The proposition, therefore, of her noble lover He had grown fatter both in person and face, and seemed to the young Contessa little less than sacri- the latter had most suffered by the change,-havlege, and the agitation of her mind, between the ing lost, by the enlargement of the features, some of horrors of such a step, and her eager readiness to that refined and spiritualised look that had, in other give up all and every thing for him she loved, was times, distinguished it. The addition of whiskers, depicted most strongly in her answer to the pro-too, which he had not long before been induced to posal. In a subsequent letter, too, the romantic adopt, from hearing that some one had said he had girl even proposed, as a means of escaping the a "faccia di musico," as well as the length to which ignominy of an elopement, that she should, like his hair grew down on his neck, and the rather another Juliet," pass for dead,”—assuring him that foreign air of his coat and cap,-all combined to there were many easy ways of effecting such a produce that dissimilarity to his former self I had deception. observed in him. He was still, however, eminently Towards the latter end of August, Count Guic- handsome; and, in exchange for whatever his feacioli, accompanied by his lady, went for a short tures might have lost of their high romantic chatime to visit some of his Romagnese estates, while racter, they had become more fitted for the expresLord Byron remained at Bologna alone. And here, sion of that arch waggish wisdom, that Epicurean with a heart softened and excited by the new feel-play of humour, which he had shown to be equally ing that had taken possession of him, he appears to inherent in his various and prodigally-gifted nahave given himself up, during this interval of soli-ture; while, by the somewhat increased roundness tude, to a train of melancholy and impassioned of the contours, the resemblance of his finely-formthought, such as, for a time, brought back all the ed mouth and chin to those of the Belvidere Apollo romance of his youthful days. In the month of had become still more striking. September, Count Guiccioli, being called away by business to Ravenna, left his young Countess and her lover to the free enjoyment of each other's society at Bologna. The lady's ill health, which had been the cause of her thus remaining behind, was thought soon after to require the still further advantage of a removal to Venice, and the Count, her husband, being written to on the subject, consent-Guiccioli, who was at this time, as my readers ed, with the most complaisant readiness, that she should proceed thither in company with Lord Byron. Some business having called Count Guiccioli | lar in an Italian, as being fair-complexioned and to Ravenna, she was obliged, by the state of her health, instead of accompanying him, to return to Venice, and he consented that Lord Byron should be the companion of her journey. They left Bologna on the 15th of September, visited the Euganean Hills and Arquà, and wrote their names in the book which is presented to those who make this pilgrimage. When she arrived at Venice, the physicians ordered her to try the country air; and Lord Byron, having a villa at La Mira, gave it up to the Countess, and went to reside there with her. this place they passed the autumn. At It was my good fortune, at this period, in the course of a short and hasty tour through the north of Italy, to pass five or six days with Lord Byron at Venice. I was a good deal struck by the alteration that had taken place in his personal appearance. His breakfast, which I found he rarely took before three or four o'clock in the afternoon, was speedily despatched, — his habit being to eat it standing, and the meal in general consisting of one or two raw eggs, a cup of tea without either milk or sugar, and a bit of dry biscuit. Before we took our departure, he presented me to the Countess already know, living under the same roof with him at La Mira; and who, with a style of beauty singu delicate, left an impression upon my mind, during this our first short interview, of intelligence and amiableness, such as all that I have since known or heard of her has but served to confirm. He had all along expressed his determination that I should not go to any hotel, but fix my quarters at his house during the period of my stay ; and, had he been residing there himself, such an arrangement would have been all that I most desired; but, this not being the case, a common hotel was, I thought, a far readier resource; and I therefore entreated that he would allow me to order an apartment at the Gran Bretagna, which had the reputation, I understood, of being a comfortable hotel. This, however, he would not hear of; and I, accordingly, accepted his kind and hospitable offer. On the day preceding that of my departure from Venice, my noble host, on arriving from La Mira to dinner, told me, with all the glee of a schoolboy who had been just granted a holiday, that, as this was my last evening, the Contessa had given him leave to "make a night of it," and that, accordingly, he would not only accompany me to the opera, but that we should sup together at some café (as in the old times) afterwards. At the time of my visit to him, he was writing the Third Canto of Don Juan, and, before dinner, one day, read me two or three hundred lines of it. He had been so far influenced by the general outcry against his Poem, as to feel the zeal and zest with which he had commenced it considerably abated, --so much so, as to render, ultimately, in his own opinion, the Third and Fourth Cantos much inferior in spirit to the Two First. So sensitive, indeed, in addition to his usual abundance of this quality,-did he, at length, grow on the subject, that when Mr. W. Bankes, who succeeded me as his visitor, happened to tell him one day, that he had heard a Mr. Saunders (or some such name), then resident at Venice, declare that, in his opinion, "Don Juan was all Grub-street," such an effect had this disparaging speech upon his mind (though coming from a person who, as he himself would have it, was "nothing but a d―d salt-fish seller"), that, for some time after, by his own confession to Mr. Bankes, he could not bring himself to write another line of the Poem; and, one morning, opening a drawer where the neglected manuscript lay, be said to his friend, "Look here--this is all Mr. Saunders's 'Grub-street." To return, however, to the details of our last evening together at Venice.-After a dinner with Mr. Scott, at the Pellegrino, we all went, rather late, to the opera, at the end of which we betook ourselves to a sort of cabaret, in the Place of St. Mark, and there, within a few yards of the Palace of the Doges, sat drinking hot brandy punch, and laughing over old times, till the clock of St. Mark struck the second hour of the morning. Lord Byron then took me in his gondola; and the moon being in its fullest splendour, he made the gondoliers row us to such points of view as might enable me to see Venice, at that hour, to advantage; and at about three o'clock in the morning, at the door of his own palazzo, we parted, laughing as we had met; an agreement having been first made that I should take an early dinner with him next day, at his villa, on my road to Ferrara. Having employed the morning of the following day in completing my round of sights at Venice, I took my departure from that city, and, at about three o'clock, arrived at La Mira. I found my noble host waiting to receive me, and, in passing with him through the hall, saw his little Allegra,(1) who, with her nursery-maid, was standing there as if just returned from a walk. A short time before dinner he left the room, and in a minute or two returned, carrying in his hand a white leather bag. "Look here," he said, holding it up, "this would be worth something to Murray, though you, I dare say, would not give sixpence for it."-"What is it ?" I asked.My Life and Adventures," he answered. On hearing this, I raised my hands in a gesture of wonder. "It is not a thing," he continued, “ that can be published during my lifetime, but you may have it, if you like-there, do whatever you please with it." In taking the bag, and thanking him most warmly, I added, "This will make a nice legacy for my little Tom, who shall astonish the latter days of the nineteenth century with it." He then added, You may show it to any of our friends you think worthy of it :"--and this is, nearly word for word, the whole of what passed between us on the subject. At dinner we were favoured with the presence of Madame Guiccioli; and, when it was time for me to depart, ordering his horses to follow, he proceeded with me in the carriage as far as Strà, where for the last time-how little thinking it was to be the last! I bade my kind and admirable friend farewell. The struggle which, at the time of my visit to him, I had found Lord Byron so well disposed to make towards averting, as far as now lay in his power, some of the mischievous consequences which, both to the object of his attachment and himself, were likely to result from their connexion, had been brought to a crisis soon after I left him. The Count Guiccioli, on his arrival at Venice, insisted, as we have seen, that his lady should return with him; and, after some conjugal negotiations, in which Lord Byron does not appear to have interfered, the young Contessa consented reluctantly to accompany her Lord to Ravenna, it being first covenanted that, in future, all communication between her and her lover should cease. In a few days after this, he (1) Lord Byron's natural daughter. returned to Venice very much out of spirits, owing to Madame Guiccioli's departure, and out of humour with every body and every thing around him. He went into no society, and his time, when he was not writing, hung heavy enough on hand; but the promise given by the lovers not to correspond was, as all parties must have foreseen, soon violated. He had now arranged every thing for his departure for England, and had even fixed the day, when accounts reached him from Ravenna that the Contessa was alarmingly ill;—her sorrow at their separation having so much preyed upon her mind, that even her own family, fearful of the consequences, had withdrawn all opposition to her wishes, and now, with the sanction of Count Guiccioli himself, entreated her lover to hasten to her. The very next day's tidings from Ravenna decided his fate; and he himself, in a letter to the Contessa, announced the triumph which she had achieved. He soon after this set out for Ravenna, where, for a short time after his arrival, he took up his residence at an inn; but the Count Guiccioli having allowed him to hire a suite of apartments in the Palazzo Guiccioli itself, he was once more lodged under the same roof with his mistress. In July, 1820, by a decision of the Papal Court, a separation was pronounced between the Count and Countess Guiccioli, one of the conditions being that the lady should, in future, reside under the paternal roof:-in consequence of which, Madame Guiccioli, on the 16th of July, left Ravenna, and retired to a villa belonging to Count Gamba, fifteen miles distant from that city. Here, Lord Byron occasionally visited her-about once or twice, perhaps, in the month-passing the rest of his time in perfect solitude. In August, 1821, Mr. Shelley thus wrote from Ravenna :-"Lord Byron here has splendid apartments in the palace of his mistress's husband, who is one of the richest men in Italy. She is divorced, with an allowance of twelve thousand crowns a-year; a miserable pittance from a man who has a hundred and twenty thousand a-year. There are two monkeys, five cats, eight dogs, and ten horses, all of whom (except the horses) walk about the house like the masters of it. Tita, the Venetian, is here, and operates as my valet-a fine fellow, with a prodigious black beard, who has stabbed two or three people, and is the most good-natured-looking fellow I ever saw." On the 19th of September following, his Lordship addressed Mr. Moore, from Ravenna, as follows:"I am in all the sweat, dust, and blasphemy of a universal packing of all my things, furniture, etc., for Pisa, whither I go for the winter. The cause has been the exile of all my fellow Carbonics, and, amongst them, of the whole family of Madame G.,who, you know, was divorced from her husband last week, on account of P. P., clerk of this parish,' and who is obliged to join her father and relatives, now in exile there, to avoid being shut up in a monastery, because the Pope's decree of separation required her to reside in casa paterna, or else, for decorum's sake, in a convent. As I could not say, with Hamlet, 'Get thee to a nunnery,' I am preparing to follow them. "It is awful work, this love, and prevents all a man's projects of good or glory. I wanted to go to Greece lately (as every thing seems up here) with her brother, who is a very fine brave fellow (I have seen him put to the proof), and wild about liberty. But the tears of a woman who has left her husband for a man, and the weakness of one's own heart, are paramount to these projects, and I can hardly indulge them. "We were divided in choice between Switzerland and Tuscany, and I gave my vote for Pisa, as nearer the Mediterranean, which I love for the sake of the shores which it washes, and for my young recollections of 1809." Madame Guiccioli had joined her father, in August, at Pisa, and was now superintending the preparations at the Casa Lanfranchi, one of the most ancient and spacious palaces of that city,-for the reception of her noble lover. "He left Ravenna," says this lady, "with great regret, and with a presentiment that his departure would be the forerunner of a thousand evils to us. In every letter he then wrote to me, he expressed his displeasure at this step. If your father should be recalled,' he said, ʻI immediately return to Ravenna; and if he is recalled previous to my departure, I remain.' In this hope he delayed his journey for several months; but, at last, no longer having any expectation of our immediate return, he wrote to me, saying-I set out most unwillingly, foreseeing the most evil results for all of you, and principally for yourself. I say no more, but you will see.' And in another letter he says: 'I leave Ravenna so unwillingly, and with such a persuasion on my mind XLVI that my departure will lead from one misery to another, each greater than the former, that I have not the heart to utter another word on the subject.' How entirely were these presentiments verified by the event!" Lord Byron now proceeded to Bologna, according to appointment, to join Mr. Rogers, and accidentally met on the road with his early and dearest friend, Lord Clare. At the end of February, 1822, he received the melancholy intelligence of the death of his daughter, Allegra, of a fever, in the convent of Bagna Cavallo, where she was placed for her education. The remains of this interesting child were sent to England for sepulture in Harrow Church. In the month of October, 1822, Lord Byron took up his residence at Genoa, where he remained till his departure for Leghorn, at which place he landed in the middle of July, 1823. From Leghorn he set sail, on the 24th of July, and ten days after cast anchor at Argostoli, the chief port of Cephalonia, on his way to aid the patriot Greeks. It is proper to observe here, that it had been thought expedient Lord Byron should, with the view of informing himself correctly respecting Greece, direct his course in the first instance to one of the Ionian Islands, whence, as from a post of observation, he might be able to ascertain the exact position of affairs, before he landed on the continent. On the eve of his departure for the seat of warfare, he wrote to me as follows: "Cephalonia, December 27th, 1823. "I embark for Missolonghi, to join Mavrocordato in four-and-twenty hours. The state of parties (but it were a long story) has kept me here till now; but now that Mavrocordato (their Washington or their Kosciusko) is employed again, I can act with a safe conscience. I carry money to pay the squadron, etc., and I have influence with the Suliotes, supposed sufficient to keep them in harmony with some of the dissentients for there are plenty of differences, but trifling. middle age of a brother warbler,—like Garcilasso de la Vega, Kleist, Korner, Kutoffski (a Russian nightingale-see Bowring's Anthology), or Thersander, or-or, somebody else—but never mindI pray you to remember me in your smiles and wine.' "I have hopes that the cause will triumph; but, whether it does or no, still 'Honour must be minded as strictly as a milk diet.' I trust to observe "Ever, etc." both. Owing to adverse weather, and being closely pressed by the Turkish cruisers, they did not land at Missolonghi till the morning of the 5th. The whole population of the place crowded to the shore to welcome him; the ships anchored off the fortress fired a salute as he passed; and all the troops and dignitaries of the place, civil and military, with the Prince Mavrocordato at their head, met him on his landing, and accompanied him, amidst the mingled din of shouts, wild music, and discharges of artillery, to the house that had been prepared for him. The limits of this sketch preclude the possibility of entering into the details of his brief but noble career in the cause of Grecian independence. We must therefore, though reluctantly, approach the final scene of his existence on that soil for which he had sacrificed fortune, repose, health-every thing. and It was on the very day when the intelligence of his sister's recovery reached him, having been for the last three or four days prevented from taking exercise by the rains, that he resolved, though the weather still looked threatening, to venture on horseback. Three miles from Missolonghi, Count Gamba and himself were overtaken by a heavy shower, and returned to the town walls wet through and in a state of violent perspiration. It had been their usual practice to dismount at the walls, return to their house in a boat, but, on this day, Count Gamba, representing to Lord Byron how to sit dangerous it would be, warm as he then was, "It is imagined that we shall attempt either Pa- exposed so long to the rain in a boat, entreated of tras, or the castles on the Straits; and it seems, by him to go back the whole way on horseback. To most accounts, that the Greeks, at any rate the this, however, Lord Byron would not consent; but Suliotes, who are in affinity with me of bread and said, laughingly," I should make a pretty solsalt'-expect that I should march with them, and-dier, indeed, if I were to care for such a trifle!" They accordingly dismounted and got into the boat as usual. be it even so! If any thing in the way of fever, fatigue, famine, or otherwise, should cut short the About two hours after his return home, he was seized with a shuddering, and complained of fever and rheumatic pains. "At eight that evening," says Count Gamba, "I entered his room. He was lying on a sofa, restless and melancholy. He said to me, ' I suffer a great deal of pain. I do not care for death, but these agonies I cannot bear.'" The following day (April 10th) he rose at his accustomed hour, -transacted business, and was even able to take his ride in the olive woods, accompanied, as usual, by his long train of Suliotes. De complained, however, of perpetual shudderings, and had no appetite. On his return home, he remarked to Fletcher, that his saddle, he thought, had not been perfectly dried since yesterday's wetting, and that he felt himself the worse for it. This was the last time he ever crossed the threshold alive. "After lingering nine days longer in the hands of the Faculty of Missolonghi, this noble-minded martyr in the cause of Liberty and Greece expired at NEWSTEAD ABBEY. The annexed account of this venerable Pile, as it remained, in its deserted tate, during several years of the illustrious Bard's final residence abroad, will be found interesting. Newstead Abbey is one of the most beautiful and chaste specimens of Gothic architecture in the kingdom. A gentleman who visited the Abbey presents us with the following description: "The long and gloomy gallery had not yet reuse the sombre pictures of its ancient race.' In the study, which is a small chamber overlooking the garden, the books were packed up, but there remained a sofa, over which hung a sword in a gilt sheath, and at the end of the room, opposite the window, stood a pair of light fancy stands, each supporting a couple of the most perfect and finely polished skulls I ever saw, most probably selected, along with the far-famed one converted into a drinking cup, and inscribed with some well-known lines, from amongst a vast number taken from the six o'clock in the morning of the 19th of April, in burial-ground of the abbey, and piled up in the the thirty-sixth year of his age." * The remains of Lord Byron were conveyed to England, and, on Friday, July 16th, 1824, interred in the family vault, at the village of Hucknall, a few miles beyond Nottingham, and about two miles from his ancestorial abbey of Newstead. On a tablet of white marble, in the chancel of the church of Hucknall, is the following inscription: IN THE VAULT BENEATH, WHERE MANY OF HIS ANCESTORS AND HIS MOTHER ARE LIE THE REMAINS OF LORD BYRON, OF ROCHDALE, IN THE COUNTY OF LANCASTER, THE AUTHOR OF CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE.' HE WAS BORN IN LONDON, ON THE 22ND OF JANUARY, 1788. " HE DIED AT MISSOLONGHI, IN WESTERN Greece, on the 19TH OF APRIL, 1824, form of a mausoleum, but since recommitted to the ground. Between them hung a gilt crucifix. In one corner of the servants' hall, lay a stone coffin, in which were fencing gloves and foils; and on the wall of the ample but cheerless kitchen, was painted in large letters, 'Waste not, want not.' During a great part of his Lordship's minority, the abbey was in the occupation of Lord G-, his hounds, and divers colonies of jackdaws, swallows, and starlings. The internal traces of this Goth were swept away; but without, all appeared as rude and unreclaimed as he could have left it. 1 must confess, that if I was astonished at the heterogeneous mixture of splendour and ruin within, I was more so at the perfect uniformity of wildness throughout. I never had been able to conceive poetic genius in its poetic bower, without figuring it diffusing the polish of its delicate taste on every thing around it: but here that elegant spirit and beauty seemed to have dwelt, but not to have been caressed; it was the spirit of the wilderness. The gardens were exactly as their late owner described ENGAGED IN THE GLORIOUS Attempt to restoRE THAT them in his earliest lays: COUNTRY TO HER ANCIENT FREEDOM AND RENOWN. HIS SISTER, THE BONOURABLE AUGUSTA MARIA LEIGH, PLACED THIS TABLET TO HIS MEMORY. "Thro' thy battlements, Newtead, the hollows winds whistle; In thy once smiling gardens the hemlock and thistle With the exception of the dog's tomb, a conspi |