But the real man was also a new man--or, at all events, a man whose character was undergoing a radical transformation under the very eyes of his friends. Shelley seems to have been the only one of them who perceived the change--he is, at any rate, the only one who has recorded it. Byron, he said, was "becoming a virtuous man;" and the expression may pass, and may be regarded as confirmed by the testimony of the other companions, if we do not give the word "virtue" too rigid an interpretation. The Venetian libertinism had been left behind for ever. With it had been left the old passions and the old bitterness, and the old lack of aim or of ambition to do more than enrapture the women and rub the self-righteous the wrong way. Byron, in fact, was becoming calm, tolerant, practical and sincere--learning to look forward instead of backward--a man who was at last ready, and even resolved, to make sacrifices in order to achieve. Even his feelings towards Lady Byron and her family seem to have undergone a change at about this time, though not a change which indicated any probability of reconciliation. A little while before, at Ravenna, he had composed two epigrams on the subject: one addressed "To Medea," on the anniversary of his wedding: "_This day of all our days has done The most for me and you; 'Tis just six years since we were_ One _And_ five _since we were Two!_" and the second on hearing simultaneously that _Marino Faliero_ had failed on the stage, and that Lady Noel had recovered from an illness which had seemed likely to be fatal: "_Behold the blessing of a lucky lot! My play is_ damned, _and Lady Noel not._" Now, at Pisa, we find him acknowledging the gift of a lock of his child's hair, and writing to Lady Byron thus: "The time which has elapsed since the separation has been considerably more than the whole brief period of our union, and the not much longer one of our prior acquaintance. We both made a bitter mistake; but now it is over, and irrevocably so. For, at thirty-three on my part, and a few years less on yours, though it is no very extended period of life, still it is one when the habits and thought are generally so formed as to admit of no modification; and as we could not agree when younger, we should with difficulty do so now." And also: "Whether the offence has been solely on my side, or reciprocal, or on yours chiefly, I have ceased to reflect upon any but two things--viz. that you are the mother of my child, and that we shall never meet again. I think if you also consider the two corresponding points with reference to myself, it will be better for all three."