 Madden tells us that "the very last letter, a very short time before the crash at Gore House, was one of entreaty for his exertions among the publishers to procure for her 'any kind of literary employment;' and the answer to that application was a letter of pain at the failure of every effort to accomplish her wishes".Beattie's relations with Lady Byron also would appear to have been confidential.A friend of Beattie's, whose obituary of him may be found in the "Dumfriesshire and Galloway Herald" (24 March 1876), says that Beattie told him that Lady Byron "had imparted to him the true reason of her separation from her husband, and that it was not the one given by Mrs. Stowe".