , 1818. ]
SONETTO DI VITTORELLI. [575]
PER MONACA.
Sonetto composto in nome di un genitore, a cui era motta poco
innanzi una figlia appena maritata: e diretto al genitore della
sacra sposa.
Di due vaghe donzelle, oneste, accorte
Lieti e miseri padri il ciel ne feo,
Il ciel, die degne di piu nobil sorte
L' una e l' altra veggendo, ambe chiedeo.
La mia fu tolta da veloce morte
A le fumanti tede d' Imeneo:
La tua, Francesco, in suggellate porte
Eterna prigioniera or si rendeo.
Ma tu almeno potrai dalla gelosa
Irremeabil soglia, ove s' asconde,
La sua tenera udir voce pietosa.
Io verso un flume d' amarissim' onde,
Corro a quel marmo, in cui la figlia or posa:
Batto, e ribatto, ma nessun risponde.
[_Opere Edite e Postume_ di J. Vittorelli, Bassano, 1841, p. 294. ]
TRANSLATION FROM VITTORELLI.
ON A NUN.
Sonnet composed in the name of a father, whose daughter had
recently died shortly after her marriage; and addressed to the
father of her who had lately taken the veil.
Of two fair virgins, modest, though admired,
Heaven made us happy; and now, wretched sires,
Heaven for a nobler doom their worth desires,
And gazing upon _either, both_ required.
Mine, while the torch of Hymen newly fired
Becomes extinguished,--soon--too soon expires;
But thine, within the closing grate retired,
Eternal captive, to her God aspires.
But _thou_ at least from out the jealous door,
Which shuts between your never-meeting eyes,
May'st hear her sweet and pious voice once more:
I to the marble, where _my_ daughter lies,
Rush,--the swoln flood of bitterness I pour,
And knock, and knock, and knock--but none replies.
[First published, _Childe Harold_, Canto IV. , 1818. ]
ON THE BUST OF HELEN BY CANOVA. [576]
In this beloved marble view
Above the works and thoughts of Man,
What Nature _could_ but _would not_ do,
And Beauty and Canova _can! _
Beyond Imagination's power,
Beyond the Bard's defeated art,
With Immortality her dower,
Behold the _Helen_ of the heart.
_November_ 23, 1816.
[First published, _Letters and Journals_, 1830, ii. 61. ]
VENICE. A FRAGMENT. [577]
'Tis midnight--but it is not dark
Within thy spacious place, St. Mark!
The Lights within, the Lamps without,
Shine above the revel rout.
The brazen Steeds are glittering o'er
The holy building's massy door,
Glittering with their collars of gold,
The goodly work of the days of old--
And the winged Lion stern and solemn
Frowns from the height of his hoary column,
Facing the palace in which doth lodge
The ocean-city's dreaded Doge.
The palace is proud--but near it lies,
Divided by the "Bridge of Sighs,"
The dreary dwelling where the State
Enchains the captives of their hate:
These--they perish or they pine;
But which their doom may none divine:
Many have passed that Arch of pain,
But none retraced their steps again.
It is a princely colonnade!
And wrought around a princely place,
When that vast edifice displayed
Looks with its venerable face
Over the far and subject sea,
Which makes the fearless isles so free!
And 'tis a strange and noble pile,
Pillared into many an aisle:
Every pillar fair to see,
Marble--jasper--and porphyry--
The Church of St. Mark--which stands hard by
With fretted pinnacles on high,
And Cupola and minaret;
More like the mosque of orient lands,
Than the fanes wherein we pray,
And Mary's blessed likeness stands. --
Venice, _December_ 6, 1816.
SO WE'LL GO NO MORE A-ROVING. [578]
1.
So we'll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.
2.
For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And Love itself have rest.
3.
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we'll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.
_Feb_. 28, 1817.
[First published, _Letters and Journals_, 1830, ii. 79. ]
[LORD BYRON'S VERSES ON SAM ROGERS. ][579]
QUESTION.
Nose and Chin that make a knocker,[hx]
Wrinkles that would puzzle Cocker;
Mouth that marks the envious Scorner,
With a Scorpion in each corner
Curling up his tail to sting you,[hy]
In the place that most may wring you;
Eyes of lead-like hue and gummy,
Carcase stolen from some mummy,
Bowels--(but they were forgotten,
Save the Liver, and that's rotten), 10
Skin all sallow, flesh all sodden,
Form the Devil would frighten G--d in.
Is't a Corpse stuck up for show,[580]
Galvanized at times to go?
With the Scripture has't connection,[hz]
New proof of the Resurrection?
Vampire, Ghost, or Goul (_sic_), what is it?
I would walk ten miles to miss it.
ANSWER.
Many passengers arrest one,
To demand the same free question. 20
Shorter's my reply and franker,--
That's the Bard, and Beau, and Banker:
Yet, if you could bring about
Just to turn him inside out,
Satan's self would seem less sooty,
And his present aspect--Beauty.
Mark that (as he masks the bilious)
Air so softly supercilious,
Chastened bow, and mock humility,
Almost sickened to Servility: 30
Hear his tone (which is to talking
That which creeping is to walking--
Now on all fours, now on tiptoe):
Hear the tales he lends his lip to--
Little hints of heavy scandals--
Every friend by turns he handles:
All that women or that men do
Glides forth in an inuendo (_sic_)--
Clothed in odds and ends of humour,
Herald of each paltry rumour-- 40
From divorces down to dresses,
Woman's frailties, Man's excesses:
All that life presents of evil
Make for him a constant revel.
You're his foe--for that he fears you,
And in absence blasts and sears you:
You're his friend--for that he hates you,
First obliges, and then baits you,
Darting on the opportunity
When to do it with impunity: 50
You are neither--then he'll flatter,
Till he finds some trait for satire;
Hunts your weak point out, then shows it,
Where it injures, to expose it
In the mode that's most insidious,
Adding every trait that's hideous--
From the bile, whose blackening river
Rushes through his Stygian liver.
Then he thinks himself a lover--[581]
Why? I really can't discover, 60
In his mind, age, face, or figure;
Viper broth might give him vigour:
Let him keep the cauldron steady,
He the venom has already.
For his faults--he has but _one_;
'Tis but Envy, when all's done:
He but pays the pain he suffers,
Clipping, like a pair of Snuffers,
Light that ought to burn the brighter
For this temporary blighter. 70
He's the Cancer of his Species,
And will eat himself to pieces,--
Plague personified and Famine,--
Devil, whose delight is damning. [582]
For his merits--don't you know 'em? [ia]
Once he wrote a pretty Poem.
1818.
[First published, _Fraser's Magazine_, January, 1833,
vol. vii. pp. 88-84. ]
THE DUEL. [583]
1.
'Tis fifty years, and yet their fray
To us might seem but yesterday.
Tis fifty years, and three to boot,
Since, hand to hand, and foot to foot,
And heart to heart, and sword to sword,
One of our Ancestors was gored.
I've seen the sword that slew him;[584] he,
The slain, stood in a like degree
To thee, as he, the Slayer, stood
(Oh had it been but other blood! )
In kin and Chieftainship to me.
Thus came the Heritage to thee.
2.
To me the Lands of him who slew
Came through a line of yore renowned;
For I can boast a race as true
To Monarchs crowned, and some discrowned,
As ever Britain's Annals knew:
For the first Conqueror gave us Ground,[585]
And the last Conquered owned the line
Which was my mother's, and is mine.
3.
I loved thee--I will not say _how_,
Since things like these are best forgot:
Perhaps thou may'st imagine now
Who loved thee, and who loved thee not.
And thou wert wedded to another,[586]
And I at last another wedded:
I am a father, thou a mother,
To Strangers vowed, with strangers bedded.
For land to land, even blood to blood--
Since leagued of yore our fathers were--
Our manors and our birthright stood;
And not unequal had I wooed,
If to have wooed thee I could dare.
But this I never dared--even yet
When naught is left but to forget.
I feel that I could only love:
To sue was never meant for me,
And least of all to sue to thee;
For many a bar, and many a feud,
Though never told, well understood
Rolled like a river wide between--
And then there was the Curse of blood,
Which even my Heart's can not remove.
Alas! how many things have been!
Since we were friends; for I alone
Feel more for thee than can be shown.
4.
How many things! I loved thee--thou
Loved'st me not: another was
The Idol of thy virgin vow,
And I was, what I am, Alas!
And what he is, and what thou art,
And what we were, is like the rest:
We must endure it as a test,
And old Ordeal of the Heart. [587]
Venice, _Dec_. 29, 1818.
STANZAS TO THE PO. [588]
1.
River, that rollest by the ancient walls,
Where dwells the Lady of my love, when she
Walks by thy brink, and there perchance recalls
A faint and fleeting memory of me:
2.
What if thy deep and ample stream should be
A mirror of my heart, where she may read
The thousand thoughts I now betray to thee,
Wild as thy wave, and headlong as thy speed!
3.
What do I say--a mirror of my heart?
Are not thy waters sweeping, dark, and strong?
Such as my feelings were and are, thou art;
And such as thou art were my passions long.
4.
Time may have somewhat tamed them,--not for ever;
Thou overflow'st thy banks, and not for aye
Thy bosom overboils, congenial river!
Thy floods subside, and mine have sunk away:
5.
But left long wrecks behind, and now again,[ib]
Borne in our old unchanged career, we move:
Thou tendest wildly onwards to the main,
And I--to loving _one_ I should not love.
6.
The current I behold will sweep beneath
Her native walls, and murmur at her feet;
Her eyes will look on thee, when she shall breathe
The twilight air, unharmed by summer's heat.
7.
She will look on thee,--I have looked on thee,
Full of that thought: and, from that moment, ne'er
Thy waters could I dream of, name, or see,
Without the inseparable sigh for her!
8.
Her bright eyes will be imaged in thy stream,--
Yes! they will meet the wave I gaze on now:
Mine cannot witness, even in a dream,
That happy wave repass me in its flow!
9.
The wave that bears my tears returns no more:
Will she return by whom that wave shall sweep? --
Both tread thy banks, both wander on thy shore,
I by thy source, she by the dark-blue deep. [ic]
10.
But that which keepeth us apart is not
Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth,
But the distraction of a various lot,
As various as the climates of our birth.
11.
A stranger loves the Lady of the land,[id]
Born far beyond the mountains, but his blood
Is all meridian, as if never fanned
By the black wind that chills the polar flood. [ie]
12.
My blood is all meridian; were it not,
I had not left my clime, nor should I be,[if]
In spite of tortures, ne'er to be forgot,
A slave again of love,--at least of thee.
13.
'Tis vain to struggle--let me perish young--
Live as I lived, and love as I have loved;
To dust if I return, from dust I sprung,
And then, at least, my heart can ne'er be moved.
June, 1819.
[First published, _Conversations of Lord Byron_, 1824, 4? , pp. 24-26. ]
SONNET ON THE NUPTIALS OF THE MARQUIS ANTONIO CAVALLI
WITH THE COUNTESS CLELIA RASPONI OF RAVENNA. [589]
A noble Lady of the Italian shore
Lovely and young, herself a happy bride,
Commands a verse, and will not be denied,
From me a wandering Englishman; I tore
One sonnet, but invoke the muse once more
To hail these gentle hearts which Love has tied,
In Youth, Birth, Beauty, genially allied
And blest with Virtue's soul, and Fortune's store.
A sweeter language, and a luckier bard
Were worthier of your hopes, Auspicious Pair!
And of the sanctity of Hymen's shrine,
But,--since I cannot but obey the Fair,
To render your new state your true reward,
May your Fate be like _Hers_, and unlike _mine. _
Ravenna, July 31, 1819.
[From an autograph MS. in the possession of the Lady Dorchester, now
for the first time printed. ]
SONNET TO THE PRINCE REGENT. [ig]
ON THE REPEAL OF LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD'S FORFEITURE.
To be the father of the fatherless,
To stretch the hand from the throne's height, and raise
_His_ offspring, who expired in other days
To make thy Sire's sway by a kingdom less,--[ih]
_This_ is to be a monarch, and repress
Envy into unutterable praise.
Dismiss thy guard, and trust thee to such traits,
For who would lift a hand, except to bless? [ii]
Were it not easy, Sir, and is't not sweet
To make thyself beloved?
