from Canto IV

41

It has a strange quick jar upon the ear,
     That cocking of a pistol, when you know
A moment more will bring the sight to bear
     Upon your person, twelve yards off, or so;
A gentlemanly distance, not too near,
     If you have got a former friend for foe;
But after being fired at once or twice,
The ear becomes more Irish, and less nice.

42

Lambro presented, and one instant more
     Had stopp’d this Canto, and Don Juan’s breath,
When Haide threw herself her boy before;
     Stern as her sire: “On me,” she cried, “let death
Descend—the fault is mine; this fatal shore
     He found—but sought not. I have pledged my faith;
I love him—I will die with him: I knew
Your nature’s firmness—know your daughter’s too.”

43

A minute past, and she had been all tears,
     And tenderness, and infancy: but now
She stood as one who champion’d human fears—
     Pale, statue-like, and stern, she woo’d the blow;
And tall beyond her sex, and their compeers,
     She drew up to her height, as if to show
A fairer mark; and with a fix’d eye scann’d
Her father’s face—but never stopp’d his hand.

44

He gazed on her, and she on him; ‘twas strange
     How like they looked! the expression was the same;
Serenely savage, with a little change
     In the large dark eye’s mutual-darted flame;
For she too was as one who could avenge,
    If cause should be—a lioness, though tame:
Her father’s blood before her father’s face
Boil’d up, and proved her truly of his race.

45

I said they were alike, their features and
     Their stature differing but in sex and years;
Even to the delicacy of their hand
     There was resemblance, such as true blood wears;
And now to see them, thus divided, stand
     In fix’d ferocity, when joyous tears,
And sweet sensations, should have welcomed both,
Show what the passions are in their full growth.

46

The father paused a moment, then withdrew
     His weapon, and replaced it; but stood still,
And looking on her, as to look her through,
     “Not I,” he said, “have sought this stranger’s ill;
Not I have made this desolation: few
     Would bear such outrage, and forbear to kill;
But I must do my duty—how thou hast
Done thine, the present vouches for the past.

47

“Let him disarm; or, by my father’s head,
     His own shall roll before you like a ball!”
He raised his whistle, as the word he said,
     And blew; another answered to the call,
And rushing in disorderly, though led,
     And arm’d from boot to turban, one and all,
Some twenty of his train came, rank on rank;
He gave the word, “Arrest or slay the Frank.”

48

Then, with a sudden movement, he withdrew
     His daughter; while compress’d within his clasp,
‘Twixt her and Juan interposed the crew;
     In vain she struggled in her father’s grasp—
His arms were like a serpent’s coil: then flew
     Upon their prey, as darts an angry asp,
The file of pirates; save the foremost, who
Had fallen, with his right shoulder half cut through.

49

The second had his cheek laid open; but
    The third, a wary, cool old sworder, took
The blows upon his cutlass, and then put
     His own well in; so well, ere you could look,
His man was floor’d, and helpless at his foot,
     With the blood running like a little brook
From two smart sabre gashes, deep and red—
One on the arm, the other on the head.

50

And then they bound him where he fell, and bore
     Juan from the apartment: with a sign
Old Lambro bade them take him to the shore,
     Where lay some ships which were to sail at nine.
They laid him in a boat, and plied the oar
    Until they reach’d some galliots, placed in line;
On board of one of these, and under hatches,
They stowed him, with strict orders to the watches.