The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4

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_Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza xii. lines 1, 2,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 223.]

[w]

_And more than I then could foresee._
_I have met but the fate that hath crost me._--[MS.]

[x] _In the wreck of the past_--[MS.]

[y]

_In the Desert there still are sweet waters,_
_In the wild waste a sheltering tree._--[MS.]

[81] [Byron often made use of this illustration. Compare--

"My Peri! ever welcome here!
Sweet, as the desert fountain's wave."

_The Bride of Abydos_, Canto I. lines 151, 152,
_Poetical Works_, 1900, iii. 163.]

[82] [For Hobhouse's parody of these stanzas, see _Letters_, 1900, iv.
73,74.]

[83] {57}[These stanzas--"than which," says the _Quarterly Review_ for
January, 1831, "there is nothing, perhaps, more mournfully and
desolately beautiful in the whole range of Lord Byron's poetry," were
also written at Diodati, and sent home to be published, if Mrs. Leigh
should consent. She decided against publication, and the "Epistle" was
not printed till 1830. Her first impulse was to withhold her consent to
the publication of the "Stanzas to Augusta," as well as the "Epistle,"
and to say, "Whatever is addressed to me do not publish," but on second
thoughts she decided that "the _least objectionable_ line will be _to
let them be published_."--See her letters to Murray, November 1, 8,
1816, _Letters_, 1899, iii. 366, note 1.]

[z]

_Go where thou wilt thou art to me the same_--
_A loud regret which I would not resign_.--[MS.]

[84] [Compare--

"Oh! that the Desert were my dwelling-place,
With one fair Spirit for my minister!"

_Childe Harold_, Canto IV. stanza clxxvii. lines 1, 2,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 456.]

[aa] _But other cares_----.--[MS.]

[ab] _A strange doom hath been ours, but that is past_.--[MS.]

[85] ["Admiral Byron was remarkable for never making a voyage without a
tempest. He was known to the sailors by the facetious name of
'Foul-weather Jack' [or 'Hardy Byron'].

"'But, though it were tempest-toss'd,
Still his bark could not be lost.'

He returned safely from the wreck of the _Wager_ (in Anson's voyage),
and many years after circumnavigated the world, as commander of a
similar expedition" (Moore). Admiral the Hon. John Byron (1723-1786),
next brother to William, fifth Lord Byron, published his _Narrative_ of
his shipwreck in the _Wager_ in 1768, and his _Voyage round the World_
in the _Dolphin_, in 1767 (_Letters_, 1898, i. 3).]

[ac] {58}

_I am not yet o'erwhelmed that I shall ever lean_
_A thought upon such Hope as daily mocks_.--[MS. erased.]

[86] [For Byron's belief in predestination, compare _Childe Harold_,
Canto I. stanza lxxxiii. line 9, _Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 74, note
1.]

[ad] {59}_For to all such may change of soul refer_.--[MS.]

[ae]

_Have hardened me to this--but I can see_
_Things which I still can love--but none like thee_.--[MS. erased.]

[af]

{_Before I had to study far more useless books_.--[MS. erased,]
{_Ere my young mind was fettered down to books_.

[ag] _Some living things_-----.--[MS.]

[87] [Compare--

"Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt
In solitude, when we are _least_ alone."

_Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza xc. lines 1, 2,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 272]

[88] {60}[For a description of the lake at Newstead, see _Don Juan_,
Canto XIII. stanza lvii.]

[ah] _And think of such things with a childish eye._--[MS.]

[89] {61}[Compare--

"He who first met the Highland's swelling blue,
Will love each peak, that shows a kindred hue,
Hail in each crag a friend's familiar face,
And clasp the mountain in his mind's embrace."

_The Island_, Canto II. stanza xii. lines 9-12.

His "friends are mountains." He comes back to them as to a "holier
land," where he may find not happiness, but peace.

Moore was inclined to attribute Byron's "love of mountain prospects" in
his childhood to the "after-result of his imaginative recollections of
that period," but (as Wilson, commenting on Moore, suggests) it is
easier to believe that the "high instincts" of the "poetic child" did
not wait for association to consecrate the vision (_Life_, p. 8).]

[ai]

_The earliest were the only paths for me._
_The earliest were the paths and meant for me._--[MS. erased.]

[aj]

_Yet could I but expunge from out the book_
_Of my existence all that was entwined._--[MS. erased.]

[ak]

_My life has been too long--if in a day_
_I have survived_----.--[MS. erased.]

[90] {62}[Byron often insists on this compression of life into a yet
briefer span than even mortality allows. Compare--

"He, who grown aged in this world of woe,
In deeds, not years, piercing the depths of life," etc.

_Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza v. lines 1, 2,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 218, note 1.

Compare, too--

"My life is not dated by years--
There are moments which act as a plough," etc.

_Lines to the Countess of Blessington_, stanza 4.]

[al] _And for the remnants_----.--[MS.]

[am] _Whate'er betide_----.--[MS.]

[an] _We have been and we shall be_----.--[MS. erased.]

[91] {63}["These verses," says John Wright (ed. 1832, x. 207), "of which
the opening lines (1-6) are given in Moore's _Notices_, etc. (1830, ii.
36), were written immediately after the failure of the negotiation ...
[i.e. the intervention] of Madame de Stael, who had persuaded Byron 'to
write a letter to a friend in England, declaring himself still willing
to be reconciled to Lady Byron' (_Life_, p. 321), but were not intended
for the public eye." The verses were written in September, and it is
evident that since the composition of _The Dream_ in July, another
"change had come over" his spirit, and that the mild and courteous
depreciation of his wife as "a gentle bride," etc., had given place to
passionate reproach and bitter reviling. The failure of Madame de
Stael's negotiations must have been to some extent anticipated, and it
is more reasonable to suppose that it was a rumour or report of the "one
serious calumny" of Shelley's letter of September 29, 1816, which
provoked him to fury, and drove him into the open maledictions of _The
Incantation_ (published together with the _Prisoner of Chillon_, but
afterwards incorporated with _Manfred_, act i. sc. 1, _vide post_, p.
91), and the suppressed "lines," written, so he told Lady Blessington
(_Conversations, etc._, 1834, p. 79) "on reading in a newspaper" that
Lady Byron had been ill.]

[92] [Compare--

" ... that unnatural retribution--just,
Had it but been from hands less near."

_Childe Harold_, Canto IV. stanza cxxxii. lines 6, 7,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 427.]

[93] {64}[Compare--

"Though thy slumber may be deep,
Yet thy Spirit shall not sleep.

* * * * *

Nor to slumber nor to die,
Shall be in thy destiny."

_The Incantation_, lines 201, 202, 254, 255, _Manfred_,
act i. sc. 1, _vide post_, pp. 92, 93.]

[94] [Compare "I suppose now I shall never be able to shake off my
sables in public imagination, more particularly since my moral ...
[Clytemnestra?] clove down my fame" (Letter to Moore, March 10, 1817,
_Letters_, 1900, iv. 72). The same expression, "my _moral_
Clytemnestra," is applied to his wife in a letter to Lord Blessington,
dated April 6, 1823. It may be noted that it was in April, 1823, that
Byron presented a copy of the "Lines," etc., to Lady Blessington
(_Conversations, etc._, 1834, p. 79).]

[95] {65}[Compare--

"By thy delight in others' pain."

_Manfred_, act i. sc. i, line 248, _vide post_, p. 93.]

[96] [Compare--

" ... but that high Soul secured the heart,
And panted for the truth it could not hear."

_A Sketch_, lines 18, 19, _Poetical Works_, 1900, iii. 541.]

[97] [Compare _Childe Harold_, Canto IV. stanza cxxxvi. lines 6-9,
_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 430.]

MONODY ON THE DEATH

OF

THE RIGHT HON. R. B. SHERIDAN.

INTRODUCTION TO _MONODY ON THE DEATH OF THE RIGHT HON. R. B. SHERIDAN._

When Moore was engaged on the Life of Sheridan, Byron gave him some
advice. "Never mind," he says, "the angry lies of the humbug Whigs.
Recollect that he was an Irishman and a clever fellow, and that we have
had some very pleasant days with him. Don't forget that he was at school
at Harrow, where, in my time, we used to show his name--R. B. Sheridan,
1765--as an honour to the walls. Depend upon it that there were worse
folks going, of that gang, than ever Sheridan was" (Letter to Moore,
September 19, 1818, _Letters_, 1900, iv. 261).

It does not appear that Byron had any acquaintance with Sheridan when he
wrote the one unrejected Address which was spoken at the opening of
Drury Lane Theatre, October 10, 1812, but that he met him for the first
time at a dinner which Rogers gave to Byron and Moore, on or before June
1, 1813. Thenceforward, as long as he remained in England (see his
letter to Rogers, April 16, 1816, _Letters,_ 1899, iii 281, note 1), he
was often in his company, "sitting late, drinking late," not, of course,
on terms of equality and friendship (for Sheridan was past sixty, and
Byron more than thirty years younger), but of the closest and
pleasantest intimacy. To judge from the tone of the letter to Moore
(_vide supra_) and of numerous entries in his diaries, during Sheridan's
life and after his death, he was at pains not to pass judgment on a man
whom he greatly admired and sincerely pitied, and whom he felt that he
had no right to despise. Body and soul, Byron was of different stuff
from Sheridan, and if he "had lived to his age," he would have passed
over "the red-hot ploughshares" of life and conduct, not unscathed, but
stoutly and unconsumed. So much easier is it to live down character than
to live through temperament.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan (born October 30, 1751) died July 7, 1816.
_The Monody_ was written at the Campagne Diodati, on July 17, at the
request of Douglas Kinnaird. "I did as well as I could," says Byron;
"but where I have not my choice I pretend to answer for nothing" (Letter
to Murray, September 29, 1816, _Letters_, 1899, iii. 366). He told Lady
Blessington, however, that his "feelings were never more excited than
while writing it, and that every word came direct from the heart"
(_Conversations, etc._, p. 241).

The MS., in the handwriting of Claire, is headed, "Written at the
request of D. Kinnaird, Esq., Monody on R. B. Sheridan. Intended to be
spoken at Dy. L^e.^ T. Diodati, Lake of Geneva, July 18^th^, 1816.
Byron."

The first edition was entitled _Monody on the Death of the Right
Honourable R.B. Sheridan_. Written at the request of a Friend. To be
spoken at Drury Lane Theatre, London. Printed for John Murray, Albemarle
Street, 1816.

It was spoken by Mrs. Davison at Drury Lane Theatre, September 7, and
published September 9, 1816.

When the _Monody_ arrived at Diodati Byron fell foul of the title-page:
"'The request of a Friend:'--

'Obliged by Hunger and request of friends.'

"I will request you to expunge that same, unless you please to add, 'by
a person of quality, or of wit and honour about town.' Merely say,
'written to be spoken at D[rury] L[ane]'" (Letter to Murray, September
30, 1816, _Letters,_ 1899, iii. 367). The first edition had been issued,
and no alteration could be made, but the title-page of a "New Edition,"
1817, reads, "_Monody, etc._ Spoken at Drury Lane Theatre. By Lord
Byron."]

MONODY ON THE DEATH

OF THE

RIGHT HON. R. B. SHERIDAN,

SPOKEN AT DRURY-LANE THEATRE, LONDON.

When the last sunshine of expiring Day
In Summer's twilight weeps itself away,
Who hath not felt the softness of the hour
Sink on the heart, as dew along the flower?
With a pure feeling which absorbs and awes
While Nature makes that melancholy pause--
Her breathing moment on the bridge where Time
Of light and darkness forms an arch sublime--
Who hath not shared that calm, so still and deep,
The voiceless thought which would not speak but weep, 10
A holy concord, and a bright regret,
A glorious sympathy with suns that set?[98]
'Tis not harsh sorrow, but a tenderer woe,
Nameless, but dear to gentle hearts below,
Felt without bitterness--but full and clear,
A sweet dejection--a transparent tear,
Unmixed with worldly grief or selfish stain--
Shed without shame, and secret without pain.
Even as the tenderness that hour instils
When Summer's day declines along the hills, 20
So feels the fulness of our heart and eyes
When all of Genius which can perish dies.
A mighty Spirit is eclipsed--a Power
Hath passed from day to darkness--to whose hour
Of light no likeness is bequeathed--no name,
Focus at once of all the rays of Fame!
The flash of Wit--the bright Intelligence,
The beam of Song--the blaze of Eloquence,
Set with their Sun, but still have left behind
The enduring produce of immortal Mind; 30
Fruits of a genial morn, and glorious noon,
A deathless part of him who died too soon.
But small that portion of the wondrous whole,
These sparkling segments of that circling Soul,
Which all embraced, and lightened over all,
To cheer--to pierce--to please--or to appal.
From the charmed council to the festive board,
Of human feelings the unbounded lord;
In whose acclaim the loftiest voices vied,
The praised--the proud--who made his praise their pride. 40
When the loud cry of trampled Hindostan
Arose to Heaven in her appeal from Man,
His was the thunder--his the avenging rod,
The wrath--the delegated voice of God!
Which shook the nations through his lips, and blazed
Till vanquished senates trembled as they praised.[99]

And here, oh! here, where yet all young and warm,
The gay creations of his spirit charm,[100]
The matchless dialogue--the deathless wit,
Which knew not what it was to intermit; 50
The glowing portraits, fresh from life, that bring
Home to our hearts the truth from which they spring;
These wondrous beings of his fancy, wrought
To fulness by the fiat of his thought,
Here in their first abode you still may meet,
Bright with the hues of his Promethean heat;
A Halo of the light of other days,
Which still the splendour of its orb betrays.
But should there be to whom the fatal blight
Of failing Wisdom yields a base delight, 60
Men who exult when minds of heavenly tone
Jar in the music which was born their own,
Still let them pause--ah! little do they know
That what to them seemed Vice might be but Woe.
Hard is his fate on whom the public gaze
Is fixed for ever to detract or praise;
Repose denies her requiem to his name,
And Folly loves the martyrdom of Fame.
The secret Enemy whose sleepless eye
Stands sentinel--accuser--judge--and spy. 70
The foe, the fool, the jealous, and the vain,
The envious who but breathe in other's pain--
Behold the host! delighting to deprave,
Who track the steps of Glory to the grave,
Watch every fault that daring Genius owes
Half to the ardour which its birth bestows,
Distort the truth, accumulate the lie,
And pile the Pyramid of Calumny!
These are his portion--but if joined to these
Gaunt Poverty should league with deep Disease, 80
If the high Spirit must forget to soar,
And stoop to strive with Misery at the door,[101]
To soothe Indignity--and face to face
Meet sordid Rage, and wrestle with Disgrace,
To find in Hope but the renewed caress,
The serpent-fold of further Faithlessness:--
If such may be the Ills which men assail,
What marvel if at last the mightiest fail?
Breasts to whom all the strength of feeling given
Bear hearts electric-charged with fire from Heaven, 90
Black with the rude collision, inly torn,
By clouds surrounded, and on whirlwinds borne,
Driven o'er the lowering atmosphere that nurst
Thoughts which have turned to thunder--scorch, and burst.[ao]

But far from us and from our mimic scene
Such things should be--if such have ever been;
Ours be the gentler wish, the kinder task,
To give the tribute Glory need not ask,
To mourn the vanished beam, and add our mite
Of praise in payment of a long delight. 100
Ye Orators! whom yet our councils yield,
Mourn for the veteran Hero of your field!
The worthy rival of the wondrous _Three!_[102]
Whose words were sparks of Immortality!
Ye Bards! to whom the Drama's Muse is dear,
He was your Master--emulate him _here_!
Ye men of wit and social eloquence![103]
He was your brother--bear his ashes hence!
While Powers of mind almost of boundless range,[104]
Complete in kind, as various in their change, 110
While Eloquence--Wit--Poesy--and Mirth,
That humbler Harmonist of care on Earth,
Survive within our souls--while lives our sense
Of pride in Merit's proud pre-eminence,
Long shall we seek his likeness--long in vain,
And turn to all of him which may remain,
Sighing that Nature formed but one such man,
And broke the die--in moulding Sheridan![105]

FOOTNOTES:

[98] {71}[Compare--

"As 'twere the twilight of a former Sun."

_Churchill's Grave,_ line 26, _vide ante,_ p. 48.]

[99] {72}[Sheridan's first speech on behalf of the Begum of Oude was
delivered February 7, 1787. After having spoken for five hours and forty
minutes he sat down, "not merely amidst cheering, but amidst the loud
clapping of hands, in which the Lords below the bar and the strangers in
the Gallery joined" (_Critical ... Essays,_ by T. B. Macaulay, 1843, iii.
443). So great was the excitement that Pitt moved the adjournment of the
House. The next year, during the trial of Warren Hastings, he took part
in the debates on June 3,6,10,13, 1788. "The conduct of the part of the
case relating to the Princesses of Oude was intrusted to Sheridan. The
curiosity of the public to hear him was unbounded.... It was said that
fifty guineas had been paid for a single ticket. Sheridan, when he
concluded, contrived ... to sink back, as if exhausted, into the arms of
Burke, who hugged him with the energy of generous admiration"
(_ibid.,_iii 451, 452).]

[100] [_The Rivals, The Scheming Lieutenant_, and _The Duenna_ were
played for the first time at Covent Garden, January 17, May 2, and
November 21, 1775. _A Trip to Scarborough_ and the _School for Scandal_
were brought out at Drury Lane, February 24 and May 8, 1777; the
_Critic_, October 29, 1779; and _Pizarro_, May 24, 1799.]

[101] {73}[Only a few days before his death, Sheridan wrote thus to
Rogers: "I am absolutely undone and broken-hearted. They are going to
put the carpets out of window, and break into Mrs. S.'s room and _take
me_. For God's sake let me see you!" (Moore's _Life of Sheridan_, 1825,
ii. 455).

The extent and duration of Sheridan's destitution at the time of his
last illness and death have been the subject of controversy. The
statements in Moore's _Life_ (1825) moved George IV. to send for Croker
and dictate a long and circumstantial harangue, to the effect that
Sheridan and his wife were starving, and that their immediate
necessities were relieved by the (then) Prince Regent's agent, Taylor
Vaughan (Croker's _Correspondence and Diaries_, 1884, i. 288-312). Mr.
Fraser Rae, in his _Life of Sheridan_ (1896, ii. 284), traverses the
king's apology in almost every particular, and quotes a letter from
Charles Sheridan to his half-brother Tom, dated July 16, 1816, in which
he says that his father "almost slumbered into death, and that the
reports ... in the newspapers (_vide_, e.g., _Morning Chronicle_, July,
1816) of the privations and want of comforts were unfounded."

Moore's sentiments were also expressed in "some verses" (_Lines on the
Death of SH--R--D--N_), which were published in the newspapers, and are
reprinted in the _Life_, 1825, ii. 462, and _Poetical Works_, 1850, p.
400--

"How proud they can press to the funeral array
Of one whom they shunned in his sickness and sorrow!
How bailiffs may seize his last blanket to-day,
Whose pall shall be held up by nobles to-morrow.

* * * * *

Was _this_, then, the fate of that high-gifted man,
The pride of the palace, the bower, and the hall,
The orator--dramatist--minstrel, who ran
Through each mode of the lyre, and was master of all?"]

[ao] {74}

_Abandoned by the skies, whose teams have nurst_
_Their very thunders, lighten--scorch, and burst_.--[MS.]

[102] {75}Fox--Pitt--Burke. ["I heard Sheridan only once, and that
briefly; but I liked his voice, his manner, and his wit: he is the only
one of them I ever wished to hear at greater length."--_Detached
Thoughts_, 1821, _Letters_, 1901, v. 413.]

[103] ["In society I have met Sheridan frequently: he was superb!... I
have seen him cut up Whitbread, quiz Madame de Stael, annihilate Colman,
and do little less by some others ... of good fame and abilities.... I
have met him in all places and parties, ... and always found him very
convivial and delightful."--_Ibid_., pp. 413, 414.]

[104] ["The other night we were all delivering our respective and
various opinions on him, ... and mine was this:--'Whatever Sheridan has
done or chosen to do has been, _par excellence_, always the _best_ of
its kind. He has written the _best_ comedy (_School for Scandal_), the
_best_ drama (in my mind, far before that St. Giles's lampoon, the
_Beggars Opera_), the best farce (the _Critic_--it is only too good for
a farce), and the best Address ('Monologue on Garrick'), and, to crown
all, delivered the very best Oration (the famous Begum Speech) ever
conceived or heard in this country.'"--_Journal_, December 17, 1813,
_Letters_, 1898, ii. 377.]

[105] [It has often been pointed out (_e.g. Notes and Queries_, 1855,
Series I. xi. 472) that this fine metaphor may be traced to Ariosto's
_Orlando Furioso_. The subject is Zerbino, the son of the King of
Scotland--

"Non e vu si bello in tante altre persone:
Natura il fece e poi ruppe la stampa."

Canto X. stanza lxxxiv. lines 5, 6.]

MANFRED:

A DRAMATIC POEM.

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
[_Hamlet,_ Act i. Scene 5, Lines 166, 167.

[_Manfred_, a choral tragedy in three acts, was performed at Covent
Garden Theatre, October 29-November 14, 1834 [Denvil (afterwards known
as "Manfred" Denvil) took the part of "Manfred," and Miss Ellen Tree
(afterwards Mrs. Charles Kean) played "The Witch of the Alps"]; at Drury
Lane Theatre, October 10, 1863-64 [Phelps played "Manfred," Miss Rosa Le
Clercq "The Phantom of Astarte," and Miss Heath "The Witch of the
Alps"]; at the Prince's Theatre, Manchester, March 27-April 20, 1867
[Charles Calvert played "Manfred"]; and again, in 1867, under the same
management, at the Royal Alexandra Theatre, Liverpool; and at the
Princess's Theatre Royal, London, August 16, 1873 [Charles Dillon played
"Manfred;" music by Sir Henry Bishop, as in 1834].

_Overtures, etc._

"Music to Byron's _Manfred_" (overture and incidental music and
choruses), by R. Schumann, 1850.

"Incidental Music," composed, in 1897, by Sir Alexander Campbell
Mackenzie (at the request of Sir Henry Irving); heard (in part only) at
a concert in Queen's Hall, May, 1899.

"_Manfred_ Symphony" (four tableaux after the Poem by Byron), composed
by Tschaikowsky, 1885; first heard in London, autumn, 1898.]

INTRODUCTION TO _MANFRED_

Byron passed four months and three weeks in Switzerland. He arrived at
the Hotel d'Angleterre at Secheron, on Saturday, May 25, and he left the
Campagne Diodati for Italy on Sunday, October 6, 1816. Within that
period he wrote the greater part of the Third Canto of _Childe Harold_,
he began and finished the _Prisoner of Chillon_, its seven attendant
poems, and the _Monody_ on the death of Sheridan, and he began
_Manfred_.