As this statement was made after Lady Byron’s interview with Dr. Lushington (when he decided to take no part in any attempt at reconciliation), it is perfectly clear that the alleged incriminating letters were not considered as conclusive evidence against Mrs. Leigh. Although they were sufficient to detach Lushington from the party of reconciliation, it was not considered wise to produce them as evidence in 1869, at a time when a strong revulsion of feeling had set in against Lady Byron.
The clear legal brain of Sir Alexander Cockburn, trained to appraise evidence, saw through the flimsy pretext which had deceived an equally great lawyer. Time instructs us, and much has come to light in this so-called ‘Byron mystery,’ since Lady Byron beguiled Lushington. Among other things, we now know, on Lord Lovelace’s authority, that Lady Byron was afraid that her child would be taken from her by Byron, and placed under the care of Mrs. Leigh. We also know, on the authority of Hobhouse,[69] that Lady Byron’s representatives distinctly disavowed, on Lady Byron’s behalf, having spread any rumours injurious to Lord Byron’s character in that respect, and also stated that a charge of incest would not have been made part of her allegations if she had come into court. This disavowal was signed by Lady Byron herself, and was witnessed by Mr. Wilmot. It is certain that Lord Byron would have gone into a court of law to meet that charge, and that he refused to agree to a separation until that assurance had been given. This grave charge was still in abeyance in 1816; it was not safe to speak of it until after Byron’s death, and then only under the seal of secrecy.
‘Upon one contingency only,’ wrote Sir Francis Doyle in 1830—‘namely, the taking from Lady Byron of her child, and placing her under the care of Mrs. Leigh—would the disclosure have been made of Lady Byron’s grounds for suspecting Mrs. Leigh’s guilt.’
It was evident that Lady Byron was clutching at straws to save her child from Mrs. Leigh, and to prevent this it was essential to prove Mrs. Leigh’s unworthiness. In her maternal anxiety she stuck at nothing, and for a time she triumphed. Her private correspondence was drenched with the theme that had impressed Lushington so strongly.
A fortnight after signing her ‘statement,’ Lady Byron writes to Mrs. George Lamb, in reference to Mrs. Leigh:
‘I am glad that you think of her with the feelings of pity which prevail in my mind, and surely if in mine there must be some cause for them. I never was, nor ever can be, so mercilessly virtuous as to admit no excuse for even the worst of errors.’
Such letters go perilously near that charge which Lady Byron’s representatives had repudiated in the presence of Hobhouse. But Lady Byron was desperate, and her whole case depended on a general belief in that foul accusation. What could not be done openly could be done secretly, and she poisoned the air to save her child.
Colonel Doyle, who seems to have been one of the few on Lady Byron’s side who kept his head, wrote to her on July 9, 1816:
‘I see the possibility of a contingency under which the fullest explanation of the motives and grounds of your conduct may be necessary; I therefore implore of you to suffer no delicacy to interfere with your endeavouring to obtain the fullest admission of the fact. If you obtain an acknowledgment of the facts and that your motives be, as you seem to think, properly appreciated, I think on the whole we shall have reason to rejoice that you have acted as you have done, but I shall be very anxious to have a more detailed knowledge of what has passed, and particularly of the state in which you leave it. The step you have taken was attended with great risk, and I could not, contemplating the danger to which it might have exposed you, have originally advised it.
‘If, however, your correspondence has produced an acknowledgment of the fact even previous to your marriage, I shall be most happy that it has taken place.’