Lord Byron did not admit the possibility of describing a site that had not been seen, a sentiment that had not been experienced, or at least well known on certain and direct testimony. Never could people say of him, what M. Sainte-Beuve asserted of Chateaubriand, namely, that he had not visited the places he described, that he lent to some what of right belonged only to others, and that he had not even seen Niagara.
On the contrary, when Lord Byron was writing, the objects described were really present, so to say, as facts rather than in imagination.
Mr. Galt was so persuaded of this that he almost denied him the possession of imagination, and he says that the stamp of personal experience is so strongly marked in many of Lord Byron's productions, usually considered fancies or inventions, that he deems it impossible not to assign for their basis real facts or events wherein he had been either actor or spectator.
To refuse Lord Byron imagination would be absurd; but it is true that his imagination could only have discovered the elements and materials so wonderfully put together, through a scrupulous and profound observation of reality. And it was only afterward, that superadding sentiment and thought, he wrought out such splendid truths, which, if not precisely combined in the living reality, were so far superior that any absence in the original model appeared like a forgetfulness of nature.
Without, then, admitting Mr. Galt's ideas, in their extreme consequences, it is at least certain that Lord Byron's genius required so much to lean on truth in all things, that it may be said he owed far more to facts than to the power of imagination.
Apart from the faculty of combining, which he possessed in a splendid manner, if any one should take the trouble to observe, one by one, the characters he has painted, we should be still more confirmed in the above opinion. For instance, Conrad, that magnificent type of the corsair, that energetic compound of an Albanese warrior and a naval officer, far from being an imaginary character, was entirely drawn from nature and real history. All who have travelled in the Levant, and especially at that period, must have met with personages whose appearance distinctly recalled Conrad.
That peaceful men, leading a regular monotonous life in the midst of civilized Europe, or persons who have only travelled over their maps or their books, quietly seated in their library—that they should find characters like Conrad's eccentric, and the incidents of such a career improbable, may easily be conceived; but it is not the less true that both are in perfect keeping with each other and with truth.
I might say the same thing of "Childe Harold." But having spoken of this character sufficiently elsewhere, in order to repel the unjust identification of the Pilgrim with the author,—for "Childe Harold" appears to me the personification of a moral idea, of the accidental transitory state of a soul placed under certain circumstances, rather than type,—I will only add here, that this unjust identification was also caused by that craving which Lord Byron experienced of leaning, in all things, on reality, on facts acquired through his own experience. For although it is incorrect to imagine that he made use of his looking-glass for drawing the portraits of his heroes, since the glass could not even for a passing moment—such as suffices only for a daguerreotype—have converted his gentle, beautiful expression of face into the dark countenance of a Harold, a Giaour, a Conrad, or a Lara; still it is true that he lent them some of his own noble, fine lineaments, some faint shadow of his beauty, and that more than once he committed the fault of placing them in situations exactly similar to his own, even going so far as to install his heroes within the ancient abbey of Newstead,—a hospitality that cost him dear.
Characters that had produced a strong impression on him easily became models for the personages portrayed in his poems. It was the terrible Ali Pasha of Yanina who furnished the most striking features depicted in the heroes of his Eastern poems. The reports current about Ali Pasha's uncle served to lend their share of truth; and we may say, in general, that those acquainted with Lord Byron and his history possessed the clew to his imaginary personages; they could even recognize his Adelinas, Dudus, Gulbeyazs, Angelinas, Myrrhas, Adahs; and having first taken his stand on earth, it cost his fancy very little to soar and idealize what might else have been too commonplace.
As to the historical characters, we are certain of finding them in the most authentic histories; for it would be impossible to carry scrupulous research further than he did. Some observations on "Marino Faliero," his first historical drama, will suffice for an example.