dates and figures, he says: 'Be assured no power of figures can avail
beyond the present' (life); and then ironically _advises_ her to
_anticipate the period_,--i.e. to speak out while he is alive.

In Vol. VI. Letter 518, which Lord Byron wrote to Lady Byron, but did not
send, he says: 'I burned your last note for two reasons,--firstly,
because it was written in a style not very agreeable; and, secondly,
because I wished to take your word without documents, which are the
resources of worldly and suspicious people.'

It would appear from this that there was a last letter of Lady Byron to
her husband, which he did not think proper to keep on hand, or show to
the 'initiated' with his usual unreserve; that this letter contained some
kind of _pledge_ for which he preferred to take her word, _without
documents_.

Each reader can imagine for himself what that _pledge_ might have been;
but from the tenor of the three letters we should infer that it was a
promise of silence for his lifetime, on _certain conditions_, and that
the publication of the autobiography would violate those conditions, and
make it her duty to speak out.

This celebrated autobiography forms so conspicuous a figure in the whole
history, that the reader must have a full idea of it, as given by Byron
himself, in Vol. IV. Letter 344, to Murray:--

'I gave to Moore, who is gone to Rome, my life in MS.,--in seventy-
eight folio sheets, brought down to 1816 . . . also a journal kept in
1814. Neither are for publication during my life, but when I am cold
you may do what you please. In the mean time, if you like to read