he had not had time to study it.

The next letter relates to the opinion of Mr. Shadwell, afterwards
Vice-Chancellor:

_Mr. Sharon Turner to John Murray_.

_November_ 12, 1819.

Dear Murray,

I saw Mr. Shadwell to-day on "Don Juan." He has gone through the book
with more attention than Mr. Bell had time to do. He desires me to say
that he does not think the Chancellor would refuse an injunction, or
would overturn it if obtained....

Yours most faithfully,

SHARON TURNER.

In the event the injunction to restrain the publication of "Don Juan" by
piratical publishers was granted.

Towards the end of 1819 Byron thought of returning to England. On
November 8 he wrote to Mr. Murray:

"If she [the Countess Guiccioli] and her husband make it up, you will
perhaps see me in England sooner than you expect. If not, I will retire
with her to France or America, change my name, and lead a quiet
provincial life. If she gets over this, and I get over my Tertian ague,
I will perhaps look in at Albemarle Street _en passant_ to Bolivar."

When Mr. Hobhouse, then living at Ramsbury, heard of Byron's intention
to go to South America, he wrote to Mr. Murray as follows:

" ... To be sure it is impossible that Lord B. should seriously
contemplate, or, if he does, he must not expect us to encourage, this
mad scheme. I do not know what in the world to say, but presume some one
has been talking nonsense to him. Let Jim Perry go to Venezuela if he
will--he may edit his 'Independent Gazette' amongst the Independents
themselves, and reproduce his stale puns and politics without let or
hindrance. But our poet is too good for a planter--too good to sit down
before a fire made of mare's legs, to a dinner of beef without salt and
bread. It is the wildest of all his meditations--pray tell him. The
plague and Yellow Jack, and famine and free quarter, besides a thousand
other ills, will stare him in the face. No tooth-brushes, no
corn-rubbers, no _Quarterly Reviews_. In short, plenty of all he
abominates and nothing of all he loves. I shall write, but you can tell
facts, which will be better than my arguments."

Byron's half-formed intention was soon abandoned, and the Countess
Guiccioli's serious illness recalled him to Ravenna, where he remained
for the next year and a half.

Hobhouse's next letter to Murray (January 1820), in which he reported
"Bad news from Ravenna--a great pity indeed," is dated _Newgate_, where
he had been lodged in