Life of Lord Byron Volume III Part 1

Life of Lord Byron.

Vol. III.

by Thomas Moore.

"JOURNAL, 1814.

"February 18.

"Better than a month since I last journalised:--most of it out of London and at Notts., but a busy one and a pleasant, at least three weeks of it. On my return, I find all the newspapers in hysterics[1], and town in an uproar, on the avowal and republication of two stanzas on Princess Charlotte's weeping at Regency's speech to Lauderdale in 1812. They are daily at it still;--some of the abuse good, all of it hearty. They talk of a motion in our House upon it--be it so.

"Got up--redde the Morning Post, containing the battle of Buonaparte, the destruction of the Custom-house, and a paragraph on me as long as my pedigree, and vituperative, as usual.

"Hobhouse is returned to England. He is my best friend, the most lively, and a man of the most sterling talents extant.

"'The Corsair' has been conceived, written, published, &c. since I last took up this journal. They tell me it has great success;--it was written _con amore_, and much from _existence_. Murray is satisfied with its progress; and if the public are equally so with the perusal, there's an end of the matter.

[Footnote 1: Immediately on the appearance of The Corsair, (with those obnoxious verses, "Weep, daughter of a royal line," appended to it,) a series of attacks, not confined to Lord Byron himself, but aimed also at all those who had lately become his friends, was commenced in the Courier and Morning Post, and carried on through the greater part of the months of February and March. The point selected by these writers, as a ground of censure on the poet, was one which _now_, perhaps, even themselves would agree to cla.s.s among his claims to praise,--namely, the atonement which he had endeavoured to make for the youthful violence of his Satire by a measure of justice, amiable even in its overflowings, to every one whom he conceived he had wronged.

Notwithstanding the careless tone in which, here and elsewhere, he speaks of these a.s.saults, it is evident that they annoyed him;--an effect which, in reading them over now, we should be apt to wonder they could produce, did we not recollect the property which Dryden attributes to "small wits," in common with certain other small animals:--

"We scarce could know they live, but that they _bite_."

The following is a specimen of the terms in which these party scribes could then speak of one of the masters of English song:--"They might have slept in oblivion with Lord Carlisle's Dramas and Lord Byron's Poems."--"Some certainly extol Lord Byron's Poem much, but most of the best judges place his Lordship rather low in the list of our minor poets."]

"Nine o'clock.

"Been to Hanson's on business. Saw Rogers, and had a note from Lady Melbourne, who says, it is said I am 'much out of spirits.' I wonder if I really am or not? I have certainly enough of 'that perilous stuff which weighs upon the heart,' and it is better they should believe it to be the result of these attacks than of the real cause; but--ay, ay, always _but_, to the end of the chapter.

"Hobhouse has told me ten thousand anecdotes of Napoleon, all good and true. My friend H. is the most entertaining of companions, and a fine fellow to boot.

"Redde a little--wrote notes and letters, and am alone, which Locke says, is bad company. 'Be not solitary, be not idle.'--Um!--the idleness is troublesome; but I can't see so much to regret in the solitude. The more I see of men, the less I like them. If I could but say so of women too, all would be well. Why can't I? I am now six-and-twenty; my pa.s.sions have had enough to cool them; my affections more than enough to wither them,--and yet--and yet--always _yet_ and _but_--'Excellent well, you are a fishmonger--get thee to a nunnery.'--'They fool me to the top of my bent.'

"Midnight.

"Began a letter, which I threw into the fire. Redde--but to little purpose. Did not visit Hobhouse, as I promised and ought. No matter, the loss is mine. Smoked cigars.

"Napoleon!--this week will decide his fate. All seems against him; but I believe and hope he will win--at least, beat back the invaders. What right have we to prescribe sovereigns to France? Oh for a Republic!

'Brutus, thou sleepest.' Hobhouse abounds in continental anecdotes of this extraordinary man; all in favour of his intellect and courage, but against his _bonhommie_. No wonder;--how should he, who knows mankind well, do other than despise and abhor them?

"The greater the equality, the more impartially evil is distributed, and becomes lighter by the division among so many--therefore, a Republic!

"More notes from Mad. de * * unanswered--and so they shall remain. I admire her abilities, but really her society is overwhelming--an avalanche that buries one in glittering nonsense--all snow and sophistry.

"Shall I go to Mackintosh's on Tuesday? um!--I did not go to Marquis Lansdowne's, nor to Miss Berry's, though both are pleasant. So is Sir James's,--but I don't know--I believe one is not the better for parties; at least, unless some _regnante_ is there.

"I wonder how the deuce any body could make such a world; for what purpose dandies, for instance, were ordained--and kings--and fellows of colleges--and women of 'a certain age'--and many men of any age--and myself, most of all!

"'Divesne prisco et natus ab Inacho, Nil interest, an pauper, et infima De gente, sub dio moreris, Victima nil miserantis Orci.

Omnes eodem cogimur.'

"Is there any thing beyond?--_who_ knows? _He_ that can't tell. Who tells that there _is_? He who don't know. And when shall he know?

perhaps, when he don't expect, and generally when he don't wish it. In this last respect, however, all are not alike: it depends a good deal upon education,--something upon nerves and habits--but most upon digestion.

"Sat.u.r.day, Feb. 19.

"Just returned from seeing Kean in Richard. By Jove, he is a soul!

Life--nature--truth without exaggeration or diminution. Kemble's Hamlet is perfect;--but Hamlet is not Nature. Richard is a man; and Kean is Richard. Now to my own concerns.

"Went to Waite's. Teeth all right and white; but he says that I grind them in my sleep and chip the edges. That same sleep is no friend of mine, though I court him sometimes for half the twenty-four.

"February 20.

"Got up and tore out two leaves of this Journal--I don't know why.

Hodgson just called and gone. He has much _bonhommie_ with his other good qualities, and more talent than he has yet had credit for beyond his circle.

"An invitation to dine at Holland House to meet Kean. He is worth meeting; and I hope, by getting into good society, he will be prevented from falling like Cooke. He is greater now on the stage, and off he should never be less. There is a stupid and under-rating criticism upon him in one of the newspapers. I thought that, last night, though great, he rather under-acted more than the first time. This may be the effect of these cavils; but I hope he has more sense than to mind them. He cannot expect to maintain his present eminence, or to advance still higher, without the envy of his green-room fellows, and the nibbling of their admirers. But, if he don't beat them all, why then--merit hath no purchase in 'these coster-monger days.'

"I wish that I had a talent for the drama; I would write a tragedy _now_. But no,--it is gone. Hodgson talks of one,--he will do it well;--and I think M--e should try. He has wonderful powers, and much variety; besides, he has lived and felt. To write so as to bring home to the heart, the heart must have been tried,--but, perhaps, ceased to be so. While you are under the influence of pa.s.sions, you only feel, but cannot describe them,--any more than, when in action, you could turn round and tell the story to your next neighbour! When all is over,--all, all, and irrevocable,--trust to memory--she is then but too faithful.

"Went out, and answered some letters, yawned now and then, and redde the Robbers. Fine,--but Fiesco is better; and Alfieri and Monti's Aristodemo _best_. They are more equal than the Tedeschi dramatists.

"Answered--or, rather acknowledged--the receipt of young Reynolds's Poem, Safie. The lad is clever, but much of his thoughts are borrowed,--_whence_, the Reviewers may find out. I hate discouraging a young one; and I think,--though wild and more oriental than he would be, had he seen the scenes where he has placed his tale,--that he has much talent, and, certainly, fire enough.

"Received a very singular epistle; and the mode of its conveyance, through Lord H.'s hands, as curious as the letter itself. But it was gratifying and pretty.

"Sunday, February 27.

"Here I am, alone, instead of dining at Lord H.'s, where I was asked,--but not inclined to go anywhere. Hobhouse says I am growing a _loup garou_,--a solitary hobgoblin. True;--'I am myself alone.' The last week has been pa.s.sed in reading--seeing plays--now and then visiters--sometimes yawning and sometimes sighing, but no writing,--save of letters. If I could always read, I should never feel the want of society. Do I regret it?--um!--'Man delights not me,' and only one woman--at a time.

"There is something to me very softening in the presence of a woman,--some strange influence, even if one is not in love with them,--which I cannot at all account for, having no very high opinion of the s.e.x. But yet,--I always feel in better humour with myself and every thing else, if there is a woman within ken. Even Mrs. Mule[2], my fire-lighter,--the most ancient and withered of her kind,--and (except to myself) not the best-tempered--always makes me laugh,--no difficult task when I am 'i' the vein.'

"Heigho! I would I were in mine island!--I am not well; and yet I look in good health. At times, I fear, 'I am not in my perfect mind;'--and yet my heart and head have stood many a crash, and what should ail them now? They prey upon themselves, and I am sick--sick--'Prithee, undo this b.u.t.ton--why should a cat, a rat, a dog have life--and _thou_ no life at all?' Six-and-twenty years, as they call them, why, I might and should have been a Pasha by this time. 'I 'gin to be a weary of the sun.'

"Buonaparte is not yet beaten; but has reb.u.t.ted Blucher, and repiqued Swartzenburg. This it is to have a head. If he again wins, 'Vae victis!'

[Footnote 2: This ancient housemaid, of whose gaunt and witch-like appearance it would be impossible to convey any idea but by the pencil, furnished one among the numerous instances of Lord Byron's p.r.o.neness to attach himself to any thing, however homely, that had once enlisted his good nature in its behalf, and become a.s.sociated with his thoughts. He first found this old woman at his lodgings in Bennet Street, where, for a whole season, she was the perpetual scarecrow of his visiters. When, next year, he took chambers in Albany, one of the great advantages which his friends looked to in the change was, that they should get rid of this phantom. But, no,--there she was again--he had actually brought her with him from Bennet Street. The following year saw him married, and, with a regular establishment of servants, in Piccadilly; and here,--as Mrs. Mule had not made her appearance to any of the visiters,--it was concluded, rashly, that the witch had vanished. One of those friends, however, who had most fondly indulged in this persuasion, happening to call one day when all the male part of the establishment were abroad, saw, to his dismay, the door opened by the same grim personage, improved considerably in point of habiliments since he last saw her, and keeping pace with the increased scale of her master's household, as a new peruke, and other symptoms of promotion, testified. When asked "how he came to carry this old woman about with him from place to place," Lord Byron's only answer was, "The poor old devil was so kind to me."]

"Sunday, March 6.

"On Tuesday last dined with Rogers,--Madame de Stael, Mackintosh, Sheridan, Erskine, and Payne Knight, Lady Donegall and Miss R. there.

Sheridan told a very good story of himself and Madame de Recamier's handkerchief; Erskine a few stories of himself only. _She_ is going to write a big book about England, she says;--I believe her. Asked by her how I liked Miss * *'s thing, called * *, and answered (very sincerely) that I thought it very bad for _her_, and worse than any of the others.