Miss Carpenter, who was entirely captivated by her, received from her some charge amounting to literary executorship; but after one or two furtive delvings into the trunks full of papers (since, I believe, stored in Hoare’s bank), she gave up in despair. She told me that the papers were in the most extraordinary confusion; letters both of the most trivial and of the most serious and compromising kind, household accounts, poems, and tradesmen’s bills, were all mixed together in hopeless disorder and dust. As is well known, Byron’s famous verses:
“Fare thee well! and if for ever!”
were written on the back of a butcher’s bill—unpaid like most of the rest. Miss Carpenter vouched for this fact.
Lady Byron was at one time greatly attracted by Fanny Kemble. Among Mrs. Kemble’s papers in my possession are seven letters from Lady Byron to her. Here is one of them worth presenting:
“Dear Mrs. Kemble,
“The note you wrote to me before you left Brighton made me revert to a train of thought which had been for some time in my mind. I alluded once to “your Future.” I submit to be considered a Visionary, yet some of my decided visions have come to pass in the course of years let me tell you my Vision about you—That you are to be something to the People; that your strong sympathy with them (though you will not let them touch the hem of your garment) will bring your talents to bear upon their welfare; that the way is open to you, after your personal objects are fulfilled. My mind is so full of this, that though the time has not arrived for putting it in practice, I cannot help telling you of it. I am neither Democratic nor Aristocratic. I do not see those distinctions in looking at Humanity, but I feel most strongly that for every advantage we have received we are bound to offer something to those who do not possess it. Happy they who have gifts to place at the feet of their less favoured fellow-Christians!
“I cannot believe that a relation so truthful as yours and mine will be merely casual. Time will show. I might not have an opportunity of saying this in a visit.
“Yours most truly,
A. Noel Byron.”
“March 19th.