His life was now spent more in thought than action--he had lost the
eager spirit which believed it could achieve what it projected for the
benefit of mankind. And yet in the converse of daily life Shelley was
far from being a melancholy man. He was eloquent when philosophy or
politics or taste were the subjects of conversation. He was playful; and
indulged in the wild spirit that mocked itself and others--not in
bitterness, but in sport. The author of "Nightmare Abbey" seized on some
points of his character and some habits of his life when he painted
Scythrop. He was not addicted to 'port or madeira,' but in youth he had
read of 'Illuminati and Eleutherarchs,' and believed that he possessed
the power of operating an immediate change in the minds of men and the
state of society. These wild dreams had faded; sorrow and adversity had
struck home; but he struggled with despondency as he did with physical
pain. There are few who remember him sailing paper boats, and watching
the navigation of his tiny craft with eagerness--or repeating with wild
energy "The Ancient Mariner", and Southey's "Old Woman of Berkeley"; but
those who do will recollect that it was in such, and in the creations of
his own fancy when that was most daring and ideal, that he sheltered
himself from the storms and disappointments, the pain and sorrow, that
beset his life.

No words can express the anguish he felt when his elder children were
torn from him. In his first resentment against the Chancellor, on the
passing of the decree, he had written a curse, in which there breathes,
besides haughty indignation, all the tenderness of a father's love,
which could imagine and fondly dwell upon its loss and the consequences.

At one time, while the question was still pending, the Chancellor had
said some words that seemed to intimate that Shelley should not be