Summary of Canto 1: A British lord, suffering from some sort of vague depression, goes on a walk-about through Spain and Portugal. Bad things happen. The author talks out loud a lot. The Lord is still dpressed but, as Byron put it, “… a little tumult, now and then, is an […]
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto I [continued]
XLI.
Three hosts combine to offer sacrifice;
Three tongues prefer strange orisons1 on high;
Three gaudy standards flout the pale blue skies;
The shouts are France, Spain, Albion, Victory!
The foe, the victim, and the fond ally
That fights for all, but ever fights in vain,
Are met - as if at home they could not die […]
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto I [continued]
XXXI.
More bleak to view the hills at length recede,
And, less luxuriant, smoother vales extend;
Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed!
Far as the eye discerns, withouten end,
Spain’s realms appear whereon her shepherds tend
Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows -
Now must the pastor’s arm his lambs defend:
For Spain is compass’d by unyielding […]
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto I [continued]
XIV.
On, on the vessel flies, the land is gone, 1
And winds are rude in Biscay’s2 sleepless bay.
Four days are sped, but with the fifth, anon,
New shores descried make every bosom gay;
And Cintra’s3 mountain greets them on their way.
And Tagus4 dashing onward to the deep,
His fabled golden tribute bent to pay;
And […]
I have been reading Juan Williams’ new book Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America — and What We Can Do About It (Crown Publishers, 2006) which has stirred a lot of debate. Anguish and anger are equally mixed here. Gone are the days of […]