Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) by Thomas Moore

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[Footnote 1: The generous zeal with which he applied himself to this
important object will be understood from the following
statement:--"On reporting to Lord Byron what I thought might be done,
he ordered me to draw up a plan for putting the fortifications in
thorough repair, and to accompany it with an estimate of the expense.
It was agreed that I should make the estimate only one third of what
I thought would be the actual expense; and if that third could be
procured from the magistrates, Lord Byron undertook secretly to pay
the remainder."]

With that thanklessness which too often waits on disinterested
actions, it has been sometimes tauntingly remarked, and in quarters
from whence a more generous judgment might be expected [1], that,
after all, Lord Byron effected but little for Greece:--as if much
_could_ be effected by a single individual, and in so short a time,
for a cause which, fought as it has been almost incessantly through
the six years since his death, has required nothing less than the
intervention of all the great Powers of Europe to give it a chance of
success, and, even so, has not yet succeeded. That Byron himself was
under no delusion as to the importance of his own solitary aid,--that
he knew, in a struggle like this, there must be the same prodigality
of means towards one great end as is observable in the still grander
operations of nature, where individuals are as nothing in the tide of
events,--that such was his, at once, philosophic and melancholy view
of his own sacrifices, I have, I trust, clearly shown. But that,
during this short period of action, he did not do well and wisely all
that man could achieve in the time, and under the circumstances, is
an assertion which the noble facts here recorded fully and
triumphantly disprove. He knew that, placed as he was, his measures,
to be wise, must be prospective, and from the nature of the seeds
thus sown by him, the benefits that were to be expected must be
judged. To reconcile the rude chiefs to the Government and to each
other;--to infuse a spirit of humanity, by his example, into their
warfare;--to prepare the way for the employment of the expected Loan,
in a manner most calculated to call forth the resources of the
country;--to put the fortifications of Missolonghi in such a state of
repair as might, and eventually _did_, render it proof against the
besieger;--to prevent those infractions of neutrality, so tempting to
the Greeks, which brought their Government in collision with the
Ionian authorities[2], and to restrain all such license of the Press
as might indispose the Courts of Europe to their cause:--such were
the important objects which he had proposed to himself to accomplish,
and towards which, in this brief interval, and in the midst of such
dissensions and hinderances, he had already made considerable and
most promising progress. But it would be unjust to close even here
the bright catalogue of his services. It is, after all, _not_ with
the span of mortal life that the good achieved by a name immortal
ends. The charm acts into the future,--it is an auxiliary through all
time; and the inspiring example of Byron, as a martyr of liberty, is
for ever freshly embalmed in his glory as a poet. From the period of
his attack in February he had been, from time to time, indisposed;
and, more than once, had complained of vertigos, which made him feel,
he said, as if intoxicated. He was also frequently affected with
nervous sensations, with shiverings and tremors, which, though
apparently the effects of excessive debility, he himself attributed
to fulness of habit. Proceeding upon this notion, he had, ever since
his arrival in Greece, abstained almost wholly from animal food, and
ate of little else but dry toast, vegetables, and cheese. With the
same fear of becoming fat, which had in his young days haunted him,
he almost every morning measured himself round the wrist and waist,
and whenever he found these parts, as he thought, enlarged, took a
strong dose of medicine.

[Footnote 1: Articles in the Times newspaper, Foreign Quarterly
Review, &c.]

[Footnote 2: In a letter which he addressed to Lord Sidney Osborne,
enclosing one, on the subject of these infractions, from Prince
Mavrocordato to Sir T. Maitland, Lord Byron says,--"You must all be
persuaded how difficult it is, under existing circumstances, for the
Greeks to keep up discipline, however they may be all disposed to do
so, I am doing all I can to convince them of the necessity of the
strictest observance of the regulations of the Islands, and, I trust,
with some effect"]

Exertions had, as we have seen, been made by his friends at
Cephalonia, to induce him, without delay, to return to that island,
and take measures, while there was yet time, for the re-establishment
of his health. "But these entreaties (says Count Gamba) produced just
the contrary effect; for in proportion as Byron thought his position
more perilous, he the more resolved upon remaining where he was." In
the midst of all this, too, the natural flow of his spirits in
society seldom deserted him; and whenever a trick upon any of his
attendants, or associates, suggested itself, he was as ready to play
the mischief-loving boy as ever. His engineer, Parry, having been
much alarmed by the earthquake they had experienced, and still
continuing in constant apprehension of its return, Lord Byron
contrived, as they were all sitting together one evening, to have
some barrels full of cannon-balls trundled through the room above
them; and laughed heartily, as he would have done when a Harrow boy,
at the ludicrous effect which this deception produced on the poor
frightened engineer.

Every day, however, brought new trials both to his health and temper.
The constant rains had rendered the swamps of Missolonghi almost
impassable;--an alarm of plague, which, about the middle of March,
was circulated, made it prudent, for some time, to keep within doors;
and he was thus, week after week, deprived of his accustomed air and
exercise. The only recreation he had recourse to was that of playing
with his favourite dog, Lion; and, in the evening, going through the
exercise of drilling with his officers, or practising at
single-stick.

At the same time, the demands upon his exertions, personal and
pecuniary, poured in from all sides, while the embarrassments of his
public position every day increased. The chief obstacle in the way of
his plan for the reconciliation of all parties had been the rivalry
so long existing between Mavrocordato and the Eastern Chiefs; and
this difficulty was now not a little heightened by the part taken by
Colonel Stanhope and Mr. Trelawney, who, having allied themselves
with Odysseus, the most powerful of these Chieftains, were
endeavouring actively to detach Lord Byron from Mavrocordato, and
enlist him in their own views. This schism was,--to say the least of
it,--ill-timed and unfortunate. For, as Prince Mavrocordato and Lord
Byron were now acting in complete harmony with the Government, a
co-operation of all the other English agents on the same side would
have had the effect of assuring a preponderance to this party (which
was that of the civil and commercial interests all through Greece),
that might, by strengthening the hands of the ruling power, have
afforded some hope of vigour and consistency in its movements. By
this division, however, the English lost their casting weight; and
not only marred whatever little chance they might have had of
extinguishing the dissensions of the Greeks, but exhibited, most
unseasonably, an example of dissension among themselves.

The visit to Salona, in which, though distrustful of the intended
Military Congress, Mavrocordato had consented to accompany Lord
Byron, was, as the foregoing letters have mentioned, delayed by the
floods,--the river Fidari having become so swollen as not to be
fordable. In the mean time, dangers, both from within and without,
threatened Missolonghi. The Turkish fleet had again come forth from
the Gulf, while, in concert, it was apprehended, with this resumption
of the blockade, insurrectionary movements, instigated, as was
afterwards known, by the malcontents of the Morea, manifested
themselves formidably both in the town and its neighbourhood. The
first cause for alarm was the landing, in canoes, from Anatolico, of
a party of armed men, the followers of Cariascachi of that place, who
came to demand retribution from the people of Missolonghi for some
injury that, in a late affray, had been inflicted on one of their
clan. It was also rumoured that 300 Suliotes were marching upon the
town; and the following morning, news came that a party of these wild
warriors had actually seized upon Basiladi, a fortress that commands
the port of Missolonghi, while some of the soldiers of Cariascachi
had, in the course of the night, arrested two of the Primates, and
carried them to Anatolico. The tumult and indignation that this
intelligence produced was universal. All the shops were shut, and the
bazaars deserted. "Lord Byron," says Count Gamba, "ordered his troops
to continue under arms; but to preserve the strictest neutrality,
without mixing in any quarrel, either by actions or words."

During this crisis, the weather had become sufficiently favourable to
admit of his paying the visit to Salona, which he had purposed. But,
as his departure at such a juncture might have the appearance of
abandoning Missolonghi, he resolved to wait the danger out. At this
time the following letters were written.

LETTER 559. TO MR. BARFF.

"April 3.

"There is a quarrel, not yet settled, between the citizens and some
of Cariascachi's people, which has already produced some blows. I
keep my people quite neutral; but have ordered them to be on their
guard.

"Some days ago we had an Italian private soldier drummed out for
thieving. The German officers wanted to flog him; but I flatly
refused to permit the use of the stick or whip, and delivered him
over to the police.[1] Since then a Prussian officer rioted in his
lodgings; and I put him under arrest, according to the order. This,
it appears, did not please his German confederation: but I stuck by
my text; and have given them plainly to understand, that those who do
not choose to be amenable to the laws of the country and service, may
retire; but that in all that I have to do, I will see them obeyed by
foreigner or native.

[Footnote 1: "Lord Byron declared that, as far as he was concerned,
no barbarous usages, however adopted even by some civilised people,
should be introduced into Greece; especially as such a mode of
punishment would disgust rather than reform. We hit upon an expedient
which favoured our military discipline: but it required not only all
Lord Byron's eloquence, but his authority, to prevail upon our
Germans to accede to it. The culprit had his uniform stripped off his
back, in presence of his comrades, and was afterwards marched through
the town with a label on his back, describing, both in Greek and
Italian, the nature of his offence; after which he was given up to
the regular police. This example of severity, tempered by a humane
spirit, produced the best effect upon our soldiers, as well as upon
the citizens of the town. But it was very near causing a most
disagreeable circumstance; for, in the course of the evening, some
very high words passed on the subject between three Englishmen, two
of them officers of our brigade, in consequence of which cards were
exchanged, and two duels were to have been fought the next morning.
Lord Byron did not hear of this till late at night: but he
immediately ordered me to arrest both parties, which I according did;
and, after some difficulty, prevailed on them to shake hands."--COUNT
GAMBA'S _Narrative_.]

"I wish something was heard of the arrival of part of the Loan, for
there is a plentiful dearth of every thing at present."

LETTER 560. TO MR. BARFF.

"April 6.

"Since I wrote, we have had some tumult here with the citizens and
Cariascachi's people, and all are under arms, our boys and all. They
nearly fired on me and fifty of my lads[1], by mistake, as we were
taking our usual excursion into the country. To-day matters are
settled or subsiding; but, about an hour ago, the father-in-law of
the landlord of the house where I am lodged (one of the Primates the
said landlord is) was arrested for high treason.

[Footnote 1: A corps of fifty Suliotes which he had, almost ever
since his arrival at Missolonghi, kept about him as a body-guard. A
large outer room of his house was appropriated to these troops; and
their carbines were suspended along the walls. "In this room (says
Mr. Parry), and among these rude soldiers, Lord Byron was accustomed
to walk a great deal, particularly in wet weather, accompanied by his
favourite dog, Lion."

When he rode out, these fifty Suliotes attended him on foot; and
though they carried their carbines, "they were always," says the same
authority, "able to keep up with the horses at full speed. The
captain, and a certain number, preceded his Lordship, who rode
accompanied on one side by Count Gamba, and on the other by the Greek
interpreter. Behind him, also on horseback, came two of his
servants,--generally his black groom, and Tita,--both dressed like
the chasseurs usually seen behind the carriages of ambassadors, and
another division of his guard closed the cavalcade."--PARRY'S _Last
Days of Lord Byron_.]

"They are in conclave still with Mavrocordato; and we have a number
of new faces from the hills, come to assist, they say. Gun-boats and
batteries all ready, &c.

"The row has had one good effect--it has put them on the alert. What
is to become of the father-in-law, I do not know: nor what he has
done, exactly[1]: but

"''Tis a very fine thing to be father-in-law
To a very magnificent three-tail'd bashaw,'

as the man in Bluebeard says and sings. I wrote to you upon matters
at length, some days ago; the letter, or letters, you will receive
with this. We are desirous to hear more of the Loan; and it is some
time since I have had any letters (at least of an interesting
description) from England, excepting one of 4th February, from
Bowring (of no great importance). My latest dates are of 9bre, or of
the 6th 10bre, four months exactly. I hope you get on well in the
islands: here most of us are, or have been, more or less indisposed,
natives as well as foreigners."

[Footnote 1: This man had, it seems, on his way from Ioannina, passed
by Anatolico, and held several conferences with Cariascachi. He had
long been suspected of being a spy; and the letters found upon him
confirmed the suspicion.]

LETTER 561. TO MR. BARFF.

"April 7.

"The Greeks here of the Government have been boring me for more
money.[1] As I have the brigade to maintain, and the campaign is
apparently now to open, and as I have already spent 30,000 dollars in
three months upon them in one way or another, and more especially as
their public loan has succeeded, so that they ought not to draw from
individuals at that rate, I have given them a refusal, and--as they
would not take _that,--another_ refusal in terms of considerable
sincerity.

[Footnote 1: In consequence of the mutinous proceedings of
Cariascachi's people, most of the neighbouring chieftains hastened to
the assistance of the Government, and had already with this view
marched to Anatolico near 2000 men. But, however opportune the
arrival of such a force, they were a cause of fresh embarrassment, as
there was a total want of provisions for their daily maintenance. It
was in this emergency that the Governor, Primates, and Chieftains had
recourse, as here stated, to their usual source of supply.]

"They wish now to try in the Islands for a few thousand dollars on
the ensuing Loan. If you can serve them, perhaps you will, (in the
way of information, at any rate,) and I will see that you have fair
play; but still I do not _advise_ you, except to act as you please.
Almost every thing depends upon the arrival, and the speedy arrival,
of a portion of the Loan to keep peace among themselves. If they can
but have sense to do this, I think that they will be a match and
better for any force that can be brought against them for the
present. We are all doing as well as we can."

It will be perceived from these letters, that besides the great and
general interests of the cause, which were in themselves sufficient
to absorb all his thoughts, he was also met on every side, in the
details of his duty, by every possible variety of obstruction and
distraction that rapacity, turbulence, and treachery could throw in
his way. Such vexations, too, as would have been trying to the most
robust health, here fell upon a frame already marked out for death;
nor can we help feeling, while we contemplate this last scene of his
life, that, much as there is in it to admire, to wonder at, and glory
in, there is also much that awakens sad and most distressful
thoughts. In a situation more than any other calling for sympathy and
care, we see him cast among strangers and mercenaries, without either
nurse or friend;--the self-collectedness of woman being, as we shall
find, wanting for the former office, and the youth and inexperience
of Count Gamba unfitting him wholly for the other. The very firmness
with which a position so lone and disheartening was sustained,
serves, by interesting us more deeply in the man, to increase our
sympathy, till we almost forget admiration in pity, and half regret
that he should have been great at such a cost.

The only circumstances that had for some time occurred to give him
pleasure were, as regarded public affairs, the news of the successful
progress of the Loan, and, in his personal relations, some favourable
intelligence which he had received, after a long interruption of
communication, respecting his sister and daughter. The former, he
learned, had been seriously indisposed at the very time of his own
fit, but had now entirely recovered. While delighted at this news, he
could not help, at the same time, remarking, with his usual tendency
to such superstitious feelings, how strange and striking was the
coincidence.

To those who have, from his childhood, traced him through these
pages, it must be manifest, I think, that Lord Byron was not formed
to be long-lived. Whether from any hereditary defect in his
organisation,--as he himself, from the circumstance of both his
parents having died young, concluded,--or from those violent means he
so early took to counteract the natural tendency of his habit, and
reduce himself to thinness, he was, almost every year, as we have
seen, subject to attacks of indisposition, by more than one of which
his life was seriously endangered. The capricious course which he at
all times pursued respecting diet,--his long fastings, his expedients
for the allayment of hunger, his occasional excesses in the most
unwholesome food, and, during the latter part of his residence in
Italy, his indulgence in the use of spirituous beverages,--all this
could not be otherwise than hurtful and undermining to his health;
while his constant recourse to medicine,--daily, as it appears, and
in large quantities,--both evinced and, no doubt, increased the
derangement of his digestion. When to all this we add the wasteful
wear of spirits and strength from the slow corrosion of sensibility,
the warfare of the passions, and the workings of a mind that allowed
itself no sabbath, it is not to be wondered at that the vital
principle in him should so soon have burnt out, or that, at the age
of thirty-three, he should have had--as he himself drearily expresses
it--"an old feel." To feed the flame, the all-absorbing flame, of his
genius, the whole powers of his nature, physical as well as moral,
were sacrificed;--to present that grand and costly conflagration to
the world's eyes, in which,

"Glittering, like a palace set on fire,
His glory, while it shone, but ruin'd him!"[1]

[Footnote 1: Beaumont and Fletcher.]

It was on the very day when, as I have mentioned, the intelligence of
his sister's recovery reached him, that, having been for the last
three or four days prevented from taking exercise by the rains, he
resolved, though the weather still looked threatening, to venture out
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 and return to their house in
a boat, but, on this day, Count Gamba, representing to Lord Byron how
dangerous it would be, warm as he then was, to sit exposed so long to
the rain in a boat, entreated of him to go back the whole way on
horseback. To this however, Lord Byron would not consent; but said,
laughingly, "I should make a pretty soldier indeed, if I were to care
for such a trifle." They accordingly dismounted and got into the boat
as usual.

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 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. He 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. In the evening Mr. Finlay and Mr. Millingen called
upon him. "He was at first (says the latter gentleman) gayer than
usual; but on a sudden became pensive."

On the evening of the 11th his fever, which was pronounced to be
rheumatic, increased; and on the 12th he kept his bed all day,
complaining that he could not sleep, and taking no nourishment
whatever. The two following days, though the fever had apparently
diminished, he became still more weak, and suffered much from pains
in the head.

It was not till the 14th that his physician, Dr. Bruno, finding the
sudorifics which he had hitherto employed to be unavailing, began to
urge upon his patient the necessity of being bled. Of this, however,
Lord Byron would not hear. He had evidently but little reliance on
his medical attendant; and from the specimens this young man has
since given of his intellect to the world, it is, indeed,
lamentable,--supposing skill to have been, at this moment, of any
avail,--that a life so precious should have been intrusted to such
ordinary hands. "It was on this day, I think," says Count Gamba,
"that, as I was sitting near him, on his sofa, he said to me, 'I was
afraid I was losing my memory, and, in order to try, I attempted to
repeat some Latin verses with the English translation, which I have
not endeavoured to recollect since I was at school. I remembered them
all except the last word of one of the hexameters.'"

To the faithful Fletcher, the idea of his master's life being in
danger seems to have occurred some days before it struck either Count
Gamba or the physician. So little, according to his friend's
narrative, had such a suspicion crossed Lord Byron's own mind, that
he even expressed himself "rather glad of his fever, as it might cure
him of his tendency to epilepsy." To Fletcher, however, it appears,
he had professed, more than once, strong doubts as to the nature of
his complaint being so slight as the physician seemed to suppose it,
and on his servant renewing his entreaties that he would send for Dr.
Thomas to Zante, made no further opposition; though still, out of
consideration for those gentlemen, he referred him on the subject to
Dr. Bruno and Mr. Millingen. Whatever might have been the advantage
or satisfaction of this step, it was now rendered wholly impossible
by the weather,--such a hurricane blowing into the port that not a
ship could get out. The rain, too, descended in torrents, and between
the floods on the land-side and the sirocco from the sea, Missolonghi
was, for the moment, a pestilential prison.

It was at this juncture that Mr. Millingen was, for the first time,
according to his own account, invited to attend Lord Byron in his
medical capacity,--his visit on the 10th being so little, as he
states, professional, that he did not even, on that occasion, feel
his Lordship's pulse. The great object for which he was now called
in, and rather, it would seem, by Fletcher than Dr. Bruno, was for
the purpose of joining his representations and remonstrances to
theirs, and prevailing upon the patient to suffer himself to be
bled,--an operation now become absolutely necessary from the increase
of the fever, and which Dr. Bruno had, for the last two days, urged
in vain.

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