REVIVAL OF THE BYRON SCANDAL BY MRS. BEECHER STOWE AND THE LATE LORD
LOVELACE
The Byron scandal slowly fell asleep, and was allowed to slumber for about
half a century. Even the publication of Moore's Life did not awaken it.
People took sides, indeed, as they always do, some throwing the blame on
the husband, and others on the wife; but the view that, whoever was to
blame, the causes of the separation were "too simple to be easily found
out" prevailed.
Forces, however, making for the revival of the scandal were nevertheless
at work. Byron smarted under social ostracism and resented it. Though Lady
Byron had never made any formal charge to which he could reply, but had,
on the contrary, formally retracted all "gross" charges, he continued to
be embittered by suggestions of mysterious iniquities, and his anger found
expression alike in his letters and in his poems. To a certain extent he
defended himself by taking the offensive. He caused notes on his case to
be privately distributed. He wrote "at" Lady Byron, in the Fourth Canto of
"Childe Harold," in "Don Juan," and elsewhere. A good deal of his
correspondence, printed by Moore, expressed his opinion of her in terms
very far from flattering.
Under these combined influences public opinion veered round--the more
readily because Byron was held to have made ample atonement for his
faults, whatever they might have been, by sacrificing his life in the
cause of Greek independence. Lady Byron was now thought, not indeed to
have erred in any technical sense, but to have made an undue fuss about
very little, and to have been most unwomanly in her frigid consciousness
of rectitude. The world, in short, was more certain now that she had been
"heartless" than that she had been "always in the right."
Naturally, her temptation to "answer back" was strong. She could not very
well answer back by preferring any monstrous indictment in public. That
course was not only to be avoided in her daughter's interest, but might
also have involved her in an action for defamation of character on the
part of Mrs. Leigh--an action which she could not have met with any
adequate defence. Of that risk, indeed, she had been warned by her friend
Colonel Doyle, in a letter printed in "Astarte" to which it will presently
be necessary to return--a letter in which she had been urgently
recommended to "act as if a time might possibly arise when it might be
necessary for you to justify yourself." But if she could not answer back
in public, at least she could answer back in private.
She did so. That is to say, she talked--mostly to sympathetic women who
were more or less discreet, but also, in her later years to Mrs. Harriet
Beecher Stowe, who did not so much as know what discretion was. The story
of which Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe had already received hints from the
women whose discretion was comparative was ultimately told to her, whose
indiscretion was absolute, by Lady Byron herself. She remained as discreet
as the rest--that is to say, more or less discreet--during Lady Byron's
life, and for some time afterwards. But when the Countess Guiccioli wrote
a book about Byron in which Lady Byron was disparaged, she could restrain
herself no longer. In support of Lady Byron's story she had no evidence
except Lady Byron's word. She did not know--and she did not trouble to
inquire--what evidence against it might exist. She did not pause to ask
herself whether her own recollection might not be at fault concerning a
story which she had heard thirteen years before. It was enough for her,
apparently, that Lady Byron was a religious woman, and that Byron, on his
own showing, had lived "a man's life." That sufficed, in her view,
wherever there was a conflict of statements, to demonstrate that Byron was
a liar, and that Lady Byron spoke the truth. So she plunged into the fray,
and, with a great flourish of trumpets, published Lady Byron's story in
"Macmillan's Magazine." When the "Quarterly Review" had, in so far as it
is ever possible to prove a negative, disproved the story, she repeated it
with embellishments in a book entitled: "Lady Byron Vindicated: A History
of the Byron Controversy from its Beginning in 1816 to the Present Time."
The essence of Mrs. Stowe's story is contained in this report of Lady
Byron's conversation:
"There was something awful to me in the intensity of repressed emotion
which she showed as she proceeded. The great fact upon which all
turned was stated in words that were unmistakable:
"'He was guilty of incest with his sister.'"
There is the charge. Turning over the pages in quest of the evidence in
support of it, we find this:
"She said that one night, in her presence, he treated his sister with
a liberty which both shocked and astonished her. Seeing her amazement
and alarm he came up to her, and said, in a sneering tone, 'I suppose
you perceive _you_ are not wanted here. Go to your own room, and leave
us alone. We can amuse ourselves better without you.'
"She said, 'I went to my room trembling. I went down on my knees and
prayed to my heavenly Father to have mercy on them. I thought: What
shall I do?'
"I remember, after this, a pause in the conversation, during which she
seemed struggling with thoughts and emotions; and, for my part, I was
unable to utter a word or ask a question."
No more than that. This _ex parte_ interpretation of a foolish conjugal
quarrel of forty years before, admittedly untested by any demand for
particulars, was absolutely the sole piece of testimony which Mrs. Stowe
adduced when she set out to blast Byron's reputation. The rest of the book
consists of pious and sentimental out-pourings, vulgar abuse of Byron, and
equally vulgar eulogy of his wife; the two passages cited being the only
passages material to the issue. There was nothing in writing for her to
quote--no case which a respectable lawyer would have taken into Court--no
case that would not have been laughed out of Court within five minutes if
it had ever got so far.
The tribunal of public opinion did, in fact, laugh the case out of Court
at the time. It was "snowed under," partly by laughter, and partly by
indignation and the British feeling in favour of fair play; and it
remained so buried for nearly forty years. Biographers could afford to
scout it as "monstrous" without troubling to confute it. Sir Leslie
Stephen, in the "Dictionary of National Biography," treated it as an
hallucination to which Lady Byron had fallen a victim through brooding
over her grievances in solitude.
One would be glad if one could still take that tone towards it; but Lord
Lovelace has made it impossible to do so. Mrs. Stowe, as a mischief-making
meddler, interfering with matters which did not concern her, and about
which she was obviously very ill informed, had not even a _primâ facie_
title to be taken seriously. The case of Lord Lovelace was different. He
was Byron's grandson and the custodian of Lady Byron's strong-box. He
affected not merely to assert but to argue. He produced from the
strong-box documents which he was pleased to call proofs. A good many
people, not having seen them, probably still believe that they are proofs.
They cannot be waived on one side like Mrs. Stowe's unsupported
allegations, but must be dealt with; and the whole question of the charge
which they are alleged to substantiate must, of course, be dealt with
simultaneously.
And first, as the documents laid before us are miscellaneous, we must
distinguish between those of them which count and those which do not
count. Some of the contents of the strong-box, it seems, are merely
"statements" in Lady Byron's handwriting. These are only referred to by
Lord Lovelace, but not printed. Not having been produced, they cannot be
criticised; but there are, nevertheless, two comments which it is
legitimate to make. In the first place, an _ex parte_ statement, though
admissible in evidence for what it may be worth, is not the same thing as
proof. In the second place, if the statements had been of a nature to
strengthen the case which Lord Lovelace was trying to make out, instead of
merely embellishing it, they would not have been held back. Their absence
from the _dossier_ need not, therefore, embarrass us; and we need, in
fact, be the less embarrassed by it because it was already perfectly well
known that Lady Byron was in the habit of writing out statements, and had
shown them to impartial persons who had taken the measure of their value.
That fact is set forth in the Rev. Frederick Arnold's Life of Robertson
of Brighton, who, as is well known, was, for a considerable time, Lady
Byron's religious adviser.
"A remarkable incident," writes Mr. Arnold, "may be mentioned in
illustration of the relations with Lord Byron. Lady Byron had
accumulated a great mass of documentary evidence, papers and letters,
which were supposed to constitute a case completely exculpatory of
herself and condemnatory of Byron. She placed all this printed matter
in the hands of a well-known individual, who was then resident at
Brighton, and afterwards removed into the country. This gentleman went
carefully through the papers, and was utterly astonished at the utter
want of criminatory matter against Byron. He was not indifferent to
the _éclat_ or emolument of editing such memoirs. But he felt that
this was a brief which he was unable to hold, and accordingly returned
all the papers to Lady Byron."
That comment on the "statements," significant in itself, is doubly
significant when taken in conjunction with Lord Lovelace's suppression of
them; and we may fairly consider the case without further reference to
them, and without an apprehension that a surprise will be sprung from that
source to upset the conclusions at which we arrive. Lord Lovelace did not
rest his case on them, but on quite other documents, which we will proceed
to examine after first saying the few words which need to be said in order
to clear the air.
One point, indeed, Lord Lovelace has made successfully. He has proved that
the gross and mysterious charge which Lady Byron preferred (or rather
hinted at while refusing to prefer it) at the time of the separation was,
in fact, identical with the charge formulated in Mrs. Stowe's book. A
contemporary memorandum to that effect, in Lushington's handwriting,
signed by Lady Byron, and witnessed by Lushington, Wilmot Horton, and
Colonel Doyle, is printed in "Astarte." To that extent the so-called Byron
mystery is now solved, once and for all. The statement set forth in that
memorandum, and afterwards repeated to Mrs. Stowe, was the statement on
the strength of which Lushington declared, as has already been mentioned,
that he could not be a party to any attempt to effect a reconciliation.
So far so good. The probability of these facts could have been inferred
from Hobhouse's narrative; their certainty is now established. We now know
of what Byron was accused--behind his back; we also know of what Mrs.
Leigh was accused--behind her back. But--and the "but" is most
important--the memorandum contains this remarkable sentence:
"It will be observed that this Paper does not contain nor pretend to
contain any of the grounds which gave rise to the suspicion which has
existed and still continues to exist in Lady B.'s mind."
Which is to say that Lady Byron, on her own showing, and that of her
legal advisers, was acting not on evidence but on "suspicion." In this
document there is not even so much evidence as was set before Mrs. Stowe,
or any suggestion that any evidence worthy of the name exists. The quest
for proof must be pursued elsewhere.
But where?
Lord Lovelace has not shown us. The document in which it is expressly set
forth that none of the statements contained in it are of the nature of
proofs is the only contemporary document which he cites; for the scrap of
a letter which he quotes from Mrs. George Lamb only proves, if indeed it
proves anything, that Mrs. Lamb had heard what Lady Byron said. Further on
in his book, indeed, Lord Lovelace represents that Mrs. Leigh
subsequently, under pressure, confessed her guilt to Lady Byron; but
concerning that representation two things shall be demonstrated in the
next chapter.
In the first place Mrs. Leigh did not confess--the alleged confession
having no bearing whatsoever on the matter which we are now considering.
In the second place the inherent probabilities of the case and the
circumstantial evidence which illuminates it are such that, even if Mrs.
Leigh had confessed, it would be impossible to believe her on her oath.