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MEETING OF LORD BYRON AND MR. MOORE AT VENICE.

It was my good fortune, at this period, (1819) in the course of a short
and hasty tour through the north of Italy, to pass five or six days with
Lord Byron at Venice. I had written to him on my way thither to announce
my coming, and to say how happy it would make me could I tempt him to
accompany me as far as Rome.

Having parted, at Milan, with Lord John Russell, whom I had accompanied
from England, and whom I was to rejoin, after a short visit to Rome, at
Genoa, I made purchase of a small and (as it soon proved) crazy travelling
carriage, and proceeded alone on my way to Venice. My time being limited,
I stopped no longer at the intervening places than was sufficient to hurry
over their respective wonders, and, leaving Padua at noon on the 8th of
October, I found myself, about two o'clock, at the door of my friend's
villa, at La Mira. He was but just up, and in his bath; but the servant
having announced my arrival, he returned a message that, if I would wait
till he was dressed, he would accompany me to Venice. The interval I
employed in conversing with my old acquaintance, Fletcher, and in viewing,
under his guidance, some of the apartments of the villa.

It was not long before Lord Byron himself made his appearance, and the
delight I felt in meeting him once more, after a separation of so many
years, was not a little heightened by observing that his pleasure was, to
the full, as great, while it was rendered doubly touching by the evident
rarity of such meetings to him of late, and the frank outbreak of
cordiality and gaiety with which he gave way to his feelings. It would be
impossible, indeed, to convey to those who have not, at some time or other,
felt the charm of his manner, any idea of what it could be when under the
influence of such pleasurable excitement as it was most flatteringly
evident he experienced at this moment.

I was a good deal struck, however, by the alteration that had taken place
in his personal appearance. He had grown fatter both in person and face,
and the latter had most suffered by the change, having lost, by the
enlargement of the features, some of that refined and spiritualized look
that had, in other times, distinguished it. The addition of whiskers, too,
which he had not long before been induced to adopt, from hearing that some
one had said he had a "faccia di musico," as well as the length to which
his hair grew down