At No. 1, Dr. Lane’s celebrated School of Anatomy and Medicine has for many years been established. No. 4 originally formed two houses, which were thrown together by the late Earl of Egremont, who here first formed the splendid collection of pictures now at Petworth. He was a great patron of English artists, and an excellent judge of their productions. Haydon, one of those he had befriended, declares he “never saw such a character, or such a man, nor were there ever many. ‘Live and let live’ seems to be the Earl’s motto.” Lord Egremont died in November, 1837. [232]
The mansion at the north corner of Halkin Street is that—
“Where the Howards’ noble race
For many a year have made their resting place.”
The first nobleman of this title who resided here was Frederick, the fifth earl. He was born in 1748, and died in 1825, and is the nobleman often mentioned by Boswell as gaining Johnson’s praise for his literary performances. But however valuable these may be considered, he owes his literary immortality to the attacks made on him by Byron. He was guardian to the poet, who dedicated to him his “Hours of Idleness,” which the Earl is said to have coolly received, an affront which deeply rankled in Byron’s breast—causing a wound his mother did her best to widen. Byron, however, seems to have forgotten his animosity, for in his “English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,” as originally intended for the press, he compliments Carlisle:—
“On one alone Apollo deigns to smile,
And crowns a new Roscommon in Carlisle.”
But the intended honour was not permitted to remain. Receiving, as he considered, a fresh slight, Byron erased the praise, for the vituperative sarcasm still to be read:—
“Let Stott, Matilda, and the rest
Of Grub-street and of Grosvenor-place the best,
Scrawl on, till death release us from the strain,
Or common sense asserts her rights again.”
But the poet regretted the severity, and afterwards, in his noble tribute to Major Howard, gave utterance to his repentance;—
“Their praise is hymned by loftier harps than mine;
Yet one I would select from that proud throng,
Partly because they blend me with his line,
And partly that I did his sire some wrong.”
And of the Major he writes with rapturous eloquence:—