The Real Shelley (Volume I of II), by John Cordy Jeaffreson

Venal Villains—‘Jock’ instructed to ‘Pouch’ them—At Work on another Novel—The Dog of a Publisher—Devil of a Price—St. Irvyne—Irving’s Hill—Review of St. Irvyne—Wolfstein the Magnanimous—Megalena de Metastasio—Olympia della Anzasca—Eloise St. Irvyne—The Virtuous Fitzeustace—Ginotti’s Doom—The Oxonian Shelley’s Repugnance to Marriage—His Commendation of Free Love—Parallel Passages of Zastrozzi and St. Irvyne—The Verses of St. Irvyne.

As the hour drew near for the publication of Zastrozzi, Shelley was urgent with his publisher to spend money in getting favourable reviews of the superlatively foolish book. The publisher declining to part with his money for that purpose, the literary aspirant (more truth-loving though he was than other boys, if Lady Shelley may be trusted) discovered a grievance in Mr. Robinson’s niggardly reluctance to bribe the reviewers. As the man of business would not make needful arrangements with the ‘gentlemen of the press,’ Shelley declared his intention (in a letter dated 1st April, 1810), to see that the ‘venal villains’ were properly ‘pouched.’ Many a boyish author has talked and written in the same vein, and even tipt a ‘venal villain’ for a lying paragraph, without bearing himself in later time so as to acquire a reputation for untruthfulness or for labouring under semi-delusions. A biographer might well disdain to notice so trivial an indication of a readiness to tamper with the truth and fib by deputy, had Shelley’s veracity never been called in question in later time. Under the circumstances of the case, one does not make too much of the small matter, in remarking that, whilst it accords with the action of the young man who offered verse for sale as ‘original poetry’ with the knowledge that it was not ‘original,’ this resolve to buy insincere praise, in order to deceive the public and win money or homage from credulous readers, is out of harmony with the fine things that have been said of the poet’s sublime sincerity and passionate abhorrence of falsehood. If Medwin was right in saying Zastrozzi was favourably reviewed and declared ‘a book of much promise,’ the critic must have been a sufficiently ‘pouched’ and ‘venal villain.’

In the same letter of 1st April, 1810, the poet and novelist, who ten days later donned cap and gown at University College, is seen at work on another novel, in the hope that it will bring him 60l., and place him before the world as the author of the New Romance in three volumes. If ‘Jock’ (otherwise styled Mr. John Robinson, of Paternoster Row) won’t pay him ‘a devil of a price’ for his new poem, and at least 60l. for his new romance, ‘the dog shall not have them.’ It was thus the youngster swaggered over a sheet of paper on April Fools’ Day, about his dog of a publisher, and the devil of a price the dog must pay him for the finest fruit of his genius. The young man boasting of the 60l. he meant to have for his New Romance in three volumes, was the same boy who seems to have set it about that he had been paid 40l. for Zastrozzi. What the poem was, does not appear. It may have been the ‘Original Poetry’ that wasn’t original, or the Wandering Jew that was subsequently offered for a devil of a price, or a gentlemanly price to the Messrs. Ballantyne and Co. of Edinburgh, and Mr. John Joseph Stockdale, of 41 Pall Mall, or even the first meagre sketch of Queen Mab; but I am inclined to think it was The Jew. Zastrozzi having fallen dead from the press (of course, for no other reason than the dog’s neglect to pouch the villains), Jock was not in the humour to drop money either on the poem for which ‘a devil of a price’ would be nothing more than fair payment, or on the novel that, on being finished and ‘fitted’ for the press by a publisher, instead of filling three volumes was (in bulk) a slighter and meaner book than Zastrozzi. Placed in Mr. Stockdale’s hands in September, 1810, and ‘fitted’ for public perusal by Mr. Stockdale himself, this performance in prose fiction was published by the Pall Mall bookseller (not on the payment of 60l. to the author, but altogether at the author’s cost and risk) in December, 1810, under the style and titles of St. Irvyne, or, The Rosicrucian, the first of the two titles being an adaptation of the names of the ducal seat (St. Irving’s Hills)[2], in whose glades and gardens he had walked by moonlight with the more cold than faithless Harriett, not six months since.

For insufficient reasons St. Irvyne, or, The Rosicrucian—an even wilder piece of lunacy than Zastrozzi—has been assigned to a German source. German tale-wrights may have been in some slight degree accountable for its morbid extravagances, even as they were indirectly accountable for some of the several hundreds of similar English romances, that were produced in the poet’s boyhood by the imitators of Mrs. Radcliffe and Monk Lewis. But to speak of it as a tale from the German, or even after the German, is to be guilty of a misdescription.

Consisting of two separate stories, stitched together by an inexpert handler of the literary needle, St. Irvyne is just such a performance as might have been looked for from the author of Zastrozzi, eager to produce a second romance, before ‘clearing out’ of the state of mental disease, that was partly the effect and partly the cause of the efforts that resulted in the earlier story. Something must be said of both parts of the tale that, dropping still-born from the press, would have been absolutely forgotten, had it not been for the author’s subsequent celebrity.

Consenting to participate in the adventures and fortunes of the Alpine Brigands, by whom he has been captured, the youthful and ‘high-souled’ Wolfstein—an outcast from his noble family and from the society of his equals—makes the acquaintance of Ginotti the Rosicrucian, whilst the latter is acting as First Lieutenant under Cavigni, the captain of the Banditti. Almost at the same time he falls under the influence of Megalena de Metastasio, daughter of a wealthy Italian Count, who has been despoiled, murdered, and thrown down a yawning precipice by the comrades of the magnanimous Wolfstein. The association of the brigands with Wolfstein is of no long duration: for when he has made two attempts to poison their chieftain (the second attempt being successful), the allied robbers expel Wolfstein of the lofty soul from their brotherhood.

In justice to the magnanimous Wolfstein, it must be admitted he did not poison Cavigni without provocation. Not only does the robber-chief presume to force his unacceptable addresses on the lovely Megalena de Metastasio, but follows up this presumption with a threat of ravishing her. ‘Then,’ cries the robber-chief, ‘if within four-and-twenty hours you hold yourself not in readiness to return my love, force shall wrest the jewel from the casket.’ Ere the four-and-twenty hours have passed, Cavigni has drained the poisoned chalice, and is rolling in torments at his murderer’s feet.

Saved by Ginotti from the death to which other robbers would fain consign him, Wolfstein goes off with Megalena to Genoa, where they enter the best society. On the eve of their withdrawal from the Alpine cave, Megalena shows ‘Wolfstein jewels to an immense amount’:—a sight that causes the high-souled Wolfstein to exclaim, ‘Then we may defy poverty; for I have about me jewels to the value of ten thousand zechins.’

When they have settled themselves in their Genoese home, Wolfstein of the lofty soul shocks Megalena by begging her to become his wife without a nuptial ceremony. ‘And is my adored Megalena,’ he asks, ‘a victim then to prejudice?... Does she suppose that Nature created us to become the tormentors of each other?’—questions that of course convince Megalena she ought not to stand out for the empty forms of lawful wedlock. ‘Yes, yes,’ the young lady exclaims with equal courage and sobriety. ‘Prejudice, avaunt! Once more reason takes her seat, and convinces me that to be Wolfstein’s is not criminal. O Wolfstein! if for a moment Megalena has yielded to the imbecility of nature, believe that she yet knows how to recover herself, to reappear in her proper character.’ People differ in their notions of propriety. To old-fashioned persons Megalena may seem to ‘reappear in a very improper character.’ She and the high-souled Wolfstein henceforth live together as husband and wife without being husband and wife. They ‘acted on emotional theories of liberty.’ But then, as Mr. Froude would say, they were so young and enthusiastic!

The course of their mutual affections can scarcely be used as an argument for Free Love. They ‘act on emotional theories of liberty’ in other matters. Turning pettish and restless, Megalena plunges into ‘dissipated pleasures.’ Less enamoured of his ringless bride than harassed by her caprice, the high-souled Wolfstein takes to gambling, and forms an embarrassing intimacy with the ardent and lovely Olympia della Anzasca (daughter of the Count and Countess of the same rather uncomfortable name), a young gentlewoman, whose passions, stimulated by ‘a false system of education and a wrong expansion of ideas,’ impel her to quit her father’s palazzo one evening, and pay Wolfstein a visit, just as he and Megalena are sitting down to a late supper.

‘To what, Lady Olympia, do I owe the unforeseen pleasure of your visit? What so mysterious business have you with me?’ inquires Wolfstein, on entering the room to which the untimely and unattended visitor had been shown.

Acting on an emotional theory of liberty, the Lady Olympia della Anzasca ejaculates, ‘Oh! if you wish to see me expire in horrible torments at your feet, inhuman Wolfstein, call for Megalena, and then will your purpose be accomplished!’

Having no wish to see the Lady Olympia die in so unsuitable a place, Wolfstein, instead of calling for Megalena, replies, ‘Dearest Lady Olympia, compose yourself, I beseech you. What, what agitates you?’

‘Oh! pardon me, pardon me,’ exclaims the Lady Olympia, with ‘maniac wildness,’ ‘pardon a wretched female who knows not what she does! Oh! resistlessly am I impelled to this avowal; resistlessly am I impelled to declare to you, that I love you! adore you to distraction!—Will you return my affection? But, ah! I rave! Megalena, the beloved Megalena claims you as her own; and the wretched Olympia must moan the blighted prospects which were about to open fair before her eyes.’

With the propriety, to be looked for in a gentleman whose Megalena is supping in the next room, and may come upon the scene at any moment, the high-souled Wolfstein exclaims: ‘No reflection in the present instance is needed, Lady. What man of honour needs a moment’s rumination to discover what nature has so inerasibly planted in his bosom,—the sense of right and wrong? I am connected with a female whom I love, who confides in me; in what manner should I merit her confidence, if I join myself to another? Nor can the loveliness of the beautiful Olympia della Anzasca compensate me for breaking an oath sworn to another!’

On hearing this ‘dreadful fiat of her destiny,’ Olympia swoons at Wolfstein’s feet, a swoon from which she recovers, just as Megalena sweeps into the room, at the instance of natural curiosity respecting the cause of Olympia’s visit. At the sight of Megalena’s ‘detested form,’ the ‘passion-grieving’ Olympia, faintly articulating ‘Vengeance!’ rushes into the street and bends her rapid flight to the ‘Palazzo di Anzasca.’ When Olympia has thus departed in her ‘passion-grief,’ Wolfstein protests he has never given the fair Anzasca’s passion any encouragement.

‘What further proof,’ he asks of Megalena, ‘can I give but my oath, that never in soul or body have I broken the allegiance that I formerly swore to thee?’

‘I mean,’ says Megalena, ‘I mean that, if ever you wish again to possess my affections, ere to-morrow morning Olympia must expire.’

‘’Tis done then,’ replies Wolfstein the Magnanimous, ‘’tis done. Yet’ (he mutters), ‘I may writhe, convulsed in immaterial agony, for ever and ever—ah! I cannot. No, Megalena, I am again yours; I will immolate the victim which thou requirest as a sacrifice to our love. Give me a dagger, which may sweep off from the face of the earth one who is hateful to thee! Adored creature, give me the dagger, and I will restore it to thee dripping with Olympia’s hated blood; it shall have first been buried in her heart.’

Armed with the dagger, which Megalena puts in his hand, the high-souled Wolfstein goes off to the Palazzo della Anzasca (or ‘di’ Anzasca, the author uses ‘della’ and ‘di’ indifferently), enters it, unobserved follows Olympia to her bedroom, hides himself in the room till Olympia has put herself to bed, and remains in his convenient corner of the chamber, till she breathes the heavy breath of slumber. The moment for the ruthless deed has come. Dagger in hand, Wolfstein of the exalted soul glides to the sleeper’s bed, watches her angelic features, gazes on the angelic smile that plays over her countenance, nerves himself to deliver the fatal blow, raises the poniard, and then—throws it from him. The noise of the falling dagger rouses Olympia to consciousness. She is awake and recognizes him. They speak to one another. For a moment Olympia imagines he has relented, and has come to give her the strongest proof of his affection. Another moment, and discovering her mistake, she leaps wildly from her bed.

‘A light and flowing night-dress,’ runs the narrative, ‘alone veiled her form; her alabaster bosom was shaded by the light ringlets of her hair, which rested unconfined upon it. She threw herself at the feet of Wolfstein. On a sudden, as if struck by some thought, she started convulsively from the earth; for an instant she paused. The rays of a lamp, which stood in a recess of the apartment, fell full upon the dagger of Wolfstein. Eagerly Olympia sprung towards it, and, ere Wolfstein was aware of her dreadful intent, plunged it into her bosom. Weltering in purple gore she fell; no groan, no sigh escaped her lips. A smile, which the pangs of dissolution could not dispel, played on her convulsed countenance; it irradiated her features with celestially awful, although terrific expression. “Ineffectually have I endeavoured to conquer the ardent feelings of my soul; now I overcome them,” were her last words. She uttered them in a tone of firmness: and, falling back, expired in torments, which her fine but expressive features declared that she gloried in.’

The victim of ‘a false system of education and a wrong expansion of ideas’ is at rest. All is silent in the chamber of death. As the stir, certain to ensue on the tragedy of Olympia’s bedroom, may render Genoa a perilous place of residence for the man she adored and the woman she detested, Wolfstein and Megalena fly to Bohemia, in which country he has recently succeeded to immense wealth, through his uncle’s death.

Consisting of six chapters and a concluding note, the Second Part of this marvellous combination of two several tales relates chiefly to the fortunes of Eloise St. Irvyne, who accompanies her dying mother from the Chateau de St. Irvyne in France to Geneva, where the elder lady expires of a lingering malady, after solemnly admonishing her daughter to beware of any man she may encounter, who shall be ‘a man enveloped in deceit and mystery.’ Such a man Eloise has already encountered on her journey to Geneva; and she falls under his fatal influence immediately after her mother’s death. Just as Wolfstein induces Megalena to become his ringless bride, Nempere prevails on Eloise de St. Irvyne to become his mistress.

Growing weary of his victim’s fascinations soon after he has gained possession of her body, the villain Nempere (who in due course turns out to be Ginotti, the Rosicrucian) offers Eloise St. Irvyne as a mere fille de joie, in payment of a gambling debt, to the dissolute but essentially honourable Chevalier Mountfort,—an Englishman of ancient lineage and noble rank. Too chivalrous to take advantage of the power he has acquired by purchase over the victim of Nempere’s licentiousness and perfidy, the Chevalier Mountfort places Eloise with an adequate allowance in a picturesque cottage, under the chivalric surveillance of the exemplary Fitzeustace (an Irish gentleman), who eventually makes her his wife. Having thus provided for Eloise, the Chevalier Mountfort goes off in pursuit of Nempere, to chastise him for his villany.

Eloise is left in good hands. ‘He is an Irishman,’ the Chevalier has remarked to Eloise of the gentleman to whose care she is consigned, ‘and so very moral, and so averse to every species of gaieté de cœur that you need be under no apprehensions. In short, he is a love-sick swain, without ever having found what he calls a congenial female.’ The virtues of this Irish gentleman are regarded by Mr. Denis Florence MacCarthy as indicative that, whilst writing St. Irvyne in the summer of 1810, Shelley was already disposed to regard the Irish with favour.

In Eloise this ‘love-sick swain’ discovers the ‘congenial female’ for whom he has long been seeking. Admiring her beauty, he hangs upon the music of her lips, pining for the time when he shall be permitted to salute them. Nothing in her history moderates his passion for Nempere’s abandoned mistress. In his judgment it is nothing to her disadvantage that she has been seduced, and is on the point of giving birth to a child of shame. When she answers his prayer for their immediate union by saying: ‘Know you not that I have been another’s?’ he replies with passionate fervour: ‘Oh, suppose me not the slave of such vulgar and narrow-minded prejudice. Does the frightful vice and ingratitude of Nempere sully the spotless excellence of my Eloise’s soul?’ When Eloise gives birth to Nempere’s son, Fitzeustace officiates by turns as the mother’s doctor and the infant’s nurse. At moments when he is necessarily ‘absent from the apartment of the beloved Eloise, his whole delight is to gaze on the child, and trace in its innocent countenance the features of the mother he adores.’

Eloise having at length consented to become his wife, this Irish gentleman remarks: ‘But before we go to England, before my father will see us, it is necessary that we should be married. Nay, do not start, Eloise: I view it in the light that you do; I consider it as but a chain which, although it keeps the body, still leaves the soul unfettered; it is not so with love. But still, Eloise, to those who think like us, it is, at all events, harmless; ’tis but yielding to the prejudices of the world wherein we live, and procuring moral expediency at a slight sacrifice of what we conceive to be right.’

Thus admonished, Eloise consents to the slight sacrifice of what she conceives to be right, and promises to pass to her Fitzeustace’s conjugal embraces through the narrow gate of lawful matrimony, instead of by the broad and higher way of Free Love. ‘Well, well,’ she says reluctantly, ‘it shall be done, Fitzeustace; but take the assurance of my promise that I cannot love you more.’ Partly, in palliation of the lady’s weakness and Fitzeustace’s excessive care for the world’s opinion in this business, the author of the romance remarks in his own person: ‘They soon agreed on a point, in their eyes of so trifling importance, and arriving in England, tasted that happiness, which love and innocence alone can give. Prejudice may triumph for awhile, but virtue will be eventually the conqueror.’

Reappearing, in the last chapter, to compass the high-souled Wolfstein’s destruction, Ginotti, alias Nempere, is left eventually in the darksome vaults of St. Irvyne’s ruinous abbey, to endure ‘a dateless and hopeless eternity of horror,’ as a gigantic and conscious skeleton, with ‘two pale and ghastly flames glaring in his eyeless sockets.’ The way in which the narrative is wound up surpasses all human understanding. After ‘fitting’ the manuscript for the press, Mr. John Joseph Stockdale may well have entreated Shelley to reconsider some passages of the story, and to explain or alter, certain matters of the dénouement. In answer to the publisher’s request for explanations and further instructions, Shelley wrote lightly from University College, Oxford, on 14th November, 1810:—

‘Dear Sir,—I return you the Romance by this day’s coach. I am much obligated by the trouble you have taken to fit it for the press. I am myself by no means a good hand at correction, but I think I have obviated the principal objections which you allege.

‘Ginotti, as you will see, did not die by Wolfstein’s hand, but by the influence of that natural magic which, when the secret was imparted to the latter, destroyed him.—Mountfort being a character of inferior import, I did not think it necessary to state the catastrophe of him, as at best it could be but uninteresting.—Eloise and Fitzeustace, are married and happy I suppose, and Megalena dies by the same means as Wolfstein.—I do not myself see any other explanation that is required.—As to the method of publishing it, I think, as it is a thing which almost mechanically sells to circulating libraries, &c., I would wish it to be published on my own account.

‘I am surprised that you have not received the Wandering Jew, and, in consequence write to Mr. Ballantyne to mention it; you will doubtlessly therefore, receive it soon.—Should you still perceive in the romance any error of flagrant incoherency, &c., it must be altered, but I should conceive it will (being wholly so abrupt) not require it.

I am your sincere humble servant,
Percy B. Shelley.

‘Shall you make this in one or two volumes? Mr. Robinson, of Paternoster Row, published Zastrozzi.’

The author’s explanations in no degree diminish the difficulty of understanding the story. On the contrary, they rather increase the difficulty. Having done his duty in calling the author’s attention to some of the story’s most glaring absurdities, and having (as he imagined) no pecuniary interest to be cautious for in respect to a work that was to be published at the charges of the young gentleman who, sooner or later, would, of course, be able to pay a heavy bill, Mr. Stockdale sent to the printers the thing of lunacy, of which Mr. Garnett says: ‘Worthless as St. Irvyne is of itself, it becomes of high interest when regarded as the first feeble step of a mighty genius on the road to consummate excellence.’

It was enough for the author of Zastrozzi, in the first stage of his fanatical abhorrence of lawful wedlock, to make the virtuous Verezzi speak slightingly of the nuptial rite as needless for the consecration of his spiritual union with the amiable Matilda di Laurentini. In St. Irvyne this repugnance to the fetters put upon passion, that should be left in absolute freedom, is declared more precisely and emphatically. Whilst the exemplary Fitzeustace declares his contempt for the ceremony, Eloise makes it clear she would rather be his mistress than his wife. At the same time, the author in his own person declares that, when Virtue shall have triumphed over Prejudice, women, instead of being given and taken in Marriage, will be given and taken in Free Love. In this matter the Oxonian surpasses the Etonian, and is seen to have advanced a long step towards the conclusions that qualified him to proclaim the sanctity of Free Love in Laon and Cythna,—the poem in which he ‘startled’ (his own word) the men and women of England by insisting that in a perfect state of society a brother and sister would be able, with perfect propriety, to live together in Free Love, and beget children of one another.

In the article entitled ‘A Newspaper Editor’s Reminiscences,’ to be found in the June, 1841, number of Fraser’s Magazine, the curious may find some rather strong, but inconclusive, evidence that at some time between October[3], 1811, and March, 1812, Shelley tried to sell to three or four different London publishers, for a sum of 10l., certain tales in manuscript, out of which he composed Zastrozzi and St. Irvyne. If Shelley, after publishing the two ‘failures’ in prose fiction, tried to wheedle money out of booksellers for the materials out of which those failures were made, he did what he should not have done, and received less than his proper punishment in getting nothing by his pains. But the evidence is so unsatisfactory that the young man did thus endeavour to get money for stuff, whose worthlessness he had ascertained, I cannot hold him guilty of the curious piece of sharp practice. The same newspaper editor’s evidence that one of these tales was either a translation from the German, or alleged by Shelley to have been a translation from the German, being still more unsatisfactory, there is no need to trouble the reader of these volumes to consider the particulars of it.

As he delights in the dreary labour of collating the texts of worthless books, it is strange that Mr. Buxton Forman (who has wasted a great deal of time in collating the different editions of Shelley’s writings) should have failed to discover that St. Irvyne consists, in a considerable degree, of the characters, and positions, and incidents of Zastrozzi, so changed by being turned inside out and differently coloured, as to be likely to be mistaken, by hasty and unsuspicious readers of both books, for new actors and positions and incidents. Towards the close of his career, Thackeray said to a friend, ‘I am no prolific creator of characters. In that respect I have fairly worked myself out. It remains for me now to redress my old puppets with new bits of riband and tinsel.’ The puppets of the Etonian romance are thus redressed in the Oxford story. By change of costume, the puppet, who figures as a man in Zastrozzi, is qualified for a woman’s part in St. Irvyne. By being pulled inside out, the position that was meant to rouse admiration in the one story, becomes a position that (in the hands of an abler artist) would stir to pity in the other. To escape from an humiliating position, Olympia poniards herself in St. Irvyne; even as Verezzi, to escape a melodramatic embarrassment, poniards himself in Zastrozzi. The slumbering Eloise in the later fiction declares her passion for Fitzeustace to the listening Irishman, even as the slumbering Verezzi in the earlier romance declares his passion for Julia to the listening Matilda.

Each of these passages is a fair example of the work from which it is taken. Surely their resemblance in temper, moral fibre, style, verbiage, affords sufficient evidence that the two passages were put together by the same writer. What evidence do they afford that, whilst the passage, taken from Zastrozzi (the novel universally allowed to be a thing of Shelley’s own manufacture), was written as it is printed by the future poet, the passage from St. Irvyne (the novel generally assigned to a German source) is a mere translation from a German original? Why (in the absence of evidence that Shelley could translate a page of German, and in the absence of any German novel, out of which St. Irvyne could have been made) are we to regard the passage of the earlier book as the pure product of Shelley’s mind, and the passage of the later romance as so much of the translated product of a German writer’s mind?

After comparing these two scenes of two sleeping lovers, each, of whom reveals the heart’s secret to an attentive watcher; after comparing the literary characteristics of the one scene with those of the other, the structure of the sentences, language, details, touches; after noticing the identity of the very words used in some parts of the parallel passages, can any reader think the two scenes were by two different writers? that, whilst the extract from Zastrozzi is a piece of original writing, the extract from St. Irvyne is a piece of a translation from the undiscovered work of an undiscovered German author? These passages are fair examples of the two books from which they are taken. Can any reader hesitate in coming to the conclusion that Shelley reproduced in the later the materials of the earlier romance? The writer may have been unaware he was reproducing scraps of his former work. The reproduction may have been the result of mental action, occasioned by the effort of producing the earlier tale, rather than the consequence of a deliberate design to use the old stuff for a second time. But the reproduction is obvious.

St. Irvyne contains six sets of verses, that are interesting examples of the earliest fruits of the poetical disposition, which soon developed into Shelley’s poetical genius. Resembling Byron’s Hours of Idleness, in affording only the faintest indications of the author’s eventual faculty for the service of the Muse, these sets of verses are chiefly noteworthy for their evidence that the Hours of Idleness may be styled ‘the horn-book,’ from which Shelley acquired the rudiments of the art of poesy. The resemblance of one of those pieces of versification to one of the stanzas of ‘Lachin-y-Gair’ in the Hours of Idleness is so remarkable, that the Oxonian’s lines may fairly be styled a plagiarism on the lines that had come a few years earlier from the Byron of Cambridge.

The Stanza of ‘Lachin-y-Gair.’
‘Shades of the dead! have I not heard your voices
Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale?
Surely the soul of the hero rejoices,
And rides on the wind, o’er his own Highland vale.
Round Loch-na-Garr, while the stormy mist gathers,
Winter presides in his cold icy car;
Clouds there encircle the forms of my fathers:
They dwell in the tempests of dark Loch-na-Garr.’

The Verses of ‘St. Irvyne.’
‘Ghosts of the dead! have I not heard your yelling
Rise on the night-rolling breath of the blast,
When o’er the dark ether the tempest is swelling,
And on eddying whirlwind the thunder-peal past?

‘For oft I have stood on the dark height of Jura,
Which frowns on the valley which opens beneath:
Oft have I brav’d the chill night-tempest’s fury,
Whilst around me, I thought, echo’d murmurs of death.

‘And now, whilst the winds of the mountain are howling,
O father! thy voice seems to strike on mine ear;
In air whilst the tide of the night-storm is rolling,
It breaks on the pause of the elements’ jar.

‘On the wing of the whirlwind which roars in the mountain
Perhaps rides the ghost of my sire who is dead;
On the mist of the tempest which hangs o’er the fountain,
Whilst a wreath of dark vapour encircles his head.’

In a note to St. Irvyne (in his edition of Shelley’s ‘prose works’), Mr. Buxton Forman calls attention to the obvious adoption of the two first lines of the quoted stanza of Byron’s poem, as though they were the whole of the youthful Shelley’s ‘small debt’ in this particular matter, to the youthful Byron. It cannot have escaped the notice of Shelley’s careful editor that, whilst Shelley speaks of his father’s ghost as riding on the whirlwind and the mist of the tempest, Byron sees ‘the forms of his fathers’ in the clouds over-hanging Loch-na-Garr, and sings how the soul of one of his ancestral heroes ‘rides on the wind.’ It can scarcely have escaped the careful editor that the whole thought of Shelley’s sixteen verses was ‘lifted’ out of Byron’s eight verses.

CHAPTER IX.

In assuming that, because they were both first-year’s men on making one another’s acquaintance in the dining-hall of their College, Hogg and Shelley matriculated and went into residence on or about the same day, and that, as they met one another for the first time in October, 1810, at the same dinner-table, they both entered Oxford in the Michaelmas term of that year, Mr. Denis Florence MacCarthy followed half-a-score Shelleyan specialists in assuming as matters of course, what no old Oxford man would have thought of assuming, even as mere primâ facie probabilities. Shelley’s academic senior by more than two months, Hogg was his superior in respect to ‘residence’ by a much longer time. After matriculating on 10th April, 1810, and passing a few days in the University, during which time he visited the Bodleian Library, Shelley returned to Field Place, kept ‘grace-terms’ in the country, and went ‘into residence’ in the following October. Hogg, on the contrary, went into residence on the day of his matriculation, and from that day till the next Long Vacation remained at Oxford, with the exception of the brief break of the Easter holidays, which he spent with friends who lived in counties more accessible to the undergraduate, than his own home in the northern shire. In Shelley’s time, no less than in the present writer’s time at Oxford, it was usual for freshmen, coming to the University from homes or schools at no great distance from Alma Mater, to ‘go down’ after matriculating, and keep ‘grace-terms’ in the country, before coming into residence. On the other hand, it was usual in pre-railway times for the academic freshman, who could not return to his people without a long and expensive journey, to matriculate and go ‘into residence’ at the same time.

For the information of those, who have been induced to regard Mr. MacCarthy’s book of blunders as an authoritative performance, it may be well to add that the duly matriculated undergraduate, keeping ‘grace-terms’ in the country, was just as much a member of the University, as the freshman staying at his College. Both alike had entered the University, and become members of it. In respect to Hogg’s time at Oxford, it is also well to remark that, though he did not matriculate till 2nd February, 1810, he came to Oxford from the north country in the previous autumn. Everyone, who has read his delightful ‘two volumes,’ remembers Hogg’s account of his first arrival at Oxford, one ‘fine autumnal afternoon.’ He may have come to Oxford to read with a tutor before matriculation. Or on taking his first view of the University, he may only have been passing through the seat of learning, on his way to friends in some not remote county. Anyhow, it is certain that the youngster from the north country visited Oxford, and took something more than a mere tourist’s interest in the place, at a time when the University was already, or was soon to be, agitated by the fierce conflict of parties, that resulted-in the election of Lord Grenville to be Chancellor, in the place of the late Duke of Portland,—a fact to be remembered in connection with certain of the charges made against the biographer by Mr. Denis Florence MacCarthy.

The Duke of Portland died on 30th October, 1809; his successor in the Chancellorship (Lord Grenville) was elected after an unusually vehement contest on 14th December, 1809, by only thirteen votes over the number of votes given for Lord Eldon. If he was not at Oxford during the election, or during the canvass, Hogg was there shortly before the conflict of closely-matched parties, and was a member of the University when the new Chancellor had been chosen only seven weeks and one day. Let us now see the way in which Mr. Denis Florence MacCarthy presses charges of inaccuracy against Hogg, in respect to what the latter says about this election. After accusing Hogg of serious and suspicious misstatements on other matters, the author of Shelley’s Early Life writes thus:—

THE DAGGER SCENE IN ‘ZASTROZZI.’		THE DAGGER SCENE IN ‘ST. IRVYNE.’
‘Madness—fiercest madness—revelled through his brain. He raised the poniard high, but Julia rushed forwards, and in accents of desperation, in a voice of alarmed tenderness, besought him to spare himself—to spare her—for all might yet be well. ‘“Oh! never, never!” exclaimed Verezzi, frantically, “no peace but in the grave for me. I am—I am—married to Matilda.” ‘Saying this, he fell backwards upon a sofa in strong convulsions, yet his hand still firmly grasped the fatal poniard. ‘Matilda, meanwhile, fixedly contemplated the scene. Fiercest passions raged through her breast: vengeance, disappointed love—disappointed in the instant, too, when she had supposed happiness to be hers for ever, rendered her bosom the scene of wildest anarchy. ‘Yet she spoke not—she moved not—but collected in herself, stood waiting the issue of that event, which had so unexpectedly dissolved her visions of air-built ecstasy. ‘Serened to firmness from despair, Julia administered everything which could restore Verezzi with the most unremitting attention. At last he recovered. He slowly raised himself, and starting from the sofa where he lay, his eyes rolling wildly, and his whole frame convulsed by fiercest agitation, he raised the dagger which he still retained, and, with a bitter smile of exultation, plunged it into his bosom!—His soul fled without a groan, and his body fell to the floor, bathed in purple blood.’		‘“Wilt thou be mine?” exclaimed the enraptured Olympia, as a ray of hope arose in her mind. “Never! never can I,” groaned the agitated Wolfstein, “I am irrevocably, indissolutely another’s.”—Maddened by this death-blow to all expectations of happiness, which the deluded Olympia had so fondly anticipated, she leaped wildly from the bed. A light and flowing night-dress alone veiled her form; her alabaster bosom was shaded by the light ringlets of her hair which rested unconfined upon it. She threw herself at the feet of Wolfstein. On a sudden, as if struck by some thought, she started convulsively from the earth: for an instant she paused. ‘The rays of a lamp, which stood in a recess of the apartment, fell full upon the dagger of Wolfstein. Eagerly Olympia sprung towards it; and ere Wolfstein was aware of her dreadful intent, plunged it into her bosom. Weltering in purple gore, she fell; no groan, no sigh escaped her lips. A smile, which the pangs of dissolution could not dispel, played on her convulsed countenance; it irradiated her features with celestially awful, although terrific, expression. “Ineffectually have I endeavoured to conquer the ardent feelings of my soul; now I overcome them,” were her last words. She uttered them in a tone of firmness, and, falling back, expired in torments, which her fine, her expressive features declared that she gloried in.’

THE BEDROOM SCENE IN ‘ZASTROZZI.’		THE PAVILION SCENE IN ‘ST. IRVYNE.’
‘The morning came—Matilda arose from a sleepless couch, and with hopes yet unconfirmed sought Verezzi’s apartment. She stood near the door listening. Her heart palpitated with tremulous violence, as she listened to Verezzi’s breathing—every sound from within alarmed her. At last she slowly opened the door, and though adhering to the physician’s directions in not suffering Verezzi to see her, she could not deny herself the pleasure of watching him, and busying herself in little offices about his apartment. ‘She could hear Verezzi question the attendant collectedly, yet as a person who was ignorant where he was, and knew not the events which had immediately preceded his present state. ‘At last he sank into a deep sleep.—Matilda now dared to gaze on him; the hectic colour which had flushed his cheek was fled, but the ashy hue of his lips had given place to a brilliant vermilion. She gazed intently on his countenance. ‘A heavenly yet faint smile diffused itself over his countenance—his hand slightly moved. ‘Matilda, fearing that he would awake, again concealed herself. She was mistaken: for, on looking again, he still slept. ‘She still gazed upon his countenance. The visions of his sleep were changed, for tears came fast from under his eyelids, and a deep sigh burst from his bosom. ‘Thus passed several days: Matilda still watched, with the most affectionate assiduity, by the bedside of the unconscious Verezzi. ‘The physician declared that his patient’s mind was yet in too irritable a state to permit him to see Matilda, but that he was convalescent. ‘One evening she sate by his bedside, and gazing upon the features of the sleeping Verezzi, felt unusual softness take possession of her soul—an indefinable tumultuous emotion shook her bosom—her whole frame thrilled with rapturous ecstasy, and seizing the hand, which lay motionless, beside her, she imprinted on it a thousand burning kisses. ‘“Ah, Julia! Julia! is it you?” exclaimed Verezzi, as he raised his enfeebled frame; but perceiving his mistake, as he cast his eyes on Matilda, sank back and fainted.		‘Heedless yet of the beauties of nature, the loveliness of the scene, they entered the pavilion. ‘Eloise convulsively pressed her hand upon her forehead. ‘“What is the matter, my dearest Eloise?” inquired Fitzeustace, whom awakened tenderness had thrown off his guard. ‘“Oh! nothing, nothing; but a momentary faintness. It will soon go off: let us sit down.” ‘They entered the pavilion. ‘“’Tis nothing but drowsiness,” said Eloise, affecting gaiety; “’twill soon go off. I sate up late last night: that I believe was the occasion.” ‘“Recline on this sofa, then,” said Fitzeustace, reaching another pillow to make the couch easier, “and I will play some of those Irish tunes which you admire so much.” ‘Eloise reclined on the sofa, and Fitzeustace, seated on the floor, began to play; the melancholy plaintiveness of his music touched Eloise; she sighed, and concealed her tears in her handkerchief. At length she sunk into a profound sleep; still Fitzeustace continued playing, noticing not that she slept. ‘He approached. She lay wrapped in sleep: a sweet and celestial smile played on her countenance and irradiated her features with a tenfold expression of etheriality. ‘Suddenly the visions of her slumber appeared to have changed; the smile yet remained, but the expression was melancholy; tears stole gently from her eyelids:—she sighed. ‘Ah! with what eagerness of ecstasy did Fitzeustace lean over her form. ‘He dared not speak, he dared not move; but pressing a ringlet of hair, which had escaped its band, to his lips, waited silently. ‘“Yes, yes; I think—it may,—” at last she muttered; but so confusely, as scarcely to be distinguishable. ‘Fitzeustace remained rooted in rapturous attention, listening. ‘“I thought, I thought he looked as if he could love me” articulated the sleeping Eloise. “Perhaps, though he cannot love me, he may allow me to love him.—Fitzeustace!” ‘On a sudden again were changed the visions of her slumbers; terrified, she started from sleep and cried, “Fitzeustace.”

Chapter IX.		Chapter XII.
‘The soul of Verezzi was filled with irresistible disgust, as, recovering, he found himself in Matilda’s arms. His whole frame trembled with chilly horror, and he could scarcely withhold himself from again fainting. He fixed his eyes upon her countenance—they met hers—an ardent fire, mingled with a touching softness, filled their orbits.’		‘Needless were it to expatiate on their transports; they loved each other, and that is enough for those who have felt like Eloise and Fitzeustace.’