"You will see Hunt--one of those happy souls Which are the salt of the earth, and without whom This world would smell like what it is--a tomb; Who is what others seem; his room no doubt Is still adorned by many a cast from Shout, With graceful flowers tastefully placed about, And coronals of bay from ribbons hung, And brighter wreaths in neat disorder flung,-- The gifts of the most learned among some dozens Of female friends, sisters-in-law and cousins.
And there he is with his eternal puns, Which beat the dullest brain for smiles, like duns Thundering for money at a poet"s door; Alas! it is no use to say "I"m poor!""
[311] Mr. Forman thinks that it may be part of the original draft of _Rosalind and Helen_; if so, it is still a very close approximation of Sh.e.l.ley"s opinion of Hunt (_Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, III, p. 403). William Rossetti and Felix Rabbe think that it was addressed to Hunt.
[312] Wise"s edition of _Adonais_, p. 2. London, 1887.
[313] To his wife. _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 288; July 4, 1822.
[314] Nicoll and Wise, _Literary Anecdotes_, p. 350; April 5, 1820.
[315] Hunt, _Correspondence_, I, p. 136. Professor George Edward Woodberry says that Sh.e.l.ley had the "kindest feeling of grat.i.tude and respect ...
but nothing more" towards Hunt. (_Studies in Letters and Life_, p. 153.)
[316] _Ibid._, I, p. 158. November 11, 1820. _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p.
150; November 23, 1819.
[317] Sir Walter Scott has given a good estimate of them: "Our sentiments agreed a good deal, except on the subject of religion and politics, upon neither of which I was inclined to believe that Lord Byron entertained very fixed principles.... On Politics he used sometimes to express a high strain of what is now called Liberalism; but it appeared to me that the pleasure that it afforded him as a vehicle of displaying his wit and satire against individuals in office was at the bottom of his habit of thinking. At heart I would have termed Byron a patrician on principle."
(Moore, _Letters and Journals of Lord Byron_, I, p. 616.)
[318] Hanc.o.c.k, _The French Revolution and English Poets_, p. 84.
[319] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 128.
[320] _Ibid._, p. 1; _Autobiography_, II, p. 85.
[321] _The Real Lord Byron_, I, p. 277.
[322] _Letters and Journals_, III, pp. 29-31. The article was not published.
[323] Nichol, _Life of Bryon_, p. 84, incorrectly gives 1812 as the date.
[324] _Correspondence_, I, p. 88, May 25, 1813.
[325] _Autobiography_, II, p. 85.
[326] _The Champion_, April 7, 14, 21, 1816.
[327] _Letters and Journals of Lord Byron_, p. 402.
[328] Byron, _Letters and Journals_, II, p. 157, December 1, 1813.
[329] _Ibid._, II, pp. 296-297.
[330] Page 36.
[331] _The Examiner_, April 21, 1816.
[332] _Letters and Journals_, VI, pp. 2-3.
[333] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 6.
[334] _Letters and Journals_, III, p. 265.
[335] In 1820 Byron translated the Rimini episode of the _Divine Comedy_.
[336] Trelawney, _Recollections of the Last Days of Sh.e.l.ley and Byron_, p.
109.
[337] _Letters and Journals_, V, pp. 590-591.
[338] _Letters and Journals_, V, p. 217. This pa.s.sage is omitted from the letter in which it occurs in Moore"s _Letters and Journals of Lord Byron_, II, p. 437.
[339] _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_, p. 8.
[340] Hunt wrongly gives Byron"s date of birth as 1791. The article is accompanied with a woodcut.
[341] See _Blackwood"s_, X, pp. 286, 730.
[342] _Letters and Journals_, V, pp. 143-144.
[343] Medwin, _Journal of the Conversations of Lord Byron_, p. 186.
[344] Jeaffreson, _The Real Lord Byron_, II, p. 186, says that Byron through Sh.e.l.ley"s mediation could secure Hunt as editor.
[345] _Ibid._, _Letters and Journals of Lord Byron_, II, p. 626.
[346] _Recollections of the Last Days of Sh.e.l.ley and Byron_, p. 157.
[347] See p. 103.
[348] _The Real Lord Byron_, II, p. 186.
[349] _Dictionary of National Biography._
[350] _Leigh Hunt as Poet and Essayist_, p. 30.
[351] _Life of Byron_, pp. 266-267.
[352] _Leigh Hunt_, p. 37, note.
[353] _Life of Leigh Hunt_, p. 154.
[354] _The Sonnet in England_, pp. 118-119.
[355] _Works of Sh.e.l.ley_, VIII, p. 255.
[356] _Correspondence_, I, p. 161.
[357] _Autobiography_, II, p. 59.