Some of these verses now lie before me,
written with considerable harmony of versification, but chiefly curious
as being illustrative of that singular and enthusiastic idolatry with
which she almost worshipped the genius of Byron, or rather, the
romantic image of him formed by her imagination.
Two or three extracts may not be unacceptable. The following are from a
long rhapsody addressed to Lord Byron:
"By what dread charm thou rulest the mind
It is not given for us to know;
We glow with feelings undefined,
Nor can explain from whence they flow.
"Not that fond love which passion breathes
And youthful hearts inflame;
The soul a nobler homage gives,
And bows to thy great name.
"Oft have we own'd the muses' skill,
And proved the power of song,
But sweeter notes ne'er woke the thrill
That solely to thy verse belong.
"This--but far more, for thee we prove,
Something that bears a holier name,
Than the pure dream of early love,
Or friendship's nobler flame.
"Something divine--Oh! what it is
Thy muse alone can tell,
So sweet, but so profound the bliss
We dread to break the spell."
This singular and romantic infatuation, for such it might truly be
called, was entirely spiritual and ideal, for, as she herself declares
in another of her rhapsodies, she had never beheld Lord Byron; he was,
to her, a mere phantom of the brain.
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