Chapter II: Introduction: To the First and Second Cantos of Childe Harold

The First Canto of _Childe Harold_ was begun at Janina, in Albania, October 31, 1809, and the Second Canto was finished at Smyrna, March 28, 1810. The dates were duly recorded on the MS.; but in none of the letters which Byron wrote to his mother and his friends from the East does he mention or allude to the composition or existence of such a work. In one letter, however, to his mother (January 14, 1811, _Letters_, 1898, i. 308), he informs her that he has MSS. in his possession which may serve to prolong his memory, if his heirs and executors "think proper to publish them;" but for himself, he has "done with authorship." Three months later the achievement of _Hints from Horace_ and _The Curse of Minerva_ persuaded him to give "authorship" another trial; and, in a letter written on board the _Volage_ frigate (June 28, _Letters_, 1898, i. 313), he announces to his literary Mentor, R. C. Dallas, who had superintended the publication of _English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers_, that he has "an imitation of the _Ars Poetica_ of Horace ready for Cawthorne." Byron landed in England on July 2, and on the 15th Dallas "had the pleasure of shaking hands with him at Reddish's Hotel, St. James's Street" (_Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron_, 1824, p. 103). There was a crowd of visitors, says Dallas, and no time for conversation; but the _Imitation_ was placed in his hands. He took it home, read it, and was disappointed. Disparagement was out of the question; but the next morning at breakfast Dallas ventured to express some surprise that he had written nothing else. An admission or confession followed that "he had occasionally written short poems, besides a great many stanzas in Spenser's measure, relative to the countries he had visited." "They are not," he added, "worth troubling you with, but you shall have them all with you if you like." "So," says Dallas, "came I by _Childe Harold_. He took it from a small trunk, with a number of verses."

Dallas was "delighted," and on the evening of the same day (July 16)--before, let us hope, and not after, he had consulted his "Ionian friend," Walter Rodwell Wright (see _Recollections_, p. 151, and _Diary_ of H.C. Robinson, 1872, i. 17)--he despatched a letter of enthusiastic approval, which gratified Byron, but did not convince him of the extraordinary merit of his work, or of its certainty of success. It was, however, agreed that the MS. should be left with Dallas, that he should arrange for its publication and hold the copyright. Dallas would have entrusted the poem to Cawthorne, who had published _English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers,_ and with whom, as Byron's intermediary, he was in communication; but Byron objected on the ground that the firm did not "stand high enough in the trade," and Longmans, who had been offered but had declined the _English Bards_, were in no case to be approached. An application to Miller, of Albemarle Street, came to nothing, because Miller was Lord Elgin's bookseller and publisher (he had just brought out the _Memorandum on Lord Elgin's Pursuits in Greece_), and _Childe Harold_ denounced and reviled Lord Elgin. But Murray, of Fleet Street, who had already expressed a wish to publish for Lord Byron, was willing to take the matter into consideration. On the first of August Byron lost his mother, on the third his friend Matthews was drowned in the Cam, and for some weeks he could devote neither time nor thought to the fortunes of his poem; but Dallas had bestirred himself, and on the eighteenth was able to report that he had "seen Murray again," and that Murray was anxious that Byron's name should appear on the title-page.

To this request Byron somewhat reluctantly acceded (August 21); and a few days later (August 25) he informs Dallas that he has sent him "exordiums, annotations, etc., for the forthcoming quarto," and has written to Murray, urging him on no account to show the MS. to Juvenal, that is, Gifford. But Gifford, as a matter of course, had been already consulted, had read the First Canto, and had advised Murray to publish the poem. Byron was, or pretended to be, furious; but the solid fact that Gifford had commended his work acted like a charm, and his fury subsided. On the fifth of September (_Letters_, 1898, ii. 24, note) he received from Murray the first proof, and by December 14 "the Pilgrimage was concluded," and all but the preface had been printed and seen through the press.

The original draft of the poem, which Byron took out of "the little trunk" and gave to Dallas, had undergone considerable alterations and modifications before this date. Both Dallas and Murray took exception to certain stanzas which, on personal, or patriotic, or religious considerations, were provocative and objectionable. They were apprehensive, not only for the sale of the book, but for the reputation of its author. Byron fought his ground inch by inch, but finally assented to a compromise. He was willing to cut out three stanzas on the Convention of Cintra, which had ceased to be a burning question, and four more stanzas at the end of the First Canto, which reflected on the Duke of Wellington, Lord Holland, and other persons of less note. A stanza on Beckford in the First Canto, and two stanzas in the second on Lord Elgin, Thomas Hope, and the "Dilettanti crew," were also omitted. Stanza ix. of the Second Canto, on the immortality of the soul, was recast, and "sure and certain" hopelessness exchanged for a pious, if hypothetical, aspiration. But with regard to the general tenor of his politics and metaphysics, Byron stood firm, and awaited the issue.

There were additions as well as omissions. The first stanza of the First Canto, stanzas xliii. and xc., which celebrate the battles of Albuera and Talavera; the stanzas to the memory of Charles Skinner Matthews, nos. xci., xcii.; and stanzas ix., xcv., xcvi. of the Second Canto, which record Byron's grief for the death of an unknown lover or friend, apparently (letter to Dallas, October 31, 1811) the mysterious Thyrza, and others (_vide post_, note on the MSS. of the First and Second Cantos of _Childe Harold_), were composed at Newstead, in the autumn of 1811. _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_, quarto, was published on Tuesday, March 10, 1812--Moore (_Life_, p. 157) implies that the date of issue was Saturday, February 29; and Dallas (_Recollections_, p. 220) says that he obtained a copy on Tuesday, March 3 (but see advertisements in the _Times_ and _Morning Chronicle_ of Thursday, March 5, announcing future publication, and in the _Courier_ and _Morning Chronicle_ of Tuesday, March 10, announcing first appearance)--and in three days an edition of five hundred copies was sold. A second edition, octavo, with six additional poems (fourteen poems were included in the First Edition), was issued on April 17; a third on June 27; a fourth, with the "Addition to the Preface," on September 14; and a fifth on December 5, 1812,--the day on which Murray "acquainted his friends" (see advertisement in the _Morning Chronicle_) that he had removed from Fleet Street to No. 50, Albemarle Street. A sixth edition, identical with the fifth and fourth editions, was issued August 11, 1813; and, on February 1, 1814 (see letter to Murray, February 4, 1814), _Childe Harold_ made a "seventh appearance." The seventh edition was a new departure altogether. Not only were nine poems added to the twenty already published, but a dedication to Lady Charlotte Harley ("Ianthe"), written in the autumn of 1812, was prefixed to the First Canto, and ten additional stanzas were inserted towards the end of the Second Canto. _Childe Harold_, as we have it, differs to that extent from the _Childe Harold_ which, in a day and a night, made Byron "famous." The dedication to Ianthe was the outcome of a visit to Eywood, and his devotion to Ianthe's mother, Lady Oxford; but the new stanzas were probably written in 1810. In a letter to Dallas, September 7, 1811 (_Letters_, 1898, ii. 28), he writes, "I had projected an additional canto when I was in the Troad and Constantinople, and if I saw them again, it would go on." This seems to imply that a beginning had been made. In a poem, a hitherto unpublished fragment entitled _Il Diavolo Inamorato_ (_vide post_, vol. iii.), which is dated August 31, 1812, five stanzas and a half, viz. stanzas lxxiii. lines 5-9, lxxix., lxxx., lxxxi., lxxxii., xxvii. of the Second Canto of _Childe Harold_ are imbedded; and these form part of the ten additional stanzas which were first published in the seventh edition. There is, too, the fragment entitled _The Monk of Athos_, which was first published (_Life of Lord Byron_, by the Hon. Roden Noel) in 1890, which may have formed part of this projected Third Canto.

No further alterations were made in the text of the poem; but an eleventh edition of _Childe Harold_, Cantos I., II., was published in 1819.

The demerits of _Childe Harold_ lie on the surface; but it is difficult for the modern reader, familiar with the sight, if not the texture, of "the purple patches," and unattracted, perhaps demagnetized, by a personality once fascinating and always "puissant," to appreciate the actual worth and magnitude of the poem. We are "o'er informed;" and as with Nature, so with Art, the eye must be couched, and the film of association removed, before we can see clearly. But there is one characteristic feature of _Childe Harold_ which association and familiarity have been powerless to veil or confuse--originality of design. "By what accident," asks the Quarterly Reviewer (George Agar Ellis), "has it happened that no other English poet before Lord Byron has thought fit to employ his talents on a subject so well suited to their display?" The question can only be answered by the assertion that it was the accident of genius which inspired the poet with a "new song." _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ had no progenitors, and, with the exception of some feeble and forgotten imitations, it has had no descendants. The materials of the poem; the Spenserian stanza, suggested, perhaps, by Campbell's _Gertrude of Wyoming_, as well as by older models; the language, the metaphors, often appropriated and sometimes stolen from the Bible, from Shakespeare, from the classics; the sentiments and reflections coeval with reflection and sentiment, wear a familiar hue; but the poem itself, a pilgrimage to scenes and cities of renown, a song of travel, a rhythmical diorama, was Byron's own handiwork--not an inheritance, but a creation.

But what of the eponymous hero, the sated and melancholy "Childe," with his attendant page and yeoman, his backward glances on "heartless parasites," on "laughing dames," on goblets and other properties of "the monastic dome"? Is Childe Harold Byron masquerading in disguise, or is he intended to be a fictitious personage, who, half unconsciously, reveals the author's personality? Byron deals with the question in a letter to Dallas (October 31): "I by no means intend to identify myself with _Harold_, but to _deny_ all connection with him. If in parts I may be thought to have drawn from myself, believe me it is but in parts, and I shall not own even to that." He adds, with evident sincerity, "I would not be such a fellow as I have made my hero for all the world." Again, in the preface, "Harold is the child of imagination." This pronouncement was not the whole truth; but it is truer than it seems. He was well aware that Byron had sate for the portrait of Childe Harold. He had begun by calling his hero Childe Burun, and the few particulars which he gives of Childe Burun's past were particulars, in the main exact particulars, of Byron's own history. He had no motive for concealment, for, so little did he know himself, he imagined that he was not writing for publication, that he had done with authorship. Even when the mood had passed, it was the imitation of the _Ars Poetica_, not _Childe Harold_, which he was eager to publish; and when _Childe Harold_ had been offered to and accepted by a publisher, he desired and proposed that it should appear anonymously. He had not as yet come to the pass of displaying "the pageant of his bleeding heart" before the eyes of the multitude. But though he shrank from the obvious and inevitable conclusion that Childe Harold was Byron in disguise, and idly "disclaimed" all connection, it was true that he had intended to draw a fictitious character, a being whom he may have feared he might one day become, but whom he did not recognize as himself. He was not sated, he was not cheerless, he was not unamiable. He was all a-quiver with youth and enthusiasm and the joy of great living. He had left behind him friends whom he knew were not "the flatterers of the festal hour"--friends whom he returned to mourn and nobly celebrate. Byron was not Harold, but Harold was an ideal Byron, the creature and avenger of his pride, which haunted and pursued its presumptuous creator to the bitter end.

_Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ was reviewed, or rather advertised, by Dallas, in the _Literary Panorama_ for March, 1812. To the reviewer's dismay, the article, which appeared before the poem was out, was shown to Byron, who was paying a short visit to his old friends at Harrow. Dallas quaked, but "as it proved no bad advertisement," he escaped censure. "The blunder passed unobserved, eclipsed by the dazzling brilliancy of the object which had caused it" (_Recollections_, p. 221).

Of the greater reviews, the _Quarterly_ (No. xiii., March, 1812) was published on May 12, and the _Edinburgh_ (No. 38, June, 1812) was published on August 5, 1812.

NOTES ON THE MSS. OF _CHILDE HAROLD_.

I.

The original MS. of the First and Second Cantos of _Childe Harold_, consisting of ninety-one folios bound up with a single bluish-grey cover, is in the possession of Mr. Murray.[1] A transcript from this MS., in the handwriting of R. C. Dallas, with Byron's autograph corrections, is preserved in the British Museum (Egerton MSS., No. 2027). The first edition (4to) was printed from the transcript as emended by the author. The "Addition to the Preface" was first published in the Fourth Edition.

The following notes in Byron's handwriting are on the outside of the cover of the original MS.:--

"Byron--Joannina in Albania
Begun Oct. 31^st.^ 1809.
Concluded, Canto 2^d, Smyrna,
March 28^th^, 1810. BYRON.

The marginal remarks pencilled occasionally were made by two
friends who saw the thing in MS. sometime previous to publication.
1812."

On the verso of the single bluish-grey cover, the lines, "Dear Object of Defeated Care," have been inscribed. They are entitled, "Written beneath the picture of J. U. D." They are dated, "Byron, Athens, 1811."

The following notes and memoranda have been bound up with the MS.:--

"Henry Drury, Harrow. Given me by Lord Byron. Being his original
autograph MS. of the _first_ canto of _Childe Harold_, commenced at
Joannina in Albania, proceeded with at Athens, and completed at
Smyrna."

"How strange that he did not seem to know that the volume contains
Cantos I., II., and so written by L^d.^ B.!" [_Note by J. Murray._]

"Sir,--I desire that you will settle any account for _Childe
Harold_ with Mr. R. C. Dallas, to whom I have presented the
copyright.

Y^r.^ obed^t.^ Serv^t.,^
BYRON.
To Mr. John Murray,
Bookseller,
32, Fleet Street,
London, Mar. 17, 1812."

* * * * *

"Received, April 1st, 1812, of Mr. John Murray, the sum of one
hundred pounds 15/8, being my entire half-share of the profits of
the 1st Edition of _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_ 4to.

R. C. DALLAS.

{ Mem.: This receipt is for the above sum,
L101:15:8. { in part of five hundred guineas agreed to
{ be paid by Mr. Murray for the Copyright
{ of _Childe Harold's Pilgrimage_."

The following poems are appended to the MS. of the First and Second Cantos of _Childe Harold_:--

1. "Written at Mrs. Spencer Smith's request, in her memorandum-book--

"'As o'er the cold sepulchral stone.'"

2. "Stanzas written in passing the Ambracian Gulph, November 14, 1809."

3. "Written at Athens, January 16th, 1810--

"'The spell is broke, the charm is flown.'"

4. "Stanzas composed October 11, 1809, during the night in a thunderstorm, when the guides had lost the road to Zitza, in the range of mountains formerly called Pindus, in Albania."

On a blank leaf bound up with the MS. at the end of the volume, Byron wrote--

"Dear D^s.,--This is all that was contained in the MS., but the
outside cover has been torn off by the booby of a binder.
Yours ever,
B."

The volume is bound in smooth green morocco, bordered by a single gilt line. "MS." in gilt lettering is stamped on the side cover.

II.

COLLATION OF FIRST EDITION, QUARTO, 1812, WITH MS. OF THE FIRST CANTO.

The MS. numbers ninety-one stanzas, the First Edition ninety-three stanzas.

OMISSIONS FROM THE MS.

Stanza vii. "Of all his train there was a henchman page,"-- Stanza viii. "Him and one yeoman only did he take,"-- Stanza xxii. "Unhappy Vathek! in an evil hour,"-- Stanza xxv. "In golden characters right well designed,"-- Stanza xxvii. "But when Convention sent his handy work,"-- Stanza xxviii. "Thus unto Heaven appealed the people: Heaven,"-- Stanza lxxxviii. "There may you read with spectacles on eyes,"-- Stanza lxxxix. "There may you read--Oh, Phoebus, save Sir John,"-- Stanza xc. "Yet here of Vulpes mention may be made,"--

INSERTIONS IN THE FIRST EDITION.

Stanza i. "Oh, thou! in Hellas deemed of heavenly birth,"-- Stanza viii. "Yet oft-times in his maddest mirthful mood,"-- Stanza ix. "And none did love him!--though to hall and bower,"-- Stanza xliii. "Oh, Albuera! glorious field of grief!"-- Stanza lxxxv. "Adieu, fair Cadiz! yea, a long adieu!"-- Stanza lxxxvi. "Such be the sons of Spain, and strange her Fate,"-- Stanza lxxxviii. "Flows there a tear of Pity for the dead?"-- Stanza lxxxix. "Not yet, alas! the dreadful work is done,"-- Stanza xc. "Not all the blood at Talavera shed,"-- Stanza xci. "And thou, my friend!--since unavailing woe,"-- Stanza xcii. "Oh, known the earliest, and esteemed the most,"--

The MS. of the Second Canto numbers eighty stanzas; the First Edition numbers eighty-eight stanzas.

OMISSIONS FROM THE MS.

Stanza viii. "Frown not upon me, churlish Priest! that I,"-- Stanza xiv. "Come, then, ye classic Thieves of each degree,"-- Stanza xv. "Or will the gentle Dilettanti crew,"-- Stanza lxiii. "Childe Harold with that Chief held colloquy,"--

INSERTIONS IN THE FIRST EDITION.

Stanza viii. "Yet if, as holiest men have deemed, there be,"-- Stanza ix. "There, Thou! whose Love and Life together fled,"-- Stanza xv. "Cold is the heart, fair Greece! that looks on Thee,"-- Stanza lii. "Oh! where, Dodona! is thine aged Grove?"-- Stanza lxiii. "Mid many things most new to ear and eye,"-- Stanza lxxx. "Where'er we tread 'tis haunted, holy ground,"-- Stanza lxxxiii. "Let such approach this consecrated Land,"-- Stanza lxxxiv. "For thee, who thus in too protracted song,"-- Stanza lxxxv. "Thou too art gone, thou loved and lovely one!"-- Stanza lxxxvi. "Oh! ever loving, lovely, and beloved!"-- Stanza lxxxvii. "Then must I plunge again into the crowd,"-- Stanza lxxxviii. "What is the worst of woes that wait on Age?"--

ADDITIONS TO THE SEVENTH EDITION, 1814.

The Second Canto, in the first six editions, numbers eighty-eight stanzas; in the Seventh Edition the Second Canto numbers ninety-eight stanzas.

ADDITIONS.

The Dedication, To Ianthe. Stanza xxvii. "More blest the life of godly Eremite,"-- Stanza lxxvii. "The city won for Allah from the Giaour,"-- Stanza lxxviii. "Yet mark their mirth, ere Lenten days begin,"-- Stanza lxxix. "And whose more rife with merriment than thine,"-- Stanza lxxx. "Loud was the lightsome tumult on the shore,"-- Stanza lxxxi. "Glanced many a light Caique along the foam,"-- Stanza lxxxii. "But, midst the throng' in merry masquerade,"-- Stanza lxxxiii. "This must he feel, the true-born son of Greece,"-- Stanza lxxxix. "The Sun, the soil--but not the slave, the same,"-- Stanza xc. "The flying Mede, his shaftless broken bow,"--

ITINERARY.

1809. CANTO I.

July 2. Sail from Falmouth in Lisbon packet. (Stanza xii. Letter 125.)

July 6. Arrive Lisbon. (Stanzas xvi., xvii. Letter 126.)
Visit Cintra. (Stanzas xviii.-xxvi. Letter 128.)
Visit Mafra. (Stanza xxix.)

July 17. Leave Lisbon. (Stanza xxviii. Letter 127.)
Ride through Portugal and Spain to Seville.
(Stanzas xxviii.-xlii. Letter 127.)
Visit Albuera. (Stanza xliii.)

July 21. Arrive Seville. (Stanzas xlv., xlvi. Letters 127, 128.)

July 25. Leave Seville.
Ride to Cadiz, across the Sierra Morena. (Stanza li.)
Cadiz. (Stanzas lxv.-lxxxiv. Letters 127, 128.)