"What's writ on me," cries Fitz, "I never read"!
What's writ by thee, dear Fitz, none will, indeed.
The case stands simply thus, then, honest Fitz,
Thou and thine enemies are fairly quits;
Or rather would be, if for time to come,
They luckily were 'deaf', or thou wert dumb;
But to their pens while scribblers add their tongues.
The Waiter only can escape their lungs. [A]]
{Sub-Footnote 0.1: Compare 'Hints from Horace', l. 808, 'note' 1.}
[Footnote 4: Cid Hamet Benengeli promises repose to his pen, in the last
chapter of 'Don Quixote'. Oh! that our voluminous gentry would follow
the example of Cid Hamet Benengeli!]
[Footnote 5: "This must have been written in the spirit of prophecy."
(B., 1816.)]
[Footnote 6: "He's a very good fellow; and, except his mother and
sister, the best of the set, to my mind."--B., 1816. [William
(1779-1848) and George (1784-1834) Lamb, sons of Sir Peniston Lamb
(Viscount Melbourne, 1828), by Elizabeth, only daughter of Sir Ralph
Milbanke, were Lady Byron's first cousins. William married, in 1805,
Lady Caroline Ponsonby, the writer of 'Glenarvon'. George, who was one
of the early contributors to the 'Edinburgh Review', married in 1809
Caroline Rosalie Adelaide St. Jules. At the time of the separation, Lady
Caroline Lamb and Mrs. George Lamb warmly espoused Lady Byron's cause,
Lady Melbourne and her daughter Lady Cowper (afterwards Lady Palmerston)
were rather against than for Lady Byron. William Lamb was discreetly
silent, and George Lamb declaimed against Lady Byron, calling her a
d----d fool. Hence Lord Byron's praises of George. Cf. line 517 of
'English Bards'.]
[Footnote 7: This ingenuous youth is mentioned more particularly, with
his production, in another place. ('Vide post', l. 516.)
"Spurious Brat" [see variant ii. p. 300], that is the farce; the
ingenuous youth who begat it is mentioned more particularly with his
offspring in another place. ['Note. MS. M.'] [The farce 'Whistle for It'
was performed two or three times at Covent Garden Theatre in 1807.]
[Footnote 8: In the 'Edinburgh Review'.]
[Footnote 9: The proverbial "Joe" Miller, an actor by profession
(1684-1738), was a man of no education, and is said to have been unable
to read. His reputation rests mainly on the book of jests compiled after
his death, and attributed to him by John Mottley. (First Edition. T.
Read. 1739.)]
[Footnote 10: Messrs. Jeffrey and Lamb are the alpha and omega, the
first and last of the 'Edinburgh Review'; the others are mentioned
hereafter.
[The MS. Note is as follows:--"Of the young gentlemen who write in the
'E.R.', I have now named the alpha and omega, the first and the last,
the best and the worst. The intermediate members are designated with due
honour hereafter."]
"This was not just. Neither the heart nor the head of these gentlemen
are at all what they are here represented. At the time this was written,
I was personally unacquainted with either."--B., 1816.
[Francis Jeffrey (1773-1850) founded the 'Edinburgh Review' in
conjunction with Sydney Smith, Brougham, and Francis Horner, in 1802. In
1803 he succeeded Smith as editor, and conducted the 'Review' till 1829.
Independence of publishers and high pay to contributors ("Ten guineas a
sheet," writes Southey to Scott, June, 1807, "instead of seven pounds
for the 'Annual'," 'Life and Corr'., iii. 125) distinguished the new
journal from the first. Jeffrey was called to the Scottish bar in 1794,
and as an advocate was especially successful with juries. He was
constantly employed, and won fame and fortune. In 1829 he was elected
Dean of the Faculty of Advocates, and the following year, when the Whigs
came into office, he became Lord Advocate. He sat as M.P. twice for
Malton (1830-1832), and, afterwards, for Edinburgh. In 1834 he was
appointed a Judge of the Court of Sessions, when he took the title of
Lord Jeffrey. Byron had attacked Jeffrey in British Bards before his
'Hours of Idleness' had been cut up by the 'Edinburgh', and when the
article appeared (Jan. 1808), under the mistaken impression that he was
the author, denounced him at large (ll. 460-528) in the first edition of
'English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers'. None the less, the great critic
did not fail to do ample justice to the poet's mature work, and won from
him repeated acknowledgments of his kindness and generosity. (See
'Edinburgh Review', vol. xxii. p. 416, and Byron's comment in his
'Diary' for March 20,1814; 'Life', p. 232. See, too, 'Hints from
Horace', ll. 589-626; and 'Don Juan', canto x. st. 11-16, and canto xii.
st. 16. See also Bagehot's 'Literary Studies', vol. i. article I.)]
[Footnote 11: IMITATION.
"Stulta est dementia, cum tot ubique
------occurras perituræ parcere chartæ."