With fainter sighs, thy soul's release. And didst thou not since Death for thee

Prepared a light and pangless dart Once long for him thou ne'er shalt see, Who held, and holds thee in his heart? Oh! who like him had watched thee here?

Or sadly marked thy glazing eye, In that dread hour ere Death appear, When silent Sorrow fears to sigh, Till all was past? But when no more 'Twas thine to reck of human woe, Affection's heart-drops, gushing o'er, Had flowed as fast -as now they flow.

his Lije. A marginal note ran thus: "N.B. The poor dear soul meant nothing of this. F.H.” — Memoir of Rev. Francis Hodgson, 1878. i. 212.]

[The identity of Thyrza has never been satisfactorily determined. Moore (Lije, p. 140) thought that Byron idealised his grief for friends and lovers, dead before their time, for "his adopted brother," Edlestone, the hero of the Cornelian, for C. S. Matthews, for Wingfield and Edward Noel Long that Thyrza is, as it were, the spirit or angel of Desolation. There are, no doubt, in the Thyrza poems, phrases and expressions which seem to point to Edlestone, but, on the other hand, it must be borne in mind that the poems belong to the autumn of 1811, and the spring of 1812, and that Edlestone died in May, 1811, before Byron landed in England on his return voyage from the East. There is, moreover, good reason to believe that Lady Byron was convinced that Thyrza was a real person, a young girl who died in the summer of 1811, and that Byron himself, on more than one occasion, admitted the existence, while he concealed the name of his "buried love." If there was a secret to keep, he kept the secret in his lifetime, and took good care that a secret it should remain, despite the curiosity or research of posterity.]

The tone, that taught me to rejoice, When prone, unlike thee, to repine; The song, celestial from thy voice,

But sweet to me from none but thine; The pledge we wore I wear it still, But where is thine? - Ah! where art thou?

Oft have I borne the weight of ill,
But never bent beneath till now!
Well hast thou left in Life's best bloom
The cup of Woe for me to drain;
If rest alone be in the tomb,

I would not wish thee here again:
But if in worlds more blest than this
Thy virtues seek a fitter sphere,
Impart some portion of thy bliss,

To wean me from mine anguish here. Teach me - too early taught by thee! To bear, forgiving and forgiven: On earth thy love was such to me; It fain would form my hope in Heaven. October 11, 1811. [First published, Childe Harold, 1812 (4to).]

Oh, pardon that in crowds awhile

I waste one thought I owe to thee, And, self-condemned, appear to smile, Unfaithful to thy memory:

Nor deem that memory less dear,

Cambridge, Lords Moira, Erskine, Lauderdale, Messrs Adams and Sheridan.

The Prince Regent expressed 'his surprise and mortification' at the conduct of Lords Grey and Grenville [who had replied unfavourably to a letter addressed by the P.R. to the Duke of York, suggesting an united administration]. Lord Lauderdale thereupon, with a freedom unusual in courts, asserted that the reply did not express the opinions of Lords Grey and Grenville only, but of every political friend of that way of thinking, and that he had been present at and assisted in the drawing-up, and that every sentence had his cordial assent. The Prince was suddenly and deeply affected by Lord Lauderdale's reply, so much so, that the Princess, observing his agitation, dropt her head and burst into tears upon which the Prince turned round and begged the female part of the company to withdraw" (Courier, March 10, 1812).

The newspapers were in hysterics and town in an uproar on the avowal and republication" of the stanzas in the second edition of the Corsair (Jan. 1814), and during Byron's absence from town "Murray omitted the Tears in several of the copies"- that is, in the Third Edition - but replaced them in a Fourth Edition, which was issued early in February.]

That then I seem not to repine;

I would not fools should overhear
One sigh that should be wholly thine.
3.

If not the Goblet pass unquaffed,
It is not drained to banish care;
The cup must hold a deadlier draught
That brings a Lethe for despair.
And could Oblivion set my soul

From all her troubled visions free, I'd dash to earth the sweetest bowl That drowned a single thought of thee.

4.

For wert thou vanished from my mind,
Where could my vacant bosom turn?
And who would then remain behind
To honour thine abandoned Urn?
No, no- - it is my sorrow's pride
That last dear duty to fulfil;
Though all the world forget beside,
'Tis meet that I remember still.

5.

For well I know, that such had been Thy gentle care for him, who now Unmourned shall quit this mortal scene, Where none regarded him, but thou: And, oh! I feel in that was given

A blessing never meant for me; Thou wert too like a dream of Heaven, For earthly Love to merit thee.

March 14, 1812. [First published, Childe Harold, 1812 (Second Edition).]

ON A CORNELIAN HEART WHICH WAS BROKEN.

I.

ILL-FATED Heart! and can it be,

That thou shouldst thus be rent in twain?

Have years of care for thine and thee Alike been all employed in vain?

2.

Yet precious seems each shattered part, And every fragment dearer grown,