Life of Lord Byron Volume III Part 8

TO MR. MURRAY.

"April 11. 1814.

"I enclose you a letter_et_ from Mrs. Leigh.

"It will be best _not_ to put my name to our _Ode_; but you may _say_ as openly as you like that it is mine, and I can inscribe it to Mr. Hobhouse, from the _author_, which will mark it sufficiently. After the resolution of not publishing, though it is a thing of little length and less consequence, it will be better altogether that it is anonymous; but we will incorporate it in the first _tome_ of ours that you find time or the wish to publish.

Yours alway, B.

"P.S. I hope you got a note of alterations, sent this matin?

"P.S. Oh my books! my books! will you never find my books?

"Alter '_potent_ spell' to '_quickening_ spell:' the first (as Polonius says) 'is a vile phrase,' and means nothing, besides being common-place and _Rosa-Matilda-ish_."

TO MR. MURRAY.

"April 12. 1814.

"I send you a few notes and trifling alterations, and an additional motto from Gibbon, which you will find _singularly appropriate_. A 'Good-natured Friend' tells me there is a most scurrilous attack on _us_ in the Anti-jacobin Review, which you have _not_ sent. Send it, as I am in that state of languor which will derive benefit from getting into a pa.s.sion. Ever," &c.

LETTER 175. TO MR. MOORE.

"Albany, April 20. 1814.

"I _am_ very glad to hear that you are to be transient from Mayfield so very soon, and was taken in by the first part of your letter.[24] Indeed, for aught I know, you may be treating me, as Slipslop says, with 'ironing' even now. I shall say nothing of the _shock_, which had nothing of _humeur_ in it; as I am apt to take even a critic, and still more a friend, at his word, and never to doubt that I have been writing cursed nonsense, if they say so.

There was a mental reservation in my pact with the public[25], in behalf of _anonymes_; and, even had there not, the provocation was such as to make it physically impossible to pa.s.s over this d.a.m.nable epoch of triumphant tameness. 'Tis a cursed business; and, after all, I shall think higher of rhyme and reason, and very humbly of your heroic people, till--Elba becomes a volcano, and sends him out again. I can't think it all over yet.

"My departure for the Continent depends, in some measure, on the _in_continent. I have two country invitations at home, and don't know what to say or do. In the mean time, I have bought a macaw and a parrot, and have got up my books; and I box and fence daily, and go out very little.

"At this present writing, Louis the Gouty is wheeling in triumph into Piccadilly, in all the pomp and rabblement of royalty. I had an offer of seats to see them pa.s.s; but, as I have seen a Sultan going to mosque, and been at _his_ reception of an amba.s.sador, the most Christian King 'hath no attractions for me:'--though in some coming year of the Hegira, I should not dislike to see the place where he _had_ reigned, shortly after the second revolution, and a happy sovereignty of two months, the last six weeks being civil war.

"Pray write, and deem me ever," &c.

[Footnote 24: I had begun my letter in the following manner:--"Have you seen the 'Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte?'--I suspect it to be either F----g----d's or Rosa Matilda's. Those rapid and masterly portraits of all the tyrants that preceded Napoleon have a vigour in them which would incline me to say that Rosa Matilda is the person--but then, on the other hand, that powerful grasp of history," &c. &c. After a little more of this mock parallel, the letter went on thus:--"I should like to know what _you_ think of the matter?--Some friends of mine here _will_ insist that it is the work of the author of Childe Harold,--but then they are not so well read in F----g----d and Rosa Matilda as I am; and, besides, they seem to forget that _you_ promised, about a month or two ago, not to write any more for years. Seriously," &c. &c.

I quote this foolish banter merely to show how safely, even on his most sensitive points, one might venture to jest with him.]

[Footnote 25: We find D'Argenson thus encouraging Voltaire to break a similar vow:--"Continue to write without fear for five-and-twenty years longer, but write poetry, notwithstanding your oath in the preface to Newton."]

LETTER 176. TO MR. MURRAY.

"April 21. 1814.

"Many thanks with the letters which I return. You know I am a jacobin, and could not wear white, nor see the installation of Louis the Gouty.

"This is sad news, and very hard upon the sufferers at any, but more at _such_ a time--I mean the Bayonne sortie.

"You should urge Moore to come _out_.

"P.S. I want _Moreri_ to purchase for good and all. I have a Bayle, but want Moreri too.

"P.S. Perry hath a piece of compliment to-day; but I think the _name_ might have been as well omitted. No matter; they can but throw the old story of inconsistency in my teeth--let them,--I mean, as to not publishing. However, _now_ I will keep my word.

Nothing but the occasion, which was _physically_ irresistible, made me swerve; and I thought an _anonyme_ within my _pact_ with the public. It is the only thing I have or shall set about."

LETTER 177. TO MR. MURRAY.

"April 25. 1814.

"Let Mr. Gifford have the letter and return it at his leisure. I would have offered it, had I thought that he liked things of the kind.

"Do you want the last page _immediately_! I have doubts about the lines being worth printing; at any rate, I must see them again and alter some pa.s.sages, before they go forth in any shape into the _ocean_ of circulation;--a very conceited phrase, by the by: well then--_channel_ of publication will do.

"'I am not i' the vein,' or I could knock off a stanza or three for the Ode, that might answer the purpose better.[26] At all events, I _must_ see the lines again _first_, as there be two I have altered in my mind's ma.n.u.script already. Has any one seen or judged of them? that is the criterion by which I will abide--only give me a _fair_ report, and 'nothing extenuate,' as I will in that case do something else.

"Ever," &c.

"I want _Moreri_, and an _Athenaeus_."

[Footnote 26: Mr. Murray had requested of him to make some additions to the Ode, so as to save the stamp duty imposed upon publications not exceeding a single sheet; and he afterwards added, in successive editions, five or six stanzas, the original number being but eleven.

There were also three more stanzas, which he never printed, but which, for the just tribute they contain to Washington, are worthy of being preserved:--

"There was a day--there was an hour, While earth was Gaul's--Gaul thine-- When that immeasurable power Unsated to resign Had been an act of purer fame Than gathers round Marengo's name And gilded thy decline, Through the long twilight of all time, Despite some pa.s.sing clouds of crime.

"But thou, forsooth, must be a king, And don the purple vest, As if that foolish robe could wring Remembrance from thy breast.

Where is that faded garment? where The gewgaws thou wert fond to wear, The star--the string--the crest?

Vain froward child of empire! say, Are all thy playthings s.n.a.t.c.h'd away?

"Where may the wearied eye repose When gazing on the great; Where neither guilty glory glows, Nor despicable state?

Yes--one--the first--the last--the best-- The Cincinnatus of the West, Whom envy dared not hate, Bequeathed the name of Washington, To make man blush there was but One!"

LETTER 178. TO MR. MURRAY.

"April 26. 1814.

"I have been thinking that it might be as well to publish no more of the Ode separately, but incorporate it with any of the other things, and include the smaller poem too (in that case)--which I must previously correct, nevertheless. I can't, for the head of me, add a line worth scribbling; my 'vein' is quite gone, and my present occupations are of the gymnastic order--boxing and fencing--and my princ.i.p.al conversation is with my macaw and Bayle.