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XCVIII.

This may seem strange, but yet 'tis very common; For instance gentlemen, whose ladies take Leave to o'erstep the written rights of woman,

And break the-Which commandmentis't they break?

(I have forgot the number, an think no man
Should rashly quote, for fear of a mistake.)
I say, when these same gentlemen are jealous,
They make some blunder, which their ladies tell us.

XCIX.

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.

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.

CI.

But Inez was so anxious,

and so clear

Of sight, that I must think, on this occasion, She had some other motive much more near

For leaving Juan to this new temptation; But what that motive was, I sha'n't say here; Perhaps to finish Juan's education,

Perhaps to open Don Alfonso's eyes,

In case he thought his wife too great a prize.

CII.

It was upon a day, a summer's day;
Summer's indeed a very dangerous scason,
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 ist heroinc.

I like to be particular in dates, Not only of the age, and year,

but moon;

They are a sort of post-house, where the Fates Change horses, making history change its tune, Then spur away o'er empires and o'er states, Leaving at last not much besides chronology, Excepting the post-obits of theology.

CIV.

'Twas on the sixth of June, about the hour Of half-past six - perhaps still nearer seven, When Julia sate within as pretty a bower

As e'er held houri in that heathenish heaven Described by Mahomet, and Anacreon Moore,

To whom the lyre and laurels have been given, With all the trophies of triumphant songHe won them well, and may he wear them long!

CV.

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.

CVI.

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.

CVII.

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.