(5) Byroniana No. 2 (The Courier, February 8, 1814).
"Crede Byron" is Lord Byron's armorial motto; Trust Byron is the translation in the Red-book. We cannot but admire the ingenuity with which his Lordship has converted the good faith of his ancestors into a sarcasm on his own duplicity.
"Could nothing but your chief reproach,
Serve for a motto on your coach?"
Poor Lord Carlisle; he, no doubt, trusted in his affectionate ward and kinsman, and we have seen how the affectionate ward and kinsman acknowledged, like Macbeth, "the double trust" only to abuse it. We shall now show how much another Noble Peer, Lord Holland, has to trust to from his ingenuous dedicator.
Some time last year Lord Byron published a Poem, called The Bride of Abydos, which was inscribed to Lord Holland, "with every sentiment of regard and respect by his gratefully obliged and sincere friend, Byron." "Grateful and sincere!" Alas! alas; 'tis not even so good as what Shakespeare, in contempt, calls "the sincerity of a cold heart." "Regard and respect!"
Hear with what regard, and how much respect, he treats this identical Lord Holland. In a tirade against literary assassins (a class of men which Lord Byron may well feel entitled to describe), we have these lines addressed to the Chief of the Critical Banditti:
"Known be thy name, unbounded be thy sway,
Thy Holland's banquets shall each toil repay,
While grateful Britain yields the praise she owes,
To Hollands hirelings, and to learnings foes!"
By which it appears, that
"—These wolves that still in darkness prowl;
This coward brood, which mangle, as their prey,
By hellish instinct, all that cross their way;"
are hired by Lord Holland, and it follows, very naturally, that the "hirelings" of Lord Holland must be the "foes of learning."
This seems sufficiently caustic; but hear, how our dedicator proceeds:
"Illustrious Holland! hard would be his lot,
His hirelings mention'd, and himself forgot!
Blest be the banquets spread at Holland House,
Where Scotchmen feed, and Critics may carouse!
Long, long, beneath that hospitable roof
Shall Grub-street dine, while duns are kept aloof,
And grateful to the founder of the feast
Declare the Landlord can translate, at least!"
Lord Byron has, it seems, very accurate notions of gratitude, and the word " grateful" in these lines, and in his dedication of The Bride of Abydos, has a delightful similarity of meaning. His Lordship is pleased to add, in an explanatory note to this passage, that Lord Holland's life of Lopez de Vega, and his translated specimens of that author, are much "Bepraised by these disinterested guests." Lord Byron well knows that bepraise and bespatter are almost synonimous. There was but one point on which he could have any hope of touching Lord Holland more nearly; and of course he avails himself, in the most gentlemanly and generous manner, of the golden opportunity.
When his club of literary assassins is assembled at Lord Holland's table, Lord Byron informs us
"That lest when heated with the unusual grape,
Some glowing thoughts should to the press escape,
And tinge with red the female reader's cheek,
My Lady skims the cream of each critique;
Breathes o'er each page her purity of soul,
Reforms each error, and refines the whole."
Our readers will, no doubt, duly appreciate the manliness and generosity of these lines; but, to encrease their admiration, we beg to remind them that the next time Lord Byron addresses Lord Holland, it is to dedicate to him, in all friendship, sincerity, and gratitude, the story of a young, a pure, an amiable, and an affectionate bride!
The verses were bad enough, but what shall be said, after such verses, of the insult of such a dedication!
We forbear to extract any further specimens of this peculiar vein of Lord Byron's satire; our "gorge rises at it," and we regret to have been obliged to say so much. And yet Lord Byron is, "with all regard and respect, Lord "Holland's sincere and grateful friend!" It reminds us of the respect which Lear's daughters shewed their father, and which the poor old king felt to be "worse than murder."
Some of our readers may perhaps observe that, personally, Lord Holland was not so ill-treated as Lord Carlisle; but let it be recollected, that Lord Holland is only an acquaintance, while Lord Carlisle was "guardian and relation," and had therefore peculiar claims to the ingratitude of a mind like Lord Byron's.
Trust Byron, indeed! "him," as Hamlet says "Him, I would trust as I would adders fang'd."
