The Works of Lord Byron Volume I Part 126

[Footnote 13: Mr. West, on seeing the "Elgin Collection," (I suppose we shall hear of the "Abershaw" and "Jack Shephard" collection) declared himself a "mere tyro" in art.

[Compare Letters of Benjamin West to the Earl of Elgin, February 6, 1809, March 20, 1811, published in W.R. Hamilton's 'Memorandum', 1811.]]

[Footnote 14: Poor Crib was sadly puzzled when the marbles were first exhibited at Elgin House; he asked if it was not "a stone shop?"--He was right; it 'is' a shop.]

[Footnote 15: Lines 202-265 are not in the MS.]

[Footnote 16: Herostratus or Eratostratus fired the temple of Artemis on the same night that Alexander the Great was born. (See Plut., 'Alex'., 3, etc.)]

[Footnote 17: The affair of Copenhagen. Copenhagen was bombarded by sea by Admiral Lord Gambier (1756-1833), and by land by General Lord Cathcart (1755-1843), September 2-8, 1807. The citadel was given up to the English, and the Danes surrendered their fleet, with all the naval stores, and their a.r.s.enals and dockyards. The expedition was "promptly and secretly equipped" by the British Government "with an activity and celerity," says Koch ('Hist. of Europe', p. 214), "such as they had never displayed in sending aid to their allies," with a view to antic.i.p.ate the seizure and appropriation of the Danish fleet by Napoleon and Alexander (Green's 'Hist. English People' (1875), p. 799).]]

[Footnote 18: "The East" is brought within range of Minerva's curse, 'symmetriae causa', and it is hard to say to which "rebellion" she refers. A choice lies between the mutiny which broke out in 1809, during Sir George Barlow's presidency of Madras, among the officers of the Company's service, and which at one time threatened the continuance of British sway in India; and later troubles, in 1810, arising from the Pindari hordes, who laid waste the villages of Central India and Hindostan, and from the Pathans, who invaded Berar under Ameer Khan. But here, as in lines 245-258 ('vide infra', p. 470, 'note' i), Byron is taking toll of a note to 'Epics of the Ton', pp. 246, 247, which enlarges on the mutiny of native soldiers which took place at Vellore in 1806, where several "European officers and a considerable portion of the 69th Regiment were ma.s.sacred," in consequence of "an injudicious order with respect to the dress of the Sepoys."--Gleig's 'History of the British Empire in India' (1835), iii. 233, 'note'.]]

[Footnote 19: The victory of "bright Barossa," March 5, 1811, was achieved by the sudden determination--"an inspiration rather than a resolution," says Napier--of the British commander, General Graham (Thomas, Lord Lynedoch, 1750-1843), to counter-march his troops, and force the eminence known as the Cerro de Puerco, or hill of Barosa, which had fallen into the hands of the French under Ruffin. Graham was at this time second in command to the Spanish Captain-general, La Pena, and at his orders, but under the impression that the hill would be guarded by the Spanish troops, was making his way to a neighbouring height. Meantime La Pena had withdrawn the corps of battle to a distance, and left the hill covered with baggage and imperfectly protected. Graham recaptured Barosa, and repulsed the French with heavy loss, in an hour and a half. Napier affirms that La Pena "looked idly on, neither sending his cavalry nor his horse artillery to the a.s.sistance of his ally;" and testifies "that no stroke in aid of the British was struck by a Spanish sabre that day."

"Famine" may have raised the devil in the English troops, but it prevented them from following up the victory. A further charge against the Spaniards was that, after Barosa had been won, the English were left for hours without food, and, as they had marched through the night before they came into action, they could only look on while the French made good their retreat.

Two companies of the 20th Portuguese formed part of the British contingent, and took part in the engagement. The year before, at Busaco (September 27, 1810), the Portuguese had displayed signal bravery; but at Gebora (February 19, 1811) "Madden's Portuguese, regardless of his example and reproaches, shamefully turned their backs" (Napier's 'History of the Peninsular War' (1890), iii. 26, 98, 102-107).]

[Footnote 20:

"Blest paper credit! last and best supply, That lends Corruption lighter wings to fly."

(POPE.)

[In February, 1811, a select committee of the House of Commons "on commercial credit" recommended an advance of 6,000,000 to manufacturers who were suffering from over-speculation. "Did they not know," asked Lord Grenville, in the House of Lords, March 21, "that they were adding to the ma.s.s of paper at this moment in existence a sum of 6,000,000, as if there was not paper enough already in the country, in order to protect their commerce and manufactures from destruction?" Nevertheless, the measure pa.s.sed. The year before (February 19, 1810), a committee which had sat under the presidency of Francis Horner, to inquire into the cause of the high price of gold bullion (gold was worth 4. 10s. an ounce), returned (June 10) a report urging the resumption of cash payment at the end of two years.

It has been suggested to the editor that the asterisks ('----') in line 251 (which are not filled up in Lord Stanhope's MS. of 'The Curse of Minerva') stand for "Horner," and that Byron, writing at Athens in March, 1811, was under the impression that Perceval would adopt sound views on the currency question, and was not aware that he was strongly anti-bullionist. On that supposition the two premiers are Portland and Perceval, Horner is the Mentor, and Perceval (line 257) the "patrician clod." To what extent Byron was 'au courant' with home politics when he wrote the lines, it is impossible to say, and without such knowledge some doubt must rest on any interpretation of the pa.s.sage. But of its genesis there is no doubt. Lady Ann Hamilton, in her estimate of Lord Henry Petty, in 'Epics of the Ton' (p. 139), has something to say on budget "figures"--

"Those imps which make the senses reel, and zounds!

Mistake a cypher for a thousand pounds;"

and her note-writer comments thus: "It somewhat hurts the feelings to see a minister stand up in his place, and after a very pretty exordium to the budget, take up a bundle of papers from the table, gaze at the incomprehensible calculations before him, stammer out a few confused numbers, and then, with a rueful face, look over his shoulder to V--ns--rt for a.s.sistance. How often have I grieved to see unhappy A--d--g--n in this lamentable predicament!" Again, on Th.e.l.lusson being raised to the peerage as Lord Rendlesham, she asks--

"Say, shall we bend to t.i.tles thus bestowed, And like the Egyptians, hail the calf a G.o.d?

With toads, asps, onions, ornament the shrine, And reptiles own and pot-herbs things divine?"

It is evident that Byron, uninspired by Pallas, turned to the 'Epics of the Ton' for "copy," but whether he left a blank on purpose because "Vansittart" (to whom Perceval did turn) would not scan, or, misled by old newspapers, would have written "Horner," must remain a mystery.]]

[Footnote 21: See the portrait of Spencer Perceval in the National Portrait Gallery.]

[Footnote 22: The Deal and Dover traffickers in specie.]

[Footnote i:

'O'er the blue ocean way his'.

['MS.'][A]]

[Sub-Footnote A: The only MS. of 'The Curse of Minerva' which the editor has seen, is in the possession of the Earl of Stanhope. A second MS., formerly in the possession of the Duke of Newcastle, is believed to have perished in a fire which broke out at Clumber in 1879.]

[Footnote ii:

'Nor yet forbears each long-abandoned shrine'.

['MS.']]

[Footnote iii:

'Their 'varying azure mingled with the sky Beneath his rays a.s.sumes a deeper dye'.

['MS.']]

[Footnote iv:

'Behind his Delphian cliff'----.

['Corsair', III. st. i. l. 18.]]

[Footnote v:

'The soul of him who'----.

['Corsair, III. st. i. 1. 31.']]

[Footnote vi:

'silver reign'.

['MS.']]