wine,
at the rate of forty paras a day. In spite of his strength of purpose, his
temper was not always proof against the rapacity and turbulence by which
he was surrounded. About the middle of February, when the artillery had
been got into readiness for the attack on Lepanto--the northern, as
Patras was the southern, gate of the gulf, still in the hands of the
Turks--the expedition was thrown back by the unexpected rising of the
Suliotes. These peculiarly Irish Greeks, chronically seditious by nature,
were on this occasion, as afterwards appeared, stirred up by emissaries of
Colocatroni, who, though assuming the position of the rival of
Mavrocordatos, was simply a brigand on a large scale in the Morca.
Exasperation at this mutiny, and the vexation of having to abandon a
cherished scheme, seem to have been the immediately provoking causes of a
violent convulsive fit which, on the evening of the 15th, attacked the
poet, and endangered his life. Next day he was better, but complained of
weight in the head; and the doctors applying leeches too close to the
temporal artery, he was bled till he fainted. And now occurred the last of
those striking incidents so frequent in his life, in reference to which we
may quote the joint testimony of two witnesses. Colonel Stanhope writes,
"Soon after his dreadful paroxysm, when he was lying on his sick-bed, with
his whole nervous system completely shaken, the mutinous Suliotes, covered
with dirt and splendid attires, broke into his apartment, brandishing
their costly arms and loudly demanding their rights. Lord Byron,
electrified by this unexpected act, seemed to recover from his sickness;
and the more the Suliotes raged, the more his calm courage triumphed. The
scene was truly sublime." "It is impossible," says Count Gamba, "to do
justice to the coolness and magnanimity which he displayed upon every
trying occasion. Upon trifling occasions he was certainly irritable; but
the aspect of danger calmed him in an instant, and restored him the free
exercise of all the powers of his noble nature. A more undaunted man in
the hour of peril never breathed." A few days later, the riot being
renewed, the disorderly crew were, on payment of their arrears, finally
dismissed; but several of the English artificers under Parry left about
the same time, in fear of their lives.

On the 4th, the last of the long list of Byron's letters to Moore resents,
with some bitterness, the hasty acceptance of a rumour