Microsoft Word Byron and Scott 1809-1824

34: Grierson dates this letter earlier than where he places it, adducing the dates of The Giaour’s later editions. 
35: Scott has been reading one of the later editions of The Giaour – having known its first edition, which is much 
shorter than the later ones. 
36: Scott’s memory had enabled him, for example, to recite Coleridge’s Christabel to Byron by heart. 

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which are so little known to us as to convey all the interest of novelty, yet so endeared to us by the 
early perusal of Eastern tales, that we are not embarrassed with utter ignorance upon the subject.
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Vathek, bating some passages, would have made a charming subject for a tale. The conclusion is truly 
grand. I would have given a great deal to know the originals from which it was drawn. Excuse this 
hasty scrawl, and believe me, my Lord, your Lordship’s most obliged, very humble servant, 
Walter Scott. 
April 7th 1815: Byron and Scott meet for the first time; they are introduced by Murray. 
From Thomas Moore’s Life of Byron (1830-1), I pp.614-19. 
It was in the course of this spring that Lord Byron and Sir Walter Scott became, for the first time, 
personally acquainted with each other. Mr. Murray, having been previously on a visit to the latter 
gentleman, had been intrusted by him with a superb Turkish dagger as a present to Lord Byron; and the 
noble poet, on their meeting this year in London,—the only time when these two great men had ever an 
opportunity of enjoying each other’s society,—presented to Sir Walter, in return, a vase containing 
some human bones that had been dug up from under a part of the old walls of Athens. The reader, 
however, will be much better pleased to have these particulars in the words of Sir Walter Scott himself, 
who, with that good-nature which renders him no less amiable than he is admirable, has found time, in 
the midst of all his marvellous labours for the world, to favour me with the following interesting 
communication:
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— [p.615] 
“My first acquaintance with Byron began in a manner rather doubtful. I was so far from having any 
thing to do with the offensive criticism in the Edinburgh, that I remember remonstrating against it with 
our friend, the editor, because I thought the ‘Hours of Idleness’ treated with undue severity. They were 
written, like all juvenile poetry, rather from the recollection of what had pleased the author in others 
than what had been suggested by his own imagination; but, nevertheless, I thought they contained some 
passages of noble promise. I was so much impressed with this, that I had thoughts of writing to the 
author; but some exaggerated reports concerning his peculiarities, and a natural unwillingness to 
intrude an opinion which was uncalled for, induced me to relinquish the idea. 
When Byron wrote his famous Satire, I had my share of flagellation among my betters. My crime 
was having written a poem (Marmion, I think) for a thousand pounds; which was no otherwise true 
than that I sold the copy-right for that sum. Now, not to mention that an author can hardly be censured 
for accepting such a sum as the booksellers are willing to give him, especially as the gentlemen of the 
trade made no complaints of their bargain, I thought the interference with my private affairs was rather 
beyond the limits of literary satire. On the other hand, Lord Byron paid me, in several passages, so 
much more praise than I deserved, that I must have been more irritable than I have ever felt upon such 
subjects, not to sit down contented, and think no more about the matter. 
I was very much struck, with all the rest of the world, at the vigour and force of imagination 
displayed in the first Cantos of Childe Harold, and the other splendid productions which Lord Byron 
flung from him to the public with a promptitude that savoured of profusion. My own popularity, as a 
poet, was then on the wane, and I was unaffectedly pleased to see an author of so much power and 
energy taking the field. Mr. John Murray happened to be in Scotland that season, and as I mentioned to