The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. Poetry. George Gordon Byron

      Fletcher! Murray! Bob!5 where are you?

      Stretched along the deck like logs —

      Bear a hand, you jolly tar, you!

      Here's a rope's end for the dogs.

      Hobhouse muttering fearful curses,

      As the hatchway down he rolls,

      Now his breakfast, now his verses,

      Vomits forth – and damns our souls.

      "Here's a stanza6

      On Braganza —

      Help!" – "A couplet?" – "No, a cup

      Of warm water – "

      "What's the matter?"

      "Zounds! my liver's coming up;

      I shall not survive the racket

      Of this brutal Lisbon Packet."

      Now at length we're off for Turkey,

      Lord knows when we shall come back!

      Breezes foul and tempests murky

      May unship us in a crack.

      But, since Life at most a jest is,

      As philosophers allow,

      Still to laugh by far the best is,

      Then laugh on – as I do now.

      Laugh at all things,

      Great and small things,

      Sick or well, at sea or shore;

      While we're quaffing,

      Let's have laughing —

      Who the devil cares for more? —

      Some good wine! and who would lack it,

      Ev'n on board the Lisbon Packet?

      Unhappy Dives! in an evil hour

      'Gainst Nature's voice seduced to deeds accurst!

      Once Fortune's minion now thou feel'st her power;

      Wrath's vial on thy lofty head hath burst.

      In Wit, in Genius, as in Wealth the first,

      How wondrous bright thy blooming morn arose!

      But thou wert smitten with th' unhallowed thirst

      Of Crime unnamed, and thy sad noon must close

      In scorn and solitude unsought the worst of woes.

      O thou yclep'd by vulgar sons of Men

      Cam Hobhouse!8 but by wags Byzantian Ben!

      Twin sacred titles, which combined appear

      To grace thy volume's front, and gild its rear,

      Since now thou put'st thyself and work to Sea

      And leav'st all Greece to Fletcher9 and to me,

      Oh, hear my single muse our sorrows tell,

      One song for self and Fletcher quite as well —

      First to the Castle of that man of woes

      Dispatch the letter which I must enclose,

      And when his lone Penelope shall say

      Why, where, and wherefore doth my William stay?

      Spare not to move her pity, or her pride —

      By all that Hero suffered, or defied;

      The chicken's toughness, and the lack of ale

      The stoney mountain and the miry vale

      The Garlick steams, which half his meals enrich,

      The impending vermin, and the threatened Itch,

      That ever breaking Bed, beyond repair!

      The hat too old, the coat too cold to wear,

      The Hunger, which repulsed from Sally's door

      Pursues her grumbling half from shore to shore,

      Be these the themes to greet his faithful Rib

      So may thy pen be smooth, thy tongue be glib!

      This duty done, let me in turn demand

      Some friendly office in my native land,

      Yet let me ponder well, before I ask,

      And set thee swearing at the tedious task.

      First the Miscellany!10– to Southwell town

      Per coach for Mrs. Pigot frank it down,

      So may'st them prosper in the paths of Sale,11

      And Longman smirk and critics cease to rail.

      All hail to Matthews!12 wash his reverend feet,

      And in my name the man of Method greet, —

      Tell him, my Guide, Philosopher, and Friend,

      Who cannot love me, and who will not mend,

      Tell him, that not in vain I shall assay

      To tread and trace our "old Horatian way,"13

      And be (with prose supply my dearth of rhymes)

      What better men have been in better times.

      Here let me cease, for why should I prolong

      My notes, and vex a Singer with a Song?

      Oh thou with pen perpetual in thy fist!

      Dubbed for thy sins a stark Miscellanist,

      So pleased the printer's orders to perform

      For Messrs. Longman, Hurst and Rees and Orme.

      Go – Get thee hence to Paternoster Row,

      Thy patrons wave a duodecimo!

      (Best form for letters from a distant land,

      It fits the pocket, nor fatigues the hand.)

      Then go, once more the joyous work commence14

      With stores of anecdote, and grains of sense,

      Oh may Mammas relent, and Sires forgive!

      And scribbling Sons grow dutiful and live!