Zweig MS 138

Autograph fair copy. The prose note explains the allusion to Capel Lofft in Byron's 'Hints from Horace' (published 1811), lines 693-696: 'Hark to those notes, narcotically soft! / The cobber-laureats sing to Capel Lofft! /Till, lo! that modern Midas, as he hears, / Adds an ell-growth to his egregious ears!' Byron upbraids men such as Capel Lofft and Josiah Pratt who give patronage to poor poets and encourage the publication of work lacking in merit, so that such poets are ridiculed posthumously.

Begins: 'This well meaning Gentleman has spoilt some excellent Shoemakers, & been accessory to the poetical undoing of many of the industrious poor.'

Ends: 'There is a child, a book, and a dedication: send the girl to her Grace, the volumes to the Grocer & the Dedication to the D-v-l.'

On f. 1, 'Staffordshire' was written originally but is struck through with 'Somersetshire' substituted above. At the end, the words 'Lord Byron's autograph' are in his own hand.

Stefan Zweig described the present manuscript as 'Diese ungemein geistreiche und glühend agressive Prosastelle' (Add. MS 73168, f. 4. He also noted 'Manuskripte Lord Byrons und besonders in sich vollständige wie dieses gehören heute schon zu den allergrössten Seltenheiten und sind fast unauffindbar geworden'. He was particularly pleased to acquire this item because ‘anderseits in England die Pietät den grossen Dichtern gegenüber es fast gänzlich unmöglich macht, ein Gedicht von Byron oder Shelley zu erwerben.’(Die Autographensammlung). By contrast in America ‘Stevenson wird drüben teurer bezahlt als Lord Byron, eine aktuelle Größe ungemein höher als ein Genius der Vergangenheit.’ (Überschätzung der Lebenden). He wrote more than once to Anton Kippenberg encouraging him to promote Byron’s works in Germany, and indeed an edition of the poems appeared in 1921 in the Bibliotheca Mundi published by Insel Verlag in Leipzig.

The Sotheby catalogue of the sale on 1 May 1914 lists as part of Lot 352 a two-page autograph letter with portrait of Teresa, Contessa Guiccioli (b.1800, d.1873), Lord Byron’s mistress in Ravenna. This letter, dated Paris, 6 March 1837, is not now with the Zweig MS 138 and has not been traced as ever having been in Zweig's collection. There is no evidence that the letter related to the manuscript, or that the manuscript was ever in the Contessa's possession. The manuscripts which Byron entrusted to her in 1823 when he left Italy for Greece were taken to England with her in 1832 and were eventually sold by Sotheran in 1900 to John Pierpont Morgan.