68

APPENDIX TO CANTO I.

NOTE (A).

"Blackwood's lies," Of all Lord Byron's adversaries none appear to slander his personal character more shamefully than Blackwood (or his writer). Two articles from that Magazine are quoted in Murray's edition of Byron's Works, 1846, pp. 581, 582. Surely the writer must have gathered up the defamatory rumours of the day, when it was so much the fashion to abuse Byron as a monster of cruelty and vice. In the first article the most infamous calumnies are showered upon the head of the Poet, against his personal character and conduct. It would be difficult for the writer of that article to point out in what part of Byron's works the foul accusations brought against him can be proved. So malignant a tissue of lying calumny and slander can scarcely be surpassed. It seems to have been written soon after the appearance of the first two Cantos of "Don Juan." The second article on Lord Byron defends him as much as the first blackens him, and was written in the year 1825, "when Lord Byron was no more," and his fame too well established to be overthrown by the torrent of invective cast upon him by critics and clerical fanaticism.

The Author of these remarks does not defend the noble Poet's errors, but with them he is equally disposed to deplore the obloquy which has been so unjustly heaped upon him. Could any of his bitterest traducers pretend to be free from censure, if their private lives were justly sifted, as they have falsely sifted, and calumniated his? Aye, probably, some of them might be found to be as deeply immersed in "immorality and vice," as they have made him to appear who has sustained the weight of their measureless, and therefore unjust accusations. "There is none good but One." Do any of them know where to find those words? If they do, they may also find it written-" He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone."

The Blackwood writer charges Byron with "daring to insult his Creator." "Impiously railing against his God." Where does the writer find in Byron's works this daring insult and impiety? Did the Blackwood writer ever read Byron's " Prayer of Nature?" We would also recommend the study of that prayer to the Messrs. Cottle, Colton, Cato, Terrot, Styles, and Co., and the numerous Co's of that clique, who may there find out their mistake, and that what they call "scoffing at religion," "insulting his Creator," and "impiously railing against his God," are, in reality, his doubts as to the truth of their sectarian doctrines; hence their indignation and abuse.

The charge of deserting his wife, and outraging her love for him, is couched in the bitterest terms of severity, Is the Blackwood writer quite sure that the reverse of that charge is not nearer to the truth? Did she not desert him? It seems incredible that any woman entertaining a sincere and devoted love for a husband, could, in the darkest hour of that husband's distress, both of mind and fortune, complete his desolation, and even heighten its poignancy, by writing a letter full of kindness and affection, appointing him to join her at her parent's house; then coolly depart, and, on arriving at the parental residence, get her father to write and announce to her husband her determination to see him no more!!! Now, can it be believed that a woman who could act in that manner ever felt much love for her husband? She rejected his first proposal of marriage. Unfortunately, he made a second offer and was accepted; to be in about twelve months deserted! The best account of the matter is (from letters and memoranda) that there was very little of love on either side-the usual fate of literary characters.1

The second paper in Blackwood, although it ravels out the tissue of falsehood contained in the first, does not honestly make the amende honorable, leading the reader, as it does, to suppose that it was written by another hand. Otherwise, it not only involves gross inconsistency, but sinks into a skulking, cowardly attempt to avoid the odium of having adopted the rabid reports of the day: a sort of calumniphobia having seized one slanderous spirit, he bit his neighbours, and they bit theirs. So it went on ad infinitum, till the horrible disease became general, and like the cholera,

1 See "Moore's Life and Letters of Lord Byron."

spread all over our own country, and from hence infected other nations. The second paper, however, defending and exculpating Byron from most of the former accusations seems to show that Blackwood was then ashamed of having inserted the first, but had not the generosity to make a candid avowal of his error, to call it by no harsher name.

10

NOTE (B).

Among the notes they'll find it at the end
Of this, etc.

The following is the tale alluded to:

Stanza 47.

the tale

Of the poor stable-boy, who thought no harm,
But, being bred within the Cath❜lic pale,
Went to confession, where the priest grew warm
On hearing he'd so few sins to confess;
And thought, in such case he could not do less
Than suggest a few, and put the question
To the poor lad (who'd innocence to rest on),
Whether he e'er committed this, or that,
Or something which he had not hinted at:
Whether he ever stole his master's oats?

Of this, Jack knew no more than John o'Groats;
But still the question staggered him-he look'd
With stedfast gaze upon the wily priest,
His feelings rous'd, or hurt, to say the least:
And, as he gazed, the burning tears ran down
His ruddy cheek, to which more colour flush'd,
For latent anger to his aid had flown.
As yet, he'd ne'er been tempted to transgress
And being ask'd of crimes he did not know,
20 His bosom heav'd-he labour'd to repress
The indignation which he dar'd not show.

A natural feeling, which the holy priest
Did misinterpret, as priests often will
Many more things; except, indeed, a feast :
There they make no mistake, but take their fill

Like men who understand what they are doing,
While dainty venison or turtle wooing,
Or wine that doth remind them as they sip-
Of a rich toast" The holy cup and lip."
30 Toast ecclesiastical, you must know,

Good reader, if you did not know before;
And if you did, we must here say no more,
But keep the secret, as the good priests do:
"Twere too voluptuous for public view;
So pray friend, let it still be entre nous !

"Tis not worth while to put them in a funk
With the "disclosures of Maria Monk."

And yet

But, as I've said, the poor groom's blush and tears 40 Were constru'd into very conscious guilt,

And much to his astonishment he hears
The holy sentence of the priest, who spilt
Some holy water on the poor lad's ears,

And said 'twas good to cool their burning shame.
They did indeed look red-as red as blood,
Because his blood was up.-Another name,
However, seem'd to suit his passion's flood-
Better expressed his feelings; and he would
Have kick'd the priest, if excommunication,
50 Staring him full i'the face, had not then stood
Between his purpose and his soul's salvation.
The lad in vain his innocence asserted,

The sentence of the priest was not averted,
But, without more ado (save a slight phthisic),
Condemn'd the groom, and ordered his soul's physic.
And, unless under great mistake I be,

In Cath❜lic terms, thus ran the recipe:

"A pound of treacle, three parts to be taken

At three full doses, spread on cheese that's rotten,

"Maria Monk," a nun, who about the year 1834 or 35, made her escape from the "Hotel Dieu" Convent, in Montreal, N. A. With the help of friends, she published a book entitled "The awful disclosures of Maria Monk," in which she gives an account of her sufferings there, and of the horrible atrocities committed by the priests, and some of the old nuns.

60

Covered with mustard,' when you go to bed;
The other fourth of treacle to be spread
Upon the face, on a hot summer's day,
Three several times, and at each time we say,
Facing the sun, one hour upon the mixon,-
From one to two is the one hour we fix on:
And though you're visited by many flies,
You shall not dare to wince or wink your eyes."
This was of penance quantum suff.-For pills
There were prescrib'd some pieces of small coin;
70 Not to be swallow'd, reader, by the patient,

But pocketed by priest, whose custom, ancient,
Never forgeteth to secure the pelf;

And while he gives dry wafers to lay sinners

(Who must that day have nought else for their dinners),
He drinks the rich delicious wine himself!

But this is nothing to what follows-"Priests
Are God's vice-gerents here on earth," and feasts,
And other carnal luxuries may indulge

Their holy appetites, while they promulge

80 The doctrine that "a priest can do no wrong."2

1 However ridiculous this may appear, it is not more so than many of the penances imposed by the priests, or the superior of the convent, on the victims of Catholic superstition and tyranny. Maria Monk, in her "Further Disclosures," relates being required, on one occasion, to act as confessor, in the room of Father Bonin, who was indisposed. She entered the confessional box in the disguise of a priest, and after hearing the confessions of a number of sinners, she says "The last person I confessed was a poor simpleton, who acknowledged, with great appearance of contrition, that he had eaten a piece of liver on Friday. I felt by this time so weary of my business, and so much perplexed to find a way to escape from my box, that I answered him rather shortly, telling him to do a penance for the offence he had committed, the next time he ate liver, by putting on it an equal quantity of mustard: at this he exclaimed, and went away complaining that I was more severe with him than at his last confession."-See "Confirmation of Maria Monk's Disclosures."

In Chap. xvii., Maria Monk speaks of these foolish, cruel, filthy, and often obscene penances, frequently inflicted for very trivial offences:-"Kneeling upon hard peas, walking with them in the shoes; walking on the knees in the gravel walks in the garden, or through the dark subterranean passages; thrusting pins through the cheeks; being fed on such things as were most disliked; required to drink the water in which the Superior had washed her feet. And many other penances, more cruel and more revolting, for which the reader must be referred to the Nun's account of them.-See the "Awful Disclosures," an American publication.

2 Maria Monk, relating the conversation which she had with the Superior of the Convent, after she had taken the veil, says-" She told me I must now be informed that one of my great duties was to obey the priests in all things. This