The widowed mother remained at Aberdeen with her boy, living on the hundred and fifty pounds a year that had been settled on her in a way that she could not squander the principal—­all the rest had gone.

The child was shy, sensitive, proud and headstrong.

The mother used to reprove him by throwing things at him, and by chasing him with the tongs.  At other times she diverted herself by imitating his limp.  And yet again she would smother him with caresses, beseech his pardon for abusing him, and praise the beauty of his matchless eyes.

Children are usually better judges of grown-ups than grown-ups are of children.  This boy at five years of age had estimated his mother’s character correctly.  He knew that she was not his steadfast friend, and that she was unworthy of his confidence and whole heart’s love.  He grew moody, secretive, wilful.  Once, being wrongly accused and punished, he seized a knife from the table and was about to apply it to his throat when he was disarmed.  The child longed for tenderness and love, and being denied these, was already taking on that proud and haughty temper which was to serve as a mask to hide the tenderness of his nature.

We are told that seven brothers Byron fought at Edgehill, but when we get down to the time of Mad Jack there was danger of the name being snuffed out entirely.  Nature is not anxious to perpetuate the idle and dissipated.

When little George Gordon was ten years old, his mother one day ran to him, seized him in her arms, wept and laughed, then laughed and wept, kissing him violently, addressing him as “My Lord!”

His great-uncle, William, Lord Byron of Rochdale and Newstead Abbey, had died, and the big-eyed, lame boy was the nearest heir—­in fact, the only living male who bore the family-name.  The next day at school, when the master called the roll and mentioned his name with the prefix “Dominus,” the lad did not reply “Adsum”—­he only stood up, gazed helplessly at the teacher, and burst into tears.

Even at this time he had given promise of the quality of his nature, by his firm affection for Mary Duff, his cousin.  All the intensity of his childish nature was centered in this young woman, several years his senior.  To call it a passion would be too much, but this child, denied of love at home, clung to Mary Duff, to whom he went in confession with all his childish tales of woe.  When his mother proposed to leave Aberdeen, now that fortune had smiled, the anguish of the boy at thought of leaving his “first love” nearly caused him a fit of sickness.

And all this wealth of love was met with jeers and loud laughter, save by Mary Duff.  The vibrating sensitiveness of such a child, with such a mother, must have caused a misery we can only guess.

“Your mother is a fool,” said a boy to Byron at college some years later.

“I know it,” was the melancholy answer, as the brown eyes filled with tears.