The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1824-10-25 00:00:00

THE BRITISH PRESS.

pal object in coming out was to establish a literary journal, whose
name is not yet fixed.
vehicle for some occasional poems; —for
"' I have proposed to contribute, and shall problably
mean to trans.
make it a
late Ariosto. I was ;honey advised by Tom Moore, long ago, not
instance,
to have any conaectioo with such a company as Hunt, Shelley, and
Co. ; but I have pledged myself, mid, besides. could not now, if I
Hunt's hopes. Ile has a large faintly.
had ever so great • disinclination for the scheme, disappoint all
ney, and undergone a long series of persecutions.
has undertaken • long jour.
" Moore tells me, that it was proposed to him to contribute to
the new publication, but that he had declined it. You see I cannot
get out of the scrape. The name is not yet decided upon,—lndf.a..
dun have been rejected.
" Ilunt would have made a fine writer, for he has a great deal
of fancy and feeling, :if he had not been spoiled by eircuinstances.
lie was brought up at the Illueeoat foundation, and had never till
lately beau ten miles horn St. Paul's. Wheat Poetry is to be ex.
Kau' from such a course of education ? Ile him his sehottl, how-
-1 ever, and a host of disciples. A friend of mine calls ftintini,
mini Pitnini, and foliage, Follyage. Perhaps he had a tumble in
• climbing trees in the Hesperides !'• But Rimini has a great deal
of merit. There never were so many fine things spoiled as in
R;raitfi.'"
• • • • •
"' Since you left us,' said Lord Byron, I have seen Ilebhouse
for a few days. Ilohhouse is the oldest and the hest friend I have.
'Altai scenes we have witnessed together ! Our friendship began
at Cambridge. We led the saute sort of lilt in town, and ttavellol
in company a great part of the years 1309, 1810, and 1811. Ile was
preser,t at my mamage, and was with me in 1816, after my sepa-
ration. We were at Venice, and visited Borne t%vether in 1812.
The greater part of my llarold was composed when we were
together, and I could do no less in gratitude than dedicate the
complete poem to hint. The first Canto was inscribed tome of the
most beautiful little creatures I ever saw, then a mere child t Lady
Charlotte Ilarleigh was my lanthe.
" llohhouse's Dissertation on Italian Literature is much su-
perior to his notes on Cla:de llarold. Perhaps lie understood the
antiquities better titan Nibbi, or any of the Cicerones ; but the
knowledge is somewhat misplaced shore it is. .Sliciley went to the
opposite extreme, and never made any notes.
Ilobliottne has an erczilent heart : lie fainted when he heard
a false report of my death in Greece, and was wonderfully affected
at that of Mat:hilts—a much more able inr.n than the !invalid.—
You have often heard me speak of him. The tribute I paid to his
memory was a very ipad«juate one, and ill expressed what I felt
at his leas."'
•• • •

" ' Another of the wlld freaks I played during my msther's life
time, was to dress op 31rs. ---. at:a to pass her off as my bro.
they Gordon, in order that my mother might not hear of my having
such a letnale acquaintance. You would net think me a Scipio in
Lose days, hot I can safely say I never seduced any woman.
" • A curious thing happened to me shortly after the honey-
moon, which wan very awkward at the time, bat has since amused
me much. It so happened that three married women were on a
wedding visit to my wife (and in the same room at the same time),
whom I hail known to be all birds of the same nest. Fancy the
scene of confusion that ensued !
" I have seen a great de LI of Italian society, and swam in a gon.
dole, but nothing could equal themmaigacy at high life in Log.
land, esprcially that of when I knew it.
' " • There was a lady at that time, double my own age, the mother
of several children who were perfect angels, with whom I had
funned a liaison that continued without interruption for eight
Months. The autumn of a beauty like her's is preferable to the
sring in others. She told me she never was in love till she was
thirty; and I thought myself so with her, when she was forty.
I never felt a stronger passion, which she returned with equal
ardour. I was fond of, indeed more attached than I ought to
have been, to one who had bestowed her favours on many ; but
I was flattered at a preference that had led her to discard an-
other who in personal attractions and fashion was fat my superior.
She had been sacrificed, almost before she was a women, to one
whose mind and body were equally contemptible in the scale of eves.
don ; and on whom she bestowed a numerous family, to which
the law gave me the right to be ealled father. Strange as it may
seem, she gained (as all women do), an influence over me an strong,
that I had great difficulty in breaking with her, even when I knew
she bad been inconstant to me; and once was on the point of going
abroad with her, and narrowly escaped this folly. I was at this
time a mere Bond-street lounger; a great man at lobbies, coffee,
and gambling houses: my afternoons were passed in visits, lan-
citrons, lounging, and boxing—not to mention drinking !if I had
known you in early life, you would not have been alive now ! I
remember Scrooge Davies, H—, and myself, clubbing 191. all we
had in our pockets, and losing it at a heal in St. James coitrea, at
chicken-Ituard, which may be called flint and afterwards getting
drunk together, till H. and S. D. quarrelled. Scrooge afterwards
wrote to me for my pistols to shoot himself; but I declined lending'
them, on the plea that they would be forfeited u a deodand. I
knew my answer would have more effect than four sides of prosing.
" t Don't suppose, however, that I took any pleasure inall these
excesses, or that parson A. K. or W— were associates to my taste.
The miserable consequences of such a life are detailed at length in
my Memoirs. 3ly own waster, at an age when I must required a
gala., and !eft to the dominion of mrwassions when they Wall the
strong,: with a fortune anticipated before I came into posertake
of it, aria a constitution impaired by early excesses, I commenced
tr: trove!, in MO, with &joyless indifference to a wand that was
all beton:• " • •
•
• • • •

" I ant sorry to find that he (Lord Byron) has become more
indolent. lle has almost discontinued his rides on horseback, and
has starved himself into an unnatural thhsuess; and his digestion
has become weaker. In order to keep up the stamina that he
requires. lie indulges somewhat too freely la wine, and in his fa-
vourite bev.rage, llollands, of which he drinks a pint almost every
night.
He said to toe humorously enough, Why don't you drink,
Meslwin ? oin-Ind-water is the source of all nt inspiratirm. If
you were to drit.k as is as 1 do, you would w.ite as good
vers. ; depend on it it is the trite Ilippocrene.' "
• • • • • •