At the beginning, as we have seen, of the month of December, The Bride of Abydos was published,--having been struck off, like its predecessor, The Giaour, in one of those paroxysms of passion and imagination, which adventures such as the poet was now engaged in were, in a temperament like his, calculated to excite. As the mathematician of old required but a spot to stand upon, to be able, as he boasted, to move the world, so a certain degree of foundation in _fact_ seemed necessary to Byron, before that lever which he knew how to apply to the world of the passions could be wielded by him. So small, however, was, in many instances, the connection with reality which satisfied him, that to aim at tracing through his stories these links with his own fate and fortunes, which were, after all, perhaps, visible but to his own fancy, would be a task as uncertain as unsafe;--and this remark applies not only to The Bride of Abydos, but to The Corsair, Lara, and all the other beautiful fictions that followed, in which, though the emotions expressed by the poet may be, in general, regarded as vivid recollections of what had at different times agitated his own bosom, there are but little grounds,--however he might himself, occasionally, encourage such a supposition,--for connecting him personally with the groundwork or incidents of the stories. While yet uncertain about the fate of his own new poem, the following observations on the work of an ingenious follower in the same track were written. LETTER 143. TO MR. MURRAY. "Dec. 4. 1813. "I have redde through your Persian Tales[105], and have taken the liberty of making some remarks on the _blank_ pages. There are many beautiful passages, and an interesting story; and I cannot give you a stronger proof that such is my opinion, than by the _date_ of the _hour_--_two o'clock_, till which it has kept me awake _without a yawn_. The conclusion is not quite correct in _costume_; there is no _Mussulman suicide_ on record--at least for _love_. But this matters not. The tale must have been written by some one who has been on the spot, and I wish him, and he deserves, success. Will you apologise to the author for the liberties I have taken with his MS.? Had I been less awake to, and interested in, his theme, I had been less obtrusive; but you know _I_ always take this in good part, and I hope he will. It is difficult to say what _will_ succeed, and still more to pronounce what _will not_. _I_ am at this moment in _that uncertainty_ (on our _own_ score); and it is no small proof of the author's powers to be able to _charm_ and _fix_ a _mind_'s attention on similar subjects and climates in such a predicament. That he may have the same effect upon all his readers is very sincerely the wish, and hardly the _doubt_, of yours truly, B."