'Means were taken to rouse him from his lethargy, but in vain. A great many leeches were applied to his temples, and the blood flowed copiously all night. It was exactly a quarter past six on the next day, the 19th April, that he was seen to open his eyes, and immediately close them again. The doctors felt his pulse--he was gone!' CHAPTER XIV It matters little what we now think of Byron as a man. After eighty-four years, his personality is of less public interest than his achievements, while our capacity for forming an adequate judgment of his character is necessarily dependent on second-hand evidence, some of which is false, and much tainted by prejudice. But what did those hard men of action who stood at his side in those terrible days in Greece--Stanhope, Parry, Finlay, Blaquière, Millingen, Trelawny--what did they think of Byron? Stanhope, who was at Salona, wrote to Bowring on April 30: 'A courier has just arrived from the chief Scalza. Alas! all our fears are realized. The soul of Byron has taken its last flight. England has lost her brightest genius--Greece her noblest friend. To console them for the loss, he has left behind the emanations of his splendid mind. If Byron had faults, he had redeeming virtues too--he sacrificed his comfort, fortune, health, and life, to the cause of an oppressed nation. Honoured be his memory! Had I the disposal of his ashes, I would place them in the Temple of Theseus, or in the Parthenon at Athens.' Three days later Stanhope wrote again to Bowring: 'Byron would not refuse to an entire people the benefit of his virtues; he condescended to display them wherever Humanity beckoned him to her aid. This single object of devotion to the well-being of a people has raised him to a distinguished pitch of glory among characters dignified by their virtues, of which the illustrious British nation can make so ample a display, and of whom Greece hopes to behold many co-operating in her regeneration. Having here paid the tribute of admiration due to the virtues of Lord Byron, eternal may his memory remain with the world!' Parry says: