by
Lord Byron
1817
Byron wrote this poem while in Venice, and quoted it in a letter to his friend Thomas Moore after attending the Carnival. Before the quotation, he wrote:
" . . . and, though I did not dissipate much upon the whole, yet I find 'the sword wearing out the scabbard,' though I have but just turned the corner of twenty-nine."From 1817 to 1819 Byron was alleged to have had over two hundred love affairs. In fact, in one letter to a friend, he mentioned quite a few of them by their names. In 1819 he met his final love attachment and settled down with her until he left to fight the war in Greece in 1823.