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THE LIFE AND LETTERS
OF
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
II
' . J. TRELA WNY.
from, a portrait after Severn,,
in, ?Ju>, possession, of Sir Percy f 'Shelley. 73/rrf
London. Richird BenUev i Son; 1889
THE LIFE & LETTERS
OF
oIlstonetraft
BY
MRS. JULIAN MARSHALL
WITH PORTRAITS AND FACSIMILE
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II
LONDON
RICHARD BENTLEY & SON
in rttnarg to p?cr fHajcstg tfje uem
1889
?R
5338
V-2
CONTENTS
CHAPTER XVII
JULY-SEPTEMBER 1822
1822 (July). Mary and Mrs. Williams go to Pisa They can learn
nothing Trelawny accompanies them back to Casa
Magni The bodies of Shelley and Williams are washed
ashore Trelawny brings Mary, Jane, and Clare back to
Pisa Mary's endurance Letters from Godwin Mary's
letter to Mrs. Gisborne The bodies are cremated Dispute
about Shelley's heart It remains with Mary Mary's
decision to remain for a time with the Hunts, and to assist
them and Byron with the Liberal Goes to Genoa Mrs.
Williams goes to England Letter from Mary to Mrs. Gis-
borne and Clare Letters from Clare and Jane Williams
The Hunts and Byron are established at Albaro
'-35
CHAPTER XVIII
SEPTEMBER i822-JuLV 1823
1822 (October). Mary's desolate condition Her diary Extracts
Discomfort with the Hunts Byron's antipathy to them
all Note from him to Mary Trelawny's presence a refresh-
ment Letters to and from him Letter from Godwin
Journal Letter to Clare Mary's poem "The Choice."
1823. Trelawny's zealous care for Shelley's tomb Mary's grati-
tude She decides on returning to England Sir Timothy
Shelley's refusal to assist her Letter from Godwin Cor-
respondence between Mary and Trelawny Letter from
Godwin criticising Valperga Byron is induced to go to
Greece Summons Trelawny to accompany him Mrs.
Hunt's confinement Letters from Mary to Jane Williams
She starts on her journey to England Diary
36-88
CONTENTS
CHAPTER XIX
JULY i823-DECEMBER 1824
PAGES
1823. Mary's journey Letters to the Leigh Hunts Arrival in
London Jane Williams Her attractiveness Frankenstein
on the stage Publication of Shelley's Posthumous Poems.
1824. Journal Mary's wish to write for the stage Godwin dis-
courages the idea Affairs of the Examiner newspaper
The Novellos Mrs. Cowden Clarke's reminiscences of
Mary Death of Byron Profound sensation Journal
Letters from Trelawny Description of the "Cavern For-
tress of Mount Parnassus " Letter from Mary to Trelawny
Letter to Leigh Hunt Negotiation with Sir T. Shelley
Allowance Suppression of the Posthumous Poems
Journal Medwin's Memoirs of Byron Asks Mary to assist
him Her feelings on the subject Letter to Mrs. Hunt
Journal 89-129
CHAPTER XX
JANUARY i825~JuLY 1827
1825. Improvement in Mary's prospects Letter to Miss Curran
Letter to Leigh Hunt about his article on Shelley Shelley's
portrait arrives Journal Trelawny's ad ventures and escape
from Greece Mary's letter to him (February 1826).
1826. Reminiscences of Lord Byron's projected performance of
Othello at Pisa Clare Clairmont's life as a governess in
Russia Description of her Letter from her to Jane
Williams Publication of The Last Alan Hogg's apprecia-
tion Stoppage of Mary's allowance Peacock's interven-
tion in her behalf Death of Charles Shelley Mary's letter
to Leigh Hunt on the subject of Shelley's intended legacy
Increase of allowance Melancholy letter from Trelawny.
1827. Mary's reply Letter from Clare to Jane Williams Jane
Williams' duplicity Mary becomes aware of it Her
misery Journal 130-167
CHAPTER XXI
JULY i827-AuousT 1830
1827. Letter to Mary from Frances Wright presented by Robert
Dale Owen Friendly Correspondence Acquaintance
Fanny Wright's history Her personal appearance Con-
trast between her and Mrs. Shelley She returns to
America Letter from her Letter from Godwin to Mary
Mary's stay at Arundel The Miss Robinsons Letter from
CONTENTS
Trelawny Explanation with Jane Williams Letter from
Mary Visit to Paris Mary catches the small-pox Tre-
lawny arrives in England Letters from him.
1829. He returns to Italy Letter to Mary to say he is writing his
own life. Asks Mary to help him with reminiscences of
Shelley She declines He is angry Letter from Lord
Dillon Perkin Warbeck.
1830. Journal (January) Mrs. Shelley's "at homes" in Somerset
Street T. Moore Perkin Warleck a disappointment
Need of money Letter from Clare Mary writes for the
168-203
CHAPTER XXII
AUGUST i83o-OcTOBER 1831
1830. Trelawny's autobiographical adventures to be entitled A
Mail's Life Correspondence with Mary respecting the
preparation and publication of the book.
1831. She negotiates the matter Entreats for certain modifications
The title is altered to Adventures of a Yotmger Son
The author's vexation Mary's patience Horace Smith's
assistance Trelawny surmises that "fate" may unite him
and Mary Shelley some day "My name will never be
Trelawny" Publication of the Adventures Trelawny's
later Recollections of Shelley, Byron, and the Author His
rare appreciation of Shelley Singular discrepancies between
the first and second editions of the book Complete change of
tone in later life with regard to Mrs. Shelley Conclusions 204-232
CHAPTER XXIII
OCTOBER 1831 -OCTOBER 1839
Godwin's Thottghts on Man (1830) Letter to Mary Letter
from Clare Question of Percy's going to a public school.
1831. Mary Shelley applies to Sir Timothy for an increase of allow-
ance She is refused.
1832. Letter from Godwin asking for an idea or suggestion Mary
writes "Lives of Italian and Spanish Literary Men "for
Lardner's Cyclopaedia Clare's tale Cholera in London
Mary goes to Sandgate Trelawny returns His daughter
stays with Mary at Sandgate Death of Lord Dillon
Letter from Godwin His son William dies of cholera
Posthumous novel, Transfusion Clare's letters to Jane
and Mary.
1833. Mrs. Shelley goes to live at Harrow Letter to Mrs. Gis-
borne Influenza Solitude Hard work Letter from
CONTENTS
PAGES
1834 Godwin Letters from Mary to Trelawny and to Mrs.
Gisborne Offer of ;6oo for annotated edition of Shelley's
works Difficulties.
1835. Lodore Its success Reminiscences of her own experiences
Letter from Clare Melancholy letter from Mary to Mrs.
Gisborne "A Dirge" Trelawny returns from America
Mary's friendship with Mrs. Norton Letter to Mrs. Gis-
1836 borne Godwin's death Efforts to get an annuity for his
widow Letters from Mrs. Norton and Trelawny.
1837. Letters from Mary to Trelawny Death of the Gisbornes
Impediments to Mary's undertaking the biography of her
father Her edition of Shelley's works Painful task.
1839. Letter from Sir E. L. Bulwer Fragment from Mrs. Norton
The Diplomatic Service Journal Bitter Vexations
Illness Recovery ........ 233-291
CHAPTER XXIV
OCTOBER i839-FEBRUARY 1851
1839. Publication of Shelley's prose works Motto Letter from
Carlyle.
1840. Journal Brighton Continental tour with Percy and his
reading-party Stay at Como Mary's enjoyment Her son
takes his degree, and receives allowance from his grand-
father Letter of congratulation from Mrs. Norton Mary
1841 and Percy go abroad again Kissingen ; Gotha ; Weimar ;
Leipzig ; Berlin ; Dresden ; Prague ; Linz ; Salzburg ;
Venice Associations Winter at Florence Rome Sor-
rento Home again.
1844. Rambles in Germany and Italy Dedication to Rogers :
note from him Death of Sir T. Shelley Mary's letter to
Leigh Hunt Shelley's various legacies Letter from Hogg
Portrait Mrs. Shelley's literary friendships Letter from
Walter Savage Landor Hogg's Shelley Papers Subse-
quent Life of Shelley Facsimile of fragment in Mary's
handwriting Medwin's book inaccurate and objection-
able Mary fails to write Shelley's Life Marriage of Sir
1847 Percy Shelley Mary lives with her son and daughter-in-
law Her sweetness and unselfishness Her kindness to
her son's friends Clare's visits to Field Place Her ex-
citability and eccentricity Her death at Florence ; 1878.
1851. Mary Shelley's health declines Her death Her grave in
Bournemouth Churchyard Retrospect of her history and
mental development Extract from Journal of October
1838, giving her own views The success of her life a moral
rather than an intellectual one Her nobility of character
Her influence on Shelley Her lifelong devotion to him . 292-325
THE LIFE AND LETTERS
OF
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
CHAPTER XVII
JULY-SEPTEMBER 1822
THEY set off at once, death in their hearts, yet
clinging outwardly to any semblance of a hope.
They crossed to Lerici, they posted to Pisa ; they
went first to Casa Lanfranchi. Byron was there ;
he could tell them nothing. It was midnight, but
to rest or wait was impossible ; they posted on to
Leghorn. They went about inquiring for Tre-
lawny or Roberts. Not finding the right inn they
were forced to wait till next morning before pro-
secuting their search. They found Roberts ; he
only knew the Ariel had sailed on Monday ; there
had been a storm, and no more had been heard of
her. Still they did not utterly despair. Contrary
winds might have driven the boat to Corsica or
elsewhere, and information was perhaps withheld.
VOL. ii 24
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
" So remorselessly," says Trelawny, " are the quarantine
laws enforced in Italy that, when at sea, if you render assist-
ance to a vessel in distress, or rescue a drowning stranger, on
returning to port you are condemned to a long and rigorous
quarantine of fourteen or more days. The consequence is,
should one vessel see another in peril, or even run it down by
accident, she hastens on her course, and by general accord not
a word is said or reported on the subject."
Trelawny accompanied the forlorn women
back to Casa Magni, whence, for the next seven
or eight days, he patrolled the coast with the
coastguards, stimulating them to keep a good
look-out by the promise of a reward. On Thurs-
day, the 1 8th, he left for Leghorn, and on the next
day a letter came to him from Captain Roberts
with the intelligence that the bodies of Shelley
and Williams had been washed ashore. The
letter was received and opened by Clare Clair-
mont. To communicate its contents to Mary or
Jane was more than she could do : in her distress
she wrote to Leigh Hunt for help or counsel.
Friday Evening, iqthjuly 1822.
MY DEAR SIR Mr. Trelawny went for Livorno last night.
There came this afternoon a letter to him from Captain
Roberts he had left orders with Mary that she might open it ;
I did not allow her to see it. He writes there is no hope, but
they are lost, and their bodies found three miles from Via
Reggio. This letter is dated isth July, and says he had
heard this news i4th July. Outside the letter he has added,
" I am now on my way to Via Reggio, to ascertain the facts or
no facts contained in my letter." This then implies that he
doubts, and as I also doubt the report, because we had a
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
letter from the captain of the port at Via Reggio, i5th July,
later than when Mr. Roberts writes, to say nothing had been
found, for this reason I have not shown his letter either to Mary
or Mrs. Williams. How can I, even if it were true ?
I pray you to answer this by return of my messenger. I
assure you I cannot break it to them, nor is my spirit, weakened
as it is from constant suffering, capable of giving them consola-
tion, or protecting them from the first burst of their despair.
I entreat you to give me some counsel, or to arrange some
method by which they may know it. I know not what further
to add, except that their case is desperate in every respect, and
death would be the greatest kindness to us all. Ever your
sincere friend, CLARE.
This letter can hardly have been despatched
before Trelawny arrived. He had seen the
mangled, half-devoured corpses, and had identified
them at once. It remained for him now to pro-
nounce sentence of doom, as it were, on the sur-
vivors. This is his story, as he tells it
I mounted my horse and rode to the Gulf of Spezzia, put
up my horse, and walked until I caught sight of the lone
house on the sea-shore in which Shelley and Williams had
dwelt, and where their widows still lived. Hitherto in my
frequent visits in the absence of direct evidence to the con-
trary I had buoyed up their spirits by maintaining that it was
not impossible but that the friends still lived ; now I had to
extinguish the last hope of these forlorn women. I had ridden
fast to prevent any ruder messenger from bursting in upon
them. As I stood on the threshold of their house, the bearer
or rather confirmer of news which would rack every fibre
of their quivering frames to the uttermost, I paused, and,
looking at the sea, my memory reverted to our joyous parting
only a few days before. The two families then had all been
in the verandah, overhanging a sea so clear and calm that
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
every star was reflected on the water as if it had been a mirror ;
the young mothers singing some merry tune with the accom-
paniment of a guitar. Shelley's shrill laugh I heard it still
rang in my ears, with Williams' friendly hail, the general buona
notte of all the joyous party, and the earnest entreaty to me to
return as soon as possible, and not to forget the commissions
they had severally given me. I was in a small boat beneath
them, slowly rowing myself on board the Bolivar, at anchor in
the bay, loath to part from what I verily believed to have been
at that time the most united and happiest set of human beings
in the whole world. And now by the blow of an idle puff of
wind the scene was changed.' Such is human happiness.
My reverie was broken by a shriek from the nurse Caterina
as, crossing the hall, she saw me in the doorway. After
asking her a few questions I went up the stairs, and unan-
nounced entered the room. I neither spoke nor did they
question me. Mrs. Shelley's large gray eyes were fixed on my
face. I turned away. Unable to bear this horrid silence, with
a convulsive effort she exclaimed
" Is there no hope ? "
I did not answer, but left the room, and sent the servant
with the children to them. The next day I prevailed on them
to return with me to Pisa. The misery of that night and the
journey of the next day, and of many days and nights that
followed, I can neither describe nor forget.
There is no journal or contemporary record "of
the next three or four weeks ; only from a few
scattered hints in letters can any idea be gleaned
of this dark time, when the first realisation of
incredible misfortune was being lived out in detail.
Leigh Hunt was almost broken-hearted.
" Dearest Mary," he wrote from Casa Lanfranchi on the
2oth July, "I trust you will have set out on your return from
that dismal place before you receive this. You will also have
JfAKY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 5
seen Trelawny. God bless you, and enable us all to be a sup-
port for one another. Let us do our best if it is only for that
purpose. It is easier for me to say that I will do it than for
you : but whatever happens, this I can safely say, that I belong
to those whom Shelley loves, and that all which it is possible
to me to do for them now and for ever is theirs. I will
grieve with them, endure with them, and, if it be necessary,
work for them, while I have life. Your most affectionate
friend, LEIGH HUNT.
Marianne sends you a thousand loves, and longs with
myself to try whether we can say or do one thing that can
enable you and Mrs. Williams to bear up a little better. But
we rely on your great strength of mind.
Mary bore up in a way that surprised those
who knew how ill she had been, how weak she
still was, and how much she had previously been
suffering in her spirits. It was a strange, tense,
unnatural endurance. Except to Miss Curran at
Rome, she wrote to no one for some time, not
even to her father. This, which would naturally
have been her first communication, may well have
appeared harder to make than any other. God-
win's relations with Shelley had of late been
strained, to say the least, and then, Mary could
not but remember his letters to her after Williams'
death, and the privilege he had claimed "as a
father and a philosopher" of rebuking, nay, of
contemptuously deprecating her then excess of
orief. How was she to write now in such a tone
o
as to avert an answer of that sort ? how write at
all ? She did accomplish it at last, but before her
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
letter arrived Godwin had heard of the catastrophe
through Miss Kent, sister of Mrs. Leigh Hunt.
His fatherly feeling of anxiety for his daughter
was aroused, and after waiting two days for direct
news, he wrote to her as follows
GODWIN TO MARY.
No. 195 STRAND, 6th August 1822.
DEAR MARY I heard only two days ago the most afflicting
intelligence to you, and in some measure to all of us, that can
be imagined the death of Shelley on the 8th ultimo. I
have had no direct information ; the news only comes in a
letter from Leigh Hunt to Miss Kent, and, therefore, were it
not for the consideration of the writer, I should be authorised
to disbelieve it. That you should be so overcome as not to
be able to write is perhaps but too natural ; but that Jane
could not write one line I could never have believed ; and the
behaviour of the lady at Pisa towards us on the occasion is
peculiarly cruel.
Leigh Hunt says you bear -up under the shock better than
could have been imagined ; but appearances are not to be
relied on. It would have been a great relief to me to have
had a few lines from yourself. In a case like this, one lets
one s imagination loose among the possibilities of things, and
one is apt to rest upon what is most distressing and intolerable.
I learned the news on Sunday. I was in hope to have had
my doubts and fears removed by a letter from yourself on
Monday. I again entertained the same hope to-day, and am
again disappointed. I shall hang in hope and fear on every
post, knowing that you cannot neglect me for ever.
All that I expressed to you about silence and not writing to
you again is now put an end to in the most melancholy way.
I looked on you as one of the daughters of prosperity, elevated
in rank and fortune, and I thought it was criminal to intrude
on you for ever the sorrows of an unfortunate old man and a
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
beggar. You are now fallen to my own level; you are sur-
rounded with adversity and with difficulty ; and I no longer
hold it sacrilege to trouble you with my adversities. We shall
now truly sympathise with each other ; and whatever misfor-
tune or ruin falls upon me, I shall not now scruple to lay it
fully before you.
This sorrowful event is, perhaps, calculated to draw us nearer
to each other. I am the father of a family, but without
children ; I and my wife are falling fast into infirmity and
helplessness ; and in addition to all our other calamities, we
seem destined to be left without connections and without aid.
Perhaps now we and you shall mutually derive consolation
from each other.
Poor Jane is, I am afraid, left still more helpless than you
are. Common misfortune, I hope, will incite between you
the most friendly feelings.
Shelley lived, I know, in constant anticipation of the un-
certainty of his life, though not in this way, and was anxious
in that event to make the most effectual provision for you. I
am impatient to hear in what way that has been done ; and
perhaps you will make me your lawyer in England if any steps
are necessary. I am desirous to call on Longdill, but I should
call with more effect if I had authority and instructions from
you. Mamma desires me to say how truly and deeply she
sympathises in your affliction, and I trust you know enough
of her to feel that this is the language of her heart.
I suppose you will hardly stay in Italy. In that case we
shall be near to, and support each other. Ever and ever
affectionately yours, WILLIAM GODWIN.
I have received your letter dated (it has no date) since
writing the above ; it was detained for some hours by being
directed to the care of Monro, for which I cannot account.
William wrote to you on the i4th of June, and I on the 23d
of July. I will call on Peacock and Hogg as you desire.
Perhaps Williams' letter, and perhaps others, have been kept
from you. Let us now be open and unreserved in all things.
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
This letter was doubtless intended to be kind
and sympathetic, even in the persistent promi-
nence given to the business aspect of recent events.
Yet it was comical in its solemnity. For when
had Godwin held it sacrilege to trouble his
daughter with his adversities, or shown the
slightest scruple in laying before her any mis-
fortune or ruin that may have fallen on him ? and
what new prospect was afforded her in the future
by his promise of .doing so now? No; this
privilege of a father and a philosopher had never
been neglected by him.
Well indeed might he feel anxious as to what
provision had been made for his daughter by her
husband. In these matters he had long ceased to
have a conscience, yet it was impossible he should
be unaware that the utmost his son-in-law had
been able to effect, and that at the expense of
enormous sacrifices on the part of himself and his
heirs, and of all the credit he possessed with pub-
lishers and the one or two friends who were not
also dependents, had been to pay his, Godwin's,
perpetual debts, and to keep him, as long as he
could be kept, afloat.
Small opportunity had Shelley's "dear" 1
friends allowed him as yet to make provision for
his family in case of sudden misfortune !
Godwin, however, was really anxious about
1 Leigh Hunt used often to say that he was the dearest friend Shelley
had ; I believe he was the most costly. Trelawny's Recollections.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 9
Mary, and his anxiety was perhaps increased by
his letter ; for in three days he wrote again, with
out alluding to money.
GODWIN TO MARY.
gth August 1822.
MY DEAR MARY I am inexpressibly anxious to hear from
you, and your present situation renders the reciprocation of
letters and answers implying an interval of a month between
each letter I receive from you to the next intolerable.
My poor girl, what do you mean to do with yourself? You
surely do not mean to stay in Italy ? How glad I should be to
be near you, and to endeavour by new expedients each day to
endeavour to make up your loss. But you are the best judge. If
Italy is a country to which in these few years you are naturalised,
and if England is become dull and odious to you, then stay !
I should think, however, that now that you have lost your
closest friend, your mind would naturally turn homeward, and
to your earliest friend. Is it not so ? Surely we might be a
great support to each other under the trials to which we are
reserved. What signify a few outward adversities if we find a
friend at home ?
One thing I would earnestly recommend in our future inter-
course, is perfect frankness. I think you are of a frank nature,
I am sure I am so. We have now no battle to fight, no
contention to maintain, that is over now.
Above all, let me entreat you to keep up your courage.
You have many duties to perform ; you must now be the
father as well as the mother ; and I trust you have energy of
character enough to enable you to perform your duties honour-
ably and well. Ever and ever most affectionately yours,
W. GODWIN.
The stunning nature of the blow she had
endured, the uncertainty and complication of her
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
affairs, and the absence of any one preponderating
motive, made it impossible for Mary to settle at
once on any scheme for the future. Her first
idea was to return to England without delay, so
as to avoid any possible risk to her boy from the
Italian climate. Her one wish was to possess
herself, before leaving, of the portrait of Shelley
begun at Rome by Miss Curran, and laid aside
in an unfinished state as a failure. In the absence
of any other likeness it would be precious, and it
might perhaps be improved. It was on this
subject that she had written to Miss Curran in the
quite early days of her misfortune ; no answer had
come, and she wrote again, now to request " that
favour now nearer my heart than any other thing
the picture of my Shelley."
"We leave Italy soon," she continued, "so I am par-
ticularly anxious to obtain this treasure, which I am sure you
will give me as soon as possible. I have no other likeness of
him, and in so utter desolation, how invaluable to me is your
picture. Will you not send it ? Will you not answer me
without delay ? Your former kindness bids me hope every-
thing."
She was awakening to life again ; in other
words, to pain : with keen anguish, like that of
returning circulation to a limb which has been
frozen and numb, her feelings, her forces, her
intellect, began to respond to outward calls upon
them, with a sensation, at times, of even morbid
activity. It was a kind of relief, now, to write
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 1 1
to Mrs. Gisborne that letter which contains the
most graphic and connected of all accounts of
the past tragedy.
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. GISBORNE.
\$th August 1822.
I said in a letter to Peacock, my dear Mrs. Gisborne, that
I would send you some account of the last miserable months
of my disastrous life. From day to day I have put this off,
but I will now endeavour to fulfil my design. The scene of
my existence is closed, and though there be no pleasure in
retracing the scenes that have preceded the event which has
crushed my hopes, yet there seems to be a necessity in doing
so, and I obey the impulse that urges me. I wrote to you
either at the end of May or the beginning of June. I
described to you the place we were living in our desolate
house, the beauty yet strangeness of the scenery, and the
delight Shelley took in all this. He never was in better
health or spirits than during this time. I was not well in
body or mind. My nerves were wound up to the utmost
irritation, and the sense of misfortune hung over my spirits.
No words can tell you how I hated our house and the country
about it. Shelley reproached me for this his health was
good, and the place was quite after his own heart. What
could I answer ? That the people were wild and hateful, that
though the country was beautiful yet I liked a more countri-
fied place, that there was great difficulty in living, that all our
Tuscans would leave us, and that the very jargon of these
Genovesi was disgusting. This was all I had to say, but no
words could describe my feelings ; the beauty of the woods
made me weep and shudder ; so vehement was my feeling of
dislike that I used to rejoice when the winds and waves
permitted me to go out in the boat, so that I was not obliged
to take my usual walk among the shaded paths, alleys of vine
festooned trees all that before I doated on, and that now
12
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
weighed on me. My only moments of peace were on board
that unhappy boat when, lying down with my head on his
knee, I shut my eyes and felt the wind and our swift motion
alone. My ill health might account for much of this.
Bathing in the sea somewhat relieved me, but on the 8th of
June (I think it was) I was threatened with a miscarriage, and
after a week of great ill health, on Sunday, the 1 6th, this took
place at 8 in the morning. I was so ill that for seven
hours I lay nearly lifeless kept from fainting by brandy,
vinegar, and eau-de-Cologne, etc. At length ice was brought
to our solitude ; it came before the doctor, so Clare and Jane
were afraid of using it, but Shelley overruled 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, I hardly
wished that I had, my own Shelley could never have lived
without me; the sense of eternal misfortune would have
pressed too heavily upon him, and what would have become
of my poor babe ? My convalescence was slow, and during it
a strange occurrence happened to retard it. But first I must
describe our house to you. The floor on which we lived was
thus
i is a terrace that went the whole length of our house and
was precipitous to the sea ; 2, the large dining-hall ; 3, a
private staircase ; 4, my bedroom ; 5, Mrs. Williams' bed-
room ; 6, Shelley's ; and 7, the entrance from the great
staircase. Now to return. As I said, Shelley was at first in
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
perfect health, but having over- fatigued himself one day, and
then the fright my illness gave him, caused a return of nervous
sensations and visions as bad as in his worst times. I think
it was the Saturday after my illness, 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' 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. What had
frightened him was this. He dreamt that, lying as he did in
bed, Edward and Jane came in to him ; they were in the most
horrible condition ; their bodies lacerated, their bones starting
through their skin, their faces pale yet stained with blood ;
they could hardly walk, but Edward was the weakest, and
Jane was supporting him. Edward said, "Get up, Shelley,
the sea is flooding the house, and it is all coming down."
Shelley got up, he thought, and went to his window that looked
on the terrace and the sea, and thought he saw the sea rushing
in. Suddenly his vision changed, and he saw the figure of
himself strangling me ; that had made him rush into my room,
yet, fearful of frightening me, he dared not approach the bed,
when my jumping out awoke him, or, as he phrased it, caused
his vision to vanish. All this was frightful enough, and
talking it over the next morning, he told me that he had had
many visions lately ; he had seen the figure of himself, which
met him as he walked on the -terrace and said to him, " How
long do you mean to be content ? " no very terrific words, and
certainly not prophetic of what has occurred. But Shelley had
often seen these figures when ill ; but the strangest thing is
that Mrs. Williams saw him. Now Jane, though a woman of
14 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
sensibility, has not much imagination, and is not in the
slightest degree nervous, neither in dreams nor otherwise. She
was standing one day, the day before I was taken ill, at a
window that looked on the terrace, with Trelawny. It was
day. She saw, as she thought, Shelley pass by the window,
as he often was then, without a coat or jacket ; he passed
again. Now, as he passed both times the same way, and as
from the side towards which he went each time there was no
way to get back except past the window again (except over a
wall 20 feet from the ground), she was struck at her seeing
him pass twice thus, and looked out and seeing him no more,
she cried, " Good God, can Shelley have leapt from the wall ?
Where can he be gone?" "Shelley," said Trelawny, "no
Shelley has passed. What do you mean ? " Trelawny says
that she trembled exceedingly when she heard this, and it
proved, indeed, that Shelley had never been on the terrace,
and was far off at the time she saw him. Well, we thought
no more of these things, and I slowly got better. Having
heard from Hunt that he had sailed from Genoa, on Monday,
i st July, Shelley, Edward, and Captain Roberts (the gentleman
who built our boat) departed in our boat for Leghorn to receive
him. I was then just better, had begun to crawl from my
bedroom to the terrace, but bad spirits succeeded to ill health,
and this departure of Shelley's seemed to add insufferably to
my misery. I could not endure that he should go. I called
him back two or three times, and told him that if I did not
see him soon I would go to Pisa with the child. I cried
bitterly when he went away. They went, and Jane, Clare,
and I remained alone with the children. I could not walk
out, and though I gradually gathered strength, it was slowly,
and my ill spirits increased. In my letters to him I entreated
him to return ; " the feeling that some misfortune would
happen," I said, "haunted me." I feared for the child, for
the idea of danger connected with him never struck me.
When Jane and Clare took their evening walk, I used to patrol
the terrace, oppressed with wretchedness, yet gazing on the
most beautiful scene in the world. This Gulf of Spezzia is
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 15
subdivided into many small bays, of which ours was far the
most beautiful. The two horns of the bay (so to express
myself) were wood-covered promontories, crowned with castles ;
at the foot of these, on the farthest, was Lerici, on the nearest
San Terenzo ; Lerici being above a mile by land from us, and
San Terenzo about a hundred or two yards. Trees covered
the hills that enclosed this bay, and their beautiful groups
were picturesquely contrasted with the rocks, the castle, and
the town. The sea lay far extended in front, while to the
west we saw the promontory and islands, which formed one of
the extreme boundaries of the Gulf. To see the sun set
upon this scene, the stars shine, and the moon rise, was a
sight of wondrous beauty, but to me it added only to my
wretchedness. I repeated to myself all that another would
have said to console me, and told myself the tale of love,
peace, and competence which I enjoyed ; but I answered
myself by tears Did not my William die, and did I hold my
Percy by a firmer tenure? Yet I thought when he, when
my Shelley, returns, I shall be happy ; he will comfort me, if
my boy be ill he will restore him, and encourage me. I had
a letter or two from Shelley, mentioning the difficulties he had
in establishing the Hunts, and that he was unable to fix the
time of his return. Thus a week passed. On Monday, 8th,
Jane had a letter from Edward, dated Saturday ; he said that
he waited at Leghorn for Shelley, who was at Pisa ; that
Shelley's return was certain ; " but," he continued, "if he
should not come by Monday, I will come in a felucca, and you
may expect me Tuesday evening at farthest. This was Mon-
day, the fatal Monday, but with us it was stormy all day, and
we did not at all suppose that they could put to sea. At 1 2 at
night we had a thunderstorm ; Tuesday it rained all day, and
was calm wept on their graves. On Wednesday the wind
was fair from Leghorn, and in the evening several feluccas
arrived thence ; one brought word that they had sailed on
Monday, but we did not believe them. Thursday was another
day of fair wind, and when 12 at night came, and we did
not see the tall sails of the little boat double the promontory
1 6 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
before us, we began to fear, not the truth, but some illness
some disagreeable news for their detention. Jane got so
uneasy that she determined to proceed the next day to
Leghorn in a boat, to see what was the matter. Friday came,
and with it a heavy sea and bad wind. Jane, however,
resolved to be rowed to Leghorn (since no boat could sail),
and busied herself in preparations. I wished her to wait for
letters, since Friday was letter day. She would not ; but the
sea detained her ; the swell rose so that no boat could venture
out. At 12 at noon our letters came ; . there was one from
Hunt to Shelley ; it said, " Pray write to tell us how you got
home, for they say that you had bad weather after you sailed
Monday, and we are anxious." The paper fell from me. I
trembled all over. Jane read it. " Then it is all over," she
said. " No, my dear Jane," I cried, " 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." We
crossed to Lerici, despair in our hearts ; they raised our
spirits there by telling us that no accident had been heard of,
and that it must have been known, etc., but still our fear was
great, and without resting we posted to Pisa. It must have
been fearful to see us two poor, wild, aghast creatures
driving (like Matilda) towards the sea, to learn if we were to
be for ever doomed to misery. I knew that Hunt was at
Pisa, at Lord Byron's house, but I thought that Lord Byron
was at Leghorn. I settled that we should drive to Casa
Lanfranchi, that I should get out, and ask the fearful question
of Hunt, " Do you know anything of Shelley ? " On entering
Pisa, the idea of seeing Hunt for the first time for four years,
under such circumstances, and asking him such a question,
was so terrific to me, that it was with difficulty that I
prevented myself from going into convulsions. My struggles
were dreadful. They knocked at the door, and some one
called out, chi el It was the Guiccioli's maid. Lord
Byron was in Pisa. Hunt was in bed ; so I was to see Lord
Byron instead of him. This was a great relief to me. I
staggered upstairs ; the Guiccioli came to meet me, smiling,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 17
while I could hardly say, "Where is he Sapete alcuna cosa
di Shelley?" 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. Both
Lord Byron and the lady have told me since, that on that
terrific evening I looked more like a ghost than a woman
light seemed to emanate from my features ; my face was very
white ; I looked like marble. Alas ! I had risen almost from
a bed of sickness for this journey ; I had travelled all day ;
it was now 1 2 at night, and we, refusing to rest, proceeded
to Leghorn not in despair no, for then we must have died ;
but with sufficient hope to keep up the agitation of the spirits,
which was all my life. It was past 2 in the morning when
we arrived. They took us to the wrong inn ; neither Trelawny
nor Captain Roberts were there, nor did we exactly know where
they were, so we were obliged to wait until daylight : we threw
ourselves drest on our beds, and slept a little, but at 6 o'clock
we went to one or two inns, to ask for one or the other of
these gentlemen. We found Roberts at the " Globe." He
came down to us with a face that seemed to tell us that the
worst was true, and here we learned all that occurred during
the week they had been absent from us, and under what
circumstances they had departed on their return.
Shelley had passed most of the time at Pisa, arranging the
affairs of the Hunts, and screwing Lord Byron's mind to the
sticking place about the journal. He had found this a difficult
task at first, but at length he had succeeded to his heart's con-
tent with both points. Mrs. Mason said that she saw him in
better health and spirits than she had ever known him, when he
took leave of her, Sunday, July 7, his face burnt by the sun, and
his heart light, that he had succeeded in rendering the Hunts
tolerably comfortable. Edward had remained at Leghorn.
On Monday, July 8, during the morning, they were em-
ployed in buying many things, eatables, etc., for our solitude.
There had been a thunderstorm early, but about noon the
weather was fine, and the wind right fair for Lerici. They
VOL. ii 25
18 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
were impatient to be gone. Roberts said, " Stay until to-
morrow, to see if the weather is settled ; " and Shelley might
have stayed, but Edward was in so great an anxiety to reach
home, saying they would get there in seven hours with that
wind, that they sailed ; Shelley being in one of those extrava-
gant fits of good spirits, in which you have sometimes seen him.
Roberts went out to the end of the mole, and watched them
out of sight ; they sailed at i, and went off at the rate of about
seven knots. About 3, Roberts, who was still on the mole,
saw wind coming from the Gulf, or rather what the Italians
call a temporale. Anxious to know how the boat would weather
the storm, he got leave to go up the tower, and, with the glass,
discovered them about ten miles out at sea, off Via Reggio ;
they were taking in their topsails. " The haze of the storm," he
said, " hid them from me, and I saw them no more. When
the storm cleared, I looked again, fancying that I should see
them on their return to us, but there was no boat on the sea."
This, then, was all we knew, yet we did not despair ;
they might have been driven over to Corsica, and not
knowing the coast, have gone God knows where. Reports
favoured this belief; it was even said that they had been
seen in the Gulf. We resolved to return with all possible
speed ; we sent a courier to go from tower to tower, along
the coast, to know if anything had been seen or found,
and at 9 A.M. we quitted Leghorn, stopped but one moment
at Pisa, and proceeded towards Lerici. When at two miles
from Via Reggio, we rode down to that town to know if
they knew anything. Here our calamity first began to break
on us ; a little boat and a water cask had been found five
miles off they had manufactured a piccolissima lancia of thin
planks stitched by a shoemaker, just to let them run on shore
without wetting themselves, as our boat drew four feet of water.
The description of that found tallied with this, but then this
boat was very cumbersome, and in bad weather they might
have been easily led to throw it overboard, the cask frightened
me most, but the same reason might in some sort be given
for that. I must tell you that Jane and I were not alone.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 19
Trelawny accompanied us back to our home. We journeyed
on and reached the Magra about half-past 10 P.M. I cannot
describe to you what I felt in the first moment when, fording
this river, I felt the water splash about our wheels. I was
suffocated I gasped for breath I thought I should have
gone into convulsions, and I struggled violently that Jane
might not perceive it. Looking down the river I saw the
two great lights burning at the face ; a voice from within me
seemed to cry aloud, "That is his grave." After passing the
river I gradually recovered. Arriving at Lerici we were
obliged to cross our little bay in a boat. San Terenzo was
illuminated for a festa. What a scene ! The waving sea, the
sirocco wind, the lights of the town towards which we rowed,
and our own desolate hearts, that coloured all with a shroud.
We landed. Nothing had been heard of them. This was
Saturday, July 13, and thus we waited until Thursday July
1 8, thrown about by hope and fear. We sent messengers
along the coast towards Genoa and to Via Reggio ; nothing
had been found more than the Lancetta ; reports were brought
us ; we hoped ; and yet to tell you all the agony we endured
during those twelve days, would be to make you conceive a
universe of pain each moment intolerable, and giving place
to one still worse. The people of the country, too, added to
one's discomfort ; they are like wild savages'; on festas, the
men and women and children in different bands the sexes
always separate pass the whole night in dancing on the sands
close to our door ; running into the sea, then back again, and
screaming all the time one perpetual air, the most detestable
in the world ; then the sirocco perpetually blew, and the sea
for ever moaned their dirge. On Thursday, i8th, Trelawny
left us to go to Leghorn, to see what was doing or what could
be done. On Friday I was very ill ; but as evening came on,
I said to Jane, " If anything had been found on the coast,
Trelawny would have returned to let us know. He has not
returned, so I hope." About 7 o'clock P.M. he did return ; all
was over, all was quiet now ; they had been found washed on
shore. Well, all this was to be endured.
20 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Well, what more have I to say ? The next day we returned
to Pisa, and here we are still. Days pass away, one after
another, and we live thus ; we are all together ; we shall
quit Italy together. Jane must proceed to London. If
letters do not alter my views, I shall remain in Paris.
Thus we live, seeing the Hunts now and then. Poor
Hunt has suffered terribly, as you may guess. Lord Byron
is very kind to me, and comes with the Guiccioli to see me
often. To-day, this day, the sun shining in the sky, they
are gone to the desolate sea-coast to perform the last offices
to their earthly remains, Hunt, Lord Byron, and Trelawny.
The quarantine laws would not permit us to remove them
sooner, and now only on condition that we burn them to
ashes. That I do not dislike. His rest shall be at Rome
beside my child, where one day I also shall join them.
Adonais is not Keats', it is his own elegy ; he bids you
there go to Rome. I have seen the spot where he now lies,
the sticks that mark the spot where the sands cover him ;
he shall not be there, it is too near Via Reggio. They are
now about this fearful office, and I live !
One more circumstance I will mention. As I said, he took
leave of Mrs. Mason in high spirits on Sunday. " Never," said
she, " did I see him look happier than the last glance I had of
his countenance." On Monday he was lost. On Monday
night she dreamt that she was somewhere, she knew not where,
and he came, looking very pale and fearfully melancholy. She
said to him, "You look ill; you are tired; sit down and eat."
"No," he replied, "I shall never eat more; I have not a
soldo left in the world." " Nonsense," said she, " this is no inn,
you need not pay." " Perhaps," he answered, "it is the worse for
that." Then she awoke ; and, going to sleep again, she dreamt
that my Percy was dead ; and she awoke crying bitterly so
bitterly, and felt so miserable that she said to herself, " Why,
if the little boy should die, I should not feel it in this manner."
She was so struck with these dreams, that she mentioned them
to her servant the next day, saying she hoped all was well with us.
Well, here is my story the last story I shall have to tell.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 21
All that might have been bright in my life is now despoiled.
I shall live to improve myself, to take care of my child, and
render myself worthy to join him. Soon my weary pilgrimage
will begin. I rest now, but soon I must leave Italy, and then
there is an end of all but despair. Adieu ! I hope you are
well and happy. I have an idea that while he was at Pisa,
he received a letter from you that I have never seen ; so
not knowing where to direct, I shall send this letter to
Peacock. I shall send it open ; he may be glad to read it.
Yours ever truly, MARY W. S.
PISA, 15/7^ August 1822.
I shall probably write soon again. I have left out a material
circumstance. A fishing-boat saw them go down. It was
about 4 in the afternoon. They saw the boy at mast-head,
when baffling winds struck the sails. They had looked away
a moment, and, looking again, the boat was gone. This is
their story, but there is little doubt that these men might have
saved them, at least Edward, who could swim. They could
not, they said, get near her ; but three-quarters of an hour
after passed over the spot where they had seen her. They
protested no wreck of her was visible ; but Roberts, going on
board their boat, found several spars belonging to her : perhaps
they let them perish to obtain these. Trelawny thinks he can
get her up, since another fisherman thinks that he has found
the spot where she lies, having drifted near shore. Trelawny
does this to know, perhaps, the cause of her wreck ; but I care
little about it.
All readers know Trelawny's graphic account
of the burning of the bodies of Shelley and
Williams. Subsequent to this ceremony a pain-
ful episode took place between Mary and Leigh
Hunt. Hunt had witnessed the obsequies (from
Lord Byron's carriage), and to him was given
by Trelawny the heart of Shelley, which in the
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
flames had remained unconsumed. This precious
relic he refused to give up to her who was its
rightful owner, saying that, to induce him to part
with it, her claim must be maintained by "strong
and conclusive arguments." It was difficult to
advance arguments strong enough if the nature of
the case was not in itself convincing. He showed
no disposition to yield, and Mary was desperate.
Where logic, justice, and good feeling failed, a
woman's tact, however, succeeded. Mrs. Williams
"wrote to Hunt, and represented to him how
grievous it was that Shelley's remains should be-
come a source of dissension between his dearest
friends. She obtained her purpose. Hunt said
she had brought forward the only argument that
could have induced him to yield."
Under the influence of a like feeling Mary
seems to have borne Hunt no grudge for what
must, at least, have appeared to her as an act of
most gratuitous selfishness.
But Mary Shelley and Jane Williams had, both
of them, to face facts and think of the future.
Hardest of all, it became evident that, for the
present, they must part. Their affection for each
other, warm in happier times, had developed by
force of circumstances into a mutual need ; so
much nearer, in their sorrow, were they to each
other than either could be to any one else. But
Jane had friends in England, and she required to
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 23
enlist the interest of Edward's relations in behalf
of his orphan children.
Meanwhile, if Mary had for the moment any
outward tie or responsibility, it was towards the
Leigh Hunts, thus expatriated at the request and
desire of others, with a very uncertain prospect of
permanent result or benefit. Byron, having helped
to start the Liberal with contributions of his own,
and thus fulfilled a portion of his bond, might give
them the slip at any moment. Shelley, although
little disposed toward the " coalition," had promised
assistance, and any such promise from him would
have been sure to mean, in practice, more, and not
less, than it said. Mary had his MSS. ; she knew
his intentions ; she was, as far as any mortal could
be, his fitting literary representative. She had little
to call her elsewhere. The Hunts were friendly
and affectionate and full of pity for her ; they were
also poor and dependent. All tended to one result ;
she and they must for the present join forces, so
saving expense ; and she was to give all the help
she could to the Liberal. Lord Byron was going
to Genoa. Mary and the Hunts agreed to take a
house together there for several months or a year.
Once more she wrote from Pisa to her friend.
MARY SHELLEY TO MRS. GISBORNE.
PISA, iofh September 1822.
And so here I am ! I continue to exist to see one day
succeed the other ; to dread night, but more to dread morning,
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
and hail another cheerless day. My Boy, too, is alas ! no
consolation. When I think how he loved him, the plans he
had for his education, his sweet and childish voice strikes me
to the heart. Why should he live in this world of pain and
anguish ? At times I feel an energy within me to combat
with my destiny ; but again I sink. I have but one hope for
which I live, to render myself worthy to join him, and such a
feeling sustains one during moments of enthusiasm, but dark-
ness and misery soon overwhelm the mind when all near
objects bring agony alone with them. People used to call me
lucky in my star ; you see now how true such a prophecy is !
I was fortunate in having fearlessly placed my destiny in the
hands of one who, a superior being among men, a bright
"planetary" spirit enshrined in an earthly temple, raised me
to the height of happiness. So far am I now happy, that I
would not change my situation as his widow with that of the
most prosperous woman in the world ; and surely the time will
at length come when I shall be at peace, and my brain and
heart no longer be alive with unutterable anguish. I can
conceive of but one circumstance that could afford me the
semblance of content, that is the being permitted to live
where I am now, in the same house, in the same state,
occupied alone with my child, in collecting his manuscripts,
writing his life, and thus to go easily to my grave. But this
must not be ! Even if circumstances did not compel me to
return to England, I would not stay another summer in
Italy with my child. I will at least do my best to render
him well and happy, and the idea that my circumstances
may at all injure him is the fiercest pang my mind endures.
I wrote you a long letter containing a slight sketch of my
sufferings. I sent it directed to Peacock, at the India House,
because accident led me to fancy that you were no longer in
London. I said in that, that on that day (i5th August) they
had gone to perform the last offices for him ; however, I erred in
this, for on that day those of Edward were alone fulfilled, and
they returned on the i6th to celebrate Shelley's. I will say
nothing of the ceremony, since Trelawny has written an
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 25
account of it, to be printed in the forthcoming journal. I will
only say that all, except his heart (which was inconsumable),
was burnt, and that two days ago I went to Leghorn and beheld
the small box that contained his earthly dross ; those smiles,
that form Great God ! no, he is not there, he is with me, about
me life of my life, and soul of my soul ; if his divine spirit
did not penetrate mine I could not survive to weep thus.
I will mention the friends I have here, that you may form
an idea of our situation. Mrs. Williams, Clare, and I live all
together; we have one purse, and, joined in misery, we are
for the present joined in life. She, poor girl, withers like a
lily; she lives for her children, but it is a living death. Lord
Byron has been very kind ; the Guiccioli restrains him. She,
being an Italian, is capable of being jealous of a living corpse,
such as I. Of Hunt I will speak when I see you. But the
friend to whom we are eternally indebted is Trelawny. I
have, of course, mentioned him to you as one who wishes to
be considered eccentric, but who was noble and generous at
bottom. I always thought so, even when no fact proved it,
and Shelley agreed with me, as he always did, or rather I with
him. We heard people speak against him on account of his
vagaries ; we said to one another, " Still we like him we
believe him to be good." Once, even, when a whim of his
led him to treat me with something like impertinence, I forgave
him, and I have now been well rewarded. In my outline of
events you will see how, unasked, he returned with Jane and
me from Leghorn to Lerici ; how he stayed with us poor
miserable creatures l five days there, endeavouring to keep
up our spirits ; how he left us on Thursday, and, finding our
misfortune confirmed, then without rest returned on Friday to
us, and again without rest returned to Pisa on Saturday.
These were no common services. Since that he has gone
through, by himself, all the annoyances of dancing attendance
1 Mrs. Shelley's letter says twelve days, but this is an error, due, no
doubt, to her distress of mind. She gives the date of Trelawny's return to
Leghorn as the 25th of July ; it should have been the i8th.
26
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
on Consuls and Governors for permission to fulfil the last duties
to those gone, and attending the ceremony himself; all the
disagreeable part, and all the fatigue, fell on him. As Hunt
said, " He worked with the meanest and felt with the best."
He is generous to a distressing degree. But after all these
benefits to us, what I most thank him for is this. When on
that night of agony, that Friday night, he returned to announce
that hope was dead for us ; when he had told me that his
earthly frame being found, his spirit was no longer to be my
guide, protector, and companion in this dark world, he did not
attempt to console me that would have been too cruelly use-
less, but he launched forth into, as it were, an overflowing
and eloquent praise of my divine Shelley, till I was almost
happy that thus I was unhappy, to be fed by the praise of
him, and to dwell on the eulogy that his loss thus drew from
his friend. Of my friends I have only Mrs. Mason to men-
tion ; her coldness has stung me ; yet she felt his loss keenly,
and would be very glad to serve me ; but it is not cold offers
of service one wants ; one's wounded spirit demands a number
of nameless slight but dear attentions that are a balm, and
wanting these, one feels a bitterness which is a painful addition
to one's other sufferings.
God knows what will become of me ! My life is now very
monotonous as to outward events, yet how diversified by
internal feeling ! How often in the intensity of grief does one
instant seem to fill and embrace the universe ! As to the
rest, the mechanical spending of my time : of course I have
a great deal to do preparing for my journey. I make no
visits, except one once in about ten days to Mrs. Mason. I
have not seen Hunt these nine days. Trelawny resides chiefly
at Leghorn, since he is captain of Lord Byron's vessel, the
Bolivar ; he comes to see us about once a week, and Lord
Byron visits me about twice a week, accompanied by the
Guiccioli ; but seeing people is an annoyance which I am
happy to be spared. Solitude is my only help and resource ;
accustomed, even when he was with me, to spend much of my
time alone, I can at those moments forget myself, until some
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 27
idea, which I think I would communicate to him, occurs, and
then the yawning and dark gulph again displays itself, unshaded
by the rainbow which the imagination had formed. Despair,
energy, love, desponding and excessive affliction are like
clouds driven across my mind, one by one, until tears blot the
scene, and weariness of spirit consigns me to temporary repose.
I shudder with horror when I look back on what I have
suffered, and when I think of the wild and miserable thoughts
that have possessed me I say to myself, " Is it true that I ever
felt thus ? " and then I weep in pity of myself ; yet each day
adds to the stock of sorrow, and death is the only end. I
would study, and I hope I shall. I would write, and when
I am settled I may. But were it not for the steady hope I
entertain of joining him, what a mockery would be this world !
without that hope I could not study or write, for fame and
usefulness (except as regards my child) are nullities to me.
Yet I shall be happy if anything I ever produce may exalt and
soften sorrow, as the writings of the divinities of our race have
mine. But how can I aspire to that ?
The world will surely one day feel what it has lost when
this bright child of song deserted her. Is not Adonais his
own elegy ? and there does he truly depict the universal woe
which should overspread all good minds since he has ceased
to be their fellow-labourer in this worldly scene. How lovely
does he paint death to be, and with what heartfelt sorrow does
one repeat that line
But I am chained to Time, and cannot thence depart.
How long do you think I shall live ? as long as my mother ?
Then eleven long years must intervene. I am now on the eve
of completing my five and twentieth year ; how drearily young
for one so lost as I. How young in years for one who lives
ages each day in sorrow. Think you that these moments are
counted in my life as in other people's ? Oh no ! The day
before the sea closed over mine own Shelley he said to
Marianne, " If I die to-morrow I have lived to be older than
my father ; I am ninety years of age." Thus, also, may I say.
28 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
The eight years I passed with him was spun out beyond the
usual length of a man's life, and what I have suffered since
will .write years on my brow and intrench them in my heart.
Surely I am not long for this world ; most sure should I be
were it not for my boy, but God grant that I may live to make
his early years happy.
Well, adieu ! I have no events to write about, and can,
therefore, only scrawl about my feelings ; this letter, indeed, is
'only the sequel of my last. In that I closed the history of all
events that can interest me ; that letter I wish you to send my
Father, the present one it is best not.
I suppose I shall see you in England some of these days,
but I shall write to you again before I quit this place. Be as
happy as you can, and hope for better things in the next
world; by firm hope you may attain your wishes. Again,
adieu ! Affectionately yours, M. S.
Do not write to me again here, or at all, until I write to you.
Within a day or two after this letter was written,
Mary, with Jane Williams and their children,
quitted Pisa ; Clare only remaining behind.
From a letter a very indignant one of Mrs.
Mason's, it may be inferred that appeals for a little
assistance had been made on Clare's behalf to
Byron, who did not respond. He had been, un-
wittingly, contributing to her support during the
last few weeks of Shelley's life ; Shelley having
undertaken to get some translations (from Goethe)
made for Byron, and giving the work secretly to
Clare. The truth now came out, and she found
more difficulty than heretofore in getting paid.
Dependent for the future on her own exertions,
she was going, according to her former resolution,
to Vienna, where Charles Clairmont was now
established. Mary's departure left her dreadfully
solitary, and within a few hours she despatched
one of her characteristic epistles, touched with that
motley of bitter cynicism and grotesque, racy,
humour which developed in her later letters.
Half -past 2, Wednesday Morning.
MY DEAR MARY You have only been gone a few hours.
I have been inexpressibly low-spirited. I hope dear Jane will
be with you when this arrives. Nothing new has happened
what should ? To me there seems nothing under the sun,
except the old tale of misery, .misery !
Thursday.
I am to begin my journey to Vienna on Monday. Mrs.
Mason will make me go, and the consequence is that it will
be double as much, as I am to go alone. Imagine all the
lonely inns, the weary long miles, if I do. Observe, whatever
befalls in life, the heaviest part, the very dregs of the mis-
fortune fall on me.
Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Upon a wide, wide sea,
And Christ would take no mercy
Upon my soul in agony.
But I believe my Minerva 1 is right, for I might wait to all
eternity for a party. You may remember what Lord Byron
said about paying for the translation ; now he has mumbled
and grumbled and demurred, and does not know whether it
is worth it, and will only give forty crowns, so that I shall not
be overstocked when I arrive at Vienna, unless, indeed, God
shall spread a table for me in the wilderness. I mean to
chew rhubarb the whole way, as the only diversion I can
think of at all suited to my present state of feeling, and if I
1 Mrs. Mason.
3 o THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
should write you scolding letters, you will excuse them, know-
ing that, with the Psalmist, " Out of the bitterness of my mouth
have I spoken."
Kiss the dear little Percy for me, and if Jane is with you, tell
her how much I have thought of her, and that her image will
always float across my mind, shining in my dark history like a ray
of light across a cave. Kiss her children also with all a grand-
mother's love. Accept my best wishes for your happiness. Dio
ti da, Maria, ventura. Your affectionate CLARE.
Mary answered this letter from Genoa.
FROM MARY TO CLARE.
GENOA, i$th September 1822.
MY DEAR CLARE I do not wonder that you were and are
melancholy, or that the excess of that feeling should oppress
you. Great God ! what have we gone through, what variety
of care and misery, all close now in blackest night. And I,
am I not melancholy? here in this busy hateful Genoa, where
nothing speaks to me of him, except the sea, which is his
murderer. Well, I shall have his books and manuscripts, and
in those I shall live, and from the study of these I do expect
some instants of content In solitude my imagination and
ever-moving thoughts may afford me some seconds of exalta-
tion that may render me both happier here and more worthy
of him hereafter.
Such as I felt walking up a mountain by myself at sunrise
during my journey, when the rocks looked black about me,
and a white mist concealed all but them. I thought then,
that, thinking of him and exciting my mind, my days might
pass in a kind of peace ; but these thoughts are so fleeting ;
and then I expect unhappiness alone from all the worldly part
of my life from my intercourse with human beings. I know
that will bring nothing but unhappiness to me, if, indeed, I
except Trelawny, who appears so truly generous and kind.
MARY WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 3 1
But I will not talk of myself, you have enough to annoy
and make you miserable, and in nothing can I assist you.
But I do hope that you will find Germany better suited to you
in every way than Italy, and that you will make friends, and,
more than all, become really attached to some one there.
I wish, when I was in Pisa, that you had said that you
thought you should be short of money, and I would have left
you more; but you seemed to think 150 francesconi plenty.
I would not go on with Goethe except with a fixed price per
sheet, to be paid regularly, and that price not less than five
guineas. Make this understood fully through Hunt before
you go, and then I will take care that you get the money ;
but if you do not fix it, then I cannot manage so well. You
are going to Vienna how anxiously do I hope to find peace ;
I do not hope to find it here. Genoa has a bad atmosphere
for me, I fear, and nothing but the horror of being a burthen
to my family prevents my accompanying Jane. If I had any
fixed income I would go at least to Paris, and I shall go the
moment I have one. Adieu, my dear Clare; write to me
often, as I shall to you. Affectionately yours,
MARY W. S.
I cannot get your German dictionary now, since I must
have packed it in my great case of books, but I will send it
by the first opportunity.
Jane and her children were the next to depart,
and for a short time Mary Shelley and her boy
were alone. Besides taking a house for the Hunts
and herself, she had the responsibility of finding
one for Lord Byron. People never scrupled to
make her of use ; but any object, any duty to fulfil,
was good for her in her solitary misery, and she
devoted some of her vacant time to sending an
account of her plans to Mrs. Gisborne.
32 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
MARY SHELLEY TO MRS. GISBO'RNE.
GENOA, i^th September 1822.
... I am here alone in Genoa ; quite, quite alone ! J. has
left me to proceed to England, and, except my sleeping child,
I am alone. Since you do not communicate with my Father,
you will perhaps be surprised, after my last letter, that I do
not come to England. I have written to him a long account
of the arguments of all my friends to dissuade me from that
miserable journey ; Jane will detail them to you ; and, there-
fore, I merely say now that, having no business there, I am
determined not to spend that money which will support me
nearly a year here, in a journey, the sole end of which appears
to me the necessity I should be under, when arrived in
London, of being a burthen to my Father. When my crowns
are gone, if Sir Timothy refuses, I hope to be able to support
myself by my writings and mine own Shelley's MSS. At
least during many long months I shall have peace as to money
affairs, and one evil the less is much to one whose existence
is suffering alone. Lord Byron has a house here, and will
arrive soon. I have taken a house for the Hunts and myself
outside one of the gates. It is large and neat, with a podere
attached ; we shall pay about eighty crowns between us, so I
hope that I shall find tranquillity from care this winter, though
that may be the last of my life so free, yet I do not hope it,
though I say so ; hope is a word ; that belongs not to my
situation. He my own beloved, the exalted and divine
Shelley has left me alone in this miserable world ; this earth,
canopied by the eternal starry heaven where he is where,
oh, my God ! yes, where I shall one day be.
Clare is no longer with me. Jane quitted me this morning
at 4. After she left me I again went to rest, and thought
of Pugnano, its halls, its cypresses, the perfume of its moun-
tains, and the gaiety of our life beneath their shadow. Then
I dozed awhile, and in my dream saw dear Edward most
visibly ; he came, he said, to pass a few hours with us, but
could not stay long. Then I woke, and the day began. I
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 33
went out, took Hunt's house ; but as I walked I felt that
which is with me the sign of unutterable grief. I am not
given to tears, and though my most miserable fate has often
turned my eyes to fountains, yet oftener I suffer agonies un-
assuaged by tears. But during these last sufferings I have felt
an oppression at my heart I never felt before. It is not a pal-
pitation, but a stringimento which is quite convulsive, and, did
I not struggle greatly, would cause violent hysterics. Looking
on the sea, or. hearing its roar, his dirge, it comes upon me ; but
these are corporeal sufferings I can get over, but that which is
insurmountable is the constant feeling of despair that shadows
me : I seem to walk on a narrow path with fathomless preci-
pices all around me. Yet where can I fall ? I have already
fallen, and all that comes of bad or good is a mere mockery.
Those about me have no idea of what I suffer ; none are
sufficiently interested in me to observe that, though my lips
smile, my eyes are blank, or to notice the desolate look that I
cast up towards the sky. Pardon, dear friend, this selfishness
in writing thus. There are moments when the heart must
sfogare or be suffocated, and such a moment is this when
quite alone, my babe sleeping, and dear Jane having just left
me, it is with difficulty I prevent myself from flying from
mental misery by bodily exertion, when to run into that vast
grave (the sea) until I sink to rest, would be a pleasure to me,
and instead of this I write, and as I write I say, Oh God,
have pity on me. At least I will have pity on you. Good-
night, I will finish this when people are about me, and I am
in a more cheerful mood. Good-night. I will go look at the
stars. They are eternal, so is he, so am I.
You have not written to me since my misfortune. I under-
stand this; you first waited for a letter from me, and that
letter told you not to write. But answer this as soon as you
receive it ; talk to me of yourselves, and also of my English
affairs. I am afraid that they will not go on very well in my
absence, but it would cost more to set them right than they are
worth. I will, however, let you know what I think my friends
VOL. ii 26
34 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
ought to do, that when you talk to Peacock he may learn what I
wish. A claim should be made on the part of Shelley's executors
for a maintenance for my child and myself from Sir Timothy.
Lord Byron is ready to do this or any other service for me
that his office of executor demands from him ; but I do not
wish it to be done separately by him, and I want to hear from
England before I ask him to write to Whitton on the subject.
Secondly, Oilier must be asked for all MSS., and some plan
be reflected on for the best manner of republishjng Shelley's
works, as well as the writings he has left. Who will allow
money to lanthe and Charles ?
As for you, my dear friends, I do not see what you can do
for me, except to send me the originals or copies of Shelley's
most interesting letters to you. I hope soon to get into my
house, where writing, copying Shelley's MSS., walking, and
being of some use in the education of Marianne's children
will be my occupations. Where is that letter in verse Shelley
once wrote to you ? Let me have a copy of it. Is not Pea-
cock very lukewarm and insensible in this affair ? Tell me
what Hogg says and does, and my Father also, if you have an
opportunity of knowing. Here is a long letter all about
myself, but though I cannot write, I like to hear of others.
Adieu, dear friends. Your sincerely attached,
MARY W. SHELLEY.
The fragment that follows is from Mrs.
Williams' first letter, written from Geneva, where
she and Edward had lived in such felicity, and
where they had made friends with Medwin,
Roberts, and Trelawny : a happy, light-hearted
time on which it was torture to look back.
JANE WILLIAMS TO MARY SHELLEY.
GENEVA, September 1822.
I only arrived this day, my dearest Mary, and find your
letter, the only friend who welcomes me. I will not detail all
35
the misery I have suffered, let it be added to the heap that
must be piled up ; and when the measure is brimful, it needs
must overflow ; and then, peace ! What have been my feel-
ings to-day ? I have gazed on that lake, still and ever the
same, rolling on in its course, as if this gap in creation had
never been made. I have passed that place where our little
boat used to land, but where is the hand stretched out to meet
mine, where the glad voice, the sweet smile, the beloved form?
Oh ! Mary, is my heart human that I endure scenes like this,
and live ? My arrival at the inn here has been one of the
most painful trials I have yet undergone. The landlady, who
came to the door, did not recognise me immediately, and
when she did, our mutual tears prevented both interrogation
and answer for some minutes. I then bore my sorrowful
burden up these stairs he had formerly passed in all the pride
of youth, hope, and love. When will these heartrending
scenes be finished ? Never ! for, when they cease, memory
will furnish others.
God bless you, dearest girl ; take care of yourself. Re-
member me to the Hunts. Ever yours, JANE.
Not long after this Byron arrived at Genoa
with his train, and the Hunts with their tribe.
" All that were now left of our Pisan circle," writes Tre-
lawny, " established themselves at Albaro, Byron, Leigh
Hunt, and Mrs. Shelley. The fine spirit that had animated
and held us together was gone. Left to our own devices, we
degenerated apace."
CHAPTER XVIII
SEPTEMBER i822-JuLY 1823
AN eminent contemporary writer, speaking of
Trelawny's writings, has remarked : " So long as
he dwells on Shelley, he is, like the visitants to
the Witch of Atlas, ' imparadised.' ' This was
true, in fact not as to the writings, but the natures,
of all who had friendly or intimate relations with
Shelley. His personality was like a clear, deep
lake, wherein the sky and the surrounding objects
were reflected. Now and again a breeze, or even
a storm, might sweep across the "watery glass,"
playing strange, grotesque pranks with the dis-
torted reflections. But in general those who
surrounded it saw themselves, and saw each other,
not as they were, but as they appeared, trans-
figured, idealised, glorified, by the impalpable,
fluid, medium. And like a tree that overhangs the
water's edge, whose branches dip and play in the
clear ripples, nodding and beckoning to their own
living likeness there, so Mary had grown up by
the side of this, her own image in him, herself
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 37
indeed, but " imparadised " in the immortal un-
reality of the magic mirror.
Now the eternal frost had fallen : black ice and
dreary snow had extinguished that reflection for
ever, and the solitary tree was left to weather all
storms in a wintry world, where no magic mirror
was to be hers any more.
Mary Shelley's diary, now she was alone,
altered its character. In her husband's lifetime it
had been a record of the passing facts of every
day ; almost as concise in statement as that of her
father. Now and then, in travelling, she would
stereotype an impression of beautiful scenery by an
elaborate description ; sometimes, but very rarely,
she had indulged (as at Pisa) on reflections on
people or things in general.
The case was now exactly reversed. Alone
with her child, with no one else to live for ; having
no companion-mind with which to exchange ideas,
and having never known what it was-to be without
one before, her diary became her familiar, or
rather her shadow, for it took its sombre colouring
from her and could give nothing back. The
thoughts too monotonously sad, too harrowing in
their eloquent self-pity to be communicated to
other people, but which filled her heart, the more
that heart was thrown back on itself, found here an
outlet, inadequate enough, but still the only one
they had. In thus recording her emotions for her
38 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
own benefit, she had little idea that these melan-
choly self-communings would ever be gathered up
and published for the satisfaction of the " reading
world " ; a world that loves nothing so well as
personal details, and would rather have the object
of its interest misrepresented than not represented
at all. Outwardly uneventful as Mrs. Shelley's
subsequent life was, its few occurrences are, as a
rule, not even alluded to in her journal. Such
things for the most part lost their intrinsic im-
portance to her when Shelley disappeared ; it was
only in the world of abstractions that she felt or
could imagine his companionship. Her journal,
in reality, records her first essay in living alone.
It was, to an almost incredible degree, a beginning.
Her existence, from its outset, had been offered
up at the shrine of one man. To animate his
solitude, to foster his genius, to help as far as
possible his labours, to companion him in a
world that did not understand him, this had
been her life-work, which lay now as a dream
behind her, while she awakened to find herself
alone with the solitude, the work, the cold un-
friendly world, and without Shelley.
Could any woman be as lonely ? All who share
an abnormal lot must needs be isolated when cut
adrift from the other life which has been their
raison d'etre ; and Mary had begun so early, that
she had grown, as it were, to this state of double
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 39
solitude. She had not been unconscious of the
slight hold they had on actualities.
" Mary," observed Shelley one day at Pisa, when Trelawny
was present, " Trelawny has found out Byron already. How
stupid we were ; how long it took us 1"
" That," she observed, " is because he lives with the living
and we with the dead."
And as a fact, Shelley lived with the immortals ;
finite things were outside his world ; in his con-
temporaries it was what he would have considered
their immortal side that he cared for. There are
conjurors who can be tied by no knot from which
they cannot escape, and so the limitations of
practical convention, those " ideas and feelings
which are but for a day," had no power to hold
Shelley.
And Mary knew no world but his. Now,
young, only twenty -five, yet with the past ex-
perience of eight years of chequered married life,
and of a simultaneous intellectual development
almost perilously rapid, she stood, an utter novice,
on the threshold of ordinary existence.
Journal, October 2. On the 8th of July I finished my
journal. This is a curious coincidence. The date still
remains the fatal 8th a monument to show that all ended
then. And I begin again ? Oh, never ! But several motives
induce me, when the day has gone down, and all is silent
around me, steeped in sleep, to pen, as occasion wills, my re-
flections and feelings. First, I have no friend. For eight
years I communicated, with unlimited freedom, with one whose
genius, far transcending mine, awakened and guided my
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
thoughts. I conversed with him, rectified my errors of judg-
ment ; obtained new lights from him ; and my mind was
satisfied. Now I am alone oh, how alone ! The stars may
behold my tears, and the wind drink my sighs, but my thoughts
are a sealed treasure which I can confide to none. But can
I express all I feel ? Can I give words to thoughts and feel-
ings that, as a tempest, hurry me along ? Is this the sand that
the ever-flowing sea of thought would impress indelibly ? Alas !
I am alone. No eye answers mine ; my voice can with none
assume its natural modulation. What a change ! O my
beloved Shelley ! how often during those happy days happy,
though chequered I thought how superiorly gifted I had
been in being united to one to whom I could unveil myself,
and who could understand me ! Well, then, now I am
reduced to these white pages, which I am to blot with dark
imagery. As I write, let me think what he would have said
if, speaking thus to him, he could have answered me. Yes,
my own heart, I would fain know what to think of my desolate
state ; what you think I ought to do, what to think. I guess
you would answer thus : " Seek to know your own heart, and,
learning what it best loves, try to enjoy that." Well, I cast
my eyes around, and, looking forward to the bounded prospect
in view, I ask myself what pleases me there. My child ; so
many feelings arise when I think of him, that I turn aside to
think no more. Those I most loved are gone for ever ; those
who held the second rank are absent ; and among those near
me as yet, I trust to the disinterested kindness of one alone.
Beneath all this, my imagination never flags. Literary labours,
the improvement of my mind, and the enlargement of my
ideas, are the only occupations that elevate me from my
lethargy : all events seem to lead me to that one point, and
the courses of destiny having dragged me to that single rest-
ing-place, have left me. Father, mother, friend, husband,
children all made, as it were, the team which conducted me
here, and now all, except you, my poor boy (and you are
necessary to the continuance of my life), all are gone, and I
am left to fulfil my task. So be it.
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLS Y 4 1
October 5. Well, they are come; 1 and it is all as I said.
I awoke as from sleep, and thought how I had vegetated these
last days ; for feeling leaves little trace on the memory if it be,
like mine, unvaried. I have felt for, and with myself alone, and
I awake now to take a part in life. As far as others are con-
cerned, my sensations have been most painful. I must work
hard amidst the vexations that I perceive are preparing for me,
to preserve my peace and tranquillity of mind. I must pre-
serve some, if I am to live ; for, since I bear at the bottom of
my heart a fathomless well of bitter waters, the workings of
which my philosophy is ever at work to repress, what will be
my fate if the petty vexations of life are added to this sense of
eternal and infinite misery ?
Oh, my child ! what is your fate to be ? You alone reach
me ; you are the only chain that links me to time ; but for you,
I should be free. And yet I cannot be destined to live long.
Well, I shall commence my task, commemorate the virtues of
the only creature worth loving or living for, and then, may be,
I may join him. Moonshine may be united to her planet, and
wander no more, a sad reflection of all she loved on earth.
October 7. I have received my desk to-day, and have
been reading my letters to mine own Shelley during his
absences at Marlow. What a scene to recur to ! My William,
Clara, Allegra, are all talked of. They lived then, they
breathed this air, and their voices struck on, my sense ; their
feet trod the earth beside me, and their hands were warm with
blood and life when clasped in mine, where are they all ? This
is too great an agony to be written about. I may express my
despair, but my thoughts can find no words.
I would endeavour to consider myself a faint continuation
of his being, and, as far as possible, the revelation to the earth
of what he was, yet, to become this, I must change much, and,
above all, I must acquire that knowledge and drink at those
fountains of wisdom and virtue from which he quenched his
1 The Hunts.
42 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
thirst. Hitherto I have done nothing ; yet I have not been
discontented with myself. I speak of the period of my resi-
dence here. For, although unoccupied by those studies which
I have marked out for myself, my mind has been so active
that its activity, and not its indolence, has made me neglectful.
But now the society of others causes this perpetual working of
my ideas somewhat to pause ; and I must take advantage of
this to turn my mind towards its immediate duties, and to
determine with firmness to commence the life I have planned.
You will be with me in all my studies, dearest love ! your
voice will no longer applaud me, but in spirit you will visit and
encourage me : I know you will. What were I, if I did not
believe that you still exist ? It is not with you as with another,
I believe that we all live hereafter ; but you, my only one,
were a spirit caged, an elemental being, enshrined in a frail
image, now shattered. Do they not all with one voice assert
the same ? Trelawny, Hunt, and many others. And so at last
you quitted this painful prison, and you are free, my Shelley ;
while I, your poor chosen one, am left to live as I may.
What a strange life mine has been ! Love, youth, fear,
and fearlessness led me early from the regular routine of life,
and I united myself to this being, who, not one of us, though
like to us, was pursued by numberless miseries and annoyances,
in all of which I shared. And then I was the mother of beauti-
ful children, but these stayed not by me. Still he was there ;
and though, in truth, after my William's death this world
seemed only a quicksand, sinking beneath my feet, yet beside
me was this bank of refuge so tempest-worn and frail, that
methought its very weakness was strength, and, since Nature
had written destruction on its brow, so the Power that rules
human affairs had determined, in spite of Nature, that it should
endure. But that is gone. His voice can no longer be heard ;
the earth no longer receives the shadow of his form ; annihi-
lation has come over the earthly appearance of the most gentle
creature that ever yet breathed this air ; and I am still here
still thinking, existing, all but hoping. Well, I close my book.
To-morrow I must begin this new life of mine.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 43
October 19. How painful all change becomes to one,
who, entirely and despotically engrossed by [his] own feelings
leads, as it were, an internal life, quite different from the
outward and apparent one ! Whilst my life continues its
monotonous course within sterile banks, an under-current
disturbs the smooth face of the waters, distorts all objects
reflected in it, and the mind is no longer a mirror in which
outward events may reflect themselves, but becomes itself
the painter and creator. If this perpetual activity has power
to vary with endless change the everyday occurrences of a
most monotonous life, it appears to be animated with the
spirit of tempest and hurricane when any real occurrence
diversifies the scene. Thus, to-night, a few bars of a known
air seemed to be as a wind to rouse from its depths every
deep-seated emotion of my mind. I would have given worlds
to have sat, my eyes closed, and listened to them for years.
The restraint I was under caused these feelings to vary with
rapidity ; but the words of the conversation, uninteresting as
they might be, seemed all to convey two senses to me, and,
touching a chord within me, to form a music of which the
speaker was little aware. I do not think that any person's
voice has the same power of awakening melancholy in me as
Albe's. I have been accustomed, when hearing it, to listen
and to speak little ; another voice, not mine, ever replied a
voice whose strings are broken. When Albe ceases to speak,
I expect to hear that other voice, and when I hear another
instead, it jars strangely with every association. I have seen
so little of Albe since our residence in Switzerland, and, having
seen him there every day, his voice a peculiar one is en-
graved on my memory with other sounds and objects from
which it can never disunite itself. I have heard Hunt in com-
pany and in conversation with many, when my own one was
not there. Trelawny, perhaps, is associated in my mind with
Edward more than with Shelley. Even our older friends,
Peacock and Hogg, might talk together, or with others, and
their voices suggest no change to me. But, since incapacity
and timidity always prevented my mingling in the nightly con-
44 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
versations of Diodati, they were, as it were, entirely tete-a-tete
between my Shelley and Albe ; and thus, as I have said, when
Alb speaks and Shelley does not answer, it is as thunder with-
out rain, the form of the sun without light or heat, as any
familiar object might be shorn of its best attributes ; and I
listen with an unspeakable melancholy that yet is not all pain.
The above explains that which would otherwise be an
enigma why Albe, by his mere presence and voice, has the
power of exciting such deep and shifting emotions within me.
For my feelings have no analogy either with my opinion of
him, or the subject of his conversation. With another I might
talk, and not for the moment think of Shelley at least not
think of him with the same vividness as if I were alone ; but,
when in company with Albe", I can never cease for a second to
have Shelley in my heart and brain with a clearness that mocks
reality interfering even by its force with the functions of life
until, if tears do not relieve me, the hysterical feeling,
analogous to that which the murmur of the sea gives me,
presses painfully upon me.
Well, for the first time for about a month, I have been in
company with Albe for two hours, and, coming home, I write
this, so necessary is it for me to express in words the force of
my feelings. Shelley, beloved ! I look at the stars and at all
nature, and it speaks to me of you in the clearest accents.
Why cannot you answer me, my own one ? Is the instrument
so utterly destroyed ? I would endure ages of pain to hear
one tone of your voice strike on my ear !
For nearly a year not a happy one Mary
lived with the Hunts. A bruised and bleeding
heart exposed to the cuffs and blows of everyday
life, a nervous temperament too recently strained
to its utmost pitch of endurance liable to constant,
unavoidable irritation, a nature sensitive and re-
served, accustomed to much seclusion and much
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
45
independence, thrown into the midst of a large,
noisy, and disorderly family, these conditions
could hardly result in happiness. Leigh Hunt
was nervous, delicate, overworked, and variable in
mood : his wife an invalid, condemned by the
doctors on her arrival in Italy, now expecting her
confinement in the ensuing summer, an event
which she was told would be, for good or evil, the
crisis of her fate. Six children they had already
had, who were allowed on principle to do ex-
actly as they chose, "until such time as they were
of an age to be reasoned with."
The opening for activity and usefulness would,
at another time, have been beneficial to Mary, and,
to some extent, was so now ; but it was too early,
the change from her former state was too violent ;
she was not fit yet for such severe bracing. She
met her trials bravely ; but it 'was another case
where buoyancy of spirits was indispensable to real
success, and buoyancy of spirits she had not, nor
was likely to acquire in her present surroundings.
There was another person to whom these sur-
roundings were even more supremely distasteful
than to her, and this was Byron. Small sympathy
had he for domestic life or sentiment even in their
best aspects, and this virtuous, slipshod, cockney
Bohemianism had no attraction for him whatever.
The poor man must have suffered many things
while the Hunts were in possession of his pian
4 6
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
terreno at Pisa ; he was rid of them now, but the
very sight of them was too much for him.
LORD BYRON TO MRS. SHELLEY.
6th October 1822.
The sofa which I regret is tiot of your furniture it was
purchased by me at Pisa since you left it.
It is convenient for my room, though of little value (about
12 pauls), and I offered to send another (now sent) in its
stead. I preferred retaining the purchased furniture, but
always intended that you should have as good or better in its
place. I have a particular dislike to anything of Shelley's
being within the same walls with Mrs. Hunt's children. They
are dirtier and more mischievous than Yahoos. What they
can't destroy with their filth they will with their fingers. I
presume you received ninety and odd crowns from the wreck
of the Don Juan, and also the price of the boat purchased by
Captain R., if not, you will have both. Hunt has these in
hand.
With regard to any difficulties about money, I can only
repeat that I will be your banker till this state of things is
cleared up, and you can see what is to be done ; so there is
little to hinder you on that score. I was confined for four
days to my bed at Lerici. Poor Hunt, with his six little black-
guards, are coming slowly up ; as usual he turned back once
was there ever such a kraal out of the Hottentot country
before? N. B.
Among those of their former acquaintance who
now surrounded Mary, the one who by his presence
ministered most to the needs' of her fainting moral
nature was Trelawny. Leigh Hunt, when not dis-
agreeing from her, was affectionate, nay, gushing,
and he had truly loved Shelley, but he was a feeble,
facetious, feckless creature, a hypochondriac,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 47
unable to do much to help himself, still less
another. Byron was by no means ill-disposed,
especially just now, but he was egotistic and in-
dolent, and too capricious, as the event proved,
to be depended on.
Trelawny's fresh vigorous personality, his bright
originality and rugged independence, and his un-
bounded admiration for Shelley, made him won-
derfully reviving to Mary ; he had the effect on
her of a gust of fresh air in a close crowded room.
He was unconventional and outspoken, and by no
means always complimentary, but he had a just
appreciation of Mary's real mental and moral
superiority to the people around her, and a frank
liking for herself. Their friendship was to extend
over many years, during which Mary had ample
opportunity of repaying the debt of obligation
she always felt she owed him for his kindness to
her and Mrs. Williams at the time of their great
misery.
The letters which follow were among the
earliest of a long and varied correspondence.
MARY SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
November 1822.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY I called on you yesterday, but was
too late for you. I was much pained to see you out of spirits
the other night. I can in no way make you better, I fear, but
I should be glad to see you. Will you dine with me Monday
after your ride? If Hunt rides, as he threatens, with Lord
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Byron, he will also dine late and make one of our party.
Remember, you will also do Hunt good by this, who pines in
this solitude. You say that I know so little of the world that
I am afraid I may be mistaken in imagining that you have a
friendship for me, especially after what you said of Jane the
other night ; but besides the many other causes I have to
esteem you, I can never remember without the liveliest grati-
tude all you said that night of agony when you returned to
Lerici. Your praises of my lost Shelley were the only balm
I could endure, and he always joined with me in liking you
from the first moment we saw you. Adieu. Your attached
friend, M. W. S.
Have you got my books on shore from the Bolivar 1 ) If
you have, pray let me have them, for many are odd volumes,
and I wish to see if they are too much destroyed to rank with
those I have.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
November 1822.
DEAR MARY I will gladly dine on Monday with you.
As to melancholy, I refer you to the good Antonio in Shylock.
" Alas ! I know now why I am so sad. It is time, I think."
You are not so learned in human dealings as lago, but you
cannot so sadly err as to doubt the extent or truth of my
friendship. As to gain esteem, I do not think it a word
applicable to such a lawless character. Ruled by impulse, not
by reason, I am satisfied you should like me upon my own
terms impulse. As to gratitude for uttering my thoughts of
him I so loved and admired, it was a tribute that all who knew
him have paid to his memory. " But weeping never could
restore the dead," and if it could, hope would prevent our
tears. You may remember I always in preference selected as
my companion Edward, not Jane, and that I always dissented
from your general voice of her being perfection. I am still of
the same opinion ; nothing more. But I have and ever shall
feel deeply interested, and would do much to serve her, and
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 49
if thinking on those trifles which diminish her lustre in my
eyes makes me flag, Edward's memory and my perfect friend-
ship for him is sufficient excitement to spur me on to anything.
It is impossible to dislike Jane ; but to have an unqualified
liking, such as I had for Edward, no no no ! Talking of
gratitude, I really am and ought to be so to you, for bearing on,
untired, with my spleen, humours, and violence ; it is a proof of
real liking, particularly as you are not of the sect who profess or
practise meekness, humility, and patience in common. T.
Mary had not as yet been successful in getting
possession of the half-finished portrait of Shelley.
Her letters had followed Miss Curran to Paris,
whence, in October, a reply at last arrived.
" I am sorry," Miss Curran wrote, " I am not at Rome
to execute your melancholy commission. I mean to return in
spring, but it may be then too late. I am sure Mr. Brunelli
would be happy to oblige you or me, but you may have
left Pisa before this, so I know not what to propose. Your
picture and Clare's I left with him to give you when you
should be at Rome, as I expected, before you returned to
England. The one you now write for I thought was not to
be inquired for ; it was so ill done, and I was on the point of
burning it with others before I left Italy. I luckily saved it
just as the fire was scorching, and it is packed up with my
other pictures at Rome ; and I have not yet decided where
they can be sent to, as there are serious difficulties in the way
I had not adverted to. I am very sorry indeed, dear Mary,
but you shall have it as soon as I possibly can." . . .
This was the early history of that portrait, which
was recovered a year or two later, and which has
passed, and passes still, for Shelley's likeness, and
which, bad or good, is the only authentic one in
existence.
VOL. II 27
50 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Mary now began to feel it a matter of duty as
well as of expediency to resume literary work, but
she found it hard at first.
" I am quite well, but very nervous," she wrote to Mrs.
Gisborne; "my excessive nervousness (how new a disorder
for me my illness in the summer is the foundation of it) is
the cause I do not write."
She made a beginning with an article for the
Liberal. Shelley's Defence of Poetry was, also,
to be published in the forthcoming number, and
the MS. of this had to be got from England.
She had reason to believe, too, that Oilier, the
publisher, had in his keeping other MSS. of
Shelley's, and she was restlessly desirous to get
possession of all these, feeling convinced that
among them there was nothing perfect, nothing
ready for publication exactly as it stood. In her
over-anxiety she wrote to several people on this
subject, thereby incurring the censure of her father,
whom she had also consulted about her literary
plans. His criticisms on his daughter's style were
not unsound ; she had not been trained in a school
of terseness, and, like many young authors, she
was apt to err on the side of length, and not to see
that she did so.
GODWIN TO MARY.
No. 195 STRAND, \$th November 1822.
MY DEAR MARY I have devoted the last two days to the
seeing everybody an interview with whom would best enable
me to write you a satisfactory letter. Yesterday I saw Hogg
MAR Y WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 5 1
and Mrs. Williams, and to-day Peacock and Hanson junior.
From Hogg I had, among other things, to learn Mrs. Williams'
address, for, owing to your neglect, she had been a fortnight
in London before I knew of her arrival She appeared to be
in better health and better spirits than I expected ; she did
not drop one tear; occasionally she smiled. She is a pic-
turesque little woman, and, as far as I could judge from one
interview, I like her.
Peacock has got Ollier's promise to deliver all Shelley's
manuscripts, and as earnest, he has received Peter Bell and
A Curse on L.E., which he holds at your disposal. By the
way, you should never give one commission but to one per-
son ; you commissioned me to recover these manuscripts from
Oilier, you commissioned Peacock, and, I believe, Mrs. Gis-
borne. This puts us all in an awkward situation. I heard
of Peacock's applying just in time to prevent me from looking
like a fool. Peacock says he cannot make up a parcel for
you till he has been a second time to Marlow on the question,
which cannot be till about Christmas. He appears to me,
not lukewarm, but assiduous. Mrs. Williams told me she
should write to you by this day's post. She had been inquir-
ing in vain for Miss Curran's address you should have re-
ferred her to me for it, but you referred her to me for nothing.
This, by the way, is another instance of your giving one com-
mission to more than one person. You gave -the commission
about Miss Curran to Mrs. Williams and to me. I received
your letter, inclosing one to Miss Curran, 2ist October, which
I immediately forwarded to her by a safe hand, through her
brother. You have probably heard from her by this time;
she is in Paris. ... I have a plan upon the house of Long-
man respecting Castruccio, but that depends upon coin-
cidences, and I must have patience.
You ask my opinion of your literary plans. If you expect
any price, you must think of something new : Manfred is a
subject that nobody interests himself about ; the interest,
therefore, must be made, and no bookseller understands
anything about that contingency. A book about Italy as
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
it is, written with any talent, would be sure to sell ; but
I am afraid you know very little about the present race of
Italians.
As to my own affairs, nothing is determined. I expected
something material to have happened this week, but as yet
I have heard nothing. If the subscription fills, I shall
perhaps be safe; if not, I shall be driven to sea on a
plank.
Perhaps it may be of some use to you if I give you my
opinion of Castruccio. I think there are parts of high genius,
and that your two females are exceedingly interesting ; but I
am not satisfied. Frankenstein was a fine thing ; it was com-
pressed, muscular, and firm ; nothing relaxed and weak ; no
proud flesh. Castruccio is a work of more genius ; but it
appears, in reading, that the first rule you prescribed to your-
self was, I will let it be long. It contains the quantity of
four volumes of Waverley. No hard blow was ever hit with
a woolsack ! Mamma desires me to remember her to you in
the kindest manner, and to say that she feels a deep interest
in everything that concerns you. She means to take the
earliest opportunity to see Mrs. Williams, both as she feels
an earnest sympathy in her calamity, and as she will be likely
to learn a hundred particulars respecting the dispositions and
prospects of yourself and Jane, which she might in vain desire
to learn in any other quarter. You asked Mamma for some
present, a remembrance of your mother. She has reserved
for you a ring of hers, with Fanny Blood's hair set round with
pearls.
You will, of course, rely on it that I will send you the
letters you ask for by Peacock's parcel. Miss Curran's ad-
dress is Hotel de Dusseldorf Rue Petits St. Augustin, a Paris.
Believe me, ever your most affectionate Father,
WILLIAM GODWIN.
My last letter was dated nth October.
Journal, November 10. I have made my first proba-
tion in writing, and it has done me much good, and I
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
53
get more calm ; the stream begins to take to its new channel,
insomuch as to make me fear change. But people must know
little of me who think that, abstractedly, I am content with
my present mode of life. Activity of spirit is my sphere.
But we cannot be active of mind without an object ; and I
have none. I am allowed to have some talent that is suffi-
cient, methinks, to cause my irreparable misery ; for, if one
has genius, what a delight it is to be associated with a
superior ! Mine own Shelley ! the sun knows of none to be
likened to you brave, wise, noble-hearted, full of learning,
tolerance, and love. Love ! what a word for me to write !
yet, my miserable heart, permit me yet to love, to see him
in beauty, to feel him in beauty, to be interpenetrated by the
sense of his excellence ; and thus to love singly, eternally,
ardently, and not fruitlessly; for I am still his still the
chosen one of that blessed spirit still vowed to him for ever
and ever !
November n. It is better to grieve than not to grieve.
Grief at least tells me that I was not always what I am now.
I was once selected for happiness ; let the memory of that
abide by me. You pass by an old ruined house in a desolate
lane, and heed it not. But if you hear that that house is
haunted by a wild and beautiful spirit, it acquires an interest
and beauty of its own.
I shall be glad to be more alone again ; .one ought to see
no one, or many; and, confined to one society, I shall lose
all energy except that which I possess from my own resources ;
and I must be alone for those to be put in activity.
A cold heart ! Have I a cold heart ? God knows ! But
none need envy the icy region this heart encircles ; and at
least the tears are hot which the emotions of this cold heart
forces me to shed. A cold heart ! yes, it would be cold
enough if all were as I wished it cold, or burning in the
flame for whose sake I forgive this, and would forgive every
other imputation that flame in which your heart, beloved,
lay unconsumed. My heart is very full to-night.
I shall write his life, and thus occupy myself in the only
54 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
manner from which I can derive consolation. That will be
a task that may convey some balm. What though I weep ?
All is better than inaction and not forgetful ness that never
is but an inactivity of remembrance.
And you, my own boy ! I am about to begin a task which,
if you live, will be an invaluable treasure to you in after times.
I must collect my materials, and then, in the commemoration
of the divine virtues of your Father, I shall fulfil the only act
of pleasure there remains for me, and be ready to follow you,
if you leave me, my task being fulfilled. I have lived ; rap-
ture, exultation, content all the varied changes of enjoyment
have been mine. It is all gone ; but still, the airy paintings
of what it has gone through float by, and distance shall not
dim them. If I were alone, I had already begun what I had
determined to do ; but I must have patience, and for those
events my memory is brass, my thoughts a never -tired en-
graver. France Poverty A few days of solitude, and some
uneasiness A tranquil residence in a beautiful spot Switzer-
land Bath Marlow Milan the Baths of Lucca Este
Venice Rome Naples Rome and misery Leghorn
Florence Pisa Solitude The Williams' The Baths Pisa:
these are the heads of chapters, and each containing a tale
romantic beyond romance.
I no longer enjoy, but I love. Death cannot deprive me
of that living spark which feeds on all given it, and which is
now triumphant in sorrow. I love, and shall enjoy happiness
again. I do not doubt that ; but when ?
These fragments of journal give the course
of her inward reflections ; her letters sometimes
supply the clue to her outward life, au jour le jour.
MARY SHELLEY TO CLARE CLAIRMONT.
2O//J December 1822.
MY DEAR CLARE I have delayed writing to you so long
for two reasons. First, I have every day expected to hear
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
55
from you ; and secondly, I wished to hear something decisive
from England to communicate to you. But I have waited in
vain for both things. You do not write, and I begin to despair
of ever hearing from you again. A few words will tell you all
that has been done in England. When I wrote to you last, I
think that I told you that Lord Byron had written to Hanson,
bidding him call upon Whitton. Hanson wrote to Whitton
desiring an interview, which Whitton declined, requesting
Hanson to make his application by letter, which Hanson has
done, and I know no more. This does not look like an abso-
lute refusal, but Sir Timothy is so capricious that we cannot
trust to appearances.
And now the chapter about myself is finished, for what can
I say of my present life ? The weather is bitterly cold with a
sharp wind, very unlike dear, carissima Pisa ; but soft airs and
balmy gales are not the attributes of Genoa, which place I
daily and duly join Marianne in detesting. There is but one
fireplace in the house, and although people have been for a
month putting up a stove in my room, it smokes too much to
permit of its being lighted. So I am obliged to pass the
greater part of my time in Hunt's sitting-room, which is, as
you may guess, the annihilation of study, and even of pleasure
to a great degree. For, after all, Hunt does not like me : it
is both our faults, and I do not blame him, but so it is. I
rise at 9, breakfast, work, read, and if I can at all endure
the cold, copy my Shelley's MSS. in my own room, and if
possible walk before dinner. After that I work, read Greek,
etc., till 10, when Hunt and Marianne go to bed. Then I
am alone. Then the stream of thought, which has struggled
against its argine all through the busy day, makes a piena, and
sorrow and memory and imagination, despair, and hope in
despair, are the winds and currents that impel it. I am alone,
and myself; and then I begin to say, as I ever feel, "How I
hate life ! What a mockery it is to rise, to walk, to feed, and
then go to rest, and in all this a statue might do my part. One
thing alone may or can awake me, and that is study ; the rest
is all nothing." And so it is ! I am silent and serious.
56 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Absorbed in my own thoughts, what am I then in this world
if my spirit live not to learn and become better ? That is the
whole of my destiny; I look to nothing else. For I dare
not look to my little darling other than as not the sword of
Damocles, that is a wrong simile, or to a wrecked seaman's
plank true, he stands, and only he, between me and the sea
of eternity ; but I long for that plunge ! No, I fear for him
pain, disappointment, all, all fear.
You see how it is, it is near n, and my good friends
repose. This is the hour when I can think, unobtruded
upon, and these thoughts, malgrk mot, will stain this paper.
But then, my dear Clare, I have nothing else except my
nothingless self to talk about. You have doubtless heard
from Jane, and I have heard from no one else. I see no
one. The Guiccioli and Lord Byron once a month.
Trelawny seldom, and he is on the eve of his departure for
Leghorn. . . .
Marianne suffers during this dreadfully cold weather, but
less than I should have supposed. The children are all well.
So also is my Percy, poor little darling : they all scold him
because he speaks loud a fltalien. People love to, nay, they
seem to exist on, finding fault with others, but I have no right
to complain, and this unlucky stove is the sole source of all
my dispiacere ; if I had that, I should not tease any one, or
any one me, or my only one ; but after all, these are trifles. I
have sent for another ingeniere, and I hope, before many
days are elapsed, to retire as before to my hole.
I have again delayed finishing this letter, waiting for letters
from England, that I might not send you one so barren of all
intelligence. But I have had none. And nothing new has
happened except Trelawny's departure for Leghorn, so that our
days are more monotonous than ever. The weather is drearily
cold, and an eternal north-east whistles through every crevice.
Percy, however, is far better in this cold than in summer ; he
is warmly clothed, and gets on.
Adieu. Pray write. My love to Charles ; I am ashamed
MA R Y WOLLS TO NEC R A FT SHELLE Y
57
that I do not write to him, but I have only an old story to
repeat, and this letter tells that. Affectionately yours,
MARY SHELLEY.
Journal, December 31. So this year comes to an end.
Shelley, beloved ! the year has a new name from any
thou knewest. When spring arrives leaves you never saw
will shadow the ground, and flowers you never beheld will
star it; the grass will be of another growth, and the birds
sing a new song the aged earth dates with a new number.
Sometimes I thought that fortune had relented towards us ;
that your health would have improved, and that fame and joy
would have been yours, for, when well, you extracted from
Nature alone an endless delight. The various threads of our
existence seemed to be drawing to one point, and there to
assume a cheerful hue.
Again, I think that your gentle spirit was too much wounded
by the sharpness of this world ; that your disease was incur-
able, and that in a happy time you became the partaker of
cloudless days, ceaseless hours, and infinite love. Thy name
is added to the list which makes the earth bold in her age and
proud of what has been. Time, with unwearied but slow feet,
guides her to the goal that thou hast reached, and I, her un-
happy child, am advanced still nearer the hour when my
earthly dress shall repose near thine, beneath the tomb of
Cestius.
It must have been at about this time that
Mary wrote the sad, retrospective poem entitled
"The Choice."
THE CHOICE.
My Choice ! My Choice, alas ! was had and gone
With the red gleam of last autumnal sun ;
Lost in that deep wherein he bathed his head,
My choice, my life, my hope together fled :
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
A wanderer here, no more I seek a home,
The sky a vault, and Italy a tomb.
Yet as some days a pilgrim I remain,
Linked to my orphan child by love's strong chain ;
And, since I have a faith that I must earn,
By suffering and by patience, a return
Of that companionship and love, which first
Upon my young life's cloud like sunlight burst,
And now has left me, dark, as when its beams,
Quenched in the might of dreadful ocean streams,
Leave that one cloud, a gloomy speck on high,
Beside one star in the else darkened sky ;
Since I must live, how would I pass the day,
How meet with fewest tears the morning's ray,
How sleep with calmest dreams, how find delights,
As fireflies gleam through interlunar nights ?
First let me call on thee ! Lost as thou art,
Thy name aye fills my sense, thy love my heart.
Oh, gentle Spirit ! thou hast often sung,
How fallen on evil days thy heart was wrung ;
Now fierce remorse and unreplying death
Waken a chord within my heart, whose breath,
Thrilling and keen, in accents audible
A tale of unrequited love doth tell.
It was not anger, while thy earthly dress
Encompassed still thy soul's rare loveliness,
All anger was atoned by many a kind
Caress or tear, that spoke the softened mind.
It speaks of cold neglect, averted eyes,
That blindly crushed thy soul's fond sacrifice :
My heart was all thine own, but yet a shell
Closed in its core, which seemed impenetrable,
Till sharp-toothed misery tore the husk in twain,
Which gaping lies, nor may unite again.
Forgive me ! let thy love descend in dew
Of soft repentance and regret most true ;
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
59
In a strange guise thou dost descend, or how
Could love soothe fell remorse, as it does now ?
By this remorse and love, and by the years
Through which we shared our common hopes and fears,
By all our best companionship, I dare
Call on thy sacred name without a fear ;
And thus I pray to thee, my friend, my Heart !
That in thy new abode, thou'lt bear a part
In soothing thy poor Mary's lonely pain,
As link by link she weaves her heavy chain !
And thou, strange star ! ascendant at my birth,
Which rained, they said, kind influence on the earth,
So from great parents sprung, I dared to boast
Fortune my friend, till set, thy beams were lost !
And thou, Inscrutable, by whose decree
Has burst this hideous storm of misery !
Here let me cling, here to the solitudes,
These myrtle-shaded streams and chestnut woods ;
Tear me not hence here let me live and die,
In my adopted land my country Italy.
A happy Mother first I saw this sun,
Beneath this sky my race of joy was run.
First my sweet girl, whose face resembled his,
Slept on bleak Lido, near Venetian seas.
Yet still my eldest-born, my loveliest, dearest,
Clung to my side, most joyful then when nearest.
An English home had given this angel birth,
Near those royal towers, where the grass-clad earth
Is shadowed o'er by England's loftiest trees :
Then our companion o'er the swift-passed seas,
He dwelt beside the Alps, or gently slept,
Rocked by the waves, o'er which our vessel swept,
Beside his father, nurst upon my breast,
While Leman's waters shook with fierce unrest.
His fairest limbs had bathed in Serchio's stream ;
His eyes had watched Italian lightnings gleam ;
6o
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
His childish voice had, with its loudest call,
The echoes waked of Este's castle wall ;
Had paced Pompeii's Roman market-place ;
Had gazed with infant wonder on the grace
Of stone-wrought deities, and pictured saints,
In Rome's high palaces there were no taints
Of ruin on his cheek all shadowless
Grim death approached the boy met his caress,
And while his glowing limbs with life's warmth shone,
Around those limbs his icy arms were thrown.
His spoils were strewed beneath the soil of Rome,
Whose flowers now star the dark earth near his tomb :
Its airs and plants received the mortal part,
His spirit beats within his mother's heart.
Infant immortal ! chosen for the sky !
No grief upon thy brow's young purity
Entrenched sad lines, or blotted with its might
The sunshine of thy smile's celestial light ;
The image shattered, the bright spirit fled,
Thou shin'st the evening star among the dead.
And thou, his playmate, whose deep lucid eyes,
Were a reflection of these bluest skies ;
Child of our hearts, divided in ill hour,
We could not watch the bud's expanding flower,
Now thou art gone, one guileless victim more,
To the black death that rules this sunny shore.
Companion of my griefs ! thy sinking frame
Had often drooped, and then erect again
With shows of health had mocked forebodings dark ;
Watching the changes of that quivering spark,
I feared and hoped, and dared to trust at length,
Thy very weakness was my tower of strength.
Methought thou wert a spirit from the sky,
Which struggled with its chains, but could not die,
And that destruction had no power to win
From out those limbs the soul that burnt within.
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 6 1
Tell me, ye ancient walls, and weed-grown towers,
Ye Roman airs and brightly painted flowers,
Does not his spirit visit that recess
Which built of love enshrines his earthly dress ?
No more ! no more ! what though that form be fled,
My trembling hand shall never write thee dead
Thou liv'st in Nature, Love, my Memory,
With deathless faith for aye adoring thee,
The wife of Time no more, I wed Eternity.
'Tis thus the Past on which my spirit leans,
Makes dearest to my soul Italian scenes.
In Tuscan fields the winds in odours steeped
From flowers and cypresses, when skies have wept,
Shall, like the notes of music once most dear,
Which brings the unstrung voice upon my ear
Of one beloved, to memory display
Past scenes, past hopes, past joys, in long array.
Pugnano's trees, beneath whose shade he stood,
The pools reflecting Pisa's old pine wood,
The fireflies beams, the aziola's cry
All breathe his spirit which can never die.
Such memories have linked these hills and caves,
These woodland paths, and streams, and knelling waves
Past to each sad pulsation of my breast,
And made their melancholy arms the haven of my rest.
Here will I live, within a little dell,
Which but a month ago I saw full well :
A dream then pictured forth the solitude
Deep in the shelter of a lovely wood ;
A voice then whispered a strange prophecy,
My dearest, widowed friend, that thou and I
Should there together pass the weary day,
As we before have done in Spezia's bay,
As though long hours we watched the sails that neared
O'er the far sea, their vessel ne'er appeared ;
62 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
One pang of agony, one dying gleam
Of hope led us along, beside the ocean stream,
But keen-eyed fear, the while all hope departs,
Stabbed with a million stings our heart of hearts.
The sad revolving year has not allayed
The poison of these bleeding wounds, or made
The anguish less of that corroding thought
Which has with grief each single moment fraught.
Edward, thy voice was hushed thy noble heart
With aspiration heaves no more a part
Of heaven-resumed past thou art become,
Thy spirit waits with his in our far home.
Trelawny had departed for Leghorn and his
favourite Maremma, en route for Rome, where, by
his untiring zeal for the fit interment of Shelley's
ashes, he once more earned Mary's undying grati-
tude. The ashes, which had been temporarily
consigned to the care of Mr. Freeborn, British
Consul at Rome, had, before Trelawny arrived,
been buried in the Protestant cemetery : the grave
was amidst a cluster of others. In a niche-
formed by two buttresses in the old Roman wall,
immediately under an ancient pyramid, said to be
the tomb of Caius Cestius, Trelawny (having pur-
chased the recess) built two tombs. In one
of these the box containing Shelley's ashes was
deposited, and all was covered over with solid
stone. The details of the transaction, which
extended over several months, are supplied in his
letters.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
63
TRELAWNY TO MARY SHELLEY.
PIOMBINO, ith and nth January 1823.
Thus far into the bowels of the land
Have we marched on without impediment.
DEAR MARY SHELLEY Pardon my tardiness in writing,
which from day to day I have postponed, having no other
cause to plead than idleness. On my arrival at Leghorn I
called on Grant, and was much grieved to find our fears well
founded, to wit, that nothing definitely had been done. Grant
had not heard from his correspondent at Rome after his first
statement of the difficulties ; the same letter that was enclosed
me and read by you he (Grant) had written, but not received
a reply. I then requested Grant to write and say that I would
be at Rome in a month or five weeks, and if I found the
impediments insurmountable, I would resume possession of
the ashes, if on the contrary, to personally fulfil your wishes,
and in the meantime to deposit them secure from molestation,
so that, without Grant writes to me, I shall say nothing more
till I am at Rome, which will be early in February. In the
meantime Roberts and myself are sailing along the coast,
shooting, and visiting the numerous islands in our track. We
have been here some days, living at the miserable hut of a
cattle dealer on the marshes, near this wretched town, well
situated for sporting. To-morrow we cross- over to Elba,
thence to Corsica, and so return along the Maremma, up the
Tiber in the boat, to Rome. . . .
... I like this Maremma, it is lonely and desolate, thinly
populated, particularly after Genoa, where human brutes are
so abundant that the air is dense with their garlic breath, and
it is impossible to fly the nuisance. Here there is solitude
enough : there are less of the human form here in midday
than at Genoa midnight : besides, this vagabond life has
restored my health. Next year I will get a tent, and spend
my winter in these marshes. . . .
. . . Dear Mary, of all those that I know of, or you have
64 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
told me of, as connected with you, there is not one now living
has so tender a friendship for you as I have. I have the far
greater claims on you, and I shall consider it as a breach of
friendship should you employ any one else in services that I
can execute.
My purse, my person, my extremest means
Lye all unlocked to your occasion.
I hope you know my heart so well as to make all professions
needless. To serve you will ever be the greatest pleasure I
can experience, and nothing could interrupt the almost un-
mingled pleasure I have received from our first meeting but
you concealing your difficulties or wishes from me. With
kindest remembrances to my good friends the Hunts, to whom
I am sincerely attached, and love and salaam to Lord Byron,
I am your very sincere EDWARD TRELAWNY.
" Indeed, I do believe, my dear Trelawny," wrote Mary in
reply, on the 3oth of January 1823, "that you are the best
friend I have, and most truly would I rather apply to you in
any difficulty than to any one else, for I know your heart, and
rely on it. At present I am very well off, having still a
considerable residue of the money I brought with me from
Pisa, and besides, I have received ^33 from the Liberal,
Part of this I have been obliged to send to Clare. You will
be sorry to hear that the last account she has sent of herself
is that she has been seriously ill. The cold of Vienna
has doubtless contributed to this, as it is even a dangerous
aggravation of her old complaint. I wait anxiously to hear
from her. I sent her fifteen napoleons, and shall send more if
necessary and if I can. Lord B. continues kind : he has
made frequent offers of money. I do not want it, as you see."
Journal, February 2nd. On the 2ist of January those
rites were fulfilled. Shelley ! my own beloved ! you rest
beneath the blue sky of Rome ; in that, at least, I am
satisfied.
What matters it that they cannot find the grave of my
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 65
William ? That spot is sanctified by the presence of his pure
earthly vesture, and that is sufficient at least, it must be.
I am too truly miserable to dwell on what at another time
might have made me unhappy. He is beneath the tomb of
Cestius. I see the spot.
February 3. A storm has come across me ; a slight
circumstance has disturbed the deceitful calm of which I
boasted. I thought I heard my Shelley call me not my
Shelley in heaven, but my Shelley, my companion in my daily
tasks. I was reading ; I heard a voice say, " Mary ! " " It is
Shelley," I thought ; the revulsion was of agony. Never
more. . . .
Mrs. Shelley's affairs now assumed an aspect
which made her foresee the ultimate advisability,
if not necessity, of returning to England. Sir
Timothy Shelley had declined giving any answer
to the application made to him for an allowance
for his son's widow and child; and Lord Byron, as
Shelley's executor, had written to him directly for
a decisive answer, which he obtained.
SIR TIMOTHY SHELLEY TO LORD BYRON.
FIELD PLACE, 6th February 1823.
MY LORD I have received your Lordship's letter, and my
solicitor, Mr. Whitton, has this day shown me copies of cer-
tificates of the marriage of Mrs. Shelley and of the baptism
of her little boy, and also, a short abstract of my son's will,
as the same have been handed to him by Mr. Hanson.
The mind of my son was withdrawn from me and my
immediate family by unworthy and interested individuals, when
he was about nineteen, and after a while he was led into a
new society and forsook his first associates.
In this new society he forgot every feeling of duty and
respect to me and to Lady Shelley.
VOL. ii 28
66 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Mrs. Shelley was, I have been told, the intimate friend
of my son in the lifetime of his first wife, and to the time of
her death, and in no small degree, as I suspect, estranged
my son's mind from his family, and all his first duties in
life ; with that impression on my mind, I cannot agree with
your Lordship that, though my son was unfortunate, Mrs.
Shelley is innocent ; on the contrary, I think that her conduct
was the very reverse of what it ought to have been, and
I must, therefore, decline all interference in matters in
which Mrs. Shelley is interested. As to the child, I am
inclined to afford the means of a suitable protection and care
of him in this country, if he shall be placed with a person I
shall approve ; but your Lordship will allow me to say that
the means I can furnish will be limited, as I have important
duties to perform towards others, which I cannot forget.
I have thus plainly told your Lordship my determination,
in the hope that I may be spared from all further correspond-
ence on a subject so distressing to me and my family.
With respect to the will and certificates, I have no obser-
vation to make. I have left them with Mr. Whitton, and if
anything is necessary to be done with them on my part, he will,
I am sure, do it. I have the honour, my Lord, to be your
Lordship's most obedient humble servant, p SHELLEY
Granting the point of view from which it was
written, this letter, though hard, was not unnatural.
The author of Adonais was, to Sir Timothy, a
common reprobate, a prodigal who, having gone
into a far country, would have devoured his father's
living could he have got it with harlots ; but
who had come there to well-deserved grief, and
for whose widow even husks were too good. To
any possible colouring or modification of this view
he had resolutely shut his eyes and ears. No
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 67
modification of his conclusions was, therefore, to
be looked for.
But neither could it be expected that his point
of view should be intelligible to Mary. Nor did
it commend itself to Godwin. It would have been
as little for his daughter's interest as for her
happiness to surrender the custody of her child.
MARY SHELLEY TO LORD BYRON.
MY DEAR LORD BYRON . . . It appears to me that the
mode in which Sir Timothy Shelley expresses himself about
my child plainly shows by what mean principles he would be
actuated. He does not offer him an asylum in his own house,
but a beggarly provision under the care of a stranger.
Setting aside that, I would not part with him. Something
is due to me. I should not live ten days separated from him.
If it were necessary for me to die for his benefit the sacrifice
would be easy ; but his delicate frame requires all a mother's
solicitude ; nor shall he be deprived of my anxious love and
assiduous attention to his happiness while I have it in my
power to bestow it on him ; not to mention that his future
respect for his excellent Father and his moral wellbeing
greatly depend upon his being away from the immediate in-
fluence of his relations.
This, perhaps, you will think nonsense, and it is inconceiv-
ably painful to me to discuss a point which appears to me as
clear as noonday; besides I lose all all honourable station
and name when I admit that I am not a fitting person to
take charge of my infant. The insult is keen ; the pretence
of heaping it upon me too gross ; the advantage to them, if
the will came to be contested, would be too immense.
As a matter of feeling, I would never consent to it. I am
said to have a cold heart ; there are feelings, however, so
strongly implanted in my nature that, to root them out, life
will go with it. Most truly yours, MARY SHELLEY.
68 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
GODWIN TO MRS. SHELLEY,
STRAND, \\th February 1823.
MY DEAR MARY I have this moment received a copy of
Sir Timothy Shelley's letter to Lord Byron, dated 6th Febru-
ary, and which, therefore, you will have seen long before this
reaches you. You will easily imagine how anxious I am to
hear from you, and to know the state of your feelings under
this, which seems like the last, blow of fate.
I need not, of course, attempt to assist your judgment
upon the proposition of taking the child from you. I am
sure your feelings would never allow you to entertain such a
proposition.
I requested you to let Lord Byron's letter to Sir Timothy
Shelley pass through my hands, and you did so ; but to my
great mortification, it reached me sealed with his Lordship's
arms, so that I remained wholly ignorant of its contents.
If you could send me a copy, I should be then much better
acquainted with your present situation.
Your novel is now fully printed and ready for publication,
I have taken great liberties with it, and I fear your amour
propre will be proportionately shocked. I need not tell you
that all the merit of the book is exclusively your own.
Beatrice is the jewel of the book; not but that I greatly
admire Euthanasia, and I think the characters of Pepi, Binda,
and the witch decisive efforts of original genius. I am pro-
mised a character of the work in the Morning Chronicle and
the Herald, and was in hopes to have sent you the one or the
other by this time. I also sent a copy of the book to the
Examiner for the same purpose.
Tuesday r , i8//5 February.
Do not, I entreat you, be cast down about your worldly
circumstances. You certainly contain within yourself the
means of your subsistence. Your talents are truly extraordinary.
Frankenstein is universally known, and though it can never be
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 69
a book for vulgar reading, is everywhere respected. It is the
most wonderful work to have been written at twenty years of
age that I ever heard of. You are now five and twenty, and,
most fortunately, you have pursued a course of reading, and
cultivated your mind, in a manner the most admirably adapted
to make you a great and successful author. If you cannot be
independent, who should be ?
Your talents, as far as I can at present discern, are turned
for the writing of fictitious adventures.
If it shall ever happen to you to be placed in sudden and
urgent want of a small sum, I entreat you to let me know im-
mediately ; we must see what I can do. We must help one
another. Your affectionate Father, WILLIAM GODWIN.
Mary felt the truth of what her father said,
but, wounded and embittered as she was, she had
little heart for framing plans.
Journal, February 24. Evils throng around me, my
beloved, and I have indeed lost all in losing thee. Were
it not for my child, this would be rather a soothing reflection,
and, if starvation were my fate, I should fulfil that fate without
a sigh. But our child demands all my care now that you have
left us. I must be all to him : the Father, death has deprived
him of; the relations, the bad world permits him not to have.
What is yet in store for me ? Am I to close the eyes of our
boy, and then join you ?
The last weeks have been spent in quiet. Study could
not give repose to, but somewhat regulated, my thoughts. I
said : "I lead an innocent life, and it may become a useful
one. I have talent, I will .improve that talent; and if, while
meditating on the wisdom of ages, and storing my mind with
all that has been recorded of it, any new light bursts upon me,
or any discovery occurs that may be useful to my fellows, then
the balm of utility may be added to innocence.
What is it that moves up and down in my soul, and makes
70 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
me feel as if my intellect could master all but my fate ? I
fear it is only youthful ardour the yet untamed spirit which,
wholly withdrawn from the hopes, and almost from the affec-
tions of life, indulges itself in the only walk free to it, and,
mental exertion being all my thought except regret, would
make me place my hopes in that. I am indeed become a
recluse in thought and act ; and my mind, turned heavenward,
would, but for my only tie, lose all commune with what is
around me. If I be proud, yet it is with humility that I am
so. I am not vain. My heart shakes with its suppressed
emotions, and I flag beneath the thoughts that oppress me.
Each day, as I have taken my solitary walk, I have felt
myself exalted with the idea of occupation, improvement,
knowledge, and peace. Looking back to my life as a delicious
dream, I steeled myself as well as I could against such severe
regrets as should overthrow my calmness. Once or twice,
pausing in my walk, I have exclaimed in despair, " Is it even
so?" yet, for the most part resigned, I was occupied by re-
flection on those ideas you, my beloved, planted in my
mind and meditated on our nature, our source, and our
destination. To-day, melancholy would invade me, and I
thought the peace I enjoyed was transient. Then that letter
came to place its seal on my prognostications. Yet it was
not the refusal, or the insult heaped upon me, that stung me
to tears. It was their bitter words about our Boy. Why, I
live only to keep him from their hands. How dared they
dream that I held him not far more precious than all, save
the hope of again seeing you, my lost one. But for his smiles,
where should I now be ?
Stars that shine unclouded, ye cannot tell me what will be
yet I can tell you a part. I may have misgivings, weak-
nesses, and momentary lapses into unworthy despondency,
but save in devotion towards my Boy fortune has emptied
her quiver, and to all her future shafts I oppose courage, hope-
lessness of aught on this side, with a firm trust in what is be-
yond the grave.
Visit me in my dreams to-night, my beloved Shelley ! kind,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 71
loving, excellent as thou wert ! and the event of this day shall
be forgotten.
March 19. As I have until now recurred to this book
to discharge into it the overflowings of a mind too full of
the bitterest waters of life, so will I to-night, now that I am
calm, put down some of my milder reveries ; that, when I turn
it over, I may not only find a record of the most painful
thoughts that ever filled a human heart even to distraction.
I am beginning seriously to educate myself ; and in another
place I have marked the scope of this somewhat tardy educa-
tion, intellectually considered. In a moral point of view,
this education is of some years' standing, and it only now
takes the form of seeking its food in books. I have long
accustomed myself to the study of my own heart, and have
sought and found in its recesses that which cannot embody
itself in words hardly in feelings. I have found strength in
the conception of its faculties ; much native force in the
understanding of them ; and what appears to me not a con-
temptible penetration in the subtle divisions of good and evil.
But I have found less strength of self-support, of resistance to
what is vulgarly called temptation ; yet I think also that I
have found true humility (for surely no one can be less pre-
sumptuous than I), an ardent love for the immutable laws
of right, much native goodness of emotion, and purity of
thought.
Enough, if every day I gain a profounder knowledge of my
defects, and a more certain method of turning them to a good
direction.
Study has become to me more necessary than the air I
breathe. In the questioning and searching turn it gives to my
thoughts, I find some relief to wild reverie ; in the self-satis-
faction I feel in commanding myself, I find present solace ; in
the hope that thence arises, that I may become more worthy
of my Shelley, I find a consolation that even makes me less
wretched than in my most wretched moments.
March 30. I have now finished part of the Odyssey. I
mark this. I cannot write. Day after day I suffer the most
72 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
tremendous agitation. I cannot write, or read, or think.
Whether it be the anxiety for letters that shakes a frame not
so strong as hitherto whether it be my annoyances here
whether it be my regrets, my sorrow, and despair, or all these
I know not ; but I am a wreck.
A letter from Trelawny gladdened her heart.
It said
I must confess I am to blame in not having sooner written,
particularly as I have received two letters from you here.
Nothing particular has happened to me since our parting but
a desperate assault of Maremma fever, which had nearly
reunited me to my friends, or, as lago says, removed me.
On my arrival here, my first object was to see the grave of
the noble Shelley, and I was most indignant at finding him
confusedly mingled in a heap with five or six common vaga-
bonds. I instantly set about removing this gross neglect,
and selecting the only interesting spot. I enclosed it apart
from all possibility of sacrilegious intrusion, and removed his
ashes to it, placed a stone over it, am now planting it, and
have ordered a granite to be prepared for myself, which I
shall place in this beautiful recess (of which the enclosed is a
drawing I took), for when I am dead, I have none to do me
this service, so shall at least give one instance in my life of
proficiency.
In reply Mary wrote informing him of her
change of plan, and begging for all minute details
about the tomb, which she was not likely, now, to
see. Trelawny was expecting soon to rejoin
Byron at Genoa, but he wrote at once.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
ROME, 27/7* April 1823.
DEAR MARY I should have sooner replied to your last,
but that I concluded you must have seen Roberts, who is or
MAR Y WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 73
ought to be at Genoa. He will tell you that the ashes
are buried in the new enclosed Protestant burying -ground,
which is protected by a wall and gates from every possible
molestation, and that the ashes are so placed apart,
and yet in the centre and most conspicuous spot of the
burying-ground. I have just planted six young cypresses and
four laurels, in front of the recess you see by the drawing is
formed by two projecting parts of the old ruin. My own
stone, a plain slab till I can decide on some fitting inscrip-
tion, is placed on the left hand. I have likewise dug my
grave, so that, when I die, there is only to lift up my coverlet
and roll me into it. You may lie on the other side, if you
like. It is a lovely spot. The only inscription on Shelley's
stone, besides the Cor cordium of Hunt, are the lines I have
added from Shakespeare
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
This quotation, by its double meaning, alludes both to the
manner of his death and his genius, and I think the element
on which his soul took wing, and the subtle essence of his
being mingled, may still retain him in some other shape.
The waters may keep the dead, as the earth may, and fire
and air. His passionate fondness might have been from
some secret sympathy in their natures. Thence the fascina-
tion which so forcibly attracted him, without fear or caution,
to trust an element almost all others hold in superstitious
dread, and venture as cautiously on as they would in a lair of
lions. I have just compiled an epitaph for Keats and sent it
to Severn, who likes it much better than the one he had
designed. He had already designed a lyre with only two of
the strings strung, as indicating the unaccomplished maturity
and ripening of his genius. He had intended a long inscrip-
tion about his death having been caused by the neglect of his
countrymen, and that, as a mark of his displeasure, he said
thus and then. What I wished to substitute is simply
thus
74
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Here lies the spoils
of a
Young English Poet,
" Whose master-hand is cold, whose silver lyre unstrung,"
And by whose desire is inscribed,
That his name was writ in water.
The line quoted, you remember, is in Shelley, Adonais,
and the last Keats desired might be engraved on his tomb.
Ask Hunt if he thinks it will do, and to think of something
to put on my ante-dated grave. I am very anxious to hear
how Marianne is getting on, and Hunt. You never mention
a word of them or the Liberal.
I have been delayed here longer than I had intended, from
want of money, having lent and given it away thoughtlessly.
However, old Dunn has sent me a supply, so I shall go on to
Florence on Monday. I will assuredly see you before you
go, and, if my exchequer is not exhausted, go part of the way
with you. However, I will write further on this topic at
Florence. Do not go to England, to encounter poverty and
bitter retrospections. Stay in Italy. I will most gladly share
my income with you, and if, under the same circumstances,
you would do the same by me, why then you will not hesitate
to accept it. I know of nothing would give me half so much
pleasure. As you say, in a few years we shall both be better
off. Commend me to Marianne and Hunt, and believe me,
yours affectionately, E. TRELAWNY.
Poste Restante a Genes.
You need not tell me that all your thoughts are concen-
trated on the memory of your loss, for I have observed it,
with great regret and some astonishment. You tell me nothing
in your letters of how the Liberal is getting on. Why do you
not send me a number ? How many have come out ? Does
Hunt stay at Genoa the summer, and what does Lord Byron
determine on ? I am told the Bolivar is lent to some one,
and at sea. Where is Jane? and is Mrs. Hunt likely to
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 75
recover ? I shall certainly go on to Switzerland if I can raise
the wind.
MARY SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
loth May 1823.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY You appear to have fulfilled my entire
wish in all you have done at Rome. Do you remember the
day you made that quotation from Shakespeare in our living
room at Pisa ? Mine own Shelley was delighted with it, and
thus it has for me a pleasing association. Some time hence
I may visit the spot which, of all others, I desire most to see.
It is not on my own account, my excellent friend, that I
go to England. I believe that my child's interests will be
best consulted by my return to that country. . . .
Desiring solitude and my books only, together with the
consciousness that I have one or two friends who, although
absent, still think of me with affection, England of course
holds out no inviting prospect to me. But I am sure to be
rewarded in doing or suffering for my little darling, so I am
resigned to this last act, which seems to snap the sole link
which bound the present to the past, and to tear aside the
veil which I have endeavoured to draw over the desolations
of my situation. Your kindness I shall treasure up to comfort
me in future ill I shall repeat to myself, I have such a friend,
and endeavour to deserve it.
Do you go to Greece ? Lord Byron continues in the same
mind. The G is an obstacle, and certainly her situation
is rather a difficult one. But he does not seem disposed to
make a mountain of her resistance, and he is far more able to
take a decided than a petty step in contradiction to the wishes
of those about him. If you do go, it may hasten your return
hither. I remain until Mrs. Hunt's confinement is over ; had
it not been for that, the fear of a hot journey would have
caused me to go in this month, but my desire to be useful
to her, and my anxiety concerning the event of so momentous
76 777^ LIFE AND LETTERS OF
a crisis has induced me to stay. You may think with what
awe and terror I look forward to the decisive moment, but I
hope for the best. She is as well, perhaps better, than we
could in any way expect.
I had no opportunity to send you a second No. of the
Liberal ; we only received it a short time ago, and then you
were on the wing : the third number has come out, and we
had a copy by post. It has little in it we expected, but it is
an amusing number, and L. B. is better pleased with it than
any other. . . .
I trust that I shall see you soon, and then I shall hear all
your news. I shall see you but it will be for so short a time
I fear even that you will not go to Switzerland ; but these
things I must not dwell upon, partings and separations,
when there is no circumstance to lessen any pang. I must
brace my mind, not enervate it, for I know I shall have much
to endure.
I asked Hunt's opinion about your epitaph for Keats ; he
said that the line from Adonais, though beautiful in itself,
might be applied to any poet, in whatever circumstances or
whatever age, that died ; and that to be in accord with the
two-stringed lyre, you ought to select one that alluded to his
youth and immature genius. A line to this effect you might
find in Adonais.
Among the fragments of my lost Shelley, I found the
following poetical commentary on the words of Keats, not
that I recommend it for the epitaph, but it may please you to
see it.
Here lieth one, whose name was writ in water,
But, ere the breath that could erase it blew,
Death, in remorse for that fell slaughter,
Death, the immortalising winter, flew
Athwart the stream, and time's mouthless torrent grew
A scroll of crystal, emblazoning the name
Of Adonais.
I have not heard from Jane lately ; she was well when she
last wrote, but annoyed by various circumstances, and im-
patient of her lengthened stay in England. How earnestly
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 77
do I hope that Edward's brother will soon arrive, and show
himself worthy of his affinity to the noble and unequalled
creature she has lost, by protecting one to whom protection
is so necessary, and shielding her from some of the ills to
which she is exposed.
Adieu, my dear Trelawny. Continue to think kindly of
me, and trust in my unalterable friendship.
MARY SHELLEY.
Albaro, loth May.
On his journey to Genoa, Trelawny stayed a
night at Lerici, and paid a last visit to the Villa
Magni. There, "sleeping still on the mud floor,"
its mast and oars broken, was Shelley's little skiff,
the " Boat on the Serchio."
He mounted the "stairs, or rather ladder,"
into the dining-room.
As I surveyed its splotchy walls, broken floor, cracked
ceiling, and poverty-struck appearance, while I noted the
loneliness of the situation, and remembered the fury of the
waves that in blowing weather lashed its walls, I did not
marvel at Mrs. Shelley's and Mrs. Williams' groans on first
entering it ; nor that it had required all Ned Williams' per-
suasive powers to induce them to stop there. -
But these things were all far away in the
past.
As music and splendour
Survive not the lamp and the lute,
The heart's echoes render
No song when the spirit is mute.
No song but sad dirges,
Like the wind through a ruined cell,
Or the mournful surges
That ring the dead seaman's knell.
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
At Genoa he found the " Pilgrim " in a state of
supreme indecision. He had left him discon-
tented when he departed in December. The
new magazine was not a success. Byron had
expected that other literary and journalistic ad-
vantages, leading to fame and power, would
accrue to him from the coalition with Leigh
Hunt and Shelley, but in this he was disappointed,
and he was left to bear the responsibility of the
partnership alone.
"The death of Shelley and the failure of the Liberal irri-
tated Byron," writes Trelawny; "the cuckoo -note, 'I told
you so,' sung by his friends, and the loud crowing of enemies,
by no means allayed his ill humour. In this frame of mind
he was continually planning how to extricate himself. His
plea for hoarding was that he might have a good round
tangible sum of current coin to aid him in any emergency. . . .
" He exhausted himself in planning, projecting, beginning,
wishing, intending, postponing, regretting, and doing nothing :
the unready are fertile in excuses, and his were inexhaustible."
Since that time he had been flattered and per-
suaded into joining the Greek Committee, formed
in London to aid the Greeks in their war of inde-
pendence. Byron's name and great popularity
would be a tower of strength to them. Their
proposals came to him at a right moment, when
he was dissatisfied with himself and his position.
He hesitated for months before committing him-
self, and finally summoned Trelawny, in peremp-
tory terms, to come to him and go with him.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 79
i$th June 1823.
MY DEAR T. You must have heard that I am going to
Greece. Why do you not come to me ? I want your aid and
am extremely anxious to see you. . . . They all say I can be of
use in Greece. I do not know how, nor do they ; but, at all
events, let us go. Yours, etc., truly, N. BYRON.
And, always ready for adventure, the " Pirate "
came. Before his arrival Mary's journey had
been decided on. Mrs. Hunt's confinement was
over : she and the infant had both done well, and
she was now in a fair way to live, in tolerable
health, for many years longer. Want of funds was
now the chief obstacle in Mary's way, but Byron
was no longer ready, as he had been, with offers
of help. Changeable as the wind, and utterly
unable to put himself in another person's place,
he, without absolutely declining to fulfil his
promises, made so many words about it, and
treated the matter as so great a favour on his own
part, that Mary at last declined his assistance,
although it obliged her to take advantage of
Trelawny's often -repeated offers of help, which
she would not rather have accepted, as he was
poor, while Byron was rich. The whole story
unfolds itself in the three ensuing letters.
MARY SHELLEY TO JANE WILLIAMS.
ALBARO, NEAR GENOA, July 1823.
I write to you in preference to my Father, because you, to
a great degree, understand the person I have to deal with, and
8o THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
in communicating what I say concerning him, you can, viva
voce, add such comments as will render my relation more
intelligible.
The day after Marianne's confinement, the gth June, seeing
all went on so prosperously, I told Lord Byron that I was
ready to go, and he promised to provide means. When I
talked of going post, it was because he said that I should go
so, at the same time declaring that he would regulate all
himself. I waited in vain for these arrangements. But, not
to make a long story, since I hope soon to be able to relate
the details he chose to transact our negotiation through
Hunt, and gave such an air of unwillingness and sense of the
obligation he conferred, as at last provoked Hunt to say that
there was no obligation, since he owed me ^1000.
Glad of a quarrel, straight I clap the door !
Still keeping up an appearance of amity with Hunt, he has
written notes and letters so full of contempt against me and
my lost Shelley that I could stand it no longer, and have
refused to receive his still proffered aid for my journey. This,
of course, delays me. I can muster about ,30 of my own.
I do not know whether this is barely sufficient, but as the
delicate constitution of my child may oblige me to rest several
times on the journey, I cannot persuade myself to commence
my journey with what is barely necessary. I have written,
therefore, to Trelawny for the sum requisite, and must wait
till I hear from him. I see you, my poor girl, sigh over these
mischances, but never mind, I do not feel them. My life is
a shifting scene, and my business is to play the part allotted
for each day well, and, not liking to think of to-morrow, I
never think of it at all, except in an intellectual way ; and as
to money difficulties, why, having nothing, I can lose nothing.
Thus, as far as regards what are called worldly concerns, I am
perfectly tranquil, and as free or freer from care as if my sig-
nature should be able to draw ^rooo from some banker.
The extravagance and anger of Lord Byron's letters also
relieve me from all pain that his dereliction might occasion
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
81
me, and that his conscience twinges him is too visible from
his impatient kicks and unmannerly curvets. You would
laugh at his last letter to Hunt, when he says concerning his
connection with Shelley "that "he let himself down to the level
of the democrats."
In the meantime Hunt is all kindness, consideration, and
friendship all feeling of alienation towards me has disappeared
even to its last dregs. He perfectly approves of what I have
done. So I am still in Italy, and I doubt not but that its sun
and vivifying geniality relieve me from those biting cares which
would be mine in England, I fear, if I were destitute there.
But I feel above the mark of Fortune, and my heart too much
wounded to feel these pricks, on all occasions that do not
regard its affections, s'arma di se, e d'intero diamante. Thus
am I changed ; too late, alas ! for what ought to have been,
but not too late, I trust, to enable me, more than before, to
be some stay and consolation to my own dear Jane.
MARY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
Saturday.
DEAR MARY Will you tell me what sum you want, as I
am settling my affairs ? You must from time to time let me
know your wants, that I may do my best to relieve them.
You are sure of me, so let us use no more words about it. I
have been racking my memory to remember some person in
England that would be of service to you for my sake, but my
rich friends and relations are without hearts, and it is useless
to introduce you to the unfortunate ; it would but augment
your repinings at the injustice of Fortune. My knight-errant
heart has led me many a weary journey foolishly seeking the
unfortunate, the miserable, and the outcast ; and when found,
I have only made myself as one of them without redressing
their grievances, so I pray you avoid, as you value your peace
of mind, the wretched. I shall see you, I hope, to-day.
Yours very faithfully, E. TRELAWNY.
VOL. ii 29
82 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
MARY SHELLEY TO JANE WILLIAMS.
ALBARO, 2 ^d July 1823.
DEAREST JANE I have at length fixed with the vettnrino.
I depart on the 25th, my best girl. I leave Italy; I return
to the dreariest reality after having dreamt away a year in this
blessed and beloved country.
Lord Byron, Trelawny, and Pierino Gamba sailed for
Greece on the i7th inst. I did not see the former. His
unconquerable avarice prevented his supplying me with money,
and a remnant of shame caused him to avoid me. But I have
a world of things to tell you on that score when I see you.
If he were mean, Trelawny more than balanced the moral
account. His whole conduct during his last stay here has im-
pressed us all with an affectionate regard, and a perfect faith
in the unalterable goodness of his heart. They sailed together;
Lord Byron with ; 10,000, Trelawny with ^50, and Lord
Byron cowering before his eye for reasons you shall hear soon.
The Guiccioli is gone to Bologna e poi cosa fara ? Chi lo sa?
Cosa vuoi che lo dico ? . . .
I travel without a servant. I rest first at Lyons ; but do
you write to me at Paris, Hotel Nelson. It will be a friend
to await me. Alas ! I have need of consolation. Hunt's
kindness is now as active and warm as it was dormant before;
but just as I find a companion in him I leave him. I leave
him in all his difficulties, with his head throbbing with over-
wrought thoughts, and his frame sometimes sinking under his
anxieties. Poor Marianne has found good medicine, facendo
un bimbo, and then nursing it, but she, with her female provi-
dence, is more bent by care than Hunt. How much I wished,
and wish, to settle near them at Florence ; but I must submit
with courage, and patience may at last come and give opiate
to my irritable feelings.
Both Hunt and Trelawny say that Percy is much improved
since Maria left me. He is affectionately attached to Sylvan,
and very fond of Bimbo nuovo. He kisses him by the hour,
and tells me, Come il Signore Enrico ha comprato un Baby
nuovo -forse ti dara il Baby vecchio^ as he gives away an old
toy on the appearance of a new one.
I will not write longer. In conversation, nay, almost in
thought, I can, at this most painful moment, force my excited
feelings to laugh at themselves, and my spirits, raised by
emotion, to seem as if they were light, but the natural current
and real hue overflows me and penetrates me when I write,
and it would be painful to you, and overthrow all my hopes of
retaining my fortitude, if I were to write one word that truly
translated the agitation I suffer into language.
I will write again from Lyons, where I suppose I shall be
on the 3d of August. Dear Jane, can I render you happier
than you are ? The idea of that might console me, at least
you will see one that truly loves you, and who is for ever your
affectionately attached MARY SHELLEY.
If there is any talk of my accommodations, pray tell Mrs.
Gisborne that I cannot sleep on any but a hard bed. I care
not how hard, so that it be a mattress.
And now Mary's life in Italy was at an end.
Her resolution of returning to England had been
welcomed by her father in the letter which
follows, and it was to his house, and not to Mrs.
Gisborne's that she finally decided to go on first
arriving.
GODWIN TO MARY.
No. 195 STRAND, 6tk May 1823.
It certainly is, my dear Mary, with great pleasure that I
anticipate that we shall once again meet. It is a long, long
time now since you have spent one night under my roof. You
are grown a woman, have been a wife, a mother, a widow.
You have realised talents which I but faintly and doubtfully
anticipated. I am grown an old man, and want a child of my
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
own to smile on and console me. I shall then feel less alone
than I do at present.
What William will be, I know not; he has sufficient
understanding and quickness for the ordinary concerns of
life, and something more ; and, at any rate, he is no smiler,
no consoler.
When you first set your foot in London, of course I and
Mamma expect that it will be in this house. But the house
is smaller, one floor less, than the house in Skinner Street.
It will do well enough for you to make shift with for a
few days, but it would not do for a permanent residence.
But I hope we shall at least have you near us, within a
call. How different from your being on the shores of the
Mediterranean !
Your novel has sold five hundred copies half the im-
pression.
Peacock sent your box by the Berbice, Captain Wayth.
I saw him a fortnight ago, and he said that he had not yet
received the bill of lading himself, but he should be sure to
have it in time, and would send it. I ought to have written
to you sooner. Your letter reached me on the i8th ult., but
I have been unusually surrounded with perplexities. Your
affectionate Father, WILLIAM GODWIN.
On the 25th of July she left Genoa, Hunt
accompanying her for the first twenty miles. If
one thought more than any other sustained her in
her unprotected loneliness, it was that of being
reunited in England to her sister in misfortune,
Jane Williams, to whom her heart turned with a
singular tenderness, and to whom on her journey
she addressed one more letter, full of grateful
affection and of a touching humility, new in her
character.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 85
MARY SHELLEY TO JANE WILLIAMS.
ST. JEAN DE LA MAURIENNE,
3O//& July 1823.
MY BEST JANE I wrote to you from Genoa the day before
I quitted it, but I afterwards lost the letter. I asked the
Hunts to look for it, and send it if found, but ten to one you
will never receive it. It contained nothing, however, but
what I can tell you in five minutes if I see you. It told you
of the departure of Lord Byron and Trelawny for Greece, the
former escaping with all his crowns, and the other disbursing
until he had hardly ;io left. It went to my heart to borrow
the sum from him necessary to make up my journey, but he
behaved with so much quiet generosity that one was almost
glad to put him to that proof, and witness the excellence
of his heart. In this and in another trial he acquitted
himself so well that he gained all our hearts, while the other
but more when we meet.
I left Genoa Thursday, 25th. Hunt and Thornton accom-
panied me the first twenty miles. This was much, you will
say, for Hunt. But, thank heaven, we are now the best
friends in the world. He set his heart on my quitting Italy
with as comfortable feelings as possible, and he did so much
that notwithstanding all the [bitterness] that such an event,
joined to parting with a dear friend, occasioned me, yet I have
borne up with better spirits than I could in any way have
hoped. It is a delightful thing, my dear Jane, to be able to
express one's affection upon an old and tried friend like
Hunt, and one so passionately attached to my Shelley as he
was, and is. It is pleasant also to feel myself loved by one
who loves me. You know somewhat of what I suffered
during the winter, during his alienation from me. He was
displeased with me for many just reasons, but he found me
willing to expiate, as far as I could, the evil I had done, so
his heart was again warmed ; and if, my dear friend, when I
return, you find me more amiable and more willing to suffer
86
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
with patience than I was, it is to him that I owe this benefit,
and you may judge if I ought not to be grateful to him. I
am even so to Lord Byron, who was the cause that I stayed
at Genoa, and thus secured one who, I am sure, can never
change.
The illness of one of our horses detains me here an after-
noon, so I write, and shall put the letter in the post at
Chambe'ry. I have come without a servant or companion ;
but Percy is perfectly good, and no trouble to me at all. We
are both well ; a little tired or so. Will you tell my Father
that you have heard from me, and that I am so far on my
journey. I expect to be at Lyons in three days, and will
write to him from that place. If there be any talk of my
accommodations, pray put in a word for a hard bed, for else
I am sure I cannot sleep.
So I have left Italy, and alone with my child I am travel-
ling to England. What a dream I have had ! and is it over ?
Oh no ! for I do nothing but dream ; realities seem to have
lost all power over me, I mean, as it were, mere tangible
realities, for, where the affections are concerned, calamity
has only awakened greater sensitiveness.
I fear things do not go on well with you, my dearest girl !
you are not in your mother's house, and you cannot have
settled your affairs in India, mine too ! Why, I arrive poor
to nothingness, and my hopes are small, except from my own
exertions ; and living in England is dear. My thoughts will
all bend towards Italy ; but even if Sir Timothy Shelley
should do anything, he will not, I am sure, permit me to go
abroad. At any rate we shall be together a while. We will
talk of our lost ones, and think of realising my dreams ; who
knows ? Adieu, I shall soon see you, and you will find how
truly I am your affectionate MARY SHELLEY.
With the following fragment, the last of her
Italian journal, this chapter may fitly close.
Journal, May 31'. The lanes are filled with fire-flies;
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
87
they dart between the trunks of the trees, and people the
land with earth -stars. I walked among them to-night, and
descended towards the sea. I passed by the ruined church, and
stood on the platform that overlooks the beach. The black
rocks were stretched out among the blue waters, which dashed
with no impetuous motion against them. The dark boats, with
their white sails, glided gently over its surface, and the star-
enlightened promontories closed in the bay : below, amid the
crags, I heard the monotonous but harmonious voices of the
fishermen.
How beautiful these shores, and this sea ! Such is the
scene such the waves within which my beloved vanished
from mortality.
The time is drawing near when I must quit this country.
It is true that, in the situation I now am, Italy is but the
corpse of the enchantress that she was. Besides, if I had
stayed here, the state of things would have been different.
The idea of our child's advantage alone enables me to keep
fixed in my resolution to return to England. It is best for
him and I go.
Four years ago we lost our darling William ; four years
ago, in excessive agony, I called for death to free me from all
I felt that I should suffer here. I continue to live, and thou
art gone. I leave Italy and the few that still remain to me.
That I regret less ; for our intercourse is so much chequered
with all of dross that this earth so delights to blend with
kindness and sympathy, that I long for solitude, with the
exercise of such affections as still remain to me. Away, I
shall be conscious that these friends love me, and none can
then gainsay the pure attachment which chiefly clings to them
because they knew and loved you because I knew them
when with you, and I cannot think of them without feeling
your spirit beside me.
I cannot grieve for you, beloved Shelley ; I grieve for thy
friends for the world for thy child most for myself, en-
throned in thy love, growing wiser and better beneath thy
gentle influence, taught by you the highest philosophy your
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
pupil, friend, lover, wife, mother of your children ! The glory
of the dream is gone. I am a cloud from which the light of
sunset has passed. Give me patience in the present struggle.
Meum cordium cor ! Good-night!
I would give all that I am to be as now thou art,
But I am chained to time, and cannot thence depart.
CHAPTER XIX
JULY i823-DECEMBER 1824
MARY'S journey extended over a month, one week
of which was passed in Paris and Versailles, for
the sake of seeing the Horace Smiths and other
old acquaintances now living there. Her letters
to the Hunts, describing the incidents and im-
pressions of her journey, were as lively and
cheerful as she could make them. A few extracts
follow here.
To LEIGH HUNT.
ASTI, 26th July.
Percy is very good and does not in the least annoy me.
In the state of mind I am now in, the motion and change is
delightful to me : my thoughts run with the coach and wind,
and double, and jerk, and are up and down, and forward, and
most often backward, till the labyrinth of Crete is a joke in
comparison to my intricate wanderings. They now lead me
to you, Hunt. You rose early, wrote, walked, dined, whistled,
sang and punned most outrageously, the worst puns in the
world. My best Polly, you, full of your chicks and of your
new darling, yet sometimes called " Henry " to see a beautiful
new effect of light on the mountains. . . . Dear girl, I have
a great affection for you, believe that, and don't talk or think
90 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
sorrowfully, unless you have the toothache, and then don't
think, but talk infinite nonsense mixed with infinite sense, and
Hunt will listen, as I used. Thorny, you have not been cross
yet. Oh, my dear Johnny (don't be angry, Polly, with this
nonsense), do not let your impatient nature ever overcome you,
or you may suffer as I have done which God forbid ! Be
true to yourself, and talk much to your Father, who will teach
you as he has taught me. It is the idea of his lessons of
wisdom that makes me feel the affection I do for him. I
profit by them, so do you : may you never feel the remorse of
having neglected them when his voice and look are gone, and
he can no longer talk to you ; that remorse is a terrible
feeling, and it requires a faith and a philosophy immense not
to be destroyed by the stinging monster.
2 BtA July.
... I was too late for the post yesterday at Turin, and
too early this morning, so as I determined to put this letter in
the post myself, I bring it with me to Susa, and now open it
to tell you how delighted I am with my morning's ride the
scenery is so divine. The high, dark Alps, just on this
southern side tipt with snow, close in a plain ; the meadows
are full of clover and flowers, and the woods of ash, elm, and
beech descend and spread, and lose themselves in the fields ;
stately trees, in clumps or singly, arise on each side, and
wherever you look you see some spot where you dream of
building a home and living for ever. The exquisite beauty of
nature, and the cloudless sky of this summer day soothe me,
and make this 2 8th so full of recollections that it is almost
pleasurable. Wherever the spirit of beauty dwells, he must
be ; the rustling of the trees is full of him ; the waving of
the tall grass, the moving shadows of the vast hills, the blue
air that penetrates their ravines and rests upon their heights.
I feel him near me when I see that which he best loved.
Alas ! nine years ago he took to a home in his heart this
weak being, whom he has now left for more congenial spirits
and happier regions. She lives only in the hope that she
may become one day as one of them.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 91
Absolutely, my dear Hunt, I will pass some three summer
months in this divine spot, you shall all be with me. There
are no gentlemen's seats at Palazzi, so we will take a cottage,
which we will paint and refit, just as this country here is,
in which I now write, clean and plain. We will have no
servants, only we will give out all the needlework. Marianne
shall make puddings and pies, to make up for the vegetables
and meat which I shall boil and spoil. Thorny shall sweep
the rooms, Mary make the beds, Johnny clean the kettles and
pans, and then we will pop him into the many streams here-
abouts, and so clean him. Swinny, being so quick, shall be our
Mercury, Percy our gardener, Sylvan and Percy Florence our
weeders, and Vincent our plaything ; and then, to raise us above
the vulgar, we will do all our work, keeping time to Hunt's
symphonies ; we will perform our sweepings and dustings to the
March in Alceste, we will prepare our meats to the tune of the
Laughing Trio, and when we are tired we will lie on our turf
sofas, while all our voices shall join in chorus in Notte e giorno
faticar. You see my paper is quite out, so I must say, for the
last time, Adieu ! God bless you. MARY W. S.
Tuesday, $th August.
I have your letter, and your excuses, and all. I thank
you most sincerely for it : at the same time I do entreat you
to take care of yourself with regard to writing; although
your letters are worth infinite pleasure to me, yet that
pleasure cannot be worth pain to you ; and remember, if you
must write, the good, hackneyed maxim of multum in parvo,
and, when your temples throb, distil the essence of three pages
into three lines, and my "fictitious adventure "- 1 will enable me
to open them out and fill up intervals. Not but what three
pages are best, but " you can understand me." And now let
me tell you that I fear you do not rise early, since you doubt
my ore mattutine. Be it known to you, then, that on the
journey I always rise before 3 o'clock, that I never once made
the vetturino wait, and, moreover, that there was no discontent
1 See Godwin's letter, page 96.
92
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
in our jogging on on either side, so that I half expect to be a
Santa with him. He indeed got a little out of his element
when he got into France, his good humour did not leave
him, but his self-possession. He could not speak French,
and he walked about as if treading on eggs.
When at Paris I will tell you more what I think of the
French. They still seem miracles of quietness in comparison
with Marianne's noisy friends. And the women's dresses
afford the drollest contrast with those in fashion when I first
set foot in Paris in 1814. Then their waists were between
their shoulders, and, as Hogg observed, they were rather
curtains than gowns ; their hair, too, dragged to the top of
the head, and then lifted to its height, appeared as if each
female wished to be a Tower of Babel in herself. Now their
waists are long (not so long, however, as the Genoese), and
their hair flat at the top, with quantities of curls on the temples.
I remember, in 1814, a Frenchman's pathetic horror at Clare's
and my appearance in the streets of Paris in " Oldenburgh "
(as they were called) hats ; now they all wear machines of
that shape, and a high bonnet would of course be as far out of
the right road as if the earth were to take a flying leap to
another system.
After you receive this letter, you must direct to me at
my Father's (pray put William Godwin, Esq., since the want of
that etiquette annoys him. I remember Shelley's unspeakable
astonishment when the author of Political 'Justice asked him, half
reproachfully, why he addressed him Mr, Godwin), 195 Strand.
On the 25th of August Mary met her father
once more. At his house in the Strand she
spent her first ten days in England. Considera-
tion for others, and the old habit of repressing all
show of feeling before Godwin helped to steel her
nerves and heart to bear the stings and aches of
this strange, mournful reunion.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 93
And now again, too, she saw her friend Jane.
But fondly as Mary ever clung to her, she must
have been sensible of the difference between them.
Mrs. Williams' situation was forlorn indeed ; in
some respects even more so than Mrs. Shelley's.
But, though she had grieved bitterly, as well she
might, for Edward's loss, her nature was not
impressible, and the catastrophe which had fallen
upon her had left her unaltered. Jane was
unhappy, but she was not inconsolable ; her grief
was becoming to her, and lent her a certain
interest which enhanced her attractions. And to
men in general she was very attractive. Godwin
himself was somewhat fascinated by the " pictur-
esque little woman " who had called on him on
her first arrival ; who " did not drop one tear "
and occasionally smiled. As for Hogg, he lost
his heart to her at once.
All this Mary must have seen. But Jane was
an attaching creature, and Mary loved her as the
greater nature loves the lesser ; she lavished on
her a wealth of pent-up tenderness, content to
get what crumbs she could in return. For
herself a curious surprise was in store, which
entertained, if it did not cheer her.
Just at the time of its author's return to
England, Frankenstein, in a dramatised form,
was having a considerable " run " at the English
Opera House.
94 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
MRS. SHELLEY TO LEIGH HUNT.
qth September 1823.
MY DEAR HUNT Bessy promised me to relieve you from
any inquietude you might suffer from not hearing from me, so
I indulged myself with not writing to you until I was quietly
settled in lodgings of my own. Want of time is not my
excuse ; I had plenty, but, until I saw all quiet around me, I
had not the spirit to write a line. I thought of you all how
much ? and often longed to write, yet would not till I called
myself free to turn southward ; to imagine you all, to put
myself in the midst of you, would have destroyed all my
philosophy. But now I do so. I am in little neat lodgings,
my boy in bed, I quiet, and I will now talk to you, tell you
what I have seen and heard, and with as little repining as
I can, try (by making the best of what I have, the certainty of
your friendship and kindness) to rest half content that I am
not in the " Paradise of Exiles." Well, first I will tell you,
journalwise, the history of my sixteen days in London.
I arrived Monday, the 25th of August. My Father and
William came for me to the wharf. I had an excellent passage
of eleven hours and a half, a glassy sea, and a contrary wind.
The smoke of our fire was wafted right aft, and streamed out
behind us ; but wind was of little consequence ; the tide was
with us, and though the engine gave a " short uneasy motion "
to the vessel, the water was so smooth that no one on board
was sick, and Persino played about the deck in high glee.
I had a very kind reception in the Strand, and all was done
that could be done to make me comfortable. I exerted myself
to keep up my spirits. The house, though rather dismal, is
infinitely better than the Skinner Street one. I resolved
not to think of certain things, to take all as a matter of
course, and thus contrive to keep myself out of the gulf of
melancholy, on the edge of which I was and am continually
peeping.
But lo and behold ! I found myself famous. Frankenstein
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 95
had prodigious success as a drama, and was about to be re-
peated, for the twenty-third night, at the English Opera House.
The play-bill amused me extremely, for, in the list of dramatis
persona, came " , by Mr. T. Cooke." This nameless
mode of naming the unnameable is rather good.
On Friday, 2Qth August, Jane, my Father, William, and I
went to the theatre to see it. Wallack looked very well as
Frankenstein. He is at the beginning full of hope and ex-
pectation. At the end of the first act the stage represents a
room with a staircase leading to Frankenstein's workshop ; he
goes to it, and you see his light at a small window, through
which a frightened servant peeps, who runs off in terror when
Frankenstein exclaims "It lives!" Presently Frankenstein
himself rushes in horror and trepidation from the room, and,
while still expressing his agony and terror, " " throws
down the door of the laboratory, leaps the staircase, and
presents his unearthly and monstrous person on the stage.
The story is not well managed, but Cooke played 's part
extremely well ; his seeking, as it were, for support ; his
trying to grasp at the sounds he heard ; all, indeed, he
does was well imagined and executed. I was much amused,
and it appeared to excite a breathless eagerness in the
audience. It was a third piece, a scanty pit filled at half-
price, and all stayed till it was over. They continue to play it
even now.
On Saturday, 3oth August, I went with Jane to the
Gisbornes. I know not why, but seeing them seemed more
than anything else to remind me of Italy. Evening came on
drearily, the rain splashed on the pavement, nor star nor moon
deigned to appear. I looked upward to seek an image of
Italy, but a blotted sky told me only of my change. I tried
to collect my thoughts, and then, again, dared not think, for
I am a ruin where owls and bats live only, and I lost my last
singing bird when I left Albaro. It was my birthday, and it
pleased me to tell the people so ; to recollect and feel that
time flies, and what is to arrive is nearer, and my home not so
far off as it was a year ago. This same evening, on my return
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
to the Strand, I saw Lamb, who was very entertaining and
amiable, though a little deaf. One of the first questions he
asked me was, whether they made puns in Italy : I said, " Yes,
now Hunt is there." He said that Burney made a pun in
Otaheite, the first that was ever made in that country. At first
the natives could not make out what he meant, but all at once
they discovered the pun, and danced round him in transports
of joy. . . .
. . . On the strength of the drama, my Father had published
for my benefit a new edition of Frankenstein, for he despaired
utterly of my doing anything with Sir Timothy Shelley. I
wrote to him, however, to tell him of my arrival, and on the
following Wednesday had a note from Whitton, where he
invited me, if I wished for an explanation of Sir T. Shelley's
intentions concerning my boy, to call on him. I went with
my Father. Whitton was very polite, though long-winded : his
great wish seemed to be to prevent my applying again to Sir
T. Shelley, whom he represented as old, infirm, and irritable.
However, he advanced me ;ioo for my immediate expenses,
told me that he could not speak positively until he had seen
Sir T. Shelley, but that he doubted not but that I should
receive the same annually for my child, and, with a little time
and patience, I should get an allowance for myself. This,
you see, relieved me from a load of anxieties.
Having secured neat cheap lodgings, we removed hither
last night. Such, dear Hunt, is the outline of your poor
exile's history. After two days of rain, the weather has been
uncommonly fine, dob, without rain, and cloudless, I believe,
though I trusted to other eyes for that fact, since the white-
washed sky is anything but blue to any but the perceptions of
the natives themselves. It is so cold, however, that the fire I
am now sitting by is not the first that has been lighted, for
my Father had one two days ago. The wind is east and
piercing, but I comfort myself with the hope that softer gales
are now fanning your not throbbing temples, that the climate
of Florence will prove kindly to you, and that your health and
spirits will return to you. Why am I not there? This is
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 97
quite a foreign country to me, the names of the places sound
strangely, the voices of the people are new and grating, the
vulgar English they speak particularly displeasing. But for
my Father, I should be with you next spring, but his heart and
soul are set on my stay, and in this world it always seems one's
duty to sacrifice one's own desires, and that claim ever appears
the strongest which claims such a sacrifice.
It is difficult to imagine Frankenstein on
the stage ; it must, at least, lose very much in
dramatic representation. Like its modern suc-
cessor, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, that remark-
able story which bears a certain affinity to
Frankenstein, its subtle allegorical significance
would be overweighted, if not lost, by the effect
of the grosser and more material incidents which
are all that could be played, and which, as
described, must have bordered on the ludicrous.
Still the charm of life imparted by a human
impersonation to any portion, even, of one's own
idea, is singularly powerful ; and so Mary felt it.
She would have liked to repeat the experience.
Her situation, looked at in the face, was unenvi-
able. She was unprovided for, young, delicate,
and with a child dependent on her. Her rich
connections would have nothing to do with her,
and her boy did not possess in their eyes the
importance which would have attached to him had
he been heir to the baronetcy. She had talent,
and it had been cultivated, but with her sorely-
VOL. II 30
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
tried health and spirits, the prospect of self-sup-
port by the compulsory production of imaginative
work must, at the time, have seemed unpromising
enough.
Two sheet-anchors of hope she had, and by
these she lived. They were, her child so friend-
less but for her and the thought of Shelley's
fame. The collecting and editing of his MSS.,
this was her work ; no one else should do it. It
seemed as though her brief life with him had had
for its purpose to educate her for this one object.
Those who now, in naming Shelley, feel they
name a part of everything beautiful, ethereal, and
spiritual that his words are so inextricably inter-
woven with certain phases of love and beauty as
to be indistinguishable from the very thing itself
may well find it hard to realise how little he
was known at the time when he died.
With other poets their work is the blossom
and fruit of their lives, but Shelley's poetry re-
sembles rather the perfume of the flower, that
subtle quality pertaining to the bloom which can
be neither described, nor pourtrayed, nor trans-
mitted ; an essence of immortality.
Not many months after this the news of
Byron's early death struck a kind of remorseful
grief into the hearts of his countrymen. A letter
of Miss Welsh's (Mrs. Carlyle) gives an idea of
the general feeling
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 99
" I was told it," she says, " in a room full of people. Had
I heard that the sun and moon had fallen out of their spheres
it could not have conveyed to me the feeling of a more awful
blank than did the simple words, ' Byron is dead.' "
How many, it may be asked, were conscious
of any blank when the news reached them that
Shelley had been " accidentally drowned " ? Their
numbers might be counted by tens.
The sale, in every instance, of Mr. Shelley's works has
been very confined,
was his publishers' report to his widow. One
newspaper dismissed his memory by the passing
remark, "He will now find out whether there is
a Hell or not."
The small number of those who recognised
his genius did not even include all his personal
friends.
" Mine is a life of failures ;" so he summed it up to
Trelawny and Edward Williams. "Peacock says my poetry
is composed of day-dreams and nightmares, and Leigh Hunt
does not think it good enough for the Examiner. Jefferson
Hogg says all poetry is inverted sense, and consequently non-
sense. . . .
" I wrote, and the critics denounced me as a mischievous
visionary, and my friends said that I had mistaken my voca-
tion, that my poetry was mere rhapsody of words. . . ."
Leigh Hunt, indeed, thought his own poetry
more than equal to Shelley's or Byron's. Byron
knew Shelley's power well enough, but cared little
for the subjects of his sympathy. Trelawny was
ioo THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
more appreciative, but his admiration for the
poetry was quite secondary to his enthusiasm for
the man. In Hogg's case, affection for the man
may be said to have excused the poetry. All this
Mary knew, but she knew too what she was
soon to find out by experience that among his
immediate associates he had created too warm an
interest for him to escape posthumous discussion
and criticism. And he had been familiar with
some of those regarding whom the world's curi-
osity was insatiable, concerning whom any shred
of information, true or false, was eagerly snapped
up. His name would inevitably figure in anecdotes
and gossip. His fame was Mary's to guard.
During the years she lived at Albaro she had
been employed in collecting and transcribing his
scattered MSS., and at the end of this year,
1823, the volume of Posthumous Poems came
out.
One would imagine that publishers would have
bid against each other for the possession of such
a treasure. Far from it. Among the little band of
"true believers" three came forward to guarantee
the expenses of publication. They were, the poet
Thomas Lovell Beddoes, Procter, and T. F.
Kelsall.
The appearance of this book was a melancholy
satisfaction to Mary, though, as will soon be seen,
she was not long allowed to enjoy it.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 101
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. HUNT.
LONDON, 2^/1 November 1823.
MY DEAREST POLLY Are you not a naughty girl ? How
could you copy a letter to that " agreeable, unaffected woman,
Mrs. Shelley," without saying a word from yourself to your
loving . . . . ? My dear Polly, a line from you forms a
better picture for me of what you are about than alas !
I was going to say three pages, but I check myself the rare
one page of Hunt. Do not think that I forget you even
Percy does not, and he often tells me to bid the Signor Enrico
and you to get in a carriage and then into a boat, and to come
to questo paese with Baby nuovo, Henry, Swinburne, e tutti.
But that will not be, nor shall I see you at Mariano ; this is a
dreary exile for me. During a long month of cloud and fog,
how often have I sighed for my beloved Italy, and more than
ever this day when I have come to a conclusion with Sir
Timothy Shelley as to my affairs, and I find the miserable
pittance I am to have. Nearly sufficient in Italy, here it will
not go half-way. It is ^100 per annum. Nor is this all,
for I foresee a thousand troubles ; yet, in truth, as far as regards
mere money matters and worldly prospects, I keep up my
philosophy with excellent success. Others wonder at this, but
I do not, nor is there any philosophy in it. After having
witnessed the mortal agonies of my two darling children, after
that journey from and to Lerici, I feel all these as pictures
and trifles as long as I am kept out of contact with the unholy.
I was upset to-day by being obliged to see Whitton, and the
prospect of seeing others of his tribe. I can earn a sufficiency,
I doubt not. In Italy I should be content : here I will not
bemoan. Indeed I never do, and Mrs. Godwin makes large
eyes at the quiet way in which I take it all. It is England
alone that annoys me, yet sometimes I get among friends and
almost forget its fogs. I go to Shacklewell rarely, and some-
times see the Novellos elsewhere. He is my especial favourite,
and his music always transports me to the seventh heaven.
... I see the Lambs rather often, she ever amiable, and
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THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Lamb witty and delightful. I must tell you one thing and
make Hunt laugh. Lamb's new house at Islington is close to
the New River, and George Dyer, after having paid them
a visit, on going away at 12 at noonday, walked deliberately
into the water, taking it for the high road. "But," as he
said afterwards to Procter, "I soon found that I was in the
water, sir." So Miss Lamb and the servant had to fish him
out. ... I must tell Hunt also a good saying" of Lamb's,
talking of some one, he said, " Now some men who are very
veracious are called matter-of-fact men, but such a one I
should call a matter-of-lie man."
I have seen also Procter, with his " beautifully formed
head " (it is beautifully formed), several times, and I like him.
He is an enthusiastic admirer of Shelley, and most zealous in
bringing out the volume of his poems ; this alone would please
me; and he is, moreover, gentle and gentlemanly, and apparently
endued with a true poetic feeling. Besides, he is an invalid,
and some time ago I told you, in a letter, that I have always
a sneaking (for sneaking read open) kindness for men of liter-
ary and particularly poetic habits, who have delicate health. I
cannot help revering the mind delicately attuned that shatters the
material frame, and whose thoughts are strong enough to throw
down and dilapidate the walls of sense and dikes of flesh that
the unimaginative contrive to keep in such good repair. . . .
After all, I spend a great deal of my time in solitude. I
have been hitherto too fully occupied in preparing Shelley's
MSS. It is now complete, and the poetry alone will make a
large volume. Will you tell Hunt that he need not send any
of the MSS. that he has (except the Essay on Devils, and
some lines addressed to himself on his arrival in Italy, if he
should choose them to be inserted), as I have recopied all the
rest? We should be very glad, however, of his notice as
quickly as possible, as we wish the book to be out in a month
at furthest, and that will not be possible unless he sends it
immediately. It would break my heart if the book should
appear without it. 1 When he does send a packet over (let it
1 So it happened, however.
MARY WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 1 03
be directed to his brother), will he also be so good as to send
me a copy of my "Choice," beginning after the line
Entrenched sad lines, or blotted with its might ?
Perhaps, dear Marianne, you would have the kindness to copy
them for me, and send them soon. I have another favour to
ask of you. Miss Curran has a portrait of Shelley, in many
things very like, and she has so much talent that I entertain
great hopes that she will be able to make a good one ; for this
purpose I wish her to have all the aids possible, and among
the rest a profile from you. 1 If you could not cut another,
perhaps you would send her one already cut, and if you sent
it with a note requesting her to return it when she had done
with it, I will engage that it will be most faithfully returned.
At present I am not quite sure where she is, but if she should
be there, and you can find her and send her this, I need not
tell you how you would oblige me.
I heard from Bessy that Hunt is writing something for the
Examiner for me. I conjecture that this may be concerning
Valperga. I shall be glad, indeed, when that comes, or in lieu
of it, anything else. John Hunt begins to despair.
And now, dear Polly, I think I have done with gossip and
business : with words of affection and kindness I should never
have done. I am inexpressibly anxious about you all. Percy
has had a similar though shorter attack to that at Albaro, but
he is now recovered. I have a cold in my head, occasioned, I
suppose, by the weather. Ah, Polly ! if all the beauties of
England were to have only the mirror that Richard III
desires, a very short time would be spent at the looking-glass !
What of Florence and the gallery? I saw the Elgin marbles
to-day ; to-morrow I am to go to the Museum to look over
the prints : that will be a great treat. The Theseus is a divinity,
but how very few statues they have ! Kiss the children. Ask
Thornton for his forgotten and promised P.S., give my love to
1 Mrs. Hunt, an amateur sculptress of talent, was also skilful in cutting
out profiles in cardboard. From some of these, notably from one of Lord
Byron, successful likenesses were made.
104 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Hunt, and believe me, my dear Marianne, the exiled, but ever,
most affectionately yours, MARY W. SHELLEY.
Journal, January 18 (1824). I have now been nearly
four months in England, and if I am to judge of the future by
the past and the present, I have small delight in looking for-
ward. I even regret those days and weeks of intense melancholy
that composed my life at Genoa. Yes, solitary and unbeloved
as I was there, I enjoyed a more pleasurable state of being than
I do here. I was still in Italy, and my heart and imagination
were both gratified by that circumstance. I awoke with the
light and beheld the theatre of nature from my window ; the
trees spread their green beauty before me, the resplendent sky
was above me, the mountains were invested with enchanting
colours. I had even begun to contemplate painlessly the blue
expanse of the tranquil sea, speckled by the snow-white sails,
gazed upon by the unclouded stars. There was morning and
its balmy air, noon and its exhilarating heat, evening and its
wondrous sunset, night and its starry pageant. Then, my
studies ; my drawing, which soothed me ; my Greek, which I
studied with greater complacency as I stole every now and
then a look on the scene near me; my metaphysics, that
strengthened and elevated my mind. Then my solitary walks
and my reveries ; they were magnificent, deep, pathetic, wild,
and exalted. I sounded the depths of my own nature; I
appealed to the nature around me to corroborate the testimony
that my own heart bore to its purity. I thought of him with
hope ; my grief was active, striving, expectant. I was worth
something then in the catalogue of beings. I could have
written something, been something. Now I am exiled from
these beloved scenes ; its language is becoming a stranger to
mine ears ; my child is forgetting it. I am imprisoned in a
dreary town ; I see neither fields, nor hills, nor trees, nor sky;
the exhilaration of enwrapt contemplation is no more felt by
me ; aspirations agonising, yet grand, from which the soul
reposed in peace, have ceased to ascend from the quenched
altar of my mind. Writing has become a task ; my studies
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
105
irksome ; my life dreary. In this prison it is only in human
intercourse that I can pretend to find consolation ; and woe,
woe, and triple woe to whoever seeks pleasure in human inter-
course when that pleasure is not founded on deep and intense
affection ; as for the rest
The bubble floats before,
The shadow stalks behind.
My Father's situation, his cares and debts, prevent my
enjoying his society.
I love Jane better than any other human being, but I am
pressed upon by the knowledge that she but slightly returns
this affection. I love her, and my purest pleasure is derived
from that source a capacious basin, and but a rill flows into it.
I love some one or two more, " with a degree of love," but I
see them seldom. I am excited while with them, but the
reaction of this feeling is dreadfully painful, but while in
London I cannot forego this excitement. I know some clever
men, in whose conversation I delight, but this is rare, like
angels' visits. Alas ! having lived day by day with one of the
wisest, best, and most affectionate of spirits, how void, bare,
and drear is the scene of life !
Oh, Shelley, dear, lamented, beloved ! help me, raise me,
support me; let me not feel ever thus fallen and degraded!
my imagination is dead, my genius lost, my energies sleep.
Why am I not beneath that weed -grown -tower? Seeing
Coleridge last night reminded me forcibly of past times ; his
beautiful descriptions reminded me of Shelley's conversations.
Such was the intercourse I once daily enjoyed, added to
supreme and active goodness, sympathy, and affection, and a
wild, picturesque mode of living that suited my active spirit
and satisfied its craving for novelty of impression.
I will go into the country and philosophise ; some gleams
of past entrancement may visit me there.
Lonely, poor, and dull as she was, these first
months were a dreadful trial. She was writing,
io6
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
or trying to write, another novel, The Last Man,
but it hung heavy ; it did not satisfy her. Shrink-
ing from company, yet recoiling still more from the
monotony of her own thoughts, she was possessed
by the restless wish to write a drama, perhaps with
the idea that out of dramatic creations she might
(Frankenstein-like) manufacture for herself com-
panions more living than the characters of a novel.
It may have been fortunate for her that she did
not persevere in the attempt. Her special gifts
were hardly of a dramatic order, and she had not the
necessary experience for a successful playwright.
She consulted her father, however, sending him
at the same time some specimens of her work, and
got some sound advice from him in return.
GODWIN TO MARY.
No. 195 STRAND, 27^ February 1824.
MY DEAR MARY Your appeal to me is a painful one, and
the account you give of your spirits and tone of mind is more
painful. Your appeal to me is painful, because I by no means
regard myself as an infallible judge, and have been myself an
unsuccessful adventurer in the same field toward which, in this
instance, you have turned your regards. As to what you say
of your spirits and tone of mind, your plans, and your views,
would not that much more profitably and agreeably be made
the subject of a conversation between us? You are aware
that such a conversation must be begun by you. So begun,
it would be quite a different thing than begun by me. In the
former case I should be called in as a friend and adviser, from
whom some advantage was hoped for ; in the latter I should
be an intruder, forcing in free speeches and unwelcome truths,
and should appear as if I wanted to dictate to you and direct
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
107
you, who are well capable of directing yourself. You have
able critics within your command Mr. Procter and Mr.
Lamb. You have, however, one advantage in me ; I feel a
deeper interest in you than they do, and would not mislead
you for the world.
As to the specimens you have sent me, it is easy for me to
give my opinion. There is one good scene Manfred and the
Two Strangers in the Cottage; and one that has some slightmnts
in it the scene where Manfred attempts to stab the Duke.
The rest are neither good nor bad ; they might be endured,
in the character of cement, to fasten good things together,
but no more. Am I right ? Perhaps not. I state things as
they appear to my organs. Thus far, therefore, you afford an
example, to be added to Barry Cornwall, how much easier it
is to write a detached dramatic scene than to write a tragedy.
Is it not strange that so many people admire and relish
Shakespeare, and that nobody writes or even attempts to write
like him ? To read your specimens, I should suppose that you
had read no tragedies but such as have been written since the
date of your birth. Your personages are mere abstractions
the lines and points of a mathematical diagram and not men
and women. If A crosses B, and C falls upon D, who can
weep for that ? Your talent is something like mine it cannot
unfold itself without elbow-room. As Gray sings, " Give ample
room and verge enough the characters of hell to trace." I can
do tolerably well if you will allow me to explain as much as I
like if, in the margin of what my personage says, I am per-
mitted to set down and anatomise all that he feels. Dramatic
dialogue, in reference to any talent I possess, is the devil. To
write nothing more than the very words spoken by the character
is a course that withers all the powers of my soul. Even
Shakespeare, the greatest dramatist that ever existed, often
gives us riddles to guess and enigmas to puzzle over. Many
of his best characters and situations require a volume of com-
mentary to make them perspicuous. And why is this ? Be-
cause the law of his composition confines him to set down
barely words that are to be delivered.
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THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
For myself, I am almost glad that you have not (if you
have not) a dramatic talent. How many mortifications and
heart-aches would that entail on you. Managers are to be
consulted ; players to be humoured ; the best pieces that were
ever written negatived, and returned on the author's hands
If these are all got over, then you have to encounter the
caprice of a noisy, insolent, and vulgar -minded audience,
whose senseless non fiat shall turn the labour of a year in a
moment into nothing. "
Full little knowest thou, that hast not tried,
What hell it is
To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares,
To eat thy heart through comfortless despairs ;
To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run,
To spend, to give, to want, to be undone.
It is laziness, my dear Mary, that makes you wish to be a
dramatist. It seems in prospect a short labour to write a play,
and a long one to write a work consisting of volumes ; and as
much may be gained by the one as by the other. But as
there is no royal road to geometry, so there is no idle and
self-indulgent activity that leads to literary eminence.
As to the idea that you have no literary talent, for God's
sake, do not give way to such diseased imaginations. You
have, fortunately, ascertained that at a very early period.
What would you have done if you had passed through my
ordeal ? I did not venture to face the public till I was seven
and twenty, and for ten years after that period could not con-
trive to write anything that anybody would read ; yet even I
have not wholly miscarried.
Much of this was shrewd, and undeniable, but
the wish to write for the stage continued to haunt
Mary, and recurred two years later when she saw
Kean play Othello. To the end of her life she
expressed regret that she had not tried her hand
at a tragedy.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
109
Meanwhile, besides her own novel, she was
at no loss for literary jobs and literary occupa-
tion ; her friends took care of that. Her pen and
her powers were for ever at their service, and
they never showed any scruple in working the
willing horse. Her disinterested integrity made
her an invaluable representative in business trans-
actions. The affairs of the Examiner newspaper,
edited in England by Leigh Hunt's brother John,
were in an unsatisfactory condition ; and there
was much disagreement between the two brothers
as to both pecuniary and literary arrangements.
Mary had to act as arbiter between the two,
softening the harsh and ungracious expressions
which, in his annoyance, were used by John ;
looking after Leigh Hunt's interests, and doing
all she could to make clear to him the complicated
details of the concern. In this she was aided by
Vincent Novello, the eminent musician, and inti-
mate friend of the Hunts, to whom she had had
a letter of introduction on arriving in Italy. The
Novellos had a large, old-fashioned house on
Shacklewell Green ; they were the very soul of
hospitality and kindness, and the centre of a large
circle of literary and artistic friends, they had made
Shelley's acquaintance in the days when the Leigh
Hunts lived at the Vale of Health in Hampstead,
and they now welcomed his widow, as well as
Mrs. Williams, doing all in their power to shed a
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
little cheerfulness over these two broken and
melancholy lives.
"Very, very fair both ladies were," writes Mrs.
Cowden Clarke, then Mary Victoria Novello, who
in her charming Recollections of Writers has given
us a pretty sketch of Mary Shelley as she then
appeared to a "damsel approaching towards the
age of ' sweet sixteen,' privileged to consider her-
self one of the grown-up people."
" Always observant as a child," she writes, " I had now be-
come a greater observer than ever ; and large and varied was
the pleasure I derived from my observation of the interesting
men and women around me at this time of my life. Certainly
Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin Shelley was the central figure of
attraction then to my young-girl sight ; and I looked upon her
with ceaseless admiration, for her personal graces, as well as
for her literary distinction.
"The daughter of William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin, the wife of Shelley, the authoress of Frankenstein, had
for me a concentration of charm and interest that perpetually
excited and engrossed me while she continued a visitor at my
parents' house."
Elsewhere she describes
..." Her well-shaped, golden-haired head, almost always
a little bent and drooping ; her marble-white shoulders and
arms statuesquely visible in the perfectly plain black velvet
dress, which the customs of that time allowed to be cut low,
and which her own taste adopted (for neither she nor her
sister-in-sorrow ever wore the conventional ' widow's weeds '
and ' widow's cap ') ; her thoughtful, earnest eyes ; her short
upper lip and intellectually curved mouth, with a certain close-
compressed and decisive expression while she listened, and a
relaxation into fuller redness and mobility when speaking ; her
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
in
exquisitely formed, white, dimpled, small hands, with rosy
palms, and plumply commencing fingers, that tapered into tips
as slender and delicate as those in a Vandyke portrait."
And though it was not in the power of these
kind genial people to change Mary's destiny, or
even to modify very sensibly the tenour of her
inner life and thought, still their friendship was a
solace to her ; she was grateful for it, and did her
utmost to respond with cheerfulness to their
kindly efforts on her behalf. To Leigh Hunt
(from whom depression, when it passed into
querulousness, met with almost as little quarter
as it did from Godwin) she wrote
I am not always in spirits, but if my friends say that I am
good, contrive to fancy that I am so, and so continue to love
yours most truly, MARY SHELLEY.
The news of Lord Byron's death in Greece,
which in May of this year created so profound a
sensation in England, fell on Mary's heart as a
fresh calamity. She had small reason, personally,
to esteem or regret him. Circumstances had
made her only too painfully familiar with his
worst side, and she might well have borne him
more than one serious grudge. But he was
associated in her mind with Shelley, and with
early, happy days, and now he, like Shelley, was
dead and gone, and his faults faded into distance,
while all that was great and might have been
noble in him the hero that should have been
rather than the man that was survived, and stood
112
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
out in greater clearness and beauty, surrounded
by the tearful halo of memory. The tidings
reached her at a time of unusual it afterwards
seemed of prophetic dejection.
Journal, May 14. This, then, is my English life ;
and thus I am to drag on existence ; confined in my small
room, friendless. Each day I string me to the task. I
endeavour to read and write, my ideas stagnate and my
understanding refuses to follow the words I read ; day after
day passes while torrents fall from the dark clouds, and my
mind is as gloomy as this odious sky. Without human friends
I must attach myself to natural objects ; but though I talk of
the country, what difference shall I find in this miserable
climate. Italy, dear Italy, murderess of those I love and of all
my happiness, one word of your soft language coming unawares
upon me, has made me shed bitter tears. When shall I hear
it again spoken, when see your skies, your trees, your streams ?
The imprisonment attendant on a succession of rainy days has
quite overcome me. God knows I strive to be content, but
in vain. Amidst all the depressing circumstances that weigh
on me, none sinks deeper than the failure of my intellectual
powers ; nothing I write pleases me. Whether I am just in
this, or whether the want of Shelley's (oh, my loved Shelley,
it is some alleviation only to write your name !) encouragement
I can hardly tell, but it seems to me as if the lovely and
sublime objects of nature had been my best inspirers, and, want-
ing them, I am lost. Although so utterly miserable at Genoa,
yet what reveries were mine as I looked on the aspect of the
ravine, the sunny deep and its boats, the promontories clothed
in purple light, the starry heavens, the fireflies, the uprising
of spring. Then I could think, and my imagination could
invent and combine, and self became absorbed in the grandeur
of the universe I created. Now my mind is a blank, a gulf
filled with formless mist.
The Last Man ! Yes, I may well describe that solitary being's
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 113
feelings : I feel myself as the last relic of a beloved race, my
companions extinct before me.
And thus has the accumulating sorrow of days and weeks
been forced to find a voice, because the word lucena met my
eyes, and the idea of lost Italy sprang in my mind. What
graceful lamps those are, though of base construction and
vulgar use ; I thought of bringing one with me ; I am glad I
did not. I will go back only to have a lucena.
If I told people so they would think me mad, and yet not
madder than they seem to be now, 'when I say that the blue
skies and verdure-clad earth of that dear land are necessary to
my existence.
If there be a kind spirit attendant on me in compensation
for these miserable days, let me only dream to-night that I am
in Italy ! Mine own Shelley, what a horror you had (fully
sympathised in by me) of returning to this miserable country !
To be here without you is to be doubly exiled, to be away
from Italy is to lose you twice. Dearest, why is my spirit thus
losing all energy ? Indeed, indeed, I must go back, or your
poor utterly lost Mary will never dare think herself worthy to
visit you beyond the grave.
May 15. This then was the coming event that cast its
shadow on my last night's miserable thoughts. Byron had
become one of the people of the grave that miserable con-
clave to which the beings I best loved belong. I knew him
in the bright days of youth, when neither care nor fear had
visited me before death had made me feel my mortality, and
the earth was the scene of my hopes. Can I forget our evening
visits to Diodati ? our excursions on the lake, when he sang
the Tyrolese Hymn, and his voice was harmonised with winds
and waves. Can I forget his attentions and consolations to
me during my deepest misery ? Never.
Beauty sat on his countenance and power beamed from his
eye. His faults being, for the most part, weaknesses, induced
one readily to pardon them.
Albe the dear, capricious, fascinating Albe has left this
VOL. it 31
H4 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
desert world ! God grant I may die young ! A new race is
springing about me. At the age of twenty-six I am in the con-
dition of an aged person. All my old friends are gone, I have
. no wish to form new. I cling to the few remaining ; but they
slide away, and my heart fails when I think by how few ties I
hold to the world. " Life is the desert and the solitude how
populous the grave " and that region to the dearer and best
beloved beings which it has torn from me, now adds that
resplendent spirit whose departure leaves the dull earth dark
as midnight.
June 1 8. What a divine night it is ! I have just returned
from Kentish Town ; a calm twilight pervades the clear sky ;
the lamp-like moon is hung out in heaven, and the bright west
retains the dye of sunset. If such weather would continue, I
should write again ; the lamp of thought is again illumined in
my heart, and the fire descends from heaven that kindles it.
Such, my loved Shelley, now ten years ago, at this season, did
we first meet, and these were the very scenes that church-
yard, with its sacred tomb, was the spot where first love shone
in your dear eyes. The stars of heaven are now your country,
and your spirit drinks beauty and wisdom in those spheres,
and I, beloved, shall one day join you. Nature speaks to me
of you. In towns and society I do not feel your presence ;
but there you are with me, my own, my unalienable !
I feel my powers again, and this is, of itself, happiness ;
the eclipse of winter is passing from my mind. I shall again
feel the enthusiastic glow of composition, again, as I pour
forth my soul upon paper, feel the winged ideas arise, and enjoy
the delight of expressing them. Study and occupation will
be a pleasure, and not a task, and this I shall owe to sight and
companionship of trees and meadows, flowers and sunshine.
England, I charge thee, dress thyself in smiles for my sake !
I will celebrate thee, O England ! and cast a glory on thy
name, if thou wilt for me remove thy veil of clouds, and let me
contemplate the country of my Shelley and feel in communion
with him !
I have been gay in company before, but the inspiriting
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLS Y 115
sentiment of the heart's peace I have not felt before to-night ;
and yet, my own, never was I so entirely yours. In sorrow and
grief I wish sometimes (how vainly ! ) for earthly consolation.
At a period of pleasing excitement I cling to your memory
alone, and you alone receive the overflowing of my heart.
Beloved Shelley, good-night. One pang will seize me
when I think, but I will only think, that thou art where I shall
be, and conclude with my usual prayer, from the depth of
my soul I make it, May I die young !
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
MISSOLONGHI, 30^ April 1824.
MY DEAR MARY My brain is already dizzy with business
and writing. I am transformed from the listless being you
knew me to one of all energy and fire. Not content with the
Camp, I must needs be a great diplomatist, I am again, dear
Mary, in my element, and playing no second part in Greece.
If I live, the outcast Reginald will cut his name out on the
Grecian hills, or set on its plains. I have had the merit of
discovering and bringing out a noble fellow, a gallant soldier,
and a man of most wonderful mind, with as little bigotry as
Shelley, and nearly as much imagination; he is a glorious
being. I have lived with him he calls me brother wants
to connect me with his family. We have been inseparable
now for eight months fought side by side. But I am sick at
heart with losing my friend, 1 for still I call him so, you know,
with all his weakness, you know I loved him. I cannot live
with men for years without feeling it is weak, it is want of
judgment, of philosophy, but this is my weakness. Dear Mary,
if you love me, write write write, for my heart yearns after
you. I certainly must have you and Jane out. I am serious.
This is the place after my own heart, and I am certain
of our good cause triumphing. Believe nothing you hear ;
Gamba will tell you everything about me about Lord
Byron, but he knows nothing of Greece nothing ; nor does
1 Lord Byron.
ii6 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
it appear any one else does by what I see published. Colonel
Stanhope is here ; he is a good fellow, and does much good.
The loan is achieved, and that sets the business at rest, but it
is badly done the Commissioners are bad. A word as to
your wooden god, Mavrocordato. He is a miserable Jew, and
I hope, ere long, to see his head removed from his worthless
and heartless body. He is a mere shuffling soldier, an aristo-
cratic brute wants Kings and Congresses ; a poor, weak,
shuffling, intriguing, cowardly fellow ; so no more about him.
Dear Mary, dear Jane, I am serious, turn you thoughts this
way. No more a nameless being, I am now a Greek Chieftain,
willing and able to shelter and protect you ; and thus I will
continue, or follow our friends to wander over some other
planet, for I have nearly exhausted this. Your attached
TRELAWNY.
Care of John Hunt, Esq., Examiner Office,
Catherine Street, London.
Tell me of Clare, do write me of her ! This is written with
the other in desperate haste. I have received a letter from
you, one from Jane, and none from Hunt.
This letter reached Mary at about the same
time as the fatal news. Trelawny also sent her
his narrative of the facts (now so well known to
every one) of Byron's death. It had been in-
tended for Hobhouse, but the writer changed his
mind and entrusted it to Mrs. Shelley instead,
adding, " Hunt may pick something at it if he
please."
Trelawny had been Byron's friend, and clearly
as he saw the Pilgrim's faults and deficiencies,
there would seem no doubt that he genuinely
admired him, in spite of all. But his mercurial,
impulsive temperament, ever in extremes, was
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
117
liable to the most sudden revulsions of feeling, and
retrospect hardened his feeling as much as it
softened Mary Shelley's towards the great man
who was gone. Only four months later he was
writing again, from Livadia
I have much to say to you, Mary, both as regards myself
and the part I am enacting here. I would give much that I
could, as in times dead, look in on you in the evening of every
day and consult with you on its occurrences, as I used to do
in Italy. It is curious, but, considering our characters, natural
enough, that Byron and I took the diametrically opposite
roads in Greece I in Eastern, he in Western. He took part
with, and became the paltry tool of the weak, imbecile,
cowardly being calling himself Prince Mavrocordato. Five
months he dozed away. By the gods ! the lies that are said
in his praise urge one to speak the truth. It is well for his
name, and better for Greece, that he is dead. With the aid
of his name, his fame, his talents, and his fortune, he might
have been a tower of strength to Greece, instead of which the
little he did was in favour of the aristocrats, to destroy the
republic, and smooth the road for a foreign King. But he is
dead, and I now feel my face burn with shame that so weak
and ignoble a soul could so long have influenced me. It is a
degrading reflection, and ever will be. I wish he had lived a
little longer, that he might have witnessed how I would have
soared above him here, how I would have triumphed over
his mean spirit. I would do much to see and talk to you, but
as I am now too much irritated to disclose the real state of
things, I will not mislead you by false statements.
With this fine flourish was enclosed a " Des-
cription of the Cavern Fortress . of Mount
Parnassus," which he was commanding (and of
which a full account is given in his Recollections],
and then followed a P.S. to this effect
ii8 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
DEAR MARY Will you make an article of this, as Leigh
Hunt calls it, and request his brother to publish it in the
Examiner, which will very much oblige me.
FROM MARY SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
z^thjuly 1824.
So, dear Trelawny, you remember still poor Mary Shelley ;
thank you for your remembrance, and a thousand times for
your kind letter. It is delightful to feel that absence does not
diminish your affection, excellent, warm-hearted friend, remnant
of our happy days, of my vagabond life in beloved Italy, our
companion in prosperity, our comforter in sorrow. You will
not wonder that the late loss of Lord Byron makes me cling
with greater zeal to those dear friends who remain to me. He
could hardly be called a friend, but, connected with him in a
thousand ways, admiring his talents, and (with all his faults)
feeling affection for him, it went to my heart when, the other
day, the hearse that contained his lifeless form a form of
beauty which in life I often delighted to behold passed my
windows going up Highgate Hill on his last journey to the last
seat of his ancestors. Your account of his last moments was
infinitely interesting to me. Going about a fortnight ago to
the house where his remains lay, I found there Fletcher and
Lega Lega looking a most preposterous rogue, Fletcher I
expect to call on me when he returns from Nottingham.
From a few words he imprudently let fall, it would seem that
his Lord spoke of Clare in his last moments, and of his wish to
do something for her, at a time when his mind, vacillating be-
tween consciousness and delirium, would not permit him to do
anything. Did Fletcher mention this to you ? It seems that
this doughty Leporello speaks of his Lord to strangers with the
highest respect ; more than he did a year ago, the best, the
most generous, the most wronged of peers, the notion of his
leading an irregular life, quite a false one. Lady B. sent for
Fletcher ; he found her in a fit of passionate grief, but perfectly
implacable, and as much resolved never to have united herself
MARY WO LLS TONE CRAFT SHELLEY
119
again to him as she was when she first signed their separation.
Mrs. Claremont (the governess) was with her.
His death, as you may guess, made a great sensation here,
which was not diminished by the destruction of his Memoirs,
which he wrote and gave to Moore, and which were burned by
Mrs. Leigh and Hobhouse. There was not much in them, I
know, for I read them some years ago at Venice, but the
world fancied it was to have a confession of the hidden feelings
of one concerning whom they were always passionately curious.
Moore was by no means pleased : he is now writing a life of
him himself, but it is conjectured that, notwithstanding he had
the MS. so long in his possession, he never found time to
read it. I breakfasted with him about a week ago, and he is
anxious to get materials for his work. I showed him your
letter on the subject of Lord Byron's death, and he wishes very
much to obtain from you any anecdote or account you would
like to send. If you know anything that ought to be known,
or feel inclined to detail anything that you may remember
worthy of record concerning him, perhaps you will communi-
cate with Moore. You have often said that you wished to
keep up our friend's name in the world, and if you still enter-
tain the same feeling, no way is more obvious than to assist
Moore, who asked me to make this request. You can write
to him through me or addressed to Longmans. . . .
Here then we are, Jane and I, in Kentish Town. . . . We
live near each other now, and, seeing each other almost daily,
for ever dwell on one subject. . . . The country about here is
really pretty ; lawny uplands, wooded parks, green lanes, and
gentle hills form agreeable and varying combinations. If we
had orange sunsets, cloudless noons, fireflies, large halls, etc.
etc., I should not find the scenery amiss, and yet I can attach
myself to nothing here ; neither among the people, though
some are good and clever, nor to the places, though they be
pretty. Jane is my chosen companion and only friend. I
am under a cloud, and cannot form near acquaintances among
that class whose manners and modes of life are agreeable to
120 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
me, and I think myself fortunate in having one or two pleasing
acquaintances among literary people, whose society I enjoy
without dreaming of friendship. My child is in excellent
health ; a fine, tall, handsome boy.
And then for money and the rest of those necessary annoy-
ances, the means of getting at the necessaries of life ; Jane's
affairs are yet unsettled
My prospects are somewhat brighter than they were. I
have little doubt but that in the course of a few months I shall
have an independent income of ^300 or ^400 per annum
during Sir Timothy's life, and that with small sacrifice on my
part. After his death Shelley's will secures me an income
more than sufficient for my simple habits.
One of my first wishes in obtaining the independence I
mention, will be to assist in freeing Clare from her present
painful mode of life. She is now at Moscow ; sufficiently un-
comfortable, poor girl, unless some change has taken place : I
think it probable that she will soon return to England. Her
spirits will have been improved by the information I sent her
that his family consider Shelley's will valid, and that she may
rely upon receiving the legacy. . . .
But Mary's hopes of better fortune were again
and again deferred, and she now found that any
concession on the part of her husband's family
must be purchased by the suppression of his later
poems. She was too poor to do other than
submit.
MARY SHELLEY TO LEIGH HUNT.
KENTISH TOWN, 2 zd August 1824.
. . . A negotiation has begun between Sir Timothy Shelley
and myself, by which, on sacrificing a small part of my future
expectations on the will, I shall ensure myself a sufficiency for
the present, and not only that, but be able, I hope, to relieve
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
121
Clare from her disagreeable situation at Moscow. I have been
obliged, however, as an indispensable preliminary, to suppress
the posthumous poems. More than 300 copies had been sold,
so this is the less provoking, and I have been obliged to pro-
mise not to bring dear Shelley's name before the public again
during Sir Timothy's life. There is no great harm in this,
since he is above seventy ; and, from choice, I should not
think of writing memoirs now, and the materials for a volume
of more works are so scant that I doubted before whether I
could publish it. Such is the folly of the world, and so do
things seem different from what they are ; since, from Whitton's
account, Sir Timothy writhes under the fame of his incompar-
able son, as if it were the most grievous injury done to him ;
and so, perhaps, after all it will prove.
All this was pending when I wrote last, but until I was cer-
tain I did not think it worth while to mention it. The affair is
arranged by Peacock, who, though I seldom see him, seems
anxious to do me all these kind of services in the best manner
that he can.
It is long since I saw your brother, nor had he any news
for me. I lead a most quiet life, and see hardly any one.
The Gliddons are gone to Hastings for a few weeks. Hogg is
on Circuit. Now that he is rich he is so very queer, so un-
amiable, and so strange, that I look forward to his return
without any desire of shortening the term of absence.
Poor Pierino is now in London, Non fosse male questo paese,
he says, se vi vedesse mai il sole. He is full of Greece, to which
he is going, and gave us an account of our good friend, Tre-
lawny, which was that he was not at all changed. Trelawny
has made a hero of the Greek chief, Ulysses, and declares that
there is a great cavern in Attica which he and Ulysses have
provisioned for seven years, and to which, if the cause fails, he
and this chieftain are to retire ; but if the cause is triumphant,
he is to build a city in the Negropont, colonise it, and Jane
and I are to go out to be queens and chieftainesses of the island.
When he first came to Athens he took to a Turkish life, bought
twelve or fifteen women, brntti wostri, Pierino says, one a
122 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Moor, of all things, and there he lay on his sofa, smoking,
these gentle creatures about him, till he got heartily sick of
idleness, shut them up in his harem, and joined and combated
with Ulysses. . . .
One of my principal reasons for writing just now is that I
have just heard Miss Curran's address (64 Via Sistina, Roma),
and I am anxious that Marianne should (if she will be so very
good) send one of the profiles already cut to her, of Shelley,
since I think that, by the help of that, Miss Curran will be
able to correct her portrait of Shelley, and make for us what
we so much desire a good likeness. I am convinced that
Miss Curran will return the profile immediately that she has
done with it, so that you will not sacrifice it, though you may
be the means of our obtaining a good likeness.
Journal, September 3. With what hopes did I come to
England? I pictured little of what was pleasurable, the
feeling I had could not be called hope ; it was expectation.
Yet at that time, now a year ago, what should I have said if a
prophet had told me that, after the whole revolution of the
year, I should be as poor in all estimable treasures as when I
arrived.
I have only seen two persons from whom I have hoped or
wished for friendly feeling. One, a poet, who sought me first,
whose voice, laden with sentiment, passed as Shelley's, and
who read with the same deep feeling as he ; whose gentle
manners were pleasing, and who seemed to a degree pleased ;
who once or twice listened to my sad plaints, and bent his dark
blue eyes upon me. Association, gratitude, esteem, made me
take interest in his long, though rare, visits.
The other was kind ; sought me, was pleased with me. I
could talk to him ; that was much. He was attached to
another, so that I felt at my ease with him. They have dis-
appeared from my horizon. Jane alone remains ; if she loved
me as well as I do her it would be much ; she is all gentle-
ness, and she is my only consolation, yet she does not console
me.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 123
I have just completed my twenty-seventh year ; at such a time
hope and youth are still in their prime, and the pains I feel, there-
fore, are ever alive and vivid within me. What shall I do ?
Nothing. I study, that passes the time. I write; at times
that pleases me, though double sorrow comes when I feel that
Shelley no longer reads and approves of what I write ; besides,
I have no great faith in my success. Composition is delight-
ful ; but if you do not expect the sympathy of your fellow-
creatures in what you write, the pleasure of writing is of short
duration.
I have my lovely Boy, without him I could not live. I
have Jane ; in her society I forget time ; but the idea of it
does not cheer me in my griefful moods. It is strange that
the religious feeling that exalted my emotions in happiness,
deserts me in my misery. I have little enjoyment, no hope.
I have given myself ten years more of life. God grant that
they may not be augmented. I should be glad that they were
curtailed. Loveless beings surround me; they talk of my
personal attractions, of my talents, my manners.
The wisest and best have loved me. The beautiful, and
glorious, and noble, have looked on me with the divine ex-
pression of love, till death, the reaper, carried to his over-
stocked barns my lamented harvest.
But now I am not loved ! Never, oh, never more shall I
love. Synonymous to such words are, never more shall I be
happy, never more feel life sit triumphant in my frame. I am
a wreck. By what do the fragments cling together ? Why do
they not part, to be borne away by the tide to the boundless
ocean, where those are whom day and night I pray that I may
rejoin.
I shall be happier, perhaps, in Italy; yet, when I some-
times think that she is the murderess, I tremble for my boy.
We shall see ; if no change comes, I shall be unable to support
the burthen of time, and no change, if it hurt not his dear
head, can be for the worse.
In the month of July Mary had received an-
124 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
other request for literary help ; this time from
Medwin, who wanted her aid in eking out and
correcting his notes of conversations with Lord
Byron, shortly to be published.
" You must have been, as I was, very much affected with
poor Lord Byron's death," he wrote to Mary. "All parties
seem now writing in his favour, and the papers are full of his
praise. . . .
" How do you think I have been employing myself? With
writing ; and the subject I have chosen has been Memoirs of
Lord Byron. Every one here has been disappointed in the
extreme by the destruction of his private biography, and have
urged me to give the world the little I know of him. I wish
I was better qualified for the task. When I was at Pisa I
made very copious notes of his conversations, for private refer-
ence only, and was surprised to find on reading them (which I
have never done till his death, and hearing that his life had
been burnt) that they contained so many anecdotes of his life.
During many nights that we sat up together he was very con-
fidential, and entered into his history and opinions on most
subjects, and from them I have compiled a volume which is, I
am told, highly entertaining. Shelley I have made a very pro-
minent feature in the work, and I think you will be pleased
with that part, at least, of the Memoir, and all the favourable
sentiments of Lord Byron concerning him. But I shall cer-
tainly not publish the work till you have seen it, and would
give the world to consult you in person about the whole ; you
might be of the greatest possible use to me, and prevent many
errors from creeping in. I have been told it cannot fail of
having the greatest success, and have been offered ^500 for it
a large and tempting sum in consequence of what has been
said in its praise by Grattan. . . .
" Before deciding finally on the publication there are many
things to be thought of. Lady Byron will not be pleased with
my account of the marriage and separation ; in fact, I shall be
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 125
assailed on all sides. Now, my dear friend, what do you
advise? Let me have your full opinion, for I mean to be
guided by it. I hear to-day that Moore is manufacturing five
or six volumes out of the burnt materials, for which Longman
advanced ^2000, and is to pay ^2000 more ; they will be in
a great rage. If I publish, promptitude is everything, so that
I know you will answer this soon."
The idea of entertaining the world, however,
highly, at whatever price, with "tit-bits" from
the private life and after-dinner talk of her late
intimate friends, almost before those friends were
cold in their graves, did not find favour with Mrs.
Shelley. As an excuse for declining to have any
hand in this work, she gave her own desire to
avoid publicity or notice. In a later letter Medwin
assured her that her name was not even mentioned
in the book. He frankly owned that most of his
knowledge of Byron had been derived from her
and Shelley, but added, by way of excuse
They tell me it is highly interesting, and there is at this
moment a longing after and impatience to know something
about the most extraordinary man of the age that must give
my book a considerable success.
What Mary felt about this publication can be
gathered from her allusion to it in the following
letter
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. HUNT.
KENTISH TOWN, ioth October 1824.
... I write to you on the most dismal of all days, a rainy
Sunday, when dreary church-going faces look still more drearily
126
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
from under dripping umbrellas, and the poor plebeian dame
looks reproachfully at her splashed white stockings, not her
gown, that has been warily held high up, and the to-be-con-
cealed petticoat has borne all the ill-usage of the mud. Dismal
though it is, dismal though I am, I do not wish to write a dis-
contented letter, but in a few words to describe things as they
are with me. A weekly visit to the Strand, a monthly visit to
Shacklewell (when we are sure to be caught in the rain) forms
my catalogue of visits. I have no visitors ; if it were not for
Jane I should be quite alone. The eternal rain imprisons one
in one's little room, and one's spirits flag without one ex-
hilarating circumstance. In some things, however, I am better
off than last year, for I do not doubt but that in the course of
a few months I shall have an independence ; and I no longer
balance, as I did last winter, between Italy and England.
My Father wished me to stay, and, old as he is, and wishing
as one does to be of some use somewhere, I thought that I
would make the trial, and stay if I could. But the joke has
become too serious. I look forward to the coming winter
with horror, but it shall be the last. I have not yet made up
my mind to the where in Italy. I shall, if possible, im-
mediately on arriving, push on to Rome. Then we shall see.
I read, study, and write ; sometimes that takes me out of my-
self; but to live for no one, to be necessary to none, to know
that " Where is now my hope ? for my hope, who shall see it ?
They shall go down to the base of the pit, when our rest to-
gether is in the dust." But change of scene and the sun of
Italy will restore my energy ; the very thought of it smooths my
brow. Perhaps I shall seek the heats of Naples, if they do
not hurt my darling Percy. And now, what news ? . . .
Hazlitt is abroad; he will be in Italy in the winter; he
wrote an article in the Edinburgh Review on the volume of
poems I published. I do not know whether he meant it to
be favourable or not ; I do not like it at all ; but when I saw
him I could not be angry. I never was so shocked in my
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
127
life, he has become so thin, his hair scattered, his cheek-bones
projecting; but for his voice and smile I should not have
known him ; his smile brought tears into my eyes, it was like
a sunbeam illuminating the most melancholy of ruins, light-
ning that assured you in a dark night of the identity of a
friend's ruined and deserted abode. . . .
Have you, my Polly, sent a profile to Miss Curran in
Rome? Now pray do, and pray write; do, my dear girl.
Next year by this time I shall, perhaps, be on my way to you ;
it will go hard but that I contrive to spend a week (that is, if
you wish) at Florence, on my way to the Eternal City. God
send that this prove not an airy castle ; but I own that I put
faith in my having money before that; and I know that I
could not, if I would, endure the torture of my English life
longer than is absolutely necessary. By the bye, I heard that
you are keeping your promise to Trelawny, and that in due
time he will be blessed with a namesake. How is Occhi
Turchini, Thornton the reformed, Johnny the what Johnny ?
the good boy ? Mary the merry, Irving the sober, Percy the
martyr, and dear Sylvan the good ?
Percy is quite well ; tell his friend he goes to school and
learns to read and write, being very handy with his hands,
perhaps having a pure anticipated cognition of the art of
painting in his tiny fingers. Mrs. Williams' little girl, who
calls herself Dina, is his wife. Poor Clare, at Moscow ! at
least she will be independent one day, and if I am so soon,
her situation will be quickly ameliorated.
Have you heard of Medwin's book ? Notes of conversa-
tions which he had with Lord Byron (when tipsy) ; every one
is to be in it ; every one will be angry. He wanted me to
have a hand in it, but I declined. Years ago, when a man
died, the worms ate him ; now a new set of worms feed on the
carcase of the scandal he leaves behind him, and grow fat
upon the world's love of tittle-tattle. I will not be numbered
among them. Have you received the volume of poems?
Give my love to "Very," and so, dear, very patient, Adieu.
Yours affectionately, MARY SHELLEY.
128 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Jotirnal, October 26. Time rolls on, and what does it
bring ? What can I do ? How change my destiny ? Months
change their names, years their cyphers. My brow is sadly
trenched, the blossom of youth faded. My mind gathers
wrinkles. What will become of me ?
How long it is since an emotion of joy filled my once
exulting heart, or beamed from my once bright eyes. I am
young still, though age creeps on apace ; but I may not love
any but the dead. I think that an emotion of joy would
destroy me, so strange would it be to my withered heart.
Shelley had said
Lift not the painted veil which men call life.
Mine is not painted; dark and enshadowed, it curtains out
all happiness, all hope. Tears fill my eyes ; well may I weep,
solitary girl ! The dead know you not ; the living heed you
not. You sit in your lone room, and the howling wind,
gloomy prognostic of winter, gives not forth so despairing a
tone as the unheard sighs your ill-fated heart breathes.
I was loved once ! still let me cling to the memory ; but
to live for oneself alone, to read, and communicate your
reflections to none ; to write, and be cheered by none ; to
weep, and in no bosom ; no more on thy bosom, my Shelley,
to spend my tears this is misery !
Such is the Alpha and Omega of my tale. I can speak to
none. Writing this is useless ; it does not even soothe me ;
on the contrary, it irritates me by showing the pitiful expedient
to which I am reduced.
I have been a year in England, and, ungentle England, for
what have I to thank you ? For disappointment, melancholy,
and tears ; for unkindness, a bleeding heart, and despairing
thoughts. I wish, England, to associate but one idea with
thee immeasurable distance and insurmountable barriers, so
that I never, never might breathe thine air more.
Beloved Italy ! you are my country, my hope, my heaven !
December 3 . I endeavour to rouse my fortitude and calm
my mind by high and philosophic thoughts, and my studies aid
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 129
this endeavour. I have pondered for hours on Cicero's de-
scription of that power of virtue in the human mind which
render's man's frail being superior to fortune.
" Eadem ratio habet in re quiddam amplum at que mag-
nificum ad imperandum magis quam ad parendum accommo-
datum ; omnia humana non tolerabilia solum sed etiam levia
ducens ; altum quiddam et excelsum, nihil temens, nemini
cedens, semper invictum."
What should I fear? To whom cede? By whom be
conquered ?
Little truly have I to fear. One only misfortune can touch
me. That must be the last, for I should sink under it. At
the age of seven and twenty, in the busy metropolis of native
England, I find myself alone. The struggle is hard that can
give rise to misanthropy in one, like me, attached to my fellow-
creatures. Yet now, did not the memory of those matchless
lost ones redeem their race, I should learn to hate men, who
are strong only to oppress, moral only to insult. Oh ye
winged hours that fly fast, that, having first destroyed my
happiness, now bear my swift-departing youth with you, bring
patience, wisdom, and content ! I will not stoop to the
world, or become like those who compose it, and be actuated
by mean pursuits and petty ends. I will endeavour to remain
unconquered by hard and bitter fortune ; yet the tears that
start in my eyes show pangs she inflicts upon me.
So much for philosophising. Shall I ever be a philosopher ?
VOL. n. 32
CHAPTER XX
JANUARY i825-JuLY 1827
AT the beginning of 1825 Mrs. Shelley's worldly
affairs were looking somewhat more hopeful.
The following extract is from a letter to Miss
Curran, dated 2d January
... I have now better prospects than I had, or rather, a
better reality, for my prospects are sufficiently misty. I re-
ceive now 200 a year from my Father-in-law, but this in so
strange and embarrassed a manner that, as yet, I hardly know
what to make of it. I do not believe, however, that he would
object to my going abroad, as I daresay he considers that the first
step towards kingdom come, whither, doubtless, he prays that
an interloper like me may speedily be removed. I talk, there-
fore, of going next autumn, and shall be grateful to any power,
divine or human, that assists me to leave this desert country.
Mine I cannot call it ; it is too unkind to me.
What you say of my Shelley's picture is beyond words
interesting to me. How good you are ! Send it, I pray you,
for perhaps I cannot come, and, at least, it would be a blessing
to receive it a few months earlier. I am afraid you can do
nothing about the cameo. As you say, it were worth nothing,
unless like ; but I fancied that it might be accomplished
under your directions. Would it be asking too much to lend
me the copy you took of my darling William's portrait, since
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 131
mine is somewhat injured? But from both together I could
get a nice copy made.
You may imagine that I see few people, so far from the
centre of bustling London ; but, in truth, I found that even
in town, poor, undinner-giving as I was, I could not dream of
society. It was a great confinement for Percy, and I could
not write in the midst of smoke, noise, and streets. I live
here very quietly, going once a week to the Strand. My chief
dependence for society is on Mrs. Williams, who lives at no
great distance. As to theatres, etc., how can a " lone woman "
think of such things ? No ; the pleasures and luxuries of life
await me in divine Italy ; but here, privation, solitude, and
desertion are my portion. What a change for me ! But I
must not think of that. I contrive to live on as I am ; but
to recur to the past and compare it with the present is to
deluge me in grief and tears.
My Boy is well ; a fine tall fellow, and as good as I can
possibly expect ; he is improved in looks since he came here.
Clare is in Moscow still, not very pleasantly situated ; but she
is in a situation, and being now well in health, waits with more
patience for better times. The Godwins go on as usual. My
Father, though harassed, is in good health, and is employed in
the second volume of the Commonwealth.
The weather here is astonishingly mild, but the rain con-
tinual ; half England is under water, and the damage done at
seaports from storms incalculable. In Rome, doubtless, it
has been different. Rome, dear name ! I cannot tell why,
but to me there is something enchanting in that spot. I have
another friend there, the Countess Guiccioli, now unhappy
and mournful from the death of Lord Byron. Poor girl ! I
sincerely pity her, for she truly loved him, and I cannot think
that she can endure an Italian after him. You have there
also a Mr. Taaffe, a countryman of yours, who translates
Dante, and rides fine horses that perpetually throw him. He
knew us all very well.
The English have had many a dose of scandal. First poor
dear Lord Byron, from whom, now gone, many a poor devil
132 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
of an author is now fearless of punishment, then Mr. Fauntle-
roy, then Miss Foote ; these are now dying away. The fame
of Mr. Fauntleroy, indeed, has not survived him ; that of
Lord Byron bursts forth every now and then afresh ; whilst
Miss Foote smokes most dismally still. Then we have had
our quantum of fires and misery, and the poor exiled Italians
and Spaniards have added famine to the list of evils. A
subscription, highly honourable to the poor and middle classes
who subscribed their mite, has relieved them.
Will you write soon ? How much delight I anticipate this
spring on the arrival of the picture ! In all thankfulness,
faithfully yours, MARY W. SHELLEY.
The increase of allowance, from ^"100 to ^200,
had not been actually granted at the beginning of
the year, but it appeared so probable an event
that, thanks partly to the good offices of Mr.
Peacock, Sir Timothy's lawyers agreed, while the
matter was pending, to advance Mrs. Shelley the
extra ^"100 on their own responsibility. The
concession was not so great as it looks, for all
money allowed to her was only advanced subject
to an agreement that every penny was to be re-
paid, with interest, to Sir Timothy's executors
at the time when, according to Percy Bysshe
Shelley's will, she should come into the property ;
and every cheque was endorsed by her to this
effect. But her immediate anxieties were in some
measure relieved by this addition to her income.
Not, indeed, that it set her free from pressing
money cares, for the ensuing letter to Leigh Hunt
incidentally shows that her father was a perpetual
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 133
drain on her resources, that there was every pro-
bability of her having to support him partly at
times entirely in the future, and that she was
endeavouring, with Peacock's help, to raise a large
sum, on loan, to meet these possible emergencies.
The main subject of the letter is an article of
Hunt's about Shelley, the proof of which had
been sent to Mary to read. It contained, in an
extended form, the substance of that biographical
notice, originally intended for a preface to the
volume of Posthumous Poems.
MRS. SHELLEY TO LEIGH HUNT.
^th April 1825.
MY DEAR HUNT I have just finished reading your article
upon Shelley. It is with great diffidence that I write to thank
you for it, because perceiving plainly that you think that I
have forfeited all claim on your affection, you may deem my
thanks an impertinent intrusion. But from my heart I thank
you. You may imagine that it has moved me deeply. Of
course this very article shows how entirely you have cast me
out from any corner in your affections. And from various
causes none dishonourable to me I cannot help wishing
that I could have received your goodwill and kindness, which
I prize, and have ever prized ; but you have a feeling, I had
almost said a prejudice, against me, which makes you construe
foreign matter into detractation against me (I allude to the, to
me, deeply afflicting idea you got upon some vague expression
communicated to you by your brother), and insensible to any
circumstances that might be pleaded for me. But I will not
dwell on this. The sun shines, and I am striving so hard for
a continuation of the gleams of pleasure that visit my intoler-
able state of regret for the loss of beloved companionship
134 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
during cloudless days, that I will dash away the springing tears
and make one or two necessary observations on your article.
I have often heard our Shelley relate the story of stabbing
an upper boy with a fork, but never as you relate it. He
always described it, in my hearing, as being an almost in-
voluntary act, done on the spur of anguish, and that he made
the stab as the boy was going out of the room. Shelley did
not allow Harriet half his income. She received ^200 a
year. Mr. Westbrook had always made his daughter an
allowance, even while she lived with Shelley, which of course
was continued to her after their separation. I think if I were
near you, I could readily persuade you to omit all allusion to
Clare. After the death of Lord Byron, in the thick of
memoirs, scandal, and turning up of old stories, she has never
been alluded to, at least in any work I have seen. You men-
tion (having been obliged to return your MS. to Bowring, I
quote from memory) an article in Blackwood, but I hardly
think that this is of date subsequent to our miserable loss.
In fact, poor Clare has been buried in entire oblivion, and to
bring her from this, even for the sake of defending her, would,
I am sure, pain her greatly, and do her mischief. Would you
permit this part to be erased ? I have, without waiting to ask
your leave, requested Messrs. Bowring to leave out your men-
tion that the remains of dearest Edward were brought to
England. Jane still possesses this treasure, and has once or
twice been asked by his mother-in-law about it, once an urn
was sent Consequently she is very anxious that her secret
should be kept, and has allowed it to be believed that the
ashes were deposited with Shelley's at Rome. Such, my dear
Hunt, are all the alterations I have to suggest, and I lose no
time in communicating them to you. They are too trivial for
me to apologise for the liberty, and I hope that you will agree
with me in what I say about Clare Allegra no more she at
present absent and forgotten. On Sir Timothy's death she
will come in for a legacy which may enable her to enter into
society, perhaps to marry, if she wishes it, if the past be
forgotten.
MAR Y IVOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 135
I forget whether such things are recorded by " Galignani,"
or, if recorded, whether you would have noticed it. My
Father's complicated annoyances, brought to their height by
the failure of a very promising speculation and the loss of an
impossible-to-be-lost law-suit, have ended in a bankruptcy, the
various acts of which drama are now in progress ; that over,
nothing will be left to him but his pen and me. He is so
full of his Commonwealth that in the midst of every anxiety he
writes every day now, and in a month or two will have com-
pleted the second volume, and I am employed in raising
money necessary for my maintenance, and in which he must
participate. This will drain me pretty dry for the present,
but (as the old women say) if I live, I shall have more than
enough for him and me, and recur, at least to some part of
my ancient style of life, and feel of some value to others. Do
not, however, mistake my phraseology; I shall not live with
my Father, but return to Italy and economise, the moment
God and Mr. Whitton will permit. My Percy is quite well,
and has exchanged his constant winter occupation of drawing
for playing in the fields (which are now useful as well as
ornamental), flying kites, gardening, etc. I bask in the sun
on the grass reading Virgil, that is, my beloved Georgics and
Lord Shaftesbury's Characteristics. I begin to live again, and
as the maids of Greece sang joyous hymns on the revival of
Adonis, does my spirit lift itself in delightful -thanksgiving on
the awakening of nature.
Lamb is superannuated do you understand ? as Madame
says. He has left the India House on two-thirds of his in-
come, and become a gentleman at large a delightful con-
summation. What a strange taste it is that confines him to
a view of the New River, with houses opposite, in Islington !
I saw the Novellos the other day. Mary and her new babe
are well ; he, Vincent all over, fat and flourishing moreover,
and she dolorous that it should be her fate to add more than
her share to the population of the world. How are all yours
Henry and the rest ? Percy still remembers him, though
occupied by new friendships and the feelings incident to his
136 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
state of matrimony, having taken for better and worse to wife
Mrs. Williams' little girl.
I suppose you will receive with these letters Bessy's new
book, which she has done very well indeed, and forms with
the other a delightful prize for plant and flower worshippers,
those favourites of God, which enjoy beauty unequalled and
the tranquil pleasures of growth and life, bestowing incalcul-
able pleasure, and never giving or receiving pain. Have you
seen Hazlitt's notes of his travels ? He is going over the same
road that I have travelled twice. He surprised me by calling
the road from Susa to Turin dull ; there, where the Alps sink
into low mountains and romantic hills, topped by ruined castles,
watered by brawling streams, clothed by magnificent walnut
trees ; there, where I wrote to you in a fit of enchantment,
exalted by the splendid scene ; but I remembered, first, that he
travelled in winter, when snow covers all ; and, besides, he went
from what I approached, and looked at the plain of Lombardy
with the back of the diligence between him and the loveliest
scene in nature ; so much can relation alter circumstances.
Clare is still, I believe, at Moscow. When I return to
Italy I shall endeavour to enable her to go thither also. I shall
not come without my Jane, who is now necessary to my exist-
ence almost. She has recourse to the cultivation of her mind,
and amiable and dear as she ever was, she is in every way
improved and become more valuable.
Trelawny is in the cave with Ulysses, not in Polypheme's
cave, but in a vast cavern of Parnassus ; inaccessible and
healthy and safe, but cut off from the rest of the world.
Trelawny has attached himself to the part of Ulysses, a savage
chieftain, without any plan but personal independence and
opposition to the Government. Trelawny calls him a hero.
Ulysses speaks a word or two of French ; Trelawny, no Greek !
Pierino has returned to Greece.
Horace Smith has returned with his diminished family
(little Horace is dead). He already finds London too ex-
pensive, and they are about to migrate to Tunbridge Wells.
He is very kind to me.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 137
I long to hear from you, and I am more tenderly attached
to you and yours than you imagine ; love me a little, and
make Marianne love me, as truly I think she does. Am I
mistaken, Polly? Your affectionate and obliged,
MARY W. SHELLEY.
Outwardly, this year was uneventful. Mary
was busily working at her novel, The Last Man.
The occupation was good for her, and perhaps it
was no bad thing that Necessity should stand at
her elbow to stimulate her to exertion when her
interest and energy flagged. For, in spite of her
utmost efforts to the contrary, her heart and spirit
were often faint at the prospect of an arduous and
lonely life. And when, in early autumn, Shelley's
portrait was at last sent to her by Miss Curran,
the sight of it brought back the sense of what she
had lost, and revived in all its irrecoverable bitter-
ness that past happy time, than to remember
which in misery there is no greater sorrow.
Journal, September 17 (1825). Thy picture is come, my
only one ! Thine those speaking eyes, that animated look ;
unlike aught earthly wert thou ever, and art now !
If thou hadst still lived, how different had been my life
and feelings !
Thou art near to guard and save me, angelic one ! Thy
divine glance will be my protection and defence. I was not
worthy of thee, and thou hast left me; yet that dear look
assures me that thou wert mine, and recalls and narrates to
my backward-looking mind a long tale of love and happiness.
My head aches. My heart my hapless heart is deluged
in bitterness. Great God ! if there be any pity for human
suffering, tell me what I am to do. I strive to study, I strive
138 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
to write, but I cannot live without loving and being loved,
without sympathy ; if this is denied to me I must die. Would
that the hour were come !
On the same day when Mary penned these
melancholy lines, Trelawny was writing to her
from Cephalonia.
He had been treacherously shot by an inmate
of his mountain fortress, an Englishman newly
arrived, whom he had welcomed as a guest. The
true instigator of the crime was one Fenton, a
Scotchman, who in the guise of a volunteer had
ostensibly served under Trelawny for a twelve-
month past, and who by his capability and ap-
parent zeal had so won his confidence as to be
entrusted with secret missions. He was, in fact,
an emissary of the Greek Government, foisted on
Trelawny at Missolonghi to act as a spy on
Odysseus, the insurgent Greek chieftain.
Through his machinations Odysseus was be-
trayed and murdered, and Trelawny narrowly
escaped death.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
CEPHALONIA, \ r ]th September 1825.
DEAR MARY I have just escaped from Greece and landed
here, in the hopes of patching up my broken frame and
shattered constitution. Two musket balls, fired at the distance
of two paces, struck me and passed through my framework,
which damn'd near finished me ; but 'tis a long story, and my
writing arm is rendered unfit for service, and I am yet un-
practised with the left. But a friend of mine here, a Major
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 139
Bacon, is on his way to England, and will enlighten you as to
me. I shall be confined here some time. Write to me then
at this place. I need rest and quiet, for I am shook to the
foundation. Love to Jane and Clare, and believe me still
your devoted friend, EDWARD TRELAWNY.
It would seem that this letter was many
months in reaching Mary, for in February 1826
she was writing to him in these terms
I hear at last that Mr. Hodges has letters for me, and that
prevents a thousand things I was about to say concerning the
pain your very long silence had occasioned me. Consider,
dear friend, that your last was in April, so that nearly a year
has gone by, and not only did I not hear from you, but until
the arrival of Mr. Hodges, many months had elapsed since I
had heard of you.
Sometimes I flattered myself that the foundations of my
little habitation would have been shaken by a " ship Shelley
ahoy " that even Jane, distant a mile, would have heard.
That dear hope lost, I feared a thousand things.
Hamilton Browne's illness, the death of many English, the
return of every other from Greece, filled me with gloomy
apprehensions.
But you live, what kind of life your letters will, I trust,
inform me, what possible kind of life in a cavern surrounded
by precipices, inaccessible ! All this will satisfy your craving
imagination. The friendship you have for Odysseus, does that
satisfy your warm heart ? . . . I gather from your last letter
and other intelligence that you think of marrying the daugther
of your favourite chief, and thus will renounce England and
even the English for ever. And yet, no ! you love some of
us, I am sure, too much to forget us, even if you neglect us
for a while ; but truly, I long for your letters, which will tell
all. And remember, dear friend, it is about yourself I am
anxious. Of Greece I read in the papers. I see many in-
140 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
formants, but I can learn your actions, hopes, and, above all
valuable to me, the continuation of your affection for me,
from your letters only.
27/7* February.
I now close my letter I have not yet received yours.
Last night Jane and I went with Gamba and my Father to
see Kean in Othello. This play, as you may guess, reminded
us of you. Do you remember, when delivering the killing
news, you awoke Jane, as Othello awakens Desdemona from
her sleep on the sofa? Kean, abominably supported, acted
divinely ; put as he is on his mettle by recent events and a
full house and applause, which he deserved, his farewell is
the most pathetic piece of acting to be imagined. Yet, my
dear friend, I wish we had seen it represented as was talked
of at Pisa. lago would never have found a better representa-
tive than that strange and wondrous creature whom one
regrets daily more, for who here can equal him ? Adieu,
dear Trelawny, take care of yourself, and come and visit us as
soon as you can escape from the sorceries of Ulysses. In all
truth, yours affectionately, M. W. S.
At Pisa, 1822, Lord Byron talked vehemently of our
getting up a play in his great hall at the Lanfranchi ; it was
to be Othello. He cast the characters thus : Byron, lago ;
Trelawny, Othello ; Williams, Cassio ; Medwin, Roderigo ;
Mrs. Shelley, Desdemona; Mrs. Williams, Emilia. "Who is
to be our audience ? " I asked. " All Pisa," he rejoined. He
recited a great portion of his part with great .gusto ; it exactly
suited him, he looked it, too.
All this time Miss Clairmont was pursuing her
vocation as a governess in Russia, and many
interesting glimpses into Russian family and
social life are afforded by her letters to Mrs.
Shelley and Mrs. Williams. She was a volumin-
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 141
ous letter- writer, and in these characteristic
epistles she unconsciously paints, as no other
hand could have done, a vivid portrait of herself.
We can see her, with all her vivacity, versatility,
and resource, her great cleverness, never at a
loss for a word, an excuse, or a good story, her
indefatigable energy, her shifting moods and
wild caprices, the bewildering activity of her
restless brain, and the astonishing facility with
which she transferred to paper all her passing
impressions. In narration, in description, in
panegyric, and in complaint she is equally fluent.
Unimpeachably correct as her conduct always
was after her one miserable adventure, she had,
from first to last, an innate affinity for anything in
the shape of social gossip and scandal ; her really
generous impulses were combined with the world-
liest of worldly wisdom, and the whole tinctured
with the highest of high-flown sentiment.
Fill in the few details wanting, the flat, sleek,
black hair, eyes so black that the pupil was
hardly to be distinguished from the iris (eyes
which seemed unmistakably tc indicate an admix-
ture of Portuguese, if not of African, blood in her
descent), a complexion which may in girlhood
have been olive, but in later life was sallow,
features not beautiful, and depending on expres-
sion for any charm they might have, and she
stands before the reader, the unmanageable,
H2 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
amusing, runaway schoolgirl ; a stumbling-block
first, then a bugbear, to Byron ; a curse, which
he persistently treated as a blessing, to Shelley ;
a thorn in the side of Mary and of every one who
ever was responsible for her ; yet liked by her
acquaintance, admired in society, commiserated
by her early friends, and regarded with well-
deserved affection and gratitude by many of her
pupils an
CLARE TO JANE.
Moscow, ziih October 1825.
MY DEAREST JANE It is now so long since I heard from you
that I begin to think you have quite forgotten me. I wrote twice
to you during the summer ; both letters went by private hand,
and to neither of which have I received your answer. I en-
closed also a letter or letters for Trelawny, and I hope very
much you have received them. Whenever some time elapses
without hearing from England, then I begin to grow miserable
with fear. In a letter I received from Mary in the autumn,
she mentions the approaching return of the Hunts from Italy,
and I console myself with believing that you are both so much
taken up with them that you have delayed from day to day to
write to me. Be that as it may, I have never been in greater
need of your letters than for these last two months, for I have
been truly wretched. To convince you that I am not given
to fret for trifles, I will tell you how they have been passed.
I spent a very quiet time, if not a very agreeable one, until
the 1 2th of August ; then a French newspaper fell into my
hands, in which it mentioned that Trelawny had been danger-
ously wounded in a duel on the i3th of June. You who
have known the misery of anxiety for the safety and well-
being of those dear to us may imagine what I suffered. At
last a letter from Mary came, under date of 26th of July, not
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
143
mentioning a word of this, and I allowed myself to hope that
it was not true, because certainly she would have heard of it
by the time she wrote. Then, a week after, another newspaper
mentioned his being recovered. This was scarcely passed
when our two children fell ill ; one got better, but the other,
my pupil, a little girl of six years and a half old, died. I was
truly wretched at her loss, and our whole house was a scene
of sorrow and confusion, that can only happen in a savage
country, where a disciplined temper is utterly unknown. We
came to town, and directly the little boy fell sick again of a
putrid fever, from which he was in imminent danger for some
time. At last after nights and days of breathless anxiety he
did recover. By the death of the little girl, I became of little
or no use in the house, and the thought of again entering a
new house, and having to learn new dispositions, was quite
abhorrent to me. Nothing is so cruel as to change from
house to house and be perpetually surrounded by strangers ;
one feels so forlorn, so utterly alone, that I could not have
the courage to begin the career over again ; so I settled to
remain in the same house, to continue the boy's English, and
to give lessons out-of-doors. I do not know whether my plan
will succeed yet, but, at any rate, I am bent upon trying it.
It is not very agreeable to walk about in the snow and in a
cold of twenty, sometimes thirty degrees; but anything is
better than being a governess in the common run of Moscow
houses. But you have not yet heard my greatest sorrow, and
which I think might well have been spared. I had one
Englishwoman here, to whom I was attached a woman of the
most generous heart, and whom misfortune, perhaps impru-
dence, had driven to Russia. She thought with me that
nothing can equal the misery of our situation, and accordingly
she went last spring to Odessa, hoping to find some means of
establishing a boarding-house in order to have a home. If
it succeeded, she was to have sent for me; but, however,
she wrote to me that, after well considering everything, she
found such a plan would not succeed, and that I might expect
her shortly in Moscow, to resume her old manner of life. I
144 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
expected her arrival daily, and began to grow uneasy, and at
length some one wrote to another acquaintance of hers here
that she had destroyed herself. I, who knew her thoughts,
have no doubt the horror of entering again as governess made
her resolve upon this as the only means to escape it. You
see, dearest Jane, whether these last two months have been
fruitful in woes. I cannot tell you what a consolation it
would have been to have received a letter from you whilst I
have been suffering under such extreme melancholy. The
only amelioration in my present situation is that I can with-
draw to my room and be much more alone than I could
formerly, and this solitude is so friendly to my nature that it
has been my only comfort. I have heard all about the change
in my mother's situation, and am truly glad of it. I am sure
she will be much better off than she was before. As for
Mary, her affairs seem inexplicable. Nothing can "ever per-
suade me that a will can dispose of estates which the maker
of it never possessed. Do clear up this mystery to me.
What a strange way of thinking must that be which can rely
on such a hope ! Yet my brother, my mother, and Mary
never cease telling me that one day I shall be free, and the
state of doubt, the contradiction between their assertions and
my intimate persuasion of the contrary, that awakens in my
mind, is very painful. You are almost quite silent upon the
subject, but I wish, my dear Jane, that you would answer me
the following questions. Has any professional man ever been
consulted on the subject ? What is Hogg's opinion ? Why
in this particular case should the law be set aside, which says
that no man can dispose of what he has never possessed ?
Do have the goodness to ask these questions very clearly and
to give me the answers, which no one has ever done yet.
They simply tell me, " Whitton has come forward," " Whitton
thinks the will valid," etc. etc., all of which cannot prove to
me that it is so. I know you will excuse my giving you so
much trouble, but really when you consider the painful uncer-
tainty which hangs on my mind, you will think it very natural
that I should wish to know the reasons of what is asserted to
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 1 45
me. To say the truth, I daily grow more indifferent about
the issue of the affair. The time is past when independ-
ence would have been an object of my desires, and I am now
old enough to know that misery is the universal malady of the
human race, and that there is no escaping from it, except by
a philosophic indifference to all external circumstances, and
by a disciplined mind completely absorbed in intellectual
subjects. I fashion my life accordingly to this, and I often
enjoy moments of serenest calm, which I owe to this way of
thinking. Do not mistake and think that I am indifferent to
seeing you again; so far from this, I dream of this as one
dreams of Paradise after death, as a thing of another world,
and not to be obtained here. It would be too much happi-
ness for me to venture to hope it. I endeavour often to
imagine the circle in which you live, but it is impossible, and
I think it would be equally difficult for you to picture to
yourself my mode of life. I often think what in the world
Mary or Jane would do in the dull routine I tread ; no talk
of public affairs, no talk of books, no subject do I ever hear
of except cards, eating, and the different manner of managing
slaves. Now and then some heroic young man devotes him-
self like a second Marcus Curtius to the public good, and, in
order to give the good ladies of Moscow something new to
talk of, rouses them from their lethargic gossipings by getting
himself shot in a duel ; or some governess disputes with the
mother of her pupils, and what they both said goes over the
town. Mary mentioned in her last that she thought it very
likely you might both go to Paris. I hope you may be there,
for I am sure you would find the mode of life more cheerful
than London. As I have told you so many of my sorrows, I
must tell you the only good piece of news I have to communi-
cate. I have lately made acquaintance with a German gentle-
man, who is a great resource to me. In such a country as
Russia, where nothing but ignorant people are to be met, a
cultivated mind is the greatest treasure. His society recalls
our former circle, for he is well versed in ancient and
VOL. ii 33
146 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
modern literature, and has the same noble, enlarged way of
thinking. You may imagine how delighted he was to find me
so different from everything around him, and capable of under-
standing what has been so long sealed up in his mind as trea-
sures too precious to be wasted on the coarse Russian soil. I
talk to you thus freely about him, because I know you will not
believe that I am in love, or that I have any other feeling
than a most sincere and steady friendship for him. What
you felt for Shelley I feel for him. I feel it also my duty to
tell you I have a real friend, because, in case of sickness or
death happening to me, you would at least feel the consolation
of knowing that I had not died in the hands of strangers. I
talk to him very often of you and Mary, until his desire to see
you becomes quite a passion. He is, like all Germans, very
sentimental, a very sweet temper, and uncommonly generous.
His attachment to me is extreme, but I have taken the very
greatest care to explain to him that I cannot return it in the
same degree. This does not make him unhappy, and there-
fore our friendship is of the utmost importance to both. I
hope, my dear Jane, that you will one day see him, and that
both you and Mary may find such an agreeable friend in him
as I have had. I must now turn from this subject to speak
of Trelawny, which comes naturally into my mind with the
idea of friendship ; you cannot think how uneasy I am at not
hearing from him. I am not afraid of his friendship growing
cold for me, for I am sure he is unchangeable on that point,
but I am afraid for his happiness and safety. Is it true that
his friend Ulysses is dead ? and if so, do pray write to him and
prevail upon him to return. I should be at ease if I were to
know him near you and Mary. Do think if you can do anything
to draw him to you, my dearest Jane. It would render me the
happiest of human beings to know him in the hands of two
such friends. If this could be, how hard I should work to gain
a little independence here, and return perhaps in-ten years and
live with you. As yet I have done nothing, notwithstanding
my utmost exertions, towards such a plan, but I am turning
over every possible means in my brain for devising some
MAR Y WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLS Y \ 47
scheme to get money, and perhaps I may. That is my reason
for staying in Russia, because there is no country so favour-
able to foreigners. Pray, my dear Jane, do write to me the
moment you receive this, and answer very particularly
the questions I have asked you. I have filled this whole
letter, do you the same in your answer, and tell me every
particular about Percy, Neddy, and Dina ; they little guess how
warm a friend they have in this distant land, who thinks per-
petually of them, and wishes for nothing so much as to see
them and to play with them.- Give my love to Mary. I will
write soon again to her. In the meantime do some of you
pray write. These horrid long winters, and the sky, which is
from month to month of the darkest dun colour, need some
news from you to render life supportable. Kiss all the dear
children for me, and tell me everything about them. Ever
your affectionate friend, CLARE.
Pray beg Mary to tell my mother that I wrote to her on or
about the 22d of August; has she had this letter ? and do tell
me in yours what you know of her. I have just received your
letter of the 3d of September, for which I thank you most
cordially. Thank heaven, you are all well ! What you say
of Trelawny distresses me, as it seems to me that you are un-
willing to say what you have heard, as it is of a disagreeable
nature. You could do me a great benefit if you could make
yourself mistress of the Logier's system of teaching music, and
communicate it to me in its smallest details. I am sure it
would take here. Do, pray, make serious inquiries of some one
who has been taught by him. If any one would undertake to
write me a very circumstantial account of his method, I would
cheerfully pay them. It might be the means of my making a
small independence here, and then I could join you soon in
Italy without fear for the future. Do think seriously of this,
my dear Jane, and do not take it into your head that it is an
idle project, for it would be of the greatest use to me. As to
your admirer, I think he is mad, and his society, which would
otherwise be a relief, must now be a burthen. You are very
148 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
right in saying you only find solace in mental occupation ; it is
the only thing that saves me from such a depression of spirits
taking hold of me when I have an instant to reflect upon the past
that I am ready for any rash act ; but I am occupied from 6 in
the morning until i o at night, and then am so worn out I have
no time for thinking. Once more farewell. My address is
Chez Monsieur Lenhold, Marchand de Musique, a Moscow.
The Last Man, Mrs. Shelley's third novel, was
published early in 1826. It differed widely from
its predecessors. Frankenstein was an allegorical
romance ; Valperga a historical novel, Italian, of
the fifteenth century ; the plot of the one depends
for its interest chiefly on incident, that of the other
on the development of character, but both have a
definite purpose in the inculcation of certain moral
or philosophical truths. The story of The Last
Man is purely romantic and imaginary, probabili-
ties and possibilities being entirely discarded. Its
supposed events take place in the twenty-first
century of our era, when a devouring plague de-
populates by degrees the whole world, until the
narrator remains, to his own belief, the only sur-
viving soul. At the book's conclusion he is left,
in a little boat, coasting around the shores of the
sea-washed countries of the Mediterranean, with
the forlorn hope of finding a companion solitary.
He writes the history of his fate and that of his
race on the leaves of trees, supposed to be dis-
covered and deciphered long afterwards in the
Sibyl's Cave at Baiae, the world having been (as
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 149
we must infer) repeopled by that time. It is not
difficult to understand the kind of fascination this
curious, mournful fancy had for Mary in her
solitude. Much other matter is, of course, inter-
woven with the leading idea. The characteristics
of the hero, Adrian, ' his benevolence of heart,
his winning aspect, his passion of justice and self-
devotion, and his fervent faith in the possibilities
of human nature and the future of the human race,
are unmistakably sketched from Shelley, and
the portrait was at once recognised by Shelley's
earliest friend, the value of whose appreciation
was, if anything, enhanced by the fact of the great
unlikeness between his temperament and Shelley's.
T. J. HOGG TO MRS. SHELLEY.
YORK, 22d March 1826.
MY DEAR MARY As I am about to send a frank to dearest
Jane, I enclose a note to you to thank you for the pleasure you
have given me. I read your Last Man with an intense interest
and not without tears. I began it at Stamford yesterday morn-
ing as soon as it was light ; I read on all day, even during
the short time that was allowed us for dinner, and, if I had
not finished it before it was dark, I verily believe that I should
have bought a candle and held it in my hand in the mail. I
think that it is a decided improvement, and that the character
of Adrian is most happy and most just. I am, dear Mary,
yours ever faithfully, T. J. HOGG.
The appearance of Mary's novel had for its
practical consequence the stoppage of her supplies.
The book was published anonymously, as " by the
150 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
author of Frankenstein" but Mrs. Shelley's name
found its way into some newspaper notices, and
this misdemeanour (for which she was not respon-
sible) was promptly punished by the suspension of
her allowance. Peacock's good offices were again
in request, to try and avert this misfortune, but it
was not at once that he prevailed. He impressed
on Whitton (the solicitor) that the name did not
appear in the title-page, and that its being brought
forward at all was the fault of the publisher and
quite contrary to the wishes of the writer, who,
solitary and despondent, could not be reasonably
condemned for employing her time according to
her tastes and talents, with a view to bettering her
condition. This Whitton acknowledged, but said,
" the name was the matter ; it annoyed Sir
Timothy." He would promise nothing, and
Peacock could only assure Mary that he felt little
doubt of her getting the money at last, though she
might be punished by a short delay.
It may be assumed that this turned out so.
Late in the year, however, another turn was given
to Mary's affairs by the death of Shelley's eldest
boy.
Journal, September 1826. Charles Shelley died during
this month. Percy is now Shelley's only son.
Mary's son being now direct heir to the estates,
and her own prospects being materially improved
by this fact, she at once thought of others whom
MA R Y WOLLS TO NEC RAFT SHELLS Y 151
Shelley had meant to benefit by his will, and who,
she was resolved, should not be losers by his early
death, if she lived to carry out for him his un-
written intentions. She did not think, when she
wrote to Leigh Hunt the letter which follows, that
nearly twenty years more would elapse before the
will could take effect.
MARY SHELLEY TO LEIGH HUNT.
5 BARTHOLOMEW PLACE, KENTISH TOWN,
^oth October 1826.
MY DEAR HUNT Is it, or is it not, right that these few
lines should be addressed to you now ? Yet if the subject be
one that you may judge better to have been deferred, set my
delay down to the account of over-zeal in writing to relieve
you from a part of the care which I know is just now oppressing
you ; too happy I shall be if you permit any act of mine to
have that effect.
I told you long ago that our dear Shelley intended on rewriting
his will to have left you a legacy. I think the sum mentioned
was ^2000. I trust that hereafter you will not refuse to
consider me your debtor for this sum merely because I shall
be bound to pay it you by the laws of honour instead of a
legal obligation. You would, of course, have been better
pleased to have received it immediately from dear Shelley's
bequest ; but as it is well known that he intended to make
such an one, it is in fact the same thing, and so I hope by
you to be considered ; besides, your kind heart will receive
pleasure from the knowledge that you are bestowing on me
the greatest pleasure I am capable of receiving. This is no
resolution of to-day, but formed from the moment I knew my
situation to be such as it is. I did not mention it, because it
seemed almost like an empty vaunt to talk and resolve on
things so far off. But futurity approaches, and a feeling
haunts me as if this futurity were not far distant. I have
152 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
spoken vaguely to you on this subject before, but now, you
having had a recent disappointment, I have thought it as well
to inform you in express terms of the meaning I attached to
my expressions. I have as yet made no will, but in the mean-
time, if I should chance to die, this present writing may serve
as a legal document to prove that I give and bequeath to you
the sum of ^2000 sterling. But I hope we shall both live, I
to acknowledge dear Shelley's intentions, you to honour me so
far as to permit me to be their executor.
I have mentioned this subject to no one, and do not intend ;
an act is not aided by words, especially an act unfulfilled, nor
does this letter, methinks, require any answer, at least not
till after the death of Sir Timothy Shelley, when perhaps this
explanation would have come with better grace ; but I trust
to your kindness to put rny writing now to a good motive. I
am, my dear Hunt, yours affectionately and obliged,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY.
It was admitted by the Shelley family that,
Percy being now the heir, some sort of settlement
should be made for his mother, yet for some
months longer nothing was done or arranged.
Apparently Mary wrote to Trelawny in low spirits,
and to judge from his reply, her letter found him in
little better plight than herself.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
ZANTE, i6th December 1826.
DEAR MARY- I received your letter the other day, and
nothing gives me greater pleasure than to hear from you, for
however assured we are of a friend's durability of affection, it
is soothing to be occasionally reassured of it. I sympathise
in your distresses. I have mine, too, on the same score a
bountiful will and confined means are a curse, and often have I
execrated my fortunes so ill corresponding with my wishes. But
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 153
who can control his fate ? Old age and poverty is a frightful
prospect ; it makes the heart sick to contemplate, even in the
mind's eye the reality would wring a generous nature till the
heart burst. Poverty is the vampyre which lives on human
blood, and haunts its victims to destruction. Hell can fable
no torment exceeding it, and all the other calamities of human
life wars, pestilence, fire cannot compete with it. It is the
climax of human ill. You may be certain that I could not
write thus on what I did not feel. I am glad you say
you have better hopes ; when things are at the worst, they say,
there is hope. So do I hope. Lord Cochrane and his naval
expedition having so long and unaccountably been kept back,
delayed me here from month to month till the winter has de-
finitively set in, and I am in no state for a winter's voyage ;
my body is no longer weatherproof. But I must as soon as
possible get to England, though my residence there will be
transitory. I shall then most probably hurry on to Italy.
The frigate from America is at last arrived in Greece, but
whether Cochrane is on board of her I know not. With the
loss of my friend Odysseus, my enthusiasm has somewhat
abated ; besides that I could no longer act with the prospect
of doing service, and toiling in vain is heartless work. But
have I not done so all my life ? The affairs of Greece are so
bad that little can be done to make them worse. If Cochrane
comes, and is supported with means sufficient, there is still
room for hope. I am in too melancholy a mood to say more
than that, whatever becomes of me. I am always your true
and affectionate E. TRELAWNY.
Mary answered him at once, doing and saying,
to console him, all that friendship could.
KENTISH TOWN, tfh March 1827.
[Direct me at W. Godwin, Esq., '44 Gower Place, Gower
Street, London.]
MY DEAR TRELAWNY Your long silence had instilled into
me the delusive hope that I should hear you sooner than from
154 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
you. I have been silly enough sometimes to start at a knock,
at length your letter is come. [By] that indeed I enter-
tain more reasonable hopes of seeing you. You will come
Ah, indeed you must ; if you are ever the kind-hearted being
you were you must come to be consoled by my sympathy,
exhilarated by my encouragements, and made happy by my
friendship. You are not happy ! Alas ! who is that has a
noble and generous nature ? It is not only, my noble-hearted
friend, that your will is bountiful and your means small,
were you richer you would still be tormented by ingratitude,
caprice, and change. Yet I say Amen to all your anathema
against poverty, it is beyond measure a torment and despair.
I am poor, having once been richer ; I live among the needy,
and see only poverty around. I happen, as has always been
my fate, to have formed intimate friendships with those who
are great of soul, generous, and incapable of valuing money
except for the good it may do and these very people are all
even poorer than myself, is it not hard ? But turning to you
who are dearest to me, who of all beings are most liberal, it
makes me truly unhappy to find that you are hard pressed :
do not talk of old age and poverty, both the one and the other
are in truth far from you, for the one it will be a miracle if
you live to grow old, this would appear a strange compliment
if addressed to another, but you and I have too much of the
pure spirit of fire in our souls to wish to live till the flickering
beam waxes dim ; think then of the few present years only.
I have no doubt you will do your fortunes great good by
coming to this country. A too long absence destroys the in-
terest that friends take, if they are only friends in the common
acceptation of the word ; and your relations ought to be re-
minded of you. The great fault to us in this country is its
.expensiveness, and the dreadful ills attendant here on poverty ;
elsewhere, though poor, you may live here you are actually
driven from life, and though a few might pity, none would
help you were you absolutely starving. You say you shall
stay here but a short time and then go to Italy alas !
alas !
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
155
It is impossible in a letter to communicate the exact state of
one's feelings and affairs here but there is a change at hand
I cannot guess whether for good or bad as far as regards me.
This winter, whose extreme severity has carried off many old
people, confined Sir Tim. for ten weeks by the gout
but he is recovered. All that time a settlement for me was
delayed, although it was acknowledged that Percy now being
the heir, one ought to be made ; at length after much parading,
they have notified to me that I shall receive a magnificent
^250 a year, to be increased next year to ^300. But then
I am not permitted to leave this cloudy nook. My desire to
get away is unchanged, and I used to look forward to your
return as a period when I might contrive but I fear there is
no hope for me during Sir T.'s life. He and his family are
now at Brighton. John Shelley, dear S.'s brother, is about to
marry, and talks of calling upon me. I am often led to reflect
in life how people situated in a certain manner with regard to
me might make my life less drear than it is but it is always
the case that the people that might won't, and it is a very
great mistake to fancy that they will. Such thoughts make me
anxious to draw tighter the cords of sympathy and friendship
which are so much more real than those of the world's forming
in the way of relationship or connection.
From the ends of the world we were brought together to
be friends till death ; separated as we are, this tie still subsists.
I do not wonder that you are out of heart concerning Greece ;
the mismanagement here is not less than the misgovernment
there, the discord the same, save that here ink is spilt instead
of blood. Lord Cochrane alone can assist them but without
vessels or money how can he acquire sufficient power ? at any
rate except as the Captain of a vessel I do not see what good
you can do them. But the mischief is this, that while
some cold, unimpressive natures can go to a new country,
reside among a few friends, enter into the interests of an inti-
mate and live as a brother among them for a time, and then
depart, leaving small trace, retaining none, as if they had
ascended from a bath, they change their garments and pass on ;
156 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
while others of subtler nature receive into their very essences
a part of those with whom they associate, and after a while they
become enchained, either for better or worse, and during a
series of years they bear the marks of change and attachment.
These natures indeed are the purest and best, and of such
are you, dear friend ; having you once, I ever have you ;
losing you once, I have lost you for ever ; a riddle this, but
true. And so life passes, year is added to year, the word
youth is becoming obsolete, while years bring me no change
for the better. Yet I said, change is at hand I know it,
though as yet I do not feel it you will come, in the spring
you will come and add fresh delight for me to the happy
change from winter to summer. I cannot tell what else mate-
rial is to change, but I feel sure the year will end differently
from its beginning. Jane is quite well, we talk continually of
you, and expect you anxiously. Her fortunes have been more
shifting than mine, and they are about to conclude, differ-
ently from mine, but I leave her to say what she thinks best
concerning herself, though probably she will defer the explan-
ation until your arrival. She is my joy and consolation. I
could never have survived my exile here but for her. Her
amiable temper, cheerfulness, and never ceasing sympathy are
all so much necessary value for one wounded and lost as I.
Come, dear friend, again I read your melancholy sentences
and I say, come ! let us try if we can work out good from ill ;
if I may not be able to throw a ray of sunshine on your path,
at least I will lead you as best I may through the gloom.
Believe me that all that belongs to you must be dear to me,
and that I shall never forget all I owe to you.
Do you remember those pretty lines of Burns ?
A monarch may forget his crown
That on his head an hour hath been,
A bridegroom may forget his bride
Who was his wedded wife yest'reen,
A mother may forget her child
That smiles so sweetly on her knee,
But I'll remember thee, dear friend,
And all that thou hast done for me.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 157
Such feelings are not the growth of the moment. They
must have lived for years have flourished in smiles, and re-
tained their freshness watered by tears ; to feel them . one
must have sailed much of life's voyage together have under-
gone the same perils, and sympathised in the same fears and
griefs ; such is our situation ; and the heartfelt and deep-
rooted sentiments fill my eyes with tears as I think of you,
dear friend, we shall meet soon. Adieu, M. S.
... I cannot close this letter without saying a word about
dear Hunt yet that must be melancholy. To feed nine
children is no small thing. His health has borne up pretty
well hitherto, though his spirits sink. What is it in the soil
of this green earth that is so ill adapted to the best of its
sons ? He speaks often of you with affection.
To Edward Trelawny, Esq.,
To the care of Samuel Barff, Esq.,
Zante, The Ionian Isles.
Seal Judgment of Paris.
Endorsed Received roth April 1827.
Change was indeed at hand, though not of a
kind that Mary could have anticipated. The only
event in prospect likely to affect her much was a
step shortly to be taken by Mrs. Williams. That
intended step, vaguely foreshadowed in Jane's
correspondence, aroused the liveliest curiosity in
Clare Clairmont, as was natural.
Miss CLAIRMONT TO MRS. WILLIAMS.
MY DEAREST JANE If I have not written to you before, it
is owing to low spirits. I have not been able to take the pen,
because it would have been dipped in too black a melancholy.
I am tired of being in trouble, particularly as it goes on aug-
menting every day. I have had a hard struggle with myself
158 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
lately to get over the temptation I had to lay down the
burthen at once, and be free as spirits are, and leave this
horrid world behind me. In order to let you understand
what now oppresses me, I must tell you my history since I
.came to Moscow. I came here quite unknown. I was at
first ill treated on that account, but I soon acquired a great
reputation, because all my pupils made much more progress
in whatever they undertook than those of other people. I
had few acquaintances among the English; to these I had
never mentioned a single circumstance of myself or fortunes,
but took care, on the contrary, to appear content and happy,
as if I had never known or seen any other society all my days.
I sent you a letter by Miss F., because I knew your name
would excite no suspicions ; but it seems my mother got hold
of Miss F., sought her out, and has thereby done me a most
incalculable mischief. Miss F. came back full of my story
here, and though she is very friendly to me, yet others who
are not so have already done me injury. The Professor at
the University here is a man of a good deal of talent, and was
in close connection with Lockhart, the son-in-law of Sir
Walter Scott, and all that party; he has a great deal of
friendship for me, because, as he says, very truly, I am the
only person here besides himself who knows how to speak
English. He professes the most rigid principles, and is come
to that age when it is useless to endeavour to change them.
I, however, took care not to get upon the subject of prin-
ciples, and so he was of infinite use to me both by counselling
and by protecting me with the weight of his high approbation.
You may imagine this man's horror when he heard who I
was; that the charming Miss Clairmont, the model of good
sense, accomplishments, and good taste, was brought, issued
from the very den of freethinkers. I see that he is in a com-
plete puzzle on my account ; he cannot explain to himself
how I can be so extremely delightful, and yet so detestable.
The inveteracy of his objections is shaken. This, however,
has not hindered him from doing me serious mischief. I was
to have undertaken this winter the education of an only
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
159
daughter, the child of a very rich family where the Professor
reigns despotic, because he always settles every little dispute
with some unintelligible quotation or reference to a Latin or
Greek author. I am extremely interested in the child, he
used to say, and no one can give her the education she ought
to have but Miss Clairmont. The father and the mother have
been running after me these years to persuade me to enter
when the child should be old enough. I consented, when
now, all is broken off, because the scruples of my professor
do not allow of it. God knows, he says, what Godwinish
principles she might not instil. You may, therefore, think
how teased I have been ; more so from the uncertainty of my
position, as I do not know how far this may extend. If this
is only the beginning, what may be the end ? I am not angry
with this man, he only acts according to his conscience ; nor
am I surprised. I shall never cease feeling and thinking that
if I had my choice, I had rather a thousand times have a
child of mine resigned to an early grave, and lost for ever to
me, than have it brought up in principles I abhor. If you
ask me what I shall do, I can only answer you as did the
Princess Mentimiletto, when buried under the ruins of her
villa by an earthquake, " I await my fate in silence." In the
meantime, while the page of fate is unrolling, I feel a secret
agitation which consumes me, the more so for being repressed.
I am fallen again into a bad state of health, but this is
habitual to me upon the recurrence of winter. What tor-
ments me the most is the restraint I am under of always
appearing gay in society, which I am obliged to do to avoid
their odious curiosity. Farewell awhile dismay and terror,
and let us turn to love and happiness. Never was astonish-
ment greater than mine on receiving your letter. I had
somehow imagined to myself that you never would love again,
and you may say what you like, dearest Jane, you won't drive
that out of my head. " Blue Bag " may be a friend to you,
but he never can be a lover. A happy attachment that has
seen its end leaves a void that nothing can fill up ; therefore
I counsel the timorous and the prudent to take the greatest
160 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
care always to have an unhappy attachment, because with it
you can veer about like a weathercock to every point of life.
What would I not give to have an unhappy passion, for then
one has full permission and a perfect excuse to fall into a
happy one ; one has something to expect, but a happy passion,
like death, has fan's written in such large characters in its face
there is no hoping for any possibility of a change. You will
allow me to talk upon this subject, for I am unhappily the
victim of a happy passion. I had one ; like all things perfect
in its kind, it was fleeting, and mine only lasted ten minutes,
but these ten minutes have discomposed the rest of my life.
The passion, God knows for what cause, from no faults of
mine, however, disappeared, leaving no trace whatever behind
it except my heart wasted and ruined as if it had been
scorched by a thousand lightnings. You will therefore, I
hope, excuse my not following the advice you give me in your
last letter, of falling in love, and you will readily believe me
when I tell you that I am not in love, as you suspected, with
my German friend Hermann. He went away last spring for
five years to the country. I have a great friendship for him,
because he has the most ardent love of all that is good and
beautiful of any one I know. I feel interested for his happi-
ness and welfare, but he is not the being who could make
life feel less a burthen to me than it does. It would, how-
ever, seem that you are a little happier than you were, there-
fore I congratulate you on this change of life. I am delighted
that you have some one to watch over you and guard you
from the storms of life. Do pray tell me Blue Bag's name,
(for what is a man without a name ?), or else I shall get into the
habit of thinking of him as Blue Bag, and never be able to
divest myself of this disagreeable association all my life. You
say Trelawny is coming home, but you have said so so long,
I begin to doubt it. If he does come, how happy you will be
to see him. Happy girl ! you have a great many happinesses.
I have written to him many times, but he never answers my
letters ; I suppose he does not wish to keep up the corre-
spondence, and so I have left off. If he comes home I am
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 161
sure he will fall ill, because the change of climate is most per-
nicious to the health. The first winter I passed in Russia I
thought I should have died, but then a good deal was caused
by extreme anxiety. So take care of Trelawny, and do not
let him get his feet wet. You ask me to tell you every par-
ticular of my way of life. For these last six months I have
been tormented to death; I am shut up with five hateful
children ; they keep me in a fever from morning till night.
If they fall into their father's or mother's way, and are trouble-
some, they are whipped ; but the instant they are with me,
which is pretty nearly all the day, they give way to all their
violence and love of mischief, because they are not afraid of
my mild disposition. They go on just like people in a
public-house, abusing one another with the most horrid names
and fighting ; if I separate them, then they roll on the ground,
shrieking that I have broken their arm, or pretend to fall into
convulsions, and I am such a fool I am frightened. In short,
I never saw the evil spirit so plainly developed. What is
worse, I cannot seriously be angry with them, for I do not
know how they can be otherwise with the education they re-
ceive. Everything is a crime; they may neither jump, nor
run, nor laugh. It is now two months they have never been
out of the house, and the only thing they are indulged in is
in eating, drinking, and sleeping, so that I look upon their
defects as proceeding entirely from the pernicious lives they
lead. This is a pretty just picture of all Russian children,
because the Russians are as yet totally ignorant of anything
like real education. You may, therefore, imagine what a life
I have been leading. In the summer, and we had an Italian
one, I bore up very well, because we were often in the garden,
but since the return of winter, which always makes me ill, and
their added tiresomeness, I am quite overpowered. The
whole winter long I have a fever, which comes on every
evening, and prevents my sleeping the whole night ; some-
times it leaves me for a fortnight, but then it begins again,
but in summer I am as strong and healthy as possible. The
VOL. ii 34
1 62 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
approach of winter fills me with horror, because I know I
have eight long months of suffering and sickness. The only
amusement I have is Sunday evening, to see Miss F. and
some others like her, and the only subject of conversation is
to laugh at the Russians, or dress. My God, what a life !
But complaint is useless, and therefore I shall not indulge in
it. I have said, so as those I love live, I will bear all without
a murmur. If ever I am independent, I will instantly retire
to some solitude ; I will see no one, not even you nor Mary,
and there I will live until the horrible disgust I feel at all that
is human be somewhat removed by quiet and retirement.
My heart is too full of hatred to be fit for society in its
present mood. I am very sorry for the death of little
Charles. The chances for succession are now so equally
balanced the life of an old man and the life of one young
child that I confess I see less hope than ever of the will's
taking effect. It is frightful for the despairing to have their
hopes suspended thus upon a single hair. Pray do not forget
to write to me when Trelawny is come. How glad I shall be
to know he is in England, and yet how frightened for fear he
should catch cold. I wish you would tell me how you occupy
your days ; at what hour you do this, and at what hour that.
From 1 1 till 4 I teach my children, then we dine ; at 5 we
rise from the table. They have half an hour's dawdling, for
play it cannot be called, as they are in the drawing-room, and
then they learn two hours more. At 8 we drink tea, and
then they go to bed, which is never over till n, because all
must have their hair curled, which takes up an enormous time.
Since I have written the first part of my letter I have
thought over my affairs. I must go to Petersburgh, because
it is quite another town from Moscow, and being so much
more foreign in their manners and ways of thinking, I shall
be less tormented. I have decided to go, therefore I wish
you very much to endeavour to procure me letters of intro-
duction. If Trelawny comes home, beg him to do so for me,
because, as he will be much in fashion, some of the numerous
dear female friends he will instantly have will do it for him.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 163
If I could have a letter of recommendation, not a letter of
introduction, to the English ambassador or his wife, I should
be able to get over the difficulties which now beset my passage.
Do think of this, Jane. My head is so completely giddy from
worry and torment, that I am unable to think upon my own
affairs ; only this I know, that I am in a tottering situation.
It is absolutely necessary that I should have letters of recom-
mendation, and to people high in the world at Petersburgh,
because it is very common in Russia for adventurers, such as
opera dancers too old to dance any more, and milliners, and
that class of women to come here. They are received with
open arms by the Russians, who are very hospitable, and then
naturally they betray themselves by their atrocious conduct,
and are thrown off; and I have known since I have been here
several lamentable instances of this, and I shall be classed
with these people if I cannot procure letters to people whose
countenance and protection must refute the possibility of such
a supposition. I must confess to you that my pride never
could stand this, for these adventurers are such detestable
people that I have the utmost horror of them. What a miser-
able imposture is life, that such as follow philosophy, nature
and truth, should be classed with the very refuse of mankind ;
that people who ought to be cited as models of virtue and
self-sacrifice should be trampled under foot with the dregs of
vice. It was not thus in the time of the Greeks ; and this
reflection makes me tired of life, for I might have been under-
stood in the time of Socrates, but never shall be by the
moderns. For this reason I do not wish to live, as I cannot
be understood ; in order, therefore, not to be despised, I
must renounce all worldly concerns whatever. I have long
done so, and therefore you will not wonder that I have long
since given my parting look to life. Do not be surprised
I am so dull ; I am surrounded by difficulties which I am
afraid I never shall get out of, and after so many years of
trouble and anguish it is natural I should wish it were over.
Do not, my dearest Jane, mention to my mother the harm
her indiscretion has done, for though I shall frankly tell her
164 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
of it, yet it would wound her if she were to know I had told
you, and there is already so much pain in the world it is
frightful to add ever so little to the stock. You can merely
say I have asked for letters of introduction at Petersburgh.
From the time of her first arrival in England
after Edward's death, Hogg had been Jane
Williams' persistent, devoted, and long-suffering
admirer. Not many months after receiving Clare's
letter, she changed her name and her abode, and
was thenceforward known as Mrs. Hogg. Mary's
familiar intercourse with her might, in any case,
have been somewhat checked by this event, but
such a change would have been a small matter
compared to the bitter discovery she was soon to
make, that, while accepting her affection, Jane had
never really cared for her ; that her feeling had
been of the most superficial sort. Once inde-
pendent of Mary, and under other protection, she
talked away for the benefit and amusement of
other people, talked of their past life, prating
of her power over Shelley and his devotion to her,
of Mary's gloom during those sad first weeks
at Lerici, intimating that jealousy of herself was
the cause. Stories which lost nothing in the
telling, wherein Jane Williams figured as a good
angel, while Mary Shelley was made to appear in
an unfavourable or even an absurd light.
Mary had no suspicion, no foreboding of the
mine that was preparing to explode under her
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 165
feet. She sympathised in her friend's happiness,
for she could not regard it but as happiness for
one in Jane's circumstances to be able to accept
the love and protection of a devoted man. She
herself could not do it, but she often felt a wish
that she were differently constituted. She knew
it was impossible ; but no tinge of envy or bitter-
ness coloured her words to Trelawny when she
wrote to tell him of Jane's resolution.
. . . This is to be an eventful summer to us. Janey is
writing to you and will tell her own tale best. The person to
whom she unites herself is one of my oldest friends, the early
friend of my own Shelley. It was he who chose to share the
honour, as he generously termed it, of Shelley's expulsion from
Oxford. (And yet he is unlike what you may conceive to be
the ideal of the best friend of Shelley.) He is a man of talent,
of wit, he has sensibility and even romance in his dis-
position, but his exterior is composed and, at a superficial
glance, cold. He has loved Jane devotedly and ardently
since she first arrived in England, almost five years ago. At
first she was too faithfully attached to the memory of Edward,
nor was he exactly the being to satisfy her imagination ; but
his sincere and long-tried love has at last gained the day.
. . . Nor will I fear for her in the risk she must run when
she confides her future happiness to another's constancy and
good principles. He is a man of honour, he longs for home,
for domestic life, and he well knows that none could make
such so happy as Jane. He is liberal in his opinions, constant
in his attachments, if she is happy with him now she will be
always. ... Of course after all that has passed it is our wish
that all this shall be as little talked of as possible, the obscurity
in which we have lived favours this. We shall remove hence
during the summer, for of course \ve shall still continue near
166 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
each other. I, as ever, must derive my only pleasure and
solace from her society.
Before the summer of 1827 was over the cloud
burst.
Mary's journal in June is less mournful than
usual. Congenial society always had the power
of cheering her and making her forget herself.
And in her acquaintance with Thomas Moore
she found a novelty which yet was akin to past
enjoyment.
Journal, June 26 (1827). I have just made acquaint-
ance with Tom Moore. He reminds me delightfully of the
past, and I like him much There is something warm and
genuine in his feelings and manner which is very attractive,
and redeems him from the sin of worldliness with which he
has been charged.
July 2. Moore breakfasted with me on Sunday. We
talked of past times, of Shelley and Lord Byron. He was
very agreeable, and I never felt myself so perfectly at my ease
with any one. I do not know why this is ; he seems to under-
stand and to like me. This is a new and unexpected pleasure.
I have been so long exiled from the style of society in which
I spent the better part of my life ; it is an evanescent pleasure,
but I will enjoy it while I can.
July ii. Moore has left town; his singing is something
new and strange and beautiful. I have enjoyed his visits, and
spent several happy hours in his society. That is much.
July 13. My friend has proved false and treacherous!
Miserable discovery. For four years I was devoted to her,
and earned only ingratitude. Not for worlds would I attempt
to transfer the deathly blackness of my meditations to these
pages. Let no trace remain save the deep, bleeding, hidden
wound of my lost heart of such a tale of horror and despair.
Writing, study, quiet, such remedies I must seek. What deadly
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 167
cold flows through my veins ! My head weighed down ; my
limbs sink under me. I start at every sound as the messenger
of fresh misery, and despair invests my soul with trembling
horror.
October 9. Quanto bene mi rammento sette anni fa, in
questa medesima stagione i pensieri, I sentimenti del mio
cuore ! Allora cominciai Valperga allora sola col mio Bene
fui felice. Allora le nuvole furono spinte dal furioso vento
davanti alia luna, nuvole magnifiche, che in forme grandiose e
bianche parevano stabili quanto le montagne e sotto la tirannia
del vento si mostravano piu fragili che un velo di seta minutis-
sima, scendeva allor la pioggia, gli albori si spogliavano.
Autunno bello fosti allora, ed ora bello terribile, malinconico ci
seij ed io, dove sono?
By those who hold their hearts safe at home in
their own keeping, these little breezes are, called
"storms in tea-cups." The matter was of no
importance to any one but Mary. The aspect of
her outward life was unchanged by this heart-
shipwreck over which the world's waves closed
and left no sign.
CHAPTER XXI
JULY 1 82 7- AUGUST 1830
MANY weary months passed away. Mary said
nothing to the shallow-hearted woman who had
so grievously injured her. Jane had been so dear
to her, and was so inextricably bound up with a
beloved past, that she shrank from disturbing the
superficial friendship which she nevertheless knew
to be hollow.
To one of Mary's temperament there was actual
danger in living alone with such a sorrow, and it
was a happy thing when, in August, an unforeseen
distraction occurred to compel her thoughts into a
new channel. She received from ah unknown
correspondent a letter, resulting in an acquaint-
ance which, though it passed out of her life with-
out leaving any permanent mark, was, at the time,
not unfruitful of interest.
The letter was as follows
FRANCES WRIGHT TO MRS. SHELLEY.
PARIS, 2 2d August 1827.
I shall preface this letter with no apology; the motive
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
169
which dictates it will furnish, as I trust, a sufficient introduction
both for it and its writer. As the daughter of your father and
mother (known to me only by their works and opinions), as
the friend and companion of a man distinguished during life,
and preserved in the remembrance of the public as one
distinguished not by genius merely, but, as I imagine, by the
strength of his opinions and his fearlessness in their expression ;
viewed only in these relations you would be to me an object
of interest and permit the word, for I use it in no vulgar sense
of curiosity. But I have heard (vaguely indeed, for I have
not even the advantage of knowing one who claims your per-
sonal acquaintance, nor have I, in my active pursuits and
engagements in distant countries, had occasion to peruse
your works), yet I have heard, or read, or both, that which has
fostered the belief that you share at once the sentiments and
talents of those from whom you drew your being. If you
possess the opinions of your father and the generous feelings
of your mother, I feel that I could travel far to see you. It is
rare in this world, especially in our sex, to meet with those
opinions united with those feelings, and with the manners
and disposition calculated to command respect and conciliate
affection. It is so rare, that to obtain the knowledge of such
might well authorise a more abrupt intrusion than one by
letter ; but, pledged as I am to the cause of what appears to
me moral truth and moral liberty, that I (should) neglect any
means for discovering a real friend of that cause, I were almost
failing to a duty.
In thus addressing my inquiries respecting you to your-
self, it were perhaps fitting that I should enter into some
explanations respecting my own views and the objects which
have fixed my attention. I conceive, however, the very
motive of this letter as herein explained, with the printed paper
I shall enclose with it, will supply a sufficient assurance of the
heterodoxy of my opinions and the nature of my exertions for
their support and furtherance. It will be necessary to explain,
however, what will strike you but indistinctly in the deed of
Nashoba, that the object of the experiment has in view an
i;o THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
association based on those principles of moral liberty and
equality heretofore advocated by your father. That these
principles form its base and its cement, and that while we
endeavour to undermine the slavery of colour existing in the
North American Republic, we essay equally to destroy the
slavery of mind now reigning there as in other countries. With
one nation we find the aristocracy of colour, with another
that of rank, with all perhaps those of wealth, instruction,
and sex.
Our circle already comprises a few united co-operators,
whose choice of associates will be guided by their moral fitness
only ; saving that, for the protection and support of all, each
must be fitted to exercise some useful employment, or to supply
200 dollars per annum as an equivalent for their support. The
present generation will in all probability supply but a limited
number of individuals suited in opinion and disposition to such
a state of society ; but that that number, however limited, may
best find their happiness and best exercise their utility by unit-
ing their interests, their society, and their talents, I feel a con-
viction. In this conviction I have devoted my time and fortune
to laying the foundations of an establishment where affection
shall form the only marriage, kind feeling and kind action the
only religion, respect for the feelings and liberties of others to
the only restraint, and union of interest the bond of peace and
security. With the protection of the negro in view, whose
cruel sufferings and degradation had attracted my special
sympathy, it was necessary to seek the land of his bondage,
to study his condition and imagine a means for effecting his
liberation ; with the emancipation of the human mind in view,
from the shackles of moral and religious superstition, it was
necessary to seek a country where political institutions should
allow free scope for experiment ; and with a practice in view
in opposition to all the laws of public opinion, it was necessary
to seek the seclusion of a new country, and build up a city of
refuge in the wilderness itself. Youth, a good constitution,
and a fixed purpose enabled me to surmount the fatigues,
difficulties, and privations of the necessary journeys, and the
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 171
first opening of a settlement in the American forests. Fifteen
months have placed the establishment in a fair way of progress,
in the hands of united and firm associates, comprising a family
of colour from New Orleans. As might be expected, my
health gave way under the continued fatigues of mind and
body [incidental] to the first twelvemonth. A brain fever,
followed by a variety of sufferings, seemed to point to a sea-
voyage as the only chance of recovery. Accordingly I left
Nashoba in May last, was placed on board a steamboat on the
Mississippi for Orleans, then on board a vessel for Havre, and
landed in fifty days almost restored to health. I am now in
an advanced state of convalescence, but still obliged to avoid
fatigue either bodily or mental. The approaching marriage of
a dear friend also retains me in Paris, and as I shall return by
way of New Orleans to my forest home in the month of
November, or December, I do not expect to visit London.
The bearer of this letter, should he, as I trust, be able to
deliver it, will be able to furnish any intelligence you may
desire respecting Nashoba and its inhabitants. In the name
of Robert Dale Owen you will recognise one of the trustees,
and a son of Robert Owen of Lanark.
Whatever be the fate of this letter, I wish to convey to
Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin Shelley my respect and admira-
tion of those from whom she holds those names, and my
fond desire to connect her with them in my esteem, and in
the knowledge of mutual sympathy to sign myself her friend,
FRANCES WRIGHT.
My address while in Europe Aux soins du General Lafay-
ette, Rue d'Anjou, and 7 St. Honore", a Paris.
The bearer of this letter would seem to have
been Robert Dale Owen himself. His name
must have recalled to Mary's mind the letter she
had received at Geneva, long, long ago, from poor
Fanny, describing and commenting on the schemes
172
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
for social regeneration of his father, Robert
Owen.
Mary Shelley's feeling towards Frances Wright's
schemes in 1827 may have been accurately ex-
pressed by Fanny Godwin's words in 1816.
..." The outline of his plan is this : ' That no human
being shall work more than two or three hours every day ; that
they shall be all equal ; that no one shall dress but after the
plainest and simplest manner ; that they be allowed to follow
any religion, or no religion, as they please ; and that their
studies shall be Mechanics and Chemistry.' I hate and am
sick at heart at the misery I see my fellow-beings suffering, but
I own I should not like to live to see the extinction of all
genius, talent, and elevated generous feeling in Great Britain,
which I conceive to be the natural consequence of Mr. Owen's
plan."
But any plan for human improvement, any
unselfish effort to promote the common weal, com-
manded the sure sympathy of Shelley's widow
and Mary Wollstonecraft's daughter, whether
her judgment accorded perfectly or not with that
of its promoters. She responded warmly to the
letter of her correspondent, who wrote back in
almost rapturous terms
FRANCES WRIGHT TO MARY SHELLEY.
PARIS, i$th September 1827.
My Friend, my dear Friend How sweet are the senti-
ments with which I write that sacred word so often prosti-
tuted, so seldom bestowed with the glow of satisfaction and
delight with which I now employ it ! Most surely will I go to
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 173
England, most surely to Brighton, to wheresoever you may be.
The fond belief of my heart is realised, and more than realised.
You are the daughter of your mother. I opened your letter
with some trepidation, and perused it with more emotion than
now suits my shattered nerves. I have read it again and
again, and acknowledge it before I sleep. Most fully, most
deeply does my heart render back the sympathy yours gives.
It fills up the sad history you have sketched of blighted affec-
tions and ruined hopes. I too have suffered, and we must
have done so perhaps to feel for the suffering. We must have
loved and mourned, and felt the chill of disappointment, and
sighed over the moral blank of a heartless world ere we can
be moved to sympathy for calamity, or roused to attempt its
alleviation. The curiosity you express shall be most willingly
answered in (as I trust) our approaching meeting. You will
see then that I have greatly pitied and greatly dared, only
because I have greatly suffered and widely observed. I have
sometimes feared lest too early affliction and too frequent dis-
appointment had blunted my sensibilities, when a rencontre
with some one of the rare beings dropt amid the dull mul-
titude, like oases in the desert, has refreshed my better
feelings, and reconciled me with others and with myself.
That the child of your parents should be one among these
sweet visitants is greatly soothing and greatly inspiring. But
have we only discovered each other to lament that we are not
united ? I cannot, will not think it. When we meet, and
meet we must, and I hope soon, how eagerly, and yet tremb-
lingly, shall I inquire into all the circumstances likely to favour
an approach in our destinies. I am now on the eve of separa-
tion from a beloved friend, whom marriage is about to remove
to Germany, while I run back to my forests. And I must
return without a bosom intimate ? Yes ; our little circle has
mind, has heart, has right opinions, right feelings, co-operates
in an experiment having in view human happiness, yet I do
want one of my own sex to commune with, and sometimes to
lean upon in all the confidence of equality of friendship. You
see I am not so disinterested as you suppose. Delightful
174 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
indeed it is to aid the progress of human impro.vement, and
sweet is the peace we derive from aiding the happiness of
others. But still the heart craves something more ere it can
say I am satisfied.
I must tell, not write, of the hopes of Nashoba, and of all
your sympathising heart wishes to hear. On the 28th instant
I shall be in London, where I must pass some days with a
friend about to sail for Madeira. Then, unless you should
come to London, I will seek you at Brighton, Arundel, any-
where you may name. Let me find directions from you. I
will not say, use no ceremony with me none can ever enter
between us. Our intercourse begins in the confidence, if not
in the fulness of friendship. I have not seen you, and yet
my heart loves you.
I cannot take Brighton in my way ; my sweet friend, Julia
Garnett, detaining me here until the latest moment, which may
admit of my reaching London on the 28th. I must not see
you in passing. However short our meeting, it must have
some repose in it. The feelings which draw me towards you
have in them I know not what of respect, of pitying sympathy,
of expectation, and of tenderness. They must steal some
quiet undivided hours from the short space I have yet to pass
in Europe. Tell me when they shall be, and where. I expect
to sail for America with Mr. Owen and his family early in Nov-
ember, and may leave London to visit a maternal friend in the
north of England towards the 2oth of October. Direct to
me to the care of Mr. Robert Bayley, 4 Basinghall Street,
London.
Permit me the assurance of my respect and affection,
and accord me the title, as I feel the sentiments, of a friend,
FRANCES WRIGHT.
Circumstances conspired to postpone the
desired meeting for some weeks, but the follow-
ing extract from another letter of Fanny Wright's
shows how friendly was the correspondence.
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 175
Yes, I do " understand the happiness flowing from confi-
dence and entire sympathy, independent of worldly circum-
stances." I know the latter compared to the former are
nothing.
A delicate nursling of European luxury and aristocracy, I
thought and felt for myself, and for martyrised humankind,
and have preferred all hazards, all privations in the forests of
the New World to the dear-bought comforts of miscalled
civilisation. I have made the hard earth my bed, the saddle
of my horse my pillow, and have staked my life and fortune
on an experiment having in view moral liberty and human
improvement. Many of course think me mad, and if to be
mad mean to be one of a minority, I am so, and very mad
indeed, for our minority is very small. Should that few
succeed in mastering the first difficulties, weaker spirits, though
often not less amiable, may carry forward the good work. But
the fewer we are who now think alike, the more we are of
value to each other. To know you, therefore, is a strong
desire of my heart, and all things consistent with my engage-
ments (which I may call duties, since they are connected
with the work I have in hand) will I do to facilitate our
meeting.
Soon after this Mary made Frances Wright's
acquaintance, and heard from herself .all the story
of her stirring life. She was not of American,
but of Scottish birth (Dundee), and had been very
early left an orphan. Her father had been a man
of great ability and culture, of advanced liberal
opinions, and independent fortune. Fanny had
been educated in England by a maternal aunt,
and in 1818, when twenty-three years of age, had
gone with her younger sister to the United States.
Since that time her life had been as adventurous
176 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
as it was independent. Enthusiastic, original,
and handsome, she found friends and adherents
wherever she went. Two years she spent in the
States, where she found sympathy and stimulus
for her speculative energies, and free scope for her
untried powers. She had written a tragedy,
forcible and effective, which was published at
Philadelphia and acted at New York. After that
she had been three years in Paris, where she
enjoyed the friendship and sympathy of Lafayette
and other liberal leaders. In 1824 she was once
more in America, fired with the idea of solving
the slavery question. She purchased a tract of
land on the Nashoba river (Tennessee), and
settled negroes there, assuming, in her impetuosity,
that to convert slaves into freemen it was only
necessary to remove their fetters, and that they
would soon work out their liberty. She found
out her error. In Shelley's words, slightly varied,
" How should slaves produce anything but idle-
ness, even as the seed produces the plant ?" The
slaves, freed from the lash, remained slaves as
before, only they did very little work. Fanny
Wright was disappointed ; but, as her letters
plainly show, her schemes went much farther
than negro emancipation ; she aimed at nothing
short of a complete social reconstruction, to be
illustrated on a small scale at the Nashoba settle-
ment.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 1 77
Overwork, exposure to the sun, and contin-
uous excitement, told, at last, on her constitution.
As she informed Mrs. Shelley in her first
letter, she had broken down with brain fever,
and, when convalescent, had been ordered to
Europe.
In Mary Wollstonecraft's daughter she found
a friend, hardly an adherent. Fundamentally,
their principles were alike, but their natures were
differently attuned. Neither mentally nor physic-
ally had Mary Shelley the temperament of a
revolutionary innovator. She had plenty of moral
courage, but she was too scrupulous, too reflective,
and too tender. The cause of liberty was sacred
to her, so long as it bore the fruit of justice, self-
sacrifice, fidelity to duty. Fanny Wright wor-
shipped liberty for its own sake, confident that
every other good would follow it, with the
generous, unpractical certainty of conviction that
proceeds as much from a sanguine disposition as
from a set of opinions. Experience and dis-
appointment have little power over these tempera-
ments, and so they never grow old or prudent.
It may well be that all the ideas, all the great
changes, in which is summed up the history of
progress, have originated with natures like these.
They are the salt of the earth ; but man cannot
live by salt alone, and their ideas are carried
out for them in detail, and the actual everyday
VOL. ii 35
178 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
work of the world is unconsciously accom-
plished, by those who, having put their hand
to the plough, do not look back, nor yet far
forward.
Still, it was a remarkable meeting, that of these
two women. Fanny Wright was a person who,
once seen, was not easily forgotten. " She was
like Minerva;" such is the recollection of Mrs.
Shelley's son. Mrs. Trollope has described her
personal appearance when, three years later, she
was creating a great sensation by lecturing in the
chief American cities
She came on the stage surrounded by a bodyguard of
Quaker ladies in the full costume of their sect. . . . Her tall
and majestic figure, the deep and almost solemn expression of
her eyes, the simple contour of her finely-formed head, her
garment of plain white muslin, which hung around her in folds
that recalled the drapery of a Grecian statue, all contributed
to produce an effect unlike anything that I had ever seen
before, or ever expect to see again.
On the other hand the following is Robert Dale
Owen's sketch of Mary Shelley.
... In person she was of middle height and graceful figure.
Her face, though not regularly beautiful, was comely and
spiritual, of winning expression, and with a look of inborn
refinement as well as culture. It had a touch of sadness
when at rest. She impressed me as a person of warm social
feelings, dependent for happiness on living encouragement,
needing a guiding and sustaining hand.
It is certain that Mary felt a warm interest in
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 1 79
her new friend. She made her acquainted with
Godwin, and lost no opportunity of seeing and
communing with her during her stay in England ;
nor did they part till Fanny Wright was actually
on board ship.
" Dear love," wrote Fanny, from Torbay, " how your figure
lives in my mind's eye as I saw you borne away from me till
I lost sight of your little back among the shipping ! "
From Nashoba, a few months later, she ad-
dressed another letter to Mary, which, though
slightly out of place, is given here. There had,
apparently, been some passing discord between
her and the founder of the " New Harmony "
colony. 1
FRANCES WRIGHT TO MRS. SHELLEY.
NASHOBA, 2oth March 1828.
Very, very welcome was your letter of the 1 6th November,
which awaited my return from a little excursion down the
Mississippi, undertaken soon after my arrival. Bless your
sweet kind heart, my sweet Mary ! Your little enclosure,
together with a little billet brought me by Dale, and which
came to the address of Mr. Trollope's chambers just as he left
London, is all the news I have yet received of or from our
knight-errant. Once among Greeks and Turks, correspondence
must be pretty much out of the question, so unless he address
to you some more French compliments from Toulon, I shall
1 Fanny Wright subsequently married a Frenchman, M. Phiquepal
Darusmont. Under the head of "Darusmont" a sketch of her life, by
Mr- R. Garnett, containing many highly interesting details of her career,
is to be found in the Dictionary of National Biography.
i8o THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
not look to hear of him for some months. Ay, truly, they are
incomprehensible animals, these same soi-disant lords of this
poor planet ! Like their old progenitor, Father Adam, they
walk about boasting of their wisdom, strength, and sovereignty,
while they have not sense so much as to swallow an apple with-
out the aid of an Eve to put it down their throats. I thank
thee for thine attempt to cram caution and wisdom into the
cranium of my wandering friend. Thy good offices may afford
a chance for his bringing his head on his shoulders to these
forests, which otherwise would certainly be left on the shores
of the Euxine, on the top of Caucasus, or at the sources of
the Nile.
I wrote thee hastily of my arrival and all our wellbeing in
my last, and of Dale's amende honorable, and of Fanny's
departure up the Western waters, nor have I now leisure for
details too tedious for the pen, though so short to give by the
tongue. Dale arrived, his sweet kind heart all unthawed, and
truly when he left us for Harmony I think the very last thin
flake of Scotch ice had melted from him. Camilla and Whitby
leave me also in a few days for Harmony, from whence the
latter will probably travel back with Dale, and Whitby go up
the Ohio to engage a mechanic for the building of our houses.
I hoped to have sent you, with this, the last communication
of our little knot of trustees, in which we have stated the
modification of our plan which we have found it advisable to
adopt, with the reasons of the same. We have not been able
to get it printed at Memphis, so Dale is to have it thrown off
at Harmony, from whence you will receive it. The substance
of it is, that we have reduced our co-operation to a simple
association, each throwing in from our private funds 100
dollars per annum for trie expenses of the table, including
those of the cook, whom we hire from the Institution, she
being one of the slaves gifted to it. All other expenses
regard us individually, and need not amount to 100 dollars
more. Also, each of us builds his house or room, the cost of
which, simple furniture included, does not surpass 500 dollars.
The property of the trust will stand thus free of all burden
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 1 8 1
whatsoever, to be devoted to the foundation of a school, in
which we would fain attempt a thorough co-operative educa-
tion, looking only to the next generation to effect what we in
vain attempted ourselves. You see that the change consists
in demanding as a requisite for admission an independent
income of 200 dollars, instead of receiving labour as an
equivalent.
Yes, dear Mary, I do find the quiet of these forests and
our ill-fenced cabins of rough logs more soothing to the spirit,
and now no less suited to the body than the warm luxurious
houses of European society. Yet that it would be so with
you, or to any less broken in by enthusiastic devotion to
human reform and mental liberty than our little knot of
associates, I cannot judge. I now almost forget the extent
of the change made in the last few years in my habits, yet
more than in my views and feelings ; but when I recall it, I
sometimes doubt if many could imitate it without feeling the
sacrifices almost equal to the gains ; to me sacrifices are
nothing. I have not felt them as such, and now forget that
there were any made.
Farewell, dear Mary. Recall me affectionately and respect-
fully to the memory of your Father. You will wear me in your
own, I know. Camilla sends her affectionate wishes. Yours
fondly, F. WRIGHT.
It was probably in connection with Fanny
Wright's visit that Mrs. Shelley had, in October
of 1827, contemplated the possibility of a flying
trip to the Continent ; an idea which alarmed her
father (for his own sake) not a little, although she
had taken care to assure him of her intended
speedy return. He was in as bad a way,
financially, and as dependent as ever, but proud of
the fact that he kept up his good spirits through it
1 82 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
all, and sorry for Mary that she could not say as
much.
GODWIN TO MARY.
GOWER PLACE, qth October 1827.
DEAR MARY We received your letter yesterday, and I
sent you the Examiner.
Nothing on earth, as you may perceive, could have induced
me to break silence respecting my circumstances, short of
your letter of the ist instant, announcing a trip to the Con-
tinent, without the least hint when you should return. It
seems to me so contrary to the course of nature that a father
should look for supplies to his daughter, that it is painful to
me at any time to think of it.
You say that [as] you had announced some time ago that you
must be in town in November, I should have inferred that
that was irreversible. All I can answer is, that I did not so
infer.
I called yesterday, agreeably to your suggestion, upon young
Evans ; but all I got from him was, that the thing was quite
out of his way ; to which he added (and I reproved him for it
accordingly) that we had better go to the Jews. I called on
Hodgetts on the 7th of September, and asked him to lend me
20 or ^30. He said, "Would a month hence do? he
could then furnish 20" Last Saturday he supped here,
and brought me ;io, adding that was all he could do. I
have heard nothing either from Peacock or from your anony-
mous friend. I wrote to you, of course, at Brighton on Satur-
day (before supper -time), which letter I suppose you have
received.
How differently you and I are organised. In my seventy-
second year I am all cheerfulness, and never anticipate the
evil day (with distressing feelings) till to do so is absolutely
unavoidable. Would to God you were my daughter in all
but my poverty ! But I am afraid you are a Wollstonecraft.
We are so curiously made that one atom put in the wrong
place in our original structure will often make us unhappy for
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 183
life. But my present cheerfulness is greatly owing to Crom-
well, and the nature of my occupation, which gives me an
object omnium horarum a stream for ever running, and for
ever new. Do you remember Denham's verses on the Thames
at Cooper's Hill ?
Oh ! could I flow like thee, and make thy stream
My great example, as it is my theme !
Though deep, yet clear, though gentle, yet not dull ;
Strong, without rage ; without o'erflowing, full.
Though I cannot attain this in my Commonwealth, you,
perhaps, may in your Warbeck.
May blessings shower on you as fast as the perpendicular
rain at this moment falls by my window ! prays your affec-
tionate Father, WILLIAM GODWIN.
During most of this autumn Mrs. Shelley and
her boy were staying at Arundel, in Sussex, with,
or in the near neighbourhood of her friends, the
Miss Robinsons. There were several sisters,
to one of whom, Julia, Mrs. Shelley was much
attached.
While at Arundel another letter reached her
from Trelawny, who was contemplating the pos-
sibility of a return to England.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
ZANTE, IONIAN ISLANDS, z^th October 1827.
DEAREST MARY I received your letter dated July, and
replied to both you and Hunt ; but I was then at Cerigo, and
as the communication of the islands is carried on by a succes-
sion of boats, letters are sometimes lost. I have now your
letter from Arundel, gth September. It gives me pleasure to
hear your anxieties as to money matters are at an end ; it is
1 84 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
one weighty misery off your heart. You err most egregiously
if you think I am occupied with women or intrigues, or that
my time passes pleasantly. The reverse of all this is the case ;
neither women nor amusements of any sort occupy my time,
and a sadder or more accursed kind of existence I never in all
my experience of life endured, or, I think, fell to the lot of
human being. I have been detained here for these last ten
months by a villainous law-suit, which may yet endure some
months longer, and then I shall return to you as the same
unconnected, lone, and wandering vagabond you first knew
me. I have suffered a continual succession of fevers during
the summer ; at present they have discontinued their attack ;
but they have, added to what I suffered in Greece, cut me
damnably, and I fancy now I must look like an old patriarch
who has outlived his generation. I cannot tell whether to
congratulate Jane or not ; the foundation she has built on for
happiness implies neither stability nor permanent security ;
for a summer bower 'tis well enough to beguile away the
summer months, but for the winter of life I, for my part,
should like something more durable than a fabric made up of
vows and promises. Nor can I say whether it would be wise
or beneficial to either should Clare- consent to reside with you
in England ; in any other country it might be desirable, but
in England it is questionable.
The only motive which has deterred me from writing to
Jane and Clare is that I have been long sick and ill at ease,
daily anticipating my return to the Continent, and concocting
plans whereby I might meet you all, for one hour after long
absence is worth a thousand letters. And as to my heart, it
is pretty much as you left it ; no new impressions have been
made on it or earlier affections erased. As we advance in the
stage of life we look back with deeper recollections from where
we first started; at least, I find it so. Since the death of
Odysseus, for whom I had the sincerest friendship, I have felt
no private interest for any individual in this country. The
Egyptian fleet, and part of the Turkish, amounting to some
hundred sail, including transports, have been totally destroyed
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 185
by the united squadron of England, France, and Russia in the
harbour of Navarino ; so we soon expect to see a portion of
Greece wrested from the Turks, and something definitely
arranged for the benefit of the Greeks. Dearest Mary, I am
ever your EDWARD TRELAWNY.
To Jane and Clare say all that is affectionate from me, and
forget not Leigh Hunt and his Mary Ann. / would write
them all, but I am sick at heart.
All these months the gnawing sorrow of her
friend's faithlessness lay like an ambush at Mary's
heart. In responding to Fanny Wright's over-
tures of friendship she had sought a distraction
from the bitter thoughts and deep dejection which
had been mainly instrumental in driving her from
town. But in vain, like the hunted hare, she
buried her head and hoped to be forgotten.
Slanderous gossip advances like a prairie -fire,
laying everything waste, and defying all attempts
to stop or extinguish it. Jane Williams' stories
were repeated, and, very likely, improved upon.
They got known in a certain set. Mary Shelley
might still have chosen not to hear or not to notice,
had she been allowed. But who may ignore such
things in peace ? As the French dramatist says in
Nos Intimes, " Les amis sont toujours la" Les
amis are there to enlighten you if you are
ignorant as to your enemies in disguise, to save
you from illusions, and to point out to you
should you forget it the duty of upholding,
1 86 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
at any sacrifice, your own interests and your
own dignity.
Journal, February 12, 1828. Moore is in town. By his
advice I disclosed my discoveries to Jane. How strangely
are we made ! She is horror-struck and miserable at losing
my friendship ; and yet how unpardonabty she trifled with my
feelings, and made me all falsely a fable to others.
The visit of Moore has been an agreeable variety to my
monotonous life. I see few people Lord Dillon, G. Paul,
the Robinsons, voila tout.
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. HOGG.
Since Monday I have been ceaselessly occupied by the
scene begun and interrupted, which filled me with a pain that
now thrills me as I revert to it. I then strove to speak, but
your tears overcame me, whilst the struggle gave me an appear-
ance of coldness.
If I revert to my devotion to you, it is to prove that no
worldly motives could estrange me from the partner of my
miseries. Often, having you at Kentish Town, I have wept
from the overflow of affection ; often thanked God who had
given you to me. Could any but yourself have destroyed such
engrossing and passionate love? And what are the conse-
quences of the change ?
When first I heard that you did not love me, every hope
of my life deserted me. The depression I sank under, and to
which I am now a prey, undermines my health. How many
hours this dreary winter I have paced my solitary room, driven
nearly to madness, and I could not expel from my mind the
memories of harrowing import that one after another intruded
themselves ! It was not long ago that, eagerly desiring death,
though death should only be oblivion, I thought that how to
purchase oblivion of what was revealed to me last July, a tor-
tuous death would be a bed of roses.
Do not ask me, I beseech you, a detail of the revelations
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 187
made to me. Some of those most painful you made to
several ; others, of less import, but which tended more,
perhaps, than the ' k more important to show that you loved
me not, were made only to two.
I could not write of these, far less speak of them. If any
doubt remain on your mind as to what I know, write to Isabel, 1
and she will inform you of the extent of her communication
to me. I have been an altered being since then ; long I
thought that almost a deathblow was given, so heavily and
unremittingly did the thought press on and sting me ; but one
lives on through all to be a wreck.
Though I was conscious that, having spoken of me as you
did, you could not love me, I could not easily detach myself
from the atmosphere of light and beauty that ever surrounded
you. Now I tried to keep you, feeling the while that I had lost
you ; but you penetrated the change, and I owe it to you not
to disguise the cause. What will become of us, my poor girl ?
This explains my estrangement. While with you I was
solely occupied by endeavouring not to think or feel, for had
I done either I should not have been so calm as I daresay I
appeared. . . . Nothing but my Father could have drawn me
to town again ; his claims only prevent me now from burying
myself in the country. I have known no peace since July.
I never expect to know it again. Is it not best, then, that
you forget the unhappy M. W. S. ?
We hear no more of this painful episode. It
did not put a stop to Jane's intercourse with Mary.
Friendship, in the old sense, could never be. But,
to the end of Mary's life, her letters show the
tenderness, the half-maternal solicitude she ever
felt for the companion and sharer of her deepest
affliction.
1 Miss Robinson.
1 88 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Another distraction came to her now in the
shape of an invitation to Paris, which she accepted,
although she was feeling far from well, a fact which
she attributed to depression of spirits, but which
proved to have quite another cause.
Journal, April n (1828). I depart for Paris, sick at heart,
yet pining to see my friend (Julia Robinson).
A lady, an intimate friend of hers at this time,
who, in a little book called Traits of Character,
has given a very interesting (though, in some de-
tails, inaccurate) sketch of Mary Shelley, says that
her visit to Paris was eagerly looked forward to
by many. " Honour to the authoress and ad-
miration for the woman awaited her." But,
directly after her arrival, she was prostrated on
a sick it was feared, death-bed. Her journal,
three months later, tells the sequel.
Journal, July 8, Hastings. There was a reason for my
depression : I was sickening of the small-pox. I was confined
to my bed the moment I arrived in Paris. The nature of
my disorder was concealed from me till my convalescence,
and I am so easily duped. Health, buoyant and bright,
succeeded to my illness. The Parisians were very amiable,
and, a monster to look at as I was, I tried to be agreeable,
to compensate to them.
The same authoress asserts that neither when
she recovered nor ever after was she in appear-
ance the Mary Shelley of the past. She was not
scarred by the disease ("which in its natural
'form she had had in childhood"), but the pearly
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 189
delicacy and transparency of her skin and the
brightness and luxuriance of her soft hair were
grievously dimmed.
She bore this trial to womanly vanity well and bravely, for
she had that within which passeth show high intellectual
endowments, and, better still, a true, loving, faithful heart.
The external effects of her illness must, to a
great degree, have disappeared in course of time,
for those who never knew her till some twenty
years later than this revert to their first impres-
sion of her in words almost identical with those
used by Christy Baxter when, at ninety years of
age, she described Mary Godwin at fifteen as
" white, bright, and clear."
If, however, she had any womanly vanity at
all, it must have been a trial to her that, just now,
her old friend Trelawny should return for a few
months to England. She did not see him till
November, when Clare also arrived, on a flying
visit to her native land. But, before their meeting,
she had received some characteristic letters from
Trelawny.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
SOUTHAMPTON, Wi July 1828.
DEAR MARY My moving about and having had much to
do must be my excuse for not writing as often as I should do.
That it is but an excuse I allow ; the truth would be better,
but who nowadays ever thinks of speaking truth ? The true
reason, then, is that I am getting old, and writing has become
irksome. You cannot plead either, so write on, dear Mary.
190 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
I love you sincerely, no one better. Time has not quenched
the fire of my nature ; my feelings and passions burn fierce as
ever, and will till they have consumed me. I wear the bur-
nished livery of the sun.
To whom am I a neighbour ? and near whom ? I dwell
amongst tame and civilised human beings, with somewhat the
same feelings as we may guess the lion feels when, torn from
his native wilderness, he is tortured into domestic intercourse
with what Shakespeare calls " forked animals," the most ab-
horrent to his nature.
You see by this how little my real nature is altered, but now
to reply to yours. I cannot decidedly say or fix a period of our
meeting. It shall be soon, if you stay there, at Hastings ;
but I have business on hand I wish to conclude, and now that
I can see you when I determine to do so, I, as you see, post-
pone the engagement because it is within my grasp. Such is
the perverseness of human nature ! Nevertheless, I will write,
and I pray you to do so likewise. You are my dear and long
true friend, and as such I love you. Yours, dear,
TRELAWNY.
I shall remain ten or twelve days here, so address Southamp-
ton ; it is enough.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
TREWITHEN, September 1828.
DEAR MARY I really do not know why I am everlastingly
boring you with letters. Perhaps it is to prevent you forgetting
me ; or to prove to you that I do not forget you ; or I like it,
which is a woman's reason. . . .
How is Jane (Hogg) ? Do remember me kindly to her.
I hope you are friends, and that I shall see her in town. I
have no right to be discontented or fastidious when she is not.
I trust she is contented with her lot ; if she is, she has an
advantage over most of us. Death and Time have made sad
havoc amongst my old friends here ; they are never idle, and
yet we go on as if they concerned us not, and thus dream our
lives away till we wake no more, and then our bodies are
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 191
thrown into a hole in the earth, like a dead dog's, that infects
the atmosphere, and the void is filled up, and we are forgotten.
Can such things be, and overcome us like a summer cloud,
without our special wonder ? . . .
Trelawny's visit to England was of short dura-
tion. Before the end of the next February (1829)
he was in Florence, overflowing with new plans,
and, as usual, imparting them eagerly, certain of
sympathy, to Mrs. Shelley. His renewed inter-
course with her had led to no diminution of
friendship. He may have found her even more
attractive than when she was younger ; more
equable in spirits, more lenient in her judgments,
her whole disposition mellowed and ripened in the
stern school of adversity.
Their correspondence, which for two or three
years was very frequent, opened, however, with a
difference of opinion. Trelawny was ambitious of
writing Shelley's biography, and wanted Mary to
help him by giving him the facts for it.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FLORENCE, nt/i March 1829.
DEAR MARY I arrived here some sixteen or seventeen
days back. I travelled in a very leisurely way ; whilst on the
road I used expedition, but I stayed at Lyons, Turin, Genoa,
and Leghorn. I have taken up my quarters with Brown. I
thought I should get a letter here from you or Clare, but was
disappointed. The letter you addressed to Paris I received ;
tell Clare I was pained at her silence, yet though she neglects
to write to me, I shall not follow her example, but will write
her in a few days.
192 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
My principal object in writing to you now is to tell you
that I am actually writing my own life. Brown and Landor
are spurring me on, and are to review it sheet by sheet, as it
is written ; moreover, I am commencing as a tribute of my
great love for the memory of Shelley his life and moral char-
acter. Landor and Brown are in this to have a hand, therefore
I am collecting every information regarding him. I always
wished you to do this, Mary ; if you will not, as of the living
I love him and you best, incompetent as I am, I must do my
best to show him to the world as I found him. Do you
approve of this ? Will you aid in it ? without which it cannot
be done. Will jyou give documents ? Will you write anec-
dotes ? or be explicit on this, dear give me your opinion ;
if you in the least dislike it, say so, and there is an end of it ;
if on the contrary, set about doing it without loss of time.
Both this and my life will be sent you to peruse and approve
or alter before publication, and I need not say that you will
have free scope to expunge all you disapprove of.
I shall say no more till I get your reply to this.
The winter here, if ten or twelve days somewhat cold can
be called winter, has been clear, dry, and sunny ; ever since
my. arrival in Italy I have been sitting without fire, and with
open windows. Come away, dear Mary, from the horrible
climate you are in ; life is not endurable where you are.
Florence is very gay, and a weight was taken from my
mind, and -body too, in getting on this side of the Alps.
Heaven and hell cannot be very much more dissimilar. . . .
You may suppose I have now writing enough without
scrawling long letters, so pardon this short one, dear Mary,
from your affectionate E. J. TRELAWNY.
P.S. Love to Clare.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
April 1829.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY Your letter reminded me of my
misdeeds of omission, and of not writing to you as I ought,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 193
and it assured me of your kind thoughts in that happy land
where as angels in heaven you can afford pity to us Arctic
islanders. It is too bad, is it not, that when such a Paradise
does exist as fair Italy, one should be chained here, without
the infliction of such absolutely cold weather? I have never
suffered a more ungenial winter. Winter it is still ; a cold east
wind has prevailed the last six weeks, making exercise in the
open air a positive punishment. This is truly English ; half a
page about the weather, but here this subject has every import-
ance ; is it fine ? you guess I am happy and enjoying myself;
is it as it always is ? you know that one is fighting against a
domestic enemy which saps at the very foundations of pleasure.
I am glad that you are occupying yourself, and I hope
that your two friends will not cease urging you till you really
put to paper the strange wild adventures you recount so well.
With regard to the other subject, you may guess, my dear
Friend, that I have often thought, often done more than think
on the subject. There is nothing I shrink from more fearfully
than publicity. I have too much of it, and, what is worse, I
am forced by my hard situation to meet it in a thousand ways.
Could you write my husband's life without naming me, it
would be something ; but even then I should be terrified at
the rousing the slumbering voice of the public ; each critique,
each mention of your work might drag me forward. Nor
indeed is it possible to write Shelley's life in that way. Many
men have his opinions, none heartily and conscientiously act
on them as he did, it is his act that marks him.
You know me, or you do not in which case I will tell you
what I am a silly goose, who, far from wishing to stand for-
ward to assert myself in any way, now that I am alone in the
world, have but the time to wrap night and the obscurity of
insignificance around me. This is weakness, but I cannot
help it ; to be in print, the subject of men's observations, of
the bitter hard world's commentaries, to be attacked or
defended, this ill becomes one who knows how little she
possesses worthy to attract attention, and whose chief merit
VOL. ii 36
194 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
if it be one is a love of that privacy which no woman can
emerge from without regret.
Shelley's life must be written. I hope one day to do it my-
self, but it must not be published now. There are too many
concerned to speak against him; it is still too sore a subject.
Your tribute of praise, in a way that cannot do harm, can
be introduced into your own life. But remember, I pray for
omission, for it is not that you will not be too kind, too eager
to do me more than justice. But I only seek to be forgotten.
Clare has written to you she is about to return to Germany.
She will, I suppose, explain to you the circumstances that
make her return to the lady she was before with desirable.
She will go to Carlsbad, and the baths will be of great service
to her. Her health is improved, though very far from restored.
For myself, I am as usual well in health and longing for
summer, when I may enjoy the peace that alone is left me. I
am another person under the genial influence of the sun ; I
can live unrepining with no other enjoyment but the country
made bright and cheerful by its beams ; till then I languish.
Percy is quite well ; he grows very fast and looks very healthy.
It gives me great pleasure to hear from you, dear friend,
so write often. I have now answered your letter, though I
can hardly call this one. So you may very soon expect
another. How are your dogs ? and where is Roberts ? Have
you given up all idea of shooting ? I hear Medwin is a great
man at Florence, so Pisa and economy are at an end. Adieu.
Yours, M. S.
The fiery " Pirate " was much disappointed at
Mary's refusal to collaborate with him, and quite
unable to understand her unwillingness to be the
instrument of making the facts of her own and
Shelley's life the subject of public discussion. His
resentment soon passed away, but his first wrath
was evidently expressed with characteristic vigour.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
195
MARY SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
15/7* December 1829.
. . . Your last letter was not at all kind. You are angry
with me, but what do you ask, and what do I refuse? You
talk of writing Shelley's life, and ask me for materials.
Shelley's life, as far as the public have to do with it, consisted
of few events, and these are publicly known ; the private
events were sad and tragical. How would you relate them ?
As Hunt has, slurring over the real truth ? Wherefore write
fiction? and the truth, any part of it, is hardly for the rude
cold world to handle. His merits are acknowledged, his
virtues ; to bring forward actions which, right or wrong (and
that would be a matter of dispute), were in their results
tremendous, would be to awaken calumnies and give his
enemies a voice.
As to giving Moore materials for Lord Byron's life, I thought
I think I did right. I think I have achieved a great good
by it I wish it to be kept secret decidedly I am averse to
its being published, for it would destroy me to be brought
forward in print. I commit myself on this point to your
generosity. I confided the fact to you as I would anything
I did, being my dearest friend, and had no idea that I was to
find in you a harsh censor and public denouncer." . . .
Did I uphold Medwin ? I thought that I had always dis-
liked him. I am sure I thought him a great annoyance, and he
was always borrowing crowns which he never meant to pay and
we could ill spare. He was Jane's friend more than any one's.
To be sure, we did not desire a duel, nor a horsewhipping,
and Lord Byron and Mrs. B. . . . worked hard to promote
peace. Affectionately yours, M. W. S.
During this year Mrs. Shelley was busily em-
ployed on her own novel, Perkin Warbeck, the
subject of which may have occurred to her in con-
196 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
nection with the historic associations of Arundel
Castle. It is a work of great ingenuity and re-
search, though hardly so spontaneous in conception
as her earlier books. In spite of her retired life
she had come to be looked on as a celebrity, and
many distinguished literary people sought her
acquaintance. Among these was Lord Dillon,
conspicuous by his good looks, his conversational
powers, his many rare qualities of head and heart,
and his numerous oddities. Between him and
Mrs. Shelley a strong mutual regard existed, and
the following letter is of sufficient interest to be
inserted here. The writer had desired Mary's
opinion on the subject of one of his poems.
LORD DILLON TO MRS. SHELLEY.
DITCHLEY, iSt/i March 1829.
MY DEAR MRS. SHELLEY I return you many thanks for
your letter and your favourable opinion. It is singular that
you should have hit upon the two parts that I almost think
the best of all my poem. I fear that my delineations of
women do not please you, or persons who think as you do. I
have a classic feeling about your sex that is to say, I prefer
nature to what is called delicacy. ... I must.be excused,
however ; I have never loved or much liked women of refined
sentiment, but those of strong and blunt feelings and passions.
. . . Pray tell me candidly, for I believe you to be sincere,
though at first I doubted it, for your manner is reserved, and
that put me on my guard ; but now I admit you to my full
confidence, which I seldom give. Is not Eccelino considered
as too free ? Tell me then truly I never quote whenever I
write to a person. You may trust me. You might tell me
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
197
all the secrets in the world ; they would never be breathed.
I shall see you in May, and then we may converse more
freely, but I own you look more sly than I think you are,
and therefore I never was so candid with you as I think I
ought to be. Have not people who did not know you taken
you for a cunning person ? You have puzzled me very much.
Women always feel flattered when they are told they have
puzzled people. I will tell you what has puzzled me. Your
writings and your manner are not in accordance. I should
have thought of you if I had only read you that you were
a sort of my Sybil, outpouringly enthusiastic, rather indiscreet,
and even extravagant ; but you are cool, quiet, and feminine
to the last degree I mean in delicacy of manner and ex-
pression. Explain this to me. Shall I desire my brother to
call on you with respect to Mr. Peter in the Tower ? He is
his friend, not mine. He is very clever, and I think you
would like him. Pray tell Miss G. to write to me. Yours
most truly, DILLON.
Journal, October 8 (1829). I was at Sir Thomas Law-
rence's to-day whilst Moore was sitting, and passed a delightful
morning. We then went to the Charter House, and I saw his
son, a beautiful boy.
January 9 (1830). Poor Lawrence is dead.
Having seen him so lately, the suddenness of this event
affects me deeply. His death opens all wounds. I see all
those I love die around me, while I lament.
January 22. I have begun a new kind of life somewhat,
going a little into society and forming a variety of acquaint-
ances. People like me, and flatter and follow me, and then
I am left alone again, poverty being a barrier I cannot pass.
Still I am often amused and sometimes interested.
March 23. I gave a soiree, which succeeded very well.
Mrs. Hare is going, and I am very sorry. She likes me, and
she is gentle and good. Her husband is clever and her set
very agreeable, rendered so by the reunion of some of the
best people about town.
198 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Mrs. Shelley now resided in Somerset Street,
Portman Square. Her occasional " at homes,"
though of necessity simple in character, were not
on that account the less frequented. Here might
be met many of the most famous and most charm-
ing men and women of their day, and here Moore
would thrill all hearts and bring tears to all eyes
by his exquisitely pathetic singing of his own
melodies.
The hostess herself, gentle and winning, was an
object of more admiration than would ever be
suspected from the simple, almost deprecatory tone
of her scraps of journal. Among her MSS. are
numerous anonymous poems addressed to her,
some sentimental, others high-flown in compliment,
though none, unfortunately, of sufficient literary
merit to be, in themselves, worth preserving.
But, whether they afforded her amusement or
gratification, it is probable that she had to work
too hard and too continuously to give more than
a passing thought to such things. From the
following letter of Clare's it may be inferred that
Perkin Warbeck, which appeared in 1830, was, in
a pecuniary sense, something of a disappointment,
and that this was the more vexatious as Mary had
lent Clare money during her visit to England, and
would have been glad, now, to be repaid, not,
however, on her own account, but that of Marshall,
Godwin's former amanuensis and her kind friend
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
199
in her childhood, whom, it is evident, she was help-
ing to support in his old age.
CLARE TO MRS. SHELLEY.
DRESDEN, z^th March 1830.
MY DEAR MARY At last I take up the pen to write to you.
At least thus much can I affirm, that I take it up, but whether
I shall ever get to the end of my task and complete this letter
is beyond me to decide. One of the causes of my long delay
has been the hope of being able to send you the money for
Marshall. I was to have been paid in February, but as yet
have received neither money nor notice from Mrs. K. . . . By
this I am led to think she does not intend to do so until
her return here in May. I am vexed, for I have been reproach-
ing myself the whole winter with this debt. Of this be sure,
the instant I am paid I will despatch what I owe you to Lon-
don. . . . Here I was interrupted, and for two days have
been unable to continu/e. How delighted I was with the news
of Percy's health, as also with his letter, though I am afraid it
was written unwillingly and cost him a world of pains. Poor
child ! he little thinks how much I am attached to him ! When
I first saw him I thought him cold, but afterwards he discovered
so much intellect in all his speeches, and so much originality in
his doings, that I willingly pardoned him for not being interested
in anything but himself. In some weeks he will again be at
home for Easter. But what is this to me, since I shall not
see him, nor perhaps even ever again. It seems settled that my
destination is Vienna. The negotiation with Mrs. K. . . . has
been broken off on my showing great unwillingness to go to
Italy ; that it may not be renewed I will not say. She now
talks of going to Nice, to which place I have no objection in
the world to accompany her. But nothing of this can be
settled till she comes, for as neither of us can speak frankly in
our letters, owing to their being subject to her husband's
inspection, we have as yet done nothing but mutually mis-
interpret the circumspect and circuitous phraseology in which
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
our real meaning was wrapped. Nothing can equal the letters
she has written to me ; they were detached pieces of agony.
How she lived at all after bringing such productions into the
world I cannot guess. Instruments of torture are nothing to
them. She favoured me with one every week, which was a
very clever contrivance on her part to keep us in an agitation
equal to the one she suffered at Moghiteff. Thanks to her
and Natalie's perpetual indisposition, I have passed a tolerably
disagreeable winter. At home I was employed in rubbings,
stretchings, putting on trusses, dressing ulcers, applying leeches,
and bandaging swollen glands. Out-of-doors our recreations
were [all] baths, baths of bullock's blood, mud baths, steam
baths, soap baths, and electricity. If I had served in a
hospital I should not have been more constantly employed
with sickness and its appendages. I could understand this
order of things pretty well, and even perhaps from custom find
some beauty in their deformity if the sky were pitch black
and the stars red ; but when I see them so beautiful I cannot
help imagining that they were made to look down upon a life
more consonant with their own natures than the one I lead,
and I am filled with the most bitter dislike of it. I ought to
confess, however, that it is a great mitigation of my disagreeable
life to live in Dresden ; such is the structure of existence here
that a thousand alleviations to misery are offered. Here, as
in Italy, you cannot walk the streets without meeting with
some object which affords ready and agreeable occupation to
the mind. I never yet was in a place where I met so much
to please and so little to shock me. In vain I endeavour to
recollect anything I could wish otherwise ; not a fault presents
itself. The more I become acquainted with the town and see its
smallness, the more I am struck with the uncommon resources
in literature e le belle arti it possesses. With what regret
shall I leave it for Vienna. Farewell, then, a long farewell to
Mount Olympus and its treasures of wisdom, science, poetry,
and skill ; the vales may be green and many rills trill through
them, and many flocks pasture there, but the inhabitants will
be as vile and miserable to me as were the shepherds of
MAR Y WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 201
Admetus to Apollo when he kept their company. At any rate
Vienna is better than Russia. I trust and hope when I am
there you will make some little effort to procure the newspapers
and reviews and new works ; this alone can soften the mortifi-
cation I shall feel in being obliged to live in that city. Already
I have lost the little I had gained in my English, and I can
only write with an effort that is painful to me ; it precludes
the possibility of my finding any pleasure in composition. I
pause a hundred times and lean upon my hand to endeavour
to find words to express the idea that is in my mind. It is a
vain endeavour ; the idea is there, but no words, and I leave
my task unfinished. Another favour I have to ask you, which
is, if I should require your mediation to get a book published
at Paris, you will write to your friends there, and otherwise
interest yourself as warmly as you can about it. Promise me
this, and give me an answer upon it as quick as you can. I
have had many letters from Charles. His affairs have taken
the most favourable turn at Vienna. Everything is couleur de
rose. More employment than he can accept seems likely to
be offered to him ; this is consolatory. He talks with rapture
of his future plans, has taken a charming house, painted and
furnished a pretty room for me, and will send Antonia and the
babes to the lovely hills at some miles from the town so soon
as they arrive.
Mamma has written to me everything concerning Colburn ;
this is indeed a disappointment, and the more galling because
odiously unjust. Let me hear if your plan of writing the
Memoirs of Josephine is likely to be put into execution. This
perhaps would pay you better. I tremble for the anxiety of
mind you suffer about Papa and your own pecuniary resources.
What says the world to Moore's Lord Byron ? I saw some
extracts in a review, and cannot express the pleasure I experi-
enced in finding it was sad stuff. It was the journal of the
Noble Lord, and I should say contained as fine a picture of
indigestion as one could expect to meet with in Dr. Paris,
Graham, or Johnson. Of Trelawny I know little. He wrote
202 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
to me, describing where he was living and what kind of life
he was leading. I have not yet answered him, although I
make a sacred promise every day not to let it go over my head
without so doing. But there is a certain want of sympathy
between us which makes writing to him extremely disagreeable
to me. I admire, esteem, and love him ; some excellent
qualities he possesses in a degree that is unsurpassed, but then
it is exactly in another direction from my centre and my
impetus. He likes a turbid and troubled life, I a quiet one ;
he is full of fine feelings and has no principles, I am full of
fine principles but never had a feeling; he receives all his
impressions through his heart, I through my head. Que voulez
vous ? Le moyen de se recontrer when one is bound for the
North Pole and the other for the South ?
What a terrible description you give of your winter. Ours,
though severe, was an exceedingly fine one. From the time
I arrived here until now there has not been a day that was
not perfectly dry and clear. Within this last week we have
had a great deal of rain. I well understand how much your
spirits must have been affected by three months' incessant
foggy raw weather. In my mind nothing can compensate for
a bad climate. How I wish I could draw you to Dresden.
You would go into society and would see a quantity of things
which, treated by your pen, would bring you in a good profit.
Life is very cheap here, and in the summer you might take a
course of Josephlitz or Carlsbad, which would set up your
health and enable you to bear the winter of London with
tolerable philosophy. Forgive me if I don't write descriptions.
It is impossible, situated as I am. I have not one moment
free from annoyance from morning till night. This state of
things depresses my mind terribly. When I have a moment
of leisure it is breathecl in a prayer for death. You will not
wonder, therefore, that I think the Miss Booths right in their
manner of acting ; what is the use of trifling or mincing the
matter with so despotic a ruler as the Disposer of the Universe ?
The one who is left is much to be pitied, for now she must
die by herself, and that I think is as disagreeable as to live by
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
203
oneself. In your next pray mention something about politics
and how the London University is getting on. The accounts
here of the distress in England are awful. Foreigners talk of
that country as they would of Torre del Greco or Torre dell'
Annunciata at the announcement of an eruption of Vesuvius.
I should think my mother must be delighted to be no more
plagued with us ; it was really a great bother and no pleasure
for her. She writes me a delightful account ok Papa's health
and spirits. Heaven grant it may continue. I am reading
Political Justice, and am filled with admiration at the vastness
of the plan, and the clearness and skill, nothing less than
immortal, with which it is executed.
Farewell ! write to me about your novel and particularly
the opinion it creates in society. Pray write. The letters of
my acquaintances (friends I have none) are my only pleasure.
Natalie is pretty well ; the knee is better, inasmuch as the
swelling is smaller, but the weakness is as great as ever. We
sit opposite to one another in perfect wretchedness ; I because
I am obliged to entreat her all day to do what she does not
like, and she because she is entreated. C. C.
My love to William.
During the next five years the " Author of
Frankenstein" wrote several short tales (some of
which were published in the Keepsake, an annual
periodical, the precursor of the Book of Beauty],
but no new novel. She was to have abundant
employment in furthering the work of another.
CHAPTER XXII
AUGUST i83o-OcTOBER 1831
To all who know Trelawny's curious book, the
following correspondence, which tells the story of
its publication and preparation for the press, will
in itself be interesting. To readers of Mary
Shelley's life it has a strong additional interest as
illustrating, better than any second-hand narrative
can do, the unique kind of friendship subsisting
between her and Trelawny, and which, based on
genuine mutual regard and admiration, and a
common devotion to the memory of Shelley and of
a golden age which ended at his death, proved
stronger than all obstacles, and, in spite of
occasional eclipses through hasty words and mis-
understandings, in spite of wide differences in tem-
perament, in habits, in opinions, and morals, yet
survived with a kind of dogged vitality for years.
Shelley said of Epipsychidion that it was " an
idealised history of his life and feelings." The
Adventures of a Younger Son is an idealised his-
tory of Trelawny's youth and exploits, and very
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
205
amusing it is, though rather gruesome in some of
its details ; a romance of adventures, of hair-
breadth escapes by flood and field. As will be
seen, the original MS. had to be somewhat
toned down before it was presented to the public,
but it is, as it stands, quite sufficiently forcible,
as well as blood-curdling, for most readers.
The letters may now be left to tell their own
tale.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
1 6th August 1830.
MY DEAR MARY That my letter may not be detained, I
shall say nothing about Continental politics.
My principal motive in writing is to inform you that I have
nearly completed the first portion of my History, enough for
three ordinary volumes, which I wish published forthwith.
The Johnsons, as I told you before, are totally ruined by an
Indian bankruptcy ; the smallness of my income prevents my
supporting them. Mr. Johnson is gone to India to see if he
can save aught from the ruin of his large fortune. In the
meantime his wife is almost destitute; this spurs me on.
Brown, who is experienced in these matters, declares I shall
have no difficulty in getting a very considerable sum for the
MS. now. I shall want some friend to dispose of it for me.
My name is not to appear or to be disclosed to the bookseller
or any other person. The publisher who may purchase it is
to be articled down to publish the work without omitting or
altering a single word, there being nothing actionable, though
a great deal objectionable, inasmuch as it is tinctured with the
prejudices and passions of the author's mind. However, there
is nothing to prevent women reading it but its general want of
merit. The opinion of the two or three who have read it is
that it will be very successful, but I know how little value can
be attached to such critics. I'll tell you what I think that it is
2O6
good, and might have been better ; it is [filled] with events that,
if not marred by my manner of narrating, must be interesting.
I therefore plainly foresee it will be generally read or not at
all. Who will undertake to, in the first place, dispose of it,
and, in the second, watch its progress through the press ? I
care not who publishes it : the highest bidder shall have it.
Murray would not like it, it is too violent ; parsons and Scots,
and, in short, also others are spoken of irreverently, if not pro-
fanely. But when I have your reply I shall send the MS. to
England, and your eyes will be the judge, so tell me precisely
your movements. Your attached E. J. T.
Poste Restante, Florence.
When does Moore conclude his Life of Byron ? If I knew
his address I could give him a useful hint that would be of
service to the fame of the Poet.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
FLORENCE, z'&th October 1830.
DEAREST MARY My friend Baring left Florence on the
25th to proceed directly to London, so that he will be there
as soon as you can get this letter. He took charge of my
MSS., and promised to leave them at Hookham's, Bond
Street, addressed to you. I therefore pray you lose no time
in inquiring about them ; they are divided into chapters and
volumes, copied out in a plain hand, and all ready to go to
press. They have been corrected with the greatest care, and
I do not think you will have any trouble with them on that
score. All I want you to do is to read them attentively, and
then show them to Murray and Colburn, or any other pub-
lisher, and to hear if they will publish them and what they will
give. You may say the author cannot at present be named,
but that, when the work goes forth in the world, there are
many who will recognise it. Besides the second series, which
treats of Byron, Shelley, Greece, etc., will at once remove the
veil, and the publisher who has the first shall have that. Yet
at present I wish the first series to go forth strictly anonymous,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 207
and therefore you must on no account trust the publisher with
my name. Surely there is matter enough in the book to make
it interesting, if only viewed in the light of a romance. You
will see that I have divided it into very short chapters, in the
style of Fielding, and that I have selected mottoes from the
only three poets who were the staunch advocates of liberty,
and my contemporaries. I have left eight or nine blanks in
the mottoes for you to fill up from the work of one of those
poets. Brown, who was very anxious about the fame of Keats,
has given many of his MSS. for the purpose. Now, if you
could find any from the MSS. of Shelley or Byron, they would
excite much interest, and their being strictly applicable is not
of much importance. If you cannot, why, fill them up from
the published works of Byron, Shelley, or Keats, but no others
are to be admitted. When you have read the work and heard
the opinion of the booksellers, write to me before you settle
anything ; only remember I am very anxious that no altera-
tions or omissions should be made, and that the mottoes,
whether long or short, double or treble, should not be cur-
tailed. Will not Hogg assist you ? I might get other people,
but there is no person I have such confidence in as you, and
the affair is one of confidence and trust, and are we not bound
and united together by ties stronger than those which earth
has to impose ? Dearest friend, I am obliged hastily to con-
clude. Yours affectionately, E. J..TRELAWNY.
George Baring, Esq., who takes my book, is the brother of
the banker ; he has read it, and is in my confidence, and will
be very ready to see and confer with you and do anything.
He is an excellent person. I shall be very anxious till I hear
from you.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
33 SOMERSET STREET,
27 th December 1830.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY At present I can only satisfy your
impatience with the information that I have received your MS.
208 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
and read the greater part of it. Soon I hope to say more.
George Baring did not come to England, but after consider-
able delay forwarded it to me from Cologne.
I am delighted with your work ; it is full of passion, energy,
and novelty ; it concerns the sea, and that is a subject of the
greatest interest to me. I should imagine that it must com-
mand success.
But, my dear friend, allow me to persuade you to permit
certain omissions. In one of your letters to me you say that
" there is nothing in it that a woman could not read." You
are correct for the most part, and yet without the omission of
a few words here and there the scene before you go to school
with the mate of your ship and above all the scene of the
burning of the house, following your scene with your Scotch
enemy I am sure that yours will be a book interdicted to
women. Certain words and phrases, pardoned in the days of
Fielding, are now justly interdicted, and any gross piece of ill
taste will make your booksellers draw back.
I have named all the objectionable passages, and I beseech
you to let me deal with them as I would with Lord Byron's
Don Juan, when I omitted all that hurt my taste. Without
this yielding on your part I shall experience great difficulty in
disposing of your work ; besides that I, your partial friend,
strongly object to coarseness, now wholly out of date, and beg
you for my sake to make the omissions necessary for your obtain-
ing feminine readers. Amidst so much that is beautiful and
imaginative and exalting, why leave spots which, believe me, are
blemishes ? I hope soon to write to you again on the subject.
The burnings, the alarms, the absorbing politics of the day
render booksellers almost averse to publishing at all. God
knows how it will all end, but it looks as if the autocrats would
have the good sense to make the necessary sacrifices to a
starving people.
I heard from Clare to-day ; she is well and still at Nice. I
suppose there is no hope of seeing you here. As for me, I of
course still continue a prisoner. Percy is quite well, and is
growing more and more like Shelley. Since it is necessary to
MARY. WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 209
live, it is a great good to have this tie to life, but it is a weari-
some affair. I hope you are happy. Yours, my dearest friend,
ever, MARY SHELLEY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
FIRENZE, 1 9// January 1831.
MY DEAREST MARY For, notwithstanding what you may
think of me, you every day become dearer to me. The men
I have linked myself to in my wild career through life have
almost all been prematurely cut off, and the only friends which
are left me are women, and they are strange beings. I have
lost them all by some means or other ; they are dead to me in
being married, or (for you are all slaves) separated by obstacles
which are insurmountable, and as Lord Chatham observes,
" Friendship is a weed of slow growth in aged bosoms." But
now to your letter. I to-day received yours of the 27th of
December ; you say you have received my MS. It has been
a painful and arduous undertaking narrating my life. I have
omitted a great deal, and avoided being a pander to the
public taste for the sake of novelty or effect. Landor, a man
of superior literary acquirements ; Kirkup, an artist of superior
taste ; Baring, a man of the world and very religious ; Mrs.
Baring, moral and squeamish ; Lady Burghersh, aristocratic
and proud as a queen ; and lastly, Charles Brown, a plain
downright Cockney critic, learned in the trade of authorship,
and has served his time as a literary scribe. All these male
and female critics have read and passed their opinions on my
narrative, and therefore you must excuse my apparent pre-
sumption in answering your objections to my book with an
appearance of presumptuous dictation. Your objections to the
coarseness of those scenes you have mentioned have been fore-
seen, and, without further preface or apology, I shall briefly
state my wishes on the subject. Let Hogg or Horace Smith
read it, and, without your giving any opinion, hear theirs ; then
let the booksellers, Colburn or others, see it, and then if it is
their general opinion that there are words which are better
VOL. ii 37
210 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
omitted, why I must submit to their being omitted ; but do
not prompt them by prematurely giving your opinion. My
life, though I have sent it you, as the dearest friend I have, is
not written for the amusement of women ; it is not a novel.
If you begin clipping the wings of my true story, if you begin
erasing words, you must then omit sentences, then chapters ;
it will be pruning an Indian jungle down to a clipped French
garden. I shall be so appalled at my MS. in its printed form,
that I shall have no heart to go on with it. Dear Mary, I
love women, and you know it, but my life is not dedicated to
them ; it is to men I write, and my first three volumes are
principally adapted to sailors. England is a nautical nation,
and, if they like it, the book will amply repay the publisher,
and I predict it will be popular with sailors, for it is true to its
text. By the time you get this letter the time of publishing is
come, and we are too far apart to continue corresponding on
the subject. Let Hogg, Horace Smith, or any one you like,
read the MS. ; or the booksellers ; if they absolutely object to
any particular words or short passages, why let them be
omitted by leaving blanks ; but I should prefer a first edition
as it now stands, and then a second as the bookseller thought
best. In the same way that Anastasius was published, the
suppression of the first edition of that work did not prevent its
success. All men lament that Don Juan was not published as
it was written, as under any form it would have been inter-
dicted to women, and yet under any form they would have
unavoidably read it.
Brown, who is learned in the bookselling trade, says I
should get ^200 per volume. Do not dispose of it under
any circumstances for less than ^500 the three volumes.
Have you seen a book written by a man named Millingen ?
He has written an article on me, and I am answering it. My
reply to it I shall send you. The Literary Gazette^ which
published the extract regarding me, I have replied to, and to
them I send my reply ; the book I have not seen. If they
refuse, as the article I write is amusing, you will have no
difficulty in getting it admitted in some of the London maga-
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 211
zines. It will be forwarded to you in a few days, so you see
I am now fairly coming forward in a new character. I have
laid down the sword for the pen. Brown has just called with
the article in question copied, and I send it together.
I have spoken to you about filling up the mottoes ; the
title of my book I wish to be simply thus The Life of a Man,
and not The Discarded Son, which looks too much like
romance or a common novel. . . .
Florence is very gay, and there are many pretty girls here,
and balls every night. Tell Mrs. Paul not to be angry at my
calling her and her sisters by their Christian names, for I am
very lawless, as you know, in that particular, and not very
particular on other things.
Brown talks of writing to you about the mottoes to my
book, as he is very anxious about those of his friend Keats.
Have you any MS. of Shelley's or Byron's to fill up the eight
or ten I left blank ? Remember the short chapters are to be
adhered to in its printed form. I shall have no excitement to
go on writing till I see what I have already written in print.
By the bye, my next volumes will to general readers be far
more interesting, and published with my name, or at least
called Treloen, which is our original family name.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
$th April 1831.
MY DEAR MARY Since your letter, dated December 1830,
I have not had a single line from you, yet in that you promised
to write in a few days. Why is this ? or have you written,
and has your letter miscarried, or have not my letters reached
you? I was anxious to have published the first part of my
life this year, and if it had succeeded in interesting general
readers, it would have induced me to have proceeded to its
completion, for I cannot doubt that if the first part, published
anonymously, and treating of people, countries, and things
little known, should suit the public palate, that the latter,
212 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
treating of people that everybody knows, and of things gener-
ally interesting, must be successful. But till I see the effect
of the first part, I cannot possibly proceed to the second, and
time is fleeting, and I am lost in idleness. I cannot write a
line, and thus six months, in which I had leisure to have
finished my narrative, are lost, and I am now deeply engaged
in a wild scheme which will lead me to the East, and it is
firmly my belief that when I again leave Europe it will be for
ever. I have had too many hair-breadth escapes to hope that
fortune will bear me up. My present Quixotic expedition is
to be in the region wherein is still standing the column erected
by Sardanapalus, and on it by him inscribed words to the
effect : // faut jouir des plaisirs de la vie ; tout le reste n'est
rien,
At present I can only say, if nothing materially intervenes
to prevent me, that in the autumn of this year I shall bend my
steps towards the above-mentioned column, and try the effect
of it.
I am sick to death of the pleasureless life I lead here, and
I should rather the tinkling of the little bell, which I hear
summoning the dead to its last resting-place, was ringing for
my body than endure the petty vexations of what is called
civilised life, and see what I saw a few days back, the Austrian
tyrants trampling on their helot Italians ; but letters are not
safe. Your affectionate friend, E. J. T.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
SOMERSET STREET, 2 2 d March 1831.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY What can you think of me and of
my silence ? I can guess by the contents of your letters and
your not having yet received answers. Believe me that if I
am at all to blame in this it arises from an error in judgment,
not from want of zeal. Every post-day I have waited for the
next, expecting to be able to communicate something defini-
tive, and now still I am waiting ; however, I trust that this
letter will contain some certain intelligence before I send it.
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 213
After all, I have done no more than send your manuscripts to
Colburn, and I am still in expectation of his answer. In the
first place, they insist on certain parts being expunged, parts
of which I alone had the courage to speak to you, but which
had before been remarked upon as inadmissible. These, how-
ever (with trifling exceptions), occur only in the first volume.
The task of deciding upon them may very properly be left to
Horace Smith, if he will undertake it we shall see. Mean-
while, Colburn has not made up his mind as to the price. He
will not give ^500. The terms he will offer I shall hope to
send before I close this letter, so I will say no more except to
excuse my having conceded so much time to his dilatoriness.
In all I have done I may be wrong ; I commonly act from my
own judgment ; but alas ! I have great experience. I believe
that, if I sent your work to Murray, he would return it in two
months unread ; simply saying that he does not print novels.
Your end part would be a temptation, did not your intention
to be severe on Moore make it improbable that he would like
to engage in it ; and he would keep me as long as Colburn in
uncertainty ; still this may be right to do, and I shall expect
your further instructions by return of post. However, in one
way you may help yourself. You know Lockhart. He reads
and judges for Murray; write to him ; your letter shall accom-
pany the MS. to him. Still, this thing must not be done
hastily, for if I take the MS. out of Colburn's hands, and, fail-
ing to dispose of it elsewhere, I come back to him, he will
doubtless retreat from his original proposal. There are other
booksellers in the world, doubtless, than these two, but, occu-
pied as England is by political questions, and impoverished
miserably, there are few who have enterprise at this juncture
to offer a price. I quote examples. My father and myself
would find it impossible to make any tolerable arrangement
with any one except Colburn. He at least may be some guide
as to what you may expect. Mr. Brown remembers the golden
days of authors. When I first returned to England I found
no difficulty in making agreements with publishers ; they came
to seek me ; now money is scarce, and readers fewer than ever.
214 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
I leave the rest of this page blank. I shall fill it up before it
goes on Friday.
Friday, 2$th March.
At length, my dear friend, I have received the ulti-
matum of these great people. They offer you ^300, and
another ;ioo on a second edition; as this was sent me
in writing, and there is no time for further communication
before post-hour, I cannot officially state the number of the
edition. I should think 1000. I think that perhaps they
may be brought to say ^400 at once, or ^300 at once and
200 on the second edition. There can be no time for par-
leying, and therefore you must make up your mind whether
after doing good battle, if necessary, I shall accept their terms.
Believe my experience and that of those about me ; you will
not get a better offer from others, because money is not to be
had, and Bulwer and other fashionable and selling authors are
now obliged to content themselves with half of what they got
before. If you decline this offer, I will, if you please, try
Murray; he will keep me two months at least, and the
worst is, if he won't do anything, Colburn will diminish his
bargain, and we shall be in a greater mess than ever. I know
that, as a woman, I am timid, and therefore a bad negotiator,
except that I have perseverance and zeal, and, I repeat, experi-
ence of things as they are. Mr. Brown knows what they
were, but they are sadly changed. The omissions mentioned
must be made, but I will watch over them, and the mottoes
and all that shall be most carefully attended to, depend
on me.
Do not be displeased, my dear friend, that I take advantage
of this enormous sheet of paper to save postage, and ask you
to tear off one half sheet, and to send it to Mrs. Hare. You
talk of my visiting Italy. It is impossible for me to tell you
how much I repine at my imprisonment here, but I dare not
anticipate a change to take me there for a long time. England,
its ungenial clime, its difficult society, and the annoyances to
which I am subjected in it weigh on my spirits more than
ever, for every step I take only shows me how impossible [it
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 215
is], situated as I am, that I should be otherwise than wretched.
My sanguine disposition and capacity to endure have borne
me up hitherto, but I am sinking at last ; but to quit so stupid
a topic and to tell you news, did you hear that Medwin con-
trived to get himself gazetted for full pay in the Guards ? I
fancy that he employed his connection with the Shelleys, who
are connected with the King through the Fitz Clarences. How-
ever, a week after he was gazetted as retiring. I suppose the
officers cut him at mess ; his poor wife and children ! how I
pity them ! Jane is quite well, living in tranquillity. Hogg
continues all that she can desire. . . .
She lives where she did ; her children are well, and so is
my Percy, who grows more like Shelley. I hear that your old
favourite, Margaret Shelley, is prettier than ever; your Miss
Burdett is married. I have been having lithographed your
letter to me about Caroline. I wish to disperse about 100
copies among the many hapless fair who imagine themselves
to have been the sole object of your tenderness. Clare is
to have a first copy. Have you heard from poor dear
Clare ? She announced a little time ago that she was to visit
Italy with the Kaisaroff to see you. I envied her, but I hear
from her brother Charles that she has now quarrelled with
Madame K., and that she will go to Vienna. God grant that
her sufferings end soon. I begin to anticipate it, for I hear
that Sir Tim is in a bad way. I shall hear more certain
intelligence after Easter. Mrs. P. spends her Easter with
Caroline, who lives in the neighbourhood, and will dine at
Field Place. I have not seen Mrs. Aldridge since her
marriage ; she has scarcely been in town, but I shall see her
this spring, when she comes up as she intends. You know,
of course, that Elizabeth St. Aubyn is married, so you know
that your ladies desert you sadly. If Clare and I were either
to die or marry you would be left without a Dulcinea at all,
with the exception of the sixscore new objects for idolatry
you may have found among the pretty girls in Florence. Take
courage, however ; I am scarcely a Dulcinea, being your friend
and not the Lady of your love, but such as I am, I do not think
216 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
that I shall either die or marry this year, whatever may happen
the next; as it is only spring you have some time before
you.
We are all here on the qui vive about the Reform Bill ; if
it pass, and Tories and all expect it, well, if not, Parliament
is dissolved immediately, and they say that the new writs are
in preparation. The Whigs triumphed gloriously in the bold-
ness of their measure. England will be free if it is carried. I
have had very bad accounts from Rome, but you are quiet as
usual in Florence. I am scarcely wicked enough to desire
that you should be driven home, nor do I expect it, and yet
how glad I should be to see you. You never mention Zela.
Adieu, my dear Trelawny. I am always affectionately yours,
MARY W. SHELLEY.
Hunt has set up a little 2d. paper, the Tatler, which is
succeeding ; this keeps him above water. I have not seen
him very lately. He lives a long way off. He is the same as
ever, a person whom all must love and regret.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
Wi April 1831.
DEAR MARY The day after I had despatched a scolding
letter to you, I received your Titanic letter, and sent Mrs.
Hare her fathom of it. ...
Now, let's to business. I thank you for the trouble you
have taken about the MS. Let Colburn have it, and try to
get ,400 down, for as to what may be promised on a second
edition, I am told is mere humbug. When my work is com-
pleted I have no doubt the first part will be reprinted, but get
what you can paid down at once ; as to the rest, I have only
to say that I consent to Horace Smith being the sole arbitrator
of what is necessary to be omitted, but do not let him be
prompted, and tell him only to omit what is absolutely indis-
pensable. Say to him that it is a friend of Shelley's who asks
him this favour, but do not let him or any other individual
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
217
know that I am the author. If my name is known, and the
work can be brought home to me, the consequences will be
most disastrous. I beseech you bear this in mind. Let
all the mottoes appear in their respective chapters without any
omission, regardless of their number to each chapter, for they
are all good, and fill up the eight or ten I left blank from
Byron and Shelley ; if from MS. so much the better. The
changes in the opinions of all mankind on political and other
topics are favourable to such writers as I and the Poets of
Liberty whom I have selected. We shall no longer be hooted
at ; it is our turn to triumph now. Would those glorious
spirits, to whose genius the present age owes so much, could
witness the triumphant success of these opinions. I think I
see Shelley's fine eyes glisten, and faded cheek glow with fire
unearthly. England, France, and Belgium free, the rest of
Europe must follow ; the theories of tyrants all over the world
are shaken as by an earthquake ; they may be propped up for
a time, but their fall is inevitable. I am forgetting the main
business of my letter. I hope, Mary, that you have not told
Colburn or any one else that I am the author of the book.
Remember that I must have the title simply A Man's Life,
and that I should like to have as many copies for my friends
as you can get from Colburn ten, I hope and that you will
continue to report progress, and tell me when it is come out.
You must have a copy, Horace Smith one, and Jane and Lady
Burghersh ; she is to be heard of at Apsley House Duke of
Wellington's and then I have some friends here ; you must
send me a parcel by sea. If the time is unfavourable for
publication, from men's minds being engrossed with politics,
yet it is so far an advantage that my politics go with the times,
and not as they would have been some years back, obnoxious
and premature. I decide on Colburn as publisher, not from
liberality of his terms, but his courage, and trusting that as
little as possible will be omitted ; and, by the bye, I wish you
to keep copies, for I have none, of those parts which are
omitted. Enough of this. Of Clare I have seen nothing.
Do not you, dear Mary, abandon me by following the evil
218
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
examples of my other ladies. I should not wonder if fate,
without our choice, united us ; and who can control his fate ?
I blindly follow his decrees, dear Mary. Your
E. J. T.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
SOMERSET STREET, i^thfune 1831.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY Your work is in progress at last,
and is being printed with great rapidity. Horace Smith
undertook the revision, and sent a very favourable report of it
to the publishers ; to me he says : " Having written to you a
few days ago, I have only to annex a copy of my letter to
Colburn and Bentley, whence you will gather my opinion of
the MS. ; it is a most powerful, but rather perilous work, which
will be much praised and much abused by the liberal and
bigoted. I have read it with great pleasure and think it
admirable, in everything but the conclusion ; " by this he
means, as he says to Colburn and Bentley, "The conclusion
is abrupt and disappointing, especially as previous allusions
have been made to his later life which is not given.
Probably it is meant to be continued, and if so it would be
better to state it, for I have no doubt that his first part will
create a sufficient sensation to ensure the sale of a second."
In his former letter to me H. S. says : " Any one who has
proved himself the friend of yourself and of him whom we
all deplore I consider to have strong claims on my regard, and
I therefore willingly undertake the revision of the MS. Pray
assure the author that I feel flattered by this little mark of his
confidence in my judgment, and that it will always give me
pleasure to render him these or any other services." And
now, my dear Trelawny, I hope you will not be angry at the
title given to your book ; the responsibility of doing anything
for any one so far away as you is painful, and I have had
many qualms, but what could I do ? The publishers strongly
objected to the History of a Man as being no title at all, or
rather one to lead astray. The one adopted is taken from
the first words of your MS., where you declare yourself a
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 219
younger son words pregnant of meaning in this country,
where to be the younger son of a man of property is to be
virtually discarded, and they will speak volumes to the English
reader ; it is called, therefore, The Adventures of a Younger Son.
If you are angry with me for this I shall be sorry, but I knew
not what to do. Your MS. will be preserved for you ; and
remember, also, that it is pretty well known whom it is by.
I suppose the persons who read the MS. in Italy have talked,
and, as I told you, your mother speaks openly about it.
Still it will not appear in print, in no newspaper accounts over
which I have any control as emanating from the publisher.
Let me know immediately how I am to dispose of the dozen
copies I shall receive on your account. One must go to H.
Smith, another to me, and to whom else ? The rest I will
send to you in Italy.
There is another thing that annoys me especially. You
will be paid in bills dating from the day of publication, now
not far distant; three of various dates. To what man of busi-
ness of yours can I consign these ? the first I should think I
could get discounted at once, and send you the cash ; but tell
me what I am to do. I know that all these hitches and draw-
backs will make you vituperate womankind, and had I ever
set myself up for a woman of business, or known how to
manage my own affairs, I might be hurt ; but you know my
irremediable deficiencies on those subjects, and I represented
them strongly to you before I undertook my task ; and all I
can say in addition is, that as far as I have seen, both have
been obliged to make the same concessions, so be as forgiving
and indulgent as you can.
We are full here of reform or revolution, whichever it is to
be ; I should think something approaching the latter, though
the first may be included in the last. Will you come over and
sit for the new parliament? what are you doing? Have you
seen Clare ? how is she ? She never writes except on special
occasions, when she wants anything. Tell her that Percy is
quite well.
You tell me not to marry, but I will, any one who will
220 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
take me out of my present desolate and uncomfortable position.
Any one, and with all this do you think that I shall marry ?
Never, neither you nor anybody else. Mary Shelley shall be
written on my tomb, and why ? I cannot tell, except that it
is so pretty a name that though I were to preach to myself for
years, I never should have the heart to get rid of it.
Adieu, my dear friend. I shall be very anxious to hear
from you ; to hear that you are not angry about all the
contretemps attendant on your publication, and to receive your
further directions. Yours very truly, M. W. SHELLEY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
29/7^ June 1831.
DEAR MARY Your letter, dated i4th June, I have re-
ceived, after a long interval, and your letter before that is dated
22d March. It would appear by your last that you must
have written another letter between March and June, by
allusions in this last respecting my Mother. If so, it has never
reached me, so that if it contained anything which is necessary
for me to know, I pray you let me have a transcript, so far as
your memory will serve to give it me. I am altogether ignorant
of what arrangements you have made with Colburn ; and am
only in possession of the facts contained in the second, to wit,
that Horace Smith is revising the work for publication. I
trust he will not be too liberal with the pruning-knife. When
will the cant and humbug of these costermonger times be re-
formed ? Nevertheless tell H. Smith that the author is fully
sensible of his kindness and (for once, at least, in his life) with
all his heart joins his voice to that of the world in paying
tribute to the sterling ability of Mr. Horace Smith ; and I re-
member Shelley and others speaking of him as one often
essayed on the touchstone of proof, and never found wanting.
Horace Smith's criticism on the Life is flattering, and as regards
the perilous part why I never have, and never shall, crouch
to those I utterly despise, to wit, the bigoted. The Roman
MAR Y WOLLS TO NEC R A FT SHELLE Y 221
Pontiff might as well have threatened me with excommunication
when on board the Grub, if I failed to strike my top-sails, and
lower my proud flag to the lubberly craft which bore his silly
banner, bedaubed with mitres, crosses, and St. Peter's Keys.
I did not mean to call my book The History of a Man, but
simply thus, A Man's Life; "Adventures" and "Younger
Son " are commonplace, and I don't like it ; but if it is to be
so, why, I shall not waste words in idle complaints : would
it were as I had written it. By the bye, you say justly the
MS. ends abruptly ; the truth is, as you know, it is only the
first part of my life, and to conclude it will fill three more
volumes: that it is to be concluded, I thought I had stated
in a paragraph annexed to the last chapter of that which is now
in the press, which should run thus
" I am, or rather have, continued this history of my life,
and it will prove I have not been a passive instrument of
despotism, nor shall I be found consorting with those base,
sycophantic, and mercenary wretches who crouch and crawl
and fawn on kings, and priests, and lords, and all in authority
under them. On my return to Europe, its tyrants had
gathered together all their helots and gladiators to restore the
cursed dynasty of the Bourbons, and thousands of slaves went
forth to extinguish and exterminate liberty, truth, and justice.
I went forth, too, my hand ever against them, and when
tyranny had triumphed, I wandered an exile in the world
and leagued myself with men worthy to be called so, for they,
inspired by wisdom, uncoiled the frauds contained in lying
legends, which had so long fatally deluded the majority of
mankind. Alas ! those apostles have not lived to see the tree
they planted fructify ; would they had tarried a little while to
behold this new era of 1830-31, how they would have rejoiced
to behold the leagued conspiracy of kings broken, and their
bloodhound priests and nobles muzzled, their impious con-
federacy to enslave and rob the people paralysed by a blow
that has shaken their usurpation to the base, and must in-
evitably be followed by their final overthrow. Yes, the sun of
freedom is dawning on the pallid slaves of Europe," etc.
222
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
The conclusion of this diatribe I am certain you have, and
if you have not the beginning, why put it in beginning with the
words : " I have continued the history of my life."
If I thought there was a probability that I could get a seat
in the reformed House of Commons, I would go to England,
or if there was a probability of revolution. I was more
delighted with your resolve not to change your name than with
any other portion of your letter. Trelawny, too, is a good
name, and sounds as well as Shelley ; it fills the mouth as well
and will as soon raise a spirit. By the bye, when you send my
books, send me also Mary Wollstonecraft's Rights of Women,
and Godwin's new work on Man, and tell me what you are
now writing. The Hares are at Lucca Baths. Never omit to
tell me what you know of Caroline. Do you think there is any
opening .among the demagogues for me? It is a bustling
world at present, and likely so to continue. I must play a
part. Write, Mary mine, speedily.
Is my book advertised? If so, the motto from Byron
should accompany it.
Clare only remained in Florence about ten days; some
sudden death of a relative of the family she resides with recalled
them to Russia. I saw her three or four times. She was
very miserable, and looked so pale, thin, and haggard. The
people she lived with were bigots, and treated her very badly.
I wished to serve her, but had no means. Poor lady, I pity
her ; her life has been one of continued misery. I hope on
Sir Timothy's death it will be bettered ; her spirits are broken,
and she looks fifty ; I have not heard of her since her
departure. Mrs. Hare once saw her, but she was so prejudiced
against her, from stories she had heard against her from the
Beauclercs, that she could hardly be induced to notice her.
You are aware that I do not wish my book to appear as if
written for publication, and therefore have avoided all allusions
which might induce people to think otherwise. I wish all the
mottoes to be inserted, as they are a selection of beautiful
poetry, and many of them not published.
The bills, you say, Colburn and Bentley are to give you ;
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 223
perhaps Horace Smith may further favour me by getting them
negotiated. I am too much indebted to him to act so scurvily
as not to treat him with entire confidence, so with the in-
junction of secrecy you may tell him my name. If he dis-
likes the affair of the bills, as I cannot employ any of my
people of business, why give the bills, or rather place them in
the hands of a man who keeps a glover's shop (I know him well).
His name is Moon, and his shop is corner one in Orange Street,
Bloomsbury Square. When I get your reply, I will, if necessary,
write to him on the subject. I pray you write me on receipt
of this. My child Zella is growing up very pretty, and with a
soul of fire. She is living with friends of mine near Lucca.
The only copies of the book I wish you to give away are to
Horace Smith, Mary Shelley, Lady Burghersh, No. i Hyde
Park Terrace, Oxford Road, and Jane Williams, to remind her
that she is not forgotten. Shelley's tomb and mine in Rome,
is, I am told, in a very dilapidated state. I will see to its re-
pair. Send me out six copies by sea ; one if you can sooner.
Address them to Henry Dunn, Leghorn.
E. J. TRELAWNY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
July 1831.
By the bye, Mary, if it is not too late, I should wish
the name of Zella to be spelt in the correct Arabic, thus,
Zella, in my book. I changed it in common with several
others of the names to prevent my own being too gener-
ally recognised ; with regard to hers, if not too late, I should
now wish it to appear in its proper form, besides which, in
the chapter towards the conclusion, wherein I narrate an
account of a pestilence which was raging in the town of
Batavia, I wish the word Java fever to be erased, and cholera
morbus substituted. For we alone had the former malady on
board the schooner, having brought it into the Batavia Roads
224 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
with us, but on our arrival there we found the cholera raging
with virulence, most of those attacked expiring in the interval
of the setting and rising of the sun. Luis, our steward, I
thought died from fever, as we had had it previously on board,
but the medicals pronounced it or denounced it cholera. If the
alteration can be made, it will be interesting, as in the history
of the cholera I see published, they only traced the origin to
1 8 1 6, when the fact is, it was in 1 8 1 1 that I am speaking of,
and no doubt it has existed for thousands of years before, but
it is only of late, like the natives of Hindoostan, it has visited
Europe. It is sent by Nemesis, a fitting retribution for the
gold and spices we have robbed them of. The malediction of
my Malayan friends has come to pass, for I have no doubt the
Russian caravans which supply that empire with tea, silks, and
spices introduced the cholera, or gave it into the bargain, or as
bona mano. I wish you would write, for I am principally
detained here by wishing to get a letter from you ere I go to
some other place. Yours, and truly, E. T.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
SOMERSET STREET, 26th July 1831.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY Your third volume is now printing,
so I should imagine that it will very soon be published ; every-
thing shall be attended to as you wish. The letter to which I
alluded in my former one was a tiny one enclosed to Clare,
which perhaps you have received by this time. It mentioned
the time of the agreement ; ^300 in bills of three, six, and
eight months, dated from the day of publication, and ^100
more on a second edition. The mention I made of your
mother was, that she speaks openly in society of your forth-
coming memoirs, so that I should imagine very little real
secrecy will attend them. However, you will but gain reputa-
tion and admiration through them.
I hope you are going on, for your continuation will, I am
sure, be ardently looked for. I am so sorry for the delay of
all last winter, yet I did my best to conclude the affair ; but
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 225
the state of the nation has so paralysed bookselling that pub-
lishers were very backward, though Colburn was in his heart
eager to get at your book. As to the price, I have taken pains
to ascertain ; and you receive as much as is given to the best
novelists at this juncture, which may console your vanity if it
does not fill your pocket.
The Reform Bill will pass, and a considerable revolution in
the government of the country will, I imagine, be the con-
sequence.
You have talents of a high order. You have powers ; these,
with industry and discretion, would advance you in any career.
You ought not, indeed you ought not to throw away yourself
as you do. Still, I would not advise your return on the
speculation, because England is so sad a place that the mere
absence from it I consider a peculiar blessing.
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 Shelley will never be yours.
I write in haste, but I will write soon again, more at length.
You shall have your copies the moment I receive them.
Believe me, with all gratitude and affection, yours,
M. W. SHELLEY.
Jane thanks you for the book promised. I am infinitely
chagrined at what you tell me concerning Clare. If the B.'s
spoke against her, that means Mrs. B. and her stories were
gathered from Lord Byron, who feared Clare and did not
spare her ; and the stories he told were such as to excuse
the prejudice of any one.
THE SAME TO THE SAME.
SOMERSET STREET, zd October 1831.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY I suppose that I have now some
certain intelligence to send you, though I fear that it will both
VOL. ii 38
226 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
disappoint and annoy you. I am indeed ashamed that I have
not been able to keep these people in better order, but I
trusted to honesty, when I ought to have ensured it ; however,
thus it stands : your book is to be published in the course of
the month, and then your bills are to be dated. As soon as I
get them I will dispose of them as you direct, and you will receive
notice on the subject without delay. I cannot procure for you
a copy until then ; they pretend that it is not all printed. If
I can get an opportunity I will send you one by private hand,
at any rate I shall send them by sea without delay. I will
write to Smith about negotiating your bills, and I have no
doubt that I shall be able somehow or other to get you money
on them. I will go myself to the City to pay Barr's corre-
spondent as soon as I get the cash. Thus your pretty dear (how
fascinating is flattery) will do her best, as soon as these tiresome
people fulfil their engagements. In some degree they have the
right on their side, as the day of publication is a usual time from
which to date the bills, and that was the time which I acceded
to ; but they talked of such hurry and speed that I expected
that that day was nearer at hand than it now appears to be.
November is the publishing month, and no new things are
coming out now. In fact, the Reform Bill swallows up every
other thought. You have heard of the Lords' majority
against it, much longer than was expected, because it was not
imagined that so many bishops would vote against Govern-
ment. . . .
Do whenever you write send me news of Clare. She never
writes herself, and we are all excessively anxious about her. I
hope she is better. God knows when fate will do anything
for us. I despair. Percy is well, I fancy that he will go to
Harrow in the spring ; it is not yet finally arranged, but this
is what I wish, and therefore I suppose it will be, as they
have promised to increase my allowance for him, and leave me
pretty nearly free, only with Eton prohibited ; but Harrow is
now in high reputation under a new head-master. I am de-
lighted to hear that Zella is in such good hands, it is so neces-
sary in this world of woe that children should learn betimes to
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRA FT SHELLE Y 227
yield to necessity ; a girl allowed to run wild makes an unhappy
woman.
Hunt has set up a penny daily paper, literary and theatri-
cal ; it is succeeding very well, but his health is wretched, and
when you consider that his sons, now young men, do not con-
tribute a penny towards their own support, you may guess
that the burthen on him is very heavy. I see them very
seldom, for they live a good way off, and when I go he is out,
she busy, and I am entertained by the children, who do not
edify me. Jane has just moved into a house about half a mile
further from town, on the same road ; they have furnished it
themselves. Dina improves, or rather she always was, and
continues to be, a very nice child.
The Adventures did not reach a second edition
in their original form ; the first edition failed,
indeed, to repay its expenses ; but they were after-
wards republished in Colburns Family Library.
The second part of Trelawny's Autobiography took
the chatty and discursive form, so popular at the
present day, of " Reminiscences." It is universally
known as Recollections^- of Shelley, Byron, and
the Author.
So long as Shelley and Byron survive as
objects of interest in this world, so long must
this fascinating book share their existence. As
originally published, it has not a dull page. Life-
like as if written at the moment it all happened, it
yet has the pictorial sense of proportion which can
rarely exist till a writer stands at such a distance
1 "Recollections" in the original; "Records" in the later and, now,
better known edition.
228 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
(of time) from the scenes he describes that he can
estimate them, not only as they are, but in their
relation to surrounding objects. It would seem as
if, for the conversations at least, Trelawny must
sometimes have drawn on his imagination as well
as his memory ; if so, it can only be replied that,
by his success, he has triumphantly vindicated
his artistic right to do so. Terse, original, and
characteristic, each speech paints its speaker in
colours which we know and feel to be true. No-
thing seems set down for effect ; it is spontaneous,
unstudied, everyday reality. And if the history
of Trelawny's own exploits in Greece somewhat
recall the " tarasconnades " of his early adventures,
it at least puts a thrilling finish to a book it
was hard to conclude without falling into bathos.
As a writer on Shelley, Trelawny surely stands
alone. Many authors have praised Shelley,
others have condemned and decried him, others
again have tried to pity and "excuse" him.
No one has apprehended as happily -as Trelawny
the peculiar timbre, if it may be so described, of
his nature, or has brought out so vividly, and with
so few happy touches, his moral and social
characteristics. Saint or sinner, the Shelley of
Trelawny is no lay figure, no statue even, no hero
of romance ; it is Shelley, the man, the boy, the
poet. Trelawny assures us that Hogg's picture of
Shelley as a youth is absolutely faithful. But
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
229
Hogg's picture only shows us Shelley in his
"salad days," and even that we are never allowed
to contemplate without the companion-portrait of
the biographer, smiling with cynical amusement
while he yields his tribute of heartfelt, but
patronising praise.
The conclusions to which Hogg had come by
observation Trelawny arrived at by intuition.
Fiery and imaginative, his nature was by far the
more sympathetic of the two ; though it may be
that, in virtue of very unlikeness, Hogg would
have proved, in the long run, the fitter companion
for Shelley.
Between Trelawny and Mary there existed
the same kind of adjustable difference. His
descriptions of her have been largely drawn upon
in earlier chapters of the present work, and need
not be reverted to here. She had been seven
years dead when the Recollections were published.
Twenty years later, when Mary Shelley had been
twenty-seven years in her grave, there appeared
a second edition of the book. In those twenty
years, what change had come over the spirit of its
pages ? An undefinable difference, like that which
comes over the face of Nature when the wind
changes from west to east, and yet not so un-
definable either, for it had power to reverse some
very definite facts. Byron's feet, for instance,
which as the result of an investigation after
230 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
death were described, in 1858, as having, both,
been "clubbed and withered to the knee," "the
feet and legs of a sylvan satyr," are, in 1878,
pronounced to have been faultless, but for the
contraction of the back sinews (the " Tendon
Achilles "), which prevented his heels from resting
on the ground. " Unfortunately," to quote Mr.
Garnett's comment on this discrepancy, in his
article on Shelley s Last Days, "as in the natural
world the same agencies that are elevating one
portion of the earth's surface are at the same time
depressing another, so, in the microcosm of Mr.
Trelawny's memory and judgment, the embellish-
ment of Lord Byron's feet has been accompanied
by a corresponding deterioration of Mrs. Shelley's
heart and head."
Yes ; the Mary Shelley with whom, in early
days, even Trelawny could find no fault, save
perhaps for a tendency to mournfulness in solitude
and an occasional fit of literary abstraction when
she might have been looking after the com-
missariat who in later years was his trusty friend,
his sole correspondent, his literary editor, his man
of business and withal his " pretty dear " " every
day dearer" to him, "Mary my Mary"
superior surely to the rest of her sex, with whom
at one time it seems plain enough that he would
have been nothing loth to enter into an alliance,
offensive and defensive, for life, would she but
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 231
have preferred the name of Trelawny to that of
Shelley, this Mary whose voice had been silent
for seven and twenty years, and to whom he
himself had raised a monument of praise, rises
from her tomb as conventional and commonplace,
unsympathetic and jealous, narrow, orthodox, and
worldly.
Yet she had borne with his exactions and scold-
ings and humours for friendship's sake, and with full
faith in the loyalty and generosity of his heart. A
pure and delicate-minded woman, she had not been
scandalised by his lawless morals. She had had
the courage to withstand him when he was wrong,
working for him the while like a devoted slave.
Never was a more true and disinterested friend-
ship than hers for him ; and he, who knew her
better than most people did, was well aware of it.
Where then was the change ? Alas ! it was
in himself. In this revolving world, where " Time
that gave doth now his gift confound," and where
"nought may endure but mutability," the "flourish
set on youth " is soon transfixed.
Greek fevers and gunshot wounds told on the
" Pirate's" disposition as well as on his constitution.
The habits of mind he had cultivated and been
proud of, combativeness, opposition to all auth-
ority as such finally became his masters ; he
could not even acquiesce in his own experience.
Age and the ravages of Time were to blame
232 MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
for his morbid censoriousness ; Time that
" feeds on the rarities of Nature's truth."
These later recollections are but the distorted
images of a blurred mirror. But, none the less,
the tale is a sad one. We can but echo Trelawny's
own words to Mary 1 "Can such things be, and
overcome us like a summer cloud, without our
especial wonder ? "
1 Page 191.
CHAPTER XXIII
OCTOBER i83i-OcTOBER 1839
TRELAWNY'S book was only one among many
things which claimed Mrs. Shelley's attention
during these three years.
In 1830 Godwin published his Thoughts on
Man. The relative positions of father and
daughter had come to be reversed, and Mary
now negotiated with the publishers for the sale
of his work, as he had formerly done for her.
Godwin himself set a high value, even for him, on
this book, and anticipated for it a future and an
influence which were not to be realised.
GODWIN TO MARY.
15/7* April 1830.
DEAR MARY If you do me the favour to see Murray, I
know not how far you can utter the following things ; or if you
do, how far they will have any weight with his highness ; yet I
cannot but wish you should have them in your mind.
The book I offer is a collection of ten new and interesting
truths, illustrated in no unpopular style. They are the fruit of
thirty years' meditation (it being so long since I wrote the
Enqtiirer], in the full maturity of my understanding.
234 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
The book, therefore, will be very far from being merely one
book more added to the number of books already existing in
English literature. It must, as I conceive, when published
make a deep impression, and cause the thinking part of the
public to perceive There are here laid before us ten interest-
ing truths never before delivered.
Whether it is published during my life or after my death it
is a light that cannot be extinguished " the precious life-blood
of a discerning spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose
to a life beyond life."
In the following amusing letter Clare gives
Mary a few commissions. She was to interest
her literary acquaintance in Paris in the publica-
tion and success of a French poem by a friend of
Clare's at Moscow, the greatest wish of whose
heart was to appear in print. She was also to
find a means of preventing the French translatress
of Moore's Life of Byron from introducing Clare's
name into her elucidatory footnotes. This was
indeed all-important to Clare, as any revival of
scandal about her might have robbed her of the
means of subsistence, but it was also an extremely
difficult and delicate task for Mary. But no one
ever hesitated to make her of use. Her friends
estimated her power by her goodwill, and her
goodwill by their own need of her services ; and
they were generally right, for the will never failed,
and the way was generally found.
CLARE TO MRS. SHELLEY.
NICE, i \th December 1830.
MY DEAR MARY Your last letter, although so melancholy,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
235
gave me much pleasure, merely, therefore, because it came
from you.
I intended to have written to all and each of you, but until
now have not been able to put my resolution into execution.
It must seem to you that I am strangely neglectful of my
friends, or perhaps you think since I am so near Trelawny
that I have been taking a lesson from him in the art of culti-
vating one's friendships ; but neither of these is the case, my
silence is quite on another principle than this.
I am not desperately in love, nor just risen from my bed at
four in the afternoon in order to write my millionth love letter,
nor am I indifferent to those whom time and the malice of
fortune have yet spared to me, but simply I have been too
busy.
Since I have been at Nice I have had to change lodgings
four times ; besides this, we were a long time without a maid,
and received and paid innumerable visits. My whole day was
spent in shifting my character. In the morning I arose a
waiting-maid, and, having attended to the toilette of Natalie,
sank into a house-maid, a laundry-maid, and, after noon, I
fear me, a cook, having to look to the cleaning of the rooms,
the getting up of linen, and the preparation of various pot-
tages fit for the patient near me. At mid-day I turned into a
governess, gave my lessons, and at four or five became a fine
lady for the rest of the day, and paid visits or received them,
for at Nice it is the custom, so soon as a stranger arrives, that
everybody comme il faut in the place comes to call upon you ;
nor can you shut your doors against them even if you were
dying, for as Nice is the resort of the sick, and as everybody
either is sick or has been sick, nursing has become the com-
mon business.
So we went on day after day. We had dejeuners dansants,
soirees dansantes (diners dansants are considered as de trap by
order of the physicians), bals pares, theatres, of eras, grands
diners, petits soupers, concerts, msites de matin, promenades a
dne, parties de campagne, reunions litteraires, grands cercles,
promenades en bateau, coteries choisies, thunder-storms from the
236
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
sea, and political storms from France ; in short, if we had only
had an earthquake, or the shock of one, we should have run
through the whole series of modifications of which human
existence is susceptible. Voila Paris, Voila Paris, as the song
says.
You may perhaps expect that the novelty of society should
have suggested to me remarks and observations as multifarious
as the forms under which I observed it. Sorry I am to say
that either from its poverty, or from my own poverty of intel-
lect, I have not gathered from it anything beyond the following
couple of conclusions, that people of the world, disguise them-
selves as they may, possess but two qualities, a great want of
understanding, and a vast pretension to sentiment. From
this duplexity arises the duplicity with which they are so
often charged, and no wonder, for with hearts so heavy, and
heads so light, how is it possible to keep anything like a
straightforward course ? In alleviation of this, I must confess
that wherever I went I carried about with me my own identity
(that unhappy identity which has cost me so dear, and of
which, with all my pains, I have never been able to lose a
particle), and contemplated the people I judge through the
medium of its rusty atoms.
I must speak to you of an affair that interests me deeply.
M. Gambs has informed me that he has sent to Paris a poem
of his in manuscript called Moise. He gave it to the Prince
Nicolas Scherbatoff at Moscow, just upon his setting out for
Paris ; this is many months ago. Whether the Prince gave
any promise to endeavour to get it published I do not know ;
but if he did, he is such a very indolent and selfish man
that his efforts would never get the thing done. M. Gambs
has written to me to ask if you have any literary friends in
Paris who would be kind enough to interest themselves about
it. The address of the Prince is as follows : Son Excellence
Le Prince Nicolas Scherbatoff, Rue St. Lazare, No. 17, a
Paris. Can you not get some one to call upon him to ask
about the manuscript, and to propose it to some bookseller?
This some one may enter into a direct correspondence with
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 237
M. Gambs by addressing him Chez M. Lenhold, Marchand de
Musique, a Moscow. I should be highly delighted if you
could settle things in this way, as I know my friend has nothing
more at heart than to appear in print, and that I should be
glad to be the means of communicating some pleasure to an
existence which I know is almost utterly without it, and of
showing my gratitude for the kindness and goodness he has
showered upon me ; nor, as far as my poor judgment goes, is
the work unworthy of inspiring interest, and of being saved
from oblivion. It pleased me much when it was read to
me ; but then it is true I was in a desert, and there a drop
of water will often seem to us more precious than the finest
jewel.
Another subject connected with Paris also presses itself
on my mind. In Moore's Life of Lord Byron only the most
distant allusion was made to Lady Caroline Lamb ; yet, in the
French translation, its performer, Madame Sophie Bellay (or
some such name) had the indelicacy to unveil the mystery in
a note, and to expose it in distinct and staring characters to
the public. This piece of impudence was harmless to Lady
Caroline, since her independence of others was assured beyond
a doubt ; but to any one whose bread depends upon the public
a printed exposure of their conduct will infallibly bring on
destitution, and reduce them to the necessity of weighing upon
their relations for support.
I know the subject is a disagreeable one, and that you do
not like disagreeable subjects. I know nothing of business or
whether there exists any means of averting this blow ; perhaps
a representation to the translator of the evils that would follow
would be sufficient ; but as I have no means of trying this, I
am reduced to suggest the subject to your attention, with the
firm hope that you will find some method of warding off the
threatened mischief.
What you tell me of the state of family resources has natu-
rally depressed my spirits. Will the future never cease unrolling
new shapes of misery? Stair above stair of wretchedness is
all we know ; the present, bad as it is, is always better than
238 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
what comes after. Of all the crowd of eager inquirers at the
Delphic shrine was there ever found one who thanked, or had
any reason to thank, the Pythia for what she disclosed to him ?
For me, I have long abandoned hope and the future, and am
now diligently pursuing and retracing the past, going the back
way as it were to eternity in order to avoid the disappoint-
ments and perplexities of an unknown course. But I must
beg pardon for my cowardice and disagreeableness, and leave
it, or else I shall be recollected with as much reluctance as
the Pythia.
I wish I could give you any idea of the beauty of Nice.
So long as I can walk about beside the sounding sea, beneath
its ambient heaven, and gaze upon the far hills enshrined in
purple light, I catch such pleasure from their loveliness that I
am happy without happiness ; but when I come home, then it
seems to me as if all the phantasmagoria of hell danced before
my eyes.
Mrs. K. has arrived and in no very amiable humour.
The only conversation I hear is, first, the numberless perfec-
tions of herself, husband, and child ; this, as it is true, would
be well enough, but still upon repetition it tires ; second, the
infinite superiority of Russia over all other countries, since it
is an established truth that liberty and civilisation are the most
dreadful of all evils. I, to avoid ill-temper, assent to all they
say ; then in company, when opposed in their doctrines, they
drag me forward, and the tacit consent I have given, as an
argument in favour of their way of thinking, and I am at once
set down by everybody either as a fawning creature or an utter
fool. However, I am glad she has come, as the responsibility
of Natalie's health was too much. For heaven's sake excuse
me to dear Jane that I have not written. My first moment
shall be given to do so.
I think of England and my friends all day long. Entreat
everybody to write to me. Do pray do so yourself. My love
to my Mother and Papa, and William and everybody. How
happy was I that Percy was well. In haste, ever yours,
C. CLAIRMONT.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFJ SHELLEY 239
Mrs. Shelley's mind was much occupied during
1831 by the serious question of sending her son
to a public school. She wished to give him the
best possible education, and she wished, too, to
give it him in such a form as would place him at
no disadvantage among other young men when
he took his place in English society.
Shelley (she mentions in one of her letters)
had expressed himself in favour of a public school,
but Shelley's family had also to be consulted, and
she seems to have had reason to hope they would
help in the matter.
They quite concurred in her views for Percy,
only putting a veto on Eton, where legends of his
father's school-days might still be lingering about.
Nothing was better than that she should send
him to a public school if she could. These last
words were implied, not expressed. But a public
school education in England is not to be given
on a very limited income. Funds had to be
found ; and Mrs. Shelley made, through the
lawyer, a direct request to Sir Timothy for
assistance.
She received the following answer
MR. WHITTON TO MRS. SHELLEY.
STONE HALL, 6th November 1831
DEAR MADAM I have been, from the time I received
your last favour to the present, in correspondence with Sir
Timothy Shelley as to your wishes of an advance upon the
240
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
^300 per annum he now makes to you, and I recommended
him to consult his friend and solicitor, Mr. Steadman, of
Horsham, thereon, and which he did.
You have not perhaps well put together and estimated on
the great amount of the charges upon the estate by the late
Mr. Shelley, and on the legacies given by his will ; but look-
ing at all these, and the very limited interest of the estate
now vested in you, Sir Timothy has paused in his consideration
thereof, and in the result has brought his mind, that, having
regard to the other provisions he is bound to make for his
other children, he ought not to increase the allowance to you,
and upon that ground he declines so doing; and therefore
feels the necessity of your making such arrangements as you
may find necessary to make the ^300 per annum answer the
purposes for yourself and for your son, and he has this morn-
ing stated to me his fixed determination to abide thereby ;
and I lose not a moment, after I receive this communication
from him, to make it known to you, and I trust and hope you
will find it practicable to give him a good education out of
the ^300 a year. I remain, Madam, your very obedient
servant, WM. WHITTON.
The seeming brutality of the concluding sen-
tence must in fairness be ascribed to the writer
and not to those he represented.
To Mrs. Shelley, knowing the impossibility of
carrying out the public school plan on her own in-
come, the wishes and hopes must have sounded a
mockery. It had to be done, however, if it was
the best thing for the boy. The money must be
earned, and she worked on.
One day she received from her father a new
kind of petition, which, showing the effect on him
of advancing years, must have struck a pang to
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLS Y 24 1
her heart. She was accustomed to his requests
for money, but now he wrote to her for an idea.
GODWIN TO MRS. SHELLEY.
13/7* April 1832.
MY DEAR MARY You desire me to write to you, if I have
anything particular to say.
I write, then, to say that I am still in the same dismaying
predicament in .which I have been for weeks past at a loss
for materials to make up my third volume. This is by no
means what I expected.
I knew, and I know, that incidents of hair-breadth escapes
and adventures are innumerable, and that without having
fixed on any one of them, I took for granted they would come
when I called for them. Such is the mischievous effect, the
anxious expectation, that is produced by past success.
I believe that when I came to push with all my force
against the barriers that seemed to shut me in they would
give way, and place all the treasures of invention before me.
Meanwhile, it unfortunately happens that I cannot lay my
present disappointment to the charge of advancing age.
I find all my faculties and all my strength in full bloom
about me. My disappointment has put that to a sharp trial.
I thought that the severe stretch of my faculties would cause
them to yield, and subside into feebleness and torpor. No
such thing. Day after day, week after week, I apply to this
one question, without remission and with discernment. But
I cannot please myself. If I make the round of all my
thoughts, and come home empty-handed, it would seem that
in the flower and vigour of my youth I should have done the
same.
Meanwhile, my situation is deplorable. I am not free to
choose the thing I would do. I have written two volumes
and a quarter, and have received five-sixths of the price of
my work.
I am afraid you will think I am useless, by teasing you with
VOL. ii 39
242 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
"conceptions only proper to myself." But it is not altogether
so. A bystander may see a point of game which a player
overlooks. Though I cannot furnish myself with satisfactory
incidents I have disciplined my mind into a tone that would
enable me to improve them, if offered to me.
My mind is like a train of gunpowder, and a single spark,
now happily communicated, might set the whole in motion
and activity.
Do not tease yourself about my calamity ; but give it one
serious thought. Who knows what such a thought may
produce ? Your affectionate Father, WILLIAM GODWIN.
In the spring of 1832 the cholera appeared in
London. Clare, at a distance, was torn to pieces
between real apprehension for the safety of her
friends, and distracting fears lest the disease
should select among them for its victim some one
on whose life depended the realisation of Shelley's
will. For Percy especially she was solicitous.
Mary must take him away at once, to the seaside
anywhere : if money was an obstacle she, Clare,
was ready to help to defray the cost out of her
salary.
Mrs. Shelley did leave London, although, it
may safely be asserted, at no one's expense but
her own. She stayed for a month at Southend,
and afterwards for a longer time at Sandgate.
Besides contributing tales and occasionally
verses to the Keepsake, she was employed now
and during the next two or three years in prepar-
ing and writing the Italian and Spanish Lives of
Literary Men for Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
2 43
These included, among the Italians Petrarch,
Boccaccio, Bojardo, Macchiavelli, Metastasio,
Goldoni, Alfieri, Ugo Foscolo, etc. ; among the
Spanish and Portuguese Cervantes, Lope de
Vega, Calderon, Camoens, and a host of others,
besides notices of the Troubadours, the " Ro-
mances Moriscos," and the early poets of Por-
tugal.
Clare, too, tried her hand at a story, to which
she begged Mary to be a kind of godmother.
I have written a tale, which I think will do for the
Keepsake, I shall send it home for your perusal. Will you
correct it ? Do write and let me know where I may send it,
so as to be sure to find you. Will you be angry with me if I
beg you to write the last scene of it ? I am now so unwell I
can't.
My only time for writing is after i o at night ; the rest
of the tale was composed at that hour, after having been
scolding and talking and giving lessons from 7 in the morning.
It was very near its end when I got so ill, I gave it up.
If you cannot do anything with it you can at least make curl-
papers of it, and that is always something. Do not mention
it to anybody ; should it be printed one can speak of it, and
if you judge it not worthy, then it is no use mortifying my
vanity.
The truth, is I should never think of writing, knowing well
my incapacity for it, but I want to gain money. What would
one not do for that, since it is the only key of freedom ? One
is even impudent enough to ask a great authoress to finish
one's tale for one. I think, in your hands, it might get into
the Keepsake, for it is about a Pole, and that is the topic of
the day.
If it should get any money, half will naturally belong to
244
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
you. Should you have the kindness to arrange it, Julia would
perhaps also be so kind as to copy it out for me, that the
alterations in your hand may not be seen. I wish it to be
signed " Mont Obscur." . . .
Mary did what was asked of her. Trelawny,
now in England again, had influence in some
literary quarters, and, at her request, willingly con-
sented to exert it on Clare's behalf.
Meanwhile he requested her to receive his
eldest daughter on a visit of considerable length.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
17 th July 1832.
MY DEAR MARY I am awaiting an occasion of sending
to Italy, my friend, Lady D., undertaking the charge
of her.
It may be a month before she leaves England. At the
end of this month Mrs. B. leaves London, and you will do
me a great service if you will permit my daughter to reside
with you till I can make the necessary arrangements for going
abroad; she has been reared in a rough school, like her
father. I wish her to live and do as you do, and that you
will not put yourself to the slightest inconvenience on her
account.
As we are poor, the rich are our inheritance, and we are
justified on all and every occasion to rob and use them.
But we must be honest and just amongst ourselves, there-
fore must to the last fraction pay her own expenses, and
neither put you to expense nor inconvenience. For the rest,
I should like to learn to lean upon herself alone to see
the practical part of life : to learn housekeeping on trifling
means, and to benefit by her intercourse with a woman like
you ; but I am ill at compliments.
If you will permit - to come to you, I will send or
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 245
bring her to you about the 25th of this month. I should like
you and - to know each other before she leaves England,
and thus I have selected you to take charge of her in prefer-
ence to any other person ; but say if it chimes in with your
wishes.
Adieu, dear Mary. Your attached friend,
EDWARD TRELAWNY.
By the bye, tell me where the Sandgate coach starts from,
its time of leaving London, and its time of arrival at Sandgate,
and where you are, and if they will give you another bedroom
in the house you are lodging in ; and if you have any inten-
tion of leaving Sandgate soon.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
2ith July 1832.
MY DEAR MARY You told me in your letter that it would
be more convenient for you to receive on the last of the
month, so I made my arrangements accordingly. I now find
it will suit me better to come to you on Wednesday, so that
you may expect on the evening of that day by the coach
you mention. I shall of course put up at the inn.
As to your style of lodging or living, is not such a
fool as to let that have any weight with her ; if you were in
a cobbler's stall she would be satisfied ; and as to the dulness
of the place, why, that must mainly depend on ourselves.
Brompton is not so very gay, and the reason of my remov-
ing to Italy is that Mrs. B. was about sending her to
reside with strangers at Lincoln ; besides is acting
entirely by her own free choice, and she gladly preferred
Sandgate to Lincoln. At all events, come we shall ; and if
you, by barricading or otherwise, oppose our entrance, why
I shall do to you, not as I would have others do unto me,
but as I do unto others, make an onslaught on your dwell-
ing, carry your tenement by assault, and give the place up to
plunder.
246
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
So on Wednesday evening (at 5, by your account) you
must be prepared to quietly yield up possession or take the
consequences. So as you shall deport yourself, you will find
me your friend or foe, TRELAWNY.
Mary's guest stayed with her over a month.
During this time she was saddened by the sudden
death of her friendly acquaintance, Lord Dillon.
She was anxious, too, about her father, whose
equable spirits had failed him this year. No
assistance seemed to avail much to ease his cir-
cumstances ; he was not far from his eightieth
year, and still his hopes were anchored in a yet-
to-be-written novel.
" I feel myself able and willing to do everything, and to do
it well," so he wrote, " and nobody disposed to give me the
requisite encouragement. If I can agree with these tyrants "
(his publishers) "for ^300, ^400, or ^500 for a novel, and
to be subsisted by them while I write it, I probably shall not
starve for a twelvemonth to come . . . but this dancing
attendance wears my spirits and destroys my tranquillity.
' Hands have I, but I handle not ; I have feet, but I walk
not ; neither is there any breath in my nostrils.'
" Meanwhile my life wears away, and ' there is no work,
nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave whither I
go.' But, indeed, I am wrong in talking of that, for I write
now, not for marble to be placed over my remains, but for
bread to put into my mouth."
Mary tried in the summer to tempt him down
to Sandgate for a change. But the weather was
very cold, and he declined.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
247
28/7; August 1832.
DEAR MARY
See, Winter comes, to rule the varied year,
Sullen and sad, with all his rising train
Vapours, and clouds, and storms.
I am shivering over a little fire at the bottom of my grate,
and have small inclination to tempt the sea-breezes and the
waves; we must therefore defer our meeting till it comes
within the walls of London.
Au revoir ! To what am I reserved ? I know not.
The wide (no not) the unbounded prospect lies before me,
But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
A new shadow was now to fall upon the poor
old man, in the death from cholera of his only
son, Mary's half-brother, William. This son in
his early youth had given some trouble and caused
some anxiety, but his character, as he grew up,
had become steadier and more settled. He was
happily married, and seemed likely to be a source
of real comfort and satisfaction to his parents in
their old age. By profession he was a reporter,
but he had his hereditary share of literary ability
and of talent " turned for the relation of fictitious
adventures," and left in MS. a novel called
Transfusion, published by his father after his
death, with the motto-
Some noble spirits, judging by themselves,
May yet conjecture what I might have been.
Although inevitably somewhat hardened against
misfortune of the heart by his self-centred habits
248
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
of mind and anxiety about money, Godwin was
much saddened by this loss, and to Mrs. Godwin
it was a very great and bitter grief indeed.
Clare saw at once in this the beginning of fresh
troubles ; the realisation of all the gloomy fore-
bodings in which she had indulged. . She wrote
to Jane Hogg
That nasty year, 1832, could not go over without imitating
in some respects 1822, and bringing death and misfortune to
us. From the time it came in till it went out I trembled,
expecting at every moment to hear the most gloomy tidings.
William's death came, and fulfilled my anticipations ; mis-
fortune as it was, it was not such a heavy one to me as the
loss of others might have been. I, however, was fond of him,
because I did not view his faults in that desponding light
which his other relations did. I have seen more of the world,
and, comparing him with other young men, his frugality, his
industry, his attachment to his wife, and his talents, raised him,
in my opinion, considerably above the common par.
But in our family, if you cannot write an epic poem or
novel that by its originality knocks all other novels on the
head, you are a despicable creature, not worth acknowledging.
What would they have done or said had their children been
fond of dress, fond of cards, drunken, profligate, as most
people's children are ?
To Mary she wrote in a somewhat different
tone, assuming that she, Clare, was the victim on
whom all misfortune really fell, and wondering at
Mary's incredible temerity in allowing her boy,
that all-important heir-apparent, to face the perils
of a public school.
And then, losing sight for a moment of her own
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 249
feverish anxiety, she gives a vivid sketch of Mrs.
Mason's family.
Miss CLAIRMONT TO MRS. SHELLEY.
PISA, 26//z October 1832.
MY DEAR MARY Though your last letter was on so
melancholy a subject, yet I am so destitute of all happiness
that to receive it was one to me.
I have not yet got over the shock of William's death ; from
the moment I heard of it until now I have been in a complete
state of annihilation. How long it will last I am sure I can-
not tell ; I hope not much longer, or perhaps I shall go mad.
A horrible and most inevitable future is the image that
torments me, just as it did ten years ago, in this very city.
But I won't torment you, who have a thousand enjoyments
that veil it from you, and need not feel the blow till it comes.
Our fates were always different ; mine is to feel the shadow of
coming misfortunes, and to sicken beneath it. There seems
to have been great imprudence on William's part : my Mother
says he went to Bartholomew Fair the day before he was taken
ill ; then he did not have medical assistance so soon as ill,
which they say is of the highest importance in the cholera, so
altogether I suppose his life was thrown away a most lucky
circumstance for himself, but God knows what it will be for
the Godwins.
His death changed my plans. I had settled to go to
Vienna, but as the cholera is still there, I no longer considered
myself free to offer another of my Mother's children to be its
victim. Mrs. Mason represented the imprudence of it, con-
sidering my weak health, the depressed state of my spirits for
the last twelve years, the fatigue of the long journey, and the
chilliness of the season of the year, which are all things that
predispose excessively to the disease, and I yielded out of
regard to my Mother. I thought she would prefer anything
to my dying, or else at Vienna, Charles tells me, I could earn
more than I am likely to earn here. For the same reason
250
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Paris was abandoned. I beg you will tell her this, and hope
she will think I have done well.
In the meantime I stay with Mrs. Mason, and have got an
engagement as day governess with an English family, which
will supply me with money for my own expenses, but nothing
more. In the spring they wish to take me entirely, but the
pay is not brilliant. When I know more about them I will
tell you. Nothing can equal Mrs. Mason's kindness to me.
Hers is the only house, except my Mother's, in which all my
life I have always felt at home. With her, I am as her child ;
from the merest trifle to the greatest object, she treats me as
if her happiness depended on mine. Then she understands
me so completely. I have no need to disguise my sentiments ;
to barricade myself up in silence, as I do almost with every-
body, for fear they should see what passes in my mind, and
hate me for it, because it does not resemble what passes in
theirs. This ought to be a great happiness to me, and would,
did not her unhappiness and her precarious state of health
darken it with the torture of fear. It is too bitter, after a long
life passed in unbroken misery, to find a good only that you
may lose it.
Laurette's marriage is to take place at the end of November.
Mrs. Mason having tried every means to hinder it, and
seeing that she cannot, is now impatient it should be over.
Their present state is too painful. She cannot disguise her
dislike of Galloni ; he having nearly killed her with his scenes,
and Laurette cannot sympathise with her ; being on the point
of marrying him, and feeling grateful for his excessive attach-
ment, she wishes to think as well of him as she can. It is
the first time the mother and daughter have ever divided
in opinion, and galls both in a way that seems unreasonable
to those who live in the world, and are accustomed to meet
rebuffs in their dearest feelings at every moment. But our
friends live in solitude, and have nursed themselves into a
height of romance about everything. They both think their
destinies annihilated, because the union of their minds has
suffered this interruption. However, no violence mingles with
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 251
this sentiment and excites displeasure ; on the contrary, I wish
it did, for it would be easier to heal than the tragic immutable
sorrow with which they take it.
While these two dissolve in quiet grief, Nerina, the Italian,
agitates herself on the question ; she forgets all her own love
affairs, and all the sabre slashes and dagger stabs of her own
poor heart, to fall into fainting fits and convulsions every time
she sees Laurette and her mother fix their eyes mournfully
upon each other ; then she talks and writes upon the subject
incessantly, even till 3 o'clock in the morning. She has a
band of young friends of both sexes, and with them, either by
word of mouth or by letter, she sfogares herself of her hatred
of Galloni,'of the unparalleled cruelty of Laurette's fate, and
of the terrific grave that is yawning for her mother ; her mind
is discursive, and she introduces into her lamentations observa-
tions upon the faulty manner in which she and her sister have
been educated, strictures upon the nature of love, objurgations
against the whole race of man, and eloquent appeals to the
female sex to prefer patriotism to matrimony.
All the life that is left in the house is now concentrated in
Nerina, and I am sure she cannot complain of a dearth of
sensations, for she takes good care to feel with everything
around her, for if the chair does but knock the table, she
shudders and quakes for both, and runs into her own study to
write it down in her journal. Into this small study she always
hurries me, and pours out her soul, and I am well pleased to
listen, for she is full of genius ; when the tide has flowed so
long, it has spent itself, we generally pause, and then begin to
laugh at the ridiculous figures human beings cut in struggling
all their might and main against a destiny which forces millions
and millions of enormous planets on their way, and against
which all struggling is useless.
Sf/i Ncrvember.
My letter has been lying by all this time, I not having
time to write. I am afraid this winter I shall scarcely be
able to keep up a correspondence at all. I must be out at
252
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
9 in the morning, and am not home before 10 at night.
I inhabit at Mrs. Mason's a room without a fire, so that
when I get home there is no sitting in it without perishing
with cold. I cannot sit with the Masons, because they have
a set of young men every night to see them, and I do not
wish to make their acquaintance. I walk straight into my
own room on my return. Writing either letters or articles
will be a matter of great difficulty. The season is very cold
here. My health always diminishes in proportion to the
cold.
I am very glad to hear that Percy likes Harrow, but I
shudder from head to foot when I think of your boldness in
sending him there. I think in certain things you are the
most daring woman I ever knew. There are few mothers who,
having suffered the misfortunes you have, and having such
advantages depending upon the life of an only son, would
venture to expose that life to the dangers of a public school.
As for me, it is not for nothing that my fate has been taken
out of my own hands and put into those of people who have
wantonly torn it into miserable shreds and remnants ; having
once endured to have my whole happiness sacrificed to the
gratification of some of their foolish whims, why I can endure
it again, and so my mind is made up and my resolution taken.
I confess, I could wish there were another world in which
people were to answer for what they do in this ! I wish this,
because without it I am afraid it will become a law that those
who inflict must always go on inflicting, and those who have
once suffered must always go on suffering.
I hope nothing will happen to Percy; but the year, the
school itself that you have chosen, and the ashes l that lie near
it, and the hauntings of my own mind, all seem to announce
the approach of that consummation which I dread.
I am very glad you are delighted with Trelawny. My
affections are entirely without jealousy; the more those I
love love others, and are loved by them, the better pleased
1 Allegra was buried at Harrow.
MAR Y WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 253
am I. I am in a vile humour for writing a letter ; you would
not wonder at it if you knew how I am plagued. I can say
from experience that the wonderful variety there is of miseries
in this world is truly astonishing ; if some Linnaeus would
class them as he did flowers, the number of their kinds would
far surpass the boasted infinitude of the vegetable creation.
Not a day nor hour passes but introduces me to some new
pain, and each one contains within itself swarms of smaller
ones animalculse pains which float up and down in it, and
compose its existence and their own. What Mademoiselle de
L'Espinasse was for love, I am for pain, all my letters are on
the same subject, and yet I hope I do not repeat myself, for
truly, with such diversity of experience, I ought not.
Our friends here send their best love to you, and are
interested in your perilous destiny. I have just received a
letter from my Mother, and in obedience to her representations
draw my breath as peacefully as I can till the month of
January. Will you explain to me one phrase of her letter?
Talking of the chances of their getting money, she says :
" Then Miss Northcote is not expected to live over the
winter," and not a word beside. Who in the world is Miss
Northcote ? and what influence can her death have in bettering
their prospects ?
Notwithstanding my writing such a beastly letter as this to
you, pray do write. I work myself into the most dreadful
state of irritation when I am long without letters from some
of you. Tell Jane I entreat her to write, and tell my Mother
that the bill of lading of the parcel for me is come, but Mrs.
Mason sent it off to Leghorn without my seeing it, and was
too ill herself to look at the date, so I know not when it was
shipped, but as Mr. Routh has the bill, I suppose I shall hear
when it has arrived and performed quarantine.
Thank Trelawny for me for his kindness about the article.
Pisa is very dull yet. I am told there are seven or eight
English families arrived, but I have not seen them.
Farewell, my dear Mary. Be well and happy, and excuse
my dulness. Yours ever affectionately, C. CLAIRMONT.
254
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
One term's experience was enough to convince
Mrs. Shelley that she could only afford to con-
tinue her son's school education by leaving London
herself and settling with him at Harrow for some
years.
In January 1833 she wrote an account of her
affairs to her old friend, Mrs. Gisborne
Never was poor body so worried as I have been ever
since I last wrote, I think ; worries which plague and press on
one, and keep one fretting. Money, of course, is the Alpha
and Omega of my tale. Harrow proves so fearfully expensive
that I have been sadly put to it to pay Percy's bill for one
quarter (;6o, soltanto), and, to achieve it, am hampered for
the whole year. My only resource is to live at Harrow, for
in every other respect I like the school, and would not take
him from it. He will become a home boarder, and school ex-
penses will be very light. I shall take a house, being promised
many facilities for furnishing it by a kind friend.
To go and live at pretty Harrow, with my boy, who im-
proves each day and is everything I could wish, is no bad
prospect, but I have much to go through, and am so poor
that I can hardly turn myself. It is hard on my poor dear
Father, and I sometimes think it hard on myself to leave a
knot of acquaintances I like ; but that is a fiction, for half the
times I am asked out I cannot go because of the expense, and
I am suffering now for the times when I do go, and so incur
debt.
No, Maria mine, God never intended me to do other than
struggle through life, supported by such blessings as make
existence more than tolerable, and yet surrounded by such
difficulties as make fortitude a necessary virtue, and destroy
all idea of great and good luck. I might have been much
worse off, and I repeat this to myself ten thousand times a
day to console myself for not being better.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 255
My Father's novel is printed, and, I suppose, will come out
soon. Poor dear fellow ! It is hard work for him.
I am in all the tremor of fearing what I shall get for my
novel, which is nearly finished. His and my comfort depend
on it. I do not know whether you will like it. I cannot
guess whether it will succeed. There is no writhing interest ;
nothing wonderful nor tragic will it be dull? Chi lo sa?
We shall see. I shall, of course, be very glad if it succeeds.
Percy went back to Harrow to-day. He likes his school
much. Have I any other news for you ? Trelawny is gone
to America ; he is about to cross to Charlestown directly
there is a prospect of war war in America. I am truly sorry.
Brothers should not fight for the different and various portions
of their inheritance. What is the use of republican principles
and liberty if peace is not the offspring ? War is the com-
panion and friend of monarchy ; if it be the same of freedom,
the gain is not much to mankind between a sovereign and
president.
Not long after taking up her residence at
Harrow, which she did in April 1833, Mrs. Shelley
was attacked by influenza, then prevailing in a
virulent form. She did not wholly recover from
its. effects till after the Midsummer holidays, which
she spent at Putney for change of air. She found
the solitude of her new abode very trying. Her
boy had, of course, his school pursuits and in-
terests to occupy him, and, though her literary
work served while it lasted to ward off depression,
the constant mental strain was attended with an
inevitable degree of reaction for which a little
genial and sympathetic human intercourse would
have been the best indeed, the only cure.
2 5 6
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
As for her father, now she had gone he missed
her sadly.
GODWIN TO MRS. SHELLEY.
July 1833.
DEAR MARY I shall certainly not come to you on
Monday. It would do neither of us good. I am a good
deal of a spoiled child. And were I not so, and could rouse
myself, like Diogenes, to be independent of all outward com-
forts, you would treat me as if I could not, so that it would
come to the same thing.
What a while it is since I saw you ! The last time was
the loth of May, towards two months, we who used to see
each other two or three times a week ! But for the scale of
miles at the bottom of the map, you might as well be at
Timbuctoo or in the deserts of Arabia.
Oh, this vile Harrow ! Your illness, for its commence-
ment or duration, is owing to that place. At one time I was
seriously alarmed for you.
And now that I hope you are better, with what tenaciousness
does it cling to you ! If I ever see you again I wonder whether
I shall know you. I am much tormented by my place, by my
book, and hardly suppose I shall ever be tranquil again.
I am disposed to adopt the song of Simeon, and to say,
" Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace ! " At
seventy years of age, what is there worth living for ? I have
enjoyed existence, been active, strenuous, proud, but my eyes
are dim, and my energies forsake me. Your affectionate
Father, WILLIAM GODWIN.
The next letter is addressed to Trelawny, now
in America,
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
HARROW, ith May 1834.
DEAR TRELAWNY I confess I have been sadly remiss in
not writing to you. I have written once, however, as you
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 257
have written once (but once) to me. I wrote in answer to
your letter. I am sorry you did not get it, as it contained a
great deal of gossip. It was misdirected by a mistake of
Jane's. ... It was sent at the end of last September to New
York. I told you in it of the infidelity of several of your
womankind, how Mrs. R. S. was flirting with Bulwer, to the
infinite jealousy of Mrs. Bulwer, and making themselves the
talk of the town. . . . Such and much tittle-tattle was in that
letter, all old news now. . . . The S.'s (Captain Robert and
wife, I mean) went to Paris and were ruined, and are returned
under a cloud to rusticate in the country in England.
Bulwer is making the amiable to his own wife, who is worth
in beauty all the Mrs. R. S.'s in the world. . . .
Jane has been a good deal indisposed, and has grown very
thin. Jeff had an appointment which took him away for
several months, and she pined and grew ill on his absence ; she
is now reviving under the beneficent influence of his presence.
I called on your mother a week or two ago ; she always
asks after you with empressement, and is very civil indeed
to me. She was looking well, but tells me, in her note
enclosing your letter, that she is ill of the same illness as she
had two years ago, but not so bad. I think she lives too well.
- is expecting to be confined in a very few weeks, or
even days. She is very happy with B. . . . He is a thoroughly
good-natured and estimable man ; it is a pity he is not younger
and handsomer ; however, she is a good girl, and contented
with her lot ; we are very good friends. ... I should like
much to see your friend, Lady Dorothea, but, though in
Europe, I am very far from her. I live on my hill, descending
to town now and then. I should go oftener if I were richer.
Percy continues quite well, and enjoys my living at Harrow,
which is more than I do, I am sorry to say, but there is
no help.
My Father is in good health. Mrs. Godwin has been very
ill lately, but is now better.
I thought Fanny Kemble was to marry and settle in
VOL. ii 40
258 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
America : what a singular likeness you have discovered ! I
never saw her, except on the stage.
So much for news. They say it is a long lane that has no
turning. I have travelled the same road for nearly twelve
years ; adversity, poverty, and loneliness being my companions.
I suppose it will change at last, but I have nothing to tell of
myself except that Percy is well, which is the beginning and
end of my existence.
I am glad you are beginning to respect women's feelings.
. . . You have heard of Sir H.'s death. Mrs. B. (who
is great friends with S., now Sir William, an M.P.) says
that it is believed that he has left all he could to the Catholic
members of his family. Why not come over and marry
Letitia, who in consequence will be rich ? and, I daresay, still
beautiful in your eyes, though thirty-four.
We have had a mild, fine winter, and the weather now is
as warm, sunny, and cheering as an Italian May. We have
thousands of birds and flowers innumerable, and the trees of
spring in the fields.
Jane's children are well. The time will come, I suppose,
when we may meet again more (richly) provided by fortune,
but youth will have flown, and that in a woman is some-*
thing. . . .
I have always felt certain that I should never again change
my name, and that is a comfort, it is a pretty and a dear one.
Adieu, write to me often, and I will behave better, and as
soon as I have accumulated a little news, write again. Ever
yours, M. W. S.
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. GISBORNE.
i ith July 1834.
I am satisfied with my plan as regards him (Percy). I like
the school, and the affection thus cultivated for me will, I
trust, be the blessing of my life.
Still there are many drawbacks ; this is a dull, inhospitable
place. I came counting on the kindness of a friend who lived
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 259
here, but she died of the influenza, and I live in a silence and
loneliness not possible anywhere except in England, where
people are so islanded individually in habits ; I often languish
for sympathy, and pine for social festivity.
Percy is much, but I think of you and Henry, and shrink
from binding up my life in a child who may hereafter divide
his fate from mine. But I have no resource; everything
earthly fails me but him ; except on his account I live but to
suffer. Those I loved are false or dead ; those I love, absent
and suffering; and I, absent and poor, can be of no use
to them. Of course, in this picture, I subtract the enjoy-
ment of good health and usually good spirits, these are
blessings; but when driven to think, I feel so desolate, so
unprotected, so oppressed and injured, that my heart is ready
to break with despair. I came here, as I said, 'in April
1833, and gth June was attacked by the influenza, so as to be
confined to my bed ; nor did I recover the effects for several
months.
In September, during Percy's holidays, I went to Putney,
and recovered youth and health ; Julia Robinson was with
me, and we spent days in Richmond Park and on Putney
Heath, often walking twelve or fourteen miles, which I did
without any sense of fatigue. I sorely regretted returning
here. I am too poor to furnish. I have lodgings in the
town, disagreeable ones, yet often, in spite of care and
sorrow, I feel wholly compensated by my boy. . . . God help
me if anything was to happen to him I should not survive
it a week. Besides his society I have also a good deal of
occupation.
I have finished a novel, which, if you meet with, read, as I
think there are parts which will please you. I am engaged
writing the lives of some of the Italian literati for Dr. Lardner's
Cyclopedia . I have written those of Petrarch, Boccaccio, etc.,
and am now engaged on Macchiavelli ; this takes up my time,
and is a source of interest and pleasure.
My Father, I suppose you know, has a tiny, shabby place
under Government. The retrenchments of Parliament en-
260 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
danger and render us anxious. He is quite well, but old age
takes from his enjoyments. Mrs. Godwin, after influenza, has
been suffering from the tic-doloreux in her arm most dread-
fully; they are trying all sorts of poisons on her with little
effect. Their discomfort and low spirits will force me to spend
Percy's holidays in town, to be near them. Jane and Jeff are
well ; he was sent last autumn and winter by Lord Brougham
as one of the Corporation Commissioners ; he was away for
months, and Jane took the opportunity to fall desperately in
love with him she pined and grew ill, and wasted away for
him. The children are quite well. Dina spent a week here
lately ; she is a sweet girl. Edward improves daily under the
excellent care taken of his education. I leave Jane to inform
you of their progress in Greek. Dina plays wonderfully well,
and has shown great taste for drawing, but this last is not
cultivated.
I did not go to the Abbey, nor the Opera, nor hear Grisi ;
I am shut out from all things like you by poverty and
loneliness. Percy's pleasures are not mine ; I have no other
companion.
What effect Paganini would have had on you, I cannot
tell ; he threw me into hysterics. I delight in him more than
I can express. His wild, ethereal figure, rapt look, and the
sounds he draws from his violin are all superhuman of
human expression. It is interesting to see the astonishment
and admiration of Spagnoletti and Nervi as they watch his
evolutions.
Bulwer is a man of extraordinary and delightful talent.
He went to Italy and Sicily last winter, and, I hear, disliked
the inhabitants. Yet, notwithstanding, I am sure he will
spread inexpressible and graceful interest over the Last Days
of Pompeii, the subject of his new novel. Trelawny is in
America, and not likely to return. Hunt lives at Chelsea,
and thrives, I hear, by his London pursuit. I have not seen
him for more than a year, for reasons I will not here detail
they concern his family, not him.
Clare is in a situation in Pisa, near Mrs. Mason. Laurette
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
261
and Nerina are married; the elder badly, to one who won
her at the dagger's point a sad unintelligible story ; Nerina,
to the best and most delightful Pistoiese, by name Bartolomeo
Cini both to Italians. Laurette lives at Genoa, Nerina at
Livorno ; the latter is only newly a bride, and happier than
words can express. My Italian maid, Maria, says to Clare,
Non vedrb ora mat la mia Padrona ed il mio Bimbo 1 her
Bimbo as tall as I am and large in proportion has good
health withal. . . .
Pray write one word of information concerning your health
before I attribute your silence to forgetfulness ; but you must
not trifle now with the anxiety you have awakened. I will
write again soon. With kindest regards to your poor, good
husband, the fondest hopes that your health is improved, and
anxious expectation of a letter, believe me, ever affectionately
yours, M. W. SHELLEY.
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. GISBORNE.
HARROW, 30^ October 1834.
MY DEAREST MARIA Thank you many times for your
kind dear letter. God grant that your constitution may yet bear
up a long time, and that you may continue impressed with
the idea of your happiness. To be loved is indeed necessary.
Sympathy and companionship are the only sweets to make the
nauseous draught of life go down ; and I, who feel this, live
in a solitude such as, since the days of hermits in the desert,
no one was ever before condemned to ! I see no one, speak
to no one except perhaps for a chance half-hour in the course
of a fortnight. I never walk beyond my garden, because I
cannot walk alone. You will say I ought to force myself; so
I thought once, and tried, but it would not do. The sense of
desolation was too oppressive. I only find relief from the
sadness of my position by living a dreamy existence from
which realities are excluded ; but going out disturbed this ; I
wept ; my heart beat with a sense of injury and wrong ; I was
better shut up. Poverty prevents me from visiting town ; I
262
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
am too far for visitors to reach me ; I must bear to the end.
Twelve years have I spent, the currents of life benumbed by
poverty ; life and hope are over for me, but I think of Percy !
Yet for the present something more is needed something
not so unnatural as my present life. Not that I often feel
ennui I am too much employed but it hurts me, it destroys
the spring of my mind, and makes me at once over-sensitive
with my fellow-creatures, and yet their victim and their dupe.
It takes all strength from my character, and makes me who
by nature am too much so timid. I used to have one
resource, a belief in my good fortune ; this is exchanged after
twelve years one adversity, blotted and sprinkled with many
adversities ; a dark ground, with sad figures painted on it to
a belief in my ill fortune.
Percy is spared to me, because I am to live. He is a
blessing; my heart acknowledges that perhaps he is as great
an one as any human being possesses ; and indeed, my dear
friend, while I suffer, I do not repine while he remains. He
is not all you say ; he has no ambition, and his talents are
not so transcendent as you appear to imagine; but he is a
fine, spirited, clever boy, and I think promises good things ;
if hereafter I have reason to be proud of him, these melan-
choly days and weeks at Harrow will brighten in my imagina-
tion and they are not melancholy. I am seldom so, but
they are not right, and it will be a good thing if they terminate
happily soon.
At the same time, I cannot in the least regret having come
here : it was the only way I had of educating Percy at a public
school, of which institution, at least here at Harrow, the more
I see the more I like ; besides that, it was Shelley's wish that
his son should be brought up at one. It is, indeed, peculiarly
suited to Percy ; and whatever he may be, he will be twice as
much as if he had been brought up in the narrow confinement
of a private school.
The boys here have liberty to the verge of licence ; yet of
the latter, save the breaking of a few windows now and then,
there is none. His life is not quite what it would be if he
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 263
did not live with me, but the greater scope given to the
cultivation of the affections. is surely an advantage.
* * * * * # *
You heard of the dreadful fire at the Houses of Parliament.
We saw it here from the commencement, raging like a volcano ;
it was dreadful to see, but, fortunately, I was not aware of the
site. Papa lives close to the Speaker's, so you may imagine
my alarm when the news reached me, fortunately without
foundation, as the fire did not gain that part of the Speaker's
house near them, so they were not even inconvenienced. The
poor dear Speaker has lost dreadfully ; what was not burnt is
broken, soaked, and drenched all their pretty things; and
imagine the furniture and princely chambers the house was
a palace. For the sake of convenience to the Commons, they
are to take up their abode in the ruins. With kindest wishes
for you and S. G., ever dearest friend, your affectionate
MARY W. SHELLEY.
THE SAME TO THE SAME.
February 1835.
... I must tell you that I have had the offer of ^600
for an edition of Shelley's works, with Life and Notes. I am
afraid it cannot be arranged, yet at least, and the Life is out
of the question ; but in talking over it the question of letters
comes up. You know how I shrink from all private detail
for the public ; but Shelley's letters are beautifully written,
and everything private might be omitted.
Would you allow the publisher to treat with you for their
being added to my edition ? If I could arrange all as I wish,
they might be an acquisition to the books, and being trans-
acted through me, you could not see any inconvenience in
receiving the price they would be worth to the bookseller.
This is all in aria as yet, but I should like to know what you
think about it. I write all this, yet am very anxious to hear
from you ; never mind postage, but do write.
Percy is reading the Antigone ; he has begun mathematics.
264 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Mrs. Cleveland l and Jane dined with me the other day. Mrs.
Cleveland thought Percy wonderfully improved.
The volume of Lardner's Cyclopadia, with my Lives, was
published on the first of this month; it is called Lives of
Eminent Literary Men, vol. i. The lives of Dante and
Ariosto are by Mr. Montgomery, the rest are mine.
Do write, my dearest Maria, and believe me ever and ever,
affectionately yours, M. W. SHELLEY.
Lodore, Mrs. Shelley's fifth novel, came out in
1835. It differs from the others in being a novel
of society, and has been stigmatised, rather un-
justly, as weak and colourless, although at the
time of its publication it had a great success. It
is written in a style which is now out of date, and
undoubtedly fails to fulfil the promise of power
held out by Frankenstein and to some extent by
Valperga, but it bears on every page the impress
of the refinement and sensibility of the author,
and has, moreover, a special interest of its own,
due to the fact that some of the incidents are
taken from actual occurrences in her early life,
and some of the characters sketched from people
she had known.
Thus, in the description of Clorinda, it is
impossible not to recognise Emilia Viviani. The
whole episode of Edward Villier's arrest and
imprisonment for debt, and his young wife's
anxieties, is an echo of her own experience at the
time when Shelley was hiding from the bailiffs and
1 Jane's mother.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 265
meeting her by stealth in St. Paul's or Holborn.
Lodore himself has some affinity to Byron, and
possibly the account of his separation from his wife
and of their daughter's girlhood is a fanciful train
of thought suggested by Byron's domestic history.
Most of Mary's novels present the contrast of the
Shelleyan and Byronic types. In this instance
the latter was recognised by Clare, and drew from
her one of those bitter tirades against Byron,
which, natural enough in her at the outset, became
in the course of years quite morbidly venomous.
Not content with laying Allegra's death to his
charge, she, in her later letters, accuses him of
treacherously plotting and conspiring, out of hatred
to herself, to do away with the child, an allegation
unjust and false. In the present instance, how-
ever, she only entered an excited protest against
his continual reappearance as the hero of a novel.
Mrs. Hare admired Lodore amazingly ; so do I, or should
I, if it were not for that modification of the -beastly character
of Lord Byron of which you have composed Lodore. I stick
to Frankenstein, merely because that vile spirit does not haunt
its pages as it does in all your other novels, now as Castruccio.
now as Raymond, 1 now as Lodore. Good God ! to think a
person of your genius, whose moral tact ought to be pro-
portionately exalted, should think it a task befitting its powers
to gild and embellish and pass off as beautiful what was the
merest compound of vanity, folly, and every miserable weak-
ness that ever met together in one human being ! As I do
not want to be severe on the poor man, because he is dead
1 In The Last Man.
266
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
and cannot defend himself, I have only taken the lighter
defects of his character, or else I might say that never was a
nature more profoundly corrupted than his became, or was
more radically vulgar than his was from the very outset.
Never was there an individual less adapted, except perhaps
Alcibiades, for being held up as anything but an object of
commiseration, or as an example of how contemptible is even
intellectual greatness when not joined with moral greatness.
I shall be anxious to see if the hero of your new novel will be
another beautified Byron. Thank heaven ! you have not
taken to drawing your women upon the same model. Cor-
nelia I like the least of them ; she is the most like him,
because she is so heartlessly proud and selfish, but all the
others are angels of light.
Euthanasia 1 is Shelley in female attire, and what a glorious
being she is ! No author, much less the ones French,
English, or German of our day, can bring a woman that
matches her. Shakespeare has not a specimen so perfect ot
what a woman ought to be ; his, for amiability, deep feeling,
wit, are as high as possible, but they want her commanding
wisdom, her profound benevolence.
I am glad to hear you are writing again ; I am always in a
fright lest you should take it into your head to do what the
warriors do after they have acquired great fame, retire and
rest upon your laurels. That would be very comfortable for
you, but very vexing to me, who am always wanting to see
women distinguishing themselves in literature, and who believe
there has not been or ever will be one so calculated as your-
self to raise our sex upon that point. If you would but know
your own value and exert your powers you could give the
men a most immense drubbing ! You could write upon meta-
physics, politics, jurisprudence, astronomy, mathematics all
those highest subjects which they taunt us with being incap-
able of treating, and surpass them ; and what a consolation it
would be, when they begin some of their prosy, lying, but
1 The heroine of Valperga.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
267
plausible attacks upon female inferiority, to stop their mouths
in a moment with your name, and then to add, "and if
women, whilst suffering the heaviest slavery, could out-do you,
what would they not achieve were they free?
With this manifesto on the subject of women's
genius in general and of Mary's in particular
perhaps just redeemed by its tinge of irony from
the last degree of absurdity it is curious to
contrast Mrs. Shelley's own conclusions, drawn
from weary personal experience, and expressed,
towards the end of the following letter, in a
mood which permitted her no illusions and few
hopes.
MRS. SHELLEY TO MRS. GISBORNE.
HARROW, \\th June 1835.
MY DEAREST FRIEND It is so inexpressibly warm that
were not a frank lying before me ready for you, I do not think I
should have courage to write. Do npt be surprised, therefore,
at stupidity and want of connection. I cannot collect my
ideas, and this is a goodwill offering rather than a letter.
Still I am anxious to thank S. G. for the pleasure I
have received from his tale of Italy a tale all Italy, breathing
of the land I love. The descriptions are beautiful, and he
has shed a charm round the concentrated and undemonstrative
person of his gentle heroine. I suppose she is the reality of
the story ; did you know her ?
It is difficult, however, to judge how to procure for it the
publication it deserves. I have no personal acquaintance with
the editors of any of the annuals I had with that of the
Keepsake, but that is now in Mrs. Norton's hands, and she has
not asked me to write, so I know nothing about it ; but there
arises a stronger objection from the length of the story. As
268
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
the merit lies in the beauty of the details, I do not see how it
could be cut down to one quarter of its present length, which
is as long as any tale printed in an annual. When I write for
them, I am worried to death to make my things shorter and
shorter, till I fancy people think ideas can be conveyed by
intuition, and that it is a superstition to consider words neces-
sary for their expression.
( I was so very delighted to get your last letter, to be sure the
" Wisest of Men " said no news was good news, but I am not
apt to think so, and was uneasy. I hope this weather does
not oppress you. What an odd climate ! A week ago I had
a fire, and now it is warmer than Italy ; warmer at least in a
box pervious to the sun than in the stone palaces where one
can breathe freely. My Father is well. He had a cough in
the winter, but after we had persuaded him to see a doctor
it was easily got rid of. He -writes to me himself, " I am
now well, now nervous, now old, now young." One sign of
age is, that his horror is so great of change of place that I
cannot persuade him ever to visit me here. One would think
that the sight of the fields would refresh him, but he likes his
own nest better than all, though he greatly feels the annoyance
of so seldom seeing me.
Indeed, my kind Maria, you made me smile when you
asked me to be civil to the brother of your kind doctor. I
thought I had explained my situation to you. You must con-
sider me as one buried alive. I hardly ever go to town ; less
often I see any one here. My kind and dear young friends,
the Misses Robinson, are at Brussels. I am cut off from my
kind. What I suffer ! What I have suffered ! I, to whom
sympathy, companionship, the interchange of thought is more
necessary than the air I breathe, I will not say. Tears are in
my eyes when I think of days, weeks, months, even years
spent alone eternally alone. It does me great harm, but no
more of so odious a subject. Let me speak rather of my
Percy ; to see him bright and good is an unspeakable blessing ;
but no child can be a companion. He is very fond of me,
and would be wretched if he saw me unhappy ; but he is with
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
269
his boys all day long, and I am alone, so I can weep unseen.
He gets on very well, and is a fine boy, very stout ; this hot
weather, though he exposes himself to the sun, instead of
making him languid, heightens the colour in his cheeks and
brightens his eyes. He is always gay and in good humour,
which is a great blessing.
You talk about my poetry and about the encouragement I
am to find from Jane and my Father. When they read all the
fine things you said they thought it right to attack me about
it, but I answered them simply, " She exaggerates ; you read
the best thing I ever wrote in the Keepsake and thought
nothing of it." I do not know whether you remember the
verses I mean. I will copy it in another part ; it was written
for music. Poor dear Lord Dillon spoke of it as you do of
the rest ; but " one swallow does not make a summer." I can
never write verses except under the influence of strong senti-
ment, and seldom even then. As to a tragedy, Shelley used
to urge me, which produced his own. When I returned first
to England and saw Kean, I was in a fit of enthusiasm, and
wished much to write for the stage, but my Father very earnestly
dissuaded me. I think that he was in the wrong. I think
myself that I could have written a good tragedy, but not now.
My good friend, every feeling I have is blighted, I have no
ambition, no care for fame. Loneliness has made a wreck of
me. I was always a dependent thing, wanting fosterage and
support. I am left to myself, crushed by fortune, and I am
nothing.
You speak of woman's intellect. We can scarcely do
more than judge by ourselves. I know that, however clever
I may be, there is in me a vacillation, a weakness, a want
of eagle -winged resolution that appertains to my intellect
as well as to my moral character, and renders me what I am,
one of broken purposes, failing thoughts, and a heart all
wounds. My mother had more energy of character, still
she had not sufficient fire of imagination. In short, my
belief is, whether there be sex in souls or not, that the sex of
our material mechanism makes us quite different creatures,
270
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
better, though weaker, but wanting in the higher grades of
intellect.
I am almost sorry to send you this letter, it is so querulous
and sad ; yet, if I write with any effusion, the truth will creep
out, and my life since you left has been so stained by sorrow
and disappointments. I have been so barbarously handled
both by fortune and my fellow-creatures, that I am no longer
the same as when you knew me. I have no hope. In a few
years, when I get over my present feelings and live wholly in
Percy, I shall be happier. I have devoted myself to him as
no mother ever did, and idolise him ; and the reward will
come when I can forget a thousand memories and griefs that
are as yet alive and burning, and I have nothing to do but
brood.
Percy is gone two miles off to bathe ; he can swim, and I
am obliged to leave the rest to fate. It is no use coddling,
yet it costs me many pangs ; but he is singularly trustworthy
and careful. Do write, and believe me ever your truly attached
friend, M. W. S.
A DIRGE
This morn thy gallant bark, love,
Sailed on a stormy sea ;
'Tis noon, and tempests dark, love,
Have wrecked it on the lee.
Ah woe ! ah woe ! ah woe !
By spirits of the deep
He's cradled on the billow
To his unwaking sleep.
Thou liest upon the shore, love,
Beside the knelling surge,
But sea-nymphs ever more, love,
Shall sadly chant thy dirge.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 271
Oh come ! oh come ! oh come !
Ye spirits of the deep ;
While near his seaweed pillow
My lonely watch I keep.
in
From far across the sea, love,
I hear a wild lament,
By Echo's voice for thee, love,
From ocean's caverns sent.
Oh list ! oh list ! oh list !
Ye spirits of the deep,
Loud sounds their wail of sorrow,
While I for ever weep.
P.S. Do you not guess why neither these nor those I sent
you could please those you mention? Papa loves not the
memory of Shelley, because he feels that he injured him ;
and Jane do you not understand enough of her to be con-
vinced of the thoughts that make it distasteful to her that I
should feel, and above all be thought by others to feel, and to
have a right to feel? Oh ! the human heart ! It is a strange puzzle.
The weary, baffled tone of this letter was partly
due to a low state of health, which resulted in a
severe attack of illness. During her boy's Mid-
summer holidays she went to Dover in search of
strength, and, while there, received a letter from
Trelawny, who had returned from America, as
vivacious and irrepressible as ever.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
BEDFORD HOTEL, BRIGHTON,
\2th September 1835.
MARY, DEAR Six days I rest, and do all that I have to
do on the seventh, because it is forbidden. If they would
272 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
make it felony to obey the Commandments (without benefit of
clergy), don't you think the pleasures of breaking the law would
make me keep them ?
*******
I cannot surmise one of the " thousand reasons " which
you say are to prevent my seeing you. On the contrary, your
being " chained to your rock " enables me to play the vulture
at discretion. It is well for you, therefore, that I am " the
most prudent of men." What a host of virtues I am gifted
with ! When I am dead, lady mine, build a temple over me
and make pilgrimages. Talking of tombs, let it be agreed
between you and me that whichever first has five hundred
pounds at his disposal shall dedicate it to the placing a fitting
monument over the ashes of Shelley.
We will go to Rome together. The time, too, cannot be
far distant, considering all things. Remember me to Percy.
I shall direct this to Jane's, not that I think you are there.
Adieu, Mary ! Your E. TRELAWNY.
During the latter part of Mary's residence in
London she had seen a great deal of Mrs. Norton,
who was much attracted by her and very fond of
her society, finding in her a most sympathetic
friend and confidant at the time of those domestic
troubles, culminating in the separation from her
children, which afterwards obtained a melancholy
publicity. Mrs. Shelley never became wholly inti-
mate with her brilliant contemporary. Reserve, and
a certain pride of poverty, forbade it, but she greatly
admired her, and they constantly corresponded.
1835-
... "I do not wonder," Mary wrote to Trelawny, "at
your not being able to deny yourself the pleasure of Mrs.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
273
Norton's society. I never saw a woman I thought so fascinat-
ing. Had I been a man I should certainly have fallen in love
with her ; as a woman, ten years ago, I should have been spell-
bound, and, had she taken the trouble, she might have wound
me round her finger. Ten years ago I was so ready to give
myself away, and being afraid of men, I was apt to get tousy-
mousy for women ; experience and suffering have altered all
that. I am more wrapt up in myself, my own feelings,
disasters, and prospects for Percy. I am now proof, as
Hamlet says, both against man and woman.
" There is something in the pretty way in which. Mrs. Norton's
witticisms glide, as it were, from her lips, that is very charm-
ing ; and then her colour, which is so variable, the eloquent
blood which ebbs and flows, mounting, as she speaks, to her
neck and temples, and then receding as fast ; it reminds me
of the frequent quotation of 'eloquent blood,' and gives a
peculiar attraction to her conversation not to speak of fine
eyes and open brow.
" Now do not in your usual silly way show her what I say.
She is, despite all her talents and sweetness, a London lady.
She would quiz me not, perhaps, to you well do I know
the London ton but to every one else in her prettiest
manner."
The day after this she was writing again to
Mrs. Gisborne.
October 1835.
Of myself, my dearest Maria, I can give but a bad account.
Solitude, many cares, and many deep sorrows brought on this
summer an illness, from which I am only now recovering. I
can never forget, nor cease to be grateful to Jane for her
excessive kindness to me, when I needed it most, confined, as
I was, to my sofa, unable to move. I went to Dover during
Percy's holidays, and change of air and bathing made me so
much better that I thought myself well, but on my return here
I had a relapse, from which now this last week I am, I trust,
VOL. ii 41
274 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
fast recovering. Bark and port wine seem the chief means
of my getting well. But in the midst of all this I had
to write to meet my expenses. I have published a second
volume of Italian Lives in Lardner's Encyclopedia. All in
that volume, except Galileo and Tasso, are mine. The last
is chief, I allow, and I grieve that it had been engaged
to Mr. M. before I began to write. I am now about to
write a volume of Spanish and Portuguese Lives. This is
an arduous task, from my own ignorance, and the diffi-
culty of getting books and information. The booksellers
want me to write another novel, Lodore having succeeded
so well, but I have not as yet strength for such an under-
taking.
Then there is no Spanish circulating library. I cannot,
while here, read in the Museum if I would, and I would not
if I could. I do not like finding myself a stray bird alone
among men, even if I knew them. 1 One hears how happy
people will be to lend me- their books, but when it comes to
the point it is very difficult to get at them. However, as I am
rather persevering, I hope to conquer these obstacles after all.
Percy grows ; he is taller than I am, and very stout. If he
does not turn out an honour to his parents, it will be through
no deficiency in virtue or in talents, but from a dislike of
mingling with his fellow -creatures, except the two or three
friends he cannot do without. He may be the happier for it ;
he has a good understanding, and great integrity of character.
Adieu, my dear friend. Ever affectionately yours,
MARY W. SHELLEY.
In April 1836 poor old Godwin died, and with
him passed away a large part of Mary's life. Of
those in whose existence her own was summed
up only her son now remained, and even he was
1 Things have changed at the British Museum, not a little, since these
words were written.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 275
not more dependent on her than her father had
been. Godwin had been to his daughter one of
those lifelong cares which, when they disappear,
leave a blank that nothing seems to fill, too often
because the survivor has borne the burden so
long as to exhaust the power and energy indis-
pensable to recovery. But she had also been
attached to him all her life with an "excessive
and romantic attachment," only overcome in one
instance by a stronger devotion still a defection
she never could and never did repent of, but for
which her whole subsequent life had been passed
in attempting to make up. If she confided any
of her feelings to her diary, no fragment has
survived.
She busied herself in trying to obtain from
Government some assistance an annuity if
possible for Mrs. Godwin. It was very seldom
in her life that Mary asked anybody for anything,
and the present exception was made in favour of
one whom she did not love, and who had never
been a good friend to her. But had Mrs. Godwin
been her own mother instead of a disagreeable,
jealous, old stepmother, she could not have made
greater exertions in her behalf. Mrs. Norton was
ready and willing to help by bringing influence to
bear in powerful quarters, and gave Mary some
shrewd advice as to the wording of her letter to
Lord Melbourne. She wrote
276 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
. . . Press not on the politics of Mr. Godwin (for God
knows how much gratitude for that ever survives), but on his
celebrity, the widow's age and /// health, and (if your proud
little spirit will bear it) on your own toils ; for, after all, the
truth is that you, being generous, will, rather than see the old
creature starve, work your brains and your pen ; and you have
your son and delicate health to hinder you from having means
to help her.
As to petitioning, no one dislikes begging more than I do,
especially when one begs for what seems mere justice ; but I
have long observed that though people will resist claims (how-
ever just), they like to do favours. Therefore, when / beg, I
am a crawling lizard, a humble toad, a brown snake in cold
weather, or any other simile most feebly rampante the
reverse of rampant, which would be the natural attitude
for petitioning, but which must never be assumed except in
the poodle style, standing with one's paws bent to catch the
bits of bread on one's nose.
Forgive my jesting ; upon my honour I feel sincerely
anxious for your anxiety, and sad enough on my own affairs,
but Irish blood will dance. My meaning is, that if one asks
at all, one should rather think of the person written to than
one's own feelings. He is an indolent man talk of your
literary labours ; a kind man speak of her age and infir-
mities ; a patron of all genius talk of your father's and your
own ; a prudent man speak of the likelihood of the pension
being a short grant (as you have done) ; lastly, he is a great
man take it all as a personal favour. As to not apologising
for the intrusion, we ought always to kneel down and beg
pardon for daring to remind people we are not so well off as
they are.
What was asked was that Godwin's small
salary, or a part of it, should be continued to
Mrs. Godwin for her life. As the nominal office
Godwin had held was abolished at his death, this
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 277
could not be ; but Lord Melbourne pledged him-
self to do what he could to obtain assistance for
the widow in some form or other, so it is probable
that Mary effected her purpose.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
HASTINGS, 25/7* September 1836.
MARY, DEAR Your letter was exceedingly welcome ; it was
honoured accordingly. You divine truly ; I am leading a
vegetable sort of a life. They say the place is pretty, the air
is good, the sea is fine. I would willingly exchange a pretty
place for a pretty girl. The air is keen and shrewish, and as
to the sea, I am satisfied with a bath of less dimensions.
Notwithstanding the want of sun, and the abundance of cold
winds, I lave my sides daily in the brine, and thus I am
gradually cooling down to the temperature of the things
round about me so that the thinnest skinned feminine may
handle me without fear of consequences. Possibly you may
think that I am like the torpid snake that the forester warmed
by his hearth. No, I am not. I am steeling myself with
Plato and Platonics ; so now farewell to love and womankind.
" Othello's occupation's gone."
*******
From an allusion in one of Mrs. Norton's
letters to Mary, it appears likely that what follows
refers to Fanny Kemble (Mrs. Butler).
You say, " Had I seen those eyes you saw the other day."
Yes, the darts shot from those eyes are still rankling in my
body ; yet it is a pleasing pain. The wound of the scorpion
is healed by applying the scorpion to the wound. Is she not
a glorious being ? Have you ever seen such a presence ? Is
she not dazzling? There is enchantment in all her ways.
Talk of the divine power of music, why, she is all melody, and
278
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
poetry, and beauty, and harmony. How envious and malig-
nant must the English be not to do her homage universal.
They never had, or will have again, such a woman as that. I
would rather be her slave than king of such an island of
Calibans. You have a soul, and sense, and a deep feeling for
your sex, and revere such "cunning patterns of excelling
nature," therefore besides, I owe it you I will transcribe
what she says of you : " I was nervous, it was my first visit
to any one, and there is a gentle frankness in her manner, and
a vague remembrance of the thought and feeling in her books
which prevents my being as with a ' visiting acquaintance.' "
*******
Zella is doing wondrous well, and chance has placed her
with a womankind that even I (setting beauty aside) am satis-
fied with. By the bye, I wish most earnestly you could get
me some good morality in the shape of Italian and French.
It is indispensable to the keeping alive her remembrance of
those languages, and not a book is to be had here, nor do
I know exactly how to get them by any other means, so pray
think of it.
*******
I am inundated with letters from America, and am answer-
ing them by Mrs. Jameson ; she sailing immediately is a very
heavy loss to me. She is the friendliest-hearted woman in the
world. I would rather lose anything than her. . . .
I don't think I shall stay here much longer; it is a bad
holding ground ; my cable is chafing. I shall drift somewhere
or other. It is well for Mamma Percy has so much of her
temperate blood. When us three meet, we shall be able to
ice the wine by placing it between us ; that will be nice, as the
girls say.
A glance from Mrs. Nesbitt has shaken my firm nerves a
little. There is a mystery a deep well of feeling in those
star-like eyes of hers. It is strange that actresses are the only
true and natural people ; they only act in the proper season
and place, whilst all the rest seem eternally playing a part, and
like dilettanti acting, damn'd absurdly. J. TRELAWNY.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 279
From Brighton, at New Year, Mrs. Shelley
sent Trelawny a cheery greeting.
FROM MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
BRIGHTON, $d January 1837.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY This day will please you; it is a thaw;
what snow we had ! Hundreds of people have been -employed
to remove it during the last week ; at first they cut down deep
several feet as if it had been clay, and piled it up in glittering
pyramids and masses; then they began to cart it on to the
beach ; it was a new sort of Augean stable, a never-ending
labour. Yesterday, when I was out, it was only got rid of in
a very few and very circumscribed spots. Nature is more of a
Hercules ; she puts out a little finger in the shape of gentle
thaw, and it recedes and disappears.
*******
Percy arrived yesterday, having rather whetted than satisfied
his appetite by going seven times to the play. He plays like
Apollo on the flageolet, and like Apollo is self-taught. Jane
thinks him a miracle ! it is very odd. He got a frock-coat at
Mettes, and, if you had not disappointed us with your handker-
chief, he would have been complete ; he is a good deal
grown, though not tall enough to satisfy me ; however, there
is time yet. He is quite a child still, full -of theatres and
balloons and music, yet I think there is a gentleness about
him which shows the advent of the reign of petticoats how I
dread it !
# * * * * * *
Poor Jane writes dismally. She is so weak that she has
frequent fainting fits ; she went to a physician, who ordered
her to wean the child, and now she takes three glasses of wine
a day, and every other strengthening medicament, but she is
very feeble, and has a cough and tendency to inflammation on
the chest. I implored her to come down here to change the
air, and Jeff gave leave, and would have given the money ;
but fear lest his dinner should be overdone while she was
280
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
away, and lest the children should get a finger scratched,
makes her resolve not to come ; what bad bogie is this ? If
she got stronger how much better they would be in conse-
quence ! I think her in a critical state, but she will not allow
of a remedy.
######*
Poor dear little Zella. I hope she is well and happy. . . .
Thank you for your offer about money. I have plenty at pre-
sent, and hope to do well hereafter. You are very thoughtful,
which is a great virtue. I have not heard from your mother
or Charlotte since you left ; a day or two afterwards I saw
Betsy Freeman ; she was to go to her place the next day. I
paid her for her work ; she looked so radiantly happy that you
would have thought she was going to be married rather than
to a place of hardship. I never saw any one look so happy.
I told her to let me know how she got on, and to apply to me
if she wanted assistance. ... I am glad you are amused
at your brother's. I really imagined that Fanny Butler had
been the attraction, till, sending to the Gloucester, I found
you were gone by the Southampton coach, and then I sus-
pected another magnet till I find that you are in all peace,
or rather war, at Sherfield House much better so.
I am better a great deal ; quite well, I believe I ought to
call myself, only I feel a little odd at times. I have seen
nothing of the S.'s. I have met with scarce an acquaint-
ance here, which is odd ; but then I do not look for them. I
am too lazy. I hope this letter will catch you before you leave
your present perch. Believe me always, yours truly,
M. W. SHELLEY.
Will this be a happy New Year ? Tell me ; the last I
can't say much for, but I always fear worse to come. Nobody's
mare is dead, if this frost does not kill, my own (such as it
will be) is far enough off still.
The next letter is dated only three weeks later.
What happened in that short time to account for
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 281
its complete change of tone does not appear, ex-
cept that from one allusion it may be inferred that
Mrs. Shelley was overtaken by unexpected money
difficulties at a moment when she had fancied her-
self tolerably at ease on that score. Nothing
more likely, for in the matter of helping others she
never learnt prudence or the art of self-defence. 1
Probably, however, there was a deeper cause for
her sombre mood. She was being pressed on all
sides to write the biography of her father. The
task would have been well suited to her powers ;
she looked on it, moreover, in the light of a duty
which she wished and intended to perform. Frag-
ments and sketches of hers for this book have
been published, and are among the best specimens
of her writing. But circumstances scruples-
similar to those which had hindered her from
writing Shelley's life stood between her and the
present fulfilment of the task. There were few
people to whom she could bring herself to explain
her reasons, and those few need not have required,
still less insisted on any such explanation. But
Trelawny, hot and vehement, could and would not
see why Mary did not rush into the field at once,
to immortalise the man whose system of philo-
sophy, more than any other writer's, had moulded
Shelley's. He never spared words, and he prob-
1 In a letter of Clare's, before this time, referring to the marriage of one
of the Miss Robinsons, she remarks, " I am quite glad to think that for
the future you may only have Percy and yourself to maintain."
282 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
ably taxed her with cowardice or indolence, time-
serving and " worldliness."
Shaken by her father's loss, and saddened by
that of her friends, Mr. and Mrs. Gisborne, who
had died within a short time of each other shortly
before this, exhausted by work, her feelings
warped by solitude, struggle, and disappointment,
this challenge to explain her conduct evoked the
most mournful of all her letters, as explicit as any
one could wish ; true in its bitterness, and most
bitter in its truth.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
BRIGHTON, Thursday, 2 ith January 1837.
DEAR TRELAWNY I am very glad to hear that you are
amused and happy ; fate seems to have turned her sunny
side to you, and I hope you will long enjoy yourself. I
know of but one pleasure in the world sympathy with
another, or others, rather ; leaving out of the question the
affections, the society of agreeable, gifted, congenial-minded
beings is the only pleasure worth having in the world. My
fate has debarred me from this enjoyment, but you seem in
the midst of it.
With regard to my Father's life I certainly could not
answer it to my conscience to give it up. I shall therefore do
it, but I must wait. This year I have to fight my poor Percy's
battle, to try and get him sent to College without further
dilapidation of his ruined prospects, and he has now to enter
life at College. That this should be undertaken at a moment
when a cry was raised against his mother, and that not on the
question of politics but religion, would mar all. I must see
him fairly launched before I commit myself to the fury of the
waves.
A sense of duty towards my Father, whose passion was
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 283
posthumous fame, makes me ready, as far as I am concerned,
to meet the misery that must be mine if I become an object
of scurrility and attack; for the rest, for my own private
satisfaction, all I ask is obscurity. What can I care for the
parties that divide the world, or the opinions that possess it ?
What has my life been ? What is it ? Since I lost Shelley I
have been alone, and worse. I had my Father's fate for many
a year pressing me to the earth ; I had Percy's education and
welfare to guard over, and in all this I had no one friendly
hand stretched out to support me. Shut out from even the
possibility of making such an impression as my personal
merits might occasion, without a human being to aid or
encourage, or even to advise me, I toiled on my weary
solitary way. The only persons who deigned to share those
melancholy hours, and to afford me the balm of affection,
were those dear girls 1 whom you chose so long to abuse.
Do you think that I have not felt, that I do not feel all this ?
If I have been able to stand up against the breakers which
have dashed against my stranded, wrecked bark, it has been
by a sort of passive, dogged resistance, which has broken my
heart, while it a little supported my spirit. My happiness, my
health, my fortunes, all are wrecked. Percy alone remains to
me, and to do him good is the sole aim of my life. One thing I
will add ; if I have ever found kindness, it has not been from
liberals ; to disengage myself from them was the first act of my
freedom. The consequence was that I gained peace and civil
usage, which they denied me ; more I do not ask ; of fate I only
ask a grave. I know not what my future life is, and shudder,
but it must be borne, and for Percy's sake I must battle on.
If you wish for a copy of my novel 2 you shall have one,
but I did not order it to be sent to you, because, being a
rover, all luggage burthens. I have told them to send it to
your mother, at which you will scoff, but it was the only way
I had to show my sense of her kindness. You may pick and
choose those from whom you deign to receive kindness; you
1 The Miss Robinsons. 2 Lodore.
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
are a man at a feast, champagne and comfits your diet, and
you naturally scoff at me and my dry crust in a corner. Often
have you scoffed and sneered at all the aliment of kindness or
society that fate has afforded me. I have been silent, for the
hungry cannot be dainty, but it is useless to tell a pampered
man this. Remember in all this, except in one or two in-
stances, my complaint is not against persons, but fate. Fate
has been my enemy throughout. I have no wish to increase
her animosity or her power by exposing [myself] more than I
possibly can to her venomous attacks.
You have sent me no address, so I direct this to your
Mother; give her and Charlotte my love, and tell them I
think I shall be in town at the beginning of next month; my
time in this house is up on the 3d, and I ought to be in
town with Percy to take him to Sir Tim's solicitors, and so
begin my attack. I should advise you, by the bye, not to
read my novel; you will not like it. I cannot teach; I can
only paint such as my paintings are, and you will not
approve of much of what I deem natural feeling, because it is
not founded on the new light.
I had a long letter from Mrs. N[orton]. I admire her
excessively, and I think I could love her infinitely, but I shall
not be asked nor tried, and shall take very good care not to
press myself. I know what her relations think.
If you are still so rich, and can lend me 20 till my
quarter, I shall be glad. I do not know that I absolutely
[need] it here now, but may run short at last, so, if not incon-
venient, will you send it next week ?
I shall soon be in town, I suppose ; where, I do not yet
know. I dread my return, for I shall have a thousand
worries.
Despite unfavourable weather, quiet and ease have much
restored my health, but mental annoyance will soon make me as
ill as ever. Only writing this letter makes me feel half dead.
Still, to be thus at peace is an expensive luxury, and I must
forego it for other duties, which I have been allowed to forget
for a time, but my holiday is past.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 285
Happy is Fanny Butler if she can shed tears and not be de-
stroyed by them ; this luxury is denied me. I am obliged to guard
against low spirits as my worst disease, and I do guard, and
usually I am not in low spirits. Why then do you awaken me
to thought and suffering by forcing me to explain the motives of
my conduct ? Could you not trust that I thought anxiously,
decided carefully, and from disinterested motives, not to save
myself, but my child, from evil. Pray let the stream flow
quietly by, as glittering on the surface as it may, and do not
awaken the deep waters which are full of briny bitterness. I
never wish any one to dive into the secret depths ; be content,
if I can render the surface safe sailing, that I do not annoy
you with clouds and tempests, but turn the silvery side outward,
as I ought, for God knows I would not render any living
creature so miserable as I could easily be ; and I would also
guard myself from the sense of woe which I tie hard about,
and sink low, low, out of sight and fathom line.
Adieu. Excuse all this; it is your own fault; speak of
yourself. Never speak of me, and you will never again be
annoyed- with so much stupidity. Yours truly, M. S.
The painful mood of this letter was not destined
to find present relief. From her father's death in
1836 till the year 1840 was to be perhaps the
hardest, dreariest, and most laborious time she had
ever known. No chance had she now to distract
her mind or avoid the most painful themes. Her
very occupation was to tie her down to these. She
was preparing her edition of Shelley's works, with
notes. The prohibition as to bringing his name
before the public seems to have been withdrawn
or at any rate slackened ; it had probably become
evident, even to those least disposed to see, that
the undesirable publicity, if not given by the right
286 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
person, would inevitably be given by the wrong
one. Much may also have been due to the
fact that Mr. Whitton, Sir Timothy's solicitor,
was dead, and had been replaced by another
gentleman who, unlike his predecessor, used his
influence to promote milder counsels and a
better mutual understanding than had prevailed
hitherto.
This task was accepted by Mary as the most
sacred of duties, but it is probable that if circum-
stances had permitted her to fulfil it in the years
which immediately followed Shelley's death she
would have suffered from it less than now. It
might not have been so well done, she might have
written at too great length, or have indulged in
too much expression of personal feeling ; and in the
case of omissions from his writings, the decision
might have been even harder to make. Still it
would have cost her less. Her heart, occupied by
one subject, would have found a kind of relief in
the necessity for dwelling on it. But seventeen
years had elapsed, and she was forty-two, and very
tired. Seventeen years of struggle, labour, and
loneliness ; even the mournful satisfaction of retro-
spect poisoned and distorted by Jane Williams'
duplicity. She could no longer dwell on the
thought of that affection which had consoled her
in her supreme misfortune.
Mary had had many and bitter troubles and
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 287
losses, but nothing entered into her soul so deeply
as the defection of this, friend. Alienation is worse
than bereavement. Other sorrows had left her
desolate ; this one left her different.
Hence the fact that an undertaking which would
once have been a painful pleasure was too often a
veritable martyrdom. Who does not remember
Hans Andersen's little princess, in his story of
the White Swans, who freed her eleven brothers
from the evil enchantment which held them trans-
formed, by spinning shirts of stinging -nettles ?
Such nettle-shirts had Mary now to weave and
spin, to exorcise the evil spirits which had power
of misrepresenting and defaming Shelley's mem-
ory, and to save Percy for ever from their sinister
spells.
Her health was weak, her heart was sore, her
life was lonely, and, in spite of her undaunted
efforts, she was still so badly off that she was,
as the last letter shows, reduced to accepting
Trelawny's offer of a loan of money. Nor was it
only her work that she had .on her mind ; she was
also very anxious about her son's future. He had,
at this time, an idea of entering the Diplomatic
Service, and his mother overcame her diffidence
so far as to try and procure an opening for him
no easy thing to find. Among the people she
consulted and asked was Lytton Bulwer ; his
answer was not encouraging.
288 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
SIR E. L. BULWER TO MRS. SHELLEY.
HERTFORD STREET, \ith March 1839.
MY DEAR MRS. SHELLEY Many thanks for your kind
congratulations. I am delighted to find you like Richelieu.
With regard to your son, with his high prospects, the
diplomacy may do very well ; but of all professions it is the
most difficult to rise in. The first steps are long and tedious.
An Attache at a small Court is an exile without pay, and very
little opening to talent. However, for young men of fortune
and expectations it fills up some years agreeably enough, what
with flirting, dressing, dancing, and perhaps, if one has good
luck, a harmless duel or two !
To be serious, it is better than being idle, and one certainly
learns languages, knowledge of the world, and good manners.
Perhaps I may send my son, some seventeen years hence, if
my brother is then a minister, into that career. But it will
depend on his prospects. Are you sure that you can get an
attacheship ? It requires a good deal of interest, and there
are plenty of candidates among young men of rank, and, I fear,
claims more pressing and urging than the memory of genius.
I could not procure that place for a most intimate friend of
mine a little time ago. I will take my chance some evening,
but I fear not Thursday ; in fact, I am so occupied just at
present that till after Easter I have scarcely a moment to my-
self, and at Easter I must go to Lincoln. Yours ever,
- E. L. BULWER.
Mrs. Norton interested herself in the matter.
She could not effect much, but she was sympathetic
and kind.
"You have your troubles," she wrote, "struggling for one
who, I trust, will hereafter repay you for every weary hour and
years of self-denial, and I shall be glad to hear from you now
and then how all goes on with you and him, so do not forget
me when you have a spare half hour, and if ever I have any
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY . 289'
good news to send, do not doubt my then writing by the first
post, for I think my happiest moments now are when, in the
strange mixture of helplessness and power which has made the
warp and woof of my destiny, I can accidentally serve some
one who has had more of the world's buffets than its good
fortune."
Some scraps of journal belonging to 1839 afford
a little insight into Mrs. Shelley's difficulties while
editing her husband's MSS.
Journal, February 12 (1839). ^ almost think that my
present occupation will end in a fit of illness. I am editing
Shelley's Poems, and writing notes for them. I desire to
do Shelley honour in the notes to the best of miy knowledge
and ability ; for the rest, they are or are not well written ; it
little matters to me which. Would that I had more literary
vanity, or vanity of any kind ; I were happier. As it is, I am
torn to pieces by memory. Would that all were mute in the
grave !
I much disliked the leaving out any of Queen Mab, I dislike
it still more than I can express, and I even wish I had resisted
to the last ; but when I was told that certain portions would
injure the copyright of all the volumes to the publisher, I
yielded. I had consulted Hunt, Hogg, and Peacock ; they all
said I had a right to do as I liked, and offered no one objec-
tion. Trelawny sent back the volume to Moxon in a rage at
seeing parts left out. . . .
Hogg has written me an insulting letter because I left out
the dedication to Harriet. . . .
Little does Jefferson, how little does any one, know me !
When Clarke's edition of Queen Mab came to us at the Baths
of Pisa, Shelley expressed great pleasure that these verses were
omitted. This recollection caused me to do the same. It
was to do him honour. What could it be to me ? There are
other verses I should well like to obliterate for ever, but they
will be printed ; and any to her could in no way tend to my
VOL. ii 42
290 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
discomfort, or gratify one ungenerous feeling. They shall be
restored, though I do not feel easy as to the good I do Shelley.
I may have been mistaken. Jefferson might mistake me and
be angry ; that were nothing. He has done far more, and
done his best to give another poke to the poisonous dagger
which has long rankled in my heart. I cannot forgive any
man that insults any woman. She cannot call him out, she
disdains words of retort ; she must endure, but it is never to
be forgiven ; not, " indeed, cherished as matter of enmity ' -
that I never feel, but of caution to shield oneself from the
like again.
In so arduous a task, others might ask for encouragement
and kindness from their friends, I know mine better. I am
unstable, sometimes melancholy, and have been called on some
occasions imperious ; but I never did an ungenerous act in my
life. I sympathise warmly with others, and have wasted my
heart in their love and service.
All this together is making me feel very ill, and my holiday
at Woodlay only did me good while it lasted.
March. . . . Illness did ensue. What an illness ! driving
me to the verge of insanity. Often I felt the cord would snap,
and I should no longer be able to rule my thoughts ; with
fearful struggles, miserable relapses, after long repose I became
somewhat better.
October 5, 1839. Twice in my life I have believed my-
self to be dying, and my soul being alive, though the bodily
functions were faint and perishing, I had opportunity to look
Death in the face, and I did not fear it far from it. My
feelings, especially in the first and most perilous instance, was,
I go to no new creation. I enter under no new laws. The
God that made this beautiful world (and I was then at Lerici,
surrounded by the most beautiful manifestation of the visible
creation) made that into which I go ; as there is beauty and
love here, such is there, and I feel as if my spirit would when
it left my frame be received and sustained by a beneficent and
gentle Power.
I had no fear, rather, though I had no active wish but a
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
291
passive satisfaction in death. Whether the nature of my illness
debility from loss of blood, without pain caused this tran-
quillity of soul, I cannot tell ; but so it was, and it had this
blessed effect, that I have never since anticipated death with
terror, and even if a violent death (which is the most repugnant
to human nature) menaced me, I think I could, after the first
shock, turn to the memory of that hour, and renew its emotion
of perfect resignation.
The darkest moment is that which precedes the
dawn. These unhappy years were like the series
of "clearing showers" which often concludes a
stormy day. The clouds were lifting, and though
Mary Shelley could never be other than what
sorrow and endurance had made her, the remaining
years of her life were to bring alleviations to her
lot, slanting rays of afternoon sunshine, powerless,
indeed, to warm into life the tender buds of morn-
ing, but which illumined the landscape and light-
ened her path, and shed over her a mild radiance
which she reflected back on others, affording to
them the brightness she herself could know no
more, and diffusing around her that sensation of
peace which she was to know now, perhaps, for the
first time.
CHAPTER XXIV
OCTOBER i839-FEBRUARY 1851
MRS. SHELLEY'S annotated edition of Shelley's
works was completed by the appearance, in 1840,
of the collected prose writings ; along with which
was republished the Journal of a Six Weeks Tour
(a joint composition) and her own two letters
from Geneva, reprinted in the present work.
Mary's correspondence with Carlyle on the
subject of a motto for her book was the occasion
of the following note
5 CHEYNE Row, CHELSEA,
$d December 1839.
DEAR MRS. SHELLEY There does some indistinct re-
membrance of a sentence like the one you mention hover
in my head ; but I cannot anywhere lay hand on it. Indeed,
I rather think it was to this effect : " Treat men as what they
should be, and you help to make them so." Further, is it not
rather one of Wilhelm's kind speeches than of the Uncle's or the
Fair Saint's ? James Fraser shall this day send you a copy of
the work ; you, with your own clear eyes, shall look for yourself.
I have no horse now ; the mud forced me to send it into
the country till dry weather came again. Layton House is so
much the farther off. Tant pis pour mot. Yours always
truly, T. CARLYLE.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
293
The words ultimately prefixed to the collec-
tion are the following, from Carlyle
That thou, O my Brother, impart to me truly how it
stands with thee in that inner heart of thine ; what lively
images of things past thy memory has painted there ; what
hopes, what thoughts, affections, knowledge, do now dwell
there. For this and no other object that I can see was the
gift of hearing and speech bestowed on us two.
The proceeds of this work were such as to set
her for some time at comparative ease on the
score of money ; the Godwin quicksand was no
longer there to engulf them.
Journal, June i, 1840 (Brighton). I must mark this
evening, tired as I am, for it is one among few soothing
and balmy. Long oppressed by care, disappointment, and ill
health, which all combined to depress and irritate me, I felt
almost to have lost the spring of happy reverie. On such a
night it returns the calm sea, the soft breeze, the silver bow
new bent in the western heaven Nature in her sweetest mood,
raised one's thoughts to God and imparted peace.
Indeed I have many, many blessings, and ought to be
grateful, as I am, though the poison lurks among them ; for
it is my strange fate that all my friends are sufferers ill
health or adversity bears heavily on them, and I can do
little good, and lately ill health and extreme depression have
even marred the little I could do. If I could restore health,
administer balm to the wounded heart, and banish care from
those I love, I were in myself happy, while I am loved,
and Percy continues the blessing that he is. Still, who on
such a night must not feel the weight of sorrow lessened ?
For myself, I repose in gentle and grateful reverie, and hope
for others. I am content for myself. Years have how
much ! cooled the ardent and swift spirit that at such hours
bore me freely along. Yet, though I no longer soar, I
294 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
repose. Though I no longer deem all things attainable, I
enjoy what is ; and while I feel that whatever I have lost of
youth and hope, I have acquired the enduring affection of a
noble heart, and Percy shows such excellent dispositions that
I feel that I am much the gainer in life.
Fate does indeed visit some too heavily poor R. for
instance, God restore him ! God and good angels guard
us ! surely this world, stored outwardly with shapes and
influences of beauty and good, is peopled in its intellectual
life by myriads of loving spirits that mould our thoughts to
good, influence beneficially the course of events, and minister
to the destiny of man. Whether the beloved dead make a
portion of this company I dare not guess, but that such exist
I feel far off, when we are worldly, evil, selfish ; drawing
near and imparting joy and sympathy when we rise to noble
thoughts and disinterested action. Such surely gather round
one on such an evening, and make part of that atmosphere of
love, so hushed, so soft, on which the soul reposes and is
blest.
These serene lines were written by Mrs.
Shelley within a few days of leaving England on
the first of those tours described by her in the
series of letters published as Rambles in Germany
and Italy. It had been arranged that her son
and two college friends, both of whom, like him,
were studying for their degree, should go abroad
for the Long Vacation, and that Mrs. Shelley
should form one of the reading party. Paris was
to be the general rendezvous. Mrs. Shelley, who
was staying at Brighton, intended travelling via
Dieppe, but her health was so far from strong
that she shrank from the long crossing, and
started from Dover instead. She was now
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
295
accompanied by a lady's-maid, a circumstance
which relieved her from some of the fatigue
incidental to a journey. They travelled by
diligence ; a new experience to her, as, in her
former wanderings with Shelley, they had had
their own carriage (save indeed on the first tour
of all, when they set off to walk through France
with a donkey) ; and in more recent years she
had travelled, in England, by the newly-introduced
railroads
" To which, whatever their faults may be, I feel eternally grate-
ful," she says ; adding afterwards, " a pleasant day it will be
when there is one from Calais to Paris."
So recent a time, and yet how remote it seems !
Mary had never been a good traveller, but she
found now, to her surprise and satisfaction, that
in spite of her nervous suffering she was better
able than formerly to stand the fatigue of a
journey. She had painful sensations, but
the fatigue I endured seemed to take away weariness instead
of occasioning it. I felt light of limb and in good spirits.
On the shores of France I shook the dust of accumulated
cares from off me : I forgot disappointment and banished
sorrow : weariness of body replaced beneficially weariness of
soul so much heavier, so much harder to bear.
Change, in short, did her more good than
travelling did her harm.
" I feel a good deal of the gipsy coming upon me," she
wrote a few days later, " now that I am leaving Paris. I bid
296 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
adieu to all acquaintances, and set out to wander in new lands,
surrounded by companions fresh to the world, unacquainted
with its sorrows, and who enjoy with zest every passing amuse-
ment. I myself, apt to be too serious, but easily awakened to
sympathy, forget the past and the future, and am ready to be
amused by all I see as much or even more than they."
From Paris they journeyed to Metz and
Treves, down the Moselle and the Rhine, by
Schaffhausen and Zurich, over the Splugen Pass
to Cadenabbia on the Lake of Como. Here they
established themselves for two months. Mrs.
Shelley occupied herself in the study of Ital-
ian literature, while the young men were busy
with their Cambridge work. Her son's friends
were devoted to her, and no wonder. Indeed,
her amiability and sweetness, her enjoyment of
travelling, her wide culture and great store of
knowledge, her acuteness of observation, and the
keen interest she took in all she saw, must have
made her a most fascinating companion. On
leaving Como they visited Milan, and, on their
way home, passing through Genoa, Mary looked
again on the Villa Diodati, and the little Maison
Chapuis nestling below, where she had begun to
write Frankenstein. All unaltered ; but in her,
what a change ! Shelley, Byron, the blue-eyed
William, where were they ? Where was Fanny,
whose long letters had kept them informed of
English affairs ? Mary herself, and Clare, were
they the same people as the two girls, one fair,
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 297
one dark, who had excited so much idle and
impertinent speculation in the tourists from whose
curiosity Byron had fled ?
But where are the snows of yester-year ?
In autumn Mrs. Shelley and her son returned
to England ; but the next year they again went
abroad, and this time for a longer sojourn.
They were now better off than they had ever
been, for, after Percy had attained his majority
and taken his degree, his grandfather made him
an allowance of ^400 a year ; a free gift, not
subject to the condition of repayment. This wel-
come relief from care came not a day too soon.
Mrs. Shelley's strength was much shaken, her
attacks of nervous illness were more frequent,
and, had she had to resume her life of unvaried
toil, the results might have been serious.
It is probably to this event that Mrs. Norton
refers in the following note of congratulation
MRS. NORTON TO MRS. SHELLEY.
DEAR MRS. SHELLEY I cannot tell you how sincerely
glad I was to get a note so cheerful, and cheerful on such
good grounds as your last. I hope it is the dawn, that your
day of struggling is over, and nothing to come but gradually
increasing comfort. With tolerable prudence, and abroad, I
should hope Percy would find his allowance quite sufficient,
and I think it will be a relief that may lift your mind and do
your health good to see him properly provided for.
I am too ill to leave the sofa or I should (by rights) be at
Lord Palmerston's this evening, but, when I see any one likely
298 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
to support the very modest request made to Lord P., I will
speak about it to them ; I have little doubt that, since they
are not asked for a paid attacheship, you will succeed.
... In three weeks I am to set up the magnificence of a
" one 'orse chay " myself, and then Fulham and the various
streets of London where friends and foes live will become
attainable ; at present I have never stirred over the threshold
since I came up from Brighton. Ever yours very truly,
CAR. NORTON.
They began their second tour by a residence
at Kissingen, where Mrs. Shelley had been ad-
vised to take the waters for her health. The
" Cur " over (by which she benefited a good deal),
they proceeded to Gotha, Weimar, Leipzig, Berlin,
and Dresden all perfectly new ground to Mary.
Dresden and its treasures of art were a delight
to her, only marred by the overwhelming heat
of the summer.
Through Saxon Switzerland they travelled to
Prague, and Mary was roused to enthusiasm by
the intense romantic interest of the Bohemian
capital, as she was afterwards by the magnificent
scenery of the approach to Linz (of which she
gives in her letters a vivid description), and of
Salzburg and the Salzkammergut.
Through the Tyrol, over the Brenner Pass, by
the Lake of Garda, they came to Verona, and
finally to Venice another place fraught to Mary
with associations unspeakable.
Many a scene which I have since visited and admired has
faded in my mind, as a painting in a diorama melts away, and
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 299
another struggles into the changing canvass ; but this road
was as distinct in my mind as if traversed yesterday. I will
not here dwell on the sad circumstances that clouded my first
visit to Venice. Death hovered over the scene. Gathered
into myself, with my "mind's eye" I saw those before me
long departed, and I was agitated again by emotions, by
passions and those the deepest a woman's heart can harbour
a dread to see her child even at that instant expire, which
then occupied me. It is a strange, but, to any person who has
suffered, a familiar circumstance, that those who are enduring
mental or corporeal agony are strangely alive to immediate
external objects, and their imagination even exercises its wild
power over them. ... I have experienced it ; and the par-
ticular shape of a room, the progress of shadows on a wall,
the peculiar flickering of trees, the exact succession of objects
on a journey, have been indelibly engraved in my memory, as
marked in and associated with hours and minutes when the
nerves were strung to their utmost tension by endurance of
pain, or the far severer infliction of mental anguish. Thus
the banks of the Brenta presented to me a moving scene ; not
a palace, not a tree of which I did not recognise, as marked
and recorded, at a moment when life and death hung upon
our speedy arrival at Venice.
And at Fusina, as then, I now beheld the domes and
towers of the Queen of Ocean arise from the waves with a
majesty unrivalled upon earth.
They spent the winter at Florence, and by
April were in Rome. This indeed was the Holy
Land of Mary Shelley's pilgrimage. There was
the spot where William lay ; there the tomb
which held the heart of Shelley. Mary may well
have felt as if standing by her own graveside.
Was not her heart of hearts buried with them ?
And there, too, was the empty grave where now
300 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Trelawny lies ; the touching witness to that un-
dying devotion of his to Shelley's memory which
Mary never forgot.
None of this is touched upon it could not be
in the published letters. The Eternal City
itself filled her with such emotions and interests
as not even she had ever felt before. It is
curious to compare some of these with her earlier
letters from abroad, and to notice how, while her
power of observation was undiminished, the intel-
lectual faculties of thought and comparison had de-
veloped and widened, while her interest was as keen
as in her younger days, nay keener, for her attention
now, poor thing, was comparatively undivided.
Scenery, art, historical associations, the political
and social state of the countries she visited, and
the characteristics of the people, nothing was lost
on her, and on all she saw she brought to bear
the ripened faculties of a reflective and most
appreciative mind. Some of her remarks on
Italian politics are almost prophetic in their clear-
sighted sagacity. 1 That after all she had suffered
1 Such as the following, taken from the Preface : We have lately
been accustomed to look on Italy as a discontented province of Austria,
forgetful that her supremacy dates only from the downfall of Napoleon.
From the invasion of Charles VIII till 1815 Italy has been a battlefield,
where the Spaniard, the French, and the German have fought for masteiy;
and we are blind indeed if we do not see that such will occur again, at
least among the two last. Supposing a war to arise between them, one of
the first acts of aggression on the part of France would be to try to drive
the Germans from Italy. Even if peace continue, it is felt that the papal
power is tottering to its fall, it is only supported because the French will
not allow Austria to extend her dominions, and the Austrian is eager to
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
301
she should have retained such keen powers of
enjoyment as she did may well excite wonder.
Perhaps this enjoyment culminated at Sorrento,
where she and her son positively revelled in the
luxuriant beauty and witchery of a perfect
southern summer.
Her impressions of these two tours were pub-
lished in the form of letters, and entitled Rambles
in Germany and Italy, and were dedicated to
Samuel Rogers in 1844.
He thus acknowledged the copy of the work
she sent him
ST. JAMES'S PLACE,
$othjuly 1844.
What can I say to you in return for the honour you have
done me an honour so undeserved ! If some feelings make
us eloquent, it is not so with others, and I can only thank you
from the bottom of my heart, and assure you how highly I
shall value and how carefully I shall preserve the two precious
volumes on every account for your sake and for their own.
Ever yours most sincerely, S. ROGERS.
In the spring of 1844 ^ became evident that
Sir Timothy Shelley's life was drawing to a close.
prevent any change that may afford pretence for the French to interfere.
Did the present Pope act with any degree of prudence, his power, thus
propped, might last some time longer; but as it is, who can say how soon,
for the sake of peace in the rest of Italy, it may not be necessary to curtail
his territories.
The French feel this, and begin to dream of dominion across the Alps ;
the occupation of Ancona was a feeler put out ; it gained no positive object
except to check Austria ; for the rest its best effect was to reiterate the
lesson they have often taught, that no faith should be given to their pro-
mises of liberation.
302 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
In anticipation of what was soon to happen,
Mary, always mindful of her promise to Leigh
Hunt, wrote to him as follows
PUTNEY, 2oth April 1844.
MY DEAR HUNT The tidings from Field Place seem to
say that ere long there will be a change ; if nothing untoward
happens to us till then, it will be for the better. Twenty
years ago, in memory of what Shelley's intentions were, I said
that you should be considered one of the legatees to the amount
of 2000. I need scarcely mention that when Shelley talked
of leaving you this sum he contemplated reducing other
legacies, and that one among them is (by a mistake of the
solicitor) just double what he intended it to be.
Twenty years have, of course, much changed my position.
Twenty years ago it was supposed that Sir Timothy would not
live five years. Meanwhile a large debt has accumulated, for
I must pay back all on which Percy and I have subsisted, as
well as what I borrowed for Percy's going to college. In fact,
I scarcely know how our affairs will be. Moreover, Percy
shares now my right ; that promise was made without his
concurrence, and he must concur to render it of avail. Nor
do I like to ask him to do so till our affairs are so settled
that we know what we shall have whether Shelley's uncle
may not go to law ; in short, till we see our way before us.
It is both my and Percy's great wish to feel that you are
no longer so burdened by care and necessity ; in that he is as
desirous as I can be ; but the form and the degree in which
we can do this must at first be uncertain. From the time of
Sir Timothy's death I shall give directions to my banker to
honour your quarterly cheques for 30 a quarter ; and I
shall take steps to secure this to you, and to Marianne if she
should survive you.
Percy has read this letter, and approves. I know your
real delicacy about money matters, and that you will at once
be ready to enter into my views ; and feel assured that if any
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 303
present debt should press, if we have any command of money,
we will take care to free you from it.
With love to Marianne, affectionately yours,
MARY SHELLEY.
Sir Timothy died in this year, and Mary's son
succeeded to the baronetcy and estates. The
fortune he inherited was much encumbered, as,
besides paying Shelley's numerous legacies and
the portions of several members of the family, he
had also to refund, with interest, all the money
advanced to his mother for their maintenance for
the last twenty-one years, amounting now to a
large sum, which he met by means of a mortgage
effected on the estates. But all was done at last.
Clare was freed from the necessity for toil and
servitude ; she was, indeed, well off, as she in-
herited altogether .12,000. Hers is the legacy
to which Mrs. Shelley alludes as being, by a
mistake, double what had been intended. When
Shelley made his will, he bequeathed to her
^"6000. Not long before the end of his life he
added a codicil, to the effect that these 6000
should be invested for her benefit, intending in
this way (it is supposed) to secure to her the
interest of this sum, and to protect her against
recklessness on her own part or needy rapacity
on the part of others. Through the omission in
the lawyer's draft of the word "these" this codicil
was construed into a second bequest of ^6000,
304 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
which she received. The Hunts, by Shelley's
bounty and the generosity of his wife and son,
were made comparatively easy in their circum-
stances. Byron had declined to be numbered
among Shelley's legatees ; not so Mr. Hogg,
whose letter on the occasion is too characteristic
to omit.
HOGG TO MRS. SHELLEY.
DEAR MARY I have just had an interview with Mr.
Gregson. He spoke of your affairs cheerfully, and thinks
that, with prudence and economy, you and your baronet-boy
will do well ; and such, I trust and earnestly hope, will be the
result of this long turmoil of worldly perplexity.
Mr. Gregson paid me the noble tribute of the most generous
and kind and munificent affection of our incomparable friend.
He not only paid the legacy, but very obligingly offered me
some interest ; for which offer, and for such prompt payment,
I return my best thanks to yourself and to Percy.
I was glad to hear from Mr. Gregson, for the honour of
poesy, that Lord Byron had declined to receive his legacy.
How much I wish that my scanty fortunes would justify the
like refusal on my part !
I daresay you wish that you were a good deal richer that
this had happened and not that and that a great deal, which
was quite impossible, had been done, and so on ! I should
be sorry to believe that you were quite contented ; such a
state of mind, so preposterous and unnatural, especially in any
person whose circumstances were affluent, would surely portend
some great calamity.
I hope that I may venture to look forward to the time
when the Baronet will inhabit Field Place in a style not un-
worthy of his name. My desire grows daily in the strength
to keep \jcp families > for it is only from these that Shelleys and
Byrons proceed.
THOMAS JEFFERSON HOGG,
AS HE SAT PLAYING AT CHESS AT BOSCOMBE.
FROM A SKETCH BY R. EASTON.
To face Page 305 (Vol. ii.)
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 305
If low people sometimes effect a little in some particular
line, they always show that they are poor, creeping creatures
in the main and in general.
However this may be, and whatever you or yours may take
of Shelley property, "either by heirship or conquest," as they
say in Scotland, I hope that you may not be included in the
unbroken entail of gout, which takes so largely from the
comforts, and adds so greatly to the irritability natural to
yours, dear Mary, very faithfully, T. J. HOGG.
For many and good reasons there could be little
real sympathy between Hogg and Mary Shelley.
In lieu of it she willingly accepted his genuine
enthusiasm for Shelley, and she was a better
friend to him than he was to her. The veiled
impertinence of his tone to her must have severely
tried her patience, if not her endurance. Indeed,
the mocking style of his ironical eulogies of her
talents, and her fidelity to the memory of her
husband are more offensive to those who know
what she was than any ill-humoured tirade of
Trelawny's.
The high esteem in which Mrs. Shelley was
held by the eminent literary men who were her
contemporaries is pleasantly attested in a number
of letters and notes addressed to her by T. Moore,
Samuel Rogers, Carlyle, Bulwer, Prosper Meri-
mee, and others ; letters for the most part of no
great importance except in so far as they show the
familiar and friendly terms existing between the
writers and Mrs. Shelley. One, however, from
VOL. ii 43
306 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
Walter Savage Landor, deserves insertion here
for its intrinsic interest
DEAR MRS. SHELLEY It would be very ungrateful in me to
delay for a single post an answer to your very kind letter. If
only three or four like yourself (supposing there are that
number in one generation) are gratified by my writings, I am
quite content. Hardly do I know whether in the whole
course of fifty years I have been so fortunate. For one of my
earliest resolutions in life was never to read what was written
about me, favourable or unfavourable ; and another was, to
keep as clear as possible of all literary men, well knowing their
jealousies and animosities, and so little did I seek celebrity, or
even renown, that on making a present of my Gebir and after-
wards of my later poems to the bookseller, I insisted that they
should not even be advertised. Whatever I have written since
I have placed at the disposal and discretion of some friend.
Are not you a little too enthusiastic in believing that writers
can be much improved by studying my writings ? I mean in
their style. The style is a part of the mind, just as feathers
are part of the bird. The style of Addison is admired it is
very lax and incorrect. But in his manner there is the shyness
of the Loves ; there is the graceful shyness of a beautiful girl
not quite grown up ! People feel the cool current of delight,
and never look for its source. However, he wrote the Vision
of Mirza, and no prose man in any age of the world had
written anything so delightful. Alas ! so far from being able
to teach men how to write, it will be twenty years before I
teach them how to spell. They will write simiL?, foreign,
sovera'gn, therefore, impe/, compel, reb^/, etc. I wish they
would turn back to Hooker, not for theology the thorns of
theology are good only to heat the oven for the reception of
wholesome food. But Hooker and Jonson and Milton spelt
many words better than we do. We need not wear their coats,
but we may take the gold buttons off them and put them on
smoother stuff. Believe me, dear Mrs. Shelley, very truly
yours, W. S. LANDOR.
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307
Of individuals as of nations, it may be true
that those are happiest who have no history.
The later years of Mrs. Shelley, which offer no
event of public interest, were tranquil and com-
paratively happy. She brought out no new work
after I844. 1 It had been her intention, now
that the prohibition which constituted the chief
obstacle was removed, to undertake the long-
projected Life of Shelley. It seemed the more
desirable as there was no lack of attempts at
biography. Chief among these was the series of
articles entitled " Shelley Papers," contributed by
Mr. Hogg to the New Monthly magazine during
1832. They were afterwards incorporated with
that so-called Life of Shelley which deals only
with Shelley's first youth, and which, though it
consists of one halfpennyworth of Shelley to an
intolerable deal of Hogg, is yet a classic, and one
of the ,most amusing classics in the world ; so
amusing, indeed, that, for its sake, we might
address the author somewhat as Sterne is said to
have apostrophised Mrs. Gibber, after hearing her
sing a pathetic air of Handel, " Man, for this be
all thy sins forgiven thee ! " The second chapter
of the book includes some fragments of biography
by Mary, a facsimile of one of which, in her hand-
writing, is given here.
Medwin's Life of Shelley, inaccurate and false
1 She had published her last novel, Falkner, in 1837.
308 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
in facts, distasteful in style and manner, had caused
Mrs. Shelley serious annoyance. The author,
who wrote for money chiefly, actually offered to
suppress the book for a consideration ; a proposal
which Mrs. Shelley treated with the silent con-
tempt it deserved. These were, however, strong
arguments in favour of her undertaking the book
herself. She summoned up her resolution and
began to collect her materials.
But it was not to be. Her powers and her
health were unequal to the task. The parallel
between her and the Princess of the nettle-shirts
was to be carried out to the bitter end, for the
last nettle-shirt lacked a sleeve, and the youngest
brother always retained one swan's wing instead
of an arm. The last service Mary could have
rendered to Shelley was never to be completed,
and so the exact details of certain passages of
Shelley's life must remain for ever, to some
extent, matters of speculation. No one but Mary
could have supplied the true history % and, as she
herself had said, in the introductory note to her
edition of his poems, it was not yet time to do
that. Too many were living who might have
been wounded or injured ; nay, there still are too
many to admit of a biographer's speaking with
perfect frankness. But, although she might have
furnished to some circumstances a key which is
now for ever lost, it is equally true that there was
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 309
much to be said, which hardly could, and most
certainly never would have been told by her. Of
his earliest youth and his life with Harriet she
could, herself, know nothing but by hearsay. But
the chief difficulty lay in the fact that too much
of her own history was interwoven with his.
How could she, now, or at any time, have placed
herself, as an observer, so far outside the subject
of her story as to speak of her married life with
Shelley, of its influence on the development of
his character and genius, of the effect of that
development, and of her constant association
with it on herself? Yet any life of him which
left this out of account would have been most in-
complete. More than that, no biography of such
a man as Shelley can be completely successful
which is written under great restrictions and
difficulties. To paint a life-like picture of a
nature "like his requires a genius akin to his,
aglow with the fervour of confident enthusiasm.
It was, then, as well that Mary never wrote
the book. The invaluable notes which she did
write to Shelley's poems have done for him all
that it was in her power to accomplish, and all
that is necessary. They put the reader in
possession of the knowledge it concerns him
to have ; that of the scenes or the circum-
stances which inspired or suggested the poems
themselves.
310 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
In 1847 she became acquainted with the lady
to whom her son was afterwards married, and
who was to be to Mrs. Shelley a kind of daughter
and sister in one. No one, except her son, is
living who knew Mary so well and loved her so
enthusiastically. A mutual friend had urged them
to become acquainted, assuring them both " they
ought to know each other, they would suit so
perfectly." Some people think that this course is
one which tends oftener to postpone than to
promote the desired intimacy. In the present
case it was justified by the result. Mrs. Shelley
called. Her future daughter-in-law, on entering
the room, beheld something utterly unlike what
she had imagined or expected in the famous Mrs.
Shelley, a fair, lovely, almost girlish -looking
being, "as slight as a reed," with beautiful clear
eyes, who put out her hand as she rose, saying
half timidly, "I'm Mary Shelley." From "that
moment we have her word for it the future
wife of Sir Percy had lost her heart to his mother!
Their intercourse was frequent, and soon became
necessary to both. The younger lady had had
much experience of sorrow, and this drew the
bond all the closer.
Not for some time after this meeting did Sir
Percy appear on the scene. His engagement
followed at no distant date, and after his marriage
he, with his wife and his mother, who never
MAR Y WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLE Y 311
during her life was to be parted from them, again
went abroad.
The cup of such happiness as in this world was
possible to Mary Shelley seemed now to be full,
but the time was to be short during which she
could taste it. She only lived three years longer,
years chequered by very great anxiety (on account
of illness), yet to those who now look back on
them they seem as if lived under a charm. To
live with Mary Shelley was indeed like entertain-
ing an angel. Perfect unselfishness, selflessness
indeed, characterised her at all times.
One illustration of this is afforded by her
repression of the terror she felt when she saw
Shelley's passion for the sea asserting itself in his
son. Her own nerves had been shaken and her
life darkened by a catastrophe, but not for this
would she let it overshadow the lives of others.
Not even when her son, with a friend, went off to
Norway in a little yacht, and she was dependent
for news of them on a three weeks' post, would
she ever let him know the mortal anxiety she
endured, but after his marriage she told it to her
daughter-in-law, saying, " Now he will never
wish to go to sea."
But of herself she never seemed to think at
all ; she lived in and for others. Her gifts and
attainments, far from being obtruded, were kept
out of sight ; modest almost to excess as she was,
312 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
she yet knew the secret of putting others at their
ease. She was ready with sympathy and help
and gentle counsel for all who needed them, and
to the friends of her son she was such a friend as
they will never forget.
The thought of Shelley, the idea of his pres-
ence, never seemed to leave her mind for a
moment. She would constantly refer to what he
might think, or do, or approve of, almost as if he
had been in the next room. Of his history, or
her own, she never spoke, nor did she ever refer
to other people connected with their early life,
unless there was something good to be said of
them. Of those who had behaved ill to her, no
word on the subject of their behaviour passed
her lips. Her daughter-in-law had so little idea
of what her associations were with Clare, that on
one occasion when Miss Clairmont was coming to
stay at Field Place, and Lady Shelley, who did
not like her, expressed a half-formed intention of
being absent during her visit and leaving Mrs.
Shelley to entertain her, she was completely taken
aback by the exclamation which escaped Mary's
lips, "Don't go, dear! don't leave me alone with
her ! she has been the bane of my life ever since
I was three years old ! "
No more was ever said, but this was enough,
even to those who did not know all, to reveal a
long history of endurance.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 313
Clare came, and more than once, to stay at
Field Place, but her excitability and eccentricity
had so much increased as, at times, to be little if at
all under her own control, and after one unmis-
takable proof of this, it was deemed (by those
who cared for Mrs. Shelley) desirable that she
should go and return no more.
She died at Florence in 1878.
Mary Shelley's strength was ebbing, her
nervous ailments increased, and the result was a
loss of power in one side. Life at Field Place
had had to be abandoned on grounds of health
(not her own), and Sir Percy Shelley had
purchased Boscombe Manor for their country
home, anticipating great pleasure from his mother's
enjoyment of the beautiful spot and fine climate.
But she became worse, and never could be moved
from her house in Chester Square till she was
taken to her last resting-place. She died on the
2 1 st of February 1851.
She died, "and her place among those who
knew her intimately has never been filled up.
She walked beside them, like a spirit of good,
to comfort and benefit, to lighten the darkness
of life, to cheer it with her sympathy and
love."
These, her own words about Shelley, may with
equal fitness be applied to her.
Her grave is in Bournemouth Churchyard,
3'4
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
where, some time after, her father and mother
were laid by her side.
As an author Mary Shelley did not accomplish
all that was expected -of her. Her letters from
abroad, both during her earlier and later tours, the
descriptive fragments intended for her father's
biography, and above all her notes on Shelley's
works, are indeed valuable and enduring con-
tributions to literature. But it was in imaginative
work that she had aspired to excel, and in which
both Shelley and Godwin had urged her to per-
severe, confident that she could achieve a brilliant
success. None of her novels, however, except
Frankenstein, can be said to have survived the
generation for which they were written. Only in
that work has she left an abiding mark on
literature. Yet her powers were very great, her
culture very extensive, her ambition very high.
The friend whose description of her has been
quoted in an earlier chapter tries to account for
this. She says
I think a partial solution for the circumscribed fame of
Mrs. Shelley as a writer may be traced to her own shrinking
and sensitive retiringness of nature. If, as Thackeray, perhaps
justly, observes, " Persons, to succeed largely in this world,
must assert themselves," most assuredly Mary Shelley never
tried that path to distinction. . . .
I never knew, in my life, either man or woman whose
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
315
whole character was so entirely in harmony : no jarring dis-
cords no incongruous, anomalous, antagonistic opposites met
to disturb the perfect unity, and to counteract one day the
impressions of the former. Gentleness was ever and always
her distinguishing characteristic. Many years' friendship never
showed me a deviation from it. But with this softness there
was neither irresolution nor feebleness. . . .
Many have fancied and accused her of being cold and apa-
thetic. She was no such thing. She had warm, strong affec-
tions : as daughter, wife, and mother she was exemplary and
devoted. Besides this, she was a faithful, unswerving friend.
She was not a mirthful scarcely could be called a cheer-
ful person; and at times was subject to deep and profound
fits of despondency, when she would shut herself up, and be
quite inaccessible to all. Her undeviating love of truth was
ever acted on never swerved from. Her worst enemy could
never charge her with falsification even equivocation. Truth
truth truth was the governing principle in all the words
she uttered, the thoughts and judgments she expressed. Hence
she was most intolerant to deceit and falsehood, in any shape
or guise, and those who attempted to practise it on her
aroused as much bitter indignation as her nature was capable
of. ...
It is too often the case that authors talk too much of their
writings, and all thereunto belonging. Mrs. Shelley was the
extremest reverse of this. In fact, she was almost morbidly
averse to the least allusion to herself as an authoress. To call
on her and find her table covered with all the accessories and
unmistakable traces of book-making, such as copy, proofs for
correction, etc., made her nearly as nervous and unself-
possessed as if she had been detected in the commission of
some offence against the conventionalities of society, or the
code of morality. . . .
I really think she deemed it unwomanly to print and pub-
lish ; and had it not been for the hard cash which, like so
many of her craft, she so often stood in need of, I do not
THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
think she would ever have come before the world as an
authoress. . . .
Like all raised in supremacy above their fellows, either men-
tally or physically, Mrs. Shelley had her enemies and detractors.
But none ever dared to impugn the correctness of her conduct.
From the hour of her early widowhood to the period of her
death, she might have married advantageously several times.
But she often said, " I know not what temptation could make
me change the name of Shelley."
But the true cause lay deeper still, and may
afford a clue to more puzzles than this one.
What Mary Godwin might have become had she
remained Mary Godwin for -six or eight years
longer it is impossible now to do more than guess
at. But the free growth of her own original
nature was checked and a new bent given to it
by her early union with Shelley. Two original
geniuses can rarely develop side by side, certainly
not in marriage, least of all in a happy marriage.
Two minds may, indeed, work consentaneously, but
one, however unconsciously, will take the lead ;
should the other preserve its complete independ-
ence, angles must of necessity develop, and the
first fitness of things disappear. And in a marriage
of enthusiastic devotion and mutual admiration,
the younger or the weaker mind, however candid,
will shirk or stop short of conclusions which, it
instinctively feels, may lead to collision. On the
other hand, strong and pronounced views or
peculiarities on the part of one may tend to elicit
MARY WOLLS TONECRAFT SHELLE Y 31?
their exact opposite on the part of the other ; both
results being equally remote from real independ-
ence of thought. However it may be, either in
marriage or in any intellectual partnership, it is a
general truth that from the moment one mind is
penetrated by the influence of another, its own
native power over other minds has gone, and for
ever. And Mary parted with this power at six-
teen, before she knew what it was to have it.
When she left her father's house with Shelley she
was but a child, a thing of promise, everything
about her yet to be decided. Shelley himself was
a half-formed creature, but of infinite possibilities
and extraordinary powers, and Mary's develop-
ment had not only to keep pace with his, but to
keep in time and tune with his. Sterne said of
Lady Elizabeth Hastings that " to have loved
her was a liberal education." To love Shelley
adequately and worthily was that and more it
was a vocation, a career, enough for a life-time
and an exceptional one.
Every reader of the present biography must see
too that in Mary Shelley's case physical causes
had much to do with the limit of her intellectual
achievements. Between seventeen and twenty-
five she had drawn too largely on the reserve
funds of life. Weak health and illness, a roving
unsettled life, the birth and rearing, and then the
loss, of children ; great joys and great griefs, all
318 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
crowded into a few young years, and coinciding
with study and brain-work and the constant call on
her nervous energy necessitated by companionship
with Shelley, these exhausted her ; and when he
who was the beginning and end of her existence
disappeared, " and the light of her life as if gone
out," 1 she was left, left what those eight years had
made her, to begin again from the beginning all
alone. And nobly she began, manfully she
struggled, and wonderfully, considering all things,
did she succeed. No one, however, has more
than a certain, limited, amount of vitality to
express in his or her life ; the vital force may
take one form or another, but cannot be used twice
over. The best of Mary's power spent itself in
active life, in ministering to another being, during
those eight years with Shelley. What she gained
from him, and it was much, was paid back to him
a hundredfold. When he was gone, and those
calls for outward activity were over, there lay
before her the life of literary labour and thought
for which nature and training had pre-eminently
fitted her. But she could not call back the fresh-
ness of her powers nor the wholeness of her heart.
She did not fully know, or realise, then, the
amount of life-capital she had run through. She
did realise it at a later time, and the very interest-
ing entry in her journal, dated October 21, 1838,
1 Carlyle's epitaph on his wife.
MAR Y WOLLS TONECRA FT SHELLE Y 319
is a kind of profession of faith ; a summary of her
views of life ; the result of her reflections and of
her experience
Journal, October 21. I have been so often abused by
pretended friends for my lukewarmness in " the good cause,"
that I disdain to answer them. I shall put down here a few
thoughts on this subject. I am much of a self -examiner.
Vanity is not my fault, I think ; if it is, it is uncomfortable
vanity, for I have none that teaches me to be satisfied with
myself; far otherwise and, if I use the word disdain, it is
that I think my qualities (such as they are) not appreciated from
unworthy causes. In the first place, with regard to " the good
cause " the cause of the advancement of freedom and know-
ledge, of the rights of women, etc. I am not a person of
opinions. I have said elsewhere that human beings differ
greatly in this. Some have a passion for reforming the world,
others do not cling to particular opinions. That my parents
and Shelley were of the former class makes me respect it. I
respect such when joined to real disinterestedness, tolera-
tion, and a clear understanding. My accusers, after such
as these, appear to me mere drivellers. For myself, I
earnestly desire the good and enlightenment of my fellow-
creatures, and see all, in the present course, tending to the
same, and rejoice ; but I am not for violent extremes, which
only bring on an injurious reaction. I have never written a
word in disfavour of liberalism : that I have not supported
it openly in writing arises from the following causes, as far as
I know
That I have not argumentative powers : I see things pretty
clearly, but cannot demonstrate them. Besides, I feel the
counter-arguments too strongly. I do not feel that I could say
aught to support the cause efficiently ; besides that, on some
topics (especially with regard to my own sex) I am far from
making up my mind. I believe we are sent here to educate
ourselves, and that self-denial, and disappointment, and self-
control are a part of our education ; that it is not by taking
320 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
away all restraining law that our improvement is to be achieved ;
and, though many things need great amendment, I can by no
means go so far as my friends would have me. When I feel
that I can say what will benefit my fellow-creatures, I will speak ;
not before. Then, I recoil from the vulgar abuse of the inimi-
cal press. I do more than recoil : proud and sensitive, I act on
the defensive an inglorious position. To hang back, as I do,
brings a penalty. I was nursed and fed with a love of glory.
To be something great and good was the precept given me by
my Father ; Shelley reiterated it. Alone and poor, I could
only be something by joining a party ; and there was much in
me the woman's love of looking up, and being guided, and
being willing to do anything if any one supported and brought
me forward which would have made me a good partisan. But
Shelley died and I was alone. My Father, from age and
domestic circumstances, could not me faire valoir. My total
friendlessness, my horror of pushing, and inability to put
myself forward unless led, cherished and supported all this
has sunk me in a state of loneliness no other human being
ever before, I believe, endured except Robinson Crusoe.
How many tears and spasms of anguish this solitude has cost
me, Ires buried in my memory.
If I had raved and ranted about what I did not understand,
had I adopted a set of opinions, and propagated them with en-
thusiasm ; had I been careless of attack, and eager for noto-
riety ; then the party to which I belonged had gathered round
me, and I had not been alone.
It has been the fashion with these same friends to accuse
me of worldliness. There, indeed, in my own heart and con-
science, I take a high ground. I may distrust my own judg-
ment too much be too indolent and too timid ; but in con-
duct I am above merited blame.
I like society ; I believe all persons who have any talent
(who are in good health) do. The soil that gives forth
nothing may lie ever fallow ; but that which produces how-
ever humble its product needs cultivation, change of harvest,
refreshing dews, and ripening sun. Books do much ; but the
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 321
living intercourse is the vital heat. Debarred from that, how
have I pined and died !
My early friends chose the position of enemies. When I
first discovered that a trusted friend had acted falsely by me, I
was nearly destroyed. My health was shaken. I remember
thinking, with a burst of agonising tears, that I should prefer
a bed of torture to the unutterable anguish a friend's falsehood
engendered. There is no resentment; but the world can never
be to me what it was before. Trust and confidence, and the
heart's sincere devotion are gone.
I sought at that time to make acquaintances to divert
my mind from this anguish. I got entangled in various ways
through my ready sympathy and too eager heart ; but I never
crouched to society never sought it unworthily. If I have
never written to vindicate the rights of women, I have ever
befriended women when oppressed. At every risk I have be-
friended and supported victims to the social system ; but I make
no boast, for in truth it is simple justice I perform ; and so I am
still reviled for being worldly.
God grant a happier and a better day is near ! Percy my
all-in-all will, I trust, by his excellent understanding, his clear,
bright, sincere spirit and affectionate heart, repay me for sad
long years of desolation. His career may lead me into the
thick of life or only gild a quiet home. I am content with
either, and, as I grow older, I grow more fearless for myself
I become firmer in my opinions. The experienced, the suffer-
ing, the thoughtful, may at last speak unrebuked. If it be the
will of God that I live, I may ally my name yet to " the Good
Cause," though I do not expect to please my accusers.
Thus have I put down my thoughts. I may have deceived
myself ; I may be in the wrong ; I try to examine myself ; and
such as I have written appears to me the exact truth.
Enough of this ! The great work of life goes on. Death
draws near. To be better after death than in life is one's hope
and endeavour to be so through self-schooling. If I write
the above, it is that those who love me may hereafter know
VOL. ii 44
322 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
that I am not all to blame, nor merit the heavy accusations
cast on me for not putting myself forward. I cannot do that ;
it is against my nature. As well cast me from a precipice and
rail at me for not flying.
The true success of Mary Shelley's life was
not, therefore, the intellectual triumph of which,
during her youth, she had loved to dream, and
which at one time seemed to be actually within
her grasp, but the moral success of beauty of
character. To those people a daily increasing
number in this tired world who erect the natural
grace of animal spirits to the rank of the highest
virtue, this success may appear hardly worth the
name. Yet it was a very real victory. Her
nature was not without faults or tendencies
which, if undisciplined, might have developed
into faults, but every year she lived seemed
to mellow and ripen her finer qualities, while
blemishes or weaknesses were suppressed or over-
come, and finally disappeared altogether.
As to her theological views, about which the
most contradictory opinions have been expressed,
it can but be said that nothing in Mrs. Shelley's
writings gives other people the right to formulate
for her any dogmatic opinions at all. Brought up
in a purely rationalistic creed, her education had
of course, no tinge of what is known as " personal
religion," and it must be repeated here that none
of her acts and views were founded, or should be
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY 323
judged as if they were founded on Biblical com-
mands or prohibitions. That the temper of her
mind, so to speak, was eminently religious there
can be no doubt ; that she believed in God and a
future state there are many allusions to show. 1
Perhaps no one, having lived with the so-called
atheist, Shelley, could have accepted the idea of
the limitation, or the extinction of intelligence
and goodness. Her liberality of mind, however,
was rewarded by abuse from some of her acquaint-
ance, because her toleration was extended even to
the orthodox.
Her moral opinions, had they ever been formu-
lated, which they never were, would have approxi-
mated closely to those of Mary Wollstonecraft,
limited, however, by an inability, like her father's,
not to see both sides of a question, and also by
the severest and most elevated standard of moral
purity, of personal faith and loyalty. To be judged
by such a standard she would have regarded as
a woman's highest privilege. To claim as a
"woman's right" any licence, any lowering of the
standard of duty in these matters, would have
been to her incomprehensible and impossible.
But, with all this, she discriminated. Her stand-
ard was not that of the conventional world.
At every risk, as she says, she befriended
1 "My belief is," she says in the preface to her edition of Shelley's
prose works, " that spiritual improvement in this life prepares the way to a
higher existence."
324 THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF
those whom she considered " victims to the social
system." It was a difficult course ; for, while her
acquaintance of the " advanced " type accused her
of cowardice and worldliness for not asserting
herself as a champion of universal liberty, there
were more who were ready to decry her for
her friendly relations with Countess Guiccioli,
Lady Mountcashel, and others not named here ;
to say nothing of Clare, to whom much of
her happiness had been sacrificed. She refrained
from pronouncing judgment, but reserved her
liberty of action, and in all doubtful cases gave
others the benefit of the doubt, and this without
respect of persons. She would not excommuni-
cate a humble individual for what was passed over
in a man or woman of genius ; nor condemn a
woman for what, in a man, might be excused, or
might even add to his social reputation. Least
of all would she secure her own position by shun-
ning those whose case had once been hers, and
who in their after life had been less fortunate than
she. ' Pure herself, she could be charitable, and
she could be just.
The influence of such a wife on Shelley's more
vehement, visionary temperament can hardly be
over-estimated. Their moods did not always suit
or coincide ; each, at times, made the other suffer.
It could not be otherwise with two natures so
young, so strong, and so individual. But, if for-
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
325
bearance may have been sometimes called for on
the one hand, and on the other a charity which is
kind and thinks no evil, it was only a part of that
discipline from which the married life of geniuses
is not exempt, and w r hich tests the temper and
quality of the metal it tries ; an ordeal from which
two noble natures come forth the purer and the
stronger.
The indirect, unconscious power of elevation of
character is great, and not even a Shelley but
must be the better for association with it, not even
he but must be the nobler, " yea, three times less
unworthy " through the love of such a woman as
Mary. He would not have been all he was with-
out her sustaining and refining influence ; without
the constant sense that in loving him she loved his
ideals also. We owe him, in part, to her.
Love the love of Love was Shelley's life
and creed. This, in Mary's creed, was inter-
preted as love of Shelley. By all the rest she
strove to do her duty, but, when the end came,
that survived as the one great fact of her life a
fact she might have uttered in words like his
And where is Truth ? On tombs ; for such to thee
Has been my heart ; and thy dead memory
Has lain from (girlhood), many a changeful year,
Unchangingly preserved, and buried there.
y. D. & co.
Printed by R. & R. CLARK, Edinburgh.
POSTSCRIPT
SINCE this book was printed, a series of letters from
Harriet Shelley to an Irish friend, Mrs. Nugent, con-
taining references to the separation from Shelley, has
been published in the New York Nation. These
letters, however, add nothing to what was previously
known of Harriet's history and life with Shelley. After
November 1813 the correspondence ceases. It is
resumed in August 1814, after the separation and
Shelley's departure from England. Harriet's account
of these events gathered by her at second-hand from
those who can, themselves, have had no knowledge of
the facts they professed to relate embodies all the
slanderous reports adverted to in the seventh chapter
of the present work, and all the gratuitous falsehoods
circulated by Mrs. Godwin ; falsehoods which Pro-
fessor Dowden, in the Appendix to his Life of Shelley,
has been at the trouble directly to disprove, statement
by statement ; falsehoods of which the Author cannot
but hope that an amply sufficient, if an indirect,
refutation may be found in the present Life of Mary
Shelley.
ERRATA
Vol. i. p. 55, footnote, for " Schlabrendorf," read " Schlaberndorf."
Vol. i. p. 84, line *]>for "(including his own mother, in Skinner Street),"
read " (including his own mother) in Skinner Street."
Vol. i. p. 170, line 20, for "Heeding not the misery then spoken,"
read " Heeding not the words then spoken."
Vol. ii. p. 200, line T,for "Moghiteff," read "Moghileff."
Vol. ii. p. 216, line 12, for " Zela," read " Zella."
In 1 vols. Crown 8vo, with 2 Portraits, 24s.
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