Every sentence of this extract from an important letter should be carefully weighed by the reader who would apprehend precisely the relations of Mr. Timothy Shelley and the poet, and observe the pains taken by the Duke of Norfolk in mediating between the father and son. The letter shows to whose influence Shelley attributed, and no doubt justly attributed, the quickness with which his father relented to him in the spring. In this respect the Squire suffers in some degree from the testimony of the epistle, which denies him the credit that would otherwise seem due to his clemency and financial liberality to the son, who had so recently exasperated him by rebellious extravagances. It does not follow that left to himself the Squire would not in a somewhat longer time have subsided from his wrath, and treated his boy with the same generosity. It must, however, be conceded that the Duke’s counsel was accountable for the quickness with which the Squire dismissed his anger, and offered the terms which Shelley accepted with exultation, calling the terms ‘very good ones,’ when he wrote of them exultingly to Hogg in the middle of May. On the other hand, by all who would take an impartial view of the father’s treatment of his son, it must be admitted that the Squire’s readiness in deferring to his patron on so delicate a question was creditable to his moderation, was at least incompatible with the violent and stubborn wrong-headedness with which he has been unfairly charged. Indicative of a disposition to do what was right by his boy, this readiness indicates a conscientious desire to be preserved by judicious counsel from the vehemence of his own temper, and withheld from errors to which he might be betrayed by the fervour of his feelings. The evidence is conclusive that Shelley was not more quick than his father to have recourse to the Duke’s mediation; a fact which must be at least allowed to indicate a desire on the father’s part, that his behaviour to his son should be such as a fair and high-minded arbitrator would approve. The evidence is no less conclusive that Mr. Timothy Shelley’s treatment of his son had the Duke’s approval; and that his sense of the Duke’s approval caused him to look to his patron as a friend, who would defend his paternal character from social reprehension.
It is noteworthy that, whilst thanking the Duke for his good services of the previous spring, Shelley speaks of the pecuniary arrangement resulting from his Grace’s intervention as a ‘reasonable and proper’ arrangement. Even more noteworthy is it that, instead of attributing his father’s anger and withdrawal of the allowance to disapproval of his religious and philosophical views, he attributes them altogether to indignation at his marriage, and displeasure at his letters. It is not suggested by phrase or word that the rupture was due in any degree to differences of opinion on matters of creed. The letter’s only complaint against Mr. Timothy Shelley is that his indignation is ‘greater than is consistent with justice’ (words of admission that the writer had given his father cause for serious, though less extravagant, displeasure): the letter’s only prayer is that the Duke will address himself to the pecuniary consequence of this displeasure. The Duke is not asked to modify the Squire’s religious intolerance, but to moderate his anger at the mésalliance, and induce him to allow his son ‘a sufficient income to live with tolerable comfort.’ There is no suggestion that he was shut out of his ‘boyhood’s home’ on account of his heterodoxy. On the contrary, the writer speaks of himself as leaving that home of his own accord to make the match, on which he had not spoken to his father. Writing to the Duke, who knew the truth of the case, Shelley could not venture to be otherwise than precisely truthful on these points. In the letter, therefore, we have Shelley’s sincere view of his relations with his father, and see how he spoke of them to well-informed persons. By-and-by it will be seen how he wrote of those relations to William Godwin, who did not know the truth of them.
Just two days before Shelley dated his letter (of 28th October, 1811) from York to the Duke of Norfolk, old Sir Bysshe Shelley executed a noteworthy codicil to the will, by which he had directed that all persons entitled to lands, &c. (designated A in my abstract of the will), whose consent and co-operation should be needful for the purpose of the testament, should join in settling the same lands A precisely as the lands, &c. (designated C) were ordered by the same will to be put in strict settlement. It was observed in the aforementioned abstract, that the testator’s grandson (Percy Bysshe) was tenant in tail in remainder expectant on the deaths of his father and grandfather, of two lots of real estate, designated A and B. By the will he was required to resettle, in accordance with the testator’s purpose, the lands, &c., A; no requirement being made for the resettlement of lands, &c., B. By the codicil, which old Sir Bysshe executed on 26th October, 1811, it was directed that any person, being tenant for life at the same time of A, B, and C, and every person or persons being tenant in tail of A and B, and at the same time tenant for life of C, should settle A and B as C, within a year of so becoming entitled and capable of joining in the resettlement. It was further provided by this noteworthy codicil that, if any such entitled person or persons should refuse or neglect to settle A and B as C, then the estates of such person or persons and their respective issue under the will in estates C, should be forfeited, and the remainder expectant on such estates should be accelerated. Yet, further, it was directed by this remarkable codicil that if, by reason of alienation or charge any person, at the date of the codicil interested in remainder to any estate in A and B should not be able to settle A and B as C, there should then be the same forfeiture of the estate and estates of such person and his issue under the will, as if he had refused or neglected to settle A and B as C. As this last provision was aimed directly at the future poet, though he is not mentioned by name in the clause, and as readers of this work should be under no uncertainty respecting the provision, by which the poet may be said to have disinherited himself and his issue from participation in his grandfather’s very large property, it is well to put on the present page the ipsissima verba of the provision, which runs thus:—
‘Provided always and I do hereby declare,’ says old Sir Bysshe in this momentous codicil, ‘my will and mind to be that, if any person or persons who is or are now entitled in remainder under or by virtue of the said Indenture of Appointment of the twentieth day of April, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-one, and the said Indenture of Release of the thirtieth day of April, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-two respectively, to any estate or estates of and in the hereditaments therein respectively comprised hath or have or shall alien or charge the same whereby he or they may be prevented from making or causing to be made the resettlement hereinbefore by me directed to be made of the said settled estates, then and in such case, from and after the expiration of the time before limited or mentioned for making such resettlement, the uses or use estates or estate by my said will directed to be limited to or for the benefit of the person or persons who hath or have so aliened or charged or shall so alien or charge as aforesaid and his or their issue shall, notwithstanding he or they may be personally willing to make such resettlement as aforesaid, cease determine and become absolutely void, and that the manors and other hereditaments by my said will devised and directed to be settled in trust as aforesaid shall in such case immediately thereupon go over in the same manner as I have hereinbefore directed the same to go over in case such person or persons had refused or neglected to make such resettlement as aforesaid, and I do hereby expressly declare that my intentions in respect to the resettlement of the said settled estates shall be carried into effect by proper clauses and provisoes to be for that purpose inserted in the settlement in and by said will directed to be made as aforesaid.’
It is obvious that differences on questions of religion or politics were in no degree accountable for the codicil, by which the future poet was required to resettle the real estates, that would devolve on him absolutely after the lives of his father and grandfather. Himself an atheist and materialist, it mattered nothing to old Sir Bysshe, whether his grandson believed in fifty gods or one God, or chose to deny the existence of a supreme Deity. Himself a man of the people, the son of a Yankee apothecary by the miller Plum’s widow, old Sir Bysshe was not so strongly prejudiced in favour of aristocratic persons and institutions, as to be greatly incensed by his grandson’s folly in wedding a publican’s pretty daughter. It was a matter of comparative indifference to the aged cynic, whether the boy held to the Whigs, went over to the Tories, or, declaring against both political parties, joined the red Republicans. The one thing he required of his eldest son’s eldest son, was that on coming of age, the youngster should join in a resettlement of the settled estates, that would make them part and parcel of the big entailed property of the Castle Goring Shelleys. Let him be compliant on that point, and the youngster had his grandsire’s permission to be as wilful as he pleased on all other matters. On the other hand, should he prove rebellious and undutiful in respect to this one requirement, neither he nor his issue should profit by the grand estate that would be created for the perpetual dignity of the house, founded by his grandfather. For all the veteran cared, the youngster might think, say, write, do whatever he pleased, provided he forbore to cross the purpose of his elders on the one matter of business. Should he refuse to exchange his larger estate in the settled lands for a contingent life interest in them, he must be content with that estate (which, though a comparatively small affair, was sufficient to maintain a baronet’s dignity), and forego all interest for himself and issue in the lordly revenue, to which he would otherwise succeed in the course of nature.
Having formed this scheme for the honour of his descendants, at a time when he never imagined the little Brentford schoolboy might decline to further it, Sir Bysshe was not the man to relinquish any part of his grand ambition out of deference to the whim and wildness of an unruly stripling. From the boy’s action in wedding a girl of Harriett Westbrook’s condition, without the consent or knowledge of his parents, it was obvious to the veteran, that his grandson’s regard for the feelings and wishes of his nearest kindred were not likely to be largely operative in determining him to concur in the proposed resettlement of family estate. From the circumstances of the mésalliance, the veteran had also reason for thinking it probable that the youngster would raise money on his future resources even in his minority; and, unless pressure was put upon him at the earliest moment to resettle the estates A and B, would be under the control of money-lenders, soon after the attainment of his majority. Hence the old man’s resolve that the strongest possible appeal should be made at the earliest moment to the young man’s self-interest to put it out of his power to squander the estates, in which he was interested as tenant in tail in remainder expectant. The stringent codicil was old Sir Bysshe’s answer to his grandson’s mad-cap elopement; and in taking this action on the boy’s latest escapade, the founder of the poet’s mushroom ‘house’ had no consideration whatever for the young man’s religious or political opinions.
It is uncertain on what day the trio left York. Mr. Denis Florence MacCarthy is certain they departed on Friday, 29th October, the day next after the date of the epistle to the Duke of Norfolk, and perhaps the inaccurate writer does not err on this point. Anyhow it is unquestionable that they had left York several days, when the Duke’s reply (dated 7th November, 1811) came to Hogg’s hands, and was forthwith (on the 9th or 10th of the month) forwarded to Shelley, at Keswick. Moreover, enough is known of the droll circumstances of the departure, which may indeed be called a flight, and of the manner in which His Grace the Duke of Norfolk answered Shelley’s judiciously worded letter.
Charles, the eleventh Duke of Norfolk, a keen politician, and methodical man of affairs, kept a diary; and on 7th November, 1811 (when he was in his sixty-sixth year) he made this entry in the personal record, ‘Wrote to T. Shelly that I would come to Field Place on the 10th, to confer with him on the unhappy difference with his son, from whom I have a letter before me.—To Mr. B. Shelley in answer that I should be glad to interfere, but fear with little hope of success; fearing that his father, and not he alone, will see his late conduct in a different point of view from what he sees it.—That I propose going into the North next week, and will come to York to see him, provided he will inform me when I may find him there.’
Written to Shelley himself, a letter of this sentiment and tone shows, even more forcibly than the Earl of Chichester’s gossiping note, written to his official subordinate, what view the great Sussex families took of the young gentleman’s latest escapade. To the Duke no less than the Earl, the marriage with the innkeeper’s daughter appeared a discreditable business; and though in writing to Shelley, he of course made no mention of her low origin, the Duke told him frankly the marriage was an affair about which his father had reason to be indignant. In saying the Squire would not be singular in declining to take Shelley’s view of the matter, the Duke declared, as plainly as courtesy allowed him, that he could not take that view. Shelley’s view, as exhibited in the letter, was a mere opinion that his father’s anger exceeded just and reasonable displeasure; and from this opinion the Duke dissented. Having in the meanwhile dined with the angry father at Horsham, the Duke, thirteen days later (23rd November), wrote Shelley another letter, inviting him, his wife and sister-in-law, to Greystoke Castle, some twelve miles from Keswick. Of this invitation, Shelley wrote on 26th November to Mr. Medwin, the Horsham attorney, ‘We dine with the Duke of N. at Graystock this week,’ words implying that this first invitation was only for dinner. On the same day (26th November), the Duke appears from another entry of his journal to have sent the trio a second invitation, which enabled Shelley to write on Saturday (30th November) to the Horsham lawyer, ‘We visit the Duke of N. at Graystock to-morrow. We return to Keswick on Wednesday,’ words indicating an extension of the invitation, and a stronger disposition on the Duke’s part to befriend the young people.
What was there comical in the departure from York? Having gone to chambers one morning under the impression that the trio would leave York on the morrow, Hogg was not a little surprised at his dinner-hour to discover that, whilst he was at work over legal papers, his friends had gone away in a post-chaise for Richmond. ‘When I returned to dinner, such was the precipitation of the young votaries of the Muses, that the birds were flown,’ says Hogg, in language which, at the first glance, seems to imply that he lived in the same house as the trio, till the moment of their departure. But though the evidence is less than conclusive, I have grounds for thinking that, after retiring from the dingy abode of the dingy milliners, Shelley and the sisters rested in a tenement which Hogg did not enter except as their visitor. If I am right on this point, it would seem that on returning to the lodgings, where he was a daily visitor, he went there by invitation to a farewell dinner, instead of returning to his proper place at the common board. Anyhow it is certain that, on going to the Blake Street lodging-house, he learnt that the friends with whom he meant to dine had taken their departure. The birds had flown, to Hogg’s surprise and perplexity. Had they at the last moment changed their plans? or had they gone away in accordance with pre-arrangements, that had been withheld from him? The blood may well have brightened Hogg’s cheek, as he asked himself these questions. His annoyance was not diminished by the short note left for him by the fugitives, who merely informed him they were off to Keswick, and would pass the next night at Richmond, whither he had better follow them speedily, if he would attend them to the lakes.