Volume I Part 31 (2/2)

Dorant's Hotel, February 21st, 1808.

Mr. Ridge,--Something has occurred which will make considerable alteration in my new volume. You must _go back_ and _cut out_ the whole _poem_ of 'Childish Recollections'. [1] Of course you will be surprized at this, and perhaps displeased, but it must be _done_. I cannot help its detaining you a _month_ longer, but there will be enough in the volume without it, and as I am now reconciled to Dr.

Butler I cannot allow my satire to appear against him, nor can I alter that part relating to him without spoiling the whole. You will therefore omit the whole poem. Send me an _immediate_ answer to this letter but _obey_ the directions. It is better that my reputation should suffer as a poet by the omission than as a man of honour by the insertion.

Etc., etc.,

BYRON.

[Footnote 1: For ”Childish Recollections,” see 'Poems', vol.i. p.101. A previous letter, written to Ridge from Dorant's Hotel, January 9, 1808, ill.u.s.trates the rapidity with which Byron's moods changed. In this case, the lines on ”Euryalus” (Lord Delawarr: see page 41 [Letter 13], [Foot]note 1 [5]) were to be omitted:--

”Mr. Ridge,--In Childish Recollections omit the whole character of 'Euryalus', and insert instead the lines to 'Florio' as a part of the poem, and send me a proof in due course.

”Etc. etc.,

”BYRON.

”P.S.--The first line of the pa.s.sage to be omitted begins 'Shall fair Euryalus,' etc., and ends at 'Toil for more;' omit the _whole_.”]

CHAPTER III.

1808-1809.

'ENGLISH BARDS, AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS.'

94.--To the Rev. John Becher. [1]

Dorant's Hotel, Feb. 26, 1808.

MY DEAR BECHER,--Now for Apollo. I am happy that you still retain your predilection, and that the public allow me some share of praise. I am of so much importance that a most violent attack is preparing for me in the next number of the 'Edinburgh Review'. [2] This I had from the authority of a friend who has seen the proof and ma.n.u.script 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 pa.s.s 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 by indiscriminate abuse, and they never praise except the partisans of Lord Holland and Co. [3] It is nothing to be abused when Southey, Moore, Lauderdale, Strangford, and Payne Knight, share the same fate. [4]

I am sorry--but ”Childish Recollections” must be suppressed during this edition. I have altered, at your suggestion, the _obnoxious allusions_ in the sixth stanza of my last ode.

And now, my dear Becher, I must return my best acknowledgments for the interest you have taken in me and my poetical bantlings, and I shall ever be proud to show how much I esteem the _advice_ and the _adviser._

Believe me, most truly, etc.

[Footnote 1: The Rev. John Thomas Becher (1770-1848), educated at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford, was appointed Vicar of Rumpton, Notts., and Midsomer Norton, 1801; Prebendary of Southwell in 1818; and chairman of Newark Quarter Sessions in 1816. In all matters relating to the condition of the poor he made himself an acknowledged authority. He was the originator of a house of correction, a Friendly Society, and a workhouse at Southwell. He was one of the ”supervisors” appointed to organize the Milbank Penitentiary, which was opened in June, 1816. On Friendly Societies he published three works (1824, 1825, and 1826), in which, 'inter alia', he sought to prove that labourers, paying sixpence a week from the time they were twenty, could secure not only sick-pay, but an annuity of five s.h.i.+llings a week at the age of sixty-five. His 'Anti-Pauper System' (1828) pointed to indoor relief as the true cure to pauperism. It was by Becher's advice that Byron destroyed his 'Fugitive Pieces'. No one who has read the silly verses which Becher condemned, can doubt that the counsel was wise (see Byron's Lines to Becher, 'Poems', vol. i. pp. 112-114, 114-116, 247-251). The following are the lines in which Becher expostulated with Byron on the mischievous tendency of his verses:--

<script>