it as his mission to regenerate the world, and to give it freedom from the shackles which had been too long endured, and which barred its progress to indefinite perfectibility, Harriet had in their many interviews in London bent a well-pleased ear; and when the day came for her return to her Brompton seminary, these new lights seemed to her mind to have a practical bearing on the forms and discipline of her boarding-school. She therefore petitioned her father to be allowed to remain at home. On his refusal, she wrote to Shelley; and, in a sad and evil hour for both, this girl, “who had thrown herself upon his protection," and "with whom he was not in love,"* became his wife.

From London, the young pair (whose united ages amounted to thirty-five years, Harriet being sixteen and Shelley nineteen) went to Edinburgh, and thence to York. During their residence in the latter town, a new inmate was added to their circle in the person of the elder Miss Westbrook-a visitor whose presence was in many respects unfortunate. From strength of character and disparity of years (for she was much older than Harriet), she exercised a strong influence over her sister; and this influence was used without much discretion, and with little inclination to smooth the difficulties or promote the happiness of the young couple.

Keswick was the next resting-place to which the Shelleys were tempted by the beauty of the scenery and the cheapness of the necessaries of life, which gave some

* These expressions are quoted from some published letters of Shelley's, the authenticity of which I am not able to guarantee.

hope that their scanty income might suffice for their moderate wants. While residing here, the then Duke of Norfolk, who owned a large extent of land in the neighbourhood, greatly interested himself in Shelley and his girl wife, introduced them to the neighbouring gentry, directed his agents to furnish their house with necessary accommodations, and interceded (but in vain) with the elder Mr. Shelley. The young poet became speedily acquainted with Robert Southey, Thomas De Quincey, and other eminent writers then resident in the north. With Southey he was particularly intimate for a time, despite the diametrical opposition of their creeds. It was in the year 1811, also-but previous to his marriage -that Shelley sought and obtained the friendship of Leigh Hunt, whose noble-spirited political writings in the Examiner had moved the highest admiration of the youthful enthusiast. While the latter was yet unknown to the journalist, he had proposed to him, in a letter, a scheme for forming an association of Liberals, with a view to resisting the spread of despotic principles; and this was followed by Shelley's self-introduction. The friendship of the two writers was only broken by death.

CHAPTER IV.

SHELLEY'S ACQUAINTANCE WITH GODWIN.

We now come to that period of Shelley's life when the poet became acquainted with William Godwin-a period fraught with important results, and one over which it will be necessary to linger.

An eminent place among the writers of the eighteenth century is due to the author of Political Justice. He came of a family which had long been connected with the Nonconformist ministry; for both his father and grandfather were Dissenting preachers in their generation, and the grandfather had enjoyed the intimate friendship of Dr. Watts, Neale, and Baker. William Godwin was born at Guestwick, Norfolk, in 1756. He was educated at the Hoxton College by Dr. Kippis and Dr. Rees, and for some time followed the profession of his father at Stowmarket, Suffolk; but, in 1782, owing to a change in his religious opinions, he returned to London, and for ten years devoted himself with unwearied assiduity to historical and metaphysical inquiries. The result of this mental discipline was the publication, in 1793, of his Political Justice, the effect of which work on the public mind is sufficiently attested by the fact that

three editions were sold in as many years.

Caleb Wil

liams and the Enquirer followed, and gave Godwin a reputation which he preserved unsullied through the whole of his long life. Early in 1797, Godwin married the celebrated Mary Wollstonecraft, who died in giving birth to a daughter.*

From the commencement of his career in London, the philosopher lived in a small cottage, without any further attendance than that of a woman who came every morning to set the house in order for the day. Liberal overtures from the leaders of the Whig phalanx, who desired to enlist in their service so eminent and influential an author, were repeatedly made to him, and as often refused; for Godwin, like a second Andrew Marvell, disdained to be the slave of party. This stern independence of character, combined with the mild, unimpassioned manner with which he prosecuted his inquiries into subjects which most men at that time debated with the fierceness and acrimony of personal strife, soon gathered round him a small knot of disciples, who sat at his feet, and gathered up his sayings as they might have done those of a sage of ancient Greece. He became, as it were, the recognised head of a small sect; and of this sect Shelley speedily regarded himself as a member. The poet wrote to the philosopher from Keswick, and, frankly stating his position, his marriage, and his prospects, proceeded to reveal his political, religious, and moral opinions, and to declare his long-cherished hope of being on some future day of use to his fellow-creatures.

* Mary, Shelley's second wife.

Towards this end, and for the better regulation of his pursuits and studies, he requested the aid of the author of Political Justice. Godwin received this unexpected communication with great kindness, and a long and interesting correspondence ensued between the two writers. Some portions of this will be found in the present volume.

From Keswick, Shelley went to Dublin, and during this period the influence of his newly acquired friend and adviser was of incalculable benefit to him, in guarding him from the consequences which his own fearless impetuosity would have entailed, in his championship of Irish wrongs. Ireland was at that time a disgrace to England and to herself. A dominant caste-proud, resolute, and vindictive, opposed to all change, and certain, in the last resort, of the support of England's strength misruled a population which was priestridden, ignorant, and averse from labour. The priests themselves (with the exception of those who had been specially educated on the Continent, for the purpose of representing the interests and maintaining the dignity of their church in the more polished circles of Dublin) were scarcely more literate than the rabble over whom they possessed unbounded influence; and the Union had handed over to still meaner minds and yet more uncleanly hands the traditionary struggles for the perquisites of a delegated Court.

Loud was the cry of Irish patriotism when Shelley visited the sister island, where he flung himself, with his usual impulsive ardour, into the turbid stream of