The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-05-02
From the Kansas city Star.

from Nle Kansas city Star.
"HE body of the Poet Shelley was
washed ashore on the coast of
\ Italy, near the Bay of Spezzia, al
most a century ago-it was in July, 1922
to be exact-and the world in general ac-
cepted the story told at the time, that
Shelley and his companion, e. w. Will
Jams, had been drowned when their boat
possibly they were.
But there is another and more tragic
explanation of the poets death, an ex-
planaton with an element of mystery in
it. which many people prefer to believe
This explanation has been brought once
more to light by letter written by the
Poet Heine and recently discovered Heine
believed, as did certain of Shelley's other
friends, that he was the victim of long
short banditti that italian sailormen ran
down his vessel under cover of the storm
and cast its occupantsN overheard to
drown.
Shelley and his wife and the Williamses
took a villa together on the Bay of Spez-
zia in the spring of 1922. An ideal sort
Of an arrangement, it seemed; all the
charm of the golden Italian climate, the
blue sea and bluer sky spread out around
them, and the four English people were
wonderfully congenial. On the broad
ye~anda of the Villa Magni, overlooking
the water they sang together of an even
ing. watching the moon come up, while
Mrs. Shelley and Mrs. Williams thrummed
at guitars. after the manner of your
true Italian. In both little families were
little children, flourishing in this balmy
climate; Shelley was writing under ideal
surroundings and finding market for the
things he wrote.
There was a little boat in which Shell
lev and williams sailed the blue waters
of the bay; they called the boat the Ariel
because it skinned the water so lightly
It was in the Ariel that Shelley and his
friend sailed away July !, bound across
the bay to Leghorn, to patch up quar-
rel between Byron and Leigh Hunt, Tor
Byron, like Achilles, was "sulking in
his tent"
| The patching up was not an easy pro-
cess, nor was it particularly well done
when Shelley and Williams set out for
home again the afternoon of July s. Will
Jams was eager to return to his wife; a
| letter he wrote to her before leaving Leg
horn sounds pathetic and prophetic
enough in the dight of what befell the
! Ariel on that ill-fated trip.
| 81 have Just left the quay, my dearest
| girl" he wrote, '.and the wind blows right
across to Spezza, which adds to my veX-
! alton. Would | could take the present
| gale by the wings and reach you tonight;
| hard as it blows, | would venture across
for such a reward. How / long to see
YOU: but | will make no promises. for /,
| too, well know how distressing it is to
| both of us to break them"
! There was no gale blowing when Shell
! ley and his friend set out July s; a mist
hung ever the sea. and 1t was hot and
sultry; gray rags of cloud seemed to float
in the sky and the mist on the water
curled like smoke.
| A few hours later Shelley's friend, Trel-
awny, who had meant to sail in his own
boat along with them, but had been de-
tanned by foolish quarantine regulations,
was awakened by the coming of the
storm. The sky was very dark now, and
the waves oily and wicked; there burst
over the harbor one of those sudden
storms which are not infrequent in warm
climates.
The Ariel never came to land after
that storm; but Trelawny believed the
Shelley and Williams to their deaths.