The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 7 | Page 6

_Don Juan_: "Across the stanzas ... we swim forward as over the 'broad backs of the sea;' they break and glitter, hiss and laugh, murmur and move like waves that sound or that subside. There is in them a delicious resistance, an elastic motion, which salt water has and fresh water has not. There is about them a wide wholesome air, full of vivid light and constant wind, which is only felt at sea. Life undulates and Death palpitates in the splendid verse.... This gift of life and variety is the supreme quality of Byron's chief poem" (_A Selection, etc._, by A.C. Swinburne, 1885, p. x.).
Cantos I., II. of _Don Juan_ were reviewed in _Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_, August, 1819, vol. v. pp. 512-518; Cantos III., IV., V., August, 1821, vol. x. pp. 107-115; and Cantos VI., VII., VIII., July, 1823, vol. xiv. pp. 88-92: in the _British Critic_, Cantos I., II. were reviewed August, 1819, vol. xii. pp. 195-205; and Cantos III., IV., V., September, 1821, vol. xvi. pp. 251-256: in the _British Review_, Cantos I., II. were reviewed August, 1819, vol. xiv. pp. 266-268; and Cantos III., IV., V., December, 1821, vol. xviii. pp. 245-265: in the _Examiner_, Cantos I., II. were reviewed October 31, 1819; Cantos III., IV., V., August 26, 1821; and Cantos XV., XVI., March 14 and 21, 1824: in the _Literary Gazette_, Cantos I., II. were reviewed July 17 and 24, 1819; Cantos III., IV., V., August 11 and 18, 1821; Cantos VI., VII., VIII., July 19, 1823; Cantos IX., X., XL, September 6, 1823; Cantos XII., XIII., XIV., December 6, 1823; and Cantos XV., XVI., April 3, 1824: in the _Monthly Review_., Cantos I., II. were reviewed July, 1819, Enlarged Series, vol. 89, p. 309; Cantos III., IV., V., August, 1821, vol. 95, p. 418; Cantos VI., VII., VIII., July, 1823, vol. 101, p. 316; Cantos IX., X., XI., October, 1823, vol. 102, p. 217; Cantos XII., XIII., XIV., vol. 103, p. 212; and Cantos XV., XVI., April, 1824, vol. 103, p. 434: in the _New Monthly Magazine_, Cantos I., II. were reviewed August, 1819, vol. xii. p. 75. See, too, an article on the "Morality of _Don Juan_," _Dublin University Magazine_, May, 1875, vol. lxxxv. pp. 630-637.
Neither the _Quarterly_ nor the _Edinburgh Review_ devoted separate articles to _Don Juan_; but Heber, in the _Quarterly Review_ (Lord Byron's _Dramas_), July, 1822, vol. xxvii. p. 477, and Jeffrey, in the _Edinburgh Review_ (Lord Byron's _Tragedies_), February, 1822, vol. 36, pp. 446-450, took occasion to pass judgment on the poem and its author.
For the history of the legend, see _History of Spanish Literature_, by George Ticknor, 1888, vol. ii. pp. 380, 381; and _Das Kloster_, von J. Scheible, 1846, vol. iii. pp. 663-765. See, too, _Notes sur le Don Juanisme_, par Henri de Bruchard, _Mercure de France_, Avril, 1898, vol. xxvi. pp. 58-73; and _Don Juan_, par Gustave Kahn, _Revue?Encyclop��dique_, 1898, tom. viii. pp. 326-329.
DON JUAN.
FRAGMENT?ON THE BACK OF THE MS. OF CANTO I.
I WOULD to Heaven that I were so much clay,?As I am blood, bone, marrow, passion, feeling--?Because at least the past were passed away,?And for the future--(but I write this reeling,?Having got drunk exceedingly to-day,?So that I seem to stand upon the ceiling)?I say--the future is a serious matter--?And so--for God's sake--hock and soda-water!
DEDICATION.[1]
I.
BOB SOUTHEY! You're a poet--Poet-laureate,?And representative of all the race;?Although 't is true that you turned out a Tory at?Last,--yours has lately been a common case;?And now, my Epic Renegade! what are ye at??With all the Lakers, in and out of place??A nest of tuneful persons, to my eye?Like "four and twenty Blackbirds in a pye;
II.
"Which pye being opened they began to sing,"?(This old song and new simile holds good),?"A dainty dish to set before the King,"?Or Regent, who admires such kind of food;--?And Coleridge, too, has lately taken wing,?But like a hawk encumbered with his hood,--?Explaining Metaphysics to the nation--?I wish he would explain his Explanation.[2]
III.
You, Bob! are rather insolent, you know,?At being disappointed in your wish?To supersede all warblers here below,?And be the only Blackbird in the dish;?And then you overstrain yourself, or so,?And tumble downward like the flying fish?Gasping on deck, because you soar too high, Bob,?And fall, for lack of moisture, quite a-dry, Bob![3]
IV.
And Wordsworth, in a rather long "Excursion,"?(I think the quarto holds five hundred pages),?Has given a sample from the vasty version?Of his new system[4] to perplex the sages;?'T is poetry-at least by his assertion,?And may appear so when the dog-star rages--?And he who understands it would be able?To add a story to the Tower of Babel.
V.
You--Gentlemen! by dint of long seclusion?From better company, have kept your own?At Keswick, and, through still continued fusion?Of one another's minds, at last have grown?To deem as a most logical conclusion,?That Poesy has wreaths for you alone:?There is