{ "id": "lord-byron/canto-viii", "title": "Canto VIII", "ordinal": null, "subtitle": null, "poet": "Lord Byron", "poet_slug": "lord-byron", "language": "en", "book": "Don Juan", "book_slug": "don-juan", "book_kind": "volume", "sequence": 10, "container": null, "epigraph": null, "first_published": { "year": 1824, "venue": "Don Juan (1824)", "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.", "uncertain": false, "sources": [ "https://github.com/standardebooks/lord-byron_don-juan", "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/18762" ] }, "source": { "kind": "standard-ebooks", "repo": "standardebooks/lord-byron_don-juan", "file": "canto-8.xhtml", "upstream": [ "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/18762", "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000667686" ], "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)" }, "verification": { "level": "structural-only", "last_checked": "2026-08-20" }, "stats": { "n_lines": 1128, "n_stanzas": 141, 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null, "stanza_range": [ 133, 134 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXXXV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 134, 135 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXXXVI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 135, 136 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXXXVII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 136, 137 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXXXVIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 137, 138 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXXXIX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 138, 139 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXL", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 139, 140 ] }, { "ordinal": "CXLI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 140, 141 ] } ], "stanzas": [ [ { "text": "Oh, blood and thunder! and oh, blood and wounds!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "These are but vulgar oaths, as you may deem,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Too gentle reader! and most shocking sounds:⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And so they are; yet thus is Glory’s dream", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Unriddled, and as my true Muse expounds", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At present such things, since they are her theme,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "So be they her inspirers! Call them Mars,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Bellona, what you will⁠—they mean but wars.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "All was prepared⁠—the fire, the sword, the men", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To wield them in their terrible array⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The army, like a lion from his den,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Marched forth with nerve and sinews bent to slay⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A human Hydra, issuing from its fen", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To breathe destruction on its winding way,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whose heads were heroes, which cut off in vain", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Immediately in others grew again.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "History can only take things in the gross;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But could we know them in detail, perchance", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In balancing the profit and the loss,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "War’s merit it by no means might enhance,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To waste so much gold for a little dross,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As hath been done, mere conquest to advance.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The drying up a single tear has more", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of honest fame, than shedding seas of gore.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And why?⁠—because it brings self-approbation;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whereas the other, after all its glare,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Shouts, bridges, arches, pensions from a nation,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which (it may be) has not much left to spare,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A higher title, or a loftier station,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Though they may make Corruption gape or stare,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Yet, in the end, except in Freedom’s battles,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Are nothing but a child of Murder’s rattles.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And such they are⁠—and such they will be found:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Not so Leonidas and Washington,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whose every battle-field is holy ground,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which breathes of nations saved, not worlds undone.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "How sweetly on the ear such echoes sound!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "While the mere victor’s may appal or stun", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The servile and the vain⁠—such names will be", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A watchword till the Future shall be free.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The night was dark, and the thick mist allowed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nought to be seen save the artillery’s flame,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Which arched the horizon like a fiery cloud,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And in the Danube’s waters shone the same⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A mirrored Hell! the volleying roar, and loud", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Long booming of each peal on peal, o’ercame", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The ear far more than thunder; for Heaven’s flashes", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Spare, or smite rarely⁠—Man’s make millions ashes!", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The column ordered on the assault scarce passed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Beyond the Russian batteries a few toises,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "When up the bristling Muslim rose at last,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Answering the Christian thunders with like voices:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Then one vast fire, air, earth, and stream embraced,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which rocked as ’twere beneath the mighty noises;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "While the whole rampart blazed like Etna, when", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The restless Titan hiccups in his den;", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And one enormous shout of “Allah!” rose", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In the same moment, loud as even the roar", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of War’s most mortal engines, to their foes", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Hurling defiance: city, stream, and shore", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Resounded “Allah!” and the clouds which close", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With thickening canopy the conflict o’er,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Vibrate to the Eternal name. Hark! through", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All sounds it pierceth⁠—“Allah! Allah Hu!”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The columns were in movement one and all,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But of the portion which attacked by water,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Thicker than leaves the lives began to fall,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Though led by Arseniew, that great son of slaughter,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As brave as ever faced both bomb and ball.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "“Carnage” (so Wordsworth tells you) “is God’s daughter:”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "If he speak truth, she is Christ’s sister, and", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Just now behaved as in the Holy Land.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The Prince de Ligne was wounded in the knee;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Count Chapeau-Bras,⁠—too, had a ball between", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His cap and head, which proves the head to be", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Aristocratic as was ever seen,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Because it then received no injury", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "More than the cap; in fact, the ball could mean", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "No harm unto a right legitimate head;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "“Ashes to ashes”⁠—why not lead to lead?", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Also the General Markow, Brigadier,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Insisting on removal of the Prince", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Amidst some groaning thousands dying near⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All common fellows, who might writhe and wince,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And shriek for water into a deaf ear⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The General Markow, who could thus evince", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His sympathy for rank, by the same token,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To teach him greater, had his own leg broken.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Three hundred cannon threw up their emetic,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And thirty thousand muskets flung their pills", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Like hail, to make a bloody Diuretic.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Mortality! thou hast thy monthly bills:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Thy plagues⁠—thy famines⁠—thy physicians⁠—yet tick,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Like the death-watch, within our ears the ills", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Past, present, and to come;⁠—but all may yield", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To the true portrait of one battle-field;", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "There the still varying pangs, which multiply", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Until their very number makes men hard", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "By the infinities of agony,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which meet the gaze, whate’er it may regard⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The groan, the roll in dust, the all-white eye", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Turned back within its socket⁠—these reward", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Your rank and file by thousands, while the rest", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "May win perhaps a ribbon at the breast!", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Yet I love Glory;⁠—Glory’s a great thing:⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Think what it is to be in your old age", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Maintained at the expense of your good King:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A moderate pension shakes full many a sage,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And Heroes are but made for bards to sing,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which is still better⁠—thus, in verse, to wage", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Your wars eternally, besides enjoying", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Half-pay for life, make Mankind worth destroying.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The troops, already disembarked, pushed on", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To take a battery on the right: the others,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Who landed lower down, their landing done,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had set to work as briskly as their brothers:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Being grenadiers, they mounted one by one,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Cheerful as children climb the breasts of mothers,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "O’er the intrenchment and the palisade,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Quite orderly, as if upon parade.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And this was admirable: for so hot", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The fire was, that were red Vesuvius loaded,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Besides its lava, with all sorts of shot", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And shells or hells, it could not more have goaded.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of officers a third fell on the spot,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A thing which Victory by no means boded", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To gentlemen engaged in the assault:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Hounds, when the huntsman tumbles, are at fault.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But here I leave the general concern", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To track our Hero on his path of Fame:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He must his laurels separately earn⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For fifty thousand heroes, name by name,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Though all deserving equally to turn", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A couplet, or an elegy to claim,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Would form a lengthy lexicon of Glory,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And, what is worse still, a much longer story:", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And therefore we must give the greater number", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To the Gazette⁠—which doubtless fairly dealt", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "By the deceased, who lie in famous slumber", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In ditches, fields, or wheresoe’er they felt", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their clay for the last time their souls encumber;⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Thrice happy he whose name has been well spelt", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In the despatch: I knew a man whose loss", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was printed Grove, although his name was Grose.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Juan and Johnson joined a certain corps,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And fought away with might and main, not knowing", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The way which they had never trod before,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And still less guessing where they might be going;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But on they marched, dead bodies trampling o’er,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Firing, and thrusting, slashing, sweating, glowing,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But fighting thoughtlessly enough to win,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To their two selves, one whole bright bulletin.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Thus on they wallowed in the bloody mire", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of dead and dying thousands⁠—sometimes gaining", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A yard or two of ground, which brought them nigher", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To some odd angle for which all were straining;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "At other times, repulsed by the close fire,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which really poured as if all Hell were raining", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Instead of Heaven, they stumbled backwards o’er", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A wounded comrade, sprawling in his gore.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Though ’twas Don Juan’s first of fields, and though", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The nightly muster and the silent march", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In the chill dark, when Courage does not glow", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So much as under a triumphal arch,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Perhaps might make him shiver, yawn, or throw", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A glance on the dull clouds (as thick as starch,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Which stiffened Heaven) as if he wished for day;⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Yet for all this he did not run away.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Indeed he could not. But what if he had?", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There have been and are heroes who begun", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "With something not much better, or as bad:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Frederick the Great from Molwitz deigned to run,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For the first and last time; for, like a pad,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or hawk, or bride, most mortals after one", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Warm bout are broken in to their new tricks,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And fight like fiends for pay or politics.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "He was what Erin calls, in her sublime", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Old Erse or Irish, or it may be Punic;⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "(The antiquarians⁠—who can settle Time,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which settles all things, Roman, Greek, or Runic⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Swear that Pat’s language sprung from the same clime", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With Hannibal, and wears the Tyrian tunic", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of Dido’s alphabet⁠—and this is rational", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As any other notion, and not national;)⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But Juan was quite “a broth of a boy,”", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A thing of impulse and a child of song;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Now swimming in the sentiment of joy,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or the sensation (if that phrase seem wrong),", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And afterward, if he must needs destroy,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In such good company as always throng", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To battles, sieges, and that kind of pleasure,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "No less delighted to employ his leisure;", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But always without malice: if he warred", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or loved, it was with what we call “the best", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Intentions,” which form all Mankind’s trump card,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To be produced when brought up to the test.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The statesman⁠—hero⁠—harlot⁠—lawyer⁠—ward", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Off each attack, when people are in quest", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of their designs, by saying they meant well;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "’Tis pity “that such meaning should pave Hell.”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "I almost lately have begun to doubt", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whether Hell’s pavement⁠—if it be so paved⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Must not have latterly been quite worn out,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Not by the numbers good intent hath saved,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But by the mass who go below without", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Those ancient good intentions, which once shaved", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And smoothed the brimstone of that street of Hell", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which bears the greatest likeness to Pall Mall.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Juan, by some strange chance, which oft divides", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Warrior from warrior in their grim career,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Like chastest wives from constant husbands’ sides", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Just at the close of the first bridal year,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "By one of those odd turns of Fortune’s tides,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was on a sudden rather puzzled here,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "When, after a good deal of heavy firing,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He found himself alone, and friends retiring.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "I don’t know how the thing occurred⁠—it might", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Be that the greater part were killed or wounded,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And that the rest had faced unto the right", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "About; a circumstance which has confounded", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Caesar himself, who, in the very sight", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of his whole army, which so much abounded", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In courage, was obliged to snatch a shield,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And rally back his Romans to the field.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Juan, who had no shield to snatch, and was", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "No Caesar, but a fine young lad, who fought", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He knew not why, arriving at this pass,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Stopped for a minute, as perhaps he ought", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For a much longer time; then, like an ass", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(Start not, kind reader, since great Homer thought", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "This simile enough for Ajax, Juan", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Perhaps may find it better than a new one);", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Then, like an ass, he went upon his way,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And, what was stranger, never looked behind;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But seeing, flashing forward, like the day", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Over the hills, a fire enough to blind", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Those who dislike to look upon a fray,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He stumbled on, to try if he could find", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A path, to add his own slight arm and forces", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To corps, the greater part of which were corses.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Perceiving then no more the commandant", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of his own corps, nor even the corps, which had", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Quite disappeared⁠—the gods know how! (I can’t", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Account for everything which may look bad", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In history; but we at least may grant", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "It was not marvellous that a mere lad,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In search of Glory, should look on before,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor care a pinch of snuff about his corps:)⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Perceiving nor commander nor commanded,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And left at large, like a young heir, to make", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His way to⁠—where he knew not⁠—single handed;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As travellers follow over bog and brake", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "An “ignis fatuus;” or as sailors stranded", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Unto the nearest hut themselves betake;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "So Juan, following Honour and his nose,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Rushed where the thickest fire announced most foes.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "He knew not where he was, nor greatly cared,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For he was dizzy, busy, and his veins", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Filled as with lightning⁠—for his spirit shared", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The hour, as is the case with lively brains;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And where the hottest fire was seen and heard,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And the loud cannon pealed his hoarsest strains,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He rushed, while earth and air were sadly shaken", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By thy humane discovery, Friar Bacon!", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And as he rushed along, it came to pass he", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fell in with what was late the second column,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Under the orders of the General Lascy,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But now reduced, as is a bulky volume", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Into an elegant extract (much less massy)", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of heroism, and took his place with solemn", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Air ’midst the rest, who kept their valiant faces", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And levelled weapons still against the Glacis.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Just at this crisis up came Johnson too,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who had “retreated,” as the phrase is when", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Men run away much rather than go through", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Destruction’s jaws into the Devil’s den;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But Johnson was a clever fellow, who", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Knew when and how “to cut and come again,”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And never ran away, except when running", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was nothing but a valorous kind of cunning.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And so, when all his corps were dead or dying,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Except Don Juan, a mere novice, whose", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "More virgin valour never dreamt of flying,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From ignorance of danger, which indues", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Its votaries, like Innocence relying", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On its own strength, with careless nerves and thews⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Johnson retired a little, just to rally", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Those who catch cold in “shadows of Death’s valley.”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And there, a little sheltered from the shot,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which rained from bastion, battery, parapet,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Rampart, wall, casement, house⁠—for there was not", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In this extensive city, sore beset", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "By Christian soldiery, a single spot", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which did not combat like the Devil, as yet⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He found a number of Chasseurs, all scattered", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By the resistance of the chase they battered.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And these he called on; and, what ’s strange, they came", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Unto his call, unlike “the spirits from", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The vasty deep,” to whom you may exclaim,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Says Hotspur, long ere they will leave their home:⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their reasons were uncertainty, or shame", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At shrinking from a bullet or a bomb,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And that odd impulse, which in wars or creeds", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Makes men, like cattle, follow him who leads.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "By Jove! he was a noble fellow, Johnson,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And though his name, than Ajax or Achilles,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Sounds less harmonious, underneath the sun soon", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "We shall not see his likeness: he could kill his", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Man quite as quietly as blows the Monsoon", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her steady breath (which some months the same still is):", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Seldom he varied feature, hue, or muscle,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And could be very busy without bustle;", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And therefore, when he ran away, he did so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon reflection, knowing that behind", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He would find others who would fain be rid so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of idle apprehensions, which like wind", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Trouble heroic stomachs. Though their lids so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Oft are soon closed, all heroes are not blind,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But when they light upon immediate death,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Retire a little, merely to take breath.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But Johnson only ran off, to return", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With many other warriors, as we said,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Unto that rather somewhat misty bourne,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which Hamlet tells us is a pass of dread.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To Jack, howe’er, this gave but slight concern:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His soul (like galvanism upon the dead)", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Acted upon the living as on wire,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And led them back into the heaviest fire.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Egad! they found the second time what they", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The first time thought quite terrible enough", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To fly from, malgré all which people say", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of Glory, and all that immortal stuff", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Which fills a regiment (besides their pay,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That daily shilling which makes warriors tough)⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "They found on their return the self-same welcome,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which made some think, and others know, a hell come.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "They fell as thick as harvests beneath hail,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Grass before scythes, or corn below the sickle,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Proving that trite old truth, that Life’s as frail", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As any other boon for which men stickle.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The Turkish batteries thrashed them like a flail,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or a good boxer, into a sad pickle", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Putting the very bravest, who were knocked", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon the head before their guns were cocked.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The Turks behind the traverses and flanks", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of the next bastion, fired away like devils,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And swept, as gales sweep foam away, whole ranks:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "However, Heaven knows how, the Fate who levels", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Towns⁠—nations⁠—worlds, in her revolving pranks,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So ordered it, amidst these sulphury revels,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "That Johnson, and some few who had not scampered,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Reached the interior “talus” of the rampart.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "First one or two, then five, six, and a dozen", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Came mounting quickly up, for it was now", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "All neck or nothing, as, like pitch or rosin,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Flame was showered forth above, as well ’s below,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "So that you scarce could say who best had chosen,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The gentlemen that were the first to show", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their martial faces on the parapet,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or those who thought it brave to wait as yet.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But those who scaled, found out that their advance", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was favoured by an accident or blunder:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The Greek or Turkish Cohorn’s ignorance", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had pallisadoed in a way you’d wonder", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To see in forts of Netherlands or France⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(Though these to our Gibraltar must knock under)⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Right in the middle of the parapet", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Just named, these palisades were primly set:", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "So that on either side some nine or ten", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Paces were left, whereon you could contrive", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To march; a great convenience to our men,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At least to all those who were left alive,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Who thus could form a line and fight again;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And that which farther aided them to strive", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Was, that they could kick down the palisades,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which scarcely rose much higher than grass blades.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Among the first⁠—I will not say the first,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For such precedence upon such occasions", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Will oftentimes make deadly quarrels burst", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Out between friends as well as allied nations:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The Briton must be bold who really durst", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Put to such trial John Bull’s partial patience,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As say that Wellington at Waterloo", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was beaten⁠—though the Prussians say so too;⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And that if Blucher, Bulow, Gneisenau,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And God knows who besides in “au” and “ow,”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Had not come up in time to cast an awe", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Into the hearts of those who fought till now", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As tigers combat with an empty craw,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The Duke of Wellington had ceased to show", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His Orders⁠—also to receive his pensions,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which are the heaviest that our history mentions.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But never mind;⁠—“God save the King!” and Kings!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For if he don’t, I doubt if men will longer⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "I think I hear a little bird, who sings", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The people by and by will be the stronger:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The veriest jade will wince whose harness wrings", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So much into the raw as quite to wrong her", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Beyond the rules of posting⁠—and the mob", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At last fall sick of imitating Job.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "At first it grumbles, then it swears, and then,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Like David, flings smooth pebbles ’gainst a Giant;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "At last it takes to weapons such as men", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Snatch when Despair makes human hearts less pliant.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Then comes “the tug of war;”⁠—’twill come again,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "I rather doubt; and I would fain say “fie on ’t,”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "If I had not perceived that Revolution", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Alone can save the earth from Hell’s pollution.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But to continue:⁠—I say not the first,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But of the first, our little friend Don Juan", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Walked o’er the walls of Ismail, as if nursed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Amidst such scenes⁠—though this was quite a new one", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To him, and I should hope to most. The thirst", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of Glory, which so pierces through and through one,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Pervaded him⁠—although a generous creature,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As warm in heart as feminine in feature.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And here he was⁠—who upon Woman’s breast,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Even from a child, felt like a child; howe’er", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The Man in all the rest might be confessed,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To him it was Elysium to be there;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And he could even withstand that awkward test", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which Rousseau points out to the dubious fair,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "“Observe your lover when he leaves your arms;”", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But Juan never left them⁠—while they had charms,", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Unless compelled by Fate, or wave, or wind,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or near relations⁠—who are much the same.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But here he was!⁠—where each tie that can bind", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Humanity must yield to steel and flame:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And he whose very body was all mind,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Flung here by Fate or Circumstance, which tame", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The loftiest, hurried by the time and place,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Dashed on like a spurred blood-horse in a race.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "So was his blood stirred while he found resistance,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As is the hunter’s at the five-bar gate,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Or double post and rail, where the existence", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of Britain’s youth depends upon their weight⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The lightest being the safest: at a distance", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He hated cruelty, as all men hate", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Blood, until heated⁠—and even then his own", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At times would curdle o’er some heavy groan.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The General Lascy, who had been hard pressed,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Seeing arrive an aid so opportune", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As were some hundred youngsters all abreast,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who came as if just dropped down from the moon", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To Juan, who was nearest him, addressed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His thanks, and hopes to take the city soon,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Not reckoning him to be a “base Bezonian”", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(As Pistol calls it), but a young Livonian.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Juan, to whom he spoke in German, knew", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As much of German as of Sanskrit, and", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In answer made an inclination to", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The General who held him in command;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For seeing one with ribbons, black and blue,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Stars, medals, and a bloody sword in hand,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Addressing him in tones which seemed to thank,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He recognised an officer of rank.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Short speeches pass between two men who speak", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "No common language; and besides, in time", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of war and taking towns, when many a shriek", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Rings o’er the dialogue, and many a crime", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Is perpetrated ere a word can break", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon the ear, and sounds of horror chime", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In like church-bells, with sigh, howl, groan, yell, prayer,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There cannot be much conversation there.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And therefore all we have related in", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Two long octaves, passed in a little minute;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But in the same small minute, every sin", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Contrived to get itself comprised within it.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The very cannon, deafened by the din,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Grew dumb, for you might almost hear a linnet,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As soon as thunder, ’midst the general noise", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of Human Nature’s agonizing voice!", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The town was entered. Oh Eternity!⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "“God made the country, and man made the town,”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "So Cowper says⁠—and I begin to be", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of his opinion, when I see cast down", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Rome⁠—Babylon-Tyre-Carthage⁠—Nineveh⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All walls men know, and many never known;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And pondering on the present and the past,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To deem the woods shall be our home at last:⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Of all men, saving Sylla, the man-slayer,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who passes for in life and death most lucky,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of the great names which in our faces stare,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The General Boon, back-woodsman of Kentucky,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Was happiest amongst mortals anywhere;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For killing nothing but a bear or buck, he", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Enjoyed the lonely, vigorous, harmless days", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of his old age in wilds of deepest maze.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Crime came not near him⁠—she is not the child", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of solitude; Health shrank not from him⁠—for", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Her home is in the rarely trodden wild,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where if men seek her not, and death be more", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their choice than life, forgive them, as beguiled", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By habit to what their own hearts abhor⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In cities caged. The present case in point I", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Cite is, that Boon lived hunting up to ninety;", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And, what’s still stranger, left behind a name", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For which men vainly decimate the throng,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Not only famous, but of that good fame,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Without which Glory’s but a tavern song⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Simple, serene, the antipodes of Shame,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which Hate nor Envy e’er could tinge with wrong;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "An active hermit, even in age the child", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of Nature⁠—or the Man of Ross run wild.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "’Tis true he shrank from men even of his nation,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "When they built up unto his darling trees⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He moved some hundred miles off, for a station", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where there were fewer houses and more ease;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The inconvenience of civilisation", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Is, that you neither can be pleased nor please;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But where he met the individual man,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He showed himself as kind as mortal can.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "He was not all alone: around him grew", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A sylvan tribe of children of the chase,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whose young, unwakened world was ever new,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor sword nor sorrow yet had left a trace", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "On her unwrinkled brow, nor could you view", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A frown on Nature’s or on human face;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The free-born forest found and kept them free,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And fresh as is a torrent or a tree.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And tall, and strong, and swift of foot were they,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Beyond the dwarfing city’s pale abortions,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Because their thoughts had never been the prey", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of care or gain: the green woods were their portions;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "No sinking spirits told them they grew grey,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "No fashion made them apes of her distortions;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Simple they were, not savage⁠—and their rifles,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Though very true, were not yet used for trifles.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Motion was in their days, Rest in their slumbers,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And Cheerfulness the handmaid of their toil;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Nor yet too many nor too few their numbers;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Corruption could not make their hearts her soil;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The lust which stings, the splendour which encumbers,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With the free foresters divide no spoil;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Serene, not sullen, were the solitudes", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of this unsighing people of the woods.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "So much for Nature:⁠—by way of variety,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Now back to thy great joys, Civilisation!", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And the sweet consequence of large society,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "War⁠—pestilence⁠—the despot’s desolation,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The kingly scourge, the lust of notoriety,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The millions slain by soldiers for their ration,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The scenes like Catherine’s boudoir at threescore,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With Ismail’s storm to soften it the more.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The town was entered: first one column made", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Its sanguinary way good⁠—then another;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The reeking bayonet and the flashing blade", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Clashed ’gainst the scimitar, and babe and mother", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "With distant shrieks were heard Heaven to upbraid:⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Still closer sulphury clouds began to smother", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The breath of morn and man, where foot by foot", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The maddened Turks their city still dispute.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Koutousow, he who afterwards beat back", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(With some assistance from the frost and snow)", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Napoleon on his bold and bloody track,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "It happened was himself beat back just now:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He was a jolly fellow, and could crack", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His jest alike in face of friend or foe,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Though Life, and Death, and Victory were at stake;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But here it seemed his jokes had ceased to take:", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "For having thrown himself into a ditch,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Followed in haste by various grenadiers,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whose blood the puddle greatly did enrich,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He climbed to where the parapet appears;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But there his project reached its utmost pitch", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(’Mongst other deaths the General Ribaupierre’s", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Was much regretted), for the Muslim men", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Threw them all down into the ditch again.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And had it not been for some stray troops landing", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They knew not where, being carried by the stream", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To some spot, where they lost their understanding,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And wandered up and down as in a dream,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Until they reached, as daybreak was expanding,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That which a portal to their eyes did seem⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The great and gay Koutousow might have lain", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where three parts of his column yet remain.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And scrambling round the rampart, these same troops,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "After the taking of the “Cavalier,”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Just as Koutousow’s most “forlorn” of “hopes”", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Took, like chameleons, some slight tinge of fear,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Opened the gate called “Kilia,” to the groups", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of baffled heroes, who stood shyly near,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Sliding knee-deep in lately frozen mud,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Now thawed into a marsh of human blood.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The Kozacks, or, if so you please, Cossacques⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(I don’t much pique myself upon orthography,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "So that I do not grossly err in facts,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Statistics, tactics, politics, and geography)⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Having been used to serve on horses’ backs,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And no great dilettanti in topography", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of fortresses, but fighting where it pleases", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Their chiefs to order⁠—were all cut to pieces.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Their column, though the Turkish batteries thundered", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon them, ne’ertheless had reached the rampart,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And naturally thought they could have plundered", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The city, without being farther hampered;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But as it happens to brave men, they blundered⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The Turks at first pretended to have scampered,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Only to draw them ’twixt two bastion corners,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From whence they sallied on those Christian scorners.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Then being taken by the tail⁠—a taking", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fatal to bishops as to soldiers⁠—these", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Cossacques were all cut off as day was breaking,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And found their lives were let at a short lease⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But perished without shivering or shaking,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Leaving as ladders their heaped carcasses,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "O’er which Lieutenant-Colonel Yesouskoi", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Marched with the brave battalion of Polouzki:⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "This valiant man killed all the Turks he met,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But could not eat them, being in his turn", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Slain by some Mussulmans, who would not yet,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Without resistance, see their city burn.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The walls were won, but ’twas an even bet", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which of the armies would have cause to mourn:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "’Twas blow for blow, disputing inch by inch,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For one would not retreat, nor ’t other flinch.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Another column also suffered much:⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And here we may remark with the historian,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "You should but give few cartridges to such", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Troops as are meant to march with greatest glory on:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "When matters must be carried by the touch", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of the bright bayonet, and they all should hurry on;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "They sometimes, with a hankering for existence,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Keep merely firing at a foolish distance.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "A junction of the General Meknop’s men", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(Without the General, who had fallen some time", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Before, being badly seconded just then)", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was made at length with those who dared to climb", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The death-disgorging rampart once again;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And, though the Turk’s resistance was sublime,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "They took the bastion, which the Seraskier", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Defended at a price extremely dear.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Juan and Johnson, and some volunteers,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Among the foremost, offered him good quarter,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A word which little suits with Seraskiers,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or at least suited not this valiant Tartar.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He died, deserving well his country’s tears,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A savage sort of military martyr:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "An English naval officer, who wished", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To make him prisoner, was also dished:", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "For all the answer to his proposition", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was from a pistol-shot that laid him dead;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "On which the rest, without more intermission,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Began to lay about with steel and lead⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The pious metals most in requisition", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On such occasions: not a single head", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Was spared;⁠—three thousand Muslims perished here,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And sixteen bayonets pierced the Seraskier.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The city’s taken⁠—only part by part⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And Death is drunk with gore: there’s not a street", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Where fights not to the last some desperate heart", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For those for whom it soon shall cease to beat.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Here War forgot his own destructive art", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In more destroying Nature; and the heat", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of Carnage, like the Nile’s sun-sodden slime,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Engendered monstrous shapes of every crime.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "A Russian officer, in martial tread", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Over a heap of bodies, felt his heel", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Seized fast, as if ’twere by the serpent’s head", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whose fangs Eve taught her human seed to feel;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In vain he kicked, and swore, and writhed, and bled,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And howled for help as wolves do for a meal⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The teeth still kept their gratifying hold,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As do the subtle snakes described of old.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "A dying Muslim, who had felt the foot", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of a foe o’er him, snatched at it, and bit", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The very tendon which is most acute⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "(That which some ancient Muse or modern wit", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Named after thee, Achilles!) and quite through’t", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He made the teeth meet, nor relinquished it", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Even with his life⁠—for (but they lie) ’tis said", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To the live leg still clung the severed head.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "However this may be, ’tis pretty sure", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The Russian officer for life was lamed,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For the Turk’s teeth stuck faster than a skewer,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And left him ’midst the invalid and maimed:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The regimental surgeon could not cure", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His patient, and, perhaps, was to be blamed", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "More than the head of the inveterate foe,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which was cut off, and scarce even then let go.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But then the fact’s a fact⁠—and ’tis the part", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of a true poet to escape from fiction", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whene’er he can; for there is little art", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "in leaving verse more free from the restriction", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of Truth than prose, unless to suit the mart", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For what is sometimes called poetic diction,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And that outrageous appetite for lies", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which Satan angles with for souls, like flies.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The city’s taken, but not rendered!⁠—No!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There’s not a Muslim that hath yielded sword:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The blood may gush out, as the Danube’s flow", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Rolls by the city wall; but deed nor word", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Acknowledge aught of dread of Death or foe:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In vain the yell of victory is roared", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "By the advancing Muscovite⁠—the groan", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of the last foe is echoed by his own.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The bayonet pierces and the sabre cleaves,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And human lives are lavished everywhere,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As the year closing whirls the scarlet leaves", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "When the stripped forest bows to the bleak air,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And groans; and thus the peopled city grieves,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Shorn of its best and loveliest, and left bare;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But still it falls in vast and awful splinters,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As oaks blown down with all their thousand winters.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "It is an awful topic⁠—but ’tis not", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "My cue for any time to be terrific:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For checkered as is seen our human lot", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With good, and bad, and worse, alike prolific", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of melancholy merriment, to quote", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Too much of one sort would be soporific;⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Without, or with, offence to friends or foes,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "I sketch your world exactly as it goes.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And one good action in the midst of crimes", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Is “quite refreshing,” in the affected phrase", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of these ambrosial, Pharisaic times,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With all their pretty milk-and-water ways,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And may serve therefore to bedew these rhymes,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A little scorched at present with the blaze", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of conquest and its consequences, which", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Make Epic poesy so rare and rich.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Upon a taken bastion, where there lay", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Thousands of slaughtered men, a yet warm group", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of murdered women, who had found their way", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To this vain refuge, made the good heart droop", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And shudder;⁠—while, as beautiful as May,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A female child of ten years tried to stoop", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And hide her little palpitating breast", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Amidst the bodies lulled in bloody rest.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Two villainous Cossacques pursued the child", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With flashing eyes and weapons: matched with them,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The rudest brute that roams Siberia’s wild", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Has feelings pure and polished as a gem⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The bear is civilised, the wolf is mild;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And whom for this at last must we condemn?", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their natures? or their sovereigns, who employ", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All arts to teach their subjects to destroy?", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Their sabres glittered o’er her little head,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whence her fair hair rose twining with affright,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Her hidden face was plunged amidst the dead:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "When Juan caught a glimpse of this sad sight,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "I shall not say exactly what he said,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Because it might not solace “ears polite;”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But what he did, was to lay on their backs,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The readiest way of reasoning with Cossacques.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "One’s hip he slashed, and split the other’s shoulder,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And drove them with their brutal yells to seek", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "If there might be chirurgeons who could solder", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The wounds they richly merited, and shriek", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their baffled rage and pain; while waxing colder", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As he turned o’er each pale and gory cheek,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Don Juan raised his little captive from", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The heap a moment more had made her tomb.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And she was chill as they, and on her face", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A slender streak of blood announced how near", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Her fate had been to that of all her race;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For the same blow which laid her mother here", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Had scarred her brow, and left its crimson trace,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As the last link with all she had held dear;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But else unhurt, she opened her large eyes,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And gazed on Juan with a wild surprise.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Just at this instant, while their eyes were fixed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon each other, with dilated glance,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In Juan’s look, pain, pleasure, hope, fear, mixed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With joy to save, and dread of some mischance", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Unto his protégée; while hers, transfixed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With infant terrors, glared as from a trance,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A pure, transparent, pale, yet radiant face,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Like to a lighted alabaster vase:⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Up came John Johnson (I will not say “Jack,”", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For that were vulgar, cold, and common-place", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "On great occasions, such as an attack", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On cities, as hath been the present case):", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Up Johnson came, with hundreds at his back,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Exclaiming⁠—“Juan! Juan! On, boy! brace", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Your arm, and I’ll bet Moscow to a dollar,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That you and I will win St. George’s collar.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "“The Seraskier is knocked upon the head,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But the stone bastion still remains, wherein", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The old Pacha sits among some hundreds dead,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Smoking his pipe quite calmly ’midst the din", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of our artillery and his own: ’tis said", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Our killed, already piled up to the chin,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Lie round the battery; but still it batters,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And grape in volleys, like a vineyard, scatters.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "“Then up with me!”⁠—But Juan answered, “Look", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon this child⁠—I saved her⁠—must not leave", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Her life to chance; but point me out some nook", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of safety, where she less may shrink and grieve,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And I am with you.”⁠—Whereon Johnson took", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A glance around⁠—and shrugged⁠—and twitched his sleeve", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And black silk neckcloth⁠—and replied, “You’re right;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Poor thing! what’s to be done? I’m puzzled quite.”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Said Juan⁠—“Whatsoever is to be", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Done, I’ll not quit her till she seems secure", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of present life a good deal more than we.”⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Quoth Johnson⁠—“Neither will I quite insure;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But at the least you may die gloriously.”⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Juan replied⁠—“At least I will endure", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whate’er is to be borne⁠—but not resign", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This child, who is parentless, and therefore mine.”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Johnson said⁠—“Juan, we’ve no time to lose;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The child’s a pretty child⁠—a very pretty⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "I never saw such eyes⁠—but hark! now choose", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Between your fame and feelings, pride and pity:⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Hark! how the roar increases!⁠—no excuse", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Will serve when there is plunder in a city;⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "I should be loath to march without you, but,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By God! we’ll be too late for the first cut.”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But Juan was immovable; until", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Johnson, who really loved him in his way,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Picked out amongst his followers with some skill", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Such as he thought the least given up to prey,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And, swearing, if the infant came to ill", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That they should all be shot on the next day⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But if she were delivered safe and sound,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They should at least have fifty rubles round,", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And all allowances besides of plunder", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In fair proportion with their comrades;⁠—then", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Juan consented to march on through thunder,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which thinned at every step their ranks of men:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And yet the rest rushed eagerly⁠—no wonder,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For they were heated by the hope of gain,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A thing which happens everywhere each day⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "No hero trusteth wholly to half pay.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And such is Victory, and such is Man!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At least nine tenths of what we call so:⁠—God", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "May have another name for half we scan", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As human beings, or his ways are odd.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But to our subject: a brave Tartar Khan⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or “Sultan,” as the author (to whose nod", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In prose I bend my humble verse) doth call", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This chieftain⁠—somehow would not yield at all:", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But flanked by five brave sons (such is polygamy,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That she spawns warriors by the score, where none", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Are prosecuted for that false crime bigamy),", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He never would believe the city won", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "While Courage clung but to a single twig.⁠—Am I", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Describing Priam’s, Peleus’, or Jove’s son?", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Neither⁠—but a good, plain, old, temperate man,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who fought with his five children in the van.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "To take him was the point.⁠—The truly brave,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "When they behold the brave oppressed with odds,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Are touched with a desire to shield and save;⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A mixture of wild beasts and demi-gods", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Are they⁠—now furious as the sweeping wave,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Now moved with pity: even as sometimes nods", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The rugged tree unto the summer wind,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Compassion breathes along the savage mind.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But he would not be taken, and replied", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To all the propositions of surrender", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "By mowing Christians down on every side,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As obstinate as Swedish Charles at Bender.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His five brave boys no less the foe defied;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whereon the Russian pathos grew less tender", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As being a virtue, like terrestrial patience,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Apt to wear out on trifling provocations.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And spite of Johnson and of Juan, who", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Expended all their Eastern phraseology", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In begging him, for God’s sake, just to show", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So much less fight as might form an apology", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For them in saving such a desperate foe⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He hewed away, like Doctors of Theology", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "When they dispute with sceptics; and with curses", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Struck at his friends, as babies beat their nurses.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Nay, he had wounded, though but slightly, both", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Juan and Johnson; whereupon they fell,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The first with sighs, the second with an oath,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon his angry Sultanship, pell-mell,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And all around were grown exceeding wroth", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At such a pertinacious infidel,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And poured upon him and his sons like rain,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which they resisted like a sandy plain", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "That drinks and still is dry. At last they perished⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His second son was levelled by a shot;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His third was sabred; and the fourth, most cherished", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of all the five, on bayonets met his lot;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The fifth, who, by a Christian mother nourished,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had been neglected, ill-used, and what not,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Because deformed, yet died all game and bottom,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To save a Sire who blushed that he begot him.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The eldest was a true and tameless Tartar,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As great a scorner of the Nazarene", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As ever Muhammad picked out for a martyr,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who only saw the black-eyed girls in green,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Who make the beds of those who won’t take quarter", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On earth, in Paradise; and when once seen,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Those houris, like all other pretty creatures,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Do just whate’er they please, by dint of features.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And what they pleased to do with the young Khan", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In Heaven I know not, nor pretend to guess;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But doubtless they prefer a fine young man", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To tough old heroes, and can do no less;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And that’s the cause no doubt why, if we scan", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A field of battle’s ghastly wilderness,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "For one rough, weather-beaten, veteran body,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "You’ll find ten thousand handsome coxcombs bloody.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Your houris also have a natural pleasure", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In lopping off your lately married men,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Before the bridal hours have danced their measure", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And the sad, second moon grows dim again,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Or dull Repentance hath had dreary leisure", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To wish him back a bachelor now and then:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And thus your Houri (it may be) disputes", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of these brief blossoms the immediate fruits.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Thus the young Khan, with Houris in his sight,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Thought not upon the charms of four young brides,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But bravely rushed on his first heavenly night.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In short, howe’er our better faith derides,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "These black-eyed virgins make the Muslims fight,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As though there were one Heaven and none besides⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Whereas, if all be true we hear of Heaven", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And Hell, there must at least be six or seven.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "So fully flashed the phantom on his eyes,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That when the very lance was in his heart,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "He shouted “Allah!” and saw Paradise", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With all its veil of mystery drawn apart,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And bright Eternity without disguise", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On his soul, like a ceaseless sunrise, dart:⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "With Prophets⁠—Houris⁠—Angels⁠—Saints, descried", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In one voluptuous blaze⁠—and then he died⁠—", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But with a heavenly rapture on his face.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The good old Khan, who long had ceased to see", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Houris, or aught except his florid race,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who grew like cedars round him gloriously⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "When he beheld his latest hero grace", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The earth, which he became like a felled tree,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Paused for a moment from the fight, and cast", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A glance on that slain son, his first and last.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The soldiers, who beheld him drop his point,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Stopped as if once more willing to concede", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Quarter, in case he bade them not “aroynt!”", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As he before had done. He did not heed", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Their pause nor signs: his heart was out of joint,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And shook (till now unshaken) like a reed,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As he looked down upon his children gone,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And felt⁠—though done with life⁠—he was alone.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But ’twas a transient tremor:⁠—with a spring", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Upon the Russian steel his breast he flung,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As carelessly as hurls the moth her wing", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Against the light wherein she dies: he clung", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Closer, that all the deadlier they might wring,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Unto the bayonets which had pierced his young;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And throwing back a dim look on his sons,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In one wide wound poured forth his soul at once.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "’Tis strange enough⁠—the rough, tough soldiers, who", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Spared neither sex nor age in their career", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of carnage, when this old man was pierced through,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And lay before them with his children near,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Touched by the heroism of him they slew,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Were melted for a moment; though no tear", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Flowed from their bloodshot eyes, all red with strife,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They honoured such determined scorn of Life.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But the stone bastion still kept up its fire,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where the chief Pacha calmly held his post:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Some twenty times he made the Russ retire,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And baffled the assaults of all their host;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "At length he condescended to inquire", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "If yet the city’s rest were won or lost;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And being told the latter, sent a Bey", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To answer Ribas’ summons to give way.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "In the mean time, cross-legged, with great sang-froid,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Among the scorching ruins he sat smoking", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Tobacco on a little carpet;⁠—Troy", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Saw nothing like the scene around;⁠—yet looking", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "With martial Stoicism, nought seemed to annoy", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His stern philosophy; but gently stroking", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His beard, he puffed his pipe’s ambrosial gales,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As if he had three lives, as well as tails.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The town was taken⁠—whether he might yield", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Himself or bastion, little mattered now:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His stubborn valour was no future shield.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Ismail’s no more! The Crescent’s silver bow", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Sunk, and the crimson Cross glared o’er the field,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But red with no redeeming gore: the glow", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of burning streets, like moonlight on the water,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was imaged back in blood, the sea of slaughter.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "All that the mind would shrink from of excesses⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All that the body perpetrates of bad;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "All that we read⁠—hear⁠—dream, of man’s distresses⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All that the Devil would do if run stark mad;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "All that defies the worst which pen expresses⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All by which Hell is peopled, or as sad", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As Hell⁠—mere mortals who their power abuse⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was here (as heretofore and since) let loose.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "If here and there some transient trait of pity", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was shown, and some more noble heart broke through", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Its bloody bond, and saved, perhaps, some pretty", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Child, or an agèd, helpless man or two⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "What’s this in one annihilated city,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where thousand loves, and ties, and duties grew?", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Cockneys of London! Muscadins of Paris!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Just ponder what a pious pastime War is.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Think how the joys of reading a Gazette", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Are purchased by all agonies and crimes:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Or if these do not move you, don’t forget", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Such doom may be your own in after-times.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Meantime the Taxes, Castlereagh, and Debt,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Are hints as good as sermons, or as rhymes.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Read your own hearts and Ireland’s present story,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Then feed her famine fat with Wellesley’s glory.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But still there is unto a patriot nation,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which loves so well its country and its King,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A subject of sublimest exultation⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Bear it, ye Muses, on your brightest wing!", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Howe’er the mighty locust, Desolation,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Strip your green fields, and to your harvests cling,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Gaunt famine never shall approach the throne⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Though Ireland starve, great George weighs twenty stone.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But let me put an end unto my theme:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There was an end of Ismail⁠—hapless town!", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Far flashed her burning towers o’er Danube’s stream,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And redly ran his blushing waters down.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The horrid war-whoop and the shriller scream", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Rose still; but fainter were the thunders grown:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of forty thousand who had manned the wall,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Some hundreds breathed⁠—the rest were silent all!", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "In one thing ne’ertheless ’tis fit to praise", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The Russian army upon this occasion,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "A virtue much in fashion now-a-days,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And therefore worthy of commemoration:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The topic’s tender, so shall be my phrase⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Perhaps the season’s chill, and their long station", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In Winter’s depth, or want of rest and victual,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had made them chaste;⁠—they ravished very little.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Much did they slay, more plunder, and no less", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Might here and there occur some violation", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "In the other line;⁠—but not to such excess", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As when the French, that dissipated nation,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Take towns by storm: no causes can I guess,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Except cold weather and commiseration;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But all the ladies, save some twenty score,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Were almost as much virgins as before.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Some odd mistakes, too, happened in the dark,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which showed a want of lanterns, or of taste⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Indeed the smoke was such they scarce could mark", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Their friends from foes⁠—besides such things from haste", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Occur, though rarely, when there is a spark", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of light to save the venerably chaste:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But six old damsels, each of seventy years,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Were all deflowered by different grenadiers.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "But on the whole their continence was great;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So that some disappointment there ensued", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To those who had felt the inconvenient state", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of “single blessedness,” and thought it good", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "(Since it was not their fault, but only fate,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To bear these crosses) for each waning prude", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To make a Roman sort of Sabine wedding,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Without the expense and the suspense of bedding.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Some voices of the buxom middle-aged", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Were also heard to wonder in the din", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "(Widows of forty were these birds long caged)", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "“Wherefore the ravishing did not begin!”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But while the thirst for gore and plunder raged,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There was small leisure for superfluous sin;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But whether they escaped or no, lies hid", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In darkness⁠—I can only hope they did.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Suwarrow now was conqueror⁠—a match", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For Timour or for Zinghis in his trade.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "While mosques and streets, beneath his eyes, like thatch", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Blazed, and the cannon’s roar was scarce allayed,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "With bloody hands he wrote his first despatch;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And here exactly follows what he said:⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "“Glory to God and to the Empress!” (Powers", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Eternal! such names mingled!) “Ismail’s ours.”", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Methinks these are the most tremendous words,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Since “Mene, Mene, Tekel,” and “Upharsin,”", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Which hands or pens have ever traced of swords.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Heaven help me! I’m but little of a parson:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "What Daniel read was short-hand of the Lord’s,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Severe, sublime; the prophet wrote no farce on", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The fate of nations;⁠—but this Russ so witty", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Could rhyme, like Nero, o’er a burning city.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "He wrote this Polar melody, and set it,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Duly accompanied by shrieks and groans,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Which few will sing, I trust, but none forget it⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For I will teach, if possible, the stones", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To rise against Earth’s tyrants. Never let it", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Be said that we still truckle unto thrones;⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But ye⁠—our children’s children! think how we", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Showed what things were before the World was free!", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "That hour is not for us, but ’tis for you:", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And as, in the great joy of your Millennium,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "You hardly will believe such things were true", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As now occur, I thought that I would pen you ’em;", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But may their very memory perish too!⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Yet if perchance remembered, still disdain you ’em", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "More than you scorn the savages of yore,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who painted their bare limbs, but not with gore.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "And when you hear historians talk of thrones,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And those that sate upon them, let it be", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "As we now gaze upon the mammoth’s bones,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And wonder what old world such things could see,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Or hieroglyphics on Egyptian stones,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The pleasant riddles of futurity⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Guessing at what shall happily be hid,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As the real purpose of a pyramid.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "Reader! I have kept my word⁠—at least so far", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As the first Canto promised. You have now", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Had sketches of Love⁠—Tempest⁠—Travel⁠—War⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All very accurate, you must allow,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "And Epic, if plain truth should prove no bar;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For I have drawn much less with a long bow", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Than my forerunners. Carelessly I sing,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But Phoebus lends me now and then a string,", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "With which I still can harp, and carp, and fiddle.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "What further hath befallen or may befall", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "The hero of this grand poetic riddle,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "I by and by may tell you, if at all:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "But now I choose to break off in the middle,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Worn out with battering Ismail’s stubborn wall,", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "While Juan is sent off with the despatch,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For which all Petersburgh is on the watch.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "This special honour was conferred, because", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He had behaved with courage and humanity⁠—", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Which last men like, when they have time to pause", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From their ferocities produced by vanity.", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "His little captive gained him some applause", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For saving her amidst the wild insanity", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Of carnage⁠—and I think he was more glad in her", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Safety, than his new order of St. Vladimir.", "indent": 0 } ], [ { "text": "The Muslim orphan went with her protector,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For she was homeless, houseless, helpless; all", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Her friends, like the sad family of Hector,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had perished in the field or by the wall:", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "Her very place of birth was but a spectre", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of what it had been; there the Muezzin’s call", "indent": 1 }, { "text": "To prayer was heard no more!⁠—and Juan wept,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And made a vow to shield her, which he kept.", "indent": 0 } ] ] }