'Stockdale,' says Mr. Garnett, of this creditable witness to character and want of character, 'had frequent opportunities of observing the uneasy terms on which the two stood towards each other, and unhesitatingly throws the entire blame upon the father, whom he represents as narrow-minded and wrong-headed, behaving with extreme niggardliness in money matters, and at the same time continually fretting Shelley by harsh and unnecessary interference with his most indifferent actions.' What a use to make of the words of a slanderer-by-trade, a libeller surcharged with rancorous enmity against the poet's father! To insult Shelley by making his character depend in any degree on the words of such a rascal as Stockdale, it is necessary that a man of letters should be a 'Shelleyan enthusiast.' It is not a fact that 'Stockdale had frequent opportunities of observing the uneasy terms on which the two stood to each other.' With the exception of the two or three occasions when the father and son came together to the Pall-Mall shop, Stockdale never saw them together. Doubtless there was uneasiness between them on those occasions, for they met on matters of disagreement, and in the presence of the man who, for his own advantage, was doing his best to render the father more than usually distrustful of, and anxious about, his son. The whole period of Stockdale's acquaintance with Mr. Timothy Shelley was covered by the few weeks, during which time they exchanged letters and had two or three conferences touching the poet's affairs,--the few weeks during which the unscrupulous tradesman was vainly endeavouring to wheedle the Member of Parliament into paying the minor's bill for the publication of _St. Irvyne_. What opportunities can so brief and slight an intercourse have offered the publisher for using influence to dispose Mr. Shelley to be a better father? To believe the fellow's impudent statements, one must believe that during those few weeks he assumed an almost parental authority over the gentleman on whose pocket he had designs. In 1827 sixteen years had elapsed since this slight intercourse of less than two months. How strange that after so many years, Stockdale should have had so clear a memory of the incidents of this slight intercourse,--so distinct a recollection of the peculiarities of the gentleman with whom he spoke on three or four occasions, and exchanged perhaps as many letters! How strange that 'the Shelleyan enthusiasts'--so suspicious and distrustful of the accuracy of Hogg's recollections of his most familiar friend whom he knew thoroughly--should accept so readily the publisher's recollections of the gentleman, of whom he knew scarcely anything!