FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[1]Immediately on the appearance of The Corsair, (with those obnoxious verses, "Weep, daughter of a royal line," appended to it,) a series of attacks, not confined to Lord Byron himself, but aimed also at all those who had lately become his friends, was commenced in the Courier and Morning Post, and carried on through the greater part of the months of February and March. The point selected by these writers, as a ground of censure on the poet, was one whichnow, perhaps, even themselves would agree to class among his claims to praise,—namely, the atonement which he had endeavoured to make for the youthful violence of his Satire by a measure of justice, amiable even in its overflowings, to every one whom he conceived he had wronged.Notwithstanding the careless tone in which, here and elsewhere, he speaks of these assaults, it is evident that they annoyed him;—an effect which, in reading them over now, we should be apt to wonder they could produce, did we not recollect the property which Dryden attributes to "small wits," in common with certain other small animals:—"We scarce could know they live, but that theybite."The following is a specimen of the terms in which these party scribes could then speak of one of the masters of English song:—"They might have slept in oblivion with Lord Carlisle's Dramas and Lord Byron's Poems."—"Some certainly extol Lord Byron's Poem much, but most of the best judges place his Lordship rather low in the list of our minor poets."[2]This ancient housemaid, of whose gaunt and witch-like appearance it would be impossible to convey any idea but by the pencil, furnished one among the numerous instances of Lord Byron's proneness to attach himself to any thing, however homely, that had once enlisted his good nature in its behalf, and become associated with his thoughts. He first found this old woman at his lodgings in Bennet Street, where, for a whole season, she was the perpetual scarecrow of his visiters. When, next year, he took chambers in Albany, one of the great advantages which his friends looked to in the change was, that they should get rid of this phantom. But, no,—there she was again—he had actually brought her with him from Bennet Street. The following year saw him married, and, with a regular establishment of servants, in Piccadilly; and here,—as Mrs. Mule had not made her appearance to any of the visiters,—it was concluded, rashly, that the witch had vanished. One of those friends, however, who had most fondly indulged in this persuasion, happening to call one day when all the male part of the establishment were abroad, saw, to his dismay, the door opened by the same grim personage, improved considerably in point of habiliments since he last saw her, and keeping pace with the increased scale of her master's household, as a new peruke, and other symptoms of promotion, testified. When asked "how he came to carry this old woman about with him from place to place," Lord Byron's only answer was, "The poor old devil was so kind to me."[3]Part of this passage has been already extracted, but I have allowed it to remain here in its original position, on account of the singularly sudden manner in which it is introduced.[4]He adopted this thought afterwards in his Ode to Napoleon, as well as most of the historical examples in the following paragraph.[5]"As much company," says Pope, "as I have kept, and as much as I love it, I love reading better, and would rather be employed in reading than in the most agreeable conversation."[6]He had made a present of the copyright of "The Corsair" to Mr. Dallas, who thus describes the manner in which the gift was bestowed:—"On the 28th of December, I called in the morning on Lord Byron, whom I found composing 'The Corsair.' He had been working upon it but a few days, and he read me the portion he had written. After some observations, he said, 'I have a great mind—I will.' He then added that he should finish it soon, and asked me to accept of the copyright. I was much surprised. He had, before he was aware of the value of his works, declared that he never would take money for them, and that I should have the whole advantage of all he wrote. This declaration became morally void when the question was about thousands, instead of a few hundreds; and I perfectly agree with the admired and admirable author of Waverley, that 'the wise and good accept not gifts which are made in heat of blood, and which may be after repented of.'—I felt this on the sale of 'Childe Harold,' and observed it to him. The copyright of 'The Giaour' and 'The Bride of Abydos' remained undisposed of, though the poems were selling rapidly, nor had I the slightest notion that he would ever again give me a copyright. But as he continued in the resolution of not appropriating the sale of his works to his own use, I did not scruple to accept that of 'The Corsair,' and I thanked him. He asked me to call and hear the portions read as he wrote them. I went every morning, and was astonished at the rapidity of his composition. He gave me the poem complete on New-year's day, 1814, saying, that my acceptance of it gave him great pleasure, and that I was fully at liberty to publish it with any bookseller I pleased, independent of the profit."Out of this last-mentioned permission arose the momentary embarrassment between the noble poet and his publisher, to which the above notes allude.[7]It had been at first Genevra,—not Francesca, as Mr. Dallas asserts.[8]The first was, of course, the one that I preferred. The other ran as follows:—"January 7. 1814."My dear Moore,"I had written to you a long letter of dedication, which I suppress, because, though it contained something relating to you which every one had been glad to hear, yet there was too much about politics, and poesy, and all things whatsoever, ending with that topic on which most men are fluent, and none very amusing—one's self. It might have been re-written—but to what purpose? My praise could add nothing to your well-earned and firmly-established fame; and with my most hearty admiration of your talents, and delight in your conversation, you are already acquainted. In availing myself of your friendly permission to inscribe this poem to you, I can only wish the offering were as worthy your acceptance as your regard is dear to,"Yours, most affectionately and faithfully,"BYRON."[9]He had at first, after the words "Scott alone," inserted, in a parenthesis,—"He will excuse theMr.——'we do not sayMr.Cæsar.'"[10]The amusing rages into which he was thrown by the printer were vented not only in these notes, but frequently on the proof-sheets themselves. Thus, a passage in the dedication having been printed "the first of her bands in estimation," he writes in the margin, "bards, not bands—was there ever such a stupid misprint?" and, in correcting a line that had been curtailed of its due number of syllables, he says, "Donotomit words—it is quite enough to alter or mis-spell them."[11]His translation of the pretty Portuguese song, "Tu mi chamas." He was tempted to try another version of this ingenious thought, which is, perhaps, still more happy, and has never, I believe, appeared in print."You call me still yourlife—ah! change the word—Life is as transient as th' inconstant's sigh;Say rather I'm yoursoul, more just that name,For, like the soul, my love can never die."[12]It will be recollected that he had announced The Corsair as "the last production with which he should trespass on public patience for some years."[13]Reprinting the "Hours of Idleness."[14]The printer at Newark.[15]Relative to a proposed reconciliation between Lord Carlisle and himself.[16]Of the Satire.[17]I had endeavoured to persuade him to take a part in parliamentary affairs, and to exercise his talent for oratory more frequently.[18]In concluding my letter, having said "God bless you!" I added—"that is, if you have no objection."[19]The statement of the Courier, &c.[20]In asserting that he devoted but four days to the composition of The Bride, he must be understood to refer only to the first sketch of that poem,—the successive additions by which it was increased to its present length having occupied, as we have seen, a much longer period. The Corsair, on the contrary, was, from beginning to end, struck off at a heat—there being but little alteration or addition afterwards,—and the rapidity with which it was produced (being at the rate of nearly two hundred lines a day) would be altogether incredible, had we not his own, as well as his publisher's, testimony to the fact. Such an achievement,—taking into account the surpassing beauty of the work,—is, perhaps, wholly without a parallel in the history of Genius, and shows that 'écrirepar passion,' as Rousseau expresses it, may be sometimes a shorter road to perfection than any that Art has ever struck out.[21]Those bitter and powerful lines which he wrote on the opening of the vault that contained the remains of Henry VIII. and Charles I.[22]He was not yet aware, it appears, that the anonymous manuscript sent to him by his publisher was from the pen of Mr. Knight.[23]The manuscript of a long grave satire, entitled "Anti-Byron," which had been sent to Mr. Murray, and by him forwarded to Lord Byron, with arequest—not meant, I believe, seriously—that he would give his opinion as to the propriety of publishing it.[24]I had begun my letter in the following manner:—"Have you seen the 'Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte?'—I suspect it to be either F——g——d's or Rosa Matilda's. Those rapid and masterly portraits of all the tyrants that preceded Napoleon have a vigour in them which would incline me to say that Rosa Matilda is the person—but then, on the other hand, that powerful grasp of history," &c. &c. After a little more of this mock parallel, the letter went on thus:—"I should like to know whatyouthink of the matter?—Some friends of mine herewillinsist that it is the work of the author of Childe Harold,—but then they are not so well read in F——g——d and Rosa Matilda as I am; and, besides, they seem to forget thatyoupromised, about a month or two ago, not to write any more for years. Seriously," &c. &c.I quote this foolish banter merely to show how safely, even on his most sensitive points, one might venture to jest with him.[25]We find D'Argenson thus encouraging Voltaire to break a similar vow:—"Continue to write without fear for five-and-twenty years longer, but write poetry, notwithstanding your oath in the preface to Newton."[26]Mr. Murray had requested of him to make some additions to the Ode, so as to save the stamp duty imposed upon publications not exceeding a single sheet; and he afterwards added, in successive editions, five or six stanzas, the original number being but eleven. There were also three more stanzas, which he never printed, but which, for the just tribute they contain to Washington, are worthy of being preserved:—"There was a day—there was an hour,While earth was Gaul's—Gaul thine—When that immeasurable powerUnsated to resignHad been an act of purer fameThan gathers round Marengo's nameAnd gilded thy decline,Through the long twilight of all time,Despite some passing clouds of crime."But thou, forsooth, must be a king,And don the purple vest,As if that foolish robe could wringRemembrance from thy breast.Where is that faded garment? whereThe gewgaws thou wert fond to wear,The star—the string—the crest?Vain froward child of empire! say,Are all thy playthings snatch'd away?"Where may the wearied eye reposeWhen gazing on the great;Where neither guilty glory glows,Nor despicable state?Yes—one—the first—the last—the best—The Cincinnatus of the West,Whom envy dared not hate,Bequeathed the name of Washington,To make man blush there was but One!"[27]A Poem by Mr. Stratford Canning, full of spirit and power, entitled "Buonaparte." In a subsequent note to Mr. Murray, Lord Byron says,—"I do not think less highly of 'Buonaparte' for knowing the author. I was aware that he was a man of talent, but did not suspect him of possessingallthefamilytalents in such perfection."[28]It was the fear of this sort of back-water current to which so rapid a flow of fame seemed liable, that led some even of his warmest admirers, ignorant as they were yet of the boundlessness of his resources, to tremble a little at the frequency of his appearances before the public. In one of my own letters to him, I find this apprehension thus expressed:—"If you did not write so well,—as the Royal wit observed,—I should say you write too much; at least, too much in the same strain. The Pythagoreans, you know, were of opinion that the reason why we do not hear or heed the music of the heavenly bodies is that they are always sounding in our ears; and I fear that even the influence ofyoursong may be diminished by falling upon the world's dull ear too constantly."The opinion, however, which a great writer of our day (himself one of the few to whom his remark replies) had the generosity, as well as sagacity, to pronounce on this point, at a time when Lord Byron was indulging in the fullest lavishment of his powers, must be regarded, after all, as the most judicious and wise:—"But they cater ill for the public," says Sir Walter Scott, "and give indifferent advice to the poet, supposing him possessed of the highest qualities of his art, who do not advise him to labour while the laurel around his brows yet retains its freshness. Sketches from Lord Byron are more valuable than finished pictures from others; nor are we at all sure that any labour which he might bestow in revisal would not rather efface than refine those outlines of striking and powerful originality which they exhibit when flung rough from the hand of a master."—Biographical Memoirs, by SIR W. SCOTT.[29]To such lengths did he, at this time, carry his enthusiasm for Kean, that when Miss O'Neil soon after appeared, and, by her matchless representation of feminine tenderness, attracted all eyes and hearts, he was not only a little jealous of her reputation, as interfering with that of his favourite, but, in order to guard himself against the risk of becoming a convert, refused to go to see her act. I endeavoured sometimes to persuade him into witnessing, at least, one of her performances; but his answer was, (punning upon Shakspeare's word, "unanealed,") "No—I'm resolved to continueun-Oneiled."To the great queen of all actresses, however, it will be seen, by the following extract from one of his journals, he rendered due justice:—"Of actors, Cooke was the most natural, Kemble the most supernatural,—Kean the medium between the two. But Mrs. Siddons was worth them all put together."—Detached Thoughts.[30]An epigram here followed, which, as founded on a scriptural allusion, I thought it better to omit.[31]We had been invited by Lord R. to dineafterthe play,—an arrangement which, from its novelty, delighted Lord Byron exceedingly. The dinner, however, afterwards dwindled into a mere supper, and this change was long a subject of jocular resentment with him.[32]I had begged of him to write something for me to set to music.[33]Miss Foote's first appearance, which we witnessed together.[34]In a few days after this, he sent me a long rhyming epistle full of jokes and pleasantries upon every thing and every one around him, of which the following are the only parts producible:—'What sayI?'—not a syllable further in prose;I'm your man 'of all measures,' dear Tom,—so, here goes!Here goes, for a swim on the stream of old Time,On those buoyant supporters the bladders of rhyme.If our weight breaks them down, and we sink in the flood,We are smother'd, at least, in respectable mud,Where the divers of bathos lie drown'd in a heap,And S * * 's last paean has pillow'd his sleep;—That 'felo de se' who, half drunk with his malmsey,Walk'd out of his depth and was lost in a calm sea,Singing 'Glory to God' in a spick-and-span stanza,The like (since Tom Sternhold was choked) never man saw."The papers have told you, no doubt, of the fusses,The fêtes, and the gapings to get at these Russes,—Of his Majesty's suite, up from coachman to Hetman,—And what dignity decks the flat face of the great man.I saw him, last week, at two balls and a party,—For a prince, his demeanour was rather too hearty.You know,weare used to quite different graces,* * * * *The Czar's look, I own, was much brighter and brisker,But then he is sadly deficient in whisker;And wore but a starless blue coat, and in kersey-mere breeches whisk'd round in a waltz with the J * *,Who, lovely as ever, seem'd just as delightedWith majesty's presence as those she invited."[35]The Journal from which I have given extracts in the preceding pages.[36]Mr. Wrangham.[37]A satirical pamphlet, in which all the writers of the day were attacked.[38]He alludes to an action for piracy brought by Mr. Power (the publisher of my musical works), to the trial of which I had been summoned as a witness.[39]Lord Byron afterwards proposed that I should make a third in this publication; but the honour was a perilous one, and I begged leave to decline it.[40]In a note which I wrote to him, before starting, next day, I find the following:—"I got Lara at three o'clock this morning—read him before I slept, and was enraptured. I take the proofs with me."[41]He here refers to an article in the number of the Edinburgh Review, just then published (No. 45.), on The Corsair and Bride of Abydos.[42]An engraving by Agar from Phillips's portrait of him.[43]Alluding to Lara.[44]Mr. Hogg had been led to hope that he should be permitted to insert this poem in a Miscellany which he had at this time some thoughts of publishing; and whatever advice I may have given against such a mode of disposing of the work arose certainly not from any ill will to this ingenious and remarkable man, but from a consideration of what I thought most advantageous to the fame of Lord Byron.[45]His servant had brought him up a large jar of ink, into which, not supposing it to be full, he had thrust his pen down to the very bottom. Enraged, on finding it come out all smeared with ink, he flung the bottle out of the window into the garden, where it lighted, as here described, upon one of eight leaden Muses, that had been imported, some time before, from Holland,—the ninth having been, by some accident, left behind.[46]It was, if I mistake not, during his recent visit to Newstead, that he himself actually fancied he saw the ghost of the Black Friar, which was supposed to have haunted the Abbey from the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, and which he thus describes, from the recollection perhaps of his own fantasy, in Don Juan:—"It was no mouse, but, lo! a monk, array'dIn cowl and beads and dusky garb, appear'd,Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard:His garments only a slight murmur made:He moved as shadowy as the sisters weird,But slowly; and as he pass'd Juan by,Glanced, without pausing, on him a bright eye."It is said, that the Newstead ghost appeared, also, to Lord Byron's cousin, Miss Fanny Parkins, and that she made a sketch of him from memory.[47]The reviews and magazines of the month.[48]The following characteristic note, in reference to this passage, appears, in Mr. Gifford's hand-writing, on the copy of the above letter:—"It is a pity that Lord B. was ignorant of Jonson. The old poet has a Satire on the Court Pucelle that would have supplied him with some pleasantry on Johanna's pregnancy."[49]On the day of the arrival of the lady's answer, he was sitting at dinner, when his gardener came in and presented him with his mother's wedding ring, which she had lost many years before, and which the gardener had just found in digging up the mould under her window. Almost at the same moment, the letter from Miss Milbanke arrived; and Lord Byron exclaimed, "If it contains a consent, I will be married with this very ring." It did contain a very flattering acceptance of his proposal, and a duplicate of the letter had been sent to London, in case this should have missed him.—Memoranda.[50]He had agreed to forfeit these sums to the persons mentioned, should he ever marry.[51]I had frequently, both in earnest and in jest, expressed these hopes to him; and, in one of my letters, after touching upon some matters relative to my own little domestic circle, I added, "This will all be unintelligible to you; though I sometimes cannot help thinking it within the range of possibility, that evenyou, volcano as you are, may, one day, cool down into something of the samehabitablestate. Indeed, when one thinks of lava having been converted into buttons for Isaac Hawkins Browne, there is no saying what such fiery things may be brought to at last."[52]Of the lamentable contrast between sentiments and conduct, which this transfer of the seat of sensibility from the heart to the fancy produces, the annals of literary men afford unluckily too many examples. Alfieri, though he could write a sonnet full of tenderness to his mother, never saw her (says Mr. W. Rose) but once after their early separation, though he frequently passed within a few miles of her residence. The poet Young, with all his parade of domestic sorrows, was, it appears, a neglectful husband and harsh father; and Sterne (to use the words employed by Lord Byron) preferred "whining over a dead ass to relieving a living mother."[53]It is the opinion of Diderot, in his Treatise on Acting, that not only in the art of which he treats, but in all those which are called imitative, the possession of real sensibility is a bar to eminence;—sensibility being, according to his view, "le caractere de la bonté de l'ame et de la médiocrité du génie."[54]Pope.[55]See Foscolo's Essay on Petrarch. On the same principle, Orrery says, in speaking of Swift, "I am persuaded that his distance from his English friends proved a strong incitement to their mutual affection."[56]That he was himself fully aware of this appears from a passage in one of his letters already given:—"My sister is in town, which is a great comfort; for, never having been much together, we are naturally more attached to each other."[57]Wife and children, Bacon tells us in one of his Essays, are "impediments to great enterprises;" and adds, "Certainly, the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men." See, with reference to this subject, chapter xviii. of Mr. D'Israeli's work on "The Literary Character."[58]Milton's first wife, it is well known, ran away from him, within a month after their marriage, disgusted, says Phillips, "with his spare diet and hard study;" and it is difficult to conceive a more melancholy picture of domestic life than is disclosed in his nuncupative will, one of the witnesses to which deposes to having heard the great poet himself complain, that his children "were careless of him, being blind, and made nothing of deserting him."[59]By whatever austerity of temper or habits the poets Dante and Milton may have drawn upon themselves such a fate, it might be expected that, at least, the "gentle Shakspeare" would have stood exempt from the common calamity of his brethren. But, among the very few facts of his life that have been transmitted to us, there is none more clearly proved than the unhappiness of his marriage. The dates of the birth of his children, compared with that of his removal from Stratford,—the total omission of his wife's name in the first draft of his will, and the bitter sarcasm of the bequest by which he remembers her afterwards,—all prove beyond a doubt both his separation from the lady early in life, and his unfriendly feeling towards her at the close of it.In endeavouring to argue against the conclusion naturally to be deduced from this will, Boswell, with a strange ignorance of human nature, remarks:—"If he had taken offence at any part of his wife's conduct, I cannot believe that he would have taken this petty mode of expressing it."[60]In a small book which I have in my possession, containing a sort of chronological History of the Ring, I find the name of Lord Byron, more than once, recorded among the "backers."[61]Dr. Woolriche, an old and valued friend of mine, to whose skill, on the occasion here alluded to, I was indebted for my life.[62]The Dream.[63]The Hebrew Melodies which he had employed himself in writing, during his recent stay in London.[64]I had just been reading Mr. Southey's fine poem of "Roderick;" and with reference to an incident in it, had put the following question to Lord Byron:—"I should like to know from you, who are one of the philocynic sect, whether it is probable, that any dog (out of a melodrame) could recognise a master, whom neither his own mother or mistress was able to find out. I don't care about Ulysses's dog, &c.—all I want is to know fromyou(who are renowned as 'friend of the dog, companion of the bear') whether such a thing is probable."[65]The letter H. is blotted in the MS.[66]It was thus that, according to his account, a certain celebrated singer and actor used frequently to pronounce the word "enthusiasm."[67]Mrs. Mule.[68]Some remark which he told me had been made with respect to the frequent use of the demonstrative pronoun both by himself and by Sir W. Scott.[69]Verses to Lady J * * (containing an allusion to Lord Byron), which I had written, while at Chatsworth, but consigned afterwards to the flames.[70]A seal, with the head of Anacreon, which I had given him.[71]I had taken the liberty of laughing a little at the manner in which some of his Hebrew Melodies had been set to music.[72]The verses enclosed were those melancholy ones, now printed in his works, "There's not a joy the world can give like those it takes away."[73]The MS. was in the handwriting of Lady Byron.[74]These allusions to "a speech" are connected with a little incident, not worth mentioning, which had amused us both when I was in town. He was rather fond (and had been always so, as may be seen in his early letters,) of thus harping on some conventional phrase or joke.[75]He here alludes to a circumstance which I had communicated to him in a preceding letter. In writing to one of the numerous partners of a well-known publishing establishment (with which I have since been lucky enough to form a more intimate connection), I had said confidentially (as I thought), in reference to a poem that had just appeared,—"Between you and me, I do not much admire Mr. * *'s poem." The letter being chiefly upon business, was answered through the regular business channel, and, to my dismay, concluded with the following words:—"Weare very sorry that you do not approve of Mr. * *'s new poem, and are your obedient, &c. &c. L.H.R.O., &c. &c."[76]The death of his infant god-daughter, Olivia Byron Moore.[77]I had accused him of having entirely forgot that, in a preceding letter, I had informed him of my intention to publish with the Messrs. Longman in the ensuing winter, and added that, in giving him this information, I found I had been—to use an elegant Irish metaphor—"whistling jigs to a mile-stone."[78]A few passages at the beginning of these recollections have been omitted, as containing particulars relative to Lord Byron's mother, which have already been mentioned in the early part of this work. Among these, however, there is one anecdote, the repetition of which will be easily pardoned, on account of the infinitely greater interest as well as authenticity imparted to its details by coming from such an eye-witness as Sir Walter Scott:—"I remember," he says, "having seen Lord Byron's mother before she was married, and a certain coincidence rendered the circumstance rather remarkable. It was during Mrs. Siddons's first or second visit to Edinburgh, when the music of that wonderful actress's voice, looks, manner, and person, produced the strongest effect which could possibly be exerted by a human being upon her fellow-creatures. Nothing of the kind that I ever witnessed approached it by a hundred degrees. The high state of excitation was aided by the difficulties of obtaining entrance and the exhausting length of time that the audience were contented to wait until the piece commenced. When the curtain fell, a large proportion of the ladies were generally in hysterics."I remember Miss Gordon of Ghight, in particular, harrowing the house by the desperate and wild way in which she shrieked out Mrs. Siddons's exclamation, in the character of Isabella, 'Oh my Byron! Oh my Byron!' A well-known medical gentleman, the benevolent Dr. Alexander Wood, tendered his assistance; but the thick-pressed audience could not for a long time make way for the doctor to approach his patient, or the patient the physician. The remarkable circumstance was, that the lady had not then seen Captain Byron, who, like Sir Toby, made her conclude with 'Oh!' as she had begun with it."[79]Mr. Murray had, at the time of giving the vase, suggested to Lord Byron, that it would increase the value of the gift to add some such inscription; but the feeling of the noble poet on this subject will be understood from the following answer which he returned:—"April 9. 1815."Thanks for the books. I have great objection to your proposition about inscribing the vase,—which is, that it would appearostentatiouson my part; and of course I must send it as it is, without any alteration."Yours," &c.[80]Mr. Murray had presented Lady Byron with twelve drawings, by Stothard, from Lord Byron's Poems.[81]This and the following letter were addressed to me in Ireland, whither I had gone about the middle of the preceding month.[82]He had lately become one of the members of the Sub-Committee, (consisting, besides himself, of the persons mentioned in this letter,) who had taken upon themselves the management of Drury Lane Theatre; and it had been his wish, on the first construction of the Committee, that I should be one of his colleagues. To some mistake in the mode of conveying this proposal to me, he alludes in the preceding sentence.[83]The following is the enclosure here referred to:—"Darlington, June 3. 1815."My Lord,"I have lately purchased a set of your works, and am quite vexed that you have not cancelled the Ode to Buonaparte. It certainly was prematurely written, without thought or reflection. Providence has now brought him to reign over millions again, while the same Providence keeps as it were in a garrison another potentate, who, in the language of Mr. Burke, 'he hurled from his throne.' See if you cannot make amends for your folly, and consider that, in almost every respect, human nature is the same, in every clime and in every period, and don't act the part of afoolish boy.—Let not Englishmen talk of the stretch of tyrants, while the torrents of blood shed in the East Indies cry aloud to Heaven for retaliation. Learn, good sir, not to cast the first stone. I remain your Lordship's servant,"J. R * *."[84]Notwithstanding this precaution of the poet, the coincidence in question was, but a few years after, triumphantly cited in support of the sweeping charge of plagiarism brought against him by some scribblers. The following are Mr. Sotheby's lines:—"And I have leaptIn transport from my flinty couch, to welcomeThe thunder as it burst upon my roof,And beckon'd to the lightning, as it flash'dAnd sparkled on these fetters."I have since been informed by Mr. Sotheby that, though not published, these lines had been written long before the appearance of Lord Byron's poem.[85]Mr. Taylor having inserted in the Sun newspaper (of which he was then chief proprietor) a sonnet to Lord Byron, in return for a present which his Lordship had sent him of a handsomely bound copy of all his works, there appeared in the same journal, on the following day (from the pen of some person who had acquired a control over the paper), a parody upon this sonnet, containing some disrespectful allusion to Lady Byron; and it is to this circumstance, which Mr. Taylor had written to explain, that the above letter, so creditable to the feelings of the noble husband, refers.[86]It is but justice both to "him that gave and him that took" to mention that the noble poet, at this time, with a delicacy which enhanced the kindness, advanced to the eminent person here spoken of, on the credit of some work he was about to produce, one hundred pounds.[87]A correspondent of one of the monthly Miscellanies gives the following account of this incident:—"During Lord Byron's administration, a ballet was invented by the elder Byrne, in which Miss Smith (since Mrs. Oscar Byrne) had apas seul. This the lady wished to remove to a later period in the ballet. The ballet-master refused, and the lady swore she would not dance it at all. The music incidental to the dance began to play, and the lady walked off the stage. Both parties flounced into the green-room to lay the case before Lord Byron, who happened to be the only person in that apartment. The noble committee-man made an award in favour of Miss Smith, and both complainants rushed angrily out of the room at the instant of my entering it. 'If you had come a minute sooner,' said Lord Byron, 'you would have heard a curious matter decided on by me: a question of dancing!—by me,' added he, looking down at the lame limb, 'whom Nature from my birth has prohibited from taking a single step.' His countenance fell after he had uttered this, as if he had said too much; and for a moment there was an embarrassing silence on both sides."[88]A tragedy entitled, I think, Zopolia.[89]"The last tidings recently heard of Dervish (one of the Arnaouts who followed me) state him to be in revolt upon the mountains, at the head of some of the bands common in that country in times of trouble."[90]I had mentioned to him, as a subject worthy of his best powers of pathos, a melancholy event which had just occurred in my neighbourhood, and to which I have myself made allusion in one of the Sacred Melodies—"Weep not for her."[91]My reply to this part of his letter was, I find, as follows:—"With respect to Hunt's poem, though it is, I own, full of beauties, and though I like himself sincerely, I really could not undertake to praise itseriously. There is so much of thequizziblein all he writes, that I never can put on the proper pathetic face in reading him."[92]This sad doubt,—"if Iamat all,"—becomes no less singular than sad when we recollect that six and thirty was actually the age when he ceased to "be," and at a moment, too, when (as even the least friendly to him allow) he was in that state of "progressing merits" which he here jestingly anticipates.[93]It will be perceived from this that I was as yet unacquainted with the true circumstances of the transaction.[94]MS.—"Detached Thoughts."[95]An anecdote connected with one of these occasions is thus related in the Journal just referred to:—"When the bailiff (for I have seen most kinds of life) came upon me in 1815 to seize my chattels, (being a peer of parliament, my person was beyond him,) being curious (as is my habit), I first asked him "what extents elsewhere he had for government?" upon which he showed me one uponone house onlyforseventy thousand pounds! Next I asked him if he had nothing for Sheridan? "Oh—Sheridan!" said he; "ay, I have this" (pulling out a pocket-book, &c.); "but, my Lord, I have been in Sheridan's house a twelvemonth at a time—a civil gentleman—knows how to deal withus," &c. &c. &c. Our own business was then discussed, which was none of the easiest for me at that time. But the man was civil, and (what I valued more) communicative. I had met many of his brethren, years before, in affairs of my friends, (commoners, that is,) but this was the first (or second) on my own account.—A civil man; fee'd accordingly; probably he anticipated as much."[96]For this story, however, there was so far a foundation that the practice to which he had accustomed himself from boyhood, of having loaded pistols always near him at night, was considered so strange a propensity as to be included in that list of symptoms (sixteen, I believe, in number,) which were submitted to medical opinion, in proof of his insanity. Another symptom was the emotion, almost to hysterics, which he had exhibited on seeing Kean act Sir Giles Overreach. But the most plausible of all the grounds, as he himself used to allow, on which these articles of impeachment against his sanity were drawn up, was an act of violence committed by him on a favourite old watch that had been his companion from boyhood, and had gone with him to Greece. In a fit of vexation and rage, brought on by some of those humiliating embarrassments to which he was now almost daily a prey, he furiously dashed this watch upon the hearth, and ground it to pieces among the ashes with the poker.[97]Of the abuse lavished upon him, the following extract from a poem, published at this time, will give some idea:—"From native England, that endured too longThe ceaseless burden of his impious song;His mad career of crimes and follies run,And grey in vice, when life was scarce begun;He goes, in foreign lands prepared to findA life more suited to his guilty mind;Where other climes new pleasures may supplyFor that pall'd taste, and that unhallow'd eye;—Wisely he seeks some yet untrodden shore,For those who know him less may prize him more."In a rhyming pamphlet, too, entitled "A Poetical Epistle from Delia, addressed to Lord Byron," the writer thus charitably expresses herself:—"Hopeless of peace below, and, shuddering thought!Far from that Heav'n, denied, if never sought,Thy light a beacon—a reproach thy name—Thy memory "damn'd to everlasting fame,"Shunn'd by the wise, admired by fools alone—The good shall mourn thee—and the Muse disown."[98]Had he noterred, he had far less achieved.[99]The sale of these books took place the following month, and they were described in the catalogue as the property of "a Nobleman about to leave England on a tour."From a note to Mr. Murray, it would appear that he had been first announced as going to the Morea."I hope that the catalogue of the books, &c., has not been published without my seeing it. I must reserve several, and many ought not to be printed. The advertisement is a very bad one. I am not going to the Morea; and if I was, you might as well advertise a man in Russiaas going to Yorkshire.—Ever," &c.Together with the books was sold an article of furniture, which is now in the possession of Mr. Murray, namely, "a large screen covered with portraits of actors, pugilists, representations of boxing-matches," &c.[100]Petrarch was, it appears, also in his youth, a Dandy. "Recollect," he says, in a letter to his brother, "the time, when we wore white habits, on which the least spot, or a plait ill placed, would have been a subject of grief; when our shoes were so tight we suffered martyrdom," &c.[101]To this masquerade he went in the habit of a Caloyer, or Eastern monk,—a dress particularly well calculated to set off the beauty of his fine countenance, which was accordingly, that night, the subject of general admiration.[102]In his Memoranda there were equally enthusiastic praises of Curran. "The riches," said he, "of his Irish imagination were exhaustless. I have heard that man speak more poetry than I have ever seen written,—though I saw him seldom and but occasionally. I saw him presented to Madame de Staël at Mackintosh's;—it was the grand confluence between the Rhone and the Saone, and they were both so d——d ugly, that I could not help wondering how the best intellects of France and Ireland could have taken up respectively such residences."In another part, however, he was somewhat more fair to Madame de Staël's personal appearance:—"Her figure was not bad; her legs tolerable; her arms good. Altogether, I can conceive her having been a desirable woman, allowing a little imagination for her soul, and so forth. She would have made a great man."[103]Dated April 16.[104]It will be seen, from a subsequent letter, that the first stanza of that most cordial of Farewells, "My boat is on the shore," was also written at this time.[105]In one of his letters to Mr. Hunt, he declares it to be his own opinion that "an addiction to poetry is very generally the result of 'an uneasy mind in an uneasy body;' disease or deformity," he adds, "have been the attendants of many of our best. Collins mad—Chatterton,Ithink, mad—Cowper mad—Pope crooked—Milton blind," &c. &c.[106]The Deformed Transformed.[107]Childe Harold, Canto iii. stanza 17.[108]The following was the advertisement enclosed:—"Neatly printed and hot-pressed, 2s. 6d."Lord Byron's Farewell to England, with Three other Poems—Ode to St. Helena, to My Daughter on her Birthday, and To the Lily of France."Printed by J. Johnston, Cheapside, 335.; Oxford, 9."The above beautiful Poems will be read with the most lively interest, as it is probable they will be the last of the author's that will appear in England."[109]The motto is—He left a name to all succeeding times,Link'd with one virtue and a thousand crimes."[110]A Monody on the death of Sheridan, which was spoken at Drury Lane theatre.[111]Dent de Jaman.[112]It is interesting to observe the use to which he afterwards converted these hasty memorandums in his sublime drama of Manfred."It is not noon—the sunbow's rays still archThe torrent with the many hues of heaven,And roll the sheeted silver's waving columnO'er the crag's headlong perpendicular,And fling its lines of foaming light along,And to and fro, like the pale coursers tail,The Giant steed, to be bestrode by DeathAs told in the Apocalypse."[113]"Yeavalanches, whom a breath draws downIn mountainous o'erwhelming, come and crush me!I hear ye momently above, beneath,Crash with a frequent conflict.* * *The mists boil up around the glaciers;cloudsRise curlingfast beneath me, white and sulphury,Like foam from the roused ocean of deep hell!"MANFRED.[114]"O'er the savage sea,The glassy ocean of the mountain ice,We skim its rugged breakers, which put onThe aspect of a tumblingtempest's foam,Frozen in a moment."MANFRED.[115]"Like theseblasted pines,Wrecks of a single winter, barkless, branchless."IBID.[116]Childe Harold, Canto iii.[117]To this lameness of Polidori, one of the preceding letters of Lord Byron alludes.[118]The Corsair.[119]His system of diet here was regulated by an abstinence almost incredible. A thin slice of bread, with tea, at breakfast—a light, vegetable dinner, with a bottle or two of Seltzer water, tinged with vin de Grave, and in the evening, a cup of green tea, without milk or sugar, formed the whole of his sustenance. The pangs of hunger he appeased by privately chewing tobacco and smoking cigars.[120]From his remembrance of this sketch, Polidori afterwards vamped up his strange novel of the Vampire, which, under the supposition of its being Lord Byron's, was received with such enthusiasm in France. It would, indeed, not a little deduct from our value of foreign fame, if what some French writers have asserted be true, that the appearance of this extravagant novel among our neighbours first attracted their attention to the genius of Byron.[121]"The wind (says Lord Byron's fellow-voyager) gradually increased in violence until it blew tremendously; and, as it came from the remotest extremity of the Lake, produced waves of a frightful height, and covered the whole surface with a chaos of foam. One of our boatmen, who was a dreadfully stupid fellow, persisted in holding the sail at a time when the boat was on the point of being driven under water by the hurricane. On discovering this error, he let it entirely go, and the boat for a moment refused to obey the helm; in addition, the rudder was so broken as to render the management of it very difficult; one wave fell in, and then another."[122]"I felt, in this near prospect of death (says Mr. Shelley), a mixture of sensations, among which terror entered, though but subordinately. My feelings would have been less painful had I been alone; but I knew that my companion would have attempted to save me, and I was overcome with humiliation, when I thought that his life might have been risked to preserve mine. When we arrived at St. Gingoux, the inhabitants, who stood on the shore, unaccustomed to see a vessel as frail as ours, and fearing to venture at all on such a sea, exchanged looks of wonder and congratulation with our boatmen, who, as well as ourselves, were well pleased to set foot on shore."[123]In the account of this visit to Copet in his Memoranda, he spoke in high terms of the daughter of his hostess, the present Duchess de Broglie, and, in noticing how much she appeared to be attached to her husband, remarked that "Nothing was more pleasing than to see the developement of the domestic affections in a very young woman." Of Madame de Staël, in that Memoir, he spoke thus:—"Madame de Staël was a good woman at heart and the cleverest at bottom, but spoilt by a wish to be—she knew not what. In her own house she was amiable; in any other person's, you wished her gone, and in her own again."[124]Upon the same occasion, indeed, he wrote some verses in a spirit not quite so generous, of which a few of the opening lines is all I shall give:—"And thou wert sad—yet I was not with thee!And thou wert sick—and yet I was not near.Methought that Joy and Health alone could beWhere I wasnot, and pain and sorrow here.And is it thus?—it is as I foretold,And shall be more so:—" &c. &c.[125]"Admiral Byron was remarkable for never making a voyage without a tempest. He was known to the sailors by the facetious name of 'Foul-weather Jack.'"But, though it were tempest-tost,Still his bark could not be lost.He returned safely from the wreck of the Wager (in Anson's Voyage), and subsequently circumnavigated the world, many years after, as commander of a similar expedition."[126]The lake of Newstead Abbey.[127]With Milan, however, or its society, the noble traveller was far from being pleased, and in his Memoranda, I recollect, he described his stay there to be "like a ship under quarantine." Among other persons whom he met in the society of that place was M. Beyle, the ingenious author of "L'Histoire de la Peinture en Italie," who thus describes the impression their first interview left upon him:—"Ce fut pendant l'automne de 1816, que je le rencontrai au théâtre de laScala, à Milan, dans la loge de M. Louis de Brême. Je fus frappé des yeux de Lord Byron au moment où il écoutait un sestetto d'un opéra de Mayer intitulé Elena. Je n'ai vu de ma vie, rien de plus beau ni de plus expressif. Encore aujourd'hui, si je viens à penser à l'expression qu'un grand peintre devrait donner an génie, cette tête sublime reparaît tout-à-coup devant moi. J'eus un instant d'enthousiasme, et oubliant la juste répugnance que tout homme un peu fier doit avoir à se faire présenter à un pair d'Angleterre, je priai M. de Brême de m'introduire à Lord Byron, je me trouvai le lendemain à dîner chez M. de Brême, avec lui, et le celèbre Monti, l'immortel auteur de laBasvigliana. On parla poésie, on en vint à demander quels étaient les douze plus beaux vers faits depuis un siècle, en Français, en Italien, en Anglais. Les Italiens présens s'accordèrent à designer les douze premiers vers de laMascheronianade Monti, comme ce que l'on avait fait de plus beau dans leur langue, depuis cent ans.Montivoulut bien nous les réciter. Je regardai Lord Byron, il fut ravi. La nuance de hauteur, ou plutôt l'air d'un hommequi se trouve avoir à repousser une importunité, qui déparait un peu sa belle figure, disparut tout-à-coup pour faire à l'expression du bonheur. Le premier chant de laMascheroniana, que Monti récita presque en entier, vaincu par les acclamations des auditeurs, causa la plus vive sensation à l'auteur de Childe Harold. Je n'oublierai jamais l'expression divine de ses traits; c'était l'air serein de la puissance et du génie, et suivant moi, Lord Byron n'avait, en ce moment, aucune affectation à se reprocher."[128]Manfred.[129]An article in No. 31. of this Review, written, as Lord Byron afterwards discovered, by Sir Walter Scott, and well meriting, by the kind and generous spirit that breathes through it, the warm and lasting gratitude it awakened in the noble poet.[130]He had been misinformed on this point,—the work in question having been, from the first, entitled an "Oriental Romance." A much worse mistake (because wilful, and with no very charitable design) was that of certain persons, who would have it that the poem was meant to be epic!—Even Mr. D'Israeli has, for the sake of a theory, given in to this very gratuitous assumption:—"The Anacreontic poet," he says, "remains only Anacreontic in his Epic."[131]In a note to Mr. Murray, subjoined to some corrections for Manfred, he says, "Since I wrote to you last, theslowfever I wot of thought proper to mend its pace, and became similar to one which I caught some years ago in the marshes of Elis, in the Morea."[132]Whenever a word or passage occurs (as in this instance) which Lord Byron would have pronounced emphatically in speaking, it appears, in his handwriting, as if written with something of the same vehemence.[133]Here follow the same rhymes ("I read the Christabel," &c.) which have already been given in one of his letters to myself.[134]The only plausible claim of these epistles to authenticity arises from the circumstance of St. Paul having (according to the opinion of Mosheim and others) written an epistle to the Corinthians, before that which we now call his first. They are, however, universally given up as spurious. Though frequently referred to as existing in the Armenian, by Primate Usher, Johan. Gregorius, and other learned men, they were for the first time, I believe, translated from that language by the two Whistons, who subjoined the correspondence, with a Greek and Latin version, to their edition of the Armenian History of Moses of Chorene, published in 1736.The translation by Lord Byron is, as far as I can learn, the first that has ever been attempted in English; and as, proceeding fromhispen, it must possess, of course, additional interest, the reader will not be displeased to find it in the Appendix. Annexed to the copy in my possession are the following words in his own handwriting:—"Done into English by me, January, February, 1817, at the Convent of San Lazaro, with the aid and exposition of the Armenian text by the Father Paschal Aucher, Armenian friar.—BYRON. I had also (he adds) the Latin text, but it is in many places very corrupt, and with great omissions."

[1]Immediately on the appearance of The Corsair, (with those obnoxious verses, "Weep, daughter of a royal line," appended to it,) a series of attacks, not confined to Lord Byron himself, but aimed also at all those who had lately become his friends, was commenced in the Courier and Morning Post, and carried on through the greater part of the months of February and March. The point selected by these writers, as a ground of censure on the poet, was one whichnow, perhaps, even themselves would agree to class among his claims to praise,—namely, the atonement which he had endeavoured to make for the youthful violence of his Satire by a measure of justice, amiable even in its overflowings, to every one whom he conceived he had wronged.Notwithstanding the careless tone in which, here and elsewhere, he speaks of these assaults, it is evident that they annoyed him;—an effect which, in reading them over now, we should be apt to wonder they could produce, did we not recollect the property which Dryden attributes to "small wits," in common with certain other small animals:—"We scarce could know they live, but that theybite."The following is a specimen of the terms in which these party scribes could then speak of one of the masters of English song:—"They might have slept in oblivion with Lord Carlisle's Dramas and Lord Byron's Poems."—"Some certainly extol Lord Byron's Poem much, but most of the best judges place his Lordship rather low in the list of our minor poets."

Notwithstanding the careless tone in which, here and elsewhere, he speaks of these assaults, it is evident that they annoyed him;—an effect which, in reading them over now, we should be apt to wonder they could produce, did we not recollect the property which Dryden attributes to "small wits," in common with certain other small animals:—

"We scarce could know they live, but that theybite."

The following is a specimen of the terms in which these party scribes could then speak of one of the masters of English song:—"They might have slept in oblivion with Lord Carlisle's Dramas and Lord Byron's Poems."—"Some certainly extol Lord Byron's Poem much, but most of the best judges place his Lordship rather low in the list of our minor poets."

[2]This ancient housemaid, of whose gaunt and witch-like appearance it would be impossible to convey any idea but by the pencil, furnished one among the numerous instances of Lord Byron's proneness to attach himself to any thing, however homely, that had once enlisted his good nature in its behalf, and become associated with his thoughts. He first found this old woman at his lodgings in Bennet Street, where, for a whole season, she was the perpetual scarecrow of his visiters. When, next year, he took chambers in Albany, one of the great advantages which his friends looked to in the change was, that they should get rid of this phantom. But, no,—there she was again—he had actually brought her with him from Bennet Street. The following year saw him married, and, with a regular establishment of servants, in Piccadilly; and here,—as Mrs. Mule had not made her appearance to any of the visiters,—it was concluded, rashly, that the witch had vanished. One of those friends, however, who had most fondly indulged in this persuasion, happening to call one day when all the male part of the establishment were abroad, saw, to his dismay, the door opened by the same grim personage, improved considerably in point of habiliments since he last saw her, and keeping pace with the increased scale of her master's household, as a new peruke, and other symptoms of promotion, testified. When asked "how he came to carry this old woman about with him from place to place," Lord Byron's only answer was, "The poor old devil was so kind to me."

[3]Part of this passage has been already extracted, but I have allowed it to remain here in its original position, on account of the singularly sudden manner in which it is introduced.

[4]He adopted this thought afterwards in his Ode to Napoleon, as well as most of the historical examples in the following paragraph.

[5]"As much company," says Pope, "as I have kept, and as much as I love it, I love reading better, and would rather be employed in reading than in the most agreeable conversation."

[6]He had made a present of the copyright of "The Corsair" to Mr. Dallas, who thus describes the manner in which the gift was bestowed:—"On the 28th of December, I called in the morning on Lord Byron, whom I found composing 'The Corsair.' He had been working upon it but a few days, and he read me the portion he had written. After some observations, he said, 'I have a great mind—I will.' He then added that he should finish it soon, and asked me to accept of the copyright. I was much surprised. He had, before he was aware of the value of his works, declared that he never would take money for them, and that I should have the whole advantage of all he wrote. This declaration became morally void when the question was about thousands, instead of a few hundreds; and I perfectly agree with the admired and admirable author of Waverley, that 'the wise and good accept not gifts which are made in heat of blood, and which may be after repented of.'—I felt this on the sale of 'Childe Harold,' and observed it to him. The copyright of 'The Giaour' and 'The Bride of Abydos' remained undisposed of, though the poems were selling rapidly, nor had I the slightest notion that he would ever again give me a copyright. But as he continued in the resolution of not appropriating the sale of his works to his own use, I did not scruple to accept that of 'The Corsair,' and I thanked him. He asked me to call and hear the portions read as he wrote them. I went every morning, and was astonished at the rapidity of his composition. He gave me the poem complete on New-year's day, 1814, saying, that my acceptance of it gave him great pleasure, and that I was fully at liberty to publish it with any bookseller I pleased, independent of the profit."Out of this last-mentioned permission arose the momentary embarrassment between the noble poet and his publisher, to which the above notes allude.

Out of this last-mentioned permission arose the momentary embarrassment between the noble poet and his publisher, to which the above notes allude.

[7]It had been at first Genevra,—not Francesca, as Mr. Dallas asserts.

[8]The first was, of course, the one that I preferred. The other ran as follows:—"January 7. 1814."My dear Moore,"I had written to you a long letter of dedication, which I suppress, because, though it contained something relating to you which every one had been glad to hear, yet there was too much about politics, and poesy, and all things whatsoever, ending with that topic on which most men are fluent, and none very amusing—one's self. It might have been re-written—but to what purpose? My praise could add nothing to your well-earned and firmly-established fame; and with my most hearty admiration of your talents, and delight in your conversation, you are already acquainted. In availing myself of your friendly permission to inscribe this poem to you, I can only wish the offering were as worthy your acceptance as your regard is dear to,"Yours, most affectionately and faithfully,"BYRON."

[8]The first was, of course, the one that I preferred. The other ran as follows:—

"January 7. 1814."My dear Moore,"I had written to you a long letter of dedication, which I suppress, because, though it contained something relating to you which every one had been glad to hear, yet there was too much about politics, and poesy, and all things whatsoever, ending with that topic on which most men are fluent, and none very amusing—one's self. It might have been re-written—but to what purpose? My praise could add nothing to your well-earned and firmly-established fame; and with my most hearty admiration of your talents, and delight in your conversation, you are already acquainted. In availing myself of your friendly permission to inscribe this poem to you, I can only wish the offering were as worthy your acceptance as your regard is dear to,"Yours, most affectionately and faithfully,"BYRON."

"January 7. 1814.

"My dear Moore,

"I had written to you a long letter of dedication, which I suppress, because, though it contained something relating to you which every one had been glad to hear, yet there was too much about politics, and poesy, and all things whatsoever, ending with that topic on which most men are fluent, and none very amusing—one's self. It might have been re-written—but to what purpose? My praise could add nothing to your well-earned and firmly-established fame; and with my most hearty admiration of your talents, and delight in your conversation, you are already acquainted. In availing myself of your friendly permission to inscribe this poem to you, I can only wish the offering were as worthy your acceptance as your regard is dear to,

"Yours, most affectionately and faithfully,

"BYRON."

[9]He had at first, after the words "Scott alone," inserted, in a parenthesis,—"He will excuse theMr.——'we do not sayMr.Cæsar.'"

[10]The amusing rages into which he was thrown by the printer were vented not only in these notes, but frequently on the proof-sheets themselves. Thus, a passage in the dedication having been printed "the first of her bands in estimation," he writes in the margin, "bards, not bands—was there ever such a stupid misprint?" and, in correcting a line that had been curtailed of its due number of syllables, he says, "Donotomit words—it is quite enough to alter or mis-spell them."

[11]His translation of the pretty Portuguese song, "Tu mi chamas." He was tempted to try another version of this ingenious thought, which is, perhaps, still more happy, and has never, I believe, appeared in print."You call me still yourlife—ah! change the word—Life is as transient as th' inconstant's sigh;Say rather I'm yoursoul, more just that name,For, like the soul, my love can never die."

"You call me still yourlife—ah! change the word—Life is as transient as th' inconstant's sigh;Say rather I'm yoursoul, more just that name,For, like the soul, my love can never die."

[12]It will be recollected that he had announced The Corsair as "the last production with which he should trespass on public patience for some years."

[13]Reprinting the "Hours of Idleness."

[14]The printer at Newark.

[15]Relative to a proposed reconciliation between Lord Carlisle and himself.

[16]Of the Satire.

[17]I had endeavoured to persuade him to take a part in parliamentary affairs, and to exercise his talent for oratory more frequently.

[18]In concluding my letter, having said "God bless you!" I added—"that is, if you have no objection."

[19]The statement of the Courier, &c.

[20]In asserting that he devoted but four days to the composition of The Bride, he must be understood to refer only to the first sketch of that poem,—the successive additions by which it was increased to its present length having occupied, as we have seen, a much longer period. The Corsair, on the contrary, was, from beginning to end, struck off at a heat—there being but little alteration or addition afterwards,—and the rapidity with which it was produced (being at the rate of nearly two hundred lines a day) would be altogether incredible, had we not his own, as well as his publisher's, testimony to the fact. Such an achievement,—taking into account the surpassing beauty of the work,—is, perhaps, wholly without a parallel in the history of Genius, and shows that 'écrirepar passion,' as Rousseau expresses it, may be sometimes a shorter road to perfection than any that Art has ever struck out.

[21]Those bitter and powerful lines which he wrote on the opening of the vault that contained the remains of Henry VIII. and Charles I.

[22]He was not yet aware, it appears, that the anonymous manuscript sent to him by his publisher was from the pen of Mr. Knight.

[23]The manuscript of a long grave satire, entitled "Anti-Byron," which had been sent to Mr. Murray, and by him forwarded to Lord Byron, with arequest—not meant, I believe, seriously—that he would give his opinion as to the propriety of publishing it.

[24]I had begun my letter in the following manner:—"Have you seen the 'Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte?'—I suspect it to be either F——g——d's or Rosa Matilda's. Those rapid and masterly portraits of all the tyrants that preceded Napoleon have a vigour in them which would incline me to say that Rosa Matilda is the person—but then, on the other hand, that powerful grasp of history," &c. &c. After a little more of this mock parallel, the letter went on thus:—"I should like to know whatyouthink of the matter?—Some friends of mine herewillinsist that it is the work of the author of Childe Harold,—but then they are not so well read in F——g——d and Rosa Matilda as I am; and, besides, they seem to forget thatyoupromised, about a month or two ago, not to write any more for years. Seriously," &c. &c.I quote this foolish banter merely to show how safely, even on his most sensitive points, one might venture to jest with him.

I quote this foolish banter merely to show how safely, even on his most sensitive points, one might venture to jest with him.

[25]We find D'Argenson thus encouraging Voltaire to break a similar vow:—"Continue to write without fear for five-and-twenty years longer, but write poetry, notwithstanding your oath in the preface to Newton."

[26]Mr. Murray had requested of him to make some additions to the Ode, so as to save the stamp duty imposed upon publications not exceeding a single sheet; and he afterwards added, in successive editions, five or six stanzas, the original number being but eleven. There were also three more stanzas, which he never printed, but which, for the just tribute they contain to Washington, are worthy of being preserved:—"There was a day—there was an hour,While earth was Gaul's—Gaul thine—When that immeasurable powerUnsated to resignHad been an act of purer fameThan gathers round Marengo's nameAnd gilded thy decline,Through the long twilight of all time,Despite some passing clouds of crime."But thou, forsooth, must be a king,And don the purple vest,As if that foolish robe could wringRemembrance from thy breast.Where is that faded garment? whereThe gewgaws thou wert fond to wear,The star—the string—the crest?Vain froward child of empire! say,Are all thy playthings snatch'd away?"Where may the wearied eye reposeWhen gazing on the great;Where neither guilty glory glows,Nor despicable state?Yes—one—the first—the last—the best—The Cincinnatus of the West,Whom envy dared not hate,Bequeathed the name of Washington,To make man blush there was but One!"

"There was a day—there was an hour,While earth was Gaul's—Gaul thine—When that immeasurable powerUnsated to resignHad been an act of purer fameThan gathers round Marengo's nameAnd gilded thy decline,Through the long twilight of all time,Despite some passing clouds of crime."But thou, forsooth, must be a king,And don the purple vest,As if that foolish robe could wringRemembrance from thy breast.Where is that faded garment? whereThe gewgaws thou wert fond to wear,The star—the string—the crest?Vain froward child of empire! say,Are all thy playthings snatch'd away?"Where may the wearied eye reposeWhen gazing on the great;Where neither guilty glory glows,Nor despicable state?Yes—one—the first—the last—the best—The Cincinnatus of the West,Whom envy dared not hate,Bequeathed the name of Washington,To make man blush there was but One!"

[27]A Poem by Mr. Stratford Canning, full of spirit and power, entitled "Buonaparte." In a subsequent note to Mr. Murray, Lord Byron says,—"I do not think less highly of 'Buonaparte' for knowing the author. I was aware that he was a man of talent, but did not suspect him of possessingallthefamilytalents in such perfection."

[28]It was the fear of this sort of back-water current to which so rapid a flow of fame seemed liable, that led some even of his warmest admirers, ignorant as they were yet of the boundlessness of his resources, to tremble a little at the frequency of his appearances before the public. In one of my own letters to him, I find this apprehension thus expressed:—"If you did not write so well,—as the Royal wit observed,—I should say you write too much; at least, too much in the same strain. The Pythagoreans, you know, were of opinion that the reason why we do not hear or heed the music of the heavenly bodies is that they are always sounding in our ears; and I fear that even the influence ofyoursong may be diminished by falling upon the world's dull ear too constantly."The opinion, however, which a great writer of our day (himself one of the few to whom his remark replies) had the generosity, as well as sagacity, to pronounce on this point, at a time when Lord Byron was indulging in the fullest lavishment of his powers, must be regarded, after all, as the most judicious and wise:—"But they cater ill for the public," says Sir Walter Scott, "and give indifferent advice to the poet, supposing him possessed of the highest qualities of his art, who do not advise him to labour while the laurel around his brows yet retains its freshness. Sketches from Lord Byron are more valuable than finished pictures from others; nor are we at all sure that any labour which he might bestow in revisal would not rather efface than refine those outlines of striking and powerful originality which they exhibit when flung rough from the hand of a master."—Biographical Memoirs, by SIR W. SCOTT.

The opinion, however, which a great writer of our day (himself one of the few to whom his remark replies) had the generosity, as well as sagacity, to pronounce on this point, at a time when Lord Byron was indulging in the fullest lavishment of his powers, must be regarded, after all, as the most judicious and wise:—"But they cater ill for the public," says Sir Walter Scott, "and give indifferent advice to the poet, supposing him possessed of the highest qualities of his art, who do not advise him to labour while the laurel around his brows yet retains its freshness. Sketches from Lord Byron are more valuable than finished pictures from others; nor are we at all sure that any labour which he might bestow in revisal would not rather efface than refine those outlines of striking and powerful originality which they exhibit when flung rough from the hand of a master."—Biographical Memoirs, by SIR W. SCOTT.

[29]To such lengths did he, at this time, carry his enthusiasm for Kean, that when Miss O'Neil soon after appeared, and, by her matchless representation of feminine tenderness, attracted all eyes and hearts, he was not only a little jealous of her reputation, as interfering with that of his favourite, but, in order to guard himself against the risk of becoming a convert, refused to go to see her act. I endeavoured sometimes to persuade him into witnessing, at least, one of her performances; but his answer was, (punning upon Shakspeare's word, "unanealed,") "No—I'm resolved to continueun-Oneiled."To the great queen of all actresses, however, it will be seen, by the following extract from one of his journals, he rendered due justice:—"Of actors, Cooke was the most natural, Kemble the most supernatural,—Kean the medium between the two. But Mrs. Siddons was worth them all put together."—Detached Thoughts.

To the great queen of all actresses, however, it will be seen, by the following extract from one of his journals, he rendered due justice:—

"Of actors, Cooke was the most natural, Kemble the most supernatural,—Kean the medium between the two. But Mrs. Siddons was worth them all put together."—Detached Thoughts.

[30]An epigram here followed, which, as founded on a scriptural allusion, I thought it better to omit.

[31]We had been invited by Lord R. to dineafterthe play,—an arrangement which, from its novelty, delighted Lord Byron exceedingly. The dinner, however, afterwards dwindled into a mere supper, and this change was long a subject of jocular resentment with him.

[32]I had begged of him to write something for me to set to music.

[33]Miss Foote's first appearance, which we witnessed together.

[34]In a few days after this, he sent me a long rhyming epistle full of jokes and pleasantries upon every thing and every one around him, of which the following are the only parts producible:—'What sayI?'—not a syllable further in prose;I'm your man 'of all measures,' dear Tom,—so, here goes!Here goes, for a swim on the stream of old Time,On those buoyant supporters the bladders of rhyme.If our weight breaks them down, and we sink in the flood,We are smother'd, at least, in respectable mud,Where the divers of bathos lie drown'd in a heap,And S * * 's last paean has pillow'd his sleep;—That 'felo de se' who, half drunk with his malmsey,Walk'd out of his depth and was lost in a calm sea,Singing 'Glory to God' in a spick-and-span stanza,The like (since Tom Sternhold was choked) never man saw."The papers have told you, no doubt, of the fusses,The fêtes, and the gapings to get at these Russes,—Of his Majesty's suite, up from coachman to Hetman,—And what dignity decks the flat face of the great man.I saw him, last week, at two balls and a party,—For a prince, his demeanour was rather too hearty.You know,weare used to quite different graces,* * * * *The Czar's look, I own, was much brighter and brisker,But then he is sadly deficient in whisker;And wore but a starless blue coat, and in kersey-mere breeches whisk'd round in a waltz with the J * *,Who, lovely as ever, seem'd just as delightedWith majesty's presence as those she invited."

[34]In a few days after this, he sent me a long rhyming epistle full of jokes and pleasantries upon every thing and every one around him, of which the following are the only parts producible:—

'What sayI?'—not a syllable further in prose;I'm your man 'of all measures,' dear Tom,—so, here goes!Here goes, for a swim on the stream of old Time,On those buoyant supporters the bladders of rhyme.If our weight breaks them down, and we sink in the flood,We are smother'd, at least, in respectable mud,Where the divers of bathos lie drown'd in a heap,And S * * 's last paean has pillow'd his sleep;—That 'felo de se' who, half drunk with his malmsey,Walk'd out of his depth and was lost in a calm sea,Singing 'Glory to God' in a spick-and-span stanza,The like (since Tom Sternhold was choked) never man saw."The papers have told you, no doubt, of the fusses,The fêtes, and the gapings to get at these Russes,—Of his Majesty's suite, up from coachman to Hetman,—And what dignity decks the flat face of the great man.I saw him, last week, at two balls and a party,—For a prince, his demeanour was rather too hearty.You know,weare used to quite different graces,* * * * *The Czar's look, I own, was much brighter and brisker,But then he is sadly deficient in whisker;And wore but a starless blue coat, and in kersey-mere breeches whisk'd round in a waltz with the J * *,Who, lovely as ever, seem'd just as delightedWith majesty's presence as those she invited."

[35]The Journal from which I have given extracts in the preceding pages.

[36]Mr. Wrangham.

[37]A satirical pamphlet, in which all the writers of the day were attacked.

[38]He alludes to an action for piracy brought by Mr. Power (the publisher of my musical works), to the trial of which I had been summoned as a witness.

[39]Lord Byron afterwards proposed that I should make a third in this publication; but the honour was a perilous one, and I begged leave to decline it.

[40]In a note which I wrote to him, before starting, next day, I find the following:—"I got Lara at three o'clock this morning—read him before I slept, and was enraptured. I take the proofs with me."

[41]He here refers to an article in the number of the Edinburgh Review, just then published (No. 45.), on The Corsair and Bride of Abydos.

[42]An engraving by Agar from Phillips's portrait of him.

[43]Alluding to Lara.

[44]Mr. Hogg had been led to hope that he should be permitted to insert this poem in a Miscellany which he had at this time some thoughts of publishing; and whatever advice I may have given against such a mode of disposing of the work arose certainly not from any ill will to this ingenious and remarkable man, but from a consideration of what I thought most advantageous to the fame of Lord Byron.

[45]His servant had brought him up a large jar of ink, into which, not supposing it to be full, he had thrust his pen down to the very bottom. Enraged, on finding it come out all smeared with ink, he flung the bottle out of the window into the garden, where it lighted, as here described, upon one of eight leaden Muses, that had been imported, some time before, from Holland,—the ninth having been, by some accident, left behind.

[46]It was, if I mistake not, during his recent visit to Newstead, that he himself actually fancied he saw the ghost of the Black Friar, which was supposed to have haunted the Abbey from the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, and which he thus describes, from the recollection perhaps of his own fantasy, in Don Juan:—"It was no mouse, but, lo! a monk, array'dIn cowl and beads and dusky garb, appear'd,Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard:His garments only a slight murmur made:He moved as shadowy as the sisters weird,But slowly; and as he pass'd Juan by,Glanced, without pausing, on him a bright eye."It is said, that the Newstead ghost appeared, also, to Lord Byron's cousin, Miss Fanny Parkins, and that she made a sketch of him from memory.

"It was no mouse, but, lo! a monk, array'dIn cowl and beads and dusky garb, appear'd,Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard:His garments only a slight murmur made:He moved as shadowy as the sisters weird,But slowly; and as he pass'd Juan by,Glanced, without pausing, on him a bright eye."

It is said, that the Newstead ghost appeared, also, to Lord Byron's cousin, Miss Fanny Parkins, and that she made a sketch of him from memory.

[47]The reviews and magazines of the month.

[48]The following characteristic note, in reference to this passage, appears, in Mr. Gifford's hand-writing, on the copy of the above letter:—"It is a pity that Lord B. was ignorant of Jonson. The old poet has a Satire on the Court Pucelle that would have supplied him with some pleasantry on Johanna's pregnancy."

[49]On the day of the arrival of the lady's answer, he was sitting at dinner, when his gardener came in and presented him with his mother's wedding ring, which she had lost many years before, and which the gardener had just found in digging up the mould under her window. Almost at the same moment, the letter from Miss Milbanke arrived; and Lord Byron exclaimed, "If it contains a consent, I will be married with this very ring." It did contain a very flattering acceptance of his proposal, and a duplicate of the letter had been sent to London, in case this should have missed him.—Memoranda.

[50]He had agreed to forfeit these sums to the persons mentioned, should he ever marry.

[51]I had frequently, both in earnest and in jest, expressed these hopes to him; and, in one of my letters, after touching upon some matters relative to my own little domestic circle, I added, "This will all be unintelligible to you; though I sometimes cannot help thinking it within the range of possibility, that evenyou, volcano as you are, may, one day, cool down into something of the samehabitablestate. Indeed, when one thinks of lava having been converted into buttons for Isaac Hawkins Browne, there is no saying what such fiery things may be brought to at last."

[52]Of the lamentable contrast between sentiments and conduct, which this transfer of the seat of sensibility from the heart to the fancy produces, the annals of literary men afford unluckily too many examples. Alfieri, though he could write a sonnet full of tenderness to his mother, never saw her (says Mr. W. Rose) but once after their early separation, though he frequently passed within a few miles of her residence. The poet Young, with all his parade of domestic sorrows, was, it appears, a neglectful husband and harsh father; and Sterne (to use the words employed by Lord Byron) preferred "whining over a dead ass to relieving a living mother."

[53]It is the opinion of Diderot, in his Treatise on Acting, that not only in the art of which he treats, but in all those which are called imitative, the possession of real sensibility is a bar to eminence;—sensibility being, according to his view, "le caractere de la bonté de l'ame et de la médiocrité du génie."

[54]Pope.

[55]See Foscolo's Essay on Petrarch. On the same principle, Orrery says, in speaking of Swift, "I am persuaded that his distance from his English friends proved a strong incitement to their mutual affection."

[56]That he was himself fully aware of this appears from a passage in one of his letters already given:—"My sister is in town, which is a great comfort; for, never having been much together, we are naturally more attached to each other."

[57]Wife and children, Bacon tells us in one of his Essays, are "impediments to great enterprises;" and adds, "Certainly, the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men." See, with reference to this subject, chapter xviii. of Mr. D'Israeli's work on "The Literary Character."

[58]Milton's first wife, it is well known, ran away from him, within a month after their marriage, disgusted, says Phillips, "with his spare diet and hard study;" and it is difficult to conceive a more melancholy picture of domestic life than is disclosed in his nuncupative will, one of the witnesses to which deposes to having heard the great poet himself complain, that his children "were careless of him, being blind, and made nothing of deserting him."

[59]By whatever austerity of temper or habits the poets Dante and Milton may have drawn upon themselves such a fate, it might be expected that, at least, the "gentle Shakspeare" would have stood exempt from the common calamity of his brethren. But, among the very few facts of his life that have been transmitted to us, there is none more clearly proved than the unhappiness of his marriage. The dates of the birth of his children, compared with that of his removal from Stratford,—the total omission of his wife's name in the first draft of his will, and the bitter sarcasm of the bequest by which he remembers her afterwards,—all prove beyond a doubt both his separation from the lady early in life, and his unfriendly feeling towards her at the close of it.In endeavouring to argue against the conclusion naturally to be deduced from this will, Boswell, with a strange ignorance of human nature, remarks:—"If he had taken offence at any part of his wife's conduct, I cannot believe that he would have taken this petty mode of expressing it."

In endeavouring to argue against the conclusion naturally to be deduced from this will, Boswell, with a strange ignorance of human nature, remarks:—"If he had taken offence at any part of his wife's conduct, I cannot believe that he would have taken this petty mode of expressing it."

[60]In a small book which I have in my possession, containing a sort of chronological History of the Ring, I find the name of Lord Byron, more than once, recorded among the "backers."

[61]Dr. Woolriche, an old and valued friend of mine, to whose skill, on the occasion here alluded to, I was indebted for my life.

[62]The Dream.

[63]The Hebrew Melodies which he had employed himself in writing, during his recent stay in London.

[64]I had just been reading Mr. Southey's fine poem of "Roderick;" and with reference to an incident in it, had put the following question to Lord Byron:—"I should like to know from you, who are one of the philocynic sect, whether it is probable, that any dog (out of a melodrame) could recognise a master, whom neither his own mother or mistress was able to find out. I don't care about Ulysses's dog, &c.—all I want is to know fromyou(who are renowned as 'friend of the dog, companion of the bear') whether such a thing is probable."

[65]The letter H. is blotted in the MS.

[66]It was thus that, according to his account, a certain celebrated singer and actor used frequently to pronounce the word "enthusiasm."

[67]Mrs. Mule.

[68]Some remark which he told me had been made with respect to the frequent use of the demonstrative pronoun both by himself and by Sir W. Scott.

[69]Verses to Lady J * * (containing an allusion to Lord Byron), which I had written, while at Chatsworth, but consigned afterwards to the flames.

[70]A seal, with the head of Anacreon, which I had given him.

[71]I had taken the liberty of laughing a little at the manner in which some of his Hebrew Melodies had been set to music.

[72]The verses enclosed were those melancholy ones, now printed in his works, "There's not a joy the world can give like those it takes away."

[73]The MS. was in the handwriting of Lady Byron.

[74]These allusions to "a speech" are connected with a little incident, not worth mentioning, which had amused us both when I was in town. He was rather fond (and had been always so, as may be seen in his early letters,) of thus harping on some conventional phrase or joke.

[75]He here alludes to a circumstance which I had communicated to him in a preceding letter. In writing to one of the numerous partners of a well-known publishing establishment (with which I have since been lucky enough to form a more intimate connection), I had said confidentially (as I thought), in reference to a poem that had just appeared,—"Between you and me, I do not much admire Mr. * *'s poem." The letter being chiefly upon business, was answered through the regular business channel, and, to my dismay, concluded with the following words:—"Weare very sorry that you do not approve of Mr. * *'s new poem, and are your obedient, &c. &c. L.H.R.O., &c. &c."

[76]The death of his infant god-daughter, Olivia Byron Moore.

[77]I had accused him of having entirely forgot that, in a preceding letter, I had informed him of my intention to publish with the Messrs. Longman in the ensuing winter, and added that, in giving him this information, I found I had been—to use an elegant Irish metaphor—"whistling jigs to a mile-stone."

[78]A few passages at the beginning of these recollections have been omitted, as containing particulars relative to Lord Byron's mother, which have already been mentioned in the early part of this work. Among these, however, there is one anecdote, the repetition of which will be easily pardoned, on account of the infinitely greater interest as well as authenticity imparted to its details by coming from such an eye-witness as Sir Walter Scott:—"I remember," he says, "having seen Lord Byron's mother before she was married, and a certain coincidence rendered the circumstance rather remarkable. It was during Mrs. Siddons's first or second visit to Edinburgh, when the music of that wonderful actress's voice, looks, manner, and person, produced the strongest effect which could possibly be exerted by a human being upon her fellow-creatures. Nothing of the kind that I ever witnessed approached it by a hundred degrees. The high state of excitation was aided by the difficulties of obtaining entrance and the exhausting length of time that the audience were contented to wait until the piece commenced. When the curtain fell, a large proportion of the ladies were generally in hysterics."I remember Miss Gordon of Ghight, in particular, harrowing the house by the desperate and wild way in which she shrieked out Mrs. Siddons's exclamation, in the character of Isabella, 'Oh my Byron! Oh my Byron!' A well-known medical gentleman, the benevolent Dr. Alexander Wood, tendered his assistance; but the thick-pressed audience could not for a long time make way for the doctor to approach his patient, or the patient the physician. The remarkable circumstance was, that the lady had not then seen Captain Byron, who, like Sir Toby, made her conclude with 'Oh!' as she had begun with it."

"I remember Miss Gordon of Ghight, in particular, harrowing the house by the desperate and wild way in which she shrieked out Mrs. Siddons's exclamation, in the character of Isabella, 'Oh my Byron! Oh my Byron!' A well-known medical gentleman, the benevolent Dr. Alexander Wood, tendered his assistance; but the thick-pressed audience could not for a long time make way for the doctor to approach his patient, or the patient the physician. The remarkable circumstance was, that the lady had not then seen Captain Byron, who, like Sir Toby, made her conclude with 'Oh!' as she had begun with it."

[79]Mr. Murray had, at the time of giving the vase, suggested to Lord Byron, that it would increase the value of the gift to add some such inscription; but the feeling of the noble poet on this subject will be understood from the following answer which he returned:—"April 9. 1815."Thanks for the books. I have great objection to your proposition about inscribing the vase,—which is, that it would appearostentatiouson my part; and of course I must send it as it is, without any alteration."Yours," &c.

"April 9. 1815."Thanks for the books. I have great objection to your proposition about inscribing the vase,—which is, that it would appearostentatiouson my part; and of course I must send it as it is, without any alteration."Yours," &c.

"April 9. 1815.

"Thanks for the books. I have great objection to your proposition about inscribing the vase,—which is, that it would appearostentatiouson my part; and of course I must send it as it is, without any alteration.

"Yours," &c.

[80]Mr. Murray had presented Lady Byron with twelve drawings, by Stothard, from Lord Byron's Poems.

[81]This and the following letter were addressed to me in Ireland, whither I had gone about the middle of the preceding month.

[82]He had lately become one of the members of the Sub-Committee, (consisting, besides himself, of the persons mentioned in this letter,) who had taken upon themselves the management of Drury Lane Theatre; and it had been his wish, on the first construction of the Committee, that I should be one of his colleagues. To some mistake in the mode of conveying this proposal to me, he alludes in the preceding sentence.

[83]The following is the enclosure here referred to:—"Darlington, June 3. 1815."My Lord,"I have lately purchased a set of your works, and am quite vexed that you have not cancelled the Ode to Buonaparte. It certainly was prematurely written, without thought or reflection. Providence has now brought him to reign over millions again, while the same Providence keeps as it were in a garrison another potentate, who, in the language of Mr. Burke, 'he hurled from his throne.' See if you cannot make amends for your folly, and consider that, in almost every respect, human nature is the same, in every clime and in every period, and don't act the part of afoolish boy.—Let not Englishmen talk of the stretch of tyrants, while the torrents of blood shed in the East Indies cry aloud to Heaven for retaliation. Learn, good sir, not to cast the first stone. I remain your Lordship's servant,"J. R * *."

[83]The following is the enclosure here referred to:—

"Darlington, June 3. 1815."My Lord,"I have lately purchased a set of your works, and am quite vexed that you have not cancelled the Ode to Buonaparte. It certainly was prematurely written, without thought or reflection. Providence has now brought him to reign over millions again, while the same Providence keeps as it were in a garrison another potentate, who, in the language of Mr. Burke, 'he hurled from his throne.' See if you cannot make amends for your folly, and consider that, in almost every respect, human nature is the same, in every clime and in every period, and don't act the part of afoolish boy.—Let not Englishmen talk of the stretch of tyrants, while the torrents of blood shed in the East Indies cry aloud to Heaven for retaliation. Learn, good sir, not to cast the first stone. I remain your Lordship's servant,"J. R * *."

"Darlington, June 3. 1815.

"My Lord,

"I have lately purchased a set of your works, and am quite vexed that you have not cancelled the Ode to Buonaparte. It certainly was prematurely written, without thought or reflection. Providence has now brought him to reign over millions again, while the same Providence keeps as it were in a garrison another potentate, who, in the language of Mr. Burke, 'he hurled from his throne.' See if you cannot make amends for your folly, and consider that, in almost every respect, human nature is the same, in every clime and in every period, and don't act the part of afoolish boy.—Let not Englishmen talk of the stretch of tyrants, while the torrents of blood shed in the East Indies cry aloud to Heaven for retaliation. Learn, good sir, not to cast the first stone. I remain your Lordship's servant,

"J. R * *."

[84]Notwithstanding this precaution of the poet, the coincidence in question was, but a few years after, triumphantly cited in support of the sweeping charge of plagiarism brought against him by some scribblers. The following are Mr. Sotheby's lines:—"And I have leaptIn transport from my flinty couch, to welcomeThe thunder as it burst upon my roof,And beckon'd to the lightning, as it flash'dAnd sparkled on these fetters."I have since been informed by Mr. Sotheby that, though not published, these lines had been written long before the appearance of Lord Byron's poem.

"And I have leaptIn transport from my flinty couch, to welcomeThe thunder as it burst upon my roof,And beckon'd to the lightning, as it flash'dAnd sparkled on these fetters."

I have since been informed by Mr. Sotheby that, though not published, these lines had been written long before the appearance of Lord Byron's poem.

[85]Mr. Taylor having inserted in the Sun newspaper (of which he was then chief proprietor) a sonnet to Lord Byron, in return for a present which his Lordship had sent him of a handsomely bound copy of all his works, there appeared in the same journal, on the following day (from the pen of some person who had acquired a control over the paper), a parody upon this sonnet, containing some disrespectful allusion to Lady Byron; and it is to this circumstance, which Mr. Taylor had written to explain, that the above letter, so creditable to the feelings of the noble husband, refers.

[86]It is but justice both to "him that gave and him that took" to mention that the noble poet, at this time, with a delicacy which enhanced the kindness, advanced to the eminent person here spoken of, on the credit of some work he was about to produce, one hundred pounds.

[87]A correspondent of one of the monthly Miscellanies gives the following account of this incident:—"During Lord Byron's administration, a ballet was invented by the elder Byrne, in which Miss Smith (since Mrs. Oscar Byrne) had apas seul. This the lady wished to remove to a later period in the ballet. The ballet-master refused, and the lady swore she would not dance it at all. The music incidental to the dance began to play, and the lady walked off the stage. Both parties flounced into the green-room to lay the case before Lord Byron, who happened to be the only person in that apartment. The noble committee-man made an award in favour of Miss Smith, and both complainants rushed angrily out of the room at the instant of my entering it. 'If you had come a minute sooner,' said Lord Byron, 'you would have heard a curious matter decided on by me: a question of dancing!—by me,' added he, looking down at the lame limb, 'whom Nature from my birth has prohibited from taking a single step.' His countenance fell after he had uttered this, as if he had said too much; and for a moment there was an embarrassing silence on both sides."

[87]A correspondent of one of the monthly Miscellanies gives the following account of this incident:—

"During Lord Byron's administration, a ballet was invented by the elder Byrne, in which Miss Smith (since Mrs. Oscar Byrne) had apas seul. This the lady wished to remove to a later period in the ballet. The ballet-master refused, and the lady swore she would not dance it at all. The music incidental to the dance began to play, and the lady walked off the stage. Both parties flounced into the green-room to lay the case before Lord Byron, who happened to be the only person in that apartment. The noble committee-man made an award in favour of Miss Smith, and both complainants rushed angrily out of the room at the instant of my entering it. 'If you had come a minute sooner,' said Lord Byron, 'you would have heard a curious matter decided on by me: a question of dancing!—by me,' added he, looking down at the lame limb, 'whom Nature from my birth has prohibited from taking a single step.' His countenance fell after he had uttered this, as if he had said too much; and for a moment there was an embarrassing silence on both sides."

[88]A tragedy entitled, I think, Zopolia.

[89]"The last tidings recently heard of Dervish (one of the Arnaouts who followed me) state him to be in revolt upon the mountains, at the head of some of the bands common in that country in times of trouble."

[90]I had mentioned to him, as a subject worthy of his best powers of pathos, a melancholy event which had just occurred in my neighbourhood, and to which I have myself made allusion in one of the Sacred Melodies—"Weep not for her."

[91]My reply to this part of his letter was, I find, as follows:—"With respect to Hunt's poem, though it is, I own, full of beauties, and though I like himself sincerely, I really could not undertake to praise itseriously. There is so much of thequizziblein all he writes, that I never can put on the proper pathetic face in reading him."

[92]This sad doubt,—"if Iamat all,"—becomes no less singular than sad when we recollect that six and thirty was actually the age when he ceased to "be," and at a moment, too, when (as even the least friendly to him allow) he was in that state of "progressing merits" which he here jestingly anticipates.

[93]It will be perceived from this that I was as yet unacquainted with the true circumstances of the transaction.

[94]MS.—"Detached Thoughts."

[95]An anecdote connected with one of these occasions is thus related in the Journal just referred to:—"When the bailiff (for I have seen most kinds of life) came upon me in 1815 to seize my chattels, (being a peer of parliament, my person was beyond him,) being curious (as is my habit), I first asked him "what extents elsewhere he had for government?" upon which he showed me one uponone house onlyforseventy thousand pounds! Next I asked him if he had nothing for Sheridan? "Oh—Sheridan!" said he; "ay, I have this" (pulling out a pocket-book, &c.); "but, my Lord, I have been in Sheridan's house a twelvemonth at a time—a civil gentleman—knows how to deal withus," &c. &c. &c. Our own business was then discussed, which was none of the easiest for me at that time. But the man was civil, and (what I valued more) communicative. I had met many of his brethren, years before, in affairs of my friends, (commoners, that is,) but this was the first (or second) on my own account.—A civil man; fee'd accordingly; probably he anticipated as much."

[95]An anecdote connected with one of these occasions is thus related in the Journal just referred to:—

"When the bailiff (for I have seen most kinds of life) came upon me in 1815 to seize my chattels, (being a peer of parliament, my person was beyond him,) being curious (as is my habit), I first asked him "what extents elsewhere he had for government?" upon which he showed me one uponone house onlyforseventy thousand pounds! Next I asked him if he had nothing for Sheridan? "Oh—Sheridan!" said he; "ay, I have this" (pulling out a pocket-book, &c.); "but, my Lord, I have been in Sheridan's house a twelvemonth at a time—a civil gentleman—knows how to deal withus," &c. &c. &c. Our own business was then discussed, which was none of the easiest for me at that time. But the man was civil, and (what I valued more) communicative. I had met many of his brethren, years before, in affairs of my friends, (commoners, that is,) but this was the first (or second) on my own account.—A civil man; fee'd accordingly; probably he anticipated as much."

[96]For this story, however, there was so far a foundation that the practice to which he had accustomed himself from boyhood, of having loaded pistols always near him at night, was considered so strange a propensity as to be included in that list of symptoms (sixteen, I believe, in number,) which were submitted to medical opinion, in proof of his insanity. Another symptom was the emotion, almost to hysterics, which he had exhibited on seeing Kean act Sir Giles Overreach. But the most plausible of all the grounds, as he himself used to allow, on which these articles of impeachment against his sanity were drawn up, was an act of violence committed by him on a favourite old watch that had been his companion from boyhood, and had gone with him to Greece. In a fit of vexation and rage, brought on by some of those humiliating embarrassments to which he was now almost daily a prey, he furiously dashed this watch upon the hearth, and ground it to pieces among the ashes with the poker.

[97]Of the abuse lavished upon him, the following extract from a poem, published at this time, will give some idea:—"From native England, that endured too longThe ceaseless burden of his impious song;His mad career of crimes and follies run,And grey in vice, when life was scarce begun;He goes, in foreign lands prepared to findA life more suited to his guilty mind;Where other climes new pleasures may supplyFor that pall'd taste, and that unhallow'd eye;—Wisely he seeks some yet untrodden shore,For those who know him less may prize him more."In a rhyming pamphlet, too, entitled "A Poetical Epistle from Delia, addressed to Lord Byron," the writer thus charitably expresses herself:—"Hopeless of peace below, and, shuddering thought!Far from that Heav'n, denied, if never sought,Thy light a beacon—a reproach thy name—Thy memory "damn'd to everlasting fame,"Shunn'd by the wise, admired by fools alone—The good shall mourn thee—and the Muse disown."

[97]Of the abuse lavished upon him, the following extract from a poem, published at this time, will give some idea:—

"From native England, that endured too longThe ceaseless burden of his impious song;His mad career of crimes and follies run,And grey in vice, when life was scarce begun;He goes, in foreign lands prepared to findA life more suited to his guilty mind;Where other climes new pleasures may supplyFor that pall'd taste, and that unhallow'd eye;—Wisely he seeks some yet untrodden shore,For those who know him less may prize him more."

In a rhyming pamphlet, too, entitled "A Poetical Epistle from Delia, addressed to Lord Byron," the writer thus charitably expresses herself:—

"Hopeless of peace below, and, shuddering thought!Far from that Heav'n, denied, if never sought,Thy light a beacon—a reproach thy name—Thy memory "damn'd to everlasting fame,"Shunn'd by the wise, admired by fools alone—The good shall mourn thee—and the Muse disown."

[98]Had he noterred, he had far less achieved.

[99]The sale of these books took place the following month, and they were described in the catalogue as the property of "a Nobleman about to leave England on a tour."From a note to Mr. Murray, it would appear that he had been first announced as going to the Morea."I hope that the catalogue of the books, &c., has not been published without my seeing it. I must reserve several, and many ought not to be printed. The advertisement is a very bad one. I am not going to the Morea; and if I was, you might as well advertise a man in Russiaas going to Yorkshire.—Ever," &c.Together with the books was sold an article of furniture, which is now in the possession of Mr. Murray, namely, "a large screen covered with portraits of actors, pugilists, representations of boxing-matches," &c.

[99]The sale of these books took place the following month, and they were described in the catalogue as the property of "a Nobleman about to leave England on a tour."

From a note to Mr. Murray, it would appear that he had been first announced as going to the Morea.

"I hope that the catalogue of the books, &c., has not been published without my seeing it. I must reserve several, and many ought not to be printed. The advertisement is a very bad one. I am not going to the Morea; and if I was, you might as well advertise a man in Russiaas going to Yorkshire.—Ever," &c.

Together with the books was sold an article of furniture, which is now in the possession of Mr. Murray, namely, "a large screen covered with portraits of actors, pugilists, representations of boxing-matches," &c.

[100]Petrarch was, it appears, also in his youth, a Dandy. "Recollect," he says, in a letter to his brother, "the time, when we wore white habits, on which the least spot, or a plait ill placed, would have been a subject of grief; when our shoes were so tight we suffered martyrdom," &c.

[101]To this masquerade he went in the habit of a Caloyer, or Eastern monk,—a dress particularly well calculated to set off the beauty of his fine countenance, which was accordingly, that night, the subject of general admiration.

[102]In his Memoranda there were equally enthusiastic praises of Curran. "The riches," said he, "of his Irish imagination were exhaustless. I have heard that man speak more poetry than I have ever seen written,—though I saw him seldom and but occasionally. I saw him presented to Madame de Staël at Mackintosh's;—it was the grand confluence between the Rhone and the Saone, and they were both so d——d ugly, that I could not help wondering how the best intellects of France and Ireland could have taken up respectively such residences."In another part, however, he was somewhat more fair to Madame de Staël's personal appearance:—"Her figure was not bad; her legs tolerable; her arms good. Altogether, I can conceive her having been a desirable woman, allowing a little imagination for her soul, and so forth. She would have made a great man."

In another part, however, he was somewhat more fair to Madame de Staël's personal appearance:—"Her figure was not bad; her legs tolerable; her arms good. Altogether, I can conceive her having been a desirable woman, allowing a little imagination for her soul, and so forth. She would have made a great man."

[103]Dated April 16.

[104]It will be seen, from a subsequent letter, that the first stanza of that most cordial of Farewells, "My boat is on the shore," was also written at this time.

[105]In one of his letters to Mr. Hunt, he declares it to be his own opinion that "an addiction to poetry is very generally the result of 'an uneasy mind in an uneasy body;' disease or deformity," he adds, "have been the attendants of many of our best. Collins mad—Chatterton,Ithink, mad—Cowper mad—Pope crooked—Milton blind," &c. &c.

[106]The Deformed Transformed.

[107]Childe Harold, Canto iii. stanza 17.

[108]The following was the advertisement enclosed:—"Neatly printed and hot-pressed, 2s. 6d."Lord Byron's Farewell to England, with Three other Poems—Ode to St. Helena, to My Daughter on her Birthday, and To the Lily of France."Printed by J. Johnston, Cheapside, 335.; Oxford, 9."The above beautiful Poems will be read with the most lively interest, as it is probable they will be the last of the author's that will appear in England."

[108]The following was the advertisement enclosed:—

"Neatly printed and hot-pressed, 2s. 6d."Lord Byron's Farewell to England, with Three other Poems—Ode to St. Helena, to My Daughter on her Birthday, and To the Lily of France."Printed by J. Johnston, Cheapside, 335.; Oxford, 9."The above beautiful Poems will be read with the most lively interest, as it is probable they will be the last of the author's that will appear in England."

"Neatly printed and hot-pressed, 2s. 6d.

"Lord Byron's Farewell to England, with Three other Poems—Ode to St. Helena, to My Daughter on her Birthday, and To the Lily of France.

"Printed by J. Johnston, Cheapside, 335.; Oxford, 9.

"The above beautiful Poems will be read with the most lively interest, as it is probable they will be the last of the author's that will appear in England."

[109]The motto is—He left a name to all succeeding times,Link'd with one virtue and a thousand crimes."

[109]The motto is—

He left a name to all succeeding times,Link'd with one virtue and a thousand crimes."

[110]A Monody on the death of Sheridan, which was spoken at Drury Lane theatre.

[111]Dent de Jaman.

[112]It is interesting to observe the use to which he afterwards converted these hasty memorandums in his sublime drama of Manfred."It is not noon—the sunbow's rays still archThe torrent with the many hues of heaven,And roll the sheeted silver's waving columnO'er the crag's headlong perpendicular,And fling its lines of foaming light along,And to and fro, like the pale coursers tail,The Giant steed, to be bestrode by DeathAs told in the Apocalypse."

[112]It is interesting to observe the use to which he afterwards converted these hasty memorandums in his sublime drama of Manfred.

"It is not noon—the sunbow's rays still archThe torrent with the many hues of heaven,And roll the sheeted silver's waving columnO'er the crag's headlong perpendicular,And fling its lines of foaming light along,And to and fro, like the pale coursers tail,The Giant steed, to be bestrode by DeathAs told in the Apocalypse."

[113]"Yeavalanches, whom a breath draws downIn mountainous o'erwhelming, come and crush me!I hear ye momently above, beneath,Crash with a frequent conflict.* * *The mists boil up around the glaciers;cloudsRise curlingfast beneath me, white and sulphury,Like foam from the roused ocean of deep hell!"MANFRED.

[113]

"Yeavalanches, whom a breath draws downIn mountainous o'erwhelming, come and crush me!I hear ye momently above, beneath,Crash with a frequent conflict.* * *The mists boil up around the glaciers;cloudsRise curlingfast beneath me, white and sulphury,Like foam from the roused ocean of deep hell!"MANFRED.

[114]"O'er the savage sea,The glassy ocean of the mountain ice,We skim its rugged breakers, which put onThe aspect of a tumblingtempest's foam,Frozen in a moment."MANFRED.

[114]

"O'er the savage sea,The glassy ocean of the mountain ice,We skim its rugged breakers, which put onThe aspect of a tumblingtempest's foam,Frozen in a moment."MANFRED.

[115]"Like theseblasted pines,Wrecks of a single winter, barkless, branchless."IBID.

[115]

"Like theseblasted pines,Wrecks of a single winter, barkless, branchless."IBID.

[116]Childe Harold, Canto iii.

[117]To this lameness of Polidori, one of the preceding letters of Lord Byron alludes.

[118]The Corsair.

[119]His system of diet here was regulated by an abstinence almost incredible. A thin slice of bread, with tea, at breakfast—a light, vegetable dinner, with a bottle or two of Seltzer water, tinged with vin de Grave, and in the evening, a cup of green tea, without milk or sugar, formed the whole of his sustenance. The pangs of hunger he appeased by privately chewing tobacco and smoking cigars.

[120]From his remembrance of this sketch, Polidori afterwards vamped up his strange novel of the Vampire, which, under the supposition of its being Lord Byron's, was received with such enthusiasm in France. It would, indeed, not a little deduct from our value of foreign fame, if what some French writers have asserted be true, that the appearance of this extravagant novel among our neighbours first attracted their attention to the genius of Byron.

[121]"The wind (says Lord Byron's fellow-voyager) gradually increased in violence until it blew tremendously; and, as it came from the remotest extremity of the Lake, produced waves of a frightful height, and covered the whole surface with a chaos of foam. One of our boatmen, who was a dreadfully stupid fellow, persisted in holding the sail at a time when the boat was on the point of being driven under water by the hurricane. On discovering this error, he let it entirely go, and the boat for a moment refused to obey the helm; in addition, the rudder was so broken as to render the management of it very difficult; one wave fell in, and then another."

[122]"I felt, in this near prospect of death (says Mr. Shelley), a mixture of sensations, among which terror entered, though but subordinately. My feelings would have been less painful had I been alone; but I knew that my companion would have attempted to save me, and I was overcome with humiliation, when I thought that his life might have been risked to preserve mine. When we arrived at St. Gingoux, the inhabitants, who stood on the shore, unaccustomed to see a vessel as frail as ours, and fearing to venture at all on such a sea, exchanged looks of wonder and congratulation with our boatmen, who, as well as ourselves, were well pleased to set foot on shore."

[123]In the account of this visit to Copet in his Memoranda, he spoke in high terms of the daughter of his hostess, the present Duchess de Broglie, and, in noticing how much she appeared to be attached to her husband, remarked that "Nothing was more pleasing than to see the developement of the domestic affections in a very young woman." Of Madame de Staël, in that Memoir, he spoke thus:—"Madame de Staël was a good woman at heart and the cleverest at bottom, but spoilt by a wish to be—she knew not what. In her own house she was amiable; in any other person's, you wished her gone, and in her own again."

[124]Upon the same occasion, indeed, he wrote some verses in a spirit not quite so generous, of which a few of the opening lines is all I shall give:—"And thou wert sad—yet I was not with thee!And thou wert sick—and yet I was not near.Methought that Joy and Health alone could beWhere I wasnot, and pain and sorrow here.And is it thus?—it is as I foretold,And shall be more so:—" &c. &c.

[124]Upon the same occasion, indeed, he wrote some verses in a spirit not quite so generous, of which a few of the opening lines is all I shall give:—

"And thou wert sad—yet I was not with thee!And thou wert sick—and yet I was not near.Methought that Joy and Health alone could beWhere I wasnot, and pain and sorrow here.And is it thus?—it is as I foretold,And shall be more so:—" &c. &c.

[125]"Admiral Byron was remarkable for never making a voyage without a tempest. He was known to the sailors by the facetious name of 'Foul-weather Jack.'"But, though it were tempest-tost,Still his bark could not be lost.He returned safely from the wreck of the Wager (in Anson's Voyage), and subsequently circumnavigated the world, many years after, as commander of a similar expedition."

[125]"Admiral Byron was remarkable for never making a voyage without a tempest. He was known to the sailors by the facetious name of 'Foul-weather Jack.'

"But, though it were tempest-tost,Still his bark could not be lost.

He returned safely from the wreck of the Wager (in Anson's Voyage), and subsequently circumnavigated the world, many years after, as commander of a similar expedition."

[126]The lake of Newstead Abbey.

[127]With Milan, however, or its society, the noble traveller was far from being pleased, and in his Memoranda, I recollect, he described his stay there to be "like a ship under quarantine." Among other persons whom he met in the society of that place was M. Beyle, the ingenious author of "L'Histoire de la Peinture en Italie," who thus describes the impression their first interview left upon him:—"Ce fut pendant l'automne de 1816, que je le rencontrai au théâtre de laScala, à Milan, dans la loge de M. Louis de Brême. Je fus frappé des yeux de Lord Byron au moment où il écoutait un sestetto d'un opéra de Mayer intitulé Elena. Je n'ai vu de ma vie, rien de plus beau ni de plus expressif. Encore aujourd'hui, si je viens à penser à l'expression qu'un grand peintre devrait donner an génie, cette tête sublime reparaît tout-à-coup devant moi. J'eus un instant d'enthousiasme, et oubliant la juste répugnance que tout homme un peu fier doit avoir à se faire présenter à un pair d'Angleterre, je priai M. de Brême de m'introduire à Lord Byron, je me trouvai le lendemain à dîner chez M. de Brême, avec lui, et le celèbre Monti, l'immortel auteur de laBasvigliana. On parla poésie, on en vint à demander quels étaient les douze plus beaux vers faits depuis un siècle, en Français, en Italien, en Anglais. Les Italiens présens s'accordèrent à designer les douze premiers vers de laMascheronianade Monti, comme ce que l'on avait fait de plus beau dans leur langue, depuis cent ans.Montivoulut bien nous les réciter. Je regardai Lord Byron, il fut ravi. La nuance de hauteur, ou plutôt l'air d'un hommequi se trouve avoir à repousser une importunité, qui déparait un peu sa belle figure, disparut tout-à-coup pour faire à l'expression du bonheur. Le premier chant de laMascheroniana, que Monti récita presque en entier, vaincu par les acclamations des auditeurs, causa la plus vive sensation à l'auteur de Childe Harold. Je n'oublierai jamais l'expression divine de ses traits; c'était l'air serein de la puissance et du génie, et suivant moi, Lord Byron n'avait, en ce moment, aucune affectation à se reprocher."

"Ce fut pendant l'automne de 1816, que je le rencontrai au théâtre de laScala, à Milan, dans la loge de M. Louis de Brême. Je fus frappé des yeux de Lord Byron au moment où il écoutait un sestetto d'un opéra de Mayer intitulé Elena. Je n'ai vu de ma vie, rien de plus beau ni de plus expressif. Encore aujourd'hui, si je viens à penser à l'expression qu'un grand peintre devrait donner an génie, cette tête sublime reparaît tout-à-coup devant moi. J'eus un instant d'enthousiasme, et oubliant la juste répugnance que tout homme un peu fier doit avoir à se faire présenter à un pair d'Angleterre, je priai M. de Brême de m'introduire à Lord Byron, je me trouvai le lendemain à dîner chez M. de Brême, avec lui, et le celèbre Monti, l'immortel auteur de laBasvigliana. On parla poésie, on en vint à demander quels étaient les douze plus beaux vers faits depuis un siècle, en Français, en Italien, en Anglais. Les Italiens présens s'accordèrent à designer les douze premiers vers de laMascheronianade Monti, comme ce que l'on avait fait de plus beau dans leur langue, depuis cent ans.Montivoulut bien nous les réciter. Je regardai Lord Byron, il fut ravi. La nuance de hauteur, ou plutôt l'air d'un hommequi se trouve avoir à repousser une importunité, qui déparait un peu sa belle figure, disparut tout-à-coup pour faire à l'expression du bonheur. Le premier chant de laMascheroniana, que Monti récita presque en entier, vaincu par les acclamations des auditeurs, causa la plus vive sensation à l'auteur de Childe Harold. Je n'oublierai jamais l'expression divine de ses traits; c'était l'air serein de la puissance et du génie, et suivant moi, Lord Byron n'avait, en ce moment, aucune affectation à se reprocher."

[128]Manfred.

[129]An article in No. 31. of this Review, written, as Lord Byron afterwards discovered, by Sir Walter Scott, and well meriting, by the kind and generous spirit that breathes through it, the warm and lasting gratitude it awakened in the noble poet.

[130]He had been misinformed on this point,—the work in question having been, from the first, entitled an "Oriental Romance." A much worse mistake (because wilful, and with no very charitable design) was that of certain persons, who would have it that the poem was meant to be epic!—Even Mr. D'Israeli has, for the sake of a theory, given in to this very gratuitous assumption:—"The Anacreontic poet," he says, "remains only Anacreontic in his Epic."

[131]In a note to Mr. Murray, subjoined to some corrections for Manfred, he says, "Since I wrote to you last, theslowfever I wot of thought proper to mend its pace, and became similar to one which I caught some years ago in the marshes of Elis, in the Morea."

[132]Whenever a word or passage occurs (as in this instance) which Lord Byron would have pronounced emphatically in speaking, it appears, in his handwriting, as if written with something of the same vehemence.

[133]Here follow the same rhymes ("I read the Christabel," &c.) which have already been given in one of his letters to myself.

[134]The only plausible claim of these epistles to authenticity arises from the circumstance of St. Paul having (according to the opinion of Mosheim and others) written an epistle to the Corinthians, before that which we now call his first. They are, however, universally given up as spurious. Though frequently referred to as existing in the Armenian, by Primate Usher, Johan. Gregorius, and other learned men, they were for the first time, I believe, translated from that language by the two Whistons, who subjoined the correspondence, with a Greek and Latin version, to their edition of the Armenian History of Moses of Chorene, published in 1736.The translation by Lord Byron is, as far as I can learn, the first that has ever been attempted in English; and as, proceeding fromhispen, it must possess, of course, additional interest, the reader will not be displeased to find it in the Appendix. Annexed to the copy in my possession are the following words in his own handwriting:—"Done into English by me, January, February, 1817, at the Convent of San Lazaro, with the aid and exposition of the Armenian text by the Father Paschal Aucher, Armenian friar.—BYRON. I had also (he adds) the Latin text, but it is in many places very corrupt, and with great omissions."

The translation by Lord Byron is, as far as I can learn, the first that has ever been attempted in English; and as, proceeding fromhispen, it must possess, of course, additional interest, the reader will not be displeased to find it in the Appendix. Annexed to the copy in my possession are the following words in his own handwriting:—"Done into English by me, January, February, 1817, at the Convent of San Lazaro, with the aid and exposition of the Armenian text by the Father Paschal Aucher, Armenian friar.—BYRON. I had also (he adds) the Latin text, but it is in many places very corrupt, and with great omissions."

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