134 Mms of tbe 1[3untinci*3Fielb 



he was peculiarly sensitive on the subject of his lameness, 

 and one day he unfortunately overheard Mary Chaworth 

 say to her maid, who had spoken of Byron's evident 

 passion for her : ' Do you think I could ever care anything 

 for that lame boy ? ' The words cut him to the heart, 

 and, though it was late at night, he darted out of the 

 house and ran every step of the way to his home at 

 Newstead Abbey, three miles away. From that moment 

 Byron abandoned all hope of winning the heart of Mary 

 Chaworth, though he never ceased to brood over the 

 happiness of which he thought he had been robbed by 

 her coldness to his suit. ' Our union,' he writes in his 

 diary, ' would have healed feuds in which blood had 

 been shed by our fathers — it would have joined lands 

 broad and rich — it would have joined at least on^ heart 

 and two persons not ill-matched in years (she is two 

 years my elder) and — and— and — w/iat has been the 

 result?' In that touching and powerful poem 'The 

 Dream,' wherein Byron lays bare his most sacred 

 feelings, he says : — 



' But she in these fond feelings had no share, 

 Her sighs were not for him — to her he was 

 Even as a brother — but no more.' 



And the result ? He answers that query thus : 



' It was of a strange order that the doom 

 Of these two creatures should be thus traced out 

 Almost like a reality — the one 

 To end in madness — both in misery.' 



Mary Chaworth, however, had given her heart to 

 handsome Jack Musters, who was as fine a specimen of 

 a manly athletic young Englishman as any woman could 

 wish to see, an accomplished dancer, gifted with a 

 fine singing voice, and pronounced by the Prince Regent 

 himself to be the most perfect gentleman he ever met. 



