Canto the First
(excerpts)

65

Alfonso was the name of Julia’s lord,
A man well looking for his years, and who
Was neither much beloved, nor yet abhorr’d;
They lived together as most people do,
Suffering each other’s foibles by accord,
And not exactly either one or two
Yet he was jealous, though he did not show it,
For jealousy dislikes the world to know it.

69

Juan she saw, and, as a pretty child,
Caress’d him often, such a thing might be
Quite innocently done, and harmless styled,
When she had twenty years, and thirteen he;
But I am not so sure I should have smiled
When he was sixteen, Julia twenty-three,
These few short years make wondrous alterations,
Particularly amongst sun-burnt nations.

81
Love, then, but love within its proper limits,
Was Julia’s innocent determination
In young Don Juan’s favour, and to him its
Exertion might be useful on occasion;
And, lighted at too pure a shrine to dim its
Etherial lustre, with what sweet persuasion
He might be taught, by love and her together –
I really don’t know what, nor Julia either.

83

Her plan she deem’d both innocent and feasible,
And, surely, with a stripling of sixteen
Not scandal’s fangs could fix on much that’s seizable,
Or if they did so, satisfied to mean
Nothing but what was good, her breast was peaceable –
A quiet conscience makes one so serene!
Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded
That all the Apostles would have done as they did.

84

And if in the mean time her husband died,
But heaven forbid that such a thought should cross
Her brain, though in a dream! (and then she sigh’d)
Never could she survive that common loss;
But just suppose that moment should betide,
I only say suppose it – inter nos
(This should be entre nous, for Julia thought
In French, but then the rhyme would go for nought).

99

A real husband always is suspicious,
But still no less suspects in the wrong place,
Jealous of some one who had no such wishes,
Or pandering blindly to his own disgrace
By harbouring some dear friend extremely vicious;
The last indeed’s infallibly the case:
And when the spouse and friend are gone off wholly,
He wonders at their vice, and not his folly.

100

Thus parents also are at times short-sighted;
Though watchful as the lynx, they ne’er discover,
The while the wicked world beholds delighted,
Young Hopeful’s mistress, or Miss Fanny’s lover,
Till some confounded escapade has blighted
The plan of twenty years, and all is over;
And then the mother cries, the father swears,
And wonders why the devil he got heirs.

102

It was upon a day, a summer’s day; –
Summer’s indeed a very dangerous season,
And so is spring about the end of May;
The sun, no doubt, is the prevailing reason;
But whatsoe’er the cause is, one may say,
And stand convicted of more truth than treason,
That there are months which nature grows more merry in,
March has its hares, and May must have its heroine.

105

She sate, but not alone; I know not well
How this same interview had taken place,
And even if I knew, I should not tell –
People should hold their tongues in any case;
No matter how or why the thing befell,
But there were she and Juan, face to face –
When two such faces are so, ’twould be wise,
But very difficult, to shut their eyes.

106

How beautiful she look’d! her conscious heart
Glow’d in her cheek, and yet she felt no wrong.
Oh Love! how perfect is thy mystic art,
Strengthening the weak, and trampling on the strong,
How self-deceitful is the sagest part
Of mortals whom thy lure hath led along –
The precipice she stood on was immense,
So was her creed in her own innocence.

107

She thought of her own strength, and Juan’s youth,
And of the folly of all prudish fears,
Victorious virtue, and domestic truth,
And then of Don Alfonso’s fifty years;
I wish these last had not occurr’d, in sooth,
Because that number rarely much endears,
And through all climes, the snowy and the sunny,
Sounds ill in love, whate’er it may in money.

108

When people say, ‘I’ve told you fifty times,’
They mean to scold, and very often do;
When poets say, ‘I’ve written fifty rhymes,’
They make you dread that they’ll recite them too;
In gangs of fifty, thieves commit their crimes;
At fifty love for love is rare, ’tis true,
But then, no doubt, it equally as true is,
A good deal may be bought for fifty Louis.

109

Julia had honour, virtue, truth, and love,
For Don Alfonso; and she inly swore,
By all the vows below to powers above,
She never would disgrace the ring she wore,
Nor leave a wish which wisdom might reprove;
And while she ponder’d this, besides much more,
One hand on Juan’s carelessly was thrown,
Quite by mistake – she thought it was her own;

110

Unconsciously she lean’d upon the other,
Which play’d within the tangles of her hair;
And to contend with thoughts she could not smother,
She seem’d by the distraction of her air.
’Twas surely very wrong in Juan’s mother
To leave together this imprudent pair,
She who for many years had watch’d her son so –
I’m very certain mine would not have done so.

111

The hand which still held Juan’s, by degrees
Gently, but palpably confirm’d its grasp,
And if it said ‘detain me, if you please’;
Yet there’s no doubt she only meant to clasp
His fingers with a pure Platonic squeeze;
She would have shrunk as from a toad, or asp,
Had she imagined such a thing could rouse
A feeling dangerous to a prudent spouse.

115

And Julia sate with Juan, half embraced
And half retiring from the glowing arm,
Which trembled like the bosom where ’twas placed;
Yet still she must have thought there was no harm,
Or else ’twere easy to withdraw her waist;
But then the situation had its charm,
And then – God knows what next, – I can’t go on;
I’m almost sorry that I e’er begun.

117

And Julia’s voice was lost, except in sighs,
Until too late for useful conversation;
The tears were gushing from her gentle eyes,
I wish, indeed, they had not had occasion,

But who, alas! can love, and then be wise?
Not that remorse did not oppose temptation,
A little still she strove, and much repented,
And whispering ‘I will ne’er consent’ – consented.

Readings

Lord Byron: 'Don Juan (Excerpt Canto the First)' read by Colin Salmon
Don Juan (Excerpt Canto the First) read by Harriet Walter and Guy Paul
Don Juan read by Anna Savva and Michael Maloney
Don Juan read by Elizabeth McGovern, Lily James and Freddie Fox
Don Juan read by Edward Fox
Select reading
Lord Byron: 'Don Juan (Excerpt Canto the First)' read by Colin Salmon
Don Juan (Excerpt Canto the First) read by Harriet Walter and Guy Paul
Don Juan read by Anna Savva and Michael Maloney
Don Juan read by Elizabeth McGovern, Lily James and Freddie Fox
Don Juan read by Edward Fox
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