[313] Byron spent his childhood at Aberdeen.—T.
[314] Macpherson's Ossian was published in 1760.—T.
[315] Goethe's Sorrows of Werther appeared in 1774.—T.
[316] Rousseau's posthumous work, published in 1782.—T.
[317] By Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (1784).—T.
[318] Chateaubriand cannot have read the Age of Bronze: it is true that this poem was written in 1823, at Genoa, a year later than the earlier portion of these remarks. In Stanza XVI. of the Age of Bronze, or Carmen Seculare et Annus haud Mirabilis, treating of the Congress of Verona (1822), occur the following lines:
There Metternich, power's foremost parasite,
Cajoles; there Wellington forgets to fight;
There Chateaubriand forms new books of martyrs;
And subtle Greeks intrigue for stupid Tartars.
And Byron appends the following note:
"Monsieur de Chateaubriand, who has not forgotten the author in the minister, receives a handsome compliment at Verona from a literary sovereign: 'Ah! Monsieur C., are you related to that Chateaubriand who-who-who has written something?' (écrit quelque chose!). It is said that the author of Atala repented him for a moment of his legitimacy."—T.
[319] De la Littérature considérée dans ses rapports avec l'état moral et politique des nations, by Madame de Staël. As this book appeared in 1800, before Atala and the Génie du Christianisme, Madame de Staël may well be excused for not mentioning Chateaubriand's name in it.—B.