Lord Byron.
The Times, 1824-10-25T00:00:00

-- Ane nr3t uime or nmy seeing lliss fMilbanke vvas at Lady - 's. It was a fatal day . and I remetmuber that in going up stairs I stumbled, and remarked to Moore, who accompanied me, that it was a bad omen. I ought to have taken the wvxrning. On enterung the room I observed a young lady, more simply dressed than the rest, sitting u-pon a tofa. I took her for a humble comnpa. nien, and asked Moore if I was right in? my conJecture.-- She is a great hicress,' said he in a whisper, that became lower as he pro. ccded; 'voa had better marry her, and repair the old place at Newstead.' "There was sometlhing piquant, and what we term pretty, In Miss Milbanke; her features were small aud fcminlne, though not regular. She had the fairest skin imaginable. Her figure was per- fect for her height, and there was a simplicity aad retired modesty about her, which vras very claracteristic, and formed a striking con. trast to the cold artificial formality and sludied stiffness of what is called fashion. She interected me exeedingly. It is unnecessary to detail the progress of our acquaintance; * becaame daily mere at. tached to her, and it ended in my making a proposal, which was re- WWhat do you think of Ada ?" said he, looking earmestly at his tdaughter's miniature that hunig by the side of his writing table. They tell me slhe is like me, but 8he has her mother's eye&s It it very odd that my mother was an ouly child, and Ada is an only child. It is a singular coincidence the least that can be said of it. T can't help thinking it was d"ftineii to be so, and perhaps it is best. I wvas anxious for a Fon, for if I had one he woald be a peer at once, bat after our separation was glad to have had a daughter; fbr it would have distressed mne too muchi to have taken hiis: away from L,ady Byron, and I could inot have trusted her with a son's educatien. I hRave no Wica of boy's being brought up by mo- thers. I suffered too much from that myself; and then, wan. dierilig about the world as I do, I could not take Proper care of a child; otherwise I wolid not liave left Altegra, poor little thing, at Ravenna. Site has been a great resource to me, though I anm n:t so fond of her as of -Ada: and yet I mean to make their fortunes rqual-there will be enough for them both. I have desired, in my will, that Allegra shalt not marry an Englishman. The Irish and Scotch make better hu3bands than we do. Yoa will think it was an odd fancy-but I was not in the best of hLomours with miy countrymen at that lnoonent. You know the reason. I am told tbat Ada is a little temiagant. I hope not. I will write to mv sister to know. if this is the case. Perhaps I am wrong in letting Lady Byron have entirely her own vay in her education. I hear that nmy name is never mentioied in ber presence; that a green curtain is always kept over mny portrait, as soinething forbhtilcn; and that she is not to know that she has a father till she comes of age. Of course she will be taught to hate me-slhe will be brought %t to it. Lady Byron is conscious of all this, and is afraid that I will rsonc day carry off her daughter by stcalth or force. I might claim her from the Chancellor, without having ecourse to either one or the otlher; but I had rather be t4n. happy myselfthan make her mother so. Probably I s'iall never see ner again !" Here he opened his writing.desk, and showed mesome hair, which he told me was his chitl's. Durinz our Irive and ride this evenling, lie declinel our usual amUSCmeet of vistol-firing with- oat assigning a cause. He hardly apoke a word during tile fist half hour, and it vas evident that something weti.4ed heavily on his inind. There was a sacredns8s in his melanclholy, that I daredl not interrupt. Atlength he said, This is Ada's bitth.daiv and might have been the happiest day of my lifci Asit I6-. He stopped, seemingly ashamled of having betr.ayed lils feelings. He tried in rain to rally his spirits by turnling the conversation, but he crjeafted a laugh In which lie could not join, and esoon relapsed into hi, former rererie."~ ~~~~~~~~utli 0 0 0 * Almost all the frienis of ny youth are dead ; eilher shot in duels. ruined, or in the galleys (mnentioning the nanics of several.1 Aiomong UlOse I lost in the early part of nmy career was Lord Faulklann..poor fellow ! our fethers' fathers were friends. '4e lost his life for a joke, and one, too, lie did not nanke hius'elf. The pre' sent race is iore steady than the laSt. T hey have les cotiatitutioti, aid not so much rnoney-that accountns for the change in their I amx nowr tamed ; but before I married, showed some of the blood of ny ancestors: It is ridiculon3 to say tlat we do not illerit our passions, RS well as the gout or anyother disorder. " I was net so young when my father died, but tilat I perfeetly retteinber inns; and had very early a horror of nmatti:nony, foin the sight of domestic broils; this feching came over ise veryqstrongly at my wedding. Something whisper4d me that twas sealing nmy own death.warrant. I am a great believer aii presentimiektss S0o. crates donuon was no fiction. - Mhick Lewis hnd bi4 monitor; and Napoleon many warnings. At the last moinent X Uould have rca treated, if I could have donTe so. I valled to minduW trlizsd of mine, who had married a young, beautirul, and rich girl3 and yet was miserable. He had strongly urged me against pUiting my nec1k in the sanle yoke; and to show yeu how drmily I W0i iesoIved to at. ted to "s advigcc I betted Hay 30 guineas to one that I should al. *Si IMa~ll fqnfle. six yeats afterwarxts I sent him the tahney. T~he day before Ipr-oposed imarriageso Lady Byron 1?had no idea oi A*'erthi 4grasistbe somtissued..... I lost my father when I wga onlysix earsof ae. y mnother, when she waLs in- a rage with ate andI gae hr cause enoutgh), used to iay, I'Ah, you little dog,youarea Bronall over; you are asL bad aft your father!' It eetfromn Mrs. 1Melaprop's saying 'Ah! good dear ~~ p, I never loved him till he was dead.' f " Thee are two intgs that strike me at the moment which I did t Hrro; Ifought Loard Calthorpe for writing Atheist' wdrmy name; and prevented the school -room from being burnt during a rebellion, by pointing out to the boys the names of their fathers and grandfathers on the walls." * 0 Hie used to say there wvere three great meni ruined in one yeamr, Brmntmlli, hituself, and Napoleon!I a a 1 "1I wrote little at Venice, anti was forced into the search of plea.. sare-an empIloym ent I wias soon jaded with the pursuit of. "Women pwere[ there, as they have ever been fated to be, my bane. Like Napoleon, I have always had a great contempt for women:. and formed thttL opinion of them not hastily, buat from miy own fatal experience. Mly writings, indeed, tend to exalt the sex; and. my Imagination has always delighted, in giving them a beau ideal like.. ness, but I only drew them at a painter or statuary wouild do--as they should be. Perhaps my prejudices and keeping, them at a dis- tance contributed to prevent the illusion froint altogethier being wforn out and destroyed as to their eelestial qualities. They are in aTn unnatural satate of society. The Tur~ks and Eatr people manage these tmitters better than we do. fThey lock thtem up, sad they ar much hapgir. Give a woman a looking-glass and a few sn.g~ar.lums, said hie, wilb satisfied." i% rmy" Paidhe,11pretends to have lost money by my writ.. ings and pleads poverty ; bat if he is poor, which is some~what problematical to mne, pgray -who is to blame' The fault is in his having piarchased, at th- instance orf his great friends, during the~ last year, so many expensive voyages and travels, which all ihs in. flu pee with The Quarterly cannot Persuade people to buy, cannot pufin to popularity. The Cookery Book (which he has got a law.. Mut about) hai been for a long timne hit sheet-anchor ; but they say he will have to re-feind -t-he worst of funds. " MaItrray offered me, of his own accordl, 1,0001. a canto for Don Juian and afterwards reduced it to MIO., on the plea of piracy, and comnplained of my dividling one caHtro into two, because I happened to stAy something at the end of the third about having done so. It is true enough that Don Juan has beent pirated ; but whom has he to thank but himself? In the first place,he put too high a pice on the copies of the two first cantos that came out, only printing a qitarbo edition, at I think, a guinea and a haMf There was a great demand for it, ana this induced the kp)avish booksellers to buccaveer. If he had put John Murray on the title-page, like a man, instea f smuggling the brat into the world, anid getting Davison, who Is a printer and not a publisher, to father it, who would have ventu'ed t queation his paternal rights? or who would hatve attemap$ed to de prive him of themi I"The thing was plainly thls--he dlisowrned and refused to ac- knowledge the bantling ; the natuxral consequence was, tLhat otherg should rome forward to adopt it. Mir. John Mllurray is the Most nervous of God's booksellers. When Dont Jucan first came out, he wasi so frightened, that he made a precipitate retreat into the countrv, shut himself up. and wouldi not open his letters. The fact is, fie1 prinits fur too many Bishops. Ile is alwvaysi borinig me with piraticali edition after edition, to prove the amount of his own losses, an fur-. nish proof of the extent of his own folly. Here is one at 2s. FMd., that came only yesterday. I do not pity him. Because I gave himlL one of my poemis, ha wanted to maLke me believe that I had made hiM L present of two others, anid Ihintedl at some lines in Engli.eh Bards that were certinly to the point. Buit I have altered mny mind considerably upon that subject: as I once hinted to him, I see no reaston why, aiW should not profit by the sweat of hiis brain, as wyell as thtat of his brQw, &c.; besides, I was poor at that time, and have no Idea of aggrandizing bDoksellers. I was in Switzerland when he made this modest request ; and he always entertained a spite against ShelIley for making the agreement, anid tixiri h pie which I believe was not, dear, for the third canto of Chtilde Hlarrold, Mfanfred, and The Pr-ison &f Chililon, &c. I got 2,4001. De'. pnonit, he did not lose money-he wa iiot ruined by that specu- " One of the principal incidents in Thie Gitwoer is derived from a real oecurrence,andone, too,in wlhich I inyself wag nearly and deeply interested ; but an) unwillingniess to have it consideredI a traveller's tale made me suppress the faot of its genuineness. The Marquis of Slipa, wvho Iknew the particulars of the sttorv, reminded me of' themn in England, and wondered I had not authieuiicated theni in tile preface : "1 When I was at Athena, there was an edict in force similar to that of All's, except that the mode oftpunishmnent. was diffecrent. It was necessary, therefore, that all love-affairs should be carrieti on with the greatest privacy. r was very fond at that time of a Turk.. hslt ir,.uy fond ot' her as I. have been of few women. All went on very well till the Ramazani for forty days, which is rather a long fast forlovers ; all intercourse between the sexes is forbidden by law, as well as by religion. During this Lent of' the Mussulmans, the women are not allowed to quit their apartmentts. I was in despair, and couldI hardly contrive to get a cinder or a token-flower sent to express it. We hiad not met for several days, and all my thoughts wvere occupied in polanning an assigniation, -when, as; ill fate would lhave it, thie means I took to effect it led to thie discovery 01' our secreL The penalty was death,-death without remrieve,-a horrible dleath, at which wone cannot think witlhout fsh'udlderingr! An order was issued for the law beinig put into immediate effect. fin the mean time I knew nothing of what hiad hiappened, and it was determined that I should be kept in ignorance of the whiole affair till it was too late to interfere. A mere accident only enabled me to prevent the colmpletion of the sentence. I was taking one of' mY usual evening rides by the sea-side, when I observed a crowd ofpeople moving down to the shore, and the armst of the soldiers gitring among them. They were not so far off hut that I thought I cud now and then t1istingisish a faint and stifled sthriek. MPy curoiyastoclyectd and I despztched onie of my followers to iqietecueo h procession. What was my horror to learn that te eecryn an untortunate girl, sewn up in a sackt, to be thrownit h c I did not hesitaLte a'sto whet was to be done. Iknw I could dependi on miy faithful Albaniians. anti rodle up to the ofiRcer commandinig the party, threatening, in case of his refusal to give up his4 prisoner, thaLt I would adopt means to compel him. He did not like the business he was on, or perliaps tire de termined look of my body-.guard, and consented to accompany me back to the city with the tiirl, whom I soon discovered to boe my Turkishi favourite. Saifilce it to say, that my interference with the chief magitrate, backted by a heavy bribe, saved her; but it was only on condition that I should break off all intercourse witht her, arid that she should imimmiegiately qitit Atienis, and be sent to her friends in Thebes. There she diea, a few dAys after her arrival, of a fever-perhaps of love." a I thtink I can give no stronger proof of the sociability of Lord Byron's disposition than the festivity that pre,sided over his dinneix. Wednesiday being oneof his fixed days, "Yomu will dine with nme," said lie, "1thoughi it is the 2d of ,Janjuary." His own table, when alone, was frugal, not to say abstemious bitt on the occasion of these mieetings every sort of wine, everyluxurv, of the season, and English delimea, were displayed. I never kned' any mian do the honours of his house with greater kindniess and hos- pitality. Oin this eventful anniversary he was not, hower,ih; usual spirits57 and evidently tried to drown the reaiernbrnnce of thec day by a levity that was forced and uinnatural ; for it was clear, in apite of all his efforts, that something orppessell him, and he could not hel continually recurr Ing to the subject. One of the parry pre- posed Ladly Byron's health, which he gave with evident pleasure, and we all drank in bumnpers. The coinversatioa turniing on liit separation, the Probability of thteir being reconciled was canivassed. "WVhiat," said he, ". after having lost the five best years of ou r lives ? Never! But," added lie, "1 it was no fault of mine that we quarrelled. I have madAe advances enough. I had once an idea that people are hiappiest in the mnarriage stare after the Impetuosity of tite passions has subsided ; but that hoepe is all over with me." "I ami accused of ingratitude to a erttaini personage. It is pre- tendled that, after his civilities, I slisoizld not lhave spoken ot him disrespectftully. Those epigramis were written loiSg before my' in- troduction to him ; which was, after all, entirely'accidentuIu and unsought for on myv part. I met him one evening at ColonelJ'. As, the party wras ; smnall one. lie couldi not hielp observing me; aindi as I madte a considerable noisei at that time, ancti was orne of the lions of time dav, he sent General -~ to desire I would be presented to him. I 'would willingly have declined the honiour, btitt could not with decency. His request was in the niature of a coini-nmind. I, e was very polite. for he is the poilitest mian in Europe, andl p4d nit soine comnplimnents thiat mneant nothing. Thlis was all the civility hie ever showed mae, and it does not burdeaniny contscience much." "4About this timne I becamte what the Fronch call ur hoasnpe a bountesforlunes, was erugaged in a unisoa, and, I auight adld, a se- rious onle. "1The lady hiad scarcely any personal attractions to recoinniend her. Her figure, thought genteel, wats too thin to be good, and( wauted that roundness which elegance andi grace vwould vainly supply; Site was, hiowever, young, andl of the first connexions.; an re.rte, slite possessed an infinite vivacity, aid nn eimragination heated1 y novel-reading, which niade her fancy herself a heroine of romane, andi led her into all sorts ofeceeatricities. She was miar.. tied, but it'was a match of couivenaierc andI no couple could be miore fashionably indifferent to, or independent of, one ainothier. It watsat this time thiatwe happened tt bethir'own much together.Sliel liad never been in love, at least whiere time affiections are concerned, atnd was perhIaPS iiiade withiout a hecart, as many of thec sex arc, but licer head miore than supplied th-e deficiency. I was soon rongratu. lated by my friends on the conquest I liad inade, arid did nmy utm-ost to shiow that I was iiot Insenjsiblbe to the piartitality I could not help perceiving. I inade every eflbrt to be in love, expressed as muchi ardlour as I could muster, and kept feedling the flanme with a constant apply of bilket -doux aiid aniiatory verses. In short, I was in tuine 1 du3ly aITi regularly installed isato whaj~t the Italians call service, and Soon becamne, in every, senise of the word, a paztito. It required, no' (Edipus to see whiere all tfihf wouldI end. I ails easily groysmesI- by womens, and she gainedi an ascendancy over mie that I could not eailbsake off. " I subnsitted to this thlraldom long, for I hate scenes, arid am of an indolent disposition ; but I was forced to snap the knot rather rudely at lust- L,ike all lovers, we had several quarrels before we ame to a final rupture. Onewas madeup inaveryodd lsav anti withoutanv verbal explanation. lhe will renietnber it. Even dur- img o ur fntinmacy I was not at al! constant to this fair one, and she supected as niuchi. In order to detect my intrigues she watched nse. and eartihed a lady into iry lodgings, an(ti caie herelf, terrier- like, in the disguise of a canuan. hly valet, who did not see throuigih the masquerade, let her in, witeii, to tie despair of Fletcher, she put ofF tke man and assumed the woman. Imagine the scene ; it was worthy of FafblAs. Her conduct was unaccountable mtad- neassa comtinatiois of spite and jealousv. It was perfectv agreed anid gudertood that we were to meet as strangers. lre wvere at a ball Shiui came up and asked me if shie nmight waltz. I thought it perfectly indifferent whether ahe waltzed or not, or with whoal, and I told her so, in dtferent terms, but with much coolness. After she had finished, a coti-tragic scene occurred whielh was in the moutha oF every one. Soon after thist she lpromnised yotng _ wr- if he would call use out. Yet can any one believe that she should be so infatuated after all this as to call at rny apartments ?_ certainly with no -viewv of gidooting herself: I was from liome, bat tindting Vathek on the table, she wrote in the first page 'Rentem. ber nie !'-Yes, I had cause to reseiuber her, and in the irritability of the nioment wrote, under the two words, these two stanizas:_ "'Remnember thee-remember thee I "' Till Isethe quench iife's burning stream - ; ' Remorse and shame elall cling to thee, ' Aiid haunt thee like a feverish dream. Remember thee !-aye, doubt it not- "4 Thy busband toO shall think ef thee " 'By neither shalt thou be forgot " Thou false to blin-thou fiend to re !" LORD BYRON. FURTRER EXTRACTS FTOM1 CAPTAIZ!. mflWI)'s JOUR WAY.