The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1880-01-29
A TALK WITH E. ]. TRELAwNY,
Some New Anecdotes Of the Poets..The
Cremation Of Shelley.
Whitehall Review.l

VI Cremation Of Shelley.
= Whitehall Review.l
: To see Mr.. Trelawny and hear hin
talk is to be transported back, as if b,
magic, half a century or SO, to that thrill
ing period when Shelley and Byron
those revolutionary Dioscuri Of Englisl
poetry, passed the last years of their brie
lives self-exiled in Italy. As he sit
Ismoking in his chair, or PAGES up ant
down the room, the grand old man Wit
has been so long before Europe as II
, have become historical, still shows trace
In his fine features which justify the as
sertion that he, Lord Byron and Coun
d0rsay were considered the three hand
solnest men of their time. Then, as he
begins talking to you in a voice That
seems issuing from some deep cavern
his prodigious memory and singular
power Of expression make the past pres
ent, 81 ..' r.-. ~.
\ Shelley seems to be the only mortal
who ever touched that stproud, rebel spirit
with a feeling akin to worship
When he speaks of the poet there is some.
thing like tenderness in his accents, some.
thing iyerging on the reverence in his
looks. The customary formulas of social
i intercourse are an abomination in his
sight Woe to you If, on first seeing
him, you should unfortunately say, "How
do you do, Mr.. Trelawnyw He will, if
not rebuke, merely grunt out reply and
look as if he thought you q fool. He
gives no small change of conversation
every word he utters is stamped with
his personality-a personality so power
full that it overtops everything he can
say or do.
He will begin speaking quite abruptly,
as if only continuing aloud some previ-
Gus train of thought.
what" he growled, "is all that rub
bish that Symonds writes about Shelley
being too beautiful to paint? Too beau
tiful to paint, indeed! When he was
quite young he might thave had the beauty
that we admire in children or young girls,
but he had no manly beauty.
"He was narrow-chested and he stooped
like scholar. You could see that from
a child, almost baby, he had been bend
ing over books. He had the smallest
head Of any man ever knew; Byron's
came next. His eyes were slightly promi-
nent, and there was hardly any Of the
white visible. To see him in a crowd
was like seeing stag in the midst of
herd of deer. The deer has timid way
of looking on the ground, but the stag
walks with lifted head and shining eyes.
His were like stars. Now Byron was
handsome. The upper part of his figure
was nobly proportioned and his throat
was like column. He had most beauti-
full eyes, we'll set in his head; they were
like cats, changing continually in color,
now brown, now golden, then green, full
Of eyer-yarying expression" ,,..3A
"What do you think of their genius
respectivelyP'' - soE,4.a
"Shelley had the divine madness
which alone makes a man write great
poetry. But he appealed to the intel
lect, while Byron's poetry appealed to
the passions of mankind. All men
have passions; therefore they understood
him. But Shelley was a great meta
physician, logician, a poet whom peo-
pie summed in his day. No one read
his writings; and. when went to Ollier,
his publisher, he pretended not to have
a copy, till being informed that I was
Shelley's friend he fetched it from a
secret drawer. This was the universal
feeling concerning him. No one under
stood him-not Hogg-not Peacock; and
the former, though he often calls him
divine poet did not believe anything of
the kind. On the contrary, he thought
it all nonsense, and was laughing in his
sleeve when he used such expressions"
"But what was the bond between
them, thenf" - ln.i ti.tf"
"Why, they were both excellent schol-
ars. Shelley was an enthusiastic student
of the Greek poets, and greatly in.
fuenced by them, especially in his latter
years. No one who Is ignorant of the
classics can thoroughly appreciate him.
That is partly the reason why Swinburne
understands him SO we'll; he has written
better things concerning him than any
one else. 7isBut he, too, has some of the
divine madness. Nothing. great can ever
he donewithoutit. Here is another man
who was also full of it. "iAS''t" " 'f 'a''''''
Mr.. Trelawny was pacing up'and down
the room while uttering these sentences
in his deep, leonine voice. He. now
brought me portrait Of John, Brown,
the American martyr, of whom he spoke
with kindling eye. t;n"a M a9.' s9r ~
"Do you know what was bis. answer to
the rebels when they threatened to hang
him? DO, said heJ 4 wish for nothing
better, for then my hame will become a
flag for the North to rally round En-
thusiasts and fanatics are the men that
move the worlds There is Blake, now; /
consider him a true poet. also; what he
writes is full Of inspiration."'' ry,-5 wa, |
He repeated some Of Blake's lines. His
manner of quoting poetry is peculiarly
almost oracular; it seems that
Shelley was ryfond Of il. Once hear
ing him declaim: ..a III, .,,'' --i