On the other hand, after the poem was completed (March 25, 1818), he was under the impression that "Berni was the original of all ... the father of that kind [i.e. the mock-heroic] of writing;" but there is nothing to show whether he had or had not read the rifacimento of Orlando's Innamorato, or the more distinctively Bernesque Capitoli. Two years later (see Letter to Murray, February 21, 1820, Letters, 1900, iv. 407; and "Advertisement" to Morgante Maggiore) he had discovered that "Pulci was the parent of Whistlecraft, and the precursor and model of Berni," but, in 1817, he was only at the commencement of his studies. A time came long before the "year or two" of his promise (March 25, 1818) when he had learned to simulate the vera imago of the Italian Muse, and was able not only to surpass his "immediate model," but to rival his model's forerunners and inspirers. In the meanwhile a tale based on a "Venetian anecdote" (perhaps an "episode" in the history of Colonel Fitzgerald and the Marchesa Castiglione,—see Letter to Moore, December 26, 1816, Letters, 1900, iv. 26) lent itself to "the excellent manner of Mr. Whistlecraft," and would show "the knowing ones," that is, Murray's advisers, Gifford, Croker, Frere, etc., that "he could write cheerfully," and "would repel the charge of monotony and mannerism."

Eckermann, mindful of Goethe's hint that Byron had too much empeiria (an excess of mondanite—a this-worldliness), found it hard to read Beppo after Macbeth. "I felt," he says, "the predominance of a nefarious, empirical world, with which the mind which introduced it to us has in a certain measure associated itself" (Conversations of Goethe, etc., 1874, p. 175). But Beppo must be taken at its own valuation. It is A Venetian Story, and the action takes place behind the scenes of "a comedy of Goldoni." A less subtle but a more apposite criticism may be borrowed from "Lord Byron's Combolio" (sic), Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 1822, xi. 162-165.

"The story that's in it May be told in a minute; But par parenthese chatting, On this thing and that thing, Keeps the shuttlecock flying, And attention from dying."

Beppo, a Venetian Story (xcv. stanzas) was published February 28, 1818; and a fifth edition, consisting of xcix. stanzas, was issued May 4, 1818.

Jeffrey, writing in the Edinburgh Review (February, 1818, vol. xxix. pp. 302-310), is unconcerned with regard to Whistlecraft, or any earlier model, but observes "that the nearest approach to it [Beppo] is to be found in some of the tales and lighter pieces of Prior—a few stanzas here and there among the trash and burlesque of Peter Pindar, and in several passages of Mr. Moore, and the author of the facetious miscellany entitled the Twopenny Post Bag."

Other notices, of a less appreciative kind, appeared in the Monthly Review, March, 1818, vol. 85, pp. 285-290; and in the Eclectic Review, N.S., June, 1818, vol. ix. pp. 555-557.



BEPPO.[194]

I.

'Tis known, at least it should be, that throughout All countries of the Catholic persuasion,[195] Some weeks before Shrove Tuesday comes about, The People take their fill of recreation, And buy repentance, ere they grow devout, However high their rank, or low their station, With fiddling, feasting, dancing, drinking, masquing, And other things which may be had for asking.

II.

The moment night with dusky mantle covers The skies (and the more duskily the better), The Time less liked by husbands than by lovers Begins, and Prudery flings aside her fetter; And Gaiety on restless tiptoe hovers, Giggling with all the gallants who beset her; And there are songs and quavers, roaring, humming, Guitars, and every other sort of strumming.[196]

III.

And there are dresses splendid, but fantastical, Masks of all times and nations, Turks and Jews, And harlequins and clowns, with feats gymnastical, Greeks, Romans, Yankee-doodles, and Hindoos; All kinds of dress, except the ecclesiastical, All people, as their fancies hit, may choose, But no one in these parts may quiz the Clergy,— Therefore take heed, ye Freethinkers! I charge ye.

IV.

You'd better walk about begirt with briars, Instead of coat and smallclothes, than put on A single stitch reflecting upon friars, Although you swore it only was in fun; They'd haul you o'er the coals, and stir the fires Of Phlegethon with every mother's son, Nor say one mass to cool the cauldron's bubble That boiled your bones, unless you paid them double.

V.

But saving this, you may put on whate'er You like by way of doublet, cape, or cloak, Such as in Monmouth-street, or in Rag Fair, Would rig you out in seriousness or joke; And even in Italy such places are, With prettier name in softer accents spoke, For, bating Covent Garden, I can hit on No place that's called "Piazza" in Great Britain.[197]



VI.

This feast is named the Carnival, which being Interpreted, implies "farewell to flesh:" So called, because the name and thing agreeing, Through Lent they live on fish both salt and fresh. But why they usher Lent with so much glee in, Is more than I can tell, although I guess 'Tis as we take a glass with friends at parting, In the Stage-Coach or Packet, just at starting.

VII.

And thus they bid farewell to carnal dishes, And solid meats, and highly spiced ragouts, To live for forty days on ill-dressed fishes, Because they have no sauces to their stews; A thing which causes many "poohs" and "pishes," And several oaths (which would not suit the Muse), From travellers accustomed from a boy To eat their salmon, at the least, with soy;

VIII.

And therefore humbly I would recommend "The curious in fish-sauce," before they cross The sea, to bid their cook, or wife, or friend, Walk or ride to the Strand, and buy in gross (Or if set out beforehand, these may send By any means least liable to loss), Ketchup, Soy, Chili-vinegar, and Harvey, Or, by the Lord! a Lent will well nigh starve ye;

IX.

That is to say, if your religion's Roman, And you at Rome would do as Romans do, According to the proverb,—although no man, If foreign, is obliged to fast; and you, If Protestant, or sickly, or a woman, Would rather dine in sin on a ragout— Dine and be d—d! I don't mean to be coarse, But that's the penalty, to say no worse.

X.

Of all the places where the Carnival Was most facetious in the days of yore, For dance, and song, and serenade, and ball, And Masque, and Mime, and Mystery, and more Than I have time to tell now, or at all, Venice the bell from every city bore,— And at the moment when I fix my story, That sea-born city was in all her glory.

XI.

They've pretty faces yet, those same Venetians, Black eyes, arched brows, and sweet expressions still; Such as of old were copied from the Grecians, In ancient arts by moderns mimicked ill; And like so many Venuses of Titian's[198] (The best's at Florence—see it, if ye will,) They look when leaning over the balcony, Or stepped from out a picture by Giorgione,[199]

XII.

Whose tints are Truth and Beauty at their best; And when you to Manfrini's palace go,[200] That picture (howsoever fine the rest) Is loveliest to my mind of all the show; It may perhaps be also to your zest, And that's the cause I rhyme upon it so: Tis but a portrait of his Son, and Wife, And self; but such a Woman! Love in life![201]

XIII.

Love in full life and length, not love ideal, No, nor ideal beauty, that fine name, But something better still, so very real, That the sweet Model must have been the same; A thing that you would purchase, beg, or steal, Wer't not impossible, besides a shame: The face recalls some face, as 'twere with pain, You once have seen, but ne'er will see again;

XIV.

One of those forms which flit by us, when we Are young, and fix our eyes on every face; And, oh! the Loveliness at times we see In momentary gliding, the soft grace, The Youth, the Bloom, the Beauty which agree, In many a nameless being we retrace, Whose course and home we knew not, nor shall know, Like the lost Pleiad[202] seen no more below.

XV.

I said that like a picture by Giorgione Venetian women were, and so they are, Particularly seen from a balcony, (For beauty's sometimes best set off afar) And there, just like a heroine of Goldoni,[202A] They peep from out the blind, or o'er the bar; And truth to say, they're mostly very pretty, And rather like to show it, more's the pity!

XVI.

For glances beget ogles, ogles sighs, Sighs wishes, wishes words, and words a letter, Which flies on wings of light-heeled Mercuries, Who do such things because they know no better; And then, God knows what mischief may arise, When Love links two young people in one fetter, Vile assignations, and adulterous beds, Elopements, broken vows, and hearts, and heads.

XVII.

Shakspeare described the sex in Desdemona As very fair, but yet suspect in fame,[202B] And to this day from Venice to Verona Such matters may be probably the same, Except that since those times was never known a Husband whom mere suspicion could inflame To suffocate a wife no more than twenty, Because she had a "Cavalier Servente."[203]

XVIII.

Their jealousy (if they are ever jealous) Is of a fair complexion altogether, Not like that sooty devil of Othello's, Which smothers women in a bed of feather, But worthier of these much more jolly fellows, When weary of the matrimonial tether His head for such a wife no mortal bothers, But takes at once another, or another's.

XIX.

Didst ever see a Gondola? For fear You should not, I'll describe it you exactly: 'Tis a long covered boat that's common here, Carved at the prow, built lightly, but compactly, Rowed by two rowers, each call'd "Gondolier," It glides along the water looking blackly, Just like a coffin clapt in a canoe, Where none can make out what you say or do.

XX.

And up and down the long canals they go, And under the Rialto[204] shoot along, By night and day, all paces, swift or slow, And round the theatres, a sable throng, They wait in their dusk livery of woe,— But not to them do woeful things belong, For sometimes they contain a deal of fun, Like mourning coaches when the funeral's done.

XXI.

But to my story.—'Twas some years ago, It may be thirty, forty, more or less, The Carnival was at its height, and so Were all kinds of buffoonery and dress; A certain lady went to see the show, Her real name I know not, nor can guess, And so we'll call her Laura, if you please, Because it slips into my verse with ease.

XXII.

She was not old, nor young, nor at the years Which certain people call a "certain age,"[205] Which yet the most uncertain age appears, Because I never heard, nor could engage A person yet by prayers, or bribes, or tears, To name, define by speech, or write on page, The period meant precisely by that word,— Which surely is exceedingly absurd.

XXIII.

Laura was blooming still, had made the best Of Time, and Time returned the compliment, And treated her genteelly, so that, dressed, She looked extremely well where'er she went; A pretty woman is a welcome guest, And Laura's brow a frown had rarely bent; Indeed, she shone all smiles, and seemed to flatter Mankind with her black eyes for looking at her.

XXIV.

She was a married woman; 'tis convenient, Because in Christian countries 'tis a rule To view their little slips with eyes more lenient; Whereas if single ladies play the fool, (Unless within the period intervenient A well-timed wedding makes the scandal cool) I don't know how they ever can get over it, Except they manage never to discover it.

XXV.

Her husband sailed upon the Adriatic, And made some voyages, too, in other seas, And when he lay in Quarantine for pratique[206] (A forty days' precaution 'gainst disease), His wife would mount, at times, her highest attic, For thence she could discern the ship with ease: He was a merchant trading to Aleppo, His name Giuseppe, called more briefly, Beppo.[207]

XXVI.

He was a man as dusky as a Spaniard, Sunburnt with travel, yet a portly figure; Though coloured, as it were, within a tanyard, He was a person both of sense and vigour— A better seaman never yet did man yard; And she, although her manners showed no rigour, Was deemed a woman of the strictest principle, So much as to be thought almost invincible.[208]

XXVII.

But several years elapsed since they had met; Some people thought the ship was lost, and some That he had somehow blundered into debt, And did not like the thought of steering home; And there were several offered any bet, Or that he would, or that he would not come; For most men (till by losing rendered sager) Will back their own opinions with a wager.

XXVIII.

'Tis said that their last parting was pathetic, As partings often are, or ought to be, And their presentiment was quite prophetic, That they should never more each other see, (A sort of morbid feeling, half poetic, Which I have known occur in two or three,) When kneeling on the shore upon her sad knee He left this Adriatic Ariadne.

XXIX.

And Laura waited long, and wept a little, And thought of wearing weeds, as well she might; She almost lost all appetite for victual, And could not sleep with ease alone at night; She deemed the window-frames and shutters brittle Against a daring housebreaker or sprite, And so she thought it prudent to connect her With a vice-husband, chiefly to protect her.

XXX.

She chose, (and what is there they will not choose, If only you will but oppose their choice?) Till Beppo should return from his long cruise, And bid once more her faithful heart rejoice, A man some women like, and yet abuse— A Coxcomb was he by the public voice; A Count of wealth, they said as well as quality, And in his pleasures of great liberality.[bk]

XXXI.

And then he was a Count, and then he knew Music, and dancing, fiddling, French and Tuscan; The last not easy, be it known to you, For few Italians speak the right Etruscan. He was a critic upon operas, too, And knew all niceties of sock and buskin; And no Venetian audience could endure a Song, scene, or air, when he cried "seccatura!"[209]

XXXII.

His "bravo" was decisive, for that sound Hushed "Academie" sighed in silent awe; The fiddlers trembled as he looked around, For fear of some false note's detected flaw; The "Prima Donna's" tuneful heart would bound, Dreading the deep damnation of his "Bah!" Soprano, Basso, even the Contra-Alto, Wished him five fathom under the Rialto.

XXXIII.

He patronised the Improvisatori, Nay, could himself extemporise some stanzas, Wrote rhymes, sang songs, could also tell a story, Sold pictures, and was skilful in the dance as Italians can be, though in this their glory Must surely yield the palm to that which France has; In short, he was a perfect Cavaliero, And to his very valet seemed a hero.[210]

XXXIV.

Then he was faithful too, as well as amorous; So that no sort of female could complain, Although they're now and then a little clamorous, He never put the pretty souls in pain; His heart was one of those which most enamour us, Wax to receive, and marble to retain: He was a lover of the good old school, Who still become more constant as they cool.

XXXV.

No wonder such accomplishments should turn A female head, however sage and steady— With scarce a hope that Beppo could return, In law he was almost as good as dead, he Nor sent, nor wrote, nor showed the least concern, And she had waited several years already: And really if a man won't let us know That he's alive, he's dead—or should be so.

XXXVI.

Besides, within the Alps, to every woman, (Although, God knows, it is a grievous sin,) 'Tis, I may say, permitted to have two men; I can't tell who first brought the custom in, But "Cavalier Serventes" are quite common, And no one notices or cares a pin; An we may call this (not to say the worst) A second marriage which corrupts the first.

XXXVII.

The word was formerly a "Cicisbeo,"[211] But that is now grown vulgar and indecent; The Spaniards call the person a "Cortejo,"[212] For the same mode subsists in Spain, though recent; In short it reaches from the Po to Teio, And may perhaps at last be o'er the sea sent: But Heaven preserve Old England from such courses! Or what becomes of damage and divorces?

XXXVIII.[213]

However, I still think, with all due deference To the fair single part of the creation, That married ladies should preserve the preference In tete a tete or general conversation— And this I say without peculiar reference To England, France, or any other nation— Because they know the world, and are at ease, And being natural, naturally please.

XXXIX.

'Tis true, your budding Miss is very charming, But shy and awkward at first coming out, So much alarmed, that she is quite alarming, All Giggle, Blush; half Pertness, and half Pout; And glancing at Mamma, for fear there's harm in What you, she, it, or they, may be about: The Nursery still lisps out in all they utter— Besides, they always smell of bread and butter.[214]

XL.

But "Cavalier Servente" is the phrase Used in politest circles to express This supernumerary slave, who stays Close to the lady as a part of dress, Her word the only law which he obeys. His is no sinecure, as you may guess; Coach, servants, gondola, he goes to call, And carries fan and tippet, gloves and shawl.

XLI.

With all its sinful doings, I must say, That Italy's a pleasant place to me, Who love to see the Sun shine every day, And vines (not nailed to walls) from tree to tree Festooned, much like the back scene of a play, Or melodrame, which people flock to see, When the first act is ended by a dance In vineyards copied from the South of France.

XLII.

I like on Autumn evenings to ride out, Without being forced to bid my groom be sure My cloak is round his middle strapped about, Because the skies are not the most secure; I know too that, if stopped upon my route, Where the green alleys windingly allure, Reeling with grapes red wagons choke the way,— In England 'twould be dung, dust, or a dray.

XLIII.

I also like to dine on becaficas, To see the Sun set, sure he'll rise to-morrow, Not through a misty morning twinkling weak as A drunken man's dead eye in maudlin sorrow, But with all Heaven t'himself; the day will break as Beauteous as cloudless, nor be forced to borrow That sort of farthing candlelight which glimmers Where reeking London's smoky cauldron simmers.

XLIV.

I love the language, that soft bastard Latin,[215] Which melts like kisses from a female mouth, And sounds as if it should be writ on satin,[216] With syllables which breathe of the sweet South, And gentle liquids gliding all so pat in, That not a single accent seems uncouth, Like our harsh northern whistling, grunting guttural, Which we're obliged to hiss, and spit, and sputter all.

XLV.

I like the women too (forgive my folly!), From the rich peasant cheek of ruddy bronze,[bl] And large black eyes that flash on you a volley Of rays that say a thousand things at once, To the high Dama's brow, more melancholy, But clear, and with a wild and liquid glance, Heart on her lips, and soul within her eyes, Soft as her clime, and sunny as her skies.[bm]

XLVI.

Eve of the land which still is Paradise! Italian Beauty didst thou not inspire Raphael,[217] who died in thy embrace, and vies With all we know of Heaven, or can desire, In what he hath bequeathed us?—in what guise, Though flashing from the fervour of the Lyre, Would words describe thy past and present glow, While yet Canova[218] can create below?[219]

XLVII.

"England! with all thy faults I love thee still,"[220] I said at Calais, and have not forgot it; I like to speak and lucubrate my fill; I like the government (but that is not it); I like the freedom of the press and quill; I like the Habeas Corpus (when we've got it); I like a Parliamentary debate, Particularly when 'tis not too late;

XLVIII.

I like the taxes, when they're not too many; I like a seacoal fire, when not too dear; I like a beef-steak, too, as well as any; Have no objection to a pot of beer; I like the weather,—when it is not rainy, That is, I like two months of every year. And so God save the Regent, Church, and King! Which means that I like all and every thing.

XLIX.

Our standing army, and disbanded seamen, Poor's rate, Reform, my own, the nation's debt, Our little riots just to show we're free men, Our trifling bankruptcies in the Gazette, Our cloudy climate, and our chilly women, All these I can forgive, and those forget, And greatly venerate our recent glories, And wish they were not owing to the Tories.

L.

But to my tale of Laura,—for I find Digression is a sin, that by degrees Becomes exceeding tedious to my mind, And, therefore, may the reader too displease— The gentle reader, who may wax unkind, And caring little for the Author's ease, Insist on knowing what he means—a hard And hapless situation for a Bard.

LI.

Oh! that I had the art of easy writing What should be easy reading! could I scale Parnassus, where the Muses sit inditing Those pretty poems never known to fail, How quickly would I print (the world delighting) A Grecian, Syrian,[221] or Assyrian tale; And sell you, mixed with western Sentimentalism, Some samples of the finest Orientalism.

LII.

But I am but a nameless sort of person, (A broken Dandy[222] lately on my travels) And take for rhyme, to hook my rambling verse on, The first that Walker's Lexicon unravels, And when I can't find that, I put a worse on, Not caring as I ought for critics' cavils; I've half a mind to tumble down to prose, But verse is more in fashion—so here goes!

LIII.

The Count and Laura made their new arrangement, Which lasted, as arrangements sometimes do, For half a dozen years without estrangement; They had their little differences, too; Those jealous whiffs, which never any change meant; In such affairs there probably are few Who have not had this pouting sort of squabble, From sinners of high station to the rabble.

LIV.

But, on the whole, they were a happy pair, As happy as unlawful love could make them; The gentleman was fond, the lady fair, Their chains so slight, 'twas not worth while to break them: The World beheld them with indulgent air; The pious only wished "the Devil take them!" He took them not; he very often waits, And leaves old sinners to be young ones' baits.

LV.

But they were young: Oh! what without our Youth Would Love be! What would Youth be without Love! Youth lends its joy, and sweetness, vigour, truth, Heart, soul, and all that seems as from above; But, languishing with years, it grows uncouth— One of few things Experience don't improve; Which is, perhaps, the reason why old fellows Are always so preposterously jealous.

LVI.

It was the Carnival, as I have said Some six and thirty stanzas back, and so Laura the usual preparations made, Which you do when your mind's made up to go To-night to Mrs. Boehm's masquerade,[223] Spectator, or Partaker in the show; The only difference known between the cases Is—here, we have six weeks of "varnished faces."

LVII.

Laura, when dressed, was (as I sang before) A pretty woman as was ever seen, Fresh as the Angel o'er a new inn door, Or frontispiece of a new Magazine,[224] With all the fashions which the last month wore, Coloured, and silver paper leaved between That and the title-page, for fear the Press Should soil with parts of speech the parts of dress.

LVIII.

They went to the Ridotto;[225] 'tis a hall Where People dance, and sup, and dance again; Its proper name, perhaps, were a masqued ball, But that's of no importance to my strain; 'Tis (on a smaller scale) like our Vauxhall, Excepting that it can't be spoilt by rain; The company is "mixed" (the phrase I quote is As much as saying, they're below your notice);

LIX.

For a "mixed company" implies that, save Yourself and friends, and half a hundred more, Whom you may bow to without looking grave, The rest are but a vulgar set, the Bore Of public places, where they basely brave The fashionable stare of twenty score Of well-bred persons, called "The World;" but I, Although I know them, really don't know why.

LX.

This is the case in England; at least was During the dynasty of Dandies, now Perchance succeeded by some other class Of imitated Imitators:—how[bn] Irreparably soon decline, alas! The Demagogues of fashion: all below Is frail; how easily the world is lost By Love, or War, and, now and then,—by Frost!

LXI.

Crushed was Napoleon by the northern Thor, Who knocked his army down with icy hammer, Stopped by the Elements[226]—like a Whaler—or A blundering novice in his new French grammar; Good cause had he to doubt the chance of war, And as for Fortune—but I dare not d—n her, Because, were I to ponder to Infinity, The more I should believe in her Divinity.[227]

LXII.

She rules the present, past, and all to be yet, She gives us luck in lotteries, love, and marriage; I cannot say that she's done much for me yet; Not that I mean her bounties to disparage, We've not yet closed accounts, and we shall see yet How much she'll make amends for past miscarriage; Meantime the Goddess I'll no more importune, Unless to thank her when she's made my fortune.

LXIII.

To turn,—and to return;—the Devil take it! This story slips for ever through my fingers, Because, just as the stanza likes to make it, It needs must be—and so it rather lingers; This form of verse began, I can't well break it, But must keep time and tune like public singers; But if I once get through my present measure, I'll take another when I'm next at leisure.

LXIV.

They went to the Ridotto ('tis a place To which I mean to go myself to-morrow,[228] Just to divert my thoughts a little space Because I'm rather hippish, and may borrow Some spirits, guessing at what kind of face May lurk beneath each mask; and as my sorrow Slackens its pace sometimes, I'll make, or find, Something shall leave it half an hour behind.)

LXV.

Now Laura moves along the joyous crowd, Smiles in her eyes, and simpers on her lips; To some she whispers, others speaks aloud; To some she curtsies, and to some she dips, Complains of warmth, and this complaint avowed, Her lover brings the lemonade, she sips; She then surveys, condemns, but pities still Her dearest friends for being dressed so ill.

LXVI.

One has false curls, another too much paint, A third—where did she buy that frightful turban? A fourth's so pale she fears she's going to faint, A fifth's look's vulgar, dowdyish, and suburban, A sixth's white silk has got a yellow taint, A seventh's thin muslin surely will be her bane, And lo! an eighth appears,—"I'll see no more!" For fear, like Banquo's kings, they reach a score.

LXVII.

Meantime, while she was thus at others gazing, Others were levelling their looks at her; She heard the men's half-whispered mode of praising And, till 'twas done, determined not to stir; The women only thought it quite amazing That, at her time of life, so many were Admirers still,—but "Men are so debased, Those brazen Creatures always suit their taste."

LXVIII.

For my part, now, I ne'er could understand Why naughty women—but I won't discuss A thing which is a scandal to the land, I only don't see why it should be thus; And if I were but in a gown and band, Just to entitle me to make a fuss, I'd preach on this till Wilberforce and Romilly Should quote in their next speeches from my homily.

LXIX.

While Laura thus was seen, and seeing, smiling, Talking, she knew not why, and cared not what, So that her female friends, with envy broiling, Beheld her airs, and triumph, and all that; And well-dressed males still kept before her filing, And passing bowed and mingled with her chat; More than the rest one person seemed to stare With pertinacity that's rather rare.

LXX.

He was a Turk, the colour of mahogany; And Laura saw him, and at first was glad, Because the Turks so much admire philogyny,[bo] Although their usage of their wives is sad; 'Tis said they use no better than a dog any Poor woman, whom they purchase like a pad: They have a number, though they ne'er exhibit 'em, Four wives by law, and concubines "ad libitum."

LXXI.

They lock them up, and veil, and guard them daily, They scarcely can behold their male relations, So that their moments do not pass so gaily As is supposed the case with northern nations; Confinement, too, must make them look quite palely; And as the Turks abhor long conversations, Their days are either passed in doing nothing, Or bathing, nursing, making love, and clothing.

LXXII.

They cannot read, and so don't lisp in criticism; Nor write, and so they don't affect the Muse; Were never caught in epigram or witticism, Have no romances, sermons, plays, reviews,— In Harams learning soon would make a pretty schism, But luckily these Beauties are no "Blues;" No bustling Botherby[229] have they to show 'em "That charming passage in the last new poem:"

LXXIII.

No solemn, antique gentleman of rhyme, Who having angled all his life for Fame, And getting but a nibble at a time, Still fussily keeps fishing on, the same Small "Triton of the minnows," the sublime Of Mediocrity, the furious tame, The Echo's echo, usher of the school Of female wits, boy bards—in short, a fool!

LXXIV.

A stalking oracle of awful phrase, The approving "Good!" (by no means good in law) Humming like flies around the newest blaze, The bluest of bluebottles you e'er saw, Teasing with blame, excruciating with praise, Gorging the little fame he gets all raw,[bp] Translating tongues he knows not even by letter, And sweating plays so middling, bad were better.

LXXV.

One hates an author that's all author—fellows In foolscap uniforms turned up with ink, So very anxious, clever, fine, and jealous, One don't know what to say to them, or think, Unless to puff them with a pair of bellows; Of Coxcombry's worst coxcombs e'en the pink Are preferable to these shreds of paper, These unquenched snuffings of the midnight taper.

LXXVI.

Of these same we see several, and of others. Men of the world, who know the World like Men, Scott, Rogers, Moore, and all the better brothers, Who think of something else besides the pen; 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,"[230] Smug coterie, and literary lady.

LXXVII.

The poor dear Mussulwomen whom I mention Have none of these instructive pleasant people, And one would seem to them a new invention, Unknown as bells within a Turkish steeple; I think 'twould almost be worth while to pension (Though best-sown projects very often reap ill) A missionary author—just to preach Our Christian usage of the parts of speech.

LXXVIII.

No Chemistry for them unfolds her gases, No Metaphysics are let loose in lectures, No Circulating Library amasses Religious novels, moral tales, and strictures Upon the living manners, as they pass us; No Exhibition glares with annual pictures; They stare not on the stars from out their attics, Nor deal (thank God for that!) in Mathematics.[231]

LXXIX.

Why I thank God for that is no great matter, I have my reasons, you no doubt suppose, And as, perhaps, they would not highly flatter, I'll keep them for my life (to come) in prose; I fear I have a little turn for Satire, And yet methinks the older that one grows Inclines us more to laugh than scold, though Laughter Leaves us so doubly serious shortly after.

LXXX.[232]

Oh, Mirth and Innocence! Oh, Milk and Water! Ye happy mixtures of more happy days! In these sad centuries of sin and slaughter, Abominable Man no more allays His thirst with such pure beverage. No matter, I love you both, and both shall have my praise: Oh, for old Saturn's reign of sugar-candy!—- Meantime I drink to your return in brandy.

LXXXI.

Our Laura's Turk still kept his eyes upon her, Less in the Mussulman than Christian way, Which seems to say, "Madam, I do you honour, And while I please to stare, you'll please to stay." Could staring win a woman, this had won her, But Laura could not thus be led astray; She had stood fire too long and well, to boggle Even at this Stranger's most outlandish ogle.

LXXXII.

The morning now was on the point of breaking, A turn of time at which I would advise Ladies who have been dancing, or partaking In any other kind of exercise, To make their preparations for forsaking The ball-room ere the Sun begins to rise, Because when once the lamps and candles fail, His blushes make them look a little pale.

LXXXIII.

I've seen some balls and revels in my time, And stayed them over for some silly reason, And then I looked (I hope it was no crime) To see what lady best stood out the season; And though I've seen some thousands in their prime Lovely and pleasing, and who still may please on, I never saw but one (the stars withdrawn) Whose bloom could after dancing dare the Dawn.

LXXXIV.

The name of this Aurora I'll not mention, Although I might, for she was nought to me More than that patent work of God's invention, A charming woman, whom we like to see; But writing names would merit reprehension, Yet if you like to find out this fair She, At the next London or Parisian ball You still may mark her cheek, out-blooming all.

LXXXV.

Laura, who knew it would not do at all To meet the daylight after seven hours' sitting Among three thousand people at a ball, To make her curtsey thought it right and fitting; The Count was at her elbow with her shawl, And they the room were on the point of quitting, When lo! those cursed Gondoliers had got Just in the very place where they should not.

LXXXVI.

In this they're like our coachmen, and the cause Is much the same—the crowd, and pulling, hauling, With blasphemies enough to break their jaws, They make a never intermitted bawling. At home, our Bow-street gem'men keep the laws, And here a sentry stands within your calling; But for all that, there is a deal of swearing, And nauseous words past mentioning or bearing.

LXXXVII.

The Count and Laura found their boat at last, And homeward floated o'er the silent tide, Discussing all the dances gone and past; The dancers and their dresses, too, beside; Some little scandals eke; but all aghast (As to their palace-stairs the rowers glide) Sate Laura by the side of her adorer,[bq] When lo! the Mussulman was there before her!

LXXXVIII.

"Sir," said the Count, with brow exceeding grave, "Your unexpected presence here will make It necessary for myself to crave Its import? But perhaps 'tis a mistake; I hope it is so; and, at once to waive All compliment, I hope so for your sake; You understand my meaning, or you shall." "Sir," (quoth the Turk) "'tis no mistake at all:

LXXXIX.

"That Lady is my wife!" Much wonder paints The lady's changing cheek, as well it might; But where an Englishwoman sometimes faints, Italian females don't do so outright; They only call a little on their Saints, And then come to themselves, almost, or quite; Which saves much hartshorn, salts, and sprinkling faces, And cutting stays, as usual in such cases.

XC.

She said,—what could she say? Why, not a word; But the Count courteously invited in The Stranger, much appeased by what he heard: "Such things, perhaps, we'd best discuss within," Said he; "don't let us make ourselves absurd In public, by a scene, nor raise a din, For then the chief and only satisfaction Will be much quizzing on the whole transaction."

XCI.

They entered, and for Coffee called—it came, A beverage for Turks and Christians both, Although the way they make it's not the same. Now Laura, much recovered, or less loth To speak, cries "Beppo! what's your pagan name? Bless me! your beard is of amazing growth! And how came you to keep away so long? Are you not sensible 'twas very wrong?

XCII.

"And are you really, truly, now a Turk? With any other women did you wive? Is't true they use their fingers for a fork? Well, that's the prettiest Shawl—as I'm alive! You'll give it me? They say you eat no pork. And how so many years did you contrive To—Bless me! did I ever? No, I never Saw a man grown so yellow! How's your liver?

XCIII.

"Beppo! that beard of yours becomes you not; It shall be shaved before you're a day older: Why do you wear it? Oh! I had forgot— Pray don't you think the weather here is colder? How do I look? You shan't stir from this spot In that queer dress, for fear that some beholder Should find you out, and make the story known. How short your hair is! Lord! how grey it's grown!"

XCIV.

What answer Beppo made to these demands Is more than I know. He was cast away About where Troy stood once, and nothing stands; Became a slave of course, and for his pay Had bread and bastinadoes, till some bands Of pirates landing in a neighbouring bay, He joined the rogues and prospered, and became A renegade of indifferent fame.

XCV.

But he grew rich, and with his riches grew so Keen the desire to see his home again, He thought himself in duty bound to do so, And not be always thieving on the main; Lonely he felt, at times, as Robin Crusoe, And so he hired a vessel come from Spain, Bound for Corfu: she was a fine polacca, Manned with twelve hands, and laden with tobacco.

XCVI.

Himself, and much (heaven knows how gotten!) cash, He then embarked, with risk of life and limb, And got clear off, although the attempt was rash; He said that Providence protected him— For my part, I say nothing—lest we clash In our opinions:—well—the ship was trim, Set sail, and kept her reckoning fairly on, Except three days of calm when off Cape Bonn.[233]

XCVII.

They reached the Island, he transferred his lading, And self and live stock to another bottom, And passed for a true Turkey-merchant, trading With goods of various names—but I've forgot 'em. However, he got off by this evading, Or else the people would perhaps have shot him; And thus at Venice landed to reclaim His wife, religion, house, and Christian name.

XCVIII.

His wife received, the Patriarch re-baptised him, (He made the Church a present, by the way;) He then threw off the garments which disguised him, And borrowed the Count's smallclothes for a day: His friends the more for his long absence prized him, Finding he'd wherewithal to make them gay, With dinners, where he oft became the laugh of them, For stories—but I don't believe the half of them.

XCIX.

Whate'er his youth had suffered, his old age With wealth and talking made him some amends; Though Laura sometimes put him in a rage, I've heard the Count and he were always friends. My pen is at the bottom of a page, Which being finished, here the story ends: 'Tis to be wished it had been sooner done, But stories somehow lengthen when begun.

FOOTNOTES:

[191] {153}["Although I was in Italie only ix. days, I saw, in that little tyme, more liberty to sin than ever I heard tell of in our noble citie of London in ix. yeares."—Schoolmaster, bk. i. ad fin. By Roger Ascham.]

[192] {155}

["I've often wish'd that I could write a book, Such as all English people might peruse; I never shall regret the pains it took, That's just the sort of fame that I should choose: To sail about the world like Captain Cook, I'd sling a cot up for my favourite Muse, And we'd take verses out to Demerara, To New South Wales, and up to Niagara.

"Poets consume exciseable commodities, They raise the nation's spirit when victorious, They drive an export trade in whims and oddities, Making our commerce and revenue glorious; As an industrious and pains-taking body 'tis That Poets should be reckoned meritorious: And therefore I submissively propose To erect one Board for Verse and one for Prose.

"Princes protecting Sciences and Art I've often seen in copper-plate and print; I never saw them elsewhere, for my part, And therefore I conclude there's nothing in't: But every body knows the Regent's heart; I trust he won't reject a well-meant hint; Each Board to have twelve members, with a seat To bring them in per ann. five hundred neat:—

"From Princes I descend to the Nobility: In former times all persons of high stations, Lords, Baronets, and Persons of gentility, Paid twenty guineas for the dedications; This practice was attended with utility; The patrons lived to future generations, The poets lived by their industrious earning,— So men alive and dead could live by Learning.

"Then twenty guineas was a little fortune; Now, we must starve unless the times should mend: Our poets now-a-days are deemed importune If their addresses are diffusely penned; Most fashionable authors make a short one To their own wife, or child, or private friend, To show their independence, I suppose; And that may do for Gentlemen like those.

"Lastly, the common people I beseech— Dear People! if you think my verses clever, Preserve with care your noble parts of speech, And take it as a maxim to endeavour To talk as your good mothers used to teach, And then these lines of mine may last for ever; And don't confound the language of the nation With long-tailed words in osity and ation."

Canto I. stanzas i.-vi.]

[193] {156}[For some admirable stanzas in the metre and style of Beppo, by W.S. Rose, who passed the winter of 1817-18 in Venice, and who sent them to Byron from Albaro in the spring of 1818, see Letters, 1900 iv. 211-214, note 1.]

[194] {159}[The MS. of Beppo, in Byron's handwriting, is now in the possession of Captain the Hon. F. L. King Noel. It is dated October 10, 1817.]

[195] [The use of "persuasion" as a synonime for "religion," is, perhaps, of American descent. Thomas Jefferson, in his first inaugural address as President of U.S.A., speaks "of whatever state or persuasion, political or religious." At the beginning of the nineteenth century theological niceties were not regarded, and the great gulph between a religion and a sect or party was imperfectly discerned. Hence the solecism.]

[196] [Compare the lines which Byron enclosed in a letter to Moore, dated December 24, 1816 (Letters, 1900, iv. 30)—

"But the Carnival's coming, Oh Thomas Moore, * * * * * Masking and humming, Fifing and drumming, Guitarring and strumming, Oh Thomas Moore."]

[197] {160}[Monmouth Street, now absorbed in Shaftesbury Avenue (west side), was noted throughout the eighteenth century for the sale of second-hand clothes. Compare—

"Thames Street gives cheeses, Covent Garden fruits, Moorfields old books, and Monmouth Street old suits."

Gay's Trivia, ii. 547, 548.

Rag Fair or Rosemary Lane, now Royal Mint Street, was the Monmouth Street of the City. Compare—

"Where wave the tattered ensigns of Rag Fair."

Pope's Dunciad, i. 29, var.

The Arcade, or "Piazza," so called, which was built by Inigo Jones in 1652, ran along the whole of the north and east sides of the Piazza or Square of Covent Garden. The Arcade on the north side is still described as the "Piazzas."—London Past and Present, by H. B. Wheatley, 1891, i. 461, ii. 554, iii. 145.]

[198] {162}["At Florence I remained but a day.... What struck me most was ... the mistress of Titian, a portrait; a Venus of Titian in the Medici Gallery ..."—Letter to Murray, April 27, 1817, Letters, 1900, iv. 113. Compare, too, Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza xlix. line i, Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 365, note 2.]

[199] ["I know nothing of pictures myself, and care almost as little: but to me there are none like the Venetian—above all, Giorgione. I remember well his Judgment of Solomon in the Mareschalchi Gallery [in the Via Delle Asse, formerly celebrated for its pictures] in Bologna."—Letter to William Bankes, February 26, 1820, Letters, 1900, iv. 411.]

[200] ["I also went over the Manfrini Palace, famous for its pictures. Among them, there is a portrait of Ariosto by Titian [now in the possession of the Earl of Rosebery], surpassing all my anticipations of the power of painting or human expression: it is the poetry of portrait, and the portrait of poetry. There was also one of some learned lady, centuries old, whose name I forget, but whose features must always be remembered. I never saw greater beauty, or sweetness, or wisdom:—it is the kind of face to go mad for, because it cannot walk out of its frame.... What struck me most in the general collection was the extreme resemblance of the style of the female faces in the mass of pictures, so many centuries or generations old, to those you see and meet every day amongst the existing Italians. The Queen of Cyprus and Giorgione's wife, particularly the latter, are Venetians as it were of yesterday; the same eyes and expression, and, to my mind, there is none finer,"—Letter to Murray, April 14, 1817, Letters, 1900, iv. 105. The picture which caught Byron's fancy was the so-called Famiglia di Giorgione, which was removed from the Manfrini Palace in 1856, and is now in the Palazzo Giovanelli. It represents "an almost nude woman, probably a gipsy, seated with a child in her lap, and a standing warrior gazing upon her, a storm breaking over the landscape."—Handbook of Painting, by Austen H. Layard, 1891, part ii. p. 553.]

[201] {163}[According to Vasari and others, Giorgione (Giorgio Barbarelli, b. 1478) was never married. He died of the plague, A.D. 1511.]

[202] {164} "Quae septem dici, sex tanien esse solent."—Ovid., [Fastorum, lib. iv. line 170.]

[202A] [Carlo Goldoni (1707-1793). His play, Belisarius, was first performed November 24, 1734; Le Bourru Bienfaisant, November 4, 1771. La Bottega del Caffe, La Locandiera, etc., still hold the stage. His Memoires were published in 1787.]

[202B] ["Look to't: * * * * * In Venice they do let heaven see the pranks They dare not show their husbands; their best conscience Is not to leave't undone, but keep't unknown."

Othello, act iii. sc. 3, lines 206-208.]

[203] {165}[Compare—

"An English lady asked of an Italian, What were the actual and official duties Of the strange thing, some women set a value on, Which hovers oft about some married beauties, Called 'Cavalier Servente,' a Pygmalion Whose statues warm (I fear, alas! too true 't is) Beneath his art. The dame, pressed to disclose them, Said—'Lady, I beseech you to suppose them.'"

Don Juan, Canto IX. stanza li.

A critic, in the Monthly Review (March, 1818, vol. lxxxv. p. 286), took Byron to task for omitting the e in Cavaliere. In a letter to Murray, April 17, 1818, he shows that he is right, and takes his revenge on the editor (George Edward) Griffiths, and his "scribbler Mr. Hodgson."—Letters, 1900, iv. 226.]

[204] ["An English abbreviation. Rialto is the name, not of the bridge, but of the island from which it is called; and the Venetians say, Il ponti di Rialto, as we say Westminster Bridge. In that island is the Exchange; and I have often walked there as on classic ground.... 'I Sopportichi,' says Sansovino, writing in 1580 [Venetia, 1581, p. 134], 'sono ogni giorno frequentati da i mercatanti Fiorentini, Genovesi, Milanesi, Spagnuoli, Turchi, e d'altre nationi diverse del mondo, i quali vi concorrono in tanta copia, che questa piazza e annoverata fra le prime dell' universo.' It was there that the Christian held discourse with the Jew; and Shylock refers to it when he says—

"'Signer Antonio, many a time and oft, In the Rialto you have rated me.'

'Andiamo a Rialto,'—' L'ora di Rialto,' were on every tongue; and continue so to the present day, as we learn from the Comedies of Goldoni, and particularly from his Mercanti."—Note to the Brides of Venice, Poems, by Samuel Rogers, 1852, ii. 88, 89. See, too, Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza iv. line 6, Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 331.]

[205] {166}[Compare "At the epoch called a certain age she found herself an old maid."—Jane Porter, Thaddeus of Warsaw (1803), cap. xxxviii. (See N. Eng. Dict., art. "Certain.")

Ugo Foscolo, in his article in the Quarterly Review, April, 1819, vol. xxi. pp. 486-556, quotes these lines in illustration of a stanza from Forteguerri's Ricciardetto, iv. 2—

Quando si giugne ad una certa eta, Ch'io non voglio descrivervi qual e," etc.]

[206] {167}[A clean bill of health after quarantine. Howell spells the word "pratic," and Milton "pratticke."]

[207] Beppo is the "Joe" of the Italian Joseph.

[208] {168}["The general state of morals here is much the same as in the Doges' time; a woman is virtuous (according to the code) who limits herself to her husband and one lover; those who have two, three, or more, are a little wild; but it is only those who are indiscriminately diffuse, and form a low connection ... who are considered as over-stepping the modesty of marriage.... There is no convincing a woman here, that she is in the smallest degree deviating from the rule of right, or the fitness of things, in having an Amoroso."—Letter to Murray, January 2, 1817, Letters, 1900, iv. 40, 41.]

[bk] {169}

A Count of wealth inferior to his quality, Which somewhat limited his liberality.—[MS.]

[209]["Some of the Italians liked him [a famous improvisatore], others called his performance 'seccatura' (a devilish good word, by the way), and all Milan was in controversy about him."—Letter to Moore, November 6, 1816, Letters, 1899, iii. 384.]

[210] {170}[The saying, "Il n'y a point de heros pour son valet de chambre," is attributed to Marechal (Nicholas) Catinat (1637-1712). His biographer speaks of presenting "le heros en deshabille." (See his Memoires, 1819, ii. 118.)]

[211] {171}[The origin of the word is obscure. According to the Vocab. della Crusca, "cicisbeo" is an inversion of "bel cece," beautiful chick (pea). Pasqualino, cited by Diez, says it is derived from the French chiche beau.—N. Eng. Dict., art. "Cicisbeo."]

[212] Cortejo is pronounced Corteho, with an aspirate, according to the Arabesque guttural. It means what there is as yet no precise name for in England, though the practice is as common as in any tramontane country whatever.

[213] [Stanzas xxxviii., xxxix., are not in the original MS.]

[214] {172}[For the association of bread and butter with immaturity, compare, "Ye bread-and-butter rogues, do ye run from me?" (Beaumont and Fletcher, The Humorous Lieutenant, act iii. sc. 7). (See N. Eng. Dict., art. "Bread.")]

[215] {173}[Compare—

" ... the Tuscan's siren tongue? That music in itself, whose sounds are song, The poetry of speech?"

Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza lviii. lines 4-6, Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 374, note i.]

[216] Sattin, eh? Query, I can't spell it.—[MS.]

[bl] From the tall peasant with her ruddy bronze.—[MS.]

[bm] Like her own clime, all sun, and bloom, and skies.—[MS.]

[217] {174}[For the received accounts of the cause of Raphael's death, see his Lives. "Fidem matrimonii quidem dederat nepti cuidam Cardinal. Bibiani, sed partim Cardinalatus spe lactatus partim pro seculi locique more, Romae enim plerumque vixit, vagis amoribus delectatus, morbo hinc contracto, obiit A.C. 1520, aetat. 37."—Art. "Raphael," apud Hofmann, Lexicon Universale. It would seem that Raphael was betrothed to Maria, daughter of Antonio Divizio da Bibiena, the nephew of Cardinal Bibiena (see his letter to his uncle Simone di Battista di Ciarla da Urbino, dated July 1, 1514), and it is a fact that a girl named Margarita, supposed to be his mistress, is mentioned in his will. But the "causes of his death," April 6, 1520, were a delicate constitution, overwork, and a malarial fever, caught during his researches among the ruins of ancient Rome" (Raphael of Urbino, by J. D. Passavant, 1872, pp. 140, 196, 197. See, too, Raphael, by E. Muntz, 1888).]

[218] [Compare the lines enclosed in a letter to Murray, dated November 25, 1816—

"In this beloved marble view, Above the works and thoughts of man, What Nature could but would not do, And Beauty and Canova can."]

[219]

["(In talking thus, the writer, more especially Of women, would be understood to say, He speaks as a Spectator, not officially, And always, Reader, in a modest way; Perhaps, too, in no very great degree shall he Appear to have offended in this lay, Since, as all know, without the Sex, our Sonnets Would seem unfinished, like their untrimmed bonnets.) "(Signed) Printer's Devil."]

[220] [The Task, by William Cowper, ii. 206. Compare The Farewell, line 27, by Charles Churchill—

"Be England what she will, With all her faults, she is my Country still."]

[221] {175}[The allusion is to Gally Knight's Ilderim, a Syrian Tale. See, too, Letter to Moore, March 25, 1817, Letters, 1900, iv. 78: "Talking of tail, I wish you had not called it [Lalla Rookh] a 'Persian Tale.' Say a 'Poem,' or 'Romance,' but not 'Tale.' I am very sorry that I called some of my own things 'Tales.' ... Besides, we have had Arabian, and Hindoo, and Turkish, and Assyrian Tales." Beppo, it must be remembered, was published anonymously, and in the concluding lines of the stanza the satire is probably directed against his own "Tales."]

[222] {176}["The expressions 'blue-stocking' and 'dandy' may furnish matter for the learning of a commentator at some future period. At this moment every English reader will understand them. Our present ephemeral dandy is akin to the maccaroni of my earlier days. The first of these expressions has become classical, by Mrs. Hannah More's poem of 'Bas-Bleu' and the other by the use of it in one of Lord Byron's poems. Though now become familiar and rather trite, their day may not be long.

' ... Cadentque Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula.'"

—Translation of Forteguerri's Ricciardetto, by Lord Glenbervie, 1822 (note to stanza v.).

Compare, too, a memorandum of 1820. "I liked the Dandies; they were always very civil to me, though in general they disliked literary people ... The truth is, that, though I gave up the business early, I had a tinge of Dandyism in my minority, and probably retained enough of it to conciliate the great ones at four-and-twenty."—Letters, 1901, v. 423.]

[223] {177}[The Morning Chronicle of June 17, 1817, reports at length "Mrs. Boehm's Grand Masquerade." "On Monday evening this distinguished lady of the haut ton gave a splendid masquerade at her residence in St. James's Square." "The Dukes of Gloucester, Wellington, etc., were present in plain dress. Among the dominoes were the Duke and Duchess of Grafton, etc." Lady Caroline Lamb was among the guests.]

[224] {178}[The reference is, probably, to the Repository of Arts, Literature, Commerce, Manufactures, Fashions, and Politics (1809-1829), which was illustrated by coloured plates of dresses, "artistic" furniture, Gothic cottages, park lodges, etc.]

[225] [For "Ridotto," see Letter to Moore, January 28, 1817, Letters, 1900, iv. 49, note 1.]

[bn] Of Imited (sic) Imitations, how soon! how.—[MS.]

[226] ["When Brummell was obliged ... to retire to France, he knew no French; and having obtained a Grammar for the purposes of study, our friend Scrope Davies was asked what progress Brummell had made in French ... he responded, 'that Brummell had been stopped, like Buonaparte in Russia, by the Elements.' I have put this pun into Beppo, which is 'a fair exchange and no robbery;' for Scrope made his fortune at several dinners (as he owned himself), by repeating occasionally, as his own, some of the buffooneries with which I had encountered him in the Morning."—Detached Thoughts, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 422, 423.]

[227] ["Like Sylla, I have always believed that all things depend upon Fortune, and nothing upon ourselves. I am not aware of any one thought or action, worthy of being called good to myself or others, which is not to be attributed to the Good Goddess—Fortune!"—Ibid., p. 451.]

[228] "January 19th, 1818. To-morrow will be a Sunday, and full Ridotto."—[MS.]

[bo] {181} ——philoguny,—[MS.]

[229] {182}[Botherby is, of course, Sotheby. In the English Bards (line 818) he is bracketed with Gifford and Macneil honoris causti, but at this time (1817-18) Byron was "against" Sotheby, under the impression that he had sent him "an anonymous note ... accompanying a copy of the Castle of Chillon, etc. [sic]." Sotheby affirmed that he had not written the note, but Byron, while formally accepting the disclaimer, refers to the firmness of his "former persuasion," and renews the attack with increased bitterness. "As to Beppo, I will not alter or suppress a syllable for any man's pleasure but my own. If there are resemblances between Botherby and Sotheby, or Sotheby and Botherby, the fault is not mine, but in the person who resembles,—or the persons who trace a resemblance. Who find out this resemblance? Mr. S.'s friends. Who go about moaning over him and laughing? Mr. S.'s friends" (Letters to Murray, April 17, 23, 1818, Letters, 1900, iv. 226-230). A writer of satires is of necessity satirical, and Sotheby, like "Wordswords and Co.," made excellent "copy." If he had not written the "anonymous note," he was, from Byron's point of view, ridiculous and a bore, and "ready to hand" to be tossed up in rhyme as Botherby. (For a brief account of Sotheby, see Poetical Works, i. 362, note 2.)]

[bp] {183}Gorging the slightest slice of Flattery raw.—[MS. in a letter to Murray, April 11, 1818, Letters, 1900, iv. 218.]

[230] {184}[So, too, elsewhere. Wordsworth and Coleridge had depreciated Voltaire, and Byron, en revanche, contrasts the "tea-drinking neutrality of morals" of the school, i.e. the Lake poets, with "their convenient treachery in politics" (see Letters, 1901, v. 600).]

[231] {184}["Lady Byron," her husband wrote, "would have made an excellent wrangler at Cambridge." Compare—

"Her favourite science was the mathematical."

Don Juan, Canto I. stanza xii. line 1.]

[232] {185}[Stanza lxxx. is not in the original MS.]

[bq] {186}Sate Laura with a kind of comic horror.—[MS.]

[233] {189}[Cap Bon, or Ras Adden, is the northernmost point of Tunis.]



ODE ON VENICE



ODE ON VENICE[234]

I.

Oh Venice! Venice! when thy marble walls Are level with the waters, there shall be A cry of nations o'er thy sunken halls, A loud lament along the sweeping sea! If I, a northern wanderer, weep for thee, What should thy sons do?—anything but weep: And yet they only murmur in their sleep. In contrast with their fathers—as the slime, The dull green ooze of the receding deep, Is with the dashing of the spring-tide foam, 10 That drives the sailor shipless to his home, Are they to those that were; and thus they creep, Crouching and crab-like, through their sapping streets. Oh! agony—that centuries should reap No mellower harvest! Thirteen hundred years[235] Of wealth and glory turned to dust and tears; And every monument the stranger meets, Church, palace, pillar, as a mourner greets; And even the Lion all subdued appears,[236] And the harsh sound of the barbarian drum, 20 With dull and daily dissonance, repeats The echo of thy Tyrant's voice along The soft waves, once all musical to song, That heaved beneath the moonlight with the throng Of gondolas[237]—and to the busy hum Of cheerful creatures, whose most sinful deeds Were but the overbeating of the heart, And flow of too much happiness, which needs The aid of age to turn its course apart From the luxuriant and voluptuous flood 30 Of sweet sensations, battling with the blood. But these are better than the gloomy errors, The weeds of nations in their last decay, When Vice walks forth with her unsoftened terrors, And Mirth is madness, and but smiles to slay; And Hope is nothing but a false delay, The sick man's lightning half an hour ere Death, When Faintness, the last mortal birth of Pain, And apathy of limb, the dull beginning Of the cold staggering race which Death is winning, 40 Steals vein by vein and pulse by pulse away; Yet so relieving the o'er-tortured clay, To him appears renewal of his breath, And freedom the mere numbness of his chain; And then he talks of Life, and how again He feels his spirit soaring—albeit weak, And of the fresher air, which he would seek; And as he whispers knows not that he gasps, That his thin finger feels not what it clasps, And so the film comes o'er him—and the dizzy 50 Chamber swims round and round—and shadows busy, At which he vainly catches, flit and gleam, Till the last rattle chokes the strangled scream, And all is ice and blackness,—and the earth That which it was the moment ere our birth.[238]

II.

There is no hope for nations!—Search the page Of many thousand years—the daily scene, The flow and ebb of each recurring age, The everlasting to be which hath been, Hath taught us nought or little: still we lean 60 On things that rot beneath our weight, and wear Our strength away in wrestling with the air; For't is our nature strikes us down: the beasts Slaughtered in hourly hecatombs for feasts Are of as high an order—they must go Even where their driver goads them, though to slaughter. Ye men, who pour your blood for kings as water, What have they given your children in return? A heritage of servitude and woes, A blindfold bondage, where your hire is blows. 70 What! do not yet the red-hot ploughshares burn,[239] O'er which you stumble in a false ordeal, And deem this proof of loyalty the real; Kissing the hand that guides you to your scars, And glorying as you tread the glowing bars? All that your Sires have left you, all that Time Bequeaths of free, and History of sublime, Spring from a different theme!—Ye see and read, Admire and sigh, and then succumb and bleed! Save the few spirits who, despite of all, 80 And worse than all, the sudden crimes engendered By the down-thundering of the prison-wall, And thirst to swallow the sweet waters tendered, Gushing from Freedom's fountains—when the crowd,[240] Maddened with centuries of drought, are loud, And trample on each other to obtain The cup which brings oblivion of a chain Heavy and sore,—in which long yoked they ploughed The sand,—or if there sprung the yellow grain, 'Twas not for them, their necks were too much bowed, 90 And their dead palates chewed the cud of pain:— Yes! the few spirits—who, despite of deeds Which they abhor, confound not with the cause Those momentary starts from Nature's laws, Which, like the pestilence and earthquake, smite But for a term, then pass, and leave the earth With all her seasons to repair the blight With a few summers, and again put forth Cities and generations—fair, when free— For, Tyranny, there blooms no bud for thee! 100

III.

Glory and Empire! once upon these towers[241] With Freedom—godlike Triad! how you sate! The league of mightiest nations, in those hours When Venice was an envy, might abate, But did not quench, her spirit—in her fate All were enwrapped: the feasted monarchs knew And loved their hostess, nor could learn to hate, Although they humbled—with the kingly few The many felt, for from all days and climes She was the voyager's worship;—even her crimes 110 Were of the softer order, born of Love— She drank no blood, nor fattened on the dead, But gladdened where her harmless conquests spread; For these restored the Cross, that from above Hallowed her sheltering banners, which incessant Flew between earth and the unholy Crescent,[242] Which, if it waned and dwindled, Earth may thank The city it has clothed in chains, which clank Now, creaking in the ears of those who owe The name of Freedom to her glorious struggles; 120 Yet she but shares with them a common woe, And called the "kingdom"[243] of a conquering foe,— But knows what all—and, most of all, we know— With what set gilded terms a tyrant juggles!

IV.

The name of Commonwealth is past and gone O'er the three fractions of the groaning globe; Venice is crushed, and Holland deigns to own A sceptre, and endures the purple robe;[244] If the free Switzer yet bestrides alone His chainless mountains, 't is but for a time, 130 For Tyranny of late is cunning grown, And in its own good season tramples down The sparkles of our ashes. One great clime, Whose vigorous offspring by dividing ocean[245] Are kept apart and nursed in the devotion Of Freedom, which their fathers fought for, and Bequeathed—a heritage of heart and hand, And proud distinction from each other land, Whose sons must bow them at a Monarch's motion, As if his senseless sceptre were a wand 140 Full of the magic of exploded science— Still one great clime, in full and free defiance, Yet rears her crest, unconquered and sublime, Above the far Atlantic!—She has taught Her Esau-brethren that the haughty flag, The floating fence of Albion's feebler crag,[246] May strike to those whose red right hands have bought Rights cheaply earned with blood.—Still, still, for ever Better, though each man's life-blood were a river, That it should flow, and overflow, than creep 150 Through thousand lazy channels in our veins, Dammed like the dull canal with locks and chains, And moving, as a sick man in his sleep, Three paces, and then faltering:—better be Where the extinguished Spartans still are free, In their proud charnel of Thermopylae, Than stagnate in our marsh,—or o'er the deep Fly, and one current to the ocean add, One spirit to the souls our fathers had, One freeman more, America, to thee![247] 160

FOOTNOTES:

[234] {193}[The Ode on Venice (originally Ode) was completed by July 10, 1818 (Letters, 1900, iv. 245), but was published at the same time as Mazeppa and A Fragment, June 28, 1819. The motif, a lamentation over the decay and degradation of Venice, re-echoes the sentiments expressed in the opening stanzas (i.-xix.) of the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold. A realistic description of the "Hour of Death" (lines 37-55), and a eulogy of the United States of America (lines 133-160), give distinction to the Ode.]

[235] [Compare Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza xiii. lines 4-6.]

[236] [Compare ibid., stanza xi. lines 5-9.]

[237] {194}[Compare Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza iii lines 1-4.]

[238] [Compare The Prisoner of Chillon, line 178, note 2, vide ante, p. 21.]

[239] {195}[In contrasting Sheridan with Brougham, Byron speaks of "the red-hot ploughshares of public life."—Diary, March 10, 1814, Letters, 1898, ii. 397.]

[240] [Compare—

"At last it [the mob] takes to weapons such as men Snatch when despair makes human hearts less pliant. Then comes 'the tug of war;'—'t will come again, I rather doubt; and I would fain say 'fie on't,' If I had not perceived that revolution Alone can save the earth from Hell's pollution."

Don Juan, Canto VIII. stanza li. lines 3-8.]

[241] {196}[Compare Lord Tennyson's stanzas—

"Of old sat Freedom on the heights."]

[242] [Compare Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza xiv. line 3, note 1, and line 6, Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 339, 340.]

[243] {197}[In 1814 the Italian possessions of the Emperor of Austria were "constituted into separate and particular states, under the title of the kingdom of Venetian Lombardy."—Koch's Europe, p. 234.]

[244] [The Prince of Orange ... was proclaimed Sovereign Prince of the Low Countries, December 1, 1813; and in the following year, August 13, 1814, on the condition that he should make a part of the Germanic Confederation, he received the title of King of the Netherlands.-Ibid., p. 233.]

[245] [Compare "Oceano dissociabili," Hor., Odes, I. iii 22.]

[246] [In October, 1812, the American sloop Wasp captured the English brig Frolic; and December 29, 1812, the Constitution compelled the frigate Java to surrender. In the following year, February 24, 1813, the Hornet met the Peacock off the Demerara, and reduced her in fifteen minutes to a sinking condition. On June 28, 1814, the sloop-of-war Wasp captured and burned the sloop Reindeer, and on September 11, 1814, the Confiance, commanded by Commodore Downie, and other vessels surrendered."—History of America, by Justin Winsor, 1888, vii. 380, seq.]

[247] {198}[Byron repented, or feigned to repent, this somewhat provocative eulogy of the Great Republic: "Somebody has sent me some American abuse of Mazeppa and 'the Ode;' in future I will compliment nothing but Canada, and desert to the English."—Letter to Murray, February 21, 1820, Letters, 1900, iv. 410. It is possible that the allusion is to an article, "Mazeppa and Don Juan," in the Analectic Magazine, November, 1819, vol. xiv, pp. 405-410.]



MAZEPPA.



INTRODUCTION TO MAZEPPA

Mazeppa, a legend of the Russian Ukraine, or frontier region, is based on the passage in Voltaire's Charles XII. prefixed as the "Advertisement" to the poem. Voltaire seems to have known very little about the man or his history, and Byron, though he draws largely on his imagination, was content to take his substratum of fact from Voltaire. The "true story of Mazeppa" is worth re-telling for its own sake, and lends a fresh interest and vitality to the legend. Ivan Stepanovitch Mazeppa (or Mazepa), born about the year 1645, was of Cossack origin, but appears to have belonged, by descent or creation, to the lesser nobility of the semi-Polish Volhynia. He began life (1660) as a page of honour in the Court of King John Casimir V. of Poland, where he studied Latin, and acquired the tongue and pen of eloquent statesmanship. Banished from the court on account of a quarrel, he withdrew to his mother's estate in Volhynia, and there, to beguile the time, made love to the wife of a neighbouring magnate, the pane or Lord Falbowski. The intrigue was discovered, and to avenge his wrongs the outraged husband caused Mazeppa to be stripped to the skin, and bound to his own steed. The horse, lashed into madness, and terror-stricken by the discharge of a pistol, started off at a gallop, and rushing "thorough bush, thorough briar," carried his torn and bleeding rider into the courtyard of his own mansion!

With regard to the sequel or issue of this episode, history is silent, but when the curtain rises again (A.D. 1674) Mazeppa is discovered in the character of writer-general or foreign secretary to Peter Doroshenko, hetman or president of the Western Ukraine, on the hither side of the Dnieper. From the service of Doroshenko, who came to an untimely end, he passed by a series of accidents into the employ of his rival, Samoilovitch, hetman of the Eastern Ukraine, and, as his secretary or envoy, continued to attract the notice and to conciliate the good will of the (regent) Tzarina Sophia and her eminent boyard, Prince Basil Golitsyn. A time came (1687) when it served the interests of Russia to degrade Samoilovitch, and raise Mazeppa to the post of hetman, and thenceforward, for twenty years and more, he held something like a regal sway over the whole of the Ukraine (a fertile "no-man's land," watered by the Dnieper and its tributaries), openly the loyal and zealous ally of his neighbour and suzerain, Peter the Great.

How far this allegiance was genuine, or whether a secret preference for Poland, the land of his adoption, or a long-concealed impatience of Muscovite suzerainty would in any case have urged him to revolt, must remain doubtful, but it is certain that the immediate cause of a final reversal of the allegiance and a break with the Tsar was a second and still more fateful affaire du coeur. The hetman was upwards of sixty years of age, but, even so, he fell in love with his god-daughter, Matrena, who, in spite of difference of age and ecclesiastical kinship, not only returned his love, but, to escape the upbraidings and persecution of her mother, took refuge under his roof. Mazeppa sent the girl back to her home, but, as his love-letters testify, continued to woo her with the tenderest and most passionate solicitings; and, although she finally yielded to force majeure and married another suitor, her parents nursed their revenge, and endeavoured to embroil the hetman with the Tsar. For a time their machinations failed, and Matrena's father, Kotchubey, together with his friend Iskra, were executed with the Tsar's assent and approbation. Before long, however, Mazeppa, who had been for some time past in secret correspondence with the Swedes, signalized his defection from Peter by offering his services first to Stanislaus of Poland, and afterwards to Charles XII. of Sweden, who was meditating the invasion of Russia.

"Pultowa's day," July 8, 1709, was the last of Mazeppa's power and influence, and in the following year (March 31, 1710), "he died of old age, perhaps of a broken heart," at Varnitza, a village near Bender, on the Dniester, whither he had accompanied the vanquished and fugitive Charles.

Such was Mazeppa, a man destined to pass through the crowded scenes of history, and to take his stand among the greater heroes of romance. His deeds of daring, his intrigues and his treachery, have been and still are sung by the wandering minstrels of the Ukraine. His story has passed into literature. His ride forms the subject of an Orientale (1829) by Victor Hugo, who treats Byron's theme symbolically; and the romance of his old age, his love for his god-daughter Matrena, with its tragical issue, the judicial murder of Kotchubey and Iskra, are celebrated by the "Russian Byron" Pushkin, in his poem Poltava. He forms the subject of a novel, Iwan Wizigin, by Bulgarin, 1830, and of tragedies by I. Slowacki, 1840, and Rudolph von Gottschall. From literature Mazeppa has passed into art in the "symphonic poem" of Franz Lizt (1857); and, yet again, pour comble de gloire, Mazeppa, or The Wild Horse of Tartary, is the title of a "romantic drama," first played at the Royal Amphitheatre, Westminster Bridge, on Easter Monday, 1831; and revived at Astley's Theatre, when Adah Isaacs Menken appeared as "Mazeppa," October 3, 1864. (Peter the Great, by Eugene Schuyler, 1884, ii. 115, seq.; Le Fils de Pierre Le Grand, Mazeppa, etc., by Viscount E. Melchior de Voguee, Paris, 1884; Peter the Great, by Oscar Browning, 1899, pp. 219-229.)

Of the composition of Mazeppa we know nothing, except that on September 24, 1818, "it was still to finish" (Letters, 1900, iv. 264). It was published together with an Ode (Venice: An Ode) and A Fragment (see Letters, 1899, iii. Appendix IV. pp. 446-453), June 28, 1819.

Notices of Mazeppa appeared in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, July, 1819, vol. v. p. 429 (for John Gilpin and Mazeppa, by William Maginn, vide ibid., pp. 434-439); the Monthly Review, July, 1819, vol. 89, pp. 309-321; and the Eclectic Review, August, 1819, vol. xii. pp. 147-156.



ADVERTISEMENT.

"Celui qui remplissait alors cette place etait un gentilhomme Polonais, nomine Mazeppa, ne dans le palatinat de Podolie: il avait ete eleve page de Jean Casimir, et avait pris a sa cour quelque teinture des belles-lettres. Une intrigue qu'il eut dans sa jeunesse avec la femme d'un gentilhomme Polonais ayant ete decouverte, le mari le fit lier tout nu sur un cheval farouche, et le laissa aller en cet etat. Le cheval, qui etait du pays de l'Ukraine, y retourna, et y porta Mazeppa, demi-mort de fatigue et de faim. Quelques paysans le secoururent: il resta longtems parmi eux, et se signala dans plusieurs courses contre les Tartares. La superiorite de ses lumieres lui donna une grande consideration parmi les Cosaques: sa reputation s'augmentant de jour en jour, obligea le Czar a le faire Prince de l'Ukraine."—Voltaire, Hist. de Charles XII., 1772, p. 205.

"Le roi, fuyant et poursuivi, eut son cheval tue sous lui; le Colonel Gieta, blesse, et perdant tout son sang, lui donna le sien. Ainsi on remit deux fois a cheval, dans la fuite,[br] ce conquerant qui n'avait pu y monter pendant la bataille."—p. 222.

"Le roi alla par un autre chemin avec quelques cavaliers. Le carrosse, ou il etait, rompit dans la marche; on le remit a cheval. Pour comble de disgrace, il s'egara pendant la nuit dans un bois; la, son courage ne pouvant plus suppleer, a ses forces epuisees, les douleurs de sa blessure devenues plus insupportables par la fatigue, son cheval etant tombe de lassitude, il se coucha quelques heures au pied d'un arbre, en danger d'etre surpris a tout moment par les vainqueurs, qui le cherchaient de tous cotes."—p. 224.



MAZEPPA

I.

'Twas after dread Pultowa's day,[248] When Fortune left the royal Swede— Around a slaughtered army lay, No more to combat and to bleed. The power and glory of the war, Faithless as their vain votaries, men, Had passed to the triumphant Czar, And Moscow's walls were safe again— Until a day more dark and drear,[249] And a more memorable year, 10 Should give to slaughter and to shame A mightier host and haughtier name; A greater wreck, a deeper fall, A shock to one—a thunderbolt to all.

II.

Such was the hazard of the die; The wounded Charles was taught to fly[250] By day and night through field and flood, Stained with his own and subjects' blood; For thousands fell that flight to aid: And not a voice was heard to upbraid 20 Ambition in his humbled hour, When Truth had nought to dread from Power. His horse was slain, and Gieta gave His own—and died the Russians' slave. This, too, sinks after many a league Of well-sustained, but vain fatigue; And in the depth of forests darkling, The watch-fires in the distance sparkling— The beacons of surrounding foes— A King must lay his limbs at length. 30 Are these the laurels and repose For which the nations strain their strength? They laid him by a savage tree,[251] In outworn Nature's agony; His wounds were stiff, his limbs were stark; The heavy hour was chill and dark; The fever in his blood forbade A transient slumber's fitful aid: And thus it was; but yet through all, Kinglike the monarch bore his fall, 40 And made, in this extreme of ill, His pangs the vassals of his will: All silent and subdued were they. As once the nations round him lay.

III.

A band of chiefs!—alas! how few, Since but the fleeting of a day Had thinned it; but this wreck was true And chivalrous: upon the clay Each sate him down, all sad and mute, Beside his monarch and his steed; 50 For danger levels man and brute, And all are fellows in their need. Among the rest, Mazeppa made[252] His pillow in an old oak's shade— Himself as rough, and scarce less old, The Ukraine's Hetman, calm and bold; But first, outspent with this long course, The Cossack prince rubbed down his horse, And made for him a leafy bed, And smoothed his fetlocks and his mane, 60 And slacked his girth, and stripped his rein, And joyed to see how well he fed; For until now he had the dread His wearied courser might refuse To browse beneath the midnight dews: But he was hardy as his lord, And little cared for bed and board; But spirited and docile too, Whate'er was to be done, would do. Shaggy and swift, and strong of limb, 70 All Tartar-like he carried him; Obeyed his voice, and came to call, And knew him in the midst of all: Though thousands were around,—and Night, Without a star, pursued her flight,— That steed from sunset until dawn His chief would follow like a fawn.

IV.

This done, Mazeppa spread his cloak, And laid his lance beneath his oak, Felt if his arms in order good 80 The long day's march had well withstood— If still the powder filled the pan, And flints unloosened kept their lock— His sabre's hilt and scabbard felt, And whether they had chafed his belt; And next the venerable man, From out his havresack and can, Prepared and spread his slender stock; And to the Monarch and his men The whole or portion offered then 90 With far less of inquietude Than courtiers at a banquet would. And Charles of this his slender share With smiles partook a moment there, To force of cheer a greater show, And seem above both wounds and woe;— And then he said—"Of all our band, Though firm of heart and strong of hand, In skirmish, march, or forage, none Can less have said or more have done 100 Than thee, Mazeppa! On the earth So fit a pair had never birth, Since Alexander's days till now, As thy Bucephalus and thou: All Scythia's fame to thine should yield For pricking on o'er flood and field." Mazeppa answered—"Ill betide The school wherein I learned to ride!" Quoth Charles—"Old Hetman, wherefore so, Since thou hast learned the art so well?" 110 Mazeppa said—"'Twere long to tell; And we have many a league to go, With every now and then a blow, And ten to one at least the foe, Before our steeds may graze at ease, Beyond the swift Borysthenes:[253] And, Sire, your limbs have need of rest, And I will be the sentinel Of this your troop."—"But I request," Said Sweden's monarch, "thou wilt tell 120 This tale of thine, and I may reap, Perchance, from this the boon of sleep; For at this moment from my eyes The hope of present slumber flies."

"Well, Sire, with such a hope, I'll track My seventy years of memory back: I think 'twas in my twentieth spring,— Aye 'twas,—when Casimir was king[254]— John Casimir,—I was his page Six summers, in my earlier age:[255] 130 A learned monarch, faith! was he, And most unlike your Majesty; He made no wars, and did not gain New realms to lose them back again; And (save debates in Warsaw's diet) He reigned in most unseemly quiet; Not that he had no cares to vex; He loved the Muses and the Sex;[256] And sometimes these so froward are, They made him wish himself at war; 140 But soon his wrath being o'er, he took Another mistress—or new book: And then he gave prodigious fetes— All Warsaw gathered round his gates To gaze upon his splendid court, And dames, and chiefs, of princely port. He was the Polish Solomon, So sung his poets, all but one, Who, being unpensioned, made a satire, And boasted that he could not flatter. 150 It was a court of jousts and mimes, Where every courtier tried at rhymes; Even I for once produced some verses, And signed my odes 'Despairing Thyrsis.' There was a certain Palatine,[257] A Count of far and high descent, Rich as a salt or silver mine;[258] And he was proud, ye may divine, As if from Heaven he had been sent; He had such wealth in blood and ore 160 As few could match beneath the throne; And he would gaze upon his store, And o'er his pedigree would pore, Until by some confusion led, Which almost looked like want of head, He thought their merits were his own. His wife was not of this opinion; His junior she by thirty years, Grew daily tired of his dominion; And, after wishes, hopes, and fears, 170 To Virtue a few farewell tears, A restless dream or two—some glances At Warsaw's youth—some songs, and dances, Awaited but the usual chances, Those happy accidents which render The coldest dames so very tender, To deck her Count with titles given, 'Tis said, as passports into Heaven; But, strange to say, they rarely boast Of these, who have deserved them most. 180