Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 6.djvu/487

CANTO XII.]

I.

Of all the barbarous middle ages, that Which is most barbarous is the middle age Of man ! it is — I really scarce know what ; But when we hover between fool and sage, And don't know justly what we would be at — A period something like a printed page, Black letter upon foolscap, while our hair Grows grizzled, and we are not what we were ; —

II.

Too old for Youth, — too young, at thirty-five, To herd with boys, or hoard with good threescore,- I wonder people should be left alive ; But since they are, that epoch is a bore : Love lingers still, although 't were late to wive : And as for other love, the illusion 's o'er ; And Money, that most pure imagination. Gleams only through the dawn of its creation.

III. O Gold ! Why call we misers miserable? Theirs is the pleasure that can never pall;