by Lord Byron
And the Quarterly say that I must have been bribed.
“‘You see how I’m puzzled; I don’t say it wouldn’t
Be pleasant just now to have just that amount:
But to take it in gold or in bank-notes! — I couldn’t,
I wouldn’t accept it — on any account.
“‘But couldn’t you just write your Autobiography,
All fearless and personal, bitter and stinging?
Sure that, with a few famous heads in lithography,
Would bring me far more than my Songs or my singing.
“‘You know what I did for poor Sheridan’s Life;
Your’s is sure of my very best superintendence;
I’ll expunge what might point at your sister or wife, —
And I’ll thus keep my priceless, unbought independence!’
“The Giant smiled grimly: he couldn’t quite see
What diff’rence there was on the face of the earth,
Between the Dwarf’s taking the money in fee,
And his taking the same thing in that money’s worth.
“But to please him he wrote; and the business was done:
The Dwarf went immediately off to ‘the Row;’
And ere the next night had pass’d over the sun,
The Memoirs were purchas’d by Longman and Co.
“W. Gyngell, Showman, Bartholomew Fair.”
APPENDIX VII — Attacks on Lord Byron in the Newspapers for February and March, 1814
I: The Courier
(1) Lord Byron (The Courier, February 1, 1814).
A new Poem has just been published by the above Nobleman, and the Morning Chronicle of to-day has favoured its readers with his Lordship’s Dedication of it to Thomas Moore, Esq., in what that paper calls “an elegant eulogium.” If the elegance of an eulogium consist in its extravagance, the Chronicle’s epithet is well chosen. But our purpose is not with the Dedication, nor the main Poem, The Corsair, but with one of the pieces called Poems, published at the end of the Corsair. Nearly two years ago (in March, 1812), when the Regent was attacked with a bitterness and rancour that disgusted the whole country; when attempts were made day after day to wound every feeling of the heart; there appeared in the Morning Chronicle an anonymous Address to a Young Lady weeping, upon which we remarked at the time (Courier of March 7, 1812), considering it as tending to make the Princess Charlotte of Wales view the Prince Regent her father as an object of suspicion and disgrace. Few of our readers have forgotten the disgust which this address excited. The author of it, however, unwilling that it should sleep in the oblivion to which it had been consigned with the other trash of that day, has republished it, and, placed the first of what are called Poems at the end of this newly published work the Corsair, we find this very address:
“Weep daughter of a royal line,
A Sire’s disgrace, a realm’s decay;”
Lord Byron thus avows himself to be the Author.
To be sure the Prince has been extremely disgraced by the policy he has adopted, and the events which that policy has produced; and the realm has experienced great decay, no doubt, by the occurrences in the Peninsula, the resistance of Russia, the rising in Germany, the counter-revolution in Holland, and the defeat, disgrace, and shame of Buonaparte. But, instead of continuing our observations, suppose we parody his Lordship’s Address, and apply it to February 1814:
To a Young Lady.
February, 1814.
“View! daughter of a royal line,
A father’s fame, a realm’s renown:
Ah! happy that that realm is thine,
And that its father is thine own!
“View, and exulting view, thy fate,
Which dooms thee o’er these blissful Isles
To reign, (but distant be the date!)
And, like thy Sire, deserve thy People’s smiles.”
(2) The Courier, February 2, 1814.
Lord Byron, as we stated yesterday, has discovered and promulgated to the world, in eight lines of choice doggrel, that the realm of England is in decay, that her Sovereign is disgraced, and that the situation of the country is one which claims the tears of all good patriots. To this very indubitable statement, the Morning Chronicle of this day exhibits an admirable companion picture, a genuine letter from Paris, of the 25th ult.
(3) The Courier, February 3, 1814
“The Courier is indignant,” says the Morning Chronicle, “at the discovery now made by Lord BYRON, that he was the author of ‘the Verses to a Young Lady weeping,’ which were inserted about a twelvemonth ago in the Morning Chronicle. The Editor thinks it audacious in a hereditary Counsellor of the King to admonish the Heir Apparent. It may not be courtly but it is certainly British, and we wish the kingdom had more such honest advisers.”
The discovery of the author of the verses in question was not made by Lord Byron. How could it be? When he sent them to the Chronicle, without his name, he was just as well informed about the author as he is now that he has published them in a pamphlet, with his name. The discovery was made to the public. They did not know in March, 1812, what they know in February, 1814. They did not suspect then what they now find avowed, that a Peer of the Realm was the Author of the attack upon the Prince; of the attempt to induce the Princess Charlotte of Wales to think that her father was an object not of reverence and regard, but of disgrace.
But we “think it audacious in an hereditary Counsellor of the King to admonish the Heir Apparent.” No! we do not think it audacious: it is constitutional and proper. But are anonymous attacks the constitutional duty of a Peer of the Realm? Is that the mode in which he should admonish the Heir Apparent? If Lord Byron had desired to admonish the Prince, his course was open, plain, and known — he could have demanded an audience of the Prince; or, he could have given his admonition in Parliament. But to level such an attack — What! — ”Kill men i’ the dark!” This, however, is called by the Chronicle “certainly British,” though it might not be courtly, and a strong wish is expressed that “the country had many more such honest advisers” or admonishers. — Admonishers indeed! A pretty definition of admonition this, which consists not in giving advice, but in imputing blame, not in openly proffering counsel, but in secretly pointing censure.
(4) Byroniana No. 1 (The Courier, February 5, 1814).
The Lord Byron has assumed such a poetico-political and such a politico-poetical air and authority, that in our double capacity of men of letters and politicians, he forces himself upon our recollection. We say recollection for reasons which will bye and by, be obvious to our readers, and will lead them to wonder why this young Lord, whose greatest talent it is to forget, and whose best praise it would be to be forgotten, should be such an enthusiastic admirer of Mr. Sam Rogers’s Pleasures of Memory.
The most virulent satirists have ever been the most nauseous panegyrists, and they are for the most part as offensive by the praise as by the abuse which they scatter.
His Lordship does not degenerate from the character of those worthy persons, his poetical ancestors:
“The mob of Gentlemen who wrote with ease”
who of all authors dealt the most largely in the alternation of flattery and filth. He is the severest satirical and the civilest dedicator of our day; and what completes his reputation for candour, good feeling, and honesty, is that the persons whom he most reviles, and to whom he most fulsomely dedicates, are identically the same.
We shall indulge our readers with a few instances: — the most obvious case, because the most recent, is that of Mr. Thomas Moore, to whom he has dedicated, as we have already stated, his last pamphlet; but as we wish to proceed orderly, we shall postpone this and revert to some instances prior in order of time; we shall afterwards show that his Lordship strictly adheres to Horace’s rule, in maintaining to the end the ill character in which he appeared at the outset. His Lordship’s first dedication was to his guardian and relative, the Earl of Carlisle
. So late as the year 1808, we find that Lord Byron was that noble Lord’s “most affectionate kinsman, etc., etc.”
Hear how dutifully and affectionately this ingenuous young man celebrates, in a few months after (1809), the praises of his friend:
“No Muse will cheer with renovating smile,
The paralytic puling of Carlisle;
What heterogeneous honours deck the Peer,
Lord, rhymester, petit-maitre, pamphleteer!
So dull in youth, so drivelling in age,
His scenes alone had damn’d our sinking stage.
But Managers, for once, cried ‘hold, enough,’
Nor drugg’d their audience with the tragic stuff.
Yet at their judgment let his Lordship laugh,
And case his volumes in congenial calf:
Yes! doff that covering where Morocco shines,
And hang a calf-skin on those recreant lines.”
And in explanation of this affectionate effusion, our lordly dedicator subjoins a note to inform us that Lord Carlisle’s works are splendidly bound, but that “the rest is all but leather and prunella,” and a little after, in a very laborious note, in which he endeavours to defend his consistency, he out-Herods Herod, or to speak more forcibly, out-Byrons Byron, in the virulence of his invective against “his guardian and relative, to whom he dedicated his volume of puerile poems.” Lord Carlisle has, it seems, if we are to believe his word, for a series of years, beguiled “the public with reams of most orthodox, imperial nonsense,” and Lord Byron concludes by asking,
“What can ennoble knaves, or fools, or cowards?
Alas! not all the blood of all the Howards.”
“So says Pope,” adds Lord Byron. But Pope does not say so; the words “knaves and fools,” are not in Pope, but interpolated by Lord Byron, in favour of his “guardian and relative.” Now, all this might have slept in oblivion with Lord Carlisle’s Dramas, and Lord Byron’s Poems; but if this young Gentleman chooses to erect himself into a spokesman of the public opinion, it becomes worth while to consider to what notice he is entitled; when he affects a tone of criticism and an air of candour, he obliges us to enquire whether he has any just pretensions to either, and when he arrogates the high functions of public praise and public censure, we may fairly inquire what the praise or censure of such a being is worth:
“Thus bad begins, but worse remains behind.”
(5) Byroniana No. 2 (The Courier, February 8, 1814)
.
“Crede Byron” is Lord Byron’s armorial motto; Trust Byron is the translation in the Red-book. We cannot but admire the ingenuity with which his Lordship has converted the good faith of his ancestors into a sarcasm on his own duplicity.
“Could nothing but your chief reproach,
Serve for a motto on your coach?”
Poor Lord Carlisle; he, no doubt, trusted in his affectionate ward and kinsman, and we have seen how the affectionate ward and kinsman acknowledged, like Macbeth, “the double trust” only to abuse it. We shall now show how much another Noble Peer, Lord Holland, has to trust to from his ingenuous dedicator.
Some time last year Lord Byron published a Poem, called The Bride of Abydos, which was inscribed to Lord Holland, “with every sentiment of regard and respect by his gratefully obliged and sincere friend, Byron.” “Grateful and sincere!” Alas! alas; ‘tis not even so good as what Shakespeare, in contempt, calls “the sincerity of a cold heart.” “Regard and respect!” Hear with what regard, and how much respect, he treats this identical Lord Holland. In a tirade against literary assassins (a class of men which Lord Byron may well feel entitled to describe), we have these lines addressed to the Chief of the Critical Banditti:
“Known be thy name, unbounded be thy sway,
Thy Holland’s banquets shall each toil repay,
While grateful Britain yields the praise she owes,
To Hollands hirelings, and to learnings foes!”
By which it appears, that
“ — These wolves that still in darkness prowl;
This coward brood, which mangle, as their prey,
By hellish instinct, all that cross their way;”
are hired by Lord Holland, and it follows, very naturally, that the “hirelings” of Lord Holland must be the “foes of learning.”
This seems sufficiently caustic; but hear, how our dedicator proceeds:
“Illustrious Holland! hard would be his lot,
His hirelings mention’d, and himself forgot!
Blest be the banquets spread at Holland House,
Where Scotchmen feed, and Critics may carouse!
Long, long, beneath that hospitable roof
Shall Grub-street dine, while duns are kept aloof,
And grateful to the founder of the feast
Declare the Landlord can translate, at least!”
Lord Byron has, it seems, very accurate notions of gratitude, and the word “grateful” in these lines, and in his dedication of The Bride of Abydos, has a delightful similarity of meaning. His Lordship is pleased to add, in an explanatory note to this passage, that Lord Holland’s life of Lopez de Vega, and his translated specimens of that author, are much “Bepraised by these disinterested guests.” Lord Byron well knows that bepraise and bespatter are almost synonimous. There was but one point on which he could have any hope of touching Lord Holland more nearly; and of course he avails himself, in the most gentlemanly and generous manner, of the golden opportunity.
When his club of literary assassins is assembled at Lord Holland’s table, Lord Byron informs us
“That lest when heated with the unusual grape,
Some glowing thoughts should to the press escape,
And tinge with red the female reader’s cheek,
My Lady skims the cream of each critique;
Breathes o’er each page her purity of soul,
Reforms each error, and refines the whole.”
Our readers will, no doubt, duly appreciate the manliness and generosity of these lines; but, to encrease their admiration, we beg to remind them that the next time Lord Byron addresses Lord Holland, it is to dedicate to him, in all friendship, sincerity, and gratitude, the story of a young, a pure, an amiable, and an affectionate bride!
The verses were bad enough, but what shall be said, after such verses, of the insult of such a dedication!
We forbear to extract any further specimens of this peculiar vein of Lord Byron’s satire; our “gorge rises at it,” and we regret to have been obliged to say so much. And yet Lord Byron is, “with all regard and respect, Lord “Holland’s sincere and grateful friend!” It reminds us of the respect which Lear’s daughters shewed their father, and which the poor old king felt to be “worse than murder.”
Some of our readers may perhaps observe that, personally, Lord Holland was not so ill-treated as Lord Carlisle; but let it be recollected, that Lord Holland is only an acquaintance, while Lord Carlisle was “guardian and relation,” and had therefore peculiar claims to the ingratitude of a mind like Lord Byron’s.
Trust Byron, indeed! “him,” as Hamlet says
“Him, I would trust as I would adders fang’d.”
(6) Byroniana No. 3 (The Courier, February 12, 1814). Crede Byron — ”Trust Byron.”
We have seen Lord Byron’s past and present opinions of two Noble Persons whom he has honoured with his satire, and vilified by his dedications; let us now compare the evidence which he has given at different and yet not distant times, on the merits of his third Dedicatee, Mr. Thomas Moore. To him Lord Byron has inscribed his last poem as a person “of unshaken public principle, and the most undoubted and various talents; as the firmest of Irish patriots, and the first of Irish bards.”
Before we proceed to give Lord Byron’s own judgment of this “firmest of patriots,” and this “best of poets,” we must be allowed to say, that though we consider Mr. Moore as a very good writer of songs, we should very much compla
in of the poetical supremacy assigned to him, if Lord Byron had not qualified it by calling him the first only of Irish poets, and, as we suppose his Lordship must mean, of Irish poets of the present day. The title may be, for aught we know to the contrary, perfectly appropriate; but we cannot conceive how Mr. Moore comes by the high-sounding name of “patriot;” what pretence there is for such an appellation; by what effort of intellect or of courage he has placed his name above those idols of Irish worship, Messrs. Scully, Connell, and Dromgoole. Mr. Moore has written words to Irish tunes; so did Burns for his national airs; but who ever called Burns the “firmest of patriots” on the score of his contributions to the Scots Magazine?
Mr. Moore, we are aware, has been accused of tuning his harpsichord to the key-note of a faction, and of substituting, wherever he could, a party spirit for the spirit of poetry: this, in the opinion of most persons, would derogate even from his poetical character, but we hope that Lord Byron stands alone in considering that such a prostitution of the muse entitles him to the name of patriot. Mr. Moore, it seems, is an Irishman, and, we believe, a Roman Catholic; he appears to be, at least in his poetry, no great friend to the connexion of Ireland with England. One or two of his ditties are quoted in Ireland as laments upon certain worthy persons whose lives were terminated by the hand of the law, in some of the unfortunate disturbances which have afflicted that country; and one of his most admired songs begins with a stanza, which we hope the Attorney-General will pardon us for quoting:
“Let Erin remember the days of old,
Ere her faithless sons betrayed her,
When Malachy wore the collar of gold,
Which he won from her proud Invader;
When her Kings, with standard of green unfurl’d,
Led the Red Branch Knights to danger,
Ere, the emerald gem of the western world,
Was set in the crown of a Stranger.”
This will pretty well satisfy an English reader, that, if it be any ingredient of patriotism to promote the affectionate connexion of the English isles under the constitutional settlement made at the revolution and at the union; and if the foregoing verses speak Mr. Moore’s sentiments, he has the same claims to the name of “patriot” that Lord Byron has to the title of “trustworthy;” but if these and similar verses do not speak Mr. Moore’s political sentiments, then undoubtedly he has never written, or at least published any thing relating to public affairs; and Lord Byron has no kind of pretence for talking of the political character and public principles of an humble individual who is only known as the translator of Anacreon, and the writer, composer, and singer of certain songs, which songs do not (ex-hypothesi) speak the sentiments even of the writer himself.