to repeat, the various misdoings which I have from time
to time heard him attribute to himself, I could fill a volume. But I
never believed them. I very soon became aware of this strange
idiosyncrasy: it puzzled me to account for it; but there it was, a
sort of diseased and distorted vanity. The same eccentric spirit
would induce him to report things which were false with regard to his
family, which anybody else would have concealed, though true. He told
me more than once that his father was insane, and killed himself. I
shall never forget the manner in which he first told me this. While
washing his hands, and singing a gay Neapolitan air, he stopped,
looked round at me, and said, "There always was madness in the
family." Then, after continuing his washing and his song, he added,
as if speaking of a matter of the slightest indifference, "My father
cut his throat." The contrast between the tenour of the subject and
the levity of the expression was fearfully painful: it was like a
stanza of "Don Juan." In this instance, I had no doubt that the fact
was as he related it; but in speaking of it, only a few years since,
to an old lady in whom I had perfect confidence, she assured me that
it was not so. Mr. Byron, who was her cousin, had been extremely
wild, but was quite sane, and had died very quietly in his bed. What
Byron's reason could have been for thus calumniating not only himself
but the blood which was flowing in his veins, who can divine? But,
for some reason or other, it seemed to be his determined purpose to
keep himself unknown to the great body of his fellow-creatures; to
present himself to their view in moral masquerade.'

Certainly the character of Lord Byron here given by his friend is not the
kind to make him a trustworthy witness in any case: on the contrary, it
seems to show either a subtle delight in falsehood for falsehood's sake,
or else the wary artifices of a man who, having a deadly secret to
conceal, employs many turnings and windings to throw the world off the
scent. What intriguer, having a crime to cover, could devise a more
artful course than to send half a dozen absurd stories to the press,
which should, after a while, be traced back to himself, till the public
should gradually look on all it heard from him as the result of this
eccentric humour?

The easy, trifling air with which Lord Byron made to this frien