 10 Mary's despondency and birth of a son Before the fatal illness of her child, Willie, Mary had encountered an old friend in Rome, and had renewed her acquaintance with Miss Curran, whom she had formerly known at her father's. Congenial tastes in drawing and painting drew these ladies together, and Miss Curran did or began portraits of Mary, Shelley, and, what was of more importance to them at the time, of little Willie. The portraits of Mary and of Shelley unfinished, and, by an amateur or by no means satisfactory, certainly not giving in Mary's case an idea of the beauty and charm which are constantly referred to by her friends, and which seem to have endured up to the time when, much later, an attack of smallpox altered her appearance. The portrait of Mary, although not artistic, is interesting as painted from life. Her oval face is here given with the high forehead. The complexion described as delicate and white was not in the gift of Miss Curran who was not a colourist. To depict the eyes grey, tending to brown near the iris, agrees with Shelley's brown and Trelawney's grey eyes, but the beauty of expression is wanting. The mouth, thin and hard, might have caught a passing look, but certainly not what an artist would have wished to portray, while a certain stiffness of pose is not what one would expect in the high-strung, sensitive Mary Shelley. The beauty of gold-brown hair was not in the painter's power to catch. Mary was of middle height, tending towards short. Her hands were considered very beautiful, and, by some, she was supposed to be given to displaying them, although concealing them would have been difficult and unnecessary. Her arms and neck were also beautiful. Lee Hunt refers to her at the opera Decolite with white, gleaming, sloping shoulders. Her voice, the sweetest ever heard, added to her gifts of conversation, described as resembling her father's, with an added softness of manner and charm of description, with elegance and correctness, devoid of reserve or affectation. Cyrus Redding, who much admired and esteemed her, obtained her opinion about Miss Curran's portrait of her husband, for his article in the Gallignani edition of Shelley. She considered it by no means a good one, as unfinished, but with some striking points of resemblance. She consented to superintend the engraving from it for Gallignani's volume, which is regarded as far more successful. Miss Curran kindly assisted with advice. While these portraits were being executed, Mary was gaining the sympathy of the painter, a boon soon much needed, for, after the death of her third child, her courage for a while broke down entirely. In a very delicate state of health at the time, she could not rouse herself to think of anything but her losses. With no other child needing her care, she could only abandon herself to inconsolable grief. Shelley felt that he was out of her life for the first time, that her heart was in Rome in the grave with her child. They revisited the falls of Turney, but the spirit had fled from the waters. They passed through bustling leghorn and visit the gizbons, but the noise is intolerable, and Shelley, ever attentive in such matters, finds a house at a short distance in the country, the Villa Valsovana, down a quiet lane surrounded by a market garden. Olives, fig trees, peach trees, myrtles, alive at night with fireflies, must have been soothing surroundings to the wounded Mary, to whom nature was ever a kind friend. Nor were they in solitude, for they were within visiting distance of friends at leghorn. Two months after her loss, she recommends as her diary on Shelley's birthday, this time not without a wail. She rides to Mrs. Hunt, of the tears she constantly sheds, and confesses she has done little work since coming to Italy. She had read, however, several books of Livy, Antenna, Clarissa, some novels, the Bible, Lucan's Fossalia, and Dante. Shelley is reading her Paradise Lost, and he is writing the Semsee where, that fair blue-eyed boy who was the lodestar of your life, Mary tells us refers to William. Shelley wrote that the house was a melancholy one, and only cheered by letters from England. On September the 18th, Mary wrote to her friend, Miss Curran, that they were about to move. She knew not with her. Then Shelley, with Charles Clermont, went to Florence and engaged rooms for six months, and at the end of September Shelley returned and took his wife by slow and easy stages to the Tuscan capital, for her health was then in a very delicate state for travelling. There, in the lovely city of Florence, on November the 12th, 1819, she gave birth to her son, Percy Florence, who first broke the spell of unhappiness which had hung over for the last five months like a cloud over them. He, as events prove, was to be her one comfort with her memories when the supreme calamity of her life fell on her, and he was mercifully spared to be the solace of her later years. END OF CHAPTER X time while political events were absorbing England and Shelley was weaving them into poetry in Italy during the remainder of his residence in Florence, Godwin's personal difficulties were reaching their climax. When he lost, in an action for the rent of his house, Shelley came to his help, but in some way Godwin expected more than he received and became very unpleasant in his correspondence, so much so that Shelley had to beg him not to write to Mary on these subjects, as her health was not then, in October 1819, able to bear the strain, and the subject of money was not a fitting one to be pressed on her by him. Mary had not the disposal of money. If she had, she would give it all to her father. He assured Godwin that the four or five thousand pounds already expended on him might have made him comfortable for the remainder of his life. Mrs. Godwin, naturally, would not hear of abandoning the Skinner Street business as being the only provision for herself when Godwin should die. It is extremely painful at this stage of Godwin's career to witness the lowering effects of his wife's smaller nature upon him, as he certainly allowed himself to be unduly influenced by her excited and not always truthful views, as known since the earlier days of their married life. We have seen Mrs. Gisborne's diary showing how Mrs. Godwin could not endure to see anyone in 1820 who had an attachment for Mary, whom, as Godwin told Mrs. Gisborne, she considered her greatest enemy. And although he described his wife as of the most irritable disposition possible, he listened to and repeated her conjectures to the disparagement of Shelly and Mary at the time when she did not hesitate to accept with her husband the large sums of money which Shelly with difficulty raised for them. All the facts shown in this diary prove that Mary and Fanny must have had a sufficiently trying life at home to account for the result in either case, especially when we consider that Claire and her brother Charles both preferred to leave Godwin's house on the first possible occasion, Charles having left for France immediately after Mary and Claire's departure with Shelly. William alone remained at home, before years past and avoiding school at Grinwich, from 1814 must have helped him to endure the discomforts of the time. Before Mrs. Gisborne's return to Italy, Godwin gave her a detailed account in writing of his money transactions with Shelly, which had become very painful to both. In January 1820 Florence, proving unsuitable for Shelly's health, they left for Pisa, the mild climate of which city made it a favorite resort of the poet during most of the short remainder of his life. Mary, ever hospitable, although as Shelly said the bills for printing his poems must be paid for by stinting himself and meat and drink, hoped that Mrs. Gisborne would have stayed with them during her husband's visit to England in 1820, as they had moved into a pleasant apartment in March. This idea was not carried out. About this time Mary and Claire, both with their own absorbing anxieties, became again irksome to each other. Mary found relief when Claire was absent, and Claire notes how the Claire and the May find something to fight about every day, a way of putting it which indicates differences, but certainly no grave cause of disturbance. This was after their removal to Lake Horn, where they went towards the end of June to be near the lawyer on account of Payolo. At the beginning of August the heat at Lake Horn caused the Shelley's to migrate to the baths at San Grigliano, where Shelly found a very pleasant house, Casaprini. The moderate rent suited their slender purse, which had so many outside calls upon it. In October Claire's departure for Florence, as governess in the family of Professor Bochti, where she went by the advice of her friend Mrs. Mason, formerly Lady Montcachel, brought an end to her permanent residence with the Shelley's, although she was still to look upon their house as her home, and she visited them either for her pleasure or to assist them. Her absence from her friends gives us the advantage of letters from them, letters full of a certain exaggeration of affection and sympathy from Shelly, who felt more acutely than Mary that Claire might be unhappy under a strange roof. Mary, less anxious on those grounds, writes about the operas she has seen, giving good descriptions of them. One of her letters is full of anxiety as to Allegra, who has been placed in the convent of Bagnica Vallejo by Byron. She feels that the child ought, as soon as possible, be taken out of the hands of so remorseless and unprincipled a man, but advises caution in waiting for a favorable opportunity. She hopes that he may be returning to England. He may be reconciled with his wife. At any rate, Bagnica Vallejo is high in a healthy position, quite different from the dirty canals of Venice, which might injure any child's health. Mary thus tries to console Claire, who was planning, in her imagination, various ways of getting at her child, and corresponding with and seeing Shelly on the subject. Mary dissuades Claire from attempting anything in the spring, there on lucky time. It was in the second spring, Claire met LB, etc. The third they went to Marlowe, no wise thing at least. The fourth uncomfortable in London. Fifth, their Roman misery. The sixth paola at Pisa. The seventh, a mixture of Amelia and a chancery suit. Mary acknowledges this superstitious feeling is more in Claire's line than her own, but thinks it is worth considering. But this letter to Claire carries us a year in advance. During the summer of 1820, Mary had some of the delightful times she loved so dearly, of poetic wanderings with Shelly through the woods and by the river, one of which she remembers long afterwards. When making her note to the skylock, she recalls how she and Shelly, wandering through the lanes whose mortal hedges were the bowers of the firefly, heard the caroling of the skylock which inspired one of the most beautiful of his poems. Precious memories which helped her through many after-years, devoid of the sympathy she yearned for. At the baths they had the pleasure of a visit from Medwyn, who gave a description of how Shelly, his wife and child, had to escape from the upper windows of their house in a boat, when the canal overflowed and inundated the valley. Mary speaks of it as a very picturesque sight, with the herdsmen driving their cattle. During the short absence of Shelly, when he took Claire to Florence, Mary was occupied, planning her novel of Valperga, for which she studied Valani's chronicle and Sismondi's history. Unleaving the baths of San Guiliano after the floods, the Shellys returned to Pisa, where they passed the late autumn and winter of 1820 and the spring of 1821. Here they made more acquaintances than here to four, Professor Pacchiani, also called Il Diavolo, introducing them to Prince Mavro Cordado, to Princess Agiro Poli, the Improvisator, Segrici, Teofi, and last not least, to Emilia Viviani. Here Mary continued to write Valperga and pursued her Latin, Spanish, and Greek studies. The latter, the Prince Mavro Cordado, assisted her with, as Mary writes to Mrs. Gisborne. Do not you envy me, my luck, that having begun Greek and amiable young, agreeable, and learned Greek Prince comes every morning to give me a lesson of an hour and a half. But the person of most moment at this time was undoubtedly the Contessina Emilia Viviani, whom, accompanied by Pacchiani, Claire, then Mary and then Shelley, visited at the convent of Santana. This beautiful girl with profuse black hair, grecian profile, and dreamy eyes, placed in the convent till she should be married to satisfy the jealousy of her stepmother, became naturally an object of extreme interest to the Shellys. Many visits were paid and Mary invited her to stay with them at Christmas. Shelley was convinced that she had great talent, if not genius. Shelley and Mary sent her books, and Claire gave her English lessons at her convent, while she was taking a holiday from the botches. Many letters are preserved from the beautiful Emilia to Shelley and Mary. Letters which, translated into English, seem overflowing with sentiment and affection, but which to Italians would indicate rather the style cultivated by Italian ladies, which to this day seems one of their chief accomplishments if they're not gifted with a voice to sing. To Mary she complains of a certain coldness, but certainly this could not be brought to the charge of Shelley, who was now inspired to write his Epicycadion. To him, Emilia was as the Skylock, an emanation of the beautiful, but to Mary for a time, during Shelley's transitory adoration, the event evidently became painful, with all her philosophy and belief in her husband. She could not regard the lovely girl who took walks with him as the Skylock that soared over their heads. And the Epicycadion was evidently not a favourite poem of Mary. Surely we may ascribe to this time, in the spring of 1821, the poem written by Shelley to Lieutenant Williams, whose acquaintance he had made in January. There is no month affixed to. The serpent is cast out from Paradise. And it might well apply with its reference to my cold home, to the time when Mary, in depression and peak, did not always give her likewise sensitive husband all the welcome he was accustomed to. And Shelley took refuge in a poem by way of a letter. For this is the time referred to by Mary and her letter to Claire as their seventh unfortunate spring, a mixture of Emilia and a chancery suit. It was not till the next spring that Emilia was married, and that her husband and mother-in-law, as Mary puts it, a devil of a life. We have only to be grateful to Emilia for having inspired one of the most wondrous poems in any language. The Williamses, to whom Shelley's poem is addressed, were met by them in January. Mary writes of the fascinating Jane, Mrs. Williams, that she is certainly very pretty, but wants animation, while Shelley writes that she is extremely pretty and gentle, but apparently not very clever, that he liked her much, but had only seen her for an hour. Mary, among her multifarious reading, notes an article by Medwin on animal magnetism. And Shelley, who suffered severely at this time, shortly afterwards, tried its effect through Medwin. The latter bored Mary excessively. Possibly she found the magnetizing, aware-some operation, although Shelley is said to have been relieved by it. His highly nervous temperament was evidently impressed. When Medwin left, Mrs. Williams undertook to carry on the cure. The chancery suit, referred to by Mary, was an attempt between Sir Timothy's attorney and Shelley's to throw their affairs into chancery, causing great alarm to them in Italy, till Horace Smith came to their rescue in England, and with indignant letters settled the inconsiderate litigation. Mrs. Shelley, in her notes to poems in 1821, recounts how Shelley was nearly drowned, by a flat boat which she had recently acquired being overturned in the canal near Pisa, when returning from Lake Horn. Williams upset the boat by standing up and holding the mast. Henry Reveley, Mrs. Gisborne's son, rescued Shelley and brought him to land, where he fainted with the cold. At this time at Pisa Mary had to consider with Shelley a matter of great importance to Claire. Byron now at Ravenna had placed Allegra, as already stated, in the convent of Bagna Cavallio. He told Mrs. Hopner that she had become so unmanageable by servants that it was necessary to have her under better care than he could secure, and he considered that it would be preferable to bring her up as a Roman Catholic with an Italian education, as in that way, with a fortune of five or six thousand pounds, she would marry an Italian and be provided for, whereas she would always hold an anomalous position in England. At this proposal Claire was extremely indignant. But Shelley and Mary took the opposite view, and considered that Byron acted for the best, as the convent was in a healthy position and the nuns would be kind to the child. This idea of Mary would naturally be agreed with by some, and disapproved of by others. But at that time there was certainly no cause to indicate that Bagna Cavallio would be more fatal to Allegra than in the other place, although Claire's apprehensions were cruelly realized. From this time Claire and Byron wrote letters of recrimination to each other, which considering Byron's obduracy against the feelings of the mother, Shelley and Mary came to hold as tyrannically unfeeling. In May Shelley and his wife and son returned to the Baths of San Guiliano, and while here Shelley's Adonais was published. In 1820 when the Shelley's heard of Keats' fatal illness for Mrs. Gisborne, she having met him the day after he had received his death warrant from the doctor, they were the first to beg him to join them at Pisa. A small touch of poetical criticism, however, appears to have weighed more with the sensitive Keats than these friendly considerations for his health. And as he was about to accompany his friend Mr. Severn to Rome he did not accept their kind offer, though in all probability Pisa would have been better for him. During this summer at the Baths Mary had finished her romance of Valperga and read it to her husband, who admired it extremely. He considered it to be a living and moving picture of an age almost forgotten, a profound study of the passions of human nature. Valperga published in 1823, the year after Shelley's death, is a romance of the 14th century in Italy, during the height of the struggle between the Guelphs and the Gibrilines, when each state in almost each town was at war with the other, a condition of things which lends itself to romance. Mary Shelley's intimate acquaintance with Italy and the Italians gives her the necessary knowledge to write on this subject. Her zealous Italian studies came to her aid, and her love of nature give life and vitality to the scene. Valperga, the ancestral castle home of Euthanasia, a Florentine lady of the Guelph faction, is most picturesquely described, on its ledge of projecting rock overlooking the plane of Luca, the dependent peasants around happy under the protection of their good Signora. That this beautiful and high-minded lady should be a finance to a Gibriline leader is a natural combination, but when her lover, Castruccio, Prince of Luca carries his political enthusiasm, the length of making war on her native city of Florence, whose republican greatness and love of art are happily described, Euthanasia cannot let love stand in the way of duty and gratitude to all those dearest to her. The severe struggle is well described. For Euthanasia has loved Castruccio from their childhood. When they played about the mountain grounds of her home at Valperga, Castruccio learned the secret paths to the castle, which knowledge later helped him to take the fortress when Euthanasia refused to yield it to him. Castruccio's character is also well described. His devoted attachment to Euthanasia, from which nothing could turn him, till the passions of the conqueror and party faction are still stronger, and the irresistible force which impels him to make war and subdue the Guelphs, which by her is regarded as murder and rapine, disunites beings seemingly formed for each other. All these different emotions are portrayed with great beauty and simplicity. The Italian superstitions are well shown, as how the Florentines ascribed all good and evil fortune to conjunction of stars. The power of the Inquisition in Rome comes likewise into play when the beautiful prophetess, Bietrichi, the child of the prophetess, Wilhelmina, who had to be given to the leper for protection, as even his filthy and deserted hut was safer for her than that it should be known to the Inquisition that she existed. She is rescued from the leper by a bishop who heard her story from the deathbed of the woman to whom her mother, when dying, had confided her. She was then brought up by the bishop's sister. Her mother's spirit of prophecy was inherited by the daughter, and as the mother believed herself to be an emanation of the Holy Spirit, so Bietrichi thought herself the Ancilla Dei. These mystical fantasies and their workings are depicted with much beauty and strength. These Donnae estetici first appear in Italy after the 12th century, and had continued to the time which Mary Shelley selected for her romance. After giving an account of their pretensions, Moratori gravely observes. We may piously believe that some were distinguished by supernatural gifts and admitted to the secrets of heaven, but we may justly suspect that the source of many of their revelations was their ardent imagination filled with ideas of religion and piety. Bietrichi, on prophesying, the Gibleen rule in Ferrera, is seized by the emissaries of the Pope and has to undergo the ordeal of the white hot plowshares, through which she passes unscathed, there having apparently been connivants to help her through. Her exaltation and enthusiasm became intense, and it is only after a great shock that she grows conscious of the falseness of her position. For having met Castruccio on his mission to Ferrera, she is irresistibly attracted by him, and mixing up her infactuation with her mystical ideas does not hesitate to make secret appointments with him, never doubting that her love is returned, and that they are one at heart. When at length Castruccio has to return to Luca and to his betrothed Euthanasia, the shock to the poor mystical Bietrichi is terrible. Finally she is met as a pilgrim wending her weary way to Rome. Assuredly, Shelley was justified in admiring this character. There is a straightforwardness in the plot into which the stormy history of the period is clearly introduced, which gives much interest to this romance, and it is a decided advance upon Frankenstein, though her age, when that was written, must not be forgotten. A book of this kind shows forcibly the troubles to which a lovely country like Italy is exposed through disunion, and must fill the hearts of all lovers of this beautiful land with gratitude to the noble men who willingly sacrificed themselves to help in the cause of united Italy. Those whose songs rouse the people and carried hope into the hearts of even the prisoners in the pausia Venice, for the man of idea who can rouse the nation by his songs, does not help less than the brave soldier who can aid with his arms, though alas, he does not always live to see the triumph he has helped to achieve. Footnote. Gabriela Rossetti, whom Mary Shelley knew, and to whom she referred for information while writing her lies with Italian poets, has been said to have been the first who in modern times had the idea of a united Italy under a constitutional monarch. For which idea, and for his rousing songs, he was forced to leave Italy by Ferdinand the First of Naples in 1821 and remained in exile in England till his death in 1854 at the age of seventy-one? How Mary Shelley with her husband must have sympathized in these ideas, with the love of Italy, can be understood, although it was the climate and the beauty of Italy more than the people that charmed Shelley. But then, was he not also in exile from his native land? And, to footnote, this work, when completed, was sent to her father by Mary, for it had been a labour of love, and the sum of four hundred pounds which God meant obtained for it, was devoted to help him in his difficulties. Unhappily, the romance was not published till the year after her husband's death. CHAPTER 12 PART 1 LAST MONTHS WITH Shelley In July 1821 Shelley left his wife at the baths while he went to seek a house at Florence for the winter. But he returned in three days unsuccessful. He then received a letter from Byron, begging him to go straight to Ravenna, various matters having to be talked over. Shelley left at two in the afternoon, on his birthday August 4. Here he had to go through the Paola Hopner scandal, which we have referred to. Shelley had to write letters to Mary on the subject, and Mary wrote the most indignant and decisive denial of the imputation on her husband in Claire. She writes, I swear by the life of my child, by my blessed beloved child, that I know the accusations to be false. If more were needed, the clear exposition by Mr. Giefersen and later Professor Doudin leave nothing to be said. Shelley wrote to Mary describing his visit to Allegra at the convent, where he found her prettily dressed in white muslin with an apron of black silk. She was the most graceful airy child. She took Shelley all over the convent and began ringing the nun's call bell without being reprimanded, although the priors had considerable trouble to prevent the nun's assembling dressed or undressed, which struck Shelley as showing that she was kindly treated. Before leaving Ravenna about August 17, he wrote to thank his wife for her promise of her miniature, done by Williams, which he received a few days later from her at the Baths of Pisa. Mary and Shelley both were of those who wherever they found a friend, found also a pensioner, or person to be benefited by them, as they did not seek their friends for personal advantage, and were among those who hold it more blessed to give than to receive. In January 1821 Mrs. Leigh Hunt wrote to Mary Shelley, begging her to help her husband and family to come to Italy. He was ill and depressed, and surrounded by all his children sick and suffering. While Shelley was at Ravenna, he brought up this subject with Byron, who proposed that he, Shelley, and Leigh Hunt should start a periodical for their joint works and share the profits. Shelley did not agree to this for himself, as he was not popular, and could only gain advantage from the others. But for Hunt it was different, and Shelley joyfully wrote to him from Pisa on his return from Ravenna to join them as soon as possible. Delays occurred in Hunt's departure, and Byron received letters from England warning him against joining with Shelley and Hunt. Byron arrived in Pisa with the Countess, Guiccioli, and her brother Pietro Gamba, on of him at the first, at the Launfranqui Palace, and the ladies had apartments at the top of one Trey Palasi de Ciesa opposite. Claire, who had been staying with them, and accompanied them on a trip to Spesia, had now returned to Professor Boci's at Florence. Mary had the task of furnishing the ground floor of Byron's Launfranqui Palace for the Hunt's, although Byron insisted on paying for it. Hunt, meanwhile, was unable to proceed beyond Plymouth that winter, where they were obliged to stay by stress of weather in Mrs. Hunt's illness. Thus some months passed by, during which time Byron lost the first odour of the enterprise, and became very lukewarm. That must have been when Mary had good reason to foresee this result that she wrote to Hunt thus. My dear friend, I know that S. has some idea of persuading you to come here. I am too ill to write the reasonings. Only let me entreat you, let no persuasions induce you to come. Selfish feelings, you may be sure, do not dictate me. But it would be complete madness to come. I wish I could write more. I wish I were with you to assist you. I wish I could break my chains and leave this dungeon. And do, I shall hear about Yon and Mary Hunt's health from S. Ever your aim. Shelly was forced to apply to Byron to help him with money to lend Hunt, and Byron had ceased to care about the liberal, the projected magazine. While staying near Byron the Shellys came in for a large influx of visitors. Often much to Shelly's annoyance, a Mary wrote of their wish, if Greece were liberated, of settling at one of the lovely islands. The middle of January brought one visitor to the Shellys, who introduced by the Williams, became more than a passing figure in Mary's life. In Edward John Trelawney, she found a staunch friend ever after. Trelawney, who had led a wild life from the time he left the navy in mere boyhood, was a conspicuous character were ever known. With small reverence for the orthodox creeds he must have had some of the traits of the ancient Vikings before meeting Shelly. But from that time he became his devoted admirer, or as one is observed to know him, as Ahab at Elijah's feet. So Trelawney at Shelly's was ready to humble himself for the first time. Nor did he afterwards, to the end of a long life, ever speak of him without veneration. Shelly's exalted ideas touched a chord in the strong man's heart. And within a few weeks of his death he rejoiced in hearing of a crowded assembly in Glasgow, enthusiastic in hearing a lecture on Shelly. And asserted, it is the spirit of poetry which needs spreading now, science is popular to the exclusion of poetry as a regenerator. The day after their first meeting with Trelawney, Mary notes in her diary how Trelawney discussed with Williams and Shelly about building a boat, which they desired to have, and which Captain Roberts was to build at Genoa without delay. A year later Mary added a note to this entry to the effect, how she and Jane Williams then laughed at the way their husbands decided, without consulting them, though they agreed in hating the boat. She adds, how well I remember that night, how short-sighted we are. And now that its anniversary is come and gone, me thinks I cannot be the wretch I too truly am. This winter at Pisa, Mary, with popular and strong men to protect her, was not neglected so much as hitherto. She went to Mrs. Bowclork's ball with Trelawney. But she refers to a strange feeling of depression in the mists of a gay assembly. On February 8th Shelly started, with Williams, to seek for houses in the neighborhood of Spezia. The idea being that the Shellys, the Williamses, Trelawney, and Captain Roberts, Byron, Countess Guiccioli, and her brother, should all spend the summer there. Although Mary feared the party would be too large for unity. Only one suitable house could be found. But Shelly was not to be stopped by such a trifle, and the house must do for all. In the early spring of this year, Mary wrote to Mrs. Hunt how she and Mrs. Williams went violent hunting, while the men went on longer expeditions. The Shelly's in their surroundings must have kept the English assembled in Pisa in a pleasing state of excitement. At one time Mary caused a commotion by attending Dr. Knott's Sunday service, which was held on the ground floor of her house. On one occasion he preached against atheism, and having specially asked Mary to attend, it was taken as a marked attack on Shelly, and it was considered that Mary had taken part against her husband. Mary wrote a pathetic letter to Mrs. Guizborn, that she had only been three times to church, and now long to be in some sea-girt aisle with Shelly and her baby, but that Shelly was entangled with Byron and could not get away. She was longing for the time by the sea when she would have boats and horses. While Mary was yearning for sympathy with her kind, or solitude with Shelly, he for a time was wasting regrets that she did not sympathize with or feel his poetry. It was the old story of the skylark. While he was seeking inspiration at some fresh source, Mary did not become equally enthusiastic about the new idea. But most probably, in spite of Trelawney's later notion and her own self-approaches of not having done all possible things to sympathize with Shelly, Mary's behavior was really the best calculated for his comfort. A man who did not like regular meals and conventional habits in this respect would not have liked his wife to wary him constantly on the subject, and a plate of cold meat and the bread placed on a shelf, as his table was probably covered with papers. Which Trelawney found there forgotten, towards the end of a lost day, as Shelly called it, was not inappropriate for one who forgot his meals and did not like being teased. Mary was not of the nature to make, nor Shelly of the nature to require a docile slave. And during the time at Naples, for which Mary felt most regret, Shelly wrote of her as a dear friend with whom added years old intercourse adds to my appreciation of its value, and who would have more right than anyone to complain that she has not been able to extinguish me in the very power of delineating sadness. During this time the English visitors believed and manufactured all kinds of stories about the eccentric English then at Pisa. Trelawney had been murdered, Byron wounded, and Tyaffee was guarded by bulldogs in Byron's house. These rumors were laughed over by the people concerned. On one occasion Mrs. Shelly, with the Countess, Guaccioli, witnessed from their carriage the affair with the Dragoon Mazi, when he jostled against Tyaffee. Byron, Shelly, and Gamba pursued him. Shelly coming up with him first was knocked down, but was rescued by Captain Hay. The Dragoon was finally wounded by one of Byron's servants, under the idea that he had wounded Byron. During this exciting time at Pisa, Claire was eating her heart at Florence with longings of regrets for Allegra, and Mary and Shelly were trying to calm her by letters and growing themselves more and more dissatisfied at Byron's treatment of the mother. There are entries in Claire's diary as to her cough. And the last entry before the day she left Florence for Pisa, April 13th, is erased. Then there is one of her ominous blanks from April till September. While Claire travelled with Williams and his wife to Spezia to look for a house, news came from Bagna Cavallo, which verified her worst fears. Typhus Pfefer had ravaged the convent and district, and the fragile blossom had succumbed. Shelly and Mary determined to keep this evil news, as Mary calls it, from Claire till she is away from the neighbourhood of Byron. So, on her return from the unsuccessful visit to Spezia, they have to conceal their sorrow and their feelings. Shelly, ever anxious for Claire's distress, persuaded her to accompany Mary to Spezia, saying that they must take any house they could get. Claire had thought of returning to Florence but was overruled by Shelly, who as Mary wrote to Mrs. Kisborne, carried all like a torrent before him, and sent Mary and Claire with Trilani to Spezia. Shelly followed with their furniture and boats, and so, on April 26th, they were hurried by Shelly, or fate, from misfortune to misfortune, and taken Claire to a haven where she might be helped to bear her sore trouble. Mary, with her companions, secured the only available house, Casa Magui, at San Terenzio, near La Ricci, in which it was settled that they and the Williams' must find room and bring their furniture. Difficulties of all kinds had to be overcome from the Dugana. The furniture arrived in boats, and they were told the dues upon it would amount to three hundred pounds, but the Habermaster kindly allowed it to be removed to the villa, as to a depot, till further orders arrived. Then there were the difficulties of Mrs. Williams, of whom Shelly wrote that she was pining for her saucepans. Claire felt the necessity of returning to Florence, the space being so small. This, however, was not to be thought of. Claire still had to have the news of her child's death broken to her, and Mrs. Williams' room had to be used for secret consultations. Claire, entering the room and seeing the agitated silence on her approach, at once realized the state of the case. She felt her Allegra was dead, and it was only devolved on Shelly to tell the sad tale of a fever ravaged district, and a fever-tossed child, dying among the kind nuns who were ever good nurses. Claire's grief was intense, but all that she now wanted was a sight of her child's coffin, a likeness of her, and a locker for golden hair, a portion of which, last, is now in the writer's possession. The latter, Shelly, helped to obtain for her. McClare never after forgave him, who had consigned her child to the convent in Romagna, nor allowed her another sight of her little one. On May twenty-first Claire left for Florence, and Mary remained with her husband in the Williams' at Casa Magni. These rapidly succeeding troubles, together with Mary's being again in a delicate state of health, left the circle in an unhinged and nervous state of apprehension. Shelly saw visions of Allegra rising from the sea, clapping her hands and smiling at him. Mrs. Williams saw Shelly on the balcony, and then he was nowhere near, nor had he been there. Shelly ranged from wild delight with the beauty around him to such fits of despondency as when he most culpably proposed to Mrs. Williams, while in a boat with him and her babies, in the bay. Now, let us together solve the great mystery. But she managed to get him to turn shore-woods and escape to the first opportunity from the boat. Mary was not without her prophetic periods. A deep melancholy settled on her amid the lovely scenery. Generally at home with mountain and water, she now only felt oppressed by their proximity. Shelly was at work on the triumph of life, one of his grandest poems. But Mary was always apprehensive, except when with her husband. Least so when lying in a boat with her head on his knees. If Shelly were absent, she feared for Percy, her son. So that in spite of the oasis of peace and rest and beauty around them, she was weak and nervous. And Shelly, for fear of hurting her, had to conceal such matters as might trouble her, especially the again critical state of the affairs of her father, who was in want of four hundred pounds to compound with his creditors. These alarms for Mary's health and tranquility of mind, and the consequent necessity of keeping any trying subject from her, may have induced Shelly in writing to Claire to adopt a confidential tone, not otherwise advisable. While at Casa Magni, the fatal boat, which had been discussed on the first evening Trelawney spent with the Shellys arrived, the perfect plaything for the summer had been built against the advice of Trelawney by a Genoese shipbuilder, after a model obtained by Lieutenant Williams from one of the Royal Dockyards in England. Originally it was intended to call it the Don Juan, but recent circumstances had caused a break in the intimacy of Shelly with Byron, and Shelly felt that this would be eternal. He therefore no longer wished any name to remind him of Byron, and gave the name Arielle, proposed by Trelawney to the small craft. With considerable difficulty the name Don Juan was taken from the sail, where Byron had manoeuvred to have it painted. Towards the end of May Mary was seriously suffering. The difficulties of housekeeping for the Williamses, as well as themselves, were no trifle. Provisions had to be fetched from a distance of over three miles. Shelly writes to Claire, hoping she will be able to find them a man-cook. As Mary was somewhat better when Shelly wrote, he feared he would have to speak to her about Godwin's affairs, but put off the evil day. CHAPTER XII On June 6 we find Shelly setting out with Williams and the Arielle to meet Claire on her way from Florence to Casamagny. A calm having delayed them till the evening they were too late to meet Claire, who travelled on by land for Via Reggio. Shelly and Williams, returning by sea, arrived home a short time before her. Their return and her arrival were none too soon. For on the 8th or 9th Mary fell dangerously ill, as she wrote in August to Mrs. Gisborne. I was so ill that for seven hours I lay nearly lifeless. Kept from painting by Brandy, Vinegar, Modicolone, etc. At length ice was brought to our solitude. It came before the doctor, so Claire and Jane were afraid of using it, but Shelly 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. Shelly, equal to the occasion, felt a strain on his nerves afterwards, and a week after his wife was out of danger he alarmed her greatly as she relates. While yet unable to walk I was confined to my bed. In the middle of the night I was awoke by hearing him scream and come rushing into my room. I was sure that he was asleep and tried to awaken 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, or I fell through weakness, though I was so frightened that I got up again immediately. She let me in and Williams went to Shelly, who had been awakened by my getting out of bed. He said that he had not been asleep, and that it was a vision that he saw that had frightened him, but as he declared that he had not screamed it was certainly a dream, and no waking vision. And so the lovely summer months passed by with all these varying emotions, with thoughts soaring to the highest pinnacles of imagination as in the triumph of life, and with the enjoyment of the high ideals of others, as in reading the Spanish dramas, music also gave enchantment when Jane Williams played her guitar, with the intense beauty of the scenery and the wildness of the natives who used sometimes to dance all night on the sands in front of their house. The emotions of life seemed compressed into this time, spent in what would be considered by many great dullness in the company of Trelawney and the Williams''. And now an event, long hoped for, arrived. For the hunts were in the harbour of Genoa, and Shelly was to meet them at Lake Horn as hunts' letter, which reached them on June 19th, had been delayed too long to allow of Shelly joining them at Genoa. On July 1st, intelligence came of the hunts' departure from Genoa, and at noon a breeze rising from the west decided the desirability of at once starting for Lake Horn. Shelly, with Captain Roberts, who would join them at La Ricci, arrived by night in the evening after the officers of health had left their office. The voyages were thus unable to land that evening, but spent the time alongside of Byron's Yacht, the Bolivar, from which they received coverings for the night. The next morning news arrived from Byron's villa, which already began to verify Mary's forebodings in her letter to hunt, and proved the clear sightedness of her forecast. Disturbances, having taken place at his house at Montanero, Count Gamba and his family were banished by the government from Tuscany, and they were rumours that Byron might be leaving immediately for America or Switzerland. This was indeed trying news for Shelly, to have to break to the hunts on their first meeting in the hotel at Lake Horn, where after four years the two friends again met. The encounter was most touching, as remembered years later by Thornton Hunt. Shelly had plenty of work on hand for a few days. He procured Vaca, the physician, for Mrs. Hunt, and had to sustain his friend during his anxiety as to his wife's health, and the uncertainty as to Byron's conduct. Shelly would not think of leaving him till he had seen him comfortably installed in the La Pranqui Palace, in the rooms which Mary had prepared for him at Byron's request. The still more difficult task of fixing Byron to some promise of assistance with regard to the liberal was likewise carried out, and after one or two days of dejection, during which Shelly wrote to Mrs. Williams on July 4th to relieve his own despondency, and to his wife to relieve hers, as her depression of spirits required more cheering than adding to. He wrote, How are you, my best Mary? Write especially how is your health and how your spirits are, and whether you are not reconciled to staying at La Ricci, at least during the summer. You have no idea how I am hurried and occupied. I have not a moment's leisure, but will write by the next post. Soon after writing these letters, Shelly found with exaltation that his work was done. As usual he had carried ale before him, and secured Byron's vision of judgment for the first number of the liberal, and by July 7th he was able to show his friends the ever-delightful sights of Pisa. This one day of rest and pleasure remained to Shelly after doing his utmost to assist his friend Hunt. To the last, Shelly was faithful to his aim, that of doing all he could for others. His interviews with Byron had secured a return of the friendly feeling which not but death was henceforth to sever, and the two great names which nothing can divide are linked by the unbreakable chain of genius. Genius, the fire of the universe, which at times may flicker low, but which, bursting into flame here and there, illumines the dark recesses of the soul of the universe. Genius, which has made the world we know, which never absent, though dormant, has changed the stone to the flower, the flower to animal, and gaining ever in degree through the various stages of life is the divine attribute, the will, the idea. Genius manifests in the greatest and best of humanity, shown indeed as the word of God, or is he who holds the mirror up to nature, or by the great power which in color or monotone can display the love and agony of a dying Christ, by the loving poet who can soar beyond his age to uphold an unselfish aim of perfection to the world, by all those who, throwing off their mortal attributes at times, can live the true life, free from the two absorbing pleasures of the flesh, which can only be enjoyed by dividing. But now Shelly's mortal battle was nearly over. He who had not let his talent or myriad talents lie dormant was to rest. His work of life was nearly done, not that the good has ever ended. Verily, through thousands of generations, through eternity, it endures. While the bad, perhaps not useless, is the chaff which is dispersed, and which has no result unless to hurry on the divine will. Our life is double. Shelly's atoms were to return to their primal elements. The unknown atoms or attributes of them were undoubtedly to carry on their work. He had added to the eternal intellect. The last facts of Shelly's life are related by Trelawney and by Mrs. Shelly, on the morning of July 8, having finished his arrangements for the hunts and spent one day in showing the noble sights of Pisa, Shelly, after making purchases for their house and obtaining money from his banker, accompanied by Trelawney, during the four-noon was ready by noon to embark on the Ariel, with Edward Williams and the sailor-boy Charles Vivian. Captain Roberts was not without apprehensions as to the weather, and urged Shelly to delay his departure for a day. But Williams was anxious to rejoin his wife, and Shelly not in a humor to frustrate his wishes. Trelawney, who desired to accompany them in the Bolivar, into the offing, was prevented not having obtained his health order, and so could only reluctantly remain behind and watch his friends' small craft through a ship's glass. Mistakes were noted. The ship's mate of the Bolivar remarked they ought to have started at daybreak instead of after one o'clock. That they were too near shore. That there would soon be a land breeze. The gaff top sail was foolish in a boat with no deck and no sailor on board. And then, pointing to the southwest, look at those black lines and dirty rags hanging on them out of the sky. Look at the smoke on the water. The devil is brewing mischief. The approaching storm was watched also by Captain Roberts from the lighthouse. When she saw the top sail taken in, then the vessel freighted with such precious life was seen no more in the midst of the storm. For a time the sea seemed solidified and appeared as of lead with an oily scum. The wind did not ruffle it. Then sounds of thunder, wind, and rain filled the air. These lasted with fury for twenty minutes. Then a lull, in anxious looks among the boats which had rushed into the harbour for Shelley's Hark. No glass could find it on the horizon. Trelawney landed at eight o'clock. Inquiries were useless. An oar was seen on a fishing boat. It might be English. It might be Shelley's. But this was denied. Nothing to do but wait till the third day when he returned to Pisa to tell his fears to hunt in Byron, who could only listen with quivering lips and speak with faltering voice. While these friends were agitated between hope and fear, the time was passing wearily at San Terenzio. Jane Williams received a letter from her husband on that day, written on Saturday from Lake Horn, where he was waiting for Shelley. It stated that if they did not return on Monday, he certainly would be back at the latest on Thursday in a faluca by himself if necessary. A fatal Monday passed amid storm and rain, and no idea was entertained by Mrs. Shelley or Mrs. Williams, that their husbands had started in such weather as they experienced. Mary, who had then scarcely recovered from her dangerous illness, and was unable to join Claire and Jane Williams in their evening walks, could only pace up and down in the veranda and feel oppressed by the very beauty which surrounded her. So till Wednesday, these days of storm and oppression and undefined fears passed, then some falucas arrived from Lake Horn. They were informed that their husbands had left on Monday. But that could not be believed. Thursday came and passed. The Thursday, which should be the latest for Williams' arrival. The wind had been fair. But midnight arrived, and still Mary and Jane were alone. Then sad hope gave place to fearful anxiety proceeding to spare. But Friday was letter day. Wait for that, and no boat could leave. Noon on Friday and letters came. But two, not from Shelley. Hunt wrote to him, Pray, tell us how you got home, for they say that you had bad weather after you sailed on Monday, and we are anxious. Mary read so far when the paper fell from her hands and she trembled all over. Jane read it and said, It's all over. Mary replied, No, my dear Jane, it's not all over. But this suspense is dreadful. Come with me. We will go to Lake Horn. We will post to be swift and learn our fate. Thus as Mary Shelley herself describes, they crossed to Lyricci to spare in their hearts. Two poor, wild, aghast creatures, driving like Matilda, towards the sea to know if they were to be forever doomed to misery. The idea of seeing Hunt for the first time after four years, to ask, Where is he? nearly drove Mary into convulsions. On knocking at the door of the castle of Franke, they found Lord Byron was in Pisa, and Hunt being in bed, their interview was to be with Byron, only to hear. They knew nothing. He had left Pisa on Sunday, on Monday he had sailed. There had been bad weather Monday afternoon. More they knew not. Mary, who had risen from a bed of sickness for the journey, and had traveled all day, had now at midnight to proceed to Lake Horn in search of Trelani. For what rest could there be with such a terrible doubt hanging over their lives? They could not to spare. For that would have been death. They had to pass through longer hours and days of anguish to subdue their souls to bear the inevitable. They reached Lake Horn and were driven to the wrong end. Nothing to do but wait till morning. But wait dressed till six o'clock. When they proceeded to other ends and found Captain Roberts, his face showed that the worst was true. They only heard how their husbands had set out. Still hope was not dead might not their husbands be at Corsica or Elba. It was said that they had been seen in the Gulf. They resolved to return, but now not alone, for Trelani accompanied them. Agony succeeded Agony. The water they crossed told Mary it was his grave. While crossing the bay, they saw San Terenzio illuminated for a festa, while the spare was in their hearts. The days passed, a week ever counted as two by Mary. And then, when she was very ill, Trelani, who had been long expected from a search, returned. And now they knew that all was over. For the bodies had been cast on shore. One was a tall slight figure, with Sophocles in one pocket of the jacket, and Keats last poems on the other. The poetry he loved remained. His body a mere mutilated corpse, which for a while had enshrined such a divine intellect. Williams' corpse also was found some miles distant, still more unrecognizable, save for the black silk canker chief tied sailor fashion round his neck. And after some ten days, a third body was found, a mere skeleton, supposed to be the sailor boy, Charles Vivian. Is there no hope? Mary asked when Trelani reappeared on July 19. He could not answer, but left the room, and sent the servant to take the children to their widowed mothers. He then, on the 20th, took them from the sound of the cruel waves to the Hansa Pisa. Not remain now but to perform the last funeral rites. Mary decided that Shelley should rest with his dearly loved son in the English Cemetery in Rome. With some little difficulty Trelani obtained permission with the kind assistance of the English charged affairs at Florence, Mr. Dawkins, to have the bodies burned on the shore according to the custom of bodies cast up from the sea, so that the ashes could be removed without fear of infection. The iron furnace was made at Lake Horn of the dimensions of a human body, according to Trelani's orders. And on August 15 the body of Lieutenant Williams was disinterred from the sand where it had been buried when cast up. Byron recognized him by his clothes and his teeth. The funeral rites were performed by Trelani by throwing incense, salt, and wine on the pyre, according to classic custom. And when nothing remained but some black ashes and small pieces of white bone, these were placed by Trelani and one of the oaken boxes he had provided for the purpose, and then consigned to Byron and Hunt. The next day another pyre was raised. And again the soldiers had to dig for the body, buried in lime. When placed in the furnace it was three hours before the consuming body showed the still-unconsumed heart, which Trelani saved from the furnace, snatching it out with his hand, and there, amidst the Italian beauty on the Italian shore, was consumed the body of the poet, who held out a mortal hope to his kind, who in advance of the scientists held it as a noble fact that humanity was progressive. Who, more for this than for his unfortunate first marriage and its unhappy sequel, was banished by his countrymen and held as nothing by his generation. But as Clare wrote later in her diary, it might be said of him, as Cicero said of Rome, ungrateful England shall not possess my bones. The ashes of the body were placed in the oaken box. Those of the heart, handed by Trelani to Hunt, were afterwards given into the possession of Mary, who jealously guarded them during her life in a place where they were found at her death, in a silken case, in which was kept a peasant copy of the Adonais. The ashes of Shelley's body were finally buried in the Cemetery in Rome, where the grave of the English poet is now one of the strongest links between the present and the past world. And there beside him rests now the ashes of his faithful friend, Trelani, who survived him nearly sixty years. Mrs. Shelley by Lucy Maddox-Brown-Rosetti. CHAPTER XIII. WIDOWHOOD The last ceremony was over. Hope, fear, despair were passed, and Mary Shelley had to recommence her life, or death in life, her one solace, her little son, her one resource for many years, her work. Fortunately for her, her education and her studious habits were a shield against the cold world which she had to encounter, and her accustomed personal economy which had fitted her to be the worthy companion to her generous husband, whom she had encouraged rather than thwarted in his constantly recurring acts of philanthropy, would help her in her present struggle, and one friend was ready to assist with advice and out of his then slender means, Mr. Trelani. But from England no help was forthcoming. Godwin's affairs, having reached the climax of bankruptcy, already referred to, were not likely to settle down easily, now that the ever-ready supply was suddenly cut short. Sir Timothy Shelley was not inclined to continue the terms he made with his son, nor was anything to be arranged but on conditions which Mrs. Shelley could never consent to. Of her despondent state of misery we can judge in her letters of 1822 to Clare, as when she writes from Genoa, September 15, this hateful Genoa. And describing her misery on her husband's death she exclaims, Well, I shall have his books and his manuscripts, and in these I shall live, and from the study of these I do expect some instance of content, some seconds of exaltation, that may render me happier here, and more worthy of him hereafter. Then there is nothing but unhappiness to me if indeed I accept Trelani, who appears so truly generous and kind. Nothing but the horror of being a burden to my family prevents my accompanying Jane to England. If I had any fixed income I should go at least to Paris, and I shall go the moment I have one. And again in December of the same year she writes to Clare, addressing her as Mademoiselle de Claremont, Shea Madame de Hennestine, Vienna. She mentions an approach to Sir Timothy, through lawyers, aboard of As yet, how she detests Genoa. Hunt does not like me. Her daily routine is copying Shelley's manuscripts and reading Greek. In her despair study is her only relief. She sees no one but Lord Byron, and the Guiccioli, once a month. Trelani seldom, and he is on the eve of his departure for Leghorn. Thus we find Mary Shelley, going on from day to day, too poor to travel so far as Paris, as yet her child in her work of love on her husband's manuscripts, filling up her time, till in February she had to undergo the mortification of her father-in-law, proposing that she should give her son up entirely to him, and in return receive a settled income. But Mary was not of those who can be either bought or sold, and having the means of subsistence in herself she could be independent. A letter from her father shows how they were at one on this important subject, and it must have been a great encouragement to her in her loneliness, as she was always diffident of her own powers. However, now her work lay in arranging and copying her husband's manuscripts, and saving treasures which but for her loving care might have been lost. In the spring of this year, 1823, Trelawney was in Rome arranging Shelley's grave, which he bought with the adjoining ground for himself, and he had the massive slab of stone placed there which still tells of the core cordium. In the autumn of the same year Mary found means for leaving the hated Genoa, and travelling through France she stayed for a time at Versailles, with her father's old friends, the Kennes, and of this visit one of the daughters, now Mrs. Cox, then a child of about six years, retains a lively and pleasing recollection. Brought up in France, and imbued with the idea and pictures of the Madonna and child, the little girl, on seeing Mrs. Shelley arrive with her small son, became impressed with the idea that the pale, sweet, oval-faced lady was the Madonna come to visit them. And this idea was not dispelled by the gentle manner and kind way that she had with the children. Reminding one who had been punished by mistake, that the next time she was naughty, she would have had her punishment in advance. This visit was followed later by the intimacy and friendship of the two families. In London, as we learned from a letter to Miss Holcroft, Mrs. Kenny's daughter, by her previous marriage with Holcroft, Mrs. Shelley was settled at 14, shelled her street Brunswick Square. She was then hoping that her father-in-law would make her an allowance sufficient for her to live comfortably in Dear Italy. And at all events, she had received a present supply so that much good at least has been accomplished by my journey. She felt quite lost in London, and Percy had not yet learned English. She had seen Lamb, but he did not remark on her being altered. She would then have returned to Italy, but her father did not like the idea. Among other work at this time Mary Shelley attempted a drama, but in this her father did not encourage her, as he writes to her in February 1824 that her personages are mere abstractions, not men and women. Godwin does not regret that she has not dramatic talent, as the want of it will save her much trouble and mortification. This disappointment did not discourage Mary, for in the next year she published, with Henry Cole Byrne of New Burlington Street, her novel The Last Man, of which a second edition appeared in the succeeding year. This must have been a great help to Mary's limited means. She had received four hundred pounds for her previous romance. During this year we find Mrs. Shelley living in Kentish town, as she writes from that address to Trilani in July 1824. She is much cheered by finding her old friend still remembers her. She speaks of him as her warm-hearted friend, the remnant of the happy days of her vagabond life in beloved Italy. And now, shortly before writing, she had seen another link in her past life disappear, for the hearse containing the body of Lord Byrne had passed by her window going up Highgate Hill, on his last journey to the seat of his ancestors. Mary had been much interested in the account Trilani had sent her of Byrne's latest moments. She had been to see the poet's remains at the house where they lay in London. She saw his valet, Fletcher, and from a few words he imprudently let fall it would seem that his lordship spoke of sea in his last moments and of his wish to do something for her. At a time when his mind, vacillating between consciousness and allerium, would not permit him to do anything. She describes how Fletcher found Lady Byrne in great relief, but inexorable, and how Byrne's memoirs had been destroyed by Mrs. Lay in Hobhouse, but adds, There was not much in them, I know, for I read them some years ago at Venice, but the world fancied that it was to have a confession of the hidden feelings of one concerning whom they were always passionately curious. She says that Moore was much disgusted. He was writing a life of Byrne. But it was considered that although he had the manuscripts so long in his hands he had not found time to read them. She asks Trilani to help Moore with any facts or details. Mary thanks Trilani for his wish that she and Jane Williams, who see each other and little else every day, should join him in Greece. That is impossible, but she looks for him to come in the winter to England. She speaks of July as fatal to her for good and ill. On this very, very day she is writing July twenty-eighth. I went to France with my Shelley, how young, heedless and happy and poor we were then. And now my sleeping boy is all that is left to me of that time. My boy in a thousand recollections which never sleep. She describes the pretty country lanes round Kentish Town. If only there were cloudless skies and orange sunsets she would not mind the scenery, but she can attach herself to no one. She and Jane live there alone. Her child is an excellent health, a tall, fine, handsome boy. She is still in hopes that she will get an income of three or four hundred a year from Sir Timothy in a few months. One of her chief wishes and being independent would be to help Claire, who was in Russia. Of this time Claire wrote a good account in her diary. These letters to Tullani give much insight into the present life of Mary Shelley, and refer to much of interest in her past. On February twenty-fifth she tells how she had been with Jane, her father, and Count Gamba to see Keane and our fellow. But she adds, yet my dear friend I wish we had seen it represented as was talked of at Pisa. Iago would never have found a better representative than that strange and wondrous creature whom one regrets daily more. For who can equal him? Tullani adds a note that in 1822 Byron had contemplated that he, Tullani, Williams, Medwin, Mary Shelley, and Mrs. Williams were to take the several parts. Byron, Iago, Tullani Othello, Mary Desdemona. Tullani adds that Byron recited a great portion of his part with great gusto and looked at two. Byron said that all Pisa were to be the audience. Letters from Tullani, from Zontë, in 1826 carry on the correspondence. He regrets that poverty keeps them apart, speaks of the difficulty of traveling without money. He rejoices that he still holds a place in her affections and says, you know, Mary, that I always loved you impetuously and sincerely. In 1827, still writing from Kentish Town on Easter Sunday, but saying that in future her address will be at her father's, 44 Gower Place, Bedford Square, we have another of her charming letters to her friend, full of good reflections. In this letter she tells how Jane Williams has united her life with that of Shelley's early friend, Mr. Jefferson Hogg. He had loved her devotedly since her arrival in England five years earlier, but till now she had been too constant to William's memory to accept him. Claire was still in Russia. Mary writes, I wrote to you last while I entertained the hope that my money-cares were diminishing, but shabby as the best of these shabby people was, I am not to arrive at that best without due waiting and anxiety, nor do I yet see the end of this worse than tedious uncertainty. Mary was to see Shelley's younger brother, who was just married, but she had small hope of reaping any good from his visit. She adds, I do, my dear friend, while hearts such as yours beat I will not wholly despond. Mary refers with great kindness to hunt and is most anxious as to his future. She also notices with high satisfaction that the wigs with canning are in the ascendant and that they may be favourable to Greece. While Mary Shelley was residing in Kentish Town, before she joined her father in Gower Place, after the winding up of his affairs, a letter from Godwin to his wife at the seaside shows that the latter considered he did not need her society as Mrs. Shelley was with him. He explains that he sees her about twice a week, but is feeling lonely every day. After Mary removed to Gower Place in 1827, among other work she was occupied by her lives of eminent literary men for Lardner's Cyclopedia. About the same year Godwin writes to his daughter, who is evidently in very low spirits, wishing that she resembled him in temperament rather than the Wollstone Crafts. But explains that his present good spirits may be owing to his work on Cromwell. A little later we find Godwin writing to Mary himself in depression. He is troubled by publishers who will not decide to take a novel—three, four or five hundred pounds—and to be subsisted by them while I write it, is what he hoped to get. Mrs. Shelley was at self-end for change of air and wishing her father to join her, but this he could not decide on. Every day lost is taking away from his means of subsistence, for he is writing now, not for marble to be placed over his remains, but for bread to be put into his mouth. In April 1829 Mrs. Shelley, writing still from her father's address, 44 Gower Street, complains to Trelani in a truly English way, as she says, of the weather. She rejoices that her friend has taken to work in hopes that his friends will keep him to recording his own adventures. But she strongly dissuades him from writing A Life of Shelley, for how could that be done without bringing her into publicity, which she shrinks from fearfully, though she is forced by her hired situation to meet it in a thousand ways? Or as she expresses it, I will tell you what I am, a silly goose, who far from wishing to stand forward to assert myself in any way, now that I am alone in the world, have but the desire to wrap night in the obscurity of insignificance around me. This is weakness, but I cannot help it. Neither does Mary consider that the time has come to write Shelley's life, though she herself hopes to do some day. Towards the end of 1830 we find Mary in Somerset Street, Whitman Square, from which place she writes to Trelawney on the subject of his manuscript of Adventures of a Younger Son, which she had consigned to her hands to place with a publisher, make the best terms for that she could, and see through the press, a task distasteful to Trelawney to the last. Mrs. Shelley had much admired the work, considering it full of passion and interest. But she does not hesitate to point out the blemishes, certain coarsenesses, which she begs him to allow her to deal with, as she would have dealt with parts of Lord Byron's Don Juan. She is sure that without this she will have great difficulty in disposing of the book. Mary finds the absorbing politics of the day a great hindrance to publishing, and says, God knows how it will all end, but it looks as if the aristocrats would have the good sense to make the necessary sacrifices to a starving population. The worry of awaiting the decision of the publisher was felt by Mrs. Shelley more than for Trelawney than for herself. She finds it difficult to make the terms she wishes for him, and writing to her friend on March 22 of the next year, she regrets that she cannot make coal burn the best publisher she knows of, give five hundred pounds as she wishes, but trusts to get three hundred pounds for first edition and two hundred pounds for second. But times have changed since she first returned to England. Neither she nor her father can command the same prices which they did then. At that time publishers came to seek me, she writes, now money is scarcer and readers fewer than ever. Three days later she is able to add the news that she has received the ultimatum of these great people. Three hundred pounds down and one hundred pounds on second edition. She thinks four thousand copies. She advises acceptance but will try other publishers if he wish it. Mary again regrets that it is impossible for her to go to Italy. She expresses herself as wretched in England, and in spite of her sanguine disposition and capacity to endure, which have borne her up hither too, she feels sinking at last, situated as she is, it is impossible for her not to be wretched. Mary does not give way long to despondency. She goes on to tell news as to Medwyn Hogg, Jane, etc. She can even tease Trelawney about the different ladies who believe themselves the sole object of his affection, and tells him she is having a certain letter of his about Caroline, lithographed, and thinks of dispensing one hundred copies among the many hapless fair. A third letter on the subject of the book, on June 14th, 1831, tells Trelawney how his work is in progress, and Horace Smith, who much admires it, has promised to revise it. Again, in July of the same year, she writes that the third volume is in print, and his book will soon be published, but that as his mother talks openly of his memoirs and society, she must not hope for secrecy. In this letter also we have a fact which redounds to the credit of both Mary Shelley and Trelawney, as she clearly tells him that she cannot marry him, but remains, in all gratitude and friendship, his MS. Trelawney had evidently made her an offer of marriage, moved perhaps by gratitude for her help, as well as probably, in his case, a passing love. Though she writes to him, My name will never be Trelawney. 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 women kind in general, and Mary S. will never be yours. I write in haste. Etc., etc. Trelawney would never have offered his name thus to a woman he could not respect, and perhaps few know better than those of his reckless class who were most worthy of respect. Mary Shelley, who dreaded men's looks or words, by her own knowledge in her intimate friend's accounts, had no fear of him. He had the instincts of a gentleman for a true lady who may be found in any class. Four years later we have Mary again writing to Mr. Trelawney with regard to his book, a second edition being called for. When to her confusion she finds that through her not having read over the agreement, and having taken for granted that the proposal of three hundred pounds on first edition, with one hundred pounds more on second, was inserted, she had signed the contract, but now it turned out that what was proposed by letter was not inserted by Eulier in his agreement, and she knew not what to do. In a second letter, a few days later, from Harrow, where she lived for a while to be near her son at school, she wrote in answer to Trelawney, proposing Peacock as umpire, because, she writes, he would not lean to the strongest side, which Jefferson as a lawyer is inclined, I think, to do. Euler, she writes, devoutly wished she had read the agreement, as the clause ought to have been in it. Again a few months later, on April 7th, 1836, there is another letter asking Trelawney if he would like to attend her father's funeral, and if he would go with the undertaker to choose the spot nearest to her mother's, in St. Pancras Churchyard, and if he could do this, to write to Mrs. Godwin, at the ex- checker, to tell her so. The last few years of Godwin's life had not ended, as he had so bitterly apprehended and penury, as his friends in power had obtained for him the post of Yeoman Usher of the ex-checker, with residence in New Palace Yard in 1833. The office was, in fact, a sinecure, and was soon abolished, but it was arranged that no change should be made in the old philosopher's position. His old friends had died, but his work had its reward for him, as well as its high place in the thought of the world. For such people as the Duke of Wellington and Lord Melbourne had used their influence for him. Mary had been his constant devoted daughter to the last. In 1834 he writes to his wife of Mrs. Shelley, as he always called his daughter to Mrs. Godwin, of various meetings and dinners with each other, though he cannot attend her evenings as she would wish since the walk across the park to reach Somerset Street, where she then lived, was by no means pleasant after dark. And now we find Mary honoring Trelawney with the last service for her father, apologizing, but adding, Are you not the best in most constant of friends? Godwin's last grief was the loss of his son, William, in 1832. He had been settled in a literary career and left a widow. One of Mary's first acts of generosity later on was to settle a pension on her. CHAPTER XIV. PART I. Literary Work Having traced Mary's life as far as space will allow to the death of her father, we must now retrace our steps to show the work she did, which gives the raison d'etre for this biography. It has already been shown that her second book, Valperga, much admired by Shelley, was written to assist her father in his distress before his bankruptcy. After her husband's death, while arranging his manuscripts, and noting facts and connection with them, she planned and wrote her third romance, The Last Man. This highly imaginative work of Mary Shelley's twenty-sixth year contains some of the author's most powerful ideas, but is marred in the commencement by some of her most stilted writing. The account of the events recorded professes to be found in the cave of the Comsian Sibyl, near Naples, where they had remained for centuries, outlasting the changes of nature, and when found being still two hundred and fifty years in advance of the time foretold. The accounts are all written on the Sibylian leaves. They are in all languages, ancient and modern, and those concerning the story are in English. We find ourselves in England in 2073, in the mists of a republic, the last king of England having abdicated at the quietly expressed wish of his subjects. This book, like all Mrs. Shelley's, is full of biographical reminiscences. The introduction gives the date of her own visit to Naples with Shelley in 1818. The places they visited are there indicated. The poetry romance, the pleasures and pains of her own existence are worked into her subjects, while her imagination carries her out of her own surroundings. We clearly recognize in the ideal character of the son of the abdicated king an imaginary portrait of Shelley, as Mary would have known him, not as she knew him as a living person. To give an adequate idea of genius with all his charm, and yet with its human imperfections, was beyond Mary's power. Adrian the son of kings, the aristocratic republican, is the weakest part, and one cannot help being struck by Mary Shelley's preference for the aristocrat over the plebeian. In fact, Mary's idea of a republic still needed king's sons by their good manners to grace it, while at the same time the king's son had to be transmuted into an ideal Shelley. The strange confusion of ideas allowed for, in the fact that over half a century of perhaps the earth's most rapid period of progress has passed, the imaginative qualities are still remarkable in Mary. Balloons, then dreamed of, were attained, but naturally the steam engine and other wonders of science now achieved were unknown to Mary. When the plague breaks out, she has scope for her fancy, and she certainly adds vivid pictures of horror and pathos to a subject which has been handled by masters of thought at different periods. In this time of horror it is amusing to note how the people's candidate, Rylan, represented as a vulgar specimen of humanity, succumbs to abject fear. The description of the deserted towns and grass-grown streets of London is impressive. The fortunes of the family to whom the last man, Lionel Verne, belongs, are traced through their varying phases, as one by one the dire plague assails them, and Verne, the only man who recovers from the disease, becomes the leader of the remnant of the English nation. This small handful of humanity leaves England and wanders through France on its way to the favorite southern countries, where human aid, now so scarce, was less needed. On this journey Mrs. Shelley avails herself of reminiscences of her own traveling with Shelley some few years before, and we pass the places noted in her diary, but strange grotesque figures cross the path of the few wanderers who are decimated each day. At one moment a dying acrobat, deserted by his companions, is seen bounding in the air behind a hedge in the dusk of the evening. At another a black figure mounted on a horse, which only shows itself after dark, to cause apprehensions soon calmed by the death of the poor wanderer, who wished only for distant companionship through dread of contagion. Dijon is reached and passed, and here the old Countess of Windsor, the ex-Queen of England, dies. She had only been reconciled to her changed position by the destruction of humanity. Once near Geneva they come upon the sound of divine music in a church, and find a dying girl, playing to her blind father to keep up the delusion to the last. The small party, reduced by this time to five, reached Chamouni, and the grand scenes so familiar to Mary contrast with the final tragedy of the human race. Yet one more dies, and only four of one family remain. They bury the dead man in an ice-cavern, and with this last victim, find the pestilence has ended, after a seven years rain over the earth. A wait is lifted from the atmosphere, and the world is before them. But now alone they must visit her ruins, and the beauty of the earth, and the love of each other, bear them up till none but the last man remains to complete the comesian Sibyl's prophecy. Various stories of minor importance followed from Mrs. Shelley's pen, and preparations were made for the lives of eminent literary men. But it was not till the year preceding her father's death that we have L'Adore published in 1835. Of this novel we have already spoken in relation to the separation of Shelley and Harriet. Mary had too much feeling of art in her work to make an imaginary character a mere portrait, and we are constantly reminded in her novels of the different wonderful and interesting personages whom she knew intimately, though most of their characters were far too subtle and complex to be unraveled by her, even with her intimate knowledge. Indeed, the very fact of having known some of the greatest people of her age, or of almost any age, gives an appearance of affection to her novels, as it fills them with characters so far from the common run that their place in life cannot be reduced to an ordinary fashionable level. Romantic episodes there may be, but their true place is in the theatre of time of which they are the movers, not the little apputians of life who are slowly worked on and molded by them, and whose small doings are the material of most novels. We know a few novelists who have touched at all successfully on the less known characters. This accomplishment seems to need the great poet himself. The manner in which Lady Lodore is influenced seems to point to Harriet, but the unyielding and revengeful side of her character has certainly more of Lady Byron. She is charmingly described and shows a great deal of insight on Mary's part into the life of fashionable people of her time, which then, perhaps more than now, was the favourite theme with novelists. This must be owing to a certain inate Tory propensity in the English classes or masses for whom Mary Shelley had to work hard, and for whose tendencies in this respect she certainly had a sympathy. Mary's own life at this point we have now reached is also here touched on in the character of Ethel, Lord and Lady Lodore's daughter, who was brought up in America by her father, and on his death entrusted to an aunt, with injunctions in his will that she is not to be allowed to be brought in contact with her mother. Her character is sweetly feminine and trusting, and in her fortunate love and marriage, in all but the early money matters, might be considered quite unlike Mary's own less fortunate experiences. But in her perfect love and confidence in her husband, her devotion and unselfishness through the trials of poverty in London, the descriptions of which were evidently taken from Mary's own experiences, there is no doubt of the resemblance, as also in her love and reverence for all connected with her father. There are also passages undoubtedly expressive of her own inner feelings, such as this one describing the young husband with a wife at a tetate supper. Mutual esteem and gratitude sanctified the unreserved sympathy which made each so happy in the other. Did they love the less for not loving and sin and fear? Far from it. The certainty of being the cause of good to each other tended to foster the most delicate of all passions. More than the rough administrations of terror and the knowledge that each was the occasion of injury. A woman's heart is peculiarly unfitted to sustain this conflict. Her sensibility gives keenness to her imagination and she magnifies every peril and writhes beneath every sacrifice which tends to humiliate her in her own eyes. The natural pride of her sex struggles with her desire to confer happiness and her peace is wrecked. What stronger expression of feeling could be needed than this of a woman speaking from her heart in her own experiences? Does it not remind one of the moral on this subject in all George Eliot's writing, where she shows that the outcome of what by some might be considered minor transgressions against morality leads even in modern times to the nemesis of the most terrible Greek dramas? The complicated money transactions carried on with the aid of lawyers were clearly a reminiscence of Shelley's troubles into her own incapacity to feel all the distress contingent so long as she was with him and there was evidently money somewhere in the family and it would come some time. In this novel we also perceive that Mary works off her pent-up feelings with regard to Amelia Viviani. It cannot be supposed that the corporeal part of Shelley's creation of Epicycadion so exquisite in appearance and touching in manner and story as to give rise when transmitted through the poet's brain to the most perfect of love ideals really ultimately became the fiery tempered, worldly-minded varigo that Mary Shelley indulges herself in depicting, after first, in spite of altering some relations and circumstances, clearly showing whom the character was intended for. It is true that Shelley himself, after investing her with divinity to serve the purposes of art, speaks later of her as a very commonplace, worldly-minded woman. But poets, like artists, seem at times to needly figures to attire with their thoughts. Enough has been shown to prove that there is genuine subject of interest in this work of Mary's 37th year. The next work, Faulkner, published in 1837, is the last novel we have by Mary Shelley. And as we see from her letter she had been writing, she had been passing through a period of ill-health and depression while writing it. This may account for less spontaneity in the style which is decidedly more stilted. But here again we feel that we are admitted to some of the circle which Mary had encountered in the stirring times of her life, and there is undoubted imagination with some fine descriptive passages. The opening chapter introduces a little deserted child in a picturesque, cornish village. Her parents had died there in apartments, one after the other, the husband having married a governess against the wishes of his relations. Consequently, the wife was first neglected on her husband's death, and on her own sudden death a few months later the child was simply left to the care of the poor people of the village, a dreamy, poetic little thing, whose one pleasure was to stroll in the twilight to the village churchyard and be with her mama. Here she was found by Faulkner, the principal character of the romance, who had selected this very spot to end a ruined existence, and which attempt he was frustrated by the child jogging his arm to move him from her mother's grave. His life being thus saved by the child's instrumentality he naturally became interested in her. He is allowed to look through the few remaining papers of the parents. Among these he finds that unfinished letter of the wife evidently addressed to a lady he had known, and also indications who the parents were. He was much moved and offered to relieve the poor people of the child and to restore her to her relations. The mother's unfinished letter to her friend contains the following passage, surely autobiographical. When I lost Edwin, the husband, I wrote to Mr. Rabie, the husband's father, acquainting him with the sad intelligence and asking for maintenance for myself and my child. The family solicitor answered my letter. Edwin's conduct had, I was told, estranged his family from him, and they could only regard me as one encouraging his disobedience and apostasy. I had no claim on them. If my child was sent to them and I would promise to abstain from all intercourse with her, she should be brought up with her cousins and treated in all respects like one of the family. I declined the barbarous offer, and haughtily and in few words relinquished every claim on their bounty, declaring my intention to support and bring up my child myself. This was foolishly done, I fear, but I cannot regret it even now. I cannot regret the impulse that made me disdain these unnatural and cruel relatives, or that led me to take my poor orphan to my heart with pride as being all my own. What had they done to merit such a treasure, and did they show themselves capable of replacing a fond and anxious mother? This reminds the reader of the correspondence between Mary and her father on Shelley's death. It suffices to say that Faulkner became so attached to the small child that by the time he discovered her relations he had not the heart to confide her to their hard guardianship, and as he was compelled to leave England shortly he took her with him, and through all difficulties he contrived that she should be well guarded and brought up. There is much in the character of Faulkner that reminds the reader of Trelawney, the gallant and generous friend of Byron and Shelley in their last years, the brave and romantic traveller. The description of Faulkner's face and figure must have much resembled that of Trelawney when young, though of course the incidents of the story have no connection with him. In the meantime the little girl is growing up, and the nurses are replaced by an English governess whom Faulkner engages abroad and whose praises and qualifications he hears from everyone at Odessa. The story progresses through various incidents foreshadowing the cause of Faulkner's mystery. Elizabeth, the child, now grown up, passes under his surname. While travelling in Germany they come across a youth of great personal attraction, who appears, however, to be of a singularly, reckless, and misanthropical disposition, for one so young. Elizabeth, seeming attracted by his daring and beauty, Faulkner suddenly finds it necessary to return to England. Shortly afterwards he is moved to go to Greece during the War of Independence and wishes to leave Elizabeth with her relations in England. But this she strenuously opposes, so far as to induce Faulkner to let her accompany him to Greece, where he places her with a family while he rushes into the thick of the danger only hoping to end his life in a good cause. In this he nearly succeeds, but Elizabeth, hearing of his danger, hastens to his side and nurses him assiduously through the fever brought on from his wounds in the malaria's climate. By short stages and the utmost care she succeeds in reaching Malta on their homeward journey, and Faulkner, a second time rescued from death by his beloved adopted child, determines not again to endanger recklessly the life more dear to her than that of many fathers. Again at Malta, during a fortnight's quarantine, the smallness of the world of fashionable people brings them in contact with an English party, a lord and lady Cecil, who were traveling with their family. Faulkner is too ill to see any one, and when Elizabeth finally gets him on board a vessel to proceed to Genoa, he seems rapidly sinking. In his despair and lowliness, feeling unable to cope with all the difficulties of burning sun and cold winds, help unexpectedly comes, a gentleman whom Elizabeth has not before perceived, and who now, she is too much preoccupied to observe. Quietly arranges the sail to shelter the dying man from sun and wind, places pillows and does all that is possible, he even induces the poor girl to go below and rest on a couch for a time while he watches. Faulkner becomes easier in the course of the night, he sleeps and gains in strength, and from this he progresses till, while at Marseille he hears the name Neville, of the unknown friend who had helped to restore him to life. He becomes extremely agitated and faints. On being restored to consciousness he begs Elizabeth to continue the journey with him alone, as he can bear no one but her near him. The mystery of Faulkner's life seems to be forcing itself to the surface. The Travellers reach England, and Elizabeth is sought out by the Lady Cecil, who had been much struck by her devotion to her father. Elizabeth is invited to stay with Lady Cecil, as she much needs rest in her turn. During a pleasant time of repose near Hastings, Elizabeth hears Lady Cecil talk much of her brother Gerard, but it is not till he too arrives on a visit that she acknowledges to herself that he is really the same Mr. Neville whom she had met, and from whom she had received such kindness. Before had Gerard spoken of Elizabeth, he had been too much drawn towards her, as his life also is darkened by a mystery. They spend a short tranquil time together. When a letter announces the approaching arrival of Sir Boyville Neville, the young man's father, although Lady Cecil called Gerard her brother, they were not really related. Sir Boyville had married the mother of Lady Cecil, who was the offspring of a previous marriage. Gerard Neville at once determines to leave the house, but before going, refers Elizabeth to his sister, Lady Cecil, to hear the particulars of the tragedy which surrounds him. The story told is this. Sir Boyville Neville was a man of the world with all the too frequent disbelief in women and selfishness. This led to his becoming very tyrannical when he married, at the age of 45, Aletheia, a charming young woman who had recently lost her mother, and whose father, a retired naval officer of limited means, would not hear of her refusing so good an offer as Sir Boyville's. After their marriage, Sir Boyville, feeling himself too fortunate in having secured so charming and beautiful a wife, kept out of all society, and after living abroad for some years, took her to an estate he possessed in Cumberland. They lived there shut out from all the world except for trips which he took himself to London, or elsewhere, whenever on we assailed him. They had, at the time we are approaching, two charming children, a beautiful boy of some ten years, and a little girl of two. At this time, while Aletheia perfectly happy with her children, and quite contented with her retirement, which she perceived took away the jealous tortures of her husband, he left home for a week, drawn out to two months, on one of his periodical visits to the capital. Lady Neville's frequent letters concerning her home and her children were always cheerful and placid. In the time for her husband's return was fixed. He arrived at the appointed hour in the evening. The servants were at the door to receive him. But in an instant alarm prevailed. Lady Neville and her son Gerard were not with him. They had left the house some hours before to walk in the park, and had not since been seen or heard of. An unprecedented occurrence. The alarm was raised. The country searched in all directions, but ineffectually, during a fearful tempest. Ultimately the poor boy was found unconscious on the ground, drenched to the skin. On being taken home, and his father questioning him. All that could be heard were his cries. Come back, Mama. Stop, stop for me. Nothing else but the tossings of fever. Once again. Then she has come back, he cried. That man did not take her quite away. The carriage drove here at last. The story slowly elicited from the child on his gaining strength was this. On his going for a walk with his mother in the park she took the key of a gate which led into a lane. A gentleman was waiting outside. Gerard had never seen him before, but he heard his mother call him Rupert. They walked together through the lane accompanied by the child, and talked earnestly. She wept, and the boy was indignant. When they reached a cross-road a carriage was waiting. On approaching it the gentleman pulled the child's hand from hers, lifted her in, spraying in after her, and the coachman drove like the wind, leaving the child to hear his mother shriek in agony. My child, my son! Nothing more could be discovered. The country was ransacked in vain. The servants only stated that ten days ago a gentleman called, asked for Lady Neville, and was shown in to her. He remained some two hours, and on his leaving it was remarked that she had been weeping. He had called again but was not admitted. One letter was found to signed Rupert, begging for one more meeting, and if that were granted he would leave her in his just revenge forever, otherwise he could not tell what the consequences might be on her husband's return that night. In answer to this letter she went, but with her child, which clearly proved her innocent intention. Months passed with no fresh result till her husband, died himself with wounded pride, determined to be avenged by obtaining a bill of divorce in the House of Lords, and producing his son Gerard as evidence against his lost mother, whom he so dearly loved. The poor child by this time, by dint of thinking and weighing every word he could remember, such as, I grieve deeply for you, Rupert. My good wishes are all I have to give you. It became more and more convinced that his mother was taken forcibly away, and would return at any moment if she were able. He only longed for the time when he should be old enough to go and seek her through the world. His father was relentless, and the child was brought before the House of Lords to repeat the evidence he had innocently given against her. But when called on to speak in that awful position, no word could be drawn from him except, she is innocent. The house was moved by the brave child's agony and resolved to carry on the case without him, and the witnesses whom he had spoken to. And finally they pronounced a decree of divorce in Sir Boyville's favor. The struggle and agony of the poor child are admirably described, as also his subsequent flight from his father's house, and wanderings round his old home in Cumberland. In his fruitless search for his mother he reached a deserted sea-coast. After wandering about for two months barefoot and almost starving but for the used milk and bread given him by the cottagers, he was recognized. His father being informed had him seized and brought home, where he was confined and treated as a criminal. His state became so helpless that even his father was at length moved to some feeling of self-restraint, and finally took Gerard with him abroad, when he was first seen at Baden by Elizabeth and Pogner. There also he first met his sister by affinity, Lady Cecil. With her he lost somewhat his defiant tone and felt that for his mother's sake he must not appear to others as lost in sullenness and despair. He now talked of his mother and reasoned about her, but although he had much interested Lady Cecil, he did not convince her really of his mother's innocence. So much did all circumstances weigh against her. But now, during Elizabeth's visit to Lady Cecil, a letter is received by Gerard and his father informing them that one Gregory Hoskings believed he could give some information he was at Lancaster. Sir Boyville only anxious to hush up the matter by which his pride had suffered, hastened to prevent his son from taking steps to reopen the subject. This Hoskings was originally a native of the district round Drumeau, Neville's home, and had emigrated to America at the time of Sir Boyville's marriage. At one time, years ago, he met a man named Osborne, who confided to him how he had gained money before coming to America by helping a gentleman to carry off a lady, and how terribly the affair ended, as the lady got drowned in a river near which they had placed her, while nearly dead from fright, on the dangerous coast of Cumberland. On returning to England and hearing the talk about the Neville's in his native village, this old story came to his mind and he wrote his letter. Neville, on hearing this, instantly determined to proceed to Mexico, trace out Osborne and bring him to accuse his mother's murderer. All these details were written by Elizabeth to her beloved father. After some delay, one line entreated her to come to him instantly for one day. Faulkner could not ignore the present state of things, the mutual attraction of his Elizabeth and of Gerard, yet how, with all he knew, could that be suffered to proceed? Never except by eternal separation from his adored child, but this should be done. He would now tell her his story. He could not speak but he wrote it, and now she must come and receive it from him. He told of all his solitary, unloved youth, the miseries and tyranny of school to the unprotected, a reminiscence of Shelley. How on emerging from childhood, one gleam of happiness entered his life in the friendship of a lady, an old friend of his mother's, who had one lovely daughter, of the happy, innocent time spent in their cottage during holidays, of the dear lady's death, of her daughter's despair, then how he was sent off to India, of the letters he wrote to the daughter, Alathea, letters unanswered as the father, the naval officer, intercepted all, of his return after years to England, his one hope that which had buoyed him up through years of constancy to meet and marry his only love, for that he felt she was and must remain. He recounted his return and the news lie received, his one rash visit to her to judge for himself whether she was happy, this from her manner he could not feel, and spite of her delight in her children, his mad request to see her, mad plot, and still mad her execution of it, till he had her in his arms dashing through the country, through storm and thunder, unable to tell whether she lived or died, the first moment of pause, the efforts to save the ebbing life in a ruined hut, the few minutes absence to seek materials for fire, the return to find her a floating corpse in the wild little river flowing to the sea, the rescue of her body from the waves, her burial on the seashore, and his own subsequent life of despair, saved twice by Elizabeth. All this was told to the son, to whom Faulkner denounced himself as his mother's destroyer. He named the spot where the remains would be found, and now what was left to be done, only to wait a little while Sir Boyville and Gerard Neville proved his words and traced out the grave. An inquest was held and Faulkner apprehended. A few days passed, and then Elizabeth found her father gone, and by degrees it was broken to her, that he was in Carlisle jail on the charge of murder. She who had not feared the dangers in Greece of war and fever, was not to be deterred now. She who believed in his innocence. No minutes were needed to decide her to go straight to Carlisle, and remain as near as she could to the dear father who had rescued and cared for her when deserted. Gerard, who was with his father when the bones were exhumed at the spot indicated, soon realized the new situation. His passion for justice to his mother did not deaden his feelings for others. He felt that Faulkner's story was true, and though nothing could restore his mother's life, her honor was intact. Sir Boyville would leave no stone unturned to be revenged, rightly or wrongly, on the man who had assailed his domestic peace. But Gerard saw Elizabeth, gave what consolation he could, and determined to set off at once to America to seek Osborne as the only witness who could exculpate Faulkner from the charge of murder. After various difficulties Osborne was found in England, where he had returned in terror of being taken in America as the accomplice in the murder. With great difficulty he is brought to give evidence, for all his thoughts and fears are for himself. But at length, when all hopes seem failing, he is induced by Elizabeth to give his evidence, which fully confirms Faulkner's statement. At length the day of trial came. The news of liberty arrived. Not guilty. Who can imagine the effect but those who have passed innocently through the ordeal? Once more all are united. Gerard has to remain for the funeral of his father, who had died affirming his belief which in fact he had always entertained, in Faulkner's innocence. The Cecil had secured for Elizabeth the companionship of Mrs. Rabie, her relation on the father's side. She takes Faulkner and Elizabeth home to the beautiful ancestral Bella Forest. Here a time of rest and happiness ensues. Those so much tried by adversity would not let real happiness escape for a chimera. Honor being restored, love and friendship remained, and Gerard, Elizabeth and Faulkner felt that now they ought to remain together, with not having disunited them. Too much space may appear to be given here to one romance. But it seems just to show the scope of Mary's imaginative conception. There are certainly both imagination and power in carrying it out. It is true that the ideas seem founded, to some extent, on Godwin's Caleb Williams, the man passing through life with a mystery. The similar names of Faulkner and Faulkland may even be meant to call attention to this fact. The three-volume form, in this, as in many novels, seems to detract from the strength of the work in parts, the second volume being noticeably drawn out here and there. It may be questioned also, whether the form adopted in this, as in many romances, of giving the early history by way of narrative told by one of the Dramatis personae, to another is the desirable one, a point to which we have already averted to in relation to Frankenstein. Can it be true to nature to make one character give a description, over a hundred pages long, repeating at length, word for word, long conversations, which he has never heard, marking the changes of color which he has not seen, and all this with a minuteness which even the firmest memory and the most equations tongue could not recall? Does not this give an unreality to the style incompatible with art, which ought to be the main spring of all imaginative work? This, however, is not Mrs. Shelley's era alone, but is traceable through many masterpieces. The author, the creator, who sees the workings of the soul of his characters, has naturally memory and perception for all. Yet Mary Shelley, in this, as in most of her work, has great insight into character. Elizabeth's grandfather, in his dotage, is quite a photograph from life. Old Oswig Rabey, who was more shriveled with narrowness of mind than with age, but who felt himself in his house the oldest in England, of more importance than ought else he knew of. His daughter-in-law, the widow of his eldest son, is also well-drawn. A woman of upright nature who could acknowledge the faults of the family and try to retrieve them, and who finally does her best to atone for the past.