The interest in the old idea was revived in him; he became engrossed in the subject, and soon after his “lyrical drama” was done, he transferred himself to this other, completely different work. There was no talk, now, of passing it on to Mary, and indeed she may well have recoiled from the unmitigated horrors of the tale. But, though he dealt with it himself, Shelley still felt on unfamiliar ground, and, as he proceeded, he submitted what he wrote to Mary for her judgment and criticism; the only occasion on which he consulted her about any work of his during its progress towards completion.
Late in April they made the acquaintance of one English (or rather, Irish) lady, who will always be gratefully remembered in connection with the Shelleys.
This was Miss Curran, a daughter of the late Irish orator, who had been a friend of Godwin’s, and to whose death Mary refers in one of her letters from Marlow.[35]
Mary may, perhaps, have met her in Skinner Street; in any case, the old association was one link between them, and another was afforded by similarity in their present interests and occupations. Mary was very keen about her drawing and painting. Miss Curran had taste, and some skill, and was vigorously prosecuting her art-studies in Rome. Portrait painting was her especial line, and each of the Shelley party, at different times, sat to her; so that during the month of May they met almost daily, and became well acquainted.
This new interest, together with the unwillingness to bring to an end a time at once so peaceful and so fruitful, caused them once and again to postpone their departure, originally fixed for the beginning of May. They stayed on longer than it is safe for English people to remain in Rome. Ah! why could no presentiment warn them of impending calamity? Could they, like the Scottish witch in the ballad, have seen the fatal winding-sheet creeping and clinging ever higher and higher round the wraith of their doomed child, they would have fled from the face of Death. But they had no such foreboding.
Not a fortnight after his portrait had been taken by Miss Curran, William showed signs of illness. How it was that, knowing him to be so delicate,—having learned by bitterest experience the danger of southern heat to an English-born infant,—having, as early as April, suspected the Roman air of causing “weakness and depression, and even fever” to Shelley himself, how, after all this, they risked staying in Rome through May is hard to imagine.
They were to pay for their delay with the best part of their lives. William sickened on the 25th, but had so far recovered by the 30th that his parents, though they saw they ought to leave Rome as soon as he was fit to travel, were in no immediate anxiety about him, and were making their summer plans quite in a leisurely way; Mary writing to ask Mrs. Gisborne to help them with some domestic arrangements, begging her to inquire about houses at Lucca or the Baths of Pisa, and to engage a servant for her.
The journal for this and the following days runs—
Sunday, May 30.—Read Livy, and Persiles and Sigismunda. Draw. Spend the evening at Miss Curran’s.
Monday, May 31.—Read Livy, and Persiles and Sigismunda. Draw. Walk in the evening.