torted facts, and to clear away the mist in which the misrepresentations of foes and professed friends have obscured the memory of Shelley, have been my only objects. My labours have been greatly assisted by the help of an intimate and valued friend of Mrs. Shelley, and by Mr. Edmund Ollier, whose father (the publisher of Shelley's works) at once freely offered me the use of some most interesting letters written to himself. I regret to say that this gentleman died while the present work was passing through the printer's hands. It is needless to say that the authenticity of all the documents contained in this volume is beyond question; but the public would do well to receive with the utmost caution all letters purporting to be by Shelley which have not some indisputable warrant.* The art of forging letters purporting to be relics of men of literary celebrity, and therefore apparently possessing a commercial value, has been brought to a rare perfection by those who have made Mr. Shelley's handwriting the object of their imitation. Within the last fourteen years, on no less than three occasions, have forged letters been presented to our family for purchase. In December 1851, Sir Percy Shelley and the late * Those printed in the work to which allusion has already been made have never, for the most part, been seen by any other person than the author of that work; and the erasures which he has already made in them, together with the arrangement of their paragraphs, render them of doubtful value, however authentic may be the originals which that gentleman asserts he possesses. Χ PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. Mr. Moxon bought several letters, all of which proved to be forgeries, though, on the most careful inspection, we could scarcely detect any difference between these and the originals; for some were exact copies of documents in our possession. The water-mark on the paper was generally, though not always, the mark appropriate to the date; and the amount of ingenuity exercised was most extraordinary. Mr. Moxon published what he had bought in a small volume, but recalled the work shortly afterwards, on discovering that some of the letters had been manufactured from articles in magazines and reviews, written long after Shelley's death. The letter to Lord Ellenborough has never before been published; but I regard it as too extraordinary a production for a youth of eighteen to feel myself justified in suppressing it. The fragmentary Essay on Christianity, published at the end of this volume, was found amongst Shelley's papers in the imperfect state in which it is now produced. BOSCOMBE: June 22, 1859. SHELLEY MEMORIALS. CHAPTER I. EARLY LIFE. Ar the close of the last century, the family of the Shelleys had long held a high position among the large landholders of Sussex. Fortunate marriages in the two generations preceding the birth of the poet considerably increased the wealth and influence of the house, the head of which in 1806 was a staunch Whig, and on that ground obtained a baronetcy from the short-lived Whig Administration of that year. Fourteen years previously,-viz., on the 4th of August, 1792, his illustrious grandson drew the first breath of life. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY was born on that day at Field Place, near Horsham, Sussex. He was the eldest son of Timothy Shelley, Esq., subsequently the second baronet; and was christened Bysshe after his grandfather. At six years of age, the boy was sent to a day-school near the residence of his B |