When, gazing on them, mystified by distance, We enter on our nautical existence. XIII. {swore, So Juan stood, bewilder'd, on the deck: The wind sung, cordage strain'd, and sailors And the ship creak'd, the town became a speck, From which away so fair and fast they bore. The best of remedies is a beefsteak Against sea-sickness: try it, sir, before You sneer, and I assure you this is true, For I have found it answer-so may you. XIV. Don Juan stood, and gazing from the stern, A kind of shock that sets one's heart ajar: At leaving even the most unpleasant people And places, one keeps looking at the steeple. XV. But Juan had got many things to leave, His mother, and a mistress, and no wife, So that he had much better cause to grieve Than many persons more advanced in life; And if we now and then a sigh must heave At quitting even those we quit in strife, No doubt we weep for those the heart endearsThat is, till deeper griefs congeal our tears. XVI. So Juan wept, as wept the captive Jews By Babel's waters, still remembering Sion: I'd weep, but mine is not a weeping Muse, And such light griefs are not a thing to die on : Young men should travel, if but to amuse Themselves; and the next time their servants tie on Behind their carriages their new portmanteau, XVII. And Juan wept, and much he sigh'd, and thought, While his salt tears dropp'd into the salt sea, 'Sweets to the sweet ;' (I like so much to quote; You must excuse this extract-'tis where she, The queen of Denmark, for Ophelia brought . Flowers to the grave); and, sobbing often, he Reflected on his present situation, And seriously resolved on reformation. XVIII. Farewell, my Spain! a long farewell!' he cried; But die, as many an exiled heart hath died, ΧΙΧ. And oh! if e'er I should forget, I swear-But that's impossible, and cannot be ; Sooner shall this blue ocean melt to air, Sooner shall earth resolve itself to sea, Than I resign thine image, oh, my fair! XX. 'Sooner shall heaven kiss earth (here he fell sicker)--Oh, Julia! what is every other woe? (For God's sake, let me have a glass of liquor; Pedro, Battista, help me down below)--Julia, my love! (you rascal, Pedro, quicker)→ Oh, Julia this curst vessel pitches so)→ Beloved Julia, hear me still beseeching! (Here he grew inarticulate with retching.) XXI. He felt that chilling heaviness of heart, The loss of love, the treachery of friends. Of us dies with them, as each fond hope ends: No doubt he would have been much more pathetic, But the sea acted as a strong emetic. XXII. Love's a capricious power: I've known it hold But vulgar illnesses don't like to meet, But worst of all is nausea, or a pain About the lower regions of the bowels; Love, who heroically breathes a vein, Shrinks from the application of hot towels, Could Juan's passion, while the billows roar, There's nought, no doubt, so much the spirit calms Of all the luckless landsmen's sea-sick maws: Perhaps more mischief had been done, but for It with a pair of pistols; and their fears, Of fire than water, spite of oaths and tears, Kept still aloof the crew, who, ere they sunk, Thought it would be becoming to die drunk. XXXVI. 'Give us more grog,' they cried, for it will be All one an hour hence.' Juan answer'd, 'No! The good old gentleman was quite aghast, Irrevocable vow of reformation: In cloisters of the classic Salamanca, But now there came a flash of hope once more; LXVI. 'Tis thus with people in an open boat, LXVII. But man is a carnivorous production, And must have meals, at least one meal a day; He cannot live, like woodcocks, upon suction, But, like the shark and tiger, must have prey: Although his anatomical construction Bears vegetables, in a grumbling way, And thus it was with this our hapless crew; LXIX. The consequence was easily foreseen They ate up all they had, and drank their wine, In spite of all remonstrances, and then On what, in fact, next day were they to dine? They hoped the wind would rise, these foolish men! And carry them to shore; these hopes were fine, But as they had but one oar, and that brittle, It would have been more wise to save their victual. LXX. The fourth day came, but not a breath of air, And Ocean slumber'd like an unwean'd child; The fifth day, and their boat lay floating there, The sea and sky were blue, and clear, and mildWith their one oar (I wish they had had a pair) What could they do? and hunger's rage grew So Juan's spaniel, spite of his entreating, [wild: Was kill'd, and portion'd out for present eating. LXXI.. On the sixth day they fed upon his hide, The creature was his father's dog that died, LXXII. The seventh day, and no wind-the burning sun Blister'd and scorch'd, and, stagnant on the sea, They lay like carcases; and hope was none, Save in the breeeze that came not: savagely They glared upon each other-all was done, Water, and wine, and food; and you might see The longings of the cannibal arise (Although they spoke not) in their wolfish eyes. An ominous, and wild, and desperate sound; But ere they came to this, they that day shared LXXV. The lots mere made, and mark'd, and mix'd, and handed In silent horror, and their distribution Lull'd even the savage hunger which demanded, Like the Promethean vulture, this pollution; None in particular had sought or plann'd it, 'Twas nature gnaw'd them to this resolution, By which none were permitted to be neuterAnd the lot fell on Juan's luckless tutor. LXXVI. He but requested to be bled to death: Like most, in the belief in which they're bred; LXXVII. The surgeon, as there was no other fee, And such things as the entrails and the braius Regaled two sharks, who follow'd o'er the billowThe sailors ate the rest of poor Pedrillo. LXXVIII. The sailors ate him, all save three or four, Who were not quite so fond of animal food; To these was added Juan, who, before Refusing his own spaniel, hardly could Feel now his appetite increase much more; 'Twas not to be expected that he should, Even in extremity of their disaster, Dine with them on his pastor and his master. LXXIX. 'Twas better that he did not; for in fact, The consequence was awful in the extreme; For they who were most ravenous in the act, Went raging mad-Lord! how they did blaspheme, And foam, and roll, with strange convulsions rack'd, Drinking salt-water, like a mountain-stream' |