Selected Poems

by Byron

  3. Arthur’s Seat; the hill which overhangs Edinburgh.

  1. [‘Too ferocious – this is mere insanity.’ – B. 1816.]

  2. [‘All this is bad, because personal.’ – B. 1816.]

  3. In 1806, Messrs Jeffrey and Moore met at Chalk-Farm. The duel was prevented by the interference of the magistracy; and, on examination, the balls of the pistols were found to have evaporated. This incident gave occasion to much waggery in the daily prints.

  1. The Tweed here behaved with proper decorum; it would have been highly reprehensible in the English half of the river to have shown the smallest symptom of apprehension.

  2. This display of sympathy on the part of the Tolbooth (the principal prison in Edinburgh), which truly seems to have been most affected on this occasion, is much to be commended. It was to be apprehended, that the many unhappy criminals executed in the front might have rendered the edifice more callous. She is said to be of the softer sex, because her delicacy of feeling on this day was truly feminine, though, like most feminine impulses, perhaps a little selfish.

  1. His lordship has been much abroad, is a member of the Athenian Society, and reviewer of ‘Gell’s Topography of Troy.’

  2. Mr Herbert is a translator of Icelandic and other poetry. One of the principal pieces is a ‘Song on the Recovery of Thor’s Hammer:’ the translation is a pleasant chant in the vulgar tongue, and endeth thus: –

  ‘Instead of money and rings, I wot,

  The hammer’s bruises were her lot.

  Thus Odin’s son his hammer got.’

  3. The Rev. Sydney Smith, the reputed author of Peter Plymley’s Letters, and sundry criticisms.

  4. Mr Hallam reviewed Payne Knight’s ‘Taste,’ and was exceedingly severe on some Greek verses therein. It was not discovered that the lines were Pindar’s till the press rendered it impossible to cancel the critique, which still stands an everlasting monument of Hallam’s ingenuity.Note added to second edition. – The said Hallam is incensed because he is falsely accused, seeing that he never dineth at Holland House. If this be true, I am sorry – not for having said so, but on his account, as I understand his lordship’s feasts are preferable to his compositions. – If he did not review Lord Holland’s performance, I am glad, because it must have been painful to read, and irksome to praise it. If Mr Hallam will tell me who did review it, the real name shall find a place in the text; provided, nevertheless, the said name be of two orthodox musical syllables, and will come into the verse: till then, Hallam must stand for want of a better.

  5. Pillans is a tutor at Eton.

  1. The Hon. George Lambe reviewed ‘Beresford’s Miseries,’ and is moreover, author of a farce enacted with much applause at the Priory, Stanmore; and damned with great expedition at the late theatre, Covent Garden. It was entitled, ‘Whistle for It.’

  2. Mr Brougham, in No. XXV, of the Edinburgh Review, throughout the article concerning Don Pedro de Cevallos, has displayed more politics than policy; many of the worthy burgesses of Edinburgh being so incensed at the infamous principles it evinces, as to have withdrawn their subscriptions.

  3. I ought to apologise to the worthy deities for introducing a new goddess with short petticoats to their notice: but, alas! what was to be done? I could not say Caledonia’s genius, it being well known there is no such genius to be found from Clackmanan to Caithness; yet, without supernatural agency, how was Jeffrey to be saved? The national ‘kelpies’ are too unpoetical, and the ‘brownies’ and ‘gude neighbours’ (spirits of a good disposition) refused to extricate him. A goddess, therefore, has been called for the purpose; and great ought to be the gratitude of Jeffrey, seeing it is the only communication he ever held, or is likely to hold, with any thing heavenly.

  4. See the colour of the back binding of the Edinburgh Review.

  1. [‘Bad enough, and on mistaken grounds too.’ – B. 1816.]

  2. Lord Holland has translated some specimens of Lope de Vega, inserted in his life of the author. Both are bepraised by his disinterested guests. –

  3. Certain it is, her ladyship is suspected of having displayed her matchless wit in the Edinburgh Review. However that may be, we know, from good authority, that the manuscripts are submitted to her perusal – no doubt, for correction.

  4. In the melodrama of Tekeli, that heroic prince is clapt into a barrel on the stage; a new asylum for distressed heroes.

  1. All these are favourite expressions of Mr Reynolds, and prominent in his comedies, living and defunct.

  2. Mr T. Sheridan, the new manager of Drury Lane theatre, stripped the tragedy of Bonduca of the dialogue, and exhibited the scenes as the spectacle of Caractacus. Was this worthy of his sire? or of himself? –

  1. Mr Greenwood is, we believe, scene-painter to Drury-lane theatre – as such, Mr Skeffington is much indebted to him.

  2. Mr [now Sir Lumley] Skeffington is the illustrious author of the ‘Sleeping Beauty;’ and some comedies, particularly ‘Maids and Bachelors:’ Baccalaurii baculo magis quam lauro digni.

  3. Naldi and Catalani require little notice; for the visage of the one and the salary of the other, will enable us long to recollect these amusing vagabonds. Besides, we are still black and blue from the squeeze on the first night of the lady’s appearance in trousers.

  1. To prevent any blunder, such as mistaking a street for a man, I beg leave to state, that it is the institution, and not the duke of that name, which is here alluded to. A gentleman, with whom I am slightly acquainted, lost in the Argyle Rooms several thousand pounds at backgammon. [‘True. It was Billy Way who lost the money. I knew him, and was a subscriber to the Argyle at the time of the event.’ – B. 1816.] It is but justice to the manager in this instance to say, that some degree of disapprobation was manifested: but why are the implements of gaming allowed in a place devoted to the society of both sexes? A pleasant thing for the wives and daughters of those who are blest or cursed with such connections, to hear the billiard-tables rattling in one room, and the dice in another! That this is the case I myself can testify, as a late unworthy member of an institution which materially affects the morals of the higher orders, while the lower may not even move to the sound of a tabor and fiddle, without a chance of indictment for riotous behaviour.

  2. Petronius ‘Arbiter elegantiarum’ to Nero, ‘and a very pretty fellow in his day,’ as Mr Congreve’s ‘Old Bachelor’ saith of Hannibal.

  1. I knew the late Lord Falkland well. On Sunday night I beheld him presiding at his own table, in all the honest pride of hospitality; on Wednesday morning, at three o’clock, I saw stretched before me all that remained of courage, feeling, and a host of passions. He was a gallant and successful officer: his faults were the faults of a sailor – as such, Britons will forgive them. He died like a brave man in a better cause; for had he fallen in like manner on the deck of the frigate to which he was just appointed, his last moments would have been held up by his countrymen as an example to succeeding heroes.

  2. [‘Yes: and a precious chase they led me.’ – B. 1816.]

  3. [‘Fool enough, certainly, then, and no wiser since.’ – B. 1816.]

  4. What would be the sentiments of the Persian Anacreon, Hafiz, could he rise from his splendid sepulchre at Sheeraz, (where he reposes with Ferdousi and Sadi, the oriental Homer and Catullus,) and behold his name assumed by one Stott of Dromore, the most impudent and execrable of literary poachers for the daily prints?

  1. The Earl of Carlisle has lately published an eighteen-penny pamphlet on the state of the stage, and offers his plan for building a new theatre. It is to be hoped his lordship will be permitted to bring forward any thing for the stage – except his own tragedies.

  2. ‘Doff that lion’s hide,And hang a calf-skin on those recreant limbs.’ Shak. King John.Lord Carlisle’s works, most resplendently bound, form a conspicuous ornament to his book-shelves: –‘The rest is all but leather and prunella.’

  3. [‘Wrong also – the provocation was not sufficient to justify the acerbity.’ –
B. 1816.]

  1. ‘Melville’s Mantle,’ a parody on ‘Elijah’s Mantle,’ a poem.

  2. This lovely little Jessica, the daughter of the noted Jew King, seems to be a follower of the Della Crusca school, and has published two volumes of very respectable absurdities in rhyme, as times go; besides sundry novels in the style of the first edition of the Monk. – [‘She since married the Morning Post – an exceeding good match; and is now dead – which is better.’ – B. 1816.]

  3. These are the signatures of various worthies who figure in the poetical departments of the newspapers.

  1. [‘This was meant for poor Blackett, who was then patronised by A. J. B.’ (Lady Byron); ‘but that I did not know, or this would not have been written, at least I think not.’ – B. 1816.]

  2. Capel Lofft, Esq., the Mæcenas of shoemakers, and preface-writer-general to distressed versemen; a kind of gratis accoucheur to those who wish to be delivered of rhyme, but do not know how to bring forth.

  3. See Nathaniel Bloomfield’s ode, elegy, or whatever he or any one else chooses to call it, on the enclosure of ‘Honington Green.’

  1. Vide ‘Recollections of a Weaver in the Moorlands of Staffordshire.’

  2. It would be superfluous to recall to the mind of the reader the authors of ‘The Pleasures of Memory’ and ‘The Pleasures of Hope,’ the most beautiful didactic poems in our language, if we except Pope’s ‘Essay on Man:’ but so many poetasters have started up, that even the names of Campbell and Rogers are become strange.

  3. [‘Rogers has not fulfilled the promise of his first poems, but has still very great merit.’ – B. 1816.]

  4. Gifford, author of the Baviad and Maviad, the first satires of the day, and translator of Juvenal.

  5. Sotheby, translator of Wieland’s Oberon and Virgil’s Georgics, and author of ‘Saul,’ an epic poem.

  6. Macneil, whose poems are deservedly popular, particularly ‘Scotland’s Scaith,’ and the ‘Waes of War,’ of which ten thousand copies were sold in one month.

  1. Mr Gifford promised publicly that the Baviad and Maviad should not be his last original works: let him remember, ‘Mox in reluctantes dracones.’

  2. Henry Kirke White died at Cambridge, in October, 1806, in consequence of too much exertion in the pursuit of studies that would have matured a mind which disease and poverty could not impair, and which death itself destroyed rather than subdued. His poems abound in such beauties as must impress the reader with the liveliest regret that so short a period was allotted to talents which would have dignified even the sacred functions he was destined to assume.

  1. [‘I consider Crabbe and Coleridge as the first of these times, in point of power and genius.’ – B. 1816.]

  2. Mr Shee, author of ‘Rhymes on Art,’ and ‘Elements of Art.’

  3. Waller Rodwell Wright, late consul-general for the Seven Islands, is author of a very beautiful poem, just published: it is entitled ‘Horæ Ionicæ,’ and is descriptive of the isles and the adjacent coast of Greece.

  1. The translators of the Anthology, Bland and Merivale, have since published separate poems, which evince genius that only requires opportunity to attain eminence.

  2. The neglect of the ‘Botanic Garden‘ is some proof of returning taste. The scenery is its sole recommendation.

  3. Messrs Lamb and Lloyd, the most ignoble followers of Southey and Co.

  1. By the bye, I hope that in Mr Scott’s next poem, his hero or heroine will be less addicted to ‘Gramarye,’ and more to grammar, than the Lady of the Lay and her bravo, William of Deloraine.

  2. [‘Unjust.’ – B. 1816.]

  3. It may be asked, why I have censured the Earl of Carlisle, my guardian and relative, to whom I dedicated a volume of puerile poems a few years ago? – The guardianship was nominal, at least as far as I have been able to discover; the relationship I cannot help, and am very sorry for it; but as his lordship seemed to forget it on a very essential occasion to me, I shall not burden my memory with the recollection. I do not think that personal differences sanction the unjust condemnation of a brother scribbler; but I see no reason why they should act as a preventive, when the author, noble or ignoble, has, for a series of years, beguiled a ‘discerning public’ (as the advertisements have it) with divers reams of most orthodox, imperial nonsense. Besides, I do not step aside to vituperate the earl: no – his works come fairly in review with those of other partrician literati. If, before I escaped from my teens, I said any thing in favour of his lordship’s paper books, it was in the way of dutiful dedication, and more from the advice of others than my own judgment, and I seize the first opportunity of pronouncing my sincere recantation. I have heard that some persons conceive me to be under obligations to Lord Carlisle: if so, I shall be most particularly happy to learn what they are, and when conferred, that they may be duly appreciated and publicly acknowledged. What I have humbly advanced as an opinion on his printed things, I am prepared to support, if necessary,by quotations from elegies, eulogies, odes, episodes, and certain facetious and dainty tragedies bearing his name and mark: –‘What can ennoble knaves, or fools, or cowards?Alas! not all the blood of all the Howards.’So says Pope. Amen! – [‘Much too savage, whatever the foundation might be.’ – B. 1816.]

  1. [‘The devil take that phoenix! How came it there?’ – B. 1816.]

  2. The ‘Games of Hoyle,’ well known to the votaries of whist, chess, &c., are not to be superseded by the vagaries of his poetical namesake, whose poem comprised, as expressly stated in the advertisement, all the ‘plagues of Egypt.’

  3. [‘Right enough: this was well deserved, and well laid on.’ – B. 1816.]

  4. This person, who has lately betrayed the most rabid symptoms of confirmed authorship, is writer of a poem denominated the ‘Art of Pleasing,’ as ‘lucus a non lucendo,’ containing little pleasantry and less poetry. He also acts as monthly stipendiary and collector of calumnies for the ‘Satirist.’ If this unfortunate young man would exchange the magazines for the mathematics, and endeavour to take a decent degree in his university, it might eventually prove more serviceable than his present salary.

  1. ‘Into Cambridgeshire the Emperor Probus transported a considerable body of Vandals.’ – Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, vol. ii. p. 83. There is no reason to doubt the truth of this assertion; the breed is still in high perfection.

  2. This gentleman’s name requires no praise: the man who in translation displays unquestionable genius may be well expected to excel in original composition, of which it is to be hoped we shall soon see a splendid specimen.

  3. Hewson Clarke, Esq. as it is written.

  4. The ‘Aboriginal Britons,’ an excellent poem, by Richards.

  1. A friend of mine being asked, why his Grace of Portland was likened to an old woman? replied, ‘he supposed it was because he was past bearing.’ – His Grace is now gathered to his grandmothers, where he sleeps as sound as ever; but even his sleep was better than his colleagues’ waking. 1811.

  2. Georgia.

  3. Mount Caucasus.

  4. These four lines originally stood, –

  ‘But should I back return, no letter’d sage

  Shall drag my common-place book on the stage;

  Let vain Valentia* rival luckless Carr,

  And equal him whose work he sought to mar.’

  * Lord Valentia (whose tremendous travels are forthcoming with due decorations, graphical, topographical, typographical) deposed, on Sir John Carr’s unlucky suit, that Mr Dubois’s satire prevented his purchase of the ‘Stranger in Ireland.’ – Oh, fie, my lord! has your lordship no more feeling for a fellow-tourist? – but ‘two of a trade,’ they say, &c.

  1. Lord Elgin would fain persuade us that all the figures, with and without noses, in his stoneshop are the work of Phidias! ‘Credat Judæus!’

  2. The original epithet was ‘classic.’ Lord Byron altered it in the fifth edition, and added this note – ‘Rapid’ indeed! He topographised and typo-graphised King Priam’s dominions
in three days! I called him ‘classic’ before I saw the Troad, but since have learned better than to tack to his name what don’t belong to it.’ [Editors]

  3. Mr Gell’s Topography of Troy and Ithaca cannot fail to insure the approbation of every man possessed of classical taste, as well for the information Mr Gell conveys to the mind of the reader, as for the ability and research the respective works display. – [‘Since seeing the plain of Troy, my opinions are somewhat changed as to the above note. Gell’s survey was hasty and superficial.’ – B. 1816.]

  1. [‘The greater part of this satire I most sincerely wish had never been written – not only on account of the injustice of much of the critical, and some of the personal part of it – but the tone and temper are such as I cannot approve.’ – BYRON. July 14, 1816. Diodati, Geneva.]

  1. In the East (where ladies are not taught to write, lest they should scribble assignations) flowers, cinders, pebbles, &c. convey the sentiments of the parties by that universal deputy of Mercury – an old woman. A cinder says, ‘I burn for thee;’ a bunch of flowers tied with hair, ‘Take me and fly;’ but a pebble declares – what nothing else can.

  2. Constantinople.

  1. On the 3d of May, 1810, while the Salsette (Captain Bathurst) was lying in the Dardanelles, Lieutenant Ekenhead, of that frigate and the writer of these rhymes swam from the European shore to the Asiatic – by the by, from Abydos to Sestos would have been more correct. The whole distance, from the place whence we started to our landing on the other side, including the length we were carried by the current, was computed by those on board the frigate at upwards of four English miles; though the actual breadth is barely one. The rapidity of the current is such that no boat can row directly across, and it may, in some measure, be estimated from the circumstance of the whole distance being accomplished by one of the parties in an hour and five, and by the other in an hour and ten, minutes. The water was extremely cold, from the melting of the mountain snows. About three weeks before, in April, we had made an attempt; but, having ridden all the way from the Troad the same morning, and the water being of an icy chillness, we found it necessary to postpone the completion till the frigate anchored below the castles, when we swam the straits, as just stated; entering a considerable way above the European, and landing below the Asiatic, fort. Chevalier says that a young Jew swam the same distance for his mistress; and Oliver mentions its having been done by a Neapolitan; but our consul, Tarragona, remembered neither of these circumstances, and tried to dissuade us from the attempt. A number of the Salsette’s crew were known to have accomplished a greater distance; and the only thing that surprised me was, that, as doubts had been entertained of the truth of Leander’s story, no traveller had ever endeavoured to ascertain its practicability.