Chapter 24

"La Mira, near Venice, August 21. 1817.

"I take you at your word about Mr. Hanson, and will feel obliged if you will _go_ to him, and request Mr. Davies also to visit him by my desire, and repeat that I trust that neither Mr. Kinnaird's absence nor mine will prevent his taking all proper steps to accelerate and promote the sale of Newstead and Rochdale, upon which the whole of my future personal comfort depends. It is impossible for me to express how much any delays upon these points would inconvenience me; and I do not know a greater obligation that can be conferred upon me than the pressing these things upon Hanson, and making him act according to my wishes. I wish you would _speak out_, at least to _me_, and tell me what you allude to by your cold way of mentioning him. All mysteries at such a distance are not merely tormenting but mischievous, and may be prejudicial to my interests; so, pray expound, that I may consult with Mr. Kinnaird when he arrives; and remember that I prefer the most disagreeable certainties to hints and innuendoes. The devil take every body: I never can get any person to be explicit about any thing or any body, and my whole life is passed in conjectures of what people mean: you all talk in the style of C * * L * *'s novels.

"It is not Mr. St. John, but _Mr. St. Aubyn_, son of Sir John St. Aubyn. _Polidori_ knows him, and introduced him to me. He is of Oxford, and has got my parcel. The Doctor will ferret him out, or ought. The parcel contains many letters, some of Madame de Staël's, and other people's, besides MSS., &c. By ----, if I find the gentleman, and he don't find the parcel, I will say something he won't like to hear.

"You want a 'civil and delicate declension' for the medical tragedy? Take it--

"Dear Doctor, I have read your play, Which is a good one in its way,-- Purges the eyes and moves the bowels, And drenches handkerchiefs like towels With tears, that, in a flux of grief, Afford hysterical relief To shatter'd nerves and quicken'd pulses, Which your catastrophe convulses. "I like your moral and machinery; Your plot, too, has such scope for scenery! Your dialogue is apt and smart; The play's concoction full of art; Your hero raves, your heroine cries, All stab, and every body dies. In short, your tragedy would be The very thing to hear and see: And for a piece of publication, If I decline on this occasion, It is not that I am not sensible To merits in themselves ostensible, But--and I grieve to speak it--plays Are drugs, mere drugs, sir--now-a-days. I had a heavy loss by 'Manuel,'-- Too lucky if it prove not annual,-- And S * *, with his 'Orestes,' (Which, by the by, the author's best is,) Has lain so very long on hand That I despair of all demand. I've advertised, but see my books, Or only watch my shopman's looks;-- Still Ivan, Ina, and such lumber, My back-shop glut, my shelves encumber. "There's Byron too, who once did better, Has sent me, folded in a letter, A sort of--it's no more a drama Than Darnley, Ivan, or Kehama; So alter'd since last year his pen is, I think he's lost his wits at Venice. In short, sir, what with one and t'other, I dare not venture on another. I write in haste; excuse each blunder; The coaches through the street so thunder! My room's so full--we've Gifford here Reading MS., with Hookham Frere, Pronouncing on the nouns and particles Of some of our forthcoming Articles. "The Quarterly--Ah, sir, if you Had but the genius to review!-- A smart critique upon St. Helena, Or if you only would but tell in a Short compass what--but, to resume: As I was saying, sir, the room-- The room's so full of wits and bards, Crabbes, Campbells, Crokers, Freres, and Wards, And others, neither bards nor wits:-- My humble tenement admits All persons in the dress of gent., From Mr. Hammond to Dog Dent. "A party dines with me to-day, All clever men, who make their way; They're at this moment in discussion On poor De Staël's late dissolution. Her book, they say, was in advance-- Pray Heaven, she tell the truth of France! "Thus run our time and tongues away.-- But, to return, sir, to your play: Sorry, sir, but I cannot deal, Unless 'twere acted by O'Neill. My hands so full, my head so busy, I'm almost dead, and always dizzy; And so, with endless truth and hurry, Dear Doctor, I am yours,

"JOHN MURRAY.

"P.S. I've done the fourth and last Canto, which amounts to 133 stanzas. I desire you to name a price; if you don't, _I_ will; so I advise you in time.

"Yours, &c.

"There will be a good many notes."

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Among those minor misrepresentations of which it was Lord Byron's fate to be the victim, advantage was, at this time, taken of his professed distaste to the English, to accuse him of acts of inhospitality, and even rudeness, towards some of his fellow-countrymen. How far different was his treatment of all who ever visited him, many grateful testimonies might be collected to prove; but I shall here content myself with selecting a few extracts from an account given me by Mr. Henry Joy of a visit which, in company with another English gentleman, he paid to the noble poet this summer, at his villa on the banks of the Brenta. After mentioning the various civilities they had experienced from Lord Byron; and, among others, his having requested them to name their own day for dining with him,--"We availed ourselves," says Mr. Joy, "of this considerate courtesy by naming the day fixed for our return to Padua, when our route would lead us to his door; and we were welcomed with all the cordiality which was to be expected from so friendly a bidding. Such traits of kindness in such a man deserve to be recorded on account of the numerous slanders thrown upon him by some of the tribes of tourists, who resented, as a personal affront, his resolution to avoid their impertinent inroads upon his retirement. So far from any appearance of indiscriminate aversion to his countrymen, his enquiries about his friends in England (_quorum pars magna fuisti_) were most anxious and particular.

"He expressed some opinions," continues my informant, "on matters of taste, which cannot fail to interest his biographer. He contended that Sculpture, as an art, was vastly superior to Painting;--a preference which is strikingly illustrated by the fact that, in the fourth Canto of Childe Harold, he gives the most elaborate and splendid account of several statues, and none of any pictures; although Italy is, emphatically, the land of painting, and her best statues are derived from Greece. By the way, he told us that there were more objects of interest in Rome alone than in all Greece from one extremity to the other. After regaling us with an excellent dinner, (in which, by the by, a very English joint of roast beef showed that he did not extend his antipathies to all John-Bullisms,) he took me in his carriage some miles of our route towards Padua, after apologising to my fellow-traveller for the separation, on the score of his anxiety to hear all he could of his friends in England; and I quitted him with a confirmed impression of the strong ardour and sincerity of his attachment to those by whom he did not fancy himself slighted or ill treated."

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