But the glamour of Byron's fame, the romance that surrounded him, his
rank, which Leigh Hunt valued almost pathetically, kept the amiable
invalid--for such Leigh Hunt was at this time--hanging on to Byron's
skirts and claiming his protection. The Review began with a flourish of
trumpets, but soon broke down; and finally the very uncongenial
partnership was dissolved.
One cannot pardon Leigh Hunt at any stage. He ought never to have
accepted the original invitation; he ought never to have retained the
undignified position of a sort of literary parasite. He endeavoured to
protect his own self-respect by adopting a tone of easy familiarity
with Byron, which only resulted in galling his host; and he ought not
to have written his very damaging reminiscences of the period, though
it is quite clear that he felt under no obligation whatever to Byron.
Still it is a deeply interesting piece of portraiture, and probably
substantially accurate. The painful fact is that Byron was a very
ill-bred person. He had drawn a prize in the lottery of life, and had
obtained, so to speak, by accident of birth, a position that gave him
fortuitously the consequence which numbers of ambitious men spend their
lives in trying to obtain. And then, too, we must not lose sight of
Byron's genius, though it is abundantly clear that all there was of
noble and beautiful in Byron's nature was entirely given to his art,
and that outside of his art there remained nothing but a temperament
burdened with all the ugliest faults of the artistic nature,
artificially forced and developed by untoward circumstance.
Pages:
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311