an example, further than to show, that early perversion of mind and morals leads to satiety of past pleasures and disappointment in new ones, and that even the beauties of nature, and the stimulus of travel (except ambition, the most powerful of all excitements) are lost on a soul so constituted, or rather misdirected. Had I proceeded with the poem, this character would have deepened as he drew to the close; for the outline which I once meant to fill up for him was, with some exceptions, the sketch of a modern Timon 1, perhaps a poetical Zeluco. 2 London, 1813. [In one of his early poems "Childish Recollections," Lord Byron compares himself to the Athenian misanthrope, of whose bitter apophthegms many are upon record, though no authentic particulars of his life have come down to us ; — "Weary of love, of life, devoured with spleen, 2 [It was Dr. Moore's object, in this powerful romance (now unjustly neglected), to trace the fatal effects resulting from a fond mother's unconditional compliance with the humours and passions of an only child. With high advantages of person, birth, fortune, and ability, Zeluco is represented as miserable, through every scene of life, owing to the spirit of unbridled self-indulgence thus pampered in infancy,] TO IANTHE.' Nor in those climes where I have late been straying, To paint those charms which varied as they beam'd— Ah! may'st thou ever be what now thou art, The Lady Charlotte Harley, second daughter of Edward fifth Earl of Oxford (now Lady Charlotte Bacon), in the autumn of 1812, when these lines were addressed to her, had not completed her eleventh year. Mr. Westall's portrait of the juvenile beauty, painted at Lord Byron's request, is engraved in "Finden's Illustrations of the Life and Works of Lord Byron."] Young Peri1 of the West!-'t is well for me To those whose admiration shall succeed, But mix'd with pangs to Love's even loveliest hours decreed. Oh! let that eye, which, wild as the Gazelle's, 2 Wins as it wanders, dazzles where it dwells, This much, dear maid, accord; nor question why Such is thy name with this my verse entwined; My days once number'd, should this homage past Of him who hail'd thee, loveliest as thou wast, Though more than Hope can claim, could Friendship less require? [Peri, the Persian term for a beautiful intermediate order of beings, is generally supposed to be another form of our own word Fairy.] 2 [A species of the antelope. "You have the eyes of a gazelle," is considered all over the East as the greatest compliment that can be paid to a woman.] |