ngth of his limbs he attributed his
being such a good swimmer. His hands were very white, and--according
to his own notion of the size of hands as indicating
birth--aristocratically small. The lameness of his right foot[1],
though an obstacle to grace, but little impeded the activity of his
movements; and from this circumstance, as well as from the skill with
which the foot was disguised by means of long trowsers, it would be
difficult to conceive a defect of this kind less obtruding itself as
a deformity; while the diffidence which a constant consciousness of
the infirmity gave to his first approach and address made, in him,
even lameness a source of interest.

[Footnote 1: In speaking of this lameness at the commencement of my
work, I forbore, both from my own doubts on the subject and the great
variance I found in the recollections of others, from stating in
_which_ of his feet this lameness existed. It will, indeed, with
difficulty be believed what uncertainty I found upon this point, even
among those most intimate with him. Mr. Hunt, in his book, states it
to have been the left foot that was deformed, and this, though
contrary to my own impression, and, as it appears also, to the fact,
was the opinion I found also of others who had been much in the habit
of living with him. On applying to his early friends at Southwell and
to the shoemaker of that town who worked for him, so little prepared
were they to answer with any certainty on the subject, that it was
only by recollecting that the lame foot "was the off one in going up
the street" they at last came to the conclusion that his right limb
was the one affected; and Mr. Jackson, his preceptor in pugilism,
was, in like manner, obliged to call to mind whether his noble pupil
was a right or left hand hitter before he could arrive at the same
decision.]

In looking again into the Journal from which it was my intention to
give extracts, the following unconnected opinions, or rather
reveries, most of them on points connected with his religious
opinions, are all that I feel tempted to select. To an assertion in
the early part of this work, that "at no time of his life was Lord
Byron a confirmed unbeliever," it has been objected, that many
passages of his writings prove the direct contrary. This assumption,
however, as well as the interpretation of most of the passages
referred to in its support, proceed, as it appears to me, upon the
mistake, not uncommon in conversati