Зображення сторінки
PDF
ePub
[ocr errors]

66

66

or no avail here, he indulges himself in a pleasant vision

as to what will be their fate hereafter. The third Hea

ven is hardly good enough for a king, and Dante's worst "berth in the 'Inferno' hardly bad enough for me. My "kindness to his brother-in-law might have taught him to "be more charitable. I said in a Note to The Two Fos

66

66

[ocr errors]

cari,' in answer to his vain boasting, that I had done

more real good in one year than Mr. Southey in the "whole course of his shifting and turn-coat existence, on

66

66

which he seems to reflect with so much complacency. I did not mean to pride myself on the act to which I have just referred, and should not mention it to you, but that "his self-sufficiency calls for the explanation. When Cole

66

66

66

ridge was in great distress, I borrowed 100l. to give him."

Some days after this discussion appeared Mr. Southey's reply to the Note in question. I happened to see 'The Literary Gazette' at Mr. Edgeworth's, and mentioned the general purport of the letter to Lord Byron during our evening ride. His anxiety to get a sight of it was so great, that he wrote me two notes in the course of the evening, entreating me to procure the paper. I at length succeeded, and took it to the Lanfranchi palace at eleven o'clock,

(after coming from the opera,) an hour at which I was frequently in the habit of calling on him.

He had left the Guiccioli earlier than usual, and I found him waiting with some impatience. I never shall forget his countenance as he glanced rapidly over the contents. He looked perfectly awful: his colour changed almost prismatically; his lips were as pale as death. He said not a word. He read it a second time, and with more attention than his rage at first permitted, commenting on some of the passages as he went on. When he had finished, he threw down the paper, and asked me if I thought there was any thing of a personal nature in the reply that demanded satisfaction; as, if there was, he would instantly set off for England and call Southey to an account,—muttering something about whips, and branding-irons, and gibbets, and wounding the heart of a woman, words of Mr. Southey's. I said that, as to personality, his own expressions of "cowardly ferocity," "pitiful renegado," "hireling," much stronger than any in the letter before me. He paused a moment, and said:

66

Perhaps you are right; but I will consider of it. You "have not seen my Vision of Judgment.' I wish I had a

66 copy to shew you; but the only one I have is in London. “I had almost decided not to publish it, but it shall now go "forth to the world. I will write to Douglas Kinnaird by "to-morrow's post, to-night, not to delay its appearance. "The question is, whom to get to print it. Murray will "have nothing to say to it just now, while the prosecution "of Cain' hangs over his head. It was offered to Longman; but he declined it on the plea of its injuring the "sale of Southey's Hexameters, of which he is the pub"lisher. Hunt shall have it."

66

Another time he said:

"I am glad Mr. Southey owns that article on 'Foliage,' "which excited my choler so much. But who else could

have been the author? Who but Southey would have "had the baseness, under the pretext of reviewing the "work of one man, insidiously to make it a nest egg for hatching malicious calumnies against others?

66

66

"It was bad taste, to say the least of it, in Shelley

to write Altos after his name at Mont Anvert. I knew "little of him at that time, but it happened to meet my eye,

66

" and I put my pen through the word, and Mopos too, that

"had been added by some one else by way of comment

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

and a very proper comment too, and the only one that

should have been made on it. There it should have stop

ped. It would have been more creditable to Mr. Southey's heart and feelings if he had been of this opinion; he would then never have made the use of his travels he “did, nor have raked out of an album the silly joke of a

66

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

66

66

66

66

66

boy, in order to make it matter of serious accusation

against him at home. I might well say he had impudence enough, if he could confess such infamy. I say nothing of the critique itself on 'Foliage;' with the exception of

a few sonnets, it was unworthy of Hunt. But what was the object of that article? I repeat, to vilify and scatter his dark and devilish insinuations against me and others. Shame on the man who could wound an already bleeding heart, be barbarous enough to revive the of a

[ocr errors]

memory

fatal event that Shelley was perfectly innocent of-and found scandal on falsehood! Shelley taxed him with

writing that article some years ago; and he had the

audacity to admit that he had treasured up some opinions of Shelley's, ten years before, when he was on a visit at

Keswick, and had made a note of them at the time. "But his bag of venom was not full; it is the nature

“of the reptile. Why does a viper have a poison-tooth, or the scorpion claws?"

66

[ocr errors]

Some days after these remarks, on calling on him one morning, he produced The Deformed Transformed.' Handing it to Shelley, as he was in the habit of doing his daily compositions, he said:

[ocr errors]

66

Shelley, I have been writing a Faustish kind of drama : "tell me what you think of it."

After reading it attentively, Shelley returned it.

66

66

Well," said Lord Byron," how do you like it?

Least," replied he, " of any thing I ever saw of yours.

It is a bad imitation of 'Faust;' and besides, there are two entire lines of Southey's in it.

Lord Byron changed colour immediately, and asked hastily what lines? Shelley repeated,

66

"And water shall see thee,

"And fear thee, and flee thee."

They are in The Curse of Kehamah.'"

His Lordship, without making a single observation, in

« НазадПродовжити »