"Venice, February 2. 1818.
"Your letter of December 8th arrived but this day, by some delay,
common but inexplicable. Your domestic calamity is very grievous,
and I feel with you as much as I _dare_ feel at all. Throughout
life, your loss must be my loss, and your gain my gain; and, though
my heart may ebb, there will always be a drop for you among the
dregs.
"I know how to feel with you, because (selfishness being always the
substratum of our damnable clay) I am quite wrapt up in my own
children. Besides my little legitimate, I have made unto myself an
_il_legitimate since (to say nothing of one before[13]), and I look
forward to one of these as the pillar of my old age, supposing that
I ever reach--which I hope I never shall--that desolating period. I
have a great love for my little Ada, though perhaps she may torture
me, like * * *.
"Your offered address will be as acceptable as you can wish. I
don't much care what the wretches of the world think of me--all
_that's_ past. But I care a good deal what _you_ think of me, and,
so, say what you like. You _know_ that I am not sullen; and, as to
being _savage_, such things depend on circumstances. However, as to
being in good humour in _your_ society, there is no great merit in
that, because it would be an effort, or an insanity, to be
otherwise.
"I don't know what Murray may have been saying or quoting.[14] I
called Crabbe and Sam the fathers of present Poesy; and said, that
I thought--except them--_all_ of '_us youth_' were on a wrong tack.
But I never said that we did not sail well. Our fame will be hurt
by _admiration_ and _imitation_. When I say _our_, I mean _all_
(Lakers included), except the postscript of the Augustans. The next
generation (from the quantity and facility of imitation) will
tumble and break their necks off our Pegasus, who runs away with
us; but we keep the _saddle_, because we broke the rascal and can
ride. But though easy to mount, he is the devil to guide; and the
next fellows must go back to the riding-school and the manège, and
learn to ride the 'great horse.'
"Talking of horses, by the way, I have transported my own, four in
number, to the Lido (_beach_ in English), a strip of some ten miles
along the Adriatic, a mile or two from the city; so that I not only
get a row in my gondola, but a spanking gallop of some miles daily
along a firm and solitary beach, from the fortress to Malamocco,
the which contributes considerably to my health and spirits.
"I have hardly had a wink of sleep this week past. We are in the
agonies of the Carnival's last days, and I must be up all night
again, as well as to-morrow. I have had some curious masking
adventures this Carnival; but, as they are not yet over, I shall
not say on. I will work the mine of my youth to the last veins of
the ore, and then--good night. I have lived, and am content.
"Hobhouse went away before the Carnival began, so that he had
little or no fun. Besides, it requires some time to be
thoroughgoing with the Venetians; but of all this anon, in some
other letter.
"I must dress for the evening. There is an opera and ridotto, and I
know not what, besides balls; and so, ever and ever yours,
"B.
"P.S. I send this without revision, so excuse errors. I delight in
the fame and fortune of Lalla, and again congratulate you on your
well-merited success."
[Footnote 13: This possibly may have been the subject of the Poem given
in p. 152. of the first volume.]
[Footnote 14: Having seen by accident the passage in one of his letters
to Mr. Murray, in which he denounces, as false and worthless, the
poetical system on which the greater number of his contemporaries, as
well as himself, founded their reputation, I took an opportunity, in the
next letter I wrote to him, of jesting a little on this opinion, and his
motives for it. It was, no doubt (I ventured to say), excellent policy
in him, who had made sure of his own immortality in this style of
writing, thus to _throw overboard_ all _us poor devils_, who were
embarked with him. He was, in fact, I added, behaving towards us much in
the manner of the methodist preacher who said to his congregation--"You
may think, at the Last Day, to get to heaven by laying hold on my
skirts; but I'll cheat you all, for I'll wear a spencer, I'll wear a
spencer!"]
* * * * *
Of his daily rides on the Lido, which he mentions in this letter, the
following account, by a gentleman who lived a good deal with him at
Venice, will be found not a little interesting:--
"Almost immediately after Mr. Hobhouse's departure, Lord Byron proposed
to me to accompany him in his rides on the Lido. One of the long narrow
islands which separate the Lagune, in the midst of which Venice stands,
from the Adriatic, is more particularly distinguished by this name. At
one extremity is a fortification, which, with the Castle of St. Andrea
on an island on the opposite side, defends the nearest entrance to the
city from the sea. In times of peace this fortification is almost
dismantled, and Lord Byron had hired here of the Commandant an
unoccupied stable, where he kept his horses. The distance from the city
was not very considerable; it was much less than to the Terra Firma,
and, as far as it went, the spot was not ineligible for riding.
"Every day that the weather would permit, Lord Byron called for me in
his gondola, and we found the horses waiting for us outside of the fort.
We rode as far as we could along the sea-shore, and then on a kind of
dyke, or embankment, which has been raised where the island was very
narrow, as far as another small fort about half way between the
principal one which I have already mentioned, and the town or village of
Malamocco, which is near the other extremity of the island,--the
distance between the two forts being about three miles.
"On the land side of the embankment, not far from the smaller fort, was
a boundary stone which probably marked some division of property,--all
the side of the island nearest the Lagune being divided into gardens for
the cultivation of vegetables for the Venetian markets. At the foot of
this stone Lord Byron repeatedly told me that I should cause him to be
interred, if he should die in Venice, or its neighbourhood, during my
residence there; and he appeared to think, as he was not a Catholic,
that, on the part of the government, there could be no obstacle to his
interment in an unhallowed spot of ground by the sea-side. At all
events, I was to overcome whatever difficulties might be raised on this
account. I was, by no means, he repeatedly told me, to allow his body to
be removed to England, nor permit any of his family to interfere with
his funeral.
"Nothing could be more delightful than these rides on the Lido were to
me. We were from half to three quarters of an hour crossing the water,
during which his conversation was always most amusing and interesting.
Sometimes he would bring with him any new book he had received, and read
to me the passages which most struck him. Often he would repeat to me
whole stanzas of the poems he was engaged in writing, as he had composed
them on the preceding evening; and this was the more interesting to me,
because I could frequently trace in them some idea which he had started
in our conversation of the preceding day, or some remark, the effect of
which he had been evidently trying upon me. Occasionally, too, he spoke
of his own affairs, making me repeat all I had heard with regard to
him, and desiring that I would not spare him, but let him know the worst
that was said."
* * * * *