The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1861-01-25
THE popUI,.RITy on pvpoy

In the course of Harriet Martineaus article. in
the Atlantic Monthly for February, on "Lady By.
ron" occur the following remarks about the carly
popularity of the author of "Childe Harold" The
period was just before his marriage with Miss Mil
banke.
byron was then the idol of much more than The
literary world. His poetry was known by heart by
multitudes OF men and women who read very little
else; and one meets, at this day, elderly men, who
live quite outside of the regions ofliterature who
believe that there never could have been such a
poet before, and would say, if they dared that there
will never be such another again. lie appeared at
the moment when society was restless and miser
able, and discontented with the tates and the uni
verse, and all that it contained. The general SEN
siblhty had not long found any expression in poet
ny. Literature seemed something quite apart from
experience and with which none but particular
CLASS had any concern. At such a time, when
Europe lay desolate under the ravage and inces.
SAINT menace of the French empire when England
mad an insane king, profigate regent an afro
clous ministry and a corrupt Parliament-yhen
the war drained the kingdom of its youth and
every class oil ITS resources when there was chronic
dlscontent in the manufacturing districts and hun
ger among the rural population, with a perpetual
extension of pauperism swallowing up the working
and even the middle classes-when everybody was
iull OF anxiety, dread, or reactionary reckless
ness-there suddenly appeared new strain of
poetry which seemed to express every mans mood.
Every man took up the song. Byron's musical
woe resounded through the land. People who had
not known exactly whatwas the matter with them
now found that life was what Byron said it was,
and that they were sick of it. | can well remem-
Der the enthusasm-the better perhaps for never
having shared it. At first was too young, and
afterwards found too much of moods and too lit
tie of matter to create any lasting attachment to
his poetry. But the music of it rang in all ears
and the rush of its popularity could not be resisted
by any but downright churish persons. | remem-
Der how ladies in morning calls, rected passages
OF Byron to each other and how gentlemen, in
l.. L
next neighbour If a man was seen walking with
his head down, and his lips moving, he was revoIg
ing Byron's last romance; and children who began
to keep albums wrote in double lines on the first
page, some stanza which caught them by its sound
If they were not up to its sense. On some pane in
every inn window there was scrap of b yron; and
in young ladies' portfolios there were portraits of
the poet, recognizable, through all bad drawing
and distortion by the cast of the beautiful features
and the Corsair style. Where popularity like
this sprang up, there must be sufficient reason for
1t to cause it TO involve more or less all orders of
mind; and the wisest and most experienced men,
and the most thoroughly trained scholars fell into
the general admiration, and keenly enjoyed so me-
lodlous an expression OF general state of feeling.
without asking too pertlnacousy for higher views
and deeper meanings. Old Quakers were troubled
at detecting hidden copies and secret studies of
byron among young men and maidens who were
to be preserved from all stimuans to the PASSIONS
and they were yet more troubled, when, looking
to see what the charm was which so wrought upon
the youth of their Sect they found themselves car
ried away By it, beyond all power to forget what
they had read. The idolatry of the poet which
marked that time, was an inevitable consequence
of the singular aptness of his uttcrance His dress,
manner, and likings adopted so far as they
could be ascertaned, by hundreds of thousands of
youths who were at once stated with life and amb-
tious of fame, at least of reputation for fastd-
ious discomfort; young ladies declared that Byron
was everything that was great and good, and even
our best literature of criticism shows how respect
tul and ndmlrlnp the hardest reviewers aft
the poet had become the pet and the idol of all
England"