them, and heard him use language as blackguard as his action. I have seen Sheridan drunk, too, with all the world; but his intoxication was that of Bacchus, and Porson's that of Silenus. Of all the disgusting brutes, sulky, abusive, and intolerable, Porson was the most bestial, as far as the few times that I saw him went, which were only at William Bankes's (the Nubian discoverer's) rooms. I saw him once go away in a rage, because nobody knew the name of the "Cobbler of Messina," insulting their ignorance with the most vulgar terms of reprobation. He was tolerated in this

state among the young men for his talents, as the Turks think a madman inspired, and bear with him. He used to recite, or rather vomit, pages of all languages, and could hiccup Greek like a Helot; and certainly Sparta never shocked her children with a grosser exhibition than this man's intoxication.

I perceive, in the book you sent me, a long account of him, which is very savage. I cannot judge, as I never saw him sober, except in hall or combinationroom; and then I was never near enough to hear, and hardly to see him. Of his drunken deportment I can be sure, because I saw it.-To Mr. Murray, Feb. 20, 1818.

GAMBLING.

I have a notion that gamblers are as happy as many people, being always excited. Wine, fame, the table -even ambition, sate now and then; but every turn of the card and cast of the dice keeps the gamester alive besides, one can game ten times longer than one can do anything else. I was very fond of it when young, that is to say, of hazard, for I hate all card games,-even faro. When macco (or whatever

they spell it) was introduced, I gave up the whole thing, for I loved and missed the rattle and dash of the box and dice, and the glorious uncertainty, not only of good luck or bad luck, but of any luck at all, as one had sometimes to throw often to decide at all. I have thrown as many as fourteen mains running, and carried off all the cash upon the table occasionally; but I had no coolness, or judgment, or calculation. It was the delight of the thing that pleased me. Upon the whole, I left off in time, without being much a winner or loser. Since one-and-twenty years of age I played but little, and then never above a hundred, or two, or three.— -Journal.

SUPPOSED RESEMBLANCE BETWEEN BYRON AND

ROUSSEAU.

11

My mother, before I was twenty, would have it that I was like Rousseau, and Madame de Stael used to say so too in 1813, and the Edinburgh Review has something of the sort in its critique on the fourth canto of Childe Harold. I can't see any point of resemblance: he wrote prose; I verse: he was of the people; I of the aristocracy: he was a philosopher; I am none: he published his first work at forty; I mine at eighteen: his first essay brought him universal applause; mine the contrary: he married his housekeeper; I could not keep house with my wife: he thought all the world in a plot against him; my little world seems to think me in a plot against it, if I may judge by their abuse in print and coterie: he liked botany; I like flowers, herbs, and trees, but know nothing of their pedigrees: he wrote music; I limit my knowledge of it to what I catch by ear-I never

SUPPOSED RESEMBLANCE TO ROUSSEAU.

13

could learn anything by study, not even a language-it was all by rote and ear, and memory: he had a bad memory; I had, at least, an excellent one (ask Hodgson the poet—a good judge, for he has an astonishing one): he wrote with hesitation and care; I with rapidity, and rarely with pains: he could never ride, nor swim, nor was cunning of fence;" I am an excellent swimmer, a decent, though not at all a dashing, rider, (having staved in a rib at eighteen, in the course of scampering,) and was sufficient of fence, particularly of the Highland broadsword—not a bad boxer, when I could keep my temper, which was difficult, but which I strove to do ever since I knocked down Mr. Purling, and put his knee-pan out (with the gloves on), in Angelo's and Jackson's rooms in 1806, during the sparring—and I was, besides, a very fair cricketerone of the Harrow eleven, when we played against Eton in 1805. Besides, Rousseau's way of life, his country, his manners, his whole character, were so very different, that I am at a loss to conceive how such a comparison could have arisen, as it has done three several times, and all in rather a remarkable manner. I forgot to say that he was also short-sighted, and that hitherto my eyes have been the contrary to such a degree that, in the largest theatre of Bologna, I distinguished and read some busts and inscriptions, painted near the stage, from a box so distant and so darkly lighted, that none of the company (composed of young and very bright-eyed people, some of them in the same box), could make out a letter, and thought it was a trick, though I had never been in that theatre before.

Altogether, I think myself justified in thinking the comparison not well founded. I don't say this out of pique, for Rousseau was a great man; and the thing, if

true, were flattering enough ;* but I have no idea of being pleased with the chimera.

LORD BYRON'S READING.

As to my reading, I believe I may aver, without hyperbole, it has been tolerably extensive in the historical department; so that few nations exist, or have existed, with whose records I am not in some degree acquainted, from Herodotus down to Gibbon. Of the classics, I know about as much as most schoolboys after a discipline of thirteen years; of the law of the land as much as enables me to keep "within the statute"-to use the poacher's vocabulary. I did study the "Spirit of Laws" and the Law of Nations; but when I saw the latter violated every month, I gave up my attempts at so useless an accomplishment :—of geography, I have seen more land on maps than I should wish to traverse on foot; of mathematics, enough to give me the headache without clearing the part affected of philosophy astronomy, and meta physics, more than I can comprehend; and of common sense so little, that I mean to leave a Byronian prize at each of our "Alma Matres" for the first

* When, however, his mother first suggested the comparison, he replied, "I do not know that I resemble Jean Jacques Rousseau. I have no ambition to be like so illustrious a madman; but this I know, that I shall live in my own manner, and as much alone as possible."

+ Lord Byron left a list of the books he had read before fifteen, which, if he had fairly perused them, would have entitled him to a place among the prodigies of early knowledge. But though an acute, quick, and discursive reader, he was more apt to taste books than to chew and digest them. History and poetry have the largest share in the formidable list, and yet, later in life, it appeared to Sir Walter Scott that his acquaintance was not extensive with either of these ubjects.

"HOURS OF IDLENESS."

15

discovery, though I rather fear that of the longitude will precede it.

I once thought myself a philosopher, and talked nonsense with great decorum: I defied pain, and preached up equanimity. For some time this did very well; for no one was in pain for me but my friends, and none lost their patience but my hearers. At last, a fall from my horse convinced me bodily suffering was an evil; and the worst of an argument overset my maxims and my temper at the same moment.-To Mr. Dallas, Jan., 1808.

*

THE EDINBURGH REVIEW AND "HOURS OF IDLENESS."

I am of so much importance that a most violent attack is preparing for me in the next number of the Edinburgh Review. This I had from the authority of a friend who has seen the proof and manuscript of the critique. You know the system of the Edinburgh gentlemen is universal attack. They praise none; and neither the public nor the author expects praise from them. It is, however, something to be noticed, as they profess to pass judgment only on works requiring the public attention. You will see this when it comes out; -it is, I understand, of the most unmerciful description; but I am aware of it, and hope you will not be hurt by its severity.

Tell Mrs. Byron not to be out of humour with them, and to prepare her mind for the greatest hostility on their part. It will do no injury whatever, and I trust her mind will not be ruffled. They defeat their object

* Sir Humphry Davy, when a boy, preached the same doctrine, and was confuted by a similar argumentum ad hominem. A crab griped his foot as he was bathing on the Cornish coast, and made him roar so loud that his cries were heard at Penzance.