The Works of Lord Byron Volume III Part 5

4.

Nor need I write--to tell the tale My pen were doubly weak: Oh! what can idle words avail,[q]

Unless the heart could speak?

5.

By day or night, in weal or woe, That heart, no longer free, Must bear the love it cannot show, And silent ache for thee.

_March_, 1811.

[First published, _Childe Harold_, 1812(4to).]

FAREWELL TO MALTA.[19]

Adieu, ye joys of La Valette!

Adieu, Sirocco, sun, and sweat!

Adieu, thou palace rarely entered!

Adieu, ye mansions where--I've ventured!

Adieu, ye cursed streets of stairs![20]

(How surely he who mounts them swears!) Adieu, ye merchants often failing!

Adieu, thou mob for ever railing!

Adieu, ye packets--without letters!

Adieu, ye fools--who ape your betters! 10 Adieu, thou d.a.m.ned'st quarantine, That gave me fever, and the spleen!

Adieu that stage which makes us yawn, Sirs, Adieu his Excellency's dancers![21]

Adieu to Peter--whom no fault's in, But could not teach a colonel waltzing; Adieu, ye females fraught with graces!

Adieu red coats, and redder faces!

Adieu the supercilious air Of all that strut _en militaire_![22] 20 I go--but G.o.d knows when, or why, To smoky towns and cloudy sky, To things (the honest truth to say) As bad--but in a different way.

Farewell to these, but not adieu, Triumphant sons of truest blue!

While either Adriatic sh.o.r.e,[23]

And fallen chiefs, and fleets no more, And nightly smiles, and daily dinners,[24]

Proclaim you war and women's winners. 30 Pardon my Muse, who apt to prate is, And take my rhyme--because 'tis "gratis."

And now I've got to Mrs. Fraser,[25]

Perhaps you think I mean to praise her-- And were I vain enough to think My praise was worth this drop of ink, A line--or two--were no hard matter, As here, indeed, I need not flatter: But she must be content to shine In better praises than in mine, 40 With lively air, and open heart, And fashion's ease, without its art; Her hours can gaily glide along.

Nor ask the aid of idle song.

And now, O Malta! since thou'st got us, Thou little military hot-house!

I'll not offend with words uncivil, And wish thee rudely at the Devil, But only stare from out my cas.e.m.e.nt, And ask, "for what is such a place meant?" 50 Then, in my solitary nook, Return to scribbling, or a book, Or take my physic while I'm able (Two spoonfuls hourly, by this label), Prefer my nightcap to my beaver, And bless my stars I've got a fever.

_May_ 26, 1811.[26]

[First published, 1816.]

NEWSTEAD ABBEY.

1.

In the dome of my Sires as the clear moonbeam falls Through Silence and Shade o'er its desolate walls, It shines from afar like the glories of old; It gilds, but it warms not--'tis dazzling, but cold.

2.

Let the Sunbeam be bright for the younger of days: 'Tis the light that should shine on a race that decays, When the Stars are on high and the dews on the ground, And the long shadow lingers the ruin around.

3.

And the step that o'erechoes the gray floor of stone Falls sullenly now, for 'tis only my own; And sunk are the voices that sounded in mirth, And empty the goblet, and dreary the hearth.

4.

And vain was each effort to raise and recall The brightness of old to illumine our Hall; And vain was the hope to avert our decline, And the fate of my fathers had faded to mine.

5.

And theirs was the wealth and the fulness of Fame, And mine to inherit too haughty a name;[r]

And theirs were the times and the triumphs of yore, And mine to regret, but renew them no more.

6.

And Ruin is fixed on my tower and my wall, Too h.o.a.ry to fade, and too ma.s.sy to fall; It tells not of Time's or the tempest's decay,[s]

But the wreck of the line that have held it in sway.

_August_ 26, 1811.

[First published in _Memoir_ of Rev. F. Hodgson, 1878, i. 187.]

EPISTLE TO A FRIEND,[27]

IN ANSWER TO SOME LINES EXHORTING THE AUTHOR TO BE CHEERFUL, AND TO "BANISH CARE."

"Oh! banish care"--such ever be The motto of _thy_ revelry!

Perchance of _mine,_ when wa.s.sail nights Renew those riotous delights, Wherewith the children of Despair Lull the lone heart, and "banish care."

But not in Morn's reflecting hour, When present, past, and future lower, When all I loved is changed or gone, Mock with such taunts the woes of one, Whose every thought--but let them pa.s.s-- Thou know'st I am not what I was.

But, above all, if thou wouldst hold Place in a heart that ne'er was cold, By all the powers that men revere, By all unto thy bosom dear, Thy joys below, thy hopes above, Speak--speak of anything but Love.

'Twere long to tell, and vain to hear, The tale of one who scorns a tear; And there is little in that tale Which better bosoms would bewail.

But mine has suffered more than well 'Twould suit philosophy to tell.

I've seen my bride another's bride,-- Have seen her seated by his side,-- Have seen the infant, which she bore, Wear the sweet smile the mother wore, When she and I in youth have smiled, As fond and faultless as her child;-- Have seen her eyes, in cold disdain, Ask if I felt no secret pain; And _I_ have acted well my part, And made my cheek belie my heart, Returned the freezing glance she gave, Yet felt the while that _woman's_ slave;-- Have kissed, as if without design, The babe which ought to have been mine, And showed, alas! in each caress Time had not made me love the less.

But let this pa.s.s--I'll whine no more, Nor seek again an eastern sh.o.r.e; The world befits a busy brain,-- I'll hie me to its haunts again.

But if, in some succeeding year,[28]

When Britain's "May is in the sere,"

Thou hear'st of one, whose deepening crimes Suit with the sablest of the times, Of one, whom love nor pity sways, Nor hope of fame, nor good men's praise; One, who in stern Ambition's pride, Perchance not blood shall turn aside; One ranked in some recording page With the worst anarchs of the age, Him wilt thou _know_--and _knowing_ pause, Nor with the _effect_ forget the cause.

Newstead Abbey, Oct. 11, 1811.