out of the "Liberal," Hunt had the misfortune to be deprived of
Shelley's friendship, by death, immediately on his arrival; and of
the friendship of Byron, through incompatibilities of taste, and the
jealous officiousness of Byron's friends, amongst whom Moore bore a
prominent part. Mr. Hunt published a volume on the subject soon after
his return to England, which occasioned him a great deal of ill-will.
To this publication he now refers with expressions of much regret, and
with the calmness which has been produced by time. But it cannot be
denied that he endured most mortifying and irritating provocations,
which never could have taken place had Shelley lived. We are glad that
he has had an opportunity of leaving a generous and forgiving record
of this remarkable portion of his life; and certainly nothing can be
more delightful than his present account of it:--

"The greatest comfort I experienced," he says, "in Italy
was living in the same neighborhood, and thinking, as I went
about, of Boccaccio. Boccaccio's father had a house at Maiano,
supposed to have been situated at the Fiesolan extremity of
the hamlet. That merry-hearted writer was so fond of the place
that he has not only laid the two scenes of the 'Decameron' on
each side of it, with the valley which his company resorted
to in the middle, but has made the two little streams which
embrace Maiano, the Affrico and the Mensola, the hero and the
heroine of his 'Nimphale Fiesolano.' The scene of another of
his works is on the banks of the Margnone, a river a little
distant; and the 'Decameron' is full of the neighboring
villages. Out of the windows of one side of our house we saw
the turret of the Villa Gherardi, to which, according to
his biographers, his 'joyous company' resorted in the first
instance. A house belonging to the Macchiavelli was near, a