"Breakfasted with Mr. Cowell," writes Moore, in his Diary, June 11, 1828, "having made his acquaintance for the purpose of gaining information about Lord Byron. Knew Byron for the first time when he himself was a little boy, from being in the habit of playing with B.'s dogs. Byron wrote to him to school to bid him mind his prosody. Gave me two or three of his letters to him. Saw a good deal of B. at Hastings; mentioned the anecdote about the ink-bottle striking one of the lead Muses. These Muses had been brought from Holland; and there were, I think, only eight of them arrived safe. Fletcher had brought B. a large jar of ink, and, not thinking it was full, B. had thrust his pen down to the very bottom; his anger at finding it come out all besmeared with ink made him chuck the jar out of the window, when it knocked down one of the Muses in the garden, and deluged her with ink. In 1813, when B. was at Salt Hill, he had Cowell over from Eton, and pouched him no less than ten pounds. Cowell has ever since kept one of the notes. Told me a curious anecdote of Byron's mentioning to him, as if it had made a great impression on him, their seeing Shelley (as they thought) walking into a little wood at Lerici, when it was discovered afterwards that Shelley was at that time in quite another direction. 'This,' said Byron, in a sort of awe-struck voice, 'was about ten days before his death.' Cowell's imitation of his look and manner very striking. Thinks that in Byron's speech to Fletcher, when he was dying, threatening to appear to him, there was a touch of that humour and fun which he was accustomed to mix up with everything".
(
Memoirs, Journals, etc
., vol. v. pp. 302, 303).
See
Letters
, vol. i. p. 70, and
note