Chapter IV: Results After Lord Byron's Death (1)

At the time of Lord Byron's death, the English public had been so skilfully manipulated by the Byron propaganda, that the sympathy of the whole world was with him. A tide of emotion was now aroused in England by his early death--dying in the cause of Greece and liberty. There arose a general wail for him, as for a lost pleiad, not only in England, but over the whole world; a great rush of enthusiasm for his memory, to which the greatest literary men of England freely gave voice. By general consent, Lady Byron seems to have been looked upon as the only cold-hearted unsympathetic person in this general mourning.

From that time the literary world of England apparently regarded Lady Byron as a woman to whom none of the decorums, nor courtesies of ordinary womanhood, nor even the consideration belonging to common humanity, were due.

'She that is a widow indeed, and desolate,' has been regarded in all Christian countries as an object made sacred by the touch of God's afflicting hand, sacred in her very helplessness; and the old Hebrew Scriptures give to the Supreme Father no dearer title than 'the widow's God.' But, on Lord Byron's death, men not devoid of tenderness, men otherwise generous and of fine feeling, acquiesced in insults to his widow with an obtuseness that seems, on review, quite incredible.

Lady Byron was not only a widow, but an orphan. She had no sister for confidante; no father and mother to whom to go in her sorrows--sorrows so much deeper and darker to her than they could be to any other human being. She had neither son nor brother to uphold and protect her. On all hands it was acknowledged that, so far, there was no fault to be found in her but her utter silence. Her life was confessed to be pure, useful, charitable; and yet, in this time of her sorrow, the writers of England issued article upon article not only devoid of delicacy, but apparently injurious and insulting towards her, with a blind unconsciousness which seems astonishing.

One of the greatest literary powers of that time was the 'Blackwood:' the reigning monarch on that literary throne was Wilson, the lion-hearted, the brave, generous, tender poet, and, with some sad exceptions, the noble man. But Wilson had believed the story of Byron, and, by his very generosity and tenderness and pity, was betrayed into injustice.

In 'The Noctes' of November 1824 there is a conversation of the Noctes Club, in which North says, 'Byron and I knew each other pretty well; and I suppose there's no harm in adding, that we appreciated each other pretty tolerably. Did you ever see his letter to me?'

The footnote to this says, '_This letter, which was_ PRINTED _in Byron's lifetime, was not published till_ 1830, when it appeared in Moore's "Life of Byron." It is one of the most vigorous prose compositions in the language. Byron had the highest opinion of Wilson's genius and noble spirit.'

In the first place, with our present ideas of propriety and good taste, we should reckon it an indecorum to make the private affairs of a pure and good woman, whose circumstances under any point of view were trying, and who evidently shunned publicity, the subject of public discussion in magazines which were read all over the world.

Lady Byron, as they all knew, had on her hands a most delicate and onerous task, in bringing up an only daughter, necessarily inheriting peculiarities of genius and great sensitiveness; and the many mortifications and embarrassments which such intermeddling with her private matters must have given, certainly should have been considered by men with any pretensions to refinement or good feeling.

But the literati of England allowed her no consideration, no rest, no privacy.

In 'The Noctes' of November 1825 there is the record of a free conversation upon Lord and Lady Byron's affairs, interlarded with exhortations to push the bottle, and remarks on whisky-toddy. Medwin's 'Conversations with Lord Byron' is discussed, which, we are told in a note, appeared a few months after the _noble_ poet's death.

There is a rather bold and free discussion of Lord Byron's character--his fondness for gin and water, on which stimulus he wrote 'Don Juan;' and James Hogg says pleasantly to Mullion, 'O Mullion! it's a pity you and Byron could na ha' been acquaint. There would ha' been brave sparring to see who could say the wildest and the dreadfullest things; for he had neither fear of man or woman, and would ha' his joke or jeer, cost what it might.' And then follows a specimen of one of his jokes with an actress, that, in indecency, certainly justifies the assertion. From the other stories which follow, and the parenthesis that occurs frequently ('Mind your glass, James, a little more!'), it seems evident that the party are progressing in their peculiar kind of _civilisation_.

It is in this same circle and paper that Lady Byron's private affairs come up for discussion. The discussion is thus elegantly introduced:--

Hogg.--'Reach me the black bottle. I say, Christopher, what, after
all, is your opinion o' Lord and Leddy Byron's quarrel? Do you
yoursel' take part with him, or with her? I wad like to hear your
real opinion.'

North.--'Oh, dear! Well, Hogg, since you will have it, I think
Douglas Kinnard and Hobhouse are bound to tell us whether there be any
truth, and how much, in this story about the _declaration_, signed by
Sir Ralph' [Milbanke].

The note here tells us that this refers to a statement that appeared in 'Blackwood' immediately after Byron's death, to the effect that, previous to the formal separation from his wife, Byron required and obtained from Sir Ralph Milbanke, Lady Byron's father, a statement to the effect that Lady Byron had no charge of moral delinquency to bring against him. {61}

North continues:--

'And I think Lady Byron's letter--the "Dearest Duck" one I mean--should
really be forthcoming, if her ladyship's friends wish to stand fair
before the public. At present we have nothing but loose talk of
society to go upon; and certainly, _if the things that are said be
true, there must be thorough explanation from some quarter, or the
tide will continue, as it has assuredly begun, to flow in a direction
very opposite to what we were for years accustomed_. Sir, they must
_explain this business of the letter_. You have, of course, heard
about the invitation it contained, the warm, affectionate invitation,
to Kirkby Mallory'--

Hogg interposes,--

'I dinna like to be interruptin' ye, Mr. North; but I must inquire, Is
the _jug_ to stand still while ye're going on at that rate?'

North--'There, Porker! These things are part and parcel of the
chatter of every bookseller's shop; a fortiori, of every drawing-room
in May Fair. Can the matter stop here? Can a great man's memory be
permitted to incur damnation while these saving clauses are afloat
anywhere uncontradicted?'

And from this the conversation branches off into strong, emphatic praise of Byron's conduct in Greece during the last part of his life.

The silent widow is thus delicately and considerately reminded in the 'Blackwood' that she is the talk, not only over the whisky jug of the Noctes, but in every drawing-room in London; and that she must speak out and explain matters, or the whole world will set against her.

But she does not speak yet. The public persecution, therefore, proceeds. Medwin's book being insufficient, another biographer is to be selected. Now, the person in the Noctes Club who was held to have the most complete information of the Byron affairs, and was, on that account, first thought of by Murray to execute this very delicate task of writing a memoir which should include the most sacred domestic affairs of a noble lady and her orphan daughter, was Maginn. Maginn, the author of the pleasant joke, that 'man never reaches the apex of civilisation till he is too drunk to pronounce the word,' was the first person in whose hands the 'Autobiography,' Memoirs, and Journals of Lord Byron were placed with this view.

The following note from Shelton Mackenzie, in the June number of 'The Noctes,' 1824, says,--

'At that time, had he been so minded, Maginn (Odoherty) could have got
up a popular Life of Byron as well as most men in England. Immediately
on the account of Byron's death being received in London, John Murray
proposed that Maginn should bring out Memoirs, Journals, and Letters
of Lord Byron, and, with this intent, placed in his hand every line
that he (Murray) possessed in Byron's handwriting. . . . . The strong
desire of Byron's family and executors that the "Autobiography" should
be burned, to which desire Murray foolishly yielded, made such an
hiatus in the materials, that Murray and Maginn agreed it would not
answer to bring out the work then. Eventually Moore executed it.'

The character of the times in which this work was to be undertaken will appear from the following note of Mackenzie's to 'The Noctes' of August 1824, which we copy, with the author's own Italics:--

'In the "Blackwood" of July 1824 was a poetical epistle by the
renowned Timothy Tickler to the editor of the "John Bull" magazine, on
an article in his first number. This article. . . professed to be a
portion of the veritable "Autobiography" of Byron which was burned,
and was called "My Wedding Night." It appeared to relate in detail
everything that occurred in the twenty-four hours immediately
succeeding that in which Byron was married. It had plenty of
coarseness, and some to spare. It went into particulars such as
hitherto had been given only by Faublas; and it had, notwithstanding,
many phrases and some facts which evidently did not belong to a mere
fabricator. Some years after, I compared this "Wedding Night" with
what I had all assurance of having been transcribed from the actual
manuscripts of Byron, and was persuaded that the magazine-writer must
have had the actual statement before him, or have had a perusal of it.
The writer in "Blackwood" declared his conviction that it really was
Byron's own writing.'

The reader must remember that Lord Byron died April 1824; so that, according to this, his 'Autobiography' was made the means of this gross insult to his widow three months after his death.

If some powerful cause had not paralysed all feelings of gentlemanly honour, and of womanly delicacy, and of common humanity, towards Lady Byron, throughout the whole British nation, no editor would have dared to open a periodical with such an article; or, if he had, he would have been overwhelmed with a storm of popular indignation, which, like the fire upon Sodom, would have made a pillar of salt of him for a warning to all future generations.

'Blackwood' reproves the 'John Bull' in a poetical epistle, recognising the article as coming from Byron, and says to the author,--

'But that you, sir, a wit and a scholar like you,
Should not blush to produce what he blushed not to do,--
Take your compliment, youngster; this doubles, almost,
The sorrow that rose when his honour was lost.'

We may not wonder that the 'Autobiography' was burned, as Murray says in a recent account, by a committee of Byron's friends, including Hobhouse, his sister, and Murray himself.

Now, the 'Blackwood' of July 1824 thus declares its conviction that this outrage on every sentiment of human decency came from Lord Byron, and that his honour was lost. Maginn does not undertake the memoir. No memoir at all is undertaken; till finally Moore is selected, as, like Demetrius of old, a well-skilled gilder and 'maker of silver shrines,' though not for Diana. To Moore is committed the task of doing his best for this battered image, in which even the worshippers recognise foul sulphurous cracks, but which they none the less stand ready to worship as a genuine article that 'fell down from Jupiter.'

Moore was a man of no particular nicety as to moralities, but in that matter seems not very much below what this record shows his average associates to be. He is so far superior to Maginn, that his vice is rose- coloured and refined. He does not burst out with such heroic stanzas as Maginn's frank invitation to Jeremy Bentham:--

'Jeremy, throw your pen aside,
And come get drunk with me;
And we'll go where Bacchus sits astride,
Perched high on barrels three.'

Moore's vice is cautious, soft, seductive, slippery, and covered at times with a thin, tremulous veil of religious sentimentalism.

In regard to Byron, he was an unscrupulous, committed partisan: he was as much bewitched by him as ever man has been by woman; and therefore to him, at last, the task of editing Byron's 'Memoirs' was given.

This Byron, whom they all knew to be obscene beyond what even their most drunken tolerance could at first endure; this man, whose foul license spoke out what most men conceal from mere respect to the decent instincts of humanity; whose 'honour was lost,'--was submitted to this careful manipulator, to be turned out a perfected idol for a world longing for an idol, as the Israelites longed for the calf in Horeb.

The image was to be invested with deceitful glories and shifting haloes,--admitted faults spoken of as peculiarities of sacred origin,--and the world given to understand that no common rule or measure could apply to such an undoubtedly divine production; and so the hearts of men were to be wrung with pity for his sorrows as the yearning pain of a god, and with anger at his injuries as sacrilege on the sacredness of genius, till they were ready to cast themselves at his feet, and adore.

Then he was to be set up on a pedestal, like Nebuchadnezzar's image on the plains of Dura; and what time the world heard the sound of cornet, sackbut, and dulcimer, in his enchanting verse, they were to fall down and worship.

For Lady Byron, Moore had simply the respect that a commoner has for a lady of rank, and a good deal of the feeling that seems to underlie all English literature,--that it is no matter what becomes of the woman when the man's story is to be told. But, with all his faults, Moore was not a cruel man; and we cannot conceive such outrageous cruelty and ungentlemanly indelicacy towards an unoffending woman, as he shows in these 'Memoirs,' without referring them to Lord Byron's own influence in making him an unscrupulous, committed partisan on his side.

So little pity, so little sympathy, did he suppose Lady Byron to be worthy of, that he laid before her, in the sight of all the world, selections from her husband's letters and journals, in which the privacies of her courtship and married life were jested upon with a vulgar levity; letters filled, from the time of the act of separation, with a constant succession of sarcasms, stabs, stings, epigrams, and vindictive allusions to herself, bringing her into direct and insulting comparison with his various mistresses, and implying their superiority over her. There, too, were gross attacks on her father and mother, as having been the instigators of the separation; and poor Lady Milbanke, in particular, is sometimes mentioned with epithets so offensive, that the editor prudently covers the terms with stars, as intending language too gross to be printed.

The last mistress of Lord Byron is uniformly brought forward in terms of such respect and consideration, that one would suppose that the usual moral laws that regulate English family life had been specially repealed in his favour. Moore quotes with approval letters from Shelley, stating that Lord Byron's connection with La Guiccioli has been of inestimable benefit to him; and that he is now becoming what he should be, 'a virtuous man.' Moore goes on to speak of the connection as one, though somewhat reprehensible, yet as having all those advantages of marriage and settled domestic ties that Byron's affectionate spirit had long sighed for, but never before found; and in his last resume of the poet's character, at the end of the volume, he brings the mistress into direct comparison with the wife in a single sentence: 'The woman to whom he gave the love of his maturer years idolises his name; and, with a single unhappy exception, scarce an instance is to be found of one brought. . . into relations of amity with him who did not retain a kind regard for him in life, and a fondness for his memory.'

Literature has never yet seen the instance of a person, of Lady Byron's rank in life, placed before the world in a position more humiliating to womanly dignity, or wounding to womanly delicacy.

The direct implication is, that she has no feelings to be hurt, no heart to be broken, and is not worthy even of the consideration which in ordinary life is to be accorded to a widow who has received those awful tidings which generally must awaken many emotions, and call for some consideration, even in the most callous hearts.

The woman who we are told walked the room, vainly striving to control the sobs that shook her frame, while she sought to draw from the servant that last message of her husband which she was never to hear, was not thought worthy even of the rights of common humanity.

The first volume of the 'Memoir' came out in 1830. Then for the first time came one flash of lightning from the silent cloud; and she who had never spoken before spoke out. The libels on the memory of her dead parents drew from her what her own wrongs never did. During all this time, while her husband had been keeping her effigy dangling before the public as a mark for solemn curses, and filthy lampoons, and secretly- circulated disclosures, that spared no sacredness and violated every decorum, she had not uttered a word. She had been subjected to nameless insults, discussed in the assemblies of drunkards, and challenged to speak for herself. Like the chaste lady in 'Comus,' whom the vile wizard had bound in the enchanted seat to be 'grinned at and chattered at' by all the filthy rabble of his dehumanised rout, she had remained pure, lofty, and undefiled; and the stains of mud and mire thrown upon her had fallen from her spotless garments.

Now that she is dead, a recent writer in 'The London Quarterly' dares give voice to an insinuation which even Byron gave only a suggestion of when he called his wife Clytemnestra; and hints that she tried the power of youth and beauty to win to her the young solicitor Lushington, and a handsome young officer of high rank.

At this time, such insinuations had not been thought of; and the only and chief allegation against Lady Byron had been a cruel severity of virtue.

At all events, when Lady Byron spoke, the world listened with respect, and believed what she said.

Here let us, too, read her statement, and give it the careful attention she solicits (Moore's 'Life of Byron,' vol. vi. p.275):--

'I have disregarded various publications in which facts within my own
knowledge have been grossly misrepresented; but I am called upon to
notice some of the erroneous statements proceeding from one who claims
to be considered as Lord Byron's confidential and authorised friend.
Domestic details ought not to be intruded on the public attention: if,
however, they are so intruded, the persons affected by them have a
right to refute injurious charges. Mr. Moore has promulgated his own
impressions of private events in which I was most nearly concerned, as
if he possessed a competent knowledge of the subject. Having survived
Lord Byron, I feel increased reluctance to advert to any circumstances
connected with the period of my marriage; nor is it now my intention
to disclose them further than may be indispensably requisite for the
end I have in view. Self-vindication is not the motive which actuates
me to make this appeal, and the spirit of accusation is unmingled with
it; but when the conduct of my parents is brought forward in a
disgraceful light by the passages selected from Lord Byron's letters,
and by the remarks of his biographer, I feel bound to justify their
characters from imputations which I know to be false. The passages
from Lord Byron's letters, to which I refer, are,--the aspersion on my
mother's character (p.648, l.4): {70a} "My child is very well and
flourishing, I hear; but I must see also. I feel no disposition to
resign it to the contagion of its grandmother's society." The
assertion of her dishonourable conduct in employing a spy (p.645, l.7,
etc.): "A Mrs. C. (now a kind of housekeeper and spy of Lady N's),
who, in her better days, was a washerwoman, is supposed to be--by the
learned--very much the occult cause of our domestic discrepancies."
The seeming exculpation of myself in the extract (p.646), with the
words immediately following it, "Her nearest relations are a---;"
where the blank clearly implies something too offensive for
publication. These passages tend to throw suspicion on my parents,
and give reason to ascribe the separation either to their direct
agency, or to that of "officious spies" employed by them. {70b} From
the following part of the narrative (p.642), it must also be inferred
that an undue influence was exercised by them for the accomplishment
of this purpose: "It was in a few weeks after the latter communication
between us (Lord Byron and Mr. Moore) that Lady Byron adopted the
determination of parting from him. She had left London at the latter
end of January, on a visit to her father's house in Leicestershire;
and Lord Byron was in a short time to follow her. They had parted in
the utmost kindness, she wrote him a letter, full of playfulness and
affection, on the road; and, immediately on her arrival at Kirkby
Mallory, her father wrote to acquaint Lord Byron that she would return
to him no more."

'In my observations upon this statement, I shall, as far as possible,
avoid touching on any matters relating personally to Lord Byron and
myself. The facts are,--I left London for Kirkby Mallory, the
residence of my father and mother, on the 15th of January, 1816. Lord
Byron had signified to me in writing (Jan. 6) his absolute desire that
I should leave London on the earliest day that I could conveniently
fix. It was not safe for me to undertake the fatigue of a journey
sooner than the 15th. Previously to my departure, it had been
strongly impressed on my mind that Lord Byron was under the influence
of insanity. This opinion was derived in a great measure from the
communications made to me by his nearest relatives and personal
attendant, who had more opportunities than myself of observing him
during the latter part of my stay in town. It was even represented to
me that he was in danger of destroying himself. With the concurrence
of his family, I had consulted Dr. Baillie, as a friend (Jan. 8),
respecting this supposed malady. On acquainting him with the state of
the case, and with Lord Byron's desire that I should leave London, Dr.
Baillie thought that my absence might be advisable as an experiment,
assuming the fact of mental derangement; for Dr. Baillie, not having
had access to Lord Byron, could not pronounce a positive opinion on
that point. He enjoined that, in correspondence with Lord Byron, I
should avoid all but light and soothing topics. Under these
impressions I left London, determined to follow the advice given by
Dr. Baillie. Whatever might have been the nature of Lord Byron's
conduct towards me from the time of my marriage, yet, supposing him to
be in a state of mental alienation, it was not for me, nor for any
person of common humanity, to manifest at that moment a sense of
injury. On the day of my departure, and again on my arrival at Kirkby
(Jan. 16), I wrote to Lord Byron in a kind and cheerful tone,
according to those medical directions.

'The last letter was circulated, and employed as a pretext for the
charge of my having been subsequently influenced to "desert" {72} my
husband. It has been argued that I parted from Lord Byron in perfect
harmony; that feelings incompatible with any deep sense of injury had
dictated the letter which I addressed to him; and that my sentiments
must have been changed by persuasion and interference when I was under
the roof of my parents. These assertions and inferences are wholly
destitute of foundation. When I arrived at Kirkby Mallory, my parents
were unacquainted with the existence of any causes likely to destroy
my prospects of happiness; and, when I communicated to them the
opinion which had been formed concerning Lord Byron's state of mind,
they were most anxious to promote his restoration by every means in
their power. They assured those relations who were with him in
London, that "they would devote their whole care and attention to the
alleviation of his malady;" and hoped to make the best arrangements
for his comfort if he could be induced to visit them.

'With these intentions, my mother wrote on the 17th to Lord Byron,
inviting him to Kirkby Mallory. She had always treated him with an
affectionate consideration and indulgence, which extended to every
little peculiarity of his feelings. Never did an irritating word
escape her lips in her whole intercourse with him. The accounts given
me after I left Lord Byron, by the persons in constant intercourse
with him, added to those doubts which had before transiently occurred
to my mind as to the reality of the alleged disease; and the reports
of his medical attendant were far from establishing the existence of
anything like lunacy. Under this uncertainty, I deemed it right to
communicate to my parents, that, if I were to consider Lord Byron's
past conduct as that of a person of sound mind, nothing could induce
me to return to him. It therefore appeared expedient, both to them
and myself, to consult the ablest advisers. For that object, and also
to obtain still further information respecting the appearances which
seemed to indicate mental derangement, my mother determined to go to
London. She was empowered by me to take legal opinions on a written
statement of mine, though I had then reasons for reserving a part of
the case from the knowledge even of my father and mother. Being
convinced by the result of these inquiries, and by the tenor of Lord
Byron's proceedings, that the notion of insanity was an illusion, I no
longer hesitated to authorise such measures as were necessary in order
to secure me from being ever again placed in his power. Conformably
with this resolution, my father wrote to him on the 2nd of February to
propose an amicable separation. Lord Byron at first rejected this
proposal; but when it was distinctly notified to him that, if he
persisted in his refusal, recourse must be had to legal measures, he
agreed to sign a deed of separation. Upon applying to Dr. Lushington,
who was intimately acquainted with all the circumstances, to state in
writing what he recollected upon this subject, I received from him the
following letter, by which it will be manifest that my mother cannot
have been actuated by any hostile or ungenerous motives towards Lord
Byron:--

'"MY DEAR LADY BYRON,--I can rely upon the accuracy of my memory for
the following statement. I was originally consulted by Lady Noel, on
your behalf, whilst you were in the country. The circumstances
detailed by her were such as justified a separation; but they were not
of that aggravated description as to render such a measure
indispensable. On Lady Noel's representation, I deemed a
reconciliation with Lord Byron practicable, and felt most sincerely a
wish to aid in effecting it. There was not on Lady Noel's part any
exaggeration of the facts; nor, so far as I could perceive, any
determination to prevent a return to Lord Byron: certainly none was
expressed when I spoke of a reconciliation. When you came to town, in
about a fortnight, or perhaps more, after my first interview with Lady
Noel, I was for the first time informed by you of facts utterly
unknown, as I have no doubt, to Sir Ralph and Lady Noel. On receiving
this additional information, my opinion was entirely changed: I
considered a reconciliation impossible. I declared my opinion, and
added, that, if such an idea should be entertained, I could not,
either professionally or otherwise, take any part towards effecting
it.

'"Believe me, very faithfully yours,

'"STEPH. LUSHINGTON.

'"Great George Street, Jan. 31, 1830."

'I have only to observe, that, if the statements on which my legal
advisers (the late Sir Samuel Romilly and Dr. Lushington) formed their
opinions were false, the responsibility and the odium should rest with
me only. I trust that the facts which I have here briefly
recapitulated will absolve my father and mother from all accusations
with regard to the part they took in the separation between Lord Byron
and myself.

'They neither originated, instigated, nor advised that separation; and
they cannot be condemned for having afforded to their daughter the
assistance and protection which she claimed. There is no other near
relative to vindicate their memory from insult. I am therefore
compelled to break the silence which I had hoped always to observe,
and to solicit from the readers of Lord Byron's "Life" an impartial
consideration of the testimony extorted from me.

'A. I. NOEL BYRON.

'Hanger Hill, Feb. 19, 1830.'

The effect of this statement on the literary world may be best judged by the discussion of it by Christopher North (Wilson) in the succeeding May number of 'The Noctes,' where the bravest and most generous of literary men that then were--himself the husband of a gentle wife--thus gives sentence: the conversation is between North and the Shepherd:--

North.--'God forbid I should wound the feelings of Lady Byron, of
whose character, known to me but by the high estimation in which it is
held by all who have enjoyed her friendship, I have always spoken with
respect! . . . But may I, without harshness or indelicacy, say, here
among ourselves, James, that, by marrying Byron, she took upon
herself, with eyes wide open and conscience clearly convinced, duties
very different from those of which, even in common cases, the
presaging foresight shadows. . . the light of the first nuptial moon?'

Shepherd.--'She did that, sir; by my troth, she did that.'

. . . .

North.--'Miss Milbanke knew that he was reckoned a rake and a roue;
and although his genius wiped off, by impassioned eloquence in love-
letters that were felt to be irresistible, or hid the worst stain of,
that reproach, still Miss Milbanke must have believed it a perilous
thing to be the wife of Lord Byron. . . . But still, by joining her
life to his in marriage, she pledged her troth and her faith and her
love, under probabilities of severe, disturbing, perhaps fearful
trials, in the future. . . .

'But I think Lady Byron ought not to have printed that Narrative.
Death abrogates not the rights of a husband to his wife's silence when
speech is fatal. . . to his character as a man. Has she not flung
suspicion over his bones interred, that they are the bones of
a--monster? . . . If Byron's sins or crimes--for we are driven to use
terrible terms--were unendurable and unforgivable as if against the
Holy Ghost, ought the wheel, the rack, or the stake to have extorted
that confession from his widow's breast? . . . But there was no such
pain here, James: the declaration was voluntary, and it was calm. Self-
collected, and gathering up all her faculties and feelings into
unshrinking strength, she denounced before all the world--and
throughout all space and all time--her husband, as excommunicated by
his vices from woman's bosom.

. . . .

''Twas to vindicate the character of her parents that Lady Byron
wrote,--a holy purpose and devout, nor do I doubt sincere. But filial
affection and reverence, sacred as they are, may be blamelessly, nay,
righteously, subordinate to conjugal duties, which die not with the
dead, are extinguished not even by the sins of the dead, were they as
foul as the grave's corruption.'

Here is what John Stuart Mill calls the literature of slavery for woman, in length and breadth; and, that all women may understand the doctrine, the Shepherd now takes up his parable, and expounds the true position of the wife. We render his Scotch into English:--

'Not a few such widows do I know, whom brutal, profligate, and savage
husbands have brought to the brink of the grave,--as good, as bright,
as innocent as, and far more forgiving than, Lady Byron. There they
sit in their obscure, rarely-visited dwellings; for sympathy
instructed by suffering knows well that the deepest and most hopeless
misery is least given to complaint.'

Then follows a pathetic picture of one such widow, trembling and fainting for hunger, obliged, on her way to the well for a can of water, her only drink, to sit down on a 'knowe' and say a prayer.

'Yet she's decently, yea, tidily dressed, poor creature! in sair worn
widow's clothes, a single suit for Saturday and Sunday; her hair,
untimely gray, is neatly braided under her crape cap; and sometimes,
when all is still and solitary in the fields, and all labour has
disappeared into the house, you may see her stealing by herself, or
leading one wee orphan by the hand, with another at her breast, to the
kirkyard, where the love of her youth and the husband of her prime is
buried.

'Yet,' says the Shepherd, 'he was a brute, a ruffian, a monster. When
drunk, how he raged and cursed and swore! Often did she dread that,
in his fits of inhuman passion, he would have murdered the baby at her
breast; for she had seen him dash their only little boy, a child of
eight years old, on the floor, till the blood gushed from his ears;
and then the madman threw himself down on the body, and howled for the
gallows. Limmers haunted his door, and he theirs; and it was hers to
lie, not sleep, in a cold, forsaken bed, once the bed of peace,
affection, and perfect happiness. Often he struck her; and once when
she was pregnant with that very orphan now smiling on her breast,
reaching out his wee fingers to touch the flowers on his father's
grave. . . .

'But she tries to smile among the neighbours, and speaks of her boy's
likeness to its father; nor, when the conversation turns on bygone
times, does she fear to let his name escape her white lips, "My
Robert; the bairn's not ill-favoured, but he will never look like his
father,"--and such sayings, uttered in a calm, sweet voice. Nay, I
remember once how her pale countenance reddened with a sudden flush of
pride, when a gossiping crone alluded to their wedding; and the
widow's eye brightened through her tears to hear how the bridegroom,
sitting that sabbath in his front seat beside his bonny bride, had not
his equal for strength, stature, and all that is beauty in man, in all
the congregation. That, I say, sir, whether right or wrong,
was--forgiveness.

Here is a specimen of how even generous men had been so perverted by the enchantment of Lord Byron's genius, as to turn all the pathos and power of the strongest literature of that day against the persecuted, pure woman, and for the strong, wicked man. These 'Blackwood' writers knew, by Byron's own filthy, ghastly writings, which had gone sorely against their own moral stomachs, that he was foul to the bone. They could see, in Moore's 'Memoirs' right before them, how he had caught an innocent girl's heart by sending a love-letter, and offer of marriage, at the end of a long friendly correspondence,--a letter that had been written to show to his libertine set, and sent on the toss-up of a copper, because he cared nothing for it one way or the other.

They admit that, having won this poor girl, he had been savage, brutal, drunken, cruel. They had read the filthy taunts in 'Don Juan,' and the nameless abominations in the 'Autobiography.' They had admitted among themselves that his honour was lost; but still this abused, desecrated woman must reverence her brutal master's memory, and not speak, even to defend the grave of her own kind father and mother.

That there was no lover of her youth, that the marriage-vow had been a hideous, shameless cheat, is on the face of Moore's account; yet the 'Blackwood' does not see it nor feel it, and brings up against Lady Byron this touching story of a poor widow, who really had had a true lover once,--a lover maddened, imbruted, lost, through that very drunkenness in which the Noctes Club were always glorying.

It is because of such transgressors as Byron, such supporters as Moore and the Noctes Club, that there are so many helpless, cowering, broken- hearted, abject women, given over to the animal love which they share alike with the poor dog,--the dog, who, beaten, kicked, starved, and cuffed, still lies by his drunken master with great anxious eyes of love and sorrow, and with sweet, brute forgiveness nestles upon his bosom, as he lies in his filth in the snowy ditch, to keep the warmth of life in him. Great is the mystery of this fidelity in the poor, loving brute,--most mournful and most sacred

But, oh that a noble man should have no higher ideal of the love of a high-souled, heroic woman! Oh that men should teach women that they owe no higher duties, and are capable of no higher tenderness, than this loving, unquestioning animal fidelity! The dog is ever-loving, ever-forgiving, because God has given him no high range of moral faculties, no sense of justice, no consequent horror at impurity and vileness.

Much of the beautiful patience and forgiveness of women is made possible to them by that utter deadness to the sense of justice which the laws, literature, and misunderstood religion of England have sought to induce in woman as a special grace and virtue.

The lesson to woman in this pathetic piece of special pleading is, that man may sink himself below the brute, may wallow in filth like the swine, may turn his home into a hell, beat and torture his children, forsake the marriage-bed for foul rivals; yet all this does not dissolve the marriage- vow on her part, nor free his bounden serf from her obligation to honour his memory,--nay, to sacrifice to it the honour due to a kind father and mother, slandered in their silent graves.

Such was the sympathy, and such the advice, that the best literature of England could give to a young widow, a peeress of England, whose husband, as they verily believed and admitted, might have done worse than all this; whose crimes might have been 'foul, monstrous, unforgivable as the sin against the Holy Ghost.' If these things be done in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry? If the peeress as a wife has no rights, what is the state of the cotter's wife?

But, in the same paper, North again blames Lady Byron for not having come out with the whole story before the world at the time she separated from her husband. He says of the time when she first consulted counsel through her mother, keeping back one item,--

'How weak, and worse than weak, at such a juncture, on which hung her
whole fate, to ask legal advice on an imperfect document! Give the
delicacy of a virtuous woman its due; but at such a crisis, when the
question was whether her conscience was to be free from the oath of
oaths, delicacy should have died, and nature was privileged to show
unashamed--if such there were--the records of uttermost pollution.'

Shepherd.--'And what think ye, sir, that a' this pollution could hae
been, that sae electrified Dr. Lushington?'

North.--'Bad--bad--bad, James. Nameless, it is horrible; named, it
might leave Byron's memory yet within the range of pity and
forgiveness; and, where they are, their sister affections will not be
far; though, like weeping seraphs, standing aloof, and veiling their
wings.'

Shepherd.--'She should indeed hae been silent--till the grave had
closed on her sorrows as on his sins.'

North.--'Even now she should speak,--or some one else for her,-- . . .
and a few words will suffice. Worse the condition of the dead man's
name cannot be--far, far better it might--I believe it would be--were
all the truth somehow or other declared; and declared it must be, not
for Byron's sake only, but for the sake of humanity itself; and then a
mitigated sentence, or eternal silence.'

We have another discussion of Lady Byron's duties in a further number of 'Blackwood.'

The 'Memoir' being out, it was proposed that there should be a complete annotation of Byron's works gotten up, and adorned, for the further glorification of his memory, with portraits of the various women whom he had delighted to honour.

Murray applied to Lady Byron for her portrait, and was met with a cold, decided negative. After reading all the particulars of Byron's harem of mistresses, and Moore's comparisons between herself and La Guiccioli, one might imagine reasons why a lady, with proper self-respect, should object to appearing in this manner. One would suppose there might have been gentlemen who could well appreciate the motive of that refusal; but it was only considered a new evidence that she was indifferent to her conjugal duties, and wanting in that respect which Christopher North had told her she owed a husband's memory, though his crimes were foul as the rottenness of the grave.

Never, since Queen Vashti refused to come at the command of a drunken husband to show herself to his drunken lords, was there a clearer case of disrespect to the marital dignity on the part of a wife. It was a plain act of insubordination, rebellion against law and order; and how shocking in Lady Byron, who ought to feel herself but too much flattered to be exhibited to the public as the head wife of a man of genius!

Means were at once adopted to subdue her contumacy, of which one may read in a note to the 'Blackwood' (Noctes), September 1832. An artist was sent down to Ealing to take her picture by stealth as she sat in church. Two sittings were thus obtained without her knowledge. In the third one, the artist placed himself boldly before her, and sketched, so that she could not but observe him. We shall give the rest in Mackenzie's own words, as a remarkable specimen of the obtuseness, not to say indelicacy of feeling, which seemed to pervade the literary circles of England at the time:--

'After prayers, Wright and his friend (the artist) were visited by an
ambassador from her ladyship to inquire the meaning of what she had
seen. The reply was, that Mr. Murray must have her portrait, and was
compelled to take what she refused to give. The result was, Wright
was requested to visit her, which he did; taking with him, not the
sketch, which was very good, but another, in which there was a strong
touch of caricature. Rather than allow that to appear as her likeness
(a very natural and womanly feeling by the way), she consented to sit
for the portrait to W. J. Newton, which was engraved, and is here
alluded to.'

The artless barbarism of this note is too good to be lost; but it is quite borne out by the conversation in the Noctes Club, which it illustrates.

It would appear from this conversation that these Byron beauties appeared successively in pamphlet form; and the picture of Lady Byron is thus discussed:--

Mullion.--'I don't know if you have seen the last brochure. It has a
charming head of Lady Byron, who, it seems, sat on purpose: and that's
very agreeable to hear of; for it shows her ladyship has got over any
little soreness that Moore's "Life" occasioned, and is now willing to
contribute anything in her power to the real monument of Byron's
genius.'

North.--'I am delighted to hear of this: 'tis really very noble in the
unfortunate lady. I never saw her. Is the face a striking one?'

Mullion.--'Eminently so,--a most calm, pensive, melancholy style of
native beauty,--and a most touching contrast to the maids of Athens,
Annesley, and all the rest of them. I'm sure you'll have the proof
Finden has sent you framed for the Boudoir at the Lodge.'

North.--'By all means. I mean to do that for all the Byron Beauties.'

But it may be asked, Was there not a man in all England with delicacy enough to feel for Lady Byron, and chivalry enough to speak a bold word for her? Yes: there was one. Thomas Campbell the poet, when he read Lady Byron's statement, believed it, as did Christopher North; but it affected him differently. It appears he did not believe it a wife's duty to burn herself on her husband's funeral-pile, as did Christopher North; and held the singular idea, that a wife had some rights as a human being as well as a husband.

Lady Byron's own statement appeared in pamphlet form in 1830: at least, such is the date at the foot of the document. Thomas Campbell, in 'The New Monthly Magazine,' shortly after, printed a spirited, gentlemanly defence of Lady Byron, and administered a pointed rebuke to Moore for the rudeness and indelicacy he had shown in selecting from Byron's letters the coarsest against herself, her parents, and her old governess Mrs. Clermont, and by the indecent comparisons he had instituted between Lady Byron and Lord Byron's last mistress.

It is refreshing to hear, at last, from somebody who is not altogether on his knees at the feet of the popular idol, and who has some chivalry for woman, and some idea of common humanity. He says,--

'I found my right to speak on this painful subject on its now
irrevocable publicity, brought up afresh as it has been by Mr. Moore,
to be the theme of discourse to millions, and, if I err not much, the
cause of misconception to innumerable minds. I claim to speak of Lady
Byron in the right of a man, and of a friend to the rights of woman,
and to liberty, and to natural religion. I claim a right, more
especially, as one of the many friends of Lady Byron, who, one and
all, feel aggrieved by this production. It has virtually dragged her
forward from the shade of retirement, where she had hid her sorrows,
and compelled her to defend the heads of her friends and her parents
from being crushed under the tombstone of Byron. Nay, in a general
view, it has forced her to defend herself; though, with her true sense
and her pure taste, she stands above all special pleading. To plenary
explanation she ought not--she never shall be driven. Mr. Moore is
too much a gentleman not to shudder at the thought of that; but if
other Byronists, of a far different stamp, were to force the savage
ordeal, it is her enemies, and not she, that would have to dread the
burning ploughshares.

'We, her friends, have no wish to prolong the discussion: but a few
words we must add, even to her admirable statement; for hers is a
cause not only dear to her friends, but having become, from Mr. Moore
and her misfortunes, a publicly-agitated cause, it concerns morality,
and the most sacred rights of the sex, that she should (and that, too,
without more special explanations) be acquitted out and out, and
honourably acquitted, in this business, of all share in the blame,
which is one and indivisible. Mr. Moore, on further reflection, may
see this; and his return to candour will surprise us less than his
momentary deviation from its path.

'For the tact of Mr. Moore's conduct in this affair, I have not to
answer; but, if indelicacy be charged upon me, I scorn the charge.
Neither will I submit to be called Lord Byron's accuser; because a
word against him I wish not to say beyond what is painfully wrung from
me by the necessity of owning or illustrating Lady Byron's
unblamableness, and of repelling certain misconceptions respecting
her, which are now walking the fashionable world, and which have been
fostered (though Heaven knows where they were born) most delicately
and warily by the Christian godfathership of Mr. Moore.

'I write not at Lady Byron's bidding. I have never humiliated either
her or myself by asking if I should write, or what I should write;
that is to say, I never applied to her for information against Lord
Byron, though I was justified, as one intending to criticise Mr.
Moore, in inquiring into the truth of some of his statements. Neither
will I suffer myself to be called her champion, if by that word be
meant the advocate of her mere legal innocence; for that, I take it,
nobody questions.

'Still less is it from the sorry impulse of pity that I speak of this
noble woman; for I look with wonder and even envy at the proud purity
of her sense and conscience, that have carried her exquisite
sensibilities in triumph through such poignant tribulations. But I am
proud to be called her friend, the humble illustrator of her cause,
and the advocate of those principles which make it to me more
interesting than Lord Byron's. Lady Byron (if the subject must be
discussed) belongs to sentiment and morality (at least as much as Lord
Byron); nor is she to be suffered, when compelled to speak, to raise
her voice as in a desert, with no friendly voice to respond to her.
Lady Byron could not have outlived her sufferings if she had not wound
up her fortitude to the high point of trusting mainly for consolation,
not to the opinion of the world, but to her own inward peace; and,
having said what ought to convince the world, I verily believe that
she has less care about the fashionable opinion respecting her than
any of her friends can have. But we, her friends, mix with the world;
and we hear offensive absurdities about her, which we have a right to
put down.

. . . .

'I proceed to deal more generally with Mr. Moore's book. You speak,
Mr. Moore, against Lord Byron's censurers in a tone of indignation
which is perfectly lawful towards calumnious traducers, but which will
not terrify me, or any other man of courage who is no calumniator,
from uttering his mind freely with regard to this part of your hero's
conduct. I question your philosophy in assuming that all that is
noble in Byron's poetry was inconsistent with the possibility of his
being devoted to a pure and good woman; and I repudiate your morality
for canting too complacently about "the lava of his imagination," and
the unsettled fever of his passions, being any excuses for his
planting the tic douloureux of domestic suffering in a meek woman's
bosom.

'These are hard words, Mr. Moore; but you have brought them on
yourself by your voluntary ignorance of facts known to me; for you
might and ought to have known both sides of the question; and, if the
subject was too delicate for you to consult Lady Byron's confidential
friends, you ought to have had nothing to do with the subject. But
you cannot have submitted your book even to Lord Byron's sister,
otherwise she would have set you right about the imaginary spy, Mrs.
Clermont.'

Campbell now goes on to print, at his own peril, he says, and without time to ask leave, the following note from Lady Byron in reply to an application he made to her, when he was about to review Moore's book, for an 'estimate as to the correctness of Moore's statements.'

The following is Lady Byron's reply:--

'DEAR MR. CAMPBELL,--In taking up my pen to point out for your private
information {86} those passages in Mr. Moore's representation of my
part of the story which were open to contradiction, I find them of
still greater extent than I had supposed; and to deny an assertion
here and there would virtually admit the truth of the rest. If, on
the contrary, I were to enter into a full exposure of the falsehood of
the views taken by Mr. Moore, I must detail various matters, which,
consistently with my principles and feelings, I cannot under the
existing circumstances disclose. I may, perhaps, convince you better
of the difficulty of the case by an example: It is not true that
pecuniary embarrassments were the cause of the disturbed state of Lord
Byron's mind, or formed the chief reason for the arrangements made by
him at that time. But is it reasonable for me to expect that you or
any one else should believe this, unless I show you what were the
causes in question? and this I cannot do.

'I am, etc.,

'A. I. NOEL BYRON.'