Our guides are gone, our hope is lost, And lightnings, as they play, But show where rocks our path have cross'd, Or gild the torrent's spray. Is yon a cot I saw, though low? When lightning broke the gloomHow welcome were its shade!-ah, no! "Tis but a Turkish tomb. Through sounds of foaming waterfalls, A shot is fired-by foe or friend? The mountain-peasants to descend, Oh! who in such a night will dare And who 'mid thunder-peals can hear And who that heard our shouts would rise To try the dubious road, Nor rather deem from nightly cries That outlaws were abroad? Clouds burst, skies flash, oh, dreadful hour! Yet here one thought has still the power While wandering through each broken path, While elements exhaust their wrath, Not on the sea, not on the sea Thy bark hath long been gone: Oh, may the storm that pours on me Full swiftly blew the swift Siroc, Now thou art safe; nay, long ere now And since I now remember thee Which mirth and music sped; Do thou, amid the fair white walls, At times from out her latticed halls Then think upon Calypso's isles, And when the admiring circle mark A half-form'd tear, a transient spark Again thou'lt smile, and blushing shun Nor own for once thou thought'st of one, Though smile and sigh alike are vain, My spirit flies o'er mount and main, STANZAS WRITTEN IN PASSING THE AMBRAGIAN GULF. THROUGH cloudless skies, in silvery sheen, And now upon the scene I look, The azure grave of many a Roman; As ever yet was said or sung (Since Orpheus sang his spouse from hell), Whilst thou art fair and I am young; Sweet Florence! those were pleasant times, When worlds were staked for ladies' eyes: Had bards as many realms as rhymes, Thy charms might raise new Antonies. Though Fate forbids such things to be, Yet, by thine eyes and ringlets curl'd! I cannot lose a world for thee, But would not lose thee for a world. November 14, 1809. THE SPELL IS BROKE, THE CHARM IS FLOWN! WRITTEN AT ATHENS, JANUARY 16, 1810. Each lucid interval of thought Recalls the woes of Nature's charter, And he that acts as wise men ought, But lives, as saints have died, a martyr. WRITTEN AFTER SWIMMING FROM SESTOS IF, in the month of dark December, To cross thy stream, broad Hellespont! head, of that frigate, and the writer of these rhymes, swam from the European shore to the Asiatic-by the by, from Abydos to Sestos would have been more correct. The whole distance, from the place whence we started to our landing on the other side, including the length we were carried by If, when the wintry tempest roar'd, He sped to Hero, nothing loth, And thus of old thy current pour'd, Fair Venus! how I pity both! For me, degenerate modern wretch, Though in the genial month of May, My dripping limbs I faintly stretch, And think I've done a feat to-day. But since he cross'd the rapid tide, According to the doubtful story, 'T were hard to say who fared the best: For he was drown'd, and I've the ague.(1) LINES IN THE TRAVELLERS' BOOK AT ORCHOMENUS. IN THIS BOOK A TRAVELLER HAD WRITTEN "FAIR Albion, smiling, sees her son depart To trace the birth and nursery of art: Noble his object, glorious is his aim; He comes to Athens, and he writes his name." BENEATH WHICH LORD BYRON INSERTED THE THE modest bard, like many a bard unknown, His name would bring more credit than his verse. (2) the current, was computed by those on board the frigate at upwards of four English miles; though the actual breadth is barely one. The rapidity of the current is such that no boat can row directly across, and it may, in some measure, be estimated from the circumstance of the whole distance being accomplished by one of the parties in an hour and five, and by the other in an hour and ten, minutes. The water was extremely cold, from the melting of the mountain snows. About three weeks before, in April, we had made an attempt; but, having ridden all the way from the Troad the same morning, and the water being of an icy chillness, we found it necessary to postpone the completion till the frigate anchored below the castles, when we swam the straits, as just stated; entering a considerable way above the European, and landing below the Asiatic, fort. Chevalier says that a young Jew swam the same distance for his mistress; and Oliver mentions its having been done by a Neapolitan; but our consul, Tarragona, remembered neither of these circumstances, and tried to dissuade us from the attempt. A number of the Salsette's crew were known to have accomplished a greater distance; and the only thing that surprised me was, that, as doubts had been entertained of the truth of Leander's story, no traveller had ever endeavoured to ascertain its practicability. (1) "My companion," says Mr. Hobhouse, had before made a more perilous but less celebrated passage; for I recollect that, when we were in Portugal, he swam from Old Lisbon to Belem Castle, and having to contend with a tide and counter current, the wind blowing freshly, was but little less than two hours in crossing."-L. E. The exceeding pride which Byron took in the classic feat (of swimming across the Hellespont) may be cited among the instances of that boyishness of character which he carried with him so remarkably into his maturer years, and which, while it puzzled distant observers of his conduct, was not among the least amusing or attaching of his peculiarities to those who knew him intimately. So late as eleven years from the period, when some sceptical traveller ventured to question, after all, the practicability of Lean. PARAPHRASE FROM THE OPENING LINES On how I wish that an embargo EPITAPH. (4) YOUTH, Nature, and relenting Jove, To keep my lamp in strongly strove; But Romanelli was so stout, He beat all three-and blew it out. SUBSTITUTE FOR AN EPITAPH. KIND Reader! take your choice to cry or laugh; Here HAROLD lies-but where's his Epitaph? If such you seek, try Westminster, and view Ten thousand just as fit for him as you. Athens. TRANSLATION OF THE FAMOUS GREEK WAR SONG, Δεῦτε, παῖδες τῶν Ελλήνων. (5) SONS of the Greeks, arise! CHORUS. Sons of Greeks! let us go In arms against the foe, Till their hated blood shall flow In a river past our feet. der's exploit, Lord Byron, with that jealousy on the subject of his own personal prowess which he retained from boy! hood, entered again with fresh zeal into the discussion, and brought forward two or three other instances of his own feats in swimming to corroborate the statement originally made by him. "In the year 1808, he had been nearly drowned while swimming at Brighton with Mr. L. Stanhope. His friend, Mr. Hobhouse, and other by-standers, sent in some boatmen with ropes tied round them, who at last succeeded in dragging Lord Byron and Mr. Stanhope from the surf, and thus saved their lives."- Moore. From the authority above cited, we learn that Lord Byron, on one occasion, swam across the Thames with Mr. H. Drury, after the Montem, to see how many times they could perform the passage backwards and forwards without touching land. In this trial (which took place at night, after supper, when both were heated with drinking), Lord Byron was the conquerer.-P. E. (2) "At Orchomenus, where stood the Temple of the Graces, I was tempted to exclaim, Whither have the Graces fled?' Little did I expect to find them here; yet here comes one of them with golden cups and coffee, and another with a book. The book is a register of names, some of which are far sounded by the voice of fame. Among them is Lord Byron's, connected with some lines which I here send you." H. W. Williams.-L. E. (3) "I am just come from an expedition through the Bosphorus to the Black Sea and the Cyanean Symplegades, up which last I scrambled at as great a risk as ever the Argonauts escaped in their hoy. You remember the beginning of the nurse's dole in the Medea, of which I beg you to take the following translation, done on the summit." Letter to Mr. Henry Drury, June 17, 1810.-P. E. (4) "I have just escaped from a physician and a fever. The English consul forced a physician upon me. In this state I made my epitaph-take it." Letter to Mr. Hodgson, Oct. 3, 1810. Moore.-P. E. (5) The song Acute naidis, etc., was written by Riga, who perished in the attempt to revolutionise Greece. This trans Then manfully despising The Turkish tyrant's yoke, Oh, start again to life! At the sound of my trumpet, breaking Sons of Greeks, etc. Sparta, Sparta! why in slumbers Lethargic dost thou lie? Awake, and join thy numbers That chief of ancient song, Which utters its song to adore thee, Yet trembles for what it has sung. But the loveliest garden grows hateful When Love has abandon'd the bowers; My heart from these horrors to save: As the chief who to combat advances Hast pierced through my heart to its core. Ah, tell me, my soul! must I perish By pangs which a smile would dispel? Would the hope, which thou once bad'st me cherish, For torture repay me too well? Now sad is the garden of roses, Beloved but false Haidée! Sons of Greeks, etc. (2) There Flora all wither'd reposes, TRANSLATION OF THE ROMAIC SONG, Επαινῶ μὲς τὸ περιβόλι, 3) Ωραιοτάτη Χαηδή, κ. τ. λ. I ENTER thy garden of roses, (4) Beloved and fair Haidée, Each morning where Flora reposes, Oh, lovely! thus low I implore thee, Receive this fond truth from my tongue, lation is as literal as the author could make it in verse. It is of the same measure as that of the original. [While at the Capuchin convent, Lord Byron devoted some hours daily to the study of the Romaic; and various proofs of his diligence will be found in the Appendix to the Second Canto of Childe Harold, p. 104, antè.-L. E.] (1) Constantinople. " Επτάλοφος.” (2) Riga was a Thessalian, and passed the first part of his youth among his native mountains, in teaching ancient Greek to his countrymen. On the first burst of the French revolution, he joined himself to some other enthusiasts, and with them perambulated Greece, rousing the bold, and encouraging the timid by his minstrelsy. He afterwards went to Vienna, to solicit aid for a rising, which he and his com. rades had for years been endeavouring to accomplish; but he was given up by the Austrian government to the Turks, who vainly endeavoured by torture to force from him the names of the other conspirators.-L. E. (3) The song from which this is taken is a great favourite with the young girls of Athens of all classes. Their manner of singing it is by verses in rotation, the whole number pre sent joining in the chorus. I have heard it frequently at our "pot," in the winter of 1810-11. The air is plaintive and pretty. (4) "National songs and popular works of amusement throw no small light on the manners of a people: they are materials which most travellers have within their reach, but which they almost always disdain to collect. Lord By. ron has shown a better taste; and it is to be hoped that his example will, in future, be generally followed." George Ellis. L. E. And mourns o'er thine absence with me. MAID OF ATHENS, ERE WE PART. MAID of Athens, (C) ere we part, (5) Romaic expression of tenderness: If I translate it, I shall affront the gentlemen, as it may seem that I supposed they could not; and if I do not, I may affront the ladies. For fear of any misconstruction on the part of the latter, I shall do so, begging pardon of the learned. It means, "My life, I love you!" which sounds very prettily in all languages, and is as much in fashion in Greece at this day as, Juvenal tells us, the two first words were amongst the Roman ladies, whose erotic expressions were all Hel lenized. (6) We copy the following interesting account of the Maid of Athens and her family from the late eminent artist, Mr. Hugh Williams of Edinburgh's Travels in Italy, Greece, etc. -“Our servant, who had gone before to procure accommodation, met us at the gate, and conducted us to Theodora Macri, the Consulina's, where we at present live. This lady is the widow of the consul, and has three lovely daughters; the eldest, celebrated for her beauty, and said to be the Maid of Athens,' of Lord Byron. Their apartment is immediately opposite to ours, and, if you could see them, as we do now, through the gently-waving aromatic plants hefore our window, you would leave your heart in Athens. "Theresa, the Maid of Athens, Catinco, and Mariana, are of middle stature. On the crown of the head of each is a red Albanian skull-cap, with a blue tassel spread out and fastened down like a star. Near the edge or bottom of the skuli-cap is a handkerchief of various colours bound round their temples. The youngest wears her hair loose, falling on her shoulders,- the hair behind descending down the back nearly to the waist, and, as usual, mixed with silk. The two eldest generally have their hair bound, and fastened By those tresses unconfined, Woo'd by each gean wind; By those lids, whose jetty fringe By that lip I long to taste; By that zone-encircled waist; By all the token-flowers (1) that tell What words can never speak so well; Maid of Athens! I am gone: Athens, 1810 LINES WRITTEN BENEATH A PICTURE. (3) DEAR object of defeated care! Though now of love and thee bereft, Thine image and my tears are left. under the handkerchief. Their upper robe is a pelisse edged with fur, hanging loose down to the ankles; below is a handkerchief of muslin covering the bosom, and terminating at the waist, which is short; under that, a gown of striped silk or muslin, with a gore round the swell of the loins, falling in front in graceful negligence;-white stockings and yellow slippers complete their attire. The two eldest have black, or dark, hair and eyes; their visage oval, and complexion somewhat pale, with teeth of dazzling whiteness. Their cheeks are rounded, and noses straight, rather inclined to aquiline. The youngest, Mariana, is very fair, her face not so finely rounded, but has a gayer expression than her sisters', whose countenances, except when the conversation has something of mirth in it, may be said to be rather pensive. Their persons are elegant, and their manners pleasing and ladylike, such as would be fascinating in any country. They possess very considerable powers of conver sation, and their minds seem to be more instructed than those of the Greek women in general. With such attrac. tions, it would, indeed, be remarkable, if they did not meet with great attentions from the travellers who occasionally are resident in Athens. They sit in the eastern style, a little reclined, with their limbs gathered under them on the divan, and without shoes. Their employments are the needle, tambouring, and reading." There is a beautiful engraving of the Maid of Athens in Finden's Illustrations of Byron, No. I.-L. E. We learn from Moore, that Byron, in making love to one of the three Athenian maids, "had recourse to an act of courtship often practised in that country-namely, giving himself a wound across the breast with his dagger. The young Athenian, by his own account, looked on very coolly during the operation, considering it a fit tribute to her beauty, but in no degree moved to gratitude." "The latest accounts of Theresa have broken the charm of poetry which surrounded her. She is said to be married and grown fat!" Finden's Illustrations —P. E. (1) In the East (where ladies are not taught to write, lest they should scribble assignations) flowers, cinders, pebbles. etc. convey the sentiments of the parties by that universal deputy of Mercury-an old woman. A cinder says, "I burn for thee;" a bunch of flowers tied with hair, "Take me and fly;" but a pebble declares-what nothing else can. (2) Constantinople. (3) These lines are copied from a leaf of the original MS. of the second canto of Childe Harold.-L. E. (4) The last two lines, though hardly intelligible as connected with the rest of the poem, may, taken separately, be interpreted as employing a sort of prophetic conscious "Tis said with sorrow Time can hope; But this I feel can ne'er be true: For by the death-blow of my hope My memory immortal grew. (4) Athens, January, 1811.(5) ON PARTING. THE kiss, dear maid! thy lip has left Till happier hours restore the gift Thy parting glance, which fondly beams, The tear that from thine eyelid streams I ask no pledge to make me blest Nor need I write-to tell the tale ness, that it was out of the wreck and ruin of all his hopes the immortality of his name was to arise." Moore.-P. E. (5) On the departure, in July, 1810, of his friend and fellow-traveller, Mr. Hobhouse, for England, Lord Byron fixed his head-quarters at Athens, where he had taken lodg ings in a Franciscan convent; making occasional excursions through Attica and the Morea, and employing himself, in the interval of his tours, in collecting materials for those notices on the state of modern Greece which are appended! to the second canto of Childe Harold. In this retreat also he wrote Hints from Horace, The Curse of Minerva, and Remarks on the Romaic, or Modern Greek Language. He thus writes to his mother:-" At present, I do not care to venture a winter's voyage, even if I were otherwise tired of travelling; but I am so convinced of the advantages of looking at mankind, instead of reading about them, and the bitter effects of staying at home with all the narrow prejadices of an islander, that I think there should be a law amongst us to send our young men abroad, for a term, among the few allies our wars have left us. Here I see, and have conversed with, French, Italians, Germans, Danes, Greeks, Turks, Americans, etc. etc. etc.; and, without losing sight of my own, I can judge of the countries and manners of others. When I see the superiority of England (which, by the by, we are a good deal mistaken about in many things), I am pleased; and where I find her inferior, I am at least enlightened. Now, I might have stayed, smoked in your towns, or fogged in your country, a century, without being sure of this, and without acquiring any thing more useful or amusing at home. I keep no journal; nor have 1 any intention of scribbling my travels. I have done with authorship; and if, in my last production, I have convinced the critics or the world 1 was something more than they took me for, I am satisfied; nor will I hazard that reputation by a future effort. It is true I have some others in manuscript, but I leave them for those who come after me; and, if deemed worth publishing, they may serve to prolong my memory, when I myself shall cease to remember. I have a famous Bavarian artist taking some views of Athens, etc. etc., for me. This will be better than scribbling-a disease | I hope myself cured of. I hope, on my return, to lead a quiet recluse life; but God knows, and does best for us all."-L. E. "Notwithstanding this resolution to abandon for ever the vocation of authorship, and to leave the whole Cas. ¦ talian state' to others, he was hardly landed in England (on his return), when we find him busily engaged in pre- | parations for the publication of some of the poems which ' he had produced abroad." Moore.-P. E. MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. EPITAPH FOR JOSEPH BLACKETT, LATE STRANGER! behold, interr'd together, His works were neat, and often found And if he did, 't were shame to "Black-it." FAREWELL TO MALTA. ADIEU, ye joys of La Valette! Adieu, sirocco, sun, and sweat! Adieu, ye mansions where-I've ventured! (How surely he who mounts you swears!) Adieu that stage which makes us yawn, sirs, Of all that strut "en militaire!" Farewell to these, but not adieu, And fallen chiefs, and fleets no more, (1) Some notice of this poetaster has been given, antè, p. 61. He died in 1810, and his works have followed him. -L. E. (2) The farce in question was called M P.; or, the Blue And now I've got to Mrs. Fraser, And fashion's ease, without its art; And now, O Malta! since thou'st got us, I'll not offend with words uncivil, But only stare from out my casement, And ask, for what is such a place meant? Return to scribbling, or a book, Or take my physic while I'm able And bless the gods-I've got a fever! TO DIVES. A FRAGMENT. UNHAPPY DIVES! in an evil hour May 26, 1811. 'Gainst Nature's voice seduced to deeds accurst! 1811. Stocking, and came out at the Lyceum Theatre, on the 9th of September.-L.. E. (3) I. e. Mr. Francis Hodgson (not then the Reverend). 108 See p. 64.-L. E. 1 |