The Pavonian Shelley: a study of Shelley in the novels of Peacock

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Authors Perper, Marion Eileen Bowman, 1922-

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Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/317937 THE PAVONIAN SHELLEY: A STUDY OF SHELLEY IN THE

NOVELS OF PEACOCK

by

Marion Eileen Perper

A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

In the Graduate College

THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

1966 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR

This thesis has been submitted in partial fulfillment of require­ ments for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library„

Brief quotations from this thesis are allowable without special permissiong provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the Dean of the Graduate College when in his judgment the proposed use of the material is in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, . however, permission must be obtained from the author.

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"M e- ^ 7 a % GERALD MC NIECE / Date _ _ P ro fesso r of English TABLE OF CONTENTS

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1 Percy Bysshe Shelley was not only Thomas Love "Peacock 1 s

friend; he was also the prototype for a main character in four of

Peacock 11 s novels? each of which reveals a -slightly different view

of Shelleyo That Peacock made use of his personal knowledge of

Shelley's life and .mind in creating his heroes can be documented

by references to letters 9 biographical sources 9 and the poet's

works o

I*1 Headlong Hallg M r,. Foster entertainingly exhibits the

young Shelley's optimistic views on the perfectibility of mankind

and his naivete concerning methods of achieving such improvement 0

. M r0 F o rester 9 in Me line our ts rather tediously expounds Shelley's

ideas on the evils inherent in the political and social system of his

day and introduces the Shelleyan quest for ideal beauty 0 The hero

of Nightmare Abbey is an extravagantly romantic youth whose

problems parallel Shelley's difficulties with Harriet and Mary 0

Gryll Grange 9 written many years after Shelley's death * presents

in M r 0 Falconer a review of Shelley's characteristic attitudes 0

Peacock's inimitable wit enabled him to convert Shelley's

virtues and absurdities into gently satiric comedies which reveal

rather than exploit the friendship between the two men0

iv

\ INTRODUCTION

Thomas Love Peacock's caricature of Percy Bysshe Shelley in

Nightmare Abbey is generally considered amusing and highly inaccu- ra te 0 The portrayal of Shelley in Peacock's other novels has been largely ignored or deniedo An examination of the relationship between the men,. an appraisal of the acts, opinionsa and characteristics of

Peacock's heroes, and an understanding of Peacock's literary techniques present an interesting, if limited, view of the Shelley that

Peacock knew.

Of Peacock it has usually been held, even by his devoted admirers, that he was not particularly inventive. Although his early poetry had had.some little success, he soon turned to comedy and the novel, for he recognized his lack of poetic creativity. Rather than genius, he possessed a fine wit, good judgment, a distaste for stupidity, vulgarity and pretension, and an irrepressible sense of the comic. In his novels his deficiency is irrelevant, for they depend upon neither originality of plot nor development of fully rounded characters.

Two of his novels,. Maid Marian and The Misfortunes of Elphin, are derived frorn folktales, British and Welsh, The other five follow a persistent pattern--the gathering in a country house of a group of persons,, each of whom is the embodiment of an idee fixe. The subsequent activity 9 although neat and ingeniouss matters far less than the always unresolved arguments and exchanges of opinions incorporated in some of the best dialogue ever written. The ideas are not new; they are the rational and irrational notions prevalent in the early 19th century. The expounders of these views are only in part the product of the author's imagination; they are fictional presentations of a facet of actual individuals known in varying degrees to Peacock,

Identification of Peacock 1 s dramatis personae is s in many cases, relatively easy and persuasive if one does not demand an exact corres­ pondence between the historical person and his fictional counterpart.

In no case was Peacock endeavoring to present a total personality. His interest was in singular characteristics, acts, or enthusiasms which he found essentially ludicrous or annoying. From such slight bases he constructed his characters, and they somewhat resemble figures in a comic morality play which really has no moral.

Effective satire requires that its objects and incidents be immediately recognizable; effective comedy does not. For the reader who can identify the characters, there are copious hints in reiterated catch phrases easily associated, exact quotations, and parodies of expression; for the reader who cannot make out the name tags, there is sufficient wit and farce to satisfy.

The targets of Peacock's satire included straw-man versions of literary personages (Coleridge, Southey, Wordsworth, Byron, and Shelley)s political figures {'Canning, Gifford,. and Crokef), and some who, if at all known today, are chiefly remembered as adherents to particular theories f'Jo. F» Newton, Humphrey Repton,. and Sir Uvedale

P rice),

It is agreed by most critics that Percy Bysshe Shelley was the original for several of the characters in Peacock's novels. Of the previously mentioned prototypes, Shelley was the only one whom

Peacock knew as an intimate friend. The relationship between Peacock and Shelley has been much discussed,, and the comment often made that it is surprising.that men so different in temperament should have maintained so close a friendship, . Peacock, the elder by seven years, is generally credited with having provided Shelley with congenial companionship, encouraged in him an interest in Greek language and literature, performed innumerable chores of a financial, practical, and diplomatic nature, and acted as a curb on some of Shelley's wilder flights of fancy. Direct traces of Peacock's influence on Shelley's works are few and largely inconsequential.

His association .with Shelley in no way diminished Peacock's slight poetic gifts, but it is probable that the contact with a man whom he recognized to be a genius made him increasingly aware of his own inadequacies. In the youthful Shelley he also saw rampant some of the radical ideas he had previously entertained, albeit in lesser degree, and without Shelley1's extravagent sense of commitment-. Always in Peacock lurked the knowledge that extremes in either action or belief

tended to end in tragedy or absurdity.

In the life of his'friend. Peacock was a first hand observer of both

tragedy and absurdity. In his fictional depictions of Shelley,. Peacock,

in keeping with his basic sympathy for the man, utilized the eccentrici­

ties without jeering, and transformed the emotional dramas into light

comedy. For a bitter satirist,. Shelley would have provided more than

adequate material for scornful cruelty, but Peacock never employed

such tactics on him. That he was capable of grossly unfair handling is

demonstrated in his treatment of Southey as Mr. Feathernest, or

• Coleridge as Mr. Mystic in. Melincourt.

Peacock,, almost invariably a man of good taste, was never guilty

of telling all he knew about Shelley. . He could, and did, make fun of

his friend, but the important point is that what he did make was fun,

and Shelley remained his friend. PEACOCK ANB SHELLEY

The life of Shelley is so well known that it is unnecessary to recount it. The life, however, of the man Shelley and his friends called II Pavone, is less familiar, except for the instances when the lesser known man was intimately involved in Shelley's affairs. A resume of Peacock's biography is presented here to place in better perspective the relationship between the two men.

For reasons unknown, Mrs. Sarah Peacock, in .1825, drew up a document stating that her son Thomas Love Peacock had been born at a quarter past two in the morning of October 18,. 1784, at Weymouth, in Dorsetshire. , An undated note provides the information that her child was baptized at the Scotch Kirk in London two or three months later.

Of Peacock's father little is known except that he was a London glass merchant whose death date is usually given as 1788. However, a letter written by young Thomas to his mother on August 14,, 1792, requests that she "write to my Father to tell him to send some Sweet meats. " Whatever may have been the fate of Samuel Peacock, his

1. All parenthetical references to Peacock's works are from The Works of Thomas Love Peacock, edited by H., F. B. Brett-Smith and

5 6 wife ('or widow) took their three-year-old son to Gogmoor Hall in

Chertsey to live with her father, Thomas Love,, a retired officer of the Royal Navy who had lost his leg at Lord Rodney's defeat of the

French in the West Indies in 1782,

. During his twelve-year residence with his grandfather, young

Peacock, precocious and spoiled in a household of adults,. developed a deep appreciation of outdoor life around the small village on the south bank of the Thames, . His studies were directed by his mother, a well-read woman particularly interested in history, with whom he had an unusually close relationship,

. A little information concerning his boyhood may be culled from

Peacock's nostalgic Recollections of Childhood: The Abbey House, written in his old age, . Charles Harwell, his school mate at Englefield

Green, lived in the neighboring Abbey House and was his companion.

It is interesting that Charles, like young.Shelley,, was an insatiable reader of Gothic romances,, delighting in terror-filled tales of ghosts.

Peacock claimed even then to be merely an amused sceptic, especially after the spectre he discovered proved to be a stalk of lilies swaying in the twilight of a dark grove near the Abbey, . No. other young friends

C, E, Jones (Halliford Edition) 10 vols,, (1934) and are identified by the following abbreviations: Vol, I, Biography & Headlong Hall HH Vol,. II, Melinc ourt - ' M Vol,. Ill, Nightmare Abbey & Maid Marian ■ N A Vol,. V, Gryll Grange ' - GG • Vol, VIII,: Essays,1. Memoirs,: Letters, Unfinished Novels . EML ; are mentioned, and it may be assumed that Peacock's social self-

sufficiency was achieved at an early age 0

Two of the first specimens of Peacock's writing, although lacking

humor,. are indicative of the man he was to become. The aforementioned

letter to his mother contains a request for "candied lemon, and figs,

and cakes" f’EML, p, 157),. revealing an early and enduring taste for

good food. The other, published when he was fourteen,. was a prize-

winning defense in heroic couplets of history as a study superior to

biography. Scholarship and banquets were always of prime importance.

Peacock's six years at Englefield Green constituted his only

period of formal education. He had been an excellent student, proficient

in Greek, Latin, and French, and he continued to read prodigiously,

sometimes with: a book in each hand, throughout his long life. Among

his favorites were the works of Homer, Sophocles,, Aristophanes,

Nonnus,, Ariosto,. Shakespeare, Rabelais, Voltaire, Boiardo, Samuel

Butler,. Wordsworth, Lord Monboddb's Origin and Progress of Language

and Ancient Metaphysics, Horne Tooke's Diversions of Pur ley, and Sir

William Drummond's. Academical Questions, all of which he made use

of in his novels. He scorned German literature, agreeing with the

scholar Richard Person that there is nothing in it to compensate for the

time and effort required to learn the language.

One can only speculate concerning the etiology of his persistent

contempt for universities. The only academic discipline to which he was subjected after leaving Englefield Green was self-imposed 0 A reference

(later deleted) to Oxford as a second-Athens in The Genius of the Thames

(1810) constitutes his only friendly allusiono His five novels of conversa­ tion include the following derogatory comments 0

Harry Headlong set off on an expedition to Oxford/ to inquire for other, varieties of the same general namely^ men of taste and philosophers; but being assured by a learned professor that there were no such things in the University5 he proceeded to Lbndono <, o o [ISIS] (HHg p 0 7)

I profited little at the University 0 o o The system of education pursued there 9 appeared to me the result of a deep-laid conspiracy against the human understandings a mighty effort of political and ecclesiastical machiavelism 9 to turn the energies of inquiring minds into channelss where they will either stagnate in disgust,, or waste themselves in nugatory labor» 0 0 o [l81 (M 9 p 0 130)

Scythrop had had a taste for romance reading before he went to the Universitys where9 we must confess, in justification to his college 5 he was cured of the love of r eading in all its shape So - (181# ' #A, p. 13)

He must have finished his education at some very rigid college, where a quotation, or any other overt act showing acquaintanoe with classical literature, was visited with a severe penalty0 [l831| - Po 126)

The test of intellectual capacity.is in swallow, and not in diges- tion 0 The art of teaching everything except what will be of use to the recipient,. is national educationo fj-SGo} |GG, po 2)

Obviously Peacock needed neither the stimulation nor the restric­ tions of a university to prod him into intellectual activity 0 He was a dilettante in the true and unpejorative sense of the word--one who delighted in the voluntary pursuit of knowledge,. If his quotations were occasionally inaccurate and his translations faulty, such flaws have also been detected in scholarly works which lack the saving grace of wit such as Peacock*s 0

But in 1 8 0 6 'Peacock made no use of his talent for comedy when he wrote Palmyra9. a conventional poetic effusion on the transitory nature of human achievement. . This and some other minor poems were published by Thomas Hookham, whose younger son Edward became the friend of both Peacock aud Shelley, sharing their liberal political opinions and heretical religious beliefs.

. When Peacock was twenty-two he fell in love with Fanny Falkner.

The couple were betrothed, but a misunderstanding occurred and the engagement was terminated. Almost immediately Fanny married another man, and she died the next year. . Fanny was the great (’and probably the only) love of his life. Handsome Peacock had a few affairs, and an apparently satisfactory marriage, but it was Fanny he remembered just before he died almost sixty years later.

In 1808 he followed the tradition of his mother's family and entered the Navy. A year of it was more than enough for Peacock, who loathed being confined aboard a vessel, mUch preferring to sail care­ fully folded little paper boats,. a rather juvenile pastime also enjoyed by

Shelley. His next undertaking was a walking tour during.which he wrote

The Genius of the Thames, a descriptive, didactic, and dull poem which

Hookham published in 1809. It should be noted that Shelley1 s qualified praise of both galmyra and The Genius of the Thames referred to the

much revised versions published several years later..

The following year. Peacock moved to Maentwrog in Merioneth­

shire where he read much and enjoyed the scenery, a significant part

of which was the parson's daughter, Jane Gryffydh. .She was dismayed

by his heretical opinions, but less so than a lady (probably.Mrs„

Madocks) who later told Shelley that "Mr, Peacock lived in a cottage

:near Tan-y-bwlch, associating with no one, and hiding his head, like

a murderer, but . „ " , he was worse ■ 'than that,' he was an atheist!"2

He returned to England without making any declaration of love

to-Jane, probably because he enjoyed his independence and was not in

a financial position to marry, and perhaps because he had not recovered

from Fanny's defection and death. He took his usual extended walking

tours and wrote The Praise of Melancholy, a justification of solitary

meditation which...asserts. that the spirit of melancholy is the source of

love, charity, filial affection and other virtues, and includes a more

sincere sounding passage extolling the beauties of the Welsh country­

side.

It was, however. Farewell to Meirion, a blast at the ignorance,

dishonesty, and drunkenness of.the inhabitants of'Wales, with which

.Shelley, than involved in the Tremadoc embankment project,

2. Roger Ingpen, . ed„ The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, 2 vbls„ (New York, 1909), I, 368. concur re do The two men probably did not meet until the fall of 1812* although Thomas Hookham had previously written to Shelley about

Peacocko The acquaintance remained casual until the. summer of 1813, when Harriet and Shelley had taken a house in Bracknell and invited

Peacock to visit them. ,

. Peacock at this point was outgrowing his gloomy romanticism, much of which had been a youthful, pose, and his maturing judgment led him to the following appraisal of Shelley's coterie, although these words were written much later«

, At Bracknell, Shelley was surrounded by a numerous society, all in,a great measure of his own opinions in relation to religion and politics, and the larger portion of them in relation to vegetable diet. But they wore their rue with a difference. Every one of them adopting some of the articles of the faith of their general church, had each nevertheless some predomi­ nant crotchet of his or her own, which left a number of open questions for earnest and not always temperate discussions, I was sometimes irreverent enough to laugh at the fervor with which opinions utterly uneonducive to. any practical result were battled for as matters of the highest importance to the well-, being of mankind; Harriet: Shelley was always ready to laugh . with me, and we thereby both lost caste with some of the more hot-headed of the party» , (EML, pp» 29-30)

He was quite right, at least insofar as the ladies of the group were concerned. Peacock chivalrously professed to have pleasant memories of Mrs, Boinville,. whom Shelley considered "the most admirable specimen of. a human being £he| had ever seen"^ but she disliked him, Mrs, Newton thought him a cold, mocking scholar whom

3, Newman Ivey White, Shelley (2 yols,: New York,. 1987), I, 305, • ; - 12

Shelley would soon find uncongenial,, She was quite wrong. Their undeniably different personalities were complementary rather than clashing,

J, I,. M ,. Stewart well summarizes the relationship between them which outlasted the friendship of most of the Bracknell group:

ooo what was growing in ^Peacock) in those years was, in the broadest sense, critical power. The mingling in Shelley of genius and absurdity was a perpetual challenge to analysis. Yet we misrepresent Peacock if we exhibit his part in the relationship as that of a merely detached and amused spec­ tator, , , , His association with Shelley's studies was very close; the two evolved ideas and generated enthusiasms to­ gether, Peacock was the older man by seven years; it was his natural role to supply a maturer judgment,. a moderating influence, as the emotional crises and practical perplexities constituting.Shelley's diurnal life came along, ^

And come along they certainly and predictably did, . Peacock's faithful services to his friend included diverse good deeds. When

Shelley suffered from the delusion that an obese old woman had infected him with elephantiasis, Peacock provided a comforting quotation from Lucretius to the effect that the disease could be con­ tracted only in Egypt, He house-hunted for him, and eventually acted as executor of Shelley's will. Although Peacock's personal conduct was usually unexceptionable and his existence comparatively uneventful, he had an affinity for the fantastic, the bizarre, and the absurd in both life and literature. He moved calmly and efficiently

4, J,. I, M, Stewart, Thomas Love Peacock (London,. 1963), p. 8, 13

through the imbroglios of Shelley’s career, participating helpfully

when possible.

In June a. 1814,. Shelley sent an urgent request to Peacock to

join him in London, . Shelley, frantically in love with Mary Godwin

and still married to Harriet, who was pregnant with their second

child,. was suffering from what Peacock described as a ,lsudden,

violent, irresistible, uncontrollable passion" fEML, p, 91), and was

9 ' threatening suicide. Peacock’s attempts at sympathetic reasoning

were rejected, and Shelley and Mary eloped,

. From Troyes Shelley wrote a letter dated August 13,, 1814,

.to the wife he had deserted. He addressed her as "My Dearest

Harriet, " and urged her to "come to Switzerland, where you will

at last find one firm and constant friend, to whom your interests

will always be dear--by whom your feelings will never be willfully injured, Until he could welcome her to a "sweet retreat" in the

mountains, he advised her that Peacock would handle her financial

affairs, Harriet accepted Peacock’s services, but, not surpris­

ingly, rejected the invitation.

The friend on whom Shelley was relying to carry out this

difficult and delicate assignment he described as "expensive, incon­

siderate, and cold, but surely not utterly perfidious and unfriendly

5, Ingpen, p, 426, . 14

and unmindful of our kindness to him, Obviously the fact that Peacock

had not encouraged Shelley's passion for-Mary had temporarily cooled

his affection for Peacocko In his new state of poverty caused by the

elopement,. Shelley regretted his former generosity 0

When Shelley and Mary returned from the Continent, the

Boinvilles, the Newtons, and for a while even Jefferson Hogg, Shelley's friend from the days of their association at Oxford, treated the lovers

as pariahso Mary's father, William Godwin, despite his views on

free love,, was violently opposed to the liaison, and remained so until they were legally married and his son-in-law's financial prospects were brighter,

. It is undeniable that William Godwin hounded Shelley for money,

and Shelley responded to his often unreasonable demands, Shelley's

generosity to friends,. acquaintances, and causes amounted to what

can only be considered financial irresponsibility, but the duties per­

formed by Peacock were of such a nature and extent that no monetary

evaluation of them could ever be made. There were those who con­

sidered Peacock to be among the many who were too ready to accept

funds. White comments that Hogg eventually distrusted Peacock,

and "Trelawny and Thornton Hunt both spoke of him as a selfish

6, Ingpen, p, 427, .15 exploiter of Shelley 1 s friendshipp Whatever temporary misgivings

Shelley may have had9 he was willing to bail Peacock out of jail in

January of 1815 when he had been arrested for debts accrued during a mysterious affair with a supposed heiress«, and later granted him an annuity of one hundred pounds 0 . Debt and fear of creditors were well known to Shelley 9 who had9 on at least one occasion 9 found it expedient to hide from them in Peacock*s apartmento

, Mary Shelley*s dislike of' Peacock did not preclude the con­ tinuation: of the men*s friendship 9 and until March9, 18189 when the

Shelleys* departure for Italy occurred 9 he accompanied them on boating excursions 9 and frequently visited them in both London and

Marlowo They discussed everything from opera to suicide 9 and of course read 9 criticized 9 and admired each other*s works in progress 0

Many of the events of this period will be discussed in detail in connec­ tion with the use which Peacock made of them in his novels0 .

When the Shelleys left England a chapter of Peacock* s life endedo He was never again to associate so intimately with,a friendo

From 1818 until his retirement in 1856s he was a successful business man employed by the East India House 9 and lived the rather routine life of a commuter-bureaucrafo , It had been thought for some time that he would marry Marianne de St0. Croix 9 whom he had known since

7 0 W hite9 p 0 685o 16

Ms cMldhoodg but in 1819 he wrote to Jane Oryffydh after a silence of eight years, proposed,, and was accepted, , Shelley wrote to him on

May 169. 1820, . as follows:

I congratulate you most sincerely on your choice and on your marriage. If you had married Marianne 1 should never have seen much of you, and now I have at least a chance, I was very much amused by your laconic account of the affair, . It is altogether extremely like the denoue­ ment of one of your own novels, and as such serves to a theory I once imagined,. that in everything any man ever wrote, spoke, acted, or imagined, is contained, as it were, an allegorical idea of his own future life, as the acorn contains the oak, ^

The marriage was a successful one, although marred by the death of a much-loved daughter and Jane Peacock 1 s eventual lapse into invalidism. Peacock’s mother joined the household and attended to the domestic duties that the wife was unable to manage, . Shelley, ironically,, was wrong about his chances to see more of Peacock, . His continued residence in Italy and Peacock's lack of interest in travel to the Continent kept them apart,. and in 1821 Shelley died,

, Many years later, with some reluctance, Peacock published four articles in Fraser's Magazine which later were included in the three-volume edition of Peacock's works edited by Sir Henry Cole, and subsequently issued separately as Memoirs of Shelley in a single volume edited by Brett-Smith, The articles were written partially to correct what Peacock felt to be inaccuracies in the accounts.many of

8, Ingpen, p, 782, 17 t Shelley's friends and relatives had made public concerning the poet's

separation from Harriet, Peacock's introductory justification for

writing the Memo ir s with characteristic reticence, summarizes the

extent of his friendship with Shelley,

Having lived some years in very familiar intimacy with the subject of these memoirs; having had as good oppor­ tunities as any 3 and better than most persons now living, to observe and appreciate his great genius, extensive acquirements, cordial friendships, disinterested devotion to the well-being of the few with whom he lived in domestic intercourse, and ardent endeavors by private charity and public advocacy to ameliorate the condition of many who pass their days in unremunerating toil; having been named his executor , , , having lived after his death in the same cordial intimacy with his widow, her family, and one br two at least of his surviving friends, I have been considered to have some peculiar advantages for writing his life, , , , flEML, p, 41)

In the main, this appears to be a fair appraisal, although Mary

Shelley's occasionally spiteful accusations and behavior which Peacock

was too much of a gentleman to mention, might lead one to question

the cordiality of their intimacy, : That Shelley relied on Peacock for

mundane services and intellectual exchanges is not so telling as the

fact that it was with Peacock that he shared his most intimate thoughts

in times of personal distress. So far as is known, it was only to him

that Shelley expressed his intense and lasting grief over Harriet 1 s

■ suicide {EML, p. 111), and to him that he wrote requesting that their

mutual friends be informed of the death, of his and Mary's son

William fcEML, p. 116), s ' 18

Shelley, whose laudable virtues, philosophic convictions, and flamboyant flaws were so well known to Peacock, appears in various

guises in many of Peacock's novels 0 . Of this there can be no doubt, but

critical opinion varies as to the extent Peacock used his friend and interpretation of the techniques used.

It is commonly agreed that Peacock's lack of inventiveness caused him to use puppet-like characters whose dialogue consists of repetitions and ramifications of a single opinion held by the actual person. . If his novels are romans-a-clef, the personages are identi­ fiable, in most cases, by only one salient feature. In the Preface to

Bentley's selection from his works in the Standard Novels series, which contains Headlong Hall, Nightmare Abbey, Maid Marian, and

Crotchet Castle,. Peacock stated that he had "never intruded on the personality of others, nor taken any liberties but with public conduct and public opinions. " This statement may be true of most people who found their way into Peacock's novels, but an examination of the characters presumed to be Shelley reveals more of the man himself than could be considered public knowledge.

Idolaters:of Shelley, protectively obscuring his faults and absurdities, fasten upon the obvious discrepancies in the caricatures and minimize the similarities. Admirers of Peacock |who was not a man to inspire idolatry) often tend to do the same thing, stressing his 19

reticence and discretionary judgments and pointing out that his aim was comic-satiric treatment of idiosyncrasies and opinions rather than portraiture,, Stewart warns against attempts at minute identifications 9

saying9. ^There is not very much in this0 However 9. Edmund Blundeng a biographer of Shelleys states that the Scythrop Glowry of Nightmare

Abbey wis 'nearer, to Shelley in life 9 so far as the sketch goes 9 than official biography 0 11

There is truth in both .attitudes0 . Confining attention to Peacock 8 s presentations of Shelleys it can be shown that in Headlong Halls

Melincourts and Gryll Grange he played with his friend8s published opinions and mingled within them his own 0 In Nightmare Abbey the situation is differento There he drew upon his personal knowledge of \ the man rather than his. mind. . It must be noted that in his fiction

Peacock never deals with Shelley as a poet. His respect for Shelley's genius constrained him from ever making that aspect of his friend the target of his far-reaching humor, but almost everything else was fair game.

In his old age Peacock lived quietly, enjoying his library and

garden, an unregenerate pagan to the very end. . Shortly before his death, a fire broke out in the roof of his bedroom,. and he was moved

9. .Stew art, p. 16.

10. . Edmund Blunden,. Shelley fvLondon,. 1946), p. 201. 20 to his library at the other end of the house. When it was suggested by

a neighboring curate that he leave the house,. Peacock’s granddaughter

Edith Nicolls recalled that the octogenarian exclaimed, MBy the immortal gods I will not move !11 And move he did not, but he never

recovered from the shock. After a few weeks’ illness, he died on

January 23, 1866, in his eighty-second year.

11, Olwen Wo Campbell,, Thomas' Love:Peacock fiLondpn, 1953), p, 1 0 1 , ' HEADLONG HALL

Headlong Hall,. Peacock's first novel, written in 1815, won for.

:him The Critical Review's epithet,, "laughing philosopher, " The plot

conventions of the romantic novel of the period are employed so

extravagantly that they constitute a parody. In brief, a lover saves

his; young lady's father from drowning,. but parental consent to a

marriage is withheld in hope that a. richer suitor may claim her. The

father is won over only when his penchant for phrenology is catered

to and the lover presents to him an enormous skull purported to be

that of an ancestor, . One bethrothal inspires others, and several

couples plunge into matrimony,

. The amusing, farcical plot, however, is of little import as

compared to the conversations of Mr,. Foster, the perfectibilian;

Mr,. Escot, the deteriorationist; and Mr,. Jenkison, the statu-quo-ite,

who are respectively identified as Shelley,. Peacock,. and Hogg, ^

Mr, Foster is introduced as a dark-eyed man of thirty blue­

eyed Shelley v/as only twenty-three at the time the novel was written.

But these details are inconsequential. The point which Peacock

12, Peacock's variant,

13, Mr,. Escot,. however, may be J, F, Newton, or,. more likely, a composite of Newton and Peacock, 22

wished to make was that a deteriorationist and a perfectibilian 9 con­

vinced of a theory,, will slant all their ideas to make them conform to

their major premise, although even in the process of making their

pronouncements, their actions are often in:obvious oppositipno The

epigraph Peacock chose from Swift,

, All philosophers, who find Some favorite system to their mind. In every point to make it fit, <„ .Will force all nature fo subm it

is only part of';Peacock's joke» The possible punch line, inferred

from events in the novel, might have been added--"Except his own,

. when it might benefit, " Thus the deteriorationist who can see only a

miserable future scrambles to secure his own happiness,, a vegetarian

inveighs against animal diet while helping himself to beef, and a

theoretical teetotaler deplores the effects of alcohol while drinking

wine,

. Peacock helped himself liberally to Shelley's ideas,, but he did

not confine the expression of them to Mr,. Foster, It might have been

part of his mischievous jesting to take the sense of Shelley's state­

ments of perfectibility and Slyly twist them into an argument for the

opposition,

Shelley,, much to Peacock's disapproval, was a vegetarian. In

the Memoirs, written long after the event, Peacock was still savouring

the fact that his prescription of well peppered mutton chops had had an immediately salubrious effect on Shelley. It must have amused him,

•when writing Headlong Hall, to have Mr. Escot rather than Mr. Foster

defend vegetarianism.

. The vegetarian theories, as well as several others expressed

by either Foster or Escot, were derived from J. F« Newton, a member

of the Bracknell group. Although he was considerably older than

Peacock and Shelley, they were frequent guests in his home. His

speculations on health, morality,, and astronomy, all based on his

interpretation of the signs of the zodiac, must have been among the

topics so heatedly discussed as to provoke Peacock's laughter.

Peacock could have made use of his material directly from its origi­

nator, . since he knew him well, but the following excerpts indicate that

Peacock chose to use the secondary source, for Mr. Foster echoes

Shelley's Notes to Queen Mab, which had been published in an edition

of 250 copies in 1813. •

Mr. Escot avowed that the "use of animal food, conjointly with

that of fire „ .’ . |is^] one of the principal causes of the degeheracy of

mankind" $HH, p. 15). His interpretation of the Prom ethean myth is,

a wittily abbreviated paraphrase of Shelley1 s'lengthy note which begins,

. "I hold that the depravity of the physical and moral nature of man

originated in his unnatural habits of life.

14. , Percy Bysshe Shelley, .The Complete Poetical Works, ed. Thomas Hutchison (London, I960), p. 826. 24

After explaining that the ’’allegory of Adam and Eve eating of the tree of evil „ „ » admits of no other explanation than the disease and crime that have flowed from unnatural diet, H Shelley interprets the

Promethean myth.as follows:

The story of Prometheus is one which, although univer­ sally admitted to be allegorical, has never been satisfactorily explained, Prometheus stole fire from heaven, and was chained for this crime to Mount Caucasus, where a vulture continually devoured his liver, , „ » Prometheus (who repre­ sents the human race) effected some great change in the condition of his nature, and applied fire to culinary purposes; thus inventing an expedient for screening from his disgust the horrors of the shambles. From this moment his vitals were devoured by the vultures of disease, ^

Liver trouble, according to Shelley, is only one of the con­ comitant evils of the post-Promethean man's diet. Meat eaters also

suffer from bloodshot eyes,, swollen veins, violent passions,. madness, crime,, unnecessary foreign commerce,, tyranny, war, and the un­

conquerable disparity between the rich and the poor, . He admits that

even if mankind were to abandon the eating of animal flesh, the results

of its long-time consumption would not be immediately rectified, . All that Shelley Contends is "that from the moment of the relinquishing.of

all unnatural habits no new disease is generated; and that the pre-

• disposition to hereditary maladies gradually perishes, for want of its accustomed supply,

15, Shelley, pp=. 826-7,

16, . Shelley, p, 833, 25

M r0 Escotj in substantial agreement with, the myth interpretation, however, sees no hope of regeneration, and expecifcs that eventually

"the whole race will vanish imperceptibly from the face of the earth”

(HH, po 16)0 His citing of physiological evidence to place man with the herbivores @HH, p. 18) is also derived from the same note, in which Shelley states:

Comparative anatomy teaches us that man resembles frugivorous animals in everything, and carnivorous in nothing; he has neither claws wherewith to seize his prey, nor distinct and pointed teeth to tear the living fibre, , , ,

Man resembles no carnivorous animal,' There is no exception, unless man be one, to the rule of herbivorous . animals having cellulated colons,

Mr,. Foster admits that while animal food may retard the perfectibility of man, it can not prevent it, and in so far as fire is concerned, its use ’’was indispensably necessary , „ , to give being to the various arts of life, which, in their rapid and interminable progress, will finally conduct every individual of the race to the philosophic pinnacle of pure and perfect felicity" |HH, p, 16), He also suggests that "animal food may act on the mind as manure on flowers, forcing them into a degree of expansion they would not other­ wise have attained" §HH, p,, 18), The optimism is Shelleyan, the vegetarianism was lifted from J, F,. Newton, but the reasoning is pure Peacock,

17, . Shelley, p, 828, 26

In another section of Headlong Hall,. Mr, Escot speaks of past geologic disasters which have brought physical (and consequently'moral) evil on the world,. and predicts their repetition until the human race has been destroyed. Mr. Foster counters with a theory also held by

Newton and restated by Shelley in another of the Queen-Mab Notes, as a comparison of the following passages reveals.

The precession of the equinoxes „ „ . will gradually ameliorate the physical state of our planet, till the ecliptic shall again coincide with the equator, and the equal diffusion of light and heat over the whole surface of the earth typify the equal and happy existence of man, who will then have attained the final state of pure and perfect intelligence. . (HH, pp. 72-73)

It is exceedingly probable, from many considerations, that this obliquity [of the earth's axis] will gradually diminish, . until the equator coincides with the ecliptic: the nights and days will then become equal on earth throughout the year, and probably the seasons also. There is no great extrava­ gance in presuming that the progress of the perpendicularity of the poles may be as rapid as the progress of the intellect; or that there should be a perfect identity between the moral and physical improvement of the human species. It is certain that wisdom is not compatible with disease,, and that, in the present state of the Climates of the earth, health, in the true and comprehensive sense of the word, is now in its progress, and that the poles are every year becoming more and more perpendicular to the ecliptic.

A. Martin Freeman,. who deals rather extensively with the identification of Peacock's characters,, assumes that Shelley probably

18. Shelley, p. 808. did not recognize in Mre Foster a philosophical counterpart of him self; ^ But surely Shelley could not have missed the slight re- wordings of his own materiah Freeman accounts for the discrepancies, between the real and the fictitious personages as a deliberate masking to conceal their identities 0 It seems more likely that the confusion of characteristicss and the attributing of one man^s ideas to another was a considered stroke to give additional zest to his mockery,, Peacock's novels 9 which he must have hoped would have wide circulation^ contain 9 how ever9 many of the marks of an author who writes primarily to amuse himselfo The private jokes and sly innuendos could have been meaningful only to the few who had shared the original circumstances 9 and could appreciate the full extent of the humor 0 It is to his credit as a comic writer that Peacock could utilize events and friends not generally known to the reading public and still produce tales that are amusing, and satisfying in themselves 0 Very few . readers would be aware that when,Mr0. Escot tries to prove a point by using classical referen ces 9 and M r 0 Foster admits he cannot refute the argument from comparable sources 9 that this was Peacock's gentle gibe at

Shelley's possessing less knowledge of Greek and Roman literature than Peacocko To the reader who knows nothing of Peacock's and

19o Ao Martin .Freeman^ Thomas Love Peacock |New Yorks 1911 ) 9 P o 157. ' v ~ ~ ' '■ ' 28

Shelley's joint pursuit of the subject, this is completely unimportant; to one who is aware, it evokes an added smile.

At one point in Headlong Hall, Peacock has Mri, Foster, Mr„

Escot, and Mr, Jenkison, all good pedestrians (‘as were Shelley,

Peacock, and Hogg) walk to view the Tremadoc embankment. The incident in no way furthers the plot but does give the three a chance to express their perfectibilian, deteriorationist, and statu-quo-ite re­ actions. Both Shelley and Peacock had visited Tremadoc, although not at the same time. Shelley had, in his youthful philanthropic en­ thusiasm, been personally involved in the project carried out by Mr.

Madocks, the creation of a model village on land reclaimed from the sea.

When Shelley was in the area in 1812, the embankment was complete except for a center gap through:which the sea could flood and endanger the village at high tide during storms. The combination of modern science and humanitarian effort Was rrresistible to Shelley, and he pledged his own funds, and attempted to raise money from others.

When subscriptions were not fulfilled, and the laborers were left un­ paid, , Shelley visited in their homes and performed many acts of personal charity. The irritations and disappointments which are always attendant upon fundraising, and the extreme lack of sympathy of the local inhabitants for his often expressed political and religious views, . 29 proved too much for/Shelley« His initial fervor for the project and ad­ m iration for Mro Madocks 1 scheme were inevitably lost in disillusion- mento ..

In the novel if is Mr 0 Es cot-who expresses horror at the artificially created little town with its woolen manufactory^ and*Mr 0

F oster 9 who is inspired by it to an effusion of praise 0

. The manufacturing system is not as yet purified from some evils which necessarily attend it5 but; which I conceive are greatly overbalanced by their Gbncomitant advantageso . Contemplate the vast sum of human industry to which this system so essentially contributes 9 i 0 e 0 seas covered with . vessels., ports resounding with life/ profound researches 9 scientific inventions 9 complicated mechanismsd canals carried over deep valleys and through the bosoms of hills; employment and existence thus given to innumerable ' fam ilies9 and the multiplied comforts and conveniences of life diffused over the whole community 0 (HH9 p 0 76)

Although these sentiments may have been Shelley1 s at the be­ ginning of his Tremadoc experience 9 Peacock well knew that Shelley had personally seen the miseries of the-Welsh workers who were forced to subsist on the produce of tiny gardens they cultivated at night after their daytime duties at the factory or on the embankment were complete do And as was mentioned^ Peacock 1 s and Shelley1 s mutual aversion to Wales and its denizens had been an early basis for their - friendshipo Here again it seems likely that Peacock was taking artful pleasure in perverting Shelley 1 s attitudes rather than just con­ cealing his identity or steadfastly adhering to his perfectibilian proclivities o 30

At the close of Headlong Hall, when the denouement precipitates four couples into wedded bliss, Mr, Foster's discourse on marriage is a mirror image of the doctrines Shelley accepted from the works of William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft.

The extensive circle of'general philanthropy, which, in the present advanced stage of human nature, comprehands in its circumference the destinies of the whole species originated, and still proceeds, from that narrower circle of domestic affection, which first set limits to the empire of selfishness, and by purifying the passions and enlarging the affections of mankind, has given to the views of benevolence an increasing and illimitable expansion, which will finally diffuse happiness and peace over the whole surface of the world, (HH, p. 151)

One of Shelley1 s ’Queen,Mab Notes, which is often quoted as evidence of Shelley's unhappiness while married to Harriet, is a diatribe against marriageo Far from considering matrimony a diffuser of peace and happiness, he sees wedlock as a legal despotism supported by a savage society. It requires a vow which no honest person can make, and the constraints enjoined upon the couple tend to wither their love and render them hypocrites. The offspring of unhappy parents "are nursed in a systematic school of ill-humour, violence, and falsehood," and prostitution, abortion, disease, and death are the products of legal unions forced to continue when liberty, justice and love would demand their dissollution. In short, "A system could not well have been devised more studiously hostile to human happiness than marriage,

20, Shelley, pp, 806-8, 31

' In 1816 Peacock was still a bachelor and not personally inclined

toward matrimony, Certainly there is insufficient evidence to label

him a rake, but he was amused rather than outraged when a relative

threatened to write 11 The One Thousand and One Loves of Thomas Love

Peacock, 11 The tragedy of Fanny Falkner, his dependence upon his

mother for domestic comforts, his financial insecurity, and his long

association with Marianne de St, Croix indicate that he was unready

for marriage rather than opposed to it. From his novels it is obvious

that marriages contracted for financial reasons disgusted him, but

■ when he believed that legalization of Shelley's union with Mary would

aid his friend's chances of obtaining custody of Charles and lanthe, he

recommended marriage. This, however, was not until after Harriet

.Shelley's death. When Peacock's first novel was written, Shelley was

adultcrously living with Mary, . Peacock deplored the replacement of

Harriet by Mary, but his grounds seem to have been personal

|Peacock and Mary were never congenial) rather than moral.

What conjecture then may be made for Peacock's having Mr, .

Foster state so favorable a case for marriage ? As we have seen, Mr,

Foster is often more perfectibilian than Shelleyan, and the author's

insistence on Foster's over enthusiastic optimism would be adequate

justification. But there may be more to it than this. Those who know

the-Queen Mab Notes,. Shelley's defection from a legal marriage, his

unlawful cohabitation with Mary, and his ■ still utopian aspirations for 32 the w orld 9 must find Mr 0 Foster* s epithalamial pronouncement the crowning touch of the humorist who utilized his friend 1 s inconsistencies to underscore the lack of logic of a determined perfectibi 11 am MEUNCOURT

In the year that elapsed between the publication of Headlong Hall and Melincourt, Peacock had been in close association with Shelley on pleasant excursions and at the time of the tragic suicides of Fanny

Imlay Godwin and Harriet Shelley, In Headlong Hall's Mr» Foster/

Peacock had played with and mocked Shelley 1 s ideas to create a character perfectly suited to exemplify Peacock's sardonic view of perfectibilianism. In the interval he had observed Shelley1 s living in accordance with his principles and some of the effects. His personal admiration for-Shelley increased, but the shared experiences were sobering. In Melincourt's Mr, Forester he presented a more thought­ ful appraisal of Shelley's ideals, with too lengthy a lingering over those which coincided with his own. Instead of wittily demolishing each con­ cept, he allowed Mr, Forester to expound his views in a manner that, while more equitable to Shelley, borders on being unfair to the reader,

Shelley is said to have preferred Melincourt to Headlong Hall because it was more serious. This is certainly true of the sections allotted to Mr, Forester's discourses, . Although Melincourt contains some of the most farcical episodes Peacock ever contrived, and Mr,

Forester is involved in them, there is an observable separation between the wildly humorous plot and the deadly seriousness of much

. 33 34 of the dialogue--a separation which destroys the comic unity so happily maintained in Headlong Hallo . Shelley was completely 9 even fanatic ally 9 committed to his ideals even though the commitments might be tem porary 0 Peacock was practical and judicious . and submitted his beliefs to such impartial scrutiny that his actual convictions on many subjects can not be conclusively determine do , At the time he was writing

Melincourtg. Peacock was critically evaluating his own ideas and Shelley 1 s 9 and M r 0 Forester is a composite embodiment of bottu . Unfortunately he lacks the gaiety of Peacock and the enthusiasm of Shelley0 It may be hoped that the creation of Mr 0 Forester was therapeutic for

Peacock; it does not do much for the reader 0

In Melincourt Peacock was examining and rejecting reactionary opinions in the fields of literature, politics, and social convention, and used his customary weapon- - ridicule 0 But in Melinc ourt the humor is found in the development of the plot rather than in the prolonged discussionSo . Shelley never purchased a seat in parliament for an orang-outang, nor priggishly evaluated a woman*s intellectual and charitable qualities before falling in love with her, but Mr 0 Forester*s pronouncements on politics and ideal mates have an authentic Shelley an echOo

, Sylvan Forester is described £as so often was Shelley) as a bright-eyed,. wild-looking young man somewhat self-righteously de­ ploring the current state of civilization in which nif you have money, 35

you may make pretty ure of being cheated, and if you have none, quite

sure of being starved" (M, p» 34)„ •

Forester had converted the decayed abbey of Rednose to Redrose

Abbey ^'preserving the picturesque atmosphere of antiquity) and lived

there engaged in two pursuits. He was studying the physical diminution

of man through evidence collected from old graveyards, and.also con­

ducting a living experiment in the person of Sir Oran to demonstrate

-the similarities between man and a simian- - delighting in the moral

and physical superiority of the supposedly lesser creature,

. Both notions were familiar to Peacock and Shelley, The first

was a favorite of Mr, Newton, and the second was drawn from the

works of Lord Monboddo, a Scottish judge and anthropological pioneer.

The latter's - Ancient Metaphysi c s and Origin and Progress ol. Language

had been included, no doubt at Peacock's suggestion, in Shelley's

reading list,. Forester's attitude toward Sir Oran Haut-ton (an orang­

outang) is always serious and appreciative. For Peacock, Sir Oran

provided an ingenious vehicle for satirizing the ignorance and pomposity

of a society which will accept anything which conforms to its super­

ficial conventions, yet resents the application of simple virtues.

Forester's belief that as man's body became smaller his heart was

also miniaturized leads easily to Shelley's concern with the problems

of political tyranny, the miserable condition of the working class, the

stultifying,effects of luxury, and the enslavement of women. All 36

could be ameliorated eventually, if not immediately, by the combined

forces of love and reason.

F o re s te r 1 s statement that "There are many , , „ who think that

they have no business with politics, but they find to their cost that

politics will have business with them" |M, p, 324), parallels Shelley's

conviction that the suffering of one group of people causes suffering

for all, and that he should become personally involved, as he did in his youthful efforts to aid the Irish in their fight for freedom in 1812,

In a letter to Peacock not long:after the publication -of Melincourt, he wrote: -

I consider poetry very subordinate to political science, and, ifT were well, certainly I would aspire to the latter, for T can conceive a great work embodying the discoveries of all ages, and harmonizing the contending creeds by which man­ kind.has been ruled, ^

Shelley had nothing but contempt for the Members of Parliament,

and if his family had ever expected that he would take his, place among .

them they were to be disappointed., , Shelley's political theories stemmed largely from William Godwin's Political Justice, They both believed

that man's mind is an aggregate of ideas ruled over by reason, and

truth, if properly presented,. cannot fail to be accepted. Individual

conduct should be based on reason rather than on artificial standards

or custom. In his Address to the Irish Shelley said that "Temperance,

21, In g p en , p, 654, 37 sobriety, charity, and independence will give you virtue; and reading, talking, thinking and searching will give you wisdom; when you have those things you may defy the tyrant,

Godwin felt that improvement and reform could not flourish under the current forms of government, but Shelley believed that personal enlightenment and adherence to virtuous practices must precede the overthrow of rulers. He was hopeful that in the intermediate stages legislation could be helpful. He was dismayed that Godwin advised caution when.Shelley was trying single-handed to save the Irish people.

Forester promulgates this optimistic view;

The progress of truth is slow, but its ultimate triumph is secure; though its immediate effects may be rendered al­ most imperceptible, by the power of habit and interest , „ „ „ Giye currency to reason, improve the moral code of society, and the theory of one generation will be the practice of the next, §M, pp, 236-7)

Shelley, in 1813, in his Declaration of Rights saw the usefulness of government as a securer and defender of human rights, but, "As the benefit of the governed is, ought to be, the origin of government, no man can have any authority that does not expressly emanate from their will, Another of. Shelley's political works, the Proposal for

2 2 , Quoted in White, p,, 2 1 1 ,

23, Quoted in Daniel J, MacDonald, The Radicalism of Shelley and Its Sources ^Washington,. D, C ,, 1912), p, 81, 38

Putting Reform to the Vote,. was published at almost the same time as

. Melincourto . , '

With,Shelley's ideas, Peacock the novelist combined the rotten

borough system and wrote the most amusingly effective episode of

Melincourt, the 'election preliminaries at the city of One Vote. Here

Peacock found Forester, who after all was responsible for the purchase

of the seat for Sir Oran, an inadequate medium to express his satire.

Accordingly, he introduced Mr. Sarcastic, who clearly is the author's

mouthpiece, with the result that Shelley-Forester is somewhat divorced

from the hilarious political lampoon.

, Shelley and Godwin agreed on the evils of luxury, and that wealth

should be.distributed in proportion to need. Godwin's personal financial

needs always, exceeded his income; true to his convictions, he demanded

and expected that Shelley should contribute liberally, even when he

knew his son-in-law's circumstances were not much better than his

own. Peacock is said to have acted as a diplomatic intermediary when

Godwin's histrionic extortions included threats of suicide. Shelley's

biographies abound in instances of his personal charities, which

ranged from generous subscriptions to philanthropic projects to the

presentation of the shoes from his feet. Mr. Forester's charitable

acts are frequent, and are never the subject of ridicule, perhaps

because Peacock, often the recipient of Shelley's financial favors,

had the grace to be grateful. Both Forester and Shelley considered themselves morally

obligated to share what wealth they had. Forester horrified the

avaricious Mrs. Pinmoney when she heard him say that "not a shilling

of his property was his own, that it was a portion of the general

possession of human society, of which the distribution had devolved

upon him; and that for the mode of that distribution he was most rigidly

responsible to the principles of immutable justice" (M, p., 262).

His old college friend ('who represents Hogg) feels that Forester

cannot be serious when he states: "If, in any form of human society,

any one human being dies of hunger, while another wastes or consumes in the wantonness of vanity, as much as would have preserved his

existence, I hold that second man guilty of the death of the first"

CM, p. 265). A man may have a legal right to do as he pleases with his money, but he does not have a moral right. Forester also feels that the perniciousness of indulgence in luxuries lies in the enslave­

ment of many to provide that which enervates rather than improves

the indulgers. He does not, however, foresee any drastic reform in

sight when "the quantity of money in a nation, the quantity of food,

and the number of animals that consume that food, maintain a triangular

harmony, of which, in all fluctuations of time and circumstances, the

proportions are always the same" (M, p. 2 6 2 ). ■ 40

But Forester is not a revolutionisto He saysg . . - ' /

HI am no advocate for violent and arbitrary changes in the state of societyo I care not in what proportions property is divided Q o o provided the rich can be made to know that they are but the stewards of the poor 9. that they are not to be the monopolizers of solitary, spoil*’ but.the distributors of general possession; that they are responsible for that . distribution to .every principle of general justice 9 to every tie of moral obligation/ to every feeling of human sympathy: that they are bound to cultivate simple habits in themselves0 <> Q 0 11 , (M, pp. 269-70)

Shelley* s /Queen Mab Note had stated much the same.

I will not insult common sense by insisting on the doctrine of the natural.equality of mam • The question is not con­ cerning its desirableness, but its practicability^ so far as it is practicable, it is de si re able. That state of human society which approaches nearer to an equal partition of its benefits and evils should . . . be preferred: but so long as we conceive that a wanton expenditure of human labor, not for necessities, ’ not eyen for the luxuries of the mass of society, but for the egotism and. ostentation of a few of its members, is defensible on the ground of public justice, so long we neglect to approximate to the redemption of the human raced ^ ‘

Forester represents the deter1 orationist-perfectibilian who is much closer to Shelley than is Mr. Foster. In the preface to The

, Revolt of Islam Shelley had clearly stated, in discussing the French

Revolution and its aftermath, that violent changes in government can not immediately herald an ideal s ociety' be cans e the formerly oppressed individuals have not been philosophically prepared.

Could they listen to a plea of reason who had groaned under the calamities of a social state according to the provisions

24. Shelley, p. 805. 41

of which one man riots in luxury whilst another famishes for want of bread ? Can he who the day before was a trampled slave suddenly become liberal minded, forbearing, and independent? This is the consequence of the habits of a state, of society to be produced by resolute perseverence and indefatigable hope, and long-suffering and long-believing courage, and the systematic efforts of generations of men of intellect and virtue. ^ > .

Mr. Forester frequently states that each person must not only

share the responsibility for improvement in man's condition, but

actively pursue it, for apathy achieves nothing. The keystone of

evil is "mistrust of individual example. . . . Yet the history of the

world abounds with sudden and extraordinary revolutions in the

opinions of mankind, which have been effected by single en­

thusiasts" $M,. p. 45). •

As a single enthusiast, Mr. Forester attempts to do his part

to eliminate the nefarious slave trade by totally abstaining from the

use of sugar which is "economically superfluous, physically pernicious,

. morally atrocious,. and politically abominable" .(M, p. 51).

I never suffer an atom of West Indian produce to pass my - threshold. I have no wish to resemble those pseudo- philanthropists, those miserable declaimers against slavery, who are very liberal of words which cost them nothing, but are not capable of advancing the object they profess to have at heart, by submitting to the smallest personal privation. If I wish seriously to exterminate an evil, I begin by examining how far I am myself, in any­ way whatever, an accomplice in the extension of its bale­ ful influence. My reform commences at home. . . „ How

25. Shelley, p. 33. 42

can I seriously call myself an enemy to slavery, while I indulge in the luxuries that slavery acquired? How can the consumer of sugar pretend to throw on the grower of it the exclusive burden of their participated criminality ? (M, p. 42)

To enlarge the circle of those who will cooperate to abolish the

West Indian slavery,. Mr, Forester has organized the Anti-saccharine

Society, and is host at a fete at which the guests are treated to an excellent sugarless banquet and subjected to a harangue on the hypocrisy of liberty-loving consumers of sugar. Mr. Sarcastic's rejoinder that custom and the pleasures of the palate can not be so easily defeated is countered by Miss Melincourt 1 s defence of unselfish human virtue, which, when ignorance is overcome, will prevail.

One might expect that the satirist in Peacock, given such material, would take over and end the fete in a debacle, but instead, the society's membership is increased. Here Peacock was indulging

one of his own crotchets, and as a crotcheteer, could not make full use of the potential humor. In this incident there is little of Shelley in Mr. Forester. Shelley often made for himself a concoction called panada, consisting of bread soaked in water and sprinkled with nutmeg, and sugar. ^ . The extremism of Shelley's diet, except in the area of vegetarianism, was the product of indifference rather than con­ viction. As Peacock well knew,. Shelley had, in the summer of 1816

26. White-, p. 299? . 43

in Geneva, seen much of "Monk" Lewis, writer of Gothic novels, and

humanitarian owner of a West Indian plantation. Indeed, instead of

eschewing the company of a slave owner and bending all efforts to

abolish slavery, Shelley witnessed.a codicil to Lewis' will which re-

quired the heirs to continue benevolent treatment of slaves 0 This

of course in no way indicates that Shelley favored slavery 9 but it is

• an act of which Mro Forester would have been incapable 0

Both Peacock and Shelley were in complete agreement with Mr 0

F o re s te r 1 s attitude toward the poets Southey and Wordswortibu The

early poetry of both had been.influenced by the older poets 9 and they

admired the stands for liberty previously takem When Southey's

former political convictions were exchanged for the laureate ship, and

Wordsworth accepted the position of Distributor of Stamps, many of

their earlier admirers were disillusionedo Shelley 1 s 11 To Wordsworth, n

published in 1816, contains the following lines:

In honoured poverty thy voice did weave Songs consecrate to truth and liberty, Deserting these, thou leavest me to grieve, . Thus having been, that thou shouldst cease to be*

. Of the political opportunism of Wordsworth and Southey, -Mr 0

Forester has much to say in condemnationo When Feathernest

(Southey) says, "Poets are verbal musicians, and, like other musicians,

270 White, pc 461 0 4 #

they have a right to sing and play 9 where they can be best paid for their

music g ^ For ester ^ s reply is s cathing: >

f 3 The re could be ho objection to th at/if they would be c ontent to * ahnpuhc e thems elve s vas. dealers and chapmen: but the poetical character is too frequently a combination of the most .arrogant and exclusive .assumption of freedom and independence in the or y, with the most abject and un- . qualified venality^ ... servilitys /and sycophancy in practice «31 : V l a i ) :

. There can be no doubt as to whom he is referring when Forester says:

,!I cannot now remember what names of true greatness and unshaken devotion to general libertys are associated with - these healthy rocks and cloud-capped mountains of Cumber­ land, We have seen a little horde of poets 9 who brought \ hither from the vales of the souths'the hhrps -which they ! ; had consecrated to Truth and Libertys to acquire new energy in the mountain winds: and now those harps are attuned to the praise of luxurious power s to the strains of courtly sycophancyj and to the hyhins of exploded super­ stition, H : - (Ms p„ 386)

Mro Feathernestj. when he has stated, MPoets9 Sir, are not amenable

to censure, however frequently their political opinions may exhibit

marks of incons'istoncy, H is answered with this final example of

Forester's solemn turgidity:

"If a poet be contented to consider himself in the light of a merry-andrew, be it so. But if he assume the garb of moral austerity, and pour forth: against corruption and . ^ oppression the language of moral indignation, there would at least be some decency, if, when he changes sides, he would let the world see that conversion and promotion have not gone hand in hand,'i ' ; fMs; 415-16)’ <

Peacock's and Shelley's jointly held contempt for'mercenary

marriages is implicit throughout Melincourt. Mrs,. Pinmoney's 45 machinations to find a wealthy husband for her daughter Danaretta are a complete contrast to Mr„ Hippy's sympathetic cooperation with his niece Anthelia's considered selecting of a mate, Anthelia frankly wants to m arry,. but is .aware that to many suitors her income is as much an attraction as her personal charms. She is never a sentimental ninny, and behaves unlike fashionable heroines. When Lord Anophel has abducted her, she declares that regardless of whatever outrage he might commit, she would never submit to marriage with him to hide what the world might consider her shame.

. Mr. Forester's views on love and marriage come forth less in his conversations with Anthelia than in his extraneous and extended discourses with Mr. Fax on the subject of over-population. Mr. Fax fMalthus),. Sir Telegraph fHogg), and Forester generally agree that overpopulatidn causes misery, but their attitudes toward celibacy differ.

To Sir Telegraph,. "celibacy is almost always a muddy horse pond," and to Mr. Fax it is "a calm,. clear river," which Mr. Forester says is

"flowing through a desert, where it moves in loneliness, and reflects no forms of beauty" (M, p. 70). . To Shelley celibacy was unnatural, and like all unnatural things, was undesirable. His abhorrence of marriage as an institution and his acceptance of free love did not, however,, make him an advocate of promiscuity. He praised Hogg's O Q Alexy Haimatoff, but reviled the sexual immorality of the book 6 In

theory he was willing to share his wife, but when Hogg attempted to

seduce H arriet,, Shelley temporarily broke off the friendship.

In another conversation in Melincourt, Mr, Forester says he

is not a lover, and Mr, Fax suggests that he must have in mind an-

imaginary damsel possessing all desirable qualifications„ Mr,

Forester says that his mental image is "not too ideal to exclude the

possible existence of its material archetype, though I have never

found it yet" (M, p» 113), He, continues,. "I desire, no phantasm of

abstract perfection--no visionary creation of romantic philosophy, .

I seek no more than I know to have existed" (M, p, 116), His ideal

woman must understand poetry, love liberty and truth, and practice

charity. This, of course, describes Anthelia,

. Peacock, no doubt, had in mind Shelley's Alastor, the title of

which had been his own contribution. The poet in A lastor, seeking a

prototype of Ideal Beauty, is doomed to failure because he removes

himself from human society, and as Shelley Wrote in a letter to John

Gisborne, seeks "in a mortal image the likeness of what is perhaps

eternal, The inconsistencies between the poem and its preface,

. and conflicting interpretations are here irrelevant. Peacock, knowing

28, Blunden, pp, 112-13,

29, .White, p, 420, 47

Shelley1 s obsessive-quest for Ideal Beauty* has oversimplified the

. concepts and solved the poet 1 s and Shelley1 s problem by having M r<>

F o re ste r 1 s dream girl perfectly available in the person of Anthelia*

The possibilities for humor are ignored^ and JPeacockg one feels §

chose to provide a simple^ commonsense solutions,, which must be

considered a flaw in the noveL MGHTMAR.E ABBEY

In Peacock's next novel, published in 1818s his treatment of

Shelley is quite different. Having exhausted the serious consider­

ations of Shelley's opinions fand quite a few readers ) 9 Peacock's

comic genius bubbled forth with the delightful caricature which led

Blunden to state,. "Had Shelley done nothing else but supply the original

for Peacock's droll study he would not have lived in vain, " 30

As was not the case with the previous novels, the plot of Night-

mare Abbey is important, and a much more detailed resume -is

necessary. It begins with the master of the Abbey, the happily widowed

Christopher dowry, attempting to cheer his mournful son, Scythrop,

. who has just suffered a disappointment in love, . The young man finds

some relief in studies of transcendental philosophy and-German

romantic tragedies. Inspired by the injustices of the world, he writes

a treatise which he expects will regenerate mankind, or at least cause

a stir, but only seven copies are sold,

Mr, dow ry's friends and relatives gather, • including his

attractive, coquettish niece Mafiohetta, with whom the volatile

Scythrop is soon in love, . Also present, among others, are Mr,

Listless,, a fashionably unenergetic young gentleman, and Mr, Flosky,

- -

30, Blunden, p, 190,

'43 4 9 a mystically transcendental philosopher. Another of Mr, dowry!s friends .9 Mr, Toobad, hopes for an engagement between Scythrop and his daughter, Celinda, who has been completing her education in

Germany, Instead of returning.as expected, she disappears rather than marry her father* s choice, who is unknown to her.

The guests at the Abbey,. much involved in discussions of philosophy, literature, the, deterioration of mankind, and mermaids and ghosts, are unaware that a mysterious young woman who calls herself. Stella has been discovered by Scythrop, She asks his pro­ tection from a tyrannical father, and since she is one of the seven who have read his treatise, and is also quite handsome, he agrees to hide her in his tower apartment. Entranced by her intellectual qualities, and. proximity,, he soon finds himself in love with her, with­ out being able to forego the charms of Marionetta,

Mr, Glowry finds Stella ^unsurprisingly revealed to be the missing Celinda) and in a farcical scene, the two objects of Scythrop*s i ' . - ■ , affections, after a shocked confrontation, renounce the distraught

Scythrop.and depart, Scythrop is quite easily persuaded to delay committing suicide for a week while his father attempts to convince one or the other of the fiancees to return,

Mr, Glowry is unsuccessful, A week later he delivers letters to Scythrop from Marionetta, who is about to become Mrs,. Eistless, and Celinda, the future Mrs,. Flosky. . Scythrop tears up the letters 50 and rails against the fickleness of women, Mr, Glowry points out that there are. yet other maidens in England, but advises him to limit himself to one at a time, Scythrop agrees. Noting that the exact hour that he had appointed for his suicide has slipped by without the fetal deed having been accomplished, and reflecting, that his tragic, experiences with love have qualified him for some eminence in the world as a misanthropist, he decides that he might just as well continue to live. He orders the butler to bring him some madeira,

. The Scythrop Glowry of Nightmare Abbey is a fictional character, but one very like a young Shelley if his absurdities are focused upon and his genius and virtues ignored. Peacock chose, in this novel, to utilize only the personal characteristics and events of Shelley's life which could be effective in a purely comic work, Blunden, in citing the similarities to Shelley, calls Scythrop "a perfectly accomplished member of society but of a romantic and speculative disposition. He is highly liable to fall in love. He has a zeal for metaphysical romance and romantic metaphysics , , , and a 'passion for re-

O I forming the world, '"

The matching of these traits is easy. Scythrop is described as "a very accomplished and charming fellow , , , ^who"^ danced with the ladies, and dfank with the gentlemen" |NA, p, 4), Although young

31, Blunden,. 190, 51

Shelley was dismissed by his dancing teacher as impossibly awkward,

. and echoes Mro Newton's views on alcohol, there can be no doubt that his'family background, education, and natural instincts would have made him acceptable in any drawing room.

With the ladies „ « «, Shelley was extraordinarily popular„ His romantic personal beauty, his harmless eccentricity, gentle manners and earnest enthusiasms made him . , » irresistibly attractive to them. They called him by affectionate names and thought elegant society his proper vocation, ^ '

White also tells us that. Shelley "never tasted whiskey, and drank beer ' oo and weak wine only occasionally, and never of his own volition, "

Hogg, however,. describes. Shelley at Oxford as being "moderately fond of his negus, This minor discrepancy would be of no im- . portance to Peacock, to whom the enjoyment of Bacchic refreshment. was an integral part of life,

Shelley's proclivities for falling in love far surpassed Scythrop's, who, so far as we learn in Nightmare Abbey, has had only three en­

counters with the tender passion. At a comparable ago, Shelley had

experienced various degrees of love with Harriet Grove, Harriet

Westbrook,. Elizabeth Kitchener,, Cornelia Turner, and Mary Godwin,

32, White, pp, 306-7,

33, White, p, 299.

34, White, p, 655, 52

with.many more to come, and quite probably,, undocumented company

in youtho

That Scythrop and Shelley shared an interest in metaphysics and

romances is obvious. Scythrop

had some taste for romance reading before he went to the University, , , Later he began to devour romances and German tragedies,, and by the recommendation of Mr, Flo sky, to pore over ponderous tomes of transcendental philosophy, which reconciled him to the labour of studying them by their mystical jargon and necromantic imagery, (HA, pp, 13-14)

Mary Shelley's note to Queen Mab describes her husband as follows:

He was a lover of the wonderful and wild in literature, but had not fostered these tastes at their genuine sources -- the romances and chivalry of the middle ages -- but in the perusal of such German works as were current in those days. Under the influence of these he, at the age of fifteen, wrote two short prose romances of Slender merit, , „ , He also wrote a poem on the subject of Ahasueras — being led to it by a German fragment, ^

White supplies, a list of authors whose works are known to have been

read by Shelley, which includes Albertus Magnus, Paracelsus,

. Schiller,. Schlegel, M, G,. Lewis., and Charlotte Dacre,. whose Zofloya,

or the Moor had a strong effect on his Zastrozzi,

For political and social reform ,. Shelley and Scythrop enter­

tained similar unrealistic notions and grandiose plans. Here Peacock,

having given Shelley's idealism more than its due in Melincourt,

35, Shelley, p, 837, 53

seldom refrains from ridiculing extravagant positions„ When Scythrop

is smitten with a "passion for reforming the woidd, "

He huilt many castles in the air, and peopled them with secret tribunals, and bands of Illuminati who were always the imaginary instruments of his projected regeneration of the human species«, • As he intended to institute a perfect republic, he invested himself with absolute sovereignty over these mystical dispensers of liberty. (NA, p0 14)

Hp believes that "Action « » » is the result of opinion, and to new-model

opinion would be to new-mo del society 0 Knowledge is power; it is in

the hands of a few, who employ it to mislead the many, for their own

selfish purposes" fKTA, p* 15)„ This is by now a familiar repetition

of Shelley's version of Godwin!sm„ And so Scythrop

wrote and published a treatise in which his meanings were carefully wrapt up in a monk’s hood of transcendental technology, but filled with hints of matter deep and dangerous, which he thought would set the whole nation in a ferment; and he awaited the result in aweful ex­ pectation, , o , However, he listened and heard nothing , , , and some months afterwards he received a letter from his bookseller, informing him that only seven copies had been sold, and concluded with a polite request for the balance, (NA, p. 16)

This treatise was entitled Philosophical Gas; or, A Project for a .

. General Illumination of the Human Mind, a ludicrous title, to be sure, but at least it had the virtue of comparative brevity, which its counter­ part, written by Shelley in 1812, had lacked. The eighteen-page octavo

pamphlet which.Shelley addressed to the Irish leaders was called 54

Proposals for an Association of those Philanthropists, who Convinced of the Inadequacy of the Moral and Political State of Ireland to Produce

Benefits which are Nevertheless Attainable are Willing to Unite to

Accomplish its Regeneration, Shelley's early conviction that he had a mission to improve the lot of mankind and his expectation that his writing and personal activity would effect reforms were doomed to disappointment. The Irish patriots were-as unresponsive as Scythrop's audience, and the government, which Shelley thought would be resentful-- at least to the point of tampering with his mailr- -ignored the fiery young

;man and his treatise which held that the solution to all problems lay in virtue achieved through moderation, sobriety, and wisdom,

Shelley's doctrine of Necessity is parodied by Peacock when Mr,

Toobad and Scythrop collide at the top of a staircase, and the two tumble to the foot, . Shelley's Queen Mab Notes point out the "immense and uninterrupted chain of causes and effects, no one of which could occupy, or act in any other place than it does act," and state that

"every human being is irresistibly impelled to act precisely as he does. Q / act, " and the subsequent actions are inevitable, Mr, Toobad's interpretation of their fall as proof of the temporary supremacy of the devil is used by~Peacock as a device to. have Scythrop give an exagger­ ated version of Shelley's doctrine, . Mr, Toobad begins the exchange,

36, Shelley, pp,. 809-10, 55

"o 0 o for what but a systematic design and concurrent contrivance of evil could have made our angles of time and place coincide in our unfortunate persons at the head of this accursed staircase ?" "Nothing else, certainly," said Scythrop, „ =, „ , "Evil,. and mischief, and misery, and confusion, and vanity,, and vexation of spirit,. and death, and disease, and assasination,. and war, and poverty,, and pestilence, and famine, and avarice, and selfishness „ „ „ all prove the accuracy of your view sand the truth of your system; and it is not impossible that the infernal interruption of this fall downstairs may throw a colour of evil on the whole of my future existence»" "My dear boy," said Mr, Toobad,. "you have a fine eye for consequences, " (NA, • pp. 25-26)

Another shared interest of Scythrop and Shelley was in science and rather impractical applications of their knowledge. At Eton Shelley had experimented to the extent of almost blowing himself up with chemicals, and constructed a steam engine which exploded at Field

Place, Scythrop1 s mechanical genius turned to such romantic projects as the construction of sliding panels and secret passages that proved temporarily useful when he was hiding Celinda, A mocking parallel of the detailed Queen Mab Notes on light and astronomy may be found in Scythrop1 s inane attempts to avoid answering his father's questions about a feminine voice emanating from Scythrop1 s supposedly bachelor quarters. His exposition of the laws of acoustics and the construction of the human ear may have been an allusion to the medical information

Shelley acquired When he had attended anatomy lectures at St, 56

Bartholomew's Hospital in 1811, but it was certainly a gibe at the in­ vincibly theoretical reactions of Shelley when caught in a practical dilemma,

Scythrop's penchant for gloom §the name is derived from Greek, meaning "of sullen countenance") is less like Shelley's nature than superficial pictures of him as a man of little or no humor would have, one believe. As an introspective young genius oppressed.by the in­ justices of the world and beset by personal problems, he seemed, much of the time of the verge of desperation. But many things amused

Shelley, and Peacock tells us that when he did laugh, Qiejjlaughed heartily, the more so as what he considered the perversions of comedy excited not his laughter but his indignation. . . The ludicrous, when it neither offended good feeling, nor perverted moral judgement, necessarily presented itself to him with greater force" |EML, p. 113).

Hogg complained that Shelley's mirth was apt to be expressed in

37 paroxysms of wild, uncontrolled laughter.

. Although Scythrbp is little involved with the "ghost" of Nightmare

Abbey, its presence is consistent with Shelley's interest in spirits and necromancy. Hogg recounted tales Shelley told him of learning incantations for raising ghosts and devils,. and drinking ritually from

37. White, p. 314. 57 an old skulL Shelley's "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty” contains these autobiographical lines:

While yet a boy I sought for ghosts9. and sped Through many a listening chamber, cave, and ruin, And starlight wood, with fearful steps pursuing Hopes of high talk with the departed dead.

The mockery of Shelley1 s ideas and the transformation of minor incidents into the stuff of comedy is what one-might expect of Peacock,

Startling, however, is the conversion of tragic and intensely personal events of Shelley's life into farce. The plot of Nightmare Abbey so closely parallels Shelley's unhappy involvement with women that some

Peacock admirers, uneasy at the apparent breach of taste or faith, have stressed the divergent elements, , Peacock's comic solution of

Scythrop's situation does not duplicate the course of Shelley's life, nor was it meant to. Peacock was merely indulging himself in wish fulfillment,

. Scythrop's introductory affair of the heart, admittedly preceded in literature by the conditions under which Romeo and many other young men are initially presented, is very like Shelley's relationship with

Harriet Grove,

At the house of Mr, Hilary, Scythrop first saw the beautiful Miss. Emily Girouette, He fell in love; which is nothing new. He was favorably received; which is nothing strange, Mr, Glowry and Mr, Girouette had a meeting on the occasion,, and quarreled about the terms of the bargain; which is neither new nor strange. The lovers were torn asunder, weeping and vowing everlasting constancy; and. 58

in three weeks after this tragical event, the lady was led a smiling bride to the altar, by the honourable Mr, Lackwit; which is neither strange nor new. Scythrop received this intelligence at Nightmare .Abbey, and was half distracted on the occasion. It was his first disappointment, , and preyed "deeply on his sensitive spirit, (NA, p, 5)

In 1809 and 1810 Shelley was in love with his pretty cousin

Harriet, who returned Ms affections,, although she was not of his intellectual or passionate disposition. The alliance was terminated by her father,. a conventional squire who felt that the proposed marriage would not be a happy one. He undoubtedly was quite right, Shelley hoped for some time that Harriet would eventually become his wife, but at the beginning of 1811 news came to him at Field Place that she was engaged to William Helyar,. a gentleman farmer whose family owned an estate near the Groves,

Shelley's letters to Hogg in January, 1811, express his despair,

"She is gone. She is lost to me forever. She is married--married to a clod of earth. She will become as insensible herself: all those

Q O fine capabilities will moulder. " Harriet's marriage did not. actually take place until the following autumn, but details of. time were un­ important to the rejected lover, who was contemplating suicide by pistol or poison. So alarmed at his grief was his sister Hellen that she followed Mm on his Solitary walks. Shelley's "Melody to a

38. White, p. 102. 59

Scene of Former Times" describes his feelings toward Harriet

Grove*

The rejected lovelorn young suitor is a commonplace of both

literature and life* The Grove affair was over by the time Peacock

and Shelley met, and so his Tight touch on this subject is understandable*

Peacock also may have seen.Shelley's reaction as another example of

his emotional sulks when thwarted* . One Wonders, however, if Peacock

recalled his early love, Fanny Falkner*

. Peacock lived through Shelley's next great crisis in intimate

association with the participants, and his version of those events is

both curiously like and unlike the actual occurrence* It is commonly

accepted that Marionetta is a fictional portrayal of Shelley's first

wife, Harriet Westbrook, of whom Peacock was very fond* In his

..Memoirs he gives this description of her*

She had a good figure, light, active, and graceful. Her features were regular and well proportioned* Her hair was light brown, and dressed With taste and simplicity* In her dress she was truly simplex munditiis* Her complexion was beautifully transparent; the tint of the blush rose shining through the lily. The tone of her voice was pleasant; her speech the essence of frankness and cordiality; her spirits always cheerful; her laugh spontaneous, hearty,. and joyous* She was well educated* ' , (BML, p * 95)

In his novel Peacock presents Marionetta as

a very blooming and accomplished young lady. Being a compound of the. Allegto Vivace of the O'Carrolls, and of the Andante Dolor os o of the dow ries, she 60

exhibited in her character all the diversities of an April sky0 Her hair was light brown; her eyes hazel,, and sparkling with a mild but fluctuating light; her features were; regular; her lips full,, and of equal Size; and her person surpassingly graceful. She was proficient in music. Her conversation was sprightly, but always on subjects light in their nature and limited in their interest; for moral sympathies, in any general sense, had no place in her mind. She had some coquetry, and more caprice, liking and disliking almost in the same moment. . . . , fiNLA, pp. 21-*22)

The evaluations of Harriet Shelley's character have, for the most part, been prompted by a desire either to excuse or excoriate Shelley1 s behavior. , Peacock,, who remained a friend to both Shelley and his first wife until their deaths, would seem to have been relatively impartial, and certainly well informed.

. Peacock and Mary Shelley were not congenial, but much as he had liked Harriet, he quite willingly granted that "Shelley's second wife was intellectually better suited to him than his first ..." fEML, p. 51). There is less evidence that Celinda Toobad is as

close a reproduction of Mary Shelley as Marionetta is of Harriet.

Physically they are unlike; Celinda is a tall brunette, and Mary was fair.

In temperament, however, the two are comparable. William

Godwin described his daughter at fifteen as "singularly bold, some­ what imperious,. and active of mind, " and added, "Her desire of knowledge is great,. and her perseverance in everything she undertakes 61

almost invincible o Mary, daughter of Mary Wolls tone craft and

William Godwin, had absorbed their ideas on feminine independence

and political justice,, . When Peacock describes Celinda |or Stella,. as

she is known in this section of the novel) one is more than just re­

minded of Mary,

Stella, in her conversations with Scythrop, displayed a highly cultivated and energetic mind, full of impassioned schemes of liberty, and impatience of masculine usurpation. She had a lively sense of all the oppressions that are done under the sun; and the vivid pictures which her imagination presented to her of numberless scenes of injustice and misery which are being acted at every moment in every part of the inhabited world, gave an habitual seriousness to her physiognamy, that made it seem as if a smile had never once hovered on her lips. She was intimately con­ versant with the German language and literature. . . . . CNAt. pp.. 93*94)

When Scythrop offers to conceal her in his tower, and tells her she may

rely upon his honor as a transcendental eleutherach, Celinda is a

true daughter of Mary W oil stone craft, and the last sentence of the

following quotation is taken directly from the Vindication of the Rights

, of Women.

"I rely on myself. . . . I act as I please, go where I please, and let the world say what it will. . . .. I submit not to be an accomplice in my sex's slavery. I am, like yourself, a lover of freedom,, and I carry my theory into practice. They alone are subject to blind authority who have no reliance on their own strength." (NA, p. 92)

39. White, p. 335. 62

Earlier in the novel, before Celinda has appeared, her father, learning of Scythrop's attachment to charming Marionetta, is confident that his daughter-may well displace her, and says, „ „ we shall see whether Thalia or Melpomene--whether the Allegra or the

Fens er os a--will carry off the symbol of victory" (NA, p. 33)„ Poor

Marionetta, like Harriet Shelley, could not oyer come such comp e titi on,

Scythrop found that his soul had a greater capacity of love than the image of Marionetta had filled. The form of Stella took possession’of every vacant'corner of the cavity, and by degrees displaced'that of Marionetta from the outworks of the citadel; though, the latter still held possession of the keep., (NA, p.. 94)

This was almost exactly Shelley1 s situation in 1814. Still married to Harriet (recently for the second time), Shelley had fallen violently in love with Mary Godwin, Peacock, who was called to

London by Shelley to give advice, witnessed his suffering, and quotes

Shelley as saying, "Everyone who knows me must know that the partner of my life should be one who can feel poetry and understand philosophy,

Harriet is a noble animal, but she can do neither" |EML, p, 92).

Newman Ivey White says of her: -

With:a naturally apt mind, Harriet had been able in her letters to reflect:Spelley's political and social views with remarkable fidelity, as if they were her own. When she got beyond this she showed that her mind was quite naive and certainly not interested in philosophy and poetry for their own sake, but only - - as far as she could go for "Percy's, She belonged naturally far more to a : . world of brisk physical cheerfulness and unquestioned ; conventions than to the speculative, literary, and I

unconventional atmosphere to which Mary had been long accustomed at Godwin's shop and home in Skinner S treet.^

This sounds much like Peacock*s appraisal of Stella and Marionetta,

With Stella, . Scythrop could indulge freely in all his romantic and philosophical visions. He could build castles in the air, and she would pile towers and turrets on the imaginary edifices. With Mari one tta it was otherwise: she knew nothing of the world and society beyond the sphere of her own experience. Her life was all music and sunshine, and she wondered what any one could see to complain of in such a pleasant state of things. fNA, p. 96)

The very different delights offered by the young,women appealed almost equally to Scythrop. Unable to choose or renounce either, he romantically wished to keep both. That Shelley would have welcomed such a solution we know from a letter written by Hariett to her friend

Catherine Nugent on July 14,. 1814, in which she repeats Shelley's suggestion that they all live together, Harriet as his sister,, and Mary as his wife. ^ If Shelley and Scythrop might have found this position tenable, their ladies most definitely did not, and characteristically

Scythrop and Shelley threatened suicide.

. Shelley, in the throes of his early passion for Mary, burst into

Skinner Street and cried to Mary,, "They wish to separate us, my beloved, but Death shall unite us," whereupon he offered her a bottle

40. White, p. 351.

White, p. 340. 64

4? of laudanum and flourished a pistoL The scene was terminated through the intervention of M rs0 Godwin,. Clare.,, and a family friend, ' , ' ' ■ Somewhat later Shelley actually did attempt to carry out his threat by taking laudanum, but a doctor and secret notes from Mary brought about his recovery. For-Shelley the conflict was between/two irrecon­ cilable moral paths--his duty to Harriet, and his obligation to follow the dictates of true love. For Scythrop, Peacock had eliminated the dramatic moral problem and reduced it to the romantic sulking of a man who wanted more than he could have.

In Nightmare Abbey the author concludes the dilemma by having

Marionetta and Celinda hastily find other mates. As is well known,

Shelley chose to elope with Mary, and Harriet eventually committed suicide,. a fate which she had often discussed even when she was con­ sidered by most observers to be a contented, cheerful wife. So Peacock described her, and he was often in her company at that time. Others, however, evaluate Harriet's character differently, , Perhaps they are correct, or perhaps they are motivated by a desire to elevate Shelley's moral reputation, Henry S, Salt believed that Harriet's death was due to "the degradation of the life to which she deliberately subjected

42, White, p, 343, herself, and partly to a morbid nature constitutionally prone to

suicideo

In any case, episodes in Shelley's life, stripped of their tragic

reality, were artistically converted by the clever Peacock fwho seldom

bothered to invent when he could transform) into the raw material

of his comedy. At the time of the publication of the novel there were

few who knew enough of Shelley's private affairs to recognize the

caricature. But Shelley did, and professed to be much amused by it,

_ Perhaps the five-year interval since his elopement with Mary had

dimmed unhappy memories, A more recent tragedy, the death of

their son William, may have eclipsed old sorrows, Carl Van Doren,

discussing Shelley's reaction, says,. "In him it reveals either an un­

suspected sense of humour, or magnanimity, or coldness, It may

have been a little of all three, for these qualities are not necessarily

mutually exclusive. At any rate, probably because Peacock knew his

friend well, he took the chance of injuring or insulting Shelley,. and got

away with it, Shelley acknowledged the distorted portrait of himself,

but stressed that Scythrop's misdirected enthusiasm was what "J, C,

43, Henry S, Salt,, Percy Bysshe Shelley (London, 1924), p. 55,

44, . Carl Van Doren, The Life of Thomas Love Peacock {'New York, 1911), p.. 119. calls the 'salt of the earth, Peacock had told him that Nightmare

Abbey had been written primarily to satirize the ultraromantic gloom typical of Byron's Childe Harold and many novels of the period, and he made one more effort to explain that the object had been "merely to bring into a sort of philosophical focus a few of the morbidities of modern literature and to let in & little daylight on its atrabilafious complexion, Further exchanges between Peacock and Shelley on the subject (if there were any) are unrecorded.

45, Ingpen, p, 694,

46, Van Doren, p, 114, GRYLiL GRANGE

After 1819 when .Peacock became employed by the East India

House, his separation froin Shelley was more than just geographic.

His career as a business man was highly, successful, and as a practical man, now married, he was far removed from the period of his life when he had read and rambled through the countryside with Shelley,

His "deliberately provocative and satirical"^ Four Ages of Poetry begins with a eulogy of the past glories of classical literature,. and ends with an attack on the Lake Poets, Today it is remembered as the irritant which evoked Shelley1 s Defense of Poetry, Shelley drowned in

1822, and Peacock never again had a comparable companion.

Maid Marian (1822) and The Misfortunes of Elphin (1829) are in most aspects a complete departure from his -previous novels, Maid

Marian, a gay parody of medieval romance, had a greater contemporary success than any of his other works,. and was produced as an opera.

The Misfortunes of Elphin, a burlesque of Arthurian legends, is con­ sidered by many to be his most amusing novel. Both include some of

Peacock's finest songs, but have little to remind one of Shelley,

47, Thomas Love Peacock, The Four Ages of Poetry (Oxford,. 1947) Bretts Smith, ed, , p. viii,

67 Crotchet Castle (1831) is a return to the format of Headlong Hall, with an assemblage of one track minds on collision courseso Hazlitt

(Eavesdrop), Southey (Shantsee),. Coleridge (Skionar),. and Wordsworth

(Wontsee) are blatantly caricatures,. and many of the old familiar ideas are again ridiculed, but Shelley is not of the party» There is, however a boating excursion that is clearly reminiscent of a trip taken up the

Thames by Peacock, Shelley, Mary, and Charles Clairmont in 1815.

Between Crotchet Castle and Gryll Grange (I860) there was a twenty-nine year interval of comparative silence. Peacock wrote a few critical articles, essays, and starts of novels he never continued.

The death of his much loved mother, his first and best audience and critic , may have been one reason for the curtailment of his literary output. But his duties at the East India House and family respon­ sibilities were time consuming, and Peacock had always been a man who would rather read than write. His retirement in 1856 allowed him more leisure for both pursuits*

• Gryll Grange, published only six years before Peacock's death, is almost identical in general conception with his novels of forty years before. Peacock, who had never been convinced that he (or anyone else) could do much to reform the world, had mellowed somewhat, and the satire of Gryll Grange is less caustic, . Peacock, if not selfish, was self-indulgent, and in his last work,, written as were all the others 69

to amuse himself, he used an incredible number of quotations, literary

•and classical allusions, and anything else that came to mind.

Because Gryll Grange was written between the publication of

the first and second parts of the Shelley memoir, it is not surprising /> that another version of his long dead friend rejoined the cast of

characters. A. Martin Freeman believed that Peacock, full of memories

of the old days in Marlow and London, had been musing over what

Shelley, had he lived,. might have become. Algernon Falconer, Freeman 4 o thought, is Peacock's projection of the Shelley-that-would-have-been.

This is an interesting theory, but one difficult to justify from evidence

in the novel. The Shelleyan traits discernible in Mr. Falconer, a

young man, are the same ones that Peacock had used before, and they

do not seem to have changed, flourished, or diminished appreciably.

. Falconer reads extensively, with a distinct taste for Greek, _ Spanish,

and Italian literature; he is something of a recluse, but enjoys congenial

society; he is dependent upon feminine companionship; in his devotion

to ideal beauty he tends to live in an unreal world,. and confuses the

immaterial with the material; he is concerned with the sufferings of

the poor and the oppressed; he is an idealist afflicted with indecision

- who finds it difficult to. act,. and he has trouble with his love life. All :

of which is neither new nor strange.

48. Freeman, p. 332. 70

The Mri. Falconer of Gryll Grange is introduced very much as was the Mr, Forester of Melincourt<, Falconer is discovered by a man who becomes his friend in the remote and newly remodeled

"Duke1 s Folly, " a solitary, round tower. Forester, it will be re­ membered, was found living in the recently renovated Redrose Abbey > . by an old friendo The tower motif Peacock associated with Shelley, and had introduced it in Scythrop’s apartments in Nightmare Abbey,

Shelley, while living in a small country house in Livorno,. had a study which he told Peacock was something like Scythrop’s tower,

Perhaps to Peacock a tower symbolized Shelley’s frequent desire for a refuge from the turmoil of the world, a place where he could read and think, safe from unwelcome intrusions of reality.

Falconer is called "the Hermit of the Folly," and Shelley had published his Proposal for Putting Reform to the Vote with authorship atfibuted to The Hermit of Marlow, Falconer seems to Dr, Opimion to be "indisposed to general society, and to care for nothing but woods, rivers,, and the sea; and Greek poetry , „ ," fGG, p, 66), His know­ ledge of Homer serves as the first impetus to friendship with the

Reverend Doctor Opimion, who, despite his ecclesiastical calling, is generally accepted as representing the author. It is interesting that

49o Ingpen, p, 695, 71

- Peacock, in the Memoir, speaking of the influence the Reverend Mr0.

Edwards had had on the very young Shelley, had this to say:'

Shelley never came, directly or indirectly, under any authority, public or private, for which he entertained, or had much cause to entertain, any degree of respect. His own father, the Brentford schoolmaster, the head master of. Eton, the Master and Fellows of his college at Oxford, the Lord Chancellor Eldon, all successively presented themselves to him in the light of tyrants and oppressors. It was perhaps from the recollection of his early preceptor that he felt a sort of poetical regard for country clergy­ men, and was always pleased when he fell in with one who had a sympathy with him in classical literature, and was willing to pass sub silentio the debateable ground between them , (XiM, p, .75)

Opimion,. the apotheosis of the literate, good natured country

clergy which did not demand complete orthodoxy, is impressed with

Falconer's library, which contains the volumes Peacock and Shelley

knew in common. In addition to the expected classics, Falconer, like

Shelley, expressed admiration for the novels of Charles Brockden

Brown, the American Quaker whose .Arthur Mervyn .and WMland had

influenced Shelley's early romances and Laon and Cythna (EML, p, 71),

The inclusion of Spanish literature dates from a period later than the.

years of Peacock's and Shelley's close association, for. Shelley did

notHearn Spanish until after 1818 when he studied the language with

Maria Gisborne, But is is the Greek that Opimion stresses as "the

strongest chord in his |F ale oner1 s~| sympathies " (GG, p, 3.8), and

Falconer agrees to participate in the Aristophanic comedy produced . 72

At Gryll Grange, although at that time he wished to avoid the company

there assembled,

Mr, Falconer's domestic arrangements were highly unusual.

He lived alone, except for a staff of seven female domestics whom he

had trained to wait upon him and sing and play for him, and who, in

turn, had servants to perform the less agreeable household chores.

The relationship was perfectly chaste, and although Falconer was

aware that it was the subject of gossip, he was contented with the

arrangement. He was well taken care of, and as for the criticism--

"The world will never suppose a good motive, where it can suppose a

bad one" .(GG, p, 30),

Presenting Falconer in these circumstances is Peacock1 s

engaging method of commenting upon the peculiarities of Shelley's

households, Shelley, the older brother of four girls was brought up

surrounded by feminine companions who loved, admired, obeyed, and

waited upon him. He seemed to have had little desire for playmates

of his own sex, and his first.contacts with boys were unhappy ones,

. as the accounts of "Shelley baits" attest. It was he who directed his

sister's games and guided their opinions, Cameron comments:

"He was, in fact, continually, and often with an abnormal intensity of

purpose attempting to shape the thinking of the whole female group.

And the pattern persisted throughout his life, later becoming 73 integrated with his, feminist social philosophy, It will be recalled that it was his intention to educate Harriet Grove, and to mold Harriet

Westbrook's character. Furthermore,. Shelley usually had more than one woman in his menage. He invited Elizabeth Hitchener, "a sister of his soul, " to join him and Harriet, much to his later regret. Eliza

Westbrook, Harriet's sister, lived with them during most of their married life. The circumstances were not happy, and unless Shelley had had some peculiar need, he should have profited from past ex­ perience and prevented Clare Clairmont from spending so much time under his roof. Few men would welcome a third person on a honey­ moon. Many people, seeing only one possible explanation, believed, that Shelley, whose morality was already in question, shared the favors of both Mary and Clare, and it must be admitted that the pos sibility certainly did exist. In Gryll Grange, - Peacock makes clear the chastity of Falconer's relationship with the seven pretty domestics, stressing their complete dependence upon their master, and Falconer's conviction that his treatment of them has elevated not only their station but their character and contentment. As a plot device the situation serves to postpone Falconer's proposing to Morgana Gryll. It is also

Peacock's, representation of Shelley surrounded by his "sisters of the soul" in an "abode of spiritual love. "

50. Kenneth Neil Cameron, The Young Shelley (New York, 1950), P. 16o - ' ' " 74

When Opimion accuses Falconer of being determined to connect

the immaterial and material world. Falconer replies, "I like the

immaterial world, I like to live among thoughts and images of the

past and the possible, and even the impossible, now and then"

|GG, p« 91)o He has already given his reason for so doing,. and

recognizes that his efforts can not always be successful.

Our happiness is not in what is, but in what is to be. We may be disappointed in our every-day realities, and, , , we •may make an ideality of the unattainable, and quarrel with nature for not giving what she has not to give. It is un­ reasonable to be so disappointed, but it is disappointment not the less, (GG, pp, 31-2)

Mr, Falconer had been reluctant to admit Opimi on into his bed­

room because he was not sure that the clergyman would approve of

the decor--pictures of St, Catharine, an image, and an altar. The

legend of St, Catharine and her portrait had impressed Falconer, and

he considered her a type of ideal beauty, possessing "all that can charm,

irradiate, refine, exalt" |GG, p,. 72), He had felt the need to believe

in the presence of a spiritual influence in a world whi^ch.has banished

nymphs-and genii loci, . Confident that he was able to distinguish

between superstitious practices of the church and a pure devotion to

ideal beauty,. he had practiced his own brand of veneration. This,

- perhaps, may be an example of Freeman's theory--but that Peacock

thought Shelley would eventually have given up pursuing the ladies of

Epipsychidion to pay homage to a Saint is highly unlikely, Cameron 75

speculated that Shelley' s' "later search for the ideal had some roots in

his early phobic insecurities in love9 that is earthly, human love:

security might perhaps be found only in a transcendental love,, a love

of permanence--not failing: and wounding like human love - - and of

51 supreme beauty,11 But Mr, Falconer, like most men, is getting

ready to settle for less. Having met Morgana Gryll, his meditations

on ideal beauty and St, Catharine are interrupted by the persistent

thought that Hthe ideal might be real, at least in one instance"

(GG, p. 96), And so thought Shelley, and more than once,

, Mr, Falconer, while still sensitive to the miseries of the world,-

engages in no schemes for reformation. He says,, "I look with feelings

of intense pain on the mass of poverty and crime; of unhealthy, un-

- availing, unremunerated toil, blighting childhood in its bios som, and

womanhood in its prime" (GG, p, 92), and suggests that "the white

slavery of our factories is , , „ worse than the black slavery of

America" |GG, p, 194), but he has withdrawn to his tower.

The indecisiveness and slowness to act that Peacock attributed

to Shelley in the character of Scythrop is repeated in Falconer, His

reluctance to recognize his love for Morgana and his failure to propose

because he had a mistaken notion of his duty to the seven servants is

so prolonged that it becomes almost as annoying to the reader as it

51, Cameron, p, 16, must have been to Miss Gryll, This procrastination seems more characteristic of Peacock ^'whose affair with Marianne lasted for so long,, and who allowed a lapse of eight years between meeting and marrying.Jane Gryffydh) than of Shelley,. whose embarkations into love were more hasty than reflective. CONCLUSION

When Peacock wrote his first novel. Headlong Hall, in 1816,

he had known Shelley for six years. . Melincourt and Nightmare Abbey

followed in 1817 and 1819. During this period Shelley was his most

intimate friend, and it is not surprising that Peacock,. admittedly not

particularly inventive, used Shelley as the convenient material from

which he constructed his heroes. The two men, in close association,

. shared interests and ideas which they both expressed in literary form,

. but their differences in personality, temperament,. and character made

their work, even that which dealt with common material, quite

different. The Shelley of Peacock's novels is not Shelley the poetic

genius, but Shelley the fascinating human being,. as he appeared to a

sympathetic friend with an active sense of humor. . Each novel reveals

a slightly different view of Shelley. In none is he fully portrayed, but

a composite of Foster,. Forester,. Scythrop dowry, and Falconer

presents a fairly complete picture of the man Peacock knew, with, of

course, the modifications inevitable in the transformation of an actual

person into a fictional character.

In Headlong Hall Peacock found his seldom-deserted formula,

and a more likely candidate than Shelley for inclusion in a collection

of opinionated enthusiasts would be difficult to imagine. An optimist,

. 77 78

a pessimist; and one, equally uncommitted to either philosophy comment

upon literature, politics, and social situations, and the slight plot is

the exemplification of their attitudes» Peacock dug rather deeply into

Shelley's ideas for discussion material., but for the characterization of

Foster, he lightly skimmed off only.Shelley's perfectibilian tendencies.

In so doing, he frequently made a subtle jest that has usually been

ignored amid the more pointed raillery, Mr, Foster is slightly

ridiculous, as would be any individual shown tenaciously sounding the

same note despite, varied circumstances. In Mr, Foster are preserved

some of young Shelley's more endearing qualities--his devotion to the improvement of mankind, and his naivete concerning possible methods

to achieve it,

. In Melincourt's Mr, Forester,. Peacock inadvertently displays

Shelley's finer characteristics less attractively. So much virtue be­

comes unrewarding. Peacock contrived a plot worthy of Ms Mgh

spirited satiric gifts; his worthy hero is spared satiric treatment,, and

the reader's spirits are lowered when mired in Mr, Forester's murky

profundities and priggish propriety. The gap between the Forester who

acts and the Forester-who talks is seldom bridged. If Peacock meant

to be amusing about Shelley's propensity for high-minded prolixity, he

fell into the trap that has ever awaited those who would criticise dull­ ness by displaying it with verisimilitude. The emphasis, in Melincourt, is on the examination of the evils inherent in the political system. r

79

, and the preparation requisite for individuals to participate in: and benefit

from reform. The novel also introduces the Shelleyan quest for ideal

beauty3 although Peacock is not interested in exploring far into the

more rarefied aspects of the concepts.

In Nightmare Abbey, Peacock the comic writer triumphs. The

subject m atter,. Shelley’s agonized moral conflict between his duty to

Harriet and his recognition of his need for a more intellectual mate, is

divested of the tragic elements and becomes high comedy. Perhaps this

was -Peacock1 s way of coming to terms with his disappointment at

Shelley’ s, leaving Harriet for a woman fundamentally incompatible with

Peacock.

Shelley accepted the caricature of his early enthusiasms, but .

ignored the burlesque of a crucial event in his past. Peacock had

made Scythrop Glowry an extravagently romantic youth whose problems,

although authentic parallels of Shelley's,. can not be taken very seriously.

But Peacock knew that the real Shelley, as viewed by ordinary people

of common sense, was equally unbelievable.

. In .Shelley' s "Letter to Maria Gisborne" (1820), he praised

Peacock and summed up his own reactions to his friend's literary tactics.

-- his fine wit Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it.

It may be that Shelley missed the point of some of Peacock's more fanci­

ful jests, but his appraisal is sound. Peacock, with his diversified 80 interests and good nature, lacked the acerbity and singleness of purpose that effective satire demands.

Gryll Grange (I860) is a coda* . Peacock., full of years and memories, takes a last look at his friend. In his Memoirs he had

speculated that had the idealistic.Shelley lived to achieve a firmer grasp of reality, he would have become a very different and disillusioned man (EMLi, p, 131), Falconer is no such person. All the old ideas are touched upon again, with Shelley's devotion to ideal beauty given most attention, although what the reader remembers is less Falconer's talk than his modus vivendi. Peacock was making his usual humorous commentary; he used variations of his same old jokes, but to the credit of the old man,. he told them differently. Peacock and Shelley exemplified the truism that the men who think, laugh; those who feel,

suffer, Shelley was long gone,. spared the disenchantments of middle and old age, . Peacock, having had few illusions to lose, aged as deliciously as his beloved madeira, mellow to the last heel-tap. LITERATURE CITED

Blunden9. Edmund, Shelley. London, 1946.

Cameron,. Kenneth Neil. The Young Shelley. New York,. 1950.

Campbell,. Olwen W. , Thomas Love Peacock. London, 1953.

Freeman, A. Martin- . Thomas Love Peacock. New York, 1911 =

Ingpen,; Roger, ed„ .The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, 2 vols. New York, 1909.

. MacDonald,..Daniel J. . The Radicalism of Shelley and Its Sources. Washington, D. C. , . 1912;

Peacock, Thomas Love. The Four Ages of Poetry, ed. H. F. B. Brett-Smith. Oxford,. 1947.

. , The Complete Works,, ed. H. F. B. Brett-Smith and C. E. Jones, H alliford Edition, 10 vols.,. London, 1934. Vol.. I,., Biography & Headlong Hall. Vol. II, Melincourt. Vol. III,. Nightmare Abbey & Maid Marian. Vol. IV, The Misfortunes of Elphin & Crochet Castle. Vol.. V, Gryll Grange. Vol. VIII, Essays, Memoirs, Letters, & Unfinished Novels.

Salt, Henry S. Percy Bysshe Shelley. . London, 1924.

Shelley,. Percy Bysshe. The Complete Poetical Works, ed. Thomas Hutchinson. London, I960.

Stew art, J„.I„ M. Thomas Love Peacock. . London,. 1963.

Van Doren, Carl. , The: Life of Thomas Love Peacock. New York, 1911.

White, Newman Ivey. . Shelley, 2 vols. New York, 1947.

81