The funeral he desired to be “as private as is consistent with
decency;” and he expressed a hope that his friend, the Rev. Henry
Drury, would read the church service.
Murray found himself beset by unexpected difficulties. The vicar of
Harrow, the Rev. J. W. Cunningham, objected strenuously to the erection
of Allegra’s tablet, and stated his objections at length;--not to Lord
Byron (which was prudent), but to the unhappy publisher, who, all his
life, had everybody’s business to attend to. Mr. Cunningham declared
that the proposed inscription “would be felt by every man of refined
taste, to say nothing of sound morals, to be an offence against taste
and propriety.” He explained cautiously that, as he did not dare to say
this to Byron, he expected Murray to do so. “My correspondence with his
Lordship has been so small that I can scarcely venture myself to urge
these objections. You, perhaps, will feel no such scruple. I have seen
no person who did not concur in the propriety of stating them. I would
intreat, however, that, should you think it right to introduce my name
into any statement made to Lord Byron” (as if it could well have been
left out), “you will not do so without assuring him of my unwillingness
to oppose the smallest obstacle to his wishes, or give the slightest
pain to his mind. The injury which, in my judgment, he is from day
to day inflicting upon society is no justification for measures of
retaliation and unkindness.”
Even the expansive generosity of this last sentiment failed to soften
Byron’s wrath, when the vicar’s scruples were communicated to him.
He anathematized the reverend gentleman in language too vigorous for
repetition, and he demanded of Murray, “what was the matter with the
inscription,”--apparently under the impression that he had mistaken
his dates, or misquoted his text. His anger deepened into fury when he
was subsequently informed that Allegra’s interment in Harrow Church
was held to be a deliberate insult to Lady Byron, who occasionally
attended the services there. He wrote passionately that of his wife’s
church-goings he knew nothing; but that, had he known, no power
would have induced him to bury his poor infant where her foot might
tread upon its grave. Meanwhile, Mr. Cunningham had marshalled his
church-wardens, who obediently withheld their consent to the erection
of the tablet; so that matter was settled forever. Two years later, Dr.
Ireland, Dean of Westminster, refused to permit Lord Byron’s body to
be buried in Westminster Abbey. Even Thorwaldsen’s statue of the poet,
now in Trinity College, Cambridge, was rejected by this conscientious
dignitary. “I do indeed greatly wish for a figure by Thorwaldsen here,”
he wrote piously to Murray; “but no taste ought to be indulged to the
prejudice of a duty.” The statue lay unheeded for months in a shed on
the Thames wharf, and was finally transferred to the library of Trinity
College, Cambridge. Comment is superfluous. Byron was denied a grave
in Westminster Abbey; but Gifford, through Dr. Ireland’s especial
insistence, was buried within its walls.
Allegra lies in Harrow Church, with no tablet to mark her
resting-place, or to preserve her memory. Visitors searching
sentimentally for “Byron’s tomb,”--by which they mean a stone in the
churchyard, “on the brow of the hill, looking towards Windsor,” where,
as a boy, he was wont to sit and dream for hours,--seldom know the spot
where his little daughter sleeps.