Letters and Journals of Lord Byron
Lord Byron to Samuel Rogers, 16 February 1814
“I wrote to Lord Holland
briefly, but I hope distinctly, on the subject which has lately occupied much of my
conversation with him and you*. As things now stand, upon that topic my determination
must be unalterable.
“I declare to you most sincerely that there is no human
being on whose regard and esteem I set a higher value than on Lord Holland’s; and, as far as concerns himself, I would concede
even to humiliation without any view to the future, and solely from my sense of his
conduct
* Relative to a proposed reconciliation between
Lord Carlisle and himself. |
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| A. D. 1814. | LIFE OF LORD BYRON. | 529 |
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as to the past. For the rest, I conceive that I have
already done all in my power by the suppression*. If that is not enough, they must act
as they please; but I will not ‘teach my tongue a most inherent
baseness,’ come what may. You will probably be at the Marquis Lansdowne’s to-night. I am asked, but I am not sure that I
shall be able to go. Hobhouse will be there. I
think, if you knew him well, you would like him.
“Believe me always yours very affectionately,
“B.”
Henry Richard Fox, third baron Holland (1773-1840)
Whig politician and literary patron; Holland House was for many years the meeting place
for reform-minded politicians and writers. He also published translations from the Spanish
and Italian;
Memoirs of the Whig Party was published in 1852.
John Cam Hobhouse, baron Broughton (1786-1869)
Founder of the Cambridge Whig Club; traveled with Byron in the orient, radical MP for
Westminster (1820); Byron's executor; after a long career in politics published
Some Account of a Long Life (1865) later augmented as
Recollections of a Long Life, 6 vols (1909-1911).
Frederick Howard, fifth earl of Carlisle (1748-1825)
The Earl of Carlisle was appointed Lord Byron's guardian in 1799; they did not get along.
He published a volume of
Poems (1773) that included a translation
from Dante.
Samuel Rogers (1763-1855)
English poet, banker, and aesthete, author of the ever-popular
Pleasures of Memory (1792),
Columbus (1810),
Jaqueline (1814), and
Italy (1822-28).
