The Works of Lord Byron Volume IV Part 83

NOTE C.

Venetian Society and Manners.

"Vice without splendour, sin without relief Even from the gloss of love to smooth it o'er; But in its stead, coa.r.s.e l.u.s.ts of habitude," etc.

"To these attacks so frequently pointed by the government against the clergy,--to the continual struggles between the different const.i.tuted bodies,--to these enterprises carried on by the ma.s.s of the n.o.bles against the depositaries of power,--to all those projects of innovation, which always ended by a stroke of state policy; we must add a cause not less fitted to spread contempt for ancient doctrines; _this was the excess of corruption_.

"That freedom of manners, which had been long boasted of as the princ.i.p.al charm of Venetian society, had degenerated into scandalous licentiousness: the tie of marriage was less sacred in that Catholic country, than among those nations where the laws and religion admit of its being dissolved. Because they could not break the contract, they feigned that it had not existed; and the ground of nullity, immodestly alleged by the married pair, was admitted with equal facility by priests and magistrates, alike corrupt. These divorces, veiled under another name, became so frequent, that the most important act of civil society was discovered to be amenable to a tribunal of exceptions; and to restrain the open scandal of such proceedings became the office of the police. In 1782 the Council of Ten decreed, that every woman who should sue for a dissolution of her marriage should be compelled to await the decision of the judges in some convent, to be named by the court.[486]

Soon afterwards the same council summoned all causes of that nature before itself.[487] This infringement on ecclesiastical jurisdiction having occasioned some remonstrance from Rome, the council retained only the right of rejecting the pet.i.tion of the married persons, and consented to refer such causes to the holy office as it should not previously have rejected.[488]

"There was a moment in which, doubtless, the destruction of private fortunes, the ruin of youth, the domestic discord occasioned by these abuses, determined the government to depart from its established maxims concerning the freedom of manners allowed the subject. All the courtesans were banished from Venice; but their absence was not enough to reclaim and bring back good morals to a whole people brought up in the most scandalous licentiousness. Depravity reached the very bosoms of private families, and even into the cloister; and they found themselves obliged to recall, and even to indemnify,[489] women who sometimes gained possession of important secrets, and who might be usefully employed in the ruin of men whose fortunes might have rendered them dangerous. Since that time licentiousness has gone on increasing; and we have seen mothers, not only selling the innocence of their daughters, but selling it by a contract, authenticated by the signature of a public officer, and the performance of which was secured by the protection of the laws.[490]

"The parlours of the convents of n.o.ble ladies, and the houses of the courtesans, though the police carefully kept up a number of spies about them, were the only a.s.semblies for society in Venice; and in these two places, so different from each other, there was equal freedom. Music, collations, gallantry, were not more forbidden in the parlours than at the casinos. There were a number of casinos for the purpose of public a.s.semblies, where gaming was the princ.i.p.al pursuit of the company. It was a strange sight to see persons of either s.e.x masked, or grave in their magisterial robes, round a table, invoking chance, and giving way at one instant to the agonies of despair, at the next to the illusions of hope, and that without uttering a single word.

"The rich had private casinos, but they lived _incognito_ in them; and the wives whom they abandoned found compensation in the liberty they enjoyed. The corruption of morals had deprived them of their empire. We have just reviewed the whole history of Venice, and we have not once seen them exercise the slightest influence."--Daru, _Hist. de la Repub.

de Venise_, Paris, 1821, v. 328-332.

The author of "Sketches Descriptive of Italy," (1820), etc., one of the hundred tours lately published, is extremely anxious to disclaim a possible plagiarism from _Childe Harold_ and _Beppo_. See p. 159, vol.

iv. He adds that still less could this presumed coincidence arise from "my conversation," as he had "_repeatedly declined an introduction to me while in Italy_."

Who this person may be I know not;[491] but he must have been deceived by all or any of those who "repeatedly offered to introduce" him, as I invariably refused to receive any English with whom I was not previously acquainted, even when they had letters from England. If the whole a.s.sertion is not an invention, I request this person not to sit down with the notion that he could have been introduced, since there has been nothing I have so carefully avoided as any kind of intercourse with his countrymen,--excepting the very few who were for a considerable time resident in Venice, or had been of my previous acquaintance. Whoever made him any such offer was possessed of impudence equal to that of making such an a.s.sertion without having had it. The fact is, that I hold in utter abhorrence any contact with the travelling English, as my friend the Consul General Hoppner and the Countess Benzoni (in whose house the Conversazione mostly frequented by them is held), could amply testify, were it worth while. I was persecuted by these tourists even to my riding ground at Lido, and reduced to the most disagreeable circuits to avoid them. At Madame Benzoni's I repeatedly refused to be introduced to them;--of a thousand such presentations pressed upon me, I accepted two, and both were to Irish women.

I should hardly have descended to speak of such trifles publicly, if the impudence of this "sketcher" had not forced me to a refutation of a disingenuous and gratuitously impertinent a.s.sertion; so meant to be, for what could it import to the reader to be told that the author "had repeatedly declined an introduction," even if it had been true, which, for the reasons I have above given, is scarcely possible. Except Lords Lansdowne, Jersey, and Lauderdale, Messrs. Scott, Hammond, Sir Humphry Davy, the late M. Lewis, W. Bankes, Mr. Hoppner, Thomas Moore, Lord Kinnaird, his brother, Mr. Joy, and Mr. Hobhouse, I do not recollect to have exchanged a word with another Englishman since I left their Country; and almost all these I had known before. The others,--and G.o.d knows there were some hundreds, who bored me with letters or visits, I refused to have any communication with, and shall be proud and happy when that wish becomes mutual.

FOOTNOTES:

[483] {462}Mr. Francis Cohen, afterwards Sir Francis Palgrave (1788-1861), the author of the _Rise and Progress of the English Const.i.tution, History of the Anglo-Saxons_, etc., etc.

[483a][In the earlier editions (1821-1825) Francis Cohen's translation (Appendix II.) is preceded by an Italian version (Appendix I.), taken directly from Muratori's edition of Marin Sanudo's _Vite dei Dogi_ (_Rerum Italicarum Scriptores_, 1733, xii. 628-635). The two versions are by no means identical. Cohen's "translation" is, presumably an accurate rendering of Sanudo's text, and must have been made either from the original MS. or from a transcript sent from Italy to England.

Muratori's Italian is a _rifacimento_ of the original, which has been altered and condensed with a view to convenience or literary effect.

Proper names of persons and places are changed, Sanudo's Venetian dialect gives place to Muratori's Italian, and notes which Sanudo added in the way of ill.u.s.tration and explanation are incorporated in the text.

In the _Life of Marino Faliero_, pp. 199, 200 of the original text are omitted, and a pa.s.sage from an old chronicle, which Sanudo gives as a note, is made to appear part of the original narrative. (See Preface to _Le Vite dei Dogi di Marin Sanudo_, by G. Monticolo, 1900; _Marino Faliero, La Congiura_, by V. Lazzarino; _Nuovo Archivio Veneto_, 1897, vol. xiii. pt. i. p. 15, note 1.)]

[484] {463}["_Marin Faliero dalla bella moglie: altri la G.o.de, ed egli la mantien._" According to Andrea Navagero (_It. Rer. Script._, xxiii.

1038), the writing on the chair ran thus: "_Becco Marino Falier dalla bella mogier_" (_vide ante_, p. 349). Palgrave has bowdlerized Steno's lampoon.]

[485] {468}["Had a copy taken of an extract from Petrarch's Letters, with reference to the conspiracy of the Doge Marino Faliero, containing the poet's opinion of the matter."--_Diary_, February 11, 1821, _Letters_, 1901, v. 201.]

[486] {470}Correspondence of M. Schlick, French charge d'affaires.

Despatch of 24th August, 1782.

[487] _Ibid_. Despatch, 31st August.

[488] _Ibid_. Despatch of 3d September, 1785.

[489] The decree for their recall designates them as _nostre benemerite meretrici_: a fund and some houses, called _Case rampane_, were a.s.signed to them; hence the opprobrious appellation of _Carampane_. [The writer of the Preface to _Leggi e memorie Venete sulla Prost.i.tuzione_, which was issued from Lord Orford's private press in 1870, maintains that the designation is mythical. "Tale a.s.serzione che non ha verum fondamento, salvo che nella imagin.a.z.ione di chi primo la scrisse lo storico francese Daru non si fece scrupolo di ripetuta ciecamente. Fu altresi ripetuta da Lord Byron e da altri," etc. The volume, a sumptuous folio, prints a series of rescripts promulgated by the Venetian government against _meretrici_ and other disagreeable persons.]

[490] Meyer, Description of Venice, vol. ii.; and M. de Archenholtz, Picture of Italy, vol. i. sect. 2, pp. 65, 66. [_Voyage en Italie_, par F. J. L. Meyer, An X. cap. iii.]

[491] {471}[In a letter to Murray, September 11, 1820 (_Letters_, 1901, v. 75, 84), Byron writes, "Last post I sent you a note fierce as Faliero himself, in answer to a trashy tourist, who pretends that he could have been introduced to me;" but at the end of the month, September 29, 1820, he withdraws his animadversions: "I open my letter to say, that on reading more of the 4 volumes on Italy [_Sketches descriptive of Italy in the Years_ 1816, 1817, etc., by Miss Jane Waldie] ... I perceive (_horresco referens_) that it is written by a WOMAN!!! In that case you must suppress my note and answer.... I can only say that I am sorry that a Lady should say anything of the kind. What I would have said to one of the other s.e.x you know already." Nevertheless, the note was appended to the first edition, which appeared April 21, 1821.]

THE VISION OF JUDGMENT.

BY

QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS.

SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO ENt.i.tLED BY THE AUTHOR OF "WAT TYLER."

"A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel!

I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word."

[_Merchant of Venice_, act iv. sc. 1, lines 218, 336.]

INTRODUCTION TO _THE VISION OF JUDGMENT_.

Byron's _Vision of Judgment_ is a parody of Southey's _Vision of Judgement_.

The acts or fyttes of the quarrel between Byron and Southey occur in the following order. In the summer of 1817 Southey, accompanied by his friends, Humphrey Senhouse and the artist Edward Nash, pa.s.sed some weeks (July) in Switzerland. They visited Chamouni, and at Montanvert, in the travellers' alb.u.m, they found, in Sh.e.l.ley's handwriting, a Greek hexameter verse, in which he affirmed that he was an "atheist," together with an indignant comment ("fool!" also in Greek) superadded in an unknown hand (see _Life of Sh.e.l.ley_, by E. Dowden, 1886, ii. 30, note).

Southey copied this entry into his note-book, and "spoke of the circ.u.mstance on his return" (circ. August 12, 1817). In the course of the next year some one told Byron that a rumour had reached England that he and Sh.e.l.ley "had formed a league of incest with two sisters," and that Southey and Coleridge were the authors of the scandal. There is nothing to show through what channel the report of the rumour reached Byron's ears, but it may be inferred that it was in his mind (see Letter to Murray, November 24, 1818, _Letters_, 1900, iv. 272) when he a.s.sailed Southey in the "Dedication" ("in good, simple, savage verse") to the First Canto of _Don Juan_, which was begun September 6, 1818. Sh.e.l.ley, who was already embittered against Southey (see the account of a dinner at G.o.dwin's, November 6, 1817, _Diary of H. C. Robinson_, 1869, ii. 67), heard Byron read this "Dedication," and, in a letter to Peac.o.c.k (October 8, 1818), describes it as being "more like a mixture of wormwood and verdigrease than satire."

When _Don Juan_ appeared (July 15, 1819), the "Dedication" was not forthcoming, but of its existence and character Southey had been informed. "Have you heard," he asks (Letter to the Rev. H. Hill, _Selections from the Letters, etc._, 1856, iii. 142), "that _Don Juan_ came over with a Dedication to me, in which Lord Castlereagh and I ...

were coupled together for abuse as the 'two Roberts'? A fear of persecution (_sic_) from the _one_ Robert is supposed to be the reason why it has been suppressed. Lord Byron might have done well to remember that the other can write dedications also; and make his own cause good, if it were needful, in prose or rhyme, against a villain, as well as against a slanderer."

When George III. died (January 29, 1820), it became the duty of the "laurel-honouring laureate" to write a funeral ode, and in composing a Preface, in vindication of the English hexameter, he took occasion "incidentally to repay some of his obligations to Lord Byron by a few comments on _Don Juan_" (Letter to the Rev. H. Hill, January 8, 1821, _Selections, etc._, iii. 225). He was, no doubt, impelled by other and higher motives to const.i.tute himself a _censor morum_, and take up his parable against the spirit of the age as displayed and fostered in _Don Juan_ (see a letter to Wynne, March 23, 1821, _Selections, etc._, iii.

238), but the suppressed "Dedication" and certain gibes, which had been suffered to appear, may be reckoned as the immediate causes of his anathema.

Southey's _Vision of Judgement_ was published April 11, 1821--an undivine comedy, in which the apotheosis of George III., the beatification of the virtuous, and the bale and d.a.m.nation of such egregious spirits as Robespierre, Wilkes, and Junius, are "thrown upon the screen" of the showman or lecturer. Southey said that the "Vision"

ought to be read aloud, and, if the subject could be forgotten and ignored, the hexameters might not sound amiss, but the subject and its treatment are impossible and intolerable. The "Vision" would have "made sport" for Byron in any case, but, in the Preface, Southey went out of his way to attack and denounce the anonymous author of _Don Juan_.

"What, then," he asks (ed. 1838, x. 204), "should be said of those for whom the thoughtlessness and inebriety of wanton youth can no longer be pleaded, but who have written in sober manhood, and with deliberate purpose?... Men of diseased hearts and depraved imaginations, who, forming a system of opinions to suit their own unhappy course of conduct, have rebelled against the holiest ordinances of human society, and hating that revealed religion which, with all their efforts and bravadoes, they are unable entirely to disbelieve, labour to make others as miserable as themselves, by infecting them with a moral virus that eats into the soul! The school which they have set up may properly be called the Satanic school; for, though their productions breathe the spirit of Belial in their lascivious parts, and the spirit of Moloch in those loathsome images of atrocities and horrors which they delight to represent, they are more especially characterized by a Satanic pride and audacious impiety, which still betrays the wretched feeling of hopelessness wherewith it is allied."

Byron was not slow to take up the challenge. In the "Appendix" to the _Two Foscari_ (first ed., pp. 325-329), which was written at Ravenna, June-July, but not published till December 11, 1821, he retaliates on "Mr. Southey and his 'pious preface'" in many words; but when it comes to the point, ignores the charge of having "published a lascivious book," and endeavours by counter-charges to divert the odium and to cover his adversary with shame and confusion. "Mr. S.," he says, "with a cowardly ferocity, exults over the antic.i.p.ated 'death-bed repentance' of the objects of his dislike; and indulges himself in a pleasant 'Vision of Judgment,' in prose as well as verse, full of impious impudence.... I am not ignorant," he adds, "of Mr. Southey's calumnies on a different occasion, knowing them to be such, which he scattered abroad on his return from Switzerland against me and others.... What _his_ 'death-bed'