My Recollections of Lord Byron. contessa di Teresa Guiccioli
to bring her back to a sense of reason and of her duty. He was indulging in the hope that he had succeeded in these endeavors when, at a ball given by Lady Heathcote, Lady L——, after vain efforts to attract Byron's attention, went up to him and asked him whether she might waltz. Byron replied, half-absently, that he saw no reason why she should not; upon which her pride and her passion became so excited that she seized hold of a knife, and feigned to commit suicide. The ball was at once at an end, and all London was soon filled with accounts of this incident. Lady L—— had scarcely recovered from the slight wound she had inflicted on herself, when she wrote to a young peer, and made him all kinds of extravagant promises, if he would consent to call out Byron and kill him. This, however, did not prevent her calling again upon Lord Byron, not, however, says Medwin, with the intention of blowing his brains out; as he was not at home, she wrote on one of his books
"Remember me."
On returning home, Byron read what she had written, and, filled with disgust and indignation, he wrote the famous lines
"Remember thee! Ay, doubt it not,"
and sent her back several of her letters sealed up. "Glenarvon" was her revenge. She painted Byron in fiendish colors, giving herself all the qualities he possessed, so as to appear an angel, and to him all the passions of the "Giaour," of the "Corsair," and of "Childe Harold," so that he might be taken for a demon.
In this novel, the result of revenge, truth asserts its rights, notwithstanding all the contradictions of which the book is full. Thus Lady L—— can not help depicting Byron under some of his real characteristics. She was asked, for instance, what she thought of him, when she met him for the first time after hearing of his great reputation, and she answers, while gazing at the soft loveliness of his smile—
"What do I think? I think that never did the hand of God imprint upon a human form so lovely, so glorious an expression."
And further she adds:—
"Never did the Sculptor's hand, in the sublimest product of his talent, imagine a form and a face so exquisite, so full of animation or so varied in expression. Can one see him without being moved? Oh! is there in the nature of woman the possibility of listening to him, without cherishing every word he utters? and having listened to him once, is it possible for any human heart ever to forget those accents which awaken every sentiment and calm every fear?"
Again:—
"Oh better far to have died than to see or listen to Glenarvon. When he smiled, his smile was like the light of heaven; his voice was more soothing from its softness than the softest music. In his manner there was such a charm, that it would have been vain to affect even to be offended by its sweetness."
But while she was obliged to obey the voice of passion and of truth, she took on the other hand as a motto to her novel that of the "Corsair," which even applied to the "Corsair" is not altogether just, for he was gifted with more than "one virtue:—"
"He left a Corsair's name to other times,
Link'd with one virtue and a thousand crimes."
It is, however, fair to add, that this revenge became the punishment of the heroine; she never again found any rest, struggled against a troubled mind, and never succeeded in forgetting her love. It is even said that, diseased in mind and body, she was one day walking along one of the alleys of her beautiful place, on the road to Newstead Abbey, when she saw a funeral procession coming up the road in the direction of Newstead. Having inquired whose funeral it was, and being told it was that of the great poet, whose mortal remains were being conveyed to their last resting-place, she fainted, and died a few days afterward. His name was the last word she uttered, and this she did with love and despair. In London, and wherever the authoress was known, the book had no success, but the case was different abroad and in the provinces.
Attracted as he always was toward all that is good, great, and sincere, Byron was wont to break the monotony of his retired life in the villa Diodati by frequent visits to Madame de Staël at her country-seat, "Coppet." She was the first who mentioned "Glenarvon" to him, and when Murray wrote to him on the subject, Byron simply replied—
"Of Glenarvon, Madame de Staël told me (ten days ago at Coppet) marvellous and grievous things; but I have seen nothing of it but the motto, which promises amiably 'for us and for our tragedy' … 'a name to all succeeding,' etc. The generous moment selected for the publication is probably its kindest accompaniment, and, truth to say, the time was well chosen."[11]
"I have not even a guess at its contents," said he, and he really attached no importance to its publication. But a few days later he had a proof of the bad effect which its appearance had produced, for all this venom against him had so poisoned the mind of a poor old woman of sixty-three, an authoress, that on Lord Byron entering Madame de Staël's drawing-room one afternoon, she fainted, or feigned to do so. Poor soul! a writer of novels herself, and probably most partial to such reading, she had, no doubt, from the perusal of "Glenarvon" gleaned the idea that she had before her eyes that hideous monster of seduction and perpetrator of crimes who was therein depicted!
At last Lord Byron read this too famous novel, and wrote to Moore as follows on the subject:—
"Madame de Staël lent me 'Glenarvon' last autumn. It seems to me that if the author had written the truth, and nothing but the truth, and the whole truth, the novel might not only have been more romantic but more amusing. As for the likeness, it can not be good, I did not sit long enough for it."
From Venice Byron wrote as follows to Murray, in consequence of a series of articles which appeared in Germany, where a serious view had been taken of the novel of "Glenarvon:"—
"An Italian translation of 'Glenarvon' was lately printed at Venice. The censor (Sgr. Petrolini) refused to sanction the publication till he had seen me on the subject. I told him that I did not recognize the slightest relation between that book and myself; but that, whatever opinions might be held on that subject, I would never prevent or oppose the publication of any book in any language, on my own private account, and desired him (against his inclination) to permit the poor translator to publish his labors. It is going forward in consequence. You may say this, with my compliments, to the author."[12]
Madame de Staël had a great affection for Lord Byron, but his detractors had found their way into her house.[13] Among these was a distinguished lawyer, who had never been injured by any speech or word of Lord Byron, but who, setting him self up as an amateur enemy of the poet, had, under an anonymous designation, been one of his bitterest detractors in the "Edinburgh Review," on the occasion of the publication of his early poems. This same lawyer endeavored to gain Madame de Staël over to his opinion of Byron's merit, probably on account of the very knowledge that he had of the harm he had done him; hatred, like nobility, has its obligations. But Madame de Staël, who, on reading "Farewell," was wont to say that she wished almost she had been as unfortunate as Lady Byron, was too elevated in mind and too noble in character to listen quietly to the abuse of Byron in which his enemies indulged. She, however, tried to induce Lord Byron to become reconciled to his wife, on the ground that one should never struggle against the current of public opinion. Madame de Staël actually succeeded in obtaining his permission to endeavor to effect this reconciliation; but the lawyer before mentioned used every argument to prevent her pursuing this project of mediation.
Lord Byron's biographers have told how Lady Byron received this proposal; which, after the way in which he had been treated, appears to have been, on the part of Byron, an act of almost superhuman generosity. Such an offer should have moved any being gifted with a heart and a soul. But I will not here speak of her refusal and of its consequences; all I wish to state is, that the calumnies put forward against him being too absurd for Byron to condescend to notice, assumed a degree of consistency which deceived the public, and even made dupes of superior men, who in their turn contributed to make dupes of others. At this time, then, when the war and the continental blockade were at an