VII.

"A strange example of the force of Law, And hasty temper on a kindling mind-- Are these the dreams his young Ambition saw? Poor fellow! he had better far been blind! I'm sorry thus to probe a wound so raw-- But, then, as Bard my duty to Mankind, For warning to the rest, compels these raps-- As Geographers lay down a Shoal in Maps."

[[*A] For Brougham's Fabian tactics with regard to duelling, _vide post_, Canto XIII. stanza lxxxiv. line 1, p. 506, note 1.]

[[*B] _Vide post_, Canto XIII. stanza lxxxiv. line 1, p. 506, note 1.]

[[*C] For "Captain Bobadill, a Paul's man," see Ben Jonson's _Every Man in his Humour_, act iv. sc. 5, _et passim_.]

[[*D] The _N. Eng. Dict._, quotes a passage in _Phil. Trans._, iv. 286 (1669), as the latest instance of "courtisan" for "courtier."]

NOTE TO THE ANNEXED STANZAS ON BROUGHAM.

"Distrusted by the Democracy, disliked by the Whigs, and detested by the Tories, too much of a lawyer for the people, and too much of a demagogue for Parliament, a contestor of counties, and a Candidate for cities, the refuse of half the Electors of England, and representative at last upon sufferance of the proprietor of some rotten borough, which it would have been more independent to have purchased, a speaker upon all questions, and the outcast of all parties, his support has become alike formidable to all his enemies (for he has no friends), and his vote can be only valuable when accompanied by his Silence. A disappointed man with a bad temper, he is endowed with considerable but not first-rate abilities, and has blundered on through life, remarkable only for a fluency, in which he has many rivals at the bar and in the Senate, and an eloquence in which he has several Superiors. 'Willing to wound and _not_ afraid to strike, until he receives a blow in return, he has not yet betrayed any illegal ardour, or Irish alacrity, in accepting the defiances, and resenting the disgraceful terms which his proneness to evil-speaking have (sic) brought upon him. In the cases of Mackinnon and Manners,[*E] he sheltered himself behind those parliamentary privileges, which Fox, Pitt, Canning, Castlereagh, Tierney, Adam, Shelburne, Grattan, Corry, Curran, and Clare disdained to adopt as their buckler. The House of Commons became the Asylum of his Slander, as the Churches of Rome were once the Sanctuary of Assassins.

"His literary reputation (with the exception of one work of his early career) rests upon some anonymous articles imputed to him in a celebrated periodical work; but even these are surpassed by the Essays of others in the same Journal. He has tried every thing and succeeded in nothing; and he may perhaps finish as a Lawyer without practice, as he has already been occasionally an orator without an audience, if not soon cut short in his career.

"The above character is _not_ written impartially, but by one who has had occasion to know some of the baser parts of it, and regards him accordingly with shuddering abhorrence, and just so much fear as he deserves. In him is to be dreaded the crawling of the centipede, not the spring of the tiger--the venom of the reptile, not the strength of the animal--the rancour of the miscreant, not the courage of the Man.

"In case the prose or verse of the above should be actionable, I put my name, that the man may rather proceed against me than the publisher--not without some faint hope that the brand with which I blast him may induce him, however reluctantly, to a manlier revenge."

[*E] [Possibly George Manners (1778-1853), editor of _The Satirist_, whose appointment to a foreign consulate Brougham sharply criticized in the House of Commons, July 9, 1817 (_Parl. Deb._, vol. xxxvi. pp. 1320, 1321); and Daniel Mackinnon (1791-1836), the nephew of Henry Mackinnon, who fell at Ciudad Rodrigo. Byron met "Dan" Mackinnon at Lisbon in 1809, and (Gronow, _Reminiscences_, 1889, ii. 259, 260) was amused by his "various funny stories."]

EXTRACT FROM LETTER TO MURRAY.

"I enclose you the stanzas which were intended for 1st Canto, after the line

'Who to Madrid on purpose made a journey:'

but I do not mean them for present publication, because I will not, at this distance, publish _that_ of a Man, for which he has a claim upon another too remote to give him redress.

"With regard to the Miscreant Brougham, however, it was only long after the fact, and I was made acquainted with the language he had held of me on my leaving England (with regard to the D^ss^ of D.'s house),[*F] and his letter to Me. de Staël, and various matters for all of which the first time he and I foregather--be it in England, be it on earth--he shall account, and one of the two be carried home.

"As I have no wish to have mysteries, I merely prohibit the _publication_ of these stanzas in _print_, for the reasons of fairness mentioned; but I by no means wish _him not_ to _know_ their existence or their tenor, nor my intentions as to himself: he has shown no forbearance, and he shall find none. You may show them to _him_ and to all whom it may concern, with the explanation that the only reason that I have not had satisfaction of this man has been, that I have never had an opportunity since I was aware of the facts, which my friends had carefully concealed from me; and it was only by slow degrees, and by piecemeal, that I got at them. I have not sought him, nor gone out of my way for him; but I will _find_ him, and then we can have it out: he has shown so little courage, that he _must_ fight at last in his absolute necessity to escape utter degradation.

"I send you the stanzas, which (except the last) have been written nearly two years, merely because I have been lately copying out most of the MSS. which were in my drawers."

[*F] [Byron's town-house, in 1815-1816, No. 13, Piccadilly, belonged to the Duchess of Devonshire. When he went abroad in April, 1816, the rent was still unpaid. The duchess, through her agent, distrained, but was unable to recover the debt. See Byron's "Letter to Elizabeth, Duchess of Devonshire," November 3, 1817, _Letters_, 1900, iv. 178.]

{71}[ak] _Julia was sent into a nunnery_, _And there, perhaps, her feelings may be better_.--[MS. M.]

[al] _Man's love is of his life_----.--[MS. M.]

[84] ["Que les hommes sont heureux d'aller à la guerre, d'exposer leur vie, de se livrer à l'enthousiasme de l'honneur et du danger! Mais il n'y a rien au-dehors qui soulage les femmes."--_Corinne, ou L'Italie_, Madame de Staël, liv., xviii. chap. v. ed. 1835, iii. 209.]

[am] _To mourn alone the love which has undone._ or, _To lift our fatal love to God from man._

Take that which, of these three, seems the best prescription.--B.

{72}[an] _You will proceed in beauty and in pride_, _You will return_----.--[MS. M.]

[ao] / fatal now \ Or, _That word is < lost for me >--but let it go_.--[MS. M.] \ deadly now /

[ap] _I struggle, but can not collect my mind_.--[MS.]

[aq] _As turns the needle trembling to the pole_ _It ne'er can reach--so turns to you my soul_.--[MS.]

[ar] _With a neat crow-quill, rather hard, but new_.--[MS.]

{73}[85] [Byron had a seal bearing this motto.]

[as] _And there are other incidents remaining_ _Which shall be specified in fitting time,_ _With good discretion, and in current rhyme_.--[MS.]

{74}[at] _To newspapers, to sermons, which the zeal_ _Of pious men have published on his acts_.--[MS.]

[au] _I'll call the work "Reflections o'er a Bottle_."--[MS.]

[86] [Here, and elsewhere in _Don Juan_, Byron attacked Coleridge fiercely and venomously, because he believed that his _protégé_ had accepted patronage and money, and, notwithstanding, had retailed scandalous statements to the detriment and dishonour of his advocate and benefactor (see letter to Murray, November 24, 1818, _Letters_, 1900, iv. 272; and "Introduction to the _Vision of Judgment," Poetical Works_, 1901, iv. 475). Byron does not substantiate his charge of ingratitude, and there is nothing to show whether Coleridge ever knew why a once friendly countenance was changed towards him. He might have asked, with the Courtenays, _Ubi lapsus, quid feci?_ If Byron had been on his mind or his conscience he would have drawn up an elaborate explanation or apology; but nothing of the kind is extant. He took the abuse as he had taken the favours--for the unmerited gifts of the blind goddess Fortune. (See, too, _Letter_ ..., by John Bull, 1821, p. 14.)]

{76}[87] [Compare Byron's "Letter to the Editor of My Grandmother's Review," _Letters_, 1900, iv. Appendix VII. 465-470; and letter to Murray, August 24, 1819, ibid., p. 348: "I wrote to you by last post, enclosing a buffooning letter for publication, addressed to the buffoon Roberts, who has thought proper to tie a canister to his own tail. It was written off-hand, and in the midst of circumstances not very favourable to facetiousness, so that there may, perhaps, be more bitterness than enough for that sort of small acid punch." The letter was in reply to a criticism of _Don Juan_ (Cantos I., II.) in the _British Review_ (No. xxvii., 1819, vol. 14, pp. 266-268), in which the Editor assumed, or feigned to assume, that the accusation of bribery was to be taken _au grand sérieux_.]

{77}[88] [Hor., _Od._ III. C. xiv. lines 27, 28.]

[av] _I thought of dyeing it the other day_.--[MS.]

[89] [Compare _Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza cvii. line 2.]

{78}[90]

"Me nec femina, nec puer Jam, nec spes animi credula mutui, Nec certare juvat mero; Nec vincire novis tempora floribus."

Hor., _Od._ IV. i. 30.

[In the revise the words _nec puer Jam_ were omitted. On this Hobhouse comments, "Better add the whole or scratch out all after femina."--"Quote the whole then--it was only in compliance with your _settentrionale_ notions that I left out the remnant of the line."--[B.]]

[91] [For "How Fryer Bacon made a Brazen head to speak," see _The Famous Historie of Fryer Bacon_ (Reprint, London, 1815, pp. 13-18); see, too, _Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay_, by Robert Greene, ed. Rev. Alexander Dyce, 1861, pp. 153-181.]

[92]

["Ah! who can tell how hard it is to climb The steep where Fame's proud temple shines afar?" etc.

Beattie's _Minstrel_, Bk. I. stanza i. lines 1, 2.]

{79}[aw] _A book--a damned bad picture--and worse bust_.--[MS.]

["Don't swear again--the third 'damn.'"--[H.]--[_Revise._]]

[93] [Byron sat for his bust to Thorwaldsen, in May, 1817.]

[94] [This stanza appears to have been suggested by the following passage in the _Quarterly Review_, April, 1818, vol. xix. p. 203: "[It was] the opinion of the Egyptians, that the soul never deserted the body while the latter continued in a perfect state. To secure this union, King Cheops is said, by Herodotus, to have employed three hundred and sixty thousand of his subjects for twenty years in raising over the 'angusta domus' destined to hold his remains, a pile of stone equal in weight to six millions of tons, which is just three times that of the vast Breakwater thrown across Plymouth Sound; and, to render this precious dust still more secure, the narrow chamber was made accessible only by small, intricate passages, obstructed by stones of an enormous weight, and so carefully closed externally as not to be perceptible.--Yet, how vain are all the precautions of man! Not a bone was left of Cheops, either in the stone coffin, or in the vault, when Shaw entered the gloomy chamber.]

{80}[ax] _Must bid you both farewell in accents bland_.--[MS.]

[95] [Lines 1-4 are taken from the last stanza of the _Epilogue to the Lay of the Laureate_, entitled "L'Envoy." (See _Poetical Works_ of Robert Southey, 1838, x. 174.)]

CANTO THE SECOND.[96]