The Works of Lord Byron Volume IV Part 110

[618] {579}[The publication of the _British Review_ was discontinued in 1825.]

[619] [For "Botherby," _vide ante_, _Beppo_, stanza lxxii. line 7, p.

182, note 1; and with the "ex-cathedra tone" compare "that awful note of woe," _Vision of Judgment_, stanza xc. line 4, _ante_, p. 518.]

[620] {580}["Sotheby is a good man, rhymes well (if not wisely), but is a bore. He seizes you by the b.u.t.ton. One night of a rout at Mrs. Hope's, he had fastened upon me (something about Agamemnon, or Orestes, or some of his plays), notwithstanding my symptoms of manifest distress (for I was in love, and just nicked a minute, when neither mothers, nor husbands, nor rivals, nor gossips, were near my then idol, who was beautiful as the Statues of the Gallery where we stood at the time)--Sotheby I say had seized upon me by the b.u.t.ton and the heart-strings, and spared neither. William Spencer, who likes fun, and don't dislike mischief, saw my case, and coming up to us both, took me by the hand, and pathetically bade me farewell; 'for,' said he, 'I see it is all over with you.' Sotheby then went way. '_Sic me servavit Apollo_.'"--_Detached Thoughts_, 1821, _Letters_, 1901, v. 433.]

[621] [For Byron's misapprehension concerning "kibes," see _Childe Harold_, Canto I. stanza lxvii. line 5, _Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 64, note 3.]

[622] ["Where can the animals who write this trash have been bred, to fancy that ladies drink b.u.mpers of Madeira at luncheon?"--_Literary Register_, May 3, 1823.]

[623] {582}[Wordsworth's _Resolution and Independence_, originally ent.i.tled _The Leech-gatherer_, was written in 1802, and published in 1807.]

[624] [Wordsworth was appointed Distributor of Stamps for the County of Westmoreland, in March, 1813. Lord Lonsdale and Sir George Beaumont were "suretys for the due execution of the trust."--_Life of William Wordsworth_, by William Knight, 1889, ii. 210.]

[625] Grange is or was a famous pastry-cook and fruiterer in Piccadilly.

["Grange's" (James Grange, confectioner, No. 178, Piccadilly, see Kent's London Directory of 1820), moved farther west some fifteen years ago.]

[626] {584}["When I belonged to the Drury Lane Committee ... the number of plays upon the shelves were about _five_ hundred.... Mr. Sotheby obligingly offered us all his tragedies, and I pledged myself; and, notwithstanding many squabbles with my Committe[e]d Brethren, did get 'Ivan' accepted, read, and the parts distributed. But lo! in the very heart of the matter, upon some _tepid_-ness on the part of Kean, or warmth on that of the author, Sotheby withdrew his play."--_Detached Thoughts_, 1821, _Letters_, 1901, v. 442.]

[627] [_Fugitive Pieces_ is the t.i.tle of the suppressed quarto edition of Byron's juvenile poems.]

[628] {585}[Sir George Beaumont, Bart., of Coleorton, Leicestershire (1753-1827), landscape-painter, art critic, and picture-collector, one of the founders of the National Gallery, married, in 1778, Margaret Willis, granddaughter of Chief Justice Willis. She corresponded with Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy, and with Coleridge (see _Memorials of Coleorton_, 1888). Coleridge visited the Beaumonts for the first time at Dunmore, in 1804. "I was not received here," he tells Wordsworth, "with mere kindness; I was welcomed _almost_ as you welcomed me when first I visited you at Racedown" (_Letters of S. T. Coleridge_, 1895, ii. 459).

Scott (_Memoirs of the life, etc._, 1838, ii, II) describes Sir George Beaumont as "by far the most sensible and pleasing man I ever knew, kind, too, in his nature, and generous and gentle in society.... He was the great friend of Wordsworth, and understood his poetry."]

[629] [It was not Wordsworth's patron, William Lord Lonsdale, but his kinsman James, the first earl, who, towards the close of the American war, offered to build and man a ship of seventy-four guns.]

[630] {586}[For this harping on "schools" of poetry, see Hazlitt's Lectures "On the Living Poets" _Lectures on the English Poets_ (No.

viii.), 1818, p. 318.]

[631] Fact from life, with the _words_.

[632] [Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829), President of the Royal Society, received the honour of knighthood April 8, 1812. He was created a baronet January 18, 1819.]

[633] {587}[Compare "We have been for many years at a great distance from each other; we are now separated. You have combined a.r.s.enic with your gold, Sir Humphry! You are brittle, and I will rather dine with Duke Humphry than with you."--_Anima Poetae_, by S. T. Coleridge, 1895, p. 218.]

[634] ["Lydia White," writes Lady Morgan (_Memoirs_, 1862, ii. 236), "was a personage of much social celebrity in her day. She was an Irish lady of large fortune and considerable talent, noted for her hospitality and dinners in all the capitals of Europe." She is mentioned by Moore (_Memoirs_, 1853, in. 21), Miss Berry (_Journal_, 1866, ii. 484), Ticknor (_Life, Letters, and Journal_, 1876, i. 176), etc., etc.

Byron saw her for the last time in Venice, when she borrowed a copy of _Lalla Rookh_ (Letter to Moore, June 1, 1818, _Letters_, 1900, iv. 237).

Sir Walter Scott, who knew her well, records her death: "January 28, [1827]. Heard of Miss White's death--she _was_ a woman of wit, and had a feeling and kind heart. Poor Lydia! I saw the Duke of York and her in London, when Death, it seems, was brandishing his dart over them.

'The view o't gave them little fright.'"

(_Memoirs of the Life, etc._, 1838, iv. 110.)]

[635] [Moore, following the example of Pope, who thought his "delicious lobster-nights" worth commemorating, gives details of a supper at Watier's, May 19, 1814, at which Kean was present, when Byron "confined himself to lobsters, and of these finished two or three, to his own share," etc.--an Ambrosian night, indeed!--_Life_, p. 254.]

END OF VOL. IV.