scene

Mr Greenwood is, we believe, painter to Drury Lane theatre as such, Mr Skeffington is much indebted to him.

Naldi and Catalani require little notice; for the visage of the one, and the salary of the other, will enable us long to recollect these amusing vagabonds. Besides, we are still black and blue from the squeeze on the first night of the Lady's appearance in trousers. [Giuseppe Naldi (1770-1820) made his debut on the London stage at the King's Theatre in April, 1806. Angelica Catalani (circ. 1785-1849), a famous soprano, made her début at Venice in 1795. Her first appearance in England was at the King's Theatre, in Portogallo's Semiramide, in 1806.]

[Moore says that the following twenty lines were struck off one night after Lord Byron's return from the Opera, and sent the next morning to the printer. The representation which provoked the outburst was probably that of I Villegiatori Rezzani, at the King's Theatre, February 21, 1809. The first piece, in which Naldi and Catalani were the principal singers, was followed by d'Egville's musical extrava

ganza, Don Quichotte, ou les Noces de G mache. In the corps de ballet were Deshay of Herculean stature, for many years mast of the ballet at the King's Theatre, Miss Gayto who had played a Sylph at Drury Lane as car as 1806, and Mademoiselle Angiolini, "elega of figure, petite, but finely formed, with t manner of Vestris." Mademoiselle Presle do not seem to have taken part in Don Quichott but she was well known as première danseu in La Belle Laitière, La Fête Chinoise, ar other ballets.]

To prevent any blunder, such as mistakir a street for a man, I beg leave to state, that it the institution, and not the Duke of that nam which is here alluded to.

A gentleman, with whom I am slightly

Where yon proud palace, Fashion's hallowed fane,

Spreads wide her portals for the motley train,

640 Behold the new Petronius1 of the day,

Our arbiter of pleasure and of play! There the hired eunuch, the Hesperian choir,

The melting lute, the soft lascivious lyre,

The song from Italy, the step from France,

The midnight orgy, and the mazy dance,

The smile of beauty, and the flush of wine,

For fops, fools, gamesters, knaves, and Lords combine:

Each to his humour - Comus all allows;

Champagne, dice, music or your neighbour's spouse.

650 Talk not to us, ye starving sons of trade!

Of piteous ruin, which ourselves have made;

quainted, lost in the Argyle Rooms several thousand pounds at Backgammon.* It is but justice to the manager in this instance to say, that some degree of disapprobation was manifested: but why are the implements of gaming allowed in a place devoted to the society of both seres? A pleasant thing for the wives and daughters of those who are blessed or cursed with such connections, to hear the BilliardBalls rattling in one room, and the dice in another! That this is the case I myself can testify, as a late unworthy member of an Institution which materially affects the morals of the higher orders, while the lower may not even move to the sound of a tabor and fiddle, without a chance of indictment for riotous behaviour. [The Argyle Institution, founded by Colonel Greville, flourished many years before the Argyll Rooms were built by Nash in 1818. This mention of Greville's name caused him to demand an explanation from Byron, but the matter was amicably settled by Moore and G. F. Leckie, who acted on behalf of the disputants (See Life, pp. 160, 161.)]

Petronius, "Arbiter elegantiarum" to Nero, "and a very pretty fellow in his day," as Mr Congreve's "Old Bachelor" saith of Hannibal.

"True. It was Billy Way who lost the money. I knew him, and was a subscriber to the Argyle at the time of this event." B., 1816.

The curtain dropped, the gay Burletta o'er,

The audience take their turn upon the floor:

Now round the room the circling dow'gers sweep,

Now in loose waltz the thin-clad daughters leap; 660

The first in lengthened line majestic swim,

The last display the free unfettered limb!

Those for Hibernia's lusty sons repair With art the charms which Nature could not spare;

These after husbands wing their eager flight,

Nor leave much mystery for the nuptial night.

Oh! blest retreats of infamy and ease, Where, all forgotten but the power to please,

Each maid may give a loose to genial thought,

Each swain may teach new systems, or

be taught:

670

There the blithe youngster, just returned

from Spain,

Cuts the light pack, or calls the rattling main;

The jovial Caster's set, and seven's the Nick, done! ing trick!

Or

a thousand on the com

If, mad with loss, existence 'gins to tire, And all your hope or wish is to expire, Here's POWELL'S' pistol ready for your

life,

2

And, kinder still, two PAGETS for your wife:

I ["We are authorised to state that Mr Greville, who has a small party at his private assembly rooms at the Argyle, will receive from 10 to 12 [P.M.] masks who have Mrs. Chichester's Institution tickets." Morning Post, June 7, 1809.] 2 [See note on line 683, infra.]

On

I knew the late Lord Falkland well. Sunday night I beheld him presiding at his own table, in all the honest pride of hospitality; on Wednesday morning, at three o'clock, I saw stretched before me all that remained of courage, feeling, and a host of passions. He was a gallant and successful officer: his faults were the faults of a sailor as such, Britons will forgive them. He died like a brave man in a better cause; for had he fallen in like manner on the deck of the frigate to which he was just appointed, his last moments would have been held up by his countrymen as an example to succeeding heroes.

[Charles John Carey, ninth Viscount Falkland, died from a wound received in a duel with Mr A. Powell on February 28, 1800.]

3" Yes: and a precious chase they led me." B., 1816.

4" Fool enough, certainly, then, and no wiser since."-- B., 1816.

[In a manuscript fragment, bound in the sire volume as British Bards (the first draft of English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers which Byron had set up in type), we find these lines: "In these, our times, with daily wonders big, A lettered peer is like a lettered pig; Both know their Alphabet, but who, from thence,

Infers that peers or pigs have manly sense? Stil less that such should woo the graceful nine; Parnassus was not made for lords and swine."]

[Wentworth Dillon, 4th Earl of Roscommon 1534-1685), author of many translations and nor poems, endeavoured (circ. 1663) to found an English literary academy.]

[John Sheffield (1648-1721), Earl of Mulave (1658), Marquis of Normanby (1694), Duke of Buckingham (1703), wrote an Essay en Poetry, and several other works.]

[Frederick Howard, 5th Earl of Carlisle, KG. (1748-1825), Viceroy of Ireland, 1780732. and Privy Seal, etc., published Tragedies and Poems, 1801. He was Byron's first cousin ere removed, and his guardian. Poems Bricinal and Translated were dedicated to Lord Carlisle, and, as an erased MS. addition

British Bards testifies, he was to have been excepted from the roll of titled poetasters"Ah, who would take their titles from their rhymes?

On one alone Apollo deigns to smile, And crowns a new Roscommon in Carlisle." Before, however, the revised Satire was sent to fie press, Carlisle ignored his cousin's request to introduce him on taking his seat in the House of Lends, and, to avenge the slight, eighteen lines of tigation supplanted the flattering couplet. Lord Carlisle suffered from a nervous disorder, ari Byron was informed that some readers had nted an allusion in the words "paralytic ping." "I thank Heaven," he exclaimed, "I did not know it; and would not, could not, if I had. I must naturally be the last person to be pointed on defects or maladies."}

The Earl of Carlisle has lately published an eighteen-penny pamphlet on the state of the Stage, and offers his plan for building a new theatre. It is to be hoped his Lordship will be permitted to bring forward anything for the Stage - except his own tragedies. [This pamphlet was entitled Thoughts upon the present condition of the stage, and upon the construction of a new Theatre. Anon. 1808.]

"Doff that lion's hide, And hang a calf-skin on those recreant limbs." SHAKESPEARE, King John.

Lord Carlisle's works, most resplendently bound, form a conspicuous ornament to his bookshelves:

"The rest is all but leather and prunella." "Wrong also the provocation was not sufficient to justify such acerbity." B., 1816.

3 All the Blocks, or an Antidote to "All the Talents," by Flagellum (W. H. Ireland), London, 1807; The Groan of the Talents, or Private Sentiments on Public Occasions, 1807; "Gr-vile Agonistes, A Dramatic Poem, 1807, etc., etc."

"MELVILLE'S Mantle," a parody on Elijah's Mantle, a poem. [Elijah's Mantle, being verses occasioned by the death of the Right Hon. W. Pitt (1807), was written by James Sayer. Melville's Mandle, being a Parody on the poem entitled "Elijah's Mantle," was published by Budd, 1807. A Monody on the death of the R. H. C. J. Fox, by Richard Payne Knight, was printed for J. Payne, 1806-7, and there were others.]

This lovely little Jessica, the daughter of the noted Jew King, seems to be a follower of the Della Crusca school, and has published two volumes of very respectable absurdities in rhyme, as times go; besides sundry novels in the style of the first edition of The Monk.

-an

"She since married the Morning Post exceeding good match; and is now dead which is better." B., 1816. [The novelist "Rosa," the daughter of Jew King," the lordly money-lender who lived in Clarges Street, and drove a yellow chariot, may possibly be confounded with "Rosa Matilda,' Mrs. Byrne, the wife of the Editor of the Morning Post.] 3 These are the signatures of various worthies who figure in the poetical departments of the newspapers.

"

[Lines 756-764 refer to the so-called Della Cruscan school attacked by Gifford in The

or "Rosa Baviad, and The Maviad. "Rosa' Matilda" (1. 756), born Charlotte Dacre, afterwards Mrs. Byrne, published poems (Hours of "Anna Solitude, 1805), etc.; "Anna" (1. 762) or Matilda," born Hannah Parkhouse, afterwards Mrs. Cowley, wrote The Belle's Stratagem, acted at Covent Garden, in 1782; "Hafiz," Robert Stott, wrote for the Morning Post; Robert Merry (1755-1798), who had helped to found the school at Florence, and written for the Arno Miscellany, 1784, etc., afterward contributed The World, then edited by Captain Topham. Rosa Of these writers, Merry was dead; Matilda Byrne, "Anna Matilda" Cowley, and "Hafiz" Stott were still living.]

to

"This was meant for poor Blackett, who was then patronised by A. I. B." [Lady Byron]; "but that I did not know, or this would not have B., 1816. been written, at least I think not."

He

[Joseph Blacket (1786-1810), said by Southey to possess "force and rapidity," and to be endowed with "more powers than Robert Bloomfield, and an intellect of higher pitch," was the son of a labourer, and by trade a cobbler. was brought into notice by S. J. Pratt (who published Blacket's Remains in 1811), and was befriended by the Milbanke family. He died on the Seaham estate in September, 1810, at the age of twenty-three.]

Capell Lofft, Esq., the Maecenas of shoemakers, and Preface-writer General to distressed versemen; a kind of gratis Accoucheur to those who wish to be delivered of rhyme, but do not know how to bring it forth.

[Capell Lofft (1751-1824), jurist, poet, critic, and horticulturist, honoured himself by his kindly patronage of Robert Bloomfield (17661823), who was born at Honington, near Lofft's Robert Bloom estate of Throston, Suffolk.

field was brought up by his elder brothers Nathaniel a tailor, and George a shoemaker. It was in the latter's workshop that he composed The Farmer's Boy, which was published (1798) with the help of Lofft.]