Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (With Byron's Biography). Lord Byron
In that case the "silver streamlet" may be identified as the Caia. Beckford remarks on "the rivulet which separates the two kingdoms" (Italy, etc., 1834, p. 291).]
bs But eer the bounds of Spain have far been passed.—[MS. D.]
bt For ever famed—in many a native song.—[MS. erased.] ——a noted song.—[MS. D.]
57 [Compare Virgil, Æneid, i. 100—
"Ubi tot Simois correpta sub undis
Scuta virûm galeasque et fortia corpora volvit."]
58 [The standard, a cross made of Asturian oak (La Cruz de la Victoria), which was said to have fallen from heaven before Pelayo gained the victory over the Moors at Cangas, in A.D. 718, is preserved at Oviedo. Compare Southey's Roderick, XXV.: Poetical Works, 1838, ix. 241, and note, pp. 370, 371.]
bu —which Pelagius bore.—[MS. D.]
59 [The Moors were finally expelled from Granada in 1492, in the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella.]
bv ——waxed the Crescent pale.—[MS. erased.]
60 [The reference is to the Romanceros and Caballerías of the sixteenth century.]
bw ——thy little date.—[MS. erased.]
bx ——from rock to rock Blue columns soaring loft in sulphury wreath Fragments on fragments in contention knock.—[MS. erased, D.]
61 "The Siroc is the violent hot wind that for weeks together blows down the Mediterranean from the Archipelago. Its effects are well known to all who have passed the Straits of Gibraltar."—[MS. D.]
62 [The battle of Talavera began July 27, 1809, and lasted two days. As Byron must have reached Seville by the 21st or 22nd of the month, he was not, as might be inferred, a spectator of any part of the engagement. Writing to his mother, August 11, he says, "You have heard of the battle near Madrid, and in England they would call it a victory—a pretty victory! Two hundred officers and five thousand men killed, all English, and the French in as great force as ever. I should have joined the army, but we have no time to lose before we get up the Mediterranean."—Letters, i. 241.]
by Their rival scarfs that shine so gloriously.—[MS. erased.] Their rural scarfs——.—[MS. D.]
63 [Compare Campbell's "Hohenlinden"—"Few, few shall part where many meet."]
64 [Compare Macbeth, act i. sc. 2, line 51—"Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky."]
65 [In a letter to Colonel Malcolm, December 3, 1809, the Duke admits that the spoils of conquest were of a moral rather than of a material kind. "The battle of Talavera was certainly the hardest fought of modern days.... It is lamentable that, owing to the miserable inefficiency of the Spaniards, ... the glory of the action is the only benefit which we have derived from it.... I have in hand a most difficult task.... In such circumstances one may fail, but it would be dishonourable to shrink from the task."—Wellington Dispatches, 1844, iii. 621.]
bz There shall they rot—while rhymers tell the fools How honour decks the turf that wraps their clay! Liars avaunt!——.—[MS.]
66 Two lines of Collins' Ode, "How sleep the brave," etc., have been compressed into one—
"There Honour comes a pilgrim grey,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay."
ca But Reason's elf in these beholds——.—[D.]
cb ——a fancied throne As if they compassed half that hails their sway.—[MS. erased.]
cc ——glorious sound of grief.—[D.]
67 [The battle of Albuera (May 16, 1811), at which the English, under Lord Beresford, repulsed Soult, was somewhat of a Pyrrhic victory. "Another such a battle," wrote the Duke, "would ruin us. I am working hard to put all right again." The French are said to have lost between 8000 and 9000 men, the English 4158, the Spaniards 1365.]
cd A scene for mingling foes to boast and bleed.—[D.]
ce Yet peace be with the perished—-.—[D. erased.]
cf And tears and triumph make their memory long.—[D. erased.]
cg ——there sink with other woes.—[D. erased.]
68 [Albuera was celebrated by Scott, in his Vision of Don Roderick. The Battle of Albuera, a Poem (anon.), was published in October, 1811.]
ch Who sink in darkness——.—[MS. erased.]
ci ——swift Rapines path pursued.—[MS. D.]
cj To Harold turn we as——.—[MS. erased.]
69 [In this "particular" Childe Harold did not resemble his alter ego. Hobhouse and "part of the servants" (Joe Murray, Fletcher, a German, and the "page" Robert Rushton, constituted his "whole suite"), accompanied Byron in his ride across Spain from Lisbon to Gibraltar. (See Letters, 1898, i. 224, 236.)]
ck Where proud Sevilha——.—[MS. D.]
70 [Byron, en route