“It is boring to trouble you with ‘such small
gear;’ but it must be owned that I should be glad if you would inquire
whether my Irish subscription ever reached the Committee in Paris from Leghorn. My
reasons, like Vellum’s, ‘are
threefold:’ First, I doubt the accuracy of all almoners, or remitters of
benevolent cash; second, I do suspect that the said Committee, having in part served its
time to time-serving, may
| A. D. 1822. | LIFE OF LORD BYRON. | 609 |
“It is not, as you may opine, that I am ambitious of having my name in the papers, as I can have that any day in the week gratis. All I want is to know if the Reverend Thomas Hall did or did not remit my subscription (200 scudi of Tuscany, or about a thousand francs, more or less) to the Committee at Paris.
“The other day at Viareggio I thought proper to swim off to my schooner (the Bolivar) in the offing, and thence to shore again—about three miles, or better in all. As it was at midday, under a broiling sun, the consequence has been a feverish attack, and my whole skin’s coming off, after going through the process of one large continuous blister, raised by the sun and sea together. I have suffered much pain; not being able to lie on my back, or even side; for my shoulders and arms were equally St. Bartholomewed. But it is over,—and I have got a new skin, and am as glossy as a snake in its new suit.
“We have been burning the bodies of Shelley and Williams on the sea-shore, to render them fit for removal and regular interment. You can have no idea what an extraordinary effect such a funeral pile has, on a desolate shore, with mountains in the back-ground and the sea before, and the singular appearance the salt and frankincense gave to the flame. All of Shelley was consumed, except his heart, which would not take the flame, and is now preserved in spirits of wine.
“Your old acquaintance Londonderry has quietly died at North Cray! and the virtuous De Witt was torn in pieces by the populace! What a lucky * * * * * the Irishman has been in his life and end*. In him your Irish Franklin est mort!
“Leigh Hunt is sweating articles for his new Journal; and both he and I think it somewhat shabby in you not to contribute. Will you become one of the properrioters? ‘Do, and we go snacks.’ I recommend you to think twice before you respond in the negative.
|
* The particulars of this event had, it is evident, not yet readied him. |
| 610 | NOTICES OF THE | A. D. 1822. |
“I have nearly (quite three) four new cantos of Don Juan ready. I obtained permission from the female Censor Morum of my morals to continue it, provided it were immaculate; so I have been as decent as need be. There is a deal of war—a siege, and all that, in the style, graphical and technical, of the shipwreck in Canto Second, which ‘took,’ as they say, in the Row. “Yours, &c.
“P.S. That * * * Galignani has about ten lies in one paragraph. It was not a Bible that was found in Shelley’s pocket, but John Keats’s poems. However, it would not have been strange, for he was a great admirer of Scripture as a composition. I did not send my bust to the academy of New York; but I sat for my picture to young West, an American artist, at the request of some members of that Academy to him that he would take my portrait,—for the Academy, I believe.
“I had, and still have, thoughts of South America, but am fluctuating between it and Greece. I should have gone, long ago, to one of them, but for my liaison with the Countess Gi.; for love, in these days, is little compatible with glory. She would be delighted to go too; but I do not choose to expose her to a long voyage, and a residence in an unsettled country, where I shall probably take a part of some sort.”
