<0Ta 
 
 'PA^t/XS? /z~~*^ 
 
 
 ■1 
 
 A MEMOIR 
 
 OF 
 
 THE LIFE AND WRITINGS 
 
 OP 
 
 LORD BYRON 
 
HOWMITT AND BRIMMER, 
 PRINTERS. 10, FRITH STREET, SOHO. 
 
3***^ 
 
 of 
 
 TH6 
 
 u»w* 
 
 *SfPf 
 
 of 
 
, w 
 
 Lord btrok. 
 
 //>v// //. ' v O . 
 
 
 lendvn. Publish 
 
MEMOIRS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 LIFE AND WRITINGS 
 
 OP 
 
 THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 LORD BYRON, 
 
 WITH 
 
 ANECDOTES OF SOME OF HIS CONTEMPORARIES. 
 
 of 
 
 .cal.ii 
 
 LONDON 
 
 PRINTED FOR HENRY COLBURN AND CO. 
 
 1822. 
 

OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 TO 
 
 WILLIAM GIFFORD, ESQ. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 The intent of this address is 
 neither to pay you a compliment, nor to 
 court your favour. The one you would 
 despise, and of the other the writer has no 
 need. But though praise may be beneath 
 your notice, and personal motives are out of 
 the question ; this inscription conveys an 
 eulogium of substantial value, since it is a 
 call upon you for the application of great 
 talents, and the employment of powerful 
 means, in a cause worthy of your best exer- 
 tions. Having already contributed, perhaps 
 
 211223 
 
VI 
 
 more than any man in this generation, to 
 preserve our poetry from contamination, and 
 our public morals from injury, your duties 
 appear to multiply in proportion to the ser- 
 vices you have performed. So long as there 
 are enemies in the field, the privilege of su- 
 perannuation cannot be allowed to him who 
 has hitherto shown no decay of his faculties. 
 The presence of Nestor in the camp of the 
 Greeks, strengthened their councils and ani- 
 mated their cottimanders ; but the fate of Ilium 
 was of trivial import when compared with the 
 morality of literature, in which are involved 
 the interests of religion, and the welfare of 
 society. At the head of the court of cri- 
 ticism, you have done so much for these 
 great concerns, as to make us adopt the wish 
 " that age may be the lot of any chief but 
 thee/' All virtue, however, is mixed ; and it 
 is to be regretted that the best men too often 
 seek excuses for the neglect of what they 
 are conscious ought to have been diligently 
 
Vll 
 
 discharged. Complicated cares and increas- 
 ing infirmities, the fear of giving offence, 
 and the tenderness of friendship, are all ready- 
 apologies for sluggish indifference and want 
 of zeal, when honour calls upon every man 
 to buckle on his armour in the defence of 
 truth. 
 
 To what cause may be attributed the 
 forbearance hitherto manifested towards the 
 most popular, and at the same time the most 
 profane, poet of the present day, it would 
 be useless to enquire. But it is a lamen- 
 table fact; and the friends of social order 
 see with indignation, that the author of 
 " Don Juan" and " Cain" has been suf- 
 fered to asGend in the climax of prostituted 
 genius, without meeting with that exposure 
 and castigation in his progress, which might 
 have restrained his rashness, if it did not 
 reform his principles or correct his man- 
 ners. 
 
Vlll 
 
 You, Mr. GifFord, have had the honour, 
 such as it is, of being praised uniformly by 
 the noble lord; and in that distinction, it 
 seems, you stand proudly pre-eminent; for 
 there is hardly any other living writer to 
 whom he has not dealt out nearly as much 
 abuse as adulation. 
 
 The voice of the public had long before this 
 fixed you upon an immovable basis ; so that 
 the eulogies of Lord Byron, however strongly 
 perfumed they might be, were of no value ; 
 but on the contrary had a suspicious cha- 
 racter, and carried with them more of the 
 appearance of fear than respect ; like those 
 offerings which the pagans presented to cer- 
 tain of their divinities, to propitiate their fa- 
 vour and prevent them from doing mischief. 
 
 Since then, the right honourable poet has 
 rendered you, or himself, a marvellous piece 
 of kindness in stating that his last performance 
 
IX 
 
 was submitted to your examination previous 
 to its publication. It is true, he has also 
 acknowledged that you disapproved of the 
 piece, so far at least as to advise its sup- 
 pression. Notwithstanding this, the "Mys- 
 tery of Cain" made its appearance, in spite 
 of your opinion ; whence the world may esti- 
 mate the sincerity of the noble lord, in con- 
 sulting the judgment of wise men and then 
 abiding by his own. There is nothing sur- 
 prising in his lordship's resolution ; but it is 
 matter of astonishment and regret, that any 
 communion at all should have subsisted be- 
 tween the conductor of the first Periodical 
 Journal in Europe, and the author of such a 
 performance as " Cain ;" since the circum- 
 stance seems to account for the little notice 
 that has been taken in the Quarterly Review 
 of the literary delinquencies of the noble lord. 
 
 But as the fact has been divulged, it be- 
 comes incumbent upon you, Sir, to rouse from 
 
your torpidity, and, setting aside all private 
 considerations, to make it evident that the same 
 principle actuates you now as when, in the 
 Baviad and the M^viAD,you put down the 
 witlings and libellers of a former day. The 
 objects against whom you directed those 
 powerful weapons, were harmless ephemera, 
 or at the most but troublesome insects, com- 
 pared with the chartered Libertine who has 
 gone forth defying heaven and earth. In 
 your hands, Mr. GifTord, is placed the only 
 effectual instrument that can bring this 
 haughty spirit to a sense of shame and a 
 course of propriety. 
 
 This, perhaps, will be called the language 
 of intolerance, and an incitement to persecu- 
 tion. Be it so : — the world has not now to 
 learn the meaning of those words when used 
 by men who, while they are themselves the 
 most fiery inquisitors and torturers of charac- 
 ters, cannot endure that their own evil deeds 
 
XI 
 
 and the consequences of their dangerous 
 principles should be made manifest. 
 
 But, Sir, you are not to be told that strong 
 argument is the reverse of intolerance, and 
 that the detection of falsehood, instead of 
 being persecution, is a benefit conferred upon 
 society. Were the case otherwise, and were 
 Vice and Error to have full liberty to walk up 
 and down the earth without exposure and 
 confutation, because that such an opposition 
 tends to abridge the means of mischief, then 
 is it high time that you should close your 
 critical labours, and, by consigning all the 
 volumes of your valuable journal to the 
 flames, proclaim your recantation aloud to 
 the world. But if you are not prepared for 
 such a sacrifice, and if you still think it a 
 duty to continue in the office which you have 
 hitherto filled with general credit, let it be seen 
 that neither the fear nor the love of man has 
 
Xll 
 
 any influence over your mind in the adminis- 
 tration of justice. 
 
 I am, 
 With great respect for your virtue 
 and admiration of your talents, 
 
 **** ******* 
 
 London, May 1, 1822. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 Introduction - - - 1 
 
 Chapter I. — Genealogical History. — Grant of New- 
 stead Abbey. — Sir John Byron created a Peer by 
 Charles the First. — His Descendants. — Trial of 
 William Lord Byron, for murder.— Memoir of 
 Admiral Byron. — Account of his Son, John Byron 15 
 
 Chapter II. — Early life of Lord Byron. — Character 
 of Isabella, Countess of Carlisle. — His Lordship's 
 studies at Harrow, and respect for his Tutor. — His 
 Opinion for the poetic Classics controverted. — Re- 
 moval to Cambridge, and reflections upon that 
 University - - - - - 44 
 
 Chapter 111. — Publication of the " Hours of Idleness ;" 
 — Critique of the Edinburgh Reviewers thereon ; 
 and the noble Author's severe Retort - - 62 
 
 Chapter V. — Anecdote of the Duke of Wharton.— 
 Similar one of Lord Byron. — Monument to his dog. 
 Inscription on a skull made into a cup. — Amorous 
 Connexions. — Anecdote of false Sensibility.- Lord 
 Byron made the subject of a novel - - - 85 
 
 Chapter VI. — Voyage to Lisbon. — Assassination. — 
 Travels in Spain. — Patriotic War. — Voyage to 
 Greece. — Albania. — Ali Pacha. — Anecdotes. — 
 Highlanders. — Athens. — Spoliations. — Poem of 
 Minerva. — Tweddell. — Literary Pursuits. — Eman- 
 cipation of the Greeks. — Adventure in the Helles- 
 pont. — Return to England - - 97 
 
XIV CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 v Chapter VII.— Advantages of Travelling to Poets ; 
 Exhihited in Childe Harold. — Observations on that 
 Poem. — Lines on the Princess Charlotte of Wales. 
 — Address on opening Drury-Lane Theatre. — Sale 
 of Newstead Abbey ; and failure of the Contract - 157 
 
 v/ Chapter VIII. — Publication of " The Giaour." — Plan 
 of the Poem. — Its beauties and defects. — Um made 
 of the story of Sisera. — Account of the " Bride of 
 Abydos." — Its dangerous tendency - - 180 
 
 ^CHAPTER IX.— Publication of " The Corsair."— Beau- 
 ties and defects of that Poem. — Supposed origin of 
 the Piece. — Dedication to Thomas Moore. — Libe- 
 rality of Lord Byron. — The Story of Conrad resumed 
 in ft Lara." — Character of that Poem. — Ode to 
 Napoleon Buonaparte - 194 
 
 Chapter X. — Marriage of Lord Byron. — Character of 
 the Hebrew Melodies. — Observations on Devotional 
 Poetry. — Publication of the " Siege of Corinth" 
 and " Parisina." — Criticisms on those Poems - 215 
 
 Chapter XI.— Birth of a Daughter to Lord Byron. — 
 Differences with his Lady. — She quits his Residence. 
 —Causes of the Separation. — The Lady's conduct 
 approved. — Strange procedure of his Lordshp. — The 
 Editor of the Morning Chronicle's interference. — 
 Lord Byron's Verses to his Wife, and Satire upon 
 her Governess. — His Lordship leaves the kingdom - 230 
 
 Chapter XII. — On the Banishment of Ovid. — Lord 
 Byron's Visit to the Field of Waterloo. — Fortress 
 of Ehrenbreitstein. — French General Marceau. — 
 Pyramid of Bones at Morat. — Clarens, on the Lake 
 of Geneva. — Rousseau. — Monks of St. Bernard. 
 — Superstition and Infidelity contrasted. — Descrip- 
 tion of the Jungfraw. — Departure for Italy - 250 
 
CONTENTS. XV 
 
 Page 
 . Chapter XIII. — Monody on Sheridan. — Palpable 
 Imitation of Ariosto. — Poem of the Prisoner of 
 Chillon. — Story of Bonnivard. — Publication of the 
 Third Canto of * Childe Harold" - - 274 
 
 vtlH after XIV.— Marloe and Lord Byron compared. — 
 Account of the dramatic Poem of " Manfred/' — 
 Origin and tendency of that piece. — Ferrara. — The 
 ^ Lament of Tasso" - 295 
 
 •/ Chapter XV. — Rome. — Completion of " Childe 
 Harold." — Fall of Venice. — An Italian Landscape 
 
 by Moonlight Statue of Venus. — Conclusion of the 
 
 Poem. — Deformities.— Poetical Tale of " Beppo." 
 — Allusion to Peter Pindar and Whistlecraft.— A 
 Literary Imposition practised on Lord Byron, in the 
 Story of the " Vampyre." — Publication of " Ma- 
 zeppa" - - • - - 310 
 
 * Chapter XVI — Observation on Italy by Ascham.— 
 Its application to Lord Byron. — Degradation of his 
 Poetic Genius— Instanced in " Don Juan."— That 
 character a counterpart of Childe Harold.— Family 
 Sketches. — Outline of the Story. — Its gross immora- 
 lities and profanity - 327 
 
 Chapter XVII. — Controversy on the Character of 
 Pope, and Poetic Composition. — Attack on Mr. 
 Bowles. — His Defence. — Letter of Lord Byron.— 
 Reply of Mr. Bowles. — Observations on the Dispute 344 
 
 Chapter XVIII. — Dramatic Incidents in the History of 
 Venice. — Publication of the Tragedy of "Marino 
 Fallen). 1 '— Performed without success.— Injunction 
 obtained against the representation. — " Prophecy 
 of Dante."— Tragedies of " Sardanapalus" and the 
 " Two Foscari." - - - - 358 
 
XT1 CONTENTS, 
 
 Page 
 
 Chapter XIX.— Origin of Plays on Religious Sub- 
 jects.— Sacred Dramas, Ancient and Modern. — 
 111 adapted to the Stage. — Account of " Cain, a 
 Mystery/'— Dedication.— Bayle Manicheism.— In- 
 decency.— Prae-Adamites.— Cuvier.— The Piece pi- 
 rated — Injunction refused Milton justified.— Con- 
 duct of the Publisher.— Anecdote of Curll.— Lord 
 Byron's Letter - - 370 
 
 Chapter XX.— Spanish Proverb. Lord Byron's At- 
 tacks on Mr. Southey. — Reply of the latter, in his 
 " Vision of Judgment." — Term of the " Satanic 
 School."— Retort of Lord Byron.— His Opinions on 
 the French Revolution— On Politics and Religion.— 
 Mr. Southey's Letter.— Parody on the " Vision of 
 Judgment" - 389 
 
 Chapter XXI. — Anecdote of Dryden. — His conduct 
 contrasted with that of Lord Byron. — Projected 
 Literary Institution at Pisa. — Anecdote of Voltaire. 
 The Associates of Lord Byron.— -The writings of 
 Shelley recommended by him. — English Journal at 
 Pisa. — Lord Byron's Liberality, — Increase of his 
 Fortune.— Law suit. — Impropriety of his conduct. — 
 Review of his personal and literary character. —Con- 
 clusion. 407 
 
INTRODUCTION, 
 
 " POETRY, especially heroical," says the great 
 Bacon, " seems to be raised altogether from a noble 
 foundation, which makes much for the dignity of 
 man's nature. For, seeing this sensible world is 
 in dignity inferior to the soul of man, Poesy seems 
 to endow human nature with that which History 
 denies, and to give satisfaction to the mind with at 
 least the shadows of things, where the substance cannot 
 be had. For if the matter be thoroughly considered, 
 a strong argument may be drawn from Poesy, that a 
 more stately greatness of things, a more perfect order, 
 and a more beautiful variety, delight the soul of man, 
 than any way can be found in nature since the Fall. 
 Wherefore, seeing the acts and events which are the 
 
 B 
 
% INTRODUCTION. 
 
 subjects of true History, are not of that amplitude as 
 to content the mind of man, Poesy is ready at hand 
 to feign acts more heroical. Because true History 
 reports the successes of business not proportionable 
 to the merit of virtues and vices, Poesy corrects it, 
 and presents events and fortunes according to desert, 
 and according to the law of Providence. Because 
 true History, through the frequent satiety and simili- 
 tude of things, works a distaste and misprision in the 
 mind of man, Poesy cheereth and refresheth the 
 soul, chanting things rare and various, and full of 
 vicissitudes. So as Poesy serveth and conferreth to 
 delectation, magnanimity, and morality ; and therefore 
 it may seem deservedly to have some participation 
 of divineness, because it doth raise the mind, and 
 exalt the spirit with high raptures, by proportioning 
 the shows of things to the desires of the mind, and 
 not submitting the mind to things, as reason and his- 
 tory do ; and by these allurements and congruities, 
 whereby it cherisheth the soul of man, joined also 
 with concert of music, whereby it may more sweetly 
 insinuate itself, it hath won such success, that it hath 
 been in estimation even in ruder times, and barbarous 
 nations, when other learning stood excluded." 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 Poetry, therefore, being the highest effort of ori- 
 ginal genius, may justly claim for its professors, what 
 indeed has always been conceded to them, the fore- 
 most rank in the temple of literary fame. 
 
 To the powerful influence of this fascinating art on 
 language and opinion, the experience of all ages, and 
 the history of every country, bear abundant testimony ; 
 but on the utility of poetry to any great moral pur- 
 poses, there is a diversity of judgment among'' the 
 wisest men of ancient and modern times. While 
 Aristotle went so far as to say, of poetry, that it is 
 better adapted for instruction than history ; Plato, 
 who was more of a harmonist than his pupil, and 
 whose works are full of poetic beauty, denounced 
 Homer as dangerous because he dealt in fiction ; and 
 in the same spirit of scrupulous morality, the same 
 great philosopher, when framing an ideal republic of 
 perfection, expressly banished all poets from it, as 
 professing an art inimical to truth. However strange 
 and severe this censure may seem, it has been coun- 
 tenanced by a sage of our own, who, at the very time 
 that he was employed in immortalizing the bards of 
 his country, and in forming a body of criticism more 
 
4 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 valuable than the Poetics of Aristotle, ventured to 
 remark on the amiable character of West, the trans- 
 lator of Pindar, that he was one of the few poets to 
 whom the grave might appear without its terrors. 
 
 Plato has been animadverted upon in many elabo- 
 rate dissertations, and Johnson has suffered much 
 reproach for a reflection which it were well if the 
 history of letters could prove to be unjust ; but until 
 that is the case, the main question in regard to the 
 superior moral efficacy of the poetic art must remain 
 unsettled. Poesy, however, has its various and com- 
 manding excellencies ; for besides " raising the mind 
 and exalting the spirit with high raptures," as Bacon 
 observes, it brings out innumerable beauties from the 
 immense storehouse of nature, that would otherwise 
 have lain concealed, or been passed over without pro- 
 ducing the least emotion : it also creates new beings 
 and associations, which, if they cannot be identified 
 with any realities in the external world, serve at least 
 to excite astonishment at the power of the human 
 intellect ; and though it originates and centres solely 
 in the imagination, it contributes material aid to the 
 reasoning faculty by the force of illustration and com- 
 parison. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 But farther than all this, Poetry has occasionally 
 a great influence on the state of society, by the turn 
 which it gives to public taste, opinion, and manners. 
 Thus Virgil reconciled, in a great degree, the Roman 
 people to imperial authority ; and, in more modern 
 times, Chaucer certainly paved the way for the Refor- 
 mation, and the dissolution of the religious orders, by 
 the ridiculous light in which his popular tales placed 
 the monks and friars. 
 
 Such then being the magic power of this delectable 
 art, it becomes a duty as well as a pleasure to examine 
 into the character of the prevailing poetry of the age 
 and country in which we live, as thereby a correct idea 
 may be formed of the advance that has been made 
 both in literary taste and moral sentiment. Perhaps 
 at no period were there so many contemporary poets 
 in one country as are now to be found in this island ; 
 and though, where the candidates for distinction are 
 numerous, the palm of excellence can be but the lot 
 of few, it is a proud triumph to literature that ori- 
 ginal genius, instead of being on the decline, is flou- 
 rishing in full vigour, and putting forth new shoots 
 every day. In this luxuriant enclosure, this " wilder- 
 
6 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 ness of sweets," one object towers above the rest 
 in lofty and fantastic majesty, demanding universal 
 homage, and certainly attracting general admiration. 
 
 It is beyond question that the writings of Lord 
 Byron have thrown the works of the other poets of 
 the day comparatively into shade ; and this celebrity 
 has, with the accustomed effect of popularity, raised a 
 host of imitators, who, if they cannot catch a portion 
 of their master's genius, make up for the deficiency 
 by aping his misanthropy, and exceeding him, if 
 possible, in licentiousness. Thus standing, as he does, 
 at the head of a new order, or school of poetry, 
 which, whatever be its period of duration, cannot but 
 affect the manners as well as the literature of the time 
 in which it lasts ; no excuse is necessary for an exami- 
 nation into the merits of one, whose performances 
 directly and avowedly tend to produce a revolution 
 in the feelings and principles of mankind. Where 
 such is the aim of a writer, whose singularly versatile 
 talents, elevated station, and peculiar circumstances, 
 arm him with more than ordinary power to enable him 
 to carry his object into effect, it becomes a duty to lay 
 open his personal history, that it may be seen whe-. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 ther he, who seeks to create a new state of things, or 
 rather to disorganize all that constitutes social union, 
 has, by the propriety of his own conduct, established 
 the right to be a dictator in morals, as well as in poetry. 
 Living biography, if such a term may be used, is of a 
 very delicate nature. Yet there want not sufficient 
 authorities to warrant the practice of publishing the 
 memoirs of men of eminence, while they are still 
 shining above the horizon. The younger Patin did 
 honour to his brother professors at Padua, by writing 
 their history; — the life and letters of that learned 
 phenomenon, Anna Maria a Schurman, were printed 
 with her own consent ; and John Le Clerc published, 
 as the production of a friend, his own memoirs for 
 the double purpose of showing what a great scholar 
 he was, and of abusing his antagonists Burman and 
 Bentley, who had levelled his critical reputation in the 
 dust ; — in our own day, one of the best writers and 
 most amiable characters that the republic of letters 
 can boast, has prefixed an interesting account of his 
 eventful life to his translation of the first of Roman 
 satirists ; and to crown all, we are credibly informed, 
 that Lord Byron himelf has ventured, like the late ve- 
 teran Cumberland, to write his own history, with an 
 
8 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 injunction, however, that it shall not appear till he is 
 numbered with his ancestors. 
 
 Rich as such a piece of autobiography may be, 
 both in style and incident, it will exhibit to those who 
 shall chance to behold it, a veiled and not a naked 
 portraiture of the noble writer's mind and actions. It 
 is neither to be expected, nor desired, that a memoir 
 written under his peculiar circumstances, and at so 
 critical a period of his life, should display an exact 
 representation of the master passion that rules the 
 author's heart. Rousseau, indeed, left behind him a 
 reflected image of his own character, sketched in all the 
 minute accuracy of moral deformity ; but who is there 
 that would wish to see another instance of Confessions, 
 in which there are no traces of humility, conscience, 
 and respect for the common sense of mankind ? The 
 philosopher of Geneva, if such a splenetic spirit de- 
 served the name of philosopher, was frank enough to 
 own that he chose rather to be remarkable for his 
 paradoxes than his prejudices; the plain sense of 
 which amounted to this, that he was ready to sacri- 
 fice every thing to the love of singularity. Thus in 
 declaiming against prejudice, he made it appear that 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 he was the slave of the very worst of all prejudices — a 
 selfish, ungovernable pride of intellect. Rousseau, in 
 fact, made an idol of his own genius, and then quar- 
 relled with his contemporaries for not falling down 
 and worshipping the image which he had set up, as 
 the very model of mental excellence. Impatient of 
 restraint, he denounced war upon all received prin- 
 ciples, and every established institution, as derogatory 
 to the liberty and independence of man, while at the 
 same time he assumed the right of dictating, with 
 more than oriental despotism, his opinions to others, 
 without considering himself amenable to any laws of 
 criticism or morals. 
 
 This extraordinary character had, it must be ad- 
 mitted, a brilliant imagination ; but as it was suffered 
 to run wild for want of self-controul and proper direc- 
 tion, it produced more weeds than flowers ; and, what 
 is worse, the mind of Rousseau thereby became so 
 morbid that he at length grew fonder of poison than 
 of nutriment, and the deadly nightshade was more 
 acceptable to his taste than the fruits of Paradise. 
 The false views of human nature to which he had 
 habituated himself, made him take a delight in the 
 
10 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 horrible conceptions of his fancy, till at last he be- 
 lieved that the world was peopled with nothing but 
 vice and misery. What he felt in the dark chaos of 
 his own perturbed brain, he supposed to be the actual 
 condition of society, in which, according to his notion, 
 it was his misfortune to be the object of general 
 hatred on account of his superior virtue and talent. 
 Yet the wayward caprices and dangerous extrava- 
 gancies of this strange man have met with admirers, 
 and even with apologists, who have justified him in his 
 utmost aberrations, on the ground that as a sublime 
 genius he was not to be tied down by vulgar rules to 
 the ordinary duties of life. Thus genius is not only 
 a sufficient atonement for mental errors, but for 
 vicious practices; and the man who possesses this 
 high gift in a supreme degree, may boldly set the laws 
 of social order at defiance, and then presume to rush 
 where angels fear to tread. 
 
 But the laws of truth are immutable and universal ; 
 they allow no exemption in favour of pre-eminent 
 ability ; and therefore he who violates them, must be 
 responsible not only to the Judge of all thoughts and 
 deeds, but even to the generation in which he is cast, 
 
INTRODUCTION. 11 
 
 if his opinions and works shall produce an improper 
 influence upon the state of the community. In such 
 a case every individual is interested as a member of 
 the commonwealth, the happiness of which it is his 
 duty to promote by every means in his power ; and 
 by none more than in the endeavour to check the 
 current of baneful principles, especially when those 
 principles are sent forth clothed with the attractive 
 ornaments of literary elegance, and recommended by 
 the potent spells of rank and popularity. 
 
 It is not easy to open the eyes of those who are 
 wilfully blind, and it is still more difficult to make a 
 proud man sensible of his folly. Still something 
 should be done to abate an increasing evil; and 
 though lawless wit will, in spite of remonstrance, 
 retain its votaries, the poison may be counteracted 
 by an antidote. It is obvious, however, that the 
 remedy must be of a caustic nature, to be of any 
 powerful effect. Works of reasoning may be encoun- 
 tered by argumentation, till their fallacies are made 
 sufficiently clear to require no farther notice : but 
 errors of the imagination are not to be written down 
 by logic ; for their strength lies in fiction, and having 
 
12 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 no tangible principles, they wound and are irrefutable. 
 Didactic poetry, indeed, is of a more substantial form, 
 and, therefore, as in the case of Pope's Essay on 
 Man, the sophistry may be detected, because the false 
 doctrine as well as the consequences of it, lie open to 
 exposure, and are capable of confutation. But this is 
 a species of the art that takes a narrow range, and is 
 limited to few objects compared with the boundless 
 regions of fable and feeling, lively invention, and meta- 
 physical sentiment. It is in these wilds that the 
 witcheries of moral delusion prevail, which prove so 
 dangerous to the young and inexperienced, who are 
 apt to take upon trust whatever has the charm of 
 external dignity and meretricious beauty. 
 
 To undeceive those who are liable to be lost in this 
 enchanted land, is, therefore, as noble and godlike an 
 act of charity, as it was in the Hierarch, who 
 
 " from Adam's eyes the film remov'd, 
 
 Which that false fruit that promis'd clearer sight 
 Had bred ; then purg'd with euphrasy and rue 
 The visual nerve." 
 
 Such is the direct object of this biographical and 
 critical memoir of one of the most prominent charac- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 13 
 
 ters of the present age, who, by his wonderful powers, 
 and fatal use of them, has acquired so dreadful a dis- 
 tinction in the world of letters, as calls for the only 
 effectual means of abridging his influence by a detec- 
 tion of his errors. 
 
 Beyond this salutary point the writer does not pro- 
 fess or wish to go; for his aim is truth, and not 
 satire ; a simple exposition of facts, and not an ex- 
 aggeration of failings. But if the life of a man is an 
 illustration of his works, and if these, however elegant 
 they may be, have a perilous tendency to make ship- 
 wreck the best interests of society, then a full and 
 candid examination of the author's history is neces- 
 sary in order to correct the mischief likely to be pro- 
 duced by the influence of his name, and the popularity 
 of his writings. 
 
 To use the language of a sensible French critic — 
 " Comme il n'y a point de loix civiles qui defendent 
 a personne de se faire auteur, et d'ecrire pour le 
 public; il semble qu'il ny en ait pas aussi, pour 
 retrancher ou reformer la licence que chacun prend 
 de se rendre le censeur ou le juge de ces sortes de 
 
14 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 personnes." — " As there are no civil laws to forbid 
 any one from being an author, and writing for the 
 public ; so neither are there any, as it should seem, 
 to restrain or correct the liberty which every person 
 takes to become the censor and judge of such cha- 
 racters." — Baillet. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 Genealogical History. — Grant of Newstead Abbey. 
 Sir John Byron created a Peer by Charles the 
 First. — His Descendants. — Trial of William 
 Lord Byron, for murder. — Memoir of Admiral 
 Byron. — Account of his Son, John Byron. 
 
 THE family of Buron or Byron, for the orthography 
 continued unsettled till the reign of Henry the Second, 
 ascends to the Conquest, at which period there were 
 two potent barons of this name, Erneis and Ralph ; 
 but what relation they bore to each other, antiquaries 
 and genealogists cannot determine. The first of these 
 lords, Erneis, who appears to have been the most 
 considerable of the two, held numerous manors in the 
 counties of York and Lincoln; as Ralph, the direct 
 ancestor of the present lord, did in Nottinghamshire 
 and Derbyshire, in which last county he had his seat, 
 
16 GENEALOGICAL HISTORY. 
 
 called Horestan Castle, from whence he took his 
 title. To this Ralph succeeded Hugh de Buron, 
 Lord of Horestan, who with his son Hugh, in the 
 ninth year of the reign of King Stephen, gave to the 
 monastery of Lenton in Nottinghamshire, the church of 
 Ossington, to which grant was afterwards added that of 
 Horsley, being the parochial church of Horestan. This 
 last-mentioned Hugh de Buron retired from secular 
 affairs, and professed himself a monk in the hermitage 
 of Kersale, belonging to the priory of Lenton. He 
 was succeeded in his estates by Sir Roger de Buron, 
 who gave some lands to the monastery of Swinsted in 
 the reign of Henry the Second. His son Robert de 
 Byron, as the name now began to be spelt, increased 
 the possessions and consequence of his family by 
 marrying Cecilia, the daughter and sole heir of Sir 
 Richard Clayton, of Clayton in Lancashire, at which 
 seat the Byrons fixed their seat, till the reign of Henry 
 the Eighth. This Sir Robert was succeeded by a 
 son of the same name, whose two sons distinguished 
 themselves with great glory, in the military service, 
 under Edward the First. Sir John de Byron, the elder 
 of these warriors, became governor of the city of York; 
 and from him descended Sir John, who served in the 
 
GENEALOGICAL HISTORY. M 
 
 wars of France, under Edward the Third, by whom 
 he was knighted at the memorable siege of Calais. 
 He was succeeded by his brother, Sir Richard de 
 Byron ; whose widow, in 1397, made a vow of perpe- 
 tual chastity before the Archbishop of York. Her 
 son John, who received the honour of knighthood in 
 the third year of Henry the Fifth, was succeeded in 
 his estates by his second son Nicholas, whose son and 
 heir, Sir John, joined Henry Earl of Richmond, on his 
 landing at Milford, and was knighted by him at that 
 place. He fought gallantly at the battle of Bos worth, 
 for which he was afterwards made Constable of Not- 
 tingham Castle, and Steward and Warden of Sher- 
 wood Forest. At his death, in 1480, he left his lands 
 to Nicholas his brother, who was made one of the 
 knights of the Bath, at the marriage of Arthur Prince 
 of Wales, in 1502. This Sir Nicholas had only one 
 son, Sir John Byron, who was made by Henry the 
 Eighth Steward of Manchester and Rochdale, and 
 Lieutenant of the Forest of Sherwood. On the disso- 
 lution of the monasteries, he came in for no small 
 portion of the spoils, being rewarded with the grant 
 of the church and priory of Newstead, in the County 
 of Nottingham, together with the manor of Papel- 
 
 c 
 
18 ROYAL GRANTS. 
 
 wick, the rectory of the same, and the lands thereunto 
 adjoining. 
 
 This religious house, called Newstead, that is Novus 
 Locus, or New Place, was a monastery of canons 
 regular of St. Augustine, dedicated to God and the 
 Virgin Mary, by the founder, Henry the Second, who 
 endowed it with the church and town of Papelwick, 
 as well as other considerable appurtenances. The 
 same king afterwards gave to the monks of New- 
 stead, long and large wastes lying about the mo- 
 nastery, within the Forest, also a park of ten acres to 
 be enclosed as they pleased, out of the run of the 
 Verdurers, and a field of arable land, for a grange. 
 Other grants of considerable value were made to this 
 royal foundation, from time to time, by different 
 benefactors ; so that at the spoliation of the works of 
 piety, and the alienation of them from the charitable 
 objects for which they were set apart, the yearly 
 revenues of Newstead Abbey, were estimated at some- 
 what more than two hundred pounds, a rate, consi- 
 dering all the circumstances, equivalent to a modern 
 income of four thousand a year. 
 
NEWSTEAD ABBEY. 19 
 
 The Abbey now became the family seat of its new 
 possessors, and so it has continued till the present 
 time, though shorn of its honours, and exhibiting, in 
 its dilapidated state, a melancholy relique of ancient 
 splendour and hospitality. The worthy Evelyn, in 
 his account of a tour through England, in the summer 
 of 1654, has the following note : " We passed through 
 Sherwood Forest, accounted the most extensive in 
 England ; then Papelwick, an incomparable vista, 
 with the pretty castle near it. Thence we saw New- 
 stead Abbey, belonging to the Lord Byron, situate 
 much like Fontainebleau in France ; capable of being 
 made a noble seat, accommodated as it is with brave 
 woods and streams : it has yet remaining the front of 
 a glorious Abbey Church." 
 
 To this venerable mansion, its present noble owner 
 consecrated the first effusion of his muse, when only 
 fifteen years of age, in the following stanzas : 
 
 Through thy battlements, Newstead, hollow winds whistle, 
 Thou, the hall of my fathers, art gone to decay ; 
 
 In thy once-smiling garden, the hemlock and thistle 
 Have choak'd up the rose, which late bloom'd in the way. 
 
20 I SIR NICHOLAS BYROtf, 
 
 Of the mail-covered barons, who proudly to battle 
 Led their vassals from Europe to Palestine's plain, 
 
 The escutcheon and shield, which every blast rattle, 
 Are the only sad vestiges now that remain. 
 
 Sir John Byron, who dislodged the monks of the 
 Abbey of Newstead, left that and his other posses- 
 sions to his fourth son of the same name, on whom 
 Queen Elizabeth bestowed the honour of knighthood, 
 in 1579- His eldest son, Sir Nicholas, served with 
 distinction in the Low Country wars ; and when the 
 great Rebellion broke out, he was one of the first to 
 take up arms in the defence of the Royal cause. After 
 the battle of Edge Hill, where he displayed his cou- 
 rage, he was made Governor of Chester, which city 
 he defended gallantly against the Parliamentarians, 
 though at last he fell into their hands. Lord Cla- 
 rendon speaks highly of his character, and of the 
 exertions made by him in Cheshire to assist the king. 
 " He was," says the noble historian, " a person of 
 great affability and dexterity, as well as martial 
 knowledge, which gave great life to the designs of the 
 well-affected, and, with the encouragement of some 
 
SIR JOHN BYKON. 2J 
 
 gentlemen of North Wales, he in a short time raised 
 such a power of horse and foot, as made frequent 
 skirmishes with the enemy, sometimes with notable 
 advantage, never with signal loss." 
 
 Sir John Byron, the younger brother of Sir Nicholas, 
 was made Knight of the Bath, at the coronation of 
 King James the First. He married Anne, the eldest 
 daughter of Sir Richard Molyneux, Bart, by whom 
 he had eleven sons and a daughter. The eldest of the 
 sons served under his uncle in the Low Countries, and 
 in 1641, when the House of Commons complained 
 against Colonel Lunsford, as being an unfit person to 
 be governor of the Tower, the King appointed this Sir 
 John Byron to that office. In a short time, however, 
 the new Lieutenant became no less obnoxious to the 
 refractory spirits in the city and parliament, than his 
 predecessor; and he was ordered to attend at the 
 bar of the House, to answer certain charges alleged 
 against him by the sectaries. Sir John, instead of 
 complying with this mandate, refused peremptorily to 
 leave his post without the king's command. Upon 
 this the Commons applied to the Lords, to join them 
 in a petition to the King, praying him to remove Sir 
 
22 SIR JOHN BYRON, 
 
 John Byron ; but though the Peers in other respects 
 gave too much way to the encroachments of the Lower 
 House, they had firmness enough in this instance to 
 reject the proposition. The City, however, petitioned 
 the King on this subject, and, among other grievances, 
 complained of the u preparations made in the Tower, 
 and the calling of divers cannoniers into that fortress/' 
 To this his Majesty replied, that " for the Tower, he 
 wondered that, having removed a servant of good 
 trust and reputation from that charge, only to satisfy 
 the fears of the City, and put in another of unques- 
 tionable reputation and known ability, the petitioners 
 should still entertain those fears." 
 
 But some time afterwards the King, from a dispo- 
 sition to conciliate the malcontents, thought proper 
 to remove Sir John Byron, who in the summer of 
 1642 was employed in escorting the plate contri- 
 buted by the University of Oxford, for his royal 
 master's use. This important trust he discharged 
 with such satisfaction, that the learned body conferred 
 on him, the same year, the honorary degree of Doctor 
 in the Civil Law. Shortly after this he bore a distin- 
 guished part in the battle of Edge Hill ; as also in 
 
CREATED LORD BYRON. 23 
 
 that of Newbury, where six of his brothers, besides 
 himself, were actively engaged. For these services 
 Sir John Byron received a patent of peerage, dated 
 at Oxford, October 24, 1643, creating him Baron 
 Byron, of Rochdale, in the County of Lancaster, with 
 the remainder of the title to his brothers, and their 
 male issue respectively. 
 
 As a farther testimony of the royal favour, Lord 
 Byron was made Field- Marshal-General of all 
 his Majesty's forces in Worcestershire, Shropshire, 
 Cheshire, and North Wales ; and when his uncle 
 Sir Nicholas was made prisoner by the rebels, he 
 was appointed to the government of the city of Ches- 
 ter in his room. In this capacity he rendered great 
 service to the Royal cause, particularly by defeating 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax, and relieving Montgomery Cas- 
 tle, for which the Parliament passed a vote, except- 
 ing him from pardon and sequestrating his estates. 
 On the other hand, the King reposed the most entire 
 confidence in this loyal subject, and appointed him 
 governor to the Duke of York, with whom he escaped 
 to Holland, when the unfortunate Monarch became a 
 prisoner in the Isle of Wight. Lord Byron after- 
 
24 HIS DEATH. 
 
 wards accompanied his royal pupil in Flanders, under 
 the immortal Turenne ; but he did not long survive 
 that campaign, dying at Paris in 1652. Though 
 married twice, he left no issue, and was succeeded in 
 the title and estates by his second brother, Sir Richard 
 Byron, who was knighted by Charles the First, for 
 his conduct at the battle of Edge Hill. He was 
 also appointed governor first of Appleby Castle, in 
 Westmoreland, and next of Newark, which place he 
 defended with great honour. This second Lord 
 Byron died in 1679, and was succeeded by his eldest 
 son William, who married Elizabeth the daughter of 
 John Viscount Chaworth of the kingdom of Ireland ; 
 by whom he had five sons, all of whom died young, 
 except William, the fourth lord, born in 1 669- He be- 
 came Gentleman of the Bedchamber to Prince George 
 of Denmark, with whom he was a great favourite, 
 His first wife, Mary, daughter of John Earl of 
 Bridgewater, died of the small pox, eleven weeks 
 after her nuptials. By his second wife, the daughter 
 of William Bentinck Earl of Portland, he had three 
 sons, who all died before their father. His third wife, 
 Frances, daughter of William Lord Berkeley, of 
 Stratton, brought him five sons and a daughter. 
 
WILLIAM, THE FIFTH LOUD BYRON. 25 
 
 William the eldest son, born in 1722, succeeded to 
 the family honours on the death of his father, in 1736. 
 He entered into the naval service, and became lieu- 
 tenant of the Victory, under Admiral Balchen ; which 
 ship he had but just left, before she was lost on the 
 rocks of Alderney. In 1763, he was made Master 
 of the Stag-hounds ; but in 1765, he was sent to the 
 Tower, and tried before the House of Peers, for kill- 
 ing his relation and neighbour, Mr. Chaworth, in a 
 duel fought at the Star and Garter Tavern, in Pail- 
 Mall. It appeared in evidence, that Lord Byron's 
 passions, which were at all times boisterous, carried 
 him so far in the dispute with Mr. Chaworth, that 
 nothing would satisfy him, short of fighting in the 
 room where the quarrel commenced. They accord- 
 ingly fought, by the dim light of a single candle, and 
 Mr. Chaworth, who was the less skilful of the two, 
 received a mortal wound. He lived long enough, 
 however, to make his will, and to impart some parti- 
 culars, which induced the coroner's jury to return a 
 verdict of wilful murder against the noble lord ; who, 
 on the 16th of April, took his trial in Westminster 
 Hall ; when the public curiosity was so great, that 
 tickets of admission were publicly sold for six gui- 
 

 26 HIS TKIAL. 
 
 neas, and found eager purchasers. The trial lasted 
 two days ; and at the conclusion, all the peers present, 
 amounting to about two hundred and fifty, pronounced 
 the prisoner guilty of manslaughter; but on being 
 brought up for judgment, he pleaded his privilege, 
 and was discharged. This lord married Elizabeth 
 the daughter of Charles Shaw, Esq. of Besthorp Hall, 
 in the County of Norfolk, by whom he had three sons; 
 but all of them died without issue before their father, 
 who departed this life at Newstead Abbey, May 17, 
 1798. 
 
 #* 
 
 One of the most remarkable members of this cele- 
 brated family was the Honourable John Byron, second 
 son of William, the fourth lord, by his third wife. He 
 was born at Newstead Abbey, on the 8th of Novem- 
 ber, 1723 ; and at an early age entered into the naval 
 service, in which he suffered more hardships perhaps 
 than any man of his time. In 1740, he embarked as 
 a midshipman on board the Wager, one of the ships 
 fitted out for an expedition to the South Seas, under 
 the command of Commodore Anson. The Wager 
 was an old Indiaman, and was purchased by Govern- 
 ment to serve as a store-ship; so that, being very deeply 
 
ADMIRAL BYRON. 27 
 
 laden, she sailed heavily, and was incapable of keep- 
 ing company with the rest of the squadron. In a 
 squall of wind, off the southernmost mouth of the 
 straits Le Maire, she lost sight of all her companions, 
 and soon afterwards carried away her mizen mast. 
 The commander, Captain Cheap, then endeavoured 
 to make the island of Soccoro, the appointed place of 
 rendezvous, but in vain ; for the gale increased to such 
 a degree that no exertions of the crew could prevent 
 the ship from falling upon a lee shore; where, the 
 rudder and tiller being gone, she struck between two 
 rocks. This was in the middle of the night; and when 
 day broke, the people got the boats out ; but Mr. 
 Byron, who with the captain went on shore, could 
 not save a single article of his clothes, except what he 
 had on his back. The land was, if possible, more 
 dreadful than the sea, nothing appearing all around 
 but a wild solitude, alike destitute of animals and ve- 
 getation. This dismal spot lay to the northward of 
 the Straits of Magellan ; but whether it formed part 
 of an island or of the continent, the sufferers had ho 
 means of determining. From the wreck so little was 
 saved at first, that when the people landed, they had no 
 more than two or three pounds of biscuit-dust and a sea- 
 
28 HIS SHIPWRECK. 
 
 gull as a breakfast, to be divided among one hundred 
 and forty men, after having been without food eight- 
 and-forty hours. To such a pitch of misery were they 
 at last reduced, that the gallinaso, the carrion crow 
 of this inhospitable coast, which occasionally came 
 to devour the carcases of the drowned men on the 
 shore, was regarded as a dainty. Some Indians, who 
 rowed into the bay, brought them a few trifling articles, 
 and some provisions were obtained from the vessel ; but 
 not in a sufficient quantity to supply the present neces- 
 sities of the men, who to increase their misfortune, had, 
 on the first striking of the ship among the breakers, 
 made free with all the stores and liquors they could 
 find. All order was at an end ; and while one party 
 resolved to pursue a wild journey into the interior, 
 another body determined upon seizing the long boat, 
 which they at last did, leaving the captain, whom 
 they hated, behind. Mr. Byron joined these adven- 
 turers ; but on discovering their intentions towards the 
 captain, he quitted them ; though in so doing he be- 
 came exposed to the horror of starving, for the fugi- 
 tives were so unfeeling that they carried away with 
 them every morsel of food that could be obtained from 
 the hull of the wreck. The number remaining on the 
 
DEVICES. 29 
 
 island, for such it was now found to be, amounted to 
 twenty ; and the only boats they had left, were the 
 barge and yawl. Of the distress to which they were 
 reduced some idea may be formed from the circum- 
 stance, that Mr. Byron had an Indian dog, to which 
 he became much attached, but nothing could prevail 
 with the crew to spare the animal from slaughter ; and 
 three weeks after this the owner himself was glad to 
 make a meal of the rotten paws and skin which he 
 found on the place where the poor creature had been 
 killed. Among other devices which the seamen had 
 recourse to for a precarious subsistence, one of the 
 most remarkable was that of the boatswain's mate, 
 who having got a water-cask, scuttled it, and lashing 
 it to two logs, made a sort of boat, with which he put 
 out to sea, and succeeded in getting fish and wild 
 fowl, when his comrades on shore were starving. 
 To get away from this inhospitable clime, which, as 
 a great writer says, seems to have been cast aside 
 from human use, the captain came to a resolution 
 of embarking in the two boats, with the hope of 
 being able to reach the island of Chiloe. The 
 attempt was made ; but after a struggle of two 
 months, during which the crews lived upon seal, 
 
30 DISTRESSES. 
 
 sea-weed, and tangle, they were driven back by the 
 force of the current to Wager's Island, the place from 
 whence they set out. Their fate appeared now to 
 be fixed, when two canoes arrived with a party of 
 Indians, headed by the chief of a tribe in the 
 neighbourhood of Chiloe. With him an agreement 
 was made, that he should have the barge, and all 
 that had been saved from the wreck on the condition 
 of conducting the people up the creeks and across the 
 bays by which he had himself reached the island. 
 They accordingly embarked once more in the barge, 
 being now reduced to thirteen in number, and entered 
 on a voyage to which there are not many parallels in 
 the history of nautical hardships. To such extre- 
 mities were they reduced in attempting to force the 
 barge against a rapid stream, that when one of the 
 stoutest of the sailors fell from the oar, exhausted by 
 labour and the want of food, the captain refused to 
 give him a morsel, though he had a large piece of boiled 
 seal by him, so hardened was he become by the fami- 
 liarity of distress. Mr. Byron was the only one who, 
 having a few dried shell-fish in his pocket, from time 
 to time dropped one into the poor fellow's mouth — an 
 act of kindness which only prolonged his torture, but 
 
DELIVERANCE. 31 
 
 not his life. Their attempt to get up the river being 
 fruitless, a party went on shore, and penetrated into 
 the morasses in search of some sustenance ; but on 
 their return, six of the remaining crew, with an Indian, 
 advanced hastily and put off, leaving the Captain, Mr. 
 Byron, Mr. Campbell, Mr. Hamilton, and Mr. 
 Elliot, never to return. 
 
 Their misfortunes now seemed to have attained the 
 utmost point of desperate misery ; but at this moment 
 Providence relieved them, by the arrival of a canoe, 
 the Indians on board of which agreed to take them 
 up the river. After toiling at their oars three days, 
 they came to a carrying place, where it being neces- 
 sary for the party to proceed on foot, each person had 
 some load ; and Mr. Byron had allotted to him a 
 wet heavy piece of stinking seal, wrapped up in can- 
 vas belonging to the captain. Their way was through 
 a thick wood, and a swamp, where every step sunk 
 the person almost to the middle. In this dismal 
 place Mr. Byron was left behind, by falling from a 
 tree into some water, where he narrowly escaped being 
 drowned. With some difficulty he extricated him- 
 self; but, on joining his companions, Captain Cheap 
 
32 HARDSHIPS. 
 
 reproached him so seriously for losing his piece of 
 seal, that he voluntarily went back five miles to re- 
 cover it. Notwithstanding this heroic act of gene- 
 rosity, the captain and the whole party embarked 
 without taking Mr. Byron with them when he returned ; 
 and, what was still more inhuman in this brutal com- 
 mander, he did not even leave the youth a morsel of the 
 stinking seal for which he had endured such hardship 
 and had nearly paid his life. Night coming on, and 
 being quite worn out with fatigue and hunger, he there 
 lay down, and fell asleep. Before day he awoke, 
 and hearing some voices at a little distance, he went 
 towards the spot whence the sound proceeded, and 
 found a wigwam, or Indian hut, into which he entered, 
 though not till he had received some blows for his 
 intrusion. The Indians, however, were soon recon- 
 ciled to him, and he embarked with them in their 
 canoe ; but when they hauled up to the shore at night, 
 they all disappeared, and left him alone in a dark, 
 dismal desert, amidst a violent storm of rain. The 
 next day the party returned, and took him with them 
 to a place, where finding a quantity of limpets, he 
 filled his hat with them ; but the Indians were so en- 
 raged at his throwing the shells overboard, that he 
 
RETURN TO EUROPE. 33 
 
 had some difficulty to prevent them from doing the 
 same by himself. In a few days Mr. Byron rejoined 
 his company ; and soon afterwards they landed in the 
 island of Chiloe, at the imminent hazard of their lives. 
 The natives received them very kindly, and the women, 
 in particular, strove who should contribute most to the 
 comfort of the poor shipwrecked mariners, who on 
 their part were so ravenous that they did nothing but 
 eat for the whole day together: and such was the 
 impression of his privations on the mind of Mr. 
 Byron, that for several months he could not avoid 
 pocketing all the victuals that he could lay his hands 
 upon. From Chiloe they were conveyed by a Spanish 
 guard to Castro, and thence to Chaco, where the niece 
 of an old priest fell in love with Mr. Byron ; and the 
 uncle, so far from disapproving of it, offered the 
 favoured youth tar settle all his property upon him, 
 provided he would marry the lady. This proposition, 
 however, tempting as it was under all the circum- 
 stances in which he stood, Mr. Byron had the fortitude 
 to decline. At the beginning of 1 743, they were sent 
 off to Valparaiso, and next to St. Jago, the capital of 
 Chili, where Mr. Byron was hospitably entertained 
 near two years by Dr. Gedd, a Scotch physician. In 
 
 D 
 
34 VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY. 
 
 the month of December 1744, they were put on 
 board the Lys, a French frigate, which did not reach 
 the harbour of Brest till the 27th of October, 1745. 
 After some time Mr. Byron and his companions 
 obtained a passage in a Dutch vessel, which landed 
 them at Dover ; but so completely were their finances 
 exhausted, that they had not wherewithal to pay the 
 turnpikes as they came to London, where they arrived 
 at the beginning of 1746. 
 
 Having passed through the several gradations of 
 service, Mr, Byron, in 1758, was appointed commo- 
 dore of a small squadron in the channel ; and soon 
 after he was despatched to North Amerca, as com- 
 mander of the British ships at Louisburg, the fortifi- 
 cations of which place he demolished, pursuant to his 
 orders, and then removed the stores to Halifax. 
 
 It is well known that the first object of his late 
 Majesty on ascending the throne, was to restore the 
 blessing of peace, that he might be enabled to pro- 
 mote the interests of science. Accordingly, when the 
 war terminated, the king turned his attention to the 
 favourite idea, which had long occupied his thoughts — 
 
FALKLAND S ISLANDS. 35 
 
 that of ascertaining whether there existed a southern 
 continent. Upon this point, Lord Egmont, then at 
 the head of the Admiralty, was consulted ; and after 
 some deliberation and inquiry it was determined that 
 a voyage of discovery should be undertaken, and that 
 Commodore Byron was the fittest person to conduct 
 the expedition. He sailed from the Downs, on the 
 21st of June, 1764, with two ships, the Dolphin and 
 the Tamar. In ranging along that coast where he 
 had suffered such dreadful hardships, the commodore 
 observed, near the entrance of the Straits of Magel- 
 lan, a number of people on the shore, who made signs 
 for an interview. With this invitation he complied, 
 and met with a most friendly reception from the In- 
 dians, who were above five hundred in number, and of 
 a gigantic stature. On the 1 4th of January, 1 765, 
 the commodore took possession of the principal of 
 Falkland's Islands, which afterwards had nearly pro- 
 duced a war between this country and Spain. Having 
 accomplished this part of his mission, and explored 
 the coast, the English commander passed through the 
 Magellanic Straits, and entered the Great Pacific 
 Ocean, where he discovered some new islands, to one 
 of which his name was given by the officers ; and in 
 
36 AMERICAN WAR. 
 
 the month of May, 1766, after having circumnavi- 
 gated the globe, the two ships came to anchor in 
 the Downs. 
 
 In 1775, this gallant officer was promoted to the 
 rank of admiral; and in the spring of 1778, he was 
 despatched with thirteen ships of the line, in pursuit of 
 the French fleet, which had sailed from Brest to 
 North America, under the command of D'Estaing. 
 In his passage the English admiral encountered such 
 severe weather, that several of his ships suffered much, 
 and the whole were separated. After this D'Estaing 
 got out from Boston, and sailed for the West Indies, 
 whither he was followed by Admiral Byron, but with- 
 out his being able to get up with the enemy, who lay 
 secure for several months in the harbour of Marti- 
 nique. Such was the ill-fortune of this brave com- 
 mander, that the seamen, who with all their courage 
 are remarkably superstitious, regarded him as one 
 born under an evil planet, and gave him the appella- 
 tion of " foul- weather Jack." Yet personally no 
 officer in the service was better beloved by those who 
 served under him ; for he was kind to all, and remark- 
 ably attentive to the comforts of the common mem 
 
CAPTAIN JOHN BYRON. 37 
 
 of which a striking proof appeared in his voyage round 
 the world, during which by his care he prevented the 
 
 scurvy from making any ravages in his ships. 
 
 w 
 
 At the close of the American war he retired to do- 
 mestic life; in which, however, he was almost as un- 
 fortunate as in his professional career. In 1748, he 
 married the daughter of John Trevannion, Esq. of 
 Carhays, in the County of Cornwall, by whom he had 
 two sons and three daughters ; one of which last mar- 
 ried her cousin William, the eldest son of the fifth 
 Lord Byron, but had no issue by him, and died 
 in 1788 ; two years after her father, the admiral. 
 
 John Byron the eldest son of the brave veteran, a 
 sketch of whose life we have just given, was born in 
 1751. He received a liberal education at Westmin- 
 ster School ; after which his father purchased for him 
 a commission in the Guards, where he obtained the 
 rank of captain ; but his life was so irregular, that the 
 admiral, though a very good-natured man, discarded 
 him long before his death. To be seen in the com- 
 pany of Jack Byron was enough to bring the charac- 
 
38 INTRIGUES WITH 
 
 ter of any man or woman into suspicion, for he was a 
 spendthrift, a gambler, and a debauchee. 
 
 In 1778, an affair happened which occasioned much 
 noise in the upper circles of life, and brought the sub- 
 ject of this narrative before the public, in a manner 
 that excited more than common indignation. The 
 late Duke of Leeds, then Marquess of Carmarthen, 
 married in 1773, Amelia, the only daughter of the 
 Earl of Holdernesse, and never to appearance was 
 there a happier couple. Two or three years after the 
 marriage, the marquess was taken with a violent fever 
 at Bath, when such was the anxiety of his lady, that 
 she watched by him herself, both day and night, with 
 an assiduity of attention that brought her own life in 
 danger. The Marquess was not insensible to this 
 proof of affection, which he endeavoured to repay, 
 after his recovery, by a correspondent concern for the 
 happiness of one who had shown so much regard for 
 him, in the hour of danger. 
 
 4 
 
 They lived together after this in the utmost har- 
 mony; and any insinuation reflecting upon the fidelity 
 
MARCHIONESS OF CARMARTHEN. 39 
 
 of the lady, would have drawn from her lord the 
 keenest expressions of insulted honour. Yet while 
 the Marquess was thus wrapped up in the fullest 
 confidence of his partner's virtue, those around them 
 saw a strange alteration in the deportment of her 
 ladyship. Her intimacy with Jack Byron excited 
 surprise, in all who knew the profligacy of his cha- 
 racter ; and as he took no pains to keep his conquest 
 a secret, the illicit connexion was soon hinted abroad. 
 The Marquess could not avoid hearing of the reports 
 that were in circulation ; but such was his opinion of 
 his wife's affection for him, manifested so strongly in 
 his late illness ; so fully was he persuaded of the 
 innate purity of her mind, fortified by the principles 
 of religion, and the noble example of her parents, that 
 he treated the rumours which were spread about, as 
 the malignant effusions of envy, contrived by wicked 
 minds to destroy his felicity. But this incredulity on 
 the part of the husband, and his unabated kindness 
 amidst the talk which his consort's behaviour had 
 produced, facilitated a complete detection, by throwing 
 the criminal parties off their guard. One day when 
 the Marquess was in the country, her ladyship de- 
 livered a letter to her footman to carry to Captain 
 
40 DISCOVERY. 
 
 Byron. This epistle she had the imprudence to seal 
 with a wafer, which was still wet ; so that the trusty 
 Hermes had no trouble in reading the contents. 
 Finding that the billet contained an appointment, the 
 man, instead of conveying it to the place of destina- 
 tion, carried it to Lord Holdernesse, whose agitation 
 was so great on this shocking discovery, that he made 
 it known to the Countess. Lady Holdernesse imme- 
 diately repaired to her daughter, whom she taxed 
 with her infidelity, which she as resolutely denied, 
 till the fatal letter was produced, and then she fell 
 into a fit. A scene followed that no language can 
 describe; but upon promises of repentance, the matter 
 was hushed up, the servant who made the discovery 
 was silenced, and the Marquess for that time had no 
 intimation of his dishonour ; yet it was impossible 
 that he could be kept altogether ignorant of a con- 
 duct which was the subject of general remark. 
 Though, therefore, he could not believe what the 
 world roundly asserted, he now deemed it prudent to 
 remain in the country, and to set a watch upon the 
 movements of the Marchioness. Two gentlemen of 
 tried honour and friendship were employed upon this 
 delicate service ; and they were not long engaged on 
 
ELOPEMENT. 41 
 
 the post of observation, till they brought the guilt of 
 her ladyship to the test of evidence. At this time, 
 Byron was in the country ; and having, as was usual 
 with him, pressing occasion for a sum of money, he 
 wrote to the Marchioness for a supply. 
 
 She immediately despatched to him a packet, con- 
 taining notes to the amount of one hundred pounds, 
 which fell into the hands of the two spies, who had 
 now an unequivocal demonstration of her ladyship's 
 infidelity, for the letter contained the most ardent ex- 
 pressions of affection, and a pressing entreaty that her 
 paramour would hasten to town, to take advantage of 
 the absence of the Marquess. The Captain did 
 indeed hurry up to London, not, however, in conse- 
 quence of the invitation, but because he had received 
 no answer to his letter — the interception of which 
 was a thunderbolt to both ; for, it afforded a certain 
 proof, that their guilt was now made known to him, 
 whom they had so grossly injured. In this dilemma, 
 they came to the resolution of repairing to the Continent ; 
 and with that view, her Ladyship wrote to the Mar- 
 quess, for leave to draw money from his banker. To 
 this request she received no answer, which only served 
 
42 MARRIAGE. 
 
 to hasten the determination of elopement ;, and they 
 accordingly set off for Dover in a chaise and four : 
 but just as they were about to enter the packet, the 
 two friends of the Marquess arrived, and brought the 
 Lady back to London, whither she was followed, at 
 a respectful distance, by her disappointed lover. Soon 
 after their arrival in town, her Ladyship again found 
 means to escape ; and as nothing more could be done 
 to hide the shame, legal proceedings were adopted, 
 the consequence of which was, a separation a mensa 
 et thoro ; and next, an act of parliament followed, by 
 which the marriage of the Marquess of Carmarthen 
 and Amelia D'Arcy was dissolved. This was in 
 May, 1779, and soon after, as the only means that 
 could be devised to patch up a broken reputation, 
 the friends on both sides interposed to bring about a 
 marriage between her Ladyship and Captain Byron, 
 which was effected ; but it turned out unhappily, for 
 the season of pleasure was over, and the dregs of illicit 
 love were become gall and wormwood. The mind 
 of the new husband was vitiated, and his manners 
 were brutal ; he had no relish for rational amusement, 
 or for the comforts of domestic life ; and, therefore, 
 it can excite no wonder, that within two years the 
 
DEATH. 43 
 
 ill-fated Amelia should have died literally of a broken 
 heart, after giving birth to two daughters, one of 
 whom only survived her mother. 
 
 In 1785, Mr. Byron took for a second wife, Miss 
 Gordon, a Scotch lady of noble descent, being nearly 
 allied to the Ducal House of that name, and herself 
 heiress to an estate at Rayne, in the district of Garioch, 
 near Aberdeen ; which, however, fell a prey to the extra- 
 vagances of her husband, who then cruelly abandoned 
 his wife and child, and, to avoid his creditors, went to 
 Valenciennes, where he died on the second of August, 
 1791. His widow lived long enough to see her son 
 received into the House of Lords, as the legitimate 
 claimant of the Barony of Byron; but though she 
 had the pleasure also to witness the opening of his 
 splendid talents, she was denied the satisfaction of 
 embracing him in her last moments, dying in Scot- 
 land, while he was on his travels, in 181 1. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 Early life of Lord Byron. — Character of Isabella, 
 Countess of Carlisle. — His Lordship's studies at 
 Harrow, and respect for his Tutor. — His opinion 
 of the poetic Classics controverted. — Removal to 
 Cambridge, and reflections upon that University. 
 
 ON the death of William, the fifth Lord Byron, 
 without male issue, the title and estates, at least those 
 which remained attached to the barony, devolved upon 
 George Gordon, the only son of the last-mentioned 
 John Byron, then a child of ten years old, being 
 born January 22, 1788. 
 
 The old lord lived many years, after his unfortunate 
 affair with Mr. Chaworth, a life of absolute seclusion 
 in the country, hated by his tenantry, at war with his 
 neighbours, and separated from all his family. He 
 
CHILDHOOD. 45 
 
 suffered the paternal mansion to fall into a state of 
 ruin; and, as far as lay in his power, he alienated the 
 lands which should have kept it in repair. Eccentri- 
 city, indeed, seems to have distinguished the whole 
 blood ; for his sister Isabella, late Countess of Car- 
 lisle, and mother of the present earl, was a woman of 
 singular genius, and as singular habits. She wrote a 
 charming copy of verses, addressed to Mrs. Greville, 
 on her " Ode to Indifference," which, with other poe- 
 tical effusions of her ladyship's pen, are in Pearch's 
 collection. After shining for a long period in the 
 circle of fashion as one of its most lively and fasci- 
 nating luminaries, she suddenly retired, and in a 
 manner shut herself up from the world ; which made 
 the late Mr. Fox, in one of his sportive productions, 
 characterize her severely enough, as 
 
 " Carlisle recluse in pride and rags." 
 
 Of the talents of her son the public has long pos- 
 sessed ample proofs, in a volume of poems, and the 
 nervous tragedy of " The Father's Revenge ;" which 
 last was submitted to the judgment of Dr. Johnson, a 
 little before his death, and received his approbation. 
 
46 INDULGENCE. 
 
 But to return to the immediate subject of these 
 Memoirs. His infant years, from the age of two to 
 ten, were spent at the birth-place of his mother, and 
 under her personal care ; which was of so lenient and 
 indulgent a cast, that perhaps much of the irregula- 
 rity which has marked his progress through life, may 
 be ascribed to the want of early restraint, and season- 
 able discipline. A mal-formation of one of his feet, 
 and other indications of a rickety constitution, served 
 as a plea for suffering him to range the hills, and 
 to wander about at his pleasure on the sea-shore, 
 that his frame might be invigorated by air and exercise. 
 But if much was gained in bodily strength, it was at 
 the expense of mental cultivation ; and this early 
 custom of roaming at will, became a confirmed habit, 
 and a disposition impatient of controul. 
 
 When the right to the family honours was de- 
 termined, and the young minor became a ward under 
 the guardianship of his relation, the Earl of Carlisle, 
 an order was made for his removal to an English se- 
 minary, that he might have an education suited to his 
 rank. Harrow was pitched upon, and thither he was 
 sent, towards the close of the year 1798. The re- 
 
HARROW SCHOOL. 47 
 
 strictions of a well-regulated school were seriously 
 felt by one who had never before experienced the 
 least abridgement of his freedoom, and whose desires 
 had always been gratified to such a degree that to him 
 even the language of authority was hardly known. A 
 mind so ill prepared for the trammels of education, 
 could not easily be brought into a state of conformity 
 with the established regulations of the institution ; and 
 though the usual exercises were correctly performed, 
 it was with reluctance and an avowed hatred both to 
 the task and the authority by which it was enforced. 
 That he did not acquire a classical taste at this cele- 
 brated seat of the Muses, where Jones and Sheridan 
 first tried their powers, is certain, for we have his own 
 testimony to the fact. The fourth canto of " Childe 
 Harold's Pilgrimage" contains a bitter anathema 
 against the use of the Latin poets in schools, followed 
 by a long note upon the same subject. The lines, 
 which possess neither strength nor harmony, are these : 
 
 " May he who will, his recollections rake 
 
 And quote in classic raptures, and awake 
 
 The hills with Latian echoes : I abhorr'd 
 
 Too much to conquer, for the poet's sake, 
 
 The drill'd dull lesson, forced down word byword, 
 
 In my repugnant youth, with pleasure, to record." 
 

 48 ON CLASSIC POETRY. 
 
 As an apology for this admitted defect, and in 
 justification of the contempt put upon classic allusions, 
 the noble author makes these observations : — 
 
 " I wish to express, that we become tired of the 
 task before we can comprehend the beauty ; that we 
 learn by rote, before we can get by heart ; that the 
 freshness is worn away, and the future pleasure and 
 advantage deadened and destroyed, by the didactic 
 anticipation, at an age when we can neither feel nor 
 understand the power of compositions which it re- 
 quires an acquaintance with life, as well as Latin and 
 Greek, to relish, or to reason upon. For the same 
 reason, we never can be aware of the fulness of some 
 of the finest passages of Shakspeare, (' To be, or not 
 to be/ for instance,) from the habit of having them 
 hammered into us at eight years old, as an exercise, 
 not of mind, but of memory ; so that when we are 
 old enough to enjoy them, the taste is gone, and the 
 appetite palled. In some parts of the Continent 
 young persons are taught from more common authors, 
 and do not read the best classics till their maturity. I 
 certainly do not speak on this point from any pique 
 or aversion towards the place of my education. I 
 
ON CLASSIC POETRY. 49 
 
 was not a slow, though an idle boy; and I believe no 
 one could be more attached to Harrow than I have 
 always been, and with reason : — a part of the time 
 passed there was the happiest of my life ; and my 
 preceptor (the Reverend Dr. Joseph Drury) was the 
 best and worthiest friend I ever possessed, whose 
 warnings I have remembered but too well, though too 
 late, when I have erred ; and whose counsels I have 
 but followed when I have done well and wisely. If 
 ever this imperfect record of my feelings towards him 
 should reach his eyes, let it remind him of one who 
 never thinks of him but with gratitude and veneration, 
 — of one who would more gladly boast of having been 
 his pupil, if by more closely following his injunctions 
 he could reflect any honour upon his instructor." 
 
 Pleasing as this tribute of gratitude is, it would 
 have been more so had the noble author forborne to 
 satirize in the coarsest strain of rude invective, by the 
 appellation of Pomposus, the head master of the same 
 seminary, for no other cause in the world than that of 
 having enforced, without any relaxation in favour of 
 individuals, the statutes of the house over which he 
 presided. 
 
50 PUBLIC EDUCATION. 
 
 But it is the sweeping censure passed upon the 
 system of instruction adopted in all our grammar- 
 schools that calls for particular notice and animad- 
 version. If the attainment of Latin and Greek is at 
 all necessary, it is obvious that those languages cannot 
 be acquired in perfection, but through the medium of 
 the finest writers, as well in verse as in prose. 
 
 What the late Dean Vincent has observed on 
 this subject in his admirable " Defence of Public 
 Education," is so decisive of the question that it is 
 only to be regretted that the author of Childe Harold 
 should have been ignorant of a tract, the perusal of 
 which would have saved him from falling under the 
 keen remark, that " he who writes with the Goths, 
 cannot thoroughly feel with the Classics." 
 
 Having remarked that Milton, Cowley, and Addison 
 had distinguished themselves by their paradoxical 
 opinions in regard to education, Dr. Vincent take3 
 their reflections in order. — 
 
 "Milton," says he, "complained of the years 
 that were wasted in teaching the dead languages, and 
 
PUBLIC EDUCATION. 51 
 
 proposed a more compendious method of his own ; 
 but Johnson, who had taught these languages himself, 
 observes that no man can teach faster than a boy can 
 learn. We know nothing of Milton's success; for 
 not a name of all his pupils is upon record : but we 
 know what the brightest luminaries of the age issued 
 from the school of Busby ; and we know that to form 
 the habits of literature, time is required as well as 
 teaching. 
 
 " Cowley complained that classical education 
 taught words only, and not things ; but it ought to be 
 considered that all the instruction of childhood de- 
 pends more on memory than intellect. When the age of 
 comprehension comes, from twelve or fourteen to six- 
 teen or eighteen, if the master teaches only words, he 
 is a blockhead. It is the composition of the poet he 
 is to notice, and not the rendering a word of the 
 original by its correspondent term in English; the 
 order, connexion, and relation of part to part, the 
 allusions to history, mythology, and geography ; and 
 if these are not things rather than words, where are 
 we to search for them ? 
 
52 INVOCATION TO HARROW. 
 
 "Addison deemed it an inexpiable error, that 
 boys, with genius or without , were all to be bred poet 
 indiscriminately; and if this were our object in 
 teaching prosody, his reproof would be just ; but no 
 ear can be formed to harmony, no poet can be read 
 with pleasure, no intimate acquaintance with any dead 
 language can be obtained, without a knowledge of 
 prosody." 
 
 While Lord Byron was at school, one of the living 
 ornaments of that seminary printed, though he did 
 not publish, " An Invocation to the Harrow Muses, 
 to defend the use of the Heathen Mythology, in 
 Poetry." 
 
 Whether the author of Childe Harold had this 
 poem in his eye when he spoke so contemptuously of 
 " Latian echoes," is a question which cannot be dis- 
 cussed in this place ; but the reader of sensibility, it 
 is apprehended, will not be displeased with some lines 
 from a performance conceived in the genuine strain of 
 classic taste and genuine poesy : 
 
 " I will not from remembrance blot the lays 
 Which Harrow echo'd in my younger days — 
 
INVOCATION TO HARROW, 53 
 
 Those days, in which your votaries loved to rove 
 Through the dark windings of the sacred grove ;* 
 Or where the steeple rises to the view, 
 Or where, in earlier times, the arrow flew :f 
 Then oft, upon some bank, from sorrow free, 
 Or at the roots we sat of some old tree, 
 There hail'd the flocks and herds that wander'd nigh, 
 Or hymn'd the smiling hours that fleeted by : 
 As yet our youthful passions were not strong, 
 And few the opportunities of wrong ; 
 But rash adventures (when th' appointed bound 
 Our feet o'erleapt, and trod forbidden ground), 
 Or themes in haste perform'd (a heinous crime), 
 Or verse unfinish'd at the stated time, 
 Soon follow'd punishment ; nor, that once o'er, 
 The fault, which caused it, was remember'd more. 
 Past scenes ! which, while in manhood we pursue 
 Life's toilsome march, with fondness we review": 
 Now constant care fills up the present hour, 
 With schemes for future wealth, or distant pow'r ; 
 Now, if we pass in idleness the day, 
 Or from our road, allured by pleasure, stray, 
 Stern Conscience frowns, an unrelenting foe, 
 Holds her dread scourge on high, but still delays the blow." 
 
 * The Grove was the name of a garden at Harrow, in which the 
 upper hoys were allowed by the owner to walk. 
 
 t A place on Harrow Hill, called the Butts, where the ceremony 
 of shooting for the arrow was performed, before that custom was 
 abolished, and the speeches instituted in its stead. 
 
54 DEFENCE OF THE CLASSICS. 
 
 Though the author of Childe Harold could pro- 
 nounce an anathema against Horace, and the use 
 made of the poets in education, his earliest and best 
 productions are indebted for their harmony and ex- 
 pression to that knowledge of the classics in his 
 youth, which he so strangely condemns in his latter 
 work. One of his warm, but not blind, admirers, has 
 noticed this in the piece intituled " Childe Harold's 
 Monitor," where the noble poet's treatment of 
 Horace is censured with just severity. 
 
 " No lover of the classics," says that powerful 
 writer, " can speak with more lip-honour of Horace, 
 than Harold has done in that objectionable passage 
 of his fourth Canto, to which he has solicited the 
 attention of his reader by an ingenious but most inju- 
 dicious note. But, if he really did, as he imagines, 
 understand the Lyric Bard of the Latins, it would 
 be impossible for him, with all his feeling, not to 
 enter into the spirit of that divine poet. This doc- 
 trine of antipathies, contracted by the impatience of 
 youth against the noblest authors of antiquity, from 
 the circumstance of their having been made the vehi- 
 cles of early instruction, is a most dangerous doctrine 
 indeed; since it strikes at the root not only of all 
 
DEFENCE OF THE CLASSICS. 55 
 
 pure taste, but of all praiseworthy industry. It would, 
 if acted upon, (as Harold, by his mention of the Con- 
 tinental practice of using inferior writers in the busi- 
 ness of tuition, would seem to recommend,) destroy 
 the great source of intellectual vigour of our country- 
 men. The labour of acquiring the learned languages, 
 salutary as that labour is to the whole understanding, 
 is acknowledged to be considerable : and if it is not 
 to be cheered by the delightful inspirations of ancient 
 genius ; if the digger in the mine of philology is not to 
 be enlivened by the accompanying song of classical 
 poets ; there is no other digger, or hedger, or ditcher, 
 who is denied so natural and necessary a recreation — 
 
 Solatur carmine fossor opus 
 
 " Many a would-be genius will hereafter eagerly 
 shelter himself under the authority of Harold, and 
 pronounce it a proof of original fancy, and strong 
 ungovernable powers of mind, to be unable to submit 
 to the drudgery of penetrating into the sense of 
 Horace ; and the simple and appropriate panegyric 
 of Pope will lose all its veracity, as far as the reader 
 is concerned — 
 
 " Horace still charms with graceful negligence," &c. 
 
56 RECOLLECTIONS. 
 
 " It is probable, that among the occasions which 
 Harold commemorates so gratefully and so honour- 
 ably, both to himself and to his preceptor Dr. Drury,-— 
 occasions on which that preceptor gave his pupil good 
 advice, — that there was no failure of encomium upon 
 Horace, nor any want of encouragement to study his 
 useful and animating pages. ' Tile se profecisse sciet, 
 cui Horatius valde placebit,' may be said perhaps as 
 truly of this as of any author of antiquity. When will 
 men of real genius feel their responsibility, and weigh 
 what they are doing, when about to set a licentious 
 example? 'Exemplar vitiis imitabile,' should be 
 their constant motto and monitor." 
 
 Previous to leaving Harrow, it will be no more 
 than justice to the youthful genius and feelings of its 
 noble Poet, to quote a few lines from one of his ear- 
 liest pieces, entitled, " Childish Recollections," but 
 which most readers of sensibility will regard with 
 concern, as the promising shoots of a fancy that has 
 since suffered much by luxuriance. 
 
 " Yet why should I alone with such delight 
 Retrace the circuit of my former flight? 
 Is there no cause beyond the common claim, 
 Endear'd to all, in childhood's very name ? 
 
REMOVAL TO CAMBRIDGE. 57 
 
 Ah ! sure some stronger impulse vibrates here, 
 Which, whispers Friendship, will be doubly dear 
 To one who thus with kindred hearts must roam, 
 And seek abroad the love denied at home : 
 Those hearts, dear Ida,* have I found in thee — 
 A home, a world, a Paradise to me. 
 Stern Death forbade my orphan youth to share 
 The tender guidance of a father's care ; 
 Can rank, or e'en a guardian's name, supply 
 The love which glistens in a father's eye ? 
 For this can wealth or title's sound alone, 
 Made, by a parent's early loss, my own ? 
 What brother springs a brother's love to seek ? 
 What sister's gentle kiss has press'd my cheek ? 
 For me how dull the vacant moments rise, 
 To no fond bosom link'd by kindred ties." 
 
 At the age of little more than sixteen, the author of 
 these verses removed to the University of Cambridge, 
 where he became a student of Trinity College. 
 
 Of the pursuits which occupied his time during the 
 short period of his continuance in this venerable seat 
 of learning not much can be said ; since it appears 
 that he despised academical honours, and treated 
 with contempt the peculiar studies by which alone 
 
 s 
 
 * Harrow. 
 
e 
 
 58 SATIRE ON THE UNIVERSITY. 
 
 they could be procured. The same indolence that 
 characterized him at school, distinguished him in col- 
 lege ; but though he paid little attention to the clas- 
 sics, and had an abhorrence for mathematics, he read 
 e English poets with avidity, and exercised his genius 
 in writing verses, chiefly of an amatory description. 
 His turn for satire also at this period appears in the 
 sketches which he has drawn of a collegiate life, and 
 of the labours of the candidate for public prizes. But 
 however excusable these light productions may be, no 
 palliative can be found for the author, who after 
 leaving the university could vent his spleen against 
 her in these venemous lines : 
 
 "Oh ! dark asylum of a Vandal race, 
 
 At once the boast of learning, and disgrace.' 
 
 As an illustration of this foul aspersion, a passage 
 from Gibbon is quoted where the historian says, that 
 " into Cambridgeshire the emperor Probus trans- 
 ported a considerable body of Vandals :" — after giving 
 which notable extract the satirist observes, that " there 
 is no reason to doubt the truth of this "assertion ; for 
 the breed is still in high perfection.'^ 
 
SATIRE ON THE UNIVERSITY. 59 
 
 There are four other lines in the same poem, which 
 betray a malignity of mind, that is difficult to account 
 for, but on the ground of its having been excited by 
 resentment of coercion inflicted or distinctions with- 
 held: 
 
 " Ye, who in Granta's honours would surpass, 
 Must mount her Pegasus, a full-grown ass ; 
 A foal well worthy of her ancient dam, 
 Whose Helicon is duller than her Cam." 
 
 Instances of similar calumny upon a University, 
 by one of its members, are of rare occurrence ; for in 
 general men, however irregular their conduct may 
 have been, feel interested in the glory of the seminary 
 where they were bred. 
 
 Milton, it is true, who had been subjected to the 
 severity of academic discipline, complained in some 
 Latin verses, that the banks of the Cam were unpro- 
 pitious to Phoebus ; but this querulousness arose from 
 a hatred of the government, and not a dislike to the 
 studies, of the University. 
 
 Gibbon, in the Memoirs of his own life, has done 
 
60> ANECDOTE OF GIBBON. 
 
 Oxford the honour of abusing her entire constitu- 
 tion, as monastic ; but the diatribe of the luminous 
 historian is rendered nugatory by his own confession 
 that he was an unfledged school-boy when he 
 became a gentleman-commoner of Magdalen Col- 
 lege ; that he [mew little Latin, and no Greek ; and 
 that of his whole academic life, which consisted only 
 of fourteen months, one half was wasted in truant 
 excursions. 
 
 With respect to Lord Byron, we have his own ad- 
 mission, that neither his habits nor connexions were 
 such as to ensure him the esteem of those of his con- 
 temporaries who, valuing most highly their relation to 
 the University, could not but feel hurt at every in 
 dignity put upon its institutes. 
 
 In the same poem which has called forth these 
 remarks, his Lordship, to make his sting more severe—-* 
 against the reputation of Carnbridge, throws out53u^ 
 far-fetched compliment upon Oxford, in these lines ^Sk^v 
 
 " But where fair Isis rolls her purer wave, 
 The partial Muse delighted loves to lave ; 
 On her green banks a greener wreath is wove, 
 To crown the Bar4s that haunt her classic grove." 
 
ENCOMIUM ON OXFORD. 6l 
 
 Reflecting, however, upon the purpose for which this 
 comparison was made, and sensible that the character 
 of one learned establishment is not to be supported 
 by an invidious contrast with another, the friends of 
 Oxford could hardly be gratified by praises which so 
 forcibly reminded them of Gibbon's illiberal sarcasms, 
 and the truth of the maxim that, 
 
 Non talis auxilio, nee defensoribus istis. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 Publication of the "Hours of Idleness ;" — Critique 
 of the Edinburgh Reviewers thereon ; and the 
 noble Author's severe retort. 
 
 AT the age of nineteen, Lord Byron left the Uni- 
 versity for Newstead Abbey, the seat of his ancestors, 
 where, at the importunity of friends, he made a small 
 collection of those poems which having been circulated 
 privately had excited considerable interest. The volume 
 accordingly appeared the same year, from the neigh- 
 bouring printing-press of Newark ; to which however 
 the execution did little honour in point of correctness 
 or elegance. The title " Hours of Idleness," given to 
 the book, cannot be considered otherwise than as an 
 affectation unworthy of the author; inasmuch as it im- 
 plies a contempt of poesy, while at the same time the 
 
HOURS OF IDLENESS. 63 
 
 very publication manifested the importance attached 
 to the art in his estimation, and the laudable ambi-y 
 tion of excellency in it, by which he was actuated. 
 That a noble youth in his minority could conceive 
 himself to be " idly employed," when cultivating an 
 intimacy with the Muses, is too ridiculous to be be- 
 lieved ; and the keen resentment which he afterwards 
 felt against the critics who endeavoured to blight these 
 early blossoms of his genius, afforded a decisive proof 
 that he was not sincere in his humility. Neither 
 indeed would it have been much to his honour if the 
 title which he adopted had corresponded with his 
 real sentiments ; since writing verses is at all events 
 as good an application of time, to say nothing of the 
 exercise of the mind, as chasing a fox, driving a coach, 
 or rattling the dice. Whether a young man of family 
 and rank may be better employed than in poetic com- 
 position is not the question ; but certain it is that the 
 hours so devoted, cannot in any sense be called those 
 of idleness. This designation of the juvenile per- 
 formances of Lord Byron, bears some resemblance to 
 the behaviour of Congreve, who told Voltaire that he 
 wished to be visited as a gentleman, and not as a poet. 
 " Had I considered you only as a gentleman," ob- 
 
64 SATIRE ON LORD CARLISLE, 
 
 served the French wit, " I certainly should never have 
 visited you at all." 
 
 The volume bearing this unlucky title was inscribed 
 very properly, and very respectfully, to the author's 
 noble relative and guardian the Earl of Carlisle, 
 himself a poet and a man of learning. But though 
 the dedication is highly complimentary to his lord- 
 ship's virtues and genius, on some account or other, 
 for which it would be difficult to assign a satisfactory 
 reason, the young poet in his next and most vigorous 
 performance, thought proper to abuse the noble earl, 
 in the bitterest gall and wormwood of satire ; as one 
 
 " Whose hairs grow hoary as his rhymes grow worse." 
 
 In justification of this marvellous inconsistency the 
 author offers the following plea : 
 
 " It may be asked why I have censured the Earl of 
 Carlisle, my guardian and relative, to whom I dedi- 
 cated a volume of puerile poems some years ago. 
 The guardianship was nominal, at least as far as I 
 have been able to discover ; the relationship I cannot 
 help, and am very sorry for it; but, as his lordship 
 
RECANTATION. 65 
 
 seemed to forget it on a very essential occasion to 
 me, I shall not burden my memory with the recol- 
 lection. I do not think that personal differences sanc- 
 tion the unjust condemnation of a brother scribbler ; 
 but I see no reason why they should act as a pre- 
 ventive, when the author, noble or ignoble, has for a 
 series of years beguiled a "discerning public" (as the ad- 
 vertisements have it) with divers reams of most ortho- 
 dox, imperial nonsense. Besides, I do not step aside 
 to vituperate the Earl ; no— his works come fairly in 
 review with those of other Patrician Literati. If, 
 before I escaped from my teens, I said any thing in 
 favour of his lordship's paper books, it was in the 
 way of dutiful dedication, and more from the advice 
 of others than my own judgment ; and I seize the first 
 opportunity of pronouncing my sincere recantation. 
 I have heard that some persons conceive me to be 
 under personal obligations to Lord Carlisle ; if so, 
 I shall be most particularly happy to learn what 
 they are, and when conferred, that they may be duly 
 appreciated and publicly acknowledged. What I 
 have humbly advanced as an opinion on his printed 
 things, I am prepared to support, if necessary, by 
 quotations from elegies, eulogies, odes, episodes, and 
 
 F 
 
66 INCONSISTENCY. 
 
 certain facetious and dainty tragedies bearing his 
 name and mark : 
 
 " What can ennoble knaves, or fools, or cowards, 
 Alas ! not all the blood of all the Howards !" 
 
 " So says Pope. Amen!" 
 
 No provocation in the world could warrant an 
 outrageous attack of this virulent cast ; and though 
 the satirist says, that the works of the noble Earl 
 came before him as fair game for critical review, it 
 is very evident that he only seized upon them for the 
 purpose of gratifying his revenge on account of some 
 private differences. But the inconsistency of this 
 extraordinary genius did not end here; for in his 
 survey of the field of Waterloo, contained in the 
 third Canto of Childe Harold, he takes occasion to 
 notice the death of his cousin, Major Howard, to 
 whose memory he pays a feeling tribute of respect, 
 and then acknowledges, that formerly he had " done 
 his noble father wrong." 
 
 This perhaps may be considered as a proof of 
 ingenuousness— be it so: but when this is allowed to 
 
VACILALTIOX. 67 
 
 pass for all that it is worth, what must be thought of 
 the texture of that mind which could send into the 
 world a piece tending to wound with an envenomed 
 point the feelings of an aged and exalted friend ? 
 
 This alternation of sentiment, this change of con- 
 duct, from fulsome praise to the grossest calumny, 
 and from the severest injury to the most servile retrac- 
 tation, indicates a disposition governed by passion 
 and not by principle. 
 
 An apology for such vacillation cannot be found 
 in any of the ordinary rules by which the intercourse 
 of social life is preserved from the fury of anarchy 
 and the treachery of savage warfare. 
 
 But to revert to the volume, the dedication of 
 
 which has unavoidably occasioned these observations ; 
 
 though the noble author at a subsequent period 
 
 affected to treat the first fruits of his genius with 
 
 s 
 contempt, these " puerile poems," as he called them, 
 
 evinced vigorous conception, and correct taste, with a 
 
 great command of language, and a knowledge of the 
 
 laws of metrical harmony. 
 
6S CRITICAL SEVERITY. 
 
 Happier specimens of precocious talent will not 
 indeed be easily found in the history of poetry ; and 
 yet one of the first literary journals of the day fell 
 with unaccountable ferocity upon the infant muse, 
 which it attempted to strangle in the cradle. A 
 similar act of barbarity was practised, with more 
 success, against that amiable son of genius and 
 virtue, Henry Kirke White, whose mind certainly 
 suffered seriously from the lacerations inflicted upon 
 it by the fangs of critical malevolence. In the present 
 instance, the malignity of the criticism roused energies 
 far superior to the power which provoked them 
 into retaliation ; and the Edinburgh Reviewer, while 
 triumphing in the wanton insolence of assumed au- 
 thority over a stripling, found himself locked in an 
 Herculean grasp, from whence there was no escape 
 without indelible disgrace. 
 
 As an article of curiosity, and showing what little 
 respect is generally due to periodical criticism, where 
 conceited ignorance, clad in a coat of darkness, may 
 with deadly effect aim the poisoned arrow of defama- 
 tion at solid learning and brilliant genius ; the Edin- 
 burgh review of Lord Byron's u Hours of Idleness" 
 
EDINBURGH REVIEW. 69 
 
 is here inserted. It forms indeed an essential part of 
 the literary history of this noble writer ; for though 
 talents like his could hardly lie dormant, it may be 
 reasonably doubted whether he would have put them 
 forth so effectively and speedily as he did, had not the 
 northern Zoilus held him up to unmerited ridicule, 
 in the twenty-second volume of the Review for the 
 year 1 808. 
 
 Nothing can be well conceived more ludicrously 
 pompous than the opening of the criticism which is 
 couched in the technical jargon of legal sophistry ; 
 but, to make amends for this solemn foolery, the 
 reviewer takes care to close his judicial sentence in 
 the language of a buffoon. 
 
 " The poesy of this young Lord," says he, " belongs 
 to the class which neither Gods nor man are said to 
 permit. Indeed, we do not recollect to have seen a 
 quantity of verse with so few deviations in either 
 direction from that exact standard. His effusions 
 are spread over a dead flat, and can no more get 
 above or below the level, than if they were so much 
 stagnant water. As an extenuation of this offence, 
 
70 EDINBURGH REVIEW'. 
 
 the noble author is peculiarly forward in pleading 
 minority. We have it in the title-page, and on the 
 very back of the volume ; it follows his name, like a 
 favourite part of his style. Much stress is laid upon 
 it in the preface ; and the poems are connected with 
 this general statement of his case, by particular dates, 
 substantiating the age at which each was written. 
 Now, the law upon the point of minority, we hold to 
 be perfectly clear. It is a plea available only to the 
 defendant; no plaintiff can offer it as a supple- 
 mentary ground of action. Thus, if any suit could 
 be brought against Lord Byron, for the purpose of 
 compelling him to put into court a certain quantity of 
 poetry, and if judgment were given against him, it is 
 highly probable that an exception would be taken, were 
 he to deliver for poetry the contents of this volume. 
 To this he might plead minority ; but as he now 
 makes voluntary tender of the article, he hath no right 
 to sue, on that ground, for the price in good current 
 praise, should the goods be unmarketable. This is 
 our view of the law on the point, and we dare to say, 
 so will it be ruled. Perhaps, however, in reality, all 
 that he tells us about his youth, is rather with a view 
 to increase our wonder, than to soften our censures. 
 
EDINBURGH HE V JEW. 71 
 
 He possibly means to say, * See how a minor can 
 write ! This poem was actually composed by a young 
 man of eighteen, and this by one of only sixteen 1' — 
 But, alas, we all remember the poetry of Cowley at 
 ten, and Pope at twelve ; and so far from hearing with 
 any degree of surprise, that very poor verses were 
 written by a youth from his leaving school to his 
 leaving college inclusive, we really believe this to be 
 the most common of all occurrences ; that it happens 
 in the life of nine men in ten who are educated in 
 England ; and that the tenth man writes better verse 
 than Lord Byron. 
 
 " His other plea of privilege, our author rather 
 brings forward in order to wave it. He certainly, 
 however, does allude frequently to his family and 
 ancestors ; sometimes in poetry, sometimes in notes : 
 and while giving up his claim on the score of rank, 
 he takes care to remember us of Dr. Johnson's 
 saying, that when a nobleman appears as an author, 
 his merit should be handsomely acknowledged. In 
 truth, it is this consideration only, that induces us to 
 give Lord Byron's poems a place in our review, 
 beside our desire to counsel him, that he do forthwith 
 
72 EDINBURGH It E VIEW. 
 
 abandon poetry, and turn his talents, which are con- 
 siderable, and his opportunities, which are great, to 
 better account. 
 
 " With this view, we must beg leave seriously to 
 assure him, that the mere rhyming of the final 
 syllable, even when accompanied by the presence of a 
 certain number of feet, nay, although (which does not 
 always happen) these feet should scan regularly, and 
 have been all counted accurately upon the fingers, 
 is not the whole art of poetry. We would entreat 
 him to believe, that a certain portion of liveliness, 
 somewhat of fancy, is necessary to constitute a poem ; 
 and that a poem in the present day, to be read, must 
 contain at least one thought either in a little degree 
 different from the ideas of former writers, or differently 
 expressed. We put it to his candour, whether there 
 is any thing so deserving the name of poetry in verses 
 like the following, written in 1806, and whether, if a 
 youth of eighteen could say any thing so uninteresting 
 to his ancestors, a youth of nineteen should publish it. 
 
 " Shades of heroes, farewell ! your descendant, departing 
 From the seat of his ancestors, bids you adieu ! 
 
 Abroad, or at home, your remembrance imparting 
 New courage, he '11 think upon glory and you. 
 
EDINBURGH REVIEW. 73 
 
 Though a tear dim his eye, at this sad separation, 
 
 Tis nature, not fear, that excites his regret; 
 Far distant he goes, with the same emulation, 
 
 The fame of his fathers he ne'er can forget. 
 
 That fame, and that memory, still will he cherish ; 
 
 He vows that he ne'er will disgrace your renown ; 
 Like you will he live, or like you will he perish — 
 
 When decay'd, may he mingle his dust with your own." 
 
 " Now we positively do assert, that there is nothing 
 better than these stanzas in the whole compass of the 
 noble minor's volume. 
 
 " Lord Byron should also have a care of attempting 
 what the greatest poets have done before him, for 
 comparisons (as he must have had occasion to see 
 at his writing-master's) are odious. — Gray's Ode to 
 Eton College, should really have kept out the ten 
 hobbling stanzas on a distant view of the village and 
 school at Harrow. 
 
 " Where fancy, yet, joys to retrace the resemblance^ 
 Of comrades in friendship or mischief allied ; 
 
 How welcome to me, your ne'er fading remembrance, 
 Which rests in the bosom, though hope is denied." 
 
74 EDINBURGH REVIEW. 
 
 " In like manner the exquisite lines of Mr. Rogers, 
 1 On a Tear' might have warned the noble author off 
 those premises, and spared us a whole dozen such 
 stanzas as the following : 
 
 " Mild charity's glow, 
 
 To us mortals below, 
 Shows the soul from barbarity clear ; 
 
 Compassion will melt, 
 
 Where the virtue is felt, 
 And its dew is diffus'd in a tear. 
 
 The man doom'd to sail, 
 
 "With the blast of the gale, 
 Through billows Atlantic to steer, 
 
 As he bends o'er the wave, 
 
 Which may soon be his grave, 
 The green sparkles bright with a tear." 
 
 u And so of instances in which former poets had 
 failed. Thus, we do not think Lord Byron was made 
 for translating, during his non-age, Adrian's Address 
 to his Soul, when Pope succeeded indifferently in the 
 attempt. If our readers, however, are of another 
 opinion, they may look at it : 
 
EDINBURGH REVIEW. 75 
 
 " Ah ! gentle, fleeting, wav'ring sprite, 
 Friend and associate of this clay ; 
 
 To what unknown region borne, 
 Wilt thou now wing thy distant flight? 
 No more with wonted humour gay, 
 
 But pallid, cheerless, and forlorn." 
 
 " However, be this as it may, we fear his trans- 
 lations and imitations are great favourites with Lord 
 Byron. We have them of all kinds, from Anacreon 
 to Ossian ; and viewing them as school exercises, they 
 may pass. Only, why print them after they have had 
 their day and served their turn ? And why call the thing 
 in p. 79, a translation, where two words (0s\o teysiv) 
 of the original are expanded into four lines, and the 
 other thing, in p. 81, where /asctovvktiois wo9' b?au{ is ren- 
 dered by means of six hobbling verses ? — As to his 
 Ossianic poesy, we are not very good jugdes; being, in 
 truth, so moderately skilled in that species of composi- 
 tion, that we should, in all probability, be criticizing 
 some bit of the genuine Macpherson itself, were we to 
 express our opinion of Lord Byron's rhapsodies. If, 
 then, the following beginning of a ' Song of Bards,' is 
 by his Lordship, we venture to object to it, as far as 
 
76 EDINBURGH REVIEW. 
 
 we can comprehend it. ' What form rises on the 
 roar of clouds, whose dark ghost gleams on the red 
 stream of tempests ? His voice rolls on the thunder : 
 'tis Oila the brown Chief of Otihona. He was,' &c. 
 After detaining this \ brown Chief some time, the 
 bards conclude by giving him their advice to ' raise his 
 fair locks ;' then to ' spread them on the arch of the 
 rainbow ;' and to * smile through the tears of the 
 storm/ Of this kind of thing there are no less than 
 nine pages ; and we can so far venture an opinion in 
 their favour, that they look very like Macpherson ; 
 and we are positive they are pretty nearly as stupid 
 and tiresome. 
 
 " It is a sort of privilege of poets to be egotists ; 
 but they should ' use it as not abusing it ;' and par- 
 ticularly one who piques himself (though indeed at 
 the ripe age of nineteen) of being ' an infant bard' — 
 (' The artless Helicon I boast is youth) — should either 
 not know, or should seem not to know, so much 
 about his own ancestry. Besides a poem, above 
 cited ; on the family seat of the Byrons, we have 
 another of eleven pages on the self-same subject, intro- 
 duced with an apology, * he certainly had no intert- 
 
EDINBURGH REVIEW. 77 
 
 tion of inserting it ;' but really, \ the particular request 
 of some friends/ &c. &c. It concludes with five 
 stanzas on himself, ' the last and youngest of the 
 noble line.' There is a good deal also about his 
 maternal ancestors, in a poem on Lachion-y-Gair, a 
 mountain where he spent a part of his youth, and 
 might have learnt, that pibroch is not a bagpipe, any 
 more than duet means a fiddle. 
 
 16 As the author has dedicated so large a part of his 
 volume to immortalize his employments at school and 
 college, we cannot possibly dismiss it without pre- 
 senting the reader with a specimen of these ingenious 
 effusions. In an ode with a Greek motto, called 
 Granta, we have the following magnificent stanzas : 
 
 " There in apartments small and damp, 
 
 The candidate for college prizes, 
 Sits poring by the midnight lamp, 
 
 Goes late to bed, yet early rises : 
 Who reads false quantities in Scale,* 
 
 Or puzzles o'er the deep triangle ; 
 Depriv'd of many a wholesome meal, 
 
 In barbarous Latin doom'd to wrangle. 
 
 * This alludes to the " Analysis of Greek Metres/' by J. B. Seate, 
 D. D. of Christ's College ; a standard work on the construction of the 
 
78 EDINBURGH REVIEW, 
 
 Renouncing every pleasing- page 
 
 From authors of historic use ; 
 Preferring to the letter'd sage, 
 
 The square of the hypothenuse. 
 Still harmless are these occupations, 
 
 That hurt none but the hapless student, 
 Compar'd with other recreations 
 
 Which bring together the imprudent." 
 
 " We are sorry to hear so bad an account of the 
 College Psalmody, as is contained in the following 
 Attic stanzas : 
 
 " Our choir would scarcely be excused, 
 
 Even as a band of raw beginners ; 
 All mercy now must be refused 
 
 To such a set of croaking sinners. 
 
 " If David, when his toils were ended, 
 
 Had heard these blockheads sing before him, 
 
 To us his psalms had ne'er descended, 
 In furious mood he would have tore 'em." 
 
 Greek poetry, and which Lord Byron ought to have studied, and 
 made himself master of before he tried his wit upon it. 
 
EDINBURGH REVIEW. 79 
 
 " But, whatever judgment may be passed on the 
 poems of this noble minor, it seems we must take 
 ,them as we find them, and be content; for they are 
 the last we shall ever have from him. He is at best, 
 he says, but an intruder into the groves of Parnassus ; 
 he never lived in a garret, like thorough -bred poets; 
 and ' though he once roved a careless mountaineer in 
 the Highlands of Scotland," he has not of late enjoyed 
 this advantage. Moreover, he expects no profit from 
 his publication ; and whether it succeeds or not, ' it 
 is highly improbable, from his situation and pursuits 
 hereafter,' that he should again condescend to become 
 an author. Therefore, let us take what we get, and 
 be thankful. What right have we poor devils to be 
 nice ? We are well off to have got so much from a 
 man of this Lord's station, who does not live in a 
 garret, but ' has the sway' of Newstead Abbey. 
 Again, we say, let us be thankful ; and, with honest 
 Sancho, bid God bless the giver, nor look the gift 
 horse in the mouth." 
 
80 RETORT ON THE CRITICS. ■ 
 
 Such was the merciless judgment fulminated with 
 more than inquisitorial vengeance, against a volume 
 of poems which, if the reviewer really believed what 
 he predicted, stood no chance of being known ; and 
 therefore, all the pains of the learned Theban were 
 spent in the idle labour of breaking a fly upon his 
 critical wheel. It is very evident, however, that this 
 Aristarchus of the New School of Criticism had a 
 much higher opinion of the genius displayed in the 
 tc Hours of Idleness," than he feigned to have, and 
 that his contemptuous denunciation of all the poems, 
 without exception, arose from personal enmity to the 
 author. Be this as it may the sweeping censure de- 
 livered from the chair of literary despotism, with in- 
 sufferable dogmatism, recoiled upon the critic with 
 tenfold vengeance ; and it was not long before he had 
 the mortification of proclaiming his own disgrace, so 
 far at least as to be obliged to echo the voice of the 
 public, in acknowledging the poetical merits of the 
 very person whom he had doomed to oblivion. 
 
 Roused by this unprovoked attack upon his book, 
 and stung by the sarcasms thrown out against his 
 talents, the noble author turned upon his assailant, 
 
RETORT ON THE CRITICS. 81 
 
 the conductor of the Journal, in a poem which, for 
 spirited description, and strength of colouring, may 
 vie with the most pointed of Dryden's satires. 
 
 It is, however, to be regretted, that with so much 
 real cause for applying the lash, where no one could 
 say it was undeserved, the noble lord should in 
 the effervescence of his rage, run a-muck, like the 
 intoxicated Indian, against persons from whom he 
 had received no offence. Had he contented him- 
 self in his vigorous imitation of the first satire 
 of Juvenal, with exposing the malevolence of the 
 " Scotch Reviewers," he would have acted wisely ; nor, 
 indeed, could any thing be said against the adminis- 
 tration of a little wholesome correction to those 
 " English Bards," who had contributed in various 
 ways to the corruption of the public taste. 
 
 The Edinburgh Reviewers, chief and subalterns, 
 were proper game, for they were become ferae naturae, 
 and of course had put themselves out of the privilege 
 of legal protection as writers. They had in fact, made 
 war upon the literary world, and consequently were 
 brigands and pirates, who by their outrages, justified 
 
82 SUPPRESSION OF THE REPLV. 
 
 every honest trader, in hanging them up to public 
 odium, as robbers and outlaws. Lord Byron merited 
 therefore, the thanks of the commonwealth of letters, 
 for laying open the practices and holding up the 
 names of the persons of these marauders ; who were 
 known to hold their meetings for the selection of vic- 
 tims under the roof of a British Peer. The able and 
 unreserved manner in which the exposure was made, 
 did infinite credit to the spirit and genius of the 
 noble author ; but then, on the other hand, he 
 tarnished the fame acquired by this gallant act of 
 chivalry, when, instead of directing his prowess solely 
 against his recreant adversaries, he rambled aside to 
 disturb the peaceful travellers on the king's high-way. 
 By doing this, he unfortunately made himself enemies, 
 and weakened the good effect that would otherwise 
 have resulted from his poignant satire. 
 
 But this was not all ; for after sharpening the edge 
 of his weapon in a third edition, he as suddenly re- 
 called the next impression, and thus a poem, calculated 
 to produce a salutary revolution in literary criticism, 
 could not be procured. To what cause this capri- 
 cious resolution is to be ascribed, must be left to con- 
 
SUPPRESSION OF THE REPLY. 83 
 
 jecture; but, whatever, it might be, the reputation 
 of the. noble author, was far from being advanced by 
 the suppression. It would, in fact, have been better 
 if he had pocketed the affront put upon him by the nor- 
 thern critics in the first instance, than, after publishing 
 his satire, entitled " English Bards, and Scotch Re- 
 viewers,'' to recall the piece ; thus, in effect, retracting 
 both what he had advanced, and succumbing to the 
 very opponents over whom he had gained a triumph. 
 The noble lord should have erased what he had written 
 and printed of an offensive nature against public 
 institutions, and private individuals, from whom he 
 had received no injury ; and in doing this the power 
 of his satire upon the proper objects of it would have 
 been increased. 
 
 In a subsequent publication, his lordship took 
 occasion to correct an historical error into which the 
 Scotch critic had fallen ; and having done this, he 
 thought proper to add the following note : " I have 
 endeavoured to wave the personal feelings which rise 
 in despite of me, in touching upon any part of the 
 Edinburgh Review ; not from a wish to conciliate the 
 favour of its writers, or to cancel the remembrance 
 
84 REMARKS. 
 
 of a syllable, I have formerly published, from a 
 sense of the impropriety of mixing up private re- 
 sentments, with a disquisition of the present kind, 
 and more particularlarly at this distance of time and 
 but simply place/' 
 
 Now this note is at variance with his conduct in 
 suppressing the satire, for by that very act, he did 
 endeavour to " cancel the remembrance of what he 
 had formerly published ;*' and so far it seems evident, 
 that his object must have been to " conciliate the 
 favour of the Reviewers." 
 
 But this was not the only inconsistency of which 
 the noble lord was guilty, in his just quarrel with the 
 Edinburgh Critics; for he followed up his satire by 
 another poem, bearing the title of " Hints to Horace," 
 which, after printing one or two copies he destroyed, 
 because he now felt, or was persuaded that it would be 
 for his interest as an author, to lay down his lance, and 
 make friends of those, against whom he had declared 
 eternal war, " as a Hydra, to crush one head of which 
 he had deemed it so much an act of duty, that he 
 was contented to lose a hand in the encounter." 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 Anecdote of the Duke of Wharton. — Similar one of 
 Lord Byron. — Monument Jo his dog. — Inscrip- 
 tion on a skull made into a cup. — Amourous con- 
 nexions. — Anecdote of false sensibility. — Lord 
 Byron made the subject of a novel. 
 
 IT is related of Philip, the profligate Duke of 
 Wharton, that in his travels he purchased a bear's cub 
 of which he became so extremely fond as to make it 
 his constant attendant both night and day, to the 
 great annoyance of his tutor. On reaching Geneva, 
 this extraordinary man, suddenly departed for Lyons, 
 leaving young Bruin behind him with the following 
 letter to the poor governor ; " Being no longer able 
 to bear with your ill-usage, I have thought proper to 
 be gone from you ; however, that you may not want 
 
86 duke of wharton's 
 
 company, I have left you the bear, as the most suitable 
 companion in the world that could be picked up 
 for you." 
 
 Whether Lord Byron had read the history of this 
 eccentric nobleman, who was a wit and a poet, the 
 writer of the present sketch has not the means of 
 determining; but it is somewhat remarkable, that 
 while a student at Cambridge, he should have indulged 
 himself in a similar humour, by making a young bear 
 the associate of his studies ; and what is no less sin- 
 gular, on quitting the university, his lordship left the 
 animal in possession of his chambers, to stand, as he 
 expressed it, candidate for the next vacant fellowship. 
 Whimsical as this coincidence is, it appears to be 
 more than accidental, especially as in both instances 
 the choice of the favourites resulted rather from a wish 
 to give offence to others than Jto gratify any particular 
 attachment. It would betray a narrow spirit to scru- 
 tinize with severity the propensities and amusements 
 of youth ; but when those inclinations and sports have 
 a peculiarity in them different from juvenile pursuits 
 in general, they are no longer matters of trifling 
 interest, but become circumstances of import in the 
 
EXTRAVAGANCE. 87 
 
 illustration of character. He who, under the regimen 
 of academic discipline, manifests an impatience of 
 restraint, and a contempt of the laws of decorum, 
 gives plain indications of what may be expected from 
 him when he shall have attained the entire command 
 of his own actions. 
 
 The eventful and melancholy story of the Duke of 
 Wharton may be mentioned in confirmation of the 
 truth of this observation. Possessed of talents which 
 only required a proper direction to have proved bene- 
 ficial to the world, this extraordinary man, by becoming 
 his own master, while yet a minor, had such oppor- 
 tunities of following the impulse of his passions, that 
 his mind, for want of government, at length took 
 delight in nothing but extravagance. Though he 
 married for love, he soon abandoned his wife, and 
 went abroad, where he not only dissipated his patri- 
 mony, upon low connexions, but changed his religion, 
 if indeed he ever had any, and at the age of thirty-two 
 closed his mortal, but short career, in a Spanish con- 
 vent, whither he had been removed out of charity. 
 
 Such was the end of a noble genius who might have 
 
88 ANECDOTE OF A DOG. 
 
 shone one of the brightest ornaments of the British 
 peerage, if he had been guided by principle and had laid 
 the reins upon his imagination. 
 
 But to return to the immediate object of these 
 memoirs. On leaving college, and getting rid of his 
 shaggy chum, the noble lord adopted another favourite 
 of the four-footed kind but of a different species. 
 This was a large Newfoundland dog, in the instruc- 
 tion of which he took as much delight, as Sir Ashton 
 Lever formerly did in the education of horses. 
 Among the early amusements of his lordship, were 
 swimming and managing a boat, in both of which 
 exercises he acquired great dexterity, even in his 
 childhood. In his aquatic exercises near Newstead 
 Abbey, he had seldom any other companion than his 
 dog to try whose sagacity and fidelity he would some- 
 times fall out of the boat, as if by accident, upon 
 which the animal never failed to jump overboard 
 and seizing his master, would drag him instantly to 
 the shore. There was, however, a very prudential 
 reason for this artifice, since the dog being practised 
 in the performance of a necessary piece of service ; 
 might on some occasion or other prove of great 
 benefit in saving human life. 
 
EPITAPH. 89 
 
 On losing this faithful creature in the autumn of 
 1808, his lordship caused a monument to be 
 erected commemorative of its attachment: and 
 bearing an inscription which is so little to the credit of 
 the author, that four lines only, and those not the 
 worst in the piece, must here suffice as a precious 
 evidence of early misanthropy : 
 
 " Ye, who perchance behold this simple urn, 
 Pass on — it honours none you wish to mourn : 
 To mark a friend's remains these stones arise, 
 I never knew but one and here he lies." 
 
 Now this panegyric upon a dog, the whole of whose 
 virtue lay in mechanical instinct, when the writer had 
 a parent living, with many other relatives and ac- 
 quaintance, the sincerity of whose friendship he had 
 no right to call in question, can be considered as 
 nothing better than an intended violation of good 
 manners, and a direct insult upon moral feeling. 
 That this young nobleman acted well in placing a 
 grateful token of remembrance over the remains of an 
 affectionate animal, cannot be denied ; but in doing 
 this, he should have been careful to keep his praises 
 within the bounds of decent propriety, and not have 
 
 
90 SINGULAR CUP. 
 
 made the good qualities of a dog, whatever they might 
 be, the vehicle for pouring out the most cynical lan- 
 guage of abuse upon the whole body of mankind. 
 
 It was remarked of Sterne, who had much philan- 
 thropy in his writings and none in his heart, that a dead 
 ass was a dearer object to him than a dying mother. 
 Thus also in the present instance ; while the noble 
 lord was erecting a mausoleum to his dog, in the park 
 of Newstead, he had so little respect for decorum, as 
 to rake into the cemetery of his ancestors, for a 
 skull sufficiently capacious and in a proper state to be 
 converted into a carousing cup. Having found one 
 to his liking, without troubling himself whether it 
 had belonged to man or woman, to his grandfather or 
 grandmother, he had it mounted upon a silver stand, 
 with an inscription engraven round it, which for 
 spirit might rival the Bacchanalian productions of the 
 Teian bard; but which, for delicacy of sentiment, 
 could only become the Scandinavian barbarians, who 
 deemed it the highest point of felicity that they 
 should in the future state be seated in the hall of Odin, 
 and there get intoxicated by quaffing strong liquors 
 from the skulls of those over whom they had triumphed 
 in battle. 
 
 
REFLECTIONS. 91 
 
 But, as Sir Thomas Browne observes, " to be 
 knaved out of our graves, to have our skulls made 
 drinking-bowls, and our bones turned into pipes to 
 delight and sport our enemies, are tragical abomi- 
 nations." 
 
 What, however, would that energetic writer have 
 said of a youth possessing ample means, and a lively 
 genius, polished by education, who could so far 
 forget the natural awe and sensibility produced by 
 the sight of the last reliques of mortality, as to make a 
 wassailing cup of the head of one of his progenitors, 
 whose virtue perhaps, in a former age, had been a 
 blessing and an example to that mansion and the 
 neighbourhood ? 
 
 Anchorets have been accustomed to take a skull 
 for their companion and monitor, to remind them 
 of the vanity of life, and to prepare their thoughts 
 for death, by learning from it the salutary lesson 
 of a constant subjugation of the passions. But 
 it is to be hoped, for the honour of humanity, that 
 there are few or none so lost to the impression of 
 that truth as to look upon a skull, and read these lines 
 written beneath it, without a chill of horror and disgust : 
 
92 INSCRIPTION, 
 
 " Quaff while thou canst— another race, 
 When thou and thine like me are sped, 
 
 May rescue thee from earth's embrace, 
 And rhyme and revel with the dead." 
 
 Now whatever may be thought of the " rhyme," there 
 surely cannot be two opinions among rational men, 
 concerning that " revelry," which is promoted by the 
 emblems of mortality. 
 
 After this mockery of 
 
 the great Counsellor who man inspires 
 
 With every nobler thought and fairer deed, 
 
 one ceases to wonder at the melancholy whinings oc- 
 casioned by repeated disappointments in love, or at the 
 frequent allusion to early riot and intemperance which 
 abound in the juvenile productions of the noble au- 
 thor ; for of what value could that passion be, which 
 had nothing but external form and sensual gratifi- 
 cation for its excitement, and which, when crossed, 
 sought oblivion in a goblet, fetched from the charnel 
 house ? 
 
 As the love that inspires poets with be?- dtfui 
 
MISTRESSES. 93 
 
 imagery, and tender sentiments, frequently becomes 
 ridiculous, when traced to its origin, so it will be 
 often found scandalously immoral in its effects. 
 
 It is doubtful whether the Laura of Petrarch had 
 ever any real existence : but the Chloe of Prior is 
 certainly known to have been a vulgar drab, and a 
 common prostitute. 
 
 All the publications of Lord Byron, exhibit proofs 
 that the fire of his passions burst forth with the flame 
 of his genius ; and that, while yet in his boyhood, 
 he had more mistresses than muses. It is curious to 
 observe, how pathetecally he complains in his verses, 
 of the inconstancy of one, the marriage of another, 
 the death of a third, and the " light fame" of a 
 fourth ; — but though every loss, according to his own 
 account, blighted his happiness, and made the world 
 a blank : he " is not always," as Johnson says of 
 Waller " at the last gasp ; he does not die of a frown 
 nor live, upon a smile. There is, however, too much 
 love and too many trifles. Little things are made too 
 important ; and the empire of beauty is represented 
 as exerting its influence further than can be allowed 
 
94 AMATORY POEMS. 
 
 by the multiplicity of human passions, and the variety 
 of human wants." 
 
 Had the amatory productions of the noble author 
 been confined to his first publications, there would 
 have been little occasion for these remarks ; but in 
 almost every one of his subsequent volumes, he brings 
 before the reader some of those effusions of his pen, 
 of which, upon sober reflection, he ought to have felt 
 ashamed. 
 
 What idea can be entertained in favour of the 
 moral constitution of that mind, which in one moment 
 is disconsolate at having been deprived by death of 
 a loving and beloved maiden ; and in the next, is 
 breathing out the most tender sentiments to a married 
 woman ! Is it possible that the love could be pure, 
 which had so many objects ; or that the grief could 
 be sincere, which was so soon converted into ardent 
 devotion for a new idol ? 
 
 The pride of him who seeks fame by his conquests 
 over the female heart, is of the most contemptible de- 
 scription ; and yet, what else but this could induce 
 
AFFECTED SENSIBILITY. 95 
 
 any man to publish, though under enigmatic signatures, 
 the variety of his amorous connexions ? Though the 
 writing of love elegies, and stanzas " on a mistress's 
 eyebrows," may not be altogether affectation; the print- 
 ing of such performances certainly savours more of 
 vanity than feeling, since it manifests as strong a wish 
 to gain credit for fine verses as for tender senti- 
 ments. 
 
 It is related of one of our poets, that he made every 
 incident of his life the subject of an ode or a sonnet. 
 On hearing that his only son lay ill, and that his life 
 was despaired of, he exclaimed very affectionately, — 
 " Oh, I will sit down and write an elegy upon 
 him." — " Had you not better," said his friend, " order 
 your carriage immediately, and console him by your 
 presence ?" 
 
 This story will apply pertinently enough to illustrate 
 the true quality of that esteem which is expressed in 
 metaphors, and clothed in numbers ; which pretends 
 raptures that are not felt, and describes beauties that 
 are not seen. 
 
96 GLENARVON. 
 
 Such, there is every reason to believe, was the real 
 nature of that passion, which burns so ardently in the 
 amatory lines of Lord Byron, but in which there is 
 too much richness of phrase, to comport with true 
 sensibility. 
 
 One female of elevated rank, who was said to have 
 been in the number of those to whom the poet pro- 
 fessed more than common attachment, took ample 
 revenge on him for his inconstancy and freedom, by 
 drawing his character as the hero of a novel, which 
 for a time, arrested the public curiosity in no ordinary 
 degree. In that performance his lordship's supposed 
 intrigues and infidelity were laid open with unsparing 
 severity ; and, with the exception of Zeluco, and the 
 personages that figure most conspicuously in the noble 
 lord's principal poems, it will not be easy to meet with 
 any thing more repulsive either in works of fiction, or 
 in the world of reality, than what has been exhibited 
 in caricature by the author of Glenarvon. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Voyage to Lisbon. — Assassination. — Travels in 
 Spain. — Patriotic War. — Voyage to Greece. — 
 Albania. — Ali Pacha. — Anecdotes. — High- 
 landers. — Athens. — Spoliations. — Poem of Mi- 
 nerva. — Tweddell. — Literally Pursuits. — Eman- 
 cipation of the Greeks. — Adventure in the Hel- 
 lespont. — Return to England. 
 
 ON arriving at the age of manhood, Lord Byron 
 took a long leave of his native country, with the view 
 of making a tour in foreign lands ; but as the ordinary 
 course of travelling through Europe was then impeded, 
 by the war which prevailed between . England and 
 France, he embarked at Falmouth, for Lisbon, in- 
 tending to proceed from thence across the Peninsula 
 to the Mediterranean. The companion of his voyage 
 was Mr. Hobhouse, in conjunction with whom he had 
 just before published a small volume of poems and 
 
 if 
 
98 LISBON. 
 
 translations; which attracted so little notice, that 
 almost the whole impression was converted into 
 waste paper. Though Portugal was at this time 
 occupied by the British forces, who were engaged in 
 the defence of the country against the French, such 
 was the frequency of assassination in the streets of 
 Lisbon and its vicinity, that the people paid no more 
 respect to their protectors than to their own country- 
 men. Englishmen were daily butchered ; and so far 
 from redress being obtained, not the slightest notice 
 was taken of these murders ; and it was even dan- 
 gerous to interfere on such occasions. 
 
 " I was once stopped," says Lord Byron, " on the 
 way to the theatre at eight o'clock in the evening, 
 when the streets were not more empty than they gene- 
 rally are at that hour, opposite to an open shop, and 
 in a carriage with a friend. Had we not fortunately 
 been armed, I have not the least doubt that we should 
 have adorned a tale instead of telling one." 
 
 A state of society so disorganized as this could not 
 but excite indignant feelings in a sensible mind, espe- 
 cially when the moral disorder was contrasted with 
 
ASSASSINATION. 99 
 
 the wonders and beauties which nature had wasted 
 on such men. 
 
 Yet there was nothing new or strange in all this; 
 for the present writer remembers to have witnessed 
 similar acts of atrocity in that very city, many years 
 before the visit of Lord Byron. Walking one morning 
 in the neighbourhood of Belem, he saw a Portuguese 
 barber issue furiously out of his shop, and, without 
 the least provocation in the world, plunge a stiletto 
 into the side of an English sailor who happened to be 
 passing quietly along. Having perpetrated this mur- 
 derous deed, the assassin ran with all haste till he 
 reached the church, where he fell prostrate before the 
 altar, crossed himself with great appearance of devo- 
 tion, and, being in that sanctuary, escaped punish- 
 ment. An enquiry was indeed made into the affair, 
 but without answering any other end than that of 
 ascertaining the motive of the misguided wretch, who 
 fancied it a meritorious act to destroy an heretic. 
 
 Where then religion is considered as a justifiable 
 plea for shedding human blood, it ought not to raise 
 wonder that the stimulants of revenge and rapacious- 
 
100 ANECDOTE. 
 
 ness should operate to the commission of homicide. 
 That an offence so heinous should cease to be regarded 
 as a crime, can only be accounted for by the total 
 deficiency of moral principle, and the facility of 
 obtaining absolution for every thing short of sacrilege 
 and heresy, which, in Spain, Portugal, and Italy, are 
 sins infinitely greater than the violation of all the 
 ten commandments. 
 
 " Pray," said a priest to one of his parishioners, who 
 in his confession, particularly enumerated offences of 
 such little moment as eating flesh on fast-days, — " pray 
 friend, have you never been guilty of robbing a tra- 
 veller, now and then?" — "Oh yes, father; to be sure, 
 I have," answered the peasant with great frankness. 
 " Well, and I suppose, that upon a time you and 
 your fellows have not scrupled to murder some of 
 those unfortunate passengers who have chanced to 
 fall in your way." — " No," says the robber, " not 
 exactly murdered them, your reverence ; we only put 
 them to death, when they made a show of resistance ; 
 and then it was a matter of course/' 
 
 Our noble traveller, therefore, might have easily 
 
 , I * 
 
 1 : * - 
 
PORTUGAL. 101 
 
 traced the cause of the indifference with which 
 assassination is treated in Portugal, to something 
 else than the degeneracy of the people of that 
 country ; since he must have known that the crime 
 is not peculiar to that nation, but prevails, more 
 or less, wherever the form of sacerdotal absolution is 
 regarded as equivalent to a complete remission of 
 sins. 
 
 During his short residence at Lisbon, Lord Byron 
 made excursions to Coimbra, the university of Por- 
 tugal ; to Mafra, the palace where the late Queen 
 resided after the loss of her reason ; and to the ro- 
 mantic seat built in a secluded spot on the side of a 
 mountain by our countryman Beckford, but which 
 was then abandoned by the owner, whose history in 
 many respects bears a melancholy resemblance to that 
 of the noble poet. 
 
 Having just seen enough of the Portuguese capital 
 to admire the beauty of the surrounding scenery, and 
 to conceive an utter dislike to the nation, our traveller 
 pursued his course across the mountainous ridge that 
 divides the province of Alentejo, and then, descending 
 
 Mm*m -^ 
 

 102 SPAIN. 
 
 to the banks of the dark Guadiana at Beia, entered 
 the plains of Andalusia. The period was extremely 
 critical, for upon the fate of Spain, hung suspended 
 that of Europe: but though a general anxiety pre- 
 vailed among all those who were panting for the peace 
 of the world; and who knew that this desirable 
 object was a consummation not to be expected, so 
 long as the Colossus of France remained unsubdued ; 
 such was the apathy of the noble lord, an apathy ac- 
 quired in the school of politics to which he had 
 attached himself, that he looked with splenetic uncon- 
 cern upon the tremendous struggle, and beheld the 
 agitated state of the country where he now stood, 
 with the same feelings that he would have contem- 
 plated the war of the ant-hill. 
 
 The very circumstance of a nation being forced to 
 contend for its political existence with a gigantic 
 power, by whom it had been drawn into an alliance 
 under the pledge of protection, was of a nature to 
 rouse the most phlegmatic spirit into resentment 
 against the oppressor. 
 
 Yet nothing of this natural sense of justice, or this 
 
PATRIOTIC WAR. 1 0^ 
 
 sympathy with the injured, appears to have been felt 
 by Lord Byron when, on passing the gentle river that 
 divided Portugal from Spain, he heard that warlike 
 sound which threatened the annihilation of a king- 
 dom, and the subjection of the people to a foreign 
 and hated yoke. Instead of being warmed, with the 
 usual ardour of youthful heroism in such a cause, and 
 looking upon the men with admiration, who were 
 thus generously resolved to save their country or to 
 perish with its independence, Lord Byron ventured to 
 ridicule the Spanish Patriots as fools, and to pro- 
 nounce a decisive judgment against the mighty under- 
 taking in which they were gloriously embarked. 
 
 It is much to be regretted, that a mind so feelingly 
 alive to the harmony of nature in other respects, and 
 so susceptible of the most powerful impressions from 
 the wonders of the material creation, should have 
 been out of tune only when brought into association 
 with the rest of the species. Yet thus early did the 
 disposition to expel the whole moral world from the 
 communion of charitable sentiment develope itself in 
 this noble person, who saw nothing wrong in the 
 universe, except mankind. 
 
104 ALBANIA. 
 
 From Seville, which, according to the representation 
 given of the place by its noble visitant, was at this 
 period sunk in lewdness, his lordship proceeded to 
 Cadiz, where he remained some time, and then em- 
 barked with his friend Hobhouse in an English frigate 
 for the Mediterranean. 
 
 Our travellers explored Albania before they visited 
 any other part of the Ottoman dominions, and having 
 reached Joannina, the capital of Ali Pacha's territory, 
 were presented to that chief by Major now Colonel 
 Leake, the English resident. Ali received them with 
 the greatest respect, and gave them an invitation to Te- 
 paleni, his birth-place, and favourite seat, which though 
 only one day's distance from Berent, where he then was, 
 the journey took up nine in the accomplishment, on ac- 
 count of the rains. In this excursion, Lord Byron and 
 his companion were overtaken by a violent thunder- 
 storm, during which the guides lost their way, so that 
 it was with great difficulty and no little peril that they 
 regained the right road in this mountainous country. 
 The resemblance between the inhabitants of this 
 region, and the Highlanders of Scotland, in dress, 
 figure, and manner of living, struck his lordship very 
 
THE INHABITANTS. 105 
 
 forcibly. The very mountains of Albania seemed to 
 him Caledonian, but only with a kinder climate. 
 The kilt, though white ; the spare active form ; the 
 dialect, Celtic in its sound ; and the hardy habits of 
 the Albanians, all carried the mind of the noble tra- 
 veller back to the days of his childhood, and the hills 
 of Morven. " No nation," says he, " are so detested by 
 their neighbours, as these mountaineers are by all the 
 tribes in the vicinity. The Greeks hardly regard them 
 as Christians, or the Turks as Moslems ; and in fact, 
 they are a mixture of both, and sometimes neither. 
 Their habits are predatory : all are armed ; and the 
 red-shawled Arnaouts, the Montenegrins, Chimariots 
 and Gaydes, are treacherous ; the others differ some- 
 what in garb, and essentially in character. As far 
 as my own experience goes," continues the noble lord, 
 " I can speak favourably. I was attended by two, an 
 Infidel and a Mussulman, to Constantinople, and 
 every other part of Turkey which came within 
 my observation ; and men more faithful in peril, or 
 indefatigable in service, are rarely to be found. The 
 Infidel was named Basilius, the Moslem Dervish 
 Tahiri : the former a man of middle age, and the 
 latter about my own. Basilius was strictly charged 
 
106 FIDELITY. 
 
 by Ali Pacha in person to attend us ; and Dervish 
 was one of fifty who accompanied us through the 
 forests of Acarnania to the banks of the Achelous, 
 and onward to Messalunghi in iEtolia. There I took 
 him into my own service, and never had occasion to 
 repent till the moment of my departure." 
 
 «Of the attachment of these mountaineers his lord- 
 ship gives the following remarkable instances : 
 
 "When in 1810, after the departure of my friend 
 Mr. Hobhouse for England, I was seized with a 
 severe fever in the Morea, these men saved my life, 
 by frightening away my physician, whose throat they 
 threatened to cut, if I was not cured within a given 
 time. To this consolatory assurance of posthumous 
 retribution, and a resolute refusal of Dr. Romanelli's 
 prescriptions, I attribute my recovery. I had left my 
 last remaining English servant at Athens ; my drago 
 man, or interpreter, was as ill as myself; and my 
 poor Arnaouts nursed me with an attention which 
 would have done honour to civilization. 
 
 ; 
 
 " When preparations were made for my return, my 
 
 to P 
 
AFFECTION. 107 
 
 Albanians were summoned to receive their pay. 
 Basilius took his with an awkward show of regret at 
 my intended departure, and marched away to his 
 quarters with his bag of piastres. I sent for Dervish, 
 but for some time he was not to be found ; at last 
 he entered, just as Signor Logotheti, father to the 
 Anglo-consul at Athens, and some other of my Greek 
 acquaintances, paid me a visit. Dervish took the 
 money, but on a sudden dashed it to the ground, and 
 clasping his hands, which he raised to his forehead, 
 rushed out of the room weeping bitterly. From that 
 moment to the hour of my embarkation, he continued 
 his lamentations, and all our efforts to console him 
 only produced this answer, " He leaves me!" — 
 Signor Logotheti, who never wept before for any 
 thing less than the loss of a para, (about the fourth of 
 a farthing,) the Padre of the convent, my attendants, 
 and my visitors, melted ; and I verily believe that 
 even Sterne's foolish fat scullion would have left her 
 fish-kettle to sympathize with the unaffected and un- 
 expected sorrow of this barbarian. For my own part, 
 when I remembered that, a short time before my de- 
 parture from England, a noble and most intimate 
 associate had excused himself from taking leave of me, 
 
108 ANECDOTES. 
 
 * because he had to attend a relation to a milliner's' — 
 I felt no less surprised than humiliated by the present 
 occurrence and the past recollection." 
 
 One or two more anecdotes related of this child of 
 nature are both interesting and characteristic. " That 
 Dervish," says his lordship, " would leave me with 
 some regret was to be expected ; for when master and 
 man have been scrambling over the mountains of a dozen 
 provinces together, they are unwilling to separate ; but 
 his present feelings, contrasted with his native ferocity, 
 improved my opinion of the human heart. I believe 
 this almost feudal fidelity is frequent among them. 
 One day, on our journey over Parnassus, an English- 
 man in my service gave him a push, in some dispute 
 about the baggage, which he unluckily mistook for a 
 blow ; he spoke not, but sat down, leaning his head 
 upon his hands. Foreseeing the consequences, we 
 endeavoured to explain away the affront, which only 
 produced the following answer:—* I have been a 
 robber ;— I am a soldier ;— no captain ever struck me ; 
 —You are my master ;— I have eaten your bread ;— 
 but by that bread (a usual oath) had it been otherwise, 
 I would have stabbed the dog your servant, and gone 
 
ANECDOTES. 109 
 
 to the mountains.' So the affair ended ; but from 
 that day forward he never thoroughly forgave the 
 thoughtless fellow by whom he had been insulted. 
 
 " On my third journey to Cape Colonna, as we 
 passed through the defile that leads from the hamlet 
 between Keratia and Colonna, I observed Dervisli 
 riding rather out of the path, and leaning his head 
 upon his hand as if in pain. I rode up to him and 
 enquired. ' We are in peril,' he answered. — ' What 
 peril ? We are not now in Albania, nor in the passes 
 to Ephesus, Messalunghi, or Lepanto; there are 
 plenty of us, well armed, and the Choriates have not 
 courage to be thieves.' — ' True, Affendi, (that is, 
 Lord,) but nevertheless the shot is ringing in my ears/ 
 — ' The shot ! not one has been fired this morning.' 
 — * I hear it notwithstanding— bom, bom, as plainly 
 as I hear your voice.' — * Pshaw !' — ' As you please, 
 Affendi ; if it is written, so will it be.' I left this 
 quick-eared predestinarian, and rode up to Basili, his 
 Christian compatriot, whose ears, though not at all 
 prophetic, by no means relished the intelligence. We 
 all arrived at Colonna, remained some hours, and re- 
 turned leisurely, saying a variety of brilliant things in 
 
110 ANECDOTES. 
 
 more languages than spoiled the building of Babel, 
 upon the mistaken seer. While we were contem- 
 plating the beautiful prospect, Dervish was occupied 
 about the columns. I thought he was deranged into 
 an antiquarian, and asked him if he had become 
 a Palaocastro man ? — ' No,' said he, ' but these 
 pillars will be useful in making a stand ;' and added 
 other remarks which at least evinced his own beliet 
 in his troublsome faculty of ' forehearing.' On our 
 return to Athens, we heard from Leon6, (a prisoner set 
 on shore some days after,) of an intended attack from 
 a party of Mainotes concealed in the caverns beneath, 
 and that they were only deterred from attacking us by 
 the appearance of my two Albanians, conjecturing 
 very sagaciously, but falsely, that we had a complete 
 guard of Arnaouts at hand. I was at some pains to 
 question the man, and he described the dresses, arms, 
 and marks of the horses of our party so accurately, 
 that, with other circumstance?, we could not doubt of 
 his having been in villanous company, and ourselves 
 in a bad neighbourhood." 
 
 When Lord Byron noticed the striking affinity be- 
 tween his Albanian friends, in language, person, and 
 
HIGHLANDERS. Ill 
 
 manners, and the mountaineers of North Britain, it is * 
 wonderful that he should have passed over the faculty 
 possessed by Dervish, which bears so strong a resem- 
 blance to the gift of prescience said to be still exist- 
 ing among the Highlanders. The similarity in this 
 respect is full as observable as in others; and yet 
 there is nothing in either, but what may very well be 
 accounted for upon common principles. The inhabi- 
 tants of lofty regions are universally of a spare and 
 active constitution, for they are from infancy accus- 
 tomed to constant exercise ; which of course requires a 
 dress adapted to agility, and not liable to incommode 
 the wearers. In regard to quickness of perception 
 also, the dwellers on lofty eminences, have a manifest 
 advantage over those who reside on plains, in towns, 
 and in valleys ; since the very situations which the 
 mountaineers occupy, and the pursuits in which they 
 are almost constantly engaged, compel them to a per- 
 petual exertion of the organs of hearing and sight. 
 To the same cause may be ascribed the sharp, so- 
 norous, and guttural sounds which distinguish the 
 native tongues of Highlanders, from the more liquid 
 and modulated languages of social life in closely con- 
 nected communities. 
 

 112 ATHE.VS. 
 
 So likewise, without any disparagement of Lord 
 Byron's judgment, or detracting from the merit of his 
 Albanian servant, we see nothing extraordinary in 
 the sensibility of Dervish on parting with his master. 
 No doubt the expression w r as creditable to both, 
 since it was a proof of gratitude felt, for kindness 
 uniformly bestowed ; but where such a liberal patron 
 had never been known, and where one of like courtesy 
 was not likely again to be found, it was natural that 
 the los^er should be affected by the separation. 
 
 When Lord Byron and his company visited 
 Athens, they were greatly mortified and thoroughly 
 indignant to see the place dismantled of many of 
 the beauties which had rendered the spot, even in 
 its dilapidated state, sacred in the estimation of 
 all travellers who possessed any reverence for the 
 genius of antiquity. But the ravages of time, and 
 those committed by barbarians, bore no comparison 
 to the extent of the spoliation recently perpetrated in 
 the name, and by the orders of an English Ambassador 
 at the Porte ; who had exerted his influence so effec- 
 tually as almost to demolish several of the finest of 
 the temples that were then remaining. After this is 
 
VANITY PUNISHED. 1 13 
 
 was too much in the spirit of Erostratus for the same 
 nobleman to cause his own name, together with that 
 of his wife, to be inscribed on a pillar of the temple 
 of Minerva. This extraordinary mark of vanity, 
 however, was actually executed in a very conspicuous 
 manner, and deeply engraved in the marble, at a con- 
 siderable elevation. Lord Byron, on beholding the 
 inscription, was so much hurt, and conceived such a 
 just abhorrence of this presumption, which he con- 
 sidered as almost amounting to sacrilege, that with 
 great labour and difficulty he got himself raised up to 
 the requisite height, and obliterated the name of the 
 earl, but gallantly left that of the lady untouched. 
 Besides this act of zeal, he adopted another, and 
 severer method of humbling the pride of his brother 
 peer ; for, on the west side of the same temple, he 
 caused the following monkish lines to be very deeply 
 cut, in large characters : 
 
 " Quod non fecerunt Goti, 
 Hoc fecerunt Scoti." 
 
 But the resentment of our young lord was not 
 limited to mere localities. He invoked his powerful 
 
114 POEM OF "MINERVA." 
 
 muse on the occasion, and, as if he had been actually 
 inspired by the Genius of the place, he wrote a poem, 
 the opening part of which constitutes the introduction 
 to the second Canto of Childe Harold, but the re- 
 mainder was suppressed as being too caustic for pub- 
 lication. In this performance, composed amid the 
 ruins of the temple of Minerva, the goddess is repre- 
 sented as addressing herself to the noble bard, and 
 calling upon him to " survey her vacant violated 
 fane," despoiled by Alaric and the modern Goth. 
 Pallas then proceeds : 
 
 " Arms gave the first his right, the last had none, 
 But basely stole what less barbarians won : 
 So when the lion quits the fell repast, 
 Next prowls the wolf, the filthy jackall last: 
 Flesh, limbs, and blood, the former make their own, 
 The last base brute securely gnaws the bone. 
 Yet still the gods are just, and crimes are crost, 
 See here what ***** won, and what he lost. 
 Another name with his pollutes my shrine : 
 Behold where Dian's beams disdain to shine. 
 Some retribution still might Pallas claim, 
 When Venus half aveng'd Minerva's shame." 
 
POEM OF " MINERVA." 115 
 
 In allusion to the country of the spoliator, the god- 
 dess is made to express her vindictive feelings in 
 these vigorous lines : 
 
 '* And thus accursed be the day and year 
 She sent a Pict to play the felon here. 
 Yet Caledonia claims some native worth, 
 And dull Bosotia gave a Pindar birth. 
 So may her few, the letter'd and the brave, 
 Bound to no clime, and victors o'er the grave, 
 Shake off the mossy slime of such a land, 
 And shine like children of a happier strand. 
 Mortal, (the blue-ey'd maid resumed once more) 
 Bear back my mandate to thy native shore : 
 Though fallen, alas ! this vengeance yet is mine, 
 To turn my counsels far from lands like thine. 
 Hear, then, in silence, Pallas' stern behest ; 
 Hear and believe, for time will tell the rest : 
 First, on the head of him who did the deed, 
 My curse shall light, on him and all his seed. 
 Without one spark of intellectual fire, 
 Be all his sons as senseless as their sire ; 
 If one with wit the parent-breed disgrace, 
 Believe him bastard of a better race ; 
 Still with his hireling artists let him prate, 
 And Folly's praise repay for Wisdom's hate. 
 
 
116 LOUD ELGIN. 
 
 Long of their patron's gusto let them tell, 
 Whose noblest native gusto is to sell; 
 To sell, and make (may shame record the day) 
 The State, receiver of his pilfer'd prey." 
 
 These extracts are sufficient to show the spirit in 
 which the whole piece was written, and the necessity 
 of withholding it from publication. But the author 
 condensed and pointed the virus of it in one stanza 
 of the poetic narrative of his travels, as follows : 
 
 " But most the modern Pict's ignoble boast, 
 
 To rive what Goth, and Turk, and Time hath spared ; 
 Cold as the crags upon his native coast, 
 
 His mind as barren, and his heart as hard, 
 Is he whose head Conceived, whose hand prepared 
 
 Aught to displace Athena's poor remains : 
 Her sons, too weak the sacred shrine to guard, 
 
 Yet felt some portion of their mother's pains, 
 And never knew till then the weight of despot's chains." 
 
 In a note on this passage, the author relates these 
 curious particulars of the final ruin of Athens, by 
 British agency : 
 
SPOLIATIONS. 117 
 
 "An Italian painter of the first eminence, named 
 Lusieri, is the agent of devastation ; and like the 
 G reek finder of Verres in Sicily, who followed the 
 same profession, he has proved the able instrument 
 of plunder. Between this artist, and the French 
 Consul, Fauvel, who wishes to rescue the remains for 
 his own government, there is now a violent dispute 
 concerning a car employed in their conveyance, the 
 wheel of which (I wish they were both broken upon it,) 
 has been locked up by the Consul \ and Lusieri has 
 laid his complaint before the Waywode. Lord Elgin 
 has been extremely happy in his choice of Signor Lu- 
 sieri. During a residence. of ten years at Athens, he 
 never had the curiosity, to proceed as far as Sunium, 
 till he accompanied us in our second excursion. 
 However, his works, as far as they go, are most 
 beautiful ; but they are almost all unfinished. While 
 he and his patrons confine themselves to tasting 
 metals, appreciating cameos, sketching columns, and 
 cheapening gems, their little absurdities are as harmless 
 as insect or fox-hunting, maiden-speechifying, barouche 
 driving, or any such pastime ; but when they carry 
 away three or four ship-loads of the most valuable and 
 massy relics, that time and barbarism have left to \fy% 
 
118 SPOLIATIONS. 
 
 most injured and most celebrated of cities'; when 
 they destroy, in a vain attempt to tear down, those 
 works, which have been the admiration of ages, I 
 know no motive which can excuse, no name which 
 can designate, the perpetrators of this most dastardly 
 devastation. It was not the least of the crimes laid 
 to the charge of Verres, that he had plundered Sicily, 
 in the manner since imitated at Athens. The most 
 unblushing impudence could hardly go further than 
 to affix the name of its plunderer to the walls of the 
 Acropolis ; while the wanton and useless defacement 
 of the whole range of the basso-relievos, in one com- 
 partment of the temple, will never permit that name 
 to be pronounced by an observer without execration. 
 On this occasion I speak impartially : I am not a 
 collector, or admirer of collections, consequently 
 no rival ; but I have some early prepossession in 
 favour of Greece, and do not think the honour of 
 England advanced by plunder, whether of India or 
 Attica. 
 
 " Another noble lord has done better, because he 
 has done less ; but some others, more or less noble, 
 yet " all honourable men," have done best, because, 
 
ELGIN MARBLES. 119 
 
 after a deal of excavation, and execration, they have 
 done nothing at all. We had such ink shed, and 
 wine shed, which almost ended in blood-shed ! — Lord 
 E's prig quarrelled with another, Gropius by name, 
 (and a very good name too for his business,) and mut- 
 tered something about satisfaction, in a verbal answer 
 to a note of the poor Prussain : this was stated at 
 table to Gropius, who laughed, but could eat no 
 dinner afterwards. The rivals were not reconciled 
 when I left Greece. I have reason to remember their 
 squabble, for they wanted to make me their arbi- 
 trator." 
 
 The national purchase of the Athenian marbles, 
 and the transfer of them to the British Museum, can 
 hardly be considered as justifying the manner in 
 which those treasures were obtained ; though when 
 they were obtained, it was perhaps prudent to secure 
 them from going out of the kingdom. There can be 
 no doubt in regard to the motive of the person who 
 first got them into his possession ; and, therefore, all 
 the cant about the love of the arts, and of the patriotic 
 wish to enrich England, by those relics of ancient 
 genius which France coveted so much, will be con- 
 
120 M. FAUVEL. 
 
 sidered as so much dust raised to cover what nothing 
 could excuse. It is true Fauvel was employed in 
 Greece, in collecting curious remains for the National 
 Institute ; but let us hear what he says himself on the 
 subject, three years before the arrival of Lord Byron. 
 In a letter to M. Monge, he thus observes and com- 
 plains: " General Sebastiani, to whom I am recom- 
 mended with respect to the arts and antiquities, has 
 not yet honoured me with an answer. I have re- 
 quested him to procure me liberty to make researches 
 wherever I please, without being liable to interruption 
 from the preponderance of the English, owing, it must 
 however be confessed, to their money. As I am not 
 provided with the same weapons, I am obliged to have 
 recourse to our ambassador, who is an amateur and 
 connoisseur in antiquities. In your kind letter, you 
 offer me your services for the preservation and publi- 
 cation of my discoveries, for which I thank you ; but 
 the war prevents me from sending any thing. On the 
 conclusion of peace, I shall claim your promise, and 
 avail myself of your offer to place in security whatever 
 I may think myself liable to be robbed of, as long as 
 the temple of Janus shall remain open." 
 
NATIONAL CLAIMS. 121 
 
 Again he says in another letter to the same asso- 
 ciate of the Institute: " Without information, and al- 
 ways uncertain with regard to our fate, I retire to rest 
 in the midst of my works, my antiquities, and my 
 medals, ignorant whether to-morrow I may call my- 
 self their owner. Judge therefore, my friend, whether 
 this situation is suited to the artist and the amateur. 
 It is indeed so precarious that I think nothing safe, 
 but what I commit to paper." 
 
 Now it is evident From this, that while the English 
 minister made use of his influence to get the most pre- 
 cious remains of ancient art into his possession, the 
 French ambassador took no concern at all in the 
 matter ; but left poor Fauvel to contend, as well as he 
 could, with the superior power of his rival. After 
 this, and it deserves notice that the fact is admitted 
 in Lord Elgin's own publication, it becomes a mate- 
 rial question whether his lordship attained the marbles 
 of Athens in his public or private , capacity. If, as 
 there is every reason to believe, that it was in the 
 former alone, and that otherwise he could not have 
 succeeded ; then the national repository ought to have 
 received them as a matter of right ; but if in the latter, 
 
122 ATHENIANS. 
 
 then the representative of the British monarch acted 
 the part of a trafficker, when he ought to have been 
 differently employed. 
 
 In an official publication entitled, " a Memorandum 
 on the subject of the Earl of Elgin's Pursuits in 
 Greece," great stress is laid upon the vast importance 
 of the treasures which he procured at Athens, and the 
 perilous state from which they were rescued by his 
 exertions. Now as it is allowed that these remains of 
 ancient sculpture had continued undisturbed during 
 many ages, it is hardly to be supposed that they were 
 in danger of being destroyed at the enlightened period 
 when our minister took such pains to get them into his 
 hands. What the barbarians of the middle ages had 
 spared, the Greeks and the Turks of the present gene- 
 ration were not the parties to remove or destroy ; for 
 the best of all reasons, the desire of gain, which they 
 both well knew was promoted by the preservation of 
 these valuable objects. As to the Athenians them- 
 selves, who were the most interested in taking care of 
 the relics of their ancient glory ; though they might 
 not perhaps be enthusiasts in the cause of science, 
 they could neither be devoid of the' feeling of national 
 
ATHENIANS. 123 
 
 pride, nor yet insensible of the advantages resulting 
 from the visits of foreigners to survey the ruins of their 
 city and neighbourhood. 
 
 We are assured by Lord Byron, who from his long 
 residence there at the time must have been well ac- 
 quainted with the sentiments of the Greeks, that there 
 was but one opinion among them upon the spoliation, 
 which they were compelled to witness, and could only 
 lament. 
 
 " We can all feel or imagine," says his lordship, 
 " the regret with which the ruins of cities, once the 
 capitals of empires, are beheld ; the reflections sug- 
 gested by such events are too trite to require recapitu- 
 lation. But never did the littleness of man and the 
 vanity of his very best virtues, of patriotism to exalt, 
 and of valour to defend his country, appear more 
 conspicuous than in the record of what Athens was, 
 and the certainty of what she now is. This theatre 
 of contention between mighty factions, of the struggles 
 of orators, the exaltation and deposition of tyrants, 
 the triumph and punishment of generals, is now be- 
 come a scene of petty intrigue and perpetual disturb- 
 
124 THE PARTHENON. 
 
 ance, between the bickering agents of certain British 
 nobility and gentry. The wild foxes, the owls, and 
 serpents in the ruins of Babylon, were surely less 
 degrading than such inhabitants. The Turks have the 
 plea of conquest for their tyranny, and the Greeks 
 have only suffered the fortune of war, incidental to 
 the bravest; but how are the mighty fallen, when 
 two painters contest the privilege of plundering the 
 Parthenon, and triumph in turn, according to the 
 tenour of each succeeding firmaun ! Sylla could but 
 punish, Philip subdue, and Xerxes burn Athens ; but 
 it remained for the paltry antiquarian, and his despi- 
 cable agents, to render her contemptible as himself 
 and his pursuits. The Parthenon, before its destruc- 
 tion in part by fire, during the Venetian siege, had 
 been a temple, a church, and a mosque. In each 
 point of view, it is an object of regard ; for though it 
 changed its worshippers, it was still a place of wor- 
 ship; being therefore thrice sacred to devotion, its 
 violation is a triple sacrilege.'' 
 
 During the residence of Lord Byron at Athens, he 
 joined with one or two more Englishmen in paying a 
 tribute of respect to the remains of the learned John 
 
TW ED PELL.. 125 
 
 Tweddell, Fellow of Triuity College, Cambridge, who 
 died in that city, while on his travels, in the summer 
 of 1799. No stone or inscription had marked the 
 spot in the Theseum where the bones of this accom- 
 plished scholar lay, till the noble lord and Mr. John 
 Fiott, of St. John's College, succeeded though not 
 without some opposition, in placing on the grave a 
 large block of marble, with a beautiful Greek epitaph 
 thereon, written by Mr. Walpole. 
 
 Amidst his excursions and amusements, the noble 
 lord devoted much of his time to the attainment of 
 the Romaic or modern language of Greece, and also 
 of the Turkish, which is infinitely more difficult. Of 
 the former he became complete master ; and the notes 
 to his principal poems evince the diligence of his ap- 
 plication, and the extent of his acquirements in philo- 
 logical erudition. But, perhaps, the happiest proofs 
 of his facility in making himself thoroughly acquainted 
 with the structure and idioms of modern tongues, are 
 to be found in his translations. 
 
 It is no hard. matter, with the help of dictionaries 
 and grammars, especially when a good instructor can 
 
126 LORD BYRON'S JOURNAL. 
 
 also be procured, to gain a competent knowledge of 
 any living speech ; but it requires genius of a very 
 superior description to seize the poetic spirit of one 
 language, and to diffuse it without evaporation into 
 another. This, however, has been accomplished most 
 effectually by Lord Byron, in his versions of French, 
 Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and Greek poems ; and 
 that which enhances the merit of these performances, 
 is the difficulty of expressing the manner, as well as 
 the very thought of the original, when both have a 
 peculiarity arising from local customs, sentiments, and 
 phraseology. 
 
 It is, therefore, evident that the time of this young 
 nobleman was not idly spent, or thrown away upon 
 trifling objects, while on his travels ; and though he 
 has withheld from the public, the journal of his pro- 
 gress, those who have been favoured with a sight of it 
 can bear testimony to the elegance of the descriptive 
 part, and the judgment displayed in the reflections. 
 
 Some idea indeed of the value of the narrative, 
 may be formed from the detached notes which the 
 author has himself selected out of the mass, as illus- 
 
CAPE COLO NX A. 1 c 2 7 
 
 trative of his poems. In one of these, he has given a 
 brief but admirable sketch of the ruins of Minerva's 
 temple, situated on the promontory of Sunium, now 
 called Cabo Colonna, or the Cape of the Columns, 
 from the pillars which adorn its brow. 
 
 " In all Attica," says Lord Byron, " if we except 
 Athens itself and Marathon, there is no scene more 
 interesting than Cape Colonna. To the antiquary and 
 artist, sixteen columns are an inexhaustible source of ob- 
 servation and design ; to the philosopher, the supposed 
 scene of Plato's conversations, will not be unwelcome ; 
 and the traveller will be struck with the beauty of the 
 prospect over ' Isles that crown the iEgean deep f 
 but for an Englishman, Colonna has yet an additional 
 interest, as the actual spot of Falconer's shipwreck. 
 Pallas and Plato are forgotten in the recollection of 
 Falconer and Campbell. This temple of Minerva 
 may be seen at sea, from a great distance. In two 
 journeys which I made, and one voyage to Colonna, 
 the view from either side by land was less striking 
 than the approach from the Isles." 
 
 With regard to the climate of Attica, Lord Byron 
 
128 CLIMATE. 
 
 observes, that, " setting aside the magic of the name, 
 and all those associations which it would be pedantic 
 and superfluous to recapitulate ; the verysituatio n of 
 Athens would render it the favourite of all who 
 have eyes for art or nature. The climate, to me 
 at least, appeared a perpetual spring; during eight 
 months I never passed a day without being as many 
 hours on horseback : rain is extremely rare, snow 
 never lies in the plains, and a cloudy day is an agree- 
 able rarity. In Spain, Portugal, and every part of 
 the east which I visited, except Ionia and Attica, I 
 perceived no such superiority of climate to our own ; 
 and at Constantinople you might damn the climate, 
 and complain of spleen, five days out of seven." 
 
 This remark on the excellence of the English cli- 
 mate, brings to recollection the saying of Charles the 
 Second, who had himself been a traveller, and that for 
 a long period. After his restoration, the discourse 
 turned one day, in his presence, upon the pleasantness 
 of the different countries on the continent of Europe. 
 Some having praised one part and some another ; the 
 king said, " Well, gentlemen, you have all given your 
 
LITLIiAKY PURSUITS. ] %9 
 
 opinions; and now I wiil let you know mine. I have 
 lived abroad longer than any of you ; but never saw 
 the country yet where I could remain out ofxloors so 
 many days in the year as in Engl and. " 
 
 Though Lord Byron traversed the Morea in every 
 direction, and extended his travels over Eubcea, as 
 well as the plain of Athens, and every part of Achaia, 
 he paid diligent attention to literary pursuits, and not 
 only sketched, but actually wrote some of those pieces 
 which he has since published. Of his zeal for letters 
 he gave an instance in exchanging a very valuable 
 antique gem for a triglot manuscript Lexicon ; and 
 he also undertook the commission to get printed for 
 his Greek tutor, a Romaic translation of Barthelemi's 
 Travels of Anacharsis ; but this work, on account of 
 the heaviness of the expense, never appeared. 
 
 From the interest excited by the present aspect of 
 affairs in the East, and the exertions now making by 
 the Greeks to recover and establish their independence, 
 we are naturally led to inquire into the opinion of so 
 intelligent an observer as Lord Byron, concerning 
 that people and their political state. 
 
 K 
 
130 THE GREEKS. 
 
 At the time when his lordship resided there, the 
 condition of these oppressed descendants of heroes 
 and sages became the frequent subject of conver- 
 sation, among the foreigners who were assembled as it 
 were from all parts of Europe, in that famous seat of 
 antiquity. But it is mortifying to see the little sym- 
 pathy which these visitors felt for the Greeks, and 
 the general contempt in which those people were then 
 held by the Franks. 
 
 Lord Byron gives the substance of what he heard 
 from the best informed, and oldest residents, in these 
 words : 
 
 " Mr. Fauvel, the French Consul, who has passed 
 thirty years principally at Athens, and to whose 
 talents as an artist, and manners as a gentleman, 
 none who have known him can refuse their testimony, 
 has frequently declared in my hearing that the 
 Greeks do not deserve to be emancipated ; reasoning 
 on the grounds of their " national and individual 
 depravity ;" while he forgot that such depravity is to 
 be attributed to causes which can only be removed by 
 the measure he reprobates. — Mr. Roque, a French 
 
THE GREEKS. 131 
 
 merchant of respectability, long settled in Athens, 
 asserted with the most amusing gravity, ' Sir, they 
 are the same canaille that existed in the days of The- 
 mistocles ;' — an alarming remark to the ' Laudatur 
 temporis acti.' The ancients banished Themistocles ; 
 the moderns cheat Monsieur Roque ; thus great men 
 have ever been treated ! 
 
 <c In short, all the Franks who are fixtures, and 
 most of the Englishmen, Germans, Danes, &c. of 
 passage, came over by degrees to their opinion ; on 
 much the same grounds, that a Turk in England 
 would condemn the nation by wholesale, because he 
 was wronged by his lacquey, and overcharged by his 
 washerwoman. Certainly, it was not a little stagger- 
 ing when the Sieurs Fauvel and Lusieri, the two 
 greatest demagogues of the day, who divide between 
 them the power of Pericles and the popularity of 
 Cleon, and who puzzle the poor Waywode with per- 
 petual differences, agreed in the utter condemnation, 
 " nulla virtute redemptum," of the Greeks in general, 
 and of the Athenians in particular. But it seems to 
 me rather hard to declare so positively and pertina- 
 ciously, as almost every body has declared, that the 
 
132 - THE GREEKS. 
 
 Greeks, because they are very bad, will never be 
 better." 
 
 But though our noble countryman differed with 
 these foreign residents at Athens, in the opinion that 
 the Greeks were an unimprovable race ; his own 
 judgment of their renovation was not so favourable as 
 that of Eton and Sonnini. " The Greeks, in oppo- 
 sition to these travellers," he says, " will never be 
 independent; they will never be Sovereigns, as here- 
 tofore, and God forbid they ever should ! But they 
 may be subjects without being slaves. Our Colonies 
 are not independent, but they are free and industrious ; 
 and such may Greece be hereafter. At present, like 
 the Catholics of Ireland, and the Jews throughout the 
 world, and such other cudgelled and heterodox people, 
 they suffer all the moral and physical ills that can 
 afflict humanity. Their life is a struggle against 
 truth ; they are vicious in their own defence. They 
 are so unused to kindness, that when they occa- 
 sionally meet with it, they look upon it with suspicion, 
 as a dog often beaten snaps at your fingers, if you 
 attempt to caress him. ' They are ungrateful, noto- 
 riously, abominably ungrateful !' — This is the general 
 
THE GREEKS. 133 
 
 cry. Now in the name of Nemesis, for what are 
 they to be grateful? Where is the human being that 
 ever conferred a benefit on Greek or Greeks ? They 
 are to be grateful to the Turks for their fetters, and 
 to the Franks for their broken promises and lying 
 counsels ! They are to be grateful to the artist, who 
 engraves their ruins, and to the antiquary who carries 
 them away ; to the traveller whose Janissary flogs 
 them, and to the scribbler w r hose journal abuses 
 them ! This is the amount of their obligations to 
 foreigners." 
 
 Recurring to the same subject, the noble author in 
 another part of his journal observes : " The interpo' 
 s ition of foreigners alone can emancipate the Greeks, 
 who otherwise appear to have as small a chance of 
 redemption from the Turks, as the Jews have from 
 mankind in general. Of the ancient Greeks we 
 know more than enough ; at least the young men of 
 Europe devote much of their time to the study of the 
 Greek writers, and history, which would be more 
 usefully spent in mastering their own. Of the 
 moderns, we are perhaps more neglectful than they 
 deserve ; and while every man of any pretensions to 
 
134 THE GREEKS. 
 
 learning, is tiring out his youth, and often his age, in 
 the study of the language, and of the harangues of the 
 Athenian demagogues in favour of freedom, the real 
 or supposed descendants of these sturdy republicans 
 are left to the actual tyranny of their masters, although 
 a very slight effort is required to shake off their chains. 
 To talk, as the Greeks themselves do, of their rising 
 again to their pristine superiority, would be ridiculous ; 
 as the rest of the world must resume its barbarism, 
 after re-asserting the sovereignty of Greece : but there 
 seems to be no very great obstacle, except in the 
 apathy of the Franks, to their becoming an useful 
 dependency, or even a free state, with a proper gua- 
 rantee ; under correction, however, be it spoken, for 
 many, and well-informed men doubt the practicability 
 even of this, 
 
 " The Greeks have never lost their hope, though 
 they are now more divided in opinion on the subject 
 of their probable deliverers. Religion recommends 
 the Russians ; but they have twice been deceived, and 
 abandoned by that power ; and the dreadful lesson 
 they received after the Muscovite desertion in the 
 Morea, has never been forgotten. The French they 
 
thj: cheeks. 135 
 
 dislike ; although the suhjugation of the rest of Eu- 
 rope will probably be attended by the deliverance of 
 Continental Greece. The Islanders look to the 
 English for succour, as they have very lately pos- 
 sessed themselves of the Ionian republic, Corfu 
 excepted. But, whoever shall appear with arms in 
 their hands will be welcome; and when that day 
 arrives, Heaven have mercy on the Ottomans, for they 
 cannot expect it from the G reeks." 
 
 Loose and general as these remarks are, and disin- 
 clined as the author was at that time to believe that 
 the people of whom he spoke would struggle of them- 
 selves into independence ; it is plain that even then the 
 Greeks were animated by the hope of liberty and resus- 
 citation. Where such a principle operates generally, 
 the seeds of a revolution are sown, and the event is 
 certain. Time nurtures the sentiment into a resolu- 
 tion, and continued oppression hastens the accom- 
 plishment. Though considered in all ages as fickle 
 and treacherous, the Greeks have not wanted energy, 
 or been deficient in sensibility. The propensity to 
 commerce and navigation has enlarged their minds, 
 and, by increasing the stock of knowledge, made them 
 
\36 THE GREEKS. 
 
 more desirous of freedom. While Lord Byron and 
 his companions at Athens were discussing the ques- 
 tion, whether the Greeks merited emancipation, or 
 could possibly effect it, the people themselves were 
 silently employed, by the establishment of a marine, 
 and the cultivation of letters, even among the islanders 
 who were formerly the most ignorant part of the 
 whole nation, in preparing the means of a revolution, 
 which, though it may be attended with great diffi- 
 culties, and be disgraced by many crimes, must 
 ultimately prove successful; and who is there so lost 
 to the sense of justice, the love of liberty, and the value 
 of civilization, as to wish it were otherwise ? Surely 
 there is nothing in the history of modern Europe, 
 since the fall of Byzantium, and the ascendancy of the 
 Crescent on the shores of the Levant, that can or 
 ought to excite one emotion of regret for the fate of 
 the Ottoman empire. On the contrary, the interests 
 of science and literature, policy and religion, are 
 united in the desire that a monstrous fabric, originating 
 in fraud, and upheld by the sword, should fall before 
 the power of truth, and by the instrumentality of 
 those who have suffered from its tyranny. That the 
 Greeks have for ages been ground down to the lowest 
 
,TIIK GREEKS. 137 
 
 pitch of humiliation under the oppressive force of this 
 combination of imposture and despotism, cannot be 
 denied ; nor will any one presume to assert that their 
 tyrants have in all that dark period done any thing to 
 merit the good-will of the rest of mankind. Other 
 conquerors have had the address to conciliate their 
 new subjects, and to ensure, not only their obedience, 
 but attachment, by the grant of honourable privileges, 
 and the continuance of ancient customs ; but the 
 Turks, from first to last, have kept the Greeks in 
 an insulated state, and treated them as an inferior 
 order of beings, fit only to be " hewers of wood and 
 drawers of water," for the servants of the Prophet. 
 Is it therefore to be wondered, that a people so de- 
 graded by the usurpers of their inheritance, and so 
 neglected by their fellow Christians, should in the 
 lapse of years become mistrustful and hardened, 
 treacherous and vindictive ? — or, are they to be con- 
 demned if, on seeing the nations around them im- 
 proving their condition, they adopted measures, and 
 projected a plan of co-operation secretly among 
 themselves, for shaking oft' the yoke of bondage ? 
 
 There were times, when the cause of such a people 
 
]3S THE CREEKS. 
 
 would have roused even the most sluggish minds into 
 sympathetic feeling, and have produced powerful 
 exertions in their favour throughout the whole Chris- 
 tian world. 
 
 We have, however, lived to witness the prevalence of 
 a cold, calculating policy, which, measuring every 
 thing by the scale of interest, throws aside all the 
 generous and exalted motives that directly lead to the 
 accomplishment of great objects. Shut up in this 
 contracted sphere, we seem to regard the other 
 families of the earth as having no claim to our assist- 
 ance ; because, to use the phrase of the rustic in 
 justification of his want of tenderness for his neigh- 
 bours, " they belong to another parish." 
 
 There is but too much reason to believe, that the 
 revolutions by which a great part of Europe has been 
 agitated for near thirty years have rather weakened 
 than increased the sentiment of benevolence. It is 
 true, we have no lack of legislators and politicians, 
 ready to give their advice for the renovation of states 
 and the formation of constitutions ; we have also ad- 
 venturers enow full willing to take a part in any foreign 
 
the <J KEEKS. 139 
 
 commotions ; and, which is infinitely more to our 
 credit, we have institutions on a large scale, and 
 societies in abundance, having for their objects the 
 circulation of the Scriptures and the conversion of 
 infidels. But all this is private, not public feeling ; 
 and it may be questioned whether the glory of any 
 nation is substantially promoted by the dissipation of 
 individual energies, however praiseworthy may be the 
 design, or honourable the motives of those who en- 
 gage in it. What the British character gains on the 
 score of charity, is no compensation for the loss of 
 its dignity ; and, therefore, he that has the general 
 interests of humanity at heart, would rather see the 
 senate and cabinet leading and directing the people, 
 than following them in those beneficent works, which 
 the impulse of zeal prompts them to undertake. 
 
 A crusade against the Mussulmans would no doubt 
 be as unjust now, as it was madness in the eleventh 
 century ; but that is no reason why the efforts of the 
 Greeks to recover their freedom should be damped by 
 any of the European governments, and least of all, 
 by the English, who, having secured an establishment 
 
140 THE GREEKS. 
 
 among them, ought from policy to have cultivated their 
 confidence. 
 
 Instead of this, it calls for indignation to see our 
 public journals debased by venting the blackest asser- 
 tions upon the whole Greek community, for having 
 asserted the natural right, which every nation has, to 
 shake off the yoke of the conqueror. This glorious 
 struggle, which is more to be justified than that of the 
 North Americans against the English government, or 
 that of the United Provinces against Spain, has been 
 called a rebellion ; though it is well known that the 
 Greeks were never, in any legal sense of the term, sub- 
 jects of the Ottomans. The number of years under 
 which they have groaned in slavery, makes no diffe- 
 rence in regard to the right of resistance ; for the 
 wrong originally inflicted having descended with an 
 increase of injury to the present generation, renders 
 insurrection as much a virtue in them as it would 
 have been in their forefathers. And it is well, per- 
 haps, that the Greeks have been so kept in a sepa- 
 rated and persecuted state by the Turks, since hereby 
 the retribution becomes more certain and equitable. 
 
THEGREEksVW'VERSITY 1 141 
 
 V Of 1 
 
 The conflict is between the tyranttm&^he-oppressed ; 
 between the natives of the soil and its invaders ; so 
 that as there is no reciprocity of duty, arising from 
 mutual obligations and blended interests, the parties 
 are, to all intents and purposes, legitimate bellige- 
 rents. Much has been said on the sanguinary cha- 
 racter of this warfare; but if hostilities have been 
 carried on with more than customary fury, and if the 
 Greeks in some, perhaps too many instances, have 
 evinced a vengeful spirit, let it be impartially examined, 
 whether they have exceeded their opponents in fero- 
 ciousness. Savagely as they are said to have deported 
 themselves in the heat of battle, and the hour of 
 triumph, they had at all events the plea of retaliation 
 to offer in justification of their excesses. That plea 
 certainly is far from being admissible in extenuation 
 of wanton cruelties ; but let who will condemn the 
 Greeks for carrying the barbarity of war to an un- 
 warrantable height, their adversaries the Turks have 
 no right to do so, since it was from them that they 
 learnt both the example and the apology. 
 
 The observation which Lord Byron has thrown out 
 in one of his notes, that the Greeks neither can nor 
 
14<2 THE TIMtKS. 
 
 ought to enjoy sovereignty, is strange ; especially as 
 he is an advocate for their emancipation : but, if they 
 are undeserving of independence, it will be difficult to 
 show how they can be entitled to freedom, since that 
 which incapacitates them for the one, must equally 
 do so for the other. That these people have been 
 long unused to the exercise of power, is no more 
 an argument why they should continue to be deprived 
 of it, than it would be to say that the lawful heir to 
 an extensive domain ought to be kept out of it, because 
 he has hitherto lived in poverty and ignorance. Such 
 reasoning is as futile and mischievous in a political, 
 as it would be in a legal point of view ; but in the pre- 
 sent case it becomes ridiculous, when used for the 
 purpose of barring out the claim of the Greeks to their 
 ancient inheritance ; since to support the fallacy it 
 must be shown that the character of the Turks is the 
 most estimable of the two, and that their system of 
 government is of a liberal description. Though Lord 
 Byron does not venture to assert the latter proposition, 
 he evidently appears to incline to the former ; but 
 then it merits notice, that his praise of the Turks is 
 mixed with sarcastic reflections upon all the Christian 
 states, not excepting even the English nation. Of the 
 
AXKCDOTK. 143 
 
 intelligence and education of the Ottomans he gives 
 a remarkable instance in an anecdote, which we 
 must relate as we find it, and take of course upon the 
 authority of the narrator, who might, perhaps, have 
 rendered it clearer by explanation : 
 
 " I remember Mahmout, the grandson of AH Pacha, 
 asking whether my fellow-traveller and myself were in 
 the upper or lower House of Parliament. Now this 
 question from a boy of ten years old, proves that his 
 education had not been neglected. It may be doubted 
 whether an English boy, at that age, knows the dif- 
 ference of the Divan from a College of Dervises ; but 
 I am very sure a Spaniard does not. How little 
 Mahmout, surrounded as he had been entirely by his 
 tutors, had learned that there was such a thing as a 
 Parliament, it were useless to conjecture, unless we 
 suppose that his instructors did not confine his stu- 
 dies to the Koran." 
 
 . Now the noble lord might, we think, have dis- 
 covered the cause of this inquiry much more easily 
 than by attributing it to the system of Turkish educa- 
 tion. The question, there can be little doubt, resulted 
 
144 THE DARDANELLES. 
 
 from the quickness of the boy on hearing his English 
 friends talking of the two houses of Parliament; a 
 subject very natural to become frequent matter of con- 
 versation on their part ; and therefore calculated to 
 raise the curiosity of a sharp-witted youth, who wished 
 to know every thing about a country the manners of 
 which were so different from his own. 
 
 But thus it is, that winders are made of trifling 
 occurrences, for want of considering the causes out of 
 which they spring; and hence also conclusions are 
 often drawn, to the advantage or disadvantage "of cha- 
 racter, from adventitious circumstances, which only 
 require to be investigated to prove their utter insigni- 
 ficance. 
 
 From Athens Lord Byron proceeded by sea to 
 Constantinople, in the Salsette frigate, Captain Ba- 
 thurst. While that ship lay in the Dardanelles, a 
 discourse arose among some of the officers respecting 
 the practicability of swimming across the Hellespont, 
 and of thus verifying the truth of the story of Leander, 
 so familiar to every classical reader. At length it was 
 agreed on by Lord Byron and Lieutenant Ekenhead 
 
CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 145 
 
 of the above frigate, that they would make the trial ; 
 and this adventure accordingly took place on the 3rd 
 of May, 1810. Of this memorable enterprise, his 
 lordship gives the following account : " The whole dis- 
 tance from Abydos, the place whence we started, to 
 our landing at Sestos on the other side, including the 
 length we were carried by the current, was computed 
 by those on board the frigate at upwards of four Eng- 
 lish miles ; though the actual breadth is barely one. 
 The rapidity of the current is such, that no boat can 
 row directly across ; and it may in some measure be 
 estimated, from the circumstance of the whole distance 
 being accomplished by one of the parties in an hour 
 and five, and by the other, in an hour and ten minutes. 
 The water was extremely cold, from the melting of the 
 mountain snows. About three weeks before, we had 
 made an attempt ; but having ridden all the way from 
 the Troad the same morning, and the water being of an 
 icy chillness, we found it necessary to postpone the 
 completion till the frigate anchored below the castles, 
 when we swam the straits, as just stated, entering a 
 considerable way above the European, and landing 
 below the Asiatic, fort. Chavalier says that a young 
 Jew swam the same distance for his mistress ; and 
 
 L 
 
146 CROSSING THE HELLESPONT. 
 
 Olivier mentions its having been done by a Neapo- 
 litan : but our consul at Tarragona remembered neither 
 of those circumstances, and tried to dissuade us from 
 the attempt. A number of the Salsette's crew were 
 known to have accomplished a greater distance ; and 
 the only thing that surprised me was, that as doubts 
 had been entertained of the truth of Leander's story, 
 no traveller had ever endeavoured to ascertain its 
 practicability." 
 
 Some years after this an English gentleman, named 
 Turner, tried the same experiment and failed, in 
 consequence of which he made a few remarks on Lord 
 Byron's narrative; and though he did not directly 
 call his veracity in question, he showed by his observa- 
 tions on the fact of Leander's swimming across twice 
 in one night, his doubts of the modern as well as of 
 the ancient tale. 
 
 In consequence of this, his lordship wrote the follow- 
 ing letter to his publisher, Mr. Murray; dated Ra- 
 venna, February 21, 1821 : 
 
confirmation. 147 
 
 " Dear Sir, 
 
 " In the 44th page, Vol. I. of Turner's 
 Travels, (which you lately sent me,) it is stated-that 
 Lord Byron, when he expressed such confidence of 
 its practicability, seems to have forgotten that Leander 
 swam both ways, with and against the tide ; whereas 
 he, (Lord Byron) only performed the easiest part of 
 the task, by swimming with it, from Europe to Asia. 
 
 " I certainly could not have forgotten what is known 
 to every school-boy, that Leander crossed in the night 
 and returned towards the morning. My object was 
 to ascertain that the Hellespont could be crossed at all 
 by swimming, and in this Mr. Ekenhead and myself 
 both succeeded ; the one in an hour and ten minutes, 
 the other in one hour and five minutes : the tide was 
 not in our favour; on the contrary, the great difficulty 
 was to bear up against the current ; which, so far from 
 helping us to the Asiatic side, set us down right 
 towards the Archipelago. Neither Mr. Ekenhead, 
 myself, nor, I will venture to add, any person on board 
 the frigate, from Captain (now Admiral Bathurst) 
 downwards, had any notion of a difference of the cur- 
 rent on the Asiatic side, of which Mr. Turner speaks. 
 
148 CONFIRMATION. 
 
 I never heard of it till this moment, or I would have 
 taken the other course. Lieutenant Ekenhead's sole 
 motive, and mine also, for setting out from the Euro- 
 pean side was, that the little Cape above Sestos was 
 a more prominent starting-place, and the frigate 
 which lay below, close under the Asiatic castle, formed 
 a better point of view to move towards ; and, in fact, 
 we landed immediately below it. Mr. Turner says, 
 ' whatever is thrown into the stream on this part of 
 the European bank, must arrive at the Asiatic shore.' 
 This is so far from being the case, that it must arrive 
 in the Archipelago if left to the current, although a 
 strong wind from the Asiatic side might have such an 
 effect occasionally. 
 
 " Mr. Turner attempted the passage from the 
 Asiatic side, and failed ; ' after five-and-twenty 
 minutes, in which he did not advance a hundred 
 yards, he gave it up, from complete exhaustion. 
 This is very possible, and might have occurred to him 
 just as readily on the European side. I particularly 
 stated, and Mr. Hobhouse has done so also, that we 
 were obliged to make the real passage of one mile, 
 extend to between three and four, owing to the force 
 
 
CONFIRMATION. 149 
 
 of the stream. I can assure Mr. Turner, that his 
 success would have given me great pleasure ; as it 
 would have added one more instance to the proofs of 
 its practicability. — It is not quite fair in him to infer, 
 that because he failed, Leander could not succeed. 
 
 " There are still four instances on record — a Neapo- 
 litan, a young Jew, Mr. Ekenhead, and myself: the 
 two last were in the presence of hundreds of English 
 witnesses. With regard to the difference of the cur- 
 rent, I perceived none ; it is favourable to the swim- 
 mer on neither side, but may be stemmed by plunging 
 into the sea a considerable way above the opposite 
 point of the coast, which the swimmer wishes to make, 
 but still bearing up against it : it is strong ; but if you 
 calculate well, you may reach land. My own expe- 
 rience, and that of others, bids me pronounce the 
 passage of Leander perfectly practicable : any young 
 man in good health, and with tolerable skill in swim- 
 ming, might succeed in it from either side. I was 
 three hours in swimming across the Tagus, which is 
 much more hazardous, being two hours longer than 
 the passage of the Hellespont. Of what may be done 
 in swimming, I shall mention one more instance. In 
 
150 CONFIRMATION. 
 
 1818, the Chevalier Mingaldo, (a gentleman of Bas- 
 sano,) a good swimmer, wished to swim with my 
 friend Mr. Alexander Scott and myself; as he 
 seemed particularly anxious on the subject, we indulged 
 him. — We all three started from the Island of the 
 Lido, and swam to Venice. — At the entrance of the 
 Grand Canal, Scott and I were a good way a-head, 
 and we saw no more of our foreign friend ; which, 
 however, was of no consequence, as there was a 
 gondola to hold his clothes, and pick him up. Scott 
 swam on till past the Rialto, where he got out — less 
 from fatigue than chill, having been four hours in the 
 water without rest, or stay, except what is to be ob- 
 tained by floating on one's back, — this being the 
 condition of our performance. I continued my course 
 on to Santa Chiara, comprising the whole of the 
 Grand Canal, (beside the distance from the Lido,) 
 and got out where the Laguna once more opens to 
 Fusina. I had been in the water, by my watch, 
 without help or rest, and never touching ground or 
 boat, four hours and twenty minutes. To this 
 match, and during the greater part of the performance, 
 Mr. Hoppner, the Consul General, was witness, and 
 it is well known to many others. Mr, Turner can 
 
CONFIRMATION. 151 
 
 easily verify the fact, if he thinks it worth while, by 
 referring to Mr. Hoppner. The distance we could 
 not accurately ascertain; it was of course consi- 
 derable. 
 
 " I crossed the Hellespont in one hour and ten 
 minutes only. I am now ten years older in time, and 
 twenty in constitution, than I was when I passed the 
 Dardanelles ; and yet two years ago, I was capable of 
 swimming four hours and twenty minutes ; and I am 
 sure that I could have continued two hours longer, 
 though I had on a pair of trowsers — an accoutrement 
 which by no means assists the performance. My 
 two companions were also four hours in the water. 
 Mingaldo might be about thirty years of age, Scott 
 about six-and-twenty. With this experience in 
 swimming, at different periods of age, not only on the 
 spot, but elsewhere, of various persons, what is there 
 to make me doubt that Leander's exploit was perfectly 
 practicable ? If three individuals did more than 
 passing the Hellespont, why should he have done 
 less? But Mr. Turner failed, and, naturally seeking 
 a plausible excuse for his failure, lays the blame on 
 the Asiatic side of the strait ; — to me the cause is evi- 
 
152 OBSERVATIONS 
 
 dent. He tried to swim directly across, instead of 
 going higher up to take the vantage. — He might 
 as well have tried to fly over Mount Athos. 
 
 " That a young Greek of the heroic times, in love, 
 and with his limbs in full vigour, might have suc- 
 ceeded in such an attempt, is neither wonderful nor 
 doubtful.^ — Whether he attempted it or not, is another 
 question, because he might have had a small boat to 
 save him the trouble. 
 
 I am, yours very truly, 
 
 BVRON. 
 
 "P. S. Mr. Turner says, that the swimming from 
 Europe to Asia was 'the easiest part of the task/ I 
 doubt whether Leander found it so, as it was the 
 return ; however, he had several hours between the 
 intervals. — The argument of Mr. T. ' that, higher up 
 or lower down, the strait widens so considerably, that 
 he would save little labour by his starting,' is only 
 good for indifferent swimmers. A man of any prac- 
 tice or skill, will always consider the distance less than 
 the strength of the stream. If Ekenhead and myself 
 had thought of crossing at the narrowest point, instead 
 
OX THE CURRENT. 153 
 
 of going up to the Cape above it, we should have been 
 swept down to Tenedos. The strait is, however, not 
 extraordinarily wide, even where it broadens above 
 and below the forts; as the frigate was stationed some 
 time in the Dardanelles waiting for the firman, I 
 bathed often in the Strait, subsequently to our traject, 
 and generally on the Asiatic side, without perceiving 
 the greater strength of the opposing stream, by which 
 Mr. Turner palliates his own failure. Our amusement 
 in the small bay, which opens immediately below the 
 Asiatic fort, was to dive for the land tortoises, which 
 we flung in on purpose, as they amphibiously crawled 
 along the bottom : this does not argue any greater 
 violence of current than on the European shore. With 
 regard to the modest insinuation, that we chose the 
 European side as ' easier,' I appeal to Mr. Hob- 
 house and Admiral Bathurst, if it be true or no ; poor 
 Ekenhead being since dead. — Had we been aware of 
 any such difference of current, as is asserted, we would 
 at least have proved it, and were not likely to have 
 given it up in the twenty-five minutes of Mr. Turner's 
 own experiment/' 
 
 This memorable adventure, however, was attended 
 
154 STANZAS. 
 
 with a fit of the ague, which produced the following 
 pleasant stanzas from the noble imitator of Leander. 
 
 " If in the month of dark December 
 
 Leander, who was nightly wont 
 (What maid will not the tale remember ?) 
 
 To cross thy stream, broad Hellespont ; 
 
 " If, when the wintry tempest roared 
 
 He sped to Hero, nothing loth, 
 And thus, of old, thy current poured — 
 
 Fair Venus ! how I pity both ! 
 
 " For me, degenerate, modern wretch, 
 
 Though in the genial month of May 
 My dripping limbs I faintly stretch, 
 
 And think I've done a feat to-day. 
 
 " But since he cross'd the rapid tide, 
 
 According to the doubtful story, 
 To woo — and Lord knows what beside, 
 
 And swam for love, as I for glory ; 
 
 " 'Twere hard to say who fared the best. 
 
 Sad mortals ! thus the Gods shall plague you : 
 He lost his labour, I my jest — 
 
 For he was drown'd, and I've the ague/' 
 
FORGERIES. 155 
 
 Having explored theTroad, with Homer in his hand, 
 and satisfied himself, by personal observation, of the 
 truth of the scenes represented in the Iliad, Lord 
 Byron visited Constantinople ; and, after making some 
 excursions in Romania, returned again to Athens, 
 where he and Mr. Hobhouse parted ; the latter bending 
 his course homewards, and his noble friend resolving 
 to spend a few months longer in Greece. 
 
 During this last residence in Attica, his lordship 
 wrote several of his lighter pieces, and some part of 
 his more important works ; for the enriching of which 
 he was much indebted to the local knowledge he 
 hereby acquired. But the whole story of his voyages 
 in a ship of his own, of his residences in several 
 islands, and particularly Mitylene (where he never was 
 at all,) of his manner of study, his amours, and acts of 
 eccentric benevolence, — though the narrative was 
 alledged to be written by a person who had his in- 
 formation in the Archipelago and at Athens — was the 
 fabrication of a needy adventurer in London, who 
 wished to avail himself of the public curiosity, and to 
 get a little money by a subject of popularity. Such 
 is the tax which splendid genius is compelled to pay 
 
156 RETURN TO ENGLAND. 
 
 for celebrity ; and therefore he who is fortunate 
 enough to gain a name among his contemporaries, 
 must not be surprised at seeing things ascribed to him 
 of which he is ashamed, or of having his acquaintance 
 claimed by men whose company he would disdain. 
 Horace was troubled with one of these impertinents, 
 who stuck to him as closely as his shadow ; " Pro- 
 sequar hinc, quo nunc iter est tibi ;" and our Pope 
 was still more unlucky, in having his secret corre- 
 spondence exposed by Curll. Lord Byron, therefore, 
 may console himself with the reflection, that while the 
 forgeries and falsehoods passed off in his name did 
 him no injury, they furnished the impostor with a 
 dinner. 
 
 After an absence of near three years, our noble poet 
 re- visited his native shores; but without feeling that 
 delight which usually exhilarates the mind on re- 
 turning home ; for some of his nearest friends were 
 dead v and one beloved object, to whom he was 
 attached in his earliest youth, was separated from 
 him by an insurmountable bar. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 Advantages of Travelling, to Poets ; — Exhibited in 
 Childe Harold.— Observations on that Poem. — 
 Lines on the Princess Charlotte of Wales. — Ad- 
 dress on opening Drury-Lane Theatre. — Sale of 
 New stead Abbey ; and failure of the Contract. 
 
 FEW poets have been travellers ; and yet the advan- 
 tages arising from the observation of nature and society, 
 in all the varieties of situation and life, are inesti- 
 mably great to him who would give animation to his 
 characters and beauty to his descriptions. But as he 
 cannot pourtray accurately what he has not seen per- 
 sonally, he will be desirous of magnifying his sphere of 
 knowledge. In the language of a great writer, " the 
 poet who transfers his attention to nature and life, 
 
 
a 
 
 158 ON TRAVELLING. 
 
 ranges mountains and deserts for images and resem- 
 blances, and pictures upon his mind every tree of the 
 forest and flower of the valley. He observes with 
 equal care the crags of the rock and the pinnacles of 
 the palace. Sometimes he wanders along the mazes 
 of the rivulet, and sometimes watches the changes of 
 the summer clouds. To a poet nothing can be useless. 
 Whatever is beautiful, and whatever is dreadful, 
 must be familiar to his imagination : he must be con- 
 versant with all that is awfully vast or elegantly little ' f 
 the plants of the garden, the animals of the wood, 
 the minerals of the earth, and meteors of the sky, 
 must all concur to store his mind with inexhaustible 
 variety ; for every idea is useful for the enforcement 
 or decoration of moral or religious truth : and he who 
 knows most, will have the most power of diversifying 
 his scenes, and of gratifying his reader with remote 
 allusions and unexpected instruction. 
 
 " All the appearances of nature, therefore, the in- 
 quirer will be careful to study, and every country 
 which he surveys will contribute something to his 
 poetical powers." — " His business, however, is to exa- 
 mine not the individual, but the species ; to remark 
 
ON TRAVELLING. 159 
 
 general properties and large appearances ; he does not 
 number the streaks of the tulip, or describe the dif- 
 ferent shades in the verdure of the forest. He exhibits 
 in his portraits of nature such prominent and striking 
 features, as recall the original to every mind ; and he 
 omits the minuter circumstances which one may have 
 remarked, and another have neglected, for those cha- 
 racteristics which are alike obvious to vigilance and 
 carelessness." 
 
 Whether this sound poetical canon operated on the 
 mind of Lord Byron, when, like Imlac, in Johnson's 
 beautiful romance, he resolved to eternize his name 
 by immortal verse, is not easy to ascertain ; but cer- 
 tain it is, that no modern writer has more effectually 
 exemplified its value, as far as regards the power of 
 composition, than the author of Childe Harold. It 
 is to be regretted, however, that the noble writer did 
 not pay proper attention to the remainder of the rule, 
 and consider that " the knowledge of nature is only 
 half the task of a poet ; who must be acquainted like- 
 wise with all the modes of life. His character requires 
 that he estimates the happiness and misery of every 
 condition, observe the power of all the passions, in 
 
 $ 
 
l60 THE END OF POETRY. 
 
 all their combinations, and trace the changes of the 
 human mind as they are modified by various institu- 
 tions and accidental influences of climate or custom, 
 from the sprightliness of infancy to the despondency 
 of decrepitude." 
 
 Romantic as all this may seem, it is sober truth, 
 and the works of the greatest poets of antiquity, show 
 that the description of nature in its external forms, 
 and of art in its numerous varieties, is only subordinate 
 to the moral object of improving, as well as enter- 
 taining, the mind. The writer who disregards this 
 essential end of poetic composition, and who betrays 
 an indifference to the effect likely to be produced by 
 his representations, is guilty of a flagrant insult upon 
 social order, for which all the elegance of versification, 
 strength of language, and richness of imagery, cannot 
 make an atonement. 
 
 It was the misfortune of Lord Byron, the causes 
 and particulars of which it would be improper to ex- 
 amine, that ere he quitted his native land, his temper 
 had become sour by opposition, and gloomy by dis- 
 appointment. The most effective remedy in such 
 
DEFECTS. 161 
 
 cases, next to the operation of religious principle, is the 
 influence of good society. Of the one, unhappily, we 
 can find no trace in any of his performances from first 
 to last ; and of the latter, the only correct judgment 
 that can be formed, must be taken from the views 
 which he has himself given of the human heart, and of 
 human life. That he enlarged his stock of infor- 
 mation, and invigorated his fancy, by a long sojourn 
 on classic ground, cannot be denied ; and it is to this 
 residence in Greece, that the best of his works are 
 indebted for those beauties which will render them 
 imperishable. But if in his travels he cultivated an 
 intimacy with nature, so far as to gather an immense 
 stock of poetic materials, he did it at the expense of 
 more substantial qualities, the loss of which no genius 
 can possibly supply. 
 
 Having gone out into the world with this disposition, 
 and bent his course to a region where man is seen almost 
 in his worst condition, it ought not to excite wonder, 
 that our noble poet should fail so egregiously as he 
 has done in his moral paintings, however happily he 
 may have succeeded in descriptive scenery, and the 
 expression of the turbulent passions. 
 
 M 
 
162 MISANTHROPY. 
 
 Like the philosopher Hobbes,who expatriated him- 
 self in times of public disturbance, and afterwards lived 
 at enmity with all mankind, this young nobleman 
 conceived an ill-will to the whole species, from disgust 
 taken at the conduct of individuals ; and hence it is 
 that the personages which figure prominently in his 
 works, are so extravagant in crime as to be perfectly 
 unnatural in character. Young minds generally take 
 delight in the bright side of things, and love to frame 
 in their imagination, gay, lovely, and innocent ob- 
 jects. Lord Byron, on the contrary, at the outset of 
 his career, appears to have made it a resolution to be 
 pleased with nothing but moral deformity, and natural 
 beauty, in sketching both of which he has shown the 
 hand of a master. 
 
 The two first Cantos of his poem, entituled " Childe 
 Harold's Pilgrimage," published a few months after 
 his return to England, afford a very decisive proof of 
 this misanthropy, and perversion of moral feeling. 
 We are told by the author, that he laid the plan of 
 this poem in Albania, and prosecuted it at Athens, 
 where, beyond doubt, it received some of its finest 
 touches and most splendid ornaments. 
 
CHILD! 1IAK0LD. 163 
 
 The hint of adapting the style and stanza of 
 Spenser, to a journal of travels and opinions, was 
 taken from an observation of Dr. Beattie, who thought 
 this species of composition admirably suited to humour 
 and seriousness, description and pathos. Upon this 
 idea, Lord Byron formed the plan of giving to the 
 world a poetical history of his observations in fo- 
 reign lands ; and the thought was not only excellent 
 in itself, but so perfectly original, and calculated to 
 produce a work of so much instruction, as well as 
 pleasure, that it is only to be lamented the noble author 
 did not act perfectly up to the dignity of the senti 
 ment. Instead of this, the reader is hurt at the very 
 outset, at being compelled to become the companion 
 of an unprincipled, impenitent profligate ; for such 
 Harold is represented, contrary to all our conceptions 
 of chivalry ; and, what is worse, without the least reason 
 whatever being assigned for making the character 
 vicious, instead of virtuous and honourable. Had the 
 noble lord been writing a novel, he was at full liberty 
 to have sketched out a monster of debauchery and 
 profaneness, in as dark colours as it was possible for 
 the imagination to figure human villany. But when, 
 in undertaking a narrative of his own travels in foreign 
 
164 CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 countries, the noble lord thought proper to clothe his 
 remarks in a poetic dress, and to convey them as the 
 observations of a fictitious character, created for the 
 purpose of enlivening the piece, he should have taken 
 care to make that convenient personage a respectable, 
 and not an abandoned, being. It surely was as easy 
 to have done the one, as the other ; and for his own 
 credit, no less than for the elevation of the poem, it 
 was incumbent on the author to do so ; for otherwise, 
 how could he expect that any deference should be 
 paid to the opinions and remarks of one whom " none 
 did love ;" and for a very good reason too, consi- 
 dering that he 
 
 u was a shameless wight, 
 Sore given to revel and ungodly glee ; 
 Few earthly things found favour in his sight, 
 Save concubines and carnal company, 
 And flaunting wassailers, of high and low degree !" 
 
 Yet such is the precious associate, whose senti- 
 ments on national character we are called upon to 
 receive without questioning; though he is allowed 
 to have disgraced his own name and lineage by vices 
 of no ordinary magnitude. 
 
CHILD!* HAROLD. 165 
 
 Honest Bunyan might have taught the noble poet a 
 much better lesson ; for he sent out his pilgrim laden 
 indeed with enormities, but desirous to get rid of the 
 burthen of guilt, and to become a new man. Lord 
 Byron, on the contrary, is resolved that the reader 
 shall take his pilgrim u for better or worse," without 
 being at the trouble of making him a penitent, or con- 
 verting him to sobriety of thought, in the course of his 
 long progress. Childe Harold, in short, presents to 
 our contemplation, the anomalous compound of a 
 knight without honour, and a pilgrim without religion. 
 
 From the description given of this goodly youth's 
 paternal mansion, iC a monastic dome, condemned to 
 uses vile ;" — and from many other circumstances in 
 the piece, independently of the line of march traced 
 out in the narrative, which corresponded with the 
 route pursued by the author in his own travels, it 
 was perfectly natural that the world should consider 
 the pilgrim and the poet as intended for the same 
 person. 
 
 It would indeed have been strange if any other 
 conclusion had been drawn from such remarkable 
 
1 6'6* CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 coincidences: and therefore, when the noble lord 
 felt uneasy at the suspicion, and was anxious to evade 
 the application, he must have perceived the error 
 into which he had fallen, and the gross indecorum he 
 had committed, in obtruding such an offensive cha- 
 racter before the eye of the public, for no moral object 
 whatever. But let us hear what the author himself 
 says by way of apology for the creation of this 
 mirror of knighthood : 
 
 " I now leave Childe Harold to live his day, such 
 as he is ; it had been more agreeable, and certainly 
 more easy, to have drawn an amiable character. It 
 had been easy to varnish over his faults ; to make 
 him do more and express less : but he never was in- 
 tended as an example, further than to show that early 
 perversion of mind and morals leads to satiety of past 
 pleasures, and disappointment in new ones, and that 
 even the beauties of nature, and the stimulus of travel, 
 (except ambition, the most powerful of all excitements,) 
 are lost on a soul so constituted or rather mis- 
 directed. Had I proceeded with the poem, this cha- 
 racter would have deepened as he drew to the close ; 
 for the outline which I once meant to fill up for him 
 
DESCRIPTIVE SCENERY. 1 67 
 
 was, with some exceptions, the sketch of a modern 
 Timon, perhaps a poetical Zeluco." 
 
 This is an ingenious, but extremely forced plea for 
 doing a gratuitous act of indiscretion, the necessity or 
 propriety of which the author dares not attempt to 
 justify. All that the excuse amounts to is this, that 
 having drawn a reprobate, he did not choose to be at 
 the trouble either of withdrawing or reforming him ; 
 though it is admitted that this Palmer without grace, 
 is a garrulous companion " who says much and does 
 little." It is to be hoped, however, that there are few 
 persons so devoid of taste and sensibility as to take 
 pleasure in sentiments avowedly conveyed to them 
 through an impure channel ; or who would thank the 
 writer that should engage to instruct them by the 
 urbanity of a Timon or the morality of a Zeluco. 
 
 Having said so much upon the character which 
 deforms the poem, it becomes a more pleasing 
 task to notice the merits of the composition. The 
 first Canto is occupied chiefly by descriptive 
 sketches of the scenery observed by the noble author 
 in his travels through Portugal and Spain; which 
 
168 SUBLIME FIGURE. 
 
 pictures, particularly of the mountains behind Lisbon, 
 and of the rich valleys in the interior, are exquisitely 
 beautiful ; but would have been still more so had the 
 reflections interspersed been less severe and ludicrous. 
 The representation of the Daemon of Folly presiding 
 at the famed convention of Cintra, is of the low 
 burlesque cast ; and would have disgraced Ariosto ; 
 though it seems to have been one of the author's 
 studied and worst imitations of Spenser, forgetting 
 that the Faery Queen being altogether an allegory, 
 gave the poet full liberty to embody all the passions 
 according to the effects they generally produce. Of a 
 different description is the personification of " Battle," 
 stamping his foot on the rock overhanging the plain 
 of Talavera; 
 
 ft Lo ! where the giant on the mountain stands, 
 His blood-red tresses deepening in the sun, 
 With death shot glowing in his hands, 
 And eye that scorcheth all it glares upon ; 
 Restless it rolls, now fix'd, and now anon 
 Flashing afar — and at his iron feet 
 Destruction comes to mark what deeds are done, 
 For on this morn three potent nations meet 
 To shed before his shrine the blood he deems most sweet." 
 
TALAVKIIA. 169 
 
 A bolder prosopopoeia, or one better imagined and 
 expressed, cannot easily be found in the whole range 
 of ancient and modern poetry. Unlike the " Plume 
 of Horror,'' or the " Eagle-winged Victory," de- 
 scribed by our great epic poet, this gigantic figure is a 
 distinct object, perfect in lineaments, tremendous in 
 operation, and vested with all the attributes calculated 
 to excite terror and admiration. 
 
 What follows, however, mars the sublime grandeur 
 of the piece ; for instead of the natural emotions 
 of pity and commiseration, which should arise on 
 viewing the field of suffering, the poet endeavours to 
 excite a sneer of contempt and ridicule at the ex- 
 pense of humanity ; when, turning from the lifeless 
 remains of his fellow creatures heaped together on the 
 ensanguined plain, he exclaims, 
 
 " Here shall they rot — Ambition's honour'd fools !" 
 
 Yet the noble author could be pathetic when he 
 pleased ; and this very Canto exhibits some touches 
 of sensibility on the losses which he had sustained, in 
 the death of friends; though the disposition to be 
 
170 POETIC BEAUTIES. 
 
 sarcastic breaks out so quickly after, as almost to 
 render the sincerity of his serious feelings doubtful. 
 
 In the second Canto of the poem, the graphical 
 powers of the author shine forth to still greater advan- 
 tage than in the former part, and it is hardly pos- 
 sible for genius to exceed the descriptions of the ocean 
 which are given in the narrative of the voyage up the 
 Mediterranean. The sea appears to inspire the 
 noble poet with more than usual animation ; and he 
 takes a delight in all that belongs to it, whether it be 
 the dashing of the waves against the cliffs, the roaring 
 of the winds, or the motion of the vessel as she rides 
 proudly over the bounding billows. 
 
 The account of Albania, of AH Pacha's court, and 
 of the manners of the people, is picturesque and 
 amusing; but it is amidst the ruins of Athens that 
 Lord Byron finds himself in the seat of mental en- 
 joyment. Here he paints with a rapid and vivid 
 pencil, the rich and varied scenes extended before his 
 eye, and those which crowd upon his imagination. 
 But if the one are delineated with accuracy and spirit, 
 the others exhibit a sombrous and sceptical hue. 
 
SCEPTICISM. 171 
 
 Thus, in moralizing upon the vicissitudes which 
 Greece has undergone, the poet says, 
 
 " Even Gods must yield — religions take their turn : 
 'Twas Jove's 'tis Mahomet's ; —and other creeds 
 Will rise with other years, till man shall learn 
 Vainly his incense soars, his victim bleeds ; 
 Poor child of doubt and death, whose hope is built on reeds." J 
 
 Much more, and worse, is added of the same ap- 
 palling strain, tending, if it has any meaning at all, 
 to bury in the dust every hope of immortality, and to 
 destroy the whole of man's being with the " shattered 
 cell" which he tenanted. 
 
 That one so young in years, of a liberal education, 
 religiously brought up, and born to a noble inheritance, 
 should thus early have his mind imbued with the 
 poison of infidelity, is lamentable; but there is some- 
 thing in an open, unblushing avowal of impiety, that 
 scares even those who profess indifference to modes 
 of faith, and makes them ashamed of the association. 
 The opponents of revelation have generally gone to 
 work insidiously, and proceeded by degrees from 
 doubt to Atheism; but still in all that downward, 
 
172 IMPIETY. 
 
 serpentine course they have endeavoured to save ap- 
 pearances, and to cover their design against religion 
 under the mask of some belief in a future state. Here, 
 however, seated on a broken column, perhaps where 
 Plato reasoned sublimely upon the internal evidences 
 of the soul's immortality, is a poet who strives to 
 cheat both himself and his neighbour out of that 
 anchor of hope, and guide of life. Instead of deriving 
 any consolation from this spring of virtue and prin- 
 ciple of consolation, he thus treats with cruel mockery 
 the very expectation of him who lifts his eye to 
 Heaven- 
 
 " Is't not enough, unhappy thing ! to know 
 Thou art? Is this a boon so kindly given, 
 That being, thou wouldst be again, and go 
 Thou know'st not, reck'st not to what region, so 
 On earth no more, but mingled with the skies ? 
 Still wilt thou dream on future joy and woe ? 
 Regard and weigh yon dust before it flies ; 
 That little urn saith more than thousand homilies." 
 
 These are not the profane musings of a fictitious 
 personage, but the deliberate and formal reflections of 
 the noble author, while meditating on the revolutions of 
 
WANT OF JUDGMENT. 173 
 
 ages, among the ruins of Athens. Childe Harold, the 
 wandering creature of the poet's imagination, appears 
 very little after the introductory stanzas in which his 
 evil qualities are so faithfully pourtrayed ; and here 
 he recedes altogether from the view : so that even 
 the flimsy excuse is wanting that might be made for 
 the ascription of proper language to particular cha- 
 racters. Though Lord Byron has been at the pains 
 of denying that he had any real person in view when 
 he took Harold for his hero, certain it is that for the 
 most objectionable sentiments in the poem he is 
 himself solely accountable ; and he must therefore be 
 considered as having brought them forward, not dra- 
 matically or by virtue of a poetical licence, but as 
 his own unequivocal opinions. 
 
 In regard to the poem itself, the noble author would 
 have acted judiciously in closing it with his first tra- 
 vels ; for the two subsequent Cantos, which appeared 
 at long intervals afterwards, have so little connexion 
 with the former parts, and are written in a manner 
 so very different from them, that the continuity is 
 entirely lost. 
 
174 ANACHRONISMS. 
 
 Two very material objections have been made 
 against this celebrated performance; the one is a 
 charge of gross anachronism in the representation of 
 modern events, and existing characters, under the 
 antique garb of the age of chivalry ; and the other is 
 the profuse adoption of obsolete archaisms, which, 
 however proper they might be in the time of Spenser, 
 though even then they were ancient, are perfectly un- 
 couth and ridiculous as applied to living manners. 
 
 The success of the poem must have been highly 
 gratifying to the writer, who now saw his fame se- 
 cured, and his character as a poet of the first order 
 effectually acknowledged; not only in the repeated 
 demands for new impressions of his work, but in the 
 suffrages of the critics ; not even omitting those who 
 had so prematurely sentenced him to perpetual silence 
 and oblivion. 
 
 Yet with all this celebritv, and the stock of know- 
 ledge that Lord Byron now possessed, he was cer- 
 tainly deficient in one branch of science, without 
 which the most brilliant genius is little better than a 
 meteor. A man may see much of the world, but 
 
INSENSIBILITY. 175 
 
 while he avoids cultivating the means of utility, and 
 so long as he neglects the opportunities of turning his 
 talents to the public advantage, whatever be his repu- 
 tation on the score of wit, he will gain little respect 
 for his wisdom. 
 
 Poetry is an elegant art, but it ought not to be 
 made the business of life ; especially by those who, 
 from their condition and circumstances, are called 
 upon to the discharge of high and varied duties. 
 That the .noble author of Childe Harold had pro- 
 fited little by his travels, in the study of man and 
 political society, was evident from the connexions 
 which he formed, and the pursuits he entered into, 
 after his return to England. It seemed as if the 
 crisis of all nations affected him no more than the 
 storm of the elements ; — and instead of taking any 
 interest in the conflict upon which the existence of his 
 own country depended, he showed, by his writings at 
 this awful period, a manifest indifference to her fate. 
 Where such an insensibility to national glory pre- 
 vailed, it could not excite astonishment that the poet 
 should be one of those who thought themselves en- 
 
176 PRINCESS CHARLOTTE. 
 
 titled by their talents to insult the throne with impu- 
 nity. But it was beneath the character of Lord 
 Byron as a man of genius, it was degrading to him 
 as a British Peer, and it was unpardonable in one so 
 young in years, and whose course of life had by his own 
 account been far enough from irreproachable, to pub- 
 lish, as he did, two scandalous stanzas in a newspaper, 
 addressed to the Hope of England, not for the pur- 
 pose of complimenting that accomplished Princess, 
 but to convey the most stinging and shameful satire 
 against her august father. 
 
 If any thing could possibly add to the indecency 
 of this libellous act; it was that of including the ob- 
 noxious verses in the collection of the author's works, 
 after the death of the lamented personage to whom 
 they were inscribed ; and whose feeling mind, if ever 
 she read the abominable lines, must have been sorely 
 wounded by the perusal. 
 
 It would be difficult to imagine a motive for an 
 outrage so flagrantly offensive to every prescription of 
 good manners ; but let it be what it may, neither the 
 
DRURY LANE, 17 
 
 heat of party, nor the resentment excited by real or 
 fancied wrongs, can ever palliate an impertinent 
 inroad upon the privacies of domestic life. 
 
 Another instance of perverted talent, though of a 
 different description, exhibited by the author of Childe 
 Harold about this time, was in the poem which he 
 wrote to be delivered at the opening of Drury-Lane 
 Theatre. It is well known that the renovation of 
 that establishment, after the conflagration which 
 levelled the former building to the ground, was an 
 object of such public interest, as to occasion a com- 
 petition among the poets of the day for the honour of 
 writing the introductory address. That distinction fell 
 to the lot of Lord Byron, but with what justice, the 
 following lines will show : 
 
 " In one dread night, our city saw, and sigh'd 
 Bow'd to the dust, the drama's tower of pride ; 
 In one short hour beheld the blazing fane, 
 Apollo sink, and Shakspeare cease to reign. 
 Ye who beheld (Oh sight admired and mourn'd, 
 Whose radiance mock'd the ruin it adorn'd,) 
 Through clouds of fire the massy fragments riven, 
 Like Israel's pillar, chase the night from Heaven ; 
 Saw the long column of revolving flames 
 Shake its red shadow o'er the startled Thames." 
 
 N 
 
178 PROFANE ALLUSION. 
 
 That imagination must have been put miserably to 
 its shifts, for a comparison on such a subject, when it 
 could find none more apt to the purpose, than the 
 miraculous guide of the chosen people through the 
 wilderness. Setting aside the profanity of the allusion, 
 though it was an act of indecorum (to say the least of 
 it) which ought to have caused an instant rejection of 
 the piece, the figure chosen is the least analogous that 
 could possibly have been adopted ; — for Israel's pillar 
 was an object of trust, confidence, and preservation to 
 those who followed it: whereas the fiery column, 
 which " shook its red shadow" so furiously over the 
 British metropolis, spread terror in every direction. 
 
 But it is inconceivable how any mind, animated 
 by a proper respect for serious things, or paying 
 the smallest deference to the religion of his country, 
 could ever have thought of bringing together things 
 and circumstances so totally dissimilar in themselves, 
 and so improper on all accounts to be made illus- 
 trative of each other. 
 
 The rest of this hasty production is entitled to no 
 remark ; being made up of common-place allusions 
 
SALE OF NEWSTEAD. 179 
 
 — the customary appeal to liberality — and promises 
 of continued exertions to deserve the public pa- 
 tronage. 
 
 It was in this year that Lord Byron endeavoured 
 to dispose of the seat of Newstead Abbey, with the 
 manorial lands immediately appertaining to it; and 
 accordingly the whole property was sold for one 
 hundred and fifty thousand pounds. The purchaser, 
 however, not being able to make good the payments 
 within the stipulated time, the noble owner entered 
 again some time after upon the possession of his an* 
 cient mansion; in addition to which he had, soon 
 afterwards, the valuable acquisition of a coal-mine, 
 worth fifty thousand pounds, discovered upon his 
 estate in Rochdale. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Publication of " The Giaour." — Plan of the Poem. 
 — Its beauties and defects. — Use made of the 
 story of Sisera. — Account of the " Bride of 
 Abydos."—Its dangerous tendency. 
 
 THE success of Childe Harold, instead of stimu- 
 lating the author to hasten the completion of his plan, 
 encouraged him to publish within a few months 
 another poem, of a very different construction, and in 
 some respects of a far superior character. This was 
 the Turkish tale of " The Giaour," which Lord 
 Byron inscribed to the author of The Pleasures of 
 Memory, " as a slight, but sincere, token of admi- 
 ration of his genius, respect for his character, and 
 gratitude for his friendship." 
 
 The story is simple, and very indistinctly told, but 
 developes itself, at the conclusion, in a manner which 
 
 A 
 
THE GIAOUR. 181 
 
 the reader must have easily anticipated. Hassan, a 
 powerful Emir, discovers an intrigue between his 
 favourite mistress Leila and a young Venetian, to 
 whom no other name is given in the poem, than the 
 common appellation of u the Giaour,'' or Infidel, by 
 which Christians are called, out of contempt, among 
 the zealous Mussulmans. The lover escapes with 
 difficulty ; but the poor female slave is carried off in a 
 sack, and thrown into the sea. In the mean time, 
 the fugitive gains the mountains, joins a band of rob- 
 bers, and at length becomes their chief. At the head 
 of this company, or tribe of Arnaouts, he has an 
 opportunity of wreaking his revenge upon Hassan, 
 who recognizes him in the fray, but falls beneath the 
 arm of the detested Giaour. The victor then quits 
 his predatory course of life, and throws himself into 
 a monastery ; not, however, in the spirit of devotion 
 and penitence, but in a gloomy fit of despondence ; still 
 preserving under the cowl all the ferocity of his former 
 character. In this state he dies, after revealing the par- 
 ticulars of his story, and rejecting alike all the counsels 
 and consolations of the monk to whom he makes his 
 confession. Such is the outline of this fable, as the 
 
182 THE GIAOUR, 
 
 author calls his poem ; but he has made ample 
 amends for the irregularity of the narrative, and the 
 deficiency of incident, by copiousness of reflection, 
 and richness of description. 
 
 The performance opens with an indignant apos- 
 trophe to Greece, whose ancient and present state is 
 forcibly contrasted : 
 
 " Clime of the unforgotten brave, 
 Whose land, from plain to mountain cave, 
 Was Freedom's home, or Glory's grave ! 
 Shrine of the mighty can it be, 
 That this is all remains of thee ?" 
 
 
 The poet then goes on to paint more minutely and 
 severely the character of the modern Greeks, who are 
 represented as " callous, save to crime." 
 
 Of the low state to which the people are reduced, 
 and the insecurity of even the humblest of them, a 
 more striking instance could hardly be given than the 
 picture of the fisherman working his wary course, 
 after a long day of labour, to the shore, yet suspicious 
 
THE GIAOUR. 183 
 
 of every point he passes, and dreading every speck 
 that appears on the horizon : 
 
 * Far, dark, along the blue sea glancing, 
 The shadows of the rocks advancing 
 Start on the fisher's eye, like boat 
 Of island pirate, or Mainote; 
 And, fearful for his light caique, 
 He shuns the near but doubtful creek : 
 Though worn and weary with his toil, 
 And cumberd with his scaly spoil, 
 Slowly, yet strongly, plies the oar, 
 Till Port Leone's safer shore 
 Receives him by the lovely light 
 That best becomes an eastern night." 
 
 Nothing can be better imagined, or more happily 
 expressed, than the manner in which the unhappy 
 victim of eastern jealousy is sacrificed : 
 
 " Sullen it plunged, and slowly sank ; 
 The calm wave rippled to the bank : 
 I watch'd it, as it sank — methought 
 Some motion from the current caught 
 Bestirr'd it more — 'twas but the beam 
 That checquer'd o'er the living stream. 
 
184 BEAUTIES. 
 
 I gazed till, vanishing from view, 
 
 Like lessening pebble it withdrew : 
 
 Still less and less, a speck of white 
 
 That gemm'd the tide, then mock'd the sight — 
 
 And all the hidden secrets sleep, 
 
 Known but to Genii of the deep, 
 
 Which, trembling in the coral caves, 
 
 They dare not whisper to the waves." 
 
 The account of the conflict between Hassan and 
 his inveterate enemy, is wrought up with great ani- 
 mation; and presents to the reader's mind a very 
 distinct picture of the danger to which travellers are 
 exposed in the east, and of the manner in which hos- 
 tilities are carried on when they are forced to contend 
 for their lives. But the noble author of this fine 
 poem has, in one instance, copied the sacred history 
 literally, and that without noticing the circumstance 
 in the slightest degree, in his appendix of notes. It 
 is where the mother of the emir Hassan looks out 
 anxiously for the arrival of her son : 
 
 " She saw the dews of eve besprinkling 
 
 The pasture green beneath her eye ; 
 She saw the planets faintly twinkling, 
 
 * Tis twilight — sure his train is nigh !' 
 
IMITATIONS. 185 
 
 She could not rest in the garden bower 
 
 But gazed through the grate of his steepest tower ; 
 
 * Why comes he not — and his steeds are fleet, 
 
 Nor shrink they from the summer heat ? 
 
 Why sends not the bridegroom his promised gift? 
 
 Is his heart more cold, or his barb less swift?' 
 
 " ' Oh ! false reproach ! yon Tartar now 
 
 Has gain'd our nearest mountain's brow ; ; 
 
 And warily the steep descends, 
 
 And now within the valley bends ; 
 
 And he bears the gift at his saddle-bow — 
 
 How could I deem his courser slow ! 
 
 Right well my largess shall repay 
 
 His welcome speed, and weary way.' " 
 
 This is a beautiful painting, but it is not original : 
 for, as Parson Evans says, the " author has prayed 
 his pible well ;" so far, at least, as to select from the 
 sacred records a passage well adapted to poetry. 
 
 " The mother of Sisera looked out at a window, 
 and cried through the lattice, Why is his chariot so 
 long in coming ? why tarry the wheels of his cha- 
 riots? Her wise ladies answered her; yea, she 
 returned answer to herself, Have they not sped? 
 
186 IMITATION'S. 
 
 have they not divided the prey? to every man a dam- 
 sel or two ? to Sisera, a prey of divers colours, a prey 
 of divers colours of needlework, of divers colours of 
 needlework on both sides, meet for the necks of them 
 that take the spoil?'' Judges, ch. v, 28 — 30. 
 
 This paraphrase is too plain to require any further 
 observation ; and yet the author would have acted 
 wisely, if he had caught the spirit rather than the 
 precise words of the inspired historian. Lord Byron 
 has also been accused of having taken the picture of 
 the monastic but impenitent Giaour from the cha- 
 racter of Schedoni, in Mrs. Radcliffe's romance of 
 " The Italian ;" and it must be admitted that the resem- 
 blance is so strong as to preclude all idea of a casual 
 coincidence. On the dying confession of the hero of 
 this poem, the less that is said the better. It is of a 
 piece with all the scenes where the noble poet has had 
 an opportunity of showing a proper respect for religion. 
 In a note upon the interlocution of the Friar and the 
 Giaour, the author speaks out thus broadly and 
 offensively : " The Monk's sermon is omitted. It 
 seems to have had so little effect upon the patient, 
 that it could have no hope from the reader. It may 
 
BRIDE OF ABYDOS. 187 
 
 be sufficient to say, that it was of a customary length, 
 (as may be perceived from the interruptions and un- 
 easiness of the penitent,) and was delivered in the 
 nasal tone of all orthodox preachers." 
 
 Within a very short space, the " Giaour" was 
 followed by the publication of another Turkish tale, 
 entitled " The Bride of Abydos." The poem differs 
 essentially from the former productions of the noble 
 author. It is not, like them, rambling, episodical, and 
 metaphysical ; but consists of a story regularly con- 
 structed, and carried straight forward to its proper 
 catastrophe, with almost a rigid regard to the dra- 
 matic unities of time and place. 
 
 Giaffir, the Pacha of a province on the Asiatic 
 side of the Dardanelles, has two children, as on and 
 daughter, of whom the latter only is a favourite. 
 The tale opens with a representation of the old chief 
 holding a Divan, and directing Haroun, the keeper of 
 the Haram, to bring his daughter Zuleika into the 
 council-chamber from her apartment. At this moment 
 Selim, the son of Giaffir, knowing that his sister was 
 walking in the cypress-grove, informs his father of it, 
 
188 BRIDE OF ABYDOS. 
 
 and acknowledges that it was at his solicitation she 
 had left the women's tower to enjoy with him the 
 beauty of nature. This information, instead of plea- 
 sing the father, provokes him to vent the bitterest re- 
 proaches upon his son, for indulging in effeminate 
 pursuits : 
 
 " Son of a slave ! — the Pacha said — 
 From unbelieving mother bred; 
 Vain were a father's hope to see 
 Aught that becomes a man in thee. 
 Thou, when thine arm should bend the bow, 
 And hurl the dart, and curb the steed, 
 Thou Greek in'soul if not in creed, 
 Must pore where bubbling waters flow, 
 And watch unfolding roses blow ! 
 Would that yon orb, whose matin glow 
 Thy listless eyes so much admire, 
 Would lend thee something of his fire ! 
 Thou, who would see this battlement 
 By Christian cannon piece-meal rent — r . 
 Nay, tamely view old StamboPs wall 
 Before the dogs of Moscow fall — 
 Nor strike one stroke for life and death 
 Against the curs of Nazareth ! — 
 Go — let thy less than woman's hand 
 Assume the distaff — not the brand." 
 
THE STORY. 189 
 
 This torrent of wrath, though it calls forth no 
 reply in words, acts in such a manner upon the youth, 
 that his father cannot help perceiving in the resent- 
 ment of his eye, the workings of a rebellious spirit. 
 
 The suspicion thus raised, produces a fresh storm 
 of angry invective, which is only put a stop to by the 
 entrance of Zuleika, who hears, with grief, her 
 father's intention of marrying her immediately to 
 Carasman Oglou, the Pacha of Magnesia. From 
 the Divan, old Giaffir proceeds to the review of his 
 troops, while his daughter retires to her room, there to 
 mourn her hapless destiny. An interview follows 
 between her and Selim, of the most tender description, 
 in which Zuleika shows so much more of the lover, 
 than the sister, that her feelings of affection are ex- 
 pressed even with a degree of warmth, which would 
 hardly become any female to the legitimate object of 
 her choice. Mutual vows of unchangeable attachment 
 take place ; and the parties separate with the pledge 
 to meet again at twilight, in the gardens of the 
 Haram. The second Canto opens with a description 
 of evening, and a parallel between the story of Selim 
 and Zuleika, and that of Hero and Leander, the idea 
 
190 DISCOVERY. 
 
 of which we may suppose arose from local circum- 
 stances. 
 
 At this meeting, Selim reveals the particulars of his 
 birth, and surprises Zuleika with the information, that 
 instead of being her brother, he is only her cousin ; 
 his father Abdallah having been poisoned by Giaffir, 
 to get possession of his property and dignity ; after 
 which, to avoid discovery, the fratricide brought up 
 his nephew as his own son. This story Selim had 
 learnt from Haroun, the chief of the Haram guard, 
 by whose assistance also he had been enabled, while 
 Giaffir was upon a distant expedition, to range at 
 liberty for some time ; during which he visited the 
 islands of the Archipelago, and became the leader of 
 a band of pirates. These trusty followers he thought 
 proper to leave in due season, that his absence might 
 not be missed by Giaffir ; though he still continued to 
 keep up a correspondence with them, and that with a 
 view of making the connexion serviceable to his 
 design, of carrying off Zuleika to a place of safety, 
 and making her his bride. The resolution of Giaffir 
 to marry his daughter to the Carasman, hastens the 
 crisis of the piece. The elopement of Zuleika is dis- 
 
CATASTROPHE. 191 
 
 covered ; and just as the pirates' boat reaches the 
 place where the lovers are, the Pacha also arrives with 
 his train : Selim having secured his bethrothed spouse 
 in the cave, rushes forth to meet his comrades, 
 but— 
 
 " One bound he made and gain'd the sand — 
 
 Already at his feet hath sunk 
 
 The foremost of the prying band; — 
 
 A gasping head, a quivering trunk. 
 
 Another falls, but round him close 
 
 A swarming circle of his foes : 
 
 From right to left his path he cleft, 
 
 And almost met the meeting wave ; — 
 
 His boat appears — not five oars' length — 
 
 His comrades strain with desperate strength. — 
 
 Oh ! are they yet in time to save ? 
 
 His feet the foremost breakers lave ; 
 His band are plunging in the bay, 
 Their sabres glitter through the spray; 
 Wet, wild, unwearied, to the strand 
 They struggle — now they touch the land ! 
 They come — 'tis but to add to slaughter, 
 His heart's best blood is on the water !" 
 
 Thus Selim falls by the hand of his father's mur- 
 derer, who, however, is so far punished that he finds 
 
192 AFFECTING PIECE. 
 
 his daughter lifeless in the cave; having been over- 
 whelmed by the terror of the scene, grief for her be- 
 loved, and the dread of what would befall her from 
 the ire of her parent. 
 
 Such is the romance of the Bride of Abydos, the 
 poetry of which cannot fail to charm every reader of 
 taste ; though the improbabilities of the tale are great, 
 and the morality of it more than questionable. One 
 of the finest descriptions in the piece is that of the 
 dead body of Selim, floating on the Hellespont : 
 
 " Ye ! who would o'er his relics weep, 
 Go — seek him where the surges sweep 
 Their burthen round Sigaeum's steep, 
 
 And cast on Lemnos' shore : 
 The sea-birds shriek above the prey, 
 O'er which their hungry beaks delay ; 
 As, shaken on the restless pillow, 
 His head heaves with the heaving billow — » 
 That hand — whose motion is not life — 
 Yet feebly seems to menace strife — 
 Flung by the tossing tide on high, 
 
 Then levelPd with the wave — 
 What recks it, though that corse shall lie 
 
 Within a living grave ? 
 
SUPERSTITION. J 93 
 
 The bird that tears that prostrate form, 
 Hath only robb'd the meaner worm." 
 
 This highly wrought dramatic romance, which in 
 many respects will remind the reader of the Northern 
 Minstrel, concludes with such a traditional article of 
 belief as might naturally be expected to prevail in a 
 land of superstition. 
 
 " There late was laid a marble stone ; 
 
 Eve saw it placed — the morrow gone ! 
 
 It was no mortal arm that bore 
 
 That deep-fix'd pillar to the shore ; 
 
 For there, as Helle's legends tell, 
 
 Next morn 'twas found where Selim fell — 
 
 Lash'd by the tumbling tide, whose wave 
 
 Denied his bones a holier grave ; — 
 
 And there, by night, reclined, 'tis said, 
 
 Is seen a ghastly turban'd head ; — 
 
 And hence extended by the billow, 
 
 Tis named " the Pirate-phantom's pillow V* 
 
 Where first it lay — that morning flower 
 
 Hath flourish'd — flourisheth this hour — 
 Alone — and dewy — coldly pure and pale — 
 As weeping beauty's cheek at sorrow's tale." 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Publication of u The Corsair" — Beauties and de- 
 fects of that Poem. — Supposed origin of the 
 Piece. — Dedication to Thomas Moore. — Libe- 
 rality of Lord Byron* — The Story of Conrad re- 
 sumed in " Lara."— Character of that Poem. — 
 Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte. 
 
 SO rapid and prolific was the genius of Lord Byron, 
 on his return from the Levant, that scarcely had 
 public curiosity been awakened and delighted by one 
 poem, before another made its appearance, and com- 
 manded fresh applause. If IC Childe Harold" exhibited 
 originality of thought, eccentricity of character, and 
 richness of description, the " Giaour" excited a stronger 
 interest by its circumstances ; while the " Bride of Aby- 
 dos" had the higher poetic merit of unity of design, 
 vigour of expression, and tenderness of sentiment. 
 
THK CORSAIR. 1 §5 
 
 Rising, as it were in the scale of emulation, the 
 noble author now put forth his strength in a new 
 effort; and while the world was as yet divided in 
 opinion to which of his pieces the palm of pre- 
 eminence should be ascribed, he produced a poem 
 surpassing his former productions in strength of com- 
 position, perspicuity of narrative, and numerical har- 
 mony. Still attached to the romantic scenes among 
 which he had so long wandered, and fond of pour- 
 traying man as, perhaps, he had too often seen him 
 in those regions, the poet took for the hero of his 
 piece a piratical chief, who, at the head of a despe- 
 rate band, had fixed his seat in one of those small 
 islands which spot the bosom of the iEgean sea. 
 Of Conrad the " Corsair," whose name on every 
 shore was famed and feared, it is said that he was — 
 
 " a man of loneliness and mystery, 
 Scarce seen to smile and seldom heard to sigh— - 
 Robust, but not Herculean — to the sight 
 No giant frame sets forth his common height ; 
 Yet in the whole, who paused to look again, 
 Saw more than marks the crowd of vulgar men ; 
 They gaze and marvel how — and still confess 
 That thus it is, but why they cannot guess. 
 
196 THE CORSAIR. 
 
 Sun-burnt his cheek — his forehead high and pale, — 
 
 The sable curls in wild profusion veil ; 
 
 And oft perforce his rising lip reveals 
 
 The haughtier thought it curbs, but scarce conceals. 
 
 Though smooth his voice, and calm his general mien, 
 
 Still seems there something he would not have seen. 
 
 His features' deepening lines and varying hue 
 
 At times attracted, yet perplex'd the view ; 
 
 As if within that murkiness of mind 
 
 Work'd feelings fearful, and yet undefined ; 
 
 Such might it be— that none could truly tell — 
 
 Too close inquiry his stern glance could quell. 
 
 There breathe but few whose aspect could defy 
 
 The full encounter of his searching eye : 
 
 He had the skill, when Cunning's gaze would seek 
 
 To probe his heart and watch his changing cheek, 
 
 At once the observer's purpose to espy, 
 
 And on himself roll back his scrutiny ; 
 
 Lest he to Conrad rather should betray 
 
 Some secret thought, than drag that chief's to day. 
 
 There was a laughing devil in his sneer, 
 
 That raised emotions both of rage and fear ; 
 
 And where his frown of hatred darkly fell, 
 
 Hope withering fled — and mercy sigh'd farewell." 
 
 Yet with all these demoniacal qualities, — enough, 
 one would suppose, to drive from him all human kind, — 
 
THE CORSAIR. 197 
 
 we are told that Conrad felt the passion of love, and, 
 what is more extraordinary, that he was beloved again. 
 For this " man of one virtue and a thousand crimes," 
 the amiable Medora is represented as feeling the 
 most impassioned affection, while Conrad, with all 
 his misanthropy, repaid her love with constancy. 
 
 The desire of Medora that Conrad should quit his 
 dangerous vocation, is perfectly natural ; nor less so 
 is her intense anxiety for his safety when he is roving 
 in quest of prey : but still there is something out of 
 the usual current of things in the fondness with which 
 this heart of excessive sensibility yearns over a ruffian. 
 In their last meeting, just after the return of the 
 pirates from a cruize, Medora thus relates the fears 
 and hopes that had agitated her mind : 
 
 " Oh ! many a night, on this lone couch reclined, 
 My dreaming fear with storms hath wing'd the wind, 
 And deem'd the breath that faintly fann'd thy sail— 
 The murmuring prelude of the ruder gale ; 
 Though soft, — it seem'd the low prophetic dirge, 
 That mourn'd thee floating on the savage surge : 
 Still would I rise, to rouse the beacon fire, 
 Lest spies less true should let the blaze expire ; 
 
198 THE CORSAIR. 
 
 And many a restless hour out-watch'd each star, 
 And morning came — and still thou wert afar. 
 Oh ! how the chill blast on my bosom flew, 
 And day broke dreary on my troubled view, 
 And still I gazed and gazed, and not a prow 
 Was granted to my tears, my truth, my vow ! 
 At length, 'twas noon, I hail'd and blest the mast 
 That met my sight — it near'd — alas ! it past, 
 Another came — Oh, God ! 'twas thine at last ! — 
 Would that those days were over ! wilt thou ne'er, 
 My Conrad ! learn the joys of peace to share ? 
 Sure thou hast more than wealth, and many a home, 
 As bright as this, invites us not to roam : 
 Thou know'st it is not peril that I fear, 
 I only tremble when thou art not here ; 
 Then not for mine, but that far dearer life, 
 Which flies from love, and languishes for strife — 
 How strange that heart, to me so tender still, 
 Should war with nature and its better will I" 
 
 All this is beautifully pathetic; nor is it in the 
 power of language to go beyond it in affectionate ex- 
 pression and earnestness of persuasion : still, when 
 we view the object to which it is addressed, and con- 
 sider him such as the poet has drawn his person and 
 character, we cannot help wondering at the sort of 
 love that could unite two hearts apparently so ill 
 
THE CORSAIR. K99 
 
 fitted to each other. At the moment that Medora 
 thus tenderly hung over Conrad, and strove to allure 
 him to a peaceful life, she knew that he was a dark 
 designing villain, who made it his business to prowl 
 about for the ruin of the helpless, and ready to 
 murder all that presumed to defend their property. 
 Yet the woman who is made to feel thus passionately, 
 never once alludes to the wickedness of Conrad's oc- 
 cupation, nor endeavours in any way to convince him 
 of the injustice of his conduct. She trembles for his 
 personal safety, but she has no concern for those who 
 suffer by his outrages ; and the only inducement that 
 she offers to draw him from the predatory course of 
 life which he follows, is that he has already realized 
 wealth more than sufficient for his wants. Where 
 such is the morality of the best character in the 
 piece, what shall be thought of the love which is so 
 finely exhibited ? 
 
 Conrad, however, though not unmoved by the 
 expostulations of Medora, ventures out again the 
 same night upon another expedition. Having received 
 intelligence that Seyd Pacha has collected an arma- 
 ment in the bay of Coron, for the purpose of exter- 
 
200 THE CORSAIR. 
 
 minating the nest of pirates ; the Corsair resolves to 
 anticipate the attack by surprising the chief in his 
 place of rendezvous. Accordingly before midnight 
 he and his squadron arrive at the bay, where the Pa- 
 cha's galleys are lying unsuspicious of any danger. 
 
 Conrad, in the dress of a dervise, then steals on 
 shore, and gains admission to Seyd, by pretending 
 to have escaped from the pirates, whose numbers and 
 destination he is in the act of describing, when his 
 people set fire to the ships of the Pacha, who instantly 
 perceives the treacherous character of his visitor, and 
 orders him to be seized. Conrad, upon this, throws off 
 his disguise, and maintains his ground bravely, till his 
 comrades arrive, and put the Ottomans to the rout ; 
 at which moment the palace is in flames. In the 
 midst of the conflagration, Conrad, hearing female 
 cries, hastens to the Haram, and rescues all the women 
 from the devouring element, bearing in his own arms 
 Gulnare, the chief favourite of the Pacha, to a place 
 of safety. At this moment the Turks rally, and, being 
 superior in numbers, attack the pirates, whom they de- 
 feat after an obstinate conflict, and take Conrad pri- 
 soner. The Pacha, exasperated by his loss, decrees 
 
THE CORSAIR. 201 
 
 the Corsair to an excruciating death; when Gulnare, 
 whose gratitude for her deliverance had kindled a more 
 tender sentiment in her breast, intercedes for his life, 
 but obtains only a short respite of the execution. In 
 the mean time she gains admittance to the cell of the 
 prisoner, and informs him of the fate that awaits him, 
 unless he seizes the opportunity now afforded him of 
 despatching his inexorable foe. Strange as it may 
 seem, this man of a thousand crimes refuses the con- 
 dition, and chooses rather to be impaled alive, than 
 to be guilty of assassination ; upon which Gulnare, 
 more determined, plunges the poniard herself into the 
 heart of Seyd, and, having bribed the guards, escapes 
 with Conrad to a galley, of which he takes the com- 
 mand, and steers for his own island. On his arrival, 
 he finds that Medora, when apprised of his misfor- 
 tune, had fallen a victim to her grief; which loss 
 affects him so much, that he leaves the place, and 
 though diligently sought by his followers, Conrad is 
 never afterwards found. 
 
 Such is the outline of the story of Conrad ; from 
 which it will be seen, that it is made up of slender 
 materials, and those put together in a manner little 
 
202 DEFECTS. 
 
 accordant with probability. The love which is made 
 to counterbalance the crimes of Conrad, is of a 
 very equivocal description ; and his declining the 
 poniard presented to him by Gulnare, is not only 
 totally out of character, but preposterous in itself, 
 for the poet admits that 
 
 " Not much could Conrad of his sentence blame — 
 His foe, if vanquished, had but shared the same." 
 
 But there are still greater defects than these ; and 
 by much the worst of them all is the spirit of infidel ity 
 that runs through the poem. In one place Conrad 
 is represented as saying, 
 
 " There is a war, a chaos of the mind, 
 When all its elements convulsed — combined — 
 Lie dark and jarring with perturbed force, 
 And gnashing with impenitent Remorse ; 
 That juggling fiend — who never spake before, 
 But cries " I warn'd thee V when the deed is o'er. 
 Vain voice ! the spirit burning, but unbent, 
 May writhe — rebel — the weak alone repent.* 
 
 Thus also, in the same strain of impious defiance, 
 this blasphemer is made to expatiate on his fallen con- 
 dition : 
 
BEAUTIES. 203 
 
 u My sole resources in the path I trod 
 
 Were these — my bark — my sword — my love — my God. 
 
 The last I left in youth ; he leaves me now, 
 
 And man but works his will to lay me low. 
 
 I have no thought to mock his throne with prayer, 
 
 Wrung from the coward crouching of despair, 
 
 It is enough — I breathe — and I can bear." 
 
 These are ghastly deformities, but they become 
 peculiarly disgusting when love is made to associate 
 with such detestable qualities ; an alliance so unna- 
 tural and revolting that we are mistaken if any writer, 
 of the most prurient description, ever before had an 
 idea of it. 
 
 Yet there are beauties of the higher order of poetry 
 scattered throughout the piece; of which the fine 
 picture of Medora, when she receives the tidings of 
 Conrad's fate, may be adduced as one of the best : 
 
 " The night-breeze freshens — she that day had past 
 In watching all that Hope proclaimed a mast: 
 Sadly she sat — on high — Impatience bore 
 At last her footsteps to the midnight shore ; 
 And there she wander* d heedless of the spray, 
 That dash'd her garments oft, and warn'd away. 
 
204 ORIGIN. 
 
 She saw not — felt not this — nor dared depart, 
 
 Nor deem'd it cold— her chill was at her heart ; 
 
 Till grew such certainty from that suspense, 
 
 His very sight had shock'd from life or sense ! 
 
 It came at last — a sad and shatter'd boat, 
 
 Whose inmates first beheld whom first they sought — 
 
 Some bleeding — all most wretched — these the few 
 
 Scarce knew how they escaped — this all they knew. 
 
 In silence darkling each appear'd to wait 
 
 His fellow's mournful guess at Conrad's fate. 
 
 Something they would have said ; but seem'd to fear 
 
 To trust their accents to Medora's ear. 
 
 She saw at once, yet sunk not, — trembled not — 
 
 Beneath her grief — that loneliness of lot : — 
 
 Within that meek fair form were feelings high, 
 
 That deem'd not till they found their energy. 
 
 While yet was Hope, they soften'd — flutter'd — wept; — 
 
 All lost — that softness died not — but it slept ; — 
 
 And o'er its slumber rose that strength which said, 
 
 1 With nothing left to love — there's nought to dread/ 
 
 'Tis more than nature's — like the burning might 
 
 Delirium gathers from the fever's height." 
 
 It has been observed that both for sketches of 
 character, and leading incidents, the author of the 
 Corsair was indebted to the very worst poem of his 
 great contemporary, Walter Scott. But if " Rokeby" 
 
OF THE STORY. 205 
 
 is really here presented in a new form, the tale has 
 certainly not lost any thing in the translation. The 
 scaffolding may be perhaps the same, but the structure 
 to which it is applied is different ; and the imagery, 
 the versification, and passion which distinguish Lord 
 Byron's poem, far exceed the feeble and cumbrous 
 machinery of the northern bard. 
 
 The noble author himself, in his notes, alludes to 
 two remarkable instances in the history of Archbishop 
 Blackburn, and that of a Monsieur La Fitte, a French 
 revolutionist. But what these had to do with the 
 Corsair, the reader is left to guess ; and he may con- 
 jecture long enough before he can see any similarity 
 at all between the cases thus adduced and the cha- 
 racter of Conrad. With respect to the archbishop, it 
 is surprising how the circumstance of his having, when 
 a youth, sailed with Dampier and other buccaneers, 
 could be considered as bearing any analogy at all to a 
 history of pirates ; since it is well known that the one 
 class of men were smugglers, and the other robbers. 
 
 This poem of the " Corsair" was inscribed, in a 
 very long and courtly address, to Thomas Moore, the 
 
206 LIBERALITY 
 
 translator of Anacreon ; upon whose character tor 
 poetical morality and personal courage the noble 
 lord had, in his " English Bards and Scotch Re- 
 viewers," exercised a degree of severity scarcely 
 equalled in the range of modern satire. Forgetting 
 all this, and wishing to make an alliance with those 
 whom he had formerly denounced as a disgrace to 
 Parnassus, Lord Byron was more profuse of his com- 
 pliments, than he had even been of his sarcasms upon 
 " the melodious advocate of lust." But the fit of 
 indignant virtue was past, and the imitator of Juvenal 
 now thought it a honour to be enrolled among the 
 warmest friends and admirers of the modem Catullus. 
 So much for the stability of literary morality, and the 
 sincerity of that zeal which flows from personal re- 
 sentment and originates not in public principle. Since 
 then, the author of Childe Harold has given another, 
 and a more remarkable proof of his attachment to the 
 " poet of lewdness," by presenting him with the 
 " Memoir of his own life and times ;" but under the 
 condition that the said valuable performance shall 
 not appear in public, till death enables the survivor to 
 write an epitaph and elegy upon the noble historian. 
 This gift may seem very extraordinary ; but when it is 
 
OK LORD BYRON. 207 
 
 known that the literary treasure has been actually 
 purchased by the proprietor of Lord Byron's works, 
 for the sum of two thousand pounds, and that the 
 price was fixed by the donor himself, the nature of the 
 present is explained clearly enough. Such a post-obit, 
 however, was never before heard of; and it may bear 
 a calculation, considering the chances of life, which 
 will gain most by the bargain — the person who now 
 enjoys the manuscript, or he for whose benefit it was 
 sold. It is to be hoped that a stipulation has been 
 made for a continuation of the history ; and in that 
 case, perhaps, the further adventures, observations and 
 confessions of the noble author may, by enlarging 
 the work, render it more valuable in itself, and more 
 profitable to the publisher. 
 
 Though Lord Byron, in the dedication of his " Cor- 
 sair," declared that this was the last time he should ap- 
 pear before the world as an author for some years, his 
 resolution soon failed him ; for within a few months he 
 again published, anonymously indeed, two poems, of a 
 very different character. The one which merits most 
 notice, is the tale of " Lara ;" an evident, though not 
 an acknowledged, supplement to the story of Conrad. 
 
208 LARA- 
 
 It will be recollected that the latter personage, on re- 
 turning to his isle and finding Medora no more, dis- 
 appeared and could never afterwards be found. As the 
 story of the Corsair closes abruptly, so that of " Lara" 
 opens with his sudden arrival at the seat of his ances- 
 tors in Spain, attended only by a foreign page, after 
 so long an absence that his very name was almost for- 
 gotten. Thus the description of this chieftain corre- 
 sponds minutely in person, circumstance, and charac- 
 ter with that of the leader of the pirates ; but that the 
 lord of a rich domain should degrade himself in this 
 strange manner, is too much out of the line of proba- 
 bility to pass even by virtue of a poetical licence. 
 
 While, however, his vassals stand in awe of Lara, 
 and all his neighbours are vainly inquisitive about his 
 adventures " in those far lands where he had wan- 
 dered long," accident very nearly brings his story to 
 light. Being invited to a festival given by a neigh- 
 bouring grandee, named Otho, one of the guests, Sir 
 Ezzelin, who had been himself a great traveller, views 
 Lara intently, and becomes at last so satisfied of his 
 identity, as to exclaim with surprise, 
 
 " Tis he ! how came he thence ? What doth he here ?" 
 
LARA. 209 
 
 This of course, while it excites general surprise and 
 curiosity, calls forth the resentment of Lara ; and a 
 quarrel ensues, which produces a challenge, to be de- 
 cided the next day. This ends the first Canto, and 
 the second opens with the meeting of the other chief- 
 tains, impatient to hear the charge of Sir Ezzelin 
 against Lara ; but the knight fails to make his ap- 
 pearance, which begetting suspicion in the mind of 
 Otho, that some foul play had been practised, he takes 
 up the cause of his absent friend, and a combat takes 
 place. The conflict is short, and Otho falls, though 
 not mortally wounded, by the superior dexterity of his 
 adversary, who mounts his steed and takes his home- 
 ward path. The mysterious disappearance of Ezzelin, 
 however, demands enquiry ; and Lara, fearing the re- 
 sult, gathers around him a number of retainers, so that 
 when Otho recovers, and the destined criminal is 
 summoned to judgment, he is found " begirt by 
 thousands, fresh from their feudal fetters, defying 
 earth and confident of heaven." 
 
 Civil war follows, in which, though Lara has for 
 some time the advantage, he afterwards falls in battle, 
 
 p 
 
 • 
 
 % 
 
210 BEAUTIFUL PICTURE. 
 
 his last breath being received by his trusty page, 
 Kaled, who is then discovered to be a female. 
 
 Of this poem it may truly be said, that it rises even 
 above the Corsair in correctness of language, strength 
 of conception, and elegance of description. In both 
 pieces the author has shown his complete command of 
 the heroic couplet ; which it is a pity he should ever 
 have forsaken in an affected imitation of some modern 
 writers, whose popularity drew him aside from a style 
 of composition to which they could not aspire. With 
 respect to the principal character of this piece, it has 
 the same faults as the author's former productions ; 
 displaying a mind fearlessly guilty, and yet tormented 
 by that secret restlessness which ever attends the de- 
 pravity of will. 
 
 The contrast between such a state of mental con- 
 fusion and the harmony of external nature, is finely 
 depicted in the following representation of Lara's walk 
 by moon-light : 
 
 " It was the night — and Lara's glassy stream 
 The stars are studding, each with imaged beam : 
 
 .-K> . 
 
JACQUELINE. 211 
 
 So calm, the waters scarcely seem to stray, 
 
 And yet they glide like happiness away ; 
 
 Reflecting far and fairy-like from high 
 
 The immortal lights that live along the sky : 
 
 Its banks are fringed with many a goodly tree, 
 
 And flowers the fairest that may feast the bee ; 
 
 Such in her chaplet infant Dian wove, 
 
 And Innocence would offer to her love. 
 
 These deck the shore : the waves their channel make 
 
 In windings light and mazy like the snake. 
 
 All was so still, so soft in earth and air, 
 
 You scarce would start to meet a spirit there : 
 
 Secure that nought of evil could delight 
 
 To walk in such a scene, on such a night ! 
 
 It was a moment only for the good : 
 
 So Lara deem'd, nor longer there he stood, 
 
 But turn'd in silence to his castle-gate ; 
 
 Such scene his soul no more could contemplate : 
 
 Such scene reminded him of other days, 
 
 Of skies more cloudless, moons of purer blaze, 
 
 Of nights more soft and frequent, hearts that now — 
 
 No — no —the storm may beat upon his brow, 
 
 Unfelt — unsparing — but a night like this, 
 
 A night of beauty mock'd such breast as his." 
 
 To the first edition of this poem was appended a 
 tale, entituled " Jacqueline," written by Mr. Samuel 
 
212 ODE TO NAPOLEON. 
 
 Rogers, and published at the request of the author 
 of <c Lara ;" who " regretted that the tenacious cour- 
 tesy of his friend did not permit him to place it where 
 the judgment of the reader, concurring with his own, 
 must have suggested its more appropriate station." 
 
 This simple story, the scene of which is laid in the 
 south of France, is far more touching than its com- 
 panion ; though disfigured and rendered uncouth in the 
 telling by the peculiarity of the verse. Lara makes the 
 reader wonder and shudder, but Jacqueline melts the 
 heart. Unlike the gloomy and frightful visions which 
 the magic wand of Lord Byron raises to disturb the 
 mind without improving it, the author of the " Plea- 
 sures of Memory" delights in painting scenes which 
 actually occur in the chequered drama of humanity ; 
 and such as afford practical lessons for the correction, 
 rather than the excitement, of the passions. 
 
 Nearly at the same time with Lara appeared an 
 " Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte ;" which, from in- 
 ternal evidence, independently of other circumstances, 
 the public voice attributed, without being mistaken, to 
 Lord Byron. This slight performance, however, 
 
ODE TO NAPOLEON. 213 
 
 could not add to the author's reputation ; for it is made 
 up of trite comparisons and ordinary thoughts, clothed 
 in language which is sometimes ungrammatical, and 
 never elegant. The verses are, in general, so doggrel, 
 and the allusions so ludicrous, as almost to raise a 
 question whether the noble author did not intend this 
 ode as a burlesque, for the purpose of ridiculing some 
 of his brother poets. If this was not the case, Lord 
 Byron degraded himself when he penned the following 
 lines, in which he compares Napoleon to Milo the 
 Crotonian, wedged fast in the cleft of the tree, rent 
 asunder by his own hands : 
 
 " He who of old would rend the oak, 
 
 Dream' d not of the rebound ; 
 Chained by the trunk he vainly broke 
 
 Alone — how look'd he round V 
 
 Simple and childish as this appears, it is outdone 
 in absurdity by the allusion to Nebuchadnezzar ; 
 
 44 Unless, like he of Babylon, 
 
 All sense is with thy sceptre gone ; 
 
 Life will not long confine 
 That spirit pour'd so widely forth, 
 So long obey'd— so little worth !" 
 
 
# 
 
 1 
 
 214 ODE TO NAPOLEON. 
 
 It seems hardly possible to carry the " art of 
 sinking" below all this; and yet there is another 
 verse which, for Sternholdian sense and beauty, may 
 compete with any thing in the records of church-yard 
 poetry : 
 
 " Weigh'd in the balance, hero dust 
 
 Is vile as vulgar clay ; 
 Thy scales, Mortality, are just 
 
 To all that pass away \" 
 
 ■ 
 
 I 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 Marriage of Lord Byron. — Character of the 
 Hebrew Melodies. — Observations on Devotional 
 Poetry. — Publication of the Siege of Corinth 
 and Parisina. — Criticisms on those Poems. 
 
 WHEN Lord Byron professed his intention of 
 hanging up his harp for some years, he perhaps 
 thought that marriage afforded as legitimate an excuse 
 for withdrawing from the service of the Muses, as it 
 formerly did from that of the tented field. Let this 
 be as it may, the union which he contemplated, when 
 he made that declaration, took place on the 2nd of 
 January, 1815, at Seham, in Durham, with the only 
 daughter of Sir Ralph Milbank Noel, baronet, of that 
 place. But the vows of poets are like those of lovers ; 
 and our noble author, could not resist the importunity 
 of friends, or the solicitation of genius, to favour the 
 
216 HEBREW MELODIES. 
 
 world with more of his performances. Shortly after 
 this change of his condition, he produced what he 
 called " Hebrew Melodies :" being a series of songs 
 adapted to some of the most favourite airs that are 
 still sung in the religious worship of the Jews ; the 
 music of which has been preserved by memory and 
 tradition alone, without the assistance of written cha- 
 racters, probably ever since the dispersion of the tribes. 
 But though the age and original of these airs must be 
 left to conjecture ; modern skill has grafted upon them 
 a wildness and pathos that have rendered the choral 
 service of the synagogue enchanting to the lovers of 
 harmony. Impressed with a natural partiality for 
 what may properly be called their national minstrelsy, 
 two eminent performers, Mr. Brahamand Mr. Nathan, 
 the one a singer of the first rank and the other a com- 
 poser of eminence, applied to Lord Byron, through his 
 friend Mr. Kinnaird, to favour them with some poetry 
 suited to the popular music of their religious society. 
 
 His lordship readily assented, and the melodies ap- 
 peared, first with the music, and afterwards without ; 
 though the application of the term to the words alone 
 is an incongruity which ought to have been avoided. 
 
IMPROPRIETY. 217 
 
 Besides the technical objection that the appella- 
 tion of melodies belongs only to the music, there is 
 another of more serious import against the title, when 
 the contents of the work are examined. To every 
 religious mind the term Hebrew Melodies conveys an 
 idea of sacred poetry, and nothing else. It brings 
 both to the eye and the ear, the Royal Prophet and 
 the other holy men of ancient days, whose inspirations 
 have descended to us as the songs of Zion for private 
 edification and public worship. In the work of Lord 
 Byron, on the contrary, there is nothing of a devotional 
 character at all ; and scarcely any piece that can be 
 properly called moral, taking the word in the sense of 
 hortatory instruction. The first piece contains a per- 
 sonification of Night, without a single thought of reli- 
 gious character in it ; in another Love is described by 
 a profusion of metaphors; and in a third, Melancholy 
 is pictured in a similar way ; beautifully, it is true, but 
 not as it might and ought to have been with a turn 
 of pious sentiment, tending to raise the soul above the 
 darkness and sorrow of this sublunary state, to the 
 cloudless skies of a happier region. 
 
 Dr. Johnson, was of opinion that poetry and 
 
b 
 
 218 DEVOTIONAL POETRY. 
 
 devotion cannot harmonize; and he has elabo- 
 rated the position with his wonted eloquence and 
 ingenuity. " The essence of poetry," says that 
 great critic, " is invention ; such invention as, by 
 producing something unexpected, surprises and de- 
 lights. The topics of devotion are few, and being 
 few are universally known; but few as there are, 
 they can be made no more; they can receive no 
 grace from novelty of sentiment, and very little from 
 novelty of expression." 
 
 This, in the main, is perfectly just, yet it follows 
 not that because the truths of religion interdict the 
 ornaments of imagination, therefore the harmony of 
 numbers may not be profitably employed in cheering 
 the mind by those sublime considerations which can 
 only be drawn from the fountain of immortality. 
 Few as the topics of devotion may be, they are yet 
 capable of receiving new illustrations and incitements 
 from fresh views of the divine operations in nature 
 and providence. But whether the mind can by 
 varying its observations improve and enlarge the de- 
 votional principle or not, the volume of inspiration 
 will ever continue to present rich and interesting 
 
DEVOTIONAL POETRY. 219 
 
 subjects for poetical translation. Of these Lord 
 Byron might have found a copious variety, suited 
 to lyrical composition, and* admirably fitted to the 
 peculiar music of the Jewish choir. The writings 
 of the prophets abound in such passages ; and Lowth 
 on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews would have 
 helped his lordship to the right choice and use of 
 these sublime portions of scripture. But, instead of 
 directing his attention to that inexhaustible treasure, 
 he contented himself with two or three paraphrases 
 of historical incidents, such as that of Jephthah's 
 daughter, who is sacrificed contrary to the correct 
 reading of the original ; the death of Saul, and the 
 destruction of Sennacherib's Host. This last is by 
 far the best poem in the whole collection ; but one 
 stanza of it bears a striking resemblance to the old 
 Scotch song of " the Flowers of the Forest." The 
 stanza alluded to is this ; 
 
 " Like the leaves of the forest, when summer is green, ] 
 That host, with their banners, at sun-set were seen ; 
 Like the leaves of the forest, when autumn hath blown, 
 That host on the morrow lay wither'd and strown." 
 
 It would be unjust to pass unnoticed part of one 
 
1 
 
 220 HEBREW MELODIES. 
 
 poem, which touches with great elegance the highest 
 and most endearing hope that can support the mind 
 in the loss of friends, by enlivening it with the pros- 
 pect of a re-union : 
 
 u If that high world, which lies beyond 
 
 Our own, surviving love endears ; 
 If there the cherish'd heart be found, 
 
 The eye the same, except in tears : 
 
 How welcome those untrodden spheres, 
 
 How sweet this very hour to die ! 
 To soar from earth, and find all fears 
 
 Lost in thy light — Eternity !" 
 
 That this is sweetly poetical cannot be denied ; but 
 the sentiment would have lost nothing, had the author 
 avoided the hypothetical mode of expression, by 
 which the consolation intended to be conveyed is so 
 much weakened as to be rendered almost nugatory. 
 
 It is evident that, whatever be the merit of such 
 productions as the Hebrew Melodies for musical 
 purposes, or as literary compositions, they are ill 
 adapted to improve the heart ; and there is reason to 
 
HEBREW MELODIES. 221 
 
 apprehend, that language like the following, supposed 
 to be spoken by a Jew, is of a tendency to generate 
 scepticism and encourage discontent, rather than to 
 promote liberality of thinking, and the sentiment of 
 mutual good-will, among the sons of Abraham : 
 
 " I have lost, for my faith, more than thou canst bestow, 
 As the God who permits thee to prosper doth know ; 
 In his hand is my heart and my hope — and in thine 
 The land and the life, which for him I resign." 
 
 It would be idle to enter upon an exposure of the 
 error which the poet has here committed, in repre- 
 senting the expatriation of the Jews as a voluntary 
 act of their own ; when every child among them knows 
 that the judgment which fell upon their fathers, was 
 a visitation for their iniquities. 
 
 How one of Lord Byron's principles, and those 
 principles so unequivocally displayed to the world, 
 came to undertake the task of writing lyrical poems 
 upon scriptural subjects, might well excite surprise in 
 light as well as serious minds ; but if the attempt 
 shows the versatility of his powers, the execution 
 
222 SIEGE OF CORINTH. 
 
 affords a proof that something more than poetic genius 
 is necessary to perform such a work properly. 
 
 The noble author's next publication was more in 
 character, and displayed his talents to much greater 
 advantage ; being two poetical narratives, on very dif- 
 ferent subjects, but in both, as far as description and 
 passion can produce interest, the reader will find his 
 attention fixed, and his wonder raised, by scenes of 
 horror and tenderness. The first of these poems is 
 founded on the " Siege of Corinth," when the Turks 
 finally wrested that city from the hands of the Ve- 
 netians, after an assault, in which the whole garrison, 
 with the governor Minotti, bravely perished. In- 
 dependently of the suitableness of such an event to 
 the power of Lord Byron's genius, the Fall of Corinth 
 afforded local attractions, by the intimate knowledge 
 which the poet had of the place and the surrounding 
 objects. During his residence in Greece, he had 
 crossed the Isthmus eight times, in his way from 
 Attica to the Morea, either in one direction over the 
 mountains, or in the other when passing from the 
 gulph of Athens to that of Lepanto. Thus furnished 
 with that topographical information which could not 
 
SIEGE OF CORINTH. 223 
 
 be well obtained from books and maps, he was admi- 
 rably qualified to depict the various operations and 
 progress of the siege ; while history supplied him 
 with ample materials for an elaborate performance. 
 Instead, however, of diversifying the scene by the 
 introduction of several contrasted characters, and 
 thereby giving a dramatic effect to the piece, the poet 
 has bestowed all his efforts upon a single personage, 
 and that one, as usual, of the very worst description. 
 Alp, the renegade, who leads on the Turks in every 
 attack against his own countrymen, is a being so 
 atrociously villanous, that the inspiring him with 
 love is almost libellous upon the constitution of 
 human nature. This apostate, who is bent upon 
 destroying all the inhabitants of Corinth, except the 
 object of his affection and her family, takes his soli" 
 tary walk on the night preceding the last assault, 
 along the shore, and while contemplating the walls 
 of the citadel, the breach already made, and the dead 
 bodies of his own comrades scattered around, a 
 female figure stands before him, in whom he recog- 
 nizes Francesca, the daughter of the governor Minotti, 
 and the " maid who should have been his bride." 
 
224 SIEGE OF CORINTH. 
 
 In' the dialogue that ensues, though there is no 
 want of the power of remonstrance, that of persuasion 
 fails where it should be most eloquent; but it is spent 
 upon an obdurate mind, alike insensible to the voice 
 of pity, and the influence of superstition. The gentle 
 monitor endeavours to recall Alp to the religion he 
 had left, by a sign in the heavens, which he beholds in 
 stupid wonder, and suffers to pass without being 
 moved by the warning. At this awful crisis the 
 visitant disappears, *and the renegado returns to the 
 camp, to prepare for the desolation he has medi- 
 tated, and the fate he has deserved. In the descrip- 
 tion of the assault the author has put forth all his 
 energies, and in the meeting of Alp and Minotti, he 
 has shown how capable he was, if he had been so 
 minded, of pourtraying what the ancient moralist con- 
 sidered as a sight worthy of heaven — a good man 
 struggling with adversity. Here the miserable outcast 
 falls by a shot, after learning that Francesca died the 
 preceding night ; and Minotti, on retreating to the 
 interior of the church, sets fire to a train, the explo- 
 sion produced by which buries the Christians and the 
 Infidels in one promiscuous heap. 
 
DISGUSTING PICTURE. 225 
 
 That the poem is wrought up with a high strain 
 of animation, must be admitted ; yet it fails in the 
 excitement of sympathy, for the want of bringing 
 more moral action into play, by contrasting the 
 characters in a variety of circumstances ; and though 
 too much praise cannot be paid to the descriptive 
 parts, in some places the minuteness of detail 
 is carried to a most disgusting length. What, for 
 instance, can be more repulsive than the spectacle 
 which caught the eye of the renegade Alp, in his 
 midnight ramble ? — 
 
 " And he saw the lean dogs beneath the wall 
 
 Hold over the dead their carnival ; 
 
 Gorging and growling o'er carcase and limb : 
 
 They were too busy to look at him ! 
 
 From a Tartar's skull they had stripp'd the flesh, 
 
 As ye peel the fig when its fruit is fresh : 
 
 And their white tusks cranch'd o'er the whiter skull, 
 
 As it slipp'd through their jaws when their edge grew dull; 
 
 As they lazily mumbled the bones of the dead, 
 
 When they scarce could rise from the spot where they fed : 
 
 So well had they broken a lingering fast 
 
 With those who had fallen for that night's repast. 
 
 And Alp knew by the turbans that roll'd in the sand, 
 
 The foremost of these were the best of his band : 
 
 Q 
 
2,26 PABISINA. 
 
 Crimson and green were the shawls of their wear, 
 
 And each scalp had a single long tuft of hair, 
 
 All the rest were shaven and bare ; 
 
 The scalps were in the Wild-dog's maw, 
 
 The hair was tangled round his jaw. 
 
 But close by the shore, on the edge of the gulf, 
 
 There sat a vulture flapping a wolf, 
 
 Who had stolen from the hills, but kept away, 
 
 Scared by the dogs from human prey ; 
 
 But he seiz'd on his share of a steed that lay, 
 
 Peck'd by the birds, on the sands of the bay." 
 
 This amplification of the " Obsoecnique canes, 
 importunaeque volucres," is as badly conceived as it 
 is wofully expressed ; being equally offensive to good 
 taste and correct language. If any thing could add 
 to the filthy horror of the picture, it is the levity with 
 which the noble author treats a subject that ought to 
 have been either thrown into shade, or mentioned 
 with some regard to humanity. 
 
 The " Siege of Corinth" was accompanied by 
 another poem, founded on the story of " Parisina," 
 the wife of Nicholas, the third Duke of Ferrara, by 
 whom she was put to death, for a criminal intercourse 
 
THE STORY. l 2%7 
 
 with Hugo, the bastard son of that prince, who also 
 deservedly suffered decapitation at the same time. 
 Gibbon, in his posthumous history of the House of 
 Brunswick, has briefly touched upon this shocking in- 
 cident ; but it was reserved for Lord Byron to embel- 
 lish it with the ornaments of poetry. No moral mind 
 however, can take pleasure in contemplating the opera- 
 tion and effects of monstrous passions : and there- 
 fore, the choice of such a story is a reflection upon 
 the author, for endeavouring to engage the feelings of 
 his readers in behalf of two persons who wilfully com- 
 mitted one of the foulest offences against nature. If 
 we turn with horror from the (Edipus of Euripides, 
 and the Mysterious Mother of Walpole, how much 
 more must we be shocked at the open, unblushing 
 advocacy of incest manifested in the tale of Parisina ? 
 In the two dramas, the crime belongs to one party 
 only ; and of course there is a just mixture of pity 
 and indignation excited by the developement of the 
 dreadful scene: but the present story exhibits both 
 offenders as being equally well acquainted with their 
 mutual relation, and yet continuing to indulge their 
 forbidden loves, without the least compunction. 
 Even when discovered, repentance does not follow ; 
 
228 PLAGIARISM. 
 
 and though the woman loses her senses by the shock, 
 her paramour glories in his guilt, accuses his parent 
 and sovereign of injustice, and dies impenitent. Such 
 is the poem of Parisina, in which the noble author 
 has taken the liberty, not indeed an unusual one 
 with him, of paraphrasing the words of a modern 
 writer without any acknowledgment. The passage 
 alluded to is that where the guilty duchess appears 
 before the assembled court, consisting of persons 
 whose former admiration of her was such, that 
 
 " had her eye in sorrow wept, 
 
 A thousand warriors forth had leapt ; 
 
 * 
 A thousand swords had sheathless shone, 
 
 And made her quarrel all their own." 
 
 Thus Burke, after the beautiful description which 
 he has given of the unfortunate Maria Antoinette, 
 in her splendour and fall, breaks out with this fine 
 exclamation : " Little did I dream that when she 
 added titles of veneration to those of enthusiastic, 
 distant, respectful love, that she should ever be 
 obliged to carry the sharp antidote against disgrace, 
 concealed in that bosom ; little did I dream that I 
 
PLAGIARISM. 229 
 
 should have lived to see such disasters fallen upon 
 her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men 
 of honour and of cavaliers. I thought ten thousand 
 swords must have leaped from their scabbards to 
 avenge even a look that threatened her with insult." 
 
 ' 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 
 Birth of a Daughter to Lord Byron. — Differences 
 with his Lady. — She quits his Residence. — Causes 
 of the Separation. — The Lady's conduct approved. 
 — Strange procedure of his Lordship. — The Edi- 
 tor of the Morning Chronicle's interference. — 
 Lord Byron's Verses to his TVife, and Satire upon 
 her Governess. — His Lordship leaves the kingdom. 
 
 OUR attention is now called from literary to per- 
 sonal history ; and here also, by a fatality peculiarly 
 unfortunate, we find more room for complaint and 
 censure, than gratulation or praise, in the conduct of 
 the noble person whose wayward course we are pur- 
 suing. Private memoirs are of so delicate a nature, 
 that few circumstances can warrant the discussion of 
 facts which, though made matter of public notoriety, 
 involve the peace of families and the character of 
 individuals. Still, however, there are some cases in 
 
MIRTH OF A DAUGHTER. 231 
 
 which, as it is impossible to be absolutely indifferent, 
 so neither is it just to remain altogether silent. But 
 in the present instance there can be little call for an 
 apology, since, substantially, nothing is left to be told, 
 more than what has already been made known to the 
 world either in the form of narrative or in the nature 
 of explanatory appeal, by those who in prudence 
 should have avoided that tribunal. 
 
 At the beginning of 1815 Lord Byron married, and 
 towards the close of the same year his lady brought 
 him a daughter; so that, as the union, to all ap- 
 pearance, was one of love, the fruits of it gave the pro- 
 mise of permanent felicity. That prospect, however, 
 was not realized'; and the harmony which the birth of 
 a first child seemed most likely to promote, was within 
 a few weeks after that event so completely broken, that 
 an absolute separation took place. Various causes 
 were assigned for this rupture, but all of them con- 
 curring in the suspicion of infidelity against the noble 
 husband — of which, if some were strong, others were 
 slight and equivocal. Yet it could not be said, nor 
 indeed was it even pretended, that the charges alledged 
 were totally void of foundation. Enough appeared, 
 
 * 
 
232 IMPROPER CONNEXIONS. 
 
 upon investigation, to convince those who acted with 
 a sincere regard to both parties, that there was but 
 little chance of tranquillity, where jealousy on the one 
 side and levity on the other continually created new 
 sources of disquiet. The share which Lord Byron had 
 been unfortunately led to take in the direction of the 
 concerns of Drury-LaneTheatre, contributed very much 
 to increase his domestic trouble ; by bringing about him 
 a set of persons with whom a lady of high sensibility 
 could not willingly associate. The scruples of such a 
 mind every man of feeling will be careful to respect, 
 because he sees in them the best security of his own 
 happiness. Here, on the contrary, the repugnance to 
 join that sort of society which the husband selected 
 was treated with stern contempt; and those con- 
 nexions were openly continued, the propriety of which 
 became as much a matter of public scandal as of 
 private disagreement. It might have been expected, 
 that in the situation of the lady some regard would 
 have been paid to her mental repose, if not to the 
 opinion of the world : but great genius is above the 
 ordinary rules of life ; it scorns to be restricted in its 
 pursuit of pleasure by the laws of decorum, and " at 
 m one slight bound it overleaps all bounds." 
 
IRREGULAR CONDUCT. 233 
 
 Considering how short a period had elapsed since 
 the celebration of the nuptials, the age of the parties, 
 and the amiable disposition of the lady, the very idea 
 of giving her uneasiness was a disgraceful act of wanton 
 barbarity, of which a virtuous mind would have been 
 ashamed. Even to the capriciousness of temper a 
 man of true generosity will be so far yielding as to 
 sacrifice many things rather than occasion pain to 
 others. If this be expedient in the common inter- 
 course of mankind, how much more necessary is it in 
 the state of matrimony, where blended interests require 
 a reciprocal attention to each other's temper and in- 
 clination, for their mutual happiness ? 
 
 But when a husband finds in his wife that her pre- 
 judices, if they must be called by that name, are on 
 the side of virtue, and that even her love for himself is 
 subordinate to that higher principle ; his obligations 
 to cherish her affections by the correctness of his own 
 conduct, become stronger in proportion to the bright- 
 ness of the example which he has continually in his view. 
 
 A blessing like this cannot be too highly estimated, 
 especially in an age of relaxed moral discipline ; and 
 
5234 DOMESTIC UNEASINESS. 
 
 therefore the man who sports with the sensibility of 
 such a mind, by obtruding into his domestic circle 
 meretricious characters, and persevering to do so after 
 detection and in spite of remonstrance, whatever 
 credit he may assume, or be entitled to for splendour 
 of talents and freedom of spirit, he lias little to boast 
 of in morality of thinking. After marriage, even the 
 most dissipated characters commonly affect, for a 
 short time at least, somewhat of chastened habits ; or 
 f they do still hanker after licentious pleasures, they 
 generally take care to wander from home, thereby en- 
 deavouring to avoid as much as possible such an 
 exposure as they know will bring a disquiet house. 
 But that man must have worked up his mind to 
 a high pitch of contemptuous superiority over the 
 ordinary principles by which the social relations are 
 maintained in harmony, who can presume to bring 
 depravity under his roof, and introduce vice to his 
 table. 
 
 What causes besides there might be for serious 
 offence, can only be surmised ; but associates of the 
 above description, were certainly not of a nature to be 
 pleasing either to a virtuous wife or her friends. The 
 
SEPARATION* '235 
 
 one felt sensibly her degradation, and complained 
 without effect, the others could only pity and remain 
 absent. At length patience was exhausted, and a 
 temporary separation occurred ; during which, an ami- 
 cable correspondence was carried on for a few weeks, 
 but without producing any change of conduct or such 
 promises of amendment as the party aggrieved had a 
 right to demand. In such a state of irritable suspense 
 it is impossible to keep curiosity hoodwinked, and 
 many particulars thus came to light which otherwise 
 perhaps would have remained buried for ever in 
 
 silence. The beginning of domestic uneasiness is like 
 
 ■ 
 the dropping of water ; and that which by concession 
 
 and liberality might have been at first easily gathered 
 
 up, or absorbed in oblivion, swells into a stream, till 
 
 it defeats every attempt to prevent its progress. 
 
 On the one side no measures were taken, but those 
 which common prudence suggested, and which the 
 highest wisdom must have approved ; for the case was 
 laid in consultation before the nearest relatives, who 
 saw enough to convince them that the chance of hap- 
 piness was hopeless where so much duplicity had been 
 practised. But though satisfied in their own minds 
 
9,36 THE LADY VINDICATED. 
 
 after a very close and delicate inquiry, that a recon- 
 ciliation was neither practicable nor even advisable, 
 they thought it safest to take the opinion of an emi- 
 nent civilian upon the case ; and when it is known 
 that the judgment of Dr. Lushington was decidedly 
 in favour of Lady Byron's resolution to live apart 
 from her husband, there will be few persons hardy 
 enough to call the propriety of her determination in 
 question. That determination was a very painful, but 
 it was also a very deliberate, act of duty ; and did not 
 result from mere capriciousness of temper, or jealousy 
 conceived on false grounds, and nourished by base 
 insinuations. 
 
 Now what was the line of conduct pursued on the 
 other side, where, from intellectual superiority, and 
 natural dignity of feeling, it might have been ex- 
 pected that the utmost delicacy of reserve would have 
 distinguished the deportment of the husband, so as 
 to have kept him from all conversation and com- 
 munion on the subject of his domestic differences, 
 except with those who were immediately interested in 
 them ? Instead of weighing seriously the particulars 
 of his conduct, entering into an explanation of those 
 
CONDUCT OF JAMES PERRY. 237 
 
 points which were most suspicious, and frankly con- 
 fessing what might be wrong, he delivers his senti- 
 ments in harmonious verse, and talks of his own 
 wounded feelings in heroics, without paying the 
 slightest regard to the feelings of others. But this was 
 not all ; for this man, of exquisite sensibility, calls 
 to his counsel, not a professional advocate, or a 
 relative of dignified rank, — in both of whom he might 
 have reposed his secrets with safety, — but the pro- 
 prietor and editor of a newspaper, to whose honest 
 hands and immaculate honour he entrusts the 
 letters of his spouse and his own verses. The con- 
 sequence was, as might have been easily predicted, 
 the world soon became acquainted with the par- 
 ticulars of a separation, which, whatever might be 
 its expediency under the circumstances of the noble 
 parties, was not of a nature to be made a matter of 
 public discourse. The part which the late Mr. Perry 
 took in this unpleasant affair did him little credit; for 
 he made the Morning Chronicle a stage of exhibition, 
 and strutted about on it with an air of as much con- 
 sequence as if this concern had been one in which 
 he had a personal interest. But when the editor 
 threatened the father of Lady Byron with the publi- 
 
238 ANECDOTE OF LORD FALKLAND. 
 
 cation of his daughter's letters, his wonted acuteness 
 of intellect seems to have been obtunded by his ex- 
 cessive vanity ; or else he would not have overlooked 
 the plain questions naturally arising, how he came 
 into possession of them, and what authority he had 
 to publish the correspondence of two persons, without 
 the consent of both having been previously obtained. 
 
 Lord Byron in one of his poems has paid a tribute 
 of respect to the unfortunate Lord Falkland, who some 
 years ago was killed in a duel. But the great Earl of 
 Clarendon has bestowed a finer encomium upon the 
 illustrious ancestor of that nobleman, who fell in the 
 battle of Newbury. 
 
 " One thing," says the noble historian, " Lord 
 Falkland could never bring himself to, while Secretary 
 of State, and that was the liberty of opening letters, 
 upon a suspicion that they might contain matter of 
 dangerous consequence; which he thought such a 
 violation of the law of nature, that no qualification 
 of office could justify him in the trespass." 
 
 This was certainly carrying the sense of honour 
 
DISC l.osi RE OF CORRESPONDENCE. 239 
 
 very far ; but what would such a person have thought 
 of the man who, in a family quarrel, could make the 
 conductor of a weekly paper the depository of his 
 secrets, and entrust to his hands, not for his private 
 perusal, but for publication, the letters that had 
 passed between himself and his wife ? 
 
 The friendship of Lord Byron and the proprietor 
 of the Morning Chronicle, was formed on a literary 
 and political basis ; to poetry and politics, therefore, 
 that relation should have been rigidly confined. The 
 advantage of it was all on one side ; and there can be 
 no doubt but that the Journalist duly appreciated 
 the value of a connexion, which so materially contri- 
 buted to uphold and extend the popularity of his 
 paper. But for that very reason, this man was one 
 of the last persons in the world to whom Lord Byron 
 should have confided the secrets of his heart and the 
 state of his house ; for it was not in the nature of 
 things that such an adviser could be impartial, even 
 supposing that in other respects he might be an 
 unobjectionable arbiter of family differences. The 
 manner in which he deported himself in a business so 
 
240 THE BREACH WIDENED. 
 
 imprudently entrusted to his management, showed his 
 zeal more than his discretion or politeness ; for he 
 went the length of venting reproaches upon the lady's 
 "conduct in tearing herself from the bosom of her 
 husband ;" he even threatened a disclosure of secrets, 
 and ventured to assert that there existed a foul 
 conspiracy against his noble client. Thus the mo- 
 dern Cato, who affected to seat himself in the cen- 
 sorial chair, over-acted his part, and " by his decision 
 more embroiled the fray." Matters were now come 
 to a pass which made a reconciliation impracticable ; 
 but the wonder was that amidst all this newspaper 
 strife, the husband should appear passive as far as 
 regarded the exercise of his legal rights. Had the 
 noble lord been conscious that his own "withers 
 were unwrung," he certainly would have exerted 
 himself to the utmost in the defence of his natural 
 privileges, even though he might not think it neces- 
 sary, or consistent with his dignity, to enter upon 
 an explanatory justification of his conduct. If he 
 was the victim of a conspiracy, justice required that 
 the plot should be detected and the agents punished ; 
 and if the peace of his family had been broken by 
 
ARTIFICIAL G1UEF. 241 
 
 any artifices or mis-representation, it was incumbent 
 upon him as a husband and a father, to unravel the 
 fraud for the establishment of his honour. 
 
 Instead of taking the straight and obvious course 
 which every man of common virtue and understand- 
 ing would have adopted in such an exigency, this 
 exalted genius soars into the clouds, and leaving 
 his tenderest concerns on earth to be discussed in a 
 printing-office, solaces his afflicted mind by composing 
 pathetic and caustic verses. 
 
 With that grief which is expressed in the artificial 
 jingle of rhyme, no reflecting mind, accustomed to the 
 genuine workings of the heart, will be inclined to 
 sympathize. Sorrow is usually of a silent and re- 
 tiring nature, especially in those cases where the 
 exercise of the judgment is required to provide a 
 remedy for an evil that cannot be cured by lamen- 
 tation. 
 
 Some man of fine imagination wrote very beau- 
 tiful lines upon his wife's coffin, and the next day 
 
242 
 
 addressed as tender a sonnet to the second object of 
 his affections. 
 
 Thus Lord Byron, when it was natural for him to 
 have been employed in vigorous measures for the 
 restoration of his domestic harmony, the vindication 
 of his character, and the assertion of his rights, con- 
 tented himself with circulating among his acquaintance, 
 and sending to the newspapers, a poem to his wife 
 and a satire on her friend. 
 
 The former piece, entitled " Fare thee well," was 
 cried up as one of the most exquisite productions that 
 had ever issued from human genius ; and it was con- 
 sidered, by those who could see the heavenly lumi- 
 naries in a muddy pool, as being completely demon- 
 strative of the noble writer's purity of heart. But 
 there were minds of sterner mould, who, refusing to be 
 caught by the cant of sensibility, demanded why the 
 noble lord, instead of whining over his desk, did not 
 rouse his moral powers into action. That the verses 
 which he published so ostentatiously were very pretty, 
 nobody pretended to deny ; but here lay the mischief, 
 for they were too pretty to be sincere; and they 
 
HYPOCRISY. 243 
 
 exhibited all the quaintness of a writer who aimed to 
 draw tears from his readers while he shed none him- 
 self. The noble poet affected a wonderful attachment 
 to his young and amiable lady, to whom he had been 
 united little more than a year ; and he also mourned 
 in very harmonious numbers over his infant child, of 
 three months old : but though all of this might have 
 passed as a private effusion of poetic feeling, it lost 
 its effect when sent into the world through the channel 
 of the periodical press. Then the design was seen 
 through by all who were not wilfully blind ; and every 
 man of discernment despised the affectation which, 
 under the guise of fondness, conveyed an envenomed 
 sting of reproach. Now as the author was fully 
 aware, when he endeavoured to excite commiseration 
 by his piteous wailing, that in proportion as he 
 raised pity for himself, he kindled a flame of resent* 
 ment against his wife as the cause of his misery, what 
 could be thought of the delicacy of his sentiments or 
 of the truth of his professions ? , 
 
 Thus, let hypocrisy varnish ever so deeply, truth 
 will escape through some crack or other ; and Lord 
 Byron was so ill qualified for keeping on the mask, 
 
244 STRANGE RESOLUTION. 
 
 that by reflecting upon the " unforgiving spirit" of his 
 wife, he at once stumbled into a confession of his own 
 errors, and thereby furnished a ground for suspicion 
 that the offence could not have been slight which was 
 attended with such serious consequences. There are 
 women of wanton minds who will abandon the path 
 of rectitude and honour without compunction ; but 
 no virtuous wife will forsake the habitation and com- 
 pany of her husband, unless strongly impelled to that 
 measure, by something painfully distressing in his 
 conduct. 
 
 How far Lady Byron was justified in the proceeding 
 which she spontaneously adopted, and in the propriety 
 of which she was supported by all her friends, can only 
 be estimated by the excellence of her character, when 
 contrasted with that of her husband : but as her sacri- 
 fices were great, her resolution could only have been 
 formed from a resentment of more than ordinary 
 wrongs. It deserves serious consideration also that 
 while the lady was arming herself with evidences to 
 vindicate the separation into which she had been dri- 
 ven, her lord made preparations for a final departure 
 from the kingdom. This determination was stranger 
 
than all the rest ; for, if it did not amount to an ab- 
 solute desertion, through a consciousness of impro- 
 priety, it betrayed a want of that firmness which is the 
 characteristic of upright intentions. But before he 
 left England the noble lord put into circulation ano- 
 ther production of his muse, occasioned by the pecu- 
 liarity of his domestic circumstances. Never, how- 
 ever, did the history of perverted talent exhibit a more 
 disgraceful composition than this " Sketch from 
 Private Life." The person whose character was here 
 so grossly vilified was the governess and companion 
 of Lady Byron ; and her only fault appears to have 
 been the very uncommon one of retaining the confi- 
 dence and affectionate regard of her pupil. There 
 must, indeed, have been some valuable qualities in 
 such a female ; for though, according to the liberal 
 report of her noble traducer, " she was born in a 
 garret, and bred in a kitchen/' it is evident that she 
 discharged her duty faithfully in modelling the mind 
 of the young lady whose education was entrusted to 
 her care. This is manifest from the praises which the 
 noble lord bestowed upon his wife after their separa- 
 tion; for those virtues which he acknowledged to 
 shine so pre-eminently in her, must, at least in some 
 
246 INCONSISTENCY. 
 
 degree, have been the effect of mental culture. Thus if 
 Lord Byron was honest in the declaration which he 
 made of his own affection, and of his lady's goodness, 
 he, without intending it, paid a compliment to the per- 
 son by whom those graces were cherished which he pre- 
 tended so much to admire. The old maxim seems to 
 hold equally good in morals as in science — that where 
 two have an affinity in principle, they agree in their 
 associations ; so that what one party loves, the other 
 cannot hate. But even where a man may not altoge- 
 ther approve of the same objects with his wife, he 
 will, if he has any delicacy of mind, forbear to wound 
 her feelings by the expression of his dislike. He will 
 not vilify a female who has from her infancy enjoyed 
 the confidence and esteem of the woman whom he 
 loves ; and he will scorn to hold her up, on account 
 of her humble origin and homely features, to public 
 ridicule. Yet all this, and worse than this, Lord 
 Byron was guilty of at the very time when he affected 
 the tenderest concern for his lady, and the bitterest 
 grief at the resolution which she had formed of leaving 
 him for ever. While mourning his widowed lot, and 
 pouring out his lamentations in elegiac verse, such was 
 his rancour and malice that he could write and publish 
 
*ALSE EXCUSE. 247 
 
 a poetical anathema against a defenceless woman, 
 whose skin he compared to parchment, and the colour 
 of her blood to saffron. Having worked up his spirit 
 to this diabolical pitch, he proceeded to express his 
 horrible wish, that the poor object of his vengeance 
 might experience despair in her last moments, and 
 find afterwards a sleepless grave. Beyond this it was 
 hardly possible for the malignant passions to go ; and 
 yet the accumulated curses, which flow on with in~ 
 creasing virulence in each line, show that the author 
 had worked himself up to the very height of fury, so 
 that it might truly have been said of him, " Hell 
 grew darker at his frown." 
 
 When this * Sketch' made its appearance, even the 
 admirers of the noble lord became alarmed for his 
 reputation; and it was said that the verses were 
 never intended for the public eye. This, however, 
 was an arrant falsehood, for the author himself dis- 
 tributed copies among his acquaintances, and sent 
 others to the editors of some of the public journals ; 
 though if the fact had been as his apologists stated, 
 the excuse could have availed nothing in a moral 
 point of view, since the very writing of such a piece 
 
£48 DEPARTURE OF LORD BYRON, 
 
 was in itself incompatible with the principles of ho- 
 nour, and an act that showed the utmost malignity 
 of mind. Had the injured party sought redress 
 against the noble traducer in a court of justice, the 
 plea of having composed the libel for his own private 
 fancy, would have been little attended to by an up- 
 right judge, and an intelligent jury ; especially when 
 it came out, as the fact must in evidence, that the 
 copies in circulation proceeded from the author ; and 
 consequently that the publication could not have been 
 altogether without his privity. 
 
 Yet perhaps it was not much to be regretted, that this 
 atrocious compound of hatred and impiety made its ap- 
 pearance when it did, since it afforded a complete illus- 
 tration of the hypocritical character of the lines bearing 
 the title of " Fare thee well ;" so that if any persons 
 were cheated by the affected sensibility displayed 
 in that performance, they had only to read the " Sketch 
 from Private Life," to exclaim with the offended hus- 
 band in the comedy, M Oh ! confound your sentiments." 
 All this took place in the months of March and April ; 
 and while the public were anxiously waiting to see 
 the course which the noble lord would adopt for re* 
 
LINES ON HIS DEPARTURE. 249 
 
 claiming his rights and vindicating his character, he 
 suddenly left the kingdom, with the resolution never 
 to return. This was another inexplicable proceeding, 
 for which Lord Byron's most ardent admirers could 
 not account ; and though some strong necessity must 
 have arisen for so extraordinary an abandonment of 
 high duties and near connexions, no reason was 
 ever assigned for the dereliction, either by his lord- 
 ship or his friends. There were some, however, who 
 considered this abdication as a full justification of the 
 lady's conduct, in having withdrawn from such a 
 partner ; and one writer, of no common powers, pub- 
 lished a poem on the occasion, entitled, u Lines on 
 the departure of a great Poet ;" the introduction to 
 which is thus vigorously expressed : 
 
 " From native England, that endured too long 
 
 The 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 find 
 
 A life more suited to his guilty mind ; 
 
 Where other climes new pleasures may supply 
 
 For that palPd taste, and that unhallow'd eye : — 
 
 Wisely he seeks some yet untrodden shore, 
 
 For those who know him less may prize him more/' 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 On the Banishment of Ovid. — Lord Byron's Visit 
 to the Field of Waterloo. — Fortress of Ehren- 
 breit stein. — French General Marceau. — Pyra- 
 mid of Bones at Morat. — Clarens, on the Lake of 
 Geneva. — Rousseau. — Monks of St. Bernard. — • 
 Superstition and Infidelity contrasted. — Descrip- 
 tion of the Jung f raw. — Departure for Italy. 
 
 IT is not improbable but that the exile of Lord 
 Byron, though his own spontaneous act, may, in 
 a distant age, form as curious a question in literary 
 history, as the banishment of Ovid has hitherto proved 
 to commentators. The Roman poet, if we are to take 
 his own word for it, was not sent to waste the remain- 
 der of his life on the borders of the Euxine, for any 
 fault of his own, but simply because it was his misfor- 
 tune to have witnessed something which he ought not 
 to have seen. Hence conjectures have multiplied to 
 
BANISHMENT OF OVID. 251 
 
 the wildest extent, to ascertain the cause of this harsh 
 measure; and, in order to save the character of a fa- 
 vourite writer, that of Augustus has been calumniated 
 without mercy ; though, luckily for his reputation, the 
 matters alledged against him are fully disproved by 
 the evidence of facts and dates. But there is still 
 more than this to be said in favour of the emperor ; 
 for if the poet was actually the victim of imperial 
 tyranny, it is scarcely to be believed that he would 
 have idolized the author of his wrongs. Yet Ovid, 
 after his exile, praised Augustus in the highest terms 
 for his liberality, and even when he had nothing more 
 to hope or dread from his power, the poet erected an 
 altar to his memory among the Getae, in whose coun- 
 try he resided. 
 
 Such being the fact, it is reasonable to suppose 
 that the misfortune of this ingenious writer was the 
 consequence of his own indiscretion, and that it did 
 not proceed from the capriciousness of despotism. 
 There is nothing in the known history of Ovid to 
 make one think more favourably of him ; and his 
 writings are alone sufficient to induce the belief that 
 his relegation, notwithstanding his insinuation to the 
 
252 CASE OF LORD BYRON. 
 
 contrary, was a punishment justly inflicted upon him 
 for his criminality. 
 
 The author of Childe Harold has also endeavoured 
 to persuade the world that he is a persecuted man ; 
 and that his exile, though not a judicial stretch of 
 power, has been produced by oppression of a severer 
 description. It must, perhaps, be left to posterity to 
 determine the truth of this point, when time shall have 
 developed those scenes and circumstances which pru- 
 dence now buries in secresy : in the mean time, how- 
 ever, it ill becomes a man to complain of what he had 
 it in his power to avoid ; and, therefore, he who omits 
 to perform those things which are necessary for the 
 preservation of his own peace and character, must be 
 content to endure the consequences of his neglect. If 
 Lord Byron, instead of guarding the various important 
 trusts belonging to him in his own land, thought it 
 expedient to become a wanderer upon earth, he may 
 thank himself for the hard judgment which the public 
 has formed, and still continues to entertain of that 
 conduct which led him to renounce his country, on 
 the extraordinary pretence that his wife had for- 
 saken him. The laws were sufficiently strong, and 
 
HIS TRAVELS. 253 
 
 the administration of them pure enough, to have 
 afforded him redress under his circumstances; and 
 therefore if he did not avail himself of the common 
 protection which the legal courts of the kingdom 
 indiscriminately grant to all subjects, it can only be 
 ascribed to that discretion which of two evils chooses 
 the least, and inclines to submit to an unpleasant 
 privation, rather than suffer more acutely by a fearful 
 exposure. 
 
 Having thus taken his option, the noble lord crossed 
 over to France, through which he passed rapidly to 
 Brussels, taking in his way a survey of the field of 
 Waterloo. Twelve months had not elapsed since the 
 decision of empires had taken place on this memora- 
 ble spot, where mad ambition received its death-blow, 
 and the rage for war its most effectual check : not- 
 withstanding which, the jaundiced mind of the poet 
 could contemplate this interesting spectacle without 
 a single sentiment of patriotism, or philanthropy. 
 What his feelings would have been had Napoleon 
 triumphed instead of being overthrown, we can only 
 surmise from what he has expressed in the following 
 note : — 
 
254 VISIT TO WATERLOO. 
 
 i 
 
 " My guide from Mont St. Jean over the field 
 seemed intelligent and accurate. The place where 
 Major Howard fell, was not far from two tall and 
 solitary trees (there was a third cut down or shi- 
 vered in the battle) which stand a few yards from 
 each other at a pathway's side. Beneath these he 
 died, and was buried. The body has since been 
 removed to England. A small hollow for the present 
 marks where it lay, but will probably be soon effaced ; 
 the plough has been upon it, and the grain is. After 
 pointing out the different spots where Picton and 
 other gallant men had perished ; the guide said, 
 ' Here Major Howard lay ; I was near him when 
 wounded.' I told him my relationship, and he 
 seemed then still more anxious to point out the 
 particular spot and circumstances. The place is one 
 of the most marked in the field, from the peculiarity 
 of the two trees above mentioned. I went on horse- 
 back twice over the field, comparing it with my re- 
 collection of similar scenes. As a plain, Waterloo 
 seems marked out for the scene of some great action, 
 though this may be mere imagination. I have viewed 
 with attention those of Plataea, Troy, Mantinea, 
 
VISIT TO WATERLOO. 255 
 
 Leuctra, Choeronea, and Marathon ; and the field 
 around Mont St. Jean and Hougoumont appears 
 to want little but a better cause, and that undefinable 
 but impressive halo, which the lapse of ages throws 
 around a celebrated spot, to vie in interest with any 
 or all of these, except perhaps the last mentioned." 
 
 Though it is not very easy to discern any clear 
 meaning through this cloud of words, enough appears 
 to show the dark mind of the writer, and his total in- 
 competency either to form an impartial judgment of 
 the circumstances of his own time, or a correct one 
 of remoter ages. Had he not been completely under 
 the influence of self-will, which perverts every object 
 and incident to the worst purposes, he would have 
 seen in the defeat of the French at Waterloo a greater 
 triumph to humanity and liberty than that of the 
 Persians at Marathon ; for in the one case Greece 
 alone was saved, whereas in the other all Europe was 
 delivered from a restless and insatiable spirit thirsting 
 for universal dominion, and scrupling no means to ac- 
 complish that detestable object. Whatever pretences, 
 therefore, a man may set up to liberality of sentiment, 
 he can neither have any true sense of freedom, a de- 
 
£56 NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE 
 
 sire of peace, nor a proper love of his native country, 
 who can bring himself to regret the humiliation of a 
 power which for ages past, and in none more than the 
 present, has been the common disturber of the world. 
 Whether in a monarchical or republican state ; whe- 
 ther governed by Louis the Fourteenth, or Napoleon 
 Buonaparte, France has invariably manifested a dis- 
 position to encroach upon the rights and liberties of all 
 other nations. The canting jargon, therefore, of Lord 
 Byron, and those who, like him, can see no glory 
 but in usurpation, is an insult upon common sense, 
 and a libel against humanity ; since, if it has any 
 meaning at all, it amounts to a justification of Napo- 
 leon in his invasion of Spain, his attack on Russia, and 
 his attempt to make himself master of the world. 
 Providentially the cupidity of this monster proved too 
 much for his cunning ; so that after making the earth 
 tremble under him, he became an object of contempt, 
 with none to pity him, unless it were the many who 
 had profited by his crimes, and the few who admired 
 him for nothing else. 
 
 Having gratified his curiosity, and indulged his 
 spleen, in contemplating a scene where others of his 
 
MARCEAU. 257 
 
 countryman had been warmed by nobler emotions, 
 Lord Byron proceeded to Coblentz, opposite to which 
 city stands the castle of Ehrenbreristein, of which he 
 says : " After having seen the fortifications of Gibraltar 
 and Malta, it did not much strike by comparison ; but 
 the situation is commanding. General Marceau be- 
 sieged it in vain for some time ; and I slept in a room 
 where I was shown a window, at which he is said to 
 have been standing observing the progress of the siege 
 by moon-light, when a ball struck immediately below 
 it." 
 
 On this same General Marceau, who was slain near 
 Coblentz, our English poet has bestowed an eulogium, 
 merely because he was a republican hero who fell in 
 asserting the rights of France, though it is now uni- 
 versally known that this man and his masters battled 
 to take away the rights and liberties of all other 
 people. 
 
 From Coblentz, Lord Byron proceeded up the 
 Rhine as far as Basle, and thence to Clarens on the 
 Lake of Geneva, by the way of Soleure and Mcrat. 
 At this latter place, his lordship visited the pyramid 
 
 s 
 
258 PYRAMID OF BONES. 
 
 which the Swiss formed of the bones of the Burgun- 
 dians, after the battle fought there, June 22, 1476. 
 As that victory established the independence of the 
 Swiss, they erected a chapel on the spot, and near it 
 reared this extraordinary monument. " The former," 
 says Lord Byron, " is destroyed, and the pyramid of 
 bones diminished to a small number by the Burgun- 
 dian legion in the service of France, who anxiously 
 effaced this record of their ancestors' less successful 
 invasions. A few still remain, notwithstanding the 
 pains taken by the Burgundians for ages, all who 
 passed that way removing a bone to their own 
 country, and the less justifiable larcenies of the Swiss 
 postillions, who carried them off to sell for knife- 
 handles, a purpose for which the whiteness imbibed 
 by the bleaching of years had rendered them in great 
 request. Of these relics I ventured to bring away 
 as much as may have made the quarter of a hero ; 
 for which the sole excuse is, that if I had not, the 
 next passer-by might have perverted them to worse 
 uses, than the careful preservation which I intend for 
 them." 
 
 A taste like this, is not a subject for discussion : 
 
CLAHENS. , Q59 
 
 but while it is easy to account for the conduct of a 
 Burgundian from fellow-feeling, and of a Swiss from 
 pride, it becomes difficult to see what interest an 
 Englishman could take in the bones of soldiers who 
 perished above three centuries ago; unless it is 
 because, as history informs us, there happened to 
 be several of his countrymen among the slain in 
 the battle. 
 
 Clarens, where Lord Byron fixed his residence for 
 some time, must be familiar to those who are ac- 
 quainted with the writings of Rousseau ; and it will 
 no doubt acquire additional fame from having been 
 the temporary resting-place of a genius equally origi- 
 nal, capricious, and unsettled. 
 
 In one of the notes to his continuation of Childe 
 Harold, the author speaks of his new abode and the 
 surrounding objects with rapture: " In July 1816," 
 says he, " I made a voyage round the Lake of Geneva, 
 and, as far as my own observations have led me to, a 
 not uninterested nor inattentive survey of all the 
 scenes most celebrated by Rousseau in his Heloise, 
 I can safely say, that in the description of Clarens, 
 
260 ROUSSEAU. 
 
 there is no exaggeration. It would be difficult to see 
 Clarens, with the scenes around it, Vevay, Chillon, 
 Boveret, St. Gingo, Meillerie, Ersan, and the entrances 
 of the Rhine, without being forcibly struck with its pe- 
 culiar adaptation to the persons and events with which 
 it has been peopled. But this is not all ; the feeling 
 with which all around Clarens, and the opposite rocks 
 of Meillerie, is invested, is of a still higher and more 
 comprehensive order than the mere sympathy with 
 individual passion : it is a sense of the existence of 
 love in its most extended and sublime capacity, and 
 of our own participation of its good and of its glory ; 
 it is the great principle of the universe which is there 
 more condensed, but not less manifested; and of 
 which, though knowing ourselves a part, we lose our 
 individuality and mingle in the beauty of the whole. 
 
 " If Rousseau had never written, nor lived, the 
 same associations would not less have belonged to 
 such scenes. He has added to the interest of his 
 works by their adoption ; he has shown his sense of 
 their beauty by the selection : but they have done 
 that for him, which no human being could do for 
 them. 
 
9 
 
 LAKE OF GENEVA. 26l 
 
 " I had the fortune, good or evil as it might be, to 
 sail from Meillerie (where we landed for some time) 
 to St. Gingo, during a lake storm, which added to 
 the impression of all around, although occasionally 
 accompanied by danger to the boat, which was small 
 and overloaded. By a coincidence, which I did not 
 regret, it was over this very part of the lake that 
 Rousseau has driven the boat of St. Preux and 
 Madame Wolmar to Meillerie for shelter, during a 
 tempest. On gaining the shore at St. Gingo, we 
 found that the wind had been sufficiently strong to 
 blow down some fine old chesnut-trees on the lower 
 part of the mountains. On the height is a seat 
 called the Chateau de Clarens. The hills are covered 
 with vineyards, and interspersed with some small 
 but beautiful woods : one of these was named the 
 1 Bosquet de Julie;' and it is remarkable that though 
 long ago cut down by the brutal selfishness of the 
 monks of St. Bernard, to whom the land appertained, 
 that the ground might be inclosed into a vineyard, 
 for the miserable drones of an execrable superstition, 
 the inhabitants of Clarens still point out the spot 
 where its trees stood, calling it by the name which 
 consecrated and survived them. Rousseau has not 
 
262 MONKS OF St. BERNARD. 
 
 been particularly fortunate in the preservation of the 
 ' local habitations' he has given to ' airy nothings.' 
 The prior of Great St. Bernard has cut down some 
 of his woods for the sake of a few casks of wine, and 
 Buonaparte has levelled part of the rocks of Meillerie 
 in improving the road to Simplon. The road is an 
 excellent one ; but I cannot quite agree with a remark 
 which I heard made, that ' La route vaut mieux que 
 les souvenirs/' 
 
 It will be seen from the reflections thrown out in 
 this passage, that the author had imbibed the scepti- 
 cism of Rousseau and Voltaire, to the fullest extent ; 
 so far, indeed, as to copy the shockingly offensive 
 language of the French Infidel in speaking of the 
 Christian religion ; for it would be idle to suppose that 
 by " execrable superstition," the noble author meant 
 any thing else. Now after allowing all that can be ad- 
 vanced against monachism, it would be easy to prove 
 that even such drones as the brothers of St. Bernard 
 are here represented have done infinitely more good 
 by their works of charity, than the whole fraternity 
 of sceptical writers have effected or even intended by 
 their productions. What hospitals for the relief of the 
 
# 
 
 HOSPITALITY. 263 
 
 sick, what schools for the instruction of the ignorant, 
 what asylums for the distressed, have the philoso- 
 phical and poetical unbelievers ever established, or 
 supported ? 
 
 The monks of the convent of St. Bernard are 
 bound by their order to the constant exercise of the 
 virtue of hospitality ; and all travellers without excep- 
 tion or solicitation are liberally entertained by this 
 benevolent brotherhood, whose entire revenues are 
 devoted to the work and labour of love. In the 
 depth of winter, the monks are seen traversing the 
 hills and valleys at the imminent risk of their lives, 
 among the snow, in search of forlorn objects, for the 
 purpose of relieving and conveying them to the mo- 
 nastery. Alpine mastiffs are also trained up to this 
 service, and sent forth in couples at the seasons of 
 greatest peril, to assist travellers who may be passing 
 the mountain. The dogs are provided, one with a 
 small keg of brandy attached to his collar, the other 
 with a bundle of w r arm woollen cloth: thus accoutred, 
 the animals hasten forth, exploring as they go every 
 dangerous pass ; and when they find a person over- 
 whelmed in the snow, they exert themselves to the 
 
264 ANECDOTE. 
 
 utmost to extricate him from his dreadful situation. 
 If they are at too great a distance from the convent 
 to be heard, one of the dogs returns swiftly to give 
 notice to the benevolent monks, whilst the other 
 remains to administer comfort to the poor traveller. 
 Nor is this all ; for the fraternity, instead of being idle 
 drones, are most active and heroically enterprising in 
 braving all dangers for the relief of their fellow-crea- 
 tures. The following is only one out of innumerable 
 instances: — On the 28th of September, 1818, at five 
 in the evening, a voice was heard at the monastery ; 
 and after a moment of surprise, a white speck was 
 discovered, which seemed to be moving on an almost 
 inaccessible rock. Upon this a monk hastened to the 
 summit of the mountain, to the north of the hospital 
 called the Point of Chenalletatz, and found on the 
 brink of a precipice an Englishman, who, in attempt- 
 ing to reach the top, had taken the wrong direction, 
 and made his way to the middle of a rock, from which 
 he could neither ascend nor descend. The monk soon 
 called for assistance to his brethren, who quickly 
 climbed up with a lantern and ropes ; but it was not 
 till after dark that they reached the spot, and extri- 
 cated the traveller from the imminent danger in which 
 
INTREPIDITY. %65 
 
 he was placed. The rocks, the hardened snow, and 
 the darkness, retarded their progress ; so that it was 
 very late when they arrived at the hospital. This 
 circumstance is related on the authority of M. Pictet, 
 the celebrated naturalist of Geneva, who saw the 
 gentleman eight days afterwards, and heard from his 
 own mouth the particulars of his escape ; for which, 
 next to Providence, he expressed his grateful obliga- 
 tions to the good fathers of St. Bernard. 
 
 Such are the men upon whom Lord Byron has 
 poured the foulest abuse, for having improved their 
 domain, by cutting down a grove which had been 
 celebrated by that wretched maniac Rousseau. It is 
 probable that neither the prior of St. Bernard, nor 
 any of his brethren, ever read the " New Heloise ;" 
 and they were certainly no losers by their ignorance 
 of such a work, though it exhibits a very picturesque 
 description of scenes with which they were familiar. 
 But what these good men wanted in literary taste, 
 was more than supplied by substantial virtue ; and if 
 they destroyed an unproductive wood, it was that 
 they might raise wine, not to indulge in riot and de- 
 bauchery, but to administer comfort to the wanderer, 
 
266 USE OF MONASTERIES. 
 
 the sick, and afflicted. At the period when the 
 brethren of St. Bernard were thus calumniated, they 
 kept a table every day for all travellers, who were en- 
 tertained free of expense; and in two months alone 
 there were furnished, thus gratuitously, no less than 
 twelve thousand three hundred and twenty-four meals 
 to passengers, by this nest of drones, as they have 
 been most illiberally termed by Lord Byron, who, 
 from his residence in their neighbourhood and visiting 
 their house, well knew that to no set of men in the 
 world could the epithet which he adopted be applied 
 with so little propriety. 
 
 Perhaps the original possessors of his lordship's 
 mansion in Nottinghamshire did not carry the virtue 
 of hospitality quite so far as the monks of St. Bernard ; 
 but we know enough of the monastic history in ge- 
 neral, to be satisfied that even the abbeys in England 
 were nurseries of learning, and seats of charity. When 
 they passed into the hands of hungry courtiers, the 
 country in general was far from being benefited by the 
 transfer ; and the immediate neighbourhood of each 
 of these religious foundations had reason enough to 
 curse the exchange. Neither, if we were inclined to 
 
USE OF MONASTERIES. 2,67 
 
 carry on the historical enquiry to our own times, shall 
 we find much to admire in the consequences that have 
 resulted from this part of the Reformation ; for, let the 
 monkish superstition have been ever so despicable, it 
 gave employment, instruction, and relief to the indi- 
 gent ; which is more than can be said of the state of 
 things that followed, when the possessors of the abbey 
 lands threw the maintenance of the poor upon the 
 public, without compensating for that burthen, or the 
 loss that had been otherwise sustained, either by local 
 improvement, the influence of moral example, or the 
 diffusion of knowledge. 
 
 Lord Byron is one of those noblemen who are in- 
 debted for all they enjoy to that spoliation of ecclesi- 
 astical property, which took place when it was deemed 
 expedient to strengthen the power of the crown by 
 sacrilege. It ill becomes such a man, therefore, to 
 talk contemptuously of monastic foundations as the 
 seats of idleness ; when in fact the monks, by being 
 resident and spending their revenues within their im- 
 mediate vicinity, did incalculable good. The noble 
 lord, on the contrary, like too many more who have 
 been enriched in the same way, lives abroad, expends 
 
268 SHOCKING OUTRAGE. 
 
 the whole of his rental upon foreigners, and contri- 
 butes nothing in return to the land that supports him, 
 but publications tending to destroy all that can make 
 society desirable, or life a blessing. There is some- 
 thing of ingratitude in this conduct ; but infidelity is 
 always spiteful ; and, however much the tribe of scep- 
 tics may boast of their liberality of sentiment, they 
 never show any courtesy to the opinions of others, even 
 while they claim the utmost indulgence to their own 
 sophisms. Of this want of common civility, a remark- 
 able instance occurred during Lord Byron's abode in 
 Switzerland. His lordship and two or three friends 
 went to visit the priory of St. Bernard at Chamouny, 
 and were entertained there with the customary hospi- I 
 tality of the fraternity. On going away, the album 
 was presented us usual to the company, that each i 
 person might write his name therein, with such obser- 
 vation in prose or verse as might strike his fancy. 
 One of these persons, Percy Bysshe Shelley, had the 
 unparalleled audacity to write in Greek characters a 
 blasphemous distich, to which he subscribed his name 
 with the infamous epithet, AQeog. As the monks are \ 
 not learned, and perhaps seldom scrutinize their re- > 
 gister minutely, this shocking outrage passed unno- > 
 
AMI SEME NTS. $69 
 
 ticed, till some inquisitive traveller happened to de- ' 
 tect and expose it. Yet Lord Byron continued to i 
 live on terms of intimacy with this person, after wit- 
 nessing the atrocity which he committed; and he is ' 
 actually associated with him at the present moment, in ) 
 some new literary projects in Italy. How different j 
 from this unmanly conduct was that of the learned 
 Sir Thomas Browne, who in his " Religio Medici" 
 says, " I should violate my own arm rather than a 
 church, nor willingly deface the name of saint or 
 martyr. At the sight of a cross or a crucifix, I can 
 dispense with my hat, but scarce with the thought or 
 memory of my Saviour ; I cannot laugh at, but rather 
 pity the fruitless journeys of Pilgrims, or contemn 
 the miserable condition of Friars; for though mis- 
 placed in circumstances, there is something in it of 
 devotion." 
 
 The principal amusement of the noble wanderer 
 during his residence in this romantic spot, was sailing 
 on the Lake of Geneva, and sometimes he extended 
 his aquatic excursions to other parts of Switzerland. 
 In his manner of living, he is said to have been very 
 reserved, and somewhat forbidding. Having invited 
 
270 SINGULARITIES. 
 
 M. Pictet and M. Bonstetten one day to dinner, 
 he went on the lake to Chillon, leaving a gen- 
 tleman who travelled with him as a companion to do 
 the honours of the table, and make the requisite apo- 
 logies for his absence. Another time when engaged to 
 an evening party at the house of a lady, he abruptly 
 returned home on finding that the drawing-room was 
 full of company. Many similar instances of capri- 
 ciousness are related of his lordship in these parts, 
 whence some persons might be inclined to suppose 
 that the genius of the place had produced such an im- 
 pression upon his mind, as to make him an imitator of 
 Rousseau's wildest extravagancies. 
 
 Thus much is certain, that the stupendous scenery 
 by which he was surrounded in every direction, had 
 a wonderful effect upon his imagination ; and of this 
 the following extract from his note-book, giving an 
 account of his visit to the Jungfraw, is a proof: — 
 
 "September 22, 1816. — Left Thunn in a boat, 
 which earned us the length of the lake in three hours. 
 The lake small, but the banks fine. Rocks down to 
 the water's edge. Landed at Newhouse. Passed 
 
THE JUNGFRAW. 271 
 
 Interlachen. Entered upon a range of scenes beyond 
 all description or previous conception. Passed a 
 rock bearing an inscription, — two brothers — one mur- 
 dered the other — just the place for it. After a 
 variety of windings came to an enormous rock — 
 arrived at the foot of the mountain (the Jungfraw). — 
 Glaciers — torrents — one of these nine hundred feet 
 visible descent. Lodge at the curate's — set out to 
 see the valley — heard an Avalanche fall like thunder ! 
 Glaciers enormous — storm came on — thunder and 
 lightning and hail ! — all in perfection and beautiful. — 
 The torrent is in shape, curving over the rock, like 
 the tail of the white horse streaming in the wind — 
 just as it might be conceived would be that of the 
 "Pale Horse," on which Death is mounted in the 
 Apocalypse. It is neither mist nor water, but a 
 something between both. Its immense height gives 
 it a wave, a curve, a spreading here, a condensation 
 there ; — wonderful — indescribable. 
 
 u Sept. 23. — Ascent on the Wingren. The Dent 
 <T Argent, shining, like Truth, on the one side ; on 
 the other, the clouds rose from the opposite valley, 
 curling in perpendicular precipices, like the foam of 
 
272 GLACIERS. 
 
 the ocean of hell during a spring-tide ! ! — It was 
 white and sulphury, and immeasurably deep in ap- 
 pearance. The side we ascended was of course not of 
 so precipitous a nature; but on arriving at the summit, 
 we looked down on the other side, upon a boiling sea 
 of cloud, dashing against the crag on which we stood. 
 
 " Arrived at the Grindelwald; mounted and rode 
 to the higher glacier — twilight — but distinct — very 
 fine — glacier like a frozen hurricane — star-light, beau- 
 tiful — the whole of the day was fine in point of wea- 
 ther, as the day in which Paradise was made. Passed 
 whole woods of withered pines — all withered — trunks 
 stripped and lifeless — done by a single winter !" 
 
 It is evident that these loose memoranda were 
 thrown down warmly when the sublimities of which 
 they are notices struck the mind of the writer most 
 impressively : but the hints are therefore the more va- 
 luable on that account, as exhibiting the outlines of a 
 panoramic picture, and the workings of a poetic 
 genius in its first contemplation of some of the higher 
 wonders of nature. 
 
DEPARTURE. 273 
 
 But though Lord Byron declared that the Lake of 
 Geneva made him forget the troubled waters of the 
 world ; neither the Lethean efficacy of this pure 
 stream, nor the mountainous palaces of nature, re- 
 flected therein as in a glassy mirror, could detain him 
 from courting the charms of a softer climate. Within 
 a few months he broke up the establishment which 
 he had formed at Clarens, and, taking his course 
 across the Alps, descended into the plains of the 
 Milanese territory. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 Monody on Sheridan ; Palpable Imitation of Aristo. 
 — Poem of the Prisoner of Chillon. — Story of 
 Bonnivard. — Publication of the Third Canto of 
 Childe Harold. 
 
 SOON after the arrival of Lord Byron in Switzerland, 
 he received from the managing committee of Drury- 
 lane Theatre, a request to write for them a Monody 
 on the late Mr. Sheridan. With this desire his lord- 
 ship very readily complied ; and his performance was 
 recited to the audience at the opening of the season, on 
 the 7th of September, 1816, immediately before the 
 play of "The School for Scandal." In this eulogium 
 the character of Sheridan, as an orator and a dramatic 
 writer, is forcibly drawn, but not without a slight apolo- 
 getic glance at his moral imperfections ; upon which, 
 
MONODY ON SHERIDAN. 27 5 
 
 perhaps, it would have been the wiser course to have 
 said nothing. The concluding part, in which the 
 leading qualities of the deceased are brought into 
 review, may here be quoted ; though rather for the 
 quaintness of the last thought, than on account of any 
 extraordinary merit in the lines themselves : 
 
 " While powers of mind almost of boundless range, 
 Complete in kind — as various in their change ; 
 While Eloquence, Wit, Poesy and Mirth, 
 That humbler harmonist of Care on earth 
 Survive within our souls ; — while lives our sense 
 Of pride in Merit's proud pre-eminence ; 
 Long shall we seek his likeness — long in vain, 
 And turn to all of him which may remain, 
 Sighing that Nature form'd but one such man, 
 And broke the die — in moulding Sheridan !" 
 
 Such is the extravagance of the last two lines, and 
 their forced connexion, if they can be said to connect 
 at all with the former part of the encomium, that we are 
 rather disposed to be pleased than offended on learn- 
 ing the source from whence the conceit was derived. 
 Lord Byron, however, must have been in a very dull 
 humour, or not over- zealous in the work which he 
 
9,76 IMITATION. 
 
 undertook, when he had recourse to Ariosto for an 
 illustration with which to wind up his panegyric. Yet 
 so it is, that the whole of this fine compliment, in 
 which one man, and he none of the best, is praised, 
 at the expense of the species, is literally translated 
 from the Italian romancer, whose words are, " Natura 
 il fece, e poi ruppi la stampa." 
 
 No poet has availed himself more of the remarkable 
 incidents and scenery which he has had the fortune to 
 meet with in his travels than Lord Byron ; and it is 
 observable how the successive pieces published by him, 
 take their imagery and characters from the localities 
 by which the author was last surrounded. Few coun- 
 tries could afford a richer variety of matter for such a 
 genius to work upon than Switzerland ; and during 
 his residence there he failed not to store his mind 
 with an ample stock of original conceptions and 
 combinations, drawn from the sublime and beautiful 
 objects continually presented to his view. 
 
 It was here that he wrote, and caused to be pub- 
 lished, his most pathetic poem, "The Prisoner of 
 Chillon;" which, without any avowed or obvious 
 
PRISONER OF CIIILLON. 277 
 
 reason, he called a fable. The Chateau de Chillon, 
 we are informed by the noble author, is situated 
 between Clarens and Villeneuve ; which last is one 
 extremity of the Lake of Geneva. On its left are 
 the entrances of the Rhone, and opposite are the 
 heights of Meillerie, and the range of Alps above 
 Bovinet and St. Gingo. Near it, on a hill behind, is 
 a torrent ; below it, and washing its walls, the lake 
 has been fathomed to the depth of eight hundred feet 
 of French measure : within it is a range of dungeons, 
 in which the early reformers, and subsequently pri- 
 soners of state, were confined. Across one of the 
 vaults is a beam, black with age, on which, it is said, 
 the condemned persons were executed. In the cells 
 are seven pillars, or rather eight, one being half 
 merged in the wall : on some of these are rings for 
 the fetters and fettered, and in the pavement the steps 
 of Bonnivard have left their traces. Of this cele- 
 brated patriot, to whom Geneva is so much indebted 
 for its independence, the following particulars are 
 related. 
 
 Francis de Bonnivard, son of Louis de Bonnivard, 
 
278 BONNIVARD. 
 
 originally of Seyssel, and Lord of Lunes, was born in 
 1496. He studied at Turin; and in 1510, John 
 Ame de Bonnivard, his uncle, resigned to him the 
 priory of St. Victor, near Geneva. When the Refor- 
 mation began, and set thinking men upon enquiry, 
 Bonnivard became the great advocate of liberty, and 
 sacrificed every thing for the establishment of it at 
 Geneva, of which republic he wrote the history. In 
 1519> the Duke of Savoy having entered the Gene- 
 van territory, Bonnivard retired to Friburg ; but he 
 was betrayed by two men who accompanied him, 
 and the prince sent him to prison, where he remained 
 two years. This, however, did not abate his zeal ; 
 and in 1530 he fell again into the hands of the Duke 
 of Savoy, who confined him in the castle of Chillon, 
 where he continued till 1536, when he was released 
 by the Bernese. He had now the pleasure of seeing 
 Geneva free and reformed ; after which he spent the 
 remainder of his days in peace, and died full of age 
 and honour in 1570. Such is the story of Bonni- 
 vard, in honour of whom Lord Byron wrote this 
 sonnet, prefixed to the poem of the prisoner of 
 Chillon : 
 
BONNIVARD. 279 
 
 " Eternal Spirit of the chainless mind ! 
 Brightest in dungeons, Liberty ! thou art, 
 For there thy habitation is the heart— 
 The heart which love of thee alone can bind ; 
 And when thy sons to fetters are consign'd— 
 
 To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom— 
 Their country conquers with their martyrdom, 
 And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. 
 Chillon ! thy prison is a holy place, 
 
 And thy sad floor an altar — for 'twas trod, 
 Until his very steps have left a trace 
 
 Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, 
 By Bonnivard ! — may none those marks efface ! 
 For they appeal from tyranny to God." 
 
 Yet the history of Bonnivard, highly interesting as 
 it might have been made, forms no part of the poem 
 which the genius of Lord Byron produced upon the 
 gloomy citadel where that illustrious man was so 
 long imprisoned. The narrative, however, which is 
 uncommonly well imagined, and most affectingly 
 told, pourtrays just such an event as may well be 
 supposed to have happened in those turbulent days, 
 when Bonnivard and his compatriots succeeded in 
 breaking the yoke of tyranny. 
 
380 CHILLON. 
 
 The seven pillars in the dungeon of Chillon, ap- 
 pear to have suggested the idea to Lord Byron, of a 
 family consisting of that number of persons, who 
 became the victims of persecution. Of these the 
 single survivor is supposed to relate the history ; but 
 it commences so abruptly, as to make it difficult to 
 guess whether it be a soliloquy, or an address to ano- 
 ther person in answer to his enquiry. Notwith. 
 standing this defect, which is a very common one 
 with the narratory poems of the noble author, the 
 piece operates strongly upon the mind of the reader 
 as he proceeds with the story ; in which the sufferer 
 paints the dreadful calamities of his house with that 
 pathos of woe and minuteness of feeling, which might 
 be expected in one who endured such an accumula- 
 tion of misery. The father and one son are repre- 
 sented as martyred at the stake, for the Protestant 
 faith; two other sons fall in the field of battle, 
 fighting for the liberties of their country; and the 
 three survivors are incarcerated in the dungeon of 
 Chillon, where each is fastened to a pillar, without 
 having the power to hold any communion with one 
 another, except by the voice of lamentation. In this 
 dismal place, and under these distressing circum- 
 
CHILLON. 281 
 
 stances, two of the brothers fall a prey to disease pro- 
 duced by grief; and it is in the description of their 
 sufferings, and of his own agonizing feelings when 
 beholding them without having had the power to ad- 
 minister relief, that the narrator is made to excite the 
 powerful emotions of sympathy. Yet this is effected 
 in a very artless manner, and the tale is told with 
 all that simplicity which is best adapted to work its 
 way directly to the heart. The death of the youngest 
 of this persecuted family, is most affectingly described ; 
 and nothing can be more touching than the awful 
 care which the survivor is represented as observing, 
 .after having obtained the liberty of walking about 
 his cell, to avoid passing over the graves of his bre- 
 thren. Another stroke of sensibility in this exquisitely 
 pathetic piece, is the visit of the little bird at the win- 
 dow of the cell, the prisoner's emotions on losing it, and 
 the fancy which darted itself into his mind, that this was 
 the soul of his younger brother under that appearance. 
 Beautiful as these strokes are, 'there is yet another of 
 equal, if not superior, excellence in the description of 
 the captive climbing up to catch an occasional glimpse 
 of the lake and the distant mountains, with the effect 
 which these slight glances produce upon his mind. 
 
282 SONNET. 
 
 Upon the whole, the " Prisoner of Chillon" may 
 safely be pronounced the purest of Lord Byron's 
 performances, though it may not come up to many 
 or most of the others in richness of imagery, and 
 loftiness of sentiment. If one thing is wanting in 
 the poem, to render it as perfect as could be wished, 
 the deficiency is easily accounted for; since the 
 efficacy of that faith from which a sufferer for his 
 religion [may be supposed to have derived support, 
 could only be painted by one who had felt the in- 
 fluence of the same principle. 
 
 How incompetent the noble author was to express 
 the power of religious feeling, in fortifying the mind 
 under captivity, and in the face of death, will appear 
 from the sonnet which he wrote in praise of four 
 sceptics, about the same time that he composed this 
 poem on the suffering virtues of the Protestant 
 martyrs : 
 
 " Rousseau — Voltaire — our Gibbon — and De Stael — 
 Leman ! these names are worthy of thy shore ; 
 Thy shore, of names like these, wert thou no more, 
 
 Their memory thy remembrance would recall : 
 
 To them thy banks were lovely, as to all ; 
 
SCEPTICISM. 283 
 
 But they have made them lovelier, for the lore 
 
 Of mighty minds doth hallow in the core 
 Of human hearts the ruin of a wall, 
 
 Where dwelt the wise and wondrous ; — but by thee, 
 How much more, Lake of Beauty ! do we feel, 
 
 In sweetly gliding o'er thy crystal sea, 
 The wild glow of that not ungentle zeal, 
 
 Which of the heirs of immortality 
 Is proud, and makes the breath of glory real !" 
 
 These " Heirs of Immortality," some, perhaps, 
 without being guilty of bigotry, may be disposed to 
 rank with the worthies of whom our great ethical 
 poet speaks as being u doomed to everlasting fame." 
 Notoriety was their object, and they gained it by 
 poisoning the stream of truth, as far as lay in their 
 power, for the base purpose of corrupting public 
 morals. Rousseau told Hume that he aimed in his 
 writings to excite wonder by marvellous representa- 
 tions of life and manners. Voltaire endeavoured to 
 destroy religion, because he was afraid of it. The 
 same may be observed of our Gibbon, who thought 
 of nothing but himself; and, however splendid his 
 great work may be, it is a monument of personal 
 vanity; in which pride and malice are equally predo- 
 
284 THIRD CANTO OF I 
 
 minant. Of the lady who brings up the rear, the 
 least that can be said is, that no moral man would 
 wish to have a wife or daughter of her character, 
 even though endowed with the advantages of the 
 knowledge and genius which she possessed. 
 
 But among the literary pursuits of Lord Byron 
 while in Switzerland, his third Canto of Childe 
 Harold may be said to possess the strongest claims 
 to notice, on account of its importance as the con- 
 tinuation of an original design, and for the pecu- 
 liarities by which it is distinguished. 
 
 This part opens with an address to the author's 
 daughter, but evidently not so much from the prin- 
 ciple of paternal affection for the child, as from the 
 wish to shine in the poetic expression of tenderness ; 
 for, let what will be thought of the feelings of the 
 noble lord, there was certainly a want of consistency 
 in dedicating a poem to an infant of whom he had 
 taken so little care. 
 
 The manner in which this curious inscription 
 begins has an air of affectation, that must disgust 
 
• CHILDE HAKOLD. 285 
 
 every sensible mind on taking into consideration the 
 circumstances under which it was written, the ab- 
 ruptness of his lordship's departure from England, 
 and the wandering course of life adopted by him, 
 when he had so fond a tie to call for his personal 
 attention at home. Instead of discharging those 
 imperative obligations which belong to the paternal 
 relation, the noble author contents himself with apos- 
 trophizing his daughter in print, and that in a strain 
 which would seem to preclude all prospect of a re- 
 union : 
 
 * Is thy face like thy mother's, my fair child? 
 Ada, sole daughter of my house and heart ! 
 When last I saw thy young blue eyes, they smiled — 
 And then we parted — not as now we part — 
 But with a hope." 
 
 With the private feelings of any man, or the con- 
 cerns of his family, the public have nothing to do — 
 unless those feelings and concerns are mixed up with 
 his writings, and obtruded on the world by himself; in 
 which case they' become proper matter for discussion. 
 Lord Byron, when he left his native land, should have 
 
286 THIRD CANTO OF 
 
 buried his domestic differences in the privacy of his 
 own mind ; for if he did not choose to explicate the 
 causes of them, he had no right, in any way, or at any 
 time, to endeavour by his appeals to excite that sym- 
 pathy which could not be felt towards him without 
 prejudice to others. But as he begins, so he ends 
 this song with dwelling upon the affectionate solicitude 
 which, according to his representation, occupied his 
 thoughts for the child whom he had left behind ; when 
 he might, and ought, if he was really an injured man, 
 to have taken that child under his own proper pro- 
 tection. Nor should it be forgotten that the man who 
 has the moral welfare of his offspring at heart, will be 
 sedulously circumspect of his own character and 
 conduct ; knowing how much the peace and reputation 
 of a family depend upon the principles and deport- 
 ment of a father. Lord Byron has an only daughter, 
 the heiress of his house, name, and fortunes : now let 
 the world judge of the tender regard which the noble 
 poet has had to the future comforts of this daughter. 
 Has that regard been manifested by invectives against 
 marriage, by tales of debauchery, by a daring mockery 
 of all religion , and by an open apology for offences which 
 ought not to be named ? Such, however, is the lite- 
 
CHILDE HAROLD. 287 
 
 rary estate which this right honourable author will leave 
 to his posterity ; and in this manner has he discharged 
 the duties of life, though blessed with an inheritance 
 and a genius that enabled him to have secured for his 
 descendants the proud and grateful remembrance of 
 talent consecrated to virtue. Yet in this poem Lord 
 Byron anticipates the enjoyment of a blessing to 
 which he certainly can have no claim, unless a great 
 moral change is effected, of which as yet the world 
 has seen no symptoms. In his concluding lines to his 
 infant daughter he says — 
 
 u Though dull Hate as duty should be taught, 
 
 I know that thou wilt love me : though my name 
 
 Should be shut from thee, as a spell still fraught 
 
 "With desolation— and a broken claim ; — 
 
 Though the grave closed between us — 'twere the same — 
 
 I know that thou wilt love me : though to drain 
 
 My blood from out thy being, were an aim, 
 
 And an attainment, — all would be in vain ; 
 
 Still thou wouldst love me— still that more than life retain." 
 
 Thus begins and thus ends the third canto of 
 Childe Harold, in which the noble author has so 
 completely pourtrayed himself that it would be ridi- 
 
288 THIRD CANTO OF 
 
 culous to separate the pilgrim from the poet, however 
 disagreeable the junction may appear. 
 
 The travels of Lord Byron from England to the 
 Lake of Geneva constitute the materials of the poem ; 
 and he has sketched the scenery which occurred to his 
 view as he passed along the Rhine with a rapid but 
 accurate pencil. Still there is throughout this part 
 much more of metaphysical abstraction and gloomy 
 reflection than of glowing description or varied ima- 
 gery, until we are brought to the vicinity of the Alps ; 
 and here the author is in his element. These mighty 
 hills are — 
 
 ' The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls 
 Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps, 
 And throned Eternity in icy halls, 
 Of cold sublimity where forms and falls 
 The avalanche— the thunderbolt of snow ! 
 All that expands the spirit, yet appals 
 Gather around these summits, as to show 
 How Earth may pierce to Heaven, yet leave vain man 
 below !" 
 
 An Alpine tempest is pictured with a power which 
 nothing short of personal observation could have 
 
LAKE OF GENEVA. 289 
 
 enabled any one to describe accurately, and which 
 none but a mind enthusiastically poetical could have 
 painted so forcibly. As a contrast to this grand and 
 terrible exhibition, we turn to the mild and gentle lake, 
 at the close of day : 
 
 " It is the hush of night, and all between 
 
 Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear J 
 Mellowing and mingling, yet distinctly seen, 
 
 Save darken'd Jura, whose capt heights appear 
 Precipitously steep ; and drawing near 
 
 There breathes a living fragrance from the shore, 
 Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
 
 Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, 
 Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more." 
 
 But though the mind of the author could har- 
 monize so well with inanimate nature, he was at 
 complete war with the moral world: for thus he 
 soliloquizes — 
 
 " I live not in myself, but I become 
 Portion of that around me ; and to me 
 High mountains are a feeling, but the hum 
 
 Of human cities, torture. I can see 
 
 U 
 
290 GLOOMY DESCRIPTION. 
 
 Nothing to loathe in nature, save to be 
 A link reluctant in a fleshly chain 
 
 Class'd among creatures, when the soul can flee 
 And with the sky, the peak, the heaving plain 
 Of ocean, or the stars, mingle, and not in vain. 
 
 And thus I am absorb'd, and this is life : 
 
 I look upon the peopled desart past 
 As on a place of agony and strife, 
 
 Where, for some sin, to sorrow I was cast— 
 To act and suffer, but remount at last 
 
 With a fresh pinion ; which I feel to spring, 
 Though young, yet waxing vigorous as the blast 
 
 Which it would cope with, on delighted wing 
 Spurning the clay-cold bonds which round our being cling." 
 
 He who could bring himself to think and judge so 
 uncharitably of the whole mass of mankind, had no 
 reason to complain of severity. But after all, what in 
 reality had this noble person to be dissatisfied with in 
 the moral constitution of the universe ? Of the good 
 things of this life he possessed a superabundance; 
 certainly far more than ever before fell to the lot of a 
 poet; and if literary fame was the object of his ambi- 
 tion, he had even at this period attained a much 
 
MISANTHROPY. 291 
 
 higher rank, and more extensive celebrity, than his 
 most ardent expectation could have augured when he 
 first offered himself as a candidate for literary distinc- 
 tion. He was now become a planet in the poetic 
 system, surrounded with his belts and luminous ring ; 
 attended also by an increasing number of satellites, and 
 even acquiring new honours and admirers every day. 
 Yet with all these advantages, and having little or no 
 apparent cause for discontent, the noble lord never 
 appeared before the public without inveighing bitterly 
 against the whole construction of human society, and 
 bewailing in the most piteous terms his own hard lot, 
 in being obliged to associate with mountains, oceans, 
 and deserts. To use his own phraseology in this 
 third Canto of Childe Harold, his mind, " proud in 
 desolation, refused to yield up its dominion to the 
 spirits against whom he rebelled." 
 
 But who called upon him to deliver up his mind to 
 thraldom ? or what attempt was ever made to bind 
 down this unfettered spirit from exercising its intel- 
 lectual privileges to a boundless extent ? If this que- 
 rulous language has any meaning at all, and some it 
 must have, the rational interpretation of it can only 
 
29% DISORDERED IMAGINATION. 
 
 be this ; that the forms and laws of civil life were 
 by him considered as too strict for conformity. 
 
 His strange comparison of the appearance of the 
 Alpine clouds, when tossed and tumbling in restless 
 confusion, to the " ocean of hell during a spring tide," 
 is not an inapt figure of his own perturbed state of 
 mind, when he threw out so many denunciations 
 against mankind. After this, the quiet and humble 
 spirit who seeks happiness with the desire of commu- 
 nicating it to others, as far as he has it in his power, 
 will not be disposed to regard these views of life, 
 whatever may be thought of their high poetical colour- 
 ing, as entitled to credit, or the author to respect. In 
 truth, the metaphysical lucubrations of Lord Byron dis- 
 play every where such bursts of ungovernable passion, 
 and are so totally void of any thing like the correct ob- 
 servation of existing things, or a philosophical discri- 
 mination of them, that no one can read his ravings 
 without pain, though they were evidently intended to 
 command assent and to raise pity. The coruscations of 
 a mighty genius, indeed, shoot forth like the glare of 
 lightning amidst these wild and tumultuary ebullitions ; 
 but the light so thrown out only serves to expose a 
 
VOLTAIRE. 293 
 
 chaos of boiling thoughts, and indigested conceptions, 
 working together in endless confusion, and rendered 
 worse by a proud'contempt of all order and authority. 
 
 To the arbitrary decisions of a mind so disturbed in 
 itself, what sober understanding can be disposed to 
 pay attention on questions that require patient inves- 
 tigation and an impartial judgment ? Yet the noble 
 author of Childe Harold, in this third Canto, while 
 professing enmity to his own kind, and affinity only 
 with lakes and rocks, presumes to enter into the affairs 
 of nations, and to pass sentence upon the counsels of 
 empires. 
 
 In addition to this political excrescence, is another 
 deformity of a still fouler description ; and that is the 
 bold avowal of infidelity, with an eulogy upon the 
 great champions of Scepticism. Of Voltaire, who is 
 evidently a favourite of the noble lord, it is said that 
 he was 
 
 " Most unstable in wishes, but in mind! 
 
 A wit as various— gay, grave, sage, or wild,— 
 Historian, bard, philosopher combined: 
 
 He multiplied himself among mankind, 
 
294 SCEPTICISM. 
 
 The Proteus of their talents ; but his own 
 
 Breathed most in ridicule — which, as the wind, 
 Blew where it listed, laying all things prone 
 Now to o'erthrow a fool, and now to shake a throne/' 
 
 To render this encomiastic description more cha- 
 racteristic of the object, and more offensive to good 
 manners, the noble lord has here applied one of the 
 sublimest figures in the gospel, to the man who spent 
 his whole life in endeavouring to root out the princi- 
 ples of all religion from the minds of men. In the 
 same spirit jGfibbon the historian partakes of the 
 author's praises, for having " sapped a solemn creed 
 with solemn sneer ;" and it is for this also that Lord 
 Byron puts in his own claim to immortality, though, 
 while boasting of his mental independence, he makes 
 the dreadful confession that he knew not how to 
 direct his steps aright ; for which, however, he assigns 
 this cogent reason, 
 
 " Untaught in youth my heart to tame, 
 My springs of life were poisoned." 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 Marloe a?id Lord Byron compared.— Account of 
 the dramatic Poem of " Manfred:'— Origin 
 and tendency of that Piece.— Ferrara.— The 
 " Lament qfTasso" 
 
 WERE we disposed to select a parallel to Lord 
 Byron from among our old English writers, we know 
 not one so exactly suited in all points to our purpose, 
 as Christopher Marloe, the contemporary of Shak- 
 speare; and who is thus characterised by Michael 
 Drayton : 
 
 " Next Marloe, bathed in Thespian springs, 
 Had in him those brave translunary things 
 That your first poets had ; his raptures were 
 All air and fire, which made his verses clear : 
 For that fine madness still he did retain 
 Which rightly should possess a poet's brain." 
 
296 MARLOE. 
 
 To the most daring scepticism and licentiousness of 
 principles, were added in him a fertile genius and 
 great originality of conception ; but he delighted in 
 drawing characters which, for the honour of human 
 nature, it is to be hoped had rarely if ever any proto- 
 types ; and though Marloe was himself a professed 
 unbeliever to the widest extent, he encumbered his 
 pieces with all the dreadful machinery of superstitious 
 credulity. But his main power lay in representing 
 villany ; and in doing this, no one ever exceeded him ; 
 for all the personages of his dramas, upon whom he 
 has heaped the load of guilt, are criminal without any 
 motive except that of vice, and this deadly innate 
 obliquity of mind they retain without compunction or 
 repentance to the last moment of existence. It is, 
 therefore, not to be wondered that the works of Mar- 
 loe should have long since sunk into oblivion'; for 
 where no moral end is answered by such repre- 
 sentations, the effect must be mischievous. The 
 reproach which iEschylus, according to Aristophanes, 
 brings against Euripides, is that he exhibited the 
 vilest characters in his pieces. " What," said the 
 great tragedian, " am I the inventor of those per- 
 sonages?" — " No," answers iEschylus, " their ad- 
 
ON POETIC CHARACTERS. 297 
 
 ventures were known long before ; but a poet, whose 
 business it is to instruct mankind, ought not to choose 
 for his subjects, historical adventures the recital of 
 which may have a pernicious influence." 
 
 But if this be wrong in regard to the exhibition of 
 real events, and the delineation of characters that 
 have actually lived in the world; how much more 
 improper is it to imagine new scenes of iniquity, and 
 to bring before the public, either on the stage, or in 
 print, creatures whose sole pleasure is wickedness? 
 Such, however, are the dramatic personages of Marloe, 
 and such are the prominent ones in the poems of Lord 
 Byron. After carrying the idea of human depravity 
 to a depth of degradation as far as imagination 
 seemed capable of going, the noble author resolved to 
 make another effort, and to embody a being that 
 should outdo all his former doings. It is curious 
 that he should have been tempted to this strange trial 
 of his creative powers, by the sublime scenery which 
 excited his astonishment among the icy mountains of 
 Switzerland ; and that the contemplation of objects cal- 
 culated to raise the mind to noble thoughts, should 
 have inspired him with the notion of forming a hideous 
 
298 MANFRED. 
 
 moral contrast to those wonders. Such, however, is the 
 fact ; and it was the Jungfraw, of which he sketched 
 so fine an outline, that suggested to him the idea of 
 pourtraying a character no less gigantic in wicked- 
 ness, than that mountain appeared terrible in the awful 
 magnificence of nature. This may be poetical, but it is 
 not consistent, and such a manner of studying the grand 
 appearances of the external world, differs in sentiment 
 and utility from that mentioned by our immortal dra- 
 matic writer, who could 
 
 " Find tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
 Sermons in stones, and good in every thing." 
 
 The poem of " Manfred," though called a drama, 
 has nothing more of that species of composition, 
 than what arises from the circumstance of its being 
 divided into acts and scenes, with machinery drawn 
 from mythology, and the chimeras of magical super- 
 stition. The piece opens with the appearance of 
 Manfred soliloquizing, at midnight, in his Gothic gal- 
 lery, upon the wretchedness of his situation, though 
 the particulars and causes of his misery are left to 
 be conjectured. After a long preamble, he veiv 
 
INCANTATIONS. 299 
 
 tures to call to his aid the ministers of darkness ; who, 
 being disobedient to the first summons, are invocated 
 by a more potent spell, the like of which will not 
 easily be found in any of the demonologists from 
 Jamblichus down to Cornelius Agrippa : 
 
 " By a power 
 Deeper than all yet urged, a tyrant spell 
 Which had its birth-place in a star condemn'd, 
 The burning wreck of a demolish'd world, 
 A wandering hell in the eternal space ; 
 By the strong curse which is upon my soul, 
 The thought which is within me and around me, 
 I do compel ye to my will." 
 
 There was no standing against this terrible conju- 
 ration, and accordingly forth issue the trembling inha- 
 bitants of the deep, " black spirits and white, blue 
 spirits and grey," anxious to know the wish of the 
 necromancer. Manfred, in reply, demands the boon 
 of u forgetfulness of that which is within him." 
 This, however, is more than they have the power of 
 granting ; on which the enchanter commands them 
 to assume the human form, and accordingly one of 
 them takes the appearance of his deceased sister, with 
 
300 WITCH OF THE ALPS. 
 
 whom he had committed a crime too horrible to be 
 stated. This phantom overpowers the faculties of 
 Manfred, and terminates the first scene. In the 
 next, he appears on the edge of one of the precipices 
 of the Jungfraw, ready to throw himself into the 
 chasm below, when he is snatched from destruction 
 by a hunter, who conveys him to his cottage. The 
 second act presents Manfred wandering by a cataract, 
 where he invokes the witch of the Alps, who comes 
 at his call ; and the following colloquy takes place : — 
 
 Witch. — Proceed. 
 
 Man. — Oh ! I but thus prolong'd my words, 
 Boasting these idle attributes, because 
 As I approach the core of my heart's grief — 
 But to my task. I have not named to thee 
 Father or mother, mistress, friend, or being* 
 With whom I wore the chain of human ties ; 
 If I had such, they seem'd not such to me — 
 Yet there was one — 
 
 Witch. — Spare not thyself — proceed. 
 
 Man. — She was like me in lineaments — her eyes, 
 Her hair, her features, all, to the very tone 
 Even of her voice, they said, were like to mine ; 
 But soften'd all, and temper'd into beauty : 
 She had the same lone thoughts and wanderings, 
 
WITCH OF THE ALPS. 301 
 
 The quest of hidden knowledge, and a mind 
 To comprehend the universe ; nor these / 
 Alone, but with them gentler powers than mine- 
 Pity, and smiles, and tears— which I had not ; 
 And tenderness — but that I had for her : 
 Humility — and that I never had. 
 Her faults were mine— her virtues were her own : — 
 I loved her and destroyed her ! 
 Witch.— With thy hand ? 
 
 Man. — Not with my hand, but heart— which broke her 
 heart ; — 
 It gazed on mine, and wither'd. I have shed 
 Blood, but not hers — and yet her blood was shed ; — 
 I saw — and could not staunch it. 
 
 Witch.— And for this— 
 A being of the race thou dost despise, 
 The order which thine own would rise above, 
 Mingling with us and ours, thou dost forego 
 The gifts of our great knowledge, and shrinkest back 
 To recreant mortality. — Away ! 
 
 Man. — Daughter of Air ! I tell thee, since that hour — 
 But words are breath — look on me in my sleep, 
 Or watch my watchings — come and sit by me ! 
 My solitude is solitude no more, 
 But peopled with the furies : —1 have gnash'd 
 My teeth in darkness till returning morn, 
 Then cursed myself till sun-set : — I have pray'd 
 For madness as a blessing — 'tis denied me. 
 
302 NEMESIS. 
 
 I have affronted Death — ut in the war 
 
 Of elements the waters shrunk from me, 
 
 And fatal things pass'd harmless — the cold hand 
 
 Of an all-pitiless daemon held me back, 
 
 Back by a single hair, which would not break." 
 
 After some more confessions of the same fearful 
 description, Manfred being left alone by the witch, 
 proceeds to his incantations, for the purpose of ascer- 
 taining whether there is any existence after death. 
 Then follows a meeting of the Destinies, with Nemesis 
 at their head, in the Hall of Arimanes, on the summit 
 of a mountain. In this part the author gives a spe- 
 cimen of his politics and liberal sentiments, in the 
 following account which Nemesis gives of herself 
 and her late occupations : 
 
 " I was detain'd repairing shatter'd thrones, 
 Marrying fools, restoring dynasties ; 
 Avenging men upon their enemies, 
 And making them repent their own revenge ; 
 Goading the wise to madness ; from the dull 
 Shaping out oracles to rule the world 
 Afresh ; for they were waxing out of date, 
 And mortals dared to ponder for themselves, 
 To weigh kings in the balance, and to speak 
 Of Freedom the forbidden fruit." 
 
DViNG SCENE. 303 
 
 Into the hall where these personages are as- 
 sembled, Manfred presumes to enter, and, after some 
 entreaty, prevails upon the Destinies to call up his 
 sister Astarte from the dead. This is done, and the 
 apparition having informed him, that "to-morrow 
 ends his earthly ills," vanishes. In the last act, an 
 Abbot is introduced, for the purpose, as it should 
 seem, of manifesting the authors contempt of re- 
 ligion ; for there is neither dignity in the priest, nor 
 penitence in Manfred. The following scene is an 
 awkward and ludicrous travesty of the story of Saul 
 and the witch of Endor : 
 
 * Man. — Look there, I say, 
 And stedfastly ; — now tell me what thou seest. 
 
 Abbot. — That which should shake me — but I fear it 
 not: — 
 I see a dusk and awful figure rise 
 Like an infernal God from out the earth, 
 His face wrapt in a mantle, and his form 
 Robed as with angry clouds ; he stands between > 
 Thyself and me — but I do fear him not. 
 
 Man. — Thou hast no cause — he shall not harm thee — but 
 His sight may shock thine old limbs into palsy. 
 I say to thee— Kftire ! 
 
304 PARALLELS. 
 
 Abbot. — And I reply — 
 
 Never— till I have talk'd with this fiend— 
 
 t 
 
 What doth he here ? 
 
 Man. — Why — ay — what doth he here ? 
 I did not send for him — he is unbidden. 
 
 Abbot. — Alas ! lost mortal ! what with guests like these 
 Hast thou to do ? I tremble for thy sake : 
 Why doth he gaze on thee, and thou on him ? 
 Ah ! he unveils his aspect ; on his brow 
 The thunder scars are graven ; from his eye 
 Glares forth the immortality of hell. — 
 A vaunt !" 
 
 Satan, however, is not so easily scared ; and though 
 Manfred, like Doctor Faustus, in Marloe's play, 
 strives hard to void his, doom, a legion of spirits 
 arise to enforce obedience. The dying scene, and 
 the reflection of the Abbot, will remind the reader 
 of Shakspeare's inimitable description of the death- 
 bed of Cardinal Beaufort. 
 
 Such is the story of Manfred, than which a worse 
 could not well have been conceived by any imagination ; 
 but for what purpose a character so unique in wicked- 
 ness and absurdity was formed, we are not told. Set- 
 ting aside this deformity, and the incongruities with 
 
SOLILOQUY. 305 
 
 which it is connected, there are many fine passages in 
 the poem ; but they lose the effect which would other- 
 wise have been produced by them, from their being 
 intermixed with disgusting scenes and extravagant 
 reflections. One of the finest descriptions in the 
 piece, is the following soliloquy of Manfred : 
 
 " The stars are forth, the moon above the tops 
 Of the snow-shining mountains. Beautiful ! 
 I linger yet with Nature, for the night 
 Hath been to me a more familiar face 
 Than that of man ; and in her starry shade 
 Of dim and solitary loveliness, 
 I learn'd the language of another world. 
 1 do remember me, that in my youth 
 When I was wandering — upon such a night- - 
 I stood within the Colisteum's wall, 
 Midst the chief relics of almighty Rome : 
 The trees which grew along the broken arches 
 Waved dark in the blue midnight, and the stars 
 Shone through the rents of ruin : from afar 
 The watch-dog bay ? d beyond the Tiber ; and 
 More near from out the Caesar's palace came 
 The owl's long cry ; and, interruptedly, 
 Of distant sentinels — the fitful song 
 Begun and died upon the gentle wind. 
 Some cypresses beyond the tinio-worn breach 
 
 x 
 
306 DEFORMITIES. 
 
 Appear'd to skirt the horizon, yet they stood 
 
 Within a bow shot. Where the Caesars dwelt, 
 
 And dwell the tuneless birds of night, amidst 
 
 A grove which springs through levell'd battlements, 
 
 And twines its roots with the imperial hearths — 
 
 Ivy usurps the laurel's place of growth : 
 
 But the gladiator's bloody circus stands, 
 
 A noble wreck in ruinous perfection ; 
 
 While Caesar's chambers, and the Augustan halls, 
 
 Grovel on earth in indistinct decay." 
 
 There is great beauty in this description, but it is 
 sadly marred by dislocated sentences, prosaic diction 
 and gross solecisms of language ; faults which not 
 only disfigure the present poem, but run through all 
 the works of the noble author. These defects, how- 
 ever, are but as a feather in the balance, compared 
 with the black immorality of the piece. Yet it has 
 been said of the hero of the poem, that his character 
 is marked by independent dignity, intellectual power, 
 and intrepid philosophy ; though his dignity consisted 
 in unrepented guilt under the remembrance of the 
 foulest of crimes, and his mental superiority lay in 
 the belief of sorcery, and in the practice of the dri- 
 velling superstitions of the dark ages. 
 
LAMENT OF TASSO. 307 
 
 The next production of the noble lord was of a 
 healthier complexion; so much so as almost to 
 make the reader believe, that the genial climate to 
 which he had now removed had wrought a happy 
 effect upon his mind. In passing through Ferrara, 
 Lord Byron was induced to visit the Lunatic Hos- 
 pital of St. Anne, where Tasso was confined some 
 years, for his presumption in aspiring to the love of 
 the Princess Leonora of Este. Of the insanity of 
 the Italian poet, there can be little doubt ; and yet 
 his case was of a description to excite the sympathy 
 of every mind of sensibility. Lord Byron, in this 
 poem, has personified the suffering bard, and ex- 
 pressed in strong language the sentiments which 
 Tasso may be supposed to have felt during his long 
 confinement. 
 
 There is, however, one passage in this short but 
 fine poem, which savours more of the noble author's 
 own style of thinking than that of the great poet in 
 whose name he professes to pour out the strain of 
 lamentation. It is where Tasso is made to justify 
 his ambitious love : 
 
308 LAMENT OF TASSO. 
 
 " It is no marvel — from my very birth 
 
 My soul was drunk with love, which did pervade 
 
 And mingle with whate'er I saw on earth ; 
 
 Of objects all inanimate I made 
 
 Idols, and out of wild and lonely flowers 
 
 Whereby they grew, a paradise, 
 
 Where I did lay me down within the shade 
 
 Of waving trees, and dream'd uncounted hours." 
 
 Now this is so far from being in character, that it 
 is the very reverse; for whether Tasso was in his 
 senses or not, if his love was sincere, he would have 
 made the object of his affection the sole theme of his 
 meditation, instead of generalizing his passion, and 
 talking about the original sympathies of his nature. 
 Lord Byron, we know, is fond of this kind of 
 boasting, and of declaring how powerfully his mind 
 has ever been attracted to the beauties of the universe; 
 but a man over head and ears in love, would make 
 use of other language, and direct all his thoughts to 
 the single being in whom his soul centered. 
 
 Still the " Lament of Tasso" is a beautiful piece, 
 notwithstanding the negligence of the composition ; 
 
MADNESS. 309 
 
 * .id it would be difficult perhaps to find a better 
 piece of painting, than this description of the Mad- 
 I louse : 
 
 " Above me, hark ! the long and maniac cry] 
 
 Of minds and bodies in captivity. 
 And hark ! the lash and the increasing howl, 
 
 And the half inarticulate blasphemy ! 
 There be some here with worse than frenzy soul, 
 
 Some who do still goad on the o'er-labour'd mind,] 
 
 And dim the little light that 's left behind J 
 
 "With needless torture, as their tyrant will j 
 
 Is wound up to the lust of doing ill : 
 With these and with their victims am I class'd, 
 Mid sounds and sights like these long years have pass'd ; ] 
 Mid sights and sounds like these my life may close : 
 So let it be— for then I shall reposed 
 
 This picture, though enfeebled by unnecessary 
 expletives, is finely touched, and had the noble 
 author never written any thing else, the monument 
 here erected by him to the honour of Tasso, would 
 have entitled him to the praise of being a poet of 
 the first order. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Rome, — Completion of " Childe Harold!' — Fall of 
 Venice. — An Italian Landscape by Moonlight. — 
 Statue of Venus. — Conclusion of the Poem. — 
 Deformities. —Poetical Tale of " Beppo." — Allu- 
 sion to Peter Pindar and Whist leer aft. — A 
 Literary imposition practised on Lord Byron, in 
 the Story of the " Vampyre." — Publication of 
 " Mazeppa? 
 
 AFTER visiting various parts of the North of Italy, 
 Lord Byron took up his abode for some time at 
 Venice, where he was joined by his old acquaintance 
 Mr. Hobhouse, with whom he went on an excursion 
 to Rome ; and there the poem of Childe Harold re- 
 ceived its completion. The longest and last Canto 
 of this very irregular piece was published at the be- 
 ginning of 1 8 1 8, with a complimentary address to the 
 
VENICE. 311 
 
 author's fellow traveller, who, besides contributing to 
 the volume a copious body of notes, printed also, in 
 a separate form, a miscellany, entituled " Illustra- 
 tions of Childe Harold." 
 
 The poem opens at Venice, which city is described 
 as seen from the " Bridge of Sighs," and rising like 
 a new Cybele from the ocean. The fallen fortunes 
 of this once famed republic are lamented in strong 
 terms, and with many severe reflections upon England, 
 for neglecting to protect the most tyrannical of all 
 oligarchies, and which for many years had given 
 indications of irremediable and merited dissolution. 
 From Venice we are conducted to Arqua, where 
 Petrarch lies ; thence to Ferrara ; and finally, by the 
 course of the Arno, to the ancient capital of the 
 world. In this circuit various interesting objects are 
 described, and some spirited sketches introduced of 
 eminent Italian writers, among whom are Dante, 
 Tasso, Ariosto, Boccacio, and Alfieri. Of the pic- 
 turesque representations, the moonlight scene near 
 Venice is one of the most beautiful ; and the de- 
 scription of a cataract on the Velino, one of the 
 
312 ITALIAN LANDSCAPE. 
 
 grandest in the poem. The former as exhibiting the 
 soft features of an Italian sky and landscape, may be 
 considered as a poetical Claude : 
 
 '* The Moon is up, and yet it is not night — 
 
 Sunset divides the sky with her : — a sea 
 Of glory streams along the Alpine height 
 
 Of blue Friuli's mountains : heaven is free 
 From clouds, but of all colours seems to be 
 Melted to one vast Iris of the west, 
 
 Where the Day joins the past Eternity; 
 While, on the other hand, meek Dian's crest 
 Floats through the azure air — an island of the blest ! 
 A single star is at her side, and reigns 
 
 With her o'er half the lovely heaven ; but still 
 Yon sunny sea heaves brightly, and remains 
 
 RolFd o'er the peak of the far Rhcetian hill, 
 As day and night contending were, until 
 
 Nature reclaim'd her order : — gently flows 
 The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues instil 
 
 The odorous purple of a new-born rose, 
 Which streams upon her stream, and glass'd within it glows. 
 Fill'd with the face of heaven, which from afar 
 
 Comes down upon the waters, all its hues 
 From the rich sunset to the rising star 
 
 Their magical variety diffuse ; 
 
THE BATHOS. 313 
 
 And now they change; a paler shadow strews 
 Its mantle o'er the mountains ; parting day 
 Die9, and like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues 
 With a new colour as it gasps away, 
 The last still loveliest, 'till— 'tis gone— and all is grey." 
 
 There are some sad prosaic lines and uncouth ter- 
 minations in this passage ; but the worst drawback 
 from unqualified praise lies against a ludicrous in- 
 stance of the bathos, in which the mellowing shades 
 of a delightful evening sky are compared to the 
 changes of colour in a dying fish. 
 
 Such excrescencies are, however, too thickly strewn 
 throughout the poem ; and what is very extraordinary, 
 we meet with them most in those parts where it was 
 natural to expect the greatest correctness and the 
 highest polish. Thus, in the apostrophe to Venus, 
 occasioned by a contemplation of her statue, nothing 
 can be conceived more incongruous, limping, and 
 absurd, than the following lines : 
 
 " Appear'dst thou not to Paris in this guise? 
 
 Or to more deeply blest Anchises ? or 
 Tn all thy perfect goddess-ship, when lies 
 
 Before thee thy own vanquish'd Lord of War ? 
 
314 STRANGE SIMILE. 
 
 And gazing on thy face as toward a star, 
 
 Laid on thy lap, his eyes to thee upturn, 
 Feeding on thy sweet cheek ! while thy lips are 
 With lava kisses melting while they burn 
 Shower'd on his eye-lids, brow, and mouth, as from an urn !" 
 
 This simile of volcanic kisses, showered from an 
 urn, if any idea can be formed of such endearments, 
 would have made Longinus swear, even though he 
 had found the figure in Homer. 
 
 The address to Rome is of a different character, 
 and the description of the Collisaeum, with the story 
 of the gladiator, will make the reader forget, for a 
 moment, the blemishes which elsewhere disjoint the 
 verse and spoil the sense. 
 
 We pass over the flaming spirit with which the 
 author raves upon his mighty wrongs, and prophe- 
 sies bitter things against the " souls of those whom 
 he surveys in his imagination." His imprecations 
 are indeed deep and dreadful, but we turn from them 
 to a feeling more sentimental and poetic : 
 
CONCLUSION. 31,5 
 
 "There it a pleasure in the pathless woods, 
 
 There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 
 There is society where none intrudes, 
 By the deep sea, and music in its roar ; 
 I love not man the less, but Nature more. 
 From these our interviews, in which I steal, 
 
 From all T may be, or have been before, 
 To mingle with the Universe, and feel 
 What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal." 
 
 Little as the supposed pilgrim appears in this 
 part, any more than in the preceding one, he is in- 
 troduced at the conclusion, for the purpose of taking 
 his final leave of the reader, in an epilogue, the 
 last stanza of which is as follows : 
 
 " Farewell ! a word that must be, and hath been 
 
 A sound which makes us linger ; — yet — farewell ! 
 Ye who have traced the pilgrim to the scene 
 
 Which is his last, if in your memories dwell 
 A thought which once was his, if on ye swell 
 
 A single recollection, not in vain 
 He wore the sandal-shoon and scallop shell. 
 
 Farewell ! with him alone may rest the pain, 
 If such there were — with you the moral of the strain." 
 
 Unhappily, however, there is no moral at all in 
 
316 POETIC ERRORS. 
 
 the piece, if by the word be meant any direct object, 
 or implied design, under the form of a narrative. The 
 poem in truth exhibits nothing more than sketches 
 of scenery, and metaphysical considerations, neither 
 connected with, nor bearing any necessary relation to 
 each other ; or tending, as far as can be discerned, to 
 the elucidation of any one moral truth. 
 
 In regard to poetical conception, the piece through- 
 out carries decided proofs of a most fertile and exu- 
 berant fancy ; but it is a fancy unchastised by judg- 
 ment; hence every Canto, and none more so than 
 the last, abounds with the grossest errors in language, 
 violations of prosody, and miserable rhymes ; of 
 which the following curious instance occurs in an 
 address to the Ocean, on the destruction of a poor 
 sailor, who has 
 
 " His petty hope in some near port or bay, 
 
 And dashest him again to earth— there let him lay." 
 
 While the noble author of Childe Harold was 
 putting the last hand to that poem, he produced 
 another of a widely different character, both in sub- 
 
liKi'Po. 317 
 
 ject and versification, entituled " Beppo ; a Venetian 
 Story." The tale is of the humorous cast, and of a 
 very slight texture, being nothing more than the ad- 
 venture of a Venetian mariner named Giuseppe, or 
 by diminution Beppo, who remains abroad so long, 
 that his wife Laura takes what the poet calls a 
 " vice-husband" to protect her. In the midst of the 
 Carnival, however, the amusements of which are 
 admirably described, Beppo, who had been a slave 
 and a pirate, makes his appearance, reclaims his 
 lady, and all the parties continue to live together 
 very harmoniously. Flimsy, as the materials are, 
 the manner in which the noble author has wrought 
 them up, is very pleasant ; and shows an uncommon 
 sportiveness of disposition, tending somewhat strongly 
 to the causticity of satire ; with such a command of 
 language, that it may absolutely be said to dance 
 under the gaiety of fancy. The happiest specimen 
 of this jeu d'esprit of verse, is the introductory picture 
 of the Carnival : 
 
 " The moment Night with dusky mantle covers 
 The skies, (and the more duskily the better), 
 
 The time less liked by husbands than by lovers 
 Begins, and prudery flings aside her fetter : 
 
318 CARNIVAL. 
 
 And Gaiety on restless tiptoe hovers, 
 
 Giggling with all the gallants who beset her ; 
 And there are songs and quavers, roaring, humming r 
 Guitars, and every other sort of strumming. 
 
 u And there are dresses, splendid, but fantastical, 
 
 Masks of all times and nations, Turks and Jews, 
 And harlequins and clowns, with feats gymnastical, 
 Greeks, Romans, Yankee-Doodles, and Hindoos. 
 All kinds of dress except the ecclesiastical, 
 All people as their fancies hit may choose ; 
 But no one in these parts may quiz the clergy, 
 Therefore, take heed, ye Freethinkers, I charge ye : 
 
 " You M better walk about begirt with briars 
 
 Instead of coat and small-clothes, than put on 
 A single stitch reflecting upon friars, 
 
 Altho' you swore it only was in fun. 
 They 'd haul you o'er the coals and stir the fires 
 Of Phlegethon with every mother's son, 
 Nor say one mass to cool the cauldron's bubble 
 That boil'd your bones, unless you paid them double." 
 
 This poem will naturally remind the reader of the 
 humorous productions of the facetious Wolcot, better 
 known by the assumed appellation of Peter Pindar ; 
 but if we are not mistaken, there is more flexibility in 
 
PI \ DAK. 319 
 
 the versification of the noble satirist, who is equal to 
 Butler in the invention of compound words and the 
 whimsicality of double rhymes; of which the follow- 
 ing description of the Tuscan dialect may serve as 
 an instance : 
 
 * I love the language, that soft bastard Latin, 
 
 Which melts like kisses from a female mouth, 
 And sounds as if it should be writ on satin, 
 
 With syllables which breathe of the sweet South, 
 And gentle liquids gliding all so pat in, 
 That not a single accent seems uncouth, 
 Like our harsh northern whistling, grunting guttural, 
 Which we 're obliged to hiss, and spit, and sputter all." 
 
 Though it seems probable that the noble author 
 had the merry tales of Peter Pindar in his mind, when 
 he sketched this burlesque story ; it should be ob- 
 served that some months previous to the appearance 
 of Beppo, the town was amused and puzzled by a 
 strange piece, bearing the title of " A Prospectus and 
 Specimen of an intended national work by William 
 and Robert Whistlecraft, of Stow Market, in Suffolk, 
 Harness and Collar Makers. Intended to comprize 
 
320 WH1STLECRAFT. 
 
 the most interesting particulars relating to King 
 Arthur and his Round Table." 
 
 This singular performance, which was evidently in- 
 tended to ridicule the poetical romances of the Poet 
 Laureat, is constructed exactly in the same measure 
 as Beppo, and exhibits an equal portion of dry 
 humour and fluency of language ; so that if the pa- 
 rentage be not the same, the likeness is strong enough 
 to deceive the keenest observers, as the following 
 stanza will evince : 
 
 ' * True courage bears about a charm or spell — 
 
 It looks, I think, like an instinctive law, 
 By which superior nations daunt and quell 
 
 Frenchmen and foreigners with fear and awe. 
 I wonder if philosophers can tell — 
 
 Can they explain the thing, with all their jaw ? 
 I can't explain it — but the fact is so, 
 A fact which every midshipman must know." 
 
 As the celebrity attached to the name of Lord 
 Byron now made the public anxious for every thing 
 that came from his pen, some persons in London, 
 
IMF- VAMl'VKF.. "M 1 
 
 for the |ftke <>1 a little temporary profit, contrived to 
 get up, in his name, a tale in prose, with the title of 
 " The Vampyre." This performance had all the 
 success that the parties concerned in the fabrication 
 could well hope for ; since, owing to the absence of 
 the noble lord, there was little probability of the ap- 
 pearance of a formal exposure of the fraud, till the 
 whole impression should have been sold. The pub- 
 lisher of his lordship's works, however, ventured to 
 assert in print that it was an imposture ; and then a 
 person, who had attended the noble lord abroad in a 
 medical capacity, had the temerity to affirm that 
 though the developement of the story was his own, 
 the ground-work was certainly Lord Byron's, having 
 been related by him in company during his residence 
 on the Lake of Geneva. Whatever truth there 
 might be in this, it furnished no excuse for the publi- 
 cation of the piece, in the name of the noble lord, 
 without consulting him upon the subject. Had he 
 even been the actual writer, instead of the mere 
 relater of this marvellous story, no man of any 
 moral principles would have presumed to send such 
 an article into the world, until he had obtained full 
 
 Y 
 
'322 IMPOSTURE. 
 
 authority for the publication. But in reality the 
 whole was a mere speculation, contrived by some 
 needy adventurers, two or three of whom pretended 
 to have lived on terms of the closest intimacy and 
 correspondence with the noble lord ; whose disavowal 
 of them, and their spurious bantling, they well knew 
 could not possibly arrive in time to prevent them 
 from reaping the first fruits of their unprincipled 
 deception. It k not a little remarkable that one of 
 these persons, after having been a servile adulator of 
 Lord Byron, should since have become his most 
 inveterate enemy, by endeavouring, as far as lay in 
 his power, to undermine his literary reputation. The 
 right honourable poet, however, has not much reason 
 to complain of such treatment, considering how in- 
 consistent he has himself been in his enmities and 
 partialities. Having also taken up an evil opinion 
 of mankind, it is no more to be wondered that he 
 should have selected the designing and the worthless 
 for his companions, than that they should deceive 
 him, and take a foul advantage of his credulity. On 
 the proper choice of friends depends much of the 
 happiness of life ; he, therefore, who is careless in 
 
MAZEPPA. 323 
 
 this respect, and takes a pleasure in the fulsome 
 incense of hungry parasites, may thank his own 
 vanity for the ingratitude and treachery which he 
 will most assuredly experience. 
 
 Though Lord Byron was thus made to suffer the 
 usual effects of popularity, he did not on that account 
 secede from the service of the Muses, or withhold his 
 productions from the public eye. At the time when 
 the crafty were endeavouring to avail themselves of 
 the distinction of his name, he brought out another 
 poem, of a new description, and written in a style very 
 different from any of his preceding performances. 
 This narrative entitled " Mazeppa," is the story of 
 that celebrated chief of the Cossacks mentioned by 
 Voltaire, and others who have written the life of 
 Charles XII. of Sweden. The night after the fatal 
 battle of Pultowa, Mazeppa, while the king and his 
 attendants are resting beneath a tree, relates his 
 adventures ; which simply consist of his amour with 
 a Polish Countess, and his detection by the husband, 
 who orders him to be fastened to a wild horse and 
 turned loose upon the desert. The sufferings which 
 Mazeppa endures in this dreadful journey, through 
 
324 MAZEPPA. 
 
 forest and flood, over hill and dale, are powerfully 
 described ; and when the animal at last falls with 
 his rider, who is unable to disengage himself, the 
 mind feels as it were a chill of horror at this dreadful 
 linking of the living and the dead. While Mazeppa 
 lies beneath the horse, he sees a raven hovering round, 
 which he scares away by a feeble cry and motion of 
 his hand. This very natural incident heightens the 
 spirit of the picture ; which is in every part complete, 
 and terminates by the release of the sufferer from his 
 perilous state, through the humanity of some Cossacks, 
 who remove him to their cottage ; after which he 
 rises to be a chief among these people, and takes 
 dreadful vengeance upon his persecutor. This act of 
 retribution he dwells upon with much satisfaction in 
 his relation, and says, 
 
 " They little thought that day of pain 
 When launch'd, as on the lightning's flash, 
 They bade me to destruction dash ; 
 
 That one day I should come again, 
 With twice five thousand horse, to thank 
 
 The Count for his uncourteous ride. 
 They play'd me then a bitter prank, 
 
 When, with the wild horse for my guide, 
 
MAZEPPA. 325 
 
 They bound me to his foaming flank : 
 At length I play'd them one as frank ; — 
 For time, at last, sets all things even ; 
 
 And if we do but watch the hour, 
 
 There never yet was human power 
 Which could evade, if unforgiven, 
 The patient search and vigil long 
 Of him who treasures up a wrong." 
 
 The imagery of the poem is of the richest and 
 most appropriate character; but the same praise 
 cannot be justly given to the construction of the 
 verse, which in numerous instances is incorrect and 
 feeble, obsolete and affected. The rhymes also are 
 frequently harsh and defective, as thus : 
 
 " And many a time ye there might pass, 
 Nor dream that e'er that fortress was ; 
 I saw its turrets in a blaze/' 
 
 With the story of Mazeppa, the noble author 
 published an " Ode to Venice," written in a strain of 
 lamentation for the loss of its liberty by despots, — 
 
326 VENICE. 
 
 as the combined states are denominated, though Lord 
 Byron must have known that the independence of 
 that republic had been completely destroyed by Buo- 
 naparte, long antecedent to the annihilation of his 
 own colossal power. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Observation on Italy by Ascham. — Its application 
 to Lord Byron. — Degradation of his Poetic 
 Genius — Instanced in " Don Juan." — That cha- 
 racter a counterpart of Childe Harold. — Family 
 Sketches. — Outline of the Story. — Its gross im- 
 moralities and profanity. 
 
 THE learned Roger Ascham, who was Queen Eli- 
 zabeth's tutor, says, that " though he was only nine 
 days at Venice, he saw in that little time more 
 liberty to sin, than ever he heard tell of in the city of 
 London in nine years." This made him inveigh 
 sharply against the practice of sending young gen- 
 tlemen to complete their education in Italy, from 
 whence, observes he, " they return common con- 
 temners of marriage ; not because they love virginity, 
 nor \ use they hate pretty young virgins, but 
 
32$ ITALY. 
 
 having been there free to go whithersoever lust will 
 carry them, they do not like that law and honesty 
 should be such a bar to their liberty at home in 
 England." 
 
 What other changes the lapse of above two cen- 
 turies may have produced in that country of blue 
 lakes and perpetual sun-shine, it would be tedious to 
 examine ; but there is some reason to fear that they 
 who go thither for the benefit of the climate, or the 
 contemplation of its scenery, neither bring away a 
 substantial addition to their stock of knowledge, nor 
 any valuable improvement in their morals. That a 
 long residence in that land of soft enchantment has 
 an injurious effect upon the mental faculties, seems 
 remarkably exemplified in the case of Lord Byron ; 
 whose poetic genius if it has not been altogether 
 enfeebled by Italianized manners, has neither ac- 
 quired new vigour, nor gained an access of lustre in 
 what honest Ascham calls " Circe's Court.'' Though 
 posssesed of that high and commanding faculty 
 which is capable of " building the lofty rhyme/' the 
 noble lord appears to have lost the ambition of 
 achieving an object worthy of his name and calculated 
 
DEGRADATION. 329 
 
 to ensure immortality* Instead of raising his thoughts 
 to some great argument, and endeavouring to secure 
 that honourable place in the temple of fame, the 
 attainment of which few of his contemporaries could 
 with equal reason at one period have anticipated, 
 he seems to have formed the resolution of taking a 
 downward course, and of obtaining distinction by the 
 degradation of his intellectual powers. 
 
 In the apology which he published for sketching 
 the character of Childe Harold, he stated that it was 
 his original intention to have exhibited, under that 
 denomination, a poetic portraiture resembling the 
 Zeluco of the novelist. This idea, however, was 
 abandoned, when it was found that the public were so 
 incorrigibly obstinate as to identify the poet and the 
 pilgrim, in spite of all remonstrance and explanation. 
 Yet a favourite conception is with difficulty dismissed 
 from the mind ; and though Childe Harold was suffered 
 to quit the scene without performing any of those adven- 
 tures and committing any of those excesses which he 
 was originally destined to enact, the poet could not lose 
 the impressions that his fancy had once formed in the 
 labyrinth of his brain. Having given in bis former pieces 
 
330 DON JUAN. 
 
 the most bold and daring sketches of unprincipled 
 guilt, clothed with circumstances of peculiar terror 
 and atrocity, he determined upon showing the same 
 cast of characters arrayed in the more dangerous 
 garb of gaiety and humour. The whimsical tale of 
 Beppo proved that his powers were equally adapted 
 to comic as to tragic representations; and this 
 versatility of talent his evil genius instigated him to 
 display in the attempt to excite the passions, not in 
 the cause of virtue, but of vice. Here, however, 
 the noble poet was fated again to commit the blunder 
 that branded his first and greatest narratory poem ; 
 that of making a tale of fiction bear a close resem- 
 blance to his own personal history. Nor was he 
 more prudent, or fortunate, in the choice of a 
 subject when he took " Don Juan" for his model ; a 
 personage become almost proverbial for wickedness, 
 and disgustingly so by the figure which, as a dra- 
 matic hero, he cuts on the stage. 
 
 Having thus discarded the pretence to originality 
 and set at defiance that of decorum, the noble author 
 professed his design of following this goodly character 
 through a regular Epic of twelve Cantos. Two of 
 
DON MAX. 331 
 
 these were accordingly sent into the world, in a quarto 
 volume, at the beginning of the season in 1819; but, 
 strange to say, though the public had, for some time, 
 been prepared for the appearance of this exotic, it 
 came forth without the name of either author or book- 
 seller. By the law of the land, indeed, the printer 
 was under the necessity of ushering, in his own proper 
 person, this stranger to the world ; and thus the mys- 
 tery would have been developed easily enough, even 
 had the poet not taken care to discover himself in the 
 following passage, which put the matter beyond all 
 doubt : 
 
 " But in his native stream the Guadalquivir, 
 Juan to lave his youthful limbs was wont ; 
 
 And having learnt to swim in that sweet river, 
 Had often turn'd his art to some account. 
 
 A better swimmer you could scarce see ever, 
 He could, perhaps, have pass'd the Hellespont, 
 
 As once (a feat on which ourselves we prided,) 
 
 Leander, Mr. Ekenhead, and I did." 
 
 Why the noble author should so plainly come 
 forward, in the body of the poem, to tell a familiar tale 
 of himself, and yet withhold his name from the title of 
 
33 l i DON JUAN. 
 
 his work, is not very easy to be conjectured. It 
 could not be from a respect for public opinion ; for 
 had he possessed a particle of that virtue, he would 
 not have sent into the world a performance of which 
 his very bookseller was ashamed ; and it could not be 
 with a view to deception, for in that case he would 
 have avoided every circumstance likely to convert sus- 
 picion into certainty. In this unaccountable manner, 
 however, did " Don Juan" stalk abroad, exciting the 
 amazement of the thoughtless, and the indignation of 
 the virtuous, by an audacious spirit of libertinism, to 
 which few parallels can be found among the dreadful 
 abortions produced by the unnatural commixture of 
 genius and vice. 
 
 Though the leading characters are exhibited in the 
 Spanish costume, the guise is so very thin and ill- 
 managed, that the reader must be dull indeed who 
 does not see in Don Juan, the same hero that ap- 
 peared under the form of a pilgrim as Childe Harold. 
 In that poem, however, some regard was had to the 
 filial affections; but in this licentious tale, the author 
 treats the most sacred relations of life as matter fit 
 only for ridicule. Don Jose, the father of Don Juan, 
 
DON J I AN. 333 
 
 is represented as a profligate who abandons his wife 
 Donna Inez, by whom this only son is brought up 
 with the most watchful attention over his morals. Of 
 this lady and her husband the following sketch is 
 given, which, whoever has paid any attention to the 
 family history of the noble author will be at no loss 
 to recognize : 
 
 " His mother was a learned lady, famed 
 For every branch of every science known — 
 
 In every Christian language ever named, 
 With virtues equall'd by her wit alone, 
 
 She made the cleverest people quite ashamed, 
 And even the good with inward envy groan, 
 
 Finding themselves so very much exceeded 
 
 In their own way by all the things that she did. 
 
 u Her favourite science was the mathematical, 
 Her noblest virtue was her magnanimity, 
 
 Her wit (she sometimes tried at wit,) was Attic all, 
 Her serious sayings darken'd to sublimity ; 
 
 In short, in all things she was fairly what I call 
 A prodigy — her morning dress was dimity, 
 
 Her evening, silk ; or, in the summer, muslin, 
 
 And other stuffs, with which I won't stay puzzling. 
 
334 DON JUAN. 
 
 " Perfect she was — but as perfection is 
 Insipid in this naughty world of ours, 
 
 Where our first parents never learn'd to kiss, 
 Till they were exiled from their earlier bowers, 
 
 Where all was peace, and innocence, and bliss, 
 (I wonder how they got through the twelve hours) 
 
 Don Jose, like a lineal son of Eve, 
 
 Went plucking various fruit without her leave. 
 
 " He was a mortal of the careless kind — 
 With no great love of learning or the learn'd, 
 
 Who chose to go where'er he had a mind, 
 And never dream'd his lady was concern'd. 
 
 The world, as usual, wickedly inclined 
 To see a kingdom or a house o'erturn'd, 
 
 Whisper'd he had a mistress — some said two — 
 
 But for domestic quarrels one will do. 
 
 " Now Donna Inez had, with all her merit, 
 A great opinion of her own good qualities ; 
 
 Neglect, indeed, requires a saint to bear it, 
 And such, indeed, she was in her moralities ; 
 
 But then she had a devil of a spirit — 
 
 And sometimes mix'd up fancies with realities, 
 
 And let few opportunities escape 
 
 Of getting her liege lord into a scrape." 
 
DON .11 AN. 335 
 
 This high-minded lady, who has more of the Cale- 
 donian than the Spanish character, is about to sue 
 out a divorce against her husband, when that legal 
 mode of proceeding is put an end to by the decree of 
 a higher power, and she becomes a widow. Not- 
 withstanding the care taken of the education of Don 
 Juan, by his pious mother, he turns out at a very 
 early age, according to the vulgar adage, a chip of the 
 old block ; or rather, as the negro said of his young 
 lord, " Massa was all block himself." 
 
 An intrigue takes place between this hopeful sprig 
 of nobility and Donna Julia, the young wife of Don 
 Alfonso ; which being discovered, the lady is sent to a 
 convent and Juan to Cadiz, where he is embarked on 
 board a ship bound to Leghorn. In this voyage, the 
 vessel, after encountering a succession of stormy wea- 
 ther, founders ; and it is in the description of this 
 sad scene that the author shines : 
 
 44 Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell — 
 
 Then shriek'd the timid, and stood still the brave- 
 Then some leap'd overboard with dreadful yell, 
 As eager to anticipate their grave ; 
 
336 DON JUAN. 
 
 And the sea yawn'd around her like a hell, 
 
 And down she suck'd with her the whirling wave, 
 Like one who grapples with his enemy, 
 And strives to strangle him before he die. 
 
 " And first one universal shriek there rush'd, 
 Louder than the loud ocean, like a crash 
 
 Of echoing thunder ; and then all was hush'd, 
 Save the wild wind and the remorseless dash 
 
 Of billows ; but at intervals there gush'd, 
 Accompanied with a convulsive splash, 
 
 A solitary shriek, the bubbling cry 
 
 Of some strong swimmer in his agony." 
 
 Nearly two hundred of the crew perish with the 
 vessel ; and only nine men in the cutter, and thirty in the 
 long boat, escape. After struggling with the tempes- 
 tuous waves for some time, the cutter is swamped, and 
 all the people on board are drowned. The sufferings 
 of those in the long boat, among whom are Don 
 Juan, his tutor Pedrillo, and his dog, are painted with 
 a minuteness that could only have been executed by 
 one familiarized to the sea. The dog is killed and 
 devoured ; but Don Juan refuses to taste the flesh of 
 his favourite, though afterwards he is glad to divide 
 one of the fore paws with Pedrillo. For this incident 
 
BURLESQUE. 337 
 
 the author was indebted to the affecting narrative of 
 his grandfather, as he was for another to the account 
 of the shipwreck of the Lady Hobart packet. The 
 pangs of famine at length drive the crew to the dire 
 necessity of casting lots for flesh and blood. The lot 
 falls upon poor Pedrillo, who is bled to death by the 
 surgeon ; but those who partake of the horrid ban- 
 quet, go mad, and, by drinking salt water, die raving. 
 It is impossible to conceive a more heart-rending 
 scene than this ; and yet, strange to say, the author 
 has treated it in a mingled strain of pathos and 
 drollery, as if he had determined to make his readers 
 laugh and cry at the same moment, for when painting 
 the extremity of misery to which the famishing wretches 
 were reduced, he says, 
 
 " At length they caught two boobies and a noddy, 
 And then they left off eating the dead body." 
 
 But this is really moderate and decent, when 
 compared with the following impious allusion to 
 one of the most awful descriptions in the Sacred 
 Scriptures : 
 
33$ BLASPHEMY. 
 
 " Their throats were ovens, their swoln tongues were black, 
 As the rich man's in hell, who vainly scream'd 
 
 To beg the beggar, who could not rain back 
 A drop of dew, when every drop had seem'd 
 
 To taste of heaven — if this be true, indeed, 
 
 Some Christians have a comfortable creed." 
 
 Shockingly offensive as this blasphemy is, there are 
 yet passages of an infinitely worse description, both 
 with regard to impiety and filthiness, thickly strewed 
 throughout the whole poem, which will again bring 
 old Ascham to remembrance, who says of the travelled 
 libertines of his day, that " the mark they shoot at, 
 the end they look for, the heaven they desire, is only 
 their own present pleasure and private profit ; whereby 
 they plainly declare of whose school, of what religion 
 they be, that is, Epicures in living, and Atheists in 
 doctrine." * 
 
 To bring the story of Don Juan to a conclusion ; 
 after enduring the most dreadful privations, the boat 
 makes land and is overset, by which all on board 
 perish, except the hero of the poem, who is reserved 
 for fresh adventures. The place where he is cast on 
 
CATASTROIM1I ■:. 339 
 
 shore is one of the islands in the iEgean sea, inhabited 
 only by the family of Lambro, a Greek pirate, who 
 happens himself to be then on a cruize. His daughter 
 Haidee, however, an interesting maiden of seventeen, 
 gives Juan a most hospitable reception, and he returns 
 the favour by seduction. Thus end the two first 
 Cantos of the publication ; and the second opens with 
 the arrival of Lambro after so long an absence that 
 his daughter, having given him up for lost, had aban- 
 doned herself to a life of dissoluteness, under the 
 guidance of her unprincipled paramour. The old 
 man, surprised as he naturally might, to see on his 
 arrival every where the appearances of riot and de- 
 bauchery, makes his way into the house, where he 
 finds Don Juan and Haidee fast asleep. On their 
 awakening, the lovers are thrown into a state of con- 
 fusion : Haidee goes mad, and dies of a broken blood- 
 vessel, occasioned by the fright; while Don Juan, 
 after a short conflict, is sent off in chains to be sold 
 for a slave. 
 
 It cannot be denied that the powers of the author 
 are displayed with great effect in the descriptions 
 which he has given of the Grecian scenery and 
 
340 POET LAUREAT. 
 
 manners. But the account of the luxury which Don 
 Juan contrives to introduce into this lonely island, is 
 outrageously improbable, and extravagantly over- 
 charged. Among other attendants upon the lord 
 and lady of this rocky domain, is a poet or minstrel, 
 of whom it is said, that 
 
 " He praised the present, and abused the past, 
 Reversing the good custom of old days ; 
 
 An eastern anti-jacobin at last 
 
 He turn'd, preferring pudding to no praise — 
 
 For some few years his lot had been o'ercast 
 By his seeming independent in his lay3 ; 
 
 But now he sung the Sultan and the Pacha, 
 
 With truth like Southey, and with verse like Crashaw, 
 
 " He was a man who had seen many changes, 
 And always changed as true as any needle, 
 
 His polar star being one which never ranges, 
 And not the fix'd — he knew how to wheedle ; 
 
 So vile he 'scap'd the doom which oft avenges ; 
 And being fluent (anc} indeed when fee'd ill) 
 
 He lied with such a fervour of intention — 
 
 There was no doubt he earn'd his laureat pension." 
 
 The noble satirist, not satisfied with this keen 
 stroke, afterwards returns to the same object, laying 
 
SCURRILITY. 341 
 
 oil the lash with increased severity, and introducing a 
 burlesque ode in imitation of the " pensioned and 
 laureated Orpheus." In the same vein of sarcastic 
 humour he digresses from his tale to attack some 
 other writers : 
 
 " All are not moralists, like Southey, when 
 He prated to the world of ■ Pantisocrasy ; ] 
 
 Or Wordsworth unexcised, unhired,who then 
 Season *d his pedlar poems with democracy ; 
 
 Or Coleridge, long before his flighty pen 
 Let to the Morning Post its aristocracy ; 
 
 When he and Southey, following the same path, 
 
 Espoused two sisters, (milliners of Bath.)" 
 
 Now if this episodical cutting and slashing does 
 not savour very strongly of personal resentment ; the 
 least that can be said of it is, that it is shamefully 
 scurrilous, and in some respects cruelly ill-natured. Of 
 the parties so grossly abused in these lines, it does not 
 appear that two of them ever gave any offence whatever 
 to the noble lord ; and with regard to Coleridge, he 
 had not long before received from the author of Don 
 Juan a very high encomium. But consistency and 
 sincerity could not be expected in one who had so 
 
342 LICENTIOUSNESS. 
 
 often praised and vilified the same persons, without 
 assigning any cause for the change of sentiment. 
 There was, however, one thing with which they who 
 had now fallen under the displeasure of the noble 
 lord might console themselves, and that was the re- 
 flection of having published no work so disgraceful as 
 the poem in which they were held up to ridicule.* 
 
 The history of Don Juan is carried on till his 
 arrival at Constantinople, where he is purchased by 
 a black eunuch for the favourite Sultana of the Grand 
 Signor. Here our hero is compelled to put on 
 female attire, in which disguise he attracts the notice 
 of the Sultan himself; but at this period the author 
 cuts the story short ; and if he terminates it here, the 
 world will be gainers by his prudence. 
 
 Of this Odyssey of immorality, there cannot be 
 two opinions ; for let the religious sentiments of the 
 reader be as lax as possible, he must be shocked at 
 the barefaced licentiousness of the poem, and the 
 direct attempt made in it to recommend a promis- 
 cuous sexual intercourse as the sum of human happi- 
 ness. Marriage is of course reprobated, and all the 
 
OF THE POEM. 343 
 
 laws of social life are set at open defiance as viola- 
 tions of natural liberty. Lord Byron is the very 
 Coinus of poetry, who, by the bewitching airiness of 
 his numbers, aims to turn the moral world into a 
 herd of monsters. It must however be allowed that 
 in his tale of Don Juan, he has not acted the wily 
 part flf concealing the poison under the appearance of 
 virtue ; on the contrary, he makes a frank confession 
 of his principles, and glories in vice with the unblush- 
 ing temerity of a rampant satyr who acknowledges 
 no rule but appetite. The mischief of the work is 
 rendered doubly so by the attractive gaiety of the 
 language, the luxuriance of the imagery, and the 
 humorous digressions with which the story is em- 
 bellished and checquered. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Controversy on the Character of Pope y and Poetic 
 Composition. — Attack on Mr. Bowles. — His De- 
 fence. — Letter of Lord Byron. — Reply of Mr. 
 Bowles.— Observations on the Dispute. 
 
 WE have now to consider Lord Byron in a new cha- 
 racter: as a controvertist and critic. His entrance 
 into this field of contention, however, was not occa- 
 sioned by an attack upon his own writings ; nor in 
 fact could any ostensible cause be assigned for his 
 interference at all in a dispute with which he had no 
 concern. About fifteen years since, the associated 
 Booksellers employed Mr. Bowles, the favourite pupil 
 of Warton, on a new edition of the works of Pope ; 
 which task he performed with great credit as a com- 
 mentator, and not less so as a biographer and critic. 
 A little after the appearance of this edition, Lord 
 
ATTACK ON BOWLES. 345 
 
 Byron published his celebrated satire against the 
 English Bards and Scotch Reviewers ; in which piece 
 he fell upon Mr. Bowles with unwarrantable severity,' 
 but for what reason it would be difficult and idle to 
 guess. No reply was made to this virulent outrage ; 
 and some years afterwards, the parties met on friendly 
 terms at the house of Mr. Rogers, who, much to his 
 credit, exerted his efforts in prevailing upon the 
 noble lord to suppress his poem. At length the 
 edition of Pope became an object of attack to a host 
 of critics, who accused the biographer of partiality, 
 and taxed him with incompetency. He was said to 
 have injured the moral character of the poet, and to 
 have detracted from his literary honour. This 
 outcry spread from the Thames to the Tweed ; and 
 they who were hostile to each other on general ques- 
 tions, now joined in hunting down the reverend editor 
 of the works of Pope. The game being started, 
 afforded rare sport to the public, by whom, as in most 
 cases of clamour, the real intent of those who set up 
 the war-whoop was not discerned. The object, however, 
 so artfully concealed, was no other than to clear the 
 ground for a rival edition of Pope's works, then me- 
 ditated, and still proceeding in under the direction of 
 
346 CHARACTER OF POPE. 
 
 the principal instigator of this uproar. So profitable 
 is the business of supervising the reprints of valuable 
 works, that the province of editorship has become a 
 sort of monopoly in certain hands, who by having the 
 periodical press considerably under their influence are 
 enabled to ruin every interloper, however honest and 
 industrious he may be, or even though, in point of 
 talent, he should be far superior to his assailants. 
 But after all, what were the faults of Mr. Bowles ? 
 Nothing more than a simple, and in fact too mild a 
 statement of those particulars in the life of Pope, 
 which being notorious could not have been passed 
 over without a violation of historic truth. Biography 
 would be of little worth if the character of the man 
 must be drawn with a half face, like the portrait of 
 Cardinal Wolsey, for the sake of concealing the loss 
 of an eye. Yet according to the fastidious taste of 
 the vindicators of Pope, the mantle should have been 
 thrown over the moral deformities of the man for the 
 sake of his genius, which like (< charity is to cover a 
 multitude of sins." Mr. Bowles said no more of the 
 imperfections of the poet than what all the world 
 knew, and what no one in the present day can dis- 
 prove. For this fidelity, however, the biographer is 
 
roi lie co.Mi'osiTiox. 34.7 
 
 stigmatized as a calumniator, and a defamer of the 
 illustrious dead ; though he has not told one half of 
 what he knew to the disadvantage of his hero, and the 
 other half he has softened into shade. But it seems 
 the editor has committed a still more heinous offence, 
 by asserting it as an axiom, that " all images drawn 
 from what is beautiful or sublime in the works of 
 Nature are more beautiful and sublime than any 
 images drawn from Art, and therefore of themselves 
 they are more poetical." By this position as an in- 
 controvertible canon, the editor tries the poetical 
 character of Pope, which he pronounces to be more 
 that of art than nature. Here the critics who wished 
 to destroy the literary reputation of the commentator 
 on Pope, joined in battle array to attack the position 
 which he had advanced as the criterion of poetical 
 sublimity. It was contended in opposition to him, 
 that poesy itself is an art, and that, therefore, its most 
 powerful effects are produced by the combination of 
 images, in which nature is only a subordinate or 
 passive agent. 
 
 But the argument adopted by Mr. Bowles, and 
 which, in fact, is only the same with that of his pre- 
 
348 lord byron's letter. 
 
 ceptor War ton, was not easily shaken by sophistry, 
 while it acquired additional strength when assailed by 
 illustration. Thus Mr. Thomas Campbell, in his 
 defence of Pope, prefixed to the Specimens of 
 English Poetry, having adduced the image of a ship 
 about to be launched as an instance of the superior 
 beauty of art over nature, Mr. Bowles replied very 
 happily by showing that this object would have no- 
 thing at all poetical in it without the more active and 
 commanding powers of the winds and waves. Mr. 
 Campbell upon this prudently retired, and left the 
 arena, well aware, as may be inferred from his silence, 
 that the more art shall be ransacked for similes, the 
 more triumphant, nature will prove in the competition. 
 Lord Byron, however, like a true knight-errant, took 
 up the gauntlet, and in a long letter from Ravenna to 
 his publisher, made a spirited attack upon the bio- 
 grapher of Pope for having only glanced at some of 
 the Bard of Twickenham's immoralities: but the 
 principal object of this desultory epistle is to contro- 
 vert the opinion that for the power of poetical adap- 
 tation art is inferior to nature. The mode of treating 
 this curious subject, pursued by the noble author, is so 
 vague and inconclusive, that it would be a waste of 
 
PICTURE OF A STORM. 349 
 
 words to attempt any thing like an abstract; and, 
 therefore, a quotation must suffice, but it shall be of 
 the best passage in the whole work. 
 
 11 I look upon myself," says Lord Byron, " as 
 entitled to talk of naval matters, at least to poets: 
 with the exception of Walter Scott, Moore, and 
 Southey, perhaps, who have been voyagers, I have 
 swam more miles than all the rest of them together 
 now living ever sailed, and have lived for months 
 and months on ship-board ; and, during the whole 
 period of my life abroad, have scarcely ever passed a 
 month out of sight of the ocean, besides being 
 brought up from two years till ten on the brink of it. 
 I recollect when anchored off Cape Sigeum in 
 1810, in an English frigate, a violent squall coming 
 on at sun-set, so violent as to make us imagine that 
 the ship would part cable, or drive from her anchor- 
 age. Mr. Hobhouse, and myself, and some officers, 
 had been up the Dardanelles to Abydos, and were 
 just returned in time. The aspect of a storm in the 
 Archipelago is as poetical as need be, the sea being 
 particularly short, dashing, and dangerous, and the 
 navigation intricate and broken by the isles and 
 
350 PICTURE OF A STORM. 
 
 currents. Cape Sigeum, the Tumuli of the Troad, 
 Lemnos, Tenedos, all added to the associations of 
 the time. But what seemed the most " poetical" of 
 all at the moment, were the numbers (about two hun- 
 dred) of Greek and Turkish craft, which were 
 obliged to " cut and run" before the wind from their 
 unsafe anchorage, some for Tenedos, some for other 
 isles, some for the main, and some it might be for 
 eternity. The sight of these little scudding vessels, 
 darting over the foam in the twilight, now appearing 
 and now disappearing between the waves in the cloud 
 of night, with their peculiarly white sails, (the Levant 
 sails not being of coarse canvas, but of white cotton,) 
 skimming along as quickly, but less safely than the 
 sea-mews which hovered over them ; their evident 
 distress, their reduction to fluttering specks in the 
 distance, their crowded succession, their littleness as 
 contending with the giant element, which made our 
 stout forty-four's teak timbers creak again ; their 
 aspect and their motion all struck me as something 
 far more " poetical" than the mere broad, brawling, 
 shipless sea and the sullen winds could possibly 
 have been without them." 
 
VOK1KV OF NATIUE. 35 1 
 
 This is really a beautiful picture ; but it is surprising 
 that the noble lord should not have seen how com- 
 pletely the whole of it made against the hypothesis 
 which it was intended to support. Nature predo- 
 minates so completely in this scene, that art is totally 
 lost ; and every idea is absorbed in the grandeur of 
 the tempest. The sea has always been a fertile source 
 of images to the poetical observer, as exhibiting a 
 vast variety of changes and objects naturally belonging 
 to it, without deriving any adjuncts whatever from 
 art ; yet the noble critic has ventured to, assert that 
 it is a monotonous waste of waters without a ship. 
 What then are we to think of the following passages, 
 one from Homer and the other from Virgil ? In the 
 Iliad, the passive valour of the Greeks is compared 
 to an object in nature which nothing in art could 
 equal : 
 
 " So some tall rock o'erhangs the hoary main, 
 By winds assail'd, by billows beat in vain, 
 Unmoved it hears, above, the tempest blow, 
 And sees the watery mountains break below." 
 
 Now here are images all purely natural, and, what 
 U more, such gg would be rather weakened than 
 
352 POETRY OF NATURE. 
 
 heightened by an artificial object of any kind. In 
 contemplating a bold promontory, upon whose lofty 
 head the lightnings flash with harmless effect, and at 
 whose base the mountainous billows rage in vain, we 
 are struck with sublime admiration ; but if instead of 
 this towering and gigantic rock, rooted in the abyss 
 and carrying its proud scalp to the clouds, you sub- 
 stitute the Eddystone Light- House, or any other 
 building made with hands, the poetical beauty will 
 be considerably lessened ; for knowing that the object 
 is of human construction, we at once lose the idea of 
 assured stability. 
 
 Thus also the prince of Roman poets draws from 
 the flux and reflux of the sea, a beautiful illustration 
 of the persevering valour of the Latians : 
 
 " Qualis ubi alterno procurrens gurgite pontus 
 Nunc ruit ad terras, scopulosque superjacit undam 
 Spumeus, extremaraque sinu perfundit arenam : 
 Nunc rapidus retro atque aestu revoluta resorbens 
 Saxa, fugit, littusque vado Iabente relinquit. " 
 
 " Thus in full tide, alternate o'er the strand 
 Swells the proud ocean, and inyades the land ; 
 
SCRIPTURAL SUBLIMITY. 353 
 
 Wire after wave, the waters mount on high, 
 Foam o'er the rocks, and thunder to the sky ; 
 Then in their turn the swelling floods subside, 
 And seek the channel with an ebbing tide ; 
 Roll back as rapid as they flow'd before, 
 With all the plunder of the sounding shore." 
 
 JEn. I. xu 
 
 Here we have a simple and common object, expressed 
 in words corresponding exactly with the sense, and 
 altogether painting both the natural scene, and the 
 conflict of which it affords so apt a simile. 
 
 Notwithstanding this* Lord Byron contended, in 
 opposition to Mr. Bowles, that the works of art confer 
 poetry upon, instead of deriving their poetic beauty 
 from nature ; and, strangely enough, the noble critic 
 actually ventured to fetch an elucidation of his posi- 
 tion from the sublime imagery of prophetic scripture. 
 His words are : " In the sublime of sacred poetry, 
 1 who is this that cometh from Edom with dyed gar- 
 ments from Bozrah ?' Would ' the comer' be poeti- 
 cal without his ' dyed garments V which strike and 
 startle the spectator, and identify the approaching 
 object" 
 
 A A 
 
354 SARCASM. 
 
 This illustration is no less unfortunate for the works 
 of art, than that of the storm ; for the garments of the 
 warrior were stained with blood, and not coloured, as 
 the noble lord imagined, by having been dipped in the 
 dyer's vat. 
 
 There is throughout the pamphlet much more of the 
 same loose and inconsistent declamation, for reason- 
 ing it cannot be called; but what disfigures it 
 most, is the dogmatical and ironical language in 
 which the letter writer speaks of his respectable 
 opponent, whose very profession is respeatedly brought 
 in by way of sneer and ridicule, as though it were im- 
 possible for a parson to be a good critic. This illibe- 
 rality is the more inexcusable, as it is directed, without 
 provocation, against one of the mildest men in the 
 universe ; and it is behaviour which could only be- 
 come such a character as Squire Western, who roars 
 to his chaplain, when remonstrated with upon his 
 brutality, " thee art n't in pulpit now ; and when thee 
 art I don't mind what thee sayest." 
 
 Mr. Bowles replied to his right honourable antagonist 
 in two letters, written with some spirit, and yet in the 
 
KEPLY OF MR. BOWLES. 355 
 
 style of agentleman. There is not, however, so much 
 critical acumen in them as might have been expected ; 
 neither has the author retorted upon his adversary 
 those glaring proofs of inconsistency which were in 
 his power. Lord Byron having, to make use of his 
 own curious term, obtruded himself into the dispute, 
 " like an Irishman in a row, any body's customer," 
 could have no claim to respect, after setting himself up 
 as a judge to determine a dispute of opinions by the 
 M argument um baculinum" of his own peremptory 
 decision. Mr. Bowles should have met his adver- 
 sary with the resolution of defeating and disarming 
 him, instead of standing on the defensive and con- 
 tenting himself with mere explanations. It required 
 no great prowess or skill in argument, to have buried 
 his lordship under his own authorities, and to have 
 made him ridiculous by his own confessions. The 
 main point which Mr. Bowles took, (and there he was 
 invulnerable,) is this — that the essence of poetry being 
 derived from nature, which is universal, has in that 
 source all the elements of composition, to which the 
 works of art, sublime and beautiful as they may be, only 
 bear a relation, and consequently are not poetical in the 
 abstract. It is not meant to say that artificial objects 
 
356 A NEC DOT K 
 
 are unpoetical — far from it ; but the aassailants of Mr. 
 Bowles argued against him as though that had been 
 his original proposition. This gross misrepresen- 
 tation he repelled, very satisfactorily ; and he might 
 have gained a decided victory, if he had gone farther, 
 and shown, as it was very easy to have done, that 
 there is not a single object in the whole range of human 
 art that is not indebted, for whatever of a poetical 
 character it actually does possess or is capable of, to its 
 association with nature. Lord Byron, on this occasion, 
 acted a very zealous part as the defender of Pope ; 
 but in so doing he condemned himself, for not having 
 more closely imitated that harmonist, as well in the 
 structure of his verse as in the moral spirit of his 
 poems. The praise of Pope, however, ought not 
 to have been joined with a reflection upon the Cal- 
 vinism of Cowper ; whose insanity and attempt at 
 suicide should have commanded pity, instead of being 
 made the subject of ridicule. There is in this ego- 
 tistical letter a curious anecdote of Sheridan and 
 Whitbread, with which the consideration of the po- 
 etical controversy shall here close. " Soon after the 
 1 Rejected Address' scene, in 1812, 1 met Sheridan. In 
 the course of dinner he said, f Lord Byron, did you 
 
OF SHEHIDAN. S57 
 
 know that, amongst the writers of addresses, was 
 Whitbread himself ?' I answered by an inquiry of what 
 sort of an address he had made. ' Of that/ replied 
 Sheridan, ■ I remember little, except that there was 
 a Phoenix in it.' ' A Phoenix ! ! well, how did he 
 describe it?' * Like a Poulterer/ answered Sheridan ; 
 * it was green, and yellow, and red, and blue : he 
 did not let us off for a single feather/ " 
 
 Here, however, an impartial by-stander might very 
 properly have observed that a phoenix, though fabu- 
 lous, was a far more appropriate figure to represent 
 the resuscitation of a theatre from its ashes, than 
 the pillar of fire which Lord Byron himself selected 
 on that occasion. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 Dramatic incidents in the History of Venice. — 
 Publication of the Tragedy of " Marino Faliero" 
 — Performed without success. — Injunction ob- 
 tained against the representation. — " Prophecy 
 of Dante." — Tragedies of " Sardanapalus 9 and 
 f' the Two Foscari. v 
 
 OF all the cities in Italy, there is not one so familiar 
 to Englishmen as Venice, owing chiefly, perhaps, to 
 the two popular dramas of Shakspeare and Otway. 
 The residence of Lord Byron in that state seems to 
 have inspired him with the ambition of rivalling those 
 great writers, and of trying his strength in the same 
 species of composition in which they excelled. u Every 
 thing about Venice," says the noble lord, " is, or was 
 extraordinary — her aspect is like a dream, and her his- 
 tory is like a romance." How an existing city can have 
 
TRAGEDY OF FALERIO. 359 
 
 the appearance of a dream, we are not told; but 
 that the history of this republic abounds in romantic 
 incidents well suited to histrionic representation, we 
 can easily believe. One of these is the conspiracy 
 formed in the year 1 355, by the Doge Marino Faliero, 
 to render himself absolute in the government, on 
 account of an affront cast upon his lady by a 
 libeller, and inadequately punished by the senate, 
 because the offender happened to be one of their 
 body. This circumstance, Lord Byron adopted for 
 the construction of a tragedy ; but, though the piece 
 is regularly divided into five acts, and supported by a 
 train of characters, we are informed in the preface 
 that the noble lord had no view to the stage ; for 
 which he assigns this reason, that the English theatre 
 is in a state of declension. Notwithstanding this de- 
 claration, the managing lessee of Drury-Lane ven- 
 tured to bring out the tragedy, relying evidently upon 
 the popularity of the poet, who, on the other hand, by 
 his publisher sought and obtained an injunction from 
 the Court of Chancery against the representation. 
 There was, however, little or no occasion for such a 
 legal prohibition ; as the audience, without the chan- 
 
360 ITS FAILURES. 
 
 cellor's authority, sentenced the play to oblivion on 
 the night of its performance. 
 
 It is, indeed, one of the very dullest of all dull dramas, 
 being totally destitute of plot, and insufferably tedious 
 in the dialogue. The female character Angiolina, 
 who, it might be expected, would interest the reader 
 and audience most strongly, excites no feeling at all ; 
 and that for a very obvious reason, because she takes 
 no lively concern in the business of the scene, nor in 
 the resentment or fate of her husband. She is per- 
 fectly stoical, and moralizes like a philosopher about 
 virtue and reputation, instead of endeavouring to 
 work upon the passions of the Duke, or engaging 
 actively in a cause that so nearly concerned herself. 
 But if the characters are insipid and phlegmatic, the 
 language is of a still lower description ; of which the 
 following speech of Faliero to his wife may be 
 adduced as an instance : 
 
 " Well I know 
 'Twere hopeless for humanity to dream 
 Of honesty in such infected blood, 
 Although 'twere wed to him it covets most : 
 An incarnation of the poet's God 
 
PllOPHECY OF DANTE. 36 1 
 
 In all his marble-chisell'd beauty, or 
 The demi-deity Alcides, in 
 His majesty of superhuman manhood — 
 Would not suffice to bind where virtue is not : 
 It is consistency which forms and proves it : 
 Vice cannot fix, and virtue cannot change. 
 The once fallen woman must for ever fall ; 
 For vice must have variety, while virtue 
 Stands like the sun, and all which rolls around 
 Drinks life, and light, and glory from her aspect." 
 
 This is so far from being poetry, that it has not 
 even the vulgar merit of being grammatical prose ; 
 and what the sentiment is, which the author meant 
 to convey, in such an enigmatic mixture of cloudy 
 metaphysics and incongruous metaphors, it would 
 be idle to examine. 
 
 To the historical tragedy of u Marino Faliero," 
 were appended four Cantos, of a poem, entituled 
 " The Prophecy of Dante." The account of this 
 segment of a larger work is as follows: " In the 
 course of a visit to Ravenna in the summer of 1819, 
 it was suggested to the author, that having composed 
 something on the subject of Tasso's confinement, he 
 
36% PROPHECY OF DANTE* 
 
 should do the same on Dante's exile — the tomb of the 
 poet forming one of the principal objects of interest 
 in that city both to the native and to the stranger. 
 The result of this hint has been these four Cantos 
 in terza rima. If they are understood, and ap- 
 proved, it is intended to continue the poem in various 
 other Cantos, to its natural conclusion in the present 
 age. The reader is requested to suppose that Dante 
 addresses hiin in the interval between the conclusion 
 of the Divine Commedia and his death, and shortly 
 before the latter event, foretelling the fortunes of 
 Italy in general, in the ensuing centuries. In adopting 
 this plan, I have had in my mind the Cassandra of 
 Lycophron, and the prophecy of Nereus by Horace, 
 as well as the prophecies of Holy Writ." 
 
 This idea of converting Dante into a prophet is 
 bold enough, but the authorities for so doing are still 
 more temerarious ; for here the obscure and oracular 
 Lycophron, with the fanciful Horace, are placed upon 
 an equal footing with the inspired writers of the Old 
 and New Testament : the author, however, has gone 
 farther than all this daring, by raising the Italian 
 poet to a level with the divine founder of the Chris- 
 
PKOFAN1 PARODY. 36S 
 
 tiau religion. His making Dante foretell the future 
 political state of Italy, and of Italian literature, was 
 pardonable, and might have been beautiful, if worked 
 up in the form of a poetical vision. But unfortu- 
 nately the noble lord has described the old bard as 
 being truly rapt, and carried forth into the ' chaos of 
 events' by the same afflatus which the "sons of 
 Israel had within them" when they foretold things to 
 come. The following parody of the lamentation of 
 our Saviour when contemplating the destruction of 
 the temple and state of the Jews, is so near to 
 blasphemy, that the reader must be callous indeed to 
 all feelings of propriety, who can regard it without 
 detestation of the spirit in which it is conceived : 
 
 H Oh Florence ! Florence ! unto me thou wast 
 Like that Jerusalem which the almighty He] 
 
 Wept over, u but thou wouldest not :" as the bird 
 Gathers its young, I would have gather'd thee 
 
 Beneath a parent pinion, hadst thou heard 
 My voice ; but as the adder, deaf and fierce, 
 
 Against the breast that cherish'd thee was stirr'd 
 Thy venom, and my state thou didst amerce, 
 
 And doom this body forfeit to the fire." 
 
364 TRAGEDY OF 
 
 Such is the " Prophecy of Dante;" in which, though 
 the author professes his sole design to be that of 
 doing honour to the memory of a great poet, it is 
 impossible to acquit him of a lurking attempt to 
 undermine the divine authority of the scriptures, by 
 representing the sacred predictions as no better than 
 the musings of a heated or gloomy imagination. 
 
 The ill success of Lord Byron in his dramatic 
 attempt, had not the effect of disheartening him from 
 pressing again into the service of Melpomene; for, 
 within a few months after the failure of his tragedy, 
 he brought out in one volume three new pieces, of 
 which two were regularly constructed plays, and the 
 other one of those strange compositions which, from 
 their being founded upon scriptural subjects, have 
 obtained, at least in former days, the name of " Mys- 
 teries." 
 
 The first of these dramas is upon the fabulous his- 
 tory of " Sardanapalus," the voluptuous king of 
 Assyria, who is said to have destroyed himself and 
 his palace in Nineveh, after an unsuccessful struggle 
 against the two rebellious satraps Arbaces and Bele- 
 
^AUD.WAPAIt .s. 365 
 
 ses. The character of this luxurious prince is well 
 sketched in the play ; but the poet has availed himself 
 of the dramatic licence in making him become both a 
 penitent and hero. The introduction of a favourite 
 Greek slave is happily contrived, and the part is well 
 managed ; but the bringing on Zarina, the deserted 
 wife of Sardanapalus, merely to hold a dialogue with 
 her fallen husband, previous to her departure for 
 Paphlagonia, is so awkward that the reader will 
 hardly avoid suspecting a covert allusion to some 
 recent events in the English history. The dream 
 also, which the Assyrian king relates to Myrrha his 
 mistress, is very extravagant, and calculated rather to 
 excite ridicule than to raise awe or produce sympathy. 
 The language is in general more correct and lively 
 than that of the preceding drama; but it has the 
 same fault of being prosaic and metaphysical. 
 Sardanapalus defends his conduct with the subtlety of 
 a sophist ; and, what is still more extraordinary in a 
 man supposed to have lived in a land of idolatry, 
 above rive hundred years before the Christian era, he 
 talks like a modern sceptic against superstition, and 
 that too in the presence of a priest and a soothsayer. 
 
366 TRAGEDY OF THE 
 
 The second piece is another attempt to dramatize 
 a portion of the Venetian history. This tragedy, 
 which is of a stronger texture than either " Faliero," 
 or " Sardanapalus," exhibits a striking and terrible 
 picture of the Council of Ten, which tyrannized over 
 Venice in the fifteenth century, when the Doge Fran- 
 cis Foscari was obliged by that sanguinary tribunal to 
 see his own son, Jacopo Foscari, racked three times, 
 upon the unproved charge of having intrigued with 
 foreign states. He was also sentenced to perpetual 
 banishment, but died in prison ; and the Doge his 
 father, without any cause being assigned for such a 
 measure, was deposed, which had such an effect upon 
 his spirits that, we are told, on hearing St. Mark's 
 bell sound for the election of his successor, he fell 
 down dead. 
 
 Such is the story, which has afforded Lord Byron 
 ample scope for the display of his powers in de- 
 scription. But here again, as in his other dramatic 
 efforts, the noble author plays upon the feelings of his 
 readers without raising their curiosity; for where 
 there is no plot, the mind is fatigued, rather than gra- 
 tified, by being dragged through five tedious acts, each 
 
TWO KOSCARI. 367 
 
 of which ends as if the whole business ended with it. 
 The character of the elder Foscari, an old man of 
 eighty, is feebly drawn ; for it is neither consistent 
 with nature nor poetry, that a father, even though 
 past the age of man, should sit down like a dotard 
 and suffer himself to be made a passive instrument, in 
 the hands of a set of monsters, for the destruction of 
 his innocent and only son. Even supposing that the 
 chronicle of Venice has been strictly followed in this 
 instance, the adherence to historic veracity is no ex- 
 cuse for the dramatist ; who might, and ought, to 
 have infused some spirit and dignity into the principal 
 personage of the piece ; instead of which, Francis 
 Foscari is altogether a being destitute of strength of 
 mind, and, as it should seem, of natural affection. 
 With him Venice is every thing, and his son nothing ; 
 but, what is stranger still, the young man also, not- 
 withstanding the horrible wrongs which he had 
 endured, is made to feel the same strange passion for 
 Venice, even when his limbs have been dislocated, by 
 the barbarity of the " ten devils," as they were pro- 
 perly termed, who reigned absolute in that city. All 
 this may be very pathetic, patriotic, and stoically 
 magnanimous ; but it is out of probability, and not 
 
368 SINGULAR CATASTROPHE. 
 
 well suited to the passion that should characterize a 
 tragedy. Shakspeare would have managed the story 
 in a very different manner ; and with regard to the 
 unities, on the preservation of which Lord Byron 
 prides himself so much, our immortal bard would 
 have cared less for such an object than for the 
 strength of his characters, the effect of their contrast, 
 the business of the scene, and the vivacious recipro- 
 cation of the dialogue. In this essential combination 
 of qualities to make up an interesting drama, the 
 noble author is totally deficient ; and hence his tra- 
 gedies, as he calls them, however brilliantly they may 
 sparkle occasionally with poetical beauties of sentiment 
 and allusion, are too heavy for representation, and 
 scarcely attractive enough to invite a second reading. 
 
 Though the tradition of the elder Foscari's death 
 by a sudden shock is adhered to in the play, Lord 
 Byron has contrived to raise a suspicion that it was 
 occasioned by poison, administered in a cup of wine 
 by the Duke's enemy Loredano. Yet in a note to Don 
 Juan, the death of Haidee by a sudden haemorrhage 
 is shown to be probable, by the instance of the Doge 
 of Venice, who, at the age of eighty, made it a matter 
 
EFFECT OF PASSION. 369 
 
 of surprise that the old " man should have" had so 
 much blood in him. Here his lordship takes the oppor- 
 tunity of relating the following anecdote : u Before 
 I was sixteen years of age I was witness to a melan- 
 choly instance of the same effect of mixed passion 
 upon a young person, who however did not die in 
 consequence at that time; but fell a victim, some 
 years afterwards, to a seizure of the same kind, arising 
 from causes intimately connected with agitation of 
 mind. ,, 
 
 is B 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Origin of Plays on Religious Subjects, — Sacred 
 Dramas, Ancient and Modern. — /// adapted to 
 the Stage. — Account of " Cain, a Mystery." — 
 Dedication. — Bayle. — Manicheism. — Indecency. 
 — Pr<z*Adamites. — Cuvier. — The Piece Pirated. 
 Injunction refused. — Milton justified. — Conduct 
 of the Publisher. — Anecdote of Curll. — Lord 
 Byron's Letter. 
 
 BEFORE the Reformation, plays were made upon 
 religious subjects only, and acted chiefly in churches, 
 whence they were called mysteries. These wretched 
 interludes, as may well be imagined, were wholly 
 destitute of a poetical character, and only calculated 
 to amuse an ignorant assembly, incapable of a more 
 elevated species of entertainment. At a subsequent 
 period, when letters began to be cultivated, some tra- 
 gedies were written in Latin, on Scriptural topics, as 
 the " Jephthe" of Buchanan, and the " Adamus 
 
SACKED DRAMAS. 371 
 
 Exul" of Grotius. Long afterwards Racine, at 
 the desire of Madame de Maintenon, composed his 
 u Esther" and " Athaliah," which were performed by 
 the young ladies in the religious house of St. Cyr. 
 But, however meritorious these pieces might be as 
 poems, they were not adapted for the stage, there 
 being something in the very nature of the sacred 
 history, that makes such an exhibition carry the ap- 
 pearance of profanation. Since then, two female 
 writers of eminence, one in England and the other in 
 France, have acquired notice by the composition of 
 what they call " Sacred Dramas ;" but without in- 
 tending that any of the pieces so constructed in the 
 form of dialogue should be brought into theatrical 
 representation. The propriety, indeed, of casting any 
 part of the Scripture into a dress of this sort, may 
 well be questioned, since it is scarcely possible so to 
 model the incidents and the language, as to avoid 
 affecting the sense of the original. Thus, for example, 
 there is hardly a circumstance in the bible, that does 
 not owe its beauty in a great degree to the simple 
 brevity observed in the relation. Now when the 
 narrative is dramatized, the poet of necessity is ob- 
 liged to frame speeches, and to devise motives of 
 
372 CAIN, A MYSTERY. 
 
 action, which, however consonant they may be to 
 the characters introduced, are not in the sacred text, 
 and therefore may possibly tend to the encourage- 
 ment of error. The writers of whom we have been 
 speaking, have in general avoided falling into any 
 egregious fault ; for, as they had no other object in 
 view than to blend instruction with amusement, they 
 took care to keep as close as possible to the plain 
 story, and the analogy of faith. It never entered 
 into their imagination to turn the bible against itself, 
 by grafting upon any of its facts such monstrous 
 fictions as would destroy the credit of the whole. The 
 disgrace of doing this was reserved for the author of 
 * Cain, a Mystery ;" which work it is now our painful 
 task to examine. 
 
 This performance is dedicated to Sir Walter Scott ; 
 and yet the author knew that the publication had 
 been objected to, as of dangerous tendency, by his 
 publisher, as well as by Mr. GifFord, and even by 
 Mr. Hobhouse. His sending so reprehensible a com- 
 position into the world, after this united expression of 
 disapprobation, evinced a marvellous respect for the 
 iudgment of his friends ; but the attempt to procure 
 
DEDICATION. 374 
 
 for his drama some degree of public favour, by ad- 
 dressing it to one of the most popular and moral 
 writers of the age, merits a censure still more severe. 
 If Sir Walter Scott really takes this inscription for a 
 compliment, he deserves to go down to posterity with 
 Cain branded upon his forehead ; and if the noble 
 lord intended it as such, he must have formed a vile 
 opinion of the ingenious Baronet's principles and un- 
 derstanding. In his preface the author professes to 
 have " composed his scenes in conformity to the an- 
 cient title annexed to the dramas upon similar subjects ; 
 but says that he has not taken the same liberties with 
 his topic, which were common formerly." The auda- 
 ciousness of this declaration is of a piece with the 
 blasphemous texture of the performance which it pre- 
 ludes : for if there are no farcical representations in 
 the Mystery of Cain, it exhibits, what is ten thousand 
 times worse, a direct aim to overturn the faith of ages 
 in the existence of one Supreme Intelligence, the sole 
 creator and governor of the universe. Instead of 
 this fundamental article of belief, which even^philo- 
 sophy itself, without the aid of Revelation, could re- 
 ceive and prove, the author of Cain adopts from 
 Bayle, the great reviver of the Manic haean system' 
 
374 MANICMEISM. 
 
 the doctrine of two opposing and independent princi- 
 ples, the admission of which necessarily leads to athe- 
 ism. Even for the very title of M Mystery," which the 
 noble lord has given to his performance, he is clearly 
 indebted to that learned compiler of exploded errors, 
 who says of Christians that " they are bound to 
 believe the mysteries which are said to have been 
 revealed, however inconceivable and impossible they 
 may be to reason." 
 
 It is obvious, therefore, that in adopting the word 
 " Mystery," the noble author of Cain did not allude 
 to the old dramas, but to the foundation of Chris- 
 tianity, which according to him and his master is a 
 fiction irreconcilable with reason. 
 
 Into the particulars of the story of Cain it is not 
 needful to enter, farther than to state that the prin- 
 cipal agents in the piece are the Fratricide and Lucifer, 
 who appears to him in the field, and, at his own desire, 
 to know something of the state of the dead, conveys him 
 beyond this sublunary sphere into Hades, where the 
 shadows of the prae-Adamites appear, but which neither 
 say nor do any thing. This curious phantasmagoria 
 
DRY DEN. 375 
 
 being ended, Cain is brought back, with his head 
 heated by the visions which he had witnessed ; and 
 soon after he slays his brother, in the attempt to over- 
 turn Abel's altar. 
 
 Lord Byron says that " with regard to the language 
 of Lucifer, it was difficult to make him talk like a 
 clergyman upon the same subject, but that he had 
 done what he could to restrain him within the bounds 
 of spiritual politeness." 
 
 What ideas the noble poet may have of the Devil's 
 politeness, must be left to himself; but certain it is that 
 he has not given any honourable specimen of his own 
 in this passage — the reading of which puts one in mind 
 of what Dry den (and he was no bigot) said of some of 
 the wits in his day, whose company he shunned, be- 
 cause " blasphemy and atheism, if they were neither 
 sin nor ill manners, are subjects so very common and 
 worn so threadbare, that people who have sense avoid 
 them, for fear of being suspected to have none." 
 
 But if the Devil does not talk like a clergyman, the 
 noble lord, by the help of Bayle and his ape Voltaire, 
 
376 IMMORALITY. 
 
 has taken special cafe to make him prate with the 
 cunning of a sophist, and he has managed the matter 
 so well as to give even to the Devil's argumentation a 
 colouring calculated to raise doubts in the minds of 
 thousands. The noble lord and his advocates, if he 
 has any, will perhaps pretend that the infidelity here 
 brought forward is merely in character, and that the 
 impiety belongs to Lucifer ; but who has exhibited 
 this being in a dramatic pOem ? and who made him 
 utter what ought not to be written at all? Will 
 Lord Byron, or any man, dare advance the position, 
 that a poet has a right to create a character for the 
 purpose of obtruding upon the world, through that 
 fictitious organ, language which the author in his own 
 proper person could not venture to publish? No 
 man of common understanding can avoid seeing in 
 the speeches of Cain and Lucifer, the sentiments of 
 the dramatist himself; and to prove that this is not an 
 unjust imputation, one passage alone will be suffi- 
 cient. All the false reasoning about the introduction 
 of natural and moral evil, is little indeed when com- 
 pared with the diabolical justification of incest. 
 
 In the discourse which Lucifier holds with Cain, 
 
immorality. 377 
 
 and his wife Adah, the subject is thus introduced, for 
 the purpose of showing that the connexion which 
 then subsisted between brother and sister, would in 
 the next generation become a sin by an arbitrary 
 violation of the law of nature : — 
 
 "Adah.— What! 
 Must not my daughter love her brother Enoch ! 
 
 Lucifer. — Not as thou I o vest Cain. 
 
 Adah.— Oh ! my God ! 
 Shall they not love, and bring forth things that love, 
 Out of their love ? Have they not drawn their milk 
 Out of this bosom ? Was not he, their father, 
 Born of the same sole womb, in the same hour 
 With me ? did we not love each other ; and, 
 In multiplying our being, multiply 
 Things which will love each other as we love 
 Them ? — And as I love thee, my Cain ! go not 
 Forth with this spirit ; he is not of ours. 
 
 Lucifer. —The sin I speak of is not of my making, 
 An d cannot be a sin to you — whate'er 
 It seem in those who will replace ye in 
 Mortality. 
 
 Adah. — What is the sin which is not 
 Sin in itself? can circumstance make sin 
 A virtue ? — if it doth, we are the slaves 
 Of ." 
 
378 BAYLE. 
 
 Now this is not the delusive reasoning of a tempter, 
 but conclusions put into the mouth of a child of 
 nature, and so expressed as to make the reader 
 believe that the law which prohibits certain connexions 
 is an act of tyranny. To make the venom stronger, 
 the author of this Mystery has made Cain and Adah 
 twins, contrary even to the tradition of the Rabbins, 
 and those old writers of legends, who say that Cain 
 married the twin sister of Abel, that their relationship 
 might be as distant as possible. Such is the morality 
 of this poem ; but it is only consequential of the 
 principles of infidelity, for thus says Bayle, the oracle 
 of the sect : " According to the rules of philosophy it 
 may be maintained, that if it be repugnant to the 
 nature of the Deity to produce sin, it is also repug- 
 nant to the same nature to produce creatures who will 
 infallibly commit sin, under those circumstances in 
 which he chose to place them : for according to our 
 most distinct ideas, it is altogether the same thing to 
 commit murder oneself, as to put a man into cir- 
 cumstances where we know he must inevitably be 
 killed." Again : u If we depend only upon one 
 cause, almighty, infinitely good, and infinitely free, 
 and which disposes universally of all beings, accord- 
 
IMPIETY. 379 
 
 ing to the pleasure of his own will, we ought not to 
 feel any evil, all our good ought to be pure, and we 
 ought never to have any thing dangerous. The 
 author of our being, if He is infinitely beneficent, 
 ought to take a continual pleasure in making us happy, 
 and preventing every thing that may disturb or 
 diminish our felicity ; for this is a property essentially 
 inherent in the idea of supreme goodness." These 
 are the fundamental positions ramified into dialogue, 
 expanded into declamation, and worked up into 
 action, throughout the Mystery of Cain. 
 
 After the magic-lantern show, for which the first 
 murderer takes so long an excursion, and that a 
 much less amusing one than the famous journey of 
 Mohammed to Paradise, Lucifer takes leave of his 
 companion with this piece of philosophical advice : 
 
 M One good gift has the fatal apple given — 
 Your reason : — let it not be oversway'd 
 By tyrannous threats, to force you into faith, 
 'Gainst all external sense and inward feeling : 
 Think and endure — and form an inner world 
 In your own bosom — where the outward fails ; 
 So shall you nearer be to the spiritual 
 Mature, and war triumphant with your owi. w 
 
580 CUVIER. 
 
 Were this passage, and the same might be said 
 of a great many others in the drama, printed as plain 
 prose, no reader who then saw it for the first time 
 would ever dream that it had been divided into the 
 form of verse. Of the general beggarliness of the 
 language, one specimen, taken from the description 
 of the world of the supposed prae- Adamites, shall 
 suffice. Lucifer, in answer to a question put to him 
 by Cain respecting those old inhabitants of the globe, 
 says, 
 
 " Their earth is gone for ever — 
 So changed by convulsion, they would not 
 Be conscious to a single present spot 
 Of its new scarcely hardened surface — 'twas — 
 Oh, what a beautiful world it was ! !" 
 
 For this notion of a succession of worlds, the 
 noble author in his preface quotes the authority of 
 Cuvier, and roundly asserts that the speculation is 
 not contrary to the Mosaic account, but rather con- 
 firms it. Now having read the bible, he must know 
 that the cosmogony of Moses directly maintains, and 
 necessarily pre-supposes, a creation of the world in 
 its original elements ; and not the renovation of a 
 
ATHEISM. S81 
 
 decayed planet out of the old materials. Hut though 
 Lord Byron pretends to call in the aid of Cuvier 
 it is clear, that he never read the works of that great 
 naturalist : and that he is indebted for this, as he is 
 for all the rest of his machinery and sentiments, 
 solely to Bayle, who has defended the notion at great 
 length in various parts of his Dictionary. 
 
 Having said so much upon the general character 
 of this Mystery, it would be needless to enter into 
 more minute criticism either on the slovenliness of the 
 execution, or the attacks upon particular points of 
 faith — such as the fall of man, the doctrine of the 
 atonement, and the reality of the miracles recorded 
 in the New Testament. It is enough to have 
 shown that the foundation on which the author has 
 built his structure, is one that former sceptics have 
 taken advantage of, and that it sinks inevitably into 
 the depth of Atheism ; since, if the moral government 
 of the universe is limited and divided, there must be 
 endless confusion and misery among all the variety 
 of beings that spring into existence — consequently the 
 idea of omnipotence is at an end. This inference 
 from the premises which he has laid down, or rather 
 
382 PLUTAKCH. 
 
 extracted, the author of the drama has himself put 
 into the mouth of Cain, who, when Lucifer says that 
 " Jehovah and he both reign together, though their 
 dwellings are asunder, f answers him like an Epicu- 
 rean, or one just fresh from reading Lucretius — 
 
 " Would there were only one of ye ! perchance 
 
 An unity of purpose might make union 
 
 In elements, which seem now jarr'd in storms." 
 
 After this, one may say with honest Plutarch, that, 
 let superstition be never so disagreeable, it is infinitely 
 better than Atheism : for the former does sometimes 
 keep men from violence and indecency ; but absolute 
 scepticism, by pulling up the belief and influence of 
 the Deity from the mind, leaves all actions indifferent, 
 and the moral world becomes a chaos. 
 
 Among the extraordinary things which attended 
 this composition, the conduct of the publisher was 
 not a little remarkable. Having demurred to the 
 printing of such a piece as Cain, and called to his 
 counsels some of the literary friends of the author, who 
 concurred with him in the opinion of its character, 
 it was hardly to be expected that he would still 
 
MILTON. 383 
 
 lend himself to the office of sending it into the world. 
 Yet such was the case ; and though this drama 
 appeared in conjunction with two others, it was an- 
 nounced by a separate advertisement, for the purpose 
 of exciting the greater curiosity. After this, when 
 one of the freebooters of the trade seized this same 
 Mystery, and printed piratically a cheap edition of it, 
 the proprietor claimed his goods by an application to 
 the Court of Chancery for an injunction to protect 
 what he had himself admitted to be contraband. The 
 point was well argued by Mr. Shadwell, the coun- 
 sel ; but in attempting to defend Cain by comparing 
 it with Paradise Lost, he did his client little good, and 
 himself less credit, since no two pieces can be more 
 dissimilar. Our divine poet has, it is true, made 
 Satan a leading character in his epic ; but he is not 
 the principal one, neither does he appear in his proper 
 person for the purpose of effecting the ruin of man. 
 The tempter is represented exactly as the Scriptural 
 history describes him ; but he is in the poem, as he 
 is in the bible, a fallen being, and no more. There is 
 nothing of a Manichaean tendency in Milton's immor- 
 tal work; throughout which, the, supremacy of the 
 
184 MILTOtf. 
 
 Deity, the free agency of man, and the immutability 
 of truth, are enforced and illustrated with equal 
 power of argument and elegance of diction. What 
 Johnson has said upon this point is so apposite, that 
 while it fully vindicates Milton, it does at the same 
 time in the strongest manner condemn the author of 
 Cain. " To make Satan speak as a rebel," observes 
 the profound critic, " without any such expressions 
 as might taint the reader's imagination, was indeed 
 one of the great difficulties in Milton's undertaking, 
 and I cannot but think that he has extricated himself 
 with great happiness. There is in Satan's speeches, 
 little that can give pain to a pious ear. The lan- 
 guage of rebellion cannot be the same with that of 
 obedience. The malignity of Satan foams in haugh- 
 tiness and obstinacy ; but his expressions are com- 
 monly general, and no otherwise offensive than as 
 they are wicked." 
 
 This cannot be said of Lord Byron's Mystery, 
 where both Cain and Lucifer doubt, reason, and blas- 
 pheme with mutual agreement from the beginning of 
 their acquaintance till they part ; and even when the 
 
ANECDOTE OF CUltLL. 385 
 
 murder is perpetrated and judgment is pronounced, 
 the fratricide sticks to his principles, taking consola- 
 tion in the reflection, 
 
 H That which I am, I am : I did not seek 
 For life, nor did I make myself." 
 
 The refusal of the Chancellor to grant an injunc- 
 tion, has subjected his lordship to some rash censures ; 
 and it has been observed, that in consequence of the 
 denial the copies of the work are multiplied. This 
 may be true; but the evil, though great, would have 
 been greater, had the first law authority in the land 
 given the high sanction of his imprimatur to a book the 
 direct object of which is to bring the religion of the 
 country into contempt. The application to the Court 
 of Chancery for the protection of this blasphemous 
 play, is somewhat like the conduct of Curll, of libel- 
 lous memory, who, when warned by the t Bishop of 
 London not to print Rochester's poems, sent his lord- 
 ship a copy, and begged him to strike out the offensive 
 passages. The worthy prelate, however, was not so 
 easy to be duped; but returned the book to the 
 crafty publisher, without any other remark than a 
 
 c c 
 
386 DUPLICITY. 
 
 verbal message, — that if he printed it, he must take 
 the consequences. 
 
 With regard to the present case, nothing can ex- 
 ceed the duplicity that marked the conduct of the 
 parties ; for if the bookseller really in his conscience 
 thought the Mystery of Cain so objectionable as not 
 to be fit for the press, why did he submit to the 
 irksome task of ushering it into the world, merely 
 because the author was obstinately bent upon the pub- 
 lication ? That very resolution to make him a tool for 
 so vile a purpose, ought to have stimulated him to re- 
 ject the mandate as an unwarrantable act of tyrannous 
 insult. But he submitted, and that without the plea 
 of Romeo's apothecary; for he is far enough from 
 standing in need of Lord Byron's assistance, though 
 he knows full well the lucrative importance of their 
 alliance. If any thing could increase the folly and 
 inconsistency of this conduct, it was the direction 
 given to the Counsel to disavow the preface, as 
 forming no part of the work. By whom then was 
 this preface written ? or how came it into the hands of 
 the printer, without the knowledge and consent of the 
 publisher ? Yet, in fact, there is no occasion for such a 
 
LOUD liVHONs LETTER. 3$7 
 
 question ; the preface is Lord Byron's composition, 
 and this the bookseller well knew at the time when 
 Mr. Shadwell was instructed not to claim it. And why 
 was the preface to be separated from the Mystery ? 
 Because the parties were aware that nobody cared a 
 farthing for the former, or would miss it ; since all the 
 wickedness lay in the drama of Cain, and not in the 
 foolish essay prefixed to it. 
 
 • 
 Having failed in the attempt to obtain legal pro- 
 tection for his blasphemous poem, Lord Byron ad- 
 dressed a letter to his publisher; who committed 
 another act of indiscretion, in causing it to be printed 
 in the daily papers. The author of Cain, in this 
 curious epistle, acknowledges that the publication of 
 the piece was owing to his pertinacity, and then he 
 goes on talking about the attempt to " bully the pub- 
 lisher ;" offering, right manfully, to appear in person, 
 and take the responsibility of the work upon himself 
 in case of a prosecution. Now it happens, and this 
 the noble lord knew, that no one had threatened a 
 prosecution at all. His profession, therefore, to save 
 the publisher harmless, was a mere piece of gasconade ; 
 and at all events could be considered as no atone- 
 
388 MILTOK. 
 
 ment for the offence which he had committed against 
 the public morals, and private manners. In this 
 letter his lordship reiterated what the Counsel had 
 advanced, respecting Milton, — but to as littl epurpose, 
 for the author of Paradise Lost was a believer in the 
 Bible, which it is the object of the Mystery of Cain to 
 turn into ridicule. Had the noble author acted upon 
 the principles of the great poet, he would have ensured 
 a very different kind of immortality from that which 
 now awaits him ; for, as Milton observes in his 
 Lycidas, 
 
 " Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, 
 
 Nor in the glittering foil, 
 
 Set off to th' world, nor in broad rumour lies, 
 
 But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes, 
 
 And perfect witness of all-judging Jove ; 
 
 As he pronounces lastly on each deed, 
 
 Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed." 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Spanish Proverb. — Lord Byron's Attacks on Mr. 
 Southey. — Reply of the latter in his " Vision of 
 Judgment." — Term of the " Satanic School." — 
 Retort of Lord Byron. — His Opinions on the 
 French Revolution — on Politics — and Religion- 
 Mr. Southey" s Letter. — Parody on the " Vision 
 of Judgment." 
 
 THE Spaniards have a good proverb, " El que 
 tiene piedras al de su vezino ;" that is, " He that 
 has his house covered with glass, should avoid throw- 
 ing stones on the roof or his neighbour." 
 
 Lord Byron had not this wholesome lesson in his 
 mind when he attacked so many contemporaneous 
 poets, and some of them without the slightest provoca- 
 tion. Among other objects of his satire, the Poet Laureate 
 
390 CONTROVERSY WITH 
 
 came in for the largest share of his virulence ; and not 
 content with throwing out the most biting invectives 
 against him in his poems, and the newspapers, he even 
 went so far out of his way, when agitating the contro- 
 versy dn the character of Pope, as to cast a reflection 
 upon the " invariable principles of Mr. Southey." 
 This animosity, therefore, evidently arose from the 
 change that had taken place in the opinions and con- 
 nexions of the Laureate, and most likely, in a great 
 degree, from the very circumstance of his having been 
 honoured with the poetic crown. A political change, 
 when it occurs jn one direction, is always considered 
 as an unpardonable sin; but, like Plowden's case, 
 when it takes an opposite course, then it becomes a 
 virtue. In other words — a man who, from being a 
 demagogue, turns moderate or a supporter of the 
 government, will on that account be branded as an 
 apostate ; but if, from pique or disappointment, he 
 quits the ranks" of loyalty for the mob of faction, he 
 will be hailed as~a patriot. The former happened to 
 be the lot of Mr. Southey ; and in consequence Lord 
 Byron, who ought to have had more sense and libe- 
 rality, joined in the cry against him — without duly 
 considering, that political principles may change 
 
MR. SOUTHEY. 3$l 
 
 without any impeachment of a man's motives, but 
 that moral principles are immutable, and that it is 
 by these the character will be estimated hereafter, 
 when the bickerings of parties shall be forgotten. 
 Had the noble lord weighed this serious truth in his 
 mind, he would not have written " Don Juan ;" but 
 having written it, common prudence should have 
 restrained him from attacking those who needed no 
 stronger weapons, than what he had furnished them 
 with in this very work. 
 
 Admitting that Southey and his friends have for- 
 saken their old political creed, and former associates ; 
 has not their noble antagonist renounced a creed of 
 infinitely greater moment ? and though he may boast 
 of adhering inflexibly to a party, has he not abandoned 
 his country, and broken all the ties which bound him 
 to it? 
 
 Mr. Southey does not appear to have felt the re- 
 peated contumelies poured out upon him, with such 
 sensibility as to think it necessary for him to retaliate { 
 till the composition of his " Vision of Judgment" 
 seemed to require some notice of the literary cor- 
 
392 VISION OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 ruption of the age. In celebrating the virtues of the 
 late King, and the trials which he had undergone 
 during his long and unparalleled reign ; the progress 
 of opinion, and the changes produced in the state 
 of society, could not well be passed over, without 
 weakening the representation which the poet had 
 undertaken to give. Of the boldness of this apotheo- 
 sis, the manner in which it is conducted, and the 
 peculiar style of versification adopted, it is not neces- 
 sary here to speak. The Laureate conceived that he 
 had an official duty to execute ; and if in the per- 
 formance he displayed little taste, it cannot be said 
 that he has violated the laws of truth. The charac- 
 ter of George the Third did not stand in need of the 
 panegyrist. There was nothing in his private or public 
 history that could either require the ingenuity of apology, 
 or call for the mantle of charity. The Laureate had, 
 in fact, more difficulty in finding an excuse for the 
 nation, than for the sovereign, whose exalted and uni- 
 form merits had so long shone like a star of the first 
 magnitude. Of this the poet was fully aware; and 
 he lamented the depravity which, as it were in abso- 
 lute defiance of so bright an example, had gone on 
 progressively increasing. On the prostitution of poetry 
 
SATANIC SCHOOL. 393 
 
 he dwelt, in his preliminary discourse, in this strong 
 language : " For more than half a century English 
 literature had been distinguished by its moral purity, 
 — the effect, and, in its turn, the cause of an improve- 
 ment in national manners. A father might, without 
 apprehension of evil, have put into the hands of his 
 children, any book which issued from the press, if it 
 did not bear either in its title-page, or frontispiece, 
 manifest signs that it was intended as furniture for 
 the brothel. There was no danger in any work which 
 bore the name of a respectable publisher, or was to 
 be procured at any respectable bookseller's. This 
 was particularly the case with regard to our poetry. 
 It is now no longer so ; and woe to those by whom 
 the offence cometh !" The Laureate having made his 
 charge, proceeded to apply it more particularly 
 against those whom he designated as the " Satanic 
 School ;" comparing them to the infidels from whose 
 labours arose the revolution in France. The appli- 
 cation to Lord Byron, as the head of this new school, 
 was too strikingly direct to be mistaken ; and accord- 
 ingly, in the appendix to his tragedy of the " Two 
 Foscari," he repelled the accusation with vehemence. 
 His commencement, however, is curious and unfor- 
 
394 FRENCH REVOLUTION. 
 
 tunate. He denies that the French revolution was oc- 
 casioned by any writings whatsoever, and asserts that 
 it would have occurred, had no such writers ever existed. 
 Here the noble lord, in the heat of his anger, seems 
 to have forgotten what he himself had acknowledged 
 and boasted, of Rousseau and Voltaire, that they had 
 * shaken thrones," by giving a new impulse to the 
 minds of men. But, whether in verse or prose, the 
 decision of Lord Byron will go for little in opposition 
 to the evidence of facts, and the records of history. 
 If the world is now governed by opinion, the conse- 
 quence is obvious, that they who gain an influence 
 over public feeling have a dreadful responsibility, for 
 which they must be answerable. The encyclopedists 
 in France, with the whole tribe of writers who were led 
 away by their example, gave a fashion to the national 
 literature, which operated so powerfully in morals 
 and politics, that an opportunity was only wanted for 
 the revolutionary spirit to overflow and destroy the 
 established institutions of the country. Lord Byron 
 may deny this, with the same scepticism that he calls 
 in question the truth of revelation, and the moral go- 
 vernment of the universe. But the proofs are written . 
 in letters of blood upon the page of modern history ; 
 
POLITICAL PROPHECY. 39«5 
 
 and unless the friends of order are active and zealous 
 in counteracting infidelity and licentiousness, similar 
 miseries may recur. That they will recur, the noble 
 poet himself believes, though he deprecates the charge 
 of contributing either in act or wish to the change 
 which he anticipates. " I wish," says he, " to see 
 thejEnglish constitution restored, and not destroyed. 
 Born an aristocrat, and naturally one by temper, 
 with the greater part of my present property in the 
 funds, what have I to gain by a revolution ? Perhaps 
 I have more to' lose injevery way than Mr. Sou they, 
 with all his places, and presents for panegyrics and 
 abuse into the bargain. But that a revolution is ine- 
 vitable, I repeat. The government may exult over 
 the repression of petty tumults ; these are but the 
 receding waves repulsed and broken for a moment on 
 the shore^while the great tide is still rolling on and 
 gaining ground with every breaker." 
 
 There is more poetry than argument in all this, 
 and the latter part would look well in verse ; though 
 it has in fact been already so well applied by Virgil, 
 as to render any new attempt at adaptation super^ 
 fluous. But, setting poetry aside, may we not 
 
396 POLITICAL OPINIONS 
 
 seriously ask the noble lord, how it happens, that 
 when the nation is in this perilous state, he, as one of 
 the hereditary legislators, contents himself with living 
 at a distance from the land of his fathers, to which he 
 has so many more obligations than Mr. Southey, or 
 ordinary commoners? The property of which Lord 
 Byron speaks thus proudly, whether it be in the funds 
 or elsewhere, is in a great measure national ; for it 
 is capable of proof, that his patrimonial estates were 
 grants from the crown, and confirmed by parliament. 
 But even allowing that they were not ; and that all 
 which he enjoys is the fruit of his own industry, and 
 the meed of his great merit, yet as an Englishman of 
 talent, and more especially as one of the barons of 
 the realm, it is his duty to stand and fall in his pro- 
 per place, instead of growling and prophesying in 
 the land of silk and slavery. If the constitution is 
 really in such a state as to need restoration, that good 
 work must be accomplished either by a reform or a 
 revolution. Now, when it is allowed that the first is 
 the only desirable mode of securing this blessing, it 
 may be asked how can the object be carried into 
 effect, but by the union of those who have the power, 
 ability, and will, to engage in the undertaking? The 
 
OF LORD BYRON. 397 
 
 revolution, which changed the dynasty, and that 
 without blood, in 1688, was brought about by the as- 
 sociated nobility ; but if the peers, instead of exerting 
 themselves to preserve the constitution, had aban- 
 doned the country, our portion at this day might 
 have been popery and despotism. We are not of the 
 opinion that Lord Byron has the weakness or wicked- 
 ness to desire a revolution, though he is so imprudent 
 as to say that such an event is inevitable. But this 
 we aver, that if there be a revolution, let the issue be 
 what it may, as he has left us to take care of our- 
 selves, no thanks will be due to him for any good 
 that shall remain in our possession after the struggle. 
 
 On the subject of religion, the noble lord is equally 
 unfortunate as on politics ; for he says, in answer to 
 the charge of attacking the established faith : " One 
 mode of worship is merely destroyed by another. 
 There never was, nor ever will be a country without 
 a religion. We shall be told of France again; but 
 it was only Paris, and a frantic party, which for 
 a moment upheld their dogmatic nonsense of theo- 
 phil anthropy. The church of England, if overthrown, 
 will be swept away by the sectarians, and not by the 
 
398 opinions 
 
 sceptics. People are too wise, too well informed, 
 too certain of their own immense importance in the 
 realms of space, ever to submit to the impiety of 
 doubt. There may be a few such diffident specu- 
 lators, like water in the pale sun-beam of human 
 reason, but they are very few; and their opinions, 
 without enthusiasm or appeal to the passions, can 
 never gain proselytes ; unless, indeed they are per- 
 secuted ; that, to be sure, will increase any thing." 
 
 The former part of this rhapsody is at variance 
 with the truth of history ; for that portion of the revo- 
 lution of France which was disgraced by decrees 
 against all religion, natural as well as revealed, was 
 conducted, not by a frantic party, but philosophers, 
 geometricians, and astronomers, who were, all of them, 
 in principle and practice, avowed atheists. The latter 
 part is poetical ; and what the author means by the 
 " certain conviction which the people have of their 
 importance in the realms of space," it would puzzle 
 even a metaphysician with all his subtlety to explain. 
 Nor is his lordship less happy in the winding-up of 
 his paragraph, in asserting of the sceptics, that as 
 " they do not appeal to the passions, they can never 
 
I 
 
 <>\ RLLrcioN. :399 
 
 gain proselytes." Now if by " appealing to the pas- 
 sions," we are to understand the attempt to influence 
 the imagination, none are more guilty of that very 
 thing than the noble author, and the writers whose 
 talents he has eulogized, and whose opinions he has 
 vamped up and adorned with the charms of verse. 
 The entire body of sceptics owe all the influence they 
 have gained over the minds of men, to this very art 
 of working upon the passions ; and the only method 
 that has succeeded, or ever can succeed, in effectually 
 destroying the delusion, is by bringing men to the 
 steady exercise of their reasoning faculties. Lord 
 Byron has shown his own skill in appealing to the 
 passions, by saying that "sceptics will never gain pro- 
 selytes, unless they are persecuted ;" thus insinuating, 
 as Gibbon had done before him, that Christianity is 
 intolerant, and that infidelity makes men mild, patient, 
 and amiable. Middleton, however, (and he is good 
 authority in this case, for he was an enemy to perse- 
 cution,) says that " Tis not the believers of religion, 
 but Infidels and Atheists, who in every country have 
 always been the severest persecutors and cruellest 
 oppressors of all civil as well as religious liberty." 
 
400 RETORT ON SOUTHEY. 
 
 The Laureate having observed something about 
 " death-bed repentance," provoked his noble antago- 
 nist to more than ordinary wrath ; and, by way of 
 reply, he says : " In common, I presume, with most 
 men of any reflection, I have not waited for a ' death- 
 bed' to repent of many of my actions, notwith- 
 standing the f diabolical pride 1 which this pitiful 
 renegado in his rancour would impute to those who 
 scorn him. Whether, upon the whole, the good or 
 evil of my deeds may preponderate, is not for me to 
 ascertain ; but, as my means and opportunities have 
 been greater, I shall limit my present defence to an 
 assertion, (easily proved if necessary,) that I, in my 
 degree, have done more real good in any one given 
 year, since I was twenty, than Mr. Southey in the 
 whole course of his shifting and turncoat existence." 
 In the same spirit, his lordship, warming as he goes 
 on, thus concludes his replication : " I am not ignorant 
 of Mr. Southey 's calumnies on a different occasion, 
 knowing them to be such, which he scattered abroad 
 on his return from Switzerland against me and others; 
 they have done him no good in this world, and if his 
 creed be the right one, they will do him less in the 
 
FIERY WARFARE. 401 
 
 next; what his * death-bed' may be, it is not my 
 province to predicate ; let him settle it with his Maker, 
 as I must do with mine. There is something at once 
 ludicrous and blasphemous in this arrogant scribbler 
 of all work, sitting down to deal damnation and 
 destruction upon his fellow- creatures with Wat Tyler, 
 the apotheosis of George the Third, and the elegy on 
 Marten the regicide, all shuffled together in his 
 writing-desk." 
 
 In the midst of this fiery warfare, one thing, and 
 that the most essential, had so completely escaped his 
 lordship's notice, that he never paid the slightest atten- 
 tion to it throughout the whole dispute. Mr. Southey 
 had charged him and his school, with attempting to 
 debauch the minds of their readers by writings calcu- 
 lated only for the brothel. Upon this most heinous 
 accusation Lord Byron is silent. He says not a 
 single syllable in explanation of this part of his con- 
 duct ; but leaves that count of the indictment, which 
 most directly affects his moral character, entirely 
 untouched. To what purpose then could he retort 
 political apostacy against his adversary; when he 
 
402 mr. southey's reply 
 
 either could not, or chose not, to remove from him- 
 self a stain of infinitely greater turpitude ? 
 
 The Laureate was not backward in bringing out a 
 reply, and it was of a temperature correspondent with 
 the collision by which it was elicited. The only 
 portion, however, of this answer, necessary to be 
 noticed here, is what concerns the personal history of 
 the parties. u Once, and once only," says Mr. 
 Southey, " in connexion with Switzerland, I have al- 
 luded to his Lordship: and as the passage was 
 curtailed in the press, I take this opportunity of re- 
 storing it. In the Quarterly Review, speaking inci- 
 dentally of the Jungfraw, I said : c It was the scene 
 where Lord Byron's. Manfred met the Devil, and 
 bullied him — though the Devil must have won his 
 cause before any tribunal in this world, or the next, if 
 he had not pleaded more feebly for himself than his 
 advocate, in a cause of canonization, ever pleaded 
 for him. With regard to the ? others' whom his 
 Lordship accuses me of calumniating, I suppose he 
 alludes to a party of his friends, whose names I found 
 written in the Album at Mont Auvert, with an 
 
AND EXPLANATION. 403 
 
 avowal of Atheism annexed in Greek, and an indig- 
 nant comment, in the same language, underneath it. 
 Those names, with that avowal, and the comment, I 
 transcribed in my note book, and spoke of the cir- 
 cumstance on my return. If I had published it, the 
 gentleman in question, would not have thought him- 
 self slandered, by having that recorded of him which 
 he has often recorded of himself." 
 
 Mr. Southey having observed that the exacerbation 
 of his noble adversary arose from the animadversions 
 bestowed upon the Satanic School of poetry, in the 
 preface to the " Vision of Judgment," adds : " well 
 would it be for Lord Byron, if he could look back 
 upon any of his writings, with as much satisfaction 
 as I shall always do upon what is there said of that 
 flagitious school. Many persons, and parents espe- 
 cially, have expressed their gratitude to me for having 
 applied the branding-iron where it was so richly 
 deserved. Lord Byron, however, has not ventured 
 to bring the matter of those animadversions into view. 
 He conceals the fact, that they are directed against 
 the authors of blasphemous and lascivious books ; 
 against men who, not content with indulging their 
 
404 mr. southey's reply 
 
 own vices, labour to make others the slaves of sen- 
 suality, like themselves : against public panders, who, 
 mingling impiety with lewdness, seek at once to 
 destroy the cement of social order, and to carry pro- 
 fanation and pollution into private families and into 
 the hearts of individuals." 
 
 His lordship having called the Laureate a " scribbler 
 of all work," receives this answer by way of recrimi- 
 nation : " I will tell Lord Byron what kind of work I 
 have not done. I have never published libels upon 
 my friends and acquaintance, expressed my sorrow 
 for those libels, and called them in, during a mood 
 of better mind — and then re-issued them, when the 
 evil spirit, which for a time has been cast out, had 
 returned and taken possession, with seven others more 
 wicked than himself. I have never abused the power, 
 of which every author is in some degree possessed, to 
 wound the character of a man, or the heart of a 
 woman. I have never sent into the world, a book 
 to which I did not dare to affix my name ; or which 
 I feared to claim in a Court of Justice, if it were 
 pirated by a knavish bookseller. I have never ma- 
 nufactured furniture for the brothel. None of these 
 
AND EXPLANATION. 405 
 
 things have I done ; none of the foul work by which 
 literature is perverted to the injury of mankind. My 
 hands are clean ; there is no 1 damned spot' upon 
 them — no taint, which ' all the perfumes of Arabia 
 will not sweeten.' Of the work which I have done, 
 it becomes me not here to speak, savo only as re- 
 lates to the Satanic School and its Coryphaeus, the 
 author of ' Don Juan.' I have held up that school 
 to public detestation, as enemies to the religion, the 
 institutions, and the domestic morals of their coun- 
 try. I have sent a stone from my sling which has 
 smitten their Goliath in the forehead; I have fastened 
 his name upon the gibbet, for reproach and igno- 
 miny, as long as it shall endure. Take it down who 
 
 can. 
 
 Here the contest ended, but not the enmity, which 
 continued to burn with an increase of fury, especially 
 in the bosom of the noble lord, who carried his re- 
 sentment so far as to write a parody of the Laureate's 
 Apotheosis; but of a description so outrageously 
 indecorous as to render the publication too hazardous 
 for any printer to undertake with the least regard to 
 his safety or reputation. 
 
406 lord byron's parody. 
 
 The hexameter verse adopted in the " Vision of 
 Judgment/' made both imitation and ridicule ex- 
 tremely easy ; but the noble lord would have acted 
 a wiser part in preserving a dignified silence ; for if 
 ever the burlesque poem gets abroad into the world, 
 it will be at once considered as a full justification of 
 the strong epithet that has been applied to some of 
 the author's other works. 
 
CHAPTER XXL 
 
 Anecdote of Dryden. — His conduct contrasted 
 with that of Lord Byron. — Projected Literary 
 Institution at Pisa. — Anecdote of Voltaire. — 
 The associates of Lord Byron.— The Writings of 
 Shelley recommended by him. — English Journal 
 at Pisa. — Lord Byrons Liberality. — Increase 
 of his Fortune. — Law suit. — Impropriety of his 
 conduct. — Review of his personal and literary 
 character. — Conclusion. 
 
 IT redounds to the honour of Dryden, that when 
 accused by Jeremy Collier, of having stained his 
 dramatic pieces with impure scenes and profane 
 speeches, instead of bullying the critic and justifying 
 himself, he made a frank confession of his error, and 
 said: "it becomes me not to draw my pen in the 
 defence of a bad cause, when I have so often drawn 
 it for a good one/ 
 
408 ' pjsa. 
 
 Happy will it be, if the future biographer of Lord 
 Byron shall have to record a similar act of true 
 magnanimity on his part ; but as yet there appears 
 no indication of any such salutary change. On 
 the contrary the circumstance, too well accredited 
 to be called in question, of his lordship's having 
 established a literary circle at Pisa, where he now 
 resides, after having quitted Ravenna, has a most 
 portentous aspect. Thus the charge of his having 
 formed a poetical school of immorality and profane- 
 ness, will, there is room to fear, be realized in the 
 literal sense and to the fullest extent. This college 
 of infidelity, founded, supported, and directed by the 
 noble lord, under his own roof, will no doubt make a 
 considerable noise in the world ; though it is not very 
 probable that mankind, after having so recently wit- 
 nessed the practical effects resulting from a combina- 
 tion of talents, employed in overturning religion, will 
 contentedly suffer a repetition of the experiment. There 
 was, during a great portion of the century that is past, 
 a legion of this description, but somewhat of a higher 
 order of intellect, who distinguished themselves in the 
 same course which Lord Byron and his associates are 
 ambitious of pursuing. The patriarch of that frater- 
 
VOLTAIRE. 409 
 
 nity began his project early in life, and he continued 
 to labour at it through a long period, till he had very 
 nearly tasted some of the precious fruits of the tree 
 which he had planted. His followers, however, had 
 that enjoyment, and they found to their cost, that 
 what was so fair to the eye, mocked their hopes, 
 and, like the apples of Sodom, " not the touch but 
 taste deceived." 
 
 When Voltaire first began the work of enlightening 
 the minds of men, at the age of little more than thirty ; 
 a worthy magistrate of France said to him : " You 
 have undertaken that which is too hard for you. 
 Religion is not to be shaken by your efforts. " The 
 answer of this sceptic was, " Nous verrons," " We 
 shall see ;" and within two generations Atheism was 
 so triumphant in France, that the whole land was 
 deluged with human blood. 
 
 Our noble countryman affects to laugh at this, 
 and says, " That religion has too strong a hold upon 
 the mass of mankind to be removed ;" why then does 
 he exert himself to bring it into such contempt as 
 
410 LITERARY INSTITUTION. 
 
 must weaken that influence ? If religion be in any 
 degree necessary to public order and private happi- 
 ness, the writer who makes it an object of ridicule, 
 and who endeavours to lessen its obligations, does all 
 that in him lies to introduce discord, to loosen the 
 bonds of society; and, of course, to abridge the com 
 forts of individuals. 
 
 The scheme of collecting around him a constel- 
 lation of talent for the purpose of propagating his 
 principles, is a goodly proof of the regard which 
 the noble lord has for the human race, and of his 
 respect for the institutions of his native land. It is 
 true we can most gladly spare the worthies whom he 
 has chosen as his co-adjutors in this great concern; 
 and if to the Shelleys, and the Hunts, who are to 
 be the professors in this new academy of blasphemy, 
 the noble president shall be pleased to add a score 
 or two more of the same kind, England will be a 
 gainer by their emigration. One circumstance has 
 already been related of the Pylades of the noble wan- 
 derer; but it is proper here to mention, that, besides 
 avowing Atheism in Switzerland, he has circulated 
 
shelley's poems. 411 
 
 poems in England, which he dare not publish, or 
 rather, it should be said, which no bookseller will 
 have the hardihood openly to sell. 
 
 Lord Byron disavows the charge of having assisted 
 Shelley in the composition of his " Queen Mab," 
 and he says, " I never wrote a line of the notes, nor 
 ever saw them except in their published form. No 
 one knows better than their real author, that his opi- 
 nions and mine differ materially upon the metaphy- 
 sical portion of that work ; though, in common with 
 all who are not blinded by baseness and bigotry, I 
 highly admire the poetry of that and his other pub- 
 lications/' 
 
 This declaration is of importance ; for it is an ad- 
 mission that there is no other difference between Lord 
 Byron and his favourite disciple, than upon metaphy- 
 sics ; it follows, therefore, that in morals they are 
 agreed. It is not necessary here to examine the cha- 
 racteristics of the poetry which the noble lord has so 
 extravagantly eulogized; but it ought to be made 
 known that the writer has, among other outrages, 
 boldly defended the lawfulness, as far as natural 
 
412 DANGEROUS PRINCIPLES. 
 
 right extends, of a brother and sister living together 
 in a state of conjugation. Now this is the man to 
 whose works, Lord Byron has given the high autho- 
 rity of his sanction, accompanied with the declaration, 
 that whoever does not admire them as he does, is 
 both base and a bigot. This anathema is really more 
 ludicrous, than that of Lord Peter, in the " Tale of 
 a Tub," who swore eternal perdition against any of 
 his company that should refuse to swallow his brown 
 bread, and deny that it was good fat mutton. Lord 
 Byron may purge his brain as he pleases, and, having 
 acquired new ideas of moral and poetical beauty, he 
 is at full liberty to regale his morbid taste upon what- 
 ever objects shall strike his fancy ; but this privilege 
 does not give him the right of playing the dictator, 
 and calling other men fools and knaves because they 
 also venture to think for themselves. It was said of 
 the ancient inhabitants of the island of Corcyra, by 
 the polished Greeks, that Eteu9spa Kepxvfa %^ otou Seteig; 
 " they were at liberty to do in public what all the rest 
 of the world endeavoured to conceal." The same 
 latitude of thinking and acting is assumed by Lord 
 Byron and the members of his school, whence the 
 fruits of their associated labours may be easily augured. 
 
DANGEROUS PRINCIPLES. 413 
 
 But though we are willing enough that Italy should 
 enjoy the honour of fostering this sect of modern 
 Pyrrhonists, we have neither a wish to see the new 
 academy transplanted from the Arno to the Thames, 
 nor any desire to be illuminated by the works which 
 they may produce. If our forefathers had some 
 reason to be jealous of the combination instituted " de 
 propaganda fide;" we may be allowed to entertain 
 our suspicions of this society for the propagation of 
 infidelity. 
 
 There are some, it may be, who will consider this 
 scheme of establishing an English academy in Tus- 
 cany as a proof of the increasing liberality of the 
 age ; and one that is highly honourable to the noble 
 patron, who has devoted his talents and fortune to the 
 cause of literature. If indeed the object of this 
 affiliation were the advancement of learning, the 
 friends of truth and humanity would rejoice in the 
 measure, and applaud the spirit of him with whom it 
 originated. But, without calling in question the ge- 
 nerosity of the English Maecenas, we may reasonably 
 entertain doubts of his prudence, if not some appre- 
 hensions of his designs. It seems extraordinary that 
 
414 LITERARY JOURNAL 
 
 the noble lord should find it expedient to call to his 
 assistance a set of writers for the purpose of com- 
 piling a literary journal at Pisa; but it has a doubtful 
 aspect, when we see the proprietor and editor of the 
 most seditious paper in England pensioned and 
 drawn to Italy that he may have the management of 
 this work. Lord Byron, we cannot help thinking, 
 would have done more honour to himself, and benefit 
 to society, in contributing to the support of some 
 literary institution in his native country, than by 
 joining himself, and that at a great expense, to a knot 
 of persons whose talents and principles are unworthy 
 of his patronage. There can be no doubt that the 
 love of fame is the ruling motive of his lordship ; but 
 the mode in which he pursues his object, is one more 
 likely to injure than to advance his reputation. Lord 
 Byron has already obtained a much more elevated 
 station in the world by his genius, than by his birth ; 
 the eyes of the present age are upon him, and they 
 who come hereafter will be naturally inquisitive about 
 his life, connexions, and opinions. So circumstanced, 
 it might have been expected that he would have pre- 
 served the splendour of his talents unsullied by any 
 wrong direction of them, and that having for con- 
 
AT PISA. 415 
 
 venience left England, he would have so deported 
 himself as to give no occasion to his enemies to 
 exult, or his admirers to blush for him. 
 
 When his lordship resided at Venice, he avoided 
 as much as he could all intercourse with his country- 
 men ; and in his rides generally took disagreeable cir- 
 cuits, that he might not fall in with those who were 
 anxious to get a sight of him : but since his settle- 
 ment at Pisa, where he has formed a much more 
 extensive establishment, he has thrown aside that 
 reserve in some degree, and no longer secludes him- 
 self from English society ; though his intimates are 
 select, and of congenial sentiments. This increase of 
 his establishment, and more free communion with the 
 world, may, probably, arise from the desire of enriching 
 his intended journal with all the advantages to be 
 obtained from a combination of varied knowledge ; 
 but how far foreigners will be edified by these new 
 lights, or England honoured for having produced 
 them, must be left to time and experience. The 
 institution is, at least, a proof of literary enthusiasm ; 
 and it should be observed as evidence of the founder's 
 munificence, that he has presented the copyright of 
 
416 ANECDOTE. 
 
 his most popular works, either to such particular 
 friends whose circumstances rendered the favour of 
 great importance to them, or to his publisher, who 
 has reaped no inconsiderable harvest from so fortunate 
 a connexion. The following anecdote also merits 
 notice, as a pleasing trait of urbanity. Previous to 
 his lordship's marriage, when he resided in the Al- 
 bany, a young lady of poetical talent, but not suc- 
 cessful in her literary attempts, found herself involved 
 in difficulties, owing to the misfortunes of her family. 
 Those friends who might have served her were 
 abroad, and she knew not where to address them ; 
 her distresses accumulated, and she felt so severely 
 the state of those who were most dear to her, that 
 she resolved to apply to Lord Byron, on the plea 
 of authorship, by soliciting his subscription to her 
 poems. It is singular that her idea of his character 
 was formed from his works, the perusal of which 
 made her conclude him of an amiable disposition, 
 and one who was much misunderstood by the world. 
 Such as her imagination had pourtrayed him, she 
 found him in reality. She simply stated her motives 
 for applying to him, and requested his subscription ; 
 when he, in the most delicate manner, prevented her 
 
li u ku a lit v. 417 
 
 from duelling on any painful subject, by immediately 
 entering into some general conversation, in the course 
 of which he wrote a draft, which he folded up and 
 presented to her, saying, " that was his subscription." 
 She did not, of course, look at the paper while she 
 remained with him, which was some time, as the 
 pleasure of his discourse was too delightful to be soon 
 relinquished : and while he professed himself highly 
 interested in her future welfare, from motives of de- 
 licacy, he refrained from taking any active part in pro- 
 moting the subscription ; for, as they were both young, 
 he feared, from the well-known censoriousness of the 
 world, he might rather injure than serve her by so 
 doing. On her leaving him, she inspected the paper, 
 and found it to be a draft on his banker, for fifty 
 pounds. 
 
 That one so capable of great and excellent things, 
 should be alienated from his natal soil, to which he 
 might have proved a high ornament and substantial 
 benefit, is most sincerely to be regretted. And this 
 voluntary expatriation is the more unaccountable, 
 considering how many powerful ties the noble wan- 
 derer has to draw him to and fix him in England. 
 
 E E 
 
418 LAW SUIT. 
 
 His patrimonial estate has already received a large 
 increase ; and he has recently obtained, by the death 
 of his lady's mother, an addition to his income, which, 
 under the peculiarity of the circumstances, ought not 
 perhaps to be spent out of the kingdom. That his 
 lordship has not been unmindful of his worldly con- 
 cerns, is evident from the writs of ejectment which 
 he some time since brought against the possessors of 
 certain estates in Rochdale, on the ground that the 
 lands had been illegally conveyed by a former Lord 
 Byron and the trustees under his marriage settle- 
 ment. A suit in equity followed, and the pur- 
 chasers' titles were confirmed, with costs, against 
 the noble claimant, who has appealed from the decree 
 of the Court of Exchequer, to the House of Lords ; 
 before which supreme tribunal the matter now lies 
 for judgment. 
 
 Whether these events, or the serious fracas which 
 his lordship is said to have recently had with some of 
 the military in Tuscany, will induce him to turn his 
 face homewards, cannot of course be as yet known ; 
 but of this there can be little doubt, that in adopting 
 such a resolution, he would both consult his true 
 
ASPERITY. 419 
 
 interest, and act in a manner best becoming his 
 station ; for, after all, self-banishment has a ten- 
 dency to create suspicions, and to weaken that at- 
 tachment, which in all cases must be mutual to be 
 lasting. But if the noble author will persist in dis- 
 pensing the favour of his presence upon foreign 
 climes, and if he will go on affectedly, or really, to 
 despise his native land ; he must expect that in what- 
 ever admiration his genius may be held by English- 
 men, they will at last be disposed to turn the eye of 
 scorn against him, and be as ready to cast him out 
 of their minds, as he is to treat them with contempt. 
 The popularity which he has attained ; the avidity 
 with which his writings are sought after ; and the cu- 
 riosity people naturally have to see and know a man 
 of whom so much is said, ought to have produced a 
 good-natured sentiment towards his countrymen, even 
 though he might not have chosen to re-visit England. 
 But we are sorry to observe, that the splendour dif- 
 fused around his name has not had the effect of 
 softening down the asperity of the noble author; for 
 in one of his recent publications he professes his 
 abhorrence to hold any contact whatever with Eng- 
 lishmen who travel in foreign parts. 
 
420 POPULARITY. 
 
 This acerbity, however, itis to be hoped is in a great 
 measure assumed ; and, perhaps, like the sombre tinge 
 of his principal performances, it is nothing more than 
 a colour put on for the sake of singularity. We may 
 reasonably conclude that this is the case, from the 
 report of those who are most intimately acquainted 
 with Lord Byron; for, according to their united re- 
 presentation, no man is possessed of a milder dispo- 
 sition, or distinguished by pleasanter manners. 
 
 A similar instance of extensive literary fame 
 acquired within so short a period, the annals of 
 literature do not furnish ; but the nearest to it is the 
 history of Pope, though in other respects there are 
 scarcely any points of resemblance between the two 
 characters. The great ethical poet was studiously 
 correct in his compositions, and remarkably musical 
 in the construction of his verse ; while the noble author 
 on the contrary evinces a kind of wanton carelessness, 
 and throws out his productions hot from the brain, 
 without being at the pains to give them the slightest 
 polish. Hence his rhymes are often discordant, and 
 his similes indigestible ; the sentences ungrammatical, 
 and the sense scarcely intelligible. Lord Byron how- 
 
PLAGIARISM. 421 
 
 ever, like Pope, has been accused of the grossest 
 plagiarism ; and some scribblers, envious of his repu- 
 tation, have been at the pains of collecting numerous 
 passages from various authors, in prose and verse, to 
 discover parallelisms in the writings of this popular 
 poet. One or two of our literary journals were dis- 
 graced with these invidious catalogues, the compilers 
 of which might be compared to the critic in Bocca- 
 lini's fable, — who, having presented to Apollo an im- 
 mense volume of the errors of great poets, was directed 
 in return to select the grains from a bushel of wheat, 
 after which he received the chaff for his labour. It 
 deserves to be known that the principal person en~ 
 gaged in this attack upon Lord Byron, was one who 
 had servilely courted his favour, and flattered him in 
 the most fulsome manner ; but not meeting with the 
 countenance he expected, he became, as is usually the 
 case, the vengeful calumniator of the man whom he had 
 idolized. The noble lord, in an appendix to his tragedy 
 of the "Two Foscari," has condescended to notice the 
 charge of plagiarism, in which he says, u I have had an 
 anonymous sort of threatening intimation, apparently 
 with the intent of extorting money. To such charges 
 I have no answer to make. One of them is ludicrous 
 
422 PLAGIARISM. 
 
 enough. I am reproached for having formed the 
 description of a shipwreck in verse, from the narra- 
 tives of many actual shipwrecks in prose, selecting 
 such materials as were most striking. Gibbon makes 
 it a merit in Tasso, " to have copied the minutest 
 details of the Siege of Jerusalem from the Chronicles." 
 In me it may be a demerit, I presume : let it remain so. 
 Whilst I have been occupied in defending Pope's 
 character, the lower orders of Grub-street, appear to 
 have been assailing mine : this is as it should be, 
 both in them and in me. One of the accusations in 
 the nameless epistle alluded to, is still more laughable ; 
 it states seriously, that ' I received five hundred 
 pounds for writing the advertisements for Day and 
 Martin's patent Blacking.' This is the highest com- 
 pliment to my literary powers, which I ever received." 
 That the reading of Lord Byron has been very multifa- 
 rious, is obvious upon the most superficial examination 
 of his works ; and, therefore, the casual coincidences 
 of allusion and phrase between him and other writers 
 may easily be accounted for, without supposing that 
 a poet of such natural fertility of conception was 
 under the necessity of borrowing from other sources 
 than his own genius. This accusation of literary 
 
POETIC CHARACTER. 423 
 
 larceny is too absurd to require any serious refutation : 
 but there are some things affecting the poetical cha- 
 racter of the noble lord, which his most enthusiastic 
 admirers will find it more difficult to excuse. The 
 prominent fault in his compositions is a total absence 
 of moral feeling; amounting, apparently, to a studied 
 disregard of the difference between virtue and vice. 
 Representations of sensualists and debauchees, robbers 
 and assassins, are brought forward in every possible 
 situation, and they are made to express themselves 
 so as to excite the reader's interest in their favour ; 
 though at the same time there is not one redeeming 
 quality in the character of these heroes of profligacy, 
 to balance their crimes. 
 
 What renders this bad taste still more offensive, 
 is the strange and unnatural mixture of the right 
 honourable writer's own private history, with that 
 of his fictitious personages. 
 
 Childe Harold, Conrad, Lara, and Don Juan, 
 have all of them a strong portion of this similitude, 
 which, instead of enlivening, only serves to perplex the 
 story, and confuse the mind, by dividing its attention 
 
424 POETIC CHARACTER. 
 
 between what is real, and what is merely imaginary 
 None of Lord Byron's heroes, however, can be said 
 to possess- a definite character ; for though they appear 
 with powerful effect on the scene, there is no mind in 
 any of them ; but all is storm, passion, and instinct. 
 The females are of a description exactly suited to 
 the men with whom they are associated ; being 
 beautiful, airy, and enchanting creatures, calculated 
 for pleasure, but void of intellect. 
 
 The distinguishing feature of Lord Byron's poetry 
 is eloquence; and that of the most vehement cha- 
 racter. His verse rushes on with the rapidity of a 
 cataract, carrying our ideas impetuously along in such 
 a manner as to prevent any thing like repose or steady 
 contemplation. Yet amidst the wild variety of objects 
 and obscure disquisitions which this magical genius 
 contrives to bring together, without any regard to 
 appropriate selection or lucid arrangement, there are 
 descriptions and sentiments of exquisite beauty and 
 tenderness, profusely scattered throughout his poems, 
 all of which show that he is a perfect master of the 
 art, and that he wants nothing but a noble moral 
 motive to render his works imperishable. Attempts 
 
POETIC CHAM A C T Eft. 4 2.5 
 
 have been made to set up some other living poets, in 
 comparison with Lord Byron, but these are futile ; 
 the noble poet is perfectly sui generis ; he stands 
 alone, and if not actually the very best of the existing 
 bards of Britain, he shines more conspicuously ori- 
 ginal than any of them. It were to be wished indeed 
 that he paid more regard to the purity of his senti- 
 ments, the harmony of his style, and the dignity of 
 his subjects ; but, as it is, his poetical abstractions, 
 the vigour of his language, and the romantic cast of 
 the creatures of his lively imagination, have procured 
 him a lofty eminence, from which he will not fall but 
 by his own indiscretion. The versatility of his talents 
 shows that he is capable of the boldest flights, and 
 that there is nothing within the range of poesy to 
 which he may not aspire. Judgment alone is wanting 
 to secure for him the high rank which he has already 
 attained, and to carry him yet farther in the career of 
 literary distinction. As yet the world has only wit- 
 nessed astonishing efforts of daring genius, without 
 one steady direction, or the accomplishment of any 
 valuable object. If the noble lord will, in due season, 
 form a proper estimate of his talents, and consider 
 that utility is the only permanent consecration of 
 
426 POETIC CHARACTER. 
 
 them, he may, notwithstanding his occasional errors, 
 assure to himself the gratitude of the living age, and 
 the admiration of posterity. Much has been said of 
 the pernicious tendency of his lordship's latter pro- 
 ductions; but it admits of a doubt whether his 
 serious and metaphysical performances are not infi- 
 nitely more dangerous. His meretricious stories may 
 create a laugh, or perhaps shock the feelings ; but the 
 others contain the seeds of false and vicious principles 
 which being imbibed by unsuspecting minds may take 
 root, and prove injurious through life. Both his 
 levities and his disquisitions are licentious ; and it is 
 painful to observe, that through them all there is, as 
 in the writings of Voltaire, an assiduous desire to 
 render those objects ridiculous, which have for ages 
 been regarded as sacred. It is melancholy to see the 
 fire of genuine poetry, applied to such baneful pur- 
 poses ; when it should only have been devoted to the 
 sublimest of all services, that of promoting the cause 
 of virtue and the welfare of mankind. 
 
 In spite of his misanthropy, the noble lord has a 
 strong propensity to humour ; but his love of joking 
 is not always governed by discretion, and too often 
 
CONCLUSION. 427 
 
 it betrays him into gross indelicacies, profane allu- 
 sions, and personal ribaldries ; offences which neither 
 wit can palliate nor provocation excuse. This pro- 
 pensity to sensuality and ridicule has increased with 
 the popularity of the author, who, in proportion to 
 the extension of his influence, seems to have studied 
 how the power of verse might be most effectually 
 applied in corrupting the heart. 
 
 Such a perversion of talent was never before wit- 
 nessed. in this country; for though one or two poets 
 have mixed up scepticism in their works, they have 
 done it in a disguised manner : and though others 
 have delighted in prurient description and virulent 
 satire, they have not ventured to justify crime or to 
 attack religion. That the author of Childe Harold 
 has committed these violations of the morality of 
 literature, no man can have the presumption to deny ; 
 and that his example and writings will be attended 
 with pernicious consequences to society cannot well 
 be doubted. 
 
 Poetry takes a faster hold of the memory than any 
 other species of composition ; and by fascinating the 
 
4&8 CONCLUSION. 
 
 imagination it imposes upon the understanding fal- 
 lacies which in a different form would be rejected. 
 
 When, therefore, a writer attains the high distinction 
 of being universally read, translated, and imitated, the 
 practical tendency of his performances becomes an 
 object of importance; and if his personal history be 
 necessary to the illustration of them, justice requires 
 that it should be laid perspicuously open for the 
 benefit of public morals and public taste, both of 
 which are likely to be affected by his example. 
 
 Whether the portraiture here exhibited is a correct 
 and spirited likeness must be left to the decision of 
 competent judges ; but this the Biographer can con- 
 scientiously aver that he has sedulously regarded the 
 laws of Truth,- and been more anxious to soften than 
 to exaggerate the failings and errors of one who will 
 occupy a proud station in the literary histoiy of the 
 nineteenth century. 
 
 THE EXD. 
 
 Howmtt and Primmm. Printers, lo, frith Street, Soho. 
 
THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE 
 STAMPED BELOW 
 
 AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS 
 
 WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN 
 THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY 
 WILL INCREASE TO 50 CENTS ON THE FOURTH 
 DAY AND TO $I.OO ON THE SEVENTH DAY 
 OVERDUE. 
 
 ^ 5 1933 
 
 MAR 27 193 4 
 D K 15 1934 
 
 MAR 1 4 ^35 ; 
 J M U 1947 
 
 LD 21-50m-l,'33 
 

 211228 
 
 ,■•*