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Lord Byron as Rinaldo

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

David V. Erdman
David V. Erdman*
Affiliation:
Olivet College
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Extract

In identifying Lady Oxford as Byron's political “tutelar genius” of 1813, as the “woman, who, amid all her fascination, always urged a man to usefulness or glory,” I have brought to light a certain speciousness in the interpretation accepted by Byron's biographers of his liaison with Jane Elizabeth Scott, Lady Oxford, as simply comparable to the story of Rinaldo overcome by indolence in the “Bower of Armida.” Miss Mayne and M. Maurois and even Miss Raymond have somehow overlooked the fact that Lady Oxford was a pupil of Home Tooke, the Reform “agitator” (to use Byron's admiring term), was sometime mistress and lifelong political “genius” of the Radical spokesman, Sir Francis Burdett—was, in short, a woman who did not content herself with “soothing” and enchanting Byron but rather “always” pressed him on “senatorial duties” and endeavored to make him an advocate “particularly in the cause of weakness.” Eywood was a pleasant bower, but Jane, it turns out, was not Armida—though Byron, eager to realize that dream of Tasso he had always cherished, took a cue from the picture of Armida and Rinaldo which she had hung in his room and let his fancy feed on the intensity of the passion which she inspired and “returned with equal ardour,” for the time preferring her sorcery to “parliamentary mummeries” of doubtful value in which she was urging him to engage. Byron liked her politics, but he wanted to escape politics for a while. He did not wish to think himself attached to her party, nor to any party. Similar conflicting emotions troubled Byron's dramatic hero Sardanapalus when his lovely Myrrha said, “I think the present is the wonted hour / Of council....”

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 57 , Issue 1 , March 1942 , pp. 189 - 231
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1942

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References

Note 1 in page 189 The Works of Lord Byron, rev. ed. Letters and Journals, ed. by R. E. Prothero (London, 1901), ii, 359, hereinafter referred to as L & J. I have traced the history of Lady Oxford and the Radical Reformers, particularly as it concerns Lady Oxford's relations with Byron and his with Radical politics in 1813, in “Lord Byron and the Genteel Reformers,” PMLA, lvi (1941), 1065–94.

Note 2 in page 189 Dora Niell Raymond, The Political Career of Lord Byron (New York, 1924).

Note 3 in page 189 L & J, ii, 342.

Note 4 in page 189 See L & J, ii, 49. Byron appears to have bought his third copy of the Gerusalemme Liberata in 1813.

Note 5 in page 189 Thomas Medwin, Journal of the Conversations of Lord Byron (London, 1824), p. 67.

Note 6 in page 189 L & J, ii, 318.

Note 7 in page 190 Lord Byron's Correspondence, ed. by John Murray (London, 1922), i, 122, hereinafter referred to as Corr.

Note 8 in page 190 Byron's Sardanapalus, i, ii.

Note 9 in page 190 Cp. L & J, ii, 339.

Note 10 in page 190 If not earlier. See Raymond, p. 3. Byron succeeded to the peerage in 1798.

Note 11 in page 190 L & J, i, 64–65. April 25, 1805. Cf. ibid., 140.

Note 12 in page 190 See Hobhouse's letter, L & J, iv, 500, and Byron's, i, 135.

Note 13 in page 191 Hobhouse himself had needed to be persuaded by Tavistock. L & J, iv, 500, and Corr., i, 2.

Note 14 in page 191 L & J, i, 210. Cf. R. C. Dallas, Correspondence of Lord Byron (Paris, 1825), i, 53.

Note 15 in page 191 Thomas Moore, Life of Byron (New York, 1857), p. 57, describes his “lone and unfriended” state.—None of Byron's Cambridge acquaintance was in Lords yet. Bob Milnes, a Tory, had entered Commons, but Byron, hearing his second speech, January, 1808, had felt “it made no impression.” L & J, v, 412. Lord Althorp, a Harrow and Cambridge man, Byron's friend since 1805, and of the same political views as Tavistock and others of the Whig Club, was also showing his first active interest in politics, in the Lower House. Very likely they saw something of each other this spring. See Sir Denis LeMarchant, Memoir of John Charles Viscount Althorp Third Earl Spencer (London, 1876), pp. 92, 141.

Note 16 in page 191 John Cordy Jeaffreson, The Real Lord Byron (London, 1883), i, 196–197, discusses Byron's misconception of the etiquette and technicalities of seating.

Note 17 in page 191 Reconstructed from L & J, v, 432.

Note 18 in page 192 Journal of the House of Lords, 1809. Byron was present March 13, 14, 15, 21; April 28; May 10, 15. Compare Raymond, p. 17: “He did not again enter the House of Lords before setting forth on his travels”; and Ethel Colburn Mayne, Byron (London, 1924), pp. 96–97; and André Maurois, Byron (New York, 1930), p. 117 ff.

Note 19 in page 192 In March he had hoped “the Duke's business” would be “brought before our House ... in a debatable form.” “I believe I shall be tempted to say something on the subject ...” L & J, i, 218. But that business was closed in the Lower House, March 20, by the motion of his friend Lord Althorp (Parliamentary Debates, xiii, 745) without reaching Lords. In the Upper House practically nothing happened in these months.

Note 20 in page 192 February 1, 1812. L & J, ii, 96.

Note 21 in page 192 January 31, February 28, March 19, April 21, July 1, July 7. The other three are February 27, March 2, and April 20.

Note 22 in page 192 Seventy-five times in 1812, 66 in 1813.

Note 23 in page 193 January 20, and cf. report of the committee, March 5. Lords Journal.

Note 24 in page 193 Ibid., February 17: “Their Lordships, or any five of them, to meet on Wednesday next [Feb. 19]; at ten o'clock in the Forenoon, in the Prince's lodgings, near the House of Peers; and to adjourn as they please.”

Note 25 in page 193 Ibid., February 20.

Note 26 in page 193 Ibid., March 2.

Note 27 in page 193 Lord Holland, for whom Bryon wrote the Address in September, was also on this House committee. Cf. L & J, ii, 145.

Note 28 in page 193 As that on R. Moore's divorce bill, April 16. E.g.: “What did you imagine this noise to be?” “I thought it must be them on the Bed.” ... “Where was the Boy Snazell?” etc.—the kind of “pleasaunt mirth” that always delighted Byron.

Note 29 in page 193 In June there was very little doing except the discussion, which Byron attended, of unsuccessful negotiations to get Whigs into the cabinet.

Note 30 in page 193 March 12, May 14, and June 18. Byron did not attend the debate, April 2, on an attempt to repeal the death penalty for shop-lifting.

Note 31 in page 193 May 14, on a motion of inquiry into the Naval Administration.

Note 32 in page 194 Byron's name is on the one roll-call vote of these six occasions; he probably voted on the others, which are unrecorded. But he no longer bothered to sign the Whigs' protests with Holland, Stanhope, Grey, and the rest, as he had done in 1812.

Note 33 in page 194 Byron was present in 1814, April 9 (debate on Norway and on Dullwich College Bill) and May 10 (long debate on address to rescue “unoffending people of Norway from the dreadful Alternative of Famine, or of Subjugation”); in 1815, April 12 (Buonaparte's escape from Elba) and May 23 (Whig attempt to censure Tory part in Congress of Vienna; Byron voted); and in 1816, February 19 (debate on foreign treaties) and April 2 (debate on state of Ireland).—Of this last visit Lady Caroline Lamb wrote to John Murray, “Lord Byron was at the House which I am glad as it showed him calmed.” “To Lord Byron”;“ Feminine Profiles ... ed. by George Paston and Peter Quennell (London, 1939), p. 70.

Note 34 in page 194 Cf. L “ J, v, 415. Byron evinced rather the opposite of no ”inclination to try“ at becoming ”a parliament man.“

Note 35 in page 194 “Lord Byron and the Genteel Reformers,” loc. cit.

Note 36 in page 195 L & J, v, 415. There is a certain seductiveness about the frank opportunism in Byron's discourse on his youthful love of fame after he claims to have abandoned it. Disavowels of ambition were, of course, made every step of the way. Cf. i, 284.

Note 37 in page 195 L & J, vi, 33, and Corr., ii, 204.

Note 38 in page 195 He could hardly consider such “ephemeral poesie” as the Giaour and Bride more than a form of “dissipation.” In the spring of 1812 his poetic efforts had all been subordinated to his politics and directly related to the speeches he was delivering and hearing—e.g.: Ode to the Framers of the Frame Bill, A Sympathetic Address to a Young Lady, and the passages on British foreign policy probably then added to The Curse of Minerva, privately printed in February.

Note 39 in page 195 L & J, ii, 105. John Galt, who was “frequently with” Byron that winter, says “his debut was more showy than promising. It lacked weight in metal, as was observed at the time.” Life of Lord Byron (New York, 1845), pp. 163, 167. My italics.

Note 40 in page 196 The Diaries of Sylvester Douglas (Lord Glenbervie), ed. by Francis Bickley (London, 1928), ii, 190.—I deduce the date of the visit from the circumstances. Peter Quennell points out that the fame did not catch fire till March 10. Byron, The Years of Fame (New York, 1935), p. 56.

Note 41 in page 196 Leigh Hunt, Byron and Bis Contemporaries (London, 1828), i, 4–5.

Note 42 in page 196 See Sidmouth's motion to “reject” Byron's petition, after its reception had already been voted down. Parl. Deb., xxvi, 483–485.

Note 43 in page 196 June 11. The speech was June 1. Leigh Hunt, Correspondence (London, 1862), i, 90.

Note 44 in page 196 Medwin, p. 229. See Raymond, p. 60; Lord Holland, Further Memoirs of the Whig Party, 1807–1821 (New York, 1905), p. 123; and Horace Twiss, Life of Eldon (London, 1844), ii, 72. Ward, from what he was told of Byron's speeches, imagined “they were strange, absurd, conceited performances.” Letters to “Ivy,” p. 199.

Note 45 in page 197 Lord Broughton (John Cam Hobhouse), Recollections of a Long Life (New York, 1909), i, 38.

Note 46 in page 197 L & J, v, 415. Moore (p. 122) reports, from hearsay, that Byron's second speech “seems to have been less promising than ... his first essay.” Moore's suggestion that Byron's delivery was chiefly responsible is only a guess: “I take for granted (having never heard him speak in Parliament).”

Note 47 in page 197 L & J, v, 416. Hereinafter, unannotated quotations of Byron are from L & J or Corr.

Note 48 in page 197 The Curse of Minerva, line 245, quoting Pope.

Note 49 in page 198 Op. cit., i, 276.

Note 50 in page 199 Stanzas x-xv, Childe Harold II, and The Curse of Minerva, both with notes.

Note 51 in page 199 See Corr., i, 43.

Note 52 in page 199 The Curse of Minerva.

Note 53 in page 199 The material of the above paragraph will be found in Corr., i, 20, 50, 57, 67, 69, 88; L & J, ii, 12; and Byron's Maiden Speech.—For Byron's political views in 1809 see L & J, i, 209–210, and Jeaffreson, i, 199.

Note 54 in page 200 The Curse was written in March, 1811, and the quarto edition, “printed by T. Davison in 1812, was probably set up at the same time as Murray's quarto edition of Childe Harold, and reserved for private circulation.” Poetry, i, 453. It seems to me very likely that the lines of political comment which are echoed in the Frame speech were added to the poem at this time, February, 1812.

Note 55 in page 200 February 13, 17, 20, and 24. Lords Journal.

Note 56 in page 201 Within the next six years the political left wing was to accept the party name Radical. I follow most historians in using the term for the entire period.

Note 57 in page 201 Lord Holland could, of course, like any politician, speak sympathetically of the poor—when the issue under debate was not their defense. Compare his speech the following day (February 28, 1812) calling for an inquiry into the workings of the Orders in Council. Here he refers feelingly to the “suffering working classes,” but his concern is over “the annihilation of commerce,” and his emphasis is on the necessity “to allay the ferments of the distressed.” Parl. Deb., xxi, 1063–64.

Note 58 in page 201 Holland proposed that those renting frames should be held responsible for breakage by Luddites. Ibid., xxi, 973. Later (December 10, 1813) Holland even spoke of the Frame Bill as a success and approved the passage of a revised bill making its provisions permanent but substituting life transportation for the death penalty. Ibid., xxvii, 275–276.

Note 59 in page 201 We know, however, that Holland was sensitive and disapproving of the “republican” tendency in the arguments of his “Jacobinical” floormate, Earl Stanhope. Holland had been bolder in his younger years, but even as early as 1800 he was relieved to have Burdett and Stanhope supplant him in popularity with the workers for speaking against the Combination Acts which outlawed unions. The Journal of Elizabeth Lady Holland (1791–1811) (London, 1908), ii, 101–102 et passim.

Note 60 in page 202 See L & J, index, and Patterson, pp. 528–532.

Note 61 in page 202 Corr., i, 47. In 1818 Scrope was a member of the Westminster Burdett Committee, the “Radical Rota Club.” Corr., ii, 85, 96.

Note 62 in page 202 See L & J, ii, 85, December 8, 1811.

Note 63 in page 202 Moore, p. 111. Cp. Byron (Corr., i, 42), July 31, 1811: “... having never entered a coffee-house since my return, and meaning by the blessing of reformation to keep out of them.”

Note 64 in page 203 In November, 1811, it was reported of Lady Oxford: “She says that she has three consolations under all the censure of the world: the consciousness of her own virtue, Lord Archibald Hamilton, and Lord Folkestone.” Lord Auckland to Lord Grenville. Report on the MSS of J. B. Fortesque (London, 1927), x, 181.

Note 65 in page 203 R. E. Roberts, Samuel Rogers and Bis Circle (London, 1910), p. 184.

Note 66 in page 203 Moore, p. 122.

Note 67 in page 203 L & J, v, 424. In 1820 Ward called the Alfred “the asylum of doting Tories and drivelling Quidnuncs.”

Note 68 in page 203 The Archbishop was a Tory of the King's party.

Note 69 in page 203 Lady Blessington, Conversations with Lord Byron (London, 1824), p. 197.

Note 70 in page 204 “He is an alarmist about reform and popular principles,” said Brougham, “and he considers me as being a Jacobin ... very absurdly.” Letters to “Ivy” (London, 1905), p. 155. See ibid., pp. 93, 126, 160, 199, et passim; L&J, v, 420; and Parl. Deb., xxiii, 113–142. Ward was a Whig on the way to become a Tory, but apparently he did not introduce his new leader, Canning, to Byron until 1813. L & J, ii, 286.

Note 71 in page 204 “A lady told me the other day,” wrote Ward in 1812, “that she had heard that I, Mr. Luttrell, Mr. Nugent, and one Smith, a clergyman [Sidney Smith], were a set of good-for-nothing people who made open profession of unbelief.” Letters to “Ivy”, p. 164.

Note 72 in page 204 L & J, iv, 500. Hobhouse to Murray, November, 1820.

Note 73 in page 204 These are Mr. W. Ponsonby, Mr. George O'Callaghan, Mr. Dominick Browne, Mr. Henry Pearce, and the young Lord Ellenborough. Browne entered Commons in 1815; introduced a minor and non-controversial Reform Bill in 1816 on limiting the time of the Irish Elections. O'Callaghan was a Hampden Club charter member in 1812, but never an M. P. Ellenborough, inclining the way of his father, was to enter Commons in 1813 as a Tory, although liberal on some points. Cf. Albert H. Imlah, Lord Ellenborough (Cambridge, 1939).

Note 74 in page 204 L & J, ii, 96. See Parl. Deb., xxi, 412.

Note 75 in page 204 Another Cambridge Whig mentioned by Byron in 1807 (but never afterwards) is the Duke of Leinster. In 1812 Leinster was in Sicily until August; he took his seat in Lords February 3, 1813.

Note 76 in page 204 Although Byron was sure that Hobhouse had founded both that club and an Amicable Society. L & J, v, 123.

Note 77 in page 205 Hobhouse saw quite a bit of Tavistock before 1814. See Recollections, ii, 174, and L & J, i, 163n; v, 414.

Note 78 in page 205 LeMarchant, p. 141. Byron and Althorp were boxing companions. They witnessed the fight between Gully and the Chicken, October 8, 1805.

Note 79 in page 205 Ibid., pp. 111–112. Thomas Grenville wrote to Lord Grenville, in 1809: “Lord Milton and Lord Althorp have both dipped more into this [Reform agitation] than one could wish, and I see by the letters from Althorp that there is more ground of uneasiness in our young friend than I had expected.” MSS of Fortesque, ix, 285. And in May, 1812: “I lament to count Lord Tavistock in that list [of Whitbread's declared associates] and certainly regret that Whitbread should have had influence enough to have placed him in those ranks ...” Ibid., x, 246. Tavistock had not been a Whitbreadite in 1809. See Michael Roberts, The Whig Party 1807–1812 (London, 1939), p. 215.

Note 80 in page 205 LeMarchant, p. 133. In 1812 Althorp, although he spoke against the Leather Tax Bill, June 26, following Brougham's “excellent landlord's speech” with a plea against the tax's “unequal pressure on the lower orders,” in July, speaking against the Preservation of the Peace Bill, “with the love of truth that kept him from propitiating the landlords, he now showed himself equally independent of the people,—for he [insisted] that his opposition did not arise from any apprehensions that the power entrusted to the magistrates would be abused.” Ibid., pp. 136, 138, and Parl. Deb., xxiii, 785, 1024.

Note 81 in page 205 See J. Cartwright, Six Letters to the Marquis of Tavistock on a Reform of ... Parliament (London, 1812).

Note 82 in page 205 L & J, v, 454. For Sinclair's career see DNB.

Note 83 in page 205 See Hobhouse, Recollections, i, 44.

Note 84 in page 206 Parl. Deb., xxi, 864–865; cf. 859 ff.

Note 85 in page 206 See Life and Correspondence of Major Cartwright (London, 1826), and Stanhope and Gooch, The Life of Charles Third Earl Stanhope (London, 1914), passim.

Note 86 in page 206 Ibid., p. 204.

Note 87 in page 206 Life of Cartwright, ii, 43.

Note 88 in page 206 Printed, it sold 30,000 copies, one of which Byron most probably read. His speech seems to echo certain passages.

Note 89 in page 207 Conjecture. Byron mentions Tavistock's speaking (L & J, v, 68), and this is Tavistock's only speech until July, 1815. Byron might well have gone to hear Ward, who delivered a prepared speech: Byron called his speeches “studied, but keen, and sometimes eloquent.” L & J, v, 412. The speaking of Burdett and Whitbread also might have attracted him.

Note 90 in page 207 Parl. Deb., xiii, 107, May 8, 1812.

Note 91 in page 207 For the June 8 meeting and Byron's election see Examiner, v (June 14, 1812), 385. For full membership list see Life of Cartwright, ii, 380–383.

Note 92 in page 207 “... at least I always heard the Country Gentlemen and the ministerial devilry praise his speeches upstairs, and run down from Bellamy's when he was upon his legs.” L & J, v, 412.

Note 93 in page 208 Susan Vaughan to Byron, January 1812. “To Lord Byron,” pp. 31–32.

Note 94 in page 208 See F. O. Darvall, Popular Disturbances and Public Order in Regency England (London, 1934), p. 78.

Note 95 in page 208 Corr., i, 68–69; L & J, ii, 96.—Note that the letter to Hodgson disproves his biographer's assertion that Hodgson was the begetter of Byron's first speech.

Note 96 in page 208 “... anxious to learn the forms and consult some peer in Opposition.” Lord Holland, Further Memoirs, p. 123.

Note 97 in page 208 L & J, ii, 96–97. February 4, 1812.

Note 98 in page 208 Loc. cit.

Note 99 in page 208 See Darvall, pp. 82, 225.

Note 100 in page 208 So Romilly complains during the debate. Parl. Deb., xxi, 833, 840.

Note 101 in page 209 See L & J, ii, 100.—Hobhouse's first dinners with Burdett did not take place until May, and he was not introduced to Whitbread till 1814. See Recollections, i, 38, 148, and L & J, iv, 500.

Note 102 in page 209 In 1812 elections the “Whig-Radical Party” recaptured Nottingham after brief Tory control. Annals of Nottingham, ed. by T. Bailey, iii, 258. Cp. Lujo Brentano, History of Gilds and Origin of Trade-Unions (London, 1870), pp. 117–119.

Note 103 in page 209 Life of Cartwright, ii, 17–21.

Note 104 in page 209 See Darvall, pp. 38, 80, 244. Becher wrote to the Home Office on February 11.

Note 105 in page 209 Life of Cartwright, ii, 18.—Said clerk, Mr. Coldham, secretary of a secret Committee recently appointed by the Nottingham Corporation to detect Luddites (Darvall, p. 243), wrote to Lord Holland a letter which was turned over to Byron on his request for “documents” but which Byron returned as useless, primarily selfish, and ignoble. L & J, ii, 102–104.

Note 106 in page 210 Byron's speech.

Note 107 in page 210 The government spy sent to penetrate the Luddite organization called himself Samuel Whitbread. Darvall, p. 287. In mid-February the leading hosiery workers of Nottingham were to meet to prepare a report for Lord Holland, M. P.s for the town and county, and Mr. Whitbread. Nottingham Journal, February 15, 1812. Darvall, p. 85.

Note 108 in page 210 His first references to Whitbread, in the fall of 1812, contain no suggestion of the degree of their acquaintance.

Note 109 in page 210 Parl. Deb., xxi, 602–603, 671–672. In Lords, Liverpool replied that Government was taking steps to bring the matter before Parliament.

Note 110 in page 210 Wynn was of the Grenville clan but frequently supported Whitbread; he was a steady voter for Reform in 1809–11. Michael Roberts, op. cit., pp. 234–235.

Note 111 in page 210 Parl. Deb., xxi, 815.

Note 112 in page 211 Indicated by his vote on 12 out of 17 minorities with Whitbread in 1812, especially on the Walsh resolution, March 5.

Note 113 in page 211 Lost by 11 to 49 and 15 to 40. On the second vote George Sinclair voted in favor of a committee, although he was not opposed to the Frame Bill itself.

Note 114 in page 211 Except for the passing remark that “I think a little investigation, some previous inquiry, would induce even them [Tories] to change their purpose.”

Note 115 in page 211 Although Althorp spoke later (July 13, 1812) against the related Peace Preservation Bill. Parl. Deb., xxiii, 1024, and LeMarchant, p. 138.—“Very few upper-class people,” says Darvall (p. 337), “agreed with Lord Byron....”

Note 116 in page 211 Further Memoirs, p. 122.

Note 117 in page 211 See Corr., i, 59.

Note 118 in page 212 February 17, 20, 24.

Note 119 in page 212 Cp. Lords Journal, February 24, 25, and the London Packet and Lloyd's Evening Post, February 24.

Note 120 in page 212 Twiss, Eldon, ii, 190. Cp. Thomas Grenville in May regarding “the abominable and wicked speech of Sir Francis Burdett.” MSS of Fortesque, x, 242.

Note 121 in page 212 Further Memoirs, p. 123.—Dr. E. Dudley H. Johnson, in an unpublished paper, “Lord Byron: Poet-Laureate of the Whigs,” points out that Byron, in blaming Tory foreign policy for the misery of the weavers, “oriented his address to this controlling purpose of his [the Whig] party.” He has traced with more clarity and force than Miss Raymond the coincidence of Byron's early political interests and views with those of the Foxite Whigs, and he has correctly emphasized the fact that Byron's political development cannot be properly understood without a consideration of how thoroughly his formative years were steeped in Whiggery. Dr. Johnson calls Byron's voting with the Whigs very “significant” because “the debates involved issues of national importance which produced clean-cut differences of opinion between the two opposing parties.” As between Tory and Whig, it is clear Byron was on the Whig side.

Note 122 in page 213 Lords Journal, February 28. They had decided their action “was informal and irregular.”

Note 123 in page 213 Idem and March 4 and March 6. It is not recorded which lords did add their names.

Note 124 in page 213 Byron attended this meeting, but the discussion is not recorded. On February 28 he voted in the minority for the revocation of Orders in Council.

Note 125 in page 213 March 5 and 11. The Lords' amendment to “fine ‘or’ imprisonment” was rejected in Commons, Ryder insisting that it was the “constant practice of the House [to reject] any amendment from the Lords which interfered with any branch of the public revenue.” Parl. Deb., xxi, 1216, March 9.

Note 126 in page 213 He attended April 16, when Stanhope presented a bill “for the better protection of the Peasantry and Tenantry in Great Britain and Ireland,” and April 20, when a message from the Regent and some Catholic petitions were read. He spoke on the 21st and signed a protest with twenty-eight others.

Note 127 in page 214 In March, Lords Gower and Milton had protested in Commons that they were denied admittance to the Regent to present petitions signed by thousands of workers “complaining of deep distress and praying for relief.” Parl. Deb., xxi, 1162 ff.

Note 128 in page 214 “Far from being peculiar on the point of dignity, Byron was not more certain than the ignoble journalists of his acquaintance that, as a peer, he could not honourably take to his own use the pecuniary fruits of his literary toil.” Jeaffreson, i, 222.

Note 129 in page 215 See Corr., i, 122, 161.

Note 130 in page 215 “Lord Byron is still [May 10] upon a pedestal, and Caroline William [Lamb] doing homage.” Letters of Harriet Countess Granville (London, 1894), i, 34.

Note 131 in page 215 Early in November Byron had received through Rogers “a kind of pacific overture from Lord Holland.” Corr., i, 59. “The introduction took place at Lord Byron's lodgings.” Holland, loc. cit., Dallas, iii, 13.

Note 132 in page 215 Published March 2, second day of debate on the Frame Bill. See L & J, ii, 97n.

Note 133 in page 216 L & J, iii, 227; Moore, p. 121.

Note 134 in page 216 Dallas, iii, 36. —Cp. Lady Alvanley to Scott, April 25: “Politics have lately brought [Byron] and Lord Holland to become very intimate ...” The Private Letter-Books of Sir Walter Scott (New York, 1930), p. 184.

Note 135 in page 216 Journal of Lady Holland, i, 251; ii, 10–11.

Note 136 in page 216 Moore, p. 125.

Note 137 in page 216 Loc. cit.

Note 138 in page 217 Moore's account (p. 138) has been traditionally misinterpreted. For its most flagrant perversion see Quennell, Byron, pp. 149–150. When Byron, interrupted in his “mockheroic” take-off of his recent speech by a matter-of-fact question from Moore, shouted back through the chamber wall, “The grievance?”—then, pausing “as if” to consider—“Oh that I forget,” the point was not at all that Byron didn't know the subject of his speech (see Raymond, p. 68, on that matter); the point was the “fun and oddity” of the remark. Moore is trying “to convey an idea of the dramatic humour with which he gave effect to these words,” to describe the “irresistable” comedy of Byronic make-believe.

Note 139 in page 217 L & J, iv, 500.

Note 140 in page 217 A failure which marked the end of what may or may not have been a genuine chance for the Whigs—who were not eager, in any event, to risk the adventure of office. Canning's young Tories were also out: “Canning has disbanded his party by a speech from his ... — the true throne of a Tory.” Byron to Murray, July 22, 1813.

Note 141 in page 217 L & J, v, 431.—Michael Roberts, pp. 382–405, elucidates the probabilities.

Note 142 in page 218 L & J, v, 430.—This was undoubtedly the meeting of June 3 described by Creevey. The Creevey Papers (New York, 1904), i, 164.

Note 143 in page 218 The Duke of Norfolk also joined the Hampden Club, but not at the same time as Byron; he was not a charter member.

Note 144 in page 218 Even on this their favorite question the Whigs had lost the initiative to the young Tories, Canning in Commons and Wellesley in Lords.

Note 145 in page 218 L & J, v, 431. Byron voted.

Note 146 in page 218 July 7, 10.

Note 147 in page 218 Corr., i, 102.

Note 148 in page 218 “The Jerseys, Melbournes, Cowpers, and Hollands.” L & J, ii, 163–164.

Note 149 in page 218 Byron first stayed at a “sordid inn” but was soon ensconced in the Hollands' house. Lady Holland had left and Byron's acceptance of Lord Hollands' commission to do the Drury Lane address, which busied him for the next month, was a sort of return for obligations. See Corr., i, 71–72.

Note 150 in page 219 Medwin, p. 228.

Note 151 in page 220 See Preface to The Waltz.

Note 152 in page 220 Corr., i, 82–88.

Note 153 in page 221 “There is a woman, who ... always urged a man to usefulness or glory.... [She] would have made me an advocate, if not an orator.” L & J, ii, 359.

Note 154 in page 221 “Thou art not false, but thou art fickle,” November, 1812, is generally recognized as written to Lady Oxford, but the context has never been studied.

Note 155 in page 222 Cf. Sardanapalus, i.iii.

Note 156 in page 222 In E. Barrington's Glorious Appollo (New York, 1929), pp. 77, 91–92, a novelized life of Byron, Sam Rogers is made to account for Caroline's hysterical behavior of July, 1812, by the gossip that Byron was spending “many days and hours” in the company of Lady Oxford and taking her to parties and routs. We know that Byron enraged Caroline by going to parties that month without her, but there is no evidence that he went with Lady Oxford. Sam Rogers' actual account mentions no names, does not even suggest there was any question of another woman. Moreover Rogers described the Byron-Lady Oxford affair as news in the following February. See Sir Herbert Maxwell, Sir Charles Murray, a Memoir (Edinburgh, 1898), p. 21.

Note 157 in page 222 It is Glenarvon [Byron] who first breaks off, from imagined jealousy, and Lady Mandeville [Oxford] who comforts Carantha [Caroline]. Glenarvon, ii, 212.

Note 158 in page 223 See iii, 49, 82, 94. Events of Cheltenham and Eywood are telescoped in the novel. Mortanville Priory represents at one point Cheltenham, at another, Eywood.

Note 159 in page 223 Corr., i, 72.

Note 160 in page 223 See Leiters of Harriet Countess Granville, i, 4.

Note 161 in page 223 Glenarvon, ii, 31, 46, 117–118.—She seems to be always with Caroline's entourage, but seldom in the foreground. See ii, 46, 138, 167–168.

Note 162 in page 223 ii, 198.

Note 163 in page 223 If Caroline had known of any goings-on before she left England, Byron's caution to Lady Melbourne in late October would have been pointless. Lady Oxford had asked him “not to mention that we have met, to C[aroline],” and he warned Lady Melbourne, “You may say that we met at Cheltenham] or elsewhere,—anything but that we are now together.” Corr., i, 95–96, October 20, 24, 1812.

Note 164 in page 223 See M. W. Patterson, Sir Francis Burdett and His Times 1770–1844 (London, 1931), i, 295–311, and Byron's reference to the affair, Corr., i, 171.

Note 165 in page 224 Moore, p. 122.—Byron to Moore, Friday [March 28?]: “I must consult with you about the day we dine with Sir Francis.” Sir Francis D'lvernois, of the Alfred Club, might be the man, or Sir Philip Francis—although Sir Francis Burdett is most likely.

Note 166 in page 224 Although Byron had joined the Hampden Club, Hobhouse would not, and not till seven years later did he and Kinnaird help Burdett form the similar Radical Rota Club, which Byron joined in absentia. Hobhouse, Recollections, ii, 113.

Note 167 in page 224 Byron was so frequently with Hobhouse in his daily adventures that the latter may sometimes have neglected to name him in his meager entries.

Note 168 in page 224 Was it perhaps on this or a similar occasion that Samuel Rogers received “a note from Lady-requesting the pleasure of my company on a particular evening, with a postscript, ‘Pray, could you not contrive to bring Byron with you‘?” Table Talk, p. 230.

Note 169 in page 225 “I was flattered,” Byron told Medwin (pp. 67–68), “at a preference that had led her to discard another, who in personal attractions and fashion was far my superior.” Hamilton was handsome, but deaf.

Note 170 in page 225 Recollections, i, 40–45.—The next entry touching Lady Oxford is: “January 12 [1813]. —”Got a picture of Lady Oxford from Mrs. Mee. Lord B's money for it.“ Ibid., i, 47.

Note 171 in page 225 Lords Journal. In 1812 Lord Oxford was also present January 31, February 28, April 21 (Byron's speech), and May 1, 5, and 12. In 1813: February 22, March 2, 4, 12, and 23. Byron was also present March 4 and 12, 1813.

Note 172 in page 226 Examiner, v (1812), 463–464, 478, 495, 606.

Note 173 in page 226 Letters to “Ivy,” p. 164.

Note 174 in page 226 Cp. L & J, vi, 101, Byron: “... it is necessary in the present clash of philosophy and tyranny, to throw away the scabbard.”

Note 175 in page 226 Dallas, iii, 29–30; L & J, ii, 125, 135.—We know the ball occurred during the week ending June 27. Samuel Smiles, Memoir of John Murray (London, 1891), i, 213. Byron on June 25 writes of it as “the other night.” And it was apparently later than the June 23 levee, since that levee, like the only other June levees announced (12th and 19th), took place as announced. Cp. London Gazette and London Packet for the season. The next levee, announced in the Gazette of June 29, was to be held July 7, but on that day the King's illness was acute and the Prince visited him instead, apparently, of holding the levee. The next and last levee of the season was held July 17.

Under date of July 6, Byron wrote to Scott reporting the Prince's compliments at the ball and adding, in his last paragraph, “I never went to the levee.” Did Byron proceed the following day to dress for the levee? We must conclude either that he mistook the date on which a levee was to be held and dressed for one some day between June 23 and July 7—perhaps on Friday (June 26 or July 3), the day levees had been held fairly regularly—or that he misdated the letter to Scott.

Some Biographers, such as Miss Raymond (p. 63), interpret Dallas as referring to “a new love who deterred [Byron] and instilled her own aversion to the Regent.” Others, such as Prothero, supply the name of Thomas Moore. But Dallas's account is confused. On the one hand he clearly refers to a “newly made friend” and indicates that this influence was not operative until after a posponed levee following the meeting at the ball, that is some time in late June or July. On the other hand he mixes in a reference to Byron's “harsh verses” (apparently the “Tear” lines against the Regent done in March but not publicly acknowledged till 1814), which he “believes” were “composed more to humor his new friend's passions than his own.” If the influences of March and July were from the same source, it could hardly have been Lady Oxford—although Dallas, in recollection, could have thought so. If, howe ver, these are two separate matters, connected only in Dallas's mind, then the “friend” of July, whose identification in Dallas is chastely obscured by three rows of asterisks, may well have been Lady Oxford, although the case is thin. Miss Raymond's account (p. 63) of Byron's relations with the Regent is based on a vagueness in dates.

Note 176 in page 227 Date conjectural—from the evidence that Byron was well enough acquainted at Kensington to inquire after the Princess's attendant, whom he could have met in April or May, her period of attendance.

Note 177 in page 227 The Court of England under George IV, founded on a diary [by Lady Charlotte Campbell Bury] (London, 1896), ii, 239. This letter, like so many in the Bury collection, is a composite. The first portion, dated February, 1810, by inscription and internal evidence, belongs to a time when Byron was in Greece and is obviously unrelated to the second portion, quoted above.

Note 178 in page 227 Perhaps Jane's activity is indicated in the fact that Princess Caroline and her daughter became Patronesses of the Benevolent Society at the same time that Byron subscribed.

Note 179 in page 227 Only once again in the Bury diary and correspondence is Byron referred to without mention of Lady Oxford—in a passage of April 24, 1814. Op. cit., ii, 272. The quotation above could belong to 1814, although it seems written when the acquaintance was fairly new.

A puzzling letter that may belong to 1812 is the following from the Princess to Lady Campbell [Bury]: “Lady Oxford has no thought but for Lord B—–. I wonder if she will succeed in captivating him. She can be very agreeable when she pleases, but she has not pleased to come near me this long time past; she has quite forgotten that Kensington Palace used to be a convenient place to see certain folks, and be seen by them ...” ii, 255.

The last lines imply that Byron is now on view at Kensington, but not necessarily that Lady Oxford has previously see him there; she used frequently to see other lovers there, Lord Hamilton and Lord Gower. The only dated record of Lady Oxford's visiting the Princess in 1812 is that of May 13. i, 163. If the letter belongs to that summer, then Jane's interest in Byron must have been evident enough for gossip to have reached the Princess. It won't fit into any of the time that Jane and Byron were together at Cheltenham and Eywood—which brings us to January, 1813, when the Princess knew well that Byron was captivated. The possibility remains that the letter belongs to late spring 1813, with “captivate” in the sense of “recapture”—except that it seems to have been Jane and not Byron who then became “fickle.”

Note 180 in page 229 In May Cartwright had tried without success to get Whitbread to present his petition in the House of Commons. Life of Cartwright, ii, 56.

Note 181 in page 229 Life of Stanhope, p. 189.

Note 182 in page 229 See Byron's Journal, November, 1813, to April, 1814, passim; Hobhouse, Recollections, passim; and Patterson, ii, 408.

Note 183 in page 230 William Parry, The Last Days of Lord Byron (Paris, 1826), p. 174.

Note 184 in page 230 Quotations from Corr., i, 162; L & J, ii, 338; Corr., i, 182; L & J, iii, 405—My italics in the last paragraph.

Note 185 in page 230 L & J, ii, 381.

Note 186 in page 231 LeMarchant, pp. 139–140. See Corr., i, 217, November 25, 1813: “Yesterday I dined with the patrons of pugilism, and some of the professors, who amused me almost as much.”