persons with whom he held intercourse through the post. Whilst some of his correspondents were given to understand that he was a sceptical layman, others were led to imagine him a sceptic in holy orders. The prelates and other learned divines who answered his letters answered them under misconceptions, arising chiefly or altogether from his misstatements. At least on one occasion he signed with a woman's name, that of course accorded with the tenor, tone, and handwriting of the epistle to which it was appended. The bishop, whom the poet thus lured in controversy (_vide_ Medwin's _Life_, I. p. 119), was under the impression that his correspondent was a gentlewoman. Referring to the day he passed with his cousin at Oxford in Lent term, 1811, Medwin remarks:-- 'He showed and read to me many letters he had received in controversies he had originated with learned divines; among the rest with a bishop, under the assumed name of a woman.... It is to be lamented,' Medwin adds, 'that all his letters written at this time should have perished, as they would throw light on the speculations of his active and inquiring mind.' Whether they would materially enlarge our knowledge of the poet's intellectual and moral constitution is questionable; but it cannot be doubted the recovery of the vanished epistles would afford some curious examples of the untruthfulness of which the singularly outspoken and truth-loving Shelley was capable. Instead of expressing, or hinting disapproval of his cousin's duplicity, Mr. Medwin only regrets so few illustrations of so droll a practice should have been preserved. To Mr. Medwin the whole business of these Shelleyan fabrications appears equally innocent and diverting; and in this respect he resembles the Shelleyan enthusiasts of later time, who regard the same evidence of the truth-loving Shelley's staggering untruthfulness, merely as so much testimony that he was an exceedingly clever and amusing young gentleman, and that the learned divines whom he tricked with untruths must have been stupid fellows and sad simpletons.