"Your little friend, Caro William," writes the Duchess of Devonshire,
May 4, 1812, "as usual, is doing all sorts of imprudent things for him
and with him."
Again she writes, six days later, of Byron:
"The ladies, I hear, spoil him, and the gentlemen are jealous of him.
He is going back to Naxos, and then the husbands may sleep in peace. I
should not be surprised if Caro William were to go with him, she is so
wild and imprudent"
(The 'Two Duchesses', pp. 362, 364). But Lady Caroline's extravagant
adoration wearied Byron, who felt that it made him ridiculous; Lady
Melbourne gave him sound advice about her daughter-in-law; and he was
growing attached to Miss Milbanke, and, when rejected by her, at first
to Lady Oxford, and later to Lady Frances Wedderburn Webster. When Lady
Bessborough endeavoured to persuade her daughter to leave London for
Ireland, Lady Caroline is said to have forced herself into Byron's room,
and implored him to fly with her. Byron refused, conducted her back to
Melbourne House, wrote her the letter printed above, and, as she herself
admits, kept the secret. In December, 1812, Lady Caroline burned Byron
in effigy, with "his book, ring, and chain," at Brocket Hall. The lines
which she wrote for the ceremony are preserved in Mrs. Leigh's
handwriting, and given in Appendix III., 2.
From Ireland Lady Caroline continued the siege, threatening to follow
him into Herefordshire, demanding interviews, and writing about him to
Lady Oxford.
Pages:
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210