The approach of home to husbands and to sires, After long travelling by land or water, Most naturally some small doubt inspires-- A female family's a serious matter, (None trusts the sex more, or so much admires-- But they hate flattery, so I never flatter); Wives in their husbands' absences grow subtler, And daughters sometimes run off with the butler. XXIII. An honest gentleman at his return May not have the good fortune of Ulysses; Not all lone matrons for their husbands mourn, Or show the same dislike to suitors' kisses; The odds are that he finds a handsome urn To his memory--and two or three young misses Born to some friend, who holds his wife and riches-- And that _his_ Argus[177]--bites him by the breeches. XXIV. If single, probably his plighted Fair Has in his absence wedded some rich miser; But all the better, for the happy pair May quarrel, and, the lady growing wiser, He may resume his amatory care As cavalier servente, or despise her; And that his sorrow may not be a dumb one, Writes odes on the Inconstancy of Woman. XXV. And oh! ye gentlemen who have already Some chaste _liaison_ of the kind--I mean An honest friendship with a married lady-- The only thing of this sort ever seen To last--of all connections the most steady, And the true Hymen, (the first's but a screen)-- Yet, for all that, keep not too long away-- I've known the absent wronged four times a day.[cl] XXVI. Lambro, our sea-solicitor, who had Much less experience of dry land than Ocean, On seeing his own chimney-smoke, felt glad; But not knowing metaphysics, had no notion Of the true reason of his not being sad, Or that of any other strong emotion; He loved his child, and would have wept the loss of her, But knew the cause no more than a philosopher. XXVII. He saw his white walls shining in the sun, His garden trees all shadowy and green; He heard his rivulet's light bubbling run, The distant dog-bark; and perceived between The umbrage of the wood, so cool and dun, The moving figures, and the sparkling sheen Of arms (in the East all arm)--and various dyes Of coloured garbs, as bright as butterflies. XXVIII. And as the spot where they appear he nears, Surprised at these unwonted signs of idling, He hears--alas! no music of the spheres, But an unhallowed, earthly sound of fiddling! A melody which made him doubt his ears, The cause being past his guessing or unriddling; A pipe, too, and a drum, and shortly after-- A most unoriental roar of laughter. XXIX.