dress'd for proceeding to spunge on
(According to compact) the wit in the dungeon--
Pray Phoebus at length our political malice
May not get us lodgings within the same palace!
I suppose that to-night you're engaged with some codgers,
And for Sotheby's Blues have deserted Sam Rogers;
And I, though with cold I have nearly my death got,
Must put on my breeches, and wait on the Heathcote.
But to-morrow at four, we will both play the Scurra,
And you'll be Catullus, the R----t Mamurra.

"Dear M.--having got thus far, I am interrupted by * * * *. 10
o'clock.

"Half-past 11. * * * * is gone. I must dress for Lady
Heathcote's.--Addio."

* * * * *

Our day in the prison was, if not agreeable, at least novel and odd. I
had, for Lord Byron's sake, stipulated with our host beforehand, that
the party should be, as much as possible, confined to ourselves; and, as
far as regarded dinner, my wishes had been attended to;--there being
present, besides a member or two of Mr. Hunt's own family, no other
stranger, that I can recollect, but Mr. Mitchell, the ingenious
translator of Aristophanes. Soon after dinner, however, there dropped in
some of our host's literary friends, who, being utter strangers to Lord
Byron and myself, rather disturbed the ease into which we were all
settling. Among these, I remember, was Mr. John Scott,--the writer,
afterwards, of some severe attacks on Lord Byron; and it is painful to
think that, among the persons then assembled round the poet, there
should have been _one_ so soon to step forth the assailant of his living
fame, while _another_, less manful, was to reserve the cool venom for
his grave.

On the 2d of June, in presenting a petition to the House of Lords, he
made his third and last appearance as an orator, in that assembly. In
his way home from the House that day, he called, I remember, at my
lodgings, and found me dressing in a very great hurry for dinner. He
was, I recollect, in a state of most humorous exaltation after his
display, and, while I hastily went on with my task in the dressing-room,
continued to walk up and down the adjoining chamber, spouting forth for
me, in a sort of mock heroic voice, detached sentences of the speech he
had just been delivering. "I told them," he said, "that it was a most
flagrant violation of the Constitution--that, if such things were