Such was the sympathy, and such the advice, that the best literature of England could give to a young widow, a peeress of England, whose husband, as they verily believed and admitted, might have done worse than all this; whose crimes might have been ’foul, monstrous, unforgivable as the sin against the Holy Ghost.’  If these things be done in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry?  If the peeress as a wife has no rights, what is the state of the cotter’s wife?

But, in the same paper, North again blames Lady Byron for not having come out with the whole story before the world at the time she separated from her husband.  He says of the time when she first consulted counsel through her mother, keeping back one item,—­

’How weak, and worse than weak, at such a juncture, on which hung her whole fate, to ask legal advice on an imperfect document!  Give the delicacy of a virtuous woman its due; but at such a crisis, when the question was whether her conscience was to be free from the oath of oaths, delicacy should have died, and nature was privileged to show unashamed—­if such there were—­the records of uttermost pollution.’

   Shepherd.—­’And what think ye, sir, that a’ this pollution could hae
   been, that sae electrified Dr. Lushington?’

North.—­’Bad—­bad—­bad, James.  Nameless, it is horrible; named, it might leave Byron’s memory yet within the range of pity and forgiveness; and, where they are, their sister affections will not be far; though, like weeping seraphs, standing aloof, and veiling their wings.’

   Shepherd.—­’She should indeed hae been silent—­till the grave had
   closed on her sorrows as on his sins.’

North.—­’Even now she should speak,—­or some one else for her,—­ . . . and a few words will suffice.  Worse the condition of the dead man’s name cannot be—­far, far better it might—­I believe it would be—­were all the truth somehow or other declared; and declared it must be, not for Byron’s sake only, but for the sake of humanity itself; and then a mitigated sentence, or eternal silence.’

We have another discussion of Lady Byron’s duties in a further number of ‘Blackwood.’

The ‘Memoir’ being out, it was proposed that there should be a complete annotation of Byron’s works gotten up, and adorned, for the further glorification of his memory, with portraits of the various women whom he had delighted to honour.

Murray applied to Lady Byron for her portrait, and was met with a cold, decided negative.  After reading all the particulars of Byron’s harem of mistresses, and Moore’s comparisons between herself and La Guiccioli, one might imagine reasons why a lady, with proper self-respect, should object to appearing in this manner.  One would suppose there might have been gentlemen who could well appreciate the motive of that refusal; but it was only considered a new evidence that she was indifferent to her conjugal duties, and wanting in that respect which Christopher North had told her she owed a husband’s memory, though his crimes were foul as the rottenness of the grave.