183t).] Moore s Notices of Lord Byron. 195 



Byron's letters have a fling at every body. " Rogers is out of town 

 with Madame de Stael, who hath published an essay against suicide, 

 which I presume will make somebody shoot himself; as a sermon by 

 Blenkinsop, in proof of Christianity, sent a hitherto most orthodox 

 acquaintance of mine out of a chapel of ease a perfect atheist. There 

 is to be a thing on Tuesday yclept a National Fete. The Regent is 

 to be there. Vauxhall is the scene. There are six tickets issued 

 for the modest women, and it is supposed there will be three to 

 spare. Canning has disbanded his party, by a speech from his 

 * * # * I t ne true throne for a Tory. Madame de Stael Hoi- 

 stein has lost one of her young barons, who has been carbon- 

 adoed by a vile Teutonic adjutant, kilt and killed in a coffee-house in 

 Scrawsenhausen. Corinne is of course what all mothers must be, but 

 will, I venture to prophecy, do what few mothers could, write an Essay 

 upon it. She cannot exist without a grievance, and somebody to see 

 or read Jiow much grief becomes her." In his poem* the " Devil's 

 Drive," Satan comes to the House of Lords. 



ff He saw my Lord Liverpool seemingly wise, 

 The Lord Westmoreland certainly silly ; 

 And Johnny of Norfolk a man of some size, 

 And Chatham, so like his friend Billy. 

 And he heard, which set Satan himself a staring, 

 A certain Chief Justice say something like swearing, 

 And the Devil was shocked, and says he I must go, 

 For I find we have much better manners below." 



The " Chief Justice" was probably Ellenborough, whose manners were 

 violent and insolent. 



Byron at length turned his thoughts to looking out for a wife; and Lady 

 Melbourne recommended Miss Milbanke, to whom he accordingly made 

 proposals. The offer was rejected ; but the lady adopted the extraordi- 

 nary measure of requesting his correspondence. So much for the 

 delicacy of the blues. At the end of two years of this foolish and triiing 

 sentimentality, he was informed that he might make his proposals again. 

 " What an odd situation is ours," says Byron, t{ not a spark of love on 

 either side/' The mode of making this overture must be a pleasant 

 discovery for the lady. His " memoranda" say, that a friend advised 

 him to take a wife, and mentioned one. Byron mentioned Miss Mil- 

 banke. The friend objected to her want of immediate fortune, and her 

 " learning." Byron allowed the argument, proposed for the friend's 

 choice, and was refused. On reading the refusal he tried Miss Milbanke 

 again, writing a letter to her at the moment of his receiving the rejec- 

 tion. The friend still argued, but taking up the letter said, " It is 

 really a very pretty letter. It is a pity it should not go. I never read 

 a prettier one." " Then it shall go," said Byron. It went at the instant,, 

 and as Moore rather legally says, was " the fiat of his fate." Byron 

 declared that he had not seen her for ten months before ! 



What wonder that this kind of marriage should have run into bicker- 

 ings and separation. The biographer throws no further light on the 

 " mysterious separation," of which all the world talked so much at the 

 time. But the courtship was a sufficient solution. The wife had taken, 

 her steps in palpable defiance of her parents and friends, and of course 

 had nobody to thank for her subsequent ill-luck but herself. Byron 

 brought her into a house which had nine executions in it in the 



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