from Canto II

151

Now Juan could not understand a word,
     Being no Grecian; but he had an ear,
And her voice was the warble of a bird,
     So soft, so sweet, so delicately clear,
That finer, simpler music ne’er was heard;
     The sort of sound we echo with a tear,
Without knowing why—an overpowering tone,
Whence Melody descends as from a throne.

152

And Juan gazed as one who is awoke
     By a distant organ, doubting if he be
Not yet a dreamer, till the spell is broke
     By the watchman, or some such reality,
Or by one’s early valet’s cursed knock;
     At least it is a heavy sound to me,
Who like a morning slumber—for the night
Shows stars and women in a better light.

153

And Juan, too, was help’d out from his dream,
     Or sleep, or whatsoe’er it was, by feeling
A most prodigious appetite: the steam
    Of Zoe’s cookery no doubt was stealing
Upon his senses, and the kindling beam
     Of the new fire, which Zoe kept up, kneeling,
To stir her viands, made him quite awake
And long for food, but chiefly a beef-steak.

154

But beef is rare within these oxless isles;
     Goat’s flesh there is, no doubt, and kid, and mutton;
And, when a holiday upon them smiles,
     A joint upon their barbarous spits they put on:
But this occurs but seldom, between whiles,
     For some of these are rocks with scarce a hut on,
Others are fair and fertile, among which
This, though not large, was one of the most rich.

155

I say that beef is rare, and can’t help thinking
    That the old fable of the Minotaur—
From which our modern morals, rightly shrinking,
     Condemn the royal lady’s taste who wore
A cow’s shape for a mask—was only (sinking
     The allegory) a mere type, no more,
That Pasiphae promoted breeding cattle,
To make the Cretans bloodier in battle.

156

For we all know that English people are
     Fed upon beef—I won’t say much of beer,
Because ‘tis liquor only, and being far
     From this my subject, has no business here;
We know, too, they are very fond of war,
     A pleasure—like all pleasures—rather dear;
So were the Cretans—from which I infer
That beef and battles both were owing to her.

157

But to resume. The languid Juan raised
     His head upon his elbow, and he saw
A sight on which he had not lately gazed,
     As all his latter meals had been quite raw,
Three or four things, for which the Lord he praised,
     And, feeling still the famish’d vulture gnaw,
He fell upon whate’er was offer’d, like
A priest, a shark, an alderman, or pike.

158

He ate, and he was well supplied; and she,
     Who watch’d him like a mother, would have fed
Him past all bounds, because she smiled to see
     Such appetite in one she had deem’d dead:
But Zoe, being older than Haide,
     Knew (by tradition, for she ne’er had read)
That famish’d people must be slowly nurst,
And fed by spoonfuls, else they always burst.

159

And so she took the liberty to state,
     Rather by deeds than words, because the case
Was urgent, that the gentleman, whose fate
     Had made her mistress quit her bed to trace
The sea-shore at this hour, must leave his plate,
     Unless he wish’d to die upon the place—
She snatch’d it, and refused another morsel,
Saying, he had gorged enough to make a horse ill.

160

Next they—he being naked, save a tatter’d
    Pair of scarce decent trowsers—went to work,
And in the fire his recent rags they scatter’d,
     And dress’d him, for the present, like a Turk,
Or Greek—that is, although it not much matter’d,
     Omitting turban, slippers, pistols, dirk,—
They furnish’d him, entire except some stitches,
With a clean shirt, and very spacious breeches.