[Footnote 1:  Sketch of Lord Byron.—­See Colonel Stanhope’s “Greece in 1823, 1824,” &c.]

Towards the middle of February, the indefatigable activity of Mr. Parry having brought the artillery brigade into such a state of forwardness as to be almost ready for service, an inspection of the Suliote corps took place, preparatory to the expedition; and after much of the usual deception and unmanageableness on their part, every obstacle appeared to be at length surmounted.  It was agreed that they should receive a month’s pay in advance;—­Count Gamba, with 300 of their corps, as a vanguard, was to march next day and take up a position under Lepanto, and Lord Byron with the main body and the artillery was speedily to follow.

New difficulties, however, were soon started by these untractable mercenaries; and under the instigation, as was discovered afterwards, of the great rival of Mavrocordato, Colocotroni, who had sent emissaries into Missolonghi for the purpose of seducing them, they now put forward their exactions in a new shape, by requiring of the Government to appoint, out of their number, two generals, two colonels, two captains, and inferior officers in the same proportion:—­“in short,” says Count Gamba, “that, out of three or four hundred actual Suliotes, there should be about one hundred and fifty above the rank of common soldiers.”  The audacious dishonesty of this demand,—­beyond what he could have expected even from Greeks,—­roused all Lord Byron’s rage, and he at once signified to the whole body, through Count Gamba, that all negotiation between them and himself was at an end; that he could no longer have any confidence in persons so little true to their engagements; and that though the relief which he had afforded to their families should still be continued, all his agreements with them, as a body, must be thenceforward void.

It was on the 14th of February that this rupture with the Suliotes took place; and though, on the following day, in consequence of the full submission of their Chiefs, they were again received into his Lordship’s service on his own terms, the whole affair, combined with the various other difficulties that now beset him, agitated his mind considerably.  He saw with pain that he should but place in peril both the cause of Greece and his own character, by at all relying, in such an enterprise, upon troops whom any intriguer could thus seduce from their duty; and that, till some more regular force could be organised, the expedition against Lepanto must be suspended.

While these vexatious events were occurring, the interruption of his accustomed exercise by the rains but increased the irritability that such delays were calculated to excite; and the whole together, no doubt, concurred with whatever predisposing tendencies were already in his constitution, to bring on that convulsive fit,—­the forerunner of his death,—­which, on the evening of the 15th of February, seized him.