n me, I scorn the charge.
Neither will I submit to be called Lord Byron's accuser; because a
word against him I wish not to say beyond what is painfully wrung from
me by the necessity of owning or illustrating Lady Byron's
unblamableness, and of repelling certain misconceptions respecting
her, which are now walking the fashionable world, and which have been
fostered (though Heaven knows where they were born) most delicately
and warily by the Christian godfathership of Mr. Moore.

'I write not at Lady Byron's bidding. I have never humiliated either
her or myself by asking if I should write, or what I should write;
that is to say, I never applied to her for information against Lord
Byron, though I was justified, as one intending to criticise Mr.
Moore, in inquiring into the truth of some of his statements. Neither
will I suffer myself to be called her champion, if by that word be
meant the advocate of her mere legal innocence; for that, I take it,
nobody questions.

'Still less is it from the sorry impulse of pity that I speak of this
noble woman; for I look with wonder and even envy at the proud purity
of her sense and conscience, that have carried her exquisite
sensibilities in triumph through such poignant tribulations. But I am
proud to be called her friend, the humble illustrator of her cause,
and the advocate of those principles which make it to me more
interesting than Lord Byron's. Lady Byron (if the subject must be
discussed) belongs to sentiment and morality (at least as much as Lord
Byron); nor is she to be suffered, when compelled to speak, to raise
her voice as in a desert, with no friendly voice to respond to her.
Lady Byron could not have outlived her sufferings if she had not wound
up her fortitude to the high point of trusting mainly for consolation,
not to the opinion of the world, but to her own inward peace; and,
having said what ought to convince the world, I verily believe that
she has less care about the fashionable opinion respecting her than
any of her friends can have. But we, her friends, mix with the world;
and we hear offensive absurdities about her, which we have a right to
put down.

. . . .

'I proceed to deal more generally with Mr. Moore's book. You speak,
Mr. Moore, against Lord Byron's censurers in a tone of indignation
whi