Leigh Hunt's Relations with Byron, Shelley and Keats Part 21

[358] _Autobiography_, II, p. 59.

[359] After Sh.e.l.ley's meeting with Byron in Switzerland in 1816, before they met again in Venice, there had been a lapse of two years bridged only by a not always pleasant correspondence relating to Allegra, Byron's natural daughter. Sh.e.l.ley occupied the unenviable position of mediator between him and Jane Clairmont, the child's mother. Yet when the two men met again in August, 1818, it was at first on the terms recorded in _Julian and Maddalo_. Byron's influence served as a stimulus to this and to other poems of the same period. By December of that year Sh.e.l.ley's opinion of Byron had changed; on the 22d, he wrote to Peac.o.c.k of _Childe Harold_ in terms that show how quickly his views could alter: "The spirit in which it is written, is, if insane, the most wicked and mischievous insanity that was ever given forth. It is a kind of obstinate and self-willed folly, in which he hardens himself. I remonstrated with him in vain on the tone of mind from which such a view of things alone arises....

He (Byron) a.s.sociates with wretches who seem to have lost the gait and physiognomy of man, and who do not scruple to avow practices, which are not only not named, but I believe seldom even conceived in England. He says he disapproves, but he endures. He is heartily and deeply discontented with himself; and contemplating in the distorted mirror of his own thoughts the nature and destiny of man, what can he behold but objects of contempt and despair? But that he is a great poet, I think the address to Ocean proves. And he has a certain degree of candour while you talk to him, but unfortunately it does not outlast your departure. No, I do not doubt, and for his own sake, I ought to hope, that his present career must soon end in some violent circ.u.mstance." (_Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, pp. 80-81.)

From the close of 1818 until 1821, they were again separated. Their correspondence, as previously, related chiefly to Allegra and was of a still less agreeable nature. Byron had refused to deal directly with Jane Clairmont and all communications had to pa.s.s through Sh.e.l.ley's hands. In the interval, as though in retaliation, Byron had believed the s.h.i.+loh story, a fabrication by a nurse of the Sh.e.l.leys that Jane Clairmont was Sh.e.l.ley's mistress, but he does not seem to have condemned such a state of affairs. (_Letters and Journals_, V, p. 86, October, 1820.) Yet he testified in his letters his great admiration of Sh.e.l.ley's poetry (_Ibid._, VI, p. 387), and after his death he called him "The best and least selfish man I ever knew." (_Ibid._, VI, p. 98; August 3, 1822.) But before 1821, a reversal of the opinion formed in Sh.e.l.ley's mind at the time of Byron's Venetian excesses, came about. November 11, 1820, he wrote to Mrs. Hunt: "His indecencies, too, both against s.e.xual nature, and against human nature in general, sit very awkwardly upon him. He only affects the libertine; he is, really, a very amiable, friendly and agreeable man, I hear." (Hunt, _Correspondence_, I, p. 139.) This corroborates Thornton Hunt's statement that Byron had risen in Sh.e.l.ley's estimation before 1821 and that otherwise _The Liberal_ would never have been started. (_Atlantic Monthly_, February, 1863.)

At Byron's invitation they met again in Ravenna. Sh.e.l.ley's letters dated from there show unstinted admiration of Byron's genius and of the man himself. He wrote in August, 1821, that he was living a "life totally the reverse of that which he led at Venice.... (_Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p.

211, August 7, 1821.) L. B. is greatly improved in every respect. In genius, in temper, in moral views, in health, in happiness.... He has had mischievous pa.s.sions, but these he seems to have subdued, and he is becoming what he should be, a virtuous man.... (_Ibid._, VIII, p. 217, August 10, 1821.) Lord Byron and I are excellent friends, and were I reduced to poverty, or were I a writer who had no claims to a higher station than I possess--or did I possess a higher than I deserve, we should appear in all things as such, and I would freely ask him any favour. Such is not now the case. The daemon of mistrust and pride lurks between two persons in our station, poisoning the freedom of our intercourse. This is a tax and a heavy one, which we must pay for being human." Of _Don Juan_ he wrote: "It sets him not only above, but far above, all the poets of the day--every word is stamped with immortality. I despair of rivalling Lord Byron, as well I may, and there is no other with whom it is worth contending. (_Ibid._, VIII, p. 219, August 10, 1821.) During the visit Sh.e.l.ley served as amba.s.sador to the Countess Guiccioli in persuading her not to go to Switzerland, and in the same capacity to Byron in the arrangement of Allegra's affairs. It was then settled that Byron should reside for the winter at Pisa. Sh.e.l.ley had misgivings about such an arrangement on his own and on Miss Clairmont's account, for he had previously intended to settle in the same vicinity. He finally decided not to let it make any difference in his plans. In January, 1822, Sh.e.l.ley wrote from Pisa to Peac.o.c.k: "Lord Byron is established here, and we are his constant companions. No small relief this, after the dreary solitude of the understanding and the imagination in which we pa.s.sed the first years of our expatriation, yoked to all sorts of miseries and discomforts.... if you before thought him a great poet, what is your opinion now that you have read _Cain_?" (_Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 249; January 11, 1822.) During the same month he wrote to John Gisborne: "What think you of Lord Byron now? s.p.a.ce wondered less at the swift and fair creations of G.o.d, when he grew weary of vacancy, than I at this spirit of an angel in the mortal paradise of a decaying body." (_Ibid._, VIII, p.

251, January, 1822.)

A letter to Leigh Hunt gives the first intimation of the return of the ill-feeling toward Byron: "Past circ.u.mstances between Lord B. and me render it _impossible_ that I should accept any supply from him for my own use, or that I should ask for yours if the contribution could be supposed in any manner to relieve me, or to do what I could otherwise have done."

(_Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 253, January 25, 1822.) This referred to more entanglements with Byron about Allegra. Sh.e.l.ley wrote to Jane Clairmont: "It is of vital importance, both to me and yourself, to Allegra even, that I should put a period to my intimacy with Lord Byron, and that without eclat. No sentiments of honour and of justice restrain him (as I strongly suspect) from the basest suspicion, and the only mode in which I could effectually silence him I am reluctant (even if I had proof) to employ during my father's life. But for your immediate feelings, I would suddenly and irrevocably leave the country which he inhabits, nor even enter it but as an enemy to determine our differences without words."

(_The Nation_, XLVIII, p. 116.)

[360] _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 258.

[361] _Ibid._, VIII, p. 235, August 26, 1821.

[362] _Correspondence_, I, p. 172, September 21, 1821.

[363] _Ibid._, I, p. 174, November 16, 1821.

[364] Byron, _Letters and Journals_, IV, p. 129, June 4, 1817.

[365] _Ibid._, VI, pp. 117, 122, 127, 129, 134, 138, 158.

[366] _Ibid._, VI, p. 156.

[367] In 1814 Moore showed considerable pride in being included as one of the four poets to sup with Apollo in the _Feast of the Poets_ and said that he was "particularly flattered by praise from Hunt, because he is one of the most honest and candid men" that he knew. (_Memoirs, Journal and Correspondence_, II, p. 159.) In 1819 Hunt had urged upon Perry, the editor of the _Morning Chronicle_, the necessity of a public subscription for Moore. (_Ibid._, II, p. 340). An unfavorable review of Moore's political principles in _The Examiner_ during the same year may have done something to bring about the change in Moore's feelings, though he was eulogized in a later issue of January 21, 1821.

[368] B. W. Procter, _An Autobiographical Fragment_, p. 153.

[369] _Letters and Journals of Lord Byron_, II, p. 583.

[370] _Ibid._, II, p. 582.

[371] _Ibid._, II, p. 584.

[372] Jeaffreson, _The Real Lord Byron_, II, p. 188.

[373] _Recollections of the Last Days of Sh.e.l.ley and Byron_, p. 111.

[374] Nicoll, _Literary Anecdotes of the Nineteenth Century_, p. 353, March, 1822.

[375] _Ibid._, p. 356.

[376] _Fortnightly_, XXIX, p. 850.

[377] _Recollections of the Last Days of Sh.e.l.ley and Byron_, p. 112.

[378] _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 288-289.

[379] _Life of Sh.e.l.ley_, II, p. 459.

[380] _Autobiography_, II, p. 94.

[381] _Correspondence_, I, p. 86.

[382] Monkhouse, _Life of Leigh Hunt_, p. 156.

[383] Hunt refuted the statement that Byron had walled off part of his dwelling and furnished it handsomely. (_Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 14 ff.)

[384] _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, pp. 242, 253.

[385] Nicoll and Wise, _Literary Anecdotes of the Nineteenth Century_, p.

342, December 22, 1818.

[386] _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 286.

[387] _Correspondence_, I, p. 190.

[388] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 18.

[389] _Ibid._, p. 18.

[390] "I could always procure what I wanted from Lord Byron, and living here is divinely cheap." (_Correspondence_, I, p. 198, November 7, 1822.)

[391] _Life of Byron_, p. 242.

[392] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 6.

[393] _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 257.

[394] She used no tact in her dealings with Lord Byron. She let him see that she had no respect for rank or t.i.tles. She even went beyond the limits of courtesy in her remarks to him. On Byron's saying, "What do you think, Mrs. Hunt? Trelawny had been speaking of my morals! What do you think of that?" "It is the first time," said Mrs. Hunt, "I ever heard of them." (_Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 27). Of his portrait by Harlowe she said "that it resembled a great schoolboy, who had had a plain bun given him, instead of a plum one," a facetious speech indiscreetly repeated by Hunt to Byron.

[395] _Letters and Journals_, VI, p. 124.

[396] _Ibid._, VI, pp. 119-120. Hunt's view was quite different. Byron was, he thought, intimidated "out of his reasoning" by his children and their principles. (_Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 28.)

[397] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 32.

[398] _Ibid._, p. 30.

[399] _Letters and Journals_, VI, pp. 157, 167.

[400] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 64.

[401] Medwin, _Conversations of Lord Byron_, p. 58.