LINES

ON HEARING THAT LADY BYRON WAS ILL. (1)

AND thou wert sad-yet I was not with thee; And thou wert sick, and yet I was not near; Methought that joy and health alone could be Where I was not-and pain and sorrow here! And is it thus ?. -it is as I foretold,

And shall be more so; for the mind recoils
Upon itself, and the wreck'd heart lies cold,
While heaviness collects the shatter'd spoils.
It is not in the storm nor in the strife

We feel benumb'd, and wish to be no more,
But in the after-silence on the shore,
When all is lost, except a little life.

I am too well avenged!-but 'twas my right; Whate'er my sins might be, thou wert not sent To be the Nemesis who should requite―

Nor did Heaven choose so near an instrument.

(1) [These verses, of which the opening lines are given in Moore's Notices, were written immediately after the failure of the negotiation already alluded to (antè, page. 181.), but were not intended for the public eye: as, however, they have recently found their way into circulation, we must include them, though with reluctance, in this collection.-E.]

Mercy is for the merciful!—if thou

Hast been of such, 'twill be accorded now.

Thy nights are banish'd from the realms of sleep!—
Yes! they may flatter thee, but thou shalt feel
A hollow agony which will not heal,

For thou art pillow'd on a curse too deep;
Thou hast sown in my sorrow, and must reap
The bitter harvest in a woe as real!

I have had many foes, but none like thee;
For 'gainst the rest myself I could defend,
And be avenged, or turn them into friend;
But thou in safe implacability

Hadst nought to dread-in thy own weakness shielded,
And in my love, which hath but too much yielded,
And spared, for thy sake, some I should not spare-
And thus upon the world—trust in thy truth—
And the wild fame of my ungovern'd youth—

On things that were not, and on things that are— Even upon such a basis hast thou built A monument, whose cement hath been guilt! The moral Clytemnestra of thy lord, And hew'd down, with an unsuspected sword, Fame, peace, and hope-and all the better life

Which, but for this cold treason of thy heart,
Might still have risen from out the grave of strife,
And found a nobler duty than to part.
But of thy virtues didst thou make a vice,

Trafficking with them in a purpose cold,
For present anger, and for future gold—
And buying other's grief at any price.
And thus once enter'd into crooked ways,
The early truth, which was thy proper praise,

Did not still walk beside thee-but at times,
And with a breast unknowing its own crimes,
Deceit, averments incompatible,

Equivocations, and the thoughts which dwell
In Janus-spirits—the significant eye
Which learns to lie with silence—the pretext
Of Prudence, with advantages annex'd-
The acquiescence in all things which tend,
No matter how, to the desired end—

All found a place in thy philosophy.

The means were worthy, and the end is won-
I would not do by thee as thou hast done!(1)

September, 1816.

(1) ["Lord Byron had at least this much to say for himself, that he was not the first to make his domestic differences a topic of public discussion. On the contrary, he saw himself, ere any fact but the one undisguised and tangible one was, or could be known, held up every where, and by every art of malice, as the most infamous of men, because he had parted from his wife. He was exquisitely sensitive: he was wounded at once by a thousand arrows; and all this with the most perfect and indignant knowledge, that of all who were assailing him not one knew any thing of the real merits of the case. Did he right, then, in publishing those squibs and tirades? No, certainly: it would have been nobler, better, wiser far, to have utterly scorned the assaults of such enemies, and taken no notice, of any kind, of them. But, because this young, hot-blooded, proud, patrician poet did not, amidst the exacerbation of feelings which he could not control, act in precisely the most dignified and wisest of all possible manners of action, - are we entitled, is the world at large entitled, to issue a broad sentence of vituperative condemnation? Do we know all that he had suffered ? have we imagination enough to comprehend what he suffered, under circumstances such as these?-have we been tried in similar circumstances, whether we could feel the wound unflinchingly, and keep the weapon quiescent in the hand that trembled with all the excitements of insulted privacy, honour, and faith?

"Let people consider for a moment what it is that they demand when they insist upon a poet of Byron's class abstaining altogether from expressing in his works any thing of his own feelings in regard to any thing that immediately concerns his own history. We tell him in every possible form and shape, that the great and distinguishing merit of his poetry is the intense truth with which that poetry expresses his own personal feelings. We encourage him in every possible way to dissect his own heart for our entertainment-we tempt him by every bribe most likely to act powerVOL. X. P

fully on a young and imaginative man, to plunge into the darkest depths of self-knowledge; to madden his brain with eternal self-scrutinies, to find his pride and his pleasure in what others shrink from as torture-we tempt him to indulge in these dangerous exercises, until they obviously acquire the power of leading him to the very brink of frenzy - we tempt him to find, and to see in this perilous vocation, the staple of his existence, the food of his ambition, the very essence of his glory,—and the moment that, by habits of our own creating, at least of our own encouraging and confirming, he is carried one single step beyond what we happen to approve of, we turn round with all the bitterness of spleen, and reproach him with the unmanliness of entertaining the public with his feelings in regard to his separation from his wife. This was truly the conduct of a fair and liberal public! To our view of the matter, Lord Byron, treated as he had been, tempted as he had been, and tortured and insulted as he was at the moment, did no more forfeit his character by writing what he did write upon that unhappy occasion, than another man, under circumstances of the same nature, would have done, by telling something of his mind about it to an intimate friend across the fire. The public had forced him into the habits of familiarity, and they received his confidence with nothing but anger and scorn."- LOCKHART.]

MONODY

ON THE

DEATH OF THE RIGHT HON. R. B. SHERIDAN.

SPOKEN AT DRURY-LANE THEATRE. (1)

(1) [Mr. Sheridan died the 7th of July, 1816, and this monody was written at Diodati on the 17th, at the request of Mr. Douglas Kinnaird. "I did as well as I could," says Lord Byron, "but where I have not my choice, I pretend to answer for nothing." A proof-sheet of the poem, with the words "by request of a friend" in the titlepage, having reached him,—“ I request you," he says, " to expunge that same, unless you please to add, ' by a person of quality,' or 'of wit and humour.' It is sad trash, and must have been done to make it ridiculous."- E.]