"It is difficult to say whether we are to receive this
passage as an admission or a denial of the opinion to which it refers;
but Lord Byron certainly did the public injustice, if he supposed it
imputed to him the criminal actions with which many of his heroes were
stained. Men no more expected to meet in Lord Byron the Corsair, who
'knew himself a villain,' than they looked for the hypocrisy of Kehama
on the shores of the Derwent Water; yet even in the features of Conrad,
those who had looked on Lord Byron will recognize the likeness--

"'To the sight
No giant frame sets forth his common height;

* * * * *

Sun-burnt his cheek, his forehead high and pale
The sable curls in wild profusion veil....'"
Canto I. stanza ix.

--Sir Walter Scott, _Quart. Rev_., No. xxxi. October, 1816.]

[197] {227} The time in this poem may seem too short for the
occurrences, but the whole of the AEgean isles are within a few hours'
sail of the continent, and the reader must be kind enough to take the
_wind_ as I have often found it.

[198] [Compare--"Survey the region, and confess her home." _Windsor
Forest_, by A. Pope, line 256.]

[hk] {228} _Protract to age his painful doting day_.--[MS. erased.]

[hl] {230} _Her nation--flag--how tells the telescope_.--[MS.]

[199] [Compare _The Isle of Palms_, by John Wilson, Canto I. (1812, p.
8)--

"She sailed amid the loveliness
Like a thing with heart and mind."]

[hm] {231} _Till creaks her keel upon the shallow sand_.--[MS.]

[hn] {234} _The haughtier thought his bosom ill conceals_.--[MS.]

[ho]
_He had the skill when prying souls would seek,_
_To watch his words and trace his pensive cheek_.--[MS.]
_His was the skill when prying, etc_.--[Revise.]

[200] {235} That Conrad is a character not altogether out of nature, I
shall attempt to prove by some historical coincidences which I have met
with since writing _The Corsair_.

"Eccelin, prisonnier," dit Rolandini, "s'enfermoit dans un silence
menacant; il fixoit sur la terre son visage feroce, et ne donnoit point
d'essor a sa profonde indignation. De toutes partes cependant les
soldats et les peuples accouroient; ils vouloient voir cet homme, jadis
si puissant ... et la joie universelle eclatoit de toutes partes....
Eccelino etoit d'une petite taille; mais tout l'aspect de sa personn