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

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




[Greek: O Athena, prote chora,
Ti gaidarous trepheis tora[1]?]

[Footnote 1: We write these lines from the _recitation_ of the
travellers to whom we have alluded; but we cannot vouch for the
correctness of the Romaic.]

is a couplet of reproach _now_ applied to this once famous city;
whose inhabitants seem little worthy of the inspiring call which was
addressed to them within these twenty years, by the celebrated
Riga:--

[Greek: Deute paides ton Ellenon--k.t.l.]

Iannina, the capital of Epirus, and the seat of Ali Pacha's
government, _is_ in truth deserving of the honours which Mr. Gell has
improperly bestowed on degraded Athens. As to the correctness of the
remark concerning the fashion of wearing the hair cropped in
_Molossia,_ as Mr. Gell informs us, our authorities cannot depose:
but why will he use the classical term of Eleuthero-Lacones, when
that people are so much better known by their modern name of
Mainotes? "The court of the Pacha of Tripolizza" is said "to realise
the splendid visions of the Arabian Nights." This is true with regard
to the _court_: but surely the traveller ought to have added that the
city and palace are most miserable, and form an extraordinary
contrast to the splendour of the court.--Mr. Gell mentions _gold_
mines in Greece: he should have specified their situation, as it
certainly is not universally known. When, also, he remarks that "the
first article of necessity _in Greece_ is a firman, or order from the
Sultan, permitting the traveller to pass unmolested," we are much
misinformed if he be right. On the contrary, we believe this to be
almost the only part of the Turkish dominions in which a firman is
not necessary; since the passport of the Pacha is absolute within his
territory (according to Mr. G.'s own admission), and much more
effectual than a firman.--"Money," he remarks, "is easily procured at
Salonica, or Patrass, where the English have Consuls." It is much
better procured, we understand, from the Turkish governors, who never
charge discount. The Consuls for the English are not of the most
magnanimous order of Greeks, and far from being so liberal, generally
speaking; although there are, in course, some exceptions, and Strune
of Patrass has been more honourably mentioned.--After having observed
that "horses seem the best mode of conveyance in Greece," Mr. Gell
proceeds: "Some travellers would prefer an English saddle; but a
saddle of this sort is always objected to by the owner of the horse,
_and not without reason_" &c. This, we learn, is far from being the
case; and, indeed, for a very simple reason, an English saddle must
seem to be preferable to one of the country, because it is much
lighter. When, too, Mr. Gell calls the _postilion_ "Menzilgi," he
mistakes him for his betters: _Serrugees_ are postilions; _Mensilgis_
are postmasters.--Our traveller was fortunate in his Turks, who are
hired to walk by the side of the baggage-horses. They "are certain,"
he says, "of performing their engagement without grumbling." We
apprehend that this is by no means certain:--but Mr. Gell is
perfectly right in preferring a Turk to a Greek for this purpose; and
in his general recommendation to take a Janissary on the tour: who,
we may add, should be suffered to act as he pleases, since nothing is
to be done by gentle means, or even by offers of money, at the places
of accommodation. A courier, to be sent on before to the place at
which the traveller intends to sleep, is indispensable to comfort:
but no tourist should be misled by the author's advice to suffer the
Greeks to gratify their curiosity, in permitting them to remain for
some time about him on his arrival at an inn. They should be removed
as soon as possible; for, as to the remark that "no stranger would
think of intruding when a room is pre-occupied," our informants were
not so well convinced of that fact.

Though we have made the above exceptions to the accuracy of Mr.
Gell's information, we are most ready to do justice to the general
utility of his directions, and can certainly concede the praise which
he is desirous of obtaining,--namely, "of having facilitated the
researches of future travellers, by affording that local information
which it was before impossible to obtain." This book, indeed, is
absolutely necessary to any person who wishes to explore the Morea
advantageously; and we hope that Mr. Gell will continue his Itinerary
over that and over every other part of Greece. He allows that his
volume "is only calculated to become a book of reference, and not of
general entertainment:" but we do not see any reason against the
compatibility of both objects in a survey of the most celebrated
country of the ancient world. To that country, we trust, the
attention not only of our travellers, but of our legislators, will
hereafter be directed. The greatest caution will, indeed, be
required, as we have premised, in touching on so delicate a subject
as the amelioration of the possessions of an ally: but the field for
the exercise of political sagacity is wide and inviting in this
portion of the globe; and Mr. Gell, and all other writers who
interest us, however remotely, in its extraordinary _capabilities_,
deserve well of the British empire. We shall conclude by an extract
from the author's work: which, even if it fails of exciting that
general interest which we hope most earnestly it may attract, towards
its important subject, cannot, as he justly observes, "be entirely
uninteresting to the scholar;" since it is a work "which gives him a
faithful description of the remains of cities, the very existence of
which was doubtful, as they perished before the aera of authentic
history." The subjoined quotation is a good specimen of the author's
minuteness of research as a topographer; and we trust that the credit
which must accrue to him from the present performance will ensure the
completion of his Itinerary:--

"The inaccuracies of the maps of Anacharsis are in many
respects very glaring. The situation of Phlius is marked by
Strabo as surrounded by the territories of Sicyon, Argos,
Cleonae, and Stymphalus. Mr. Hawkins observed, that Phlius, the
ruins of which still exist near Agios Giorgios, lies in a
direct line between Cleonae and Stymphalus, and another from
Sicyon to Argos; so that Strabo was correct in saying that it
lay between those four towns; yet we see Phlius, in the map of
Argolis by M. Barbie du Bocage, placed ten miles to the north
of Stymphalus, contradicting both history and fact. D'Anville
is guilty of the same error.

"M. du Bocage places a town named Phlius, and by him Phlionte,
on the point of land which forms the port of Drepano: there
are not at present any ruins there. The maps of D'Anville are
generally more correct than any others where
ancient geography is concerned. A mistake occurs on the
subject of Tiryns, and a place named by him Vathia, but of
which nothing can be understood. It is possible that Vathi, or
the profound valley, may be a name sometimes used for the
valley of Barbitsa, and that the place named by D'Anville
Claustra may be the outlet of that valley called Kleisoura,
which has a corresponding signification.

"The city of Tiryns is also placed in two different positions,
once by its Greek name, and again as Tirynthus. The mistake
between the islands of Sphaeria and Calaura has been noticed in
page 135. The Pontinus, which D'Anville represents as a river,
and the Erasinus are equally ill placed in his map. There was
a place called Creopolis, somewhere toward Cynouria; but its
situation is not easily fixed. The ports called Bucephalium
and Piraeus seem to have been nothing more than little bays in
the country between Corinth and Epidaurus. The town called
Athenae, in Cynouria, by Pausanias, is called Anthena by
_Thucydides_, book 5. 41.

"In general, the map of D'Anville will be found more accurate
than those which have been published since his time; indeed
the mistakes of that geographer are in general such as could
not be avoided without visiting the country. Two errors of
D'Anville may be mentioned, lest the opportunity of publishing
the itinerary of Arcadia should never occur. The first is,
that the rivers Malaetas and Mylaon, near Methydrium, are
represented as running toward the south, whereas they flow
northwards to the Ladon; and the second is, that the Aroanius,
which falls into the Erymanthus at Psophis, is represented as
flowing from the lake of Pheneos; a mistake which arises from
the ignorance of the ancients themselves who have written on
the subject. The fact is that the Ladon receives the waters of
the lakes of Orchomenos and Pheneos: but the Aroanius rises at
a spot not two hours distant from Psophis."

In furtherance of our principal object in this critique, we have only
to add a wish that some of our Grecian tourists, among the fresh
articles of information concerning Greece which they have lately
imported, would turn their minds to the language of the country. So
strikingly similar to the ancient Greek is the modern Romaic as a
written language, and so dissimilar in sound, that even a few general
rules concerning pronunciation would be of most extensive use.




PARLIAMENTARY SPEECHES.

* * * * *

DEBATE ON THE FRAME-WORK BILL, IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS, FEBRUARY 27, 1812.


The order of the day for the second reading of this Bill being read,

Lord BYRON rose, and (for the first time) addressed their Lordships
as follows:--

My Lords; the subject now submitted to your Lordships for the first
time, though new to the House, is by no means new to the country. I
believe it had occupied the serious thoughts of all descriptions of
persons, long before its introduction to the notice of that
legislature, whose interference alone could be of real service. As a
person in some degree connected with the suffering county, though a
stranger not only to this House in general, but to almost every
individual whose attention I presume to solicit, I must claim some
portion of your Lordships' indulgence, whilst I offer a few
observations on a question in which I confess myself deeply
interested.

To enter into any detail of the riots would be superfluous: the House
is already aware that every outrage short of actual bloodshed has
been perpetrated, and that the proprietors of the Frames obnoxious to
the rioters, and all persons supposed to be connected with them, have
been liable to insult and violence. During the short time I recently
passed in Nottinghamshire, not twelve hours elapsed without some
fresh act of violence; and on the day I left the county I was
informed that forty Frames had been broken the preceding evening, as
usual, without resistance and without detection.

Such was then the state of that county, and such I have reason to
believe it to be at this moment. But whilst these outrages must be
admitted to exist to an alarming extent, it cannot be denied that
they have arisen from circumstances of the most unparalleled
distress: the perseverance of these miserable men in their
proceedings, tends to prove that nothing but absolute want could have
driven a large, and once honest and industrious, body of the people,
into the commission of excesses so hazardous to themselves, their
families, and the community. At the time to which I allude, the town
and county were burdened with large detachments of the military; the
police was in motion, the magistrates assembled, yet all the
movements, civil and military, had led to--nothing. Not a single
instance had occurred of the apprehension of any real delinquent
actually taken in the fact, against whom there existed legal evidence
sufficient for conviction. But the police, however useless, were by
no means idle: several notorious delinquents had been detected; men,
liable to conviction, on the clearest evidence, of the capital crime
of poverty; men, who had been nefariously guilty of lawfully
begetting several children, whom, thanks to the times! they were
unable to maintain. Considerable injury has been done to the
proprietors of the improved Frames. These machines were to them an
advantage, inasmuch as they superseded the necessity of employing a
number of workmen, who were left in consequence to starve. By the
adoption of one species of Frame in particular, one man performed the
work of many, and the superfluous labourers were thrown out of
employment. Yet it is to be observed, that the work thus executed was
inferior in quality; not marketable at home, and merely hurried over
with a view to exportation. It was called, in the cant of the trade,
by the name of "Spider work." The rejected workmen, in the blindness
of their ignorance, instead of rejoicing at these improvements in
arts so beneficial to mankind, conceived themselves to be sacrificed
to improvements in mechanism. In the foolishness of their hearts they
imagined, that the maintenance and well doing of the industrious
poor, were objects of greater consequence than the enrichment of a
few individuals by any improvement, in the implements of trade, which
threw the workmen out of employment, and rendered the labourer
unworthy of his hire. And it must be confessed that although the
adoption of the enlarged machinery in that state of our commerce
which the country once boasted, might have been beneficial to the
master without being detrimental to the servant; yet, in the present
situation of our manufactures, rotting in warehouses, without a
prospect of exportation, with the demand for work and workmen equally
diminished, Frames of this description tend materially to aggravate
the distress and discontent of the disappointed sufferers. But the
real cause of these distresses and consequent disturbances lies
deeper. When we are told that these men are leagued together not only
for the destruction of their own comfort, but of their very means of
subsistence, can we forget that it is the bitter policy, the
destructive warfare of the last eighteen years, which has destroyed
their comfort, your comfort, all men's comfort? That policy, which,
originating with "great statesmen now no more," has survived the dead
to become a curse on the living, unto the third and fourth
generation! These men never destroyed their looms till they were
become useless, worse than useless; till they were become actual
impediments to their exertions in obtaining their daily bread. Can
you, then, wonder that in times like these, when bankruptcy,
convicted fraud, and imputed felony, are found in a station not far
beneath that of your Lordships, the lowest, though once most useful
portion of the people, should forget their duty in their distresses,
and become only less guilty than one of their representatives? But
while the exalted offender can find means to baffle the law, new
capital punishments must be devised, new snares of death must be
spread for the wretched mechanic, who is famished into guilt. These
men were willing to dig, but the spade was in other hands: they were
not ashamed to beg, but there was none to relieve them: their own
means of subsistence were cut off, all other employments
pre-occupied; and their excesses, however to be deplored and
condemned, can hardly be subject of surprise.

It has been stated that the persons in the temporary possession of
frames connive at their destruction; if this be proved upon enquiry,
it were necessary that such material accessories to the crime should
be principles in the punishment. But I did hope, that any measure
proposed by his Majesty's government, for your Lordships' decision,
would have had conciliation for its basis; or, if that were hopeless,
that some previous enquiry, some deliberation would have been deemed
requisite; not that we should have been called at once without
examination, and without cause, to pass sentences by wholesale, and
sign death-warrants blindfold. But, admitting that these men had no
cause of complaint; that the grievances of them and their employers
were alike groundless; that they deserved the worst; what
inefficiency, what imbecility has been evinced in the method chosen
to reduce them! Why were the military called out to be made a mockery
of, if they were to be called out at all? As far as the difference of
seasons would permit, they have merely parodied the summer campaign
of Major Sturgeon; and, indeed, the whole proceedings, civil and
military, seemed on the model of those of the mayor and corporation
of Garratt.--Such marchings and counter-marchings! from Nottingham to
Bullwell, from Bullwell to Banford, from Banford to Mansfield! and
when at length the detachments arrived at their destination, in all
"the pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war," they came just
in time to witness the mischief which had been done, and ascertain
the escape of the perpetrators, to collect the "_spolia opima_" in
the fragments of broken frames, and return to their quarters amidst
the derision of old women, and the hootings of children. Now, though,
in a free country, it were to be wished, that our military should
never be too formidable, at least to ourselves, I cannot see the
policy of placing them in situations where they can only be made
ridiculous. As the sword is the worst argument that can be used, so
should it be the last. In this instance it has been the first; but
providentially as yet only in the scabbard. The present measure will,
indeed, pluck it from the sheath; yet had proper meetings been held
in the earlier stages of these riots, had the grievances of these men
and their masters (for they also had their grievances) been fairly
weighed and justly examined, I do think that means might have been
devised to restore these workmen to their avocations, and
tranquillity to the county. At present the county suffers from the
double infliction of an idle military and a starving population. In
what state of apathy have we been plunged so long, that now for the
first time the house has been officially apprised of these
disturbances? All this has been transacting within 130 miles of
London, and yet we, "good easy men, have deemed full sure our
greatness was a ripening," and have sat down to enjoy our foreign
triumphs in the midst of domestic calamity. But all the cities you
have taken, all the armies which have retreated before your leaders,
are but paltry subjects of self-congratulation, if your land divides
against itself, and your dragoons and your executioners must be let
loose against your fellow-citizens.--You call these men a mob,
desperate, dangerous, and ignorant; and seem to think that the only
way to quiet the "_Bellua multorum capitum_" is to lop off a few of
its superfluous heads. But even a mob may be better reduced to reason
by a mixture of conciliation and firmness, than by additional
irritation and redoubled penalties. Are we aware of our obligations
to a mob? It is the mob that labour in your fields and serve in your
houses,--that man your navy, and recruit your army,--that have
enabled you to defy all the world, and can also defy you when neglect
and calamity have driven them to despair! You may call the people a
mob; but do not forget, that a mob too often speaks the sentiments of
the people. And here I must remark, with what alacrity you are
accustomed to fly to the succour of your distressed allies, leaving
the distressed of your own country to the care of Providence or--the
parish. When the Portuguese suffered under the retreat of the French,
every arm was stretched out, every hand was opened, from the rich
man's largess to the widow's mite, all was bestowed, to enable them
to rebuild their villages and replenish their granaries. And at this
moment, when thousands of misguided but most unfortunate
fellow-countrymen are struggling with the extremes of hardships and
hunger, as your charity began abroad it should end at home. A much
less sum, a tithe of the bounty bestowed on Portugal, even if those
men (which I cannot admit without enquiry) could not have been
restored to their employments, would have rendered unnecessary the
tender mercies of the bayonet and the gibbet. But doubtless our
friends have too many foreign claims to admit a prospect of domestic
relief; though never did such objects demand it. I have traversed the
seat of war in the Peninsula, I have been in some of the most
oppressed provinces of Turkey, but never under the most despotic of
infidel governments did I behold such squalid wretchedness as I have
seen since my return in the very heart of a Christian country. And
what are your remedies? After months of inaction, and months of
action worse than inactivity, at length comes forth the grand
specific, the never-failing nostrum of all state physicians, from the
days of Draco to the present time. After feeling the pulse and
shaking the head over the patient, prescribing the usual course of
warm water and bleeding, the warm water of your mawkish police, and
the lancets of your military, these convulsions must terminate in
death, the sure consummation of the prescriptions of all political
Sangrados. Setting aside the palpable injustice and the certain
inefficiency of the bill, are there not capital punishments
sufficient in your statutes? Is there not blood enough upon your
penal code, that more must be poured forth to ascend to Heaven and
testify against you? How will you carry the bill into effect? Can you
commit a whole county to their own prisons? Will you erect a gibbet
in every field, and hang up men like scarecrows? or will you proceed
(as you must to bring this measure into effect) by decimation? place
the county under martial law? depopulate and lay waste all around
you? and restore Sherwood Forest as an acceptable gift to the crown,
in its former condition of a royal chase and an asylum for outlaws?
Are these the remedies for a starving and desperate populace? Will
the famished wretch who has braved your bayonets be appalled by your
gibbets? When death is a relief, and the only relief it appears that
you will afford him, will he be dragooned into tranquillity? Will
that which could not be effected by your grenadiers, be accomplished
by your executioners? If you proceed by the forms of law, where is
your evidence? Those who have refused to impeach their accomplices,
when transportation only was the punishment, will hardly be tempted
to witness against them when death is the penalty. With all due
deference to the noble lords opposite, I think a little
investigation, some previous enquiry would induce even them to change
their purpose. That most favourite state measure, so marvellously
efficacious in many and recent instances, temporising, would not be
without its advantages in this. When a proposal is made to emancipate
or relieve, you hesitate, you deliberate for years, you temporise and
tamper with the minds of men; but a death-bill must be passed off
hand, without a thought of the consequences. Sure I am, from what I
have heard, and from what I have seen, that to pass the hill under
all the existing circumstances, without enquiry, without
deliberation, would only be to add injustice to irritation, and
barbarity to neglect. The framers of such a bill must be content to
inherit the honours of that Athenian lawgiver whose edicts were said
to be written not in ink but in blood. But suppose it past; suppose
one of these men, as I have seen them,--meagre with famine, sullen
with despair, careless of a life which your Lordships are perhaps
about to value at something less than the price of a
stocking-frame;--suppose this man surrounded by the children for whom
he is unable to procure bread at the hazard of his existence, about
to be torn for ever from a family which he lately supported in
peaceful industry, and which it is not his fault that he can no
longer so support;--suppose this man, and there are ten thousand such
from whom you may select your victims, dragged into court, to be
tried for this new offence, by this new law; still, there are two
things wanting to convict and condemn him; and these are, in my
opinion,--twelve butchers for a jury, and a Jefferies for a judge!



DEBATE ON THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE'S MOTION FOR A COMMITTEE ON THE
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLAIMS, APRIL 21. 1812.

Lord BYRON rose and said:--

My Lords,--The question before the House has been so frequently,
fully, and ably discussed, and never perhaps more ably than on this
night, that it would be difficult to adduce new arguments for or
against it. But with each discussion, difficulties have been removed,
objections have been canvassed and refuted, and some of the former
opponents of Catholic emancipation have at length conceded to the
expediency of relieving the petitioners. In conceding thus much,
however, a new objection is started; it is not the time, say they, or
it is an improper time, or there is time enough yet. In some degree I
concur with those who say, it is not the time exactly; that time is
passed; better had it been for the country, that the Catholics
possessed at this moment their proportion of our privileges, that
their nobles held their due weight in our councils, than that we
should be assembled to discuss their claims. It had indeed been
better--

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