XXV.

"But after all, what is our present state? 'Tis bad, and may be better-all men's lot. Most men are slaves, none more so than the great, To their own whims and passions, and what not; Society itself, which should create

Kindness, destroys what little we had got:

To feel for none is the true social art

Of the world's stoics-men without a heart."

XXVI.

Just now a black old neutral personage

Of the third sex stepp'd up, and peering over The captives, seem'd to mark their looks, and age, And capabilities, as to discover

If they were fitted for the purposed cage :

No lady e'er is ogled by a lover,
Horse by a blackleg, broadcloth by a tailor,
Fee by a counsel, felon by a jailor,

XXVII.

As is a slave by his intended bidder.

'T is pleasant purchasing our fellow-creatures; And all are to be sold, if you consider

Their passions, and are dext'rous; some by features

Are bought up, others by a warlike leader,

Some by a place—as tend their years or natures;

The most by ready cash-but all have prices,
From crowns to kicks, according to their vices.

XXVIII.

The eunuch having eyed them o'er with care,
Turn'd to the merchant, and began to bid
First but for one, and after for the pair;

They haggled, wrangled, swore, too-so they did! As though they were in a mere christian fair, Cheapening an ox, an ass, a lamb, or kid;

So that their bargain sounded like a battle
For this superior yoke of human cattle.

XXIX.

At last they settled into simple grumbling,
And pulling out reluctant purses, and
Turning each piece of silver o'er, and tumbling
Some down, and weighing others in their hand,
And by mistake sequins with paras jumbling,
Until the sum was accurately scann'd,

And then the merchant giving change, and signing
Receipts in full, began to think of dining.

XXX.

I wonder if his appetite was good;

Or if it were, if also his digestion.

Methinks at meals some odd thoughts might intrude,
And conscience ask a curious sort of question,
About the right divine how far we should

Sell flesh and blood. When dinner has oppress'd one,

I think it is perhaps the gloomiest hour

Which turns up out of the sad twenty-four.

XXXI.

Voltaire says, "No" he tells you that Candide
Found life most tolerable after meals:
He's wrong—unless man were a pig, indeed,
Repletion rather adds to what he feels;

Unless he 's drunk, and then no doubt he 's freed
From his own brain's oppression while it reels. •
Of food I think with Philip's son, or rather
Ammon's (ill pleased with one world and one father);

XXXII.

I think with Alexander, that the act

Of eating, with another act or two,

Makes us feel our mortality in fact

Redoubled; when a roast and a ragout,
And fish, and soup, by some side dishes back'd,
Can give us either pain or pleasure, who
Would pique himself on intellects, whose use
Depends so much upon the gastric juice?

XXXIII.

The other evening ('t was on Friday last)—
This is a fact, and no poetic fable-
Just as my great coat was about me cast,
My hat and gloves still lying on the table,
I heart a shot-'t was eight o'clock scarce past—
And running out as fast as I was able,3

I found the military commandant

Stretch'd in the street, and able scarce to pant.

XXXIV.

Poor fellow! for some reason, surely bad,

They'd slain him with five slugs; and left him there

To perish on the pavement: so I had

Him borne into the house and up the stair,

And stripp'd, and look'd to- -But why should I add
More circumstances? vain was every care;

The man was gone in some Italian quarrel
Kill'd by five bullets from an old gun-barrel.4

XXXV.

I gazed upon him, for I knew him well;

And, though I have seen many corpses, never Saw one, whom such an accident befell,

So calm; though pierced through stomach, heart, and liver, He seem'd to sleep, for you could scarcely tell (As he bled inwardly, no hideous river

Of gore divulged the cause) that he was dead :-
So as I gazed on him, I thought or said—

XXXVI.

"Can this be death? then what is life or death?

Speak!' but he spoke not: wake!' but still he slept : But yesterday and who had mightier breath?

A thousand warriors by his word were kept

In awe he said, as the centurion saith,

6

Go,' and he goeth; come,' and forth he stepp'd.
The trump and bugle till he spake were dumb-
And now nought left him but the muffled drum."

XXXVII.

And they who waited once and worshipp❜d-they
With their rough faces throng'd about the bed,
To gaze once more on the commanding clay

Which for the last though not the first time bled:
And such an end! that he who many a day

Had faced Napoleon's foes until they fled, The foremost in the charge or in the sally, Should now be butcher'd in a civic alley!

XXVIII.

The scars of his old wounds were near his new,
Those honourable scars which brought him fame;
And horrid was the contrast to the view-

But let me quit the theme, as such things claim
Perhaps even more attention than is due

From me: I gazed (as oft I have gazed the same)
To try if I could wrench aught out of death,
Which should confirm, or shake, or make a faith;

XXXIX.

But it was all a mystery. Here we are,

And there we go :-but where? five bits of lead, Or three, or two, or one, send very far!

And is this blood, then, form'd but to be shed?

Can every element our elements mar?

And air-earth-water-fire live-and we dead? We, whose minds comprehend all things? No more; But let us to the story as before.

XL.

The purchaser of Juan and acquaintance
Bore off his bargains to a gilded boat,

Embark'd himself and them, and off they went thence
As fast as oars could pull and water float.
They look'd like persons being led to sentence,

Wondering what next, till the caique was brought
Up in a little creek below a wall

O'ertopp'd with cypresses dark-green and tall.

XLI.

Here their conductor tapping at the wicket
Of a small iron door, 't was open'd, and

He led them onward, first through a low thicket
Flank'd by large groves which tower'd on either hand:
They almost lost their way, and had to pick it—
For night was closing ere they came to land.
The eunuch made a sign to those on board,
Who row'd off, leaving them without a word.

XLII.

As they were plodding on their winding way, Through orange bowers, and jasmine, and so forth (Of which I might have a good deal to say,

There being no such profusion in the North

Of oriental plants, "et cætera,"

But that of late your scribblers think it worth Their while to rear whole hotbeds in their works, Because one poet travell'd 'mongst the Turks) :

XLIII.

As they were threading on their way,

there came

Into Don Juan's head a thought, which he Whisper'd to his companion ;-'t was the same

Which might have then occurr'd to you or me. "Methinks," said he "it would be no great shame If we should strike a stroke to set us free; Let's knock that old black fellow on the head, And march away-'t were easier done than said."

XLIV.

"Yes," said the other, "and when done, what then? How get out? how the devil got we in?

And when we once were fairly out, and when
From Saint Bartholomew we have saved our skin,
To-morrow 'd see us in some other den,

And worse off than we hitherto have been ;
Besides, I'm hungry, and just now would take,
Like Esau, for my birthright a beef-steak.

XLV.

"We must be near some place of man's abode; For the old negro's confidence in creeping, With his two captives, by so queer a road,

Shows that he thinks his friends have not been sleeping; A single cry would bring them all abroad :

'Tis therefore better looking before leaping

And there, you see, this turn has brought us through.
By Jove, a noble palace !-lighted too."

XLVI.

It was indeed a wide extensive building

Which open'd on their view, and o'er the front
There seem'd to be besprent a deal of gilding
And various hues, as is the Turkish wont,-
A gaudy taste; for they are little skill'd in

The arts of which these lands were once the font:
Each villa on the Bosphorus looks a screen
New painted, or a pretty opera-scene.

XLVII.

And nearer as they came, a genial savour

Of certain stews, and roast-meats, and pilaus, Things which in hungry mortals' eyes find favour, Made Juan in his harsh intentions pause,

And

put himself upon his good behaviour:

His friend, too, adding a new saving clause,
Said, "In Heaven's name let 's get some supper now,
And then I'm with you, if you 're for a row."

XLVIII.

Some talk of an appeal unto some passion,
Some to men's feelings, others to their reason:
The last of these was never much the fashion,
For reason thinks all reasoning out of season.
Some speakers whine, and others lay the lash on,
But more or less continue still to tease on,
With arguments according to their "forte ;"
But no one ever dreams of being short.

I

:

XLIX.

But I digress of all appeals,—although
grant the power of pathos, and of gold,
Of beauty, flattery, threats, a shilling,-no
Method 's more sure at moments to take hold
Of the best feelings of mankind, which grow
More tender, as we every day behold,
Than that all-softening, over-powering knell,
The tocsin of the soul-the dinner-bell.