"Mr. J. C. Jeaffreson in his book 'The Real Shelley' writes: 'All the world knows how Shelley's torn and disfigured corpse was reduced to ashes and a few fragments of bone (with the exception of the heart that would not be burnt) on the pyre;' and probably, since Trelawny, shortly after the poet's death, reported that 'his heart remained entire,' his statement has been unhesitatingly accepted. I have, however, reason for thinking that the story does not rest on trustworthy evidence.
"When a body is burnt the part which longest resists the action of the fire after the base of the skull and one or two of the most solid portions of bone, is the liver. The heart, being hollow and smaller, is easily destroyed: but the liver, a moist and solid mass, repels intense heat, and ultimately deposits an ash of pure carbon, which no continued burning or increase of temperature can further change. In the cemetery of Milan where I have seen human cremations completely carried out in seventy minutes by Signor Venini's reverberatory furnace, the best method known, I also learned that the liver, perhaps from its containing this element of carbon, can endure for a considerable time even that concentrated whirlwind of fire, and remain almost intact after the heart has totally disappeared. Moreover, in Shelley's case the liver would have been saturated with sea-water, and thereby rendered still more incombustible. It is extremely improbable that Byron, Leigh Hunt, or Trelawny knew enough anatomy to identify accurately the charred substance they took to be the heart, and it is more likely, owing to the thin edge of the liver being consumed, and its size consequently being much reduced, that they mistook the shrunken remains of the one organ for the whole of the other.
"From observing the Milanese cremations alluded to I think it barely possible that the human heart is ever capable of withstanding fire for more than a brief period; but since Mr. J. A. Symonds asserts, to my surprise, that Shelley's heart was given by Leigh Hunt to Mrs. Shelley, and is now at Boscombe, the seat of the present baronet, it would be easy for some competent anatomist to determine the question I have raised.
"In any case, the hero-worshipping and sentimental tourists who go in crowds to that lovely spot beneath the pyramid of Caius Cestius to mourn over Shelley's untimely fate have been strangely deceived for more than sixty years in believing that beneath the marble graven with the touching words 'Cor Cordium' lies the flame proof heart of their favorite poet."—Bicknell.
The man whose mind, on virtue bent,
Pursues some greatly good intent,
With undiverted aim,
Serene beholds the angry crowd;
Nor can their clamors, fierce and loud,
His stubborn honor tame.
Not the proud tyrant's fiercest threat,
Nor storms, that from their dark retreat
The lawless surges wake;
Not Jove's dread bolt, that shakes the pole,
The firmer purpose of his soul
With all its power can shake.
Should nature's frame in ruins fall,
And chaos o'er the sinking ball
Resume the primeval sway,
His courage chance and fate defies,
Nor feels the wreck of earth and skies
Obstruct its destined way.
Translated by Blacklocke.
[17] Charles V., of Spain, seems to have entertained the same morbid desire for a personal acquaintance with his own postmortem appearance and condition. In Robertson's History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles V. we have this account of the monarch's attendance upon his own funeral: "He resolved to celebrate his own obsequies before his death. He ordered his tomb to be erected in the chapel of the monastery. His domestics marched thither in funeral procession, with black tapers in their hands. He himself followed in his shroud. He was laid in his coffin with much solemnity. The service for the dead was chanted, and Charles joined in the prayers which were offered up for the rest of his soul, mingling his tears with those which his attendants shed, as if they had been celebrating a real funeral. The ceremony closed with sprinkling holy water on the coffin in the usual form, and all the assistants retiring, the doors of the chapel were shut. Then Charles rose out of the coffin, and withdrew to his apartment, full of those awful sentiments which such a singular solemnity was calculated to inspire." This story is somewhat changed in Stirling's "Cloister Life of the Emperor Charles V."
If I must die, I'll snatch at every thing
That may but mind me of my latest breath;
Death's-heads, Graves, Knells, Blacks, Tombs, all these shall bring
Into my soul such useful thoughts of death,
That this sable king of fears
Shall not catch me unawares.—Quarles.