Don Juan Part 27

And these he call'd on; and, what 's strange, they came Unto his call, unlike 'the spirits from The vasty deep,' to whom you may exclaim, Says Hotspur, long ere they will leave their home.

Their reasons were uncertainty, or shame At shrinking from a bullet or a bomb, And that odd impulse, which in wars or creeds Makes men, like cattle, follow him who leads.

By Jove! he was a n.o.ble fellow, Johnson, And though his name, than Ajax or Achilles, Sounds less harmonious, underneath the sun soon We shall not see his likeness: he could kill his Man quite as quietly as blows the monsoon Her steady breath (which some months the same still is): Seldom he varied feature, hue, or muscle, And could be very busy without bustle;

And therefore, when he ran away, he did so Upon reflection, knowing that behind He would find others who would fain be rid so Of idle apprehensions, which like wind Trouble heroic stomachs. Though their lids so Oft are soon closed, all heroes are not blind, But when they light upon immediate death, Retire a little, merely to take breath.

But Johnson only ran off, to return With many other warriors, as we said, Unto that rather somewhat misty bourn, Which Hamlet tells us is a pa.s.s of dread.

To Jack howe'er this gave but slight concern: His soul (like galvanism upon the dead) Acted upon the living as on wire, And led them back into the heaviest fire.

Egad! they found the second time what they The first time thought quite terrible enough To fly from, malgre all which people say Of glory, and all that immortal stuff Which fills a regiment (besides their pay, That daily s.h.i.+lling which makes warriors tough)-- They found on their return the self-same welcome, Which made some think, and others know, a h.e.l.l come.

They fell as thick as harvests beneath hail, Gra.s.s before scythes, or corn below the sickle, Proving that trite old truth, that life 's as frail As any other boon for which men stickle.

The Turkish batteries thrash'd them like a flail, Or a good boxer, into a sad pickle Putting the very bravest, who were knock'd Upon the head, before their guns were c.o.c.k'd.

The Turks, behind the traverses and flanks Of the next bastion, fired away like devils, And swept, as gales sweep foam away, whole ranks: However, Heaven knows how, the Fate who levels Towns, nations, worlds, in her revolving pranks, So order'd it, amidst these sulphury revels, That Johnson and some few who had not scamper'd, Reach'd the interior talus of the rampart.

First one or two, then five, six, and a dozen, Came mounting quickly up, for it was now All neck or nothing, as, like pitch or rosin, Flame was shower'd forth above, as well 's below, So that you scarce could say who best had chosen, The gentlemen that were the first to show Their martial faces on the parapet, Or those who thought it brave to wait as yet.

But those who scaled, found out that their advance Was favour'd by an accident or blunder: The Greek or Turkish Cohorn's ignorance Had palisado'd in a way you 'd wonder To see in forts of Netherlands or France (Though these to our Gibraltar must knock under)-- Right in the middle of the parapet Just named, these palisades were primly set:

So that on either side some nine or ten Paces were left, whereon you could contrive To march; a great convenience to our men, At least to all those who were left alive, Who thus could form a line and fight again; And that which farther aided them to strive Was, that they could kick down the palisades, Which scarcely rose much higher than gra.s.s blades.

Among the first,--I will not say the first, For such precedence upon such occasions Will oftentimes make deadly quarrels burst Out between friends as well as allied nations: The Briton must be bold who really durst Put to such trial John Bull's partial patience, As say that Wellington at Waterloo Was beaten--though the Prussians say so too;--

And that if Blucher, Bulow, Gneisenau, And G.o.d knows who besides in 'au' and 'ow,'

Had not come up in time to cast an awe Into the hearts of those who fought till now As tigers combat with an empty craw, The Duke of Wellington had ceased to show His orders, also to receive his pensions, Which are the heaviest that our history mentions.

But never mind;--'G.o.d save the king!' and kings!

For if he don't, I doubt if men will longer-- I think I hear a little bird, who sings The people by and by will be the stronger: The veriest jade will wince whose harness wrings So much into the raw as quite to wrong her Beyond the rules of posting,--and the mob At last fall sick of imitating Job.

At first it grumbles, then it swears, and then, Like David, flings smooth pebbles 'gainst a giant; At last it takes to weapons such as men s.n.a.t.c.h when despair makes human hearts less pliant.

Then comes 'the tug of war;'--'t will come again, I rather doubt; and I would fain say 'fie on 't,'

If I had not perceived that revolution Alone can save the earth from h.e.l.l's pollution.

But to continue:--I say not the first, But of the first, our little friend Don Juan Walk'd o'er the walls of Ismail, as if nursed Amidst such scenes--though this was quite a new one To him, and I should hope to most. The thirst Of glory, which so pierces through and through one, Pervaded him--although a generous creature, As warm in heart as feminine in feature.

And here he was--who upon woman's breast, Even from a child, felt like a child; howe'er The man in all the rest might be confest, To him it was Elysium to be there; And he could even withstand that awkward test Which Rousseau points out to the dubious fair, 'Observe your lover when he leaves your arms;'

But Juan never left them, while they had charms,

Unless compell'd by fate, or wave, or wind, Or near relations, who are much the same.

But here he was!--where each tie that can bind Humanity must yield to steel and flame: And he whose very body was all mind, Flung here by fate or circ.u.mstance, which tame The loftiest, hurried by the time and place, Dash'd on like a spurr'd blood-horse in a race.

So was his blood stirr'd while he found resistance, As is the hunter's at the five-bar gate, Or double post and rail, where the existence Of Britain's youth depends upon their weight, The lightest being the safest: at a distance He hated cruelty, as all men hate Blood, until heated--and even then his own At times would curdle o'er some heavy groan.

The General Lascy, who had been hard press'd, Seeing arrive an aid so opportune As were some hundred youngsters all abreast, Who came as if just dropp'd down from the moon, To Juan, who was nearest him, address'd His thanks, and hopes to take the city soon, Not reckoning him to be a 'base Bezonian'

(As Pistol calls it), but a young Livonian.

Juan, to whom he spoke in German, knew As much of German as of Sanscrit, and In answer made an inclination to The general who held him in command; For seeing one with ribands, black and blue, Stars, medals, and a b.l.o.o.d.y sword in hand, Addressing him in tones which seem'd to thank, He recognised an officer of rank.

Short speeches pa.s.s between two men who speak No common language; and besides, in time Of war and taking towns, when many a shriek Rings o'er the dialogue, and many a crime Is perpetrated ere a word can break Upon the ear, and sounds of horror chime In like church-bells, with sigh, howl, groan, yell, prayer, There cannot be much conversation there.

And therefore all we have related in Two long octaves, pa.s.s'd in a little minute; But in the same small minute, every sin Contrived to get itself comprised within it.

The very cannon, deafen'd by the din, Grew dumb, for you might almost hear a linnet, As soon as thunder, 'midst the general noise Of human nature's agonising voice!

The town was enter'd. Oh eternity!- 'G.o.d made the country and man made the town,'

So Cowper says--and I begin to be Of his opinion, when I see cast down Rome, Babylon, Tyre, Carthage, Nineveh, All walls men know, and many never known; And pondering on the present and the past, To deem the woods shall be our home at last

Of all men, saving Sylla the man-slayer, Who pa.s.ses for in life and death most lucky, Of the great names which in our faces stare, The General Boon, back-woodsman of Kentucky, Was happiest amongst mortals anywhere; For killing nothing but a bear or buck, he Enjoy'd the lonely, vigorous, harmless days Of his old age in wilds of deepest maze.

Crime came not near him--she is not the child Of solitude; Health shrank not from him--for Her home is in the rarely trodden wild, Where if men seek her not, and death be more Their choice than life, forgive them, as beguiled By habit to what their own hearts abhor-- In cities caged. The present case in point I Cite is, that Boon lived hunting up to ninety;

And what 's still stranger, left behind a name For which men vainly decimate the throng, Not only famous, but of that good fame, Without which glory 's but a tavern song-- Simple, serene, the antipodes of shame, Which hate nor envy e'er could tinge with wrong; An active hermit, even in age the child Of Nature, or the man of Ross run wild.

'T is true he shrank from men even of his nation, When they built up unto his darling trees,-- He moved some hundred miles off, for a station Where there were fewer houses and more ease; The inconvenience of civilisation Is, that you neither can be pleased nor please; But where he met the individual man, He show'd himself as kind as mortal can.

He was not all alone: around him grew A sylvan tribe of children of the chase, Whose young, unwaken'd world was ever new, Nor sword nor sorrow yet had left a trace On her unwrinkled brow, nor could you view A frown on Nature's or on human face; The free-born forest found and kept them free, And fresh as is a torrent or a tree.

And tall, and strong, and swift of foot were they, Beyond the dwarfing city's pale abortions, Because their thoughts had never been the prey Of care or gain: the green woods were their portions; No sinking spirits told them they grew grey, No fas.h.i.+on made them apes of her distortions; Simple they were, not savage; and their rifles, Though very true, were not yet used for trifles.

Motion was in their days, rest in their slumbers, And cheerfulness the handmaid of their toil; Nor yet too many nor too few their numbers; Corruption could not make their hearts her soil; The l.u.s.t which stings, the splendour which enc.u.mbers, With the free foresters divide no spoil; Serene, not sullen, were the solitudes Of this unsighing people of the woods.

So much for Nature:--by way of variety, Now back to thy great joys, Civilisation!

And the sweet consequence of large society, War, pestilence, the despot's desolation, The kingly scourge, the l.u.s.t of notoriety, The millions slain by soldiers for their ration, The scenes like Catherine's boudoir at threescore, With Ismail's storm to soften it the more.

The town was enter'd: first one column made Its sanguinary way good--then another; The reeking bayonet and the flas.h.i.+ng blade Clash'd 'gainst the scimitar, and babe and mother With distant shrieks were heard Heaven to upbraid: Still closer sulphury clouds began to smother The breath of morn and man, where foot by foot The madden'd Turks their city still dispute.

Koutousow, he who afterward beat back (With some a.s.sistance from the frost and snow) Napoleon on his bold and b.l.o.o.d.y track, It happen'd was himself beat back just now; He was a jolly fellow, and could crack His jest alike in face of friend or foe, Though life, and death, and victory were at stake; But here it seem'd his jokes had ceased to take:

For having thrown himself into a ditch, Follow'd in haste by various grenadiers, Whose blood the puddle greatly did enrich, He climb'd to where the parapet appears; But there his project reach'd its utmost pitch ('Mongst other deaths the General Ribaupierre's Was much regretted), for the Moslem men Threw them all down into the ditch again.

And had it not been for some stray troops landing They knew not where, being carried by the stream To some spot, where they lost their understanding, And wander'd up and down as in a dream, Until they reach'd, as daybreak was expanding, That which a portal to their eyes did seem,-- The great and gay Koutousow might have lain Where three parts of his column yet remain.

And scrambling round the rampart, these same troops, After the taking of the 'Cavalier,'

Just as Koutousow's most 'forlorn' of 'hopes'

Took like chameleons some slight tinge of fear, Open'd the gate call'd 'Kilia,' to the groups Of baffled heroes, who stood shyly near, Sliding knee-deep in lately frozen mud, Now thaw'd into a marsh of human blood.

The Kozacks, or, if so you please, Cossacques (I don't much pique myself upon orthography, So that I do not grossly err in facts, Statistics, tactics, politics, and geography)-- Having been used to serve on horses' backs, And no great dilettanti in topography Of fortresses, but fighting where it pleases Their chiefs to order,--were all cut to pieces.

Their column, though the Turkish batteries thunder'd Upon them, ne'ertheless had reach'd the rampart, And naturally thought they could have plunder'd The city, without being farther hamper'd; But as it happens to brave men, they blunder'd-- The Turks at first pretended to have scamper'd, Only to draw them 'twixt two bastion corners, From whence they sallied on those Christian scorners.

Then being taken by the tail--a taking Fatal to bishops as to soldiers--these Cossacques were all cut off as day was breaking, And found their lives were let at a short lease-- But perish'd without s.h.i.+vering or shaking, Leaving as ladders their heap'd carca.s.ses, O'er which Lieutenant-Colonel Yesouskoi March'd with the brave battalion of Polouzki:--

This valiant man kill'd all the Turks he met, But could not eat them, being in his turn Slain by some Mussulmans, who would not yet, Without resistance, see their city burn.

The walls were won, but 't was an even bet Which of the armies would have cause to mourn: 'T was blow for blow, disputing inch by inch, For one would not retreat, nor t' other flinch.

Another column also suffer'd much:-- And here we may remark with the historian, You should but give few cartridges to such Troops as are meant to march with greatest glory on: When matters must be carried by the touch Of the bright bayonet, and they all should hurry on, They sometimes, with a hankering for existence, Keep merely firing at a foolish distance.

A junction of the General Meknop's men (Without the General, who had fallen some time Before, being badly seconded just then) Was made at length with those who dared to climb The death-disgorging rampart once again; And though the Turk's resistance was sublime, They took the bastion, which the Seraskier Defended at a price extremely dear.