enerally on easy--sometimes on cordial--terms with him as a man. He has
left us a fine and discriminating portrait of Byron in the 'Count
Maddalo' of his poem _Julian and Maddalo_, written in 1818. At times
however Shelley felt and expressed great indignation against Byron,
especially in reference to the ungenerous and cruel conduct of the
latter towards Miss Clairmont. See some brief reference to this matter
at p. 9.

11. 3-5. _Whose fame Over his living head like heaven is bent, An early
but enduring monument._ These phrases are not very definite. When fame
is spoken of as being bent over Byron's head, we must conceive of fame
as taking a form cognizable by the senses. I think Shelley means to
assimilate it to the rainbow; saying substantially--Fame is like an arc
bent over Byron's head, as the arc of the rainbow is bent over the
expanse of heaven. The ensuing term 'monument' applies rather to fame in
the abstract than to any image of fame as an arc.

11. 6, 7. _Came, veiling all the lightnings of his song In sorrow._ No
doubt it would have been satisfactory to Shelley if he could have
found that Byron entertained or expressed any serious concern
at Keats's premature death, and at the hard measure which had
been meted out to him by critics. Byron did in fact admire
_Hyperion_; writing (in November 1821, not long after the publication
of _Adonais_)--'His fragment of _Hyperion_ seems actually inspired
by the Titans, and is as sublime as Aeschylus'; and other
utterances of his show that--being with difficulty persuaded to
suppose that Keats's health and life had succumbed to the attack
in the _Quarterly_--he fittingly censured the want of feeling or
want of reflection on the critic's part which had produced so
deplorable a result. But on the whole Byron's feeling towards
Keats was one of savage contempt during the young poet's life,
and of bantering levity after his death. Here are some specimens.
(From a letter to Mr. Murray, 12 October, 1820). 'There is such
a trash of Keats and the like upon my tables that I am ashamed
to look at them.... No more Keats, I entreat. Flay him alive:
if some of you don't, I must skin him myself. There is no bearing
the drivelling idiotism of the manikin.'

'"Who killed John Keats?"
"I," says the Quarterly,
So savage and Tartarly;
"'Twas one of my feats."'

'John Keats, who was killed off by one critique
Just as he really promised something