About this time, as might have been anticipated, Seduced by youth and dangerous examples, Don Juan grew, I fear, a little dissipated; Which is a sad thing, and not only tramples On our fresh feelings, but—as being participated With all kinds of incorrigible samples Of frail humanity—must make us selfish, And shut our souls up in us like a shell-fish.
This we pass over. We will also pass The usual progress of intrigues between Unequal matches, such as are, alas! A young lieutenant’s with a not old queen, But one who is not so youthful as she was In all the royalty of sweet seventeen. Sovereigns may sway materials, but not matter, And wrinkles, the d—d democrats, won't flatter.
And Death, the sovereign’s sovereign, though the great Gracchus of all mortality, who levels With his Agrarian laws the high estate Of him who feasts, and fights, and roars, and revels, To one small grass-grown patch (which must await Corruption for its crop) with the poor devils Who never had a foot of land till now,— Death ’s a reformer, all men must allow.
He lived (not Death, but Juan) in a hurry Of waste, and haste, and glare, and gloss, and glitter, In this gay clime of bear-skins black and furry— Which (though I hate to say a thing that ’s bitter) Peep out sometimes, when things are in a flurry, Through all the ‘purple and fine linen,’ fitter For Babylon’s than Russia’s royal harlot— And neutralize her outward show of scarlet.
And this same state we won’t describe: we would Perhaps from hearsay, or from recollection; But getting nigh grim Dante’s ‘obscure wood,’ That horrid equinox, that hateful section Of human years, that half-way house, that rude Hut, whence wise travellers drive with circumspection Life’s sad post-horses o’er the dreary frontier Of age, and looking back to youth, give one tear;—
I won’t describe,—that is, if I can help Description; and I won’t reflect,—that is, If I can stave off thought, which—as a whelp Clings to its teat—sticks to me through the abyss Of this odd labyrinth; or as the kelp Holds by the rock; or as a lover’s kiss Drains its first draught of lips:—but, as I said, I won’t philosophise, and will be read.
Juan, instead of courting courts, was courted,— A thing which happens rarely: this he owed Much to his youth, and much to his reported Valour; much also to the blood he show’d, Like a race-horse; much to each dress he sported, Which set the beauty off in which he glow’d, As purple clouds befringe the sun; but most He owed to an old woman and his post.
He wrote to Spain:—and all his near relations, Perceiving he was in a handsome way Of getting on himself, and finding stations For cousins also, answer’d the same day. Several prepared themselves for emigrations; And eating ices, were o’erheard to say, That with the addition of a slight pelisse, Madrid’s and Moscow’s climes were of a piece.
His mother, Donna Inez, finding, too, That in the lieu of drawing on his banker, Where his assets were waxing rather few, He had brought his spending to a handsome anchor,— Replied, ‘that she was glad to see him through Those pleasures after which wild youth will hanker; As the sole sign of man’s being in his senses Is, learning to reduce his past expenses.
‘She also recommended him to God, And no less to God’s Son, as well as Mother, Warn’d him against Greek worship, which looks odd In Catholic eyes; but told him, too, to smother Outward dislike, which don’t look well abroad; Inform’d him that he had a little brother Born in a second wedlock; and above All, praised the empress’s maternal love.
‘She could not too much give her approbation Unto an empress, who preferr’d young men Whose age, and what was better still, whose nation And climate, stopp’d all scandal (now and then):— At home it might have given her some vexation; But where thermometers sunk down to ten, Or five, or one, or zero, she could never Believe that virtue thaw’d before the river.’
O for a forty-parson power to chant Thy praise, Hypocrisy! Oh for a hymn Loud as the virtues thou dost loudly vaunt, Not practise! Oh for trumps of cherubim! Or the ear-trumpet of my good old aunt, Who, though her spectacles at last grew dim, Drew quiet consolation through its hint, When she no more could read the pious print.
She was no hypocrite at least, poor soul, But went to heaven in as sincere a way As any body on the elected roll, Which portions out upon the judgment day Heaven’s freeholds, in a sort of doomsday scroll, Such as the conqueror William did repay His knights with, lotting others’ properties Into some sixty thousand new knights’ fees.
I can’t complain, whose ancestors are there, Erneis, Radulphus—eight-and-forty manors (If that my memory doth not greatly err) Were their reward for following Billy’s banners: And though I can’t help thinking ’twas scarce fair To strip the Saxons of their hydes, like tanners; Yet as they founded churches with the produce, You’ll deem, no doubt, they put it to a good use.
The gentle Juan flourish’d, though at times He felt like other plants called sensitive, Which shrink from touch, as monarchs do from rhymes, Save such as Southey can afford to give. Perhaps he long’d in bitter frosts for climes In which the Neva’s ice would cease to live Before May-day: perhaps, despite his duty, In royalty’s vast arms he sigh’d for beauty:
Perhaps—but, sans perhaps, we need not seek For causes young or old: the canker-worm Will feed upon the fairest, freshest cheek, As well as further drain the wither’d form: Care, like a housekeeper, brings every week His bills in, and however we may storm, They must be paid: though six days smoothly run, The seventh will bring blue devils or a dun.
I don’t know how it was, but he grew sick: The empress was alarm’d, and her physician (The same who physick’d Peter) found the tick Of his fierce pulse betoken a condition Which augur’d of the dead, however quick Itself, and show’d a feverish disposition; At which the whole court was extremely troubled, The sovereign shock’d, and all his medicines doubled.
Low were the whispers, manifold the rumours: Some said he had been poison’d by Potemkin; Others talk’d learnedly of certain tumours, Exhaustion, or disorders of the same kin; Some said ’twas a concoction of the humours, Which with the blood too readily will claim kin; Others again were ready to maintain, ‘’Twas only the fatigue of last campaign.’
But here is one prescription out of many: ‘Sodae sulphat. ʒvj., ʒss. Mannae optim. Aq. fervent. f. ℥iss. ʒij. tinct. Sennae Haustus’ (And here the surgeon came and cupp’d him) ‘℞ Pulv. Com gr. iij. Ipecacuanhae’ (With more beside if Juan had not stopp’d ’em). ‘Bolus Potassae Sulphuret. sumendus, Et haustus ter in die capiendus.’
This is the way physicians mend or end us, Secundum artem: but although we sneer In health—when ill, we call them to attend us, Without the least propensity to jeer: While that ‘hiatus maxime deflendus’ To be fill’d up by spade or mattock’s near, Instead of gliding graciously down Lethe, We tease mild Baillie, or soft Abernethy.
Juan demurr’d at this first notice to Quit; and though death had threaten’d an ejection, His youth and constitution bore him through, And sent the doctors in a new direction. But still his state was delicate: the hue Of health but flicker’d with a faint reflection Along his wasted cheek, and seem’d to gravel The faculty—who said that he must travel.
The climate was too cold, they said, for him, Meridian-born, to bloom in. This opinion Made the chaste Catherine look a little grim, Who did not like at first to lose her minion: But when she saw his dazzling eye wax dim, And drooping like an eagle’s with clipt pinion, She then resolved to send him on a mission, But in a style becoming his condition.
There was just then a kind of a discussion, A sort of treaty or negotiation Between the British cabinet and Russian, Maintain’d with all the due prevarication With which great states such things are apt to push on; Something about the Baltic’s navigation, Hides, train-oil, tallow, and the rights of Thetis, Which Britons deem their ‘uti possidetis.’
So Catherine, who had a handsome way Of fitting out her favourites, conferr’d This secret charge on Juan, to display At once her royal splendour, and reward His services. He kiss’d hands the next day, Received instructions how to play his card, Was laden with all kinds of gifts and honours, Which show’d what great discernment was the donor’s.
But she was lucky, and luck ’s all. Your queens Are generally prosperous in reigning; Which puzzles us to know what Fortune means. But to continue: though her years were waning Her climacteric teased her like her teens; And though her dignity brook’d no complaining, So much did Juan’s setting off distress her, She could not find at first a fit successor.