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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
This etext contains only characters from the Latin-1 set. The original
work contained a few phrases of Greek text. These are represented here
as Beta-code transliterations in brackets, e.g. [Greek: Liakyra].
The original text used a few other characters not found in the Latin-1
set. These have been represented using bracket notation: [=a], [=i] [=e]
represent those letters with a macron. A few instances of superscript
letters are indicated by carets, as in "Concluded, Canto 2^d, Smyrna,
March 28^th^."
An important feature of this edition is its copious notes, which are of
three types. Notes indexed with a number and a letter, for example
[4.B.], are end-notes provided by Byron or, following Canto IV, by J. C.
Hobhouse. These notes follow each Canto.
Poems and end-notes have footnotes. Footnotes indexed with lowercase
letters (e.g. [c], [bf]) show variant forms of Byron's text from
manuscripts and other sources. Footnotes indexed with arabic numbers
(e.g. [17], [221]) are informational. In the original, footnotes are
printed at the foot of the page on which they are referenced, and their
indices start over on each page. In this etext, footnotes have been
collected at the end of each section, and have been numbered
consecutively throughout the book. Within each block of footnotes are
numbers in braces, e.g. {321}. These represent the page number on which
the following notes originally appeared. To find a note that was
originally printed on page 27, search for {27}.
Text in footnotes and end-notes in square brackets is the work of Editor
E. H. Coleridge. Note text not in brackets is by Byron or Hobhouse. In
certain notes on variant text, the editor showed deleted text struck
through with lines. The struck-through words are noted here with braces
and dashes, as in {-deleted words-}.
The Works
OF
LORD BYRON.
A NEW, REVISED AND ENLARGED EDITION,
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS.
Poetry. Vol. II.
EDITED BY
ERNEST HARTLEY COLERIDGE, M.A.
LONDON:
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS.
1899.
PREFACE TO THE SECOND VOLUME.
The text of the present edition of _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ is based
upon a collation of volume i. of the Library Edition, 1855, with the
following MSS.: (i.) the original MS. of the First and Second Cantos, in
Byron's handwriting [MS. M.]; (ii.) a transcript of the First and Second
Cantos, in the handwriting of R. C. Dallas [D.]; (iii.) a transcript of
the Third Canto, in the handwriting of Clara Jane Clairmont [C.]; (iv.)
a collection of "scraps," forming a first draft of the Third Canto, in
Byron's handwriting [MS.]; (v.) a fair copy of the first draft of the
Fourth Canto, together with the MS. of the additional stanzas, in
Byron's handwriting. [MS. M.]; (vi.) a second fair copy of the Fourth
Canto, as completed, in Byron's handwriting [D.].
The text of the First and Second Cantos has also been collated with the
text of the First Edition of the First and Second Cantos (quarto,
1812); the text of the Third and of the Fourth Cantos with the texts of
the First Editions of 1816 and 1818 respectively; and the text of the
entire poem with that issued in the collected editions of 1831 and 1832.
Considerations of space have determined the position and arrangement of
the notes.
Byron's notes to the First, Second, and Third Cantos, and Hobhouse's
notes to the Fourth Canto are printed, according to precedent, at the
end of each canto.
Editorial notes are placed in square brackets. Notes illustrative of the
text are printed immediately below the variants. Notes illustrative of
Byron's notes or footnotes are appended to the originals or printed as
footnotes. Byron's own notes to the Fourth Canto are printed as
footnotes to the text.
Hobhouse's "Historical Notes" are reprinted without addition or comment;
but the numerous and intricate references to classical, historical, and
archaeological authorities have been carefully verified, and in many
instances rewritten.
In compiling the Introductions, the additional notes, and footnotes, I
have endeavoured to supply the reader with a compendious manual of
reference. With the subject-matter of large portions of the three
distinct poems which make up the five hundred stanzas of _Childe
Harold's Pilgrimage_ every one is more or less familiar, but details
and particulars are out of the immediate reach of even the most
cultivated readers.
The poem may be dealt with in two ways. It may be regarded as a
repertory or treasury of brilliant passages for selection and quotation;
or it may be read continuously, and with some attention to the style and
message of the author. It is in the belief that _Childe Harold_ should
be read continuously, and that it gains by the closest study, reassuming
its original freshness and splendour, that the text as well as Byron's
own notes have been somewhat minutely annotated.
In the selection and composition of the notes I have, in addition to
other authorities, consulted and made use of the following editions of
_Childe Harold's Pilgrimage:_--
i. _Edition Classique_, par James Darmesteter, Docteur-es-lettres.
Paris, 1882.
ii. Byron's _Childe Harold_, edited, with Introduction and Notes, by H.
F. Tozer, M.A. Oxford, 1885 (Clarendon Press Series).
iii. _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_, edited by the Rev. E.C. Everard Owen,
M.A. London, 1897 (Arnold's British Classics).
Particular acknowledgments of my indebtedness to these admirable works
will be found throughout the volume.
I have consulted and derived assistance from Professor Eugen Koelbing's
exhaustive collation of the text of the two first cantos with the Dallas
Transcript in the British Museum (_Zur Textueberlieferung von Byron's
Childe Harold, Cantos I., II. Leipsic_, 1896); and I am indebted to the
same high authority for information with regard to the Seventh Edition
(1814) of the First and Second Cantos. (See _Bemerkungen zu Byron's
Childe Harold, Engl. Stud._, 1896, xxi. 176-186.)
I have again to record my grateful acknowledgments to Dr. Richard
Garnett, C.B., Dr. A. S. Murray, F.R.S., Mr. R. E. Graves, Mr. E. D.
Butler, F.R.G.S., and other officials of the British Museum, for
constant help and encouragement in the preparation of the notes to
_Childe Harold._
I desire to express my thanks to Dr. H. R. Mill, Librarian of the Royal
Geographical Society; Mr. J. C. Baker, F.R.S., Keeper of the Herbarium
and Library of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Mr. Horatio F. Brown
(author of _Venice, an Historical Sketch_, etc.); Mr. P. A. Daniel, Mr.
Richard Edgcumbe, and others, for valuable information on various points
of doubt and difficulty.
On behalf of the Publisher, I beg to acknowledge the kindness of his
Grace the Duke of Richmond, in permitting Cosway's miniature of
Charlotte Duchess of Richmond to be reproduced for this volume.
I have also to thank Mr. Horatio F. Brown for the right to reproduce the
interesting portrait of "Byron at Venice," which is now in his
possession.
ERNEST HARTLEY COLERIDGE.
_April_, 1899.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST AND SECOND CANTOS OF _CHILDE HAROLD_.
The First Canto of _Childe Harold_ was begun at Janina, in Albania,
October 31, 1809, and the Second Canto was finished at Smyrna, March 28,
1810. The dates were duly recorded on the MS.; but in none of the
letters which Byron wrote to his mother and his friends from the East
does he mention or allude to the composition or existence of such a
work. In one letter, however, to his mother (January 14, 1811,
_Letters_, 1898, i. 308), he informs her that he has MSS. in his
possession which may serve to prolong his memory, if his heirs and
executors "think proper to publish them;" but for himself, he has "done
with authorship." Three months later the achievement of _Hints from
Horace_ and _The Curse of Minerva_ persuaded him to give "authorship"
another trial; and, in a letter written on board the _Volage_ frigate
(June 28, _Letters_, 1898, i. 313), he announces to his literary Mentor,
R. C. Dallas, who had superintended the publication of _English Bards,
and Scotch Reviewers_, that he has "an imitation of the _Ars Poetica_ of
Horace ready for Cawthorne." Byron landed in England on July 2, and on
the 15th Dallas "had the pleasure of shaking hands with him at Reddish's
Hotel, St. James's Street" (_Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron_,
1824, p. 103). There was a crowd of visitors, says Dallas, and no time
for conversation; but the _Imitation_ was placed in his hands. He took
it home, read it, and was disappointed. Disparagement was out of the
question; but the next morning at breakfast Dallas ventured to express
some surprise that he had written nothing else. An admission or
confession followed that "he had occasionally written short poems,
besides a great many stanzas in Spenser's measure, relative to the
countries he had visited." "They are not," he added, "worth troubling
you with, but you shall have them all with you if you like." "So," says
Dallas, "came I by _Childe Harold_. He took it from a small trunk, with
a number of verses."
Dallas was "delighted," and on the evening of the same day (July
16)--before, let us hope, and not after, he had consulted his "Ionian
friend," Walter Rodwell Wright (see _Recollections_, p. 151, and _Diary_
of H.C. Robinson, 1872, i. 17)--he despatched a letter of enthusiastic
approval, which gratified Byron, but did not convince him of the
extraordinary merit of his work, or of its certainty of success. It was,
however, agreed that the MS. should be left with Dallas, that he should
arrange for its publication and hold the copyright. Dallas would have
entrusted the poem to Cawthorne, who had published _English Bards, and
Scotch Reviewers,_ and with whom, as Byron's intermediary, he was in
communication; but Byron objected on the ground that the firm did not
"stand high enough in the trade," and Longmans, who had been offered but
had declined the _English Bards_, were in no case to be approached. An
application to Miller, of Albemarle Street, came to nothing, because
Miller was Lord Elgin's bookseller and publisher (he had just brought
out the _Memorandum on Lord Elgin's Pursuits in Greece_), and _Childe
Harold_ denounced and reviled Lord Elgin. But Murray, of Fleet Street,
who had already expressed a wish to publish for Lord Byron, was willing
to take the matter into consideration. On the first of August Byron lost
his mother, on the third his friend Matthews was drowned in the Cam, and
for some weeks he could devote neither time nor thought to the fortunes
of his poem; but Dallas had bestirred himself, and on the eighteenth was
able to report that he had "seen Murray again," and that Murray was
anxious that Byron's name should appear on the title-page.
To this request Byron somewhat reluctantly acceded (August 21); and a
few days later (August 25) he informs Dallas that he has sent him
"exordiums, annotations, etc., for the forthcoming quarto," and has
written to Murray, urging him on no account to show the MS. to Juvenal,
that is, Gifford. But Gifford, as a matter of course, had been already
consulted, had read the First Canto, and had advised Murray to publish
the poem. Byron was, or pretended to be, furious; but the solid fact
that Gifford had commended his work acted like a charm, and his fury
subsided. On the fifth of September (_Letters_, 1898, ii. 24, note) he
received from Murray the first proof, and by December 14 "the Pilgrimage
was concluded," and all but the preface had been printed and seen
through the press.
The original draft of the poem, which Byron took out of "the little
trunk" and gave to Dallas, had undergone considerable alterations and
modifications before this date. Both Dallas and Murray took exception to
certain stanzas which, on personal, or patriotic, or religious
considerations, were provocative and objectionable. They were
apprehensive, not only for the sale of the book, but for the reputation
of its author. Byron fought his ground inch by inch, but finally
assented to a compromise. He was willing to cut out three stanzas on the
Convention of Cintra, which had ceased to be a burning question, and
four more stanzas at the end of the First Canto, which reflected on the
Duke of Wellington, Lord Holland, and other persons of less note. A
stanza on Beckford in the First Canto, and two stanzas in the second on
Lord Elgin, Thomas Hope, and the "Dilettanti crew," were also omitted.
Stanza ix. of the Second Canto, on the immortality of the soul, was
recast, and "sure and certain" hopelessness exchanged for a pious, if
hypothetical, aspiration. But with regard to the general tenor of his
politics and metaphysics, Byron stood firm, and awaited the issue.
There were additions as well as omissions. The first stanza of the First
Canto, stanzas xliii. and xc., which celebrate the battles of Albuera
and Talavera; the stanzas to the memory of Charles Skinner Matthews,
nos. xci., xcii.; and stanzas ix., xcv., xcvi. of the Second Canto, which
record Byron's grief for the death of an unknown lover or friend,
apparently (letter to Dallas, October 31, 1811) the mysterious Thyrza,
and others (_vide post_, note on the MSS. of the First and Second
Cantos of _Childe Harold_), were composed at Newstead, in the autumn of
1811. _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_, quarto, was published on Tuesday,
March 10, 1812--Moore (_Life_, p. 157) implies that the date of issue
was Saturday, February 29; and Dallas (_Recollections_, p. 220) says
that he obtained a copy on Tuesday, March 3 (but see advertisements in
the _Times_ and _Morning Chronicle_ of Thursday, March 5, announcing
future publication, and in the _Courier_ and _Morning Chronicle_ of
Tuesday, March 10, announcing first appearance)--and in three days an
edition of five hundred copies was sold. A second edition, octavo, with
six additional poems (fourteen poems were included in the First
Edition), was issued on April 17; a third on June 27; a fourth, with the
"Addition to the Preface," on September 14; and a fifth on December 5,
1812,--the day on which Murray "acquainted his friends" (see
advertisement in the _Morning Chronicle_) that he had removed from Fleet
Street to No. 50, Albemarle Street. A sixth edition, identical with the
fifth and fourth editions, was issued August 11, 1813; and, on February
1, 1814 (see letter to Murray, February 4, 1814), _Childe Harold_ made a
"seventh appearance." The seventh edition was a new departure
altogether. Not only were nine poems added to the twenty already
published, but a dedication to Lady Charlotte Harley ("Ianthe"), written
in the autumn of 1812, was prefixed to the First Canto, and ten
additional stanzas were inserted towards the end of the Second Canto.
_Childe Harold_, as we have it, differs to that extent from the _Childe
Harold_ which, in a day and a night, made Byron "famous." The dedication
to Ianthe was the outcome of a visit to Eywood, and his devotion to
Ianthe's mother, Lady Oxford; but the new stanzas were probably written
in 1810. In a letter to Dallas, September 7, 1811 (_Letters_, 1898, ii.
28), he writes, "I had projected an additional canto when I was in the
Troad and Constantinople, and if I saw them again, it would go on." This
seems to imply that a beginning had been made. In a poem, a hitherto
unpublished fragment entitled _Il Diavolo Inamorato_ (_vide post_, vol.
iii.), which is dated August 31, 1812, five stanzas and a half, viz.
stanzas lxxiii. lines 5-9, lxxix., lxxx., lxxxi., lxxxii., xxvii. of the
Second Canto of _Childe Harold_ are imbedded; and these form part of
the ten additional stanzas which were first published in the seventh
edition. There is, too, the fragment entitled _The Monk of Athos_, which
was first published (_Life of Lord Byron_, by the Hon. Roden Noel) in
1890, which may have formed part of this projected Third Canto.
No further alterations were made in the text of the poem; but an
eleventh edition of _Childe Harold_, Cantos I., II., was published in
1819.
The demerits of _Childe Harold_ lie on the surface; but it is difficult
for the modern reader, familiar with the sight, if not the texture, of
"the purple patches," and unattracted, perhaps demagnetized, by a
personality once fascinating and always "puissant," to appreciate the
actual worth and magnitude of the poem. We are "o'er informed;" and as
with Nature, so with Art, the eye must be couched, and the film of
association removed, before we can see clearly. But there is one
characteristic feature of _Childe Harold_ which association and
familiarity have been powerless to veil or confuse--originality of
design. "By what accident," asks the Quarterly Reviewer (George Agar
Ellis), "has it happened that no other English poet before Lord Byron
has thought fit to employ his talents on a subject so well suited to
their display?" The question can only be answered by the assertion that
it was the accident of genius which inspired the poet with a "new song."
_Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ had no progenitors, and, with the exception
of some feeble and forgotten imitations, it has had no descendants. The
materials of the poem; the Spenserian stanza, suggested, perhaps, by
Campbell's _Gertrude of Wyoming_, as well as by older models; the
language, the metaphors, often appropriated and sometimes stolen from
the Bible, from Shakespeare, from the classics; the sentiments and
reflections coeval with reflection and sentiment, wear a familiar hue;
but the poem itself, a pilgrimage to scenes and cities of renown, a song
of travel, a rhythmical diorama, was Byron's own handiwork--not an
inheritance, but a creation.
But what of the eponymous hero, the sated and melancholy "Childe," with
his attendant page and yeoman, his backward glances on "heartless
parasites," on "laughing dames," on goblets and other properties of "the
monastic dome"? Is Childe Harold Byron masquerading in disguise, or is
he intended to be a fictitious personage, who, half unconsciously,
reveals the author's personality? Byron deals with the question in a
letter to Dallas (October 31): "I by no means intend to identify myself
with _Harold_, but to _deny_ all connection with him. If in parts I may
be thought to have drawn from myself, believe me it is but in parts, and
I shall not own even to that." He adds, with evident sincerity, "I would
not be such a fellow as I have made my hero for all the world." Again,
in the preface, "Harold is the child of imagination." This pronouncement
was not the whole truth; but it is truer than it seems. He was well
aware that Byron had sate for the portrait of Childe Harold. He had
begun by calling his hero Childe Burun, and the few particulars which he
gives of Childe Burun's past were particulars, in the main exact
particulars, of Byron's own history. He had no motive for concealment,
for, so little did he know himself, he imagined that he was not writing
for publication, that he had done with authorship. Even when the mood
had passed, it was the imitation of the _Ars Poetica_, not _Childe
Harold_, which he was eager to publish; and when _Childe Harold_ had
been offered to and accepted by a publisher, he desired and proposed
that it should appear anonymously. He had not as yet come to the pass of
displaying "the pageant of his bleeding heart" before the eyes of the
multitude. But though he shrank from the obvious and inevitable
conclusion that Childe Harold was Byron in disguise, and idly
"disclaimed" all connection, it was true that he had intended to draw a
fictitious character, a being whom he may have feared he might one day
become, but whom he did not recognize as himself. He was not sated, he
was not cheerless, he was not unamiable. He was all a-quiver with youth
and enthusiasm and the joy of great living. He had left behind him
friends whom he knew were not "the flatterers of the festal
hour"--friends whom he returned to mourn and nobly celebrate. Byron was
not Harold, but Harold was an ideal Byron, the creature and avenger of
his pride, which haunted and pursued its presumptuous creator to the
bitter end.
_Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ was reviewed, or rather advertised, by
Dallas, in the _Literary Panorama_ for March, 1812. To the reviewer's
dismay, the article, which appeared before the poem was out, was shown
to Byron, who was paying a short visit to his old friends at Harrow.
Dallas quaked, but "as it proved no bad advertisement," he escaped
censure. "The blunder passed unobserved, eclipsed by the dazzling
brilliancy of the object which had caused it" (_Recollections_, p. 221).
Of the greater reviews, the _Quarterly_ (No. xiii., March, 1812) was
published on May 12, and the _Edinburgh_ (No. 38, June, 1812) was
published on August 5, 1812.
NOTES ON THE MSS. OF _CHILDE HAROLD_.
I.
The original MS. of the First and Second Cantos of _Childe Harold_,
consisting of ninety-one folios bound up with a single bluish-grey
cover, is in the possession of Mr. Murray.[1] A transcript from this
MS., in the handwriting of R. C. Dallas, with Byron's autograph
corrections, is preserved in the British Museum (Egerton MSS., No.
2027). The first edition (4to) was printed from the transcript as
emended by the author. The "Addition to the Preface" was first published
in the Fourth Edition.
The following notes in Byron's handwriting are on the outside of the
cover of the original MS.:--
"Byron--Joannina in Albania
Begun Oct. 31^st.^ 1809.
Concluded, Canto 2^d, Smyrna,
March 28^th^, 1810. BYRON.
The marginal remarks pencilled occasionally were made by two
friends who saw the thing in MS. sometime previous to publication.
1812."
On the verso of the single bluish-grey cover, the lines, "Dear Object of
Defeated Care," have been inscribed. They are entitled, "Written beneath
the picture of J. U. D." They are dated, "Byron, Athens, 1811."
The following notes and memoranda have been bound up with the MS.:--
"Henry Drury, Harrow. Given me by Lord Byron. Being his original
autograph MS. of the _first_ canto of _Childe Harold_, commenced at
Joannina in Albania, proceeded with at Athens, and completed at
Smyrna."
"How strange that he did not seem to know that the volume contains
Cantos I., II., and so written by L^d.^ B.!" [_Note by J. Murray._]
"Sir,--I desire that you will settle any account for _Childe
Harold_ with Mr. R. C. Dallas, to whom I have presented the
copyright.
Y^r.^ obed^t.^ Serv^t.,^
BYRON.
To Mr. John Murray,
Bookseller,
32, Fleet Street,
London, Mar. 17, 1812."
* * * * *
"Received, April 1st, 1812, of Mr. John Murray, the sum of one
hundred pounds 15/8, being my entire half-share of the profits of
the 1st Edition of _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ 4to.
R. C. DALLAS.
{ Mem.: This receipt is for the above sum,
L101:15:8. { in part of five hundred guineas agreed to
{ be paid by Mr. Murray for the Copyright
{ of _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_."
The following poems are appended to the MS. of the First and Second
Cantos of _Childe Harold_:--
1. "Written at Mrs. Spencer Smith's request, in her memorandum-book--
"'As o'er the cold sepulchral stone.'"
2. "Stanzas written in passing the Ambracian Gulph, November 14, 1809."
3. "Written at Athens, January 16th, 1810--
"'The spell is broke, the charm is flown.'"
4. "Stanzas composed October 11, 1809, during the night in a
thunderstorm, when the guides had lost the road to Zitza, in the range
of mountains formerly called Pindus, in Albania."
On a blank leaf bound up with the MS. at the end of the volume, Byron
wrote--
"Dear D^s.,--This is all that was contained in the MS., but the
outside cover has been torn off by the booby of a binder.
Yours ever,
B."
The volume is bound in smooth green morocco, bordered by a single gilt
line. "MS." in gilt lettering is stamped on the side cover.
II.
COLLATION OF FIRST EDITION, QUARTO, 1812, WITH MS. OF THE FIRST CANTO.
The MS. numbers ninety-one stanzas, the First Edition ninety-three
stanzas.
OMISSIONS FROM THE MS.
Stanza vii. "Of all his train there was a henchman page,"--
Stanza viii. "Him and one yeoman only did he take,"--
Stanza xxii. "Unhappy Vathek! in an evil hour,"--
Stanza xxv. "In golden characters right well designed,"--
Stanza xxvii. "But when Convention sent his handy work,"--
Stanza xxviii. "Thus unto Heaven appealed the people: Heaven,"--
Stanza lxxxviii. "There may you read with spectacles on eyes,"--
Stanza lxxxix. "There may you read--Oh, Phoebus, save Sir John,"--
Stanza xc. "Yet here of Vulpes mention may be made,"--
INSERTIONS IN THE FIRST EDITION.
Stanza i. "Oh, thou! in Hellas deemed of heavenly birth,"--
Stanza viii. "Yet oft-times in his maddest mirthful mood,"--
Stanza ix. "And none did love him!--though to hall and bower,"--
Stanza xliii. "Oh, Albuera! glorious field of grief!"--
Stanza lxxxv. "Adieu, fair Cadiz! yea, a long adieu!"--
Stanza lxxxvi. "Such be the sons of Spain, and strange her Fate,"--
Stanza lxxxviii. "Flows there a tear of Pity for the dead?"--
Stanza lxxxix. "Not yet, alas! the dreadful work is done,"--
Stanza xc. "Not all the blood at Talavera shed,"--
Stanza xci. "And thou, my friend!--since unavailing woe,"--
Stanza xcii. "Oh, known the earliest, and esteemed the most,"--
The MS. of the Second Canto numbers eighty stanzas; the First Edition
numbers eighty-eight stanzas.
OMISSIONS FROM THE MS.
Stanza viii. "Frown not upon me, churlish Priest! that I,"--
Stanza xiv. "Come, then, ye classic Thieves of each degree,"--
Stanza xv. "Or will the gentle Dilettanti crew,"--
Stanza lxiii. "Childe Harold with that Chief held colloquy,"--
INSERTIONS IN THE FIRST EDITION.
Stanza viii. "Yet if, as holiest men have deemed, there be,"--
Stanza ix. "There, Thou! whose Love and Life together fled,"--
Stanza xv. "Cold is the heart, fair Greece! that looks on Thee,"--
Stanza lii. "Oh! where, Dodona! is thine aged Grove?"--
Stanza lxiii. "Mid many things most new to ear and eye,"--
Stanza lxxx. "Where'er we tread 'tis haunted, holy ground,"--
Stanza lxxxiii. "Let such approach this consecrated Land,"--
Stanza lxxxiv. "For thee, who thus in too protracted song,"--
Stanza lxxxv. "Thou too art gone, thou loved and lovely one!"--
Stanza lxxxvi. "Oh! ever loving, lovely, and beloved!"--
Stanza lxxxvii. "Then must I plunge again into the crowd,"--
Stanza lxxxviii. "What is the worst of woes that wait on Age?"--
ADDITIONS TO THE SEVENTH EDITION, 1814.
The Second Canto, in the first six editions, numbers eighty-eight
stanzas; in the Seventh Edition the Second Canto numbers ninety-eight
stanzas.
ADDITIONS.
The Dedication, To Ianthe.
Stanza xxvii. "More blest the life of godly Eremite,"--
Stanza lxxvii. "The city won for Allah from the Giaour,"--
Stanza lxxviii. "Yet mark their mirth, ere Lenten days begin,"--
Stanza lxxix. "And whose more rife with merriment than thine,"--
Stanza lxxx. "Loud was the lightsome tumult on the shore,"--
Stanza lxxxi. "Glanced many a light Caique along the foam,"--
Stanza lxxxii. "But, midst the throng' in merry masquerade,"--
Stanza lxxxiii. "This must he feel, the true-born son of Greece,"--
Stanza lxxxix. "The Sun, the soil--but not the slave, the same,"--
Stanza xc. "The flying Mede, his shaftless broken bow,"--
ITINERARY.
1809. CANTO I.
July 2. Sail from Falmouth in Lisbon packet. (Stanza xii. Letter 125.)
July 6. Arrive Lisbon. (Stanzas xvi., xvii. Letter 126.)
Visit Cintra. (Stanzas xviii.-xxvi. Letter 128.)
Visit Mafra. (Stanza xxix.)
July 17. Leave Lisbon. (Stanza xxviii. Letter 127.)
Ride through Portugal and Spain to Seville.
(Stanzas xxviii.-xlii. Letter 127.)
Visit Albuera. (Stanza xliii.)
July 21. Arrive Seville. (Stanzas xlv., xlvi. Letters 127, 128.)
July 25. Leave Seville.
Ride to Cadiz, across the Sierra Morena. (Stanza li.)
Cadiz. (Stanzas lxv.-lxxxiv. Letters 127, 128.)
CANTO II.
Aug. 6. Arrive Gibraltar. (Letters 127, 128.)
Aug. 17. Sail from Gibraltar in Malta packet. (Stanzas xvii.-xxviii.)
Malta. (Stanzas xxix.-xxxv. Letter 130.)
Sept. 19. Sail from Malta in brig-of-war _Spider_. (Letter 131.)
Sept. 23. Between Cephalonia and Zante.
Sept. 26. Anchor off Patras.
Sept. 27. In the channel between Ithaca and the mainland.
(Stanzas xxxix.-xlii.)
Sept. 28. Anchor off Prevesa (7 p.m.). (Stanza xlv.)
Oct. 1. Leave Prevesa, arrive Salakhora (Salagoura).
Oct. 3. Leave Salakhora, arrive Arta.
Oct. 4. Leave Arta, arrive han St. Demetre (H. Dhimittrios).
Oct. 5. Arrive Janina. (Stanza xlvii. Letter 131.)
Oct. 8. Ride into the country. First day of Ramazan.
Oct. 11. Leave Janina, arrive Zitza ("Lines written during
a Thunderstorm"). (Stanzas xlviii.-li. Letter 131.)
Oct. 13. Leave Zitza, arrive Mossiani (Moseri).
Oct. 14. Leave Mossiani, arrive Delvinaki (Dhelvinaki). (Stanza liv.)
Oct. 15. Leave Delvinaki, arrive Libokhovo.
Oct. 17. Leave Libokhovo, arrive Cesarades (Kestourataes).
Oct. 18. Leave Cesarades, arrive Ereeneed (Irindi).
Oct. 19. Leave Ereeneed, arrive Tepeleni. (Stanzas lv.-lxi.)
Oct. 20. Reception by Ali Pacha. (Stanzas lxii.-lxiv.)
Oct. 23. Leave Tepeleni, arrive Locavo (Lacovon).
Oct. 24. Leave Locavo, arrive Delvinaki.
Oct. 25. Leave Delvinaki, arrive Zitza.
Oct. 26. Leave Zitza, arrive Janina.
Oct. 31. Byron begins the First Canto of _Childe Harold_.
Nov. 3. Leave Janina, arrive han St. Demetre.
Nov. 4. Leave han St. Demetre, arrive Arta.
Nov. 5. Leave Arta, arrive Salakhora.
Nov. 7. Leave Salakhora, arrive Prevesa.
Nov. 8. Sail from Prevesa, anchor off mainland near Parga.
(Stanzas lxvii., lxviii.)
Nov. 9. Leave Parga, and, returning by land, arrive
Volondorako (Valanidorakhon). (Stanza lxix.)
Nov. 10. Leave Volondorako, arrive Castrosikia (Kastrosykia).
Nov. 11. Leave Castrosikia, arrive Prevesa.
Nov. 13. Sail from Prevesa, anchor off Vonitsa.
Nov. 14. Sail from Vonitsa, arrive Lutraki (Loutraki).
(Stanzas lxx., lxxii., Song "Tambourgi, Tambourgi;"
stanza written in passing the Ambracian Gulph. Letter 131.)
Nov. 15. Leave Lutraki, arrive Katuna.
Nov. 16. Leave Katuna, arrive Makala (? Machalas).
1809.
Nov. 18. Leave Makala, arrive Guria.
Nov. 19. Leave Guria, arrive AEtolikon.
Nov. 20. Leave AEtolikon, arrive Mesolonghi.
Nov. 23. Sail from Mesolonghi, arrive Patras.
Dec. 4. Leave Patras, sleep at _Han_ on shore.
Dec. 5. Leave _Han_, arrive Vostitsa (Oegion).
Dec. 14. Sail from Vostitsa, arrive Larnaki (? Itea).
Dec. 15. Leave Larnaki (? Itea), arrive Chryso.
Dec. 16. Visit Delphi, the Pythian Cave, and stream of Castaly.
(Canto I. stanza i.)
Dec. 17. Leave Chryso, arrive Arakhova (Rhakova).
Dec. 18. Leave Arakhova, arrive Livadia (Livadhia).
Dec. 21. Leave Livadia, arrive Mazee (Mazi).
Dec. 22. Leave Mazee, arrive Thebes.
Dec. 24. Leave Thebes, arrive Skurta.
Dec. 25. Leave Skurta, pass Phyle, arrive Athens.
(Stanzas i.-xv., stanza lxxiv.)
Dec. 30. Byron finishes the First Canto of _Childe Harold_.
1810.
Jan. 13. Visit Eleusis.
Jan. 16. Visit Mendeli (Pentelicus). (Stanza lxxxvii.)
Jan. 18. Walk round the peninsula of Munychia.
Jan. 19. Leave Athens, arrive Vari.
Jan. 20. Leave Vari, arrive Keratea.
Jan. 23. Visit temple of Athene at Sunium. (Stanza lxxxvi.)
Jan. 24. Leave Keratea, arrive plain of Marathon.
Jan. 25. Visit plain of Marathon. (Stanzas lxxxix., xc.)
Jan. 26. Leave Marathon, arrive Athens.
Mar. 5. Leave Athens, embark on board the _Pylades_ (Letter 136.)
Mar. 7. Arrive Smyrna. (Letters 132, 133.)
Mar. 13. Leave Smyrna, sleep at _Han_, near the river Halesus.
Mar. 14. Leave _Han_, arrive Aiasaluk (near Ephesus).
Mar. 15. Visit site of temple of Artemis at Ephesus. (Letter 132.)
Mar. 16. Leave Ephesus, return to Smyrna. (Letter 132.)
Mar. 28. Byron finishes the Second Canto of _Childe Harold_.
April 11. Sail from Smyrna in the _Salsette_ frigate. (Letter 134.)
April 12. Anchor off Tenedos.
April 13. Visit ruins of Alexandria Troas.
April 14. Anchor off Cape Janissary.
April 16. Byron attempts to swim across the Hellespont, explores
the Troad. (Letters 135, 136.)
April 30. Visit the springs of Bunarbashi (Bunarbasi).
May 1. Weigh anchor from off Cape Janissary, anchor eight miles
from Dardanelles.
May 2. Anchor off Castle Chanak Kalessia (Kale i Sultaniye).
May 3. Byron and Mr. Ekenhead swim across the Hellespont
(lines "Written after swimming," etc.).
May 13. Anchor off Venaglio Point, arrive Constantinople.
(Stanzas lxxvii.-lxxxii. Letters 138-145.)
July 14. Sail from Constantinople in _Salsette_ frigate.
July 18. Byron returns to Athens.
NOTE TO "ITINERARY."
[For dates and names of towns and villages, see _Travels in Albania, and
other Provinces of Turkey, in 1809 and 1810_, by the Right Hon. Lord
Broughton, G.C.B. [John Cam Hobhouse], two volumes, 1858. The
orthography is based on that of Longmans' _Gazetteer of the World_,
edited by G. G. Chisholm, 1895. The alternative forms are taken from
Heinrich Kiepert's _Carte de l'Epire et de la Thessalie_, Berlin, 1897,
and from Dr. Karl Peucker's _Griechenland_, Wien, 1897.]
CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.
Preface to Vol. II. of the Poems v
Introduction to the First and Second Cantos ix
Notes on the MSS. of the First and Second Cantos xvi
Itinerary xxi
Preface to the First and Second Cantos 3
To Ianthe 11
Canto the First 15
Notes 85
Canto the Second 97
Notes 165
Introduction to Canto the Third 211
Canto the Third 215
Notes 291
Introduction to Canto the Fourth 311
Original Draft, etc., of Canto the Fourth 316
Dedication 321
Canto the Fourth 327
Historical Notes by J. C. Hobhouse 465
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
1. Ianthe (Lady Charlotte Harley), from an Engraving _Frontispiece_
by W. Finden, after a Drawing by R. Westall, R.A.
2. The Duchess of Richmond, from a Miniature by
Richard Cosway, in the Possession of His Grace the
Duke of Richmond and Gordon, K.G.
_To face p._ 228
3. Portrait of Lord Byron at Venice, from a Painting
in Oils by Ruckard, in the Possession of Horatio F.
Brown, Esq. 326
4. The Horses of St. Mark, from a Photograph by
Alinari 338
5. S. Pantaleon, from a Woodcut published at Cremona
in 1493 340
6. The Dying Gaul, from the Original in the Museum of
the Capitol 432
CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE
_A ROMAUNT_.
"L'univers est une espece de livre, dont on n'a lu que la
premiere page quand on n'a vu que son pays. J'en ai feuillete un
assez grand nombre, que j'ai trouve egalement mauvaises. Cet
examen ne m'a point ete infructueux. Je haissais ma patrie. Toutes
les impertinences des peuples divers, parmi lesquels j'ai vecu,
m'ont reconcilie avec elle. Quand je n'aurais tire d'autre
benefice de mes voyages que celui-la, je n'en regretterais ni les
frais ni les fatigues."--_Le Cosmopolite, ou, le Citoyen du
Monde_, par Fougeret de Monbron. Londres, 1753.
PREFACE [a]
[TO THE FIRST AND SECOND CANTOS.]
The following poem was written, for the most part, amidst the scenes
which it attempts[b] to describe. It was begun in Albania; and the parts
relative to Spain and Portugal were composed from the author's
observations in those countries. Thus much it may be necessary to state
for the correctness of the descriptions. The scenes attempted to be
sketched are in Spain, Portugal, Epirus, Acarnania and Greece. There,
for the present, the poem stops: its reception will determine whether
the author may venture to conduct his readers to the capital of the
East, through Ionia and Phrygia: these two cantos are merely
experimental.
A fictitious character is introduced for the sake of giving some
connection to the piece; which, however, makes no pretension to
regularity. It has been suggested to me by friends, on whose opinions I
set a high value,[c]--that in this fictitious character, "Childe
Harold," I may incur the suspicion of having intended some real
personage: this I beg leave, once for all, to disclaim--Harold is the
child of imagination, for the purpose I have stated.
In some very trivial particulars, and those merely local, there might
be grounds for such a notion;[d] but in the main points, I should hope,
none whatever.[e]
It is almost superfluous to mention that the appellation "Childe,"[2] as
"Childe Waters," "Childe Childers," etc., is used as more consonant with
the old structure of versification which I have adopted. The "Good
Night" in the beginning of the first Canto, was suggested by Lord
Maxwell's "Good Night"[3] in the _Border Minstrelsy_, edited by Mr.
Scott.
With the different poems[4] which have been published on Spanish
subjects, there may be found some slight coincidence[f] in the first
part, which treats of the Peninsula, but it can only be casual; as, with
the exception of a few concluding stanzas, the whole of the poem was
written in the Levant.
The stanza of Spenser, according to one of our most successful poets,
admits of every variety. Dr. Beattie makes the following observation:--
"Not long ago I began a poem in the style and stanza of Spenser, in
which I propose to give full scope to my inclination, and be either
droll or pathetic, descriptive or sentimental, tender or satirical, as
the humour strikes me; for, if I mistake not, the measure which I have
adopted admits equally of all these kinds of composition."[5]
Strengthened in my opinion by such authority, and by the example of some
in the highest order of Italian poets, I shall make no apology for
attempts at similar variations in the following composition;[g]
satisfied that, if they are unsuccessful, their failure must be in the
execution, rather than in the design sanctioned by the practice of
Ariosto, Thomson, and Beattie.
London, February, 1812.
ADDITION TO THE PREFACE.
I have now waited till almost all our periodical journals have
distributed their usual portion of criticism. To the justice of the
generality of their criticisms I have nothing to object; it would ill
become me to quarrel with their very slight degree of censure, when,
perhaps, if they had been less kind they had been more candid.
Returning, therefore, to all and each my best thanks for their
liberality, on one point alone I shall venture an observation. Amongst
the many objections justly urged to the very indifferent character of
the "vagrant Childe" (whom, notwithstanding many hints to the contrary,
I still maintain to be a fictitious personage), it has been stated,
that, besides the anachronism, he is very _unknightly_, as the times of
the Knights were times of Love, Honour, and so forth.[6] Now it so
happens that the good old times, when "l'amour du bon vieux tems,
l'amour antique," flourished, were the most profligate of all possible
centuries. Those who have any doubts on this subject may consult
Sainte-Palaye, _passim_, and more particularly vol. ii. p. 69.[7] The
vows of chivalry were no better kept than any other vows whatsoever; and
the songs of the Troubadours were not more decent, and certainly were
much less refined, than those of Ovid. The "Cours d'Amour, parlemens
d'amour, ou de courtoisie et de gentilesse" had much more of love than
of courtesy or gentleness. See Rolland[8] on the same subject with
Sainte-Palaye.
Whatever other objection may be urged to that most unamiable personage
Childe Harold, he was so far perfectly knightly in his attributes--"No
waiter, but a knight templar."[9] By the by, I fear that Sir Tristrem
and Sir Lancelot were no better than they should be, although very
poetical personages and true knights, "sans peur," though not "sans
reproche." If the story of the institution of the "Garter" be not a
fable, the knights of that order have for several centuries borne the
badge of a Countess of Salisbury, of indifferent memory. So much for
chivalry. Burke need not have regretted that its days are over, though
Marie-Antoinette was quite as chaste as most of those in whose honour
lances were shivered, and knights unhorsed.[10]
Before the days of Bayard, and down to those of Sir Joseph Banks[11]
(the most chaste and celebrated of ancient and modern times) few
exceptions will be found to this statement; and I fear a little
investigation will teach us not to regret these monstrous mummeries of
the middle ages.
I now leave "Childe Harold" to live his day such as he is; it had been
more agreeable, and certainly more easy, to have drawn an amiable
character. It had been easy to varnish over his faults, to make him do
more and express less, but he never was intended as an example, further
than to show, that early perversion of mind and morals leads to satiety
of past pleasures and disappointment in new ones, and that even the
beauties of nature and the stimulus of travel (except ambition, the most
powerful of all excitements) are lost on a soul so constituted, or
rather misdirected. Had I proceeded with the Poem, this character would
have deepened as he drew to the close; for the outline which I once
meant to fill up for him was, with some exceptions, the sketch of a
modern Timon,[12] perhaps a poetical Zeluco.[13]
CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE
CANTO THE FIRST.
TO IANTHE.[h][14]
Not in those climes where I have late been straying,
Though Beauty long hath there been matchless deemed,
Not in those visions to the heart displaying
Forms which it sighs but to have only dreamed,
Hath aught like thee in Truth or Fancy seemed:
Nor, having seen thee, shall I vainly seek
To paint those charms which varied as they beamed--
To such as see thee not my words were weak;
To those who gaze on thee what language could they speak?
Ah! may'st thou ever be what now thou art,
Nor unbeseem the promise of thy Spring--
As fair in form, as warm yet pure in heart,
Love's image upon earth without his wing,[15]
And guileless beyond Hope's imagining!
And surely she who now so fondly rears
Thy youth, in thee, thus hourly brightening,
Beholds the Rainbow of her future years,
Before whose heavenly hues all Sorrow disappears.
Young Peri of the West!--'tis well for me
My years already doubly number thine;[16]
My loveless eye unmoved may gaze on thee,
And safely view thy ripening beauties shine;
Happy, I ne'er shall see them in decline;
Happier, that, while all younger hearts shall bleed,
Mine shall escape the doom thine eyes assign
To those whose admiration shall succeed,
But mixed with pangs to Love's even loveliest hours decreed.
Oh! let that eye, which, wild as the Gazelle's,
Now brightly bold or beautifully shy,
Wins as it wanders, dazzles where it dwells,[17]
Glance o'er this page, nor to my verse deny
That smile for which my breast might vainly sigh
Could I to thee be ever more than friend:
This much, dear Maid, accord; nor question why
To one so young my strain I would commend,
But bid me with my wreath one matchless Lily blend.
Such is thy name[18] with this my verse entwined;
And long as kinder eyes a look shall cast[i]
On Harold's page, Ianthe's here enshrined
Shall thus be _first_ beheld, forgotten _last_:
My days once numbered--should this homage past
Attract thy fairy fingers near the Lyre
Of him who hailed thee loveliest, as thou wast--
Such is the most my Memory may desire;
Though more than Hope can claim, could Friendship less require?[j]
* * * * *
CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.
A ROMAUNT.
* * * * *
CANTO THE FIRST.
I.[19]
Oh, thou! in Hellas deemed of heavenly birth,[k]
Muse! formed or fabled at the Minstrel's will!
Since shamed full oft by later lyres on earth,[l][20]
Mine dares not call thee from thy sacred Hill:
Yet there I've wandered by thy vaunted rill;[m]
Yes! sighed o'er Delphi's long deserted shrine,[1.B.]
Where, save that feeble fountain, all is still;
Nor mote my shell awake the weary Nine
To grace so plain a tale--this lowly lay of mine.
II.
Whilome in Albion's isle there dwelt a youth,
Who ne in Virtue's ways did take delight;
But spent his days in riot most uncouth,
And vexed with mirth the drowsy ear of Night.
Ah me! in sooth he was a shameless wight,
Sore given to revel and ungodly glee;[n]
Few earthly things found favour in his sight[o]
Save concubines and carnal companie,
And flaunting wassailers of high and low degree.[21]
III.
Childe Harold was he hight:[22]--but whence his name[p]
And lineage long, it suits me not to say;
Suffice it, that perchance they were of fame,
And had been glorious in another day:
But one sad losel soils a name for ay,[23]
However mighty in the olden time;
Nor all that heralds rake from coffined clay,
Nor florid prose, nor honied lies of rhyme,[q]
Can blazon evil deeds, or consecrate a crime.
IV.
Childe Harold basked him in the Noontide sun,[r]
Disporting there like any other fly;
Nor deemed before his little day was done
One blast might chill him into misery.
But long ere scarce a third of his passed by,
Worse than Adversity the Childe befell;
He felt the fulness of Satiety:
Then loathed he in his native land to dwell,
Which seemed to him more lone than Eremite's sad cell.
V.
For he through Sin's long labyrinth had run,[s]
Nor made atonement when he did amiss,
Had sighed to many though he loved but one,[t][24]
And that loved one, alas! could ne'er be his.
Ah, happy she! to 'scape from him whose kiss
Had been pollution unto aught so chaste;
Who soon had left her charms for vulgar bliss,
And spoiled her goodly lands to gild his waste,
Nor calm domestic peace had ever deigned to taste.
VI.
And now Childe Harold was sore sick at heart,[u]
And from his fellow Bacchanals would flee;
'Tis said, at times the sullen tear would start,
But Pride congealed the drop within his ee:[25]
Apart he stalked in joyless reverie,[v]
And from his native land resolved to go,
And visit scorching climes beyond the sea;[26]
With pleasure drugged, he almost longed for woe,
And e'en for change of scene would seek the shades below.
VII.
The Childe departed from his father's hall:
It was a vast and venerable pile;
So old, it seemed only not to fall,
Yet strength was pillared in each massy aisle.
Monastic dome! condemned to uses vile![w]
Where Superstition once had made her den
Now Paphian girls were known to sing and smile;[x]
And monks might deem their time was come agen,[27]
If ancient tales say true, nor wrong these holy men.
VIII.[y]
Yet oft-times in his maddest mirthful mood
Strange pangs would flash along Childe Harold's brow,[z]
As if the Memory of some deadly feud
Or disappointed passion lurked below:
But this none knew, nor haply cared to know;
For his was not that open, artless soul
That feels relief by bidding sorrow flow,
Nor sought he friend to counsel or condole,
Whate'er this grief mote be, which he could not control.
IX.[aa]
And none did love him!--though to hall and bower[28]
He gathered revellers from far and near,
He knew them flatterers of the festal hour,
The heartless Parasites of present cheer.
Yea! none did love him--not his lemans dear--[ab][29]
But pomp and power alone are Woman's care,
And where these are light Eros finds a feere;[30]
Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare,
And Mammon wins his way where Seraphs might despair.
X.
Childe Harold had a mother--not forgot,[ac]
Though parting from that mother he did shun;
A sister whom he loved, but saw her not[31]
Before his weary pilgrimage begun:
If friends he had, he bade adieu to none.[ad]
Yet deem not thence his breast a breast of steel:[ae][32]
Ye, who have known what 'tis to dote upon
A few dear objects, will in sadness feel
Such partings break the heart they fondly hope to heal.
XI.
His house, his home, his heritage, his lands,[af]
The laughing dames in whom he did delight,[ag]
Whose large blue eyes, fair locks, and snowy hands,
Might shake the Saintship of an Anchorite,
And long had fed his youthful appetite;
His goblets brimmed with every costly wine,
And all that mote to luxury invite,
Without a sigh he left, to cross the brine,
And traverse Paynim shores, and pass Earth's central line.[ah][33]
XII.
The sails were filled, and fair the light winds blew,[ai]
As glad to waft him from his native home;
And fast the white rocks faded from his view,
And soon were lost in circumambient foam:
And then, it may be, of his wish to roam
Repented he, but in his bosom slept[34]
The silent thought, nor from his lips did come
One word of wail, whilst others sate and wept,
And to the reckless gales unmanly moaning kept.
XIII.
But when the Sun was sinking in the sea
He seized his harp, which he at times could string,
And strike, albeit with untaught melody,
When deemed he no strange ear was listening:
And now his fingers o'er it he did fling,
And tuned his farewell in the dim twilight;
While flew the vessel on her snowy wing,
And fleeting shores receded from his sight,
Thus to the elements he poured his last "Good Night."[35]
CHILDE HAROLD'S GOOD NIGHT.
1.
"Adieu, adieu! my native shore
Fades o'er the waters blue;
The night-winds sigh, the breakers roar,
And shrieks the wild sea-mew.
Yon Sun that sets upon the sea
We follow in his flight;
Farewell awhile to him and thee,
My native Land--Good Night!
2.
"A few short hours and He will rise
To give the Morrow birth;
And I shall hail the main and skies,
But not my mother Earth.
Deserted is my own good Hall,
Its hearth is desolate;
Wild weeds are gathering on the wall;
My Dog howls at the gate.
3.
"Come hither, hither, my little page[36]
Why dost thou weep and wail?
Or dost thou dread the billows' rage,
Or tremble at the gale?
But dash the tear-drop from thine eye;
Our ship is swift and strong:
Our fleetest falcon scarce can fly[aj]
More merrily along."[ak]
4.
"Let winds be shrill, let waves roll high,[al]
I fear not wave nor wind:
Yet marvel not, Sir Childe, that I
Am sorrowful in mind;[37]
For I have from my father gone,
A mother whom I love,
And have no friend, save these alone,
But thee--and One above.
5.
'My father blessed me fervently,
Yet did not much complain;
But sorely will my mother sigh
Till I come back again.'--
"Enough, enough, my little lad!
Such tears become thine eye;
If I thy guileless bosom had,
Mine own would not be dry.
6.
"Come hither, hither, my staunch yeoman,[38]
Why dost thou look so pale?
Or dost thou dread a French foeman?
Or shiver at the gale?"--
'Deem'st thou I tremble for my life?
Sir Childe, I'm not so weak;
But thinking on an absent wife
Will blanch a faithful cheek.
7.
'My spouse and boys dwell near thy hall,
Along the bordering Lake,
And when they on their father call,
What answer shall she make?'--
"Enough, enough, my yeoman good,[am]
Thy grief let none gainsay;
But I, who am of lighter mood,
Will laugh to flee away.
8.
"For who would trust the seeming sighs[an]
Of wife or paramour?
Fresh feeres will dry the bright blue eyes
We late saw streaming o'er.
For pleasures past I do not grieve,
Nor perils gathering near;
My greatest grief is that I leave
No thing that claims a tear.[39]
9.
"And now I'm in the world alone,
Upon the wide, wide sea:
But why should I for others groan,
When none will sigh for me?
Perchance my Dog will whine in vain,
Till fed by stranger hands;
But long ere I come back again,
He'd tear me where he stands.[ao][40]
10.
"With thee, my bark, I'll swiftly go
Athwart the foaming brine;
Nor care what land thou bear'st me to,
So not again to mine.
Welcome, welcome, ye dark-blue waves!
And when you fail my sight,
Welcome, ye deserts, and ye caves!
My native Land--Good Night!"
XIV.
On, on the vessel flies, the land is gone,
And winds are rude in Biscay's sleepless bay.
Four days are sped, but with the fifth, anon,
New shores descried make every bosom gay;
And Cintra's mountain[41] greets them on their way,
And Tagus dashing onward to the Deep,
His fabled golden tribute[42] bent to pay;
And soon on board the Lusian pilots leap,
And steer 'twixt fertile shores where yet few rustics reap.[ap]
XV.
Oh, Christ! it is a goodly sight to see
What Heaven hath done for this delicious land![aq]
What fruits of fragrance blush on every tree!
What goodly prospects o'er the hills expand!
But man would mar them with an impious hand:
And when the Almighty lifts his fiercest scourge
'Gainst those who most transgress his high command,
With treble vengeance will his hot shafts urge
Gaul's locust host, and earth from fellest foemen purge[ar]
XVI.
What beauties doth Lisboa[43] first unfold![as]
Her image floating on that noble tide,
Which poets vainly pave with sands of gold,[at]
But now whereon a thousand keels did ride
Of mighty strength, since Albion was allied,
And to the Lusians did her aid afford:
A nation swoln with ignorance and pride,[44]
Who lick yet loathe the hand that waves the sword[au]
To save them from the wrath of Gaul's unsparing lord.
XVII.
But whoso entereth within this town,
That, sheening far, celestial seems to be,
Disconsolate will wander up and down,
'Mid many things unsightly to strange ee;[av]
For hut and palace show like filthily:[aw]
The dingy denizens are reared in dirt;[ax]
Ne personage of high or mean degree
Doth care for cleanness of surtout or shirt,
Though shent with Egypt's plague, unkempt, unwashed, unhurt.
XVIII.
Poor, paltry slaves! yet born 'midst noblest scenes--
Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men?
Lo! Cintra's glorious Eden intervenes[45]
In variegated maze of mount and glen.
Ah, me! what hand can pencil guide, or pen,
To follow half on which the eye dilates
Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken[ay]
Than those whereof such things the Bard relates,
Who to the awe-struck world unlocked Elysium's gates.
XIX.
The horrid crags, by toppling convent crowned,[az]
The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep,
The mountain-moss by scorching skies imbrowned,
The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep,
The tender azure[46] of the unruffled deep,
The orange tints that gild the greenest bough,
The torrents that from cliff to valley leap,[ba]
The vine on high, the willow branch below,
Mixed in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow.
XX.
Then slowly climb the many-winding way,
And frequent turn to linger as you go,
From loftier rocks new loveliness survey,
And rest ye at "Our Lady's house of Woe;"[47][2.B.]
Where frugal monks their little relics show,
And sundry legends to the stranger tell:
Here impious men have punished been, and lo!
Deep in yon cave Honorius long did dwell,
In hope to merit Heaven by making earth a Hell.
XXI.
And here and there, as up the crags you spring,
Mark many rude-carved crosses near the path:[48]
Yet deem not these Devotion's offering--
These are memorials frail of murderous wrath:
For wheresoe'er the shrieking victim hath
Pour'd forth his blood beneath the assassin's knife,
Some hand erects a cross of mouldering lath;
And grove and glen with thousand such are rife
Throughout this purple land, where Law secures not life.[3.B.]
XXII.
On sloping mounds, or in the vale beneath,[49]
Are domes where whilome kings did make repair;
But now the wild flowers round them only breathe:
Yet ruined Splendour still is lingering there.
And yonder towers the Prince's palace fair:
There thou too, Vathek! England's wealthiest son,[bb][50]
Once formed thy Paradise, as not aware
When wanton Wealth her mightiest deeds hath done,[bc]
Meek Peace voluptuous lures was ever wont to shun.
XXIII.
Here didst thou dwell, here schemes of pleasure plan,
Beneath yon mountain's ever beauteous brow:
But now, as if a thing unblest by Man,[bd]
Thy fairy dwelling is as lone as Thou!
Here giant weeds a passage scarce allow
To Halls deserted, portals gaping wide:
Fresh lessons to the thinking bosom, how
Vain are the pleasaunces on earth supplied;[be]
Swept into wrecks anon by Time's ungentle tide!
XXIV.
Behold the hall where chiefs were late convened![4.B.]
Oh! dome displeasing unto British eye!
With diadem hight Foolscap, lo! a Fiend,
A little Fiend that scoffs incessantly,
There sits in parchment robe arrayed, and by[bf]
His side is hung a seal and sable scroll,
Where blazoned glare names known to chivalry,[bg]
And sundry signatures adorn the roll,[bh]
Whereat the Urchin points and laughs with all his soul.[bi]
XXV.
Convention is the dwarfish demon styled[51]
That foiled the knights in Marialva's dome:
Of brains (if brains they had) he them beguiled,
And turned a nation's shallow joy to gloom.
Here Folly dashed to earth the victor's plume,
And Policy regained what arms had lost:
For chiefs like ours in vain may laurels bloom!
Woe to the conquering, not the conquered host,
Since baffled Triumph droops on Lusitania's coast.
XXVI.
And ever since that martial Synod met,
Britannia sickens, Cintra! at thy name;
And folks in office at the mention fret,[bj]
And fain would blush, if blush they could, for shame.
How will Posterity the deed proclaim!
Will not our own and fellow-nations sneer,
To view these champions cheated of their fame,
By foes in fight o'erthrown, yet victors here,
Where Scorn her finger points through many a coming year?
XXVII.
So deemed the Childe, as o'er the mountains he
Did take his way in solitary guise:
Sweet was the scene, yet soon he thought to flee,
More restless than the swallow in the skies:[bk]
Though here awhile he learned to moralise,
For Meditation fixed at times on him;
And conscious Reason whispered to despise
His early youth, misspent in maddest whim;
But as he gazed on truth his aching eyes grew dim.[52]
XXVIII.
To horse! to horse! he quits, for ever quits[53]
A scene of peace, though soothing to his soul:[bl]
Again he rouses from his moping fits,
But seeks not now the harlot and the bowl.[bm]
Onward he flies, nor fixed as yet the goal
Where he shall rest him on his pilgrimage;
And o'er him many changing scenes must roll
Ere toil his thirst for travel can assuage,[bn]
Or he shall calm his breast, or learn experience sage.
XXIX.
Yet Mafra shall one moment claim delay,[5.B.]
Where dwelt of yore the Lusians' luckless queen;[bo][54]
And Church and Court did mingle their array,
And Mass and revel were alternate seen;
Lordlings and freres--ill-sorted fry I ween!
But here the Babylonian Whore hath built
A dome, where flaunts she in such glorious sheen,
That men forget the blood which she hath spilt,
And bow the knee to Pomp that loves to varnish guilt.
XXX.
O'er vales that teem with fruits, romantic hills,
(Oh, that such hills upheld a freeborn race!)
Whereon to gaze the eye with joyaunce fills,
Childe Harold wends through many a pleasant place.[bp]
Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase,
And marvel men should quit their easy chair,
The toilsome way, and long, long league to trace,
Oh! there is sweetness in the mountain air,
And Life, that bloated Ease can never hope to share.
XXXI.
More bleak to view the hills at length recede,
And, less luxuriant, smoother vales extend:[bq]
Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed!
Far as the eye discerns, withouten end,
Spain's realms appear whereon her shepherds tend
Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows--
Now must the Pastor's arm his _lambs_ defend:
For Spain is compassed by unyielding foes,
And _all_ must shield their _all_, or share Subjection's woes.
XXXII.
Where Lusitania and her Sister meet,
Deem ye what bounds the rival realms divide?[br]
Or ere the jealous Queens of Nations greet,
Doth Tayo interpose his mighty tide?
Or dark Sierras rise in craggy pride?
Or fence of art, like China's vasty wall?--
Ne barrier wall, ne river deep and wide,
Ne horrid crags, nor mountains dark and tall,
Rise like the rocks that part Hispania's land from Gaul:[55]
XXXIII.
But these between a silver streamlet[56] glides,
And scarce a name distinguisheth the brook,
Though rival kingdoms press its verdant sides:
Here leans the idle shepherd on his crook,
And vacant on the rippling waves doth look,
That peaceful still 'twixt bitterest foemen flow;
For proud each peasant as the noblest duke:
Well doth the Spanish hind the difference know
'Twixt him and Lusian slave, the lowest of the low.[6.B.]
XXXIV.
But ere the mingling bounds have far been passed,[bs]
Dark Guadiana rolls his power along
In sullen billows, murmuring and vast,
So noted ancient roundelays among.[bt]
Whilome upon his banks did legions throng
Of Moor and Knight, in mailed splendour drest:
Here ceased the swift their race, here sunk the strong;
The Paynim turban and the Christian crest
Mixed on the bleeding stream, by floating hosts oppressed.[57]
XXXV.
Oh, lovely Spain! renowned, romantic Land!
Where is that standard[58] which Pelagio bore,[bu]
When Cava's traitor-sire first called the band
That dyed thy mountain streams with Gothic gore?[7.B.]
Where are those bloody Banners which of yore
Waved o'er thy sons, victorious to the gale,
And drove at last the spoilers to their shore?[59]
Red gleamed the Cross, and waned the Crescent pale,[bv]
While Afric's echoes thrilled with Moorish matrons' wail.
XXXVI.
Teems not each ditty with the glorious tale?[60]
Ah! such, alas! the hero's amplest fate!
When granite moulders and when records fail,
A peasant's plaint prolongs his dubious date.[bw]
Pride! bend thine eye from Heaven to thine estate,
See how the Mighty shrink into a song!
Can Volume, Pillar, Pile preserve thee great?
Or must thou trust Tradition's simple tongue,
When Flattery sleeps with thee, and History does thee wrong?
XXXVII.
Awake, ye Sons of Spain! awake! advance!
Lo! Chivalry, your ancient Goddess, cries,
But wields not, as of old, her thirsty lance,
Nor shakes her crimson plumage in the skies:
Now on the smoke of blazing bolts she flies,
And speaks in thunder through yon engine's roar:
In every peal she calls--"Awake! arise!"
Say, is her voice more feeble than of yore,
When her war-song was heard on Andalusia's shore?
XXXVIII.
Hark!--heard you not those hoofs of dreadful note?
Sounds not the clang of conflict on the heath?
Saw ye not whom the reeking sabre smote,
Nor saved your brethren ere they sank beneath
Tyrants and Tyrants' slaves?--the fires of Death,
The Bale-fires flash on high:--from rock to rock![bx]
Each volley tells that thousands cease to breathe;
Death rides upon the sulphury Siroc,[61]
Red Battle stamps his foot, and Nations feel the shock.
XXXIX.
Lo! where the Giant on the mountain stands,
His blood-red tresses deepening in the Sun,
With death-shot glowing in his fiery hands,
And eye that scorcheth all it glares upon;
Restless it rolls, now fixed, and now anon
Flashing afar,--and at his iron feet
Destruction cowers, to mark what deeds are done;
For on this morn three potent Nations meet,
To shed before his Shrine the blood he deems most sweet.
XL.
By Heaven! it is a splendid sight to see[62]
(For one who hath no friend, no brother there)
Their rival scarfs of mixed embroidery,[by]
Their various arms that glitter in the air!
What gallant War-hounds rouse them from their lair,
And gnash their fangs, loud yelling for the prey!
All join the chase, but few the triumph share;[63]
The Grave shall bear the chiefest prize away,
And Havoc scarce for joy can number their array.
XLI.
Three hosts combine to offer sacrifice;
Three tongues prefer strange orisons on high;
Three gaudy standards flout the pale blue skies;[64]
The shouts are France, Spain, Albion, Victory!
The Foe, the Victim, and the fond Ally
That fights for all, but ever fights in vain,[65]
Are met--as if at home they could not die--
To feed the crow on Talavera's plain,
And fertilise the field that each pretends to gain.
XLII.
There shall they rot--Ambition's honoured fools![bz]
Yes, Honour decks the turf that wraps their clay![66]
Vain Sophistry! in these behold the tools,[ca]
The broken tools, that Tyrants cast away
By myriads, when they dare to pave their way
With human hearts--to what?--a dream alone.
Can Despots compass aught that hails their sway?[cb]
Or call with truth one span of earth their own,
Save that wherein at last they crumble bone by bone?
XLIII.
Oh, Albuera! glorious field of grief![cc][67]
As o'er thy plain the Pilgrim pricked his steed,
Who could foresee thee, in a space so brief,
A scene where mingling foes should boast and bleed![cd]
Peace to the perished! may the warrior's meed[ce]
And tears of triumph their reward prolong![cf]
Till others fall where other chieftains lead
Thy name shall circle round the gaping throng,
And shine in worthless lays, the theme of transient song.[cg][68]
XLIV.
Enough of Battle's minions! let them play
Their game of lives, and barter breath for fame:
Fame that will scarce reanimate their clay,
Though thousands fall to deck some single name.
In sooth 'twere sad to thwart their noble aim
Who strike, blest hirelings! for their country's good,[ch]
And die, that living might have proved her shame;
Perished, perchance, in some domestic feud,
Or in a narrower sphere wild Rapine's path pursued.[ci]
XLV.
Full swiftly Harold wends his lonely way[cj][69]
Where proud Sevilla triumphs unsubdued:[ck]
Yet is she free? the Spoiler's wished-for prey!
Soon, soon shall Conquest's fiery foot intrude,
Blackening her lovely domes with traces rude.
Inevitable hour! 'Gainst fate to strive
Where Desolation plants her famished brood
Is vain, or Ilion, Tyre might yet survive,
And Virtue vanquish all, and Murder cease to thrive
XLVI.
But all unconscious of the coming doom,[70]
The feast, the song, the revel here abounds;
Strange modes of merriment the hours consume,
Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds:
Nor here War's clarion, but Love's rebeck[71] sounds;[cl]
Here Folly still his votaries inthralls;
And young-eyed Lewdness walks her midnight rounds:[cm]
Girt with the silent crimes of Capitals,
Still to the last kind Vice clings to the tott'ring walls.
XLVII.
Not so the rustic--with his trembling mate
He lurks, nor casts his heavy eye afar,
Lest he should view his vineyard desolate,
Blasted below the dun hot breath of War.
No more beneath soft Eve's consenting star
Fandango twirls his jocund castanet:[72]
Ah, Monarchs! could ye taste the mirth ye mar,
Not in the toils of Glory would ye fret;[cn]
The hoarse dull drum would sleep, and Man be happy yet!
XLVIII.
How carols now the lusty muleteer?
Of Love, Romance, Devotion is his lay,
As whilome he was wont the leagues to cheer,
His quick bells wildly jingling on the way?
No! as he speeds, he chants "Viv[=a] el Rey!"[8.B.]
And checks his song to execrate Godoy,
The royal wittol Charles, and curse the day
When first Spain's queen beheld the black-eyed boy,
And gore-faced Treason sprung from her adulterate joy.
XLIX.
On yon long level plain, at distance crowned[73]
With crags, whereon those Moorish turrets rest,
Wide-scattered hoof-marks dint the wounded ground;
And, scathed by fire, the greensward's darkened vest
Tells that the foe was Andalusia's guest:
Here was the camp, the watch-flame, and the host,
Here the bold peasant stormed the Dragon's nest;
Still does he mark it with triumphant boast,
And points to yonder cliffs, which oft were won and lost.
L.
And whomsoe'er along the path you meet
Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue,
Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet:[9.B.]
Woe to the man that walks in public view
Without of loyalty this token true:
Sharp is the knife, and sudden is the stroke;
And sorely would the Gallic foeman rue,
If subtle poniards, wrapt beneath the cloke,
Could blunt the sabre's edge, or clear the cannon's smoke.
LI.
At every turn Morena's dusky height[74]
Sustains aloft the battery's iron load;
And, far as mortal eye can compass sight,
The mountain-howitzer, the broken road,
The bristling palisade, the fosse o'erflowed,
The stationed bands, the never-vacant watch,[co]
The magazine in rocky durance stowed,
The bolstered steed beneath the shed of thatch,
The ball-piled pyramid, the ever-blazing match,[10.B.]
LII.
Portend the deeds to come:--but he whose nod
Has tumbled feebler despots from their sway,
A moment pauseth ere he lifts the rod;
A little moment deigneth to delay:
Soon will his legions sweep through these their way;
The West must own the Scourger of the world.[cp]
Ah! Spain! how sad will be thy reckoning-day,
When soars Gaul's Vulture, with his wings unfurled,[cq]
And thou shall view thy sons in crowds to Hades hurled.
LIII.
And must they fall? the young, the proud, the brave,
To swell one bloated Chiefs unwholesome reign?[75]
No step between submission and a grave?
The rise of Rapine and the fall of Spain?
And doth the Power that man adores ordain
Their doom, nor heed the suppliant's appeal?
Is all that desperate Valour acts in vain?
And Counsel sage, and patriotic Zeal--
The Veteran's skill--Youth's fire--and Manhood's heart of steel?
LIV.
Is it for this the Spanish maid, aroused,
Hangs on the willow her unstrung guitar,
And, all unsexed, the Anlace[76] hath espoused,
Sung the loud song, and dared the deed of war?
And she, whom once the semblance of a scar
Appalled, an owlet's 'larum chilled with dread,[77]
Now views the column-scattering bay'net jar,[cr]
The falchion flash, and o'er the yet warm dead
Stalks with Minerva's step where Mars might quake to tread.
LV.
Ye who shall marvel when you hear her tale,
Oh! had you known her in her softer hour,
Marked her black eye that mocks her coal-black veil,
Heard her light, lively tones in Lady's bower,
Seen her long locks that foil the painter's power,
Her fairy form, with more than female grace,
Scarce would you deem that Saragoza's tower
Beheld her smile in Danger's Gorgon face,
Thin the closed ranks, and lead in Glory's fearful chase.
LVI.
Her lover sinks--she sheds no ill-timed tear;
Her Chief is slain--she fills his fatal post;
Her fellows flee--she checks their base career;
The Foe retires--she heads the sallying host:
Who can appease like her a lover's ghost?
Who can avenge so well a leader's fall?
What maid retrieve when man's flushed hope is lost?
Who hang so fiercely on the flying Gaul,
Foiled by a woman's hand, before a battered wall?[11.B.]
LVII.
Yet are Spain's maids no race of Amazons,
But formed for all the witching arts of love:
Though thus in arms they emulate her sons,
And in the horrid phalanx dare to move,
'Tis but the tender fierceness of the dove,
Pecking the hand that hovers o'er her mate:
In softness as in firmness far above
Remoter females, famed for sickening prate;
Her mind is nobler sure, her charms perchance as great.
LVIII.
The seal Love's dimpling finger hath impressed[cs]
Denotes how soft that chin which bears his touch:[12.B.]
Her lips, whose kisses pout to leave their nest,
Bid man be valiant ere he merit such:
Her glance how wildly beautiful! how much
Hath Phoebus wooed in vain to spoil her cheek,
Which glows yet smoother from his amorous clutch!
Who round the North for paler dames would seek?
How poor their forms appear! how languid, wan, and weak![78]
LIX.
Match me, ye climes! which poets love to laud;
Match me, ye harems of the land! where now
I strike my strain, far distant, to applaud
Beauties that ev'n a cynic must avow;[ct]
Match me those Houries, whom ye scarce allow
To taste the gale lest Love should ride the wind,
With Spain's dark-glancing daughters--deign to know,
There your wise Prophet's Paradise we find,
His black-eyed maids of Heaven, angelically kind.
LX.
Oh, thou Parnassus! whom I now survey,[79][13.B.]
Not in the phrensy of a dreamer's eye,
Not in the fabled landscape of a lay,[cu]
But soaring snow-clad through thy native sky,
In the wild pomp of mountain-majesty!
What marvel if I thus essay to sing?
The humblest of thy pilgrims passing by
Would gladly woo thine Echoes with his string,
Though from thy heights no more one Muse will wave her wing.
LXI.
Oft have I dreamed of Thee! whose glorious name
Who knows not, knows not man's divinest lore:
And now I view thee--'tis, alas, with shame
That I in feeblest accents must adore.
When I recount thy worshippers of yore
I tremble, and can only bend the knee;
Nor raise my voice, nor vainly dare to soar,
But gaze beneath thy cloudy canopy
In silent joy to think at last I look on Thee![80]
LXII.
Happier in this than mightiest Bards have been,
Whose Fate to distant homes confined their lot,
Shall I unmoved behold the hallowed scene,
Which others rave of, though they know it not?
Though here no more Apollo haunts his Grot,
And thou, the Muses' seat, art now their grave,
Some gentle Spirit still pervades the spot,
Sighs in the gale, keeps silence in the Cave,
And glides with glassy foot o'er yon melodious wave.[cv]
LXIII.
Of thee hereafter.--Ev'n amidst my strain
I turned aside to pay my homage here;
Forgot the land, the sons, the maids of Spain;
Her fate, to every freeborn bosom dear;
And hailed thee, not perchance without a tear.
Now to my theme--but from thy holy haunt
Let me some remnant, some memorial bear;[cw]
Yield me one leaf of Daphne's deathless plant,
Nor let thy votary's hope be deemed an idle vaunt.
LXIV.
But ne'er didst thou, fair Mount! when Greece was young,
See round thy giant base a brighter choir,[81]
Nor e'er did Delphi, when her Priestess sung
The Pythian hymn with more than mortal fire,
Behold a train more fitting to inspire
The song of love, than Andalusia's maids,
Nurst in the glowing lap of soft Desire:
Ah! that to these were given such peaceful shades
As Greece can still bestow, though Glory fly her glades.
LXV.
Fair is proud Seville; let her country boast
Her strength, her wealth, her site of ancient days;[14.B.]
But Cadiz, rising on the distant coast,[82]
Calls forth a sweeter, though ignoble praise.
Ah, Vice! how soft are thy voluptuous ways!
While boyish blood is mantling, who can 'scape[cx]
The fascination of thy magic gaze?
A Cherub-Hydra round us dost thou gape,
And mould to every taste thy dear delusive shape.
LXVI.
When Paphos fell by Time--accursed Time!
The Queen who conquers all must yield to thee--
The Pleasures fled, but sought as warm a clime;
And Venus, constant to her native Sea,
To nought else constant, hither deigned to flee,
And fixed her shrine within these walls of white:
Though not to one dome circumscribeth She
Her worship, but, devoted to her rite,
A thousand Altars rise, for ever blazing bright.[83]
LXVII.
From morn till night, from night till startled Morn[84]
Peeps blushing on the Revel's laughing crew,
The Song is heard, the rosy Garland worn;
Devices quaint, and Frolics ever new,
Tread on each other's kibes.[85] A long adieu
He bids to sober joy that here sojourns:
Nought interrupts the riot, though in lieu[cy]
Of true devotion monkish incense burns,
And Love and Prayer unite, or rule the hour by turns.[cz]
LXVIII.
The Sabbath comes, a day of blessed rest:
What hallows it upon this Christian shore?
Lo! it is sacred to a solemn Feast:
Hark! heard you not the forest-monarch's roar?
Crashing the lance, he snuffs the spouting gore
Of man and steed, o'erthrown beneath his horn;
The thronged arena shakes with shouts for more;
Yells the mad crowd o'er entrails freshly torn,
Nor shrinks the female eye, nor ev'n affects to mourn.
LXIX.[86]
The seventh day this--the Jubilee of man!
London! right well thou know'st the day of prayer:
Then thy spruce citizen, washed artisan,
And smug apprentice gulp their weekly air:
Thy coach of hackney, whiskey,[87] one-horse chair,
And humblest gig through sundry suburbs whirl,[da]
To Hampstead, Brentford, Harrow make repair;
Till the tired jade the wheel forgets to hurl,
Provoking envious gibe from each pedestrian churl.[db]
LXX.
Some o'er thy Thamis row the ribboned fair,[dc]
Others along the safer turnpike fly;
Some Richmond-hill ascend, some scud to Ware,
And many to the steep of Highgate hie.
Ask ye, Boeotian Shades! the reason why?[15.B.]
'Tis to the worship of the solemn Horn,[88]
Grasped in the holy hand of Mystery,
In whose dread name both men and maids are sworn,
And consecrate the oath with draught, and dance till morn.
LXXI.
All have their fooleries--not alike are thine,
Fair Cadiz, rising o'er the dark blue sea![89]
Soon as the Matin bell proclaimeth nine,
Thy Saint-adorers count the Rosary:
Much is the VIRGIN teased to shrive them free
(Well do I ween the only virgin there)
From crimes as numerous as her beadsmen be;
Then to the crowded circus forth they fare:
Young, old, high, low, at once the same diversion share.
LXXII.
The lists are oped, the spacious area cleared,[90]
Thousands on thousands piled are seated round;
Long ere the first loud trumpet's note is heard,
Ne vacant space for lated wight is found:
Here Dons, Grandees, but chiefly Dames abound,
Skilled in the ogle of a roguish eye,
Yet ever well inclined to heal the wound;
None through their cold disdain are doomed to die,
As moon-struck bards complain, by Love's sad archery.
LXXIII.
Hushed is the din of tongues--on gallant steeds,
With milk-white crest, gold spur, and light-poised lance,
Four cavaliers prepare for venturous deeds,
And lowly-bending to the lists advance;
Rich are their scarfs, their chargers featly prance:
If in the dangerous game they shine to-day,
The crowd's loud shout and ladies' lovely glance,
Best prize of better acts! they bear away,
And all that kings or chiefs e'er gain their toils repay.
LXXIV.
In costly sheen and gaudy cloak arrayed.
But all afoot, the light-limbed Matadore
Stands in the centre, eager to invade
The lord of lowing herds; but not before
The ground, with cautious tread, is traversed o'er,
Lest aught unseen should lurk to thwart his speed:
His arms a dart, he fights aloof, nor more
Can Man achieve without the friendly steed--
Alas! too oft condemned for him to bear and bleed.
LXXV.
Thrice sounds the Clarion; lo! the signal falls,
The den expands, and Expectation mute
Gapes round the silent circle's peopled walls.
Bounds with one lashing spring the mighty brute,
And, wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot,
The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe:
Here, there, he points his threatening front, to suit
His first attack, wide-waving to and fro
His angry tail; red rolls his eye's dilated glow.
LXXVI.
Sudden he stops--his eye is fixed--away--
Away, thou heedless boy! prepare the spear:
Now is thy time, to perish, or display
The skill that yet may check his mad career!
With well-timed croupe[91] the nimble coursers veer;
On foams the Bull, but not unscathed he goes;
Streams from his flank the crimson torrent clear:
He flies, he wheels, distracted with his throes;
Dart follows dart--lance, lance--loud bellowings speak his woes.
LXXVII.
Again he comes; nor dart nor lance avail,
Nor the wild plunging of the tortured horse;
Though Man and Man's avenging arms assail,
Vain are his weapons, vainer is his force.
One gallant steed is stretched a mangled corse;
Another, hideous sight! unseamed appears,
His gory chest unveils life's panting source;
Though death-struck, still his feeble frame he rears;
Staggering, but stemming all, his Lord unharmed he bears.
LXXVIII.
Foiled, bleeding, breathless, furious to the last,
Full in the centre stands the Bull at bay,
Mid wounds, and clinging darts, and lances brast,[92]
And foes disabled in the brutal fray:
And now the Matadores[93] around him play,
Shake the red cloak, and poise the ready brand:
Once more through all he bursts his thundering way--
Vain rage! the mantle quits the conynge hand,
Wraps his fierce eye--'tis past--he sinks upon the sand![dd]
LXXIX.
Where his vast neck just mingles with the spine,
Sheathed in his form the deadly weapon lies.
He stops--he starts--disdaining to decline:
Slowly he falls, amidst triumphant cries,
Without a groan, without a struggle dies.
The decorated car appears--on high
The corse is piled--sweet sight for vulgar eyes--[de][94]
Four steeds that spurn the rein, as swift as shy,
Hurl the dark bulk along, scarce seen in dashing by.
LXXX.
Such the ungentle sport that oft invites
The Spanish maid, and cheers the Spanish swain.
Nurtured in blood betimes, his heart delights
In vengeance, gloating on another's pain.
What private feuds the troubled village stain!
Though now one phalanxed host should meet the foe,
Enough, alas! in humble homes remain,
To meditate 'gainst friend the secret blow,
For some slight cause of wrath, whence Life's warm stream must flow.[95]
LXXXI.
But Jealousy has fled: his bars, his bolts,
His withered Centinel,[96] Duenna sage!
And all whereat the generous soul revolts,[df]
Which the stern dotard deemed he could encage,
Have passed to darkness with the vanished age.
Who late so free as Spanish girls were seen,
(Ere War uprose in his volcanic rage,)
With braided tresses bounding o'er the green,
While on the gay dance shone Night's lover-loving Queen?
LXXXII.
Oh! many a time and oft, had Harold loved,
Or dreamed he loved, since Rapture is a dream;
But now his wayward bosom was unmoved,
For not yet had he drunk of Lethe's stream;
And lately had he learned with truth to deem
Love has no gift so grateful as his wings:
How fair, how young, how soft soe'er he seem,
Full from the fount of Joy's delicious springs[dg]
Some bitter o'er the flowers its bubbling venom flings.[16.B.]
LXXXIII.
Yet to the beauteous form he was not blind,
Though now it moved him as it moves the wise;
Not that Philosophy on such a mind
E'er deigned to bend her chastely-awful eyes:
But Passion raves herself[97] to rest, or flies;
And Vice, that digs her own voluptuous tomb,
Had buried long his hopes, no more to rise:[dh]
Pleasure's palled Victim! life-abhorring Gloom
Wrote on his faded brow curst Cain's unresting doom.[98]
LXXXIV.
Still he beheld, nor mingled with the throng;
But viewed them not with misanthropic hate:
Fain would he now have joined the dance, the song;
But who may smile that sinks beneath his fate?
Nought that he saw his sadness could abate:
Yet once he struggled 'gainst the Demon's sway,
And as in Beauty's bower he pensive sate,
Poured forth his unpremeditated lay,
To charms as fair as those that soothed his happier day.
TO INEZ.[99]
1.
Nay, smile not at my sullen brow;
Alas! I cannot smile again:
Yet Heaven avert that ever thou
Shouldst weep, and haply weep in vain.
2.
And dost thou ask what secret woe
I bear, corroding Joy and Youth?
And wilt thou vainly seek to know
A pang, ev'n thou must fail to soothe?
3.
It is not love, it is not hate,
Nor low Ambition's honours lost,
That bids me loathe my present state,
And fly from all I prized the most:
4.
It is that weariness which springs
From all I meet, or hear, or see:
To me no pleasure Beauty brings;
Thine eyes have scarce a charm for me.
5.
It is that settled, ceaseless gloom
The fabled Hebrew Wanderer bore;
That will not look beyond the tomb,
But cannot hope for rest before.
6.
What Exile from himself can flee?[100]
To zones though more and more remote,[di]
Still, still pursues, where'er I be,
The blight of Life--the Demon Thought.[101]
7.
Yet others rapt in pleasure seem,
And taste of all that I forsake;
Oh! may they still of transport dream,
And ne'er--at least like me--awake!
8.
Through many a clime 'tis mine to go,
With many a retrospection curst;
And all my solace is to know,
Whate'er betides, I've known the worst.
9.
What is that worst? Nay do not ask--
In pity from the search forbear:
Smile on--nor venture to unmask
Man's heart, and view the Hell that's there.
Jan. 25. 1810.--[MS.]
LXXXV.
Adieu, fair Cadiz! yea, a long adieu!
Who may forget how well thy walls have stood?
When all were changing thou alone wert true,
First to be free and last to be subdued;[102]
And if amidst a scene, a shock so rude,
Some native blood was seen thy streets to dye,
A Traitor only fell beneath the feud: [17.B.]
Here all were noble, save Nobility;
None hugged a Conqueror's chain, save fallen Chivalry!
LXXXVI.
Such be the sons of Spain, and strange her Fate!
They fight for Freedom who were never free,
A Kingless people for a nerveless state;[103]
Her vassals combat when their Chieftains flee,
True to the veriest slaves of Treachery:
Fond of a land which gave them nought but life,
Pride points the path that leads to Liberty;
Back to the struggle, baffled in the strife,
War, war is still the cry, "War even to the knife!"[18.B.]
LXXXVII.
Ye, who would more of Spain and Spaniards know[dj]
Go, read whate'er is writ of bloodiest strife:
Whate'er keen Vengeance urged on foreign foe
Can act, is acting there against man's life:
From flashing scimitar to secret knife,
War mouldeth there each weapon to his need--
So may he guard the sister and the wife,
So may he make each curst oppressor bleed--
So may such foes deserve the most remorseless deed!
LXXXVIII.[104]
Flows there a tear of Pity for the dead?
Look o'er the ravage of the reeking plain;
Look on the hands with female slaughter red;
Then to the dogs resign the unburied slain,
Then to the vulture let each corse remain,
Albeit unworthy of the prey-bird's maw;
Let their bleached bones, and blood's unbleaching stain,
Long mark the battle-field with hideous awe:
Thus only may our sons conceive the scenes we saw!
LXXXIX.
Nor yet, alas! the dreadful work is done;
Fresh legions pour adown the Pyrenees:
It deepens still, the work is scarce begun,
Nor mortal eye the distant end foresees.
Fall'n nations gaze on Spain; if freed, she frees
More than her fell Pizarros once enchained:
Strange retribution! now Columbia's ease
Repairs the wrongs that Quito's sons sustained,[105]
While o'er the parent clime prowls Murder unrestrained.
XC.
Not all the blood at Talavera shed,
Not all the marvels of Barossa's fight,
Not Albuera lavish of the dead,
Have won for Spain her well asserted right.
When shall her Olive-Branch be free from blight?
When shall she breathe her from the blushing toil?
How many a doubtful day shall sink in night,
Ere the Frank robber turn him from his spoil,
And Freedom's stranger-tree grow native of the soil![106]
XCI.
And thou, my friend!--since unavailing woe[dk][107][19.B.]
Bursts from my heart, and mingles with the strain--
Had the sword laid thee with the mighty low,
Pride might forbid e'en Friendship to complain:
But thus unlaurelled to descend in vain,
By all forgotten, save the lonely breast,
And mix unbleeding with the boasted slain,
While Glory crowns so many a meaner crest!
What hadst thou done to sink so peacefully to rest?
XCII.
Oh, known the earliest, and esteemed the most![dl][108]
Dear to a heart where nought was left so dear![dm]
Though to my hopeless days for ever lost,
In dreams deny me not to see thee here!
And Morn in secret shall renew the tear
Of Consciousness awaking to her woes,
And Fancy hover o'er thy bloodless bier,[dn]
Till my frail frame return to whence it rose,
And mourned and mourner lie united in repose.
XCIII.
Here is one fytte[109] of Harold's pilgrimage:
Ye who of him may further seek to know,
Shall find some tidings in a future page,
If he that rhymeth now may scribble moe.
Is this too much? stern Critic! say not so:
Patience! and ye shall hear what he beheld
In other lands, where he was doomed to go:
Lands that contain the monuments of Eld,
Ere Greece and Grecian arts by barbarous hands were quelled.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] "The first and second cantos of _Childe Harold_ were written in
separate portions by the noble author. They were afterwards arranged for
publication; and when thus arranged, the whole was copied. This copy was
placed in Lord Byron's hands, and he made various alterations,
corrections, and large additions. These, together with the notes, are in
his Lordship's own handwriting. The manuscript thus corrected was sent
to the press, and was printed under the direction of Robt. Chas. Dallas,
Esq., to whom Lord Byron had given the copyright of the poem. The MS.,
as it came from the printers, was preserved by Mr. Dallas, and is now in
the possession of his son, the Rev. Alex. Dallas."
[See Dallas Transcript, p. 1. Mus. Brit. Bibl. Egerton, 2027. Press 526.
H. T.]
[a] {3} _Advertisement to be prefixed y^e Poem_.--[MS. B.M.]
[b] _Professes to describe_.--[MS. B.M.]
[c] ----_that in the fictitious character of "Childe Harold" I may incur
the suspicion of having drawn "from myself." This I beg leave once for
all to disclaim. I wanted a character to give some connection to the
poem, and the one adopted suited my purpose as well as any other_.--[MS.
B.M.]
[d] {4} _Such an idea_.--[MS. B.M.]
[e] _My readers will observe that where the author speaks in his own
person he assumes a very different tone from that of_
"_The cheerless thing, the man without a friend_,"
_at least, till death had deprived him of his nearest connections_.
_I crave pardon for this Egotism, which proceeds from my wish to discard
any probable imputation of it to the text_.--[MS. B.M.]
[2] ["In the 13th and 14th centuries the word 'child,' which signifies a
youth of gentle birth, appears to have been applied to a young noble
awaiting knighthood, e.g. in the romances of _Ipomydon_, _Sir Tryamour_,
etc. It is frequently used by our old writers as a title, and is
repeatedly given to Prince Arthur in the _Faerie Queene_"--(_N. Eng.
Dict._, art. "Childe").
Byron uses the word in the Spenserian sense, as a title implying youth
and nobility.]
[3] [John, Lord Maxwell, slew Sir James Johnstone at Achmanhill, April
6, 1608, in revenge for his father's defeat and death at Dryffe Sands,
in 1593. He was forced to flee to France. Hence his "Good Night."
Scott's ballad is taken, with "some slight variations," from a copy in
Glenriddel's MSS.--_Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border_, 1810, i.
290-300.]
[4] [Amongst others, _The Battle of Talavera_, by John Wilson Croker,
appeared in 1809; _The Vision of Don Roderick_, by Walter Scott, in
1811; and _Portugal, a Poem_, by Lord George Grenville, in 1812.]
[f] _Some casual coincidence_.--[MS. B.M.]
[5] {5} Beattie's Letters. [See letter to Dr. Blacklock, September 22,
1766 (_Life of Beattie_, by Sir W. Forbes, 1806, i. 89).]
[g] _Satisfied that their failure_.--[MS. B.M.]
[6] [See _Quarterly Review_, March, 1812, vol. vii. p. 191: "The moral
code of chivalry was not, we admit, quite pure and spotless, but its
laxity on some points was redeemed by the noble spirit of gallantry
which courted personal danger in the defence of the sovereign ... of
women because they are often lovely, and always helpless; and of the
priesthood.... Now, _Childe Harold_, if not absolutely craven and
recreant, is at least a mortal enemy to all martial exertion, a scoffer
at the fair sex, and, apparently, disposed to consider all religions as
different modes of superstition." The tone of the review is severer than
the Preface indicates. Nor does Byron attempt to reply to the main issue
of the indictment, an unknightly aversion from war, but rides off on a
minor point, the licentiousness of the Troubadours.]
[7] {6} [See _Memoires sur l'Ancienne Chevalerie_, par M. De la Curne de
Sainte-Palaye, Paris, 1781: "Qu'on lise dans l'auteur du roman de Gerard
de Roussillon, en Provencal, les details tres-circonstancies dans
lesquels il entre sur la reception faite par le Comte Gerard a
l'ambassadeur du roi Charles; on y verra des particularites singulieres
qui donnent une etrange idee des moeurs et de la politesse de ces
siecles aussi corrompus qu'ignorans" (ii. 69). See, too, _ibid., ante_,
p. 65: "Si l'on juge des moeurs d'un siecle par les ecrits qui nous en
sont restes, nous serons en droit de juger que nos ancetres observerent
mal les loix que leur prescrivirent la decence et l'honnetete."]
[8] [See _Recherches sur les Prerogatives des Dames chez les Gaulois sur
les Cours d'Amours_, par M. le President Rolland [d'Erceville], de
l'Academie d'Amiens. Paris, 1787, pp. 18-30, 117, etc.]
[9] [The phrase occurs in _The Rovers, or the Double Arrangement_
(_Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin_, 1854, p. 199), by J. Hookham Frere, a
skit on the "moral inculcated by the German dramas--the reciprocal
duties of one or more husbands to one or more wives." The waiter at the
Golden Eagle at Weimar is a warrior in disguise, and rescues the hero,
who is imprisoned in the abbey of Quedlinburgh.]
[10] {7} ["But the age of chivalry is gone--the unbought grace of life,
the cheap defence of nations," etc. (_Reflections on the Revolution in
France_, by the Right Hon. Edmund Burke, M.P., 1868, p. 89).]
[11] [Passages relating to the Queen of Tahiti, in _Hawkesworth's
Voyages, drawn from journals kept by the several commanders, and from
the papers of Joseph Banks, Esq._ (1773, ii. 106), gave occasion to
malicious and humorous comment. (See _An Epistle from Mr. Banks,
Voyager, Monster-hunter, and Amoroso, To Oberea, Queen of Otaheite_, by
A.B.C.) The lampoon, "printed at Batavia for Jacobus Opani" (the Queen's
Tahitian for "Banks"), was published in 1773. The authorship is assigned
to Major John Scott Waring (1747-1819).]
[12] {8} [Compare _Childish Recollections: Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 84,
_var_. i.--
"Weary of love, of life, devour'd with spleen,
I rest a perfect Timon, not nineteen."]
[13] [John Moore (1729-1802), the father of the celebrated Sir John
Moore, published _Zeluco. Various views of Human Nature, taken from Life
and Manners, Foreign and Domestic_, in 1789. Zeluco was an unmitigated
scoundrel, who led an adventurous life; but the prolix narrative of his
villanies does not recall _Childe Harold_. There is, perhaps, some
resemblance between Zeluco's unbridled childhood and youth, due to the
indulgence of a doting mother, and Byron's early emancipation from
discipline and control.]
[h] {11} _To the Lady Charlotte Harley_.--[MS. M.]
[14] [The Lady Charlotte Mary Harley, second daughter of Edward, fifth
Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, was born 1801. She married, in 1823,
Captain Anthony Bacon (died July 2, 1864), who had followed "young,
gallant Howard" (see _Childe Harold_, III. xxix.) in his last fatal
charge at Waterloo, and who, subsequently, during the progress of the
civil war between Dom Miguel and Maria da Gloria of Portugal (1828-33),
held command as colonel of cavalry in the Queen's forces, and finally as
a general officer. Lady Charlotte Bacon died May 9, 1880. Byron's
acquaintance with her probably dated from his visit to Lord and Lady
Oxford, at Eywood House, in Herefordshire, in October-November, 1812.
Her portrait, by Westall, which was painted at his request, is included
among the illustrations in Finden's _Illustrations of the Life and Works
of Lord Byron_, ii. See _Gent. Mag_., N.S., vol. xvii. (1864) p. 261;
and an obituary notice in the Times, May 10, 1880, See, too, letter to
Murray, March 29, 1813 (_Letters_, 1898, ii. 200).]
[15] {12} [The reference is to the French proverb, _L'Amitie est l'Amour
sans Ailes_, which suggested the last line (line 412) of _Childish
Recollections_, "And Love, without his pinion, smil'd on youth," and
forms the title of one of the early poems, first published in 1832
(_Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 106, 220).]
[16] [In 1814, when the dedication was published, Byron completed his
twenty-sixth year, Ianthe her thirteenth.]
[17] {13} [For the modulation of the verse, compare Pope's lines--
"Correctly cold, and regularly low."
_Essay on Criticism_, line 240.
"Glows while he reads, but trembles as he writes."
_Ibid_., line 198.]
[18] [Ianthe ("Flower o' the Narcissus") was the name of a Cretan girl
wedded to one Iphis (_vid_. Ovid., _Metamorph_., ix. 714). Perhaps
Byron's dedication was responsible for the Ianthe of _Queen Mab_ (1812,
1813), who in turn bestowed her name on Shelley's eldest daughter (Mrs.
Esdaile, d. 1876), who was born June 28, 1813.]
[i]
_And long as kinder eyes shall deign to cast_
_A look along my page, that name enshrined_
_Shalt thou be_ first _beheld, forgotten_ last.--[MS.]
[j] {13} _Though more than Hope can claim--Ah! less could I
require?_--[MS.]
[19] {15} [The MS. does not open with stanza i., which was written after
Byron returned to England, and appears first in the Dallas Transcript
(see letter to Murray, September 5, 1811). Byron and Hobhouse visited
Delphi, December 16, 1809, when the First Canto (see stanza lx.) was
approaching completion (_Travels in Albania_, by Lord Broughton, 1858,
i. 199).]
[k] _Oh, thou of yore esteemed_----.--[D.]
[l] _Since later lyres are only strung on earth_.--[D.]
[20] [For the substitution of the text for _vars_. ii., iii., see letter
to Dallas, September 21, 1811 (_Letters_, 1898, ii. 43).]
[m]
----_thy glorious rill_.--[D.]
or, --_wooed thee, drank the vaunted rill_.--[D.]
[n] {16} _Sore given to revel and to Pageantry_.--[MS. erased.]
[o]
_He chused the bad, and did the good affright_
_With concubines_----.--[MS.]
_No earthly things_----.--[D.]
[21] ["We [i.e. Byron and C.S. Matthews] went down [April, 1809] to
Newstead together, where I had got a famous cellar, and _Monks'_ dresses
from a masquerade warehouse. We were a company of some seven or eight,
... and used to sit up late in our friars' dresses, drinking burgundy,
claret, champagne, and what not, out of the _skull-cup_, and all sorts
of glasses, and buffooning all round the house, in our conventual
garments" (letter to Murray, November 19, 1820. See, too, the account of
this visit which Matthews wrote to his sister in a letter dated May 22,
1809 [_Letters_, 1898, i. 150-160, and 153, note]). Moore (_Life_, p.
86) and other apologists are anxious to point out that the Newstead
"wassailers" were, on the whole, a harmless crew of rollicking
schoolboys "--were, indeed, of habits and tastes too intellectual for
mere vulgar debauchery." And as to the "alleged 'harems,'" the "Paphian
girls," there were only one or two, says Moore, "among the ordinary
menials." But, even so, the "wassailers" were not impeccable, and it is
best to leave the story, fact or fable, to speak for itself.]
[22] {17} ["Hight" is the preterite of the passive "hote," and means
"was called." "Childe Harold he hight" would be more correct. Compare
Spenser's _Faerie Queene_, bk. i. c. ix. 14. 9, "She Queene of Faeries
hight." But "hight" was occasionally used with the common verbs "is,"
"was." Compare _The Ordinary_, 1651, act iii. sc. 1--
"... the goblin
That is _hight_ Good-fellow Robin."
Dodsley (ed. Hazlitt), xii. 253.]
[p] _Childe Burun_------.--[MS.]
[23] [William, fifth Lord Byron (the poet's grand-uncle), mortally
wounded his kinsman, Mr. Chaworth, in a duel which was fought, without
seconds or witnesses, at the Star and Garter Tavern, Pall Mall, January
29, 1765. He was convicted of wilful murder by the coroner's jury, and
of manslaughter by the House of Lords; but, pleading his privilege as a
peer, he was set at liberty. He was known to the country-side as the
"wicked Lord," and many tales, true and apocryphal, were told to his
discredit (_Life of Lord Byron_, by Karl Elze, 1872, pp. 5, 6).]
[q] ------_nor honied glose of rhyme_.--[D. pencil.]
[r] _Childe Burun_------.--[MS.]
[s] {18} _For he had on the course too swiftly run_.--[MS. erased.]
[t] _Had courted many_----.--[MS. erased.]
[24] [Mary Chaworth. (Compare "Stanzas to a Lady, on leaving England,"
passim: _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 285.)]
[u] ----_Childe Burun_----.--[MS.]
[25] {19} [Compare _The Lay of the Last Minstrel_, Canto I,
stanza ix. 9--
"And burning pride and high disdain
Forbade the rising tears to flow."]
[v]
_And strait he fell into a reverie_.--[MS.]
----_sullen reverie_.--[D.]
[26] [_Vide post_, stanza xi. line 9, note.]
[w] _Strange fate directed still to uses vile_.--[MS. erased.]
[x]
_Now Paphian jades were heard to sing and smile_.--[MS. erased.]
_Now Paphian nymphs_----.--[D. pencil.]
[27] [The brass eagle which was fished out of the lake at Newstead in
the time of Byron's predecessor contained, among other documents, "a
grant of full pardon from Henry V. of every possible crime ... which the
monks might have committed previous to the 8th of December preceding
(_Murdris_, per ipsos _post decimum nonum Diem Novembris_, ultimo
praeteritum perpetratis, si quae fuerint, _exceptis_)" (_Life_, p. 2,
note). The monks were a constant source of delight to the Newstead
"revellers." Francis Hodgson, in his "Lines on a Ruined Abbey in a
Romantic Country" (_Poems_, 1809), does not spare them--
"'Hail, venerable pile!' whose ivied walls
Proclaim the desolating lapse of years:
And hail, ye hills, and murmuring waterfalls,
Where yet her head the ruin'd Abbey rears.
No longer now the matin tolling bell,
Re-echoing loud among the woody glade,
Calls the fat abbot from his drowsy cell,
And warns the maid to flee, if yet a maid.
No longer now the festive bowl goes round,
Nor monks get drunk in honour of their God."]
[y] {20} The original MS. inserts two stanzas which were rejected during
the composition of the poem:--
_Of all his train there was a henchman page,_
_peasant_ _served_
_A {-dark eyed-} boy, who {-loved-} his master well;_
_And often would his pranksome prate engage_
_Harold's_
_Childe {-Burun's-} ear, when his proud heart did swell_
_With sable thoughts that he disdained to tell_.
_Alwin_
_Then would he smile on him, as {-Rupert-} smiled,_
_{-Robin-}_
_When aught that from his young lips archly fell_
_Harold's_
_The gloomy film from {-Burun's-} eye beguiled;_
_And pleased the Childe appeared nor ere the boy reviled_.}
_And pleased for a glimpse appeared the woeful Childe_. }
_Him and one yeoman only did he take_
_To travel Eastward to a far countree;_
_And though the boy was grieved to leave the lake_
_On whose firm banks he grew from Infancy,_
_Eftsoons his little heart beat merrily_
_With hope of foreign nations to behold,_
_And many things right marvellous to see,_
_vaunting_
_Of which our {-lying-} voyagers oft have told,_
_{-From Mandevilles' and scribes of similar mold.-}_ }
or, _In tomes pricked out with prints to monied ... sold_}
_In many a tome as true as Mandeville's of old_. }
[z] ----_Childe Burun_----.--[MS.]
[aa] {21} Stanza ix. was the result of much elaboration. The first
draft, which was pasted over the rejected stanzas (_vide supra_, p. 20,
_var_. i.), retains the numerous erasures and emendations. It ran as
follows:--
_And none did love him though to hall and bower_
_{-few could-}_
_Haughty he gathered revellers from far and near_
_{-An evil smile just bordering on a sneer-}_
_He knew them flatterers of the festal hour_
_{-Curled on his lip-}_
_The heartless Parasites of present cheer,_
_As if_
_{-And deemed no mortal wight his peer-}_
_Yea! none did love him not his lemmans dear_
_{-To gentle Dames still less he could be dear-}_
_{-Were aught-} But pomp and power alone are Woman's care_
_{-But-} And where these are let no Possessor fear_
_{-The sex are slaves-} Maidens like moths are ever caught by glare_
_{-Love shrinks outshone by Mammons dazzling-} glare_
_And Mammon_
_{-That Demon-} wins his_ [MS. torn] _where Angels might despair._
[28] [The "trivial particular" which suggested to Byron the
friendlessness and desolation of the Childe may be explained by the
refusal of an old schoolfellow to spend the last day with him before he
set out on his travels. The friend, possibly Lord Delawarr, excused
himself on the plea that "he was engaged with his mother and some ladies
to go shopping." "Friendship!" he exclaimed to Dallas. "I do not believe
I shall leave behind me, yourself and family excepted, and, perhaps, my
mother, a single being who will care what becomes of me" (Dallas,
_Recollections, etc._, pp. 63, 64). Byron, to quote Charles Lamb's
apology for Coleridge, was "full of fun," and must not be taken too
seriously. Doubtless he was piqued at the moment, and afterwards, to
heighten the tragedy of Childe Harold's exile, expanded a single act of
negligence into general abandonment and desertion at the hour of trial.]
[ab] {22} _No! none did love him_----.--[D. pencil.]
[29] The word "lemman" is used by Chaucer in both senses, but more
frequently in the feminine.--[_MS. M._]
[30] "Feere," a consort or mate. [Compare the line, "What when lords go
with their _feires_, she said," in "The Ancient Fragment of the Marriage
of Sir Gawaine" (Percy's _Reliques_, 1812, iii. 416), and the lines--
"As with the woful _fere_,
And father of that chaste dishonoured dame."
_Titus Andronicus_, act iv. sc. 1.
Compare, too, "That woman and her fleshless Pheere" (_The Rime of the
Ancyent Marinere_, line 180 of the reprint from the first version in the
_Lyrical Ballads_, 1798; _Poems_ by S. T. Coleridge, 1893, App. E, p.
515).]
[ac] {23} _Childe Burun_----.--[MS.]
[31] [In a suppressed stanza of "Childe Harold's Good Night" (see p. 27,
_var._ ii.), the Childe complains that he has not seen his sister for
"three long years and moe." Before her marriage, in 1807, Augusta Byron
divided her time between her mother's children, Lady Chichester and the
Duke of Leeds; her cousin, Lord Carlisle; and General and Mrs. Harcourt.
After her marriage to Colonel Leigh, she lived at Newmarket. From the
end of 1805 Byron corresponded with her more or less regularly, but no
meeting took place. In a letter to his sister, dated November 30, 1808
(_Letters_, 1898, i. 203), he writes, "I saw Col. Leigh at Brighton in
July, where I should have been glad to have seen you; I only know your
husband by sight." Colonel Leigh was his first cousin, as well as his
half-sister's husband, and the incidental remark that "he only knew him
by sight" affords striking proof that his relations and connections were
at no pains to seek him out, but left him to fight his own way to social
recognition and distinction. (For particulars of "the Hon. Augusta
Byron," see _Letters_, 1898, i. 18, note.)]
[ad] _Of friends he had but few, embracing none_.--[MS. erased.]
[ae] _Yet deem him not from this with breast of steel_.--[MS. D.]
[32] [Compare Campbell's _Gertrude of Wyoming_, ii. 8. 1--"Yet deem not
Gertrude sighed for foreign joy."]
[af] {24} _His house, his home, his vassals, and his lands_.--[MS. D.]
[ag]
_The Dalilahs_----.--[MS. D.]
_His damsels all_----.--[MS. erased.]
[ah] ----_where brighter sunbeams shine_.--[MS. erased.]
[33] "Your objection to the expression 'central line' I can only meet by
saying that, before Childe Harold left England, it was his full
intention to traverse Persia, and return by India, which he could not
have done without passing the equinoctial" (letter to Dallas, September
7, 1811; see, too, letter to his mother, October 7, 1808: _Letters_,
1898, i. 193; ii. 27).
[ai] _The sails are filled_----.--[MS.]
[34] He experienced no such emotion on the resumption of his Pilgrimage
in 1816. With reference to the confession, he writes (Canto III. stanza
i. lines 6-9)--
"... I depart,
Whither I know not; but the hour's gone by,
When Albion's lessening shores could grieve or glad mine eye."
[35] {25} [See Lord Maxwell's "Good Night" in Scott's _Minstrelsy of the
Scottish Border_ (_Poetical Works_, ii. 141, ed. 1834): "Adieu, madam,
my mother dear," etc. [MS.]. Compare, too, Armstrong's "Good Night"
_ibid._--
"This night is my departing night,
For here nae langer mun I stay;
There's neither friend nor foe of mine,
But wishes me away.
What I have done thro' lack of will,
I never, never can recall;
I hope ye're a' my friends as yet.
Good night, and joy be with you all."]
[36] {26} [Robert Rushton, the son of one of the Newstead tenants.
"Robert I take with me; I like him, because, like myself, he seems a
friendless animal. Tell Mr. Rushton his son is well, and doing well"
(letter to Mrs. Byron, Falmouth, June 22, 1809: _Letters_, 1898, i.
224).]
[aj] {27}
_Our best gos-hawk can hardly fly_
_So merrily along_.--[MS.]
_Our best greyhound can hardly fly_.--[D. erased.]
[ak] Here follows in the MS. the following erased stanza:--
_My mother is a high-born dame_,
_And much misliketh me;_
_She saith my riot bringeth shame_
_On all my ancestry_.
_I had a sister once I ween_,
_Whose tears perhaps will flow;_
_But her fair face I have not seen_
_For three long years and moe._
[al]
_Oh master dear I do not cry_
_From fear of wave or wind_.--[MS.]
[37] [Robert was sent back from Gibraltar under the care of Joe Murray
(see letter to Mr. Rushton, August 15, 1809: _Letters_, 1898, i. 242).]
[38] {28} [William Fletcher, Byron's valet. He was anything but
"staunch" in the sense of the song (see Byron's letters of November 12,
1809, and June 28, 1810) (_Letters_, 1898, i. 246, 279); but for twenty
years he remained a loyal and faithful servant, helped to nurse his
master in his last illness, and brought his remains back to England.]
[am] {29}
_Enough, enough, my yeoman good_.
_All this is well to say;_
_But if I in thy sandals stood_
_I'd laugh to get away_.--[MS. erased, D.]
[an]
_For who would trust a paramour_
_Or e'en a wedded feere_--
_Though her blue eyes were streaming o'er_,
_And torn her yellow hair?_--[MS.]
[39] ["I leave England without regret--I shall return to it without
pleasure. I am like Adam, the first convict sentenced to transportation,
but I have no Eve, and have eaten no apple but what was sour as a crab"
(letter to F. Hodgson, Falmouth, June 25, 1809, _Letters_, 1898, i.
230). If this _Confessio Amantis_, with which compare the "Stanzas to a
Lady, on leaving England," is to be accepted as _bona fide_, he leaves
England heart-whole, but for the bitter memory of Mary Chaworth.]
[ao] {30} Here follows in the MS., erased:--
_Methinks it would my bosom glad_,
_To change my proud estate_,
_And be again a laughing lad_
_With one beloved playmate_.
_Since youth I scarce have pass'd an hour_
_Without disgust or pain_,
_Except sometimes in Lady's bower_,
_Or when the bowl I drain_.
[40] ["I do not mean to exchange the ninth verse of the 'Good Night.' I
have no reason to suppose my dog better than his brother brutes,
mankind; and Argus we know to be a fable" (letter to Dallas, September
23, 1811: _Letters_, 1898, ii. 44).
Byron was recalling an incident which had befallen him some time
previously (see letter to Moore, January 19, 1815): "When I thought he
was going to enact Argus, he bit away the backside of my breeches, and
never would consent to any kind of recognition, in despite of all kinds
of bones which I offered him." See, too, for another thrust at Argus,
_Don Juan_, Canto III. stanza xxiii. But he should have remembered that
this particular Argus "was half a _wolf_ by the she side." His portrait
is preserved at Newstead (see _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 280, _Edition
de Luxe_).
For the expression of a different sentiment, compare _The Inscription on
the Monument of a Newfoundland Dog_ (first published in Hobhouse's
_Imit. and Transl_., 1809), and the prefatory inscription on Boatswain's
grave in the gardens of Newstead, dated November 16, 1808 (_Life_, p.
73).]
[41] {31} [Cintra's "needle-like peaks," to the north-west of Lisbon,
are visible from the mouth of the Tagus.]
[42] [Compare Ovid, _Amores_, i. 15, and Pliny, _Hist. Nat._, iv. 22.
Small particles of gold are still to be found in the sands of the Tagus,
but the quantity is, and perhaps always was, inconsiderable.]
[ap] ----_where thronging rustics reap_.--[MS. erased.]
[aq] {32} _What God hath done_--[MS. D.]
[ar] _Those Lusian brutes and earth from worst of wretches
purge_.--[MS.]
[43] ["_Lisboa_ is the Portuguese word, consequently the very best.
Ulissipont is pedantic; and as I have _Hellas_ and _Eros_ not very long
before, there would be something like an affectation of Greek terms,
which I wish to avoid" (letter to Dallas, September 23, 1811: _Letters_,
1898, ii. 44. See, too, _Poetical Works_, 1883, p. 5).]
[as] _Ulissipont, or Lisbona_.--[MS. pencil.]
[at]
_Which poets, prone to lie, have paved with gold_.--[MS.]
_Which poets sprinkle o'er with sands of gold_.--[MS. pencil.]
_Which fabling poets_--[D. pencil.]
[44] {33} [For Byron's estimate of the Portuguese, see _The Curse of
Minerva_, lines 233, 234, and note to line 231 (_Poetical Works_, 1898,
i. 469, 470). In the last line of the preceding stanza, the substitution
of the text for _var._ i. was no doubt suggested by Dallas in the
interests of prudence.]
[au]
_Who hate the very hand that waves the sword_
_To shield them, etc_.--[MS. D.]
_To guard them, etc_.--[MS. pencil.]
[av]
_Mid many things that grieve both nose and ee_.--[MS.]
_Midst many_----.--[MS. D.]
[aw] ----_smelleth filthily_.--[MS. D.]
[ax] ----_dammed with dirt_.--[MS. erased.]
[45] {34} [For a fuller description of Cintra, see letter to Mrs. Byron,
dated August 11, 1808 (_Life_, p. 92; _Letters_, 1898, i. 237). Southey,
not often in accord with Byron, on his return from Spain (1801)
testified that "for beauty all English, perhaps all existing, scenery
must yield to Cintra" (_Life and Corr. of R. Southey_, ii. 161).]
[ay] ----_views too sweet and vast_----.--[MS. erased.]
[az]
----_by tottering convent crowned_.--[MS. erased.]
_Alcornoque_.--[Note (pencil).]
[46] "The sky-worn robes of tenderest blue." Collins' _Ode to Pity_ [MS.
and D.].
[ba] _The murmur that the sparkling torrents keep_.--[MS. erased.]
[47] {35} [The convent of Nossa Senora (now the Palazio) da Pena, and
the Cork Convent, were visited by Beckford (circ. 1780), and are
described in his _Italy, with Sketches of Spain and Portugal_ (8vo,
1834), the reissue of his _Letters Picturesque and Poetical_ (4to,
1783).
"Our first object was the convent of Nossa Senhora da Penha, the little
romantic pile of white building I had seen glittering from afar when I
first sailed by the coast of Lisbon. From this pyramidical elevation the
view is boundless; you look immediately down upon an immense expanse of
sea.
... A long series of detached clouds of a dazzling whiteness suspended
low over the waves had a magic effect, and in pagan times might have
appeared, without any great stretch of fancy, the cars of marine
divinities, just risen from the bosom of their element."--_Italy, etc._,
p. 249.
"Before the entrance, formed by two ledges of ponderous rock, extends a
smooth level of greensward.... The Hermitage, its cell, chapel, and
refectory, are all scooped out of the native marble, and lined with the
bark of the cork tree. Several of the passages are not only roofed, but
floored with the same material ... The shrubberies and garden-plots
dispersed amongst the mossy rocks ... are delightful, and I took great
pleasure in ... following the course of a transparent rill, which was
conducted through a rustic water-shoot, between bushes of lavender and
roses, many of the tenderest green."--_Ibid._, p. 250.
The inscription to the memory of Honorius (d. 159, aet. 95) is on a stone
in front of the cave--
"Hic Honorius vitam finivit;
Et ideo cum Deo in coelis revivit."]
[48] {36} "I don't remember any crosses there."--[Pencilled note by J.C.
Hobhouse.]
[The crosses made no impression upon Hobhouse, who, no doubt, had
realized that they were nothing but guideposts. For an explanation, see
letter of Mr. Matthew Lewtas to the _Athenaeum_, July 19, 1873: "The
track from the main road to the convent, rugged and devious, leading up
to the mountain, is marked out by numerous crosses now, just as it was
when Byron rode along it in 1809, and it would appear he fell into the
mistake of considering that the crosses were erected to show where
assassinations had been committed."]
[49] [Beckford, describing the view from the convent, notices the wild
flowers which adorned "the ruined splendour." "Amidst the crevices of
the mouldering walls ... I noticed some capillaries and polypodiums of
infinite delicacy; and on a little flat space before the convent a
numerous tribe of pinks, gentians, and other Alpine plants, fanned and
invigorated by the fresh mountain air."--_Italy, etc.,_ 1834, p. 229.
The "Prince's palace" (line 5) may be the royal palace at Cintra, "the
Alhambra of the Moorish kings," or, possibly, the palace (_vide post_,
stanza xxix. line 7) at Mafra, ten miles from Cintra.]
[bb] {37} _There too proud Vathek--England's wealthiest son_.--[MS. D.]
[50] [William Beckford, 1760 (?1759)-1844, published _Vathek_ in French
in 1784, and in English in 1787. He spent two years (1794-96) in
retirement at Quinta da Monserrate, three miles from Cintra. Byron
thought highly of _Vathek_. "I do not know," he writes (_The Giaour_, l.
1328, note), "from what source the author ... may have drawn his
materials ... but for correctness of costume ... and power of
imagination, it surpasses all European imitations.... As an Eastern
tale, even _Rasselas_ must bow before it; his happy valley will not bear
a comparison with the 'Hall of Eblis.'" In the MS. there is an
additional stanza reflecting on Beckford, which Dallas induced him to
omit. It was afterwards included by Moore among the _Occasional Pieces_,
under the title of _To Dives: a Fragment_ (_Poetical Works_, 1883, p.
548). (For Beckford, see _Letters_, 1898, i. 228, note 1; and with
regard to the "Stanzas on Vathek," see letter to Dallas, September 26,
1811: _Letters_, 1898, ii. 47.)]
[bc]
_When Wealth and Taste their worst and best have done_,
_Meek Peace pollution's lure voluptuous still must shun_.--[MS.]
[bd]
_But now thou blasted Beacon unto man_.--[MS.]
----_thou Beacon unto erring man_.--[MS. D.]
[be] {38} _Vain are the pleasaunces by art supplied_.--[MS. D.]
[bf] ----_yclad, and by_.--[MS. D.]
[bg] _Where blazoned glares a name spelt "Wellesley."_--[MS. D.]
[bh] ----_are on the roll_.--[MS. erased, D.]
[bi] The following stanzas, which appear in the MS., were excluded at
the request of Dallas (see his letter of October 10, 1811,
_Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron_, 1824, pp. 173-187),
_Letters_, 1898, ii. 51:--
In golden characters right well designed
First on the list appeareth one "Junot;"
Then certain other glorious names we find,
(Which Rhyme compelleth me to place below:)
Dull victors! baffled by a vanquished foe,
Wheedled by conynge tongues of laurels due,
Stand, worthy of each other in a row--
Sirs Arthur, Harry, and the dizzard Hew
Dalrymple, seely wight, sore dupe of t'other tew.
Convention is the dwarfy demon styled
That failed the knights in Marialva's dome:
Of brains (if brains they had) he them beguiled,
And turned a nation's shallow joy to gloom.
For well I wot, when first the news did come
That Vimiera's field by Gaul was lost,
For paragraph ne paper scarce had room,
Such Paeans teemed for our triumphant host,
In Courier, Chronicle, and eke in Morning Post.
But when Convention sent his handy work
Pens, tongues, feet, hands combined in wild uproar;
Mayor, Aldermen, laid down the uplifted fork;
The Bench of Bishops half forgot to snore;
Stern Cobbett,[Sec.]--who for one whole week forbore
To question aught, once more with transport leapt,
And bit his devilish quill agen, and swore
With foes such treaty never should be kept,
While roared the blatant Beast,[Sec.Sec.] and roared, and raged, and--slept!!
Thus unto Heaven appealed the people: Heaven
Which loves the lieges of our gracious King,
Decreed that ere our Generals were forgiven,
Enquiry should be held about the thing.
But Mercy cloaked the babes beneath her wing;
And as they spared our foes so spared we them;
(Where was the pity of our Sires for Byng?)[Sec.Sec.Sec.]
Yet knaves, not idiots should the law condemn;
Then live ye gallant Knights! and bless your Judges' phlegm!
[Sec.] [Sir Hew Dalrymple's despatch on the so-called Convention of Cintra
is dated September 3, and was published in the _London Gazette
Extraordinary_, September 16, 1808. The question is not alluded to in
the _Weekly Political Register_ of September 17, but on the 24th Cobbett
opened fire with a long article (pp. 481-502) headed, "Conventions in
Portugal," which was followed up by articles on the same subject in the
four succeeding issues. Articles iii., iv., v., vi., of the "Definitive
Convention" provided for the restoration of the French troops and their
safe convoy to France, with their artillery, equipments, and cavalry.
"Did the men," asks Cobbett (September 24), "who made this promise beat
the Duke d'Abrantes [Junot], or were they like curs, who, having felt
the bite of the mastiff, lose all confidence in their number, and,
though they bark victory, suffer him to retire in quiet, carrying off
his bone to be disposed of at his leisure? No, not so; for they
complaisantly carry the bone for him." The rest of the article is
written in a similar strain.]
[Sec.Sec.] "'Blatant beast.'[*] A figure for the mob. I think first used by
Smollett, in his _Adventures of an Atom_.[**] Horace has the 'bellua
multorum capitum.'[***] In England, fortunately enough, the illustrious
mobility has not even one."--[MS.]
[*] [Spenser (_Faerie Queene_, bk. vi. cantos iii. 24; xii. 27, sq.)
personifies the _vox populi_, with its thousand tongues, as the "blatant
beast."]
[**][In _The History and Adventures of an Atom_ (Smollett's Works, 1872,
vi. 385), Foksi-Roku (Henry Fox, the first Lord Holland) passes judgment
on the populace. "The multitude, my lords, is a many-headed monster, it
is a Cerberus that must have a sop; it is a wild beast, so ravenous that
nothing but blood will appease its appetite; it is a whale, that must
have a barrel for its amusement; it is a demon, to which we must offer
human sacrifice.... Bihn-Goh must be the victim--happy if the sacrifice
of his single life can appease the commotions of his country."
Foksi-Roku's advice is taken, and Bihn-Goh (Byng) "is crucified for
cowardice."]
[***][Horace, _Odes_, II. xiii. 34: "Bellua centiceps."]
[Sec.Sec.Sec.] "By this query it is not meant that our foolish generals should have
been shot, but that Byng [Admiral John Byng, born 1704, was executed
March 14, 1757] might have been spared; though the one suffered and the
others escaped, probably for Candide's reason 'pour encourager les
autres.'"[*]--[MS.]
[*]["Dans ce pays-ci il est bon de tuer de temps en temps un amiral
pour encourager les autres."--_Candide_, xxii.]
[51] {39} [On August 21, 1808, Sir Harry Burrard (1755-1813) superseded
in command Sir Arthur Wellesley, who had, on the same day, repulsed
Junot at Vimiera. No sooner had he assumed his position as
commander-in-chief, than he countermanded Wellesley's order to give
pursuit and make good the victory. The next day (August 22) Sir Hew
Dalrymple in turn superseded Burrard, and on the 23rd, General Kellerman
approached the English with certain proposals from Junot, which a week
later were formulated by the so-called Convention of Cintra, to which
Kellerman and Wellesley affixed their names. When the news reached
England that Napoleon's forces had been repulsed with loss, and yet the
French had been granted a safe exit from Portugal, the generals were
assailed with loud and indiscriminate censure. Burrard's interference
with Wellesley's plans was no doubt ill-judged and ill-timed; but the
opportunity of pursuit having been let slip, the acceptance of Junot's
terms was at once politic and inevitable. A court of inquiry, which was
held in London in January, 1809, upheld both the armistice of August 22
and the Convention; but neither Dalrymple nor Burrard ever obtained a
second command, and it was not until Talavera (July 28, 1809) had
effaced the memories of Cintra that Wellesley was reinstated in popular
favour.]
[bj] {41} ----_at the mention sweat_.--[MS. D.]
[bk] {42} _More restless than the falcon as he flies_.--[MS. erased.]
[52] [With reference to this passage, while yet in MS., an early reader
(?Dallas) inquires, "What does this mean?" And a second (?Hobhouse)
rejoins, "What does the question mean? It is one of the finest stanzas I
ever read."]
[53] [Byron and Hobhouse sailed from Falmouth, July 2, 1809; reached
Lisbon on the 6th or 7th; and on the 17th started from Aldea Galbega
("the first stage from Lisbon, which is only accessible by water") on
horseback for Seville. "The horses are excellent--we rode seventy miles
a day" (see letters of August 6 to F. Hodgson, and August 11, 1809, to
Mrs. Byron; _Letters_, 1898, i. 234, 236).]
[bl] ----_long foreign to his soul_.--[MS. erased.]
[bm] ----_the strumpet and the bowl_.--[MS. D]
[bn] {43} _And countries more remote his hopes engage_.--[MS. erased.]
[bo]
_Where dwelt of yore the Lusians' crazy queen_,--[MS.]
_Where dwelt of yore Lusania's_----.--[D.]
[54] [Her luckless Majesty went subsequently mad; and Dr. Willis, who so
dexterously cudgelled kingly pericraniums, could make nothing of hers.
(For the Rev. Francis Willis, see _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 416.)
Maria I. (b. 1734), who married her uncle, Pedro III., reigned with him
1777-86, and, as sole monarch, from 1786 to 1816. The death of her
husband, of her favourite confessor, Ignatio de San Caetano, who had
been raised by Pombal from the humblest rank to the position of
archbishop _in partibus_, and of her son, turned her brain, and she
became melancholy mad. She was only queen in name after 1791, and in
1799 her son, Maria Jose Luis, was appointed regent. Beckford saw her in
1787, and was impressed by her dignified bearing. "Justice and
clemency," he writes, "the motto so glaringly misapplied on the banner
of the abhorred Inquisition, might be transferred, with the strictest
truth, to this good princess" (_Italy, with Sketches of Spain and
Portugal_, 1834, p. 256). Ten years later, Southey, in his _Letters from
Spain_, 1797, p. 541, ascribes the "gloom" of the court of Lisbon to
"the dreadful malady of the queen." When the Portuguese royal family
were about to embark for Brazil in November, 1807, the queen was once
more seen in public after an interval of sixteen years. "She had to wait
some while upon the quay for the chair in which she was to be carried to
the boat, and her countenance, in which the insensibility of madness was
only disturbed by wonder, formed a striking contrast to the grief which
appeared in every other face" (Southey's _History of the Peninsular
War_, i. 110).]
[bp] {44} _Childe Burun_----.--[MS.]
[bq]
_Less swoln with culture soon the vales extend_
_And long horizon-bounded realms appear_.--[MS. erased.]
[br] {45} _Say Muse what bounds_----.--[MS. D.]
[55] The Pyrenees.--[MS.]
[56] [If, as stanza xliii. of this canto (added in 1811) intimates,
Byron passed through "Albuera's plain" on his way from Lisbon to
Seville, he must have crossed the frontier at a point between Elvas and
Badajoz. In that case the "silver streamlet" may be identified as the
Caia. Beckford remarks on "the rivulet which separates the two kingdoms"
(_Italy, etc_., 1834, p. 291).]
[bs] {46} _But eer the bounds of Spain have far been passed_.--[MS. D.]
[bt]
_For ever famed--in many a native song_.--[MS. erased.]
----_a noted song_.--[MS. D.]
[57] [Compare Virgil, _AEneid_, i. 100--
"Ubi tot Simois correpta sub undis
Scuta virum galeasque et fortia corpora volvit."]
[58] [The standard, a cross made of Asturian oak (_La Cruz de la
Victoria_), which was said to have fallen from heaven before Pelayo
gained the victory over the Moors at Cangas, in A.D. 718, is preserved
at Oviedo. Compare Southey's _Roderick_, XXV.: _Poetical Works_, 1838,
ix. 241, and note, pp. 370, 371.]
[bu] --_which Pelagius bore_.--[MS. D.]
[59] {47} [The Moors were finally expelled from Granada in 1492, in the
reign of Ferdinand and Isabella.]
[bv] ----_waxed the Crescent pale_.--[MS. erased.]
[60] [The reference is to the Romanceros and Caballerias of the
sixteenth century.]
[bw] ----_thy little date_.--[MS. erased.]
[bx]
----_from rock to rock_
_Blue columns soaring loft in sulphury wreath_
_Fragments on fragments in contention knock_.--[MS. erased, D.]
[61] "The Siroc is the violent hot wind that for weeks together blows
down the Mediterranean from the Archipelago. Its effects are well known
to all who have passed the Straits of Gibraltar."--[MS. D.]
[62] {49} [The battle of Talavera began July 27, 1809, and lasted two
days. As Byron must have reached Seville by the 21st or 22nd of the
month, he was not, as might be inferred, a spectator of any part of the
engagement. Writing to his mother, August 11, he says, "You have heard
of the battle near Madrid, and in England they would call it a
victory--a pretty victory! Two hundred officers and five thousand men
killed, all English, and the French in as great force as ever. I should
have joined the army, but we have no time to lose before we get up the
Mediterranean."--_Letters_, i. 241.]
[by]
_Their rival scarfs that shine so gloriously_.--[MS. erased.]
_Their rural scarfs_----.--[MS. D.]
[63] [Compare Campbell's "Hohenlinden"--"Few, few shall part where many
meet."]
[64] {50} [Compare _Macbeth_, act i. sc. 2, line 51--"Where the Norweyan
banners flout the sky."]
[65] [In a letter to Colonel Malcolm, December 3, 1809, the Duke admits
that the spoils of conquest were of a moral rather than of a material
kind. "The battle of Talavera was certainly the hardest fought of modern
days.... It is lamentable that, owing to the miserable inefficiency of
the Spaniards, ... the glory of the action is the only benefit which we
have derived from it.... I have in hand a most difficult task.... In
such circumstances one may fail, but it would be dishonourable to shrink
from the task."--_Wellington Dispatches_, 1844, iii. 621.]
[bz]
_There shall they rot--while rhymers tell the fools_
_How honour decks the turf that wraps their clay!_
_Liars avaunt!_----.--[MS.]
[66] Two lines of Collins' _Ode_, "How sleep the brave," etc., have been
compressed into one--
"There Honour comes a pilgrim grey,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay."
[ca] _But Reason's elf in these beholds_----.--[D.]
[cb] {51}
----_a fancied throne_
_As if they compassed half that hails their sway_.--[MS. erased.]
[cc] ----_glorious sound of grief_.--[D.]
[67] [The battle of Albuera (May 16, 1811), at which the English, under
Lord Beresford, repulsed Soult, was somewhat of a Pyrrhic victory.
"Another such a battle," wrote the Duke, "would ruin us. I am working
hard to put all right again." The French are said to have lost between
8000 and 9000 men, the English 4158, the Spaniards 1365.]
[cd] _A scene for mingling foes to boast and bleed_.--[D.]
[ce] _Yet peace be with the perished_---.--[D. erased.]
[cf] _And tears and triumph make their memory long_.--[D. erased.]
[cg] ----_there sink with other woes_.--[D. erased.]
[68] [Albuera was celebrated by Scott, in his _Vision of Don Roderick_.
_The Battle of Albuera_, a Poem (anon.), was published in October,
1811.]
[ch] {52} _Who sink in darkness_----.--[MS. erased.]
[ci] ----_swift Rapines path pursued_.--[MS. D.]
[cj] _To Harold turn we as_----.--[MS. erased.]
[69] [In this "particular" Childe Harold did not resemble his _alter
ego_. Hobhouse and "part of the servants" (Joe Murray, Fletcher, a
German, and the "page" Robert Rushton, constituted his "whole suite"),
accompanied Byron in his ride across Spain from Lisbon to Gibraltar.
(See _Letters_, 1898, i. 224, 236.)]
[ck] _Where proud Sevilha_----.--[MS. D.]
[70] {53} [Byron, _en route_ for Gibraltar, passed three days at Seville
at the end of July or the beginning of August, 1809. By the end of
January, 1810, the French had appeared in force before Seville. Unlike
Zaragoza and Gerona, the pleasure-loving city, "after some negotiations,
surrendered, with all its stores, foundries, and arsenal complete, and
on the 1st of February the king [Joseph] entered in triumph" (Napier's
_History of the War in the Peninsula_, ii. 295).]
[71] [A kind of fiddle with only two strings, played on by a bow, said
to have been brought by the Moors into Spain.]
[cl] _Not here the Trumpet, but the rebeck sounds_.--[MS. erased.]
[cm] _And dark-eyed Lewdness_----.--[MS. erased.]
[72] [See _The Waltz: Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 492, note 1.]
[cn] {54} _Not in the toils of Glory would ye sweat._--[MS. erased, D.]
[73] [The scene is laid on the heights of the Sierra Morena. The
travellers are looking across the "long level plain" of the Guadalquivir
to the mountains of Ronda and Granada, with their "hill-forts ...perched
everywhere like eagles' nests" (Ford's _Handbook for Spain_, i. 252).
The French, under Dupont, entered the Morena, June 2, 1808. They stormed
the bridge at Alcolea, June 7, and occupied Cordoba, but were defeated
at Bailen, July 19, and forced to capitulate. Hence the traces of war.
The "Dragon's nest" (line 7) is the ancient city of Jaen, which guards
the skirts of the Sierras "like a watchful Cerberus." It was taken by
the French, but recaptured by the Spanish, early in July, 1808 (_History
of the War in the Peninsula_, i. 71-80).]
[74] {55} [The Sierra Morena gets its name from the classical _Montes
Mariani_, not, as Byron seems to imply, from its dark and dusky aspect.]
[co] {56} ----_the never-changing watch_.--[MS. D.]
[cp] _The South must own_----.--[MS. D.]
[cq] _When soars Gaul's eagle_----.--[MS. D.]
[75] [As time went on, Byron's sentiments with regard to Napoleon
underwent a change, and he hesitates between sympathetic admiration and
reluctant disapproval. At the moment his enthusiasm was roused by
Spain's heroic resistance to the new Alaric, "the scourger of the
world," and he expresses himself like Southey "or another" (_vide post_,
Canto III., pp. 238, 239).]
[76] {57} ["A short two-edged knife or dagger ... formerly worn at the
girdle" (_N. Eng. Dict._, art. "Anlace"). The "anlace" of the Spanish
heroines was the national weapon, the _punal_, or _cuchillo_, which was
sometimes stuck in the sash (_Handbook for Spain_, ii. 803).]
[77] [Compare _Macbeth_, act v. sc. 5, line 10--
"The Time has been, my senses would have cooled
To hear a night-shriek."]
[cr]
-----_the column-scattering bolt afar,_
_The falchion's flash_--[MS. erased, D.]
[cs] {59}
_The seal Love's rosy finger has imprest_
_On her fair chin denotes how soft his touch:_
_Her lips where kisses make voluptuous nest_.--[MS. erased.]
[78] [Writing to his mother (August 11, 1809), Byron compares "the
Spanish style" of beauty to the disadvantage of the English: "Long black
hair, dark languishing eyes, _clear_ olive complexions, and forms more
graceful in motion than can be conceived by an Englishman ... render a
Spanish beauty irresistible" (_Letters_, 1898, i. 239). Compare, too,
the opening lines of _The Girl of Cadiz_, which gave place to the
stanzas _To Inez_, at the close of this canto--
"Oh never talk again to me
Of northern climes and British ladies."
But in _Don Juan_, Canto XII. stanzas lxxiv.-lxxvii., he makes the
_amende_ to the fair Briton--
"She cannot step as doth an Arab barb,
Or Andalusian girl from mass returning.
* * * * *
But though the soil may give you time and trouble,
Well cultivated, it will render double."]
[ct] {60}
_Beauties that need not fear a broken vow_.--[MS. erased.]
----_a lecher's vow_.--[MS.]
[79] [The summit of Parnassus is not visible from Delphi or the
neighbourhood. Before he composed "these stanzas" (December 16), (see
note 13.B.) at the foot of Parnassus, Byron had first surveyed its
"snow-clad" majesty as he sailed towards Vostizza (on the southern shore
of the Gulf of Corinth), which he reached on the 5th, and quitted on the
14th of December. "The Echoes" (line 8) which were celebrated by the
ancients (Justin, _Hist._, lib. xxiv. cap. 6), are those made by the
Phaedriades, or "gleaming peaks," a "lofty precipitous escarpment of red
and grey limestone" at the head of the valley of the Pleistus, facing
southwards.--_Travels in Albania_, i. 188, 199; _Geography of Greece_,
by H. F. Tozer, 1873, p. 230.]
[cu] _Not in the landscape of a fabled lay_.--[MS. D.]
[80] {61} ["Upon Parnassus, going to the fountain of Delphi (Castri) in
1809, I saw a flight of twelve eagles (Hobhouse said they were
vultures--at least in conversation), and I seized the omen. On the day
before, I composed the lines to Parnassus [in _Childe Harold_] and, on
beholding the birds, had a hope that Apollo had accepted my homage. I
have, at least, had the name and fame of a poet during the poetical
period of life (from twenty to thirty). Whether it will last is another
matter; but I have been a votary of the deity and the place, and am
grateful for what he has done in my behalf, leaving the future in his
hands, as I left the past" (B. _Diary_, 1821).]
[cv] {62} _And walks with glassy steps o'er Aganippe's wave_.--[MS.
erased.]
[cw]
_Let me some remnant of thy Spirit bear_
_Some glorious thought to my petition grant_.--[MS. erased, D.]
[81] ["Parnassus ... is distinguished from all other Greek mountains by
its mighty mass. This, with its vast buttresses, almost fills up the
rest of the country" (_Geography of Greece_, by H.F. Tozer, 1873, p.
226).]
[82] {63} [In his first letter from Spain (to F. Hodgson, August 6,
1809) Byron exclaims, "Cadiz, sweet Cadiz!--it is the first spot in the
creation ... Cadiz is a complete Cythera." See, too, letter to Mrs.
Byron, August 11, 1809 (Letters, 1898, i. 234, 239).]
[cx]
_While boyish blood boils gaily, who can 'scape_
_The lurking lures of thy enchanting gaze_.--[MS. erased.]
[83] {64} [It must not be supposed that the "thousand altars" of Cadiz
correspond with and are in contrast to the "one dome" of Paphos. The
point is that where Venus fixes her shrine, at Paphos or at Cadiz,
altars blaze and worshippers abound (compare _AEneid_, i. 415-417)--
"Ipsa Paphum sublimis abit, sedesque revisit
Laeta suas, ubi templum illi, centumque Sabaeo
Ture calent arae."]
[84] [Compare Milton's _Paradise Lost_, i.--
... from morn
To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve.]
[85] [It was seldom that Byron's memory played him false, but here a
vague recollection of a Shakespearian phrase has beguiled him into a
blunder. He is thinking of Hamlet's jibe on the corruption of manners,
"The age is grown so picked that the toe of the peasant comes so near
the heel of the courtier, he galls his kibe" (act v. sc. 1, line 150),
and he forgets that a kibe is not a heel or a part of a heel, but a
chilblain.]
[cy]
----_though in lieu_
_Of true devotion monkish temples share_
_The hours misspent, and all in turns is Love or Prayer_.----
[_MS. erased_.]
[cz] ----_or rule the hour in turns_.----[D.]
[86] {65} [As he intimates in the Preface to _Childe Harold_, Byron had
originally intended to introduce "variations" in his poem of a droll or
satirical character. Beattie, Thomson, Ariosto, were sufficient
authorities for these humorous episodes. The stanzas on the Convention
of Cintra (stanzas xxv.-xxviii. of the MS.), and the four stanzas on Sir
John Carr; the concluding stanzas of the MS., which were written in this
lighter vein, were suppressed at the instance of Dallas, or Murray, or
Gifford. From a passage in a letter to Dallas (August 21, 1811), it
appears that Byron had almost made up his mind to leave out "the two
stanzas of a buffooning cast on London's Sunday" (_Letters_, 1898, i.
335). But, possibly, owing to their freedom from any compromising
personalities, or because wiser counsels prevailed, they were allowed to
stand, and continued (wrote Moore in 1832) to "disfigure the poem."]
[87] [A whiskey is a light carriage in which the traveller is _whisked_
along.]
[da] {66} _And humbler gig_----.--[MS.]
[db] _And droughty man alights and roars for "Roman Purl."_[Sec.]--[MS. D.]
[Sec.] A festive liquor so called. Query why "Roman"? [Query if "Roman"?
"'Purl Royal,' Canary wine with a dash of the tincture of wormwood"
(Grose's _Class. Dict._).]
----_for Punch or Purl_.--[D.]
[dc] _Some o'er thy Thames convoy_----.--[MS. D.]
[88] [Hone's _Everyday Book_ (1827, ii. 80-87) gives a detailed account
of the custom of "swearing on the horns" at Highgate. "The horns, fixed
on a pole of about five feet in length, were erected by placing the pole
upright on the ground near the person to be sworn, who is requested to
take off his hat," etc. The oath, or rather a small part of it, ran as
follows: "Take notice what I am saying unto you, for _that_ is the first
word of your oath--mind _that_! You must acknowledge me [the landlord]
to be your adopted father, etc.... You must not eat brown bread while
you can get white, except you like the brown best. You must not drink
small beer while you can get strong, except you like the small best. You
must not kiss the maid while you can kiss the mistress, but sooner than
lose a good chance you may kiss them both," etc. Drovers, who frequented
the "Gate House" at the top of the hill, and who wished to keep the
tavern to themselves, are said to have been responsible for the rude
beginnings of this tedious foolery.]
[89] {67} [M. Darmesteter quotes a striking passage from Gautier's
_Voyage en Espagne_ (xv.), in appreciation of Cadiz and Byron: "L'aspect
de Cadix, en venant du large, est charmant. A la voir ainsi etincelante
de blancheur entre l'azur de la mer et l'azur du ciel, on dirait une
immense couronne de filigrane d'argent; le dome de la cathedrale, peint
en jaune, semble une tiare de vermeil posee au milieu. Les pots de
fleurs, les volutes et les tourelles qui terminent les maisons, varient
a l'infini la dentelure. Byron a merveilleusement caracterise la
physionomie de Cadix en une seule touche:
"Brillante Cadix, qui t'eleves vers le ciel du milieu du bleu fonce de
la mer."]
[90] [The actors in a bull-fight consist of three or four classes: the
_chulos_ or footmen, the _banderilleros_ or dart-throwers, the
_picadores_ or horsemen, the _matadores_ or _espadas_ the executioners.
Each bull-fight, which lasts about twenty minutes, is divided into three
stages or acts. In the first act the _picadores_ receive the charge of
the bull, defending themselves, but not, as a rule, attacking the foe
with their lances or _garrochas_. In the second act the _chulos_, who
are not mounted, wave coloured cloaks or handkerchiefs in the bull's
face, and endeavour to divert his fury from the _picadores_, in case
they have been thrown or worsted in the encounter. At the same time, the
_banderilleros_ are at pains to implant in either side of the bull's
neck a number of barbed darts ornamented with cut paper, and, sometimes,
charged with detonating powder. It is _de rigeur_ to plant the barbs
exactly on either side. In the third and final act, the protagonist, the
_matador_ or _espada_, is the sole performer. His function is to entice
the bull towards him by waving the _muleta_ or red flag, and, standing
in front of the animal, to inflict the death-wound by plunging his sword
between the left shoulder and the blade. "The teams of mules now enter,
glittering with flags and tinkling with bells, whose gay decorations
contrast with the stern cruelty and blood; the dead bull is carried off
at a rapid gallop, which always delights the populace."--_Handbook for
Spain_, by Richard Ford, 1898, i. 67-76.]
[91] {70} "The croupe is a particular leap taught in the manege."--[MS.]
[_Croupe_, or _croup_, denotes the hind quarters of a horse. Compare
Scott's ballad of "Young Lochinvar"--"So light to the croupe the fair
lady he swung." Here it is used for "croupade," "a high curvet in which
the hind legs are brought up under the belly of the horse" (_N. Eng.
Dict._, art. "Croupade.")]
[92] {71} ["Brast" for "burst" is found in Spenser (_Faerie Queene_, i.
9. 21. 7), and is still current in Lancashire dialect. See _Lanc.
Gloss._ (E. D. S. "brast").]
[93] [One bull-fight, one matador. In describing the last act Byron
confuses the _chulos_ or cloak-waving footmen, who had already played
their part, with the single champion, the matador, who is about to
administer the _coup de grace_.]
[dd] ----_he lies along the sand._--[MS. erased.]
[de]
_The trophy corse is reared--disgusting prize_.
or, _The corse is reared--sparkling the chariot flies_.--[MS. M.]
[94] [Compare Virgil, _AEneid_, viii. 264--
"Pedibusque informe cadaver
Protrahitur. Nequeunt expleri corda tuendo--"]
[95] {72} "The Spaniards are as revengeful as ever. At Santa Otella, I
heard a young peasant threaten to stab a woman (an old one, to be sure,
which mitigates the offence), and was told, on expressing some small
surprise, that this ethic was by no means uncommon."--[MS.]
[96] [Byron's "orthodoxy" of the word "centinel" was suggested by the
Spanish _centinela_, or, perhaps, by Spenser's "centonell" (_Faerie
Queene_, bk. i. c. ix. st. 41, line 8).]
[df]
_And all whereat the wandering soul revolts_
_Which that stern dotard dreamed he could encage_.--[MS. erased.]
[dg] {73}
_Full from the heart of Joy's delicious springs_
_Some Bitter bubbles up, and even on Roses stings_.--[MS.]
[97] [The Dallas Transcript reads "itself," but the MS. and earlier
editions "herself."]
[dh] {74}
_Had buried then his hopes, no more to rise:_
_Drugged with dull pleasure! life-abhorring Gloom_
_Wrote on his faded brow curst Cain's wandering doom_.--
[MS. erased.]
_Had buried there_.--[MS. D.]
[98] [Byron's belief or, rather, haunting dread, that he was predestined
to evil is to be traced to the Calvinistic teaching of his boyhood
(compare _Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza lxx. lines 8, 9; and Canto
IV. stanza xxxiv. line 6). Lady Byron regarded this creed of despair as
the secret of her husband's character, and the source of his
aberrations. In a letter to H. C. Robinson, March 5, 1855, she writes,
"Not merely from casual expressions, but from the whole tenour of Lord
Byron's feelings, I could not but conclude he was a believer in the
inspiration of the Bible, and had the gloomiest Calvinistic tenets. To
that unhappy view of the relation of the creature to the Creator, I have
always ascribed the misery of his life.... Instead of being made happier
by any apparent good, he felt convinced that every blessing would be
'turned into a curse' to him. Who, possessed by such ideas, could lead a
life of love and service to God or man? They must in a measure realize
themselves. 'The worst of it is, I _do_ believe,' he said. I, like all
connected with him, was broken against the rock of predestination."]
[99] {75} "Stanzas to be inserted after stanza 86th in _Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage_, instead of the song at present in manuscript."-[MS. note to
"To Inez."] [The stanzas _To Inez_ are dated January 25, 1810, on which
day Byron and Hobhouse visited Marathon. Most likely they were addressed
to Theresa Macri, the "Maid of Athens," or some favourite of the moment,
and not to "Florence" (Mrs. Spencer Smith), whom he had recently
(January 16) declared _emerita_ to the tune of "The spell is broke, the
charm is flown." A fortnight later (February 10), Hobhouse, accompanied
by the Albanian Vasilly and the Athenian Demetrius, set out for the
Negroponte. "Lord Byron was unexpectedly detained at Athens" (_Travels
in Albania_, i. 390). (For the stanzas to _The Girl of Cadiz_, which
were suppressed in favour of those _To Inez,_ see _Poetical Works_,
1891, p. 14, and vol. iii. of the present issue.)]
[100] {76} [Compare Horace, _Odes_, II. xvi. 19, 20--
"Patriae quis exsul
Se quoque fugit?"]
[di]
_To other zones howe'er remote_
_Still, still pursuing clings to me._--[MS. erased.]
[101] [Compare Prior's _Solomon_, bk. iii. lines 85, 86--
"In the remotest wood and lonely grot
Certain to meet that worst of evils--_thought."_]
[102] {77} [Cadiz was captured from the Moors by Alonso el Sabio, in
1262. It narrowly escaped a siege, January-February, 1810. Soult
commenced a "serious bombardment," May 16, 1812, but, three months
later, August 24, the siege was broken up. Stanza lxxxv. is not in the
original MS.]
[103] {78} [Charles IV. abdicated March 19, 1808, in favour of his son
Ferdinand VII.; and in the following May, Charles once more abdicated on
his own behalf, and Ferdinand for himself and his heirs, in favour of
Napoleon. Thenceforward Charles was an exile, and Ferdinand a prisoner
at Valencay, and Spain, so far as the Bourbons were concerned, remained
"kingless," until motives of policy procured the release of the latter,
who re-entered his kingdom March 22, 1814.]
[dj]
Ye, who would more of Spain and Spaniards know,
Sights, Saints, Antiques, Arts, Anecdotes and War,
Go hie ye hence to Paternoster Row--
Are they not written in the Boke of Carr,[Sec.1]
Green Erin's Knight and Europe's wandering star!
Then listen, Readers, to the Man of Ink,
Hear what he did, and sought, and wrote afar;
All those are cooped within one Quarto's brink,
This borrow, steal,--don't buy,--and tell us what you think.
There may you read with spectacles on eyes,
How many Wellesleys did embark for Spain,[Sec.2]
As if therein they meant to colonise,
How many troops y-crossed the laughing main
That ne'er beheld the said return again:
How many buildings are in such a place,
How many leagues from this to yonder plain,
How many relics each cathedral grace,
And where Giralda stands on her gigantic base.[Sec.3]
There may you read (Oh, Phoebus, save Sir John!
That these my words prophetic may not err)[Sec.4]
All that was said, or sung, and lost, or won,
By vaunting Wellesley or by blundering Frere,[Sec.a]
He that wrote half the "Needy Knife-Grinder,"[Sec.5]
Thus Poesy the way to grandeur paves--[Sec.b]
Who would not such diplomatists prefer?
But cease, my Muse, thy speed some respite craves,
Leave legates to the House, and armies to their graves.
Yet here of Vulpes mention may be made,[Sec.c][Sec.6]
Who for the Junta modelled sapient laws,
Taught them to govern ere they were obeyed:
Certes fit teacher to command, because
His soul Socratic no Xantippe awes;
Blest with a Dame in Virtue's bosom nurst,--
With her let silent Admiration pause!--
True to her second husband and her first:
On such unshaken fame let Satire do its worst.
[Sec.1] "Porphyry said that the prophecies of Daniel were written after
their completion, and such may be my fate here; but it requires no
second sight to foretell a tome; the first glimpse of the knight was
enough."--[MS.]
["I have seen Sir John Carr at Seville and Cadiz, and, like Swift's
barber, have been down on my knees to beg he would not put me into black
and white" (letter to Hodgson, August 6, 1809, _Letters_, 1898, i. 235,
note).]
[Sec.2] "I presume Marquis and Mr. and Pole and Sir A. are returned by this
time, and eke the bewildered Frere whose conduct was canvassed by the
Commons."--[MS.]
[A motion which had been brought forward in the House of Commons,
February 24, 1809, "to inquire into the causes ...of the late campaign
in Spain," was defeated, but the Government recalled J. Hookham Frere,
British Minister to the Supreme Junta, and nominated the Marquis
Wellesley Ambassador Extraordinary to Seville. Wellesley landed in Spain
early in August, but a duel which took place, September 21, between
Perceval and Canning led to changes in the ministry, and, with a view to
taking office, he left Cadiz November 10, 1809. His brother, Henry
Wellesley (1773-1847, first Baron Cowley), succeeded him as Envoy
Extraordinary. If "Mr." stands for Henry Wellesley, "Pole" may be
William Wellesley Pole, afterwards third Earl of Mornington.]
[Sec.3] [The base of the Giralda, the cathedral tower at Seville, is a
square of fifty feet. The pinnacle of the filigree belfry, which
surmounts the original Moorish tower, "is crowned with _El Girardillo_,
a bronze statue of _La Fe_, The Faith.... Although 14 feet high, and
weighing 2800 lbs., it turns with the slightest breeze."--Ford's
_Handbook for Spain_, i. 174.]
[Sec.4] [_Vide ante_, p. 78, note 2.]
[Sec.a] _By shrivelled Wellesley_----.--[MS. erased.]
[Sec.b]
_None better known for doing things by halves_
_As many in our Senate did aver_.--[MS. erased.]
[Sec.c] _Yet surely Vulpes merits some applause_.--[MS. erased.]
[Sec.5] "The Needy Knife-grinder," in the _Anti-Jacobin_, was a joint
production of Messrs. Frere and Canning.
[Sec.6] [Henry Richard Vassall Fox, second Lord Holland (1773-1840),
accompanied Sir David Baird to Corunna, September, 1808, and made a
prolonged tour in Spain, returning in the autumn of 1809. He suggested
to the Junta of Seville to extend their functions as a committee of
defence, and proposed a new constitution. His wife, Elizabeth Vassall,
the daughter of a rich Jamaica planter, was first married (June 27,
1786) to Sir Godfrey Webster, Bart. Sir Godfrey divorced his wife July
3, 1797, and three days later she was married to Lord Holland. She had
lived with him for some time previously, and before the divorce had
borne him a son, Charles Richard Fox (1796-1873), who was acknowledged
by Lord Holland.]
[104] {81} [Stanzas lxxxviii.-xciii., which record the battles of
Barossa (March 5, 1811) and Albuera (May 16, 1811), and the death of
Byron's school-friend Wingfield (May 14, 1811), were written at Newstead
in August, 1811, and take the place of four omitted stanzas (_q.v.
supra_).]
[105] [Francisco Pizarro (1480-1541), with his brothers, Hernando, Juan
Gonzalo, and his half-brother Martin de Alcantara, having revisited
Spain, set sail for Panama in 1530. During his progress southward from
Panama, he took the island of Puna, which formed part of the province of
Quito. His defeat and treacherous capture of Atuahalpa, King of Quito,
younger brother of Huascar the Supreme Inca, took place in 1532, near
the town of Caxamarca, in Peno (_Mod. Univ. History_, 1763, xxxviii.
295, _seq._). Spain's weakness during the Napoleonic invasion was the
opportunity of her colonies. Quito, the capital of Ecuador, rose in
rebellion, August 10, 1810, and during the same year Mexico and La Plata
began their long struggle for independence.]
[106] {82} [During the American War of Independence (1775-83), and
afterwards during the French Revolution, it was the custom to plant
trees as "symbols of growing freedom." The French trees were decorated
with "caps of Liberty." No such trees had ever been planted in Spain.
(See note by the Rev. E.C. Everard Owen, _Childe Harold_, 1897, p.
158.)]
[dk]
_And thou, my friend! since thus my selfish woe_
{_to weaken in_
_Bursts from my heart,_ {_however light my strain,_
{_for ever light the_----.--[D.]
_Had the sword laid thee, with the mighty, low_
_Pride had forbade me of thy fall to plain_.--[MS. D.]
[107] [Compare the In Memoriam stanzas at the end of Beattie's
_Minstrel_--"And am I left to unavailing woe?" II. 63, line 2.]
[dl] {83} ----_belov'd the most_.--[MS. D.]
[108] [With reference to this stanza, Byron wrote to Dallas, October 25,
1811 (_Letters_, 1898, ii. 58, 59), "I send you a conclusion to the
_whole_. In a stanza towards the end of Canto I. in the line,
"Oh, known the earliest and _beloved_ the most,
I shall alter the epithet to '_esteemed_ the most.'"]
[dm] ----_where none so long was dear_.--[MS. D.]
[dn] _And fancy follow to_----.--[MS. D.]
[109] "Fytte" means "part."--[Note erased.]
* * * * *
NOTES TO CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.
CANTO I.
1.
Yes! sighed o'er Delphi's long deserted shrine.
Stanza i. line 6.
The little village of Castri stands partially on the site of Delphi.
Along the path of the mountain, from Chrysso, are the remains of
sepulchres hewn in and from the rock:--"One," said the guide, "of a king
who broke his neck hunting." His majesty had certainly chosen the
fittest spot for such an achievement.
A little above Castri is a cave, supposed the Pythian, of immense depth;
the upper part of it is paved, and now a cowhouse.
On the other side of Castri stands a Greek monastery; some way above
which is the cleft in the rock, with a range of caverns difficult of
ascent, and apparently leading to the interior of the mountain; probably
to the Corycian Cavern mentioned by Pausanias. From this part descend
the fountain and the "Dews of Castalie."
[Byron and Hobhouse slept at Crissa December 15, and visited Delphi
December 16, 1809.--_Travels in Albania_, i. 199-209.]
2.
And rest ye at "Our Lady's house of Woe."
Stanza xx. line 4.
The convent of "Our Lady of Punishment," _Nossa Senora de Pena_, on the
summit of the rock. Below, at some distance, is the Cork Convent, where
St. Honorius dug his den, over which is his epitaph. From the hills, the
sea adds to the beauty of the view.--[_Note to First Edition_.] Since
the publication of this poem, I have been informed [by W. Scott, July 1,
1812] of the misapprehension of the term _Nossa Senora de Pena_. It was
owing to the want of the _tilde_, or mark over the _n_, which alters the
signification of the word: with it, _Pena_ signifies a rock; without it,
_Pena_ has the sense I adopted. _I_ do not think it necessary to alter
the passage; as, though the common acceptation affixed to it is "Our
Lady of the Rock," I may well assume the other sense from the severities
practised there.--[_Note to Second Edition._]
3.
Throughout this purple land, where Law secures not life.
Stanza xxi. line 9.
It is a well-known fact that in the year 1809, the assassinations in the
streets of Lisbon and its vicinity were not confined by the Portuguese
to their countrymen; but that Englishmen were daily butchered: and so
far from redress being obtained, we were requested not to interfere if
we perceived any compatriot defending himself against his allies. I was
once stopped in the way to the theatre at eight o'clock in the evening,
when the streets were not more empty than they generally are at that
hour, opposite to an open shop, and in a carriage with a friend: had we
not fortunately been armed, I have not the least doubt that we should
have "adorned a tale" instead of telling one. The crime of assassination
is not confined to Portugal; in Sicily and Malta we are knocked on the
head at a handsome average nightly, and not a Sicilian or Maltese is
ever punished!
4.
Behold the hall where chiefs were late convened!
Stanza xxiv. line 1.
The Convention of Cintra was signed in the palace of the Marchese
Marialva. The late exploits of Lord Wellington have effaced the follies
of Cintra. He has, indeed, done wonders; he has perhaps changed the
character of a nation, reconciled rival superstitions, and baffled an
enemy who never retreated before his predecessor.
["The armistice, the negotiations, the convention, the execution of its
provisions, were commenced, conducted, concluded, at the distance of
thirty miles from Cintra, with which place they had not the slightest
connection, political, military, or local. Yet Lord Byron has sung that
the convention was signed in the Marquis of Marialva's house at Cintra"
(Napier's _History of the War in the Peninsula_, i. 161). The
"suspension of arms" is dated "Head Quarters of the British Army, August
22, 1808." The "Definitive Convention for the Evacuation of Portugal by
the British Army" is dated "Head Quarters, Lisbon, August 30, 1808."
(See Wordsworth's pamphlet _Concerning the Relations of Great Britain,
Spain, and Portugal, etc._, 1809, App. pp. 199-201. For sentiments
almost identical with those expressed in stanzas xxiv., xxv., see
_ibid._, p. 49, _et passim_.)]
5.
Yet Mafra shall one moment claim delay.
Stanza xxix. line 1.
The extent of Mafra is prodigious; it contains a palace, convent, and
most superb church. The six organs are the most beautiful I ever beheld,
in point of decoration: we did not hear them, but were told that their
tones were correspondent to their splendour. Mafra is termed the
Escurial of Portugal.
[Mafra was built by D. Joao V. The foundation-stone was laid November 7,
1717, and the church consecrated October 22, 1730. (For descriptions of
Mafra, see Southey's _Life and Correspondence_, ii. 113; and _Letters_,
1898, i. 237.)]
6.
Well doth the Spanish hind the difference know
'Twixt him and Lusian slave, the lowest of the low.
Stanza xxxiii. lines 8 and 9.
As I found the Portuguese, so I have characterised them. That they are
since improved, at least in courage, is evident.
[The following "Note on Spain and Portugal," part of the original draft
of Note 3 (p. 86), was suppressed at the instance of Dallas: "We have
heard wonders of the Portuguese lately, and their gallantry. Pray Heaven
it continue; yet 'would it were bed-time, Hal, and all were well!' They
must fight a great many hours, by 'Shrewsbury clock,' before the number
of their slain equals that of our countrymen butchered by these kind
creatures, now metamorphosed into 'Cacadores,' and what not. I merely
state a fact, not confined to Portugal; for in Sicily and Malta we are
knocked on the head at a handsome average nightly, and not a Sicilian or
Maltese is ever punished! The neglect of protection is disgraceful to
our government and governors; for the murders are as notorious as the
moon that shines upon them, and the apathy that overlooks them. The
Portuguese, it is to be hoped, are complimented with the 'Forlorn
Hope,'--if the cowards are become brave (like the rest of their kind, in
a corner), pray let them display it. But there is a subscription for
these [Greek: thrasy/deiloi][110] (they need not be ashamed of the
epithet once applied to the Spartans); and all the charitable
patronymics, from ostentatious A. to diffident Z., and L1 1s. 0d. from
'An Admirer of Valour,' are in requisition for the lists at Lloyd's, and
the honour of British benevolence. Well! we have fought, and subscribed,
and bestowed peerages, and buried the killed by our friends and foes;
and, lo! all this is to be done over again! Like Lien Chi (in
Goldsmith's _Citizen of the World_), as we 'grow older, we grow never
the better.' It would be pleasant to learn who will subscribe for us, in
or about the year 1815, and what nation will send fifty thousand men,
first to be decimated in the capital, and then decimated again (in the
Irish fashion, _nine_ out of _ten_), in the 'bed of honour;' which, as
Serjeant Kite says [in Farquhar's _Recruiting Officer_, act i. sc. 1],
is considerably larger and more commodious than 'the bed of Ware.' Then
they must have a poet to write the 'Vision of Don Perceval,'[111] and
generously bestow the profits of the well and widely printed quarto, to
rebuild the 'Backwynd' and the 'Canongate,' or furnish new kilts for the
half-roasted Highlanders. Lord Wellington, however, has enacted marvels;
and so did his Oriental brother, whom I saw charioteering over the
French flag, and heard clipping bad Spanish, after listening to the
speech of a patriotic cobler of Cadiz, on the event of his own entry
into that city, and the exit of some five thousand bold Britons out of
this 'best of all possible worlds' [Pangloss, in _Candide_]. Sorely were
we puzzled how to dispose of that same victory of Talavera; and a
victory it surely was somewhere, for everybody claimed it. The Spanish
despatch and mob called it Cuesta's, and made no great mention of the
Viscount; the French called it _theirs_[1] (to my great
discomfiture,--for a French consul stopped my mouth in Greece with a
pestilent Paris Gazette, just as I had killed Sebastiani'[112] 'in
buckram,' and King Joseph 'in Kendal green'),--and we have not yet
determined _what_ to call it, or _whose_; for, certes, it was none of
our own. Howbeit, Massena's retreat [May, 1811] is a great comfort; and
as we have not been in the habit of pursuing for some years past, no
wonder we are a little awkward at first. No doubt we shall improve; or,
if not, we have only to take to our old way of retrograding, and there
we are at home."--_Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron_, 1824, pp.
179-185.]
7.
When Cava's traitor-sire first called the band
That dyed thy mountain streams with Gothic gore.
Stanza xxxv. lines 3 and 4.
Count Julian's daughter, the Helen of Spain. Pelagius preserved his
independence in the fastnesses of the Asturias, and the descendants of
his followers, after some centuries, completed their struggle by the
conquest of Grenada.
[Roderick the Goth violated Florinda, or Caba, or Cava, daughter of
Count Julian, one of his principal lieutenants. In revenge for this
outrage, Julian allied himself with Musca, the Caliph's lieutenant in
Africa, and countenanced the invasion of Spain by a body of Saracens and
Africans commanded by Tarik, from whom Jebel Tarik, Tarik's Rock, that
is, Gibraltar, is said to have been named. The issue was the defeat and
death of Roderick and the Moorish occupation of Spain. A Spaniard,
according to Cervantes, may call his dog, but not his daughter,
Florinda. (See _Vision of Don Roderick_, by Sir W. Scott, stanza iv.
note 5.)]
8.
No! as he speeds, he chants "Viv[=a] el Rey!"
Stanza xlviii. line 5.
"Viv[=a] el Rey Fernando!" Long live King Ferdinand! is the chorus of
most of the Spanish patriotic songs. They are chiefly in dispraise of
the old King Charles, the Queen, and the Prince of Peace. I have heard
many of them: some of the airs are beautiful. Godoy, the _Principe de la
Paz_, of an ancient but decayed family, was born at Badajoz, on the
frontiers of Portugal, and was originally in the ranks of the Spanish
guards; till his person attracted the queen's eyes, and raised him to
the dukedom of Alcudia, etc., etc. It is to this man that the Spaniards
universally impute the ruin of their country.
[Manuel de Godoy (1767-1851) received the title of _Principe de la Paz_,
Prince of the Peace, in 1795, after the Treaty of Basle, which ceded
more than half St. Domingo to France. His tenure of power, as prime
minister and director of the king's policy, coincided with the downfall
of Spanish power, and before the commencement of the Peninsular War he
was associated in the minds of the people with national corruption and
national degradation. He was, moreover, directly instrumental in the
betrayal of Spain to France. By the Treaty of Fontainebleau, October 27,
1807, Portugal was to be divided between the King of Etruria and Godoy
as Prince of the Algarves, Portuguese America was to fall to the King of
Spain, and to bring this about Napoleon's troops were to enter Spain and
march directly to Lisbon. The sole outcome of the treaty was the
occupation of Portugal and subsequent invasion of Spain. Before Byron
had begun his pilgrimage, Godoy's public career had come to an end.
During the insurrection at Aranjuez, March 17-19, 1808, when Charles IV.
abdicated in favour of his son Ferdinand VII., Godoy was only preserved
from the fury of the populace by a timely imprisonment. In the following
May, by which time Ferdinand himself was a prisoner in France, he was
released at the instance of Murat, and ordered to accompany Charles to
Bayonne, for the express purpose of cajoling his master into a second
abdication in favour of Napoleon. The remainder of his long life was
passed, first at Rome, and afterwards at Paris, in exile and dependence.
The execration of Godoy, "who was really a mild, good-natured man,"
must, in Napier's judgment, be attributed to Spanish venom and Spanish
prejudice. The betrayal of Spain was, he thinks, the outcome of
Ferdinand's intrigues no less than of Godoy's unpatriotic ambition.
Another and perhaps truer explanation of popular odium is to be found in
his supposed atheism and well-known indifference to the rites of the
Church, which many years before had attracted the attention of the Holy
Office. The peasants cursed Godoy because the priests triumphed over his
downfall (Napier's _History of the War in the Peninsula_, i. 8;
Southey's _Peninsular War_, i. 85 note, 93, 215, 280).]
9.
Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue,
Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet.
Stanza l. lines 2 and 3.
The red cockade, with "Fernando Septimo" in the centre.
10.
The ball-piled pyramid, the ever-blazing match.
Stanza li. line 9.
All who have seen a battery will recollect the pyramidal form in which
shot and shells are piled. The Sierra Morena was fortified in every
defile through which I passed in my way to Seville.
11.
Foiled by a woman's hand, before a battered wall.
Stanza lvi. line 9.
Such were the exploits of the Maid of Saragoza, who by her valour
elevated herself to the highest rank of heroines. When the author was at
Seville, she walked daily on the Prado, decorated with medals and
orders, by command of the Junta.
[The story, as told by Southey (who seems to have derived his
information from _The Narrative of the Siege of Zaragoza_, by Charles
Richard Vaughan, M.B., 1809), is that "Augustina Zaragoza (_sic_), a
handsome woman of the lower class, about twenty-two years of age," a
vivandiere, in the course of her rounds came with provisions to a
battery near the Portello gate. The gunners had all been killed, and, as
the citizens held back, "Augustina sprang over the dead and dying,
snatched a match from the hand of a dead artilleryman, and fired off a
twenty-six pounder; then, jumping upon the gun, made a solemn vow never
to quit it alive during the siege."
After the retreat of the French, "a pension was settled upon Augustina,
and the daily pay of an artilleryman. She was also to wear a small
shield of honour, embroidered upon the sleeve of her gown, with
'Zaragoza' inscribed upon it" (Southey's _Peninsular War_, ii. 14, 34).
Napier, "neither wholly believing nor absolutely denying these
exploits," which he does not condescend to give in detail, remarks "that
for a long time afterwards, Spain swarmed with Zaragoza heroines,
clothed in half-uniforms, and theatrically loaded with weapons."
A picture of "The Defence of Saragossa," painted by Sir David Wilkie,
which contained her portrait, was exhibited in the Royal Academy in
1829, and was purchased by the king (Napier's _History of the War in the
Peninsula_, i. 45; _Life of Sir D. Wilkie_, by John W. Mollett, 1881, p.
83). Compare, too, _The Age of Bronze_, vii. lines 53-56--
"... the desperate wall
Of Saragossa, mightiest in her fall;
The man nerved to a spirit, and the maid
Waving her more than Amazonian blade."]
12.
The seal Love's dimpling finger hath impressed
Denotes how soft that chin which bears his touch.
Stanza lviii. lines 1 and 2.
"Sigilla in mento impressa Amoris digitulo
Vestigio demonstrant mollitudinem."
Aul. Gel.
[The quotation does not occur in Aulus Gellius, but is a fragment in
iambic metre from the Papia papae [Greek: peri\ e)nkomi/on] of M.
Terentius Varro, cited by the grammarian Nonius Marcellus (_De Comp.
Doct_., ii. 135, lines 19-23). _Sigilla_ is a variant of the word in the
text, _laculla_, a diminutive of _lacuna_, signifying a dimple in the
chin. _Lacullum_ is not to be found in Facciolati. (_Vide_ Riese,
_Varro. Satur. Menipp. Rel_., 1865, p. 164.)]
13.
Oh, thou Parnassus!
Stanza lx. line 1.
These stanzas were written in Castri (Delphos), at the foot of
Parnassus, now called [Greek: Liakyra] (Liakura), Dec. [16], 1809.
14.
Fair is proud Seville; let her country boast
Her strength, her wealth, her site of ancient days.
Stanza lxv. lines 1 and 2.
Seville was the Hispalis of the Romans.
15.
Ask ye, Boeotian Shades! the reason why?
Stanza lxx. line 5.
This was written at Thebes, and consequently in the best situation for
asking and answering such a question; not as the birthplace of Pindar,
but as the capital of Boeotia, where the first riddle was propounded and
solved.
[Byron reached Thebes December 22, 1809. By the first riddle he means,
of course, the famous enigma of Oedipus--the prototype of Boeotian wit.]
16.
Some bitter o'er the flowers its bubbling venom flings.
Stanza lxxxii. line 9.
"Medio de fonte leporum
Surgit amari aliquid quod in ipseis floribus angat."
Lucr., iv. 1133.
17.
A Traitor only fell beneath the feud.
Stanza lxxxv. line 7.
Alluding to the conduct and death of Solano, the governor of Cadiz, in
May, 1808.
[The Marquis of Solano, commander-in-chief of the forces at Cadiz, was
murdered by the populace. The "Supreme Junta" of Seville had directed
him to attack the French fleet anchored off Cadiz, and Admiral Purvis,
acting in concert with General Spencer, had offered to co-operate, but
Solano was unwilling to take his orders "from a self-constituted
authority, and hesitated to commit his country in war with a power whose
strength he knew better than the temper of his countrymen." "His
abilities, courage, and unblemished character have never been
denied."--Napier's _War in the Peninsula_, i. 20, 21.]
18.
"War even to the knife!"
Stanza lxxxvi. line 9.
"War to the knife." Palafox's answer to the French general at the siege
of Saragoza.
[Towards the close of the first siege of Zaragoza, August 5, 1808,
Marshal Lefebvre (1755-1820), under the impression that the city had
fallen into his hands, "required Palafox to surrender in these words:
'Quartel-general, Santa Engracia. La Capitulation!' ['Head-quarters, St.
Engracia. Capitulation']. The reply was, 'Quartel-general, Zaragoza.
Guerra al cuchillo' ['Head-quarters, Zaragoza. War at the knife's
point']." Subsequently, December, 1808, when Moncey (1754-1842) again
called upon him to surrender, he appealed to the people of Madrid. "The
dogs," he said, "by whom he was beset scarcely left him time to clean
his sword from their blood; but they still found their grave at
Zaragoza." Southey notes that "all Palafox's proclamations had the high
tone and something of the inflection of Spanish romance, suiting the
character of those to whom it was directed" (_Peninsular War_, ii. 25;
iii. 152; _Narrative of the Siege_, by C. R. Vaughan, 1809, pp. 22, 23).
Napier, whose account of the first siege of Zaragoza is based on
Caballero's _Victoires et Conquetes des Francais_, and on the _Journal
of Lefebvre's Operations_ (MSS.), does not record these romantic
incidents. He attributes the raising of the siege to the "bad discipline
of the French, and the system of terror established by the Spanish
leaders." The inspirers and proclaimers of "war even to the knife" were,
he maintains, _Tio_ or Goodman Jorge (Jorge Ibort) and Tio Murin, and
not Palafox, who was ignorant of war, and who, on more than one
occasion, was careful to provide for his own safety (_History of the War
in the Peninsula_, i. 41-46).]
19.
And thou, my friend! etc.
Stanza xci. line 1.
The Honourable John Wingfield, of the Guards, who died of a fever at
Coimbra (May 14, 1811). I had known him ten years, the better half of
his life, and the happiest part of mine. In the short space of one month
I have lost _her_ who gave me being, and most of those who had made
that being tolerable. To me the lines of Young are no fiction--
"Insatiate archer! could not one suffice?
Thy shaft flew thrice, and thrice my peace was slain,
And thrice ere thrice yon moon had fill'd her horn."
_Night Thoughts: The Complaint_, Night i.
(London, 1825, p. 5).
I should have ventured a verse to the memory of the late Charles Skinner
Matthews, Fellow of Downing College, Cambridge, were he not too much
above all praise of mine. His powers of mind, shown in the attainment of
greater honours, against the ablest candidates, than those of any
graduate on record at Cambridge, have sufficiently established his fame
on the spot where it was acquired; while his softer qualities live in
the recollection of friends who loved him too well to envy his
superiority. [To an objection made by Dallas to this note, Byron
replied, "I was so sincere in my note on the late Charles Matthews, and
do feel myself so totally unable to do justice to his talents, that the
passage must stand for the very reason you bring against it. To him all
the men I ever knew were pigmies. He was an intellectual giant. It is
true I loved Wingfield better; he was the earliest and the dearest, and
one of the few one could never repent of having loved: but in
ability--ah! you did not know Matthews,!"--_Letters_, 1898, ii. 8. [For
Charles Skinner Matthews, and the Honourable John Wingfield, see
_Letters_, 1898, i. 150 note, 180 note. See, too, "Childish
Recollections," _Poems_, 1898, i. 96, note.]
FOOTNOTES:
[110] {88} [_Vide post_, p. 196, note 1.]
[111] [In a letter to J. B. S. Morritt, April 26, 1811, Sir Walter Scott
writes, "I meditate some wild stanzas referring to the Peninsula; if I
can lick them into any shape, I hope to get something handsome from the
booksellers for the Portuguese sufferers: 'Silver and gold have I none,
but that which I have I will give unto them.' My lyrics are called The
Vision of Don Roderick."--Lockhart's _Mem. of the Life of Sir W. Scott_,
1871, p. 205.]
[112] {89} [Francois Horace Bastien Sebastiani (1772-1851), one of
Napoleon's generals, defeated the Spanish at Ciudad Real, March 17,
1809. In his official report he said that he had sabred more than 3000
Spaniards in flight. At the battle of Talavera, July 27, his corps
suffered heavily; but at Almonacid, August 11, he was again victorious
over the Spanish.]
* * * * *
CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE
CANTO THE SECOND.
Childe Harold
Canto 2.
Byron. Joannina in Albania.
Begun Oct. 31st 1809.
Concluded Canto 2. Smyrna.
March 28^th^, 1810. [MS. D.]
* * * * *
CANTO THE SECOND
I.[113]
Come, blue-eyed Maid of Heaven!--but Thou, alas!
Didst never yet one mortal song inspire--
Goddess of Wisdom! here thy temple was,
And is, despite of War and wasting fire,[1.B.]
And years, that bade thy worship to expire:
But worse than steel, and flame, and ages slow,[2.B.]
Is the dread sceptre and dominion dire
Of men who never felt the sacred glow
That thoughts of thee and thine on polished breasts bestow.
II.
Ancient of days! august Athena! where,[do]
Where are thy men of might? thy grand in soul?
Gone--glimmering through the dream of things that were:[dp]
First in the race that led to Glory's goal,
They won, and passed away--is this the whole?
A schoolboy's tale, the wonder of an hour!
The Warrior's weapon and the Sophist's stole[114]
Are sought in vain, and o'er each mouldering tower,
Dim with the mist of years, gray flits the shade of power.[dq]
III.
Son of the Morning, rise! approach you here!
Come--but molest not yon defenceless Urn:
Look on this spot--a Nation's sepulchre!
Abode of Gods, whose shrines no longer burn.[dr]
Even Gods must yield--Religions take their turn:
'Twas Jove's--'tis Mahomet's--and other Creeds
Will rise with other years, till Man shall learn
Vainly his incense soars, his victim bleeds;
Poor child of Doubt and Death, whose hope is built on reeds.[ds]
IV.
Bound to the Earth, he lifts his eye to Heaven--
Is't not enough, Unhappy Thing! to know
Thou art? Is this a boon so kindly given,
That being, thou would'st be again, and go,
Thou know'st not, reck'st not to what region, so[115]
On Earth no more, but mingled with the skies?
Still wilt thou dream on future Joy and Woe?[dt]
Regard and weigh yon dust before it flies:
That little urn saith more than thousand Homilies.
V.
Or burst the vanished Hero's lofty mound;
Far on the solitary shore he sleeps:[3.B.]
He fell, and falling nations mourned around;
But now not one of saddening thousands weeps,
Nor warlike worshipper his vigil keeps
Where demi-gods appeared, as records tell.[du][116]
Remove yon skull from out the scattered heaps:
Is that a Temple where a God may dwell?
Why ev'n the Worm at last disdains her shattered cell!
VI.
Look on its broken arch, its ruined wall,
Its chambers desolate, and portals foul:
Yes, this was once Ambition's airy hall,
The Dome of Thought, the Palace of the Soul:
Behold through each lack-lustre, eyeless hole,
The gay recess of Wisdom and of Wit[117]
And Passion's host, that never brooked control:
Can all Saint, Sage, or Sophist ever writ,
People this lonely tower, this tenement refit?
VII.
Well didst thou speak, Athena's wisest son![118]
"All that we know is, nothing can be known."
Why should we shrink from what we cannot shun?
Each hath its pang, but feeble sufferers groan
With brain-born dreams of Evil all their own.
Pursue what Chance or Fate proclaimeth best;
Peace waits us on the shores of Acheron:
There no forced banquet claims the sated guest,
But Silence spreads the couch of ever welcome Rest.
VIII.[119]
Yet if, as holiest men have deemed, there be[dv]
A land of Souls beyond that sable shore,
To shame the Doctrine of the Sadducee
And Sophists, madly vain of dubious lore;
How sweet it were in concert to adore
With those who made our mortal labours light!
To hear each voice we feared to hear no more!
Behold each mighty shade revealed to sight,
The Bactrian, Samian sage, and all who taught the Right!
IX.[120]
There, Thou!--whose Love and Life together fled,
Have left me here to love and live in vain--
Twined with my heart, and can I deem thee dead
When busy Memory flashes on my brain?
Well--I will dream that we may meet again,
And woo the vision to my vacant breast:
If aught of young Remembrance then remain,
Be as it may Futurity's behest,[dw]
For me 'twere bliss enough to know thy spirit blest!
X.
Here let me sit upon this massy stone,
The marble column's yet unshaken base;
Here, son of Saturn! was thy favourite throne:[4.B.]
Mightiest of many such! Hence let me trace
The latent grandeur of thy dwelling-place.
It may not be: nor ev'n can Fancy's eye
Restore what Time hath laboured to deface.
Yet these proud Pillars claim no passing sigh;
Unmoved the Moslem sits, the light Greek carols by.
XI.
But who, of all the plunderers of yon Fane[121]
On high--where Pallas linger'd, loth to flee
The latest relic of her ancient reign--
The last, the worst, dull spoiler, who was he?[dx]
Blush, Caledonia! such thy son could be!
England! I joy no child he was of thine:
Thy free-born men should spare what once was free;
Yet they could violate each saddening shrine,
And hear these altars o'er the long-reluctant brine.[5.B.]
XII.
But most the modern Pict's ignoble boast,[dy][122]
To rive what Goth, and Turk, and Time hath spared:[6.B.]
Cold as the crags upon his native coast,
His mind as barren and his heart as hard,
Is he whose head conceived, whose hand prepared.
Aught to displace Athenae's poor remains:
Her Sons too weak the sacred shrine to guard,
Yet felt some portion of their Mother's pains,[7.B.]
And never knew, till then, the weight of Despot's chains.
XIII.
What! shall it e'er be said by British tongue,[dz]
Albion was happy in Athena's tears?
Though in thy name the slaves her bosom wrung,
Tell not the deed to blushing Europe's ears;
The Ocean Queen, the free Britannia, bears
The last poor plunder from a bleeding land:
Yes, she, whose generous aid her name endears,
Tore down those remnants with a Harpy's hand,
Which envious Eld forbore, and tyrants left to stand.[ea]
XIV.
Where was thine AEgis, Pallas! that appalled[eb]
Stern Alaric and Havoc on their way?[8.B.]
Where Peleus' son? whom Hell in vain enthralled.
His shade from Hades upon that dread day
Bursting to light in terrible array!
What! could not Pluto spare the Chief once more,
To scare a second robber from his prey?
Idly he wandered on the Stygian shore,
Nor now preserved the walls he loved to shield before.
XV.
Cold is the heart, fair Greece! that looks on Thee,
Nor feels as Lovers o'er the dust they loved;
Dull is the eye that will not weep to see
Thy walls defaced, thy mouldering shrines removed
By British hands, which it had best behoved[ec]
To guard those relics ne'er to be restored:--
Curst be the hour when from their isle they roved,
And once again thy hapless bosom gored,
And snatched thy shrinking Gods to Northern climes abhorred![123]
XVI.
But where is Harold? shall I then forget
To urge the gloomy Wanderer o'er the wave?
Little recked he of all that Men regret;
No loved-one now in feigned lament could rave;[124]
No friend the parting hand extended gave,
Ere the cold Stranger passed to other climes:
Hard is his heart whom charms may not enslave;
But Harold felt not as in other times,
And left without a sigh the land of War and Crimes.
XVII.
He that has sailed upon the dark blue sea
Has viewed at times, I ween, a full fair sight,
When the fresh breeze is fair as breeze may be,
The white sail set, the gallant Frigate tight--
Masts, spires, and strand retiring to the right,
The glorious Main expanding o'er the bow,
The Convoy spread like wild swans in their flight,
The dullest sailer wearing bravely now--
So gaily curl the waves before each dashing prow.
XVIII.
And oh, the little warlike world within!
The well-reeved guns, the netted canopy,[9.B.]
The hoarse command, the busy humming din,
When, at a word, the tops are manned on high:
Hark, to the Boatswain's call, the cheering cry!
While through the seaman's hand the tackle glides;
Or schoolboy Midshipman that, standing by,
Strains his shrill pipe as good or ill betides,
And well the docile crew that skilful Urchin guides.[ed]
XIX.
White is the glassy deck, without a stain,
Where on the watch the staid Lieutenant walks:
Look on that part which sacred doth remain[ee]
For the lone Chieftain, who majestic stalks,
Silent and feared by all--not oft he talks
With aught beneath him, if he would preserve
That strict restraint, which broken, ever balks
Conquest and Fame: but Britons rarely swerve
From law, however stern, which tends their strength to nerve[ef].
XX.
Blow! swiftly blow, thou keel-compelling gale!
Till the broad Sun withdraws his lessening ray:
Then must the Pennant-bearer slacken sail,
That lagging barks may make their lazy way.[125]
Ah! grievance sore, and listless dull delay,
To waste on sluggish hulks the sweetest breeze!
What leagues are lost, before the dawn of day,
Thus loitering pensive on the willing seas,
The flapping sail hauled down to halt for logs like these!
XXI.
The Moon is up; by Heaven, a lovely eve!
Long streams of light o'er dancing waves expand;
Now lads on shore may sigh, and maids believe[eg]:
Such be our fate when we return to land!
Meantime some rude Arion's restless hand[eh]
Wakes the brisk harmony that sailors love;
A circle there of merry listeners stand
Or to some well-known measure featly move,
Thoughtless, as if on shore they still were free to rove.
XXII.
Through Calpe's straits survey the steepy shore;[ei]
Europe and Afric on each other gaze![126]
Lands of the dark-eyed Maid and dusky Moor
Alike beheld beneath pale Hecate's blaze:
How softly on the Spanish shore she plays![127]
Disclosing rock, and slope, and forest brown,[128]
Distinct, though darkening with her waning phase;
But Mauritania's giant-shadows frown,
From mountain-cliff to coast descending sombre down.
XXIII.
'Tis night, when Meditation bids us feel
We once have loved, though Love is at an end:
The Heart, lone mourner of its baffled zeal,[ej]
Though friendless now, will dream it had a friend.
Who with the weight of years would wish to bend,
When Youth itself survives young Love and Joy?
Alas! when mingling souls forget to blend,
Death hath but little left him to destroy!
Ah! happy years! once more who would not be a boy?[ek]
XXIV.
Thus bending o'er the vessel's laving side,
To gaze on Dian's wave-reflected sphere,[el]
The Soul forgets her schemes of Hope and Pride,[em]
And flies unconscious o'er each backward year;
None are so desolate but something dear,[en]
Dearer than self, possesses or possessed
A thought, and claims the homage of a tear;
A flashing pang! of which the weary breast
Would still, albeit in vain, the heavy heart divest.
XXV.[eo][129]
To sit on rocks--to muse o'er flood and fell--
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene,
Where things that own not Man's dominion dwell,
And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen,
With the wild flock that never needs a fold;
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean;[ep]
This is not Solitude--'tis but to hold
Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores unrolled.
XXVI.
But midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men,
To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess,
And roam along, the World's tired denizen,
With none who bless us, none whom we can bless;
Minions of Splendour shrinking from distress![130]
None that, with kindred consciousness endued,
If we were not, would seem to smile the less,
Of all that flattered--followed--sought, and sued:
This is to be alone--This, This is Solitude![eq]
XXVII.[131]
More blest the life of godly Eremite,
Such as on lonely Athos may be seen,
Watching at eve upon the Giant Height,
Which looks o'er waves so blue, skies so serene,
That he who there at such an hour hath been
Will wistful linger on that hallowed spot;
Then slowly tear him from the 'witching scene,
Sigh forth one wish that such had been his lot,
Then turn to hate a world he had almost forgot.
XXVIII.
Pass we the long unvarying course, the track
Oft trod, that never leaves a trace behind;
Pass we the calm--the gale--the change--the tack,
And each well known caprice of wave and wind;
Pass we the joys and sorrows sailors find,
Cooped in their winged sea-girt citadel;
The foul--the fair--the contrary--the kind--
As breezes rise and fall and billows swell,
Till on some jocund morn--lo, Land! and All is well!
XXIX.
But not in silence pass Calypso's isles,[10.B.]
The sister tenants of the middle deep;
There for the weary still a Haven smiles,
Though the fair Goddess long hath ceased to weep,
And o'er her cliffs a fruitless watch to keep
For him who dared prefer a mortal bride:
Here, too, his boy essayed the dreadful leap
Stern Mentor urged from high to yonder tide;
While thus of both bereft, the Nymph-Queen doubly sighed.[132]
XXX.
Her reign is past, her gentle glories gone:
But trust not this; too easy Youth, beware!
A mortal Sovereign holds her dangerous throne,
And thou may'st find a new Calypso there.
Sweet Florence[133] could another ever share
This wayward, loveless heart, it would be thine:
But checked by every tie, I may not dare
To cast a worthless offering at thy shrine,
Nor ask so dear a breast to feel one pang for _mine_.
XXXI.
Thus Harold deemed, as on that Lady's eye
He looked, and met its beam without a thought,
Save Admiration glancing harmless by:
Love kept aloof, albeit not far remote,
Who knew his Votary often lost and caught,
But knew him as his Worshipper no more,
And ne'er again the Boy his bosom sought:
Since now he vainly urged him to adore,
Well deemed the little God his ancient sway was o'er.
XXXII.
Fair Florence found, in sooth with some amaze,
One who, 'twas said, still sighed to all he saw,
Withstand, unmoved, the lustre of her gaze,
Which others hailed with real or mimic awe,
Their hope, their doom, their punishment, their law;
All that gay Beauty from her bondsmen claims:
And much she marvelled that a youth so raw
Nor felt, nor feigned at least, the oft-told flames,
Which though sometimes they frown, yet rarely anger dames.
XXXIII.
Little knew she that seeming marble heart,
Now masked in silence or withheld by Pride,
Was not unskilful in the spoiler's art,
And spread its snares licentious far and wide;[134]
Nor from the base pursuit had turned aside,
As long as aught was worthy to pursue:
But Harold on such arts no more relied;
And had he doted on those eyes so blue,
Yet never would he join the lover's whining crew.
XXXIV.
Not much he kens, I ween, of Woman's breast,
Who thinks that wanton thing is won by sighs;
What careth she for hearts when once possessed?
Do proper homage to thine Idol's eyes;
But not too humbly, or she will despise
Thee and thy suit, though told in moving tropes:
Disguise ev'n tenderness, if thou art wise;
Brisk Confidence still best with woman copes:[er]
Pique her and soothe in turn--soon Passion crowns thy hopes.
XXXV.
'Tis an old lesson--Time approves it true,
And those who know it best, deplore it most;
When all is won that all desire to woo,
The paltry prize is hardly worth the cost:
Youth wasted--Minds degraded--Honour lost--[es]
These are thy fruits, successful Passion! these![135]
If, kindly cruel, early Hope is crost,
Still to the last it rankles, a disease,
Not to be cured when Love itself forgets to please.
XXXVI.
Away! nor let me loiter in my song,
For we have many a mountain-path to tread,
And many a varied shore to sail along,
By pensive Sadness, not by Fiction, led--
Climes, fair withal as ever mortal head[et]
Imagined in its little schemes of thought;[eu]
Or e'er in new Utopias were ared,[136]
To teach Man what he might be, or he ought--
If that corrupted thing could ever such be taught.
XXXVII.
Dear Nature is the kindest mother still!
Though always changing, in her aspect mild;
From her bare bosom let me take my fill,
Her never-weaned, though not her favoured child.[ev]
Oh! she is fairest in her features wild,
Where nothing polished dares pollute her path:
To me by day or night she ever smiled,
Though I have marked her when none other hath,
And sought her more and more, and loved her best in wrath.[137]
XXXVIII.
Land of Albania! where Iskander rose,[138]
Theme of the young, and beacon of the wise,[139]
And he his namesake, whose oft-baffled foes
Shrunk from his deeds of chivalrous emprize:
Land of Albania! let me bend mine eyes[11.B.]
On thee, thou rugged Nurse of savage men!
The Cross descends, thy Minarets arise,
And the pale Crescent sparkles in the glen,
Through many a cypress-grove within each city's ken.
XXXIX.
Childe Harold sailed, and passed the barren spot,[140]
Where sad Penelope o'erlooked the wave;[12.B.]
And onward viewed the mount, not yet forgot,
The Lover's refuge, and the Lesbian's grave.
Dark Sappho! could not Verse immortal save
That breast imbued with such immortal fire?
Could she not live who life eternal gave?
If life eternal may await the lyre,
That only Heaven to which Earth's children may aspire.[141]
XL.
'Twas on a Grecian autumn's gentle eve
Childe Harold hailed Leucadia's cape afar;
A spot he longed to see, nor cared to leave:
Oft did he mark the scenes of vanished war,
Actium--Lepanto--fatal Trafalgar;[13.B.]
Mark them unmoved, for he would not delight
(Born beneath some remote inglorious star)[142]
In themes of bloody fray, or gallant fight,
But loathed the bravo's trade, and laughed at martial wight.[ew]
XLI.
But when he saw the Evening star above
Leucadia's far-projecting rock of woe,
And hailed the last resort of fruitless love,[14.B.]
He felt, or deemed he felt, no common glow:
And as the stately vessel glided slow[143]
Beneath the shadow of that ancient mount,
He watched the billows' melancholy flow,
And, sunk albeit in thought as he was wont,[ex]
More placid seemed his eye, and smooth his pallid front.
XLII.
Morn dawns; and with it stern Albania's hills,
Dark Suli's rocks, and Pindus' inland peak,[144]
Robed half in mist, bedewed with snowy rills,
Arrayed in many a dun and purple streak,
Arise; and, as the clouds along them break,
Disclose the dwelling of the mountaineer:
Here roams the wolf--the eagle whets his beak--
Birds--beasts of prey--and wilder men appear,
And gathering storms around convulse the closing year.
XLIII.
Now Harold felt himself at length alone,
And bade to Christian tongues a long adieu;
Now he adventured on a shore unknown,[145]
Which all admire, but many dread to view:
His breast was armed 'gainst fate, his wants were few
Peril he sought not, but ne'er shrank to meet:
The scene was savage, but the scene was new;
_This_ made the ceaseless toil of travel sweet,
Beat back keen Winter's blast, and welcomed Summer's heat.
XLIV.
Here the red Cross, for still the Cross is here,
Though sadly scoffed at by the circumcised,
Forgets that Pride to pampered priesthood dear;
Churchman and Votary alike despised.
Foul Superstition! howsoe'er disguised,
Idol--Saint--Virgin--Prophet--Crescent--Cross--
For whatsoever symbol thou art prized,
Thou sacerdotal gain, but general loss!
Who from true Worship's gold can separate thy dross?
XLV.
Ambracia's gulf behold, where once was lost
A world for Woman, lovely, harmless thing![ey][146]
In yonder rippling bay, their naval host
Did many a Roman chief and Asian King[15.B.]
To doubtful conflict, certain slaughter bring:
Look where the second Caesar's trophies rose![147][16.B.]
Now, like the hands that reared them, withering:
Imperial Anarchs, doubling human woes![ez]
GOD! was thy globe ordained for such to win and lose?
XLVI.
From the dark barriers of that rugged clime,
Ev'n to the centre of Illyria's vales,
Childe Harold passed o'er many a mount sublime,
Through lands scarce noticed in historic tales:
Yet in famed Attica such lovely dales
Are rarely seen; nor can fair Tempe boast
A charm they know not; loved Parnassus fails,
Though classic ground and consecrated most,
To match some spots that lurk within this lowering coast.
XLVII.
He passed bleak Pindus, Acherusia's lake,[17.B.]
And left the primal city of the land,
And onwards did his further journey take[148]
To greet Albania's Chief, whose dread command[18.B.]
Is lawless law; for with a bloody hand
He sways a nation,--turbulent and bold:
Yet here and there some daring mountain-band
Disdain his power, and from their rocky hold
Hurl their defiance far, nor yield, unless to gold.[19.B.]
XLVIII.
Monastic Zitza![149] from thy shady brow,[20.B.]
Thou small, but favoured spot of holy ground!
Where'er we gaze--around--above--below,--
What rainbow tints, what magic charms are found!
Rock, river, forest, mountain, all abound,
And bluest skies that harmonise the whole:
Beneath, the distant Torrent's rushing sound
Tells where the volumed Cataract doth roll
Between those hanging rocks, that shock yet please the soul.
XLIX.
Amidst the grove that crowns yon tufted hill,
Which, were it not for many a mountain nigh
Rising in lofty ranks, and loftier still,
Might well itself be deemed of dignity,
The Convent's white walls glisten fair on high:
Here dwells the caloyer, nor rude is he,[21.B.]
Nor niggard of his cheer;[150] the passer by
Is welcome still; nor heedless will he flee
From hence, if he delight kind Nature's sheen to see.
L.
Here in the sultriest season let him rest,
Fresh is the green beneath those aged trees;
Here winds of gentlest wing will fan his breast,[fa]
From Heaven itself he may inhale the breeze:
The plain is far beneath--oh! let him seize
Pure pleasure while he can; the scorching ray
Here pierceth not, impregnate with disease:
Then let his length the loitering pilgrim lay,
And gaze, untired, the Morn--the Noon--the Eve away.
LI.
Dusky and huge, enlarging on the sight,
Nature's volcanic Amphitheatre,[22.B.]
Chimaera's Alps extend from left to right:
Beneath, a living valley seems to stir;
Flocks play, trees wave, streams flow, the mountain-fir
Nodding above; behold black Acheron![23.B.]
Once consecrated to the sepulchre.
Pluto! if this be Hell I look upon,
Close shamed Elysium's gates, my shade shall seek for none[fb].
LII.
Ne city's towers pollute the lovely view;
Unseen is Yanina, though not remote,
Veiled by the screen of hills: here men are few,
Scanty the hamlet, rare the lonely cot:
But, peering down each precipice, the goat[fc]
Browseth; and, pensive o'er his scattered flock,
The little shepherd in his white capote[24.B.]
Doth lean his boyish form along the rock,
Or in his cave awaits the Tempest's short-lived shock.[fd]
LIII.
Oh! where, Dodona![151] is thine aged Grove,
Prophetic Fount, and Oracle divine?
What valley echoed the response of Jove?
What trace remaineth of the Thunderer's shrine?
All, all forgotten--and shall Man repine
That his frail bonds to fleeting life are broke?[152]
Cease, Fool! the fate of Gods may well be thine:
Wouldst thou survive the marble or the oak?
When nations, tongues, and worlds must sink beneath the stroke!
LIV.
Epirus' bounds recede, and mountains fail;[153]
Tired of up-gazing still, the wearied eye
Reposes gladly on as smooth a vale
As ever Spring yclad in grassy dye:[154]
Ev'n on a plain no humble beauties lie,
Where some bold river breaks the long expanse,
And woods along the banks are waving high,
Whose shadows in the glassy waters dance,
Or with the moonbeam sleep in Midnight's solemn trance.
LV.
The Sun had sunk behind vast Tomerit,[25.B.]
And Laos wide and fierce came roaring by;[26.B.]
The shades of wonted night were gathering yet,
When, down the steep banks winding warily,
Childe Harold saw, like meteors in the sky,[155]
The glittering minarets of Tepalen,
Whose walls o'erlook the stream; and drawing nigh,
He heard the busy hum of warrior-men
Swelling the breeze that sighed along the lengthening glen.
LVI.
He passed the sacred Haram's silent tower,
And underneath the wide o'erarching gate
Surveyed the dwelling of this Chief of power,
Where all around proclaimed his high estate.
Amidst no common pomp the Despot sate,
While busy preparation shook the court,
Slaves, eunuchs, soldiers, guests, and santons[156] wait;[fe]
Within, a palace, and without, a fort:
Here men of every clime appear to make resort.
LVII.
Richly caparisoned, a ready row
Of armed horse, and many a warlike store,
Circled the wide-extending court below;
Above, strange groups adorned the corridore;
And oft-times through the area's echoing door
Some high-capped Tartar spurred his steed away:
The Turk--the Greek--the Albanian--and the Moor,
Here mingled in their many-hued array,
While the deep war-drum's sound announced the close of day.[ff]
LVIII.
The wild Albanian kirtled to his knee,
With shawl-girt head and ornamented gun,
And gold-embroidered garments, fair to see;
The crimson-scarfed men of Macedon;
The Delhi with his cap of terror on,
And crooked glaive--the lively, supple Greek
And swarthy Nubia's mutilated son;
The bearded Turk that rarely deigns to speak,
Master of all around, too potent to be meek,
LIX.
Are mixed conspicuous: some recline in groups,[157]
Scanning the motley scene that varies round;
There some grave Moslem to devotion stoops,
And some that smoke, and some that play, are found;
Here the Albanian proudly treads the ground;
Half-whispering there the Greek is heard to prate;
Hark! from the Mosque the nightly solemn sound,
The Muezzin's call doth shake the minaret,
"There is no god but God!--to prayer--lo! God is great!"
LX.
Just at this season Ramazani's fast[158]
Through the long day its penance did maintain:
But when the lingering twilight hour was past,
Revel and feast assumed the rule again:
Now all was bustle, and the menial train
Prepared and spread the plenteous board within;
The vacant Gallery now seemed made in vain,
But from the chambers came the mingling din,
As page and slave anon were passing out and in.[159]
LXI.
Here woman's voice is never heard: apart,
And scarce permitted, guarded, veiled, to move,[fg]
She yields to one her person and her heart,
Tamed to her cage, nor feels a wish to rove:
For, not unhappy in her Master's love,[fh]
And joyful in a mother's gentlest cares,
Blest cares! all other feelings far above!
Herself more sweetly rears the babe she bears
Who never quits the breast--no meaner passion shares.
LXII.
In marble-paved pavilion, where a spring
Of living water from the centre rose,
Whose bubbling did a genial freshness fling,
And soft voluptuous couches breathed repose,
ALI reclined, a man of war and woes:[160]
Yet in his lineaments ye cannot trace,
While Gentleness her milder radiance throws[161]
Along that aged venerable face,
The deeds that lurk beneath, and stain him with disgrace.
LXIII.
It is not that yon hoary lengthening beard
Ill suits the passions which belong to Youth;[fi]
Love conquers Age--so Hafiz hath averr'd,
So sings the Teian, and he sings in sooth[162]--
But crimes that scorn the tender voice of ruth,[fj][163]
Beseeming all men ill, but most the man
In years, have marked him with a tiger's tooth;
Blood follows blood, and, through their mortal span,
In bloodier acts conclude those who with blood began.[fk][164]
LXIV.
'Mid many things most new to ear and eye[fl]
The Pilgrim rested here his weary feet,
And gazed around on Moslem luxury,
Till quickly, wearied with that spacious seat
Of Wealth and Wantonness, the choice retreat
Of sated Grandeur from the city's noise:
And were it humbler it in sooth were sweet;
But Peace abhorreth artificial joys,
And Pleasure, leagued with Pomp, the zest of both destroys.
LXV.
Fierce are Albania's children, yet they lack
Not virtues, were those virtues more mature.
Where is the foe that ever saw their back?
Who can so well the toil of War endure?
Their native fastnesses not more secure
Than they in doubtful time of troublous need:
Their wrath how deadly! but their friendship sure,
When Gratitude or Valour bids them bleed,
Unshaken rushing on where'er their Chief may lead.
LXVI.
Childe Harold saw them in their Chieftain's tower
Thronging to War in splendour and success;
And after viewed them, when, within their power,
Himself awhile the victim of distress;
That saddening hour when bad men hotlier press:
But these did shelter him beneath their roof,
When less barbarians would have cheered him less,
And fellow-countrymen have stood aloof--[27.B.]
In aught that tries the heart, how few withstand the proof!
LXVII.
It chanced that adverse winds once drove his bark
Full on the coast of Suli's shaggy shore,[165]
When all around was desolate and dark;
To land was perilous, to sojourn more;
Yet for awhile the mariners forbore,
Dubious to trust where Treachery might lurk:
At length they ventured forth, though doubting sore
That those who loathe alike the Frank and Turk
Might once again renew their ancient butcher-work.
LXVIII.
Vain fear! the Suliotes stretched the welcome hand,
Led them o'er rocks and past the dangerous swamp,
Kinder than polished slaves though not so bland,
And piled the hearth, and wrung their garments damp,
And filled the bowl, and trimmed the cheerful lamp,
And spread their fare; though homely, all they had:
Such conduct bears Philanthropy's rare stamp:
To rest the weary and to soothe the sad,
Doth lesson happier men, and shames at least the bad.
LXIX.
It came to pass, that when he did address
Himself to quit at length this mountain-land,
Combined marauders half-way barred egress,
And wasted far and near with glaive and brand;
And therefore did he take a trusty band
To traverse Acarnania's forest wide,
In war well-seasoned, and with labours tanned,
Till he did greet white Achelous' tide,
And from his further bank AEtolia's wolds espied.[166]
LXX.
Where lone Utraikey forms its circling cove,[167]
And weary waves retire to gleam at rest,
How brown the foliage of the green hill's grove,
Nodding at midnight o'er the calm bay's breast,
As winds come lightly whispering from the West,
Kissing, not ruffling, the blue deep's serene:--
Here Harold was received a welcome guest;
Nor did he pass unmoved the gentle scene,
For many a joy could he from Night's soft presence glean.
LXXI.
On the smooth shore the night-fires brightly blazed,
The feast was done, the red wine circling fast,[28.B.]
And he that unawares had there ygazed
With gaping wonderment had stared aghast;
For ere night's midmost, stillest hour was past,
The native revels of the troop began;
Each Palikar his sabre from him cast,[29.B.]
And bounding hand in hand, man linked to man,
Yelling their uncouth dirge, long daunced the kirtled clan.[168]
LXXII.
Childe Harold at a little distance stood
And viewed, but not displeased, the revelrie,
Nor hated harmless mirth, however rude:
In sooth, it was no vulgar sight to see
Their barbarous, yet their not indecent, glee;
And, as the flames along their faces gleamed,
Their gestures nimble, dark eyes flashing free,
The long wild locks that to their girdles streamed,
While thus in concert they this lay half sang,
half screamed:--[169][30.B.]
1.
Tambourgi![170] Tambourgi! thy 'larum afar[fm][31.B.]
Gives hope to the valiant, and promise of war;
All the Sons of the mountains arise at the note,
Chimariot, Illyrian, and dark Suliote!
2.
Oh! who is more brave than a dark Suliote,
In his snowy camese[171] and his shaggy capote?
To the wolf and the vulture he leaves his wild flock,
And descends to the plain like the stream from the rock.
3.
Shall the sons of Chimari, who never forgive[fn]
The fault of a friend, bid an enemy live?
Let those guns so unerring such vengeance forego?
What mark is so fair as the breast of a foe?[172]
4.
Macedonia sends forth her invincible race;
For a time they abandon the cave and the chase:
But those scarfs of blood-red shall be redder, before
The sabre is sheathed and the battle is o'er.
5.
Then the Pirates of Parga that dwell by the waves,
And teach the pale Franks what it is to be slaves,
Shall leave on the beach the long galley and oar,
And track to his covert the captive on shore.
6.
I ask not the pleasures that riches supply,
My sabre shall win what the feeble must buy;
Shall win the young bride with her long flowing hair,[fo]
And many a maid from her mother shall tear.
7.
I love the fair face of the maid in her youth,[fp]
Her caresses shall lull me, her music shall soothe;[fq]
Let her bring from the chamber her many-toned lyre,
And sing us a song on the fall of her Sire.
8.
Remember the moment when Previsa fell,[173][32.B.]
The shrieks of the conquered, the conquerors' yell;
The roofs that we fired, and the plunder we shared,
The wealthy we slaughtered, the lovely we spared.
9.
I talk not of mercy, I talk not of fear;
He neither must know who would serve the Vizier:
Since the days of our Prophet the Crescent ne'er saw
A chief ever glorious like Ali Pashaw.
10.
Dark Muchtar his son to the Danube is sped,[174]
Let the yellow-haired[175] Giaours[176]
view his horse-tail[177] with dread;
When his Delhis[178] come dashing in blood o'er the banks,
How few shall escape from the Muscovite ranks!
11.
Selictar![179] unsheathe then our chief's Scimit[=a]r;
Tambourgi! thy 'larum gives promise of War.[fr]
Ye Mountains, that see us descend to the shore,
Shall view us as Victors, or view us no more!
LXXIII.
Fair Greece! sad relic of departed Worth![33.B.]
Immortal, though no more; though fallen, great!
Who now shall lead thy scattered children forth,
And long accustomed bondage uncreate?
Not such thy sons who whilome did await,
The helpless warriors of a willing doom,
In bleak Thermopylae's sepulchral strait--
Oh! who that gallant spirit shall resume,
Leap from Eurotas' banks, and call thee from the tomb?[180]
LXXIV.
Spirit of Freedom! when on Phyle's brow[34.B.]
Thou sat'st with Thrasybulus and his train,
Couldst thou forebode the dismal hour which now
Dims the green beauties of thine Attic plain?
Not thirty tyrants now enforce the chain,
But every carle can lord it o'er thy land;
Nor rise thy sons, but idly rail in vain,
Trembling beneath the scourge of Turkish hand,
From birth till death enslaved; in word, in deed, unmanned.[fs]
LXXV.
In all save form alone, how changed! and who
That marks the fire still sparkling in each eye,
Who but would deem their bosoms burned anew
With thy unquenched beam, lost Liberty![ft]
And many dream withal the hour is nigh
That gives them back their fathers' heritage:
For foreign arms and aid they fondly sigh,
Nor solely dare encounter hostile rage,
Or tear their name defiled from Slavery's mournful page.
LXXVI.
Hereditary Bondsmen! know ye not
_Who_ would be free _themselves_ must strike the blow?
By their right arms the conquest must be wrought?[181]
Will Gaul or Muscovite redress ye? No!
True--they may lay your proud despoilers low,
But not for you will Freedom's Altars flame.
Shades of the Helots! triumph o'er your foe!
Greece! change thy lords, thy state is still the same;
Thy glorious day is o'er, but not thine years of shame.
LXXVII.
The city won for Allah from the Giaour
The Giaour from Othman's race again may wrest;
And the Serai's impenetrable tower
Receive the fiery Frank, her former guest;[35.B.]
Or Wahab's[182] rebel brood who dared divest
The Prophet's tomb of all its pious spoil,[36.B.]
May wind their path of blood along the West;
But ne'er will Freedom seek this fated soil,
But slave succeed to slave through years of endless toil.
LXXVIII.
Yet mark their mirth--ere Lenten days begin,
That penance which their holy rites prepare
To shrive from Man his weight of mortal sin,
By daily abstinence and nightly prayer;
But ere his sackcloth garb Repentance wear,
Some days of joyaunce are decreed to all,
To take of pleasaunce each his secret share,
In motley robe to dance at masking ball,
And join the mimic train of merry Carnival.
LXXIX.[183]
And whose more rife with merriment than thine,
Oh Stamboul! once the Empress of their reign?
Though turbans now pollute Sophia's shrine,
And Greece her very altars eyes in vain:
(Alas! her woes will still pervade my strain!)
Gay were her minstrels once, for free her throng,
All felt the common joy they now must feign,
Nor oft I've seen such sight, nor heard such song,
As wooed the eye, and thrilled the Bosphorus along.
LXXX.
Loud was the lightsome tumult on the shore,[184]
Oft Music changed, but never ceased her tone,
And timely echoed back the measured oar,
And rippling waters made a pleasant moan:
The Queen of tides on high consenting shone,
And when a transient breeze swept o'er the wave,
'Twas, as if darting from her heavenly throne,
A brighter glance her form reflected gave,
Till sparkling billows seemed to light the banks they lave.
LXXXI.
Glanced many a light Caique along the foam,
Danced on the shore the daughters of the land,
No thought had man or maid of rest or home,
While many a languid eye and thrilling hand
Exchanged the look few bosoms may withstand,
Or gently prest, returned the pressure still:
Oh Love! young Love! bound in thy rosy band,
Let sage or cynic prattle as he will,
These hours, and only these, redeem Life's years of ill![185]
LXXXII.
But, midst the throng in merry masquerade,
Lurk there no hearts that throb with secret pain,
Even through the closest searment[186] half betrayed?
To such the gentle murmurs of the main
Seem to re-echo all they mourn in vain;
To such the gladness of the gamesome crowd
Is source of wayward thought and stern disdain:
How do they loathe the laughter idly loud,
And long to change the robe of revel for the shroud!
LXXXIII.
This must he feel, the true-born son of Greece,
If Greece one true-born patriot still can boast:
Not such as prate of War, but skulk in Peace,
The bondsman's peace, who sighs for all he lost,
Yet with smooth smile his Tyrant can accost,
And wield the slavish sickle, not the sword:
Ah! Greece! they love thee least who owe thee most--
Their birth, their blood, and that sublime record[187]
Of hero Sires, who shame thy now degenerate horde!
LXXXIV.
When riseth Lacedemon's Hardihood,
When Thebes Epaminondas rears again,
When Athens' children are with hearts endued,[fu]
When Grecian mothers shall give birth to men,
Then may'st thou be restored; but not till then.
A thousand years scarce serve to form a state;
An hour may lay it in the dust: and when
Can Man its shattered splendour renovate,
Recall its virtues back, and vanquish Time and Fate?
LXXXV.
And yet how lovely in thine age of woe,
Land of lost Gods and godlike men, art thou!
Thy vales of evergreen, thy hills of snow,[37.B.]
Proclaim thee Nature's varied favourite now:
Thy fanes, thy temples to thy surface bow,
Commingling slowly with heroic earth,
Broke by the share of every rustic plough:
So perish monuments of mortal birth,
So perish all in turn, save well-recorded _Worth_:[188]
LXXXVI.
Save where some solitary column[189] mourns
Above its prostrate brethren of the cave;[38.B.]
Save where Tritonia's[190] airy shrine adorns
Colonna's cliff,[191] and gleams along the wave;
Save o'er some warrior's half-forgotten grave,
Where the gray stones and unmolested grass
Ages, but not Oblivion, feebly brave;
While strangers, only, not regardless pass,
Lingering like me, perchance, to gaze, and sigh "Alas!"
LXXXVII.
Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild;
Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields,
Thine olive ripe as when Minerva[192] smiled,
And still his honied wealth Hymettus[193] yields;
There the blithe Bee his fragrant fortress builds,
The free-born wanderer of thy mountain-air;
Apollo still thy long, long summer gilds,
Still in his beam Mendeli's marbles glare:[fv]
Art, Glory, Freedom fail, but Nature still is fair.
LXXXVIII.[194]
Where'er we tread 'tis haunted, holy ground;
No earth of thine is lost in vulgar mould,
But one vast realm of Wonder spreads around,
And all the Muse's tales seem truly told,
Till the sense aches with gazing to behold
The scenes our earliest dreams have dwelt upon;
Each hill and dale, each deepening glen and wold
Defies the power which crushed thy temples gone:
Age shakes Athenae's tower, but spares gray Marathon.[195]
LXXXIX.
The Sun, the soil--but not the slave, the same;--
Unchanged in all except its foreign Lord,
Preserves alike its bounds and boundless fame[fw]
The Battle-field, where Persia's victim horde
First bowed beneath the brunt of Hellas' sword,
As on the morn to distant Glory dear,
When Marathon became a magic word;[39.B.]
Which uttered, to the hearer's eye appear[fx]
The camp, the host, the fight, the Conqueror's career,[fy]
XC.
The flying Mede, his shaftless broken bow--[fz][196]
The fiery Greek, his red pursuing spear;
Mountains above--Earth's, Ocean's plain below--
Death in the front, Destruction in the rear!
Such was the scene--what now remaineth here?
What sacred Trophy marks the hallowed ground,
Recording Freedom's smile and Asia's tear?[ga]
The rifled urn, the violated mound,[197]
The dust thy courser's hoof, rude stranger! spurns around.
XCI.
Yet to the remnants of thy Splendour past[gb]
Shall pilgrims, pensive, but unwearied, throng;
Long shall the voyager, with th' Ionian blast,[198]
Hail the bright clime of Battle and of Song:
Long shall thine annals and immortal tongue
Fill with thy fame the youth of many a shore;
Boast of the aged! lesson of the young!
Which Sages venerate and Bards adore,
As Pallas and the Muse unveil their awful lore.
XCII.
The parted bosom clings to wonted home,
If aught that's kindred cheer the welcome hearth;
He that is lonely--hither let him roam,
And gaze complacent on congenial earth.
Greece is no lightsome land of social mirth:
But he whom Sadness sootheth may abide,
And scarce regret the region of his birth,
When wandering slow by Delphi's sacred side,
Or gazing o'er the plains where Greek and Persian died.[199]
XCIII.
Let such approach this consecrated Land,
And pass in peace along the magic waste;
But spare its relics--let no busy hand
Deface the scenes, already how defaced!
Not for such purpose were these altars placed:
Revere the remnants Nations once revered:
So may our Country's name be undisgraced,
So may'st thou prosper where thy youth was reared,
By every honest joy of Love and Life endeared!
XCIV.
For thee, who thus in too protracted song
Hast soothed thine Idlesse with inglorious lays,
Soon shall thy voice be lost amid the throng
Of louder Minstrels in these later days:
To such resign the strife for fading Bays--
Ill may such contest now the spirit move
Which heeds nor keen Reproach nor partial Praise,[gc]
Since cold each kinder heart that might approve--
And none are left to please when none are left to love.
XCV.
Thou too art gone, thou loved and lovely one!
Whom Youth and Youth's affections bound to me;
Who did for me what none beside have done,
Nor shrank from one albeit unworthy thee.
What is my Being! thou hast ceased to be!
Nor staid to welcome here thy wanderer home,
Who mourns o'er hours which we no more shall see--
Would they had never been, or were to come!
Would he had ne'er returned to find fresh cause to roam![gd][200]
XCVI.
Oh! ever loving, lovely, and beloved!
How selfish Sorrow ponders on the past,
And clings to thoughts now better far removed!
But Time shall tear thy shadow from me last.[ge]
All thou couldst have of mine, stern Death! thou hast;
The Parent, Friend, and now the more than Friend:
Ne'er yet for one thine arrows flew so fast,[201]
And grief with grief continuing still to blend,
Hath snatched the little joy that Life had yet to lend.
XCVII.
Then must I plunge again into the crowd,
And follow all that Peace disdains to seek?
Where Revel calls, and Laughter, vainly loud,
False to the heart, distorts the hollow cheek,
To leave the flagging spirit doubly weak;
Still o'er the features, which perforce they cheer,
To feign the pleasure or conceal the pique:
Smiles form the channel of a future tear,
Or raise the writhing lip with ill-dissembled sneer.
XCVIII.
What is the worst of woes that wait on Age?
What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow?
To view each loved one blotted from Life's page,
And be alone on earth, as I am now.
Before the Chastener humbly let me bow,
O'er Hearts divided and o'er Hopes destroyed:
Roll on, vain days! full reckless may ye flow,
Since Time hath reft whate'er my soul enjoyed,[gf]
And with the ills of Eld mine earlier years alloyed.
* * * * *
[Note.--The MS. closes with stanza xcii. Stanzas xciii.-xcviii. were
added after _Childe Harold_ was in the press. Byron sent them to Dallas,
October 11, 1811, and, apparently, on the same day composed the _Epistle
to a Friend_ (F. Hodgson) _in answer to some lines exhorting the Author
to be cheerful, and to "Banish Care,"_ and the first poem _To Thyrza_
("Without a stone to mark the Spot"). "I have sent," he writes, "two or
three additional stanzas for both '_Fyttes_.' I have been again shocked
with a _death_, and have lost one very dear to me in happier times; but
'I have almost forgot the taste of grief,' and 'supped full of horrors'
till I have become callous, nor have I a tear left for an event which,
five years ago, would have bowed down my head to the earth. It seems as
though I were to experience in my youth the greatest misery of age. My
friends fall around me, and I shall be left a lonely tree before I am
withered." In one respect he would no longer disclaim identity with
Childe Harold. "Death had deprived him of his nearest connections." He
had seen his friends "around him fall like leaves in wintry weather." He
felt "like one deserted;" and in the "dusky shadow" of that early
desolation he was destined to walk till his life's end. It is not
without cause when "a man of great spirit grows melancholy."
In connection with this subject, it may be noted that lines 6 and 7 of
stanza xcv. do not bear out Byron's contention to Dallas (_Letters_,
October 14 and 31, 1811), that in these three _in memoriam_ stanzas
(ix., xcv., xcvi.) he is bewailing an event which took place _after_ he
returned to Newstead. The "more than friend" had "ceased to be" before
the "wanderer" returned. It is evident that Byron did not take Dallas
into his confidence.]
FOOTNOTES:
[113] {99} [Stanzas i.-xv. form a kind of dramatic prologue to the
Second Canto of the Pilgrimage. The general meaning is clear enough, but
the unities are disregarded. The scene shifts more than once, and there
is a moral within a moral. The poet begins by invoking Athena (Byron
wrote Athenae) to look down on the ruins of "her holy and beautiful
house," and bewails her unreturning heroes of the sword and pen. He then
summons an Oriental, a "Son of the Morning," Moslem or "light Greek,"
possibly a _Canis venaticus_, the discoverer or vendor of a sepulchral
urn, and, with an adjuration to spare the sacred relic, points to the
Acropolis, the cemetery of dead divinities, and then once more to the
urn at his feet. "'Vanity of vanities--all is vanity!' Gods and men may
come and go, but Death 'goes on for ever.'" The scene changes, and he
feigns to be present at the rifling of a barrow, the "tomb of the
Athenian heroes" on the plain of Marathon, or one of the lonely tumuli
on Sigeum and Rhoeteum, "the great and goodly tombs" of Achilles and
Patroclus ("they twain in one golden urn"); of Antilochus, and of
Telamonian Ajax. Marathon he had already visited, and marked "the
perpendicular cut" which at Fauvel's instigation had been recently
driven into the large barrow; and he had, perhaps, read of the real or
pretended excavation by Signor Ghormezano (1787) of a tumulus at the
Sigean promontory. The "mind's eye," which had conjured up "the
shattered heaps," images a skull of one who "kept the world in awe,"
and, after moralizing in Hamlet's vein on the humorous catastrophe of
decay, the poet concludes with the Preacher "that there is no work, nor
device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave." After this profession
of unfaith, before he returns to Harold and his pilgrimage, he takes up
his parable and curses Elgin and all his works. The passage as a whole
suggests the essential difference between painting and poetry. As a
composition, it recalls the frontispiece of a seventeenth-century
classic. The pictured scene, with its superfluity of accessories, is
grotesque enough; but the poetic scenery, inconsequent and yet vivid as
a dream, awakens, and fulfills the imagination. (_Travels in Albania_,
by Lord Broughton, 1858, i. 380; ii. 128, 129, 138; _The Odyssey_, xxiv.
74, _sq_. See, too, Byron's letters to his mother, April 17, and to H.
Drury, May 3, 1810: _Letters_, 1898, i. 262.)]
[do] {100} _Ancient of days! august Athenae! where_.--[MS. D.]
[dp] _Gone--mingled with the waste_----.--[MS. erased.]
[114] {101} ["Stole," apart from its restricted use as an ecclesiastical
vestment, is used by Spenser and other poets as an equivalent for any
long and loosely flowing robe, but is, perhaps inaccurately, applied to
the short cloak (_tribon_), the "habit" of Socrates when he lived, and,
after his death, the distinctive dress of the cynics.]
[dq] ----_gray flits the Ghost of Power_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[dr] ----_whose altars cease to burn_.--[D.]
[ds] ----_whose Faith is built on reeds_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[115] {102} [Compare Shakespeare, _Measure for Measure_, act iii, sc. 1,
lines 5-7--
"Reason thus with life:
If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing
That none but fools would keep."]
[dt] _Still wilt thou harp_----.--[MS. D. erased.]
[du] _Though 'twas a God, as graver records tell_.--[MS. erased.]
[116] [The demigods Erechtheus and Theseus "appeared" at Marathon, and
fought side by side with Miltiades (Grote's _History of Greece_, iv.
284).]
[117] {103} [Compare Shakespeare, _Hamlet_, act v. sc. 1, _passim_.]
[118] [Socrates affirmed that true self-knowledge was to know that we
know nothing, and in his own case he denied any other knowledge; but
"this confession of ignorance was certainly not meant to be a sceptical
denial of all knowledge." "The idea of knowledge was to him a boundless
field, in the face of which he could not but be ignorant" (_Socrates and
the Socratic Schools_, by Dr. E. Zeller, London, 1868, p. 102).]
[119] [Stanzas viii. and ix. are not in the MS.
The expunged lines (see _var._ i.) carried the Lucretian tenets of the
preceding stanza to their logical conclusion. The end is silence, not a
reunion with superior souls. But Dallas objected; and it may well be
that, in the presence of death, Byron could not "guard his unbelief," or
refrain from a renewed questioning of the "Grand Perhaps." Stanza for
stanza, the new version is an improvement on the original. (See
_Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron_, 1824, p. 169. See, too,
letters to Hodgson, September 3 and September 13, 1811: _Letters_, 1898,
ii. 18, 34.)]
[dv]
_Frown not upon me, churlish Priest! that I_
_Look not for Life, where life may never be:_
_I am no sneerer at thy phantasy;_
_Thou pitiest me, alas! I envy thee,_
_Thou bold Discoverer in an unknown sea_
_Of happy Isles and happier Tenants there;_
_I ask thee not to prove a Sadducee;_[Sec.1]
_Still dream of Paradise, thou know'st not where,_[Sec.2]
_Which if it be thy sins will never let thee share_.[Sec.3]
--[MS. D. erased.]_
[Sec.1] The Sadducees did not believe in the Resurrection.--[MS. D.]
[Sec.2]
_But look upon a scene that once was fair_.--[Erased.]
_Zion's holy hill which thou wouldst fancy fair_.--[Erased.]
[Sec.3]
_As those, which thou delight'st to rear in upper air_.--[Erased.]
_Yet lovs't too well to bid thine erring brother share_.--[D. erased.]
[120] {104} [Byron forwarded this stanza in a letter to Dallas, dated
October 14, 1811, and was careful to add, "I think it proper to state to
you, that this stanza alludes to an event which has taken place since my
arrival here, and not to the death of any _male_ friend" (_Letters_.
1898, ii. 57). The reference is not to Edleston, as Dallas might have
guessed, and as Wright (see _Poetical Works_, 1891, p. 17) believed.
Again, in a letter to Dallas, dated October 31, 1811 (_ibid_., ii. 65),
he sends "a few stanzas," presumably the lines "To Thyrza," which are
dated October 31, 1811, and says that "they refer to the death of one to
whose name you are a _stranger_, and, consequently, cannot be interested
(_sic_) ... They relate to the same person whom I have mentioned in Canto
2nd, and at the conclusion of the poem." It follows from this second
statement that we have Byron's authority for connecting stanza ix. with
stanzas xcv., xcvi., and, inferentially, his authority for connecting
stanzas ix., xcv., xcvi. with the group of "Thyrza" poems. And there our
knowledge ends. We must leave the mystery where Byron willed that it
should be left. "All that we know is, nothing can be known."]
[dw] {105}
_Whate'er beside_}
} _Futurity's behest_.[Sec.]
_Howe'er may be_ }
Or seeing thee no more to sink in sullen rest_.--[MS. D.]
[Sec.] [See letter to Dallas, October 14, 1811.]
[121] {106} [For note on the "Elgin Marbles," see _Introduction to the
Curse of Minerva: Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 453-456.]
[dx]
_The last, the worst dull Robber, who was he?_
_Blush Scotland such a slave thy son could be_--
_England! I joy no child he was of thine:_
_Thy freeborn men revere what once was free,_
_Nor tear the Sculpture from its saddening shrine,_
_Nor bear the spoil away athwart the weeping Brine_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[dy]
_This be the wittol Picts ignoble boast_.--[MS. D.]
_To rive what Goth and Turk, and Time hath spared:_
_Cold and accursed as his native coast_.--[MS. D. erased]
[122] ["On the plaster wall of the Chapel of Pandrosos adjoining the
Erechtheum, these words have been very deeply cut--
'Quod non fecerunt Goti,
Hoc fecerunt Scoti'"
(_Travels in Albania_, 1858, i. 299). M. Darmesteter quotes the
original: "mot sur les Barberini" ("Quod non fecere Barbari, Fecere
Barberini"). It may be added that Scotchmen are named among the
volunteers who joined the Hanoverian mercenaries in the Venetian
invasion of Greece in 1686. (See _The Curse of Minerva: Poetical Works_,
1898, i. 463, note 1; Finlay's _Hist. of Greece_, v. 189.)]
[dz] {107}
What! shall it e'er be said by British tongue,
Albion was happy while Athenae mourned?
Though in thy name the slave her bosom wrung,
Albion! I would not see thee thus adorned
With gains thy generous spirit should have scorned,
From Man distinguished by some monstrous sign,
Like Attila the Hun was surely horned,[Sec.1]
Who wrought the ravage amid works divine:
Oh that Minerva's voice lent its keen aid to mine.--[MS. D. erased.]
What! shall it e'er be said by British tongue,
Albion was happy in Athenae's tears?
Though in thy name the slave her bosom wrung,
Let it not vibrate in pale Europe's ears,[Sec.2]
The Saviour Queen, the free Britannia, wears
The last poor blunder of a bleeding land:
That she, whose generous aid her name endears,
Tore down those remnants with a Harpy's hand,
Which Envious Eld forbore and Tyrants left to stand.--[MS. D.][Sec.3]
[Sec.1] Attila was horned, if we may trust contemporary legends, and the
etchings of his visage in Lavater.--[M.S.]
[Sec.2] Lines 5-9 in the Dallas transcript are in Byron's handwriting.
[Sec.3] _Which centuries forgot_----.--[D. erased.]
[ea] {108} After stanza xiii. the MS. inserts the two following
stanzas:--
Come then, ye classic Thieves of each degree,
Dark Hamilton[Sec.1] and sullen Aberdeen,
Come pilfer all the Pilgrim loves to see,
All that yet consecrates the fading scene:
Ah! better were it ye had never been,
Nor ye, nor Elgin, nor that lesser wight.
The victim sad of vase-collecting spleen.
House-furnisher withal, one Thomas[Sec.2] hight,
Than ye should bear one stone from wronged Athenae's site.
Or will the gentle Dilettanti crew
Now delegate the task to digging Gell,[Sec.3]
That mighty limner of a bird's eye view,
How like to Nature let his volumes tell:
Who can with him the folio's limit swell
With all the Author saw, or said he saw?
Who can topographize or delve so well?
No boaster he, nor impudent and raw,
His pencil, pen, and spade, alike without a flaw.--[D. erased.]
[Sec.1] [William Richard Hamilton (1777-1859) was the son of Anthony
Hamilton, Archdeacon of Colchester, etc., and grandson of Richard
Terrick, Bishop of London. In 1799, when Lord Elgin was appointed
Ambassador to the Sublime Porte, Hamilton accompanied him as private
secretary. After the battle of Ramassieh (Alexandria, March 20, 1801),
and the subsequent evacuation of Egypt by the French (August 30, 1801),
Hamilton, who had been sent on a diplomatic mission, was successful in
recapturing the Rosetta Stone, which, in violation of a specified
agreement, had been placed on board a French man-of-war. He was
afterwards employed by Elgin as agent plenipotentiary in the purchase,
removal, and deportation of marbles. He held office (1809-22) as
Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and as Minister at the Court of
Naples (1822-25). From 1838 to 1858 he was a Trustee of the British
Museum. He published, in 1809, _AEgyptiaca, or Some Account of the
Ancient and Modern State of Egypt_; and, in 1811, his _Memorandum on the
Subject of the Earl of Elgin's Pursuits in Greece_. (For Hamilton, see
_English Bards_, etc., line 509; _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 336, note
2.)]
[Sec.2] Thomas Hope, Esqr., if I mistake not, the man who publishes quartos
on furniture and costume.
[Thomas Hope (1770-1831) (see _Hints from Horace_, line 7: _Poetical
Works_, 1898, i. 390, note 1) published, in 1805, a folio volume
entitled, _Household Furniture and Internal Decoration_. It was severely
handled in the _Edinburgh Review_ (No. xx.) for July, 1807.]
[Sec.3] It is rumoured Gell is coming out to dig in Olympia. I wish him
more success than he had at Athens. According to Lusieri's account, he
began digging most furiously without a firmann, but before the
resurrection of a single sauce-pan, the Painter countermined and the
Way-wode countermanded and sent him back to bookmaking.--[MS. D.]
[See _English Bards, etc._, lines 1033, 1034: _Poetical Works_, 1898, i.
379, _note_ 1.]
[eb] _Where was thine AEgis, Goddess_----.--[MS. D. erased]
[ec] {110} ----_which it had well behoved_.--[MS. D.]
[123] [The Athenians believed, or feigned to believe, that the marbles
themselves shrieked out in shame and agony at their removal from their
ancient shrines.]
[124] [Byron is speaking of his departure from Spain, but he is thinking
of his departure from Malta, and his half-hearted amour with Mrs.
Spencer Smith.]
[ed] {111} ----_that rosy urchin guides_.--[MS.]
[ee] _Save on that part_----.--[MS. erased.]
[ef] {112}
_From Discipline's stern law_----.--[MS.]
----_keen law_----.--[MS. D.]
[125] An additional "misery to human life!"--lying to at sunset for a
large convoy, till the sternmost pass ahead. Mem.: fine frigate, fair
wind likely to change before morning, but enough at present for ten
knots!--[MS. D.]
[eg] ----_their melting girls believe_.--[MS.]
[eh] {113}
_Meantime some rude musician's restless hand_
_Ply's the brisk instrument that sailors love_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[ei] _Through well-known straits behold the steepy shore_.--[MS.
erased.]
[126] [Compare Coleridge's reflections, in his diary for April 19, 1804,
on entering the Straits of Gibraltar: "When I first sat down, with
Europe on my left and Africa on my right, both distinctly visible, I
felt a quickening of the movements in the blood, but still felt it as a
pleasure of _amusement_ rather than of thought and elevation; and at the
same time, and gradually winning on the other, the nameless silent forms
of nature were working in me, like a tender thought in a man who is
hailed merrily by some acquaintance in his work, and answers it in the
same tone" (_Anima Poetae_, 1895, pp. 70, 71).]
[127] ["The moon is in the southern sky as the vessel passes through the
Straits; consequently, the coast of Spain is in light, that of Africa in
shadow" (_Childe Harold_, edited by H. F. Tozer, 1885, p. 232).]
[128] [Campbell, in _Gertrude of Wyoming_, Canto I. stanza ii. line 6,
speaks of "forests brown;" but, as Mr. Tozer points out, "'brown' is
Byron's usual epithet for landscape seen in moonlight." (Compare Canto
II. stanza lxx. line 3; _Parisina_, i. 10; and _Siege of Corinth_, ii.
1.)]
[ej] {114}
_Bleeds the lone heart, once boundless in its zeal_.--[D.]
_And friendless now, yet dreams it had a friend_.--[MS.]
or, _Far from affection's chilled or changing zeal_.--[MS.]
_Divided far by fortune, wave or steel_
_Though friendless now we once have had a friend_.--
[MS. D. erased.]
[ek] _Ah! happy years! I would I were once more a boy_.--[MS.]
[el] _To gaze on Dian's wan reflected sphere_.--[MS. D]
[em] ----_her dreams of hope and pride_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[en] {115} _None are so wretched[Sec.] but that_----.--[MS.D.]
[Sec.] "Desolate."--[MS. pencil.]
[eo] _T.t.b._ [tres tres bien], _but why insert here_.--[MS. pencil.]
[129] [In this stanza M. Darmesteter detects "l'accent Wordsworthien"
prior to any "doses" as prescribed by Shelley, and quotes as a possible
model the following lines from Beattie's _Minstrel_:--
"And oft the craggy cliff he lov'd to climb,
When all in mist the world below was lost,
What dreadful pleasure! there to stand sublime,
Like shipwreck'd mariner on desert coast,
And view th' enormous waste of vapour, tost
In billows, lengthening to th' horizon round,
Now scoop'd in gulfs, with mountains now emboss'd!
And hear the voice of mirth, and song rebound,
Flocks, herds, and waterfalls, along the hoar profound."
In felicity of expression, the copy, if it be a copy, surpasses the
original; but in the scope and originality of the image, it is vastly
inferior. Nor are these lines, with the possible exception of line
3--"Where things that own not Man's dominion dwell," at all
Wordsworthian. They fail in that imaginative precision which the Lake
poets regarded as essential, and they lack the glamour and passion
without which their canons of art would have profited nothing. Six years
later, when Byron came within sound of Wordsworth's voice, he struck a
new chord--a response, not an echo. Here the motive is rhetorical, not
immediately poetical.]
[ep] {116} ----_and foaming linns to lean_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[130] [There are none to bless us, for when we are in distress the
great, the rich, the gay, shrink from us; and when we are popular and
prosperous those who court us care nothing for us apart from our
success. Neither do they bless us, or we them.]
[eq] _This is to live alone--This, This is solitude_.--[MS. D.]
[131] [The MS. of stanza xxvii. is on the fly-leaf of a bound volume of
proof-sheets entitled "Additions to Childe Harold," It was first
published in the seventh edition, 1814. It may be taken for granted that
Byron had seen what he describes. There is, however, no record of any
visit to Mount Athos, either in his letters from the East or in
Hobhouse's journals.
The actual mount, "the giant height [6350 feet], rears itself in
solitary magnificence, an insulated cone of white limestone." "When it
is seen from a distance, the peninsula [of which the southern portion
rises to a height of 2000 feet] is below the horizon, and the peak rises
quite solitary from the sea." Of this effect Byron may have had actual
experience; but Hobhouse, in describing the prospect from Cape
Janissary, is careful to record that "Athos itself is said to be
sometimes visible in the utmost distance (circ. 90 miles), but it was
not discernible during our stay on the spot." (Murray's _Handbook for
Greece_, p. 843; _Childe Harold_, edited by H. F. Tozer, p. 233;
_Travels in Albania_, 1858, ii. 103. Compare, too, the fragment entitled
the _Monk of Athos_, first published in the Hon. Roden Noel's _Life of
Lord Byron_, 1890.)]
[132] {118} ["Le sage Mentor, poussant Telemaque, qui etait assis sur le
bord du rocher, le precipite dans le mer et s'y jette avec lui....
Calypso inconsolable, rentra dans sa grotte, qu'elle remplit de ses
hurlements."--Fenelon's _Telemaque_, vi., Paris, 1837. iii. 43.]
[133] [For Mrs. Spencer Smith, see _Letters_, 1898, i. 244, 245, note.
Moore (_Life_, pp. 94, 95) contrasts stanzas xxx.-xxxv., with their
parade of secret indifference and plea of "a loveless heart," with the
tenderness and warmth of his after-thoughts in Albania ("Lines composed
during a Thunderstorm," etc.), and decides the coldness was real, the
sentiment assumed. He forgets the flight of time. The lines were written
in October, 1809, within a month of his departure from "Calypso's
isles," and the _Childe Harold_ stanzas belong to the early spring of
1810. "Ou sont les neiges d'antan?" Moreover, he speaks by the card.
Writing at Athens, January 16, 1810, he tells us, "The spell is broke,
the charm is flown."]
[134] {120} [More than one commentator gravely "sets against" this
line--Byron's statement to Dallas (_Corr. of Lord Byron_, Paris, 1824,
iii. 91), "I am not a Joseph or a Scipio; but I can safely affirm that
never in my life I seduced any woman." Compare _Memoirs of Count Carlo
Gozzi_, 1890, ii. 12, "Never have I employed the iniquitous art of
seduction ... Languishing in soft and thrilling sentiments, I demanded
from a woman a sympathy and inclination of like nature with my own. If
she fell ... I should have remembered how she made for me the greatest
of all sacrifices.... I should have worshipped her like a deity. I could
have spent my life's blood in consoling her; and without swearing
eternal constancy, I should have been most stable on my side in loving
such a mistress."]
[er] {121} _Brisk Impudence_----.--[MS.]
[es] _Youth wasted, wretches born_----.--[MS. erased.]
[135] [Compare Lucretius, iv. 1121-4--
"Adde quod absumunt viris pereuntque labore,
* * * * *
Labitur interea res, et Babylonica fiunt:
Languent officia, atque aegrotat fama vacillans."]
[et] {122} _Climes strange withal as ever mortal head_.--[MS.]
[eu] _Suspected in its little pride of thought_.--[MS. erased.]
[136] ["Were counselled or advised." The passive "were ared" seems to
lack authority. (See _N. Eng. Dict._, art. "Aread.")]
[ev]
_Her not unconscious though her weakly child_.
or, ----_her rudest child_.--[MS. erased.]
[137] [Compare the description of the thunderstorm in the Alps (Canto
III. stanzas xcii.-xcvi., pp. 273-275); and _Manfred_, act ii. sc. 2--
"My joy was in the wilderness; to breathe
The difficult air of the iced mountain-top--
* * * * *
In them my early strength exulted; or
To follow through the night the moving moon,
The stars and their development; or catch
The dazzling lightnings till my eyes grew dim."
Beattie, who describes the experiences of his own boyhood in the person
of Edwin in _The Minstrel_, had already made a like protestation--
"In sooth he was a strange and wayward youth.
Fond of each gentle and each dreadful scene.
In darkness and in storm he found delight;
Not less than when on ocean-wave serene
The Southern sun diffus'd his dazzling sheen;
Even sad vicissitude amus'd his soul."
Kirke White, too, who was almost Byron's contemporary, and whose verses
he professed to admire--
"Would run a visionary boy
When the hoarse tempest shook the vaulted sky."
This love of Nature in her wilder aspects, which was perfectly genuine,
and, indeed, meritorious, was felt to be out of the common, a note of
the poetic temperament, worth recording, but unlikely to pass without
questioning and remonstrance.]
[138] {123} [Alexander's mother, Olympias, was an Epiriote. She had a
place in the original draft of Tennyson's _Palace of Art_ (_Life of Lord
Tennyson_,. 119)--
"One was Olympias; the floating snake
Roll'd round her ankles, round her waist
Knotted," etc.
Plutarch (_Vitae_, Lipsiae:, 1814, vi. 170) is responsible for the legend:
[Greek: O)\phthe de/ pote kai\ dra/kon koimome/nes te~s O)lympia/dou
parektetame/ns to~| so/mati], "Now, one day, when Olympias lay abed,
beside her body a dragon was espied stretched out at full length."
(Compare, too, Dryden's _Alexander's Feast_, stanza ii.)]
[139] [Mr. Tozer (_Childe Harold_, p. 236) takes this line to mean "whom
the young love to talk of, and the wise to follow as an example," and
points to Alexander's foresight as a conqueror, and the "extension of
commerce and civilization" which followed his victories. But, surely,
the antithesis lies between Alexander the ideal of the young, and
Alexander the deterrent example of the old. The phrase, "beacon of the
wise," if Hector in _Troilus and Cressida_ (act ii. sc. 2, line 16) is
an authority, is proverbial.
" ... The wound of peace is surety,
Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd
The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches
To the bottom of the worst."
The beauty, the brilliance, the glory of Alexander kindle the enthusiasm
of the young; but the murder of Clytus and the early death which he
brought upon himself are held up by the wise as beacon-lights to save
others from shipwreck.]
[140] [Byron and Hobhouse sailed for Malta in the brig-of-war _Spider_
on Tuesday, September 19, 1809 (Byron, in a letter to his mother,
November 12, says September 21), and anchored off Patras on the night of
Sunday, the 24th. On Tuesday, the 26th, they were under way at 12 noon,
and on the evening of that day they saw the sun set over Mesalonghi. The
next morning, September 27, they were in the channel between Ithaca and
the mainland, with Ithaca, then in the hands of the French, to the left.
"We were close to it," says Hobhouse, "and saw a few shrubs on a brown
heathy land, two little towns in the hills scattered among trees." The
travellers made "but little progress this day," and, apparently, having
redoubled Cape St. Andreas, the southern extremity of Ithaca, they
sailed (September 28) through the channel between Ithaca and Cephalonia,
passed the hill of AEtos, on which stood the so-called "Castle of
Ulysses," whence Penelope may have "overlooked the wave," and caught
sight of "the Lover's refuge" in the distance. Towards the close of the
same day they doubled Cape Ducato ("Leucadia's cape," the scene of
Sappho's leap), and, sailing under "the ancient mount," the site of the
Temple of Apollo, anchored off Prevesa at seven in the evening. Poetry
and prose are not always in accord. If, as Byron says, it was "an
autumn's eve" when they hailed "Leucadia's cape afar," if the evening
star shone over the rock when they approached it, they must have sailed
fast to reach Prevesa, some thirty miles to the north, by seven o'clock.
But _de minimis_, the Muse is as disregardful as the Law. And, perhaps,
after all, it was Hobhouse who misread his log-book. (_Travels in
Albania_, i. 4, 5; Murray's _Handbook for Greece_, pp. 40, 46.)]
[141] {125} [The meaning of this passage is not quite so obvious as it
seems. He has in his mind the words, "He saved others, Himself He cannot
save," and, applying this to Sappho, asks, "Why did she who conferred
immortality on herself by her verse prove herself mortal?" Without Fame,
and without verse the cause and keeper of Fame, there is no heaven, no
immortality, for the sons of men. But what security is there for the
eternity of verse and Fame? "_Quis custodiet custodes_?"]
[142] {126} [For Byron's "star" similes, see Canto III. stanza xxxviii.
line 9.]
[ew] ----_and looked askance on Mars_.--[MS. erased.]
[143] [Compare the line in Tennyson's song, _Break, break, break,_ "And
the stately ships go on."]
[ex]
_And roused him more from thought than he was wont_
_While Pleasure almost seemed to smooth his pallid front_.--[MS. D.]
_While Pleasure almost smiled along_----.--[MS. erased.]
[144] [By "Suli's rocks" Byron means the mountainous district in the
south of the Epirus. The district of Suli formed itself into a small
republic at the close of the last century, and offered a formidable
resistance to Ali Pacha. "Pindus' inland peak," Monte Metsovo, which
forms part of the ridge which divides Epirus from Thessaly, is not
visible from the sea-coast.]
[145] {127} ["Shore unknown." (See Byron's note to stanza xxxviii. line
5.)]
[ey] {128} ----_lovely harmful thing_.--[MS. pencil.]
[146] [Compare Byron's _Stanzas written on passing the Ambracian
Gulph_.]
[147] [Nicopolis, "the city of victory," which Augustus, "the second
Caesar," built to commemorate Actium, is some five miles to the north of
Prevesa. Byron and Hobhouse visited the ruins on the 30th of September,
and again on the 12th of November (see Byron's letter to Mrs. Byron.
November 12, 1809: _Letters_, 1898, i. 251).]
[ez]
_Imperial wretches, doubling human woes!_
_God!--was thy globe ere made_----.--[MS. erased.]
[148] {129} [The travellers left Prevesa on October 1, and arrived at
Janina on October 5. They left Janina on October 11, and reached Zitza
at nightfall (Byron at 3 a.m., October 12). They left Zitza on October
13, and arrived at Tepeleni on October 19.]
[149] [On the evening of October 11, as the party was approaching Zitza,
Hobhouse and the Albanian, Vasilly, rode on, leaving "Lord Byron and the
baggage behind." It was getting dark, and just as the luckier Hobhouse
contrived to make his way to the village, the rain began to fall in
torrents. Before long, "the thunder roared as it seemed without any
intermission; for the echoes of one peal had not ceased to roll in the
mountains before another crash burst over our heads." Byron, dragoman,
and baggage were not three miles from Zitza when the storm began, and
they lost their way. After many wanderings and adventures they were
finally conducted by ten men with pine torches to the hut; but by that
time it was three o'clock in the morning. Hence the "Stanzas composed
during a Thunderstorm."--Hobhouse's _Travels in Albania_, i. 69-71.]
[150] {130} ["The prior of the monastery, a humble, meek-mannered man,
entertained us in a warm chamber with grapes and a pleasant white wine
...We were so well pleased with everything about us that we agreed to
lodge with him."--Hobhouse's _Travels in Albania_, i. 73.]
[fa] _Here winds, if winds there be, will fan his breast_.--[MS. D.
erased.]
[fb] _Keep Heaven for better souls, my shade shall seek for none_.--[MS.
erased.]
[fc] {132}
_But frequent is the lamb, the kid, the goat_--
_And watching pensive with his browsing flock_.--[MS. erased.]
[fd] _Counting the hours beneath yon skies unerring shock_.--[MS.
erased.]
[151] [The site of Dodona, a spot "at the foot of Mount Tomaros" (Mount
Olytsika) in the valley of Tcharacovista, was finally determined, in
1876, by excavations carried out, at his own expense, by M. Constantin
Carapanos, a native of Arta. In his monograph, _Dodone et ses Ruines_
(Paris, 1878, 4to), M. Carapanos gives a detailed description of the
theatre, the twofold Temenos (I. _L'Enceinte du Temple_, II. _Temenos_,
pp. 13-28), including the Temple of Zeus and a sanctuary of Aphrodite,
and of the numerous _ex voto_ offerings and inscriptions on lead which
were brought to light during the excavations, and helped to identify the
ruins. An accompanying folio volume of plates contains (Planches, i.,
ii.) a map of the valley of Tcharacovista, and a lithograph of Mount
Tomaros, "d'un aspect majestueux et pittoresque ... un roc nu sillonne
par le lit de nombreux torrents" (p. 8). Behind Dodona, on the summit of
the many-named chain of hills which confronts Mount Tomaros, are
"bouquets de chene," sprung it may be from the offspring of the [Greek:
prose/goroi dry/es] (AEsch., _Prom._, 833), the "talking oaks," which
declared the will of Zeus. For the "prophetic fount" (line 2), Servius,
commenting on Virgil, _AEneid_, iii. 41-66, seems to be the authority:
"Circa hoc templum quercus immanis fuisse dicitur ex cujus radicibus
fons manebat, qui suo murmure instinctu Deorum diversis oracula
reddebat" (_Virgilii Opera_, Leovardiae, 1717, i. 548).
Byron and Hobhouse, on one of their excursions from Janina, explored and
admired the ruins of the "amphitheatre," but knew not that "here and
nowhere else" was Dodona (_Travels in Albania_, i. 53-56).]
[152] {133} [The sentiment that man, "whose breath is in his nostrils,"
should consider the impermanence of all that is stable and durable
before he cries out upon his own mortality, may have been drawn
immediately from the famous letter of consolation sent by Sulpitius
Severus to Cicero, which Byron quotes in a note to Canto IV. stanza
xliv., or, in the first instance, from Tasso's _Gerusalemme Liberata_,
xv. 20--
"Giace l'alta Cartago; appena i segni
Dell' alte sue ruini il lido serba.
Muojono le citta; muojono i regni:
Copre i fasti, e le pompe, arena ed erba;
E l'uom d'esser mortal par cue si sdegni!"
Compare, too, Addison's "Reflections in Westminster Abbey," _Spectator_,
No. 26.]
[153] [The six days' journey from Zitza to Tepeleni is compressed into a
single stanza. The vale (line 3) may be that of the Kalama, through
which the travellers passed (October 13) soon after leaving Zitza, or,
more probably, the plain of Deropoli ("well-cultivated, divided by rails
and low hedges, and having a river flowing through it to the south"),
which they crossed (October 15) on their way from Delvinaki, the
frontier village of Illyria, to Libokhovo.]
[154] {134} ["Yclad," used as a preterite, not a participle (compare
Coleridge's "I wis" [_Christabel_, part i. line 92]), is a
Byronism--"archaisme incorrect," says M. Darmesteter.]
[155] ["During the fast of the Ramazan, ... the gallery of each minaret
is decorated with a circlet of small lamps. When seen from a distance,
each minaret presents a point of light, 'like meteors in the sky;' and
in a large city, where they are numerous, they resemble a swarm of
fireflies."--H.F. Tozer. (Compare _The Giaour_, i. 449-452--
"When Rhamazan's last sun was set,
And flashing from each minaret.
Millions of lamps proclaimed the feast
Of Bairam through the boundless East.")]
[156] {135} ["A kind of dervish or recluse ... regarded as a
saint."--_Cent. Dict._, art. "Santon."]
[fe] ----_guests and vassals wait_.--[MS. erased.]
[ff] _While the deep Tocsin's sound_----.--[MS. D. erased.]
[157] {136} ["We were disturbed during the night by the perpetual
carousal which seemed to be kept up in the gallery, and by the drum, and
the voice of the 'muezzinn,' or chanter, calling the Turks to prayers
from the minaret of the mosck attached to the palace. This chanter was a
boy, and he sang out his hymn is a sort of loud melancholy recitative.
He was a long time repeating the Eraun. The first exclamation was
repeated four times, the remaining words twice; and the long and
piercing note in which he concluded his confession of faith, by twice
crying out the word 'hou!' ['At solemn sound of "Alla Hu!"' _Giaour_, i.
734] still rings in my ears."--Hobhouse's _Travels in Albania_, i. 95.
D'Ohsonn gives the Eraun at full length: "Most high God! [four times
repeated]. I acknowledge that there is no other God except God! I
acknowledge that there is no other God except God! I acknowledge that
Mohammed is the prophet of God! Come to prayer! Come to prayer! Come to
the temple of salvation! Come to the temple of salvation! Great God!
great God! There is no God except God!"--_Oriental Antiquities_
(Philadelphia, 1788), p. 341.]
[158] {137} ["The Ramazan, or Turkish Lent, which, as it occurs in each
of the thirteen months in succession, fell this year in October ...
Although during this month the strictest abstinence, even from tobacco
and coffee, is observed in the daytime, yet with the setting of the sun
the feasting commences."--_Travels in Albania_, i. 66. "The Ramadan or
Rhamazan is the ninth month of the Mohammedan year. As the Mohammedans
reckon by lunar time, it begins each year eleven days earlier than in
the preceding year, so that in thirty-three years it occurs successively
in all the seasons."--_Imp. Dictionary_.]
[159] [The feast was spread within the courtyard, "in the part farthest
from the dwelling," and when the revelry began the "immense large
gallery" or corridor, which ran along the front of the palace and was
open on one side to the court, was deserted. "Opening into the gallery
were the doors of several apartments," and as the servants passed in and
out, the travellers standing in the courtyard could hear the sound of
voices.--_Travels in Albania_, i. 93.]
[fg] {138}
----_even for health to move_.--[MS.]
_She saves for one_----.--[MS. erased.]
[fh]
_For boyish minions of unhallowed love_
_The shameless torch of wild desire is lit_,
_Caressed, preferred even to woman's self above_,
_Whose forms for Nature's gentler errors fit_
_All frailties mote excuse save that which they commit_.
--[MS. D. erased.]
[160] [For an account of Ali Pasha (1741-1822), see _Letters_, 1898, i.
246, note.]
[161] [In a letter to his mother, November 12, 1809, Byron writes, "He
[Ali] said he was certain I was a man of birth, because I had small
ears, curling hair, and little white hands. ... He told me to consider
him as a father whilst I was in Turkey, and said he looked on me as his
son. Indeed, he treated me like a child, sending me almonds and sugared
sherbet, fruit and sweetmeats, twenty times a day." Many years after, in
the first letter _On Bowles' Strictures_, February 7, 1821, he
introduces a reminiscence of Ali: "I never judge from manners, for I
once had my pocket picked by the civillest gentleman I ever met with;
and one of the mildest persons I ever saw was Ali Pasha" (_Life_, p.
689).]
[fi] {139} _Delights to mingle with the lips of youth_.--[MS. D.
erased.]
[162] [Anacreon sometimes bewails, but more often defies old age.
(_Vide_ Carmina liv., xi., xxxiv.)
The paraphrase "Teian Muse" recurs in the song, "The Isles of Greece,"
_Don Juan_, Canto III.]
[fj] _But 'tis those ne'er forgotten acts of ruth_.--[MS. D.]
[163] [In the first edition the reading (see _var_. ii.) is, "But
crimes, those ne'er forgotten crimes of ruth." The mistake was pointed
out in the _Quarterly Review_ (March, 1812, No. 13, vol. vii. p. 193).
But in Spenser "ruth" means sorrow as well as pity, and three weeks
after _Childe Harold_ was published, Ali committed a terrible crime, the
outcome of an early grief. On March 27, 1812, in revenge for wrongs done
to his mother and sister nearly thirty years before, he caused 670
Gardhikiots to be massacred in the khan of Valiare, and followed up the
act of treachery by sacking, plundering, and burning the town of
Gardiki, and, "in direct violation of the Mohammedan law," carrying off
and reducing to slavery the women and children.--Finlay's _Hist. of
Greece_ (edited by Rev. H. F. Tozer, 1877), vi. 67, 68.]
[fk] {140} _Those who in blood begin in blood conclude their
span_.--[MS. erased.]
[164] [This was prophetic. "On the 5th of February, 1822, a meeting took
place between Ali and Mohammed Pasha.... When Mohammed rose to depart,
the two viziers, being of equal rank, moved together towards the
door.... As they parted Ali bowed low to his visitor, and Mohammed,
seizing the moment when the watchful eye of the old man was turned away,
drew his hanjar, and plunged it in Ali's heart. He walked on calmly to
the gallery, and said to the attendants, 'Ali of Tepalen is dead.' ...
The head of Ali was exposed at the gate of the serai."--Finlay's _Hist.
of Greece_, 1877, vi. 94, 95.]
[fl]
_Childe Harold with that chief held colloquy_
_Yet what they spake it boots not to repeat;_
_Converse may little charm strange ear or eye;_
_Albeit he rested on that spacious seat,_
_Of Moslem luxury the choice retreat_.--[MS. D. erased.]
_Four days he rested on that worthy seat_.-[MS. erased.]
[165] {141} [The travellers left Janina on November 3, and reached
Prevesa November 7. At midday November 9 they set sail for Patras in a
galliot of Ali's, "a vessel of about fifty tons burden, with three short
masts and a large lateen sail." Instead of doubling Cape Ducato, they
were driven out to sea northward, and, finally, at one o'clock in the
morning, anchored off the Port of Phanari on the Suliote coast. Towards
the evening of the next day (November 10) they landed in "the marshy
bay" (stanza lxviii. line 2) and rode to Volondorako, where they slept.
"Here they were well received by the Albanian primate of the place and
by the Vizier's soldiers quartered there." Instead of re-embarking in
the galliot, they returned to Prevesa by land (November 11). As the
country to the north of the Gulf of Arta was up in arms, and bodies of
robbers were abroad, they procured an escort of thirty-seven Albanians,
hired another galliot, and on Monday, the 13th, sailed across the
entrance of the gulf as far as the fortress of Vonitsa, where they
anchored for the night. By four o'clock in the afternoon of November 14
they reached Utraikey or Lutraki, "situated in a deep bay surrounded
with rocks at the south-east corner of the Gulf of Arta." The courtyard
of a barrack on the shore is the scene of the song and dance (stanzas
lxx.-lxxii.). Here, in the original MS., the pilgrimage abruptly ends,
and in the remaining stanzas the Childe moralizes on the fallen fortunes
and vanished heroism of Greece.--_Travels in Albania_, i. 157-165.]
[166] {143} [The route from Utraikey to Gouria (November 15-18) lay
through "thick woods of oak," with occasional peeps of the open
cultivated district of AEtolia on the further side of the Aspropotamo,
"white Achelous' tide." The Albanian guard was not dismissed until the
travellers reached Mesolonghi (November 21).]
[167] [With this description Mr. Tozer compares Virgil, _AEneid_, i.
159-165, and Tasso's imitation in _Gerus. Lib._, canto xv. stanzas 42,
43. The following lines from Hoole's translation (_Jerusalem Delivered_,
bk. xv. lines 310, 311, 317, 318) may be cited:--
"Amidst these isles a lone recess is found,
Where circling shores the subject flood resound ...
Within the waves repose in peace serene;
Black forests nod above, a silvan scene!"]
[168] {144} ["In the evening the gates were secured, and preparations
were made for feeding our Albanians. A goat was killed and roasted
whole, and four fires were kindled in the yard, round which the soldiers
seated themselves in parties. After eating and drinking, the greater
part of them assembled round the largest of the fires, and, whilst
ourselves and the elders of the party were seated on the ground, danced
round the blaze to their own songs, in the manner before described, but
with astonishing energy. All their songs were relations of some robbing
exploits. One of them ... began thus: 'When we set out from Parga there
were sixty of us!' then came the burden of the verse--
'Robbers all at Parga!
Robbers all at Parga!'
[Greek: Kle/phteis pote\ Pa/rga!]
[Greek: Kle/phteis pote\ Pa/rga!]
And as they roared out this stave, they whirled round the fire, dropped,
and rebounded from their knees, and again whirled round as the chorus
was again repeated."--_Travels in Albania_, i. 166, 167.]
[169] {145} [This was not Byron's first experience of an Albanian
war-song. At Salakhora, on the Gulf of Arta (nine miles north-east of
Prevesa), which he reached on October 1, the Albanian guard at the
custom-house entertained the travellers by "singing some songs." "The
music is extremely monotonous and nasal; and the shrill scream of their
voices was increased by each putting his hand behind his ear and cheek,
to give more force to the sound."--_Travels in Albania_, i. 28.
Long afterwards, in 1816, one evening, on the Lake of Geneva, Byron
entertained Shelley, Mary, and Claire with "an Albanian song." They seem
to have felt that such melodies "unheard are sweeter." Hence, perhaps,
his _petit nom_, "Albe," that is, the "Albaneser."--_Life of Shelley_,
by Edward Dowden, 1896, p. 309.]
[170] {146} [Tambourgi, "drummer," a Turkish word, formed by affixing
the termination _-gi_, which signifies "one who discharges any
occupation," to the French _tambour_ (H. F. Tozer, _Childe Harold_, p.
246).]
[fm] ----_thy tocsin afar_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[171] [The _camese_ is the _fustanella_ or white kilt of the Toska, a
branch of the Albanian, or Shkipetar, race. Spenser has the forms
"camis," "camus." The Arabic _quam[=i]c_ occurs in the Koran, but is
thought to be an adaptation of the Latin _camisia, camisa_.--Finlay's
_Hist, of Greece_, vi. 39; _N. Eng. Dict._, art. "Camis." (For "capote,"
_vide post_, p. 181.)]
[fn] _Shall the sons of Chimaera_----.--[MS. D.]
[172] [The Suliotes, after a protracted and often successful resistance,
were finally reduced by Ali, in December, 1803. They are adjured to
forget their natural desire for vengeance, and to unite with the
Albanians against their common foe, the Russians.]
[fo] {147} _Shall win the young minions_----.--[MS. D.]
[fp] ----_the maid and the youth_.--[MS.]
[fq] _Their caresses shall lull us, their voices shall soothe_.--[MS. D.
erased.]
[173] {148} [So, too, at Salakhora (October 1): "One of the songs was on
the taking of Prevesa, an exploit of which the Albanians are vastly
proud; and there was scarcely one of them in which the name of Ali Pasha
was not roared out and dwelt upon with peculiar energy."--_Travels in
Albania_, i. 29.
Prevesa, which, with other Venetian possessions, had fallen to the
French in 1797, was taken in the Sultan's name by Ali, in October, 1798.
The troops in the garrison (300 French, 460 Greeks) encountered and were
overwhelmed by 5000 Albanians, on the plain of Nicopolis. The victors
entered and sacked the town.]
[174] [Ali's eldest son, Mukhtar, the Pasha of Berat, had been sent
against the Russians, who, in 1809, invaded the trans-Danubian provinces
of the Ottoman Empire.]
[175] Yellow is the epithet given to the Russians.
[176] Infidel.
[177] The insignia of a Pacha.
[178] {149} [The literal meaning of Delhi or Deli, is, says M.
Darmesteter, "fou" ["properly madmen" (D'Herbelot)], a title bestowed on
Turkish warriors _honoris causu_. Byron suggests "forlorn hope" as an
equivalent; but there is a wide difference between the blood-drunkenness
of the Turk and the "foolishness" of British chivalry.]
[179] Sword-bearer.
[fr] _Tambourgi! thy tocsin_----.--[MS. D. erased]
[180] [Compare "The Isles of Greece," stanza 7 (_Don Juan_, Canto
III.)--
"Earth! render back from out thy heart
A remnant of our Spartan dead!
Of the three hundred grant but three
To make a new Thermopylae!"
The meaning is, "When shall another Lysander spring from Laconia
('Eurotas' banks') and revive the heroism of the ancient Spartans?"]
[fs] {150} _A fawning feeble race, untaught, enslaved, unmanned_.--[MS.
erased.]
[ft] ----_fair Liberty_.--[MS. erased, D.]
[181] {151} [Compare _The Age of Bronze_, vi. lines 39-46.]
[182] [The Wahabees, who took their name from the Arab sheik Mohammed
ben Abd-el-Wahab, arose in the province of Nedj, in Central Arabia,
about 1760. Half-socialists, half-puritans, they insisted on fulfilling
to the letter the precepts of the Koran. In 1803-4 they attacked and
ravaged Mecca and Medinah, and in 1808 they invaded Syria and took
Damascus. During Byron's residence in the East they were at the height
of their power, and seemed to threaten the very existence of the Turkish
empire.]
[183] {152} [Byron spent two months in Constantinople (Stamboul, i.e.
[Greek: ei)s te po/lin] )--from May 14 to July 14, 1810. The "Lenten
days," which were ushered in by a carnival, were those of the second
"great" Lent of the Greek Church, that of St. Peter and St. Paul, which
begins on the first Monday after Trinity, and ends on the 29th of June.]
[184] {153} [These _al-fresco_ festivities must, it is presumed, have
taken place on the two days out of the seven when you "might not 'damn
the climate' and complain of the spleen." Hobhouse records excursions to
the Valley of Sweet Waters; to Belgrade, where "the French minister gave
a sort of _fete-champetre_," when "the carousal lasted four days," and
when "night after night is kept awake by the pipes, tabors, and fiddles
of these moonlight dances;" and to the grove of
Fanar-Baktchesi.--_Travels in Albania_, ii. 242-258.]
[185]
["There's nothing like young Love, No! No!
There's nothing like young love at last."]
[186] {154} [It has been assumed that "searment" is an incorrect form of
"cerement," the cloth dipped "in melting wax, in which dead bodies were
enfolded when embalmed" (_Hamlet_, act i. sc. 4), but the sense of the
passage seems rather to point to "cerecloth," "searcloth," a plaster to
cover up a wound. The "robe of revel" does but half conceal the sore and
aching heart.]
[187] [For the accentuation of the word, compare Chaucer, "The
Sompnour's Tale" (_Canterbury Tales_, line 7631)--
"And dronkennesse is eke a foul record
Of any man, and namely of a lord."]
[fu] _When Athens' children are with arts endued_.--[MS. D.]
[188] [Compare _Ecclus._ xliv. 8, 9: "There be of them, that have left a
name behind them, that their praises might be reported. And some there
be, which have no memorial; who are perished, as though they had never
been."]
[189] {156} [The "solitary column" may be that on the shore of the
harbour of Colonna, in the island of Kythnos (Thermia), or one of the
detached columns of the Olympeion.]
[190] [Tritonia, or Tritogenia, one of Athena's names of uncertain
origin. Hofmann's _Lexicon Universale_, Tooke's _Pantheon_, and Smith's
_Classical Dictionary_ are much in the same tale. Lucan (_Pharsalia_,
lib. ix. lines 350-354) derives the epithet from Lake Triton, or
Tritonis, on the Mediterranean coast of Libya--
"Hanc et Pallas amat: patrio quae vertice nata
Terrarum primum Libyen (nam proxima coelo est,
Ut probat ipse calor) tetigit, stagnique quieta
Vultus vidit aqua, posuitque in margine plantas,
Et se dilecta Tritonida dixit ab unda."]
[191] [Hobhouse dates the first visit to Cape Colonna, January 24,
1810.]
[192] {157} [Athene's dower of the olive induced the gods to appoint her
as the protector and name-giver of Athens. Poseidon, who had proffered a
horse, was a rejected candidate. (See note by Rev. E. C. Owen, _Childe
Harold_, 1897, p. 175.)]
[193] ["The wild thyme is in great abundance; but there are only two
stands of bee-hives on the mountains, and very little of the real honey
of Hymettus is to be now procured at Athens.... A small pot of it was
shown to me as a rarity" (_Travels in Albania_, i. 341). There is now, a
little way out of Athens, a "honey-farm, where the honey from Hymettus
is prepared for sale" (_Handbook for Greece_, p. 500).]
[fv] ----_Pentele's marbles glare_.--[MS. D. erased.]
[194] [Stanzas lxxxviii.-xc. are not in the MS., but were first included
in the seventh edition, 1814.]
[195] [Byron and Hobhouse, after visiting Colonna, slept at Keratea, and
proceeded to Marathon on January 25, returning to Athens on the
following day.]
[fw] {158} _Preserve alike its form_----.--[MS. L.]
[fx] _When uttered to the listener's eye_----.--[MS. L.]
[fy] _The host, the plain, the fight_----.--[MS. L.]
[fz] _The shattered Mede who flies with broken bow_.--[MS. L.]
[196] ["The plain of Marathon is enclosed on three sides by the rocky
arms of Parnes and Pentelicus, while the fourth is bounded by the sea."
After the first rush, when the victorious wings, where the files were
deep, had drawn together and extricated the shallower and weaker centre,
which had been repulsed by the Persians and the Sakae, "the pursuit
became general, and the Persians were chased to their ships, ranged in
line along the shore. Some of them became involved in the impassable
marsh, and there perished." (See _Childe Harold_, edited by H. F. Tozer,
1885, p. 253; Grote's _History of Greece_, iv. 276. See, too, _Travels
in Albania_, i. 378-384.)]
[ga] _To tell what Asia troubled but to hear_.--[MS. L.]
[197] [See note to Canto II. stanzas i.-xv., pp. 99, 100.]
[gb] _Long to the remnants_--.----[D.]
[198] [The "Ionian blast" is the western wind that brings the voyager
across the Ionian Sea.]
[199] {160} [The original MS. closes with this stanza.]
[gc] _Which heeds nor stern reproach_----.--[D.]
[gd] {161}_Would I had ne'er returned_----.--[D.]
[200]
"To Mr. Dallas.
The 'he' refers to 'Wanderer' and anything is better than
_I I I I_ always _I_.
Yours,
BYRON."
[4th Revise B.M.]
[ge] _But Time the Comforter shall come at last_.--[MS. erased.]
[201] [Compare Young's _Night Thoughts_ ("The Complaint," Night i.).
_Vide ante_, p. 95.]
[gf]
_Though Time not yet hath ting'd my locks with snow,_[Sec.]
_Yet hath he reft whate'er my soul enjoy'd_.--[D.]
[Sec.] "To Mr. Dallas.
If Mr. D. wishes me to adopt the former line so be it. I prefer the
other I confess, it has less egotism--the first sounds affected.
Yours,
B."
[Dallas assented, and directed the printer to let the Roll stand.]
* * * * *
NOTES TO CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.
CANTO II.
1.
Despite of War and wasting fire.
Stanza i. line 4.
Part of the Acropolis was destroyed by the explosion of a magazine
during the Venetian siege.
[In 1684, when the Venetian Armada threatened Athens, the Turks removed
the Temple of Victory, and made use of the materials for the
construction of a bastion. In the autumn of 1687, when the city was
besieged by the Venetians under Francesco Morosini (1618-1694; Doge of
Venice, 1688), "mortars were planted ... near the north-east corner of
the rock, which threw their shells at a high angle, with a low charge,
into the Acropolis.... On the 25th of September, a Venetian bomb blew up
a small powder-magazine in the Propylaea, and on the following evening
another fell in the Parthenon, where the Turks had deposited ... a
considerable quantity of powder.... A terrific explosion took place; the
central columns of the peristyle, the walls of the cella, and the
immense architraves and cornices they supported, were scattered around
the remains of the temple. The Propylaea had been partly destroyed in
1656 by the explosion of a magazine which was struck by
lightning."--Finlay's _History of Greece_, 1887, i. 185.]
2.
But worse than steel, and flame, and ages slow,
Is the dread sceptre and dominion dire.
Stanza i. lines 6, 7.
We can all feel, or imagine, the regret with which the ruins of cities,
once the capitals of empires, are beheld: the reflections suggested by
such objects are too trite to require recapitulation. But never did the
littleness of man, and the vanity of his very best virtues, of
patriotism to exalt, and of valour to defend his country appear more
conspicuous than in the record of what Athens was, and the certainty of
what she now is. This theatre of contention between mighty factions, of
the struggles of orators, the exaltation and deposition of tyrants, the
triumph and punishment of generals, is now become a scene of petty
intrigue and perpetual disturbance, between the bickering agents of
certain British nobility and gentry. "The wild foxes, the owls and
serpents in the ruins of Babylon,"[202] were surely less degrading than
such inhabitants. The Turks have the plea of conquest for their tyranny,
and the Greeks have only suffered the fortune of war, incidental to the
bravest; but how are the mighty fallen, when two painters[203] contest
the privilege of plundering the Parthenon, and triumph in turn,
according to the tenor of each succeeding firman! Sylla could but
punish, Philip subdue, and Xerxes burn Athens; but it remained for the
paltry antiquarian, and his despicable agents, to render her
contemptible as himself and his pursuits. The Parthenon, before its
destruction, in part, by fire during the Venetian siege, had been a
temple, a church, and a mosque.[204] In each point of view it is an
object of regard: it changed its worshippers; but still it was a place
of worship thrice sacred to devotion: its violation is a triple
sacrifice. But--
"Man, proud man,
Drest in a little brief authority,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven
As make the angels weep."
[Shakespeare, _Measure for Measure_,
act ii. sc. 2, lines 117-122.]
3.
Far on the solitary shore he sleeps.
Stanza v. line 2.
It was not always the custom of the Greeks to burn their dead; the
greater Ajax, in particular, was interred entire. Almost all the chiefs
became gods after their decease; and he was indeed neglected, who had
not annual games near his tomb, or festivals in honour of his memory by
his countrymen, as Achilles, Brasidas, etc., and at last even Antinous,
whose death was as heroic as his life was infamous.
4.
Here, son of Saturn! was thy favourite throne.
Stanza x. line 3.
The Temple of Jupiter Olympius, of which sixteen columns, entirely of
marble, yet survive; originally there were one hundred and fifty. These
columns, however, are by many supposed to have belonged to the Pantheon.
[The Olympieion, or Temple of Zeus Olympius, on the south-east of the
Acropolis, some five hundred yards from the foot of the rock, was begun
by Pisistratos, and completed seven hundred years later by Hadrian. It
was one of the three or four largest temples of antiquity. The cella had
been originally enclosed by a double row of twenty columns at the sides,
and a triple row of eight columns at each front, making a hundred and
four columns in all; but in 1810 only sixteen "lofty Corinthian columns"
were standing. Mr. Tozer points out that "'base' is accurate, because
Corinthian columns have bases, which Doric columns have not," and notes
that the word "'unshaken' implies that the column itself had fallen, but
the base remains."--_Childe Harold_, 1888, p. 228.]
5.
And bear these altars o'er the long-reluctant brine.
Stanza xi. line 9.
The ship was wrecked in the Archipelago.
[The _Mentor_, which Elgin had chartered to convey to England a cargo
consisting of twelve chests of antiquities, was wrecked off the Island
of Cerigo, in 1803. His secretary, W. R. Hamilton, set divers to work,
and rescued four chests; but the remainder were not recovered till
1805.]
6.
To rive what Goth, and Turk, and Time hath spared.
Stanza xii. line 2.
At this moment (January 3, 1810), besides what has been already
deposited in London, an Hydriot vessel is in the Pyraeus to receive every
portable relic. Thus, as I heard a young Greek observe, in common with
many of his countrymen--for, lost as they are, they yet feel on this
occasion--thus may Lord Elgin boast of having ruined Athens. An Italian
painter of the first eminence, named Lusieri[205], is the agent of
devastation; and like the Greek _finder_[206] of Verres in Sicily, who
followed the same profession, he has proved the able instrument of
plunder. Between this artist and the French Consul Fauvel[207], who
wishes to rescue the remains for his own government, there is now a
violent dispute concerning a car employed in their conveyance, the wheel
of which--I wish they were both broken upon it!--has been locked up by
the Consul, and Lusieri has laid his complaint before the Waywode. Lord
Elgin has been extremely happy in his choice of Signer Lusieri. During a
residence of ten years in Athens, he never had the curiosity to proceed
as far as Sunium (now Cape Colonna),[208] till he accompanied us in our
second excursion. However, his works, as far as they go, are most
beautiful: but they are almost all unfinished. While he and his patrons
confine themselves to tasting medals, appreciating cameos, sketching
columns, and cheapening gems, their little absurdities are as harmless
as insect or fox-hunting, maiden-speechifying, barouche-driving, or any
such pastime; but when they carry away three or four shiploads of the
most valuable and massy relics that time and barbarism have left to the
most injured and most celebrated of cities: when they destroy, in a vain
attempt to tear down, those works which have been the admiration of
ages, I know no motive which can excuse, no name which can designate,
the perpetrators of this dastardly devastation. It was not the least of
the crimes laid to the charge of Verres, that he had plundered Sicily,
in the manner since imitated at Athens. The most unblushing impudence
could hardly go farther than to affix the name of its plunderer to the
walls of the Acropolis; while the wanton and useless defacement of the
whole range of the basso-relievos, in one compartment of the temple,
will never permit that name to be pronounced by an observer without
execration.
On this occasion I speak impartially: I am not a collector or admirer of
collections, consequently no rival; but I have some early prepossession
in favour of Greece, and do not think the honour of England advanced by
plunder, whether of India or Attica.
Another noble Lord [Aberdeen] has done better, because he has done less:
but some others, more or less noble, yet "all honourable men," have done
_best_, because, after a deal of excavation and execration, bribery to
the Waywode, mining and countermining, they have done nothing at all. We
had such ink-shed, and wine-shed, which almost ended in bloodshed![209]
Lord E.'s "prig"--see Jonathan Wild for the definition of
"priggism"[210]--quarrelled with another, _Gropius_[211] by name (a very
good name too for his business), and muttered something about
satisfaction, in a verbal answer to a note of the poor Prussian: this
was stated at table to Gropius, who laughed, but could eat no dinner
afterwards. The rivals were not reconciled when I left Greece. I have
reason to remember their squabble, for they wanted to make me their
arbitrator.
7.
Her Sons too weak the sacred shrine to guard,
Yet felt some portion of their Mother's pains.
Stanza xii. lines 7 and 8.
I cannot resist availing myself of the permission of my friend Dr.
Clarke, whose name requires no comment with the public, but whose
sanction will add tenfold weight to my testimony, to insert the
following extract from a very obliging letter of his to me, as a note to
the above lines:--"When the last of the Metopes was taken from the
Parthenon, and, in moving of it, great part of the superstructure with
one of the triglyphs was thrown down by the workmen whom Lord Elgin
employed, the Disdar, who beheld the mischief done to the building, took
his pipe from his mouth, dropped a tear, and in a supplicating tone of
voice, said to Lusieri, [Greek: Telos]!--I was present." The Disdar
alluded to was the father of the present Disdar.
[Disdar, or Dizdar, i.e. castle-holder--the warden of a castle or fort
(_N. Eng. Dict_., art. "Dizdar"). The story is told at greater length in
_Travels in Various Countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa_, by Edward
Daniel Clarke, LL.D., 1810-14, Part II. sect. ii. p. 483.]
8.
Where was thine AEgis, Pallas! that appalled
Stern Alaric and Havoc on their way?
Stanza xiv. lines i and 2.
According to Zosimus, Minerva and Achilles frightened Alaric from the
Acropolis: but others relate that the Gothic king was nearly as
mischievous as the Scottish peer.--See Chandler.
[Zosimus, _Historiae_, lib. v. cap. 6, _Corp. Scr. Byz_., 1837, p. 253.
As a matter of fact, Alaric, King of the Visigoths, occupied Athens in
A.D. 395 without resistance, and carried off the movable treasures of
the city, though he did not destroy buildings or works of art.--Note by
Rev. E. C. Owen, _Childe Harold_, 1898, p. 162.]
9.
The netted canopy.
Stanza xviii. line 2.
To prevent blocks or splinters from falling on deck during action.
10.
But not in silence pass Calypso's isles.
Stanza xxix. line 1.
Goza is said to have been the island of Calypso.
[Strabo (Paris, 1853), lib. i. cap. ii. 57 and lib. vii. cap. iii. 50,
says that Apollodorus blamed the poet Callimachus, who was a grammarian
and ought to have known better, for his contention that Gaudus, i.e.
Gozo, was Calypso's isle. Ogygia (_Odyssey_, i. 50) was
"a sea-girt isle,
Where is the navel of the sea, a woodland isle."
It was surely as a poet, not as a grammarian, that Callimachus was at
fault.]
11.
Land of Albania! let me bend mine eyes
On thee, thou rugged Nurse of savage men!
Stanza xxxviii. lines 5 and 6.
Albania comprises part of Macedonia, Illyria, Chaonia, and Epirus.
Iskander is the Turkish word for Alexander; and the celebrated
Scanderbeg[212] (Lord Alexander) is alluded to in the third and fourth
lines of the thirty-eighth stanza. I do not know whether I am correct
in making Scanderbeg the countryman of Alexander, who was born at Pella
in Macedon, but Mr. Gibbon terms him so, and adds Pyrrhus to the list,
in speaking of his exploits.
Of Albania Gibbon remarks that a country "within sight of Italy is less
known than the interior of America." Circumstances, of little
consequence to mention, led Mr. Hobhouse and myself into that country
before we visited any other part of the Ottoman dominions; and with the
exception of Major Leake,[213] then officially resident at Joannina, no
other Englishmen have ever advanced beyond the capital into the
interior, as that gentleman very lately assured me. Ali Pacha was at
that time (October, 1809) carrying on war against Ibrahim Pacha, whom he
had driven to Berat, a strong fortress, which he was then besieging: on
our arrival at Joannina we were invited to Tepaleni, his highness's
birthplace, and favourite Serai, only one day's distance from Berat; at
this juncture the Vizier had made it his headquarters. After some stay
in the capital, we accordingly followed; but though furnished with every
accommodation, and escorted by one of the Vizier's secretaries, we were
nine days (on account of the rains) in accomplishing a journey which, on
our return, barely occupied four. On our route we passed two cities,
Argyrocastro and Libochabo, apparently little inferior to Yanina in
size; and no pencil or pen can ever do justice to the scenery in the
vicinity of Zitza and Delvinachi, the frontier village of Epirus and
Albania Proper.
On Albania and its inhabitants I am unwilling to descant, because this
will be done so much better by my fellow-traveller, in a work which may
probably precede this in publication, that I as little wish to follow as
I would to anticipate him.[214] But some few observations are necessary
to the text. The Arnaouts, or Albanese, struck me forcibly by their
resemblance to the Highlanders of Scotland, in dress, figure, and manner
of living. Their very mountains seemed Caledonian, with a kinder
climate. The kilt, though white; the spare, active form; their dialect,
Celtic in its sound; and their hardy habits, all carried me back to
Morven. No nation are so detested and dreaded by their neighbours as the
Albanese; the Greeks hardly regard them as Christians, or the Turks as
Moslems; and in fact they are a mixture of both, and sometimes neither.
Their habits are predatory--all are armed; and the red-shawled Arnaouts,
the Montenegrins, Chimariots, and Gegdes, are treacherous;[215] the
others differ somewhat in garb, and essentially in character. As far as
my own experience goes, I can speak favourably. I was attended by two,
an Infidel and a Mussulman, to Constantinople and every other part of
Turkey which came within my observation; and more faithful in peril, or
indefatigable in service, are rarely to be found. The Infidel was named
Basilius; the Moslem, Dervish Tahiri; the former a man of middle age,
and the latter about my own. Basili was strictly charged by Ali Pacha in
person to attend us; and Dervish was one of fifty who accompanied us
through the forests of Acarnania to the banks of Achelous, and onward to
Messalonghi in AEtolia. There I took him into my own service, and never
had occasion to repent it till the moment of my departure.
When, in 1810, after the departure of my friend Mr. Hobhouse for
England, I was seized with a severe fever in the Morea, these men saved
my life by frightening away my physician, whose throat they threatened
to cut if I was not cured within a given time. To this consolatory
assurance of posthumous retribution, and a resolute refusal of Dr.
Romanelli's prescriptions, I attributed my recovery.[gg] I had left my
last remaining English servant at Athens; my dragoman was as ill as
myself, and my poor Arnaouts nursed me with an attention which would
have done honour to civilization. They had a variety of adventures; for
the Moslem, Dervish, being a remarkably handsome man, was always
squabbling with the husbands of Athens; insomuch that four of the
principal Turks paid me a visit of remonstrance at the Convent on the
subject of his having taken a woman from the bath--whom he had lawfully
bought, however--a thing quite contrary to etiquette. Basili also was
extremely gallant amongst his own persuasion, and had the greatest
veneration for the church, mixed with the highest contempt of churchmen,
whom he cuffed upon occasion in a most heterodox manner. Yet he never
passed a church without crossing himself; and I remember the risk he
ran in entering St. Sophia, in Stambol, because it had once been a place
of his worship. On remonstrating with him on his inconsistent
proceedings, he invariably answered, "Our church is holy, our priests
are thieves:" and then he crossed himself as usual, and boxed the ears
of the first "papas" who refused to assist in any required operation, as
was always found to be necessary where a priest had any influence with
the Cogia Bashi[216] of his village. Indeed, a more abandoned race of
miscreants cannot exist than the lower orders of the Greek clergy.
When preparations were made for my return, my Albanians were summoned to
receive their pay. Basili took his with an awkward show of regret at my
intended departure, and marched away to his quarters with his bag of
piastres. I sent for Dervish, but for some time he was not to be found;
at last he entered, just as Signor Logotheti,[217] father to the
ci-devant Anglo-consul of Athens, and some other of my Greek
acquaintances, paid me a visit. Dervish took the money in his hand, but
on a sudden dashed it to the ground; and clasping his hands, which he
raised to his forehead, rushed out of the room weeping bitterly. From
that moment to the hour of my embarkation, he continued his
lamentations, and all our efforts to console him only produced this
answer, "[Greek: M'apheinei]", "He leaves me." Signer Logotheti, who
never wept before for anything less than the loss of a para (about the
fourth of a farthing), melted; the padre of the convent, my attendants,
my visitors--and I verily believe that even Sterne's "foolish fat
scullion" would have left her "fish-kettle" to sympathize with the
unaffected and unexpected sorrow of this barbarian.[218]
For my own part, when I remembered that, a short time before my
departure from England, a noble and most intimate associate had excused
himself from taking leave of me because he had to attend a female
relation "to a milliner's,"[219] I felt no less surprised than
humiliated by the present occurrence and the past recollection. That
Dervish would leave me with some regret was to be expected; when master
and man have been scrambling over the mountains of a dozen provinces
together, they are unwilling to separate; but his present feelings,
contrasted with his native ferocity, improved my opinion of the human
heart. I believe this almost feudal fidelity is frequent amongst them.
One day, on our journey over Parnassus, an Englishman in my service gave
him a push in some dispute about the baggage, which he unluckily mistook
for a blow; he spoke not, but sat down leaning his head upon his hands.
Foreseeing the consequences, we endeavoured to explain away the affront,
which produced the following answer:--"I _have been_ a robber; I _am_ a
soldier; no captain ever struck me; _you_ are my master, I have eaten
your bread, but by _that_ bread! (a usual oath) had it been otherwise, I
would have stabbed the dog, your servant, and gone to the mountains." So
the affair ended, but from that day forward he never thoroughly forgave
the thoughtless fellow who insulted him. Dervish excelled in the dance
of his country, conjectured to be a remnant of the ancient Pyrrhic: be
that as it may, it is manly, and requires wonderful agility. It is very
distinct from the stupid Romaika,[220] the dull round-about of the
Greeks, of which our Athenian party had so many specimens.
The Albanians in general (I do not mean the cultivators of the earth in
the provinces, who have also that appellation, but the mountaineers)
have a fine cast of countenance; and the most beautiful women I ever
beheld, in stature and in features, we saw _levelling_ the _road_ broken
down by the torrents between Delvinachi and Libochabo. Their manner of
walking is truly theatrical; but this strut is probably the effect of
the capote, or cloak, depending from one shoulder. Their long hair
reminds you of the Spartans, and their courage in desultory warfare is
unquestionable. Though they have some cavalry amongst the Gegdes, I
never saw a good Arnaout horseman; my own preferred the English saddles,
which, however, they could never keep. But on foot they are not to be
subdued by fatigue.
12.
And passed the barren spot,
Where sad Penelope o'erlooked the wave.
Stanza xxxix. lines 1 and 2.
Ithaca.
13.
Actium--Lepanto--fatal Trafalgar.
Stanza xl. line 5.
Actium and Trafalgar need no further mention. The battle of Lepanto
[October 7, 1571], equally bloody and considerable, but less known, was
fought in the Gulf of Patras. Here the author of Don Quixote lost his
left hand.
["His [Cervantes'] galley the _Marquesa_, was in the thick of the fight,
and before it was over he had received three gun-shot wounds, two in the
breast and one on the left hand or arm." In consequence of his wound "he
was seven months in hospital before he was discharged. He came out with
his left hand permanently disabled; he had lost the use of it, as
Mercury told him in the 'Viaje del Parnase,' for the greater glory of
the right."--_Don Quixote_, A Translation by John Ormsby, 1885,
_Introduction_, i. 13.]
14.
And hailed the last resort of fruitless love.
Stanza xli. line 3.
Leucadia, now Santa Maura. From the promontory (the Lover's Leap) Sappho
is said to have thrown herself.
[Strabo (lib. x. cap. 2, ed. Paris, 1853, p. 388) gives Menander as an
authority for the legend that Sappho was the first to take the "Lover's
Leap" from the promontory of Leucate. Writers, he adds, better versed in
antiquities [Greek: a)rchaiologiko/teroi], prefer the claims of one
Cephalus. Another legend, which he gives as a fact, perhaps gave birth
to the later and more poetical fiction. The Leucadians, he says, once a
year, on Apollo's day, were wont to hurl a criminal from the rock into
the sea by way of expiation and propitiation. Birds of all kinds were
attached to the victim to break his fall, and, if he reached the sea
uninjured, there was a fleet of little boats ready to carry him to other
shores. It is possible that dim memories of human sacrifice lingered in
the islands, that in course of time victims were transformed into
"lovers," and it is certain that poets and commentators, "prone to lie,"
are responsible for names and incidents.]
15.
Many a Roman chief and Asian King.
Stanza xlv. line 4.
It is said, that on the day previous to the battle of Actium, Antony had
thirteen kings at his levee.
[Plutarch, in his _Antonius_, gives the names of "six auxiliary kings
who fought under his banners," and mentions six other kings who did not
attend in person but sent supplies. Shakespeare (_Anthony and
Cleopatra_, act iii. sc. 6, lines 68-75), quoting Plutarch almost
_verbatim_, enumerates ten kings who were "assembled" in Anthony's
train--
"Bocchus, the king of Libya; Archelaus,
Of Cappadocia; Philadelphos, king
Of Paphlagonia; the Thracian king, Adallas;
King Malchus of Arabia; king of Pont;
Herod of Jewry; Mithridates, king
Of Comagene; Polemon and Amintas,
The kings of Mede and Lycaonia,
With a more larger list of sceptres."
Other authorities for the events of the campaign and battle of Actium
(Dion Cassius, Appian, and Orosius) are silent as to "kings;" but Florus
(iv. 11) says that the wind-tossed waters "vomited back" to the shore
gold and purple, the spoils of the Arabians and Sabaeans, and a thousand
other peoples of Asia.]
16.
Look where the second Caesar's trophies rose.
Stanza xlv. line 6.
Nicopolis, whose ruins are most extensive, is at some distance from
Actium, where the wall of the Hippodrome survives in a few fragments.
These ruins are large masses of brickwork, the bricks of which are
joined by interstices of mortar, as large as the bricks themselves, and
equally durable.
17.
Acherusia's lake.
Stanza xlvii. line 1.
According to Pouqueville, the lake of Yanina; but Pouqueville is always
out.
[The lake of Yanina (Janina or Joannina) was the ancient Pambotis. "At
the mouth of the gorge [of Suli], where it suddenly comes to an end, was
the marsh, the Palus Acherusia, in the neighbourhood of which was the
Oracle."--_Geography of Greece_, by H. F. Tozer, 1873, p. 121.]
18.
To greet Albania's Chief.
Stanza xlvii. line 4.
The celebrated Ali Pacha. Of this extraordinary man there is an
incorrect account in Pouqueville's _Travels_. [For note on Ali Pasha
(1741-1822), see _Letters_, 1898, i. 246.]
19.
Yet here and there some daring mountain-band
Disdain his power, and from their rocky hold
Hurl their defiance far, nor yield, unless to gold.
Stanza xlvii. lines 7, 8, and 9.
Five thousand Suliotes, among the rocks and in the castle of Suli,
withstood thirty thousand Albanians for eighteen years; the castle at
last was taken by bribery. In this contest there were several acts
performed not unworthy of the better days of Greece.
[Ali Pasha assumed the government of Janina in 1788, but it was not till
December 12, 1803, that the Suliotes, who were betrayed by their
leaders, Botzaris and Koutsonika and others, finally
surrendered.--Finlay's _History of Greece_, 1877, vi. 45-50.]
20.
Monastic Zitza! etc.
Stanza xlviii. line 1.
The convent and village of Zitza are four hours' journey from Joannina,
or Yanina, the capital of the Pachalick. In the valley the river Kalamas
(once the Acheron) flows, and, not far from Zitza, forms a fine
cataract. The situation is perhaps the finest in Greece, though the
approach to Delvinachi and parts of Acarnania and AEtolia may contest the
palm. Delphi, Parnassus, and, in Attica, even Cape Colonna and Port
Raphti, are very inferior; as also every scene in Ionia, or the Troad: I
am almost inclined to add the approach to Constantinople; but, from the
different features of the last, a comparison can hardly be made.
21.
Here dwells the caloyer.
Stanza xlix. line 6.
The Greek monks are so called.
[_Caloyer_ is derived from the late Greek [Greek: kalo/geros], "good in
old age," through the Italian _caloieso_. Hence the accent on the last
syllable.--_N. Eng. Dict._]
22.
Nature's volcanic Amphitheatre.
Stanza li. line 2.
The Chimariot mountains appear to have been volcanic.
[By "Chimaera's Alps" Byron probably meant the Ceraunian Mountains, which
are "woody to the top, but disclose some wide chasms of red rock"
(_Travels in Albania_, i. 73) to the north of Jannina,--not the
Acroceraunian (Chimariot) Mountains, which run from north to south-west
along the coast of Mysia. "The walls of rock (which do not appear to be
volcanic) rise in tiers on every side, like the seats and walls of an
amphitheatre" (H. F. Tozer). The near distance may have suggested an
amphitheatre; but he is speaking of the panorama which enlarged on his
view, and uses the word not graphically, but metaphorically, of the
entire "circle of the hills."]
23.
Behold black Acheron!
Stanza li. line 6.
Now called Kalamas.
24.
In his white capote.
Stanza lii. line 7.
Albanese cloak.
[The _capote_ (feminine of _capot_, masculine diminutive of _cope_,
cape) was a long shaggy cloak or overcoat, with a hood, worn by
soldiers, etc.--_N. Eng. Dict_., art. "Capote."]
25.
The Sun had sunk behind vast Tomerit.
Stanza lv. line 1.
Anciently Mount Tomarus.
["Mount Tomerit, or Tomohr," says Mr. Tozer, "lies north-east of
Tepalen, and therefore the sun could not set behind it" (_Childe
Harold_, 1885, p. 272). But, writing to Drury, May 3, 1810, Byron says
that "he penetrated as far as Mount Tomarit." Probably by "Tomarit" he
does not mean Mount Tomohr, which lies to the north-east of Berat, but
Mount Olytsika, ancient Tomaros (_vide ante_, p. 132, note 1), which
lies to the west of Janina, between the valley of Tcharacovista and the
sea. "Elle domine," writes M. Carapanos, "toutes les autres montagnes
qui l'entourent." "Laos," Mr. Tozer thinks, "is a mere blunder for Aoeus,
the Viosa (or Voioussa), which joins the Derapuli a few miles south of
Tepaleni, and flows under the walls of the city" (_Dodone et ses
Ruines_, 1878, p. 8). (For the Aoeus and approach to Tepeleni, see
_Travels in Albania_, i. 91.)]
26.
And Laos wide and fierce came roaring by.
Stanza lv. line 2.
The river Laos was full at the time the author passed it; and,
immediately above Tepaleen, was to the eye as wide as the Thames at
Westminster; at least in the opinion of the author and his
fellow-traveller. In the summer it must be much narrower. It certainly
is the finest river in the Levant; neither Achelous, Alpheus, Acheron,
Scamander, nor Cayster, approached it in breadth or beauty.
27.
And fellow-countrymen have stood aloof.
Stanza lxvi. line 8.
Alluding to the wreckers of Cornwall.
28.
The red wine circling fast.
Stanza lxxi. line 2.
The Albanian Mussulmans do not abstain from wine, and, indeed, very few
of the others.
29.
Each Palikar his sabre from him cast.
Stanza lxxi. line 7.
Palikar, shortened when addressed to a single person, from [Greek:
Palikari] [[Greek: palleka/ri]], a general name for a soldier amongst
the Greeks and Albanese, who speak Romaic: it means, properly, "a lad."
30.
While thus in concert, etc.
Stanza lxxii. line 9.
As a specimen of the Albanian or Arnaout dialect of the Illyric, I here
insert two of their most popular choral songs, which are generally
chanted in dancing by men or women indiscriminately. The first words are
merely a kind of chorus without meaning, like some in our own and all
other languages.
1. Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, 1. Lo, Lo, I come, I come;
Naciarura, popuso. be thou silent.
2. Naciarura na civin 2. I come, I run; open the
Ha pen derini ti hin. door that I may enter.
3. Ha pe uderi escrotini 3. Open the door by halves,
Ti vin ti mar servetini. that I may take my turban.
4. Caliriote me surme 4. Caliriotes[Sec.] with the dark
Ea ha pe pse dua tive. eyes, open the gate that
I may enter.
5. Buo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, 5. Lo, Lo, I hear thee, my soul.
Gi egem spirta esimiro.
6. Caliriote vu le funde 6. An Arnaout girl, in costly
Ede vete tunde tunde. garb, walks with graceful pride.
7. Caliriote me surme 7. Caliriot maid of the dark
Ti mi put e poi mi le. eyes, give me a kiss.
8. Se ti puta citi mora 8. If I have kissed thee,
what hast thou gained?
Si mi ri ni veti udo gia. My soul is consumed with fire.
9. Va le ni il che cadale 9. Dance lightly, more
Celo more, more celo. gently, and gently still.
10. Plu hari ti tirete 10. Make not so much dust
Plu huron cia pra seti. to destroy your embroidered hose.
[Sec.]The Albanese, particularly the women, are frequently termed
"Caliriotes," for what reason I inquired in vain.
The last stanza would puzzle a commentator: the men have certainly
buskins of the most beautiful texture, but the ladies (to whom the above
is supposed to be addressed) have nothing under their little yellow
boots and slippers but a well-turned and sometimes very white ankle. The
Arnaout girls are much handsomer than the Greeks, and their dress is far
more picturesque. They preserve their shape much longer also, from being
always in the open air. It is to be observed, that the Arnaout is not a
_written_ language: the words of this song, therefore, as well as the
one which follows, are spelt according to their pronunciation. They are
copied by one who speaks and understands the dialect perfectly, and who
is a native of Athens.
1. Ndi sefda tinde ulavossa 1. I am wounded by thy love, and
Vettimi upri vi lofsa. have loved but to scorch myself.
2. Ah vaisisso mi privi lofse 2. Thou hast consumed me! Ah, maid!
Si mi rini mi la vosse. thou has struck me to the heart.
3. Uti tasa roba stua 3. I have said I wish no dowry,
Sitti eve tulati dua. but thine eyes and eyelashes.
4. Roba stinori ssidua 4. The accursed dowry I
Qu mi sini vetti dua. want not, but thee only.
5. Qurmini dua civileni 5. Give me thy charms, and
Roba ti siarmi tildi eni. let the portion feed the flames.
6. Utara pisa vaisisso me 6. I have loved thee, maid,
simi rin ti hapti with a sincere soul, but
Eti mi bire a piste si gui thou hast left me like
dendroi tiltati. a withered tree.
7. Udi vura udorini udiri 7. If I have placed my hand on
cicova cilti mora thy bosom, what have I gained?
Udorini talti hollna u ede my hand is withdrawn, but
caimoni mora. retains the flame.
I believe the two last stanzas, as they are in a different measure,
ought to belong to another ballad. An idea something similar to the
thought in the last lines was expressed by Socrates, whose arm having
come in contact with one of his "[Greek: hupokolpioi]," Critobulus or
Cleobulus, the philosopher complained of a shooting pain as far as his
shoulder for some days after, and therefore very properly resolved to
teach his disciples in future without touching them.
31.
Tambourgi! Tambourgi! thy 'larum afar.
Song, stanza 1, line 1.
These stanzas are partly taken from different Albanese songs, as far as
I was able to make them out by the exposition of the Albanese in Romaic
and Italian.
32.
Remember the moment when Previsa fell.
Song, stanza 8, line 1.
It was taken by storm from the French [October, 1798].
33.
Fair Greece! sad relic of departed Worth! etc.
Stanza lxxiii. line 1.
Some thoughts on this subject will be found in the subjoined papers, pp.
187-208.
34.
Spirit of Freedom! when on Phyle's brow
Thou sat'st with Thrasybulus and his train.
Stanza lxxiv. lines 1 and 2.
Phyle, which commands a beautiful view of Athens, has still considerable
remains: it was seized by Thrasybulus, previous to the expulsion of the
Thirty.
[Byron and Hobhouse caught their first glance of Athens from this spot,
December 25, 1809. (See Byron's note.) "The ruins," says Hobhouse, "are
now called Bigla Castro, or The Watchtower."]
35.
Receive the fiery Frank, her former guest.
Stanza lxxvii. line 4.
When taken by the Latins, and retained for several years. See Gibbon.
[From A.D. 1204 to 1261.]
36.
The Prophet's tomb of all its pious spoil.
Stanza lxxvii. line 6.
Mecca and Medina were taken some time ago by the Wahabees, a sect yearly
increasing. [_Vide supra_, p. 151.]
37.
Thy vales of evergreen, thy hills of snow.
Stanza lxxxv. line 3.
On many of the mountains, particularly Liakura, the snow never is
entirely melted, notwithstanding the intense heat of the summer; but I
never saw it lie on the plains, even in winter.
[This feature of Greek scenery, in spring, may, now and again, be
witnessed in our own country in autumn--a blue lake, bordered with
summer greenery in the foreground, with a rear-guard of "hills of snow"
glittering in the October sunshine.]
38.
Save where some solitary column mourns
Above its prostrate brethren of the cave.
Stanza lxxxvi. lines 1 and 2.
Of Mount Pentelicus, from whence the marble was dug that constructed the
public edifices of Athens. The modern name is Mount Mendeli. An immense
cave, formed by the quarries, still remains, and will till the end of
time.
[Mendeli is the ancient Pentelicus. "The white lines marking the
projecting veins" of marble are visible from Athens (_Geography of
Greece_, by H.F. Tozer, 1873, p. 129).]
39.
When Marathon became a magic word.
Stanza lxxxix. line 7.
"Siste Viator--heroa calcas!" was the epitaph on the famous Count
Merci;[221]--what then must be our feelings when standing on the
tumulus of the two hundred (Greeks) who fell on Marathon? The principal
barrow has recently been opened by Fauvel: few or no relics, as vases,
etc. were found by the excavator. The plain of Marathon[222] was offered
to me for sale at the sum of sixteen thousand piastres, about nine
hundred pounds! Alas!--"Expende[223]--quot _libras_ in duce
summo--invenies!"--was the dust of Miltiades worth no more? It could
scarcely have fetched less if sold by _weight_.
PAPERS REFERRED TO BY NOTE 33.
I.[224]
Before I say anything about a city of which every body, traveller or
not, has thought it necessary to say something, I will request Miss
Owenson,[225] when she next borrows an Athenian heroine for her four
volumes, to have the goodness to marry her to somebody more of a
gentleman than a "Disdar Aga" (who by the by is not an Aga), the most
impolite of petty officers, the greatest patron of larceny[226] Athens
ever saw (except Lord E.), and the unworthy occupant of the Acropolis,
on a handsome annual stipend of 150 piastres (eight pounds sterling),
out of which he has only to pay his garrison, the most ill-regulated
corps in the ill-regulated Ottoman Empire. I speak it tenderly, seeing I
was once the cause of the husband of "Ida of Athens" nearly suffering
the bastinado; and because the said "Disdar" is a turbulent husband, and
beats his wife; so that I exhort and beseech Miss Owenson to sue for a
separate maintenance in behalf of "Ida." Having premised thus much, on a
matter of such import to the readers of romances, I may now leave Ida to
mention her birthplace.
Setting aside the magic of the name, and all those associations which it
would be pedantic and superfluous to recapitulate, the very situation of
Athens would render it the favourite of all who have eyes for art or
nature. The climate, to me at least, appeared a perpetual spring; during
eight months I never passed a day without being as many hours on
horseback: rain is extremely rare, snow never lies in the plains, and a
cloudy day is an agreeable rarity. In Spain, Portugal, and every part of
the East which I visited, except Ionia and Attica, I perceived no such
superiority of climate to our own; and at Constantinople, where I passed
May, June, and part of July (1810), you might "damn the climate, and
complain of spleen," five days out of seven.[227]
The air of the Morea is heavy and unwholesome, but the moment you pass
the isthmus in the direction of Megara the change is strikingly
perceptible. But I fear Hesiod will still be found correct in his
description of a Boeotian winter.[228]
We found at Livadia an "esprit fort" in a Greek bishop, of all
free-thinkers! This worthy hypocrite rallied his own religion with great
intrepidity (but not before his flock), and talked of a mass as a
"coglioneria."[229] It was impossible to think better of him for this;
but, for a Boeotian, he was brisk with all his absurdity. This
phenomenon (with the exception indeed of Thebes, the remains of
Chaeronea, the plain of Platea, Orchomenus, Livadia, and its nominal
cave of Trophonius) was the only remarkable thing we saw before we
passed Mount Cithaeron.
The fountain of Dirce turns a mill: at least my companion (who,
resolving to be at once cleanly and classical, bathed in it) pronounced
it to be the fountain of Dirce,[230] and any body who thinks it worth
while may contradict him. At Castri we drank of half a dozen streamlets,
some not of the purest, before we decided to our satisfaction which was
the true Castalian, and even that had a villanous twang, probably from
the snow, though it did not throw us into an epic fever, like poor Dr.
Chandler.[231]
From Fort Phyle, of which large remains still exist, the plain of
Athens, Pentelicus, Hymettus, the AEgean, and the Acropolis, burst upon
the eye at once; in my opinion, a more glorious prospect than even
Cintra or Istambol. Not the view from the Troad, with Ida, the
Hellespont, and the more distant Mount Athos, can equal it, though so
superior in extent.
I heard much of the beauty of Arcadia, but excepting the view from the
Monastery of Megaspelion (which is inferior to Zitza in a command of
country), and the descent from the mountains on the way from Tripolitza
to Argos, Arcadia has little to recommend it beyond the name.
"Sternitur, et _dulces_ moriens reminiscitur Argos."
_AEneid_, x. 782.
Virgil could have put this into the mouth of none but an Argive, and
(with reverence be it spoken) it does not deserve the epithet. And if
the Polynices of Statius, "In mediis audit duo litora campis"
(_Thebaidos_, i. 335), did actually hear both shores in crossing the
isthmus of Corinth, he had better ears than have ever been worn in such
a journey since.
"Athens," says a celebrated topographer, "is still the most polished
city of Greece."[232] Perhaps it may of _Greece_, but not of the
_Greeks_; for Joannina in Epirus is universally allowed, amongst
themselves, to be superior in the wealth, refinement, learning, and
dialect of its inhabitants. The Athenians are remarkable for their
cunning; and the lower orders are not improperly characterised in that
proverb, which classes them with the "Jews of Salonica, and the Turks of
the Negropont."
Among the various foreigners resident in Athens, French, Italians,
Germans, Ragusans, etc., there was never a difference of opinion in
their estimate of the Greek character, though on all other topics they
disputed with great acrimony.
M. Fauvel, the French Consul, who has passed thirty years principally at
Athens, and to whose talents as an artist, and manners as a gentleman,
none who have known him can refuse their testimony, has frequently
declared in my hearing, that the Greeks do not deserve to be
emancipated; reasoning on the grounds of their "national and individual
depravity!" while he forgot that such depravity is to be attributed to
causes which can only be removed by the measure he reprobates.
M. Roque,[233] a French merchant of respectability long settled in
Athens, asserted with the most amusing gravity, "Sir, they are the same
_canaille_ that existed _in the days of Themistocles!_" an alarming
remark to the "Laudator temporis acti." The ancients banished
Themistocles; the moderns cheat Monsieur Roque; thus great men have ever
been treated!
In short, all the Franks who are fixtures, and most of the Englishmen,
Germans, Danes, etc., of passage, came over by degrees to their opinion,
on much the same grounds that a Turk in England would condemn the nation
by wholesale, because he was wronged by his lacquey, and overcharged by
his washerwoman.
Certainly it was not a little staggering when the Sieurs Fauvel and
Lusieri, the two greatest demagogues of the day, who divide between them
the power of Pericles and the popularity of Cleon, and puzzle the poor
Waywode with perpetual differences, agreed in the utter condemnation,
"nulla virtute redemptum" (Juvenal, lib. i. _Sat._ iv. line 2), of the
Greeks in general, and of the Athenians in particular. For my own humble
opinion, I am loth to hazard it, knowing as I do, that there be now in
MS. no less than five tours of the first magnitude, and of the most
threatening aspect, all in typographical array, by persons of wit and
honour, and regular common-place books: but, if I may say this, without
offence, it seems to me rather hard to declare so positively and
pertinaciously, as almost everybody has declared, that the Greeks,
because they are very bad, will never be better.
Eton and Sonnini[234] have led us astray by their panegyrics and
projects; but, on the other hand, De Pauw and Thornton[235] have debased
the Greeks beyond their demerits.
The Greeks will never be independent; they will never be sovereigns as
heretofore, and God forbid they ever should! but they may be subjects
without being slaves. Our colonies are not independent, but they are
free and industrious, and such may Greece be hereafter.
At present, like the Catholics of Ireland and the Jews throughout the
world, and such other cudgelled and heterodox people, they suffer all
the moral and physical ills that can afflict humanity. Their life is a
struggle against truth; they are vicious in their own defence. They are
so unused to kindness, that when they occasionally meet with it they
look upon it with suspicion, as a dog often beaten snaps at your fingers
if you attempt to caress him. "They are ungrateful, notoriously,
abominably ungrateful!"--this is the general cry. Now, in the name of
Nemesis! for what are they to be grateful? Where is the human being that
ever conferred a benefit on Greek or Greeks? They are to be grateful to
the Turks for their fetters, and to the Franks for their broken promises
and lying counsels. They are to be grateful to the artist who engraves
their ruins, and to the antiquary who carries them away; to the
traveller whose janissary flogs them, and to the scribbler whose journal
abuses them. This is the amount of their obligations to foreigners.
II.
Franciscan Convent, Athens, _January_ 23, 1811.[236]
Amongst the remnants of the barbarous policy of the earlier ages, are
the traces of bondage which yet exist in different countries; whose
inhabitants, however divided in religion and manners, almost all agree
in oppression.
The English have at last compassionated their negroes, and under a less
bigoted government, may probably one day release their Catholic
brethren; but the interposition of foreigners alone can emancipate the
Greeks, who, otherwise, appear to have as small a chance of redemption
from the Turks, as the Jews have from mankind in general.
Of the ancient Greeks we know more than enough; at least the younger men
of Europe devote much of their time to the study of the Greek writers
and history, which would be more usefully spent in mastering their own.
Of the moderns, we are perhaps more neglectful than they deserve; and
while every man of any pretensions to learning is tiring out his youth,
and often his age, in the study of the language and of the harangues of
the Athenian demagogues in favour of freedom, the real or supposed
descendants of these sturdy republicans are left to the actual tyranny
of their masters, although a very slight effort is required to strike
off their chains.
To talk, as the Greeks themselves do, of their rising again to their
pristine superiority, would be ridiculous: as the rest of the world must
resume its barbarism, after reasserting the sovereignty of Greece: but
there seems to be no very great obstacle, except in the apathy of the
Franks, to their becoming an useful dependency, or even a free state,
with a proper guarantee;--under correction, however, be it spoken, for
many and well-informed men doubt the practicability even of this.
The Greeks have never lost their hope, though they are now more divided
in opinion on the subject of their probable deliverers. Religion
recommends the Russians; but they have twice been deceived and abandoned
by that power, and the dreadful lesson they received after the Muscovite
desertion in the Morea has never been forgotten. The French they
dislike; although the subjugation of the rest of Europe will, probably,
be attended by the deliverance of continental Greece. The islanders look
to the English for succour, as they have very lately possessed
themselves of the Ionian republic, Corfu excepted.[237] But whoever
appear with arms in their hands will be welcome; and when that day
arrives, Heaven have mercy on the Ottomans; they cannot expect it from
the Giaours.
But instead of considering what they have been, and speculating on what
they may be, let us look at them as they are.
And here it is impossible to reconcile the contrariety of opinions:
some, particularly the merchants, decrying the Greeks in the strongest
language; others, generally travellers, turning periods in their eulogy,
and publishing very curious speculations grafted on their former state,
which can have no more effect on their present lot, than the existence
of the Incas on the future fortunes of Peru.
One very ingenious person terms them the "natural allies of Englishmen;"
another no less ingenious, will not allow them to be the allies of
anybody, and denies their very descent from the ancients; a third, more
ingenious than either, builds a Greek empire on a Russian foundation,
and realises (on paper) all the chimeras of Catharine II. As to the
question of their descent, what can it import whether the Mainotes[238]
are the lineal Laconians or not? or the present Athenians as indigenous
as the bees of Hymettus, or as the grasshoppers, to which they once
likened themselves? What Englishman cares if he be of a Danish, Saxon,
Norman, or Trojan blood? or who, except a Welshman, is afflicted with a
desire of being descended from Caractacus?
The poor Greeks do not so much abound in the good things of this world,
as to render even their claims to antiquity an object of envy; it is
very cruel, then, in Mr. Thornton to disturb them in the possession of
all that time has left them; viz. their pedigree, of which they are the
more tenacious, as it is all they can call their own. It would be worth
while to publish together, and compare, the works of Messrs. Thornton
and De Pauw, Eton and Sonnini; paradox on one side, and prejudice on the
other. Mr. Thornton conceives himself to have claims to public
confidence from a fourteen years' residence at Pera; perhaps he may on
the subject of the Turks, but this can give him no more insight into the
real state of Greece and her inhabitants, than as many years spent in
Wapping into that of the Western Highlands.
The Greeks of Constantinople live in Fanal;[239] and if Mr. Thornton did
not oftener cross the Golden Horn than his brother merchants are
accustomed to do, I should place no great reliance on his information. I
actually heard one of these gentlemen boast of their little general
intercourse with the city, and assert of himself, with an air of
triumph, that he had been but four times at Constantinople in as many
years.
As to Mr. Thornton's voyages in the Black Sea with Greek vessels, they
gave him the same idea of Greece as a cruise to Berwick in a Scotch
smack would of Johnny Groat's house. Upon what grounds then does he
arrogate the right of condemning by wholesale a body of men of whom he
can know little? It is rather a curious circumstance that Mr. Thornton,
who so lavishly dispraises Pouqueville on every occasion of mentioning
the Turks, has yet recourse to him as authority on the Greeks, and terms
him an impartial observer. Now, Dr. Pouqueville is as little entitled to
that appellation as Mr. Thornton to confer it on him.
The fact is, we are deplorably in want of information on the subject of
the Greeks, and in particular their literature; nor is there any
probability of our being better acquainted, till our intercourse becomes
more intimate, or their independence confirmed. The relations of
passing travellers are as little to be depended on as the invectives of
angry factors; but till something more can be attained, we must be
content with the little to be acquired from similar sources.[240]
However defective these may be, they are preferable to the parodoxes of
men who have read superficially of the ancients, and seen nothing of the
moderns, such as De Pauw; who, when he asserts that the British breed of
horses is ruined by Newmarket, and that the Spartans[241] were cowards
in the field,[242] betrays an equal knowledge of English horses and
Spartan men. His "philosophical observations" have a much better claim
to the title of "poetical." It could not be expected that he who so
liberally condemns some of the most celebrated institutions of the
ancient, should have mercy on the modern Greeks; and it fortunately
happens, that the absurdity of his hypothesis on their forefathers
refutes his sentence on themselves.
Let us trust, then, that, in spite of the prophecies of De Pauw, and the
doubts of Mr. Thornton, there is a reasonable hope of the redemption of
a race of men, who, whatever may be the errors of their religion and
policy, have been amply punished by three centuries and a half of
captivity.
III.[243]
Athens, Franciscan Convent, _March_ 17, 1811.
"I must have some talk with this learned Theban."[244]
Some time after my return from Constantinople to this city I received
the thirty-first number of the _Edinburgh Review_[245] as a great
favour, and certainly at this distance an acceptable one, from the
captain of an English frigate off Salamis. In that number, Art. 3,
containing the review of a French translation of Strabo,[246] there are
introduced some remarks on the modern Greeks and their literature, with
a short account of Coray, a co-translator in the French version. On
those remarks I mean to ground a few observations; and the spot where I
now write will, I hope, be sufficient excuse for introducing them in a
work in some degree connected with the subject. Coray, the most
celebrated of living Greeks, at least among the Franks, was born at Scio
(in the _Review_, Smyrna is stated, I have reason to think,
incorrectly), and besides the translation of Beccaria and other works
mentioned by the Reviewer, has published a lexicon in Romaic and French,
if I may trust the assurance of some Danish travellers lately arrived
from Paris; but the latest we have seen here in French and Greek is that
of Gregory Zolikogloou.[247] Coray has recently been involved in an
unpleasant controversy with M. Gail,[248] a Parisian commentator and
editor of some translations from the Greek poets, in consequence of the
Institute having awarded him the prize for his version of Hippocrates'
"[Greek: Peri\ y(da/ton]," etc., to the disparagement, and consequently
displeasure, of the said Gail. To his exertions, literary and patriotic,
great praise is undoubtedly due; but a part of that praise ought not to
be withheld from the two brothers Zosimado (merchants settled in
Leghorn), who sent him to Paris and maintained him, for the express
purpose of elucidating the ancient, and adding to the modern,
researches of his countrymen. Coray, however, is not considered by his
countrymen equal to some who lived in the two last centuries; more
particularly Dorotheus of Mitylene,[249] whose Hellenic writings are so
much esteemed by the Greeks, that Meletius[250] terms him "[Greek: Meta\
to Thoukydi/den kai\ Xenopho/nta a)/ristos E(lle/non]" (p. 224,
_Ecclesiastical History_, iv.).
Panagiotes Kodrikas, the translator of Fontenelle, and Kamarases,[251]
who translated Ocellus Lucanus on the Universe into French,
Christodoulus,[252] and more particularly Psalida,[253] whom I have
conversed with in Joannina, are also in high repute among their
literati. The last-mentioned has published in Romaic and Latin a work on
_True Happiness_, dedicated to Catherine II. But Polyzois,[254] who is
stated by the Reviewer to be the only modern except Coray who has
distinguished himself by a knowledge of Hellenic, if he be the Polyzois
Lampanitziotes of Yanina, who has published a number of editions in
Romaic, was neither more nor less than an itinerant vender of books;
with the contents of which he had no concern beyond his name on the
title page, placed there to secure his property in the publication; and
he was, moreover, a man utterly destitute of scholastic acquirements. As
the name, however, is not uncommon, some other Polyzois may have edited
the Epistles of Aristaenetus.
It is to be regretted that the system of continental blockade has closed
the few channels through which the Greeks received their publications,
particularly Venice and Trieste. Even the common grammars for children
are become too dear for the lower orders. Amongst their original works
the Geography of Meletius, Archbishop of Athens, and a multitude of
theological quartos and poetical pamphlets, are to be met with; their
grammars and lexicons of two, three, and four languages are numerous and
excellent. Their poetry is in rhyme. The most singular piece I have
lately seen is a satire in dialogue between a Russian, English, and
French traveller, and the Waywode of Wallachia (or Blackbey, as they
term him), an archbishop, a merchant,[255] and Cogia Bachi (or primate),
in succession; to all of whom under the Turks the writer attributes
their present degeneracy. Their songs are sometimes pretty and pathetic,
but their tunes generally unpleasing to the ear of a Frank; the best is
the famous "[Greek: Deu/te, pai~des to~n E(lle/non]," by the unfortunate
Riga.[256] But from a catalogue of more than sixty authors, now before
me, only fifteen can be found who have touched on any theme except
theology.
I am intrusted with a commission by a Greek of Athens named Marmarotouri
to make arrangements, if possible, for printing in London a translation
of Barthelemi's _Anacharsis_ in Romaic, as he has no other opportunity,
unless he dispatches the MS. to Vienna by the Black Sea and Danube.
The Reviewer mentions a school established at Hecatonesi,[257] and
suppressed at the instigation of Sebastiani:[258] he means Cidonies, or,
in Turkish, Haivali; a town on the continent, where that institution for
a hundred students and three professors still exists. It is true that
this establishment was disturbed by the Porte, under the ridiculous
pretext that the Greeks were constructing a fortress instead of a
college; but on investigation, and the payment of some purses to the
Divan, it has been permitted to continue. The principal professor, named
Ueniamin (i.e. Benjamin), is stated to be a man of talent, but a
freethinker. He was born in Lesbos, studied in Italy, and is master of
Hellenic, Latin, and some Frank languages: besides a smattering of the
sciences.
Though it is not my intention to enter farther on this topic than may
allude to the article in question, I cannot but observe that the
Reviewer's lamentation over the fall of the Greeks appears singular,
when he closes it with these words: "_The change is to be attributed to
their misfortunes rather than to any 'physical degradation.'_" It may be
true that the Greeks are not physically degenerated, and that
Constantinople contained on the day when it changed masters as many men
of six feet and upwards as in the hour of prosperity; but ancient
history and modern politics instruct us that something more than
physical perfection is necessary to preserve a state in vigour and
independence; and the Greeks, in particular, are a melancholy example of
the near connexion between moral degradation and national decay.
The Reviewer mentions a plan "_we believe_" by Potemkin[259] for the
purification of the Romaic; and I have endeavoured in vain to procure
any tidings or traces of its existence. There was an academy in St.
Petersburg for the Greeks; but it was suppressed by Paul, and has not
been revived by his successor.
There is a slip of the pen, and it can only be a slip of the pen, in p.
58, No. 31, of the _Edinburgh Review_, where these words occur: "We are
told that when the capital of the East yielded to _Solyman_"--It may be
presumed that this last word will, in a future edition, be altered to
Mahomet II.[260] The "ladies of Constantinople," it seems, at that
period spoke a dialect, "which would not have disgraced the lips of an
Athenian." I do not know how that might be, but am sorry to say that the
ladies in general, and the Athenians in particular, are much altered;
being far from choice either in their dialect or expressions, as the
whole Attic race are barbarous to a proverb:--
"[Greek: O) A)the~nai, pro/te cho/ra],
[Greek: Ti/ gaida/rous tre/pheis to/ra];"[261]
In Gibbon, vol. x. p. 161, is the following sentence:--"The vulgar
dialect of the city was gross and barbarous, though the compositions of
the church and palace sometimes affected to copy the purity of the Attic
models." Whatever may be asserted on the subject, it is difficult to
conceive that the "ladies of Constantinople," in the reign of the last
Caesar, spoke a purer dialect than Anna Comnena[262] wrote, three
centuries before: and those royal pages are not esteemed the best models
of composition, although the princess [Greek: glo~ttan ei~)chen A)KRIBOE
A)ttikisou/san].[263] In the Fanal, and in Yanina, the best Greek is
spoken: in the latter there is a flourishing school under the direction
of Psalida.
There is now in Athens a pupil of Psalida's, who is making a tour of
observation through Greece: he is intelligent, and better educated than
a fellow-commoner of most colleges. I mention this as a proof that the
spirit of inquiry is not dormant among the Greeks.
The Reviewer mentions Mr. Wright,[264] the author of the beautiful poem
_Horae Ionicae_, as qualified to give details of these nominal Romans and
degenerate Greeks; and also of their language: but Mr. Wright, though a
good poet and an able man, has made a mistake where he states the
Albanian dialect of the Romaic to approximate nearest to the Hellenic;
for the Albanians speak a Romaic as notoriously corrupt as the Scotch of
Aberdeenshire, or the Italian of Naples. Yanina, (where, next to the
Fanal, the Greek is purest,) although the capital of Ali Pacha's
dominions, is not in Albania, but Epirus; and beyond Delvinachi in
Albania Proper up to Argyrocastro and Tepaleen (beyond which I did not
advance) they speak worse Greek than even the Athenians. I was attended
for a year and a half by two of these singular mountaineers, whose
mother tongue is Illyric, and I never heard them or their countrymen
(whom I have seen, not only at home, but to the amount of twenty
thousand in the army of Vely Pacha[265]) praised for their Greek, but
often laughed at for their provincial barbarisms.
I have in my possession about twenty-five letters, amongst which some
from the Bey of Corinth, written to me by Notaras, the Cogia Bachi, and
others by the dragoman of the Caimacam[266] of the Morea (which last
governs in Vely Pacha's absence), are said to be favourable specimens of
their epistolary style. I also received some at Constantinople from
private persons, written in a most hyperbolical style, but in the true
antique character.
The Reviewer proceeds, after some remarks on the tongue in its past and
present state, to a paradox (page 59) on the great mischief the
knowledge of his own language has done to Coray, who, it seems, is less
likely to understand the ancient Greek, because he is perfect master of
the modern! This observation follows a paragraph, recommending, in
explicit terms, the study of the Romaic, as "a powerful auxiliary," not
only to the traveller and foreign merchant, but also to the classical
scholar; in short, to every body except the only person who can be
thoroughly acquainted with its uses; and by a parity of reasoning, our
own language is conjectured to be probably more attainable by
"foreigners" than by ourselves! Now, I am inclined to think, that a
Dutch Tyro in our tongue (albeit himself of Saxon blood) would be sadly
perplexed with "Sir Tristram,"[267] or any other given "Auchinleck MS."
with or without a grammar or glossary; and to most apprehensions it
seems evident that none but a native can acquire a competent, far less
complete, knowledge of our obsolete idioms. We may give the critic
credit for his ingenuity, but no more believe him than we do Smollett's
Lismahago,[268] who maintains that the purest English is spoken in
Edinburgh. That Coray may err is very possible; but if he does, the
fault is in the man rather than in his mother tongue, which is, as it
ought to be, of the greatest aid to the native student.--Here the
Reviewer proceeds to business on Strabo's translators, and here I close
my remarks.
Sir W. Drummond, Mr. Hamilton, Lord Aberdeen, Dr. Clarke, Captain Leake,
Mr. Gell, Mr. Walpole,[269] and many others now in England, have all the
requisites to furnish details of this fallen people. The few
observations I have offered I should have left where I made them, had
not the article in question, and above all the spot where I read it,
induced me to advert to those pages, which the advantage of my present
situation enabled me to clear, or at least to make the attempt.
I have endeavoured to waive the personal feelings which rise in despite
of me in touching upon any part of the _Edinburgh Review_; not from a
wish to conciliate the favour of its writers, or to cancel the
remembrance of a syllable I have formerly published, but simply from a
sense of the impropriety of mixing up private resentments with a
disquisition of the present kind, and more particularly at this distance
of time and place.
ADDITIONAL NOTE ON THE TURKS.
The difficulties of travelling in Turkey have been much exaggerated, or
rather have considerably diminished, of late years. The Mussulmans have
been beaten into a kind of sullen civility very comfortable to voyagers.
It is hazardous to say much on the subject of Turks and Turkey; since it
is possible to live amongst them twenty years without acquiring
information, at least from themselves. As far as my own slight
experience carried me, I have no complaint to make; but am indebted for
many civilities (I might almost say for friendship), and much
hospitality, to Ali Pacha, his son Vely Pacha of the Morea, and several
others of high rank in the provinces. Suleyman Aga, late Governor of
Athens, and now of Thebes, was a _bon vivant_, and as social a being as
ever sat cross-legged at a tray or a table. During the carnival, when
our English party were masquerading, both himself and his successor were
more happy to "receive masks" than any dowager in Grosvenor-square.[270]
On one occasion of his supping at the convent, his friend and visitor,
the Cadi[271] of Thebes, was carried from table perfectly qualified for
any club in Christendom; while the worthy Waywode himself triumphed in
his fall.
In all money transactions with the Moslems, I ever found the strictest
honour, the highest disinterestedness. In transacting business with
them, there are none of those dirty peculations, under the name of
interest, difference of exchange, commission, etc., etc., uniformly
found in applying to a Greek consul to cash bills, even on the first
houses in Pera.
With regard to presents, an established custom in the East, you will
rarely find yourself a loser; as one worth acceptance is generally
returned by another of similar value--a horse, or a shawl.
In the capital and at court the citizens and courtiers are formed in the
same school with those of Christianity; but there does not exist a more
honourable, friendly, and high-spirited character than the true Turkish
provincial Aga, or Moslem country gentleman. It is not meant here to
designate the governors of towns, but those Agas who, by a kind of
feudal tenure, possess lands and houses, of more or less extent, in
Greece and Asia Minor.
The lower orders are in as tolerable discipline as the rabble in
countries with greater pretensions to civilisation. A Moslem, in walking
the streets of our country-towns, would be more incommoded in England
than a Frank in a similar situation in Turkey. Regimentals are the best
travelling dress.
The best accounts of the religion and different sects of Islamism may be
found in D'Ohsson's[272] French; of their manners, etc., perhaps in
Thornton's English. The Ottomans, with all their defects, are not a
people to be despised. Equal at least to the Spaniards, they are
superior to the Portuguese. If it be difficult to pronounce what they
are, we can at least say what they are _not_: they are _not_
treacherous, they are _not_ cowardly, they do _not_ burn heretics, they
are _not_ assassins, nor has an enemy advanced to _their_ capital. They
are faithful to their sultan till he becomes unfit to govern, and devout
to their God without an inquisition. Were they driven from St. Sophia
to-morrow, and the French or Russians enthroned in their stead, it would
become a question whether Europe would gain by the exchange. England
would certainly be the loser.
With regard to that ignorance of which they are so generally, and
sometimes justly accused, it may be doubted, always excepting France and
England, in what useful points of knowledge they are excelled by other
nations. Is it in the common arts of life? In their manufactures? Is a
Turkish sabre inferior to a Toledo? or is a Turk worse clothed or
lodged, or fed and taught, than a Spaniard? Are their Pachas worse
educated than a Grandee? or an Effendi[273] than a Knight of St. Jago? I
think not.
I remember Mahmout, the grandson of Ali Pacha, asking whether my
fellow-traveller and myself were in the upper or lower House of
Parliament. Now, this question from a boy of ten years old proved that
his education had not been neglected. It may be doubted if an English
boy at that age knows the difference of the Divan from a College of
Dervises; but I am very sure a Spaniard does not. How little Mahmout,
surrounded as he had been entirely by his Turkish tutors, had learned
that there was such a thing as a Parliament, it were useless to
conjecture, unless we suppose that his instructors did not confine his
studies to the Koran.
In all the mosques there are schools established, which are very
regularly attended; and the poor are taught without the church of Turkey
being put into peril. I believe the system is not yet printed (though
there is such a thing as a Turkish press, and books printed on the late
military institution of the Nizam Gedidd);[274] nor have I heard whether
the Mufti and the Mollas have subscribed, or the Caimacan and the
Tefterdar taken the alarm, for fear the ingenuous youth of the turban
should be taught not to "pray to God their way." The Greeks also--a kind
of Eastern Irish papists--have a college of their own at Maynooth,--no,
at Haivali; where the heterodox receive much the same kind of
countenance from the Ottoman as the Catholic college from the English
legislature. Who shall then affirm that the Turks are ignorant bigots,
when they thus evince the exact proportion of Christian charity which is
tolerated in the most prosperous and orthodox of all possible kingdoms?
But though they allow all this, they will not suffer the Greeks to
participate in their privileges: no, let them fight their battles, and
pay their haratch (taxes), be drubbed in this world, and damned in the
next. And shall we then emancipate our Irish Helots? Mahomet forbid! We
should then be bad Mussulmans, and worse Christians: at present we unite
the best of both--jesuitical faith, and something not much inferior to
Turkish toleration.
APPENDIX.
Amongst an enslaved people, obliged to have recourse to foreign presses
even for their books of religion, it is less to be wondered at that we
find so few publications on general subjects than that we find any at
all. The whole number of the Greeks, scattered up and down the Turkish
empire and elsewhere, may amount, at most, to three millions; and yet,
for so scanty a number, it is impossible to discover any nation with so
great a proportion of books and their authors as the Greeks of the
present century. "Aye," but say the generous advocates of oppression,
who, while they assert the ignorance of the Greeks, wish to prevent
them from dispelling it, "ay, but these are mostly, if not all,
ecclesiastical tracts, and consequently good for nothing." Well! and
pray what else can they write about? It is pleasant enough to hear a
Frank, particularly an Englishman, who may abuse the government of his
own country; or a Frenchman, who may abuse every government except his
own, and who may range at will over every philosophical, religious,
scientific, sceptical, or moral subject, sneering at the Greek legends.
A Greek must not write on politics, and cannot touch on science for want
of instruction; if he doubts he is excommunicated and damned; therefore
his countrymen are not poisoned with modern philosophy; and as to
morals, thanks to the Turks! there are no such things. What then is left
him, if he has a turn for scribbling? Religion and holy biography; and
it is natural enough that those who have so little in this life should
look to the next. It is no great wonder then, that in a catalogue now
before me of fifty-five Greek writers, many of whom were lately living,
not above fifteen should have touched on anything but religion. The
catalogue alluded to is contained in the twenty-sixth chapter of the
fourth volume of Meletius' _Ecclesiastical History_.
[The above forms a preface to an Appendix, headed "Remarks on the Romaic
or Modern Greek Language, with Specimens and Translations," which was
printed at the end of the volume, after the "Poems," in the first and
successive editions of _Childe Harold_. It contains (1) a "List of
Romaic Authors;" (2) the "Greek War-Song," [Greek: Deu~te, Pai~des to~n
E(lle/non]; (3) "Romaic Extracts," of which the first, "a Satire in
dialogue" (_vide_ Note III. _supra_), is translated (see _Epigrams,
etc._, vol. vi. of the present issue); (4) scene from [Greek: O
Kaphene\s] (the Cafe), translated from the Italian of Goldoni by
Spiridion Vlanti, with a "Translation;" (5) "Familiar Dialogues" in
Romaic and English; (6) "Parallel Passages from St. John's Gospel;" (7)
"The Inscriptions at Orchomenos from Meletius" (see _Travels in Albania,
etc._, i. 224); (8) the "Prospectus of a Translation of Anacharsis into
Romaic, by my Romaic master, Marmarotouri, who wished to publish it in
England;" (9) "The Lord's Prayer in Romaic" and in Greek.
The Excursus, which is remarkable rather for the evidence which it
affords of Byron's industry and zeal for acquiring knowledge, than for
the value or interest of the subject-matter, has been omitted from the
present issue. The "Remarks," etc., are included in the "Appendix" to
_Lord Byron's Poetical Works_, 1891, pp. 792-797. (See, too, letter to
Dallas, September 21, 1811: _Letters_, ii. 43.)]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES:
[202] {166} ["Owls and serpents" are taken from _Isa._ xiii. 21, 22;
"foxes" from _Lam._ v. 18, "Zion is desolate, the foxes walk upon it."]
[203] [For Herr Gropius, _vide post_, note 6.]
[204] [The Parthenon was converted into a church in the sixth century by
Justinian, and dedicated to the _Divine Wisdom_. About 1460 the church
was turned into a mosque. After the siege in 1687 the Turks erected a
smaller mosque within the original enclosure. "The only relic of the
mosque dedicated by Mohammed the Conqueror (1430-1481) is the base of
the minaret ... at the south-west corner of the Cella" (_Handbook for
Greece_, p. 319).]
[205] {168} ["Don Battista Lusieri, better known as Don Tita," was born
at Naples. He followed Sir William Hamilton "to Constantinople, in 1799,
whence he removed to Athens." "It may be said of Lusieri, as of Claude
Lorraine, 'If he be not the _poet_, he is the historian of
nature.'"--_Travels, etc_., by E. D. Clarke, 1810-1823, Part II. sect.
ii. p. 469, note. See, too, _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 455.]
[206] ["Mirandum in modum (canes venaticos diceres) ita odorabantur
omnia et pervestigabant, ut, ubi quidque esset, aliqua ratione
invenirent" (Cicero, _In Verrem_, Act. II. lib. iv. 13). Verres had two
_finders_: Tlepolemus a worker in wax, and Hiero a painter. (See
_Introduction to The Curse of Minerva: Poems_, 1898, i. 455.)]
[207] [M. Fauvel was born in Burgundy, circ. 1754. In 1787 he was
attached to the suite of the Count Choiseul-Gouffier, French Ambassador
at Constantinople, and is said to have prepared designs and
illustrations for his patron's _Voyage Pittoresque de la Grece_, vol. i.
1787, vol. ii. 1809. He settled at Athens, and was made vice-consul by
the French Government. In his old age, after more than forty years'
service at Athens, he removed finally to Smyrna, where he was appointed
consul-general.--_Biographic des Contemporains_ (Rabbe), 1834, art.
"(N.) Fauvel."]
[208] {169} In all Attica, if we except Athens itself and Marathon,
there is no scene more interesting than Cape Colonna.[Sec.1] To the
antiquary and artist, sixteen columns are an inexhaustible source of
observation and design; to the philosopher, the supposed scene of some
of Plato's conversations will not be unwelcome; and the traveller will
be struck with the beauty of the prospect over "Isles that crown the
AEgean deep:" but, for an Englishman, Colonna has yet an additional
interest, as the actual spot of Falconer's[Sec.2] shipwreck. Pallas and
Plato are forgotten in the recollection of Falconer and Campbell:--
"Here in the dead of night, by Lonna's steep,[Sec.3]
The seaman's cry was heard along the deep."
This temple of Minerva may be seen at sea from a great distance. In two
journeys which I made, and one voyage to Cape Colonna, the view from
either side, by land, was less striking than the approach from the
isles. In our second land excursion, we had a narrow escape from a party
of Mainotes, concealed in the caverns beneath. We were told afterwards,
by one of their prisoners, subsequently ransomed, that they were
deterred from attacking us by the appearance of my two Albanians:
conjecturing very sagaciously, but falsely, that we had a complete guard
of these Arnaouts at hand, they remained stationary, and thus saved our
party, which was too small to have opposed any effectual resistance.
Colonna is no less a resort of painters than of pirates; there
"The hireling artist plants his paltry desk,
And makes degraded nature picturesque."
See Hodgson's _Lady Jane Grey_, etc.[Sec.4][1809, p. 214].
But there Nature, with the aid of Art, has done that for herself. I was
fortunate enough to engage a very superior German artist; and hope to
renew my acquaintance with this and many other Levantine scenes, by the
arrival of his performances.
[Sec.1] [This must have taken place in 1811, after Hobhouse returned to
England.--_Travels in Albania_, i. 373, note.]
[Sec.2] [William Falconer (1732-1769), second mate of a vessel in the
Levant trade, was wrecked between Alexandria and Venice. Only three of
the crew survived. His poem, _The Shipwreck_, was published in 1762. It
was dedicated to the Duke of York, and through his intervention he was
"rated as a midshipman in the Royal Navy." Either as author or naval
officer, he came to be on intimate terms with John Murray the first, who
thought highly of his abilities, and offered him (October 16, 1768) a
partnership in his new bookselling business in Fleet Street. In
September, 1769, he embarked for India as purser of the _Aurora_
frigate, which touched at the Cape, but never reached her destination.
See _Memoir_, by J. S. Clarke; _The Shipwreck_, 1804, pp. viii.-xlvi.]
[Sec.3] _Yes, at the dead of night_, etc.--_Pleasures of Hope_,
lines 149, 150.
[Sec.4] [The quotation is from Hodgson's "Lines on a Ruined Abbey in a
Romantic Country," _vide ante_, Canto I., p. 20, note.]
[209] {171} ["It was, however, during our stay in the place, to be
lamented that a war, more than civil, was raging on the subject of Lord
Elgin's pursuits in Greece, and had enlisted all the French settlers and
the principal Greeks on one side or the other of the controversy. The
factions of Athens were renewed."--_Travels in Albania, etc._, i. 243.]
[210] This word, in the cant language, signifies thieving.--Fielding's
_History of Jonathan Wild_, i. 3, note.
[211] This Sr. Gropius was employed by a noble Lord for the sole purpose
of sketching, in which he excels: but I am sorry to say, that he has,
through the abused sanction of that most respectable name, been treading
at humble distance in the steps of Sr. Lusieri.--A shipful of his
trophies was detained, and I believe confiscated, at Constantinople in
1810. I am most happy to be now enabled to state, that "this was not in
his bond;" that he was employed solely as a painter, and that his noble
patron disavows all connection with him, except as an artist. If the
error in the first and second edition of this poem has given the noble
Lord a moment's pain, I am very sorry for it: Sr. Gropius has assumed
for years the name of his agent; and though I cannot much condemn myself
for sharing in the mistake of so many, I am happy in being one of the
first to be undeceived. Indeed, I have as much pleasure in contradicting
this as I felt regret in stating it.--[_Note to Third Edition._]
[According to Bryant's _Dict. of Painters_, and other biographical
dictionaries, Karl Wilhelm Gropius (whom Lamartine, in his _Voyage en
Orient_, identifies with the Gropius "injustement accuse par lord Byron
dans ses notes mordantes sur Athenes") was born at Brunswick, in 1793,
travelled in Italy and Greece, making numerous landscape and
architectural sketches, and finally settled at Berlin in 1827, where he
opened a diorama, modelled on that of Daguerre, "in connection with a
permanent exhibition of painting.... He was considered the first wit in
Berlin, where he died in 1870." In 1812, when Byron wrote his note to
the third edition of _Childe Harold_, Gropius must have been barely of
age, and the statement "that he has for years assumed the name of his (a
noble Lord's) agent" is somewhat perplexing.]
[212] {173} [George Castriota (1404-1467) (Scanderbeg, or Scander Bey),
the youngest son of an Albanian chieftain, was sent with his four
brothers as hostage to the Sultan Amurath II. After his father's death
in 1432 he carried on a protracted warfare with the Turks, and finally
established the independence of Albania. "His personal strength and
address were such as to make his prowess in the field resemble that of a
knight of romance." He died at Lissa, in the Gulf of Venice, and when
the island was taken by Mohammed II., the Turks are said to have dug up
his bones and hung them round their necks, either as charms against
wounds or "amulets to transfer his courage to themselves." (Hofmann's
_Lexicon Universale_; Gorton's _Biog. Dict._, art. "Scanderbeg.")]
[213] {174} [William Martin Leake (1777-1860), traveller and
numismatist, published (_inter alia_) _Researches in Greece_, in 1814.
He was "officially resident" in Albania, February, 1809-March, 1810.]
[214] [_A Journey through Albania during the Years 1809-10_, London,
1812.]
[215] {175} [The inhabitants of Albania, of the Shkipetar race, consist
of two distinct branches: the Gueghs, who belong to the north, and are
for the most part Catholics; and the Tosks of the south, who are
generally Mussulmans (Finlay's _History of Greece_, i. 35).]
[gg] _I laughed so much as to induce a violent perspiration to which ...
I attribute my present individuality_.--[D.]
[216] {176} [The mayor of the village; in Greek, [Greek: proestos].]
[217] [The father of the Consulina Teodora Macri, and grandfather of the
"Maid of Athens."]
[218] [_Tristram Shandy_, 1775, iv. 44.]
[219] [See _Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron_, 1824, p.64.]
[220] {177} [Compare _The Waltz_, line 125--"O say, shall dull
_Romaika's_ heavy sound." _Poems_, 1898, i. 492.]
[221] {186} [Francois Mercy de Lorraine, who fought against the
Protestants in the Thirty Years' War, was mortally wounded at the battle
of Nordlingen, August 3, 1645.]
[222] {187} [Byron and Hobhouse visited Marathon, January 25, 1810. The
unconsidered trifle of the "plain" must have been offered to Byron
during his second residence at Athens, in 1811.]
[223] ["Expende Annibalem--quot libras," etc. (Juvenal, x. 147), is the
motto of the _Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte_, which was written April 10,
1814.--_Journal_, 1814; _Life_, p. 325.]
[224] [Compare letter to Hodgson, September 25, 1811: _Letters_, 1898,
ii. 45.]
[225] [Miss Owenson (Sydney, Lady Morgan), 1783-1859, published her
_Woman, or Ida of Athens_, in 4 vols., in 1812. Writing to Murray,
February 20, 1818, Byron alludes to the "cruel work" which an article
(attributed to Croker but, probably, written by Hookham Frere) had made
with her _France_ in the _Quarterly Review_ (vol. xvii. p. 260); and in
a note to _The Two Foscari_, act iii. sc. 1, he points out that his
description of Venice as an "Ocean-Rome" had been anticipated by Lady
Morgan in her "fearless and excellent work upon Italy." The play was
completed July 9, 1821, but the work containing the phrase, "Rome of the
Ocean," had not been received till August 16 (see, too, his letter to
Murray, August 23, 1821). His conviction of the excellence of Lady
Morgan's work was, perhaps strengthened by her outspoken eulogium.]
[226] {188} [For the Disdar's extortions, see _Travels in Albania_, i.
244.]
[227]
["The poor ...when once abroad,
Grow sick, and damn the climate like a lord."
Pope, _Imit. of Horace_, Ep. 1, lines 159, 160.]
[228] [_Works and Days_, v. 493, _et seq.; Hesiod. Carm._, C.
Goettlingius (1843), p. 215.]
[229] Nonsense; humbug.
[230] {189} [Hobhouse pronounced it to be the Fountain of Ares, the
Paraporti Spring, "which serves to swell the scanty waters of the
Dirce." The Dirce flows on the west; the Ismenus, which forms the
fountain, to the east of Thebes. "The water was tepid, as I found by
bathing in it" (_Travels in Albania_, i. 233; _Handbook for Greece_, p.
703).]
[231] [_Travels in Greece_, ch. lxvii.]
[232] [Gell's _Itinerary of Greece_ (1810), Preface, p. xi.]
[233] {190} [For M. Roque, see _Itineraire de Paris a Jerusalem: Oeuvres
Chateaubriand_, Paris, 1837, ii. 258-266.]
[234] {191} [William Eton published (1798-1809) _A Survey of the Turkish
Empire_, in which he advocated the cause of Greek independence. Sonnini
de Manoncourt (1751-1812), another ardent phil-Hellenist, published his
_Voyage en Grece et en Turquie_ in 1801.]
[235] [Cornelius de Pauw (1739-1799), Dutch historian, published, in
1787, _Recherches philosophiques sur les Grecs_. Byron reflects upon his
paradoxes and superficiality in Note II., _infra_. Thomas Thornton
published, in 1807, a work entitled _Present State of Turkey_ (see Note
II., _infra_).]
[236] {192} [The MSS. of _Hints from Horace_ and _The Curse of Minerva_
are dated, "Athens, Capuchin Convent, March 12 and March 17, 1811."
Proof B of _Hints from Horace_ is dated, "Athens, Franciscan Convent,
March 12, 1811." Writing to Hodgson, November 14, 1810, he says, "I am
living alone in the Franciscan monastery with one 'fri_ar_' (a Capuchin
of course) and one 'fri_er_' (a bandy-legged Turkish cook)" (_Letters_,
1898, i. 307).]
[237] {193} [The Ionian Islands, with the exception of Corfu and Paxos,
fell into the hands of the English in 1809, 1810. Paxos was captured in
1814, but Corfu, which had been blockaded by Napoleon, was not
surrendered till the restoration of the Bourbons in 1815.]
[238] [The Mainotes or Mainates, who take their name from Maina, near
Cape Taenaron, were the Highlanders of the Morea, "remarkable for their
love of violence and plunder, but also for their frankness and
independence." "Pedants have termed the Mainates descendants of the
ancient Spartans," but "they must be either descended from the Helots,
or from the Perioikoi.... To an older genealogy they can have no
pretension."--Finlay's History of Greece, 1877, v. 113; vi. 26.]
[239] {194} [The Fanal, or Phanar, is to the left, Pera to the right, of
the Golden Horn. "The water of the Golden Horn, which flows between the
city and the suburbs, is a line of separation seldom transgressed by the
Frank residents."--_Travels in Albania_, ii. 208.]
[240] {195} A word, _en passant_, with Mr. Thornton and Dr. Pouqueville,
who have been guilty between them of sadly clipping the Sultan's
Turkish.[Sec.1]
Dr. Pouqueville tells a long story of a Moslem who swallowed corrosive
sublimate in such quantities that he acquired the name of "_Suleyman
Yeyen_" i.e. quoth the Doctor, "_Suleyman the eater of corrosive
sublimate_." "Aha," thinks Mr. Thornton (angry with the Doctor for the
fiftieth time), "have I caught you?"[Sec.2]--Then, in a note, twice the
thickness of the Doctor's anecdote, he questions the Doctor's
proficiency in the Turkish tongue, and his veracity in his own.--"For,"
observes Mr. Thornton (after inflicting on us the tough participle of a
Turkish verb), "it means nothing more than '_Suleyman the eater_,' and
quite cashiers the supplementary '_sublimate_.'" Now both are right, and
both are wrong. If Mr. Thornton, when he next resides "fourteen years in
the factory," will consult his Turkish dictionary, or ask any of his
Stamboline acquaintance, he will discover that "_Suleyma'n yeyen_," put
together discreetly, mean the "_Swallower of sublimate_" without any
"Suleyman" in the case: "_Suleyma_" signifying "_corrosive sublimate_"
and not being a proper name on this occasion, although it be an orthodox
name enough with the addition of _n_. After Mr. Thornton's frequent
hints of profound Orientalism, he might have found this out before he
sang such paeans over Dr. Pouqueville.
After this, I think "Travellers _versus_ Factors" shall be our motto,
though the above Mr. Thornton has condemned "hoc genus omne," for
mistake and misrepresentation. "Ne Sutor ultra crepidam," "No merchant
beyond his bales." N.B. For the benefit of Mr. Thornton, "Sutor" is not
a proper name.
[Sec.1][For Pouqueville's story of the "theriakis" or opium-eaters, see
_Voyage en Moree_, 1805, ii. 126.]
[Sec.2][Thornton's _Present State of Turkey_, ii. 173.]
[241] _Recherches Philosophiques sur les Grecs_, 1787, i. 155.
[242] {196} [De Pauw (_Rech. Phil. sur les Grecs_, 1788, ii. 293), in
repeating Plato's statement (_Laches_, 191), that the Lacedaemonians at
Plataea first fled from the Persians, and then, when the Persians were
broken, turned upon them and won the battle, misapplies to them the term
[Greek: thrasy/deiloi] (Arist., _Eth. Nic._, iii. 9.7)--men, that is,
who affect the hero, but play the poltroon.]
[243] [Attached as a note to line 562 _of Hints from Horace_ (MS. M.).]
[244] ["I'll talk a word with this same learned Theban." Shakespeare,
_King Lear_, act iii. sc. 4, line 150.]
[245] [For April, 1810: vol. xvi. pp. 55, _sq_.]
[246] [Diamant or Adamantius Coray (1748-1833), scholar and
phil-Hellenist, declared his views on the future of the Greeks in the
preface to a translation of Beccaria Bonesani's treatise, _Dei Delitti e
delle Pene_ (1764), which was published in Paris in 1802. He began to
publish his _Bibliotheque Hellenique_, in 17 vols., in 1805. He was of
Chian parentage, but was born at Smyrna. [Greek: Korae Au)tobiographia],
Athens, 1891.]
[247] I have in my possession an excellent lexicon "[Greek:
tri/glosson]" which I received in exchange from S. G----, Esq., for a
small gem: my antiquarian friends have never forgotten it or forgiven
me.
[[Greek: Lexiko tri/glosson te~s Gallike~s, I)talike~s, kai\ 'Romaike~s
diale/ktou, k.t.l.], 3 vols., Vienna, 1790. By Georgie Vendoti
(Bentotes, or Bendotes) of Joanina. The book was in Hobhouse's
possession in 1854.]
[248] In Gail's pamphlet against Coray, he talks of "throwing the
insolent Hellenist out of the windows." On this a French critic
exclaims, "Ah, my God! throw an Hellenist out of the window! what
sacrilege!" It certainly would be a serious business for those authors
who dwell in the attics: but I have quoted the passage merely to prove
the similarity of style among the controversialists of all polished
countries; London or Edinburgh could hardly parallel this Parisian
ebullition.
[Jean Baptiste Gail (1755-1829), Professor of Greek in the College de
France, published, in 1810, a quarto volume entitled, _Reclamations de
J. B. Gail, ... et observations sur l'opinion en virtu de laquelle le
juri--propose de decerner un prix a M. Coray, a l'exclusion de la chasse
de Xenophon, du Thucydide, etc., grec-latin-francais, etc._]
[249] {198} Dorotheus of Mitylene (fl. sixteenth century), Archbishop of
Monembasia (Anglice "Malmsey"), on the south-east coast of Laconia, was
the author of a _Universal History_ ([Greek: Biblion I(storiko/n,
k.t.l.]), edited by A. Tzigaras, Venice, 1637, 4to.
[250] Meletius of Janina (1661-1714) was Archbishop of Athens, 1703-14.
His principal work is _Ancient and Modern Geography_, Venice, 1728, fol.
He also wrote an Ecclesiastical History, in four vols., Vienna, 1783-95.
[251] Panagios (Panagiotes) Kodrikas, Professor of Greek at Paris,
published at Vienna, in 1794, a Greek translation of Fontenelle's
_Entretiens sur la Pluralite des Mondes_. John Camarases, a
Constantinopolitan, translated into French the apocryphal treatise, _De
Universi Natura_, attributed to Ocellus Lucanus, a Pythagorean
philosopher, who is said to have flourished in Lucania in the fifth
century B.C.
[252] Christodoulos, an Acarnanian, published a work, [Greek: Peri\
Philoso/phou, Philosophi/as, Physio~n, Metaphysiko~n, k.t.l.], at
Vienna, in 1786.
[253] Athanasius Psalidas published, at Vienna, in 1791, a sceptical
work entitled, _True Felicity_ ([Greek: A)lethe\s Eu)daimoni/a]). "Very
learned, and full of quotations, but written in false taste."--_MS. M._
He was a schoolmaster at Janina, where Byron and Hobhouse made his
acquaintance--"the only person," says Hobhouse, "I ever saw who had what
might be called a library, and that a very small one" (_Travels in
Albania, etc._, i. 508).
[254] Hobhouse mentions a patriotic poet named Polyzois, "the new
Tyrtaeus," and gives, as a specimen of his work, "a war-song of the
Greeks in Egypt, fighting in the cause of Freedom."--_Travels in
Albania, etc._, i. 507; ii. 6, 7.
[255] {199} [By Blackbey is meant Bey of Vlack, i.e. Wallachia. (See a
_Translation_ of this "satire in dialogue"--"Remarks on the Romaic,"
etc., _Poetical Works_, 1891, p. 793.)]
[256] [Constantine Rhigas (born 1753), the author of the original of
Byron's "Sons of the Greeks, arise," was handed over to the Turks by the
Austrians, and shot at Belgrade in 1793, by the orders of Ali Pacha.]
[257] {200} [The Hecatonnesi are a cluster of islands in the Gulf of
Adramyttium, over against the harbour and town of Aivali or Aivalik.
Cidonies may stand for [Greek: e(po/lis kydoni\s], the quince-shaped
city. "At Haivali or Kidognis, opposite to Mytilene, there is a sort of
university for a hundred students and three professors, now
superintended by a Greek of Mytilene, who teaches not only the Hellenic,
but Latin, French, and Italian."--_Travels in Albania_, _etc._, i. 509,
510.]
[258] [Francois Horace Bastien, Conte Sebastiani (1772-1851), was
ambassador to the _Sublime Porte_, May, 1806-June, 1807.]
[259] [Gregor Alexandrovitch Potemkin (1736-1791), the favourite of the
Empress Catherine II.]
[260] {201} In a former number of the _Edinburgh Review_, 1808, it is
observed: "Lord Byron passed some of his early years in Scotland, where
he might have learned that _pibroch_ does not mean a _bagpipe_, any more
than _duet_ means a _fiddle_." Query,--Was it in Scotland that the young
gentlemen of the _Edinburgh Review_ _learned_ that _Solyman_ means
_Mahomet II._ any more than _criticism_ means _infallibility_?--but thus
it is,
"Caedimus, inque vicem praebemus crura sagittis."
Persius, _Sat._ iv. 42.
The mistake seemed so completely a lapse of the pen (from the great
_similarity_ of the two words, and the _total absence of error_ from the
former pages of the literary leviathan) that I should have passed it
over as in the text, had I not perceived in the _Edinburgh Review_ much
facetious exultation on all such detections, particularly a recent one,
where words and syllables are subjects of disquisition and
transposition; and the above-mentioned parallel passage in my own case
irresistibly propelled me to hint how much easier it is to be critical
than correct. The _gentlemen_, having enjoyed many a _triumph_ on such
victories, will hardly begrudge me a slight _ovation_ for the present.
[At the end of the review of _Childe Harold_, February, 1812 (xix.,
476), the editor inserted a ponderous retort to this harmless and
good-natured "chaff:" "To those strictures of the noble author we feel
no inclination to trouble our readers with any reply ... we shall merely
observe that if we viewed with astonishment the immeasurable fury with
which the minor poet received the innocent pleasantry and moderate
castigation of our remarks on his first publication, we now feel nothing
but pity for the strange irritability of temperament which can still
cherish a private resentment for such a cause, or wish to perpetuate
memory of personalities as outrageous as to have been injurious only to
their authors."]
[261] ["O Athens, first of all lands, why in these latter days dost thou
nourish asses?"]
[262] [Anna Comnena (1083-1148), daughter of Alexis I., wrote the
_Alexiad_, a history of her father's reign.]
[263] [Zonaras (_Annales_, B 240), lib. viii. cap. 26, A 4. Venice,
1729.]
[264] [See _English Bards, etc._, line 877: _Poems_, 1898, i. 366, _note
1._]
[265] {203} [For Vely Pacha, the son of Ali Pacha, Vizier of the Morea,
see _Letters_, 1898, i. 248, note 1.]
[266] [The Caimacam was the deputy or lieutenant of the grand Vizier.]
[267] [Scott published "_Sir Tristrem, a Metrical Romance of the
Thirteenth Century_, by Thomas of Ercildoun," in 1804.]
[268] [Captain Lismahago, a paradoxical and pedantic Scotchman, the
favoured suitor of Miss Tabitha Bramble, in Smollett's _Expedition of
Humphry Clinker_.]
[269] {204} [Sir William Drummond (1780?-1828) published, _inter alia_,
_A Review of the Government of Athens and Sparta_, in 1795; and
_Herculanensia, an Archaeological and Philological Dissertation
containing a Manuscript found at Herculaneum_, in conjunction with the
Rev. Robert Walpole (see letter to Harness, December 8, 1811. See
_Letters_, 1898, ii. 79, note 3).
For Aberdeen and Hamilton, see _English Bards, etc._, line 509:
_Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 336, note 2, and _Childe Harold_, Canto II.
supplementary stanzas, _ibid._, ii. 108.
Edward Daniel Clarke, LL.D. (1769-1822), published _Travels in Various
Countries_, 1810-1823 (_vide ante_, p. 172, note 7).
For Leake, _vide ante_, p. 174, note 1.
For Gell, see _English Bards, etc._, line 1034, note 1: _Poetical
Works_, 1898, i. 379.
The Rev. Robert Walpole (1781-1856), in addition to his share in
_Herculanensia_, completed the sixth volume of Clarke's _Travels_, which
appeared in 1823.]
[270] {205} [Compare English Bards, etc., line 655, note 2: _Poetical
Works_, 1898, i. 349.]
[271] [The judge of a town or village--the Spanish _alcalde_.--_N. Eng.
Dict._, art. "Cadi."]
[272] {206} [Mouradja D'Ohsson (1740-1804), an Armenian by birth, spent
many years at Constantinople as Swedish envoy. He published at Paris
(1787-90, two vols. fol.) his _Tableau general de l'empire Othoman_, a
work still regarded as the chief authority on the subject.]
[273] ["Effendi," derived from the Greek [Greek: au)the/ntes], through
the Romaic [Greek: a)phe/ntes], an "absolute master," is a title borne
by distinguished civilians.
The Spanish order of St. James of Compostella was founded circ. A.D.
1170.]
[274] {207} [The "Nizam Gedidd," or new ordinance, which aimed at
remodelling the Turkish army on a quasi-European system, was promulgated
by Selim III in 1808.
A "mufti" is an expounder, a "molla" or "mollah" a superior judge, of
the sacred Moslem law. The "tefterdars" or "defterdars" were provincial
registrars and treasurers under the supreme defterdar, or Chancellor of
the Exchequer.]
* * * * *
CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.
CANTO THE THIRD.
"Afin que cette application vous forcat a penser a autre chose.
Il n'y a en verite de remede que celui-la et le temps."--_Lettres
du Roi de Prusse et de M. D'Alembert_.[275] [_Lettre_ cxlvi.
Sept. 7, 1776.]
* * * * *
INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD CANTO.
The Third Canto of _Childe Harold_ was begun early in May, and finished
at Ouchy, near Lausanne, on the 27th of June, 1816. Byron made a fair
copy of the first draft of his poem, which had been scrawled on loose
sheets, and engaged the services of "Claire" (Jane Clairmont) to make a
second transcription. Her task was completed on the 4th of July. The
fair copy and Claire's transcription remained in Byron's keeping until
the end of August or the beginning of September, when he consigned the
transcription to "his friend Mr. Shelley," and the fair copy to Scrope
Davies, with instructions to deliver them to Murray (see Letters to
Murray, October 5, 9, 15, 1816). Shelley landed at Portsmouth, September
8, and on the 11th of September he discharged his commission.
"I was thrilled with delight yesterday," writes Murray (September 12),
"by the announcement of Mr. Shelley with the MS. of _Childe Harold_. I
had no sooner got the quiet possession of it than, trembling with
auspicious hope, ... I carried it ... to Mr. Gifford.... He says that
what you have heretofore published is nothing to this effort.... Never,
since my intimacy with Mr. Gifford, did I see him so heartily pleased,
or give one fiftieth part of the praise, with one thousandth part of the
warmth."
The correction of the press was undertaken by Gifford, not without some
remonstrance on the part of Shelley, who maintained that "the revision
of the proofs, and the retention or alteration of certain particular
passages had been entrusted to his discretion" (Letter to Murray,
October 30, 1816).
When, if ever, Mr. Davies, of "inaccurate memory" (Letter to Murray,
December 4, 1816), discharged his trust is a matter of uncertainty. The
"original MS." (Byron's "fair copy") is not forthcoming, and it is
improbable that Murray, who had stipulated (September 20) "for all the
original MSS., copies, and scraps," ever received it. The "scraps" were
sent (October 5) in the first instance to Geneva, and, after many
wanderings, ultimately fell into the possession of Mrs. Leigh, from whom
they were purchased by the late Mr. Murray.
The July number of the _Quarterly Review_ (No. XXX.) was still in the
press, and, possibly, for this reason it was not till October 29 that
Murray inserted the following advertisement in the _Morning Chronicle:_
"Lord Byron's New Poems. On the 23^d of November will be published The
Prisoners (_sic_) of Chillon, a Tale and other Poems. A Third Canto of
Childe Harold...." But a rival was in the field. The next day (October
30), in the same print, another advertisement appeared: "_The R. H. Lord
Byron's Pilgrimage to the Holy Land...._ Printed for J. Johnston,
Cheapside.... Of whom may be had, by the same author, a new ed. (the
third) of _Farewell to England: with three other poems...._" It was, no
doubt, the success of his first venture which had stimulated the
"Cheapside impostor," as Byron called him, to forgery on a larger scale.
The controversy did not end there. A second advertisement (_Morning
Chronicle_, November 15) of "Lord Byron's Pilgrimage," etc., stating
that "the copyright of the work was consigned" to the Publisher
"exclusively by the Noble Author himself, and for which he gives 500
guineas," precedes Murray's second announcement of _The Prisoners of
Chillon_, and the Third Canto of _Childe Harold_, in which he informs
"the public that the poems lately advertised are not written by Lord
Byron. The only bookseller at present authorised to print Lord Byron's
poems is Mr. Murray...." Further precautions were deemed necessary. An
injunction in Chancery was applied for by Byron's agents and
representatives (see, for a report of the case in the _Morning
Chronicle_, November 28, 1816, _Letters_, vol. iv., Letter to Murray,
December 9, 1816, note), and granted by the Chancellor, Lord Eldon.
Strangely enough, Sir Samuel Romilly, whom Byron did not love, was
counsel for the plaintiff.
In spite of the injunction, a volume entitled "_Lord Byron's Pilgrimage
to the Holy Land_, a Poem in Two Cantos. To which is attached a
fragment, _The Tempest_," was issued in 1817. It is a dull and,
apparently, serious production, suggested by, but hardly an imitation
of, _Childe Harold_. The notes are descriptive of the scenery, customs,
and antiquities of Palestine. _The Tempest_, on the other hand, is a
parody, and by no means a bad parody, of Byron at his worst; e.g.--
"There was a sternness in his eye,
Which chilled the soul--one knew not why--
But when returning vigour came,
And kindled the dark glare to flame,
So fierce it flashed, one well might swear,
A thousand souls were centred there."
It is possible that this _Pilgrimage_ was the genuine composition of
some poetaster who failed to get his poems published under his own name,
or it may have been the deliberate forgery of John Agg, or Hewson
Clarke, or C. F. Lawler, the _pseudo_ Peter Pindar--"Druids" who were in
Johnston's pay, and were prepared to compose pilgrimages to any land,
holy or unholy, which would bring grist to their employer's mill. (See
the _Advertisements_ at the end of _Lord Byron's Pilgrimage, etc._)
The Third Canto was published, not as announced, on the 23rd, but on the
18th of November. Murray's "auspicious hope" of success was amply
fulfilled. He "wrote to Lord Byron on the 13th of December, 1816,
informing him that at a dinner at the Albion Tavern, he had sold to the
assembled booksellers 7000 of his Third Canto of _Childe Harold_...."
The reviews were for the most part laudatory. Sir Walter Scott's
finely-tempered eulogium (_Quart. Rev_., No. xxxi., October, 1816
[published February 11, 1817]), and Jeffrey's balanced and cautious
appreciation (_Edin. Rev_., No. liv., December, 1816 [published February
14, 1817]) have been reprinted in their collected works. Both writers
conclude with an aspiration--Jeffrey, that
"This puissant spirit
Yet shall reascend,
Self-raised, and repossess its native seat!"
Scott, in the "tenderest strain" of Virgilian melody--
"I decus, i nostrum, melioribus utere fatis!"
NOTE ON MSS. OF THE THIRD CANTO.
[The following memorandum, in Byron's handwriting, is prefixed to the
Transcription:--
"This copy is to be printed from--subject to comparison with the
original MS. (from which this is a transcription) in such parts as
it may chance to be difficult to decypher in the following. The
notes in this copy are more complete and extended than in the
former--and there is also _one stanza more_ inserted and added to
this, viz. the 33d. B.
Byron. July 10th, 1816.
Diodati, near y^e Lake of Geneva."
The "original MS." to which the memorandum refers is not forthcoming
(_vide ante_, p. 212), but the "scraps" (MS.) are now in Mr. Murray's
possession. Stanzas i.-iii., and the lines beginning, "The castled Crag
of Drachenfels," are missing.
Claire's Transcription (C.) occupies the first 119 pages of a
substantial quarto volume. Stanzas xxxiii. and xcix.-cv. and several of
the notes are in Byron's handwriting. The same volume contains _Sonnet
on Chillon_, in Byron's handwriting; a transcription of the _Prisoners_
(_sic_) _of Chillon_ (so, too, the advertisement in the _Morning
Chronicle_, October 29, 1816); _Sonnet_, "Rousseau," etc., in Byron's
handwriting, and transcriptions of _Stanzas to_----, "Though the day of
my destiny's over;" _Darkness_; _Churchill's Grave_; _The Dream_; _The
Incantation_ (_Manfred_, act ii. sc. 1); and _Prometheus_.]
CANTO THE THIRD.
I.
Is thy face like thy mothers, my fair child!
ADA! sole daughter of my house and heart?[276]
When last I saw thy young blue eyes they smiled,
And then we parted,--not as now we part,
But with a hope.--
Awaking with a start,
The waters heave around me; and on high
The winds lift up their voices: I depart,
Whither I know not; but the hour's gone by,
When Albion's lessening shores could grieve or glad mine eye.[gh]
II.
Once more upon the waters! yet once more![277]
And the waves bound beneath me as a steed
That knows his rider.[278] Welcome to their roar!
Swift be their guidance, wheresoe'er it lead!
Though the strained mast should quiver as a reed,
And the rent canvass fluttering strew the gale,[gi]
Still must I on; for I am as a weed,
Flung from the rock, on Ocean's foam, to sail
Where'er the surge may sweep, the tempest's breath prevail.
III.
In my youth's summer I did sing of One,
The wandering outlaw of his own dark mind;[279]
Again I seize the theme, then but begun,
And bear it with me, as the rushing wind
Bears the cloud onwards: in that Tale I find
The furrows of long thought, and dried-up tears,
Which, ebbing, leave a sterile track behind,
O'er which all heavily the journeying years
Plod the last sands of life,--where not a flower appears.
IV.
Since my young days of passion--joy, or pain--
Perchance my heart and harp have lost a string--
And both may jar: it may be, that in vain
I would essay as I have sung to sing[gj]:
Yet, though a dreary strain, to this I cling;
So that it wean me from the weary dream
Of selfish grief or gladness--so it fling
Forgetfulness around me--it shall seem
To me, though to none else, a not ungrateful theme.
V.
He, who grown aged in this world of woe,
In deeds, not years,[280] piercing the depths of life,
So that no wonder waits him--nor below
Can Love or Sorrow, Fame, Ambition, Strife,
Cut to his heart again with the keen knife
Of silent, sharp endurance--he can tell
Why Thought seeks refuge in lone caves, yet rife
With airy images, and shapes which dwell
Still unimpaired, though old, in the Soul's haunted cell.[gk]
VI.
'Tis to create, and in creating live[281]
A being more intense that we endow[gl]
With form our fancy, gaining as we give
The life we image, even as I do now--
What am I? Nothing: but not so art thou,
Soul of my thought! with whom I traverse earth,
Invisible but gazing, as I glow--
Mixed with thy spirit, blended with thy birth,
And feeling still with thee in my crushed feelings' dearth.
VII.
Yet must I think less wildly:--I _have_ thought
Too long and darkly, till my brain became,
In its own eddy boiling and o'erwrought,
A whirling gulf of phantasy and flame:[gm]
And thus, untaught in youth my heart to tame,
My springs of life were poisoned.[282] 'Tis too late:
Yet am I changed; though still enough the same
In strength to bear what Time can not abate,[gn]
And feed on bitter fruits without accusing Fate.
VIII.
Something too much of this:--but now 'tis past,
And the spell closes with its silent seal--[283]
Long absent HAROLD re-appears at last;
He of the breast which fain no more would feel,[go]
Wrung with the wounds which kill not, but ne'er heal;
Yet Time, who changes all, had altered him
In soul and aspect as in age: years steal
Fire from the mind as vigour from the limb;
And Life's enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim.
IX.
His had been quaffed too quickly, and he found
The dregs were wormwood; but he filled again,
And from a purer fount, on holier ground,
And deemed its spring perpetual--but in vain!
Still round him clung invisibly a chain
Which galled for ever, fettering though unseen,
And heavy though it clanked not; worn with pain,
Which pined although it spoke not, and grew keen,
Entering with every step he took through many a scene.
X.
Secure in guarded coldness, he had mixed[gp]
Again in fancied safety with his kind,
And deemed his spirit now so firmly fixed
And sheathed with an invulnerable mind,
That, if no joy, no sorrow lurked behind;
And he, as one, might 'midst the many stand
Unheeded, searching through the crowd to find
Fit speculation--such as in strange land
He found in wonder-works of God and Nature's hand.[gq]
XI.
But who can view the ripened rose, nor seek[gr]
To wear it? who can curiously behold
The smoothness and the sheen of Beauty's cheek,
Nor feel the heart can never all grow old?[gs]
Who can contemplate Fame through clouds unfold
The star[284] which rises o'er her steep, nor climb?
Harold, once more within the vortex, rolled
On with the giddy circle, chasing Time,
Yet with a nobler aim than in his Youth's fond prime.[gt][285]
XII.
But soon he knew himself the most unfit[gu]
Of men to herd with Man, with whom he held
Little in common; untaught to submit
His thoughts to others, though his soul was quelled
In youth by his own thoughts; still uncompelled,
He would not yield dominion of his mind
To Spirits against whom his own rebelled,
Proud though in desolation--which could find
A life within itself, to breathe without mankind.
XIII.
Where rose the mountains, there to him were friends;[gv]
Where rolled the ocean, thereon was his home;
Where a blue sky, and glowing clime, extends,
He had the passion and the power to roam;
The desert, forest, cavern, breaker's foam,
Were unto him companionship; they spake
A mutual language, clearer than the tome
Of his land's tongue, which he would oft forsake
For Nature's pages glassed by sunbeams on the lake.
XIV.
Like the Chaldean, he could watch the stars,[gw]
Till he had peopled them with beings bright
As their own beams; and earth, and earth-born jars,
And human frailties, were forgotten quite:
Could he have kept his spirit to that flight
He had been happy; but this clay will sink
Its spark immortal, envying it the light
To which it mounts, as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brink.[gx]
XV.
But in Man's dwellings he became a thing[gy]
Restless and worn, and stern and wearisome,
Drooped as a wild-born falcon with clipt wing,
To whom the boundless air alone were home:
Then came his fit again, which to o'ercome,
As eagerly the barred-up bird will beat
His breast and beak against his wiry dome
Till the blood tinge his plumage--so the heat
Of his impeded Soul would through his bosom eat.
XVI.
Self-exiled Harold wanders forth again,[286]
With nought of Hope left--but with less of gloom;
The very knowledge that he lived in vain,
That all was over on this side the tomb,
Had made Despair a smilingness assume,
Which, though 'twere wild,--as on the plundered wreck
When mariners would madly meet their doom
With draughts intemperate on the sinking deck,--
Did yet inspire a cheer, which he forbore to check.
XVII.
Stop!--for thy tread is on an Empire's dust!
An Earthquake's spoil is sepulchred below!
Is the spot marked with no colossal bust?[287]
Nor column trophied for triumphal show?
None; but _the moral's truth_ tells simpler so.--[gz][288]
As the ground was before, thus let it be;--[ha]
How that red rain hath made the harvest grow!
And is this all the world has gained by thee,
Thou first and last of Fields! king-making Victory?
XVIII.
And Harold stands upon this place of skulls,
The grave of France, the deadly Waterloo![hb]
How in an hour the Power which gave annuls
Its gifts, transferring fame as fleeting too!--
In "pride of place" here last the Eagle flew,[1.B.]
Then tore with bloody talon the rent plain,[hc]
Pierced by the shaft of banded nations through;
Ambition's life and labours all were vain--
He wears the shattered links of the World's broken chain.[hd]
XIX.
Fit retribution! Gaul may champ the bit
And foam in fetters;--but is Earth more free?[289]
Did nations combat to make _One_ submit?
Or league to teach all Kings true Sovereignty?[he]
What! shall reviving Thraldom again be
The patched-up Idol of enlightened days?
Shall we, who struck the Lion down, shall we
Pay the Wolf homage? proffering lowly gaze
And servile knees to Thrones? No! _prove_ before ye praise!
XX.
If not, o'er one fallen Despot boast no more!
In vain fair cheeks were furrowed with hot tears
For Europe's flowers long rooted up before
The trampler of her vineyards; in vain, years
Of death, depopulation, bondage, fears,
Have all been borne, and broken by the accord
Of roused-up millions: all that most endears
Glory, is when the myrtle wreathes a Sword,
Such as Harmodius[2.B.] drew on Athens' tyrant Lord.
XXI.
There was a sound of revelry by night,[290]
And Belgium's Capital had gathered then
Her Beauty and her Chivalry--and bright
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men;[hf]
A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell,
Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again,
And all went merry as a marriage bell;[3.B.]
But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell!
XXII.
Did ye not hear it?--No--'twas but the Wind,
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street;
On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;
No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet
To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet--
But hark!--that heavy sound breaks in once more,
As if the clouds its echo would repeat;
And nearer--clearer--deadlier than before![hg]
Arm! Arm! it is--it is--the cannon's opening roar![hh]
XXIII.
Within a windowed niche of that high hall
Sate Brunswick's fated Chieftain; he did hear[291]
That sound the first amidst the festival,
And caught its tone with Death's prophetic ear;
And when they smiled because he deemed it near,
His heart more truly knew that peal too well[hi]
Which stretched his father on a bloody bier,
And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell;
He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting, fell.
XXIV.
Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro--
And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress,[hj]
And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago
Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness--
And there were sudden partings, such as press[hk]
The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs
Which ne'er might be repeated; who could guess
If ever more should meet those mutual eyes,
Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise![hl]
XXV.
And there was mounting in hot haste--the steed,
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car,
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed,
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war--
And the deep thunder peal on peal afar;
And near, the beat of the alarming drum
Roused up the soldier ere the Morning Star;
While thronged the citizens with terror dumb,[hm]
Or whispering, with white lips--"The foe! They come! they come!"
XXVI.