He seems to have been of a susceptible nature, for, while still a boy, he fell in love several times. His third experience in this way was undoubtedly the strongest of his whole life. The lady was Miss Mary Chaworth, who did not return his affection. His last interview with her he has powerfully described in his poem called _The Dream_. From Harrow he went to Trinity College, Cambridge, where he lived an idle and self-indulgent life, reading discursively, but not studying the prescribed course. As early as November, 1806, before he was nineteen, he published his first volume, _Poems on Various Occasions_, for private distribution, which was soon after enlarged and altered, and presented to the public as _Hours of Idleness, a Series of Poems Original and Translated, by George Gordon, Lord Byron, A Minor_. These productions, although by no means equal to his later poems, are not without merit, and did not deserve the exceedingly severe criticism they met with from the _Edinburgh Review_. The critics soon found that they had bearded a young lion: in his rage, he sprang out upon the whole literary craft in a satire, imitated from Juvenal, called _The English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_, in which he ridicules and denounces the very best poets of the day furiously but most uncritically. That his conduct was absurd and unjust, he himself allowed afterwards; and he attempted to call in and destroy all the copies of this work. CHILDE HAROLD AND EASTERN TALES.--In March, 1809, he took his seat in the House of Lords, where he did not accomplish much. He took up his residence at Newstead Abbey, his ancestral seat, most of which was in a ruinous condition; and after a somewhat disorderly life there, he set out on his continental tour, spending some time at Lisbon, Cadiz, Gibraltar, Malta, and in Greece. On his return, after two years' absence, he brought a summary of his travels in poetical form,--the first part of _Childe Harold_; and also a more elaborated poem entitled _Hints from Horace_. Upon the former he set little value; but he thought the latter a noble work. The world at once reversed his decision. The satire in the Latin vein is scarcely read; while to the first cantos of _Childe Harold_ it was due that, in his own words, "he woke up one morning and found himself famous." As fruits of the eastern portion of his travels, we have the romantic tale, _The Giaour_, published in 1811, and _The Bride of Abydos_, which appeared in 1813. The popularity of these oriental stories was mainly due to their having been conceived on the spots they describe. In 1814 he issued _The Corsair_, perhaps the best of these sensational stories; and with singular versatility, in the same year, inspired by the beauty of the Jewish history, he produced _The Hebrew Melodies_, some of which are fervent, touching, and melodious. Late in the same year _Lara_ was published, in the same volume with Mr. Rogers's _Jacqueline_, which it threw completely into the shade.