yes followed it for a
moment--it could hardly be longer than ten might be counted. I felt
Darvell's weight, as it were, increase upon my shoulder, and, turning
to look upon his face, perceived that he was dead!

I was shocked with the sudden certainty which could not be
mistaken--his countenance in a few minutes became nearly black. I
should have attributed so rapid a change to poison, had I not been
aware that he had no opportunity of receiving it unperceived. The day
was declining, the body was rapidly altering, and nothing remained
but to fulfil his request. With the aid of Suleiman's ataghan and my
own sabre, we scooped a shallow grave upon the spot which Darvell had
indicated: the earth easily gave way, having already received some
Mahometan tenant. We dug as deeply as the time permitted us, and
throwing the dry earth upon all that remained of the singular being
so lately departed, we cut a few sods of greener turf from the less
withered soil around us, and laid them upon his sepulchre.

Between astonishment and grief, I was tearless.

* * * * *

LETTER

TO JOHN MURRAY, ESQ. ON THE REV. W.L. BOWLES'S STRICTURES ON THE LIFE
AND WRITINGS OF POPE.

* * * * *

"I'll play at _Bowls_ with the sun and moon."--OLD SONG.

"My mither's auld, Sir, and she has rather forgotten hersel in
speaking to my Leddy, that canna weel bide to be contradickit,
(as I ken nobody likes it, if they could help themsels.)"

TALES OF MY LANDLORD, _Old Mortality_, vol. ii. p. 163.

* * * * *

Ravenna, February 7. 1821.

Dear Sir,

In the different pamphlets which you have had the goodness to send
me, on the Pope and Bowles' controversy, I perceive that my name is
occasionally introduced by both parties. Mr. Bowles refers more than
once to what he is pleased to consider "a remarkable circumstance,"
not only in his letter to Mr. Campbell, but in his reply to the
Quarterly. The Quarterly also and Mr. Gilchrist have conferred on me
the dangerous honour of a quotation; and Mr. Bowles indirectly makes
a kind of appeal to me personally, by saying, "Lord Byron, _if he
remembers_ the circumstance, will _witness_"--_(witness_ IN ITALICS,
an ominous character for a testimony at present).

I shall not avail myself of a "non mi ricordo," even after so long a
residence in Italy;--I _do_ "remember the circumstance,"--and have