AUGUST 1830-OCTOBER 1831
To all who know Trelawny's curious book, the following correspondence,
which tells the story of its publication and preparation for the press,
will in itself be interesting. To readers of Mary Shelley's life it has a
strong additional interest as illustrating, better than any second-hand
narrative can do, the unique kind of friendship subsisting between her and
Trelawny, and which, based on genuine mutual regard and admiration, and a
common devotion to the memory of Shelley and of a golden age which ended
at his death, proved stronger than all obstacles, and, in spite of
occasional eclipses through hasty words and misunderstandings, in spite of
wide differences in temperament, in habits, in opinions, and morals, yet
survived with a kind of dogged vitality for years.
Shelley said of _Epipsychidion_ that it was "an idealised history of his
life and feelings." _The Adventures of a Younger Son_ is an idealised
history of Trelawny's youth and exploits, and very amusing it is, though
rather gruesome in some of its details; a romance of adventures, of
hair-breadth escapes by flood and field. As will be seen, the original MS.
had to be somewhat toned down before it was presented to the public, but
it is, as it stands, quite sufficiently forcible, as well as
blood-curdling, for most readers.
The letters may now be left to tell their own tale.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
_16th August 1830._
MY DEAR MARY--That my letter may not be detained, I shall say nothing
about Continental politics.
My principal motive in writing is to inform you that I have nearly
completed the first portion of _my History_, enough for three ordinary
volumes, which I wish published forthwith. The Johnsons, as I told you
before, are totally ruined by an Indian bankruptcy; the smallness of
my income prevents my supporting them. Mr. Johnson is gone to India to
see if he can save aught from the ruin of his large fortune. In the
meantime his wife is almost destitute; this spurs me on. Brown, who is
experienced in these matters, declares I shall have no difficulty in
getting a very considerable sum for the MS. now. I shall want some
friend to dispose of it for me. My name is not to appear or to be
disclosed to the bookseller or any other person. The publisher who may
purchase it is to be articled down to publish the work without
omitting or altering a single word, there being nothing actionable,
though a great deal objectionable, inasmuch as it is tinctured with
the prejudices and passions of the author's mind. However, there is
nothing to prevent women reading it but its general want of merit. The
opinion of the two or three who have read it is that it will be very
successful, but I know how little value can be attached to such
critics. I'll tell you what I think--that it is good, and might have
been better; it is [filled] with events that, if not marred by my
manner of narrating, must be interesting. I therefore plainly foresee
it will be generally read or not at all. Who will undertake to, in the
first place, dispose of it, and, in the second, watch its progress
through the press? I care not who publishes it: the highest bidder
shall have it. Murray would not like it, it is too violent; parsons
and _Scots_, and, in short, also others are spoken of irreverently, if
not profanely. But when I have your reply I shall send the MS. to
England, and your eyes will be the judge, so tell me precisely your
movements.--Your attached
E. J. T.
Poste Restante, Florence.
When does Moore conclude his _Life of Byron_? If I knew his address I
could give him a useful hint that would be of service to the fame of
the Poet.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
FLORENCE, _28th October 1830_.
DEAREST MARY--My friend Baring left Florence on the 25th to proceed
directly to London, so that he will be there as soon as you can get
this letter. He took charge of my MSS., and promised to leave them at
Hookham's, Bond Street, addressed to you. I therefore pray you lose no
time in inquiring about them; they are divided into chapters and
volumes, copied out in a plain hand, and all ready to go to press.
They have been corrected with the greatest care, and I do not think
you will have any trouble with them on that score. All I want you to
do is to read them attentively, and then show them to Murray and
Colburn, or any other publisher, and to hear if they will publish them
and what they will give. You may say the author cannot at present be
_named_, but that, when the work goes forth in the world, there are
many who will recognise it. Besides the second series, which treats of
Byron, Shelley, Greece, etc., will at once remove the veil, and the
publisher who has the first shall have that. Yet at present I wish the
first series to go forth strictly anonymous, and therefore you must
on no account trust the publisher with my name. Surely there is matter
enough in the book to make it interesting, if only viewed in the light
of a _romance_. You will see that I have divided it into very short
chapters, in the style of Fielding, and that I have selected mottoes
from the only three poets who were the staunch advocates of liberty,
and my contemporaries. I have left eight or nine blanks in the mottoes
for you to fill up from the work of one of those poets. Brown, who was
very anxious about the fame of Keats, has given many of his MSS. for
the purpose. Now, if you could find any from the MSS. of Shelley or
Byron, they would excite much interest, and their being strictly
applicable is not of much importance. If you cannot, why, fill them up
from the published works of Byron, Shelley, or Keats, but no others
are to be admitted. When you have read the work and heard the opinion
of the booksellers, write to me before you settle anything; only
remember I am very anxious that no alterations or omissions should be
made, and that the mottoes, whether long or short, double or treble,
should not be curtailed. Will not Hogg assist you? I might get other
people, but there is no person I have such confidence in as you, and
the affair is one of confidence and trust, and are we not bound and
united together by ties stronger than those which earth has to impose?
Dearest friend, I am obliged hastily to conclude.--Yours
affectionately,
E. J. TRELAWNY.
George Baring, Esq., who takes my book, is the brother of the banker;
he has read it, and is in my confidence, and will be very ready to see
and confer with you and do anything. He is an excellent person. I
shall be very anxious till I hear from you.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
33 SOMERSET STREET,
_27th December 1830_.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY--At present I can only satisfy your impatience with
the information that I have received your MS. and read the greater
part of it. Soon I hope to say more. George Baring did not come to
England, but after considerable delay forwarded it to me from Cologne.
I am delighted with your work; it is full of passion, energy, and
novelty; it concerns the sea, and that is a subject of the greatest
interest to me. I should imagine that it must command success.
But, my dear friend, allow me to persuade you to permit certain
omissions. In one of your letters to me you say that "there is nothing
in it that a woman could not read." You are correct for the most part,
and yet without the omission of a few words here and there--the scene
before you go to school with the mate of your ship--and above all the
scene of the burning of the house, following your scene with your
Scotch enemy--I am sure that yours will be a book interdicted to
women. Certain words and phrases, pardoned in the days of Fielding,
are now justly interdicted, and any gross piece of ill taste will make
your booksellers draw back.
I have named all the objectionable passages, and I beseech you to let
me deal with them as I would with Lord Byron's _Don Juan_, when I
omitted all that hurt my taste. Without this yielding on your part I
shall experience great difficulty in disposing of your work; besides
that I, your partial friend, strongly object to coarseness, now wholly
out of date, and beg you for my sake to make the omissions necessary
for your obtaining feminine readers. Amidst so much that is beautiful
and imaginative and exalting, why leave spots which, believe me, are
blemishes? I hope soon to write to you again on the subject.
The burnings, the alarms, the absorbing politics of the day render
booksellers almost averse to publishing at all. God knows how it will
all end, but it looks as if the autocrats would have the good sense to
make the necessary sacrifices to a starving people.
I heard from Clare to-day; she is well and still at Nice. I suppose
there is no hope of seeing you here. As for me, I of course still
continue a prisoner. Percy is quite well, and is growing more and more
like Shelley. Since it is necessary to live, it is a great good to
have this tie to life, but it is a wearisome affair. I hope you are
happy.--Yours, my dearest friend, ever,
MARY SHELLEY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
FIRENZE, _19th January 1831_.
MY DEAREST MARY--For, notwithstanding what you may think of me, you
every day become dearer to me. The men I have linked myself to in my
wild career through life have almost all been prematurely cut off, and
the only friends which are left me are women, and they are strange
beings. I have lost them all by some means or other; they are dead to
me in being married, or (for you are all slaves) separated by
obstacles which are insurmountable, and as Lord Chatham observes,
"Friendship is a weed of slow growth in aged bosoms." But now to your
letter. I to-day received yours of the 27th of December; you say you
have received my MS. It has been a painful and arduous undertaking
narrating my life. I have omitted a great deal, and avoided being a
pander to the public taste for the sake of novelty or effect. Landor,
a man of superior literary acquirements; Kirkup, an artist of superior
taste; Baring, a man of the world and very religious; Mrs. Baring,
moral and squeamish; Lady Burghersh, aristocratic and proud as a
queen; and lastly, Charles Brown, a plain downright Cockney critic,
learned in the trade of authorship, and has served his time as a
literary scribe. All these male and female critics have read and
passed their opinions on my narrative, and therefore you must excuse
my apparent presumption in answering your objections to my book with
an appearance of presumptuous dictation. Your objections to the
coarseness of those scenes you have mentioned have been foreseen, and,
without further preface or apology, I shall briefly state my wishes on
the subject. Let Hogg or Horace Smith read it, and, without your
_giving any_ opinion, hear theirs; then let the booksellers, Colburn
or others, see it, and then if it is their general opinion that there
are _words_ which are better omitted, why I must submit to their
being omitted; but do not prompt them by prematurely giving your
opinion. My life, though I have sent it you, as the dearest friend I
have, is not written for the amusement of women; it is not a novel. If
you begin clipping the wings of my true story, if you begin erasing
words, you must then omit sentences, then chapters; it will be pruning
an Indian jungle down to a clipped French garden. I shall be so
appalled at my MS. in its printed form, that I shall have no heart to
go on with it. Dear Mary, I love women, and you know it, but my life
is not dedicated to them; it is to men I write, and my first three
volumes are principally adapted to sailors. England is a nautical
nation, and, if they like it, the book will amply repay the publisher,
and I predict it will be popular with sailors, for it is true to its
text. By the time you get this letter the time of publishing is come,
and we are too far apart to continue corresponding on the subject. Let
Hogg, Horace Smith, or any one you like, read the MS.; or the
booksellers; if they absolutely object to any particular words or
short passages, why let them be omitted by leaving blanks; but I
should prefer a first edition as it now stands, and then a second as
the bookseller thought best. In the same way that _Anastasius_ was
published, the suppression of the first edition of that work did not
prevent its success. All men lament that _Don Juan_ was not published
as it was written, as under any form it would have been interdicted to
women, and yet under any form they would have unavoidably read it.
Brown, who is learned in the bookselling trade, says I should get L200
per volume. Do not dispose of it under any circumstances for less than
L500 the three volumes. Have you seen a book written by a man named
Millingen? He has written an article on me, and I am answering it. My
reply to it I shall send you. The _Literary Gazette_, which published
the extract regarding me, I have replied to, and to them I send my
reply; the book I have not seen. If they refuse, as the article I
write is amusing, you will have no difficulty in getting it admitted
in some of the London magazines. It will be forwarded to you in a few
days, so you see I am now fairly coming forward in a new character. I
have laid down the sword for the pen. Brown has just called with the
article in question copied, and I send it together.
I have spoken to you about filling up the mottoes; the title of my
book I wish to be simply thus--_The Life of a Man_, and not _The
Discarded Son_, which looks too much like romance or a common
novel....
Florence is very gay, and there are many pretty girls here, and balls
every night. Tell Mrs. Paul not to be angry at my calling her and her
sisters by their Christian names, for I am very lawless, as you know,
in that particular, and not very particular on other things.
Brown talks of writing to you about the mottoes to my book, as he is
very anxious about those of his friend Keats. Have you any MS. of
Shelley's or Byron's to fill up the eight or ten I left blank?
Remember the short chapters are to be adhered to in its printed form.
I shall have no excitement to go on writing till I see what I have
already written in print. By the bye, my next volumes will to general
readers be far more interesting, and published with my name, or at
least called Treloen, which is our original family name.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
_5th April 1831_.
MY DEAR MARY--Since your letter, dated December 1830, I have not had a
single line from you, yet in that you promised to write in a few days.
Why is this? or have you written, and has your letter miscarried, or
have not my letters reached you? I was anxious to have published the
first part of my life this year, and if it had succeeded in
interesting general readers, it would have induced me to have
proceeded to its completion, for I cannot doubt that if the first
part, published anonymously, and treating of people, countries, and
things little known, should suit the public palate, that the latter,
treating of people that everybody knows, and of things generally
interesting, must be successful. But till I see the effect of the
first part, I cannot possibly proceed to the second, and time is
fleeting, and I am lost in idleness. I cannot write a line, and thus
six months, in which I had leisure to have finished my narrative, are
lost, and I am now deeply engaged in a wild scheme which will lead me
to the East, and it is firmly my belief that when I again leave Europe
it will be for ever. I have had too many hair-breadth escapes to hope
that fortune will bear me up. My present Quixotic expedition is to be
in the region wherein is still standing the column erected by
Sardanapalus, and on it by him inscribed words to the effect: _Il faut
jouir des plaisirs de la vie; tout le reste n'est rien_.
At present I can only say, if nothing materially intervenes to prevent
me, that in the autumn of this year I shall bend my steps towards the
above-mentioned column, and try the effect of it.
I am sick to death of the pleasureless life I lead here, and I should
rather the tinkling of the little bell, which I hear summoning the
dead to its last resting-place, was ringing for my body than endure
the petty vexations of what is called civilised life, and see what I
saw a few days back, the Austrian tyrants trampling on their helot
Italians; but letters are not safe.--Your affectionate friend,
E. J. T.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
SOMERSET STREET, _22d March 1831_.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY--What can you think of me and of my silence? I can
guess by the contents of your letters and your not having yet received
answers. Believe me that if I am at all to blame in this it arises
from an error in judgment, not from want of zeal. Every post-day I
have waited for the next, expecting to be able to communicate
something definitive, and now still I am waiting; however, I trust
that this letter will contain some certain intelligence before I send
it. After all, I have done no more than send your manuscripts to
Colburn, and I am still in expectation of his answer. In the first
place, they insist on certain parts being expunged,--parts of which I
alone had the courage to speak to you, but which had before been
remarked upon as inadmissible. These, however (with trifling
exceptions), occur only in the first volume. The task of deciding upon
them may very properly be left to Horace Smith, if he will undertake
it--we shall see. Meanwhile, Colburn has not made up his mind as to
the price. He will not give L500. The terms he will offer I shall hope
to send before I close this letter, so I will say no more except to
excuse my having conceded so much time to his dilatoriness. In all I
have done I may be wrong; I commonly act from my own judgment; but
alas! I have great experience. I _believe_ that, if I sent your work
to Murray, he would return it in two months unread; simply saying that
he does not print novels. Your end part would be a temptation, did not
your intention to be severe on Moore make it improbable that he would
like to engage in it; and he would keep me as long as Colburn in
uncertainty; still this may be right to do, and I shall expect your
further instructions by return of post. However, in one way you may
help yourself. You know Lockhart. He reads and judges for Murray;
write to him; your letter shall accompany the MS. to him. Still, this
thing must not be done hastily, for if I take the MS. out of Colburn's
hands, and, failing to dispose of it elsewhere, I come back to him, he
will doubtless retreat from his original proposal. There are other
booksellers in the world, doubtless, than these two, but, occupied as
England is by political questions, and impoverished miserably, there
are few who have enterprise at this juncture to offer a price. I quote
examples. My father and myself would find it impossible to make any
tolerable arrangement with any one except Colburn. He at least may be
some guide as to what you may expect. Mr. Brown remembers the golden
days of authors. When I first returned to England I found no
difficulty in making agreements with publishers; they came to seek me;
now money is scarce, and readers fewer than ever. I leave the rest of
this page blank. I shall fill it up before it goes on Friday.
_Friday, 25th March._
At length, my dear friend, I have received the ultimatum of these
great people. They offer you L300, and another L100 on a second
edition; as this was sent me in writing, and there is no time for
further communication before post-hour, I cannot _officially_ state
the number of the edition. I should think 1000. I think that perhaps
they may be brought to say L400 at once, or L300 at once and L200 on
the second edition. There can be no time for parleying, and therefore
you must make up your mind whether after doing good battle, if
necessary, I shall accept their terms. Believe _my experience_ and
that of those about me; you will not get a better offer from others,
because money is not to be had, and Bulwer and other fashionable and
selling authors are now obliged to content themselves with half of
what they got before. If you decline this offer, I will, if you
please, try Murray; he will keep me two months at least, and the worst
is, if he won't do anything, Colburn will diminish his bargain, and we
shall be in a greater mess than ever. I know that, as a woman, I am
timid, and therefore a bad negotiator, except that I have perseverance
and zeal, and, I repeat, experience of things as they are. Mr. Brown
knows what they were, but they are sadly changed. The omissions
mentioned must be made, but I will watch over them, and the mottoes
and all that shall be most carefully attended to, depend on me.
Do not be displeased, my dear friend, that I take advantage of this
enormous sheet of paper to save postage, and ask you to tear off one
half sheet, and to send it to Mrs. Hare. You talk of my visiting
Italy. It is impossible for me to tell you how much I repine at my
imprisonment here, but I dare not anticipate a change to take me there
for a long time. England, its ungenial clime, its difficult society,
and the annoyances to which I am subjected in it weigh on my spirits
more than ever, for every step I take only shows me how impossible
[it is], situated as I am, that I should be otherwise than wretched.
My sanguine disposition and capacity to endure have borne me up
hitherto, but I am sinking at last; but to quit so stupid a topic and
to tell you news, did you hear that Medwin contrived to get himself
gazetted for full pay in the Guards? I fancy that he employed his
connection with the Shelleys, who are connected with the King through
the Fitz Clarences. However, a week after he was gazetted as retiring.
I suppose the officers cut him at mess; his poor wife and children!
how I pity them! Jane is quite well, living in tranquillity. Hogg
continues all that she can desire....
She lives where she did; her children are well, and so is my Percy,
who grows more like Shelley. I hear that your old favourite, Margaret
Shelley, is prettier than ever; your Miss Burdett is married. I have
been having lithographed your letter to me about Caroline. I wish to
disperse about 100 copies among the many hapless fair who imagine
themselves to have been the sole object of your tenderness. Clare is
to have a first copy. Have you heard from poor dear Clare? She
announced a little time ago that she was to visit Italy with the
Kaisaroff to see you. I envied her, but I hear from her brother
Charles that she has now quarrelled with Madame K., and that she will
go to Vienna. God grant that her sufferings end soon. I begin to
anticipate it, for I hear that Sir Tim is in a bad way. I shall hear
more certain intelligence after Easter. Mrs. P. spends her Easter with
Caroline, who lives in the neighbourhood, and will dine at Field
Place. I have not seen Mrs. Aldridge since her marriage; she has
scarcely been in town, but I shall see her this spring, when she comes
up as she intends. You know, of course, that Elizabeth St. Aubyn is
married, so you know that your ladies desert you sadly. If Clare and I
were either to die or marry you would be left without a Dulcinea at
all, with the exception of the sixscore new objects for idolatry you
may have found among the pretty girls in Florence. Take courage,
however; I am scarcely a Dulcinea, being your friend and not the Lady
of your love, but such as I am, I do not think that I shall either
die or marry this year, whatever may happen the next; as it is only
spring you have some time before you.
We are all here on the _qui vive_ about the Reform Bill; if it pass,
and Tories and all expect it, well,--if not, Parliament is dissolved
immediately, and they say that the new writs are in preparation. The
Whigs triumphed gloriously in the boldness of their measure. England
will be free if it is carried. I have had very bad accounts from Rome,
but you are quiet as usual in Florence. I am scarcely wicked enough to
desire that you should be driven home, nor do I expect it, and yet how
glad I should be to see you. You never mention Zella. Adieu, my dear
Trelawny.--I am always affectionately yours,
MARY W. SHELLEY.
Hunt has set up a little 2d. paper, the _Tatler_, which is succeeding;
this keeps him above water. I have not seen him very lately. He lives
a long way off. He is the same as ever, a person whom all must love
and regret.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
_8th April 1831_.
DEAR MARY--The day after I had despatched a scolding letter to you, I
received your Titanic letter, and sent Mrs. Hare her fathom of it....
Now, let's to business. I thank you for the trouble you have taken
about the MS. Let Colburn have it, and try to get L400 down, for as to
what may be promised on a second edition, I am told is mere humbug.
When my work is completed I have no doubt the first part will be
reprinted, but get what you can paid down at once; as to the rest, I
have only to say that I consent to Horace Smith being the sole
arbitrator of what is necessary to be omitted, but do not let him be
prompted, and tell him only to omit what is _absolutely
indispensable_. Say to him that it is a friend of Shelley's who asks
him this favour, but do not let him or any other individual know that
I am the author. If my name is known, and the work can be brought home
to me, the consequences will be most disastrous. I beseech you bear
this in mind. Let all the mottoes appear in their respective chapters
without any omission, regardless of their number to each chapter, for
they are all good, and fill up the eight or ten I left blank from
Byron and Shelley; if from MS. so much the better. The changes in the
opinions of all mankind on political and other topics are favourable
to such writers as I and the Poets of Liberty whom I have selected. We
shall no longer be hooted at; it is our turn to triumph now. Would
those glorious spirits, to whose genius the present age owes so much,
could witness the triumphant success of these opinions. I think I see
Shelley's fine eyes glisten, and faded cheek glow with fire unearthly.
England, France, and Belgium free, the rest of Europe must follow; the
theories of tyrants all over the world are shaken as by an earthquake;
they may be propped up for a time, but their fall is inevitable. I am
forgetting the main business of my letter. I hope, Mary, that you have
not told Colburn or any one else that I am the author of the book.
Remember that I must have the title simply _A Man's Life_, and that I
should like to have as many copies for my friends as you can get from
Colburn--ten, I hope--and that you will continue to report progress,
and tell me when it is come out. You must have a copy, Horace Smith
one, and Jane and Lady Burghersh; she is to be heard of at Apsley
House--Duke of Wellington's--and then I have some friends here; you
must send me a parcel by sea. If the time is unfavourable for
publication, from men's minds being engrossed with politics, yet it is
so far an advantage that my politics go with the times, and not as
they would have been some years back, obnoxious and premature. I
decide on Colburn as publisher, not from liberality of his terms, but
his courage, and trusting that as little as possible will be omitted;
and, by the bye, I wish you to keep copies, for I have none, of those
parts which are omitted. Enough of this. Of Clare I have seen nothing.
Do not you, dear Mary, abandon me by following the evil examples of
my other ladies. I should not wonder if fate, without our choice,
united us; and who can control his fate? I blindly follow his decrees,
dear Mary.--Your
E. J. T.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
SOMERSET STREET, _14th June 1831_.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY--Your work is in progress at last, and is being
printed with great rapidity. Horace Smith undertook the revision, and
sent a very favourable report of it to the publishers; to me he says:
"Having written to you a few days ago, I have only to annex a copy of
my letter to Colburn and Bentley, whence you will gather my opinion of
the MS.; it is a most powerful, but rather perilous work, which will
be much praised and much abused by the liberal and bigoted. I have
read it with great pleasure and think it admirable, in everything but
the conclusion;" by this he means, as he says to Colburn and Bentley,
"The conclusion is abrupt and disappointing, especially as previous
allusions have been made to his later life which is not given.
Probably it is meant to be continued, and if so it would be better to
state it, for I have no doubt that his first part will create a
sufficient sensation to ensure the sale of a second."
In his former letter to me H. S. says: "Any one who has proved himself
the friend of yourself and of him whom we all deplore I consider to
have strong claims on my regard, and I therefore willingly undertake
the revision of the MS. Pray assure the author that I feel flattered
by this little mark of his confidence in my judgment, and that it will
always give me pleasure to render him these or any other services."
And now, my dear Trelawny, I hope you will not be angry at the title
given to your book; the responsibility of doing anything for any one
so far away as you is painful, and I have had many qualms, but what
could I do? The publishers strongly objected to the _History of a Man_
as being no title at all, or rather one to lead astray. The one
adopted is taken from the first words of your MS., where you declare
yourself a younger son--words pregnant of meaning in this country,
where to be the younger son of a man of property is to be virtually
discarded,--and they will speak volumes to the English reader; it is
called, therefore, _The Adventures of a Younger Son_. If you are angry
with me for this I shall be sorry, but I knew not what to do. Your MS.
will be preserved for you; and remember, also, that it is pretty well
known whom it is by. I suppose the persons who read the MS. in Italy
have talked, and, as I told you, your mother speaks openly about it.
Still it will not appear in print, in no newspaper accounts over which
I have any control as emanating from the publisher. Let me know
immediately how I am to dispose of the dozen copies I shall receive on
your account. One must go to H. Smith, another to me, and to whom
else? The rest I will send to you in Italy.
There is another thing that annoys me especially. You will be paid in
bills dating from the day of publication, now not far distant; three
of various dates. To what man of business of yours can I consign
these? the first I should think I could get discounted at once, and
send you the cash; but tell me what I am to do. I know that all these
hitches and drawbacks will make you vituperate womankind, and had I
ever set myself up for a woman of business, or known how to manage my
own affairs, I might be hurt; but you know my irremediable
deficiencies on those subjects, and I represented them strongly to you
before I undertook my task; and all I can say in addition is, that as
far as I have seen, both have been obliged to make the same
concessions, so be as forgiving and indulgent as you can.
We are full here of reform or revolution, whichever it is to be; I
should think something approaching the latter, though the first may be
included in the last. Will you come over and sit for the new
parliament? what are you doing? Have you seen Clare? how is she? She
never writes except on special occasions, when she wants anything.
Tell her that Percy is quite well.
You tell me not to marry,--but I will,--any one who will take me out
of my present desolate and uncomfortable position. Any one,--and with
all this do you think that I shall marry? Never,--neither you nor
anybody else. Mary Shelley shall be written on my tomb,--and why? I
cannot tell, except that it is so pretty a name that though I were to
preach to myself for years, I never should have the heart to get rid
of it.
Adieu, my dear friend. I shall be very anxious to hear from you; to
hear that you are not angry about all the _contretemps_ attendant on
your publication, and to receive your further directions.--Yours very
truly,
M. W. SHELLEY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
_29th June 1831_.
DEAR MARY--Your letter, dated 14th June, I have received, after a long
interval, and your letter before that is dated 22d March. It would
appear by your last that you must have written another letter between
March and June, by allusions in this last respecting my Mother. If so,
it has never reached me, so that if it contained anything which is
necessary for me to know, I pray you let me have a transcript, so far
as your memory will serve to give it me. I am altogether ignorant of
what arrangements you have made with Colburn; and am only in
possession of the facts contained in the second, to wit, that Horace
Smith is revising the work for publication. I trust he will not be too
liberal with the pruning-knife. When will the cant and humbug of these
costermonger times be reformed? Nevertheless tell H. Smith that the
author is fully sensible of his kindness and (for once, at least, in
his life) with all his heart joins his voice to that of the world in
paying tribute to the sterling ability of Mr. Horace Smith; and I
remember Shelley and others speaking of him as one often essayed on
the touchstone of proof, and never found wanting. Horace Smith's
criticism on the _Life_ is flattering, and as regards the perilous
part--why I never have, and never shall, crouch to those I utterly
despise, to wit, the bigoted. The Roman Pontiff might as well have
threatened me with excommunication when on board the _Grub_, if I
failed to strike my top-sails, and lower my proud flag to the lubberly
craft which bore his silly banner, bedaubed with mitres, crosses, and
St. Peter's Keys.
I did not mean to call my book _The History of a Man_, but simply
thus, _A Man's Life_; "Adventures" and "Younger Son" are commonplace,
and I don't like it; but if it is to be so, why, I shall not waste
words in idle complaints: would it were as I had written it. By the
bye, you say justly the MS. ends abruptly; the truth is, as you know,
it is only the first part of my life, and to conclude it will fill
three more volumes: that it is to be concluded, I thought I had stated
in a paragraph annexed to the last chapter of that which is now in the
press, which should run thus--
"I am, or rather have, continued this history of my life, and it will
prove I have not been a passive instrument of despotism, nor shall I
be found consorting with those base, sycophantic, and mercenary
wretches who crouch and crawl and fawn on kings, and priests, and
lords, and all in authority under them. On my return to Europe, its
tyrants had gathered together all their helots and gladiators to
restore the cursed dynasty of the Bourbons, and thousands of slaves
went forth to extinguish and exterminate liberty, truth, and justice.
I went forth, too, my hand ever against them, and when tyranny had
triumphed, I wandered an exile in the world and leagued myself with
men worthy to be called so, for they, inspired by wisdom, uncoiled the
frauds contained in lying legends, which had so long fatally deluded
the majority of mankind. Alas! those apostles have not lived to see
the tree they planted fructify; would they had tarried a little while
to behold this new era of 1830-31, how they would have rejoiced to
behold the leagued conspiracy of kings broken, and their bloodhound
priests and nobles muzzled, their impious confederacy to enslave and
rob the people paralysed by a blow that has shaken their usurpation to
the base, and must inevitably be followed by their final overthrow.
Yes, the sun of freedom is dawning on the pallid slaves of Europe,"
etc.
The conclusion of this diatribe I am certain you have, and if you have
not the beginning, why put it in beginning with the words: "I have
continued the history of my life."
If I thought there was a probability that I could get a seat in the
reformed House of Commons, I would go to England, or if there was a
probability of revolution. I was more delighted with your resolve not
to change your name than with any other portion of your letter.
Trelawny, too, is a good name, and sounds as well as Shelley; it fills
the mouth as well and will as soon raise a spirit. By the bye, when
you send my books, send me also Mary Wollstonecraft's _Rights of
Women_, and Godwin's new work on _Man_, and tell me what you are now
writing. The Hares are at Lucca Baths. Never omit to tell me what you
know of Caroline. Do you think there is any opening among the
demagogues for me? It is a bustling world at present, and likely so to
continue. I must play a part. Write, Mary mine, speedily.
Is my book advertised? If so, the motto from Byron should accompany
it.
Clare only remained in Florence about ten days; some sudden death of a
relative of the family she resides with recalled them to Russia. I saw
her three or four times. She was very miserable, and looked so pale,
thin, and haggard. The people she lived with were bigots, and treated
her very badly. I wished to serve her, but had no means. Poor lady, I
pity her; her life has been one of continued misery. I hope on Sir
Timothy's death it will be bettered; her spirits are broken, and she
looks fifty; I have not heard of her since her departure. Mrs. Hare
once saw her, but she was so prejudiced against her, from stories she
had heard against her from the Beauclercs, that she could hardly be
induced to notice her. You are aware that I do not wish my book to
appear as if written for publication, and therefore have avoided all
allusions which might induce people to think otherwise. I wish all the
mottoes to be inserted, as they are a selection of beautiful poetry,
and many of them not published.
The bills, you say, Colburn and Bentley are to give you; perhaps
Horace Smith may further favour me by getting them negotiated. I am
too much indebted to him to act so scurvily as not to treat him with
entire confidence, so with the injunction of secrecy you may tell him
my name. If he dislikes the affair of the bills, as I cannot employ
any of my people of business, why give the bills, or rather place them
in the hands of a man who keeps a glover's shop (I know him well). His
name is Moon, and his shop is corner one in Orange Street, Bloomsbury
Square. When I get your reply, I will, if necessary, write to him on
the subject. I pray you write me on receipt of this. My child Zella is
growing up very pretty, and with a soul of fire. She is living with
friends of mine near Lucca.
The only copies of the book I wish you to give away are to Horace
Smith, Mary Shelley, Lady Burghersh, No. 1 Hyde Park Terrace, Oxford
Road, and Jane Williams, to remind her that she is not forgotten.
Shelley's tomb and mine in Rome, is, I am told, in a very dilapidated
state. I will see to its repair. Send me out six copies by sea; one if
you can sooner. Address them to Henry Dunn, Leghorn.
E. J. TRELAWNY.
TRELAWNY TO MRS. SHELLEY.
POSTE RESTANTE, FIRENZE,
_19th July 1831_.
* * * * *
By the bye, Mary, if it is not too late, I should wish the name of
Zella to be spelt in the correct Arabic, thus, _Zella_, in my book. I
changed it in common with several others of the names to prevent my
own being too generally recognised; with regard to hers, if not too
late, I should now wish it to appear in its proper form, besides
which, in the chapter towards the conclusion, wherein I narrate an
account of a pestilence which was raging in the town of Batavia, I
wish the word Java fever to be erased, and cholera morbus substituted.
For we alone had the former malady on board the schooner, having
brought it into the Batavia Roads with us, but on our arrival there
we found the cholera raging with virulence, most of those attacked
expiring in the interval of the setting and rising of the sun. Luis,
our steward, I thought died from fever, as we had had it previously on
board, but the medicals pronounced it or denounced it cholera. If the
alteration can be made, it will be interesting, as in the history of
the cholera I see published, they only traced the origin to 1816, when
the fact is, it was in 1811 that I am speaking of, and no doubt it has
existed for thousands of years before, but it is only of late, like
the natives of Hindoostan, it has visited Europe. It is sent by
Nemesis, a fitting retribution for the gold and spices we have robbed
them of. The malediction of my Malayan friends has come to pass, for I
have no doubt the Russian caravans which supply that empire with tea,
silks, and spices introduced the cholera, or gave it into the bargain,
or as _bona mano_. I wish you would write, for I am principally
detained here by wishing to get a letter from you ere I go to some
other place.--Yours, and truly,
E. T.
MRS. SHELLEY TO TRELAWNY.
SOMERSET STREET, _26th July 1831_.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY--Your third volume is now printing, so I should
imagine that it will very soon be published; everything shall be
attended to as you wish. The letter to which I alluded in my former
one was a tiny one enclosed to Clare, which perhaps you have received
by this time. It mentioned the time of the agreement; L300 in bills of
three, six, and eight months, dated from the day of publication, and
L100 more on a second edition. The mention I made of your mother was,
that she speaks openly in society of your forthcoming memoirs, so that
I should imagine very little real secrecy will attend them. However,
you will but gain reputation and admiration through them.
I hope you are going on, for your continuation will, I am sure, be
ardently looked for. I am so sorry for the delay of all last winter,
yet I did my best to conclude the affair; but the state of the nation
has so paralysed bookselling that publishers were very backward,
though Colburn was in his heart eager to get at your book. As to the
price, I have taken pains to ascertain; and you receive as much as is
given to the best novelists at this juncture, which may console your
vanity if it does not fill your pocket.
The Reform Bill will pass, and a considerable revolution in the
government of the country will, I imagine, be the consequence.
You have talents of a high order. You have powers; these, with
industry and discretion, would advance you in any career. You ought
not, indeed you ought not to throw away yourself as you do. Still, I
would not advise your return on the speculation, because England is so
sad a place that the mere absence from it I consider a peculiar
blessing.
My name will _never_ be Trelawny. I am not so young as I was when you
first knew me, but I am as proud. I must have the entire affection,
devotion, and, above all, the solicitous protection of any one who
would win me. You belong to womenkind in general, and Mary Shelley
will _never_ be yours.
I write in haste, but I will write soon again, more at length. You
shall have your copies the moment I receive them. Believe me, with all
gratitude and affection, yours,
M. W. SHELLEY.
Jane thanks you for the book promised. I am infinitely chagrined at
what you tell me concerning Clare. If the B.'s spoke against her, that
means Mrs. B. and her stories were gathered from Lord Byron, who
feared Clare and did not spare her; and the stories he told were such
as to excuse the prejudice of any one.
THE SAME TO THE SAME.
SOMERSET STREET, _2d October 1831_.
MY DEAR TRELAWNY--I suppose that I have now some certain intelligence
to send you, though I fear that it will both disappoint and annoy
you. I am indeed ashamed that I have not been able to keep these
people in better order, but I trusted to honesty, when I ought to have
ensured it; however, thus it stands: your book is to be published in
the course of the month, and then your bills are to be dated. As soon
as I get them I will dispose of them as you direct, and you will
receive notice on the subject without delay. I cannot procure for you
a copy until then; they pretend that it is not all printed. If I can
get an opportunity I will send you one by private hand, at any rate I
shall send them by sea without delay. I will write to Smith about
negotiating your bills, and I have no doubt that I shall be able
somehow or other to get you money on them. I will go myself to the
City to pay Barr's correspondent as soon as I get the cash. Thus your
_pretty dear_ (how fascinating is flattery) will do her best, as soon
as these tiresome people fulfil their engagements. In some degree they
have the right on their side, as the day of publication is a usual
time from which to date the bills, and that was the time which I
acceded to; but they talked of such hurry and speed that I expected
that that day was nearer at hand than it now appears to be. November
_is_ the publishing month, and no new things are coming out now. In
fact, the Reform Bill swallows up every other thought. You have heard
of the Lords' majority against it, much longer than was expected,
because it was not imagined that so many bishops would vote against
Government....
Do whenever you write send me news of Clare. She never writes herself,
and we are all excessively anxious about her. I hope she is better.
God knows when fate will do anything for us. I despair. Percy is well,
I fancy that he will go to Harrow in the spring; it is not yet finally
arranged, but this is what I wish, and therefore I suppose it will be,
as they have promised to increase my allowance for him, and leave me
pretty nearly free, only with Eton prohibited; but Harrow is now in
high reputation under a new head-master. I am delighted to hear that
Zella is in such good hands, it is so necessary in this world of woe
that children should learn betimes to yield to necessity; a girl
allowed to run wild makes an unhappy woman.
Hunt has set up a penny daily paper, literary and theatrical; it is
succeeding very well, but his health is wretched, and when you
consider that his sons, now young men, do not contribute a penny
towards their own support, you may guess that the burthen on him is
very heavy. I see them very seldom, for they live a good way off, and
when I go he is out, she busy, and I am entertained by the children,
who do not edify me. Jane has just moved into a house about half a
mile further from town, on the same road; they have furnished it
themselves. Dina improves, or rather she always was, and continues to
be, a very nice child.
* * * * *
The _Adventures_ did not reach a second edition in their original form;
the first edition failed, indeed, to repay its expenses; but they were
afterwards republished in _Colburn's Family Library_. The second part of
Trelawny's Autobiography took the chatty and discursive form, so popular
at the present day, of "Reminiscences." It is universally known as
_Recollections[11] of Shelley, Byron, and the Author_.
So long as Shelley and Byron survive as objects of interest in this world,
so long must this fascinating book share their existence. As originally
published, it has not a dull page. Life-like as if written at the moment
it all happened, it yet has the pictorial sense of proportion which can
rarely exist till a writer stands at such a distance (of time) from the
scenes he describes that he can estimate them, not only as they are, but
in their relation to surrounding objects. It would seem as if, for the
conversations at least, Trelawny must sometimes have drawn on his
imagination as well as his memory; if so, it can only be replied that, by
his success, he has triumphantly vindicated his artistic right to do so.
Terse, original, and characteristic, each speech paints its speaker in
colours which we know and feel to be true. Nothing seems set down for
effect; it is spontaneous, unstudied, everyday reality. And if the history
of Trelawny's own exploits in Greece somewhat recall the "tarasconnades"
of his early adventures, it at least puts a thrilling finish to a book it
was hard to conclude without falling into bathos. As a writer on Shelley,
Trelawny surely stands alone. Many authors have praised Shelley, others
have condemned and decried him, others again have tried to pity and
"excuse" him. No one has apprehended as happily as Trelawny the peculiar
_timbre_, if it may be so described, of his nature, or has brought out so
vividly, and with so few happy touches, his moral and social
characteristics. Saint or sinner, the Shelley of Trelawny is no lay
figure, no statue even, no hero of romance; it is _Shelley_, the man, the
boy, the poet. Trelawny assures us that Hogg's picture of Shelley as a
youth is absolutely faithful. But Hogg's picture only shows us Shelley in
his "salad days," and even that we are never allowed to contemplate
without the companion-portrait of the biographer, smiling with cynical
amusement while he yields his tribute of heartfelt, but patronising
praise.
The conclusions to which Hogg had come by observation Trelawny arrived at
by intuition. Fiery and imaginative, his nature was by far the more
sympathetic of the two; though it may be that, in virtue of very
unlikeness, Hogg would have proved, in the long run, the fitter companion
for Shelley.
Between Trelawny and Mary there existed the same kind of adjustable
difference. His descriptions of her have been largely drawn upon in
earlier chapters of the present work, and need not be reverted to here.
She had been seven years dead when the _Recollections_ were published.
Twenty years later, when Mary Shelley had been twenty-seven years in her
grave, there appeared a second edition of the book. In those twenty years,
what change had come over the spirit of its pages? An undefinable
difference, like that which comes over the face of Nature when the wind
changes from west to east,--and yet not so undefinable either, for it had
power to reverse some very definite facts. Byron's feet, for instance,
which--as the result of an investigation after death--were described, in
1858, as having, both, been "clubbed and withered to the knee," "the feet
and legs of a sylvan satyr," are, in 1878, pronounced to have been
_faultless_, but for the contraction of the back sinews (the "Tendon
Achilles"), which prevented his heels from resting on the ground.
"Unfortunately," to quote Mr. Garnett's comment on this discrepancy, in
his article on _Shelley's Last Days_, "as in the natural world the same
agencies that are elevating one portion of the earth's surface are at the
same time depressing another, so, in the microcosm of Mr. Trelawny's
memory and judgment, the embellishment of Lord Byron's feet has been
accompanied by a corresponding deterioration of Mrs. Shelley's heart and
head."
Yes; the Mary Shelley with whom, in early days, even Trelawny could find
no fault, save perhaps for a tendency to mournfulness in solitude and an
occasional fit of literary abstraction when she might have been looking
after the commissariat--who in later years was his trusty friend, his sole
correspondent, his literary editor, his man of business--and withal his
"pretty dear" "every day dearer" to him, "Mary--my Mary"--superior surely
to the rest of her sex, with whom at one time it seems plain enough that
he would have been nothing loth to enter into an alliance, offensive and
defensive, for life, would she but have preferred the name of Trelawny to
that of Shelley,--this Mary whose voice had been silent for seven and
twenty years, and to whom he himself had raised a monument of praise,
rises from her tomb as conventional and commonplace, unsympathetic and
jealous, narrow, orthodox, and worldly.
Yet she had borne with his exactions and scoldings and humours for
friendship's sake, and with full faith in the loyalty and generosity of
his heart. A pure and delicate-minded woman, she had not been scandalised
by his lawless morals. She had had the courage to withstand him when he
was wrong, working for him the while like a devoted slave. Never was a
more true and disinterested friendship than hers for him; and he, who knew
her better than most people did, was well aware of it.
Where then was the change? Alas! It was in himself. In this revolving
world, where "Time that gave doth now his gift confound," and where
"nought may endure but mutability," the "flourish set on youth" is soon
transfixed.
Greek fevers and gunshot wounds told on the "Pirate's" disposition as well
as on his constitution. The habits of mind he had cultivated and been
proud of,--combativeness, opposition to all authority as such--finally
became his masters; he could not even acquiesce in his own experience. Age
and the ravages of Time were to blame for his morbid censoriousness;
Time--that "feeds on the rarities of Nature's truth." These later
recollections are but the distorted images of a blurred mirror. But, none
the less, the tale is a sad one. We can but echo Trelawny's own words to
Mary[12]--"Can such things be, and overcome us like a summer cloud,
without our especial wonder?"