LETTERS AND JOURNALS OF LORD BYRON, WITH NOTICES OF HIS LIFE, from
April, 1817, to October, 1820.Pg 1
LETTER 272. TO MR. MURRAY.
"Venice, April 9. 1817.
"Your letters of the 18th and 20th are arrived. In my own I havegiven you the rise, progress, decline, and fall, of my recentmalady. It is gone to the devil: I won't pay him so bad acompliment as to say it came from him;—he is too much of agentleman. It was nothing but a slow fever, which quickened itspace towards the end of its journey. I had been bored with it someweeks—with nocturnal burnings and morning perspirations; but I amquite well again, which I attribute to having had neither medicinenor doctor thereof.
"In a few days I set off for Rome: such is my purpose. I shallchange it very often before Monday next, but do you continue todirect and address to Venice, as heretofore. If I go, letterswill be forwarded: I say 'if,' because I never know what I shalldo till it is done; and as I mean most firmly toPg 2 set out for Rome,it is not unlikely I may find myself at St. Petersburg.
"You tell me to 'take care of myself;'—faith, and I will. I won'tbe posthumous yet, if I can help it. Notwithstanding, only thinkwhat a 'Life and Adventures,' while I am in full scandal, would beworth, together with the 'membra' of my writing-desk, the sixteenbeginnings of poems never to be finished! Do you think I would nothave shot myself last year, had I not luckily recollected that Mrs.C * * and Lady N * *, and all the old women in England would havebeen delighted;—besides the agreeable 'Lunacy,' of the 'Crowner'sQuest,' and the regrets of two or three or half a dozen? Be assuredthat I would live for two reasons, or more;—there are one or twopeople whom I have to put out of the world, and as many into it,before I can 'depart in peace;' if I do so before, I have notfulfilled my mission. Besides, when I turn thirty, I will turndevout; I feel a great vocation that way in Catholic churches, andwhen I hear the organ.
"So * * is writing again! Is there no Bedlam in Scotland? northumb-screw? nor gag? nor hand-cuff? I went upon my knees to himalmost, some years ago, to prevent him from publishing a politicalpamphlet, which would have given him a livelier idea of 'HabeasCorpus' than the world will derive from his present production uponthat suspended subject, which will doubtless be followed by thesuspension of other of his Majesty's subjects.
"I condole with Drury Lane and rejoice with * *,—Pg 3that is, in amodest way,—on the tragical end of the new tragedy.
"You and Leigh Hunt have quarrelled then, it seems? I introduce himand his poem to you, in the hope that (malgré politics) the unionwould be beneficial to both, and the end is eternal enmity; and yetI did this with the best intentions: I introduce * * *, and * * *runs away with your money: my friend Hobhouse quarrels, too, withthe Quarterly: and (except the last) I am the innocent Istmhus(damn the word! I can't spell it, though I have crossed that ofCorinth a dozen times) of these enmities.
"I will tell you something about Chillon.—A Mr. De Luc, ninetyyears old, a Swiss, had it read to him, and is p