The Works of Lord Byron Volume IV Part 35

[208] {168}["The general state of morals here is much the same as in the Doges' time; a woman is virtuous (according to the code) who limits herself to her husband and one lover; those who have two, three, or more, are a little wild; but it is only those who are indiscriminately diffuse, and form a low connection ... who are considered as over-stepping the modesty of marriage.... There is no convincing a woman here, that she is in the smallest degree deviating from the rule of right, or the fitness of things, in having an _Amoroso._"--Letter to Murray, January 2, 1817, _Letters,_ 1900, iv. 40, 41.]

[bk] {169}

_A Count of wealth inferior to his quality,_ _Which somewhat limited his liberality_.--[MS.]

[209]["Some of the Italians liked him [a famous improvisatore], others called his performance '_seccatura_' (a devilish good word, by the way), and all Milan was in controversy about him."--Letter to Moore, November 6, 1816, _Letters_, 1899, iii. 384.]

[210] {170}[The saying, "Il n'y a point de heros pour son valet de chambre," is attributed to Marechal (Nicholas) Catinat (1637-1712). His biographer speaks of presenting "_le heros en deshabille_." (See his _Memoires_, 1819, ii. 118.)]

[211] {171}[The origin of the word is obscure. According to the _Vocab.

della Crusca_, "cicisbeo" is an inversion of "bel cece," beautiful chick (pea). Pasqualino, cited by Diez, says it is derived from the French _chiche beau_.--_N. Eng. Dict._, art. "Cicisbeo."]

[212] Cortejo is p.r.o.nounced Corte_h_o, with an aspirate, according to the Arabesque guttural. It means what there is as yet no precise name for in England, though the practice is as common as in any tramontane country whatever.

[213] [Stanzas x.x.xviii., x.x.xix., are not in the original MS.]

[214] {172}[For the a.s.sociation of bread and b.u.t.ter with immaturity, compare, "Ye bread-and-b.u.t.ter rogues, do ye run from me?" (Beaumont and Fletcher, _The Humorous Lieutenant_, act iii. sc. 7). (See _N. Eng.

Dict._, art. "Bread.")]

[215] {173}[Compare--

" ... the Tuscan's siren tongue?

That music in itself, whose sounds are song, The poetry of speech?"

_Childe Harold,_ Canto IV. stanza lviii. lines 4-6, _Poetical Works,_ 1899, ii. 374, note i.]

[216] _Sattin,_ eh? Query, I can't spell it.--[MS.]

[bl] _From the tall peasant with her ruddy bronze_.--[MS.]

[bm] _Like her own clime, all sun, and bloom, and skies_.--[MS.]

[217] {174}[For the received accounts of the cause of Raphael's death, see his Lives. "Fidem matrimonii quidem dederat nepti cuidam Cardinal.

Bibiani, sed partim Cardinalatus spe lactatus partim pro seculi locique more, Romae enim plerumque vixit, vagis amoribus delectatus, morbo hinc contracto, obiit A.C. 1520, aetat. 37."--Art. "Raphael," _apud_ Hofmann, _Lexicon Universale_. It would seem that Raphael was betrothed to Maria, daughter of Antonio Divizio da Bibiena, the nephew of Cardinal Bibiena (see his letter to his uncle Simone di Battista di Ciarla da Urbino, dated July 1, 1514), and it is a fact that a girl named Margarita, supposed to be his mistress, is mentioned in his will. But the "causes of his death," April 6, 1520, were a delicate const.i.tution, overwork, and a malarial fever, caught during his researches among the ruins of ancient Rome" (_Raphael of Urbino_, by J. D. Pa.s.savant, 1872, pp. 140, 196, 197. See, too, _Raphael_, by E. Muntz, 1888).]

[218] [Compare the lines enclosed in a letter to Murray, dated November 25, 1816--

"In this beloved marble view, Above the works and thoughts of man, What Nature _could_ but _would not_ do, And Beauty and Canova can."]

[219]

["(In talking thus, the writer, more especially Of women, would be understood to say, He speaks as a Spectator, not officially, And always, Reader, in a modest way; Perhaps, too, in no very great degree shall he Appear to have offended in this lay, Since, as all know, without the s.e.x, our Sonnets Would seem unfinished, like their untrimmed bonnets.) "(Signed) Printer's Devil."]

[220] [_The Task_, by William Cowper, ii. 206. Compare _The Farewell_, line 27, by Charles Churchill--

"Be England what she will, With all her faults, she is my Country still."]

[221] {175}[The allusion is to Gally Knight's _Ilderim,_ a Syrian Tale.

See, too, Letter to Moore, March 25, 1817, _Letters,_ 1900, iv. 78: "Talking of tail, I wish you had not called it [_Lalla Rookh_] a '_Persian Tale_.' Say a 'Poem,' or 'Romance,' but not 'Tale.' I am very sorry that I called some of my own things 'Tales.' ... Besides, we have had Arabian, and Hindoo, and Turkish, and a.s.syrian Tales." _Beppo_, it must be remembered, was published anonymously, and in the concluding lines of the stanza the satire is probably directed against his own "Tales."]

[222] {176}["The expressions '_blue-stocking_' and '_dandy_' may furnish matter for the learning of a commentator at some future period. At this moment every English reader will understand them. Our present ephemeral dandy is akin to the maccaroni of my earlier days. The first of these expressions has become cla.s.sical, by Mrs. Hannah More's poem of '_Bas-Bleu_' and the other by the use of it in one of Lord Byron's poems. Though now become familiar and rather trite, their day may not be long.

' ... Cadentque Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula.'"

--Translation of Forteguerri's _Ricciardetto_, by Lord Glenbervie, 1822 (note to stanza v.).

Compare, too, a memorandum of 1820. "I liked the Dandies; they were always very civil to _me_, though in general they disliked literary people ... The truth is, that, though I gave up the business early, I had a tinge of Dandyism in my minority, and probably retained enough of it to conciliate the great ones at four-and-twenty."--_Letters_, 1901, v. 423.]

[223] {177}[The _Morning Chronicle_ of June 17, 1817, reports at length "Mrs. Boehm's Grand Masquerade." "On Monday evening this distinguished lady of the _haut ton_ gave a splendid masquerade at her residence in St. James's Square." "The Dukes of Gloucester, Wellington, etc., were present in plain dress. Among the dominoes were the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Grafton, etc." Lady Caroline Lamb was among the guests.]

[224] {178}[The reference is, probably, to the _Repository of Arts, Literature, Commerce, Manufactures, Fashions, and Politics_ (1809-1829), which was ill.u.s.trated by coloured plates of dresses, "artistic"

furniture, Gothic cottages, park lodges, etc.]

[225] [For "Ridotto," see Letter to Moore, January 28, 1817, _Letters,_ 1900, iv. 49, note 1.]

[bn] _Of Imited_ (_sic_) _Imitations, how soon! how._--[MS.]

[226] ["When Brummell was obliged ... to retire to France, he knew no French; and having obtained a Grammar for the purposes of study, our friend Scrope Davies was asked what progress Brummell had made in French ... he responded, 'that Brummell had been stopped, like Buonaparte in Russia, by the _Elements_.' I have put this pun into _Beppo,_ which is 'a fair exchange and no robbery;' for Scrope made his fortune at several dinners (as he owned himself), by repeating occasionally, as his own, some of the buffooneries with which I had encountered him in the Morning."--_Detached Thoughts_, 1821, _Letters_, 1901, v. 422, 423.]

[227] ["Like Sylla, I have always believed that all things depend upon Fortune, and nothing upon ourselves. I am not aware of any one thought or action, worthy of being called good to myself or others, which is not to be attributed to the Good G.o.ddess--Fortune!"--_Ibid_., p. 451.]

[228] "January 19th, 1818. To-morrow will be a Sunday, and full Ridotto."--[MS.]

[bo] {181} ----_philoguny,_--[MS.]

[229] {182}[Botherby is, of course, Sotheby. In the _English Bards_ (line 818) he is bracketed with Gifford and Macneil _honoris causti,_ but at this time (1817-18) Byron was "against" Sotheby, under the impression that he had sent him "an anonymous note ... accompanying a copy of the _Castle of Chillon,_ etc. [_sic_]." Sotheby affirmed that he had not written the note, but Byron, while formally accepting the disclaimer, refers to the firmness of his "former persuasion," and renews the attack with increased bitterness. "As to _Beppo,_ I will not alter or suppress a syllable for any man's pleasure but my own. If there are resemblances between Botherby and Sotheby, or Sotheby and Botherby, the fault is not mine, but in the person who resembles,--or the persons who trace a resemblance. _Who_ find out this resemblance? Mr. S.'s _friends._ _Who_ go about moaning over him and laughing? Mr. S.'s _friends"_ (Letters to Murray, April 17, 23, 1818, _Letters,_ 1900, iv.

226-230). A writer of satires is of necessity satirical, and Sotheby, like "Wordswords and Co.," made excellent "copy." If he had not written the "anonymous note," he was, from Byron's point of view, ridiculous and a bore, and "ready to hand" to be tossed up in rhyme as _Botherby._ (For a brief account of Sotheby, see _Poetical Works,_ i. 362, note 2.)]

[bp] {183}_Gorging the slightest slice of Flattery raw_.--[MS. in a letter to Murray, April 11, 1818, _Letters_, 1900, iv. 218.]

[230] {184}[So, too, elsewhere. Wordsworth and Coleridge had depreciated Voltaire, and Byron, _en revanche_, contrasts the "tea-drinking neutrality of morals" of the _school_, i.e. the Lake poets, with "their convenient treachery in politics" (see _Letters,_ 1901, v. 600).]

[231] {184}["Lady Byron," her husband wrote, "would have made an excellent wrangler at Cambridge." Compare--

"Her favourite science was the mathematical."

_Don Juan,_ Canto I. stanza xii. line 1.]

[232] {185}[Stanza lx.x.x. is not in the original MS.]

[bq] {186}_Sate Laura with a kind of comic horror_.--[MS.]

[233] {189}[Cap Bon, or Ras Adden, is the northernmost point of Tunis.]

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