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XXXII.

Fair Florence found, in sooth with some amaze, One who, 't was said, still sigh'd to all he saw, Withstand, unmoved, the lustre of her gaze, Which others hail'd with real or mimic awe, Their hope, their doom, their punishment, their law; All that gay Beauty from her bondsmen claims: And much she marvell'd that a youth so raw Nor felt, nor feign'd at least, the oft-told flames, Which, though sometimes they frown, yet rarely anger dames.

XXXIII.

Little knew she that seeming marble heart,
Now mask'd in silence or withheld by pride,
Was not unskilful in the spoiler's art, 2
And spread its snares licentious far and wide; $
Nor from the base pursuit had turn'd aside,
As long as aught was worthy to pursue:
But Harold on such arts no more relied;
And had he doted on those eyes so blue,

Yet never would he join the lover's whining crew.

[For an account of this accomplished but eccentric lady, whose acquaintance the poet formed at Malta, see Miscellaneous Poems, September, 1809, "To Florence."-" In one so imaginative as Lord Byron, who, while he infused so much of his life into his poetry, mingled also not a little of poetry with his life, it is dif ficult," says Moore, “in unravelling the texture of his feelings, to distinguish at all times between the fanciful and the real. His description here, for instance, of the unmoved and 'loveless heart,' with which he contemplated even the charms of this attractive son, is wholly at variance with the statements in many of his ; and, above all, with one of the most graceful of his lesser poems, addressed to this same lady, during a thunder-storm on his road to Zitza."]

2 [Against this line it is sufficient to set the poet's own declaration, in 1821" I am not a Joseph, nor a Scipio; but I can safely affirm, that I never in my life seduced any woman."]

3" We have here another instance of his propensity to selfmisrepresentation. However great might have been the irregu

XXXIV.

Not much he kens, I ween, of woman's breast,
Who thinks that wanton thing is won by sighs;
What careth she for hearts when once possess'd?
Do proper homage to thine idol's eyes;
But not too humbly, or she will despise

Thee and thy suit, though told in moving tropes :
Disguise ev'n tenderness, if thou art wise;

Brisk Confidence still best with woman copes: Pique her and soothe in turn, soon Passion crowns thy hopes.

XXXV.

'Tis an old lesson; Time approves it true,
And those who know it best, deplore it most;
When all is won that all desire to woo,

The paltry prize is hardly worth the cost:
Youth wasted, minds degraded, honour lost,
These are thy fruits, successful Passion! these !
If, kindly cruel, early Hope is crost,

Still to the last it rankles, a disease,

Not to be cured when Love itself forgets to please.

XXXVI.

Away ! nor let me loiter in my song,

For we have many a mountain-path to tread,
And many a varied shore to sail along,
By pensive Sadness, not by Fiction, led-
Climes, fair withal as ever mortal head
Imagined in its little schemes of thought;
Or e'er in new Utopias were ared,

To teach man what he might be, or he ought;

If that corrupted thing could ever such be taught.

larities of his college life, such phrases as 'the spoiler's art,' and 'spreading snares,' were in no wise applicable to them." MOORE.]

1["Brisk Impudence," &c. - MS ]

XXXVII.

Dear Nature is the kindest mother still,
Though always changing, in her aspect mild;
From her bare bosom let me take

my fill, Her never-wean'd, though not her favour'd child. Oh! she is fairest in her features wild,

Where nothing polish'd dares pollute her path:
To me by day or night she ever smiled,

Though I have mark'd her when none other hath, And sought her more and more, and loved her best in wrath.

XXXVIII.

Land of Albania! where Iskander rose,

Theme of the young, and beacon of the wise, And he his namesake, whose oft-baffled foes Shrunk from his deeds of chivalrous emprize : Land of Albania! 1 let me bend mine eyes On thee, thou rugged nurse of savage men! The cross descends, thy minarets arise, And the pale crescent sparkles in the glen, Through many a cypress grove within each city's ken.

XXXIX.

Childe Harold sail'd, and pass'd the barren spot,
Where sad Penelope o'erlook'd the wave; 2
And onward view'd the mount, not yet forgot,
The lover's refuge, and the Lesbian's grave.

! See Appendix, Note [B],

2 Ithaca." Sept. 24th," says Mr. Hobhouse, "we were in the channel, with Ithaca, then in the hands of the French, to the west of us. We were close to it, and saw a few shrubs on a brown heathy land, two little towns in the hills, scattered amongst trees, and a windmill or two, with a tower on the heights. That Ithaca was not very strongly garrisoned you will easily believe, when I tell, that a month afterwards, when the Ionian Islands were invested by a British squadron, it was surrendered into the hands of a sergeant and seven men." For a very curious account of the state of the kingdom of Ulysses in 1816, see Williams's Travels, vol. ii. p. 427.]

Dark Sappho could not verse immortal save
That breast imbued with such immortal fire?
Could she not live who life eternal gave?

If life eternal may await the lyre,

That only Heaven to which Earth's children may aspire.

XL.

1

'Twas on a Grecian autumn's gentle eve
Childe Harold hail'd Leucadia's cape afar;
A spot he longed to see, nor cared to leave:
Oft did he mark the scenes of vanish'd war,
Actium, Lepanto, fatal Trafalgar ; 2
Mark them unmoved, for he would not delight
(Born beneath some remote inglorious star)
In themes of bloody fray, or gallant fight,

[wight. But loathed the bravo's trade, and laughed at martial

XLI.

But when he saw the evening star above Leucadia's far-projecting rock of woe, And hail'd the last resort of fruitless love, He felt, or deem'd he felt, no common glow : And as the stately vessel glided slow Beneath the shadow of that ancient mount, He watch'd the billows' melancholy flow, And, sunk albeit in thought as he was wont, More placid seem'd his eye, and smooth his pallid front. 3

Leucadia, now Santa Maura. From the promontory (the Lover's Leap) Sappho is said to have thrown herself. - Sept. 28th, we doubled the promontory of Santa Maura, and saw the precipice which the fate of Sappho, the poetry of Ovid, and the rocks so formidable to the ancient mariners, have made for ever memorable."- HOBHOUSE.]

2 Actium and Trafalgar need no further mention. The battle of Lepanto, equally bloody and considerable, but less known, was fought in the Gulf of Patras. Here the author of Don Quixote lost his left hand.

3 ["And roused him more from thought than he was wont, While Pleasure almost seemed to smooth his placid front.❤

-MS.]

XLII.

Morn dawns; and with it stern Albania's hills, Dark Suli's rocks, and Pindus' inland peak, Robed half in mist, bedew'd with snowy rills, Array'd in many a dun and purple streak, Arise; and, as the clouds along them break, Disclose the dwelling of the mountaineer: Here roams the wolf, the eagle whets his beak, Birds, beasts of prey, and wilder men appear, And gathering storms around convulse the closing year.

XLIII.

Now Harold felt himself at length alone,
And bade to Christian tongues a long adieu;
Now he adventured on a shore unknown,
Which all admire, but many dread to view:

His breast was arm'd 'gainst fate, his wants were few;
Peril he sought not, but ne'er shrank to meet :
The scene was savage, but the scene was new;
This made the ceaseless toil of travel sweet,

Beat back keen winter's blast, and welcomed summer's heat.

XLIV.

Here the red cross, for still the cross is here,
Though sadly scoff'd at by the circumcised,
Forgets that pride to pamper'd priesthood dear;
Churchman and votary alike despised.
Foul Superstition! howsoe'er disguised,
Idol, saint, virgin, prophet, crescent, cross,
For whatsoever symbol thou art prized,

Thou sacerdotal gain, but general loss!

Who from true worship's gold can separate thy dross?

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