fell Byron.
Allegra, his natural daughter by Claire Clairmont, died at the convent of
Bagna Cavallo on the 20th of April 1822. She was in her sixth year, an
interesting and attractive child, and he had hoped that her companionship
would have atoned for his enforced separation from Ada. She is buried in a
nameless grave at the entrance of Harrow church. Soon after the death of
Allegra, Byron wrote the last of his eight plays, _The Deformed
Transformed_ (published by John Hunt, February 20, 1824). The "sources" are
Goethe's _Faust_, _The Three Brothers_, a novel by Joshua Pickersgill, and
various chronicles of the sack of Rome in 1527. The theme or _motif_ is the
interaction of personality and individuality. Remonstrances on the part of
publisher and critic induced him to turn journalist. The control of a
newspaper or periodical would enable him to publish what and as he pleased.
With this object in view he entered into a kind of literary partnership
with Leigh Hunt, and undertook to transport him, his wife and six children
to Pisa, and to lodge them in the Villa Lanfranchi. The outcome of this
arrangement was _The Liberal--Verse and Prose from the South_. Four numbers
were issued between October 1822 and June 1823. _The Liberal_ did not
succeed financially, and the joint menage was a lamentable failure.
_Correspondence of Byron and some of his Contemporaries_ (1828) was Hunt's
revenge for the slights and indignities which he suffered in Byron's
service. Yachting was one of the chief amusements of the English colony at
Pisa. A schooner, the "Bolivar," was built for Byron, and a smaller boat,
the "Don Juan" re-named "Ariel," for Shelley. Hunt arrived at Pisa on the
1st of July. On the 8th of July Shelley, who had remained in Pisa on Hunt's
account, started for a sail with his friend Williams and a lad named
Vivian. The "Ariel" was wrecked in the Gulf of Spezia and Shelley and his
companions were drowned. On the 16th of August Byron and Hunt witnessed the
"burning of Shelley" on the seashore near Via Reggio. Byron told Moore that
"all of Shelley was consumed but the _heart_." Whilst the fire was burning
Byron swam out to the "Bolivar" and back to the shore. The hot sun and the
violent exercise brought on one of those many fevers which weakened his
constitution and shortened his life.

The Austrian government would not allow the Gambas or the countess
Guiccioli to remain in Pisa. As a half measure Byron took a villa for them