No More Learning

Such fever burns him, of his sorrow bred,
He halts on Arbia's and on Arno's shore;
And, if a charm is left, 'tis faded soon,
And withered like a rose-bud plucked at noon.

XXVIII
"Besides that Faustus sorrowed to descry
Him so bested; worse cause for sorrowing
Was to that courtier to appear to lie
Before Astolpho; he was pledged to bring
One that was fairest deemed in every eye,
Who must appear the foulest to that king;
Yet he continued on his way to wend,
And brought him to Pavia in the end.

XXIX
"Not that forthwith he lets the youth be seen,
Lest him the king of little wit arraign;
He first by his dispatches lets him ween,
That thither he Jocundo brings with pain:
Saying, that of his beauteous air and mien
Some secret cause of grief had been the bane,
Accompanied by a distemper sore:
So that he seemed not what he was before.

XXX
"Glad was the monarch, of his coming taught,
As of a friend's arrival he could be;
Since in the universal world was nought,
That he so much desired as him to see:
Nor was the Lombard's king displeased in ought
To mark his guest's inferiority;
Though, but for his misfortune, it was clear,
He his superior would have been or peer.

XXXI
"Lodged by him in his palace, every day
And every hour, the stranger youth he sees,
Studious to honour him, and bids purvey
Store of provision for his better ease.
While still his thoughts to his ill consort stray,
Jocundo languishes; nor pastimes please
That melancholy man; nor music's strain
One jot diminishes his ceaseless pain.

XXXII
"Above his chambers, on the upper floor,
Nearest the roof, there was an ancient hall:
Thither, in solitary mood, (for sore
Pastime and company, the stripling gall,)
He aye betakes himself; while evermore
Sad thoughts some newer cause of grief recall.
He here (who would believe the story? ) found
A remedy unhoped, which made him sound.

XXXIII
"At that hall's farther end, more feebly lighted,
(For windows ever closed shut out the day)
Where one wall with another ill united,
He, through the chink, beheld a brighter ray:
There laid his eye, and saw, what he had slighted
As hard to credit, were it but hearsay:
He hears it not, but this himself descries;
Yet hardly can believe his very eyes.

XXXIV
"He of the Queen's apartment here was sight,
Her choicest and her priviest chamber, where
Was never introduced whatever wight,
Save he most faithful was esteemed: he there,
As he was peeping, saw an uncouth fight;
A dwarf was wrestling with the royal fair;
And such that champion's skill, though undergrown,
He in the strife his opposite had thrown.

XXXV
"As in a dream, Jocundo stood, beside
Himself, awhile of sober sense bereaved;
Nor, but when of the matter certified,
And sure it was no dream, his sight believed.
-- `A scorned and crooked monster,' (then he cried,)
`Is, as her conqueror, by a dame received,
Wife of the comeliest, of the curtiest wight,
And greatest monarch; Oh! what appetite! '

XXXVI
"And he the consort to whom he was wed,
Her he most used to blame, recalled to mind,
And, for the stripling taken to her bed,
To deem the dame less culpable inclined:
Less of herself than sex the fault he read,
Which to one man could never be confined:
And thought, if in one taint all women shared,
At least his had not with a monster paired.
XXXVII
"To the same place Jocundo made return,
At the same hour, upon the following day;
And, putting on the king the self-same scorn,
Again beheld that dwarf and dame at play:
And so upon the next and following morn;
For -- to conclude -- they made no holiday:
While she (what most Jocundo's wonder moved)
The pigmy for his little love reproved.

XXXVIII
"One day, amid the rest, the youth surveyed
The dame disordered and opprest with gloom;
Having twice summoned, by her waiting-maid,
The favoured dwarf, who yet delayed to come;
A third time by the lady sent, she said:
-- `Engaged at play, Madonna, is the groom,
Nor, lest he lose a doit, his paltry stake,
Will that discourteous churl his game forsake. '

XXXIX
"At such strange spectacle, the Roman knight
Cleared up his brow, his visage and his eyes;
He jocund, as in name, became in sprite,
And changed his tears for smiles; with altered guise,
He waxed ruddy, gay, and plump in plight,
And seems a cherubim of Paradise.
So that such change with wonderment all see,
Brother and king, and royal family.

XL
"If from the youth Astolpho wished to know
From whence this sudden light of comfort came,
No less Jocundo this desired to show,
And to the king such injury proclaim:
But willed that like himself he should forego
Revenge upon the author of that shame.
Hence, that he might discern her guilt, yet spare,
He made him on the Agnus Dei swear.

XLI
"He made him swear that he, for nothing said,
Or seen, which might to him displeasing be,
(Though he, in what he should discover, read
An outrage offered to his majesty,)
Would, now or ever, venge him on his head:
Moreover him he bound to secrecy;
That the ill doer ne'er, through deed or word,
Might guess his injured king that case had heard.

XLII
"The monarch, who to every thing beside
Could better have given credit, freely swore:
To him the cause Jocundo signified,
Why he had many days lamenting sore;
-- Because he had his evil wife espied
In the embraces of a serjeant poor;
And vowed he should in fine have died of grief,
If he for longer time had lacked relief.

XLIII
"But that within his highness' palace said,
He had witnessed what had much appeased his woe;
For, if foul shame had fallen upon his head,
At least he was not single; saying so,
He to that chink the Lombard monarch led,
Who spied the mannikin of hideous show.
(Lines 7 & 8 untranslated by Rose)

XLIV
"You may believe he shameless deemed that act,
Without my swearing it; he, at the sight,
It seemed, would go distraught, -- with fury racked,
He against every wall his head would smite --
Would cry aloud -- would break the solemn pact,
Yet kept parforce the promise he had plight;
And gulped his anger down and bitter scorn;
Since on the holy water he had sworn.

XLV
"Then to Jocundo: `What remains to me
To do in this misfortune, brother, speak;
Since vengeance with more noted cruelty
Thou wilt not let me on the sinners wreak. '
(Jocundo answered) `Let these ingrates be;
And try we if all women are as weak;
And if the wives of others can be won
To do what others by our own have done.

XLVI
" `Both fair and youthful, measured by this scale,
Nor easily our equals shall we find;
What woman but to us shall strike her sail,
If even to the ugly these are kind?
At least, if neither youth nor grace avail,
The money may, with which our bags are lined;
Nor will I that we homeward more return,
Ere the chief spoils we from a thousand earn.

XLVII
" `Long absence, seeing with a distant part,
Converse with different women, oft allay,
As it would seem, the troubles of a heart,
Whereof Love's angry passions make their prey. '
The king is pleased to hear the youth impart
This counsel, nor his journey will delay:
Thence on their road, with but two squires beside,
He and the Roman knight together ride.