o town, by paying the money and giving up the
agreement. Mr. Moore did return to town, but did not, that I have heard
of, take any proceedings for insuring his life; he positively neither
wrote nor called upon me as he had promised to do (though he was
generally accustomed to make mine one of his first houses of call);--nor
did he take any other step, that I am aware of, to show that he had any
recollection of the conversation which had passed between us previous to
his leaving town, until _the death of Lord Byron_ had, _ipso facto_,
cancelled the agreement in question, and completely restored my absolute
rights over the property of the Memoirs.

You will therefore perceive that there was no verbal agreement in
existence between Mr. Moore and me, at the time I made a verbal
agreement with you to deliver the Memoirs to be destroyed. Mr. Moore
might undoubtedly, _during Lord Byron's life_, have obtained possession
of the Memoirs, if he had pleased to do so; he however neglected or
delayed to give effect to our verbal agreement, which, as well as the
written instrument to which it related, being cancelled by the death of
Lord Byron, there was no reason whatsoever why I was not at that instant
perfectly at liberty to dispose of the MS. as I thought proper. Had I
considered only my own interest as a tradesman, I would have announced
the work for immediate publication, and I cannot doubt that, under all
the circumstances, the public curiosity about these Memoirs would have
given me a very considerable profit beyond the large sum I originally
paid for them; but you yourself are, I think, able to do me the justice
of bearing witness that I looked at the case with no such feelings, and
that my regard for Lord Byron's memory, and my respect for his surviving
family, made me more anxious that the Memoirs should be immediately
destroyed, since it was surmised that the publication might be injurious
to the former and painful to the latter.

As I myself scrupulously refrained from looking into the Memoirs, I
cannot, from my own knowledge, say whether such an opinion of the
contents was correct or not; it was enough for me that the friends of
Lord and Lady Byron united in wishing for their destruction. Why Mr.
Moore should have wished to preserve them I did not nor will I inquire;
but, having satisfied myself that he had no right whatever in them, I
was happy in having an opportunity of making, by a pecuniary sacrifice
on my part, so