He was
disposed to be more sociable than at Venice or Ravenna, and occasionally
entertained strangers; but his intimate acquaintanceship was confined to
Captain Williams and his wife, and Shelley's cousin, Captain Medwin. The
latter used frequently to dine and sit with his host till the morning,
collecting materials for the _Conversations_ which he afterwards gave to
the world. The value of these reminiscences is impaired by the fact of
their recording, as serious revelations, the absurd confidences in which
the poet's humour for mystification was wont to indulge. Another of the
group, an Irishman, called Taafe, is made, in his Lordship's
correspondence of the period, to cut a somewhat comical figure. The
master-passion of this worthy and genial fellow was to get a publisher for
a fair commentary on Dante, to which he had firmly linked a very bad
translation, and for about six months Byron pesters Murray with constant
appeals to satisfy him; e.g. November l6, "He must be gratified, though
the reviewers will make him suffer more tortures than there are in his
original." March 6, "He will die if he is not published; he will be damned
if he is; but that he don't mind.
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