Lord Byron arrived in London about the middle of July, 1811, having been absent a few days more than two years. The embarrassed condition in which he found his affairs sufficiently explains the dejection and uneasiness with which he was afflicted during the latter part of his residence in Greece; and yet it was not such as ought to have affected him so deeply, nor have I ever been able to comprehend wherefore so much stress has been laid on his supposed friendlessness. In respect both to it and to his ravelled fortune, a great deal too much has been too often said; and the manliness of his character has suffered by the puling.
His correspondence shows that he had several friends to whom he was much
attached, and his disposition justifies the belief that, had he not been well persuaded the
attachment was reciprocal, he would not have remained on terms of intimacy with them. And
though for his rank not rich, he was still able to maintain all its suitable exhibition. The
world could never regard as an object of compassion or of sympathy an English noble, whose
income was enough to support his dignity among his peers, and whose poverty, however grievous
to his pride, caused only the privation of extravagance. But it cannot be controverted, that
there was an innate predilection in the mind of Lord
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On his arrival in London, his relation, Mr. Dallas, called on him, and in the course of their first brief conversation his Lordship mentioned that he had written a paraphrase of Horace’s Art of Poetry, but said nothing then of Childe Harold, a circumstance which leads me to suspect that he offered him the slighter work first, to enjoy his surprise afterward at the greater. If so, the result answered the intent. Mr Dallas carried home with him the paraphrase of Horace, with which he was grievously disappointed; so much so, that on meeting his Lordship again in the morning, and being reluctant to speak of it as he really thought, he only expressed some surprise that his noble friend should have produced nothing else during his long absence.
I can easily conceive the emphatic indifference, if my conjecture be well founded, with which Lord Byron must have said to him, “I have occasionally written short poems, besides a great many stanzas in Spenser’s measure, relative to the countries I have visited: they are not worth troubling you with, but you shall have them all with you, if you like.”
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage was accordingly
placed in his hands; Mr. Dallas took it home, and was
not slow in discovering its beauties, for in the course of the same evening he despatched a
note to his Lordship, as fair a specimen of the style of an elderly patron-
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For some reason or another, Lord Byron, however, felt or feigned great reluctance to publish Childe Harold. Possibly his repugnance was dictated by diffidence, not with respect to its merits, but from a consciousness that the hero of the poem exhibited traits and resemblances of himself. It would indeed be injustice to his judgment and taste, to suppose he was not sensible of the superiority of the terse and energetic poetry which brightens and burns in every stanza of the Pilgrimage, compared with the loose and sprawling lines, and dull rhythm, of the paraphrase. It is true that he alleged it had been condemned by a good critic—the only one who had previously seen it—probably Mr. Hobhouse, who was with him during the time he was writing it; but still I cannot conceive he was so blind to excellence, as to prefer in sincerity the other composition, which was only an imitation. But the arguments of Mr. Dallas prevailed and in due season Childe Harold was prepared for the press.
In the meantime, while busily engaged in his literary projects with Mr. Dallas, and in law affairs with his agent, he was suddenly summoned to Newstead by the state of his mother’s health: before he had reached the Abbey she had breathed her last. The event deeply affected him; he had not seen her since his return, and a presentiment possessed her when they parted, that she was never to see him again.
Notwithstanding her violent temper and other un-
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On the night after his arrival at the Abbey, the waiting-woman of Mrs. Byron, in passing the door of the room where the corpse lay, heard the sound of some one sighing heavily within, and on entering found his Lordship sitting in the dark beside the bed. She remonstrated with him for so giving way to grief, when he burst into tears, and exclaimed, “I had but one friend in the world, and she is gone.” Of the fervency of his sorrow I do therefore think there can be no doubt; the very endeavour which he made to conceal it by indifference, was a proof of its depth and anguish, though he hazarded the strictures of the world by the indecorum of his conduct on the occasion of the funeral. Having declined to follow the remains himself, he stood looking from the hall door at the procession, till the whole had moved away; and then, turning to one of the servants, the only person left, he desired him to fetch the sparring-gloves, and proceeded with him to his usual exercise. But the scene was impressive, and spoke eloquently of a grieved heart; he sparred in silence all the time, and the servant thought that he hit harder than was his habit: at last he suddenly flung away the gloves and retired to his own room.
As soon as the funeral was over the publication of Childe Harold was resumed, but it went slowly through the
press. In the meantime, an incident
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In English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, he had alluded, with provoking pleasantry, to a meeting which had taken place at Chalk Farm some years before, between Mr. Jeffrey, the Edinburgh reviewer, and Mr. Moore, without recollecting, indeed without having heard, that Mr. Moore had explained, through the newspapers, what was alleged to have been ridiculous in the affair. This revival of the subject, especially as it called in question the truth of Mr. Moore’s statement, obliged that gentleman to demand an explanation; but Lord Byron, being abroad, did not receive this letter, and of course knew not of its contents, so that, on his return, Mr. Moore was induced to address his Lordship again. The correspondence which ensued is honourable to the spirit and feelings of both.
Mr. Moore, after referring to his first letter, restated
the nature of the insult which the passage in the note to the poem was calculated to convey,
adding, “It is now useless to speak of the steps with which it was my intention to
follow up that letter, the time which has elapsed since then, though it has done away
neither the injury nor the feeling of it, has, in many respects, materially altered my
situation, and the only object I have now in writing to your Lordship, is to preserve some
consistency with that former letter, and to prove to you that the injured feeling still
exists, however circumstances may compel me to be deaf to its dictates at present. When I
say ‘injured feeling,’ let me assure your Lordship that there is not a single
vindictive sentiment in my mind towards you; I mean but to express that uneasiness under
what I consider to be a charge of falsehood, which must haunt a man of any feeling to his
grave, unless the insult be retracted, or atoned for, and which, if I did not feel, I
should
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The answer of Lord Byron was diplomatic but manly. He declared that he never received Mr. Moore’s letter, and assured him that in whatever part of the world it had reached him, he would have deemed it his duty to return and answer it in person; that he knew nothing of the advertisement to which Mr. Moore had alluded, and consequently could not have had the slightest idea of “giving the lie” to an address which he had never seen. “When I put my name to the production,” said his Lordship, “which has occasioned this correspondence, I became responsible to all whom it might concern, to explain where it requires explanation, and where insufficiently or too sufficiently explicit, at all events to satisfy; my situation leaves me no choice; it rests with the injured and the angry to obtain reparation in their own way. With regard to the passage in question, you were certainly not the person towards whom I felt personally hostile: on the contrary, my whole thoughts were engrossed by one whom I had reason to consider as my worst literary enemy, nor could I foresee that his former antagonist was about to become his champion. You do not specify what you would wish to have done. I can neither retract nor apologize for a charge of falsehood which I never advanced.”
In reply, Mr. Moore commenced by
acknowledging that his Lordship’s letter was upon the whole as satisfactory as he could
expect; and after alluding to specific circumstances in the case, concluded thus: “As
your Lordship does not show any wish to proceed beyond the rigid formulary of explanation,
it is
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Mr. Moore acknowledges that he was somewhat piqued at the manner in which his efforts towards a more friendly understanding were received, and hastened to close the correspondence by a short note, saying that his Lordship had made him feel the imprudence he was guilty of in wandering from the point immediately in discussion between them. This drew immediately from Lord Byron the following frank and openhearted reply:
“You must excuse my troubling you once more upon this very unpleasant subject. It would be a satisfaction to me, and I should think to yourself, that the unopened letter in Mr. Hodgson’s possession (supposing it to prove your own) should be returned in statu quo to the writer, particularly as you expressed yourself ‘not quite easy under the manner in which I had dwelt on its miscarriage.’
“A few words more and I shall not trouble you further. I felt, and still feel, very much flattered by those parts of your correspondence which held out the prospect of our becoming acquainted. If I did not meet them, in the first instance, as perhaps I ought, let the situation in which I was placed be my defence. You have now declared yourself satisfied, and on that point we are no longer at issue. If, therefore, you still retain any wish to do me the honour you hinted at, I shall be most happy to meet you when, where, and how you please, and I presume you will not attribute my saying thus much to any unworthy motive.”
The result was a dinner at the house of Mr. Rogers, the amiable and celebrated author of The Pleasures of Memory, and the only guest besides the two adversaries was Mr. Campbell, author of The Pleasures of Hope: a poetical group of four not easily to be matched, among contemporaries in any age or country.
The meeting could not but be interesting, and Mr. Moore has described the effect it had on himself with
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“Among the impressions,” says he, “which this meeting left on me, what I chiefly remember to have remarked was, the nobleness of his air, his beauty, the gentleness of his voice and manners, and—what was naturally not the least attraction—his marked kindness for myself. Being in mourning for his mother, the colour as well of his dress as of his glossy, curling, and picturesque hair, gave more effect to the pure spiritual paleness of his features, in the expression of which, when he spoke, there was a perpetual play of lively thought, though melancholy was their habitual character when in repose.”
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