Mary Baldwin College - Bluestocking Yearbook (Staunton, VA)

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6 The A7tn7ial of moiis. Byronism became the rage, the new idol was petted, spoiled and humored. Even the wild and dissipated life into which he plunged at this time was considered interesting, and all the world admired and endeavored to imitate the haughty and reserved bearing which characterized him. That much of this reserve and haughtiness was affected we learn from Mr. Moore, who tells us that Byron was intensely shy by nature and that he jealously concealed this timidity by assuming a haughty and distant manner; for his pride could not tolerate that he .should exhibit timidity before these fashionable people whom he neither cared for nor respected. Three years after his return to England he married, and the real trouble of his life began. After one short year came the separation from his wife, and the world turned upon him and ca.st him aside with a violence and a suddenness almost incredi- ble; he was lampooned, ridiculed and hissed. His pride had received a deadly blow, and filled with mingled feelings of in- dignation, bitterness and remorse, after a month he fled from his country never to return. Though we know that much of his life abroad was reckless and uncreditably spent, in the last few months of his life he displayed a brave and self-sacrificing spirit in entering into the struggles of the Greeks. This is a brief outline of Byron ' s life, one of the saddest and most interesting in history. Strongly impulsive, unhappy and consumed with a desire for affection and sympathy, his feelings must have an outlet, and as he was a poet he found ex- pression in his poetry. It seems to have been the dark side of his life that characterizes his poetry much more than the lighter side. Hence he revels in painting the grand and gloomy side of nature, the lofty mountains, the .storms, the ruin, all of these form the theme for his grandest descriptions, as the moonlight scene of the Coliseum so gloriously described in his Manfred, the shipwreck in Don Juan, the description of the storms and mountains in Childe Harold. In all of his heroes we recognize the same predominant traits, they are all the same grand, gloomy characters, men of intense passions with a won- derous capacity for love, yet separated from the world and hu- man companionship by trouble which has embittered them. Such men are Manfred, Conrad, Lara, and Childe Harold, dif-

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The Mary Baldwin Seminary. 5 mates. He formed many warm friendships and much to his credit these friendships were never forgotten. He was consid- ered a very brave boy, always more ready to give a IjIow than to take one, and he never failed to take the part of tlie weak- er boy in the various controversies of school life. As he grew older his mother ' s influence still continued to affect him, and was developing in him a bitterness, a rebellious- ness, and a misanthropy which found outlet in moody fits. However, this was not his only trouble; he had other difficulties to contend with, and chief among them was his poverty. His income was very small, and the estate which he had inherited was seriously encumbered. Thus he was constantly being placed in some embarrassing position the circumstances of which he could not control. Perhaps much of the moodiness and gloominess which characterizes him at this period can be attrib- uted to this poverty. It was a great blow to his pride that he could not live as he thought the dignity of his position demand- ed. He had vers- rigid ideas of birth and though all through his life his views were liberal, he proudly held himself distinct from the people. The next year after he had domiciled himself at Xewstead he made his first trip upon the Continent. The account of his departure from his native land is very pathetic. He was feeling very desolate and depressed; in his literary attempts, in his love affairs and in many other ways, he had met bitter disap- pointments. The preparations for his journey were looked upon with indifference by most of those whom he thought his friends. He says that on the day of his departure he chanced to meet one of his old school fellows to whom he had been very much attached during his school days. Upon being asked to come and sit awhile with him to indulge in a farewell chat, the friend excused himself on the plea of an engagement to go shopping with some ladies. One can imagine the bitterness and indigna- tion with which he records this, adding that, with one or two exceptions, he believed his mother to be the only person who cared a whit as to his fate. After two years he returned to England bringing with him the first two Cantos of his Childe Harold. The stor - of its success is known to all. Byron himself tells us that he awoke one morning to find himself fa-

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The Afary iahhcin Sn iinar) ' . 7 fering from one another only from the fact that they are pre- sented under different circumstances. Manfred passes his life among the Alps, a lonely recluse. The magnificent scen- ery surrounding him inspires him and he seeks to drown his griefs in an intellectual life; thus the higher part of his nature is developed, and the superhuman glamour which overcasts him veils his person with awe and grandeur. Conrad and Lara give vent to their sorrows by daring exploits and brave deeds of warfare. Childe Harold roams the earth and seeks diversion from his woe by revelling in the grandeur of nature and in scenes sacred in history. Thus, all those who appreciate the greatness of Byron ' s poetry must realize sadly that the greatest creations of his genius were the ofifspring of sorrow. k. d. y. THE COLONIAL PERIOD IN VIRGINIA. Tons, the daughters of the Colonial Dames of the olden days , every page of Virginia history is dear, and though what we glean from her first years of hardship and trial comes to us through a mist blown about by the winds of old yeais yet even that is a cherished tradition. Now and then the veil of uncertainty lifts and we see an adventurous band sail over the sea in search of pearls and gold and land at Jamestown in 1607. Through all the chang- ing years of hope and doubt, failure and success, when faction and strife ran high and Indian treachery was always near, we see the rulers, from the wise and gallant Smith to the false and rebellious Ratcliflfe, ' not worth remembering but to his dishonor ' ' come and go, vainly tr3 ' ing to hold the reins of governmetit. Like a pall we see starvation settle down upon the colonists ; Indian cruelties lose their terrors, famine stares them in the face and the hearts of men turn to stone. They were in the last days of May, 1610, and day by day they strained their eyes to search the far horizon, then turned back, while despair pressed heavily But help was near, and