It is possible that, in a conversation between Mary and himself, the former may have spoken of the risks they had incurred in the past, and of her resolve never to transgress again. To which Byron replied:
Harmodia.
‘The things that were—and what and whence are they?
Those clouds and rainbows of thy yesterday?
Their path has vanish’d from th’ eternal sky,
And now its hues are of a different dye.
Thus speeds from day to day, and Pole to Pole,
The change of parts, the sameness of the whole;
And all we snatch, amidst the breathing strife,
But gives to Memory what it takes from Life:
Despoils a substance to adorn a shade—
And that frail shadow lengthens but to fade.
Sun of the sleepless! Melancholy Star!
Whose tearful beam shoots trembling from afar—
That chang’st the darkness thou canst not dispel—
How like art thou to Joy, remembered well!
Such is the past—the light of other days
That shines, but warms not with its powerless rays—
A moonbeam Sorrow watcheth to behold,
Distinct, but distant—clear, but death-like cold.
‘Oh! as full thought comes rushing o’er the Mind
Of all we saw before—to leave behind—
Of all!—but words, what are they? Can they give
A trace of truth to thoughts while yet they live?
No—Passion—Feeling speak not—or in vain—
The tear for Grief—the Groan must speak for Pain—
Joy hath its smile—and Love its blush and sigh—
Despair her silence—Hate her lip and eye—
These their interpreters, where deeply lurk—
The Soul’s despoilers warring as they work—
The strife once o’er—then words may find their way,
Yet how enfeebled from the forced delay!
‘But who could paint the progress of the wreck—
Himself still clinging to the dangerous deck?
Safe on the shore the artist first must stand,
And then the pencil trembles in his hand.’
When, four years later, Byron was writing the first canto of ‘Don Juan,’ with feelings chastened by suffering and time, he recurred to that period—never effaced from his memory—the time when he wrote:
‘When thou art gone—the loved—the lost—the one
Whose smile hath gladdened—though, perchance, undone!’
Time could not change the feelings of his youth, nor keep his thoughts for long from the object of his early love.
‘They tell me ’tis decided you depart:
’Tis wise—’tis well, but not the less a pain;
I have no further claim on your young heart,
Mine is the victim, and would be again:
To love too much has been the only art
I used.’
‘I loved, I love you, for this love have lost
State, station, Heaven, Mankind’s, my own esteem,
And yet can not regret what it hath cost,
So dear is still the memory of that dream;
Yet, if I name my guilt, ’tis not to boast,
None can deem harshlier of me than I deem.’
‘All is o’er
For me on earth, except some years to hide
My shame and sorrow deep in my heart’s core:
These I could bear, but cannot cast aside
The passion which still rages as before—
And so farewell—forgive me, love me—No,
That word is idle now—but let it go.’
*******
‘My heart is feminine, nor can forget—
To all, except one image, madly blind;
So shakes the needle, and so stands the pole,
As vibrates my fond heart to my fixed soul.’
It was early in 1814 that Byron also wrote his farewell verses to Mary Chaworth, which appeared in the second edition of ‘The Corsair’:
I.
‘Farewell! if ever fondest prayer
For other’s weal availed on high,
Mine will not all be lost in air,
But waft thy name beyond the sky.
’Twere vain to speak—to weep—to sigh:
Oh! more than tears of blood can tell,
When wrung from Guilt’s expiring eye,
Are in that word—Farewell! Farewell!
II.
‘These lips are mute, these eyes are dry;
But in my breast, and in my brain,
Awake the pangs that pass not by,
The thought that ne’er shall sleep again.
My soul nor deigns nor dares complain,
Though Grief and Passion there rebel:
I only know we loved in vain—
I only feel—Farewell! Farewell!’
Even in the ‘Hebrew Melodies,’ which were probably begun in the autumn of 1814, and finished after Byron’s marriage in January, 1815, there are traces of that deathless remorse and love, whose expression could not be altogether repressed. We select some examples at random. In the poem ‘Oh, snatched away in Beauty’s bloom,’ the poet had added two verses which were subsequently suppressed:
‘Nor need I write to tell the tale,
My pen were doubly weak.
Oh! what can idle words avail,
Unless my heart could speak?
‘By day or night, in weal or woe,
That heart, no longer free,
Must bear the love it cannot show,
And silent turn for thee.’