136 — To Henry Drury
Salsette
frigate, May 3, 1810.
My Dear Drury, — When I left England, nearly a year ago, you requested me to write to you — I will do so. I have crossed Portugal, traversed the south of Spain, visited Sardinia, Sicily, Malta, and thence passed into Turkey, where I am still wandering. I first landed in Albania, the ancient Epirus, where we penetrated as far as Mount Tomarit — excellently treated by the chief Ali Pacha, — and, after journeying through Illyria, Chaonia, etc., crossed the Gulf of Actium, with a guard of fifty Albanians, and passed the Achelous in our route through Acarnania and Ætolia. We stopped a short time in the Morea, crossed the Gulf of Lepanto, and landed at the foot of Parnassus; — saw all that Delphi retains, and so on to Thebes and Athens, at which last we remained ten weeks.
His Majesty's ship,
Pylades
, brought us to Smyrna; but not before we had topographised Attica, including, of course, Marathon and the Sunian promontory. From Smyrna to the Troad (which we visited when at anchor, for a fortnight, off the tomb of Antilochus) was our next stage; and now we are in the Dardanelles, waiting for a wind to proceed to Constantinople.
This
morning I
swam
from
Sestos
to
Abydos
. The immediate distance is not above a mile, but the current renders it hazardous; — so much so that I doubt whether Leander's conjugal affection must not have been a little chilled in his passage to Paradise. I attempted it a week ago, and failed, — owing to the north wind, and the wonderful rapidity of the tide, — though I have been from my childhood a strong swimmer. But, this morning being calmer, I succeeded, and crossed the "broad Hellespont" in an hour and ten minutes.
Well, my dear sir, I have left my home, and seen part of Africa and Asia, and a tolerable portion of Europe. I have been with generals and admirals, princes and pashas, governors and ungovernables, — but I have not time or paper to expatiate. I wish to let you know that I live with a friendly remembrance of you, and a hope to meet you again; and if I do this as shortly as possible, attribute it to any thing but forgetfulness.
Greece, ancient and modern, you know too well to require description. Albania, indeed, I have seen more of than any Englishman (except a Mr. Leake), for it is a country rarely visited, from the savage character of the natives, though abounding in more natural beauties than the classical regions of Greece, — which, however, are still eminently beautiful, particularly Delphi and Cape Colonna in Attica. Yet these are nothing to parts of Illyria and Epirus, where places without a name, and rivers not laid down in maps, may, one day, when more known, be justly esteemed superior subjects, for the pencil and the pen, to the dry ditch of the Ilissus and the bogs of Boeotia.
The Troad is a fine field for conjecture and snipe-shooting, and a good sportsman and an ingenious scholar may exercise their feet and faculties to great advantage upon the spot; — or, if they prefer riding, lose their way (as I did) in a cursed quagmire of the Scamander, who wriggles about as if the Dardan virgins still offered their wonted tribute. The only vestige of Troy, or her destroyers, are the barrows supposed to contain the carcasses of Achilles, Antilochus, Ajax, etc.; — but Mount Ida is still in high feather, though the shepherds are now-a-days not much like Ganymede.
But
why should I say more of these things? are they not written in the
Boke
of
Gell
? and has not Hobhouse got a journal? I keep none, as I have renounced scribbling.
I see not much difference between ourselves and the Turks, save that we have — — and they have none — that they have long dresses, and we short, and that we talk much, and they little. They are sensible people. Ali Pacha told me he was sure I was a man of rank, because I had
small ears
and
hands
, and
curling hair
. By the by, I speak the Romaic, or modern Greek, tolerably. It does not differ from the ancient dialects so much as you would conceive; but the pronunciation is diametrically opposite. Of verse, except in rhyme, they have no idea.
I like the Greeks, who are plausible rascals, — with all the Turkish vices, without their courage. However, some are brave, and all are beautiful, very much resembling the busts of Alcibiades; — the women not quite so handsome. I can swear in Turkish; but, except one horrible oath, and "pimp," and "bread," and "water," I have got no great vocabulary in that language. They are extremely polite to strangers of any rank, properly protected; and as I have two servants and two soldiers, we get on with great éclat. We have been occasionally in danger of thieves, and once of shipwreck, — but always escaped.
Of Spain I sent some account to our Hodgson, but have subsequently written to no one, save notes to relations and lawyers, to keep them out of my premises. I mean to give up all connection, on my return, with many of my best friends — as I supposed them — and to snarl all my life. But I hope to have one good-humoured laugh with you, and to embrace Dwyer, and pledge Hodgson, before I commence cynicism.
Tell Dr. Butler I am now writing with the gold pen he gave me before I left England, which is the reason my scrawl is more unintelligible than usual. I have been at Athens, and seen plenty of these reeds for scribbling, some of which he refused to bestow upon me, because topographic Gell had brought them from Attica. But I will not describe, — no — you must be satisfied with simple detail till my return, and then we will unfold the floodgates of colloquy. I am in a thirty-six gun frigate, going up to fetch Bob Adair from Constantinople, who will have the honour to carry this letter.
And
so Hobhouse's
boke
is out
, with some sentimental sing-song of my own to fill up, — and how does it take, eh? and where the devil is the second edition of my Satire, with additions? and my name on the title page? and more lines tagged to the end, with a new exordium and what not, hot from my anvil before I cleared the Channel? The Mediterranean and the Atlantic roll between me and criticism; and the thunders of the Hyperborean Review are deafened by the roar of the Hellespont.
Remember
me to Claridge
, if not translated to college, and present to Hodgson assurances of my high consideration. Now, you will ask, what shall I do next? and I answer, I do not know. I may return in a few months, but I have intents and projects after visiting Constantinople. Hobhouse, however, will probably be back in September.
On the 2d of July we have left Albion one year —
oblitus meorum obliviscendus et illis
.
I
was sick of my own country, and not much prepossessed in favour of any other; but I "drag on my chain" without "lengthening it at each remove."
I
am
like the Jolly Miller, caring for nobody, and not cared for
. All countries are much the same in my eyes. I smoke, and stare at mountains, and twirl my mustachios very independently. I miss no comforts, and the musquitoes that rack the morbid frame of H. have, luckily for me, little effect on mine, because I live more temperately.
I omitted Ephesus in my catalogue, which I visited during my sojourn at Smyrna; but the Temple has almost perished, and St. Paul need not trouble himself to epistolise the present brood of Ephesians, who have converted a large church built entirely of marble into a mosque, and I don't know that the edifice looks the worse for it.
My paper is full, and my ink ebbing — good afternoon! If you address to me at Malta, the letter will be forwarded wherever I may be. H. greets you; he pines for his poetry, — at least, some tidings of it.
I
almost forgot to tell you that I am dying for love of three Greek girls at Athens, sisters. I lived in the same house. Teresa, Mariana, and Katinka
, are the names of these divinities, — all of them under fifteen.
Your
Greek (transliterated): tapeinotatos doulos
Byron
.
Footnote 1:
Byron made two attempts to swim across the Hellespont from Abydos to Sestos. The first, April 16, failed; the second, May 3, in warmer weather, succeeded.
"Byron was one hour and ten minutes in the water; his companion, Mr. Ekenhead, five minutes less ... My fellow-traveller 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 the river"
(Hobhouse,
Travels in Albania
, etc., vol. ii. p. 195). In Hobhouse's journal, Byron made the following note:
"The whole distance E. and myself swam was more than four miles — the current very strong and cold — some large fish near us when half across — we were not fatigued, but a little chilled — did it with little difficulty. — May 26, 1810. Byron."
Of his feat Byron was always proud. See the "Lines Written after Swimming from Sestos to Abydos" ("by the by, from Abydos to Sestos would have been more correct"), and
Don Juan
, Canto II. stanza cv.:—
"A better swimmer you could scarce see ever;
He could, perhaps, have pass'd the Hellespont,
As once (a feat on which ourselves we prided)
Leander, Mr. Ekenhead, and I did."
In a note to the "Lines Written after Swimming from Sestos to Abydos," Byron writes,
"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."
Lieutenant Ekenhead, of the Marines, was afterwards killed by a fall from the fortifications of Malta.
Footnote 2:
Sir William Gell (1777-1836) published the
Topography of Troy
(1804);
Geography and Antiquities of Ithaca
(1807); the
Itinerary of Greece
(1810); and many other subsequent works. (For Byron's review of
Ithaca
and
Greece
, in the
Monthly Review
for August, 1811, see
.) In the MS. of
English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers
(line 1034) he called him "coxcomb Gell;" but, having made his personal acquaintance before the Satire was printed, he changed the epithet to "classic." After seeing the country himself, he again altered the epithet —
"Of Dardan tours let Dilettanti tell,
I leave topography to rapid Gell."
To these lines is appended the following note:
"'Rapid,' indeed! He topographised and typographised King Priam's dominions in three days! I called him 'classic' before I saw the Troad, but since have learned better than to tack to his name what don't belong to it."
To this passage Byron, in 1816, added the further expression of his opinion, that "Gell's survey was hasty and superficial." One of two suppressed stanzas in
Childe Harold
(Canto II. stanza xiii.) refers to Gell and his works:—
"Or will the gentle Dilettanti crew
Now delegate the task to digging Gell?
That mighty limner of a bird's-eye view,
How like to Nature let his volumes tell;
Who can with him the folio's limits swell
With all the Author saw, or said he saw?
Who can topographise or delve so well?
No boaster he, nor impudent and raw,
His pencil, pen, and shade, alike without a flaw."
Footnote 3:
Imitations and Translations from the Ancient and Modern Classics, etc.
(London, 1809, 8vo). Of the sixty-five pieces, nine were by Byron (see
Poems
, vol. i, Bibliographical note; and vol. vi, Bibliographical note). The second and enlarged edition of
English Bards, and Scotch Reviewers
, with Byron's name attached, appeared in October, 1809.
Footnote 4:
Two boys of this name, sons of J. Claridge, of Sevenoaks, entered Harrow School in April, 1805. George became a. solicitor, and died at Sevenoaks in 1841; John (afterwards Sir John) went to Christ Church, Oxford, became a barrister, and died in 1868. John Claridge seems to have been one of Byron's "juniors and favourites," whom he "spoilt by indulgence."
Footnote 5:
"Still to my brother turns with ceaseless pain,
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain."
Goldsmith's
Traveller, lines 9, 10.
Footnote 6:
The allusion is to the familiar lines inserted by Isaac Bickerstaffe in
Love in a Village
(1762), act i. sc. 3 —
"There was a jolly miller once,
Liv'd on the river Dee;
He work'd and sung from morn till night;
No lark more blithe than he.
"And this the burden of his song,
For ever us'd to be —
I care for nobody, not I,
If no one cares for me."
Footnote 7:
"During our stay at Athens," writes Hobhouse (Travels in Albania, etc., vol. i. pp. 242, 243), "we occupied two houses separated from each other only by a single wall, through which we opened a doorway. One of them belongs to a Greek lady, whose name is Theodora Macri, the daughter of the late English Vice-Consul, and who has to show many letters of recommendation left in her hands by several English travellers. Her lodgings consisted of a sitting-room and two bedrooms, opening into a court-yard where there were five or six lemon-trees, from which, during our residence in the place, was plucked the fruit that seasoned the pilaf and other national dishes served up at our frugal table."
The beauty of the Greek women is transient. Hughes (
Travels in Sicily, etc.
, vol. i. p. 254, published in 1820) speaks of the three daughters of Madame Macri as "the
belles
of Athens." Of Theresa, the eldest, he says that "her countenance was extremely interesting, and her eye retained much of its wonted brilliancy; but the roses had already deserted the cheek, and we observed the remains only of that loveliness which elicited such strains from an impassioned poet." Walsh, in his
Narrative of a Resident in Constantinople
(vol. i p. 122), speaks of Theresa Macri, the "Maid of Athens," whom he saw in 1821, as "still very elegant in her person, and gentle and ladylike in her manners," but adds that "she has lost all pretensions to beauty, and has a countenance singularly marked by hopeless sadness." On the other hand, Williams, in his
Travels in Italy, etc.
(vol. ii. pp. 290, 291), speaks, in 1820, with an artist's enthusiasm, of the beauty of the three daughters of Theodora Macri. He quotes from the "Visitors' Book," to which Hobhouse alludes, four lines written by Byron in answer to an anonymous versifier —
"This modest bard, like many a bard unknown,
Rhymes on our names, but wisely hides his own;
But yet, whoe'er he be, to say no worse,
His name would bring more credit than his verse."
Theresa and Mariana Macri were dark; Katinka was fair. The latter name Byron uses as that of the fair Georgian in
Don Juan
(Canto VI. stanza xli.).
"It was," says Moore, "if I recollect right, in making love to one of these girls that he 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."
Theresa, sometimes called Thyrza, Macri married an Englishman named Black, employed in H.M.'s Consular service at Missolonghi. She survived her husband, and fell into great poverty. Finlay, the historian of Greece, made an appeal on her behalf, which obtained the support of the leading members of Athenian society, including M. Charilaus Tricoupi, for some time Prime Minister at Athens, the son of Spiridion Tricoupi — Byron's intimate friend. In the
New York Times
for October 22, 1875, Mr. Anthony Martelaus, United States Consular Agent at Athens, describes Mrs. Black, whom he visited in August, 1875, as "a tall old lady, with features inspiring reverence, and showing that at a time past she was a beautiful woman." Theresa Black died October 15, 1875, aged 80 years. (See letters to the
Times
, October 25 and October 27, 1875, by Richard Edgcumbe and Neocles Mussabini respectively.)
