[102] In another letter to Mr. Harness, dated February, 1809, he says, "I do not know how you and Alma Mater agree. I was but an untoward child myself, and I believe the good lady and her brat were equally rejoiced when I was weaned; and if I obtained her benediction at parting, it was, at best, equivocal."
[103] The poem, in the first edition, began at the line,
"Time was ere yet, in these degenerate days."
[104] Lady Byron, then Miss Milbank.
[105] In the MS. remarks on his Satire, to which I have already referred, he says, on this passage—"Yea, and a pretty dance they have led me."
[106] "Fool then, and but little wiser now."—MS. ibid.
[107] Dated, in his original copy, Nov. 2. 1808.
[108] Entitled, in his original manuscript, "To Mrs. ——, on being asked my reason for quitting England in the spring." The date subjoined is Dec. 2. 1808.
[109] In his first copy, "Thus, Mary."
[110] Thus corrected by himself in a copy of the Miscellany now in my possession;—the two last lines being, originally, as follows:—