But somehow,- it may seem a schoolboy's whine, And yet I seek not to be grand nor witty, But I am half a Scot by birth, and bred A whole one, and my heart flies to my head,-As 'Auld Lang Syne' brings Scotland, one and all, Scotch plaids, Scotch snoods, the blue hills, and clear streams, The Dee, the Don, Balgounie's brig's black wall, All my boy feelings, all my gentler dreams Of what I then dreamt, clothed in their own pall, Like Banquo's offspring;- floating past me seems My childhood in this childishness of mine:
I care not- 't is a glimpse of 'Auld Lang Syne.'
And though, as you remember, in a fit Of wrath and rhyme, when juvenile and curly, I rail'd at Scots to show my wrath and wit, Which must be own'd was sensitive and surly, Yet 't is in vain such sallies to permit, They cannot quench young feelings fresh and early:
I 'scotch'd not kill'd' the Scotchman in my blood, And love the land of 'mountain and of flood.'
Don Juan, who was real, or ideal,-For both are much the same, since what men think Exists when the once thinkers are less real Than what they thought, for mind can never sink, And 'gainst the body makes a strong appeal;
And yet 't is very puzzling on the brink Of what is call'd eternity, to stare, And know no more of what is here, than there;-Don Juan grew a very polish'd Russian-How we won't mention, why we need not say:
Few youthful minds can stand the strong concussion Of any slight temptation in their way;
But his just now were spread as is a cushion Smooth'd for a monarch's seat of honour; gay Damsels, and dances, revels, ready money, Made ice seem paradise, and winter sunny.
The favour of the empress was agreeable;
And though the duty wax'd a little hard, Young people at his time of life should be able To come off handsomely in that regard.
He was now growing up like a green tree, able For love, war, or ambition, which reward Their luckier votaries, till old age's tedium Make some prefer the circulating medium.
About this time, as might have been anticipated, Seduced by youth and dangerous examples, Don Juan grew, I fear, a little dissipated;
Which is a sad thing, and not only tramples On our fresh feelings, but- as being participated With all kinds of incorrigible samples Of frail humanity- must make us selfish, And shut our souls up in us like a shell-fish.
This we pass over. We will also pass The usual progress of intrigues between Unequal matches, such as are, alas!
A young lieutenant's with a not old queen, But one who is not so youthful as she was In all the royalty of sweet seventeen.
Sovereigns may sway materials, but not matter, And 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 fie 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.'
Oh 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!
