I shall confine myself
to tracing the chief outlines of Shelley's life, and (very briefly) the
sequence of his literary work.
Percy Bysshe Shelley came of a junior and comparatively undistinguished
branch of a very old and noted family. His branch was termed the
Worminghurst Shelleys; and it is only quite lately[1] that the
affiliation of this branch to the more eminent and senior stock of the
Michelgrove Shelleys has passed from the condition of a probable and
obvious surmise into that of an established fact. The family traces up
to Sir William Shelley, Judge of the Common Pleas under Henry VII,
thence to a Member of Parliament in 1415, and to the reign of Edward I,
or even to the Norman Conquest. The Worminghurst Shelleys start with
Henry Shelley, who died in 1623. It will be sufficient here to begin
with the poet's grandfather, Bysshe Shelley. He was born at Christ
Church, Newark, North America, and raised to a noticeable height,
chiefly by two wealthy marriages, the fortunes of the junior branch.
Handsome, keen-minded, and adventurous, he eloped with Mary Catherine,
heiress of the Rev.
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