Lord Byron
3 days after this brought me a Rose and Carnation and used the very
words I mentioned in Glenarvon--with a sort of half sarcastic
smile--saying, 'Your Ladyship I am told likes all that is new and rare
for a moment'--I have them still, and the woman who through many a trial
has kept these relics with the romance of former ages--deserves not that
you should speak of her as you do. Byron never never could say I had no
heart. He never could say, either, that I had not loved my husband. In
his letters to me he is perpetually telling me I love him the best of
the two; and my only charm, believe me, in his eyes was, that I was
innocent, affectionate, and enthusiastic.
Recall those words, and let me not go down with your book as heartless.
Tell the truth; it is bad enough; but not what is worse. It makes me so
nervous to write that I must stop--will it tire you too much if I
continue? I was not a woman of the world. Had I been one of that sort,
why would he have devoted nine entire months almost entirely to my
society; have written perhaps ten times in a day; and lastly have
press'd me to leave all and go with him--and this at the very moment
when he was made an Idol of, and when, as he and you justly observe, I
had few personal attractions. Indeed, indeed I tell the truth. Byron did
not affect--but he loved me as never woman was loved. I have had one of
his letters copied in the stone press for you; one just before we
parted. See if it looks like a mere lesson.
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