Originally published in The Keepsake for 1828 (Hurst, Chance, and Co.; Nov 1827).
I.
I've worshipp'd woman—saints, forgive my folly!—
In every colour, and in every clime;
The Spanish dame, all love and melancholy;
La Portuguesa, not quite so sublime,
But every atom passion, Cupid's wholly,
The Columbine of Love's long pantomime:
As well he knows who makes her bone of his bone;
As well you'll know in your first week at Lisbon.
II.
What made the fuss, that banish'd the Hussars
From Hounslow and the Horse Guards, in the season
When London routs were sparkling thick as stars,
To broil in Lisbon barracks? The true reason
Was, the sweet prisoners within convent bars
Pined for their old Peninsular liaisons;
The blues were quite essential to the yellows.
In short, they long'd to see our handsome fellows.
III.
Yet that same Lisbon—give the devil his due—
Is pleasant in its way. Its summer nights
Are thick with sighs, that shoot you through and through,
And glances keener than mosquito bites.
The river's sheeted silver, sky stone-blue;
The moon a chandelier of pearly lights;
You take a barge, guitar, your white-wine negus,
And sip, and sing, and sleep along the Tagus.
IV.
And I have knelt to black Parisian eyes,
Orbs in whose liquid lustre Cupid dips
His cureless arrows; and have sigh'd the sighs
That tender travellers pay to Grecian lips:
Nay, ev'n where Love has more than tender ties,
Bowstrings, and so forth, I have made some trips;
Laugh'd at, O Istamboul! thy beards and sabres;
And found the She Turks—very like their neighbours.
V.
But, after all, as I'm no epicure,
I love the loveliest women much the best.
The hazel eye, love's most resistless lure;
The bosom, stately as a wild swan's crest;
The sunny smile, the skin as ivory pure;
The step that scarcely seems on earth to rest.
So, sweet SELINA! at thy feet I fall,
And own thy women, Britain, queens of all!