1817, {28a} where he says: 'I have been working up my impressions into a
_Fourth_ Canto of Childe Harold,' and also 'Mr. Lewis is in Venice. I am
going up to stay a week with him there.'

Next, under date La Mira, Venice, July 10, {28b} he says, 'Monk Lewis is
here; how pleasant!'

Next, under date July 20, 1817, to Mr. Murray: 'I write to give you
notice that I have _completed the fourth and ultimate canto of Childe
Harold_. . . . It is yet to be copied and polished, and the notes are to
come.'

Under date of La Mira, August 7, 1817, he records that the new canto is
one hundred and thirty stanzas in length, and talks about the price for
it. He is now ready to launch it on the world; and, as now appears, on
August 9, 1817, _two days after_, he wrote the document above cited, and
put it into the hands of Mr. Lewis, as we are informed, 'for circulation
among friends in England.'

The reason of this may now be evident. Having prepared a suitable number
of those whom he calls in his notes to Murray 'the initiated,' by private
documents and statements, he is now prepared to publish his accusations
against his wife, and the story of his wrongs, in a great immortal poem,
which shall have a band of initiated interpreters, shall be read through
the civilised world, and stand to accuse her after his death.

In the Fourth Canto of 'Childe Harold,' with all his own overwhelming
power of language, he sets forth his cause as against the silent woman
who all this time had been making no party, and telling no story, and
whom the world would therefore conclude to be silent because she had no