the room in convulsive struggles to repress her tears and sobs, while
she over and over again strove to elicit something from him which
should enlighten her upon what that last message had been; but in vain:
the gates of eternity were shut in her face, and not a word had passed
to tell her if he had repented.
For all that, Lady Byron never doubted his salvation. Ever before her,
during the few remaining years of her widowhood, was the image of her
husband, purified and ennobled, with the shadows of earth for ever
dissipated, the stains of sin for ever removed; 'the angel in him,' as
she expressed it, 'made perfect, according to its divine ideal.'
Never has more divine strength of faith and love existed in woman.
Out of the depths of her own loving and merciful nature, she gained
such views of the divine love and mercy as made all hopes possible.
There was no soul of whose future Lady Byron despaired,--such was her
boundless faith in the redeeming power of love.
After Byron's death, the life of this delicate creature--so frail in
body that she seemed always hovering on the brink of the eternal world,
yet so strong in spirit, and so unceasing in her various ministries of
mercy--was a miracle of mingled weakness and strength.
To talk with her seemed to the writer of this sketch the nearest
possible approach to talking with one of the spirits of the just made
perfect.
She was gentle, artless; approachable as a little child; with ready,
outflowing sympathy for the cares and sorrows and interests of all who
approached her; with a _naïve_ and gentle playfulness, that adorned,
without hiding, the breadth and strength of her mind; and, above all,
with a clear, divining, moral discrimination; never mistaking wrong
for right in the slightest shade, yet with a mercifulness that made
allowance for every weakness, and pitied every sin.
There was so much of Christ in her, that to have seen her seemed to be
to have drawn near to heaven. She was one of those few whom absence
cannot estrange from friends; whose mere presence in this world seems
always a help to every generous thought, a strength to every good
purpose, a comfort in every sorrow.
Living so near the confines of the spiritual world, she seemed already
to see into it: hence the words of comfort which she addressed to a
friend who had lost a son:--
'Dear friend, remember, as long as our loved ones are in _God's_ world,
they are in _ours_.'
* * * * *
It has been thought by some friends who have read the proof-sheets
of the foregoing that the author should give more specifically her
authority for these statements.
The circumstances which led the writer to England at a certain time
originated a friendship and correspondence with Lady Byron, which was
always regarded as one of the greatest acquisitions of that visit.
On the occasion of a second visit to England, in 1856, the writer
received a note from Lady Byron, indicating that she wished to have
some private, confidential conversation upon important subjects,
and inviting her, for that purpose, to spend a day with her at her
country-seat near London.
The writer went and spent a day with Lady Byron alone; and the object
of the invitation was explained to her. Lady Byron was in such a state
of health, that her physicians had warned her that she had very little
time to live. She was engaged in those duties and retrospections which
every thoughtful person finds necessary, when coming deliberately, and
with open eyes, to the boundaries of this mortal life.
At that time, there was a cheap edition of Byron's works in
contemplation, intended to bring his writings into circulation among
the masses; and the pathos arising from the story of his domestic
misfortunes was one great means relied on for giving it currency.
Under these circumstances, some of Lady Byron's friends had proposed
the question to her, _whether she had not a responsibility to society
for the truth_; whether _she did right_ to allow these writings to gain
influence over the popular mind by giving a silent consent to what she
knew to be utter falsehoods.
Lady Byron's whole life had been passed in the most heroic
self-abnegation and self-sacrifice: and she had now to consider whether
one more act of self-denial was not required of her before leaving this
world; namely, to declare the absolute truth, no matter at what expense
to her own feelings.
For this reason, it was her desire to recount the whole history to a
person of another country, and entirely out of the sphere of personal
and local feelings which might be supposed to influence those in the
country and station in life where the events really happened, in order
that she might be helped by such a person's views in making up an
opinion as to her own duty.
The interview had almost the solemnity of a death-bed avowal. Lady
Byron stated the facts which have been embodied in this article, and
gave to the writer a paper containing a brief memorandum of the whole,
with the dates affixed.
We have already spoken of that singular sense of the reality of the
spiritual world which seemed to encompass Lady Byron during the last
part of her life, and which made her words and actions seem more like
those of a blessed being detached from earth than of an ordinary
mortal. All her modes of looking at things, all her motives of action,
all her involuntary exhibitions of emotion, were so high above any
common level, and so entirely regulated by the most unworldly causes,
that it would seem difficult to make the ordinary world understand
exactly how the thing seemed to lie before her mind. What impressed
the writer more strongly than anything else was Lady Byron's perfect
conviction that her husband was now a redeemed spirit; that he looked
back with pain and shame and regret on all that was unworthy in his
past life; and that, if he could speak or could act in the case, he
would desire to prevent the further circulation of base falsehoods,
and of seductive poetry, which had been made the vehicle of morbid and
unworthy passions.
Lady Byron's experience had led her to apply the powers of her strong
philosophical mind to the study of mental pathology: and she had become
satisfied that the solution of the painful problem which first occurred
to her as a young wife, was, after all, the true one; namely, that
Lord Byron had been one of those unfortunately constituted persons in
whom the balance of nature is so critically hung, that it is always in
danger of dipping towards insanity; and that, in certain periods of his
life, he was so far under the influence of mental disorder as not to be
fully responsible for his actions.
She went over with a brief and clear analysis the history of his
whole life as she had thought it out during the lonely musings of her
widowhood. She dwelt on the ancestral causes that gave him a nature
of exceptional and dangerous susceptibility. She went through the
mismanagements of his childhood, the history of his school-days, the
influence of the ordinary school-course of classical reading on such
a mind as his. She sketched boldly and clearly the internal life of
the young men of the time, as she, with her purer eyes, had looked
through it; and showed how habits, which, with less susceptible fibre,
and coarser strength of nature, were tolerable for his companions,
were deadly to him, unhinging his nervous system, and intensifying the
dangers of ancestral proclivities. Lady Byron expressed the feeling
too, that the Calvinistic theology, as heard in Scotland, had proved
in his case, as it often does in certain minds, a subtle poison. He
never could either disbelieve or become reconciled to it; and the sore
problems it proposes embittered his spirit against Christianity.
'The worst of it is, I _do believe_,' he would often say with violence,
when he had been employing all his powers of reason, wit, and ridicule
upon these subjects.
Through all this sorrowful history was to be seen, not the care of a
slandered woman to make her story good, but the pathetic anxiety of
a mother, who treasures every particle of hope, every intimation of
good, in the son whom she cannot cease to love. With indescribable
resignation, she dwelt on those last hours, those words addressed to
her, never to be understood till repeated in eternity.
But all this she looked upon as for ever past; believing, that, with
the dropping of the earthly life, these morbid impulses and influences
ceased, and that higher nature which he often so beautifully expressed
in his poems became the triumphant one.
While speaking on this subject, her pale ethereal face became luminous
with a heavenly radiance; there was something so sublime in her belief
in the victory of love over evil, that faith with her seemed to have
become sight. She seemed so clearly to perceive the divine ideal of
the man she had loved, and for whose salvation she had been called to
suffer and labour and pray, that all memories of his past unworthiness
fell away, and were lost.
Her love was never the doting fondness of weak women; it was the
appreciative and discriminating love by which a higher nature
recognised god-like capabilities under all the dust and defilement
of misuse and passion: and she never doubted that the love which in
her was so strong, that no injury or insult could shake it, was yet
stronger in the God who made her capable of such a devotion, and that
in him it was accompanied by power to subdue all things to itself.
The writer was so impressed and excited by the whole scene and recital,
that she begged for two or three days to deliberate before forming any
opinion. She took the memorandum with her, returned to London, and gave
a day or two to the consideration of the subject. The decision which
she made was chiefly influenced by her reverence and affection for Lady
Byron. She seemed so frail, she had suffered so much, she stood at
such a height above the comprehension of the coarse and common world,
that the author had a feeling that it would almost be like violating a
shrine to ask her to come forth from the sanctuary of a silence where
she had so long abode, and plead her cause. She wrote to Lady Byron,
that while this act of justice did seem to be called for, and to be in
some respects most desirable, yet, as it would involve so much that was
painful to her, the writer considered that Lady Byron would be entirely
justifiable in leaving the truth to be disclosed after her death; and
recommended that all the facts necessary should be put in the hands of
some person, to be so published.
Years passed on. Lady Byron lingered four years after this interview to
the wonder of her physicians and all her friends.
After Lady Byron's death, the writer looked anxiously, hoping to see a
Memoir of the person whom she considered the most remarkable woman that
England has produced in the century. No such Memoir has appeared on the
part of her friends; and the mistress of Lord Byron has the ear of the
public, and is sowing far and wide unworthy slanders, which are eagerly
gathered up and read by an undiscriminating community.
There may be family reasons in England which prevent Lady Byron's
friends from speaking. But Lady Byron has an American name and an
American existence; and reverence for pure womanhood is, we think, a
national characteristic of the American; and, so far as this country
is concerned, we feel that the public should have this refutation of
the slanders of the Countess Guiccioli's book.
LORD LINDSAY'S LETTER TO THE LONDON 'TIMES.'
TO THE EDITOR OF 'THE TIMES.'
Sir,--I have waited in expectation of a categorical denial of the
horrible charge brought by Mrs. Beecher Stowe against Lord Byron and
his sister on the alleged authority of the late Lady Byron. Such denial
has been only indirectly given by the letter of Messrs. Wharton and
Fords in your impression of yesterday. That letter is sufficient to
prove that Lady Byron never contemplated the use made of her name, and
that her descendants and representatives disclaim any countenance of
Mrs. B. Stowe's article; but it does not specifically meet Mrs. Stowe's
allegation, that Lady Byron, in conversing with her thirteen years ago,
affirmed the charge now before us. It remains open, therefore, to a
scandal-loving world, to credit the calumny through the advantage of
this flaw, involuntary, I believe, in the answer produced against it.
My object in addressing you is to supply that deficiency by proving
that what is now stated on Lady Byron's supposed authority is at
variance, in all respects, with what she stated immediately after the
separation, when everything was fresh in her memory in relation to
the time during which, according to Mrs. B. Stowe, she believed that
Byron and his sister were living together in guilt. I publish this
evidence with reluctance, but in obedience to that higher obligation
of justice to the voiceless and defenceless dead which bids me break
through a reserve that otherwise I should have held sacred. The Lady
Byron of 1818 would, I am certain, have sanctioned my doing so, had
she foreseen the present unparalleled occasion, and the bar that the
conditions of her will present (as I infer from Messrs. Wharton and
Fords' letter) against any fuller communication. Calumnies such as the
present sink deep and with rapidity into the public mind, and are not
easily eradicated. The fame of one of our greatest poets, and that
of the kindest and truest and most constant friend that Byron ever
had, is at stake; and it will not do to wait for revelations from the
fountain-head, which are not promised, and possibly may never reach us.
The late Lady Anne Barnard, who died in 1825, a contemporary and friend
of Burke, Windham, Dundas, and a host of the wise and good of that
generation, and remembered in letters as the authoress of 'Auld Robin
Gray,' had known the late Lady Byron from infancy, and took a warm
interest in her; holding Lord Byron in corresponding repugnance, not
to say prejudice, in consequence of what she believed to be his harsh
and cruel treatment of her young friend. I transcribe the following
passages, and a letter from Lady Byron herself (written in 1818) from
_ricordi_, or private family memoirs, in Lady Anne's autograph, now
before me. I include the letter, because, although treating only in
general terms of the matter and causes of the separation, it affords
collateral evidence bearing strictly upon the point of the credibility
of the charge now in question:--
* * * * *
'The separation of Lord and Lady Byron astonished the world, which
believed him a reformed man as to his habits, and a becalmed man as to
his remorses. He had written nothing that appeared after his marriage
till the famous "Fare thee well," which had the power of compelling
those to pity the writer who were not well aware that he was not the
unhappy person he affected to be. Lady Byron's misery was whispered
soon after her marriage and his ill usage, but no word transpired,
no sign escaped, from her. She gave birth, shortly, to a daughter;
and when she went, as soon as she was recovered, on a visit to her
father's, taking her little Ada with her, no one knew that it was to
return to her lord no more. At that period, a severe fit of illness had
confined me to bed for two months. I heard of Lady Byron's distress;
of the pains he took to give a harsh impression of her character
to the world. I wrote to her, and entreated her to come and let me
see and hear her, if she conceived my sympathy or counsel could be
any comfort to her. She came; but what a tale was unfolded by this
interesting young creature, who had so fondly hoped to have made a
young man of genius and romance (as she supposed) happy! They had not
been an hour in the carriage which conveyed them from the church, when,
breaking into a malignant sneer, "Oh! what a dupe you have been to your
imagination! How is it possible a woman of your sense could form the
wild hope of reforming _me_? Many are the tears you will have to shed
ere that plan is accomplished. It is enough for me that you are my wife
for me to hate you! If you were the wife of any other man, I own you
might have charms," &c. I who listened was astonished. "How could you
go on after this," said I, "my dear? Why did you not return to your
father's?" "Because I had not a conception he was in earnest; because I
reckoned it a bad jest, and told him so,--that my opinions of him were
very different from his of himself, otherwise he would not find me by
his side. He laughed it over when he saw me appear hurt: and I forgot
what had passed, till forced to remember it. I believe he was pleased
with me, too, for a little while. I suppose it had escaped his memory
that I was his wife." But she described the happiness they enjoyed to
have been unequal and perturbed. Her situation, in a short time, might
have entitled her to some tenderness; but she made no claim on him for
any. He sometimes reproached her for the motives that had induced her
to marry him: all was "vanity, the vanity of Miss Milbanke carrying the
point of reforming Lord Byron! He always knew _her_ inducements; her
pride shut her eyes to _his_: _he_ wished to build up his character
and his fortunes; both were somewhat deranged: she had a high name,
and would have a fortune worth his attention,--let her look to that
for his motives!"--"O Byron, Byron!" she said, "how you desolate me!"
He would then accuse himself of being mad, and throw himself on the
ground in a frenzy, which she believed was affected to conceal the
coldness and malignity of his heart,--an affectation which at that
time never failed to meet with the tenderest commiseration. I could
find by some implications, not followed up by me, lest she might have
condemned herself afterwards for her involuntary disclosures, that he
soon attempted to corrupt her principles, both with respect to her own
conduct and her latitude for his. She saw the precipice on which she
stood, and kept his sister with her as much as possible. He returned
in the evenings from the haunts of vice, where he made her understand
he had been, with manners so profligate! "O the wretch!" said I. "And
had he no moments of remorse?" "Sometimes he appeared to have them.
One night, coming home from one of his lawless parties, he saw me so
indignantly collected, and bearing all with such a determined calmness,
that a rush of remorse seemed to come over him. He called himself a
monster, though his sister was present, and threw himself in agony at
my feet. I could not--no--I could not forgive him such injuries. He
had lost me for ever! Astonished at the return of virtue, my tears, I
believe, flowed over his face, and I said, 'Byron, all is forgotten:
never, never shall you hear of it more!' He started up, and, folding
his arms while he looked at me, burst into laughter. 'What do you
mean?' said I. 'Only a philosophical experiment; that's all,' said
he. 'I wished to ascertain the value of your resolutions.'" I need
not say more of this prince of duplicity, except that varied were his
methods of rendering her wretched, even to the last. When her lovely
little child was born, and it was laid beside its mother on the bed,
and he was informed he might see his daughter, after gazing at it with
an exulting smile, this was the ejaculation that broke from him: "Oh,
what an implement of torture have I acquired in you!" Such he rendered
it by his eyes and manner, keeping her in a perpetual alarm for its
safety when in his presence. All this reads madder than I believe he
was: but she had not then made up her mind to disbelieve his pretended
insanity, and conceived it best to intrust her secret with the
excellent Dr. Baillie; telling him all that seemed to regard the state
of her husband's mind, and letting his advice regulate her conduct.
Baillie doubted of his derangement; but, as he did not reckon his own
opinion infallible, he wished her to take precautions as if her husband
were so. He recommended her going to the country, but to give him no
suspicion of her intentions of remaining there, and, for a short time,
to show no coldness in her letters, till she could better ascertain his
state. She went, regretting, as she told me, to wear any semblance but
the truth. A short time disclosed the story to the world. He acted the
part of a man driven to despair by her inflexible resentment and by the
arts of a governess (once a servant in the family) who hated him. "I
will give you," proceeds Lady Anne, "a few paragraphs transcribed from
one of Lady Byron's own letters to me. It is sorrowful to think, that,
in a very little time, this young and amiable creature, wise, patient,
and feeling, will have her character mistaken by every one who reads
Byron's works. To rescue her from this, I preserved her letters; and,
when she afterwards expressed a fear that any thing of her writings
should ever fall into hands to injure him (I suppose she meant by
publication), I safely assured her that it never should. But here this
letter shall be placed, a sacred record in her favour, unknown to
herself":--
'"I am a very incompetent judge of the impression which the last canto
of 'Childe Harold' may produce on the minds of indifferent readers.
It contains the usual trace of a conscience restlessly awake; though
his object has been too long to aggravate its burden, as if it could
thus be oppressed into eternal stupor. I will hope, as you do, that it
survives for his ultimate good. It was the acuteness of his remorse,
impenitent in its character, which so long seemed to demand from my
compassion to spare every resemblance of reproach, every look of
grief, which might have said to his conscience, 'You have made me
wretched.' I am decidedly of opinion that he is responsible. He has
wished to be thought partially deranged, or on the brink of it, to
perplex observers, and prevent them from tracing effects to their
real causes through all the intricacies of his conduct. I was, as
I told you, at one time the dupe of his acted insanity, and clung
to the former delusions in regard to the motives that concerned me
personally, till the whole system was laid bare. He is the absolute
monarch of words, and uses them, as Bonaparte did lives, for conquest,
without more regard to their intrinsic value; considering them only
as ciphers, which must derive all their import from the situation in
which he places them, and the ends to which he adapts them with such
consummate skill. Why, then, you will say, does he not employ them to
give a better colour to his own character? Because he is too good an
actor to over-act, or to assume a moral garb which it would be easy
to strip off. In regard to his poetry, egotism is the vital principle
of his imagination, which it is difficult for him to kindle on any
subject with which his own character and interests are not identified:
but by the introduction of fictitious incidents, by change of scene
or time, he has enveloped his poetical disclosures in a system
impenetrable except to a very few; and his constant desire of creating
a sensation makes him not averse to be the object of wonder and
curiosity, even though accompanied by some dark and vague suspicions.
Nothing has contributed more to the misunderstanding of his real
character than the lonely grandeur in which he shrouds it, and his
affectation of being above mankind, when he exists almost in their
voice. The romance of his sentiments is another feature of this mask
of state. I know no one more habitually destitute of that enthusiasm
he so beautifully expresses, and to which he can work up his fancy
chiefly by contagion. I had heard he was the best of brothers, the
most generous of friends; and I thought such feelings only required to
be warmed and cherished into more diffusive benevolence. Though these
opinions are eradicated, and could never return but with the decay
of my memory, you will not wonder if there are still moments when
the association of feelings which arose from them soften and sadden
my thoughts. But I have not thanked you, dearest Lady Anne, for your
kindness in regard to a principal object,--that of rectifying false
impressions. I trust you understand my wishes, which never were to
injure Lord Byron in any way: for, though he would not suffer me to
remain his wife, he cannot prevent me from continuing his friend; and
it was from considering myself as such that I silenced the accusations
by which my own conduct might have been more fully justified. It is
not necessary to speak ill of his heart in general: it is sufficient
that to me it was hard and impenetrable; that my own must have been
broken before his could have been touched. I would rather represent
this as _my_ misfortune than as _his_ guilt; but surely that
misfortune is not to be made my crime! Such are my feelings: you will
judge how to act. His allusions to me in 'Childe Harold' are cruel
and cold, but with such a semblance as to make _me_ appear so, and to
attract all sympathy to himself. It is said in this poem that hatred
of him will be taught as a lesson to his child. I might appeal to all
who have ever heard me speak of him, and still more to my own heart,
to witness that there has been no moment when I have remembered injury
otherwise than affectionately and sorrowfully. It is not my duty to
give way to hopeless and wholly unrequited affection; but, so long
as I live, my chief struggle will probably be not to remember him
too kindly. I do not seek the sympathy of the world; but I wish to be
known by those whoso opinion is valuable, and whose kindness is dear
to me. Among such, my dear Lady Anne, you will ever be remembered by
your truly affectionate,
'"A. BYRON."'
It is the province of your readers, and of the world at large, to
judge between the two testimonies now before them,--Lady Byron's in
1816 and 1818, and that put forward in 1869 by Mrs. B. Stowe, as
communicated by Lady Byron thirteen years ago. In the face of the
evidence now given, positive, negative, and circumstantial, there
can be but two alternatives in the case: either Mrs. B. Stowe must
have entirely misunderstood Lady Byron, and been thus led into error
and misstatement, or we must conclude that, under the pressure of a
lifelong and secret sorrow, Lady Byron's mind had become clouded with
an hallucination in respect of the particular point in question.
Tho reader will admire the noble but severe character displayed
in Lady Byron's letter; but those who keep in view what her first
impressions were, as above recorded, may probably place a more lenient
interpretation than hers upon some of the incidents alleged to Byron's
discredit. I shall conclude with some remarks upon his character,
written shortly after his death by a wise, virtuous, and charitable
judge, the late Sir Walter Scott, likewise in a letter to Lady Anne
Barnard:--
'Fletcher's account of poor Byron is extremely interesting. I
had always a strong attachment to that unfortunate though most
richly-gifted man, because I thought I saw that his virtues (and he had
many) were his own; and his eccentricities the result of an irritable
temperament, which sometimes approached nearly to mental disease. Those
who are gifted with strong nerves, a regular temper, and habitual
self-command, are not, perhaps, aware how much of what they may think
virtue they owe to constitution; and such are but too severe judges of
men like Byron, whose mind, like a day of alternate storm and sunshine,
is all dark shades and stray gleams of light, instead of the twilight
gray which illuminates happier though less distinguished mortals. I
always thought, that, when a moral proposition was placed plainly
before Lord Byron, his mind yielded a pleased and willing assent to
it; but, if there was any side view given in the way of raillery or
otherwise, he was willing enough to evade conviction.... It augurs
ill for the cause of Greece that this master-spirit should have been
withdrawn from their assistance just as he was obtaining a complete
ascendency over their counsels. I have seen several letters from the
Ionian Islands, all of which unite in speaking in the highest praise of
the wisdom and temperance of his counsels, and the ascendency he was
obtaining over the turbulent and ferocious chiefs of the insurgents. I
have some verses written by him on his last birthday: they breathe a
spirit of affection towards his wife, and a desire of dying in battle,
which seems like an anticipation of his approaching fate.'
I remain, sir, your obedient servant,
LINDSAY,
DUNECHT, Sept. 3.
DR. FORBES WINSLOW'S LETTER TO THE LONDON 'TIMES.'
TO THE EDITOR.
SIR,--Your paper of the 4th of September, containing an able
and deeply interesting 'Vindication of Lord Byron,' has followed me
to this place. With the general details of the 'True Story' (as it is
termed) of Lady Byron's separation from her husband, as recorded in
'Macmillan's Magazine,' I have no desire or intention to grapple. It
is only with the hypothesis of insanity, as suggested by the clever
writer of the 'Vindication' to account for Lady Byron's sad revelations
to Mrs. Beecher Stowe, with which I propose to deal. I do not believe
that the mooted theory of mental aberration can, in this case, be for a
moment maintained. If Lady Byron's statement of facts to Mrs. B. Stowe
is to be viewed as the creation of a distempered fancy, a delusion or
hallucination of an insane mind, what part of the narrative are we to
draw the boundary-line between fact and delusion, sanity and insanity?
Where are we to fix the _point d'appui_ of the lunacy? Again: is the
alleged 'hallucination' to be considered as strictly confined to the
idea that Lord Byron had committed the frightful sin of incest? or is
the whole of the 'True Story' of her married life, as reproduced with
such terrible minuteness by Mrs. Beecher Stowe, to be viewed as the
delusion of a disordered fancy? If Lady Byron was the subject of an
'hallucination' with regard to her husband, I think it not unreasonable
to conclude that the mental alienation existed on the day of her
marriage. If this proposition be accepted, the natural inference will
be, that the details of the conversation which Lady Byron represents to
have occurred between herself and Lord Byron as soon as they entered
the carriage never took place. Lord Byron is said to have remarked
to Lady Byron, 'You might have prevented this (or words to this
effect): you will now find that you have married a devil.' Is this
alleged conversation to be viewed as _fact_, or _fiction_? evidence of
_sanity_, or _insanity_? Is the revelation which Lord Byron is said to
have made to his wife of his 'incestuous passion' another delusion,
having no foundation except in his wife's disordered imagination? Are
his alleged attempts to justify to Lady Byron's mind the _morale_ of
the plea of 'Continental latitude--the good-humoured marriage, in which
complaisant couples mutually agree to form the cloak for each other's
infidelities,'--another morbid perversion of her imagination? Did this
conversation ever take place? It will be difficult to separate one
part of the 'True Story' from another, and maintain that this portion
indicates insanity, and that portion represents sanity. If we accept
the hypothesis of hallucination, we are bound to view the whole of Lady
Byron's conversations with Mrs. B. Stowe, and the written statement
laid before her, as the wild and incoherent representations of a
lunatic. On the day when Lady Byron parted from her husband, did she
enter his private room, and find him with the 'object of his guilty
passion?' and did he say, as they parted, 'When shall we three meet
again?' Is this to be considered as an actual occurrence, or as another
form of hallucination? It is quite inconsistent with the theory of Lady
Byron's insanity to imagine that her delusion was restricted to the
idea of his having committed 'incest.' In common fairness, we are bound
to view the aggregate mental phenomena which she exhibited from the
day of the marriage to their final separation and her death. No person
practically acquainted with the true characteristics of insanity would
affirm, that, had this idea of 'incest' been an insane hallucination,
Lady Byron could, from the lengthened period which intervened between
her unhappy marriage and death, have refrained from exhibiting her
mental alienation, not only to her legal advisers and trustees, but to
others, exacting no pledge of secrecy from them as to her disordered
impressions. Lunatics do for a time, and for some special purpose, most
cunningly conceal their delusions; but they have not the capacity to
struggle for thirty-six years with a frightful hallucination, similar
to the one Lady Byron is alleged to have had, without the insane state
of mind becoming obvious to those with whom they are daily associating.
Neither is it consistent with experience to suppose that, if Lady Byron
had been a monomaniac, her state of disordered understanding would have
been restricted to one hallucination. Her diseased brain, affecting the
normal action of thought, would, in all probability, have manifested
other symptoms besides those referred to of aberration of intellect.
During the last thirty years, I have not met with a case of insanity
(assuming the hypothesis of hallucination) at all parallel with that
of Lady Byron's. In my experience, it is unique. I never saw a patient
with such a delusion. If it should be established, by the statements of
those who are the depositors of the secret (and they are now bound, in
vindication of Lord Byron's memory, to deny, if they have the power of
doing so, this most frightful accusation), that the idea of incest did
unhappily cross Lady Byron's mind prior to her finally leaving him, it
no doubt arose from a most inaccurate knowledge of facts and perfectly
unjustifiable data, and was not, in the right psychological acceptation
of the phrase, an insane hallucination.
Sir, I remain your obedient servant,
FORBES WINSLOW, M.D.
ZARINGERHOF, FREIBURG-EN-BREISGAU, Sept. 8, 1869.
EXTRACT FROM LORD BYRON'S EXPUNGED LETTER.
TO MR. MURRAY.
'BOLOGNA, June 7, 1819.
... 'Before I left Venice, I had returned to you your late, and Mr.
Hobhouse's sheets of "Juan." Don't wait for further answers from
me, but address yours to Venice as usual. I know nothing of my own
movements. I may return there in a few days, or not for some time:
all this depends on circumstances. I left Mr. Hoppner very well. My
daughter Allegra is well too, and is growing pretty: her hair is
growing darker, and her eyes are blue. Her temper and her ways, Mr.
Hoppner says, are like mine, as well as her features: she will make, in
that case, a manageable young lady.
'I have never seen anything of Ada, the little Electra of my Mycenæ....
But there will come a day of reckoning, even if I should not live
to see it. I have at least seen ---- shivered, who was one of my
assassins. When that man was doing his worst to uproot my whole
family,--tree, branch, and blossoms; when, after taking my retainer,
he went over to them; when he was bringing desolation on my hearth,
and destruction on my household gods,--did he think that, in less
than three years, a natural event, a severe domestic, but an expected
and common calamity, would lay his carcass in a cross-road, or stamp
his name in a verdict of lunacy? Did he (who in his sexagenary ...)
reflect or consider what my feelings must have been when wife and child
and sister, and name and fame and country, were to be my sacrifice on
his legal altar?--and this at a moment when my health was declining,
my fortune embarrassed, and my mind had been shaken by many kinds of
disappointment? while I was yet young, and might have reformed what
might be wrong in my conduct, and retrieved what was perplexing in
my affairs? But he is in his grave, and--What a long letter I have
scribbled!'...
* * * * *
In order that the reader may measure the change of moral tone with
regard to Lord Byron, wrought by the constant efforts of himself and
his party, we give the two following extracts from 'Blackwood.'
The first is 'Blackwood' in 1819, just after the publication of 'Don
Juan': the second is 'Blackwood' in 1825.
'In the composition of this work, there is, unquestionably, a more
thorough and intense infusion of genius and vice, power and profligacy,
than in any poem which had ever before been written in the English,
or, indeed, in any other modern language. Had the wickedness been less
inextricably mingled with the beauty and the grace and the strength of
a most inimitable and incomprehensible Muse, our task would have been
easy. 'Don Juan' is by far the most admirable specimen of the mixture
of ease, strength, gaiety, and seriousness, extant in the whole body
of English poetry: the author has devoted his powers to the worst of
purposes and passions; and it increases his guilt and our sorrow that
he has devoted them entire.
'The moral strain of the whole poem is pitched in the lowest key. Love,
honour, patriotism, religion, are mentioned only to be scoffed at, as
if their sole resting-place were, or ought to be, in the bosoms of
fools. It appears, in short, as if this miserable man, having exhausted
every species of sensual gratification, having drained the cup of sin
even to its bitterest dregs, were resolved to show us that he is no
longer a human being, even in his frailties, but a cool, unconcerned
fiend, laughing with a detestable glee over the whole of the better and
worse elements of which human life is composed; treating well-nigh with
equal derision the most pure of virtues, and the most odious of vices;
dead alike to the beauty of the one, and the deformity of the other;
a mere heartless despiser of that frail but noble humanity, whose
type was never exhibited in a shape of more deplorable degradation
than in his own contemptuously distinct delineation of himself. To
confess to his Maker, and weep over in secret agonies the wildest and
most fantastic transgressions of heart and mind, is the part of a
conscious sinner, in whom sin has not become the sole principle of life
and action; but to lay bare to the eye of man and of _woman_ all the
hidden convulsions of a wicked spirit, and to do all this without one
symptom of contrition, remorse, or hesitation, with a calm, careless
ferociousness of contented and satisfied depravity,--this was an insult
which no man of genius had ever before dared to put upon his Creator
or his species. Impiously railing against his God, madly and meanly
disloyal to his sovereign and his country, and brutally outraging all
the best feelings of female honor, affection, and confidence, how small
a part of chivalry is that which remains to the descendant of the
Byrons!--a gloomy visor and a deadly weapon!
'Those who are acquainted (as who is not?) with the main incidents in
the private life of Lord Byron, and who have not seen this production,
will scarcely believe that malignity should have carried him so far as
to make him commence a filthy and impious poem with an elaborate satire
on the character and manners of his wife, from whom, even by his own
confession, he has been separated only in consequence of his own cruel
and heartless misconduct. It is in vain for Lord Byron to attempt in
any way to justify his own behaviour in that affair; and, now that he
has so openly and audaciously invited inquiry and reproach, we do not
see any good reason why he should not be plainly told so by the general
voice of his countrymen. It would not be an easy matter to persuade
any man who has any knowledge of the nature of woman, that a female
such as Lord Byron has himself described his wife to be would rashly or
hastily or lightly separate herself from the love with which she had
once been inspired for such a man as he is or was. Had he not heaped
insult upon insult, and scorn upon scorn, had he not forced the iron
of his contempt into her very soul, there is no woman of delicacy and
virtue, as he _admitted_ Lady Byron to be, who would not have hoped all
things, and suffered all things, from one, her love of whom must have
been inwoven with so many exalting elements of delicious pride, and
more delicious humility. To offend the love of such a woman was wrong,
but it might be forgiven; to desert her was unmanly, but he might have
returned, and wiped for ever from her eyes the tears of her desertion:
but to injure and to desert, and then to turn back and wound her
widowed privacy with unhallowed strains of cold-blooded mockery, was
brutally, fiendishly, inexpiably mean. For impurities there might be
some possibility of pardon, were they supposed to spring only from the
reckless buoyancy of young blood and fiery passions; for impiety there
might at least be pity, were it visible that the misery of the impious
soul equalled its darkness: but for offences such as this, which cannot
proceed either from the madness of sudden impulse or the bewildered
agonies of doubt, but which speak the wilful and determined spite of
an unrepenting, unsoftened, smiling, sarcastic, joyous sinner, there
can be neither pity nor pardon. Our knowledge that it is committed
by one of the most powerful intellects our island ever has produced
lends intensity a thousand-fold to the bitterness of our indignation.
Every high thought that was ever kindled in our breasts by the Muse of
Byron, every pure and lofty feeling that ever responded from within
us to the sweep of his majestic inspirations, every remembered moment
of admiration and enthusiasm, is up in arms against him. We look back
with a mixture of wrath and scorn to the delight with which we suffered
ourselves to be filled by one, who, all the while he was furnishing
us with delight, must, we cannot doubt it, have been mocking us with
a cruel mockery; less cruel only, because less peculiar, than that
with which he has now turned him from the lurking-place of his selfish
and polluted exile to pour the pitiful chalice of his contumely on
the surrendered devotion of a virgin bosom, and the holy hopes of the
mother of his child. It is indeed a sad and a humiliating thing to
know, that in the same year, there proceeded from the same pen two
productions in all things so different as the fourth canto of "Childe
Harold" and his loathsome "Don Juan."
'We have mentioned one, and, all will admit, the worst instance of the
private malignity which has been embodied in so many passages of "Don
Juan;" and we are quite sure the lofty-minded and virtuous _men_ whom
Lord Byron has debased himself by insulting will close the volume which
contains their own injuries, with no feelings save those of pity for
him that has inflicted them, and for her who partakes so largely in the
same injuries.'--_August, 1819._
'BLACKWOOD,'--_iterum_.
'We shall, like all others who say anything about Lord Byron, begin,
_sans apologie_, with his personal character. This is the great object
of attack, the constant theme of open vituperation to one set, and the
established mark for all the petty but deadly artillery of sneers,
shrugs, groans, to another. Two widely different matters, however,
are generally, we might say universally, mixed up here,--the personal
character of the man, as proved by his course of life; and his personal
character, as revealed in or guessed from his books. Nothing can be
more unfair than the style in which this mixture is made use of. Is
there a noble sentiment, a lofty thought, a sublime conception, in
the book? "Ah, yes!" is the answer, "But what of that? It is only
the _roué_ Byron that speaks!" Is a kind, a generous action of the
man mentioned? "Yes, yes!" comments the sage; "but only remember the
atrocities of 'Don Juan:' depend on it, this, if it be true, must have
been a mere freak of caprice, or perhaps a bit of vile hypocrisy."
Salvation is thus shut out at either entrance: the poet damns the man,
and the man the poet.
'Nobody will suspect us of being so absurd as to suppose that it is
possible for people to draw no inferences as to the character of an
author from his book, or to shut entirely out of view, in judging of
a book, that which they may happen to _know_ about the man who writes
it. The cant of the day supposes such things to be practicable; but
they are not. But what we complain of and scorn is the extent to which
they are carried in the case of this particular individual, as compared
with others; the impudence with which things are at once assumed to be
facts in regard to _his_ private history; and the absolute unfairness
of never arguing from _his_ writings to _him, but for evil_.
'Take the man, in the first place, as unconnected, in so far as we
can thus consider him, with his works; and ask, What, after all, are
the bad things we know of him? Was he dishonest or dishonourable?
had he ever _done_ anything to forfeit, or even endanger, his rank
as a gentleman? Most assuredly, no such accusations have ever been
maintained against Lord Byron the private nobleman, although something
of the sort may have been insinuated against the author. "But he was
such a profligate in his morals, that his name cannot be mentioned with
anything like tolerance." Was he so, indeed? We should like extremely
to have the catechising of the individual _man_ who says so. That
he indulged in sensual vices, to some extent, is certain, and to be
regretted and condemned. But was he worse, as to such matters, than
the enormous majority of those who join in the cry of horror upon this
occasion? We most assuredly believe exactly the reverse; and we rest
our belief upon very plain and intelligible grounds. First, we hold it
impossible that the majority of mankind, or that anything beyond a very
small minority, are or can be entitled to talk of sensual profligacy as
having formed a part of the life and character of the man, who, dying
at six and thirty, bequeathed a collection of works such as Byron's to
the world. Secondly, we hold it impossible, that laying the extent of
his intellectual labours out of the question, and looking only to the
nature of the intellect which generated, and delighted in generating,
such beautiful and noble conceptions as are to be found in almost all
Lord Byron's works,--we hold it impossible that very many men can be
at once capable of comprehending these conceptions, and entitled to
consider sensual profligacy as having formed the principal, or even
a principal, trait in Lord Byron's character. Thirdly, and lastly,
we have never been able to hear any one fact established which could
prove Lord Byron to deserve anything like the degree or even kind
of odium which has, in regard to matters of this class, been heaped
upon his name. We have no story of base unmanly seduction, or false
and villainous intrigue, against him,--none whatever. It seems to us
quite clear, that, if he had been at all what is called in society
an unprincipled sensualist, there must have been many such stories,
authentic and authenticated. But there are none such,--absolutely none.
His name has been coupled with the names of three, four, or more women
of some rank: but what kind of women? Every one of them, in the first
place, about as old as himself in years, and therefore a great deal
older in character; every one of them utterly battered in reputation
long before he came into contact with them,--licentious, unprincipled,
characterless women. What father has ever reproached him with the ruin
of his daughter? What husband has denounced him as the destroyer of his
peace?
'Let us not be mistaken. We are not defending the offences of which
Lord Byron unquestionably was guilty; neither are we finding fault
with those, who, after looking honestly within and around themselves,
condemn those offences, no matter how severely: but we are speaking
of society in general as it now exists; and we say that there is vile
hypocrisy in the tone in which Lord Byron is talked of _there_. We
say, that, although all offences against purity of life are miserable
things, and condemnable things, the degrees of guilt attached to
different offences of this class are as widely different as are the
degrees of guilt between an assault and a murder; and we confess our
belief, that no man of Byron's station or age could have run much risk
in gaining a very bad name in society, had a course of life similar
(in so far as we know any thing of that) to Lord Byron's been the only
thing chargeable against him.
'The last poem he wrote was produced upon his birthday, not many weeks
before he died. We consider it as one of the finest and most touching
effusions of his noble genius. We think he who reads it, and can ever
after bring himself to regard even the worst transgressions that have
been charged against Lord Byron with any feelings but those of humble
sorrow and manly pity, is not deserving of the name of man. The deep
and passionate struggles with the inferior elements of his nature (and
ours) which it records; the lofty thirsting after purity; the heroic
devotion of a soul half weary of life, because unable to believe in
its own powers to live up to what it so intensely felt to be, and so
reverentially honoured as, the right; the whole picture of this mighty
spirit, often darkened, but never sunk,--often erring, but never
ceasing to see and to worship the beauty of virtue; the repentance of
it; the anguish; the aspiration, almost stilled in despair,--the whole
of this is such a whole, that we are sure no man can read these solemn
verses too often; and we recommend them for repetition, as the best and
most conclusive of all possible answers whenever the name of Byron is
insulted by those who permit themselves to forget nothing, either in
his life or in his writings, but the good.'--[1825.]
* * * * *
The following letters of Lady Byron's are reprinted from the Memoirs of
H. C. Robinson. They are given that the reader may form some judgment
of the strength and activity of her mind, and the elevated class of
subjects upon which it habitually dwelt.
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'DEC. 31, 1853.
'DEAR MR. CRABB ROBINSON,--I have an inclination, if I were
not afraid of trespassing on your time (but you can put my letter by
for any leisure moment), to enter upon the history of a character which
I think less appreciated than it ought to be. Men, I observe, do not
understand men in certain points, without a woman's interpretation.
Those points, of course, relate to feelings.
'Here is a man taken by most of those who come in his way either for
Dry-as-Dust, Matter-of-fact, or for a "vain visionary." There are,
doubtless, some defective or excessive characteristics which give rise
to those impressions.
'My acquaintance was made, oddly enough, with him twenty-seven years
ago. A pauper said to me of him, "He's the _poor man's_ doctor." Such
a recommendation seemed to me a good one: and I also knew that his
organizing head had formed the first district society in England (for
Mrs. Fry told me she could not have effected it without his aid); yet
he has always ignored his own share of it. I felt in him at once the
curious combination of the Christian and the cynic,--of reverence for
_man_, and contempt of _men_. It was then an internal war, but one in
which it was evident to me that the holier cause would be victorious,
because there was deep belief, and, as far as I could learn, a
blameless and benevolent life. He appeared only to want sunshine. It
was a plant which could not be brought to perfection in darkness. He
had begun life by the most painful conflict between filial duty and
conscience,--a large provision in the church secured for him by his
father; but he could not _sign_. There was discredit, as you know,
attached to such scruples.
'He was also, when I first knew him, under other circumstances of
a nature to depress him, and to make him feel that he was unjustly
treated. The gradual removal of these called forth his better nature
in thankfulness to God. Still the old misanthropic modes of expressing
himself obtruded themselves at times. This passed in '48 between him
and Robertson. Robertson said to me, "I want to know something about
ragged schools." I replied, "You had better ask Dr. King: he knows
more about them."--"I?" said Dr. King. "I take care to know nothing of
ragged schools, lest they should make _me_ ragged." Robertson did not
see through it. Perhaps I had been taught to understand such suicidal
speeches by my cousin, Lord Melbourne.
'The example of Christ, imperfectly as it may be understood by him, has
been ever before his eyes: he woke to the thought of following it, and
he went to rest consoled or rebuked by it. After nearly thirty years
of intimacy, I may, without presumption, form that opinion. There is
something pathetic to me in seeing any one _so_ unknown. Even the other
medical friends of Robertson, when I knew that Dr. King felt a woman's
tenderness, said on one occasion to him, "But we know that you, Dr.
King, are _above all feeling_."
'If I have made the character more consistent to you by putting in
these bits of mosaic, my pen will not have been ill employed, nor
unpleasingly to you.
'Yours truly,
'A. NOEL BYRON.'
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'BRIGHTON, Nov. 15, 1854.
'The thoughts of all this public and private suffering have taken
the life out of my pen when I tried to write on matters which would
otherwise have been most interesting to me: _these_ seemed the shadows,
_that_ the stern reality. It is good, however, to be drawn out of
scenes in which one is absorbed most unprofitably, and to have one's
natural interests revived by such a letter as I have to thank you for,
as well as its predecessor. You touch upon the very points which do
interest me the most, habitually. The change of form, and enlargement
of design, in "The Prospective" _had_ led me to express to one of the
promoters of that object my desire to contribute. The religious crisis
is instant; but the man for it? The next best thing, if, as I believe,
he is not to be found _in England_, is an association of such men as
are to edit the new periodical. An address delivered by Freeman Clarke
at Boston, last May, makes me think him better fitted for a leader than
any other of the religious "Free-thinkers." I wish I could send you
my one copy; but you do not _need_, it, and others do. His object is
the same as that of the "Alliance Universelle:" only he is still more
free from "partialism" (his own word) in his aspirations and practical
suggestions with respect to an ultimate "Christian synthesis." He
so far adopts Comte's theory as to speak of religion itself under
three successive aspects, historically,--1. Thesis; 2. Antithesis;
3. Synthesis. I made his acquaintance in England; and he inspired
confidence at once by his brave independence (_incomptis capillis_) and
self-_un_consciousness. J. J. Tayler's address of last month follows in
the same path,--all in favour of the "irenics," instead of polemics.
'The answer which you gave me so fully and distinctly to the questions
I proposed for your consideration was of value in turning to my view
certain aspects of the case which I had not before observed. I had
begun a second attack on your patience, when all was forgotten in the
news of the day.'
Lady Byron to H. C. R.
'BRIGHTON, Dec. 25, 1854.
'With J. J. Tayler, though almost a stranger to him, I have a peculiar
reason for sympathising. A book of his was a treasure to my daughter on
her death-bed.[50]
[Footnote 50: Probably 'The Christian Aspects of Faith and Duty.'
Mr. Tayler has also written 'A Retrospect of the Religious Life of
England.']
'I must confess to intolerance of opinion as to these two
points,--_eternal_ evil in any form, and (involved in it) _eternal_
suffering. To believe in these would take away my God, who is
all-loving. With a God with whom omnipotence and omniscience were all,
evil might be eternal; but why do I say to you what has been better
said elsewhere?'
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'BRIGHTON, Jan. 31, 1855.
... 'The great difficulty in respect to "The Review"[51] seems to be
to settle a basis, inclusive and exclusive; in short, a _boundary
question_. From what you said, I think you agreed with me, that
a latitudinarian Christianity ought to be the character of the
periodical; but the depth of the roots should correspond with the width
of the branches of that tree of knowledge. Of some of those minds one
might say, "They have no root;" and then, the richer the foliage, the
more danger that the trunk will fall. "Grounded in Christ" has to me
a most practical significance and value. I, too, have anxiety about
a friend (Miss Carpenter) whose life is of public importance: she,
more than any of the English reformers, unless Nash and Wright, has
found the art of drawing out the good of human nature, and proving its
existence. She makes these discoveries by the light of love. I hope
she may recover, from to-day's report. The object of a Reformatory
in Leicester has just been secured at a county meeting.... Now the
desideratum is well-qualified masters and mistresses. If you hear
of such by chance, pray let me know. The regular schoolmaster is an
extinguisher. Heart, and familiarity with the class to be educated,
are all important. At home and abroad, the evidence is conclusive on
that point; for I have for many years attended to such experiments
in various parts of Europe. "The Irish Quarterly" has taken up the
subject with rather more zeal than judgment. I had hoped that a sound
and temperate exposition of the facts might form an article in the
"Might-have-been Review."'
[Footnote 51: 'The National Review.']
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'BRIGHTON, Feb. 12, 1855.
'I have at last earned the pleasure of writing to you by having settled
troublesome matters of little moment, except locally; and I gladly take
a wider range by sympathizing in your interests. There is, besides, no
responsibility--for me at least--in canvassing the merits of Russell
or Palmerston, but much in deciding whether the "village politician"
Jackson or Thompson shall be leader in the school or public-house.
'Has not the nation been brought to a conviction that the _system_
should be broken up? and is Lord Palmerston, who has used it so long
and so cleverly, likely to promote that object?
'But, whatever obstacles there may be in state affairs, that general
persuasion must modify other departments of action and knowledge.
"Unroasted coffee" will no longer be accepted under the official
seal,--another reason for a new literary combination for distinct
special objects, a review in which every separate article should be
_convergent_. If, instead of the problem to make a circle pass through
three given points, it were required to find the centre from which to
describe a circle through any three articles in the "Edinburgh" or
"Westminster Review," who would accomplish it? Much force is lost for
want of this one-mindedness amongst the contributors. It would not
exclude variety or freedom in the unlimited discussion of means towards
the ends unequivocally recognized. If St. Paul had edited a review, he
might have admitted Peter as well as Luke or Barnabas....
'Ross gave us an excellent sermon, yesterday, on "Hallowing the Name."
Though far from commonplace, it might have been delivered in any church.
'We have had Fanny Kemble here last week. I only heard her "Romeo
and Juliet,"--not less instructive, as her readings always are, than
exciting; for in her glass Shakspeare is a philosopher. I know her, and
honour her, for her truthfulness amidst all trials.'
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'BRIGHTON, March 5, 1855.
'I recollect only those passages of Dr. Kennedy's book which bear
upon the opinions of Lord Byron. Strange as it may seem, Dr. Kennedy
is most faithful where you doubt his being so. Not merely from casual
expressions, but from the whole tenor of Lord Byron's feelings, I could
not but conclude he was a believer in the inspiration of the Bible,
and had the gloomiest Calvinistic tenets. To that unhappy view of the
relation of the creature to the Creator, I have always ascribed the
misery of his life.... It is enough for me to remember, that he who
thinks his transgressions beyond _forgiveness_ (and such was his own
deepest feeling) _has_ righteousness beyond that of the self-satisfied
sinner, or, perhaps, of the half-awakened. It was impossible for me to
doubt, that, could he have been at once assured of pardon, his living
faith in a moral duty, and love of virtue ("I love the virtues which
I cannot claim"), would have conquered every temptation. Judge, then,
how I must hate the creed which made him see God as an Avenger, not a
Father! My own impressions were just the reverse, but could have little
weight; and it was in vain to seek to turn his thoughts for long from
that _idée fixe_ with which he connected his physical peculiarity as
a stamp. Instead of being made happier by any apparent good, he felt
convinced that every blessing would be "turned into a curse" to him.
Who, possessed by such ideas, could lead a life of love and service to
God or man? They must, in a measure, realize themselves. "The worst
of it is, I _do_ believe," he said. I, like all connected with him,
was broken against the rock of predestination. I may be pardoned for
referring to his frequent expression of the sentiment that I was only
sent to show him the happiness he was forbidden to enjoy. You will now
better understand why "The Deformed Transformed" is too painful to me
for discussion. Since writing the above, I have read Dr. Granville's
letter on the Emperor of Russia, some passages of which seem applicable
to the prepossession I have described. I will not mix up less serious
matters with these, which forty years have not made less than present
still to me.'
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'_Brighton_, April 8, 1855.
... 'The book which has interested me most, lately, is that on
"Mosaism," translated by Miss Goldsmid, and which I read, as you
will believe, without any Christian (unchristian?) prejudice. The
missionaries of the Unity were always, from my childhood, regarded by
me as in that sense _the_ people; and I believe they were true to that
mission, though blind, intellectually, in demanding the crucifixion.
The present aspect of Jewish opinions, as shown in that book, is
all but Christian. The author is under the error of taking, as the
representatives of Christianity, the Mystics, Ascetics, and Quietists;
and therefore he does not know how near he is to the true spirit of the
gospel. If you should happen to see Miss Goldsmid, pray tell her what
a great service I think she has rendered to us _soi-disant_ Christians
in translating a book which must make us sensible of the little we have
done, and the much we have to do, to justify our preference of the
later to the earlier dispensation.'...
LADY BYRON TO H. C. R.
'BRIGHTON, April 11, 1855.
'You appear to have more definite information respecting "The Review"
than I have obtained.... It was also said that "The Review" would, in
fact, be "The Prospective" amplified,--not satisfactory to me, because
I have always thought that periodical too Unitarian, in the sense of
separating itself from other Christian churches, if not by a high wall,
at least by a wire-gauze fence. Now, separation is to me _the_
[Greek: ha/iresis]. The revelation through Nature never separates: it
is the revelation through the Book which separates. Whewell and Brewster
would have been one, had they not, I think, equally dimmed their lamps
of science when reading their Bibles. As long as we think a truth
_better_ for being shut up in a text, we are not of the wide-world
religion, which is to include all in one fold: for that text will not
be accepted by the followers of other books, or students of the same;
and separation will ensue. The Christian Scripture should be dear to
us, not as the charter of a few, but of mankind; and to fashion it into
cages is to deny its ultimate objects. These thoughts hot, like the
roll at breakfast, where your letter was so welcome an addition.'
* * * * *
THREE DOMESTIC POEMS BY LORD BYRON.
FARE THEE WELL.
Fare thee well! and if for ever,
Still for ever fare thee well!
Even though unforgiving, never
'Gainst thee shall my heart rebel.
Would that breast were bared before thee
Where thy head so oft hath lain,
While that placid sleep came o'er thee
Which thou ne'er canst know again!
Would that breast, by thee glanced over,
Every inmost thought could show!
Then thou wouldst at last discover
'Twas not well to spurn it so.
Though the world for this commend thee,
Though it smile upon the blow,
Even its praises must offend thee,
Founded on another's woe.
Though my many faults defaced me,
Could no other arm be found,
Than the one which once embraced me,
To inflict a cureless wound?
Yet, oh! yet, thyself deceive not
Love may sink by slow decay;
But, by sudden wrench, believe not
Hearts can thus be torn away:
Still thine own its life retaineth;
Still must mine, though bleeding, beat
And the undying thought which paineth
Is--that we no more may meet.
These are words of deeper sorrow
Than the wail above the dead:
Both shall live, but every morrow
Wake us from a widowed bed.
And when thou wouldst solace gather,
When our child's first accents flow,
Wilt thou teach her to say 'Father,'
Though his care she must forego?
When her little hand shall press thee,
When her lip to thine is pressed,
Think of him whose prayer shall bless thee
Think of him thy love had blessed.
Should her lineaments resemble
Those thou never more mayst see,
Then thy heart will softly tremble
With a pulse yet true to me.
All my faults, perchance, thou knowest;
All my madness none can know:
All my hopes, where'er thou goest,
Wither; yet with thee they go.
Every feeling hath been shaken:
Pride, which not a world could bow,
Bows to thee, by thee forsaken;
Even my soul forsakes me now.
But 'tis done: all words are idle;
Words from me are vainer still;
But the thoughts we cannot bridle
Force their way without the will.
Fare thee well!--thus disunited,
Torn from every nearer tie,
Seared in heart, and lone and blighted,
More than this I scarce can die.
A SKETCH.
Born in the garret, in the kitchen bred;
Promoted thence to deck her mistress' head;
Next--for some gracious service unexpress'd,
And from its wages only to be guessed--
Raised from the toilette to the table, where
Her wondering betters wait behind her chair,
With eye unmoved, and forehead unabashed,
She dines from off the plate she lately washed.
Quick with the tale, and ready with the lie,
The genial confidante and general spy,
Who could, ye gods! her next employment guess?--
An only infant's earliest governess!
She taught the child to read, and taught so well,
That she herself, by teaching, learned to spell.
An adept next in penmanship she grows,
As many a nameless slander deftly shows:
What she had made the pupil of her art,
None know; but that high soul secured the heart,
And panted for the truth it could not hear,
With longing breast and undeluded ear.
Foiled was perversion by that youthful mind,
Which flattery fooled not, baseness could not blind,
Deceit infect not, near contagion soil,
Indulgence weaken, nor example spoil,
Nor mastered science tempt her to look down
On humbler talents with a pitying frown,
Nor genius swell, nor beauty render vain,
Nor envy ruffle to retaliate pain,
Nor fortune change, pride raise, nor passion bow,
Nor virtue teach austerity, till now.
Serenely purest of her sex that live;
But wanting one sweet weakness,--to forgive;
Too shocked at faults her soul can never know,
She deems that all could be like her below:
Foe to all vice, yet hardly Virtue's friend;
For Virtue pardons those she would amend.
But to the theme, now laid aside too long,--
The baleful burthen of this honest song.
Though all her former functions are no more,
She rules the circle which she served before.
If mothers--none know why--before her quake;
If daughters dread her for the mothers' sake;
If early habits--those false links, which bind
At times the loftiest to the meanest mind--
Have given her power too deeply to instil
The angry essence of her deadly will;
If like a snake she steal within your walls
Till the black slime betray her as she crawls;
If like a viper to the heart she wind,
And leave the venom there she did not find,--
What marvel that this hag of hatred works
Eternal evil latent as she lurks,
To make a Pandemonium where she dwells,
And reign the Hecate of domestic hells?
Skilled by a touch to deepen scandal's tints
With all the kind mendacity of hints,
While mingling truth with falsehood, sneers with smiles,
A thread of candour with a web of wiles;
A plain blunt show of briefly-spoken seeming.
To hide her bloodless heart's soul-hardened scheming
A lip of lies; a face formed to conceal,
And, without feeling, mock at all who feel;
With a vile mask the Gorgon would disown;
A cheek of parchment, and an eye of stone.
Mark how the channels of her yellow blood
Ooze to her skin, and stagnate there to mud!
Cased like the centipede in saffron mail,
Or darker greenness of the scorpion's scale,
(For drawn from reptiles only may we trace
Congenial colours in that soul or face,)--
Look on her features! and behold her mind
As in a mirror of itself defined.
Look on the picture! deem it not o'ercharged;
There is no trait which might not be enlarged:
Yet true to 'Nature's journeymen,' who made
This monster when their mistress left off trade,
This female dog-star of her little sky,
Where all beneath her influence droop or die.
O wretch without a tear, without a thought,
Save joy above the ruin thou hast wrought!
The time shall come, nor long remote, when thou
Shalt feel far more than thou inflictest now,--
Feel for thy vile self-loving self in vain,
And turn thee howling in unpitied pain.
May the strong curse of crushed affections light
Back on thy bosom with reflected blight,
And make thee, in thy leprosy of mind,
As loathsome to thyself as to mankind,
Till all thy self-thoughts curdle into hate
Black as thy will for others would create;
Till thy hard heart be calcined into dust,
And thy soul welter in its hideous crust!
Oh, may thy grave be sleepless as the bed,
The widowed couch of fire, that thou hast spread
Then, when thou fain wouldst weary Heaven with prayer,
Look on thine earthly victims, and despair!
Down to the dust! and, as thou rott'st away,
Even worms shall perish on thy poisonous clay.
But for the love I bore, and still must bear,
To her thy malice from all ties would tear,
Thy name, thy human name, to every eye
The climax of all scorn, should hang on high,
Exalted o'er thy less abhorred compeers,
And festering in the infamy of years.
LINES
ON HEARING THAT LADY BYRON WAS ILL.
And thou wert sad, yet I was not with thee!
And thou wert sick, and yet I was not near!
Methought that joy and health alone could be
Where I was _not_, and pain and sorrow here.
And is it thus? It is as I foretold,
And shall be more so; for the mind recoils
Upon itself, and the wrecked heart lies cold,
While heaviness collects the shattered spoils.
It is not in the storm nor in the strife
We feel benumbed, and wish to be no more,
But in the after-silence on the shore,
When all is lost except a little life.
I am too well avenged! But 'twas my right:
Whate'er my sins might be, _thou_ wert not sent
To be the Nemesis who should requite;
Nor did Heaven choose so near an instrument.
Mercy is for the merciful!--if thou
Hast been of such, 'twill be accorded now.
Thy nights are banished from the realms of sleep!
Yes! they may flatter thee; but thou shalt feel
A hollow agony which will not heal;
For thou art pillowed on a curse too deep:
Thou hast sown in my sorrow, and must reap
The bitter harvest in a woe as real!
I have had many foes, but none like thee;
For 'gainst the rest myself I could defend,
And be avenged, or turn them into friend;
But thou in safe implacability
Hadst nought to dread, in thy own weakness shielded
And in my love, which hath but too much yielded,
And spared, for thy sake, some I should not spare.
And thus upon the world,--trust in thy truth,
And the wild fame of my ungoverned youth,
On things that were not and on things that are,--
Even upon such a basis hast thou built
A monument, whose cement hath been guilt;
The moral Clytemnestra of thy lord,
And hewed down, with an unsuspected sword,
Fame, peace, and hope, and all the better life,
Which, but for this cold treason of thy heart,
Might still have risen from out the grave of strife,
And found a nobler duty than to part.
But of thy virtues didst thou make a vice,
Trafficking with them in a purpose cold,
For present anger and for future gold,
And buying others' grief at any price.
And thus, once entered into crooked ways,
The early truth, which was thy proper praise,
Did not still walk beside thee, but at times,
And with a breast unknowing its own crimes,
Deceit, averments incompatible,
Equivocations, and the thoughts which dwell
In Janus-spirits; the significant eye
Which learns to lie with silence; the pretext
Of prudence, with advantages annexed;
The acquiescence in all things which tend,
No matter how, to the desired end,--
All found a place in thy philosophy.
The means were worthy, and the end is won
I would not do by thee as thou hast done.
_Spottiswoode & Co., Printers, New-street Square, London._
End of Project Gutenberg's Lady Byron Vindicated, by Harriet Beecher Stowe