Note 32 — LIFE OF LORD BYRON.
Reading edition
Even previously to any of these school friendships, he had formed the same sort of romantic attachment to a boy of his own age, the son of one of his tenants at Newstead; and there are two or three of his most juvenile poems, in which he dwells no less upon the inequality than the warmth of this friendship. Thus:—
"Let Folly smile, to view the names Of thee and me in friendship twined; Yet Virtue will have greater claims To love, than rank with Vice combined.
"And though unequal is thy fate, Since title deck'd my higher birth, Yet envy not this gaudy state, Thine is the pride of modest worth.
"Our souls at least congenial meet, Nor can thy lot my rank disgrace; Our intercourse is not less sweet Since worth of rank supplies the place.
"November, 1802."