The life of Byron, strange to say, was less exposed to scandal after he made the acquaintance of the countess who enslaved him, and who was also enslaved in turn.  His heart now opened to many noble sentiments.  He returned, in a degree, to society, and gave dinners and suppers.  He associated with many distinguished patriots and men of genius.  He had a strong sympathy with the Italians in their struggle for freedom.  One quarter of his income he devoted to charities.  He was regular in his athletic exercises, and could swim four hours at a time; he was always proud of swimming across the Hellespont.  He was devoted to his natural daughter, and educated her in a Catholic school.  He studied more severely all works of art, though his admiration for art was never so great as it was for Nature.  The glories and wonders of Nature inspired him with perpetual joys.  There is nothing finer in all his poetry than the following stanza:—­

     “Ye stars! which are the poetry of Heaven,
      If in your bright leaves we would read the fate
      Of men and empires,—­’t is to be forgiven
      That in our aspirations to be great
      Our destinies o’erleap their mortal state,
      And claim a kindred with you; for ye are
      A beauty and a mystery, and create
      In us such love and reverence from afar,
  That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves a star.”

There never was a time when Byron did not seek out beautiful retreats in Nature as the source of his highest happiness.  Hence, solitude was nothing to him when he could commune with the works of God.  His biographer declares that in 1821 “he was greatly improved in every respect,—­in genius, in temper, in moral views, in health and happiness.  He has had mischievous passions, but these he seems to have subdued.”  He was always temperate in his diet, living chiefly on fish and vegetables; and if he drank more wine and spirits than was good for him, it was to rally his exhausted energies.  His powers of production were never greater than at this period, but his literary labors were slowly wearing him out.  He could not live without work, while pleasure palled upon him.  In a letter to a stranger who sought to convert him, he showed anything but anger or contempt.  “Do me,” says he, “the justice to suppose, that Video meliora proboque, however the deteriora sequor may have been applied to my conduct.”  Writing to Murray in 1822, he says:  “It is not impossible that I may have three or four cantos of ‘Don Juan’ ready by autumn, as I obtained a permission from my dictatress [the Countess Guiccioli] to continue it,—­provided always it was to be more guarded and decorous in the continuation than in the commencement.”  Alas, he could not undo the mischief he had done!

About this time Byron received a visit from Lord Clare, his earliest friend at Cambridge, to whom through life he was devotedly attached,—­a friendship which afforded exceeding delight.  He never forgot his few friends, although he railed at his enemies.  He was ungenerously treated by Leigh Hunt, to whom he rendered every kindness.  He says,—­