The poet, after spending a month on board
the "Hercules," dismissed the vessel, and hired a house for Gamba and
himself at Metaxata, a healthy village about four miles from the capital
of the island. Meanwhile, Blaquiere, neglecting his appointment at Zante,
had gone to Corfu, and thence to England. Colonel Napier being absent from
Cephalonia, Byron had some pleasant social intercourse with his deputy,
but, unable to get from him any authoritative information, was left
without advice, to be besieged by letters and messages from the factions.
Among these there were brought to him hints that the Greeks wanted a king,
and he is reported to have said, "If they make me the offer, I will
perhaps not reject it."
The position would doubtless have been acceptable to a man who never--amid
his many self-deceptions--affected to deny that he was ambitious: and who
can say what might not have resulted for Greece, had the poet lived to add
lustre to her crown? In the meantime, while faring more frugally than a
day-labourer, he yet surrounded himself with a show of royal state, had
his servants armed with gilt helmets, and gathered around him a body-guard
of Suliotes.
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