Manfred (With Byron's Biography). Lord Byron

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СКАЧАТЬ ne'er shall want an heir;

      When once more her hosts assemble,

       Tyrants shall believe and tremble—

       Smile they at this idle threat?

       Crimson tears will follow yet."

      Ode from the French, v. 8, 11-14. Poetical Works, 1900, iii. 435.

      Compare, too, Napoleon's Farewell, stanza 3, ibid., p. 428. The "Voice" prophesies that St. Helena will prove a second Elba, and that Napoleon will "live to fight another day."]

143 [Byron may have had in his mind Thomas Lord Cochrane (1775-1860), "who had done brilliant service in his successive commands—the Speedy, Pallas, Impérieuse, and the flotilla of fire-ships at Basque Roads in 1809." In his Diary, March 10, 1814, he speaks of him as "the stock-jobbing hoaxer" (Letters, 1898, ii. 396, note 1).]

144 [Arimanes, the Aherman of Vathek, the Arimanius of Greek and Latin writers, is the Ahriman (or Angra Mainyu, "who is all death," the spirit of evil, the counter-creator) of the Zend-Avesta, "Fargard," i. 5 (translated by James Darmesteter, 1895, p. 4). Byron may have got the form Arimanius (vide Steph., Thesaurus) from D'Herbelot, and changed it to Arimanes.]

145 [The "formidable Eblis" sat on a globe of fire—"in his hand ... he swayed the iron sceptre that causes ... all the powers of the abyss to tremble."—Vathek, by William Beckford, 1887, p. 178.]

bb The comets herald through the burning skies.—[Alternative reading in MS.]

146 [Compare—

      "Sorrow is Knowledge."

      Act I. sc. 1, line 10, vide ante, p. 85.

      Compare, too—

      "Well didst thou speak, Athena's wisest son!

       'All that we know is, nothing can be known.'"

      Childe Harold, Canto II. stanza vii. lines 1, 2, Poetical Works, 1899, ii. 103.]

147 [Astarte is the classical form (vide Cicero, De Naturâ Deorum, iii. 23, and Lucian, De Syriâ Deâ, iv.) of Milton's

      "Moonéd Ashtaroth,

       Heaven's queen and mother both."

      Cicero says that she was married to Adonis, alluding, no doubt, to the myth of the Phoenician Astoreth, who was at once the bride and mother of Tammuz or Adonis.]

bc Or dost Qy?—[Marginal reading in MS.]

148 [Compare—

      " ... illume

       With hectic light, the Hesperus of the dead,

       Of her consuming cheek the autumnal leaf-like red."

      Childe Harold, Canto IV. stanza cii. lines 7-9.]

149 [Compare—

      " ... a firm will, and a deep sense,

       Which even in torture can descry

       Its own concentered recompense."

      Prometheus, iii. 55-57, vide ante, p. 51.]

150 [On September 22, 1816 (Letters, 1899, iii. 357, note 2), Byron rode from Neuhaus, at the Interlaken end of Lake Thun, to the Staubbach. On the way between Matten and Müllinen, not far from the village of Wilderswyl, he passed the baronial Castle of Unspunnen, the traditional castle of Manfred. It is "but a square tower, with flanking round turrets, rising picturesquely above the surrounding brushwood." On the same day and near the same spot he "passed a rock; inscription—two brothers—one murdered the other; just the place for it." Here, according to the Countess Guiccioli, was "the origin of Manfred." It is somewhat singular that, on the appearance of Manfred, a paper was published in the June number of the Edinburgh Monthly Magazine, 1817, vol. i. pp. 270-273, entitled, "Sketch of a Tradition related by a Monk in Switzerland." The narrator, who signs himself P. F., professes to have heard the story in the autumn of 1816 from one of the fathers "of Capuchin Friars, not far from Altorf." It is the story of the love of two brothers for a lady with whom they had "passed their infancy." She becomes the wife of the elder brother, and, later, inspires the younger brother with a passion against which he struggles in vain. The fate of the elder brother is shrouded in mystery. The lady wastes away, and her paramour is found dead "in the same pass in which he had met his sister among the mountains." The excuse for retelling the story is that there appeared to be "a striking coincidence in some characteristic features between Lord Byron's drama and the Swiss tradition."]

151 [The "revised version" makes no further mention of the "key and casket;" but in the first draft (vide infra, p. 122) they were used by Manfred in calling up Astaroth (Selections from Byron, New York, 1900, p. 370).]

152 [Byron may have had in his mind a sentence in a letter of C. Cassius to Cicero (Epist., xv. 19), in which he says, "It is difficult to persuade men that goodness is desirable for its own sake (τὸ καλὸν δἰ αὐτὸ αἱρετὸν); and yet it is true, and may be proved, that pleasure and calm are won by virtue, justice, in a word by goodness (τῷ καλῷ)."]

153 St. Maurice is in the Rhone valley, some sixteen miles from Villeneuve. The abbey (now occupied by Augustinian monks) was founded in the fourth century, and endowed by Sigismund, King of Burgundy.

154 [Thus far the text stands as originally written. The rest of the scene as given in the first MS. is as follows:—

      Abbot. Then, hear and tremble! For the headstrong wretch Who in the mail of innate hardihood Would shield himself, and battle for his sins, There is the stake on earth—and beyond earth Eternal—

      Man. Charity, most reverend father, Becomes thy lips so much more than this menace, That I would call thee back to it: but say, What would'st thou with me?

      Abbot. It may be there are Things that would shake thee—but I keep them back, And give thee till to-morrow to repent.10 Then if thou dost not all devote thyself To penance, and with gift of all thy lands To the Monastery——

      Man. СКАЧАТЬ