Lord Byron (1788-1824). Epistle to Augusta. William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. 1909. The Book of Georgian Verse

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William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Georgian Verse. 1909.

Epistle to Augusta

By Lord Byron (1788–1824)


MY sister! my sweet sister! if a name
Dearer and purer were, it should be thine;
Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim
No tears, but tenderness to answer mine:
Go where I will, to me thou art the same—	5
A loved regret which I would not resign.
There yet are two things in my destiny,—
A world to roam through, and a home with thee.

The first were nothing—had I still the last,
It were the haven of my happiness;	10
But other claims and other ties thou hast,
And mine is not the wish to make them less.
A strange doom is thy father’s son’s, and past
Recalling, as it lies beyond redress;
Reversed for him our grandsire’s fate of yore,—	15
He had no rest at sea, nor I on shore.

If my inheritance of storms hath been
In other elements, and on the rocks
Of perils, overlook’d or unforeseen,
I have sustain’d my share of worldly shocks,	20
The fault was mine; nor do I seek to screen
My errors with defensive paradox;
I have been cunning in mine overthrow,
The careful pilot of my proper woe.

Mine were my faults, and mine be their reward.	25
My whole life was a contest, since the day
That gave me being, gave me that which marr’d
The gift,—a fate, or will, that walk’d astray;
And I at times have found the struggle hard,
And thought of shaking off my bonds of clay:	30
But now I fain would for a time survive,
If but to see what next can well arrive.

Kingdoms and empires in my little day
I have outlived, and yet I am not old;
And when I look on this, the petty spray	35
Of my own years of trouble, which have roll’d
Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away:
Something—I know not what—does still uphold
A spirit of slight patience;—not in vain,
Even for its own sake, do we purchase pain.	40

Perhaps the workings of defiance stir
Within me,—or perhaps a cold despair,
Brought when ills habitually recur,—
Perhaps a kindlier clime, or purer air,
(For even to this may change of soul refer,	45
And with light armour we may learn to bear),
Have taught me a strange quiet, which was not
The chief companion of a calmer lot.

I feel almost at times as I have felt
In happy childhood; trees, and flowers, and brooks,	50
Which do remember me of where I dwelt
Ere my young mind was sacrificed to books.
Come as of yore upon me, and can melt
My heart with recognition of their looks;
And even at moments I could think I see	55
Some living thing to love—but none like thee.

Here are the Alpine landscapes which create
A fund for contemplation;—to admire
Is a brief feeling of a trivial date;
But something worthier do such scenes inspire;	60
Here to be lonely is not desolate,
For much I view which I could most desire,
And, above all, a lake I can behold
Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old.

Oh that thou wert but with me!—but I grow	65
The fool of my own wishes, and forget
The solitude, which I have vaunted so,
Has lost its praise in this but one regret;
There may be others which I less may show!—
I am not of the plaintive mood, and yet	70
I feel an ebb in my philosophy,
And the tide rising in my alter’d eye.

I did remind thee of our own dear Lake,
By the old Hall which may be mine no more.
Leman’s is fair; but think not I forsake	75
The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore;
Sad havoc Time must with my memory make,
Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before;
Though, like all things which I have loved, they are
Resign’d for ever, or divided far.	80

The world is all before me; I but ask
Of Nature that with which she will comply—
It is but in her summer’s sun to bask,
To mingle with the quiet of her sky,
To see her gentle face without a mask,	85
And never gaze on it with apathy.
She was my early friend, and now shall be
My sister—till I look again on thee.

I can reduce all feeling but this one;
And that I would not;—for at length I see	90
Such scenes as those wherein my life begun.
The earliest—even the only paths for me—
Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to shun,
I had been better than I now can be;
The passions which have torn me would have slept;	95
I had not suffer’d and thou hadst not wept.

With false Ambition what had I to do?
Little with Love, and least of all with Fame;
And yet they came unsought, and with me grew,
And made me all which they can make—a name.	100
Yet this was not the end I did pursue;
Surely I once beheld a nobler aim.
But all is over—I am one the more
To baffled millions which have gone before.

And for the future, this world’s future may	105
From me demand but little of my care;
I have outlived myself by many a day;
Having survived so many things that were;
My years have been no slumber, but the prey
Of ceaseless vigils; for I had the share	110
Of life which might have fill’d a century,
Before its fourth in time had pass’d me by.

And for the remnant which may be to come
I am content; and for the past I feel
Not thankless,—for within the crowded sum	115
Of struggles, happiness at times would steal,
And for the present, I would not benumb
My feelings farther.—Nor shall I conceal
That with all this I still can look around,
And worship Nature with a thought profound.	120

For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy heart
I know myself secure, as thou in mine.
We were and are—I am, even as thou art—
Beings who ne’er each other can resign:
It is the same, together or apart,	125
From life’s commencement to its slow decline
We are entwined—let death come slow or fast,
The tie which bound the first endures the last!

CONTENTS · GLOSSARY · BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

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