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XXIII.

Here didst thou dwell, here schemes of pleasure plan, Beneath yon mountain's ever beauteous brow: But now, as if a thing unblest by Man, Thy fairy dwelling is as lone as thou! Here giant weeds a passage scarce allow To halls deserted, portals gaping wide: Fresh lessons to the thinking bosom, how Vain are the pleasaunces on earth supplied; Swept into wrecks anon by Time's ungentle tide!

XXIV.

Behold the hall where chiefs were late convened!! Oh! dome displeasing unto British eye!

With diadem hight foolscap, lo! a fiend,

A little fiend that scoffs incessantly,

There sits in parchment robe array'd, and by
His side is hung a seal and sable scroll,

Where blazon'd glare names known to chivalry,

And sundry signatures adorn the roll,

Whereat the Urchin points and laughs with all his soul.2

The Convention of Cintra was signed in the palace of the Marchese Marialva.["The armistice, the negotiations, the convention itself, and the execution of its provisions, were all commenced, conducted, and concluded, at the distance of thirty miles from Cintra, with which place they had not the slightest connection, political, military, or local; yet Lord Byron has gravely asserted, in prose and verse, that the convention was signed at the Marquis of Marialva's house at Cintra; and the author of The Diary of an Invalid,' improving upon the poet's discovery, detected the stains of the ink spilt by Junot upon the occasion."Napier's History of the Peninsular War.]

2 The passage stood differently in the original MS. Some verses which the poet omitted at the entreaty of his friends can now offend no one, and may perhaps amuse many :

In golden characters right well design'd,
First on the list appeareth one "Junot:

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XXV.

Convention is the dwarfish demon styled
That foil'd the knights in Marialva's dome :
Of brains (if brains they had) he them beguiled,
And turn'd a nation's shallow joy to gloom.
Here Folly dash'd to earth the victor's plume,
And Policy regain'd what arms had lost :
For chiefs like ours in vain may laurels bloom!
Woe to the conqu'ring, not the conquer'd host,
Since baffled Triumph droops on Lusitania's coast!

Then certain other glorious names we find,
Which rhyme compelleth me to place below:
Dull victors! baffled by a vanquish'd foe,
Wheedled by conynge tongues of laurels due,
Stand, worthy of each other, in a row-
Sir Arthur, Harry, and the dizzard Hew
Dalrymple, seely wight, sore dupe of t' other tew.

Convention is the dwarfish demon styled
That foil'd the knights in Marialva's dome :
Of brains (if brains they had) he them beguiled,
And turn'd a nation's shallow joy to gloom.
For well I wot, when first the news did come,
That Vimiera's field by Gaul was lost,
For paragraph ne paper scarce had room,
Such Pæans teemed for our triumphant host,
In Courier, Chronicle, and eke in Morning Post:

But when Convention sent his handy-work,
Pens, tongues, feet, hands, combined in wild uproar;
Mayor, aldermen, laid down the uplifted fork;
The Bench of Bishops half forgot to snore;

Stern Cobbett, who for one whole week forbore

To question aught, once more with transport leapt,
And bit his devilish quill agen, and swore
With foe such treaty never should be kept,

Then burst the blatant beast, and roar'd, and raged, and

slept !

-

"Blatant beast"- a figure for the mob, I think first used by Smollett in his "Adventures of an Atom." Horace has the " bellua multorum capitum: " in England, fortunately enough, the illustrious mobility have not even one.

XXVI.

And ever since that martial synod met,
Britannia sickens, Cintra! at thy name;
And folks in office at the mention fret,

And fain would blush, if blush they could, for shame.
How will posterity the deed proclaim!

Will not our own and fellow-nations sneer,

To view these champions cheated of their fame, By foes in fight o'erthrown, yet victors here, [year? Where Scorn her finger points through many a coming

XXVII.

So deem'd the Childe, as o'er the mountains he
Did take his way in solitary guise :

Sweet was the scene, yet soon he thought to flee,
More restless than the swallow in the skies:
Though here awhile he learn'd to moralize,
For Meditation fix'd at times on him;
And conscious Reason whisper'd to despise
His early youth, misspent in maddest whim;
But as he gazed on truth his aching eyes grew dim.

Thus unto Heaven appeal'd the people: Heaven,
Which loves the lieges of our gracious King,
Decreed, that, ere our generals were forgiven,
Inquiry should be held about the thing.

But Mercy cloak'd the babes beneath her wing;
And as they spared our foes, so spared we them;
(Where was the pity of our sires for Byng? *)
Yet knaves, not idiots, should the law condemn ;
Then live, ye gallant knights! and bless your Judges'
phlegm !

By this query it is not meant that our foolish generals should have been shot, but that Byng might have been spared, though the one suffered and the others escaped, probably for Candide's reason," pour encourager les autres." [See Croker's" Boswell," vol. i. p. 298.; and the Quarterly Review, vol. xxvii. p. 207., where the question, whether the admiral was or was not a political martyr, is treated at large.]

XXVIII.

To horse! to horse! he quits, for ever quits
A scene of peace, though soothing to his soul:
Again he rouses from his moping fits,

But seeks not now the harlot and the bowl.
Onward he flies, nor fix'd as yet the goal
Where he shall rest him on his pilgrimage;
And o'er him many changing scenes must roll
Ere toil his thirst for travel can assuage,
Or he shall calm his breast, or learn experience sage.

XXIX.

Yet Mafra shall one moment claim delay,

Where dwelt of yore the Lusians' luckless queen; 2 And church and court did mingle their array, And mass and revel were alternate seen; Lordlings and freres-ill-sorted fry

ween!

But here the Babylonian whore hath built 3

A dome, where flaunts she in such glorious sheen, That men forget the blood which she hath spilt, And bow the knee to Pomp that loves to varnish guilt.

[" After remaining ten days in Lisbon, we sent our baggage and part of our servants by sea to Gibraltar, and travelled on horseback to Seville; a distance of nearly four hundred miles. The horses are excellent: we rode seventy miles a-day. Eggs and wine, and hard beds, are all the accommodation we found, and, in such torrid weather, quite enough." - B. Letters, 1809.]

2 "Her luckless Majesty went subsequently mad; and Dr. Willis, who so dexterously cudgelled kingly pericraniums, could make nothing of hers.". Byron MS. [The queen laboured under a melancholy kind of derangement, from which she never recovered. She died at the Brazils, in 1816.]

3 The extent of Mafra is prodigious: it contains a palace, convent, and most superb church. The six organs are the most beautiful I ever beheld, in point of decoration: we did not hear them, but were told that their tones were correspondent to their splendour. Mafra is termed the Escurial of Portugal. ["About ten miles to the right of Cintra," says Lord Byron, in a letter to

XXX.

O'er vales that teem with fruits, romantic hills,
(Oh, that such hills upheld a freeborn race!)
Whereon to gaze the eye with joyaunce fills,
Childe Harold wends through many a pleasant
place.

Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase,
And marvel men should quit their easy chair,
The toilsome way, and long, long league to trace,
Oh! there is sweetness in the mountain air,
And life, that bloated Ease can never hope to share.

XXXI.

More bleak to view the hills at length recede,
And, less luxuriant, smoother vales extend;
Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed!
Far as the eye discerns, withouten end,

Spain's realms appear whereon her shepherds tend Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows

Now must the pastor's arm his lambs defend :

For Spain is compass'd by unyielding foes,

And all must shield their all, or share Subjection's

woes.

his mother," is the palace of Mafra, the boast of Portugal, as it might be of any country, in point of magnificence, without elegance. There is a convent annexed: the monks, who possess large revenues, are courteous enough, and understand Latin; so that we had a long conversation. They have a large library, and asked me if the English had any books in their country."-Mafra was erected by John V., in pursuance of a vow, made in a dangerous fit of illness, to found a convent for the use of the poorest friary in the kingdom. Upon inquiry, this poorest was found at Mafra; where twelve Franciscans lived together in a hut. There is a magnificent view of the existing edifice in Finden's " Illustrations."]

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