"March 26.
"Since your intelligence with regard to the Greek loan, P.
Mavrocordato has shown to me an extract from some correspondence of
his, by which it would appear that three commissioners are to be
named to see that the amount is placed in proper hands for the
service of the country, and that my name is amongst the number. Of
this, however, we have as yet only the report.
"This commission is apparently named by the Committee or the
contracting parties in England. I am of opinion that such a
commission will be necessary, but the office will be both delicate
and difficult. The weather, which has lately been equinoctial, has
flooded the country, and will probably retard our proceeding to
Salona for some days, till the road becomes more practicable.
"You were already apprised that P. Mavrocordato and myself had been
invited to a conference by Ulysses and the Chiefs of Eastern Greece.
I hear (and am indeed consulted on the subject) that in case the
remittance of the first advance of the Loan should not arrive
immediately, the Greek General Government mean to try to raise some
thousand dollars in the islands in the interim, to be repaid from the
earliest instalments on their arrival. What prospect of success they
may have, or on what conditions, you can tell better than me: I
suppose, if the Loan be confirmed, something might be done by them,
but subject of course to the usual terms. You can let them and me
know your opinion. There is an imperious necessity for some national
fund, and that speedily, otherwise what is to be done? The auxiliary
corps of about two hundred men, paid by me, are, I believe, the sole
regularly and properly furnished with the money, due to them weekly,
and the officers monthly. It is true that the Greek Government give
their rations; but we have had three mutinies, owing to the badness
of the bread, which neither native nor stranger could masticate (nor
dogs either), and there is still great difficulty in obtaining them
even provisions of any kind.
"There is a dissension among the Germans about the conduct of the
agents of _their_ Committee, and an examination amongst themselves
instituted. What the result may be cannot be anticipated, except that
it will end in _a row_, of course, as usual.
"The English are all very amicable as far as I know; we get on too
with the Greeks very tolerably, always making allowance for
circumstances; and we have no quarrels with the foreigners."
During the month of March there occurred but little, besides what is
mentioned in these letters, that requires to be dwelt upon at any
length, or in detail. After the failure of his design against
Lepanto, the two great objects of his daily thoughts were, the
repairs of the fortifications of Missolonghi [1], and the formation
of a brigade;--the one, with a view to such defensive measures as
were alone likely to be called for during the present campaign; and
the other in preparation for those more active enterprises, which he
still fondly flattered himself he should undertake in the next. "He
looked forward (says Mr. Parry) for the recovery of his health and
spirits, to the return of the fine weather, and the commencement of
the campaign, when he proposed to take the field at the head of his
own brigade, and the troops which the Government of Greece were to
place under his orders."
[Footnote 1: The generous zeal with which he applied himself to this
important object will be understood from the following
statement:--"On reporting to Lord Byron what I thought might be done,
he ordered me to draw up a plan for putting the fortifications in
thorough repair, and to accompany it with an estimate of the expense.
It was agreed that I should make the estimate only one third of what
I thought would be the actual expense; and if that third could be
procured from the magistrates, Lord Byron undertook secretly to pay
the remainder."]
With that thanklessness which too often waits on disinterested
actions, it has been sometimes tauntingly remarked, and in quarters
from whence a more generous judgment might be expected [1], that,
after all, Lord Byron effected but little for Greece:--as if much
_could_ be effected by a single individual, and in so short a time,
for a cause which, fought as it has been almost incessantly through
the six years since his death, has required nothing less than the
intervention of all the great Powers of Europe to give it a chance of
success, and, even so, has not yet succeeded. That Byron himself was
under no delusion as to the importance of his own solitary aid,--that
he knew, in a struggle like this, there must be the same prodigality
of means towards one great end as is observable in the still grander
operations of nature, where individuals are as nothing in the tide of
events,--that such was his, at once, philosophic and melancholy view
of his own sacrifices, I have, I trust, clearly shown. But that,
during this short period of action, he did not do well and wisely all
that man could achieve in the time, and under the circumstances, is
an assertion which the noble facts here recorded fully and
triumphantly disprove. He knew that, placed as he was, his measures,
to be wise, must be prospective, and from the nature of the seeds
thus sown by him, the benefits that were to be expected must be
judged. To reconcile the rude chiefs to the Government and to each
other;--to infuse a spirit of humanity, by his example, into their
warfare;--to prepare the way for the employment of the expected Loan,
in a manner most calculated to call forth the resources of the
country;--to put the fortifications of Missolonghi in such a state of
repair as might, and eventually _did_, render it proof against the
besieger;--to prevent those infractions of neutrality, so tempting to
the Greeks, which brought their Government in collision with the
Ionian authorities[2], and to restrain all such license of the Press
as might indispose the Courts of Europe to their cause:--such were
the important objects which he had proposed to himself to accomplish,
and towards which, in this brief interval, and in the midst of such
dissensions and hinderances, he had already made considerable and
most promising progress. But it would be unjust to close even here
the bright catalogue of his services. It is, after all, _not_ with
the span of mortal life that the good achieved by a name immortal
ends. The charm acts into the future,--it is an auxiliary through all
time; and the inspiring example of Byron, as a martyr of liberty, is
for ever freshly embalmed in his glory as a poet. From the period of
his attack in February he had been, from time to time, indisposed;
and, more than once, had complained of vertigos, which made him feel,
he said, as if intoxicated. He was also frequently affected with
nervous sensations, with shiverings and tremors, which, though
apparently the effects of excessive debility, he himself attributed
to fulness of habit. Proceeding upon this notion, he had, ever since
his arrival in Greece, abstained almost wholly from animal food, and
ate of little else but dry toast, vegetables, and cheese. With the
same fear of becoming fat, which had in his young days haunted him,
he almost every morning measured himself round the wrist and waist,
and whenever he found these parts, as he thought, enlarged, took a
strong dose of medicine.
[Footnote 1: Articles in the Times newspaper, Foreign Quarterly
Review, &c.]
[Footnote 2: In a letter which he addressed to Lord Sidney Osborne,
enclosing one, on the subject of these infractions, from Prince
Mavrocordato to Sir T. Maitland, Lord Byron says,--"You must all be
persuaded how difficult it is, under existing circumstances, for the
Greeks to keep up discipline, however they may be all disposed to do
so, I am doing all I can to convince them of the necessity of the
strictest observance of the regulations of the Islands, and, I trust,
with some effect"]
Exertions had, as we have seen, been made by his friends at
Cephalonia, to induce him, without delay, to return to that island,
and take measures, while there was yet time, for the re-establishment
of his health. "But these entreaties (says Count Gamba) produced just
the contrary effect; for in proportion as Byron thought his position
more perilous, he the more resolved upon remaining where he was." In
the midst of all this, too, the natural flow of his spirits in
society seldom deserted him; and whenever a trick upon any of his
attendants, or associates, suggested itself, he was as ready to play
the mischief-loving boy as ever. His engineer, Parry, having been
much alarmed by the earthquake they had experienced, and still
continuing in constant apprehension of its return, Lord Byron
contrived, as they were all sitting together one evening, to have
some barrels full of cannon-balls trundled through the room above
them; and laughed heartily, as he would have done when a Harrow boy,
at the ludicrous effect which this deception produced on the poor
frightened engineer.
Every day, however, brought new trials both to his health and temper.
The constant rains had rendered the swamps of Missolonghi almost
impassable;--an alarm of plague, which, about the middle of March,
was circulated, made it prudent, for some time, to keep within doors;
and he was thus, week after week, deprived of his accustomed air and
exercise. The only recreation he had recourse to was that of playing
with his favourite dog, Lion; and, in the evening, going through the
exercise of drilling with his officers, or practising at
single-stick.
At the same time, the demands upon his exertions, personal and
pecuniary, poured in from all sides, while the embarrassments of his
public position every day increased. The chief obstacle in the way of
his plan for the reconciliation of all parties had been the rivalry
so long existing between Mavrocordato and the Eastern Chiefs; and
this difficulty was now not a little heightened by the part taken by
Colonel Stanhope and Mr. Trelawney, who, having allied themselves
with Odysseus, the most powerful of these Chieftains, were
endeavouring actively to detach Lord Byron from Mavrocordato, and
enlist him in their own views. This schism was,--to say the least of
it,--ill-timed and unfortunate. For, as Prince Mavrocordato and Lord
Byron were now acting in complete harmony with the Government, a
co-operation of all the other English agents on the same side would
have had the effect of assuring a preponderance to this party (which
was that of the civil and commercial interests all through Greece),
that might, by strengthening the hands of the ruling power, have
afforded some hope of vigour and consistency in its movements. By
this division, however, the English lost their casting weight; and
not only marred whatever little chance they might have had of
extinguishing the dissensions of the Greeks, but exhibited, most
unseasonably, an example of dissension among themselves.
The visit to Salona, in which, though distrustful of the intended
Military Congress, Mavrocordato had consented to accompany Lord
Byron, was, as the foregoing letters have mentioned, delayed by the
floods,--the river Fidari having become so swollen as not to be
fordable. In the mean time, dangers, both from within and without,
threatened Missolonghi. The Turkish fleet had again come forth from
the Gulf, while, in concert, it was apprehended, with this resumption
of the blockade, insurrectionary movements, instigated, as was
afterwards known, by the malcontents of the Morea, manifested
themselves formidably both in the town and its neighbourhood. The
first cause for alarm was the landing, in canoes, from Anatolico, of
a party of armed men, the followers of Cariascachi of that place, who
came to demand retribution from the people of Missolonghi for some
injury that, in a late affray, had been inflicted on one of their
clan. It was also rumoured that 300 Suliotes were marching upon the
town; and the following morning, news came that a party of these wild
warriors had actually seized upon Basiladi, a fortress that commands
the port of Missolonghi, while some of the soldiers of Cariascachi
had, in the course of the night, arrested two of the Primates, and
carried them to Anatolico. The tumult and indignation that this
intelligence produced was universal. All the shops were shut, and the
bazaars deserted. "Lord Byron," says Count Gamba, "ordered his troops
to continue under arms; but to preserve the strictest neutrality,
without mixing in any quarrel, either by actions or words."
During this crisis, the weather had become sufficiently favourable to
admit of his paying the visit to Salona, which he had purposed. But,
as his departure at such a juncture might have the appearance of
abandoning Missolonghi, he resolved to wait the danger out. At this
time the following letters were written.