"Bologna, August 29. 1819.
"I have been in a rage these two days, and am still bilious
therefrom. You shall hear. A captain of dragoons, * *, Hanoverian
by birth, in the Papal troops at present, whom I had obliged by a
loan when nobody would lend him a paul, recommended a horse to me,
on sale by a Lieutenant * *, an officer who unites the sale of
cattle to the purchase of men. I bought it. The next day, on
shoeing the horse, we discovered the _thrush_,--the animal being
warranted sound. I sent to reclaim the contract and the money. The
lieutenant desired to speak with me in person. I consented. He
came. It was his own particular request. He began a story. I asked
him if he would return the money. He said no--but he would
exchange. He asked an exorbitant price for his other horses. I told
him that he was a thief. He said he was an _officer_ and a man of
honour, and pulled out a Parmesan passport signed by General Count
Neifperg. I answered, that as he was an officer, I would treat him
as such; and that as to his being a gentleman, he might prove it by
returning the money: as for his Parmesan passport, I should have
valued it more if it had been a Parmesan cheese. He answered in
high terms, and said that if it were the _morning_ (it was about
eight o'clock in the evening) he would have _satisfaction_. I then
lost my temper: 'As for THAT,' I replied, 'you shall have it
directly,--it will be _mutual_ satisfaction, I can assure you. You
are a thief, and, as you say, an officer; my pistols are in the
next room loaded; take one of the candles, examine, and make your
choice of weapons.' He replied, that _pistols_ were _English
weapons_; _he_ always fought with the _sword_. I told him that I
was able to accommodate him, having three regimental swords in a
drawer near us: and he might take the longest and put himself on
guard.
"All this passed in presence of a third person. He then said _No_;
but to-morrow morning he would give me the meeting at any time or
place. I answered that it was not usual to appoint meetings in the
presence of witnesses, and that we had best speak man to man, and
appoint time and instruments. But as the man present was leaving
the room, the Lieutenant * *, before he could shut the door after
him, ran out roaring 'Help and murder' most lustily, and fell into
a sort of hysteric in the arms of about fifty people, who all saw
that I had no weapon of any sort or kind about me, and followed
him, asking him what the devil was the matter with him. Nothing
would do: he ran away without his hat, and went to bed, ill of the
fright. He then tried his complaint at the police, which dismissed
it as frivolous. He is, I believe, gone away, or going.
"The horse was warranted, but, I believe, so worded that the
villain will not be obliged to refund, according to law. He
endeavoured to raise up an indictment of assault and battery, but
as it was in a public inn, in a frequented street, there were too
many witnesses to the contrary; and, as a military man, he has not
cut a martial figure, even in the opinion of the priests. He ran
off in such a hurry that he left his hat, and never missed it till
he got to his hostel or inn. The facts are as I tell you, I can
assure you. He began by 'coming Captain Grand over me,' or I should
never have thought of trying his 'cunning in fence.' But what could
I do? He talked of 'honour, and satisfaction, and his commission;'
he produced a military passport; there are severe punishments for
_regular duels_ on the Continent, and trifling ones for
_rencontres_, so that it is best to fight it out directly; he had
robbed, and then wanted to insult me;--what could I do? My
patience was gone, and the weapons at hand, fair and equal.
Besides, it was just after dinner, when my digestion was bad, and I
don't like to be disturbed. His friend * * is at Forli; we shall
meet on my way back to Ravenna. The Hanoverian seems the greater
rogue of the two; and if my valour does not ooze away like
Acres's--'Odds flints and triggers!' if it should be a rainy
morning, and my stomach in disorder, there may be something for the
obituary.
"Now pray, 'Sir Lucius, do not you look upon me as a very ill-used
gentleman?' I send my Lieutenant to match Mr. Hobhouse's Major
Cartwright: and so 'good morrow to you, good master Lieutenant.'
With regard to other things I will write soon, but I have been
quarrelling and fooling till I can scribble no more."
* * * * *
In the month of September, Count Guiccioli, being called away by
business to Ravenna, left his young Countess and her lover to the free
enjoyment of each other's society at Bologna. The lady's ill health,
which had been the cause of her thus remaining behind, was thought, soon
after, to require the still further advantage of a removal to Venice;
and the Count her husband, being written to on the subject, consented,
with the most complaisant readiness, that she should proceed thither in
company with Lord Byron. "Some business" (says the lady's own Memoir)
"having called Count Guiccioli to Ravenna, I was obliged, by the state
of my health, instead of accompanying him, to return to Venice, and he
consented that Lord Byron should be the companion of my journey. We left
Bologna on the fifteenth of September: we visited the Euganean Hills
and Arquà, and wrote our names in the book which is presented to those
who make this pilgrimage. But I cannot linger over these recollections
of happiness;--the contrast with the present is too dreadful. If a
blessed spirit, while in the full enjoyment of heavenly happiness, were
sent down to this earth to suffer all its miseries, the contrast could
not be more dreadful between the past and the present, than what I have
endured from the moment when that terrible word reached my ears, and I
for ever lost the hope of again beholding him, one look from whom I
valued beyond earth's all happiness. When I arrived at Venice, the
physicians ordered that I should try the country air, and Lord Byron,
having a villa at La Mira, gave it up to me, and came to reside there
with me. At this place we passed the autumn, and there I had the
pleasure of forming your acquaintance."[47]
It was my good fortune, at this period, in the course of a short and
hasty tour through the north of Italy, to pass five or six days with
Lord Byron at Venice. I had written to him on my way thither to announce
my coming, and to say how happy it would make me could I tempt him to
accompany me as far as Rome.
During my stay at Geneva, an opportunity had been afforded me of
observing the exceeding readiness with which even persons the least
disposed to be prejudiced gave an ear to any story relating to Lord
Byron, in which the proper portions of odium and romance were but
plausibly mingled. In the course of conversation, one day, with the late
amiable and enlightened Monsieur D * *, that gentleman related, with
much feeling, to my fellow-traveller and myself, the details of a late
act of seduction of which Lord Byron had, he said, been guilty, and
which was made to comprise within itself all the worst features of such
unmanly frauds upon innocence;--the victim, a young unmarried lady, of
one of the first families of Venice, whom the noble seducer had lured
from her father's house to his own, and, after a few weeks, most
inhumanly turned her out of doors. In vain, said the relator, did she
entreat to become his servant, his slave;--in vain did she ask to
remain in some dark corner of his mansion, from which she might be able
to catch a glimpse of his form as he passed. Her betrayer was obdurate,
and the unfortunate young lady, in despair at being thus abandoned by
him, threw herself into the canal, from which she was taken out but to
be consigned to a mad-house. Though convinced that there must be
considerable exaggeration in this story, it was only on my arrival at
Venice I ascertained that the whole was a romance; and that out of the
circumstances (already laid before the reader) connected with Lord
Byron's fantastic and, it must be owned, discreditable fancy for the
Fornarina, this pathetic tale, so implicitly believed at Geneva, was
fabricated.
Having parted at Milan, with Lord John Russell, whom I had accompanied
from England, and whom I was to rejoin, after a short visit to Rome, at
Genoa, I made purchase of a small and (as it soon proved) crazy
travelling carriage, and proceeded alone on my way to Venice. My time
being limited, I stopped no longer at the intervening places than was
sufficient to hurry over their respective wonders, and, leaving Padua at
noon on the 8th of October, I found myself, about two o'clock, at the
door of my friend's villa, at La Mira. He was but just up, and in his
bath; but the servant having announced my arrival, he returned a message
that, if I would wait till he was dressed, he would accompany me to
Venice. The interval I employed in conversing with my old acquaintance,
Fletcher, and in viewing, under his guidance, some of the apartments of
the villa.
It was not long before Lord Byron himself made his appearance; and the
delight I felt in meeting him once more, after a separation of so many
years, was not a little heightened by observing that his pleasure was,
to the full, as great, while it was rendered doubly touching by the
evident rarity of such meetings to him of late, and the frank outbreak
of cordiality and gaiety with which he gave way to his feelings. It
would be impossible, indeed, to convey to those who have not, at some
time or other, felt the charm of his manner, any idea of what it could
be when under the influence of such pleasurable excitement as it was
most flatteringly evident he experienced at this moment.
I was a good deal struck, however, by the alteration that had taken
place in his personal appearance. He had grown fatter both in person and
face, and the latter had most suffered by the change,--having lost, by
the enlargement of the features, some of that refined and spiritualised
look that had, in other times, distinguished it. The addition of
whiskers, too, which he had not long before been induced to adopt, from
hearing that some one had said he had a "faccia di musico," as well as
the length to which his hair grew down on his neck, and the rather
foreign air of his coat and cap,--all combined to produce that
dissimilarity to his former self I had observed in him. He was still,
however, eminently handsome: and, in exchange for whatever his features
might have lost of their high, romantic character, they had become more
fitted for the expression of that arch, waggish wisdom, that Epicurean
play of humour, which he had shown to be equally inherent in his
various and prodigally gifted nature; while, by the somewhat increased
roundness of the contours, the resemblance of his finely formed mouth
and chin to those of the Belvedere Apollo had become still more
striking.
His breakfast, which I found he rarely took before three or four o'clock
in the afternoon, was speedily despatched,--his habit being to eat it
standing, and the meal in general consisting of one or two raw eggs, a
cup of tea without either milk or sugar, and a bit of dry biscuit.
Before we took our departure, he presented me to the Countess Guiccioli,
who was at this time, as my readers already know, living under the same
roof with him at La Mira; and who, with a style of beauty singular in an
Italian, as being fair-complexioned and delicate, left an impression
upon my mind, during this our first short interview, of intelligence and
amiableness such as all that I have since known or heard of her has but
served to confirm.
We now started together, Lord Byron and myself, in my little Milanese
vehicle, for Fusina,--his portly gondolier Tita, in a rich livery and
most redundant mustachios, having seated himself on the front of the
carriage, to the no small trial of its strength, which had already once
given way, even under my own weight, between Verona and Vicenza. On our
arrival at Fusina, my noble friend, from his familiarity with all the
details of the place, had it in his power to save me both trouble and
expense in the different arrangements relative to the custom-house,
remise, &c.; and the good-natured assiduity with which he bustled about
in despatching these matters, gave me an opportunity of observing, in
his use of the infirm limb, a much greater degree of activity than I had
ever before, except in sparring, witnessed.
As we proceeded across the Lagoon in his gondola, the sun was just
setting, and it was an evening such as Romance would have chosen for a
first sight of Venice, rising "with her tiara of bright towers" above
the wave; while, to complete, as might be imagined, the solemn interest
of the scene, I beheld it in company with him who had lately given a new
life to its glories, and sung of that fair City of the Sea thus
grandly:--
"I stood in Venice on the Bridge of Sighs;
A palace and a prison on each hand:
I saw from out the wave her structures rise
As from the stroke of the enchanter's wand:
A thousand years their cloudy wings expand
Around me, and a dying glory smiles
O'er the far times, when many a subject land
Look'd to the winged lion's marble piles,
Where Venice sat in state, throned in her hundred isles."
But, whatever emotions the first sight of such a scene might, under
other circumstances, have inspired me with, the mood of mind in which I
now viewed it was altogether the very reverse of what might have been
expected. The exuberant gaiety of my companion, and the
recollections,--any thing but romantic,--into which our conversation
wandered, put at once completely to flight all poetical and historical
associations; and our course was, I am almost ashamed to say, one of
uninterrupted merriment and laughter till we found ourselves at the
steps of my friend's palazzo on the Grand Canal. All that had ever
happened, of gay or ridiculous, during our London life together,--his
scrapes and my lecturings,--our joint adventures with the Bores and
Blues, the two great enemies, as he always called them, of London
happiness,--our joyous nights together at Watier's, Kinnaird's, &c. and
"that d----d supper of Rancliffe's which _ought_ to have been a
dinner,"--all was passed rapidly in review between us, and with a flow
of humour and hilarity, on his side, of which it would have been
difficult, even for persons far graver than I can pretend to be, not to
have caught the contagion.
He had all along expressed his determination that I should not go to any
hotel, but fix my quarters at his house during the period of my stay;
and, had he been residing there himself, such an arrangement would have
been all that I most desired. But, this not being the case, a common
hotel was, I thought, a far readier resource; and I therefore entreated
that he would allow me to order an apartment at the Gran Bretagna, which
had the reputation, I understood, of being a comfortable hotel. This,
however, he would not hear of; and, as an inducement for me to agree to
his plan, said that, as long as I chose to stay, though he should be
obliged to return to La Mira in the evenings, he would make it a point
to come to Venice every day and dine with me. As we now turned into the
dismal canal, and stopped before his damp-looking mansion, my
predilection for the Gran Bretagna returned in full force; and I again
ventured to hint that it would save an abundance of trouble to let me
proceed thither. But "No--no," he answered,--"I see you think you'll be
very uncomfortable here; but you'll find that it is not quite so bad as
you expect."
As I groped my way after him through the dark hall, he cried out, "Keep
clear of the dog;" and before we had proceeded many paces farther, "Take
care, or that monkey will fly at you;"--a curious proof, among many
others, of his fidelity to all the tastes of his youth, as it agrees
perfectly with the description of his life at Newstead, in 1809, and of
the sort of menagerie which his visiters had then to encounter in their
progress through his hall. Having escaped these dangers, I followed him
up the staircase to the apartment destined for me. All this time he had
been despatching servants in various directions,--one, to procure me a
_laquais de place_; another to go in quest of Mr. Alexander Scott, to
whom he wished to give me in charge; while a third was sent to order his
Segretario to come to him. "So, then, you keep a Secretary?" I said.
"Yes," he answered, "a fellow who _can't write_[48]--but such are the
names these pompous people give to things."
When we had reached the door of the apartment it was discovered to be
locked, and, to all appearance, had been so for some time, as the key
could not be found;--a circumstance which, to my English apprehension,
naturally connected itself with notions of damp and desolation, and I
again sighed inwardly for the Gran Bretagna. Impatient at the delay of
the key, my noble host, with one of his humorous maledictions, gave a
vigorous kick to the door and burst it open; on which we at once entered
into an apartment not only spacious and elegant, but wearing an aspect
of comfort and habitableness which to a traveller's eye is as welcome as
it is rare. "Here," he said, in a voice whose every tone spoke kindness
and hospitality,--"these are the rooms I use myself, and here I mean to
establish you."
He had ordered dinner from some Tratteria, and while waiting its
arrival--as well as that of Mr. Alexander Scott, whom he had invited to
join us--we stood out on the balcony, in order that, before the daylight
was quite gone, I might have some glimpses of the scene which the Canal
presented. Happening to remark, in looking up at the clouds, which were
still bright in the west, that "what had struck me in Italian sunsets
was that peculiar rosy hue--" I had hardly pronounced the word "rosy,"
when Lord Byron, clapping his hand on my mouth, said, with a laugh,
"Come, d----n it, Tom, don't be poetical." Among the few gondolas
passing at the time, there was one at some distance, in which sat two
gentlemen, who had the appearance of being English; and, observing them
to look our way, Lord Byron putting his arms a-kimbo, said with a sort
of comic swagger, "Ah! if you, John Bulls, knew who the two fellows
are, now standing up here, I think you _would_ stare!"--I risk
mentioning these things, though aware how they may be turned against
myself, for the sake of the otherwise indescribable traits of manner and
character which they convey. After a very agreeable dinner, through
which the jest, the story, and the laugh were almost uninterruptedly
carried on, our noble host took leave of us to return to La Mira, while
Mr. Scott and I went to one of the theatres, to see the Ottavia of
Alfieri.
The ensuing evenings, during my stay, were passed much in the same
manner,--my mornings being devoted, under the kind superintendence of
Mr. Scott, to a hasty, and, I fear, unprofitable view of the treasures
of art with which Venice abounds. On the subjects of painting and
sculpture Lord Byron has, in several of his letters, expressed strongly
and, as to most persons will appear, heretically his opinions. In his
want, however, of a due appreciation of these arts, he but resembled
some of his great precursors in the field of poetry;--both Tasso and
Milton, for example, having evinced so little tendency to such
tastes[49], that, throughout the whole of their pages, there is not, I
fear, one single allusion to any of those great masters of the pencil
and chisel, whose works, nevertheless, both had seen. That Lord Byron,
though despising the imposture and jargon with which the worship of the
Arts is, like other worships, clogged and mystified, felt deeply, more
especially in sculpture, whatever imaged forth true grace and energy,
appears from passages of his poetry, which are in every body's memory,
and not a line of which but thrills alive with a sense of grandeur and
beauty such as it never entered into the capacity of a mere connoisseur
even to conceive.
In reference to this subject, as we were conversing one day after dinner
about the various collections I had visited that morning, on my saying
that fearful as I was, at all times, of praising any picture, lest I
should draw upon myself the connoisseur's sneer for my pains, I would
yet, to _him_, venture to own that I had seen a picture at Milan
which--"The Hagar!" he exclaimed, eagerly interrupting me; and it was in
fact this very picture I was about to mention as having wakened in me,
by the truth of its expression, more real emotion than any I had yet
seen among the chefs-d'oeuvre of Venice. It was with no small degree of
pride and pleasure I now discovered that my noble friend had felt
equally with myself the affecting mixture of sorrow and reproach with
which the woman's eyes tell the whole story in that picture.
On the second evening of my stay, Lord Byron having, as before, left us
for La Mira, I most willingly accepted the offer of Mr. Scott to
introduce me to the conversazioni of the two celebrated ladies, with
whose names, as leaders of Venetian fashion, the tourists to Italy have
made every body acquainted. To the Countess A * *'s parties Lord Byron
had chiefly confined himself during the first winter he passed at
Venice; but the tone of conversation at these small meetings being much
too learned for his tastes, he was induced, the following year, to
discontinue his attendance at them, and chose, in preference, the less
erudite, but more easy, society of the Countess B * *. Of the sort of
learning sometimes displayed by the "blue" visitants at Madame A * *'s,
a circumstance mentioned by the noble poet himself may afford some idea.
The conversation happening to turn, one evening, upon the statue of
Washington, by Canova, which had been just shipped off for the United
States, Madame A * *, who was then engaged in compiling a Description
Raisonnée of Canova's works, and was anxious for information respecting
the subject of this statue, requested that some of her learned guests
would detail to her all they knew of him. This task a Signor * * (author
of a book on Geography and Statistics) undertook to perform, and, after
some other equally sage and authentic details, concluded by informing
her that "Washington was killed in a duel by Burke."--"What," exclaimed
Lord Byron, as he stood biting his lips with impatience during this
conversation, "what, in the name of folly, are you all thinking
of?"--for he now recollected the famous duel between Hamilton and
Colonel Burr, whom, it was evident, this learned worthy had confounded
with Washington and Burke!
In addition to the motives easily conceivable for exchanging such a
society for one that offered, at least, repose from such erudite
efforts, there was also another cause more immediately leading to the
discontinuance of his visits to Madame A * *. This lady, who has been
sometimes honoured with the title of "The De Staël of Italy," had
written a book called "Portraits," containing sketches of the characters
of various persons of note; and it being her intention to introduce Lord
Byron into this assemblage, she had it intimated to his Lordship that an
article in which his portraiture had been attempted was to appear in a
new edition she was about to publish of her work. It was expected, of
course, that this intimation would awaken in him some desire to see the
sketch; but, on the contrary, he was provoking enough not to manifest
the least symptoms of curiosity. Again and again was the same hint, with
as little success, conveyed; till, at length, on finding that no
impression could be produced in this manner, a direct offer was made, in
Madame A * *'s own name, to submit the article to his perusal. He could
now contain himself no longer. With more sincerity than politeness, he
returned for answer to the lady, that he was by no means ambitious of
appearing in her work; that, from the shortness, as well as the distant
nature of their acquaintance, it was impossible she could have qualified
herself to be his portrait-painter, and that, in short, she could not
oblige him more than by committing the article to the flames.
Whether the tribute thus unceremoniously treated ever met the eyes of
Lord Byron, I know not; but he could hardly, I think, had he seen it,
have escaped a slight touch of remorse at having thus spurned from him a
portrait drawn in no unfriendly spirit, and, though affectedly
expressed, seizing some of the less obvious features of his
character,--as, for instance, that diffidence so little to be expected
from a career like his, with the discriminating niceness of a female
hand. The following are extracts from this Portrait:--
"'Toi, dont le monde encore ignore le vrai nom,
Esprit mystérieux, Mortel, Ange, ou Démon,
Qui que tu sois, Byron, bon ou fatal génie,
J'aime de tes conceits la sauvage harmonie.'
LAMARTINE.
"It would be to little purpose to dwell upon the mere beauty of a
countenance in which the expression of an extraordinary mind was so
conspicuous. What serenity was seated on the forehead, adorned with the
finest chestnut hair, light, curling, and disposed with such art, that
the art was hidden in the imitation of most pleasing nature! What
varied expression in his eyes! They were of the azure colour of the
heavens, from which they seemed to derive their origin. His teeth, in
form, in colour, in transparency, resembled pearls; but his cheeks were
too delicately tinged with the hue of the pale rose. His neck, which he
was in the habit of keeping uncovered as much as the usages of society
permitted, seemed to have been formed in a mould, and was very white.
His hands were as beautiful as if they had been the works of art. His
figure left nothing to be desired, particularly by those who found
rather a grace than a defect in a certain light and gentle undulation of
the person when he entered a room, and of which you hardly felt tempted
to enquire the cause. Indeed it was scarcely perceptible,--the clothes
he wore were so long.
"He was never seen to walk through the streets of Venice, nor along the
pleasant banks of the Brenta, where he spent some weeks of the summer;
and there are some who assert that he has never seen, excepting from a
window, the wonders of the 'Piazza di San Marco;'--so powerful in him
was the desire of not showing himself to be deformed in any part of his
person. I, however, believe that he has often gazed on those wonders,
but in the late and solitary hour, when the stupendous edifices which
surrounded him, illuminated by the soft and placid light of the moon,
appeared a thousand times more lovely.
"His face appeared tranquil like the ocean on a fine spring morning;
but, like it, in an instant became changed into the tempestuous and
terrible, if a passion, (a passion did I say?) a thought, a word,
occurred to disturb his mind. His eyes then lost all their sweetness,
and sparkled so that it became difficult to look on them. So rapid a
change would not have been thought possible; but it was impossible to
avoid acknowledging that the natural state of his mind was the
tempestuous.
"What delighted him greatly one day annoyed him the next; and whenever
he appeared constant in the practice of any habits, it arose merely from
the indifference, not to say contempt, in which he held them all:
whatever they might be, they were not worthy that he should occupy his
thoughts with them. His heart was highly sensitive, and suffered itself
to be governed in an extraordinary degree by sympathy; but his
imagination carried him away, and spoiled every thing. He believed in
presages, and delighted in the recollection that he held this belief in
common with Napoleon. It appeared that, in proportion as his
intellectual education was cultivated, his moral education was
neglected, and that he never suffered himself to know or observe other
restraints than those imposed by his inclinations. Nevertheless, who
could believe that he had a constant, and almost infantine timidity, of
which the evidences were so apparent as to render its existence
indisputable, notwithstanding the difficulty experienced in associating
with Lord Byron a sentiment which had the appearance of modesty?
Conscious as he was that, wherever he presented himself, all eyes were
fixed on him, and all lips, particularly those of the women, were opened
to say, 'There he is, that is Lord Byron,'--he necessarily found
himself in the situation of an actor obliged to sustain a character, and
to render an account, not to others (for about them he gave himself no
concern), but to himself, of his every action and word. This occasioned
him a feeling of uneasiness which was obvious to every one.
"He remarked on a certain subject (which in 1814 was the topic of
universal discourse) that 'the world was worth neither the trouble taken
in its conquest, nor the regret felt at its loss,' which saying (if the
worth of an expression could ever equal that of many and great actions)
would almost show the thoughts and feelings of Lord Byron to be more
stupendous and unmeasured than those of him respecting whom he spoke.
"His gymnastic exercises were sometimes violent, and at others almost
nothing. His body, like his spirit, readily accommodated itself to all
his inclinations. During an entire winter, he went out every morning
alone to row himself to the island of Armenians, (a small island
situated in the midst of a tranquil lake, and distant from Venice about
half a league,) to enjoy the society of those learned and hospitable
monks, and to learn their difficult language; and, in the evening,
entering again into his gondola, he went, but only for a couple of
hours, into company. A second winter, whenever the water of the lake was
violently agitated, he was observed to cross it, and landing on the
nearest _terra firma_, to fatigue at least two horses with riding.
"No one ever heard him utter a word of French, although he was
perfectly conversant with that language. He hated the nation and its
modern literature; in like manner, he held the modern Italian literature
in contempt, and said it possessed but one living author,--a restriction
which I know not whether to term ridiculous, or false and injurious. His
voice was sufficiently sweet and flexible. He spoke with much suavity,
if not contradicted, but rather addressed himself to his neighbour than
to the entire company.
"Very little food sufficed him; and he preferred fish to flesh for this
extraordinary reason, that the latter, he said, rendered him ferocious.
He disliked seeing women eat; and the cause of this extraordinary
antipathy must be sought in the dread he always had, that the notion he
loved to cherish of their perfection and almost divine nature might be
disturbed. Having always been governed by them, it would seem that his
very self-love was pleased to take refuge in the idea of their
excellence,--a sentiment which he knew how (God knows how) to reconcile
with the contempt in which, shortly afterwards, almost with the
appearance of satisfaction, he seemed to hold them. But contradictions
ought not to surprise us in characters like Lord Byron's; and then, who
does not know that the slave holds in detestation his ruler?
"Lord Byron disliked his countrymen, but only because he knew that his
morals were held in contempt by them. The English, themselves rigid
observers of family duties, could not pardon him the neglect of his, nor
his trampling on principles; therefore neither did he like being
presented to them, nor did they, especially when they had their wives
with them, like to cultivate his acquaintance. Still there was a strong
desire in all of them to see him, and the women in particular, who did
not dare to look at him but by stealth, said in an under voice, 'What a
pity it is!' If, however, any of his compatriots of exalted rank and of
high reputation came forward to treat him with courtesy, he showed
himself obviously flattered by it, and was greatly pleased with such
association. It seemed that to the wound which remained always open in
his ulcerated heart such soothing attentions were as drops of healing
balm, which comforted him.
"Speaking of his marriage,--a delicate subject, but one still agreeable
to him, if it was treated in a friendly voice,--he was greatly moved,
and said it had been the innocent cause of all his errors and all his
griefs. Of his wife he spoke with much respect and affection. He said
she was an illustrious lady, distinguished for the qualities of her
heart and understanding, and that all the fault of their cruel
separation lay with himself. Now, was such language dictated by justice
or by vanity? Does it not bring to mind the saying of Julius, that the
wife of Caesar must not even be suspected? What vanity in that saying of
Caesar! In fact, if it had not been from vanity, Lord Byron would have
admitted this to no one. Of his young daughter, his dear Ada, he spoke
with great tenderness, and seemed to be pleased at the great sacrifice
he had made in leaving her to comfort her mother. The intense hatred he
bore his mother-in-law, and a sort of Euryclea of Lady Byron, two women
to whose influence he, in a great measure, attributed her estrangement
from him,--demonstrated clearly how painful the separation was to him,
notwithstanding some bitter pleasantries which occasionally occur in his
writings against her also, dictated rather by rancour than by
indifference."
[Footnote 47: "Il Conte Guiccioli doveva per affari ritornare a Ravenna;
lo stato della mia salute esiggeva che io ritornassi in vece a Venezia.
Egli acconsenti dunque che Lord Byron, mi fosse compagno di viaggio.
Partimmo da Bologna alli 15 di Sre.--visitammo insieme i Colli Euganei
ed Arquà; scrivemmo i nostri nomi nel libro che si presenta a quelli che
fanno quel pellegrinaggio. Ma sopra tali rimembranze di felicità non
posso fermarmi, caro Signr. Moore; l'opposizione col presente é troppo
forte, e se un anima benedetta nel pieno godimento di tutte le felicità
celesti fosse mandata quaggiù e condannata a sopportare tutte le miserie
della nostra terra non potrebbe sentire più terribile contrasto frà il
passato ed il presente di quello che io sento dacchè quella terribile
parola è giunta alle mie orecchie, dacchè ho perduto la speranza di più
vedere quello di cui uno sguardo valeva per me più di tutte le felicità
della terra. Giunti a Venezia i medici mi ordinarono di respirare l'aria
della campagna. Egli aveva una villa alla Mira,--la cedesse a me, e
venne meco. Là passammo l'autunno, e là ebbi il bene di fare la vostra
conoscenza."--MS.]
[Footnote 48: The title of Segretario is sometimes given, as in this
case, to a head-servant or house-steward.]
[Footnote 49: That this was the case with Milton is acknowledged by
Richardson, who admired both Milton and the Arts too warmly to make such
an admission upon any but valid grounds. "He does not appear," says this
writer, "to have much regarded what was done with the pencil; no, not
even when in Italy, in Rome, in the Vatican. Neither does it seem
Sculpture was much esteemed by him." After an authority like this, the
theories of Hayley and others, with respect to the impressions left upon
Milton's mind by the works of art he had seen in Italy, are hardly worth
a thought. Though it may be conceded that Dante was an admirer of the
Arts, his recommendation of the Apocalypse to Giotto, as a source of
subjects for the pencil, shows, at least, what indifferent judges poets
are, in general, of the sort of fancies fittest to be embodied by the
painter.]
* * * * *
From the time of his misunderstanding with Madame A * * *, the visits of
the noble poet were transferred to the house of the other great rallying
point of Venetian society, Madame B * * *,--a lady in whose manners,
though she had long ceased to be young, there still lingered much of
that attaching charm, which a youth passed in successful efforts to
please seldom fails to leave behind. That those powers of pleasing, too,
were not yet gone, the fidelity of, at least, one devoted admirer
testified; nor is she supposed to have thought it impossible that Lord
Byron himself might yet be linked on at the end of that long chain of
lovers, which had, through so many years, graced the triumphs of her
beauty. If, however, there could have been, in any case, the slightest
chance of such a conquest, she had herself completely frustrated it by
introducing her distinguished visitor to Madame Guiccioli,--a step by
which she at last lost, too, even the ornament of his presence at her
parties, as in consequence of some slighting conduct, on her part,
towards his "Dama," he discontinued his attendance at her evening
assemblies, and at the time of my visit to Venice had given up society
altogether.
I could soon collect, from the tone held respecting his conduct at
Madame B * * *'s, how subversive of all the morality of intrigue they
considered the late step of which he had been guilty in withdrawing his
acknowledged "Amica" from the protection of her husband, and placing
her, at once, under the same roof with himself. "You must really (said
the hostess herself to me) scold your friend;--till this unfortunate
affair, he conducted himself _so_ well!"--a eulogy on his previous moral
conduct which, when I reported it the following day to my noble host,
provoked at once a smile and sigh from his lips.
The chief subject of our conversation, when alone, was his marriage, and
the load of obloquy which it had brought upon him. He was most anxious
to know the worst that had been alleged of his conduct; and as this was
our first opportunity of speaking together on the subject, I did not
hesitate to put his candour most searchingly to the proof, not only by
enumerating the various charges I had heard brought against him by
others, but by specifying such portions of these charges as I had been
inclined to think not incredible myself. To all this he listened with
patience, and answered with the most unhesitating frankness, laughing to
scorn the tales of unmanly outrage related of him, but, at the same
time, acknowledging that there had been in his conduct but too much to
blame and regret, and stating one or two occasions, during his domestic
life, when he had been irritated into letting "the breath of bitter
words" escape him,--words, rather those of the unquiet spirit that
possessed him than his own, and which he now evidently remembered with
a degree of remorse and pain which might well have entitled them to be
forgotten by others.
It was, at the same time, manifest, that, whatever admissions he might
be inclined to make respecting his own delinquencies, the inordinate
measure of the punishment dealt out to him had sunk deeply into his
mind, and, with the usual effect of such injustice, drove him also to be
unjust himself;--so much so, indeed, as to impute to the quarter, to
which he now traced all his ill fate, a feeling of fixed hostility to
himself, which would not rest, he thought, even at his grave, but
continue to persecute his memory as it was now embittering his life. So
strong was this impression upon him, that during one of our few
intervals of seriousness, he conjured me, by our friendship, if, as he
both felt and hoped, I should survive him, not to let unmerited censure
settle upon his name, but, while I surrendered him up to condemnation,
where he deserved it, to vindicate him where aspersed.
How groundless and wrongful were these apprehensions, the early death
which he so often predicted and sighed for has enabled us, unfortunately
but too soon, to testify. So far from having to defend him against any
such assailants, an unworthy voice or two, from persons more injurious
as friends than as enemies, is all that I find raised in hostility to
his name; while by none, I am inclined to think, would a generous
amnesty over his grave be more readily and cordially concurred in than
by her, among whose numerous virtues a forgiving charity towards
himself was the only one to which she had not yet taught him to render
justice.
I have already had occasion to remark, in another part of this work,
that with persons who, like Lord Byron, live centred in their own
tremulous web of sensitiveness, those friends of whom they see least,
and who, therefore, least frequently come in collision with them in
those every-day realities from which such natures shrink so morbidly,
have proportionately a greater chance of retaining a hold on their
affections. There is, however, in long absence from persons of this
temperament, another description of risk hardly less, perhaps, to be
dreaded. If the station a friend holds in their hearts is, in near
intercourse with them, in danger from their sensitiveness, it is almost
equally, perhaps, at the mercy of their too active imaginations during
absence. On this very point, I recollect once expressing my
apprehensions to Lord Byron, in a passage of a letter addressed to him
but a short time before his death, of which the following is, as nearly
as I can recall it, the substance:--"When _with_ you, I feel _sure_ of
you; but, at a distance, one is often a little afraid of being made the
victim, all of a sudden, of some of those fanciful suspicions, which,
like meteoric stones, generate themselves (God knows how) in the upper
regions of your imagination, and come clattering down upon our heads,
some fine sunny day, when we are least expecting such an invasion."
In writing thus to him, I had more particularly in recollection a fancy
of this kind respecting myself, which he had, not long before my present
visit to him at Venice, taken into his head. In a ludicrous, and now,
perhaps, forgotten publication of mine, giving an account of the
adventures of an English family in Paris, there had occurred the
following description of the chief hero of the tale:--
"A fine, sallow, sublime sort of Werter-faced man,
With mustachios which gave (what we read of so oft)
The dear Corsair expression, half savage, half soft,--
As hyænas in love may be fancied to look, or
A something between Abelard and old Blucher."
On seeing this doggrel, my noble friend,--as I might, indeed, with a
little more thought, have anticipated,--conceived the notion that I
meant to throw ridicule on his whole race of poetic heroes, and
accordingly, as I learned from persons then in frequent intercourse with
him, flew out into one of his fits of half humorous rage against me.
This he now confessed himself, and, in laughing over the circumstance
with me, owned that he had even gone so far as, in his first moments of
wrath, to contemplate some little retaliation for this perfidious hit at
his heroes. "But when I recollected," said he, "what pleasure it would
give the whole tribe of blockheads and blues to see you and me turning
out against each other, I gave up the idea." He was, indeed, a striking
instance of what may be almost invariably observed, that they who best
know how to wield the weapon of ridicule themselves, are the most alive
to its power in the hands of others. I remember, one day,--in the year
1813, I think,--as we were conversing together about critics and their
influence on the public. "For my part," he exclaimed, "I don't care what
they say of me, so they don't quiz me."--"Oh, you need not fear
that,"--I answered, with something, perhaps, of a half suppressed smile
on my features,--"nobody could quiz _you_"--"_You could_, you villain!"
he replied, clenching his hand at me, and looking, at the same time,
with comic earnestness into my face.
Before I proceed any farther with my own recollections, I shall here
take the opportunity of extracting some curious particulars respecting
the habits and mode of life of my friend while at Venice, from an
account obligingly furnished me by a gentleman who long resided in that
city, and who, during the greater part of Lord Byron's stay, lived on
terms of the most friendly intimacy with him.
"I have often lamented that I kept no notes of his observations during
our rides and aquatic excursions. Nothing could exceed the vivacity and
variety of his conversation, or the cheerfulness of his manner. His
remarks on the surrounding objects were always original: and most
particularly striking was the quickness with which he availed himself of
every circumstance, however trifling in itself, and such as would have
escaped the notice of almost any other person, to carry his point in
such arguments as we might chance to be engaged in. He was feelingly
alive to the beauties of nature, and took great interest in any
observations, which, as a dabbler in the arts, I ventured to make upon
the effects of light and shadow, or the changes produced in the colour
of objects by every variation in the atmosphere.
"The spot where we usually mounted our horses had been a Jewish
cemetery; but the French, during their occupation of Venice, had thrown
down the enclosures, and levelled all the tombstones with the ground, in
order that they might not interfere with the fortifications upon the
Lido, under the guns of which it was situated. To this place, as it was
known to be that where he alighted from his gondola and met his horses,
the curious amongst our country people, who were anxious to obtain a
glimpse of him, used to resort; and it was amusing in the extreme to
witness the excessive coolness with which ladies, as well as gentlemen,
would advance within a very few paces of him, eyeing him, some with
their glasses, as they would have done a statue in a museum, or the wild
beasts at Exeter 'Change. However flattering this might be to a man's
vanity, Lord Byron, though he bore it very patiently, expressed himself,
as I believe he really was, excessively annoyed at it.
"I have said that our usual ride was along the sea-shore, and that the
spot where we took horse, and of course dismounted, had been a cemetery.
It will readily be believed, that some caution was necessary in riding
over the broken tombstones, and that it was altogether an awkward place
for horses to pass. As the length of our ride was not very great,
scarcely more than six miles in all, we seldom rode fast, that we might
at least prolong its duration; and enjoy as much as possible the
refreshing air of the Adriatic. One day, as we were leisurely returning
homewards, Lord Byron, all at once, and without saying any thing to me,
set spurs to his horse and started off at full gallop, making the
greatest haste he could to get to his gondola. I could not conceive what
fit had seized him, and had some difficulty in keeping even within a
reasonable distance of him, while I looked around me to discover, if I
were able, what could be the cause of his unusual precipitation. At
length I perceived at some distance two or three gentlemen, who were
running along the opposite side of the island nearest the Lagoon,
parallel with him, towards his gondola, hoping to get there in time to
see him alight; and a race actually took place between them, he
endeavouring to outstrip them. In this he, in fact, succeeded, and,
throwing himself quickly from his horse, leapt into his gondola, of
which he hastily closed the blinds, ensconcing himself in a corner so as
not to be seen. For my own part, not choosing to risk my neck over the
ground I have spoken of, I followed more leisurely as soon as I came
amongst the gravestones, but got to the place of embarkation just at the
same moment with my curious countrymen, and in time to witness their
disappointment at having had their run for nothing. I found him exulting
in his success in outstripping them. He expressed in strong terms his
annoyance at what he called their impertinence, whilst I could not but
laugh at his impatience, as well as at the mortification of the
unfortunate pedestrians, whose eagerness to see him, I said, was, in my
opinion, highly flattering to him. That, he replied, depended on the
feeling with which they came; and he had not the vanity to believe that
they were influenced by any admiration of his character or of his
abilities, but that they were impelled merely by idle curiosity. Whether
it was so or not, I cannot help thinking that if they had been of the
other sex, he would not have been so eager to escape from their
observation, as in that case he would have repaid them glance for
glance.
"The curiosity that was expressed by all classes of travellers to see
him, and the eagerness with which they endeavoured to pick up any
anecdotes of his mode of life, were carried to a length which will
hardly be credited. It formed the chief subject of their enquiries of
the gondoliers who conveyed them from terra firma to the floating city;
and these people, who are generally loquacious, were not at all backward
in administering to the taste and humours of their passengers, relating
to them the most extravagant and often unfounded stories. They took care
to point out the house where he lived, and to give such hints of his
movements as might afford them an opportunity of seeing him. Many of the
English visiters, under pretext of seeing his house, in which there were
no paintings of any consequence, nor, besides himself, any thing worthy
of notice, contrived to obtain admittance through the cupidity of his
servants, and with the most barefaced impudence forced their way even
into his bedroom, in the hopes of seeing him. Hence arose, in a great
measure, his bitterness towards them, which he has expressed in a note
to one of his poems, on the occasion of some unfounded remark made upon
him by an anonymous traveller in Italy; and it certainly appears well
calculated to foster that cynicism which prevails in his latter works
more particularly, and which, as well as the misanthropical expressions
that occur in those which first raised his reputation, I do not believe
to have been his natural feeling. Of this I am certain, that I never
witnessed greater kindness than in Lord Byron.
"The inmates of his family were all extremely attached to him, and would
have endured any thing on his account. He was indeed culpably lenient to
them; for even when instances occurred of their neglecting their duty,
or taking an undue advantage of his good-nature, he rather bantered than
spoke seriously to them upon it, and could not bring himself to
discharge them, even when he had threatened to do so. An instance
occurred within my knowledge of his unwillingness to act harshly towards
a tradesman whom he had materially assisted, not only by lending him
money, but by forwarding his interest in every way that he could.
Notwithstanding repeated acts of kindness on Lord Byron's part, this man
robbed and cheated him in the most barefaced manner; and when at length
Lord Byron was induced to sue him at law for the recovery of his money,
the only punishment he inflicted upon him, when sentence against him was
passed, was to put him in prison for one week, and then to let him out
again, although his debtor had subjected him to a considerable
additional expense, by dragging him into all the different courts of
appeal, and that he never at last recovered one halfpenny of the money
owed to him. Upon this subject he writes to me from Ravenna, 'If * * is
in (prison), let him out; if out, put him in for a week, merely for a
lesson, and give him a good lecture.'
"He was also ever ready to assist the distressed, and he was most
unostentatious in his charities: for besides considerable sums which he
gave away to applicants at his own house, he contributed largely by
weekly and monthly allowances to persons whom he had never seen, and
who, as the money reached them by other hands, did not even know who was
their benefactor. One or two instances might be adduced where his
charity certainly bore an appearance of ostentation; one particularly,
when he sent fifty louis d'or to a poor printer whose house had been
burnt to the ground, and all his property destroyed; but even this was
not unattended with advantage; for it in a manner compelled the Austrian
authorities to do something for the poor sufferer, which I have no
hesitation in saying they would not have done otherwise; and I attribute
it entirely to the publicity of his donation, that they allowed the man
the use of an unoccupied house belonging to the government until he
could rebuild his own, or re-establish his business elsewhere. Other
instances might be perhaps discovered where his liberalities proceeded
from selfish, and not very worthy motives[50]; but these are rare, and
it would be unjust in the extreme to assume them as proofs of his
character."
It has been already mentioned that, in writing to my noble friend to
announce my coming, I had expressed a hope that he would be able to go
on with me to Rome; and I had the gratification of finding, on my
arrival, that he was fully prepared to enter into this plan. On becoming
acquainted, however, with all the details of his present situation, I so
far sacrificed my own wishes and pleasure as to advise strongly that he
should remain at La Mira. In the first place, I saw reason to apprehend
that his leaving Madame Guiccioli at this crisis might be the means of
drawing upon him the suspicion of neglecting, if not actually deserting,
a young person who had just sacrificed so much to her devotion for him,
and whose position, at this moment, between the Count and Lord Byron, it
required all the generous prudence of the latter to shield from shame or
fall. There had just occurred too, as it appeared to me, a most
favourable opening for the retrieval of, at least, the imprudent part of
the transaction, by replacing the lady instantly under her husband's
protection, and thus enabling her still to retain that station in
society which, in such society, nothing but such imprudence could have
endangered.
This latter hope had been suggested by a letter he one day showed me,
(as we were dining together alone, at the well-known Pellegrino,) which
had that morning been received by the Contessa from her husband, and the
chief object of which was--_not_ to express any censure of her conduct,
but to suggest that she should prevail upon her noble admirer to
transfer into his keeping a sum of 1000_l._, which was then lying, if I
remember right, in the hands of Lord Byron's banker at Ravenna, but
which the worthy Count professed to think would be more advantageously
placed in his own. Security, the writer added, would be given, and five
per cent. interest allowed; as to accept of the sum on any other terms
he should hold to be an "avvilimento" to him. Though, as regarded the
lady herself, who has since proved, by a most noble sacrifice, how
perfectly disinterested were her feelings throughout[51], this trait of
so wholly opposite a character in her lord must have still further
increased her disgust at returning to him, yet so important did it seem,
as well for her friend's sake as her own, to retrace, while there was
yet time, their last imprudent step, that even the sacrifice of this
sum, which I saw would materially facilitate such an arrangement, did
not appear to me by any means too high a price to pay for it. On this
point, however, my noble friend entirely differed with me; and nothing
could be more humorous and amusing than the manner in which, in his
newly assumed character of a lover of money, he dilated on the many
virtues of a thousand pounds, and his determination not to part with a
single one of them to Count Guiccioli. Of his confidence, too, in his
own power of extricating himself from this difficulty he spoke with
equal gaiety and humour; and Mr. Scott, who joined our party after
dinner, having taken the same view of the subject as I did, he laid a
wager of two sequins with that gentleman, that, without any such
disbursement, he would yet bring all right again, and "save the lady and
the money too."
It is indeed, certain, that he had at this time taken up the whim (for
it hardly deserves a more serious name) of minute and constant
watchfulness over his expenditure; and, as most usually happens, it was
with the increase of his means that this increased sense of the value of
money came. The first symptom I saw of this new fancy of his was the
exceeding joy which he manifested on my presenting to him a rouleau of
twenty Napoleons, which Lord K * *d, to whom he had, on some occasion,
lent that sum, had intrusted me with, at Milan, to deliver into his
hands. With the most joyous and diverting eagerness, he tore open the
paper, and, in counting over the sum, stopped frequently to congratulate
himself on the recovery of it.
Of his household frugalities I speak but on the authority of others; but
it is not difficult to conceive that, with a restless spirit like his,
which delighted always in having something to contend with, and which,
but a short time before, "for want," as he said, "of something craggy to
break upon," had tortured itself with the study of the Armenian
language, he should, in default of all better excitement, find a sort of
stir and amusement in the task of contesting, inch by inch, every
encroachment of expense, and endeavouring to suppress what he himself
calls
"That climax of all earthly ills,
The inflammation of our weekly bills."
In truth, his constant recurrence to the praise of avarice in Don Juan,
and the humorous zest with which he delights to dwell on it, shows how
new-fangled, as well as how far from serious, was his adoption of this
"good old-gentlemanly vice." In the same spirit he had, a short time
before my arrival at Venice, established a hoarding-box, with a slit in
the lid, into which he occasionally put sequins, and, at stated periods,
opened it to contemplate his treasures. His own ascetic style of living
enabled him, as far as himself was concerned, to gratify this taste for
economy in no ordinary degree,--his daily bill of fare, when the
Margarita was his companion, consisting, I have been assured, of but
four beccafichi, of which the Fornarina eat three, leaving even him
hungry.
That his parsimony, however (if this new phasis of his ever-shifting
character is to be called by such a name), was very far from being of
that kind which Bacon condemns, as "withholding men from works of
liberality," is apparent from all that is known of his munificence, at
this very period,--some particulars of which, from a most authentic
source, have just been cited, proving amply that while, for the
indulgence of a whim, he kept one hand closed, he gave free course to
his generous nature by dispensing lavishly from the other. It should be
remembered, too, that as long as money shall continue to be one of the
great sources of power, so long will they who seek influence over their
fellow-men attach value to it as an instrument; and the more lowly they
are inclined to estimate the disinterestedness of the human heart, the
more available and precious will they consider the talisman that gives
such power over it. Hence, certainly, it is not among those who have
thought highest of mankind that the disposition to avarice has most
generally displayed itself. In Swift the love of money was strong and
avowed; and to Voltaire the same propensity was also frequently
imputed,--on about as sufficient grounds, perhaps, as to Lord Byron.
On the day preceding that of my departure from Venice, my noble host, on
arriving from La Mira to dinner, told me, with all the glee of a
schoolboy who had been just granted a holiday, that, as this was my last
evening, the Contessa had given him leave to "make a night of it," and
that accordingly he would not only accompany me to the opera, but we
should sup together at some cafe (as in the old times) afterwards.
Observing a volume in his gondola, with a number of paper marks between
the leaves, I enquired of him what it was?--"Only a book," he answered,
"from which I am trying to _crib_, as I do wherever I can[52];--and
that's the way I get the character of an original poet." On taking it up
and looking into it, I exclaimed, "Ah, my old friend,
Agathon!"[53]--"What!" he cried, archly, "you have been beforehand with
me there, have you?"
Though in imputing to himself premeditated plagiarism, he was, of
course, but jesting, it was, I am inclined to think, his practice, when
engaged in the composition of any work, to excite thus his vein by the
perusal of others, on the same subject or plan, from which the slightest
hint caught by his imagination, as he read, was sufficient to kindle
there such a train of thought as, but for that spark, had never been
awakened, and of which he himself soon forgot the source. In the present
instance, the inspiration he sought was of no very elevating
nature,--the anti-spiritual doctrines of the Sophist in this Romance[54]
being what chiefly, I suspect, attracted his attention to its pages, as
not unlikely to supply him with fresh argument and sarcasm for those
depreciating views of human nature and its destiny, which he was now,
with all the wantonness of unbounded genius, enforcing in Don Juan.
Of this work he was, at the time of my visit to him, writing the third
Canto, and before dinner, one day, read me two or three hundred lines of
it;--beginning with the stanzas "Oh Wellington," &c. which at that time
formed the opening of this third Canto, but were afterwards reserved for
the commencement of the ninth. My opinion of the poem, both as regarded
its talent and its mischief, he had already been made acquainted with,
from my having been one of those,--his Committee, as he called us,--to
whom, at his own desire, the manuscript of the two first Cantos had been
submitted, and who, as the reader has seen, angered him not a little by
deprecating the publication of it. In a letter which I, at that time,
wrote to him on the subject, after praising the exquisite beauty of the
scenes between Juan and Haidée, I ventured to say, "Is it not odd that
the same licence which, in your early Satire, you blamed _me_ for being
guilty of on the borders of my twentieth year, you are now yourself
(with infinitely greater power, and therefore infinitely greater
mischief) indulging in _after_ thirty!"
Though I now found him, in full defiance of such remonstrances,
proceeding with this work, he had yet, as his own letters prove, been so
far influenced by the general outcry against his poem, as to feel the
zeal and zest with which he had commenced it considerably abated,--so
much so, as to render, ultimately, in his own opinion, the third and
fourth Cantos much inferior in spirit to the two first. So sensitive,
indeed,--in addition to his usual abundance of this quality,--did he, at
length, grow on the subject, that when Mr. W. Bankes, who succeeded me,
as his visiter, happened to tell him, one day, that he had heard a Mr.
Saunders (or some such name), then resident at Venice, declare that, in
his opinion, "Don Juan was all Grub Street," such an effect had this
disparaging speech upon his mind, (though coming from a person who, as
he himself would have it, was "nothing but a d----d salt-fish seller,")
that, for some time after, by his own confession to Mr. Bankes, he could
not bring himself to write another line of the poem; and, one morning,
opening a drawer where the neglected manuscript lay, he said to his
friend, "Look here--this is all Mr. Saunders's 'Grub Street.'"
To return, however, to the details of our last evening together at
Venice. After a dinner with Mr. Scott at the Pellegrino, we all went,
rather late, to the opera, where the principal part in the Baccanali di
Roma was represented by a female singer, whose chief claim to
reputation, according to Lord Byron, lay in her having _stilettoed_ one
of her favourite lovers. In the intervals between the singing he pointed
out to me different persons among the audience, to whom celebrity of
various sorts, but, for the most part, disreputable, attached; and of
one lady who sat near us, he related an anecdote, which, whether new or
old, may, as creditable to Venetian facetiousness, be worth, perhaps,
repeating. This lady had, it seems, been pronounced by Napoleon the
finest woman in Venice; but the Venetians, not quite agreeing with this
opinion of the great man, contented themselves with calling her "La
Bella _per Decréto_,"--adding (as the Decrees always begin with the word
"Considerando"), "Ma _senza_ il Considerando."
From the opera, in pursuance of our agreement to "make a night of it,"
we betook ourselves to a sort of _cabaret_ in the Place of St. Mark, and
there, within a few yards of the Palace of the Doges, sat drinking hot
brandy punch, and laughing over old times, till the clock of St. Mark
struck the second hour of the morning. Lord Byron then took me in his
gondola, and, the moon being in its fullest splendour, he made the
gondoliers row us to such points of view as might enable me to see
Venice, at that hour, to advantage. Nothing could be more solemnly
beautiful than the whole scene around, and I had, for the first time,
the Venice of my dreams before me. All those meaner details which so
offend the eye by day were now softened down by the moonlight into a
sort of visionary indistinctness; and the effect of that silent city of
palaces, sleeping, as it were, upon the waters, in the bright stillness
of the night, was such as could not but affect deeply even the least
susceptible imagination. My companion saw that I was moved by it, and
though familiar with the scene himself, seemed to give way, for the
moment, to the same strain of feeling; and, as we exchanged a few
remarks suggested by that wreck of human glory before us, his voice,
habitually so cheerful, sunk into a tone of mournful sweetness, such as
I had rarely before heard from him, and shall not easily forget. This
mood, however, was but of the moment; some quick turn of ridicule soon
carried him off into a totally different vein, and at about three
o'clock in the morning, at the door of his own palazzo, we parted,
laughing, as we had met;--an agreement having been first made that I
should take an early dinner with him next day at his villa, on my road
to Ferrara.
Having employed the morning of the following day in completing my round
of sights at Venice,--taking care to visit specially "that picture by
Giorgione," to which the poet's exclamation, "_such_ a woman!"[55] will
long continue to attract all votaries of beauty,--I took my departure
from Venice, and, at about three o'clock, arrived at La Mira. I found my
noble host waiting to receive me, and, in passing with him through the
hall, saw his little Allegra, who, with her nursery maid, was standing
there as if just returned from a walk. To the perverse fancy he had for
falsifying his own character, and even imputing to himself faults the
most alien to his nature, I have already frequently adverted, and had,
on this occasion, a striking instance of it. After I had spoken a
little, in passing, to the child, and made some remark on its beauty, he
said to me,--"Have you any notion--but I suppose _you_ have--of what
they call the parental feeling? For myself, I have not the least." And
yet, when that child died, in a year or two afterwards, he who now
uttered this artificial speech was so overwhelmed by the event, that
those who were about him at the time actually trembled for his reason!
A short time before dinner he left the room, and in a minute or two
returned, carrying in his hand a white leather bag. "Look here," he
said, holding it up--"this would be worth something to Murray, though
_you_, I dare say, would not give sixpence for it."--"What is it?" I
asked.--"My Life and Adventures," he answered. On hearing this, I raised
my hands in a gesture of wonder. "It is not a thing," he continued,
"that can be published during my lifetime, but you may have it--if you
like--there, do whatever you please with it." In taking the bag, and
thanking him most warmly, I added, "This will make a nice legacy for my
little Tom, who shall astonish the latter days of the nineteenth century
with it." He then added, "You may show it to any of our friends you
think worthy of it:"--and this is, nearly word for word, the whole of
what passed between us on the subject.
At dinner we were favoured with the presence of Madame Guiccioli, who
was so obliging as to furnish me, at Lord Byron's suggestion, with a
letter of introduction to her brother, Count Gamba, whom it was
probable, they both thought, I should meet at Rome. This letter I never
had an opportunity of presenting; and as it was left open for me to
read, and was, the greater part of it, I have little doubt, dictated by
my noble friend, I may venture, without impropriety, to give an extract
from it here;--premising that the allusion to the "Castle," &c. refers
to some tales respecting the cruelty of Lord Byron to his wife, which
the young Count had heard, and, at this time, implicitly believed. After
a few sentences of compliment to the bearer, the letter proceeds:--"He
is on his way to see the wonders of Rome, and there is no one, I am
sure, more qualified to enjoy them. I shall be gratified and obliged by
your acting, as far as you can, as his guide. He is a friend of Lord
Byron's, and much more accurately acquainted with his history than those
who have related it to you. He will accordingly describe to you, if you
ask him, _the shape, the dimensions_, and whatever else you may please
to require, of _that Castle in which he keeps imprisoned a young and
innocent wife_, &c. &c. My dear Pietro, whenever you feel inclined to
laugh, do send two lines of answer to your sister, who loves and ever
will love you with the greatest tenderness.--Teresa Guiccioli."[56]
After expressing his regret that I had not been able to prolong my stay
at Venice, my noble friend said, "At least, I think, you might spare a
day or two to go with me to Arquà. I should like," he continued,
thoughtfully, "to visit that tomb with you:"--then, breaking off into
his usual gay tone; "a pair of poetical pilgrims--eh, Tom, what say
you?"--That I should have declined this offer, and thus lost the
opportunity of an excursion which would have been remembered, as a
bright dream, through all my after-life, is a circumstance I never can
think of without wonder and self-reproach. But the main design on which
I had then set my mind of reaching Rome, and, if possible, Naples,
within the limited period which circumstances allowed, rendered me far
less alive than I ought to have been to the preciousness of the episode
thus offered to me.
When it was time for me to depart, he expressed his intention to
accompany me a few miles; and, ordering his horses to follow, proceeded
with me in the carriage as far as Strà, where for the last time--how
little thinking it was to be the last!--I bade my kind and admirable
friend farewell.
[Footnote 50: The writer here, no doubt, alludes to such questionable
liberalities as those exercised towards the husbands of his two
favourites, Madame S * * and the Fornarina.]
[Footnote 51: The circumstance here alluded to may be most clearly,
perhaps, communicated to my readers through the medium of the following
extract from a letter which Mr. Barry (the friend and banker of Lord
Byron) did me the favour of addressing to me, soon after his Lordship's
death:--"When Lord Byron went to Greece, he gave me orders to advance
money to Madame G * *; but that lady would never consent to receive any.
His Lordship had also told me that he meant to leave his will in my
hands, and that there would be a bequest in it of 10,000_l._ to Madame G
* *. He mentioned this circumstance also to Lord Blessington. When the
melancholy news of his death reached me, I took for granted that this
will would be found among the sealed papers he had left with me; but
there was no such instrument. I immediately then wrote to Madame G * *,
enquiring if she knew any thing concerning it, and mentioning, at the
same time, what his Lordship had said is to the legacy. To this the lady
replied, that he had frequently spoken to her on the same subject, but
that she had always cut the conversation short, as it was a topic she by
no means liked to hear him speak upon. In addition, she expressed a wish
that no such will as I had mentioned would be found; as her
circumstances were already sufficiently independent, and the world might
put a wrong construction on her attachment, should it appear that her
fortunes were, in any degree, bettered by it."]
[Footnote 52: This will remind the reader of Molière's avowal in
speaking of wit:--"C'est mon bien, et je le prends partout où je le
trouve."]
[Footnote 53: The History of Agathon, by Wieland.]
[Footnote 54: Between Wieland, the author of this Romance, and Lord
Byron, may be observed some of those generic points of resemblance which
it is so interesting to trace in the characters of men of genius. The
German poet, it is said, never perused any work that made a strong
impression upon him, without being stimulated to commence one, himself,
on the same topic and plan; and in Lord Byron the imitative principle
was almost equally active,--there being few of his poems that might not,
in the same manner, be traced to the strong impulse given to his
imagination by the perusal of some work that had just before interested
him. In the history, too, of their lives and feelings, there was a
strange and painful coincidence,--the revolution that took place in all
Wieland's opinions, from the Platonism and romance of his youthful days,
to the material and Epicurean doctrines that pervaded all his maturer
works, being chiefly, it is supposed, brought about by the shock his
heart had received from a disappointment of its affections in early
life. Speaking of the illusion of this first passion, in one of his
letters, he says,--"It is one for which no joys, no honours, no gifts of
fortune, not even wisdom itself can afford an equivalent, and which,
when it has once vanished, returns no more."]
[Footnote 55:
"'Tis but a portrait of his son and wife,
And self; but such a woman! love in life!"
BEPPO, Stanza xii.
This seems, by the way, to be an incorrect description of the picture,
as, according to Vasari and others, Giorgione never was married, and
died young.]
[Footnote 56: "Egli viene per vedere le meraviglie di questa Città, e
sono certa che nessuno meglio di lui saprebbe gustarle. Mi sarà grato
che vi facciate sua guida come potrete, e voi poi me ne avrete obbligo.
Egli è amico de Lord Byron--sà la sua storia assai più precisamente di
quelli che a voi la raccontarono. Egli dunque vi racconterà se lo
interrogherete _la forma, le dimensioni_, e tuttociò che vi piacerà del
_Castello ove tiene imprigionata una giovane innocente sposa_, &c. &c.
Mio caro Pietro, quando ti sei bene sfogato a ridere, allora rispondi
due righe alla tua sorella, che t' ama e t' amerà sempre colla maggiore
tenerezza."]
* * * * *