CLAVERING'S AUTO-BIOGRAPHY.

_Containing opinions, characters, &c. of his Cotemporaries._


Shelley had some excellent qualities: I attribute his eccentricities to a
spice of insanity. He often wrote unintelligibly;--sometimes in short
lyrics, beautifully. The ashes of him and Keats sleep together in the
Protestant chapel at Rome. I am resolved once more to visit _Lirici_,
where the funeral pile of his relics were lighted. I am never so happy as
when I am travelling on the Continent; the mere change of air, and
locomotion, gives me vigour. I saw old Sir William Wraxall at Dover, a few
days before he died, and meant to have accompanied him to Paris. He was
still full of anecdote, to which it was necessary to listen with caution;
but his information was often curious and valuable. He was one of our
oldest litterateurs.

Some years ago I met Sismondi: I could not agree with his ULTRA-LIBERAL
politics! He has married an English lady, but does not seem to love the
English. He himself once suffered from excessive revolutionism, and was
condemned to death by it when young, about 1794, in the reign of terror,
when _Monsieur Raville_ and others were shot at Geneva. One would have
thought that this would have made a convert of him in favour of legitimate
governments. But I forget: he does not call them legitimate! He is a thick
man, of middle height, with strong features, sallow, with weak eyes, rapid
and rather indistinct in his articulation, with a character of great
generosity and kindness; but not very tolerant to others in political
thinking.

About 1802, strange lawyers perched upon the judgment-seat. Law, Pepper,