. Leigh Hunt was a singularly
ill-chosen associate. A man of Radical opinions on all matters, not only
of religion but of society--opinions which he acquired and held easily but
firmly--could never recognize the propriety of the claim to deference
which "the noble poet" was always too eager to assert, and was inclined to
take liberties which his patron perhaps superciliously repelled. Mrs. Hunt
does not seem to have been a very judicious person. "Trelawny here," said
Byron jocularly, "has been speaking against my morals." "It is the first
time I ever heard of them," she replied. Mr. Hunt, by his own admission,
had "peculiar notions on the subject of money." Byron, on his part, was
determined not to be "put upon," and doled out through his steward stated
allowances to Hunt, who says that only "stern necessity and a large
family" induced him to accept them. Hunt's expression that the 200_l_.
was, _in the first instance_, a debt to Shelley, points to the conclusion
that it was remitted on that poet's death. Besides this, Byron maintained
the family till they left Genoa for Florence in 1823, and defrayed up to
that date all their expenses. He gave his contributions to the _Liberal_
gratis; and, again by Hunt's own confession, left to him and his brother
the profits of the proprietorship. According to Mr. Galt "The whole extent
of the pecuniary obligation appears not to have exceeded 500 _l_.; but,
little or great, the manner in which it was recollected reflects no credit
either on the head or heart of the debtor."

Of the weaknesses on which the writer--bent on verifying Pope's lines on
Atossa--from his vantage in the ground-floor, was enabled to dilate, many
are but slightly magnified. We are told for instance, in very many words,
that Byron clung to the privileges of his rank while wishing to seem above
them; that he had a small library, and was a one-sided critic; that Bayle
and Gibbon supplied him with the learning he had left at school; that,
being a good rider with a graceful seat, he liked to be told of it; that
he showed letters he ought not to have shown; that he pretended to think
worse of Wordsworth than he did; that he knew little of art or music,
adored Rossini, and called Rubens a dauber; that, though he wrote _Don
Juan_ under gin and water, he had not a strong head, &c., &c. It is true,
but not new. But when Hunt proceeds to say that Byron had no sentiment;
that La Guiccioli did not really care much about him;