Selected Works of George Gordon, Lord Byron

     LXXV
And being told it was 'God's house,' she said
  He was well lodged, but only wonder'd how
He suffer'd Infidels in his homestead,
  The cruel Nazarenes, who had laid low
His holy temples in the lands which bred
  The True Believers:--and her infant brow
Was bent with grief that Mahomet should resign
A mosque so noble, flung like pearls to swine.

     LXXVI
Oh! oh! through meadows managed like a garden,
  A paradise of hops and high production;
For after years of travel by a bard in
  Countries of greater heat, but lesser suction,
A green field is a sight which makes him pardon
  The absence of that more sublime construction,
Which mixes up vines, olives, precipices,
Glaciers, volcanos, oranges, and ices.

     LXXVII
And when I think upon a pot of beer--
  But I won't weep!--and so drive on, postilions!
As the smart boys spurr'd fast in their career,
  Juan admired these highways of free millions;
A country in all senses the most dear
  To foreigner or native, save some silly ones,
Who 'kick against the pricks' just at this juncture,
And for their pains get only a fresh puncture.

     LXXVIII
What a delightful thing 's a turnpike road!
  So smooth, so level, such a mode of shaving
The earth, as scarce the eagle in the broad
  Air can accomplish, with his wide wings waving.
Had such been cut in Phaeton's time, the god
  Had told his son to satisfy his craving
With the York mail;--but onward as we roll,
'Surgit amari aliquid'--the toll

     LXXIX
Alas, how deeply painful is all payment!
  Take lives, take wives, take aught except men's purses:
As Machiavel shows those in purple raiment,
  Such is the shortest way to general curses.
They hate a murderer much less than a claimant
  On that sweet ore which every body nurses;--
Kill a man's family, and he may brook it,
But keep your hands out of his breeches' pocket.

     LXXX
So said the Florentine: ye monarchs, hearken
  To your instructor. Juan now was borne,
Just as the day began to wane and darken,
  O'er the high hill, which looks with pride or scorn
Toward the great city.--Ye who have a spark in
  Your veins of Cockney spirit, smile or mourn
According as you take things well or ill;--
Bold Britons, we are now on Shooter's Hill!

     LXXXI
The sun went down, the smoke rose up, as from
  A half-unquench'd volcano, o'er a space
Which well beseem'd the 'Devil's drawing-room,'
  As some have qualified that wondrous place:
But Juan felt, though not approaching home,
  As one who, though he were not of the race,
Revered the soil, of those true sons the mother,
Who butcher'd half the earth, and bullied t' other.

     LXXXII
A mighty mass of brick, and smoke, and shipping,
  Dirty and dusky, but as wide as eye
Could reach, with here and there a sail just skipping
  In sight, then lost amidst the forestry
Of masts; a wilderness of steeples peeping
  On tiptoe through their sea-coal canopy;
A huge, dun cupola, like a foolscap crown
On a fool's head--and there is London Town!

     LXXXIII
But Juan saw not this: each wreath of smoke
  Appear'd to him but as the magic vapour
Of some alchymic furnace, from whence broke
  The wealth of worlds (a wealth of tax and paper):
The gloomy clouds, which o'er it as a yoke
  Are bow'd, and put the sun out like a taper,
Were nothing but the natural atmosphere,
Extremely wholesome, though but rarely clear.

     LXXXIV
He paused--and so will I; as doth a crew
  Before they give their broadside. By and by,
My gentle countrymen, we will renew
  Our old acquaintance; and at least I 'll try
To tell you truths you will not take as true,
  Because they are so;--a male Mrs. Fry,
With a soft besom will I sweep your halls,
And brush a web or two from off the walls.

     LXXXV
Oh Mrs. Fry! Why go to Newgate? Why
  Preach to poor rogues? And wherefore not begin
With Carlton, or with other houses? Try
  Your head at harden'd and imperial sin.
To mend the people 's an absurdity,
  A jargon, a mere philanthropic din,
Unless you make their betters better:--Fy!
I thought you had more religion, Mrs. Fry.

     LXXXVI
Teach them the decencies of good threescore;
  Cure them of tours, hussar and highland dresses;
Tell them that youth once gone returns no more,
  That hired huzzas redeem no land's distresses;
Tell them Sir William Curtis is a bore,
  Too dull even for the dullest of excesses,
The witless Falstaff of a hoary Hal,
A fool whose bells have ceased to ring at all.

     LXXXVII
Tell them, though it may be perhaps too late,
  On life's worn confine, jaded, bloated, sated,
To set up vain pretence of being great,
  'T is not so to be good; and be it stated,
The worthiest kings have ever loved least state;
  And tell them--But you won't, and I have prated
Just now enough; but by and by I 'll prattle
Like Roland's horn in Roncesvalles' battle.