“Mr. Hill is here: I dined with him on Saturday before last; and on leaving his house at S. P. d’Arena, my carriage broke down. I walked home, about three miles,—no very great feat of pedestrianism; but either the coming out of hot rooms into a bleak wind chilled me, or the walking up-hill to Albaro heated me, or something or other set me wrong, and next day I had an inflammatory attack in the face, to which I have been subject this winter for the first time, and I suffered a good deal of pain, but no peril. My health is now much as usual. Mr. Hill is, I believe, occupied with his diplomacy. I shall give him your message when I see him again.
“My name, I see in the papers, has been dragged into the
unhappy Portsmouth business, of which all that I
know is very succinct. Mr. H—— is my solicitor. I
found him so when I was ten years old—at my uncle’s death—and he was continued in the management of my legal
business. He asked me, by a civil epistle, as an old acquaintance of his family, to be
present at the marriage of Miss H——. I went very
reluctantly, one misty morning (for I had been up at two balls all night), to witness
the ceremony, which I could not very well refuse without affronting a man who had never
offended me. I saw nothing particular
| A. D. 1823. | LIFE OF LORD BYRON. | 631 |
“I have no objection to be acquainted with the Marquis Palavicini, if he wishes it. Lately I have gone
little into society, English or foreign, for I had seen all that was worth seeing in the
former before I left England, and at the time of life when I was more disposed to like
it; and of the latter I had a sufficiency in the first few years of my residence in
Switzerland; chiefly at Madame de Staël’s,
where I went sometimes, till I grew tired of conversazioni and carnivals, with their
appendages; and the bore is, that if you go once, you are expected to be there daily, or
rather nightly. I went the round of the most noted soirées at Venice or elsewhere (where
I remained not any time) to the Benzona, and the
Albrizzi, and the
Michelli, &c. &c. and to the Cardinals and the various
potentates of the Legation in Romagna (that is, Ravenna), and only receded for the sake
of quiet when I came into Tuscany. Besides, if I go into society, I generally get, in
the long run, into some scrape of some kind or other, which don’t occur in my
solitude, However, I am pretty well settled now, by time and temper, which is so far
lucky, as it prevents restlessness; but, as I said before, as an acquaintance of yours,
I will be ready and willing to know your friends. He may be a sort of connexion for
aught I know; for a
| 632 | NOTICES OF THE | A. D. 1823. |
