s. He never learned anything until he
was sent away from her to Harrow. He was passionate, sullen, defiant of
authority, but very amenable to kindness; and with a different mother
his nobler qualities, generosity, sense of justice, hatred of hypocrisy,
and craving for friendship would have been developed, and the story of
his life would be very different from what it is. There is no doubt that
the regrettable parts of the careers of both Byron and Shelley are due
to lack of discipline and loving-kindness in their early years. Byron's
irritability and bad temper were aggravated by a physical defect, which
hindered him from excelling in athletic sports of which he was fond,
and embittered all his life. Either at birth or by an accident one of
his feet was malformed or twisted so as to affect his gait, and the evil
was aggravated by surgical attempts to straighten the limb. His
sensitiveness was increased by unfeeling references to it. His mother
used to call him "a lame brat," and his pride received an incurable
wound in the heartless remark of Mary Chaworth, "Do you think I could
care for that lame boy?" Byron was two years her junior, but his love
for her was the purest passion of his life, and it has the sincerest
expression in the famous 'Dream.' Byron's lameness, and his morbid fear
of growing obese, which led him all his life into reckless experiments
in diet, were permanent causes of his discontent and eccentricity. In
1798, by the death of its incumbent, Byron became the heir of Newstead
Abbey and the sixth Lord Byron. He had great pride in the possession of
this crumbling and ruinous old pile. After its partial repair he
occupied it with his mother, and from time to time in his stormy life;
but in 1818 it was sold for L90,000, which mostly went to pay debts and
mortgages. Almost all the influences about Byron's early youth were such
as to foster his worst traits, and lead to those eccentricities of
conduct and temper which came at times close to insanity. But there was
one exception, his nurse Mary Gray, to whom he owed his intimate
knowledge of the Bible, and for whom he always retained a sincere
affection. It is worth noting also, as an indication of his nature, that
he always had the love of his servants.

A satisfactory outline of Byron's life and work is found in Mr. John
Nichol's 'Byron' in the 'English Men of Letters' series. Owing to his
undisciplined home life, he was a backward boy in scholarship. In 180