Chapter 45

behaviour," her "fits of phrenzy," her "caprices," "passions," and so forth; and there is convincing proof--see _Life_, pp. 28, 306; _Letters_, 1898, ii. 122 (incident at Bellingham's execution); _Letters_, 1901, vi. 179 (_Le Diable Boiteux_)--that he regarded the contraction of the muscles of his legs as a more or less repulsive deformity. And yet, to quote one of a hundred testimonies,--"with regard to Lord Byron's features, Mr. Mathews observed, that he was the only man he ever contemplated, to whom he felt disposed to apply the word _beautiful_" (_Memoirs of Charles Matthews_, 1838, ii. 380). The looker-on or the consoler computes the magnitude and the liberality of the compensation. The sufferer thinks only of his sufferings.]

[205] {478}[So, too, Prospero to Caliban, _Tempest_, act i. sc. 2, line 309, etc.]

[206] {479}[Compare--"Have not partook oppression." _Marino Faliero_,