Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 3.djvu/477

Rh London, 1822, p. 222; and Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Lord Byron, by George Clinton, London, 1825, p. 284.)

It has been generally held that the Siege of Corinth was written in the second half of 1815 (Kölbing's Siege of Corinth, p. vii.). "It appears," says John Wright {Works, 1832, x. 100), "by the original MS., to have been begun in July, 1815;" and Moore {Life, p. 307), who probably relied on the same authority, speaks of "both the Siege of Corinth and Parisina having been produced but a short time before the Separation" {i.e. spring, 1816). Some words which Medwin {Conversatio?is, 1824, p. 55) puts into Byron's mouth point to the same conclusion. Byron's own testimony, which is com- pletely borne out by the MS. itself (dated Jy {i.e. January', not July] 31, 18 1 5), is in direct conflict with these statements. In a note to stanza xix. lines 521-532 {vide post, pp. 471-473) he affirms that it "was not till after these lines were written" that he heard "that wild and singularly original and beautiful poem [Christabel] recited;" and in a letter to S. T. Coleridge, dated October 27, 1815 {Letters, 1899, iii. 228), he is careful to explain that "the enclosed extract from an unpublished poem (i.e. stanza xix. lines 521-532) was written before (not seeing your Christabelle [sic], for that you know I never did till this day), but before I heard Mr. S[cott] repeat it, which he did in June last, and this thing was begun in January, and more than half written before the Summer." The question of plagiarism will be discussed in an addendum to Byron's note on the lines in question ; but, subject to the correction that it was, probably, at the end of May (see Lockhart's Memoir of the Life of Sir IV. Scott, 1871, pp. 311-313), not in June, that Scott recited Christabel for Byron's benefit, the date of the composition of the poem must be determined by the evidence of the author himself.

The copy of the MS. of the Siege of Corinth was sent to Murray at the beginning (probably on the 2nd, the date of the copy) of November, and was placed in Gifford's hands about the same time (see letter to Murray, November 4, 1815, Letters, 1899, iii. 245 ; and Murray's undated letter on Gifford's "great delight" in the poem, and his "three critical remarks," Memoir of John Murray, 1891, i. 356). As with Lara, Byron began by insisting that the Siege should not be