from Canto XIII

71

But ever and anon, to soothe your vision,
     Fatigued with these hereditary glories,
There rose a Carlo Dolce or a Titian,
     Or wilder groupe of savage Salvatore’s:
Here danced Albano’s boys, and here the sea shone
    In Vernet’s ocean lights; and there the stories
Of martyrs awed, as Spagnoletto tainted
His brush with all the blood of all the sainted.

72

Here sweetly spread a landscape of Lorraine;
     There Rembrandt made his darkness equal light,
Or gloomy Caravaggio’s gloomier stain
    Bronzed o’er some lean and stoic Anchorite:—
But lo! a Teniers woos, and not in vain,
     Your eyes to revel in a livelier sight:
His bell-mouthed goblet makes me feel quite Danish
Or Dutch with thirst—What ho! a flask of Rhenish.

73

Oh, reader! If that thou canst read,—and know,
     ‘Tis not enough to spell, or even to read,
To constitute a reader; there must go
     Virtues of which both you and I have need.
Firstly, begin with the beginning—(though
     That clause is hard); and secondly, proceed;
Thirdly, commence not with the end—or, sinning
In this sort, end at least with the beginning.

74

But, reader, thou hast patient been of late,
     While I, without remorse of rhyme, or fear,
Have built and laid out ground at such a rate,
     Dan Phoebus takes me for an auctioneer.
That Poets were so from their earliest date,
     By Homer’s “Catalogue of Ships,” is clear;
But a mere modern must be moderate—
I spare you then the furniture and plate.

75

The mellow Autumn came, and with it came
     The promised party, to enjoy its sweets.
The corn is cut, the manor full of game;
     The pointer ranges, and the sportsman beats
In russet jacket:—lynx-like is his aim,
     Full grows his bag, and wonderful his feats.
Ah, nutbrown Partridges! Ah, brilliant Pheasants!
And ah, ye Poachers!—’Tis no sport for peasants.

76

An English autumn, though it hath no vines,
    Blushing with Bacchant coronals along
The paths, o’er which the far festoon entwines
     The red grape in the sunny lands of song,
Hath yet a purchased choice of choicest wines;
     The Claret light, and the Madeira strong.
If Britain mourn her bleakness, we can tell her
The very best of vineyards is the cellar.

77

Then, if she hath not that serene decline,
     Which makes the Southern Autumn’s day appear
As if ‘twould to a second spring resign
    The season, rather than to winter drear,—
Of in-door comforts still she hath a mine,—
     The sea-coal fires, the earliest of the year;
Without doors too she may compete in mellow,
As what is lost in green is gained in yellow.

78

And for the effeminate villeggiatura—
     Rife with more horns than hounds—she hath the chase,
So animated that it might allure a
    Saint from his beads to join the jocund race;
Even Nimrod’s self might leave the plains of Dura,
     And wear the Melton jacket for a space:—
If she hath no wild boars, she hath a tame
Preserve of Bores, who ought to be made game.

79

The noble guests, assembled at the Abbey,
     Consisted of—we give the sex the pas—
The Duchess of Fitz-Fulke; the Countess Crabbey;
    The ladies Scilly, Busey;—Miss Eclt,
Miss Bombazeen, Miss Mackstay, Miss O’Tabbey,
    And Mrs. Rabbi, the rich banker’s squaw;
Also the Honourable Mrs. Sleep,
Who look’d a white lamb, yet was a black sheep:

80

With other Countesses of Blank—but rank;
     At once the “lie” and the “lite” of crowds;
Who pass like water filtered in a tank,
     All purged and pious from their native clouds;
Or paper turned to money by the Bank:
     No matter how or why, the passport shrouds
The “passe” and the passed; for good society
Is no less famed for tolerance than piety: