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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mrs. Shelley, by Lucy M. Rossetti
+
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+Title: Mrs. Shelley
+
+Author: Lucy M. Rossetti
+
+Release Date: October, 2004 [EBook #6705]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on January 17, 2003]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MRS. SHELLEY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Steve Schulze, Charles Franks
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
+This file was produced from images generously made available
+by the CWRU Preservation Department Digital Library
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+
+MRS. SHELLEY
+
+BY LUCY MADOX ROSSETTI.
+
+
+1890.
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+I have to thank all the previous students of Shelley as poet and
+man--not last nor least among whom is my husband--for their loving and
+truthful research on all the subjects surrounding the life of Mrs.
+Shelley. Every aspect has been presented, and of known material it
+only remained to compare, sift, and use with judgment. Concerning
+facts subsequent to Shelley's death, many valuable papers have been
+placed at my service, and I have made no new statement which there are
+not existing documents to vouch for.
+
+This book was in the publishers' hands before the appearance of Mrs.
+Marshall's _Life of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley_, and I have had
+neither to omit, add to, nor alter anything in this work, in
+consequence of the publication of hers. The passages from letters of
+Mrs. Shelley to Mr. Trelawny were kindly placed at my disposal by his
+son-in-law and daughter, Colonel and Mrs. Call, as early as the summer
+of 1888.
+
+Among authorities used are Prof. Dowden's _Life of Shelley_, Mr.
+W. M. Rossetti's _Memoir_ and other writings, Mr. Jeaffreson's
+_Real Shelley,_ Mr. Kegan Paul's _Life of William Godwin_,
+Godwin's _Memoir of Mary Wollstonecraft_, Mrs. Pennell's
+_Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin_, &c. &c.
+
+Among those to whom my special thanks are due for original information
+and the use of documents, &c., are, foremost, Mr. H. Buxton Forman,
+Mr. Cordy Jeaffreson, Mrs. Call, Mr. Alexander Ireland, Mr. Charles C.
+Pilfold, Mr. J. H. Ingram, Mrs. Cox, and Mr. Silsbee, and, for
+friendly counsel, Prof. Dowden; and I must particularly thank Lady
+Shelley for conveying to me her husband's courteous message and
+permission to use passages of letters by Mrs. Shelley, interspersed in
+this biography.
+
+LUCY MADOX ROSSETTI.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+CHAPTER I. PARENTAGE.
+
+CHAPTER II. GIRLHOOD OF MARY--PATERNAL TROUBLES.
+
+CHAPTER III. SHELLEY.
+
+CHAPTER IV. MARY AND SHELLEY.
+
+CHAPTER V. LIFE IN ENGLAND.
+
+CHAPTER VI. DEATH OF SHELLEY'S GRANDFATHER, AND BIRTH OF A CHILD.
+
+CHAPTER VII. "FRANKENSTEIN".
+
+CHAPTER VIII. RETURN TO ENGLAND.
+
+CHAPTER IX. LIFE IN ITALY.
+
+CHAPTER X. MARY'S DESPONDENCY AND BIRTH OF A SON.
+
+CHAPTER XI. GODWIN AND "VALPERGA".
+
+CHAPTER XII. LAST MONTHS WITH SHELLEY.
+
+CHAPTER XIII. WIDOWHOOD.
+
+CHAPTER XIV. LITERARY WORK.
+
+CHAPTER XV. LATER WORKS.
+
+CHAPTER XVI. ITALY REVISITED.
+
+CHAPTER XVII. LAST YEARS.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+PARENTAGE.
+
+
+The daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft and Godwin, the wife of Shelley:
+here, surely, is eminence by position, for those who care for the
+progress of humanity and the intellectual development of the race.
+Whether this combination conferred eminence on the daughter and wife
+as an individual is what we have to enquire. Born as she was at a time
+of great social and political disturbance, the child, by inheritance,
+of the great French Revolution, and suffering, as soon as born, a loss
+certainly in her case the greatest of all, that of her noble-minded
+mother, we can imagine the kind of education this young being passed
+through--with the abstracted and anxious philosopher-father, with the
+respectable but shallow-minded step-mother provided by Godwin to guard
+the young children he so suddenly found himself called upon to care
+for, Mary and two half-sisters about her own age. How the volumes of
+philosophic writings, too subtle for her childish experience, would be
+pored over; how the writings of the mother whose loving care she never
+knew, whose sad experiences and advice she never heard, would be read
+and re-read. We can imagine how these writings, and the discourses she
+doubtless frequently heard, as a child, between her father and his
+friends, must have impressed Mary more forcibly than the respectable
+precepts laid down in a weak way for her guidance; how all this
+prepared her to admire what was noble and advanced in idea, without
+giving her the ballast needful for acting in the fittest way when a
+time of temptation came, when Shelley appeared. He appeared as the
+devoted admirer of her father and his philosophy, and as such was
+admitted into the family intimacy of three inexperienced girls.
+
+Picture these four young imaginative beings together; Shelley,
+half-crazed between youthful imagination and vague ideas of
+regenerating mankind, and ready at any incentive to feel himself freed
+from his part in the marriage ceremony. What prudent parents would
+have countenanced such a visitor? And need there be much surprise at
+the subsequent occurrences, and much discussion as to the right or
+wrong in the case? How the actors in this drama played their
+subsequent part on the stage of life; whether they did work which
+fitted them to be considered worthy human beings remains to be
+examined.
+
+      *       *       *       *       *
+
+As no story or life begins with itself, so, more especially with this
+of our heroine, we must recall the past, and at least know something
+of her parents.
+
+Mary Wollstonecraft, one of the most remarkable and misunderstood
+women of even her remarkable day, was born in April 1759, in or near
+London, of parents of whose ancestors little is known. Her father, son
+of a Spitalfields manufacturer, possessed an adequate fortune for his
+position; her mother was of Irish family. They had six children, of
+whom Mary was the second. Family misery, in her case as in many, seems
+to have been the fountainhead of her genius. Her father, a
+hot-tempered, dissipated man, unable to settle anywhere or to
+anything, naturally proved a domestic tyrant. Her mother seems little
+to have understood her daughter's disposition, and to have been
+extremely harsh, harassed no doubt by the behaviour of her husband,
+who frequently used personal violence on her as well as on his
+children; this, doubtless, under the influence of drink.
+
+Such being the childhood of Mary Wollstonecraft, it can be understood
+how she early learnt to feel fierce indignation at the injustice to,
+and the wrongs of women, for whom there was little protection against
+such domestic tyranny. Picture her sheltering her little sisters and
+brother from the brutal wrath of a man whom no law restricted, and can
+her repugnance to the laws made by men on these subjects be wondered
+at? Only too rarely do the victims of such treatment rise to be
+eloquent of their wrongs.
+
+The frequent removals of her family left little chance of forming
+friendships for the sad little Mary; but she can scarcely have been
+exactly lonely with her small sisters and brothers, possibly a little
+more positive loneliness or quiet would have been desirable. As she
+grew older her father's passions increased, and often did she boldly
+interpose to shield her mother from his drunken wrath, or waited
+outside her room for the morning to break. So her childhood passed
+into girlhood, her senses numbed by misery, till she had the good
+fortune to make the acquaintance of a Mr. and Mrs. Clare, a clergyman
+and his wife, who were kind to the friendless girl and soon found her
+to have undeveloped good qualities. She spent much time with them, and
+it was they who introduced her to Fanny Blood, whose friendship
+henceforth proved one of the chief influences of her life; this it was
+that first roused her intellectual faculty, and, with the gratitude of
+a fine nature, she never after forgot where she first tasted the
+delight of the fountain which transmutes even misery into the source
+of work and poetry.
+
+Here, again, Mary found the story of a home that might have been
+ruined by a dissipated father, had it not been for the cheerful
+devotion of this daughter Fanny, who kept the family chiefly by her
+work, painting, and brought up her young brothers and sisters with
+care. A bright and happy example at this moment to stimulate Mary, and
+raise her from the absorbing and hopeless contemplation of her own
+troubles; she then, at sixteen, resolved to work so as to educate
+herself to undertake all that might and would fall on her as the stay
+of her family. Fresh wanderings of the restless father ensued, and
+finally she decided to accept a situation as lady's companion; this
+her hard previous life made a position of comparative ease to her,
+and, although all the former companions had left the lady in despair,
+she remained two years with her till her mother's illness required her
+presence at home. Mrs. Wollstonecraft's hard life had broken her
+constitution, and in death she procured her first longed-for rest from
+sorrow and toil, counselling her daughters to patience. Deprived of
+the mother, the daughters could no longer remain with their father;
+and Mary, at eighteen, had again to seek her fortune in a hard
+world--Fanny Blood being, as ever, her best friend. One of her sisters
+became housekeeper to her brother; and Eliza married, but by no means
+improved her position by this, for her marriage proved another unhappy
+one, and only added to Mary's sad observation of the marriage state. A
+little later she had to help this sister to escape from a life which
+had driven her to madness. When her sister's peace of mind was
+restored, they were enabled to open a school together at Stoke
+Newington Green, for a time with success; but failure and despondency
+followed, and Mary, whose health was broken, accepted a pressing
+invitation from her friend Fanny, who had married a Mr. Skeys, to go
+and stay with her at Lisbon, and nurse her through her approaching
+confinement. This sad visit--for during her stay there she lost her
+dearly loved friend--broke the monotony of her life, and perhaps the
+change, with sea voyage which was beneficial to her health, helped her
+anew to fight the battle of life on her return. But fresh troubles
+assailed her. Some friend suggested to her to try literature, and a
+pamphlet, _Thoughts on the Education of Daughters_, was her first
+attempt. For this she received ten guineas, with which she was able to
+help her friends the Bloods.
+
+She shortly afterwards accepted a situation as governess in Lord
+Kingsborough's family, where she was much loved by her pupils; but
+their mother, who did little to gain their affection herself, becoming
+jealous of the ascendency of Mary over them, found some pretext for
+dismissing her. Mary's contact, while in this house, with people of
+fashion inspired her only with contempt for their small pleasures and
+utterly unintellectual discourse. These surroundings, although she was
+treated much on a footing of equality by the family, were a severe
+privation for Mary, who was anxious to develop her mind, and to whom
+spiritual needs were ever above physical.
+
+On leaving the Kingsboroughs, Mary found work of a kind more congenial
+to her disposition, as Mr. Johnson, the bookseller in St. Paul's
+Churchyard who had taken her pamphlet, now gave her regular work as
+his "reader," and also in translating. Now began the happiest part of
+Mary's life. In the midst of books she soon formed a circle of
+admiring friends. She lived in the simplest way, in a room almost bare
+of furniture, in Blackfriars. Here she was able to see after her
+sisters and to have with her her young brother, who had been much
+neglected; and in the intervals of her necessary work she began
+writing on the subjects which lay nearest to her heart; for here,
+among other work, she commenced her celebrated _Vindication of the
+Rights of Woman_, a work for which women ought always to be
+grateful to her, for with this began in England the movement which,
+progressing amidst much obloquy and denunciation, has led to so many
+of the reforms in social life which have come, and may be expected to
+lead to many which we still hope for. When we think of the nonsense
+which has been talked both in and out of Parliament, even within the
+last decade, about the advanced women who have worked to improve the
+position of their less fortunate sisters, we can well understand in
+what light Mary Wollstonecraft was regarded by many whom fortunately
+she was not bound to consider. Her reading, which had been deep and
+constant, together with her knowledge of life from different points of
+view, enabled her to form just opinions on many of the great reforms
+needed, and these she unhesitatingly set down. How much has since been
+done which she advocated for the education of women, and how much they
+have already benefited both by her example and precept, is perhaps not
+yet generally enough known. Her religious tone is always striking; it
+was one of the moving factors of her life, as with all seriously
+thinking beings, though its form became much modified with the advance
+in her intellectual development.
+
+Her scheme in the _Vindication of the Rights of Woman_ may be
+summed up thus:--
+
+She wished women to have education equal to that of men, and this has
+now to a great extent been accorded.
+
+That trades, professions, and other pursuits should be open to women.
+This wish is now in progress of fulfilment.
+
+That married women should own their own property as in other European
+countries. Recent laws have granted this right.
+
+That they should have more facilities for divorce from husbands guilty
+of immoral conduct. This has been partially granted, though much still
+remains to be effected.
+
+That, in the case of separation, the custody of children should belong
+equally to both parents.
+
+That a man should be legally responsible for his illegitimate
+children. That he should be bound to maintain the woman he has
+wronged.
+
+Mary Wollstonecraft also thought that women should have
+representatives in Parliament to uphold their interests; but her chief
+desires are in the matter of education. Unlike Rousseau, she would
+have all children educated together till nine years of age; like
+Rousseau, she would have them meet for play in a common play-ground.
+At nine years their capacities might be sufficiently developed to
+judge which branch of education would be then desirable for each;
+girls and boys being still educated together, and capacity being the
+only line of demarcation.
+
+Thus it will be seen that Mary's primary wish was to make women
+responsible and sensible companions for men; to raise them from the
+beings they were made by the frivolous fashionable education of the
+time; to make them fit mothers to educate or superintend the education
+of their children, for education does not end or begin with what may
+he taught in schools. To make a woman a reasoning being, by means of
+Euclid if necessary, need not preclude her from being a charming woman
+also, as proved by the descriptions we have of Mary Wollstonecraft
+herself. Doubtless some of the most crying evils of civilisation can
+only be cured by raising the intellectual and moral status of woman,
+and thus raising that of man also, so that he, regarding her as a
+companion whose mind reflects the beauties of nature, and who can
+appreciate the great reflex of nature as transmitted through the human
+mind in the glorious art of the world, may really be raised to the
+ideal state where the sacrilege of love will be unknown. We know that
+this great desire must have passed through Mary Wollstonecraft's mind
+and prompted her to her eloquent appeal for the "vindication of the
+rights of woman."
+
+With Mary's improved prospects, for she fortunately lived in a time
+when the strong emotions and realities of life brought many
+influential people admiringly around her, she was able to pay a visit
+to Paris in 1792. No one can doubt her interest in the terrible drama
+there being enacted, and her courage was equal to the occasion; but
+even this journey is brought up in disparagement of her, and this
+partly owing to Godwin's naïve remark in his diary, that "there is no
+reason to doubt that if Fuseli had been disengaged at the period of
+their acquaintance he would have been the man of her choice." As the
+little _if_ is a very powerful word, of course this amounts to
+nothing, and it is scarcely the province of a biographer to say what
+might have taken place under other circumstances, and to criticise a
+character from that standpoint. If Mary was attracted by Fuseli's
+genius, and this would not have been surprising, and if she went to
+Paris for change of scene and thought, she certainly only set a
+sensible example. As it was, she had ample matter of interest in the
+stirring scenes around her--she with a heart to feel the woes of all:
+the miseries however real and terrible of the prince did not blind her
+to those of the peasant; the cold and calculating torture of centuries
+was not to be passed over because a maddened people, having gained for
+a time the right of power by might, brought to judgment the
+representatives, even then vacillating and treacherous, of ages of
+oppression. Her heart bled for all, but most for the longest
+suffering; and she was struck senseless to the ground by the news of
+the execution of the "twenty-one," the brave Girondins. Would that
+another woman, even greater than herself, had been untrammelled by her
+sex, and could have wielded at first hand the power she had to
+exercise through others; and might not France have been thus again
+saved by a Joan of Arc--not only France, but the Revolution in all its
+purity of idea, not in its horror.
+
+In France, too, the women's question had been mooted; Condorcet having
+written that one of the greatest steps of progress of the human
+intellect would be the freedom from prejudice that would give equality
+of right to both sexes: and the _Requête des Dames à l'Assemblée
+Nationale_ 1791, was made simultaneously with the appearance of
+Mary Wollstonecraft's _Vindication of the Rights of Woman_. These
+were strong reasons to attract Mary to France, strange as the time was
+for such a journey; but even then her book was translated and read
+both in France and Germany. So here was Mary settled for a time, the
+English scarcely having realised the turmoil that existed. She arrived
+just before the execution of Louis XVI., and with a few friends was
+able to study the spirit of the time, and begin a work on the subject,
+which, unfortunately, never reached more than its first volume. Her
+account, in a letter to Mr. Johnson, shows how acutely she felt in her
+solitude on the day of the King's execution; how, for the first time
+in her life, at night she dared not extinguish her candle. In fact,
+the faculty of feeling for others so acutely as to gain courage to
+uphold reform, does not necessarily evince a lack of sensitiveness on
+the part of the individual, as seems often to be supposed, but the
+very reverse. We can well imagine how Mary felt the need of sympathy
+and support, separated as she was from her friends and from her
+country, which was now at war with France. Alone at Neuilly, where she
+had to seek shelter both for economy and safety, with no means of
+returning to England, and unable to go to Switzerland through her
+inability to procure a passport, her money dwindling, still she
+managed to continue her literary work; and as well as some letters on
+the subject of the Revolution, she wrote at Neuilly all that was ever
+finished of her _Historical and Moral View of the French
+Revolution_. Her only servant at this time was an old gardener, who
+used to attend her on her rambles through the woods, and more than
+once as far as Paris. On one of these occasions she was so sickened
+with horror at the evidence of recent executions which she saw in the
+streets that she began boldly denouncing the perpetrators of such
+savagery, and had to be hurried away for her life by some sympathetic
+onlookers. It was during this time of terror around and depression
+within that Mary met Captain Gilbert Imlay, an American, at the house
+of a mutual friend.
+
+Now began the complication of reasons and deeds which caused bitter
+grief in not only one generation. Mary was prompted by loneliness,
+love, and danger on all hands. There was risk in proclaiming herself
+an English subject by marriage, if indeed there was at the time the
+possibility of such a marriage as would have been valid in England,
+though, as the wife of an American citizen, she was safe. Thus, at a
+time when all laws were defied, she took the fatal step of trusting in
+Imlay's honour and constancy; and, confident of her own pure motives,
+entered into a union which her letters to him, full of love,
+tenderness, and fidelity, proved that she regarded as a sacred
+marriage; all the circumstances, and, not least, the pathetic way she
+writes to him of their child later on, prove how she only wished to
+remain faithful to him. It was now that the sad experiences of her
+early life told upon her and warped her better judgment; she who had
+seen so much of the misery of married life when love was dead,
+regarded that side, not considering the sacred relationship, the right
+side of marriage, which she came to understand later--too late, alas!
+
+So passed this _année terrible_, and with it Mary's short-lived
+happiness with Imlay, for before the end we find her writing,
+evidently saddened by his repeated absences. She followed him to
+Havre, where, in April, their child Fanny was born, and for a while
+happiness was restored, and Mary lived in comfort with him, her time
+fully occupied between work and love for Imlay and their child; but
+this period was short, for in August he was called to Paris on
+business. She followed him, but another journey of his to England only
+finished the separation. Work of some sort having been ever her one
+resource, she started for Norway with Fanny and a maid, furnished with
+a letter of Imlay's, in which he requested "all men to know that he
+appoints Mary Imlay, his wife, to transact all his business for him."
+Her letters published shortly after her return from Denmark, Norway,
+and Sweden, divested of the personal details, were considered to show
+a marked advance in literary style, and from the slow modes of
+travelling, and the many letters of introduction to people in all the
+towns and villages she visited, she was enabled to send home
+characteristic details of all classes of people. The personal portions
+of the letters are to be found among her posthumous works, and these,
+with letters written after her return, and when she was undoubtedly
+convinced of Imlay's baseness and infidelity, are terrible and
+pathetic records of her misery--misery which drove her to an attempt
+at suicide. This was fortunately frustrated, so that she was spared to
+meet with a short time of happiness later, and to prove to herself and
+Godwin, both previous sceptics in the matter, that lawful marriage can
+be happy. Mary, rescued from despair, returned to work, the restorer,
+and refused all assistance from Imlay, not degrading herself by
+receiving a monetary compensation where faithfulness was wanting. She
+also provided for her child Fanny, as Imlay disregarded entirely his
+promises of a settlement on her.
+
+As her literary work brought her again in contact with the society she
+was accustomed to, so her health and spirits revived, and she was able
+again to hold her place as one of its celebrities. And now it was that
+her friendship was renewed with that other celebrity, whose philosophy
+ranged beyond his age and century, and probably beyond some centuries
+to come. His advanced ideas are, nevertheless, what most thinking
+people would hope that the race might attain to when mankind shall
+have reached a higher status, and selfishness shall be less allowed in
+creeds, or rather in practice; for how small the resemblance between
+the founder of a creed and its followers is but too apparent.
+
+So now Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin, the author of
+_Political Justice_, have again met, and this time not under
+circumstances as adverse as in November 1790, when he dined in her
+company at Mr. Johnson's, and was disappointed because he wished to
+hear the conversation of Thomas Paine, who was a taciturn man, and he
+considered that Mary engrossed too much of the talk. Now it was
+otherwise; her literary style had gained greatly in the opinion of
+Godwin, as of others, and, as all their subjects of interest were
+similar, their friendship increased, and melted gently into mutual
+love, as exquisitely described by Godwin himself in a book now little
+known; and this love, which ended in marriage, had no after-break.
+
+But we must now again retrace our steps, for in the father of Mary
+Shelley we have another of the representative people of his time,
+whose early life and antecedents must not be passed over.
+
+William Godwin, the seventh of thirteen children, was born at
+Wisbeach, Cambridgeshire, on March 3, 1756. His parents, both of
+respectable well-to-do families, were well known in their native
+place, his great-great-grandfather having been Mayor of Newbury in
+1706. The father, John Godwin, became a dissenting minister, and
+William was brought up in all the strictness of a sectarian country
+home of that period. His mother was equally strict in her views; and a
+cousin, who became one of the family--a Miss Godwin, afterwards Mrs.
+Sotheran, with whom William was an especial favourite--brought in aid
+her strongly Calvinistic tendencies. His first studies began with an
+"Account of the Pious Deaths of many Godly Children"; and often did he
+feel willing to die if he could, with equal success, engage the
+admiration of his friends and the world. His mother devoutly believed
+that all who differed from the basis of her own religious views would
+endure the eternal torments of hell; and his father seriously reproved
+his levity when, one Sunday, he happened to take the cat in his arms
+while walking in the garden. All this naturally impressed the child at
+the time, and his chief amusement or pleasure was preaching sermons in
+the kitchen every Sunday afternoon, unmindful whether the audience was
+duly attentive or not. From a dame's school, where, by the age of
+eight, he had read through the whole of the Old and New Testament, he
+passed to one held by a certain Mr. Akers, celebrated as a penman and
+also moderately efficient in Latin and Mathematics. Godwin next became
+the pupil of Mr. Samuel Newton, whose Sandemanian views, surpassing
+those of Calvin in their wholesale holocaust of souls, for a time
+impressed him, till later thought caused him to detest both these
+views and the master who promulgated them. Indeed, it is not to be
+wondered at that so thinking a person as Godwin, remembering the rules
+laid down by those he loved and respected in his childhood, should
+have wandered far into the abstract labyrinths of right and wrong,
+and, wishing to simplify what was right, should have travelled in his
+imagination into the dim future, and have laid down a code beyond the
+scope of present mortals. Well for him, perhaps, and for his code, if
+this is yet so far beyond that it is not taken up and distorted out of
+all resemblance to his original intention before the time for its
+possible practical application comes. For Godwin himself it was also
+well that, with these uncongenial early surroundings, he, when the
+time came to think, was of the calm--most calm and unimpassioned
+philosophic temperament, instead of the high poetic nature; not that
+the two may not sometimes overlap and mingle; but with Godwin the
+downfall of old ideas led to reasoning out new theories in clear
+prose; and even this he would not give to be rashly and
+indiscriminately read at large, but published in three-guinea volumes,
+knowing well that those who could expend that sum on books are not
+usually inclined to overthrow the existing order of things. In fact,
+he felt it was the rich who wanted preaching to more than the poor.
+
+Apart from sectarian doctrines, his tutor, Mr. Newton, seems to have
+given Godwin the advantage of the free range of his library; and
+doubtless this was excellent education for him at that time. After he
+had acted as usher for over a year, from the age of fifteen, his
+mother, at his father's death in 1772, wished him to enter Homerton
+Academy; but the authorities would not admit him on suspicion of
+Sandemanianism. He, however, gained admittance to Hoxton College. Here
+he planned tragedies on Iphigenia and the death of Cæsar, and also
+began to study Sandeman's work from a library, to find out what he was
+accused of. This probably caused, later, his horror of these ideas,
+and also started his neverending search after truth.
+
+In 1777 he became, in his turn, a dissenting minister; until, with
+reading and fresh acquaintances ever widening his views, gradually his
+profession became distasteful to him, and in 1788, on quitting
+Beaconsfield, he proposed opening a school. His _Life of Lord
+Chatham_, however, gained notice, and he was led to other political
+writing, and so became launched on a literary career. With his simple
+tastes he managed not only for years to keep himself till he became
+celebrated, but he was also a great help to different members of his
+family; several of these did not come as well as William out of the
+ordeal of their strict education, but caused so little gratification
+to their mother and elder brother--a farmer who resided near the
+mother--that she destroyed all their correspondence, nearly all
+William's also, as it might relate to them. Letters from the cousin,
+Mrs. Sotheran, show, however, that William Godwin's novel-writing was
+likewise a sore point in his family.
+
+In the midst of his literary work and philosophic thought, it was
+natural that Godwin should get associated with other men of advanced
+opinions. Joseph Fawcet, whose literary and intellectual eminence was
+much admired in his day, was one of the first to influence Godwin--his
+declamation against domestic affections must have coincided well with
+Godwin's unimpassioned justice; Thomas Holcroft, with his curious
+ideas of death and disease, whose ardent republicanism led to his
+being tried for his life as a traitor; George Dyson, whose abilities
+and zeal in the cause of literature and truth promised much that was
+unfortunately never realised: these, and later Samuel Taylor
+Coleridge, were acknowledged by Godwin to have greatly influenced his
+ideas. Godwin acted according to his own theories of right in adopting
+and educating Thomas Cooper, a second cousin, whose father died,
+ruined, in India. The rules laid down in his diary show that Godwin
+strove to educate him successfully, and he certainly gained the
+youth's confidence, and launched him successfully in his own chosen
+profession as an actor. Godwin seems always to have adhered to his
+principles, and after the success of his _Life of Chatham_, when
+he became a contributor to the _Political Herald_, he attracted
+the attention of the Whig Party, to whose cause he was so useful that
+Fox proposed, through Sheridan, to set a fund aside to pay him as
+Editor. This, however, was not accepted by Godwin, who would not lose
+his independence by becoming attached to any party.
+
+He was naturally, to a great extent, a follower of Rousseau, and a
+sympathiser with the ideas of the French Revolution, and was one of
+the so-called "French Revolutionists," at whose meetings Horne Tooke,
+Holcroft, Stanhope, and others figured. Nor did he neglect to defend,
+in the _Morning Chronicle_, some of these when on their trial for
+high treason; though, from his known principles, he was himself in
+danger; and without doubt his clear exposition of the true case
+greatly modified public opinion and helped to prevent an adverse
+verdict. Among Godwin's multifarious writings are his novels, some of
+which had great success, especially _Caleb Williams_; also his
+sketch of English History, contributed to the _Annual Register_.
+His historical writing shows much research and study of old documents.
+On comparing it with the contemporary work of his friends, such as
+Coleridge, it becomes evident that his knowledge and learning were
+utilized by them. But these works were anonymous; by his _Political
+Justice_ he became famous. This work is a philosophical treatise
+based on the assumption, that man, as a reasoning being, can be guided
+wholly by reason, and that, were he educated from this point of view,
+laws would be unnecessary. It must be observed here that Godwin could
+not then take into consideration the laws of heredity, now better
+understood; how the criminal has not only the weight of bad education
+and surroundings against him, but also how the very formation of the
+head is in certain cases an almost insuperable evil. He considered
+many of the laws relating to property, marriage, &c., unnecessary, as
+people guided by reason would not, for instance, wish for wealth at
+the expense of starving brethren. Far in the distance as the
+realisation of this doctrine may seem, it should still be remembered
+that, as with each physical discovery, the man of genius must foresee.
+As Columbus imagined land where he found America; as a planet is fixed
+by the astronomer before the telescope has revealed it to his mortal
+eye; so in the world of psychology and morals it is necessary to point
+out the aim to be attained before human nature has reached those
+divine qualifications which are only shadowed forth here and there by
+more than usually elevated natures. In fact Godwin, who sympathised
+entirely with the theories of the French Revolution, and even
+surpassed French ideas on most subjects, disapproved of the immediate
+carrying out of these ideas and views; he wished for preaching and
+reasoning till people should gradually become convinced of the truth,
+and the rich should be as ready to give as the poor to receive. Even
+in the matter of marriage, though strongly opposed to it personally
+(on philosophical grounds, not from the ordinary trite reasoning
+against it), he yielded his opinion to the claim of individual justice
+towards the woman whom he came to love with an undying affection, and
+for whom, fortunately for his theories, he needed not to set aside the
+impulse of affection for that of justice; and these remarks bring us
+again to the happy time in the lives of Godwin and Mary
+Wollstonecraft, when friendship melted into love, and they were
+married shortly afterwards, in March 1797, at old St. Pancras Church,
+London.
+
+This new change in her life interfered no more with the energy for
+work with Mary Wollstonecraft than with Godwin. They adopted the
+singular, though in their case probably advantageous, decision to
+continue each to have a separate place of abode, in order that each
+might work uninterruptedly, though, as pointed out by an earnest
+student of their character, they probably wasted more time in their
+constant interchange of notes on all subjects than they would have
+lost by a few conversations. On the other hand, as their thoughts were
+worth recording, we have the benefit of their plan. The short notes
+which passed between Mary and Godwin, as many as three and four in a
+day, as well as letters of considerable length written during a tour
+which Godwin made in the midland counties with his friend Basil
+Montague, show how deep and simple their affection was, that there was
+no need of hiding the passing cloud, that they both equally disliked
+and wished to simplify domestic details. There was, for instance, some
+sort of slight dispute as to who should manage a plumber, on which
+occasion Mary seems to have been somewhat hurt at its being put upon
+her, as giving an idea of her inferiority. This, with the tender jokes
+about Godwin's icy philosophy, and the references to a little
+"William" whom they were both anxiously expecting, all evince the
+tender devotion of husband and wife, whose relationship was of a
+nature to endure through ill or good fortune. Little Fanny was
+evidently only an added pleasure to the two, and Godwin's thought of
+her at a distance and his choice of the prettiest mug at Wedgewood's
+with "green and orange-tawny flowers," testify to the fatherly
+instinct of Godwin. But, alas! this loving married friendship was not
+to last long, for the day arrived, August 30, 1797, which had been
+long expected; and the hopeful state of the case is shown in three
+little letters written by Mary to her husband, for she wished him to
+be spared anxiety by absence. And there was born a little girl, not
+the William so quaintly spoken of; but the Mary whose future life we
+must try and realise. Even now her first trouble comes, for, within a
+few hours of the child's birth, dangerous symptoms began with the
+mother; ten days of dread anxiety ensued, and not all the care of
+intelligent watchers, nor the constant waiting for service of the
+husband's faithful intimate friends, nor the skill of the first
+doctors could save the life which was doomed: Fate must wreak its
+relentless will. Her work remains to help many a struggling woman, and
+still to give hope of more justice to follow; perchance at one
+important moment it misled her own child. And so the mysteries of the
+workings of Fate and the mysteries of death joined with those of a new
+life.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+GIRLHOOD OF MARY--PATERNAL TROUBLES.
+
+
+And now with the beginning of this fragile little life begin the
+anxieties and sorrow of poor Godwin. The blank lines drawn in his
+diary for Sunday 10th September 1797, show more than words how
+unutterable was his grief. During the time of his wife's patient agony
+he had managed to ask if she had any wishes concerning Fanny and Mary.
+She was fortunately able to reply that her faith in his wisdom was
+entire.
+
+On the very day of his wife's death Godwin himself wrote some letters
+he considered necessary, nor did he neglect to write in his own
+characteristic plain way to one who he considered had slighted his
+wife. His friends Mr. Basil Montague and Mr. Marshall arranged the
+funeral, and Mrs. Reveley, who had with her the children before the
+mother's death, continued her care till they returned to the father on
+the 17th. Mrs. Fenwick, who had been in constant attendance on Mary,
+then took care of them for a time. Indeed, Mary's fame and character
+brought forward many willing to care for the motherless infant, whose
+life was only saved from a dangerous illness by this loving zeal.
+Among others Mr. and Mrs. Nicholson appeared with offers of help, and
+as early as September 18 we find that Godwin had requested Mr.
+Nicholson to give an opinion as to the infant's physiognomy, with a
+view to her education, which he (with Trelawny later) considered could
+not begin too soon, or as the latter said: "Talk of education
+beginning at two years! Two months is too late."
+
+Thus we see Godwin conscientiously trying to bring in an imperfect
+science to assist him in the difficult task of developing his infant's
+mind, in place of the watchful love of an intelligent mother, who
+would check the first symptoms of ill-temper, be firm against
+ill-placed determination, encourage childish imagination, and not let
+the idea of untruth be presented to the child till old enough to
+discriminate for itself. A hard task enough for any father, still
+harder for Godwin, beset by all kinds of difficulties, and having to
+work in the midst of them for his and the two children's daily
+sustenance. Friends, and good friends, he certainly had; but most
+people will recognise that strength in these matters does not rest in
+numbers. The wet nurse needed by little Mary, though doubtless the
+essential necessity of the time, would not add to the domestic
+comfort, especially to that of Miss Louisa Jones, a friend of Harriet
+Godwin, who had been installed to superintend Godwin's household. This
+latter arrangement, again, did not tend to Godwin's comfort, as from
+Miss Jones's letters it is evident that she wished to marry him. Her
+wish not being reciprocated, she did not long remain an inmate of his
+house, and the nurse, who was fortunately devoted to the baby, was
+then over-looked from time to time by Mrs. Reveley and other ladies.
+
+Of anecdotes of Mary's infancy and childhood there are but few, but
+from the surroundings we can picture the child. Her father about this
+time seems to have neglected all his literary work except the one of
+love--writing his wife's "Memoirs" and reading her published and
+unpublished work. In this undertaking he was greatly assisted by Mr.
+Skeys. Her sisters, on the contrary, gave as little assistance as
+possible, and ended all communication with Godwin at this difficult
+period of his life, and for a long while utterly neglected their poor
+sister's little children, when they might have repaid to some extent
+the debt of gratitude they owed to her.
+
+All these complicated and jarring circumstances must have suggested to
+Godwin that another marriage might he the best expedient, and he
+accordingly set to work in a systematic way this time to acquire his
+end. Passion was not the motive, and probably there was too much
+system, for he was unsuccessful on two occasions. The first was with
+Miss Harriet Lee, the authoress of several novels and of _The
+Canterbury Tales_. Godwin seems to have been much struck by her,
+and, after four interviews at Bath, wrote on his return to London a
+very characteristic and pressing letter of invitation to her to stay
+in his house if she came to London, explaining that there was a lady
+(Miss Jones) who superintended his home. As this letter met with no
+answer, he tried three additional letters, drafts of all being extant.
+The third one was probably too much considered, for Miss Lee returned
+it annotated on the margin, expressing her disapproval of its
+egotistical character. Godwin, however, was not to be daunted, and
+made a fourth attempt, full of many sensible and many quaint reasons,
+not all of which would be pleasing to a lady; but he succeeded in
+regaining Miss Lee's friendship, though he could not persuade her to
+be his wife. This was from April to August 1798.
+
+About the same time there was a project of Godwin and Thomas Wedgewood
+keeping house together; but as they seem to have much differed when
+together, the plan was wisely dropped. Godwin's notes in his plan of
+work for the year 1798 are interesting, as showing how he was anxious
+to modify some of his opinions expressed in _Political Justice_,
+especially those bearing on the affections, which he now admits must
+naturally play an important part in human action, though he avers his
+opinion that none of his previous conclusions are affected by these
+admissions. Much other work was planned out during this time, and many
+fresh intellectual acquaintances made, Wordsworth and Southey among
+others. His mother's letters to Godwin show what a constant drain his
+family were upon his slender means, and how nobly he always strove to
+help them when in need. These letters are full of much common sense,
+and though quaintly illiterate are, perhaps, not so much amiss for the
+period at which they were written, when many ladies who had greater
+social and monetary advantages were, nevertheless, frequently astray
+in these matters.
+
+Godwin's novel of _St. Leon_, published in 1799, was another
+attempt to give the domestic affections their due place in his scheme
+of life; and the description of Marguerite, drawn from Mary
+Wollstonecraft, and that of her wedded life with St. Leon, are
+beautiful passages illustrative of Godwin's own happy time of
+marriage.
+
+In July 1799, the death of Mr. Reveley suggested a fresh attempt at
+marriage to Godwin; but now he was probably too prompt, for, knowing
+that Mr. Reveley and his wife had not always been on the best of
+terms, although his sudden death had driven her nigh frantic, Godwin,
+relying on certain previous expressions of affection for himself by
+Mrs. Reveley, proposed within a month after her husband's death, and
+begged her to set aside prejudices and cowardly ceremonies and be his.
+As in the previous case, a second and a third lengthy letter, full of
+subtle reasoning, were ineffectual, and did not even bring about an
+interview till December 3rd, when Godwin and Mrs. Reveley met, in
+company with Mr. Gisborne. To this gentleman Mrs. Reveley was
+afterwards married. We shall meet them both again later on.
+
+All this time there is little though affectionate mention of Mary
+Godwin in her father's diary. Little Fanny, who had always been a
+favourite, used to accompany Godwin on some of his visits to friends.
+
+Many of Godwin's letters at this time show that he was not too
+embarrassed to be able to assist his friends in time of need; twenty
+pounds sent to his friend Arnot, ten pounds shortly afterwards through
+Mrs. Agnes Hall to a lady in great distress, whose name is unknown,
+prove that he was ready to carry out his theories in practice. It is
+interesting to observe these frequent instances of generosity, as they
+account to some extent for his subsequent difficulties. In the midst
+of straits and disappointments Godwin managed to have his children
+well taken care of, and there was evidently a touching sympathy and
+confidence between himself and them, as shown in Godwin's letters to
+his friend Marshall during a rare absence from the children occasioned
+by a visit to friends in Ireland. His thought and sincere solicitude
+and messages, and evident anxiety to be with them again, are all
+equally touching; Fanny having the same number of kisses sent her as
+Mary, with that perfect justice which is so beneficial to the
+character of children. We can now picture the scarcely three year old
+Mary and little Fanny taken to await the return of the coach with
+their father, and sitting under the Kentish Town trees in glad
+expectancy.
+
+But this time of happy infancy was not to last long; for doubtless
+Godwin felt it irksome to have to consider whether the house-linen was
+in order, and such like details, and was thus prepared, in 1801, to
+accept the demonstrative advances of Mrs. Clairmont, a widow who took
+up her residence next door to him in the Polygon, Somers Town. She had
+two children, a boy and a girl, the latter somewhat younger than Mary.
+The widow needed no introduction or admittance to his house, as from
+the balcony she was able to commence a campaign of flattery to which
+Godwin soon succumbed. The marriage took place in December 1801, at
+Shoreditch Church, and was not made known to Godwin's friends till
+after it had been solemnised. Mrs. Clairmont evidently did her best to
+help Godwin through the pecuniary difficulties of his career. She was
+not an ignorant woman, and her work at translations proves her not to
+have been without cleverness of a certain kind; but this probably made
+more obvious the natural vulgarity of her disposition. For example,
+when talking of bringing children up to do the work they were fitted
+to, she discovered that her own daughter Jane was fitted for
+accomplishments, while little Mary and Fanny were turned into
+household drudges. These distinctions would naturally engender an
+antipathy to her, which later on would help in estranging Mary from
+her father's house; but occasionally we have glimpses of the little
+ones making themselves happy, in childlike fashion, in the midst of
+difficulties and disappointments on Godwin's part. On one occasion
+Mary and Jane had concealed themselves under a sofa in order to hear
+Coleridge recite _The Ancient Mariner_. Mrs. Godwin, unmindful of
+the delight they would have in listening to poetry, found the little
+ones and was banishing them to bed; when Coleridge with
+kind-heartedness, or the love ever prevalent in poets of an audience,
+however humble, interceded for the small things who could sit under a
+sofa, and so they remained up and heard the poet read his poem. The
+treat was never afterwards forgotten, and one cannot over-estimate
+such pleasures in forming the character of a child. Nor were such the
+only intellectual delights the children shared in, for Charles Lamb
+was among Godwin's numerous friends at this period, and a frequent
+visitor at his house; and we can still hear in imagination the merry
+laughter of children, old and young, whom he gathered about him, and
+who brightened at his ever ready fun. One long-remembered joke was how
+one evening, at supper at Godwin's, Lamb entered the room first,
+seized a leg of mutton, blew out the candle, and placed the mutton in
+Martin Burney's hand, and, on the candle being relit, exclaimed, "Oh,
+Martin! Martin! I should never have thought it of you."
+
+This and such like whimsies (as when Lamb would carry off a small
+cruet from the table, making Mrs. Godwin go through a long search, and
+would then quietly walk in the next day and replace it as if it were
+the most natural thing for a cruet to find its way into a pocket),
+would break the monotony of the children's days. It was infinitely
+more enlivening than the routine in some larger houses, where poor
+little children are frequently shut up in a back room on a third floor
+and left for long hours to the tender mercies of some nurse, whose
+small slaves or tyrants they become, according to their nature. And
+when we remember that the Polygon at that time was touching fields and
+lanes, we know that little Mary must have had one of the delights most
+prized by children, picking buttercups and daisies, unmolested by a
+gardener. But during this happy age, when the child would probably
+have infinitely more pleasure in washing a cup and saucer than in
+playing the scales, however superior the latter performance may be,
+Godwin had various schemes and hopes frustrated. At times his health
+was very precarious, with frequent fainting fits, causing grave
+anxiety for the future. In 1803 his son William was born, making the
+fifth member of his miscellaneous family. At times Mrs. Godwin's
+temper seems to have been very much tried or trying, and on one
+occasion she expressed the wish for a separation; but the idea appears
+to have been dropped on Godwin's writing one of his very calm and
+reasonable letters, saying that he had no obstacle to oppose to it,
+and that, if it was to take place, he hoped it would not be long in
+hand; he certainly went on to say that the separation would be a
+source of great misery to himself. Either this reason mollified Mrs.
+Godwin, or else the apparent ease with which she might have carried
+out her project, made her hesitate, as we hear no more of it. Godwin,
+however, had occasion to write her philosophically expostulatory
+letters on her temper, which we must hope, for the children's sake,
+produced a satisfactory effect; for surely nothing can be more
+injurious to the happiness of children than to witness the
+ungovernable temper of their elders; but with Godwin's calm
+disposition, quarrels must have been one-sided, and consequently less
+damaging.
+
+Godwin superintended the education of his children himself, and wrote
+many books for this purpose, which formed part of his juvenile library
+later on. "Baldwin's" fables and his histories for children were
+published by Godwin under this cognomen, owing to his political views
+having prejudiced many people against his name. His chief aim appears
+to have been to keep a certain moral elevation before the minds of
+children, as in the excellent preface to the _History of Rome_,
+where he dwells on the fact of the stories of Mucius, Curtius, and
+Regulus being disputed; but considers that stories--if they be no
+more--handed down from the great periods of Roman history are
+invaluable to stimulate the character of children to noble sentiments
+and actions. But in Godwin's case, as in many others, it must have
+been a difficult task counteracting the effect of example; for we
+cannot imagine the influence of a woman to have been ennobling who
+could act as Mrs. Godwin did at an early period of her married life;
+who, when one of her husband's friends, whom she did not care about,
+called to see Godwin, explained that it was impossible, as the kettle
+had just fallen off the hob and scalded both his legs. When the same
+friend met Godwin the next day in the street, and was surprised at his
+speedy recovery, the philosopher replied that it was only an invention
+of his wife. The safe-guard in such cases is often in the quick
+apprehension of children themselves, who are frequently saved from the
+errors of their elders by their perception of the consequences.
+Unfortunately, Mrs. Godwin's influence must have been lessened in
+other matters where her feeling for propriety, if with her only from a
+conventional and time-serving point of view, might have averted the
+fatal consequences which ensued later. Could she have gained the love
+and respect of the children instead of making them, as afterwards
+expressed by Mary, hate her, her moral precepts would have worked to
+more effect. It may have appeared to the girls, who could not
+appreciate the self-devotion of Godwin in acting against theories for
+the sake of individual justice, that the cause of all their
+unhappiness (and doubtless at times they felt it acutely) was owing to
+their father not having adhered to his previous anti-matrimonial
+opinions, and they were thus prepared to disregard what seemed to them
+social prejudices.
+
+In the meantime Godwin struggled on to provide for his numerous
+family, not necessarily losing his enthusiasm through his need of
+money as might be supposed, for, fortunately, there are great
+compensations in nature, and not unfrequently what appears to be done
+for money is done really for love of those whom money will relieve;
+and so through this necessity the very love and anguish of the soul
+are transfused into the work. On the other hand, we see not
+infrequently, after the first enthusiasm of youth wears off, how the
+poetic side of a man's nature deteriorates, and the world and his work
+lose through the very ease and comfort he has attained to, so that the
+real degradation of the man or lowering of his nature comes more from
+wealth than poverty: thus what are spoken of as degrading
+circumstances, are, truly, the very reverse--a fact felt strongly by
+Shelley and such like natures who feel their ease is to be shared. We
+find Godwin working at his task of Chaucer, with love, daily at the
+British Museum, and corresponding with the Keeper of Records in the
+Exchequer Office and Chapter of Westminster, and Herald College, and
+the Librarian of the Bodleian Library; also writing many still extant
+letters pertaining to the subject. The sum of three hundred pounds
+paid to Godwin for this work was considered very small by him, though
+it scarcely seems so now.
+
+Godwin found means and time occasionally to pay a visit to the
+country, as in September 1803, when he visited his mother and
+introduced his wife to her, as also to his old friends in Norwich; and
+during the sojourn of Mrs. Godwin and some of the children at
+Southend, a deservedly favourite resort of Mrs. Godwin, and later of
+Mrs. Shelley (for the sweet country and lovely Essex lanes, of even so
+late as thirty or forty years ago, made it a resort loved by artists)
+Godwin superintended the letter-writing of his children. We ascertain,
+also, from their letters to him during absence, that they studied
+history and attended lectures with him; so that in all probability his
+daughter Mary's mind was really more cultivated and open to receive
+impressions in after life than if she had passed through a "finishing"
+education at some fashionable school. It is no mere phrase that to
+know some people is a liberal education; and if she was only saved
+from perpetrating some of the school-girl trash in the way of drawing,
+it was a gain to her intellect, for what can be more lowering to
+intelligence of perception than the utterly inartistic frivolities
+which are supposed to inculcate art in a country out of which the
+sense of it had been all but eradicated in Puritan England, though
+some great artists had happily reappeared! Mary at least learnt to
+love literature and poetry, and had, by her love of reading, a
+universe of wealth opened to her--surely no mean beginning. In art,
+had she shown any disposition to it, her father could undoubtedly have
+obtained some of the best advice of his day, as we see that Mulready
+and Linnell were intimate enough to spend a day at Hampstead with the
+children and Mrs. Godwin during Godwin's absence in Norfolk in 1808;
+in fact, Charles Clairmont, as seen in his account written to his
+step-father, was at this time having lessons from Linnell. Perhaps
+Mrs. Godwin had not discovered the same gift in Mary.
+
+At this same date we have the last of old Mrs. Godwin's letters to her
+son. She speaks of the fearful price of food owing to the war, says
+that she is weary, and only wishes to be with Christ. Godwin spent a
+few days with her then, and the next year we find him at her funeral,
+as she died on August 13, 1809. His letter to his wife on that
+occasion is very touching, from its depth of feeling. He mourns the
+loss of a superior who exercised a mysterious protection over him, so
+that now, at her death, he for the first time feels alone.
+
+Another severance from old associations had occurred this year in the
+death of Thomas Holcroft who, in spite of occasional differences, had
+always known and loved Godwin well, and whose last words when dying
+and pressing his hands were, "My dear, dear friend." Godwin, however,
+did not at all approve of Hazlitt, in bringing out Holcroft's life,
+using all his private memoranda and letters about his friends, and
+wrote expostulatory letters to Mrs. Holcroft on the subject. He
+considered it pandering to the worst passion of the malignity of
+mankind.
+
+There do not appear to be many records of the Godwin family kept
+during the next two or three years. Mary was intimate with the
+Baxters. It was Mr. Baxter whom Mrs. Godwin tried to put off by the
+story of Godwin's scalded legs. We also find Mary at Ramsgate with
+Mrs. Godwin and her brother William, in May 1811, when she was nearly
+fourteen years old. As Mary and Mrs. Godwin were evidently unsuited to
+live together, these visits, though desirable for her health, were
+probably not altogether pleasant times to either, to judge by remarks
+in Godwin's letters to his wife. He hopes that, in spite of
+unfavourable appearances, Mary will still become a wise, and, what is
+more, a good and happy woman; this, evidently, in answer to some
+complaint of his wife. During these years many fresh acquaintances
+were made by Godwin; but as they had little or no apparent influence
+on Mary's after career, we may pass them over and notice at once the
+first communications which took place between Godwin and another
+personage, by far the greatest in this life drama, even great in the
+world's drama, for now for the first time in this story we come across
+the name of Shelley, with the words in Godwin's diary, "Write to
+Shelley." Having arrived at a name so full of import to all concerned
+in this Life, we must yet again retrace the past.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+SHELLEY.
+
+
+Shelley, a name dear to so many now, who are either drawn to him by
+his lyrics, which open an undreamed-of fountain of sympathy to many a
+silent and otherwise solitary heart, or who else are held spell-bound
+by his grand and eloquent poetical utterances of what the human race
+may aspire to. A being of this transcendent nature seems generally to
+be more the outcome of his age, of a period, the expression of nature,
+than the direct scion of his own family. So in Shelley's case there
+appears little immediate intellectual relation between himself and his
+ancestors, who seem for nearly two centuries preceding his birth to
+have been almost unknown, except for the registers of their baptisms,
+deaths, and marriages.
+
+Prior to 1623, a link has been hitherto missing in the family
+genealogy--a link which the scrupulous care of Mr. Jeaffreson has
+brought to light, and which his courtesy places at the service of the
+writer. This connects the poet's family with the Michel Grove
+Shelleys, a fact hitherto only surmised. The document is this:--
+
+
+      SHELLEY'S CASE AND COKE'S REPORT, 896.
+
+25 Sept. 1 & 2 Philip and Mary. Between Edward Shelley of
+Worminghurst, in the county of Sussex, Esqre., of the one part, and
+Rd. Cowper and Wm. Martin of the other part.
+
+90a. Covt. to suffer recovery to enure as to Findon Manor, etc.
+
+90b. To the use of him the said Edward Shelley and of the heirs male
+of his body lawfully begotten, and for lack of such issue.
+
+To the use of the heirs male of the body of John Shelley, Esqre.,
+sometime of Michael Grove, deceased, father to the said Edward
+Shelley, etc.
+
+
+It will be obvious to all readers of this important document that the
+last clause carries us back unmistakably from the Worminghurst
+Shelleys to the Michel Grove Shelleys, establishing past dispute the
+relationship of father and son.
+
+The poet's great grandfather Timothy, who died twenty-two years before
+Shelley's birth, seems to have gone out of the beaten track in
+migrating to America, and practising as an apothecary, or, as Captain
+Medwin puts it, "quack doctor," probably leaving England at an early
+age; he may not have found facilities for qualifying in America, and
+we may at least hope that he would do less harm with the simple herbs
+used by the unqualified than with the bleeding treatment in vogue
+before the Brunonian system began. Anyway, he made money to help on
+the fortunes of his family. His younger son, Bysshe, who added to the
+family wealth by marrying in succession two heiresses, also gained a
+baronetcy by adhering to the Whig Party and the Duke of Norfolk. He
+appears to have increased in eccentricity with age and became
+exceedingly penurious. He was evidently not regarded as a desirable
+match for either of his wives, as he had to elope with both of them;
+and his marriage with the first, Miss Michell, the grandmother of the
+poet, is said to have been celebrated by the parson of the Fleet. This
+took place the year before these marriages were made illegal. These
+facts about Shelley's ancestors, though apparently trivial, are
+interesting as proving that his forerunners were not altogether
+conventional, and making the anomaly of the coming of such a poet less
+strange, as genius is not unfrequently allied with eccentricity.
+
+Bysshe's son Timothy seems to have conformed more to ordinary views
+than his father, and he married, when nearly forty, Elizabeth Pilfold,
+reputed a great beauty. The first child of this marriage, born on
+August 4, 1792, was the poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, born to all the
+ease and comfort of an English country home, but with the weird
+imaginings which in childhood could people the grounds and
+surroundings with ancient snakes and fairies of all forms, and which
+later on were to lead him far out of the beaten track. Shelley's
+little sisters were the confidants of his childhood, and their
+sympathy must have made up then for the lack of it in his parents.
+Some of their childish games at diabolical processions, making a
+little hell of their own by burning a fagot stack, &c., shows how
+early his searching mind dispersed the terrors, while it delighted in
+the picturesque or fantastic images, of superstition. Few persons
+realise to themselves how soon highly imaginative children may be
+influenced by the superstitions they hear around them, and assuredly
+Shelley's brain never recovered from some of these early influences:
+the mind that could so quickly reason and form inferences would
+naturally be of that sensitive and susceptible kind which would bear
+the scar of bad education. Shelley's mother does not appear so much to
+have had real good sense, as what is generally called common sense,
+and thus she was incapable of understanding a nature like that of her
+son; and thought more of his bringing home a well-filled game bag (a
+thing in every way repulsive to Shelley's tastes) than of trying to
+understand what he was thinking; so Shelley had to pass through
+childhood, his sisters being his chief companions, as he had no
+brother till he was thirteen. At ten years of age he went to school at
+Sion House Academy, and thence to Eton, before he was turned twelve.
+At both these schools, with little exception, he was solitary, not
+having much in common with the other boys, and consequently he found
+himself the butt for their tormenting ingenuity. He began a plan of
+resistance to the fagging system, and never yielded; this seems to
+have displeased the masters as much as the boys. At Eton he formed one
+of his romantic attachments for a youth of his own age. He seems now,
+as ever after, to have felt the yearning for perfect sympathy in some
+human being; as one idol fell short of his self-formed ideal, he
+sought for another. This was not the nature to be trained by bullying
+and flogging, though sympathy and reason would never find him
+irresponsive. His unresentful nature was shown in the way he helped
+the boys who tormented him with their lessons; for though he appeared
+to study little in the regular way, learning came to him naturally.
+
+It must not, however, be supposed that Shelley was quite solitary, as
+the records of some of his old schoolfellows prove the contrary; nor
+was he averse to society when of a kind congenial to his tastes; but
+he always disliked coarse talk and jokes. Nature was ever dear to him;
+the walks round Eton were his chief recreation, and we can well
+conceive how he would feel in the lovely and peaceful churchyard of
+Stoke Pogis, where undoubtedly he would read Gray's Elegy. These
+feelings would not be sympathised with by the average of schoolboys;
+but, on the other hand, it is not apparent why Shelley should have
+changed his character, as the embryo poet would also necessarily not
+care for all their tastes. In short, the education at a public school
+of that day must have been a great cruelty to a boy of Shelley's
+sensitive disposition.
+
+One great pleasure of Shelley's while at Eton was visiting Dr. Lind,
+who assisted him with chemistry, and whose kindness during an illness
+seems to have made a lasting impression on the youth; but generally
+those who had been in authority over him had only raised a spirit of
+revolt. One great gain for the world was the passionate love of
+justice and freedom which this aroused in him, as shown in the stanzas
+from _The Revolt of Islam_--
+
+  Thoughts of great deeds were mine, dear friend, when first
+  The clouds which wrap this world from youth did pass.
+
+There can be no doubt that these verses are truly autobiographical;
+they indicate a first determination to war against tyranny. The very
+fact of his great facility in acquiring knowledge must have been a
+drawback to him at school where time on his hands was, for lack of
+better material, frequently spent in reading all the foolish romances
+he could lay hold of in the neighbouring book-shops. His own early
+romances showed the influence of this bad literature. Of course, then
+as now, fine art was a sealed book to the young student. It is
+difficult to fancy what Shelley might have been under different early
+influences, and whether perchance the gain to himself might not have
+been a loss to the world. Fortunately, Shelley's love of imagination
+found at last a field of poetry for itself, and an ideal future for
+the world instead of turning to ruffianism, high or low, which the
+neglect of the legitimate outlet for imagination so frequently
+induces. How little this moral truth seems to be considered in a
+country like ours, where art is quite overlooked in the system of
+government, and where the hereditary owners of hoarded wealth rest
+content, as a rule, with the canvases acquired by some ancestor on a
+grand tour at a date when Puritan England had already obliterated
+perception; so that frequently a few _chefs d'oeuvre_ and many
+daubs are hung indiscriminately together, giving equal pleasure or
+distaste for art. This is apposite to dwell on as showing the want of
+this influence on Shelley and his surroundings. From a tour in Italy
+made by Shelley's own father the chief acquisition is said to have
+been a very bad picture of Vesuvius.
+
+It is becoming difficult to realise at present, when flogging is
+scarcely permitted in schools, what the sufferings of a boy like
+Shelley must have been; sent to school by his father with the
+admonition to his master not to spare the rod, and where the masters
+left the boy, who was undoubtedly unlike his companions, to treatment
+of a kind from which one case of death at least has resulted quite
+recently in our own time. Such proceedings which might have made a
+tyrant or a slave of Shelley succeeded only in making a rebel; his
+inquiring mind was not to be easily satisfied, and must assuredly have
+been a difficulty in his way with a conservative master; already, at
+Eton, we find him styled Mad Shelley and Shelley the Atheist.
+
+In 1810 Shelley removed to University College, Oxford, after an
+enjoyable holiday with his family, during which he found time for an
+experiment in authorship, his father authorising a stationer to print
+for him. If only, instead of this, his father had checked for a time
+these immature productions of Shelley's pen, the youth might have been
+spared banishment from Oxford and his own father's house, and all the
+misfortune and tragedy which ensued. Shelley also found time for a
+first love with his cousin, Harriet Grove. This also the unfortunate
+printing facilities apparently quashed. There is some discussion as to
+whether he left Eton in disgrace, but any way the matter must have
+been a slight affair, as no one appears to have kept any record of it;
+and should one of the masters have recommended the removal of Shelley
+from such uncongenial surroundings, it would surely have been very
+sensible advice.
+
+Oxford was, in many respects, much to Shelley's taste. The freedom of
+the student life there suited him, as he was able to follow the
+studies most to his liking.
+
+The professional lectures chiefly in vogue, on divinity, geometry, and
+history, were not the most to his liking--history in particular seemed
+ever to him a terrible record of misery and crime--but in his own
+chambers he could study poetry, natural philosophy, and metaphysics.
+The outcome of these studies, advanced speculative thought, was not,
+however, to be tolerated within the University precincts, and,
+unfortunately for Shelley, his favourite subjects of conversation were
+tabooed, had it not been for one light-hearted and amusing friend,
+Thomas Jefferson Hogg, a gentleman whose acquaintance Shelley made
+shortly after his settling in Oxford in the Michaelmas term of 1810.
+This friendship, like all that Shelley entered on, was intended to
+endure "for ever," and, as usual, Shelley impulsively for a time threw
+so much of his own personality into his idea of the character of his
+friend as to prepare the way for future disappointment.
+
+Hogg was decidedly intellectual, but with a strong conservative
+tendency, making him quite content with the existing state of things
+so long as he could take life easily and be amused. His intellect,
+however, was clear enough to make him perceive that it is the poet who
+raises life from the apathy which assails even the most worldly-minded
+and contented, so that he in his turn was able to love Shelley with
+the love which is not afraid of a laugh, without the possibility of
+which no friendship, it has been said, can be genuine. Many are the
+charming stories giving a living presence to Shelley while at Oxford,
+preserved by this friend; here we meet with him taking an infant from
+its mother's arms while crossing the bridge with Hogg, and questioning
+it as to its previous existence, which surely the babe had not had
+time to forget if it would but speak--but alas, the mother declared
+she had never heard it speak, nor any other child of its age; here
+comes also the charming incident of the torn coat, and Shelley's
+ecstasy on its having been fine drawn. These and such-like amusing
+anecdotes show the genuine and unpedantic side of Shelley's character,
+the delightfully natural and loveable personality which is ever allied
+to genius. With the fun and humour were mixed long readings and
+discussions on the most serious and solemn subjects. Plato was
+naturally a great delight to him; he had a decided antipathy to Euclid
+and mathematical reasoning, and was consequently unable to pursue
+scientific researches on a system; but his love of chemistry and his
+imaginative faculty led him to wish in anticipation for the forces of
+nature to be utilised for human labour, &c. Shelley's reading and
+reading powers were enormous. He was seldom without a pocket edition
+of one of his favourite great authors, whose works he read with as
+much ease as the modern languages.
+
+This delightful time of study and ease was not to endure. Shelley's
+nature was impelled onwards as irresistibly as the mountain torrent,
+and as with it all obstacles had to yield. He could not rest satisfied
+with reading and discussions with Hogg on theological and moral
+questions, and, being debarred debate on these subjects in the
+university, he felt he must appeal to a larger audience, the public,
+and consequently he brought out, with the cognisance of Hogg, a
+pamphlet entitled _The Necessity of Atheism_. This work actually
+got into circulation for about twenty minutes, when it was discovered
+by one of the Fellows of the College, who immediately convinced the
+booksellers that an _auto-da-fé_ was necessary, and all the
+pamphlets were at once consigned to the back kitchen fire; but the
+affair did not end there. Shelley's handwriting was recognised on some
+letters sent with copies of the work, and consequently both he and
+Hogg were summoned before a meeting in the Common room of the College.
+First Shelley, and then Hogg, declined to answer questions, and
+refused to disavow all knowledge of the work, whereupon the two were
+summarily expelled from Oxford. Shelley complained bitterly of the
+ungentlemanly way they were treated, and the authorities, with equal
+reason, of the rebellious defiance of the students; yet once more we
+must regret that there was no one but Hogg who realised the latent
+genius of Shelley, that there was no one to feel that patience and
+sympathy would not be thrown away upon a young man free from all the
+vices and frivolities of the time and place, whose crime was an
+inquiring mind, and rashness in putting his views into print. Surely
+the dangers which might assail a young man thus thrown on the world
+and alienated from his family by this disgrace might have received
+more consideration. This seems clear enough now, when Shelley's ideas
+have been extolled even in as well as out of the pulpit.
+
+So now we find Shelley expelled from Oxford and arrived in London in
+March 1811, when only eighteen years of age, alone with Hogg to fight
+the battle of life, with no previous experience of misfortune to give
+ballast to his feelings, but with a brain surcharged with mysteriously
+imbibed ideas of the woes of others and of the world--a dangerous age
+and set of conditions for a youth to be thrown on his own resources.
+Admission to his father's house was only to be accorded on the
+condition of his giving up the society of Hogg; this condition,
+imposed at the moment when Shelley considered himself indebted to Hogg
+for life for the manner in which he stood by him in the Oxford ordeal,
+was refused. Shelley looked out for lodgings without result, till a
+wall paper representing a trellised vine apparently decided him. With
+twenty pounds borrowed from his printer to leave Oxford, Shelley is
+now settled in London, unaided by his father, a small present of money
+sent by his mother being returned, as he could not comply with the
+wishes which she expressed on the same occasion. From this time the
+march of events or of fate is as relentless as in a Greek drama, for
+already the needful woman had appeared in the person of Harriet
+Westbrook, a schoolfellow of his sisters at their Clapham school.
+During the previous January Shelley had made her acquaintance by
+visiting her at her father's house, with an introduction and a present
+from one of his sisters. There seems no reason to doubt that Shelley
+was then much attracted by the beautiful girl, smarting though he was
+at the time from his rupture with Harriet Grove; but Shakespeare has
+shown us that such a time is not exempt from the potency of love
+shafts.
+
+This visit of Shelley was followed by his presenting Harriet Westbrook
+with a copy of his new romance, _St. Irvyne_, which led to some
+correspondence. It was now Harriet's turn to visit Shelley, sent also
+by his sisters with presents of their pocket money. Shelley moreover
+visited the school on different occasions, and even lectured the
+schoolmistress on her system of discipline. There is no doubt that
+Harriet's elder sister, with or without the cognisance of their
+father, a retired hotel-keeper, helped to make meetings between the
+two; but Shelley, though young and a poet, was no child, and must have
+known what these dinners and visits and excursions might lead to; and
+although the correspondence and conversation may have been more
+directly upon theological and philosophical questions, it seems
+unlikely that he would have discoursed thus with a young girl unless
+he felt some special interest in her; besides, Shelley need not have
+felt any great social difference between himself and a young lady
+brought up and educated on a footing of equality with his own sisters.
+It is true that her family acted and encouraged him in a way
+incompatible with old-fashioned ideas of gentility, but Shelley was
+too prone at present to rebel against everything conventional to be
+particularly sensitive on this point.
+
+In May Shelley was enabled to return to his father's house, through
+the mediation of his uncle, Captain Pilfold, and henceforth an
+allowance of two hundred a year was made to him. But there had been
+work done in the two months that no reconciliations or allowances
+afterwards could undo; for while Shelley was bent on proselytising
+Harriet Westbrook, not less for his sisters' sake than for his own,
+Harriet, in a school-girl fashion, encouraged by her sister and not
+discouraged by her father, was falling in love with Shelley. How were
+the _bourgeois_ father and sister to comprehend such a character
+as Shelley's, when his own parents and all the College authorities
+failed to do so? If Shelley were not in love he must have appeared so,
+and Harriet's family did their best by encouraging and countenancing
+the intimacy to lead to a marriage, they naturally having Harriet's
+interests more at heart than Shelley's.
+
+However, the fact remains that Shelley was a most extraordinary being,
+an embryo poet, with all a poet's possible inconsistencies, the very
+brilliancy of the intellectual spark in one direction apparently
+quelling it for a time in another. In most countries and ages a poet
+seems to have been accepted as a heaven-sent gift to his nation; his
+very crimes (and surely Shelley did not surpass King David in
+misdoing?) have been the _lacrymæ rerum_ giving terrible vitality
+to his thoughts, and so reclaiming many others ere some fatal deed is
+done; but in England the convention of at least making a show of
+virtues which do not exist (perhaps a sorry legacy from Puritanism)
+will not allow the poet to be accepted for what he really is, nor his
+poetry to appeal, on its own showing, to the human heart. He must be
+analysed, and vilified, or whitewashed in turn.
+
+At any rate Shelley was superior to some of the respectable vices of
+his class, and one alleged concession of his father was fortunately
+loathsome to him, viz.--that he (Sir Timothy) would provide for as
+many illegitimate children as Percy chose to have, but he would not
+tolerate a _mésalliance_. To what a revolt of ideas must such a
+code of morality have led in a fermenting brain like Shelley's! Were
+the mothers to be provided for likewise, and to be considered more by
+Shelley's respectable family than his lawful wife? We fear not.
+
+A visit to Wales followed, during which Shelley's mind was in so
+abstracted a state that the fine scenery, viewed for the first time,
+had little power to move him, while Harriet Westbrook, with her sister
+and father, was only thirty miles off at Aberystwith; a hasty and
+unexplained retreat of this party to London likewise hastened the
+return of Shelley. Probably the father began to perceive that Shelley
+did not come forward as he had expected, and so he wished to remove
+Harriet from his vicinity. Letters from Harriet to Shelley followed,
+full of misery and dejection, complaining of her father's decision to
+send her back to school, where she was avoided by the other girls, and
+called "an abandoned wretch" for sympathising or corresponding with
+Shelley; she even contemplated suicide. It is curious how this idea
+seems to have constantly recurred to her, as in the case of some
+others who have finally committed the act.
+
+Shelley wrote, expostulating with the father. This probably only
+incensed him more. He persisted. Harriet again addressed Shelley in
+despair, saying she would put herself under his protection and fly
+with him; a difficult position for any young man, and for Shelley most
+perplexing, with his avowed hostility to marriage, and his recent
+assertions that he was not in love with Harriet. But it must be put to
+Shelley's credit that, having intentionally or otherwise led Harriet
+on to love him, he now acted as a gentleman to his sister's school
+friend, and, influenced to some extent by Hogg's arguments in a
+different case in favour of marriage, he at once determined to make
+her his wife. He wrote to his cousin, Charles Grove, announcing his
+intention and impending arrival in London, saying that as his own
+happiness was altogether blighted, he could now only live to make that
+of others, and would consequently marry Harriet Westbrook.
+
+On his arrival in London, Shelley found Harriet looking ill and much
+changed. He spent some time in town, during which Harriet's spirits
+revived; but Shelley, as he described in a letter to Hogg, felt much
+embarrassment and melancholy. Not contemplating an immediate marriage,
+he went into Sussex to pay a visit to Field Place and to his uncle at
+Cuckfield. While here he renewed the acquaintance of Miss Kitchener, a
+school mistress of advanced ideas, who had the care of Captain
+Pilfold's children. To this acquaintance we owe a great number of
+letters which throw much light on Shelley's _exalté_ character at
+this period, and which afford most amusing reading. As usual with
+Shelley, he threw much of his own personality into his ideas of Miss
+Hitchener, who was to be his "eternal inalienable friend," and to help
+to form his lovely wife's character on the model of her own. All these
+particulars are given in letters from Shelley to his friends, Charles
+Grove, Hogg, and Miss Hitchener; to the latter he is very explanatory
+and apologetic, but only after the event.
+
+Shelley had scarcely been a week away from London when he received a
+letter from Harriet, complaining of fresh persecution and recalling
+him. He at once returned, as he had undertaken to do if required, and
+then resolved that the only thing was for him to marry at once. He
+accordingly went straight to his cousin Charles Grove, and with
+twenty-five pounds borrowed from his relative Mr. Medwin, a solicitor
+at Horsham, he entered on one of the most momentous days of his
+life--the 24th or 25th August 1811. After passing the night with his
+cousin, he waited at the door of the coffee-house in Mount Street,
+watching for a girlish figure to turn the corner from Chapel Street.
+There was some delay; but what was to be could not be averted, and
+soon Harriet, fresh as a rosebud, appeared. The coach was called, and
+the two cousins and the girl of sixteen drove to an inn in the city to
+await the Edinburgh mail. This took the two a stage farther on the
+fatal road, and on August 28 their Scotch marriage is recorded in
+Edinburgh. The marriage arrangements were of the quaintest, Shelley
+having to explain his position and want of funds to the landlord of
+some handsome rooms which he found. Fortunately the landlord undertook
+to supply what was needed, and they felt at ease in the expectation of
+Shelley's allowance of money coming; but this never came, as Shelley's
+father again resented his behaviour, and took that easy means of
+showing as much.
+
+Shelley's wife had had the most contradictory education possible for a
+young girl of an ordinary and unimaginative nature--the conventional
+surface education of a school of that time followed by the talks with
+Shelley, which were doubtless far beyond her comprehension. What could
+be the outcome of such a marriage? Had Shelley, indeed, been a
+different character, all might have gone smoothly, married as he was
+to a beautiful girl who loved him; but at present all Shelley's ideas
+were unpractical. Without the moral treadmill of work to sober his
+opinions, whence was the ballast to come when disappointment ensued--
+disappointment which he constantly prepared for himself by his
+over-enthusiastic idea of his friends? Troubles soon followed the
+marriage, in the nonarrival of the money; and after five weeks in
+Edinburgh, where Hogg had joined the Shelleys, followed by a little
+over a week in York, the need became so pressing that Shelley felt
+obliged to take a hurried journey to his uncle's at Cuckfield, in
+order to try and mollify his father; in this he did not succeed.
+Though absent little over a week, he prepared the way by his absence,
+and by leaving Harriet under the care of Hogg, for a series of
+complications and misunderstandings which never ended till death had
+absolved all concerned. Harriet's sister, Eliza, was to have returned
+to York with Shelley; but hearing of her sister's solitary state with
+Hogg in the vicinity, she hurried alone to York, and from this time
+she assumed an ascendency over the small _ménage_ which, though
+probably useful in trifles, had undoubtedly a bad effect in the long
+run. Eliza, rightly from her point of view, thought it necessary to
+stand between Hogg and her sister. It seems far more likely that
+Hogg's gentlemanly instincts would have led him to treat his friend's
+wife with respect than that he should have really given cause for the
+grave suspicions which Shelley writes of in subsequent letters to Miss
+Hitchener. Might not Eliza be inclined to take an exaggerated view of
+any attention shown by Hogg to her sister, and have persuaded Harriet
+to the same effect? Harriet having seen nothing of the world as yet,
+and Eliza's experience before her father's retirement from his tavern
+not having been that in which ladies and gentlemen stand on a footing
+of equality. It is true that Shelley writes of an interview with Hogg
+before leaving York, in which he describes Hogg as much confused and
+distressed; but perhaps allowance ought to be made for the fanciful
+turn of Shelley's own mind. However this may have been, they left York
+for Keswick, where they delighted in the glorious scenery. At this
+time we see in letters to Miss Hitchener how Shelley felt the
+necessity of intellectual sympathy, and how he seemed to consider this
+friend in some way necessary for the accomplishment of various
+speculative and social ideas. Here at Chestnut Cottage novels were
+commenced and much work planned, left unfinished, or lost. While at
+Keswick he made the acquaintance of Southey and wrote his first letter
+to William Godwin, whose works had already had a great influence on
+him, and whose personal acquaintance he now sought. The often quoted
+letter by which Shelley introduced himself to Godwin was followed by
+others, and led up to the subsequent intimacy which had such important
+results.
+
+Shelley with his wife and sister-in-law paid a visit to the Duke of
+Norfolk at Greystoke; this led to a quasi reconciliation with
+Shelley's father, owing to which the allowance of two hundred a year
+was renewed, Harriet's father making her a similar allowance, it is
+presumed, owing to feeling flattered by his daughter's reception by
+the Duchess. Shortly afterwards some restless turn in the trio caused
+a further move to be contemplated, and now Shelley entered on what
+must have appeared one of the strangest of his fancies--a visit to
+Ireland to effect Catholic Emancipation and to procure the repeal of
+the Union Act. Hogg pretends to believe that Shelley did not even
+understand the meaning of the phrases, and most probably many English
+would not have cared to do so. In any case Shelley's enthusiasm for an
+oppressed people must be admired, and it is noticeable that our
+greatest statesman of the present day has come to agree with Shelley
+after eighty years of life and of conflicting endeavour.
+
+The plan adopted by Shelley caused infinite amusement to Harriet, who
+entered with animation into the fun of distributing her husband's
+pamphlets on Irish affairs, and could not well understand his
+seriousness on the subject. The pamphlets and the speeches which he
+delivered were not likely to conciliate the different Irish parties.
+The Catholics were not to be attracted by an Atheist or Antichristian,
+however tolerant he might be of them, and of all religions which tend
+to good. Lord Fingal and his adherents were not inclined to follow the
+Ardent Republican and teacher of Humanitarianism; nor were the extreme
+party likely to be satisfied with appeals, however eloquent, for the
+pursuit and practice of virtue before any political changes were to be
+expected. Shelley's exposition of the failure of the French Revolution
+by the fact that although it had been ushered in by people of great
+intellect, the moral side of intellect had been wanting, was not what
+Irish Nationalists then wished to consider. In fact, Shelley had not
+much pondered the character of the people he went to help and reform,
+if he thought a week of these arguments could have much effect.
+Shelley was much sought after by the poor Irish, during another month
+of his stay in Dublin, on account of his generosity. Here, also, they
+met Mrs. Nugent. Harriet's correspondence with her has recently been
+published. With the views which she expresses, those of the present
+writer coincide in not casting all the blame of the future separation
+on Shelley; Harriet naturally feels Mary most at fault, and does not
+perceive her own mistakes. Failing in his aim, and being disheartened
+by the distress on all sides which he could not relieve, and more
+especially owing to the strong remonstrance of Godwin, who considered
+that if there were any result it could only be bloodshed, the poet
+migrated to Nantgwilt in Wales. Here the Shelleys contemplated
+receiving Godwin and his family, Miss Hitchener with her American
+pupils; and why not Miss Hitchener's father, reported to have been an
+old smuggler? Here Shelley first met Thomas Love Peacock. They were
+unable to remain at Nantgwilt owing to various mishaps, and migrated
+to that terrestrial paradise in North Devon, Lynmouth. This lovely
+place, with its beautiful and romantic surroundings loved and
+exquisitely described by more than one poet, cannot fail to be dear to
+those who know it with and through them. Here, in a garden in front of
+their rose and myrtle covered cottage, within near sound of the
+rushing Lynn, would Shelley stand on a mound and let off his
+fire-balloons in the cool evening air. Here Miss Hitchener joined
+them. What talks and what rambles they must have had, none but those
+who have known a poet in such a place could imagine; but perhaps
+Shelley, though a poet, was not sufficient for the three ladies in a
+neighbourhood where the narrow winding paths may have caused one or
+other to appear neglected and left behind. Poor Shelley, recalled from
+heaven to earth by such-like vicissitudes, naturally held by his wife;
+and forthwith disagreements began which ended in Miss Hitchener's
+being called henceforth the "Brown Demon." What a fall from the ideal
+reformer of the world!--another of Shelley's self-made idols
+shattered.
+
+The Shelleys wished Fanny Godwin to join their party at Lynmouth; but
+this Godwin would not permit without more knowledge of his friends,
+although Shelley wrote affecting letters to the sage, trusting that he
+might be the stay of his declining years. Amid the romantic scenery
+of Lynmouth, Shelley wrote much of his _Queen Mab_; he also
+addressed a sonnet, and a longer poem, to Harriet, in August. These
+poems certainly evince no falling off in affection, although they are
+not like the glowing love-poems of a later period.
+
+From Lynmouth Shelley, with his party, moved to Swansea, and thence to
+Tremadoc, where they agreed to take a house named Tanyrallt, and then
+they moved on to London to meet Godwin, who, in the meanwhile, had
+paid a visit to Lynmouth just after their flitting. Here Shelley had
+the delight of seeing the philosopher face to face, and now visits
+were exchanged, and walks and dinners followed, and, among other
+friends of Godwin, Shelley met Clara de Boinville and Mrs. Turner, who
+is said to have inspired his first great lyric, "Away the moor is dark
+beneath the moon," but whose husband strongly objected to Shelley
+visiting their house.
+
+On this occasion Fanny Godwin was the most seen; Mary Godwin, who was
+just fifteen, only arriving towards the end of Shelley's stay in
+London from a visit to her friends, the Baxters, in Scotland. No
+mention is made of her by Shelley, though she must have dined in his
+company about November 5, 1812. During this visit to London Shelley
+became reconciled with Hogg, calling on him and begging him to come to
+see him and his wife. This certainly does not look as if Shelley still
+thought seriously of his former difference with Hogg--scarcely a year
+before. Shortly after, on the 8th, we find the poor "Brown Demon"
+leaving the Shelleys, with the promise of an annuity of one hundred
+pounds. She reopened a school later on at Edmonton, and was much loved
+by her pupils. Shelley now returned to Tremadoc, where he passed the
+winter in his house at Tanyrallt, helping the poor through this severe
+season of 1812-13. Here one of Shelley's first practical attempts for
+humanity was assisting to reclaim some land from the sea; but
+Shelley's early effort, unlike the last one of Göthe's _Faust_,
+did not satisfy him, and shortly afterwards another real or fancied
+attempt on his life, on February 26th, 1813, obliged the party to
+leave the neighbourhood, this time again for Ireland. He spent a short
+time on the Lake of Killarney, with his wife and Eliza. In April we
+again find him in London, in an hotel in Albemarle Street; thence he
+passed to Half Moon Street, where in June their first child, Ianthe,
+was born. The baby was a great pleasure to Shelley, who, however,
+objected to the wet nurse. He wrote a touching sonnet to his wife and
+child three months later. All this time there is no apparent change of
+affection suggested. Soon afterwards, while at Bracknell, near
+Windsor, they kept up the acquaintance of the De Boinville family, and
+Shelley began the study of Italian with them while Harriet
+relinquished hers of Latin. From Bracknell Shelley paid his last visit
+to Field Place to see his mother, in the absence of his father and the
+younger children. An interview with his father followed, and a journey
+to Edinburgh, and then in December a return to London; certainly an
+ominous restlessness, caused, no doubt, considerably by want of money,
+but moving about did not seem the way to save or to make it. Shelley
+visited Godwin several times during his stay in London. At this time
+Shelley had to raise ruinous post-obits on the family property, and
+for legal reasons he now thought it desirable to follow the Scotch
+marriage by one in the English church, and he and Harriet were
+re-married on March 22, 1814, at St. George's Church.
+
+But even now little rifts seem to have been growing, small enough
+apparently, and yet, like the small cloud in the sky, indicating the
+coming storm. This very time of trials, through want of money, seems
+to have been chosen by Harriet to show a hankering after luxuries
+which their present income could not warrant. A carriage was
+purchased, and was with its accompanying expenses added to the small
+_ménage_; silver plate was also considered a necessity; and,
+perhaps the thing most distasteful to Shelley's natural tastes, the
+wet nurse was retained, although Harriet had always appeared to be a
+strong young woman capable of undertaking her maternal duty. This fact
+was considered by Peacock to have chiefly alienated Shelley's
+affection.
+
+Apart from this, poor Harriet, with the birth of her child, seems to
+have given up her studies, which she had evidently pursued to please
+Shelley, and to have awakened to the fact that it was a difficult task
+to take up the whole cause of suffering humanity and aid it with their
+slender purse, and keep their wandering household going. It is
+difficult to imagine the genius that could have sufficed, and it
+certainly needed genius, or something very like it, to keep the
+Faust-like mind of Shelley in any peace.
+
+There is a letter from Fanny Godwin to Shelley, after his first visit,
+speaking of his wife as a fine lady. From this accusation Shelley
+strongly defended her, but now he felt that this disaster might really
+be impending. Poor pretty Harriet could not understand or talk
+philosophy with Shelley, and, what was worse, her sister was ever
+present to prevent any spontaneous feeling of dependence on her
+husband from endearing her to him. Even before his second ceremony of
+marriage with Harriet we find him writing a letter in great dejection
+to Hogg. He seemed really in the poet's "premature old age," as he
+expressed it, though none like the poet have the power of
+rejuvenescence. His detestation of his sister-in-law at this time was
+extreme, but he appears to have been incapable of sending her away. It
+was a perfect torture to him to see her kiss his baby. He writes thus
+from Mrs. de Boinville's at Bracknell, where he had a month's rest
+with philosophy and sweet converse. Talking was easier than acting
+philosophy at this juncture, and planning the amelioration of the
+world pleasanter than struggling to keep one poor soul from sinking to
+degradation; but who shall judge the strength of another's power, or
+feel the burden of another's woe? We can only tell how the expression
+of his agony may help ourselves; but surely it is worthy of admiration
+to find Shelley, four days after writing this most heart-broken letter
+to Hogg, binding his chains still firmer by remarrying, so that, come
+what would, no slur should be cast on Harriet.
+
+Harriet, who had never understood anything of housekeeping, and whose
+_ménage_, according to Hogg, was of the funniest, now that the
+novelty of Shelley's talk and ways was over, and when even the
+constant changes were beginning to satiate her, apparently spent a
+time of intolerable _ennui_. It is still remembered in the
+Pilfold family how Harriet appeared at their house late one night in a
+ball dress, without shawl or bonnet, having quarrelled with Shelley. A
+doctor who had to perform some operation on her child was struck with
+astonishment at her demeanour, and considered her utterly without
+feeling, and Shelley's poem, "Lines, April 1814," written, according
+to Claire Clairmont's testimony, when Mr. Turner objected to his
+visiting his wife at Bracknell, gives a touching picture of the
+comfortless home which he was returning to; in fact, they seem to have
+no sooner been together again than Harriet made a fresh departure.
+There is one imploring poem by Shelley, addressed to Harriet in May
+1814, begging her to relent and pity, if she cannot love, and not to
+let him endure "The misery of a fatal cure"; but Harriet had not
+generosity, if it was needed, and, according to Thornton Hunt, she
+left Shelley and went to Bath, where she still was in July. What
+Harriet really aimed at by this foolish move is doubtful; it was
+certainly taken at the most fatal moment. To leave Shelley alone, near
+dear friends, when she had been repelling his advances to regain her
+affection, and making his home a place for him to dread to come into,
+was anything but wise; but wisdom was not Harriet's _forte_; she
+needed a husband to be wise for her. Shelley, however, had most gifts,
+except such wisdom at this time.
+
+Beyond these facts, there seems little but surmises to judge by. It
+may always be a question how much Shelley really knew, or believed, of
+certain ideas of infidelity on his wife's part in connection with a
+Major Ryan--ideas which, even if believed, would not have justified
+his subsequent mode of action.
+
+But here, for a time, we must leave poor Harriet--all her loveliness
+thrown away upon Shelley--all Shelley's divine gifts worthless to her.
+What a strange disunion to pass through life with! Only the sternest
+philosophy or callousness could have achieved it--and Shelley was
+still so young, with his philosophy all in theory.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+MARY AND SHELLEY.
+
+
+We left Godwin about to write in answer to the letter referred to from
+Shelley. The correspondence which followed, though very interesting in
+itself, is only important here as it led to the increasing intimacy of
+the families. These letters are full of sound advice from an elderly
+philosopher to an over-enthusiastic youth; and one dated March 14,
+1812, begging Shelley to leave Ireland and come to London, ends with
+the pregnant phrase, "You cannot imagine how much all the females of
+my family, Mrs. Godwin and _three_ daughters, are interested in
+your letters and your history." So here, at fourteen, we find Mary
+deeply interested in all concerning Shelley; poor Mary, who used to
+wander forth, when in London, from the Skinner Street Juvenile Library
+northwards to the old St. Pancras Cemetery, to sit with a book beside
+her mother's grave to find that sympathy so sadly lacking in her home.
+
+About this time Godwin wrote a letter concerning Mary's education to
+some correspondent anxious to be informed on the subject. We cannot do
+better than quote from it:--
+
+Your inquiries relate principally to the two daughters of Mary
+Wollstonecraft. They are neither of them brought up with an exclusive
+attention to the system and ideas of their mother. I lost her in 1797,
+and in 1801 I married a second time. One among the motives which led
+me to choose this was the feeling I had in myself of an incompetence
+for the education of daughters. The present Mrs. Godwin has great
+strength and activity of mind, but is not exclusively a follower of
+the notions of their mother; and, indeed, having formed a family
+establishment without having a previous provision for the support of a
+family, neither Mrs. Godwin nor I have leisure enough for reducing
+novel theories of education to practice; while we both of us honestly
+endeavour, as far as our opportunities will permit, to improve the
+mind and characters of the younger branches of our family.
+
+Of the two persons to whom your inquiries relate, my own daughter is
+considerably superior in capacity to the one her mother had before.
+Fanny, the eldest, is of a quiet, modest, unshowy disposition,
+somewhat given to indolence, which is her greatest fault, but sober,
+observing, peculiarly clear and distinct in the faculty of memory, and
+disposed to exercise her own thoughts and follow her own judgment.
+Mary, my daughter, is the reverse of her in many particulars. She is
+singularly bold, somewhat imperious, and active of mind. Her desire of
+knowledge is great, and her perseverance in everything she undertakes
+almost invincible. My own daughter is, I believe, very pretty. Fanny
+is by no means handsome, but, in general, prepossessing.
+
+By this letter necessity appears to have been the chief motor in the
+education of the children. Constantly increasing difficulties
+surrounded the family, who were, however, kept above the lowering
+influences of narrow circumstances by the intellect of Godwin and his
+friends. Even the speculations into which Mrs. Godwin is considered to
+have rashly drawn her husband in the Skinner Street Juvenile Library,
+perhaps, for a time, really assisted in bringing up the family and
+educating the sons.
+
+Before the meeting with Shelley, Mary was known as a young girl of
+strong poetic and emotional nature. A story is still remembered by
+friends, proving this: just before her last return from the Highlands
+preceding her eventful meetings with Shelley, she visited, while
+staying with the Baxters, some of the most picturesque parts of the
+Highlands, in company with Mr. Miller, a bookseller of Edinburgh; and
+he told of her passionate enthusiasm when taken into a room arranged
+with looking-glasses round it to reflect the magic view without of
+cascade and cloud-capped mountains; how she fell on her knees,
+entranced at the sight, and thanked Providence for letting her witness
+so much beauty. This was the nature, with its antecedents and
+surroundings, to come shortly into communion with Shelley, at the time
+of his despondency at his wife's hardness and supposed desertion;
+Shelley then, so far from self-sufficiency, yearning after sympathy
+and an ideal in life, with all his former idols shattered. Godwin's
+house became for him the home of intellectual intercourse. Godwin,
+surrounded by a cultivated family, was not thought less of by Shelley,
+owing to the accident of his then having a book-shop to look
+after--Shelley, whose childhood, though passed in the comforts of an
+English country house, yet lacked the riches of the higher culture.
+Through two months of various trials Shelley remained on terms of
+great intimacy, visiting Godwin's house and constantly dining there.
+This was during his wife's voluntary withdrawal to Bath, from
+May--when he seems to have entreated her to be reconciled to him--till
+July, when she, in her turn, becoming anxious at a four days'
+cessation of news, wrote an imploring letter to Hookham, the Bond
+Street bookseller, for information about her husband.
+
+In the meantime, what had been passing in Godwin's house? The
+Philosopher, whom Shelley loved and revered, was becoming inextricably
+involved in money matters. What was needed but this to draw still
+closer the sympathies of the poet, who had not been exempt from like
+straits? He was thus in the anomalous position of an heir to twenty
+thousand a year, who could wish to raise three thousand pounds on his
+future expectations, not for discreditable gambling debts, or worse
+extravagances, but to save his beloved master and his family from dire
+distress.
+
+What a coil of circumstances to be entangling all concerned! Mary
+returning from the delights of her Scottish home to find her father,
+whom she always devotedly loved, on the verge of bankruptcy, with all
+the hopeless vista which her emotional and highly imaginative nature
+could conjure up; and then to find this dreaded state of distress
+relieved, and by her hero--the poet who, for more than two years, "all
+the women of her family had been profoundly interested in."
+
+And for Shelley, the contrast from the desolate home, where sulks and
+ill-humour assailed him, and which, for a time, was a deserted home
+for him; where facts, or his fitful imagination, ran riot with his
+honour, to the home where all showed its roseate side for him; where
+all vied to please the young benefactor, who was the humble pupil of
+its master; where Mary, in the expanding glow of youth and intellect,
+could talk on equal terms with the enthusiastic poet.
+
+Were not the eyes of Godwin and his wife blinded for the time, when
+still reconciliation with Harriet was possible? Surely gratitude came
+in to play honour false. The one who--were it only from personal
+feeling--might have tried to turn the course of the rushing torrent
+was not there. Fanny, who had formerly written of Shelley as a hero of
+romance, was in Wales during this period.
+
+So, step by step, and day by day, the march of fate continued, till,
+by the time that Hookham apparently unbandaged Godwin's eyes, on
+receiving Harriet's letter on July 7, 1814, passion seemed to have
+subdued the power of will; and the obstacle now imposed by Godwin only
+gave added impetus to the torrent, which nothing further could check.
+
+Such times as these in a life seem to exemplify the contrasting
+doctrines of Calvin and of Schopenhauer; of two courses, either is
+open. But at that time Shelley was more the being of emotion than of
+will--unless, indeed, will be confounded with emotion.
+
+We have seen enough to gather that Shelley did not need to enter
+furtively the house of his benefactor to injure him in his nearest
+tie, but that circumstances drew Shelley to Mary with equal force as
+her to him. The meetings by her mother's grave seemed to sanctify the
+love which should have been another's. They vaguely tried to justify
+themselves with crude principles. But self-deception could not endure
+much longer; and when Godwin forbade Shelley his house on July 8,
+Shelley, ever impetuous and headstrong, whose very virtues became for
+the time vices, thrust all barriers aside.
+
+What deceptions beside self-deception must have been necessary to
+carry out so wild a project can be imagined; for certainly neither
+Godwin nor, still less, his wife, was inclined to sanction so illegal
+and unjust an act. We see, from Hogg's description, how impassioned
+was a meeting between Mary and Shelley, which he chanced to witness;
+and later on Shelley is said to have rushed into her room with
+laudanum, threatening to take it if she would not have pity on him.
+These and such like scenes, together with the philosophical notions
+which Mary must have imbibed, led up to her acting at sixteen as she
+certainly would not have done at twenty-six; but now her knowledge of
+the world was small, her enthusiasm great--and evidently she believed
+in Harriet's faithlessness--so that love added to the impatience of
+youth, which could not foresee the dreadful future. Without doubt,
+could they both have imagined the scene by the Serpentine three years
+later, they would have shrunk from the action which was a strong link
+in the chain that conduced to it.
+
+But now all thoughts but love and self, or each for the other, were
+set aside, and on July 20, 1814, we find Mary Godwin leaving her
+father's house before five o'clock in the morning, much as Harriet had
+left her home three years earlier.
+
+An entry made by Mary in a copy of _Queen Mab_ given to her by
+Shelley, and dated in July 1814, shows us how a few days before their
+departure they had not settled on so desperate a move. The words are
+these:--"This book is sacred to me, and as no other creature shall
+ever look into it, I may write in it what I please. Yet what shall I
+write--that I love the author beyond all powers of expression, and
+that I am parted from him? Dearest and only love, by that love we have
+promised to each other, although I may not be yours I can never be
+another's. But I am thine, exclusively thine."
+
+Mary in her novel of _Lodore_, published in 1835, gave a version
+of the differences between Harriet and Shelley. Though Lord Lodore is
+more an impersonation of Mary's idea of Lord Byron than of Shelley,
+Cornelia Santerre, the heroine, may be partly drawn from Harriet,
+while Lady Santerre, her match-making mother, is taken from Eliza
+Westbrook. Lady Santerre, when her daughter is married, still keeps
+her under her influence. She is described as clever, though
+uneducated, with all the petty manoeuvring which frequently
+accompanies this condition. When differences arise between Lodore and
+his wife the mother, instead of counselling conciliation, advises her
+daughter to reject her husband's advances. Under these circumstances
+estrangements lead to hatred, and Cornelia declares she will never
+quit her mother, and desires her husband to leave her in peace with
+her child. This Lodore will not consent to, but takes the child with
+him to America. The mother-in-law speaks of desertion and cruelty, and
+instigates law proceedings. By these proceedings all further hope is
+lost. We trace much of the history of Shelley and Harriet in this
+romance, even to the age of Lady Lodore at her separation, which is
+nineteen, the same age as Harriet's. Lady Lodore henceforth is
+regarded as an injured and deserted wife. This might apply equally to
+Lady Byron; but there are traits and descriptions evidently applicable
+to Harriet. Lady Santerre encourages her to expect submission later
+from her husband, but the time for that is passed. We here trace the
+period when Shelley also begged his wife to be reconciled to him in
+May, and likewise Harriet's attempt at reconciliation with Shelley,
+all too late, in July, when Shelley had an interview with his wife and
+explanations were given, which ended in Harriet apparently consenting
+to a separation. The interview resulted in giving Harriet an illness
+very dangerous in her state of health; she was even then looking
+forward to the birth of a child. It is true that Shelley is said to
+have believed that this child was not his, though later he
+acknowledged this belief was not correct. The name of a certain Major
+Ryan figures in the domestic history of the Shelleys at this time; but
+certainly there seems no evidence to convict poor Harriet upon,
+although Godwin at a later date informed Shelley that he had evidence
+of Harriet having been false to him four months before he left her.
+This evidence is not forthcoming, and the position of his daughter
+Mary may have made slender evidence seem more weighty at the time to
+Godwin; in fact, the small amount of evidence of any kind respecting
+Shelley's and Harriet's disagreements and separation seems to point to
+the curious anomaly in Shelley's character, that while he did not
+hesitate to act upon his avowed early and crude opinions as to the
+duration of marriage--opinions which he later expressed disapproval of
+in his own criticism of _Queen Mab_--yet the innate feeling of a
+gentleman forbade him to talk of his wife's real or supposed defects
+even to his intimate friends. Thus when Peacock cross-questioned him
+about his liking for Harriet, he only replied, "Ah, but you do not
+know how I hated her sister."
+
+However more or less faulty, or sinned against, or sinning, we must
+now leave Harriet for a while and accompany Shelley and Mary on that
+28th of July when she left her father's house with Jane, henceforth
+called "Claire" Clairmont, to meet Shelley near Hatton Garden about
+five in the morning. Of the subsequent journey we have ample records,
+for with this tour Mary also began a life of literary work, in which
+she was fortunately able to confide much to the unknown friend, the
+public, which though not always directly grateful to those who open
+their hearts to it, is still eager for their works and influenced by
+them. And so from Mary herself we learn all that she cared to publish
+from her journal in the _Six Weeks' Tour_, and now we have the
+original journal by Mary and Shelley, as given by Professor Dowden. We
+must repeat for Mary the oft-told tale of Shelley; for henceforth,
+till death separates them, their lives are together.
+
+On July 27, 1814, having previously arranged a plan with Mary, which
+must have been also known to Claire in spite of her statement that she
+only thought of taking an early walk, Shelley ordered the postchaise,
+and, as Claire says, he and Mary persuaded her to go too, as she knew
+French, with which language they were unfamiliar. Shelley gives the
+account of the subsequent journey to Dover and passage to Calais, of
+the first security they felt in each other in spite of all risk and
+danger. Mary suffered much physically, and no doubt morally, having to
+pause at each stage on the road to Dover in spite of the danger of
+being overtaken, owing to the excessive heat causing faintness. On
+reaching Dover they found the packet already gone at 4 o'clock, so,
+after bathing in the sea and dining, they engaged a sailing boat to
+take them to Calais, and once more felt security from their pursuers;
+for, undoubtedly, had they been found in England, Shelley would have
+been unable to carry out his plan.
+
+They were not allowed to pass the Channel together without danger, for
+after some hours of calm, during which they could make no progress, a
+violent squall broke, and the sails of the little boat were well nigh
+shattered, the lightning and thunder were incessant, and the imminent
+danger gave Shelley cause for serious thought, as he with difficulty
+supported the sleeping form of Mary in his arms. Surely all this scene
+is well described in "The Fugitives"--
+
+  While around the lashed ocean.
+
+Though Mary woke to hear they were still far from land, and might be
+forced to make for Boulogne if they could not reach Calais, still with
+the dawn of a fresh day the lightning paled, and at length they were
+landed on Calais sands, and walked across them to their hotel. The
+fresh sights and sounds of a new language soon restored Mary, and she
+was able to remark the different costumes; and the salient contrast
+from the other side of the Channel could not fail to charm three young
+people so open to impressions. But before night they were reminded
+that there were others whom their destiny affected, for they were
+informed that a "fat lady" had been inquiring for them, who said that
+Shelley had run away with her daughter. It was poor Mrs. Godwin who
+had followed them through heat and storm, and who hoped at least to
+induce her daughter Claire to return to the protection of Godwin's
+roof; but this, after mature deliberation, which Shelley advised, she
+refused to do. Having escaped so far from the routine and fancied
+dulness of home life, the impetuous Claire was not to be so easily
+debarred from sharing in the magic delight of seeing new countries and
+gaining fresh experience. So Mrs. Godwin returned alone, to make the
+best story she could so as to satisfy the curious about the strange
+doings in her family.
+
+Meanwhile the travellers proceeded by diligence on the evening of the
+30th to Boulogne, and then, as Mary was far from well, hastened on
+their journey to Paris, where by a week's rest, in spite of many
+annoyances through want of money and difficulty in procuring it, Mary
+regained sufficient strength to enjoy some of the interesting sights.
+A pedestrian tour was undertaken across France into Switzerland. In
+Paris the entries in the diary are chiefly Shelley's; he makes some
+curious remarks about the pictures in the Louvre, and mentions with
+pleasure meeting a Frenchman who could speak English who was some
+help, as Claire's French does not seem to have stood the test of a
+lengthy discussion on business at that time. At length a remittance of
+sixty pounds was received, and they forthwith settled to buy an ass to
+carry the necessary portmanteau and Mary when unable to walk; and so
+they started on their journey in 1814, across a country recently
+devastated by the invading armies of Europe. They were not to be
+deterred by the harrowing tales of their landlady, and set out for
+Charenton on the evening of August 8, but soon found their ass needed
+more assistance than they did, which necessitated selling it at a loss
+and purchasing a mule the next day. On this animal Mary set out
+dressed in black silk, accompanied by Claire in a like dress, and by
+Shelley who walked beside. This primitive way of travelling was not
+without its drawbacks, especially after the disastrous wars. Their
+fare was of the coarsest, and their accommodation frequently of the
+most squalid; but they were young and enthusiastic, and could enter
+with delight into the fact that Napoleon had slept in their room at
+one inn. And the picturesque though frequently ruined French towns,
+with their ramparts and old cathedrals, gave them happiness and
+content; on the other hand, the dirt, discomfort, and ignorance they
+met with were extreme. At one wretched village, Echemine, people would
+not rebuild their houses as they expected the Cossacks to return, and
+they had not heard that Napoleon was deposed; while two leagues
+farther, at Pavillon, all was different, showing the small amount of
+communication between one town and another in France at that time.
+
+Shelley was now obliged to ride the mule, having sprained his ankle,
+and on reaching Troyes Mary and Claire were thoroughly fatigued with
+walking. There they had to reconsider ways and means; the mule, no
+longer sufficing, was sold and a _voiture_ bought, and a man and
+a mule engaged for eight days to take them to Neuchatel. But their
+troubles did not end here, for the man turned out far more obstinate
+than the mule, and was determined to enjoy the sweets of tyranny: he
+stopped where he would, regardless of accommodation or no
+accommodation, and went on when he chose, careless whether his
+travellers were in or out of the carriage. Mary describes how they had
+to sit one night over a wretched kitchen fire in the village of Mort,
+till they were only too glad to pursue their journey at 3 A.M. In
+fact, in those days Mary was able, in the middle of France, to
+experience the same discomforts which tourists have now to go much
+farther to find out. Their tour was far different from a later one
+described by Mary, when comfortable hotels are chronicled; but, oh!
+how she then looked back to the happy days of this time. The trio
+would willingly have prolonged the present state of things; but, alas!
+money vanished in spite of frugal fare, and they decided, on arriving
+in Switzerland, and with difficulty raising about thirty-eight pounds
+in silver, that their only expedient was to return to England in the
+least expensive way possible. They first tried, however, to live
+cheaply in an old chateau on the lake of Arx, which they hired at a
+guinea a month; but the discomfort and difficulties were too great,
+and even the customary resources of reading and writing failed to
+induce them to remain in these circumstances. They at one time
+contemplated a journey south of the Alps, but, only twenty-eight
+pounds remaining to live on from September till December, they
+naturally felt it would be safer to return to England, and decided to
+travel the eight hundred miles by water as the cheapest mode of
+transit. They proceeded from Lucerne by the Reuss, descending several
+falls on the way, but had to land at Loffenberg as the falls there
+were impassable. The next day they took a rude kind of canoe to Mumph,
+when they were forced to continue their journey in a return cabriolet;
+but this breaking down, they had to walk some distance to the nearest
+place for boats, and were fortunate in meeting with some soldiers to
+carry their box. Having procured a boat they reached Basle by the
+evening, and leaving there for Mayence the next morning in a boat
+laden with merchandise. This ended their short Swiss tour; but they
+passed the time delightfully, Shelley reading Mary Wollstonecraft's
+letters from Norway, and then, again, perfectly entranced, as night
+approached, with the magic effects of sunset sky, hills surmounted
+with ruined castles, and the reflected colours on the changing stream.
+They proceeded in this manner, staying for the night at inns, and
+taking whatever boat could be found in the morning. Thus they reached
+Cologne, passing the romantic scenery of the Rhine, recalled to
+them later when reading _Childe Harold_. From this point they
+proceeded through Holland by diligence, as they found travelling by
+the canals and winding rivers would be too slow, and consequently more
+expensive. Mary does not appear to have been impressed with the
+picturesque flat country of Holland, and gladly reached Rotterdam; but
+they were unfortunately detained two days at Marsluys by contrary
+winds, spending their last guinea, but feeling triumphant in having
+travelled so far for less than thirty pounds.
+
+The captain, being an Englishman, ventured to cross the bar of the
+Rhine sooner than the Dutch would have done, and consequently they
+returned to England in a severe squall, which must have recalled the
+night of their departure and banished tranquillity from their minds,
+if they had for a time been soothed by the changing scenes and their
+trust in each other.
+
+This account, taken chiefly from Mary's _Six Weeks' Tour_,
+published in 1817 first, differs in some details from the diary made
+at the time. In the published edition the names are suppressed. Nor
+does Mary refer to the extraordinary letter written by Shelley from
+Troyes on August 13, to the unfortunate Harriet, inviting her to come
+and stay with them in Switzerland, writing to her as his "dearest
+Harriet," and signing himself "ever most affectionately yours."
+Fortunately the proposal was not carried out; probably neither Harriet
+nor Mary desired the other's company, and Shelley was saved the
+ridicule, or worse, of this arrangement.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+LIFE IN ENGLAND.
+
+
+On leaving the vessel at Gravesend, they engaged a boatman to take
+them up the Thames to Blackwall, where they had to take a coach, and
+the boatman with them, to drive about London in search of money to pay
+him. There was none at Shelley's banker, nor elsewhere, so he had to
+go to Harriet, who had drawn every pound out of the bank. He was
+detained two hours, the ladies having to remain under the care of the
+boatman till his return with money, when they bade the boatman a
+friendly farewell and proceeded to an hotel in Oxford Street.
+
+With Shelley and Mary's return to England their troubles naturally
+were not at an end. Instead of money and security, debts and overdue
+bills assailed Shelley on all sides; so much so, that he dared not
+remain with Mary at this critical moment of their existence, when she,
+unable to return to her justly indignant father, had to stay in
+obscure lodgings with Claire, while Shelley, from some other retreat,
+ransacked London for money from attorneys and on post obits at
+gigantic interest. We have now letters which passed between Mary and
+Shelley at this time; also Mary's diary, which recounts many of their
+misadventures.
+
+Day after day we have such phrases as (October 22) "Shelley goes with
+Peacock to the lawyers, but nothing is done," till on December 21 we
+find that an agreement is entered into to repay by three thousand
+pounds a loan of one thousand. Godwin, even if he would have helped,
+could not have done so, as his own affairs were now in their perennial
+state of distress; and before long, one of Shelley's chief anxieties
+was to raise two hundred pounds to save Mary's father from bankruptcy,
+although apparently they only communicated through a lawyer. It is
+curious to note how Mary complains of the selfishness of Harriet; poor
+Harriet who, according to Mrs. Godwin, still hoped for the return of
+her husband's affection to herself, and who sent for Shelley, after
+passing a night of danger, some time before her confinement. At one
+time Mary entertained an idea, rightly or wrongly conceived, that
+Harriet had a plan for ruining her father by dissuading Hookham from
+bailing him out from a menaced arrest. And so we find, in the extracts
+from the joint diary of Mary and Shelley, Harriet written of as
+selfish, as indulging in strange behaviour, and even, when she sends
+her creditors to Shelley, as the nasty woman who compels them to
+change their lodgings.
+
+Before this entry of January 2, 1815, Harriet had given birth
+(November 30) to a second child, a son and heir, which fact Mary notes
+a week later as having been communicated to them in a letter from a
+_deserted_ wife. What recriminations and heart-burnings, neglect
+felt on one side and "insulting selfishness" on the other! In April,
+Mary writes, "Shelley passes the morning with Harriet, who is in a
+surprisingly good humour;" and then we hear how Shelley went to
+Harriet to procure his son who is to appear in one of the courts; and
+yet once more Mary writes, "Shelley goes to Harriet about his son,
+returns at four; he has been much teased by Harriet"; and then a blank
+as to Harriet, for the diary is lost from May 1815 to July 1816.
+
+In the meantime we see in the diary how Mary, far from well at times,
+is happy in her love of Shelley--how they enjoy intellectual pleasures
+together. They fortunately were satisfied with each other's company,
+as most of their few friends fell from them, Mrs. Boinville writing a
+"cold and even sarcastic letter;" the Newtons were considered to hold
+aloof; and Mrs. Turner, whom they saw a little, told Shelley her
+brother considered "you've been playing a German tragedy." Shelley
+replied, "Very severe, but very true." About this time Hogg renewed
+his acquaintance with Shelley and made that of Mary, though at first
+his answer to Shelley's letter was far from sympathetic. On his first
+visit they also were disappointed with him; but a little later
+(November 14) Hogg called at his friend's lodging in Nelson Square,
+when he made a more favourable impression on Shelley by being himself
+pleased with Mary. She in return found him amusing when he jested, but
+far astray in his opinions when discussing serious matters--in fact,
+on a later visit of his, she finds Hogg makes a sad bungle, quite
+muddled on the point when in an argument on virtue. In spite of being
+shocked by Hogg in matters of philosophy and ethics, she gets to like
+him better daily, and he helps them to pass the long November and
+December evenings with his lively talk. On one occasion he would
+describe an apparition of a lady whom he had loved, and who, he
+averred, visited him frequently after her death. They were all much
+interested, but annoyed by the interruption of Claire's childish
+superstitions. In fact, Hogg glides back to the old friendship of the
+university days, and his witticisms must have beguiled many a leisure
+hour, while he would also help Mary with her Latin studies now
+commenced. Claire frequently accompanied Shelley in his walks to the
+lawyers and other business engagements, as Mary's health not
+infrequently prevented her taking long walks, and Claire stated later
+that Shelley had a positive fear of being alone in London, as he was
+haunted by the fear of an attack from Leeson, the supposed Tanyrallt
+assassin.
+
+Claire's cleverness and liveliness made her a pleasant companion at
+times for Shelley and Mary; but even had they been sisters--and they
+had been brought up together as such--Mary might have found her
+constant presence in confined lodgings irksome, especially as Claire
+tormented herself with superstitious alarms which at times, even in
+reading Shakespeare, quite overcame her. Her fanciful imagination also
+conjured up causes of offence where none were intended, and magnified
+slight changes of mood on Shelley's or Mary's part into intentional
+affronts, when she ought rather to have taken Mary's delicate health
+and difficult position into consideration. Mary, by all accounts,
+seems naturally to have had a sweet and unselfish disposition,
+although she had sufficient character to be self-absorbed in her work,
+without which no work is worth doing. It is true that her friend
+Trelawny later appeared to consider her somewhat selfishly indifferent
+to some of Shelley's caprices or whims; but this was with the
+pardonable weakness of a man who, although he liked character in a
+woman, still considered it was her first duty to indulge her husband
+in all his freaks. However this may be, we have constantly recurring
+such entries in the joint diary as:--"Nov. 9.--Jane gloomy; she is
+very sullen with Shelley. Well, never mind, my love, we are happy.
+Nov. 10.--Jane is not well, and does not speak the whole day.... Go to
+bed early; Shelley and Jane sit up till twelve talking; Shelley talks
+her into good humour." Then--"Shelley explains with Clara."
+Again--"Shelley and Clara explain as usual."
+
+Mary writes--"Nov. 26.--Work, &c. &c. Clara in ill humour. She reads
+_The Italian_. Shelley sits up and talks her into humour." Dec.
+19.--A discussion concerning female character. Clara imagines that I
+treat her unkindly. Mary consoles her with her all-powerful
+benevolence. "I rise (having already gone to bed) and speak with Clara.
+She was very unhappy; I leave her tranquil." Clara herself writes as
+early as October--"Mary says things which I construe into unkindness.
+I was wrong. We soon became friends; but I felt deeply the imaginary
+cruelties I conjured up."
+
+It is clear that where such constant explaining is necessary there
+could not be much satisfaction in perpetual intimacy.
+
+Mary is amused at the way Shelley and Claire sit up and "frighten
+themselves" by different reasons or forms of superstition, and on one
+occasion we have their two accounts of the miraculous removal of a
+pillow in Claire's room, Claire avowing it had moved while she did not
+see it; and Shelley attesting the miracle because the pillow was on a
+chair, much as Victor Hugo describes the peasants of Brittany
+declaring that "the frog _must_ have talked on the stone because
+there was the stone it talked upon." The result might certainly have
+been injurious to Mary, who was awakened by the excited entrance of
+Claire into her room. Shelley had to interpose and get her into the
+next room, where he informed Claire that Mary was not in a state of
+health to be suddenly alarmed. They talked all night, till the dawn,
+showing Shelley in a very haggard aspect to Claire's excited
+imagination (Shelley had been quite ill the previous day, as noted by
+Mary). She excited herself into strong convulsions, and Mary had
+finally to be called up to quiet her. The same effect tried a little
+later fortunately fell flat; but there seemed no end to the vagaries
+of Claire's "unsettled mind" as Shelley calls it, for she takes to
+walking in her sleep and groaning horribly, Shelley watching for two
+hours, finally having to take her to Mary. Certainly philosophy did
+not seem to have a calming effect on Claire Claremont's nature, and
+often must Shelley and Mary have bemoaned the fatal step of letting
+her leave her home with them. It was more difficult to induce her to
+return, if indeed it was possible for her to do so, with the remaining
+sister, Fanny, still under Godwin's roof. Fanny's reputation was
+jealously looked after by her aunts Everina and Eliza, who
+contemplated her succeeding in a school they had embarked in in
+Ireland. But it is not to be wondered at that the excitable, lively
+Clara should have groaned and bemoaned her fate when transferred from
+the exhilaration of travel and the beauties of the Rhine and
+Switzerland to the monotony of London life in her anomalous position;
+and although both Mary and Shelley evidently wished to be kind to her,
+she felt more her own wants than their kindness. Want of occupation
+and any settled purpose in life caused pillows and fire-boards to walk
+in poor Claire's room, much as other uninteresting objects have to
+assume a fictitious interest in the houses and lives of many
+fashionably unoccupied ladies of the present day, who divide their
+interest between a twanging voice or a damp hand and the last poem of
+the last fashionable poet. Shelley is not the only imaginative and
+simple-minded poet who could apparently believe in such a phenomenon
+as a faded but supernatural flower slipped under his hand in the dark,
+other people in whom he has faith being present, and perchance helping
+in the performance. Genius is often very confiding.
+
+Peacock was perhaps the one other friend who, during these sombre, if
+not altogether unhappy, days of Mary, visited them in their lodgings.
+Shelley, through him, hears of some of the movements of his family,
+and at one time Mary enters with delight into the romantic idea of
+carrying off two heiresses (Shelley's sisters) to the west coast of
+Ireland. This idea occupies them for some days through many delightful
+walks and talks with Hogg. Peacock also frequently accompanied Shelley
+to a pond touching Primrose Hill, where the poet would take a fleet of
+paper boats, prepared for him by Mary, to sail in the pond, or he
+would twist paper up to serve the purpose--it must have been a
+relaxation from his projects of Reform.
+
+We must not leave this delightfully unhappy time without making
+reference to the series of letters exchanged between Mary and Shelley
+during an enforced separation. Unseen meetings had to be arranged to
+avoid encounters with bailiffs, at a time when the landlady refused to
+send them up dinner, as she wanted her money, and Shelley, after a
+hopeless search for money, could only return home--with cake. During
+this time some of their most precious letters were written to each
+other. We cannot refrain from quoting some touching passages after
+Mary had received letters from Shelley expressing the greatest
+impatience and grief at his separation from her, appointing vague
+meeting-places where she had to walk backwards and forwards from
+street to street, in the hopes of a meeting, and fearful animosity
+against the whole race of lawyers, money-lenders, &c., though all his
+hopes depended on them at the time. The London Coffee House seemed to
+be the safest meeting-place.
+
+Mary, not very clear about business matters at the time, felt most the
+separation from her husband: the dangers that surrounded them she only
+felt in a reflected way through him. They must have confidence in each
+other, she thinks, and their troubles cannot but pass, for there is
+certainly money which must come to them!
+
+She thus writes (October 25):
+
+
+For what a minute did I see you yesterday! Is this the way, my
+beloved, we are to live till the 6th? In the morning when I wake, I
+turn to look for you. Dearest Shelley, you are solitary and
+uncomfortable. Why cannot I be with you, to cheer you and press you to
+my heart? Ah! my love, you have no friends. Why then should you be
+torn from the only one who has affection for you? But I shall see you
+to-night, and this is the hope that I shall live on through the day.
+Be happy, dear Shelley, and think of me! Why do I say this, dearest
+and only one? I know how tenderly you love me, and how you repine at
+your absence from me. When shall we be free from fear of treachery? I
+send you the letter I told you of from Harriet, and a letter we
+received yesterday from Fanny (this letter made an appointment for a
+meeting between Fanny and Clara); the history of this interview I will
+tell you when I come, but, perhaps as it is so rainy a day, Fanny will
+not be allowed to come at all. I was so dreadfully tired yesterday
+that I was obliged to take a coach home. Forgive this extravagance;
+but I am so very weak at present, and I had been so agitated through
+the day, that I was not able to stand; a morning's rest, however, will
+set me quite right again; I shall be well when I meet you this
+evening. Will you be at the door of the coffee-house at five o'clock,
+as it is disagreeable to go into such places? I shall be there exactly
+at that time, and we can go into St. Paul's, where we can sit down.
+
+I send you "Diogenes," as you have no books; Hookham was so
+ill-tempered as not to send the book I asked for.
+
+
+Two more distracted letters from Shelley follow, showing how he had
+been in desperation trying to get money from Harriet; how pistols and
+microscope were taken to a pawnshop; Davidson, Hookham, and others are
+the most hopeless villains, but must be propitiated. Trying letters
+also arrive from Mrs. Godwin, who was naturally much incensed with
+Mary, and of whom Mary expresses her detestation in writing to
+Shelley. One more short letter:
+
+
+October 27.
+
+MY OWN LOVE,
+
+I do not know by what compulsion I am to answer you, but your letter
+says I must; so I do.
+
+By a miracle I saved your £5, and I will bring it. I hope, indeed, oh,
+my loved Shelley, we shall indeed be happy. I meet you at three, and
+bring heaps of Skinner St. news.
+
+Heaven bless my love and take care of him.
+
+HIS OWN MARY.
+
+
+As many as three and four letters in a day pass between Shelley and
+Mary at this time. Another tender, loving letter on October 28, and
+then they decide on the experiment of remaining together one night.
+Warned by Hookham, who regained thus his character for feeling, they
+dared not return to the London Tavern, but took up their abode for a
+night or two at a tavern in St. John Street. Soon the master of this
+inn also became suspicious of the young people, and refused to give
+more food till he received money for that already given; and again
+they had to satisfy their hunger with cakes, which Shelley obtained
+money from Peacock to purchase. Another day in the lodgings where the
+landlady won't serve dinner, cakes again supplying the deficiency.
+Still separation, Shelley seeking refuge at Peacock's. Fresh letters
+of despair and love, Godwin's affairs causing great anxiety and
+efforts on Shelley's part to extricate him. A Sussex farmer gives
+fresh hope. On November 3 Mary writes very dejectedly. She had been
+_nearly_ two days without a letter from Shelley, that is, she had
+received one of November 2 early in the morning, and that of November
+3 late in the evening. That day had also brought Mary a letter from
+her old friends the Baxters, or rather from Mr. David Booth, to whom
+her friend Isabel Baxter was engaged, desiring no further
+communication with her. This was a great blow to Mary, as, Isabel
+having been a great admirer of Mary Wollstonecraft, Mary had hoped she
+would remain her friend. Mary writes:--"She adores the shade of my
+mother. But then a married man! It is impossible to knock into some
+people's heads that Harriet is selfish and unfeeling, and that my
+father might be happy if he chose. By that cant of selling his
+daughter, I should half suspect that there has been some communication
+between the Skinner Street folks and them."
+
+But now the separation was approaching its end, and the danger of
+being arrested past, they move from their lodgings in Church Terrace,
+St. Pancras, to Nelson Square, where we have already seen Hogg in
+their company and heard of the sulks, fears, and bemoanings of poor
+Claire.
+
+Mary Shelley's novel of _Lodore_ gives a good account of the
+sufferings of this time, as referred to later. The great resource of
+intellectual power is manifested during all this period. During a time
+of ill-health, anxieties of all kinds, constant moves from lodgings
+where landladies refused to send up dinner, while she was discarded by
+all her friends, while she had to walk weary distances, dodging
+creditors, to get a sight from time to time of her loved Shelley,
+while Claire bemoaned her fate and seems to have done her best to have
+the lion's share of Shelley's intellectual attention (for she partook
+in all the studies, was able to take walks, and kept him up half the
+night "explaining"), Mary indefatigably kept to her studies, read
+endless books, and made progress with Latin, Greek, and Italian. In
+fact, she was educating herself in a way to subsist unaided hereafter,
+to bring up her son, and to fit him for any position that might come
+to him in this world of changing fortunes. Whatever faults Mary may
+have had, it is not the depraved who prepare themselves for, and
+honestly fight out, the battle of life as she did.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+DEATH OF SHELLEY'S GRANDFATHER, AND BIRTH OF A CHILD.
+
+
+After Shelley had freed himself, for a time, of some of his worst
+debts towards the close of 1814, the year 1815, with the death of his
+grandfather on January 6, brought a prospect of easier circumstances,
+as he was now his father's immediate heir.
+
+Although Shelley was not invited to the funeral, and only knew of the
+death through the papers, he determined at once to go into Sussex,
+with Claire as travelling companion, as Mary was not well enough for
+the journey. Shelley left Claire at Slinfold, and proceeded alone to
+his father's house, where he was refused admittance; so he adopted the
+singular plan of sitting in the garden, before the door, passing the
+time by reading _Comus_. One or two friends come out to see him,
+and tell him his father is very angry with him, and the will is
+most extraordinary; finally he is referred to Sir Timothy's
+solicitor--Whitton. From him, Mary writes in her diary, Shelley hears
+that if he will entail the estate he is to have the income of one
+hundred thousand pounds.
+
+The property was really left in this way, as explained by Professor
+Dowden. Sir Bysshe's possessions did not, probably, fall short of
+£200,000. One portion, valued at £80,000, consisted of certain
+entailed estates, but without Shelley's concurrence the entail could
+not be prolonged beyond himself; the rest consisted of unentailed
+landed property and personal property amounting to £120,000. Sir
+Bysshe desired that the whole united property should pass from eldest
+son to eldest son for generations. This arrangement, however, could
+not be effected without Shelley. Sir Bysshe, in his will, offered his
+grandson not only the rentals, but the income of the great personal
+property, if he would renew the entail of the settled property and
+would also consent to entail the unsettled property; otherwise he
+should only receive the entailed property, which was bound to come to
+him, and which he could dispose of at his pleasure, should he survive
+his father. He had one year to make his choice in.
+
+Shelley is considered to have been business-like in his negotiations;
+but to have retained his original distaste of 1811 to entailing large
+estates to descend to his children--in fact, he appears to have
+considered too little the contingency of what would come to them or to
+Mary in the event of his death prior to that of his father. Pressing
+present needs being paramount at this time, he agreed to an
+arrangement by which a portion of the estate valued at £18,000 could
+be disposed of to his father for £11,000, and an income of £1,000 a
+year secured to Shelley during his and his father's life. At one time
+there was an idea of disposing of the entailed estate to his father,
+as a reversion, but this was not sanctioned by the Court of Chancery.
+Money was also allowed by his father to pay his debts.
+
+So now we see Mary and Shelley with one thousand pounds a year, less
+two hundred pounds which, as Shelley ordered, was to be paid to
+Harriet in quarterly instalments.
+
+Now that the money troubles were over, which for a time absorbed their
+whole attention, Mary began to perceive signs of failing health in
+Shelley, and one doctor asserted that he had abscesses on the lungs,
+and was rapidly dying of consumption. Whatever these symptoms were
+really attributable to they rapidly disappeared, although Shelley was
+a frequent sufferer in various ways through his life.
+
+In February, we see also the effect of the mental strain and fatigue
+on Mary, as she gave birth, about the 22nd of that month, to a
+seven-months' child, a little girl, who only lived a few days, but
+long enough to win her mother's and father's love, and leave the first
+blank in their lives. The diary of this time, kept up first by Claire,
+and then by Mary, gives some details of the baby's short life. On
+February 22--
+
+
+Mary is well and at ease, the child not expected to live, Shelley sits
+up with Mary. Much agitated and exhausted. Hogg sleeps here.
+
+23.--Mary well; child unexpectedly alive. Fanny comes and stays the
+night.... 24.--Mary still well; favourable symptoms of the child. Dr.
+Clarke confirms our hope.... Hogg comes in evening. Shelley unwell and
+exhausted. 25.--Child and Mary very well. Shelley is very unwell.
+26.--Mary rises to-day. Hogg calls; talk. Mary retires at 6
+o'clock.... Shelley has a spasm. On 27 Shelley and Clara go about a
+cradle. 28.--Mary goes down-stairs; nurses the baby, and reads
+_Corinne_ and works. Shelley goes to consult Dr. Pemberton. On
+March 1st nurse baby, read _Corinne_, and work. Peacock and Hogg
+call; stay till half-past eleven.
+
+
+On March 2 they move to fresh lodgings. It is uncertain whether it was
+to 26 Marchmont Street, from which place letters are addressed in
+April and May. or whether they were in some other lodgings in the
+interval. This early move was probably detrimental to Mary and the
+baby, for on March 6 we find the entry: "Find my baby dead. Send for
+Hogg. Talk. A miserable day."
+
+Mary thinks, and talks, and dreams of her little baby, and finds
+reading the best palliative to her grief.
+
+
+March 19.--Dream that my little baby came to life again; that it had
+only been cold, and that we rubbed it before the fire, and it lived.
+Awake to find no baby. I think about the little thing all day. Not in
+good spirits. Shelley is very unwell.
+
+March 20.--Dream again about my little baby.
+
+
+Mrs. Godwin had sent a present of linen for the infant, and Fanny
+Godwin repeated her visits; but the little baby, who might have been a
+link towards peace with the Godwins, has escaped from a world of
+sorrow, where, in spite of a mother's love, she might later on have
+met with a cold reception.
+
+Godwin at this time was in the anomalous position of communicating
+with Shelley on his business matters; but for the very reason that
+Shelley lent him, or gave him, money, he felt it the more necessary to
+hold back from friendly intercourse, or from seeing his daughter--a
+curious result of philosophic reasoning, which appears more like
+worldly wisdom.
+
+From this time the company of Claire was becoming insufferable to Mary
+and Shelley. At least for a time, it was desirable to have a change.
+We find Mary sorely puzzled in her diary at times, as on March 11 she
+writes--"Talk about Clara's going away; nothing settled. I fear it is
+hopeless. She will not go to Skinner Street; then our house is the
+only remaining place I plainly see. What is to be done?
+
+March 12.--"Talk a great deal. Not well, but better. Very quiet in the
+morning and happy, for Clara does not get up till four...." Again on
+the 14th March--"The prospect appears more dismal than ever; not the
+least hope. This is, indeed, hard to bear."
+
+
+At one time Godwin, Shelley, and Mary tried to induce Mrs. Knapp to
+take her, but she refused. Claire also tried to get a place as
+companion, but that fell through, till at length the bright idea
+occurred to them of sending her into Devonshire, under the excuse of
+her needing change of air; and there, according to a letter from Mrs.
+Godwin to Lady Mountcashell, she was placed with a Mrs. Bicknall, the
+widow of a retired Indian officer. Two more entries in Mary's journal,
+of this time, show with what feelings of relief she contemplates the
+departure of Shelley's friend, as she now calls Claire. Noting that
+Shelley and his friend have their last talk, the next day, May 13,
+Shelley walks with her, and she is gone! and Mary begins "a new diary
+with our regeneration."
+
+There is a letter from Claire to Fanny Godwin, of May 28, apparently
+from Lynmouth, describing the scenery in a very picturesque manner,
+and saying how she delights in the peace and quiet of the country
+after the turmoil of passion and hatred she had passed through. She
+also expresses delight that their father had received one thousand
+pounds--this was evidently part of what Shelley had undertaken to pay
+for him, and was included in the sum which Sir Timothy paid for his
+debts. Claire--or Jane, as she was still called in Skinner
+Street--supposed her family would be comfortable for a month or two.
+
+Shelley and Mary now yearned for the country, and truly their eight
+months' experience in London had been a trying period, from various
+causes, but redeemed by their love and intellectual conversation. Now
+they felt unencumbered by pressing money troubles, and free from the
+burden of Claire's still more trying presence, at least to Mary. In
+June we find them together at Torquay, and we can imagine the
+delight of the poet and his loved Mary in their first unshared
+companionship--the quiet rambles by sea and cliff in the long June
+evenings, the sunsets, the quiet and undisturbed peace which
+surrounded them. They were able to give each other quaint pet names,
+which no one could or need understand--which would have sounded silly
+in the presence of a third person. This was a time in which they could
+grow really to know each other without reserve, when there need be no
+jealous competition as to who was most proficient in Greek or Latin;
+when Shelley was drawn to poetry, and _Alastor_ was contemplated,
+the melancholy strain of which seems to indicate love as the only
+redeeming element of life, and which might well follow the time of
+turmoil in Shelley's career. May not this poem have been his
+self-vindication as exhibiting what he might have become had he not
+followed the dictates of his heart? "Pecksie" and the "Elfin Knight"
+were the names which still stand written at the end of the first
+journal, ending with Claire's departure. Mary added some useful
+receipts for future use. One is: "A tablespoonful of the spirit of
+aniseed, with a small quantity of spermaceti;" to which Shelley adds
+the following: "9 drops of human blood, 7 grains of gunpowder, 1/2 oz.
+of putrified brain, 13 mashed grave-worms--the Pecksie's doom salve.
+The Maie and her Elfin Knight."
+
+We next find Mary at Clifton, July 27, 1815, writing in much
+despondency at being alone while Shelley is house-hunting in South
+Devon. Although she wishes to have a home of her own, she dreads the
+time it will take Shelley to find it. He ought to be with her the next
+day, the anniversary of their journey to Dover; without him it will be
+insupportable. And then the 4th of August will be his birthday, when
+they must be together. They might go to Tintern Abbey. If Shelley does
+not come to her, or give her leave to join him, she will leave in the
+morning and be with him before night to give him her present with her
+own hand. And then, is not Claire in North Devon? If Shelley has let
+her know where he is, is she not sure to join him if she think he is
+alone? Insufferable thought! As Professor Dowden shows, Mary must have
+been very soon joined by Shelley after this touching appeal. In all
+probability a house was fixed on, but in a very opposite direction,
+before the end of the week, and the lease or arrangements made by
+August 3, as the following year he writes from Geneva to Langdill to
+give up possession of his house at Bishopsgate by August 3, 1816. So
+here, far from Devonshire, by the gates of Windsor Forest, near the
+familiar haunts of his Eton days, we again find Shelley and Mary. Here
+Peacock was not far distant at Marlow, and Hogg could arrive from
+London, and here they were within reach of the river. No long time
+elapsed before they were tempted to experience again the delights of a
+holiday on the Thames. So Mary and Shelley, with Peacock and Charles
+Clairmont to help him with an oar, embarked and went up the river.
+They passed Reading and Oxford, winding through meadows and woods,
+till arriving at Lechlade, fourteen miles from the source of the
+Thames, they still strove to help the boat to reach this point if the
+boat would not help them. This proved impossible. After three miles,
+as cows had taken possession of the stream, which only covered their
+hoofs, the party had perforce to return, still contemplating
+proceeding by canal and river, even as far as the Clyde, the poet ever
+yearning forwards. But this, money and prudence forbade, as twenty
+pounds was needed to pass the first canal; so they returned to their
+pleasant furnished house at Bishopsgate. On this trip Mary saw
+Shelley's old quarters at Oxford, where they spent a night, and they
+must have lingered in Lechlade Churchyard, as the sweet verses there
+written indicate. Shelley and Mary were now settled for the first time
+in a home of their own: she was making rapid progress with Latin,
+having finished the fifth book of the Aeneid, much to Shelley's
+satisfaction, as recounted in a letter to Hogg. Hogg was expected to
+stay with them in October, and in the meanwhile, under the green
+shades of Windsor Forest, Shelley was writing his _Alastor_, and,
+as his wife describes in her edition of his poems, "The magnificent
+woodland was a fitting study to inspire the various descriptions of
+forest scenery we find in the poem." She writes:--
+
+None of Shelley's poems is more characteristic than this. The solemn
+spirit that exists throughout, the worship of the majesty of nature,
+and the breedings of a poet's heart in solitude--the mingling of the
+exulting joy which the various aspects of the visible universe inspire
+with the sad and trying pangs which human passion imparts--give a
+touching interest to the whole. The death which he had often
+contemplated during the last months as certain and near, he here
+represented in such colours as had, in his lonely musings, soothed his
+soul to peace. The versification sustains the solemn spirit which
+breathes throughout; it is peculiarly melodious. The poem ought rather
+to be considered didactic than narrative; it was the outpouring of his
+own emotions, embodied in the purest form he could conceive, painted
+in the ideal hues which his brilliant imagination inspired, and
+softened by the recent anticipation of death.
+
+Poetry was theirs, Nature their mutual love: Nature and two or three
+friends, if we may include the Quaker, Dr. Pope, who called on Shelley
+and wished to discuss theology with him, and when Shelley said he
+feared his views would not be to the Doctor's taste replied "I like to
+hear thee talk, friend Shelley. I see thou art very deep." But beyond
+these all friends had fallen off, and certainly Godwin's conduct seems
+to have been most extraordinary. He did not hesitate to put Shelley to
+considerable inconvenience for money, for not long after the one
+thousand pounds had been given, we find Shelley having to sell an
+annuity to help him with more money. Yet Godwin all this time treated
+Shelley and Mary with great haughtiness, much to their annoyance,
+though neither let it interfere with the duty they owed Godwin as
+father and philosopher. These perpetual worries helped to keep them in
+an unsettled state in their home. Owing perhaps to the loss of the
+diary at this period, we have no information about Harriet. Already in
+January, we find there is an idea of residing in Italy, both for the
+sake of health, and on account of the annoyance they experienced from
+their general treatment. Shelley had the poet's yearning for sympathy,
+and Mary must have suffered with and for him, especially when her
+father, for whom he did so much, treated him with haughty severity by
+way of thanks. Mary attributed Godwin's conduct to the influence of
+his wife, whom she cordially disliked at this time. She was loth to
+recognise inconsistency in her father, whom she always revered. Godwin
+on his side was by no means anxious for his daughter and Shelley to
+leave for Italy in a few weeks' time, as intimated to him by Shelley
+as possible on the 16th February. We thus see that a trip to the
+Continent was contemplated some months prior to the journey to Geneva.
+This idea arose after the birth of Mary's first son, William, born
+January 24, 1816, who was destined to be only for a few short years
+the joy of his parents, and then to rest in Rome, where Shelley was
+not long in following him.
+
+It is evident from Godwin's diary that Claire must have been on a
+visit or in direct communication with Mary at the beginning of
+January, as Godwin notes "Write to P.B.S. inviting Jane"; and it does
+not seem to have been possible for Shelley and Mary to have borne
+resentment. The facts of this meeting early in the year, and that Mary
+and Shelley contemplated another of their restless journeys abroad,
+certainly take off from the abruptness of their departure for Geneva
+in May with Claire Claremout. Undoubtedly Shelley was in a worried and
+excited state at this period, and he acted so as to rouse the doubts
+of Peacock as to the reason of the hurried journey. The story of
+Williams of Tremadock suddenly appearing at Bishopsgate, to warn
+Shelley that his father and uncle were engaged in a plot to lock him
+up, seems without foundation. But when, in addition to this story, we
+consider Claire's history, we can well understand that, in spite of
+Shelley's love of sincerity and truth, circumstances were too strong
+for him. At a time when he and Mary were being avoided by society for
+openly defying its laws, they might well reflect whether they could
+afford to avow the new complication which had sprung up in their small
+circle. Claire, in hopes of finding some theatrical engagement, had
+called upon Lord Byron at Drury Lane Theatre, apparently about March
+1816, during the distressing period of his rupture with his wife. The
+result of this acquaintance is too well known, and has been too much a
+source of obloquy to all concerned in it, to need much comment here,
+and it is only as the facts affect Mary that we need refer to them at
+all.
+
+At this time Byron was about to leave England, pursued, justly or
+unjustly, by the hatred of the British mob for a poet who dared to
+quarrel with his wife and follow the low manners of some of the
+leaders of fashion whom he had been intimate with. Their obscurity has
+sheltered _them_ from opprobrium. He was accompanied by the young
+physician, Dr. John Polidori, who has somehow passed with Byron's
+readers as a fool; yet he certainly could have been no fool in the
+ordinary sense of the word, as he had taken full degrees as a doctor
+at an earlier age perhaps than had ever been known before. His family,
+a simple and highly educated family (his father was Italian, and had
+been secretary to Alfieri), caring very much for poetry and
+intellectual intercourse, were delighted at the prospect of the young
+physician having such an opening to his career, as his sister, the
+mother of poets, has told the writer. It is true that this exciting
+short period with Byron must have had an injurious effect on the young
+physician's after career, though he was still able to obtain the deep
+interest of Harriet Martineau at Norwich. It might be added that his
+nephew, not only a poet but a leader in poetic thought, deeply
+resented the insulting terms in which Byron wrote of Polidori, and,
+although h deeply admired the genius of Byron, did not fail to note
+where any weakness of form could be found in his work--such is human
+nature, and so is poetic justice meted out. This might appear to be a
+slight digression from our subject, if it were not for the fact that
+when Mary wrote _Frankenstein_ at Sécheron, as one of the tales
+of horror that were projected by the assembled party, it was only John
+Polidori's story of _The Vampire_ which was completed along with
+Mary's _Frankenstein_, _The Vampire_, published anonymously,
+was at first extolled everywhere under the idea that it was Byron's,
+and when this idea was found to be a mistake the tale was slighted in
+proportion, and its author with it. The fact is that as an imaginative
+tale of horror _The Vampire_ holds its place beside Mary's
+_Frankenstein_, though not so fully developed as a literary
+performance or as an invention.
+
+So on the eve of Byron's starting for Switzerland, we find Shelley and
+Mary contemplating a journey with Claire in the same direction by
+another route, but to the same place and hotel, previously settled on
+and engaged by Byron. It certainly might appear that Shelley and Mary
+in this dilemma did not feel justified in acting towards another in a
+way contrary to their own conduct in life. In all probability Claire
+confided her belief in Byron's attachment to herseif, after his wife
+had discarded him, to Mary or even to Shelley. Mary, however
+distasteful the subject must have been to her, would not perhaps allow
+herself to stand in the way of what, from her own experience, might
+appear to be a prospect of a settlement in life for Claire, especially
+as she must deeply have felt their responsibility in having induced or
+allowed her to accompany them in their own elopement. In fact, the
+feeling of responsibility in this most trying case might, to a highly
+imaginative mind, almost conjure up the invention of a Frankenstein.
+
+We now (May 3, 1816) find Shelley, Mary, and Claire at Dover, again on
+a journey to Switzerland. From Dover Shelley wrote a kind letter to
+Godwin, explaining money matters, and promising to do all he could to
+help him. They pass by Paris, then by Troyes, Dijon, and Dôle, through
+the Jura range. This time is graphically described by Shelley in
+letters appended to the _Six Weeks' Tour_; the journey and the
+eight days' excursion in Switzerland. We read of the terrific changes
+of nature, the thunderstorms, one of which was more imposing than all
+the others, lighting up lake and pine forests with the most vivid
+brilliancy, and then nothing but blackness with rolling thunder. These
+letters are addressed to Peacock, but in them we have no reference to
+the intimacy with Byron now being carried on; how he arrived at the
+Hotel Sécheron, nor their removal to the Maison Chapuis to avoid the
+inquisitive English.
+
+There is, fortunately, no further reason to refer to the rumours which
+scandal-mongers promulgated--rumours which undoubtedly hastened the
+rupture between Byron and Claire; although evil rumours, like fire
+smouldering in a hold, are difficult to extinguish, and, as Mr.
+Jeaffreson shows, the slanders of this time were afterwards a trouble
+to Shelley at Ravenna, in 1821, when his wife had to take his part.
+These rumours were the source of certain poems, and also, later,
+stories about Byron. All lovers of Shelley owe a debt of deep
+gratitude to Mr. Jeaffreson, who, although, severe to a fault on many
+of the blemishes in his character (as if he considered that poets
+ought to be almost superhuman in all things), nevertheless proves in
+so clear a way the utter groundlessness of the rumours as to relieve
+all future biographers from considering the subject. At the same time
+he shows how distasteful Claire's presence must have become to Byron,
+who was hoping for reconciliation with his wife, and who naturally
+construed fresh obduracy on her part as the result of reports that
+were becoming current. Anyway, it is manifest that Byron did not
+regard Claire in the light that Mary may have hoped for--namely, that
+he would consider her as a wife, taking the place of her who had left
+him. Byron had no such new idea of the nature of a wife, but only
+accepted Claire as she allowed herself to be taken, with the addition
+that he grew to dislike her intensely.
+
+So after Shelley and Byron had made their eight days' tour of the
+lake, from June 23, unaccompanied by Mary and Claire, we find a month
+later Shelley taking them for an eight days' tour to Chamouni,
+unaccompanied by Byron. Of this tour Shelley each day writes long
+descriptive letters to Peacock, who is looking out for a house for
+them somewhere in the neighbourhood of Windsor. They return by July 28
+to Montalègre, where he writes of the collection of seeds he has been
+making, and which Mary intends cultivating in her garden in England.
+
+For another month these young restless beings enjoy the calm of their
+cottage by the lake, close to the Villa Diodati, while the poets
+breathe in poetry on all sides, and give it to the world in verse.
+Mary notes the books they read, and their visits in the evening to
+Diodati, where she became accustomed to the sound of Byron's voice,
+with Shelley's always the answering echo, for she was too awed and
+timid to speak much herself. These conversations caused her,
+subsequently, when hearing Byron's voice, to feel a sad want for "the
+sound of a voice that is still."
+
+It is during this sojourn by the Swiss Lake that Mary began her first
+serious attempt at literature. Being asked each day by Shelley whether
+she had found a story, she answered "No," till one evening after
+listening to a conversation between Byron and Shelley on the principle
+of life--whether it would be discovered, and the power of
+communicating life be acquired--"perhaps a corpse might be reanimated;
+galvanism had given tokens of such things"--she lay awake, and with
+the sound of the lake and the sight of the moonlight gleaming through
+chinks in the shutters, were blended the idea and the figure of a
+student engaged in the ghastly work of creating a man, until such a
+horror came to light that he shrank in fear from his own performance.
+Such was the original idea for this imaginative work of a girl of
+nineteen, which has held its place among conspicuous works of fiction
+to the present day. _Frankenstein_ was the outcome of the project
+before mentioned of writing tales of horror. One night, when pouring
+rain detained Shelley's party at the Villa Diodati over a blazing
+fire, they told strange stories, till Byron, leading to poetic ideas,
+recited the witch's scene from "Christabel," which so excited
+Shelley's imagination that he shrieked, and ran from the room; and
+Polidori writes that he brought him to by throwing water in his face.
+Upon his reviving, they agreed to write each a supernatural tale.
+Matthew Gregory Lewis, the author of _The Monk_, who visited at
+Diodati, assisted them with these weird fancies.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+"FRANKENSTEIN."
+
+
+That a work by a girl of nineteen should have held its place in
+romantic literature so long is no small tribute to its merit; this
+work, wrought under the influence of Byron and Shelley, and conceived
+after drinking in their enthralling conversation, is not unworthy of
+its origin. A more fantastically horrible story could scarcely be
+conceived; in fact, the vivid imagination, piling impossible horror
+upon horror, seems to claim for the book a place in the company of a
+Poe or a Hoffmann. Its weakness appears to be that of placing such an
+idea in the annals of modern life; such a process invariably weakens
+these powerful imaginative ideas, and takes away from, instead of
+adding to, the apparent truth, and cannot fail to give an affectation
+to the work. True, it might add to the difficulty to imagine a
+different state of society, past or future, but this seems a _sine
+quâ non_. The story of _Frankenstein_ begins with a series of
+letters of a young man, Robert Walton, writing to his sister, Mrs.
+Saville in England, from St. Petersburg, where he is about to embark
+on a voyage in search of the North Pole. He is bent on discovering the
+secret of the magnet, and is deluded with the hope of a _never_
+absent sun. When advanced some distance towards his longed-for goal,
+Walton writes of a most strange adventure which befalls them in the
+midst of the ice regions--a gigantic being, of human shape, being
+drawn over the ice in a sledge by dogs. Not many hours after this
+strange sight a fresh discovery was made of another man in another
+sledge, with only one living dog to it: this time the man was seen to
+be a European, whom the sailors tried to persuade to enter their ship.
+On seeing Walton the stranger, speaking English, asked whither they
+were bound before he would consent to enter the ship. This naturally
+caused intense excitement, as the man, reduced to a skeleton, seemed
+to have but a short time to live. However, on hearing that the vessel
+was bound northwards, he consented to enter, and with great care he
+was restored for the time. In answer to an inquiry as to his object in
+thus exposing himself, he replied, "To seek one who fled from me." An
+affection springs up and increases between Walton and the stranger,
+till the latter promises to tell his sad and strange story, which he
+had hitherto intended should die with him.
+
+This commencement leads to the story being told in the form (which
+might with advantage have been avoided) of a long narrative by the
+dying man. The stranger describes himself as of a Genevese family of
+high distinction, and gives an interesting account of his father and
+juvenile surroundings, including a playfellow, Elizabeth Lavenga, whom
+we encounter much later in his history. All his studies are pursued
+with zest, till coming upon the works of Cornelius Agrippa he is led
+with enthusiasm into the ideas of experimental philosophy; a passing
+remark of "trash" from his father, who does not explain the difference
+between past and modern science, is not enough to deter him and
+prevent the fatal consequence of the study he persists in, and thus a
+pupil of Albertus Magnus appears in the eighteenth century. The
+effects of a thunderstorm, described from those Mary had recently
+witnessed, decided him in his resolution, for electricity now was the
+aim of his research. After having passed his youth in his happy Swiss
+home with his parents and dear friends, on the death of his loved
+mother he starts for the University of Ingolstadt. Here he is much
+reprehended by the professors for his useless studies, until one, a
+Mr. Waldeman, sympathises with him, and explains how Cornelius Agrippa
+and others, although their studies did not bring the immediate fruit
+they expected, nevertheless helped on science in other directions, and
+he advises Frankenstein to pursue his studies in natural philosophy,
+including mathematics. The upshot of this advice is that two years are
+spent in intense study and thought, till he becomes thin and haggard
+in appearance. He is contemplating a visit to his home, when, making
+some fresh experiment, he finds that he has discovered the principle
+of life; this so overcomes him for a time that, oblivious of all else,
+he is bent on making use of his discovery. After much perplexing
+thought he determines to create a being superior to man, so that
+future generations shall bless him. In the first place, by the help of
+chemistry, he has to construct the form which is to be animated. The
+grave has to be ransacked in the attempt, and Frankenstein describes
+with loathing some of the details of his work, and shows the danger of
+overstraining the mind in any one direction--how the virtuous become
+vicious, and how virtue itself, carried to excess, lapses into vice.
+
+The form is created in nervous fear and fever. Frankenstein being the
+ideal scientist, devoid of all feeling for art (whose ideas of it,
+indeed, might be limited to the elevation and section of a pot),
+without any ideal of proportion or beauty, reaches the point where he
+considers nothing but the infusion of life necessary. All is ready,
+and in the first hour of the morning he applies his fatal discovery.
+Breath is given, the limbs move, the eyes open, and the colossal being
+or monster, as he is henceforth called, becomes animated; though
+copied from statues, its fearful size, its terrible complexion and
+drawn skin, scarcely concealing arteries and muscles beneath, add to
+the horror of the expression. And this is the end of two years work to
+the horrified Frankenstein. Overwhelmed by disgust, he can only rush
+from the room, and finally falls exhausted on his bed, only to wake to
+find his monster grinning at him. He runs forth into the street, and
+here, in Mary's first work, we have a reminiscence of her own infant
+days, when she and Claire hid themselves under the sofa to hear
+Coleridge read his poem, for the following stanza from the _Ancient
+Mariner_ might seem almost the key-note of _Frankenstein_:--
+
+   Like one who on a lonely road,
+     Doth walk in fear and dread,
+   And having once turned round, walks on,
+     And turns no more his head,
+   Because he knows a fearful fiend
+     Doth close behind him tread.
+
+Frankenstein hurries on, but coming across his old friend Henri
+Clerval at the stage coach, he recalls to mind his father, Elizabeth,
+his former life and friends. He returns to his rooms with his friend.
+Reaching his door, he trembles, but opening it, finds himself
+delivered from his self-created fiend. His frenzy of delight being
+attributed to madness from overwork, Clerval induces Frankenstein to
+leave his studies, and, finally (after he had for months endured a
+terrible illness), to accompany him to his native village. Various
+delays occurring, they are detained too late in the year to pass the
+dangerous roads on their way home.
+
+Health and peace of mind returning to some degree, Frankenstein is
+about to proceed on his journey homewards, when a letter arrives from
+his father with the fatal news of the mysterious death of his young
+brother. This event hastens still further his return, and gives a
+renewed gloomy turn to his mind; not only is his loved little brother
+dead, but the extraordinary event points to some unknown power. From
+this time Frankenstein's life is one agony. One after another all whom
+he loves fall victims to the demon he has created; he is never safe
+from his presence; in a storm on the Alps he encounters him; in the
+fearful murders which annihilate his family he always recognises his
+hand. On one occasion his creation wished to have a truce and to come
+to terms with his creator. This, after his most fearful treachery had
+caused the innocent to be sentenced as the perpetrator of his fearful
+deeds. On meeting Frankenstein he recounts the most pathetic story of
+his falling away from sympathy with humanity: how, after saving the
+life of a girl from drowning, he is shot by a young man who rushes up
+and rescues her from him. He became the unknown benefactor of a family
+for some period of time by doing the hard work of the household while
+they slept. Having taking refuge in a hovel adjoining a corner of
+their cottage, he hears their pathetic and romantic story, and also
+learns the language and ways of men; but on his wishing to make their
+acquaintance the family are so horrified at his appearance that the
+women faint, the men drive him off with blows, and the whole family
+leave a neigbourhood, the scene of such an apparition. After these
+experiences he retaliates, till meeting Frankenstein he proposes these
+terms: that Frankenstein shall create another being as repulsive as
+himself to be his companion--in fact, he desires a wife as hideous as
+he is. These were the conditions, and the lives of all those whom
+Frankenstein held most dear were in the balance; he hesitated long,
+but finally consented.
+
+Everything now had to be put aside to carry out this fearful task--his
+love of Elizabeth, his father's entreaties that he should marry her,
+his hopes, his ambitions, go for nothing. To save those who remain, he
+must devote himself to his work. To carry out his aim he expresses a
+wish to visit England, and, with his friend Clerval, descends the
+Rhine, which is described with the knowledge gained in Mary's own
+journey, and the same route is pursued which she, Shelley, and Claire
+had taken through Holland, embarking for England from Rotterdam, and
+thence reaching the Thames. After passing London and Oxford and
+various places of interest, he expresses a desire to be left for a
+time in solitude, and selects a remote island of the Orkneys, where an
+uninhabited hut answers the purpose of his laboratory. Here he works
+unmolested till his fearful task is nearly accomplished, when a fear
+and loathing possess his soul at the possible result of this second
+achievement. Although the demon already created has sworn to abandon
+the haunts of man and to live in a desert country with his mate, what
+hold will there be over this second being with an individuality and
+will of its own? What might be the future consequences to humanity of
+the existence of such monsters? He forms a resolution to abandon his
+dreaded work, and at that moment it is confirmed by the sight of his
+monster grinning at him through the window of the hut in the
+moonlight. Not a moment is lost. He tears his just completed work limb
+from limb. The monster disappears in rage, only to return to threaten
+eternal revenge on him and his; but the time of weakness is passed;
+better encounter any evils that may be in store, even for those he
+loves, than leave a curse to humanity. From that time there is no
+truce. Clerval is murdered and Frankenstein is seized as the murderer,
+but respited for worse fate; he is married to Elizabeth, and she is
+strangled within a few hours. When goaded to the verge of madness by
+all these events, and seeing his beloved father reduced to imbecility
+through their misfortunes, he can make no one believe his
+self-accusing story; and if they did, what would it avail to pursue a
+being who could scale the Alps, live among glaciers, and pass
+unfathomable seas? There is nothing left but a pursuit till
+death, single-handed, when one might expire and the other be
+appeased--onward, with a deluding sight from time to time of his
+avenging demon. Only in sleep and dreams did Frankenstein find
+forgetfulness of his self-imposed torture, for he lived again with
+those he had loved; he endured life in his pursuit by imagining his
+waking hours to be a horrible dream and longing for the night, when
+sleep should bring him life. When hopes of meeting his demon failed,
+some fresh trace would appear to lead him on through habited and
+uninhabited countries; he tracks him to the verge of the eternal ice,
+and even there procures a sledge from the wretched and horrified
+inhabitants of the last dwelling-place of men to pursue the monster,
+who, on a similar vehicle, had departed, to their delight. Onwards,
+onwards, over the eternal ice they pass, the pursued and the pursuer,
+till consciousness is nearly lost, and Frankenstein is rescued by
+those to whom he now narrates his history; all except his fatal
+scientific secret, which is to die with him shortly, for the end
+cannot be far off.
+
+The story is told; and the friend--for he feels the utmost sympathy
+with the tortures of Frankenstein--can only attempt to soothe his last
+days or hours, for he, too, feels the end must be near; but at this
+crisis in Frankenstein's existence the expedition cannot proceed
+northward, for the crew mutiny to return. Frankenstein determines to
+proceed alone; but his strength is ebbing, and Walton foresees his
+early death. But this is not to pass quietly, for the demon is in no
+mood that his creator should escape unmolested from his grasp. Now the
+time is ripe, and, during a momentary absence, Walton is startled by
+fearful sounds, and then, in the cabin of his dying friend, a sight to
+appal the bravest; for the fiend is having the death struggle with
+him--then all is over. Some last speeches of the demon to Walton are
+explanatory of his deed, and of his present intention of
+self-immolation, as he has now slaked his thirst to wreak vengeance
+for his existence. Then he disappears over the ice to accomplish this
+last task.
+
+Surely there is enough weird imagination for the subject. Mary in this
+work not merely intended to depict the horror of such a monster, but
+she evidently wished also to show what a being, with no naturally bad
+propensities, might sink to when under the influence of a false
+position--the education of Rousseau's natural man not being here
+possible.
+
+Some weak points, some incongruities, it would be unreasonable not to
+expect. Whether the _eternal_ light expected at the North Pole,
+if of the sun, was a misapprehension of the author or a Shelleyan
+application of the word eternal (as applied by him to certain
+friendships, or duration of residence in houses) may be questioned.
+The question as to the form used for the narrative has already been
+referred to. The difficulty of such a method is strangely exemplified
+in the long letters which are quoted by Frankenstein to his friend
+while dying, and which he could not have carried with him on his
+deadly pursuit. Mary's facility in writing was great, and having
+visited some of the most interesting places in the world, with some of
+the most interesting people, she is saved from the dreary dulness of
+the dull. Her ideas, also, though sometimes affected, are genuine, not
+the outcome of some fashionable foible to please a passing faith or
+superstition, which ought never to be the _raison d'etre_ of a
+romance, though it may be of a satire or a sermon.
+
+The last passage in the book is perhaps the weakest. It is scarcely
+the climax, but an anticlimax. The end of Frankenstein is well
+conceived, but that of the Demon fails. It is ridiculous to conceive
+anyone, demon or human, having ended his vengeance, fleeing over the
+ice to burn himself on a funeral pyre where no fuel could be found.
+Surely the tortures of the lowest pit of Dante's Inferno might have
+sufficed for the occasion. The youth of the authoress of this
+remarkable romance has raised comparison between it and the first work
+of a still younger romancist, the author of _Gabriel Denver_,
+written at seventeen, who died before he had completed his twentieth
+year.
+
+While this romance was being planned during the latter part of the
+stay of the Shelley party in Switzerland, after their return from
+Chamouni, the diary gives us a charming idea of their life in their
+cottage of Montalègre. We have the books they read, as usual; and well
+did Mary, no less than Shelley, make use of that happy reading-time of
+life--youth. The Latin authors read by Shelley were also studied by
+Mary. We find her reading "Quintus Curtius," ten and twelve pages at a
+time; also on Shelley's birthday, August 4, she reads him the fourth
+book of Virgil, while in a boat with him on the lake. Also the
+fire-balloon is not forgotten, which Mary had made two or three days
+in advance for the occasion. They used generally to visit Diodati in
+the evening, after dinner, though occasionally Shelley dined with
+Byron, and accompanied him in his boat. On one occasion Mary wrote:
+"Shelley and Claire go up to Diodati; I do not, for Lord Byron did not
+seem to wish it." Rousseau, Voltaire, and other authors cause the time
+to fly, until their spirits are damped by a letter arriving from
+Shelley's solicitor, requiring his return to England. While in
+Switzerland Mary received some letters from Fanny, her half-sister;
+these letters are interesting, showing a sweet, gentle disposition,
+very affectionate to both Shelley and Mary. One letter asks Mary
+questions about Lord Byron. There are also details as to the
+unfortunate state of the finances of Godwin, who seemed in a perennial
+state of needing three hundred pounds. Fanny also writes of herself,
+on July 29, 1816, as not being well--being in a state of mind which
+always keeps her body in a fever--her lonely life, after her sister's
+departure, with all the money anxieties, and her own dependence,
+evidently weighed upon her mind, and led to a state of despondency,
+although her letters would scarcely give the idea of a tragedy being
+imminent. She writes to Shelley and Mary that Mrs. Godwin--mamma she
+calls her--tells her that she is the laughing-stock of Mary and
+Shelley, and the constant "beacon of their satire." She shows much
+affection for little William, as well as for his parents; but there is
+certainly no word in these letters showing more than sisterly and
+friendly feeling; no word showing jealousy or envy. Claire afterwards
+alleged that Fanny had been in love with Shelley. Mr. Kegan Paul
+states the reverse most strongly. It is not easy to conceive how
+either should have been sure of the fact. Even Shelley's beautiful
+verses to her memory do not indicate any special reason for her
+sadness, as far as he was concerned.
+
+   Her voice did quiver as we parted,
+     Yet knew I not that heart was broken
+   From which it came, and I departed,
+     Heeding not the words then spoken.
+          Misery--oh Misery!
+          This world is all too wide for thee.
+
+From these lines we see that Fanny was in a very depressed state of
+mind when her sister left England for her second Continental tour in
+1816. This being two years from the time when Mary had first left her
+home, it does not seem probable that Shelley was to blame, or rather
+was the indirect cause of Fanny's sadness. She felt herself generally
+useless and unneeded in the world, and this idea weighed her down.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+RETURN TO ENGLAND.
+
+
+On leaving the Lake of Geneva on August 28, without having
+accomplished anything in the way of a settlement for Claire, but with
+pleasant reminiscences of Rousseau's surroundings, and the grandeur of
+the Alps, the party of three returned towards England by way of Dijon,
+and thence by a different route from that by which they had gone,
+returning by Rouvray, Auxerre, Fontainebleau, and Versailles. Here
+Mary and Shelley visited the palace and town, which a few years hence
+she would revisit under far different circumstances. Travelling--in
+those days so very unlike what it is in ours, when Europe can be
+crossed without being examined--allowed them to become acquainted with
+the towns they passed through. Rouen was visited; but for some reason
+they were disappointed with the cathedral. Prom Havre they sailed for
+Portsmouth, when, with their usual fate, they encountered a stormy
+passage of twenty-seven hours. It must have been a trying journey for
+them in more ways than one, for if there was any uncertainty as to
+Claire's position on leaving England, Mary could now no longer have
+been in any doubt. On arriving in England she proceeded, with Claire
+and her little William, with his Swiss nurse Elise, to Bath, where
+Claire passed as Mrs. Clairemont. Shelley addressed her as such at 5
+Abbey Churchyard, Bath. During this time Shelley was again
+house-hunting, while staying with Peacock on the banks of the Thames;
+and Mary paid a visit to Peacock at the same time, leaving little
+William to the care of Elise and Claire at Bath. From here Claire
+writes to Mary about the "Itty Babe's" baby ways, and how she and
+Elise puzzled and puzzled over the little night-gowns, or, quoting
+Albè, as they called Byron (it has been suggested a condensation of L.
+B.), "they mused and coddled" without effect. Claire certainly did her
+best to take care of the baby, walking out with it, and so forth.
+
+Now the three hundred pounds written of by Fanny was falling due. Mary
+must also have been kept in great apprehension, as we see by a letter
+from Shelley to Godwin, dated October 2, 1816, that the money was not
+forthcoming, as hoped. So the fatal Rhine gold is again helping to a
+tragedy, which the romantic prefer to impute to a still more fatal
+cause; for, so short a time after the 2nd as October 10, we find Fanny
+already at Bristol, writing to Godwin that she is about to depart
+immediately to the place whence she hopes never to return. On October
+3 there is a long letter from her to Mary, written just after
+Shelley's letter had reached Godwin, when she had read its contents on
+Godwin's countenance as he perused it. Her letter is most
+clear-sighted, noble, and single-minded; she complains of Mary's way
+of exaggerating Mrs. Godwin's resentment to herself, explaining that
+whatever Mrs. Godwin may say in moments of extreme irritation to her,
+she is quite incapable of making the worst of Mary's behaviour to
+others. She shows Mary her own carelessness in leaving letters about
+for the servants to read, so that they and Harriet spread the reports
+she complains of rather than Mrs. Godwin. She tells how she had tried
+to convince Shelley that he should only keep French servants, and she
+endeavours to persuade Mary how important it is that they should
+prevent bad news coming to Godwin in a way to give a sudden shock, as
+he is so sensitive. She saw through certain subterfuges of Shelley,
+and wrote in a calm, affectionate way, trying to set everything right,
+with a wonderful clearness of vision; for everyone but herself--for
+herself there was no outlet but despair, no rest but the grave; she,
+the utterly unselfish one, was useless--all that remained was to
+smooth her way to the grave. Not for herself, but others, she managed
+to die where she was unknown, travelling for this purpose to Swansea,
+where only a few shillings remained to her, and a little watch Mary
+had brought her from Geneva. She wrote of herself in a letter she
+left, which neither compromised anyone nor indicated who she was, as
+one whose birth was unfortunate, but whose existence would soon be
+forgotten. Poor Fanny! Is she not rather likely to be remembered as a
+type of self-abnegation? Certainly hers was not the nature to cause
+her sister a moment's jealous pang, even though her death called forth
+one of Shelley's sweetest lyrics.
+
+There was nothing to be done. Godwin paid a brief visit to the scene,
+and ascertained that all was too true. The door that had had to be
+forced, the laudanum bottle, and her letter told all that need be
+known. Shelley visited Bristol to obtain information; but there was no
+use in giving publicity to this fresh family sorrow--discretion was
+the only sympathy that could be shown. Mary bought mourning, and
+worked at it. Claire envied for herself Fanny's rest; but life had to
+proceed, awaiting fresh events.
+
+Work was the great resource. Mary was writing her _Frankenstein_.
+She persisted with the utmost fortitude in intellectual employment, as
+poor Fanny wrote to Mary on September 26:--"I cannot help envying your
+calm, contented disposition, and the calm philosophical habits of life
+which pursue yon; or, rather, which you pursue everywhere; I allude to
+your description of the manner in which you pass your days at Bath,
+when most women would hardly have recovered from the fatigues of such
+a journey as you had been taking."
+
+This is, indeed, the key-note of Mary's character, which, with her
+sensitive, retiring nature, enabled her to live through the stormy
+times of her life with equanimity.
+
+Mary had Shelley's company through November, but at the beginning of
+December she writes to Shelley, who is again staying with Peacock
+house-hunting. Mary tells him what she would _like_: "A house
+(with a lawn) near a river or lake, noble trees, or divine mountains";
+but she would be content if Shelley would give her "a garden and
+absentia Claire." This is very different from her way of thinking of
+Fanny, who, she says, might now have had a home with her. This
+expression occurs in a letter to Shelley when she was on the point of
+marrying him, and might have had Fanny with her. Mary also speaks of
+her drawing lessons, and how (thank God!) she had finished "that
+tedious, ugly picture" she had been so long about. This points to that
+terrible way of teaching Art, by accustoming its students to
+hideousness and vulgarity, till Art itself might become an unknown
+quantity. Mary also tells, what is more interesting, that
+she has finished the fourth chapter, a very long one, of her
+_Frankenstein_, which she thinks Shelley will like. She wishes
+for his return. On December 13 Mary receives a letter from Shelley,
+who is with Leigh Hunt. On December 15, 1816, he is back with Mary at
+Bath, when a letter from Hookham, who had been requested by Shelley to
+obtain information about Harriet for him, brought further fatal
+news--for Harriet had now committed suicide, and had been found
+drowned in the Serpentine. Unknown, she was called Harriet Smith;
+uncared for, she had gone to her grave beneath the water--unloved, the
+lovely Harriet cared not to live. What may have happened, it is not
+for those who may not have been tried to question; of cause and effect
+it is not for us to judge; but that her memory must have been a
+haunting shadow to Shelley and to Mary no one would wish to think them
+heartless enough to deny. Surely the lovely "Lines," with no name
+affixed, must be the dirge to Harriet's fate, and Shelley's life's
+failure:--
+
+   The cold earth slept below;
+   Above, the cold sky shone;
+       And all around
+       With a chilling sound,
+   From caves of ice and fields of snow,
+   The breath of night like death did flow
+     Beneath the sinking moon.
+
+     The wintry hedge was black;
+     The green grass was not seen;
+         The birds did rest
+         On the bare thorn's breast,
+   Whose roots, beside the pathway-track,
+   Had bound their folds o'er many a crack
+     Which the frost had made between.
+
+     Thine eyes glowed in the glare
+     Of the moon's dying light.
+         As a fen-fire's beam
+         On a sluggish stream
+   Gleams dimly, so the moon shone there;
+   And it yellowed the strings of thy tangled hair,
+     That shook in the wind of night.
+
+     The moon made thy lips pale, beloved;
+     The wind made thy bosom chill:
+         The night did shed
+         On thy dear head
+   Its frozen dew, and thou didst lie
+   Where the bitter breath of the naked sky
+       Might visit thee at will.
+
+These lines are dated 1815 by Mary in her edition, but she says she
+cannot answer for the accuracy of all the dates of minor poems.
+
+The death of Harriet was necessarily quickly followed by the marriage
+of Shelley and Mary. The most sound opinions were ascertained as to
+the desirability of an early marriage, or of postponing the ceremony
+for a year after the death of Harriet; all agreed that the wedding
+ought to take place without delay, and it was fixed for December 30,
+1816, at St. Mildred's Church in the City, where Godwin and his wife
+were present, to their no little satisfaction, as described by Shelley
+to Claire. Mary notes her marriage thus in her diary: "I have omitted
+writing my journal for some time. Shelley goes to London, and returns;
+I go with him; spend the time between Leigh Hunt's and Godwin's. A
+marriage takes place on the 30th December 1816. Draw. Read Lord
+Chesterfield and Locke."
+
+No sooner was the marriage over than their one anxiety was to return
+to Bath; for now the time of Claire's trial was approaching, and on
+January 13 a little girl was born, not destined to remain long in a
+world so sad for some. Little Allegra, a child of rare beauty, was
+welcomed by Shelley and Mary with all the benevolence they were
+capable of, and Byron's duty to his child devolved, for the time at
+least, on Shelley.
+
+During this period, Shelley's and Mary's chief anxiety was to welcome
+and care for the little children left by poor Harriet. They had been
+placed, before her death, under the care of a clergyman who kept a
+school in Warwick, the Rev. John Kendall, vicar of Budbrooke. Shelley
+had hoped that his marriage with Mary would remove all difficulty, and
+Mary was waiting to welcome Ianthe and Charles; but in this matter
+they were doomed to disappointment.
+
+On January 8 a Bill was filed in the Court of Chancery, on the part of
+the infants Charles and Ianthe Shelley, John Westbrook, their maternal
+grandfather, acting on their behalf, praying that they might not be
+transferred to the care of their father, Percy Bysshe Shelley, who had
+deserted their mother; who was the author of _Queen Mab_, and an
+avowed atheist, who wrote against the institution of marriage, and who
+had been living unlawfully with a woman whom Eliza Westbrook (as
+Shelley had written to her) might excusably regard as the cause of her
+sister's ruin. Shelley filed his answer on the 18th, denying the
+desertion of his wife, as she and he had separated with mutual
+consent, owing to various causes. He had wished for his children on
+parting with her, but left them with her at her urgent entreaty. He
+had given her two hundred pounds to pay her debts, and an allowance of
+a fifth of his income. As to his theological opinions, he understands
+that they are abandoned as not applicable to the case. His views on
+matrimony, he alleged, were only in accordance with the ideas of some
+of the greatest thinkers that divorce ought to be possible under
+various conditions.
+
+Lord Eldon gave his judgment on March 27, 1817. In fifteen carefully
+worded paragraphs he showed his reasons for depriving Shelley of his
+children. He insists through all that it is Shelley's avowed and
+published opinions, as they affected his _conduct_ in life, which
+unfitted him to be the guardian of his children.
+
+The wording in some passages caused grave anxiety to Shelley and Mary
+(as shown in their letters) as to whether they would be deprived of
+their own children; and they were prepared to abandon everything,
+property, country, all, and to escape with the infants. The poem "To
+William" was written under this misapprehension, although when he left
+England in 1818, Shelley's chief reason, as given in his letter to
+Godwin, was on account of his health. Undoubtedly the judgment, and
+all the trying circumstances they had been passing through ever since
+their return from Geneva, helped to decide them in this determination.
+
+Charles and Ianthe were finally placed under the care of Dr. and Mrs.
+Hume, who were to receive two hundred pounds a year--eighty pounds
+settled on them by Westbrook, and one hundred and twenty pounds to be
+paid by Shelley for the charge. Shelley might see them twelve times a
+year in the presence of the Humes, the Westbrooks twelve times alone,
+and Sir Timothy and his family when they chose.
+
+While these proceedings were progressing, Mary with Claire and the two
+children had moved to Marlow, having previously joined Shelley in
+London on January 26, as she feared to leave him in his depressed
+state alone. The intellectual society they met at Hunt's and at
+Godwin's helped to pass over this trying period. One evening Mary saw
+together the "three poets"--Hunt, Shelley, and Keats; Keats not being
+much drawn towards Shelley, while Hazlitt, who was also present, was
+unfavourably impressed by his worn and sickly appearance, induced by
+the terrible anxieties and trials which be had recently passed
+through. Horace Smith also proved a staunch friend: Shelley once
+remarked it was odd that the only truly generous wealthy person he
+ever met should be a stockbroker, and that he should write and care
+for poetry, and yet make money. In the midst of her anxieties, Mary
+Shelley enjoyed more social intercourse and amusement than before. We
+find her noting in her diary, in February, dining with the Hunts and
+Horace Smith, going to the opera of _Figaro_, music, &c. But now
+they had found their Marlow retreat--a house with a garden as Mary
+desired, not with a river view, but a shady little orchard, a kitchen
+garden, yews, cypresses, and a cedar tree. Here Mary was able to live
+unsaddened for a time; the Swiss nurse for the children, a cook and
+man-servant, sufficed for in-door and out-door work, and Mary, true to
+her name, was able to occupy herself with spiritual and intellectual
+employment, not to the neglect of domestic, as the succession of
+visitors entertained must prove; study, drawing, and her beloved work
+of _Frankenstein_ were making rapid progress. Nor could Mary have
+been indifferent to the woes of the poor, for Shelley would scarcely
+have been so actively benevolent as recorded during the residence at
+Marlow without the co-operation of his wife. While Shelley enquired
+into cases of distress and gave written orders for money, Mary
+dispensed the latter. Here Godwin paid them his first visit, and the
+Hunts passed a pleasant time. Shelley wrote his _Revolt of Islam_
+under the Bisham Beeches, and Mary had the pleasure of welcoming her
+old friend Mr. Baxter, of Dundee, although his daughter Isabel,
+married to Mr. Booth, still held aloof. Peacock, Horace Smith, and
+Hogg were also among the guests. We find constant references to Godwin
+having been irritated and querulous with Mary or Shelley. A forced,
+unnatural, equanimity during one period of his life seems to have
+resulted in a querulous irritability later--a not unusual case--and he
+had to vent it on those who loved and revered him most, or in fact, on
+those who would alone endure it from amiability of disposition, a
+quality not remarkable in his second wife.
+
+On May 14 we find Mary has finished and corrected her
+_Frankenstein_, and she decides to go to London and stay with her
+father while carrying on the negotiations with Murray whom she wishes
+to publish it. Shelley accompanies Mary for a few days at Godwin's
+invitation, but returns to look after "Blue Eyes," to whom he is
+charged with a million kisses from Mary. But Mary returns speedily to
+Shelley and "Blue Eyes," having felt very restless while absent. She
+soon falls into a plan of Shelley's for partially adopting a little
+Polly who frequently spent the day or slept in their house, and Mary
+would find time to tell her before she went to bed whatever she or
+Shelley had been reading that day, always asking her what she thought
+of it.
+
+Mary, who was expecting another child in the autumn, was not long idle
+after the completion of _Frankenstein_, but set to work copying
+and revising her _Six Weeks' Tour_. This work, begun in August,
+she completed after the birth of her baby Clara on September 2. In
+October the book was bought and published by Hookham.
+
+She tells, in her notes on this year 1817, how she felt the illness
+and sorrows which Shelley passed through had widened his intellect,
+and how it was the source of some of his noblest poems, but that he
+had lost his early dreams of changing the world by an idea, or, at
+least, he no longer expected to see the result.
+
+A letter from Mary to her husband, written soon after the birth of her
+baby, shows how anxious she was at that time about his health. It had
+been a positive pain to her to see him languid and ill, and she
+counselled him obtaining the best advice. Change being recommended by
+the physician, Mary has to decide between going to the seaside or
+Italy. With all the reasons for and against Italy, Mary asks Shelley
+to let her know distinctly his wish in the matter, as she can be well
+anywhere. One strong reason for their going to Italy is that Alba, as
+Allegra was then called, should join her father. Evidently the
+embarrassment was too great to settle how to account for the poor
+child longer in England; and had not she a just claim upon Byron?
+
+In another letter, September 28, Mary speaks of Claire's return to
+Marlow in a croaking state--everything wrong; Harriet's debts
+enormous. She had just been out for her first walk after the birth of
+Clara, and was surprised to find how much warmer it was out than in.
+Shelley is commissioned to buy a seal-skin fur hat for Willy, and to
+take care that it is a round fashionable shape for a boy. She is
+surrounded by babies while writing--William, Alba, and little Clara.
+Her love is to be given to Godwin when Mrs. Godwin is not there, as
+she does not love her. _Frankenstein_ is still undisposed of.
+
+The house at Marlow is soon found to be far too cold for a winter
+residence. Italy or the sea must speedily be settled on. Alba is the
+great consideration in favour of Italy, Mary feels she will not be
+safe except with them; Byron is so difficult to fix in any way, and
+the one hope seems to be to get him to provide for the child. Anxiety
+for Alba's future ruled their present, so impossible is it to foretell
+the future, which, read and judged as our past, is easy to be severe
+upon. This dream of health and rest in Italy was not to be so easily
+realised. Instead of being there, they were still dispensing charity
+at Marlow at the end of December, in spite of various negotiations for
+money in October and November. Horace Smith had lent two hundred
+pounds, and, Shelley thought, would lend more. Mary continued
+extremely anxious on Alba's account. If she could only be got to her
+father! Who could tell how he might change his mind if there be much
+delay? Might he not "change his mind, or go to Greece, or to the
+devil; and then what happens?" The lawyers' delays were heavy trials,
+and they could not go and leave Godwin unprovided for; he was a great
+anxiety to Mary at this time. It was not till December 7 that Shelley
+wrote to tell Godwin how he felt bound to go to Italy, as he had been
+informed that he was in a consumption.
+
+Owing to a visit of Mr. Baxter to them at Marlow, when he wrote a most
+enthusiastic letter about Shelley and Mary to his daughter Isabel
+Booth, Mary had hoped for a renewal of the friendship which had
+afforded her so much pleasure as a girl, and she invited Isabel to
+accompany them to Italy; but this Mr. Booth would not allow, and, in
+fact, he appears to have treated his father-in-law, Mr. Baxter, who
+was six years younger than himself, with much severity, and wished him
+to stop all intimacy with Shelley. He did not, however, prevent him
+having a friendly parting with Shelley on March 2, although he would
+not allow his wife to have any communication with Mary--much to their
+sorrow. Mary was in constant anxiety about Shelley in the last months
+of 1817, writing of his suffering and the distress she feels in seeing
+him in such pain and looking so ill. In January 1818, the month before
+they left Marlow, his sufferings became very great. But two thousand
+pounds being borrowed on the promise of four thousand five hundred
+pounds on his father's death, and the house at Marlow being sold on
+January 25th, we find the packing and flitting taking place soon
+after. By February 7, Shelley leaves for London, and on Tuesday 10th
+Mary follows. Godwin, as usual now, had been beseeching for money, and
+then, feeling his dignity wounded by the effort, retaliated on the
+giver with haughtiness and insulting demands. In a biography,
+unfortunately, characters cannot always be made the consistent beings
+they frequently become in romances.
+
+One more happy month Mary is to pass in England with Shelley. We,
+again, have accounts of visits to the opera, to museums, plays,
+dinners, and pleasant evenings spent with friends. Keats is again met,
+and Shelley calls on Mr. Baxter, who is not allowed by his son-in-law
+to say farewell to Mary Shelley: such a martinet may a Scotch
+schoolmaster be. Mary Lamb calls, and visits are paid and received
+till the last evening arrives, when Shelley, exhausted with
+ill-health, fatigue, and excitement, fell into one of his profound
+sleeps on the sofa before some of his friends left the lodgings in
+Great Russell Street, and thus the Hunts were unable to exchange with
+him their farewells. This small band of literary friends were all to
+bid Shelley and Mary farewell on his last few days in England. The
+contrast is indeed marked between that time and this, when Shelley
+societies are found in various parts of the world, when enthusiasts
+write from the most remote regions and form friendships in his name,
+when, churches, including Westminster Abbey, have rung in praise of
+his ideal yearnings, and when, not least, some have certainly tried to
+lead pure unselfish lives in memory of the godlike part of the man in
+him; but he now left his native shores, never to return, with Claire
+and Allegra, and his own two little children, and certainly a true
+wife willing to follow him through weal or woe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+LIFE IN ITALY.
+
+
+A third time, on March 11, 1818, Shelley, Mary, and Claire are on the
+road to Dover, this time with three young lives to care for--Willie,
+aged two years and two months; Clara, six months; and Allegra, one
+year and two months. These small beings kept well during their
+journey, and it is touching to note how Claire Clairmont, in her part
+of the diary recording their progress, mentions bathing her darling at
+Dover, and then cancels the passage from her diary, as many others
+where her name is given--surely one of the saddest of things for a
+mother to fear to mention her child's name! After another stormy
+passage the party again reached Calais, which they found as delightful
+as ever, and where they stayed at the Grand Cerf Hotel.
+
+Mary continues to note the journey. They took a different route this
+time--by Douai, La Fère, Rheims, Berri-le-bac, and St. Dizier, the
+road winding by the Marne. They sleep at Langres, which ramparted town
+surely ought to have left a pleasant reminiscence; but they had
+hitherto found the route uninteresting and fatiguing. Mary finds more
+interest in the country after Langres, and with the help of Schlegel,
+from whom Shelley read out loud to her, the time passed pleasantly; no
+long weary evenings in hotels; no complaints when a carriage broke
+down and they were kept three hours at Macon for it to be repaired:
+they had with them the friends of whom they never tired.
+
+At Lyons they rested three days. Mary much admired the city, and
+they visited the theatre, where they saw _L'homme gris et le
+Physionomiste_; and on Wednesday, March 25, they set out towards
+the mountains whose white tops were seen at a distance.
+
+In crossing the frontier there was a difficulty in getting their books
+allowed to enter Sardinian territory, until a Canon, who had met
+Shelley's father at the Duke of Norfolk's, helped to get them through.
+After leaving Chambéry, where Mary stayed to allow her nurse Elise to
+see her child, they crossed Mont Cenis and dined on the top. The
+beauty of the scenery greatly raised Shelley's spirits, causing him to
+sing with exultation. They stayed one night at Turin, visiting the
+opera; and after reaching Milan, Shelley and Mary went to Lake Como
+for a few days, having some idea of spending the summer on its banks;
+but not being able to suit themselves with a house they returned to
+Milan on April 12 and rejoined Claire, who had remained with the
+children. During the stay at Milan till the end of April there had
+been frequent letters from Claire to Byron. These were evidently far
+from satisfactory, as we find Shelley writing letters of caution to
+Claire in 1822, with regard to Byron and Allegra: he mentions having
+warned her against letting Byron get possession of Allegra in the
+spring of 1818, but Claire thought it for the interest of the child,
+whom she undoubtedly loved, to let her go to her father. Walks in the
+public gardens with the "Chicks" are noted by Claire several times,
+and the last entry in her diary, before April 28, when Allegra was
+taken by the nurse Elise to Byron, mentions a walk with the "Chicks"
+in the morning and drive in the evening with them, Mary and Shelley.
+Mary had sent her own trusted nurse Elise with the little Allegra,
+feeling that she would remain and in some degree replace the mother;
+and Claire believed that the child would stay with its father, though
+certainly this did not seem desirable or likely to last for long.
+
+A change of scene being needed after these trying emotions, Mary, with
+her husband and two children, and Claire, now left for Pisa and
+Leghorn. They slept on the way at Piacenza, Parma, Modena, and then
+passed a night at a little inn among the Apennines, the fifth at
+Barberino, the sixth at La Scala, and on the seventh reached Pisa,
+where they lodged at Le Tre Donzelle. On this journey Mary was able to
+enjoy the Italian scenery under the unclouded Italian sky--the
+vine-festooned trees amid the fields of corn, the hedges full of
+flowers; all these seen from the carriage convey a lasting impression,
+and poor Claire remarks that, driving in a long, straight road, she
+always hopes it will take her to some place where she will be happier.
+They pass through beautiful chestnut woods on the southern side of the
+Apennines, and along the fertile banks of the Arno to Pisa. After a
+few days' stay at Pisa, where the cathedral, "loaded with pictures and
+ornaments," and the leaning tower are visited, and where, perhaps, the
+quiet Campo Santo, with its chapel covered with the beautiful frescos
+of Orcagna and Gozzoli, &c., was enjoyed, they proceed to Leghorn;
+here, after a few days at L'Aquila Nera, they move into apartments.
+They meet and see much of Mary's mother's friend, Mrs. Gisborne, who
+grew much attached to both Shelley and Mary, and who, from her
+acquaintance with literary people, must have been a pleasant companion
+to them. They had letters of introduction to the Gisbornes from
+Godwin. While here Mary made progress with Italian, reading Ariosto
+with her husband. Leghorn was not a sufficiently interesting place to
+detain the wandering Shelleys long, in spite of the attractions of the
+Gisbornes. On June 11 Mary, with her two children and Claire, follows
+Shelley to Bagni di Lucca, where he had taken a house. Here Mary much
+enjoyed the quiet after noisy Leghorn, as she wrote to Mrs. Gisborne,
+hoping to attract her to visit them. Mary was in her element in shady
+woods within the sound of running waters; her only annoyance was the
+number of English she came in contact with in her walks, where the
+English nursery-maid flourished, "a kind of animal I by no means like"
+she wrote; neither was she pleased by "the dashing, staring
+Englishwomen, who surprise the Italians (who always are carried about
+in sedan chairs) by riding on horseback."
+
+Mary and Claire used to visit the Casino with Shelley, and look on at
+the dancing in which they did not join. Mary, however, did not agree
+with Shelley in admiring the Italian style of dancing; but those
+things on which they were ever of the same mind they had in plenty,
+for their beloved books arrived after being scrutinised by the Church
+authority; and while Shelley revelled in the delights of Greek
+literature, Mary shared those of English with him, for who can
+estimate the advantage of hearing Shakespeare and other poets read by
+Shelley! It was at the baths of Lucca also that Mary found her
+husband's unfinished _Rosalind and Helen_, and prevailed on him
+to complete it, for, as she says in her notes, "Shelley had no care
+for any of his poems that did not emanate from the depths of his mind
+and develop some high or abstruse truth." Without doubt, Mary was the
+ideal wife for Shelley. At this stage in the career of the poet one
+can but deplore that relentless destiny should only bring Mary to
+Shelley when a victim had already been sacrificed on the altar of
+fate; and the more one realises the sympathetic and intellectual
+nature of Claire, the less possible is it to help wasting a regret
+that Byron could not have met with the philosopher bookseller's
+adopted daughter earlier, instead of ruining his nature and his life
+by the fashionable follies he tampered with. But who would alter the
+workings of destiny? Does not the finest Lacryma Christi grow on the
+once devastated slopes of Vesuvius? Life, too, has its earthquakes,
+and the eruptions of its hidden depths seen through the minds of its
+poets, though causing at times agony to those who come in contact with
+them, work surely for the good of the whole. Mary had the years of
+pleasure, which are inestimable to those who can appreciate them, of
+contact with a great mind; but few among poets' wives have had the
+gifts which allow them fully to participate in such pleasures. Well
+for Mary that she also inherited much of her father's philosophic
+nature, which enabled her to endure some of the trials inherent in her
+position. What Shelley wrote Mary would transcribe--no mere task for
+her--for did she not, through Shelley, enjoy Plato's _Symposium_,
+a translation of which he was employed upon at Lucca? How could the
+fashionable idlers at the Baths find time to drink in inspiration from
+the poet and his wife? The poet gives the depths of his nature, but it
+is not he who writes with the fever or the tear of emotion who can
+stoop to be his own interpreter to the uninitiated, which seems to be
+a necessity of modern times, with few exceptions. Mary's education,
+defective though it may have been in some details, made her a fitting
+companion for some of the greatest of her day, and this quality in a
+woman could scarcely exist without a refinement of manner and tastes
+which, at times, might be misleading as to her disposition.
+
+The spirit of wandering now came over Claire, and by the middle of
+August her desire to see her child again could no longer be
+suppressed. Accordingly she set out with Shelley on August 19, and
+reached Florence the next day, when Shelley wrote to Mary the
+impression the lovely city made on him, begging her, at the same time,
+not to let little William forget him before his return--little Clara
+could not remember. Claire thought at one time of remaining at Padua,
+but on reaching that city could not endure being left alone, and they
+reached Venice in the middle of the night, during a violent storm,
+which Shelley did not fail to write an account of to his wife. He also
+told her how the Hoppners, whom they called on (Mr. Hoppner being the
+British Consul in Venice), advised them to act with regard to Byron.
+By their advice Shelley called alone on him, and Byron proposed to
+send Allegra to Padua for a week on a visit; he would not like her to
+remain longer, as the Venetians would think he had grown tired of her.
+He afterwards offered them his villa at Este, thinking they were all
+at Padua. Shelley accepted this proposal, and wrote requesting Mary to
+join him there with the children, not knowing whether he was acting
+for good or harm, but looking forward to be scolded if he had done
+wrong, or kissed if right--the event would prove. The event did prove;
+but it was out of their power to rule it.
+
+Mary had invited the Gisbornes to stay with her at the Baths. They
+arrived on August 25, but the circumstances seemed imperative for Mary
+to go to Este, and she left on the 31st with a servant, Paolo, as
+attendant. They were detained a day at Florence, and did not reach
+Este till poor little Clara was dangerously ill from dysentery, which
+reduced her to a state of fever and weakness. Mary endured the misery
+of an incompetent doctor at Este; neither had they confidence in the
+Paduan physician. Shelley proceeded to Venice to obtain further
+advice, and prepare for the arrival of his wife and child, writing
+from there that he felt somewhat uneasy, but trusted there was no
+cause for real anxiety. This arrangement made, Mary set out with her
+baby and Claire to meet Shelley at Padua, and then proceeded to
+Venice, Claire returning to mind William and Allegra at Este; and now
+Mary had to endure that terrible tension of mind, with her dying child
+in her arms, driving to Venice, the time remembered by her so well
+when, on the same route, nearly a quarter of a century later, each
+turn in the road and the very trees seemed as the most familiar
+objects of her daily life; for had they not been impressed on her
+mental vision by the strength of despair? The Austrian soldiers at the
+frontier could not detain them, though without passports, for even
+they would not prevent a dying child from being conveyed on a forlorn
+hope. Such grief could scarcely be rendered more or less acute by
+circumstances. They arrived at their inn in a gondola, but only for
+Clara to die in her mother's arms within an hour.
+
+In this trial the Hoppners proved most kind friends, taking Mary to
+their house, and relieving the first hopelessness of grief by
+kindness, which it seemed ingratitude not to respond to. Mary,
+whatever she may have felt, knew that no expression of her feelings in
+her diary would nerve her to endure. She went about her daily
+occupations as usual. One idle day elapsed, after her little Clara had
+been buried on the Lido; we find her as usual reading, shopping, and
+seeing Byron, with whom she hoped to make better terms for Claire with
+regard to Allegra. There is a curious passage in a letter from Godwin
+to his daughter, illustrative of his own turn of mind, and not without
+some general truth:--"We seldom indulge long in depression and
+mourning except when we think secretly that there is something very
+refined in it, and that it does us honour."
+
+On September 29, Shelley and Mary return to Este. Claire had taken the
+children to Padua, but returned the next day to the Villa I
+Cappuccini. In the evening they went to the Opera. Their house was
+most beautifully situated. Here Shelley wrote his "Lines among the
+Euganean Hills," for no intense feeling could come to the poet without
+the necessity of expressing himself in poetry; and it was during this
+September month that Shelley wrote the first act of his _Prometheus
+Unbound_. Mary revisited Venice with her husband, little William,
+and the nurse Elise, on October 12. The impression then formed of
+Byron and his surroundings was so painful as to render it a matter of
+surprise that they could think of returning Allegra to him; but her
+extreme youth was her safeguard in this respect, and Shelley returned
+to Este on September 24, to take Allegra a second time from her mother
+who, with all her love for her "darling," as she always wrote of her
+in the effaced passages of her diary, could not get over the
+insuperable difficulties of her birth. On January 22 of this same year
+Claire had entered in her diary the fact of its being Byron's (Albé's)
+birthday; a note carefully effaced soon after. Shelley and Mary having
+decided to spend the winter further south, after a few days of
+preparation they left Este on November 5, and spent the night at
+Ferrara, where they visited the relics of Ariosto and Tasso, and the
+dungeon where the latter was incarcerated. Thence to Bologna, where
+they endured much fatigue in the picture galleries, poor Shelley being
+obliged to confess he did not pretend to taste. From Bologna, by
+Faenza and Cesena, they followed the coast from Rimmi to Fano, and
+passed an uncomfortable night at an inn at Fossombrone among the
+Apennines. Mary was greatly impressed by the beauty and grandeur of
+Spoleto. The impressive falls at Terni are duly chronicled by her; and
+November 19 and 20 are spent in winding through the Apennines, and
+then crossing the solitude of the Roman Campagna, and then Rome is
+reached.
+
+In Italy, where wonder succeeds wonder, and where no place is a mere
+repetition of another, Mary may well have been impressed by her first
+visit to the Eternal City. Here, in November, she was able to sit and
+sketch in the Coliseum with her child and her husband, who found the
+wonderful ruin a source of inspiration. But Rome was now only a
+resting-place on their road to still sunnier Naples; and on November
+27 Shelley set out a day in advance of Mary and her child to secure
+rooms in Naples, where Mary arrived on December 1. In the best part of
+the city, facing the royal gardens in front of the marvellous bay,
+with Shelley for her guide, who himself made use of Madame de
+Staël's _Corinne_ as a handbook, Livy for the antiquities, and
+Winckelmann for art, Mary could enjoy the sights of Naples as no
+ordinary sightseer would. December was devoted to expeditions--Baiæ,
+Vesuvius, and Pompeii. The day at Baiæ was perhaps the most
+delightful, with the return by moonlight in the boat to Naples.
+Vesuvius, with its stupendous spectacle as of heaven and hell made
+visible, naturally produced a profound impression, but it was a very
+tiring expedition, as apparently it was only Claire who had a
+_chaise à porteurs_ for the ascent of the cone; Mary and Shelley
+rode on mules as far as they could go, and Claire was carried all the
+way in a chair--though this seems scarcely possible--from Resina.
+How Mary could walk through the cinders up the cone seems
+incomprehensible. She must have had great strength, as it is a trying
+task for a man, and no wonder Shelley, in spite of his pedestrian
+strength, was exhausted when they arrived at the hermitage of San
+Salvador. The winter at Naples seems to have been a trying one to
+Mary, in spite of sunshine and the beauties of Nature; for Shelley was
+in a state of depression, as is exemplified in the "Stanzas written in
+dejection near Naples." What the immediate cause of this was cannot be
+said; it seems to be one of the mysteries, or perhaps rather the one
+mystery, of Shelley's life. He asserted to Medwin that a lady, young,
+married, and of noble connections, had become infatuated with him, and
+declared her love of him on the eve of his departure for the Continent
+in 1816; that he had gently but firmly repulsed her; that she arrived
+in Naples on the day he did, and had soon afterwards died. It is
+suggested that a little girl who was left under his guardianship in
+Naples, and whom he spoke of as his poor Neapolitan, might possibly be
+the child of this lady; others doubt the story altogether, which is
+not to be wondered at, although nothing can be declared impossible in
+a life where truth is frequently so much stranger than romance.
+
+Mary was also troubled while at Naples by her servants, an unusual
+subject with her; but Paolo, having gone far beyond the limits of
+cheating, was detected by Mary, and also obliged by her to marry
+Elise, whom he had betrayed. They left for Rome, but Paolo declared he
+would be revenged on the Shelleys, and wrote threatening letters,
+which a lawyer disposed of for a time. This is known to be the origin
+of later calumnies, which Mr. Jeaffreson has now carefully and finally
+refuted.
+
+Mary, later, with the regret of love that would be all sufficient,
+wished that at Naples she had entered more into the cause of the
+grief, which Shelley had kept from her, in order not to add to the
+melancholy she was then feeling with regard to her father.
+
+Before leaving Naples they succeeded in visiting the Greek ruins at
+Paestum, which give still a fresh impression in Italy; and then, on
+February 28, 1819, Mary takes leave of Naples, never to revisit it
+with any of her companions of that time.
+
+In Rome they found rooms in the Villa Parigi, but removed from them to
+the Palazzo Verospi on the Corso, and we soon find them busy exploring
+the treasures of Rome the inexhaustible. Here they had not to take
+fatiguing journeys as in Naples to visit the chief points of interest,
+for they were to be found at every turn. Visits to St. Peter's and the
+museum of the Vatican are mentioned; walks with Shelley to the Forum,
+the Capitol, and the Coliseum, which is visited and re-visited.
+Frequent visits are paid in the evening to the Signora Marianna
+Dionigi, and with her they hear Mass in St. Peter's, where the poor
+old Pope Pius VII was nearly dying. The Palazzo Doria and its picture
+gallery are examined, where the landscapes of Claude Lorraine
+particularly strike them. Then to the baths of Caracalla, where the
+romantic beauty of the ruins forms one of their chief attractions in
+Rome. They also take walks and drives in the Borghese Gardens. The
+statue of Pompey, at the base of which Cæsar fell, is not passed
+over--but it would be impossible to tell of all they saw and enjoyed
+in Rome. Mary made more acquaintances in Rome, nor did the English
+altogether neglect to call on Shelley. Mary also recommenced lessons
+in drawing, while Claire had singing lessons, and they met some
+celebrities at the Signora Dionigi's conversazioni. Altogether this
+early part of their stay in Rome was happy, but Shelley's health
+always fluctuating made them contemplate taking a house for the summer
+at Castellamare, as a doctor recommended this for him. But the days
+were hurrying towards a fresh calamity, for little William now fell
+ill, and we find the visits of a physician, Dr. Bell, chronicled, and
+on June 2nd three visits are noted. Claire helps to her utmost;
+Shelley does not close his eyes for sixty hours, and Mary, the hopes
+of whose life were bound up with the child, could only endure, watch
+the wasting of fever, and see the last of three perish on "Monday,
+June 7th, at noonday," as Claire enters in her diary. Mary and Shelley
+were deprived of their gentle, blue-eyed darling, by a stronger hand
+than that of the Court of Chancery, and little William was buried
+where Shelley was soon to follow, in the cemetery which "might make
+one in love with death."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+MARY'S DESPONDENCY AND BIRTH OF A SON.
+
+
+Before the fatal illness of her child Willie, Mary had encountered an
+old friend in Rome, and had renewed her acquaintance with Miss Curran
+whom she had formerly known at her father's. Congenial tastes in
+drawing and painting drew these ladies together, and Miss Curran did
+or began portraits of Mary, Shelley, and, what was of more importance
+to them at the time, of little Willie. The portraits of Mary and of
+Shelley, unfinished, and by an amateur, are by no means satisfactory;
+certainly not giving in Mary's case an idea of the beauty and charm
+which are constantly referred to by her friends, and which seem to
+have endured up to the time when, much later, an attack of small-pox
+altered her appearance. The portrait of Mary, although not artistic,
+is interesting as painted from life. Her oval face is here given with
+the high forehead. The complexion described as delicate and white was
+not in the gift of Miss Curran, who was not a colourist. To depict the
+eyes grey, tending to brown near the iris, agrees with Shelley's,
+"brown" and Trelawny's "grey" eyes, but the beauty of expression is
+wanting. The mouth, thin and hard, might have caught a passing look,
+but certainly not what an artist would have wished to portray; while a
+certain stiffness of pose is not what one would expect in the
+high-strung, sensitive Mary Shelley. The beauty of gold-brown hair was
+not in the painter's power to catch. Mary was of middle height,
+tending towards short; her hands were considered very beautiful, and
+by some she was supposed to be given to displaying them, although
+concealing them would have been difficult and unnecessary. Her arms
+and neck were also beautiful. Leigh Hunt refers to her at the opera,
+_décolletée_, with white, gleaming, sloping shoulders. Her "voice
+the sweetest ever heard," added to her gifts of conversation,
+described as resembling her father's with an added softness of manner
+and charm of description, with elegance and correctness, devoid of
+reserve or affectation. Cyrus Redding, who much admired and esteemed
+her, obtained her opinion about Miss Curran's portrait of her husband,
+for his article in the Galignani edition of Shelley. She considered it
+by no means a good one, as unfinished, but with some striking points
+of resemblance. She consented to superintend the engraving from it for
+Galignani's volume, which was regarded as far more successful. Miss
+Curran kindly assisted with advice.
+
+While these portraits were being executed Mary was gaining the
+sympathy of the painter, a boon soon much needed, for after the death
+of her third child her courage for a while broke down entirely. In a
+very delicate state of health at the time, she could not rouse herself
+to think of anything but her losses. With no other child needing her
+care, she could only abandon herself to inconsolable grief. Shelley
+felt that he was out of her life for the first time; that her heart
+was in Rome in the grave with her child. They revisited the Falls of
+Terni, but the spirit had fled from the waters. They pass through
+bustling Leghorn, and visit the Gisbornes, but the noise is
+intolerable, and Shelley, ever attentive in such matters, finds a
+house at a short distance in the country, the Villa Valsovano, down a
+quiet lane surrounded by a market garden. Olives, fig trees, peach
+trees, myrtles, alive at night with fire-flies, must have been
+soothing surroundings to the wounded Mary, to whom nature was ever a
+kind friend. Nor were they in solitude, for they were within visiting
+distance of friends at Leghorn.
+
+Two months after her loss she recommences her diary on Shelley's
+birthday, this time not without a wail. She writes to Mrs. Hunt of the
+tears she constantly sheds, and confesses she has done little work
+since coming to Italy. She had read, however, several books of Livy,
+Antenor, Clarissa, some novels, the Bible, Lucan's Pharsalia, and
+Dante. Shelley is reading her _Paradise Lost_, and he is writing
+the _Cenci_, where
+
+   That fair, blue-eyed boy,
+   Who was the lodestar of your life,
+
+Mary tells us refers to William. Shelley wrote that their house was a
+melancholy one, and only cheered by letters from England.
+
+On September 18 Mary wrote to her friend, Miss Curran, that they were
+about to move, she knew not whither. Then Shelley, with Charles
+Clairmont, went to Florence and engaged rooms for six months, and at
+the end of September Shelley returned and took his wife by slow and
+easy stages to the Tuscan capital, for her health was then in a very
+delicate state for travelling. There, in the lovely city of Florence,
+on November 12, 1819, she gave birth to her son Percy Florence, who
+first broke the spell of unhappiness which had hung for the last five
+months like a cloud over them; he, as events proved, was to be her one
+comfort with her memories, when the supreme calamity of her life fell
+on her, and he was mercifully spared to be the solace of her later
+years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+GODWIN AND "VALPERGA."
+
+
+At this time while political events were absorbing England, and
+Shelley was weaving them into poetry in Italy during the remainder of
+his residence in Florence, Godwin's personal difficulties were
+reaching their climax. When he lost, in an action for the rent of his
+house, Shelley came to his help, but in some way Godwin expected more
+than he received, and became very unpleasant in his correspondence, so
+much so that Shelley had to beg him not to write to Mary on these
+subjects, as her health was not then, in October 1819, able to bear
+the strain, and the subject of money was not a fitting one to be
+pressed on her by him. Mary had not the disposal of money; if she had
+she would give it all to her father. He assured Godwin that the four
+or five thousand pounds already expended on him might have made him
+comfortable for the remainder of his life. Mrs. Godwin, naturally,
+would not hear of abandoning the Skinner Street business, as being the
+only provision for herself when Godwin should die. It is extremely
+painful at this stage of Godwin's career to witness the lowering
+effects of his wife's smaller nature upon him, as he certainly allowed
+himself to be unduly influenced by her excited and not always truthful
+views, as known since the early days of their married life. We have
+Mrs. Gisborne's diary showing how Mrs. Godwin could not endure to see
+anyone in 1820 who had an attachment for Mary, whom (as Godwin told
+Mrs. Gisborne) she considered her greatest enemy; and although he
+described his wife as of "the most irritable disposition possible," he
+listened to, and repeated her conjectures to the disparagement of
+Shelley and Mary at the time when she did not hesitate to accept with
+her husband the large sums of money which Shelley with difficulty
+raised for them. All the facts shown in this diary prove that Mary and
+Fanny must have had a sufficiently trying life at home to account for
+the result in either case, especially when we consider that Claire and
+her brother Charles both preferred to leave Godwin's house on the
+first possible occasion, Charles having left for France immediately
+after Mary's and Claire's departure with Shelley. William alone
+remained at home, but four years passed in a boarding school at
+Greenwich, from 1814, must have helped him to endure the discomforts
+of the time. Before Mrs. Gisborne's return to Italy Godwin gave her a
+detailed account, in writing, of his money transactions with Shelley,
+which had become very painful to both. In January, 1820, Florence
+proving unsuitable for Shelley's health, they left for Pisa, the mild
+climate of which city made it a favourite resort of the poet during
+most of the short remainder of his life. Mary, ever hospitable,
+although, as Shelley said, the bills for printing his poems must be
+paid for by stinting himself in meat and drink, hoped that Mrs.
+Gisborne would have stayed with them during her husband's visit to
+England in 1820, as they had moved into a pleasant apartment in March.
+This idea was not carried out. About this time Mary and Claire, both
+with their own absorbing anxieties, became again irksome to each
+other. Mary found relief when Claire was absent, and Claire notes how
+"the Claire and the Mai find something to fight about every day," a
+way of putting it which indicates differences, but certainly no grave
+cause of disturbance. This was after their removal to Leghorn, where
+they went towards the end of June to be near the lawyer on account of
+Paolo. At the beginning of August the heat at Leghorn caused the
+Shelleys to migrate to the baths of San Giuliano, where Shelley found
+a very pleasant house, Casa Prini. The moderate rent suited their
+slender purse, which had so many outside calls upon it.
+
+In October Claire's departure for Florence, as governess in the family
+of Professor Bojti, where she went by the advice of her friend Mrs.
+Mason, formerly Lady Mountcashell, brought an end to her permanent
+residence with the Shelleys, although she was still to look upon their
+house as her home, and she visited them either for her pleasure or to
+assist them. Her absence from her friends gives us the advantage of
+letters from them, letters full of a certain exaggeration of affection
+and sympathy from Shelley, who felt more acutely than Mary that Claire
+might be unhappy under a strange roof. Mary, less anxious on those
+grounds, writes about the operas she has seen, giving good
+descriptions of them. One of her letters is full of anxiety as to
+Allegra, who has been placed in the convent of Bagnacavallo by Byron.
+She feels that the child ought, as soon as possible, to be taken out
+of the hands of so "remorseless and unprincipled a man"; but advises
+caution and waiting for a favourable opportunity. She hopes that he
+may be returning to England. "He may be reconciled with his wife." At
+any rate, Bagnacavallo is high and in a healthy position, quite
+different from the dirty canals of Venice, which might injure any
+child's health. Mary thus tries to console Claire, who is planning, in
+her imagination, various ways of getting at her child, and
+corresponding with and seeing Shelley on the subject. Mary dissuades
+Claire from attempting anything in the spring--their unlucky time. It
+was in the second spring Claire met L. B., &c.; the third they went to
+Marlow--no wise thing, at least; the fourth, uncomfortable in London;
+fifth, their Roman misery; the sixth, Paolo at Pisa; the seventh, a
+mixture of Emilia and a Chancery suit. Mary acknowledges this
+superstitious feeling is more in Claire's line than her own, but
+thinks it worth considering; but this letter to Claire carries us a
+year in advance.
+
+During the summer of 1820 Mary had some of the delightful times she
+loved so dearly, of poetic wanderings with Shelley through woods and
+by the river, one of which she remembers long afterwards, when, making
+her note to the "Skylark," she recalls how she and Shelley, wandering
+through the lanes whose myrtle hedges were the bowers of the firefly,
+heard the carolling of the skylark which inspired one of the most
+beautiful of his poems. Precious memories which helped her through
+many after years devoid of the sympathy she yearned for. At the Baths
+they had the pleasure of a visit from Medwin, who gave a description
+of how Shelley, his wife and child, had to escape from the upper
+windows of their house in a boat when the canal overflowed and
+inundated the valley. Mary speaks of it as a very picturesque sight,
+with the herdsmen driving their cattle.
+
+During the short absence of Shelley, when he took Claire to Florence,
+Mary was occupied planning her novel of _Valperga_, for which she
+studied Villani's chronicle and Sismondi's history.
+
+On leaving the baths of San Giuliano, after the floods, the Shelleys
+returned to Pisa, where they passed the late autumn and winter of 1820
+and the spring of 1821. Here they made more acquaintances than
+heretofore, Professor Pacchiani, called also "Il Diavolo," introducing
+them to the Prince Mavrocordato, the Princess Aigiropoli, the
+_improvisatore_ Sgricci, Taafe, and last, not least, to Emilia
+Viviani. Here Mary continued to write _Valperga_, and pursued her
+Latin, Spanish, and Greek studies; the latter the Prince Mavrocordato
+assisted her with, as Mary writes to Mrs. Gisborne: "Do not you envy
+me my luck? that, having begun Greek, an amiable, young, agreeable,
+and learned Greek prince comes every morning to give me a lesson of an
+hour and a half."
+
+But the person of most moment at this time was undoubtedly the
+Contessina Emilia Viviani, whom, accompanied by Pacchiani, Claire,
+then Mary, and then Shelley, visited at the Convent of Sant' Anna.
+This beautiful girl, with profuse black hair, Grecian profile, and
+dreamy eyes, placed in the convent till she should be married, to
+satisfy the jealousy of her stepmother, became naturally an object of
+extreme interest to the Shelleys. Many visits were paid, and Mary
+invited her to stay with them at Christmas. Shelley was convinced that
+she had great talent, if not genius. Shelley and Mary sent her books,
+and Claire gave her English lessons at her convent, while she was
+taking a holiday from the Bojtis. Many letters are preserved from the
+beautiful Emilia to Shelley and Mary, letters which, translated into
+English, seem overflowing with sentiment and affection, but which to
+Italians would indicate rather the style cultivated by Italian ladies,
+which, to this day, seems one of their chief accomplishments if they
+are not gifted with a voice to sing. To Mary she complains of a
+certain coldness, but certainly this could not be brought to
+the charge of Shelley, who was now inspired to write his
+_Epipsychidion_. To him Emilia was as the Skylark, an emanation
+of the beautiful; but to Mary for a time, during Shelley's transitory
+adoration, the event evidently became painful, with all her philosophy
+and belief in her husband. She could not regard the lovely girl who
+took walks with him as the skylark that soared over their heads; and
+the _Epipsychidion_ was evidently not a favourite poem of Mary.
+Surely we may ascribe to this time, in the spring of 1821, the poem
+written by Shelley to Lieutenant Williams, whose acquaintance he had
+made in January. There is no month affixed to--
+
+  The Serpent is cast out from Paradise....
+
+and it might well apply, with its reference to "my cold home," to the
+time when Mary, in depression and pique, did not always give her
+likewise sensitive husband all the welcome he was accustomed to, and
+Shelley took refuge in a poem by way of letter; for this is the time
+referred to by Mary in her letter to Claire as their seventh
+unfortunate spring--a mixture of Emilia and a Chancery suit! It was
+not till the next spring that Emilia was married, and led her husband
+and mother-in-law, as Mary puts it, "a devil of a life." _We_
+have only to be grateful to Emilia for having inspired one of the most
+wondrous poems in any language.
+
+The Williamses, to whom Shelley's poem is addressed, were met by them
+in January. Mary writes of the fascinating Jane (Mrs. Williams) that
+she is certainly very pretty, but wants animation; while Shelley
+writes that she is extremely pretty and gentle, but apparently not
+very clever; that he liked her much, but had only seen her for an
+hour.
+
+Mary, among her multifarious reading, notes an article by Medwin on
+Animal Magnetism, and Shelley, who suffered severely at this time,
+shortly afterwards tried its effect through Medwin. The latter bored
+Mary excessively; possibly she found the magnetising a wearisome
+operation, although Shelley is said to have been relieved by it. His
+highly nervous temperament was evidently impressed. When Medwin left,
+Mrs. Williams undertook to carry on the cure.
+
+The Chancery suit referred to by Mary was an attempt between Sir
+Timothy's attorney and Shelley's to throw their affairs into Chancery,
+causing great alarm to them in Italy, till Horace Smith came to their
+rescue in England, and with indignant letters settled the
+inconsiderate litigation.
+
+Mrs. Shelley, in her Notes to Poems in 1821, recounts how Shelley was
+nearly drowned, by a flat boat which he had recently acquired being
+overturned in the canal near Pisa, when returning from Leghorn.
+Williams upset the boat by standing up and holding the mast. Henry
+Reveley, Mrs. Gisborne's son, rescued Shelley and brought him to land,
+where he fainted with the cold. At this same time, at Pisa, Mary had
+to consider with Shelley a matter of great importance to Claire.
+
+Byron, now at Ravenna, had placed Allegra, as already stated, in the
+convent of Bagnacavallo. He told Mrs. Hoppner that she had become so
+unmanageable by servants that it was necessary to have her under
+better care than he could secure, and he considered that it would be
+preferable to bring her up as a Roman Catholic with an Italian
+education, as in that way, with a fortune of five or six thousand
+pounds, she would marry an Italian and be provided for, whereas she
+would always hold an anomalous position in England. At this proposal
+Claire was extremely indignant; but Shelley and Mary took the opposite
+view, and considered that Byron acted for the best, as the convent was
+in a healthy position, and the nuns would be kind to the child. This
+idea of Mary would naturally be agreed with by some, and disapproved
+of by others; but at that time there was certainly no cause to
+indicate that Bagnacavallo would be more fatal to Allegra than any
+other place, although Claire's apprehensions were cruelly realised.
+From this time Claire and Byron wrote letters of recrimination to each
+other, which, considering Byron's obduracy against the feelings of the
+mother, Shelley and Mary came to hold as tyrannically unfeeling.
+
+In May, Shelley and his wife and son returned to the baths of San
+Giuliano, and while here Shelley's _Adonais_ was published. In
+1820, when the Shelleys heard of Keats's fatal illness from Mrs.
+Gisborne, she having met him the day after he had received his death
+warrant from the doctor, they were the first to beg him to join them
+at Pisa. A small touch of poetical criticism, however, appears to have
+weighed more with the sensitive Keats than these friendly
+considerations for his health, and as he was about to accompany his
+friend Mr. Severn to Rome, he did not accept their kind offer, though
+in all probability Pisa would have been better for him.
+
+During this summer at the baths Mary had finished her romance of
+_Valperga_, and read it to her husband, who admired it extremely.
+He considered it to be a "living and moving picture of an age almost
+forgotten, a profound study of the passions of human nature."
+
+_Valperga_, published in 1823, the year after Shelley's death, is
+a romance of the 14th century in Italy, during the height of the
+struggle between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, when each state and
+almost each town was at war with the other; a condition of things
+which lends itself to romance. Mary Shelley's intimate acquaintance
+with Italy and Italians gives her the necessary knowledge to write on
+this subject. Her zealous Italian studies came to her aid, and her
+love of nature give life and vitality to the scene. Valperga, the
+ancestral castle home of Euthanasia, a Florentine lady of the Guelph
+faction, is most picturesquely described, on its ledge of projecting
+rock, overlooking the plain of Lucca; the dependent peasants around
+happy under the protection of their good Signora. That this beautiful
+and high-minded lady should be affianced to a Ghibelline leader is a
+natural combination; but when her lover Castruccio, prince of Lucca,
+carries his political enthusiasm the length of making war on her
+native city of Florence, whose Republican greatness and love of art
+are happily described, Euthanasia cannot let love stand in the way of
+duty and gratitude to all those dearest to her. The severe struggle is
+well described, for Euthanasia has loved Castruccio from their
+childhood. When they played about the mountain grounds of her home at
+Valperga, Castruccio learnt the secret paths to the Castle, which
+knowledge later helped him to take the fortress when Euthanasia
+refused to yield it to him. Castruccio's character is also well
+described: his devoted attachment to Euthanasia from which nothing
+could turn him, till the passions of the conqueror and party faction
+are still stronger; and the irresistible force which impels him to
+make war and subdue the Guelphs, which by her is regarded as murder
+and rapine, disunites beings seemingly formed for each other. All
+these different emotions are portrayed with great beauty and
+simplicity.
+
+The Italian superstitions are well shown, as how the Florentines
+ascribed all good and evil fortune to conjunction of stars. The power
+of the Inquisition in Rome comes likewise into play, when the
+beautiful prophetess Beatrice (the child of the prophetess Wilhelmina)
+who had to be given to the Leper for protection, as even his filthy
+and deserted hut was safer for her than that it should be known to the
+Inquisition that she existed. She is rescued from the Leper by a
+bishop who heard her story from the deathbed of the woman to whom her
+mother when dying had confided her. She was then brought up by the
+bishop's sister. Her mother's spirit of prophecy was inherited by the
+daughter; and as the mother believed herself to be an emanation of the
+Holy Spirit, so Beatrice thought herself the Ancilla Dei. These
+mystical fancies and their working are depicted with much beauty and
+strength.
+
+These Donne Estatiche first appear in Italy after the 12th century,
+and had continued to the time which Mary Shelley selected for her
+romance. After giving an account of their pretensions, Muratori
+gravely observes: "We may piously believe that some were distinguished
+by supernatural gifts and admitted to the secrets of heaven, but we
+may justly suspect that the source of many of their revelations was
+their ardent imagination filled with ideas of religion and piety."
+Beatrice, on prophesying the Ghibelline rule in Ferrara, is seized by
+the emissaries of the Pope, and has to undergo the ordeal of the white
+hot ploughshares, through which she passes unscathed, there having
+apparently been connivance to help her through. Her exultation and
+enthusiasm become intense, and it is only after a great shock that she
+grows conscious of the falseness of her position; for, having met
+Castruccio on his mission to Ferrara, she is irresistibly attracted by
+him, and, mixing up her infatuation with her mystical ideas, does not
+hesitate to make secret appointments with him, never doubting that her
+love is returned, and that they are one at heart. When at length
+Castruccio has to return to Lucca, and to his betrothed, Euthanasia,
+the shock to the poor mystical Beatrice is terrible. Finally she is
+met as a pilgrim wending her weary way to Rome. Assuredly, Shelley was
+justified in admiring this character. There is a straightforwardness
+in the plot into which the stormy history of the period is clearly
+introduced, which gives much interest to this romance, and it is a
+decided advance upon _Frankenstein_, though her age when that was
+written must not be forgotten. A book of this kind shows forcibly the
+troubles to which a lovely country like Italy is exposed through
+disunion, and must fill the hearts of all lovers of this beautiful
+land with gratitude to the noble men who willingly sacrificed
+themselves to help in the cause of united Italy; those whose songs
+roused the people, and carried hope into the hearts of even the
+prisoners in the pozzi of Venice; for the man of idea who can rouse
+the nation by his songs does not help less than the brave soldier who
+can aid with his arms, though alas! he does not always live to see the
+triumph he has helped to achieve. [Footnote: Gabriele Rossetti, whom
+Mary Shelley knew, and to whom she referred for information while
+writing her lives of Italian poets, has been said to have been the
+first who in modern times had the idea of a united Italy under a
+constitutional monarch, for which idea and for his rousing songs he
+was forced to leave Italy by Ferdinand I. of Naples in 1821, and
+remained an exile in England till his death in 1854, at the age of 71.
+How Mary Shelley, with her husband, must have sympathised in these
+ideas with their love of Italy can be understood, although it was the
+climate and beauty of Italy more than the people that charmed Shelley;
+but then was he not also an exile from his native land?]
+
+This work, when completed, was sent to her father by Mary, for it had
+been a labour of love, and the sum of four hundred pounds which Godwin
+obtained for it was devoted to help him in his difficulties.
+Unhappily, the romance was not published till the year after her
+husband's death.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+LAST MONTHS WITH SHELLEY.
+
+
+IN July 1821, Shelley left his wife at the baths while he went to seek
+a house at Florence for the winter; but he returned in three days
+unsuccessful. He then received a letter from Byron begging him to go
+straight to Ravenna, various matters having to be talked over. Shelley
+left at two in the afternoon, on his birthday, August 4th. Here he had
+to go through the Paolo-Hoppner scandal, which we have referred to.
+Shelley had to write letters to Mary on the subject, and Mary wrote
+the most indignant and decisive denial of the imputation, on her
+husband and Claire. She writes: "I swear by the life of my child, by
+my blessed beloved child, that I know the accusations to be false." If
+more were needed, the clear exposition by Mr. Jeaffreson and later
+Professor Dowden, leave nothing to be said. Shelley wrote to Mary
+describing his visit to Allegra at the convent, where he found her
+prettily dressed in white muslin with an apron of black silk. She was
+a most graceful, airy child; she took Shelley all over the
+convent, and began ringing the nun's call-bell, without being
+reprimanded--although the prioress had considerable trouble to prevent
+the nuns assembling dressed or undressed--which struck Shelley as
+showing that she was kindly treated. Before leaving Ravenna, about
+August 17th, he wrote to thank his wife for her promise of her
+miniature, done by Williams, which he received a few days later from
+her at the Baths of Pisa. Mary and Shelley both were of those who,
+wherever they found a friend, found also a pensioner, or person to be
+benefited by them; as they did not seek their friends for personal
+advantage, and were among those who hold it more blessed to give than
+to receive. In January 1821, Mrs. Leigh Hunt wrote to Mary Shelley,
+begging her to help her husband and family to come to Italy--he was
+ill and depressed, and surrounded by all his children sick and
+suffering. While Shelley was at Ravenna he brought up this subject
+with Byron, who proposed that he, Shelley, and Leigh Hunt should start
+a periodical for their joint works, and share the profits. Shelley did
+not agree to this for himself, as he was not popular, and could only
+gain advantage from the others; but for Hunt it was different, and
+Shelley joyfully wrote to him from Pisa, on his return from Ravenna,
+to join them as soon as possible. Delays occurred in Hunt's departure,
+and Byron received letters from England warning him against joining
+with Shelley and Hunt. Byron arrived in Pisa with the Countess
+Guiccioli and her brother Pietro Gamba, on November the 1st, at the
+Lanfranchi Palace, and the Shelleys had apartments at the top of I Tre
+Palazzi di Chiesa, opposite. Claire, who had been staying with them,
+and accompanied them on a trip to Spezzia, had now returned to
+Professor Bojti's at Florence.
+
+Mary had the task of furnishing the ground floor of Byron's Lanfranchi
+Palace for the Hunts, although Byron insisted on paying for it. Hunt,
+meanwhile, was unable to proceed beyond Plymouth that winter, where
+they were obliged to stay by stress of weather and Mrs. Hunt's
+illness. Thus some months passed by, during which time Byron lost the
+first ardour of the enterprise, and became very lukewarm. It must have
+been when Mary had good reason to foresee this result that she wrote
+to Hunt thus:--
+
+MY DEAR FRIEND,
+
+I know that S. has some idea of persuading you to come here. I am too
+ill to write the reasonings, only let me entreat you let no
+persuasions induce you to come; selfish feelings you may be sure do
+not dictate me, but it would be complete madness to come. I wish I
+could write more. I wish I were with you to assist you. I wish I could
+break my chains and leave this dungeon. Adieu, I shall hear about yon
+and Marianne's health from S.
+
+Ever your M.
+
+
+Shelley was forced to apply to Byron to help him with money to lend
+Hunt, and Byron had ceased to care about the _Liberal_, the
+projected magazine.
+
+While staying near Byron the Shelleys came in for a large influx of
+visitors, often much to Shelley's annoyance, and Mary wrote of their
+wish, if Greece were liberated, of settling in one of the lovely
+islands.
+
+The middle of January brought one visitor to the Shelleys, who,
+introduced by the Williams, became more than a passing figure in
+Mary's life. In Edward John Trelawny she found a staunch friend ever
+after. Trelawny, who had led a wild life from the time he left the
+navy in mere boyhood, was a conspicuous character wherever known. With
+small reverence for the orthodox creeds, he must have had some of the
+traits of the ancient Vikings, before meeting Shelley; but from that
+time he became his devoted admirer, or, as one has observed who knew
+him, as Ahab at Elijah's feet, so Trelawny at Shelley's was ready to
+humble himself for the first time; nor did he afterwards, to the end
+of a long life, ever speak of him without veneration. Shelley's
+exalted ideas touched a chord in the strong man's heart, and within a
+few weeks of his death he rejoiced in hearing of a crowded assembly in
+Glasgow, enthusiastic in hearing a lecture on Shelley, and asserted it
+is the "spirit of poetry which needs spreading now; science is popular
+to the exclusion of poetry as a regenerator."
+
+The day after their first meeting with Trelawny, Mary notes in her
+diary how Trelawny discussed with Williams and Shelley about building
+a boat which they desired to have, and which Captain Roberts was to
+build at Genoa without delay. A year later Mary added a note to this
+entry, to the effect how she and Jane Williams then laughed at the way
+their husbands decided without consulting them, though they agreed in
+hating the boat. She adds: "How well I remember that night! How
+short-sighted we are! And now that its anniversary is come and gone,
+methinks I cannot be the wretch I too truly am." This winter, at Pisa,
+Mary, with popular and strong men to protect her, was not neglected so
+much as hitherto. She went to Mrs. Beauclerc's ball with Trelawny; but
+she refers to a strange feeling of depression in the midst of a gay
+assembly.
+
+On February 8 Shelley started, with Williams, to seek for houses in
+the neighbourhood of Spezzia; the idea being that the Shelleys, the
+Williamses, Trelawny and Captain Roberts, Byron, Countess Guiccioli
+and her brother, should all spend the summer there, although Mary
+feared the party would be too large for unity. Only one suitable house
+could be found; but Shelley was not to be stopped by such a trifle,
+and the house must do for all.
+
+In the early spring of this year, Mary wrote to Mrs. Hunt how she and
+Mrs. Williams went violet-hunting, while the men went on longer
+expeditions. The Shelleys and their surroundings must have kept the
+English assembled in Pisa in a pleasing state of excitement. At one
+time Mary caused a commotion by attending Dr. Nott's Sunday service,
+which was held on the ground floor of her house. On one occasion he
+preached against Atheism, and, having specially asked Mary to attend,
+it was taken as a marked attack on Shelley, and it was considered that
+Mary had taken part against her husband.
+
+Mary wrote a pathetic letter to Mrs. Gisborne that she had only been
+three times to church, and now longed to be in some sea-girt isle with
+Shelley and her baby, but that Shelley was entangled with Byron and
+could not get away. She was longing for the time by the sea when she
+would have boats and horses.
+
+While Mary was yearning for sympathy with her kind, or solitude with
+Shelley, he for a time was wasting regrets that she did not sympathise
+with or feel his poetry. It was the old story of the Skylark. While he
+was seeking inspiration at some fresh source, Mary did not become
+equally enthusiastic about the new idea. But most probably, in spite
+of Trelawny's later notion and her own self-reproaches of not having
+done all possible things to sympathise with Shelley, Mary's behaviour
+was really the best calculated for his comfort. A man who did not like
+regular meals and conventional habits in this respect, would not have
+liked his wife to worry him constantly on the subject, and the plate
+of cold meat and bread placed on a shelf, as his table was probably
+covered with papers--which Trelawny found there forgotten, towards the
+end of a "lost day" as Shelley called it--was not inappropriate for
+one who forgot his meals and did not like being teased. Mary was not
+of the nature to make, nor Shelley of the nature to require, a docile
+slave; and during the time at Naples, for which Mary felt most regret,
+Shelley wrote of her as "a dear friend with whom added years old
+intercourse adds to my appreciation of its value, and who would have
+more right than anyone to complain that she has not been able to
+extinguish in me the very power of delineating sadness."
+
+During this time the English visitors believed and manufactured all
+kinds of stories about the eccentric English then at Pisa. Trelawny
+had been murdered--Byron wounded--and Taaffe was guarded by bulldogs
+in Byron's house! These rumours were laughed over by the people
+concerned.
+
+On one occasion Mrs. Shelley, with the Countess Guiccioli, witnessed
+from their carriage the affair with the dragoon Masi, when he jostled
+against Taaffe. Byron, Shelley, and Gamba pursued him; Shelley, coming
+up with him first, was knocked down, but was rescued by Captain Hay.
+The dragoon was finally wounded by one of Byron's servants, under the
+idea that he had wounded Byron.
+
+During this exciting time at Pisa, Claire was eating her heart at
+Florence with longings and regrets for Allegra; and Mary and Shelley
+were trying to calm her by letters, and growing themselves more and
+more dissatisfied at Byron's treatment of the mother. There are
+entries in Claire's diary as to her cough, and the last entry before
+the day she left Florence for Pisa--April l3--is erased. Then there is
+one of her ominous blanks from April till September.
+
+While Claire travelled with Williams and his wife to Spezzia to look
+for a house, news came from Bagnacavallo which verified her worst
+fears. Typhus fever had ravaged the convent and district, and the
+fragile blossom had succumbed. Shelley and Mary determined to keep
+this "evil news," as Mary calls it, from Claire till she is away from
+the neighbourhood of Byron. So, on her return from the unsuccessful
+visit to Spezzia, they have to conceal their sorrow and their
+feelings. Shelley, ever anxious for Claire's distress, persuaded her
+to accompany Mary to Spezzia, saying they must take any house they
+could get. Claire had thought of returning to Florence, but was
+overruled by Shelley, who, as Mary wrote to Mrs. Gisborne, carried all
+like a torrent before him and sent Mary and Claire with Trelawny to
+Spezzia. Shelley followed with their furniture in boats; and so, on
+April 26, they were hurried by Shelley, or fate, from misfortune to
+misfortune, in taking Claire to a haven where she might be helped to
+bear her sore trouble. Mary, with her companions, secured the only
+available house--Casa Magui, at San Terenzio, near Lerici--in which it
+was settled that they and the Williamses must find room and bring
+their furniture. Difficulties of all kinds had to be overcome from the
+dogana. The furniture arrived in boats, and they were told the dues
+upon it would amount to three hundred pounds, but the harbour-master
+kindly allowed it to be removed to the villa as to a depôt till
+further orders arrived. Then there were the difficulties of Mrs.
+Williams, of whom Shelley wrote that she was pining for her saucepans.
+Claire felt the necessity of returning to Florence, the space being so
+small. This, however, was not to be thought of. Claire still had to
+have the news of her child's death broken to her, and Mrs. Williams's
+room had to be used for secret consultations. Claire, entering the
+room and seeing the agitated silence on her approach, at once realised
+the state of the case. She felt her Allegra was dead, and it only
+devolved on Shelley to tell the sad tale of a fever-ravaged district,
+and a fever-tossed child dying among the kind nuns, who are ever good
+nurses. Claire's grief was intense; but all that she now wanted was a
+sight of her child's coffin, a likeness of her, and a lock of her
+golden hair (a portion of which last is now in the writer's
+possession). The latter Shelley helped to obtain for her; but Claire
+never after forgave him who had consigned her child to the convent in
+the Romagna, nor allowed her another sight of her little one.
+
+On May 21 Claire left for Florence, and Mary remained with her husband
+and the Williamses at Casa Magni. These rapidly succeeding troubles,
+together with Mary's being again in a delicate state of health, left
+the circle in an unhinged and nervous state of apprehension. Shelley
+saw visions of Allegra rising from the sea, clapping her hands and
+smiling at him. Mrs. Williams saw Shelley on the balcony, and then he
+was nowhere near, nor had he been there. Shelley ranged from wild
+delight with the beauty around him, to such fits of despondency as
+when he most culpably proposed to Mrs. Williams, while in a boat with
+him and her babies, in the bay--"Now let us together solve the great
+mystery." But she managed to get him to turn shorewards, and escaped
+at the first opportunity from the boat.
+
+Mary was not without her prophetic periods--a deep melancholy settled
+on her amid the lovely scenery. Generally at home with mountain and
+water, she now only felt oppressed by their proximity. Shelley was at
+work on the _Triumph of Life_, one of his grandest poems; but
+Mary was always apprehensive except when with her husband, least so
+when lying in a boat with her head on his knees. If Shelley were
+absent, she feared for Percy, her son, so that, in spite of the oasis
+of peace and rest and beauty around them, she was weak and nervous;
+and Shelley, for fear of hurting her, had to conceal such matters as
+might trouble her, especially the again critical state of the affairs
+of her father, who was in want of four hundred pounds to compound with
+his creditors. These alarms for Mary's health and tranquillity of
+mind, and the consequent necessity of keeping any trying subject from
+her, may have induced Shelley in writing to Claire to adopt a
+confidential tone not otherwise advisable.
+
+While at Casa Magni, the fatal boat which had been discussed on the
+first evening Trelawny spent with the Shelleys, arrived. The "perfect
+plaything for the summer" had been built against the advice of
+Trelawny, by a Genoese ship-builder, after a model obtained by
+Lieutenant Williams from one of the royal dockyards in England.
+Originally it was intended to call it the _Don Juan_, but recent
+circumstances had caused a break in the intimacy of Shelley with
+Byron, and Shelley felt that this would be eternal. He, therefore, no
+longer wished any name to remind him of Byron, and gave the
+name _Ariel_, proposed by Trelawny, to the small craft. With
+considerable difficulty the name _Don Juan_ was taken from the
+sail, where Byron had manoeuvred to have it painted.
+
+Towards the end of May, Mary was seriously suffering; the difficulties
+of housekeeping for the Williamses as well as themselves were no
+trifle. Provisions had to be fetched from a distance of over three
+miles. Shelley writes to Claire, hoping she will be able to find them
+a man-cook. As Mary was somewhat better when Shelley wrote, he feared
+he should have to speak to her about Godwin's affairs, but put off the
+evil day.
+
+On June 6 we find Shelley setting out with Williams in the
+_Ariel_ to meet Claire on her way from Florence to Casa Magni. A
+calm having delayed them till the evening, they were too late to meet
+Claire, who travelled on by land for Via Reggio. Shelley and Williams,
+returning by sea, arrived home a short time before her. Their return
+and her arrival were none too soon; for, on the 8th or 9th, Mary fell
+dangerously ill, as she wrote in August to Mrs. Gisborne: "I was so
+ill that for seven hours I lay nearly lifeless--kept from fainting by
+brandy, vinegar, eau-de-cologne, &c. At length ice was brought to our
+solitude; it came before the doctor, so Claire and Jane were afraid of
+using it; but Shelley over-ruled them, and, by an unsparing
+application of it, I was restored. They all thought, and so did I at
+one time, that I was about to die."
+
+Shelley, equal to the occasion, felt the strain on his nerves
+afterwards, and a week after his wife was out of danger he alarmed her
+greatly, as she relates: "While yet unable to walk, I was confined to
+my bed. In the middle of the night I was awoke by hearing him scream,
+and come rushing into my room; I was sure that he was asleep, and
+tried to waken him by calling on him; but he continued to scream,
+which inspired me with such a panic that I jumped out of bed and ran
+across the hall to Mrs. Williams's room, where I fell through
+weakness, though I was so frightened that I got up again immediately.
+She let me in, and Williams went to Shelley who had been wakened by my
+getting out of bed. He said that he had not been asleep, and that it
+was a vision that he saw that had frightened him. But as he declared
+that he had not screamed, it was certainly a dream, and no waking
+vision." And so the lovely summer months passed by with all these
+varying emotions, with thoughts soaring to the highest pinnacles of
+imagination as in the _Triumph of Life_, and with the enjoyment
+of the high ideals of others, as in reading the Spanish dramas: music
+also gave enchantment when Jane Williams played her guitar. With the
+intense beauty of the scenery, and the wildness of the natives who
+used sometimes to dance all night on the sands in front of their
+house; the emotions of life seemed compressed into this time, spent in
+what would be considered by many great dulness, in the company of
+Trelawny and the Williamses. And now an event, long hoped for,
+arrived, for the Hunts were in the harbour of Genoa, and Shelley was
+to meet them at Leghorn, as Hunt's letter, which reached them on June
+19, had been delayed too long to allow of Shelley joining them at
+Genoa. On July I intelligence came of the Hunts' departure from Genoa;
+and at noon a breeze rising from the west decided the desirability of
+at once starting for Leghorn. Shelley, with Captain Roberts who had
+joined him at Lerici, arrived by nine in the evening, after the
+officers of health had left their office. The voyagers were thus
+unable to land that evening, but spent the time alongside of Byron's
+yacht, the _Bolivar_, from which they received coverings for the
+night.
+
+The next morning news arrived from Byron's villa, which already began
+to verify Mary's forebodings in her letter to Hunt, and proved the
+clear-sightedness of her forecast. Disturbances having taken place at
+his house at Monte Nero, Count Gamba and his family were banished by
+the Government from Tuscany, and there were rumours that Byron might
+be leaving immediately for America or Switzerland. This was indeed
+trying news for Shelley to have to break to the Hunts on their first
+meeting in the hotel at Leghorn, where, after four years, the two
+friends again met. The encounter was most touching, as remembered
+years later by Thornton Hunt. Shelley had plenty of work on hand for a
+few days; he procured Vacca, the physician, for Mrs. Hunt; and had to
+sustain his friend during his anxiety as to his wife's health and the
+uncertainty as to Byron's conduct. Shelley would not think of leaving
+him till he had seen him comfortably installed in the Lanfranchi
+Palace, in the rooms which Mary had prepared for him at Byron's
+request. The still more difficult task of fixing Byron to some promise
+of assistance with regard to the _Liberal_ was likewise carried
+out; and after one or two days of dejection, during which Shelley
+wrote to Mrs. Williams on July 4 to relieve his own despondency, and
+to his wife to relieve hers, as her depression of spirits required
+more cheering than adding to, he wrote:--"How are you, my best Mary?
+Write especially how is your health and how your spirits are, and
+whether you are not more reconciled to staying at Lerici, at least
+during the summer. You have no idea how I am hurried and occupied. I
+have not a moment's leisure, but will write by the next post."
+
+Soon after writing these letters, Shelley found with exultation that
+his work was done. As usual, he had carried ail before him, and
+secured Byron's "Vision of Judgment" for the first number of the
+_Liberal_, and by July 7 he was able to show his friends the
+ever-delightful sights of Pisa. Thus one day of rest and pleasure
+remained to Shelley after doing his utmost to assist his friend Hunt.
+To the last Shelley was faithful to his aim--that of doing all he
+could for others. His interviews with Byron had secured a return of
+the friendly feeling which nought but death was henceforth to sever,
+and the two great names, which nothing can divide, are linked by the
+unbreakable chain of genius--genius, the fire of the universe, which
+at times may flicker low, but which, bursting into flame here and
+there, illumines the dark recesses of the soul of the universe--genius
+which has made the world we know, which, never absent, though dormant,
+has changed the stone to the flower, the flower to animal, and,
+gaining ever in degree through the various stages of life, is the
+divine attribute, the will, the idea. Genius manifest in the greatest
+and best of humanity, shown indeed, as the Word of God, or as he who
+holds the mirror up to nature, or by the great power which in colour
+or monotone can display the love and agony of a dying Christ; by the
+loving poet, who can soar beyond his age to uphold an unselfish aim of
+perfection to the world; by all those who, throwing off their mortal
+attributes at times, can live the true life free from the too
+absorbing pleasures of the flesh, which can only he enjoyed by
+dividing.
+
+But now Shelley's mortal battle was nearly over; he who had not let
+his talent or myriad talents lie dormant was to rest, his work of life
+was nearly done. Not that the good is ever ended; verily, through
+thousands of generations, through eternity, it endures; while the
+bad--perhaps not useless--is the chaff which is dispersed, and which
+has no result unless to hurry on the divine will. Our life is double.
+Shelley's atoms were to return to their primal elements. The unknown
+atoms or attributes of them were undoubtedly to carry on their work;
+he had added to the eternal intellect.
+
+The last facts of Shelley's life are related by Trelawny and by Mrs.
+Shelley. On the morning of July 8, having finished his arrangements
+for the Hunts and spent one day in showing the noble sights of Pisa,
+Shelley, after making purchases for their house and obtaining money
+from his banker, accompanied by Trelawny during the forenoon, was
+ready by noon to embark on the _Ariel_ with Edward Williams and
+the sailor-boy, Charles Vivian. Captain Roberts was not without
+apprehensions as to the weather, and urged Shelley to delay his
+departure for a day; but Williams was anxious to rejoin his wife, and
+Shelley not in a humour to frustrate his wishes. Trelawny, who desired
+to accompany them in the _Bolivar_ into the offing, was prevented,
+not having obtained his health order, and so could only reluctantly
+remain behind and watch his friends' small craft through a ship's glass.
+
+Mistakes were noted, the ship's mate of the _Bolivar_ remarking
+they ought to have started at daybreak instead of after one o'clock;
+that they were too near shore; that there would soon be a land breeze;
+the gaff top-sail was foolish in a boat with no deck and no sailor on
+board; and then, pointing to the southwest, "Look at those black lines
+and dirty rags hanging on them out of the sky; look at the smoke on
+the water; the devil is brewing mischief."
+
+The approaching storm was watched also by Captain Roberts from the
+light-house, whence he saw the topsail taken in; then the vessel
+freighted with such precious life was seen no more in the mist of the
+storm. For a time the sea seemed solidified and appeared as of lead,
+with an oily scum; the wind did not ruffle it. Then sounds of thunder,
+wind, and rain filled the air; these lasted with fury for twenty
+minutes; then a lull, and anxious looks among the boats which had
+rushed into the harbour for Shelley's hark. No glass could find it on
+the horizon. Trelawny landed at eight o'clock; inquiries were useless.
+An oar was seen on a fishing boat: it might be English--it might be
+Shelley's; but this was denied. Nothing to do but wait, till the third
+day, when he returned to Pisa to tell his fears to Hunt and Byron, who
+could only listen with quivering lips and speak with faltering voice.
+
+While these friends were agitated between hope and fear, the time was
+passing wearily at San Terenzio. Jane Williams received a letter from
+her husband on that day (written on Saturday from Leghorn), where he
+was waiting for Shelley. It stated that if they did not return on
+Monday, he certainly would be back at the latest on Thursday in a
+felucca by himself if necessary. The fatal Monday passed amid storm
+and rain, and no idea was entertained by Mrs. Shelley or Mrs. Williams
+that their husbands had started in such weather as they experienced.
+Mary, who had then scarcely recovered from her dangerous illness, and
+was unable to join Claire and Jane Williams in their evening walks,
+could only pace up and down in the verandah and feel oppressed by the
+very beauty which surrounded her. So till Wednesday these days of
+storm and oppression and undefined fears passed; then, some feluccas
+arriving from Leghorn, they were informed that their husbands had left
+on Monday; but that could not be believed. Thursday came and passed,
+_the_ Thursday which should be the latest for Williams's arrival.
+The wind had been fair, but midnight arrived, and still Mary and Jane
+were alone; then sad hope gave place to fearful anxiety preceding
+despair; but Friday was letter day--wait for that--and no boat could
+leave. Noon of Friday and letters came, but _to_, not _from_
+Shelley. Hunt wrote to him: "Pray write to tell us how you got home,
+for they say that you had bad weather after you sailed on Monday, and
+we are anxious." Mary read so far when the paper fell from her hands
+and she trembled all over. Jane read it, and said, "It is all over."
+Mary replied, "No, my dear Jane, it is not all over; but this suspense
+is dreadful. Come with me; we will go to _Leghorn_; we will post,
+to be swift and learn our fate."
+
+Thus, as Mary Shelley herself describes, they crossed to Lerici,
+despair in their hearts, two poor, wild, aghast creatures driving,
+"like Matilda," towards the sea to know if they were to be for ever
+doomed to misery. The idea of seeing Hunt for the first time after
+four years, to ask "Where is he?" nearly drove Mary into convulsions.
+On knocking at the door of the Casa Lanfranchi they found Lord Byron
+was in Pisa and. Hunt being in bed, their interview was to be with
+Byron, only to hear, "They knew nothing. He had left Pisa on Sunday;
+on Monday he had sailed. There had been bad weather Monday afternoon;
+more they knew not." Mary, who had risen from, a bed of sickness for
+the journey, and had travelled all day, had now at midnight to proceed
+to Leghorn in search of Trelawny; for what rest could there be with
+such a terrible doubt hanging over their lives? They could not
+despair, for that would have been death; they had to pass through
+longer hours and days of anguish to subdue their souls to bear the
+inevitable.
+
+They reached Leghorn, and were driven to the wrong inn. Nothing to do
+but wait till the morning--but wait dressed till six o'clock--when
+they proceeded to other inns and found Captain Roberts. His face
+showed that the worst was true. They only heard how their husbands had
+set out. Still hope was not dead; might not their husbands be at
+Corsica or Elba? It was said they had been seen in the Gulf. They
+resolved to return; but now not alone, for Trelawny accompanied them.
+Agony succeeded agony; the water they crossed told Mary it was his
+grave.
+
+While crossing the bay they saw San Terenzio illuminated for a festa,
+while despair was in their hearts. The days passed, a week ever
+counted as two by Mary, and then, when she was very ill, Trelawny, who
+had been long expected from his search, returned, and now they knew
+that all was over, for the bodies had been cast on shore. One was a
+tall, slight figure, with Sophocles in one pocket of the jacket, and
+Keats's last poems in the other; the poetry he loved remained; his
+body a mere mutilated corpse, which for a while had enshrined such
+divine intellect. Williams's corpse, also, was found some miles
+distant, still more unrecognisable, save for the black silk
+handkerchief tied sailor-fashion round his neck; and after some ten
+days a third body was found, a mere skeleton., supposed to be the
+sailor-boy, Charles Vivian.
+
+"Is there no hope?" Mary asked, when Trelawny reappeared on July 19.
+He could not answer, but left the room, and sent the servant to take
+the children to their widowed mothers. He then, on the 20th, took them
+from the sound of the cruel waves to the Hunts at Pisa.
+
+Naught remained now but to perform the last funeral rites. Mary
+decided that Shelley should rest with his dearly-loved son in the
+English cemetery in Rome. With some little difficulty, Trelawny
+obtained permission, with the kind assistance of the English Chargé
+d'Affaires at Florence, Mr. Dawkins, to have the bodies burned on the
+shore, according to the custom of bodies cast up from the sea, so that
+the ashes could be removed without fear of infection. The iron furnace
+was made at Leghorn, of the dimensions of a human body, according to
+Trelawny's orders; and on August 15 the body of Lieutenant Williams
+was disinterred from the sand where it had been buried when cast up.
+Byron recognised him by his clothes and his teeth. The funeral rites
+were performed by Trelawny by throwing incense, salt, and wine on the
+pyre, according to classic custom; and when nothing remained but some
+black ashes and small pieces of white bone, these were placed by
+Trelawny in one of the oaken boxes he had provided for the purpose,
+and then consigned to Byron and Hunt. The next day another pyre was
+raised, and again the soldiers had to dig for the body, buried in
+lime. When placed in the furnace it was three hours before the
+consuming body showed the still unconsumed heart, which Trelawny saved
+from the furnace, snatching it out with his hand; and there, amidst
+the Italian beauty, on the Italian shore, was consumed the body of the
+poet who held out immortal hope to his kind, who, in advance of the
+scientists, held it as a noble fact that humanity was progressive;
+who, more for this than for his unfortunate first marriage and its
+unhappy sequel, was banished by his countrymen, and held as nothing by
+his generation. But, as Claire wrote later in her diary, "It might be
+said of him, as Cicero said of Rome, 'Ungrateful England shall not
+possess my bones.'"
+
+The ashes of the body were placed in the oaken box; those of the
+heart, handed by Trelawny to Hunt, were afterwards given into the
+possession of Mary, who jealously guarded them during her life, in a
+place where they were found at her death, in a silken case, in which
+was kept a Pisan copy of the _Adonais_. The ashes of Shelley's
+body were finally buried in the cemetery in Rome, where the grave of
+the English poet is now one of the strongest links between the present
+and the past world; and there beside him rest now the ashes of his
+faithful friend, Trelawny, who survived him nearly sixty years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+WIDOWHOOD.
+
+
+The last ceremony was over, hope, fear, despair, were past, and Mary
+Shelley had to recommence her life, or death in life, her one solace
+her little son, her one resource for many years her work. Fortunately
+for her, her education and her studious habits were a shield against
+the cold world which she had to encounter, and her accustomed personal
+economy, which had fitted her to be the worthy companion to her
+generous husband, whom she had encouraged rather than thwarted in his
+constantly recurring acts of philanthropy, would help her in her
+present struggle; and one friend was ready to assist with advice and
+out of his then slender means, Mr. Trelawny. But from England no help
+was forthcoming. Godwin's affairs having reached the climax of
+bankruptcy already referred to, were not likely to settle down easily
+now that the ever-ready supply was suddenly cut short.
+
+Sir Timothy Shelley was not inclined to continue the terms he made
+with his son, nor was anything to be arranged but on conditions which
+Mrs. Shelley could never consent to. Of her despondent state of misery
+we can judge in her letters of 1822 to Claire, as when she writes from
+Genoa, September 15, "This hateful Genoa"; and, describing her misery
+on her husband's death, she exclaims: "Well, I shall have his books
+and his MSS., and in these I shall live, and from the study of these I
+do expect some instants of content.... some seconds of exaltation that
+may render me both happier here, and more worthy of him hereafter."
+Then, "There is nothing but unhappiness to me, if indeed I except
+Trelawny, who appears so truly generous and kind.... Nothing but the
+horror of being a burden to my family prevents my accompanying Jane
+(to England). If I had any fixed income, I should go at least to
+Paris, and I shall go the moment I have one." And again in December of
+the same year she writes to Claire, addressing her as Mdlle. de
+Clairmont, _chez_ Mdme. de Hennistein, Vienna. She mentions an
+approach to Sir Timothy, through lawyers, abortive as yet; how she
+detests Genoa; "Hunt does not like me." Her daily routine is copying
+Shelley's manuscripts and reading Greek; in her despair, study is her
+only relief. She sees no one but Lord Byron, and the Guiccioli once a
+mouth, Trelawny seldom, and he is on the eve of his departure for
+Leghorn.
+
+Thus we find Mary Shelley going on from day to day, too poor to travel
+so far as Paris, as yet her child and her work of love on her
+husband's MS. filling up her time, till in February she had to undergo
+the mortification of her father-in-law proposing that she should give
+her son up entirely to him, and in return receive a settled income.
+But Mary was not of those who can be either bought or sold, and,
+having the means of subsistence in herself, she could be independent;
+a letter from her father shows how they were at one on this important
+subject, and it must have been a great encouragement to her in her
+loneliness, as she was always diffident of her own powers. However,
+now her work lay in arranging and copying her husband's MSS., and
+saving treasures which but for her loving care might have been lost.
+In the spring of this year, 1823, Trelawny was in Rome arranging
+Shelley's grave, which he bought with the adjoining ground for
+himself, and he had the massive slab of stone placed there which still
+tells of the "_Cor cordium_" In the autumn of the same year Mary
+found means for leaving the hated Genoa, and, travelling through
+France; she stayed for a time at Versailles with her father's old
+friends, the Kennys, and of this visit one of the daughters, now Mrs.
+Cox, then a child of about six years, retains a lively and pleasing
+recollection. Brought up in France and imbued with the idea and
+pictures of the Madonna and child, the little girl, on seeing Mrs.
+Shelley arrive with her small son, became impressed with the idea that
+the pale, sweet, oval-laced lady was the Madonna come to visit them;
+and this idea was not dispelled by the gentle manner and kind way that
+she had with the children, reminding one who had been punished by
+mistake that the next time she was naughty she would have had her
+punishment in advance. This visit was followed later by the intimacy
+and friendship of the two families. In London (as we learn from a
+letter to Miss Holcroft, Mrs. Kenny's daughter, by her previous
+marriage with Holcroft) Mrs. Shelley was settled at 14, Sheldhurst
+Street, Brunswick Square. She was then hoping that her father-in-law
+would make her an allowance sufficient for her to live comfortably in
+dear Italy; and, at all events, she had received "a present supply, so
+that much good at least has been accomplished by my journey." She felt
+quite lost in London, and Percy had not yet learnt English. She had
+seen Lamb, but he did not remark on her being altered. She would then
+have returned to Italy, but her father did not like the idea.
+
+Among other work at this time Mary Shelley attempted a drama, but in
+this her father did not encourage her, as he writes to her in February
+1824 that her personages are mere abstractions, not men and women.
+Godwin does not regret that she has not dramatic talent, as the want
+of it will save her much trouble and mortification.
+
+This disappointment did not discourage Mary, for in the next year she
+published, with Henry Colburn of New Burlington Street, her novel
+_The Last Man_, of which a second edition appeared in the
+succeeding year. This must have been a great help to Mary's limited
+means: she had received four hundred pounds for her previous romance.
+
+During this year we find Mrs. Shelley living in Kentish Town, as she
+writes from that address to Trelawny in July 1824. She is much cheered
+by finding her old friend still remembers her. She speaks of him as
+her warm-hearted friend, the remnant of the happy days of her vagabond
+life in beloved Italy, and now, shortly before writing, she had seen
+another link in her past life disappear; for the hearse containing the
+body of Lord Byron had passed her window going up Highgate Hill, on
+his last journey to the seat of his ancestors. Mary had been much
+interested in the account Trelawny had sent her of Byron's latest
+moments. She had been to see the poet's remains at the house where
+they lay in London. She saw his valet, Fletcher, and "from a few words
+he imprudently let fall, it would seem that his Lordship spoke of
+C----- in his last moments, and of his wish to do something for her,
+at a time when his mind, vacillating between consciousness and
+delirium, would not permit him to do anything." She describes how
+Fletcher found Lady Byron in great grief, but inexorable, and how
+Byron's memoirs had been destroyed by Mrs. Leigh and Hobhouse, but
+adds: "There was not much in them, I know, for I read them some years
+ago at Venice; but the world fancied that it was to have a confession
+of the hidden feelings of one concerning whom they were always
+passionately curious." She says that Moore was much disgusted. He was
+writing a life of Byron, but it was considered that although he had
+had the MSS. so long in his hands, he had not found time to read them.
+She asks Trelawny to help Moore with any facts or details. Mary thanks
+Trelawny for his wish that she and Jane Williams, who see each other
+and little else every day, should join him in Greece. That is
+impossible, but she looks for him to come in the winter to England.
+She speaks of July as fatal to her for good and ill. "On this very
+very day"--she is writing July 28--"I went to France with my Shelley.
+How young, heedless, and happy and poor we were then, and now my
+sleeping boy is all that is left to me of that time--my boy and a
+thousand recollections which never sleep." She describes the pretty
+country lanes round Kentish Town. If only there were cloudless skies
+and orange sunsets, she would not mind the scenery; but she can attach
+herself to no one. She and Jane live alone; her child is in excellent
+health, a tall, fine, handsome boy. She is still in hopes that she
+will get an income of three or four hundred a year from Sir Timothy in
+a few months; one of her chief wishes in being independent would be to
+help Claire, who is in Russia. Of this time Claire wrote a good
+account in her diary.
+
+These letters to Trelawny give much insight into the present life of
+Mary Shelley, and refer to much of interest in her past. On February
+25 she tells how she had been with Jane, her father, and Count Gamba
+to see Kean in Othello, but she adds: "Yet, my dear friend, I wish we
+had seen it represented as was talked of at Pisa. Iago would never
+have found a better representative than that strange and wondrous
+creature whom one regrets daily more; for who can equal him?" Trelawny
+adds a note that in 1822 Byron had contemplated that he, Trelawny,
+Williams, Medwin, Mary Shelley, and Mrs. Williams were to take the
+several parts:--Byron, Iago; Trelawny, Othello; Mary, Desdemona.
+Trelawny adds that Byron recited a great portion of his part with
+great gusto, and looked it too. Byron said that all Pisa were to be
+the audience. Letters from Trelawny from Zante in 1826, carry on the
+correspondence. He regrets that poverty keeps them apart; speaks of
+the difficulty of travelling without money; he rejoices that he still
+holds a place in her affections, and says, "You know, Mary, that I
+always loved you impetuously and sincerely." In 1827, still writing
+from Kentish Town, on Easter Sunday, but saying that in future her
+address will be at her father's, 44, Gower Place, Bedford Square, we
+have another of her charming letters to her friend, full of good
+reflections. In this letter she tells how Jane Williams has united her
+life with that of Shelley's early friend, Mr. Jefferson Hogg. He had
+loved her devotedly since her arrival in England five years earlier,
+but till now she had been too constant to Williams's memory to accept
+him. Claire was still in Russia. Mary writes:--"I wrote to you last
+while I entertained the hope that my money cares were diminishing, but
+shabby as the best of these shabby people was, I am not to arrive at
+that best without due waiting and anxiety. Nor do I yet see the end of
+this worse than tedious uncertainty." Mary was to see Shelley's
+younger brother, who was just married, but she had small hope of
+reaping any good from his visit. She adds, "Adieu, my ever dear
+friend; while hearts such as yours beat, I will not wholly despond."
+Mary refers with great kindness to Hunt, and is most anxious as to his
+future. She also notices with high satisfaction that the Whigs with
+Canning are in the ascendant, and that they may be favourable to
+Greece. While Mary Shelley was residing in Kentish Town, before she
+joined her father in Gower Place after the winding up of his affairs,
+a letter from Godwin to his wife at the sea-side shows that the latter
+considered he did not need her society as Mrs. Shelley was with him;
+he explains that he sees her about twice a week, but is feeling lonely
+every day.
+
+After Mary removed to Gower Place in 1827, among other work, she was
+occupied by her _Lives of Eminent Literary Men_, for _Lardner's
+Cyclopædia_. About the same year Godwin writes to his daughter who
+is evidently in very low spirits, wishing that she resembled him in
+temperament rather than the Wollstonecrafts, but explains that his
+present good spirits may be owing to his work on Cromwell. A little
+later we find Godwin writing to Mary, himself in depression. He is
+troubled by publishers who will not decide to take a novel. "Three,
+four, or five hundred pounds, and to be subsisted by them while I
+write it," is what he hoped to get. Mrs. Shelley was at Southend for
+change of air, and wishing her father to join her; but this he could
+not decide on. Every day lost is taking away from his means of
+subsistence; for he is writing now, not for marble to be placed over
+his remains, but for bread to be put into his mouth.
+
+In April 1829, Mrs. Shelley, writing still from her father's address,
+44, Grower Street, complains to Trelawny in a truly English way, as
+she says, of the weather. She rejoices that her friend has taken to
+work, and hopes that his friends will keep him to recording his own
+adventures; but she strongly dissuades him from writing a life of
+Shelley, for how could that be done without bringing her into
+publicity? which she shrinks from fearfully, though she is forced by
+her hard situation to meet it in a thousand ways; or as she expresses
+it, "I will tell you what I am, a silly goose, who, far from wishing
+to stand forward to assert myself in any way, now that I am alone in
+the world have but the desire to wrap night and the obscurity of
+insignificance around me. This is weakness, but I cannot help it."
+Neither does Mary consider that the time has come to write Shelley's
+life, though she her-self hopes to do so some day.
+
+Towards the end of 1830 we find Mary in Somerset Street, Portman
+Square, from which place she writes to Trelawny on the subject of his
+MS. of _The Adventures of a Younger Son,_ which he had consigned
+to her hands to place with a publisher, make the best terms for that
+she could, and see through the press; a task distasteful to Trelawny
+to the last. Mrs. Shelley much admired the work, considering it full
+of passion and interest. But she does not hesitate to point out the
+blemishes, certain coarsenesses, which she begs him to allow her to
+deal with, as she would have dealt with parts of Lord Byron's _Don
+Juan_. She is sure that without this she will have great difficulty
+in disposing of the book.
+
+Mary finds the absorbing politics of the day a great hindrance to
+publishing, and says: "God knows how it will all end, but it looks as
+if the aristocrats would have the good sense to make the necessary
+sacrifices to a starving population."
+
+The worry of awaiting the decision of the publisher was felt by Mrs.
+Shelley more for Trelawny than for herself; she finds it difficult to
+make the terms she wishes for him, and, writing to her friend on March
+22 of the next year, she regrets that she cannot make Colburn, the
+best publisher she knows of, give five hundred pounds as she wishes,
+but trusts to get three hundred pounds for first edition and two
+hundred pounds for second; but times have changed since she first
+returned to England, neither she nor her father can command the same
+prices which they did then. At that time "publishers came to seek me,"
+she writes; "now money is scarcer and readers fewer than ever."
+
+Three days later she is able to add the news that she has received
+"the ultimatum of these great people," three hundred pounds down and
+one hundred pounds on second edition, she thinks, for 1,000 copies.
+She advises acceptance, but will try other publishers if he wish it.
+
+Mary again regrets that it is impossible for her to go to Italy. She
+expresses herself as wretched in England, and in spite of her sanguine
+disposition and capacity to endure, which have borne her up hitherto,
+she feels sinking at last; situated as she is, it is impossible for
+her not to be wretched.
+
+Mary does not give way long to despondency, she goes on to tell news
+as to Medwin, Hogg, Jane, &c.; she can even tease Trelawny about the
+different ladies who believe themselves the sole object of his
+affection, and tells him she is having a certain letter of his about
+"Caroline" lithographed, and thinks of dispensing 100 copies among
+"the many hapless fair."
+
+A third letter on the subject of the hook, on June 14, 1831, tells
+Trelawny how his work is in progress, and Horace Smith, who much
+admires it, has promised to revise it. Again, in July of the same
+year, she writes that the third volume is in print, and his book will
+soon be published; but that as his mother talks openly of his memoirs
+in society, he must not hope for secrecy. In this letter, also, we
+have a fact which redounds to the credit of both Mary Shelley and
+Trelawny, as she clearly tells him she cannot marry him; but remains
+in "all gratitude and friendship" his M. S. Trelawny had evidently
+made her an offer of marriage, moved perhaps by gratitude for her
+help, as well as probably, in his case, a passing love; for she writes
+to him: "My name will never be Trelawny. I am not so young as I was
+when you first knew me, but I am as proud. I must have the entire
+affection, devotion, and, above all, the solicitous protection of any
+one who would win me. You belong to womenkind in general, and Mary S.
+will _never_ be yours. I write in haste," &c. &c.
+
+Trelawny would never have offered his name thus to a woman he could
+not respect, and perhaps few know better than those of his reckless
+class who are most worthy of respect. Mary Shelley, who dreaded men's
+looks or words, by her own knowledge and her intimate friends'
+accounts had no fear of him; he had the instincts of a gentleman for a
+true lady, who may be found in any class.
+
+Four years later, we have Mary again writing to Mr. Trelawny with
+regard to his book, a second edition being called for, when, to her
+confusion, she finds that through her not having read over the
+agreement, and having taken for granted that the proposal of three
+hundred pounds on first edition with one hundred pounds more on second
+was inserted, she had signed the contract; but now it turned out that
+what was proposed by letter was not inserted by Oilier in the
+agreement, and she knew not what to do. In a second letter a few days
+later from Harrow, where she lived for a while to be near her son at
+school, she wrote in answer to Trelawny, proposing Peacock as umpire,
+because, she writes, "he would not lean to the strongest side, which
+Jefferson, as a lawyer, is inclined, I think, to do." Oilier, she
+writes, devoutly wished she had read the agreement, as the clause
+ought to have been in it.
+
+Again, a few months later, on April 7, 1836, there is another letter
+asking Trelawny if he would like to attend her father's funeral, and
+if he would go with the undertaker to choose the spot nearest to her
+mother's, in St. Pancras Churchyard, and, if he could do this, to
+write to Mrs. Godwin, at the Exchequer, to tell her so. The last few
+years of Godwin's life had not ended, as he had so bitterly
+apprehended, in penury; as his friends in power had obtained for him
+the post of Yeoman Usher of the Exchequer, with residence in New
+Palace Yard, in 1833. The office was in fact a sinecure, and was soon
+abolished; but it was arranged that no change should be made in the
+old philosopher's position. His old friends had died, but his work had
+its reward for him, as well as its place in the thought of the world,
+for such people as the Duke of Wellington and Lord Melbourne had used
+their influence for him. Mary had been his constant devoted daughter
+to the last. In 1834 he writes to his wife of Mrs. Shelley, as he
+always called his daughter to Mrs. Godwin, of various meetings and
+dinners with each other, though he cannot attend her evenings as he
+would wish, since the walk across the park to reach Somerset Street,
+where she then lived, was by no means pleasant after dark: and now we
+find Mary honouring Trelawny with the last service for her father,
+apologising, but adding, "Are you not the best and most constant of
+friends?"
+
+Godwin's last grief was the loss of his son. William in 1832; he had
+been settled in a literary career and left a widow. One of Mary's
+first acts of generosity later on was to settle a pension on her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+LITERARY WORK.
+
+
+Having traced Mary's life, as far as space will allow, to the death of
+her father, we must now retrace our steps to show the work she did,
+which gives the _raison-d'être_ for this biography. It has
+already been shown that her second book, _Valperga_, much admired
+by Shelley, was written to assist her father in his distress before
+his bankruptcy. After her husband's death, while arranging his MSS.,
+and noting facts in connection with them, she planned and wrote her
+third romance, _The Last Man_.
+
+This highly imaginative work of Mary Shelley's twenty-sixth year
+contains some of the author's most powerful ideas; but is marred in
+the commencement by some of her most stilted writing.
+
+The account of the events recorded professes to be found in the cave
+of the Cumsean Sibyl, near Naples, where they had remained for
+centuries, outlasting the changes of nature and, when found, being
+still two hundred and fifty years in advance of the time foretold. The
+accounts are all written on the sibylline leaves; they are in all
+languages, ancient and modern; and those concerning this story are in
+English.
+
+We find ourselves in England, in 2073, in the midst of a Republic, the
+last king of England having abdicated at the quietly expressed wish of
+his subjects. This book, like all Mrs. Shelley's, is full of
+biographical reminiscences; the introduction gives the date of her own
+visit to Naples with Shelley, in 1818; the places they visited are
+there indicated; the poetry, romance, the pleasures and pains of her
+own existence, are worked into her subjects; while her imagination
+carries her out of her own surroundings. We clearly recognise in the
+ideal character of the son of the abdicated king an imaginary portrait
+of Shelley as Mary would have him known, not as she knew him as a
+living person. To give an adequate idea of genius with all its charm,
+and yet with its human imperfections, was beyond Mary's power. Adrian,
+the son of kings, the aristocratic republican, is the weakest part,
+and one cannot help being struck by Mary Shelley's preference for the
+aristocrat over the plebeian. In fact, Mary's idea of a republic still
+needed kings' sons by their good manners to grace it, while, at the
+same time, the king's son had to be transmuted into an ideal Shelley.
+This strange confusion of ideas allowed for, and the fact that over
+half a century of perhaps the earth's most rapid period of progress
+has passed, the imaginative qualities are still remarkable in Mary.
+Balloons, then dreamed of, were attained; but naturally the
+steam-engine and other wonders of science, now achieved, were unknown
+to Marv. When the-pi ague breaks out she has scope for her fancy, and
+she certainly adds vivid pictures of horror and pathos to a subject
+which has been handled by masters of thought at different periods. In
+this time of horror it is amusing to note how the people's candidate,
+Ryland, represented as a vulgar specimen of humanity, succumbs to
+abject fear. The description of the deserted towns and grass-grown
+streets of London is impressive. The fortunes of the family, to whom
+the last man, Lionel Verney, belongs, are traced through their varying
+phases, as one by one the dire plague assails them, and Verney, the
+only man who recovers from the disease, becomes the leader of the
+remnant of the English nation. This small handful of humanity leaves
+England, and wanders through France on its way to the favoured
+southern countries where human aid, now so scarce, was less needed. On
+this journey Mrs. Shelley avails herself of reminiscences of her own
+travelling with Shelley some few years before; and we pass the places
+noted in her diary; but strange grotesque figures cross the path of
+the few wanderers, who are decimated each day. At one moment a dying
+acrobat, deserted by his companions, is seen bounding in the air
+behind a hedge in the dusk of evening. At another, a black figure
+mounted on a horse, which only shows itself after dark, to cause
+apprehensions soon calmed by the death of the poor wanderer, who
+wished only for distant companionship through dread of contagion.
+Dijon is reached and passed, and here the old Countess of Windsor, the
+ex-Queen of England, dies: she had only been reconciled to her changed
+position by the destruction of humanity. Once, near Geneva, they come
+upon the sound of divine music in a church, and find a dying girl
+playing to her blind father to keep up the delusion to the last. The
+small party, reduced by this time to five, reach Chamouni, and the
+grand scenes so familiar to Mary contrast with the final tragedy of
+the human race; yet one more dies, and only four of one family remain;
+they bury the dead man in an ice cavern, and with this last victim
+find the pestilence has ended, after a seven years' reign over the
+earth. A weight is lifted from the atmosphere, and the world is before
+them; but now alone they must visit her ruins; and the beauty of the
+earth and the love of each other, bear them up till none but the last
+man remains to complete the Cumsæan Sibyl's prophecy.
+
+Various stories of minor importance followed from Mrs. Shelley's pen,
+and preparations were made for the lives of eminent literary men. But
+it was not till the year preceding her father's death that we have
+_Lodore_, published in 1835. Of this novel we have already spoken
+in relation to the separation of Shelley and Harriet.
+
+Mary had too much feeling of art in her work to make an imaginary
+character a mere portrait, and we are constantly reminded in her
+novels of the different wonderful and interesting personages whom she
+knew intimately, though most of their characters were far too subtle
+and complex to be unravelled by her, even with her intimate knowledge.
+Indeed, the very fact of having known some of the greatest people of
+her age, or of almost any age, gives an appearance of affectation to
+her novels, as it fills them with characters so far from the common
+run that their place in life cannot be reduced to an ordinary
+fashionable level. Romantic episodes there may be, but their true
+place is in the theatre of time of which they are the movers, not the
+Lilliputians of life who are slowly worked on and moulder by them, and
+whose small doings are the material of most novels. We know of few
+novelists who have touched at all successfully on the less known
+characters. This accomplishment seems to need the great poet himself.
+
+The manner in which Lady Lodore is influenced seems to point to
+Harriet; but the unyielding and revengeful side of her character has
+certainly more of Lady Byron. She is charmingly described, and shows a
+great deal of insight on Mary's part into the life of fashionable
+people of her time, which then, perhaps more than now, was the
+favourite theme with novelists. This must be owing to a certain innate
+Tory propensity in the English classes or masses for whom Mary Shelley
+had to work hard, and for whose tendencies in this respect she
+certainly had a sympathy. Mary's own life, at the point we have now
+reached, is also here touched on in the character of Ethel, Lord and
+Lady Lodore's daughter, who is brought up in America by her father,
+and on his death entrusted to an aunt, with injunctions in his will
+that she is not to be allowed to be brought in contact with her
+mother. Her character is sweetly feminine and trusting, and in her
+fortunate love and marriage (in all but early money matters) might be
+considered quite unlike Mary's own less fortunate experiences; but in
+her perfect love and confidence in her husband, her devotion and
+unselfishness through the trials of poverty in London, the
+descriptions of which were evidently taken from Mary's own
+experiences, there is no doubt of the resemblance, as also in her love
+and reverence for all connected with her father. There are also
+passages undoubtedly expressive of her own inner feelings--such as
+this when describing the young husband and wife at a _tête-à-tête_
+supper:--
+
+Mutual esteem and gratitude sanctified the unreserved sympathy which
+made each so happy in the other. Did they love the less for not loving
+"in sin and fear"? Far from it. The certainty of being the cause of
+good to each other tended to foster the most delicate of all passions,
+more than the rough ministrations of terror and the knowledge that
+each was the occasion of injury. A woman's heart is peculiarly
+unfitted to sustain this conflict. Her sensibility gives keenness to
+her imagination and she magnifies every peril, and writhes beneath
+every sacrifice which tends to humiliate her in her own eyes. The
+natural pride of her sex struggles with her desire to confer
+happiness, and her peace is wrecked.
+
+What stronger expression of feeling could be needed than this, of a
+woman speaking from her heart and her own experiences? Does it not
+remind one of the moral on this subject in all George Eliot's writing,
+where she shows that the outcome of what by some might be considered
+minor transgressions against morality leads even in modern times to
+the Nemesis of the most terrible Greek Dramas?
+
+The complicated money transactions carried on with the aid of lawyers
+were clearly a reminiscence of Shelley's troubles, and of her own
+incapacity to feel all the distress contingent so long as she was with
+him, and there was evidently money somewhere in the family, and it
+would come some time. In this novel we also perceive that Mary works
+off her pent-up feelings with regard to Emilia Viviani. It cannot be
+supposed that the corporeal part of Shelley's creation of
+_Epipsychidion_ (so exquisite in appearance and touching in
+manner and story as to give rise, when transmitted through the poet's
+brain, to the most perfect of love ideals) really ultimately became
+the fiery-tempered worldly-minded virago that Mary Shelley indulges
+herself in depicting, after first, in spite of altering some relations
+and circumstances, clearly showing whom the character was intended
+for. It is true that Shelley himself, after investing her with
+divinity to serve the purposes of art, speaks later of her as a very
+commonplace worldly-minded woman; but poets, like artists, seem at
+times to need lay figures to attire with their thoughts. Enough has
+been shown to prove that there is genuine subject of interest in this
+work of Mary's thirty-seventh year.
+
+The next work, _Falkner_, published in 1837, is the last novel we
+have by Mary Shelley; and as we see from her letter she had been
+passing through a period of ill-health and depression while writing
+it, this may account for less spontaneity in the style, which is
+decidedly more stilted; but, here again, we feel that we are admitted
+to some of the circle which Mary had encountered in the stirring times
+of her life, and there is undoubted imagination with some fine
+descriptive passages.
+
+The opening chapter introduces a little deserted child in a
+picturesque Cornish village. Her parents had died there in apartments,
+one after the other, the husband having married a governess against
+the wishes of his relations; consequently, the wife was first
+neglected on her husband's death; and on her own sudden death, a few
+months later, the child was simply left to the care of the poor people
+of the village--a dreamy, poetic little thing, whose one pleasure was
+to stroll in the twilight to the village churchyard and be with her
+mamma. Here she was found by Falkner, the principal character of the
+romance, who had selected this very spot to end a ruined existence; in
+which attempt he was frustrated by the child jogging his arm to move
+him from her mother's grave. His life being thus saved by the child's
+instrumentality, he naturally became interested in her. He is allowed
+to look through the few remaining papers of the parents. Among these
+he finds an unfinished letter of the wife, evidently addressed to a
+lady he had known, and also indications who the parents were. He was
+much moved, and offered to relieve the poor people of the child and to
+restore her to her relations.
+
+The mother's unfinished letter to her friend contains the following
+passage, surely autobiographical:--
+
+When I lost Edwin (the husband), I wrote to Mr. Raby (the husband's
+father) acquainting him with the sad intelligence, and asking for a
+maintenance for myself and my child. The family solicitor answered my
+letter. Edwin's conduct had, I was told, estranged his family from
+him, and they could only regard me as one encouraging his disobedience
+and apostasy. I had no claim on them. If my child were sent to them,
+and I would promise to abstain from all intercourse with her, she
+should be brought up with her cousins, and treated in all respects
+like one of the family. I declined their barbarous offer, and
+haughtily and in few words relinquished every claim on their bounty,
+declaring my intention to support and bring up my child myself. This
+was foolishly done, I fear; but I cannot regret it, even now.
+
+I cannot regret the impulse that made me disdain these unnatural and
+cruel relatives, or that led me to take my poor orphan to my heart
+with pride as being all my own. What had they done to merit such a
+treasure? And did they show themselves capable of replacing a fond and
+anxious mother? This reminds the reader of the correspondence between
+Mary and her father on Shelley's death.
+
+It suffices to say that Falkner became so attached to the small child,
+that by the time he discovered her relations he had not the heart to
+confide her to their hard guardianship, and as he was compelled to
+leave England shortly, he took her with him, and through all
+difficulties he contrived that she should be well guarded and brought
+up. There is much in the character of Falkner that reminds the reader
+of Trelawny, the gallant and generous friend of Byron and Shelley in
+their last years, the brave and romantic traveller. The description of
+Falkner's face and figure must have much resembled that of Trelawny
+when young, though, of course, the incidents of the story have no
+connection with him. In the meantime the little girl is growing up,
+and the nurses are replaced by an English governess, whom Falkner
+engages abroad, and whose praises and qualifications he hears from
+everyone at Odessa. The story progresses through various incidents
+foreshadowing the cause of Falkner's mystery. Elizabeth, the child,
+now grown up, passes under his surname. While travelling in Germany
+they come across a youth of great personal attraction, who appears,
+however, to be of a singularly reckless and misanthropical disposition
+for one so young. Elizabeth seeming attracted by his daring and
+beauty, Falkner suddenly finds it necessary to return to England.
+Shortly afterwards, he is moved to go to Greece during the War of
+Independence, and wishes to leave Elizabeth with her relations in
+England; but this she strenuously opposes so far as to induce Falkner
+to let her accompany him to Greece, where he places her with a family
+while he rushes into the thick of the danger, only hoping to end his
+life in a good cause. In this he nearly succeeds, but Elizabeth,
+hearing of his danger, hastens to his side, and nurses him assiduously
+through the fever brought on from his wounds and the malarious
+climate. By short stages and the utmost care, she succeeds in reaching
+Malta on their homeward journey, and Falkner, a second time rescued
+from death by his beloved adopted child, determines not again to
+endanger recklessly the life more dear to her than that of many
+fathers. Again, at Malta, during a fortnight's quarantine, the
+smallness of the world of fashionable people brings them in contact
+with an English party, a Lord and Lady Cecil, who are travelling with
+their family. Falkner is too ill to see anyone, and when Elizabeth
+finally gets him on board a vessel to proceed to Genoa, he seems
+rapidly sinking. In his despair and loneliness, feeling unable to cope
+with all the difficulties of burning sun and cold winds, help
+unexpectedly comes: a gentleman whom Elizabeth has not before
+perceived, and whom now she is too much preoccupied to observe,
+quietly arranges the sail to shelter the dying man from sun and wind,
+places pillows, and does all that is possible; he even induces the
+poor girl to go below and rest on a couch for a time while he watches.
+Falkner becomes easier in the course of the night; he sleeps and gains
+in strength, and from this he progresses till, while at Marseilles, he
+hears the name, Neville, of the unknown friend who had helped to
+restore him to life. He becomes extremely agitated and faints. On
+being restored to consciousness he begs Elizabeth to continue the
+journey with him alone, as he can bear no one but her near him. The
+mystery of Falkner's life seems to be forcing itself to the surface.
+
+The travellers reach England, and Elizabeth is sought out by Lady
+Cecil, who had been much struck by her devotion to her father.
+Elizabeth is invited to stay with Lady Cecil, as she much needs rest
+in her turn. During a pleasant time of repose near Hastings, Elizabeth
+hears Lady Cecil talk much of her brother Gerard; but it is not till
+he, too, arrives on a visit, that she acknowledges to herself that he
+is really the same Mr. Neville whom she had met, and from whom she had
+received such kindness. Nor had Gerard spoken of Elizabeth; he had
+been too much drawn towards her, as his life also is darkened by a
+mystery. They spend a short tranquil time together, when a letter
+announces the approaching arrival of Sir Boyvill Neville, the young
+man's father (although Lady Cecil called Gerard her brother, they were
+not really related; Sir Boyvill had married the mother of Lady Cecil,
+who was the offspring of a previous marriage).
+
+Gerard Neville at once determines to leave the house, but before going
+refers Elizabeth to his sister, Lady Cecil, to hear the particulars of
+the tragedy which surrounds him. The story told is this. Sir Boyvill
+Neville was a man of the world with all the too frequent disbelief in
+women and selfishness. This led to his becoming very tyrannical when
+he married, at the age of 45, Alethea, a charming young woman who had
+recently lost her mother, and whose father, a retired naval officer of
+limited means, would not hear of her refusing so good an offer as Sir
+Boyvill's. After their marriage Sir Boyvill, feeling himself too
+fortunate in having secured so charming and beautiful a wife, kept out
+of all society, and after living abroad for some years took her to an
+estate he possessed in Cumberland. They lived there shut out from all
+the world, except for trips which he took himself to London, or
+elsewhere, whenever _ennui_ assailed him. They had, at the time
+we are approaching, two charming children, a beautiful boy of some ten
+years and a little girl of two. At this time while Alethea was
+perfectly happy with her children, and quite contented with her
+retirement, which she perceived took away the jealous tortures of her
+husband, he left home for a week, drawn out to two months, on one of
+his periodical visits to the capital. Lady Neville's frequent letters
+concerning her home and her children were always cheerful and placid,
+and the time for her husband's return was fixed. He arrived at the
+appointed hour in the evening. The servants were at the door to
+receive him, but in an instant alarm prevailed; Lady Neville and her
+son Gerard were not with him. They had left the house some hours
+before to walk in the park, and had not since been seen or heard of,
+an unprecedented occurrence. The alarm was raised; the country
+searched in all directions, but ineffectually, during a fearful
+tempest. Ultimately the poor boy was found unconscious on the ground,
+drenched to the skin. On his being taken home, and his father
+questioning him, all that could be heard were his cries "Come back,
+mamma; stop, stop for me!" Nothing else but the tossings of fever.
+Once again, "Then she has come back," he cried, "that man did not take
+her quite away; the carriage drove here at last." The story slowly
+elicited from the child on his gaining strength was this. On his going
+for a walk with his mother in the park, she took the key of a gate
+which led into a lane. A gentleman was waiting outside. Gerard had
+never seen him before, but he heard his mother call him Rupert. They
+walked together through the lane accompanied by the child, and talked
+earnestly. She wept, and the boy was indignant. When they reached a
+cross-road, a carriage was waiting. On approaching it the gentleman
+pulled the child's hands from hers, lifted her in, sprang in after,
+and the coachman drove like the wind, leaving the child to hear his
+mother shriek in agony, "My child--my son!" Nothing more could be
+discovered; the country was ransacked in vain. The servants only
+stated that ten days ago a gentleman called, asked for Lady Neville
+and was shown in to her; he remained some two hours, and on his
+leaving it was remarked that she had been weeping. He had called again
+but was not admitted. One letter was found, signed "Rupert," begging
+for one more meeting, and if that were granted he would leave her and
+his just revenge for ever; otherwise, he could not tell what the
+consequences might be on her husband's return that night. In answer to
+this letter she went, but with her child, which clearly proved her
+innocent intention. Months passed with no fresh result, till her
+husband, beside himself with wounded pride, determined to be avenged
+by obtaining a Bill of Divorce in the House of Lords, and producing
+his son Gerard as evidence against his lost mother, whom he so dearly
+loved. The poor child by this time, by dint of thinking and weighing
+every word he could remember, such as "I grieve deeply for you,
+Rupert: my good wishes are all I have to give you," became more and
+more convinced that his mother was taken forcibly away, and would
+return at any moment if she were able. He only longed for the time
+when he should be old enough to go and seek her through the world. His
+father was relentless, and the child was brought before the House of
+Lords to repeat the evidence he had innocently given against her; but
+when called on to speak in that awful position, no word could be drawn
+from him except "She is innocent." The House was moved by the brave
+child's agony, and resolved to carry on the case without him, from the
+witnesses whom he had spoken to, and finally they pronounced a decree
+of divorce in Sir Boyvill's favour. The struggle and agony of the poor
+child are admirably described, as also his subsequent flight from his
+father's house, and wanderings round his old home in Cumberland. In
+his fruitless search for his mother he reached a deserted sea-coast.
+After wandering about for two months barefoot, and almost starving but
+for the ewe's milk and bread given him by the cottagers, he was
+recognized. His father, being informed, had him seized and brought
+home, where he was confined and treated as a criminal. His state
+became so helpless that even his father was at length moved to some
+feeling of self-restraint, and finally took Gerard with him abroad,
+where he was first seen at Baden by Elizabeth and Palkner. There also
+he first met his sister by affinity, Lady Cecil. With her he lost
+somewhat his defiant tone, and felt that for his mother's sake he must
+not appear to others as lost in sullenness and despair. He now talked
+of his mother, and reasoned about her; but although he much interested
+Lady Cecil, he did not convince her really of his mother's innocence,
+so much did all circumstances weigh against her. But now, during
+Elizabeth's visit to Lady Cecil, a letter is received by Gerard and
+his father informing them that one Gregory Hoskins believed he could
+give some information; he was at Lancaster. Sir Boyvill, only anxious
+to hush up the matter by which his pride had suffered, hastened to
+prevent his son from taking steps to re-open the subject. This Hoskins
+was originally a native of the district round Dromoor, Neville's home,
+and had emigrated to America at the time of Sir Boyvill's marriage. At
+one time--years ago--he met a man named Osborne, who confided to him
+how he had gained money before coming to America by helping a
+gentleman to carry off a lady, and how terribly the affair ended, as
+the lady got drowned in a river near which they had placed her while
+nearly dead from fright, on the dangerous coast of Cumberland. On
+returning to England, and hearing the talk about the Nevilles in his
+native village, this old story came to his mind, and he wrote his
+letter. Neville, on hearing this, instantly determined to proceed to
+Mexico, trace out Osborne, and bring him to accuse his mother's
+murderer.
+
+All these details were written by Elizabeth to her beloved father.
+After some delay, one line entreated her to come to him instantly for
+one day.
+
+Falkner could not ignore the present state of things--the mutual
+attraction of his Elizabeth and of Gerard. Yet how, with all he knew,
+could that be suffered to proceed? Never, except by eternal separation
+from his adored child; but this should be done. He would now tell her
+his story. He could not speak, but he wrote it, and now she must come
+and receive it from him. He told of all his solitary, unloved youth,
+the miseries and tyranny of school to the unprotected--a reminiscence
+of Shelley; how, on emerging from, childhood, one gleam of happiness
+entered his life in the friendship of a lady, an old friend of his
+mother's, who had one lovely daughter; of the happy, innocent time
+spent in their cottage during holidays; of the dear lady's death; of
+her daughter's despair; then how he was sent off to India; of letters
+he wrote to the daughter Alethea, letters unanswered, as the father,
+the naval officer, intercepted all; of his return, after years, to
+England, his one hope that which had buoyed him up through years of
+constancy, to meet and marry his only love, for that he felt she was
+and must remain. He recounted his return, and the news lie received;
+his one rash visit to her to judge for himself whether she was
+happy--this, from her manner, he could not feel, in spite of her
+delight in her children; his mad request to see her; mad plot, and
+still madder execution of it, till he had her in his arms, dashing
+through the country, through storm and thunder, unable to tell whether
+she lived or died; the first moment of pause; the efforts to save the
+ebbing life in a ruined hut; the few minutes' absence to seek
+materials for fire; the return, to find her a floating corpse in the
+wild little river flowing to the sea; the rescue of her body from the
+waves; her burial on the sea-shore; and his own subsequent life of
+despair, saved twice by Elizabeth. All this was told to the son, to
+whom Falkner denounced himself as his mother's destroyer. He named the
+spot where the remains would be found. And now what was left to be
+done? Only to wait a little, while Sir Boyvill and Gerard Neville
+proved his words, and traced out the grave. An inquest was held, and
+Falkner apprehended. A few days passed, and then Elizabeth found her
+father gone; and by degrees it was broken to her that he was in
+Carlisle gaol on the charge of murder. She, who had not feared the
+dangers in Greece of war and fever, was not to be deterred now; she,
+who believed in his innocence. No minutes were needed to decide her to
+go straight to Carlisle, and remain as near as she could to the dear
+father who had rescued and cared for her when deserted. Gerard, who
+was with his father when the bones were exhumed at the spot indicated,
+soon realised the new situation. His passion for justice to his mother
+did not deaden his feeling for others. He felt that Falkner's story
+was true, and though nothing could restore his mother's life, her
+honour was intact. Sir Boyvill would leave no stone unturned to be
+revenged, rightly or wrongly, on the man who had assailed his domestic
+peace; but Gerard saw Elizabeth, gave what consolation he could, and
+determined to set off at once to America to seek Osborne, as the only
+witness who could exculpate Falkner from the charge of murder. After
+various difficulties Osborne was found in England, where he had
+returned in terror of being taken in America as accomplice in the
+murder. With great difficulty he is brought to give evidence, for all
+his thoughts and fears are for himself; but at length, when all hopes
+seem failing, he is induced by Elizabeth to give his evidence, which
+fully confirms Falkner's statement.
+
+At length the day of trial came. The news of liberty arrived. "Not
+Guilty!" Who can imagine the effect but those who have passed
+innocently through the ordeal? Once more all are united. Gerard has to
+remain for the funeral of his father, who had died affirming his
+belief, which in fact he had always entertained, in Falkner's
+innocence. Lady Cecil had secured for Elizabeth the companionship of
+Mrs. Raby, her relation on the father's side. She takes Falkner and
+Elizabeth home to the beautiful ancestral Belleforest. Here a time of
+rest and happiness ensues. Those so much tried by adversity would not
+let real happiness escape for a chimera; honour being restored love
+and friendship remained, and Gerard, Elizabeth and Falkner felt that
+now they ought to remain, together, death not having disunited them.
+Too much space may appear to be here given to one romance; but it
+seems just to show the scope of Mary's imaginative conception. There
+are certainly both imagination and power in carrying it out. It is
+true that the idea seems founded, to some extent, on Godwin's Caleb
+Williams, the man passing through life with a mystery; the similar
+names of Falkner and Falkland may even be meant to call attention to
+this fact. The three-volume form, in this as in many novels, seems to
+detract from the strength of the work in parts, the second volume
+being noticeably drawn out here and there. It may be questioned, also,
+whether the form adopted in this as in many romances of giving the
+early history by way of narrative told by one of the _dramatis
+personæ_ to another, is the desirable one--a point to which we have
+already adverted in relation to _Frankenstein_. Can it be true to
+nature to make one character give a description, over a hundred pages
+long, repeating at length, word for word, long conversations which he
+has never heard, marking the changes of colour which he has not
+seen--and all this with a minuteness which even the firmest memory and
+the most loquacious tongue could not recall? Does not this give an
+unreality to the style incompatible with art, which ought to be the
+mainspring of all imaginative work? This, however, is not Mrs.
+Shelley's error alone, but is traceable through many masterpieces. The
+author, the creator, who sees the workings of the souls of his
+characters, has, naturally, memory and perception for all. Yet Mary
+Shelley, in this as in most of her work, has great insight into
+character. Elizabeth's grandfather in his dotage is quite a photograph
+from life; old Oswig Raby, who was more shrivelled with narrowness of
+mind than with age, but who felt himself and his house, the oldest in
+England, of more importance than aught else he knew of. His
+daughter-in-law, the widow of his eldest son, is also well drawn; a
+woman of upright nature who can acknowledge the faults of the family,
+and try to retrieve them, and who finally does her best to atone for
+the past.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+LATER WORKS.
+
+
+The writing of these novels, with other literary work we must refer
+to, passed over the many years of Mrs. Shelley's life until 1837, and
+saved her from the ennui of a quiet life in London with few friends.
+Certainly in Mary's case there had been a reason for the neglect of
+"Society," which at times she bitterly deplored; and as she had little
+other than intellectual and amiable qualities to recommend her for
+many years, she was naturally not sought after by the more successful
+of her contemporaries. There are instances even of her being cruelly
+mortified by marked rudeness at some receptions she attended; in one
+case years later, when her fidelity to her husband and his memory
+might have appeased the sternest moralist. During these early years,
+which she writes of afterwards as years of privation which caused her
+to shed many bitter tears at the time, though they were frequently
+gilded by imagination, Mrs. Shelley was cheered by seeing her son grow
+up entirely to her satisfaction, passing through the child's stage and
+the school-boy's at Harrow, from which place he proceeded to
+Cambridge; and many and substantially happy years must have been
+passed, during which Claire was not forgotten. Poor Claire, who passed
+through much severe servitude, from which Mary would fain have spared
+her, as she wrote once to Mr. Trelawny that this was one of her chief
+reasons for wishing for independence; but "Old Time," or "Eternity,"
+as she called Sir Timothy, who certainly had no reason to claim her
+affection, was long in passing; and though a small allowance before
+1831 of three hundred pounds a year had increased to four hundred
+pounds a year when her only child reached his majority in 1841, for
+this, on Sir Timothy's death, she had to repay thirteen thousand
+pounds. It had enabled her to make a tour in Germany with her son; of
+this journey we will speak after referring to her _Lives of Eminent
+Literary Men_.
+
+These lives, written for _Lardner's Cyclopedia_, and published in
+1835, are a most interesting series of biographies written by a woman
+who could appreciate the poet's character, and enter into the
+injustices and sorrows from which few poets have been exempt. They
+show careful study, her knowledge of various countries gives local
+colour to her descriptions, and her love of poetry makes her an
+admirable critic. She is said to have written all the Italian and
+Spanish lives with the exception of Galileo and Tasso; and certainly
+her writing contrasts most favourably with the life of Tasso, to
+whomever this may have been assigned. Mary was much disappointed at
+not having this particular sketch to write.
+
+To her life of Dante she affixes Byron's lines from _The Prophecy of
+Dante_--
+
+                       'Tis the doom
+   Of spirits of my order to be racked
+   In life; to wear their hearts out, and consume
+   Their days in endless strife, and die alone.
+   Then future thousands crowd around their tomb,
+   And pilgrims, come from climes where they have known
+   The name of him who now is but a name,
+   Spread his, by him unheard, unheeded fame.
+
+Mary felt how these beautiful lines were appropriate to more than one
+poet. Freedom from affectation, and a genuine love of her subject,
+make her biographies most readable, and for the ordinary reader there
+is a fund of information. The next life--that of Petrarch--is equally
+attractive; in fact, there is little that can exceed the interest of
+lives of these immortal beings when written--with the comprehension
+here displayed. Even the complicated history of the period is made
+clear, and the poet, whose tortures came from the heart, is as
+feelingly touched on as he who suffered from the political factions of
+the Bianchi and the Neri, and who felt the steepness of other's stairs
+and the salt savour of other's bread. Petrarch's banishment through
+love is not less feelingly described, and we are taken to the life and
+the homes of the time in the living descriptions given by Mary. One
+passage ought in fairness to be given to show her enthusiastic
+understanding and appreciation of the poet she writes of:--
+
+Dante, as hath been already intimated, is the hero of his own poem;
+and the Divina Commedia is the only example of an attempt triumphantly
+achieved, and placed beyond the reach of scorn or neglect, wherein
+from beginning to end the author discourses concerning himself
+individually. Had this been done in any other way than the
+consummately simple, delicate, and unobtrusive one which he has
+adopted, the whole would have been insufferable egotism, disgusting
+coxcombry, or oppressive dulness. Whereas, this personal identity is
+the charm, the strength, the soul of the book; he lives, he breathes,
+he moves through it; his pulse beats or stands still, his eye kindles
+or fades, his cheek grows pale with horror, colours with shame, or
+burns with indignation; we hear his voice, his step, in every page; we
+see his shape by the flame of hell; his shadow in the land where
+there is no _other_ shadow (_Purgatoria_) and his countenance
+gaining angelic elevation from "colloquy sublime" with glorified
+intelligence in the paradise above. Nor does he ever go out of his
+natural character. He is, indeed, the lover from infancy of Beatrice,
+the aristocratic magistrate of a fierce democracy, the valiant soldier
+in the field of Campaldino, the fervent patriot in the feuds of
+Guelphs and Ghibellines, the eloquent and subtle disputant in the
+school of theology, the melancholy exile wandering from court to
+court, depending for bread and shelter on petty princes who knew not
+his worth, except as a splendid captive in their train; and above all,
+he is the poet anticipating his own assured renown (though not
+obtrusively so), and dispensing at his will honour or infamy to
+others, whom he need but to name, and the sound must be heard to the
+end of time and echoed from all regions of the globe. Dante in his
+vision is Dante as he lived, as he died, and as he expected to live in
+both worlds beyond death--an immortal spirit in the one, an
+unforgotten poet in the other.
+
+You feel this is written from the heart of the woman who herself felt
+as she wrote. We would fain go through her different biographies,
+tracing her feelings, her appreciation, and poetic enthusiasm
+throughout, but that is impossible. She takes us through Boccaccio's
+life, and, as by the reflection of a sunset from a mirror, we are
+warmed with the glow and mirth from distant and long-past times in
+Italy. One feels through her works the innate delicacy of her mind.
+Through Boccaccio's life, as through all the others, the history of
+the times and the noteworthy facts concerning the poets are brought
+forward--such as the sums of money Boccaccio spent, though poor, to
+promote the study of Greek, so long before the taking of
+Constantinople by the Turks. In the friendship of Petrarch and
+Boccaccio, she shows how great souls can love, and makes you love them
+in return, and you feel the riches of the meetings of such people,
+these dictators of mankind--not of a faction-tossed country or
+continent. How paltry do the triumphs of conquerors which end with the
+night, the feasts of princes which leave still hungry, appear beside
+the triumphs of intellect, the symposium of souls.
+
+After Boccaccio, Mary rapidly ran over the careers of Lorenzo de'
+Medici, Ficino, Pico della Mirandola, Politian, and the Pulci,
+exhibiting again, after the lapse of a century, the study in Italy of
+the Greek language. The story of the truly great prince with his
+circle of poet friends, one of whom, Politian, died of a broken heart
+at the death of his beloved patron, is well told. From these she
+passes on to the followers of the romantic style begun by Pulci, Cieco
+da Ferrara, Burchiello, Bojardo; then Berni, born at the end of the
+fifteenth century, who carried on or recast Bojardo's _Orlando
+Innamorato_, which was followed by Ariosto's _Orlando Furioso_,
+the delight of Italy. In Ariosto's life Mary, as ever, delights in
+showing the filial affection and fine traits of the poet's nature.
+She quotes his lines--
+
+   Our mother's years with pity fill my heart,
+   For without infamy she could not be
+   By all of us at once forsaken.
+
+But with these commendations she strongly denounces the profligacy of
+his writing as presumably of his life. She says: "An author may not be
+answerable to posterity for the evil of his mortal life; but for the
+profligacy of that life which he lives through after ages,
+contaminating by irrepressible and incurable infection the minds of
+others, he is amenable even in his grave."
+
+Through the intricacies of Machiavelli Mary's clear head and
+conscientious treatment lead the reader till light appears to gleam.
+The many-sided character of the man comes out, the difficulties of the
+time he wrote in, while advising Princes how to act in times of
+danger, and so admonishing the people how to resist. Did he not
+foresee tyranny worked out and resistance complete, and his own
+favourite republic succeeding to the death of tyrants? One remark of
+Mary's with regard to the time when Machiavelli considered himself
+most neglected is worth recording: "He bitterly laments the inaction
+of his life, and expresses an ardent desire to be employed. Meanwhile
+he created occupation for himself, and it is one of the lessons that
+we may derive from becoming acquainted with the feelings and actions
+of celebrated men, to learn that this very period during which
+Machiavelli repined at the neglect of his contemporaries, and the
+tranquillity of his life, was that during which his fame took root,
+and which brought his name down to us. He occupied his leisure in
+writing those works which have occasioned his immortality."
+
+A short life of Guicciardini follows; then Mrs. Shelley comes to the
+congenial subject of Vittoria Colonna, the noble widow of the Marquis
+of Pescara, the dear friend in her latter years of Michael Angelo, the
+woman whose writings, accomplishments, and virtues have made her the
+pride of Italy. With her Mary Shelley gives a few of the long list of
+names of women who won fame in Italy from their intellect:--the
+beautiful daughter of a professor, who lectured behind a veil in
+Petrarch's time; the mother of Lorenzo de' Medici, Ippolita Sforza;
+Alessandra Scala; Isotta of Padua; Bianca d'Este; Damigella Torella;
+Cassandra Fedele. We next pass to the life of Guarini, and missing
+Tasso, whose life Mary Shelley did not write, we come to Chiabrera,
+who tried to introduce the form of Greek poetry into Italian. Tassoni,
+Marini, Filicaja are agreeable, but shortly touched on. Then
+Metastasio is reached, whose youthful genius as an _improvisatore
+early gained him applause, which was followed up by his successful
+writing of three-act dramas for the opera, and a subsequent calm and
+prosperous life at Vienna, under the successive protection of the
+Emperor Charles VI., Maria Theresa, and Joseph II. The contrast of the
+even prosperity of Metastasio's life with that of some of the great
+poets is striking. Next Goldoni claims attention, whose comedies of
+Italian manners throw much light upon the frivolous life in society
+before the French Revolution, his own career adding to the pictures of
+the time. Then Alfieri's varied life-story is well told, his sad
+period of youth, when taken from his mother to suffer much educational
+and other neglect, the difficulties he passed through owing to his
+Piedmontese origin and consequent ignorance of the pure Italian
+language. She closes the modern Italian poets with Monti and Ugo
+Foscolo, whose sad life in London is exhibited.
+
+Mary's studies in Spanish enabled her to treat equally well the poets
+of Spain and of Portugal. Her introduction is a good essay on the
+poetry and poets of Spain, and some of the translations, which are her
+own, are very happily given. The poetic impulse in Spain is traced
+from the Iberians through the Romans, Visigoths, Moors, and the early
+unknown Spanish poets, among whom there were many fine examples. She
+leads us to Boscan at the commencement of the sixteenth century.
+Boscan seems to have been one of those rare beings, a poet endowed
+with all the favours of fortune, including contentment and happiness.
+His friends Garcilaso di Vega and Mendoza aided greatly in the
+formation of Spanish poetry, all three having studied the Italian
+school and Petrarch. This century, rich in poets, gives us also Luis
+de Leon, Herrera, Saade Miranda, Jorge de Montemayor, Castillejo, the
+dramatists; and Ercilla, the soldier poet, who, in the expedition for
+the conquest of Peru went to Arauco, and wrote the poem named
+_Araucana_. From him we pass to one of the great men of all time,
+Cervantes, to one who understood the workings of the human heart, and
+was so much raised above the common level as to be neglected in the
+magnitude of his own work. Originally of noble family, and having
+served his country in war, losing his left hand at the battle of
+Lepanto, he received no recognition of his services after his return
+from a cruel captivity among the Moors. Instead of reward, Cervantes
+seems to have met with every indignity that could be devised by the
+multitudes of pigmies to lower a great man, were that possible. Mary,
+as ever, rises with her subject. She remarks:--"It is certainly
+curious that in those days when it was considered part of a noble's
+duties to protect and patronise men of letters, Cervantes should have
+been thus passed over; and thus while his book was passing through
+Europe with admiration, Cervantes remained poor and neglected. So does
+the world frequently honour its greatest, as if jealous of the renown
+to which they can never attain."
+
+From Cervantes we pass on to Lope de Vega, of whose thousand dramas
+what remains? and yet what honours and fortune were showered upon him
+during his life! A more even balance of qualities enabled him to write
+entertaining plays, and to flatter the weakness of those in power.
+From Gongora and Quevedo Mary passes to Calderon, whom she justly
+considers the master of Spanish poetry. She deplores the little that
+is known of his life, and that after him the fine period of Spanish
+literature declines, owing to the tyranny and misrule which were
+crushing and destroying the spirit and intellect of Spain; for,
+unfortunately, art and poetry require not only the artist and the
+poet, but congenial atmosphere to survive in.
+
+Writing for this Cyclopædia was evidently very apposite work for Mrs.
+Shelley. She wrote also for it lives of some of the French poets. Some
+stories were also written. In these she was less happy, as likewise in
+her novel, _Perkin Warbeck_, a pallid imitation of Walter Scott,
+which does not call for any special comment.
+
+Shortly after her father's death, Mrs. Shelley wrote from 14 North
+Bank, Regent's Park, to Moxon, wishing to arrange with him about the
+publication of Godwin's autobiography, letters, &c. But some ten years
+later we find her still expressing the wish to do some work of the
+kind as a solemn duty if her health would permit. Probably the very
+numerous notes which Mrs. Shelley made about her father and his
+surroundings were towards this object.
+
+Mrs. Shelley's health caused her at times considerable trouble from
+this period onwards. Harrow had not suited her, and in 1839 she moved
+to Putney; and the next year, 1840, she was able to make the tour
+above mentioned, which we cannot do better than refer to at once.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+ITALY REVISITED.
+
+
+In Mary Shelley's _Rambles in Germany and Italy_ in 1840-42-43,
+published in 1844, we have not only a pleasing account of herself with
+her son and friends during a pleasure trip, but some very interesting
+and charming descriptions of continental life at that time.
+
+Mary, with her son and two college friends, decided in June 1840 to
+spend their vacation on the banks of the Lake of Como. The idea of
+again visiting a country where she had so truly lived, and where she
+had passed through the depths of sorrow, filled her with much emotion.
+Her failing health made her feel the advantage that travelling and
+change of country would be to her. After spending an enjoyable two
+months of the spring at Richmond, visiting Raphael's cartoons at
+Hampton Court, she went by way of Brighton and Hastings. On her way to
+Dover she noticed how Hastings, a few years ago a mere fishing
+village, had then become a new town. They were delayed at Dover by a
+tempest, but left the next morning, the wind still blowing a gale;
+reaching Calais they were further delayed by the tide. At length Paris
+was arrived at, and we find Mary making her first experience at a
+_table d'hote_. Mary was now travelling with a maid, which no
+doubt her somewhat weakened health made a necessity to her. They went
+to the Hotel Chatham at Paris. She felt all the renovating feeling of
+being in a fresh country out of the little island; the weight of cares
+seemed to fall from her; the life in Paris cheered her, though the
+streets were dirty enough then--dirtier than those of London; whereas
+the contrast is now in the opposite direction.
+
+After a week here they went on towards Como by way of Frankfort. They
+were to pass Metz, Treves, the Moselle, Coblentz, and the Rhine to
+Mayence. The freedom from care and, worries in a foreign land, with
+sufficient means, and only in the company of young people open to
+enjoyment, gave new life to Mary. After staying a night at Metz, the
+clean little town on the Moselle, they passed on to Treves. At
+Thionville, the German frontier, they were struck by the wretched
+appearance of the cottages in contrast to the French. From Treves they
+proceeded by boat up the Moselle. The winding banks of the Moselle,
+with the vineyards sheltered by mountains, are well described. The
+peasants are content and prosperous, as, after the French Revolution,
+they bought up the confiscated estates of the nobles, and so were able
+to cultivate the land. The travellers rowed into the Rhine on reaching
+Coblentz, and rested at the Bellevue; and now they passed by the
+grander beauties of the Rhine. These made Mary wish to spend a summer
+there, exploring its recesses. They reached Mayence at midnight, and
+the next morning left by rail for Frankfort, the first train they had
+entered on the Continent. Mary much preferred the comfort of railway
+travelling. From Frankfort they engaged a voiturier to Schaffhausen,
+staying at Baden-Baden. The ruined castles recall memories of changed
+times, and Mary remarks how, except in England and Italy, country
+houses of the rich seem unknown. At Darmstadt, where they stopped to
+lunch, they were annoyed and amused too by the inconvenience and
+inattention they were subjected to from the expected arrival of the
+Grand Duke. On reaching Heidelberg, she remarks how, in travelling,
+one is struck by the way that the pride of princes for further
+dominion causes the devastation of the fairest countries. From the
+ruined castle they looked over the Palatinate which had been laid
+waste owing to the ambition of the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of our
+James I. Mary could have lingered long among the picturesque
+weed-grown walls, but had to continue the route to their destination.
+At Baden they visited the gambling saloon, and saw _Rouge et
+Noir_ played. They were much struck by the Falls of the Rhine at
+Schaffhausen; and, on reaching Chiavenna, Mary had again the delight
+of hearing and speaking Italian. After crossing the blank mountains,
+who has not experienced the delight of this sensation has not yet
+known one of the joys of existence. On arriving at their destination
+at Lake Como, their temporary resting-place, a passing depression
+seized the party, the feeling that often comes when shut in by
+mountains away from home. No doubt Mary having reached Italy, the land
+she loved, with Shelley, the feeling of being without him assailed
+her.
+
+At Cadenabia, on Lake Como, they had to consider ways and means. It
+turned out that apartments, with all their difficulties, would equal
+hotel expenses without the same amount of comfort. So they decided on
+accepting the moderate terms offered by the landlord, and were
+comfortably or even luxuriously installed, with five little bedrooms
+and large private salon. In one nook of this Mrs. Shelley established
+her embroidery frame, desk, books, and such things, showing her taste
+for order and elegance. So for some weeks she and her son and two
+companions were able to pass their time free from all household
+worries. The lake and neighbourhood are picturesquely described. One
+drawback to Mary's peace of mind was the arrival of her son's boat. He
+seemed to have inherited his father's love of boating, and this
+naturally filled her with apprehension. They made many pleasant
+excursions, of which she always gives good descriptions, and also
+enters clearly into any historical details connected with the country.
+At times she was carried by the beauty and repose of the scene into
+rapt moods which she thus describes:--
+
+It has seemed to me, and on such an evening I have felt it, that the
+world, endowed as it is outwardly with endless shapes and influences
+of beauty and enjoyment, is peopled also in its spiritual life by
+myriads of loving spirits, from whom, unaware, we catch impressions
+which mould our thoughts to good, and thus they guide beneficially the
+course of events and minister to the destiny of man. Whether the
+beloved dead make a portion of this holy company, I dare not guess;
+but that such exist, I feel. They keep far off while we are worldly,
+evil, selfish; but draw near, imparting the reward of heaven-born joy,
+when we are animated by noble thoughts and capable of disinterested
+actions. Surely such gather round me to-night, part of that atmosphere
+of peace and love which it is paradise to breathe.
+
+I had thought such ecstasy dead in me for ever, but the sun of Italy
+has thawed the frozen stream.
+
+Such poetic feelings were the natural outcome of the quiet and repose
+after the life of care and anxiety poor Mary had long been subjected
+to. She always seems more in her element when describing mountain
+cataracts, Alpine storms, water lashed into waves and foam by the
+wind, all the changes of mountain and lake scenery; but this quiet
+holiday with her son came to an end, and they had to think of turning
+homewards. Before doing so, they passed by Milan, enjoyed the opera
+there, and went to see Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper," which Mary
+naturally much admires; she mentions the Luinis without enthusiasm.
+While here, the non-arrival of a letter caused great anxiety to Mary,
+as they were now obliged to return on account of Percy's term
+commencing, and there was barely enough money for him to travel
+without her; however, that was the only thing possible, and so it had
+to be done. Percy returned to England with his two friends, and his
+mother had to remain at Milan awaiting the letter. Days pass without
+any letter coming to hand, lost days, for Mary was too anxious and
+worried to be able to take any pleasure in her stay. Nor had she any
+acquaintances in the place; she could scarcely endure to go down alone
+to _table d'hôte_ dinner, although she overcame this feeling as
+it was her only time of seeing anyone. Ten days thus passed by, days
+of storm and tempest, during which her son and his companions
+recrossed the Alps. They had left her on the 20th September, and it
+was not till she reached Paris on the 12th October that she became
+aware of the disastrous journey they had gone through, and how
+impossible it would have been for them to manage even as they did, had
+she been with them; indeed, she hardly could have lived through it.
+The description of this journey was written to Mrs. Shelley in a most
+graphic and picturesque letter by one of her son's companions. They
+were nearly drowned while crossing the lake in the diligence on a
+raft, during a violent storm. Next they were informed that the road of
+the Dazio Grande to Airolo was washed away sixty feet under the
+present torrent. They, with a guide, had to find their way over an
+unused mountain track, rendered most dangerous by the storm. They all
+lost shoes and stockings, and had to run on as best they could. Percy,
+with some others, had lost the track; but they, providentially, met
+the rest of the party at an inn at Piota, and from there managed to
+reach Airolo; and so they crossed the stupendous St. Gothard Pass, one
+of the wonders of the world.
+
+Mrs. Shelley having at last recovered the letter from the Post Office,
+returned with her maid and a vetturino who had three Irish ladies with
+him, by way of Geneva, staying at Isola Bella. After passing the Lago
+Maggiore, a turn in the road shut the lake and Italy from her sight,
+and she proceeded on her journey with a heavy heart, as many a
+traveller has done and many more will do, the fascination of Italy
+under most circumstances being intense. Mary then describes one of the
+evils of Italy in its then divided state. The southern side of the
+Simplon belonged to the King of Sardinia, but its road led at once
+into Austrian boundary. The Sardinian sovereign, therefore, devoted
+this splendid pass to ruin to force people to go by Mont Cenis, and
+thus rendered the road most dangerous for those who were forced to
+traverse it. The journey over the Simplon proved most charming, and
+Mrs. Shelley was very much pleased with the civility of her vetturino,
+who managed everything admirably. Now, on her way to Geneva, she
+passed the same scenes she had lived first in with Shelley. She thus
+describes them:--
+
+
+The far Alps were hid, the wide lake looked drear. At length I caught
+a glimpse of the scenes among which I had lived, when first I stepped
+out from childhood into life. There on the shores of Bellerive stood
+Diodati; and our humble dwelling, Maison Ohapuis, nestled close to the
+lake below. There were the terraces, the vineyards, the upward path
+threading them, the little port where our boat lay moored. I could
+mark and recognise a thousand peculiarities, familiar objects then,
+forgotten since--now replete with recollections and associations. Was
+I the same person who had lived there, the companion of the dead--for
+all were gone? Even my young child, whom I had looked upon as the joy
+of future years, had died in infancy. Not one hope, then in fair bud,
+had opened into maturity; storm and blight and death had passed over,
+and destroyed all. While yet very young, I had reached the position of
+an aged person, driven back on memory for companionship with the
+beloved, and now I looked on the inanimate objects that had surrounded
+me, which survived the same in aspect as then, to feel that all my
+life since is an unreal phantasmagoria--the shades that gathered round
+that scene were the realities, the substances and truth of the soul's
+life which I shall, I trust, hereafter rejoin.
+
+
+Mary digresses at some length on the change of manners in the French
+since the revolution of 1830, saying that they had lost so much of
+their pleasant agreeable manner, their Monsieur and Madame, which
+sounded so pretty. From Geneva by Lyons, through Chalons, the
+diligence slowly carries her to Paris, and thence she shortly returned
+to England in October.
+
+Mary's next tour with her son was in 1842, by way of Amsterdam,
+through Germany and Italy. From Frankfort she describes to a friend
+her journey with its various mishaps. After spending a charming week
+with friends in Hampshire, and then passing a day or two in London to
+bid farewell to old friends, Mrs. Shelley, her son, and Mr. Knox
+embarked for Antwerp on June 12, 1842. After the sea passage, which
+Mary dreaded, the pleasure of entering the quiet Scheldt is always
+great; but she does not seem to have recognised the charm of the
+Belgian or Dutch quiet scenery. With her love of mountains, these
+picturesque aspects seem lost on her; at least, she remarks that, "It
+is strange that a scene, in itself uninteresting, becomes agreeable to
+look at in a picture, from the truth with which it is depicted, and a
+perfection of colouring which at once contrasts and harmonizes the
+hues of sky and water." Mary does not seem to understand that the
+artist who does this selects the beauties of nature to represent. A
+truthful representation of a vulgarised piece of nature would be very
+painful for an artist to look on or to paint. The English or Italian
+villas of Lake Como, or the Riviera, would require a great deal of
+neglect by the artist not to vulgarize the glorious scenes round them;
+but this lesson has yet to be widely learnt in modern times, that
+beauty can never spoil nature, however humble; but no amount of wealth
+expended on a palace or mansion can make it fit for a picture, without
+the artist's feeling, any more than the beauties of Italy on canvas
+can be other than an eyesore without the same subtle power.
+
+At Liège, fresh worries assailed the party. The difficulty of getting
+all their luggage, as well as a theft of sixteen pounds from her son's
+bedroom in the night, did not add to the pleasures of the commencement
+of their tour; but, as Mary said, the discomfort was nothing to what
+it would have been in 1840, when their means were far narrower, and
+she feels, "Welcome this evil so that it be the only one," for, as she
+says, one whose life had been so stained by tragedy could never regain
+a healthy tone, if that is needed not to fear for those we love. On
+reaching Cologne, the party went up the Rhine to Coblentz. As neither
+Mary nor her companions had previously done this, they were again much
+imposed upon by the steward. She recalls her former voyage with
+Shelley and Claire, when in an open boat they passed the night on the
+rapid river, "tethered" to a willow on the bank. When Frankfort is at
+length reached, they have to decide where to pass the summer.
+Kissingen is decided on, for Mrs. Shelley to try the baths. Here they
+take lodgings, and all the discomforts of trying to get the
+necessaries of life and some order, when quite ignorant of the
+language of the place, are amusingly described by Mrs. Shelley. The
+treatment and diet at the baths seem to have been very severe, nearly
+every usual necessary of life being forbidden by the Government in
+order to do justice to the efficacy of the baths.
+
+Passing through various German towns their way to Leipsic, they stay
+at Weimar, where Mary rather startles the reader by remarking that she
+is not sure she would give the superiority to Goethe; that Schiller
+had always appeared to her the greater man, so complete. It is true
+she only knew the poets by translations, but the wonderful passages
+translated from Goethe by Shelley might have impressed her more. Mary
+is much struck on seeing the tombs of the poets by their being placed
+in the same narrow chamber as the Princes, showing the genuine
+admiration of the latter for those who had cast a lustre on their
+kingdom, and their desire to share even in the grave the poet's
+renown. Mary, when in the country of Frederic the Great, shows little
+enthusiasm for that great monarch, so simple in his own life, so just,
+so beloved, and so surrounded by dangers which he overcame for the
+welfare of the country. What Frederic might have been in Napoleon's
+place after the Revolution it is difficult to conceive, or how he
+might have acted. Certainly not for mere self aggrandizement. But the
+tyrannies of the petty German Princes Mary justly does not pass over,
+such as the terrible story told in Schiller's _Cabal and Love_.
+She recalls how the Duke of Hesse-Cassel sold his peasants for the
+American war, to give with their pay jewels to his mistress, and how,
+on her astonishment being expressed, the servant replied they only
+cost seven thousand children of the soil just sent to America. On this
+Mary remarks:--"History fails fearfully in its duty when it makes over
+to the poet the record and memory of such an event; one, it is to be
+hoped, that can never be renewed. And yet what acts of cruelty and
+tyranny may not be reacted on the stage of the world which we boast of
+as civilised, if one man has uncontrolled power over the lives of
+many, the unwritten story of Russia may hereafter tell."
+
+This seems to point to reminiscences of Claire's life in Russia. Mrs.
+Shelley also remarks great superiority in the comfort, order, and
+cleanliness in the Protestant over the Catholic parts of Germany,
+where liberty of conscience has been gained, and is profoundly touched
+on visiting Luther's chamber in the castle of Wartburg overlooking the
+Thuringian Forest.
+
+Her visits to Berlin and Dresden, during the heat of summer, do not
+much strike the reader by her feeling for pictorial art. She is
+impressed by world-renowned pictures; but her remarks, though those of
+a clever woman, show that the love of nature, especially in its most
+majestic forms, does not give or imply love of art. The feeling for
+plastic art requires the emotion which runs through all art, and
+without which it is nothing, to be distinctly innate as in the artist,
+or to have been cultivated by surroundings and influence. True, it is
+apparently difficult always to trace the influence. There is no one
+step from the contemplation of the Alps to the knowledge of plastic
+art. Literary art does not necessarily understand pictorial art: it
+may profess to expound the latter, and the reader, equally or still
+more ignorant, fancies that he appreciates the pictorial art because
+he relishes its literary exposition. Surely a piece of true plastic
+art, constantly before a child for it to learn to love, would do more
+than much after study. The best of all ought to be given to
+children--music, poetry, art--for it is easier then to instil than
+later to eradicate. It is true these remarks may seem unnecessary with
+regard to Mary Shelley, as, with all her real gifts and insight into
+poetry, she is most modest about her deficiencies in art knowledge,
+and is even apologetic concerning the remarks made in her letters, and
+for this her truth of nature is to be commended. In music, also, she
+seems more really moved by her own emotional nature than purely by the
+music; how, otherwise, should she have been disappointed at hearing
+_Masaniello_, while admiring German music, when Auber's grand
+opera has had the highest admiration from the chief German musicians?
+But she had not been previously moved towards it; that is the great
+difference between perception and acquired knowledge, and why so
+frequently the art of literature is mistaken for perception. But Mary
+used her powers justly, and drew the line where she was conscious of
+knowledge; she had real imagination of her own, and used the precious
+gift justifiably, and thus kept honour and independence, a difficult
+task for a woman in her position. She expresses pity for the
+travellers she meets, who simply are anxious to have "done"
+everything. She truly remarks:--"We must become a part of the scenes
+around us, and they must mingle and become a portion of us, or we see
+without seeing, and study without learning. There is no good, no
+knowledge, unless we can go out from and take some of the external
+into ourselves. This is the secret of mathematics as well as of
+poetry."
+
+Their trip to Prague, and its picturesque position, afforded great
+pleasure to her. The stirring and romantic history is well
+described--history, as Shelley truly says, is a record of crime and
+misery. The first reformers sprang up in Bohemia. The martyrdom of
+John Huss did not extinguish his enlightening influence; and while all
+the rest of Europe was enslaved in darkness, Bohemia was free with a
+pure religion. But such a bright example might not last, and Bohemia
+became a province of the Empire, and not a hundred Protestants remain
+in the country now. The interesting story of St. John Nepomuk, the
+history of Wallenstein, with Schiller's finest tragedy, all lend their
+interest to Prague. In the journey through Bohemia and southern
+Germany, dirty and uncomfortable inns were conspicuous. The Lake of
+Gemünden much struck Mary with its poetic beauty, and she felt it was
+the place she should like to retreat to for a summer. From Ischl they
+went over the Brenner Pass of the Lago di Garda on to Italy. Mary was
+particularly struck by the beauties of Salzburg, with the immense
+plain half encircled by mountains crowned by castles, with the high
+Alps towering above all. She considered all this country superior to
+the Swiss Alps, and longed to pass months there some time. By this
+beautiful route they reached Verona, and then Venice. On the road to
+Venice Mary became aware (as we have already noted) of an intimate
+remembrance of each object, and each turn in the road. It was by this
+very road she entered Venice twenty-five years before with her dying
+child. She remarks that Shakspeare knew the feeling and endued the
+grief of Queen Constance with terrible reality; and, later, the poem
+of "The Wood Spurge" enforces the same sentiment. It was remarked by
+Holcroft that the notice the soul takes of objects presented to the
+eye in its hour of agony is a relief afforded by nature to permit the
+nerves to endure pain. On reaching Venice a search for lodgings was
+not successful; but two gentlemen, to whom they had introductions,
+found for the party an hotel within their still limited means; their
+bargain came to £9 a month each for everything included. They visited
+again the Rialto, and Mrs. Shelley observes:--"Often when here before,
+I visited this scene at this hour, or later, for often I expected
+Shelley's return from Palazzo Mocenigo till two or three in the
+morning. I watched the glancing of the oars, and heard the far song,
+and saw the palaces sleeping in the light of the moon, which veils by
+its deep shadows all that grieved the eye and hurt the heart in the
+decaying palaces of Venice; then I saw, as now I see, the bridge of
+the Rialto spanning the canal. All, all is the same; but, as the poet
+says,--'The difference to me.'"
+
+She notices many of the most celebrated of the pictures in the
+Academia; and she had the good fortune of seeing St. Peter Martyr,
+which she misnames St. Peter the Hermit, out of its dark niche in the
+Church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. She gives a very good description of
+Venetian life at the time, and much commends its family affection and
+family life as being of a much less selfish nature than in England; as
+she remarks truly, if a traveller gets into a vicious or unpleasant
+set in any country, it would not do to judge all the rest of the
+nation, by that standard--as she considered Shelley did when staying
+in Venice with Byron. The want of good education in Italy at that time
+she considers the cause of the ruling indolence, love-making with the
+young and money-keeping with the elder being the chief occupation. She
+gives a very good description of the noble families and their descent.
+Many of the Italian palaces preserved their pictures, and in the
+Palazzo Pisani Mary saw the Paul Veronese, now in the National
+Gallery, of "The family of Darius at the feet of Alexander." Mary's
+love of Venice grew, and she seems to have entertained serious ideas
+of taking a palace and settling there; but all the fancies of
+travellers are not realised. One moonlit evening she heard an old
+gondoliere challenge a younger one to alternate with him the stanzas
+of the _Gerusalemme_. The men stood on the Piazzetta beside the
+Laguna, surrounded by other gondolieri in the moonlight. They chanted
+"The death of Clorinda" and other favourite passages; and though,
+owing to Venetian dialect Mary could not follow every word, she was
+much impressed by the dignity and beauty of the scene. The Pigeons of
+St. Mark's existed then as now. Mary ended her stay in Venice by a
+visit to the Opera, and joined a party, by invitation, to accompany
+the Austrian Archduke to the Lido on his departure.
+
+Mrs. Shelley much admired the expression in the early masters at
+Padua, though she does not mention Giotto. In Florence, the expense of
+the hotels again obliged her to go through the tiresome work of
+seeking apartments. They fortunately found sunny rooms, as the cold
+was intense. To cold followed rain, and she remarks:--"Walking is out
+of the question; and driving-how I at once envy and despise the happy
+rich who have carriages, and who use them only to drive every
+afternoon in the Cascine. If I could, I would visit every spot
+mentioned in Florentine history--visit its towns of old renown, and
+ramble amid scenes familiar to Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarch, and
+Machiavelli."
+
+The descriptions of Ghirlandajo's pictures in Florence are very good.
+Mary now evidently studies art with great care and intelligence, and
+makes some very clever remarks appertaining to it. She is also able to
+call attention to the fact that Mr. Kirkup had recently made the
+discovery of the head of Dante Alighieri, painted by Giotto, on the
+wall of the Chapel of the Palace of the Podestà at Florence. The fact
+was mentioned by Vasari, and Kirkup was enabled to remove the
+whitewash and uncover this inestimable treasure. Giotto, in the act of
+painting this portrait, is the subject of one of the finest designs of
+the English school--alas! not painted in any form of fresco on an
+English wall.
+
+From the art of Florence Mrs. Shelley turns to its history with her
+accustomed clear-headed method. Space will not admit all the
+interesting details, but her account of the factions and of the good
+work and terrible tragedies of the Carbonari is most interesting. The
+great equality in Florence is well noticed, accounting for the little
+real distress among the poor, and the simplicity of life of the
+nobles. She next enters into an account of modern Italian literature,
+which she ranks high, and hopes much from. The same struggle between
+romanticists and classicists existed as in other countries; and she
+classes Manzoni with Walter Scott, though admitting that he has not
+the same range of character. Mary and her party next proceeded by sea
+to Rome. Here, again, the glories of Italy and its art failed not to
+call forth eloquent remarks from Mary's pen; and her views, though at
+times somewhat contradictory, are always well expressed. She, at
+least, had a mind to appreciate the wonders of the Stanze, and to feel
+that genius and intellect are not out of their province in art. She
+only regrets that the great Italian art which can express so perfectly
+the religious sentiment and divine ecstasy did not attempt the grand
+feelings of humanity, the love which is faithful to death, the
+emotions such as Shakespeare describes. While this wish exists, and
+there are artists who can carry it out, art is not dead. After a very
+instructive chapter on the modern history of the Papal States, we
+again find Mary among the scenes dearest to her heart and her nature:
+her next letter is dated from Sorrento. She feels herself to be in
+Paradise; and who that has been in that wonderful country would not
+sympathise with her enthusiasm! To be carried up the heights to
+Ravello, and to see the glorious panorama around, she considered,
+surpassed all her previous most noble experiences. Ravello, with its
+magnificent cathedral covered with mosaics, is indeed a sight to have
+seen; the road to Amalfi, the ruinous paper mills in the ravine, the
+glorious picturesqueness, are all "well expressed and understood." Mrs.
+Shelley seems to have considered June (1844) the perfection of weather
+for Naples.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+LAST YEARS.
+
+
+This last literary work by Mrs. Shelley, of which she herself speaks
+slightingly as a poor performance, was noticed about the time of its
+publication as an interesting and truthful piece of writing by an
+authority on the subject. Mrs. Shelley's very modest and retiring
+disposition gave her little confidence in herself, and she seems to
+have met, with various discouraging remarks from acquaintances; she
+used to wonder afterwards that she was not able to defend herself and
+suppress impertinence. This last book is spoken of by Mary as written
+to help an unfortunate person whose acquaintance Claire had made in
+Paris while staying in some capacity in that city with Lady Sussex
+Lennox. A title has a factitious prestige with some people, and
+certainly in this case the acquaintance which at first seemed
+advantageous to Mary proved to be much the contrary, both in respect
+of money and of peace of mind; but, before referring further to this
+subject, we must explain that the year 1844 brought with it a perhaps
+questionable advantage for her.
+
+Sir Timothy Shelley, who had been ailing for some while, and whom
+Percy Shelley had visited from time to time at Field Place, having
+become rather a favourite with the old gentleman, now reached the
+bourne of life--he was ninety. His death in April 1844 brought his
+grandson Percy Florence to the baronetcy. That portion of the estate
+which had been entailed previous to Sir Bysshe's proposed
+rearrangement of the entire property now came to Mrs. Shelley by her
+husband's will. Owing to the poet's having refused to join in the
+entail, the larger portion of the property would not under any
+circumstances, as we have before mentioned, have devolved on him.
+
+A sum of £80,000 is mentioned by the different biographers of Shelley
+as the probable value of the minor estate entailed on him, of which he
+had the absolute right of disposal. This estate, on Sir Timothy's
+death, was found to be burdened to the extent of £50,000, which Mary
+borrowed on mortgage at 3-1/2 per cent. This large sum included
+£13,000 due to Lady Shelley for "the pittance" Mary had received;
+£4,500 to John Shelley for a mortgage Shelley signed to pay his debts,
+probably for the £2,000 borrowed on leaving Marlow, when he paid all
+his debts there; so that if any trifle was left unpaid on that
+occasion, it must have been from oversight and want of dunning, as he
+undoubtedly left there with sufficient money, having also resold his
+house for £1,000. A jointure had to be paid Lady Shelley of £500 a
+year. The different legacies still due in 1844 were £6,000 to Ianthe,
+two sums of £6,000 each to Claire, £2,000 to Hogg, £2,500 to Peacock.
+These various sums mounting up to £40,000, the remaining £10,000 can
+easily have been swallowed up by other post-obits and legal expenses.
+Two sums of £6,000 each left to his two sons who died, and £2,000 left
+to Lord Byron, had lapsed to the estate. Mrs. Shelley's first care was
+to raise the necessary money and pay all the outstanding obligations.
+Her chief anxiety through her struggles had always been not to incur
+debts; her next thought was to give an annual pension of £50 to her
+brother's widow, and £200 a year (afterwards reduced to £120) to Leigh
+Hunt. This was her manner of deriving immediate pleasure from her
+inheritance. By her husband's will, executed in 1817, everything,
+"whether in possession, reversion, remainder, or expectancy," was left
+to her; but as she always mentioned her son, Sir Percy, as acting with
+herself, and said that owing to the embarrassed condition of the
+estate they intended to share all in common for a time, it is evident
+that Mary had made her son's interest her first duty.
+
+The estate had brought £5,000 the previous year, and this would agree,
+deducting £1,750 for interest on mortgage, and £500 Lady Shelley's
+jointure, in reducing their income to a little below £3,000 a year, as
+Mrs. Shelley stated. Field Place was let in the first instance for
+sixty pounds a year, it was so damp. Mrs. Shelley continued with, her
+son to live at Putney till 1846. They had tried Putney in 1839, and
+towards the end of 1843 she took a house there, the White Cottage,
+Lower Richmond Road, Putney. Mary thus describes it:--"Our cot is on
+the banks of the Thames, not looking on it, but the garden-gate opens
+on the towing-path. It has a nice little garden, but sadly out of
+order. It is shabbily furnished, and has no spare room, except by
+great contrivance, if at all; so, perforce, economy will be the order
+of the day. It is secluded but cheerful, at the extreme verge of
+Putney, close to Barnes Common; just the situation Percy desired. He
+has bought a boat."
+
+Mrs. Shelley moved into this house shortly after the visit to Claire
+in Paris, referred to at the commencement of this chapter.
+
+Her life in London, in spite of a few very good friends, often
+appeared solitary to her; for, as she herself observes, those who
+produce and give original work to the world require the social contact
+of their fellow-beings. Thus, saddened by the neglect which she
+experienced, she tried to counteract it by sympathising with those
+less fortunate than herself; but this, also, is at times a very
+difficult task to carry out single-handed beyond a certain point.
+
+During this visit to Paris in 1843 she had the misfortune to meet, at
+the house of Lady Sussex Lennox, an Italian adventurer of the name of
+Gatteschi. They had known some people of that name formerly in
+Florence, as noted in Claire's diary of 1820; and this may have caused
+them to take a more special interest in him. Suffice it to say, that
+he appeared to be in the greatest distress, and at the same time was
+considered by Mary and Claire to have the _éclat_ of "good
+birth," and also to have talents, which, if they got but a fair
+chance, might raise him to any post of eminence. These ideas continued
+for some time; on one occasion he helped Mrs. Shelley with her
+literary work, finding the historical passages for _Rambles in
+Germany and Italy_. She and Claire used to contrive to give him
+small sums of money, in some delicate way, so as not to wound his
+feelings, as he would die of mortification. He was invited over to
+England in 1844, under the idea that he might obtain some place as
+tutor in a family, and he brought over MSS. of his own, which were
+thought highly of. While in England Gatteschi lodged with Mr. Knox,
+who had travelled with Mrs. Shelley and her son, as a friend of the
+latter. Mr. Knox seems to have been at that time on friendly terms
+with Gatteschi, though Mrs. Shelley regretted that her son did not
+take to him. With all the impulse of a generous nature, she spared no
+pains to be of assistance to the Italian, and evidently must have
+written imprudently gushing letters at times to this object of her
+commiseration. Whilst Mary was poor Gatteschi must have approached
+sentimental gratitude; she says later, "He cannot now be wishing to
+marry me, or he would not insult me." In fact he had proposed to marry
+her when she came into her money. Gatteschi waited his time, he aimed
+at larger sums of money. Failing to get these by fair means, the
+scoundrel began to use threats of publishing her correspondence with
+him. In 1845 he was said to be "ravenous for money," and, knowing how
+Mary had yielded to vehement letters on former occasions, and had at
+first answered him imprudently, instead of at once putting his letters
+into legal hands, the villain made each fresh letter a tool to serve
+his purpose. He thus worked upon her sensitive nature and dread of
+ridicule, especially at a time when she more than ever wished to stand
+well with the world and the society which she felt it her son's right
+to belong to--her son, who had never failed in his duty, and who, she
+said, was utterly without vice, although at times she wished he had
+more love of reading and steady application.
+
+It is easy to see now how perfectly innocent, although Quixotically
+generous, Mary Shelley was; but it can also be discerned how difficult
+it would have been to stop the flood of social mirth and calumny, had
+more of this subject been, made public. Mary, knowing this only too
+well, bitterly deplored it, and accused herself of folly in a way that
+might even now deceive a passing thinker; but it has been the pleasant
+task of the writer to make this subject perfectly clear to herself,
+and some others.
+
+It must be added that the letters in question, written by Mrs. Shelley
+to Gatteschi, were obtained by a requisition of the French police
+under the pretext of political motives: Gatteschi had been known to be
+mixed up with an insurrection in Bologna. Mr. Knox, who managed this
+affair for Mrs. Shelley, showed the talents of an incipient police
+magistrate.
+
+The whole of Mary's correspondence with Claire Clairmont is very
+cordial. Mary did her best to help her from time to time in her usual
+generous manner, and evidently gave her the best advice in her power.
+We find her regretting at times Claire's ill-health, sending her
+carriage to her while in Osnaburgh Street, and so on. She strongly
+urged her to come to England to settle about the investment of her
+money, telling her that one £6,000 she cannot interfere with, as
+Shelley had left it for an annuity which could not be lost or disposed
+of; but that the other £6,000 she can invest where she likes. At one
+time Mary tells her of a good investment she has heard of in an
+opera-box, but that she must act for herself, as it is too dangerous a
+matter to give advice in.
+
+In 1845 Mary Shelley visited Brighton for her health, her nerves
+having been much shaken by the anxiety she had gone through. While
+there she mentioned seeing Mr. and Mrs. John Shelley at the Theatre,
+but they took no notice of her. When Mrs. Shelley went over Field
+Place after Sir Timothy's death, Lady Shelley had expressed herself to
+a friend as being much pleased with her, and said she wished she had
+known her before: Mary on hearing this exclaimed, "Then why on earth
+didn't she?" In 1846 they moved from Putney to Chester Square, and in
+the summer Mary went to Baden for her health. From here again she
+wrote how glad she was to be away from the mortifications of London,
+and that she detested Chester Square. Her health from this time needed
+frequent change. In 1847, she moved to Field Place; she found it damp,
+but visits to Brighton and elsewhere helped to keep up her gradually
+failing health. The next year she had the satisfaction of seeing her
+son married to a lady (Mrs. St. John) in every way to her liking. A
+letter received by Mrs. Shelley from her daughter-in-law while on her
+wedding tour, and enclosed to Claire, shows how she wished the latter
+to partake in the joy she felt at the happy marriage of her son. Mary
+now had not only a son to love, but a daughter to care for her, and
+the pleasant duty was not unwillingly performed, for the lady speaks
+of her to this day with emotion.
+
+From this time there is little to record. We find Mary in 1849
+inviting Willie Clairmont, Claire's nephew, to see her at Field Place,
+where she was living with her son and his wife. In the same year they
+rather dissuaded Claire, who was then at Maidstone, from a somewhat
+wild project which she entertained, that of going to California. The
+ground of dissuasion was still wilder than the project, for it was
+just now said the hoped-for gold had turned out to be merely sulphate
+of iron. The house in Chester Square had been given up in 1848, and
+another was taken at 77, Warwick Square, before the marriage of Sir
+Percy, and thence at the end of that year Mary writes of an
+improvement in her health, but there was still a tendency to neuralgic
+rheumatism. The life-long nerve strain for a time was relaxed, but
+without doubt the tension had been too strong, and loving care could
+not prevail beyond a certain point. The next year the son and his wife
+took the drooping Mary to Nice for her health, and a short respite was
+given; but the pressure could not much longer remain. The strong
+brain, and tender, if once too impassioned heart, failed on February
+21, 1851, and nothing remained but a cherished memory of the devoted
+daughter and mother, and the faithful wife of Shelley.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mrs. Shelley, by Lucy M. Rossetti
+
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