II.

But Time, which brings all beings to their level,

And sharp Adversity, will teach at last
Man,—and, as we would hope,—perhaps the devil,
That neither of their intellects are vast:

While youth's hot wishes in our red veins revel,
We know not this-the blood flows on too fast;
But as the torrent widens towards the ocean,
We ponder deeply on each past emotion.

III.

As boy, I thought myself a clever fellow,

And wish'd that others held the same opinion; They took it up when my days grew more mellow, And other minds acknowledged my dominion: Now my sere fancy "falls into the yellow

"Leaf," and imagination droops her pinion, And the sad truth which hovers o'er my desk Turns what was once romantic to burlesque.

IV.

And if I laugh at any mortal thing,

'Tis that I may not weep; and if I weep,

Tis that our nature cannot always bring

Itself to apathy, which we must steep First in the icy depths of Lethe's spring

Ere what we least wish to behold will sleep: Thetis baptized her mortal son in Styx ;

A mortal mother would on Lethe fix.

V.

Some have accused me of a strange design Against the creed and morals of the land, And trace it in this poem every line:

I don't pretend that I quite understand My own meaning when I would be very fine; But the fact is that I have nothing plann'd, Unless it was to be a moment merry,

A novel word in my vocabulary.

:

VI.

To the kind reader of our sober clime
This way of writing will appear exotic;
Pulci was sire of the half-serious rhyme,

Who sang when chivalry was more Quixotic,

And revell'd in the fancies of the time,

True knights, chaste dames, huge giants, kings despotic;

But all these, save the last, being obsolete,

I chose a modern subject as more meet.

VII.

How I have treated it, I do not know;

Perhaps no better than they have treated me

Who have imputed such designs as show

Not what they saw, but what they wish'd to see;

But if it gives them pleasure, be it so,

This is a liberal age, and thoughts are free:
Meantime Apollo plucks me by the ear,

And tells me to resume my story here.

VIII.

Young Juan and his lady-love were left
To their own hearts' most sweet society;
Even Time the pitiless in sorrow cleft

With his rude scythe such gentle bosoms; he
Sigh'd to behold them of their hours bereft

Though foe to love; and yet they could not be Meant to grow old, but die in happy spring, Before one charm or hope had taken wing.

IX.

Their faces were not made for wrinkles, their
Pure blood to stagnate, their great hearts to fail;
The blank grey was not made to blast their hair,
But like the climes that know nor snow nor hail
They were all summer: lightning might assail
And shiver them to ashes, but to trail

A long and snake-like life of dull decay
Was not for them-they had too little clay.

X.

They were alone once more; for them to be
Thus was another Eden; they were never
Weary, unless when separate: the tree

Cut from its forest root of years-the river
Damm'd from its fountain-the child from the knee
And breast maternal wean'd at once for ever,
Would wither less than these two torn apart;
Alas! there is no instinct like the heart-

XI.

The heart-which may be broken: happy they!
Thrice fortunate! who of that fragile mould,

The precious porcelain of human clay,

Break with the first fall: they can ne'er behold The long year link'd with heavy day on day,

And all which must be borne, and never told; While life's strange principle will often lie Deepest in those who long the most to die.