* * * Shelley’s nerves were badly shaken by Fanny’s terrible death, and Mrs. Godwin in her amiable way insinuated she had killed herself for love of him. He then remembered certain signs of emotion he had seen in her, and reproached himself for having always considered her as of a slightly lower status. Perhaps he had, though quite unwittingly, awakened her love at the moment when, deserted by Harriet, he sought a shelter in any feminine tenderness. Perhaps she had weighed and counted and analysed with care, words and glances, into which he had meant to put mere friendliness. “How difficult it is to understand the soul of another; How much suffering one may cause without wishing it, or knowing it; How one may live in presence of the most profound, sometimes of the most despairful feelings without even suspecting their existence!” It does not suffice therefore to be sincere, nor to have good intentions. You can do just as much harm through not understanding as through unkindness. He was plunged into a blank despondency. To shake it off, he went to spend a few days alone with a young literary critic, Leigh Hunt, who had praised his poetry with intelligence and enthusiasm. Hunt lived on Hampstead Heath in the Vale of Health, a spot as tree-embowered and almost as charming to-day as it was then. His wife Marianne was homely and hospitable. He had a whole brood of jolly children with whom Shelley could walk and play. There, he could forget for a time poor Fanny and Godwin. The visit was short but delicious, and he came home much cheered. On his return, he found awaiting him a letter from Hookham, which he opened eagerly, for he had asked Hookham to find out for him what Harriet was doing. He had had no news of her for two months. She had drawn her allowance in March and in September, being then in her father’s house. But since October nothing was known of her. “My dear Sir,” Hookham wrote, “It is nearly a month since I had the pleasure of receiving a letter from you, and you have no doubt felt surprised that I did not reply to it sooner. It was my intention to do so; but on enquiring, I found the utmost difficulty in obtaining the information you desire relative to Mrs. Shelley and your children. “While I was yet endeavouring to discover Mrs. Shelley’s address, information was brought me that she was dead—that she had destroyed herself. You will believe that I did not credit the report. I called at the house of a friend of Mr. Westbrook; my doubt led to conviction. I was informed that she was taken from the Serpentine river on Tuesday last. . . . Little or no information was laid before the jury which sat on the body. . . . The verdict was _found drowned_. Your children are well and are both, I believe, in London.”