Note 693 — CANTO THE THIRTEENTH.[653]

[George Hardinge (1744-1816), who was returned M.P. for Old Sarum in 1784, was appointed, in 1787, Senior Justice of the Counties of Brecon, Glamorgan, and Radnor. According to the Gentleman's Magazine, 1816 (vol. lxxxvi. p. 563), "In conversation he had few equals.... He delighted in pleasantries, and always afforded to his auditors abundance of mirth and entertainment as well as information." Byron seems to have supposed that these "pleasantries" found their way into his addresses to condemned prisoners, but if the charges printed in his Miscellaneous Works, edited by John Nichols in 1818, are reported in full, he was entirely mistaken. They are tedious, but the "waggery" is conspicuous by its absence.]