Page:Journal of Conversations with Lord Byron.pdf/63

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
with Lord Byron.
51

ken one, in some of my old Glens where I used to dream in my former excursions. I should prefer a gray Greek stone over me to Westminster Abbey; but I doubt if I shall have the luck to die so happily. A lease of my 'body's length' is all the land which I should covet in that quarter.

"What the Honorable Dug [1] and his Committee may decide, I do not know, and still less what I may decide (for I am not famous for decision) for myself; but if I could do any good in any way, I should be happy to contribute thereto, and without éclat. I have seen enough of that in my time, to rate it at its value. I wish you were upon that Committee, for I think you would set them going one way or the other; at present they seem a little dormant. I dare not venture to dine with you to-morrow, nor indeed any day this week; for three days of dinners during the last seven days, have made me so head-achy and sulky, that it will take me a whole Lent to subside again into any thing like independence of sensation from the pressure of materialism. *** But I shall take my chance of finding you the first fair morning for a visit. Ever yours,

"NOEL BYRON."

"MAY 7, 1823.

"MY DEAR LORD: I return the poesy, which

  1. His abridgment for Douglas Kinnaird.