The Boot. From the Italian of Giuseppe Giusti
Giuseppe
Giusti
Giusti, Giuseppe
Translator
Mary Eliza Isabella
Frere
Frere, Mary Eliza Isabella
Metadata research and editing
DVPP Project Team
Kailey
Fukushima
University of Victoria Digital Victorian Periodical Poetry Project
Victoria, BC, Canada
In the public domain
Translation is unsigned; attribution from Wellesley Index. (AC)
Macmillan’s Magazine
2
9
244–248
I am not made of ordinary stuff,
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Italian
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The Boot
.
From the Italian of
Giuseppe Giusti
.
I am not made of ordinary stuff,
Nor am I such a boot as rustics wear ;
And if my shape seem hewn out in the rough,
No bungler’s stamp of workmanship I bear :
With double soles, and action firm and free,
I’m formed for any work by land or sea.
Up to mid-thigh I stand, nor ever stir,
Deep in the water, yet am just as sound ;
I’m good for sporting, good to wear the spur,
As many asses to their cost have found :
All stitched compact and firm by vigorous needle,
With hem at top, and seam straight down the middle.
But then, I’m not drawn on with so much ease,
Nor am I fit for any trifler’s use ;
A slender foot I should but lame or tease,
To suit the vulgar leg I should not choose :
There’s no one yet has kept me on throughout ;
They’ve worn me just a little, turn about.
I won’t inflict on you the category
Of all who’ve tried to get me for their own,
But only here and there, to fit my story,
Note such and such, most worthy to be known :
Relating how my ruin first was planned, :
And thieves have passed me down from hand to hand.
You’ll think it past belief, but once I started
Off at full gallop of my own accord,
And right across the whole known world I darted,
Till overhaste betrayed me,—I was floored :
My equilibrium lost, I lay extended
This way and that, and so the matter ended.
A grand confusion followed : o’er me surged
A flood of every race and savage fashion,
Tumbling from all outlandish quarters, urged
By a priest’s counsel, or a demon’s passion
One seized me by the instep, one the calf,
And jeering cried, “ Who’ll get the bigger half ?”
The priest, despite his-cloth, to try the boot
Upon his own account showed some desire,
But, finding that I did not suit his foot,
Hither and thither let me out on hire :
Now to the earliest bidder in the mart
He yields me, acting but the boot-jack’s part.
To wrestle with the priest, and plant his heel
Firm in me, came a German full of bluster ;
But oft to bear him home, as turned the wheel,
Those heels were forced their utmost speed to muster ;
He tried and tried enough to gall his foot,
But never yet could pull on all the boot.
Left for a century upon the shelf,
A simple trader next I’ll name who wore me,
Gave me a blacking, made me stir myself,
And o’er the sea to Eastern climates bore me,
In rough condition, but a perfect whole,
And set with good hob-nails about the sole.
My merchant friend, grown rich, a fitting act
Deemed it to deck me out with greater cost ;
Tassels and golden spurs were on me tacked,
But something of solidity was lost
And in the long run, finding out the difference,
For those good primitive nails I own a preference.
You could not find in me a crack or wrinkle
When I one day a Western rascal saw
Leap from his galley plump upon my ankle,
And try to clutch it with his little claw ;
But fair and softly—two could play that game ;
One vesper at Palermo, he went lame.
Among the other foreign dilettanti,
A certain King of Spades with all his might
Would pull me on—but while he toiled and panted
Found himself planté là in sorry plight ;
A capon, jealous of the hen-roost, crowed
And threatened to alarm the neighbourhood.
In those same times, my fortune’s underminer,
Cunningly bent its ruin to complete,
Sprang from his shop a certain Mediciner,
Who next, to make me easy to his feet,
And profitable wearing, spun a thread
Of plots and frauds that o’er three centuries spread.
He smoothed me, decked me out with tinsel, rubbed
Unguents and humbugs in at such a rate,
My very leather into holes was scrubbed,
And all who since have meddled with my fate
Set about tinkering me by the receipt
Of that same school of black and vile deceit.
Thus harassed, tossed about from hand to hand,
The aim and object of a harpy-swarm,
I felt a Frank and Spaniard take their stand,
Contending which could prove the stronger arm ;
At length Don Quixote bore me off, but found me
Crushed out of shape with all the blows around me.
Those who beheld me on his foot have told me
This Spaniard wore me in most evil style ;
He smeared me o’er with paint and varnish, called me
Most noble, most illustrious ; but the file
He worked by stealth, and only left me more
Ragged and tattered than I was before.
Still half-way down me grew, in vermeil coloured,
One lily, token of departed splendour ;
But this a shameless Pope, of birth dishonoured :
(To whom all glory may the Devil render),
Gave the barbarians, making compact base
To crown a scion of his guilty race.
Well, from that moment each one at his will
With awl and shears in cobbler-craft might dabble
And so from frying-pan to fire I fell ;
Viceroys, police, and all that sort of tabble,
To grind me down struck out a new idea,
Et diviserunt vestimenta mea.
Thus clutched alternately by paw of famished
Or vicious beast in rude and clumsy revel,
That old impression by degrees had vanished
Of well-cut feet, firm planted on the level,
Such as without a single step perverse
Had borne me safely round the universe.
Ah me ! poor boot, I have been led astray,
I own it now, by this most foolish notion,
While yet to walk or run I had free play,
By stranger legs I would be put in motion,
Nor from my mind the dangerous dream could pluck,
That change of limb would bring me change of luck.
I feel—I own it—but withal I now
Find myself in so damaged a condition,
The very ground seems to give way below
If I attempt one step on self-volition ;
Long subject td false guides, both great and small,
I’ve lost the faculty to move at all.
My greatest grievance, though, to priests is owing—
A sect malignant, void of all discretion :
And certain poets, race degenerate, growing
Mere hypocrites, who flatter by profession.
Say what you please, the Canon-laws prohibit
That priests in mundane boots their legs exhibit.
And here I am, meanwhile, threadbare, despised,
Tattered on every side, all mud and mire ;
Still for some kind limb’s advent, well advised
To shake me out and smooth me, I aspire :
No French or German leg, you understand ;
I want one grown upon my native land.
A certain worthy’s once I took on trial ;
Alas ! my hero would a-wandering go,
Or might have boasted his, without denial,
The stoutest boot in the whole world’s dépôt ;
Ah ! crooked courses ! down the snowdrift came,
Freezing his limbs, ere half played out the game,
Patched up again after the ancient style,
And once more carried to the skinning place,
I, of prodigious worth and weight erewhile,
Scarce my original leather now can trace :
Look you, to piece these various holes of mine
There’s something wanting more than tacks and twine.
Both toil and cost it needs, nor too much haste ;
Each separate shred must be resewn together ;
The mud cleaned off, the stout old nails replaced,
Smoothed into shape both calf and upper leather :
Let this be done, I’ll thank you from my heart ;
But, oh ! take care who plays the workman’s part !
Look at me, also, on this side I’m blue,
There red and white, and up here black and yellow ;—
A very harlequin of chequered hue ;
To make my tone harmonious and mellow,
Remodel me discreetly (may I hint ?)
All in one piece, and one prevailing tint.
Search diligently if the world supplies
A man,—I care not what, so not a coward—
And, when in me his foot securely lies,
If any prig peer in with schemes untoward
Of practising once more the usual quacking,
We’ll pay him off with kicks, and send him packing.