What is there wanting, then, to set thee free,
  And show thy beauty in its fullest light? 
  To make the Alps impassable; and we,
  Her sons, may do this with one deed—­Unite!

His letters reiterate the same idea, in language even more emphatic.  “It is no great matter, supposing that Italy could be liberated, who or what is sacrificed.  It is a grand object—­the very poetry of politics; only think—­a free Italy!” Byron acted on his assertion that a man ought to do more for society than write verses.  Mistrusting its leaders, and detesting the wretched lazzaroni, who “would have betrayed themselves and all the world,” he yet threw himself heart and soul into the insurrection of 1820, saying, “Whatever I can do by money, means, or person, I will venture freely for their freedom.”  He joined the secret society of the Carbonari, wrote an address to the Liberal government set up in Naples, supplied arms and a refuge in his house, which he was prepared to convert into a fortress.  In February, 1821, on the rout of the Neapolitans by the Austrians, the conspiracy was crushed.  Byron, who “had always an idea that it would be bungled,” expressed his fear that the country would be thrown back for 500 years into barbarism, and the Countess Guiccioli confessed with tears that the Italians must return to composing and strumming operatic airs.  Carbonarism having collapsed, it of course made way for a reaction; but the encouragement and countenance of the English poet and peer helped to keep alive the smouldering fire that Mazzini fanned into a flame, till Cavour turned it to a practical purpose, and the dreams of the idealists of 1820 were finally realized.

On the failure of the luckless conspiracy, Byron naturally betook himself to history, speculation, satire, and ideas of a journalistic propaganda; but all through, his mind was turning to the renewal of the action which was his destiny.  “If I live ten years longer,” he writes in 1822, “you will see that it is not all over with me.  I don’t mean in literature, for that is nothing—­and I do not think it was my vocation; but I shall do something.”  The Greek war of liberation opened a new field for the exercise of his indomitable energy.  This romantic struggle, begun in April, 1821, was carried on for two years with such remarkable success, that at the close of 1822 Greece was beginning to be recognized as an independent state; but in the following months the tide seemed to turn; dissensions broke out among the leaders, the spirit of intrigue seemed to stifle patriotism, and the energies of the insurgents were hampered for want of the sinews of war.  There was a danger of the movement being starved out, and the committee of London sympathizers—­of which the poet’s intimate friend and frequent correspondent, Mr. Douglas Kinnaird, and Captain Blaquiere, were leading promoters—­was impressed with the necessity of procuring funds in support of the cause.  With a view to this it seemed of consequence