Footnotes

• SHELLEY PAYS HIS DOCTOR: George Furnivall was a surgeon had looked after Shelley and Mary since 1815 and was to attend Mary at the birth of her second child in September 1817. He was father of Dr F.J. Furnivall, founder of the Shelley Society, who recalled in later life how: 'Shelley, who loved the river, used to pull up to old Windsor, put his boat up, and walk across Runnymede to the surgeon's house, where he would sit on the counter and chat, while [Furnivall] made up his pills... [Furnivall] knowing Shelley to be a vegetarian, always delighted in pressing him to have a cut off some cold mutton, but Shelley would have nothing more than a dish of milk and bread. On one occasion when the surgeon called upon Shelley, he found him with Leigh Hunt and others discussing the morality of suicide. George Furnivall hated the idea of suicide, and having his dissecting instruments with him, he placed the case upon the table and said, "Well, gentlemen, if any of you would like to try the experiment, there are the tools!" "This", said Furnivall, "closed the discussion, and Shelley laughed heartily at the joke."' (J.C. Castell and C.F.W. Mead in Frederick James Furnivall: A Volume of Personal Record, 1911, p.17).

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Category: Books / Books, Maps and Manuscripts

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