Chapter XIII: Letter 24 (1)

[Footnote 4: "Diggory," one of Liston's parts, a character in Jackman's 'All the World's a Stage', asks (act i. sc. 2), "But how can you extort that damned pudding-face of yours to madness?"]

[Footnote 5: Rogers had gone for a tour in the North. Byron alludes to Scott's poem 'Helvellyn':

"I climb'd the dark brow of the mighty Helvellyn," etc., etc.

The poem was occasioned, as Scott's note states, by the death of "a young gentleman of talents, and of a most amiable disposition," who was killed on the mountain in 1805.]

* * * * *

245.--To John Murray.

Cheltenham, Sept. 14, 1812.

DEAR SIR,--The parcels contained some letters and verses, all (but one) anonymous and complimentary, and very anxious for my conversion from certain infidelities into which my good-natured correspondents conceive me to have fallen. The books were presents of a _convertible_ kind also,--'Christian Knowledge' and the 'Bioscope' [1], a religious Dial of Life explained:--to the author of the former (Cadell, publisher,) I beg you will forward my best thanks for his letter, his present, and, above all, his good intentions. The 'Bioscope' contained an MS. copy of very excellent verses, from whom I know not, but evidently the composition of some one in the habit of writing, and of writing well. I do not know if he be the author of the 'Bioscope' which accompanied them; but whoever he is, if you can discover him, thank him from me most heartily. The other letters were from ladies, who are welcome to convert me when they please; and if I can discover them, and they be young, as they say they are, I could convince them perhaps of my devotion. I had also a letter from Mr. Walpole on matters of this world, which I have answered.

So you are Lucien's publisher! [2] I am promised an interview with him, and think I shall ask _you_ for a letter of introduction, as "the gods have made him poetical." From whom could it come with a better grace than from _his_ publisher and mine? Is it not somewhat treasonable in you to have to do with a relative of the "direful foe," as the 'Morning Post' calls his brother?

But my book on 'Diet and Regimen', where is it? I thirst for Scott's 'Rokeby'; let me have y'e first-begotten copy. The 'Anti-Jacobin Review' [3] is all very well, and not a bit worse than the 'Quarterly', and at least less harmless. By the by, have you secured my books? I want all the Reviews, at least the Critiques, quarterly, monthly, etc., Portuguese and English, extracted, and bound up in one volume for my _old age_; and pray, sort my Romaic books, and get the volumes lent to Mr. Hobhouse--he has had them now a long time. If any thing occurs, you will favour me with a line, and in winter we shall be nearer neighbours.

Yours very truly,

BYRON.

P.S.--I was applied to to write the _Address_ for Drury Lane, but the moment I heard of the contest, I gave up the idea of contending against all Grub Street, and threw a few thoughts on the subject into the fire. I did this out of respect to you, being sure you would have turned off any of your authors who had entered the lists with such scurvy competitors; to triumph would have been no glory, and to have been defeated--'sdeath!--I would have choked myself, like Otway, with a quartern loaf [4]; so, remember I had, and have, nothing to do with it, upon _my Honour!_

[Footnote 1: Granville Penn (1761-1844) was the author of numerous works on religious subjects. 'The Bioscope, or Dial of Life Explained' appeared in 1812. The other work referred to by Byron is probably Penn's 'Christian's Survey of all the Primary Events and Periods of the World' (1811), of which a second edition was published in 1812.]

[Footnote 2: Lucien Buonaparte (1775-1840), Prince of Canino, since 1810 a landed proprietor in Shropshire, wrote an epic poem, 'Charlemagne, ou l'Eglise delivree'. It was translated (1815) by Dr. Butler of Shrewsbury and Francis Hodgson.]

[Footnote 3: 'The Anti-Jacobin Review' criticized 'Childe Harold' in August, 1812; the 'Quarterly', in March, 1812.]

[Footnote 4: Otway died April, 1685, at the age of thirty-three, from a fever contracted by drinking water when heated by running after an assassin (Spence's 'Anecdotes', p. 44). Theophilus Cibber ('Lives of the Poets', ed. 1753, vol. ii. pp. 333, 334) gives another account of his death, viz. that he begged a shilling of a gentleman, and, being given a guinea, bought a roll, with which he was choked.]

* * * * *

246.--To Lord Holland.

September 22, 1812.

My Dear Lord,--In a day or two I will send you something which you will still have the liberty to reject if you dislike it. I should like to have had more time, but will do my best,--but too happy if I can oblige _you_, though I may offend a hundred scribblers and the discerning public.

Ever yours.

Keep _my name_ a _secret_; or I shall be beset by all the rejected, and, perhaps, damned by a party.

* * * * *

247.--To Lord Holland.

Cheltenham, September 23, 1812.

Ecco!--I have marked some passages with _double_ readings--choose between them--_cut--add--reject_--or _destroy_--do with them as you will--I leave it to you and the Committee--you cannot say so called "a _non committendo_." What will _they_ do (and I do) with the hundred and one rejected Troubadours? [1]

"With trumpets, yea, and with shawms," will you be assailed in the most diabolical doggerel. I wish my name not to transpire till the day is decided. I shall not be in town, so it won't much matter; but let us have a _good deliverer_. I think Elliston [2] should be the man, or Pope [3]; not Raymond [4], I implore you, by the love of Rhythmus!

The passages marked thus = =, above and below, are for you to choose between epithets, and such like poetical furniture. Pray write me a line, and believe me

Ever, etc.

My best remembrances to Lady H. Will you be good enough to decide between the various readings marked, and erase the other; or our _deliverer_ may be as puzzled as a commentator, and belike repeat both. If these _versicles_ won't do, I will hammer out some more endecasyllables.

P.S.--Tell Lady H. I have had sad work to keep out the Phoenix--I mean the Fire Office of that name. It has insured the theatre, and why not the Address?

[Footnote 1: The genuine rejected addresses were advertised for by B. McMillan, of Bow Street, Covent Garden, and forty-two of them were published by him in November, 1812, with the following title: 'The Genuine Rejected Addresses presented to the Committee of Management for Drury Lane Theatre; preceded by that written by Lord Byron and adopted by the Committee'.

The youngest competitor was "Anna, a young lady in the fifteenth year of her age."

The actual number sent in was 112, and sixty-nine of the competitors invoked the Phoenix. Among the competitors were Peter Pindar, whose 'Address' was printed in 1813; Whitbread, the manager, who gave the "poulterer's description" of the Phoenix; and Horace Smith, who published his 'Address without a Phoenix', By S. T. P., in 'Rejected Addresses'.]

[Footnote 2: Robert William Elliston (1774-1831), according to Genest ('English Stage', vol. ix. p. 338), made his first appearance at Bath in April, 1791, as "Tressel" in 'Richard III'., and from 1796 to 1803 Bath remained his head-quarters. An excellent actor both in tragedy and comedy, he became in 1803 a member of the Haymarket Company. From 1804 to 1809, and again from 1812 to 1815, he acted at Drury Lane. Byron's Prologue was spoken by him on October 10, 1812, at the reopening of the new theatre. It was at Drury Lane in April, 1821, while he was lessee (1819-26), that Byron's 'Marino Faliero' was acted. His last appearance was as "Sheva" in 'The Jew', at the Surrey Theatre, of which (1826-31) he was lessee. In spite of his drunken habits, he won the enthusiastic praise of Charles Lamb as the "joyousest of once embodied spirits" (see 'Essays of Elia', "To the Shade of Elliston" and "Ellistoniana").]

[Footnote 3: Alexander Pope (1763-1835), miniaturist, 'gourmand', and actor, was for years the principal tragedian at Covent Garden. Opinion was divided as to his merits as an actor. He owed much to his voice, which had a "mellow richness ... superior to any other performer on the stage." Genest, who quotes the above (vol. ix. p. 377), adds that "in his better days he had more pathos about him than any other actor." He made his first appearance in Cork as "Oroonoko," and subsequently (January, 1785) at Covent Garden in the same part. He ceased acting at Covent Garden in June, 1827.]

[Footnote 4: In the cast for 'Hamlet', with which Drury Lane reopened, Raymond played the Ghost. Raymond was also the stage manager of the theatre.]

* * * * *

248.--To Lord Holland.

September 24.

I send a recast of the four first lines of the concluding paragraph.

This greeting o'er, the ancient rule obey'd,
The drama's homage by her Herald paid,
Receive _our welcome too_, whose every tone
Springs from our hearts, and fain would win your own.
The curtain rises, etc., etc.

And do forgive all this trouble. See what it is to have to do even with the _genteelest_ of us.

Ever, etc.

* * * * *

249.--To Lord Holland.

Cheltenham, Sept. 25, 1812.

Still "more matter for a May morning." [1] Having patched the middle and end of the Address, I send one more couplet for a part of the beginning, which, if not too turgid, you will have the goodness to add. After that flagrant image of the _Thames_ (I hope no unlucky wag will say I have set it on fire, though Dryden [2], in his _Annus Mirabilis_, and Churchill [3], in his _Times_, did it before me), I mean to insert this:

As flashing far the new Volcano shone
{_meteors_}
And swept the skies with {lightnings} not their own,
While thousands throng'd around the burning dome,
Etc., etc.

I think "thousands" less flat than "crowds collected"--but don't let me plunge into the bathos, or rise into Nat. Lee's _Bedlam metaphors_ [4].

By the by, the best view of the said fire (which I myself saw from a house-top in Covent-garden) was at Westminster Bridge, from the reflection on the Thames.

Perhaps the present couplet had better come in after "trembled for their homes," the two lines after;--as otherwise the image certainly sinks, and it will run just as well.

The lines themselves, perhaps, may be better thus--("choose," or "refuse"--but please _yourself_, and don't mind "Sir Fretful" [5]):

As flash'd the volumed blaze, and {_sadly_/ghastly} shone
The skies with lightnings awful as their own.

The last _runs_ smoothest, and, I think, best; but you know _better_ than _best_. "Lurid" is also a less indistinct epithet than "livid wave," and, if you think so, a dash of the pen will do.

I expected one line this morning; in the mean time, I shall remodel and condense, and, if I do not hear from you, shall send another copy.

I am ever, etc.

[Footnote 1: 'Twelfth Night', act iii. sc. 4.]

[Footnote 2: Dryden's 'Annus Mirabilis', stanza 231:

"A key of fire ran all along the shore,
And lightened all the river with a blaze;
The wakened tides began again to roar,
And wondering fish in shining waters gaze."]

[Footnote 3: Churchill's 'Times', lines 701, 702:

"Bidding in one grand pile this Town expire,
Her towers in dust, her Thames a Lake of fire."]

[Footnote 4: Nathaniel Lee (circ. 1653-1692), the dramatist, wrote 'The Rival Queens' (1677), in which occurs the line:

"When Greek join'd Greek then was the tug of war."

He collaborated with Dryden in 'OEdipus' (1679) and 'The Duke of Guise' (1682). His numerous dramas were distinguished, in his own day, for extravagance and bombast. His mind failing, he was confined from 1684 to 1688 in Bethlehem Hospital, where he is said to have composed a tragedy in 25 acts.]

[Footnote 5: 'The Critic', act i. sc. I. "Sneer," speaking of "Sir Fretful Plagiary," says,

"He is as envious as an old maid verging on the desperation of six and
thirty; and then the insidious humility with which he seduces you to
give a free opinion on any of his works can be exceeded only by the
petulant arrogance with which he is sure to reject your observations."]

* * * * *

250.--To Lord Holland.

September 26, 1812.

You will think there is no end to my villanous emendations. The fifth and sixth lines I think to alter thus:

Ye who beheld--oh sight admired and mourn'd,
Whose radiance mock'd the ruin it adorn'd;

because "night" is repeated the next line but one; and, as it now stands, the conclusion of the paragraph, "worthy him (Shakspeare) and _you_," appears to apply the "_you_" to those only who were out of bed and in Covent Garden market on the night of conflagration, instead of the audience or the discerning public at large, all of whom are intended to be comprised in that comprehensive and, I hope, comprehensible pronoun.

By the by, one of my corrections in the fair copy sent yesterday has dived into the bathos some sixty fathom:

When Garrick died, and Brinsley ceased to write.

Ceasing to _live_ is a much more serious concern, and ought not to be first; therefore I will let the old couplet stand, with its half rhymes "sought" and "wrote." [1]

Second thoughts in every thing are best, but, in rhyme, third and fourth don't come amiss. I am very anxious on this business, and I do hope that the very trouble I occasion you will plead its own excuse, and that it will tend to show my endeavour to make the most of the time allotted. I wish I had known it months ago, for in that case I had not left one line standing on another. I always scrawl in this way, and smooth as much as I can, but never sufficiently; and, latterly, I can weave a nine-line stanza faster than a couplet, for which measure I have not the cunning. When I began _Childe Harold_, I had never tried Spenser's measure, and now I cannot scribble in any other.

After all, my dear Lord, if you can get a decent _Address_ elsewhere, don't hesitate to put this aside [2].

Why did you not trust your own Muse? I am very sure she would have been triumphant, and saved the Committee their trouble--"'tis a joyful one" to me, but I fear I shall not satisfy even myself. After the account you sent me, 'tis no compliment to say you would have beaten your candidates; but I mean that, in _that_ case, there would have been no occasion for their being beaten at all.

There are but two decent prologues in our tongue--Pope's to 'Cato' [3]--Johnson's to Drury-Lane [4].

These, with the epilogue to 'The Distrest Mother' [5] and, I think, one of Goldsmith's [6], and a prologue of old Colman's to Beaumont and Fletcher's 'Philaster' [7], are the best things of the kind we have.

P.S.--I am diluted to the throat with medicine for the stone; and Boisragon wants me to try a warm climate for the winter--but I won't.

[Footnote 1:

"Such are the names that here your plaudits sought,
When Garrick acted, and when Brinsley wrote."

At present the couplet stands thus:

"Dear are the days that made our annals bright,
Ere Garrick fled, or Brinsley ceased to write."]

[Footnote 2:

"I am almost ashamed," writes Lord Holland to Rogers, October 22, 1812
(Clayden's 'Rogers and his Contemporaries', vol. i. p. 115), "of
having induced Lord Byron to write on so ungrateful a theme
(ungrateful in all senses) as the opening of a theatre; he was so
good-humoured, took so much pains, corrected so good-humouredly, and
produced, as I thought and think, a prologue so superior to the common
run of that sort of trumpery, that it is quite vexatious to see him
attacked for it. Some part of it is a little too much laboured, and
the whole too long; but surely it is good and poetical.... You cannot
imagine how I grew to like Lord Byron in my critical intercourse with
him, and how much I am convinced that your friendship and judgment
have contributed to improve both his understanding and his
happiness."]

[Footnote 3: Pope wrote the Prologue to Addison's 'Cato' when it was acted at Drury Lane, April 13, 1713.]

[Footnote 4: Johnson wrote the Prologue when Garrick opened Drury Lane, September 15, 1747, with 'The Merchant of Venice'. "It is," says Genest ('English Stage', vol. iv. p. 231), "the best Prologue that was ever written." Johnson wrote the Prologue to Milton's 'Comus', played at Drury Lane, April 5, 1750; to Goldsmith's 'Good-Natured Man', played at Covent Garden, January 29, 1769; and to Hugh Kelly's 'A Word to the Wise', played at Drury Lane, March 3, 1770.]

[Footnote 5: 'The Distrest Mother', adapted from Racine by Ambrose Philips, was first played at Drury Lane, March 17, 1712. Addison is supposed (Genest, 'English Stage', vol. ii. p. 496) to have written the epilogue.]

[Footnote 6: It is impossible to say to which of Goldsmith's epilogues Byron refers. A previous editor of Moore's 'Life, etc'., identified it with his epilogue to Charlotte Lennox's unsuccessful comedy, 'The Sister', which was once played at Covent Garden, February 18, 1769, and then withdrawn.]

[Footnote 7: George Colman the Elder, who edited an edition of Beaumont and Fletcher (10 vols., 1778), wrote the prologue to 'Philaster', when it was produced at Drury Lane, October 8, 1763.]

* * * * *

251.--To Lord Holland.

Sept. 27, 1812.

I believe this is the third scrawl since yesterday--all about epithets. I think the epithet "intellectual" won't convey the meaning I intend; and though I hate compounds, for the present I will try (_col' permesso_) the word "genius gifted patriots of our line" [1] instead. Johnson has "many coloured life," a compound----but they are always best avoided. However, it is the only one in ninety lines [2], but will be happy to give way to a better. I am ashamed to intrude any more remembrances on Lady H. or letters upon you; but you are, fortunately for me, gifted with patience already too often tried by

Your etc., etc.,

BYRON.

[Footnote 1: This, as finally altered, stood thus:

"Immortal names emblazon'd on our line."]

[Footnote 2: Reduced to seventy-three lines.]

* * * * *

252.--To Lord Holland.

September 27, 1812.

I have just received your very kind letter, and hope you have met with a second copy corrected and addressed to Holland House, with some omissions and this new couplet,

As glared each rising flash, [1] and ghastly shone
The skies with lightnings awful as their own.

As to remarks, I can only say I will alter and acquiesce in any thing. With regard to the part which Whitbread [2] wishes to omit, I believe the 'Address' will go off _quicker_ without it, though, like the agility of the Hottentot, at the expense of its vigour. I leave to your choice entirely the different specimens of stucco-work; and a _brick_ of your own will also much improve my Babylonish turret. I should like Elliston to have it, with your leave. "Adorn" and "mourn" are lawful rhymes in Pope's 'Death of the Unfortunate Lady'.--Gray has "forlorn" and "mourn"--and "torn" and "mourn" are in Smollett's famous 'Tears of Scotland' [3].

As there will probably be an outcry amongst the rejected, I hope the Committee will testify (if it be needful) that I sent in nothing to the congress whatever, with or without a name, as your Lordship well knows. All I have to do with it is with and through you; and though I, of course, wish to satisfy the audience, I do assure you my first object is to comply with your request, and in so doing to show the sense I have of the many obligations you have conferred upon me.

Yours ever, B.

[Footnote 1: At present:

"As glared the volumed blaze."]

[Footnote 2: Samuel Whitbread (1758-1815) married, in 1789, Elizabeth, daughter of General Sir Charles Grey, created (1806) Earl Grey, and sister of the second Earl Grey, of Reform Bill fame. The son of a wealthy brewer, whose fortune he inherited, he entered Parliament as M.P. for Bedford in 1790. Raikes, in his 'Journal' (vol. iv. PP. 50, 51), speaks of him, at the outset of his career, as a staunch Foxite, and "much remarked in society." Comparing him with his brother-in-law Grey, he says,

"Mr. Whitbread was a more steady character; his appearance was heavy;
he was fond of agriculture, and was very plain and simple in his
tastes. Both were reckoned good debaters in the House, but Grey was
the most eloquent."

An independent Whig, and an advocate for peace with France, Whitbread supported Fox against Pitt throughout the Napoleonic War, strongly opposed its renewal after the return of the emperor from Elba, and interested himself in such measures as moderate Parliamentary reform, the amendment of the poor law, national education, and retrenchment of public expenditure. On April 8, 1805, he moved the resolutions which ended in the impeachment of Lord Melville, and took the lead in the inquiries, which were made, March, 1809, into the conduct of the Duke of York. He was a plain, business-like speaker, and a man of such unimpeachable integrity that Mr., afterwards Lord, Plunket, in a speech on the Roman Catholic claims, February 28, 1821, called him "the incorruptible sentinel of the constitution."

When he moved the articles of impeachment against Lord Melville, Canning scribbled the following impromptu parody of his speech ('Anecdotal History of the British Parliament', p. 222):

"I'm like Archimedes for science and skill;
I'm like a young prince going straight up a hill;
I'm like--(with respect to the fair be it said)--
I'm like a young lady just bringing to bed.
If you ask why the 11th of June I remember
Much better than April, or May, or November,
On that day, my lords, with truth I assure ye,
My sainted progenitor set up his brewery;
On that day, in the morn, he began brewing beer;
On that day, too, commenced his connubial career;]
On that day he received and he issued his bills;
On that day he cleared out all the cash from his tills;
On that day he died, having finished his summing,
And the angels all cried, 'Here's old Whitbread a-coming!'
So that day still I hail with a smile and a sigh,
For his beer with an E, and his bier with an I;
And still on that day, in the hottest of weather,
The whole Whitbread family dine all together.--
So long as the beams of this house shall support
The roof which o'ershades this respectable Court,
Where Hastings was tried for oppressing the Hindoos;
So long as that sun shall shine in at those windows,
My name shall shine bright as my ancestor's shines,
'Mine' recorded in journals, 'his' blazoned on signs!"

An active member of Parliament, a large landed proprietor, the manager of his immense brewery in Chiswell Street, Whitbread also found time to reduce to order the chaotic concerns of Drury Lane Theatre. He was, with Lord Holland and Harvey Combe, responsible for the request to Byron to write an address, having first rejected his own address with its "poulterer's description of the Phoenix." He was fond of private theatricals, and Dibdin ('Reminiscences', vol. ii. pp. 383, 384) gives the play-bill of an entertainment given by him at Southill. In the first play, 'The Happy Return', he took the part of "Margery;" and in the second, 'Fatal Duplicity', that of "Eglantine," a very young lady, loved by "Sir Buntybart" and "Sir Brandywine." In his capacity as manager of Drury Lane, Whitbread is represented by the author of 'Accepted Addresses' (1813) as addressing "the M--s of H--d"--

"My LORD,--

"As I now have the honour to be
By 'Man'ging' a 'Playhouse' a double M.P.,
In this my address I think fit to complain
Of certain encroachments on great Drury Lane," etc., etc.

Whitbread strongly supported the cause of the Princess of Wales. Miss Berry ('Journal', vol. iii. p. 25) says that he dictated the letters which the Princess wrote to the Queen, who had desired that she should not attend the two drawing-rooms to be held in June, 1814. "They were good," she adds, "but too long, and sometimes marked by Whitbread's want of taste."

The strain of his multifarious activities affected both his health and his mind, and he committed suicide July 6, 1815.]

[Footnote 3:

"By foreign hands thy humble grave adorn'd,
By strangers honour'd, and by strangers mourn'd."

(Pope.)

"Stay, oh stay! nor thus forlorn,
Leave me unbless'd, unpitied, here to mourn."

(Gray.)

"Mourn, hapless Caledonia, mourn
Thy banish'd peace, thy laurels torn."

(Smollett.)]

* * * * *

253.--To John Murray.

Cheltenham, September 27, 1812.

Dear Sir,--I sent in no 'Address' whatever to the Committee; but out of nearly one hundred (this is _confidential_), none have been deemed worth acceptance; and in consequence of their _subsequent_ application to _me_, I have written a prologue, which _has_ been received, and will be spoken. The MS. is now in the hands of Lord Holland.

I write this merely to say, that (however it is received by the audience) you will publish it in the next edition of _Childe Harold_; and I only beg you at present to keep my name secret till you hear further from me, and as soon as possible I wish you to have a correct copy, to do with as you think proper.

I am, yours very truly, BYRON.

P.S.--I should wish a few copies printed off _before_, that the Newspaper copies may be correct _after_ the _delivery_.

* * * * *

254.--To Lord Holland.

September 28, 1812.

Will this do better? The metaphor is more complete.

Till slowly ebb'd the {_lava of the_/spent volcanic} wave,
And blackening ashes mark'd the Muse's grave.

If not, we will say "burning wave," and instead of "burning clime," in the line some couplets back, have "glowing."

Is Whitbread determined to castrate all my _cavalry_ lines [1]? I don't see why t'other house should be spared; besides it is the public, who ought to know better; and you recollect Johnson's was against similar buffooneries of Rich's--but, certes, I am not Johnson. [2]

Instead of "effects," say "labours"--"degenerate" will do, will it? Mr. Betty is no longer a babe, therefore the line cannot be personal. Will this do?

Till ebb'd the lava of {_the burning_}/{that molten} wave [3]

with "glowing dome," in case you prefer "burning" added to this "wave" metaphorical. The word "fiery pillar" was suggested by the "pillar of fire" in the book of Exodus, which went before the Israelites through the Red Sea. I once thought of saying "like Israel's pillar," and making it a simile, but I did not know,--the great temptation was leaving the epithet "fiery" for the supplementary wave. I want to work up that passage, as it is the only new ground us prologuizers can go upon--

This is the place where, if a poet
Shined in description, he might show it.

If I part with the possibility of a future conflagration, we lessen the compliment to Shakspeare. However, we will e'en mend it thus:

Yes, it shall be--the magic of that name,
That scorns the scythe of Time, the torch of Flame,
On the same spot, etc., etc.

There--the deuce is in it, if that is not an improvement to Whitbread's content. Recollect, it is the "name," and not the "magic," that has a noble contempt for those same weapons. If it were the "magic," my metaphor would be somewhat of the maddest--so the "name" is the antecedent. But, my dear Lord, your patience is not quite so immortal--therefore, with many and sincere thanks, I am,

Yours ever most affectionately.

P.S.--I foresee there will be charges of partiality in the papers; but you know I sent in no _Address_; and glad both you and I must be that I did not, for, in that case, their plea had been plausible. I doubt the Pit will be testy; but conscious innocence (a novel and pleasing sensation) makes me bold.

[Footnote 1: The lines which were omitted by the Committee ran thus:

"'Nay, lower still, the Drama yet deplores
That late she deigned to crawl upon all-fours.
When Richard roars in Bosworth for a horse,
If you command, the steed must come in course.
If you decree, the Stage must condescend'
To soothe the sickly taste we dare not mend.
_Blame not our judgment should we acquiesce,
And gratify you more by showing less_.
Oh, since your Fiat stamps the Drama's laws,
Forbear to mock us with misplaced applause;
_That public praise be ne'er again disgraced,
From_ {brutes to man recall}/{_babes and brutes redeem} a nation's
taste_;
Then pride shall doubly nerve the actor's powers,
When Reason's voice is echoed back by ours."

The last couplet but one was altered in a subsequent copy, thus:

"'The past reproach let present scenes refute,
Nor shift from man to babe, from babe to brute'."

On February 18, 1811, at Covent Garden, a troop of horses were introduced in 'Bluebeard'. For the manager, Juvenal's words, "_Lucri bonus est odor ex re Qualibet_" ('Sat'. xiv. 204) may have been true; but, as the dressing-room of the equine comedians was under the orchestra, the stench on the first night was to the audience intolerable. At the same theatre, April 29, 1811, the horses were again brought on the stage in Lewis's 'Timour the Tartar'. At the same theatre, on the following December 26, a live elephant appeared. The novelty had, however, been anticipated in the Dublin Theatre during the season of 1771-72 (Genest's 'English Stage', vol. viii. p. 287). At the Haymarket, and Drury Lane, the introduction of live animals was ridiculed. 'The Quadrupeds of Quedlinburgh' was given at the Haymarket, July 26, 1811, as a burlesque on 'Timour the Tartar' and the horses. The Prologue, by Colman the Younger, attacks the passion for German plays and animal actors:

"Your taste, recover'd half from foreign quacks,
Takes airings, now, on English horses' backs;
While every modern bard may raise his name,
If not on _lasting praise_, on _stable fame_."

At the Lyceum, during the season 1811-12, 'Quadrupeds, or the Manager's Last Kick', in which the tailors were mounted on asses and mules, was given by the Drury Lane Company with success. It was this introduction of animal performers which Byron wished to attack.]

[Footnote 2: The following are the lines in Johnson's 'Prologue' to which Byron refers:

"Then crush'd by rules, and weaken'd as refined,
For years the power of Tragedy declined;
From bard to bard the frigid caution crept,
Till Declamation roared, whilst Passion slept.
Yet still did Virtue deign the stage to tread,
Philosophy remained though Nature fled.
But forced, at length, her ancient reign to quit,
She saw great Faustus lay the ghost of Wit;
Exulting Folly hailed the joyous Day,
And Pantomime and Song confirmed her sway.
But who the coming changes can presage,
And mark the future periods of the Stage?
Perhaps if skill could distant times explore,
New Behns, new Durfeys, yet remain in store;
Perhaps, where Lear has raved, and Hamlet died,
On flying cars new sorcerers may ride;
Perhaps (for who can guess th' effects of chance?)
Here Hunt may box, or Mahomet may dance."

John Rich (circ. 1682-1761) was the creator of pantomime in England, which he introduced at Lincoln's Inn Fields in April, 1716, and in which, under the stage name of Lun, he played the part of Harlequin. At Lincoln's Inn Fields, January 29, 1728, he produced 'The Beggar's Opera', which, after being refused at Drury Lane, made "Gay 'rich', and Rich 'gay'." "Great Faustus" probably alludes to the war between the two theatres, and the rival productions of 'Harlequin Dr. Faustus' at Drury Lane in 1723, and of 'The Necromancer, or the History of Dr. Faustus' at Lincoln's Inn Fields in December of the same year. On December 7, 1732, Rich opened the new theatre at Covent Garden, of which he remained manager till his death in 1761.]

[Footnote 3: The form of this couplet, as printed, is as follows:

"Till blackening ashes and lonely wall
Usurp'd the Muse's realm, and mark'd her fall."]

* * * * *

255.--To Lord Holland.

September 28.

I have altered the _middle_ couplet, so as I hope partly to do away with W.'s objection. I do think, in the present state of the stage, it had been unpardonable to pass over the horses and Miss Mudie [1], etc. As Betty is no longer a boy, how can this be applied to him? He is now to be judged as a man. If he acts still like a boy, the public will but be more ashamed of their blunder. I have, you see, _now_ taken it for granted that these things are reformed. I confess, I wish that part of the _Address_ to stand; but if W. is inexorable, e'en let it go. I have also new-cast the lines, and softened the hint of future combustion, and sent them off this morning. Will you have the goodness to add, or insert, the _approved_ alterations as they arrive? They "come like shadows, so depart," [2] occupy me, and, I fear, disturb you.

Do not let Mr. W. put his _Address_ into Elliston's hands till you have settled on these alterations. E. will think it too long:--much depends on the speaking. I fear it will not bear much curtailing, without _chasms_ in the sense.

It is certainly too long in the reading; but if Elliston exerts himself, such a favourite with the public will not be thought tedious. _I_ should think it so, if _he_ were not to speak it.

Yours ever, etc.

P.S.--On looking again, I doubt my idea of having obviated W.'s objection. To the other House allusion is _non sequitur_--but I wish to plead for this part, because the thing really is not to be passed over. Many afterpieces of the Lyceum by the _same company_ have already attacked this "Augean _Stable_"--and Johnson, in his prologue against "Lunn" (the harlequin manager, Rich),--"Hunt,"--"Mahomet," etc. is surely a fair precedent. [3]

[Footnote 1: For the horses, see p. 156, 'note' 1. Miss Mudie, another "Phenomenon," with whom the Covent Garden manager hoped to rival the success of Master Betty, was announced in the 'Morning Post', July 29, 1805, as the "Young Roscia of the Dublin Stage." She appeared at Covent Garden, November 23, 1805, in the part of "Peggy" in 'The Country Girl', Miss Brunton being "Alithea," C. Kemble "Harcourt," and Moody "Murray." Being hissed by the audience, she walked with great composure to the front of the stage, and said, as reported in the 'Morning Post' (November 25, 1805)

"Ladies and gentlemen,--I know nothing I have done to offend you, and
has set ('sic') those who are sent here to hiss me; I will be
very much obliged to you to turn them out."

This unfortunate speech made matters worse; the audience refused to hear her, and her part was finished by Miss Searle.

Miss Mudie was said to be only eight years old. But J. Kemble, being asked if she were really such a child, answered, "'Child'! Why, sir, when I was a very young actor in the York Company, that little creature kept an inn at Tadcaster, and had a large family" (Clark Russell's 'Representative Actors', p. 363, 'note' 2). The 'Morning Post' (April 5, 1806) says that Miss Mudie afterwards joined a children's troupe in Leicester Place, where, "though deservedly discountenanced at a great theatre, she will, no doubt, prove an acquisition to the infant establishment" (Ashton's 'Dawn of the XIXth Century in England', pp. 333-336).]

[Footnote 2: Macbeth, act iv. sc. 1.]

[Footnote 3: For Lun, or Rich, see p. 157, end of 'note' 1. Hunt, in the notes to Johnson's 'Prologue' (Gilfillan's edition of Johnson's 'Poestical Works', p. 38), is said to be "a famous stage-boxer, Mahomet, a rope-dancer."]

* * * * *

256.--To William Bankes.

Cheltenham, September 28, 1812.

MY DEAR BANKES,--When you point out to one how people can be intimate at the distance of some seventy leagues, I will plead guilty to your charge, and accept your farewell, but not _wittingly_, till you give me some better reason than my silence, which merely proceeded from a notion founded on your own declaration of _old_, that you hated writing and receiving letters. Besides, how was I to find out a man of many residences? If I had addressed you _now_, it had been to your borough, where I must have conjectured you were amongst your constituents. So now, in despite of Mr. N. and Lady W., you shall be as "much better" as the Hexham post-office will allow me to make you. I do assure you I am much indebted to you for thinking of me at all, and can't spare you even from amongst the superabundance of friends with whom you suppose me surrounded.

You heard that Newstead [1] is sold--the sum L140,000; sixty to remain in mortgage on the estate for three years, paying interest, of course. Rochdale is also likely to do well--so my worldly matters are mending. I have been here some time drinking the waters, simply because there are waters to drink, and they are very medicinal, and sufficiently disgusting. In a few days I set out for Lord Jersey's [2], but return here, where I am quite alone, go out very little, and enjoy in its fullest extent the _dolce far niente_. What you are about I cannot guess, even from your date;--not dauncing to the sound of the gitourney in the Halls of the Lowthers? one of whom is here, ill, poor thing, with a phthisic. I heard that you passed through here (at the sordid inn where I first alighted) the very day before I arrived in these parts. We had a very pleasant set here; at first the Jerseys, Melbournes [3], Cowpers [4], and Hollands, but all gone; and the only persons I know are the Rawdons [5] and Oxfords [6], with some later acquaintances of less brilliant descent.

But I do not trouble them much; and as for your rooms and your assemblies "they are not dreamed of in our philosophy!!"--Did you read of a sad accident in the Wye t'other day [7]? A dozen drowned; and Mr. Rossoe, a corpulent gentleman, preserved by a boat-hook or an eel-spear, begged, when he heard his wife was saved--no--_lost_--to be thrown in again!!--as if he could not have thrown himself in, had he wished it; but this passes for a trait of sensibility. What strange beings men are, in and out of the Wye!

I have to ask you a thousand pardons for not fulfilling some orders before I left town; but if you knew all the cursed entanglements I _had_ to wade through, it would be unnecessary to beg your forgiveness.--When will Parliament (the new one) meet [8]?--in sixty days, on account of Ireland, I presume: the Irish election will demand a longer period for completion than the constitutional allotment. Yours, of course, is safe, and all your side of the question. Salamanca is the ministerial watchword, and all will go well with you. I hope you will speak more frequently, I am sure at least you _ought_, and it will be expected. I see Portman means to stand again. Good night.

Ever yours most affectionately,

[Greek: Mpairon.]

[Footnote 1: Newstead was put up at Garraway's in the autumn of 1812; but only L90,000 were bid, and the property was therefore withdrawn. Subsequently it was privately sold to a Mr. Claughton, who found himself unable to complete the purchase, and forfeited L25,000 on the contract. Newstead was eventually sold, in November, 1817, to Colonel Wildman, Byron's Harrow schoolfellow, for L94,500.]

[Footnote 2: For Lady Jersey, see p. 112, 'note' 1 [Footnote 1 of Letter 230]. The following passage, from Byron's 'Detached Thoughts', gives an account of the party at Middleton:

"In 1812 at Middelton (Lord Jersey's), amongst a goodly company of
Lords, Ladies, and wits, etc., there was poor old Vice Leach, the
lawyer, attempting to play off the fine gentleman. His first
exhibition, an attempt on horseback, I think, to escort the women--God
knows where--in the month of November, ended in a fit of the
Lumbago--as Lord Ogleby says, 'a grievous enemy to Gallantry and
address'--and if he could have but heard Lady Jersey quizzing him (as
I did) next day for the _cause_ of his malady, I don't think that he
would have turned a 'Squire of dames' in a hurry again. He seemed to
me the greatest fool (in that line) I ever saw. This was the last I
saw of old Vice Leach, except in town, where he was creeping into
assemblies, and trying to look young--and gentlemanly.

"Erskine too!--Erskine was there--good but intolerable. He jested, he
talked, he did everything admirably, but then he 'would' be applauded
for the same thing twice over. He would read his own verses, his own
paragraphs, and tell his own story again and again; and then 'the
trial by Jury!!!'--I almost wished it abolished, for I sate next him
at dinner, and, as I had read his published speeches, there was no
occasion to repeat them to me. Chester (the fox-hunter), surnamed
'Cheek Chester,' and I sweated the Claret, being the only two who did
so. Cheek, who loves his bottle, and had no notion of meeting with a
'bonvivant' in a scribbler, in making my eulogy to somebody one
evening, summed it up in 'by G-d, he 'drinks like a Man'!'"]

[Footnote 3: Sir Peniston Lamb, created an Irish baron as Lord Melbourne in 1770, an Irish viscount in 1780, and an English peer in 1815, married, in 1769, Elizabeth, only daughter of Sir Ralph Milbanke, of Halnaby, Yorkshire, one of the cleverest and most beautiful women of the day. Horace Walpole, writing to Mason, May 12, 1778, mentions her when she was at the height of her beauty.

"On Tuesday," he says, "I supped, after the opera, at Mrs. Meynel's
with a set of the most fashionable company, which, take notice, I very
seldom do now, as I certainly am not of the age to mix often with
young people. Lady Melbourne was standing before the fire, and
adjusting her feathers in the glass. Says she, 'Lord, they say the
stocks will blow up! That will be very comical.'"

Greville ('Memoirs', ed. 1888, vol. vi. p. 248) associates her name with that of Lord Egremont. Reynolds painted her with her eldest son in his well-known picture 'Maternal Affection'. Her second son, William, afterwards Prime Minister, used to say,

"Ah! my mother was a most remarkable woman; not merely clever and
engaging, but the most sagacious woman I ever knew"

('Memoirs of Viscount Melbourne', vol. i. p. 135). Lady Melbourne, whom Byron spoke of as

"the best, the kindest, and ablest female I have ever known, old or
young,"

died in 1818, her husband in 1828. He thus described her to Lady Blessington ('Conversations', p. 225):

"Lady M., who might have been my mother, excited an interest in my
feelings that few young women have been able to awaken. She was a
charming person--a sort of modern Aspasia, uniting the energy of a
man's mind with the delicacy and tenderness of a woman's. She wrote
and spoke admirably, because she felt admirably. Envy, malice, hatred,
or uncharitableness, found no place in her feelings. She had all of
philosophy, save its moroseness, and all of nature, save its defects
and general 'faiblesse'; or if some portion of 'faiblesse' attached
to her, it only served to render her more forbearing to the errors of
others. I have often thought, that, with a little more youth, Lady M.
might have turned my head, at all events she often turned my heart, by
bringing me back to mild feelings, when the demon passion was strong
within me. Her mind and heart were as fresh as if only sixteen summers
had flown over her, instead of four times that number."]

[Footnote 4: Peter, fifth Earl Cowper (1778-1837), married, in 1805 Emily Mary Lamb, daughter of Lord Melbourne; she married, secondly, in 1839, Lord Palmerston.]

[Footnote 5: Francis Rawdon, second Earl of Moira (1754-1826), created Lord Rawdon (1783), and Marquis of Hastings (1817), married, in 1804, the Countess of Loudoun.]

[Footnote 6: Edward Harley (1773-1848) succeeded his uncle as fifth Earl of Oxford in 1790, and married, in 1794, Jane Elizabeth, daughter of the Rev. James Scott, Vicar of Itchin, Hants. It is probably of Lady Oxford, whose picture was painted by Hoppner, that Byron spoke to Lady Blessington ('Conversations', p. 255),

"Even now the autumnal charms of Lady----are remembered by me with
more than admiration. She resembled a landscape by Claude Lorraine,
with a setting sun, her beauties enhanced by the knowledge that they
were shedding their last dying beams, which threw a radiance around. A
woman... is only grateful for her 'first' and 'last' conquest. The
first of poor dear Lady----'s was achieved before I entered on this
world of care; but the 'last', I do flatter myself, was reserved for
me, and a 'bonne bouche' it was."

The following passage certainly relates to Lady Oxford:

"There was a lady at that time," said Byron (Medwin's 'Conversations',
pp. 93, 94), "double my own age, the mother of several children who
were perfect angels, with whom I had formed a 'liaison' that continued
without interruption for eight months. The autumn of a beauty like
her's is preferable to the spring in others. She told me she was never
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.... She had been sacrificed, almost before she was a
woman, to one whose mind and body were equally contemptible in the
scale of creation; and on whom she bestowed a numerous family, to
which the law gave him the right to be called father. Strange as it
may seem, she gained (as all women do) an influence over me so strong,
that I had great difficulty in breaking with her, even when I knew she
had been inconstant to me: and once was on the point of going abroad
with her, and narrowly escaped this folly."

To be near the Oxfords at Eywood, in Herefordshire, Byron took Kinsham Court, a dower-house of the family, where Bishop Harley died in 1788. At one time, as is evident from his correspondence with Hanson, he was bent on going abroad with Lady Oxford. In the end he only accompanied her to Portsmouth. Of Lady Oxford, Uvedale Price wrote thus to Rogers (Clayden, 'Rogers and his Contemporaries', vol. i. pp. 397, 398):

"This is a melancholy subject"--[the death, by consumption of Lord
Aberdeen's children]--"and I must go to another. Poor Lady Oxford! I
had heard with great concern of her dangerous illness, but hoped she
might get through it, and was much, very much grieved to hear that it
had ended fatally. I had, as you know, lived a great deal with her
from the time she came into this country, immediately after her
marriage; but for some years past, since she went abroad, had scarcely
had any correspondence or intercourse with her, till I met her in town
last spring. I then saw her twice, and both times she seemed so
overjoyed to see an old friend, and expressed her joy so naturally and
cordially, that I felt no less overjoyed at seeing her after so long
an absence. She talked, with great satisfaction, of our meeting for a
longer time this next spring, little thinking of an eternal
separation. There could not, in all respects, be a more ill-matched
pair than herself and Lord Oxford, or a stronger instance of the cruel
sports of Venus, or, rather, of Hymen--

'Cui placet impares
Formas atque animos sub juga ahenea
Saevo mittere cum joco.'

"It has been said that she was, in some measure, forced into the
match. Had she been united to a man whom she had loved, esteemed, and
respected, she herself might have been generally respected and
esteemed, as well as loved; but in her situation, to keep clear of all
misconduct required a strong mind or a cold heart; perhaps both, and
she had neither. Her failings were in no small degree the effect of
circumstances; her amiable qualities all her own. There was something
about her, in spite of her errors, remarkably attaching, and that
something was not merely her beauty. 'Kindness has resistless charms,'
and she was full of affectionate kindness to those she loved, whether
as friends or as lovers. As a friend, I always found her the same,
never at all changeful or capricious. As I am not a very rigid
moralist, and am extremely open to kindness, 'I could have better
spared a better woman.'"]

[Footnote 7: An account of the accident is given in the Chronicle of the 'Annual Register', September 21, 1812. The party consisted of ten people, three of whom were saved. Among those rescued was Mr. Rothery--not Rossoe, as Byron gives it.]

[Footnote 8: The new Parliament met November 30, 1812. Wellington won the battle of Salamanca on the previous July 22.]

* * * * *

257.--To Lord Holland.

September 29, 1812.

Shakespeare certainly ceased to reign in _one_ of his kingdoms, as George III. did in America, and George IV. [1] may in Ireland? Now, we have nothing to do out of our own realms, and when the monarchy was gone, his majesty had but a barren sceptre. I have _cut away_, you will see, and altered, but make it what you please; only I do implore, for my _own_ gratification, one lash on those accursed quadrupeds--"a long shot, Sir Lucius, if you love me." [2] I have altered "wave," etc., and the "fire," and so forth for the timid.

Let me hear from you when convenient, and believe me, etc.

P.S.--Do let _that_ stand, and cut out elsewhere. I shall choke, if we must overlook their damned menagerie.

[Footnote 1: Some objection, it appears, had been made to the passage, "and Shakspeare _ceased to reign_."]

[Footnote 2: Bob Acres, in 'The Rivals' (act v. se. 3), says, "A long shot, Sir Lucius, if you love me."]

* * * * *

258.--To Lord Holland.

September 30, 1812.

I send you the most I can make of it; for I am not so well as I was, and find I "pull in resolution." [1]

I wish much to see you, and will be at Tetbury by twelve on Saturday; and from thence I go on to Lord Jersey's. It is impossible not to allude to the degraded state of the Stage, but I have lightened _it_, and endeavoured to obviate your _other_ objections. There is a new couplet for Sheridan, allusive to his Monody [2]. All the alterations I have marked thus ],--as you will see by comparison with the other copy. I have cudgelled my brains with the greatest willingness, and only wish I had more time to have done better.

You will find a sort of clap-trap laudatory couplet inserted for the quiet of the Committee [3], and I have added, towards the end, the couplet you were pleased to _like_. The whole Address is seventy-three lines, still perhaps too long; and, if shortened, you will save time, but, I fear, a little of what I meant for sense also.

With myriads of thanks, I am ever, etc.

My sixteenth edition of respects to Lady H.--How she must laugh at all this!

I wish Murray, my publisher, to print off some copies as soon as your Lordship returns to town--it will ensure correctness in the papers afterwards.

[Footnote 1: 'Macbeth', act v. sc. 5.]

[Footnote 2: Sheridan's 'Monody on Garrick'.]

[Footnote 3: The Committee of Selection consisted, says the 'Satirist' (November 1, 1812, p. 395),

"of one peer and two commoners, one poet and two prosers, one Lord and
two Brewers; and the only points in which they coincided were in being
all three parliament men, all three politicians, all three in
opposition to the Government of the country. Their names, as we
understand, were Vassal Holland, Samuel Whitbread, and Harvey
Christian Combe."]

* * * * *

259.--To Lord Holland.

Far be from him that hour which asks in vain Tears such as flow for Garrick in his strain;

_or_,

Far be that hour that vainly asks in turn Such verse for him as {_crown'd his_/wept o'er} Garrick's urn.

September 30, 1812.

Will you choose between these added to the lines on Sheridan [1]?

I think they will wind up the panegyric, and agree with the train of thought preceding them.