Text 23 of 23
Letter to Murray, October 8, 1820, _Letters_, v. 1901, 89.
Byron, George Gordon Byron, Baron · about 198 minutes
Letter to Murray, October 8, 1820, Letters, v. 1901, 89.
"Sir Giles Overreach" says to "Lord Lovel," in A New Way to Pay Old Debts, act v. sc. 1, "Lord! thus I spit at thee, and at thy counsel." Compare, too--
"You call me misbeliever, cut-throat dog,
And spit upon my Jewish gaberdine."
_Merchant of Venice_, act i. sc. 3, lines 106, 107.]
[fd] {437}It is impending----.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[453] {438}["Is [Solon] cum interrogaretur, cur nullum supplicium constituisset in eum qui parentem necasset, respondit se id neminem facturum putasse."--Cicero, Pro Sext. Roscio Amerino, cap, 25.]
[454] ["Signory" is used loosely to denote the State or Government of Venice, not the "collegio" or "Signoria Serenissima."]
[455] [This statement is strictly historical. On the death of Andrea Dandolo (September 7, 1334) the Maggior Consiglio appointed a commission of five "savi" to correct and modify the "promissione," or ducal oath. The alterations which the commissioners suggested were designed to prevent the Doge from acting on his own initiative in matters of foreign policy.--La Congiura, pp. 30, 31.]
[456] {440}[Gelo is quoted as the type of a successful and beneficent tyrant held in honour by all posterity; Thrasybulus as a consistent advocate and successful champion of democracy.]
[457] [The lines from "I would have stood ... while living" are not in the MS.]
[fe] There were no other ways for truth to pierce them.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[ff] {441}The torture for the exposure of the truth.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[fg]
/ _Doge Faliero's consort_. \
Noble Venetians! < >--[MS. M. erased.] \ with respect the Duchess. /
[458] The Venetian senate took the same title as the Roman, of "conscript fathers." [It was not, however, the Senate, the Pregadi, but the Consiglio dei Dieci, supplemented by the Zonta of Twenty, which tried and condemned the Doge.]
[fh] {443}He hath already granted his own guilt.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[fi] He is a Sovereign and hath swayed the state.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[459] {445}[The accepted spelling is "aerie." The word is said to be derived from the Latin atrium. The form eyry, or eyrie, was introduced by Spelman (Gl. 1664) to countenance an erroneous derivation from the Saxon eghe, an egg. N. Eng. Dict., art. "aerie."]
[fj] Of his high aiery----.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[460] [Vide Suetonius, De XII. Cæsaribus, lib. iv. cap. 56, ed. 1691, p. 427. Angiolina might surely have omitted this particular instance of the avenging vigilance of "Great Nemesis."]
[461] {446}[The story is told in Plutarch's Alexander, cap. 38. Compare--
"And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And like another Helen, fired another Troy."
Dryden's _Alexanders Feast_, vi. lines 25-28.]
[462] [Byron's imagination was prone to dwell on the "earthworm's slimy brood." Compare Childe Harold, Canto II. stanzas v., vi. Dallas (Recollections of Lord Byron, 1824, p. 124) once ventured to remind his noble connection "that although our senses make us acquainted with the chemical decomposition of our bodies," there were other and more hopeful considerations to be entertained. But Byron was obdurate, "and the worms crept in and the worms crept out" as unpleasantly as heretofore.]
[fk] ----you call your duty.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[fl] {447} ----never heard of.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[fm] For this almost----.--[MS. M.]
[463] ["Hic est locus Marini Falethri, decapitati pro criminibus." Even more impressive is the significant omission of the minutes of the trial from the pages of the State Register. "The fourth volume of the Misti Consiglio X. contains its decrees in the year 1355. On Friday, the 17th April in that year, Marin Falier was beheaded. In the usual course, the minutes of the trial should have been entered on the thirty-third page of that volume; but in their stead we find a blank space, and the words '[=N] S[=C]BATUR:' 'Be it not written.'"--Calendar of State Papers ... in Venice, Preface by Rawdon Brown, 1864, i. xvii.]
[464] [Lines 500-507 were forwarded in a letter to Murray, dated Marzo, 1821 (Letters, 1901, v. 261). According to Moore's footnote, "These lines--perhaps from some difficulty in introducing them--were never inserted in the Tragedy." It is true that in some copies of the first edition of Marino Faliero (1821, p. 151) these lines do not appear; but in other copies of the first edition, in the second and other editions, they occur in their place. It is strange that Moore, writing in 1830, did not note the almost immediate insertion of these remarkable lines.]
[465] {448}[The Council of Ten decided that the possessions of Faliero should be confiscated; but the "Signoria," as an act of grace, and ob ducatûs reverentiam, allowed him to dispose of 2000 "lire dei grossi" of his own. The same day, April 17, the Doge dictated his will to the notary Piero de Compostelli, leaving the 2000 lire to his wife Aluica.--La Congiura, p. 105.]
[fn] {449}Of the house of Rizzando Caminese.--[MS. M.]
[fo] Have I aught else to undergo ere Death?--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[466] {450}[The story as related by Sanudo is of doubtful authenticity, vide ante, p. 332, note 1.]
[fp] {451}Until he rolled beneath----.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[fq] A madness of the heart shall rise within.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[467] [Compare--
"I pull in resolution."
_Macbeth_, act v. sc. 5, line 42.]
[468] {452}[See the translation of Sanudo's narrative in Appendix, p. 463.]
[fr]
----_whom I know_
_To be as worthless as the dust they trample_.--[MS. M. erased.]
[fs] {453}With unimpaired but not outrageous grief.--[Alternative reading, MS. M.]
[469] {454}[An anachronism, vide ante, p. 336.]
[ft] I am glad to be so----.--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[470] This was the actual reply of Bailli, maire of Paris, to a Frenchman who made him the same reproach on his way to execution, in the earliest part of their revolution. I find in reading over (since the completion of this tragedy), for the first time these six years, "Venice Preserved," a similar reply on a different occasion by Renault, and other coincidences arising from the subject. I need hardly remind the gentlest reader, that such coincidences must be accidental, from the very facility of their detection by reference to so popular a play on the stage and in the closet as Otway's chef-d'oeuvre.
["Still crueller was the fate of poor Bailly [Jean Sylvani, born September 17, 1736], First National President, First Mayor of Paris.... It is the 10th of November, 1793, a cold bitter drizzling rain, as poor Bailly is led through the streets.... Silent, unpitied, sits the innocent old man.... The Guillotine is taken down ... is carried to the riverside; is there set up again, with slow numbness; pulse after pulse still counting itself out in the old man's weary heart. For hours long; amid curses and bitter frost-rain! 'Bailly, thou tremblest,' said one. 'Mon ami, it is for cold,' said Bailly, 'C'est de froid.' Crueller end had no mortal."--Carlyle's French Revolution, 1839, iii. 264.]
[fu] {455}Who makest and destroyest suns!--[MS. M. Vide letter of February 2, 1821.]
[471] {456}[In his reply to the envoys of the Venetian Senate (April, 1797), Buonaparte threatened to "prove an Attila to Venice. If you cannot," he added, "disarm your population, I will do it in your stead--your government is antiquated--it must crumble to pieces."--Scott's Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, 1828, p. 230. Compare, too, Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza xc. lines 1, 2--
"The fool of false dominion--and a kind
Of bastard Cæsar," etc.]
[472] Should the dramatic picture seem harsh, let the reader look to the historical of the period prophesied, or rather of the few years preceding that period. Voltaire calculated their "nostre bene merite Meretrici" at 12,000 of regulars, without including volunteers and local militia, on what authority I know not; but it is, perhaps, the only part of the population not decreased. Venice once contained two hundred thousand inhabitants: there are now about ninety thousand; and THESE!! few individuals can conceive, and none could describe, the actual state into which the more than infernal tyranny of Austria has plunged this unhappy city. From the present decay and degeneracy of Venice under the Barbarians, there are some honourable individual exceptions. There is Pasqualigo, the last, and, alas! posthumous son of the marriage of the Doges with the Adriatic, who fought his frigate with far greater gallantry than any of his French coadjutors in the memorable action off Lissa. I came home in the squadron with the prizes in 1811, and recollect to have heard Sir William Hoste, and the other officers engaged in that glorious conflict, speak in the highest terms of Pasqualigo's behaviour. There is the Abbate Morelli. There is Alvise Querini, who, after a long and honourable diplomatic career, finds some consolation for the wrongs of his country, in the pursuits of literature with his nephew, Vittor Benzon, the son of the celebrated beauty, the heroine of "La Biondina in Gondoleta." There are the patrician poet Morosini, and the poet Lamberti, the author of the "Biondina," etc., and many other estimable productions; and, not least in an Englishman's estimation, Madame Michelli, the translator of Shakspeare. There are the young Dandolo and the improvvisatore Carrer, and Giuseppe Albrizzi, the accomplished son of an accomplished mother. There is Aglietti, and were there nothing else, there is the immortality of Canova. Cicognara, Mustoxithi, Bucati, etc., etc., I do not reckon, because the one is a Greek, and the others were born at least a hundred miles off, which, throughout Italy, constitutes, if not a foreigner, at least a stranger (forestiére).
[This note is not in the MS. The first eight lines were included among the notes, and the remainder formed part of the Appendix in all editions 1821-1831.
Nicolò Pasqualigo (1770-1821) received the command of a ship in the Austrian Navy in 1800, and in 1805 was appointed Director of the Arsenal of Venice. He took part in both the Lissa expeditions, and was made prisoner after a prolonged resistance, March 13, 1811. (See Personaggi illustri delta Veneta patrizia gente, by E. A. Cicogna, 1822, p. 33. See, too, for Lissa, Poetical Works, 1900, iii. 25, note 3.)
The Abate Jacopo Morelli (1745-1819), known as Principe dei Bibliotecarj, became custodian of the Marciana Library in 1778, and devoted the whole of his long and laborious life to the service of literature. (For a list of his works, etc., see Tipaldo's Biografia, etc., 1835, ii. 481. See, too, Elogio di Jacopo Morelli, by A. Zendrini, Milano, 1822.)
Alvisi Querini, brother to Marina Querini Benzon, published in 1759 a poem entitled L'Ammiraglio dell' Indie. He wrote under a pseudonym, Ormildo Emeressio.
Vittore Benzon (d. 1822), whose mother, Marina, was celebrated by Anton Maria Lamberti (1757-1832) as La biondina in gondoleta (Poesie, 1817, i. 20), was the author of Nella, a love-poem, abounding in political allusions. (See Tipaldo, v. 122, and Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi, I Suoi amici, by V. Malamani, 1882, pp. 119, 136.)
II Conte Domenico Morosini (see Letters, Venezia, 1829) was the author of two tragedies, Medea in Corinto and Giulio Sabino, published in 1806.
Giustina Renier Michiel (1755-1832) was niece to the last Doge, Lodovico Manin. Her salon was the centre of a brilliant circle of friends, including such names as Pindemonte, Foscolo, and Cesarotti. Her translation of Othello, Macbeth, and Coriolanus formed part of the Opere Drammatiche di Shakspeare, published in Venice in 1797. Her work, Origine delle Feste Veneziane, was published at Milan in 1829. (See G. R. Michiel, Archivio Veneto, tom. xxxviii. 1889.)
Luigi Carrer (1801-1856) began life as a lawyer, but afterwards devoted himself to poetry and literature. He was secretary of the Venetian Institute in 1842, and, later, Director of the Carrer Museum. (See Gio. Crespan, Della vita e delle lettere di Luigi Carrer, 1869.)
For Giuseppino Albrizzi (1800-1860), and for Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi, Countess Albrizzi (? 1761-1836), see Letters, 1900, iv. 14, note 1; and for Francesco Aglietti (1757-1836), Leopoldo Cicognara (1767-1835), and Andreas Moustoxudes (1787-1860), see Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 324, note 1.
The "younger Dandolo" may be Conte Girolamo Antonio Dandolo, author of Sui Quattro Cavalli, etc., published in 1817, and of La Caduta della Repubblica di Venezia, 1855. By "Bucati" may possibly be meant the satirist Pietro Buratti (1772-1832). (See Poesie Veneziane, by R. Barbiera, 1886, p. 209.)]
[fv] {457}
/ _lazars_ \
Beggars for nobles, < lepers > for a people!--[MS. M.] \ wretches /
[473] The chief palaces on the Brenta now belong to the Jews; who in the earlier times of the republic were only allowed to inhabit Mestri, and not to enter the city of Venice. The whole commerce is in the hands of the Jews and Greeks, and the Huns form the garrison.
[474] {458}[Napoleon was crowned King of Italy, May 3, 1805. Venice was ceded by Austria, December 26, 1805, and shortly after, Eugène Beauharnais was appointed Viceroy of Italy, with the title of Prince of Venice. It is certain that the "Vice-gerent" stands for Beauharnais, but it is less evident why Byron, doubtless quoting from Hamlet, calls Napoleon the "Vice of Kings." Did he mean a "player-king," one who not being a king acted the part, as the "vice" in the old moralities; or did he misunderstand Shakespeare, and seek to depreciate Beauharnais as the Viceroy of a Viceroy, that is Joseph Bonaparte?]
[fw] Vice without luxury----.--[Alternative reading, MS. M.]
[475] [Compare--
"When Vice walks forth with her unsoftened terrors."
_Ode on Venice_, line 34, _vide ante_, p. 194.]
[476] See Appendix, Note C.
[477] {459}If the Doge's prophecy seem remarkable, look to the following, made by Alamanni two hundred and seventy years ago;--"There is one very singular prophecy concerning Venice: 'If thou dost not change,' it says to that proud republic, 'thy liberty, which is already on the wing, will not reckon a century more than the thousandth year.' If we carry back the epocha of Venetian freedom to the establishment of the government under which the republic flourished, we shall find that the date of the election of the first Doge is 697: and if we add one century to a thousand, that is, eleven hundred years, we shall find the sense of the prediction to be literally this: 'Thy liberty will not last till 1797.' Recollect that Venice ceased to be free in the year 1796, the fifth year of the French republic; and you will perceive that there never was prediction more pointed, or more exactly followed by the event. You will, therefore, note as very remarkable the three lines of Alamanni addressed to Venice; which, however, no one has pointed out:--
"'Se non cangi pensier, l'un secol solo
Non conterà sopra 'l millesimo anno
Tua libertà, che va fuggendo a volo.'
_Sat_., xii. ed. 1531, p. 413.
Many prophecies have passed for such, and many men have been called prophets for much less."--P. L. Ginguené, Hist. Lit. d'Italie, ix. 144 [Paris Edition, 1819].
[478] Of the first fifty Doges, five abdicated--five were banished with their eyes put out--five were massacred--and nine deposed; so that nineteen out of fifty lost the throne by violence, besides two who fell in battle: this occurred long previous to the reign of Marino Faliero. One of his more immediate predecessors, Andrea Dandolo, died of vexation. Marino Faliero himself perished as related. Amongst his successors, Foscari, after seeing his son repeatedly tortured and banished, was deposed, and died of breaking a blood-vessel, on hearing the bell of Saint Mark's toll for the election of his successor. Morosini was impeached for the loss of Candia; but this was previous to his dukedom, during which he conquered the Morea, and was styled the Peloponnesian. Faliero might truly say,--
"Thou den of drunkards with the blood of princes!"
[fx] Thou brothel of the waters! thou sea Sodom!--[Alternative reading. MS. M.]
[479] [See letters to Webster, September 8, 1818, and to Hoppner, December 31, 1819, Letters, 1900, iv. 255, 393.]
[480] {461} "Un Capo de' Dieci" are the words of Sanuto's Chronicle.
[fy]
_The gory head is rolling down the steps!_
_The head is rolling dawn the gory steps!_--
[Alternative readings. MS. M.]
[481] [A picture in oils of the execution of Marino Faliero, by Ferdinand Victor Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863), which was exhibited in the Salon in 1827, is now in the Wallace Collection (Provisional Catalogue, 1900, p. 28).]
[482] [End of the Historical Tragedy of Marino Faliero, or the Doge of Venice.
Begun April 4th, 1820.
Completed July 16th, 1820.
Finished copying in August 16th, 17th, 1820.
The which copying takes ten times the toil of composing, considering the weather--thermometer 90 in the shade--and my domestic duties.
The motto is--
"Dux inquietæ turbidus Adriræ."
Horace.]
APPENDIX.
NOTE A.
I am obliged for the following excellent translation of the old Chronicle to Mr. F. Cohen,[483] to whom the reader will find himself indebted for a version that I could not myself--though after many years' intercourse with Italian--have given by any means so purely and so faithfully.
Story of Marino Faliero, Doge XLIV. mcccliv.[483a]
On the eleventh day of September, in the year of our Lord, 1354, Marino Faliero was elected and chosen to be the Duke of the Commonwealth of Venice. He was Count of Valdemarino, in the Marches of Treviso, and a Knight, and a wealthy man to boot. As soon as the election was completed, it was resolved in the Great Council, that a deputation of twelve should be despatched to Marino Faliero the Duke, who was then on his way from Rome; for when he was chosen, he was ambassador at the court of the Holy Father, at Rome,--the Holy Father himself held his court at Avignon. When Messer Marino Faliero the Duke was about to land in this city, on the 5th day of October, 1354, a thick haze came on and darkened the air: and he was enforced to land on the place of Saint Mark, between the two columns, on the spot where evil doers are put to death; and all thought that this was the worst of tokens.--Nor must I forget to write that which I have read in a chronicle.--When Messer Marino Faliero was Podesta and Captain of Treviso, the Bishop delayed coming in with the holy sacrament, on a day when a procession was to take place. Now, the said Marino Faliero was so very proud and wrathful, that he buffeted the Bishop, and almost struck him to the ground: and, therefore, Heaven allowed Marino Faliero to go out of his right senses, in order that he might bring himself to an evil death.
When this Duke had held the dukedom during nine months and six days, he, being wicked and ambitious, sought to make himself Lord of Venice, in the manner which I have read in an ancient chronicle. When the Thursday arrived upon which they were wont to hunt the bull, the bull hunt took place as usual; and, according to the usage of those times, after the bull hunt had ended, they all proceeded unto the palace of the Duke, and assembled together in one of his halls; and they disported themselves with the women. And until the first bell tolled they danced, and then a banquet was served up. My Lord the Duke paid the expenses thereof, provided he had a Duchess, and after the banquet they all returned to their homes.
Now to this feast there came a certain Ser Michele Steno, a gentleman of poor estate and very young, but crafty and daring, and who loved one of the damsels of the Duchess. Ser Michele stood amongst the women upon the solajo; and he behaved indiscreetly, so that my Lord the Duke ordered that he should be kicked off the solajo [i.e. platform]; and the esquires of the Duke flung him down from the solajo accordingly. Ser Michele thought that such an affront was beyond all bearing; and when the feast was over, and all other persons had left the palace, he, continuing heated with anger, went to the hall of audience, and wrote certain unseemly words relating to the Duke and the Duchess upon the chair in which the Duke was used to sit; for in those days the Duke did not cover his chair with cloth of sendal, but he sat in a chair of wood. Ser Michele wrote thereon--"Marin Falier, the husband of the fair wife; others kiss her, but he keeps her."[484] In the morning the words were seen, and the matter was considered to be very scandalous; and the Senate commanded the Avogadori of the Commonwealth to proceed therein with the greatest diligence. A largess of great amount was immediately proffered by the Avogadori, in order to discover who had written these words. And at length it was known that Michele Steno had written them. It was resolved in the Council of Forty that he should be arrested; and he then confessed that in the fit of vexation and spite, occasioned by his being thrust off the solajo in the presence of his mistress, he had written the words. Therefore the Council debated thereon. And the Council took his youth into consideration, and that he was a lover; and therefore they adjudged that he should be kept in close confinement during two months, and that afterwards he should be banished from Venice and the state during one year. In consequence of this merciful sentence the Duke became exceedingly wroth, it appearing to him, that the Council had not acted in such a manner as was required by the respect due to his ducal dignity; and he said that they ought to have condemned Ser Michele to be hanged by the neck, or at least to be banished for life.
Now it was fated that my Lord Duke Marino was to have his head cut off. And as it is necessary when any effect is to be brought about, that the cause of such effect must happen, it therefore came to pass, that on the very day after sentence had been pronounced on Ser Michele Steno, being the first day of Lent, a gentleman of the house of Barbara, a choleric gentleman, went to the arsenal, and required certain things of the masters of the galleys. This he did in the presence of the Admiral of the arsenal, and he, bearing the request, answered, No, it cannot be done. High words arose between the gentleman and the Admiral, and the gentleman struck him with his fist just above the eye; and as he happened to have a ring on his finger, the ring cut the Admiral and drew blood. The Admiral, all bruised and bloody, ran straight to the Duke to complain, and with the intent of praying him to inflict some heavy punishment upon the gentleman of Cà Barbaro.--"What wouldst thou have me do for thee?" answered the Duke: "think upon the shameful gibe which hath been written concerning me; and think on the manner in which they have punished that ribald Michele Steno, who wrote it; and see how the Council of Forty respect our person."--Upon this the Admiral answered, "My Lord Duke, if you would wish to make yourself a prince, and to cut all those cuckoldy gentlemen to pieces, I have the heart, if you do but help me, to make you prince of all this state; and then you may punish them all." Hearing this, the Duke said, "How can such a matter be brought about?"--and so they discoursed thereon.
The Duke called for his nephew, Ser Bertuccio Faliero, who lived with him in the palace, and they communed about this plot. And without leaving the place, they sent for Philip Calendaro, a seaman of great repute, and for Bertuccio Israello, who was exceedingly wily and cunning. Then taking counsel among themselves, they agreed to call in some others; and so, for several nights successively, they met with the Duke at home in his palace. And the following men were called in singly; to wit:--Niccolo Fagiuolo, Giovanni da Corfu, Stefano Fagiono, Niccolo dalle Bende, Niccolo Biondo, and Stefano Trivisano.--It was concerted that sixteen or seventeen leaders should be stationed in various parts of the city, each being at the head of forty men, armed and prepared; but the followers were not to know their destination. On the appointed day they were to make affrays amongst themselves here and there, in order that the Duke might have a pretence for tolling the bells of San Marco; these bells are never rung but by the order of the Duke. And at the sound of the bells, these sixteen or seventeen, with their followers, were to come to San Marco, through the streets which open upon the Piazza. And when the noble and leading citizens should come into the Piazza, to know the cause of the riot, then the conspirators were to cut them in pieces; and this work being finished, my Lord Marino Faliero the Duke was to be proclaimed the Lord of Venice. Things having been thus settled, they agreed to fulfil their intent on Wednesday, the 15th day of April, in the year 1355. So covertly did they plot, that no one ever dreamt of their machinations.
But the Lord, who hath always helped this most glorious city, and who, loving its righteousness and holiness, hath never forsaken it, inspired one Beltramo Bergamasco to be the cause of bringing the plot to light, in the following manner. This Beltramo, who belonged to Ser Niccolo Lioni of Santo Stefano, had heard a word or two of what was to take place; and so, in the above-mentioned month of April, he went to the house of the aforesaid Ser Niccolo Lioni, and told him all the particulars of the plot. Ser Niccolo, when he heard all these things, was struck dead, as it were, with affright. He heard all the particulars; and Beltramo prayed him to keep it all secret; and if he told Ser Niccolo, it was in order that Ser Niccolo might stop at home on the 15th of April, and thus save his life. Beltramo was going, but Ser Niccolo ordered his servants to lay hands upon him, and lock him up. Ser Niccolo then went to the house of Messer Giovanni Gradenigo Nasoni, who afterwards became Duke, and who also lived at Santo Stefano, and told him all. The matter seemed to him to be of the very greatest importance, as indeed it was; and they two went to the house of Ser Marco Cornaro, who lived at San Felice; and, having spoken with him, they all three then determined to go back to the house of Ser Niccolo Lioni, to examine the said Beltramo; and having questioned him, and heard all that he had to say, they left him in confinement. And then they all three went into the sacristy of San Salvatore, and sent their men to summon the Councillors, the Avogadori, the Capi de' Dieci, and those of the Great Council.
When all were assembled, the whole story was told to them. They were struck dead, as it were, with affright. They determined to send for Beltramo. He was brought in before them. They examined him, and ascertained that the matter was true; and, although they were exceedingly troubled, yet they determined upon their measures. And they sent for the Capi de' Quarante, the Signori di Notte, the Capi de' Sestieri, and the Cinque della Pace; and they were ordered to associate to their men other good men and true, who were to proceed to the houses of the ringleaders of the conspiracy, and secure them. And they secured the foreman of the arsenal, in order that the conspirators might not do mischief. Towards nightfall they assembled in the palace. When they were assembled in the palace, they caused the gates of the quadrangle of the palace to be shut. And they sent to the keeper of the Bell-tower, and forbade the tolling of the bells. All this was carried into effect. The before-mentioned conspirators were secured, and they were brought to the palace; and, as the Council of Ten saw that the Duke was in the plot, they resolved that twenty of the leading men of the state should be associated to them, for the purpose of consultation and deliberation, but that they should not be allowed to ballot.
The counsellors were the following:--Ser Giovanni Mocenigo, of the Sestiero of San Marco; Ser Almoro Veniero da Santa Marina, of the Sestiero of Castello; Ser Tomaso Viadro, of the Sestiero of Canaregio; Ser Giovanni Sanudo, of the Sestiero of Santa Croce; Ser Pietro Trivisano, of the Sestiero of San Paolo; Ser Pantalione Barbo il Grando, of the Sestiero of Ossoduro. The Avogadori of the Commonwealth were Zufredo Morosini, and Ser Orio Pasqualigo; and these did not ballot. Those of the Council of Ten were Ser Giovanni Marcello, Ser Tomaso Sanudo, and Ser Micheletto Dolfino, the heads of the aforesaid Council of Ten. Ser Luca da Legge, and Ser Pietro da Mosto, inquisitors of the aforesaid Council. And Ser Marco Polani, Ser Marino Veniero, Ser Lando Lombardo, and Ser Nicoletto Trivisano, of Sant' Angelo.
Late in the night, just before the dawning, they chose a junta of twenty noblemen of Venice from amongst the wisest, and the worthiest, and the oldest. They were to give counsel, but not to ballot. And they would not admit any one of Cà Faliero. And Niccolo Faliero, and another Niccolo Faliero, of San Tomaso, were expelled from the Council, because they belonged to the family of the Doge. And this resolution of creating the junta of twenty was much praised throughout the state. The following were the members of the junta of twenty:--Ser Marco Giustiniani, Procuratore, Ser Andrea Erizzo, Procuratore, Ser Lionardo Giustiniani, Procuratore, Ser Andrea Contarini, Ser Simone Dandolo, Ser Niccolo Volpe, Ser Giovanni Loredano, Ser Marco Diedo, Ser Giovanni Gradenigo, Ser Andrea Cornaro Cavaliere, Ser Marco Soranzo, Ser Rinieri du Mosto, Ser Gazano Marcello, Ser Marino Morosini, Ser Stefano Belegno, Ser Niccolo Lioni, Ser Filippo Orio, Ser Marco Trivisano, Ser Jacopo Bragadino, Ser Giovanni Foscarini.
These twenty were accordingly called in to the Council of Ten; and they sent for my Lord Marino Faliero, the Duke: and my Lord Marino was then consorting in the palace with people of great estate, gentlemen, and other good men, none of whom knew yet how the fact stood.
At the same time Bertuccio Israello, who, as one of the ringleaders, was to head the conspirators in Santa Croce, was arrested and bound, and brought before the Council. Zanello del Brin, Nicoletto di Rosa, Nicoletto Alberto, and the Guardiaga, were also taken, together with several seamen, and people of various ranks. These were examined, and the truth of the plot was ascertained.
On the 16th of April judgment was given in the Council of Ten, that Filippo Calendaro and Bertuccio Israello should be hanged upon the red pillars of the balcony of the palace, from which the Duke is wont to look at the bull hunt: and they were hanged with gags in their mouths.
The next day the following were condemned:--Niccolo Zuccuolo, Nicoletto Blondo, Nicoletto Doro, Marco Giuda, Jacomello Dagolino, Nicoletto Fidele, the son of Filippo Calendaro, Marco Torello, called Israello, Stefano Trivisano, the money-changer of Santa Margherita, and Antonio dalle Bende. These were all taken at Chiozza, for they were endeavouring to escape. Afterwards, by virtue of the sentence which was passed upon them in the Council of Ten, they were hanged on successive days; some singly and some in couples, upon the columns of the palace, beginning from the red columns, and so going onwards towards the canal. And other prisoners were discharged, because, although they had been involved in the conspiracy, yet they had not assisted in it; for they were given to understand by some of the heads of the plot, that they were to come armed and prepared for the service of the state, and in order to secure certain criminals; and they knew nothing else. Nicoletto Alberto, the Guardiaga, and Bartolommeo Ciricolo and his son, and several others, who were not guilty, were discharged.
On Friday, the 16th day of April, judgment was also given in the aforesaid Council of Ten, that my Lord Marino Faliero, the Duke, should have his head cut off; and that the execution should be done on the landing-place of the stone staircase, where the Dukes take their oath when they first enter the palace. On the following day, the 17th of April, the doors of the palace being shut, the Duke had his head cut off, about the hour of noon. And the cap of estate was taken from the Duke's head before he came down stairs. When the execution was over, it is said that one of the Council of Ten went to the columns of the palace over against the place of St. Mark, and that he showed the bloody sword unto the people, crying out with a loud voice--"The terrible doom hath fallen upon the traitor!"--and the doors were opened, and the people all rushed in, to see the corpse of the Duke, who had been beheaded.
It must be known that Ser Giovanni Sanudo, the councillor, was not present when the aforesaid sentence was pronounced; because he was unwell and remained at home. So that only fourteen balloted; that is to say, five councillors, and nine of the Council of Ten. And it was adjudged, that all the lands and chattels of the Duke, as well as of the other traitors, should be forfeited to the state. And as a grace to the Duke, it was resolved in the Council of Ten, that he should be allowed to dispose of two thousand ducats out of his own property. And it was resolved, that all the councillors and all the Avogadori of the Commonwealth, those of the Council of Ten, and the members of the junta, who had assisted in passing sentence on the Duke and the other traitors, should have the privilege of carrying arms both by day and by night in Venice, and from Grado to Cavazere. And they were also to be allowed two footmen carrying arms, the aforesaid footmen living and boarding with them in their own houses. And he who did not keep two footmen might transfer the privilege to his sons or his brothers; but only to two. Permission of carrying arms was also granted to the four Notaries of the Chancery, that is to say, of the Supreme Court, who took the depositions; and they were, Amedio, Nicoletto di Lorino, Steffanello, and Pietro de Compostelli, the secretaries of the Signori di Notte.
After the traitors had been hanged, and the Duke had had his head cut off, the state remained in great tranquillity and peace. And, as I have read in a Chronicle, the corpse of the Duke was removed in a barge, with eight torches, to his tomb in the church of San Giovanni e Paolo, where it was buried. The tomb is now in that aisle in the middle of the little church of Santa Maria della Pace which was built by Bishop Gabriel of Bergamo. It is a coffin of stone, with these words engraven thereon: "Heic jacet Dominus Marinus Faletro Dux."--And they did not paint his portrait in the hall of the Great Council:--but in the place where it ought to have been, you see these words:--"Hic est locus Marini Faletro, decapitati pro criminibus."--And it is thought that his house was granted to the church of Sant' Apostolo; it was that great one near the bridge. Yet this could not be the case, or else the family bought it back from the church; for it still belongs to Cà Faliero. I must not refrain from noting, that some wished to write the following words in the place where his portrait ought to have been, as aforesaid:--"Marinus Faletro Dux, temeritas me cepit. Pænas lui, decapitatus pro criminibus."--Others, also, indited a couplet, worthy of being inscribed upon his tomb.
"_Dux Venetum jacet heic, patriam qui prodere tentans,_
_Sceptra, decus, censum perdidit, atque caput._"
NOTE B.
Petrarch on the Conspiracy of Marino Faliero.[485]
"Al giovane doge Andrea Dandolo succedette un vecchio, il quale tardi si pose al timone della repubblica, ma sempre prima di quel, che facea d' uopo a lui ed alia patria: egli è Marino Faliero, personaggio a me noto per antica dimestichezza. Falsa era l' opinione intorno a lui, giacchè egli si mostrò fornito più di coraggio, che di senno. Non pago della prima dignità, entrò con sinistro piede nel pubblico Palazzo: imperciocchè questo doge dei Veneti, magistrato sacro in tutti i secoli, che dagli antichi fu sempre venerato qual nume in quella città, l' altr'jeri fu decollato nel vestibolo dell' istesso Palazzo. Discorrerei fin dal principio le cause di un tale evento, se cosi vario, ed ambiguo non ne fosse il grido: nessuno però lo scusa, tutti affermano, che egli abbia voluto cangiar qualche cosa nell' ordine della repubblica a lui tramandato dai maggiori. Che desiderava egli di più? Io son d' avviso, che egli abbia ottenuto ciò, che non si concedette a nessun altro: mentre adempiva gli uffici di legato presso il Pontefice, e sulle rive del Rodano trattava la pace, che io prima di lui avevo indarno tentato di conchiudere, gli fu conferito l' onore del ducato, che nè chiedeva, nè s' aspettava. Tornato in patria, pensò a quello, cui nessuno non pose mente giammai, e soffrì quello, che a niuno accadde mai di soffrire: giacchè in quel luogo celeberrimo, e chiarissimo, e bellissimo infra tutti quelli, che io vidi, ove i suoi antenati avevano ricevuti grandissimi onori in mezzo alle pompe trionfali, ivi egli fu trascinato in modo servile, e spogliato delle insegne ducali, perdette la testa, e macchiò col proprio sangue le soglie del tempio, l' atrio del Palazzo, e le scale marmoree endute spesse volte illustri o dalle solenni festività, o dalle ostili spoglie. Ho notato il luogo, ora noto il tempo: è l' anno del Natale di Cristo, 1355, fu il giorno diciotto aprile si alto è il grido sparso, che se alcuno esaminerà la disciplina, e le costumanze di quella città, e quanto mutamento di cose venga minacciato dalla morte di un solo uomo (quantunque molti altri, come narrano, essendo complici, o subirono l' istesso supplicio, o lo aspettano) si accorgerà, che nulla di più grande avvenne ai nostri tempi nella Italia. Tu forse qui attendi il mio giudizio: assolvo il popolo, se credere si dee alia fama, benchè abbia potuto e castigate più mitemente, e con maggior dolcezza vendicare il suo dolore: ma non cosi facilmente, si modera un' ira giusta insieme, e grande in un numeroso popolo principalmente, nel quale il precipitoso, ed instabile volgo aguzza gli stimoli dell' iracondia con rapidi, e sconsigliati clamori. Compatisco, e nell' istesso tempo mi adiro con quell' infelice uomo, il quale adorno di un' insolito onore, non so, che cosa si volesse negli estremi anni della sua vita: la calamità di lui diviene sempre più grave, perchè dalla sentenza contra di esso promulgata apparirà, che egli fu non solo misero, ma insano, e demente, e che con vane arti si usurpò per tanti anni una falsa fama di sapienza. Ammonisco i dogi, i quali gli succederanno, che questo e un' esempio posto innanzi ai loro occhi, quale specchio, nel quale veggano d' essere non signori, ma duci, anzi nemmeno duci, ma onorati servi della Repubblica. Tu sta sano; e giacchè fluttuano le pubbliche cose, sforziamoci di governar modestissimamente i privati nostri affari."--Viaggi di Francesco Petrarca, descritti dal Professore Ambrogio Levati, Milano, 1820, iv. 323-325.
The above Italian translation from the Latin epistles of Petrarch proves--1stly, That Marino Faliero was a personal friend of Petrarch's; "antica dimestichezza," old intimacy, is the phrase of the poet. 2dly, That Petrarch thought that he had more courage than conduct, "più di coraggio che di senno." 3dly, That there was some jealousy on the part of Petrarch; for he says that Marino Faliero was treating of the peace which he himself had "vainly attempted to conclude." 4thly, That the honour of the Dukedom was conferred upon him, which he neither sought nor expected, "che nè chiedeva, nè aspettava," and which had never been granted to any other in like circumstances, "ciò che non si concedette a nessun altro," a proof of the high esteem in which he must have been held. 5thly, That he had a reputation for wisdom, only forfeited by the last enterprise of his life, "si usurpò per tanti anni una falsa fama di sapienza."--"He had usurped for so many years a false fame of wisdom," rather a difficult task, I should think. People are generally found out before eighty years of age, at least in a republic.--From these, and the other historical notes which I have collected, it may be inferred, that Marino Faliero possessed many of the qualities, but not the success of a hero; and that his passions were too violent. The paltry and ignorant account of Dr. Moore falls to the ground. Petrarch says, "that there had been no greater event in his times" (our times literally), "nostri tempi," in Italy. He also differs from the historian in saying that Faliero was "on the banks of the Rhone," instead of at Rome, when elected; the other accounts say, that the deputation of the Venetian senate met him at Ravenna. How this may have been, it is not for me to decide, and is of no great importance. Had the man succeeded, he would have changed the face of Venice, and perhaps of Italy. As it is, what are they both?
NOTE C.
Venetian Society and Manners.
"Vice without splendour, sin without relief
Even from the gloss of love to smooth it o'er;
But in its stead, coarse lusts of habitude," etc.
"To these attacks so frequently pointed by the government against the clergy,--to the continual struggles between the different constituted bodies,--to these enterprises carried on by the mass of the nobles against the depositaries of power,--to all those projects of innovation, which always ended by a stroke of state policy; we must add a cause not less fitted to spread contempt for ancient doctrines; this was the excess of corruption.
"That freedom of manners, which had been long boasted of as the principal charm of Venetian society, had degenerated into scandalous licentiousness: the tie of marriage was less sacred in that Catholic country, than among those nations where the laws and religion admit of its being dissolved. Because they could not break the contract, they feigned that it had not existed; and the ground of nullity, immodestly alleged by the married pair, was admitted with equal facility by priests and magistrates, alike corrupt. These divorces, veiled under another name, became so frequent, that the most important act of civil society was discovered to be amenable to a tribunal of exceptions; and to restrain the open scandal of such proceedings became the office of the police. In 1782 the Council of Ten decreed, that every woman who should sue for a dissolution of her marriage should be compelled to await the decision of the judges in some convent, to be named by the court.[486] Soon afterwards the same council summoned all causes of that nature before itself.[487] This infringement on ecclesiastical jurisdiction having occasioned some remonstrance from Rome, the council retained only the right of rejecting the petition of the married persons, and consented to refer such causes to the holy office as it should not previously have rejected.[488]
"There was a moment in which, doubtless, the destruction of private fortunes, the ruin of youth, the domestic discord occasioned by these abuses, determined the government to depart from its established maxims concerning the freedom of manners allowed the subject. All the courtesans were banished from Venice; but their absence was not enough to reclaim and bring back good morals to a whole people brought up in the most scandalous licentiousness. Depravity reached the very bosoms of private families, and even into the cloister; and they found themselves obliged to recall, and even to indemnify,[489] women who sometimes gained possession of important secrets, and who might be usefully employed in the ruin of men whose fortunes might have rendered them dangerous. Since that time licentiousness has gone on increasing; and we have seen mothers, not only selling the innocence of their daughters, but selling it by a contract, authenticated by the signature of a public officer, and the performance of which was secured by the protection of the laws.[490]
"The parlours of the convents of noble ladies, and the houses of the courtesans, though the police carefully kept up a number of spies about them, were the only assemblies for society in Venice; and in these two places, so different from each other, there was equal freedom. Music, collations, gallantry, were not more forbidden in the parlours than at the casinos. There were a number of casinos for the purpose of public assemblies, where gaming was the principal pursuit of the company. It was a strange sight to see persons of either sex masked, or grave in their magisterial robes, round a table, invoking chance, and giving way at one instant to the agonies of despair, at the next to the illusions of hope, and that without uttering a single word.
"The rich had private casinos, but they lived incognito in them; and the wives whom they abandoned found compensation in the liberty they enjoyed. The corruption of morals had deprived them of their empire. We have just reviewed the whole history of Venice, and we have not once seen them exercise the slightest influence."--Daru, Hist. de la Répub. de Vénise, Paris, 1821, v. 328-332.
* * * * *
The author of "Sketches Descriptive of Italy," (1820), etc., one of the hundred tours lately published, is extremely anxious to disclaim a possible plagiarism from Childe Harold and Beppo. See p. 159, vol. iv. He adds that still less could this presumed coincidence arise from "my conversation," as he had "repeatedly declined an introduction to me while in Italy."
Who this person may be I know not;[491] but he must have been deceived by all or any of those who "repeatedly offered to introduce" him, as I invariably refused to receive any English with whom I was not previously acquainted, even when they had letters from England. If the whole assertion is not an invention, I request this person not to sit down with the notion that he could have been introduced, since there has been nothing I have so carefully avoided as any kind of intercourse with his countrymen,--excepting the very few who were for a considerable time resident in Venice, or had been of my previous acquaintance. Whoever made him any such offer was possessed of impudence equal to that of making such an assertion without having had it. The fact is, that I hold in utter abhorrence any contact with the travelling English, as my friend the Consul General Hoppner and the Countess Benzoni (in whose house the Conversazione mostly frequented by them is held), could amply testify, were it worth while. I was persecuted by these tourists even to my riding ground at Lido, and reduced to the most disagreeable circuits to avoid them. At Madame Benzoni's I repeatedly refused to be introduced to them;--of a thousand such presentations pressed upon me, I accepted two, and both were to Irish women.
* * * * *
I should hardly have descended to speak of such trifles publicly, if the impudence of this "sketcher" had not forced me to a refutation of a disingenuous and gratuitously impertinent assertion; so meant to be, for what could it import to the reader to be told that the author "had repeatedly declined an introduction," even if it had been true, which, for the reasons I have above given, is scarcely possible. Except Lords Lansdowne, Jersey, and Lauderdale, Messrs. Scott, Hammond, Sir Humphry Davy, the late M. Lewis, W. Bankes, Mr. Hoppner, Thomas Moore, Lord Kinnaird, his brother, Mr. Joy, and Mr. Hobhouse, I do not recollect to have exchanged a word with another Englishman since I left their Country; and almost all these I had known before. The others,--and God knows there were some hundreds, who bored me with letters or visits, I refused to have any communication with, and shall be proud and happy when that wish becomes mutual.
FOOTNOTES:
[483] {462}Mr. Francis Cohen, afterwards Sir Francis Palgrave (1788-1861), the author of the Rise and Progress of the English Constitution, History of the Anglo-Saxons, etc., etc.
[483a][In the earlier editions (1821-1825) Francis Cohen's translation (Appendix II.) is preceded by an Italian version (Appendix I.), taken directly from Muratori's edition of Marin Sanudo's Vite dei Dogi (Rerum Italicarum Scriptores, 1733, xii. 628-635). The two versions are by no means identical. Cohen's "translation" is, presumably an accurate rendering of Sanudo's text, and must have been made either from the original MS. or from a transcript sent from Italy to England. Muratori's Italian is a rifacimento of the original, which has been altered and condensed with a view to convenience or literary effect. Proper names of persons and places are changed, Sanudo's Venetian dialect gives place to Muratori's Italian, and notes which Sanudo added in the way of illustration and explanation are incorporated in the text. In the Life of Marino Faliero, pp. 199, 200 of the original text are omitted, and a passage from an old chronicle, which Sanudo gives as a note, is made to appear part of the original narrative. (See Preface to Le Vite dei Dogi di Marin Sanudo, by G. Monticolo, 1900; Marino Faliero, La Congiura, by V. Lazzarino; Nuovo Archivio Veneto, 1897, vol. xiii. pt. i. p. 15, note 1.)]
[484] {463}["Marin Faliero dalla bella moglie: altri la gode, ed egli la mantien." According to Andrea Navagero (It. Rer. Script., xxiii. 1038), the writing on the chair ran thus: "Becco Marino Falier dalla bella mogier" (vide ante, p. 349). Palgrave has bowdlerized Steno's lampoon.]
[485] {468}["Had a copy taken of an extract from Petrarch's Letters, with reference to the conspiracy of the Doge Marino Faliero, containing the poet's opinion of the matter."--Diary, February 11, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 201.]
[486] {470}Correspondence of M. Schlick, French chargé d'affaires. Despatch of 24th August, 1782.
[487] Ibid. Despatch, 31st August.
[488] Ibid. Despatch of 3d September, 1785.
[489] The decree for their recall designates them as nostre benemerite meretrici: a fund and some houses, called Case rampane, were assigned to them; hence the opprobrious appellation of Carampane. [The writer of the Preface to Leggi e memorie Venete sulla Prostituzione, which was issued from Lord Orford's private press in 1870, maintains that the designation is mythical. "Tale asserzione che non ha verum fondamento, salvo che nella imaginazione di chi primo la scrisse lo storico francese Daru non si fece scrupolo di ripetuta ciecamente. Fu altresi ripetuta da Lord Byron e da altri," etc. The volume, a sumptuous folio, prints a series of rescripts promulgated by the Venetian government against meretrici and other disagreeable persons.]
[490] Meyer, Description of Venice, vol. ii.; and M. de Archenholtz, Picture of Italy, vol. i. sect. 2, pp. 65, 66. [Voyage en Italie, par F. J. L. Meyer, An X. cap. iii.]
[491] {471}[In a letter to Murray, September 11, 1820 (Letters, 1901, v. 75, 84), Byron writes, "Last post I sent you a note fierce as Faliero himself, in answer to a trashy tourist, who pretends that he could have been introduced to me;" but at the end of the month, September 29, 1820, he withdraws his animadversions: "I open my letter to say, that on reading more of the 4 volumes on Italy [Sketches descriptive of Italy in the Years 1816, 1817, etc., by Miss Jane Waldie] ... I perceive (horresco referens) that it is written by a WOMAN!!! In that case you must suppress my note and answer.... I can only say that I am sorry that a Lady should say anything of the kind. What I would have said to one of the other sex you know already." Nevertheless, the note was appended to the first edition, which appeared April 21, 1821.]
THE VISION OF JUDGMENT.
BY
QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS.
SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO ENTITLED BY THE AUTHOR
OF "WAT TYLER."
"A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel!
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word."
[_Merchant of Venice_, act iv. sc. 1, lines 218, 336.]
INTRODUCTION TO _THE VISION OF JUDGMENT_.
Byron's Vision of Judgment is a parody of Southey's Vision of Judgement.
The acts or fyttes of the quarrel between Byron and Southey occur in the following order. In the summer of 1817 Southey, accompanied by his friends, Humphrey Senhouse and the artist Edward Nash, passed some weeks (July) in Switzerland. They visited Chamouni, and at Montanvert, in the travellers' album, they found, in Shelley's handwriting, a Greek hexameter verse, in which he affirmed that he was an "atheist," together with an indignant comment ("fool!" also in Greek) superadded in an unknown hand (see Life of Shelley, by E. Dowden, 1886, ii. 30, note). Southey copied this entry into his note-book, and "spoke of the circumstance on his return" (circ. August 12, 1817). In the course of the next year some one told Byron that a rumour had reached England that he and Shelley "had formed a league of incest with two sisters," and that Southey and Coleridge were the authors of the scandal. There is nothing to show through what channel the report of the rumour reached Byron's ears, but it may be inferred that it was in his mind (see Letter to Murray, November 24, 1818, Letters, 1900, iv. 272) when he assailed Southey in the "Dedication" ("in good, simple, savage verse") to the First Canto of Don Juan, which was begun September 6, 1818. Shelley, who was already embittered against Southey (see the account of a dinner at Godwin's, November 6, 1817, Diary of H. C. Robinson, 1869, ii. 67), heard Byron read this "Dedication," and, in a letter to Peacock (October 8, 1818), describes it as being "more like a mixture of wormwood and verdigrease than satire."
When Don Juan appeared (July 15, 1819), the "Dedication" was not forthcoming, but of its existence and character Southey had been informed. "Have you heard," he asks (Letter to the Rev. H. Hill, Selections from the Letters, etc., 1856, iii. 142), "that Don Juan came over with a Dedication to me, in which Lord Castlereagh and I ... were coupled together for abuse as the 'two Roberts'? A fear of persecution (sic) from the one Robert is supposed to be the reason why it has been suppressed. Lord Byron might have done well to remember that the other can write dedications also; and make his own cause good, if it were needful, in prose or rhyme, against a villain, as well as against a slanderer."
When George III. died (January 29, 1820), it became the duty of the "laurel-honouring laureate" to write a funeral ode, and in composing a Preface, in vindication of the English hexameter, he took occasion "incidentally to repay some of his obligations to Lord Byron by a few comments on Don Juan" (Letter to the Rev. H. Hill, January 8, 1821, Selections, etc., iii. 225). He was, no doubt, impelled by other and higher motives to constitute himself a censor morum, and take up his parable against the spirit of the age as displayed and fostered in Don Juan (see a letter to Wynne, March 23, 1821, Selections, etc., iii. 238), but the suppressed "Dedication" and certain gibes, which had been suffered to appear, may be reckoned as the immediate causes of his anathema.
Southey's Vision of Judgement was published April 11, 1821--an undivine comedy, in which the apotheosis of George III., the beatification of the virtuous, and the bale and damnation of such egregious spirits as Robespierre, Wilkes, and Junius, are "thrown upon the screen" of the showman or lecturer. Southey said that the "Vision" ought to be read aloud, and, if the subject could be forgotten and ignored, the hexameters might not sound amiss, but the subject and its treatment are impossible and intolerable. The "Vision" would have "made sport" for Byron in any case, but, in the Preface, Southey went out of his way to attack and denounce the anonymous author of Don Juan.
"What, then," he asks (ed. 1838, x. 204), "should be said of those for whom the thoughtlessness and inebriety of wanton youth can no longer be pleaded, but who have written in sober manhood, and with deliberate purpose?... Men of diseased hearts and depraved imaginations, who, forming a system of opinions to suit their own unhappy course of conduct, have rebelled against the holiest ordinances of human society, and hating that revealed religion which, with all their efforts and bravadoes, they are unable entirely to disbelieve, labour to make others as miserable as themselves, by infecting them with a moral virus that eats into the soul! The school which they have set up may properly be called the Satanic school; for, though their productions breathe the spirit of Belial in their lascivious parts, and the spirit of Moloch in those loathsome images of atrocities and horrors which they delight to represent, they are more especially characterized by a Satanic pride and audacious impiety, which still betrays the wretched feeling of hopelessness wherewith it is allied."
Byron was not slow to take up the challenge. In the "Appendix" to the Two Foscari (first ed., pp. 325-329), which was written at Ravenna, June-July, but not published till December 11, 1821, he retaliates on "Mr. Southey and his 'pious preface'" in many words; but when it comes to the point, ignores the charge of having "published a lascivious book," and endeavours by counter-charges to divert the odium and to cover his adversary with shame and confusion. "Mr. S.," he says, "with a cowardly ferocity, exults over the anticipated 'death-bed repentance' of the objects of his dislike; and indulges himself in a pleasant 'Vision of Judgment,' in prose as well as verse, full of impious impudence.... I am not ignorant," he adds, "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.... 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 works sitting down to deal damnation and destruction upon his fellow-creatures, with Wat Tyler, the Apotheosis of George the Third, and the Elegy on Martin the regicide, all shuffled together in his writing-desk."
Southey must have received his copy of the Two Foscari in the last week of December, 1821, and with the "Appendix" (to say nothing of the Third Canto of Don Juan) before him, he gave tongue, in the pages of the Courier, January 6, 1822. His task was an easy one. He was able to deny, in toto, the charge of uttering calumnies on his return from Switzerland, and he was pleased to word his denial in a very disagreeable way. He had come home with a stock of travellers' tales, but not one of them was about Lord Byron. He had "sought for no staler subject than St. Ursula." His charges of "impiety," "lewdness," "profanation," and "pollution," had not been answered, and were unanswerable; and as to his being a "scribbler of all work," there were exceptions--works which he had not scribbled, the nefanda which disfigured the writings of Lord Byron. "Satanic school" would stick.
So far, the battle went in Southey's favour. "The words of the men of Judah were fiercer than the words of the men of Israel," and Byron was reduced to silence. A challenge (sent through Kinnaird, but not delivered) was but a confession of impotence. There was, however, in Southey's letter to the Courier just one sentence too many. Before he concluded he had given "one word of advice to Lord Byron"--"When he attacks me again, let it be in rhyme. For one who has so little command of himself, it will be a great advantage that his temper should be obliged to keep tune."
Byron had anticipated this advice, and had already attacked the laureate in rhyme, scornfully and satirically, but with a gay and genial mockery which dispensed with "wormwood and verdigrease" or yet bitterer and more venomous ingredients.
There was a truth in Lamb's jest, that it was Southey's Vision of Judgement which was worthy of prosecution; that "Lord Byron's poem was of a most good-natured description--no malevolence" (Diary of H. C. Robinson, 1869, ii. 240). Good-natured or otherwise, it awoke inextinguishable laughter, and left Byron in possession of the field.
The Vision of Judgment, begun May 7 (but probably laid aside till September 11), was forwarded to Murray October 4, 1821. "By this post," he wrote to Moore, October 6, 1821 (Letters, 1901, v. 387), "I have sent my nightmare to balance the incubus of Southey's impudent anticipation of the Apotheosis of George the Third." A chance perusal of Southey's letter in the Courier (see Medwin's Conversations, 1824, p. 222, and letters to Douglas Kinnaird, February 6, 25, 1822) quickened his desire for publication; but in spite of many appeals and suggestions to Murray, who had sent Byron's "copy" to his printer, the decisive step of passing the proofs for press was never taken. At length Byron lost patience, and desired Murray to hand over "the corrected copy of the proof with the Preface" of the Vision of Judgment to John Hunt (see letters to Murray, July 3, 6, 1822, Letters, 1901, vi. 92, 93). Finally, a year after the MS. had been sent to England, the Vision of Judgment, by Quevedo Redivivus, appeared in the first number (pp. 1-39) of the Liberal, which was issued October 15, 1822. The Preface, to Byron's astonishment and annoyance, was not forthcoming (see letter to Murray, October 22, 1822, Letters, 1901, vi. 126, and Examiner, Sunday, November 3, 1822, p. 697), and is not prefixed to the first issue of the Vision of Judgment in the first number of the Liberal.
The Liberal was severely handled by the press (see, for example, the Literary Gazette for October 19, 26, November 2, 1822; see, too, an anonymous pamphlet entitled A Critique on the "Liberal" (London, 1822, 8vo, 16 pages), which devotes ten pages to an attack on the Vision of Judgment). The daily press was even more violent. The Courier for October 26 begins thus: "This scoundrel-like publication has at length made its appearance."
There was even a threat of prosecution. Byron offered to employ counsel for Hunt, to come over to England to stand his trial in his stead, and blamed Murray for not having handed over the corrected proof, in which some of the more offensive passages had been omitted or mitigated (see letter to Murray, December 25, 1822, and letter to John Hunt, January 8, 1823, Letters, 1901, vi. 155, 159). It is to be noted that in the list of Errata affixed to the table of Contents at the end of the first volume of the Liberal, the words, a "weaker king ne'er," are substituted for "a worse king never" (stanza viii. line 6), and "an unhandsome woman" for "a bad, ugly woman" (stanza xii. line 8). It would seem that these emendations, which do not appear in the MS., were slipped into the Errata as precautions, not as after-thoughts.
Nevertheless, it was held that a publication "calumniating the late king, and wounding the feelings of his present Majesty," was a danger to the public peace, and on January 15, 1824, the case of the King v. John Hunt was tried in the Court of King's Bench. The jury brought in a verdict of "Guilty," but judgment was deferred, and it was not till July 19, 1824, three days after the author of the Vision of Judgment had been laid to rest at Hucknall Torkard, that the publisher was sentenced to pay to the king a fine of one hundred pounds, and to enter into securities, for five years, for a larger amount.
For the complete text of section iii. of Southey's Preface, Byron's "Appendix" to the Two Foscari, etc., see Essays Moral and Political, by Robert Southey, 1832, ii. 183, 205. See, too, for "Quarrel between Byron and Southey," Appendix I. of vol. vi. of Letters of Lord Byron, 1901.
* * * * *
NOTE.
The following excerpt from H. C. Robinson's Diary is printed from the original MS., with the kind permission of the trustees of Dr. Williams' Theological Library (see "Diary," 1869, ii. 437):--
"[Weimar], August 15, [1829].
"W[ordsworth] will not put the nose of B[yron] out with Frau von
Goethe, but he will be appreciated by her. I am afraid of the
experiment with the great poet himself....
" ... I alone to the poet....
"I read to him the _Vision of Judgment_. He enjoyed it like a
child; but his criticisms went little beyond the exclamatory 'Toll!
Ganz grob! himmlisch! unübertrefflich!' etc., etc.
"In general, the more strongly peppered passages pleased him the
best. Stanza 9 he praised for the clear distinct painting; 10 he
repeated with emphasis,--the last two lines conscious that his own
age was eighty; 13, 14, and 15 are favourites with me. G. concurred
in the suggested praise. The stanza 24 he declared to be sublime.
The characteristic speeches of Wilkes and Junius he thought most
admirable.
"Byron 'hat selbst viel übertroffen;' and the introduction of
Southey made him laugh heartily.
"August 16.
"Lord B. he declared to be inimitable. Ariosto was not so _keck_ as
Lord B. in the _Vision of Judgment_."
PREFACE
It hath been wisely said, that "One fool makes many;" and it hath been poetically observed--
"[That] fools rush in where angels fear to tread."
[POPE'S _Essay on Criticism_, line 625.]
If Mr. Southey had not rushed in where he had no business, and where he never was before, and never will be again, the following poem would not have been written. It is not impossible that it may be as good as his own, seeing that it cannot, by any species of stupidity, natural or acquired, be worse. The gross flattery, the dull impudence, the renegade intolerance, and impious cant, of the poem by the author of "Wat Tyler," are something so stupendous as to form the sublime of himself--containing the quintessence of his own attributes.
So much for his poem--a word on his preface. In this preface it has pleased the magnanimous Laureate to draw the picture of a supposed "Satanic School," the which he doth recommend to the notice of the legislature; thereby adding to his other laurels the ambition of those of an informer. If there exists anywhere, except in his imagination, such a School, is he not sufficiently armed against it by his own intense vanity? The truth is that there are certain writers whom Mr. S. imagines, like Scrub, to have "talked of him; for they laughed consumedly."[492]
I think I know enough of most of the writers to whom he is supposed to allude, to assert, that they, in their individual capacities, have done more good, in the charities of life, to their fellow-creatures, in any one year, than Mr. Southey has done harm to himself by his absurdities in his whole life; and this is saying a great deal. But I have a few questions to ask.
1stly, Is Mr. Southey the author of Wat Tyler?
2ndly, Was he not refused a remedy at law by the highest judge of his beloved England, because it was a blasphemous and seditious publication?[493]
3rdly, Was he not entitled by William Smith, in full parliament, "a rancorous renegado?"[494]
4thly, Is he not poet laureate, with his own lines on Martin the regicide staring him in the face?[495]
And, 5thly, Putting the four preceding items together, with what conscience dare he call the attention of the laws to the publications of others, be they what they may?
I say nothing of the cowardice of such a proceeding; its meanness speaks for itself; but I wish to touch upon the motive, which is neither more nor less than that Mr. S. has been laughed at a little in some recent publications, as he was of yore in the Anti-jacobin, by his present patrons. Hence all this "skimble scamble stuff" about "Satanic," and so forth. However, it is worthy of him--"qualis ab incepto."
If there is anything obnoxious to the political opinions of a portion of the public in the following poem, they may thank Mr. Southey. He might have written hexameters, as he has written everything else, for aught that the writer cared--had they been upon another subject. But to attempt to canonise a monarch, who, whatever were his household virtues, was neither a successful nor a patriot king,--inasmuch as several years of his reign passed in war with America and Ireland, to say nothing of the aggression upon France--like all other exaggeration, necessarily begets opposition. In whatever manner he may be spoken of in this new Vision, his public career will not be more favourably transmitted by history. Of his private virtues (although a little expensive to the nation) there can be no doubt.
With regard to the supernatural personages treated of, I can only say that I know as much about them, and (as an honest man) have a better right to talk of them than Robert Southey. I have also treated them more tolerantly. The way in which that poor insane creature, the Laureate, deals about his judgments in the next world, is like his own judgment in this. If it was not completely ludicrous, it would be something worse. I don't think that there is much more to say at present.
QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS.
P.S.--It is possible that some readers may object, in these objectionable times, to the freedom with which saints, angels, and spiritual persons discourse in this Vision. But, for precedents upon such points, I must refer him to Fielding's Journey from this World to the next, and to the Visions of myself, the said Quevedo, in Spanish or translated.[496] The reader is also requested to observe, that no doctrinal tenets are insisted upon or discussed; that the person of the Deity is carefully withheld from sight, which is more than can be said for the Laureate, who hath thought proper to make him talk, not "like a school-divine,"[497] but like the unscholarlike Mr. Southey. The whole action passes on the outside of heaven; and Chaucer's Wife of Bath, Pulci's Morgante Maggiore, Swift's Tale of a Tub, and the other works above referred to, are cases in point of the freedom with which saints, etc., may be permitted to converse in works not intended to be serious.
Q.R.
-
-
- Mr. Southey being, as he says, a good Christian and vindictive, threatens, I understand, a reply to this our answer. It is to be hoped that his visionary faculties will in the meantime have acquired a little more judgment, properly so called: otherwise he will get himself into new dilemmas. These apostate jacobins furnish rich rejoinders. Let him take a specimen. Mr. Southey laudeth grievously "one Mr. Landor,"[498] who cultivates much private renown in the shape of Latin verses; and not long ago, the poet laureate dedicated to him, it appeareth, one of his fugitive lyrics, upon the strength of a poem called "Gebir." Who could suppose, that in this same Gebir the aforesaid Savage Landor (for such is his grim cognomen) putteth into the infernal regions no less a person than the hero of his friend Mr. Southey's heaven,--yea, even George the Third! See also how personal Savage becometh, when he hath a mind. The following is his portrait of our late gracious sovereign:--
(Prince Gebir having descended into the infernal regions, the shades of his royal ancestors are, at his request, called up to his view; and he exclaims to his ghostly guide)--
"'Aroar, what wretch that nearest us? what wretch Is that with eyebrows white and slanting brow? Listen! him yonder who, bound down supine, Shrinks yelling from that sword there, engine-hung; He too amongst my ancestors! [I hate The despot, but the dastard I despise. Was he our countryman?' 'Alas,][499] O king! Iberia bore him, but the breed accurst Inclement winds blew blighting from north-east.' 'He was a warrior then, nor fear'd the gods?' 'Gebir, he feared the Demons, not the gods, Though them indeed his daily face adored; And was no warrior, yet the thousand lives Squandered, as stones to exercise a sling, And the tame cruelty and cold caprice-- Oh madness of mankind! addressed, adored!'"
_Gebir_ [_Works, etc._, 1876, vii. 17].
-
I omit noticing some edifying Ithyphallics of Savagius, wishing to keep the proper veil over them, if his grave but somewhat indiscreet worshipper will suffer it; but certainly these teachers of "great moral lessons" are apt to be found in strange company.
THE VISION OF JUDGMENT.[500]
I.
Saint Peter sat by the celestial gate:
His keys were rusty, and the lock was dull,
So little trouble had been given of late;
Not that the place by any means was full,
But since the Gallic era "eighty-eight"
The Devils had ta'en a longer, stronger pull,
And "a pull altogether," as they say
At sea--which drew most souls another way.
II.
The Angels all were singing out of tune,
And hoarse with having little else to do,
Excepting to wind up the sun and moon,
Or curb a runaway young star or two,[fz]
Or wild colt of a comet, which too soon
Broke out of bounds o'er the ethereal blue,
Splitting some planet with its playful tail,
As boats are sometimes by a wanton whale.
III.
The Guardian Seraphs had retired on high,
Finding their charges past all care below;[ga]
Terrestrial business filled nought in the sky
Save the Recording Angel's black bureau;
Who found, indeed, the facts to multiply
With such rapidity of vice and woe,
That he had stripped off both his wings in quills,
And yet was in arrear of human ills.
IV.
His business so augmented of late years,
That he was forced, against his will, no doubt,
(Just like those cherubs, earthly ministers,)
For some resource to turn himself about,
And claim the help of his celestial peers,[gb]
To aid him ere he should be quite worn out
By the increased demand for his remarks:[gc]
Six Angels and twelve Saints were named his clerks.
V.
This was a handsome board--at least for Heaven;
And yet they had even then enough to do,
So many Conquerors' cars were daily driven,
So many kingdoms fitted up anew;
Each day, too, slew its thousands six or seven,
Till at the crowning carnage, Waterloo,
They threw their pens down in divine disgust--
The page was so besmeared with blood and dust.[gd]
VI.
This by the way; 'tis not mine to record
What Angels shrink from: even the very Devil
On this occasion his own work abhorred,
So surfeited with the infernal revel:
Though he himself had sharpened every sword,[ge]
It almost quenched his innate thirst of evil.
(Here Satan's sole good work deserves insertion--
'Tis, that he has both Generals in reversion.)[gf][501]
VII.
Let's skip a few short years of hollow peace,
Which peopled earth no better, Hell as wont,
And Heaven none--they form the tyrant's lease,
With nothing but new names subscribed upon't;
'Twill one day finish: meantime they increase,[gg]
"With seven heads and ten horns," and all in front,
Like Saint John's foretold beast; but ours are born
Less formidable in the head than horn.[gh]
VIII.
In the first year of Freedom's second dawn[502]
Died George the Third; although no tyrant, one
Who shielded tyrants, till each sense withdrawn[gi]
Left him nor mental nor external sun:[503]
A better farmer ne'er brushed dew from lawn,[gj]
A worse king never left a realm undone!
He died--but left his subjects still behind,
One half as mad--and t'other no less blind.[gk][504]
IX.
He died! his death made no great stir on earth:
His burial made some pomp; there was profusion
Of velvet--gilding--brass--and no great dearth
Of aught but tears--save those shed by collusion:
For these things may be bought at their true worth;
Of elegy there was the due infusion--
Bought also; and the torches, cloaks and banners,
Heralds, and relics of old Gothic manners,[505]
X.
Formed a sepulchral melodrame. Of all
The fools who flocked to swell or see the show,
Who cared about the corpse? The funeral
Made the attraction, and the black the woe,
There throbbed not there a thought which pierced the pall;
And when the gorgeous coffin was laid low,
It seemed the mockery of hell to fold
The rottenness of eighty years in gold.[506]
XI.
So mix his body with the dust! It might
Return to what it _must_ far sooner, were
The natural compound left alone to fight
Its way back into earth, and fire, and air;
But the unnatural balsams merely blight
What Nature made him at his birth, as bare
As the mere million's base unmummied clay--
Yet all his spices but prolong decay.[507]
XII.
He's dead--and upper earth with him has done;
He's buried; save the undertaker's bill,
Or lapidary scrawl, the world is gone
For him, unless he left a German will:[508]
But where's the proctor who will ask his son?
In whom his qualities are reigning still,[gl]
Except that household virtue, most uncommon,
Of constancy to a bad, ugly woman.
XIII.
"God save the king!" It is a large economy
In God to save the like; but if he will
Be saving, all the better; for not one am I
Of those who think damnation better still:[509]
I hardly know too if not quite alone am I
In this small hope of bettering future ill
By circumscribing, with some slight restriction,
The eternity of Hell's hot jurisdiction.
XIV.
I know this is unpopular; I know
'Tis blasphemous; I know one may be damned
For hoping no one else may e'er be so;
I know my catechism; I know we're crammed
With the best doctrines till we quite o'erflow;
I know that all save England's Church have shammed,
And that the other twice two hundred churches
And synagogues have made a _damned_ bad purchase.
XV.
God help us all! God help me too! I am,
God knows, as helpless as the Devil can wish,
And not a whit more difficult to damn,
Than is to bring to land a late-hooked fish,
Or to the butcher to purvey the lamb;
Not that I'm fit for such a noble dish,
As one day will be that immortal fry
Of almost every body born to die.
XVI.
Saint Peter sat by the celestial gate,
And nodded o'er his keys: when, lo! there came
A wondrous noise he had not heard of late--
A rushing sound of wind, and stream, and flame;
In short, a roar of things extremely great,
Which would have made aught save a Saint exclaim;
But he, with first a start and then a wink,
Said, "There's another star gone out, I think!"[gm]
XVII.
But ere he could return to his repose,
A Cherub flapped his right wing o'er his eyes--
At which Saint Peter yawned, and rubbed his nose:
"Saint porter," said the angel, "prithee rise!"
Waving a goodly wing, which glowed, as glows
An earthly peacock's tail, with heavenly dyes:
To which the saint replied, "Well, what's the matter?
"Is Lucifer come back with all this clatter?"
XVIII.
"No," quoth the Cherub: "George the Third is dead."
"And who _is_ George the Third?" replied the apostle:
"_What George? what Third?_" "The King of England," said
The angel. "Well! he won't find kings to jostle
Him on his way; but does he wear his head?
Because the last we saw here had a tustle,
And ne'er would have got into Heaven's good graces,
Had he not flung his head in all our faces.
XIX.
"He was--if I remember--King of France;[510]
That head of his, which could not keep a crown
On earth, yet ventured in my face to advance
A claim to those of martyrs--like my own:
If I had had my sword, as I had once
When I cut ears off, I had cut him down;
But having but my _keys_, and not my brand,
I only knocked his head from out his hand.
XX.
"And then he set up such a headless howl,
That all the Saints came out and took him in;
And there he sits by Saint Paul, cheek by jowl;[gn]
That fellow Paul--the parvenù! The skin[511]
Of Saint Bartholomew, which makes his cowl
In heaven, and upon earth redeemed his sin,
So as to make a martyr, never sped
Better than did this weak and wooden head.
XXI.
"But had it come up here upon its shoulders,
There would have been a different tale to tell:
The fellow-feeling in the Saint's beholders
Seems to have acted on them like a spell;
And so this very foolish head Heaven solders
Back on its trunk: it may be very well,
And seems the custom here to overthrow
Whatever has been wisely done below."
XXII.
The Angel answered, "Peter! do not pout:
The King who comes has head and all entire,
And never knew much what it was about--
He did as doth the puppet--by its wire,
And will be judged like all the rest, no doubt:
My business and your own is not to inquire
Into such matters, but to mind our cue--
Which is to act as we are bid to do."
XXIII.
While thus they spake, the angelic caravan,
Arriving like a rush of mighty wind,
Cleaving the fields of space, as doth the swan
Some silver stream (say Ganges, Nile, or Inde,
Or Thames, or Tweed), and midst them an old man
With an old soul, and both extremely blind,
Halted before the gate, and, in his shroud,
Seated their fellow-traveller on a cloud.[512]
XXIV.
But bringing up the rear of this bright host
A Spirit of a different aspect waved
His wings, like thunder-clouds above some coast
Whose barren beach with frequent wrecks is paved;
His brow was like the deep when tempest-tossed;
Fierce and unfathomable thoughts engraved
Eternal wrath on his immortal face,
And _where_ he gazed a gloom pervaded space.
XXV.
As he drew near, he gazed upon the gate
Ne'er to be entered more by him or Sin,
With such a glance of supernatural hate,
As made Saint Peter wish himself within;
He pottered[513] with his keys at a great rate,
And sweated through his Apostolic skin:[go]
Of course his perspiration was but ichor,
Or some such other spiritual liquor.[gp]
XXVI.
The very Cherubs huddled all together,
Like birds when soars the falcon; and they felt
A tingling to the tip of every feather,
And formed a circle like Orion's belt
Around their poor old charge; who scarce knew whither
His guards had led him, though they gently dealt
With royal Manes (for by many stories,
And true, we learn the Angels all are Tories).
XXVII.
As things were in this posture, the gate flew
Asunder, and the flashing of its hinges
Flung over space an universal hue
Of many-coloured flame, until its tinges
Reached even our speck of earth, and made a new
Aurora borealis spread its fringes
O'er the North Pole; the same seen, when ice-bound,
By Captain Parry's crew, in "Melville's Sound."[gq][514]
XXVIII.
And from the gate thrown open issued beaming
A beautiful and mighty Thing of Light,[515]
Radiant with glory, like a banner streaming
Victorious from some world-o'erthrowing fight:
My poor comparisons must needs be teeming
With earthly likenesses, for here the night
Of clay obscures our best conceptions, saving
Johanna Southcote,[516] or Bob Southey raving.[517]
XXIX.
'Twas the Archangel Michael: all men know
The make of Angels and Archangels, since
There's scarce a scribbler has not one to show,
From the fiends' leader to the Angels' Prince.
There also are some altar-pieces, though
I really can't say that they much evince
One's inner notions of immortal spirits;
But let the connoisseurs explain _their_ merits.
XXX.
Michael flew forth in glory and in good;
A goodly work of him from whom all Glory
And Good arise; the portal past--he stood;
Before him the young Cherubs and Saints hoary--
(I say _young_, begging to be understood
By looks, not years; and should be very sorry
To state, they were not older than St. Peter,
But merely that they seemed a little sweeter).
XXXI.
The Cherubs and the Saints bowed down before
That arch-angelic Hierarch, the first
Of Essences angelical who wore
The aspect of a god; but this ne'er nursed
Pride in his heavenly bosom, in whose core
No thought, save for his Maker's service, durst
Intrude, however glorified and high;
He knew him but the Viceroy of the sky.
XXXII.
He and the sombre, silent Spirit met--
They knew each other both for good and ill;
Such was their power, that neither could forget
His former friend and future foe; but still
There was a high, immortal, proud regret
In either's eye, as if 'twere less their will
Than destiny to make the eternal years
Their date of war, and their "Champ Clos" the spheres.
XXXIII.
But here they were in neutral space: we know
From Job, that Satan hath the power to pay
A heavenly visit thrice a-year or so;
And that the "Sons of God," like those of clay,
Must keep him company; and we might show
From the same book, in how polite a way
The dialogue is held between the Powers
Of Good and Evil--but 'twould take up hours.
XXXIV.
And this is not a theologic tract,[518]
To prove with Hebrew and with Arabic,
If Job be allegory or a fact,
But a true narrative; and thus I pick
From out the whole but such and such an act
As sets aside the slightest thought of trick.
'Tis every tittle true, beyond suspicion,
And accurate as any other vision.
XXXV.
The spirits were in neutral space, before
The gate of Heaven; like eastern thresholds is[519]
The place where Death's grand cause is argued o'er,
And souls despatched to that world or to this;
And therefore Michael and the other wore
A civil aspect: though they did not kiss,
Yet still between his Darkness and his Brightness
There passed a mutual glance of great politeness.
XXXVI.
The Archangel bowed, not like a modern beau,
But with a graceful oriental bend,
Pressing one radiant arm just where below[gr]
The heart in good men is supposed to tend;
He turned as to an equal, not too low,
But kindly; Satan met his ancient friend[gs]
With more hauteur, as might an old Castilian
Poor Noble meet a mushroom rich civilian.
XXXVII.
He merely bent his diabolic brow
An instant; and then raising it, he stood
In act to assert his right or wrong, and show
Cause why King George by no means could or should
Make out a case to be exempt from woe
Eternal, more than other kings, endued
With better sense and hearts, whom History mentions,
Who long have "paved Hell with their good intentions."[520]
XXXVIII.
Michael began: "What wouldst thou with this man,
Now dead, and brought before the Lord? What ill
Hath he wrought since his mortal race began,
That thou canst claim him? Speak! and do thy will,
If it be just: if in this earthly span
He hath been greatly failing to fulfil
His duties as a king and mortal, say,
And he is thine; if not--let him have way."
XXXIX.
"Michael!" replied the Prince of Air, "even here
Before the gate of Him thou servest, must
I claim my subject: and will make appear
That as he was my worshipper in dust,
So shall he be in spirit, although dear
To thee and thine, because nor wine nor lust
Were of his weaknesses; yet on the throne
He reigned o'er millions to serve me alone.
XL.
"Look to _our_ earth, or rather _mine_; it was,
_Once, more_ thy master's: but I triumph not
In this poor planet's conquest; nor, alas!
Need he thou servest envy me my lot:
With all the myriads of bright worlds which pass
In worship round him, he may have forgot
Yon weak creation of such paltry things:
I think few worth damnation save their kings,
XLI.
"And these but as a kind of quit-rent, to
Assert my right as Lord: and even had
I such an inclination,'twere (as you
Well know) superfluous; they are grown so bad,
That Hell has nothing better left to do
Than leave them to themselves: so much more mad
And evil by their own internal curse,
Heaven cannot make them better, nor I worse.
XLII.
"Look to the earth, I said, and say again:
When this old, blind, mad, helpless, weak, poor worm
Began in youth's first bloom and flush to reign,
The world and he both wore a different form,
And much of earth and all the watery plain
Of Ocean called him king: through many a storm
His isles had floated on the abyss of Time;
For the rough virtues chose them for their clime.[521]
XLIII.
"He came to his sceptre young; he leaves it old:
Look to the state in which he found his realm,
And left it; and his annals too behold,
How to a minion first he gave the helm;[522]
How grew upon his heart a thirst for gold,
The beggar's vice, which can but overwhelm
The meanest hearts; and for the rest, but glance
Thine eye along America and France.
XLIV.
"'Tis true, he was a tool from first to last
(I have the workmen safe); but as a tool
So let him be consumed. From out the past
Of ages, since mankind have known the rule
Of monarchs--from the bloody rolls amassed
Of Sin and Slaughter--from the Cæsars' school,
Take the worst pupil; and produce a reign
More drenched with gore, more cumbered with the slain.
XLV.
"He ever warred with freedom and the free:
Nations as men, home subjects, foreign foes,
So that they uttered the word 'Liberty!'
Found George the Third their first opponent. Whose
History was ever stained as his will be
With national and individual woes?[gt]
I grant his household abstinence; I grant
His neutral virtues, which most monarchs want;
XLVI.
"I know he was a constant consort; own
He was a decent sire, and middling lord.
All this is much, and most upon a throne;
As temperance, if at Apicius' board,
Is more than at an anchorite's supper shown.
I grant him all the kindest can accord;
And this was well for him, but not for those
Millions who found him what Oppression chose.
XLVII.
"The New World shook him off; the Old yet groans
Beneath what he and his prepared, if not
Completed: he leaves heirs on many thrones
To all his vices, without what begot
Compassion for him--his tame virtues; drones
Who sleep, or despots who have now forgot
A lesson which shall be re-taught them, wake
Upon the thrones of earth; but let them quake!
XLVIII.
"Five millions of the primitive, who hold
The faith which makes ye great on earth, implored
A _part_ of that vast _all_ they held of old,--[gu]
Freedom to worship--not alone your Lord,
Michael, but you, and you, Saint Peter! Cold
Must be your souls, if you have not abhorred
The foe to Catholic participation[523]
In all the license of a Christian nation.
XLIX.
"True! he allowed them to pray God; but as
A consequence of prayer, refused the law
Which would have placed them upon the same base
With those who did not hold the Saints in awe."
But here Saint Peter started from his place
And cried, "You may the prisoner withdraw:
Ere Heaven shall ope her portals to this Guelph,
While I am guard, may I be damned myself!
L.
"Sooner will I with Cerberus exchange
My office (and _his_ is no sinecure)
Than see this royal Bedlam-bigot range[gv]
The azure fields of Heaven, of that be sure!"
"Saint!" replied Satan, "you do well to avenge
The wrongs he made your satellites endure;
And if to this exchange you should be given,
I'll try to coax _our_ Cerberus up to Heaven!"
LI.
Here Michael interposed: "Good Saint! and Devil!
Pray, not so fast; you both outrun discretion.
Saint Peter! you were wont to be more civil:
Satan! excuse this warmth of his expression,
And condescension to the vulgar's level:[gw]
Even Saints sometimes forget themselves in session.
Have you got more to say?"--"No."--"If you please,
I'll trouble you to call your witnesses."
LII.
Then Satan turned and waved his swarthy hand,
Which stirred with its electric qualities
Clouds farther off than we can understand,
Although we find him sometimes in our skies;
Infernal thunder shook both sea and land
In all the planets--and Hell's batteries
Let off the artillery, which Milton mentions
As one of Satan's most sublime inventions.[524]
LIII.
This was a signal unto such damned souls
As have the privilege of their damnation
Extended far beyond the mere controls
Of worlds past, present, or to come; no station
Is theirs particularly in the rolls
Of Hell assigned; but where their inclination
Or business carries them in search of game,
They may range freely--being damned the same.
LIV.
They are proud of this--as very well they may,
It being a sort of knighthood, or gilt key
Stuck in their loins;[525] or like to an "entré"[gx]
Up the back stairs, or such free-masonry.
I borrow my comparisons from clay,
Being clay myself. Let not those spirits be
Offended with such base low likenesses;
We know their posts are nobler far than these.[gy]
LV.
When the great signal ran from Heaven to Hell--
About ten million times the distance reckoned
From our sun to its earth, as we can tell
How much time it takes up, even to a second,
For every ray that travels to dispel
The fogs of London, through which, dimly beaconed,
The weathercocks are gilt some thrice a year,
If that the _summer_ is not too severe:[526]
LVI.
I say that I can tell--'twas half a minute;
I know the solar beams take up more time
Ere, packed up for their journey, they begin it;[gz]
But then their Telegraph is less sublime,[527]
And if they ran a race, they would not win it
'Gainst Satan's couriers bound for their own clime.
The sun takes up some years for every ray
To reach its goal--the Devil not half a day.
LVII.
Upon the verge of space, about the size
Of half-a-crown, a little speck appeared
(I've seen a something like it in the skies
In the Ægean, ere a squall); it neared,
And, growing bigger, took another guise;
Like an aërial ship it tacked, and steered,[528]
Or _was_ steered (I am doubtful of the grammar
Of the last phrase, which makes the stanza stammer;
LVIII.
But take your choice): and then it grew a cloud;
And so it was--a cloud of witnesses.
But such a cloud! No land ere saw a crowd
Of locusts numerous as the heavens saw these;[ha]
They shadowed with their myriads Space; their loud
And varied cries were like those of wild geese,[hb]
(If nations may be likened to a goose),
And realised the phrase of "Hell broke loose."[529]
LIX.
Here crashed a sturdy oath of stout John Bull,
Who damned away his eyes as heretofore:
There Paddy brogued "By Jasus!"--"What's your wull?"
The temperate Scot exclaimed: the French ghost swore
In certain terms I shan't translate in full,
As the first coachman will; and 'midst the war,[hc]
The voice of Jonathan was heard to express,
"_Our_ President is going to war, I guess."
LX.
Besides there were the Spaniard, Dutch, and Dane;
In short, an universal shoal of shades
From Otaheite's isle to Salisbury Plain,
Of all climes and professions, years and trades,
Ready to swear against the good king's reign,[hd]
Bitter as clubs in cards are against spades:[530]
All summoned by this grand "subpoena," to
Try if kings mayn't be damned like me or you.
LXI.
When Michael saw this host, he first grew pale,
As Angels can; next, like Italian twilight,
He turned all colours--as a peacock's tail,
Or sunset streaming through a Gothic skylight
In some old abbey, or a trout not stale,
Or distant lightning on the horizon by night,
Or a fresh rainbow, or a grand review
Of thirty regiments in red, green, and blue.
LXII.
Then he addressed himself to Satan: "Why--
My good old friend, for such I deem you, though
Our different parties make us fight so shy,
I ne'er mistake you for a _personal_ foe;
Our difference _political_, and I
Trust that, whatever may occur below,
You know my great respect for you: and this
Makes me regret whate'er you do amiss--
LXIII.
"Why, my dear Lucifer, would you abuse
My call for witnesses? I did not mean
That you should half of Earth and Hell produce;
'Tis even superfluous, since two honest, clean,
True testimonies are enough: we lose
Our Time, nay, our Eternity, between
The accusation and defence: if we
Hear both, 'twill stretch our immortality."
LXIV.
Satan replied, "To me the matter is
Indifferent, in a personal point of view:
I can have fifty better souls than this
With far less trouble than we have gone through
Already; and I merely argued his
Late Majesty of Britain's case with you
Upon a point of form: you may dispose
Of him; I've kings enough below, God knows!"
LXV.
Thus spoke the Demon (late called "multifaced"[531]
By multo-scribbling Southey). "Then we'll call
One or two persons of the myriads placed
Around our congress, and dispense with all
The rest," quoth Michael: "Who may be so graced
As to speak first? there's choice enough--who shall
It be?" Then Satan answered, "There are many;
But you may choose Jack Wilkes as well as any."
LXVI.
A merry, cock-eyed, curious-looking Sprite[532]
Upon the instant started from the throng,
Dressed in a fashion now forgotten quite;
For all the fashions of the flesh stick long
By people in the next world; where unite
All the costumes since Adam's, right or wrong,
From Eve's fig-leaf down to the petticoat,
Almost as scanty, of days less remote.[533]
LXVII.
The Spirit looked around upon the crowds
Assembled, and exclaimed, "My friends of all
The spheres, we shall catch cold amongst these clouds;
So let's to business: why this general call?
If those are freeholders I see in shrouds,
And 'tis for an election that they bawl,
Behold a candidate with unturned coat![he]
Saint Peter, may I count upon your vote?"
LXVIII.
"Sir," replied Michael, "you mistake; these things
Are of a former life, and what we do
Above is more august; to judge of kings
Is the tribunal met: so now you know."
"Then I presume those gentlemen with wings,"[hf]
Said Wilkes, "are Cherubs; and that soul below
Looks much like George the Third, but to my mind
A good deal older--bless me! is he blind?"
LXIX.
"He is what you behold him, and his doom
Depends upon his deeds," the Angel said;
"If you have aught to arraign in him, the tomb
Gives license to the humblest beggar's head
To lift itself against the loftiest."--"Some,"
Said Wilkes, "don't wait to see them laid in lead,
For such a liberty--and I, for one,
Have told them what I thought beneath the sun."
LXX.
"_Above_ the sun repeat, then, what thou hast
To urge against him," said the Archangel. "Why,"
Replied the spirit, "since old scores are past,
Must I turn evidence? In faith, not I.
Besides, I beat him hollow at the last[534],
With all his Lords and Commons: in the sky
I don't like ripping up old stories, since
His conduct was but natural in a prince.
LXXI.
"Foolish, no doubt, and wicked, to oppress
A poor unlucky devil without a shilling;
But then I blame the man himself much less
Than Bute and Grafton[535], and shall be unwilling
To see him punished here for their excess,
Since they were both damned long ago, and still in
Their place below: for me, I have forgiven,
And vote his _habeas corpus_ into Heaven."
LXXII.
"Wilkes," said the Devil, "I understand all this;
You turned to half a courtier[536] ere you died,
And seem to think it would not be amiss
To grow a whole one on the other side
Of Charon's ferry; you forget that _his_
Reign is concluded; whatsoe'er betide,
He won't be sovereign more: you've lost your labour,
For at the best he will but be your neighbour.
LXXIII.
"However, I knew what to think of it,
When I beheld you in your jesting way,
Flitting and whispering round about the spit
Where Belial, upon duty for the day[hg],
With Fox's lard was basting William Pitt,
His pupil; I knew what to think, I say:
That fellow even in Hell breeds farther ills;
I'll have him _gagged_--'twas one of his own Bills[537].
LXXIV.
"Call Junius!" From the crowd a shadow stalked[538].
And at the name there was a general squeeze,
So that the very ghosts no longer walked
In comfort, at their own aërial ease,
But were all rammed, and jammed (but to be balked,
As we shall see), and jostled hands and knees,
Like wind compressed and pent within a bladder,
Or like a human colic, which is sadder.[hh]
LXXV.
The shadow came--a tall, thin, grey-haired figure,
That looked as it had been a shade on earth[hi];
Quick in its motions, with an air of vigour,
But nought to mark its breeding or its birth;
Now it waxed little, then again grew bigger[hj],
With now an air of gloom, or savage mirth:
But as you gazed upon its features, they
Changed every instant--to _what_, none could say.
LXXVI.
The more intently the ghosts gazed, the less
Could they distinguish whose the features were;
The Devil himself seemed puzzled even to guess;
They varied like a dream--now here, now there;
And several people swore from out the press,
They knew him perfectly; and one could swear
He was his father; upon which another
Was sure he was his mother's cousin's brother:
LXXVII.
Another, that he was a duke, or knight,
An orator, a lawyer, or a priest,
A nabob, a man-midwife;[539] but the wight[hk]
Mysterious changed his countenance at least
As oft as they their minds: though in full sight
He stood, the puzzle only was increased;
The man was a phantasmagoria in
Himself--he was so volatile and thin.
LXXVIII.
The moment that you had pronounced him _one_,
Presto! his face changed, and he was another;
And when that change was hardly well put on,
It varied, till I don't think his own mother
(If that he had a mother) would her son
Have known, he shifted so from one to t'other;
Till guessing from a pleasure grew a task,[hl]
At this epistolary "Iron Mask."[540]
LXXIX.
For sometimes he like Cerberus would seem--
"Three gentlemen at once"[541] (as sagely says
Good Mrs. Malaprop); then you might deem
That he was not even _one_; now many rays
Were flashing round him; and now a thick steam
Hid him from sight--like fogs on London days:
Now Burke, now Tooke, he grew to people's fancies
And certes often like Sir Philip Francis.
LXXX.
I've an hypothesis--'tis quite my own;
I never let it out till now, for fear
Of doing people harm about the throne,
And injuring some minister or peer,
On whom the stigma might perhaps be blown;
It is--my gentle public, lend thine ear!
'Tis, that what Junius we are wont to call,[hm]
Was _really--truly_--nobody at all.
LXXXI.
I don't see wherefore letters should not be
Written without hands, since we daily view
Them written without heads; and books, we see,
Are filled as well without the latter too:
And really till we fix on somebody
For certain sure to claim them as his due,
Their author, like the Niger's mouth,[542] will bother
The world to say if _there_ be mouth or author.
LXXXII.
"And who and what art thou?" the Archangel said.
"For _that_ you may consult my title-page,"[543]
Replied this mighty shadow of a shade:
"If I have kept my secret half an age,
I scarce shall tell it now."--"Canst thou upbraid,"
Continued Michael, "George Rex, or allege
Aught further?" Junius answered, "You had better
First ask him for _his_ answer to my letter:
LXXXIII.
"My charges upon record will outlast[hn]
The brass of both his epitaph and tomb."
"Repent'st thou not," said Michael, "of some past
Exaggeration? something which may doom
Thyself if false, as him if true? Thou wast
Too bitter--is it not so?--in thy gloom
Of passion?"--"Passion!" cried the phantom dim,
"I loved my country, and I hated him.
LXXXIV.
"What I have written, I have written: let
The rest be on his head or mine!" So spoke
Old "_Nominis Umbra_;" and while speaking yet,
Away he melted in celestial smoke.
Then Satan said to Michael, "Don't forget
To call George Washington, and John Horne Tooke,
And Franklin;"[544]--but at this time there was heard
A cry for room, though not a phantom stirred.
LXXXV.
At length with jostling, elbowing, and the aid
Of Cherubim appointed to that post,
The devil Asmodeus[545] to the circle made
His way, and looked as if his journey cost
Some trouble. When his burden down he laid,
"What's this?" cried Michael; "why, 'tis not a ghost?"
"I know it," quoth the Incubus; "but he
Shall be one, if you leave the affair to me.
LXXXVI.
"Confound the renegado![546] I have sprained
My left wing, he's so heavy;[547] one would think
Some of his works about his neck were chained.
But to the point; while hovering o'er the brink
Of Skiddaw (where as usual it still rained),
I saw a taper, far below me, wink,
And stooping, caught this fellow at a libel--[ho]
No less on History--than the Holy Bible.
LXXXVII.
"The former is the Devil's scripture, and
The latter yours, good Michael: so the affair
Belongs to all of us, you understand.
I snatched him up just as you see him there,
And brought him off for sentence out of hand:
I've scarcely been ten minutes in the air--
At least a quarter it can hardly be:
I dare say that his wife is still at tea."[548]
LXXXVIII.
Here Satan said, "I know this man of old,
And have expected him for some time here;
A sillier fellow you will scarce behold,
Or more conceited in his petty sphere:
But surely it was not worth while to fold
Such trash below your wing, Asmodeus dear:
We had the poor wretch safe (without being bored
With carriage) coming of his own accord.
LXXXIX.
"But since he's here, let's see what he has done."
"Done!" cried Asmodeus, "he anticipates
The very business you are now upon,
And scribbles as if head clerk to the Fates.[hp]
Who knows to what his ribaldry may run,
When such an ass[549] as this, like Balaam's, prates?"
"Let's hear," quoth Michael, "what he has to say:
You know we're bound to that in every way."
XC.
Now the bard, glad to get an audience, which
By no means often was his case below,
Began to cough, and hawk, and hem, and pitch
His voice into that awful note of woe
To all unhappy hearers within reach
Of poets when the tide of rhyme's in flow;[550]
But stuck fast with his first hexameter,
Not one of all whose gouty feet would stir.
XCI.
But ere the spavined dactyls could be spurred
Into recitative, in great dismay
Both Cherubim and Seraphim were heard
To murmur loudly through their long array;
And Michael rose ere he could get a word
Of all his foundered verses under way,
And cried, "For God's sake stop, my friend! 'twere best--[551]
'_Non Di, non homines_'--you know the rest."[552]
XCII.
A general bustle spread throughout the throng,
Which seemed to hold all verse in detestation;
The Angels had of course enough of song
When upon service; and the generation
Of ghosts had heard too much in life, not long
Before, to profit by a new occasion:
The Monarch, mute till then, exclaimed, "What! what![553]
_Pye_[554] come again? No more--no more of that!"
XCIII.
The tumult grew; an universal cough
Convulsed the skies, as during a debate,
When Castlereagh has been up long enough
(Before he was first minister of state,
I mean--the _slaves hear now_); some cried "Off, off!"
As at a farce; till, grown quite desperate,
The Bard Saint Peter prayed to interpose
(Himself an author) only for his prose.
XCIV.
The varlet was not an ill-favoured knave;[hq][555]
A good deal like a vulture in the face,
With a hook nose and a hawk's eye, which gave
A smart and sharper-looking sort of grace
To his whole aspect, which, though rather grave,
Was by no means so ugly as his case;
But that, indeed, was hopeless as can be,
Quite a poetic felony "_de se_."
XCV.
Then Michael blew his trump, and stilled the noise
With one still greater, as is yet the mode
On earth besides; except some grumbling voice,
Which now and then will make a slight inroad
Upon decorous silence, few will twice
Lift up their lungs when fairly overcrowed;
And now the Bard could plead his own bad cause,
With all the attitudes of self-applause.
XCVI.
He said--(I only give the heads)--he said,
He meant no harm in scribbling; 'twas his way
Upon all topics; 'twas, besides, his bread,
Of which he buttered both sides; 'twould delay
Too long the assembly (he was pleased to dread),
And take up rather more time than a day,
To name his works--he would but cite a few--[hr]
"Wat Tyler"--"Rhymes on Blenheim"--"Waterloo."[556]
XCVII.
He had written praises of a Regicide;[557]
He had written praises of all kings whatever;
He had written for republics far and wide,
And then against them bitterer than ever;
For pantisocracy he once had cried[558]
Aloud, a scheme less moral than 'twas clever;
Then grew a hearty anti-jacobin--
Had turned his coat--and would have turned his skin.
XCVIII.
He had sung against all battles, and again
In their high praise and glory; he had called
Reviewing "the ungentle craft," and then[559]
Became as base a critic as e'er crawled--
Fed, paid, and pampered by the very men
By whom his muse and morals had been mauled:
He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose,
And more of both than any body knows.
XCIX.
He had written Wesley's[560] life:--here turning round
To Satan, "Sir, I'm ready to write yours,
In two octavo volumes, nicely bound,
With notes and preface, all that most allures
The pious purchaser; and there's no ground
For fear, for I can choose my own reviewers:
So let me have the proper documents,
That I may add you to my other saints."
C.
Satan bowed, and was silent. "Well, if you,
With amiable modesty, decline
My offer, what says Michael? There are few
Whose memoirs could be rendered more divine.
Mine is a pen of all work;[561] not so new
As it was once, but I would make you shine
Like your own trumpet. By the way, my own
Has more of brass in it, and is as well blown.[hs]
CI.
"But talking about trumpets, here's my 'Vision!'
Now you shall judge, all people--yes--you shall
Judge with my judgment! and by my decision
Be guided who shall enter heaven or fall.
I settle all these things by intuition,
Times present, past, to come--Heaven--Hell--and all,
Like King Alfonso[562]. When I thus see double,
I save the Deity some worlds of trouble."
CII.
He ceased, and drew forth an MS.; and no
Persuasion on the part of Devils, Saints,
Or Angels, now could stop the torrent; so
He read the first three lines of the contents:
But at the fourth, the whole spiritual show
Had vanished, with variety of scents,
Ambrosial and sulphureous, as they sprang,
Like lightning, off from his "melodious twang."[563]
CIII.
Those grand heroics acted as a spell;
The Angels stopped their ears and plied their pinions;
The Devils ran howling, deafened, down to Hell;
The ghosts fled, gibbering, for their own dominions--
(For 'tis not yet decided where they dwell,
And I leave every man to his opinions);
Michael took refuge in his trump--but, lo!
His teeth were set on edge, he could not blow!
CIV.
Saint Peter, who has hitherto been known
For an impetuous saint, upraised his keys,
And at the fifth line knocked the poet down;[564]
Who fell like Phaeton, but more at ease,
Into his lake, for there he did not drown;
A different web being by the Destinies
Woven for the Laureate's final wreath, whene'er
Reform shall happen either here or there.
CV.
He first sank to the bottom--like his works,
But soon rose to the surface--like himself;
For all corrupted things are buoyed like corks,[565]
By their own rottenness, light as an elf,
Or wisp that flits o'er a morass: he lurks,
It may be, still, like dull books on a shelf,
In his own den, to scrawl some "Life" or "Vision,"[ht]
As Welborn says--"the Devil turned precisian."[566]
CVI.
As for the rest, to come to the conclusion
Of this true dream, the telescope is gone[hu]
Which kept my optics free from all delusion,
And showed me what I in my turn have shown;
All I saw farther, in the last confusion,
Was, that King George slipped into Heaven for one;
And when the tumult dwindled to a calm,
I left him practising the hundredth psalm.[567]
R^a^ Oct. 4, 1821.
FOOTNOTES:
[492] {481}["Aye, he and the count's footman were jabbering French like two intriguing ducks in a mill-pond; and I believe they talked of me, for they laughed consumedly."--Farquhar, The Beaux' Stratagem, act iii. sc. 2.]
[493] {482}[These were not the expressions employed by Lord Eldon. The Chancellor laid down the principle that "damages cannot be recovered for a work which is in its nature calculated to do an injury to the public," and assuming Wat Tyler to be of this description, he refused the injunction until Southey should have established his right to the property by an action. Wat Tyler was written at the age of nineteen, when Southey was a republican, and was entrusted to two booksellers, Messrs. Ridgeway and Symonds, who agreed to publish it, but never put it to press. The MS. was not returned to the author, and in February, 1817, at the interval of twenty-two years, when his sentiments were widely different, it was printed, to his great annoyance, by W. Benbow (see his Scourge for the Laureate (1825), p. 14), Sherwood, Neely and Jones, John Fairburn, and others. It was reported that 60,000 copies were sold (see Life and Correspondence of R. Southey, 1850, iv. 237, 241, 249, 252).]
[494] [William Smith, M.P. for Norwich, attacked Southey in the House of Commons on the 14th of March, 1817, and the Laureate replied by a letter in the Courier, dated March 17, 1817, and by a letter "To William Smith, Esq., M.P." (see Essays Moral and Political, by R. Southey, 1832, ii. 7-31). The exact words used were, "the determined malignity of a renegade" (see Hansard's Parl. Debates, xxxv. 1088).]
[495] [One of Southey's juvenile poems is an "Inscription for the Apartment in Chepstow Castle, where Henry Martin, the Regicide, was imprisoned thirty years" (see Southey's Poems, 1797, p. 59). Canning parodied it in the Anti-jacobin (see his well-known "Inscription for the Door of the Cell in Newgate, where Mrs. Brownrigg, the 'Prentice-cide, was confined, previous to her Execution," Poetry of the Anti-jacobin, 1828, p. 6).]
[496] {484}[See "The Vision, etc., made English by Sir R. Lestrange, and burlesqued by a Person of Quality:" Visions, being a Satire on the corruptions and vices of all degrees of Mankind. Translated from the original Spanish by Mr. Nunez, London, 1745, etc.
The Sueños or Visions of Francisco Gomez de Quevedo of Villegas are six in number. They were published separately in 1635. For an account of the "Visita de los Chistes," "A Visit in Jest to the Empire of Death," and for a translation of part of the "Dream of Skulls," or "Dream of the Judgment," see History of Spanish Literature, by George Ticknor, 1888, ii. 339-344.]
[497]
["Milton's strong pinion now not Heav'n can bound,
Now Serpent-like, in prose he sweeps the ground,
In Quibbles, Angel and Archangel join,
And God the Father turns a School-divine."
Pope's _Imitations of Horace_, Book ii. Ep. i. lines 99-102.]
[498] [Walter Savage Landor (1775-1864) had recently published a volume of Latin poems (Idyllia Heroica Decem. Librum Phaleuciorum Unum. Partim jam primum Partim iterum atque tertio edit Savagius Landor. Accedit Quæstiuncula cur Poetæ Latini Recentiores minus leguntur, Pisis, 1820, 410). In his Preface to the Vision of Judgement, Southey illustrates his denunciation of "Men of diseased hearts," etc. (vide ante, p. 476), by a quotation from the Latin essay: "Summi poetæ in omni poetarum sæculo viri fuerunt probi: in nostris id vidimus et videmus; neque alius est error a veritate longiùs quàm magna ingenia magnis necessario corrumpi vitiis," etc. (Idyllia, p. 197). It was a cardinal maxim of the Lake School "that there can be no great poet who is not a good man.... His heart must be pure" (see Table Talk, by S. T. Coleridge, August 20, 1833); and Landor's testimony was welcome and consolatory. "Of its author," he adds, "I will only say in this place, that, to have obtained his approbation as a poet, and possessed his friendship as a man, will be remembered among the honours of my life." Now, apart from the essay and its evident application, Byron had probably observed that among the Phaleucia, or Hendecasyllables, were included some exquisite lines Ad Sutheium (on the death of Herbert Southey), followed by some extremely unpleasant ones on Taunto and his tongue, and would naturally conclude that "Savagius" was ready to do battle for the Laureate if occasion arose. Hence the side issue. With regard to the "Ithyphallics," there are portions of the Latin poems (afterwards expunged, see Poemata et Inscriptiones, Moxon, 1847) included in the Pisa volume which might warrant the description; but from a note to The Island (Canto II. stanza xvii. line 10) it may be inferred that some earlier collection of Latin verses had come under Byron's notice. For Landor's various estimates of Byron's works and genius, see Works, 1876, iv. 44-46, 88, 89, etc.]
[499] {485}[The words enclosed in brackets were expunged in later editions.]
[500] {487}[Ra[venna] May 7^th^, 1821.]
[fz] {487}Or break a runaway--[MS., alternative reading.]
[ga] Finding their patients past all care and cure.--[MS. erased.]
[gb] {488}
_To turn him here and there for some resource_
{_And found no better counsel from his peers_,
{_And claimed the help of his celestial peers_.--[MS. erased.]
[gc] By the immense extent of his remarks.--[MS. erased.]
[gd] The page was so splashed o'er----.--[MS. erased.]
[ge] Though he himself had helped the Conqueror's sword.--[MS. erased.]
[gf] {489}'Tis that he has that Conqueror in reversion.--[MS. erased.]
[501] [Napoleon died May 5, 1821, two days before Byron began his Vision of Judgment, but, of course, the news did not reach Europe till long afterwards.]
[gg] They will be crushed yet----.--[MS. erased.]
[gh] Not so gigantic in the head as horn.--[MS. erased.]
[502] [George III. died the 29th of January, 1820. "The year 1820 was an era signalized ... by the many efforts of the revolutionary spirit which at that time broke forth, like ill-suppressed fire, throughout the greater part of the South of Europe. In Italy Naples had already raised the constitutional standard.... Throughout Romagna, secret societies, under the name of Carbonari, had been organized."--Life. p. 467.]
[gi] Who fought for tyranny until withdrawn.--[MS. erased.]
[503] ["Thus as I stood, the bell, which awhile from its warning had rested, Sent forth its note again, Toll! Toll! through the silence of evening.... Thou art released! I cried: thy soul is delivered from bondage! Thou who hast lain so long in mental and visual darkness, Thou art in yonder Heaven! thy place is in light and glory."
_A Vision of Judgement_, by R. Southey, i.]
[gj] A better country squire----.--[MS. erased.]
[gk] {490}
_He died and left his kingdom still behind_
_Not much less mad--and certainly as blind_.--[MS. erased.]
[504] [At the time of the king's death Byron expressed himself somewhat differently. "I see," he says (Letter to Murray, February 21, 1820), "the good old King is gone to his place; one can't help being sorry, though blindness, and age, and insanity are supposed to be drawbacks on human felicity."]
[505] ["The display was most magnificent; the powerful light which threw all below into strong relief, reached but high enough to touch the pendent helmets and banners into faint colouring, and the roof was a vision of tarnished gleams and tissues among the Gothic tracery. The vault was still open, and the Royal coffin lay below, with the crowns of England and Hanover on cushions of purple and the broken wand crossing it. At the altar four Royal banners covered with golden emblems were strewed upon the ground, as if their office was completed; the altar was piled with consecrated gold plate, and the whole aspect of the Chapel was the deepest and most magnificent display of melancholy grandeur."-From a description of the funeral of George the Third (signed J. T.), in the European Magazine, February, 1820, vol. 77, p. 123.]
[506]
["So by the unseen comforted, raised I my head in obedience,
And in a vault I found myself placed, arched over on all sides
Narrow and low was that house of the dead. Around it were coffins,
Each in its niche, and pails, and urns, and funeral hatchments,
Velvets of Tyrian dye, retaining their hues unfaded;
Blazonry vivid still, as if fresh from the touch of the limner;
Nor was the golden fringe, nor the golden broidery, tarnished."
_A Vision, etc._, ii.
"On Thursday night, the 3rd inst. [February, 1820], the body being wrapped in an exterior fold of white satin, was placed in the inside coffin, which was composed of mahogany, pillowed and ornamented in the customary manner with white satin.... This was enclosed in a leaden coffin, again enclosed in another mahogany coffin, and the whole finally placed in the state coffin of Spanish mahogany, covered with the richest Genoa velvet of royal purple, a few shades deeper in tint than Garter blue. The lid was divided into three compartments by double rows of silver-gilt nails, and in the compartment at the head, over a rich star of the Order of the Garter was placed the Royal Arms of England, beautifully executed in dead Gold.... In the lower compartment at the feet was the British Lion Rampant, regardant, supporting a shield with the letters G. R. surrounded with the garter and motto of the same order in dead gold.... The handles were of silver, richly gilt of a massive modern pattern, and the most exquisite workmanship."--Ibid., p. 126.]
[507] {491}["The body of his Majesty was not embalmed in the usual manner, but has been wrapped in cere-clothes, to preserve it as long as possible.... The corpse, indeed, exhibited a painful spectacle of the rapid decay which had recently taken place in his Majesty's constitution, ... and hence, possibly, the surgeons deemed it impossible to perform the process of embalming in the usual way."--Ibid., p. 126.]
[508] [The fact that George II. pocketed, and never afterwards produced or attempted to carry out his father's will, may have suggested to the scandalous the possibility of a similar act on the part of his great-grandson.]
[gl] {492}
/ _vices_ \
In whom his < > all are reigning still.--[MS. erased.] \ virtues /
[509] [Lady Byron's account of her husband's theological opinions is at variance with this statement. (See Diary of H. C. Robinson, 1869, iii. 436.)]
[gm] {493}
_But he with first a start and then a nod_.--[MS.]
_Snored, "There is some new star gone out by G--d!"-_-[MS. erased.]
[510] {493}[Louis the Sixteenth was guillotined January 21, 1793.]
[gn] {494}That fellow Paul the damndest Saint.--[MS. erased.]
[511] ["The blessed apostle Bartholomew preached first in Lycaonia, and, at the last, in Athens ... and there he was first flayed, and afterwards his head was smitten off."--Golden Legend, edited by F. S. Ellis, 1900, v. 41.]
[512] {495} "Then I beheld the King. From a cloud which covered the pavement His reverend form uprose: heavenward his face was directed. Heavenward his eyes were raised, and heavenward his arms were directed."
_The Vision, etc._, iii.
[513] [The reading of the MS. and of the Liberal is "pottered." The editions of 1831, 1832, 1837, etc., read "pattered."]
[go] ----his whole celestial skin.--[MS. erased.]
[gp] Or some such other superhuman ichor.--[MS. erased.]
[gq] {496}By Captain Parry's crews----.--[The Liberal, 1822, i. 12.]
[514] ["The luminous arch had broken into irregular masses, streaming with much rapidity in different directions, varying continually, in shape and interest, and extending themselves from north, by the east, to north. The usual pale light of the aurora strongly resembled that produced by the combustion of phosphorus; a very slight tinge of red was noticed when the aurora was most vivid, but no other colours were visible."--Sir E. Parry's Voyage in 1819-20, p. 135.]
[515] [Compare "Methought I saw a fair youth borne with prodigious speed through the heavens, who gave a blast to his trumpet so violent, that the radiant beauty of his countenance was in part disfigured by it."--Translation of Quevedo's "Dream of Skulls," by G. Ticknor, History of Spanish Literature, 1888, ii. 340.]
[516] {497}[Joanna Southcott, born 1750, published her Book of Wonders, 1813-14, died December 27, 1814.]
[517]
["Eminent on a hill, there stood the Celestial City;
Beaming afar it shone; its towers and cupolas rising
High in the air serene, with the brightness of gold in the furnace,
Where on their breadth the splendour lay intense and quiescent.
Part with a fierier glow, and a short thick tremulous motion
Like the burning pyropus; and turrets and pinnacles sparkled,
Playing in jets of light, with a diamond-like glory coruscant."
_The Vision, etc.,_ iv.]
[518] {498}[See The Book of Job literally translated from the original Hebrew, by John Mason Good, F.R.S. (1764-1827), London, 1812. In the "Introductory Dissertation," the author upholds the biographical and historical character of the Book of Job against the contentions of Professor Michaelis (Johann David, 1717-1791). The notes abound in citations from the Hebrew and from the Arabic version.]
[519] {499}["The gates or gateways of Eastern cities" were used as "places for public deliberation, administration of justice, or audience for kings and nations, or ambassadors." See Deut. xvi. 18. "Judges and officers shall thou make thee in all thy gates ... and they shall judge the people with just judgment." Hence came the use of the word "Porte" in speaking of the Government of Constantinople.--Smith's Diet, of the Bible, art. "Gate."]
[gr] Crossing his radiant arms----.--[MS. erased.]
[gs] But kindly; Sathan met----.--[MS. erased.]
[520] ["No saint in the course of his religious warfare was more sensible of the unhappy failure of pious resolves than Dr. Johnson; he said one day, talking to an acquaintance on this subject, 'Sir, hell is paved with good intentions.'" Compare "Hell is full of good meanings and wishes." Jacula Prudentum, by George Herbert, ed. 1651, p. 11; Boswell's Life of Johnson, 1876, p. 450, note 5.]
[521] {501}[Compare--
"Not once or twice in our rough Island's story
The path of duty has become the path of glory."
Tennyson's _Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington._]
[522] [John Stuart, Earl of Bute (1713-1792), was Secretary of State March 25, 1761, and Prime Minister May 29, 1762-April, 1763. For the general estimate of the influence which Bute exercised on the young king, see a caricature entitled "The Royal Dupe" (Wright, p. 285), Dict. of Nat. Biog., art. "George III."]
[gt] {502}With blood and debt----.--[MS.]
[gu] A part of that which they held all of old.--[MS. erased]
[523] {503}[George III. resisted Catholic Emancipation in 1795. "The more I reflect on the subject, the more I feel the danger of the proposal."--Letter to Pitt, February 6, 1795. Again, February 1, 1801, "This principle of duty must therefore prevent me from discussing any proposition [to admit 'Catholics and Dissenters to offices, and Catholics to Parliament'] tending to destroy the groundwork [that all who held employments in the State must be members of the Church of England] of our happy constitution." Finally, in 1807, he demanded of ministers "a positive assurance that they would never again propose to him any concession to the Catholics."--See Life of Pitt, by Earl Stanhope, 1879, ii. 434, 461; Dict. of Nat. Biog., art. "George III."]
[gv] Than see this blind old----.--[MS. erased.]
[gw] {504}And interruption of your speech.--[MS. erased.]
[524]
["Which into hollow engines long and round,
Thick-rammed at th' other bore with touch of fire
Dilated and infuriate," etc.
_Paradise Lost_, vi. 484, sq.]
[525] [A gold key is part of the insignia of office of the Lord Chamberlain and other court officials. In Plate 17 of Francis Sandford's History of the Coronation of James the Second, 1687, Henry Mordaunt, Earl of Peterborow, who carries the sceptre of King Edward, is represented with a key hanging from his belt. He was First Groom of the Stole and Gentleman of Bedchamber. The Queen's Vice-chamberlain, who appears in another part of the procession, also carries a key.]
[gx] Stuck in their buttocks----.--[MS. erased.]
[gy] {505}For theirs are honours nobler far than these.--[MS. erased.]
[526] [It is possible that Byron was thinking of Horace Walpole's famous quip, "The summer has set in with its usual severity." But, of course, the meaning is that, owing to excessive and abnormal fogs, the summer gilding might have to be pretermitted.]
[gz] Before they make their journey, ere begin it.--[MS. erased.]
[527] [For the invention of the electric telegraph before the date of this poem, see Sir Francis Ronalds, F. R. S., and his Works in connection with Electric Telegraphy in 1816, by J. Sime, 1893. But the "Telegraph" to which Byron refers was, probably, the semaphore (from London to Portsmouth), which, according to [Sir] John Barrow, the Secretary of the Admiralty, rendered "telegraphs of any kind now wholly unnecessary" (vide ibid., p. 10).]
[528] {506}[Compare, for similarity of sound--
"It plunged and tacked and veered."
_Ancient Mariner_, pt. iii. line 156.]
[ha]
----_No land was ever overflowed_
_By locusts as the Heaven appeared by these_.--[MS. erased.]
[hb] And many-languaged cries were like wild geese.--[Erased.]
[529] [Compare--
"Wherefore with thee
Came not all Hell broke loose?"
_Paradise Lost_, iv. 917, 918.]
[hc] Though the first Hackney will----.--[MS.]
[hd] {507}Ready to swear the cause of all their pain.--[Erased.]
[530] [In the game of ombre the ace of spades, spadille, ranks as the best trump card, and basto, the ace of clubs, ranks as the third best trump card. (For a description of ombre, see Pope's Rape of the Lock, in. 47-64.)]
[531] {508}["'Caitiffs, are ye dumb?' cried the multifaced Demon in anger."
_Vision of Judgement_, v.]
[532]
["Beholding the foremost,
Him by the cast of his eye oblique, I knew as the firebrand
Whom the unthinking populace held for their idol and hero,
Lord of Misrule in his day."
_Ibid._, v.
In Hogarth's caricature (the original pen-and-ink sketch is in the "Rowfant Library:" see Cruikshank's frontispiece to Catalogue, 1886) Wilkes squints more than "a gentleman should squint." The costume--long coat, waistcoat buttoned to the neck, knee-breeches, and stockings--is not unpleasing, but the expression of the face is something between a leer and a sneer. Walpole (Letters, 1858, vii. 274) describes another portrait (by Zoffani) as "a delightful piece of Wilkes looking--no, squinting tenderly at his daughter. It is a caricature of the Devil acknowledging Miss Sin in Milton."]
[533] {509}[For the "Coan" skirts of the First Empire, see the fashion plates and Gillray's and Rowlandson's caricatures passim.]
[he] It shall be me they'll find the trustiest patriot.--[MS. erased.]
[hf] Said Wilkes I've done as much before.--[MS. erased.]
[534] {510}[On his third return to Parliament for Middlesex, October 8, 1774, Wilkes took his seat (December 2) without opposition. In the following February, and on subsequent occasions, he endeavoured to induce the House to rescind the resolutions passed January 19, 1764, under which he had been expelled from Parliament, and named as blasphemous, obscene, etc. Finally, May, 1782, he obtained a substantial majority on a division, and the obnoxious resolutions were ordered to be expunged from the journals of the House.]
[535] [Bute, as leader of the king's party, was an open enemy; Grafton, a half-hearted friend. The duke (1736-1811) would have visited him in the Tower (1763), "to hear from himself his own story and his defence;" but rejected an appeal which Wilkes addressed to him (May 3) to become surety for bail. He feared that such a step might "come under the denomination of an insult on the Crown." A writ of Habeas Corpus (see line 8) was applied for by Lord Temple and others, and, May 6, Wilkes was discharged by Lord Chief Justice Pratt, on the ground of privilege. Three years later (November 1, 1766), on his return from Italy, Wilkes sought to obtain Grafton's protection and interest; but the duke, though he consulted Chatham, and laid Wilkes's letter before the King, decided to "take no notice" of this second appeal. In his Autobiography Grafton is careful to define "the extent of his knowledge" of Mr. Wilkes, and to explain that he was not "one of his intimates"--a caveat which warrants the statement of Junius that "as for Mr. Wilkes, it is, perhaps, the greatest misfortune of his life, that you should have so many compensations to make in the closet for your former friendship with him. Your gracious Master understands your character; and makes you a persecutor because you have been a friend" ("Letter (xii.) to the Duke of Grafton," May 30, 1769).--Memoirs of Augustus Henry, Third Duke of Grafton, by Sir W. Anson, Bart., D.C.L., 1898, pp. 190-197.]
[536] {511}[In 1774 Wilkes was elected Lord Mayor, and in the following spring it fell to his lot to present to the King a remonstrance from the Livery against the continuance of the war with America. Walpole (April 17, 1775, Letters, 1803, vi. 257) says that "he used his triumph with moderation--in modern language with good breeding." The King is said to have been agreeably surprised at his demeanour. In his old age (1790) he voted against the Whigs. A pasquinade, written by Sheridan, Tickell, and Lord John Townshend, anticipated the devil's insinuations--
"Johnny Wilkes, Johnny Wilkes,
Thou greatest of bilks,
How changed are the notes you now sing!
Your famed 'Forty-five'
Is prerogative,
And your blasphemy 'God save the King'!
Johnny Wilkes,
And your blasphemy, 'God save the King '!"
_Wilkes, Sheridan, Fox_, by W. F. Rae, 1874, pp. 132, 133.]
[hg] Where Beelzebub upon duty----.--[MS. erased.]
[537] ["In consequence of Kyd Wake's attack upon the King, two Acts were introduced [the "Treason" and "Sedition Bills," November 6, November 10, 1795], called the Pitt and Grenville Acts, for better securing the King's person "(Diary of H. C. Robinson, 1869, i. 32). "'The first of these bills [The Plot Discovered, etc., by S. T. Coleridge, November 28, 1795, Essays on his own Times, 1850, i. 56] is an attempt to assassinate the liberty of the press; the second to smother the liberty of speech." The "Devil" feared that Wilkes had been "gagged" for good and all.
[538] {512}
["Who might the other be, his comrade in guilt and in suffering,
Brought to the proof like him, and shrinking like him from the trial?
Nameless the Libeller lived, and shot his arrows in darkness;
Undetected he passed to the grave, and leaving behind him
Noxious works on earth, and the pest of an evil example,
Went to the world beyond, where no offences are hidden.
Masked had he been in his life, and now a visor of iron,
Rivetted round his head, had abolished his features for ever.
Speechless the slanderer stood, and turned his face from the Monarch,
Iron-bound as it was ... so insupportably dreadful
Soon or late to conscious guilt is the eye of the injured."
_Vision of Judgement_, v. i]
[hh] Or in the human cholic----.--[MS. erased.]
[hi] Which looked as 'twere a phantom even on earth.--[MS. erased.]
[hj] Now it seemed little, now a little bigger.--[MS. erased.]
[539] {513}[The Letters of Junius have been attributed to more than fifty authors. Among the more famous are the Duke of Portland, Lord George Sackville, Sir Philip Francis, Edmund Burke, John Dunning, Lord Ashburton, John Home Tooke, Hugh Boyd, George Chalmers, etc. Of Junius, Byron wrote, in his Journal of November 23, 1813, "I don't know what to think. Why should Junius be yet dead?.... the man must be alive, and will never die without the disclosure" (Letters, 1893, ii. 334); but an article (by Brougham) in the Edinburgh Review, vol. xxix. p. 94, on The Identity of Junius with a Distinguished Living Character established (see Letters, 1900, iv. 210), seems to have almost persuaded him that "Francis is Junius." (For a résumé of the arguments in favour of the identity of Junius with Francis, see Mr. Leslie Stephen's article in the Dict. of Nat. Biography, art. "Francis." See, too, History of England in the Eighteenth Century, by W. E. H. Lecky, 1887, iii. 233-255. For a series of articles (by W. Fraser Rae) against this theory, see Athenæum, 1888, ii. 192, 258, 319. The question is still being debated. See The Francis Letters, with a note on the Junius Controversy, by C. F. Keary, 1901.)]
[hk] A doctor, a man-midwife----.--[MS. erased.]
[hl] {514}Till curiosity became a task.--[MS. erased.]
[540] [The "Man in the Iron Mask," or, more correctly, the "Man in the Black Velvet Mask," has been identified with Count Ercole Antonio Mattioli, Secretary of State at the Court of Ferdinando Carlo Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua. Mattioli was convicted of high treason, and at the instance of Louis XIV. was seized by the Maréchal Catinat, May 2, 1679, and confined at Pinerolo. He was deported to the Iles Sainte-Marguerite, March 19, 1694, and afterwards transferred to the Bastille, September 18, 1698. He died November 19, 1703. Baron Heiss was the first to solve the mystery. Chambrier, Roux-Fazillac, Delort, G. A. Ellis (see a notice in the Quart. Rev., June, 1826, vol. xxxiv. p. 19), and others take the same view. (See, for confirmation of this theory, an article L'Homme au Masque de Velours Noir, in the Revue Historique, by M. Frantz Funck-Brentano, November, December, 1894, tom. 56, pp. 253-303.)]
[541] [See The Rivals, act iv. sc. II]
[hm] It is that he----.--[MS. erased.]
[542] {515}[The Delta of the Niger is a vast alluvial morass, covered with dense forests of mangrove. "Along the whole coast ... there opens into the Atlantic its successive estuaries, which navigators have scarcely been able to number."]
[543] [The title-page runs thus: "Letters of Junius, Stat Nominis Umbra." That, and nothing more! On the title-page of his copy, across the motto, S. T. Coleridge wrote this sentence, "As he never dropped the mask, so he too often used the poisoned dagger of the assassin."--Miscellanies, etc., by S. T. Coleridge, ed. T. Asle, 1885, p. 341.]
[hn]
_My charge is upon record and will last_
_Longer than will his lamentation_.--[MS. erased.]
[544] {516}[John Horne Tooke (1736-1812), as an opponent of the American War, and as a promoter of the Corresponding Society, etc.; and Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), as the champion of American Independence, would have been cited as witnesses against George III.]
[545] [In the Diable Boiteux (1707) of Le Sage, Don Cleofas, clinging to the cloak of Asmodeus, is carried through the air to the summit of San Salvador. Compare--
"Oh! could Le Sage's demon's gift
Be realiz'd at my desire,
This night my trembling form he'd lift,
To place it on St. Mary's spire."
_Granta, a Medley_, stanza 1., _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 56, note 2.]
[546] ["But what he most detested, what most filled him with disgust, was the settled, determined malignity of a renegado."--Speech of William Smith, M.P., in the House of Commons, March 14, 1817. (See, too, for the use of the word "renegado," Poetical Works, 1900, iii. 488, note i.)]
[547] [For the "weight" of Southey's quartos, compare Byron's note (1) to Hints from Horace, line 657, and a variant of lines 753-756. "Thus let thy ponderous quarto steep and stink" (Poetical Works, 1898, i. 435, 443).]
[ho] {517}And drawing nigh I caught him at a libel.--[MS. erased.]
[548] [Compare--
"But for the children of the 'Mighty Mother's,'
The would-be wits, and can't-be gentlemen,
I leave them to their daily 'tea is ready,'
Smug coterie, and literary lady."
_Beppo_, stanza lxxvi. lines 5-8, _vide ante_, p. 183.]
[hp]
_And scrawls as though he were head clerk to the "Fates,"_
_And this I think is quite enough for one_.--[Erased.]
[549] {518}[Compare--
"One leaf from Southey's laurels may explode
All his combustibles,
'An ass, by God!'"
_A Satire on Satirists, etc._, by W. S. Landor, 1836, p. 22.]
[550] ["There is a chaunt in the recitation both of Coleridge and Wordsworth, which acts as a spell upon the hearers."--Hazlitt's My First Acquaintance with Poets; The Liberal, 1823, ii. 23, 46.]
[551] [Compare the attitude of Minos to the "poet" in Fielding's Journey from This World to the Next: "The poet answered, he believed if Minos had read his works he would set a higher value on them. [The poet had begged for admittance to Elysium on the score of his 'dramatic works.' Minos dismissed the plea, but relented on being informed that he had once lent the whole profits of a benefit-night to a friend.] He was then beginning to repeat, but Minos pushed him forward, and turning his back to him, applied himself to the next passengers."--Novelist's Magazine, 1783, vol. xii. cap. vii. p. 17.]
[552]
[" ... Mediocribus esse poetis
Non homines, non dî, non concessere columnæ."
Horace, _Ars Poetica_, lines 372, 373.]
[553] {519}[For the King's habit of duplicating his phrases, compare--
"Whitbread, is't true? I hear, I hear
You're of an ancient family renowned.
What? what? I'm told that you're a limb
Of Pym, the famous fellow Pym:
What, Whitbread, is it true what people say?
Son of a Roundhead are you? hæ? hæ? hæ?
* * * * *
Thirtieth of January don't you _feed_?
Yes, yes, you eat Calf's head, you eat Calf's head."
_Instructions to a Celebrated Laureat_, Peter Pindar's
_Works_, 1812, i. 493.]
[554] [For Henry James Pye (1745-1813), see English Bards, etc., line 102, Poetical Works, 1898, i. 305, note 1.]
[hq] {520} ----an ill-looking knave.--[MS. erased.]
[555] ["Yesterday, at Holland House, I was introduced to Southey--the best-looking bard I have seen for some time. To have that poet's head and shoulders, I would almost have written his Sapphics. He is certainly a prepossessing person to look on, and a man of talent, and all that, and--there is his eulogy."--Letter to Moore, September 27, 1813, Letters, 1898, ii. 266.
"I have not seen the Liberal," wrote Southey to Wynn, October 26, 1822, "but a Leeds paper has been sent me ... including among its extracts the description and behaviour of a certain 'varlet.' He has not offended me in the way that the pious painter exasperated the Devil" (i.e. by painting him "more ugly than ever:" see Southey's Ballad of the Pious Painter, Works, 1838, vi. 64).]
[hr] {521}He therefore was content to cite a few.--[MS. erased.]
[556] [Southey's "Battle of Blenheim" was published in the Annual Anthology of 1800, pp. 34-37. It is quoted at length, as a republican and seditious poem, in the Preface to an edition of Wat Tyler, published by W. Hone in 1817; and it is also included in an "Appendix" entitled The Stripling Bard, or the Apostate Laureate, affixed to another edition issued in the same year by John Fairburn. The purport and motif of these excellent rhymes is non-patriotic if not Jacobinical, but, for some reason, the poem has been considered improving for the young, and is included in many "Poetry Books" for schools. The Poet's Pilgrimage to Waterloo was published in 1816, not long before the resuscitation of Wat Tyler.]
[557] [Vide ante, p. 482.]
[558] ["He has written Wat Tyler, and taken the office of poet laureate--he has, in the Life of Henry Kirke White (see Byron's note infra), denominated reviewing 'the ungentle craft,' and has become a reviewer--he was one of the projectors of a scheme called 'pantisocracy,' for having all things, including women, in common (query common women?)."--Some Observations upon an Article in Blackwood's Magazine (No. xxix., August, 1819), Letters, 1900 [Appendix IX.], iv. 483. The invention or, possibly, disinterment of this calumny was no doubt a counterblast on Byron's part to the supposed charge of a "league of incest" (at Diodati, in 1816), which he maintained had been disseminated by Coleridge on the authority of Southey (vide ante, p. 475). It is, perhaps, unnecessary to state that before Pantisocracy was imagined or devised, one of the future pantisocrats, Robert Lovell, was married to Mary Fricker; that Robert Southey was engaged to be married to her sister Edith; and that, as a result of the birth and evolution of the scheme, Coleridge became engaged to be married to a third sister, Sarah, hitherto loverless, in order that "every Jack should have his Jill," and the world begin anew in a second Eden across the seas. All things were to be held in common, in order that each man might hold his wife in particular.]
[559] {522}Remains of Henry Kirke White [1808, i. 23]
[560] [Southey's Life of Wesley, and Rise and Progress of Methodism, in two volumes octavo, was published in 1820. In a "Memento" written in a blank leaf of the first volume, Coleridge expressed his desire that his copy should be given to Southey as a bequest. "One or other volume," he writes, "was more often in my hands than any other in my ragged book-regiment ... How many an hour of self-oblivion do I owe to this Life of Wesley!"--Third ed. 1846, i. xv.]
[561] [In his reply to the Preface to Southey's Vision of Judgement, Byron attacked the Laureate as "this arrogant scribbler of all works."]
[hs] Is not unlike it, and is----.--[MS.]
[562] {523}King Alfonso, speaking of the Ptolomean system, said, that "had he been consulted at the creation of the world, he would have spared the Maker some absurdities. [Alphonso X., King of Castile (1221-1284), surnamed the Wise and the Astronomer, "gave no small encouragement to the Jewish rabbis." Under his patronage Judah de Toledo translated the works of Avicenna, and improved them by a new division of the stars. Moreover, "he sent for about 50 learned men from Gascony, Paris, and other places, to translate the tables of Ptolemy, and to compile a more correct set of them (i.e. the famous Tabulæ Alphonsinæ) ... The king himself presided over the assembly."--Mod. Univ. Hist., xiii. 304, 305, note(U).
Alfonso has left behind him the reputation of a Castilian Hamlet--"infinite in faculty," but "unpregnant of his cause." "He was more fit," says Mariana (Hist., lib. xiii. c. 20), "for letters than for the government of his subjects; he studied the heavens and watched the stars, but forgot the earth and lost his kingdom." Nevertheless his works do follow him. "He is to be remembered for his poetry ('Cántigas', chants in honour of the Virgin, and 'Tesoro' a treatise on the philosopher's stone), for his astronomical tables, which all the progress of science have not deprived of their value, and for his great work on legislation, which is at this moment an authority in both hemispheres."--Hist. of Spanish Literature, by G. Ticknor, 1888, i. 7.
Byron got the quip about Alfonso and "the absurdities of creation" from Bayle (Dict., 1735, art. "Castile"), who devotes a long note (H) to a somewhat mischievous apology for the king's apparent profanity. Bayle's immediate authority is Le Bovier de Fontenelle, in his Entretiens sur la Pluralité des Mondes, 1686, p. 38, "L'embaras de tous ces cercles estoit si grand, que dans un temps où l'on ne connoissoit encore rien de meilleur, un roy d'Aragon (sic) grand mathematicien mais apparemment peu devot, disoit que si Dieu l'eust appellé à son conseil quand il fit le Monde, il luy eust donné de bons avis."]
[563] {524}[See Aubrey's account (Miscellanies upon Various Subjects, by John Aubrey, F.R.S., 1857, p. 81) of the apparition which disappeared "with a curious perfume, and most melodious twang;" or see Scott's Antiquary, The Novels, etc., 1851, i. 375.]
[564]
["When I beheld them meet, the desire of my soul o'ercame me,
----I, too, pressed forward to enter--
But the weight of the body withheld me.--I stooped to the fountain.
* * * * *
And my feet methought sunk, and I fell precipitate. Starting,
Then I awoke, and beheld the mountains in twilight before me,
Dark and distinct; and instead of the rapturous sound of hosannahs,
Heard the bell from the tower, Toll! Toll! through the
silence of evening."
_Vision of Judgement_, xii.]
[565] {525}A drowned body lies at the bottom till rotten; it then floats, as most people know. [Byron may, possibly, have heard of the "Floating Island" on Derwentwater.]
[ht] In his own little nook----.--[MS.]
[566]
["Verily, you brache!
The devil turned precisian."
Massinger's _A New Way to Pay Old Debts_, act i. sc. 1]
[hu] ----the light is now withdrawn.--[MS.]
[567] ["Mem. This poem was begun on May 7, 1821, but left off the same day--resumed about the 20th of September of the same year, and concluded as dated."]
POEMS 1816-1823.
POEMS 1816-1823
A VERY MOURNFUL BALLAD[568] ON THE SIEGE AND CONQUEST OF ALHAMA.[569]
Which, in the Arabic language, is to the following purport[570]
1.
The Moorish King rides up and down.
Through Granada's royal town:
From Elvira's gates to those
Of Bivarambla on he goes.
Woe is me, Alhama![hv][571]
2.
Letters to the Monarch tell
How Alhama's city fell:
In the fire the scroll he threw,
And the messenger he slew.
Woe is me, Alhama!
3.
He quits his mule, and mounts his horse,
And through the street directs his course;
Through the street of Zacatin
To the Alhambra spurring in.
Woe is me, Alhama!
4.
When the Alhambra walls he gained,
On the moment he ordained
That the trumpet straight should sound
With the silver clarion round.
Woe is me, Alhama!
5.
And when the hollow drums of war
Beat the loud alarm afar,
That the Moors of town and plain
Might answer to the martial strain.
Woe is me, Alhama!
6.
Then the Moors, by this aware,
That bloody Mars recalled them there,
One by one, and two by two,
To a mighty squadron grew.
Woe is me, Alhama!
7.
Out then spake an aged Moor
In these words the king before,
"Wherefore call on us, oh King?
What may mean this gathering?"
Woe is me, Alhama!
8.
"Friends! ye have, alas! to know
Of a most disastrous blow--
That the Christians, stern and bold,
Have obtained Alhama's hold."
Woe is me, Alhama!
9.
Out then spake old Alfaqui,[572]
With his beard so white to see,
"Good King! thou art justly served,
Good King! this thou hast deserved.
Woe is me, Alhama!
10.
"By thee were slain, in evil hour,
The Abencerrage, Granada's flower;
And strangers were received by thee,
Of Cordova the Chivalry.
Woe is me, Alhama!
11.
"And for this, oh King! is sent
On thee a double chastisement;
Thee and thine, thy crown and realm,
One last wreck shall overwhelm.
Woe is me, Alhama!
12.
"He who holds no laws in awe,
He must perish by the law;
And Granada must be won,
And thyself with her undone."
Woe is me, Alhama!
13.
Fire flashed from out the old Moor's eyes,
The Monarch's wrath began to rise,
Because he answered, and because
He spake exceeding well of laws.[573]
Woe is me, Alhama!
14.
"There is no law to say such things
As may disgust the ear of kings:"--
Thus, snorting with his choler, said
The Moorish King, and doomed him dead.
Woe is me, Alhama!
15.
Moor Alfaqui! Moor Alfaqui![574]
Though thy beard so hoary be,[hw]
The King hath sent to have thee seized,
For Alhama's loss displeased.
Woe is me, Alhama!
16.
And to fix thy head upon
High Alhambra's loftiest stone;
That this for thee should be the law,
And others tremble when they saw.
Woe is me, Alhama!
17.
"Cavalier, and man of worth!
Let these words of mine go forth;
Let the Moorish Monarch know,
That to him I nothing owe.
Woe is me, Alhama!
18.
"But on my soul Alhama weighs,
And on my inmost spirit preys;
And if the King his land hath lost,
Yet others may have lost the most.
Woe is me, Alhama!
19.
"Sires have lost their children, wives
Their lords, and valiant men their lives!
One what best his love might claim
Hath lost, another wealth, or fame.
Woe is me, Alhama!
20.
"I lost a damsel in that hour,
Of all the land the loveliest flower;
Doubloons a hundred I would pay,
And think her ransom cheap that day."
Woe is me, Alhama!
21.
And as these things the old Moor said,
They severed from the trunk his head;
And to the Alhambra's wall with speed
'Twas carried, as the King decreed.
Woe is me, Alhama!
22.
And men and infants therein weep
Their loss, so heavy and so deep;
Granada's ladies, all she rears
Within her walls, burst into tears.
Woe is me, Alhama!
23.
And from the windows o'er the walls
The sable web of mourning falls;
The King weeps as a woman o'er
His loss, for it is much and sore.
Woe is me, Alhama!
[First published, _Childe Harold_, Canto IV., 1818.]
SONETTO DI VITTORELLI.[575]
PER MONACA.
Sonetto composto in nome di un genitore, a cui era motta poco
innanzi una figlia appena maritata: e diretto al genitore della
sacra sposa.
Di due vaghe donzelle, oneste, accorte
Lieti e miseri padri il ciel ne feo,
Il ciel, die degne di più nobil sorte
L' una e l' altra veggendo, ambe chiedeo.
La mia fu tolta da veloce morte
A le fumanti tede d' Imeneo:
La tua, Francesco, in suggellate porte
Eterna prigioniera or si rendeo.
Ma tu almeno potrai dalla gelosa
Irremeabil soglia, ove s' asconde,
La sua tenera udir voce pietosa.
Io verso un flume d' amarissim' onde,
Corro a quel marmo, in cui la figlia or posa:
Batto, e ribatto, ma nessun risponde.
[_Opere Edite e Postume_ di J. Vittorelli, Bassano, 1841, p. 294.]
TRANSLATION FROM VITTORELLI.
ON A NUN.
Sonnet composed in the name of a father, whose daughter had
recently died shortly after her marriage; and addressed to the
father of her who had lately taken the veil.
Of two fair virgins, modest, though admired,
Heaven made us happy; and now, wretched sires,
Heaven for a nobler doom their worth desires,
And gazing upon _either, both_ required.
Mine, while the torch of Hymen newly fired
Becomes extinguished,--soon--too soon expires;
But thine, within the closing grate retired,
Eternal captive, to her God aspires.
But _thou_ at least from out the jealous door,
Which shuts between your never-meeting eyes,
May'st hear her sweet and pious voice once more:
I to the marble, where _my_ daughter lies,
Rush,--the swoln flood of bitterness I pour,
And knock, and knock, and knock--but none replies.
[First published, _Childe Harold_, Canto IV., 1818.]
ON THE BUST OF HELEN BY CANOVA.[576]
In this belovéd marble view
Above the works and thoughts of Man,
What Nature _could_ but _would not_ do,
And Beauty and Canova _can!_
Beyond Imagination's power,
Beyond the Bard's defeated art,
With Immortality her dower,
Behold the _Helen_ of the heart.
_November_ 23, 1816.
[First published, _Letters and Journals_, 1830, ii. 61.]
VENICE. A FRAGMENT.[577]
'Tis midnight--but it is not dark
Within thy spacious place, St. Mark!
The Lights within, the Lamps without,
Shine above the revel rout.
The brazen Steeds are glittering o'er
The holy building's massy door,
Glittering with their collars of gold,
The goodly work of the days of old--
And the wingéd Lion stern and solemn
Frowns from the height of his hoary column,
Facing the palace in which doth lodge
The ocean-city's dreaded Doge.
The palace is proud--but near it lies,
Divided by the "Bridge of Sighs,"
The dreary dwelling where the State
Enchains the captives of their hate:
These--they perish or they pine;
But which their doom may none divine:
Many have passed that Arch of pain,
But none retraced their steps again.
It is a princely colonnade!
And wrought around a princely place,
When that vast edifice displayed
Looks with its venerable face
Over the far and subject sea,
Which makes the fearless isles so free!
And 'tis a strange and noble pile,
Pillared into many an aisle:
Every pillar fair to see,
Marble--jasper--and porphyry--
The Church of St. Mark--which stands hard by
With fretted pinnacles on high,
And Cupola and minaret;
More like the mosque of orient lands,
Than the fanes wherein we pray,
And Mary's blesséd likeness stands.--
Venice, _December_ 6, 1816.
SO WE'LL GO NO MORE A-ROVING.[578]
1.
So we'll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.
2.
For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And Love itself have rest.
3.
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we'll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.
_Feb_. 28, 1817.
[First published, _Letters and Journals_, 1830, ii. 79.]
[LORD BYRON'S VERSES ON SAM ROGERS.][579]
QUESTION.
Nose and Chin that make a knocker,[hx]
Wrinkles that would puzzle Cocker;
Mouth that marks the envious Scorner,
With a Scorpion in each corner
Curling up his tail to sting you,[hy]
In the place that most may wring you;
Eyes of lead-like hue and gummy,
Carcase stolen from some mummy,
Bowels--(but they were forgotten,
Save the Liver, and that's rotten), 10
Skin all sallow, flesh all sodden,
Form the Devil would frighten G--d in.
Is't a Corpse stuck up for show,[580]
Galvanized at times to go?
With the Scripture has't connection,[hz]
New proof of the Resurrection?
Vampire, Ghost, or Goul (_sic_), what is it?
I would walk ten miles to miss it.
ANSWER.
Many passengers arrest one,
To demand the same free question. 20
Shorter's my reply and franker,--
That's the Bard, and Beau, and Banker:
Yet, if you could bring about
Just to turn him inside out,
Satan's self would seem less sooty,
And his present aspect--Beauty.
Mark that (as he masks the bilious)
Air so softly supercilious,
Chastened bow, and mock humility,
Almost sickened to Servility: 30
Hear his tone (which is to talking
That which creeping is to walking--
Now on all fours, now on tiptoe):
Hear the tales he lends his lip to--
Little hints of heavy scandals--
Every friend by turns he handles:
All that women or that men do
Glides forth in an inuendo (_sic_)--
Clothed in odds and ends of humour,
Herald of each paltry rumour-- 40
From divorces down to dresses,
Woman's frailties, Man's excesses:
All that life presents of evil
Make for him a constant revel.
You're his foe--for that he fears you,
And in absence blasts and sears you:
You're his friend--for that he hates you,
First obliges, and then baits you,
Darting on the opportunity
When to do it with impunity: 50
You are neither--then he'll flatter,
Till he finds some trait for satire;
Hunts your weak point out, then shows it,
Where it injures, to expose it
In the mode that's most insidious,
Adding every trait that's hideous--
From the bile, whose blackening river
Rushes through his Stygian liver.
Then he thinks himself a lover--[581]
Why? I really can't discover, 60
In his mind, age, face, or figure;
Viper broth might give him vigour:
Let him keep the cauldron steady,
He the venom has already.
For his faults--he has but _one_;
'Tis but Envy, when all's done:
He but pays the pain he suffers,
Clipping, like a pair of Snuffers,
Light that ought to burn the brighter
For this temporary blighter. 70
He's the Cancer of his Species,
And will eat himself to pieces,--
Plague personified and Famine,--
Devil, whose delight is damning.[582]
For his merits--don't you know 'em?[ia]
Once he wrote a pretty Poem.
1818.
[First published, _Fraser's Magazine_, January, 1833,
vol. vii. pp. 88-84.]
THE DUEL.[583]
1.
'Tis fifty years, and yet their fray
To us might seem but yesterday.
Tis fifty years, and three to boot,
Since, hand to hand, and foot to foot,
And heart to heart, and sword to sword,
One of our Ancestors was gored.
I've seen the sword that slew him;[584] he,
The slain, stood in a like degree
To thee, as he, the Slayer, stood
(Oh had it been but other blood!)
In kin and Chieftainship to me.
Thus came the Heritage to thee.
2.
To me the Lands of him who slew
Came through a line of yore renowned;
For I can boast a race as true
To Monarchs crowned, and some discrowned,
As ever Britain's Annals knew:
For the first Conqueror gave us Ground,[585]
And the last Conquered owned the line
Which was my mother's, and is mine.
3.
I loved thee--I will not say _how_,
Since things like these are best forgot:
Perhaps thou may'st imagine now
Who loved thee, and who loved thee not.
And thou wert wedded to another,[586]
And I at last another wedded:
I am a father, thou a mother,
To Strangers vowed, with strangers bedded.
For land to land, even blood to blood--
Since leagued of yore our fathers were--
Our manors and our birthright stood;
And not unequal had I wooed,
If to have wooed thee I could dare.
But this I never dared--even yet
When naught is left but to forget.
I feel that I could only love:
To sue was never meant for me,
And least of all to sue to thee;
For many a bar, and many a feud,
Though never told, well understood
Rolled like a river wide between--
And then there was the Curse of blood,
Which even my Heart's can not remove.
Alas! how many things have been!
Since we were friends; for I alone
Feel more for thee than can be shown.
4.
How many things! I loved thee--thou
Loved'st me not: another was
The Idol of thy virgin vow,
And I was, what I am, Alas!
And what he is, and what thou art,
And what we were, is like the rest:
We must endure it as a test,
And old Ordeal of the Heart.[587]
Venice, _Dec_. 29, 1818.
STANZAS TO THE PO.[588]
1.
River, that rollest by the ancient walls,
Where dwells the Lady of my love, when she
Walks by thy brink, and there perchance recalls
A faint and fleeting memory of me:
2.
What if thy deep and ample stream should be
A mirror of my heart, where she may read
The thousand thoughts I now betray to thee,
Wild as thy wave, and headlong as thy speed!
3.
What do I say--a mirror of my heart?
Are not thy waters sweeping, dark, and strong?
Such as my feelings were and are, thou art;
And such as thou art were my passions long.
4.
Time may have somewhat tamed them,--not for ever;
Thou overflow'st thy banks, and not for aye
Thy bosom overboils, congenial river!
Thy floods subside, and mine have sunk away:
5.
But left long wrecks behind, and now again,[ib]
Borne in our old unchanged career, we move:
Thou tendest wildly onwards to the main,
And I--to loving _one_ I should not love.
6.
The current I behold will sweep beneath
Her native walls, and murmur at her feet;
Her eyes will look on thee, when she shall breathe
The twilight air, unharmed by summer's heat.
7.
She will look on thee,--I have looked on thee,
Full of that thought: and, from that moment, ne'er
Thy waters could I dream of, name, or see,
Without the inseparable sigh for her!
8.
Her bright eyes will be imaged in thy stream,--
Yes! they will meet the wave I gaze on now:
Mine cannot witness, even in a dream,
That happy wave repass me in its flow!
9.
The wave that bears my tears returns no more:
Will she return by whom that wave shall sweep?--
Both tread thy banks, both wander on thy shore,
I by thy source, she by the dark-blue deep.[ic]
10.
But that which keepeth us apart is not
Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth,
But the distraction of a various lot,
As various as the climates of our birth.
11.
A stranger loves the Lady of the land,[id]
Born far beyond the mountains, but his blood
Is all meridian, as if never fanned
By the black wind that chills the polar flood.[ie]
12.
My blood is all meridian; were it not,
I had not left my clime, nor should I be,[if]
In spite of tortures, ne'er to be forgot,
A slave again of love,--at least of thee.
13.
'Tis vain to struggle--let me perish young--
Live as I lived, and love as I have loved;
To dust if I return, from dust I sprung,
And then, at least, my heart can ne'er be moved.
June, 1819.
[First published, _Conversations of Lord Byron_, 1824, 4º, pp. 24-26.]
SONNET ON THE NUPTIALS OF THE MARQUIS ANTONIO CAVALLI
WITH THE COUNTESS CLELIA RASPONI OF RAVENNA.[589]
A noble Lady of the Italian shore
Lovely and young, herself a happy bride,
Commands a verse, and will not be denied,
From me a wandering Englishman; I tore
One sonnet, but invoke the muse once more
To hail these gentle hearts which Love has tied,
In Youth, Birth, Beauty, genially allied
And blest with Virtue's soul, and Fortune's store.
A sweeter language, and a luckier bard
Were worthier of your hopes, Auspicious Pair!
And of the sanctity of Hymen's shrine,
But,--since I cannot but obey the Fair,
To render your new state your true reward,
May your Fate be like _Hers_, and unlike _mine._
Ravenna, July 31, 1819.
[From an autograph MS. in the possession of the Lady Dorchester, now
for the first time printed.]
SONNET TO THE PRINCE REGENT.[ig]
ON THE REPEAL OF LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD'S FORFEITURE.
To be the father of the fatherless,
To stretch the hand from the throne's height, and raise
_His_ offspring, who expired in other days
To make thy Sire's sway by a kingdom less,--[ih]
_This_ is to be a monarch, and repress
Envy into unutterable praise.
Dismiss thy guard, and trust thee to such traits,
For who would lift a hand, except to bless?[ii]
Were it not easy, Sir, and is't not sweet
To make thyself belovéd? and to be
Omnipotent by Mercy's means? for thus
Thy Sovereignty would grow but more complete,
A despot thou, and yet thy people free,[ij]
And by the heart--not hand--enslaving us.
Bologna, _August_ 12, 1819.[590]
[First published, _Letters and Journals,_ ii. 234, 235.]
STANZAS.[591]
1.
Could Love for ever
Run like a river,
And Time's endeavour
Be tried in vain--
No other pleasure
With this could measure;
And like a treasure[ik]
We'd hug the chain.
But since our sighing
Ends not in dying,
And, formed for flying,
Love plumes his wing;
Then for this reason
Let's love a season;
But let that season be only Spring.
2.
When lovers parted
Feel broken-hearted,
And, all hopes thwarted,
Expect to die;
A few years older,
Ah! how much colder
They might behold her
For whom they sigh!
When linked together,
In every weather,[il]
They pluck Love's feather
From out his wing--
He'll stay for ever,[im]
But sadly shiver
Without his plumage, when past the Spring.[in]
3.
Like Chiefs of Faction,
His life is action--
A formal paction
That curbs his reign,
Obscures his glory,
Despot no more, he
Such territory
Quits with disdain.
Still, still advancing,
With banners glancing,
His power enhancing,
He must move on--
Repose but cloys him,
Retreat destroys him,
Love brooks not a degraded throne.
4.
Wait not, fond lover!
Till years are over,
And then recover
As from a dream.
While each bewailing
The other's failing.
With wrath and railing,
All hideous seem--
While first decreasing,
Yet not quite ceasing,
Wait not till teasing,
All passion blight:
If once diminished
Love's reign is finished--
Then part in friendship,--and bid good-night.[io]
5.
So shall Affection
To recollection
The dear connection
Bring back with joy:
You had not waited[ip]
Till, tired or hated,
Your passions sated
Began to cloy.
Your last embraces
Leave no cold traces--
The same fond faces
As through the past:
And eyes, the mirrors
Of your sweet errors,
Reflect but rapture--not least though last.
6.
True, separations[iq]
Ask more than patience;
What desperations
From such have risen!
But yet remaining,
What is't but chaining
Hearts which, once waning,
Beat 'gainst their prison?
Time can but cloy love,
And use destroy love:
The wingéd boy, Love,
Is but for boys--
You'll find it torture
Though sharper, shorter,
To wean, and not wear out your joys.
_December_ 1, 1819.
[First published, _New Monthly Magazine_, 1832,
vol. xxxv. pp. 310-312.]
ODE TO A LADY WHOSE LOVER WAS KILLED BY A BALL,
WHICH AT THE SAME TIME SHIVERED A PORTRAIT NEXT HIS HEART.
Motto.
_On peut trouver des femmes qui n'ont jamais eu de galanterie, mais
il est rare d'en trouver qui n'en aient jamais eu
qu'une_.--[_Réflexions_ ... du Duc de la Rochefoucauld, No.
lxxiii.]
1.
Lady! in whose heroic port
And Beauty, Victor even of Time,
And haughty lineaments, appear
Much that is awful, more that's dear--
Wherever human hearts resort
_There_ must have been for thee a Court,
And Thou by acclamation Queen,
Where never Sovereign yet had been.
That eye so soft, and yet severe,
Perchance might look on Love as Crime;
And yet--regarding thee more near--
The traces of an unshed tear
Compressed back to the heart,
And mellowed Sadness in thine air,
Which shows that Love hath once been there,
To those who watch thee will disclose
More than ten thousand tomes of woes
Wrung from the vain Romancer's art.
With thee how proudly Love hath dwelt!
His full Divinity was felt,
Maddening the heart he could not melt,
Till Guilt became Sublime;
But never yet did Beauty's Zone
For him surround a lovelier throne,
Than in that bosom once his own:
And he the Sun and Thou the Clime
Together must have made a Heaven
For which the Future would be given.
2.
And thou hast loved--Oh! not in vain!
And not as common Mortals love.
The Fruit of Fire is Ashes,
The Ocean's tempest dashes
Wrecks and the dead upon the rocky shore:
True Passion must the all-searching changes prove,
The Agony of Pleasure and of Pain,
Till Nothing but the Bitterness remain;
And the Heart's Spectre flitting through the brain
Scoffs at the Exorcism which would remove.
3.
And where is He thou lovedst? in the tomb,
Where should the happy Lover be!
For him could Time unfold a brighter doom,
Or offer aught like thee?
He in the thickest battle died,
Where Death is Pride;
And _Thou_ his widow--not his bride,
Wer't not more free--
_Here_ where all love, till Love is made
A bondage or a trade,
_Here_--thou so redolent of Beauty,
In whom Caprice had seemed a duty,
_Thou_, who could'st trample and despise
The holiest chain of human ties
For him, the dear One in thine eyes,
Broke it no more.
Thy heart was withered to it's Core,
It's hopes, it's fears, it's feelings o'er:
Thy Blood grew Ice when _his_ was shed,
And Thou the Vestal of the Dead.
4.
Thy Lover died, as All
Who truly love should die;
For such are worthy in the fight to fall
Triumphantly.
No Cuirass o'er that glowing heart
The deadly bullet turned apart:
Love had bestowed a richer Mail,
Like Thetis on her Son;
But hers at last was vain, and thine could fail--
The hero's and the lover's race was run.
Thy worshipped portrait, thy sweet face,
_Without_ that bosom kept it's place
As Thou _within_.
Oh! enviously destined Ball!
Shivering thine imaged charms and all
Those Charms would win:
Together pierced, the fatal Stroke hath gored
Votary and Shrine, the adoring and the adored.
That Heart's last throb was thine, that blood
Baptized thine Image in it's flood,
And gushing from the fount of Faith
O'erflowed with Passion even in Death,
Constant to thee as in it's hour
Of rapture in the secret bower.
Thou too hast kept thy plight full well,
As many a baffled Heart can tell.
[From an autograph MS. in the possession of Mr. Murray, now for the
first time printed.]
THE IRISH AVATAR.[ir][592]
"And Ireland, like a bastinadoed elephant, kneeling to receive the paltry rider."--[Life of Curran, ii. 336.]
1.
Ere the daughter of Brunswick is cold in her grave,[593]
And her ashes still float to their home o'er the tide,
Lo! George the triumphant speeds over the wave,
To the long-cherished Isle which he loved like his--bride.
2.
True, the great of her bright and brief Era are gone,
The rain-bow-like Epoch where Freedom could pause
For the few little years, out of centuries won,
Which betrayed not, or crushed not, or wept not her cause.
3.
True, the chains of the Catholic clank o'er his rags,
The Castle still stands, and the Senate's no more,
And the Famine which dwelt on her freedomless crags
Is extending its steps to her desolate shore.
4.
To her desolate shore--where the emigrant stands
For a moment to gaze ere he flies from his hearth;
Tears fall on his chain, though it drops from his hands,
For the dungeon he quits is the place of his birth.
5.
But he comes! the Messiah of Royalty comes!
Like a goodly Leviathan rolled from the waves;
Then receive him as best such an advent becomes,[is]
With a legion of cooks,[594] and an army of slaves!
6.
He comes in the promise and bloom of threescore,
To perform in the pageant the Sovereign's part--[it]
But long live the Shamrock, which shadows him o'er!
Could the Green in his _hat_ be transferred to his _heart!_
7.
Could that long-withered spot but be verdant again,
And a new spring of noble affections arise--
Then might Freedom forgive thee this dance in thy chain,
And this shout of thy slavery which saddens the skies.
8.
Is it madness or meanness which clings to thee now?
Were he God--as he is but the commonest clay,
With scarce fewer wrinkles than sins on his brow--
Such servile devotion might shame him away.
9.
Aye, roar in his train![595] let thine orators lash
Their fanciful spirits to pamper his pride--
Not thus did thy Grattan indignantly flash
His soul o'er the freedom implored and denied.
10.
Ever glorious Grattan! the best of the good!
So simple in heart, so sublime in the rest!
With all which Demosthenes wanted endued,
And his rival, or victor, in all he possessed.
11.
Ere Tully arose in the zenith of Rome,
Though unequalled, preceded, the task was begun--
But Grattan sprung up like a god from the tomb
Of ages, the first, last, the saviour, the _one!_[596]
12.
With the skill of an Orpheus to soften the brute;
With the fire of Prometheus to kindle mankind;
Even Tyranny, listening, sate melted or mute,
And Corruption shrunk scorched from the glance of his mind.
13.
But back to our theme! Back to despots and slaves![iu]
Feasts furnished by Famine! rejoicings by Pain!
True Freedom but _welcomes_, while Slavery still _raves_,
When a week's Saturnalia hath loosened her chain.
14.
Let the poor squalid splendour thy wreck can afford,
(As the bankrupt's profusion his ruin would hide)
Gild over the palace, Lo! Erin, thy Lord!
Kiss his foot with thy blessing--his blessings denied![iv]
15.
Or _if_ freedom past hope be extorted at last,[iw]
If the idol of brass find his feet are of clay,
Must what terror or policy wring forth be classed
With what monarchs ne'er give, but as wolves yield their prey?
16.
Each brute hath its nature; a King's is to _reign_,--
To _reign!_ in that word see, ye ages, comprised
The cause of the curses all annals contain,
From Cæsar the dreaded to George the despised!
17.
Wear, Fingal, thy trapping![597] O'Connell, proclaim[ix]
His accomplishments! _His!!!_ and thy country convince
Half an age's contempt was an error of fame,
And that "Hal is the rascaliest, sweetest _young_ prince!"[iy]
18.
Will thy yard of blue riband, poor Fingal, recall
The fetters from millions of Catholic limbs?
Or, has it not bound thee the fastest of all
The slaves, who now hail their betrayer with hymns?
19.
Aye! "Build him a dwelling!" let each give his mite![598]
Till, like Babel, the new royal dome hath arisen![iz]
Let thy beggars and helots their pittance unite--
And a palace bestow for a poor-house and prison!
20.
Spread--spread for Vitellius, the royal repast,
Till the gluttonous despot be stuffed to the gorge!
And the roar of his drunkards proclaim him at last
The Fourth of the fools and oppressors called "George!"
21.
Let the tables be loaded with feasts till they groan!
Till they _groan_ like thy people, through ages of woe!
Let the wine flow around the old Bacchanal's throne,
Like their blood which has flowed, and which yet has to flow.
22.
But let not _his_ name be thine idol alone--
On his right hand behold a Sejanus appears!
Thine own Castlereagh! let him still be thine own!
A wretch never named but with curses and jeers!
23.
Till now, when the Isle which should blush for his birth,
Deep, deep as the gore which he shed on her soil,
Seems proud of the reptile which crawled from her earth,
And for murder repays him with shouts and a smile.[599]
24.
Without one single ray of her genius,--without
The fancy, the manhood, the fire of her race--
The miscreant who well might plunge Erin in doubt[ja]
If _she_ ever gave birth to a being so base.
25.
If she did--let her long-boasted proverb be hushed,
Which proclaims that from Erin no reptile can spring--
See the cold-blooded Serpent, with venom full flushed,
Still warming its folds in the breast of a King![jb]
26.
Shout, drink, feast, and flatter! Oh! Erin, how low
Wert thou sunk by misfortune and tyranny, till
Thy welcome of tyrants hath plunged thee below
The depth of thy deep in a deeper gulf still.
27.
My voice, though but humble, was raised for thy right;[600]
My vote, as a freeman's, still voted thee free;
This hand, though but feeble, would arm in thy fight,[jc]
And this heart, though outworn, had a throb still for _thee!_
28.
Yes, I loved thee and thine, though thou art not my land;[jd]
I have known noble hearts and great souls in thy sons,
And I wept with the world, o'er the patriot band
Who are gone, but I weep them no longer as once.
29.
For happy are they now reposing afar,--
Thy Grattan, thy Curran, thy Sheridan,[601] all
Who, for years, were the chiefs in the eloquent war,
And redeemed, if they have not retarded, thy fall.
30.
Yes, happy are they in their cold English graves!
Their shades cannot start to thy shouts of to-day--
Nor the steps of enslavers and chain-kissing slaves[je]
Be stamped in the turf o'er their fetterless clay.
31.
Till now I had envied thy sons and their shore,
Though their virtues were hunted, their liberties fled;[jf]
There was something so warm and sublime in the core
Of an Irishman's heart, that I envy--thy _dead_.[jg]
32.
Or, if aught in my bosom can quench for an hour
My contempt for a nation so servile, though sore,
Which though trod like the worm will not turn upon power,
'Tis the glory of Grattan, and genius of Moore![jh][602]
Ra. _September_ 16, 1821.
[First published, _Conversations of Lord Byron_, 1824, pp. 331-338.]
STANZAS WRITTEN ON THE ROAD BETWEEN FLORENCE AND PISA.[603]
1.
Oh, talk not to me of a name great in story--
The days of our Youth are the days of our glory;
And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-and-twenty
Are worth all your laurels, though ever so plenty.[604]
2.
What are garlands and crowns to the brow that is wrinkled?
Tis but as a dead flower with May-dew besprinkled:
Then away with all such from the head that is hoary,
What care I for the wreaths that can _only_ give glory?
3.
Oh Fame!--if I e'er took delight in thy praises,
'Twas less for the sake of thy high-sounding phrases,
Than to see the bright eyes of the dear One discover,
She thought that I was not unworthy to love her.
4.
_There_ chiefly I sought thee, _there_ only I found thee;
Her Glance was the best of the rays that surround thee,
When it sparkled o'er aught that was bright in my story,
I knew it was Love, and I felt it was Glory.
_November_ 6, 1821.
[First published, Letters and Journals of Lord Byron, 1830, ii. 366, note.]
STANZAS TO A HINDOO AIR.[605]
1.
Oh! my lonely--lonely--lonely--Pillow!
Where is my lover? where is my lover?
Is it his bark which my dreary dreams discover?
Far--far away! and alone along the billow?
2.
Oh! my lonely--lonely--lonely--Pillow!
Why must my head ache where his gentle brow lay?
How the long night flags lovelessly and slowly,
And my head droops over thee like the willow!
3.
Oh! thou, my sad and solitary Pillow!
Send me kind dreams to keep my heart from breaking,
In return for the tears I shed upon thee waking;
Let me not die till he comes back o'er the billow.
4.
Then if thou wilt--no more my _lonely_ Pillow,
In one embrace let these arms again enfold him,
And then expire of the joy--but to behold him!
Oh! my lone bosom!--oh! my lonely Pillow!
[First published, _Works of Lord Byron_, 1832, xiv. 357.]
TO----[606]
1.
But once I dared to lift my eyes--
To lift my eyes to thee;
And since that day, beneath the skies,
No other sight they see.
2.
In vain sleep shuts them in the night--
The night grows day to me;
Presenting idly to my sight
What still a dream must be.
3.
A fatal dream--for many a bar
Divides thy fate from mine;
And still my passions wake and war,
But peace be still with thine.
[First published, _New Monthly Magazine_, 1833, vol. 37, p. 308.]
TO THE COUNTESS OF BLESSINGTON.
1.
You have asked for a verse:--the request
In a rhymer 'twere strange to deny;
But my Hippocrene was but my breast,
And my feelings (its fountain) are dry.
2.
Were I now as I was, I had sung
What Lawrence has painted so well;[607]
But the strain would expire on my tongue,
And the theme is too soft for my shell.
3.
I am ashes where once I was fire,
And the bard in my bosom is dead;
What I loved I now merely admire,
And my heart is as grey as my head.
4.
My Life is not dated by years--
There are _moments_ which act as a plough,
And there is not a furrow appears
But is deep in my soul as my brow.
5.
Let the young and the brilliant aspire
To sing what I gaze on in vain;
For Sorrow has torn from my lyre
The string which was worthy the strain.
B.
[First published, Letters and Journals, 1830, ii. 635, 636.]
ARISTOMENES.[608]
Canto First.
1.
The Gods of old are silent on the shore.
Since the great Pan expired, and through the roar
Of the Ionian waters broke a dread
Voice which proclaimed "the Mighty Pan is dead."
How much died with him! false or true--the dream
Was beautiful which peopled every stream
With more than finny tenants, and adorned
The woods and waters with coy nymphs that scorned
Pursuing Deities, or in the embrace
Of gods brought forth the high heroic race 10
Whose names are on the hills and o'er the seas.
Cephalonia, _Sept^r^_ 10^th^ 1823.
[From an autograph MS. in the possession of the Lady Dorchester,
now for the first time printed.]
FOOTNOTES:
[568] {529}[Byron does not give his authority for the Spanish original of his Romance Muy Doloroso. In default of any definite information, it may be surmised that his fancy was caught by some broadside or chap-book which chanced to come into his possession, and that he made his translation without troubling himself about the origin or composition of the ballad. As it stands, the "Romance" is a cento of three or more ballads which are included in the Guerras Civiles de Granada of Ginès Perez de Hita, published at Saragossa in 1595 (see ed. "En Alcala de Henares," 1601, pp. 249-252). Stanzas 1-11, "Passeavase el Rey Moro," etc., follow the text which De Hita gives as a translation from the Arabic; stanzas 12-14 are additional, and do not correspond with any of the Spanish originals; stanzas 15-21, with numerous deviations and omissions, follow the text of a second ballad, "Moro Alcayde, Moro Alcayde," described by De Hita as "antiguo Romance," and portions of stanzas 21-23 are imbedded in a ballad entitled "Muerte dada á Los Abencerrajes" (Duran's Romancero General, 1851, ii. 89).
The ballad as a whole was not known to students of Spanish literature previous to the publication of Byron's translation (1818), (see Ancient Ballads from the Civil Wars of Granada, by Thomas Rodd, 1801, pp. 93, 98; Southey's Common-Place Book, iv. 262-266, and his Chronicle of the Cid, 1808, pp. 371-374), and it has not been included by H. Duran in his Romancero General, 1851, ii. 89-91, or by F. Wolf and C. Hofmann in their Primavera y Flor de Romances, 1856, i. 270-278. At the same time, it is most improbable that Byron was his own "Centonista," and it may be assumed that the Spanish text as printed (see Childe Harold, Canto IV., 1818, pp. 240-254, and Poetical Works, 1891, pp. 566, 567) was in his possession or within his reach. (For a correspondence on the subject, see Notes and Queries, Third Series, vol. xii. p. 391, and Fourth Series, vol. i. p. 162.)
A MS. of the Spanish text, sent to England for "copy," is in a foreign handwriting. Two MSS. (A, B) of the translation are in Mr. Murray's possession: A, a rough draft; B, a fair copy. The watermark of A is 1808, of B (dated January 4, 1817) 1800. It is to be noted that the refrain in the Spanish text is Ay de mi Alhama, and that the insertion of the comma is a printer's or reader's error.]
[569] [In A.D. 886, during the reign of Muley Abul Hacen, King of Granada, Albania was surprised and occupied by the Christians under Don Rodrigo Ponce de Leon.]
[570] The effect of the original ballad--which existed both in Spanish and Arabic--was such, that it was forbidden to be sung by the Moors, on pain of death, within Granada. ["This ballad was so dolorous in the original Arabic language, that every time it was sung it acted as an incitement to grief and despair, and for this reason it was at length finally prohibited in Granada."--Historia ... de las Guerras Civiles, translated from the Arabic of Abenhamim, by Ginès Perez de Hita, and from the Spanish by Thomas Rodd, 1803, p. 334. According to Ticknor (Hist. of Spanish Literature, 1888, iii. 139), the "Arabic origin" of De Hita's work is not at all probable. "He may have obtained Arabic materials for parts of his story."]
[hv] Alas--alas--Alhama!--[MS. M.]
[571] [Byron's Ay de mi, Alhama, which should be printed Ay de mi Alhama, must be rendered "Woe for my Alhama!" "Woe is me, Alhama!" is the equivalent of "Ay de mi Alhama!"]
[572] {531}["Un viejo Alfaqui" is "an old Alfaqui," i.e. a doctor of the Mussulman law, not a proper name.]
[573] {532}["De leyes tambien hablava" should be rendered "He spake 'also' of the laws," not tan bien, "so well," or "exceeding well."]
[574] {533}[The Alcaide or "governor" of the original ballad is converted into the Alfaqui of stanza 9. It was the "Alcaide," in whose absence Alhama was taken, and who lost children, wife, honour, and his own head in consequence (Notes and Queries, iv. i. 162).]
[hw] ----so white to see.--[MS. M.]
[575] {535}[Jacopo Vittorelli (1749-1835) was born at Bassano, in Venetian territory. Under the Napoleonic "kingdom of Italy" he held office as a subordinate in the Ministry of Education at Milan, and was elected a member of the college of "Dotti." At a later period of his life he returned to Bassano, and received an appointment as censor of the press. His poetry, which is sweet and musical, but lacking in force and substance, recalls and embodies the style and spirit of the dying literature of the eighteenth century. "He lived and died," says Luigi Carrer, "the poet of Irene and Dori," unmoved by the hopes and fears, the storms and passions, of national change and development.--See Manuale della Letteratura Italiana, by A. d'Ancona and O. Bacci, 1894, iv. 585.]
[576] {536}["The Helen of Canova (a bust which is in the house of Madame the Countess d'Albrizzi, whom I know) is without exception, to my mind, the most perfectly beautiful of human conceptions, and far beyond my ideas of human execution,"--Letter to Murray, November 25, 1816. In the works of Antonio Canova, engraved in outline by Henry Moses (London, 1873), the bust of Helen is figured (to face p. 58), and it is stated that it was executed in 1814, and presented to the Countess Albrizzi. (See Letters, 1900, iv. 14, 15, note.)]
[577] {537}[From an autograph MS. in the possession of Mr. Murray, now for the first time printed.]
[578] {538}["The mumming closed with a masked ball at the Fenice, where I went, as also to most of the ridottos, etc., etc.; and, though I did not dissipate much upon the whole, yet I find 'the sword wearing out the scabbard,' though I have but just turned the corner of twenty-nine."--Letter to Moore, February 28, 1817. The verses form part of the letter. (See Letters, 1900, iv. 59, 60.)]
[579] [Lady Blessington told Crabb Robinson (Diary, 1869, in. 17) that the publication of the Question and Answer would "kill Rogers." The MS. is dated 1818, and it is probable that the lines were written in the early spring of that year. Moore or Murray had told Byron that Rogers was in doubt whether to praise or blame him in his poem on "Human Life" now approaching completion; and he had heard, from other sources, that it was Rogers who was the author or retailer of certain scandalous stories which were current in the "whispering-gallery of the world." He had reason to believe that everybody was talking about him, and it was a relief to be able to catch and punish so eminent a scandal-monger. It was in this spirit that he wrote to Murray (February 20, 1818), "What you tell me of Rogers, ... is like him. He cannot say that I have not been a sincere and warm friend to him, till the black drop of his liver oozed through too palpably to be overlooked. Now if I once catch him at any of his jugglery with me or mine, let him look to it," etc., etc., and in all probability the "poem on Rogers" was then in existence, or was working in his brain. The lines once written, Byron swallowed his venom, and, when Rogers visited Italy in the autumn of 1821, he met him at Bologna, travelled with him across the Apennines to Florence, and invited him "to stay as long as he liked" at Pisa. Thither Rogers came, presumably, in November, 1821, and, if we may trust the Table Talk (1856, p. 238), remained at the Palazzo Lanfranchi for several days.
Byron seems to have been more than usually provocative and cross-grained, and, on one occasion (see Medwin, Angler in Wales, 1834, i. 26, sq.; and Records of Shelley, etc., by E. T. Trelawney, 1878, i. 53), when he was playing billiards, and Rogers was in the lobby outside, secretly incited his bull-dog, "Faithful Moretto," to bark and show his teeth; and, when Medwin had convoyed the terror-stricken bard into his presence, greeted him with effusion, but contrived that he should sit down on the very sofa which hid from view the MS. of "Question and Answer." Longa est injuria, longæ ambages; but the story rests on the evidence of independent witnesses.
By far the best comment on satire and satirist is to be found in the noble lines in Italy, in which Rogers commemorates his last meeting with the "Youth who swam from Sestos to Abydos"--
"If imagined wrongs
Pursued thee, urging thee sometimes to do
Things long regretted, oft, as many know,
None more than I, thy gratitude would build
On slight foundations; and, if in thy life
Not happy, in thy death thou surely wert,
Thy wish accomplished."
_Poems_ by Samuel Rogers, 1852, ii. 119.]
[hx] ----would shame a knocker.--[Fraser's Magazine, 1833.]
[hy] {539}Turning its quick tail----.--[Fraser's, etc.]
[580] {540}["'De mortuis nihil nisi bonum!' There is Sam Rogers [No. IV. of the Maclise Caricatures] a mortal likeness--painted to the very death!" A string of jests upon Rogers's corpse-like appearance accompanied the portrait.]
[hz] With the Scripture in connexion.--[Fraser's, etc.]
[581] {541}[Among other "bogus" notes (parodies of the notes in Murray's new edition of Byron's Works in seventeen volumes), is one signed Sir E. Brydges, which enumerates a string of heiresses, beauties, and blues, whom Rogers had wooed in vain. Among the number are Mrs. Apreece (Lady Davy), Mrs. Coutts, "beat by the Duke of St. Albans," and the Princess Olive of Cumberland. "We have heard," the note concludes, "that he proposed for the Duchess of Cleveland, and was cut out by Beau Fielding, but we think that must have been before his time a little."]
[582] {542}["If 'the person' had not by many little dirty sneaking traits provoked it, I should have been silent, though I had observed him. Here follows an alteration. Put--
"Devil with such delight in damning
That if at the resurrection
Unto him the free selection
Of his future could be given
'Twould be rather Hell than Heaven.
You have a discretionary power about showing."--Letter to Murray, November 9, 1820, Letters, 1901, v. 113.]
[ia] ----would you know 'em?--[Fraser's, etc.]
[583] [Addressed to Miss Chaworth, in allusion to a duel fought between two of their ancestors, D[ominus] B[yron] and Mr. C., January 26, 1765.
Byron and Mary Anne Chaworth were fourth cousins, both being fifth in descent from George, Viscount Chaworth, whose daughter Elizabeth was married to William, third Lord Byron (d. 1695), the poet's great-great-grandfather. The duel between their grand-uncles, William, fifth Lord Byron, and William Chaworth, Esq., of Annesley, was fought between eight and nine o'clock in the evening of Saturday, January 26, 1765 (see The Gazetteer, Monday, January 28, 1765), at the Star and Garter Tavern, Pall Mall. The coroner's jury brought in a verdict of wilful murder (see for the "Inquisition," and report of trial, Journals of the House of Lords, 1765, pp. 49, 126-135), and on the presentation of their testimony to the House of Lords, Byron pleaded for a trial "by God and his peers," whereupon he was arrested and sent to the Tower. The case was tried by the Lords Temporal (the Lords Spiritual asked permission to withdraw), and, after a defence had been read by the prisoner, 119 peers brought in a verdict of "Not guilty of murder, guilty of manslaughter, on my honour." Four peers only returned a verdict of "Not guilty." The result of this verdict was that Lord Byron claimed the benefit of the statute of Edward VI., and was discharged on paying the fees.
The defence, which is given in full (see Journal, etc., for April 17, 1765), is able and convincing. Whilst maintaining an air of chivalry and candour, the accused contrived to throw the onus of criminality on his antagonist. It was Mr. Chaworth who began the quarrel, by sneering at his cousin's absurd and disastrous leniency towards poachers. It was Chaworth who insisted on an interview, not on the stairs, but in a private room, who locked the door, and whose demeanour made a challenge "to draw" inevitable. The room was dimly lit, and when the table was pushed back, the space for the combatants was but twelve feet by five. After two thrusts had been parried, and Lord Byron's shirt had been torn, he shifted a little to the right, to take advantage of such light as there was, came to close quarters with his adversary and, "as he supposed, gave the unlucky wound which he would ever reflect upon with the utmost regret."
If there was any truth in his plea, the "wicked Lord Byron" has been misjudged, and, at least in the matter of the duel, was not so black as he has been painted. For Byron's defence of his grand-uncle, see letter to M. J. J. Coulmann, Genoa, July 12, 1823, Life, by Karl Elze, 1872, pp. 443-446.]
[584] {543}[In the coroner's "Inquisition," the sword is described as being "made of iron and steel, of the value of five shillings." Byron says that "so far from feeling any remorse for having killed Mr. Chaworth, who was a fire-eater (spadassin), ... he always kept the sword ... in his bed-chamber, where it still was when he died."--Ibid., p. 445.]
[585] [Ralph de Burun held Horestan Castle and other manors from the Conqueror. Byron's mother was descended from James I. of Scotland.]
[586] {544}[See The Dream, line 127, et passim, vide ante, p. 31, et sq.]
[587] [From an autograph MS. in the possession of Mr. Murray, now for the first time printed.]
[588] {545} [There has been some misunderstanding with regard to this poem. According to the statement of the Countess Guiccioli (see Works of Lord Byron, ed. 1832, xii. 14), "Stanzas to the Po" were composed about the middle of April, 1819, "while Lord Byron was actually sailing on the Po," en route from Venice to Ravenna. Medwin, who was the first to publish the lines (Conversations, etc., 1824, 410, pp. 24-26), says that they were written when Byron was about to "quit Venice to join" the Countess at Ravenna, and, in a footnote, explains that the river referred to is the Po. Now, if the Countess and Medwin (and Moore, who follows Medwin, Life, p. 396) are right, and the river is the Po, the "ancient walls" Ravenna, and the "Lady of the land" the Guiccioli, the stanzas may have been written in June (not April), 1819, possibly at Ferrara, and the river must be the Po di Primaro. Even so, the first line of the first stanza and the third and fourth lines of the ninth stanza require explanation. The Po does not "roll by the ancient walls" of Ravenna; and how could Byron be at one and the same time "by the source" (stanza 9, line 4), and sailing on the river, or on some canalized tributary or effluent? Be the explanation what it may--and it is possible that the lines were not originally designed for the Countess, but for another "Lady of the land" (see letter to Murray, May 18, 1819)--it may be surmised that "the lines written last year on crossing the Po," the "mere verses of society," which were given to Kinnaird (see letter to Murray, May 8, 1820, and Conversations of Lord Byron with Lady Blessington, 1834, p. 143), were not the sombre though passionate elegy, "River, that rollest," but the bitter and somewhat cynical rhymes, "Could Love for ever, Run like a river" (vide post, p. 549).]
[ib] {546}
_But left long wrecks behind them, and again_.
_Borne on our old unchanged career, we move;_
_Thou tendest wildly onward to the main_.--[Medwin.]
[ic] I near thy source----.--[Medwin.]
[id] {547}A stranger loves a lady----.--[Medwin.]
[ie] By the bleak wind----.--[Medwin.]
[if] I had not left my clime;--I shall not be.--[Medwin.]
[589] I wrote this sonnet (after tearing the first) on being repeatedly urged to do so by the Countess G. [It was at the house of the Marquis Cavalli, uncle to the countess, that Byron appeared in the part of a fully-recognized "Cicisbeo."--See letter to Hoppner, December 31, 1819, Letters, 1900, iv. 393.]
[ig] {548}To the Prince Regent on the repeal of the bill of attainder against Lord E. Fitzgerald, June, 1819.
[ih] To leave----.--[MS. M.]
[ii] Who NOW would lift a hand----.--[MS. M.]
[ij]
----_becomes but more complete_
_Thyself a despot_----.--[MS. M.]
[590] ["So the prince has been repealing Lord Fitzgerald's forfeiture? Ecco un' Sonetto! There, you dogs! there's a Sonnet for you: you won't have such as that in a hurry from Mr. Fitzgerald. You may publish it with my name, an ye wool. He deserves all praise, bad and good; it was a very noble piece of principality."--Letter to Murray, August 12, 1819.
For [William Thomas] Fitgerald, see Poetical Works, 1898, i. 297, note 3; for Lord Edward Fitzgerald (1763-1798), see Letters, 1900, iv. 345, note 1. The royal assent was given to a bill for "restoring Edward Fox Fitzgerald and his sisters Pamela and Lucy to their blood," July 13, 1819. The sonnet was addressed to George IV. when Prince Regent. The title, "To George the Fourth," affixed in 1831, is incorrect.]
[591] {549}["A friend of Lord Byron's, who was with him at Ravenna when he wrote these stanzas, says, They were composed, like many others, with no view of publication, but merely to relieve himself in a moment of suffering. He had been painfully excited by some circumstances which appeared to make it necessary that he should immediately quit Italy; and in the day and the hour that he wrote the song was labouring under an access of fever" (Works, 1832, xii. 317, note 1). Here, too, there is some confusion of dates and places. Byron was at Venice, not at Ravenna, December 1, 1819, when these lines were composed. They were sent, as Lady Blessington testifies, to Kinnaird, and are probably identical with the "mere verses of society," mentioned in the letter to Murray of May 8, 1820. The last stanza reflects the mood of a letter to the Countess Guiccioli, dated November 25 (1819), "I go to save you, and leave a country insupportable to me without you" (Letters, 1900, iv. 379, note 2).]
[ik] And as a treasure.--[MS. Guiccioli.]
[il] {550}
_Through every weather_
_We pluck_.--[MS. G.]
[im]
_He'll sadly shiver_
_And droop for ever,_
_Shorn of the plumage which sped his spring_.--[MS. G.]
[in] ----that sped his Spring.--[MS. G.]
[io] {551}
_His reign is finished_
_One last embrace, then, and bid good-night_.--[MS. G.]
[ip]
_You have not waited_
_Till tired and hated_
_All passions sated_.--[MS. G.]
[iq] {552}True separations.--[MS. G.]
[ir] {555}The enclosed lines, as you will directly perceive, are written by the Rev. W. L. Bowles. Of course it is for him to deny them, if they are not.--[Letter to Moore, September 17, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 364.]
[592] [A few days before Byron enclosed these lines in a letter to Moore (September 17, 1821) he had written to Murray (September 12): "If ever I do return to England ... I will write a poem to which English Bards, etc., shall be New Milk, in comparison. Your present literary world of mountebanks stands in need of such an Avatar." Hence the somewhat ambiguous title. The word "Avatar" is not only applied ironically to George IV. as the "Messiah of Royalty," but metaphorically to the poem, which would descend in the "Capacity of Preserver" (see Sir W. Jones, Asiatic Research, i. 234).
The "fury" which sent Byron into this "lawless conscription of rhythmus," was inspired partly by an ungenerous attack on Moore, which appeared in the pages of John Bull ("Thomas Moore is not likely to fall in the way of knighthood ... being public defaulter in his office to a large amount.... [August 5]. It is true that we cannot from principle esteem the writer of the Twopenny Postbag.... It is equally true that we shrink from the profligacy," etc., August 12, 1821); and, partly, by the servility of the Irish, who had welcomed George IV. with an outburst of enthusiastic loyalty, when he entered Dublin in triumph within ten days of the death of Queen Caroline. The Morning Chronicle, August 8-August 18, 1821, prints effusive leading articles, edged with black borders, on the Queen's illness, death, funeral procession, etc., over against a column (in small type) headed "The King in Dublin." Byron's satire is a running comment on the pages of the Morning Chronicle. Moore was in Paris at the time, being, as John Bull said, "obliged to live out of England," and Byron gave him directions that twenty copies of the Irish Avatar "should be carefully and privately printed off." Medwin says that Byron gave him "a printed copy," but his version (see Conversations, 1824, pp. 332-338), doubtless for prudential reasons, omits twelve of the more libellous stanzas. The poem as a whole was not published in England till 1831, when "George the despised" was gone to his account. According to Crabb Robinson (Diary, 1869, ii. 437), Goethe said that "Byron's verses on George IV. (Query? The Irish Avatar) were the sublime of hatred."]
[593] {556}[The Queen died on the night (10.20 p.m.) of Tuesday, August 7. The King entered Dublin in state Friday, August 17. The vessel bearing the Queen's remains sailed from Harwich on the morning of Saturday, August 18, 1821.]
[is] ----such a hero becomes.--[MS. M.]
[594] ["Seven covered waggons arrived at the Castle (August 3). They were laden with plate.... Upwards of forty men cooks will be employed."--Morning Chronicle, August 8.]
[it] {557}To enact in the pageant----.-[MS. M.]
[595] ["Never did I witness such enthusiasm.... Cheer followed cheer--and shout followed shout ... accompanied by exclamation of 'God bless King George IV.!' 'Welcome, welcome, ten thousand times to these shores!'"--Morning Chronicle, August 16.]
[596] {558}["After the stanza on Grattan, ... will it please you to cause insert the following Addenda, which I dreamed of during to-day's Siesta."--Letter to Moore, September 20, 1821.]
[iu] Aye! back to our theme----.--[Medwin]
[iv] Kiss his foot, with thy blessing, for blessings denied!--[Medwin.]
[iw] Or if freedom----.--[Medwin.]
[597] {559}["The Earl of Fingall (Arthur James Plunkett, K.P., eighth earl, d. 1836), the leading Catholic nobleman, is to be created a Knight of St. Patrick."--Morning Chronicle, August 18.]
[ix] Wear Fingal thy ribbon----.--[MS. M.]
[iy] And the King is no scoundrel--whatever the Prince.--[MS. M.]
[598] [There was talk of a testimonial being presented to the King. O'Connell suggested that if possible it should take the form of "a palace, to which not only the rank around him could contribute, but to the erection of which every peasant could from his cottage contribute his humble mite."--Morning Chronicle, August 18.]
[iz] Till proudly the new----.--[MS. M.]
[599] {560}["The Marquis of Londonderry was cheered in the Castle-yard." "He was," says the correspondent of the Morning Chronicle, "the instrument of Ireland's degradation--he broke down her spirit, and prostrated, I fear, for ever her independence. To see the author of this measure cheered near the very spot," etc.]
[ja] ----might make Humanity doubt.--[MS. M.]
[jb] ----in the heart of a king.--[Medwin. MS. M. erased.]
[600] {561}[Byron spoke and voted in favour of the Earl of Donoughmore's motion for a Committee on the Roman Catholic claims, April 21, 1812. (See "Parliamentary Speeches," Appendix II., Letters, 1898, ii. 431-443.)]
[jc] My arm, though but feeble----.--[Medwin.]
[jd] ----though thou wert not my land.--[Medwin.]
[601] [For Grattan and Curran, see letter to Moore, October 2, 1813, Letters, 1898, ii. 271, note 1; for Sheridan, see "Introduction to Monody," etc., ante, pp. 69, 70.]
[je]
_Nor the steps of enslavers, and slave-kissing slaves_
_Be damp'd in the turf_----.--[Medwin.]
[jf] Though their virtues are blunted----.--[Medwin.]
[jg] {562} ----that I envy their dead.--[Medwin.]
[jh] They're the heart--the free spirit--the genius of Moore.--[MS. M.]
[602] ["Signed W. L. B----, M.A., and written with a view to a Bishoprick."--Letters and Journals, 1830, ii. 527, note.
Endorsed, "MS. Lord Byron. The King's visit to Ireland; a very seditious and horrible libel, which never was intended to be published, and which Lord B. called, himself, silly, being written in a moment of ill nature.--C. B."]
[603] ["I composed these stanzas (except the fourth, added now) a few days ago, on the road from Florence to Pisa."--Pisa, 6th November, 1821, Detached Thoughts, No. 118, Letters, 1901, v. 466.]
[604] ["I told Byron that his poetical sentiments of the attractions of matured beauty had, at the moment, suggested four lines to me; which he begged me to repeat, and he laughed not a little when I recited the following lines to him:--
"Oh! talk not to me of the charms of Youth's dimples,
There's surely more sentiment center'd in wrinkles.
They're the triumphs of Time that mark Beauty's decay,
Telling tales of years past, and the few left to stay."
_Conversations of Lord Byron_, 1834, pp. 255, 256.]
[605] [These verses were written by Lord Byron a little before he left Italy for Greece. They were meant to suit the Hindostanee air, "Alia Malla Punca," which the Countess Guiccioli was fond of singing.--Editor's note, Works, etc., xiv. 357, Pisa, September, 1821.]
[606] {564}[Probably "To Lady Blessington," who includes them in her Conversations of Lord Byron.]
[607] {565}[For reproduction of Lawrence's portrait of Lady Blessington, see "List of Illustrations," Letters, 1901, v. [xv.].]
[608] {566}[Aristomenes, the Achilles of the Alexandrian poet Rhianus (Grote's History of Greece, 1869, ii. 428), is the legendary hero of the second Messenian War (B.C. 685-668). Thrice he slew a hundred of the Spartan foe, and thrice he offered the Hekatomphonia on Mount Ithome. His name was held in honour long after "the rowers on their benches" heard the wail, "Pan, Pan is dead!" At the close of the second century of the Christian era, Pausanias (iv. 16. 4) made a note of Messenian maidens hymning his victory over the Lacedæmonians--
"From the heart of the plain he drove them,
And he drove them back to the hill:
To the top of the hill he drove them,
As he followed them, followed them still!"
Byron was familiar with Thomas Taylor's translation of the Periegesis Græciæ (vide ante, p. 109, and "Observations," etc., Letters, v. Appendix III. p. 574), and with Mitford's Greece (Don Juan, Canto XII. stanza xix. line 7). Hence his knowledge of Aristomenes. The thought expressed in lines 5-11 was, possibly, suggested by Coleridge's translation of the famous passage in Schiller's Piccolomini (act ii. sc. 4, lines 118, sq., "For fable is Love's world, his home," etc.), which is quoted by Sir Walter Scott, in the third chapter of Guy Mannering.]
THE BLUES:
A LITERARY ECLOGUE.
"Nimium ne crede colori."--Virgil, [_Ecl_. ii. 17]
O trust not, ye beautiful creatures, to hue, Though your hair were as red, as your stockings are blue.
INTRODUCTION TO _THE BLUES_.
Byron's correspondence does not explain the mood in which he wrote The Blues, or afford the slightest hint or clue to its motif or occasion. In a letter to Murray, dated Ravenna, August 7, 1821, he writes, "I send you a thing which I scribbled off yesterday, a mere buffoonery, to quiz 'The Blues.' If published it must be anonymously.... You may send me a proof if you think it worth the trouble." Six weeks later, September 20, he had changed his mind. "You need not," he says, "send The Blues, which is a mere buffoonery not meant for publication." With these intimations our knowledge ends, and there is nothing to show why in August, 1821, he took it into his head "to quiz The Blues," or why, being so minded, he thought it worth while to quiz them in so pointless and belated a fashion. We can but guess that an allusion in a letter from England, an incident at a conversazione at Ravenna, or perhaps the dialogues in Peacock's novels, Melincourt and Nightmare Abbey, brought to his recollection the half-modish, half-literary coteries of the earlier years of the Regency, and that he sketches the scenes and persons of his eclogue not from life, but from memory.
In the Diary of 1813, 1814, there is more than one mention of the "Blues." For instance, November 27, 1813, he writes, "Sotheby is a Littérateur, the oracle of the Coteries of the * *'s, Lydia White (Sydney Smith's 'Tory Virgin'), Mrs. Wilmot (she, at least, is a swan, and might frequent a purer stream), Lady Beaumont and all the Blues, with Lady Charlemont at their head." Again on December 1, "To-morrow there is a party purple at the 'blue' Miss Berry's. Shall I go? um!--I don't much affect your blue-bottles;--but one ought to be civil.... Perhaps that blue-winged Kashmirian butterfly of book-learning Lady Charlemont will be there" (see Letters, 1898, ii. 333, 358, note 2).
Byron was, perhaps, a more willing guest at literary entertainments than he professed to be. "I met him," says Sir Walter Scott (Memoirs of the Life, etc., 1838, ii. 167), "frequently in society.... Some very agreeable parties I can recollect, particularly one at Sir George Beaumont's, where the amiable landlord had assembled some persons distinguished for talent. Of these I need only mention the late Sir Humphry Davy.... Mr. Richard Sharpe and Mr. Rogers were also present."
Again, Miss Berry, in her Journal (1866, in. 49) records, May 8, 1815, that "Lord and Lady Byron persuaded me to go with them to Miss [Lydia] White (vide post, p. 587). Never have I seen a more imposing convocation of ladies arranged in a circle than when we entered ... Lord Byron brought me home. He stayed to supper." If he did not affect "your blue-bottles," he was on intimate terms with Madame de Staël, "the Begum of Literature," as Moore called her; with the Contessa d'Albrizzi (the De Staël of Italy); with Mrs. Wilmot, the inspirer of "She walks in beauty like the night;" with Mrs. Shelley; with Lady Blessington. Moreover, to say nothing of his "mathematical wife," who was as "blue as ether," the Countess Guiccioli could not only read and "inwardly digest" Corinna (see letter to Moore, January 2, 1820), but knew the Divina Commedia by heart, and was a critic as well as an inspirer of her lover's poetry.
If it is difficult to assign a reason or occasion for the composition of The Blues, it is a harder, perhaps an impossible, task to identify all the dramatis personæ. Botherby, Lady Bluemount, and Miss Diddle are, obviously, Sotheby, Lady Beaumont, and Lydia White. Scamp the Lecturer may be Hazlitt, who had incurred Byron's displeasure by commenting on his various and varying estimates of Napoleon (see Lectures on the English Poets, 1818, p. 304, and Don Juan, Canto 1. stanza ii. line 7, note to Buonaparte). Inkel seems to be meant for Byron himself, and Tracy, a friend, not a Lake poet, for Moore. Sir Richard and Lady Bluebottle may possibly symbolize Lord and Lady Holland; and Miss Lilac is, certainly, Miss Milbanke, the "Annabella" of Byron's courtship, not the "moral Clytemnestra" of his marriage and separation.
The Blues was published anonymously in the third number of the Liberal, which appeared April 26, 1823. The "Eclogue" was not attributed to Byron, and met with greater contempt than it deserved. In the Noctes Ambrosiance (Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, May, 1823, vol. xiii. p. 607), the third number of the Liberal is dismissed with the remark, "The last Number contains not one line of Byron's! Thank God! he has seen his error, and kicked them out." Brief but contemptuous notices appeared in the Literary Chronicle, April 26, and the Literary Gazette, May 3, 1823; while a short-lived periodical, named the Literary Register (May 3, quoted at length in John Bull, May 4, 1823), implies that the author (i.e. Leigh Hunt) would be better qualified to "catch the manners" of Lisson Grove than of May Fair. It is possible that this was the "last straw," and that the reception of The Blues hastened Byron's determination to part company with the profitless and ill-omened Liberal.
THE BLUES:[609]
A LITERARY ECLOGUE.
ECLOGUE THE FIRST.
_London.--Before the Door of a Lecture Room_.
_Enter_ TRACY, _meeting_ INKEL.
_Ink_. You're too late.
_Tra_. Is it over?
_Ink_. Nor will be this hour.
But the benches are crammed, like a garden in flower.
With the pride of our belles, who have made it the fashion;
So, instead of "beaux arts," we may say "la _belle_ passion"
For learning, which lately has taken the lead in
The world, and set all the fine gentlemen reading.
_Tra_. I know it too well, and have worn out my patience
With studying to study your new publications.
There's Vamp, Scamp, and Mouthy, and Wordswords and Co.[610]
With their damnable----
_Ink_. Hold, my good friend, do you know 10
Whom you speak to?
_Tra_. Right well, boy, and so does "the Row:"[611]
You're an author--a poet--
_Ink_. And think you that I
Can stand tamely in silence, to hear you decry
The Muses?
_Tra_. Excuse me: I meant no offence
To the Nine; though the number who make some pretence
To their favours is such----but the subject to drop,
I am just piping hot from a publisher's shop,
(Next door to the pastry-cook's; so that when I
Cannot find the new volume I wanted to buy
On the bibliopole's shelves, it is only two paces, 20
As one finds every author in one of those places:)
Where I just had been skimming a charming critique,
So studded with wit, and so sprinkled with Greek!
Where your friend--you know who--has just got such a threshing,
That it is, as the phrase goes, extremely "_refreshing._"[612]
What a beautiful word!
_Ink_. Very true; 'tis so soft
And so cooling--they use it a little too oft;
And the papers have got it at last--but no matter.
So they've cut up our friend then?
_Tra_. Not left him a tatter--
Not a rag of his present or past reputation, 30
Which they call a disgrace to the age, and the nation.
_Ink_. I'm sorry to hear this! for friendship, you know--
Our poor friend!--but I thought it would terminate so.
Our friendship is such, I'll read nothing to shock it.
You don't happen to have the Review in your pocket?
_Tra_. No; I left a round dozen of authors and others
(Very sorry, no doubt, since the cause is a brother's)
All scrambling and jostling, like so many imps,
And on fire with impatience to get the next glimpse.
_Ink_. Let us join them.
_Tra_. What, won't you return to the lecture? 40
_Ink_. Why the place is so crammed, there's not room for a spectre.
Besides, our friend Scamp is to-day so absurd--[613]
_Tra_. How can you know that till you hear him?
_Ink_. I heard
Quite enough; and, to tell you the truth, my retreat
Was from his vile nonsense, no less than the heat.
_Tra_. I have had no great loss then?
_Ink_. Loss!--such a palaver!
I'd inoculate sooner my wife with the slaver
Of a dog when gone rabid, than listen two hours
To the torrent of trash which around him he pours,
Pumped up with such effort, disgorged with such labour, 50
That----come--do not make me speak ill of one's neighbour.
_Tra_. _I_ make you!
_Ink_. Yes, you! I said nothing until
You compelled me, by speaking the truth----
_Tra_. _To speak ill?_
Is that your deduction?
_Ink_. When speaking of Scamp ill,
I certainly _follow, not set_ an example.
The fellow's a fool, an impostor, a zany.
_Tra_. And the crowd of to-day shows that one fool makes many.
But we two will be wise.
_Ink_. Pray, then, let us retire.
_Tra_. I would, but----
_Ink_. There must be attraction much higher
Than Scamp, or the Jew's harp he nicknames his lyre, 60
To call you to this hotbed.
_Tra_. I own it--'tis true--
A fair lady----
_Ink_. A spinster?
_Tra_. Miss Lilac.
_Ink_. The Blue!
_Tra_. The heiress! The angel!
_Ink_. The devil! why, man,
Pray get out of this hobble as fast as you can.
_You_ wed with Miss Lilac! 'twould be your perdition:
She's a poet, a chymist, a mathematician.[614]
_Tra_. I say she's an angel.
_Ink_. Say rather an angle.
If you and she marry, you'll certainly wrangle.
I say she's a Blue, man, as blue as the ether.
_Tra_. And is that any cause for not coming together? 70
_Ink_. Humph! I can't say I know any happy alliance
Which has lately sprung up from a wedlock with science.
She's so learnéd in all things, and fond of concerning
Herself in all matters connected with learning,
That----
_Tra_. What?
_Ink_. I perhaps may as well hold my tongue;
But there's five hundred people can tell you you're
wrong.
_Tra_. You forget Lady Lilac's as rich as a Jew.
_Ink_. Is it miss or the cash of mamma you pursue?
_Tra_. Why, Jack, I'll be frank with you--something of both.
The girl's a fine girl.
_Ink_. And you feel nothing loth 80
To her good lady-mother's reversion; and yet
Her life is as good as your own, I will bet.
_Tra_. Let her live, and as long as she likes; I demand
Nothing more than the heart of her daughter and hand.
_Ink_. Why, that heart's in the inkstand--that hand on the pen.
_Tra_. A propos--Will you write me a song now and then?
_Ink_. To what purpose?
_Tra_. You know, my dear friend, that in prose
My talent is decent, as far as it goes;
But in rhyme----
_Ink_. You're a terrible stick, to be sure.
_Tra_. I own it; and yet, in these times, there's no lure 90
For the heart of the fair like a stanza or two;
And so, as I can't, will you furnish a few?
_Ink_. In your name?
_Tra_. In my name. I will copy them out,
To slip into her hand at the very next rout.
_Ink_. Are you so far advanced as to hazard this?
_Tra_. Why,
Do you think me subdued by a Blue-stocking's eye,
So far as to tremble to tell her in rhyme
What I've told her in prose, at the least, as sublime?
_Ink_. _As sublime!_ If i be so, no need of my Muse.
_Tra_. But consider, dear Inkel, she's one of the "Blues."100
_Ink_. As sublime!--Mr. Tracy--I've nothing to say.
Stick to prose--As sublime!!--but I wish you good day.
_Tra_. Nay, stay, my dear fellow--consider--I'm wrong;
I own it; but, prithee, compose me the song.
_Ink_. _As_ sublime!!
_Tra_. I but used the expression in haste.
_Ink_. That may be, Mr. Tracy, but shows damned bad taste.
_Tra_. I own it, I know it, acknowledge it--what
Can I say to you more?
_Ink_. I see what you'd be at:
You disparage my parts with insidious abuse,
Till you think you can turn them best to your own use. 110
_Tra_. And is that not a sign I respect them?
_Ink_. Why that
To be sure makes a difference.
_Tra_. I know what is what:
And you, who're a man of the gay world, no less
Than a poet of t'other, may easily guess
That I never could mean, by a word, to offend
A genius like you, and, moreover, my friend.
_Ink_. No doubt; you by this time should know what is due
To a man of----but come--let us shake hands.
_Tra_. You knew,
And you _know_, my dear fellow, how heartily I,
Whatever you publish, am ready to buy. 120
_Ink_. That's my bookseller's business; I care not for sale;
Indeed the best poems at first rather fail.
There were Renegade's epics, and Botherby's plays,[615]
And my own grand romance--
_Tra_. Had its full share of praise.
I myself saw it puffed in the "Old Girl's Review."[616]
_Ink_. What Review?
_Tra_. Tis the English "Journal de Trevoux;"[617]
A clerical work of our Jesuits at home.
Have you never yet seen it?
_Ink_. That pleasure's to come.
_Tra_. Make haste then.
_Ink_. Why so?
_Tra_. I have heard people say
That it threatened to give up the _ghost_ t'other day.[618] 130
_Ink_. Well, that is a sign of some _spirit_.
_Tra_. No doubt.
Shall you be at the Countess of Fiddlecome's rout?
_Ink_. I've a card, and shall go: but at present, as soon
As friend Scamp shall be pleased to step down from the moon,
(Where he seems to be soaring in search of his wits),
And an interval grants from his lecturing fits,
I'm engaged to the Lady Bluebottle's collation,
To partake of a luncheon and learn'd conversation:
'Tis a sort of reunion for Scamp, on the days
Of his lecture, to treat him with cold tongue and praise. 140
And I own, for my own part, that 'tis not unpleasant.
Will you go? There's Miss Lilac will also be present.
_Tra_. That "metal's attractive."
_Ink_. No doubt--to the pocket.
_Tra_. You should rather encourage my passion than shock it.
But let us proceed; for I think by the hum----
_Ink_. Very true; let us go, then, before they can come,
Or else we'll be kept here an hour at their levee,
On the rack of cross questions, by all the blue bevy.
Hark! Zounds, they'll be on us; I know by the drone
Of old Botherby's spouting ex-cathedrâ tone.[619] 150
Aye! there he is at it. Poor Scamp! better join
Your friends, or he'll pay you back in your own coin.
_Tra_. All fair; 'tis but lecture for lecture.
_Ink_. That's clear.
But for God's sake let's go, or the Bore will be here.
Come, come: nay, I'm off.
[_Exit_ INKEL.
_Tra_. You are right, and I'll follow;
'Tis high time for a "_Sic me servavit Apollo_."[620]
And yet we shall have the whole crew on our kibes,[621]
Blues, dandies, and dowagers, and second-hand scribes,
All flocking to moisten their exquisite throttles
With a glass of Madeira[622] at Lady Bluebottle's. 160
[_Exit_ TRACY.
ECLOGUE THE SECOND.
An Apartment in the House of LADY BLUEBOTTLE.--A Table prepared.
SIR RICHARD BLUEBOTTLE _solus_.
Was there ever a man who was married so sorry?
Like a fool, I must needs do the thing in a hurry.
My life is reversed, and my quiet destroyed;
My days, which once passed in so gentle a void,
Must now, every hour of the twelve, be employed;
The twelve, do I say?--of the whole twenty-four,
Is there one which I dare call my own any more?
What with driving and visiting, dancing and dining,
What with learning, and teaching, and scribbling, and shining,
In science and art, I'll be cursed if I know 10
Myself from my wife; for although we are two,
Yet she somehow contrives that all things shall be done
In a style which proclaims us eternally one.
But the thing of all things which distresses me more
Than the bills of the week (though they trouble me sore)
Is the numerous, humorous, backbiting crew
Of scribblers, wits, lecturers, white, black, and blue,
Who are brought to my house as an inn, to my cost--
For the bill here, it seems, is defrayed by the host--
No pleasure! no leisure! no thought for my pains, 20
But to hear a vile jargon which addles my brains;
A smatter and chatter, gleaned out of reviews,
By the rag, tag, and bobtail, of those they call "Blues;"
A rabble who know not----But soft, here they come!
Would to God I were deaf! as I'm not, I'll be dumb.
_Enter_ LADY BLUEBOTTLE, MISS LILAC, LADY BLUEMOUNT, MR. BOTHERBY,
INKEL, TRACY, MISS MAZARINE, and others, with SCAMP the Lecturer, etc., etc.
_Lady Blueb_.
Ah! Sir Richard, good morning: I've brought you some friends.
_Sir Rich_. (_bows, and afterwards aside_).
If friends, they're the first.
_Lady Blueb_. But the luncheon attends.
I pray ye be seated, "_sans cérémonie_."
Mr. Scamp, you're fatigued; take your chair there, next me.
[_They all sit._
_Sir Rich_. (_aside_). If he does, his fatigue is to come.
_Lady Blueb_. Mr. Tracy--
Lady Bluemount--Miss Lilac--be pleased, pray, to place ye; 31
And you, Mr. Botherby--
_Both_. Oh, my dear Lady,
I obey.
_Lady Blueb_. Mr. Inkel, I ought to upbraid ye:
You were not at the lecture.
_Ink_. Excuse me, I was;
But the heat forced me out in the best part--alas!
And when--
_Lady Blueb_. To be sure it was broiling; but then
You have lost such a lecture!
_Both_. The best of the ten.
_Tra_. How can you know that? there are two more.
_Both_. Because
I defy him to beat this day's wondrous applause.
The very walls shook.
_Ink_. Oh, if that be the test, 40
I allow our friend Scamp has this day done his best.
Miss Lilac, permit me to help you;--a wing?
_Miss Lil_. No more, sir, I thank you. Who lectures next spring?
_Both_. Dick Dunder.
_Ink_. That is, if he lives.
_Miss Lil_. And why not?
_Ink_. No reason whatever, save that he's a sot.
Lady Bluemount! a glass of Madeira?
_Lady Bluem_. With pleasure.
_Ink_. How does your friend Wordswords, that Windermere treasure?
Does he stick to his lakes, like the leeches he sings,[623]
And their gatherers, as Homer sung warriors and kings?
_Lady Bluem_. He has just got a place.[624]
_Ink_. As a footman?
_Lady Bluem_. For shame!
Nor profane with your sneers so poetic a name. 51
_Ink_. Nay, I meant him no evil, but pitied his master;
For the poet of pedlers 'twere, sure, no disaster
To wear a new livery; the more, as 'tis not
The first time he has turned both his creed and his coat.
_Lady Bluem_. For shame! I repeat. If Sir George could but hear--
_Lady Blueb_. Never mind our friend Inkel; we all know, my dear,
'Tis his way.
_Sir Rich_. But this place--
_Ink_. Is perhaps like friend Scamp's,
A lecturer's.
_Lady Bluem_. Excuse me--'tis one in the "Stamps:"
He is made a collector.
_Tra_. Collector!
_Sir Rich_. How?
_Miss Lil_. What? 60
_Ink_. I shall think of him oft when I buy a new hat:
There his works will appear--
_Lady Bluem_. Sir, they reach to the Ganges.
_Ink_. I sha'n't go so far--I can have them at Grange's.[625]
_Lady Bluem_. Oh fie!
_Miss Lil_. And for shame!
_Lady Bluem_. You're too bad.
_Both_. Very good!
_Lady Bluem_. How good?
_Lady Blueb_. He means nought--'tis his phrase.
_Lady Bluem_. He grows rude.
_Lady Blueb_. He means nothing; nay, ask him.
_Lady Bluem_. Pray, Sir! did you mean
What you say?
_Ink_. Never mind if he did; 'twill be seen
That whatever he means won't alloy what he says.
_Both_. Sir!
_Ink_. Pray be content with your portion of praise;
'Twas in your defence.
_Both_. If you please, with submission 70
I can make out my own.
_Ink_. It would be your perdition.
While you live, my dear Botherby, never defend
Yourself or your works; but leave both to a friend.
Apropos--Is your play then accepted at last?
_Both_. At last?
_Ink_. Why I thought--that's to say--there had passed
A few green-room whispers, which hinted,--you know
That the taste of the actors at best is so so.[626]
_Both_. Sir, the green-room's in rapture, and so's the Committee.
_Ink_. Aye--yours are the plays for exciting our "pity
And fear," as the Greek says: for "purging the mind,"80
I doubt if you'll leave us an equal behind.
_Both_. I have written the prologue, and meant to have prayed
For a spice of your wit in an epilogue's aid.
_Ink_. Well, time enough yet, when the play's to be played.
Is it cast yet?
_Both_. The actors are fighting for parts,
As is usual in that most litigious of arts.
_Lady Blueb_. We'll all make a party, and go the _first_ night.
_Tra_. And you promised the epilogue, Inkel.
_Ink_. Not quite.
However, to save my friend Botherby trouble,
I'll do what I can, though my pains must be double. 90
_Tra_. Why so?
_Ink_. To do justice to what goes before.
_Both_. Sir, I'm happy to say, I've no fears on that score.
Your parts, Mr. Inkel, are----
_Ink_. Never mind _mine_;
Stick to those of your play, which is quite your own line.
_Lady Bluem_. You're a fugitive writer, I think, sir, of rhymes?[627]
_Ink_. Yes, ma'am; and a fugitive reader sometimes.
On Wordswords, for instance, I seldom alight,
Or on Mouthey, his friend, without taking to flight.
_Lady Bluem_. Sir, your taste is too common; but time and posterity
Will right these great men, and this age's severity 100
Become its reproach.
_Ink_. I've no sort of objection,
So I'm not of the party to take the infection.
_Lady Blueb_. Perhaps you have doubts that they ever will _take_?
_Ink_. Not at all; on the contrary, those of the lake
Have taken already, and still will continue
To take--what they can, from a groat to a guinea,
Of pension or place;--but the subject's a bore.
_Lady Bluem_. Well, sir, the time's coming.
_Ink_. Scamp! don't you feel sore?
What say you to this?
_Scamp_. They have merit, I own;
Though their system's absurdity keeps it unknown, 110
_Ink_. Then why not unearth it in one of your lectures?
_Scamp_. It is only time past which comes under my strictures.
_Lady Blueb_. Come, a truce with all tartness;--the joy of my heart
Is to see Nature's triumph o'er all that is art.
Wild Nature!--Grand Shakespeare!
_Both_. And down Aristotle!
_Lady Bluem_. Sir George[628] thinks exactly with Lady Bluebottle:
And my Lord Seventy-four,[629] who protects our dear Bard,
And who gave him his place, has the greatest regard
For the poet, who, singing of pedlers and asses,
Has found out the way to dispense with Parnassus. 120
_Tra_. And you, Scamp!--
_Scamp_. I needs must confess I'm embarrassed.
_Ink_. Don't call upon Scamp, who's already so harassed
With old _schools_, and new _schools_,
and no _schools_, and all _schools_[630].
_Tra_. Well, one thing is certain, that _some_ must be fools.
I should like to know who.
_Ink_. And I should not be sorry
To know who are _not_:--it would save us some worry.
_Lady Blueb_. A truce with remark, and let nothing control
This "feast of our reason, and flow of the soul."
Oh! my dear Mr. Botherby! sympathise!--I
Now feel such a rapture, I'm ready to fly, 130
I feel so elastic--"_so buoyant--so buoyant!_"[631]
_Ink_. Tracy! open the window.
_Tra_. I wish her much joy on't.
_Both_. For God's sake, my Lady Bluebottle, check not
This gentle emotion, so seldom our lot
Upon earth. Give it way: 'tis an impulse which lifts
Our spirits from earth--the sublimest of gifts;
For which poor Prometheus was chained to his mountain:
'Tis the source of all sentiment--feeling's true fountain;
'Tis the Vision of Heaven upon Earth: 'tis the gas
Of the soul: 'tis the seizing of shades as they pass, 140
And making them substance: 'tis something divine:--
_Ink_. Shall I help you, my friend, to a little more wine?
_Both_. I thank you: not any more, sir, till I dine.[632]
_Ink_. Apropos--Do you dine with Sir Humphry to day?
_Tra_. I should think with _Duke_ Humphry[633] was more in your way.
_Ink_. It might be of yore; but we authors now look
To the Knight, as a landlord, much more than the Duke.
The truth is, each writer now quite at his ease is,
And (except with his publisher) dines where he pleases.
But 'tis now nearly five, and I must to the Park. 150
_Tra_. And I'll take a turn with you there till 'tis dark.
And you, Scamp--
_Scamp_. Excuse me! I must to my notes,
For my lecture next week.
_Ink_. He must mind whom he quotes
Out of "Elegant Extracts."
_Lady Blueb_. Well, now we break up;
But remember Miss Diddle[634] invites us to sup.
_Ink_. Then at two hours past midnight we all meet again,
For the sciences, sandwiches, hock, and champagne!
_Tra_. And the sweet lobster salad![635]
_Both_. I honour that meal;
For 'tis then that our feelings most genuinely--feel.
_Ink_. True; feeling is truest _then_, far beyond question:
I wish to the gods 'twas the same with digestion! 161
_Lady Blueb_. Pshaw!--never mind that; for one moment of feeling
Is worth--God knows what.
_Ink_. 'Tis at least worth concealing
For itself, or what follows--But here comes your carriage.
_Sir Rich_. (_aside_).
I wish all these people were d----d with _my_ marriage!
[_Exeunt._
FOOTNOTES:
[609] {573}[Benjamin Stillingfleet is said to have attended evening parties at Mrs. Montague's in grey or blue worsted stockings, in lieu of full dress. The ladies who excused and tolerated this defiance of the conventions were nicknamed "blues," or "blue-stockings." Hannah More describes such a club or coterie in her Bas Bleu, which was circulated in MS. in 1784 (Boswell's Life of Johnson, 1848, p. 689). A farce by Moore, entitled The M. P., or The Blue-Stocking, was played for the first time at the Lyceum, September 30, 1811. The heroine, "Lady Bab Blue, is a pretender to poetry, chemistry, etc."--Genest's Hist. of the Stage, 1832, viii. 270.]
[610] {574}[Compare the dialogue between Mr. Paperstamp, Mr. Feathernest, Mr. Vamp, etc., in Peacock's Melincourt, cap. xxxii., Works, 1875, i. 272.]
[611] [Compare--
"The last edition see by Long. and Co.,
Rees, Hurst, and Orme, our fathers of the Row."
_The Search after Happiness_, by Sir Walter Scott.]
[612] [This phrase is said to have been first used in the Edinburgh Review--probably by Jeffrey. (See review of Rogers's Human Life, 1818, Edin. Rev., vol. 31, p. 325.)]
[613] {575}[It is possible that the description of Hazlitt's Lectures of 1818 is coloured by recollections of Coleridge's Lectures of 1811-1812, which Byron attended (see letter to Harness, December 6, 1811, Letters, 1898, ii. 76, note 1); but the substance of the attack is probably derived from Gifford's review of Lectures on the English Poets, delivered at the Surrey Institution (Quarterly Review, December, 1818, vol. xix. pp. 424-434.)]
[614] {576}["Yesterday, a very pretty letter from Annabella.... She is ... very little spoiled, which is strange in an heiress.... She is a poetess--a mathematician--a metaphysician."--Journal, November 30, 1813, Letters, 1898, ii. 357]
[615] {578}[The term "renegade" was applied to Southey by William Smith, M.P., in the House of Commons, March 14, 1817 (vide ante, p. 482). Sotheby's plays, Ivan, The Death of Darnley, Zamorin and Zama, were published under the title of Five Tragedies, in 1814.]
[616] [Compare--
"I've bribed my Grandmother's Review the British."
_Don Juan_, Canto I. stanza ccix. line 9.
And see "Letter to the Editor of 'My Grandmother's Review,'" Letters, 1900, iv. Appendix VII. pp. 465-470. The reference may be to a review of the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold, which appeared in the British Review, January, 1818, or to a more recent and, naturally, most hostile notice of Don Juan (No. xviii. 1819).]
[617] [The Journal de Trévoux, published under the title of Mémoires de Trévoux (1701-1775, 265 vols. 12º), edited by members of the Society of Jesus, was an imitation of the Journal des Savants. The original matter, the Mémoires, contain a mine of information for the student of the history of French Literature; but the reviews, critical notices, etc., to which Byron refers, were of a highly polemical and partisan character, and were the subject of attack on the part of Protestant and free-thinking antagonists. In a letter to Moore, dated Ravenna, June 22, 1821, Byron says, "Now, if we were but together a little to combine our Journal of Trevoux!" (Letters, 1901, v. 309). The use of the same illustration in letter and poem is curious and noteworthy.]
[618] {579}[The publication of the British Review was discontinued in 1825.]
[619] [For "Botherby," vide ante, Beppo, stanza lxxii. line 7, p. 182, note 1; and with the "ex-cathedrâ tone" compare "that awful note of woe," Vision of Judgment, stanza xc. line 4, ante, p. 518.]
[620] {580}["Sotheby is a good man, rhymes well (if not wisely), but is a bore. He seizes you by the button. One night of a rout at Mrs. Hope's, he had fastened upon me (something about Agamemnon, or Orestes, or some of his plays), notwithstanding my symptoms of manifest distress (for I was in love, and just nicked a minute, when neither mothers, nor husbands, nor rivals, nor gossips, were near my then idol, who was beautiful as the Statues of the Gallery where we stood at the time)--Sotheby I say had seized upon me by the button and the heart-strings, and spared neither. William Spencer, who likes fun, and don't dislike mischief, saw my case, and coming up to us both, took me by the hand, and pathetically bade me farewell; 'for,' said he, 'I see it is all over with you.' Sotheby then went way. 'Sic me servavit Apollo.'"--Detached Thoughts, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 433.]
[621] [For Byron's misapprehension concerning "kibes," see Childe Harold, Canto I. stanza lxvii. line 5, Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 64, note 3.]
[622] ["Where can the animals who write this trash have been bred, to fancy that ladies drink bumpers of Madeira at luncheon?"--Literary Register, May 3, 1823.]
[623] {582}[Wordsworth's Resolution and Independence, originally entitled The Leech-gatherer, was written in 1802, and published in 1807.]
[624] [Wordsworth was appointed Distributor of Stamps for the County of Westmoreland, in March, 1813. Lord Lonsdale and Sir George Beaumont were "suretys for the due execution of the trust."--Life of William Wordsworth, by William Knight, 1889, ii. 210.]
[625] Grange is or was a famous pastry-cook and fruiterer in Piccadilly. ["Grange's" (James Grange, confectioner, No. 178, Piccadilly, see Kent's London Directory of 1820), moved farther west some fifteen years ago.]
[626] {584}["When I belonged to the Drury Lane Committee ... the number of plays upon the shelves were about five hundred.... Mr. Sotheby obligingly offered us all his tragedies, and I pledged myself; and, notwithstanding many squabbles with my Committe[e]d Brethren, did get 'Ivan' accepted, read, and the parts distributed. But lo! in the very heart of the matter, upon some tepid-ness on the part of Kean, or warmth on that of the author, Sotheby withdrew his play."--Detached Thoughts, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 442.]
[627] [Fugitive Pieces is the title of the suppressed quarto edition of Byron's juvenile poems.]
[628] {585}[Sir George Beaumont, Bart., of Coleorton, Leicestershire (1753-1827), landscape-painter, art critic, and picture-collector, one of the founders of the National Gallery, married, in 1778, Margaret Willis, granddaughter of Chief Justice Willis. She corresponded with Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy, and with Coleridge (see Memorials of Coleorton, 1888). Coleridge visited the Beaumonts for the first time at Dunmore, in 1804. "I was not received here," he tells Wordsworth, "with mere kindness; I was welcomed almost as you welcomed me when first I visited you at Racedown" (Letters of S. T. Coleridge, 1895, ii. 459). Scott (Memoirs of the life, etc., 1838, ii, II) describes Sir George Beaumont as "by far the most sensible and pleasing man I ever knew, kind, too, in his nature, and generous and gentle in society.... He was the great friend of Wordsworth, and understood his poetry."]
[629] [It was not Wordsworth's patron, William Lord Lonsdale, but his kinsman James, the first earl, who, towards the close of the American war, offered to build and man a ship of seventy-four guns.]
[630] {586}[For this harping on "schools" of poetry, see Hazlitt's Lectures "On the Living Poets" Lectures on the English Poets (No. viii.), 1818, p. 318.]
[631] Fact from life, with the words.
[632] [Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829), President of the Royal Society, received the honour of knighthood April 8, 1812. He was created a baronet January 18, 1819.]
[633] {587}[Compare "We have been for many years at a great distance from each other; we are now separated. You have combined arsenic with your gold, Sir Humphry! You are brittle, and I will rather dine with Duke Humphry than with you."--Anima Poetæ, by S. T. Coleridge, 1895, p. 218.]
[634] ["Lydia White," writes Lady Morgan (Memoirs, 1862, ii. 236), "was a personage of much social celebrity in her day. She was an Irish lady of large fortune and considerable talent, noted for her hospitality and dinners in all the capitals of Europe." She is mentioned by Moore (Memoirs, 1853, in. 21), Miss Berry (Journal, 1866, ii. 484), Ticknor (Life, Letters, and Journal, 1876, i. 176), etc., etc.
Byron saw her for the last time in Venice, when she borrowed a copy of Lalla Rookh (Letter to Moore, June 1, 1818, Letters, 1900, iv. 237). Sir Walter Scott, who knew her well, records her death: "January 28, [1827]. Heard of Miss White's death--she was a woman of wit, and had a feeling and kind heart. Poor Lydia! I saw the Duke of York and her in London, when Death, it seems, was brandishing his dart over them.
'The view o't gave them little fright.'"
(Memoirs of the Life, etc., 1838, iv. 110.)]
[635] [Moore, following the example of Pope, who thought his "delicious lobster-nights" worth commemorating, gives details of a supper at Watier's, May 19, 1814, at which Kean was present, when Byron "confined himself to lobsters, and of these finished two or three, to his own share," etc.--an Ambrosian night, indeed!--Life, p. 254.]
END OF VOL. IV.