FOOTNOTES:
[562] {427}[Berkeley did not deny the reality of existence, but the reality of matter as an abstract conception. "It is plain," he says (On the Principles of Human Knowledge, sect. ix.), "that the very notion of what is called matter or corporeal substance, involves a contradiction in it." Again, "It were a mistake to think that what is here said derogates in the least from the reality of things." His contention was that this reality depended, not on an abstraction called matter, "an inert, extended unperceiving substance," but on "those unextended, indivisible substances or spirits, which act, and think, and perceive them [unthinking beings]."—Ibid., sect. xci., The Works of George Berkeley, D.D., 1820, i. 27, 69, 70.]
[563] {428}[Tempest, act v. sc. i, line 95.]
[564] ["I have been very unwell—four days confined to my bed in 'the worst inn's worst room' at Lerici, with a violent rheumatic and bilious attack, constipation, and the devil knows what."—Letter to Murray, October 9, 1822, Letters, 1901, vi. 121. The same letter contains an announcement that he had "a fifth [Canto of Don Juan] (the 10th) finished, but not transcribed yet; and the eleventh begun."]
[KK] {429}Or Rome, or Tiber—Naples or the sea.—[MS. erased.]
[565] {430}[Vide ante, Canto I. stanza xiv. lines 7, 8.]
[566] {431}["Falstaff. Let us be Diana's foresters, gentlemen of the shade, minions of the moon: and let men say, we be men of good government; being governed, as the sea is, by our noble and chaste mistress the moon, under whose countenance we—steal."-I Henry IV., act i. sc. 2, lines 24-28.]
[567] [Gin. Hence the antithesis of "All Max" in the East to Almack's in the West. (See Life in London, by Pierce Egan, 1823, pp. 284-290.)]
[568] [According to the Vocabulary of the Flash Language, compiled by James Hardy Vaux, in 1812, and published at the end of his Memoirs, 1819, ii. 149-227, a kiddy, or "flash-kiddy," is a thief of the lower orders, who, when he is breeched by a course of successful depredation dresses in the extreme of vulgar gentility, and affects a knowingness in his air and conversation. A "swell" or "rank swell" ("real swell" appears in Egan's Life in London) is the more recent "toff;" and "flash" is "fly," "down," or "awake," i.e. knowing, not easily imposed upon.]
[569] {432}[Hamlet, act v. sc. 1, line 21.]
[570] ["Ken" is a house, s.c. a thieves' lodging-house; "spellken," a play-house; "high toby-spice" is robbery on horseback, as distinguished from "spice," i.e. footpad robbery; to "flash the muzzle" is to show off the face, to swagger openly; "blowing" or "blowen" is a doxy or trull; and "nutty" is, conjointly, amorous and fascinating.]
Poor Tom was once a knowing one in town.
Not a mere kiddy, but a real one.—[MS. erased.]
[571] The advance of science and of language has rendered it unnecessary to translate the above good and true English, spoken in its original purity by the select mobility and their patrons. The following is a stanza of a song which was very popular at least in my early days:—
"On the high toby-spice flash the muzzle,
In spite of each gallows old scout;
If you at the spellken can't hustle,
You'll be hobbled in making a clout.
Then your blowing will wax gallows haughty,
When she hears of your scaly mistake,
She'll surely turn snitch for the forty—
That her Jack may be regular weight."
If there be any gemman so ignorant as to require a traduction, I refer him to my old friend and corporeal pastor and master, John Jackson, Esq., Professor of Pugilism; who, I trust, still retains the strength and symmetry of his model of a form, together with his good humour, and athletic as well as mental accomplishments.
[Gentleman Jackson was of good renown. "Servility," says Egan (Life in London, 1823, p. 217), "is not known to him. Flattery he detests. Integrity, impartiality, good-nature, and manliness, are the corner-stones of his understanding." Byron once said of him that "his manners were infinitely superior to those of the Fellows of the College whom I meet at the high table" (J.W. Clark, Cambridge, 1890, p. 140). (See, too, letter to John Jackson, September 18, 1808, Letters, 1898, i. 189, note 2; Hints from Horace, line 638, Poetical Works, 1898, i. 433, note 3.) As to the stanza quoted by Egan (Anecdotes of the Turf, 1827, p. 44), but not traduced or interpreted, "To be hobbled for making a clout" is to be taken into custody for stealing a handkerchief, to "turn snitch" is to inform, and the "forty" is the £40 offered for the detection of a capital crime, and shared by the police or Bow Street runners. Dangerous characters were let alone and tacitly encouraged to continue their career of crime, until the measure of their iniquity was full, and they "weighed forty." If Jack was clumsy enough to be detected in a trifling theft, his "blowen" would go over to the enemy, and betray him for the sake of the Government reward (see Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, by Francis Grose, 1823, art. "Weigh forty").]
[572] {433}[Don Juan must have driven by Pleasant Row, and passed within hail of Paradise Row, on the way from Kennington to Westminster Bridge. (See Cary's New Pocket Plan of London, Westminster, and Southwark, 1819.) But, perhaps, there is more in the names of streets and places than meets the eye. Here, as elsewhere, there is, or there may be, "a paltering with us in a double sense."]
Through rows called "Paradise," by way of showing
Good Christians that to which they all are going.—[MS. erased.]
[573] {434}[Compare Childe Harold, Canto 1. stanza lxix. line 8, var. ii., Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 66, note 2.]
[KN]—— distilling into the re-kindling glass.—[MS.]
[574] [The streets of London were first regularly lighted with gas in 1812.]
[575] {435}[Thomas Pennant, in Some Account of London, 1793, p. 444, writes down the Mansion House (1739-1752) as "damned ... to everlasting fame."]
[576] [Fifty years ago "the lights of Piccadilly" were still regarded as one of the "sights" of London. Byron must often have looked at them from his house in Piccadilly Terrace.]
[577] [Joseph François Foulon, army commissioner, provoked the penalty of the "lantern" (i.e. an improvised gallows on the yard of a lamp-post at the corner of the Rue de la Vannerie) by his heartless sneer, "Eh bien! si cette canaille n'a pas de pain, elle mangera du foin." He was hanged, July 22, 1789. See The Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens, cap. xxii.; see, too, Carlyle's French Revolution, 1839, i. 253: "With wild yells, Sansculottism clutches him, in its hundred hands: he is whirled ... to the 'Lanterne,' ... pleading bitterly for life,—to the deaf winds. Only with the third rope (for two ropes broke, and the quavering voice still pleaded), can he be so much as got hanged! His Body is dragged through the streets; his Head goes aloft on a pike, the mouth filled with grass: amid sounds as of Tophet, from a grass-eating people."]
[578] {436}"Hells," gaming-houses. What their number may now be in this life, I know not. Before I was of age I knew them pretty accurately, both "gold" and "silver." I was once nearly called out by an acquaintance, because when he asked me where I thought that his soul would be found hereafter, I answered, "In Silver Hell."
At length the boys drew up before a door,
From whence poured forth a tribe of well-clad waiters;
(While on the pavement many a hungry w—re
With which the moralest of cities caters
For gentlemen whose passions may boil o'er,
Stood as the unpacking gathered more spectators,)
And Juan found himself in an extensive
Apartment;—fashionable but expensive.—[MS.]
[KP] {437}'Twas one of the delightfullest hotels.—[MS.]
[579] [Perhaps Grillion's Hotel (afterwards Grillion's Club) in Albemarle Street. In 1822 diplomats patronized more than one hotel in and near St. James's Street, but among the "Departures from Grillion's Hotel," recorded in the Morning Chronicle of September, 17, 1822, appositely enough, is that of H.E. Don Juan Garcia, del Rio.]
—— of his loves and wars;
And as romantic heads are pretty painters,
And ladies like a little spice of Mars.—[MS. erased.]
[KR] {438}The false attempt at Truth——.—[MS.]
[580] {439}[Compare—
"Lo! Erin, thy Lord!
Kiss his foot with thy blessing"——
The Irish Avatar, stanza 14, Poetical Works, 1901, iv. 558.]
Kiss hands—or feet—or what Man by and by
Will kiss, not in sad metaphor—but earnest,
Unless on Tyrants' sterns—we turn the sternest.—[MS.]
[581] {440}"Anent" was a Scotch phrase meaning "concerning"—"with regard to: "it has been made English by the Scotch novels; and, as the Frenchman said, "If it be not, ought to be English." [See, for instance, The Abbot, chap. xvii. 132.]
But "Damme's" simple—dashing—free and daring
The purest blasphemy——.—[MS.]
About such general matters—but particular
A poem's progress should be perpendicular.—[MS.]
[582] {441}[Macbeth, act iii. sc. 4, line 63.]
[KV] Blushed, too, but it was hidden by their rouge.—[MS. erased.]
[KW] The natural and the prepared ceruse.—[MS. erased.]
[583] {442}"Drapery Misses."—This term is probably anything now but a mystery. It was, however, almost so to me when I first returned from the East in 1811-1812. It means a pretty, a high-born, a fashionable young female, well instructed by her friends, and furnished by her milliner with a wardrobe upon credit, to be repaid, when married, by the husband. The riddle was first read to me by a young and pretty heiress, on my praising the "drapery" of the "untochered" but "pretty virginities" (like Mrs. Anne Page) of the then day, which has now been some years yesterday: she assured me that the thing was common in London; and as her own thousands, and blooming looks, and rich simplicity of array, put any suspicion in her own case out of the question, I confess I gave some credit to the allegation. If necessary, authorities might be cited; in which case I could quote both "drapery" and the wearers. Let us hope, however, that it is now obsolete.
[584] [Compare Hints from Horace, line 173, Poetical Works, 1898, i. 401, note 1.]
[585] {443}[In his so-called "Dedication" of Marino Faliero to Goethe, Byron makes fun of the "nineteen hundred and eighty-seven poets," whose names were to be found in A Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors, etc. (See Introduction to Marino Faliero, Poetical Works, 1901, iv. 340, 341, note 1.)]
[KX] {444}A paper potentate——.—[MS. erased.]
[586] [See "Introduction to Cain," Poetical Works, 1901, v. 204.]
[KY] With turnkey Southey for my Hudson Lowe.—[MS.]
[KZ] Beneath the reverend Cambyses Croly.—[MS.]
[587] [The Reverend George Croly, D.D. (1780-1860), began his literary career as dramatic critic of the Times. "Croly," says H.C. Robinson (Diary, 1869, i. 412), "is a fierce-looking Irishman, very lively in conversation, and certainly has considerable talents as a writer; his eloquence, like his person, is rather energetic than eloquent" (hence the epithet "Cambyses," i.e. "King Cambyses' vein" in var. iii.). "He wrote tragedies, comedies, and novels; and, at last, settled down as a preacher, with the rank of doctor, but of what faculty I do not know" (ibid., footnote, H.C.R., 1847). He wrote, inter alia, Paris in 1815, a poem; Catiline, A Tragedy, 1822; and Salathiel, a novel, 1827. In lines 7, 8, Byron seems to refer to The Angel of the World, An Arabian Poem, published in 1820.]
[588] [I Henry IV., act ii. sc. 4, line 197.]
[589] {445}[Stanza lviii. was first published in 1837. The reference is to Henry Hart Milman (1791-1868). Byron was under the impression that Milman had influenced Murray against continuing the publication of Don Juan. Added to this surmise, was the mistaken belief that it was Milman who had written the article in the Quarterly, which "killed John Keats." Hence the virulence of the attack.
"Dull Dorus" is obscure, but compare Propertius, Eleg. III. vii. 44, where Callimachus is addressed as "Dore poeta." He is the "ox of verse," because he had been recently appointed to the Professorship of Poetry at Oxford. The "roaring Romans" are "The soldiery" who shout "All, All," in Croly's Catiline, act v. sc. 2.]
[599] {449}Scotch for goblin.
[LC] Handsome but blasé——— [MS.]
[600] {450}[The sentiment is reiterated in The Night Thoughts, and is the theme of Resignation, which was written and published when Young was more than eighty years old. ]
[LD] And fresher, since without a breath of air.—[MS.]
[LE] Where are the thousand lovely innocents?—[MS.]
[601] ["I have ... written ... to express my willingness to accept the, or almost any mortgage, any thing to get out of the tremulous Funds of these oscillating times. There will be a war somewhere, no doubt—and whatever it may be, the Funds will be affected more or less; so pray get us out of them with all proper expedition. It has been the burthen of my song to you three years and better, and about as useful as better counsels."—Letter of Byron to Kinnaird, January 18, 1823, Letters, 1901, vi. 162, 163.]
[602] {451}[For William Pole Tylney Long Wellesley (1788-1857), see The Waltz, line 21, Poetical Works, 1898, i. 484, note 1. He was only on the way to being "diddled" in 1822, but the prophecy (suggested, no doubt, by the announcement of the sale of furniture, etc., at Wanstead House, in the Morning Chronicle, July 8, 1822) was ultimately fulfilled. Samuel Whitbread, born 1758, committed suicide July 6, 1815. Sir Samuel Romilly, born 1758, committed suicide November 2, 1818.]
[603] [According to Charles Greville, George the Third made two wills—the first in 1770, the second, which he never signed, in 1810. By the first will he left "all he had to the Queen for her life, Buckingham House to the Duke of Clarence," etc., and as Buckingham House had been twice sold, and the other legatees were dead, a question arose between the King and the Duke of York as to the right of inheritance of their father's personal property. George IV. conceived that it devolved upon him personally, and not on the Crown, and "consequently appropriated to himself the whole of the money and the jewels." It is possible that this difference between the brothers was noised abroad, and that old stories of the destruction of royal wills were revived to the new king's discredit. (See The Greville Memoirs, 1875, i. 64, 65.)]
[604] [See Moore's Fum and Hum, the Two Birds of Royalty, appended to his Fudge Family.]
[605] [Lady Caroline Lamb and Lady Frances Wedderburn Webster.]
[LF] {452}—— their caps and curls at Dukes.—[MS.]
[606] {453}[The Congress at Verona, in 1822. See the Introduction to The Age of Bronze, Poetical Works, 1891, v. 537-540.]
[607] [2 Henry IV., act iv. sc. 3, line 117.]
[608] [Hor., Od. I. xi. line 8.]
[609] [Macbeth, act v. sc. 5, line 24.]
[610] [1 Henry IV., act ii. sc. 4, line 463.]
[611] [See the Secret Memoirs and Manners of several Persons of Quality, of Both Sexes, from the New Atalantis, 1709, a work in which the authoress, Mrs. Manley, satirizes the distinguished characters of her day. Warburton (Works of Pope, ed. 1751, i. 244) calls it "a famous book.... full of court and party scandal, and in a loose effeminacy of style and sentiment, which well suited the debauched taste of the better vulgar." Pope also alludes to it in the Rape of the Lock, iii. 165, 166—
"As long as Atalantis shall be read,
Or the small pillow grace a lady's bed."
And Swift, in his ballad on "Corinna" (stanza 8)—
"Her common-place book all gallant is,
Of scandal now a cornucopia,
She pours it out in Atalantis,
Or memoirs of the New Utopia."
Works, 1824, xii. 302.]
[612] {454}[Oct. 17, 1822.—MS.]
