Compare Macbeth, act IV sc. I, line 65. —Editor ↩
“In the eighth and concluding lecture of Mr. Hazlitt’s canons of criticism, delivered at the Surrey Institution (The English Poets, 1870, pp. 203, 204), I am accused of having ‘lauded Bonaparte to the skies in the hour of his success, and then peevishly wreaking my disappointment on the god of my idolatry.’ The first lines I ever wrote upon Bonaparte were the ‘Ode to Napoleon,’ after his abdication in 1814. All that I have ever written on that subject has been done since his decline;—I never ‘met him in the hour of his success.’ I have considered his character at different periods, in its strength and in its weakness: by his zealots I am accused of injustice—by his enemies as his warmest partisan, in many publications, both English and foreign.
“For the accuracy of my delineation I have high authority. A year and some months ago, I had the pleasure of seeing at Venice my friend the honourable Douglas Kinnaird. In his way through Germany, he told me that he had been honoured with a presentation to, and some interviews with, one of the nearest family connections of Napoleon (Eugène Beauharnais). During one of these, he read and translated the lines alluding to Bonaparte, in the Third Canto of Childe Harold. He informed me, that he was authorized by the illustrious personage—(still recognized as such by the Legitimacy in Europe)—to whom they were read, to say, that ‘the delineation was complete,’ or words to this effect. It is no puerile vanity which induces me to publish this fact;—but Mr. Hazlitt accuses my inconsistency, and infers my inaccuracy. Perhaps he will admit that, with regard to the latter, one of the most intimate family connections of the Emperor may be equally capable of deciding on the subject. I tell Mr. Hazlitt that I never flattered Napoleon on the throne, nor maligned him since his fall. I wrote what I think are the incredible antitheses of his character.
“Mr. Hazlitt accuses me further of delineating myself in Childe Harold, etc., etc. I have denied this long ago—but, even were it true, Locke tells us, that all his knowledge of human understanding was derived from studying his own mind. From Mr. Hazlitt’s opinion of my poetry I do not appeal; but I request that gentleman not to insult me by imputing the basest of crimes—viz. ‘praising publicly the same man whom I wished to depreciate in his adversity:’—the first lines I ever wrote on Bonaparte were in his dispraise, in 1814—the last, though not at all in his favour, were more impartial and discriminative, in 1818. Has he become more fortunate since 1814?”
For Byron’s various estimates of Napoleon’s character and career, see Childe Harold, Canto III, stanza XXXVI line 7, Poetical Works, 1899, II 238, note 1. —Editor ↩
Charles François Duperier Dumouriez (1739–1823) defeated the Austrians at Jemappes, November 6, 1792, etc. He published his Mémoires (Hamburg et Leipzig), 1794. For the spelling, see Memoirs of General Dumourier, written by himself, translated by John Fenwick. London, 1794. See, too, Lettre de Joseph Servan, Ex-ministre de la Guerre, Sur le mémoire lu par M. Dumourier le 13 Juin à l’Assemblée Nationale; Bibiothèque Historique de la Révolution, “Justifications,” 7, 8, 9. —Editor ↩
Antoine Pierre Joseph Barnave, born 1761, was appointed President of the Constituent Assembly in 1790. He was guillotined November 30, 1793.
Jean Pierre Brissot de Warville, philosopher and politician, born January 14, 1754, was one of the principal instigators of the revolt of the Champ de Mars, July, 1789. He was guillotined October 31, 1793.
Marie Jean Antoine, Marquis de Condorcet, born September 17, 1743, was appointed President of the Legislative Assembly in 1792. Proscribed by the Girondins, he poisoned himself to escape the guillotine, March 28, 1794.
Honoré Gabriel Riquetti, Comte de Mirabeau, born March 9, 1749, died April 2, 1791.
Jérôme Petion de Villeneuve, born 1753, Mayor of Paris in 1791, took an active part in the imprisonment of the king. In 1793 he fell under Robespierre’s displeasure, and to escape proscription took refuge in the department of Calvados. In 1794 his body was found in a field, half eaten by wolves.
Jean Baptiste, Baron de Clootz (better known as Anacharsis Clootz), was born in 1755. In 1790, at the bar of the National Convention, he described himself as the “Speaker of Mankind.” Being suspected by Robespierre, he was condemned to death, March 24, 1794. On the scaffold he begged to be executed last, “in order to establish certain principles.” (See Carlyle’s French Revolution, 1839, III 315.)
Georges Jacques Danton, born October 28, 1759, helped to establish the Revolutionary Tribunal, March 10, and the Committee of Public Safety, April 6, 1793; agreed to proscription of the Girondists, June, 1793; was executed with Camille Desmoulins and others, April 5, 1794.
Jean Paul Marat, born May 24, 1744, physician and man of science, proposed and carried out the wholesale massacre of September 2–5, 1792; was denounced to, but acquitted by, the Revolutionary Tribunal, May, 1793; assassinated by Charlotte Corday, July 13, 1793.
Marie Jean Paul, Marquis de La Fayette, born September 6, 1757, died May 19, 1834.
With the exception of La Fayette, who outlived Byron by ten years, and Lord St. Vincent, all “the famous persons” mentioned in stanzas II–IV had passed away long before the First Canto of Don Juan was written. —Editor ↩
Barthélemi Catherine Joubert, born April 14, 1769, distinguished himself at the engagements of Cava, Montebello, Rivoli, and in the Tyrol. He was afterwards sent to oppose Suvóroff, and was killed at Novi, August 15, 1799.
For Hoche and Marceau, vide ante, Poetical Works, 1899, II 296.
Jean Lannes, Duke of Montebello, born April 11, 1769, distinguished himself at Lodi, Aboukir, Acre,
