Poems which refer directly to Hunt are the fourteen lines in the _Letter to Maria Gisborne_;[310] possibly the fragment, beginning, "For me, my friend, if not that tears did tremble."[311] A cancelled passage of the _Adonais_ describes Hunt thus: And then came one of sweet and carnal looks, Those soft smiles to his dark and night-like eyes Were as the clear and ever-living brooks Are to the obscure fountains whence they rise, Showing how pure they are; a Paradise Of happy truth upon his forehead low Lay, making wisdom lovely, in the guise Of earth-awakening morn upon the brow Of star-deserted heaven, while ocean gleams below, * * * * * His song, though very sweet, was low and faint, A single strain--[312] The thirty-fifth strophe of the present version refers to Hunt. Shelley's last letter had reference to Hunt.[313] His last literary effort was a poem comparing Hunt to a firefly and welcoming him to Italy, just as Hunt's last letter and last public utterance bore reference to Shelley--strange coincidence, but striking testimony to their mutual devotion. An instance of Shelley's overestimation of Hunt's ability is seen in a passage where he says that Hunt excels in tragedy in the power of delineating passion and, what is more necessary, of connecting and developing it, "the last an incredible effort for himself but easy for Hunt."[314] He greatly valued and trusted Hunt's affection, at times calling him his best[315] and his only friend.[316] If the tender solicitude and veneration of a beautiful spirit for a man of vastly inferior abilities seems strange, it is but a witness to the humility of true genius. CHAPTER IV. Byron's Politics and Religion--His sympathy with Hunt in prison--His impression of the man--Hunt's Defense of Byron and Criticism of his works--_The Liberal_--_Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_. It is not strange that Lord Byron, son of an English father and a Scotch mother, born of a long line of adventurous and warlike sailors and illustrious and loyal knights, with a strain of royalty and madness on one side and eccentricity and immorality on the other, should have fallen heir in an unusual degree to a nature whose virtues and vices were complex and contradictory. Its singularities are nowhere more apparent than in the mutations of his friendships.