Dabbling its sleek young hands in Erin's gore,

And thus for wider carnage taught to pant,

Transferr'd to gorge upon a sister shore,

The vulgarest tool that Tyranny could want,

With just enough of talent, and no more,

To lengthen fetters by another fix'd,

And offer poison long already mix'd. -

An orator of such set trash of phrase

Ineffably- legitimately vile,

That even its grossest flatterers dare not praise,

Nor foes- all nations- condescend to smile,-

Not even a sprightly blunder's spark can blaze

From that Ixion grindstone's ceaseless toil,

That turns and turns to give the world a notion

Of endless torments and perpetual motion. -

A bungler even in its disgusting trade,

And botching, patching, leaving still behind

Something of which its masters are afraid,

States to be curb'd and thoughts to be confined,

Conspiracy or Congress to be made-

Cobbling at manacles for all mankind-

A tinkering slave-maker, who mends old chains,

With God and man's abhorrence for its gains. -

If we may judge of matter by the mind,

Emasculated to the marrow It

Hath but two objects, how to serve and bind,

Deeming the chain it wears even men may fit,

Eutropius of its many masters,- blind

To worth as freedom, wisdom as to wit,

Fearless- because no feeling dwells in ice,

Its very courage stagnates to a vice. -

Where shall I turn me not to view its bonds,

For I will never feel them?- Italy!

Thy late reviving Roman soul desponds

Beneath the lie this State-thing breathed o'er thee-

Thy clanking chain, and Erin's yet green wounds,

Have voices, tongues to cry aloud for me.

Europe has slaves, allies, kings, armies still,

And Southey lives to sing them very ill. -

Meantime, Sir Laureate, I proceed to dedicate,

In honest simple verse, this song to you.

And, if in flattering strains I do not predicate,

'T is that I still retain my 'buff and blue;'

My politics as yet are all to educate:

Apostasy 's so fashionable, too,

To keep one creed 's a task grown quite Herculean;

Is it not so, my Tory, ultra-Julian? -

VENICE, September 16, 1818.

CANTO THE FIRST. -

I WANT a hero: an uncommon want,

When every year and month sends forth a new one,

Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant,

The age discovers he is not the true one;

Of such as these I should not care to vaunt,

I 'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan-

We all have seen him, in the pantomime,

Sent to the devil somewhat ere his time. -

Vernon, the butcher Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke,

Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Keppel, Howe,

Evil and good, have had their tithe of talk,

And fill'd their sign posts then, like Wellesley now;

Each in their turn like Banquo's monarchs stalk,

Followers of fame, 'nine farrow' of that sow:

France, too, had Buonaparte and Dumourier

Recorded in the Moniteur and Courier. -

Barnave, Brissot, Condorcet, Mirabeau,

Petion, Clootz, Danton, Marat, La Fayette,

Were French, and famous people, as we know:

And there were others, scarce forgotten yet,

Joubert, Hoche, Marceau, Lannes, Desaix, Moreau,

With many of the military set,

Exceedingly remarkable at times,

But not at all adapted to my rhymes. -

Nelson was once Britannia's god of war,

And still should be so, but the tide is turn'd;

There 's no more to be said of Trafalgar,

'T is with our hero quietly inurn'd;

Because the army 's grown more popular,

At which the naval people are concern'd;

Besides, the prince is all for the land-service,

Forgetting Duncan, Nelson, Howe, and Jervis. -

Brave men were living before Agamemnon

And since, exceeding valorous and sage,

A good deal like him too, though quite the same none;

But then they shone not on the poet's page,

And so have been forgotten:- I condemn none,

But can't find any in the present age

Fit for my poem (that is, for my new one);

So, as I said, I 'll take my friend Don Juan. -

Most epic poets plunge 'in medias res'

(Horace makes this the heroic turnpike road),

And then your hero tells, whene'er you please,

What went before- by way of episode,

While seated after dinner at his ease,

Beside his mistress in some soft abode,

Palace, or garden, paradise, or cavern,

Which serves the happy couple for a tavern. -

That is the usual method, but not mine-

My way is to begin with the beginning;

The regularity of my design

Forbids all wandering as the worst of sinning,

And therefore I shall open with a line

(Although it cost me half an hour in spinning)

Narrating somewhat of Don Juan's father,

And also of his mother, if you 'd rather. -