My Recollections of Lord Byron

by contessa di Teresa Guiccioli

"It is in vain, says my learned brother, that Lord Byron attempts in any way to justify his own behavior with regard to Lady Byron.

"And now that he has so openly and audaciously invited inquiry and reproach, we do not see any good reason why he should not be plainly told so by the voice of his countrymen."

"How far the openness of an anonymous poem, and the audacity of an imaginary character, which the writer supposes to be meant for Lady Byron, may be deemed to merit this formidable denunciation from their most sweet voices, I neither know nor care; but when he tells me that I can not 'in any way justify my own behavior in that affair,' I acquiesce, because no man can justify himself until he knows of what he is accused; and I have never had—and, God knows, my whole desire has ever been to obtain it—any specific charge, in a tangible shape, submitted to me by the adversary, nor by others, unless the atrocities of public rumor and the mysterious silence of the lady's legal advisers may be deemed such.

"But is not the writer content with what has been already said and done? Has not the general voice of his countrymen long ago pronounced upon the subject sentence without trial, and condemnation without a charge? Have I not been exiled by ostracism, except that the shells which proscribed me were anonymous? Is the writer ignorant of the public opinion and the public conduct upon that occasion? If he is, I am not: the public will forget both long before I shall cease to remember either.

"The man who is exiled by a faction has the consolation of thinking that he is a martyr; he is upheld by hope and the dignity of his cause, real or imaginary: he who withdraws from the pressure of debt may indulge in the thought that time and prudence will retrieve his circumstances; he who is condemned by the law as a term to his banishment, or a dream of his abbreviation; or, it may be, the knowledge or the belief of some injustice of the law, or of its administration, in his own particular. But he who is outlawed by general opinion, without the intervention of hostile politics, illegal judgment, or embarrassed circumstances, whether he be innocent or guilty, must undergo all the bitterness of exile, without hope, without pride, without alleviation. This case was mine. Upon what grounds the public founded their opinion I am not aware; but it was general, and it was decisive. Of me or of mine they knew little, except that I had written what is called poetry, was a nobleman, had married, became a father, and was involved in differences with my wife and her relatives, no one knew why, because the persons complaining refused to state their grievances. The fashionable world was divided into parties, mine consisting of a very small minority; the reasonable world was naturally on the stronger side, which happened to be the lady's, as was most proper and polite. The press was active and scurrilous; and such was the rage of the day that the unfortunate publication of two copies of verses rather complimentary than otherwise to the subjects of both, was tortured into a species of crime, or constructive petty treason. I was accused of every monstrous vice by public rumor and private rancor; my name, which had been a knightly or a noble one since my fathers helped to conquer the kingdom for William the Norman, was tainted. I felt that, if what was whispered, and muttered, and murmured, was true, I was unfit for England; if false, England was unfit for me. I withdrew: but this was not enough. In other countries, in Switzerland, in the shadow of the Alps, and by the blue depth of the lakes, I was pursued and breathed upon by the light. I crossed the mountains, but it was the same; so I went a little farther, and settled myself by the waves of the Adriatic, like the stag at bay, who betakes him to the waters.

"If I may judge by the statements of the few friends who gathered round me, the outcry of the period to which I allude was beyond all precedent, all parallel, even in those cases where political motives have sharpened slander and doubled enmity."

One regrets not being able to go on reproducing these fine pages written by Lord Byron, but the limits we have assigned ourselves force the sacrifice.

And now, after all that has been placed before the reader, will he not be curious to learn whether Lord Byron truly loved Lady Byron. The answer admits of no doubt. Could love exist between two natures so widely dissonant? But then it will be said, why did he marry her? This question may be answered by the simple observation that two-thirds of the marriages in high life, and indeed in all classes, are contracted without any love, nor are the parties, therefore, condemned to unhappiness. Still it is as well to recall that not only it did not enter into Lord Byron's views to marry for love and to satisfy passion, but that he married rather for the sake of escaping from the yoke of his passions! "If I were in love I should be jealous," said he, "and then I could not render happy the woman I married." "Let her be happy," added he, "and then, for my part, I shall also be so." Then again we find, "Let them only leave me my mornings free." Lastly, he wrote in his journal, before marrying Miss Milbank, and while in correspondence with her, "It is very singular, but there is not a spark of love between me and Miss Milbank." If, then, Miss Milbank married Lord Byron out of self-love, and to prevent his marrying a young and beautiful Irish girl, Lord Byron, on his part, married Miss Milbank from motives the most honorable to human nature. It was her simple modest air that attracted him and caused his delusion, and the fame of her virtues quite decided him. As to interested motives, they were at most but secondary; and his disinterestedness was all the more meritorious, since the embarrassed state of his affairs made him really require money, and Miss Milbank had none at that period. She was an only daughter, it is true; but her parents were still in the prime of life, and her uncle, Lord Wentworth, from whom her mother was to inherit before herself, might yet live many years. His marriage with Miss Milbank was thus not only disinterested as regards fortune, but even imprudently generous; for she only brought him a small dowry of £10,000—a mere trifle compared to the life of luxury she was to lead, in accordance with their mutual rank.[147] And these £10,000 were not only returned by Lord Byron on their separation, but generously doubled.

And now let us hasten to add that although Lord Byron was not in love with Miss Milbank, he had no dislike to her person, for she was rather pretty and pleasing in appearance. Her reputation for moral and intellectual qualities, standing on such a high pedestal, Lord Byron naturally conceived that esteem might well suffice to replace tenderness. It is certain that, if she had lent herself to it more, and if circumstances had only been endurable, their union might have presented the same character common to most aristocratic couples in England, and that even Lord Byron might have been able to act from virtue in default of feeling; but that little requisite for him was wholly wanting.

His celebrated and touching "Farewell" might be brought up as an objection to what we have just advanced. It might be said that the word sincere is a proof of love, and insincere a proof of falsehood. Lastly, that in all cases there was a want of delicacy and refinement in thus confiding his domestic troubles to the public. Well, all that would be ill-founded, unjust, and contrary to truth. This is the truth of the matter. Lord Byron had just been informed that Lady Byron, having sent off by post the letter wherein she confirmed all that her father, Sir Ralph, had written, namely, her resolution of not returning to the conjugal roof, had afterward caused this letter to be sought for, and on its being restored, had given way to almost mad demonstrations of joy. Could he see aught else in this account save a certainty of the evil influences weighing on her, and making her act in contradiction to her real sentiments? He pitied her then as a victim, thought of all the virtues said to crown her, the illusive belief in which he was far then from having lost; he forgot the wrongs she had inflicted on him—the spying she had kept up around him—the calumnies spread against him—the use she had made of the letters subtracted from his desk. Yes, all was forgotten by his generous heart; and, according to custom, he even went so far as to accuse himself—to see in the victim only his wife, the mother of his little Ada! Under this excitement he was walking about at night in his solitary apartments, and suddenly chanced to perceive in some corner different things that had belonged to Lady Byron—dresses and other articles of attire. It is well known how much the sight of these inanimate mementoes has power to call up recollections even to ordinary imaginations. What, then, must have been the vividness with which they acted on an imagination like Lord Byron's? His heart softened toward her, and he recollected that one day, under the influence of sorrows which well-nigh robbed him of consciousness, he had answered her harshly. Thinking himself in the wrong, and full of the anguish that all these reflections and objects excited in his breast, he allowed his tears to flow, and, snatching a pen, wrote down that touching effusion, which somewhat eased his suffering.