SHELLEY AND HIS WRITINGS.

CHAPTER I.

Shelley meets Lord Byron-Sketch of Byron-Shelley and Byron contrasted-Their intimacy-Their mode of life at Geneva-Thunder-storms over the lakeByron's description of one in Childe Harold-Boating on the lake-Opposite characteristics of Byron and Shelley.

BESIDES the contemplation of the sublime scenery of Lake Leman, Shelley enjoyed the additional advantage of making the acquaintance of Lord Byron, at the Hotel de Sécheron. The two poets arrived at Geneva almost on the same day, and that being the only rendezvous in those days for travellers, they were not long in becoming intimate.

VOL. 11.

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Lord Byron, as every one is aware, had quitted England, never again to return, under very painful circumstances. He, too, had been tossed about on the rude waves of fortune, and subject to the many strange caprices which seem so especially to beset the family of genius.

Born into the world of very discordant parents, a spendthrift father, and a very violenttempered mother, but nevertheless, bringing with him considerably more than his just proportion of the "Eternal Harmonies," nature appears to have commenced the work of contrariety, by endowing him at once with a fine face and a lame foot; a species of contradiction which attended him through life, whether to mark his chequered fortunes or the singular inconsistencies of his complicated and inexplicable character.

Subjected in childhood exclusively, through domestic discord, to the care of his mother, who alternately fondled and reviled him; now overwhelming him with caresses, now reproaching him with his lameness, he was not likely to repress any of those ungovernable passions which he had already too much inherited from her.

But with all the impress of genius upon it, with all the peculiar characteristics which a celebrated writer has traced out as belonging to its growth and development, he likewise ex-. hibited a heart capable, by proper culture and proper usage, of being moulded to purposes of true nobility and greatness. Quick of susceptibilities, generous in its impulses, and dominant in courage, capable of warm affections and strong emotions, while it was far from being intractable, and so highly sensitive and so passionate in its outbursts as often to excite alarm.

Passing rapidly from the penniless orphan to the proud dignity of a noble, and the possessor of wealth, he became too early the uncontrolled arbiter of such fortunes as could not have fallen upon one of his temperament without producing great mental intoxication.

While yet a boy he enjoyed all the privileges, and was admitted to all the rights of manhood; the intemperance of youth, with its many indiscretions, was without check or curb, and there were not wanting associates to pander to the wishes, to lead to excesses, or to flatter the vanity of a stripling lord.

In the very freshness of his boyish fancy he became enamoured of a young maiden, then in the first flush of womanhood. An intimacy of a few weeks was sufficient to make an impression on his susceptible heart for life; his young imagination surrounded her with all the perfections of maidenhood; but the fair object of his passionate love, already betrothed to another, looked with indifference upon her youthful admirer, and was soon afterwards wedded, and lost to him for ever!

This circumstance, more than any other, served to direct his future career. Had his suit been successful, had the lady been willing to await his majority, he might have been married, and have sunk down, as he tells us, into domestic quiet; his brilliant talents have wasted in inaction, or might have faintly displayed themselves in some vapid effusions, such as would have handed down his name to a limited posterity in the list of noble authors.

As it was, he awoke from this short dream of happiness, with the wounded feelings of an oversensitive nature, to the busy realities of life; which had, to him, become shaded by the twilight hues of poetry.

Excessive indulgence, however, gave a morbid character to his feelings, and something too much of an overweening vanity aggravated their effect.

While the lady was in no way to be blamed, the course adopted by Lord Byron to efface her image from his mind, if, indeed, we may so regard the wilful excesses into which he seemed so naturally to fall, was that of an ill-regulated and very ordinary mind. However, that restlessness of character was established, and the unfitness for the calm tranquillity of domestic life, which afterwards distinguished him.

His genius soon declared itself; and the manner in which his first publication was received was an additional incentive for bringing forth his dormant energies. Enriching his mind with images from the vast storehouse of nature, in the course of travel, he arose rapidly to fame; and, while yet a very young man, found himself foremost in the ranks of literature; sought and admired by all, courted and caressed in every circle of society.

At this brilliant epoch of his life, he imposed upon himself a marriage, which, from the un