Life of Lord Byron Novel Chapters
List of most recent chapters published for the Life of Lord Byron novel. A total of 208 chapters have been translated and the release date of the last chapter is Apr 02, 2024
Latest Release: Chapter 1 : Life of Lord Byron.Vol. I.by Thomas Moore.PREFACE TO THE FIRST VOLUME OF THE FIRST EDITI
Life of Lord Byron.Vol. I.by Thomas Moore.PREFACE TO THE FIRST VOLUME OF THE FIRST EDITION.[1]In presenting these Volumes to the public I should have felt, I own, considerable diffidence, from a sincere distrust in my own powers of doing justice to such a
- 101 "If there is no remedy in law, there is at least the equitable one of making known his _guilt_,--that is, his silver-_gilt_, and be d----d to him."I shall carefully preserve all the purchases I made of him on that occasion for my return, as the plague i
- 102 "I wrote again to you lately, but I hope you won't be sorry to have another epistle. I have been unwell this last month, with a kind of slow and low fever, which fixes upon me at night, and goes off in the morning; but, however, I am now better. In spri
- 103 &c.) which have already been given in one of his letters to myself.]LETTER 269. TO MR. MOORE."Venice, March 31. 1817."You will begin to think my epistolary offerings (to whatever altar you please to devote them) rather prodigal. But until you answer, I
- 104 Life of Lord Byron.Vol. IV.by Thomas Moore.LETTER 272. TO MR. MURRAY."Venice, April 9. 1817."Your letters of the 18th and 20th are arrived. In my own I have given you the rise, progress, decline, and fall, of my recent malady. It is gone to the devil: I
- 105 _Abbot._ Thus, without prelude:--Age and zeal, my office, And good intent, must plead my privilege; Our near, though not acquainted neighbourhood, May also be my herald. Rumours strange, And of unholy nature, are abroad, And busy with thy name--a n.o.ble
- 106 _Her._ Come, be friendly; Relate me some, to while away our watch: I've heard thee darkly speak of an event Which happened hereabouts, by this same tower._Manuel._ That was a night indeed! I do remember 'Twas twilight, as it may be now, and such Another
- 107 Why they did it, or who did it, I know not; but so it is;--I suppose, for the English people. I will send you a copy."LETTER 279. TO MR. MOORE."Rome, May 12. 1817."I have received your letter here, where I have taken a cruise lately; but I shall return
- 108 "N."LETTER 284. TO MR. MURRAY."La Mira, near Venice, June 17. 1817."It gives me great pleasure to hear of Moore's success, and the more so that I never doubted that it would be complete. Whatever good you can tell me of him and his poem will be most
- 109 "La Mira, Venice, July 10. 1817."Murray, the Mokanna of booksellers, has contrived to send me extracts from Lalla Rookh by the post. They are taken from some magazine, and contain a short outline and quotations from the two first Poems. I am ver
- 110 Croker's cover. You have destroyed the whole effect and moral of the poem by omitting the last line of Manfred's speaking; and why this was done, I know not. Why you persist in saying nothing of the thing itself, I am equally at a loss to conjec
- 111 "The other day I wrote to convey my proposition with regard to the fourth and concluding Canto. I have gone over and extended it to one hundred and fifty stanzas, which is almost as long as the two first were originally, and longer by itself than any
- 112 LETTER 301. TO MR. MURRAY."Venice, November 15. 1817."Mr. Kinnaird has probably returned to England by this time, and will have conveyed to you any tidings you may wish to have of us and ours. I have come back to Venice for the winter. Mr. Hobho
- 113 LETTER 306. TO MR. MURRAY."Venice, January 27. 1818."My father--that is, my Armenian father, Padre Pasquali--in the name of all the other fathers of our Convent, sends you the enclosed, greeting."Inasmuch as it has pleased the translators o
- 114 "Venice, February 28. 1818."My dear Sir, "Our friend, il Conte M., threw me into a cold sweat last night, by telling me of a menaced version of Manfred (in Venetian, I hope, to complete the thing) by some Italian, who had sent it to you for
- 115 And then thou hast the 'Navy List,'My Murray."And Heaven forbid I should conclude Without 'the Board of Longitude,'Although this narrow paper would, My Murray!"[Footnote 18: There follows, in this place, among other matter, a
- 116 [Footnote 21: I had said, I think, in my letter to him, that this practice of carrying one stanza into another was "something like taking on horses another stage without baiting."][Footnote 22: I had, in first transcribing the above letter for t
- 117 Hanson for a balance which is (or ought to be) in his hands;--no answer. I expected the messenger with the Newstead papers two months ago, and instead of him, I received a requisition to proceed to Geneva, which (from * *, who knows my wishes and opinions
- 118 "I have finished the first Canto (a long one, of about 180 octaves) of a poem in the style and manner of 'Beppo', encouraged by the good success of the same. It is called 'Don Juan', and is meant to be a little quietly facetious u
- 119 "What are the hopes of man, &c."I have written to you several letters, some with additions, and some upon the subject of the poem itself, which my cursed puritanical committee have protested against publis.h.i.+ng. But we will circ.u.mvent them
- 120 "Ever very truly and affectionately yours, "B."P.S. I pet.i.tion for tooth-brushes, powder, magnesia, Maca.s.sar oil (or Russia), _the_ sashes, and Sir Nl. Wraxall's Memoirs of his own Times. I want, besides, a bull-dog, a terrier, and
- 121 "Bologna, June 7. 1819."Tell Mr. Hobhouse that I wrote to him a few days ago from Ferrara.It will therefore be idle in him or you to wait for any further answers or returns of proofs from Venice, as I have directed that no English letters be sen
- 122 "The best way will be to leave Allegra with Antonio's spouse till I can decide something about her and myself--but I thought that you would have had an answer from Mrs. V----r.[40] You have had bore enough with me and mine already."I greatl
- 123 Were it not easy, sir, and is't not sweet To make thyself beloved? and to be Omnipotent by Mercy's means? for thus Thy sovereignty would grow but more complete, A despot thou, and yet thy people free, And by the heart, not hand, enslaving us.&qu
- 124 "I a.s.sure you what I here say and feel has nothing to do with England, either in a literary or personal point of view. All my present pleasures or plagues are as Italian as the opera. And after all, they are but trifles; for all this arises from my
- 125 "Speaking of his marriage,--a delicate subject, but one still agreeable to him, if it was treated in a friendly voice,--he was greatly moved, and said it had been the innocent cause of all his errors and all his griefs. Of his wife he spoke with much
- 126 "'Tis but a portrait of his son and wife, And self; but such a woman! love in life!"BEPPO, Stanza xii.This seems, by the way, to be an incorrect description of the picture, as, according to Vasari and others, Giorgione never was married, an
- 127 "The Ferrara story is of a piece with all the rest of the Venetian manufacture,--you may judge. I only changed horses there since I wrote to you, after my visit in June last. '_Convent_' and '_carry off_', quotha! and '_girl_
- 128 The writer adds, "it is evident he has not the heart to go;" and the result proved that she had not judged him wrongly. The very next day's tidings from Ravenna decided his fate, and he himself, in a letter to the Contessa, thus announces t
- 129 "Pray let not these versiculi go forth with my name, except among the initiated, because my friend H. has foamed into a reformer, and, I greatly fear, will subside into Newgate; since the Honourable House, according to Galignani's Reports of Par
- 130 You must print it side by side with the original Italian, because I wish the reader to judge of the fidelity: it is stanza for stanza, and often line for line, if not word for word."You ask me for a volume of manners, &c. on Italy. Perhaps I am in th
- 131 Love to one death conducted us along, But Caina waits for him our life who ended:'These were the accents utter'd by her tongue,-- Since first I listen'd to these souls offended, I bow'd my visage and so kept it till-- {_then_} 'Wh
- 132 _Always write, if but a line_, by return of post, when any thing arrives, which is not a mere letter."Address direct to Ravenna; it saves a week's time, and much postage."LETTER 368. TO MR. MURRAY."Ravenna, April 16. 1820."Post af
- 133 "Send me Scott's novels and some news."P.S. I have begun and advanced into the second act of a tragedy on the subject of the Doge's conspiracy (_i.e._ the story of Marino Faliero); but my present feeling is so little encouraging on suc
- 134 "The separation business still continues, and all the world are implicated, including priests and cardinals. The public opinion is furious against _him_, because he ought to have cut the matter short _at first_, and not waited twelve months to begin.
- 135 "There is a revolution at Naples. If so, it will probably leave a card at Ravenna in its way to Lombardy."Your publishers seem to have used you like mine. M. has shuffled, and almost insinuated that my last productions are _dull_. Dull, sir!--da
- 136 LETTER 384. TO MR. MURRAY."Ravenna, Sept. 11. 1820."Here is another historical _note_ for you. I want to be as near truth as the drama can be."Last post I sent you a note fierce as Faliero himself[81], in answer to a trashy tourist, who pre
- 137 You can easily make out the accuracy of this from Peel himself, who told it in detail. I suppose you will be of the opinion of Lucretius, who (denies the immortality of the soul, but) a.s.serts that from the 'flying off of the surfaces of bodies, the
- 138 "I have written to you so often lately, that the brevity of this will be welcome. Yours," &c.LETTER 393. TO MR. MURRAY."Ravenna, 8bre 17, 1820."Enclosed is the Dedication of Marino Faliero to _Goethe_.Query,--is his t.i.tle _Baron_ or
- 139 Life of Lord Byron, With His Letters And Journals.Vol. 5.by (Lord Byron) George Gordon Byron.LETTER 394. TO MR. MOORE."Ravenna, October 17. 1820."You owe me two letters--pay them. I want to know what you are about. The summer is over, and you wi
- 140 "'_Clincher_. d.a.m.n your Timothy!--I tell you, woman, your husband has _murdered me_--he has carried away my fine jubilee clothes.'"So Bowles has been telling a story, too ('tis in the Quarterly), about the woods of 'Madeir
- 141 "However, down we ran, and found him lying on his back, almost, if not quite, dead, with five wounds, one in the heart, two in the stomach, one in the finger, and the other in the arm. Some soldiers c.o.c.ked their guns, and wanted to hinder me from
- 142 "Came home at eleven, or rather before. If the road and weather are comfortable, mean to ride to-morrow. High time--almost a week at this work--snow, sirocco, one day--frost and snow the other--sad climate for Italy. But the two seasons, last and pre
- 143 "January 10. 1821."Day fine--rained only in the morning. Looked over accounts. Read Campbell's Poets--marked errors of Tom (the author) for correction.Dined--went out--music--Tyrolese air, with variations. Sustained the cause of the origina
- 144 "Read--rode--fired pistols--returned--dined--wrote--visited--heard music--talked nonsense--and went home."Wrote part of a Tragedy--advanced in Act 1st with 'all deliberate speed.' Bought a blanket. The weather is still muggy as a Londo
- 145 clerk of this parish.' The other little petty vexations of the year--overturns in carriages--the murder of people before one's door, and dying in one's beds--the cramp in swimming--colics--indigestions and bilious attacks, &c. &c. &c.-- Man
- 146 [Footnote 22: In the original MS. these watch-words are blotted over so as to be illegible.]"January, 31. 1821."For several days I have not written any thing except a few answers to letters. In momentary expectation of an explosion of some kind,
- 147 "February 16. 1821."Last night Il Conte P.G. sent a man with a bag full of bayonets, some muskets, and some hundreds of cartridges to my house, without apprizing me, though I had seen him not half an hour before. About ten days ago, when there w
- 148 Here scatter'd oft, the _earliest_ of the year, By hands unseen, are showers of violets found; The red-breast loves to build and warble here, And little footsteps lightly print the ground.'As fine a stanza as any in his elegy. I wonder that he c
- 149 LETTER 407. TO MR. MURRAY."January 20. 1821."I did not think to have troubled you with the plague and postage of a _double letter_ this time, but I have just read in an _Italian paper_, 'That Lord Byron has a tragedy coming out,' &c. &
- 150 Now I will tell you what _you_ shall do, and take no advantage of you, though you were scurvy enough never to acknowledge my letter for three months. Offer Galignani the refusal of the copyright in France; if he refuses, appoint any bookseller in France y
- 151 "March 2. 1821."This was the beginning of a letter which I meant for Perry, but stopped short, hoping you would be able to prevent the theatres. Of course you need not send it; but it explains to you my feelings on the subject. You say that
- 152 LETTER 418. TO MR. MURRAY."Ravenna, April 21. 1821."I enclose you another letter on Bowles. But I premise that it is not like the former, and that I am not at all sure how _much_, if _any_, of it should be published. Upon this point you can cons
- 153 [Footnote 35: "Aye, down to the dust with them, slaves as they are," &c.&c.][Footnote 36: I had not, when I wrote, _seen_ this pamphlet, as he supposes, but had merely heard from some friends, that his pen had "run a-muck" in it, and t
- 154 "I agree with Mr. B. that the intention was to annoy him; but I fear that this was answered by his notice of the reception of the criticism.An anonymous writer has but one means of knowing the effect of his attack. In this he has the superiority over
- 155 I don't understand that _yielding_ sensitiveness. What I feel (as at this present) is an immense rage for eight-and-forty hours, and then, as usual--unless this time it should last longer. I must get on horseback to quiet me. Yours, &c."Francis
- 156 "You say you have written often: I have only received yours of the eleventh, which is very short. By this post, _five_ packets, I send you the tragedy of Sardanapalus, which is written in a rough hand: perhaps Mrs. Leigh can help you to decipher it.
- 157 "I have had a friend of your Mr. Irving's--a very pretty lad--a Mr.Coolidge, of Boston--only somewhat too full of poesy and 'entusymusy.' I was very civil to him during his few hours' stay, and talked with him much of Irving, whos
- 158 "This country being in a state of proscription, and all my friends exiled or arrested--the whole family of Gamba obliged to go to Florence for the present--the father and son for politics--(and the Guiccioli, because menaced with a _convent_, as her
- 159 "Lord Byron is greatly improved in every respect--in genius, in temper, in moral views, in health and happiness. His connection with La Guiccioli has been an inestimable benefit to him. He lives in considerable splendour, but within his income, which
- 160 Out of this somewhat forced simile, by a judicious transposition of the comparison, and by the subst.i.tution of the more definite word "waves"for "seas" the clear, n.o.ble thought in one of the Cantos of Childe Harold has been produce
- 161 One of the "paper-books" mentioned in this letter as intrusted to Mr.Mawman for me, contained a portion, to the amount of nearly a hundred pages, of a prose story, relating the adventures of a young Andalusian n.o.bleman, which had been begun by
- 162 The last line--'a name never spoke but with curses or jeers'--must run either 'a name only uttered with curses or jeers,' or, 'a wretch never named but with curses or jeers.' Be_case_ as _how_, 'spoke' is not gramma
- 163 "It was not Murray's fault. I did not send the MS. _overture_, but I send it now[55], and it may be restored;--or, at any rate, you may keep the original, and give any copies you please. I send it, as written, and as I _read_ it to you--I have n
- 164 "I wonder if my 'Cain' has got safe to England. I have written since about sixty stanzas of a poem, in octave stanzas, (in the Pulci style, which the fools in England think was invented by Whistlecraft--it is as old as the hills in Italy,)
- 165 "Let me find two lines from you at 'the hostel or inn.'"Yours ever, &c."B."LETTER 465. TO MR. MOORE."Ravenna, Oct. 28. 1821."''Tis the middle of night by the castle clock,' and in three hours more I h
- 166 LETTER 466. TO MR. MURRAY."Pisa, November 3. 1821."The two pa.s.sages cannot be altered without making Lucifer talk like the Bishop of Lincoln, which would not be in the character of the former. The notion is from Cuvier (that of the _old worlds
- 167 "Sir, "I have received your letter. I need not say, that the extract which it contains has affected me, because it would imply a want of all feeling to have read it with indifference. Though I am not quite _sure_ that it was intended by the writ
- 168 "December 12. 1821."My dear Sh.e.l.ley, "Enclosed is a note for you from ----. His reasons are all very true, I dare say, and it might and may be of personal inconvenience to us. But that does not appear to me to be a reason to allow a bein
- 169 "I will pay (though with the sincerest reluctance) my remaining creditors, and every man of law, by instalments from the award of the arbitrators."I recommend to you the notice in Mr. Hanson's letter, on the demands of moneys for the Rochda
- 170 "In the impartial Galignani I perceive an extract from Blackwood's Magazine, in which it is said that there are people who have discovered that you and I are no poets. With regard to one of us, I know that this north-west pa.s.sage to _my_ magne
- 171 This is what I regret, and what with all my influence I would deprecate a repet.i.tion of. _Now_, do you understand me?"As to your solemn peroration, 'the truth is, my dear Moore, &c. &c.'meaning neither more nor less than that I give into
- 172 "You will regret to hear that I have received intelligence of the death of my daughter Allegra of a fever in the convent of Bagna Cavallo, where she was placed for the last year, to commence her education. It is a heavy blow for many reasons, but mus
- 173 "Since I came here, I have been invited by the Americans on board their squadron, where I was received with all the kindness which I could wish, and with _more ceremony_ than I am fond of. I found them finer s.h.i.+ps than your own of the same cla.s.
- 174 LETTER 499. TO MR. MURRAY."Pisa, July 6. 1822."I return you the revise. I have softened the part to which Gifford objected, and changed the name of Michael to Raphael, who was an angel of gentler sympathies. By the way, recollect to alter Michae
- 175 "I have nearly (_quite three_) four new cantos of Don Juan ready. I obtained permission from the female Censor Morum of _my_ morals to continue it, provided it were immaculate; so I have been as decent as need be. There is a deal of war--a siege, and
- 176 These fellows always forget Christ in their Christianity, and what he said when 'the tower of Siloam fell.'"To-day is the 9th, and the 10th is my surviving daughter's birth-day. I have ordered, as a regale, a mutton chop and a bottle o
- 177 Life of Lord Byron.Vol. 6.by Thomas Moore.LETTER 508. TO MR. MOORE."Genoa, February 20. 1823."My Dear Tom, "I must again refer you to those two letters addressed to you at Pa.s.sy before I read your speech in Galignani, &c., and which you d
- 178 "Eleven o'clock."P.S. I wrote the above at three this morning. I regret to say that the whole of the skin of about an _inch_ square above my upper lip has come off, so that I cannot even shave or masticate, and I am equally unfit to appear
- 179 To these contrasts which he presented, as viewed publicly and privately, is to be added also the fact, that, while braving the world's ban so boldly, and a.s.serting man's right to think for himself with a freedom and even daringness unequalled,
- 180 "P.S. I have, since I wrote this, seen them again. Count P. Gamba asked them to breakfast. One of them means to publish his Journal of the campaign. The Bavarian wonders a little that the Greeks are not quite the same with them of the time of Themist
- 181 Already, as has been seen, an exchange of courtesies, founded upon mutual admiration, had taken place between Lord Byron and the great poet of Germany, Goethe. Of this intercourse between two such men,--the former as brief a light in the world's eyes
- 182 During all these occupations he went on pursuing his usual simple and uniform course of life,--rising, however, for the despatch of business, at an early hour, which showed how capable he was of conquering even long habit when necessary. Though so much oc
- 183 "N. B."P.S. Your Highness will already have known that I have sought to fulfil the wishes of the Greek government, as much as it lay in my power to do so: but I should wish that the fleet so long and so vainly expected were arrived, or, at least
- 184 "Ever yours, N. B."P.S. I am happy to say that Colonel Leicester Stanhope and myself are acting in perfect harmony together--he is likely to be of great service both to the cause and to the Committee, and is publicly as well as personally a very
- 185 "Dear Sir 'Anc.o.c.k[1],'[Footnote 1: This letter is, more properly, a postscript to one which Dr. Bruno had, by his orders, written to Mr. Hanc.o.c.k, with some particulars of their voyage; and the Doctor having begun his letter, "Pre
- 186 [Footnote 1: We have here as striking an instance as could be adduced of that peculiar feature of his character which shallow or malicious observers have misrepresented as avarice, but which in reality was the result of a strong sense of justice and fairn
- 187 LETTER 541.TO HIS HIGHNESS YUSSUFF PACHA."Missolonghi, January 23. 1824."Highness!"A vessel, in which a friend and some domestics of mine were embarked, was detained a few days ago, and released by order of your Highness. I have now to than
- 188 "Sir, "Coming to Greece, one of my princ.i.p.al objects was to alleviate as much as possible the miseries incident to a warfare so cruel as the present. When the dictates of humanity are in question, I know no difference between Turks and Greeks
- 189 "P.S. Tell Mr. Murray that I wrote to him the other day, and hope that he has received, or will receive, the letter."LETTER 549. TO DR. KENNEDY."Missolonghi, March 4. 1824."My dear Doctor, "I have to thank you for your two very kind letters, both rec
- 190 "I rejoice to hear that your school prospers, and I a.s.sure you that your good wishes are reciprocal. The weather is so much finer, that I get a good deal of moderate exercise in boats and on horseback, and am willing to hope that my health is not worse
- 191 "There is a quarrel, not yet settled, between the citizens and some of Cariascachi's people, which has already produced some blows. I keep my people quite neutral; but have ordered them to be on their guard."Some days ago we had an Italian private sold
- 192 At this time the physicians, becoming still more alarmed, expressed a wish for a consultation; and proposed calling in, without delay, Dr.Freiber, the medical a.s.sistant of Mr. Millingen, and Luca Vaya, a Greek, the physician of Mavrocordato. On hea[r]in
- 193 "Oh turn not coldly from the poet's bier, Nor check the sacred drops by Pity given; For though in sin his body slumbereth here, His soul, absolved, already wings to heaven."These lines, says the legend, were looked upon as a divine decree; the religion
- 194 In picturing to oneself so awful an event as a s.h.i.+pwreck, its many horrors and perils are what alone offer themselves to ordinary fancies. But the keen, versatile imagination of Byron could detect in it far other details, and, at the same moment with
- 195 "Matter is eternal, always changing, but reproduced, and, as far as we can comprehend eternity, eternal; and why not _mind_? Why should not the mind act with and upon the universe, as portions of it act upon, and with, the congregated dust called mankind
- 196 12 Neither do they affirm the resurrection of the flesh: 13 Neither do they affirm that man was altogether created by G.o.d: 14 Neither do they affirm that Jesus Christ was born in the flesh from the Virgin Mary: 15 Neither do they affirm that the world w
- 197 26 In whom we also, when we believe, are saved.27 Therefore know ye that these men are not the children of justice, but the children of wrath; 28 Who turn away from themselves the compa.s.sion of G.o.d; 29 Who say that neither the heavens nor the earth we
- 198 [Footnote 12: Others read, _The son of Ematthius_.][Footnote 13: Others add, _Nor did a hair of his body fall therefrom_.][Footnote 14: Some MSS. have, _Ye shall not receive other things in vain_.][Footnote 15: Others finished here thus, _Henceforth no on
- 199 Lucca Vega and Dr. Freiber, my a.s.sistants, were invited. Dr. Bruno and Lucca proposed having recourse to antispasmodics and other remedies employed in the last stage of typhus. Freiber and I maintained that they could only hasten the fatal termination,
- 200 Mr. Gell then proceeds to invalidate the authority of previous writers on the subject of Ithaca. Sir George Wheeler and M. le Chevalier fall under his severe animadversion; and, indeed, according to his account, neither of these gentlemen had visited the