The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals Volume II Part 62

[Sunday], June 27th, 1813.

MY DEAREST AUGUSTA,--If you like to go with me to ye Lady Davy's [1] [ to-night, I _have_ an invitation for you.

There you will see the _Stael_, some people whom you know, and _me_ whom you do _not_ know,--and you can talk to which you please, and I will watch over you as if you were unmarried and in danger of always being so. Now do as you like; but if you chuse to array yourself before or after half past ten, I will call for you. I think our being together before 3d people will be a new _sensation_ to _both_.

Ever yours,

B.

[Footnote 1: Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829), the son of a wood-carver of Penzance, was apprenticed to John Borlase, a surgeon at Penzance, in whose dispensary he became a chemist. He wrote poetry as a young man, but soon abandoned the pursuit for science. Two poems on Byron by Davy, one written in 1823, the other in 1824, will be found in Dr. Davy's 'Memoirs of the Life of Sir H. Davy', vol. ii. pp. 168, 169. In October, 1798, he joined Dr. Beddoes at Bristol, where he superintended the laboratory at his Pneumatic Inst.i.tution. His 'Researches, Chemical and Philosophical' (1799), made him famous. At the Royal Inst.i.tution in London, founded in 1799, Davy became a.s.sistant-lecturer in chemistry, and director of the chemical laboratory. There his lecture-room was crowded by some of the most distinguished men and women of the day.

Within the next few years his discoveries in electricity and galvanism, (1806-7) brought him European celebrity; his lectures on agricultural chemistry (1810) marked a fresh era in farming, and inaugurated the new movement of "science with practice." His famous discovery of the Safety Lamp was made in 1816. He was created a baronet in 1818. A skilful fisherman, he wrote, when in declining health, 'Salmonia, or Days of Fly-fis.h.i.+ng', published in 1827. Ticknor ('Life', vol. i. p. 57), speaking of Davy in 1815, says,

"He is now about thirty-three, but with all the freshness and bloom of five-and-twenty, and one of the handsomest men I have seen in England.

He has a great deal of vivacity, talks rapidly, though with great precision, and is so much interested in conversation, that his excitement amounts to nervous impatience, and keeps him in constant motion."

Davy married, in 1812, a rich widow, Jane Aprecce, 'nee' Kerr (1780-1855). The marriage brought him wealth; but it also, it is said, impaired the simplicity of his character, and made him ambitious of social distinction. Miss Berry ('Journal', vol. ii. p. 535) supped with Lady Davy in May, 1813, to meet the Princess of Wales, and notes that among the other guests was Byron. Lady Davy, who was so dark a brunette that Sydney Smith said she was as brown as a dry toast, was for many years a prominent figure in the society of London and Rome. It was of her that Madame de Stael said that she had "all Corinne's talents without her faults or extravagances." Ticknor, who called on her in June, 1815,

"found her in her parlour, working on a dress, the contents of her basket strewed about the table, and looking more like home than anything since I left it. She is small, with black eyes and hair, a very pleasant face, an uncommonly sweet smile, and, when she speaks, has much spirit and expression in her countenance. Her conversation is agreeable, particularly in the choice and variety of her phraseology, and has more the air of eloquence than I have ever heard before from a lady." ('Life of George Ticknor', vol. i. P. 57).]

309.--To John Murray.

July 1st, 1813.

DEAR SIR,--There is an error in my dedication. [1] The word "_my_" must be struck out--"my" admiration, etc.; it is a false construction and disagrees with the signature. I hope this will arrive in time to prevent a _cancel_ and serve for a proof; recollect it is only the "my" to be erased throughout.

There is a critique in the 'Satirist', [2] which I have read,--fairly written, and, though _vituperative_, very fair in judgment. One part belongs to you, _viz_., the 4_s_. and 6_d_ charge; it is unconscionable, but you have no conscience.

Yours truly,

B.

[Footnote 1: The dedication was originally printed thus:

"To Samuel Rogers, Esq., as a slight but most sincere token of my admiration of his genius."]

[Footnote 2: 'The Satirist' for July 1, 1813 (pp. 70-88), reviews the 'Giaour' at length. It condemns it for its fragmentary character and consequent obscurity, its carelessness and defects of style; but it also admits that the poem "abounds with proofs of genius:"

"A word in conclusion. The n.o.ble lord appears to have an aristocratical solicitude to be read only by the opulent. Four s.h.i.+llings and sixpence for forty-one octavo pages of poetry! and those pages verily happily answering to Mr. Sheridan's image of a rivulet of text flowing through a meadow of margin. My good Lord Byron, while you are revelling in all the sensual and intellectual luxury which the successful sale of Newstead Abbey has procured for you, you little think of the privations to which you have subjected us unfortunate Reviewers, ... in order to enable us to purchase your lords.h.i.+p's expensive publication."]

310.--To Thomas Moore.

4, Benedictine Street, St. James's, July 8, 1813.

I presume by your silence that I have blundered into something noxious in my reply to your letter, for the which I beg leave to send beforehand a sweeping apology, which you may apply to any, or all, parts of that unfortunate epistle. If I err in my conjecture, I expect the like from you in putting our correspondence so long in quarantine. G.o.d he knows what I have said; but he also knows (if he is not as indifferent to mortals as the _nonchalant_ deities of Lucretius), that you are the last person I want to offend. So, if I have,--why the devil don't you say it at once, and expectorate your spleen?

Rogers is out of town with Madame de Stael, who hath published an Essay against Suicide, [1] which, I presume, will make somebody shoot himself;--as a sermon by Blenkinsop, in _proof_ of Christianity, sent a hitherto most orthodox acquaintance of mine out of a chapel of ease a perfect atheist. Have you found or founded a residence yet? and have you begun or finished a poem? If you won't tell me what _I_ have done, pray say what you have done, or left undone, yourself. I am still in equipment for voyaging, and anxious to hear from, or of, you _before_ I go, which anxiety you should remove more readily, as you think I sha'n't cogitate about you afterwards. I shall give the lie to that calumny by fifty foreign letters, particularly from any place where the plague is rife,--without a drop of vinegar or a whiff of sulphur to save you from infection.

The Oxfords have sailed almost a fortnight, and my sister is in town, which is a great comfort,--for, never having been much together, we are naturally more attached to each other. I presume the illuminations have conflagrated to Derby (or wherever you are) by this time. [2] We are just recovering from tumult and train oil, and transparent fripperies, and all the noise and nonsense of victory. Drury Lane had a large _M.W._, which some thought was Marshal Wellington; others, that it might be translated into Manager Whitbread; while the ladies of the vicinity of the saloon conceived the last letter to be complimentary to themselves. I leave this to the commentators to ill.u.s.trate. If you don't answer this, I sha'n't say what _you_ deserve, but I think _I_ deserve a reply. Do you conceive there is no Post-Bag but the Twopenny? [3]

Sunburn me, if you are not too bad.

[Footnote 1:

"Madame de Stael treats me as the person whom she most delights to honour; I am generally ordered with her to dinner, as one orders beans and bacon: she is one of the few persons who surpa.s.s expectation; she has every sort of talent, and would be universally popular, if, in society, she were to confine herself to her inferior talents-- pleasantry, anecdote, and literature. I have reviewed her 'Essay on Suicide' in the last 'Edinburgh Review': it is not one of her best, and I have accordingly said more of the author and the subject than of the work."

Sir J. Mackintosh ('Life', vol. ii. p. 269).]

[Footnote 2: One result of the illuminations in honour of the battle of Vittoria (June 21, 1813), which took place July 7, was a great fire at Woolwich. Moore was at this time living at Mayfield Cottage near Ashbourne, in Derbys.h.i.+re.]

[Footnote 3: Moore's 'Intercepted Letters, or the Twopenny Post-bag', was published, without his name, in 1813.]