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about four miles from Geneva, to visit Madame De Stael. He also visited the gloomy castle at the eastern extremity of the lake, and learnt its history, one incident of which he has commemorated in the thrilling poem, entitled the Prisoners of Chillon. Thus Byron became familiar with the sublime scenery, which he so happily describes :

"Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,

With the wild world I dwell in, is a thing
Which warns me with its stillness to forsake
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring!
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing,
To waft me from distraction: once I loved
Lone ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved,

That I with stern delights should e'er have been so moved.

It is the hush of night, and all between

Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear,
Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen,

Save darken'd Jura, whose capt heights appear
Precipitously steep; and drawing near,

There breathes a living fragrance from the shore,
Of flowers yet fresh from childhood; on the ear
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar,

Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more.

Ye stars, which are the poetry of heaven!

If in your bright leaves we would read the fate
Of men and empires, 't is to be forgiven,
That in our aspirations to be great,
Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state,
And claim a kindred with you; for ye are
A beauty and a mystery, and create
In us such love and reverence from afar,

That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves a

star.

The sky is changed! and such a change! Oh night,
And storm and darkness, ye are wond'rous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light

Of a dark eye in woman! Far along,

From peak to peak, the rattling crags among,
Leaps the live thunder! Not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now hath found a tongue,
And Jura answers, through her misty shroud,
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud!

And this is in the night-most glorious night!
Thou wert not sent for slumber! let me be
A sharer in thy fierce and far delight,—
A portion of the tempest and of thee!
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea,
And the big rain comes dancing to the earth!

And now again 't is black,--and now the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-mirth,
As if they did rejoice o'er a young earthquake's birth."

We have introduced these passages, not only because of their transcendant beauty, but as giving the reader paintings, by the author's own matchless hand, of what was going on in his bosom. He was selfexiled, self-wrecked in the sea of society, and disgusted with life; still God had set a mirror in his bosom that was capable of casting such glorious reflections as these. Great then as was the evil mixed up in Byron's moral character, we cannot fail to look with admiration upon his genius as a splendid thing, illustrating the glory and goodness of that Being, who bestows such powers, not for the possessor merely, but to elevate all mankind, by a participation in their immortal fruits.

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We must also feel, in considering this subject, the wonderful capacities of human nature, and the wickedness of degrading it by our vices. We must admire that dispensation of a kind Providence, which, while it denies to the mass of mankind the possession of genius, yet enables all to share its benefits. Perhaps no man who has lived, other than Byron, could have written the lines we have quoted, yet we can all enjoy them. All may rise upon the poet's buoyant wing to the highest pitch of human conception.

Byron, at last, went to Venice, where he lived several years in vicious indulgence. He then visited Rome, and in 1820 took up his residence at Ravenna, one hundred and fifty miles north of Rome, maintaining a scandalous intimacy with the Countess Guiccioli. Here, she and her friends became implicated in some plot against the Pope's government, which being discovered, they took refuge in Pisa, in Tuscany.

Byron continued, as the humor prompted, to write, and produced a variety of poems, during these years spent in Italy. They are marked with all his power, but they are deeply tinged with the immorality and vice into which he had sunk. Having shaken off his English habits of respect for decency and virtue, he now indulged in frequent sneers at both. There were also great inconsistencies in his conduct, often betraying a pitiable weakness. While he was writing as if to spite the world, and particularly to pour forth his contempt of England, he was living in the most abstemious manner to prevent growing fat, and to preserve a genteel figure; and was also suffering excruciating torture to remedy the deformity of his

foot! The real fact is, that, pretending to banish England as unworthy of his thoughts, he yearned to go back-to be reconciled to his country—to be once more at home. While he reviled the land of his nativity, he was dying with home-sickness. Such is the weakness even of greatness; such the real littleness to which that strutting vice, pride, reduces us.

In 1823, Byron received flattering overtures from the Greek committee in London, if he would go to Greece, and lend his name and fame to aid that oppressed country, in its struggle for freedom. He yielded to these offers, and set out for Greece. He reached Missolonghi in Jan., 1824, and devoted himself with great energy to the cause he came to serve. He gave his money liberally, and was prodigal of his personal exertions. In all this, he not only showed devotion and sincerity, but he surprised every one by the good sense and practical wisdom which he displayed.

In the beginning of February he got wet through; on the evening of the 15th he was seized with a dreadful convulsive fit, and was for some time speechless and senseless. Soon after the paroxysm, while stretched on his bed, faint with bleeding, a crowd of mutinous Suliotes, whom he had engaged to fight for their country, burst into his apartment, brandishing their arms, and furiously demanding their pay. Sick and nerve-shaken as he was, Byron is said to have displayed great calmness and courage on this trying occasion; and his manner soon inspired the mutineers with respect and awe.

On the 9th of April, he again got wet, and a fever

set in, at a time when he was dispirited at seeing that his efforts were unavailing, to inspire a feeling of harmony among the wrangling leaders of Greece. His danger was seen by his physician, and bleeding was advised; but Byron obstinately refused to allow it. His mind at last wandered. His last words had reference to his wife, his child, and his sister. He was evidently aware of his approaching death. He ordered his servant to bring him pen, ink and paper, and appeared to suffer great agony that he could not collect his mind for the purpose of communicating his last wishes and directions. In a state of partial delirium, he threatened Fletcher, his servant, with torment in a future world, if he did not take down his instructions accurately. His words now became unintelligible, and what he intended to communicate is left to conjecture. He fell into a state of lethargy, and died twenty-four hours after, on the 19th April, 1824, aged thirty-six years.

His death produced a great sensation throughout the civilized world. This arose not from his literary reputation only; his position in Greece, aiding the cause of an oppressed people in a struggle for liberty, contributed to heighten the interest which was felt in the event. The authorities of Missolonghi honored his memory with a public funeral: the grief of those who had been his familiar friends, including his servants, knew no bounds. The press throughout Europe paid a united tribute to his memory, in which all but his talents was forgotten. Sir Walter Scott, in a splendid eulogy, penned immediately after hearing of his death, compared his departure to the "with

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